Journal des débats 1998-déc-09 | Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): The consequences of the bulldozer approach of the Conservative government of Mike Harris become more apparent every day in villages, towns and cities across Ontario. When opposition members and opponents of Bill 160 and the new funding formula predicted that one of the consequences would be the closing of neighbourhood schools, members of the Harris government dismissed these contentions as fear-mongering and exaggeration.

In the autumn of this year, when hundreds of schools appeared to be in danger of having their doors closed permanently, the Harris government did some rapid backfilling by announcing revised funding to put the fires out before the provincial election expected next spring. Boards across Ontario are well aware, however, that this funding was designed to make the issue of school closings go away for a year and could in the future be terminated and cause a crunch which would mean the closing of more schools.

Historic Merritton High School is in danger of being closed at the end of this school year as the District School Board of Niagara, like school boards across the province, struggles to deal with the underfunding from the provincial government. Merritton is typical of so many secondary schools in Ontario. They are an educational home for a neighbourhood and have long traditions in their community. Even St Catharines city council, which also opposed the Hotel Dieu Hospital closing, rallied to support Merritton, recognizing that it's a site of English-as-a-second-language classes and that historic Merritton needs and deserves a secondary school of this quality. It is also a community centre.

TEACHERS' PENSION LEGISLATION

Mr Bud Wildman (Algoma): I urge the Conservative government to sever part IX of Bill 81, the omnibus finance bill that is currently before the House, so that the desirability of the changes proposed and their possible ramifications can be analyzed properly.

Part IX of the bill amends the Teachers' Pension Act. The government and the Ontario Teachers' Federation are supposed to be partners in respect to this act and they have a partnership agreement, but the government drew up these amendments unilaterally and showed them to OTF officials only briefly before the bill was introduced by the government. The federation objected to the process immediately and asked the government not to proceed.

The federation has concerns about whether the wording of the bill won't have other, unintended consequences; for example, around the proper valuation of the plan's assets and liabilities. Their experts are trying to come up with suggestions that would be better than what is proposed, but so far they have not been able to come up with an amendment that may not have other problems.

That's why OTF is urging the government to sever this part of the bill so that the two sides can work together jointly to come up with the right language to ensure that the interests of the teachers and the provincial government are protected. They point out that there's no urgency in passing these amendments. The amendments deal with a situation that will only be of concern after the plan has -

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Statements.

UNIFIED FAMILY COURT

Mr Frank Klees (York-Mackenzie): This past Friday morning I had the pleasure of participating with the Attorney General in the announcement of the new Unified Family Court for York region. Also taking part were Chief Justice Patrick Lesage and York region Senior Justice David Logan. Both judges expressed appreciation to the Attorney General for his initiative in expanding the services of the Unified Family Court to York region residents.

Unified Family Court provides a single-window approach to family law matters by dealing with all aspects of family law in one court, which is more convenient, less confusing and less expensive for families.

The judges who run the Unified Family Court have special expertise in family law. This court is a better way of finding solutions to family disputes and helps lessen the emotional toll on children. It provides access to mediation services, as well as information sessions, which will help parents make informed decisions about resolving disputes in the best interests of their children. But more importantly, we are delivering these services to residents in the community in which they live, and it's not just York region.

On behalf of the residents of York region who will avail themselves of the family court's services, I thank the Attorney General for listening and responding to the needs of our communities.

Expansions of the unified family courts were also announced last Friday in 11 other locations, including Ottawa, Peterborough and St Catharines, and which should be available by the spring of 1999.

SERVICES FOR ABUSED WOMEN

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Fort William): Today in recognition of the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the representatives of a coalition of women's groups came to Queen's Park to raise their concerns with regard to the impact of the Harris government policies on women's human rights in Ontario.

They pointed out in detail the ways in which the Mike Harris government has attacked a series of services and programs which are essential to the autonomy and independence of women. It has reduced funding to shelters and second-stage housing, affecting prevention programs and support services for abused women. It has completely removed funding for certain groups dedicated to the defence of abused women's rights, such as OAITH, the Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Houses. It has reduced the social assistance payment by 21.6%, abolished the employment equity law, reduced access to legal aid in matters of family and immigration cases, rescinded rent control, made cuts to health services and social services, and attacked the right to unionize.

The coalition states uncategorically that the cumulative effect of these policies renders women more vulnerable to male violence. The coalition is concerned now that the survival of autonomous services developed by women for women, such as sexual assault centres and shelters, are themselves being threatened.

We share their concerns about the impact of the Mike Harris government cuts on women and about the future direction of this government. We particularly share these concerns at a moment in time when this government is unwilling to deal openly and fully with allegations of sexual harassment that have come right into the Legislative Assembly itself. The Harris government must start taking seriously the rights and safety of women.

POVERTY

Mr Tony Martin (Sault Ste Marie): Mr Speaker, I rise today to share with the House, yourself and others out there across Ontario my growing concern re the juxtaposition we're seeing with the various reports that are coming at us around the question of employment and poverty. On one hand, one week we hear that employment's up and unemployment's down, and during that we hear reports from various organizations that are doing statistical gathering as well.

The Centre for Social Justice put out a report saying that the gap between the rich and the poor is growing and that the poor are now poorer than ever before. The Catholic bishops of Canada have come out with a statement saying that the poverty rate is getting worse. We had a group going from Canada to the United Nations to plead a case of growing poverty, and the United Nations came back to us and told us that we have to clean up our act.

Yet we have governments saying that everything's fine, that unemployment is down and employment is going up. I'm sure people out there are becoming somewhat confused. I'm here to say to them today that they should trust their own instincts. They know, like I know, that the employment being created in Ontario and across Canada today is minimum wage, part-time employment.

The reason that fewer people are on unemployment insurance and on welfare is because the bar has been raised and the rules have been changed and they don't qualify any more. They are taking good jobs and they're breaking them up into two and three part-time jobs. That's what's happening across this province.

I'm saying to people that they should trust their own instinct on this. They should look around their neighbourhoods and their community and trust their own instinct on it. It is not good. It is -

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Statements.

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BOB BRATINA

Mr Trevor Pettit (Hamilton Mountain): Once again I rise to pay tribute to an outstanding citizen from my riding high atop Hamilton Mountain. That citizen is Bob Bratina.

Each year the Football Reporters of Canada induct members into their section of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame, which of course is located in Hamilton. This year at the Grey Cup in Winnipeg, the FRC inducted as one of its hall-of-famers long-time Hamilton and Toronto broadcaster Bob Bratina.

Bob has been covering Canadian football for over 30 years, beginning in 1967. He began doing play-by-play in 1981, and since then has been the voice of both the Tiger-Cats and the Argos. During the 1980s, Bob was one of Toronto's most popular radio hosts on CFRB, as he is today on Hamilton Hometown Radio AM 900 CHML.

Bob returned to Steeltown in 1989 and led the fight to keep the Tiger-Cats alive during the difficult period of the recession. Bob's induction into the Hall of Fame has been one of many honours he has received during his broadcasting career in several communities.

In Kitchener he received the police department citizenship award for creating a school safety program. In Toronto he was honoured by Governor General Jeanne Sauvé for his work with St John Ambulance. He has also been recognized by the citizenship court of judges, Canadian Save the Children and the Kiwanis Music Festival.

Bob Bratina is a proud Canadian and Hamiltonian, well known for his knowledge and promotion of Hamilton's history. This year, among his many activities, Bob is the honorary co-chair of the Hamilton-Wentworth United Way drive.

On behalf of all of Hamilton-Wentworth, I extend sincere congratulations to Football Reporters of Canada hall-of-famer Bob Bratina. I would ask all the members to join me in welcoming and congratulating Mr Bratina, who joins us in the members' gallery today.

BOARD OF INTERNAL ECONOMY DECISION

Mr Rick Bartolucci (Sudbury): Tomorrow night Mike Harris will be in Sudbury to attend a Tory fundraiser where he'll meet the few followers he has in Sudbury, many of whom feel they have to attend so Mike won't bully them when they ask him for money.

Outside there will be people protesting the Tory agenda, including those who have been truly hurt by the Common Sense Revolution. The scenario will be a familiar one, with Harris, as usual, being asked to account for his actions, but this time he will likely be faced with questions involving his actions surrounding the highly publicized Tory sex scandal. Will Mike throw away the fundraising script tomorrow night and explain to both supporters and protesters why he's in agreement with paying $600,000 in hush money in a bid to make this Tory sex scandal disappear?

It appears his usual bad judgment is backfiring on him again. This Tory sex scandal controversy is growing as a result of the payment because it is so questionable.

Why is he using taxpayers' money to protect his former Speaker in what is clearly a personal matter? Why is he going against all legal advice not to administer a payout? Why is he not supporting the Liberals' position that taxpayers' money should not be used now or ever as a payoff for a sex scandal?

The fact is that the Premier is willing to pay hush money and it begs the question, what are Mike Harris's views on sexual harassment and what message is he sending to Larry Beaton's grade 12 class about that?

VALIANT GROUP OF COMPANIES

Mr Wayne Lessard (Windsor-Riverside): Last evening I had the pleasure of attending the 40th anniversary celebrations of the Valiant group of companies in Windsor. From humble beginnings, Michael G. Solcz created what has become a world leader in mould making, machining, tooling and fabrication, which has 15 facilities in six countries.

For four decades the Valiant group of companies has been dedicated to quality and excellence in the service of its customers. They have been flexible and adaptable to the specific needs of those customers, no matter how challenging they may be, and they've also proven to be generous corporate citizens, sharing the benefits of their success and doing so much to improve the health, welfare and quality of life in our community.

A big part of their success is their keen sense in hiring motivated team players, treating them fairly and ensuring they enjoy what they do. They have recognized that happy employees are productive employees, and they've impressed upon those employees and their partners, associates and suppliers the importance of demonstrating confidence, leadership and innovation in everything they do. Those are qualities that will ensure that the Valiant Group of companies are well poised to continue the tradition of success they've enjoyed into the next millennium.

I was pleased to be there to congratulate the Valiant Group of companies on their success and wish them further success in the future.

CANADIAN NORMANDY PROJECT

Mr E.J. Douglas Rollins (Quinte): It is my pleasure to rise in the House today to speak on behalf of the members of the 14th Field Regiment, Royal Canadian Artillery (Children's Association).

These veterans of the D-Day landings at the battle of Normandy have conceived of a project that will, for the first time, inform thousands of people who visit Normandy and the invasion coast of the contribution Canada made on land, sea and air in liberating Europe. The Canadian Normandy Project, as it is called, will see the construction of an information centre at Bernières-sur-Mer, one of the first towns liberated by the Canadian troops on D-Day.

Visitors will see authentic newsreel footage and still photos, and hear audio recordings combined with colourful animated computer graphics. Artifacts such as war art, posters and uniforms will be loaned by the Canadian War Museum. Through the use of interactive computer terminals, visitors will have access to a wealth of information on the air war, the Battle of the Atlantic, the Italian campaign and other events.

I would like to encourage the people of Ontario to support this worthy project by calling 905-333-0233 with their donations. I would also like to thank Don Jamieson, a constituent of mine, for bringing this to my attention.

REPORTS BY COMMITTEES

STANDING COMMITTEE ON REGULATIONS AND PRIVATE BILLS

Mr Tony Martin (Sault Ste Marie): I beg leave to present a report from the standing committee on regulations and private bills and move its adoption.

Clerk at the Table (Ms Lisa Freedman): Your committee begs to report the following bill as amended:

Bill Pr25, An Act respecting the Ontario Association of Certified Engineering Technicians and Technologists.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Shall the report be received and adopted? Agreed.

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GENERAL GOVERNMENT

Mr John O'Toole (Durham East): I beg leave to present a report from the standing committee on general government on the Greater Toronto Services Board and move its adoption.

Clerk at the Table (Ms Lisa Freedman): Your committee begs to report the following bill as amended:

Bill 56, An Act to establish the Greater Toronto Services Board and the Greater Toronto Transit Authority and to amend the Toronto Area Transit Operating Authority Act / Projet de loi 56, Loi visant à créer la Commission des services du grand Toronto et la Régie des Transports en commun du grand Toronto et à modifier la Loi sur la Régie des transports en commun de la région de Toronto.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Shall the report be received and adopted? Agreed.

Pursuant to the order of the House dated December 2, 1998, the bill is ordered for third reading.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

SUPPLY ACT, 1998 / LOI DE CRÉDITS DE 1998

Mr Hodgson, on behalf of Mr Eves, moved first reading of the following bill:

Bill 96, An Act to authorize the payment of certain amounts for the Public Service for the fiscal year ending on March 31, 1999 / Projet de loi 96, Loi autorisant le paiement de certaines sommes destinées à la fonction publique pour l'exercice se terminant le 31 mars 1999.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

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ORAL QUESTIONS

BOARD OF INTERNAL ECONOMY DECISION

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): I have questions today for the Premier. It was my understanding he was going to be here.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): If he's expected to be here, do you want to stand it down? Are your first two questions to the Premier?

Mr McGuinty: Yes, they are.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: We are provided, as you may be aware, with a list of ministers who are going to be here each day. It is always our anticipation, when we have this list of who will be absent and who will be here, that in fact we're going to have the Premier or other ministers in the House.

The Speaker: So I'm assuming he'll be here.

Mr Bradley: The difficulty is when you get into a question period and you have your questions ready for various ministers, including the Premier, and they're not here.

The Speaker: I appreciate your predicament, but the fact is that they say he's going to be here. I'm quite confident he will be here.

Mr Bradley: Oh, he's here, they say. There he is.

The Speaker: OK, time for oral questions. Official opposition.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, I want to raise the issue of the settlement made yesterday directing that 600,000 taxpayer dollars be spent in connection with the Al McLean matter. I raised the issue yesterday with the Deputy Premier and with the minister responsible for women's issues. They told me effectively that they knew nothing about this, that it came as a complete surprise to both of them.

My question for you, Premier, is, did you or any member of your staff at any time in any way advise or influence the decision made by your three cabinet ministers to pay $600,000 to settle the Al McLean affair?

Hon Michael D. Harris (Premier): I think it's important in this matter that a few things be understood. We're dealing here with the Board of Internal Economy, which is separate from the government. I want to be very clear on a number of things. First of all, I have never discussed with any member of the Board of Internal Economy how he should vote on any of the motions that dealt with this matter. That's plain and simple.

What the opposition members seem to forget is that we have two individuals, an accuser and an accused, who have made a decision to put this matter behind them. I think it's very important that you understand that and you consider that, particularly in the case of Ms Thompson, in a matter as sensitive as this one. That's the best I can tell you.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, you didn't answer my question. You tell me that the Board of Internal Economy is a body that is separate and apart from you in the cabinet. Three cabinet ministers happen to sit on the Board of Internal Economy, people with whom you regularly meet and discuss issues.

You've got a bit of a track record on this front. In the past, you had no difficulty whatsoever lending direction to your members who sit on the Board of Internal Economy.

In a Toronto Sun article on May 28 you tell the Board of Internal Economy to shelve a particular proposal. One article says, "Premier Mike Harris is determined to block the plan." Another one says, "When Premier Mike Harris got wind of the hike, he put an end to it."

You appoint the board members. You've shown no reluctance in the past to give direction to those board members. How can you expect us to believe that in this particular case, given the amount of controversy that was predictable in connection with this particular matter, you had nothing whatsoever to do with this, neither you nor any single member of your staff?

Hon Mr Harris: I think the example you bring up dealt with an increase in housing allowances. I was asked by the media to express my viewpoint. This didn't involve a lawsuit, it didn't involve wrongful dismissal, it didn't involve lawyers involved on all sides; it involved giving my opinion. I reported that the opinion of our caucus was that we would not be in favour. It turns out that the Board of Internal Economy representatives agreed with that.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, nobody believes that yesterday, when 600,000 hard-earned taxpayer dollars went out the door, you had nothing whatsoever to do with that. Nobody buys that. Your office controls everything. You know that, the members of your cabinet know that and every single backbencher understands that. There is no way that 600 grand went out the door and neither you nor any member of your staff had any influence over this decision. The buck stops with you. Stand up now and admit that not only do you condone this decision but in fact you authorized it, either directly or through your staff.

Hon Mr Harris: I think it's correct to say that I and my office, if you wish, appoint the members on behalf of our party to the Board of Internal Economy. We do so with a great deal of care. We appoint members whom we ask to hear all the facts, to go through the arguments as they are presented. This individual case, I think you would agree with me, given the size of the legal bills, which we're all a little disturbed about and wanted to stop the rise in, is quite a complicated matter.

We have confidence in the individuals from our caucus and cabinet who sit on the Board of Internal Economy. I have been briefed as to what they could brief us on, given the confidentiality arrangements, which obviously not everybody has respected throughout this process in dealing with personnel matters and with lawsuits, given those limitations.

The Speaker: Answer.

Hon Mr Harris: I have said that given the facts, in the interests of the taxpayer and quite frankly in the interests of the two individuals, they believed they made the right -

The Speaker: Thank you. New question, official opposition. Leader of the official opposition.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, let's go over the facts here, which in essence are really quite simple. One of your members, a Conservative MPP, is sued for sexual harassment. This agreement provides that nobody is going to pay anything except for Ontario taxpayers, who had nothing whatsoever to do with this case.

Furthermore, those taxpayers represented by the Legislative Assembly had a lawyer. In fact, as I understand it, there were three separate law firms that advised in this matter and they all provided the same advice: that taxpayers could not be found to be responsible, should not be found to be responsible and therefore should not enter into this agreement. Please tell Ontario taxpayers why it is in their interests to spend $600,000 of their hard-earned money against the advice of the lawyers representing them.

Hon Mr Harris: You'll have to ask the individual members how they arrived at their assessment. All I can tell you is the information that's been provided to me.

First of all, the member in question was not a member of my caucus when the allegation was made. He was Speaker of the Legislature representing all of you and the Legislative Assembly. Had he been a member of my caucus, there would have been a procedure in place to deal with this. Regrettably, and it couldn't be talked about before, the members tell me, because of potential liability on the Legislative Assembly, there was no procedure in place to deal with it. It's something that our members on the board have said, now that this matter is settled, we'd better get on with making sure the Legislative Assembly has those kind of procedures in place. Had he been a member of my caucus, those procedures would have been in place.

Second, the members, it has been reported to me, indicate they have seen one legal written opinion, one opinion that was put into writing, the one they sought. There have been no other written opinions given to them.

Mr McGuinty: I think the most important opinion in all of this, Premier, is going to be the opinion held by Ontario voters.

I've got an interesting quote today made by Frank Sheehan, one of your members, the member for Lincoln. He says in today's St Catharines Standard:

"We have a responsibility to the taxpayers to protect their interests and I don't think they are being served with this decision. I have called upon my colleagues to reverse their decision."

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Premier, this man, together with Ontario taxpayers, has got it right. Why don't you stand up and tell us that you are going to distance yourself from this decision, that you reject it, that you won't accept it and that you're calling upon your members to reverse it?

Hon Mr Harris: Quite frankly, neither I nor any other member of this caucus, in fact until the settlement, has been given a lot of the facts and the details, including the fact that there's only one legal written opinion, that sought by our members, and including the fact that there was no policy in place with the Board of Internal Economy. We were not able to get some of those facts because this was a matter that these members are entrusted to keep in confidence while they deal with these very sensitive issues.

As I have been briefed by the members and have been given the facts, as they have been presented to me, it seems to me, given the massive legal bills that have been allowed to build up - the only other bill that I see is for, it looks to me, equivalent wages from the time the wrongful dismissal complaint was laid until a settlement - it was time to stop the bleeding in escalating legal fees and time to do what Ms Thompson had requested be done and settle the matter. I think our members, given all the facts, have put the interests both of Ms Thompson, of Mr McLean -

The Speaker: Final supplementary.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, I rely on the advice of the lawyers representing the Legislative Assembly and there-fore the taxpayers of Ontario. Those lawyers specifically said that the Legislative Assembly could not and would not be found responsible for costs or legal damages in this particular matter. Notwithstanding that advice, you proceeded to authorize a decision to send 600,000 hard-earned taxpayer dollars out the door.

We have members of your own backbench now speaking out against this decision. We have the Speaker of this Legislative Assembly, the man who is entrusted with looking after the interests of this Legislature, speaking out against this decision.

Premier, how can you stand -

The Speaker: Leader of the official opposition, my position in this has been clear. I would ask that it not be brought into the Legislature.

Mr McGuinty: There is virtual unanimity that this decision is wrong. It is a misuse of taxpayer dollars. How can you, the guardian of Ontario taxpayers and their money, stand there and tell us that this is an appropriate use of their money?

Hon Mr Harris: All I can do is relay to you the opinions of members on the committee that, given a settlement that they felt could have been achieved a year ago for half this - now it's double this and a year from now it might be four times this - and given something the opposition seems to forget, that there are two individuals here whom you are quick to run roughshod over, particularly the rights and the wishes of Ms Thompson, our committee members have indicated to me that they put her consideration, the accused's consideration, first. Second they put the taxpayers of Ontario, and on both counts they feel they made the right decision.

The Speaker: New question, leader of the third party.

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): I have a very simple question for the Premier, and it is this: It is your position, Premier, that you believe it is appropriate for the taxpayers of Ontario to pay $600,000 to rescue a member of your Conservative caucus from a sexual harassment scandal. Do you believe that, Premier?

Hon Mr Harris: I'm sorry, I didn't quite hear the question.

Mr Hampton: We'll try again. It's your position, it's your belief that it is appropriate for the taxpayers of Ontario to pay $600,000 of their money to rescue a member of your Conservative caucus from a sexual harassment scandal. Is that your position?

Hon Mr Harris: No, my position is the support of four members who felt, given the rapid escalation of legal fees, that the taxpayers were well served settling this issue now. Second, my position is in support of the members who actually took into account the rights and the wishes of the accused and the accuser in this case of wrongful dismissal.

Mr Hampton: We have no doubt you're looking after Mr McLean. That's what this is all about. As for your worry about escalating lawyers' costs, it was your members on the Board of Internal Economy who kept shopping for lawyers, hoping you'd get some advice that you wanted. But all of the law firms you shopped for came before the Board of Internal Economy and gave the same advice: That none of this dispute was the business of the Legislature; that this was strictly a private matter between two individuals - your member, Mr Al McLean, and Ms Thompson; that it had nothing legally to do with the Legislature; and that even if there were an appeal of the case, there was little probability that the Legislature could be found responsible for Mr McLean's actions. The legal advice that was consistently before the Board of Internal Economy over and over again was that this was a legal matter between a member of your caucus and the complainant.

The Speaker: Question.

Mr Hampton: There was no possibility or a very slight possibility of greater liability. I ask you again, is it your position that the taxpayers should pick up this expense for one of your members?

Hon Mr Harris: My position is to support the members who actually saw one written legal opinion that said the Legislative Assembly could face substantially higher costs. That was the only opinion that any lawyer had put in writing to give to any of our committee members at any time, and the only one they had. I do know there were several hundred thousand dollars of lawyers' fees on behalf of Ms Thompson, on behalf of Mr McLean and on behalf of the Legislative Assembly that seemed to have doubled over the last year and might very well have doubled over the next year.

Our members took a position in the interests of Ms Thompson, in the interests certainly of Mr McLean, in the interests of two people who said, "There is a dispute here and we wish to resolve it"; two members who asked that that be done, two members who also asked that legal fees be paid for that had been compiling over the two years that this matter had not been dealt with, many would say not very promptly.

The Speaker: Final supplementary.

Mrs Marion Boyd (London Centre): Premier, you're full of pretense here. Let's not have any more baloney. This is strictly a political settlement that you're making with the Conservative Party to try and rescue Mr McLean. It's the good old boys in the Conservative caucus coming to the rescue of a grand old boy with public funds. And let's be very clear, it has nothing to do with limiting public costs; it has to do with stopping the bleeding that's happening, because this is a candidate for you who wants to run in the next election. It has nothing to do with sexual harassment. And we are fed up with your pretense that you care about the concerns of Ms Sandi Thompson. There's been no evidence of that all along the line - none at all.

For you to try and claim that this is some kind of altruistic action when it is simply a political move to hush up this scandal is disgraceful. How can you stand there and tell the people of Ontario that this is anything except a political hush mechanism?

Hon Mr Harris: There are two political parties that are playing politics with this issue. There are two political parties that have forgotten something: They have forgotten the rights particularly of Ms Thompson. I am astounded quite frankly that your party - I'm not so surprised at the Liberal Party; I am surprised at your party - has forgotten the rights and the wishes of Ms Thompson. You've also completely ignored the rights of anybody who has been accused. You do that from time to time. That doesn't surprise me quite as much.

Mrs Boyd: You should let him exonerate himself in court.

The Speaker: Member for London Centre, come to order.

Hon Mr Harris: This matter as well, as you know, is still sitting in the files and is before the Human Rights Commission. Before you prejudge everybody, you might want to bear that in mind. I know with your legal background, you are very careful how you word things, as opposed to other members of the Legislative Assembly.

I would say this to you: The members of the committee felt they were protecting the rights and the wishes and the interests of two people who wished to resolve a conflict, and indeed of the taxpayers. They believe they accomplished both and we have to support that.

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The Speaker: New question, leader of the third party.

Mr Hampton: Premier, since you are so intent on defending Mr McLean and defending your government members on the Board of Internal Economy, I wonder what it was that possessed your members to come to the Board of Internal Economy meeting on December 2 and advocate for a settlement that only Mr McLean's lawyer had requested. What you're putting forward here, what you're asking taxpayers across this province to swallow, is not what Ms Thompson's lawyer came and asked for, it's what Mr McLean's lawyer came and asked for. What your members of the Board of Internal Economy are trying to get the taxpayers of Ontario to swallow, $600,000 worth, is almost identical to what was requested by Mr McLean's lawyer. Can you tell us what's in your mind when you simply accede to everything that Mr McLean's lawyer is requesting?

Hon Mr Harris: I know none of those details and I don't know how you know.

Mr Hampton: Premier, despite your efforts to put a lid on this, despite your government's efforts to say, "We see nothing, we know nothing, we hear nothing and we don't want to ask any questions," the fact of the matter is this is going to get out, it's going to become public, so you might as well answer the questions here. Do it up front.

Here's the problem you've got, Premier: On December 2 your members go to the Board of Internal Economy and put forward a motion to have the taxpayers of Ontario swallow $600,000 to settle a private sexual harassment scandal for one of your caucus members. There's absolutely no evidence why the taxpayers of Ontario should bestow $600,000 on Mr McLean to get him out of a sexual harassment scandal. Can you tell us what is the evidence?

Hon Mr Harris: No, I'm not aware of the evidence. You seem to be aware of more than I am aware. I don't know if you sit on the Board of Internal Economy. I know I don't. I don't even keep track of who your members are. I know the members are charged with trying to assess the facts as they see them. I can only tell you what I have been told. I'm at a disadvantage because our members can't answer in the Legislature, because none of this is a matter of government or of government business or of government policy; it's the Legislative Assembly.

Our members have certainly been quite willing to be forthcoming within the parameters of the law. Clearly they would not have wanted to talk about the absence of policy within the Legislative Assembly as that would have increased the liability of the Legislative Assembly, certainly in the legal opinion. But that is now a matter of public record and a matter of very public importance.

To the best of my knowledge, out of all this, Mr McLean will have had not one cent of any money and obviously is no longer Speaker of the Legislature.

Mr Hampton: Speaker, on a point of order: I am going to take the Premier up on his offer. I'm asking unanimous consent so that the Minister of Transportation, the minister responsible for Management Board and the government House leader can now answer questions regarding this $600,000 taxpayer settlement for Mr McLean and we can get to the facts of this once and for all.

The Speaker: Agreed? No. I heard a no.

Hon Mr Harris: If that was the question, I -

The Speaker: Final supplementary.

Mr Hampton: Premier, this is what is confusing about your position. You say you don't know any of the facts when I ask you why your members came to the Board of Internal Economy on December 2 and put before the board exactly what Mr McLean's lawyer was asking for - not what Ms Thompson's lawyer was asking for; exactly what Mr McLean's lawyer was acting for. You say you don't know, yet you say that it's entirely appropriate for the taxpayers of this province to pay $600,000 to settle Mr McLean's sexual harassment scandal. I didn't think it was the job of taxpayers to go around getting your caucus members out of their scrapes and jams. That's not the job of taxpayers in this province.

Premier, why do your members of the Board of Internal Economy and why do you think it's appropriate for taxpayers to pick up $600,000 in costs for Mr McLean when you haven't presented any evidence here? Why do you think that's appropriate?

Hon Mr Harris: The evidence, as presented before the Board of Internal Economy and as our members understand it, is that this settlement pays legal fees that were rapidly escalating with every day that went by. I put forward that what you don't seem to want to talk about is that there was an accuser and there was an accused. We are talking about a wrongful dismissal allegation.

Other than a whole whack of lawyers talking over the last two years, there has been very little progress made on that. An assessment had to be made on those lawyers' bills: Would they go higher, since they've doubled over the last year? Our members made an assessment that they likely would. Since the parties wished to resolve this - and if the Human Rights Commission wishes to proceed on the other allegations, then of course they can - this was in the interests certainly of Ms Thompson and of the accused.

The Speaker: New question, official opposition.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, you don't seem to understand that although the plaintiff has certain rights and Mr McLean has certain rights in this matter, so do Ontario taxpayers. You can protect the rights of Ontario taxpayers, you know, without doing so at the expense of the rights of the plaintiff or Mr McLean. That's what you failed to do in these circumstances.

Our lawyers, the lawyers acting for the Legislative Assembly, the lawyers therefore acting for Ontario taxpayers, said that we could not be found responsible, we should not be found responsible, and that it would be a mistake to make payment. Why is it that all of a sudden you have forgotten that you are the guardian of the rights of Ontario taxpayers? Why in these circumstances did you say, contrary to the advice of our lawyers, that you were going to make this payment?

Hon Mr Harris: It's quite clear that I didn't say any of that. I have supported those members who sat on the Board of Internal Economy who determined that lots of lawyers were getting rich with their legal opinions; the one written one they had indicated that the Legislative Assembly indeed could very well be liable and of course the Legislative Assembly was being sued and of course the Legislative Assembly, over two years, with $200,000 worth of legal advice, was not able to get that resolved.

Rather than the taxpayers having to pay more tomorrow or next month or next year, we don't particularly see that not carrying out the wishes of Ms Thompson and Mr McLean to resolve this was in the interests both of them and the taxpayer. That was the opinion of our members. Since I wasn't there, I accept their account of that and I accept their decision on that.

Mr McGuinty: The issue is not the size of the legal bills; the issue is who is responsible for the legal bills. The lawyers acting for us, and therefore for the taxpayers of Ontario, said that those bills, those damages, were not our responsibility. Notwithstanding that advice, that counsel, you decided to spend 600,000 taxpayer dollars to settle this matter.

I have a question for you on behalf of Ontario taxpayers. Why did you give away their money when our lawyer told us you should not do that?

Hon Mr Harris: There have been your lawyers, whom you quote. I don't know; I wasn't there listening to them. Certainly Ms Thompson's lawyer disagreed. Mr McLean's lawyer disagreed. The legal opinion our members received disagreed. I think lawyers like to disagree. As long as parties will keep paying them to disagree, they all make a lot of money. That certainly has been my experience. You, as a lawyer, might object to my saying that. That's certainly the case with dozens of cases in Ottawa where legal expenses have been paid on both sides. This is not a new, unusual circumstance, as you suggest.

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Our members believe, and quite frankly their record over the last 15 years - if you look at your members and the NDP members and our members, their record of protecting taxpayers is one heck of a lot better than yours or the NDP members', and that's a decision they made.

The Speaker: New question, third party.

Mr Hampton: Premier, you've got a bit of a problem and your members on the Board of Internal Economy have a bit of a problem. You say they're relying on written legal advice. I take it it's from Russell D. Laishley. What doesn't hang together here is that your members came to the Board of Internal Economy on December 2 advocating that taxpayers pay $600,000 to help Mr McLean out of his sexual harassment suit, but the legal opinion didn't come from Mr Laishley until December 3. Could you tell me, Premier, how can you and your government and your cabinet ministers, who want the taxpayers to fork over $600,000 to help out poor old Al McLean, rely on a legal opinion that you didn't even have and that in fact didn't arrive until December 3?

Hon Mr Harris: My members say that the facts that you're using are incorrect and I have to rely on them.

Mr Bruce Crozier (Essex South): Why don't you let the minister get -

The Speaker: Order. Come to order, member for Essex South.

Mr Hampton: Premier, you say you want to rely on this legal opinion. The parade of lawyers that your members brought before the Board of Internal Economy - I understand three law firms - all said the thing: that this is strictly a private dispute. In other words, it's Mr McLean's matter. It's not the government's matter, it's not the taxpayers' matter; it's Mr McLean's matter. It is strictly a case between two individuals.

Then you get this letter from Mr Laishley and you want to depend on it, except Mr Laishley says in his opinion, "Please accept the above comments as my general expression, and I reiterate my earlier caution that I advance the comments without any review or assessment of the actual merits of either the Thompson or the McLean claims." He says, "I know nothing about this case, but if you want to fork over $600,000 of taxpayers' money to help out old Al McLean, you go ahead and do it." Is that your case, Premier? Is that your evidence?

Hon Mr Harris: You forget a number of things. You forget we're dealing with the rights and the wishes of the accused and Ms Thompson. You forget we are dealing with the rights and the wishes of -

Interjections.

Mr Tony Silipo (Dovercourt): The legal opinion did not substantiate your position.

The Speaker: Hold on, Premier. Member for Cochrane North, come to order, please, and Dovercourt.

Minister.

Hon Mr Harris: Then you seem to make an allegation that this was a private matter. The Legislative Assembly, as I understand, and the lawyers tried to make that case, tried to remove themselves from the court case and were unsuccessful. If there were no charges, if there were no allegations against the Legislative Assembly, if it wasn't a matter, then the members of the Legislative Assembly committee would not have been considering it, but there were.

There were liabilities that were building up, legal bills that were building up: up to $200,000 now on behalf of lawyers who have not given any written opinion yet for the Legislative Assembly; legal bills on behalf of the former Speaker, who in his capacity as employer was being sued for wrongful dismissal - legal expenses that were being built up, and I am astounded that you think it's good politics to allow Ms Thompson after two years, when she wanted to get a matter resolved -

VISITOR

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Thank you. Stop the clock for a minute. I want to take this opportunity to introduce in the members' west gallery Mr Ed Philip, the member for Etobicoke-Rexdale in the 32nd, 33rd, 34th and 35th Parliaments. Welcome.

EDUCATION FUNDING

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel): I have a question for the Minister of Education. I represent the town of Caledon in this place, which is the geographic north half of the region of Peel and is rural in nature.

This past November 24, the Peel District School Board decreed that the parents of elementary school children will have to pay a fee to cover the costs of lunchroom attendants; in other words, the cost of the supervision of children in the lunchroom. Caledon, as I say, is generally a rural area. The majority of the children are bused to and from school and are unable to leave the school property for lunch.

The decision by the Peel board of education is essentially double taxation on my constituents. I would like to ask the minister, how much money does the Peel board of education have available for lunchroom supervision?

Hon David Johnson (Minister of Education and Training): I thank the member for Dufferin-Peel. It is disappointing that the Peel board would head in this direction. I would urge them not to charge for lunchroom supervision. I would concur that many of the taxpayers of Peel would think that they already pay high taxes.

In response to the question, I would say that the Peel board will be receiving about $623 million for operating purposes this year, which is $4 million over and above what they received last year. Including all capital purposes, the board will actually be receiving about $684 million, which is about a $15-million increase from 1997. Those figures do not include $7 million over and above that for one-time purposes. Contained within those monies is an allotment of about $13 million for paraprofessionals, which could be used for lunchroom supervision. That's where the Peel board should be -

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Supplementary.

Mr Tilson: I know when our government changed the education funding formula, one of the reasons was to ensure that every student across Ontario received the same amount of money towards their education. Clearly, this move by the Peel District School Board has unfairly taxed those families that must bus their children to school, as they do in my riding, or are working during the day and expect the school to look after the children for the entire day.

What's next, Minister? Is the Peel board of education going to charge parents for a playground or for school crossing guards or for reading a book in the library? What can you suggest to the Peel district board so that they don't need to take this totally unacceptable position?

Hon David Johnson: I'm not sure what's next, but the Education Act does not authorize school boards to charge parents for supplies or services that are necessary for a student to successfully complete the requirements of a course of study. I would have to interpret that, and ministry staff have interpreted that, in terms of charging simply for lunchroom supervision, it is not authorized within the Education Act. Perhaps some of the other services that the member for Dufferin-Peel is concerned about would not be authorized either.

I will say that across the province we've polled school boards, and of school boards that are receiving exactly the same funding under the same funding formula, none of them charge for lunchroom supervision. Some of them even have enhanced activities during the lunch period and most of them, the majority, do not charge for these extra services.

I would suggest that the Peel board follow the route of the other boards: use the funds that are available through the funding formula or use other administrative funds provided by the province of Ontario.

BOARD OF INTERNAL ECONOMY DECISION

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): Premier, I'm just wondering, do you personally approve of the settlement? You've told us that you thought your members on the Board of Internal Economy reacted appropriately, but I'm just wondering, do you personally approve of the use of 600,000 taxpayer dollars to settle this matter when the lawyer acting for the Legislative Assembly, as you now know, said this was not a good deal for taxpayers?

Hon Michael D. Harris (Premier): I think it's important to understand how the Board of Internal Economy works. Let me tell you that the board has made many decisions that I have not personally approved of. I recall when the Board of Internal Economy bailed out your caucus with $300,000 overspending and authorized that expenditure in the next fiscal year. I did not approve of that. The board did. I accepted that. It is their role to make a judgment with all the facts before them as to what will best protect the taxpayers and what will see justice served. I accept that they are the ones who have been involved with this for a number of years and I accept the Board of Internal Economy decision, just as I accepted it when they gave you 300 grand because you overspent and couldn't control your money.

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Mr McGuinty: Hang on a second, Premier. You're the taxpayer guy. You ran on that ticket. You look after the interests of Ontario taxpayers. Today Ontario taxpayers have a very simple question: Do you approve of this deal? Do you personally approve of this expenditure? Do you think it was the right thing to do, to take 600,000 taxpayer dollars and spend it on this settlement, contrary to the advice of the lawyers representing the Legislative Assembly? Do you personally approve of this?

Hon Mr Harris: Personally, as head of the government, I have to make sure that we approve of the $1.5 billion in new health care spending, that we are supportive and approve of new money into education and new money into child care, the highest money ever for child care and pay equity in this province.

I, as you know, as Premier and as head of this government, do not have a voice or a role at the Board of Internal Economy. I appoint people to make the best assessment and the best decisions they can, and I have to rely on those who were there that in fact taxpayers have been protected by cutting the losses: $200,000 of legal bills for the Legislative Assembly alone that were going to have to be paid and it hadn't even got to discovery yet, as I understand. Had it been allowed to continue, it was on track perhaps to go to $1 million worth of bills just for the lawyers for the Legislative Assembly. So I accept -

The Speaker: New question, third party. Leader of the third party.

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): Premier, the point you're trying to miss is that three separate lawyers came to the Board of Internal Economy and said: "Look, this is a private matter between Mr McLean and Ms Thompson. The Legislative Assembly has no liability here. You don't have to be involved in this."

Premier, are you trying to tell us that it is a good deal for the people of Ontario, even where we don't have any legal responsibility, where three separate lawyers have come forward and said it's a private matter? You're trying to tell taxpayers that it's a good deal for them to pay $600,000 for something they're not responsible for? Is that your position?

Hon Mr Harris: Your position is that the Legislative Assembly wasn't involved, even though they were being sued, even though they tried to get out of the suit, and even though they couldn't get out of the suit, and even though they weren't involved, and even though they were paying $200,000 worth of legal bills. So your position and your premise from which you asked the question not only do not take into account Ms Thompson, not only do not take into account the lack of policy for sexual harassment, not only do not take into account the delays of what was happening, but they're not based on fact.

Mr Hampton: Premier, here's the situation. Your members of the Board of Internal Economy won't come here and answer questions to defend themselves. They refuse to do that. They went to the Board of Internal Economy with essentially the position that everyone should accede to Mr McLean's lawyer - not to Ms Thompson's lawyer but to Mr McLean's lawyer.

When they try to support their position, they bring forward a legal opinion after the fact, which legal opinion says, "I reiterate my earlier caution that I advance the comments without any review or assessment of the actual merits of either Thompson or McLean."

There is no evidence here on the face of the record that says the taxpayers of Ontario should cough up $600,000 to pay for Allan McLean's sexual harassment case. There's no evidence. Premier, what's your evidence? Why do you think taxpayers should pay over half a million dollars to help your good friend Al McLean?

Hon Mr Harris: I think the members served what they felt were the best interests of Ms Thompson and Mr McLean, who wanted to resolve the dispute, and the taxpayers of Ontario. The evidence is that when they did wish to settle a year ago, it was half that. The legal bills have doubled in that year. As it's been relayed to me, if there was no responsibility of the Legislative Assembly, why did they run up $200,000 worth of legal bills and they hadn't even started? I think the facts are obvious. Unfortunately, because of whatever reason, in the case of lawsuits the taxpayers were on the hook for a fair bit of money; not as much as they might have been next year, but a fair bit of money. Perhaps having a proper policy in place to deal with sexual harassment will avoid that in the future, and that's what our members are pushing for.

WOMEN'S HEALTH COUNCIL

Mrs Barbara Fisher (Bruce): My question today is to the Minister of Health. One of the areas of extreme interest to myself and others here is that of women's health issues. As the population ages, women's health issues become more prominent, and I feel it is important for this government to take a proactive role in identifying and moving forward on women's health issues. Could the minister please tell the House what the government has done to prioritize women's health issues.

Hon Elizabeth Witmer (Minister of Health): Our government has certainly indicated that we want to strengthen women's health in Ontario. We have recognized that this is a priority for our government. We have recognized that women do have unique and distinctive needs.

Yesterday I was very pleased, along with my colleague Dianne Cunningham, to officially announce the chair and the members of the new Women's Health Council which our government has established to advise me, as Minister of Health, and our government on issues related to education when it comes to women's health, treatments and doing everything we can to ensure that the services and the accessibility to health are there for all women in this province, no matter where they live.

Mrs Fisher: Thank you, Minister, for taking that proactive role in establishing the council.

I understand, as you said, that the announcement was made yesterday with the minister responsible for women's issues. Could you please identify how the council was formed with regard to input interests on that council, as well as the details of that announcement and what in fact the council's mandate will be over the course of the next few months.

Hon Mrs Witmer: Ms Cunningham and I were very pleased to announce yesterday that Jane Pepino, a long-time advocate of women's health in this province, is the new chair of the Women's Health Council. I was also very pleased to announce that there would be 14 men and women from throughout the province who would be working with Jane on the council. We have selected individuals with backgrounds in academics, health and business. We have identified people from different walks of life, different ages, different cultures. We want to ensure that to the greatest degree possible the council represents all women in this province.

They will be advising us, as I said before, on issues related to treatment, research, education. They will be taking a look at issues such as violence against women, cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, eating disorders. We are prepared to provide them with $10 million in order that we can improve and strengthen women's health in Ontario.

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BOARD OF INTERNAL ECONOMY DECISION

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): Premier, I'm wondering why it is you are so reluctant to offer your personal opinion with respect to the Al McLean matter. Frank Sheehan had no reluctance to speak out. He said he thought it was a bad deal. Yesterday, Toni Skarica on open-line radio said he didn't support taxpayers paying this money. If two of your backbenchers have the guts to speak out honestly on this issue, why is it that the Premier, the champion of taxpayer rights in Ontario, is incapable of standing up in this Legislature right now and denouncing this settlement?

Hon Michael D. Harris (Premier): Certainly neither one of those members sat on the Board of Internal Economy and neither one of them would know all the facts that were before the members who were on the Board of Internal Economy. Nor do I.

I accept the advice I have been given and I ask you to go back to what's really at stake here. You have an accused and an accuser who wish to settle these differences. They dealt with a matter of employment and wrongful dismissal against the member serving in the capacity of Speaker of the House. Given the record of what was occurring with legal bills, it is hard really to look at the legal costs as they've escalated over the last two years and not agree with our members' opinion that they were likely to go substantially higher in the future.

Mr McGuinty: Premier, the matter is very, very clear. There is only one issue: Should the taxpayers of Ontario be found to be responsible for the damages and legal costs in this matter? Everybody in the province understands that if our lawyer, the lawyer acting for the Legislative Assembly, tells us that we will not be found to be liable, we will not be found to be responsible, then we should not be making that payment.

I'm coming back to you once again, the champion of Ontario taxpayers. Stand up and tell us why it is that you insisted on proceeding with this payment contrary to the advice of the lawyers acting for the Legislative Assembly when you knew that taxpayers would not be found to be responsible.

Hon Mr Harris: I understand you quoting legal opinions even though you weren't there. There are no written legal opinions for the $200,000. But these are the same lawyers who went to court four months ago arguing parliamentary privilege and lost the motion. Not only did they have to pay the legal fees for the Board of Internal Economy, because they were found to be able to be sued in this case, they had to pay the legal fees of all the parties involved as well.

Our members made an assessment on the basis of what was occurring and the legal bills escalating and the fact that two individuals involved wished to put this matter behind them, and I think that's an important factor as well. They looked at the only written legal opinion they had and made a decision they believed to be in the best interests of Ms Thompson, of Mr McLean and indeed of the Legislative Assembly, and through them of course of the taxpayers of Ontario.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): New question, leader of the third party.

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): Premier, in these kinds of matters they usually go to discovery so that under oath there is the possibility of determining some of the facts. In any case it would be so incredibly unusual for private parties to settle something before it went to discovery. It is even more unbelievably unusual that the Legislative Assembly, which legal counsel said is not in any way implicated in this, would pay $600,000 to have this dealt with before it even went to discovery. Premier, what is it that you're so afraid of?

Interjections.

The Speaker: Stop the clock. Attorney General, come to order.

Mr Hampton: What is it that you didn't want to come out in the examination for discovery? What is it that you didn't want the public of Ontario to find out that you're in such a hurry you'll spend $600,000 of taxpayers' money to keep it hushed up?

Hon Mr Harris: I'm certainly not in a hurry, nor were our members on the Board of Internal Economy in a hurry. They did see, after over two years, legal bills mounting and escalating, and they felt quite easily going over the $1-million mark very quickly. They saw two people who wished to resolve a dispute. They saw an opportunity to limit this rise in legal bills. They saw a Legislative Assembly that ought to cut its losses now because they were mounting and escalating, and I guess for their effort, they saw two partisan political parties that forgot the right of Ms Thompson and of Mr McLean -

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order. Premier.

Hon Mr Harris: No, I'm finished.

Mr Hampton: Premier, the problems you've got here are, first of all, the lawyers for the Legislative Assembly say, "Look, the Legislative Assembly isn't liable for any of this." It's a basic fact, Premier. Your members of the Board of Internal Economy paraded a number of lawyers before the Board of Internal Economy. They gave the same answer: The Legislative Assembly is not responsible for any of these costs. Al McLean will be.

What it boils down to is this: Despite the best legal advice, you believe it is acceptable to spend $600,000 of taxpayers' money to rescue your friend Al McLean from his sexual harassment suit. Even the lawyer you cite says he can't vouch in any way for Mr McLean's case.

Premier, what is it that you're afraid of? What is it that you don't want to come out in the public? Why is it that you don't want to even have Mr McLean examined under oath?

Hon Mr Harris: I think you realize this matter still rests before the Human Rights Commission on the sexual harassment side - at least I thought the member understood that. Given the things he's talked about legally here today, I'm not sure he understands much of the law. You keep quoting a lawyer for the Legislative Assembly who says there was no liability. This was a lawyer who advised to go to court, who lost in court, who cost $35,000, who had to pay all of the legal expenses of all the lawyers involved, and the court said yes, the Legislative Assembly, through the Board of Internal Economy, has to deal with this. So you've stated not one thing that's been factual today in any of your questions, which is about par for the course.

HOME CARE

Mr John L. Parker (York East): My question is for the Minister of Long-Term Care. I read in yesterday's paper an article that says the Prime Minister is musing about a national home care program. I know that while the Prime Minister is just now beginning to talk about it, Mike Harris and the minister have been quietly building the best home care services in the country. Mike Harris has been leading the other premiers of this country by demanding that the federal government put the money back into health care that they took out in the first place.

Given the fact that home care is not included in the Canada Health Act, I'd like to ask the minister how a national program would affect Ontario's home care program, which is already the best in the country.

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The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Stop the clock. I want to take this opportunity to invite all members to welcome to our chamber a special visitor who is seated at the table, Mrs Denise Weeks, who is clerk of the North Carolina House of Representatives state legislature. Welcome.

Minister.

Hon Cameron Jackson (Minister of Long-Term Care, minister responsible for seniors): Could I get the honourable member to repeat his question?

The Speaker: No.

Hon Mr Jackson: No, OK. I want to thank the member for his question and, first of all, I'd like to share with the House that I think all Canadians were a little bit concerned at the cuts to health care undertaken by the federal Liberal government. But more important -

Interjections.

Hon Mr Jackson: The member for St Catharines prefers to say they weren't enough, and that would be completely incorrect, as it is indicated on the record that the member opposite -

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Point of order, Speaker: No member of this House is allowed to mislead this House. Is that not correct? I ask this question of you.

The Speaker: Member for St Catharines, I see that as an inference and I would ask you to withdraw. If you want to correct the record, that's fine. You don't need to do that. Withdraw the comment.

Mr Bradley: I will withdraw the comment and say the member knows full well that I did not say that.

Hon Mr Jackson: Mr Speaker, I would ask you to check the interjections from the Hansard table. He clearly indicated that -

The Speaker: You know what? I heard him. He didn't say that. Why don't we just move on.

Hon Mr Jackson: The federal government two years ago announced that it was going to dip its big toe into this whole area called a national home care program. The concern that Ontarians have with the federal government's discussions is simply that all across Canada levels for home care are far below those that are currently here in Ontario. In fact, we're funding at the highest rates in all of Canada. The fact is that every province conducts a means test, an asset test or an income test, therefore home care is not a universal program in this country. It is in Ontario and Manitoba. They're the only two provinces that provide it as a universal benefit. Since home care is outside the Canada Health Act, it's clear that the federal government is going to bring in a co-paying system for home care in this country, and that is not acceptable to the province of Ontario.

The Speaker: Supplementary.

Mr Parker: I'm not sure that all Ontarians are aware that we have in this province the best access to home care services in the entire country. I know that in Toronto in the last three years alone, under Mike Harris's leadership, we have increased funding to Toronto community care access centres by over 55%, to over $190 million this year.

What I'm concerned about, though, Minister, is that when we know that Ontarians are already getting shortchanged by the federal government on employment insurance payments - $415 per month compared to $500 in the Maritimes and $600 in Quebec - are we going to get shortchanged from the federal government on home care also?

Hon Mr Jackson: The fact is that in Ontario we have increased health care spending by almost $2 billion, contrasted by a $2.7-billion cut. Ontarians who are relying on home care programs in this province are relying on the highest-quality, highest-access home care program in all of Canada. We're proud of that record.

Just to give an example - this is where the federal money is going to have to go - it's going to have to go to PEI, where they spend $32 per person. In Quebec they're spending $39 per person. In Ontario we're spending $115 for every person who requires that service, the highest rates in North America, and it's because the Mike Harris government has restructured our health services and moved services closer to home.

I ask the members opposite, especially the Liberal caucus, if you're not going to lobby the federal government, then get your own leader to give a clear statement on where he stands on a home care program for Ontario. He'd turn the clock back and turn back these home care services -

The Speaker: Petitions? Point of order.

PARLIAMENTARY PRIVILEGE

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Fort William): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Earlier this afternoon the Premier made reference I believe to a parliamentary privilege defence. I would ask whether it's within your purview on behalf of the Legislative Assembly to bring forward to us a clear definition of "parliamentary privilege" and if possible the areas in which that parliamentary privilege applies, in particular whether it can ever apply as a defence in allegations of sexual harassment.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): You mean as far as the court case is concerned?

Mrs McLeod: I'm not asking you to make judgments about the court case, Mr Speaker. I'm interested, as a parliamentarian, in the whole question of parliamentary privilege, and I think parliamentary privilege needs to be defined for us so we clearly understand what the limitations, as well as the applicability, of parliamentary privilege are. I believe it would be within your purview as Speaker to provide us with that definition.

The Speaker: I'll take that under advisement, because this is obviously a complicated question.

PETITIONS

DIABETES EDUCATION SERVICES

Mr Frank Miclash (Kenora): I have a petition that reads:

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas the Diabetes Education Service in Kenora is a necessary program; and

"Whereas the Harris government has refused to provide long-term funding for diabetes education in Kenora; and

"Whereas the Ministry of Health has acknowledged that the program is cost-effective given the volume of clients seen and the degree of specialization required;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, join our MPP, Frank Miclash, in calling upon the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to demand that the Harris government provide long-term, stable funding to the Diabetes Education Service in Kenora."

I am in full agreement with that petition and I have added my name to it.

ADOPTION

Mr Alex Cullen (Ottawa West): I have a petition here signed by residents of Windsor, Amherstburg and Tecumseh.

"To the Legislature of Ontario:

"Whereas the Adoption Reform Coalition of Ontario brings together various organizations to recommend reform of Ontario adoption law based on honesty, openness and integrity;

"Whereas existing adoption secrecy legislation is outdated and unjust;

"Whereas 20% of persons in Ontario are directly or indirectly affected by restricted rights to personal information available to other citizens;

"Whereas the adopted person's right to his or her birth identity is rooted in a basic and fundamental human need;

"Whereas most birth parents did not ask for lifelong confidentiality, it was imposed upon them involuntarily;

"Whereas research shows that not knowing basic personal information has proven harmful to adopted persons, birth parents, adoptive parents and other birth relatives; and

"Whereas research in other countries has shown that unqualified access to information" in adoption "satisfies the overwhelming majority of the parties involved;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislature of Ontario to enact revision of the Child and Family Services Act in this regard."

SCHOOL ACCOMMODATION

Mr Ernie Hardeman (Oxford): I have a petition I'd like to present on behalf of the member for St George-St David, and it's to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

"Whereas the St Michael Catholic School annex is part of the school accommodation review because it is a leased space; and

"Whereas one of the largest expenses of St Michael Catholic School is the renovated squash courts which serve as classrooms for approximately one third of the student population, known as the annex; and

"Whereas the students of St Michael Catholic School are experiencing 23 days' lost teaching time yearly; and

"Whereas there is an historic and economic solution to this problem which the Toronto District School Board refuses to negotiate;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"That the Ministry of Education be instructed to resolve this issue to the satisfaction of all parties."

I present it on behalf of the constituents from St George-St David.

ELECTION CALL

Mr Pat Hoy (Essex-Kent): I have a petition signed by a number of members of OPSEU local 126.

"To the Legislative Assembly:

"Whereas the current provincial government under Mike Harris has destroyed labour relations, gutted the WCB, caused rampant dependence on gambling, has contributed to mass homelessness and poverty while eroding our health care, educational and municipal institutions, we, the people of Chatham-Kent, are demanding that an election be called now, before the province is destroyed morally, ethically and financially."

I affix my name to this petition.

HOSPITAL RESTRUCTURING

Mrs Marion Boyd (London Centre): I have a petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, signed by hundreds of citizens of the tri-county area, which reads as follows:

"Whereas we are the residents covered by the tri-county, Lambton-Kent-Essex District Health Council; and

"Whereas we are the taxpayers covered under the Health Services Restructuring Commission, Lambton hospitals; and

"Whereas we are the health care providers and users;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to reinstate all complex continuing care beds and transitional care beds and funding slated to be removed under the Lambton hospitals restructuring report."

I'm pleased to affix my signature.

EDUCATION FUNDING

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel): I have a petition concerning the funding formula as introduced by the province of Ontario and I have signed this document to identify it.

PROTECTION FOR HEALTH CARE WORKERS

Mr Sean G. Conway (Renfrew North): I am proud to present a petition to the Legislative Assembly.

"Whereas nurses in Ontario often experience coercion to participate in practices which directly contravene their deeply held ethical standards; and

"Whereas pharmacists in Ontario are often pressured to dispense and/or sell chemicals and/or devices contrary to their moral or religious beliefs; and

"Whereas public health workers in Ontario are expected to assist in providing controversial services and promoting controversial materials against their consciences;

"We, the undersigned, urge the government of Ontario to enact legislation recognizing the freedom of conscience of health care workers, prohibiting coercion of and unjust discrimination against health care workers because of their refusal to participate in matters contrary to the dictates of their consciences and establishing penalties for such coercion and unjust discrimination."

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ELECTION CALL

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): I have a petition signed by a number of people. It reads as follows:

"Whereas the government of Ontario has not listened to the public on Bill 160; and

"Whereas the government of Ontario has chosen to overtly deceive the people of Ontario as to the true objectives of Bill 160; and

"Whereas we, the people, believe that no government has a mandate to act in isolation of the wishes of the electorate of this province and we have lost confidence in this government;

"We, the undersigned electors of Ontario, petition the Lieutenant Governor to dissolve the Legislature and call a general election forthwith to get rid of the Conservative government."

I sign it.

REMEMBRANCE DAY

Mrs Julia Munro (Durham-York): I have a petition:

"To the Parliament of Ontario:

"Whereas it is important to honour the courageous memory and sacrifices of Canada's war dead and of our veterans who fought in defence of our national rights and freedoms;

"Whereas there is a need for succeeding generations of young, school-age Canadians to learn more about the true meaning of Remembrance Day;

"Whereas Ontario veterans' associations have created excellent educational materials for use in Ontario schools on the meaning and significance of Remembrance Day;

"Whereas a special Remembrance Day curriculum for all grades in Ontario's education system, developed on the basis of the programs by Ontario veterans' associations and involving their direct participation, would increase awareness of and appreciation for Canada's wartime sacrifices in the hearts and minds of all Ontario citizens;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Parliament of Ontario as follows:

"That the provincial Ministry of Education and Training ensure that a suitable Remembrance Day learning unit be included in the curriculum of all grades of Ontario's education system."

I affix my signature to this.

SCHOOL CLOSURES

Mr Tony Ruprecht (Parkdale): I have a petition signed by a number of people very much concerned with the issue of school closures, and it's addressed to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. It reads as follows:

"Whereas the Ontario government is to slash education funding which could lead to the closure of many neighbourhood schools, including one of the most community oriented schools, like Hughes Public School; and

"Whereas the present funding formula does not take into account the historic and cultural links schools have with the communities nor the special education programs that have developed as a direct need of our communities; and

"Whereas the prospect of closing neighbourhood schools will displace many children and put others on longer bus routes; and

"Whereas Mike Harris promised in 1995 not to cut classroom spending but has already cut at least $1 billion from our schools; and

"Whereas Hughes Public School is a community school with many links to the immediate neighbourhood such as daycare and parenting centres, a site for sports activities, community events, summer sport camp, summer camp for deaf children and an international language and concurrent program;

"Therefore we, the undersigned citizens, demand that the Harris government changes the funding formula to take into account the historic, cultural and community links that Hughes Public School has established."

Since I agree very much with this petition, I'm affixing my signature to it.

REGULATION OF SOCIAL WORKERS

Mr Peter Kormos (Welland-Thorold): I have a petition addressed to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, reading:

"We, the undersigned, are opposed to the Social Work and Social Service Work Act, Bill 76, legislation now being proposed by the government of Ontario, because its provisions will not protect the public, will not protect against the deterioration of social service, and this bill does not respond to the need for social justice in Ontario. We demand professional input from other groups who are impacted by this legislation and demand public hearings on this bill."

It is signed by Ron Wing of Welland, Shailagh Hart of Sudbury, Fred Hahn of Toronto and hundreds of others. I present this to you now, Speaker.

PORNOGRAPHY

Mr Bob Wood (London South): I have a petition signed by 339 people.

"Whereas children are exposed to pornography in variety stores and video rental outlets;

"Whereas bylaws vary from city to city and have failed to protect minors from unwanted exposure to pornography;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"To enact legislation which will create uniform standards in Ontario to prevent minors from being exposed to pornography in retail establishments; prevent minors from entering establishments which rent or sell pornography; restrict the location of such establishments to non-residential areas."

VISITING SPECIALIST CLINICS

Mr Michael A. Brown (Algoma-Manitoulin): I have a petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

"Whereas the objective of the visiting specialist clinic program is to provide specialty services in communities where the population base cannot support a full-time specialist and where specialty services are established more than 40 kilometres away from those communities; and

"Whereas communities in Algoma-Manitoulin, including Espanola, Manitoulin Island, Elliot Lake, Blind River, Chapleau, Wawa, Hornepayne and Manitouwadge are situated great distances from the nearest established specialty services and travelling such distances poses undue hardship on people requiring these services; and

"Whereas the Ministry of Health has withdrawn funding for specialist support staff, seriously threatening the clinic program; and

"Whereas funding by the Ministry of Health for travel grants would far outweigh the costs to the ministry of providing support staff funding;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to restore funding for support staff for the visiting specialist clinic program."

I'm proud to affix my signature to this petition.

ADOPTION

Mr Alex Cullen (Ottawa West): I have a petition signed by residents of Richmond Hill, Aurora, Sutton, Newmarket, Keswick, Peterborough, Lakefield, London and a whole host of other communities in Ontario. It's to the Legislature of Ontario.

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislature of Ontario to enact revision of the Child and Family Services Act and other acts to:

"Permit unrestricted access to full personal identifying birth information to adopted persons and adult children of adopted persons, and unrestricted access to the adopted person's amended birth certificate to birth parents, birth grandparents, siblings and other birth relatives, when the adopted person reaches 18;

"Permit unrestricted access to identifying information to adoptive parents of minor children, emancipated minor adoptees, and individuals with legal guardianship for an adopted person in special circumstances;

"Allow adopted persons and birth relatives to file notice stating their wish for no contact;

"Replace mandatory reunion counselling with optional counselling;

"Permit access to agency and court files when original statistical information is insufficient for identification of and contact with birth relatives;

"Recognize open adoptions in the legislation."

I affix my signature to this.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): The member for Durham East.

Mr John O'Toole (Durham East): It's a very timely petition that I intend to read into the record. There have been articles in the paper. In fact, the member for Riverdale has got a private member's bill, Bill 88, on the subject of adoption.

The Acting Speaker: Read your petition, please.

Mr O'Toole: "Whereas the Adoption Reform Coalition of Ontario (ARCO) brings together various organizations to recommend reform of Ontario adoption law based on honesty, openness and integrity;

"Whereas existing adoption secrecy legislation is outdated and unjust;

"Whereas Canada has ratified standards of civil and human rights in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child; these rights are denied to persons affected by secrecy provisions in adoption laws of the Child and Family Services Act and other acts in Ontario;

"Whereas 20% of persons in Ontario are directly or indirectly affected by restricted rights to personal information available to other citizens;

"Whereas the adopted person's right to his/her birth identity is rooted in a basic and fundamental human need;

"Whereas most birth parents did not ask for lifelong confidentiality; it was imposed on them involuntarily;

"Whereas research shows that not knowing basic personal information has proven harmful to adopted persons, birth parents, adoptive parents and other birth relatives;

"Whereas research in other countries has shown that unqualified access to information in adoption satisfies the overwhelming majority of the parties involved;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislature of Ontario to enact revision of the Child and Family Services Act and other acts to:

"Permit unrestricted access to identifying information to adoptive parents of minor children, emancipated minor adoptees and individuals with legal guardianship for an adopted person in special circumstances;

"Allow adopted persons and birth relatives to file notice stating their wish for no contact;

"Replace mandatory reunion counselling with optional counselling;

"Permit access to agency and court files when original statistical information is insufficient for identification of and contact with birth relatives;

"Recognize open adoptions in the legislation."

This timely petition I'm pleased to support.

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HOTEL DIEU HOSPITAL

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I have a petition that reads as follows:

"To the government of Ontario:

"Since the Hotel Dieu Hospital has played and continues to play a vital role in the delivery of health care services in St Catharines and the Niagara region; and

"Since Hotel Dieu has modified its role over the years as part of a rationalization of medical services in St Catharines and has assumed the position of a regional health care facility in such areas as kidney dialysis and oncology; and

"Since the Niagara region is experiencing underfunding in the health care field and requires more medical services and not fewer services; and

"Since Niagara residents are required at present to travel outside of the Niagara region to receive many specialized services that could be provided in city hospitals and thereby not require local patients to make difficult and inconvenient trips down our highways to other centres; and

"Since the population of the Niagara region is older than that in most areas of the province and more elderly people tend to require more hospital services;

"We, the undersigned, request that the government of Ontario keep the election commitment of Premier Mike Harris not to close hospitals in our province, and we call upon the Premier to reject any recommendation to close Hotel Dieu Hospital in St Catharines."

I affix my signature as I'm in complete agreement with its sentiments.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

TIME ALLOCATION / ATTRIBUTION DE TEMPS

Hon Jim Wilson (Minister of Energy, Science and Technology): I move that, pursuant to standing order 46 and notwithstanding any other standing order or special order of the House relating to Bill 81, An Act to implement tax credits and revenue protection measures contained in the 1998 budget, to make amendments to other statutes and to enact a new statute, when Bill 81 is next called as a government order, the Speaker shall put every question necessary to dispose of the second reading stage of the bill without further debate or amendment, and at such time, the bill shall be ordered for third reading;

That no deferral of the second reading vote pursuant to standing order 28(h) shall be permitted;

That the order for third reading may then immediately be called;

That two hours shall be allocated to the third reading stage of the bill after which time the Speaker shall interrupt the proceedings and shall put every question necessary to dispose of this stage of the bill without further debate or amendment;

That the vote on third reading of the bill may, pursuant to standing order 28(h), be deferred until the next sessional day during the routine proceeding "deferred votes"; and

That, in the case of any division relating to any proceeding on the bill, the division bells shall be limited to five minutes.

Mr Speaker, I'll be splitting my remarks this afternoon with the members for Halton Centre and Peterborough, and I think it's appropriate at this time to yield the floor to the member for Halton Centre.

Mr Terence H. Young (Halton Centre): Today I'd like to speak in support of the time allocation motion for Bill 81, the Tax Credits and Revenue Protection Act, 1998, for a speedy passage of this resolution.

With this bill, as Minister Eves said at first reading, the government is exceeding the commitments we made in the spring budget. Measures in this bill will help parents get and keep jobs while ensuring that their young children are well looked after, both by reimbursing parents for part of their child care costs and by encouraging construction and renovation of licensed child care spaces.

Some $40 million from the existing child care tax credit will be combined with an additional $100 million in 1998-99 to create a new program that supports working families with young children. The Ontario child care supplement for working families will provide support to help parents in the workforce, in school and also in training. Under this program, low- to middle-income working families would receive annual payments of up to $1,020 for each child under age seven. That is a tax-free monthly payment of $85. More than 350,000 children in 210,000 families are expected to benefit from this program.

It is urgent that these payments go out to the families across the province who are so desperately in need of support for their essential child care needs. The Ministry of Finance has heard from parents all over Ontario who not only welcome the program but want to know when they will be getting their payments. In many instances, this is the only child care support these parents and guardians will receive.

The first payment will be made following royal assent. If royal assent is in December 1998, a lump sum payment will be made for the period July 1998 to December 1998, and starting January 1999 the supplement will be paid monthly.

Benefits will not only go to working families but to low- to middle-income families where one parent stays at home to care for a child under age seven. In addition, parents who attend school, who are getting training and have child care expenses for their children under age seven are also eligible.

The supplement is intended to go to families who need it most. It goes down in value as family net income rises above $20,000. For example, for a family earning $20,000 with one child under age seven, the annual payments through this new program could amount to $1,020, or $85 a month. For a family earning $25,000 with two children under age seven, the annual payments could be $1,640, or $136.67 monthly. For a family earning $35,000 with three children under age seven, the annual payments could be $1,860, or $155 monthly.

The amount parents or guardians receive will be based on a number of factors: the number of children under age seven in the family, the family's prior-year earned and net income, child care costs and whether the child care costs are subsidized. The benefit year will be July to June. Prior to each new benefit year, qualifying families will be sent an individualized application form which must be filled out and returned.

It is truly a supplement for low- to middle-income working families. Benefits disappear at $32,750 for a family with one child under age seven, $45,500 with two children, $58,250 with three children, $71,000 with four children and $83,750 with five children.

Bill 81 would also increase the access of working parents to affordable child care by providing a new tax incentive to incorporated and unincorporated businesses that create or improve licensed child care facilities or that make contributions to child care operators to construct or renovate facilities. The tax deduction for corporations would be equal to 30% of qualifying expenditures incurred after May 5, 1998, in constructing or renovating licensed child care facilities. Unincorporated businesses would be entitled to an equivalent refundable tax credit of 5%. The tax incentive would be available to businesses, other than child care businesses, operating permanent establishments in Ontario.

This incentive would also be available for contributions of cash, property or services by businesses to child care operators -

Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton Centre): On a point of order, Speaker: I don't believe there's a quorum present.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Would you check if we have quorum?

Clerk Assistant (Ms Deborah Deller): A quorum is not present, Speaker.

The Acting Speaker ordered the bells rung.

Clerk Assistant: A quorum is now present, Speaker.

The Acting Speaker: Member for Halton Centre.

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Mr Young: This incentive would also be available for contributions of cash, property or services by businesses to child care operators if the contribution is used by the operator constructing or renovating licensed child care facilities. Capital costs for playground equipment would also qualify.

This bill helps people with disabilities get jobs, people who deserve and want to work. The legislation is a companion piece to the government's historic Ontarians with Disabilities Act, which was introduced on Monday, November 23, the same day as this bill. Our bill provides positive fiscal measures to encourage and facilitate the participation of Ontarians with disabilities in the social and economic life of the province.

To support businesses that hire employees with disabilities, the workplace accessibility tax incentive would provide corporations with an additional 100% deduction for qualifying expenditures incurred to accommodate an eligible person with a disability. An equivalent 15% refundable tax credit would be provided to unincorporated businesses.

We're helping provide access to capital for small business in Bill 81. This bill contains provisions to enhance the community small business investment funds program and the labour-sponsored investment funds program. These provisions will increase access to capital for small businesses in communities throughout Ontario, helping them to grow and create jobs. The bill implements the 1998 Ontario budget proposal to further increase the flow of investment capital to Ontario's small business sector and proposes enhancements from consultation.

We're cutting taxes to create jobs. To encourage job creation and growth in high-technology, knowledge-based industries, the bill proposes tax incentives to support the interactive digital media, sound recording and computer animation and special effects sectors. These initiatives will help businesses in these industries to grow and to contribute to the development of long-term, internationally viable Ontario industries with jobs for the future.

This bill further supports job creation by reducing the payroll tax on small business. The phase-in of the $400,000 employer health tax exemption is being accelerated by increasing the exemption for 1998 from $300,000 to $350,000 for employers and self-employed individuals. In 1999, the employer health tax on self-employed individuals will be eliminated. This measure was enacted in 1996, Bill 47.

We're also addressing the underground economy in Ontario. Tax compliance incentives, such as new or increased penalties for failure to comply with corporations tax, and retail sales tax and tobacco tax legislation form a part of the revenue protection measures referred to in the title of this act. Proposed amendments to the Tobacco Tax Act enhance existing sanctions by prohibiting possession of unmarked cigarettes by unauthorized persons and parallel the existing provisions relating to the possession of unmarked cigarettes for the purposes of sale.

The bill also proposes increases to fines under the Retail Sales Tax Act when a person is convicted of offences related to record maintenance, including making or participating in the making of false or deceptive statements, evasion of tax through record destruction, and making or permitting false record entries. The bill proposes increased fines and penalties to deter underground distribution of marked cigarettes by unlicensed wholesalers.

This government remains committed to tax fairness through cutting taxes and ensuring that taxpayers receive efficient and effective public services.

There are also non-taxation measures in this bill intended to implement other measures that have previously been announced. The amendment to the Pension Benefits Act would enable the government to implement, by regulation, a response to its current public consultation on possible access to locked-in retirement savings in situations of financial hardship or shortened life expectancy. The amendment would also enable the government to implement, by regulation, possible reform of rules governing life income funds, which are a type of locked-in retirement savings arrangement. The government is planning a consultation on this issue.

The amendment is an enabling provision that would address a limited, technical point in the legislation. The regulations prescribing the circumstances of additional access will be developed following ministry consideration of submissions received during the two consultations. This provision relates to money that was taken out of a pension fund when a former employee terminated employment before retirement; it does not involve access to money or benefits in a pension fund.

The Minister of Finance announced in the May 1998 budget that in light of the agreement between the Ontario Teachers' Federation and the government, the government would be introducing legislation to amend the Teachers' Pension Act. The Ontario teachers' pension plan is now exempt from the requirement under the Pension Benefits Act that actuarial gains in the pension fund must first be applied to reduce any unfunded actuarial liability of the plan. The amendments in this bill to the Teachers' Pension Act repeal that exemption.

This bill also makes technical amendments with respect to the use of such actuarial gains. The requirement that the Minister of Finance make payments respecting the initial unfunded actuarial liability of the plan is to be repealed by proclamation after the liability has been eliminated.

Turning to another non-tax measure provided by this bill, schedule A of the Services Improvement Act, 1997, amended the Ambulance Act to provide for the transfer to municipalities of full funding responsibility for land ambulance services as of January 1st, 1998, and full responsibility for ensuring the proper provision of such services as of January 1, 2000.

This government has proven in the first three years of its mandate that tax cuts create jobs. This year we were able to bring in the 30% cut in personal income tax rates that we promised a full six months ahead of schedule. By spring of this year we had already announced 30 tax cuts. The deficit has declined steadily. With this bill, the government will bring the number of tax cuts it has made to 67.

The measures in this bill will continue to help foster a climate for businesses to create even more jobs and give many more Ontarians the opportunity to earn a good living. I think we can all appreciate the urgent nature of this bill, as it has a wide-ranging and positive impact on the people of this province.

Mr Christopherson: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Again the government is failing to keep quorum on their own government bill.

The Acting Speaker: Please check if we have a quorum.

Clerk Assistant: A quorum is not present, Speaker.

The Acting Speaker ordered the bells rung.

Clerk Assistant: A quorum is now present, Speaker.

The Acting Speaker: The member for Halton Centre.

Mr Young: I think we can all appreciate the urgent nature of this bill, as it has a wide-ranging and positive impact on people across this province. People are depending on the approval of this act. I urge speedy passage of this bill.

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Mr R. Gary Stewart (Peterborough): It's my pleasure to speak to Bill 81, the Tax Credits and Revenue Protection Act. I'm probably going to speak a little bit from the grassroots level rather than being quite as technical as my colleague, to speak from the perspective of the ordinary working people of this province who will be most pleased when this bill passes. I certainly hope the opposition parties support this bill because, if nothing else, the name of this bill says it all.

This act is created to implement measures that were announced in the May 1998 budget and to enact changes relating to a Supreme Court of Canada decision regarding probate fees. It also amends certain other very important issues. Under this bill, there are six main items. I'd just like to go through them one at a time and address each one, if I may.

Number one is more tax cuts for Ontarians and small businesses to help create jobs. To me, that is the bottom line of this bill, the bottom line being that we have to create and continue to create jobs in this province. As has been mentioned, the 30% tax reduction as well as some 66 reductions in taxes during the term of our government are most impressive and have contributed directly to 461,000 jobs, against the previous two governments having raised taxes 65 times and the previous one having a net job loss of 10,000. If that doesn't say it all, I don't know what does: 641,000 jobs versus 10,000 net job losses.

It was interesting. Last evening, I was at a particular function where one of our local business persons came up to me and talked to me about how great his business was developing. He's in the retail sector, in the pet food and supply business, so it's not something one has to buy every day, unless of course one is a dog owner or a cat owner or a small animal owner. He was suggesting that because people had more money in their pockets because of tax credits, he over the last six months has taken on two full-time employees and four part-time employees. Again, this is done by tax credits and revenue protection. It says a lot when you can show actual examples of what has happened.

The second item in this is assistance and accessible child care for working families with children. During the time I've been in office, some three and three quarter years, many people who have come through my door in the constituency office were very concerned about making sure they have assistance for child care. The average hard-working, modest-income taxpayer in this province needs that type of assistance. Isn't it wonderful that we can give them the type of assistance they want, especially those who have less income, have lower-paying jobs than others have? I believe this bill addresses that particular situation extremely well.

Number three is greater access to capital for small business. Small business, as all of us know, is the engine of the economy of this province. I know personally, as a small business person, that the number of employees created through small businesses is what makes this province tick and move ahead. If you look at what has happened in the last three or four years since this government took power, small business has been expanding and small business has been growing, and when they do those two things, jobs are created. Jobs are being created at a very rapid rate in this province. It doesn't matter whether it's in small industrial or small commercial; they're being created in the retail sector, in the building sector, in the automotive sector, in all sectors, because of the incentives and the tax credits and the revenue protection that we've put in and that will be enhanced by this act.

Number four is to help people with disabilities get jobs. I believe that in this province for many years the disabled, unfortunately, have had to take a back seat when it comes to having access to jobs. If you look at the Ontarians with Disabilities Act, which is in the process of through this House, yes, it may not be what everybody wanted, but it is indeed a start, a start that has happened by this government. No other government before had the courage or the will to create an Ontarians with Disabilities Act. I believe, and I stand to be corrected, that there is no province in this country that has a disability act.

I salute our government. I believe if you look at the ways in which the act will be reviewed and the procedures that it's putting in place over the next few years - all of the ministries are to look at how they will enhance jobs for the disabled - it can be highly commended.

The fifth one is the support of small business, growing firms and jobs for them. I suggest if you look at those three things, support for small, growing firms and jobs for them, that is looking at the complete package, a package to enhance jobs in this province, to create jobs and to give a track and a path to move into the new millennium, to move into the future where we will have an economically viable and efficient province.

Finally the sixth one is a fairer tax system. As I mentioned, when you look at the two previous governments raising taxes 65 times, unemployment going higher and higher, social assistance going higher and higher, and now you look at this government trying to introduce a fair tax system where we are reducing taxes at a rate of 66 times in the last three and a half years - again I suggest 641,000 jobs versus a negative of 10,000.

It's interesting to note the increase in jobs and the decrease in social assistance, yet the two opposition parties in this House voted against tax reduction. It's unspeakable to do that, having no concern for the taxpayers of this province. "Tax them forever. Make sure we don't do anything to create jobs. Tax them as much as we can."

Mr Alex Cullen (Ottawa West): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I believe the motion before us is a time allocation motion. The member for Peterborough has yet to mention the time allocation motion whatsoever.

The Acting Speaker: Member for Peterborough.

Mr Stewart: We need this bill very fast. I thought it was Bill 81, Mr Speaker.

As I suggested before, the opposition voted against any type of tax reduction. I suggest to you that the name of this bill, being the Tax Credits and Revenue Protection Act, says it all in my mind.

Child care for working families certainly has been mentioned. If you look at the $1,020 that can be received by young, modest, hard-working families, to the tune of 210,000 families in this province, I suggest to you that it will be a tremendous benefit. It may be that some of us, the older ones like myself, tend to forget the hardships of some young families who are raising two or three kiddies and maybe are not having the wage rates they want. To get this type of tax credit, paid on a monthly basis, I think is absolutely tremendous. It will mean that these young families will be able to support their families in a little bit better fashion than they have in the past. So I commend the government very much for introducing this particular bill and these types of incentives within the bill.

The other thing I wanted to mention was disabled accessibility, to encourage business to employ persons with disabilities through incentives. As I mentioned, I believe the disabled in this province have unfortunately had to take a bit of a back seat, but what we are trying to do is to make sure they get to that front seat by giving incentives to business to make sure they can accommodate the disabled, that the disabled will have the opportunity to apply for, and indeed get, those jobs.

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I remember about a year ago one of the malls in my riding of Peterborough had a promotion where they asked a lot of people who were not disabled to go into that mall, look through smoke-covered glasses and try to read the various things on the boxes of the products that were being sold there; to get into a wheelchair and go into the bathroom; to go through the mall and try and get in and out of doors; to try and get close to a cash register; to look at the necessary lifts that may be needed, elevators etc.

I suggest that these types of incentives that we're going to give to businesses are most commendable. What it says is that we are concerned and want to make sure that the disabled have the opportunities that many of us who are not disabled have.

With some of the restrictions, where a qualified employee may not be related to the employer, may not be employed and may not have been employed for the preceding 12 months, it gives some of these people who unfortunately in some cases may not have had the necessary courage to go out and look for a job, because they may not have been able to convince an employer that they were the right person for the job because of the access to that work area - I believe these types of incentives will do wonderful things for them and will expand and create those jobs that we want.

It has been mentioned that this bill also addresses the underground economy, the Tobacco Tax Act and also the Retail Sales Tax Act. I commend the government for looking at those two areas because I'm a great believer that if we put standards and rules in place, they should be adhered to. If you look at what's proposed in the Tobacco Tax Act, the proposed amendments enhance existing sanctions by prohibiting possession of unmarked cigarettes by unauthorized - and I think that's the key word - persons. Wholesale dealers selling tobacco for resale must be authorized by the minister issuing a permit, again keeping the rules and standards in place. People purchasing tobacco for resale are only permitted to purchase it from wholesale dealers who are authorized. Why not make sure that the rules and the standards are adhered to?

It is much the same in the Retail Sales Tax Act. If people are breaking the law, they must be looked at, they must be convicted, whatever it might be. People who are convicted of offences, whether it be related to record maintenance, false or deceptive statements, the evasion of tax through record destruction or making or permitting false record entries - I think it is wrong. This type of act and this legislation addresses that.

I thank the assembly for allowing me to speak on Bill 81. I believe it is a bill that this province needs. I suggest to you that it's been my pleasure to do that and I hope we do get the speedy passage we want.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate.

Mr Alvin Curling (Scarborough North): Before I begin my comments, let me state to you that I'd like to share the time with three of my colleagues: the members for Cornwall, Ottawa East and Scarborough-Agincourt.

Here we go again. The member who previously spoke hasn't mentioned one word about why he was standing up defending another dictatorial, blocking attitude of this government in time allocation. They're going to limit us speaking on something very important.

He started speaking about Bill 81, the Tax Credits and Revenue Protection Act, but basically that's not what the debate is about. The debate is about shutting us down again and running this place in the dictatorial way that Mike Harris and his Conservative government have constantly run it, muzzling us and limiting the time for the expression of the people who are elected to give their representation. I have given this speech over and over, but of course I don't expect them to listen at all. But I hope that the people out there are listening to the manner in which this government runs its business.

Let me just emphasize what this government is shutting us down on. Bill 81 is going to implement a number of tax provisions announced in the 1998 budget. As well, they are going to look at retroactively implementing estate taxes - that is in lieu of the probate fee court ruling that happened the other day - and the changing rules governing the teachers' pension fund. This is a government that doesn't like to tax. They say they don't implement taxes, but they call it by another name.

I also wanted to mention what is happening out there while they are taking away money from the poor and giving it to the rich. There was an article the other day talking about how the cuts to the poor and the cuts to welfare have created more poverty in this province than ever.

There is an old statement. It seems to me that every time Mike Harris and the minister of trade go travelling, they go around and say, "The United Nations stated that this country is the best country in the world to live in." There are many folks out there who are deprived of jobs or are deprived of affordable accommodation or are deprived of daycare or are deprived of many of the facilities that government is supposed to assist and support who are not saying this is the greatest country. They would like to participate in this wealth that is at the top end of the ladder, of the strata. They say, "Here we are, a great country, but why are there so many homeless?" They are not enjoying this great country that we are talking about, not at all.

I have to emphasize, very much so, things I have always emphasized here about our homeless. I would ask the minister of privatization if he'd like to privatize some of the homeless now too while it's going on. I'd like to look at some of those folks outside. When I speak to them, I want to invite the members here, every single one of the Conservative members, to take a walk with me down University Avenue, not very far, maybe a couple of steps down there, to find the amount of homelessness that is evident in this city. And they're not only here; they're all over. They are in Kingston, they are in Windsor, they are in London; they're all over, caused by this government.

Hon Mr Wilson: Aw, that's awful.

Mr Curling: The Minister of Energy sighs. I think he's concerned about that.

Hon Mr Wilson: Because of this government you have the lowest unemployment, higher welfare rates.

Mr Curling: He expressly said that it's the lowest unemployment. There are hundreds of people who have stopped looking for jobs, hundreds of people who have stopped looking for homes, because there are no affordable homes any more. They're on the street because this same government cut 22% off the welfare subsidies, chasing people out on to the street. We have one of the highest percentages of children in poverty at any time. One of the highest percentages of children don't have enough to eat because this government and the Minister of Community and Social Services, who touts the fact that when she cuts welfare, many of them are out there finding jobs today. They're not finding jobs; those children are starving. There will be malnutrition in a very short time and it will come back to haunt our province and haunt us later on, because the fact is that children can't even learn if they don't have any food.

The lineups at food banks are longer. More people are going to the food banks. Lots of people are there. The more food that is given, the more is taken at the food bank because of this government, this government which has created poverty for a greater set of people in our society.

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This government had a consultant look at the best way to take money away from the poor and paid the consultant an enormous amount of money. This is the government that wanted to save money. The same government that wanted to save money has paid a consultant millions of dollars so they could say they have saved and got people off welfare. It's not happening. It's not happening at all. What is really happening is that they are creating poverty and creating a longer list of the poor.

We made a resolution in Canada that we would wipe out poverty by the year 2000. We are so far from that it ain't funny. We ain't gonna get there. We are worse off today where things are at.

I'm pretty concerned about where this government is going. Today all day in the House the debate was of how they found $600,000 to pay off a disagreement that was happening about sexual harassment by one of their colleagues here, saying that it's easier to pay the $600,000 and settle the case.

Let me tell you of a case that happened to me the other day. I was at a place and a young lady called me and said: "Mr Curling, I want to speak to you. My child needs daycare. This government is going around giving money to consultants and giving money to settle cases out of court that could have been paid out of the pocket of the individual. I could use that money to send my child to daycare. I could use that money, when I do send my child to daycare, to pay daycare after I've gone to work to be more productive in our society."

This government is not at all concerned about that. They're not concerned at all. They went ahead and did some rather drastic things to our economy and to our poor. One of the main things they did was cancel rent control, and the minister stands in here and says that it is a way in which to get more homes built. They don't want to hear that. What they have done here is to make sure they have shut us down in this House so we cannot speak. Time allocation. Where is the democratic process that is supposed to exist in this House? It's not there at all.

Let me just again emphasize what we're speaking about that they're shutting us down on. Estate tax; Bill 81 amendments to fix the estate fee court ruling problem. It basically introduces a new Harris tax. Remember that this is the government that says they don't want any more taxes, they don't tax. They may call it another name. They're trying to raise about $1 billion here, I understand, $1 billion in estate taxes. Remember, this is a government that does not believe in taxes at all, but through this process they will raise $1 billion. As a matter of fact, it's a very attractive tax, going back almost 48 years.

Remember that book they talked about, the Common Sense Revolution? You said: "I will never raise taxes. No. I will resign if I raise taxes."

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker: Gentlemen, order, please. Members, order.

Mr Gerry Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt): You touched a nerve, Alvin.

Mr Curling: Yes. Every time you bring the facts to them, you touch a nerve. So, what about taxes when they had this common sense and said, "It is written here"?

Hon David Turnbull (Minister without Portfolio): We need some political honesty here.

Mr Curling: My colleague the member for Scarborough-Agincourt carries that book around every day. He said: "I can't believe they had this book. It's written right there in the Common Sense Revolution, `I will not raise taxes.'" What are they doing now? They're going to try to find $1 billion, to tax people to get the money.

Hon Mr Turnbull: Try some intellectual honesty for a change.

Mr Curling: I think the chief whip is very annoyed, that I've touched a nerve. His government is not really following the rules of his Common Sense Revolution. They write one thing and say the other. If they would just follow what is written, then we could say, "That's honesty." But what they do is completely contrary to the honest statement they made, "We will not raise taxes." They call it all sorts of names, and now they're looking at $1 billion in estate taxes.

This government promised child care. I recall that very much. They were going to have a child care tax credit. They promised all that. Now they're coming to the end of their little era and they are rushing through, trying to say, "We have kept our promise." You haven't kept your promise one bit.

You have brutalized the poor. You have assaulted many of the people on the poverty line, just on the edge. Some people are much poorer today because of this Conservative government.

They have disrespected women. It is shown in many ways in the way you speak to the women of this province, who feel this government has no respect for them and their concerns and their needs; not at all. Again, they are watching you rather closely as you do that.

The poor: You feel and some of your colleagues felt, "Some of the minorities don't vote for us so we don't have to pay them any mind." They will come home to haunt you. As a matter of fact, as we saw in the last federal election, many of the new immigrants of this country, who are citizens of this country, are participating a lot and get themselves involved. They're watching the way you have treated the minorities, the way you have treated women, the way you have treated the poor. They're watching you rather closely. They say, "We do not want this type of government that only includes some people, the rich." Those on Bay Street, of course, can easily be reached and have access to this government. It is this government that told many of those groups that are struggling to survive that they are a little noisy minority group, just a special interest group, and dismissed them.

I recall, if you remember, Mr Speaker, that just after the election we couldn't find one Conservative member around anywhere, we couldn't find any of them, to address some of the concerns the people had voted for because they were scared. Because they were so big and bullying and tough, they don't need those folks. They call them, as I said, a noisy special interest group.

After they have devastated the health care system so that many people are having difficulty accessing emergency care, after they have destroyed rent control and people can't have affordable housing, after they have taken away welfare subsidies and actually almost attacked the poor, now they're coming and dropping it off, bit by bit, dollar by dollar, and saying, "Look how good we are, how compassionate we are."

Mike Harris literally came out and said, "There's a good side to me, you know." He's been turning around and around and we can't find the good side of him yet. "There's a good side and a compassionate and a kind side to me." As to the same compassionate side of Mike Harris, what we have found is that now he has restricted us in expressing our view on these bills, on what can be debated. The public wants to have input and discussion and public consultation on all this legislation. Did we get it? No. They come here and put time allocation. I think they're going to break the record of any government in power on time allocation. They've got a couple more days to go and I'm sure there will be more time allocations that will come about.

As we go out on Christmas break, with the many turkeys and the gifts and food that may be given out, they may feel that this somehow will relieve the poor for the time being. That's only a meal. The permanent damage to our province, to the poor, is very deep.

I want to find out, when is this government going to address affordable housing? When are they going to address the homeless? When are they going to address the child care system that we need? When are they going to address some of the training programs that we want? When are they going to do that? If they don't address that, we know -

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Interjection.

Mr Curling: The chief government whip there doesn't want to hear the truth. He's very uncomfortable with the truth. I don't know if you have noticed that, Mr Speaker. The chief government whip is very uncomfortable with the truth. He's very uncomfortable when we speak of how they have brutalized and assaulted the poor people in our province. Whenever it is raised, he is extremely concerned that they could just put time allocation on this time allocation. I could speak for less, but he has to sit there and listen and he had better listen. If he doesn't, what's going to happen to the people - I think it's Don Mills he's from. What is his riding?

Mr Bernard Grandmaître (Ottawa East): Don Mills.

Mr Curling: Yes. The fact is that those people will make sure that individuals like you are not returned. We want representation of all the people, not representation of the Bay Streets and all that; we want the representation of all the people in this province.

The Conservative government continue with their right-wing agenda and with their Reform idea - they feel that only a selective few in this province should be listened to - and that will be addressed at the election time.

I wanted to put those points and to remind these members, especially the Conservative members - the Mike Harris agenda, the Common Sense Revolution - who have declared war on the poor that those people will be listening to you and will make their decision at the next election.

I'll put a challenge to them. I would love them to call the election right away. I'd like them to call an election so we can go to the polls, so the women you have denied support will then vote the way they want to, and the young people with their tuition fees that have been increased enormously can then address what has caused them to be in such a predicament today.

Mr Speaker, I want to thank you for giving me such attentive ears and I'm sure the people of Scarborough North - if I don't get a chance again, I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas, but keep in mind those poor people out there and those women who are in need of daycare. After Christmas, there will still be a great need, and the cause of this terrible situation is this Conservative government that's in power today.

Mr John C. Cleary (Cornwall): I'm pleased to join my colleagues in this debate. I've listened to some of the former speakers and I am not impressed with what has been said.

The member for Peterborough has already said how they are helping the disabled in our communities across Ontario. I just want to tell you that in my particular area, Cornwall, a government announcement was being made. People were invited to a room which was not accessible for the disabled. This was the government's own people doing that.

I want to talk a little bit about some of the tax measures announced in the 1998 budget, supposedly to help working families. I can tell you that whatever help this bit of legislation may give to some of these people, it will be more than offset by the tax nightmare the government has created through its own provincial downloading exercise.

I wish I had a little more time but, as you know, this is government policy. They do not allow time to debate. They just ram their bills through the House and everyone is supposed to be happy.

I want to take a minute to talk about the real impact of Bill 81 and the government's tax policies. I want to talk about what is happening to small business, not only in my community but across Ontario. I want to take one example, a true example, that came out of a public tax meeting which was held in our part of eastern Ontario. I never saw so many angry people.

The one example that I want to talk about is from a hard-working Ontarian. This comes from Dr Brian MacNaughton of Williamstown. Brian MacNaughton is a rural veterinarian, and a darn good one. Over 80% of his business is to the agricultural community. Brian MacNaughton tells me he recently received a 1998 supplementary tax notice. The tax indicated a 330% increase in his business tax. Why? This is isn't a new business. He's been a vet for over 16 years.

Brian MacNaughton wants to know why the Premier is downloading the assessment taxes on the backs of small business. He knows that personal income tax has changed very little in his particular case. He knows farm taxes have changed very little. He wants to know why they are putting a burden on small business. Why does this businessman have this astronomical increase? He has no choice. He will have to pass it on to his clients in the agriculture community, and we all know how much trouble they already have trying to make it in their own particular cases.

Brian MacNaughton asks, "Where is the justice?" He's just trying to make a living, just like hundreds of other small businessmen throughout Ontario. They need answers and they're not getting them from this government.

Having come from a municipal background, I want to go on a little bit to tell about the problems that our municipal politicians are having trying to cope with all the new responsibilities downloaded by the provincial government on to them, namely, land ambulances, policing, social housing and many others, with fewer staff to do the work. They are having a very difficult time.

I want to talk a little bit about health care. In the provincial election, as you know, the Premier promised not to close any hospitals. That has not happened. Not only are the residents of our community worried about their hospitals, they are worried about the service they will have after they are released from hospital and are frightened they won't be able to find access to home care when they need it.

The VON lockout has been going on for months down our way and the people are getting very discouraged that the government wouldn't get involved and solve this problem, because these nurses are much needed in our community. They would sooner see the money being spent with the VON and other nursing providers than to paying out a $600,000 settlement for a sex scandal which the government members on the committee are almost forcing the others to go along with.

The other thing is that I never saw so much turmoil in the education system. I've been at a number of meetings recently where nice, good, new schools in communities are on the hit list to be closed. These schools are the backbone of the community. The community uses them for public meetings, they use them for their recreation facilities. It's just going devastate rural Ontario if some of these schools are closed.

I find it very hard because the community has volunteered for many years to get the facilities they have, not only in the school situation but also in the hospital situation. We're ticking off many volunteers in the community who have done so much for us for so many years and I don't like to see that happen in rural Ontario.

I guess why I have a soft spot in my heart for rural Ontario is I've always lived in a rural community. They'll work together, and a perfect example of that is those schools were used in this year's ice storm and they did many great things for the community. I just don't like to see this happen.

I'm pleased to have been able to put those few remarks On the record and I look forward to listening to some of the other speakers.

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Mr Grandmaître: It's never pleasant to talk about time allocation in this House. Every time a time allocation motion is introduced, it simply diminishes democracy. This is the house of democracy. We are supposed to defend the interests of not only the people in our respective ridings, but to respect Ontarians right across this great province.

Mike Harris was elected as a taxfighter, but he never told us how he would do this. Mike Harris has attacked our education system, health system, social services. People are suffering: sick people, disadvantaged people in the province of Ontario, small children living in poverty, and this poverty is forever increasing.

What this government decided, once they were elected, was to find somebody to do their dirty work. Commission after commission, people were appointed to do the dirty work of the government, and that's exactly what they did. But they realized that the commissions weren't exactly doing what they were told when they were first appointed. For instance, in the health care system, "Close hospitals, save dollars and we'll reinvest; it's going to look good," maybe nine, 10 or 12 months before the election. But it's not working out, for the simple reason that people are looking for better-quality services from our hospitals, from our nurses, from our doctors, and they simply don't have the financial resources to do so.

If we continue on this trend - and we were promised that this government would provide us with adequate funding. We're reminded every day in the House, "Yes, but we're spending more today on health care than we did a year ago." As Chair of the public accounts committee, we have a terrible time when we invite ministry after ministry to provide us with accurate figures. It's not only the Liberal Party that's questioning those figures; the Provincial Auditor is questioning those figures. They can run, but they can't hide.

Let's talk about schools. School closures for the last 16 or 18 months have affected not only our children but parents, every parent in the province of Ontario. Again, commission after commission - and I repeat the word "commission," because this is the tool of the government: "Let's appoint a commission or committee and let them do the dirty work." That's exactly what these people were doing. They were saying, "Let's have a list of schools to be closed." I was reading in the Ottawa Citizen today that in my area 16 schools are supposed to close, nine by this coming September, September 1999. School boards are not equipped at the present time to do this dirty work, for the simple reason that they don't have the dollars. It's true that a new funding formula was introduced, but this formula is impoverishing the public system and the separate system. It's as clear as water.

I can't understand this government trying to sell us goods that don't exist. They're saying, "We're consulting." I receive phone call after phone call from parents who were part of this community working group to identify the possibility of closing their schools or somebody else's school, and yet reports are being tabled without even consideration of what the parents have to say.

In social services, the same thing is happening. They've hired this famous consultant, Andersen, for $140 billion - sorry, $140 million. That's a lot of money, but I wouldn't be surprised, coming from this government. In public accounts, we tried to find out from social services how these people were being paid, and I can tell you, we still don't know. They've sent in bills or charges for $28 million, yet they cannot identify the work that was done for $28 million.

They're taking advantage of the have-nots, of poor children, poor families. That was their first piece of legislation in the House: "Let's cut back social services or welfare by 22%." People are living on the street because of this piece of legislation. They have nowhere to go, absolutely nowhere to go, and this government takes pride in saying: "Our tax program is working. We've reduced taxes 66 times. We've reduced the personal income tax by 30%, and everybody is enjoying more money in their pockets. More people are working." But not everybody has a regular or steady job in the province of Ontario.

I want to emphasize who is really suffering. Our children are suffering, and this government will be remembered for their actions of the last two and a half years. I simply cannot accept the way they're advertising their good deeds. They're spending millions of tax dollars, $47 million, to advertise their good deeds, but people in the province of Ontario are smart enough to realize that this is not the case. I'm sure that very shortly the people of Ontario will realize that this government is not doing anybody any favour except their corporate friends.

J'aimerais m'adresser à la Chambre en français pour à peu près trois ou quatre minutes. Je crois que c'est ma responsabilité de m'adresser à la Chambre en français.

J'aimerais vous parler du système de santé en Ontario qui, en ce qui concerne les francophones en Ontario, a été durement affecté dans nos régions. Je dis «nos régions», monsieur le Président, parce que vous faites partie de cette région-là. Nous avons été durement affectés par la possibilité de la fermeture de l'hôpital Montfort, et les gens se sont rassemblés, non seulement les francophones mais les anglophones. Tous les gens qui recevaient des services auprès de l'hôpital Montfort se sont révoltés en avertissant le gouvernement : «Ne fermez jamais Montfort parce que vous allez entendre parler de nous autres.» Je vous rappelle le soir où nous avons rencontré au Centre civique 10 000 personnes qui disaient : «Montfort fermé ? Jamais.» Ne jamais fermer Montfort.

Une décision doit être prise très bientôt : est-ce que Montfort va garder tous les outils nécessaires pour desservir le seul et unique hôpital enseignant en français ? L'Université d'Ottawa est prête, le gouvernement fédéral a dit qu'il est prêt à investir 10 000 $ millions, alors je crois que maintenant l'hôpital Montfort et l'Université d'Ottawa et les gens de l'est de l'Ontario attendent le gouvernement. On veut que le gouvernement fasse partie de ce grand événement.

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Laissez-moi vous dire que cela inquiète tous les gens. On peut dire ce qu'on veut à la communauté francophone, mais nous avons droit à des services de qualité en français et nous allons exiger que ces services-là demeurent avec nous.

A little while ago, while my friend from Scarborough was speaking, the House government whip -

Ms Frances Lankin (Beaches-Woodbine): Chief government whip.

Mr Grandmaître: The chief government whip loves bringing up the Patti Starr scandal, the Patti Starr affair. I want to tell you, Mr Whip, that I am proud that this government was involved with Patti Starr, because Patti Starr built something for seniors, for children and for families. It's much better than your scandal that you're faced with today, spending $600,000 of taxpayers' money to protect your one member. I just want to remind the chief whip that when you talk about scandals of other parties, of other governments, you shouldn't broadcast these things because right now it's a big cover-up and I wouldn't be part of your scandal.

Interjection.

Mr Grandmaître: I would repeat it outside as well. You send me a reporter and I'll repeat this.

I don't have too much time; I'm taking up my colleague's time at present. I want to say that this government will pay the price they deserve to pay in the next election.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Phillips: To continue the debate on the closure motion, I say to the public, what we're dealing with here is, and I use this word advisedly, another bully tactic by the Harris government. This is the third this week. I would just say to the public, what we're dealing with here is a government that refuses to allow the public to participate in the legitimate debate of issues here in the Legislature.

Let me give you a couple of specifics. On Monday we dealt with a huge property tax bill. I might add that it is the seventh property tax bill that Mr Harris has brought in since May of last year. There has never been a public policy issue handled more poorly -

Ms Lankin: Botched.

Mr Phillips: - or more botched than this issue. We were dealing with a huge bill on Monday, and the major people involved in this, the ones who have to make it work - AMO, the Association of Municipalities of Ontario; the Clerks and Treasurers, the senior financial officials; the tax people, the people who are responsible for collecting it; and the financial officials - all said: "Listen, we can make this bill better. Let us come and present to you. Let us come and give suggestions on how to improve it."

What happened? The government shut them out. They wouldn't let them have half an hour to present their views. I can't imagine any democratic government refusing to allow the public, and particularly the organizations and the people who understand this issue - they were completely shut out. They were told they couldn't even appear, that they had no opportunity to make any suggestions on the bill. This is a group that had been begging us to listen to them, but no, the government wouldn't hear them. These are the major people who have to make the bill work, and the government shut them out completely.

I don't for the life of me understand how any of the Conservative backbench can allow that to happen. I guarantee that if any municipal council in Ontario said to the public, "We're going to deal with major issues, but we're not going to let you come and talk about them" - that was on Monday. Minister Cam Jackson and Terence Young and Ted Chudleigh and Gary Carr, the members from Halton, went to Halton council, and the region of Halton and the municipalities in Halton and the four chambers of commerce in Halton were all begging for an amendment to this bill. Cam Jackson said, "Oh, I think it's a good idea," but Halton was not allowed to appear, no government member would present their amendment and they were not listened to in spite of the fact that these are duly elected people who have a good point of view. The community, the four chambers of commerce in Halton and all the municipalities and the region of Halton wanted changes, but no, they couldn't even be heard. It's an affront to democracy that we are allowing ourselves to say, "The government knows best and we won't even hear you, let alone accommodate you." That was on Monday.

Yesterday we were dealing with another bill, the Greater Toronto Services Board bill, and exactly the same thing happened. The government forced a motion through that said: "We are not going to allow a single person from the public to appear and let their views be known. The only thing we are going to deal with is amendments to the bill that have to be in before the bill is even debated." Once again yesterday we had a citizen appear in the Legislature, with obviously important and strong views, but not allowed to speak, and that was the regional chairman of Durham. Mr Anderson was here, a well-regarded municipal politician representing a huge area of Ontario, who is going to be dramatically affected by the Greater Toronto Services Board, and whether the government agrees or disagrees with him, surely he has the right to come and present his views.

Today we're dealing with the third one of what can only be described as the bully tactic of shutting off debate. I know Mike Harris thinks that he and he alone knows what's best for Ontario, and he can't be bothered getting input from the public, but I say it's a dangerous, arrogant approach to democracy when you start to shut out the public from any participation.

Ms Lankin: Mr Speaker, on a point of order: I hate to interrupt the member, but his remarks are very important and I don't believe there is a quorum present to hear them.

The Acting Speaker: Please check if we have a quorum.

Clerk at the Table (Ms Lisa Freedman): A quorum is not present, Speaker.

The Acting Speaker ordered the bells rung.

Clerk at the Table: A quorum is now present, Speaker.

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The Acting Speaker: The member for Scarborough-Agincourt.

Mr Phillips: I once again say that what we're dealing with here is another of what I can only describe as a bully tactic by the Harris government, and that is to cut off debate. This is the third straight day that we've been dealing with similar motions.

The property tax bill on Monday, where we wouldn't allow a single group or individual to come and present - and believe me, the groups that wanted to present are ones we should be listening to, ones that could improve the bill, but no, we wouldn't listen to them.

Then the Greater Toronto Services Board: The regional chair of Durham, whose regional council has views on this, said yesterday, "There is not a municipal government in the province that could ever get away with this." The public would storm the doors and say, "I'm not going to allow you to make these decisions without listening to the public." But no, Mike Harris thinks he can get away with it.

Today we're dealing with a third one. The public should realize that once this motion passes, in the language of the motion itself, there will be no further debate or amendments; there will be no deferral of the second vote permitted, so you have to call a second vote; then, it says here, "the order for third reading may then immediately be called," and there will be two hours' debate on third reading and then it's the law.

Surely we haven't come to this in Ontario, where people no longer have an input into the bill. I would say, just so the public is aware of the significance of the bill we're dealing with, among the components in Bill 81 is a bill that will establish a brand new tax, a brand new tax that never existed before, and it will raise $1.5 billion. It is a tax designed to recover a lot of revenue that had been raised back to 1950 that the courts ruled was being collected illegally. So it is a $1.5 billion tax; a brand new tax, never before; it's retroactive to 1950; and it incorporates rates on estates, taxes on estates, that Mike Harris, when he was in opposition, found unacceptable. When the Rae government brought them in in the form of probate fees, Mike Harris thought it was unacceptable. Now we're dealing with a bill that will raise $1.5 billion, that will put in law, in a tax, a level of taxation that Mike Harris found unacceptable.

The reason this is so important is that the public should be aware that $5.5 billion of your property taxes now are set by Mike Harris. For the first time in the history of Ontario, property taxes are being set and collected on behalf of the province on Ontario. Never before - it has just started now. Over half of all the property taxes now are set by Mike Harris, property taxes raised on Mike Harris's instructions, and, I would add, we never get a chance to debate that here in the Legislature. It is set by something called regulation. It's set behind closed doors in the cabinet room - $5.5 billion.

The reason that issue is so important is that the Supreme Court of Canada said it is illegal to raise fees or taxes by regulation. You have to set taxes in the Legislature. Yet we are now setting $5.5 billion of taxation by regulation. In my opinion, the courts may very well rule that the province is acting illegally. If they follow the example under the probate fees, which is the issue we're dealing with here in Bill 81, a brand new Mike Harris estate tax of $1.5 billion, the Supreme Court could very well rule that it is just as illegal to set taxation by regulation. Essentially, it's setting taxation without representation. It is setting taxation not through a Legislature or a duly elected body but by a cabinet, by fiat. But the debate has been cut off on that issue. When this motion is called and the government brings down the guillotine, the debate's over.

A second major part of this bill deals with ambulances. It is part of a downloading of costs off the province on to property taxes. One of the reasons our municipalities are having so much difficulty is because - this is a government document - the government has loaded about $660 million of new costs on to the municipalities. One of the issues we're dealing with here is loading ambulance costs on to property taxes. Does that make sense? Let's look at what Dave Crombie and the Who Does What panel said.

Remember - and the public, I suspect, is aware of this - that about two years ago Mike Harris went out and hand-picked 14 people to form what he called the Who Does What panel. What he said was, "You tell me what things should be funded and managed by the province and what things should be funded and managed by the municipalities on property taxes." They went through a lot of work, spent a fair bit of money doing it, came up with their Who Does What recommendations and presented them to the government. Then, guess what? Mike Harris ignored it.

What did Dave Crombie and the Who Does What panel say about putting ambulance costs on to property taxes? They said, "If you do that, you undo much of the work accomplished by our disentanglement proposals, by moving health and welfare back to the property tax, putting ambulances on property tax." Here's what Crombie and the Who Does What panel said - remember, all of these picked by Mike Harris personally to give him advice, give us advice, give the province advice: "The panel strongly opposes such a move. We're unanimous in the view that it's wrong." This bill puts ambulances on to property taxes. Crombie said it's wrong, the Who Does What panel unanimously, all 14 of them hand-picked by Harris, said it's wrong, but that's what this bill does.

I would add that at a time when we are trying to make our health care system, to use the jargon, seamless, so it's a completely integrated system, it doesn't make sense to be fragmenting it and putting ambulances on to the municipal government when we're trying to pull this whole thing together. But that's what this bill does.

This is part of the budget bill. I always find the government documents interesting. I use the numbers out of them so no one can accuse anybody of having our own numbers. This is straight out of the Mike Harris 1999 Economic Outlook presented just a few weeks ago. What it shows here, and the public may want to get a copy of this, is that since Mike Harris became Premier the debt of the province has gone up by $22 billion. Remember, it took the first 125 years of the province to reach that debt. The average family now owes $6,000 more in provincial debt than when Mike Harris became Premier. So Mike Harris became Premier and now the average family owes $6,000 more.

Put in that way - and families understand this because they all pay mortgages, they pay loans, they pay their credit cards - now they realize, "Holy cow, you mean Mike Harris has run up $6,000 more debt on my behalf?" Remember, when you pay the interest, each family each year is already paying probably about $500 interest on that new debt. So I say to people, OK, you got the tax cut - for the average family it's about $500 - but how was that funded? Mike Harris went out and borrowed the money. You now owe to the provincial government $6,000 more per family, and you're paying about $500 a year more in taxes to pay the interest on it. Of course if you're making a substantial amount of money, you're further ahead, because the tax cut more than made up for that. But for the average family, they're paying that increased interest cost just to cover the increase in the debt.

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These are the figures. You can look at them. The per capita debt has gone from $8,181 to $9,624 since Mike Harris became Premier. Per capita it's up $1,500 and the average family is four, so every family in the province now owes $6,000 more. I always say to my friends: "Mike gave you this tax cut, yes, but where did he get the money? You know he's taken the debt up $22 billion. We've had to borrow every penny to fund that tax cut." So that is where the money came from for the tax cut. That's a part of this budget bill that I think is important.

In terms of the government's priorities of where it spends its money, the public now understands that when it comes to spending money on himself, Mike Harris has no problem. He has now spent $50 million on advertising promoting himself. That's all taxpayer money, every penny of it, hard-earned taxpayer dollars, $50 million designed specifically and exclusively to get Mike Harris re-elected. And it goes on.

It seems that every week - in fact, I think it is every week - we see something new from Mike Harris about spending money on himself to get himself re-elected. I might add that the $600,000 that was spent by his three cabinet colleagues and one of his parliamentary assistants to get rid of a messy sexual harassment case that could have been very embarrassing for the government - when he spent $600,000 of taxpayer money, against the advice of the legal people who were hired to give the Legislature advice on it, I think people are now beginning to see that there's a rule for Mike when he's dealing with himself and there's a rule for Mike when he's dealing with people on social assistance or hospitals he's closing. He has no hesitation in cutting that and he has no hesitation in spending the money on himself. The money that's being spent on advertising is blatant, obvious and clear, and there's no end to it. I see no shame in him in what he's doing.

We are being cut off from debating this bill, the tax bill. The guillotine will come down. We now have probably less than three hours to debate it. This is the third time this week we have been dealing with a similar tactic.

To the public, when you begin to try and understand the Harris government, you now can see what he's all about: cut off debate, bully the opposition and bully the public to get something through. The people who have found that most recently are senior municipal officials and elected people who begged us to be able to come down here and let their views be known. They would say: "Listen, if after our views are known you still want to do it, then at least democracy has been served. We've had our input and you have had a duly constituted forum for us to participate."

Yesterday I found it really strange that, among others, the regional chair of Durham was down here because the issue was extremely important for his region, and no opportunity for input or debate. Here we are on a major bill, dealing with a $1.5-billion, brand new tax on estates, dealing with land ambulances, dealing with setting up the community small business investment corporation - several extremely important matters, but no opportunity for any further debate. As a matter of fact, this bill will be dealt with and completed probably in another three hours.

So we see that.

We see that Mike Harris, when it comes to spending taxpayers' dollars on himself, has no shame - $50 million and counting every week. That's $1 million a week being spent shamelessly on the Mike Harris re-election campaign. We find they're quite prepared to spend $600,000 to get rid of a messy situation that the best legal opinions say we shouldn't be doing, that we shouldn't be spending that taxpayer money.

I say to the public that as you watch this debate it may seem that it's an argument around rules, but it's really a fundamental debate around the way this government works and around the way they shut off debate and shut off those who have a different view. It's wrong and it's an affront, in my opinion, to normal democratic procedures.

Mr Tony Silipo (Dovercourt): I rise to join in this debate on the time allocation motion on Bill 81, and wish to inform you that I'll be sharing my time with the members for Ottawa West, Sudbury East and Beaches-Woodbine.

I want to say at the outset that this is becoming more and more the norm with the Harris government, that we see ourselves in the situation where we have time allocation motions to limit discussion of bills in this House. Over the last couple of weeks we have seen this practice be used more and more. I expect that in the remaining week and a half that we have in the sittings of this House - or less than that; from now till next Thursday - we will probably see a couple more of these motions come in, because the government finds itself in the situation where, on the last list we looked at, it has 17, perhaps 20 bills that they still claim they want to push through and get through before the Christmas recess. Every time we ask them, "Which ones do you want to pass, what are your priorities?" we just get the whole list. The reality is that you can't pass all those bills in the time that's left.

I don't know whether what we're seeing at this stage of the game is more a question of incompetence or is just the continuing arrogance of the government, perhaps it's both, in their thinking that they can simply continue to steamroll, regardless of what the rules of this place say, and get every bit done as quickly as possible and blame everybody else when we can't get those things done.

We had an example here last night in the discussion that took place on a very important piece of legislation with respect to the social work act. It is a very important piece of legislation that we in the New Democratic Party support, but again there is an assumption on the government's part that this is just something that can be done in a couple of hours without any serious discussion or debate, without any ability to examine in committee the implications of some of the provisions in the bill.

It's an affront to the parliamentary process and the way in which decisions have to be made and should be made that this government continues to behave in this way, particularly when you look at the history of their behaviour and the consequences of their acting in this kind of haphazard way. We have seen bill after bill that has gone through in this manner and then had to be corrected in subsequent legislation or in subsequent actions of the government.

We were dealing, for example, on Monday of this week in committee with the property tax bill, the last in a series of bills that this government has put forward to try to rectify the whole property tax mess that they unleashed upon -

Ms Lankin: On a point of order, Speaker: I hate to interrupt, but once again there's no quorum.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Quorum call.

Clerk at the Table: A quorum is not present, Speaker.

The Speaker ordered the bells rung.

Clerk at the Table: A quorum is now present, Speaker.

The Speaker: Member for Dovercourt.

Interjection: Saved the government again.

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Mr Silipo: With a minute and 40 seconds left on the clock, I'd say that probably would be true.

I was commenting on how we have come to see this approach, this tactic, if you will, of time allocation and this haphazard way of managing the public agenda used all too often by the Harris government.

The latest example is this one, but the example I was referring to was on Monday, when we were dealing with the latest version of the property tax bill, I think bill number seven or bill number eight, depending on whether you count one of the others; in any event, the last of a series of bills by the Harris government trying to rectify the property tax fiasco they unleashed upon this province, a fiasco which resulted in many small businesses reaching the verge of going out of business before the government was brought to the point of acknowledging that it was their new assessment scheme, their changes to the property tax system, that was going to put many small businesses in danger of closing. As a result of that, they finally acceded to some changes that needed to be made to try to patch up the situation.

What we have now, in the last of a series of changes, is a hodgepodge of choices that are being put on to the municipal level of government. At this very late point in the year, they will have to deal with whether they want to implement those changes and provide the 10%, 5% and 5% caps in the 1998 year by making decisions in the remaining days of 1998, or attach them to the 1999 interim tax bill, all of which is causing a lot of consternation out there, a lot of confusion and a lot of hard feelings, and understandably so. You now have the added situation where those people who thought that under the new scheme they were actually getting some decrease are now going to find part of that, or in some cases a lot of that, being taken back.

All of this to say that this is another classic example of how the government in their rush to do things make some very serious mistakes, mistakes that are not just the kind of normal legislative oversights, but mistakes that lead to some pretty severe consequences out there, this from the government that is supposed to know how to manage the public agenda, from the government that wants to portray itself as being competent, as knowing how to handle taxpayers' monies and the legislative agenda.

They have demonstrated time after time after time that they fail on both of those scores, certainly in the way in which they handle the legislative agenda around here. As I say, I don't know whether I should be more critical of them because of their continuing arrogance or just their sheer incompetence in how they deal with this issue. But we see, with less than a week and a half left in the sittings, the government continuing to say, "Here are all these bills we want to get through. We have to get them through," many of them bills that have only been recently introduced.

One can ask and one should ask and we do ask the question, where were all these bills early on in the session if they were so important? This time allocation deals with Bill 81. It's a budget bill that has in it a number of measures that come out of the budget. The budget was presented last spring. There is no excuse for the government to have delayed up until the last couple of weeks of the legislative sitting the introduction of this piece of legislation and now to purport that this has to be done in this way, when earlier in the session they were pushing forward other legislation that then, lo and behold, we have yet to see the sight of.

At the beginning of the session, whatever happened to that other piece of legislation? The Greater Toronto Services Board was a big piece of legislation, it was an important piece of legislation, the government said. Then for two months we heard nothing about it. Then the last two weeks of the sittings, all of a sudden the fire gets set under the feet of the Minister of Municipal Affairs and that bill is a priority once again. Then we have to rush it through committee so, just like the property tax bill, it gets out to committee with no hearings whatsoever, no opportunity by anyone to come forward and give us their advice on the legislation. That piece was rammed through in a day of committee clause-by-clause, as was the property tax bill.

I have no doubt that on the property tax file, perhaps on the Greater Toronto Services Board, who knows how many other pieces of legislation, those kinds of mistakes are going to continue to come back to haunt the government. Those kinds of mistakes are going to continue to be reflected, and we will see them as the legislation unfolds and is implemented, because that is one of the consequences when the government continues to act in this fashion of believing that they know everything, they know best above all others and beyond any advice that anybody else can give them. Forget the opposition. I'm talking about the people who are out there - municipal politicians, municipal bureaucrats, who have to implement a lot of this legislation - the people who have to live with the consequences of these things. They are out there saying to the government, "This is not the way to do things."

We look particularly and specifically at this piece of legislation. One of the parts of it is dealing directly with the issue of the changes to the Teachers' Pension Act that are supposed to reflect an agreement reached between the government and the Ontario Teachers' Federation.

There is a partnership arrangement that I was happy to see we were part of establishing when we were the government in terms of the administration and the overseeing of the teachers' pension plan. Recently there were some changes made to that that were agreed upon by the two partners, the teachers' representatives and the government representatives, on how to deal with the unfunded liability, to take some of the surplus and use some of it to pay towards the unfunded liability and some to pay for early retirement incentives for teachers who wanted to leave the teaching service earlier than they might otherwise have been able to do with their pensions. This part of the bill purports to reflect those changes to the agreement inside the legislation.

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But what do we find instead? We find that the Ontario Teachers' Federation, one of the partners in this agreement, was only briefly consulted prior to the introduction of this legislation. They were only given a short period of time to look at the paper which had the changes on it, were not able to take that away with them, so they were not able to give any more than a surface reaction to the legislation. Their first opportunity to actually take a look at the legislation was after this bill received first reading on November 23. Here we are, a couple of weeks later, and their advice to us and their request to us is, "Please do not proceed with this part of the bill." Yet if the government persists, as they will, I suspect, with this time allocation motion, that request by the Ontario Teachers' Federation will go unheeded.

Who knows what will happen down the line? Perhaps the government will have to come to the realization in this bill and in this part of the bill, as they have on other bills, that by not listening to that advice and not taking that request seriously, they will actually have put into this legislation, as the Ontario Teachers' Federation fears, some changes that do not reflect properly the agreement that was reached and in some cases go beyond the provisions of that agreement. Here the Ontario Teachers' Federation is asking that this part of the bill -

Mr Toni Skarica (Wentworth North): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I ask for unanimous consent that tomorrow in question period the Liberals don't get any questions.

The Speaker: Unanimous consent that tomorrow during question period the Liberals don't get any questions. Agreed? No? OK.

Mr Silipo: I know there are rules in this place that deal with commenting on the presence of members in this place. That was a nice try around that, I think. But I want it on the record that I did not agree to that request.

The Speaker: I didn't hear you, actually, member for Dovercourt. I heard the member for Beaches-Woodbine.

Ms Lankin: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I hope that every time someone says no in this House to a unanimous request that you will take it upon yourself to point out which member said no. It's an important contribution to the record.

The Speaker: I will do so every time someone tries to take credit for saying no when they didn't.

Mr Silipo: Here we have an example in this legislation of a major change that is being made that will affect the Teachers' Pension Act. That group of people, as one of the partners in this agreement, is saying, "Do not proceed with this; sever these parts from the bill," and the government is simply not listening. They also make the point that, by severing these pieces from the legislation, you would not be delaying the implementation of the agreement, because there isn't the timeliness in having to put those changes into legislation; it could be done at a later point.

Yet the government on this, as on many other requests from all sorts of groups and individuals across this province, is simply refusing to take that advice, simply refusing to heed those kinds of requests that are coming from group after group saying: "Do not make these kinds of changes in this kind of a rushed way. It will not lead to good legislation, it is not the way to make good public policy decisions, and we will probably all have to deal with the consequences of those through further legislation."

I could go on for some time but I just want to make a couple of other comments. When we look at the legislation in front of us, we continue to see, as I mentioned, examples of how the government deals with this. Today we saw introduced another bill on which I suspect, if the government is going to be intent on proceeding with it in the next six legislative days, they are going to probably have to resort to this type of motion they are using here today. That was An Act to authorize the payment of certain amounts for the Public Service for the fiscal year ending on March 31, 1999. This is the supplementary estimates bill.

The reason I refer to that is because I was interested to see that bill presented today and to note within it that among the ministries listed is one which is not a ministry, that is, the Office of the Assembly, and that the supplementary estimates that are being requested there of just under $104,000 will be part, I'm sure, of that discussion. I will be interested to see what will happen as we go through this discussion and as we deal with that issue in the context of the discussion that we were trying to have through question period today around how this government believes public funds should be spent.

The Al McLean situation will not go away, I want to say to the government. It is a very bad decision for the government representatives on the Board of Internal Economy to have made. It is a decision that I have no doubt was driven by the Premier and the Premier's office in terms of direction being given. I could not fathom something as significant as that not having been given that kind of direction, despite what the Premier might choose to say in this House or outside this House. I believe very seriously that the government will find that they have made not just a bad public policy decision but a very bad political judgment in making that decision. In persisting to the extent they continue to persist in trying to defend that decision, they will also discover it is something that will come back to haunt them.

The public of Ontario will not accept the expenditure of public funds to settle that kind of issue, particularly from a government that tries to paint itself as the defender of the public purse and as the party that knows how to spend public monies. In this case, they are showing not only their incompetence in bringing forward this piece of legislation but the continuing arrogance that seems to be more and more the norm with this government.

I suspect the reason at the front of the list as to why the government wants to rush all of this legislation through has more to do with the fact that when we break at the end of next week, we may not likely be called back as a Legislative Assembly, except perhaps for a very brief time for the reading of the next budget and perhaps a new throne speech - who knows? - and then we will all be going to the polls; and I want to say to the government members, not a moment too soon.

Mr Marcel Beaubien (Lambton): Are you betting on this, Tony?

Mr Silipo: Yes, I would put a small wager on that in the realms of the possible and the legal. I would be happy to do that. A good espresso or a good cappuccino would be about the limit that I would go, but I would say to any honourable member who wishes that in fact that's my belief. I don't think the government is intent on proceeding to have this Legislature come back in any serious way to do any more serious work, so they are scrambling now at the last moment trying to figure out what are the things they really want to get done and what are the things they can just forget about.

When they talk to people out there and when groups out there are concerned about what is going to be happening, then I want to say to the government members, and I want to say to those groups out there particularly, that they need to keep that in mind. The government is the group and the body that decides, and at the end of the day has the ultimate authority, even at this late stage in the game, as to what bills they want to get passed. It is not up to us in the opposition to determine which bills will get passed and which bills will not get passed. It is the duty and lies within the power of the government to do that, and I suspect they will continue to use this kind of closure motion where they actually believe they want to get some things done.

That's not to say that there may not be some bills on which we can agree between now and the end of the session, that we do want to get passed and can get passed, but our basic premise is that on important pieces of legislation we need to ensure that there is adequate debate not just by the legislators but indeed by the public, where that is warranted. We have seen far too many examples where the government has refused to do that, and we have all seen the consequences of their refusal, the consequences being bad legislation, bad policy decisions, which have had to then come back and be corrected in subsequent legislation.

We continue to take our role as one of the opposition parties quite seriously in this and we say to the government that we will continue to do that. We will continue to oppose these types of tactics, and these types of motions particularly, because we think they are unnecessary, unwarranted and are an infringement upon the whole democratic process and debate we should have in this place.

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Mr Cullen: I'm pleased to follow on the remarks of the member for Dovercourt with respect to the motion we have before us today. We did hear an awful lot from the government side during their hour - not their whole hour, because they didn't use their time - extolling the virtues of Bill 81, which is a bill to implement provisions that were announced in the 1998 budget last May.

When we have measures introduced in a budget seven months ago and then we find ourselves dealing with a bill that was just tabled in this House little more than two weeks ago, and then find that the government has to come in with a time allocation motion that basically shortens the ability to debate the bill, which contains a large number of important provisions - and we heard the member for Dovercourt talk about some of the parties that would like to come before a committee to explain their concerns about different aspects of the bill, and how they are being denied this - then you have to wonder just how serious the government is in terms of consulting with affected groups when it deals with its budget provisions.

We're dealing with a government that has now exceeded previous governments in terms of the use of time allocation. This is a process by which debate is shortened. The time spent at committee is either shortened or eliminated entirely. The motion before us today would not have this important bill going to committee whatsoever and it would come to this House with only two hours of debate at third reading.

The point is that we have developed, over centuries of precedent, a legislative process that allows for due consideration of any piece of legislation. It's there for the protection not only of the government and of the process but of the taxpayer, because we're all human and mistakes are made. Indeed, we see in terms of the property tax bills that have been introduced by this government that time and time again - we're now on our seventh bill - important initiatives such as property tax reform have to be changed, have to be amended, have to be fixed, deadlines have to be extended. That chews up time in this Legislature.

Had these bills been allowed to go to committee for full consideration, so that the parties who are most affected, particularly those who have to implement the legislation, could come forward and allow the government to perfect their bill so they could do a better job on behalf of the taxpayer, then we would find ourselves with (1) fewer pieces of amending legislation than we found on the property tax side, and (2) better use of our time here in this House. Instead, today we find ourselves with about six days of debate time left - actually 12 sessional days but six calendar days - to deal with the government's legislative agenda, seeing that we're going to rise on December 17, yet we find ourselves without the proper process to deal with these important bills. It's wrong. It's simply wrong. It leads to bad government, and the proof is there with the record of the government, not only in terms of property tax but other bills as well.

The member for Dovercourt did touch on the desire of the teachers to deal with a particular aspect of the bill, which is part XI. These are amendments that are coming forward to the Teachers' Pension Act. As the member for Dovercourt said, the teachers have asked to be severed so they can go to committee and give their concerns about the wording and the implications of the act and the amendments to their own pension plan. This has been denied to them. It's very unfortunate because, dollars to donuts, we will find ourselves trying to catch up downstream and correct the errors that have been made. Why should we pass a piece of legislation that downstream is going to force another amending piece of legislation to come forward and take up time as well? This is not good government.

The member for Dovercourt did an excellent job explaining the concerns that are being raised, legitimate concerns that should be addressed through the regular legislative process that is now being denied by virtue of the motion that's before us today.

We have the motion before us today. We go through this process for a good reason. The government comes in with a motion to allocate time, to shut down debate, to determine what happens at committee, if indeed it goes to committee, and to determine what happens at third reading. We have this motion so that the government can justify why it's going outside the normal legislative process. So they table a motion and we have it before us today. What do we hear from the government side? They use the time as an advertisement for their initiatives but they don't justify why all of a sudden now it's a must bill, why now they must shorten the process.

We're left here on the opposition side reminding the government that it was their budget that they tabled back in May, seven months ago, and it's their government that chose to wait until November 23 to table this bill that they're calling for time allocation on. This bill contains some 12 particular amendments dealing with the Ambulance Act, the Community Small Business Investment Funds Act, the Corporations Tax Act, the Employer Health Tax Act, the Estate Administration Tax Act, the Income Tax Act, the Land Transfer Tax Act, the Ontario Lottery Corporation Act, the Pension Benefits Act, the Retail Sales Tax Act, the Teachers' Pension Act and the Tobacco Tax Act.

A budget that comes forward in May which details initiatives the government's going to go forward with, you'd think they would have done some of their homework on this. They wait seven months, they bring it in November 23, and then they say, "We want it done as fast as possible; no committee, no hearings whatsoever."

I alluded to the member for Dovercourt's comments with respect to teachers, but I'll just go to the first part of the bill. The first part of the bill deals with the Ambulance Act. This is part of downloading on to municipalities, on to the local property taxpayer, the responsibility for providing land ambulance services. So what does this bill try to do? This bill allows the minister to say, "It may go to the county, it may go to the regional government and the taxpayers, or it may go elsewhere; a private delivery agent may be designated for the purpose of delivering this service."

Wait a sec. Here the property taxpayers are going to be paying the bill. You would think, therefore, that the regions and the counties that represent those property taxpayers would want to come forward and be able to say something about this power that's being given to the minister to say, "You, property taxpayer," whether it's the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton or any of the other counties or what have you, "pay the bill but you will not have the ability to hold your local government accountable for what's their responsibility to fund."

Does this make sense? We know already the regions and counties are saying, "If you're going to give us the ambulances, please give us the dispatch system to allocate where these ambulances should go."

In Ottawa-Carleton we have 911 and we would like to have, if we're going to have the responsibility for delivering the service, the ability to provide dispatch, because we have a 911 service that does fire, that does police. We should therefore have that responsibility to dispatch ambulances. But oh no, they won't do that.

Why, therefore, is the government hanging on to dispatch? It's not doing a good job in Ottawa-Carleton. The Minister of Health is in her place and she knows that the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton has done an audit under the auspices of the Ministry of Health of the delivery of this ambulance service and she knows that they're failing to meet the requirements of the legislation. The legislation says that ambulances by law should be able to provide service 90% of the time within nine minutes in the urban area and she knows that in Ottawa-Carleton they fail that by four and a half minutes. It's 13½ minutes. This is absolutely objectionable. This is wrong.

Here's an opportunity for the taxpayers in Ottawa-Carleton to make sure that the standard is being met through the regional municipality, but oh no, the Ministry of Health, for some reason, is not willing to give over dispatch to provide for an integrated system within Ottawa-Carleton. We are on the leading edge in terms of providing paramedic services. You would think this would be a natural fit. There would certainly be more efficiency in government and more efficiency and accountability to the local taxpayer, who, at the end of the day, is still paying for the full shot, even though the minister is saying: "We'll look after dispatch. We're not doing a great job, we have to acknowledge that, but you're going to pay for it." It doesn't make sense.

You would think that this bill would go to committee and therefore the government and the representatives of Ottawa-Carleton would be able to come forward and they would be able to make their pitch and say, "Look, here's a cheaper, better, faster way of doing it." Isn't this the whole purpose of downloading: cheaper, faster, more efficient, better? Lord knows it's not revenue-neutral. That's the whole point, we would have thought. But oh no, this government is not allowing for the natural democratic process to go through so that this bill could be perfected and do a better job.

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What I can ask, therefore, is why are we finding ourselves in this box? Why is the government finding itself in this box that it has a budget back in May where the Minister of Finance, on behalf of his colleague the Ministry of Health, announces that there are going to be these changes, and yet seven months later we don't have the ability to go through the democratic process, through proper consultation to allow those representatives from the regional governments or county governments to come forward and say, "Minister, this is a better way of doing it"?

Why weren't we at committee in September? Why weren't we at committee in October? What was the problem with the government on this? This is, what, the 26th time allocation motion?

The member for Dovercourt hit the nail right on the head when he talked about the remaining legislative agenda for this government. We have about 25, 26, soon to be 30 government bills, plus 50 private members' bills which members opposite as well as members on this side want to see go through, and yet we're being told we're going to rise on December 17 and the House calendar will not bring us back until March 22.

It is mind-boggling that we have so much responsibility, so many pieces of legislation that have to go through, and this bill is only one of many. We have Bill 61, which has been time allocated as well, which deals with the extension of the property tax deadlines for appeals of property taxes as a result of reassessments of properties. It hasn't passed yet. After all, the current legislation says that if you haven't appealed by September 30 for this tax year, you're toast, but Bill 61 has yet to be passed.

Then we have Bill 79, which extends that yet again and tries to fix up the property tax mess yet again. That's being time allocated and has to go through. Indeed there's even a provision in that bill that says look, if we don't get it done in 1998 - because we're at December 9. In approximately 22 days the property tax year ends and where are we at? Bill 79 will say if you don't get it fixed by this year, you can carry it over into the next property tax year. That's just a lovely gift to give to municipalities and their taxpayers in terms of trying to deal with this horrendous property tax mess that the government has brought in. But the government is simply not committed to following due process in dealing with these important bills that affect the lives of ordinary Ontarians.

Speaking about the lives of ordinary Ontarians, in the time that I have allotted to me I have to remark upon part VI of the bill which the government proudly crows as being one of their shining jewels. That deals with the amendments to the Income Tax Act, their vaunted income tax cuts.

As we heard earlier, the famous Harris income tax scheme where we've seen cuts or reductions to income taxes benefiting - 25% of the benefit of this goes to the top 6% of the population. That is those individuals earning $80,000 or more. These are taxable incomes of $80,000 or more. This is not the average Ontarian whatsoever. We know that the cost of this to the treasury of Ontario is $22 billion over the term of this government to date. We're not talking about going on to June 2000, which is the end of the mandate of this government, but we're talking about to date, three and a half years, it has cost the treasury of Ontario $22 billion. If we hadn't had this income tax reduction scheme, then we would be in a balanced budget position today and not finding ourselves in a situation where we're closing hospitals and closing schools in our communities. Face it.

In my community, we are seeing the prospect of the closure of the Grace hospital. The Grace hospital, a Salvation Army institution, the most effective and efficient institution in Ottawa-Carleton. The fellow who runs it, who is a major in the Salvation Army, earns only $40,000. Compare that to any of your other hospitals and your six-figure hospital executives. But they're going to close the Salvation Army hospital, they're going to close the Riverside Hospital. They're taking the Ottawa Civic, which has a world-class reputation for heart and tertiary care, and are going to downsize that and transfer some of those services over to the Ottawa General. They're downsizing the Elisabeth Bruyère and downsizing the only teaching French-language hospital in Ontario, the Montfort.

At the same time, we're seeing six francophone schools on the hit list to be closed in Ottawa-Carleton. We're seeing another 18 schools on the list for the separate school board, and another 20 schools, coming down in two parts, on the hit list in Ottawa-Carleton for the public board, and none of these schools is being closed for the reasons of program. These are schools built by the taxpayers, serving taxpayers' needs. If they don't have all their classrooms filled with students taking classes, the remaining space is being used either for adult education or for child care or for community uses. The local taxpayer is getting benefit of that facility. There is no program reason to close these schools.

What's happening in Ottawa-Carleton is that communities are going up in flames with the notion that these schools may be closed and may be transferred to the Ontario Realty Corp, a crown corporation run by this government - actually, contracted out by this government, by the way, to the private sector - who will then flip it for development and that community resource will be lost. We're not just talking about the gym or the meeting rooms or the classrooms; we're talking about that playground as well being lost to the community forever because once it's developed it's gone.

This is a major problem in my community, yet we find ourselves in this situation because the government in this bill, on which it is now forcing a time allocation motion, is insisting on pursuing yet another tax cut which keeps us in deficit. Therefore, to bring us into a balanced situation, the government must seek to withdraw more funds from health care, more funds from education, more funds from community services. As a matter of fact, as the member for London Centre has said on earlier occasions, we find ourselves with a government that insists on spending over $50 million now, I believe, on self-promotion, more money than what it funds for women's shelters in Ontario, and that is a shame.

I have in my community women who have left abusive homes, who are in shelters trying to get into a housing situation they can afford so they can go out and get a job and look after their children, their children's health, their children's future, yet they can't get that kind of housing, because the waiting list for socially assisted housing in my community is five years: 14,000 people are waiting for affordable housing in Ottawa-Carleton so they can get ahead with their lives.

What does that mean when they can't? Obviously, they are paying far more than they can afford and are living in substandard arrangements with their children. What happens in terms of the living conditions of their children? They can't afford to properly look after their children's health. They can't afford to look after their own future, and they're finding themselves in substandard situations where their children are trying to learn, trying to live, trying to grow and it's going to cost us all.

We know that a dollar invested in early childhood intervention saves the taxpayers $5 downstream: $5 in re-education, in retraining, in housing, in assistance and in crime. This is all documented. In fact, the Minister of Community and Social Services, when she's out of this House, even speaks to that. It's wrong, simply wrong.

We find ourselves dealing with a bill that contains a number of attributes that are important and deserve discussion. This bill deserves perfection, but because of the incompetence of this government, they bring it in less than a month before the end of the sitting of this House for this session. We are going to rise on December 17, so it forces this bill to go through without proper hearings, despite the fact that we know that municipalities and the property taxpayers would like to address some aspects, despite the fact that teachers would like to address some aspects. We on this side of the House know that these income tax provisions are wrong, simply wrong, and we have a plan to deal with that so it meets the community needs in terms of health care, in terms of education.

At this juncture, I'm going to cede my time to other members of our caucus who wish to address this important issue.

1730

The Speaker: Further debate?

Ms Shelley Martel (Sudbury East): I would like to begin this debate, actually, by asking you if we have a quorum in the House.

The Speaker: Is there a quorum in the House?

Clerk Assistant: A quorum is not present, Speaker.

The Speaker ordered the bells rung.

Clerk Assistant: A quorum is now present, Speaker.

The Speaker: Member for Sudbury East.

Ms Martel: In beginning this debate, I want to go back to a note I made on Monday when we were in this Legislature, at that point dealing on the closure motion for Bill 79. If it's Monday, then it must be government closure motion day, because Monday past was the third Monday in a row when this Legislature has been sitting that we have been dealing with yet another government attempt to shut down debate, to stifle any comment made by the opposition on government bills, to in effect shut down our ability to be here and to advocate on behalf of our constituents.

Now it's Wednesday, and I was in the House last Wednesday. I think that if I check the record again I will find that last Wednesday we had a closure motion as well, and here we are again this Wednesday dealing with a closure motion. So I guess the routine that is becoming quite commonplace around here is that if it's Monday or Wednesday, those two days of the week, any week the House is sitting, you can expect that the government is going to be using its jackboot tactics to yet again drive through another closure motion. By the time we're finished, it will probably be Monday night and Wednesday night too, if the government could have its way, any week that the Legislature is in session.

The point of all of this is that the government finds itself in a position yet again that it cannot competently order its business and has no choice but to use a tactic to shut down any further debate to try and get its legislation through. We are now in the position, under the Harris government, of this government now having moved more closure motions than any other government.

Hon Mr Turnbull: Shelley, how many times did you use time allocation?

Ms Martel: I know that is a record that the chief government whip will be proud of. His government has now moved more time allocation motions, more closure motions, more motions to shut down legitimate debate than any other government. I'm sure that is a record he is proud of.

What it speaks to, and perhaps the chief government whip won't be so proud of this, is a government that cannot, despite its huge majority, order its business, get its business done, get its business through this Legislature. This is a government that, because it has had to use so many time allocation motions, makes it very clear to the public that it just can't get its work done. This is the same government that has also moved rules in this place which severely curtail the ability of members in this House to even participate in debate in the first case.

You will know, Mr Speaker, because you were one who would speak in opposition about rule changes, that it was this government that moved to a rule change which allows for one hour of debate from the leadoff speaker on any particular piece of legislation and then, in the second rotation, moves to 20 minutes, and then after four or five hours of debate moves down to 10.

The government has tried, in using a mechanism to limit the participation of individual members, to limit overall debate. Even so, despite having moved that, despite having very openly moved to cut down the ability, the time that members have to speak in this place, the government still can't get its business done. The government still finds itself in the position of now having the record of being the government in this province that has moved the most closure motions. Isn't that a record to be proud of?

Being here again today, on a Wednesday, with another time allocation or closure motion, speaks to the problem the government has not only in ordering its business but in ensuring that the business it puts forward to this House is business and pieces of legislation where thorough work has been done and where they're not going to get caught having to introduce another bill and another bill and another bill, all to fix the mistakes of the ones that came before.

This government has had a very serious problem trying to put together pieces of legislation, because they're always in such a hurry because they're downloading something to someone or trying to take away someone else's rights. This government has faced a very serious problem in cobbling together legislation that proves again and again, because we've seen it happen in this House, that they've got to go back and introduce another piece of legislation to fix the first one because they made such a mess because they were in a hurry and they didn't want to listen to anyone.

On Monday, we dealt with a closure motion for Bill 79. You know that Bill 79 is the seventh in a line of bills to allegedly amend the property tax system in Ontario. Beginning in January 1997, the government started, in a big hurry, to try to move down the road to allegedly reform the property tax system in the province.

From the beginning, from the first bill, this government was told, not only by opposition party members but by the Association of Municipal Clerks and Treasurers of Ontario, by municipal leaders, be they reeves or mayors or regional chairs, this government was told by any number of people that the way they were proceeding with respect to trying to allegedly reform the property tax system was not going to work, that the legislation was terribly complicated, that in practice it would not work. This came, when you think about the Association of Municipal Clerks and Treasurers of Ontario, particularly from people who deal with this kind of thing every day, who surely have more expertise than almost any of us who sit in this place, because it's part of what they do every day, day in, day out, on behalf of their municipality.

From the beginning of the government's process of trying to allegedly reform the property tax system, they have been very public in saying, "This will not work, but if the government would give us some time, we would sit and try to work with the government and try to put together pieces of legislation that perhaps would allow the government to reach its stated goals, its intended goals." But has the government ever chosen to listen to anyone who had a different point of view than the Harris government? Of course the answer is no.

So, there we were on Monday, dealing with a government motion to close down debate for Bill 79, the seventh in a series of bills to fix the first bill to reform the property tax system, which was such a mess. What was interesting to note during the course of the debate on Bill 79 and indeed during the course of the debate on the time allocation motion was that the Association of Municipal Clerks and Treasurers of Ontario have come yet again to Queen's Park and have said very clearly to anyone who wanted to listen, "We have a piece of legislation here, even though it's the seventh piece, which again will not work." They said very clearly that this Bill 79 was in fact the most complicated, the most convoluted and the worst that the government has put together in the long series of bills to try to fix the mess of the bill before.

The government again didn't want to listen to them, yet one more time. Those poor folks keep coming here, they try to tell this government, and this government just refuses to listen. The government's response, instead of trying to work with those people, instead of trying to work with the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, is to decide yet again that it will use its majority to ram through the closure motion, and of course any debate on third reading is time-allocated, the vote is set and that's the beginning and the end.

I have no doubt that before we're finished, the flaws in Bill 79 are going to be perfectly clear to everyone, and this government is going to be scrambling one more time, as it has been since we started this mess in January 1997, to try and fix the mess that's going to come out of Bill 79.

We are dealing here today with a time allocation motion on a bill which again represents the government's inability to get its business through the House and which also represents yet again a government attempt to cobble a bunch of pieces of legislation together or to cobble a number of policy changes together and try and ram that through the door and hope that some good policy-making might come out of it.

1740

Bill 81 is an omnibus budget bill. The items contained within it all flow from the budget that was announced in this House in May, and here we were in this House about November 22 or 23 and the government finally decided that it's oh, so important to now get these bills underway, and some six months after the items have been announced in the budget, the government finally decides to bring through the piece of legislation that will give effect to those items that were noted in the budget.

The government for almost six and a half months has been in no hurry whatsoever to deal with these items. It's clear that any number of other items were more important than this one, but suddenly on November 23 this bill arrived in this House, and here we are some two weeks later with the government using its majority to shut down the debate and say, "We have to get this through and we have to get this done." Clearly, if they were going to do this right, the government would have introduced legislation relating to those items in the budget just after the budget was announced. The government wouldn't wait until six and a half months later if these items were oh, so important to Ontarians, but here we are six and a half months later, the bill is introduced and all of a sudden we're in a big panic, there's a big hurry, there's a big rush and we've got to drive this bill through like so many other bills that this government is trying to drive through.

Now all of a sudden it's oh, so terribly important; it's a priority. Not only are we shutting down the debate on second reading through this time allocation motion, but if you take a look at the motion, you will see clearly that there will only be two hours allocated to third reading debate of the bill, and after those two hours the Speaker will interrupt the proceedings, will put any question that's necessary and that will be the end of that bill without any further debate. Then the vote on third reading will be deferred until the next sessional day but we know it will happen right after that.

We now have a situation where a bill that did not see the light of day in this place for over six and a half months suddenly appears. It's introduced, appears on the Orders and Notices paper, there is some debate that takes place at second reading, but it is quickly shut down by this government under the pretence that it needs to be passed now, that we need some of these items before the end of the session, before December 31. It's all so terribly important when it hasn't been for the last six and a half months. "We have to use our majority one more time to shut down debate in this place," to shut down the legitimate ability of members, particularly from the opposition, to speak on behalf of their constituents, to raise concerns with the government and to allow for the concerns of the people we represent to be expressed here.

If you look at the bill again, there are some 13 parts to it, including a schedule, running some 118 pages altogether. There are a number of changes. The ones that are most interesting to me are the changes around child care, because the changes we now see in this bill with respect to child care amount to the third try of this government to put together a $200-million child care program. The first plan was announced in the 1996 budget and nothing happened. In 1997 it was scrapped and the money was put into a tax credit; that program is dead. Now Ontario, instead, is going to make direct payments into those households for each child under seven. So now we have in this bill, which again is an omnibus bill, a bunch of things cobbled together in what is the third attempt of this government to allegedly do something around child care.

I know my colleague from Beaches-Woodbine wants to participate in this debate, so as I wrap up I would say yet again, if it's Monday in this House it must be a time allocation day, if it's Wednesday in this House it must be a time allocation day, and what is very clear is that the government cannot manage its business despite its big majority. That's reflected in the number of time allocation motions that have now been moved by the Harris government, a record number of any government in the province of Ontario.

What is also clear, particularly by the bill that we are dealing with here, is that it's yet another sign of the incompetence of this government because we are dealing with a bill that has cobbled together a bunch of pieces of legislation in a big hurry, in a big rush, and I have no doubt that we will see the fallout from this flawed piece of legislation in very short order and it will require any number of policy changes or other bills to try to fix the mess that we have here before us today with Bill 81.

Ms Lankin: I just want to indicate that the member for Sudbury East knows of what she speaks. She was a government House leader at one point in time in this Legislative Assembly and was responsible for shepherding through the legislative business of the government and knows the amount of -

Mr John Gerretsen (Kingston and The Islands): Shepherding through at Christmas.

Ms Lankin: That was not a Christmas reference, "shepherding through." She knows the amount of planning that it takes for good, competent management of House business.

This is a theme with the government. When they don't get things done because of the gross incompetence in the way in which they've handled it, they then turn around and blame everyone else. I think that's what I find most objectionable. I want to give you an example in spades, Mr Speaker, that happened in this Legislature last night.

There was a bill being debated, and the public who might have been watching will know that this bill would have set up a professional, self-regulating college for social workers in the province of Ontario. You'll know that there are colleges for other professions. The health professions is a really good example for doctors and nurses and physiotherapists and others. Social workers for a long time, over 15 years, have been trying to have established in Ontario a professional self-regulation system, including a college. That bill would have created that.

It's interesting that all three parties in this Legislature have expressed general support in principle at second reading for this bill. There are many groups that have raised some issues of concern and there are some amendments that people would like to see put forward, and they would like to have an opportunity to address legislators and bring forward those concerns. But that's part of the process, isn't it? Isn't that what passing legislation is about? You have a proposal for a bill, you have all of the consultation that's gone into the creation of that and then when you have the actual legislative language in front of you, there's an opportunity for people to have input. We've received letters raising some issues and people saying, "We'd like to have an opportunity to take these issues to public hearings."

We said to the government, "We support this bill and we would like to see some hearings on this so that the issues that have been raised can be dealt with in that forum." What does the government do? Last night in a pique, in a fit of temper because the government House leader had a bad day yesterday - he's one of those cabinet ministers who was behind closed doors in the Board of Internal Economy and voted for the $600,000 to pay off the Al McLean legal fees and to sweep this thing under the rug. He had a bad day. We can understand he had a bad day, but how did he take out his little fit of temper?

With all of the social workers here last night, somehow he had it communicated to him that it would pass last night. He never told anyone else in the House that he expected that to happen. Because members of the Legislature had the temerity to want to debate the bill, to want to say some things about the bill, he sort of adjourned the debate and said, "I'm sorry, I'm picking up my marbles, I'm picking up my bat, I'm picking my ball and all of the various toys and I'm going home. No more debate on this bill," and goes to all the social workers and says: "You know what? It's that third party over there that stopped your bill. They're the problem."

Not "I didn't plan this right." Not "I didn't secure the commitment or understanding." Not "When I was told there was all-party support if there were a few days of hearings, I didn't plan to put those hearings in place in time so we could finish the bill by the end of next week." None of that. Did he take one ounce of responsibility, when he's the man responsible for shepherding this through? No, and instead has essentially told a group of people I think very incorrect information about the legislative process.

But let me repeat to the government House leader: Our party generally supports this bill. We think there are some issues that need to be dealt with in committee. We would like to have an opportunity for people to be heard on those issues and for those amendments to be put forward and to be dealt with. It's simple, right? It's not complicated. It's called democracy, as my friend from Hamilton says, and it is the legislative process.

I want people to know that there is support for the concept of this college and the direction the bill's going in, but if there are concerns people have expressed to us as legislators, it is our responsibility to bring them forward and to ensure there is debate on that. That's the democratic process, not what we see in this House, which is day after day of time allocation bills, shutting down democratic debate.

1750

Mr Bruce Smith (Middlesex): I'm certainly pleased to have the opportunity to join in debate this afternoon with my colleagues from Halton Centre and Peterborough on this motion that's before us.

I have to say at the outset that very clearly all of us in this place fully understand the need to find a balance between continuing debate and closure to that debate, so that we can continue with the business of government. As we look to the record of our government, and particularly as we look at average time spent on second readings, it's significant, because the numbers in themselves speak to the issues that to some extent have been addressed by the opposition members here today.

In the second session of this government, as we look to second reading of government bills, we see that the government spent some five hours and 49 minutes on second reading on government bills, by comparison to the New Democratic administration where we saw some three hours and 55 minutes spent on second reading. By comparison, though, to both the Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party, the Liberals fall far short of that in terms of their record in the 34th Parliament, where we saw some one hour and 38 minutes spent with respect to second reading of government bills.

Very clearly there's a precedent in terms of the amount of time that's being spent, and as well, as we look to the time spent in terms of soliciting public input through the committee process that parallels the legislative process in this place, we again see a number of hours, nearly 800 hours, pursued by this government with respect to committee travel and time spent with respect to various bills before legislative committees.

We've heard a lot this afternoon, as we've talked about the motion before us, about the doom and gloom and the negative environment that exists in Ontario today. By comparison, I find myself obviously in opposition to those suggestions, because as we look to the many good things that are happening in this province, we see today and over the course of the past three and a half years the employment numbers in this province increasing. In fact, since the throne speech in 1995, we've seen an increase in total employment of some 461,000 jobs, accounting for some 49.7% of all jobs created in Canada.

Very clearly the province of Ontario is excelling in terms of its job creation agenda, and that agenda is very consistent with the merits of the bill that's before us in terms of Bill 81 and the issues that are captured within that particular piece of legislation.

We've also seen the jobless rate at an eight-year low in this province, where the unemployment rate has fallen from 7% to 6.9% in November. That equates to the lowest rate since September 1990. By comparison, as well, we see more good news in the form of improvements to the help wanted index, which in the month of November was up and very clearly at the highest level since August 1990. We're seeing an increasing level of confidence. Certainly the benchmarks are moving in the right direction.

Perhaps one of the most significant statistics that we see with respect to the news that's relevant to this province is a continued decline in the number of individuals who are dependent on welfare in this province, a decline of some 17,000 individuals in the month of November. This equates to over 357,000 individuals who have stopped their reliance or dependency on the welfare system in this province since June 1995.

There are some very strong indicators that to a certain extent are parallel with respect to items contained in this bill and broader policy objectives of our government in terms of where we want to go both currently and into the future.

Notwithstanding the points of view that have been expressed here today, we see and continue to see evidence of a continued strong economy in this province where the province of Ontario will witness and see an economy that remains strong and positions itself as a leader in this nation. As we see that materializing, it's important to realize that, yes, there are difficult decisions being made with respect to the government of Ontario today, but those decisions not only are having an immediate benefit to the province but I believe strongly, as do my colleagues, that these decisions are positioning us well for the year 2000 and beyond.

As we look to those who share that same point of view, we see the conference board indicating that Ontario is well positioned for a second consecutive year of solid growth; domestic demand will again drive overall activity. DRI/McGraw Hill states: "Ontario is expanding quickly. Lower tax rates" - which in part are captured in this particular bill - "and a large share of high technology industries will help keep Ontario at the top of the provincial growth rankings over the next decade." Very clearly we're seeing the predictions starting to come forward that in fact this economy will remain strong and very viable into the future.

It wasn't very long ago that we heard a lot of negative feedback about the government's decisions with respect to reforms in the greater Toronto area, and specifically in Toronto. As those decisions are behind us and the difficult decisions have been made, once again we're seeing that the Toronto CMA has the strongest economy in Canada and very clearly there are indications that that economy will continue to grow. Again, the Conference Board of Canada indicates that an expected growth rate of some 5.1% will be realized in the near future and continued into the year 2000.

In that context, the economy in Toronto is expected to add some 92,000 new jobs in 1998 and about 75,000 jobs annually until the year 2000. The negativity that surrounded those very difficult decisions about the collapse of the largest city in this province, the collapse of the things that Ontarians have come to know about Toronto -

Interjection: Unwarranted.

Mr Smith: As my colleague has suggested, unwarranted concerns have in fact not materialized and we're seeing predictions not only for Toronto but, I might add, for the Ottawa-Hull area whereby that particular community and the broader community of Ottawa-Hull will be benefiting from the policy decisions of this government.

Youth are one of the key issues. Certainly all members in the House would remain concerned about the degree of youth unemployment in this province, and as we look to those particular issues we see youth unemployment rates rising again, and very significantly a step forward. Albeit there has to be continued work and focus on that particular area, I think it's significant in terms of the turnaround that's occurring with respect to the economy in this province.

Other areas of interest: Obviously retail sales are strong; auto sales are up in 1998; the housing market remains extremely healthy. It's those various factors that will continue to contribute to the health of this particular province and the health of this country as we position ourselves for the year 2000 and beyond.

We see non-residential building permits up in 1998; Ontario manufacturing shipments up in 1998; in that same vein, Ontario exports up strongly for this year as well. To package the export-import aspect together, we see Ontario wholesale trade up as well in 1998.

I believe strongly we have found the balance between continued debate - this motion placed before us is a matter that's necessary for us to move to the next stage of consideration of this particular bill, and certainly this bill in itself means a continuation of reduced taxation for Ontarians. It creates opportunity for small business to create more jobs, the area of this economy that continues to lead with respect to job creation. We see the opportunity through this bill for assistance in accessible child care for working families with children in this province.

Obviously one of the key issues that my colleague from Brampton North has worked on extensively since 1995, and the minister responsible for privatization, an issue that they dealt with early on in our mandate, was the particular issue of providing greater access to capital for small businesses.

This bill as well assists those who are disabled and provides support for growing firms and for jobs, and in essence, provides us the basis as we continue to work for a fairer tax system in this province. I believe very strongly this motion is necessary and appropriate, and in that context I'll conclude my comments.

The Speaker: Mr Wilson has moved government notice of motion number 45.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour please say "aye."

All those opposed please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. It will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1801 to 1806.

The Speaker: All those in favour please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Arnott, Ted

Baird, John R.

Barrett, Toby

Beaubien, Marcel

Boushy, Dave

Carr, Gary

Carroll, Jack

Clement, Tony

Danford, Harry

DeFaria, Carl

Doyle, Ed

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Fisher, Barbara

Flaherty, Jim

Ford, Douglas B.

Galt, Doug

Grimmett, Bill

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Jordan, W. Leo

Klees, Frank

Leach, Al

Leadston, Gary L.

Martiniuk, Gerry

Munro, Julia

Mushinski, Marilyn

O'Toole, John

Ouellette, Jerry J.

Parker, John L.

Rollins, E.J. Douglas

Sampson, Rob

Shea, Derwyn

Sheehan, Frank

Skarica, Toni

Smith, Bruce

Spina, Joseph

Tilson, David

Turnbull, David

Vankoughnet, Bill

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

Young, Terence H.

The Speaker: All those opposed please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Boyd, Marion

Brown, Michael A.

Castrilli, Annamarie

Christopherson, David

Conway, Sean G.

Crozier, Bruce

Cullen, Alex

Curling, Alvin

Gerretsen, John

Kormos, Peter

Lankin, Frances

Lessard, Wayne

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

Morin, Blain K.

Phillips, Gerry

Silipo, Tony

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 44; the nays are 17.

The Speaker: I declare the motion lost.

Interjection.

The Speaker: Oh yes, darn. I declare the motion carried.

It being after 6 of the clock, this House stands adjourned until 10 am tomorrow.

The House adjourned at 1808.

9 décembre 1998