REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF SUDBURY AMENDMENT ACT
MUNICIPAL PAYMENTS IN LIEU OF TAXES STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF HALDIMAND-NORFOLK AMENDMENT ACT
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF SUDBURY AMENDMENT ACT
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF HALDIMAND-NORFOLK AMENDMENT ACT
The House resumed at 8 p.m.
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF SUDBURY AMENDMENT ACT
Mr. Watson moved, on behalf of Hon. Mr. Bennett, second reading of Bill 91, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Sudbury Act.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I do not mean to make a big thing of this, but I have a little procedural problem with a bill presented by the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Mr. Bennett) being carried in the House by the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Energy and I would like you to explain to me just how we are proceeding on that basis.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): Thank you. That is a legitimate point of order.
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, if I may try to offer an explanation of why I have been asked to do this, it is because although the regional municipality acts all come under the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, the subject of this bill has to do with the hydro commissions for those regions and from a practical standpoint it is dealt with by the Ministry of Energy.
The dealings of those municipalities with the government concerning these commissions has been primarily with the Ministry of Energy and that is the reason I have been asked to do this, as with the other 10 bills before this dealing with hydro commissions in regional municipalities dealt with and spoken to in this Legislature by the Minister of Energy (Mr. Andrewes).
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, very briefly and to the point of order, I do not want to make a big deal about this, but then again, I do not want this to become a practice, either.
I believe we are now out of order. I believe there is no question that this bill should be introduced by the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. I am happy to acquiesce, as we have on many occasions, to having that parliamentary assistant carry the bill. I have no objection to the honourable member giving the Minister of Energy's point of view, but I do think that to be in order a bill presented by one minister can be carried by his or her parliamentary assistant, but I am not convinced it is proper procedure to whip that around to whoever is available.
The Acting Speaker: Do I have the unanimous support of the House for the member for Chatham-Kent (Mr. Watson) to present this on behalf of the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing?
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, we do not mind giving consent to this, but I understand that the member for Wilson Heights (Mr. Rotenberg) has been upstaged very eloquently here by the member for Chatham-Kent and I think the record should show that. It is quite obvious this is happening.
I wonder very much why this comes under the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing when the Ministry of Energy has designated the member for Chatham-Kent, as his parliamentary assistant, to carry the bill. It seems that since the Premier (Mr. Davis) has indicated his resignation in January, there are even more than half a dozen ways this government is --
The Acting Speaker: Would you please take your seat. I have listened to the points of order. Do I have the unanimous consent of the House to proceed with the member from Chatham-Kent?
Mr. Rotenberg: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I would like to ask the person who made this point of order where in the standing orders it indicates that the minister whose name is on the bill or his parliamentary assistant has to carry the bill. There is nothing in the standing orders to prevent the minister from designating any member in his caucus or on this side of the House to carry a bill and there is nothing that would prevent that member carrying the bill.
I would submit to you with respect, Mr. Speaker, that there is no need for consent. The bill is here. The member for Chatham-Kent is carrying the bill in the absence of the minister. He has made the motion, he is the speaker you have recognized and nothing is out of order. I suggest he proceed.
The Acting Speaker: I thank the member for Wilson Heights and all honourable members. Do we have unanimous consent to proceed?
Mr. Epp: On that same point of order, Mr. Speaker.
The Acting Speaker: I thought we had handled the point of order and we could proceed with the evening's business.
Mr. Epp: He got up on a point of order.
The Acting Speaker: I do not really recognize the honourable member as having had a point of order, so do not continue that one. I accepted the first point of order, but I have not had any since.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, as I tried to point out, I did not want to make a big deal out of it, but I did hear you put to the House that you needed to have unanimous consent to continue in the manner that is being proposed.
Five minutes ago, quite frankly, I was prepared to give unanimous consent. The member for Wilson Heights once again has intervened to convince me that this would not be a proper thing to do and you do not have unanimous consent.
Mr. Rotenberg: You do not need it.
Mr. Breaugh: You are out of order, too.
Hon. Mr. Eaton, on behalf of Hon. Mr. Bennett, moved second reading of Bill 91, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Sudbury Act.
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, has the --
The Acting Speaker: We are going to have someone speak to the bill, starting with the government side.
Mr. Epp: Oh, you are? Okay.
8:10 p.m.
Mr. Edighoffer: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I believe the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing said there was nothing that would not allow another parliamentary assistant or a government member to move second reading. Standing order 55 says: "A reply is allowed to the minister or parliamentary assistant who has moved second or third reading of a bill."
The Acting Speaker: That was the reason I asked the government whip, because we did not have the unanimous consent. I think that was a valid point of order.
Mr. Edighoffer: Is that minister able to reply?
The Acting Speaker: Now we are having --
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, with due respect to this point of order, I want to draw to your respectful attention the fact that my colleague the member for Perth (Mr. Edighoffer), a former Deputy Speaker of this House, a person who is held in high esteem by every member of this House, has drawn to your attention a very important point of order, something that is in our standing orders.
We are prepared to give unanimous consent on this matter, but I think you should recognize that we follow the orders of this Legislature. He has drawn that to your attention. I think it is incumbent on you as the unabashed, unbiased arbitrator of the two sides of this House to follow the orders as set out by this House.
The Acting Speaker: The honourable member is waxing eloquent. We will now proceed with the debate. All points of order have been met.
Mr. Epp: No, Mr. Speaker. I want to draw to your attention that you cannot because --
The Acting Speaker: Order. I ask all members to kindly resume their seats. I appreciate all the assistance the Speaker is receiving. I would like us now to continue with the bill. We recognize the member for Chatham-Kent.
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this bill. I did not realize it was going to be so difficult to get on. It happens to be about 11th in a series of bills that have been presented over the past few years concerning regional commissions.
This bill establishes municipal hydro commissions in the area municipalities of Nickel Centre and Capreol. The service areas established are the boundaries serviced at present by the existing commissions. Discussions have been held with the municipal councillors and the commissions and they are in agreement with these boundaries.
Provision is made in the legislation for the expansion of the service area at a later date to include the entire municipality. Provision is made in the bill to give the councils of the municipality the option of appointing hydro commissions or limiting the electorate for the elections of the commission to those served by the commission.
I am sorry the member for Sudbury (Mr. Gordon) is not here because I think one of his special interests is in this particular bill and I would like him to note it is there.
If a municipality expands the service area at a later date, a provision is made for the purchase of assets from Ontario Hydro and for the transfer of employees to the local utility with protection of salaries and benefits.
In addition to the bill, when we come to committee stage I will be introducing a couple of amendments, one of a technical nature and another that has arisen since the bill was printed. It will allow Inco to sell its assets to certain municipalities. We thought we would include that by amendment at this time and it will clarify that, so it does not have to be amended later.
I think there is a fair amount of agreement on this bill with the municipalities concerned and I hope it will go forward.
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, I must respectfully say I agreed with my colleague's interpretation of the standing orders. In fact, I would have thought the member for London-Kent, as a member of the standing committee on procedural affairs, would have thought he would be able to interpret that himself. It says on page --
Mr. Watson: Where?
Mr. Epp: What did I say?
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I happen to come from the riding of Chatham-Kent.
Mr. Epp: Chatham-Kent. My apologies; he does come from Chatham. He is otherwise known as the member from Darcyville.
Quoting from standing order 55, "A reply is allowed to the minister or parliamentary assistant who has moved second or third reading of a bill." That is with respect to that particular ministry. Irrespective of that, we will be supporting this bill. We are in support of reduced rates which, I presume, will be a result of these local hydro commissions being formed.
I was on the committee that helped to organize the various hydro commissions in the regions in my area, and there are three of them. I know that in my own region of Waterloo the rural consumers, as a result of the reorganization, were able to organize themselves in a better manner than Ontario Hydro had organized them and they were able to get lesser rates.
In projecting that same kind of economy at the local standpoint from Waterloo to the province and from there to the area of Sudbury, I can only assume those local municipalities will pay lesser rates than they have under Ontario Hydro.
I am sure his aides who are under the gallery smiling from ear to ear will send him a note to say that is not true. I want him to be able to say it is not true that Ontario Hydro rates are much less than I expect them to be and that these people will have to pay higher rates than they pay under Ontario Hydro.
If he could tell me that, the people of Capreol and the people of Nickel Centre would be most pleased with that kind of statement, finding out that they are going to pay higher rates than they are currently paying. I can only assume it is really going to be lower.
The other thing is they are going to have more autonomy. The local commissions being formed are going to be able to organize themselves. The mayor is going to be on the local commission. Some other people from the local municipality are going to be appointed initially. After next November 30, they are either going to be elected or they are going to be appointed. Either way, there is going to be more local autonomy as far as the hydro commissions are concerned. We can support it on that basis also.
We also want to raise a concern of centres such as Nickel Centre, Onaping Falls and Walden. They have some private hydroelectric sources, some other suppliers of their hydro needs.
The parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Energy is somewhat misplaced in this context today speaking for a bill that is being sponsored by the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, who is regularly absent from this Legislature when bills come up. I wonder whether he could address this matter and expand at some length on where the private sources of hydro are in the various municipalities and what percentage of the total amount is supplied.
I notice people are taking copious notes on the things I am saying so he can respond at some length.
Can he tell us what savings they incur in these various areas by having private and not public hydro rates?
I only wish that my colleague the member for Halton-Burlington (Mr. Reed) was here to speak on this matter. There is no one in this Legislature, including the Minister of Energy, who is more attuned to the hydro power of this province or is more knowledgeable with respect to the way Hydro is being run in this province.
8:20 p.m.
We will be supporting the bill, but we have some concern with respect to whether the rates the people are going to pay will go up or down. The minister must not tell us it is going to be directly dependent on the kinds of decisions the local commission makes, because we know he has projections and we want to hear those projections.
We also want to hear the percentages of hydro supplied by those various private sources, the number of private sources that are there for hydro power and the projection as to whether Ontario Hydro plans to buy out those various private sources or to aid and abet them in producing additional hydro for the province and for their particular areas.
Last but not least, we want to hear the kind of projections the minister has for the centres of Onaping Falls, Rayside, Balfour, Valley East and Walden, particularly with respect to the first two I mentioned. We want to know when he expects hydro commissions to be formed in those areas.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, we will support the bill essentially because it is in front of us tonight at the request of the local municipalities. Wherever we can, we like to accommodate the wishes of the local elected officials.
I want to make a couple of comments on second reading that I think are worth noting. I recall watching this kind of structure being set up in other areas of Ontario, principally in my own. I think we have to put on the record that right now this looks like a piece of housekeeping business. It looks like a response on the part of the government to the requests of local municipalities to put what might be called some common sense in place, along the lines of reports that were tabled some years ago.
In doing research for this bill, I came across a committee set up in 1973 in the days when the riding of Chatham-Kent had a member and everybody knew who the member was. The member commanded a great deal of respect. There was no fumbling around with who was the member for Chatham-Kent. He sat right in the front row, an immense blue Tory right to the hilt. There was no question about whether that constituency had representation. The famous Darcy McKeough, my all-time favourite Tory, commissioned this report on restructuring public utilities.
Mr. Epp: He started right over there. When he came here, he started over there, on the side of the member for Oshawa.
Mr. Ruston: He sat in the rump.
Mr. Breaugh: Yes, I recall; I recall when there was a Tory rump.
More than a decade ago, the committee on restructuring public utilities laid out the reasons there ought to be public utilities commissions of this nature set in place and why there should be restructuring.
I also recall the famous Mr. McKeough talking about the economies of scale on many occasions. That is the little warning note I want to put in here. I have heard this argument many times before. I recognize this restructuring of public utilities is a good thing. In many respects, it is. From an organizational point of view, in terms of the provision of service and equalizing the kind of service available to people in a given geographic area. I do not think there is any question in my mind that this legislation will work.
However, we also want to be up front and drop the other shoe: it is going to cost more money. Darcy used to call this the "economies of scale." When he first started talking to me about this kind of stuff, I foolishly thought that meant one would somehow save money. That is not true. "Economies of scale" really means it is going to get bigger in servicing a bigger area; there will be bureaucracies started.
There is no question that in the case of this piece of legislation we are talking about a little bureaucracy; but little bureaucracies do have a tendency to grow up and become big bureaucracies. I do not have any question in my mind that from today's point of view, in the area that will be served by this legislation, it is viewed in one way alone: this is a good, sensible, commonsense thing to do.
In my mind there is also no question that a year or two from now, or maybe it will be even three years from now, people will be saying: "How come this thing is costing so much money? How come all the people in the new utility are off to conventions somewhere? How come they want to charge me more money to do a hook-up?" All those questions will arise.
For the record, it would be wise for us to drop the other shoe this evening. It is a good thing from an organizational point of view; there is no question about it. It is a good thing for this government to respond in a positive way to requests from those municipalities to do this kind of restructuring; I do not have any qualms about saying that. But I also wish the government would be up front and say to those people, "Folks, sooner or later, this is going to cost you more money."
I rarely, if ever, hear this government tell people there is good and bad to this kind of restructuring. It may provide better service. It will provide a better organizational technique to provide those services. It may at some point in time offer people within this geographic area a better set of services. But it would be nice if this government told them up front and honestly that all this restructuring inevitably means they will get better service but that they are going to pay for it through increased rates.
When I see this kind of proposed restructuring, I become concerned that the government is not giving the people the whole story; they give them half or three quarters of it. I believe there is an obligation for the government to say tonight, and when it does this restructuring, that it hopes there will be better service -- that is not always the case, but that is the intent; there is the potential for better service -- and a better organization in place but that does not come cheaply and the consumer will have to pay for the increases. In Ontario, to be fair about it, the only one who ever pays is the consumer.
We will support the bill. I do not have any real problems with the amendments presented to me about 10 minutes ago, but I do want to put one small objection on the record.
This bill has been in the hot little hands of some parliamentary assistant for a while. I am at a loss to explain why amendments to a piece of legislation like this, which has been on Orders and Notices for some time now and which has been requested by those municipalities for some time, are presented on the same evening the bill is being debated.
The government of Ontario has known what it wanted to do with this local restructuring for six or eight months, or even longer, if my information is correct. I am at a loss to explain why amendments are presented on the same evening the bill is being debated. I fail to see why that is necessary.
Is the government so disorganized that it honestly does not know what it wants in a piece of legislation until the very evening we are going to have a debate on second reading? If that is the way this government is organized, it should not restructure anybody else's life until it restructures its own and gets its own act in order.
Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, my colleague the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Epp) has already indicated we will support the bill, which is one of a series of bills establishing hydro commissions more or less roughly along the boundaries established by the old regionalization bills passed by this House many years ago.
In many respects, they are very slow in coming forward, probably because they have been waiting for the approval of the local communities concerned. It is also helpful to have the views of the local member since sometimes the boundaries of these new commissions tend to work a degree of hardship on the actual community and no one is better able to interpret the geography and the views of the area and what is best for the local community than the locally elected member.
My own feeling is that the regionalization approach imposed on these communities some years ago was a mistake in the first instance and that in many respects the imposition of other services on regional boundaries simply compounds that error.
On the other hand, I have listened to what my colleague the member for Waterloo North has said, and I agree with him because it is cheaper to buy one's electricity from a local commission than directly from Ontario Hydro. This counts for a lot in these days when Hydro rates are rising at twice the rate of inflation at least.
I do not intend to go over all the reasons why Hydro mismanagement under the direction of this government has resulted in these rapidly escalating costs, but I am certainly in favour of anything we can do to alleviate these costs at the local level.
8:30 p.m.
The boundaries do not mean much to me although I have been in most of the communities named here. I can well remember having a triumphal Liberal parade in Capreol. It was not successful in that instance, but it was certainly triumphal as far as I was concerned, in that we got from one end of the parade to the other without serious personal damage.
In this instance, I do believe the upshot will be better local control and lower rates for the long-suffering consumers of electricity who have been subjected to these huge increases in rates which, as I have indicated, have far exceeded the rate of inflation. Certainly they do this year, when the rate imposed will be double the rate of inflation.
There is another bill dealing with the municipalities in Haldimand-Norfolk that is not on the list for consideration tonight. It is very similar to this one, and we hope the representative of the minister will see his way clear to asking for the consent of the House so it can be discussed and approved in the same way.
Mr. Haggerty: Mr. Speaker, I want to add a few comments on Bill 91, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Sudbury Act, particularly in relation to the establishment of new hydro commissions for the municipalities of Capreol and Nickel Centre. My comments will be based on what has happened in the restructuring of hydro utilities within the Niagara region.
One of the difficulties we found when the bill was passed a few years ago was the additional cost of purchasing the physical plant and equipment from Ontario Hydro. I am slightly at a loss as to why the minister would introduce a bill at this time when we have the government telling us about the restraint program and keeping everything within five per cent. As the previous speaker mentioned, Ontario Hydro's rate increases in the past couple of years have been well over the five per cent restraint guideline.
Restructuring means somebody will have to pick up the tab and buy all the rolling stock from Ontario Hydro that is in the municipality now. The minister says no, but surely somebody is going to take it over; eventually someone will. Is Ontario Hydro going to continue servicing that area? It would be interesting if the parliamentary assistant would indicate later what is going to take place.
Niagara region had to purchase that rolling stock from Ontario Hydro. In many cases, the local utilities had to increase hydro rates considerably to carry the cost of purchasing that stock. With the high interest rates today, the bill for the restructuring of the Niagara Peninsula should not have been introduced until the interest rates had come down considerably. The government and the minister responsible have not taken into consideration that they have to buy the rolling stock from Ontario Hydro when forming these new commissions. Eventually that will take place.
The situation now facing Fort Erie is this. By reason of the Niagara bill and being serviced by Canadian Niagara Power, which is an American utility, after some 50 years the agreement has to be renewed next year. The difficulty that municipality is facing is that the agreement says either party can terminate the agreement upon 12 months' notice. I do not have to relate the difficulties that are taking place on the American side with hydro utilities. If one looks at the sweet rental package that Canadian Niagara has had for the past 50 or 100 years, one sees it is getting the hydro from Ontario Hydro for almost nothing and selling it to Fort Erie. They have to go in for restructuring in that municipality, which will mean an amendment to the bill.
One can never tell what will happen when dealing with an offshore company, but it could cost Fort Erie a considerable hike in hydro rates alone, because someone will have to purchase that plant and all the facilities. With the high interest rates today, I would not want to touch it with a 10-foot pole. I suggest to the parliamentary assistant, who is responsible for the bill tonight, that there should be some numbers and figures as to what the cost is going to be. There should be a forecast of the projected cost of hydro in the next year, once the restructuring takes place in that area with them forming their own hydroelectric commission.
The member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) is quite correct when he says he is concerned about the costs. However, he stands up and says, "I am going to support the bill." I do not know whether I should support it. If it were a good piece of legislation, the member who represents that area would be here thumping tonight and saying it was a good piece of legislation, but I do not see him here. I do not know what the reason is, but perhaps he is not happy with the legislation.
When the government brings in these restructuring bills, there should be a cost factor so the people who get the end product will know what it is going to cost. We are talking about a utility bill that is going to be introduced to take in parts of Haldimand-Norfolk, or it might be Nanticoke or one of the other municipalities in that area.
The government is asking the members to stand up and endorse a change in legislation that will incorporate a new hydroelectric commission, or it may be taken in with the regional commission. There has to be more information than what is in this bill. What is the projected cost of hydro to the consumers who will be under this local commission?
I think of Niagara, which my colleague the member for St. Catharines (Mr. Bradley) brought to my attention. When they restructured the utility bill in Niagara, they left out two townships. The reason they were left out --
Mr. Epp: They could not spell them.
Mr. Haggerty: They could not spell out the cost; that is what it was. The cost would have made it beyond their ability to pay for the hydro service. The townships I am referring to are Wainfleet and West Lincoln.
Mr. Bradley: They went through to save the government's scalp. Remember that?
Mr. Haggerty: My colleague says they went through to save the government's scalp. I am not sure of that. Those are two areas in the regional municipality that are still purchasing electricity from Ontario Hydro because if they had been put into the larger regional commission or a larger commission of one or two municipalities joined together, the cost involved would have been prohibitive; so they were left out of any local utility.
With Humberstone, which was taken in by the city of Port Colborne under regional government, it was purchased by the local utility in Port Colborne. They are feeling it now because they have to pay for all the rolling stock that Ontario Hydro owns.
At one time I was under Ontario Hydro. Sometimes I wish I still were. Now I am under the Canadian Niagara Power Co. and it is a little cheaper, but with this new agreement coming up it is not going to be any cheaper.
There is something I find difficult to understand, and I raised the matter during consideration of the restructuring bill for the Niagara utilities. If there is a hydro rate increase in the town of Fort Erie, they have no right to appeal to the Ontario Energy Board, because they are served by the American company, but on the American side there is an appeal process.
The contract is coming up and will have to be signed in 1985. The rates might be doubled; I do not know. They had a fixed rate of six mills for 50 years. They must have made a bundle at that time at 50 mills because they got the energy for nothing in the first place.
There should be some cost figures so that the consumer knows what he is buying. There is nothing in here. If they had done their homework they would have that information before the Legislature today. I will bet those people up there know nothing about what is taking place down here. There is no input.
The government should bring in that information for the restructuring bill for the Haldimand-Norfolk area and for other areas. It is the government's responsibility to bring forward that information so we can make a reasonable decision as to which way we should go to vote in principle. Is it the right direction to go?
8:40 p.m.
The Acting Speaker: The parliamentary assistant of another ministry wishes to speak to this bill. I ask for the unanimous consent of the House that he have a second opportunity to speak to it.
Agreed to.
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, I think I have some answers to questions that were raised and I would like to go in the reverse of the order in which they were raised. I have the answer for the member for Erie (Mr. Haggerty), and it relates to the same matter as that raised by the member for Waterloo North.
In this bill, there are no purchases from Ontario Hydro; there are no purchases of rolling stock. This simply brings into force a means of electing the commissioners for Capreol and Nickel Belt. These communities will operate on the same basis as they are now; they will operate on the same limits. They are not expanding.
I realize that in both these members' areas the groups have expanded. They have had to buy from Ontario Hydro. The commissions have been expanded. If there are any increases in rates, they may be from appointing a new commissioner who sets higher rates for himself or something, but there is no purchase of any stock and there is no change in boundaries. It simply legitimizes the commissions that are now there, which have been frozen since the regional municipality was created. Therefore, this bill is necessary.
There has been some discussion, particularly by the member for Sudbury East (Mr. Martel), at different stages concerning how to allow local councils another option on how they are to appoint their commissioners. We have accommodated that in this bill.
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, on a point of clarification: The member for Chatham-Kent has indicated this legislation legitimizes those commissions. I do not think he wants to leave the inference that they are illegitimate now, and he may want to clarify that.
Mr. Watson: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would like to withdraw that word. I do not want to leave any of those impressions. I want to say in clarification that this bill does not in any way imply that.
The amendment I will be bringing forward may involve a change in rates because, if the commission in the communities involved takes over and does form a commission, it will be up to it to set the rates.
In response to the member for Oshawa, I apologize for the fact the amendment to this bill is coming late, but we are really ahead of the times. If the member would read the amendment, it is a little unclear when it is going to happen because it has not happened yet.
Inco has offered to sell it. This has developed since the bill was originally printed and therefore we think it is a good idea to have this in the bill at the present time so that if and when those communities want to form a commission -- and there is every likelihood that they will -- they will have the authority to do it. Rather than drag something on for a long time, this amendment is going to permit them to take over that generating capacity and distribution system when and if they want to do so rather than be behind on it.
I realize we could have had the amendment to the members a day or so ago, but it is a relatively recent development that we think fits into this. There are other areas of the province in which this is likely to happen and it is likely to necessitate a private bill by the community involved. By putting this in the bill at this time in the form we are proposing, we will cover it when the time comes.
Motion agreed to.
Bill ordered for committee of the whole House.
MUNICIPAL PAYMENTS IN LIEU OF TAXES STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT
Mr. Rotenberg moved, on behalf of Hon. Mr. Bennett, second reading of Bill 58, An Act to amend certain Acts related to Payments in Lieu of Taxes to Municipalities.
Mr. Epp: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I am not sure how long this bill will take, but in respect to the people who are here, there was another bill on the Haldimand-Norfolk area which also had to do with restructuring on which we wanted to have unanimous consent. I am wondering whether you wanted to deal with that bill first and then go to Bill 58.
The Acting Speaker: We will follow the orders that have been set.
Mr. Epp: Fair enough.
Mr. Rotenberg: Mr. Speaker, this bill is here at the request of a number of municipalities that have provincial parks within their boundaries.
The proposal in this bill would change the basis for determining the income of those municipalities from a payment in lieu of municipal taxes on these provincial parks and also on agricultural research stations. The payments are now based on an acreage -- or I guess now a hectarage -- basis, calculated using a fixed rate. It is proposed to change this to a payment based on the assessed value of the property and the municipal tax rate year by year. As the tax rate goes up in the municipality, the grant in lieu will also go up rather than being on a fixed rate.
There could be situations in which the assessed value and the mill rate might produce less than the present grant in lieu of taxes. There is a provision in this bill that protects every municipality so that no municipality will receive less under the new proposal than it was entitled to under the old formula in 1983. As I say, this is here at the request of a number of municipalities so that the grants in lieu will be greater. We have acceded to their request and I ask for second reading of this bill.
Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, at the outset I am pleased to indicate we will be supporting this bill. The bill deals with provincial grants to various municipalities that contain provincial parks and agricultural research stations. If it means that municipalities in the future will be getting at least the amount of grants from the province they are currently getting -- I would hope they will be getting an increase in those grants -- then we have no real difficulty in supporting it.
The other important aspect is that the municipalities have been consulted by the province, although I am not sure to what extent. I know that currently there are grants in lieu of taxes for all kinds of matters. Although most municipalities do not get through grants an amount equivalent to what they could raise through taxes on a particular property, nevertheless it is a step forward from a few short years ago. At that time, the province did not recognize various municipalities still had to look after, be partly responsible for, provide services for, but at the same time not get any grants for a lot of property.
Until a few years ago, I know my own municipality did not get any grants in lieu of taxes for the universities. I think the current rate now is about $25 per student. That may have increased; nevertheless, it is a substantial increase over what it was receiving a few years ago.
Mr. Nixon: You have two universities there.
Mr. Epp: We have two great universities of which we are proud.
We are in support of the principle. I am hopeful the assessed value principle is going to be an improvement over the current practice and is going to make it more uniform across the province. As I have indicated, we are in support of this.
8:50 p.m.
Based on the current evaluation the ministry has done with all its computers, I am wondering how much more money it will be paying out on the basis of its current practice over what it is instituting. I am sure that has been calculated and the province must at least have a fairly good estimate to present to this House. It would not be doing it if it is astronomical. The Treasury with its $2.5-billion deficit every year would not be incurring great additional costs, even if those grants were going to municipalities.
They must have at least a reasonable estimate to present to the House. I am sure the parliamentary assistant, the member for Wilson Heights (Mr. Rotenberg), who always has these figures at his fingertips and ready to rattle off very quickly, has those figures for us today. We will look forward to hearing the estimates he is prepared to present to the House.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, this is one of those occasions when we have been given a reasonable amount of notice and we have had the opportunity to do a little canvassing of the people who will be directly affected. They seem reasonably satisfied that the bill will deal with them fairly and resolve a long-standing problem.
There has always been a certain awkwardness about this kind of provision, and this may be a somewhat more straightforward way to deal with it. Because the people who are more directly affected by it seem to think this is a reasonable way to proceed, we will be happy to support the bill on second reading.
Mr. Haggerty: Mr. Speaker, I want to take a look at Bill 58, An Act to amend certain Acts related to Payments in Lieu of Taxes to Municipalities. I want to look at the explanatory notes, in particular section 3: "To amend the Niagara Parks Act, the St. Clair Parkway Commission Act and the St. Lawrence Parks Commission Act to provide for payments in lieu of taxes with respect to parks established under those acts. At present, such payments are made under the Provincial Parks Municipal Tax Assistance Act."
I see the minister's parliamentary assistant is trying to put forward a program here so some assistance is given to municipalities in taxes though a grant system that will probably supply additional taxes to a municipality. My main concern is with the Niagara Parks Commission. I recall some of the important things the commission does in the area, from Fort George at Niagara-on-the-Lake to the old fort at Fort Erie, the miles of park lands the commission looks after and maintains. For example, in the town of Fort Erie it maintains nine or 10 miles along the Niagara River.
The point I want to make to the parliamentary assistant is sometimes one may overtax, particularly the Niagara parks system, so it may not provide the services it is providing now. If Fort Erie had to maintain that riverfront itself as a park it would cost the town about $400,000 a year. The Niagara Parks Commission does an excellent job of providing good care, good landscaping and everything else along that river. I suggest this may have some adverse affect upon the services that are now being funded and supplied by the commission.
It does an excellent job in that area. I think in particular of the city of Niagara Falls. If it had not been for the Niagara Parks Commission and the system there, we would not have the windfall from the tourists coming in and the spinoff to the motels and hotels and places they can visit.
Including the commission under this piece of legislation may have an adverse affect. It may have a good year and it may have a poor year. I suggest extra taxes in this area are not warranted at this time for the benefits that derive to municipalities that share this great heritage of the Niagara parks system. I suggest to the parliamentary assistant he should take a second look at this, so we do not overtax a good system that is providing recreation and entertainment for people from all over the world.
These tourist dollars mean quite a bit to those communities in the spinoff in the areas where visitors look at the sites along the Niagara River. They have a good system there and I would not want to see anything that might jeopardize the position they have taken now. If the municipalities had to maintain that parkway, it would be a rather costly project and would mean an increase in local taxes to the residents in that area to maintain this beautiful parkway.
Mr. Newman: Mr. Speaker, I want to raise an issue I have raised quite a few times in previous years. It concerns border municipalities or municipalities bordering on large metropolitan areas of another jurisdiction.
Because of the proximity of Detroit to Windsor and because the Americans do frequent our downtown areas as well as visit our various parks throughout not only Windsor but also the county of Essex, there are added costs for policing. Other municipalities would not have these additional police costs simply because they are not located, as Windsor is, close to a population of approximately five million within two hours' drive.
Has the parliamentary assistant's ministry taken into consideration municipalities such as Windsor and others throughout the province that are very close to large American urban areas? Has it considered the fact that being so close to them entices Americans to come over the border and taste our hospitality but also creates an added burden in the policing bill of these municipalities? Has he taken into consideration increasing grants to such municipalities for the reasons I have mentioned?
Mr. Rotenberg: Mr. Speaker, I thank the members for their support of this bill. I would like to deal briefly with the matters that were raised by the various honourable members.
In the absence of the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Epp), I will answer his question anyway. At the present time the grants in lieu are approximately $600,000; under the proposed legislation this would rise to approximately $1.1 million. In other words, almost double the amount of money would go into municipal coffers under the terms of this bill.
The member for Erie (Mr. Haggerty) will notice that the Niagara Parks Act is not affected by this bill. As he says, there should not be an additional burden on that commission. The money for that, in effect, comes out of the commission, not out of the government. There is no change in the method of payments by the Niagara Parks Commission through the ministry for the grant in lieu of taxes to the various municipalities in the member's riding.
The only reason this is in the bill is that at the present time the method of payment of grants in lieu by the Niagara Parks Commission and two other commissions, the St. Lawrence Parks Commission and the St. Clair Parkway Commission, are in this bill and we feel that, because each of those commissions has its separate bill, the method of paying grants in lieu of taxes should be in the bill that is peculiar to that commission.
All this bill does is to transfer the Niagara Parks Commission method of paying its grant in lieu to its own bill so it is all in one place; there is no change in the actual dollars. I can assure the member for Erie this will not change the matter.
As far as the member for Windsor-Walkerville (Mr. Newman) is concerned, of course this bill deals only with grants in lieu for provincial parks; it has nothing to do with grants for police or other matters. I really cannot say to the member at this time that any special consideration is being given for extra grants to Windsor, Niagara Falls, Cornwall or any other border municipalities because of the influx of tourists. I would think the municipalities would be more than happy to have the tourist dollars; whether that is more or less than offset by the additional costs I do not really know.
But because the member has raised it, it is now in Hansard, and I will see that our ministry officials at least look into this matter. Whether anything will come of it I cannot say at this time.
9 p.m.
Motion agreed to.
Bill ordered for third reading.
Hon. Mr. Eaton: I understand we may have unanimous consent to proceed with Bill 89.
Agreed to.
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF HALDIMAND-NORFOLK AMENDMENT ACT
Hon. Mr. Eaton moved, on behalf of Hon. Mr. Bennett, second reading of Bill 89, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Haldimand-Norfolk Act.
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on Bill 89. The bill establishes municipal hydro commissions in the six area municipalities of this region.
The first thing the bill does is state that the commission of the municipality of Simcoe will serve the entire municipality and the others will serve only the existing service area.
In view of the comments made when we were discussing the other bill, I point out that Simcoe will be purchasing some assets from Ontario Hydro. Simcoe would like this to expand its area and have asked particularly for it. The others will simply be serving their now existing areas.
In Nanticoke, the existing commissions in the three former municipalities will be disbanded and the Nanticoke Hydro-Electric Commission established to administer the three existing service areas.
In Haldimand, the existing commissions in the three former municipalities are disbanded and a Haldimand Hydro-Electric Commission is established to administer the thee existing service areas.
The bill also provides an option to council that, if at a later date a municipality expands the service area provision is made for the purchase of the assets from Ontario Hydro and the transfer of employees to the local utility with protection of salaries and benefits, as in the other bills.
Provision is made in the bill to give the councils of the municipalities the option of appointing hydro commissions or limiting the electorate for election of the commissions to those served by the commissions.
I will be asking that this bill go to committee of the whole House for a minor amendment so certain people who own businesses in the area are not disfranchised. It will be similar to the amendment asked for in the other bill.
With those few comments, I will be interested in other comments concerning Bill 89.
Mr. G. I. Miller: Mr. Speaker, we have been waiting some time for the bill to come forward. There are some concerns.
First, I would like to say that Simcoe has supported bringing in this legislation for at least two years. They have a new building and new facilities to deal with hydro services for the Simcoe area and they are prepared to take over the total town of Simcoe and look after hydro services for that area.
The town of Dunnville is in a similar position. It is satisfied with the bill. This will now give it the opportunity of selecting the way it wants to elect the commission to represent the area of Dunnville.
The township of Norfolk and the township of Delhi are in a similar position. I believe there is some concern with the city of Nanticoke. They felt the service area could have been expanded, in particular in Port Dover and Jarvis.
Speaking about Port Dover first, it has requested that it service the sewer and water area now serviced by the city of Nanticoke. Perhaps it could have taken in the town of Jarvis and the new town site of Townsend and the one commission could have looked after both.
Regional government was brought in on April 1, 1974. The new town site was selected in 1978 or 1979. They began construction in 1980. If the government really wanted to bring the community together, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Mr. Bennett) could have permitted the area to expand to cover the services, providing hydro for Townsend and Jarvis. One commission could have done that.
I believe the minister or the parliamentary assistant has indicated that was not possible. Therefore, we will not stand in the way of having the hydro commissions properly elected and having their duties delegated.
They have been working under the commission that has existed for 10 years -- since 1974 -- and I believe this has to be corrected.
I think the town of Halidmand has indicated though the mayor, Ms. E. Fuller, there were some concerns with the former town of Caledonia. It is a growing municipality. They are developing outside the original boundaries. It would have been useful if the government had accepted the wishes of the council and the commission to extend their service boundaries. It would have been an opportune time to do that. Again, the minister has refused to deal with it.
On October 18, a letter was addressed to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.
"Honourable Sir:
"Re: Bill 89:
"In reference to our conversation at the Heritage Luncheon, Simcoe Fair, Friday, October 5, the following is a brief history of events to date as promised.
"1. The former town of Caledonia was discussing boundary adjustments with Seneca and the united townships in the early 1970s. Due to the limited development lands available within its boundaries, these lands were identified in planning documents.
"2. In 1975, these lands were defined in Haldimand-Norfolk bylaw 49-75, approved by the Ontario Municipal Board, August 13, 1975, as an urban service area and an urban service charge was levied.
"3. The Haldimand-Norfolk regional official plan, passed by council in 1970 and approved by the Minister of Housing in 1980, identified the future population of Caledonia as 13,000, and the boundaries for growth were those outlined in an urban service bylaw.
"4. In 1979, amendment 3 to the Haldimand-Norfolk regional official plan, town of Haldimand district plan, was approved by Haldimand-Norfolk council and received Ministry of Housing approval in 1983. Schedule C1 of that document, enclosed, also identifies the same boundaries for growth during the term of the plan.
"Because the lands within the urban service area boundary have consistently been identified for growth of Caledonia for over 14 years and because the same area has been identified for development in legal documents approved by the Ontario Municipal Board and/or the Minister of Housing since 1975, we feel it is only logical the same boundaries should be used for servicing by the town of Haldimand-Caledonia Hydro Commission.
"Especially since in this region the local utilities are responsible for water and sewer billings, I must clarify that our original request was only to be allowed to include the urban service area in our public utilities commission service area. The proposal to move the ward boundaries was made in a letter to Philip Andrewes, MPP, in a letter of March 16, 1983, enclosed.
9:10 p.m.
"I cannot emphasize too strongly the need for a decision on the future of our hydro commission. It is impossible to make responsible decisions on equipment and staffing while we remain in limbo.
"The commissions have been frozen now for 10 years and time is taking its toll on the health and energy of some commissioners. We are anxious to put the new commissions in place so we can see their job completed.
"We believe our request is reasonable and look forward to your reply as well as the introduction of amendmenting legislation as soon as possible."
It is signed by the mayor of the town of Haldimand, Edith Fuller.
I just want to put that on the record for the benefit of the parliamentary assistant, indicating there has been a request from the town of Haldimand to expand the urban areas. It seems only reasonable when we are providing a new commission and a new bill that affects the area and the future development and provision of hydro to those areas that those requests could have been carried forward.
I believe the minister indicated he was not in agreement with that. Thus we have no alternative but to make our position known as far as the town of Haldimand is concerned and put on the record that was its wish. In any future development hydro service is important. Water and sewer services together with the hydro billing seems to me would be more efficient and less costly to the people involved. I think the bottom line is we consider the economy, the eventual billing that has to be paid by the user and the efficient service to be provided to the area.
A similar argument to amalgamate billing facilities could be made as far as the city of Nanticoke and Port Dover, which has had considerable growth, are concerned. The same service and equipment could be provided by the commission. I think it makes sense.
That is the reason the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing has been reluctant to bring this bill forward. He wanted to hold the municipalities as they are and not give them the opportunity to expand their area of service. Consequently the bill has been in limbo.
I want to thank the minister for bringing it forward. There is room in the legislation to expand these areas in the future and perhaps the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Energy (Mr. Andrewes) could clarify that so we can assure the commission officials, the mayor of the city of Nanticoke and the mayor of the town of Haldimand, that it is possible to expand those boundaries in the near future if it is the wish of the municipality.
I hope the ministry is listening to the input from the grass roots, and I hope those wishes will be carried out. With those comments, I will be interested in the response of the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Energy.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, this is a bill that does have a little local controversy about it; however, we gather the consensus is that most of the local municipalities want the legislation and so we will be happy to support it.
Before I get into that, I want to deal with a couple of matters that are beginning to disturb me somewhat. In the House at the moment there is no minister, neither the minister who has had his name printed on this bill nor the Minister of Energy. In fact, there is no real minister of the crown in attendance this evening. We are dealing with a bill that is not in Orders and Notices.
The Deputy Speaker: With all due respect to the honourable member, is that addressing the bill?
Mr. Breaugh: I am dealing with a point of order. If you want me to get sticky about it, I will make a point of order and point out that there is not a quorum in the chamber, let alone a minister of the crown who could carry it. If you would like to let the bells ring for a little while we could do that, or you can let me make these remarks and put them on the record and keep me happy. Would you like to have a quorum, sir? I sense you are unhappy with my diddling along in this matter, so I will bring it to your attention. I do not believe there is a quorum in here.
The Deputy Speaker ordered the bells to be rung.
9:19 p.m.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, before I was so rudely interrupted, I was trying to express my reservations about proceeding with this bill now. The bill is not printed in Orders and Notices. I believe there is a good reason for printing bills there; it is to give some notice to those who might be interested in the proceedings of the Legislature in regard to a given piece of legislation.
This afternoon, I questioned the member for Wilson Heights (Mr. Rotenberg), the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, as to why we would not be proceeding with the bill because we had dealt with the Sudbury bill just previously. He informed me that there was a little problem and that they might have to go to committee with it.
I was a little taken aback earlier this evening when I was asked to give unanimous consent to do this bill this evening. I did so because I was informed the local member wanted to proceed with it this evening.
I believe it is not a good precedent to set, to deal with a piece of legislation, about which it is obvious by the not so steady attendance across the way there, this government does not give a high priority. None the less, to those people who live in the riding of Haldimand-Norfolk, it is of some considerable importance. We do them a disservice when we proceed with a bill that is not previously announced, not printed on the Orders and Notices and when members have not been given ample notice.
I am prepared to make the exception this evening. I am in a particularly friendly and giving mood tonight, but the government is testing my patience sorely by doing that.
To complicate the matter further, it is my understanding that --
Interjections.
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, let us get a little order in here before we proceed.
The Deputy Speaker: As the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Epp) is just returning to his seat, I would just take this opportunity to remind the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh), with all due respect, that in spite of his comments, the fact is that the House has given unanimous consent to proceed with the bill.
All honourable members have listened to the honourable member's thoughts in that direction, but the fact is that all the members have agreed to proceed with the bill; so I do not know that we should continue to make that debate.
Mr. Breaugh: In response to that little lecture, I want to point out that I was in a very friendly mood earlier this evening, but subsequent events have changed my mind substantially. I say to the government, do not come looking to me for unanimous consent on this kind of thing again because you will not get it from me.
I am trying to point out, as gently as I can, that there is good reason for printing in Orders and Notices what legislation we will deal with. There is good reason for the precedents and practice in this House that some minister has to be responsible for legislation. Neither one of them is in here tonight.
I am trying to be gentle about it, but as I look across the way, I will repeat what I said earlier: there is no minister of any consequence in here. This is one heck of a way to run a railroad, particularly when I hear that we may be dealing with amendments I have not yet seen.
Mr. Cureatz: The Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. Baetz) is here.
Mr. McClellan: That is what he said: no minister of consequence.
Mr. Breaugh: I am talking to the back of his head; so I do not know whether he is here or elsewhere. It does not make much difference.
All I am trying to do is give a small amount of notice that, in my humble opinion, this is not the way to proceed with legislation, unanimous consent or not. Whether or not we relented earlier this evening and gave unanimous consent, that should not become a practice around here.
There is good reason for printing in Orders and Notices what we will deal with, and there is good reason to follow the past practices. The minister who brings the bill into the Legislature ought to be around when the debate on second reading occurs, and neither one of them is here.
We are getting more than liberal, one might say, with our interpretation of the rules around here. We are getting downright loose and sleazy, and I do not think it is a good way to proceed.
Let me deal quickly with my concerns about the legislation that is before us. It appears the people in Haldimand-Norfolk have been given part of what they want. The difficulty I have is that when we do our research into whether this is really a response to a local request, we have somewhat limited resources and certainly not as many as the government has.
All the area municipalities appear to me satisfied with the process of electing members and the term of office. Two of the area municipalities have some reservations about the areas that are included. The local member in his own inimitable fashion has put on record this evening that he too has some concerns about the geographic definitions.
Apparently we are not going to have much of an opportunity for those area municipalities to appear in a formal way before a committee of the Legislature and put forward their concerns. Whichever minister of the crown is carrying this legislation, and I cannot tell who that is, I trust that what has been presented to the House tonight is a reasonably accurate picture of what is happening. What makes me nervous is that I do not know that.
It appears I will not have the opportunity to hear in a formal way from the municipalities directly affected. We are being sold a pig in a poke this evening. We do not know the exact position of the area municipalities. We do not know whether they are going to be all upset tomorrow morning when they find out this bill has been called for second reading tonight. I do not know that. I did not know it was going to be called tonight. We do not know whether there is easy agreement with whatever amendments might be put.
In summary, I will stand by what I said initially. It is my judgement that the legislation before us tonight is supportable, and we will support it, but I want to put on the record that I have serious reservations about the way we are proceeding with this bill. It does not seem to me to be a sensible way to proceed. While we have given unanimous consent to do so this evening, I want to serve notice that I do not intend to do it again.
I believe there is an obligation on the part of the government to give everybody proper notice about this kind of legislation. There is an obligation on the part of the government to give all those people who are directly affected by it sufficient notice so that if they have a problem with a piece of legislation they have an opportunity to state their case. I am getting more than a little concerned that this is not going to happen.
If I were being particularly cynical, I would draw some kind of conspiracy theory around this and say that somebody wanted to whip this one through without notice, that somebody would be quite happy to deal with all this tonight and not take it off to committee, that somebody was trying to walk both sides of the street here. As you know, Mr. Speaker, I do not believe in conspiracies. I am a straightforward, honest kind of fellow and I take this at face value.
I want to put on the record that if I start getting phone calls tomorrow morning from people saying they did not know this legislation was going to be called, they wanted an opportunity to appear before a committee and they are unhappy with any amendments that might be proposed tonight, I am going to get very angry.
I want members to remember my concerns about the way we are proceeding with this bill. I do not want to be put in a position where somebody comes to me at 8:15 p.m. and says, "The local member would like to proceed with this tonight." I am then put in the rather invidious position of trying to be a reasonable person with a bill that appears to be supportable on the surface. I have to make that judgement.
After this one, we are going to play it by the book. After this one, I am going to get a little more insistent that ministers who put their names on a piece of legislation and stick it in Orders and Notices had better be around when the bill goes through. At least somebody had better be around who is in control of the ship.
There are a couple of ministers sitting over there, one of whom moved this legislation. I do not want to question his ability as a minister, but I bet neither of the two ministers present tonight has dealt very much with this piece of legislation. I do not think I am fishing too far there. They may be aware of the number of the bill, they may have called the bill and they may be aware that it is a government bill, but I would not like to grill those two gentlemen too thoroughly on the contents and ramifications of this bill.
We are establishing some practices here this evening that are unfortunate. On the surface, the arguments in the bill appear to be straightforward. On that basis and on the basis of some contacts we made from my office to the local municipalities, I am going to recommend to my caucus mates that we support this bill on second reading. But I hope the cautions and the ramifications of dealing with this type of legislation in the future are clear. I do not want to nitpick, but there are some rules around this joint on how to deal with this kind of legislation. After tonight, we are going to play by those rules.
9:30 p.m.
Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I have listened to the member for Oshawa with great care. To some extent I share his concern that the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing does not have the carriage of his own legislation. I do not know what sort of agreement was made when he took the job. I do not know whether the member for Wilson Heights was going to carry his legislation and the minister would just spend his time supporting leadership candidates or something like that. I have never been able to figure that out.
In this instance, we are dealing with the local administration of hydro commissions. I suppose there is some reason why the Minister of Energy might have the carriage of the bill. In his absence, to go another step, his parliamentary assistant is in a position to answer the questions. Frankly, I am here to assure members that in our discussions with the ministry on this, the minister has been quite helpful and he is as knowledgeable as anyone over there is. I appreciate his assistance in this connection.
The matter having to do with Haldimand-Norfolk is complicated by two or three matters. One matter that in some respects is to the advantage of all the people concerned is that the electoral boundaries between Brant-Oxford-Norfolk and Haldimand-Norfolk sort of wander right through the middle of these municipalities. These people have the advantage of two effective members. Although there are people in the area who are prepared to say nasty things about the electoral boundaries commission, I say with great respect to any members of previous commissions who happen to be in the House who were good enough to draw the line where it was, it means both the member for Haldimand-Norfolk (Mr. G. I. Miller) and myself share the responsibility to express the views of local municipal politicians and the electorate in these matters.
The problem here has to do with the formation of one of the municipalities, the city of Nanticoke. It is a marvellous place with excellent municipal leadership. When we hear of the city of Nanticoke in this House -- except for the few people who were here for the passage of the bill -- one tends to think of a nice, small city in rural Ontario which is close to the largest coal-fired electrical generating station in the world, certainly in North America. The new Stelco works down there is a great pride to the community and offers some employment.
The city of Nanticoke is largely a rural area with great expectations of growth. At least it had such expectations 10 or 12 years ago, when the then Treasurer of Ontario predicted there would be a population of 200,000, if not by now at least in the next few years. However, we have found that there has been negative population growth over these years; so those dreams associated with the former Treasurer, Mr. White, have somehow not been fulfilled.
One of the former Treasurer's dreams was the establishment of a new city called Townsend. The member for Haldimand-Norfolk has already mentioned that Townsend does exist. About $60 million to $70 million has been spent on it. I believe there are now 100 families living there. I visited it, since a part of it is in my constituency and part is in the constituency of my colleague. It is a beautiful place. It should be for all the public money that has been spent there on beautiful tennis courts, an artificial lake, everything one could possible imagine, including subsidized prices for dwellings. That is grand for the people who live there. I congratulate them on their good fortune, but we in this Legislature know the government has made a huge commitment to the growth of that community which is as yet, shall we say, unrealized.
In addition to part of Townsend, the city of Nanticoke has the beautiful community of Waterford -- which could have absorbed a lot of this growth, but it was decided it would be all centralized elsewhere -- and the community of Port Dover. Some members may have visited Port Dover. The member for Brantford (Mr. Gillies) perks up his eyebrows because anybody younger than me tends to visit Port Dover during the summer on any and all occasions. It is a great place to visit. It has marvellous attributes and attractions that used to interest even me.
Mr. Gillies: Marvellous theatre.
Mr. Nixon: Theatre, yes; the honourable member mentions the theatre. I am thinking more of the perch, but chacun son gout, as we say in South Dumfries.
The hydroelectric boards envisaged here really just preserve the status quo in Nanticoke. Those who buy their power from Ontario Hydro have thought about how they would like to get out from under Hydro's thumb and buy from a local public utilities commission because it is cheaper and the service is good. I wish I could get service from the local municipality through an extended electric service board or whatever.
However, they are not going to extend these boundaries in Nanticoke because a large part of it is still rural, as it was when the city was constituted by act of this Legislature. I think the alternative is presented that in the long run it would offer boundaries at the ward level, which is an interesting alternative. Ward 3, for example, which I have the honour to represent, has the town of Waterford and many very productive acres of farm land.
It is interesting to note that the Ontario Land Corp. owns many of those acres. The buildings have largely fallen down and the fences have deteriorated, but the farmers who are renting are still very good field husbandrymen indeed and the fields are kept productive in spite of the machinations of the Treasury of Ontario trying to give away as much money as it possibly could in that area.
The point is that the prospect of extending the boundaries of these electric boards out to the boundaries of the wards is somewhat remote at this time. When growth does occur, then the extension can take place. But the bill makes it plain that the boundaries stay where they are or else they move directly to the ward boundaries; they do not move out in stages.
It is also quite clear that these boards deal only with electricity and do not serve the areas where there is a water board or a local sewage board instead of combining that function. For this reason, the city of Nanticoke has expressed some objections over the years and is not entirely satisfied, although in essence the passage of the bill does not make very much difference to it, but it does replace the three public utilities commissions with one electric board.
One of the concerns is that the whole concept of regionalization in the area was a completely cockamamy scheme. It was seen as such at the time it was imposed on the area, and most of my constituents in talking to me still feel it was a mistake leading only to remote government and high costs for the provision of local services. I am not prepared to make a regional government speech now, but when I was thinking --
Interjection.
Mr. Nixon: My friend the member for St. Catharines is anxious to get on with his debate.
Mr. Bradley: Oh, no; I am ready for a regional government speech by my friend.
Mr. Nixon: We were actually hoping the honourable Darcy McKeough would throw his hat into the leadership ring so we could dust off some of our regional government speeches, but unfortunately we are not going to have the opportunity to do that.
As far as these boards are concerned, the objections have been expressed over many years by Nanticoke, because it feels that although the ministry and its officials have communicated with it by a series of letters and personal interviews in trying to work it out for the benefit of all, Nanticoke still has not been fully satisfied. At the same time, the town of Simcoe does want this bill so it can extend its boundaries and give direct and lower-cost service to many of its citizens, who for many months and years have had to buy their power at the elevated prices of Ontario Hydro.
To get back to the concerns expressed by the member for Oshawa, I suppose there are people in the area who would like to come down and express those views. The government is not interested in having those committee meetings. I suppose we could complain, and I do, that it said it was not even that interested in going forward with the bill. It has already been lagging for a decade when we could have gone forward with a bill better than this to provide the service that is required by all the people.
9:40 p.m.
Rather than have the government withdraw the bill, we think we can go forward; and if it needs amendment a year from now, I hope the government will consider accepting suggestions for improvement. I regret we have not had a chance to have all of the concerned citizens, and particularly the municipal leaders in the area, come into our committee to express their views.
We have seen the correspondence -- it is public correspondence, and it is actually fairly voluminous -- that has gone back and forth in attempt to work it out to the complete satisfaction of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing and its parliamentary assistant and the Minister of Energy and his parliamentary assistant. This bill is evidently the best the government is prepared to give, and the alternative is no bill at all.
As far as Simcoe is concerned, it is quite anxious to go forward. I do not believe the city of Nanticoke is totally satisfied; as a matter of fact, I am quite sure it is not. On the other hand, I do believe it is reasonable to go forward, and we hope we can improve the situation in the future.
My own feeling as a long-term critic of Ontario Hydro is that if we can do something to get more citizens buying their power from a public utility commission instead of paying the rapidly escalating Ontario Hydro prices, we should certainly do so.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): Can I obtain the unanimous consent of the House to have the member for Chatham-Kent close off the debate on behalf of the minister?
Agreed to.
Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate very much the comments from across the House. We are well aware of the fact that there have been volumes of correspondence and meetings on this. There has been a great attempt to come up with something the area there and the government can live with.
One of the basic problems we address here, of course, is whether or not one is going to allow municipalities to take in only their serviced areas. Their main argument is that if they service a growing area with water and sewers they should be able to service it with electricity.
Mr. Nixon: It makes a lot of sense.
Mr. Watson: There are arguments against that and there are arguments for it. The argument against it really is that when you do it with water and sewers you are not taking it over from a rural sewage disposal system or a rural water system, there is no system out there. When we have a case such as this, all of the citizens of this great community and all others are serviced with electricity and it is a matter of who administers that. It creates a lot of problems.
I am sure that some people, like the member for Waterloo North and the member for Erie (Mr. Haggerty), would very much object if we were to allow these areas to expand a little bit when, as a result of the Hogg committee report in 1975, when they had to expand boundaries they had to expand all the way out to the outskirts.
There is a lot of sympathy for the arguments of these communities, but to allow them to take in only the serviced area they have expanded on would not be fair in any way to the communities that have already expanded.
The bill does provide that the council will be required to review every five years whether or not it is going to expand. It does not have to, that decision is left with it, but at least it has this option at that time.
I would like to say in response to the member for Oshawa that the Minister of Energy is in estimates tonight. He is in the precinct, but his estimates are going forward and that is where he is.
In the history of all the regional bills this will be the 12th bill. I understand it has been the Ministry of Energy that has carried the bills because when the regional acts were created, all those bills were rolled into the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, but the people still associate with the Ministry of Energy and correspond with it regarding their hydroelectric commissions.
I want to assure the member for Oshawa and others that this amendment, which was sent over to the opposition on Tuesday evening, will be quite acceptable, because the way the bill was drafted one could have been disfranchised --
Mr. Breaugh: What is the member talking about?
Mr. Watson: It is on a sheet and it is a very short one. Anyway, the bill as originally drafted --
Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order: He informs me now that some time Tuesday night somebody sent an amendment somewhere. I am telling him I do not have the amendment; I have not seen it. If he wants to inform me of something, I have an office here where we go through the correspondence regularly.
I have seen no amendment and I have no idea what it is. That is a very unfortunate way to proceed when informing members about amendments.
The Acting Speaker: That is not a point of order. Anyway, amendments come forward in committee.
Mr. Watson: I will speak on the amendment when we move into committee. The original drafting could have disfranchised some voters. That was noticed after the original draft. We would not want that to happen and we wish to correct it.
With those few comments, I will end my remarks regarding Bill 89.
Motion agreed to.
Bill ordered for committee of the whole House.
House in committee of the whole.
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF SUDBURY AMENDMENT ACT
Consideration of Bill 91, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Sudbury Act.
On section 1:
Mr. Chairman: Mr. Watson moves that subsection 26b(9) of the act, as set out in section 1 of the bill, be amended by inserting after "within" in the eighth line "or are owners or tenants of the land within."
Shall the amendment carry?
Mr. Breaugh: Hold on, Mr. Chairman. I seem to be running afoul of the chair this evening, but I want to point out that we have standing order 58 that deals with the process of providing people with copies of amendments. I recognize there are weasel words at the front that say "when time permits."
What has caught my attention in my ire this evening is that the parliamentary assistant said earlier that he could have given us these amendments a couple of days ago and he did not. He is really pushing it when he flaunts it that way. He had amendments of this nature well within the time. He knew what he wanted to do. He had them and he did not provide the members of the opposition parties with those amendments.
Let me conclude like this: even if he had the world's greatest amendments, would it not make more sense to get them printed on time and get them out as early as possible, so that even members of his own government party -- God forbid they should ever read what is put under their noses -- would have a chance to take a look at them to see whether the amendments being proposed were sensible and rational.
Would it not be reasonable for him to ask people such as us on the other side of the House to take a look at amendments he is proposing ahead of the discussion so that we know what it is he wants to amend and so that we have an opportunity to ask the municipalities that are affected whether they are in agreement with the amendments or not?
He has asked us to buy a pig in a poke consistently this evening, and I am going to tell him right now that we are not buying this pig in this poke. I do not care whether it is a good amendment or a bad one. If he does not have the good common sense to stick it under my nose a day or so ahead of time and give us a chance to give it some proper consideration, I would be a fool to support it on that basis and I do not intend to.
9:50 p.m.
Mr. Nixon: Mr. Chairman, whether this is apropos anything or not, we on this side received the amendments on Tuesday. Our critic for the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing got one and the two of us in the areas concerned got them. I do not know why the New Democratic Party did not get them. They may have gone to their House leader. I guess the amendments came to me; I do not know.
I have a little sympathy for the member for Oshawa, but he must have had his mean pills with his milkshake tonight. Maybe in the absence of his House leader, he feels he has to maintain that tradition of prickliness. I can assure the chairman those of us in the area feel the amendment is proper. We hope it carries. We certainly had notice of it two days ago. The rules say "notice, if possible."
Mr. Watson: I apologize for that. I personally delivered them. As far as the NDP is concerned, I believe I delivered the amendments to the member for Sudbury East (Mr. Martel). I thought he would be speaking on the bill because it represents his area. I apologize for that.
Mr. Breaugh: The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) mentioned the members "in the area." I want to point out we are on Bill 91, the Sudbury resolution.
Mr. Nixon: Sorry about that.
Mr. Breaugh: This is how well informed we are this evening. The member is not quite sure which bill we are talking about.
Mr. Chairman: Shall the amendment to subsection 26b(9) carry? Carried.
Agreed to.
Mr. Chairman: Mr. Watson moves that part IV-A of the act, as set out in section 1 of the bill, be amended by adding thereto the following section:
"26c(1) In this section, 'town' means the municipality or corporation of the town of Onaping Falls or the town of Walden, as the case requires.
"(2) Where the town purchases the assets used by a person to supply power in the area of the town, the council of the town shall establish by bylaw the commission for the town provided for in section 26d.
"(3) The commission mentioned in subsection 2 shall distribute and supply power only in the area of the town supplied with power by the person from whom the town purchased the assets.
"(4) The commission shall commence to distribute and supply power in the area on the date that shall be specified by the council in the bylaw.
"(5) A bylaw under subsection 2 does not require the consent of Ontario Hydro.
"(6) Where the council of the town establishes the commission mentioned in subsection 2, subsections 26e(1) and (2) apply with necessary modifications to the town and to the commission and, for the purpose,
"(a) a reference to the council shall be deemed to be a reference to the council of the town;
"(b) a reference to the new commission shall be deemed to be a reference to the commission mentioned in subsection 2; and
"(c) a reference to the area municipality shall be deemed to be a reference to the town."
And that the following sections of the act, 26c to 26m inclusive as set out in the bill, be renumbered as 26d to 26o inclusive.
Mr. Breaugh: Could I correct a typographical error in the copy I have? At the bottom of subsection 6, there are thee clauses marked "a," "b" and "a." The last time I looked at the alphabet, it went "a," "b" and "c." The member might want to correct that little error.
Mr. Chairman: Does the parliamentary assistant have any opening comments on the amendment or did he cover it in reading it?
Mr. Watson: I think I covered "a," "b" and "c." I would like that corrected. In my comments about the bill, I did mention the reason this amendment was not included in the original bill is because this was a relatively recent development in that area. It provides that, if and when they want to purchase these assets from Inco, they can go ahead and do so.
Mr. Chairman: All those in favour of the amendment will please say "aye."
All those opposed will please say "nay."
In my opinion the ayes have it.
Motion agreed to.
Mr. Chairman: Any further amendments?
Mr. Watson: The first amendment has to be repeated in another subsection.
Mr. Chairman: Mr. Watson moves that subsection 26d(6) of the act, as set out in section 1 of the bill, be amended by inserting after "within" in the eighth line "or owners or tenants of the land within."
All those in favour will please say "aye."
All those opposed will please say "nay."
In my opinion the ayes have it.
Motion agreed to.
Section 1, as amended, agreed to.
Mr. Epp: Mr. Chairman, I hope in future when these bills come in, with all the staff they have available over there, they hire themselves a proofreader so they can check these things out before they bring them to the Legislature. That would avoid a lot of problems for everyone.
Could I respectfully suggest that to them? There are hundreds of people in the Ministry of Energy and hundreds of people in the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing; thousands of them. Cannot someone be hired to resolve some of these minor problems?
Mr. Chairman: I thank the member. There are no typos or anything in section 2.
Sections 2 and 3 agreed to.
Bill, as amended, ordered to be reported.
REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY OF HALDIMAND-NORFOLK AMENDMENT ACT
Consideration of Bill 89, An Act to amend the Regional Municipality of Haldimand-Norfolk Act.
On section 1:
Mr. Watson: Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment. It is, in essence, a similar amendment to the others.
Mr. Chairman: Mr. Watson moves that subsection 50b(13) of the act, as set out in section 1 of the bill, be amended by inserting after "within" in the eighth line "or are owners or tenants of land within."
Mr. Watson: This amendment is for the same reasons. If this is not changed, people who own property within the area and do not live there will be disfranchised. This is to correct that error.
Mr. Chairman: All those in favour of the amendment will please say "aye."
All those opposed will please say "nay."
In my opinion the ayes have it.
Motion agreed to.
Section 1, as amended, agreed to.
Sections 2 and 3 agreed to.
Bill, as amended, ordered to be reported.
10 p.m.
On motion by Hon. Mr. Eaton, the committee of the whole House reported two bills with certain amendments.
BUDGET DEBATE (CONTINUED)
Resuming the adjourned debate on the amendment to the motion that this House approves in general the budgetary policy of the government.
Mr. Bradley: Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to address one of the most important documents presented to this House for consideration, the budget of the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman). I had the opportunity the other day, along with my colleague the Liberal critic for the Treasury, to discuss the spending estimates of the Treasury and I touched on a couple of issues that are of particular importance to those of us in the opposition.
I was parochial enough to touch on some items of specific interest to the Niagara Peninsula, although they have importance across the province. If I wanted to isolate the one problem the budget should be addressing most forcefully and comprehensively, it would be unemployment.
Many of the surveys taken recently have reflected the feeling in the province that the inflationary spiral that was once present is not the number one problem people are looking at, although they are still concerned about the cost of living.
Most people seem to be touched by unemployment though knowing someone in the family, a relative, a friend or someone on the street who is unemployed, and they recognize the adverse effect this has on a person psychologically, most certainly economically and otherwise.
I see the member for Brantford (Mr. Gillies) here tonight. He understands what a community going though unemployment has to face, particularly when some of the unemployed people are older workers who have a difficult time getting new jobs.
I remember being contacted last week by a constituent of mine whom I will call Joe S. He is 61 years old. He has been unemployed for 17 months, almost a year and a half, and has few prospects of getting another job although he has tried many times to locate new employment.
His number one sin is his age. He is ambitious enough to want to look for another job. He was a good employee for the company with which he was employed over the years. He has been ambitious enough to knock on the doors of a good many employers, even those outside his own specific sphere of qualifications in terms of his past experience. However, he has few prospects of meaningful employment.
He informed me that when he goes to apply for a job, it may not say, "How old are you?" or "age" on the form -- in some cases it does not have that; I forget whether Ontario legislation prohibits that now. However, when he lists that he has been working for a good many years for a company, it is quite obvious the employer is dealing with an older worker.
We have a person who is extremely ambitious and wants to provide for himself and his family. He does not want to lose his automobile, home and other belongings, but having used up his unemployment insurance benefits and probably dipping into savings, he is now in difficult circumstances. He is one of those people who are victims of a plant closing, and there are many of them in St. Catharines and in other communities.
Regional councillor Bill Marshall, a former international representative of the United Auto Workers, has been deeply involved with the various programs the federal government has set up to help those who are in these circumstances. One of the options this gentleman has is early retirement, but it is not financially rewarding for him to contemplate that particular avenue of action.
We in the Ontario Legislature, and those in the federal Parliament, have placed a good deal of emphasis and concentration on the unemployment facing our youth. Heaven knows, youth unemployment in this province is extremely high and it is discouraging to those people. But in our desire to focus a lot of attention on the problem of youth unemployment, where the figures are extremely alarming, we have placed less emphasis on the problems confronting older workers who for various reasons have lost their jobs.
I know the government has one program, which was described in this budget, which allows for some kind of retraining and some incentive to employers. However, it does not seem to be serving all that many people in an appropriate fashion.
It seems to me we need two things. First of all, we need a budget that will stimulate the economy even more to produce the jobs that are required. Second, we need some specific programs geared to the needs of people who are in the category of this constituent of mine, who faces the same problems as many other people in his age category.
This person says that when he goes to an employer in the private sector, no specific reason is given but he is quite certain his age is the reason he cannot obtain employment.
One suggestion I will make to the House, and I hope this government will take it into consideration as a positive and constructive suggestion, is that the provincial government and its agencies, boards and commissions as well as the lower echelons of government, the municipal levels of government, should be persuaded to move in the same direction; that is, to hire people based on their qualifications rather than on their age.
In other words, when this person goes to a provincial government ministry where there happens to be an opening, the door should not be slammed in his face because he happens to be 61 years old. That is where our public sector can set an example for the private sector, rather than simply urging the private sector to move in that direction.
I know that borders on a quota system or on affirmative action, which some people tend to resist, but what I am really asking for is a lack of discrimination on the part of the public sector to assist individuals, such as this man, who become quite depressed over their circumstances, which come about as a result of something that is not their own fault. It is not as though this person quit a job. This person has been thrown out after many years of service to a company because it was no longer economic for that company to operate in the community.
I hope there is compassion in this House for that kind of person. I hope there is another specific program geared to help people of this kind. I hope also the economy can be stimulated through more budgetary measures aimed at bringing about the kind of economic climate in this province that would encourage the private sector to hire more people.
Another area I would like to dwell on very briefly tonight is that of spending in the field of social services.
There is a perception out there that people in our province are against more social spending, that if you knocked on the doors on your street, those people would say: "We have to cut everybody off welfare. We have to cut back on this and cut back on that."
There may be some feeling that those who are capable of fending for themselves should not receive the kind of public assistance some have been able to obtain. But for those who are unable to fend for themselves, the disadvantaged and the handicapped in this province, there is a good deal of good will out there for such people.
10:10 p.m.
In my part of the province, the Niagara region, there is an appalling situation facing people who are mentally retarded. I know some people in the House do not like to talk about the rather difficult circumstances faced by those people. There are media reports coming out this week and next that will reveal a rather disconcerting circumstance facing mentally retarded people.
When the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Drea) initiated the program of deinstitutionalization, he had some support from some quarters, particularly from those who might have had people in institutions and wanted to have them closer to home. This is not to suggest that those institutions were providing bad service. It is not to suggest that they were the snake pit we saw in the movies in the 1950s. It is to suggest that some of those people would be able to function and cope quite nicely in a community with the necessary facilities and programs to handle them. What has happened is that there are simply not the programs, facilities and the accommodation to handle the problems faced by these people.
I know of one mentally retarded person in the Niagara region who up until this week was living in a car. There were some other people living in an abandoned factory; I think they have now moved to the Salvation Army centre as a result of some action taken on their behalf. There are others living around the Niagara region in what some people would define as flophouses.
This is simply not good enough for a province as rich as Ontario that spends as much as it does on other things. I could recite the usual things we in the opposition recite, the $650 million spent on Suncor, the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on questionable land banking schemes, the $50 million on advertising, the $45 million on Minaki Lodge, and the list goes on. It would be easier to sustain those expenditures if we knew this government was meeting a genuine need and commitment in other areas.
I would suggest that no one in this House, regardless of political affiliation, would deny to mentally handicapped people appropriate programs, accommodation and facilities. Yet in the Niagara region this situation has been allowed to exist for some time now. There are probably more than 100 people on various waiting lists.
I get calls from parents who are now getting on in years. They are not particularly old but may be in their 50s or 60s. They are now looking after children who are out of their teens, still relatively young mentally handicapped people who are getting older and moving into middle age. They are wondering what will happen to their children when they themselves die or become incapacitated because of illness or for other reasons. I think they are justified in saying, and I think the figures will bear them out, that there are not the facilities or programs for these people now.
We have a core residence for young people called Barnsdale in St. Catharines. It is supposed to be for young people, yet at present there are adults accommodated in that building because there is no place for the adults to go. I believe there is an adult protection service worker who goes around to check on various mentally handicapped people in the peninsula to see how they are making out. I suspect if that person were before a committee of this House, she could tell some rather interesting horror stories about what is really happening in the peninsula.
When I question the minister on this, I get the response that these people and the associations for the mentally retarded in the Niagara region have to learn to get together, to amalgamate. It sounds very much like the enforced regionalization we saw with municipal government in our part of the province. That was not well received.
For the Ministry of Community and Social Services to hold over the heads of the associations for the mentally retarded in the Niagara region, the threat that if they do not amalgamate or regionalize, they cannot expect funds to be flowing quickly, is simply not acceptable when the consequence of this action is that the people who are mentally handicapped do not have appropriate facilities.
This is not an issue one exploits for political reasons. This is a very compassionate issue and one with which I have attempted to deal on a behind-the-scenes basis for quite a while. The people themselves have taken the initiative. The parents of the mentally retarded and the associations for the mentally retarded have been presenting their case to the ministry, while the political representatives in that part of the province have agreed to stay back a bit and see what kind of progress they could make.
The progress has not been good enough over the past few years. It is now a case of those of us who are representatives bringing this matter forward in public debate in this Legislature and through the media of television, radio and print. That is unfortunate. I would have preferred to have the progress made without that kind of publicity. I do not like to see that happen. I believe the mentally handicapped deserve the attention of members of this House though the appropriate funding, without having to become involved in media coverage themselves. Yet that is what it seems to take to get the required action.
I am calling upon this government, through its budgetary measures -- and I wish there were more money in the budget for it -- to allocate those funds to provide an adult core residence, training facilities and other programs which are very much required by young and older mentally handicapped people in our part of the province. I hope that message gets through to the Minister of Community and Social Services and to the Treasurer, who is responsible for the budget. I intend to continue to press this matter until there is a satisfactory resolution.
Another area I want to touch on is that of spending on health care services. If any of us were to talk to most of our constituents, we would find they are prepared to accept government spending in a couple of areas quite readily. One such area is for the handicapped, be they physically or mentally handicapped people, and others who are genuinely disadvantaged. There is a lot of goodwill for spending in that area. A second area is health care, and a third is the environment. In our part of the province, the environment would rank very high.
With respect to health care, despite the figures we hear -- and I know these are professional people who come forward with these figures about beds per 1,000 and so on -- more hospital beds are required in many parts of the province. At present, people have to wait for elective surgery. Some will say: "What is the difference if they have to wait? It is elective surgery anyway. It is not essential surgery. So what is the difference?"
The difference is for the many people who have not had surgery, and I am among those. The idea of getting psyched up for the surgery itself is hard to face. Some people have to work really hard on their emotions and mental condition to get themselves ready to face surgery. Then just when they are ready to face surgery, and perhaps they have taken time off work and have planned other accommodations for their children, as soon as all the arrangements have been made, they are called within hours of the operation and told: "Sorry, there is no bed for you. The operation is cancelled."
It is a tremendous letdown for these people. They have managed to work up enough courage for it, they have made the other arrangements and then they are cut off from that surgery, which is considered to be elective. That is not satisfactory, and that is brought about because there is not a sufficient number of hospital beds available at the right time.
There is also a need for specialized equipment. I was very proud of the people in our community who raised the funds for a new computerized axial tomography scanner, which will help in diagnosis in our part of the province. We had people, such as Joe West, who headed up the campaign in St. Catharines, and many others who worked very hard, who raised funds from those who contributed a few dollars, such as kids who got together with neighbourhood projects, to those who contributed several thousand dollars for the placement of that scanner in St. Catharines.
10:20 p.m.
However, one has to wonder whether the obtaining of such equipment should be dependent upon the good people in the community being able to raise the money and whether sufficient money is available in the community to be raised for purposes of this kind. I suggest governments have a greater role to play with respect to the provision and operation of these kinds of important pieces of equipment.
We know that many projects for hospitals are undertaken by volunteer groups. It is not the provincial government that provides many of these facilities and much of this equipment in hospitals. Instead, it is the ladies auxiliary of a hospital, as it might be called, or other groups that happen to be working with hospitals to raise funds for those items. Those people are to be very much commended and are to be given the credit for it, but one wonders whether they are getting sufficient support from the provincial government in providing other equipment and the ongoing operating costs.
Looking at my own centre in St. Catharines, I raised with the Provincial Secretary for Social Development (Mr. Dean), who happened to be in the House that day when the Minister of Health (Mr. Norton) was not -- the Minister of Health, by the way, is usually here; I am not making any comments about that in a disparaging way. However, on Friday he was not here and I directed my question to a gentleman who does not really have responsibility for the allocation of funds, but I know he is interested in these areas. It was for a women's detoxification centre in St. Catharines.
The government claims to be interested in women's issues and claims to be interested in advancing the cause of women in this province. However, in St. Catharines we have a men's detox centre that has worked well because it allows people to be serviced for, I think, $27.50 a day compared to probably $265 a day in a hospital bed, if we want to take all the costs of a hospital bed per day.
By having a women's detox centre available, women would not have to go into a place called Women's Place Inc., which is really not suited for this; it is really for battered women. Some of them go there, some end up in the psychiatric ward at the St. Catharines General Hospital and others end up in regular beds in a hospital. It is not really satisfactory, when a detox centre can provide the same service.
If one wants to look at it from the straight economic point of view, it saves the government money. More importantly, it saves the taxpayer money to have these people serviced in a detox centre compared to a hospital. However, the funds have not been forthcoming. I think they talked about $130,000 a year for this five-person centre for women. I hope the Minister of Health will move quickly on that. I know he has been prodded by the Provincial Secretary for Social Development, or at least informed of my question by the provincial secretary who, I am sure, shares my view that women should be treated equally with men when they have problems such as alcoholism, which takes such a toll on many people.
I also want to get in a plug for the local offices of the Addiction Research Foundation. There was a debate in this House the other night and the standing committee on procedural affairs has tried to place some onus on the Addiction Research Foundation local offices to provide justification for their continued existence. I have received considerable correspondence from various groups and agencies that feel the local offices provide a good service, and that the Legislature should move very cautiously when it attempts to redefine and change the role of the local offices.
I hope the Minister of Health will take that into consideration and not move rapidly and rashly to remove those offices from existence. I think they play a role. I think there is a need for consultation with them to see whether there is a better role they can play, but I would not want to see them abolished.
It also comes to mind that I have received representations from the Niagara Peninsula Rehabilitation Centre and other groups there. We have a need in our part of the province in one of those facilities for a speech therapist and the funding is not forthcoming. There are lots of needs that exist in terms of health. I am suggesting to the members of this House that the public is prepared to see increased spending on health care, and probably decreased spending in other areas, by this province.
The Hotel Dieu Hospital in St. Catharines has, I think, made representations to the effect that it would like to be a cancer treatment centre in the peninsula. We are fortunate in this part of the province that, not far away, we have Henderson General Hospital in Hamilton, which does a lot of cancer treatment, and the McMaster University Medical Centre in Hamilton.
People come to Toronto to Princess Margaret Hospital and the Wellesley Hospital, and other hospitals, for treatment when they have problems with cancer. But treatment can be effected at the local level. The people can be at home, have the support of family nearby and reduce the stress placed on their family and friends by being at home to receive those treatments. I hope the proposal for a cancer treatment centre at Hotel Dieu Hospital is looked at favourably.
When I speak of hospital spending, another hospital I want to look at is the St. Catharines General Hospital. When I look around the House, I suspect there are many people who would give the same speech from their ridings about what is available.
We have two wings there, the McSloy and Moore wings, which certainly would not make your heart beam with pride -- if a heart can beam -- or make your face beam with pride, I suppose, or do very much good for your heart if you went through them.
They are really used as chronic care areas for elderly people. That McSloy wing in the hospital is like a dungeon. This is despite the fact that the staff there are just immaculate; they do an outstanding job. The hospital authorities would love to see this kind of facility replaced. The present structure in that part of the hospital is very old and depressing. Paint is peeling from the walls and so on. Even though the hospital makes a big effort to keep it up, it is just that the wings are so old that those walls and that section of the hospital should be replaced.
The hospital has made a proposal to put in a new chronic care facility on its own property for people who require it. There is a need for an expanded emergency care facility at the St. Catharines General Hospital, which could use an infusion of provincial funding.
I know my colleague, the member for Brock (Mr. Welch), who represents a good portion of St. Catharines, on the other side is likely making many of the same cases in cabinet to the Treasurer, to others who have some say in how much is spent in total, and to the Minister of Health. I know he would agree with me it would be nice to see a greater infusion of funds. I think I can count on the fact he will agree with me it would be nice to see a greater infusion of funds in those areas.
I mentioned as well the environment. In our part of the province, environmental issues are extremely important. In St. Catharines, we live about 12 miles from the Niagara River. All across the Niagara Peninsula and right across the social and economic spectrum that we have there, there is a concern about the environment. A lot of Conservative friends of mine, for instance, are always saying to me: "Come on, Bradley. Get up in the House and give them heck about their commitment to cleaning up the environment." They are concerned about it and they recognize that an opposition spokesman probably has that kind of freedom to get up publicly and talk about a lot of problems that exist in the environment.
The present minister has made some inroads into that; I want to say that to him. I would like to keep an open mind on the new minister and give him the chance to make his mark. I think he is moving too slowly, but I think he is moving nevertheless. I do not doubt his sincerity in his commitment to cleaning up the environment, but we have a very special problem with the Niagara River and with the Great Lakes at large.
Once again, I think that by cleaning up our side of the border we place considerable pressure on the Americans to do the same, because most of the problem, quite frankly, exists on the American side, in New York state, with respect to the toxic chemicals that are making their way into the Niagara River.
When my friend the member for Niagara Falls (Mr. Kerrio), and I, pressed the minister for an allocation of provincial funds along with the federal funds for secondary sewage treatment at the Chippewa plant in Niagara Falls, and eventually the minister agreed with it, we had an opportunity at that time to express our pleasure with the action taken by the minister in providing those funds. I think the same could be done with the plant in Fort Erie, which also goes into the Niagara River, to increase the quality of the effluent going in. We could brag to the Americans that we were squeaky clean on our side.
I see we are moving towards 10:30. The Minister of Health also approved the funds after we raised the matter in the House. I recall raising, as did my friend the member for Niagara Falls, the need for an epidemiological study of the Niagara region -- that is, a study of the relationship between the contaminants in the environment and diseases that take place. I am pleased that this has come about, but I want to develop a second stage, which will cost us even more money.
Mr. Speaker, I see that it is getting very close to 10:30 of the clock, as you say.
On motion by Mr. Bradley, the debate was adjourned.
The House adjourned at 10:30 p.m.