1982 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 32nd Parliament

Hansard

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

( Hansard )

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1982

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page

9587 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Oral Questions

Parking passes. Mr. Howard –– 9587

Mr. Macdonald

Mrs. Dailly

Rail service to Whistler. Mr. Hyndman –– 9588

Small business bankruptcies. Mr. Lea –– 9588

School Services (Interim) Act (Bill 89). Second reading. (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm)

Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm –– 9589

Division –– 9591

Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No –– 3), 1982 (Bill 88). Committee stage.

(Hon. Mr. Williams)

section 5 –– 9592

Ms. Brown

Hon. Mr. Nielsen

section 13 –– 9592

Ms. Brown

section 23 –– 9592

Mr. Macdonald

Hon. Mr. Williams

On the amendment to

section 47 –– 9592

Mr. Barber

Hon. Mr. Williams

Mr. Howard

Hon. Mr. Hewitt

Financial Administration Amendment Act (No –– 2), 1982 (Bill 86). Second reading.

(Hon. Mr. Curtis)

On the amendment.

Mrs. Wallace –– 9594

Mr. Davis –– 9595

Mr. Skelly –– 9598

Mr. Leggatt –– 9600

Mr. Barber –– 9602

Division –– 9604

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 9605

Division –– 9605

Appendix –– 9608

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1982

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker,

at noon I had the honour of meeting and lunching with Dr. Peter

Bendixen, Minister of Education and Cultural Affairs of the state of

Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and also Dr. Kurt Boysen, State Secretary

for the state, and Dr. Hasso Frciher von Maltzahn, the consul-general,

and Heinz Pantel, the German-language adviser. Dr. Bendixen and his

party are here on a cross-Canada tour seeking information. making

contacts among educational officials and promoting good relationships

between Canada and Schleswig-Holstein. The state has given special

attention to academic exchange programs and recently sponsored a chair

for Canadian studies at the University of Kiel. I would ask the House

to bid them welcome.

HON. MR. FRASER: Mr. Speaker,

today I'd like the House to be on their best behaviour, not that they

always are. In the members' gallery today is my wife. and she has

visitors who have come to see what we do over here. The visitors are

Mrs. George Parsons and Mrs. Cecil Helmer from Vancouver South; Mrs.

Robert Forrest, whose MLA is my seatmate — both MLAs from Point Grey

are absent — and Mrs. Sidney Miller, also from Vancouver—Point Grey.

These ladies are visiting the B.C. Legislature for the first time. I

believe most of them have lived here all their lives. and they've come

to find out what their MLAs actually do. I'd like you to bid them a

hearty welcome,

HON. MR. CHABOT: Mr. Speaker, we have

in the members' gallery today Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Dgebuadze. He is

president of EMEC Trading. a Russian-owned company in Vancouver. They

are returning to the Soviet Union shortly. They are accompanied by Mr.

and Mrs. Geoffrey Edgelow of Surrey. Mr. Edgelow is a former long-time

alderman of the city of Victoria. I'd like the members to join me in

welcoming them here today.

HON. MR. ROGERS: This

morning in committee I had the opportunity, after the House granted

leave, to introduce several members of my former employer, who are here

for a convention. A number of others have joined us in the gallery and

I would like the House to extend a welcome to those members of the

Canadian Association of Retired Aviators who are here today. Most of

these Gentlemen served Canada with great distinction between 193 and

1945. and then went on to serve, until their retirement, in the

transportation of passengers in this country. I would suspect that at

one time or another each and every one of you has been a passenger of

ours.

Oral Questions

PARKING PASSES

MR. HOWARD:

I'd like to direct a question to the Deputy Premier. Can she confirm

that her Vancouver–Little Mountain constituency office mailed several

hundred forged parking passes to local residents in a crass and illegal

effort to buy votes?

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair would have some difficulty, hon. member, in strictly

ruling that question in order.

However, the Deputy Premier may wish to answer the member.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY:

The wording of the question is indeed rather doubtful as far as

protocol in the House is concerned, but considering, that it comes from

the member for Skeena.... I can well understand its being asked from

that quarter.

The members who represent Vancouver–Little

Mountain constituency — my colleague and myself — did mail to our

constituents, and in service to our-constituents, some information and

a message. I would like to quote from the message.

"In

addition, we have produced some visitor identification cards for your

visitors. When we discussed this with the police department and the

city engineer's department. It was thought that this kind of card could

be easily copied. That is quite true. However, you will know when you

have visitors at your home, and if you see a card with your street

number on it and you know you don't have visitors. then all you have to

do is report that to the same telephone number and that party will be

dealt with. We hesitate to think that people will go out of their way

to end-run the system. However, that possibility is there."

Giving

that paragraph was to ensure those who received the information in the

Vancouver–Little Mountain area, where a parking problem was thought to

be a concern....

It has two ramifications. It would give

those residents the opportunity to have visitors to their home not be

disturbed. In speaking to the super intendant of police since the

information went out, he tells me — and I'm assured — that the police

department of that city will not be going around picking up vehicles at

any rate, and that they will not be in danger of having cars impounded.

don't know why the members of the NDP opposition would be so concerned

with the members for Vancouver–Little Mountain giving a service to

those people in the constituency of Vancouver–Little Mountain. I think

that is perfectly within the realm of a Member of the Legislative

Assembly serving the community they serve well. I also want to suggest

that we at no time suggested that these were legal cards, but that they

would be a service to those who would perhaps have a visitor to their

home disrupted because of the fact that the area is determined by

resident parking reservations. We thought it would be of some service

to them. If it offends the members opposite, let me say that it has not

offended the community. We have had very many people in the community

thanking us for the kind of service we have given, not only on this

subject but on many other subjects of concern brought to our attention

in our constituency office.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker,

we're not dealing with protocol matters in the House. We're dealing

with what are loosely termed — "illegalities." Can the Deputy Premier

confirm that following her being caught out on this particular issuance

of these forged parking passes, several innocent people have had their

cars towed away as a consequence of using those passes?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY:

Not only can I not confirm that, what I can confirm is that the

community is not suffering either from people parking in the area as

was heretofore thought. In the months preceding the building of the

hospitals

[ Page 9588 ]

and

the complex in the Vancouver–Little Mountain constituency, with the

Shaughnessy, the Grace and the Children's Hospitals, it was thought

that perhaps there would be an overloading of the community. My

colleague and I from Vancouver–Little Mountain had worked to have the

"residential parking only" designation put in that area. I can confirm

that it is working and that there has not been an overloading of cars

in that area as everyone had thought. This extra precaution, I think,

has been helpful to the constituency and of service to them.

MR. HOWARD:

It's interesting to note that the Deputy Premier refused to answer the

question. So that the general public will know all that's going on, has

the Deputy Premier decided on any other novel law-flouting tricks to be

issued through the magic of her local constituency office or

counterfeiters?

MR. SPEAKER: The question is not in order.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY:

I don't think that that question deserves any kind of answer, and

coming from the member who has just asked it, I would suggest that he

is completely out of order in his questioning.

MR. MACDONALD:

I'd like to relieve the Attorney General of the big smile on his face

and ask him whether he approves parking passes that are not authorized

by the parking regulations for the use of visitors on the streets in

Vancouver contrary to the advice that had been given on that subject by

both the police and the authorities of the city of Vancouver. Do you

approve of parking passes being issued by a political party to the

public? The answer is no, because the smile has disappeared. Of course

it's illegal.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: The smile

disappeared because I was about to burst into laughter at the idiocy of

the question posed by the second member for Vancouver East.

MR. MACDONALD:

That gives me a very modest supplementary, then. Does the chief law

officer of the Crown approve of parking passes being issued by

political parties?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: The matter of

the approval of parking passes would fall under the bylaws of the city

of Vancouver. It would be dealt with by the mayor of Vancouver, the

city of Vancouver police, the police board and its enforcement officers.

MRS. DAILLY:

I have a supplementary on the same question to the Deputy Premier. In

view of the fact that when the Deputy Premier of this province, or a

representative of hers, went to see the police about issuing these

passes she was told by them that it would be illegal, would she explain

to this House whether Social Credit cabinet ministers have special laws

for them that don't apply to the rest of the public?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY:

The member who just asked the question has predicated it on an

assumption that is not true. I was not told that they were illegal.

RAIL SERVICE TO WHISTLER

MR. HYNDMAN:

I have a question for the Minister of Industry and Small Business

Development in his capacity as the minister responsible for B.C. Rail.

The topic is of particular interest, with the ski season approaching,

to young skiers on the lower mainland, skiers of modest income and

tourist visitors who are skiers. Having regard to the continuing

uncertainties of the weather and road conditions on Highway 99, would

the minister consider giving to the directors of B.C. Rail a fresh

directive to look at methods of upgrading rail service between Whistler

and Vancouver for the forthcoming ski season?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

In answer to the member's question, I realize there are literally tens

of thousands of skiers flocking from all over the world to that great

resort of Whistler. I will be meeting next week with some members of

the board of the British Columbia Railway, and I'd be most happy to

talk to them again about a special service to accommodate not only

those travelers from our province but also young people flocking here

from all over the world to take advantage of that great recreation

village that was built at Whistler.

SMALL BUSINESS BANKRUPTCIES

MR. LEA:

My question is to the same minister. The office of the registrar of

companies reports that business receiverships and bankruptcies are

running at four times the level of last year, and that 16 B.C.

companies are being driven out of business every working day. Has the

government now decided to adopt the proposal put forward by this side

of the House in March for legislation similar to

chapter 11 of the U.S.

bankruptcy code, to provide a breathing space for business people who

are beset by financial problems in this province?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

We have at the present time some very successful seminars being put on

throughout the province on how to survive in the rough economic times

prevalent throughout not only the province of British Columbia but all

provinces of Canada and the United States. The direct answer to the

member's question is no.

MR. LEA: As I understand it,

the government has decided to put on seminars to instruct the small

business community on how to go broke gracefully. Has the minister

received any communication from small business organizations such as

the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, whose members, by the

way, overwhelmingly support our position for a

chapter 11-style

breathing-space, asking for the kind of recommendation we're putting

forward on this side of the House'?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

I am, of course, constantly in touch with the small business community,

who are very sympathetic toward what is happening in Canada. They

realize that the majority of the problems are caused by the

international marketplace. They realize that in British Columbia, due

to the policies of this government, things are a lot better than they

are in other provinces. They also realize that had it not been for the

initiatives of this government, unemployment would be a lot higher —

without the opportunities

[ Page

9589 ]

that exist through the projects presently taking

place and the hope of future projects on the drawing-board. Unlike

1975, when the socialists were in power and there was no hope for the

future.... They were going broke when the rest of the world was in

favourable economic times. Due to the policies of this government

things are not as bad as they could be.

MR. LEA: I

have a supplementary, Mr. Speaker. With the statistics being contrary

to what the minister has said — that we are now the highest in Canada

for bankruptcies and receiverships — has the government now decided to

bring back the legislation just passed, the Small Business Development

Act, and include in that legislation, through amendment, the service

industry, so that the service industry will at least be able to come to

the government and borrow money in the same way as every other business

in the province that was included in that legislation? With these new

statistics, has the government decided to still leave out the service

industry in this province?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: The

small business community recognizes the great measures that this

government has taken to relieve some of the onerous burden of taxation

that was imposed on the business community during the years 1972-75,

when the socialists were government. They realize that we have relieved

a lot of the oppressive taxation. They're quite happy with the moves we

have made to assist a segment of the small business community with

lower interest rates, something the NDP feel very sad that they didn't

include in the great proposal that they brought out last March. They

also recognize that the money we are putting into our plan for economic

recovery is not a giveaway program like that laid out by the Leader of

the Opposition as an economic recovery program, where they wanted to

build a post office on every street corner. So they do have a lot of

faith that our economic recovery program will be good for them and will

maintain the employment level, and will possibly raise it during the

months ahead.

HON. MR. CHABOT: On a point of order

under standing order 8, that all members are obliged to be present in

this House unless they've been granted permission. has the member for

Atlin (Mr. Passarell) been granted permission to be absent? If so, is

the purpose to secure a tag for the last grizzly bear he shot, or is he

out to shoot another grizzly bear?

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. hon. member. The Chair has the point of order.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 89, Mr. Speaker.

SCHOOL SERVICES (INTERIM) ACT

(continued)

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, this morning I made mention of the

fact that last week there was very little debate from the NDP — the socialist

side of the House — with respect to this bill. They obviously did not want to

participate in this restraint legislation, and the debate was much more from

this side, with, as I said, no mention from the socialists. That changed yesterday,

and there was some debate from them today. Obviously, over the weekend they

were told by the BCTF: "You must get involved; you can't simply sit

there; please make yourself heard." Well, we heard from the NDP, and they

certainly provided a whole lot of criticism, but nothing constructive — no alternatives,

and no suggestions as to how they might address the matter of restraint as it

is required in the area of education. or government generally.

It's been said by the opposition that somehow this was a political move

on the part of government, that we were using it for politics, Somehow it was

also charged that we were conscripting children. Mr. Speaker. I would just like

to make some reference to a few articles that I think will indicate very clearly

where the politics have been in the whole of the debate on this particular bill

and where the politics have been out there when addressing this same legislation.

As the second member for Surrey (Mr. Hall) — and I see him there — would agree,

out there in the constituency, in Surrey as elsewhere in British Columbia,

there's support from the people, be they Social Credit or NDP. for the government

restraint measures. All people everywhere are calling in and writing in, saying

that they certainly support the government's legislative approach with respect

to restraint in educational spending. The second member for Surrey, I see by

his applause, agrees with the statement I've just made.

the same time. Mr. Speaker. It's sad when we see such things as

occurred in Esquimalt — and unfortunately the member for Esquimalt—Port

Renfrew (Mr. Mitchell) is not here — when a meeting was held to discuss

the restraint measures and the legislation in the western communities,

a meeting at which the teachers were present. I'm sure the BCTF again

put forth its case. When the media there wanted to have a comment from

the local president of the teachers' association, they could only track

him down in the NDP constituency office. That's the only place this

particular member was to be found immediately after the meeting,

conferring with the socialists as to how they could collectively try to

fight the government on the program it was instituting on behalf of all

British Columbians. As the newspaper in the area pointed out very

clearly and said very well: "There are local teachers being manipulated

by their leadership for purely political purposes perhaps. On the

surface, the fact that a local teacher, union leader John Bergbusch,

scurried off to the NDP offices after a long and inconclusive meeting

of area teachers seems all in innocence. but...." And the

article goes

on.

Mr. Speaker. the evidence is certainly there in your own

constituency. If I want to hear from at least one political party in

Delta as to what their stance on the restraint program is, I can call

the NDP candidate in Delta — my neighbouring constituency — Mr. Karl

Moser, who has circulated literature throughout the whole of that

constituency in support of his candidacy on behalf of the socialists in

British Columbia. If I call the number that he gives, and if I want his

views on a particular matter, including the government restraint

program, where do you think he answers? It's at the school in Delta.

Talk about manipulation. talk about using the system, talk about

abusing children, talk about abusing the tax-payers' time and the

taxpayers' money. Where do I call that member in Delta but at the

school he's supposed to be working at! That's the number on the

literature. They think it's funny.

The member from Courtenay

stood up in her place yesterday and said the very same thing, that

somehow the government and its legislation were using children and

abusing, as

[ Page 9590 ]

they

mentioned, the system for political purposes. Let me mention to that

member — she knows it full well — that at taxpayers' expense, every

home in the Courtenay-Comox constituency received this particular rag,

this sheet if you want to read it. I'll make it available to each and

every one of you; it's purely politics, paid for by the taxpayers —

saying, among other things, that the general public has been severely

eroded by the provincial government's actions.

It goes on

and on, but hopefully it was thought that perhaps during this debate we

could hear from the socialists and find out what alternatives they have

with respect to saving the cost of education or government on behalf of

British Columbians everywhere. All we know are the bits and pieces that

— are fed to us indirectly from time to time by the Leader of the

Opposition, not in the House in his place, but when he's speaking to

other groups. He's generally missing; maybe that explains it. The

Leader of the Opposition, when he was speaking to the government in

Ottawa, said: "Oh, yes, we'll give you all the resource revenues,

providing you will nationalize all of these companies." That was the

socialist platform: give it away to Ottawa and Trudeau. That would

certainly have speeded up the process. I guess that nationalization is

happening to a degree in any case. I guess the revenues are being

eroded to some degree, but the socialist NDP leader in British Columbia

was prepared to give all of that revenue away to Ottawa.

that isn't enough, when that same socialist leader, only last week, was

addressing the municipalities in British Columbia — remember, he

doesn't speak up here — he said: "Ladies and gentlemen, if you elect me

as your Premier and elect the socialists to government in British

Columbia, we'll give you $300 million to build edifices, various

centres or facilities in your community. We'll pay the cost. It's our

response to restraint." Do you know where that money was to come from?

It was to come from gas revenues that he hadn't received and had

already promised the feds some time ago. Now this same Leader of the

Opposition, instead of speaking out in his place in the Legislature,

writes a letter to Mr. Larry Kuehn, president of the BCTF, and says:

"Dear Mr. Kuehn:

"Further

to our conversation today, I wish to reiterate the New Democratic

Party's position regarding education financing and philosophy in

British Columbia. If returned to government, the NDP will immediately

institute the following:

" 1. Complete financing in the present fiscal year of all contracts and issues undertaken."

"We'll

give you back all the money we haven't received." Again, he's given

away the money they haven't got. He's giving it back to the BCTF. "If

you, the BCTF, will give us the vote and put the socialists back to

power, we'll give you the money. Here's the bank. The door's open. Come

on in." The socialists — the giveaway gang!

"2.

No changes in educational goals and financing without full and complete

consultation with the school teachers, the BCTF, the parents and the

trustees."

I am sure that to the executive of the BCTF this

may be music. Unfortunately, the Leader of the Opposition certainly

hadn't thought it through, because he had already given away the moneys

to Ottawa. He then gave away the moneys he didn't have to the

municipalities, and he's now giving the moneys that he has already

given away, that he didn't have anyway, to the BCTF. An open bank door.

Give it away gang, — the socialists over there. But I wonder how that

would sound to a British Columbian who lives in the constituency of

Surrey. The second member (Mr. Hall) isn't here now, but he would know

this person, who says:

"Dear Bill:

"Belated

congratulations on your appointment to the Education ministry. I

support your stand on restraint and your position with regard to the

BCTF. I think that for a profession they have a very unprofessional

attitude toward their job. I too have found a poor economy a great

strain. I have reduced my staff to one architect and myself. Our

profession has about 30 percent unemployment, and those of us who are

still working will have our earnings cut by over 25 percent."

wonder how this private entrepreneur, this taxpayer — the guy that gets

out there early in the morning and works till whatever hour required at

night to fight for a living — would feel about this socialist gang

giving away his hard-earned earnings, especially when they're simply

not there during this time of economic downturn.

In response

to the opposition, let me say very honestly that if, given the

alternatives, the economy were buoyant, I too would much prefer not to

be debating this sort of measure. I am sure the same would go for the

legislators in Alberta, who have had to close classrooms, lay off

teachers and close down whole schools. I'm sure the same would go for

the people in Washington state, our good neighbours, the Americans

across the way. I'm sure they too would much prefer not to be taking

the sorts of measures that they've had to take to close down schools,

lay off teachers and cancel programs. That's not the wish of our

American friends. It's not the wish of our neighbours in the provinces

to the east. And it's not the wish of the people in Europe to be

cutting back on various programs or cutting back on the number of

educators in order to make ends meet.

It's not my wish, or

our wish, that we should bring forth this sort of legislation, or take

the type of actions we've had to take. But given the choice, and

looking at what's happened in all of those provinces and in all of

those states below the 49th parallel, I say that British Columbians

ought to be proud that they have a government that would have the guts,

the fortitude and the foresight to take this sort of action. We are not

laying off teachers. There is no need to lay off teachers. Teachers can

feel secure in their jobs in British Columbia, unlike Alberta,

Washington state or elsewhere in the world. In British Columbia they

can feel secure because the government took this action. We're not

having to cancel programs. We can continue with all of the programs. As

a matter of fact, if you look at the special-education programs today

and compare them to the last year of the socialists, we are 50 percent

up as a percentage of budget in our special-education programs. We've

shown that we not only say we care for the handicapped, the disabled

and the disadvantaged, but we also do something about it, and that's

more than the socialists can say. I think we ought to be very proud.

would appeal to the BCTF to listen to their membership, to all of their

teachers, and to really give careful attention to all of those

individual members, those good and wonderful people who teach in our

schools, who are concerned, rational and reasonable, and who understand

that as professionals and as members of society in British Columbia,

they too are required to give somewhere, somewhat, if we're to keep a

balance and maintain a healthy educational system — the

[ Page

9591 ]

healthiest anywhere in Canada. They understand. The

people in our communities — the Surrey-ites, the Delta-ites, the

Richmonders, all of the people everywhere in British Columbia —

understand that government cannot go on spending forever, expanding its

program, providing increases to all of the people involved, while the

private sector is forced to cut back, cut down, do without. They

understand. Our citizens understand, the teachers understand, and I

would only hope that somehow the socialists — and I would appeal to

them — would be reasonable for the good of all British Columbians, and

would get the message out to the BCTF that all of us have a

responsibility. As MLAs we took a cutback: we know the people in the

medical profession are recommending a cutback; we know the private

sector is taking a cutback. 'Let's all of us here collectively appeal

to the BCTF that they. too, try to understand that they have to be a

part of this.

As a group of professionals — if they care

about their profession as opposed to their association, or as opposed

to themselves as individuals — they ought to understand that this

legislation affords the sort of protection that should be provided

wherever possible. I know it can't be done for those in the private

sector. Obviously there's no way we can provide legislation to somehow

keep all architects employed or all engineers employed, or legislation

that says whatever the amount of work last year, we'll make sure it's

available for you this year; you somehow share, but you keep working,

you keep employed. You and all of your members in the association, you

and all of those professionals, will get a piece of the pie. You'll all

have your share. You'll keep working. You'll keep bringing home the

bread. We can't give that to the architects. We can't give that to the

engineers. We can't give it the private sector. But the BCTF ought to

be grateful that we can give it to them, that we can provide that sort

of protection.

Can you imagine the members of the socialist

party, each and every one of you, particularly those few who represent

constituencies where there is forestry industry and mining...? Can you

imagine trying to advise those of your group that represent downtown

Victoria or downtown Vancouver of the world out there, where the people

in forestry are unemployed? If somehow they could be provided with this

sort of protection, don't you think they would be grateful? Don't you

think they would appreciate it? Sure, the value of the cutback for

teachers amounts to 4 to 6 percent of the 17.5 percent, plus perhaps a

2 percent increment that they received earlier this year. Maybe the 19

percent average increase that the teachers received has been cut back

possibly to an average 15 percent increase. But they all keep working,

and they keep their programs. Wouldn't that be nice for the guy in the

logging camp who is unemployed, for the miner looking for a job, for

the carpenter working part time, for the millworker sharing his work?

Wouldn't they love this? Wouldn't it be nice?

But where are

the socialists? When do they speak out on behalf of those citizens who

work in the private sector? Where are they? We have here for the

teachers, for all those in the profession, what I consider to be a good

and reasonable approach, and one that will not erode their base.

They're really maintaining their base, which is important to them as

well. I can understand that. It's good legislation, Mr. Speaker. We as

British Columbians can be very proud. We have the highest per-pupil

cost in Canada, second only to Alberta. I'm not proud of that fact. I

think I as a minister, and we as people in government, regardless of

where we sit in this Legislature, should work towards bringing down the

cost to the taxpayer.

We have the responsibility not only to

provide a good system of education, but to do so at the least possible

cost. That's not unreasonable, But we do have the second-highest cost,

second only to Alberta in the whole of Canada.

B.C. salaries

in the educational system, as a proportion of the total education

costs. are the highest in Canada. Again, we can't attribute this —

BCTF, all of you who are listening out there — to the teachers: I think

it is really much the blame of successive provincial governments,

particularly school boards, for having allowed the upper crust, the

bureaucracy, the administration to grow out of proportion to what the

total cost ought to be. It's not bad to recognize that. I as a

minister, my deputy, his assistant or a superintendent in the system

don't have to be defensive about that, We have to recognize it and ask

what we can do about it, and then: will we do it? I can assure you that

I am prepared to do it. and I think all those good people to whom I

must look for support will be prepared to do that.

Even

after restraint. the provincial grant this year is up 25 percent over

what it was last year. Even after all of the restraint, the budgets for

school districts are up 16 percent of what they were in 1981, one year

ago. I say again to the socialists: do your homework. A lot of your

constituents don't have a 16 percent increase in their household budget

or in their business. So when you're talking about the need to maintain

that initial 22 percent increase, or you're crying, as socialists do so

often, about having to cut back to 16 percent, think about all those

small businesses out there in your constituency and think about the

householder. Do you think they've got 16 percent more than they had

last year? I would guess not.

Another fact is worth

mentioning. In the last four years — again, I don't say this as

something we ought to be proud of: rather as a concern that we should

address — the student population in British Columbia has dropped by

20,000, but we have 3.000 more professionals. So, Mr. Speaker, you can

see that we have to address these problems in the ministry. Certainly I

take great pride in having the opportunity to bring about some of the

initiatives required to help provide for a better, more accountable and

more reasonable system in British Columbia. This bill is the beginning

of better things to come. It's a recognition by government that we must

protect the system and that where ever possible we should provide

protection for those who are employed in this system wherever we can —

and we're doing that.

Instead of standing up on the side of

the BCTF, in opposition to the majority of the teachers in this

province, in opposition to the will of the majority of taxpayers in

this province, in opposition to the majority of parents, who are out

there earning and paying and who understand that you can't go on

forever increasing the cost without the system somehow caving in, these

socialists have one more chance — they can vote or second reading, and

I so move.

Motion approved on the following division:

YEAS — 29

Chabot

McCarthy

Williams

Gardom

Bennett

Curtis

Phillips

McGeer

Fraser

Nielsen

Kempf

Davis

Strachan

Segarty

Waterland

Rogers

Heinrich

McClelland

Schroeder

Smith

Hewitt

Richmond

Vander Zalm

Ritchie

Jordan

Ree

Hyndman

Mussallem

Wolfe

[ Page 9592 ]

NAYS — 23

Macdonald

Howard

King

Lea

Lauk

Stupich

Dailly

Cocke

Nicolson

Hall

Lorimer

Leggatt

Sanford

Skelly

D'Arcy

Lockstead

Barnes

Brown

Barber

Wallace

Hanson

Mitchell

Passarell

Division ordered to be recorded in the Journals of the House.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: I move the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House, with leave, now.

Leave not granted.

Bill

89, School Services (Interim) Act, read a second time and referred to a

Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of

the House after today.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Committee on Bill 88, Mr. Speaker.

MISCELLANEOUS STATUTES

AMENDMENT ACT (NO. 3), 1982

The House in committee on Bill 88; Mr. Strachan in the chair.

Sections 1 to 4 inclusive approved.

section 5.

MS. BROWN:

This Community Care Facility Act was opened once before and amended to

remove a time limit in terms of inspections by health officers, and at

that time I raised the issue with the minister that that was not a good

idea, that in fact the act should retain in it a request that these

facilities be inspected at least once annually. I notice in this

section that the act is being opened again and amended, and I wonder

whether the minister would be willing at this time to put back into the

act what was taken out the last time that the act was amended, to amend

it so that it reads that inspections have to take place at least once

each year.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Even though we're reflecting on a vote, the answer is no.

Sections 5 to 12 inclusive approved.

section 13.

MS. BROWN: Mr. Chairman, if it would help, I can respond to sections 13 and 15 and say that I think they're good amendments.

Sections 13 to 22 inclusive approved.

section 23.

MR. MACDONALD:

Would the Minister of Lands (Hon. Mr. Brummet)...? Where is he? He's

not here. Would the Attorney-General explain why the removal of a

condition in a Crown grant should be at the minister's discretion,

rather than by order-in-council? It can be a very important decision.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

On behalf of the Minister of Lands, may I say that this power which is

given to the minister can only be used in those cases, as the marginal

note states, where a term, condition, stipulation or reservation has

been included in the Crown grant in error. It is not for the purpose of

making any substantive changes in Crown grants which have been issued,

but only where there has been an error and the continued existence of

the inclusion is not in the public interest.

MR. MACDONALD:

Far be it from me to give the Attorney-General a law lesson, but

section 49 (

l) says: "included in error or is no longer required in the

public interest." So it's a very broad discretion that's being given to

the Minister of Lands. We're not sure that the incumbent is not going

to use that with an ulterior motive. Why shouldn't it be an

order-in-council? Then it's published and debated by cabinet, and

decided by one man, the Premier.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

We have, in the course of preparing this amendment, discussed the

matter with Lands officials. They indicate that the use of this

provision is only an administrative act, and not one which would

require a decision by the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council.

Sections 23 to 46 inclusive approved.

section 47.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Chairman, I move the amendment standing under my name on the order paper, numbered

section 47.1. [See appendix.]

This

is an amendment to

section 133(2) of the Utilities Commission Act, as

it was enacted earlier this year. That subsection refers to: "'costs of

the commission' means costs...of consultants" and specialists which are

engaged by the commission. There was an error in the drafting of that

section earlier this year. The amendment is to change the word "means"

to "includes" so it is not restrictive.

On the amendment.

MR. BARBER:

I wonder if the Clerk could clarify. This is an amendment to

section 47

of Bill 88? What has it got to do with the Travel Agents Act?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Nothing. It's an addition.

MR. BARBER: Why is it here if it has nothing to do with it?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: It's a new heading.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Perhaps we could do this in a parliamentary fashion. Would the Attorney like to respond?

[ Page 9593 ]

MR. BARBER:

I don't understand why you're amending

section 47 of this bill by

amending

an act amending the Travel Agents Act, which is not referred

to in the principle of the same section.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

Section 47 deals with travel agents. It is intended to include an

amendment to the Utilities Commission Act in the Miscellaneous Statutes

Amendment Act by putting in a new heading, "Utilities Commission Act

Amendment," and moving an amendment to what is presently

section 133(2)

of that statute for the purpose of changing, as I explained a few

moments ago, the word "means" to "includes" so that the definition of

"costs of the commission" is made less restrictive.

MR. BARBER:

We had this problem before when, once again as the result of an

oversight or a late application, the government brought in an amendment

that was entirely irrelevant to the principal

section — in this case,

section 47 under Travel Agents Act. To the best of my knowledge, the

Utilities Commission has absolutely nothing to do with the regulation

of the travel industry; there is no connection whatsoever. With

respect, Mr. Chairman, I thought the government had agreed the last

time this occurred, when the same confusion resulted, that it would not

occur again. Surely it would be an easy matter, would it not, to

include a new

section 49 and be done with it. Why are you amending

section 47 in this way? It doesn't make any sense at all if we are

expected to address ourselves to amendments to the Travel Agents Act,

which is what the bill clearly specifies. It has nothing to do with the

Utilities Commission. I wish to speak on the travel agents; I hope not

to lose the chance to do that, by having to debate something that has

to do with the Utilities Commission and has the wrong number.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

May I offer this clarification to the member. Traditionally the

miscellaneous statutes list the various statutes dealt with in

alphabetical order. As the bill was originally introduced, sections 46

and 47 dealt with travel agents. The next position in which any new

provision would be made for the Utilities Commission would come after

"T." If indeed there had been some other intervening statute with some

other alphabetical relationship, it might have come later. We couldn't

have put it as

section 49 because the commencement

section is always

the last. This was the circumstance whereby it had to be interspaced

between 47 and 48; we could have made it 48 and renumbered 48 as 49,

which would have been a confusing amendment but certainly less

confusing than what is before the committee at this time.

MR. HOWARD: What does

section 133(2) of the Utilities Commission Act say now?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

I'd be happy to answer the question.

Section 133(2) is for the purpose

of defining the words "costs of the commission." It presently reads:

"'costs of the commission' means consultants' fees and specialists," as

near as I can remember the words. They won't be in the book before you.

We're just changing "means" those things to "includes" those things, so

it's less restrictive.

MR. HOWARD: I think that's the

problem. It's not in the statute books available here; there's no

section 133(2). so it was difficult to follow what it meant.

MR. BARBER:

With all respect to the Attorney-General, although his explanation is

welcome his policy is not. It's much more rational to just renumber the

darn things, to explain it as a renumbering, and take advantage of the

clarity.

Section 47 is an amendment to the Travel Agents

Act. What's going on here is that the classes of persons who may be

protected in the event of a business failure, which has been all too

often — and notorious — in this province, may be redefined at the will

of the Crown. First, I wonder if the minister responsible, who is here,

could advise us what the will of the Crown shall be, whether the

general level of protection currently available will be maintained or

further restricted.

HON. MR. HEWITT: It deals, of

course, with putting in an additional paragraph in the

section relating

to regulations. It allows the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council to

designate classes or kinds of people. In effect, it puts into the act

that which is policy at the present time. It has resulted primarily

from the ombudsman, who feels it should be clarified. At the present

time, it deals with those people who are either residents of British

Columbia or who have contracted for travel services wholly located

within British Columbia. So existing policy is to be maintained, but

the additional paragraph under the regulation

section sets it out more

clearly, as opposed to what has been the policy in the past.

MR. BARBER:

Together with my colleague from Surrey I act as Tourism critic, and as

I'm sure the minister knows, we've had inquiries. May I take it then

that he has given us his word that there will be no reduction in the

benefits, the coverage and the entitlement under the program as the

result of the incorporation here of what he describes as policy that's

already in place? There will be no reductions in entitlement for

protection; is that the minister's word?

HON. MR. HEWITT: There's no change in the existing policy before us at the present time.

Section 47 approved.

section 47.1.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

I now move

section 47.1, and in so moving I wish to say to the first

member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) that I feel the same way he does. If

we could remember, I think it creates far less confusion in debate in

committee. I'm told, however, that by not renumbering we save many more

problems with regard to the way in which the bill is dealt with when it

gets to the printing stage. Frankly. I don't understand that kind of

mechanics.

Section 47.1 approved.

Section 48.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: I move the amendment to

section 48 standing in my name. [See appendix.]

On the amendment.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS:

I will advise the House that the reason for this amendment is that

since the introduction of the bill, we have had the opportunity for

discussion with the

[ Page 9594 ]

various

ministries associated with the sections referred to in subsection

(1) as it now is, and it is clear that all may come into force on

proclamation except sections 8, 11, 18 and 20. We are therefore

restricting proclamation to those three sections only.

Amendment approved.

Section 48 as amended approved.

Title approved.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: I move the committee rise and report the bill complete with amendments.

Motion approved.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

Bill

88, Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No. 3) 1982, reported

complete with amendments to be considered at the next sitting of the

House after today.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 86.

FINANCIAL ADMINISTRATION

AMENDMENT ACT (No. 2), 1982

(continued)

MRS. WALLACE: As I understand it, we're discussing an amendment to Bill 86.

MR. SPEAKER: That's correct, hon. member,

On the amendment.

MRS. WALLACE:

It's a very important amendment, Mr. Speaker, because there has to be —

and I would expect the government benches to agree with me — some

control on government spending. This amendment has been proposed

because the bill itself puts no control on government spending. When we

look at the record of this government over its years in office, we can

see a very great need for some control on government spending.

I took the time to go through Public Accounts

this morning. It's interesting to note that the figures there are very

clear. It's been quoted in this House many times before, but I think it

bears repeating, inasmuch as somehow the government members don't seem

to recognize what they've managed to accomplish over the last seven or

eight years. According to Public Accounts , when they took

office at the end of the fiscal year, the public debt stood at $4.4

billion. In their first year of office that public debt rose to $5.3

billion, then to $6 billion and to $6.7 billion. I took these figures

this morning from the Public Accounts , which are the records of

this government's operation. It went from $6.7 billion to $7.2 billion,

to $7.8 billion, until the last year ending in 1981 we had a $9.4

billion debt. That has more than doubled.

If we are to listen to what the government is saying today through their legislation,

and to the words of the Minister of Finance, we are now in a position where

we are being asked — if my mathematics are correct — to forward approval to

this government for the borrowing of some $1.6 billion. The Minister of Finance

indicates, and certainly through the statistics on the operating budget, that

we're going to be looking at something like a $1 billion deficit at the

end of this year for operating expenses. Those figures, added to the $9.4 billion,

bring us up to something like $13 billion. That's almost three times the

debt we had in 1975, and that was without the benefit of this piece of legislation

which, without amendment, would be completely open-ended.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

I'm

concerned, as I'm sure the people of British Columbia are, that we have

this kind of legislation being proposed. Therefore I am very much in

favour of an amendment which points out that this is far from good

financial practice. To refresh the House's memory, the amendment reads:

"it is not in keeping with proper fiscal policy to have no limitation

on the aggregate amount of money which may be raised by borrowing under

the Financial Administration Act." What I have attempted to point out

is that without the benefit of any open-ended legislation like this,

this government has managed to approximately triple our debt over the

last seven or eight years. That's a very strange thing to happen from a

government who, year after year when they present their budget

speeches, come into this House and talk about how terrible debt is.

This

is the March 19, 1976 budget in which they talk about trying to develop

cooperation with business, labour and so on: "In addition to that we

will to the best of our ability provide the sound financial management

that the province needs." Their ability was not too great, Mr. Speaker,

if this is the kind of result that we've had from their so-called sound

financial management. The then Minister of Finance goes on to say:

Governments, like people, cannot go on spending more than it

makes. What comes in must balance what goes out. If balance is not achieved,

then governments must borrow to pay the bills. But the Bank of Canada Governor-General

Bouey warned us only the other day that too much borrowing by governments will

stifle the growth of the economy. The competition by the public sector and the

private sector for available funds will, in a period of monetary restraint,

force interest rates to a higher level.

That

was the thinking of this government in 1976. They go on to quote recent

tragic examples: New York, Chicago, Britain, etc. In 1976 the

government certainly was talking in entirely the opposite direction.

1977 they said: "We will continue to hold government spending within

income. No doubt some theorists will continue to press for deficit

financing in government, as they have in the past. This government does

not subscribe to deficit financing to underwrite its current

operations." We certainly had a very clear statement there relative to

current operations, and that was in 1977. In that year, their current

operations showed close to a billion dollars excess of revenue over

expenditure. At the same time, they had increased the fixed capital

debt by nearly a billion dollars — by about the same amount, Mr.

Speaker. They were taking it out of one pocket and putting it into the

other.

In the budget speech in 1978 things were a little different. They said:

We have extra funds that we can add to this current year's

normal spending proposals to provide dynamic action against the fight against

unemployment. This would never have been possible had we borrowed to pay our

way out of the inherited difficulties of prior years. The funds that will create

jobs today are the funds that otherwise would have gone to service dead-weight

debt.

[ Page 9595 ]

Well,

Mr. Speaker, as I pointed out, the year before they had increased their

debt by a billion dollars, and they had built up an excess of revenue

over expenditures of almost exactly a like amount. It's interesting,

when you think about it, that that occurred prior to an election. I

suspect that a government that is prepared to use the finances of this

province to attempt to hide debt and to build up revenues in excess of

their expenditures in order that the goodies can be dished out for an

election certainly needs an open-ended bill which will allow them even

more freedom than they have managed to practise in the past. Certainly

it is not in the best interests of good, proper fiscal policy.

1979 they were starting to talk a little bit about cutbacks. They were

talking about trying to balance the budget. In 1978 they were dishing

out all kinds of goodies, Mr. Speaker, and after the election in 1979

they were saying: "Well, we have to balance the budget, and this can

only lead to cutbacks in programs or the creation of more dead-weight

debt, and we do not intend to follow that road in British Columbia."

come up to the budget speech of 1980, which isn't that long ago. They

talk about having a surplus: in spite of the fact that they were

concerned whether they would even be able to make their budget balance

the year before, they have managed to get a bit of a surplus. Again,

they talk about the need to not have any debt. They say they are

budgeting for a balance between revenue and expenditure in 1980-81. No

debt — they are extremely opposed to debt.

We come to 1981. They talk about "The Balance of Choices" and "Priorities for 1981-82." There are three choices:

The

third possibility — that of running an operating deficit — was ruled

out early in our planning. This government is not prepared to consider

borrowing to pay operating expenses. Too many governments have adopted

this short-sighted way out of their financial difficulties only to find

that tough decisions become even tougher to make as the debt load

accumulates. It is a problem which is painfully obvious at the federal

level. Once a government becomes trapped in the mire of deficit

spending it is almost impossible to correct the situation. I do not

intend to leave that legacy to my successors in this portfolio in the

years ahead.

Of course. that budget was presented in 1981 by the current Minister

of Finance, so the turnabout that has taken place on the part of this

government seems very strange — even in this current budget for 1982.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, we shall continue to resist

the borrowing trap into which many other governments have fallen,

seldom to emerge. Prudent families would never borrow to buy groceries,

although many borrow for a new car. and most will borrow for a new

home. This government adheres to similar rules of careful financial

management. We shall not borrow to finance the ongoing operation of

programs, although it is both appropriate and necessary to borrow for

major capital purchases such as schools, hospitals and railway

facilities.

I would suggest most particular in the minds of

that government, Mr. Speaker, are the railway facilities. We have seen

— again from public accounts — a $45 million entry and a $12 million

entry, which comes awfully close to the amount which has been turned

over to finance the B.C. Railway for the northeast coal development and

which comes very close to the amount of funding that would be required

to keep the educational system at last year's level. Its current level

of operation, rather than instituting the series of four cutbacks that

have been asked for during the past year.

I suggest that we

have a need, as long as this government is in office — or, for that

matter, any government — to have some limits, some reporting. some

responsibility to this assembly for any borrowing of money. Their track

record is not very good. I've outlined the capital deficits and the

amount of debt that has accumulated in the eight years. It's

interesting to note that in actuality we had a deficit last year and an

even bigger one this year in our operating. So I very much support is

amendment. I believe that if we are going to go into deficit financing

— and I recognize that we are in a time of extreme economic

difficulties in this province and in other areas — any deficit

financing we undertake must have limits, for the very reasons that the

Ministers of Finance, both this one and the last one, have stated in

this House time after time that we must not establish great amounts of

deadweight debt, because of the difficulties that always occur when it

comes to paying off that debt.

If there is to be a need to

extend credit for operating, then let's have it accounted for in this

House. Let's have some limits on it. Let's make sure that we are not

just going headlong deeper and deeper in debt, with no need for

reporting — well, a need to report very briefly to the Legislature if

it happens to be sitting and when it happens to sit, but no real need

to come to this legislative body, which is supposed to be the

decision-making body in this province. It is an opportunity for this

Government to borrow for whatever purpose they want, for however long

they want, and whenever they want. That's too much unrestricted power

to put in the hands of any Minister of Finance or any cabinet. It's

particularly too much power to put in the hands of this particular

cabinet and this particular Minister of Finance and that is borne out

by their past record. I am very much in support of this amendment,

which would ensure that better fiscal policies were followed than we

have seen demonstrated here over the last eight years.

MR. DAVIS:

I won't make any bones about it: I don't like deficit financing. I

don't like it at any time, and I really believe, as does my party. the

party in government, in arranging finances on a pay-as-you-go basis. I

would like to think that we can keep our provincial bottom line, if I

can describe it that way in the black. That's the only way government,

I believe, can finance its operations and still keep a triple-A rating,

still pay minimum interest rates and still operate on a current basis

in such a way as to contain current operating outlays.

We're

obviously in a bit of a bind right now. Governments across this country

are certainly in a bind which is not entirely — in fact, not largely —

of our own making. It's a matter of record everywhere that western

democracies are having trouble financing government because of high

levels of unemployment and because they can't sell their products

overseas. That certainly goes for British Columbia, a part of the world

which is so heavily dependent on foreign trade for much of its income.

It looks to me — I've got no inside information — as if we have a

current operating deficit of, say, in the order of half a billion

dollars. It could be more, but that's a substantial amount. It's a

large deficit. seen in the context of an overall budget in the order of

$7 billion. It's an unwanted deficit in the order of 5 to 10 percent.

This,

as all hon. members know, is the first deficit that the Social Credit

Party has had to face since the early 1950s. Deficits, regardless, are

bad news. They're bad news especially in provinces like British

Columbia, in which, typically, the private sector has to borrow abroad

and which, with any luck at all, should be able to operate in the black

year in and year out through all time. This special borrowing bill is

[ Page 9596 ]

unprecedented.

It's certainly unprecedented for a Social Credit government. The Social

Credit government hasn't run a deficit since it was first elected in

This legislation must pass. It has to pass in order to

pay doctors' fees, nurses' wages, teachers' salaries and our public

service employees; to pay, in other words, to keep the machinery of

government running and to pay those very worthy people who work for us

as our public servants throughout the year. It has to pass if we're

going to be able to pay social assistance. Social assistance on an

increasing scale seems to be inevitable, especially as more and more

people are running out of unemployment insurance. They'll be coming

heavily on the province and the provincial treasury for support through

the winter months. That, I contend, is unavoidable. That's one more

reason why we are probably facing a deficit in the remainder of this

year.

There are several big projects. In fact, British

Columbia is the only part of Canada that appears to have any large

projects — call them megaprojects — going. Job-creating projects are

meanwhile in full stride. They too, at least in part, have to be

financed via the provincial treasury. I refer to northeast coal, the

port development at Prince Rupert, the downtown redevelopment in

Vancouver, North Vancouver, Burnaby now and certainly New Westminster,

hospital construction which is continuing, some school construction

which is a commitment and light rapid transit in the lower mainland.

Those

are substantial projects or programs, all of which cost money and

certainly involve hundreds of millions of dollars in total. Those

moneys must be spent now if we're to maintain the employment which they

can create. Many of them, certainly the larger ones, have the prospect

of paying out. In other words, the province has the prospect of

recovering moneys from those projects. But the recovery of moneys is

still some years away. We're talking, therefore, about additional

hundreds of millions of dollars over and above the normal operating

deficit — or not so normal — which the government is also encountering.

know the government is trimming its less vital expenses to the bone. I

know it's trying to restrain its outlays, even on education. I say

restraint in that case, because, as we all know, the budget of the

Ministry of Education has been increased in current dollars in the

order of 15 percent even with the restraint or cutback. We have to

restrain our expenditures with care in order to keep taxes down and in

order that the present level of taxation will see us through to 1983 or

1984, when, presumably, I think — with some reason we can hope — the

economy throughout this continent and certainly in this country will be

picking up again.

Restraint on the expenditure side will

certainly help, but tax revenue — income to the provincial treasury —

will be slow to turn around. It has dipped dramatically in recent

months. It may level off at a relatively low level, but it will be well

into 1983 before income to the provincial treasury begins to move up

again. So we have a difficult hiatus, a period of months in which

income will fall short of outgo, a span of time in which we have to

borrow, hopefully only on the short term — partly because interest

rates may continue to decline, and we would be able to take advantage

of the declining interest rates. Again, hopefully we will be back on

track in 1983, in the black again, where we don't have to borrow in

order to pay for people programs like health, education and social

assistance; to pay the grocery bills, if I can put it in everyday

parlance.

At the outset I said that I didn't like a

government borrowing on current operating account; I don't like it, and

I still can't get used to the thought. Here are a few suggestions which

I know the government can't act on immediately, but they are the kinds

of things that governments could do if they knew they were likely to

dip into the red on current operating account in order to balance their

budget, in order to minimize borrowing or avoid borrowing altogether.

What are these suggestions? I would continue to budget for a larger

surplus from now on: I'd build up a bigger kitty, if I could call it

that, bigger even than the billion dollar kitty the government had as

recently as 1979. It can disappear quickly, as we've seen in the early

1980s, so we have to build up a multibillion dollar operating reserve

in the mid-1980s; either that or we could be caught again and have to

borrow on current operating account on relatively short notice.

What

else would I do? I'd look at our provincial government-owned assets and

sell off some of them. I'd make up my mind to sell them as soon as

markets improve, not right away; that's why a policy along these lines

has to be thought out and scheduled perhaps even years in advance. I'd

borrow against those prospective sales and thus avoid going into the

red on current operating account, and I would pay off those borrowings

when the sale of those assets actually took place. What assets are

these? I'd sell off the mining rights to Hat Creek coal; they're worth

a fortune. Mr. Speaker, as you know, Hat Creek coal, as a resource, is

one of the best coal resources in North America, if not in the world.

In other words, I'd give the private sector a chance to perhaps develop

these coal resources and then sell their output to B.C. Hydro to

generate thermal power, if that is indeed the policy of the government

and what B.C. Hydro wishes to do. There are also petrochemical

possibilities there; gas can be manufactured from that coal and so on.

Down the years there are many private-sector possibilities as well as

public-sector possibilities.

I would sell those mining

rights at some appropriate time in the future. That would be income;

that would at least be available to the province to act as a buffer — a

kitty, if I can call it that — which could be drawn down in times such

as these. I'd make this kind of decision ahead of events. If that

policy were policy now, we'd be able to borrow against that asset; we'd

have income now or we'd have moneys that we could use to meet our

current operating deficit.

Hat Creek coal mining rights is

one such asset; the gas distribution operations of B.C. Hydro are

another. I've long felt that natural gas distribution should be

separate, corporately and administratively, from the distribution and

sale of electricity. The natural gas distribution operations of B.C.

Hydro could be sold, again, at some future date — not on a crash basis,

immediately; let's say to an investor-owned utility corporation with

good administration, the rates of which would be regulated by the

public utilities commission — rates, I suggest, which would not be

higher, and which, conceivably, with good administration would in fact

be less than might otherwise be charged by B.C. Hydro. Again, the

province could borrow against such a sale, which might yield the

provincial treasury $500 million, $600 million or $700 million. We'd

not only have those moneys available to the government to meet any

current operating deficit but we'd also have natural gas and

electricity competing head-on out in the marketplace. We'd have two

different entities setting pricing policy for energy rather than one.

We wouldn't have one head office, namely that of B.C. Hydro, deciding

which

[ Page 9597 ]

best for us — relatively low-priced electricity or relatively

low-priced natural gas. We'd have at least a measure of competition,

and we'd have them alternately intervening against each other when it

came to rate reductions or rate changes. As the public, we'd know a

little more about those operations and, I think, as a result of

competition we'd probably have a better deal as consumers.

We're

unique on this continent. I can think of only one privately owned

investor utility and no public ones which market both electricity and

gas out of one head office. Pacific Gas and Electric is the only one

that comes to mind. Otherwise, gas is marketed by one utility and

electricity by another, generally across the continent, certainly

across Canada and in western Europe. So we would be moving towards what

is generally the case elsewhere and away from this special situation

where one utility — a Crown corporation — sells both of the kinds of

energy which will not only dominate the house-heating market and the

space-heating market, but other markets for energy as well in this

province for a long time to come.

I've mentioned two

government-owned assets then: Hat Creek and the natural gas operations

of B.C. Hydro. Those proceeds, for example, could help us to finance

our new home mortgage relief plan. It could help the province to find

the moneys to build B.C. Rail's Anzac spur line to Tumbler Ridge. It

would help us to complete — I know it's nearly completed — the stadium,

roadways and other facilities at B.C. Place. It could help us to

finance light rail rapid transit, which otherwise will, in the next few

years, have to be financed by borrowing, much as B.C. Hydro borrows. So

the prospective sale of those assets, as a matter of definite policy,

could help us around this difficult financing corner in that way.

There

are numerous other assets that the province may consider selling at the

right time. They include numerous provincial lands, varying

considerably from place to place, which in the long term certainly are

suited for housing. Provincially owned real estate, such as real estate

owned by B.C. Rail, could be useful for industrial development or sold

off for commercial purposes; rights to develop resorts close to

provincial or national parks in British Columbia, or rights bordering

some of these new short-takeoff-and-landing airstrips that the province

is building or improving. Land rights around those strips will become

valuable as time goes by because more commercial activities will take

place: hotels, motels, even retailing will take place more and more

around airports much as they used to concentrate around railway

stations in the railway-building era.

One resource which has

always intrigued me that is owned by the province — at least I have

always contended it was owned by the province; there are those in

Ottawa who think otherwise — is the so-called Doininion coat block.

It's in the extreme southeastern corner of the province. It should have

been turned over to British Columbia when the Peace River block was

turned over to the province in the early 1930s, when the mineral rights

on the prairies were turned over to those provincial administrations by

the national government. The Dominion coal block was forgotten,

omitted, or left out somehow.

So you have a substantial area

in southeastern British Columbia where some of the most accessible and

best-quality coal is available in the constituency of my hon. friend

the member for Kootenay (Mr. Segarty) just south of the Crowsnest Pass.

It is generally accessible to the railway in that area and readily

mined. Yet it's in limbo. It's in federal jurisdiction and it's in

provincial jurisdiction. That dispute as to ownership should be

resolved soon, because the coal is readily accessible and those mining

rights are extremely valuable. We could begin to auction some of them.

admittedly to the higher bidder. There again is another resource which

in time will be developed by the private sector. In time it can

generate royalties and other revenue. It should be out with the private

sector sooner rather than later. It could be available to the private

sector and at the same time provide the kind of moneys, the kind of

financial reserves, which the province could use at a time like this in

order to keep in the black, in order to avoid borrowing. In order to

avoid paying exceptional interest rates, as most administrations do now.

Our

Canadian provinces and certainly the federal government, have had to

pay exceptional sums merely in interest to people who have loaned

money. The current Canadian deficit at the federal level would be wiped

out if the federal government had not borrowed so heavily over the last

decade. Interest on borrowings over the last decade at today's rates of

interest now totals in the order of S20 billion a year. That $20

billion is the magnitude of the expected deficit; it may be higher. If

we didn't have that debt federally, we would have a balanced budget.

and certainly we wouldn't have to tax Canadians in order to pay

exorbitant interest rates at a time like this. In other words, money

like that could be available for direct projects, for

employment-creating projects. This is the kind of policy I would like

to see the federal government follow, as well as the provincial

government in this province.

There are other things that can

be done which can have a short-run — if not an immediate — impact on

our provincial budget. Our Crown corporations are being required to

trim their sails a bit. They won't be borrowing as heavily. They won't

compete with the province as heavily as they might otherwise have clone

in raising money from those who are prepared to lend it at today's

interest rates.

To be more specific. I think B.C. Ferries

could operate on a break-even basis from now on, at least on its main

routes to Vancouver Island and theSun shine Coast — and be subsidized

on other routes. In other words. B.C. Ferries could manage its affairs.

It may need some increase in fares from time to time, but it could

break even on at least those high traffic routes and be less of a drain

on the current operating budget of the province, ICBC may be able to

cut back a bit by getting out of general insurance, although its

direction is to break even anyway. So I don't see it as a net drain on

the provincial treasury.

There is a whole series of things.

I personally am in favour of requiring our universities to charge costs

for foreign students. Universities around the world, with the exception

of a few Canadian universities — certainly those in British Columbia —

now charge costs. We're now getting more than our share of foreign

students because our universities are the biggest bargain in the world.

We're charging 10 percent of operating costs — not capital included but

just operating costs — to our own people and we're giving the same

break to people from elsewhere. Nowhere else in the world can you act a

deal like that. It's incredible.

I think that the provincial

government should take a good hard took at this policy of subsidizing

foreign students to the tune of at least S20 million a year and

probably more like $30 million to come to university in British

Columbia. If we need dollars for secondary education, or for health

care, or particularly for social assistance, there are a few bucks the

[ Page 9598 ]

province

could pick up, and it would merely be doing what Ontario is in the

process of doing right now, what the British government and

universities did three or four years ago. what all of western European

universities did. Faced with an influx of rich sons and daughters of

Arab sheiks and so on, they decided to charge them costs — average

costs. I think we should do the same. If we do want to favour certain

students from overseas, especially those from less-developed countries

having financial difficulties, then let's have a system of scholarships

and have those who we think deserve it — not, as the federal statistics

show, 90 percent of them from very well-to-do families, coming to this

province and to Canada for their university education. Why do

otherwise? They can save collectively tens of millions of dollars doing

so.

I wouldn't add to our public service payroll. I believe

that's being held. The lid is on it now; that's obvious. I wouldn't add

to the number of MLAs in the Legislature. That might save a few dollars

but not a large amount. Certainly we shouldn't be adding to ministers'

staffs, and I hope the various ministers are looking at consultants'

fees, overtime and travel outlays.

There is one thing I

wouldn't do, and I realize in this place it's controversial. I

certainly wouldn't put provincial moneys as a subsidy into a gas

pipeline to Vancouver Island unless and until the federal government is

committed to put at least $200 million into that project. The federal

government is now committed to put close to $1 billion into extensions

eastward from Montreal into Quebec City and the Eastern Townships. It

is prepared to put even more into extensions to the maritime provinces.

Those commitments exist. They are earmarked as subsidies in the federal

budget. There's no reason why that kind of federal money couldn't or

shouldn't be available here. In fact, some of the federal people tell

me that they've dangled it in front of British Columbia once or twice —

specifically in the federal Finance minister's budget of the fall of

1980; and a subsidy for a pipeline to Vancouver Island was mentioned

again by the Energy and Mines minister in official documents.

We've

got to nail those moneys down — however we do it; I presume through our

own utility board hearings and National Energy Board hearings — and be

sure they're available to support a pipeline to Vancouver Island, and

hopefully, as well, a petrochemical plant on, let's say, theSun shine

Coast. That would mean jobs, but it wouldn't mean an operation that was

totally subsidized by the province. It would mean a development which I

think is inevitable. I think it's one that, in all fairness, should

also be supported by the federal government and federal tax dollars.

That is by no means a complete list of new sources of funds or possible

savings, but it's a start. It's the kind of thing that I know the hon.

Minister of Finance has been thinking about, been concerned about and

is struggling with now.

I said at the beginning and I'll

repeat that I have reservations about the bill. I don't like it, merely

because to me it smacks of deficit financing on current operating

account — which it is; everyone admits it's that. I'm basically opposed

to financing current operations out of savings which otherwise could

have gone into job creation, as I said earlier. But we are in this

situation because the rest of the western world has a problem with its

finances. We need our essential services. We certainly need moneys for

social assistance in increasing amounts this fall, so the legislation

has to pass.

I've thrown out these thoughts simply because I hope they'll provoke some thinking along several of these lines.

I'm

going to vote for the bill, not because I like or am in favour of

deficit financing, but because it has to be. If members opposite want

to pay as much money for education as they do and pay as much as they

say they're prepared to pay for other projects, including $400 million

or $500 million for municipal development, then they certainly would

have us in the red under those circumstances, and they have to vote for

the bill too.

MR. SKELLY: I rise to speak in favour

of the amendment which, as the member for Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs.

Wallace) pointed out, was simply to place a limitation on the amount

which would be raised by borrowings under this proposed amendment to

the Financial Administration Act.

I must say that I'm

absolutely amazed at the speech I just heard. My family has been in

this country since 1819, in Quebec, and since 1913 here in British

Columbia. We're very proud of this country and province. I have never

heard such a suggestion as I just heard from that member for North

Vancouver. What he's proposing is that we put up a sign at the border

of British Columbia saying, "Colossal Garage Sale," and sell off all

the assets of this province — or as many of the assets of this province

as we can sell in order to bail us out of this difficulty which he says

is caused by worldwide economic circumstances. If that were the case,

who would be out there to buy our assets? What this government has done

is plunge this province into economic circumstances which they're now

trying to bail themselves out of by deficit financing.

How

can you believe anything this government says to you? For years they

tell you that they're opposed to debt and talk about deadweight debt.

They talk about deficit financing and how they're opposed to it in

principle. Now we're faced with a bill that does nothing more than

plunge this province into who knows how many years of deficit financing

if this government continues its regular spending characteristics. One

time they tell you that B.C. is not for sale, and now the member for

North Vancouver–Seymour says that we should put up a sign on the

boundary of the province saying: "Colossal Garage Sale." We're going to

sell it until we can pay our bills. How can you trust a government like

this? Time after time, Mr. Speaker, we've been told by this government

and by representatives of this government that they're opposed to debt.

colleague from Cowichan-Malahat mentioned some figures. I'm going to

present different figures. She was talking about the total direct and

guaranteed debt, but I'll just talk about the net debt as reported in

the budget speech of 1982. When the NDP government left office the

total direct and guaranteed debt, net of sinking funds, was $3.845

billion. In 1981 at the end of March, the total Social Credit debt was

$8.496 billion dollars, an increase in approximately six years of $4.65

billion. These people have raised the net debt of the province,

guaranteed by the province, by a rate of $775 million a year. And they

talk about being opposed to debt — and those were the good years. At

the same time they took all the special funds, they took all the assets

of the province, and either sold them off or liquidated them and put

them into the operating budget so that nothing was left. In the six

short years of Social Credit government, from 1976 until 1981, we went

into debt $4.65 billion. That's more than every government for every

year from 1871 to 1976. In that period of six years we've gone into

debt more than every British Columbia government has in total for 105

years. And the Premier

[ Page 9599 ]

criticizes

the federal deficit and says that this deficit is greater than any

deficit of any federal government, even through two world wars. Yet in

six years we have gone deeper into debt in this province than any

previous British Columbia government and all British Columbia

governments from 1871 to 1976. What it took these governments 105 years

to accumulate in terms of debt, the Social Credit government of British

Columbia under W.R. Bennett has done in six short years. This

government isn't shovelling money out of the back of a truck; they're

shovelling paper out — obligations. bonds, debt — and they're

shovelling that paper out of the truck as if it were money. We have to

pay that back in the future and our children and our grandchildren have

to pay that back in the future, because they've blown all of the money

of this province and all of the assets in the province. We don't even

own the truck that they shovel it out of any more.

The

member who just spoke talked about selling off the assets of the

province in order to pay our current accounts. Well, what are the

assets? What do we have left? We've sold off B.C. Resources Investment

Corporation, and that's gone bust. The Premier went around the province

telling the people to buy BCRIC at $6 a share, and now they're broke.

HON. MR. HEWITT: I bet you invested in Daon.

MR. SKELLY: Not a nickel.

Even

B.C. Ferries.... Remember the fleet that the citizens of this province

used to be proud of, the fleet that sailed the waters of British

Columbia, the fleet that was owned by the citizens of British Columbia.

They're all sold off now to eastern financial institutions. The member

who just spoke was the guy who agreed to the sales and the leaseback

with those eastern trust companies — selling off the assets of the

province.

Remember, Mr. Speaker, when the Premier came out

of the ski hills dressed in his ski uniform, looking like some

bush-league Pierre Trudeau, saying that B.C. was not for sale when the

CPR had made an offer on MacMillan Bloedel. B.C. was not for sale, he

said. They'd sold the ferries, they'd sold out Columbia Cellulose,

they'd sold out half the resources and they'd given away most of the

coal. B.C. is not for sale because it's already given away — even the

buses. There was an

article in the paper recently.... "B.C. Transit has

now followed B.C. Ferry Corporation into the sell-leaseback market." I

think that it was that member who just spoke, who believes in selling

off the assets of British Columbia as if we were involved in some kind

of giant garage sale with the people's assets, who, in his connection

with B.C. Transit, probably advocated that they sell off the buses of

this province, so that when the people get on the bus they will be able

to ride with Laurentide. Every debt institution in this country, every

trust company, has its hooks into the assets which used to be owned by

the people of this province, thanks to the profligacy of that

government opposite. Now they ask for the right to go into debt with no

limits. Who do they think the people of this province are? They've

already sold the assets of the province, they've already sold the

assets of the electors, and they've already gone into debt.

This

government has sold the birthright of the people of this province.

There's an attitude on the part of that government that they should act

as a corporation does in times of economic problems: whenever you're in

difficulty, then get into paper as quickly as you can. Sell off all the

assets, liquidate everything you can, and in order to be less

vulnerable become a paper company: nothing but debts, obligations,

contracts, leases. Then, if you have to go belly-up, nobody will be

able to get to your personal property. We've been converted from a

wealthy, proud, operating, hard-working province to a paper province.

Just like a paper corporation. We lease our buses from Laurentide

Finance. We lease our ferries from Montreal Trust. What's he going to

sell next? He can't sell B.C. Rail because he's already mortgaged it

beyond the hilt. He can't sell B.C. Hydro; it's already been mortgaged

beyond the hilt and it's not turning a dollar of profit. What is he

going to sell? He's going to sell the very land under this building,

the water, the rights to our energy and our minerals. He's going, to

sell it offshore and turn this province into a paper province.

Mr. Speaker, at one time this was a province that you and I could be

proud of. one that paid its own way in the world, built up assets for

its citizens, its children and grandchildren, one that could stand with

pride and say: "This province is a 'have' province in Canada. Our

citizens are productive citizens. Our governments are honest

governments, which manage the assets and finances of this province well

for our citizens and future generations." What have we been reduced to

now, when the member for North Vancouver–Seymour advocates the

supernatural garage sale for the province of British Columbia? I simply

can't believe it. I can't trust that government, and that's why I'm

voting for this amendment.

For the first time in

history we've got a government that's borrowed to the limit in the

short space of six years and sold off the assets of its citizens. Crown

corporations are either bankrupt, subsidized or losing money.

Government employees are being paid off in government development

bonds. We've paying our employees with bonds, with paper, with scrip.

Schools and hospital budgets are being bled to keep this government

operating over the next year. Now the government asks us to trust it

with the issuance of treasury bills with no limit and for unspecified

purposes. Why should you give a bankrupt a credit card? No other

institution in the province or the country will. Why should this

government ask the opposition to endorse giving a bankrupt government a

credit card?

If there was some kind of comprehensive plan

that wasn't simply based on getting votes in the next election

somewhere down the next three years, perhaps a new budget that would

show their strategy for getting British Columbia out of the economic

morass that we're currently involved in, thanks to the profligate

expenditures of that member for South Peace River (Hon. Mr. Phillips),

a plan that related to this borrowing. then we would say: "Let's take a

look at it." If they had a comprehensive plan to get out of debt, then

maybe we would get behind it. I think the member for North

Vancouver–Seymour just gave us the plan: "Give us the treasury bills.

We're going to turn around and sell off the rest of the province."

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

I'm not like that member who

just spoke. because I'm not solidly opposed to deficit financing if we

can see where we can get out of it at some short distance in the future

and if there is a plan of action that will show where we can pay off

those obligations. perhaps over a two- three- or four-year period —

whatever — as long as we can see sometime in the future that there's

going to be a limit to the amount and

[ Page

9600 ]

purposes upon which this money could be spent. But I haven't seen that. In

fact I haven't seen that this government is even capable of providing that kind

of economic planning, initiative and resources to the people of this province.

They ask us to entrust this type of government to borrow unlimited amounts

of money for unspecified purposes. As far as I'm concerned, we should not be

granting that type of authority to a group amounting to economic saboteurs.

They destroyed the economy of this province in the short space of six years.

They do not deserve the trust of this opposition. They do not deserve the support

of this opposition. They do not deserve the support of the citizens of British

Columbia. As far as I'm concerned, in the next election they're not going to

get it, regardless of when that election comes, because they have no plan, no

economic ability and competence. Because they're nothing more than economic

saboteurs. I don't intend to support the bill. I'm going to vote for the amendment

because it imposes limitations on the rights that this minister is seeking to

issue treasury bills: limitations as to amounts and limitations as to purposes

for which he plans to spend or borrow this money.

MR. LEGGATT: I'm surprised that I haven't heard support from the government

side with regard to the modest limit being asked for by the New Democratic Party

on this bill. Perhaps it's a problem that because votes tend to be polarized

in this place amendments aren't really examined as carefully as they should

be. I must say that I'm disappointed that the member for North Vancouver–Seymour,

who is a very rational member in this House, does not see fit to support this

particular amendment, which surely would solve one of the serious errors that

the minister has made in introducing the bill.

Why are we in this mess that we're in, having to go to the unlimited treasury

bill borrowing scheme? I think it's interesting to look back at the budget of

1982 presented by the minister earlier this year with great fanfare and a lot

of camera lights. At that time you may recall that almost every speaker on this

side of the House, without exception, stated to that minister that he had overestimated

his revenues and had underestimated his expenditures for the first time in the

history of fiscal budgeting in the province of British Columbia. The tradition

in the past had always been that the ministry constantly underestimated its

revenue and overestimated is expenditures.

HON. MR. WOLFE: How about 1975?

MR. LEGGATT: Oh, if we could have 1975 back and see a $100 million deficit

in this province, but we're facing a billion dollar deficit and the member opposite

still wish to whimper about 1975. We are looking at the worst fiscal disaster

this province has ever seen under the husbandry and administration of that government.

There's no avoiding history of 1975, 1969 or 1972.

The reality is that we are in 1982. In 1982 the Minister of Finance,

after all of the prognostications about the world economy and the B.C.

economy.... Yes, the world economy is certainly partly to blame for the

recession we're in. When it came to personal income tax revenues....

I'm referring to table 3 of the British Columbia budget of 1982. In

1981-82 this province took in $1.849 million in personal income tax.

The minister — with his crystal ball — sat down and said like

Pollyanna: "Everything's coming up roses. I'll bet personal income

taxes are going to be up again." Now this had to be the only minister

in Canada who felt personal income taxes were going to rise instead of

fall this year. I don't know anybody who would make that kind of

prediction except this government. He predicted that it would go from

$1.849 million up to 1.925 million — an increase of 4.1 percent. Do you

know any respectable economist in this country who was predicting an

increase in income tax revenue for this year?

Let's see what else he did when he got to his revenue side. Sales and fuel

tax — that's a big item. We've got $1.618 million in '81-'82. These guys were

predicting that for this year it would be up 15.2 percent to $1.864 million.

That's an interesting number. Do you really think you're going to have more

sales tax when you can't sell any products and people are out of work all across

the province? This is the fundamental philosophical flaw in this government.

You must have employment and people with money in their pockets to keep this

economy going. You don't solve it by throwing teachers out of work and health

workers out of work and closing hospital wards.

Let's look at another one. Oh, here's a big item: property taxes. They were

going to get an increase there of 31 percent. But I think the most dramatic

one of all is in the forestry sector. Who of the forest advisers was he talking

to about forest revenues for this year? It wasn't Knudsen. It wasn't anybody

we know in the forest industry. It certainly wasn't the president of Crown Zellerbach

or anybody like that. But this is what he did on forests. Our revenues in this

province from the forest sector in 1981-1982 were $104 million. He estimated

$128 million for this year. He estimated an increase of 23.1 percent in forests.

Does he never read the Financial Post ? He's got to quit reading the National

Lampoon. How can anybody be that wrong about forest revenues? In the spring

of this year there wasn't a single person you could talk to in this province

who didn't tell you the forest industry was on its back, the housing industry

had collapsed around the world — particularly in the United States. Everybody

in that industry knew it was a disaster, except the Minister of Finance, who

called for a 23 percent increase in his revenues for this year.

When you can't predict revenues, you don't know how to run a government. It's

that simple. That is fiscal stupidity. If you don't know what you're bringing

in, you don't know what you can do in terms of programming. That is why the

disaster has been visited upon the province's financial affairs today. They

failed to be realistic in their projections of revenue. They are literally a

mile out.

I can go through a lot others — they're all equally wrong. They saw sales and

service fees going up 26 percent. Licenses and permits — 18 percent. They might

have been right on that one; that's something they had a little control over.

Do you know what happened? They thought everybody else was going to increase

what they paid to the government in the private sector, the non-compulsory side.

That would go up just as much as they unilaterally increased their own fees

on things.

The disaster we are now looking at in this bill, the disaster that this province

is facing now — broke and going into deficit financing — could have been avoided

with good fiscal management. I don't think even my chartered accountant friends

will believe this statement, when they read it, as an

[ Page 9601 ]

accurate

projection. That projection that the minister presented us was about as

accurate as the Clarkson Gordon report on the New Democratic Party

government.

Imagine predicting a 23 percent increase in

forest revenues and nearly a 5 percent increase in personal income tax.

How do people on unemployment insurance pay income tax? It is a

disaster.

Another question that disturbs me — although I

don't know whether it disturbs the public; perhaps they haven't thought

about it — is the constant criticism by the member for North Vancouver

— I wish he were here — of the terrible federal deficit — a deficit I

might add that was, of course, being incurred while he was federal

Minister of the Environment. His constant concern about the federal

deficit is right. The federal deficit is a really big problem for the

country. But you don't help the federal deficit when you go into league

with private eastern financial interests so they don't have to pay

their federal income tax. That's what this government has done with the

ferry system and the buses. It's decided to play the tax-loophole game

with the private sector, thereby denying the federal government very

substantial revenues to try to correct that imbalance.

The

request for some kind of a break on the extent of borrowing is even

more important when you can see how far this Finance minister is out in

predicting his revenues. Now he wants us to give him carte blanche to

borrow as much as he wants on treasury bills. Surely it's asking too

much of the members of this Legislature to give him a blank cheque. He

told me and every other member of the Legislature, and all of the

people of the province, that forestry was going to be up 23 percent

this year. Is that the kind of prediction that we're going to have in

terms of their capacity to repay that borrowing, when they're that far

out in their revenue projections? We'll get the same kind of funny

financial statement, the same kind of nonsense, when it comes to their

capacity to repay treasury bills.

Interjection.

MR. LEGGATT:

I hope the member will take his seat and follow me, and explain how

accurate the Minister of Finance was in predicting revenues for the

year 1982. Tell me how he was able to predict in the spring of this

year that forestry revenues were going to be up 23 percent. Did anybody

in the business community take that position that you've heard of? Did

anybody in this country predict that personal income tax would rise

this year, or predict sales tax would rise in a year of terrible

depression? Even the Premier didn't think that. He must have been sold

on these numbers. He wouldn't let his Finance minister come in with

them. How can you trust a government that's that far out in its revenue

predictions with a blank cheque on borrowing? That's what I want to

know.

The amendment before the House, a reasoned amendment,

an amendment which simply asks for some limit on the capacity of this

government to borrow and therefore the capacity to be wrong — which

they have been consistently for the last two years — is a reasonable

amendment. I can't imagine why the member for North Vancouver wouldn't

vote for this amendment. I had the Minister of Finance tell me that we

are wildly out and entirely wrong when we said S900 million had been

squandered by consolidating special funds into general revenue. And we

might be wrong. It could be more like $600 million, not $900 million.

but whatever figure it is, this administration has squandered special

funds in the last three years to the tune of $500 million to $1

billion. What we have done. Mr. Speaker, is create the non-heritage

fund. While Alberta and Saskatchewan have a heritage fund, we have a

negative heritage fund. It's been squandered by this administration.

The

long-time view of the conventional wisdom in this province that

balanced budgets are good and deficit budgets are bad is essentially a

correct view. The difficulty with it is that you should not balance

annually; you should balance over a period of time, such as the

four-year period suggested by the member for New Westminster (Mr.

Cocke).

I think it makes a good deal of sense to do cyclical

budgeting. I suppose this bill could be explained away as an attempt at

cyclical budgeting, but I don't believe it is. I think it is the kind

of catch-as-catch-can hodgepodge of non-planning that we can expect

from this government.

Interjection,

MR. LEGGATT: That's right. They think planning is originating in Moscow or something.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Oh no, it comes out of the Waffle Manifesto.

MR. LEGGATT:

How about the London School of Economics, that hotbed of communists? I

hear it's a terrible place. People who have been there are the worst

kind of raving communists, like Mackenzie King, Keynes, Kennedy — all

those terrible, loony left-wingers who have gone to the London School

of Economics.

I suggest that the minister try going

there once himself; have a visit and see what actually goes on. The

London School of Economics deals with economics, and this government

doesn't know anything about economics. It's just bone ignorant about

the subject. To prattle on about the so-called socialists at the London

School of Economics....

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You say that on the hustings and you'll get defeated, you know.

MR. LEGGATT:

I'll say it on the hustings, in the House. In the hall — everywhere.

I'm quite proud of the people I know who've been to the London School

of Economics. I think they would be kind of unhappy to hear the

minister put them all down as a bunch of communist loonies. They

aren't. They make a lot of sense. In fact. they are the people who have

kept the capitalist system alive in the western world over the last 15

years by distributing wealth and putting it into the pockets of people

who can purchase the products of those small business people that this

government allegedly cares for. It's purchasing power that we have to

have.

This treasury bill, this first touch of the cold

water, this first attempt to dive into the lake and try out deficit

financing, has not been well thought out. Obviously any government in

this province will have to borrow. We are broke. We know we have to

borrow: we don't have, my revenues. We have to borrow to maintain a

decent level of services. But for this government to borrow would be

the same as the New Democratic Party's being against public Medicare.

It is the talisman: it is the thing that you've hung your hat on and

survived on all these years. They no longer have any reason to exist.

Please call an election and let us put you out of that agony.

[ Page 9602 ]

MR. BARBER: In the late 1950s, a fine American writer and playwright put together a work called The Pawnbroker .

In the course of this work he examined the attitudes and traditions, he

talked about some of the problems and difficulties, mainly from the

point of view of those who, when times get tough, have to pawn their

assets. He talked about what happens over a period of time to those who

get into the habit of pawning their assets in order to meet their

current obligations.

In this particular work, The Pawnbroker ,

we see an illustration of his customers, and we see an illustration of

his customers today. This is a government that is taking the province

to the pawnbrokers. They are taking the province's assets — the

ferries, buses and now, according to the member for North

Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Davis), even more assets — to the pawnbrokers

in order to bail themselves out. What's dangerous about that is that

first of all it's a dangerous habit to get into. Once you're into it,

how do you draw the line and how do you stop? What's dangerous is that

they've done this so often already that they have relatively little

left to take to the pawnbrokers.

The Minister of Finance, in

a pitiful and irrational defence, attempted in question period to

explain how it was that somehow simultaneously the government and the

private sector could both exploit each other to mutual benefit when the

latest assets of the province were taken to the pawnbrokers — in this

case buses. Formerly owned by all of us, they are now to be sold to

eastern financiers and then sold back to us for an extra $12 million

beyond the price we originally paid for them. His argument was

basically a sham and a hoax. Intellectually, the argument advanced by

this government is a fraud. It cannot be that we benefit by having to

pay $12 million more to buy back what we have already bought once. That

argument is a fraud, but it's typical of the attitude of those who are

prepared to go to the pawnbrokers when times get tough.

Let's

talk a bit more about what has happened to the Social Credit Party. If

W.A.C. Bennett were alive today he would spit on this bill. If W.A.C.

Bennett were alive today he would spit on the coalition that has

introduced it, because he would understand that this is a repudiation

in its entirety of the fundamental economic strategy which he held to

be correct for the people of British Columbia. If W.A.C. Bennett were

alive today he would spit on both the bill and the government that has

betrayed his legacy, his inheritance an his philosophy. This bill is a

massive repudiation of what was, at least for a time, the only unifying

principle of Social Credit. They used to call that principle "pay as

you go and don't borrow for the groceries."

Another act of

legerdemain, another kind of fraud, occurred a short while ago when it

was revealed the government had betrayed yet another promise. This was

the promise to finance B.C. Rail's development in the northeast on a

pay-as-you-go basis. I remember the Minister of Industry and Small

Business Development telling us, apparently sincerely, and apparently

intent on being believed, that he would finance that railway

pay-as-you-go first track to last track. I believed him. I don't think

the man is a liar, consciously. But we do know, Mr. Speaker, what's

gone wrong with that. In a deceitful and sneaky way, without telling us

why, without admitting when, and only finally confessing the what after

we pried it out of them, they have admitted they've abandoned the

pay-as-you-go philosophy that governed their party, the common

inheritance that W.A. C. Bennett left them by way of a philosophical

view about public administration.

Once again they've had to

go out and borrow a lot of money and redirect a lot more money in order

to finance B.C. Rail. If there were circumstances that could justify

it, surely those circumstances could be explained. If there were

circumstances that demand that change in policy, surely those

circumstances are honourable and worthy of public disclosure

volunteered by the government responsible for them. But no, this

government didn't volunteer that information. They didn't call a press

conference to give us that news. They didn't issue yet another press

release to tell us they had changed their policy for a good and

honourable reason. No, once again it was up to the opposition, the

media, and to the financial community to discover that they had

repudiated, on one further occasion, a promise, a vow, a commitment,

and a policy which they had offered apparently in good faith, and which

we accepted in good faith.

That is one of the fundamental contradictions that this government

has had to deal with in the last six, going on seven, years. It is, Mr.

Speaker, a coalition, it is no longer a single policy, a single party,

and a single point of view in government. The tragedy that the real

Socreds face in this coalition is that they know full well that they

are being forced to adopt Liberal economic policies, Trudeau borrow

because of the failures of their own administration. The government

that is taking the assets of this province to the pawn brokers — the

buses, the ferries, and all of the other things that they are now

considering; we've heard some of them and we'll be asking about them in

question period — is a government that has violated a trust, a

government that has betrayed the founder of their own party in this

province, the late W.A.C. Bennett.

W.A.

C. Bennett would never vote for this bill. He would probably consider

this to be a reasonable amendment. W.A.C. Bennett would never have

allowed this province to get into that position.

Interjection.

MR. BARBER:

We don't love W.A.C. now, Mr. Member, but we respect him for being a

man of principle who honoured his promises and kept them for 20 years.

For 20 years, at least, he was consistent, honest, plain and

straightforward about his philosophy of government. You are nothing

better than opportunists. You are nothing better than a member of a

coalition that cannot even make the pretence of a philosophical

approach to government. We honour any adversary who is honest and

consistent, and W.A.C. was that.

Interjection.

MR. BARBER: Don, please, sober up.

The

Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) a year and a half ago said

that a year ago this month the forest industry would recover. I have a

statement that you made a year and a half ago in which in your

typically inept way you said that the forest economy of British

Columbia would recover in the fall of 1981. In reply to my colleague

from Coquitlam, who asked where the Minister of Finance got such bad

advice, let me remind you and advise the House that a year and a half

ago the Minister of Forests publicly said, on the basis of his

[ Page 9603 ]

apparent ability to predict these things, that the forest economy would recover starting in the fall of 1981.

Interjection.

MR. BARBER:

Bad forecast? It's typical of a bad government unable to handle even

its own books, much less the books of the people of British Columbia.

This

bill is an admission of catastrophic failure on the part of Social

Credit. They have squandered, wasted, misspent, misappropriated and

misused public funds for almost seven years.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Order!

MR. BARBER:

What do you mean, "Order"? If your government, your financial house,

were in order, you wouldn't have to present this bill today.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER:

Order, please, Hon. members, the Chair observes that the Minister of

Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) has not yet

taken

part in the debate. If he wishes to do so he will have his

opportunity.

HON. MR. HEWITT: On a point of order,

I'd ask the member to withdraw the inference that there's been a

misappropriation of funds by this government. It's unparliamentary.

MR. BARBER: There certainly has been. What are you talking about?

MR. SPEAKER:

Order, please. If an imputation was made directly toward any specific

member of the government, the withdrawal must be made. If that is the

case, I would ask the member to withdraw,

MR. BARBER:

It wasn't the case and I don't withdraw it, because there was no

reference to any minister. However, the government as a whole has

misappropriated public funds. Let me illustrate and use your own words

to do so. Let me refer to a commitment made by the Minister of Industry

that....

HON. MR. HEWITT: Do you want to lay a charge?

MR. BARBER: It's not a criminal offence I'm referring to.

HON. MR. HEWITT: Misappropriation of funds?

MR. BARBER:

Misappropriation, that's right, We appropriate money in this

Legislature for specific purposes. We do that with the power and the

authority of law. The appropriation process in Committee of Supply is a

process that you understand and that I do too. What happens when you

take the money we appropriate for one purpose and spend it on another

that we did not approve is misappropriation of funds. Let me give an

illustration of how it worked.

Interjection.

MR. BARBER:

Lay a charge? It's not a criminal offence. It may be a political

offence to people who care about the process of appropriating public

funds for a specific purpose. Although you may feel embarrassed, as you

should, the fact is it's not a Criminal Code offence. It is, though, an

offence, I think, to the procedure in this House, which holds that the

Legislature appropriates money to the Crown upon the request of the

government. We both know that's how it works.

What you quite

clearly did, in the case of northeast coal, was to misappropriate money

that we had committed for one purpose and convert it to another, and

the way you've done it is through the costs you allocate and attribute

to B.C. Rail. This was a project that you said would pay its own way

from beginning to end. We never appropriated a nickel in this

Legislature for a policy or a budget that saw B.C. Rail being financed

by borrowings and by consolidated revenue. We were told by your

colleague that the B.C. Rail development in northeast coal would be

pay-as-you-go. That was a commitment made to us in a budget debate two

years ago and again last year, and to the people, through the

appropriations that were voted in this chamber. When you turn around,

repudiate that process and re-appropriate that money. you have done

something contrary to the express will of this Legislature. I call that

misappropriation of funds from beginning to end.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Shame on you, Charlie.

MR. BARBER:

Shame on you for having done it, for having tried to cover it up. and

for leading and participating in a government so inept. so unable to

administer, so careless of the public funds, that you have driven the

province to the position it's in today, where you need to borrow for

operating costs.

Interjections.

MR. BARBER: What do you mean, "Get out of the gutter"?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members. If the member speaking would

address the Chair, and the other members would contain their interjections,

we might slowly wend our way through this debate.

MR. BARBER: I would address the Chair always, Mr. Speaker, but I saw you dozing off and I didn't want to wake you up.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER:

Order, please. The Minister of Industry and Small Business Development

will either come to order or leave the chamber. This is the last time.

I would ask the first member for Victoria to withdraw his remark to the

Chair. I may have to sit here, hon. member, but there are certain

things I don't have to do, and one of them is consider remarks like

that.

MR. BARBER: Of course — it was meant as a friendly joke. Mr. Speaker.

MRS. JORDAN: What a sense of humour!

[ Page 9604 ]

MR. BARBER: Well, it's certainly not his or yours, and I'll certainly withdraw it.

Let's

talk again about the principle of the amendment. This is an attempt to

place a ceiling, a limit....This is an attempt to exert the

prerogatives of the Legislature. It's an attempt to protect the public

interest by establishing upon motion a commitment that this government

will not be allowed to break the bank in British Columbia. The bill

this government has put forward allows Social Credit to borrow any

amount for any purpose for any period of time. It's as simple as that.

perfectly obvious that this government may vote any amount for any

purpose for any period of time, and may go to public borrowing in order

to finance what they wish. It's not acceptable. Again, if W.A.C.

Bennett were alive, he would repudiate that absolutely. In fact, when

W. A. C., Bennett was alive, he passed a bill to outlaw the kind of

policy that the coalition now wishes to endorse. In 1960 — if I recall

the year correctly — W.A. C. Bennett passed a bill that would once and

for all establish a policy that would forbid governments from borrowing

any amount for any purpose for any period of time. Socreds who were

here then are going to have a very difficult time voting for this bill

today. You'd think they could not countenance such a complete, arrogant

and obvious reversal of policy. Either you believed it once or you

believed nothing. Either you held it to be your philosophy then or you

admit today you have no philosophy at all. Either you held it then as a

belief, a constant and a statement of public policy and you meant it,

or you mean nothing at all at any time.

This government got

elected parading as a party of competent business people. In the last

seven years that image has been by and large undermined. This is the

government, after all — briefly — responsible for the Marguerite fiasco,

the Seaboard fiasco, and what used to be known as the Ministry of

Deregulation. Any government that's capable of those stunts, any

government so inept as to be held accountable for something the Premier

boasted about — the Ministry of Deregulation, which would "free

business from the shackles of government" — and then turn around and

wreck a business by putting it out of business through mistaken

legislation.... Any government capable of that magnitude of error is no

longer capable of parading about as a party of competent business

people.

My colleague from Coquitlam has demonstrated, using

the language of the minister himself, how totally wrong his major

predictions were in the budget speech he made. My colleague from

Coquitlam has demonstrated how completely wrong has been the financial

house of cards upon which they've set their future.

The

people of British Columbia will demonstrate how completely wrong it is

for this government to govern with the presumption that they have the

confidence of the people of British Columbia anymore. This is the worst

and the most inept group of businesslike bunglers this province has

ever suffered under. Any business run as badly as this province has

been run by Social Credit would be out of business altogether by now.

Any

business that had to labour under the incompetent administration, the

inept forecasts and the waste of public funds — the waste of funds for

any purpose — that we've seen Social Credit be responsible for would

long ago have been bankrupt. The government capable of Seaboard, the

government capable of the Marguerite ,

the government capable of the heroin treatment plan, the government

capable of the Ministry of Deregulation fiascos, and the government

capable of the mess called BCRIC now asks us to trust them. They ask us

to sign a credit card and turn it over to them. They ask the people of

British Columbia to allow it to happen. We don't trust a government

that's capable of doing something like BCRIC. We don't trust a

government that's capable of accidentally wiping out the Seaboard

insurance company. We don't trust a government that's capable of

bringing in something as completely unworkable and wasteful as a heroin

treatment program. We don't trust a government so inept as to screw up

for a year tourism between Victoria and Seattle by their mishandling of

the Marguerite , the Rupert , the Surrey and the jetfoil. Any government capable of all of those mistakes is not to be trusted with a credit card.

You

are not trusted by us. You are not trusted by the majority of the

people. You are not trusted even by those whom you consult in the

Premier's office: Mr. Spector and Mr. Kinsella. They know full well

what's gone wrong with your strategy, and about the chicken dance that

the Premier has done for the last three weeks on the question of an

election. It's further evidence of the disarray in which they find

themselves in the polls. You are not trusted by the people of British

Columbia. You are not trusted by the members on this side of the

Legislature. We don't trust you when you ask us for a credit card that

will allow you to borrow any amount for any purpose for any period of

time.

We move this amendment — I trust, to the distaste of

the partisans opposite — as a gesture, a method and a symbol. The

gesture says that we want accountability; the method says that this is

how we'll find it; the symbol says that you are not to be trusted with

unlimited borrowing authority. You have already done so much damage to

the people that we do not wish to allow you to do further damage in the

future. You are not competent enough; you are not careful enough. You