Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

The House met at 1000.

Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

INSURANCE AMENDMENT ACT, 1990

Mr Runciman moved second reading of Bill 20, An Act to amend the Insurance Act.

Mr Runciman: We have 25 minutes, I think, allocated to each party. Is that correct?

The Deputy Speaker: Pursuant to standing order 94(c)(i), the honourable member has 10 minutes for his presentation.

Mr Runciman: I only have 10 minutes initially and I will make some closing comments later on.

I proposed this legislation at this juncture because of our frustration as a party, the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, with the lack of action on the part of the new government in respect to the concerns of consumers across this province in relation to the no-fault auto insurance scheme brought in by the former government.

I am not going to talk at length about the actions of the former government; it is like kicking a dead horse. We did this at length earlier this year and prior to that, in the fall of 1989, and we know, as the New Democratic Party government knows, that this is bad legislation. Innocent accident victims are seriously impacted in a negative way by this legislation. There is one Ontarian injured in an automobile accident every five minutes in this province and many of those individuals are innocent.

We in this party, the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, believe very strongly in the ethic of responsibility, that individuals should be responsible for their own actions. We were certainly led to believe during the course of deliberation on Bill 68, the Liberal no-fault legislation, that the NDP, the opposition party at that point in time, shared those views.

We were witness to a display in this Legislature by the now Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations and the Minister of Financial Institutions, the member for Welland-Thorold, the 17-hour filibuster in an effort to break a record in this Legislature, which he did. He was complimented and received significant publicity across the province for his efforts supposedly on behalf of innocent accident victims in Ontario.

Someone once said the secret to success is sincerity; once you can fake it, you have got it made. I hope that was not the case in respect to the member for Welland-Thorold. I want to say that we did indeed develop a friendship over that period of time dealing with Bill 68. We shared many of the same concerns about the no-fault legislation. But now this minister and this party have been in power for over two months and we are not seeing any action on what at one point in time, not too many months ago, was their number one priority.

They were quite well prepared to hold up the business of this Legislature for weeks and days on end to try to get a change in this legislation, to have the Liberal government pull back. They did not succeed, but it was a noble effort which we shared with them. Now, once in power, they are doing absolutely nothing. When I have posed the question, when the Liberal critic has posed the question, the minister has stood on his feet and suggested that, "We have to consult, we have to talk things over with a variety of people across the province."

I want to say that the current Minister of Financial Institutions and myself toured this province in a significant consultative effort which the Liberal government of the day failed to pay heed to. But I thought the member for Welland-Thorold and myself, and the NDP and the Conservative Party, had indeed listened to what was being said at those hearings right across this province. Over 75% of the witnesses appearing before us were very strongly opposed to the Liberal no-fault legislation, very strongly opposed to the elimination of the right to sue for innocent accident victims in this province.

So now he has the gall to stand up in this House and say, "I've got to go out and consult further." We are having thousands of innocent accident victims whose rights are being denied them while he is suggesting in this House that now he has to consult. We can go back to the 1987 election, when the NDP attempted to make automobile insurance the number one issue in this province. They took this stand in 1989 and 1990 when they were sitting over here, and now they are stalling and stalling while, as I said, thousands of innocent accident victims have their rights denied on a monthly, weekly basis. We simply cannot allow this to continue. That is why I raised this issue. That is why I am trying to at least put some public pressure, some focus on this government's lack of action in respect to innocent accident victims in this province.

I want to say I hope it was not simply public posturing on the part of the minister, but up to this point in time we have to assume that indeed was the case, that he was not sincere. I do not know. It is passing strange that the minister is not even in his chair here today during this important debate. Where is the minister? If he really cares about innocent accident victims, I want to pose the question to government members who are going to be participating in this debate, where is the minister today? We have known for a number of weeks now that this bill was going to be debated. He took up the time of this House for days on end -- and here he comes. Well, it is about time he got out of bed. It is good to see him.

Mr McLean: He has gone away again.

Mr Harnick: You chased him away. Come back, Minister, come back.

Mr Runciman: I hope I did not intimidate him. I also hope that what we were talking about in respect to the NDP government is not a lot of meaningless rhetoric and that Bob Rae is not the Milli Vanilli of Ontario politics, great at mouthing but cannot deliver the goods. I hope that is not the case.

I want to say that we hear strong indications that the NDP government is moving towards some sort of variation of the Quebec plan, which would see a pure no-fault system in respect to bodily injury. The insurance industry itself would retain responsibility for damages to automobiles. If indeed that is the case, I want to put on record at this point my very serious concern about that. As I said, right now, under the Liberal legislation, 95% to 97% of innocent accident victims are losing their right to sue. Under the Quebec meat chart plan, 100% of innocent accident victims will lose their right to sue.

I want to say if the minister has the audacity to bring in that kind of legislation in the spring. I do not think he should remain as the Minister of Financial Institutions. He is on the record very clearly in support of the right to sue. So is his leader. I do not see how they can stand in this House in the spring and completely eliminate the right to sue.

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I know a significant player in this government, the Deputy Premier, is very strongly supportive of pure no-fault. He believes in the meat chart approach to compensation for innocent accident victims. I want to say this party does not and we are strongly going to fight any attempt to do that, and if it means bringing this House to its knees, as the member for Welland-Thorold attempted to do a few short months ago, we are going to be doing it. We are the only party, in my view, up to this point. that seems to care enough about innocent accident victims to continue to stand up and fight for their rights in the Legislature of Ontario.

I want to say again that I do not want to see games played with respect to this legislation. If indeed we do get support today for this bill by members of the government, I want to see it called for third reading. I do not want to see it referred to a committee, never called and buried. That is just another phoney effort, if indeed that occurs, to try once again to dupe the public of Ontario. We are not going to allow it to happen. I personally do not want to see this legislation referred to committee, because nothing is going to happen. It will be nothing more than a farce if we have an effort of support from the NDP government and then a referral to a standing committee where it will never be called.

I want to say that I mentioned earlier that going through the Bill 68 process, the hearing process in this building and across the province, was probably the most emotional time in my life as a legislator. Members know that I can get quite emotional on occasions and sometimes I do and say things that perhaps are inappropriate and later have to apologize for them. I have done that on a couple of occasions, but I want to say in respect to that particular piece of legislation that I have never felt so strongly, I have never felt so emotional.

The people who appeared before us were the head-injured, senior citizens, people who are going to be very negatively impacted, people representing groups that would be negatively impacted and people who had no vested interest but simply cared about innocent accident victims in this province. A very emotional time indeed, shared by the member for Welland-Thorold with me. At this point in time, now that he has the authority, the opportunity to do something for these people, how can he justify continuing to drag his feet?

This bill should be passed, it should be called for third reading and given royal assent before this House adjourns.

Mrs Mathyssen: We on the government side of the House were a little surprised by the introduction of Bill 20, An Act to amend the Insurance Act.

[Failure of sound system]

-- last June by the former Liberal government, and that particular flaw was of course the threshold established by the former government, a threshold so excessively restrictive that 95% of the victims, and I emphasize the word "victims," of automobile accidents are precluded from their right to seek financial compensation for pain, suffering, psychological trauma or the loss of the enjoyment of life.

Only the most extreme injuries -- injuries resulting in death, injuries causing permanent, serious disfigurement or permanent loss of bodily function -- would qualify under this threshold, the most rigid threshold anywhere in North America, and even more rigid than the insurance industry had asked it to be. Certainly, this threshold ruled out any real kind of justice for the accident victims of Ontario.

Quite naturally, we who now sit as the government believe that is wrong and I dare say many of the voters of Ontario also believed Bill 68 was wrong. I began by indicating surprise at the third party's proposal because I wonder where their concern was last spring when Bill 68 was before this House. There was ample opportunity to voice the kind of outrage the bill deserved at that time. Why wait until now to see the error of Liberal ways?

I also have mentioned that the Liberal threshold was one of the flaws of Bill 68 because it was set inhumanely high. But it is only one flaw. We need insurance legislation that provides Ontarians with insurance that is affordable, available and does not discriminate against drivers.

Unfortunately, this amendment act proposed by the honourable member opposite does not address these other serious flaws. We are paying dearly for the current private system. Premiums have been too high, service has ranged from barely adequate to lousy, the insurers' efficiency has been low, their practices arbitrary and their methods often unfair.

We are all aware of the horror stories: the refusal to insure some drivers; the dumping of drivers into the Facility Association, where the highest rates are charged; and the penalizing of good drivers because the driving record of another member of the household is poor. These problems occurred before the former government introduced Bill 68 and they have not gone away.

As everyone knows, our party vigorously opposed the Liberals' threshold no-fault system. We did everything in our power to prevent the passage of Bill 68. At the time of the debate, we received thousands of telephone calls and letters from ordinary people opposed to the bill.

Young people were unable to take jobs because they could not afford to insure a car needed to go to work. Families were hit with increase after increase. Seniors became captive in their own homes because they could no longer afford car insurance. The public anger with the threshold no-fault system is very real. We continue to receive calls from ordinary people dissatisfied with the current insurance system. We believe the drivers of Ontario are entitled to insurance coverage at a reasonable cost and an insurance system that will guarantee the right for compensation for the injured victims.

We have historically advocated a non-profit, publicly operated insurance plan. As we indicated in the speech from the throne, we are committed to a public, driver-owned, non-profit auto insurance system. The systems operating in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Quebec are models that have caught our attention. In three of these provinces the public car insurance systems established by NDP governments were so successful that they were continued by subsequent governments. In Manitoba, the public auto insurance is now being run by a Conservative government. In Saskatchewan, public auto insurance was introduced in 1946 by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation government led by Tommy Douglas. It is now being operated by a Conservative government. British Columbia established a public auto insurance system in 1973. Their system does not discriminate on the basis of age or gender. The elimination of profits in the British Columbia system saves drivers there millions and millions of dollars every year.

We understand the intent of Bill 20 and are certainly encouraged by the recognition that amendments are needed. However, the new legislation planned by our government for the spring will be the result of careful consideration with representatives of the insurance industry and consumers. It will be a comprehensive solution to the Liberal insurance fiasco currently plaguing Ontarians and it will address all the flaws of the current legislation.

Mr Chiarelli: My colleague the member for Brampton North and I will be sharing our 15 minutes.

In spite of the antics of the current Minister of Financial Institutions, the issue of automobile insurance is indeed very serious public business. The jobs, careers and livelihood of 44,000 people are at stake. General insurance companies have nearly $9 billion invested in Ontario. The personal financial budget of every driver is at stake with premium levels. It is most important for every Ontario citizen to have the security of knowing that should an auto accident visit upon him or her there will be adequate and timely accident benefits.

Because so much is at stake, it is with much encouragement that we read the Premier's comments on 10 November that: "The approach the government takes has to be based not just on pie-in-the-sky hope but a solidly based, documented approach. The decision can't be based on ideology; it has to be based on facts."

And so it was with much discouragement that we read at almost the same time that the Minister of Financial Institutions told his home-town Welland-Port Colborne Tribune that Bill 68, the current Ontario motorist protection plan, was a "complete disaster."

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I have repeatedly asked the minister and the Premier to share their information and documented approach, but absolutely nothing is forthcoming except a veil of secrecy and contradictory statements. The present minister is like a child in a candy store or a candy factory. He has walked over to the counter that says "automobile insurance" and he has seen this array of goodies and he cannot make up his mind what he wants.

On 30 October the minister promised in a prepared speech "a public, driver-owned, non-profit insurance system with access to courtrooms for injured victims." That statement was made not when he was opposition critic, but after he had been appointed Minister of Financial Institutions. At the same time, he promised the Advocates' Society he would reinstate the right to sue.

Yet on 17 November, the Ottawa Citizen in an excellent article reported that the minister told the Consumers' Association of Canada that he was bowing to the wishes of his colleagues in dropping his insistence on a tort system giving the people the right to go to court. The minister has said he likes the BC plan with the right to sue, yet this week he called the lawyers pigs at the trough.

The minister also says he will consider Quebec's no-fault system, and while the Premier says he will consider a documented approach, he could not even confirm on 3 December that his government now has or has not commissioned an economic impact study of public automobile insurance in Ontario, something it has known will cause billions of dollars of capital to leave this province.

There are many contradictory statements this government has made since 6 September, many of which are on record in Hansard and in the press. But I encourage the Premier to follow his own advice and to tell his minister to do likewise. I say to the Premier that he should not draft his legislation, should not change Bill 68, the Ontario motorist protection plan, should not make the decision based on ideology.

I say the same thing to the member for Leeds-Grenville. The issue of expanding the right to sue cannot be taken in isolation. That is why I will be voting against this bill today.

Bill 68, the OMPP, is working. In his speech last Tuesday, the minister said on another subject, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." I challenge this government to enter the debate with documentation, deal with the facts and please share its facts.

Here are our facts:

An independent Legislative Assembly researcher reports that he contacted the three largest auto insurance companies in Ontario and learned that they were complying with government guidelines limiting premium increases to an average of 8% in the greater Toronto area and 0% outside the Toronto area.

Affordability of premiums is a key issue in automobile insurance reform, yet the Premier has refused in this House to say his plan will lower rates.

The same researcher reports that early indications are that the then government's predictions that litigation would be reduced by at least 90% under Bill 68 were accurate.

Helen Anderson, a member of the Consumers' Association of Canada and a member of the Accident Benefits Advisory Committee, told the researcher the committee is not aware of any problems with the current weekly benefit of $600 per week, although she had some suggestions to fine-tune it.

The consumer information centre of the Insurance Bureau of Canada reports as of 19 December on inquiries:

"Most of the inquiries are for specific information and we are receiving very little general comment on the new legislation. Very few callers express negative viewpoints on the current OMPP system."

It goes on to say, "We are experiencing a decrease in calls related to non-renewal or cancellation of automobile policies. The details are available for anyone who wants them."

I want to read a letter dated 19 December from the president of Allstate Insurance Co, and I want to challenge the NDP government to disprove its contents with a documented, non-ideological approach and deal with the facts. The letter was addressed to me re the Ontario motorist protection plan.

"We have every reason to feel optimistic about the prospects for the wholehearted acceptance of the OMPP by Ontario consumers. The thrust of the new regime is optimal customer service given in a caring, supportive and non-adversarial environment. Insurance people have responded remarkably to the need for a mindset change to bring this about, and they have been materially assisted in bringing it about by the absence of barriers created by the wordings of the judicial system.

"Equally remarkable is the improvement in turnaround time on claim settlements. Adjusters are sensitized to the sanctions against their employers and principals for late payments, and operating systems have been retooled so as to facilitate prompt cheque issuance. Traffic in consumer complaints to regulatory and industry bodies have been minimal. The dispute resolution staff at OIC, having geared up to process 10,000 applications for mediation annually, have received fewer than 100 since 22 June.

"As well, the direct indemnity feature of property damage has drawn much favourable comment from users of the auto insurance system. People have told us they appreciate the prompt resolution of liability and damage issues, and they especially like not having to wait months for the recovery of a collision deductible through the insurer's subrogation process.

"In all, we feel everyone's a winner. Customers like the product. Insurers are enjoying loss cost improvements and consequently are anticipating a return to profitability for this line of business. Everyone is getting along better, and essential issues are being resolved promptly.

"We believe the Ontario consumer of auto insurance is being better served than consumers in any other jurisdiction in North America.

"Yours very truly,

"J. T. Kelaher."

I urge the NDP to look at the facts, put the facts on the table and to accept Bill 68, the Ontario motorist protection plan. We urge them to improve upon it. There is a good basis there. Insurance companies must be made to improve on the issue of Facility coverage. The accident benefits package may need fine-tuning. We need to monitor how the threshold definition is working. But the previous minister, the member for Bruce, has put an election plan together and it is working. I urge the NDP to improve upon Bill 68, to fine-tune it, work with the opposition parties, with the industry and with consumer groups; but to use the minister's words, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Mr Harnick: I notice that the gallery has some students in it. In all likelihood a great many of those students are under 16 years of age. I can tell those students that if they are involved in an accident, unless they can climb the mountain that the former government has created, this threshold, if they are involved in an automobile accident, they will get nothing. They are under 16; they are eliminated from the system.

The threshold thumps and boils every innocent accident victim in this province; 95% are eliminated from the system. And the purpose of eliminating those students from the right to claim for any damages that they might suffer in an automobile accident is because the former Premier decided he had to hold the line on premiums, and when he held the line on premiums, he was able to do it by putting $650 million into the pockets of the auto insurers of this province.

I can tell members that they have not held the line on premiums. I have a constituent. His name is Ilya Trest and he lives in my riding of Willowdale. Mr Trest earns $13,999 a year. He is disabled. His wife is disabled. I have a copy of his income tax return here. His income was $13,999. Mr Trest has two sons, and when his oldest son got to be 16 years of age they scraped together enough money to buy a family car. Under the old system, they got a premium for the 16-year-old driver to drive the car of $2,489. This was under the old system; he was in the Facility.

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Then the new system came along and they got that premium renewal so this 16-year-old could drive the family car, and I might add it is a 1984 Caravelle, it is quite an old car, and when they got that new premium notice -- he had had no violations, no accidents, a clean record throughout the year between the ages of 16 and 17 -- this terrific Ontario motorist protection plan bumped his premium up to almost $3,200. I have the premium notice here. By my calculation, contrary to what my friend on the bench to my right says, that premium went up 30% -- not 8% and not 0%; 30% -- to the point --

Mr Chiarelli: Stop trying to fool the people.

Mr Harnick: I am not fooling the people. I have got it right here on the Allstate letterhead. They cannot afford any more to drive the family car, and the reason they cannot afford to drive the family car is because the Ontario motorist protection plan did not protect them.

Mr Fletcher: How come you didn't hold up Bill 68 for a month like we did?

Mr Harnick: Well, we were right there beside the NDP. If the member was watching, he saw Mr Runciman and Mr Kormos and they were fighting against Bill 68 together. I put it to the member who is shouting across the floor at me, "Why weren't you fighting Bill 68," to sit down with the minister, if he has time, and ask him who was standing there shoulder-to-shoulder helping him. The member's facts are not what you would call correct.

The member is quite concerned about why we are all of a sudden fighting this bill. We know that there are innocent accident victims who are being turned away every day because they cannot climb the mountain of this threshold. They cannot prove that they are seriously and permanently injured, and because of that they get turned away.

My friend on the bench to the right said, "Boy, these great benefits that they're getting now." What benefits are those? After you exhaust all of the other benefits that are not auto benefits, then the insurance kicks in. You pay top premiums for secondary insurance from the private insurers, which are making $650 million this year, and innocent accident victims are being turned away and cannot get recourse to put them back where they otherwise might have been had the accident not occurred.

We are bringing this bill forward because in the Progressive Conservative Party we are concerned about innocent accident victims. We are on the record as fighting on behalf of innocent accident victims in the last Parliament and we are waiting anxiously to see what the Minister of Financial Institutions will present. But in the meantime, who is going to help the innocent accident victims? What is going to become of these people, these people who do not qualify under Bill 68 and who have to wait until the minister finishes another round of consultations? He has the Osborne report. He has the 400 briefs that were filed before the committee. He is ready to act now. Why is he doing nothing to help these innocent accident victims? That is the reason we are here today and that is the reason we are asking members on the government benches to support this initiative. These people are going without redress. They have nowhere to turn.

I might add that the longer this goes on, the longer this delay takes place, the more impossible it is going to be to help these innocent accident victims. So that is why we are here. That is why we are asking the members on the government side of the House to support this initiative, because unless they do, these people are going to go without any help whatsoever. They are going to be lost between the current system and the system that may be.

I hope that the members on the government benches will see it in their hearts and in their consciences to help innocent accident victims now and to take that step without having to be led by waiting for the minister to finish the consultation process. He is not doing innocent accident victims any good by delaying this process any longer.

Ms Haeck: I want to say at the outset of my remarks that I support in principle the private member's bill to restore the right of car accident victims to compensation. This bill is designed to repeal sections of the former Liberal government's Bill 68, which came into effect in June of this year.

During the debate on Bill 68, this party opposed the threshold no-fault car insurance plan which denied any access to the courts for the vast majority of innocent victims. We opposed it and we oppose it now. The NDP government is in the process of designing a new public auto insurance plan that will not only provide fair coverage at a reasonable price but include a comprehensive package of reforms. We do not intend to move in a piecemeal fashion.

The speech from the throne promised introduction of the new auto insurance legislation by the spring session. We are moving with urgency on this vital concern. We are consulting with all groups which have an interest in the legislation, including accident victims, insurers and others.

Our party's views on auto insurance are well known. At this time we want to solicit the views of other interested parties in order to receive a range of views representing all stakeholders, and I will repeat that, because I want it to be made very clear that this government is interested in the consultative process. Our party's views on auto insurance are well known. At this time we want to solicit the views of other interested parties in order to receive a range of views representing all of the stakeholders.

The former Liberal government's threshold system is unfair and unconscionable. Under the threshold, people would only have the opportunity to sue for compensation in cases involving "death, permanent serious disfigurement, or permanent serious impairment of important functions caused by continuing injury that is physical in nature." Of all the threshold-type insurance systems in North America, the threshold put in place by the Liberals is the most onerous and the most stringent. During the hearings for Bill 68, it was estimated that this threshold would eliminate at least 95% of all claims -- not terribly fair, I would say.

However, the threshold was not the only aspect of the Liberal bill that we opposed. We fought Bill 68 on other grounds that are not dealt with in the bill we are debating today. For example, Bill 20 does not address the question of taxpayers subsidizing insurance companies. As Bill 68 failed to do, Bill 20 does not deal with the problem of availability of insurance. It is still difficult to find an insurance company that will accept individual risks at affordable prices if they will accept any at all, particularly if the individual has any record of an accident or traffic tickets. And I can assure members that in doing my canvassing during the election campaign this summer there were a lot of my electors who had an awful lot to say about this particular plan. As we heard during the Bill 68 debate, many people are being forced into the Facility Association, where rates are exorbitant.

Both the former Liberal government's bill and this private member's bill fail to deal with discrimination on the basis of age, sex, marital status, family status or disability. It also does not establish a uniform classification system for determining risk and allows the different classification variables used by each company to continue, and they are highly discriminatory.

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There are many provisions in Bill 20 that raise concerns for our party. The removal of collateral source deductions, for one, addresses some of our concerns about this measure but does not provide a solution as to how to deal with double compensation as recommended by Justice Osborne. I believe some members of this House have talked about Justice Osborne's opinions. Well, we have obviously taken them into consideration.

Bill 20 also eliminates all the mediation and arbitration systems now in place. The introduction of mediation and arbitration was recommended in Justice Osborne's report in order to facilitate a speedy resolution of disputes pertaining to accident benefits. Remember Justice Osborne?

Previously, many companies routinely denied or halted payment of benefits, leaving accident victims without ongoing compensation for long periods -- and to Gerry Plato out there, this is your problem. We believe any sensible system must address this concern.

Bill 68 and today's bill do not consider the benefits of a driver-owned system to the people of Ontario. The driver-owned systems in other provinces have proven to operate more efficiently, more effectively, than the private sector in a number of ways. They spend less money on overhead, operate on a non-profit basis, return more of the premium dollar towards claims, and integrate driver and vehicle licensing systems to ensure that all drivers are insured.

As we indicated in the throne speech, our government is moving quickly on automobile insurance. I will support in principle this private member's bill solely because it eliminates the former Liberal government's unacceptable threshold. We expect that this bill will be overtaken by government legislation which will comprehensively address all the concerns we outlined during the Bill 68 debate as well as some of the problems we have identified in the technically flawed private member's bill.

The public-operated, driver-owned system that we will introduce in the spring will provide Ontario drivers with affordable coverage in a non-profit system that will be accountable to the public. I know there are many of my constituents who will be extremely happy with that situation.

Mr McClelland: I appreciate the opportunity of spending a few moments talking about the bill put forward by the member for Leeds-Grenville. Let me say at the outset that I am impressed with the member for Middlesex, who has made a commitment on behalf of her party to deal with all of the flaws and to come up with the perfect solution. I guess that is why I cannot sit over there with her party, because I do not think that I could ever come up with anything that would be absolutely perfect. That is one of the failings that I have as an individual, and I suppose only the member and her party in its wisdom can come up with perfection. I would not want to presume to come over there because I would ruin it.

I simply say that to suggest to her that with all of her best efforts it will not be perfect. Nobody suggested that Bill 68 was perfect. As my friend the member for Ottawa West has suggested, it is working in many cases very, very well. I think it is an opportunity now for us to be a little bit objective and take a look at what has happened under Bill 68.

The member talked about the horror stories. The member for Leeds-Grenville talked about the innocent people who are denied the opportunity to sue. The member for Willowdale admits to me that he has an inability to be objective about this because his clients are not now able to reap the benefit of his tremendous legal counsel. Those clients cannot go to him and cannot have this benefit, and he admits to me clearly his inability to be objective about this. What he fails to take into consideration is the one third of accident victims who under full tort had absolutely no recourse, who were left without any recourse of substance. Talk about the horror stories.

I want to talk about a couple of horror stories under full tort by way of contrast. I would ask my friend the member for Willowdale, as he leaves, to listen and be a little bit objective and understand, as my friend the member for Ottawa West said, that there are two sides to this equation, and that there are people who I think need to be objective and look at how Bill 68 is working, affecting real people in real life. I want to talk about that for a brief moment.

I had a constituent call me who was a victim of an accident in January 1986 under full tort. He was told to proceed with litigation. They went out and got a second mortgage on the advice of counsel so that they could continue payments on their first mortgage pending settlement. The second mortgage principal ran out, so they went out and got a third mortgage so they could pay the payments on the first mortgage and the second mortgage.

Subsequently, in the latter part of this year, a settlement was reached and when all the money was used up, they were in a position where they had virtually nothing left. They are now in a situation where they are walking away from their home. Those are the types of individuals who benefited under full tort.

Mr Tilson: You're too expensive, Carmen.

Mr Harnick: I never made money like that.

Mr McClelland: Now people from the third party are making a lot of flippant, quite frankly inappropriate comments and taking shots at people who are innocent victims.

Mr Tilson: No, they are directed to you.

Mr McClelland: The member for Dufferin-Peel says they are directed at me. That may be and he is entitled to do that, but in so doing, he is actually laughing, I think, indirectly at people who are hurting and who would have benefited.

Let me talk, in the few moments I have left, about a couple of other cases under Bill 68. I want to talk about a 42-year-old Ottawa Valley teacher who was recently killed when struck by a car while riding a bicycle. He left a widow and eight children. An over $230,000 settlement was assessed. The Royal Insurance company immediately advanced a sum of $10,000 to cover funeral expenses. The balance of the $230,000 was paid within a 10-day period and the individual still has the opportunity to pursue litigation.

Another case is that of a 34-year-old driller who lived in Kenora. He was on his way to work on 1 October. He fell asleep; he had an accident; he is now a paraplegic and he is recovering in Winnipeg. The accident victim has no replacement insurance and he was completely at fault in the accident, but under Bill 68 he is receiving $740 per week. His home will be renovated and the insurance is paying for the lodging expenses of his wife, who is staying in Winnipeg to be with him during his recovery. In addition to that, he is receiving more than the standard income replacement of $600 a week. The Co-operators insurance agreed to extend enhanced income replacement benefits up to $1,050 a week.

Yes, there are cases, I say to the member for Middlesex, where insurance companies are not working, but I want to give an example again of where insurance companies have in good faith extended income replacement and, in this case, until renewal time. The accident happened before renewal and he is receiving the benefit of compensation as if he had purchased the coverage which he did not.

I want to simply say that on balance there are many people who are substantially better off under Bill 68. It has been well said by my friend the member for Ottawa West. That is working well. There are countless cases where people are receiving benefits who might otherwise not have done so.

My friend the member for Ottawa West put on the record incidents and examples gleaned by independent research in terms of the efficacy in the way that Bill 68 is working. I say to the opposition, the third party could give an opportunity to work. It is not broken. Do not fix it; improve it. I think the opportunity is here to improve it and I thank you for the opportunity to address this issue.

Mr Tilson: If the member does not realize it by now, the law is broken. It has simple as that. The law is not working. There are people around this province coming to legal firms asking for opinions as to where to go. There is not any. They simply cannot recover the rights that they had before.

The member for Middlesex says that she is surprised at this bill. Quite frankly, we on this side of the House are surprised that she is surprised. The member for Welland-Thorold did a major filibuster during the last session where he gained great notoriety around the province in his position on this, and we agreed with him.

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Mr Villeneuve: But he was just paying lip service.

Mr Tilson: Well, he was. He had a plan now and all of a sudden it is gone. It is probably like a lot of the policies that this government has. They spoke quite firmly when they were running for election and where are they now?

The people of this province cannot afford to wait until January or February when the minister plans to introduce his bill. Obviously both the Liberals and the NDP have decided that they are not going to support this bill; well, hopefully, this will make them move. We have not got time to wait any longer. The minister must move now. If he is not going to support this bill then he should bring his own bill forward.

Mr Charlton: Let me start out by saying that I will be supporting this piece of legislation by the member for Leeds-Grenville. The member for Dufferin-Peel, though, is not correct in the comments that he has just got through making. We both opposed Bill 68 last spring. We opposed that legislation for entirely different reasons, though, and the implication of the Conservative position on Bill 68 and this present bill is the status quo prior to Bill 68, which is a disaster for the drivers of the province of Ontario.

I am going to support this piece of legislation because it deals with the most offensive part of Bill 68: the threshold. But it is not the only offensive part of Bill 68, and I would to simply point out to the member for Dufferin-Peel that the member for Welland-Thorold did show great stamina last spring in his fight against the bill, and if the Conservative caucus had joined us and matched us in that stamina we might not now have a piece of legislation that is the law of the province that is causing the problems it is causing.

For example, I have a constituent who has been to see me who is eligible, because of his wage level, for the maximum benefit of $600 a week while he is off work. Unfortunately, that benefit is supposed to be tax-free, and it is tax-free if it comes from his insurance company. Unfortunately for this gentleman, he is presently getting sick leave because that is what the law requires and his sick leave happens to be taxable. He is losing benefit because of a major loophole in a shoddily constructed piece of legislation by the former Liberal government, a piece of legislation which has to be completely reworked.

I will support this bill because it addresses a small part of what has to be addressed, but to just address the threshold question will not resolve the problems that are confronting drivers in the province of Ontario who have had serious accidents, and will not resolve the majority of cases that are being imposed on people by Bill 68, the present legislation. We intend to deal with it in a comprehensive and fair way across the board.

Mr Runciman: I want to thank the members of all parties who participated in the debate today. I want to say that some of the comments made by government members were upsetting, to say the least, in respect to the role that my party played during the debate on Bill 68. The member for Niagara Falls said she was surprised by this legislation. Well, I want to say we in this party were disappointed and dismayed by the lack of action on the part of the member for Welland-Thorold, the now Minister of Financial Institutions, based on his role in the debate earlier this year and his party's position for many, many years.

We had the member for Guelph, who seems to have a permanent smirk on his face since he entered this chamber, interjecting in respect to: "Where were you? Where were you when this debate took place?" I want to say we were there very actively and vigorously fighting on behalf of innocent accident victims in this province. That is where we were. The member was warming his tail back in Guelph. We were fighting here every day and right across this province as well; we have nothing to apologize for. Once those guys got in power, what the devil are they doing? Absolutely nothing, absolutely nothing; talking about consultation, after we toured this province, myself and the member for Welland-Thorold, listening to witness after witness talking about the rights of innocent accident victims being denied them under the terrible Liberal legislation. Now they are in office for over two months and all the minister is doing is talking about further consultation. Well that is not acceptable, I want to tell members.

I want to say something about the minister, whom I like personally and consider a friend. but he has not shown his face in this assembly this morning. He is walking around the edges, or he is up in the gallery talking to the president of the Insurance Bureau of Canada. Why is he not sitting in here? Why is he not participating in this debate? He took up 17 hours of the Legislature's time last year, indicating he cared so much about innocent accident victims, but he is not even sitting in his spot here today. He is not taking up his chair. Where has that compassion gone to? Has it just simply drained away since he assumed office as a minister of the crown?

I want to say it is shameful that the minister is not here today participating in this debate. If he cared as much as he indicated to the people of this province a few short months ago, he would be here today, he would be continuing to stand up on behalf of innocent accident victims right across this province. He is not here today and that speaks volumes about the lack of sincerity on the part of the NDP and regrettably, obviously, on the part of the member for Welland-Thorold. I certainly did not consider him the kind of individual who would be a yes man, but obviously that is what has happened. He is being significantly muzzled by the Premier's office, apparently. There is no other explanation for the minister not being here and standing up on behalf of innocent accident victims.

We have some inane interjections from a Liberal member here. They talk about nobody being hurt by their terrible legislation, everybody benefits, and then the member for Ottawa West has the gall, the unmitigated gall, to quote as justification for his position the president of an insurance company. My God. They are reaping significant benefits, the insurance industry itself, and the Liberal member has the gall to stand up here and justify his continued support for this dreadful legislation by quoting a letter from an insurance industry executive.

I want to say, if the NDP thought they put up a fight -- a phoney fight indeed. That is what it was proven to be -- I want to say when they bring in pure no-fault, when they fail to recognize the rights of innocent accident victims in this province, they are going to have one hell of a much bigger fight on their hands from the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. We are not going to stand for it. If it means tying up the business of this House for a significantly longer period of time than the member for Welland-Thorold did, we are going to do it. We are going to be sincere about it, because we believe in what we stand for.

I told members earlier that this party believes very strongly in the ethic of responsibility, that individuals should be responsible for their actions. Bill 68 wiped that out. It wiped out whole groups of people in society. We talked about the kids in the gallery here today, under 16. The Liberals say everybody benefits. It was pointed out to them that kids under 16 are completely wiped out, nothing, nothing, nothing under that Liberal legislation.

Here we have an NDP government which just two or three or four months ago felt so strongly about people like those kids sitting in the gallery that they were going to do something about it. Now they have had the opportunity and what do we get from the minister? "I want to go out and consult." Well, that is a bunch of garbage and nothing less.

I want to say that we went around this province. We listened to people. I listened. I thought the member for Welland-Thorold listened. I was emotionally impacted upon by those witnesses as I have never been before as a legislator, never been before. It impacted on me and members saw it in this House on a daily basis, and I want to say I felt that I shared those emotions with the member for Welland-Thorold. I thought he was sincere and it apparently is not the case, because today we are getting a mixed reaction from across the floor now that the NDP is the government and we have a failure on the part of the minister to even make an appearance in this House, let alone participate in the debate. There is no justifiable reason whatsoever for his absence here today.

I want to say again that if we do get passage of this bill, if we have enough members of the NDP supporting passage of this bill, I personally do not want to see this referred to committee, because I think it is a procedural ploy. I think it is more gamesmanship. I do not think again that there is sincerity on the part of the government if they simply want to see this referred to a committee where it will never be called, never be debated and simply buried, another further delay while we have hundreds and hundreds of innocent accident victims continuing to suffer, continuing to have their rights pulled away from them by the draconian Liberal legislation brought in in June of this year.

I think I have said enough on this bill, on this issue. I have spoken on it for years. I think everyone knows my strong feelings in respect to the rights of innocent accident victims in this province. I urge all members of the House to support this legislation, to see it called quickly for third reading and given royal assent before the adjournment of the House.

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CITY OF LONDON ACT, 1990

Mr Winninger moved second reading of Bill 18. An Act respecting the City of London.

The Deputy Speaker: Pursuant to standing order 94(c)(i), the member has 10 minutes for his presentation.

Mr Winninger: Mr Speaker, I have a throat infection. If I sit down early, it is not because I have nothing more to say, it is because I have no more voice to say it with.

This bill, An Act respecting the City of London, is designed to conserve heritage property in London. Currently, we have 71 properties designated as heritage properties in London. I have already filed two petitions incorporating many, many names of Londoners who support Bill 18 and what it is designed to do.

As many of the members will recall, the Ontario Heritage Act was passed and proclaimed --

The Deputy Speaker: Order. Would you stop the clock, please? We have to see whether the speaker works. Could you wait just for a minute? Try it on again and let's see if it works properly. If not, take another seat.

Mr Winninger: As I was just saying, in 1975 the Ontario Heritage Act was proclaimed with a commitment to conserving our architectural heritage. Under the heritage act, municipalities could designate heritage buildings. These buildings could not be demolished for a period of 180 days. If, during that period of 180 days, these buildings were not purchased or expropriated, they could then be demolished.

This act did not go far enough, in our estimation. The city of Toronto has now passed a statute which would require that a building permit be issued before such heritage buildings can be demolished. Markham has also passed similar legislation. The city of London does not at the present time have legislation that would require the issuance of a building permit by city council before heritage buildings can be torn down. In fact, we have already lost one important building, the Sir Adam Beck House, which was torn down virtually overnight in the absence of this kind of legislation.

Another important heritage resource we have in London, which I will call the Talbot Street block, which is in fact a streetscape that has been described as the most magnificent example of Victorian uninterrupted streetscape in the province, is scheduled for demolition after 3 February, when the 180-day designation under the heritage act is due to expire.

I grew up in London certainly during the sleepy 1950s, when Eisenhower was in the White House and a milkshake cost 25 cents. London had a real architectural identity. It had a real downtown core area where people went to shop at either the local independent business stores or at the Simpsons store. London has a park in the centre of town called Victoria Park, with a bandshell and military monuments like many other small towns and cities strewn across Ontario. During the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s, a lot of these buildings were torn down either to make way for parking lots or to make way for modern structures that lack the distinct identity that the original streetscapes had. That is why it is so important that we conserve what little is left of our architectural heritage.

Another builder who has purchased a property called Thornwood Estate in London, the second-oldest house in London, has asked for a demolition permit for that property as well.

I, like many members of the House, share the view that private property owners and developers have rights too, but these rights have to be balanced from time to time against conservation of our heritage which is, I believe, a legitimate municipal planning consideration. Municipalities like Toronto and Markham that already enjoy the privilege of issuing a building permit before a building is demolished certainly have an advantage over London, where buildings can be demolished without a building permit after the period of 180 days elapses.

The one building that I have mentioned due for demolition -- in fact, a whole streetscape of buildings due for demolition on 4 February, goes back to the late 1800s. The southernmost point of the streetscape was the original town hall of London and later the first professional theatre in London. The building at the northern end of the streetscape is the terminus of the legendary Donnelly stagecoach that went from Lucan to London, and in between were a number of a notable other stores such as one that was run by an enterprising female, a Victorian entrepreneur called Jane Darch who supplied harnesses and saddles.

The Talbot Street block is in close proximity to the Covent Garden market in London which has existed for over 100 years. It supplied hotel services, it supplied staples and the sale of agricultural implements. This is a fine example of Victorian streetscape that London cannot afford to lose. If it is going to lose it, it should certainly know what kind of structure is going to replace it. The owner of that particular property, Cambridge Leaseholds, indicated in an article in the Globe and Mail on 10 December of this year that it is reining in all new developments for a period of at least two years.

Should this streetscape be sacrificed for a parking lot simply because the builder has vowed resolutely and irretrievably to tear it down? I would submit no, we have to conserve our heritage. It is a visible link that we have with the past. Psychologists have determined that where a city becomes modern and loses its distinct architecture, people develop a sense of stress and anxiety. They feel much more a sense of wellbeing when they conserve their rootedness in a community. Also, crime and other forms of social disorder increase where a city modernizes too quickly.

Our heritage which we wish to conserve in London is certainly irreplaceable. This bill only goes so far as to require a building permit, as I said earlier, before demolition can occur. We need an ongoing partnership between all levels of government and the private sector to protect our heritage.

For every million dollars spent on renovation, 27 jobs are created. For every million dollars spent on new construction, only 13 jobs are created. Certainly jobs can be created through renovation, through incorporating the old into the new. Also, the cost of renovating the Talbot streetscape, for example, is equal to the cost of adequate new construction. It does not necessarily cost more.

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John Ota of the Ministry of Culture and Communications toured the Talbot streetscape and in his report to the city of London said that he had not seen a more beautiful and intact example of 19th century commercial buildings in a row in the entire province than London's. Mr Ota said, "There is a tremendous potential here to come up with a creative method of integrating a modern development with the city's irreplaceable heritage buildings."

Certainly, if any steps towards improving the downtown are considered, they should begin with the preservation of those buildings. This view was also endorsed by the Heritage Canada Foundation and Christine Hart, the former Liberal Minister of Culture and Communications, who toured the streetscape last June, vowed that she would see that legislation was enacted to protect the streetscape. Unfortunately, the September election prevented her from so doing but we can certainly carry on the torch to ensure that buildings like the Talbot streetscape, but also many other heritage buildings in London, some of which are now owned by developers, do not fall to the wrecking ball.

Mr Sorbara: I am pleased to rise and join in this debate during private members' hour and on a private member's public business bill.

I listened very carefully to the member for London South. I noted his remarks, for example, about how impressed he is with the architectural value of the buildings which he endeavours to preserve by way of this bill. I noted as well with interest that the previous Minister of Culture and Communications had toured the buildings, had examined the site, had met, I think, with city officials probably and had made a public commitment for the government of the day to bring in a government bill in order to vest in the city of London the power that our friend the member for London South now proposes to do by way of a private bill.

The member for London South did not, unfortunately, review in his remarks any of the politics surrounding this little issue of the buildings on Talbot Street. He did not, for example, mention the fact that this House is prepared, seemingly -- to satisfy the needs of this member and his political colleagues, and perhaps the member for London North as well, the Conservative member -- that he is prepared to short-circuit, and I would suggest abandon, the regular procedures of this House in order to effect the political objectives which he wishes to effect.

He did not say that apparently we are prepared in this House, with the acquiescence of the government House leader, to urgently turn a private member's bill into government legislation with a vote this afternoon.

I am not going to comment on the merits of the bill itself. I recognize that not only the city of Toronto but other municipalities have acquired the kinds of rights and abilities that are proposed for the city of London within Bill 18.

The difference here is that this matter currently before us and before the city of London is not a matter that has been requested by the city of London. In fact, there is no doubt in anyone's mind that councillors and the mayor of the city of London are in the midst of a vicious debate over the future of this property and the powers that one private member has determined, the government should now vest in the city of London.

We have procedures in this House for the government to put forward its legislation. We have ministers in the House who are capable of proposing matters to cabinet, having matters reviewed by committees of cabinet and then bringing those matters forward in the form of legislation. This government, notwithstanding that the Ministry of Culture and Communications could have urged the incumbent minister to bring forward a bill, did not do that. So within three months of their election, they determined that it is all right to short-circuit the process.

I remind members that there is a standing order in our standing orders that governs how we do business, standing order 66, which says that a government in the last two weeks of a sitting -- the winter sitting in this case -- is not permitted to bring forward a bill and then have it go through the three readings that are required and be passed into law. Why do we have that standing order there? It is no longer of any value, because if the government wants to do something it can, by consent of this House, foist it upon members, have a private member's bill suddenly become, without any notice, a government bill. This afternoon, we are going to be asked to do precisely what the standing orders prohibit us from doing.

The member for London South, shaking his head, is not familiar enough with the rules of this House, but he will be familiar with politics. He was willing to sacrifice the interests of the folks who had asked him to bring forward a resolution on the CFB. That is what was on Orders and Notices. That is what he asked us to debate in this House this morning. That is what the notice document said. That is what he proposed to do, not this bill. This is a government bill, this is not a private member's bill. This is something that the ministry should have had on the order paper a month and a half ago. Then we could have considered it appropriately. That would have been fair.

It would have been fair for the member to urge the Minister of Culture and Communications to bring forward a bill, for the government, in a government decision, to stand behind something that the government wanted to give to the city of London. I will simply leave the fact that the city of London has not yet resolved the issue and requested the legislation to be brought forward. That is the normal course. No, but my friend from London South has a political agenda, and in this case maybe it is all right. In this case maybe it is fine that we will abridge, abbreviate, ignore the rules of this House because this is a good political objective.

I just tell my friend, who is a new member of this House, that it really saddens me that in the case of this issue we are ready to ignore the rules. Why do we have these rules here? What happened here? What political pressure was placed on the member that we just ignore the rules? I was told last week that we were going to have unanimous consent to move it off one page of the Orders and Notices to another page.

Hon Miss Martel: There was no guarantee that we were going to get it from you. That's why we're doing it this way. That's what the problem was.

Mr Sorbara: My friend the government House leader says there is no guarantee for getting it from me.

The Deputy Speaker: Please address your remarks to the Chair and ignore the heckling.

Mr Sorbara: I want to do that. If Mr Speaker would direct the government House leader to not interject, which is another part of the standing orders, that would be fine.

The government House leader says I was not prepared to give my consent to moving the bill over. I ask the government House leader this question. Why was the government not prepared a month and a half ago to introduce this legislation, to allow it to be debated in this House as a government bill, which it is and which the government wants it to be? What was the hesitation? Why is this bill not going to be allowed to be reviewed by a committee of this House? Why are members not going to be able to comment on it? Why? Because it is politically expedient in the city of London, just as it was politically expedient in the city of Hamilton for its members to meet privately with NDP members to tell them about a decision that was going to be coming out.

That is the kind of government we have in this place now, a government of convenience, very convenient for the Minister of Colleges and Universities to meet privately with NDP councillors, to tell them, sort of, about what is going to happen. It does not matter that the cabinet had not formally announced the decision. Not very important, really, when it is expedient for the movement to get the message through to its members.

Now we have got a bill. It is a fine bill and I wish that we simply could pass this bill based on the rules that we have in this House. But apparently we are not going to be allowed to do that.

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It seems to me that there is a very strong debate going on in the city of London about Talbot Street and what should happen to these buildings. It seems to me that in every other community we have laws and regulations and bylaws governing how those disputes are to be resolved. The city of Hamilton, with the exception of the Red Hill Expressway, gets along like that. The city of Toronto gets along like that. The city of North Bay gets along like that. They look at the rules that govern how these issues are to be resolved where there are differing interests and differing points of views.

But in this case, no, we are not going to have that. We are not going to have the government bring forward legislation. We are going to have one private member -- he did not make it to cabinet; he is a private member -- who takes up the cause and introduces a bill for discussion during private members' public business. But he makes a deal because the pressure is too great, the political pressure is too great. He makes a deal with the government:

"I'll introduce it as a private bill. The government won't have to go out on a limb here. We'll get it on the order paper that way. Then, on the last day of the sitting, we'll just ignore the rules and ram it through. We'll decide the issue prematurely. We won't let the parties who have a differing point of view in the city of London resolve it. We won't even wait for the city of London to come forward and request to the government that this legislation be passed."

The most unusual thing of all is I have been here five years and I have never once seen a bill changing the rules for a municipality without the municipality, by resolution, requesting those changes. But it is a new day -- "We have a New Democratic government now. We have urgent political problems to solve in the city of London. You see, we defeated the former Premier and the former Solicitor General and now we have to pay debts."

I want to tell my friend the member for London South that he starts off on a very bad course, because once we start ignoring the rules and once we start finding ways to get around the rules, we start down a terribly slippery slope, because my friend the member for London South should know that the political pressure just gets more and more severe.

He can go to London tonight -- it sounds as if we are going to adjourn tonight -- and take a bow. He can say:

"I did it. I got them to ignore the rules. I got them to change a private member's bill to an important piece of government business in the last eight days. Remember, standing order 66 says we ought not to do that, but I got them to do it. Isn't wonderful that you elected me?"

The city of London did not even ask for this bill. The city of London is very deeply divided over how this matter should be handled. "But now that I'm an MPP," says the member for London South, "I can do it all by myself, because my government understands not good policy, my government understands political expediency. My government understands political expediency when it comes to the Red Hill Expressway in Hamilton. We have to have private meetings to tell our NDP colleagues on municipal councils about decisions that are coming up so they can explain to us how to orchestrate a strategy to make sure the decision is well received."

You swear an oath when you get into cabinet that you will not violate the secrecy of cabinet. That oath does not have any qualifications to it. It does not say "except when a controversial decision is coming up which ignores a decision of an Environmental Assessment Board."

Ms Haeck: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I believe that the member for York Centre has somewhat digressed, if I may be so kind as to use such a word.

The Deputy Speaker: Thank you. The member for York Centre.

Mr Sorbara: I say to my friend the member for St Catharines-Brock that I have not digressed at all. We are talking about the rules of this House and how they are being reshaped in order for the member for London South to achieve the passage of government legislation through the most interesting little back door that I have seen in the five years I have been here. So the bill will pass. The bill is going to pass; they have a majority. The member for London South is going to be able to go to London tonight and say: "We did it, folks. I singlehandedly overcame" --

Ms Haeck: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I am sorry, but I still do believe that the member is digressing.

The Deputy Speaker: Your point has been made. Thank you very much.

Ms Haeck: Even if he is explaining this, he still seems to be digressing in that explanation. He is really not adhering to any --

The Deputy Speaker: Thank you.

Mr Sorbara: I think what I am doing is causing a little bit of embarrassment on the part of my friend for policies that she is going to have to explain to her constituents.

The bill is going to pass. The government House leader has already decided that. Notwithstanding standing order 66 and notwithstanding that the city of London has not asked for the bill, we are going to change the rules that apply. The constituents who most vigorously supported my friend the member for London South will probably be very happy. I, for one, will be very sad, not that this bill passes, but that the government could not see fit, in its first three months of office, in achieving its objectives, to simply do what is right and just, and that is to regard with a great deal of respect the rules that we ourselves have adopted to order our business in this House.

I, for one, will be delighted if these heritage buildings are preserved. I remember when Toronto's old city hall was preserved. That was a great day. This is not a great day for this Parliament, nor for the member for London South.

Mrs Cunningham: It is my responsibility this morning to rise on behalf of our party and to speak to the bill as presented by my colleague the member for London South with regard to the heritage in the city of London.

I think I will begin by addressing the comments from the member for York Centre. In a letter sent to the Premier from Cambridge Shopping Centres Ltd, which will in fact be the private sector member that will be inconvenienced somewhat by this legislation, at least over periods of time, I will say from the very beginning, it states that, "Cambridge's primary concern is with the process by which its passage is being attempted."

I will agree with the member for York Centre and I will, right up front, here in front of everyone in this House, state that I do agree we have a process that in fact is not being followed in this House. I will also agree with the member for York Centre when he said perhaps he understood that the member for London South had a reason for bringing this bill. It related to his responsibilities as a member of provincial Parliament and to the city of London, part of which he represents along with myself and the member for London Centre.

Today we have a tremendously responsible decision to make. It is not one that I am pleased to have to be part of because I am a person who supports the procedures of this House and I am a person who likes to be proud to do that. From time to time, those of us have a tremendous responsibility as we represent our communities. We are asking today that the procedures be set aside, and there is a reason for it.

At the same time in this province, those of us who represent the public recognize that our heritage is there to be preserved and our heritage is there to be passed on to our children. In this instance, it is up to the local heritage advisory committee to decide and recommend to the city of London whether or not these buildings are heritage buildings and it is up to the city of London to decide, by vote of city council, in fact that they are. Given that we in fact have an act, called the Ontario Heritage Act, that in its own way attempts to help municipalities across this province preserve their heritage buildings, I think I am entrusted this morning with the responsibility to support my city council.

On 7 May 1990, a majority of the city council decided that the buildings on Talbot Street would be heritage building sites. For want of a better way to explain that, it said to myself, and certainly others who represent the city of London, that we must do everything we can do to preserve those buildings or parts thereof, whether it be the façades, whether it be the Talbot Inn. Whatever the city council and Cambridge decide over a long period of process and negotiations would be appropriate to preserve would certainly be in the interest of the heritage buildings and the city of London.

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What we find ourselves with today is an act where the process time disappears on 4 February and we find ourselves in a position where we have not come to a conclusion that is satisfactory to either side. This is not new, I think, across the province of Ontario, but this is, at least as far as I have been able to tell, the first building that will be demolished because of an act that was considered by the former government and many members of this House, including myself, to be insufficient protection.

It will not be new to the city of London or to Cambridge to know that there was an intent on the part of the former Liberal government to change that act to make it more restrictive. In fact, in the spring of last year the minister, Christine Hart, visited the city of London, which the member for York Centre recognized in his remarks this morning, and served notice that the Ontario Heritage Act would be strengthened by that government.

It was of course the intent, I think, of this government, and certainly the member for London South in a letter that he wrote on 18 October, to move quickly along with the minister to make those changes.

There will be criticism on this process. There will never be criticism, I do not think, around the intent of the member. It would have made it a lot easier for all of us if that had happened. I am not certain whose fault it is but I will say that the criticism was directed to the government. I think there were other alternatives if in fact it had been dealt with on 18 October or shortly thereafter.

So we find ourselves with intentions and we find ourselves with the Cambridge developers being most unhappy with what is happening this morning. I can only say about this piece of legislation that there are other buildings across the province of Ontario crying out for this kind of protection today. In the city of London alone we are most fortunate. I will correct speakers: it is just the city of Toronto that has this protection; Markham did not complete the process. We probably have over 80 buildings in our municipality that have been designated under the Ontario Heritage Act. I feel all of them need the same kind of protection that we are giving this particular site this morning, if indeed this piece of legislation is passed.

The majority of London city council support the effort to introduce this legislation which will give the municipality a greater deal of control. I can only say that not because they voted on it, and I will be very clear, but I feel that the intent of the resolution last spring would, if it were consistent with the thinking of the council of that time, and as a member of provincial parliament that is the only vote that I can take seriously. This bill has certainly been in the media for the last two or three weeks and I have not seen any change in a vote of city council to give me different direction than what I had last spring. Very clearly, that is the only reason I am supporting this legislation this morning, because I have been instructed for the first time in almost three years by a vote of city council to represent my community in the best way that I see fit.

There are many misconceptions about the legislation and, I feel, some unfounded fears that have led to concern among community groups in London. I will recognize that I have had a number of groups write, as they represent citizens and their own interests, to say they are not happy with this legislation. I have also had many, many more phone calls and letters supporting it. But basically the real reason that I am voting in favour of this legislation is because of the intent of city council and the intent of the member for London South to support it in any way he can as an elected representative of our municipality at Queen's Park with his legislation.

But I will say clearly here today that Bill 18 does not stop development. It does not stop a solution to the problems that we have in developing that site in the municipality. What it might do, and this is my hope, is to get the city council and the mayor along with Cambridge talking once again about a very important piece of property in our city, one that we do not want to remain as a parking lot, but one that we hope Cambridge Shopping Centres Ltd will work with our municipality in a very positive way to develop in the best interests not only of the citizens whom they serve in their work, and very important work as they provide services, but I think one that will also meet the needs of our citizens and their children for years and years to come by preserving whatever part of that heritage property can be preserved sensibly. I would urge, because I think we have all been put through, I think, rather strong negotiations from both sides, that people grow up on this issue and show some leadership and get on with it.

One of my great concerns is that the courts and municipal boards are used when common sense should be used. If I can do anything to get our mayor and the president of Cambridge Shopping Centres Ltd together in meaningful discussion, maybe along with my two colleagues -- I have not discussed it -- I think there is a solution to this. I do not like to represent a city that seems to be dug in on planning. I do not like to think that a developer would not be speaking openly and positively with our municipality. In spite of their private interests and in spite of providing jobs, providing an enhanced living for our citizens, I think they too have a responsibility to get down and talk. The big problem with the Ontario Heritage Act, given the time frame, is both sides have allowed it to elapse. We are now giving them another opportunity to get down and talk business and get something done for the municipality which I serve.

In closing, I would like to say that I know there will be great criticism around the processes in this House and I would hope that all the members of this Legislative Assembly will not again be subjected to the breaking of the rules as we have been today. I do not think it is our intent, and I would hope it would not be the government's intent, to have this happen frequently. Perhaps we have all learned a lesson very early in the tenure of this government, that people are hurt when rules are broken.

Today, I do not think anybody needs to be hurt directly or indirectly. I think this is an opportunity for people to get together, both sides, both Cambridge and the city of London, and to come to some sensible, mature solution around that particular development and around the preservation, where possible, whether it be a building or a streetscape or otherwise, in the best interest of the citizens of London whom I serve in this House.

Mr G. Wilson: I am pleased to be arising to speak to this debate, this very crucial debate, in support of my colleague and seatmate, the member for London South.

This is the first time I rise to speak in this House and it gives me the opportunity to acknowledge the heritage of stewardship created by my predecessors in this position, most recently represented in the person of Ken Keyes.

I think we have had some discussion about the process involved here and of course that process has evolved over our experience in the House, a very important one, I think we would all agree, and one that we want to sensitively deal with and, where necessary, modify. Like any heritage, it is there to be built upon, to be used creatively and strengthened.

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Second, I would like to mention the fact that I am the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Culture and Communications and very excited to be involved in the creation of new policies in that ministry, in particular a new heritage act. Certainly, the ministry is well aware of the importance of local people taking the initiative in the preservation of culture in their particular area, but we realize they need support from the Ministry of Culture and Communications. That support will be there in a strengthened heritage bill which will be introduced in the near future after consultation with the people throughout the province who are actively engaged in the preservation of the heritage in their areas.

I want to say too that as a resident of Kingston -- in fact, part of the reason we moved to Kingston was because of its fame for its preservation of its historic buildings and other areas of heritage. It is very important that the steps taken in Kingston be emulated throughout the province.

In particular, it is well known that Kingston has a number of limestone buildings. Local residents are aware of this priceless heritage and have taken steps to ensure that future generations also enjoy the area's rich past. Kingston may have the greatest number of 19th century buildings of architectural merit of any city in Ontario. Many of our public buildings are outstanding in their design and decoration.

It is not by accident that so many magnificent buildings remain standing. The need to adopt measures to protect the city's historic architectural heritage has long been recognized by the citizens of Kingston. Kingston was the first city in Ontario to be given authority by the province to pass bylaws to designate buildings of historic or architectural interest. It was given this authority on its own request in 1970, five years before the Ontario Heritage Act came into force. The city had 30 designated buildings on its list then; now it has well over 500. Kingston was also the first municipality in Ontario to have a heritage conservation district designated. We now boast two such areas, the village of Barriefield and Market Square.

Kingston has been in the forefront of the movement of heritage conservation in the province. My constituents know that it is not so much preserving the past as it is building our future, enriched by the experiences and legacies of previous generations.

I would like to say too that fate has taken a rather tragic hand in this debate this week in the burning of a historic barn in an area of my constituency. As I mentioned, a barn is in a rural area. Sometimes we forget about the valuable heritage that exists in that area as well.

I would like to read a couple of paragraphs from the news reports of this tragedy. The building was owned by Dr Westenberg, not only a medical doctor but a diplomatic representative for the Netherlands. A couple of paragraphs describing the incident:

"He has been active in historical preservation projects and was deeply hurt by the loss of the barn, that he valued highly as an example of craftsmanship and history that is disappearing with time from the countryside. 'The area's historic buildings fit into the countryside the way furnishings complete a room in a home. My whole idea of preservation was in that barn.'

"Located beside the road, the barn had been the focus of many drawings and photographs. It was built in the old style a century or more ago with square timbers that were fitted together and held with pegs instead of the nails that became common later."

I think those of us who can tear ourselves away from the riveting debate in this building sometimes notice the marvellous decoration of this building. Many of the skills that went into designing this building have been lost and I think that is another reason that we would all agree requires the kind of support for heritage that this bill speaks to and that the Ministry of Culture and Communications is committed to.

There is also the international community which has recognized the importance of heritage and culture. In 1982, at the World Conference on Cultural Policies, UNESCO identified the connection between heritage and cultural policies and problems of growth and change.

I think we can safely say, then, that heritage conservation is not a preoccupation with the past. It is the basis on which to build our future.

Mr Sterling: I have only a few minutes to speak and I just wanted to say that while we are generally in support of this measure, we have some concerns, which the member for York Centre has raised. I think the problem arises from the fact that a private bill, if brought by the city of London to this Legislature, would enable the people who were affected in London to bring their concerns to a committee of this Legislature and then the committee of the Legislature would make its decision after hearing the concerns of not only members speaking on this bill, but also people from the actual area.

I guess another part that concerns us is that this now is the third municipality which has sought to strengthen the Ontario Heritage Act. I believe that Markham and the city of Toronto both have this kind of jurisdiction, which they have received from the province of Ontario. There is a concern if it spreads wider and wider without considering the overall policies and the structure of how it is to be done.

In my view, legislation that is brought in in a private bill at the request of a municipality does not undergo the same rigour and examination of the processes that are there, not only to properly protect the right of a municipality to protect heritage buildings, but it also does not address the right of the owner of that particular property.

One thing that concerns me about this bill is that the proposer of the bill, the member for London South, specifically referred to a project in the city of London in his remarks. That is what this bill is all about. That is not what legislation should be about in this place. It should be about creating rules which are generic in form and apply to all heritage properties, hopefully in all of Ontario, but in this case in the city of London.

The member for London South, by narrowing down on the Talbot Street property, has in effect admitted that what this bill is doing is usurping the rights of one owner of what he understood the law to be today. We are today amending those rights unilaterally without his right to be heard. That is what we find objectionable in this process. We think it could have been done another way, but we accept that in case we must proceed with it as it is.

Hon Mrs Boyd: I too am rising for the first time in this House to speak as the member for London Centre. I am delighted to have the opportunity to do so with respect to this particular bill.

I am also pleased that the member for York Centre brought up the politics of this situation because I think it is extremely important for this House to recognize the part that politics has played in our getting to this point today. I also regret that this bill needed to be brought in this way, but the political situation which surrounded this particular bill is well known to the people in London and ought to be well known to the people in this House.

It is customary, when you rise for the first time, to talk about your predecessor. My predecessor, the former Premier of the province, built his political reputation in the mid-1970s as a heritage conserver in the city of London when he took action to protect the Middlesex county courthouse from demolition. Therefore, it is not surprising that the people of London Centre expected their member to be very vigorous in defence of the Talbot streetscape and the other heritage properties that have been demolished in the city of London, and those that may be demolished and certainly are slated to be demolished if the developers involved have their way.

The whole issue in London is not a new one. It has been raging on for at least the last five years in a very public way, as anyone who reads our local press or has been aware of our local political situation will understand. Citizens in London have been very vigorous in their defence, partly of the Talbot streetscape, but also the other buildings that have been demolished. Those have included the Sir Adam Beck House, which was demolished supposedly to be renovated and put back together on a scale model by another developer who currently seeks to destroy yet another heritage property in London North.

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The Premier had been swamped, throughout his term from 1985 to 1990, by requests from the citizens of London, including the heritage associations, to bring in changes to the Ontario Heritage Act that would allow exactly what the effect of this bill allows. He delayed and he delayed. He did not do so because he was aware, as members are aware, that there is controversy about this. We would be foolish, those of us from London, to deny that there is controversy. There certainly is not a unified position within our community around heritage buildings and I know that lack of unity is true across the province.

The import of this bill and the changes that we all had asked the former Premier to make in the heritage act gives, in fact, the responsibility back to the municipality in a very real way so that that decision is made at the local level. Because of the way the heritage act reads now, once a designation is made there is a time period, the clock begins to tick. We are simply saying and are wanting to enact in this bill a position in which the city council is given the responsibility to issue a demolition permit or to hold off until a building permit is issued in order to permit demolition. That puts it back into the local decision-making power and we think that is very important.

It does mean that a very highly divided city council is going to face decisions in an election year which are going to be difficult for them and we recognize that. But that is the appropriate arena for this decision to be made, and the city council in London needs to make a decision as to whether they are prepared to allow the demolition of yet another major heritage building and streetscape, which is the one that is particularly urgent at this point since 4 February is demolition day. They have the decision-making power to determine that. We believe that it is appropriate for them to do so. The way the act reads now, they have no decision-making power. They have designated the property as heritage.

They have also made a decision based on their financial accountability that they cannot expropriate or pay for the buildings to be maintained. So they are saying, "We do not want these buildings maintained if it is going to cost the citizens of London money, but we equally do not want yet another devastation of our heritage." We do not want yet another addition to the city block which is now empty of anything but a parking lot in the very heart of my riding.

So, I would urge the members of this House to recognize that this extraordinary measure is necessary in order to buy the time that is necessary to prevent demolition by an intransigent owner who has refused every opportunity to negotiate this situation with the city, has refused offers of purchase that would have maintained the landscape and has refused to incorporate the landscape into any plans that have been submitted to the city thus far.

Ms Haeck: I rise in support of this bill. I live in a historically designated area. In fact, as a result of that designation my own home is a historically designated building. I know about the process through which the local architectural conservation advisory committee undergoes such a designation. It took, for my particular property for my particular block, in fact well over two years of consultation with the municipalities, with the actual residents, home owners of those properties as well as the local architectural conservation society hiring consultants, the city hiring consultants. So we are talking about a very long process where everyone, including the owners of those buildings, being well informed about what is going to be happening.

The Queen Street historical area in St Catharines, as I say, took over two years to be designated. It is in fact true that when properties are designated, they are not only designated because they achieved a historical status, but they also achieved financial value. I think we have to recognize that tourism today includes people visiting communities because of historical buildings. Quebec City itself plays up very largely the fact that the old town exists; Montreal plays up the fact that an old town exists. Why are we facing the destruction of our historical heritage? We are losing tourism dollars in doing so.

I personally advocate that each community should be undertaking an inventory of significant buildings and making every effort to save these structures because of their financial advantage to the community. It provides a visual record of the history, but it also adds financial value.

As a librarian who has worked for a number of years in the local history department of her local library, I see a strong need for this kind of legislation, legislation which would finally provide an important element of this province's history, the kind of protection it truly needs. Our history should not be the pawn of business interests, interests that see advantage only in parking lots.

We as a province have lost much to the wrecker's ball because the Ontario Heritage Act, an act which should be there to protect those buildings, has absolutely no teeth at all. What it should do is to protect our heritage, but it is represented in the wrecker's ball and it really needs -- When in fact our government proposes its legislation, I will be strongly working to make sure that the Victorian architecture out there gets the same kind of protection as our art heritage as well as our works of literature.

The member for York Centre fails to understand that these buildings are imperilled.

Mr Winninger: I certainly appreciate the concerns about process voiced both by the member for York Centre and also the member for Carleton. However, they know, as I do, that the clock has all but run out. I did not direct this particular piece of legislation to one development in particular but the fact is, the Talbot Street block is one development in particular that London can still save by reassuming control over the manner in which demolition permits are issued. All this bill speaks to is the need for a building permit before a property is demolished.

With the time running out, I appreciate the activities of the member for London North and certainly for London Centre in supporting this bill. I certainly appreciate the support that the various House leaders have given to facilitate speedy passage of this bill.

I would conclude by saying that all members of the House who have spoken today seem to acknowledge the political will to achieve this kind of political objective.

Mr Cousens: Mr Speaker, on a point of order: The honourable member just said he was not applying to any specific development or anything. Is that really what the member was saying and meant? He has 26 seconds to answer. It is a good question.

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The Deputy Speaker: The time provided for private members' public business has expired.

We will deal first with ballot item 3, standing in the name of Mr Runciman. If any members are opposed to a vote on this ballot item, will they please rise?

INSURANCE AMENDMENT ACT, 1990

The Deputy Speaker: Mr Runciman has moved second reading of Bill 20, an Act to amend the Insurance Act.

Motion agreed to.

Pursuant to standing order 94(f) the recorded vote on this ballot item is deferred.

CITY OF LONDON ACT, 1990

The Deputy Speaker: Mr Winninger moved second reading of Bill 18, An Act respecting the City of London. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those opposed will please say "nay." All those in favour will please say "aye."

In my opinion the ayes have it.

Motion agreed to.

Bill ordered for third reading. 1208

The House divided on Mr Runciman's motion, which was agreed to on the following vote:

Ayes -- 62

Abel, Bisson, Boyd, Buchanan, Carr, Carter, Charlton, Cooper, Coppen, Cousens, Cunningham, Dadamo, Drainville, Duignan, Eves, Fletcher, Frankford, Grier, Haeck, Hansen, Harnick, Harrington, Harris, Haslam, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Jordan, Klopp, MacKinnon, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martel, Mathyssen, McLean, Mills, Morrow, Murdoch, B., Murdock, S., O'Connor, Owens, Perruzza, Runciman, Silipo, Sterling, Stockwell, Sutherland, Swarbrick, Turnbull, Villeneuve, Ward, B., Ward, M., Waters, White, Wilson, F., Wilson, G., Winninger, Wiseman, Witmer, Wood, Ziemba.

Nays -- 9

Chiarelli, Cooke, Elston, Gigantes, McClelland, Phillips, G., Sola, Sorbara, Sullivan.

The Deputy Speaker: Pursuant to standing order 94(k) the bill is referred to the committee of the whole House.

Mr Runciman: I understand that later today the House will revert to private members' business. I would respectfully suggest that my bill be treated the same as Mr Winninger's and I be granted unanimous consent that the bill be ordered for third reading.

The Deputy Speaker: Is there unanimous consent?

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please. There is no consent.

Mr Runciman: Based on the regrettable response from the government, I would ask for consent that the bill be referred to the standing committee on administration of justice.

The Deputy Speaker: Shall this bill be referred to the standing committee on administration of justice?

All those in favour of this question will please rise and remain standing.

Please take your seats.

All of those opposed will please rise.

Please resume your seats.

The majority of the House not being in agreement with the request of the member, this bill is referred to the committee of the whole House.

Mr Sterling: I think it is important to note, because the names were not recorded in that last vote, that the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party supported it going out to committee and all of the New Democratic Party opposed that motion.

The House recessed at 1214.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1330.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

SPECIAL EDUCATION

Mr Beer: The issue of special education is and must be a critical one for all members of this Legislature. One of the fundamental goals of government is to protect those who cannot protect themselves and make it possible for each child to fulfil his or her own potential.

Over the past decade, different governments have worked to provide greater access to a whole range of educational and employment services for those with special needs. But we know that much more remains to be done. The educational system is the key to ensuring that those with special needs will have a greater opportunity to lead fuller and more productive lives.

The former government had committed to bring in major legislative changes to the provision of special education in the province. These amendments were to have been presented this fall to the Legislature. The proposed changes were the result of several years of work and public consultation.

Of particular interest to the special education community were proposed changes to enhance the rights of parents to change the current composition of appeal boards for the appropriate placement of students and to expand the placement options for students with special needs.

The children and parents for whom these amendments are intended have waited long enough. The amendments have been drafted. The new government has had plenty of time to review them. They are needed, and they are needed now. When will this government finally act and bring forward the necessary legislation?

LANDFILL SITE

Mr Eves: I rise in the House today to bring the McDougall landfill site to the attention of the Minister of the Environment. I want to address this issue, which continues to plague the township of McDougall and surrounding municipalities. The problem is a direct result of an order issued under section 29 of the Environmental Protection Act, ordering the township to assume the responsibility to operate the dump site.

A plume of leachate which has migrated from the dump and into the marsh, stream and on to neighbouring properties precipitated this order.

The township of McDougall cannot afford to place the ratepayers at risk. The ministry has failed to guarantee the necessary funding over the anticipated cost of operating the problematic site, nor has it provided a commitment to the municipalities or compensation against future liability for having complied with this order.

The Parry Sound area must have a proper place for waste. An alternative site must be found.

McDougall township officials have made several requests to meet with the Minister of the Environment to resolve this issue of liability, which has been outstanding since September of 1989. The township of McDougall has been willing to co-operate as much as possible. However, it, along with other Ontario municipalities, as demonstrated by the passing of a resolution at the annual convention of the AMO, is asking the Ministry of the Environment to assume its share of the responsibilities .

During a recent telephone conversation with the township reeve, the minister's assistant indicated that the minister was preoccupied with finding a waste site for Toronto's garbage. I hate to disturb the minister from her preoccupation with this endeavour. However, I would ask her if she would kindly sit down to meet with officials from McDougall to resolve their problem.

JACK KENNEDY

Mrs MacKinnon: Today Lambton county is quiet. The music man, Jack Kennedy, a gentle man as sweet as the music he played, passed away on Sunday. A lifelong resident of Lambton county, he was easily recognized in the music industry. He was a master of piano, organ and accordion. Thousands of young people and old were entertained by Mr Kennedy at places like Kenwick on the Lake and Kenwick Terrace.

He was a leader in the big band era. Jack, as everyone called him, was a charter member of the St Clair Parkway Commission formed in 1966, and served as chairman from 1970 to 1981. The parkway along the St Clair River is a tribute to the vision of citizenship and civic spirit that Kennedy demonstrated all his life.

He was also a woodworker, yachtsman and, most of all, a family man and a friend to the young and the not so young. The shopping malls and seniors' residence will be quieter now as Jack will not be there to play for them.

Jack's family, the parkway and his music are a legacy that will be treasured by all of Lambton county and the province of Ontario.

Left to celebrate his life are his wife, Genevieve, their four children, grandchildren and those in Lambton and throughout Ontario who had the pleasure of knowing Jack and hearing his music for 73 years. All of us will remember Jack and be truly grateful to have shared in his life.

'THE RAE-MAN'

Mr Sola:

Once upon a time, seems so long ago,

There was a party in Ontario.

Their leader, the Rae-man, used this lore,

Quoth he, "Consult and spend -- evermore!"

The People's Agenda let everyone know

All of the answers to our every woe.

Which was stated as clearly as before,

To quote the Rae-man, "Evermore!"

When, much to even their own surprise,

Voters bought the NDP enterprise,

The people expected to be in store,

Was, to quote the Rae-man, "Evermore!"

Now in power, they are on a roll.

All their promises are out of control.

Their change in message their friends abhor,

Rae's changed their tune to "Nevermore!"

Floyd in Treasury has changed his hue

From bright pink to deep Tory blue.

Ed Flip has flopped, in days of yore

Quoth this Rae-man, "53-footers -- Nevermore!"

Cowboy Pete on insurance will consult

All of those he did not insult.

Green Ruth's decrees will even the score,

Her list targets regions wanting dumps "Nevermore!"

Dave, the tenants from rent did free,

And Cooke-d the goose of Labour's Bob Mackenzie.

Now tenants and landlords and labour are sore,

There's no fixing of buildings, no jobs -- "Nevermore!"

The NDP tax revolt you cannot ignore,

Stand on your heads to be where you stood before.

Can we trust them heretofore?

To quote that Rae-man -- "Nevermore!"

With apologies to The Raven and Edgar Allan Poe.

HEALTH CARE FINANCING

Mr Jackson: I want to call the attention of all members of the House to the serious situation of provincial health care underfunding which continues to face Ontario hospitals and especially Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital in Burlington, which could be forced to cut up to as many as 30 badly needed beds as a result.

Members will be aware that Liberal mismanagement of our health care delivery system was the straw that broke the former government's back during the last provincial election. Burlington's Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital, for example, never received the 180 additional beds it was promised by that government.

But what has changed under the NDP government? There is nothing in the throne speech to indicate that health care will not continue to be relegated to the back of the line of government policy priorities. When it came to this new NDP Health minister, the people of Ontario were expecting support for hospitals to deal with the new realities they have been dealing with alone, such as the employer health payroll tax, pay equity and increased wages for health care and hospital workers. Instead, they got a minister who has done nothing to improve matters, who has continued to lower hospital funding -- and this is at the same time that her government is dragging its feet on the release of transfer payments.

The people of Burlington are outraged at this government's indifference to the funding crisis facing Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital. The time for rhetoric is over. Ontario hospitals cannot continue to operate under this government's cynical Band-Aid approach to health care funding.

TAXATION

Ms M. Ward: One of the key yardsticks of fairness in government policy is our taxation system. I think we face a great danger if our taxation system is not fair or is not perceived to be fair. A taxation system depends, as do many of our other government policies, on achieving a social consensus. Even if we do not believe that a system is ideal for us as individuals, we will accept it if we believe it offers the best for society as a whole.

In my riding of Don Mills, the question I have been asked most frequently in the last few months is, "Is there any way that the GST can be stopped?" I do not intend to dwell on the GST, but I believe it is another blow to that social consensus. If people do not believe the rules are fair, a certain number of people will stop playing by the rules.

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Recently, I have had a couple of experiences in small retail shops where the sales clerks have asked me if I wanted to pay sales tax. I did pay it. I will look at the Minister of Revenue to make sure she heard that. While these two instances do not indicate a trend necessarily, I believe they are a warning signal we have to pay attention to, and that people are beginning to feel the system is not fair and are angry about it.

That is why I was excited about the announcement in the throne speech of the Fair Tax Commission. Fair taxes are a major concern to my constituents. They are willing to pay their fair share and no more.

CANADIAN FORCES OVERSEAS

Mr Morin: As the holiday season approaches, it automatically evokes a feeling of warmth in our hearts. It is a time for reflection, nostalgia and the gathering together of close family and friends. In just a few days, we members of this House will join our own families to celebrate this special time of year.

Yet, as we do so, let us not forget our brave fellow Canadians stationed in the Persian Gulf, who will not have the good fortune of spending this holiday in the company of their loved ones. Let us also think of the friends and relatives who anxiously await their safe return. The sentimentality we experience as celebrations draw near is heightened for those troops who must prepare to spend these days far from home. The uncertainty of the situation in the Persian Gulf contributes to the sense of suspension among the soldiers.

I can understand the feelings of these young men and women at this time of year. In 1953, 37 years ago, I was in Korea as a young officer with the Royal 22nd Regiment. A Christmas package from my mother meant the world to me. I can still recall the smell of that Christmas cake in a tin from home, which was a symbol that somebody was thinking of me.

Let our thoughts extend to Canadian service personnel overseas at this special time of year. Let us pay tribute to the people who play this essential role in honouring Canada's commitment to the world community in the pursuit of peace and security in the region. À tous mes collègues et à tous mes camarades militaires : Joyeux Noël et bonne et heureuse année.

SCHOOL ACCOMMODATION

Mr Tilson: Like many high schools in high-growth areas, the Dufferin-Peel Roman Catholic Separate School Board in my riding has sustained overcrowding and extremely long travelling time to and from school. Up to three hours travelling time per day is now spent by young people in my riding travelling to and from school. Students in the Dufferin-Peel area are now obliged to travel to a new school outside my riding, to Brampton's Notre Dame Secondary School, where portables have now been increased to more than 30. Young people in both my riding and the riding to the south are therefore receiving unequal education.

The solution agreed to by the Ministry of Education and the school board was the construction of Northern Secondary School in Caledon East. The land has been purchased and is awaiting construction. Last year the Ministry of Education failed to provide the funding as promised.

I ask the new Minister of Education to give this matter top priority now and give full funding early in 1991 to alleviate this very serious problem of overcrowding and excessive and unnecessary travel by young people in Dufferin-Peel.

SKI HILL BLUES

Mr Owens: I rise today to speak about an exciting project taking place in the city of Scarborough. The program Ski Hill Blues was initiated by Toronto Police Commission Chair June Rowlands, and is financially supported by the police commission.

In co-operation with the Scarborough Board of Education, Metro Toronto Housing Authority and Tropicana Community Services, 40 children in grades 7 and 8 are given lessons in downhill skiing, as well as special attention given to the development of life skills and an awareness of the social issues facing youth today.

I would like to extend the thanks of this Legislature to the following groups and individuals: Pat Tallon, Chair of Ski Hill Blues; Jennifer Murdock, MTHA; Annie Payne, Tropicana; Blaine Bell, Canadian Ski Patrol; Michael Belec, Uplands Ski Club; Detective Janet Neate, PC Phil Semple, Inspector Karl Davis, Staff Inspector Tony Farrell, Sergeant Harry Ward, PC Ed Bain; Norm Clements, National Sports Ltd; and the auxiliary police officers who act as drivers for this group.

One last thought: I would like to wish the visitors and my fellow members in this Assembly a very merry and safe Christmas.

LEGISLATIVE PAGES

The Speaker: Before we continue with our normal proceedings, I would like, with the indulgence of the House, to take a couple of minutes. First, all of us may be aware that there is a very special group of people who have been with us for some time, and this is indeed their last day on the job. I trust that all of us feel the same way, that they have served this House and the members extremely well, and that is the pages. Could you show your appreciation for their fine work?

LEGISLATIVE STAFF

The Speaker: I would also like to take this opportunity to extend very best wishes for a well-deserved rest and happy holidays to the more than 400 women and men who serve us in the assembly: the Sergeant at Arms and the legislative attendants, the Clerk and his staff, the broadcasting and recording service, Hansard, language services branch, the staff of the office of the comptroller, the legislative library staff, assembly services, the legislative building services and the security staff. I know I speak on behalf of all the members when I say that these more than 400 individuals help to make our lives much easier and help us to do our job well. Perhaps we could show our appreciation for the work they do.

PARLIAMENTARY PRIVILEGE

Mr Cousens: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: I rise on a question of privilege of which I have given you notice. I wish to deal with a matter that constitutes not only a breach of privilege but a contempt of Parliament and a disrespect for this Legislature. I rise to this point of privilege as defined in Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms: "Parliamentary privilege is the sum of the peculiar rights enjoyed by each House collectively...and by members of each House individually, without which they could not discharge their functions and which exceed those possessed by other bodies or individuals."

I feel that my job and responsibility as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario and as a legislator is to represent and to serve the best interests of the people of Ontario. Yet circumstances have arisen which make it impossible for me, as cited by Beauchesne, to discharge my function as a member of the House. Yesterday in this chamber we were informed that a major policy document had been released by the Minister of the Environment. We did not become aware of this occurrence through the customary practice of ministerial disclosure but rather through a question and subsequent confirmation put forth by the member for Oxford and the Minister of the Environment respectively.

The Legislative Assembly Act, paragraph 45(1)6, defines a breach of privilege as, "Giving false evidence or prevaricating or misbehaving in giving evidence or refusing to give evidence or to produce papers before the assembly or a committee thereof."

I am not accusing anyone of deceit or prevarication per se. I am simply trying to establish a prima facie case of privilege. On a number of occasions in the past several weeks, responses to questions placed by members of the government side have resulted in the disclosure of information that should have more appropriately been tabled before this House by way of ministerial statement. The discussion document released yesterday, to everyone, it would seem, except members of the opposition, is a crucial component of the minister's environmental protection policy for the people of Ontario.

How can I, as a member of this Legislature, determine what is best for the people of Ontario when the government discloses important information in a way which prevents us from determining whether people would be adversely or positively affected by this policy initiative?

It is we, as mandated by the people of Ontario, we as the fiduciary of the people, and we, on behalf of the people of Ontario, who are here to serve the best interests of Ontario citizens. The manner in which this information was disclosed and the flagrant disregard in informing members of the opposition until it was deemed appropriate by the government constitutes a breach of the rights and privileges of all members and a contempt of Parliament.

I point out that the definition of contempt contained in the 21st edition of Erskine May's Parliamentary Practice, chapter 9, page 115, is as follows: "Any act of omission which obstructs or impedes either House of Parliament in the performance of its functions, or which obstructs or impedes any member or officer of such House in the discharge of his duty, or which has a tendency, directly or indirectly, to produce such results may be treated as a contempt even though there is no precedent of the offence."

Mr Speaker, I put before you and submit to you that this is a significant question of privilege covering the issue of contempt. If you find a prima facie case, I am prepared to move the appropriate motion.

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The Speaker: To the member for Markham, first I appreciate the fact that you gave prior notice to the Chair, and secondly I take your point seriously; I will take it under advisement and I will report back to you at my earliest convenience.

USE OF QUESTION PERIOD

The Speaker: This would also actually be a good opportunity to speak to the House regarding a matter which was raised yesterday. During yesterday's question period, the honourable member for Mississauga North raised a point of order regarding the use of question period by ministers to make statements under the guise of answers to questions from members of their own caucus.

Following question period, the honourable member for Parry Sound raised a similar point of order, which was contributed to by a number of honourable members. I want to thank everyone for their contributions. I have reviewed Hansard and given this matter some thought, which I am now prepared to share with you.

First of all, there can be no doubt that our standing orders and practice permit a certain number of questions to be asked of ministers during question period each day which originate from members of the government caucus. A restriction to this is that a parliamentary secretary cannot ask a question of the minister under whom she or he serves regarding the subject matter field pertaining to that minister.

The chair takes very seriously the point made by the member for Mississauga North and the member for Parry Sound that answers to questions should not be used to present to the House changes in government policy. Members will know that our standing orders provide a specific time period each day during routine proceedings for that type of announcement. The procedure for statements by the ministry also provides for replies on the part of members of the opposition parties. I therefore agree with the honourable members who made these points yesterday that question period should definitely not be used for presenting changes in government policy.

I must caution honourable members, however, that although the Chair tries to be vigilant in these matters, sometimes the skill displayed by the questioner and the minister providing the answer is such that it is difficult for the Speaker to identify what might or might not constitute a change in government policy.

I have looked at the questions and answers of yesterday's question period and I will take this occasion to tell the Minister of Labour that his answer yesterday to the question asked by the member for Dovercourt was indeed borderline and could be interpreted to be an announcement of new government policy. In conclusion therefore, members were perfectly right to raise this. It is indeed a point of order, and ministers should be aware that new government policy should be announced during the time provided for it under our standing orders and not during question period.

Hon Mrs Grier: Mr Speaker, I would like to comment if I may, or at least clarify the statement made by the member for Markham in his point of order, because I think I did make this point to you yesterday. In my ministerial statement on 21 November 1990, I announced that I would be releasing the discussion paper with respect to improvements to the Environmental Assessment Act. The question which I was asked yesterday asked for clarification of that announcement. I apologize profoundly for the way it was --

Mr Elston: On a point of order, Mr Speaker, I understand that the member for Markham, who earlier rose, had expressed a personal point of privilege. You have taken it under advisement, and this speech, although perhaps entertaining for some, is not appropriate here and it is in fact out of order when it is dealing with a personal point of privilege.

The Speaker: The member for Bruce may recall that it is perfectly in order for the Speaker to entertain anything which is germane to a point of order or privilege raised; so provided that it is not repetitious and provided that it will assist the chair in determining whether or not the point of order is valid -- you may recall that just yesterday, because members were able to give me additional information, I then was able to rule and I presented the ruling here today. If you wish further clarification, I would direct the member to Beauchesne and Erskine May, both sources which I am sure the member is familiar with.

Mr Eves: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: It is my understanding that the honourable member has asked you to rule prima facie whether there is a point of personal privilege here or not. Is what you are telling the House now, as the Chairperson of the House, that every time a member raises a point of personal privilege, any number of members, as long as they are raising new and interesting facts with respect to the point of privilege, are going to be given an opportunity to participate in the point of privilege? If indeed that is now going to become the custom of the House -- it has not been the custom in the House since I have been here in the last 10 years -- it just would be nice if we knew what those rules are and how many members from each party are going to be able to talk on each point of personal privilege.

The Speaker: To the member for Parry Sound, I do not know about the interesting aspect, but certainly new information has always been a practice. This is not anything new; this is simply established parliamentary practice. Of course, the Chair does not care to entertain repetitious points, but if it is pertinent to the point of privilege raised --

Mr Sorbara: Well, how do you know until after you have heard it?

The Speaker: That is right. That is precisely why the Speaker will listen to something which is germane to the point raised.

Hon Mrs Grier: I will conclude by saying I regretted the fact that the question had been asked of me before the report had been distributed to members opposite. I understand that it was left in their mailboxes, not sent to their offices, and I apologize for that. We will know better how to do these things in March.

The Speaker: I understood that there were other members of the House who wanted to rise on a point of -- no? Ministers' statements.

Hon Miss Martel: Mr Speaker, if I might, there will be three ministerial statements today and two more have been added, the second two with the unanimous consent of the two other House leaders. It is my understanding that with all five, we will go probably beyond the 20 minutes allocated for ministerial statements. I would ask now for consent for those to continue and then add the additional time on to each of the two opposition parties.

The Speaker: Have all five statements been circulated to the opposition?

Hon Miss Martel: The last two will not be distributed. We have asked for unanimous consent because the two members involved will be making both a clarification and apologies to the House. I did not expect that would require statements to be distributed because it is not with respect to their ministries but involvement in a particular issue.

The Speaker: Is that agreeable?

Agreed to.

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

ADVOCACY AND GUARDIANSHIP

Hon Ms Ziemba: Before I make my statement I would like to extend season's greetings to all members of the House.

Last month in the speech from the throne this government set out our social policy agenda. That agenda is to create in Ontario a supportive environment where all people, including the most vulnerable among us, can meet their full potential with hope and dignity.

One issue that demands our urgent attention is how to protect the rights and wellbeing of vulnerable adults. As we said in the throne speech, reports on advocacy for Ontario's most vulnerable citizens have been gathering dust far too long. We have known for a long time that there has been a consensus within the disabled community and among Ontario's senior citizens that a comprehensive advocacy system is needed, and I think I must add as a personal note: I too have joined that.

I am pleased to tell members that this government is going to replace words with action. We will develop three pieces of legislation for introduction early in the spring sitting. They are: the Advocacy Act, the Substitute Decisions Act and the Health Services Consent Act.

As Minister of Citizenship with responsibility for disabled persons and senior citizens, I am making this announcement on behalf of the ministers of Health, Community and Social Services and the Attorney General.

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The centrepiece is the advocacy initiative. This act will, for the first time, provide a system of advocacy for vulnerable adults which allows their concerns to be heard and their rights protected.

Ontario has approximately 600,000 citizens, including the frail elderly, with moderate to severe disabilities. Their impairments may be mental, physical or both. Most of these people can solve their own problems in daily living or have the support of family and friends to assist them. However, some of them do not have such support. They are the people we refer to as vulnerable adults. They may be residents in institutions or living in the community and who may suffer from neglect, abuse or exploitation. These are our fellow citizens who have been long abandoned and forgotten. If Ontario is to be a compassionate and caring society, we cannot allow such injustice to continue. The late Father O'Sullivan eloquently stated in his 1987 report, which was entitled You've Got a Friend:

"Regardless of physical or mental illness and/or impairment, vulnerable persons must have the power to make decisions and exercise their right of choice. People are people, whether or not they have identifiable handicaps. The advocacy system is designed to foster a vulnerable individual's sense of dignity as a valuable contributing citizen of Ontario."

At this point, I would also like to recognize the hard work of Stephen Fram, who initiated a report called the Fram report, which helped build the framework for this particular piece of legislation.

The development of a new Advocacy Act will establish a province-wide independent system of non-legal social advocacy for vulnerable adults. The advocacy system will deal with rights, personal care and systemic concerns.

These concerns will be addressed by the rights advocates, who will visit persons who may lose their right to make decisions as a result of guardianship or other intervention. They will advise vulnerable adults of their rights and options in the matter and make certain that their wishes are heard. The case advocates will provide assistance to individuals both in institutions and in the community. The systemic advocates will concentrate on identifying injustices or abuses and bringing about changes in law, rules, regulations, policies and practices that affect groups of vulnerable adults.

These services will be developed and administered by an independent advocacy commission. Its membership will be appointed by order in council on the advice of a broadly based committee representing the vulnerable adult population.

The initiative on substitute decision-making and guardianship is being led by the Ministry of the Attorney General. Under this initiative, the Mental Incompetency Act will be repealed and related statutes will be amended. In their place there will be a new Substitute Decisions Act. This new act will provide for a power of attorney for personal care so that any capable adult could plan his affairs to allow for future mental incapacity by naming a substitute decision-maker. This mechanism will allow individuals to choose in advance the types of medical treatment they would accept or refuse. Other provisions in this legislation will call for the expansion of the current office of the public trustee to the office of the public guardian and trustee.

The health services consent initiative will be led by the Ministry of Health. It will clearly define the right and responsibility of individuals, health service providers and substitute decision-makers in giving or obtaining the consent of the individual to health services. This will allow for quick and accessible substitute decision-making that, for example, will meet the acute care needs of persons whose mental incapacity is only temporary or fluctuating, such as accident victims with head injuries.

I have outlined only the highlights of our initiatives. For greater detail, I invite the members to examine the backgrounder that has been prepared to accompany this statement. I am certainly available for any questions, if members have any.

Let me conclude by saying that these three pieces of legislation will be introduced in tandem for first reading early in the spring session. Extensive and thorough consultation will take place. These initiatives will produce legislation to take effect in 1992. Let me re-emphasize that with these initiatives we will create an environment in which vulnerable adults in Ontario can live with rights and dignity.

DEVELOPMENTALLY DISABLED

Hon Mrs Akande: I am pleased to inform the Legislature today of the government's renewed commitment to providing improved opportunities for community living for people with developmental disabilities across Ontario. These opportunities strengthen the existing systems of support and introduce new measures, address current concerns and help communities to become more responsive to the needs of their members.

At the beginning of November, I promised to review the most effective ways to provide community living opportunities for residents of provincially operated institutions. To accomplish this task, I placed a temporary hold on community placement plans for these individuals. Over the past weeks, meetings have been held with representatives from People First, a consumer advocacy group, the Ontario Association for Community Living, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union and the Federation of Ontario Facility Liaison Groups.

Through these meetings we have gained a clear understanding of each group's positions, views and concerns. Our discussions were frank and, in my opinion, beneficial. We spoke about the importance of planning together for the individual placement of residents from provincially operated institutions into community settings, how to improve these plans for community living and allow residents an even better quality of life and the provision of services for people already living in the community and how these could be improved.

Our meetings confirmed that no one from any of the groups is opposed to deinstitutionalization. Everyone agreed that some individuals have a greater need for supports and services than others and that a full range of creative community services will allow individuals to be served closer to their homes, families and neighbourhoods where we all live.

Some creative approaches had been developed to meet the individual needs of people with developmental disabilities and their families in the community. It is important to build on these successful approaches to services and keep Ontario a leader in program development and delivery. Some examples are special services at home which provide the flexible approach to support families in caring for their developmentally handicapped child at home, the supported independent living program, which recognizes and responds to the individual needs of persons who are living independently in a community residential setting, and the supported employment program, which is dedicated to helping people gain employment and vital work experience often utilizing a resource known as a job coach who helps to train and support a person on the job.

While these discussions resulted in areas of agreement, they also raised issues that have caused this government some concern, including the inconsistent ways in which service providers have been held accountable and a wage gap that exists between employees of provincially operated facilities and those who work in the community. This wage gap has made it difficult for community agencies to recruit and retain qualified employees.

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Today I am announcing that effective immediately my ministry is lifting the temporary hold which was placed on the movement of residents from provincially operated facilities. We are calling for a new beginning, a fresh start that recognizes and addresses the concerns of our partners. In order to begin, we must recognize our strengths and our areas of vulnerability. Our next steps over the coming weeks and months will be to:

Sponsor a forum comprised of consumers, families, advocates, workers and leading experts in the field of services for people with developmental handicaps. The forum will help us to continue to provide leadership in the areas of program development and delivery;

Identify existing community service options and recommend ways to improve their responsiveness to an individual's needs. This will allow us to further our work on evaluating and improving the multi-year plan for community living, as well as serve as an information resource for that forum;

Communicate more strongly to families, community agencies and other interested parties the principles and guidelines used in the placement of individual residents of facilities. This will ensure their consistent application across the province;

Reduce the significant gap in wages paid to workers in ministry facilities compared to the wages paid to workers in community agencies. Over the longer term the government is committed to providing community agencies with the resources necessary to recruit and retain quality workers;

Review the operating and capital costs of a wide variety of service options already available. This will help guide agencies in developing services in the community;

Support the efforts announced today by my colleague the Minister of Citizenship to protect the rights and wellbeing of vulnerable adults. This will be accomplished through legislative change and the establishment of an independent advocacy commission. Through these actions we will strengthen support for vulnerable people in their communities.

This government is committed to maintaining and ensuring a high quality of life for residents moving into communities and for those who are already there. Two special actions will be taken to demonstrate this commitment. We will enforce the existing accountability framework in order to strengthen the development and delivery of high-quality services for vulnerable children and adults in all ministry funded programs, and introduce a process to review plans to transfer responsibility for the management of services from the ministry to community based agencies. This will be done in a consultative manner and will ensure a level of consistency in considering programs that meet the needs of clients, staff and communities.

My ministry and the Ontario government believe that community living for persons with developmental disabilities is a desirable and attainable goal. We are committed to improving the quality of life for all people with development disabilities. As we move to community living for all, we are committed to a process which ensures that the needs of all affected parties are taken into account and are addressed.

ONTARIO PUBLIC SERVICE EMPLOYEE BENEFITS / EMPLOYÉS DE LA FONCTION PUBLIQUE DE L'ONTARIO

Hon Ms Lankin: I wish, as the employer of the Ontario public service, to inform members of the House about an internal administrative change which I believe demonstrates visibly this government's commitment to recognizing the diversity of its workforce and to social reform.

Effective l January 1991 the Ontario public service will extend family coverage for all insured and non-insured benefits to couples of the same sex, including those employed by the agencies, boards and commissions that are in the OPS benefit plan.

Benefits covering spouses of public service employees are dependant life insurance, extended medical coverage, dental insurance and bereavement leave. All of these will be extended to companions of the same sex. After consultation with insurance companies, we do not anticipate a cost increase for this change.

This is a major step forward for the Ontario public service, but I also want to acknowledge and recognize that there are several other Ontario employers that have recently undertaken similar initiatives.

Cette extension ne s'applique malheureusement pas pour l'instant aux prestations de retraite accordées aux conjoints survivants en vertu du Régime de retraite de la fonction publique. Revenu Canada s'est opposé à un amendement qui aurait permis de les inclure. Toutefois, je peux vous assurer, Monsieur le Président, que cette question sera considérée de façon plus approfondie lorsque le gouvernement étudiera l'ensemble des lois et politiques relatives aux avantages sociaux des conjoints.

The principle that all of Ontario's laws and programs must treat people fairly, regardless of the nature of their personal relationships or their family unit, is the major consideration in these changes.

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Hon Mr Allen: I rise to respond formally to suggestions that I breached cabinet confidence with respect to the government's decision to withdraw funding from the Red Hill Creek Expressway in Hamilton, I want to underline that at no time was the substance of the decision conveyed by me to anyone prior to the information given to the regional chairman at 8 o'clock in the morning of Monday morning last.

Two Hamilton aldermen learned of the time and place of the announcement the previous Friday evening in the course of a meeting in my constituency office. The Friday meeting had been scheduled for some time in advance to continue our discussions around transportation alternatives in the region.

It was in fact in a surprise phone call from the office of the Minister of Transportation in the midst of that meeting that I was informed of the time and location of the announcement. Their office also requested a tour of the valley for the Minister of Transportation. This information, those two pieces, were conveyed to the aldermen, and only those two pieces, and both were invited to the tour of the site with the Minister of Transportation.

I deeply regret that as a result those two elected municipal officials did learn of the time and the location of a prospective ministerial announcement ahead of the regional chairman and the two regional mayors most affected. Clearly, all affected local officials deserve equal notice and I apologize for my part in any discourtesy to them. It was unwise, on reflection, given the political circumstances in Hamilton, to invite one of the aldermen in the tour of the valley on Saturday. I apologize to the Hamilton officials affected for the faulty composition of that touring group.

I want to underline that in all those discussions the subject at hand was not the specifics of a cabinet decision, but was the general issue of the expressway, the valley and transportation needs in Hamilton. and I personally look forward to working closely with all Hamiltonians, elected and otherwise, in the resolution of those transportation concerns.

Hon Mr Philip: On behalf of my colleagues and I, I would like to clarify the circumstances surrounding the announcement in Hamilton on 17 December 1990. In preparing for the announcement regarding the withdrawal of funds from the north-south portion of Red Hill Creek Expressway, individuals were told in advance that the press conference would be held on Monday morning, 17 December. At no point were any of these individuals told the content of the cabinet decision.

In retrospect, we recognize that the notification was a mistake. Let me be clear. The only people who were notified prior to the public announcement of the content of the cabinet decision were the regional chairman, the mayor of Hamilton and the deputy mayor of Stoney Creek. That was done on Monday morning prior to the press conference. It was not fair and it was not right that individuals would be notified of the timing of the press conference before others. No one benefited in any way from this information. However, we recognize this made an already difficult situation for the regional council even more difficult.

The communication process was faulty and we want to apologize to Reg Whynott, his council and the mayors of Hamilton and Stoney Creek for any embarrassment this may have caused them. I also want to apologize to Mr Whynott for inadvertently neglecting to tell him the location of the press conference during our telephone discussion on Monday morning.

I will be sitting down as soon as possible with the region to begin work on providing acceptable transportation facilities for the Hamilton-Wentworth area. I believe that by working together co-operatively we can find solutions to the very real transportation problems in that area.

The Speaker: We used an additional 40 seconds beyond the time. With your indulgence, I will add one and a half minutes per caucus per opposition party, giving them a total of six and a half minutes for response for each of the two opposition parties.

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RESPONSES

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Nixon: It was not my intention to respond to the statements made by the honourable members until I heard what they had to say. Certainly, this matter is in the hands of the Premier who has established himself, according to his statement last week, as the sole arbiter without appeal in these matters. But I am truly amazed that both members, having considered carefully their actions a week ago at cabinet and then on Friday and Saturday and again, in the case of the Minister of Transportation, on Monday, feel that their only error in their duty was in not properly informing the people of the press conference to make the announcement terminating provincial funding.

It is clear from the statements made by Hinkley and Wilson, clearly recognized as New Democratic Party counsellors, one of them a prospective candidate for mayor until recently, that they were informed of these matters. When I say that, I am in no way saying that the honourable ministers, in speaking to this House, have not told the truth as they see it. But whatever the implication or the inference might have been in the meeting at the minister's office on Friday or the stroll through the valley on Saturday, the NDP tagalongs -- and there were no others -- were clearly aware that the Red Hill Creek Expressway, as far as provincial funding is concerned, was history.

The honourable members are prepared to say that the only mistake was in indicating that they were going to be having a press conference on Monday. The honourable members and anyone else interested in this are aware of the quotes that are now public. I am very much concerned about this, and my concern will be better expressed when we enter into question period.

ADVOCACY AND GUARDIANSHIP

Mr Cordiano: I would like to respond to the Minister of Citizenship. While we support the minister's commitment to a comprehensive advocacy system and also her reaffirmation of our Liberal government's initiatives in this regard, we are really sadly disappointed, however, that the minister would bring in this statement on the last day of the sitting without announcing that she is prepared to bring in legislation at this time as well.

There is simply no consultation process being discussed here, no review process. It is really a non-event. There are a number of reports that were brought forward on this issue, the O'Sullivan report, the Manson report and the Fram report. The minister has simply failed to address those. She simply asks us to examine a backgrounder accompanying her statement.

We are disappointed that legislation has not been favoured at this time. All I can say is that we look forward to that legislation, but quite frankly, this is a non-event that smacks a little bit of an effort to get media hype going.

DEVELOPMENTALLY DISABLED

Mrs McLeod: I wish to respond to the statement by the Minister of Community and Social Services. I think the members of this House will be well aware that we welcome the fact that the freeze on plans to move developmentally delayed people from institutions into the community has now been lifted. This was clearly a concern we had expressed earlier in this House, and we are pleased the minister has now responded in what now remains quite a short space of time.

We do have concerns that remain about why the hold was in fact imposed unilaterally at that time, and we continue to have some questions about what disruption may have been caused as a result of the confusion that the minister actually created.

We tried to draw the minister out on her specific reasons for imposing this freeze at the time she took the action. In fact, we almost asked her to tell us that she wanted to examine the issue of the adequacy of community supports that are in place before individuals are moved from the institutions into the community.

We of course agree that those kinds of supports are essential, and in fact the minister well knows that providing the community support was one of the commitments the Liberal government made in introducing the plans for deinstitutionalization.

I was pleased with the fact that the minister recognized, after having taken some time to examine the plans that were in place, that there are a number of very excellent support programs that were established and that deserve to be supported because they are a fundamental part of carrying out deinstitutionalization successfully.

I believe, quite frankly, that the minister is now attempting somewhat to rationalize the earlier decision that was made. But we do agree that a very careful analysis of the adequacy of community supports and as well the issue of wage parity between government institutions and community agencies is necessary.

I think we can predict that what the minister will find as these reviews are now carried out is that the programs are in place, that there are issues that do need to continue to be examined carefully and that what she will find is that at the end of this examination what is required is sufficient funding to ensure that the programs continue to be effective.

In the 1990 budget, we had included some $58 million which was directed towards ensuring a greater equity in the salaries of individuals in community based agencies. We recognized that this particular budget allocation in the 1990 budget was in addition to significant budget allocations in the previous year's budget. So we had also recognized that this was an issue of concern and we would encourage the minister to continue to review it.

This is another area where we would encourage the minister and her government to follow the lead that was established, because we think it was an important lead. We would respectfully suggest that next time she might consult before taking the action.

ONTARIO PUBLIC SERVICE EMPLOYEE BENEFITS

Mr Sorbara: Just a very brief response to the announcement from the Chairman of Management Board of Cabinet concerning the provision of benefits to couples of the same sex who are living together and therefore will be accorded family coverage: We understand why the minister is doing that. We understand that it helps her to avoid some grievances that are before the Ontario public service, but what I am interested in is the cover to the document which refers to coverage for same-sex spouses in the province.

Although we finally have come to understand that we are a society which realizes that lesbian women and homosexual men may well want to live together in a conjugal-type relationship, still the definition of "spouse" I think in the province of Ontario refers to the marriage of a man and a woman, and I am just wondering whether this document suggests that law will be changed in the near future.

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Harris: I wish to respond to the statements that have been made by the Minister of Colleges and Universities and the Minister of Transportation. When this issue was first raised in the Legislature, my thought was not, as the Liberal Party has suggested, that the ministers should resign; my thought was: "This is business as usual. Instead of Liberal ministers talking to Liberal cronies, this is NDP ministers talking to NDP cronies."

Mr Mahoney: Go back before 1985.

Mr Harris: If you would like me to go back to 1984, I could say this is business as usual, Conservative ministers talking to Conservative cronies. I am happy to do that. That was my thought.

I thought it was most inappropriate because the people of Ontario had been led to believe by the Premier that it would not be business as usual, that it would not be that kind of politics of the past.

I want to share with the House and with the two ministers, in response to the statements, and I want to share with the Premier, that this was my initial reaction. Wrong? Undoubtedly. Silly? I thought so. Politics of the past? Yes. Something that the public should not have expected given the Premier's standards? Yes. But should the ministers resign? No. That was not my reaction.

I thought that was something the public should know and be aware of, and understand that they did not get what they thought they were getting from this Premier and this government, and they could take the appropriate steps at the appropriate occasion.

Today, with the statements, I want to share with the ministers and the Premier that I too have a little difficulty understanding how a major discussion could be going on in a constituency office about the transportation concerns of Hamilton with Hamilton councillors and a minister of the crown who knew on Wednesday that a decision had been made to cancel the expressway, what kind of meaningful discussion could be taking place without revealing that information.

I also have a little difficulty in understanding two things about the Minister of Transportation. First, he cancelled this expressway on moral grounds. Presumably, he had not even seen the valley when he made the decision on Wednesday, so he had to get out there on Saturday to see it. That concerns me. Is that reason to resign? Of course not. It just points out something that bothers me immensely and I would have pointed that out in the normal course of events.

Now, this Minister of Transportation, with two NDP councillors, was touring the site of the expressway, knowing full well it is not taking place, and it stretches my credibility a little to think they were chit-chatting along that, "Oh, the road will go right here and it ll come through here," and the Minister of Transportation was saying, "Yes, we'll cut down these trees, and that's everything that's going to take place."

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In view of the statements that have been made. I am more concerned with this: Once he realized on Friday, as the minister says -- and he is apologizing now -- why was that not rectified right away if he felt that was a problem? Why did the Minister of Transportation not rectify that right away? Why did none of this come forward until after it was raised as a concern? He did not see anything wrong with it until it was raised as a concern. That bothers me. What also bothers me is that now the statements are made that nobody knew. "We just strolled through the valley," says the Minister of Transportation, "looking at this expressway." That concerns me.

I would suggest that the response we have had today is not enough. It is not appropriate and in fact raises far more questions than I was prepared to raise initially. I would further suggest to the Premier that we have an investigation into this matter, that we have a committee look into it, that we ask the ministers to come before the committee under oath, and that we request as well that the committee have the power to bring before it the NDP alderman and anyone else who had any knowledge or information on this matter so that the facts can come out in full and in the open -- as the Premier would have suggested when he was in opposition and, as I am sure he would appreciate, it is important that it take place now, because the perception of what went on from Friday and Saturday and Sunday until 8 o'clock Monday morning is not a very healthy perception.

ADVOCACY AND GUARDIANSHIP

Mrs Marland: In response to the statement by the minister responsible for disabled persons, we would like to say that we are very happy to hear these announcements by this government today. The minister has addressed vulnerable adults; we look forward in the near future to her addressing vulnerable children.

DEVELOPMENTALLY DISABLED

Mr Jackson: I am very pleased that the Premier responded to my request to investigate the actions of his Minister of Community and Social Services with respect to a radical change in policy. I am pleased that this announcement is essentially putting Community and Social Services support for the multi-year plan back to the way it was the day the minister walked into her office and found it. I would specifically like to suggest to the Premier and the minister as well, on behalf of vulnerable adults and their families, for their own best interests, that instead of coming to this House every time she changes her mind she only come forward with these announcements when she has made up her mind.

ORAL QUESTIONS

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Nixon: I have an obvious question for the Premier. He has heard the statements made by the ministers, and I know that he, being meticulous and committed to fairness and equity in this matter as in others, has examined the matter carefully. Is he satisfied that no further action is necessary?

Hon Mr Rae: Let me try to put this in some perspective. I think a mistake was made. I think it was a mistake of judgement. I think an apology was owed because a mistake was made. It is a practice which I do not particularly think was appropriate in the circumstances. I have indicated that to the ministers involved, I would indicate that to the House and I would indicate that to everyone concerned, including those who I think are the principal people who have a grievance in this, that is, the members of the regional council who were informed later than other people with respect to this question.

I think a mistake was made, but if the Leader of the Opposition is saying -- I know he has said earlier that he believes I should fire the Minister of Colleges and Universities.

Mr Nixon: And the Minister of Transportation.

Hon Mr Rae: And the Minister of Transportation, as he is adding. I say to the Leader of the Opposition that that is not my intention. A mistake has been made. I do not believe that the first mistake that is made by ministers with respect to this question is one that warrants the sanction of dismissal from the cabinet. That is a judgement I have made. The recognition that a mistake has been made and the early admission that a mistake has been made is one that is important to recognize. That is my decision and I look forward to hearing his other views on the subject.

Mr Nixon: The Premier has stated clearly that he is satisfied, although I am sure he is troubled under these circumstances, and that the situation should now be considered as behind us as we have had an explanation and a minimal apology for simply not informing the regional councillors equally that they would be having to fund this expressway in alternative ways.

I want to return to something the Premier said previously. It is not his understanding that any financial gain was associated with this. In some defence, I know of no financial gain and I would defy anybody to find financial gain or loss in spite of the fact that there is $100 million involved. But there is another sort of gain and loss, and I would suggest to the Premier that it is unacceptable political manoeuvring resulting in gain by his ministers, presumably with his advice and imprimatur, that they deal with supporters only of the government party in these matters and in these communities. There is no evidence whatsoever that the ministers were trying to do anything but further their political cronies in this community. I will tell the Premier that we do not expect to uncover any evidence that somebody made money. When I think of the Premier's statement on conflict of interest and how tough it is going to be and that there will only be one judge, himself, I think, as people who believe in the democratic system, we must be equally concerned about the circumstances of a political type that have obviously and evidently occurred in Hamilton.

I was going to quote some of his stuff. I will just say this. They will "act in a manner that will not only bear the closest public scrutiny, but will further and ensure public confidence and trust in the integrity of government." I believe this confidence and trust in the integrity has been eroded. I would like the Premier's further comment on this sort of political gain, which is surely as irresponsible and unacceptable as any other.

Hon Mr Rae: The Leader of the Opposition has said that what concerns him is the sense that one party is being favoured over another. That is exactly the perception, and in this business perception is reality. That is exactly the problem I discussed with the two ministers this morning in our conversation. That is exactly the business that has troubled me. It is something which I do not want to see repeated. It is something which I regard as a mistake.

The Leader of the Opposition is right when he says I am the one who decides. I do have to make a decision with regard to these matters. The cabinet decision was made on Wednesday. The question about how to communicate that strategy is a decision of the government's; in my view, the communication was not well handled. In my view, the other political interests in the region, particularly the other elected officials, were not treated in the way they should have been. I have indicated that as clearly as I can but, if I could put it in some perspective, I do not honestly believe that dismissal from cabinet is the kind of response that is appropriate in this particular instance. That is all.

Mr Nixon: I read from the oath of a member of the executive council, in part, "I will not discuss the decisions of the executive council outside the council, so help me God," signed by the minister and countersigned by the Lieutenant Governor. We are not arguing about the evidence here. It is clear that the oath was broken. The Premier says, "It is a mistake and I forgive it from the corner office, as the only judge." Would he not say that breaking that oath should call for the resignation or dismissal of these ministers?

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Hon Mr Rae: If I thought it did, obviously I would have by now, and I --

Interjections.

Hon Mr Rae: I am sitting down because I do not feel I am -- if the House will let me respond, I would ask the members of the opposition to let me try and respond as I can.

At some point, obviously, a decision of the cabinet is going to be announced, and at that point it is discussed. There is no question about that. The decision about when to announce the decision that was made on Wednesday is one that is made by an individual minister. It is made by the minister or by members of cabinet or we make a collective judgement as to when and how an announcement is going to be made. The way in which this announcement was made is one that concerns me, but in my view -- I would repeat this to members of the House and I am quite happy to accept criticism in this regard; I understand that is one of the realities of life. I do not regard, and I do not think it is fair to say, that the first time a mistake such as this is made the only possible response is for people to be fired. I do not think you fire people every time they make a mistake. That is my judgment, and if the Leader of the Opposition has a different view, that every time a mistake is made that person has to be fired, well, he has a different view than I do. That is all I can say.

Mr Nixon: I do not think it is worth while reading to the Premier his comments made from this side of the House under similar circumstances. The idea of a first mistake was not part of his thinking in those days.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

Mr Nixon: I have a question for the Minister of Community and Social Services. The government was elected on a commitment that $300 million a year would be added to the programs directed towards social assistance so that our people would not have to go to food banks. We know that has not happened and that the honourable minister has substituted a $1-million Band-Aid for that action.

The association of food banks, whatever its correct name is, has rejected the $1 million. What is she going to do now in her timetable enunciated in her first comments to the House to abolish poverty in three months?

Hon Mrs Akande: I hate to refer to an old analogy, but I had mentioned some time ago to the member that that train had already begun. We were in fact establishing our program to abolish poverty. We have announced the increase to make sure that those on social assistance do receive adequate incomes. We have looked at garnisheeing the wages of parents so that there will be less child poverty. We have addressed $54 million towards putting people back to work and making sure there would be fewer of them on food banks. We have increased the shelter costs significantly, because the food banks told us that those people end up at the food banks. And we have addressed $700 million towards putting people back to work. The million dollars was offered to those who wanted it to address emergency needs, to address poverty; and within the context of those emergencies that money was made available. Those who do not wish to access that money do not have to.

Mr Nixon: The honourable minister would be aware that the food banks -- and there are 18 of them in their press release -- have rejected her policy. I am very impressed with the honourable minister's background. I have read in detail in the most recent issue of Toronto Life how the most persuasive New Democrats went to her and persuaded her to take on this responsibility in public service. Can she explain why she would allow herself to be pried out of her Jaguar and come up with a situation in which $1 million is all she can promise, which is rejected by these food banks, and say that that is adequate policy?

Hon Mrs Akande: I have said and I am willing to repeat if necessary, and it seems so, that in fact our addressing poverty has taken several stances and that the $1 million is not the way we seek to deinstitutionalize food banks. While the member does mention that there are 18 food banks that do not want the money, on my desk are requests from several food banks in many areas that do. The way we have made that money available allows those people to make the choice, which obviously they have made, to access it if they need and if they want it and ignore it if they do not.

Mr Nixon: I have the impression that the honourable member is one of the ablest, one of the most influential and, if not now, in the future will be one of the ministers with the most influence on decisions in the government. Having heard what she has said, why can she not now set a target? Why can she not stand in this House and say that as far as the government of Ontario is concerned, there will be no food banks in operation after 1991?

Hon Mrs Akande: I have stated several times this government's intention to deinstitutionalize food banks. I have not, because I do not have a crystal ball, said it would happen this year or next year, but I have stated that we have begun on a deliberate and a determined and an effective plan to move towards the deinstitutionalization of food banks, and so we shall continue.

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Harris: I have a question for the Premier. In response to the question from the leader of the Liberal Party, he indicated today that he thought the communication plan for announcing the cabinet decision was inappropriate and wrong; he has passed that judgement and has asked for and received an apology from the minister. I believe that was the sum context of his response.

In the statements that were made to the House by the two ministers, they said they did not communicate the cabinet decision, that there was no communication until Monday morning. Can the Premier tell me what was wrong with the communication plan if in fact they did not communicate anything, according to the statements they have given us today?

Hon Mr Rae: Let's be very clear on what has been said, what I think has been said over the last two days by both ministers as well as by me. What was communicated to the alderman was the date of the announcement, the fact that an announcement was going to be made at such-and-such a time. I think, as the Minister of Colleges and Universities also said yesterday, that it is quite possible that a reasonable inference from that would be that the decision was going to go in a certain direction.

Let's put this in some perspective for what has taken place. A cabinet decision was made on Wednesday. That decision was final and that decision was made. How that decision is communicated is a decision of ours.

All I am saying is that, as leader of the government, I would have much preferred it if everyone, the regional chairman and others, had been told earlier with respect to what took place and had been communicated with on an equal basis. It is precisely the perception that the leader of the third party raised in his answer to the statements that obviously concerns me. It is that perception that I am not happy with, and I think it needs to be changed. It is because I am not satisfied with that perception that I have indicated that to the ministers. I would stand by the view that, again putting it in perspective, the cabinet decision was made on Wednesday. How that decision is communicated after that discussion is clearly a decision for ministers. I am just not satisfied with the way it was done. That is all I am saying.

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Mr Harris: I want to be clear and I think the Premier has clarified it. In response to the question, he originally said he was not satisfied with the communication plan. Now what he is telling me is he is not satisfied with the notification of when the decision would be communicated but he accepts that there has been no breach of cabinet confidentiality. He accepts in his decision that there had been no communication, no discussion until Monday morning with any of the other members who have been mentioned, the other aldermen or with anybody who should not have been notified of this decision.

I want to be clear, because I have indicated that I agreed with the Premier in his original assessment until I heard the statements today. Am I correct in my assessment as to what the Premier thinks took place and what the appropriate action was?

Hon Mr Rae: What I think took place is what is described in the statements today. What I have said to the leader of the third party, what I have said to the Leader of the Opposition and what I will say again is this: that in my view what should have happened is that a decision should have been made by the minister with respect to the timing of the announcement. Everyone should have been equally informed as to when that announcement was going to be made, and that basically should have been it.

I say to the leader of the third party that is not what happened. But do I think that there is such a substantial offence in terms of the real public interest that is involved here to require somebody to resign or to require my dismissing him? My political judgement there and my judgement as Premier in this regard is no, not in this circumstance. Ultimately, it will be the member opposite and others and members of the public who will judge as to whether that is a fair response from me as Premier or not. I can only say that is the view I have taken and I think it is the right view.

Mr Harris: Quite frankly, I think I have been very clear, in spite of the nitter-nattering from the Liberals to my right here making it very difficult to hear and speak.

The Speaker: I am having difficulty hearing the leader of the third party, who is placing a very important question on what I take to be a very serious issue. I think he would appreciate the opportunity to place his question.

Mr Harris: I think it is very clear. The Premier keeps coming back to his judgement in response to my question and I have not questioned his judgement in that area. I think I made it clear in the response to my statement what I thought was wrong, inappropriate and not right, and I think the Premier has responded to that. I accept that on behalf of the Premier.

However, in view of the statements that were made today by the ministers, in view of the information that we have in the paper, in view of the fact that I think the public perception would be very, very difficult to be perceived to be other than the fact that there was not just the date of the communication but communication as well of the decision, and in view of that perception, would the Premier agree to refer this matter to a committee so that we can hear from the ministers, we can hear from those others who were involved, we can get to the bottom of this and we can clear this up once and for all?

Hon Mr Rae: This forum is a place for us to have these exchanges and I am quite happy to respond as directly as I can to the leader of the third party. I think that what has taken place, as I see it, is this: A cabinet decision was made on Wednesday with regard to our view on the Red Hill expressway. The decision as to how and when we announce that and how and when we communicate that is a decision that is made by the government collectively, by a minister individually, as to how that takes place.

I think one wants to put this in some perspective with respect to what has taken place. I think the action that has taken place, I think the statements that have been made by the minister today have been clear. I think my response has been clear and I think that is the conclusion that we have reached.

Mr Harris: I want to do this very delicately, because I think I have been most co-operative with the Premier in this whole matter up until today. The statements that were made by the ministers are quite contradictory not only to the public perception but to the believability that anybody would have if he read the other evidence. I think this is a much larger issue than the communication plan. I am dealing with the statements that were made by the ministers today. In order to get to the bottom of that, would the Premier agree that it would be appropriate to have a legislative committee look at this matter to determine what was said to whom and when?

Hon Mr Rae: Let me say this to the leader of the third party: Two statements have been made by ministers. I think it is a fundamental premise of our parliamentary democracy that when an honourable member makes a statement with respect to what took place, that statement is accepted by honourable members. I would say to the leader of the third party that I accept the statements that have been made by the ministers as a description of what has taken place. If the leader of the third party is saying that he does not accept those statements or that he does not believe those statements, then as he knows, that is the most serious accusation that one member could make against another. I accept the statements that have been made by the ministers as their experience and the truth that they have experienced and they are relating to the House. I think we have to accept it on that basis.

I do not know any other way in which we can do business as a Legislature except to say that when an honourable minister stands in his place. accepts responsibility for his actions, says that a mistake has been committed, apologizes to those who have been affected -- it seems to me that ought to be sufficient for the members of this House to understand and to appreciate what has taken place. I think we have to work on that basis. If we do not work on that basis, it is obviously very difficult for us to do business with one another.

Mr Harris: I appreciate what the Premier is saying. We have to operate on that basis and it is very difficult to operate and have credibility unless we do. However, there is a perception -- and I would suggest to him that the perception would be pretty widespread in Hamilton -- that what has been reported today in fact is not the case. If the Premier accepts that, that is fine. I can accept that. That is fine. But I think we do want to deal with the perception. I think we do want to deal with the public. I think we do want to clear the ministers of any cloud of suspicion, if that is indeed important to the Premier. I think it would be. It is important to me and I think it is important to the people of Ontario. Can the Premier tell me what we can possibly lose from having this referred to a committee so that we can hear from others and satisfy the public and the House once and for all?

Hon Mr Rae: Let me make this point again, because I think it is quite fundamental. The two ministers have stood in their place today and have made a statement. That statement is one that I accept. That statement is one that reflects the conversations that I had with the ministers who were in my office this morning.

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If the leader of the third party is saying that he does not believe those statements, that he does not accept those statements or that he disagrees with those statements, I wish he would say so, because it seems to me that is a fundamental point. I am telling the leader of the third party that I believe it is fundamental to the way this place works that when a minister stands up in his place and says, "This is what I said, this is what happened, this is what took place, this is what I did," we accept that.

What the ministers have said is that a mistake was made with regard to the communication of a decision that was already made by the cabinet. Let's put that in perspective. The mistake was made, and in my view a mistake was made. I have said that to them and I have indicated that to the House. An apology has been forthcoming. In my view, given what has taken place, that is a reflection of what has happened.

Mr Harris: Accepting everything that the Premier has said, accepting everything the minister has said, accepting that the Premier accepts everything the minister has said, would the Premier agree to set up the committee so we can call before it Mr Hinkley, who said he was informed of the decision Friday night after a meeting with the area NDP members of the Legislature. "'I had to hold on to what I knew,' he said last night." This is a direct quote in the Hamilton Spectator of 19 December. "'It wasn't up to me to inform the regional chairman. I was told the chairman would be informed.'"

Mr Hinkley, in his statement to the Spectator, is not saying he was informed there would be an announcement. He said, "I was informed of the decision." Would the Premier not agree, in light of the fact that this statement is out there, that the perception is out there, that it would be beneficial to have a legislative committee, not pass judgement -- he is the Premier; he will be the ultimate passer of judgement -- but have a committee that has the power to subpoena witnesses to get to the bottom of what went on and the conflicts between what some are saying went on and what we have heard from the two ministers in the House today?

Hon Mr Rae: I could only tell the leader of the third party that I am satisfied that the members of the cabinet who have spoken today have told the truth.

Mr Nixon: I want to put a question to the Minister of Transportation. It is based on the fact that the Premier said yesterday he would look into all the relevant facts on this, and yet he has based his decision simply on the direct statements made by the two ministers.

The honourable Minister of Transportation would know that Hinkley has said what my colleague has quoted, and he said further, "I can't recall precisely what he said," referring to the minister's colleague, "but it was pretty clear to me that the expressway was going to be cancelled. I didn't know the specifics of the announcement after talking with him" -- that is, the Minister of Colleges and Universities -- "I knew what was going to happen."

I would like to ask the Minister of Transportation who accompanied him on his walk through the valley.

Hon Mr Philip: I wanted to visit the valley one more time just to familiarize myself again with the details of the valley and with the construction projects which were ongoing. I was not aware that Mr Hinkley would be there. He had offered to go with me because of his intimate knowledge of the valley, and he accompanied me, along with the Minister of Colleges and Universities.

Mr Nixon: Since Mr Hinkley indicated that he had known Friday that the road was to be cancelled, can the minister confirm or deny that the matter was discussed in those terms, and at the same time can the minister deny that he told Mr Hinkley that it would be stopped?

Hon Mr Philip: During the tour of the valley with him, we talked exclusively about the nature of the valley. We did not talk about the announcement, when it would be made, nor did we talk at all about the contents of the announcement, nor did he ask me about either of those topics.

Mr Harris: I am tempted to ask questions on this matter all day and I am not sure we are going to get any different answer. I would hope that the Premier will reflect on how his government appears before dismissing allowing a committee to get to the bottom of all this.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

Mr Harris: I would like to ask the Premier a question on a different matter. I know he shares my concern for the children in this province who are going hungry. Some statistics say that one child in six lives in poverty. In Metropolitan Toronto alone that represents more than 110,000 children. I know he shares my concern, because he has raised the issue in the House before as a member of the opposition and again during the election.

Would the Premier not agree with me that the $1 million he has announced for the food banks, which the food banks say is inappropriate, not the way government should be responding -- it should not be institutionalizing food banks and in fact may affect the credibility of the program with respect to private sector donations. Would the Premier agree with me that the $1 million might not be better spent on a breakfast program for children in schools?

Hon Mr Rae: I say to the leader of the third party that I agree entirely with him that the $1 million is not in any sense a solution to the problem of child poverty and I agree with him very strongly that a food program in our schools is something that we need to be looking at as a government.

But I would say to him with respect to the $1 million, how the $1 million is used and who applies for it and which food banks use it in what ways is something about which the government has said we are going to be very flexible. There are some food banks that will use it for advocacy. There are some that will use it, frankly, for food because of the particular emergency situation that they are facing in different parts of the province. Those food banks that decide they do not want to have anything to do with it and do not think it is anything they want to touch with a 10-foot pole, that is their decision, which we respect entirely.

What we are responding to is a situation around the province -- in Ottawa, Hamilton, northern Ontario, northwestern Ontario and southwestern Ontario, as well as in Metropolitan Toronto -- where some food banks have said, "Yes, we do need to draw on this $1 million." But the leader of the third party's suggestion for a food program is obviously something that the government is looking at.

Mr Harris: It may be something that the government is looking at. It is a proposal that our party made during the past election campaign and the Liberal Party made during the past election campaign. It is a proposal that I believe can be developed in concert with the private sector and with the schools that many can buy into and will provide at least one nutritional meal every day that school is in session for children who are living in poverty.

I would ask the Premier, because I am one who says you cannot have new spending without examining priorities, to reflect on his $1-million commitment, to reflect on the integrity of the food bank program, to accept the advice of the majority of the food bank advocacy groups that are saying that now that the perception is that the government is funding them, they will have more difficulty in assistance from the private sector in meeting the short-term goals. Everybody agrees it is not a long-term goal.

Would the Premier not reflect on that now and agree with me that a better use of the $1 million would be as seed money to work with the schools and the private sector to provide directly a breakfast program and get help there immediately for children who are hungry?

Hon Mr Rae: There already are breakfast programs in some schools across the province; not as many as we would like to see and not as many as, no doubt, are needed.

I say to the member that looking overall at the general response of our schools to the problem of hunger among their pupils and the needs of the school system to respond to that is something which is of great concern to us. It was expressed in the Maloney report, which the Minister of Community and Social Services was a member of, and I know that the minister, as a former principal of an inner-city school in the city of York, is very much aware of the relationship between poverty, hunger and kids' ability to do well at all in school.

So we are responding to that and we will be responding further to it, but we stand by our commitment with respect to the question of emergency funding. There are such a variety of needs across the province with respect to the current food banks that we feel that the way we have responded is the right way to respond.

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HEALTH CARDS

Ms Haeck: I have a question for the Minister of Health. My question is with regard to the health card. I understand that this health card will be in use as of the new year. Luckily enough, I have mine, but I know that not all people have theirs. I have learned from some of my constituents in fact that they have not received theirs. Even if they apply now, I would assume that it is going to be rather difficult for them to have it by 1 January. My question to the minister is, will these people be able to access health services without this card?

Hon Mrs Gigantes: I am pleased to tell the member that yes, they will be able to get health services with their old OHIP card until the end of June next year. There will be an extra effort made to try and help people who have applied late or are applying late or who may not know of the need to apply. I am hopeful that by the end of June next year everybody in Ontario who is eligible to have a health card will have one. People can begin using their health cards, if they have them, at the beginning of 1991.

Ms Haeck: There are also residents of my riding who may face particular barriers in obtaining a new health card. I am referring to people who never received the application form through the mail because they do not have a permanent address. Others may have difficulty filling out the required form because their reading and writing skills are not adequate. Can the minister tell the House what action she is taking to ensure that these people will be registered for a health card.

Hon Mrs Gigantes: I cannot claim personal credit for this. The Ministry of Health had begun planning for these kinds of difficulties before this government was elected. There are still one million Ontarians who are not enrolled and many of them are in the situation described by the member.

Extra efforts are under way to provide all service providers with information about how to assist people to get their health card. Outreach communications have gone on with services that provide temporary shelter for transient people, for example, and also literacy groups and community health centres and health service organizations in this province are being provided with special information to help them enrol people they know who may be without their health cards.

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Scott: I have a question for the Premier. I want to begin by saying to the Premier that I interrupted aggressively during question period because I must frankly say to the Speaker and to the Premier and to the House that I was very upset.

I have been here five years and have fought three elections with the Premier on the other side, and I have heard him stipulate the highest standards of personal and governmental conduct that should be imposed on all of us. I believe the Premier. I believe that those are his standards. I believed when they were exacted from others at very considerable pain and price. I believed that if he stood for nothing else in government, he would stand at least for the implementation of those standards.

The Premier has constituted himself with the background of those standards, which he applied to those he found guilty in the last five years, the single judge and jury of the facts. Now the facts we have here are that he has interviewed two ministers. There are other witnesses out there, aldermen in the community, who have a different view of what happened.

I ask the Premier, is it not clear from the evidence that is before him now, and indeed from the admissions of the ministers themselves, that they have breached their oaths and committed the most serious offence that a member of the executive council can commit? Does the Premier not agree that either that is clearly the case or it is at least arguably the case? Can he answer that question?

Hon Mr Rae: I hope the member will extend to me the same courtesy as I have extended to him in listening to his question. In trying to answer it as clearly as I can, my own view is that if a cabinet minister, for example, prior to a decision being made, deliberately leaked information with respect to a discussion that was ongoing in the executive council, that would obviously constitute a breach of the oath. What we have here is an entirely different situation, and I am sure the former minister would hear me out in this regard. I am sure his colleagues will also hear me out in this regard.

When a decision of the executive council has been made, how that decision is to be communicated, the way in which it is to be communicated, is a decision of the minister, a decision of the government. I say to the member for St George-St David, in my judgement the communication was not well handled. It is clear from the statement that was made by the Minister of Colleges and Universities that it was certainly a reasonable inference from the discussion that took place that in fact a decision was going to be made on Monday with respect to the Red Hill Creek Expressway, and that the decision would be not to proceed with the expressway. That is granted, and that is granted in responses to the questions that have been posed by the leader of the third party.

The question that I have to answer is -- the former Attorney General is certainly entitled to his view and to be critical of me -- is this a mistake of political judgement or, to use the colloquial phrase, is it a capital offence? In my judgement, it is a mistake of political judgement in the sense that the regional chairman and the mayor were not equally informed of the timing of the decision and were not party to other discussions.

I think that is a mistake and I have accepted that. I have said that. It has been accepted by the ministers. All I am saying is that I do not regard it as grounds for firing ministers from the cabinet, and that is a judgement I have made. If the member wants to be critical of that, that is fine. Ultimately it is the people who will decide whether the standard I have applied is a fair and reasonable one. I think it is a fair and reasonable one. A mistake has been made, a mistake has been admitted, but in my view it is not a capital offence and that is the judgement I have made as Premier of the province.

Mr Scott: I do not have to tell you, Mr Speaker, that the Premier is a person of very great ability and a very distinguished lawyer, but I will tell him that when I heard him then speaking as judge, he sounded more like defence counsel to me.

There is nothing in what he says. The oath very clearly says -- perhaps he has not read it lately, since his swearing in -- "I will not discuss the decisions of the executive council outside the council without the consent of the council." On everybody's admission, that offence has been committed. The councillor in Hamilton says clearly that discussion took place on Friday night. The reality is that the Premier can be defence counsel all he wants, but if he is going to be judge he has to take account of all the facts, not simply what the accused tell him, but all the facts that come before him as judge.

I ask the Premier in this circumstance, as a fair-minded judge would be asked, what is wrong with allowing his decision, based on part of the facts, because he has not met the alderman, to be reviewed by a committee, the very thing he would ask for himself if he found himself in this situation? What is wrong with that? Is that not fair? Is that not something he would have expected? Is that not part of the standards he has imposed on others in the past, and can we have it from him now, please?

Hon Mr Rae: I want to make two points in response to the member for St George-St David. First of all, I am glad he read out the whole oath, because when he was shouting out before and when the Leader of the Opposition was quoting from the oath, he did not read out the whole oath.

Mr Scott: I read it.

Hon Mr Rae: Exactly, and I appreciate the fact that he did that.

Mr Sorbara: Give us a break.

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Hon Mr Rae: I say to the member for York Centre that we have heard the views and questions from the other side very quietly and I think we are entitled to try to answer as best we can. They may not like the answers, but it seems to me we are entitled to the courtesy in trying to respond to them.

The question is, "without the consent of the executive council." Now, the decision was made on Wednesday, the decision to announce the decision was made on Wednesday, the political decision on the part of the government that we will make this announcement and that the announcement will be made was made on Wednesday by cabinet. No one in cabinet has a privilege which has been offended by what happened. What took place was a political mistake with regard to how the message was communicated.

I do not think the facts are really in dispute. It is all accepted. There was a considerable impoliteness to the regional chairman and to the mayor of Hamilton. I accept that and I accept the implications of that for which we fully apologized. I simply stand by my view and I stand to be judged by the public of the province of Ontario. Do I really think that this is something that warrants the dismissal of the Minister of Colleges and Universities and the Minister of Transportation? My response is no, I do not think it does.

Mr Harris: I accept the Premier's argument on the communication plan. It was a rotten plan. He has said it should never have happened that way and will not happen that way again in the future. He has asked for an apology and he has got it.

I am interested in the two statements that were made today by his ministers who said they did not communicate the decision to anybody. I am interested in those two statements versus Mr Hinkley's statement that this decision was communicated to him. Now the only people that knew were the ministers. Mr Hinkley says he knew Friday. That is what I am interested in. That is what I think the public is interested in. That is what I would be doggone concerned about if I were Premier, in finding out the truth and in making sure that came out.

Can he explain to me what possible objection he could have to having a committee look at this, call witnesses before it and let us find out what was said to whom.

Hon Mr Rae: I just want to remind the leader of the third party of what has already been stated publicly by various ministers.

The Minister of Colleges and Universities said yesterday that while he did not communicate directly the substance of the decision at the meeting which took place on Friday evening, it would have been an entirely reasonable inference from that meeting that in fact a decision had been made not to proceed with the Red Hill Creek Expressway. He has admitted that.

What I am saying to the leader of the third party is the reason I am making the judgement I am is that I do not think the facts are really in dispute here. I really do not. I think what is at issue here is a question as to whether or not what took place was an error sufficient to cause two ministers of the crown to lose their jobs and their overall political responsibility, which 10 weeks ago I gave them as members of the executive council of the province.

As Premier of the province, I think a political mistake has been made in terms of how a communication was made from a cabinet decision. There has been no breach of cabinet consent with regard to the announcement of that decision. The people whose privileges have been affected or whose sensibilities have been affected by this, the impoliteness, is not towards members of the cabinet or to anybody else; it is to the members of the regional council and it is to the chairman of the regional council and it is to the mayor of the city of Hamilton, to whom I apologized, to whom the members have apologized and whom we are determined to make things right by the quality of the work that we do together in the future.

Mr Harris: I would like one more time to read him the two statements that cause me concern.

The Minister of Colleges and Universities, "I want to underline that at no time was the substance of that decision conveyed to anyone prior to the information given to the regional chairman at 8 am Monday."

Hinkley, "I was informed of the decision on Friday night after the meeting with the NDP members of the Legislature." Now Mr Hinkley does not say: "I deduced from the fact that they were going to make an announcement, guessed correctly. That's how I knew." He says, "I was informed of the decision."

I would ask the Premier one more time, can he tell me what possible objection he would have to a committee calling before it all those who are involved in this case so that we can clear up this once and for all. If it is, as he says, just a perception, I would think it would be important enough for that. As others believe, perhaps it is more than perception. Can the Premier tell me what possible objection he has to that.

Hon Mr Rae: I want to say to the member, and I can only give the answer I have given before, as I understand the fundamental ways this place works, when a minister stands in his place, says that he made a mistake, says that a mistake was made and apologizes to those who were affected, in my view, in this circumstance, with regard to the circumstance in question and what has taken place, I regard that as an admission by this government that a political mistake was made. I do not view it as grounds to fire two cabinet ministers who have a great deal to offer to the people of this province, who have learned a great deal, I would suggest, from the mistake they have made and who I think have fulfilled their jobs in every respect in terms of their other responsibilities effectively and most capably. In this circumstance I am standing by the decision I have made to carry on with the way we are doing.

COURT FACILITIES

Mr Lessard: The Premier may be relieved that my question is not going to be directed towards him. My question is with respect to a commitment made by the previous Liberal government respecting a courthouse that was promised for the city of Windsor and there --

Interjections.

The Speaker: We are now ready for a question posed by the member for Windsor-Walkerville.

Mr Lessard: My question has to do with a commitment that was made by the previous government with respect to replacing the provincial courthouse facility in the city of Windsor. My question may be directed towards the Minister of Government Services. However, I know the Attorney General is very concerned that there are adequate court facilities in the province of Ontario so that problems related to delay that we are experiencing right now do not occur. My question to the Attorney General is whether that commitment that has been made by the previous government to replace the courthouse in the city of Windsor is still going to be honoured by this government.

Hon Mr Hampton: I want to acknowledge the member's interest in this issue. I know that it has caused great interest in the city of Windsor. I can tell the member that a construction site has been purchased in downtown Windsor and a fully consolidated court building has been chosen as the alternative to be proceeded with. We will have to proceed to Management Board for final details. We hope to be able to do that some time in the new year.

Mr Lessard: I wonder, after that next step has been taken by the Attorney General, when an announcement may be made with respect to when construction can start.

Hon Mr Hampton: I want to say to the member that if a positive answer is received from Management Board some time in the new year, construction ordinarily would be able to start within two years.

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HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Elston: Would the Premier tell this House and the people who are watching on television what he has to fear from taking the matter concerning his two ministers' breach of their oath to a committee of the Legislative Assembly?

Hon Mr Rae: I have already stated that is my view -- and I accept responsibility for this view -- that there has been no breach of the oath. If the member would read the oath fully, there has been no such breach. That is the premise of the member's question. I do not agree with the premise of his question and therefore I think the decision that has been made, that the members should apologize to the House, should apologize to the regional council, should apologize to the chairman, should apologize to the mayor, should recognize that a mistake has been made -- but in my view not a fatal mistake -- and not one which requires what we would all share the view of being the most serious disciplinary standard that can be applied by the Premier, and that is one of dismissing them from the cabinet. That is the judgement that I have made. It is a judgement for which I in turn will be judged by the ultimate judge, which is the people of the province, as well as by other members of the House, and I stand by that judgement.

Mr Elston: I wonder if the Premier of the province might indicate if there are other changes being made to the conflict-of-interest guidelines and other terms of conduct which have been referred to the standing committee on general government of the Legislative Assembly, and whether he might not consider it appropriate that this matter be referred to that discussion if he will not have a separate discussion surrounding his two ministers' political judgement inabilities, I guess is the best way to describe it. Will he allow us to consider in the terms of the conflict-of-interest guidelines discussion --

Interjections.

Hon Mr Rae: Now, the member is accepting what I think is the fact in terms of the premise of his question, that there was a mistake in political judgement, and if every time there is a mistake in political judgement that is a matter that is going to be dealt with outside the House, my view is that I have made a judgement as Premier. I stand by the judgement. I think the cabinet stands by the judgement and the view that there has been no breach with respect to the consent of the executive which is referred to in the oath.

The clear political responsibility that I have as Premier is to point out to ministers when I feel they have made a mistake, to ask them to apologize when they have made a mistake. I am not saying to the member that I am entirely happy with what has happened; obviously I am not. But I am also exercising my political responsibility as Premier of the province to say, as I said in the throne speech, that when mistakes have been made, they will --

The Speaker: Stop the clock, which allows the member for Carleton to ask a question.

COURT SYSTEM

Mr Sterling: I would like to ask the Attorney General a question. I sent him over a news clipping from the Ottawa Citizen today. It is about Gregory MacMillan, who drove an overloaded subcompact car with seven other teenagers into a five-ton truck in October 1989. Three young people died as a result of that. Mr MacMillan was charged with dangerous driving causing death.

Yesterday provincial court judge Bernard Ryan stayed the prosecution because MacMillan had waited eight months and twelve days for his trial. Outside the courtroom the 19-year-old MacMillan smiled and joked in front of TV cameras after his charge was stayed. Judge Ryan said it was a final embarrassment for him with regard to the justice system. Will the Attorney General appeal this case on behalf of the three families who lost teenage sons?

Hon Mr Hampton: I want to thank the member for giving me notice in advance that he was going to ask this question, because it is a very serious question. It is one of the tragic cases that have been dismissed from our courts as a result of the Askov decision. I appreciate the seriousness of it; I can tell the member at this time that I am advised that an appeal is being considered.

Mr Sterling: Could I just ask --

Mrs Marland: Let's have all-party agreement or something.

Hon Mr Rae: Agreed, if he has got a supplementary.

The Speaker: Well, we can do just about anything with consent. Is there consent to allow a supplementary?

Agreed to.

Mr Sterling: My understanding is that when a charge is stayed, there is a 12-month period that starts to march on and that after 12 months, prosecution cannot continue on those particular charges. There are thousands and thousands of those stayed charges that are out there. There have been a lot of questions as to the meaning of the Supreme Court of Canada ruling as to how strict it is to the eight months, whether it applies to the provincial court, etc.

I would suggest to the Attorney General, and I am pleased with his openness in terms of considering this, but if there ever was a case to establish a precedent, I believe that this is the one. If in fact the Attorney General wants to save any of those court cases that have been stayed, he must get on with an appeal in at least one or two cases. I urge him to consider this as one of the test cases.

Hon Mr Hampton: I appreciate the suggestion from the member and I want to indicate to him and to all members of the House that there are currently before the Ontario Court of Appeal a number of cases similar to this in the sense that they will give the Ontario Court of Appeal the opportunity to state very clearly, very directly, whether or not the Supreme Court of Canada guidelines do apply to the Provincial Division courts, exactly to what extent they apply, and what the length of time that a charge may remain in the Provincial Division will be.

The Court of Appeal has a number of appeals before it now. They will have the opportunity to give a decision on this very shortly, and they have been invited by crown law officers to give that opinion. We are hopeful that we will have the kind of information we need to deal with these kinds of cases very shortly in the new year.

VISITOR

The Speaker: Members may wish to welcome a visitor to our galleries who has observed the entire proceedings so far this afternoon, Sergai Holovoty, a member of Parliament from the Ukraine.

MOTIONS

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr Elston: I move, given the serious breach of integrity and breach of cabinet oaths, that the standing committee on general government be directed to meet to investigate several unanswered questions regarding the cabinet decision on the Red Hill Creek Expressway; that this committee hear testimony from the Minister of Colleges and Universities, the Minister of Transportation, NDP Hamilton city councillor Brian Hinkley, and any other individuals the committee may deem appropriate; that given the gravity of the matter and given the government's commitment to restore public confidence in the integrity of government, this business be addressed on a priority basis in the committee's order of business and that the committee report back to the House upon its return in March 1991.

The Speaker: The member may already know that the motion is out of order, but it is of interest.

Mr Elston: We gave unanimous consent today for those ministers to come into the House to make their statements and we agreed to proceed on the basis that we would get something of an explanation on this and that there would be some fulfilment of an airing of all of the circumstances around this. I think that we might just as well have unanimous consent to allow the committee to go ahead and investigate this so that there will be no fear or no apprehension of fear on the part of the ministers that their full story is not available and that in fact Mr Hinkley, who is a councillor from the city of Hamilton, who I presume is very much involved in this thing, can put his story in places other than in the newspaper forum.

I think it is important to all of us, under the circumstances of this being probably the last day of the House, that we be allowed some latitude and leeway. The statements were brought to us by surprise. We were told late in the afternoon that they were coming on at question period time, and I think we should allow this to go to the committee or at least bring it on so that we can vote on it to understand --

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The Speaker: I understand the point made by the member for Bruce.

Mr Scott: They're too gutless, every one of them. They're afraid of the answer, that's what they're afraid of. We know. We understand perfectly. We went to committee; they wouldn't dare.

The Speaker: I will be able to rule once the member for St George-St David is quiet.

I will indeed ask for unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent to deal with the motion? No.

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ENERGY

Miss Martel moved that, notwithstanding any standing order, the Chair of the select committee on energy in the second session of the 34th Parliament, the member for Halton Centre, be permitted to present to the Legislature a background report to the select committee on energy by the Royal Society of Canada on Carbon Dioxide Emission Reduction Potential in the Industrial Sector.

Motion agreed to.

PETITION

HERITAGE PRESERVATION

Mr Winninger: I have a petition signed by 42 owners of heritage properties in London, all of whom support the immediate passage of Bill 18.

I support that petition as well.

REPORT BY COMMITTEE

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ENERGY

Mrs Sullivan from the select committee on energy presented a background report prepared by the Royal Society of Canada for the select committee on energy appointed in the second session of the 34th Parliament entitled Carbon Dioxide Emission Reduction Potential in the Industrial Sector.

Mrs Sullivan: I want to thank the House leaders and members of the assembly for providing an opportunity for the select committee on energy from the 34th Parliament to table a report to this Legislature.

Several members who participated in that committee work have returned to the House, including the member for Hamilton Mountain, the Minister of the Environment and the member for Algoma-Manitoulin. I would like to acknowledge their work, along with that of those past members who were not returned to this place.

The mandate of the select committee was to examine the greenhouse problem in Ontario and to look at scenarios for controlling, stabilizing or reducing carbon dioxide emissions in the province within the context of national and international actions. As well, the committee was asked to consider the types of public policy or public initiatives which could limit the adverse environmental and economic effects of carbon dioxide emissions.

During its first phase, the committee brought to Queen's Park many senior national and international scientists and diplomats to review the state of current thinking on the greenhouse effect and the national and international links and problems which this unique environmental issue presents. In what was, I believe, a special and innovative arrangement, the committee engaged the Royal Society of Canada to provide particular scientific and technical counsel and expertise. That contract provided us with a useful and learned source of knowledge. Advice which was put forward was independent of special interest, and committee members were assured of a solid grounding in and explanation of scientific projections and conclusions.

The committee has already presented one interim report to the House in the last session. In the second phase of its work, the committee commissioned a research report through the Royal Society. This report examined the technical potential for reduction of carbon dioxide emissions for major industrial energy users in Ontario.

It was to have been circulated to interested parties as a prelude to their participation in the public hearing phase of the committee's work. Many of those parties had already submitted papers relating to their specific circumstances. Others were waiting for this report to complete their documentation for the committee.

The report which I have tabled today was prepared for the Royal Society and for the committee by Dr Danny Harvey of the University of Toronto. Its focus is on what could be possible if one were determined to rapidly and aggressively reduce carbon dioxide emissions while maintaining a healthy economy. It speaks directly to the need for new and emerging technologies that could lead to significantly reduced energy use and associated carbon dioxide emissions in each of the major energy-consuming industries in Ontario. It recognizes that energy savings through retrofits in the near term will not be sufficient to even hold industrial carbon dioxide emissions constant and that new processes and technological applications will be required. It also points out the need for further research and development work to come to terms with the changes required and for government policies and programs that will drive those changes.

I think I can say for all members of the select committee that we regret we were unable to present a final report to the Legislature. Nevertheless, we all hope that this research document will be useful in further discussions, programs and policy development, both in this place and elsewhere, on the greenhouse problem.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

INTERVENOR FUNDING PROJECT AMENDMENT ACT, 1990 / LOI DE 1990 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LE PROJET D'AIDE FINANCIÈRE AUX INTERVENANTS

Mr Chiarelli moved first reading of Bill 39, An Act to amend the Intervenor Funding Project Act, 1988.

M. Chiarelli propose la première lecture du projet de loi 39, Loi portant modification de la Loi de 1988 sur le projet d'aide financière aux intervenants.

Motion agreed to.

La motion est adoptée.

Mr Chiarelli: At the present time, the Intervenor Funding Project Act provides that public interest groups may apply for intervenor funding for Ontario Energy Board and Environmental Assessment Board hearings. The purpose of the proposed amendment which I am reintroducing today is to extend application of the act to provide a level playing field for public interest groups appearing in major Ontario Municipal Board hearings and to include municipalities as eligible funding sources.

TOWN OF MARKHAM ACT, 1990

Mr Cousens moved first reading of Bill Pr38, An Act respecting the Town of Markham.

Motion agreed to.

Mr Cousens: The purpose of this bill is to enable the council of the Corporation of the Town of Markham to exercise greater control over the issuance of demolition permits for buildings which are designated under the Ontario --

The Speaker: My error, it is a private bill. It does not involve an introduction.

MORTGAGES AMENDMENT ACT, 1990

Mr Hampton moved first reading of Bill 40, An Act to amend the Mortgages Act.

Motion agreed to.

Hon Mr Hampton: The law now recognizes the interests of tenants in staying in their homes, and the ability of landlords to evict tenants is strictly limited by the Landlord and Tenant Act, which is backed up by the courts, but at present there is a gap in that protection. Where the landlord defaults on the mortgage on the premises, the courts have held that the mortgagee in possession is not bound by the tenancy agreement and can evict tenants without regard to the Landlord and Tenant Act. The legislation we have introduced today will ensure that tenants who reside in premises where the mortgagee is in possession will have the same protection as tenants in other cases under the Landlord and Tenant Act.

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ORDERS OF THE DAY

EDUCATION AMENDMENT ACT (MISCELLANEOUS), 1990

Mrs Boyd moved third reading of Bill 12, An Act to amend the Education Act.

Mrs Cunningham: I would like to make a short statement on the bills we have before us at this time. I would like to begin by thanking the minister for her time, for her input, for her openness and for her willingness to work with all committee members during the public deliberations of Bill 12 and Bill 13. It was definitely very refreshing. I think all members would agree that the hearings allowed the education community the opportunity to make constructive suggestions for improvement, many of which have now been incorporated into Bill 12.

Although some of the concerns that were brought to our attention have been addressed, we still do not agree that the Minister of Education should have the power to create additional French-language school boards by regulation. Our party feels that new boards should only be established by a bill brought before this House for full deliberation. For this reason, we will not be supporting these bills at third reading. Our decision not to endorse this substantial change in how additional boards are created in this province must not be interpreted as a statement against minority-language rights. We worked with the minister to make improvements in her legislation and we understand the realities of the day. It is simply that the Progressive Conservative Party does not agree with endorsing government by regulation.

If the minister were to withdraw these bills and bring forward an individual bill for each new board, I am sure the members of all parties would give them their careful consideration and support. We are voting against these bills as a matter of principle, but we will continue to work with the minister in her endeavours.

During the course of the public hearings of the standing committee on social development, there were a number of presentations that indicated that others share our concern. The Ottawa-Carleton French-Language School Board was created by Bill 109 after many months and years of deliberation; definitely, as a first it took much too long. However, a representative from that board indicated that he would not want the minister to have the power to make changes by regulations. This is a board that is experienced in these matters. He indicated that change is needed to resolve such matters as a $10-million debt, but that this change should be in the form of legislation.

The challenges that we face in these economic times are very real. The challenges that we face in creating more new French school boards are very real. But we think the real challenges should be met up front, openly and honestly, board by board, and that this government should indeed make it a priority.

Before creating additional French-language boards, we should look at our two existing boards to determine what has worked and what has not. We should solicit their advice and help them resolve their problems. It was brought to our attention that this has not been done in the most open way that it should have been. For this reason, I think the government should take note that the Ottawa-Carleton French-language board does not endorse the creation of new boards by regulation.

We should be learning from past experiences. We have so few of them in Ontario, but the time, commitment and energy that went into them was very real. People who have put their efforts into making something work would have much good firsthand advice, I believe, for the minister and this government.

There was a second presentation I would like to highlight. Gilles Fournier, chair of the section de langue française in Prescott and Russell County Board of Education, stated: "We are here out of concern that the government is rushing at breakneck speed to pass legislation without consulting in any form or way the true minority in Prescott-Russell." He went on to add: "What is even more disturbing is that in this proposed legislation the government plans to give power to create boards to the cabinet. The only purpose we can see for giving this power to cabinet is to remove such decisions from careful examination in the public arena, to subvert the goals of democratic society and the commitment to fully consult which has been so often espoused by this government."

Those words should be taken seriously, and during the process of trying to establish French-language school boards where numbers warrant, as I think the minister has shown her intent and for which we give her support, I would hope that if she finds that the process she has embarked upon is not working, she would be brave enough to come back to this House with individual bills.

Once again, I think the minister should take special note of the fact that part of the francophone community that will be directly affected by the creation of a new French-language school board in Prescott-Russell does not want the government to create the new board by regulation. I underline again that if the minister were to withdraw these bills and bring forward individual bills for each new board, I am sure she would receive the support of this House.

I do not think the threat of a lawsuit is really a good enough reason to rush ahead with new boards by regulation. I am sure that if the government shows a genuine commitment to move ahead to comply with the Supreme Court decision, these individuals would not move forward with legal action. What I think has been missing in the past has been just that, a genuine commitment to move ahead quickly. If they did, and I am now talking about the individuals moving forward with legal action, so be it. I strongly believe a government should never be hostage to the threat of a legal challenge. We must always place good government ahead of a hasty solution to a problem.

I would urge the minister to reconsider her decision to create new boards by regulation. Two days of public hearings clearly indicated that interested parties want a process that involves full public consultation. Our party endorses that concept, and that is why we will not support this legislation. I realize that the minister must move forward. I simply object to how she is undertaking to comply with the Mahé decision. Our party continues to believe that school boards should not be created by regulation under any circumstance. We appreciate the opportunity to participate in an open committee process. We commend the minister on the process. We will be watching very carefully the results of this legislation.

Hon Mrs Boyd: I am surprised at the member for London North's statement today, as we reached unanimous agreement in the standing committee on the amendments to this act. I am disappointed in her stance and that of her party. I certainly am not prepared to withdraw these bills.

I would just like to say for the record that negotiations have barely begun in Prescott-Russell. No board is going to be created without full consultation with all the communities involved. That was made very clear to the people in the standing committee and I think in the debate was made very clear in this House.

I do not believe the government is being held hostage. What we are attempting to do is to ensure that we as a government can make public policy without having our hands tied by the decisions of lawyers and judges in a court decision, as has happened so often in the past.

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Mr Cousens: I would just like to compliment my caucus colleague the member for London North for the statement she has just made and for highlighting two of the concerns that were very important to me. One is government by regulation. I really appreciate the fact that we have to use the Legislature and this chamber as the place we bring forward important decisions. To have them made behind closed doors in a cabinet, where all the data is not made public, is, I believe, something that undermines our democratic right and the importance of this Legislative chamber. That is a fundamental point. We have fought it in the past, and I am delighted that my colleague the member for London North has raised that as an issue.

I also want to make sure that people see the statement the honourable member has just put into the record. We have no desire to be seen as having opposition to minority rights. That is not at all a position for anyone in this province, but I do believe any decisions that are made with regard to providing additional school boards for special purposes for anyone is something that should be brought to this House, and we should have a far bigger discussion on it.

I remember on an earlier bill when things just sort of slipped by without the public debate and public discussion. We have only had a few days in committee to allow this to be rammed through by a government in a hurry to run away for Christmas -- and so are we. But to just rush it through is not the way I feel it should be handled. We are dealing with important issues when it comes to language in this province. If the government has any other agenda when it comes to language services it may not be admitting them here in this House and in committee, but the fact is that there are many of us who believe there is another hidden agenda by this government on language issues.

Mrs Marland: I know these two bills that are before us now for third reading are very significant. It is also very significant that the people pay very close attention to the words from the member for London North this afternoon. It is the process to which we object. It is a very dangerous precedent to have a process whereby this government or any government has the freedom to make those kinds of decisions without having them come back into this Legislature before all parties.

I do not care who the government of the day is; this kind of precedent is not in the best interests of the people of this province, and it is that process with which we have concern. The questions that could have been asked and further dealt with had there been more time to process these bills through the public process -- admittedly they went to committee, but with a very short time allowed for those committee hearings. It is an issue of democracy. To go to the public with committee hearings in a limited time because this government wanted to get these bills rushed through before Christmas is not a process we support, and we hope this will be the first and last of this kind of action by this government that we are subjected to.

Mrs Witmer: I would like to add my voice to those who have expressed concern about the process that has been involved. Throughout the creation of school boards in this province -- we have had Bill 30 and now we have had the creation of the French-language school boards -- there has been a need for sensitivity and a need for consultation. Unfortunately, in this case that consultation and that sensitivity were not present.

I would ask the Minister of Education that in the future, when school boards are created in this province, she do consult with all individuals involved in order that there is support from all sides.

Mrs Cunningham: It is not often that you get two minutes you did not expect, so I will just say a couple of things that I think are rather important.

I am disappointed also that we could not come to some conclusion about this legislation. I must say in response to the minister's remarks that I think the most important aspect of what we said today was in support of the two French communities which did appear before the committee. Both of them stated their concern about government by regulation, especially creating these school boards by regulation. One was an experienced member of the Ottawa-Carleton board of education, the other was a member of the Prescott-Russell school board, and both share our concern.

One has to realize that in opposition we have a job to do, that is, to bring the criticisms, hopefully constructively and with solutions, to the government. That is simply what we were doing today, and I think we did it thoroughly and in good faith.

We will stand by our principle, that is, that in spite of open public consultation that has been promised by the minister -- nothing could be more public, more open, more understood and more agreed to than a public consultation around a bill of this Legislative Assembly. That is why we have that process in our democratic society.

In the history of Ontario, a school board has never been created by regulation. I am standing here today to say that there is a reason for that and our party will not agree to that process.

Mr Beer: I rise to reiterate the views our party has expressed on these two bills. I think it is very important that we not overlook some of the fundamental principles in this legislation and the fact that in committee we were, I believe in a fair and equitable way, able to work frankly with all three parties and with a number of provincial associations that came before us to deal with some of the specific concerns that have been raised.

I think it is important in this debate to underline again that what we have done in this legislation is ensure that there can be, after following a particular process, the creation of French-language school boards. As I have made clear in a number of instances, in recognizing that right we are also recognizing a reciprocal right that English-language school boards may be created as well.

We have said, and I think everyone has agreed, that we did not want to see the regulatory process being one that was there for ever, so we moved a change to that. An amendment has been brought to the bill which, through a sunset provision, will effectively mean that the power of the government to do that by regulation will end on 1 January 1994 or before, once the consultative process that the government has launched through the French Language Education Governance Advisory Group has been completed and other work has been done. The need to have that power in the interim we felt was reasonable, and with the amendment we were able to accept that.

The second issue that arose, which dealt with the question of the extension on the part of the separate school boards to provide separate secondary programs or to purchase those programs, again was the subject of much discussion with provincial associations and in committee. Again an amendment was brought to make very clear, I believe, the role of the Planning and Implementation Commission, to ensure that if in fact extension is provided it would only be done after a very public process that would involve all those parties to any potential agreement.

In addition, another amendment was brought forward that dealt with ensuring that teachers and others working within the educational system must be consulted before any regulation is provided to create another school board.

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I think here it was important to recognize the principles around the creation of linguistic school boards and in effect to make clear that having started the Bill 30 process this was something that needed to be completed in a fair and equitable way, and I believe the process that was created will do that.

It is for those reasons, plus the Mahé court decision and the problem that is faced in terms of potential court action, that we believe there was the need to complete this work and believe we have built into the legislation some necessary and proper amendments which will ensure that there will not be any use of power in a bad or negative way. I believe in committee the minister made very clear that in the process around the potential creation of a school board in Prescott-Russell or in Simcoe, that would be done only after very extensive public consultation. As she herself pointed out, at this point in time there has been no direct request to create those school boards.

We would simply like to indicate that the principles in those two bills are ones that, with the amendments, we are prepared to support.

Hon Mrs Boyd: I wish to emphasize, as has been said before in this House, that the purpose of this action that we are taking under Bill 12 and Bill 13 is in no way to try to abuse the power of this House or to prevent any discussion of these very important issues.

We are faced with a time problem which has to do primarily with the imminence of elections in the 1991 year. If we are to provide those French-language parents with the possibility of governance of their own systems in the 1991 election year, as was promised in an agreement, an out-of-court settlement in 1988 by the previous government, it is necessary for us to pass these bills today to enable the formation of school boards, if those communities are ready and prepared in time to be enumerated for the 1991 election.

I would ask this House to support these bills at this time.

1628

The House divided on third reading of Bill 12, which was agreed to on the following vote:

Ayes -- 74

Abel, Akande, Beer, Bisson, Boyd, Buchanan, Christopherson, Churley, Cooper, Coppen, Cordiano, Dadamo, Drainville, Duignan, Elston, Fawcett, Ferguson, Fletcher, Frankford, Gigantes, Grier, Haeck, Hampton, Hansen, Haslam, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Kormos, Kwinter, Lankin, Lessard, Mackenzie, MacKinnon, Mahoney, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martel, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, Murdock, S.;

Nixon, O'Connor, Offer, O'Neill, Y., Owens, Perruzza, Philip, E., Phillips, G., Pilkey, Poirier, Poole, Rae, Scott, Silipo, Sola, Sullivan, Sutherland, Swarbrick, Ward, M., Waters, Wessenger, White, Wildman, Wilson, F., Wilson, G., Winninger, Wiseman, Ziemba.

Nays -- 14

Carr, Cousens, Cunningham, Eves, Harris, Jackson, Marland, Murdoch, B., Runciman, Sterling, Stockwell, Tilson, Turnbull, Witmer.

OTTAWA-CARLETON FRENCH-LANGUAGE SCHOOL BOARD AMENDMENT ACT, 1990 / LOI DE 1990 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LE CONSEIL SCOLAIRE DE LANGUE FRANÇAISE D'OTTAWA-CARLETON

Mrs Boyd moved third reading of Bill 13, An Act to amend the Ottawa-Carleton French-Language School Board Act.

M^me Boyd propose la troisième lecture du projet de loi 13, Loi portant modification de la Loi de 1988 sur le Conseil scolaire de langue française d'Ottawa-Carleton.

1637

The House divided on third reading of Bill 13, An Act to amend the Ottawa-Carleton French-Language School Board Act, 1988, which was agreed to on the following vote:

La motion pour la troisième lecture du projet de loi 13, Loi portant modification de la Loi de 1988 sur le Conseil scolaire de langue française d'Ottawa-Carleton, mise aux voix, est adoptée.

Ayes/Pour -- 74

Abel, Akande, Beer, Bisson, Boyd, Buchanan, Christopherson, Churley, Cooper, Coppen, Cordiano, Dadamo, Drainville, Duignan, Elston, Fawcett, Ferguson, Fletcher, Frankford, Gigantes, Grier, Haeck, Hampton, Hansen, Haslam, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Kormos, Kwinter, Lankin, Lessard, Mackenzie, MacKinnon, Mahoney, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martel, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, Murdock, S.;

Nixon, O'Connor, Offer, O'Neill, Y., Owens, Perruzza, Philip, E., Phillips, G., Pilkey, Poirier, Poole, Rae, Scott, Silipo, Sola, Sullivan, Sutherland, Swarbrick, Ward, M., Waters, Wessenger, White, Wildman, Wilson, F., Wilson, G., Winninger, Wiseman, Ziemba.

Nays/Contre -- 14

Carr, Cousens, Cunningham, Eves, Harris, Jackson, Marland, Murdoch, B., Runciman, Sterling, Stockwell, Tilson, Turnbull, Witmer.

CITY OF LONDON ACT, 1990

Mr Winninger moved third reading of Bill 18, An Act respecting the City of London.

Mr Winninger: I would like to acknowledge and thank the members who spoke on behalf of the bill, particularly the member for London North and the member for London Centre, who assisted in bringing the bill to third reading. I also acknowledge the concerns expressed by the member for York Centre and the member for Carleton about process. However, I deeply regret that due to the exigencies of time we were unable to comply with all of the rules by the letter and that in some cases notice periods had to be waived. I would hope that if this bill obtains third reading and royal assent the city council of London can heal its wounds and restore a meaningful dialogue with the owner-developers of heritage properties.

Mr Nixon: I want to say a word on third reading. I was watching some of the debate on second reading during private members' hour. I do not want to express a particular opinion as to whether the streetscape should be saved. Some of my friends are dead against it, some of my friends are all for it, and of course I support my friends.

But as a long-time participant and observer in the House, I would not say the procedure sets a precedent other than in the inability of the government of the day to come to grips with a very difficult decision. If in fact it wants to make the decision here rather than in London, then in my view the government of the day should do whatever reviews it sees fit and then bring legislation into the House for that purpose. I do not believe that private members' legislation in this regard is appropriate or suitable unless the government finds it simply cannot make a decision itself or does not have the gumption to choose between and among its friends.

I have no particular objection to this situation other than to say that in the past, when legislation dealt directly with decisions to be made by a municipality, we normally responded to a resolution of that municipality arrived at by a majority of its elected council. For the NDP member and his many friends, supporters and colleagues to decide that these decisions would be made in another way in my opinion is inappropriate.

We have moved now for third reading on the basis of government legislation. The honourable member is correct: The rules do not permit this. Being a lawyer himself, he might find that some of his colleagues learned in the law will perhaps use his own comments when they look at this legislation and discuss its validity. But it appears that all members are at least going to allow this to pass third reading without too much additional comment.

Mr Bradley: This morning I was listening to part of the debate, and I want to offer a comment that may not be well received, but that is too bad. I heard an intervention by the now member for London Centre, where she had to make a point of being rather critical of the last member for London Centre, taking that usual shot at the last minute. I thought that was particularly unnecessary at the time. If the minister would for once put a smile on her face in this Legislature and realize that she has been elected to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, there is no need to be taking boots to the last Premier, the last member for London Centre. I thought it was inopportune that that would take place in this Legislature.

Interjections.

Mr Scott: Ed, don't you mouth off today of all days, you scum.

Interjections.

Mr Scott: Don't have Ed Philip mouth off today. Maybe next day, next week. Let a little time go by.

Interjections.

Mr Bradley: There is no need to give instruction to the Speaker.

The Speaker: I will confess that if there was an untoward comment, I did not hear it. What I will remind members is that, to be frank, it would be pleasant to have a nice way to end this session without bitterness. We are in the midst of directing questions or comments to the Leader of the Opposition, who had made his remarks on this bill.

Mr Bradley: The bill obviously won a good degree of support from members of the Legislative Assembly. There will always be divisions of opinion on any legislation or any resolution that comes before the House. I felt it was unnecessary for the member for London Centre to go back into the history of her riding and the member for London Centre at that occasion to say that somehow when he got elected he forgot about it. Those members are all virtuous now and they do not forget those things when they get here. I think it will probably sharpen the memory and attention of many members over here if the same is seen by the present member for London Centre.

Mr Cousens: Just to comment very briefly, I would also like to support what was said by the member for Brant-Haldimand with regard to the process that was followed with this bill. Today I tabled a private member's bill regarding the town of Markham that in effect gives it powers regarding the protection of heritage homes and areas in the town of Markham. It was duly given application back many months and is now tabled. There is a due process, and we know how it works, through the standing committee on regulations and private bills. It is just too bad they could not do the same.

Motion agreed to.

Hon Miss Martel: Mr Speaker, His Honour awaits to give royal assent to certain bills that have been passed.

His Honour the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario entered the chamber of the Legislative Assembly and took his seat upon the throne.

ROYAL ASSENT / SANCTION ROYALE

Hon Mr Alexander: Pray be seated.

The Speaker: May it please Your Honour, the Legislative Assembly of the province has, at its present sittings thereof, passed certain bills to which, in the name of and on behalf of the said Legislative Assembly, I respectfully request Your Honour's assent.

1650

Clerk Assistant and Clerk of Committees: The following are the titles of the bills to which Your Honour's assent is prayed:

Bill 1, An Act to amend the Retail Sales Tax Act;

Bill 9, An Act to authorize borrowing on the credit of the Consolidated Revenue Fund;

Loi autorisant des emprunts garantis par le Trésor;

Bill 10, An Act to amend the Corporations Tax Act;

Bill 11, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act;

Bill 12, An Act to amend the Education Act;

Bill 13, An Act to amend the Ottawa-Carleton FrenchLanguage School Board Act, 1988;

Loi portant modification de la Loi de 1988 sur le Conseil scolaire de langue française d'Ottawa-Carleton;

Bill 14, An Act to amend the Employment Standards Act with respect to Pregnancy and Parental Leave;

Bill 15, An Act respecting Land on Manitoulin Island, Barrie Island and Cockburn Island;

Bill 16, An Act to amend the Municipal Elections Act and certain other Acts related to Municipal Elections;

Bill 18, An Act respecting the City of London;

Bill Pr9, An Act to revive the Restoule Snowmobile Club;

Bill Pr17, An Act to revive The Interlock People Ltd;

Bill Pr18, An Act to revive Conyork Construction & Engineering Ltd;

Bill Pr19, An Act respecting The Oratory of Saint Philip Neri-Toronto;

Bill Pr21, An Act respecting the City of Windsor;

Bill Pr22, An Act respecting Goderich-Exeter Railway Company Limited;

Bill Pr26, An Act respecting the Town of Richmond Hill;

Bill Pr30, An Act respecting the City of Vanier;

Bill Pr32, An Act respecting the City of Toronto;

Bill Pr45, An Act to revive Lordina Limited;

Bill Pr48, An Act to revive La Capanna Homes (Non-Profit) Inc

Clerk of the House: In Her Majesty's name, His Honour the Lieutenant Governor doth assent to these bills.

Au nom de Sa Majesté, Son Honneur le lieutenant- gouverneur sanctionne ces projets de loi.

His Honour the Lieutenant Governor was pleased to retire from the chamber.

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ONTARIO IN CONFEDERATION / COMITÉ SPÉCIAL SUR LE RÔLE DE L'ONTARIO AU SEIN DE LA CONFÉDÉRATION

Mr Rae moved resolution 9:

That a select committee on Ontario in Confederation be established to review and report on: (a) the social and economic interests and aspirations of all the people of Ontario within Confederation; and (b) what form of Confederation can most effectively meet the social and economic aspirations of the people of Ontario; that the committee have authority to adjourn from place to place in Canada to hold hearings, retain counsel, fund research, sponsor public forums and encourage public discussions to foster the broad participation of all the people of Ontario; that the proceedings of the committee be televised by the broadcast and recording service to ensure that the committee's public deliberations, hearings and activities are available to the people of Ontario; that the committee present an interim report to the House by 21 March 1991, provided that if the House is not meeting, the committee have authority to release its report by depositing a copy of it with the Clerk of the Assembly and upon resumption of the meetings of the House, the Chair of the committee shall bring such report before the House in accordance with the standing orders; that the committee have authority to meet concurrently with the House and during any adjournment of the House, subject to the approval of the three party whips, up to and including 27 June 1991; and that the committee be composed of the following members: Mr Silipo (Chair), Mr Beer, Mr Bisson, Ms Churley, Mr Eves, Mr Harnick, Ms Harrington, Mr Malkowski, Mr Offer, Mrs O'Neill (Ottawa-Rideau), Mr Wilson (Frontenac-Addington) and Mr Winninger.

Hon Mr Rae: The debate that we are about to have for two hours, as has been agreed by all three parties, is one in which each party will have about 40 minutes to speak. I am going to be sharing my time with the Minister of Natural Resources who has responsibility for native affairs. I understand that there are going to be others from the other parties who will be speaking as well.

This brief debate is, I am sure members will realize, one of several opportunities that we have held in this House, certainly in my experience going back to 1982 and my first election to this place. Looking across at the Leader of the Opposition, I fully realize that makes me a late entry in the field in terms of discussions that have taken place in this assembly over a great many years with regard to the question of the Constitution of the country.

I want to make a very brief introduction to the debate. Then we will do the usual round. The member for Algoma, the Minister of Natural Resources, will speak and then I will have an opportunity at the end of the discussion to wind up. So I do not intend to use too much of my time in the introductory comments I make to this discussion.

What I want to say to members is that there has obviously been a discussion within the government, and I think within the public, about how we as a province can most effectively contribute to what is going to be not only a crucial national debate, but frankly crucial national decision-making with respect to the Constitution of the country.

Reflecting on my own experience, I can honestly say that like a great many other members -- I do not want to ascribe views to anyone else -- I had great hopes when my predecessor as Premier went to Ottawa in 1985, 1986 and 1987 for the first discussions with respect to the so-called Quebec round. I had great hopes that we would in fact be able to complete that round and then move on to further reform.

I know this is not a day on which the former Attorney General is particularly well inclined towards any description of our former relationship, but I want to say to the former Attorney General that I vividly remember the phone call I received in my car from him, very late in the evening, when he was able to report to me that significant progress had been made with respect to what was then known as the Quebec round. This was in the days when there was a minority Parliament and there was, as is often the case in minority parliaments, a much greater tendency to need to tell people as much as possible about what is going on. The Attorney General, as he then was, was very forthcoming in coming to see me to describe what had been achieved at the first discussions.

We then had a series of debates in this House about possible changes to the first round of Meech and there were some minor amendments made at the Langevin Block. We all know that process was not able to be resolved and was not able to produce a comprehensive amendment to the Constitution as many of us had hoped.

I think it would be fair to say that there were probably a majority of the citizens of the province who, during the discussions on Meech, did not feel it was the right way to proceed, though I would suspect that by the time we got down to that last week in Ottawa, I think there began to be some understanding of the consequences of failing to reach a conclusion with respect to the Meech round. I think probably people felt, "Better to proceed and get something done than to leave us in the situation where there is no agreement and no consensus has been achieved," and in fact no consensus was in the end arrived at.

The failure of the Meech Lake process has left all of us -- I say all of us; I certainly say it has left me; I can speak very personally -- with a sense that as difficult as it is, it is absolutely essential for us to take up this task yet again. Like any defeat, it takes some time to recover from it, because I regard what took place as a setback. But I still believe that we have to find ways in the country for the Constitution to be reformed. I believe profoundly that we have to find ways to include Quebec in the Canadian Constitution in a way that is acceptable to the Legislative Assembly and to a majority of the people of the province of Quebec. I also believe we have to amend the Constitution so that if I can repeat a phrase I have used before, every citizen in the country can see his reflection in the constitutional mirror, in the Canadian mirror.

Right now I think it is fair to say that there are a great many Canadians, there are the first citizens of Canada, the first nations of Canada, as has been very clearly expressed by many members of this House -- I am sure the minister responsible for native affairs will be talking about this to some extent -- who certainly feel that the constitutional changes that have been made in recent years, particularly the patriation process and the Meech Lake discussions, really did not significantly include them in a way that would allow them to say that their sense of who they are in the Canadian fabric has been recognized.

At the same time, there are a number of people in western Canada, governments in western Canada and political movements in western Canada that have again reflected a sense of alienation from the current constitutional arrangement, and again have made it very clear that they do not see themselves as clearly as they feel they have to in the current situation.

1700

I can tell the House, the members of the opposition and the province that I believe it is important for us to move not just on one front, but on several fronts at the same time. I know there are some who disagree, but I happen to believe that it is important for a parliamentary committee, made up of the members of this House who are democratically elected to this place, to play a role in consulting with the Ontario public, but not simply consulting in a passive sense but also asking the Ontario public to engage in a serious discussion of what our real options are as a province and what our real options are as Canadians faced with what is a significant constitutional crisis.

I can assure members of the House that this is not the only front upon which we intend to move. As I have indicated to the leaders of the opposition, we are setting up a secretariat in the Ministry of Intergovernmental Affairs, which secretariat will work with the committee. It is also going to be, obviously, working with the government and with me as Premier and as Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs in providing us with ideas, in providing us with the research, in providing us with the kind of work that is going to be essential for our eventual success.

We have had many offers of help from many distinguished Canadians who have worked very hard in the past in this province to see that we are able to play an effective leadership role in what we hope will be a process of national reconciliation, recognizing that this is extremely difficult and a very tall order at the present time. I look forward to working with them and with members of the opposition and with the leaders of the opposition as we explore the central reality, it seems to me, of this discussion.

I think the central reality has two parts. The first is that the status quo is not tenable. It is not going to be good enough for us as a province, when the time comes for there to be detailed presentations of a series of proposals, to simply say that the status quo, with a few minor changes, is somehow going to be adequate. I do not think any of us should be under that illusion. I think that perhaps there was kind of a false peace that settled over many parts of the country with the collapse of the Meech Lake process. There were no doubt many who said: "Well, we've got that over with. We can go off for the summer and not have too much to worry about."

I think that anybody who suffers from that illusion is very quickly in the new year going to have to come to terms with the fact that to simply state the nostrums, or to wrap oneself in a flag or to simply say that we all believe in a united and strong Canada -- these are perhaps important sentiments to express, but they are not going to be adequate when it comes to the kinds of discussions that are going to be taking place this year and, I would suggest, not just this year but in the years to come, in terms of our conversations and discussions not only with the province of Quebec, but with the first nations of the country, with people in western and northern Canada and indeed a great many Canadians who, as I say, do not feel that up to this point the Constitution has really reflected their views.

I want to just conclude this opening of the debate by saying that I am very much aware of the role that former premiers have played and that former governments of this province have played in the discussions that have led us to this point. If I can just speak without going back into the history of the 19th century and the great debates on the formation of the country itself, a great many of the most eloquent and powerful spokesmen on behalf of the notion of Confederation itself were, of course, citizens of what was then Upper Canada which then became Ontario.

I can tell members that from my own experience I am very much aware of the role that was played by Premier Robarts in terms of the initial response to the Quiet Revolution, a response which was remarkably sensitive and far-reaching. I am thinking, of course, of the role that was played by William Davis as he led a government for 13 years in this country at a time of great change, and when obviously the views of the province of Ontario were sought after and important, and of course of David Peterson, my immediate predecessor, who was, I can tell members, elected leader of his party just a few short weeks after I was elected to the leadership of mine and whose role in national discussions has been important, positive, significant and constructive.

I am very much aware of the fact that all of us in this debate, including me, have a role to play. I think it is important to neither overplay nor to underplay the importance of that. Ontario has to be present. Ontario will be present.

But along with that, I think one of the lessons we have to learn from Meech is that we have to be prepared to listen. We have to signal to the people of the province that we do not have a pipeline to some magic solution, that frankly the experts and those who have been in this game for a very long time have not been able on their own to find an effective solution, and that therefore we have to draw on all the citizens of the province in an effort to resolve some of the most difficult questions.

As I have said, the approach we are going to be taking is active, is constructive, is intended to allow the people to have their say. It recognizes that there is more to it than that, and that as a government we must lead as well as listen. I can tell the people of the province that I am determined to do that.

Laissez-moi dire, Monsieur le Président, quelques paroles en langue française qui est après tout une des deux langues officielles du Canada. Je veux parler directement à mes concitoyens de la province de Québec.

Nous sommes tous reconnaissants, et moi je le reconnais, que l'échec du processus de Lac Meech a créé d'énormes problèmes pour les Québécois. Il y avait une chance que l'accord du Lac Meech représentait une reconnaissance, de la part du Canada, du fait que le Québec était une société distincte dans le Canada et cette reconnaissance était un événement, une étape très importante pour la réconciliation nationale.

Je veux dire à mes concitoyens québécois que la province de l'Ontario est prête pour les changements, que l'Ontario est prête pour le renouvellement constitutionnel, que nous prenons au sérieux les aspirations de la population du Québec en même temps que nous prenons au sérieux les aspirations qu'ont les autres Canadiens eux aussi aux changements qui peuvent les inclure, autant que nous insistons que la nouvelle constitution doit reconnaître la spécificité de la province de Québec.

Je dois dire en même temps que les Ontariens veulent, comme je l'ai déjà dit avant, un Canada sans passeports. Nous voulons un Canada fédéral, non pas parce que nous voulons un Canada qui soit un État centralisateur ou unitaire, mais parce que nous pensons que c'est le fédéralisme qui peut mieux refléter la réalité canadienne.

C'était la sagesse de Macdonald et c'était la sagesse de Cartier il y a plus de cent ans, de reconnaître, dans cette reconnaissance mutuelle de la réalité canadienne, que l'on allait trouver une unité plus profonde, que le fédéralisme canadien, s'il est fidèle à sa promesse, doit pouvoir changer, doit pouvoir se réformer, doit pouvoir faire des progrès parce que ça doit être un fédéralisme qui reflète des changements dans tous les coins de notre Canada.

Mais comme je l'ai dit hier, je dois dire franchement à mes concitoyens de la province de Québec que c'est la position très ferme de notre gouvernement que le Canada, ça vaut les efforts, que le Canada, ça vaut la peine et que franchement, nous n'avons pas la possibilité, qu'on ne peut même pas admettre la possibilité d'un autre échec. Nous devons réussir et je peux dire, au nom de notre gouvemement, que nous avons la détermination de réussir.

Thank you very much. I look forward to hearing the other participants in the debate.

1710

Mr Nixon: Although the resolution does not need seconding as far as I know -- and there are in that regard no formal seconders -- I believe it is apparent that both the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party and myself are in support of the resolution. He of course will speak for himself, but we have already indicated that we feel the approach to the assessment of the views of the people of the province should be without partisan involvement. There is no doubt that our goals are the same and I had mentioned during the Premier's statement yesterday that that is stating the obvious, that without respect to party here, we all want to do what we can, as successfully as we can, not only to maintain Confederation with its present partners but strengthen it.

The Premier has indicated that he remembers going back to a number of previous constitutional discussions, and it is true that I do go back farther than he did, but even at the age of five he was probably involved in some way in the Confederation of Tomorrow conference. The funny part of it is then that most people, including members of the Legislature, really were not aware that we had a Constitution, that section 93 established the legislatures and occasionally in an erudite evening session somebody like Elmer Sopha would come in with a large tome including the Constitution and read it to us all.

The idea was that in fact the Constitution was taken for granted, that Canada worked well and would continue to work well. Whenever it was necessary to adjust the Constitution, reasonable people from the provinces would sit down with the Prime Minister. I do not know where they went before Meech Lake had palatial facilities, but they would reach an agreement, or not, and the Constitution was flexible enough to accommodate the needs of the emerging nation.

Even in 1967, when for obvious reasons, our Centennial, politicians tended to think that although there was not too much wrong with the Constitution it should be examined, then Premier John Robarts had the Confederation of Tomorrow conference, which just had a slight political slant. Even its naming, I think, was established by some imaginative person in Camp Associates Advertising. But at least the meeting was held and the premiers had a chance to discuss these matters. There was no thought that cracks were appearing in our Constitution or in our nation; everybody knew it would continue and be healthy and continue to prosper and provide what we normally felt was the absolute best place in the world with the most effective and sensitive democracy.

I do not want to attribute that I know the Premier's views better than he knows his own, but I have a feeling that many people feel that we are in somewhat the same position at the present time. Certainly these matters have got to be examined, but as long as we are forthright and strong and have a slogan nailed to the mast that all will be well, I do not believe that we will be well.

For us to say and have the Toronto Star repeat in a banner, "Canada is not negotiable," is something we all wish were true. The idea that the country is not negotiable and nothing can happen to its geography, I do not believe is realistic. And when the Premier -- highly respected as he is in these and other matters -- gets up and says this, with all the panoply that was associated in an interesting way with his statement yesterday, I have a feeling that we are leading many people to say, "All is well, Bob Rae says this is not negotiable."

I was interested to see Gil Rémillard being interviewed, in his flawless English, about the matter. He indicated interest in this initiative but he says of course Quebec is dealing with the government of Canada. And however much we, I would not say protest but insist that we are equal partners and that we speak for English Canada as well the English or the non-French community -- it is fine to say that, but we may be faced with facts that are a bit more penetrating than the Premier's comments would indicate he understands. I would not for a moment suggest that he has not got an understanding that is deep and penetrating, because I have a premonition that some of the aspects of our approach to this are going to be seen to be -- unrealistic. There are a number of words that leap to my mind, but unrealistic.

However, what else can we do? I think, in the last analysis, the Premier of Ontario, with his colleagues and with the Prime Minister of Canada, whoever he or she may be by that time, will in fact have to decide what the future of the country is like. They may feel that after they make a decision it would be put to all the people. They may feel it would be ratified by the legislatures, and if they give the legislatures a three-year time period in order to do that, they will be as foolish in the future as they have been in the past.

But the idea, of course, to consult the nation calls for a national referendum, and it is difficult to know how we are going to proceed with that if there has already been a referendum authorized by the National Assembly of the province of Quebec. This gets more and more complex, and I have a feeling, and I would not say we are whistling as we walk past the graveyard because it is not an appropriate analogy, but there is a certain degree of unrealistic hope in this that concerns me.

Obviously we have to find out properly what the people of the province are thinking and what they want us to do, most of us having just come from the hustings and knowing what a lot of people have said, and many people were extremely critical of the role of Ontario and the role of the then leader, my good friend and former Premier, David Peterson, in this matter. I sincerely supported him in his support for the Meech accord and I regret more deeply than I can express to members that this was seen to be unacceptable to the people of Canada and particularly the people of Ontario. It may have been a problem in the government of the day or anybody else communicating our views. Certainly there was no stronger supporter for the Meech accord than the present Premier, and the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party, while properly expressing some concerns, made it unanimous in this House. Yet it was impossible for us as the political leaders to get any kind of significant support in this province. Without that, I really do not know what we as a province can take to Ottawa or Quebec City or Victoria, where it might have been settled two decades ago, that is going to make the circumstances come out as positively as we all pray and devoutly wish and some of us believe.

I am not going to talk unduly about "Canada is not negotiable" other than to say the fact that the Premier pins his reputation on that concerns me. There is concern expressed about the timing. The people who are in this committee are going to be extremely busy. I have already expressed my view that somehow, since our support for the concept is unanimous, I believe it will be unanimous that we will insist somehow that we hear the real views of the people and not the views of the lunatic fringe; and I will be misunderstood in this. By the time I got home last night, people were phoning my wife saying, "What does he mean 'fleur-de-lis stuffed in their pocket' and why shouldn't we tramp on the -- " We will not even go into that, other than to say that we do not really understand the strength of the views that are not so interested in the continuation of Confederation as it is and our Constitution as it is.

The view -- I hesitate to even say it -- "Let them go and good riddance," is expressed by a lot of people in this province, and we are going to hear that as a committee. I do not want to prejudge the whole thing, but we are embarking on a very difficult situation.

1720

The time scale is brief. I thought perhaps the Premier was a little self-serving when he said, "As we have looked around the country and seen some other parliaments planning consultative processes that do not end until either late next year or even 1992, we have concluded that we do not have that much time." That is fine.

The thing that really drives us of course is Bélanger-Campeau. That is the important commission and my colleague may express some views as to how our committee might have been structured to make it more of a balance. I respect his views, but he did not carry the day. But that is another matter.

I do not feel we had any choice, because whether our committee is finished or not, the government of Ontario, the Legislature of Ontario, the members of the cabinet -- all of whom are very important, particularly the people -- but essentially the Premier is going to have to know what he thinks and he is then going to say what he thinks and it has to be something more than "Canada is not negotiable."

The report may come out just a few days before Bélanger-Campeau, but this is really going to be a report of what the people have told us they think about it and our synthesis of those views. Although all parties agreed to the formation of this and have the same goals as it begins its work, obviously all parties, and maybe individuals, may retain for themselves the right to express their interpretation of those views in the Legislature as they see fit when the time comes.

It is a terribly important circumstance. All of us are thinking the unthinkable. There may come a time when we debate the unthinkable, which is even negotiation. There could be a certain unilateral approach by the people who have our similar positions in the province of Quebec and they are way ahead of us in their careful consideration of where the future lies.

I am very glad indeed to read that Robert Bourassa is coming back with full strength to take over the responsibility of the prime ministership in Quebec. He was elected as a federalist and his colleagues are federalists and I believe they can put forward the federalist position and balance what seems to be happening down there.

I wish the committee well. It will be working hard. They go with the good wishes and political blessing and other kinds of blessing I suppose of every member here.

Mr Harris: As the leader of the Liberal Party has indicated, I wish to support this motion and concur that there is no formalized procedure for the Premier to move, and for him and me to second, the actual motion striking the committee. I think it is well understood that I and my party are in support of the committee.

I also do not want to dwell at great length today on the need for the committee or on the concerns that Canada is facing. There will be many opportunities. Many members have heard me express those views that I have of this country and of this province during the Meech Lake discussions, during the committee that was struck at that time.

I also expressed a great number of views during this past year and during an event that took place this past summer. I believe that everybody who has been in this Legislature while this matter has been before us holds paramount some fundamental views that this country is more important than Ontario itself, that this country is much stronger when the sum of its parts are together than when we are apart and that we must do everything we can to make sure that stays that way.

I was reviewing some of the things I had said, and while I said that I will not dwell on it, I want to reiterate a few -- the crucial issue to be faced in the months and years ahead is not only the status of Quebec but also the role of government itself -- through some comments that I made this summer that the cost of government, the burdens and the benefits of government, how all governments in Canada can manage better are also on the table. In Quebec I believe sovereignty is also on the table. In Quebec I believe sovereignty is being considered because people are frustrated not only with the failure of Meech, not only with the concern over their language and culture, but also with the inability of the existing federal-provincial system to provide taxpayers with genuine value for their money. The taxing powers, the relationship of the federal and provincial jurisdictions on economic issues, is very much at the forefront as well.

I would be remiss too if I did not say that there were many, when Meech died, who stated the viewpoint that it is very unlikely that Canada will have an opportunity to have a deal that 10 provinces will agree with under such favourable terms as were provided in Meech Lake. I share that view. The powers that were given to provinces in Meech, many at the insistence of Quebec, were to deal with language and culture. I supported that. I thought that made a lot of sense. Many who argued against Meech at that time, including the leader of the Liberal Party's good friend and now leader of the federal Liberal Party, Jean Chrétien, stated that this could not be, that you could not give any more powers to the provinces. This was their violent objection to Meech Lake. The former Prime Minister of Canada entered that debate and said the same thing. I was a little surprised when Mr Chrétien went to Quebec and stated that it would now be important to substantially re-evaluate provincial powers, that he was prepared in order to keep Canada together to give up, from the central government point of view, many more powers to the provinces. Now I think the Premier would agree with me that the economic powers are on the table as well. He may not, but he has made great reference over the last couple of weeks to economics.

Ontario has always been a net contributor. I want this on the table as well before I get into the actual motion itself. We always have been and to have a strong country we always must be. I believe that Ontario ought to, is in a position to and must give more to Canada than it receives. I do not think that is negotiable, from my point of view, or ought to be viewed as part of the debate. I want that on the record. I want us to earn our own way, and I want us to contribute to national development with that economic strength we have always had. I want Ontario to give more intellectually and creatively to the future of Confederation than we could ever hope to receive from it. I make no apology for that and I want that clearly understood.

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Having said that, and to get to the resolution, we talk about a two-step process. I believe an important part of the first step is that we must have some analysis of what it means economically to be together and what it means economically to be apart. As the leader of the Liberal Party has said, there is a substantial body of opinion out there that when Quebec or somebody says Quebec wants to leave, the answer is, "Let them go." But that answer is made in a vacuum of understanding of what it means to let Quebec go.

When I have challenged people who have said this to me over the last number of years, at times I would probe a little and I would find out that what they really meant on many occasions was: "They're just threatening. They're really not going. They really don't want sovereignty-association." That argument I do not believe needs a lot of education now. It is not just an intellectual debate, an academic debate in Quebec; it is a pretty widespread and universal sense that they feel they will be better served through sovereignty in Quebec than they will be through renewed federalism. I believe, though, that there is still substantial education to be done in what it means.

I congratulated the Premier yesterday on the consultation in setting up the terms of reference. I believe the two-step comment was one I used. I used it in the context that before we ask Ontarians what they think about Quebec leaving and invite the response yes or no, "let them go" or "no, we must not," I think there needs to be a little time, effort and energy spent on us understanding and the public understanding just what it means from a cultural viewpoint, from pride, from a Canadian viewpoint, but also from an economic viewpoint. I think Ontarians will be surprised, because I do believe we are stronger than the individual parts; we are substantially stronger as a whole.

I alluded yesterday in my response to the Premier my concern as well. On the one hand, the Premier talked about the necessity of approaching this in a non-partisan way, which I agree with and which the leader of the Liberal Party has agreed with; on the other hand, there were what I consider to be some very partisan comments by the Premier.

The Premier has spent the last two weekends discussing federal economic policies which he somehow feels, or wants the public of Ontario to feel, have been brought in explicitly for the destruction of Canada. I suggest that that type of comment and innuendo and allegation is beneath any elected politician in this province, let alone a leader of a party in this province, let alone the Premier, and I take great exception to it. I noted the comments the Premier made in the House yesterday, when he said:

"I have always believed and I have said I do not think this is a partisan issue, but I am compelled to say that the vacuum of leadership at the federal level in this country is hurting our people. The destruction of national institutions, whether economic or cultural, has left the realm of partisanship or ideology and, I believe, now threatens the fabric of this nation.

"It used to be that when you asked: 'Is our current system of federalism working?' you would hear a cry of no from a single province or a few groups in society." I do not know how relevant that is. We have obviously found out that a cry of no from a single province is enough to throw this country into turmoil.

However, he says: "Ask the question another way. Ask the unemployed forestry worker about our high-value-dollar policy in the context of Canada." I suggest to members that I could ask the unemployed forestry worker about the disastrous fiscal policy of the province of Ontario, of this government and of the government before it, that has caused the high-dollar policy. "Ask the out-of-work plant worker in Woodstock about free trade." I suggest we could ask the out-of-work plant worker in Woodstock about the total lack of understanding of the Ontario government, particularly over the last five years and the current government, of global competitiveness and what is happening around this world and its total unpreparedness to compete in the global market whether it be with the United States or with other economies.

The Premier says, "Ask the single mother in Peterborough about federal cuts to the Canada assistance plan." There have not been any federal cuts in transfer payments in the Canada assistance plan, but the federal government, mired in debt, has not been able to keep pace with a 50% share, because provincial governments, led by the government of Ontario, have consistently decided they should spend double and triple the rate of inflation each and every year. That is something the federal government has no control over and admittedly it cannot keep pace. With a $30-billion annual deficit, I agree they cannot keep pace.

The Premier says, "Ask Windsor about the denial of local public broadcast as a result of CBC cuts." I guess the Premier is suggesting that the federal government, $30 billion in debt, can afford $1 billion to our national public broadcasting system. But in this economy, totally broke, with the provinces spending two and three times the rate of inflation, particularly Ontario, it cannot afford to spend $1.1 billion. That somehow or other Mr Mulroney or Mr Wilson has brought this policy in to try and control the economic situation to destroy the country, I take great exception to. I think that is interjecting a large degree of partisanship into the debate. I think it is inappropriate. I think it is unbecoming of the Premier.

I want to touch on one other aspect. I congratulated the Premier on the consultation that took place on the terms of reference for the committee. In my remarks in response to his statement, I asked the Premier, because it was my understanding that the bureaucracy, the secretariat set up with the Ministry of Intergovernmental Affairs, was to be made available to the committee and that the committee would have input into the paper that is to be developed -- I pointed out that the deputy minister said, "No, that will be a government paper." That was not my understanding. I was hoping the Premier in his opening remarks today would have addressed that.

Hon Mr Rae: I will say something about it at the end.

Mr Harris: He will say something at the end. I appreciate that.

I also in my remarks yesterday referred to something that I thought was very generous and novel for an opposition party. I think the Premier has gone part of the way to try and make sure this is a non-partisan issue here in Ontario. I have alluded to one aspect I take exception to. He has gone part of the way with a pre-consultation with the leader of the Liberal Party and myself in setting up the terms of reference, but I suggested yesterday that the Premier could do something very novel, very different, a break from the past, to set up a truly non-partisan committee, that is, to have equal representation on the committee from each of the three parties.

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This does not mean the Premier will not be able to speak as leader of his party, as head of the government, as Premier. But it does mean, and it is why I proposed it and why many opposition parties do not want it, that it will truly force all members of that committee to operate in the interests of Canada, to operate in a non-partisan way.

I have been around this place for some 10 years. I have been on committees in majority governments, I have been on committees in minority governments. I have seen committees from the majority side; I have seen them from the minority side. I have seen them in government and in opposition. The committee structure in this province, under majority government, in my experience has been an absolute disgrace. It has been a disaster. There has been very little, if any, sharing of decision-making or power. There has been little expectation that the committees would operate in a non-partisan way. There has been very little given to the committees in any way of any meaningful decision-making.

I spoke about this at length over the past couple of years. I spoke about it during a recent event in my party, the leadership. I spoke about it during the election at quite a number of stops. I guess I was one who had hoped that a party which had been in opposition so long and had seen committees in minority governments and in majority governments surely would want to change that process too. I have not seen any signs of that yet, although it is very early in the mandate of the regular committee process to see how that will work.

But I offer the Premier a giving up of my party's right to be partisan in the traditional way committees have operated in a majority-government situation. I have offered the Legislature an opportunity to say it is not good enough just to sit back on this committee, as we have been in the habit of doing, because we have no power or no say or what not anyway, and say: "Well, let's let the government decide, the six government members can decide. This is a government committee. It is a government report that is being done, and if we agree with it we will agree, and if we do not we can criticize it." When there is equal representation on the committee of all three parties, that is not possible.

I ask the Premier to reconsider that. He will get the credit should he decide to go that way, and I think he will deserve a lot of credit if he decides to go that way. But I also believe my party is sending a very important and strong signal that it is prepared to approach this issue in a very different way than the normal committee process.

I wish the committee well. I know it will work hard, and I know its time lines are short. I do not envy the Premier in having to decide which way to proceed. I think it will be a strong role for the first ministers in this country over the next few years, an important role, and I obviously wish the Premier very well in that role. I offer him my support, my party's support in any way we can, either through this committee or through what flows out of this committee. I feel strongly enough about the process to move an amendment to the motion that would put in place the principle I have outlined and asked about yesterday.

The Premier suggests that this is a surprise. I do not know why it is. I mentioned yesterday that I thought this was important. I think it is a principle that I brought forward. It is a very simple amendment; not an amendment that we plan on this last day of the House to divide on, but I wanted the Premier and the House to know that we are serious.

The Speaker: Mr Harris moves that government notice of motion 9 be amended by deleting everything after the word "composed" in the 19th line and that the following be substituted therefor: "in such a manner as to provide for equal representation from each of the three recognized parties in the House."

Mr Harris: I moved this amendment because I did not get a sense, when I discussed this and brought it up with the Premier yesterday and with the leader of the Liberal Party, that they felt I was serious in what I was suggesting. I think it is important and I want the Premier, the House and the leader of the Liberal Party to know that we are serious, that we are prepared to put ourselves in a position of true non-partisanship on this committee and that we are willing to work that way on the committee.

I see the Premier and the Minister of Health laughing. Perhaps they do not appreciate the gesture I have made, but it is a substantial gesture. It is a gesture that opposition parties in majority governments have not wanted before in any of the discussions I have had with them. They have preferred not to have it. I think it is substantial, and I offer it in that spirit and would hope the Premier would consider the amendment on that basis.

I wish to conclude by really and sincerely wishing the committee well. I share some of the concerns of the leader of the Liberal Party. I believe the Premier himself said, "I think we are at a quarter to 12, with a 12 o'clock deadline in this debate for our country." I assure not only the committee but the Premier and reiterate our commitment and our availability to do everything we can, if that is possible, to make sure we do not have another Meech Lake failure or Meech Lake disaster.

Hon Mr Wildman: I rise to participate in this debate with a feeling of optimism and with a feeling of great concern at the same time. Obviously, my feelings are mixed.

I think it is appropriate that we participate in this debate now, not only because of the debate that is currently going on in Quebec and across the country generally but particularly because we are talking about the Constitution of this country in response to the failure of the Meech Lake accord. That failure was largely due -- at least in the initial stages of the actual voting in Manitoba -- as the result of the profound statement of his place in this country by the MLA for Rupertsland, my good friend Elijah Harper.

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Simply by saying no in the Manitoba Legislature, the MLA for Rupertsland was asserting the rights and the right of place of all aboriginal people in this country, and saying no to a Constitution which he looked at and found did not reflect him or the reality of the country as he saw it and understood it.

It is my profound feeling that a constitution of a country, the fundamental law of a country, must reflect the society of the nation, the society as it is understood, and the history of the nation as we know it. The aboriginal people looked at the Meech Lake accord and said: "Where are we in this accord? What does this accord say about the reality for aboriginal people in Canada today?"

I recognize that many have argued that the Meech Lake accord was an attempt to deal with the aspirations and concerns of the people of Quebec, as a Quebec round, and the argument was made that if Quebec could be brought back into the constitutional fold, then the question of aboriginal rights, the recognition and entrenchment of aboriginal rights could be better dealt with and more easily dealt with by the provinces and the federal government.

The arguments were made at the time that Elijah Harper took his stand in the Manitoba Legislature that if the Meech Lake accord failed, if there was not agreement, there would be serious economic ramifications for the country, for the whole country, for all the people of Canada. In response to that, aboriginal leader after aboriginal leader in this country said: "We're at the bottom of the ladder now. It doesn't make any difference whether the economy fails because we do not benefit from the economy the way it is." That is the reality, unfortunately and tragically, of the aboriginal experience in this country.

I said that I approached this debate with optimism. One might wonder about that because of what we euphemistically referred to as the Indian summer that we experienced after the failure of the Meech Lake accord, with the terrible experiences in Oka, Quebec, the experiences that we saw in Akwesasne and parts of northern Ontario and British Columbia, where roads and railways were blocked by aboriginal people who had long-standing grievances, who felt that those grievances were not being spoken to and were being ignored.

They could look at the experience of the 1980s when that was supposed to be the round for aboriginal people, when we had a number of federal-provincial conferences on the Constitution and every one of them failed because of the intransigence of one or another group of premiers of this country, because they could not bring themselves to recognize and entrench the fundamental reality that we have first nations, aboriginal people who are a distinct people with their own society, their own rights that must be recognized in our Constitution.

Then they, as aboriginal people, would look at the round of negotiations, panic negotiations almost, to save the Meech Lake accord in the Quebec round. They would say, "Why is it so different? Why was every last-minute attempt made to save an agreement that is so important to Quebec?" I recognize that it was important to Quebec and the whole country, but could the same kind of effort not have been made in that 1987 negotiation on aboriginal rights? What does that say about the premiers, the governments and the people of this country?

Coming from the Indian summer, I believe, is a tremendous amount of goodwill, somewhat surprisingly, among most Canadians who recognize now that aboriginal people are not going to be ignored any longer and who welcome that and who are prepared to listen, and yes, to negotiate to resolve grievances that have been long-standing, many for many decades.

We still have an Indian Act that basically governs the first nations and the first nations people in this country. Anyone who has read and understood the Indian Act knows that it is essentially colonial legislation. This government, and I believe the members of the Legislature, generally are determined to move away from a colonial relationship to a relationship of equals with the first nations and the other aboriginal peoples of this province.

We call upon the federal government and the other provinces to take the same approach. We can negotiate land questions, self-government, questions related to justice administration, policing, education, social services, access to resources -- we can and from the bottom of my heart I believe we must. Meegwetch.

Mr Scott: I follow my friend the Minister of Natural Resources who says that he approaches the exercise of constitutional renewal in this country, to which we are all committed, with optimism. I candidly confess, although it is probably not politic to say it, that I approach it with something very near despair. If the members of the House will let me take a moment, I propose to say why, not to dissuade anybody, least of all our Premier, from acting aggressively and imaginatively, but to simply paint the range of risks we run and to spell out the narrowness of the opportunities that are before us in what must be the most critical moment our country has faced in 130 years.

My perspective is a little longer than that of the Minister of Natural Resources, but I remember that when I came to office as Attorney General in 1985, the first order of business was the aboriginal constitutional round. It was conceded by everybody by 1985 that two important groups of Canadian citizens had not had their concerns adequately addressed by the 1982 constitutional round. The first group was the people of Quebec who at that time had been represented by a clearly separatist government and had presented a list of demands that no federal government could have consented to, and it was therefore impossible to address their concerns effectively in the 1982 round.

The second group was the aboriginal people. The aboriginal people at least had the advantage that there was built into the 1982 Constitution the promise of a specific round of negotiations to deal with their concerns. In 1985, we began the exercise of trying to develop an inherent self-government right that would meet aboriginal concerns. That effort, although there were many ministers' conferences and one quite lengthy first ministers' conference, failed. It failed essentially, I believe, for two reasons. It failed because Quebec did not feel able to participate in the round until its own needs had been adjusted, and it failed also because the western provinces did not feel able to make the adjustments which I believe they should have made and will make that would accord even marginally with the concerns that the native people raised.

I came away from that conference satisfied in my own mind that until there was an adjustment of the Quebec question, it would not be possible to make the other kinds of adjustments, many very important and very fundamental, like the aboriginal one, that would be so necessary if we were to carry the country forward into the next century, the completion of our second century as a nation.

It was in those circumstances that the premiers of Canada agreed that there would be a round of narrow focus to try to get over this initial hurdle, so that the way would be clear to deal with constitutional amendments of other types in sequence. Whether that was a legitimate objective or process remains to be seen and is now a matter for historians to deal with, rather than politicians. But I remember that exercise well and I still carry a sense, obviously shared by the Premier, that history will tell us that an enormous opportunity for our country was perhaps accidentally lost to us.

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I remember the night when I called the now Premier to report that success, completely unexpectedly, was at hand. I am glad he was not driving his car. He probably would have gone off the road at the report, because I think going into the exercise none of us who followed the debate anticipated that this kind of accommodation would occur or occur so quickly. But it did and the debate that followed the announcement of Meech Lake and the modifications at Langevin is of course well known to all members here.

As the Premier said in his remarks yesterday, which I was unhappily not present for but which I have read, we have learned a great deal from the Meech Lake experience and it is important to take it into account as we move forward. It is important also to remember, before we get too judgemental about the performance of others in the exercise, that the Meech Lake round was the first amendment to our new Constitution. Prior to that time, amendments had been made, upon the request of the federal government, in the United Kingdom Parliament, and the extent to which provinces were invited to comment was, until the repatriation case in the Supreme Court of Canada, a matter of very real practical doubt.

So this round was the first effort to amend the Constitution, and the premiers and the governments and the legislatures were required to proceed according to an amendment formula that many say is a very difficult one, one of the most difficult ones in the western world.

But we have learned much from that experience. I think what we have learned is that new processes have to be developed. That is not to be judgemental about those who adopted the traditional processes. It is simply to observe that when this accommodation, which I believe was almost a constitutional miracle, was made it was not accepted by vast numbers of our citizens for a wide variety of reasons. They felt excluded. They felt that their concerns had not been assessed or addressed. They felt that they had not been consulted and so on. That is an important consideration, because as the Premier has noted we will have to make adjustments to the process if we hope to succeed in the future.

The other thing I think we learned -- I hope it is a lesson that we can effectively apply -- is that in Canada, at least at the present time, single-issue Constitution-making may not be on. I am not cheered up by that particularly because single-issue Constitution-making is probably an easier process to manage at one level than multi-issue processes.

So what we face as we go into the next round, and this is the reason why I approach the issue with some despair, are two new parameters which, while not written into the Constitution, we must acknowledge as practical men and women of affairs.

The first is that a new process must be developed, not only for the initiating stages but probably for the ultimate stage of constitutional renewal, which while not expressed in the Constitution will take account of and allow our citizens to play a role alongside legislators, hopefully for ever, but at least until this period of cynicism about the acts of politicians has been in some fashion allayed.

Second, we are going to have to develop a process which can adjust to a wide variety of issues. The one sense I got about the post-Meech debate, and I say this without being judgemental, if one can do that, is that groups of Canadians all across the country were in effect saying, "If I don't get what I want now, nobody else will get what he wants." I think that is what lots of my fellow Canadians were saying about the process. It is not a very gracious thing, but in their circumstances it is a realistic and understandable thing for them to say. I make no criticism of those who make that observation, but that indicates the complexity of the exercise in which we are now engaged, the development right from the drawing board of a new process to add on to the constitutionally imposed process, and second a multi-issue negotiation which will take account of the needs of western Canada to deal with Senate reform or second chamber reform, the needs of aboriginal people, the needs of women, the needs of French Canada, the needs of Canadians who speak minority languages outside Quebec and inside Quebec, the needs of Canadians who are superbly loyal to this country who come from neither one of the two major language or cultural groups in the country.

This will make the exercise one of extraordinary complexity, but there is no way of avoiding it. I remember when I talked to the now Premier after Meech Lake, when he was in his car, and told him what it was going to look like, I think I probably said to him -- I should have if I did not -- "This isn't going to be perfect, Bob." If I did not, I am sure he said to me, "Well, that's not perfect." Neither of us acknowledged any legal deficiencies whatever, at least in this environment. Both of us could have drafted constitutional amendments that suited ourselves better, but we recognized that this was a process of negotiation and that at the end of the day the question is not whether you have produced something that is perfect; the question is, have you done the best you can do for your generation of Canadians, bearing in mind that adjustments never cease in this kind of exercise?

I emphasize that point because I think Canadians and perhaps Ontarians, who are, after all, the most sophisticated and wisest Canadians, do not always understand that this process is a process of negotiation in which everybody will give up something if it is to succeed, and that of course will be the trick to adjust interests and to recognize, there being no perfection, that nobody will get exactly what he wants and sacrifices will be made in some fashion by all kinds of Canadians in order to develop a document that accommodates us all in a series of institutions, and lets the political process carry forward into the next generation.

The task is, for those reasons alone, a daunting task. Something has been said by the leader of the third party about partisanship. I do not think Brian Mulroney has ever heard me say anything particularly nice about him and I am sure he is not watching television now, but I am not prepared to judge Brian Mulroney on constitutional matters. I think if I had been the Prime Minister of Canada I might have done things differently, but I think, and I hope, more effectively in the long run. I think that if this process of negotiation is going to be successful, all Canadians, and particularly the leaders of Canadians, have to be respectful of each other, at least with respect to this issue, or those accommodations simply will not be made.

There are some other points to be made. Our party will not be supporting, as I understand it from our leader, the amendment that has been proposed by the leader of the third party.

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That leads me to say something about partisanship. The Premier wants this to be a non-partisan exercise. We all share that, but the government is the government. The Premier has indicated that he would consult with the leaders about what he proposed to do, but the Premier and the government are going to take responsibility for what is being done. They can and I hope and I am sure do listen to our suggestions, not so much in question period but at least on these main things, and then the government of the day decides if it will utilize those suggestions or not, because the government is going to be responsible. Any constitutional victories that lie in the short-term future are going to be victories for the Premier. Any defeats for which he is responsible are going to be defeats for the government. That is not partisanship: that is bearing responsibility effectively.

And though I seek the responsibility and will do everything I can to assure three years from now that it comes to me, as long as it is not mine I am not going to shoulder it for those who have the obligation to carry it forward.

Having said that, may I make, without being critical, because the responsibility is not mine, some observations about what is here proposed. The reality is that there are only four possibilities that lie before Canadians. These possibilities cannot be defined in a watertight way. There are gradations and variations with respect to each of them and they tend to overlap, but the four possibilities are: maintaining the constitutional status quo; a unilateral declaration of independence on the part of the province of Quebec; third, some kind of sovereignty-association which is just short of a unilateral declaration of independence; and fourth, a renewed federalism which will involve an adjustment of the powers under sections 91 and 92.

That fourth option breaks down into two parts, because that kind of renewed federalism may be symmetrical -- that is to say, all the powers ceded to Quebec become powers of the other provinces -- or for those who are concerned about the importance of central government, it may be asymmetrical, that is, certain powers would be ceded to the province of Quebec to deal with important matters of culture and language and perhaps other issues that are not ceded to the other provinces.

But there are not any other possibilities except those four general ones, and I begin by acknowledging my belief that the Premier is right: The first is not on. If there is anybody left out there who thinks it is on, he is dreaming in Technicolor and we had better get used to that. So what we face are not the amendments of Meech Lake, the proposals of Meech Lake which were regarded as the most moderate ever advanced by a modern Quebec Premier, but modifications, even from federalist Quebeckers, that will be substantially more invasive than the amendments that have been proposed. That is the reality.

We can send out a committee that listens to a whole lot of people who want the status quo and we can say, "Thank you for telling us," but we must recognize that they are living, for the moment, in an unreal world. That is not on.

That brings me to one of my concerns about this process. We have just come through an election. I represent, as some honourable members know, one of the most diverse and I believe interesting ridings in urban Ontario. It has the richest community of citizens and it has the poorest community of citizens in the city of Toronto. It has a strong middle-class community, half tenants and half home owners. I know what many of those people will say about constitutional renewal. Many of them will say, as they said to me, not all of them happily, "I don't want to hear about it any more." Many of them will say, "Let them go." Many of them will say other things, perhaps more directly and less pleasantly. I know what my people coming before this committee, or many of them, would tell the committee.

And so I am a little troubled, I must be frank to say, and disappointed about the shape this exercise is going to take. My leader has been kind enough to allow me to express my views, although he conceded that they did not carry the day in caucus. They did not carry the day because, under our rather arcane rules, the leader expresses the developed consensus of the caucus, a power which he exercised clearly and invincibly in this particular case.

But I am a little disappointed and a little uneasy about the establishment of the committee in this form and at this time for two reasons. First, it is purely a parliamentary committee. It is composed exclusively of members. The trouble is that we have no credibility, or little credibility, with the communities we represent. When we came back, whether it was the premiers or the members, and said about Meech Lake what I thought was apparent, "This is the best we can do," people did not believe us. They said, "If I had been there I would have been able to do better."

What we have to try to structure -- I make this as a conscious suggestion to the government -- is we need to expand this committee. If it is going to have on it 10 members of the assembly, it should have 10 members of the general public as well, representing not established organizations particularly, but 10 representative Ontarians, aboriginal people, farm people, small-town people, men and women who will be the input to the committee's work that will be undertaken parallel to the input that the legislators will provide.

I believe that would do a number of things for the committee process. It would make it a better and stronger and more effective committee, simply by virtue of its diversity. Second, it would help persuade Ontarians of the bona fides of the legislators who want to do this work. As one of my colleagues said: "Those people from the community working with the committee would be the validators of our exercise who would say to their colleagues in the general community: 'Yes, that is what was heard. That is the best that could be done.'" I think that would be an important change. It reflects, it is agreed, the kind of process that now exists in Quebec. I think one of the things, whether or not you agree with what is being said in Quebec, is the enormous focus of the province on its quasi-legislative process. Why? I believe in part because it is made up not only of legislators but of other Quebeckers and Canadians who have an interest in or concerns about this issue. I seriously suggest that to the Premier as an important modification, because I believe it will make this exercise a sounder and more important educative tool than it may be likely to be.

The second important change, and I believe this is the most important, is that at the moment, these hearings, even with the white paper which will raise questions, which will be available at the end of January, will be essentially a passive exercise in which legislators hear what people say. I have the same concerns about that as my leader has, but I have a solution. One of the things about this debate that is most discouraging is that when you look at the three or four options on the table and the variations that exist with respect to those options, almost nobody has any concrete sense of what the impacts of selecting one option over the other are.

Ontarians like me are being asked: "Do you favour this? Do you favour that? Do you favour the other thing?" But we are not being told the essential information we have to have before we can decide those questions. What is option A going to do to our standard of living? What is option B going to do to our standard of living? What is option A going to do to our trade? Is it going to increase it or decrease it? What is it going to do to our health care services in the province and in other parts of the country? Until Canadians have what I call these impact studies, prepared not by some government bureaucracy but by experts in the field who have the virtue of independence, it is really unfair to ask us to choose or to express an opinion among the options.

1820

So my second question to the Premier is that this process could, I believe, be radically improved if before the hearings there was in fact a major impact study done about the effect of the various options, not only for Ontarians but for other Canadians and other groups of Canadians as well.

I fear that without these two important modifications, I will be for some time uneasy about whether this process on which we are embarking will be productive or negative. I cannot think that the temper of the community about constitutional renewal has changed so radically in three months that we should anticipate a view in February markedly different from the view in September or June unless we have new information to share with the people we are consulting. And it seems to me, if the exercise goes ahead without that and the result is negative, the Premier's hand will not be strengthened in the exercise in which he has to engage on behalf of us all; it will be weakened.

I am very concerned about that, because like all of us here, we have a sense that time is very limited. I participated in a conference. I concede it was largely academics, but it was leavened by the chairmanship of Professor Allan Blakeney, who would not concede that he is not an academic but would not admit that that is his first occupation. The people who were at that conference almost unanimously were of the view that if, within 18 months, we have not developed the bare bones of a solution for our future in this country together, our opportunity is gone and, it went without saying, gone for ever.

That is why I have some despair about the exercise, but it is also why I want to encourage the Premier to do everything he can. I ask him to seriously consider modifying the terms of reference of the committee -- not tonight, but at some later event -- so that we can be sure it is more responsive to the needs of our fellow citizens and is more likely to produce meaningful help for him and the government in the exercise in which they are engaged.

I know the Premier is well intentioned. He made a speech yesterday that was His Premiership at his rhetorical best. It was by turns intellectual and by turns moving. It did not say very much. I will not say it was meaningless; it did not say very much. It did say, as I have said in my time, a lot of platitudinous things, that we want one Canada and we have to make these changes and so on. That, frankly, is not going to be enough to carry with the committee on its work across the province. We need an impact statement, the kind of impact statement that in our history the Rowell-Sirois report in the late 1930s represented, so that people can begin to assess the reality of the choices they make in an intelligent, thoughtful and productive way.

Like my leader, I want to wish this committee all the best. It is hard to imagine that we have ever sent a committee from this House that has a more challenging, more onerous and more fateful responsibility than this one. I urge it, as I know it will be, to be thoughtful and conscious that what it says and what it does and what it hears and what it produces will be important in Ontario, of course, but also all across the country, from Victoria to Charlottetown.

Hon Mr Rae: I will not be too long, but I did want to respond to the comments that have been made.

I appreciate the frank tone of this debate. When I said some time ago that I did not see this as a particularly partisan issue, because we are after all talking about the future of the country and the future of the province, that does not mean that I do not expect healthy and robust criticism. I am not that naïve and I am certainly not that precious about disagreements we may have about the approaches we can take. Indeed, there were a number of occasions when I had suggestions to make to premiers, when I indicated that I was prepared to go along with the general thrust but I had a lot of things I wanted to say in addition to what they were doing. Naturally, with that was the sense which most of us have in opposition, that we could certainly do better than the people who are making the decisions.

I understand the emotion. I can identify with it to some extent, and I want to say that I take the criticisms that have been made of what we have suggested and of the statements I have made very seriously. I hope we will have more opportunities in the new session to have more discussions like this when we can be far more precise about exactly how we think this discussion in Ontario and across the country needs to proceed.

Let me just respond, if I may, to each comment as I took it. I think it is fair to say that, generally speaking, the Leader of the Opposition and the member for St George-St David reflect quite naturally a sense of real scepticism about what it is the committee is going to find when it goes out to talk to people and, second, a sense of enormous disappointment with what took place leading up to June, and, as we are being candid with one another, I think a certain sense of profound disappointment with what took place on 6 September. I would make the observation that the sense of that hangs very heavily over that side of the House. I can certainly understand the frustration, having been through six general elections and this the only one in which I was successful. So five times I have some sense of why the idea of consulting with the electorate or with the general public sometimes does not produce the result you really think ought to happen. I can understand that certain sense -- I would not go so far as to describe it as bitterness -- but certainly a sense of weariness about what this is all about.

When the Leader of the Opposition says, for example, that my comments about Canada not being negotiable were rhetorically naïve and indeed that I somehow was pinning myself to a process or to a result that is not achievable, I think what I was saying and what I was trying to reflect and what I believe the sentence reflects is a sense among the citizens of this province which is, I think, widely shared in this House; that is, that whatever discussions take place with the other parts of the country and in particular, obviously, whatever discussions take place with the province of Quebec, we do not want there to be any misunderstanding as to the firm desire on the part of the people of this province for federalism to be renewed and for the country to maintain a sense of identity and a sense of having some common institutions, because that is very fundamental, it seems to me, to the interests and the views of the people of this province.

This is not some academic exercise in which we put out a number of options and say. "Choose one from column B and one from column C." This is a business in which we as a province have to speak for our own interests as we speak for the interests of Canadians as we understand them. I am saying to the people of this House that it is far better for us -- and I am sure this is a sentiment that is widely shared -- to state as our first priority the desire for a renewed federalism and for a renewed Canada rather than our beginning now to talk about the dismantling of the country.

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The leader of the third party said that I was engaging in too much partisanship myself in making comments that I have made about the policies of the federal government that I feel have been profoundly unhelpful to the tenor of this debate and indeed to the sense of unease that affects the entire country. Again, I do not want to be too precious. It would be a little bizarre if in the course of a constitutional discussion I somehow failed to reflect views which I have held for a long time and which are well known. I would think the Prime Minister himself is certainly capable of responding in kind and I would not take any exception if that happened.

Let me say to the leader of the third party that I intend to work with the Prime Minister, I intend to work with all the other first ministers, and I know all the Legislature would want that to be so. But I think it would be a little absurd if I were to somehow say, "Okay, I don't feel that what you're doing on interest rates or what's happening with respect to national institutions has no impact on what is taking place."

I say to the leader of the third party as well, since he has put forward his amendment with respect to the triple E committee, that this is a select committee that is going to reflect the makeup of the Legislature. His offer, which he describes as an act of self-sacrifice, whereby he would double the number of Conservatives on the committee and take away three from our party, I must confess I do not interpret in the same self-denying way in which it was described by the leader of the third party, although I think he is being quite sincere in suggesting it in that way, and I want to suggest to the leader of the third party that I think it would be far more realistic for us to simply recognize that the select committee is going to reflect the makeup of the Legislature. I do not say that in any grandiose sense. I think that is just a reflection of the way things should be done.

I obviously feel strongly that the comments made by the Minister of Natural Resources are an important reflection of his commitment as the minister responsible for native affairs, and I think he is quite right in saying that unless this question is on the agenda, indeed there will be no constitutional peace and there will be no constitutional reconciliation. I fully agree with that.

Let me respond very briefly to the comments of the member for St George-St David. There were some things he said that I agreed with very profoundly, about the first three quarters of his speech, I think, where he said, for example, that the lessons from Meech Lake were that there had to be consultation and more people had to be involved and, second, that there could not only be a one-issue round, but the round had to include everybody. Although he was critical of my speech yesterday, I believe that is exactly what I said yesterday and tried to put it forward. I did not put it forward in his words, I used my own, and he found my words empty when I said the same thing in comparison to the fullness of his own.

Mr Scott: I agreed with three quarters of what you said.

Hon Mr Rae: Now the member is saying he agreed with three quarters of what I said. He did not say that when he was actually speaking. I am delighted to hear that he is now making that statement.

Let me say to the member for St George-St David, and I am sure he realizes this, that despite our partisan differences and despite the very real tensions that exist in this place from time to time as he has expressed them, I think he knows that over the years his views on this subject, and the clarity and the way in which he sees things and presents the options in a very precise way and in a very powerful way as an advocate, is enlightening. I think it is enlightening for all of us to have the opportunity to hear, as I say, things presented very clearly and options presented as precisely as they are.

There are a couple of observations that I would make. One thing that I really take exception to was when he said, not once but a couple of times, "I know what my constituents are going to say." Second, he said that the mood really has not changed very much since June or September. I would suggest to him that I wish I were as sure as he is of either of those things.

I would say to him that I have been an elected politician for over a decade in two parts of Metropolitan Toronto, and if he were to say to me now, "How do your constituents really feel about the choices that are going to be there or that are there?" my answer to him would be to say I really do not know how people feel because -- I really do not know. That is why I think it is important for us to consult; that is why I think it is vital for us to consult.

He also, when he says he has a very clear sense, says nothing has changed since June or indeed since September. I would disagree; I think things are changing all the time. I think the clarity with which people see the choices is only now beginning to emerge. I think it is only now that a great many people are beginning to understand the implications for the country of our having, as a country, rejected the proposals that were put forward at Meech Lake.

To the member for St George-St David I would say this -- and he was very condescending about some things that I have said, I think described me as "well-intentioned," which is certainly --

Mr Scott: That is not condescending.

Mr Nixon: Some people do not even think it is right.

Hon Mr Rae: Some people would not agree with that, I know. He obviously felt things about the process and saw the implications of the process early on. Indeed, because he was so close to it and because he was very much part of it, he was one who came away from the discussion in June -- I know, because he and I discussed it when the House came together after that point -- who really felt profoundly uneasy about the implication that has.

I would suggest that opinion in this part of Canada is only now beginning to be formed about what the options really are available for us and what the implications are for the future of the country. I believe that it is from that perspective that we should look at this discussion.

He makes two other suggestions which I want to deal with. The first is that it is a mistake for us to create a purely parliamentary committee, that what we should have is a committee that is 20 or 25 people consisting of members of the Legislature as well as members of the general public. I want to say to the member that there may come a point in our discussions when something like that would make sense for us, and I do not reject it out of hand at all. I think it would be quite inappropriate to say that I would never contemplate such a thing or I think it is a terrible idea.

I would say to him that I believe we have to take this thing in stages, that what we are really at -- although it is hard, I know, for someone like himself who has been through this for so long to accept -- is a preliminary stage in the sense of what the new national dialogue and negotiation are really going to be like. I am not saying it is going to be a long-drawn-out process that is going to take for ever and ever. I think we all understand that the momentum for change in the province of Quebec is great and that the desire there for a speedy resolution is strong.

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I also want to suggest to him that when the Bélanger-Campeau commission reports, it becomes a report, and we then have to wait for the views of the government of Quebec. We have to wait clearly for what the duly elected government of Quebec then sees as its mandate for future steps. I say to the member for St George-St David that the idea of there being other ways of consultation, the idea that there would be other groups or other responses both from us as a province and from other parts of the country, are things that need to be explored and discussed. I would just make the observation that I think it is essential for this newly elected Parliament to begin to immerse itself in these questions and to begin the process of discussing with the public what the options and choices are.

The second thing is there is an assumption behind the second point that the member for St George-St David makes that I think is entirely unwarranted. He said, for example, that he thinks the exercise is an entirely passive one and he assumes that there will be no research commissioned by the committee, that there will be no effort by the committee to choose where to go and how to go and that there will be no effort by the committee to decide what are the kinds of groups and the kinds of discussions and how the discussion needs to be staged and will be staged, both in the early days in February and March and later on as obviously the work continues once the glass becomes a little clearer for all of us in terms of the real choices that are available.

I do not share that assumption, I do not think it is one that is there to be made. It seems to me that you need to have an active dialogue with the public, which means that the committee will be doing some work, which means that the public will be responding and that the committee is going to have to find creative ways of listening to the public and of letting the public participate, ways that, it seems to me, the committee will only begin to discuss once it is formed.

I can understand entirely his sense of frustration and his sense of foreboding and I can understand his impatience that others are less able to see as clearly as he obviously does just what the choices are and what needs to be done. I can only tell him that I share his view entirely with respect to his observations on who is going to stand or fall with respect to this process and who is ultimately responsible for the positions that the government of Ontario will take in our representation. When I say that this is not a partisan process necessarily, I am under no illusion as to the fact that it is a very political process and as to the fact that the stakes are high. They are high for all of us. I am under no illusions about that and am quite prepared to live with the consequences of the decisions that we take in this regard.

My judgement is that it is time for the Legislature to take the first step. My judgement is that it is time we talked to the people, presented views and options, which is what the discussion paper is intended to do, and as well talk to them about what some of the choices are and how those choices might be presented and discussed with the people.

I want to say to all the members of the House that as tired as some may be of the discussion and as overwhelmed as some may be by what has happened before and by its failure to come to a conclusion, I can only assure them that we do not have the luxury of that kind of ennui or fatigue anywhere in the House.

We have to make a fresh start. We have to make a fresh start understanding that it is the most important set of discussions that has happened in the country since over 100 years ago, understanding that we have to work with the people in doing it and that all the people have to be seen and see themselves as part of the process, understanding, as I can assure members that I do, that it is not easy. It is not a rhetorical exercise; it is a very difficult exercise, in which I believe patience, moderation, a capacity to listen, a desire to lead and a willingness to work with all the people are the essential characteristics.

I only hope that this government is capable, and can only pray that this government is capable, of at least some of those necessary qualities.

The Speaker: Are the members ready for the question on the amendment?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion the nays have it.

Motion negatived.

The Speaker: The next question to be decided is government notice of motion 9, placed by the Premier.

Motion agreed to.

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON THE PARLIAMENTARY PRECINCT

Miss Martel moved resolution 10:

That a special committee on the parliamentary precinct be appointed to develop, approve, supervise and co-ordinate the implementation of a program for the restoration, renovation, rehabilitation, cyclical maintenance and use of the Parliament Building and grounds and to implement an interpretative program emphasizing public education and understanding of the Parliament Building and its history, events that have taken place in the Parliament Building and at Queen's Park and the legislative and governmental processes, and to submit an annual budget to the Board of Internal Economy for funds required for proposed work or expert or professional assistance in any fiscal year; and which shall be composed of the Speaker and the Chair of the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly as co-Chairs and Mrs Cunningham, Mr Mancini and Mrs Mathyssen, no substitution being permitted except by order of the House.

Motion agreed to.

COMMITTEE SITTINGS

Miss Martel moved resolution 13:

That the following committees be authorized to meet during the winter adjournment in accordance with the schedule of meeting dates agreed to by the three party whips and tabled with the Clerk of the assembly to examine and inquire into the following matters:

Special committee on the parliamentary precinct to meet from time to time at the call of the co-Chairs of the committee to consider matters related to the restoration of the Parliament Building;

Standing committee on administration of justice to consider Bill 17, An Act to amend the Law related to the Enforcement of Support and Custody Orders / Projet de loi 17, Loi portant modification des lois relatives à l'exécution d'ordonnances alimentaires et de garde d'enfants, and matters designated pursuant to standing order 123 and to review and make recommendations with respect to the guidelines governing conflict of interest (sessional paper 52);

Standing committee on estimates to consider the estimates of ministries and offices selected in accordance with the order of the House of Thursday 6 December 1990;

Standing committee on finance and economic affairs to consider matters relating to pre-budget consultation;

Standing committee on general government to consider Bill 4, An Act to amend the Residential Rent Regulation Act, 1986, a discussion paper to be prepared by the Ministry of Housing dealing with long-term solutions to the rent review process in Ontario, which document shall be deemed to be referred to the committee when it is laid on the table, and matters designated pursuant to standing order 123;

Standing committee on government agencies to consider the operation of certain agencies, boards and commissions of the government of Ontario, appointments in the public sector and to make recommendations concerning the amendment of the standing orders in relation to the review of public sector appointments;

Standing committee on resources development to consider matters designated pursuant to standing order 123; and

Standing committee on social development to consider matters designated pursuant to standing order 123.

Mr Eves: I have an amendment that I would like to move to government notice of motion 13. It is a somewhat unusual amendment, I suppose, because normally motions of this type about what committees sit and when they sit and what they discuss would not be the subject matter of an amendment. But after the question period of today, I must say that we feel moved to move an amendment to the motion that has been put on the paper as government notice of motion 13. It has to do with the standing committee on the administration of justice.

The Speaker: Mr Eves moves that government notice of motion 13 be amended by adding to the third paragraph following the words "sessional paper 52" the words "and to review the matter of the release of cabinet information pertaining to the Red Hill Creek Expressway."

Mr Eves: That would conclude the third paragraph of government notice of motion number 13.

I will not be long in debating this proposed amendment to the government motion with respect to committees, but suffice it to say that I think there was ample evidence and discussion during question period today that would indicate in even the most partisan mind that there is at least a question here as to whether information was or was not released with respect to the cabinet position prior to the news conference taking place on the Monday. There are also directly contradictory statements made by the Minister of Transportation and the Minister of Colleges and Universities and one Mr Hinkley, a councillor.

Mr Hinkley indicated that he was told by New Democrat MPPs in the area that the expressway would be stopped. I believe that both the Minister of Colleges and Universities and the Minister of Transportation indicated that they did not communicate the decision of cabinet to anyone prior to Monday morning at 8 am.

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There is at least a doubt out there, according to Mr Hinkley anyway, as to what was or was not communicated and by whom. I am not suggesting that perhaps it is these two individuals who communicated it, but Mr Hinkley does say that he was told by Hamilton-area NDP members of the Legislature that this was going to take place and he was told that on Friday evening.

These two ministers say they communicated no such thing to anyone until the Monday morning. I think there is a significant element of doubt out there about what the facts actually are, and that this matter should be reviewed by a committee of the Legislature which would have the ability to interview witnesses, not just the two ministers but other interested parties as well, perhaps other Hamilton-area NDP MPPs, to see exactly what was communicated by whom and to whom and when so we can lay this matter to rest once and for all.

If in fact no such information was communicated to anybody until Monday morning, then I would quite agree with what the Premier has said. I would quite agree that it may have been an error in judgement, it may not have been the most appropriate way of delivering a message from cabinet or from the government to the Hamilton area, and he would see to it that it was not performed in this fashion again. I think we would all agree that that would be the end of the matter.

If, however, after some examination it is found that cabinet ministers, whomever they may be, did communicate cabinet decisions to certain particular individuals prior to that Monday morning, then I think we have a very serious matter on our hands indeed and I would leave it to the Premier to deal with that very serious matter. But I think all we are asking for in this amendment to the motion, and all we asked for during question period today, is for the matter to be reviewed by a committee of the Legislature so that we can get to the bottom of the matter and clear this matter up once and for all.

Mr Elston: I likewise will not be very long. I must say that although we had not anticipated having the amendment made, we certainly are in support of it, because really all the opposition wants is an honest chance to examine the material upon which the Premier has made a very lonely, I suspect, judgement about the credibility of his two ministers as compared to the people who in Hamilton are saying something much different.

It seems to me that the least that could be done on a day when the House leader for the government will be moving that certain items with respect to conflict-of-interest guidelines and other matters like that are to be referred out to a committee of the Legislature to be examined and to be taken piece by piece so we can understand how the new conflict-of-interest guidelines are to work -- sent out there for examination by the committee as though it were a real piece of work -- that we should likewise be able to see a significant change in the behaviour of this government so we can examine how a decision is made about the conduct of two ministers and the allegations that have surrounded that conduct in their own home cities.

It seems to me that there is a very significant piece of work to be done to clear up the nature of the behaviour of this government and the way it intends to manage its affairs and the way it intends to make sure that the province is managed in a much different way than it has been before.

It likewise seems to me that we should not be afraid to examine the material which underlies the activities of these two ministers if in fact the Premier himself is so sure and so absolutely sure that nothing has gone wrong. It seems to me that what this whole process is about is not necessarily what we all believe is the standard issue surrounding conflict of interest, that is, the gaining of absolute dollars by someone either directly or indirectly having access to information, but about a government that is committed in its place now to spread its message and to spread the power that its activities as a government can spread to individuals who are in the city governments in other organizations.

It is, for instance, an awful lot easier if a person running for a seat on city council or perhaps even mayor of the city of Hamilton can stand up in advance or after an announcement has been made and say: "I have access. I got the information first. I knew it was happening; you better vote for me." The conflict of interest and the disservice that has been done by the two people who have today apologized to this Legislative Assembly for having done nothing wrong is that they have been giving out access to power to their cronies so they can benefit on the political level. On a political level they had been giving power to those individuals, the power of information pre-distributed in a way which makes their role on city council a much more effective and much more interesting thing to take place.

I cannot understand why members of the NDP do not understand how serious a conflict-of-interest type of activity that is, promoting the power of their friends through the disposition of certain pieces of information, whether it was given specifically or whether it was given by way of allowing people to draw inferences from the information that was released. It is almost humorous to think that the Minister of Transportation could be walking through the area which was designed to become or which was earlier assumed to become the area for the expressway, talking only about the flora and the fauna, without at one point or another even dropping a single hint or even straying close to the idea that perhaps it would be a shame to see this disappear.

But he contends, without any hint of concern, that he spoke not at all about anything remotely relating to the expressway, this in the aftermath of a special strategy meeting on communications being held in the constituency office of the member for Hamilton West having received -- that night, the very time the meeting was going on -- a communication from the Ministry of Transportation saying, "Richard, it's a go for Monday morning 8 o'clock." I can hear it now, I can hear it all being transmitted. That has been admitted, that much we know is true, because there does not seem to be a dispute about that. Then on Saturday morning, the Minister of Transportation shows up just to take a look at the flowers and not make any hint whatsoever to these people who were at the meeting on Friday night.

If I can understand why there is concern, then perhaps I would withdraw my support for the motion, but it seems to me there should be no reason for anyone to be concerned about examining a clear conscience; there should be no problem in examining a record where there is no dispute as to facts about having done nothing wrong. What concerns me more than ever is that there is a real problem over there with having this material clearly out on the table.

What, I asked in question period of the Premier, is there to fear if nothing is wrong? What is there to fear on the part of the Minister of Colleges and Universities? What is there to fear on the part of the Minister of Transportation? What is there to fear on the part of the NDP councillor from the city of Hamilton? What is there to fear? Well, what there is to fear is that the NDP's organizational activities will be found out. There is a very clear direction given by the cabinet of the province that only the NDP needs to be brought into this so it can be empowered in a way to disadvantage others in the communities which we all serve.

And yes, it even goes further than that. These people are making announcements in other people's constituencies without having the courage to allow the local members to know that the announcements are being made. It is no change; these guys have not changed at all. We hear them harping over there, and do members know why they are harping? I can understand that they are sensitive, because their great Agenda for People spoke of a new era, a new dawning of openness and honesty, which today was found out to have fallen flat. In fact, the prime minister of this province -- I use those words probably even more strongly today than I would have before, because "prime minister" brings to mind Brian Mulroney, and what these people are doing and what they have shown they can do today brings them closer to that federal Conservative organization than I have ever seen before.

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That is what they have to fear, because the direction is clear. Cabinet says: "We make the decision on Wednesday. Let it out to the folks we know. Get the communication straight on Friday. Take a walk through the woods, Ed, it's a pretty good background for your announcement on Monday morning, and then let all those other people know. We don't want the regional Chair to get in the papers on the weekend, because a lot of people read the papers on the weekend. You know, you don't want big weekend news stories. You want to hide it. Do it Monday morning when everybody is busy trying to get back to work."

We are supporting this motion. It is unusual, but we know the government is hesitant about bringing forward all of the facts and we know it will do its best to make sure that this does not ever become an examination of the credibility and of the integrity of this government. The prime minister of this province has decided that this is a closed shop; as far as it concerns integrity in government, he alone will judge, no appeals necessary; and although the people here in this House heard an apology extended, we are not allowed for one moment to examine the facts upon which the apology was provided.

I think that speaks to the very point of the need of the reasoned amendment of my colleague the member for Parry Sound, and we will support it.

Hon Miss Martel: I will be much shorter than my two colleagues. I will say this: I believe the statements made by the two councillors from Hamilton this evening on TV have more than adequately responded to the concerns that were raised here by both opposition parties. I stand by what my leader said today. I support my two colleagues the Minister of Transportation and the Minister of Colleges and Universities, and we will be voting against this amendment.

Mr Scott: I intend to vote in favour of the amendment, but I do not suppose it much matters. The amendment is not going to pass because the government is going to oppose it, and that will be the end of it. I understand that -- I can count -- but I just want to mark this day, particularly for the new members who are first in the House.

We have a unique situation in Ontario now, because in a decade each of the three parties has come to government. None of us are virginal in a governmental sense; we have had a Conservative government, a Liberal government and now a New Democratic government. Each government has tough decisions to make. Governments, after all, are made up simply of men and women. We will make mistakes, and we will make good judgements and we will make bad judgements. That is a reality of life. None of us is perfect, but none of us is totally imperfect. That is the reality in which we find ourselves.

The two ministers involved, I want to tell the new members on this side of the House if they do not know this, are highly respected members of the Legislature, having given good service over many years in opposition, and are honourable men who are entitled to be considered for the executive council. I can tell them that in our benches there were those who rejoiced particularly at the choices that were made because we admired them.

But what we are talking about here when all is said and done is conflict of interest. What we are talking about is that when the standards for conflict of interest were set, when our ministers were challenged with respect to conflict of interest, they either resigned or they went to committee. I remind members of the member for Oriole and René Fontaine -- they were cleared but they went to committee, resigned their portfolios -- and Chaviva Ho_ek, who was cleared by the public auditor. I bring this to members' attention, because in this particular case, when this new government faces this challenge with which our government and the Conservative government has had experience, it has a critical decision to make.

Hon Mrs Gigantes: Oh.

Mr Scott: The honourable member for Ottawa Centre can joke about it, because she cannot present a principled reaction to these problems. The issue here is a question of principle. This is the moment at which the moral integrity of a government is tested. The question is: Is the government going to do what other governments have been doing, have been forced to do at its hands and at the hands of the House, or is it not? In the words of Colin Vaughan on television today, is it going to impose on itself standards that it regularly imposed on others or is it not?

The issue in this case is not the quality of the two men involved. They are admirable figures, and I have great general confidence in their ability to serve well. The charge is that they have breached the oath of the executive council. I do not say it was even deliberate, but that is the charge. The issue, for those who believe government must exhibit some standard of moral integrity, is: What will it do confronted by that charge? Stonewall it? Steamroll right over it in ways they, with perfect reason, would have lambasted us or the Conservatives for doing? Or, as Colin Vaughan asks, will they impose on themselves, at this first instance where their credibility is at issue, the standards they regularly imposed on others?

I have great confidence in most of the members of the government party. They have been symbols of that kind of moral leadership in this Legislature over many years. I think it would be a remarkable thing and entirely in the interests of this whole process and all of us if those two members did that, not because they were forced, not because they felt any guilt -- because I am sure they do not -- not because they felt under pressure, but because they said to themselves: "We have asked that these standards be imposed on Joan Smith and Elinor Caplan and René Fontaine and Chaviva Ho_ek even when they were adjudged to be innocent. If we ask that it be imposed on them, we, because we are New Democrats" -- that is what used to be said on the street -- "will impose those standards on ourselves at the moment of truth." Well, my friends, this is for the government the moment of truth, when its moral integrity is about to be tested. That is why, whether we win or lose the vote, I ask them to mark this day, four days before Christmas, 1990.

Mr Harris: I will try not to be very long. However, I am not speaking as the Attorney General spoke --

Mr Scott: Thanks, Mike.

Mr Harris: -- the former Attorney General; I heard his speech on the Constitution and it brought back shades of Attorney Generalship. In his remarks, the member for St George-St David asked members to mark this day in their calendar. I thought he displayed a fair degree of pessimism that his remarks were going to convince the government actually to do the right thing. I, however, am taking an optimistic note before Christmastime that they will be persuaded that what is called for in this amendment is in fact the right thing to do.

I do not want to go into the merits of the issue. We went through that today in question period. I think the record speaks for itself. I think it is very clear that there are concerns we have, concerns the public has, concerns that certainly Hamiltonians have and concerns every Ontarian should have. There are concerns, though, in what we are asking for in this amendment, aside from the concern every member of this Legislature should have.

The Premier opted today not to refer, or not at his instigation, the matter to committee. It was his option. We asked him to do that. He could have referred this matter to a committee but he opted not to do that. That is his prerogative: He can choose to or not to. However, now government members have an opportunity to express their viewpoint, not as to what the Premier should do; they can accept and support their Premier. He opted not to do it. That is fine. Now they have an opportunity. They have an opportunity to live up to the standards they campaigned on. They have an opportunity to live up to the standards they took to their constituents.

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Mr Elston: That's right; moral decisions.

Mr Harris: They have an opportunity, as the member for Bruce says, to make a moral decision as to whether they are going to cover up and stifle information from being made public, or whether they are going to allow information to come forward.

That is the decision they are making. They each have an individual choice to make that decision. They are not passing judgement on their Premier. They are not passing judgement on their colleagues. They are not passing judgement on the favoured sons in Hamilton who, if this had not been exposed, were going to get access to information a little more quickly than other elected officials, let alone citizens. All they are being asked to do is to allow their peers, members of the Legislature, to have access to the facts.

The member for St George-St David suggested government members mark this day on their calendars, because he was presuming that they would not opt for that, that they would not opt for openness, that they would not opt for wanting to have information brought forward. I hope that is not the case. If it is, they indeed ought to mark it on their calendars.

I hope they will agree with me that this is an opportunity to live up to the standards. I thought the member for St George-St David was a little presumptuous. He made it sound as if when they were in government, whenever any of these matters came forward, they quickly jumped to see which committee they could refer it to. The truth of the matter is that many times it was a long, dragged-out fight before some of these matters ended up in committee. But that in itself was what a great deal of this past election that my colleagues campaigned in was about. It was about a style of government. It was about what I call the politics of the past versus the politics of the nineties, of the 21st century, of a new openness, of a new consulting, of a new sharing of decision-making, of a new sharing of information.

Many members of this chamber, I think, would agree with me. Many politicians would agree with me that we are not held in the highest of esteem these days. I suggest to them that this lack of empowerment that the public feels has a great deal to do with the frustration it has with the whole lot of us. So I ask members to reflect on that as well, because if they vote against this amendment, they are voting against empowerment, not even to make a decision. They are voting against empowerment to have access to the facts.

That, I suggest, is worse than not consulting on making a decision. That is worse than not consulting on matters of public policy. It is worse than not consulting on the prebudget consultation, on inviting the public in to hear its views on Bill 4 that the government tried to stifle until we insisted it go out to hearings. It is worse than that. It is just saying: "We don't want the facts. We don't think the public's entitled to them. We don't want our fellow colleagues in the Legislature to have access to them." That is what the government is saying.

I ask government members to reflect on that. I ask them to support this amendment which will allow them, who will have the majority of the members on the committee, and which will allow us to examine what happened in this fiasco that took place in Hamilton on Friday, Saturday and Sunday of last week.

Mr Phillips: If I might join the debate in support of the motion, I think the members opposite are faced with a very tough decision. If they reflect back on their speech from the throne, which I always carry with me, it says:

"My government's first challenge is to earn the trust and respect of the people of Ontario. My government's integrity will be measured by the way this government is run and our relations with the people we serve. Our task is to guard against institutional arrogance and the abuse of power wherever they exist.... We must create a greater sense of integrity in the work of government. We are under no illusions that this is easy, since the public remains distrustful of governments and other large institutions. It is our job to address that cynicism and to overcome it."

Think about it. The cabinet made a decision, one of the most significant economic decisions for that region of Ontario, about a week ago. That decision was made and then three days later, at least as we understand it, a select group of people were told about that decision, and then three days later the public was informed. I just say to members that the members opposite are going to have to live with that impression unless they give themselves the opportunity for a full public airing of it, because the public can gather no other perception than the one I have just outlined -- a major cabinet decision made on Wednesday, a select group told about it on Friday and the public told about it on Monday. That is exactly the way, as I understand it, that it occurred. I do not think anyone disputes those facts.

I just say to them that their speech from the throne outlines that as their first objective, to build the respect the people of Ontario have for their government and their integrity. The very first challenge they are faced with is this one: Do they stonewall this? Do they say, "Let's just hope it all goes away," or do they give an opportunity for a full public airing?

I agree with the leader of the third party. I do not think it is clear-cut that they will vote against the amendment. I think that as they think about how they are going to have to deal with this issue publicly over the next few weeks, they may very well welcome an opportunity for that full public airing, because I do not think this is going to just quietly go away as they may hope it might.

As I say, I go back to their speech from the throne their very first objective, their major task, is integrity in government. This is their first major challenge, if I might present it to the members of the government, and we all will be looking forward to the response that we will see later this evening here on the vote.

Mrs Marland: I am going to be very brief, but I think this is a very significant amendment and I think this is a very significant time in the history of this House for all of us. For all of us, as our leader just said, the integrity of politicians, unfortunately, is in question. We are not questioning the integrity of any individual politician in this House or any individual member of this House. We are simply questioning the process.

I say with respect that if the public is to believe in us and in our responsibility in serving them, then we must be sure that the integrity of each one of us, and above all the integrity of this House, is held. The only way that integrity can be held is if we fully believe in and practise a fully open and democratic process, and that is all this amendment is about.

I know quite well that the members who now sit on the government side of the House argued with us during the past five years at different times for a full and open process. We argued in favour of the public knowing all the facts in certain circumstances. Unfortunately, then too it was a majority government and we were not able to access all the facts in all the circumstances. The public perception is such that unless we are full and open with them, we in fact insult them. We insult the intelligence of the public by suggesting that everything is open in this House when they know full well it is not.

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By supporting this motion we are simply saying, "Let's make sure that perceptions are fact and let's make sure about the perception that we have nothing to be concerned about, that in fact everyone has stated exactly what the situation is." By doing this through this route, through the committee route, what is going to happen, frankly, is that there is nothing to hide, so therefore we agree with it.

I would hope that every member of this Legislature will vote in favour of this amendment, therefore supporting the concept that if they do not have anything to hide, then let's put it out in the open and put it to bed once and for all. As long as everything is hushed up and something is not fully disclosed under any kind of scrutiny, then suspicion and concern is there. I simply say again that if we have nothing to hide in this House, then why would we not support this amendment for a full and open discussion?

The Speaker: Are members ready for the question? The first question to be decided is the amendment moved by the member for Parry Sound, who moved that government notice of motion 13 be amended by adding to the third paragraph, following the words "sessional paper 52" the words "and to review the matter of the release of cabinet information pertaining to the Red Hill Creek Expressway."

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the nays have it.

Call in the members.

Mr Eves: Stack the vote.

Hon Miss Martel: Stack the vote, please.

The Speaker: We require unanimous consent to stack the vote.

Mr Eves: I would ask for unanimous consent to stack this vote as well as other votes on succeeding motions we may have later this evening so that we can vote on them all at once.

Agreed to.

Vote stacked.

COMMITTEE SITTINGS

Miss Martel moved resolution 14:

That with the agreement of the House leaders and the whips of each party, committees may meet during the winter adjournment at times other than those specified in the schedule tabled today with the Clerk of the Assembly to consider matters referred to them by the House or to consider matters designated pursuant to standing order 123.

Motion agreed to.

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Miss Martel moved resolution 15:

That committees be authorized to release their reports during the winter adjournment by depositing a copy of any report with the Clerk of the Assembly, and upon the resumption of the meetings of the House, the chairs of such committees shall bring any such reports before the House in accordance with the standing orders.

Motion agreed to.

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT AGENCIES

Miss Martel moved resolution 11:

That standing order 104(g) be amended by inserting after "agencies;" in the 10th line "and to review the intended appointment of persons to agencies, boards and commissions and of directors to corporations in which the crown in right of Ontario is a majority shareholder according to the following procedures:

"1. A minister of the crown shall lay on the table a certificate stating that the Lieutenant Governor in Council or the Premier, as the case may be, intends to appoint a person to an agency, board or commission or to the board of directors of a corporation, together with a copy of the position description and a summary of the person's qualifications, which documents shall be deemed to be referred to the committee.

"2. The subcommittee on committee business shall meet to select from among the intended appointments referred to in paragraph 3 those intended appointees the committee will review; the first meeting for that purpose shall be held on or before 18 January 1991 and further meetings shall be held for that purpose so that there are no more than 30 calendar days between each meeting.

"3. At least five calendar days before the subcommittee on committee business meets as provided in paragraph 2, the clerk of the subcommittee shall provide to each member of the subcommittee a list of intended appointees in respect of whom a certificate has been received.

"4. The intended appointments to be reviewed by the committee shall be selected in one round by each member of the subcommittee on committee business, other than the Chair, such that the member of the party forming the official opposition shall first choose one or more, the member of a recognized party having the third largest membership in the House shall second choose one or more and the member of the party forming the government shall third choose one or more.

"5. The subcommittee shall make a report to the committee on the intended appointments for review at least seven calendar days before any one of them is to be reviewed and the report shall specify the time allocated for consideration of each of them, the date on which each is to be considered and whether the intended appointee is to be called as a witness.

"6. In its report, the subcommittee shall ensure that those intended appointments which were selected by a member of the subcommittee shall be heard on the same day and that the order of the reviews corresponds to the order of selection as provided in paragraph 4.

"7. The report of the subcommittee on business once adopted by the subcommittee shall be deemed to be adopted by the committee and shall take precedence over all other business of the committee.

"8. If an intended appointment is not selected for review by the subcommittee within 35 calendar days following the day on which the documents provided for in paragraph 1 have been laid on the table, the committee shall be deemed to have concurred in the intended appointment and a report thereon shall be deemed to have been made to and adopted by the House.

"9. The committee may waive its right to review an intended appointment not selected pursuant to paragraph 8 prior to the expiry of the 35 days mentioned in paragraph 8.

"10. Upon notice from the clerk of the committee that an intended appointment has been selected for review, the minister who recommended the appointment shall provide to the committee a copy of the intended appointee's application, a copy of his or her résumé, a description of the responsibilities of the position, a description of the candidate search process and a statement of the criteria by which the intended appointee was chosen.

"11. The committee shall review the intended appointments that have been selected and shall spend no more than three hours reviewing the intended appointments selected by any one member of the subcommittee.

"12. In reviewing an intended appointment, the committee shall not call as a witness any person other than the intended appointee.

"13. The committee shall determine whether or not it concurs in the intended appointments as its first item of business at its first meeting following the meeting at which the intended appointments were reviewed. The time for making that determination shall be limited to one hour. In its report, the committee shall state whether or not it concurs in the intended appointments and may state its reasons therefor.

"14. The committee shall present its report to the House on its review of intended appointments at the earliest opportunity following the meeting at which its findings have been made and such report shall be deemed to be adopted by the House. If the House is not meeting at this time, the committee shall have authority to release its report by depositing a copy of it with the Clerk of the Assembly and upon receipt of the report by the Clerk the report shall be deemed to be adopted by the House.

"15. If a report in respect of an intended appointment is not made within 30 calendar days following the day on which the intended appointment was selected for review, the committee shall be deemed to have concurred in the intended appointment and a report thereon shall be deemed to have been made to and adopted by the House.

"16. The clerk of the committee shall notify in writing the minister who recommended the appointment of any decision of the committee and the subcommittee on committee business respecting the appointment."

This provisional standing order shall be in effect during the period commencing on 20 December 1990 and ending on 27 June 1991.

Mr Sterling: I have given to the opposition side and the government a number of amendments to this standing order which sets up the structure for examining government appointments and puts it in the laps of the agency, boards and commissions committee of this Legislature.

The government has informed me that it agrees with three of those amendments. With your indulgence, Mr Speaker, and the indulgence of the House, I suggest that I read those three amendments as amendments to the government motion, which I believe will be accepted by the government, and then proceed to other amendments on which there may be some debate.

The Speaker: It would be very helpful actually if the member could do one at a time and then we can determine at each stage if it is agreeable.

Mr Sterling: I will, however, not proceed in numerical order as under order 11. I will deal with the three that the government is going to give some support to or has indicated to me some support.

The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 9 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by inserting between the word "committee" and the word "may" the words "or the subcommittee."

Motion agreed to.

The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 8 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by deleting the words "to have concurred in" and by substituting in their place the words "to have no recommendation concerning."

Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, I believe that in your copy two of the words are different.

The Speaker: I do not have the one you moved. What I have are the words "to have no interest in."

Mr Sterling: Instead of the words "interest in," it should have "recommendation concerning."

Motion agreed to.

The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 15 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by deleting the words "to have concurred in" and substituting therefor the words "to have no recommendation concerning."

Mr Sterling: On a point of clarification, I am replacing the words "to have concurred in" with the words "to have no recommendation concerning." That is the motion.

Motion agreed to.

Mr Sterling: I have given to the table a number of recommendations which evidently there may be some debate on. I am going to move all of these motions at once with a very brief explanation of each of the seven amendments. If members are interested and they want to follow the changes, they might refer to their Orders and Notices of today under government motion 11.

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The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that government notice of motion 11 be amended by deleting paragraph 1 and substituting the following therefor:

"1. A minister of the crown shall lay on the table a certificate stating that the Lieutenant Governor in Council or the Premier or the minister, as the case may be, intends to appoint or reappoint a person to an agency, board or commission or to the board of directors of a corporation or to the position of deputy minister in the Ontario civil service, together with a copy of the position description and of the terms of the appointment regarding such matters as the salary and other remuneration to be paid, the date of commencement of the appointment and the duration of the appointment, a summary of the person's qualifications, and a statement of the person's political affiliation and party membership, if any, which documents shall be deemed to be referred to the committee."

Mr Sterling: The purpose of this amendment is to really put into focus the fact that the scope of the proposed rule is very, very narrow and that in fact what we are getting to look at, in terms of appointments, are only a very few of the important people who run Queen's Park. We would like to include all of the appointments of ministers, which are considerable and are excluded by the government's notice of motion 11. We would like to include deputy ministers who are excluded by notice of motion 11. We would like to include all reappointments which are not included in government notice 11. We would also ask for additional information, which is outlined in the wording of my motion.

Mr Elston: The late arrival of the motions have caused us not to be as well informed about their entire meaning as we might otherwise be, but I take from the general thrust of the motions that what the honourable gentleman wants to do is allow the committee to which these tasks are being assigned to have a lot more basic information upon which to make its decision about whether to have some hearings on certain appointments or not.

Basically, my big concern about this particular makeup of an examination of appointments is one of a very practical nature, that in fact when the appointments are made they generally go through cabinet in fairly large numbers, and it would be very interesting to see how the appointments are going to be announced from time to time.

I remember myself being in cabinet when things were backed up. Clearances from the internal networks about how well people's credentials were associated to the job that they were going to be assigned had to be weighed and confirmed and talked about in local members' ridings, in the Premier's office and in the offices in which those people were going to be working. For instance, let's say they were going to be working at the Workers' Compensation Board or whatever. We had to make sure that the person was actually going to be able to perform well there.

It is a very difficult task. I am not trying to minimize the amount of work that is going to go into seeking out the best appointments possible. That all has to be done, but invariably what happens as you are looking at that list -- it is a massive list that has been shared with us and was shared by the previous government with members of the House, a massive list of people who will be appointed to agencies, boards and commissions in this province. You can understand that sometimes when you go into cabinet, you are not dealing with one, two, three, four pages. Sometimes it would be 15 pages of appointments of people to various positions throughout the province, all being signed by the chairman of cabinet on that day, all being posted at a particular time and all coming out with such speed that the committee to which this is assigned is going to be flooded and will have to make very quick judgements because the time frame is quite restrictive.

In fact, the operational activities under which this committee is going to function will prevent it from doing a very thorough analysis unless it has some of the material filed with it that the member for Carleton East -- sorry, Grenville?

Mr Sterling: Carleton.

Mr Elston: Just Carleton now, I am sorry. He keeps switching his constituency's name because he is afraid they will find him out one of these days and he keeps running under different placards. In any event, he has changed his riding name, but he has really been very stationary. We have not seen him move very far very fast over the time I have been here anyway.

In any event, there will be a flood of names coming out. The people who will be doing their best here to find the people they want to interview and examine will have to make, in a very quick way, a decision about whom they do examine. If this is going to be meaningful and if it is going to be funded properly -- and we are taking for granted it will be funded properly, with proper resources to do research and other things -- the flood of names that will have to come out of those cabinet meetings that are held on those Wednesday mornings when all these things finally arrive, as names and lists of people to be appointed, that work will be very difficult.

I apologize. I was distracted by a bright pair of white running shoes and blue jeans here in the Legislative Assembly, which is an unusual event, if I might say. It is not the normal attire to have blue jeans and running shoes on the floor of the House. I wonder if they might just check with the member who is doing that and ask that he become properly attired. I am not mentioning any names. That gentleman there is inappropriately attired.

I just want to indicate that we think these things that are being laid down here as guidelines could be assisted if there were a lot more flexibility and if there was a lot more information made available to the committee.

I have heard the government House leader getting impatient with me. She knows how many things we are concerned about, but she is pressing me to end my remarks.

Let me say just this: If this thing is supposed to work as a real mechanism for reviewing the appointments, then I hope the government will make sure that this committee has the flexibility to add to its own resources for research and that it will get maybe an extended time in the first days of sitting, which I know the next resolution will bring forward, to make sure that it really does work as a committee function.

I also want to say that while this has been left to the very end -- and I know the government House leader does not think this is as important, but we had a fairly long conversation one day --

Hon Miss Martel: We never know what you are going to do. That is the problem.

Mr Elston: The government House leader says they never know what we are going to do. I had not been aware of several amendments which were just brought forward or several things that were happening. I am not certain exactly what else is going to happen, but I can tell members that I am aware of what this is designed to do. This motion is designed to try to pass off the government's responsibility for the appointment of people to boards and commissions if they screw up. That is what, in the very vernacular, it is designed to do. I tell members that if they are good appointments, the government will take the credit, and if some problem arises from the appointment, it will say that the committee had its chance and did not make any recommendations.

If the government does not make sure that this works well, and of course the government still has a majority of members on the committee anyway to manage this thing fairly well, I can tell the government if it constrains this committee from reviewing, in a real way, the material which comes in front of it about people --

[Laughter]

Mr Elston: If that is the effect I have on some people, I am worried about the rest.

This reminds me of some details of other matters which I might want to get into a little bit later, but I do not think I will now.

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All I want to say is that I hope the majority government members on this committee make the process work, because the way the details here are drawn, the restrictions are put in place, it is going to be very difficult. That is all I ask. We will be supporting the notices of motion and the motion made by the member for Carleton, just to indicate our concern that there be a lot of flexibility allowed to the reviews that go on.

With that, I will be finishing my remarks. I hope that the government House leader will have a very happy holiday season and a very good 1991.

Hon Miss Martel: I want to point out to all members the very important fact that we have included also in this motion at the end, which we will not get to with these amendments, that the government intends to sunset the requirements that we are putting forward at this time. What we are trying to do with the process that we are putting before the House is to set in place a process that will start to deal with many of the important appointments that need to go through this committee in very short order; for example, those appointments to the Fair Tax Commission, which the Treasurer would like to get off the ground.

We have said very clearly to both of the other government House leaders that it is the first time we are trying something like this. We want the committee to at least try the process, go through it, and then it will have the chance as well to meet as a committee and make recommendations for changes to the standing order that would make the committee more appropriate and its function more effective.

So we have said very clearly to them that at this point nothing is etched completely in stone. There are some things that we will probably never give on, and I expect both opposition parties will recognize that. But by the same token, there are things and technical matters that the committee will go through as it takes on this process that we will look forward to changes to, and the committee will recommend those changes to this House.

With the matter that is before us, specifically with respect to allowing the particular committee to also look to appointments for deputy ministers, I would say that the committee that is dealing with this matter is a committee that studies agencies, boards and commissions. It is not a committee that deals with ministerial appointments or appointments within this place with respect to our staff or ministerial staff. We have no intention at this point in time of opening that process any further.

If I might, with respect to the other points of information that the opposition parties would like to have prepared and put on file, I can only say that at this point they will be given a document which will have a great deal of that information, not all of it. I look forward to the committee recommending back to us whether or not it feels more is appropriate or whether or not the information it is provided with does give an adequate profile of the candidate in question and is all it really requires in order to review that candidate.

The Speaker: Is it the pleasure of the House that the amendment carry?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion the nays have it.

Motion negatived.

Mr Sterling: Could we try to move things along and get to the next amendment? I would seek unanimous consent here to read the six remaining amendments that I have and to vote in total on those six additional amendments. I would seek unanimous consent for that.

The Speaker: We require unanimous consent. Is it agreed?

Agreed to.

The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 4 of the resolution be deleted and the following substituted therefor:

"4. The intended appointments to be reviewed by the committee shall be selected in one round by the members of the subcommittee on committee business, other than the Chair, representing the party forming the official opposition and the recognized party having the third largest membership in the House such that the member of the party forming the official opposition shall first choose one or more and the member of a recognized party having the third largest membership in the House shall second choose one or more."

Mr Sterling: This amendment excludes the right of the member --

The Speaker: Do you intend to move all of them and then to speak to the package, or do you intend to speak to each one as you introduce them? You want the House to deal with them as a package. Perhaps it would be helpful if you read all of them and then retreat to deal with each one in turn.

Mr Sterling: I will read all the amendments in and then go back. I just thought it might be easier to follow if I -- however.

The Speaker: Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 5 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by adding after the word "witness" in the last line of the paragraph the words "and specify any other witnesses to be called before the committee during its consideration of the intended appointments."

Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 10 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by adding thereto the following subparagraph:

"10(1) The committee may ask for and receive a copy of any criminal record of any intended appointee and any such record is to be received and maintained in confidence."

Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 11 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by deleting the number "three" and substituting therefor the number "five."

Mr Sterling moves that government notice of motion 11 be amended by deleting paragraph 12 and substituting the following therefor:

"12. In reviewing an intended appointment the committee has the right to call and subpoena witnesses."

Mr Sterling moves that paragraph 13 of government notice of motion 11 be amended by adding thereto the following subparagraph:

"13(1) In the case where the committee does not concur in an intended appointment the commencement of the appointment shall be postponed for a period of 60 days."

Mr Sterling: This group of amendments basically follows the Legislative Assembly's report on appointments which was drawn up two or three or four years ago. Basically what I have incorporated in these amendments is the summary of that Legislative Assembly report.

It is my feeling that the government, in introducing notice of motion 11, is in fact introducing a whitewash for government appointments. The opportunity for the members of the opposition to really get the people in front of the committee that they want in front of the committee is limited. The opportunity of the committee to get the necessary information to ask the pertinent questions to the intended appointees is limited.

Government motion 11 also limits opposition parties to the same rights as the government has in examining its very own appointees. I do not understand why government motion 11 gives to the government members the opportunity to put their own appointees on the stand, so to speak, to have them examined as to their competence. I assume that with everyone the government makes an intended appointee, it has done its homework and it is satisfied that appointee is suitable for the job. However, under this particular resolution we are going to have government members who, on instructions, no doubt, from cabinet, will be suggesting that appointees whom the government itself has put forward be brought before the committee. Quite frankly, we do not want to waste our time in dealing with stories that are really not going to produce any fruitful benefit.

One of the outstanding problems with this particular motion is that a committee is really toothless to do anything about an appointee who does not meet its satisfaction. All the committee can do is recommend that this particular person not be appointed.

I have suggested in these amendments that the bare minimum a committee must be given in terms of a sanction is the right to postpone that appointment for a period of 60 days. I do not believe that is unreasonable if an all-party committee, especially a committee controlled by the government in a majority Parliament, in fact finds that an appointee is not competent.

1950

Another part which was left out of this process but which was included in the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly's report on appointments was the ability of the committee to call other witnesses if it saw fit about a certain appointee. This resolution which the government has brought forward says that members can only call the appointee in front of the committee. It may be very important for the committee members to get other people's opinions about whether a particular intended appointee is or is not suitable for that position.

That is, in summary, where my amendments lie. I thought it was important that we put forward in detailed form our concerns about what we deem to be a real sham in terms of setting up an appointment process. The very least this government could have done is follow the Legislative Assembly report which NDP members of that committee agreed with in total, which all members of the committee agreed with in total, but the last government did not bring forward. I thought this government would at least have the guts to bring forward an appointment process which had some meaning. It will be, therefore, very difficult for us to support notice of motion 11 setting up this committee as it now is if in fact these amendments are not accepted by the government.

Mr Elston: I will not be long. It seems that if I make a couple of comments now on these, then we can probably take the vote on the main motion after dealing with these amendments and no more debate will have to occur.

I agree in some ways with the member for Carleton that there are restrictions on the way this committee is going to be able to perform its duties. I agree that the witness issue is a major problem and in fact is a very poor example to show if you are trying to get close to what is seen in the US, where they review in various committees the appointments of people to sit on the judges' panels and other things. This is nowhere close to that, where people come in and can actually be grilled if necessary, where an appointment is an unpopular one or where the onerous duties about to be taken on are extremely important to the administration of some of the cases that are most renowned from US justice. Here the appointments are no less important and no less critical to the wellbeing of the people. To restrict the number of witnesses solely to the person who is to be appointed I think is a real mistake.

I just want to underline again a concern I have about the number of appointments that will have to be made at particular times. For instance, right now -- this is a very real thing for me, from the riding of Bruce, and one reason I am really concerned about how this committee is going to be structured. We have at least two police commissions in my riding, one in Kincardine and one in Port Elgin. The appointments of commissioners for their own police commissions have been held up since the election. That is totally understandable, totally reasonable, but I can believe that those commissions, which are now non-functioning, providing no direction -- in fact, the former members whose times have expired have been told to make sure they do not go anywhere close to anything that looks like a meeting, so there is no way at all that those commissions can work, provide the direction they are required to provide to the Kincardine and Port Elgin police commissions. That is a problem.

What is going to happen if there are two in my riding of Bruce -- and there may be more I have not yet heard about -- and there are a number right across the province? There will be a veritable flood when finally the administration is able to make the appointments to all the commissions around the province; those are but the very beginning. So while I implore the Solicitor General and his staff to get on with clearing the appointees to the Kincardine and Port Elgin police commissions, I also implore the government members to allow us to do our work in the early going, because they will have a lot of new appointments flooding out at some stage. It takes a while to get the process worked up to clear appointees and then make them and draft the orders in council and get the Premier's office functioning, then get them into cabinet. Members will have those nice books with a great big sheet of things and people will get there and ask, "Who cleared this person for the appointment?" I know it is a very onerous thing, but I hope they are going to be very flexible in the early going as they get a whole series of backlogged appointments out of the way.

As members know, and this will be the last I say, we had made a commitment not to make appointments during the election period, and did not make appointments during the election nor in the period after 6 September up to 1 October unless there was consent of the incoming Premier. That means there is a lot of problems out there associated with boards for which the mandates of some members have expired. I just ask the government members sitting on the committee that with regard to the flood of appointments of women and men of, I am sure, great ability but also perhaps many of whom will be of interest to the committee, that they be flexible in allowing the examination of those.

I congratulate the member for Carleton for examining in some detail this motion and taking the time to bring these amendments forward to bring the problem areas to the attention of the members of the House.

With that, a very merry Christmas and a happy new year to you too, Mr Speaker.

Hon Miss Martel: I appreciate that the members in opposition have made their points to me about this and I appreciate what they have to say. I am hoping, as the committee goes through the process and the members deal with the new process we are advocating at this time, that changes can be made which will make the process more effective and that everyone will find some satisfaction with that. I must say, as I said earlier, that at this point there are some things we cannot agree on with the opposition parties. I have to state those and put them on record.

First, with respect to amendment 4, which would not allow government members to participate in this process, I have to say on behalf of the government that I think that is unfair. I do not think it is appropriate that our own members will not have a choice to make selections for review for appointments. I must say to the member that the backbenchers have every right to participate in this process. He knows and I know that the Premier would suggest people, which would flow through cabinet, and that our own people probably would not have an opportunity to have input. We think it is very appropriate that in fact they have the right on this committee, as would every other member in this place who wants to sit on that committee, to participate in that process.

I would also say it is the very same process in place for the standing committee on estimates, where the government members do have the chance to participate. They choose last, they rank last, and we have suggested that that can occur in this committee as well, but I do think it is unfair and inappropriate not to allow government members to have some participation in this as well.

Second, with respect to witnesses, I can say that we will not agree to have more than one witness, that is, the candidate himself or herself, come before the committee. Our fear at this time, and we may be proven wrong, is that that may then become a forum not where people seek out pertinent information or get necessary information with respect to the qualifications of the candidate but that it could become a forum for a real assassination of someone's character. We are very fearful that if indeed that is what the process might become, members would not have the most capable people wanting to come forward. In fact, they might deter a great number of people who would be excellent candidates from coming forward, because they would not want to put themselves or their credibility on that kind of line. So we will not be agreeing with that particular amendment.

Third, with respect to the request by the opposition that the committee may ask for and receive a copy of any criminal record of any intended appointee, we will not agree with this because under the Human Rights Code in this province that is discrimination. No employer in this province can ask that of his employee or view that. I would consider that when we appoint people to agencies, boards and commissions in this province they are getting paid a wage or a salary or some kind of remuneration, so in that broad sense there is employment there. I do not think it is fair that the government, or the committee for that matter, could ask that it be able to see criminal records if those applicants do have one. We will not be agreeing to that.

2000

Two more: There was a request to change the number of hours necessary to have the committee review the appointments and review particular candidates. The amendment moved by the third party was with respect to not allowing government members to have their ranking as well. It is our concern, as I already mentioned, that government members should be able to make choices about this committee and make choices about the candidates they want to be reviewed. In that sense, the time for review of all these candidates would be quite lengthy, but if we move to the five hours suggested by the third party, we would require at least six hours in every sitting of that committee in order to deal with the business. Members of the Legislature should know that we have allotted one hour before the committee sits to review new candidates to make recommendations or review the candidates who came the week before. When the House is sitting, we cannot physically block that kind of time, so we cannot agree to that number of hours.

Finally, with respect to the request that where the committee does not intend to recommend an appointment that appointment be postponed for 60 days, I remind people of the process that will be in place under this committee. First, the committee has up to 30 days to decide if it wants to review or not review candidates put forward by the Lieutenant Governor or the Premier. Second, they have yet another 30 days in order to review the candidate and report to the House whether they recommend this candidate. So we have two months from the time the Premier or Lieutenant Governor makes the recommendation to the time that might be seen and actually acted upon by the committee.

It seems to us to make no sense that if the recommendation comes back, and the Premier and cabinet do not agree with the recommendation from the committee, we should delay yet another 60 days before being able to fill that position. I would remind members that we have quite a backlog at this time, but even if there were not a backlog there are many positions that just could not wait for up to four months before decisions were made. It seems to me that if the Premier and cabinet do not agree and are going to proceed with the appointment, then there should be no delay and that should occur.

I point out again that I appreciate the concerns that were raised. They are legitimate concerns, but the government cannot agree with all of them. By the same token, it is my hope that under the amendments which we are moving the committee will have a good basis on which to work for the next six months, and after going through the process will be able to make recommendations that will make the process more effective and give all the members a sense that they have a fair opportunity to participate in it.

The Speaker: The House agreed to entertain a package of six amendments and deal with them as a package. Is it agreed that we shall vote on them as a package?

Agreed to.

The Speaker: Shall the amendments carry?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion the nays have it.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Are members prepared to vote on the motion?

Hon Miss Martel: If I might just provide this explanation. I am not sure if resolution 12 is going to be voted on in favour or not, so perhaps we should proceed. I just assumed automatically that we would be voting against it, and I would have stacked that vote as well. My apologies. I will wait to hear what they have to say.

The Speaker: I think we are on resolution ll, as amended. I am just checking to make sure that everyone has had an opportunity to participate. There are no more amendments and no more debate.

Shall resolution 11, as amended, carry?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

Mr Elston: As amended; you accepted the amendments.

Hon Miss Martel: Sorry.

The Speaker: I realize we have been here for a little while. Some of us are getting tired. We dealt with three amendments earlier, which were agreed to. We then dealt with six amendments which were not carried. We are now faced with the question of whether resolution 11, as amended, will carry.

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion the ayes have it.

Vote stacked.

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT AGENCIES

Miss Martel moved resolution 12:

That, notwithstanding standing order 104(i), the standing committee on government agencies is authorized to consider how the standing orders might be amended to permit it to best perform the task of reviewing the appointment of persons to agencies, boards and commissions and of directors to corporations in which the crown in right of Ontario is a majority shareholder and the committee shall report to the House its recommendations on or before 16 May 1991.

Motion agreed to.

2010

COMMITTEE SITTINGS

The House divided on Mr Eves's amendment to resolution 13, which was negatived on the following vote:

Ayes -- 18

Beer, Carr, Cousens, Cunningham, Elston, Eves, Harnick, Mahoney, Marland, Murdoch, B., Phillips, G., Poirier, Scott, Sola, Sterling, Sullivan, Tilson, Turnbull.

Nays -- 53

Abel, Allen, Boyd, Buchanan, Charlton, Christopherson, Churley, Cooper, Coppen, Drainville, Duignan, Ferguson, Fletcher, Frankford, Gigantes, Grier, Haeck, Hansen, Haslam, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Lankin, Lessard, MacKinnon, Mackenzie, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martel, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, O'Connor, Owens, Perruzza, Philip, E., Pilkey, Silipo, Ward, B., Ward, M., Waters, Wessenger, White, Wildman, Wilson, F., Wilson, G., Winninger, Wiseman, Ziemba.

The House divided on Miss Martel's motion of resolution 13, which was agreed to on the same vote reversed.

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT AGENCIES

The House divided on Miss Martel's motion of resolution ll, as amended, which was agreed to on the following vote:

Ayes -- 61

Abel, Allen, Beer, Boyd, Buchanan, Charlton, Christopherson, Churley, Cooper, Coppen, Drainville, Duignan, Elston, Ferguson, Fletcher, Frankford, Gigantes, Grier, Haeck, Hansen, Haslam, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Lankin, Lessard, MacKinnon, Mackenzie, Mahoney, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martel, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, O'Connor, Owens, Perruzza, Philip, E., Phillips, G., Pilkey, Poirier, Scott, Silipo, Sola, Sullivan, Ward, B., Ward, M., Waters, Wessenger, White, Wildman, Wilson, F., Wilson, G., Winninger, Wiseman, Ziemba.

Nays -- 10

Carr, Cousens, Cunningham, Eves, Harnick, Marland, Murdoch, B., Sterling, Tilson, Turnbull.

2020

INTERIM SUPPLY

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for interim supply for the period 1 January 1991 to 30 April 1991.

Mr Mahoney: Here we are together again for the first time. It is indeed my pleasure to rise to continue the debate that ended last night on supply, on the government motion, and to address this House on a number of issues that I will try to finish before midnight of the clock, to the best of my ability.

Mr Phillips: No, no, no.

Mr Mahoney: No? Do they want me to go longer? Do they want to come back tomorrow? They would like to get on question period tomorrow.

This is kind of a sad day in the life of this Legislature and indeed in the early life of this government, because it is a day when the halo has fallen off. The difficulties we were talking about before, about when these folks go back to their ridings and the difficulties they are going to have explaining the policies, or the lack of policies, of the government are now going to be compounded because when they go back to York East and other environs, they will find that they now have difficulty explaining the actions of a couple of their cabinet ministers to people who are going to wonder why these meetings were being held and this information on a cabinet decision was being shared with certain privileged few.

Interjections.

Hon Miss Martel: I can't hear you any more.

Mr Mahoney: The member for Sudbury East should keep them down, that is right, because if they heckle me too much I could go all night. I just might not know when to stop if the member for Yorkview gets too excited over there.

They are going to have some difficulty explaining all of this. Never mind the ministers involved and the Premier, who had a tough battle -- they have some difficulties explaining it -- but at least they are explaining their own actions.

An hon member: Stonewalling.

Mr Mahoney: They are stonewalling, absolutely.

What they have to do -- I could see it during question period today. I could see them sitting there wondering, "Holy smokes, we're in for it now."

Ms Churley: That's fine.

Mr Mahoney: It is fine? She thinks it is fine? I do not know -- has everyone met the member for Mississauga South? Merry Christmas. The member has not done her Christmas shopping. What is she going to buy me? If she sits down, she will probably allow me to get through this a little quicker and we can get out of here by 11:30. If she does not, it is going the full distance; that is all. In all seriousness, the member for Mississauga South will shop till she drops. The members can take my word on it. When she gets out there with that plastic going, Ken is at home. The member for Mississauga South actually had her credit cards stolen, but her husband has not reported it because the thief is spending less than she was.

Interjection.

Mr Mahoney: She should know not to interfere like that. What can I say?

Good to see the member for Durham East. I cannot believe it. There are socialists coming from everywhere around here. You just have to watch your back. I hope I am being guarded up there by the member for Mississauga East.

Just to prove that I am really a kinder and gentler person, which I know is the desire of the Premier, the cabinet and all members -- all the best to the member for Durham East. Would he get out of here? I am busy. Look at this guy. Cureatz would never do this. Sit over there. Go.

Mr Scott: What is wrong with him? He's not a bad guy.

Mr Mahoney: What is wrong with him? No, he is not a bad guy. The member for -- where is he from? -- Durham Centre. No, he is not Durham Centre, Durham East. Durham Centre is the member from Drummond White; that is the member.

Mrs Marland: Barbara has not even finished her cards and you're talking.

Mr Mahoney: Well, she has to finish her cards, so that is why I cannot stop.

Just to prove that I am a member and a kinder, gentler person, I would like to pay a certain tribute to the whip of the NDP, the member for Niagara South.

[Applause]

Mr Mahoney: They can give her a standing O. Go ahead. And to the House leader.

[Applause]

Mr Mahoney: Go ahead. To the House leader, the member for Sudbury East, who was made House leader and Minister of Northern Development. The whip of the Conservatives, the member for London North, and the member for Parry Sound have also been very co-operative -- a little bit obstreperous at times, but a great pleasure for me and for my House leader to work with. As I said -- no, that is not certainly up to me, Mr Speaker. I will leave that for the history books to judge.

Just to show, as I said, that I am a kinder, gentler person, I have a couple of gifts. The first one is a plastic bag. We have about 76 of them, because they are going to need them when you go back to their ridings and try to explain what has been going on around here, and particularly what happened today. So we have those in our caucus room, rather large, attractive, I think, plastic bags for all members of the caucus, I say to the whip and government House leader.

On a bit of a serious note, I have a lovely basket here that happens to be from my wife's store, as a matter of fact. The name is Tea Masters in the Erin Mills town centre. If anyone wants to buy such an item, it could be available.

Hon Mrs Gigantes: How much? Boy, that's class.

Mr Mahoney: For her? Anyway, this is a gift for the House leader and one for the whip, which our House leader is going to take across, in appreciation of their co-operation.

Mr Scott: Kiss, kiss.

Mr Mahoney: I give the presents and he gets the kisses. What is this?

Mr Scott: This is life.

Mr Mahoney: This is life, life in opposition when he is the House leader.

Mrs Marland: And the present for Mississauga South?

Mr Mahoney: Does she want me to get some more of these?

I pay tribute to those two honourable members because coming in new to the job, particularly in the case of the House leader but also in the case of the whip, new to government, with a tremendous amount of pressure upon them to put up with some of the nonsense that goes on here -- and I am sure there, particularly in caucus and in meetings -- I think they have done a remarkable job of surviving. I note the name of the New Democratic Party this evening is the survival party and I think it is extremely appropriate. Colin Vaughan said that the reason they will survive is because this place does not sit beyond today.

In all sincerity, on behalf of my House leader, our leader and our caucus, I want to wish all members of the Legislature in all parties a very happy Christmas, a good rest, a successful 1991. This place may be kinder and gentler, I am not sure, but we will be back here looking forward to taking on the many issues with the government on behalf of the people of Ontario whom we represent and indeed the entire population of Ontario.

2030

Mr Eves: Mr Speaker, I am not going to speak to the motion on interim supply. I may as well let you know that right off the bat. I would be very remiss if I did not, on behalf of our caucus, extend our very sincere remarks to every single member of the Ontario Legislature. I do not think it matters what political stripe members are wearing when they come to this place. I think everybody would agree that each one of the 130 of us comes here with one motive in mind and one motive only, and that is to try to not only help our constituents but to try to make the province of Ontario indeed just a little bit better place in which to live.

Hon Ms Lankin: I have the pleasure to wrap up this debate on the motion for interim supply on behalf of the Treasurer, who is in Ottawa meeting with the provincial and federal finance ministers. I want to say that in keeping with the spirit that has been set by the tone of the two previous speakers and the spirit of this time of the season, I will not take long with my remarks.

I will reflect on the fact that this has been an incredible experience. Let me speak personally but I think on behalf of all of us on this side of the House, and I am sure those members in the opposition seats who come to this place for the first time. What an incredible learning experience. What a challenge. What a pleasure. What pride we all have collectively in being able to serve the people of Ontario, being able to bring forward the vision we have for a better life for the people of Ontario, being able to exchange our views about how we go about achieving that, having honest differences, having honest agreements and in the end coming out with a product that I hope will be respected by the people of Ontario and that will achieve our collective goals.

May I say that on behalf of all the people on the government side we want to bring season's greetings to all members of this House and to all staff of the Legislative Assembly and throughout the Ontario public service who are involved in this joint effort with us to serve the people of Ontario. We thank them. I suggest members opposite get a good rest. I think they have had lots of energy and I am sure they have spent most of it during these last few nights. They should get a good rest. We all will. We will see them in the new year. Happy holidays.

The Speaker: Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion for interim supply carry?

Motion agreed to.

The Speaker: Before calling orders of the day, the Speaker wishes to quite briefly thank all members for your patience, your kindness and your co-operation. You have indeed made my job easier and I truly appreciate it. I, like others, wish everyone a happy holiday time. Have a good rest. All of us are tired; we have worked hard, but I too, like the others, am looking forward to the new year and working again with all of you. Certainly if the spirit of co-operation remains, we indeed will do work that will make us all proud and will serve the people of Ontario.

Hon Miss Martel: Before I move to adjourn the House, might the members indulge me for one moment. I want to say that if I do anything before I get out of here it would be to try to change our current pension plan which allows for maximization at age and combination of service of 55, because I can tell members I will not last that long. I will have 21 years in this place before I can qualify and I do not think I can bear that at this point.

I must say that as the Chairman of Management Board was very personal in her remarks, so am I. It has been a hell of a ride. I just must say that I appreciate the work I have indulged in with respect to the other two House leaders and the whips and my own. It has been a bit trying at times, but I must say that I think we have dealt together as honestly as we possibly can and I think we will work well together in the future. I appreciate their co-operation and their goodwill towards myself and my government as we start out on this very new adventure for us on this side of the House.

Mr Speaker, may I, on behalf of all members at this point, commend you on your work in this place. It has also been a learning experience for you and we will all together work through it, but we do want to wish you and your family all the best during the holiday season.

Might I, on behalf of all the members and the Speaker as well, commend all the legislative staff who have put in many long hours over the last two weeks. We do appreciate it. As well I would join with the Chairman of Management Board in commending the service of all those good people who work on behalf of the government of Ontario.

Finally, very personally, might I wish all of my colleagues on all sides of the House a very merry and safe Christmas and all the best in 1991.

Hon Mrs Coppen: I just want the privilege, Mr Speaker, on behalf of our caucus, of extending the best of the holiday season and co-operation in 1991, and thank you very much for what you did this evening. It is much appreciated.

The House adjourned at 2036.