2008 Legislative Session: Fourth Session, 38th 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)

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2008

Morning Sitting

Volume 27, Number 4

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Page

Introductions by Members

Reports from Committees

Select Standing Committee on Crown Corporations,

report

J. Rustad

Budget Debate (continued)

L. Krog

D. Hayer

G. Gentner

R. Hawes

[ Page 10057 ]

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2008

The House met at 10:03 a.m.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Prayers.

Introductions by Members

Hon. M. de Jong: Joining us in the gallery today is someone

who is well known to members of this assembly on both sides of the House. Dave

Haggard is a longtime labour leader, a forestry advocate. He is someone who is

no stranger to intense negotiations, working with industry, labour, government

and communities.

He is joined by his wife Eileen, who is a leader in her own right,

working with the Nuu-chah-nulth education authority. K-to-12 is her specialty.

She has dedicated her life to the advancement of education within aboriginal

communities. She is of aboriginal ancestry, as is Mr. Haggard. They are very

much a team, as I have learned through the years.

I am also pleased to advise the House that Mr. Haggard has

accepted an invitation from the province to sit as the newest commissioner with

the B.C. Treaty Commission. He has been appointed to a two-year term. He'll be

replacing the outgoing commissioner Jack Weisgerber. Of course, I want to thank

Mr. Weisgerber for his six years of excellent work with the commission.

[1005]

Mr. Haggard will serve alongside Jerry Lampert and commissioners

Robert Phillips and Jody Wilson. He'll be the newest commissioner. He brings a

passion for community involvement. He brings a passion for advancing the cause

of a new relationship with first nations.

Mr. Speaker, I am thrilled to death that Mr. Haggard has accepted

this invitation and am thankful that Eileen has chosen to agree to lend him to

us and to the work of the B.C. Treaty Commission. I ask all members to welcome

him and thank both of them for their contribution to public service.

Reports from Committees

J. Rustad: It's my honour to present the report of the

Select Standing Committee on Crown Corporations for the third session of the

current parliament.

I move that the report be taken as read and received.

Motion approved.

J. Rustad: I ask leave of the House to permit the moving of

a motion to adopt the report.

Leave granted.

J. Rustad: I move that the report be adopted, and in doing

so, I'd like to make some brief comments.

During the third session, the Select Standing Committee on Crown

Corporations met with senior officials of three British Columbia Crown

corporations. Representatives from the Columbia Power Corporation, the Industry

Training Authority and the First Peoples Heritage, Language and Culture Council

appeared before the committee and presented their annual reports and service

plans. I'd like to thank the senior officers of the various Crown corporations

who appeared before the committee. In addition, I'd also like to thank all

members of the committee for their important contributions to the committee's

unanimous report.

I move the report be adopted.

Motion approved.

Orders of the Day

Hon. M. de Jong: I call continued debate on the budget.

Budget Debate

(continued)

L. Krog: Firstly, I want to recognize that the budget

speech given by the Minister of Finance is probably her last, and I can say that

most of us on this side of the House respect the fact that she's leaving the

government benches and has announced her leaving the government benches.

[H. Bloy in the chair.]

She talked in her opening words and said: "This budget asks the

question: what kind of legacy do we really want to leave for future

generations?" I think the more important question is really: what kind of

example is this generation setting by this kind of budget in these particular

times?

The legacy we are leaving for future generations, I would argue,

is indeed from a public perspective and the kind of perspective that was brought

to the governance of this province by figures like W.A.C. Bennett or Dave

Barrett. The legacy we are leaving, in the public eye, is a much diminished one.

It is a legacy of a diminishing role of Crown corporations in the economy and in

how people receive public services.

The budget doesn't talk about, for instance, increasing ferry

fares. The budget doesn't say anything, really, about hydro per se, as we see

independent power projects proliferate across the province, all at great expense

to the taxpayer.

I submit that the better question is: what kind of example are we

setting, and what does this budget really say? What does this budget say in

terms of housing and homelessness? What does it say in terms of forestry? What

does it say of the kinds of expenses that average British Columbians face day

in, day out? How do they manage in an economy where they see increasing wealth

at higher income levels, significant increases in the value of assets of those

at higher income levels and a diminished society, if you will, in which they

have to exist and struggle day in and day out?

[1010]

[ Page 10058 ]

As an example, one would have hoped that the budget speech would

have perhaps mentioned an increase in the minimum wage for the lowest-income

earners in the province. Everyone in this chamber has seen an increase. We know

that wages across the province in the last two years, with significant increases

in resource revenues, have all increased.

Some people are doing very well — very well indeed. Others are

doing better. But quite clearly, facing rising costs, many British Columbians

are indeed doing a great deal worse.

When I ask the question again of what kind of example we are

setting through this budget, I would suggest that the example we are setting is

not one that future generations will look back on and say: "This was a great

budget. This was a transformative budget. This was a budget that people could be

proud of."

I would have expected to see in this budget, with the numbers of

homeless in my own community, a significant commitment by government to

providing housing — and not shelter beds. It's all well and good to talk about

shelter beds. That's a great place to go for a few days if you find yourself

temporarily homeless for some reason. Those facilities are needed. No one

suggests they aren't.

But in terms of what most of us think of as a home — a place where

with some confidence we can go every night and find security, safety, comfort

and a place to rest — there's nothing in this budget. There is a modest amount

of money, which I suspect is really destined for shelter beds and not for

permanent housing, not for the creation of homes and living conditions in which

people who find themselves in difficulty will be able to find that security

necessary to improve their lives — to secure a place in society, to move up the

ladder, if you will, and to provide some peace and security.

In my constituency Harmac has just recently been bought. It's a

major pulp mill. It has been — and probably is right now and continues to be —

the most significant private sector payroll in my community. I didn't see

anything in the budget, particularly for the Ministry of Forests, that is in any

way going to guarantee that Harmac will get the secure supply of fibre that it

needs in order to continue operations and continue to be a significant economic

contributor to not only my community but to the province's revenues.

The workers there are living with a great deal of uncertainty —

the suppliers to that mill, the people who work for them. All of those people

are living with great insecurity right now. We've seen other mills close up and

down the coast — sawmills, pulp mills. We've seen significant devastation in our

forest industry.

Now the government will probably respond: "Oh, it's all due to the

dark and dismal '90s." But it has been just about seven years since this

government was elected — seven years in which to manage forest policy, seven

years in which to make improvements. I saw nothing in this budget, nothing at

all, that is going to save what historically has been the mainstay of British

Columbia's economy.

You know, if the RCMP are the symbol of this country nationally,

it's probably a tree or a salmon that is the symbol of this province. I didn't

see any commitment in the budget around fisheries. We know that the wild salmon

stocks are in great danger. We know, and I think the Premier reflected, that

concept in the throne speech. We know that we're going to have to grow food

closer to home. We know we have to look after our own environment. In other

words, we've got to stop messing in our own nest. I didn't see anything in the

budget about that either.

For the average constituent in Nanaimo, if they live on Gabriola

Island, what have they seen in the last seven years? Huge increases in ferry

rates. What are they promised? Further increases in ferry rates.

I attended a meeting the other week where, as one young fellow

quite wisely pointed out…. I suspect he's probably more a supporter of the other

side of the House than he is of my party.

[1015]

He said quite simply: "We're the people that clean your gutters.

We're the people that volunteer for your fire department. We're the people who

do your gardening. As the price of the ferry rates continues to rise, it becomes

less and less likely that people like me who have families and children and who

want to live on Gabriola Island are going to continue to be able to live there."

That is, quite simply, because they won't be able to afford to do so.

The policies of this government, which weren't changed by anything

in the throne speech, are to let ferry rates continue to rise to make it more

and more that the Gulf Islands of British Columbia will become enclaves only for

the rich, only for the comfortable and, quite frankly, quite often only for

those who are older. Yet those older people require services delivered by

younger people. That's going to change the complexion of the Gulf Islands in a

way that was never anticipated — nor, indeed, was it ever intended by Dave

Barrett when he brought in the Islands Trust legislation.

Where in this throne speech did I see something to deal with what

is the most pressing social problem in my community? That's homelessness. We've

seen money poured into Victoria. We've seen money poured into Vancouver. We have

seen commitments made to those major centres, but the city of Nanaimo, one of

the three oldest cities in the province of British Columbia, where the mayor

himself is head of the Premier's Task Force on Homelessness…. That city sees

nothing in this budget.

It was this week that there was an

article in the local paper.

Indeed, I expect to be in communication with the mayor and council and some

senior staff later this morning. There was a piece in the paper where the city

of Nanaimo is going to have to crack down on rooming houses because they're

unsafe.

Where are those people going to go if there isn't any money to

provide decent public housing? They will further contribute to the growing

problem of homelessness in my community, and it's outrageous.

It's particularly outrageous when I contrast it with what the

budget says to British Columbians. It doesn't

[ Page 10059 ]

say: "We're going to give you any significant or any increase in assistance

rates." It doesn't say: "We're going to provide significant moneys for housing

and homelessness." It doesn't say, "We're going to do something to protect you

from the rising costs," over which government has some control, whether it's

ICBC rates or hydro rates or ferry fares. For those people, there is nothing.

We know that hydro is going up by 15 percent. Government has

brought in a carbon tax. By and large, I think most British Columbians support

the concept of carbon taxes. British Columbians understand keenly the

devastating effects of climate change, and they're all willing to do their

share, but sharing is the concept that's missing from the budget.

They don't mind sharing the burden. They'll put their shoulders to

the wheel. They've done it in other periods of our history, whether it was

building this province, fighting in two world wars, fighting the Korean War,

surviving the Great Depression or helping build this province in the great

growth era of the '60s and the '70s. They did their share.

What they don't see in this budget is some reasonable sharing of

the burden of addressing the most significant problem of our generation, which

is climate change. What they see is a $327 million subsidy for the oil and gas

industry. It is an unbelievable amount of money. If you took that figure and

doubled it, I'm reasonably advised that we could pretty much build the number of

housing units in this province needed to eliminate homelessness. Chronic

homelessness would be gone.

Now, I don't deny that there'd be money in every budget hereafter

to provide funding for operating costs. I accept that. But just imagine a

British Columbia that, for a couple of years, cut off the government lolly, the

oil and gas industry, but solved the problem of homelessness.

I come back to my question. What kind of example does this budget

set? What kind of example? In a time of general prosperity they could be

actually addressing these problems in a way that our generation could stand up

and look at the generations that follow us and say: "We were proud of what we

did. We did the right thing. We had opportunity given to us, and we used it

wisely for the benefit of all."

[1020]

No. Instead, it's $327 million this year for the oil and gas

industry. What's even more repugnant is that the budget is going to give a $220

million tax break to the big banks. At a time when their profits are in numbers

that most people can't even figure out how many zeroes you've got to put behind

the first digit to calculate, we're going to give the big banks 220 million

bucks.

The Coastal Credit Union's main office, Vancouver Island, is in my

constituency. It's been a successful operation. They're doing well. They pay

dividends. The customers are happy. They employ a lot of people. They're a union

operation. With great respect, I don't think they were begging for a tax break.

Royal Bank seems to be doing very well. Bank of Nova Scotia is

doing very well; CIBC is doing very well. They're all doing well, and we're

going to give them a tax break. We're going to give them a tax break when you

can walk out of my constituency office and see people who are homeless. We're

going to give them a tax break when the people in Gabriola can't afford the

ferry fares.

You're going to give them a tax break when the 58-year-old single

woman on disability living in a mobile home park in my community is terrified

that the very home she lives in is going to disappear out from under her because

this government didn't announce anything in the throne speech or the budget to

deal with the risks of mobile home parks being turned over for development. We

have a Residential Tenancy Act and other statutes that simply don't protect

those people and their houses.

I'll give you an example. A woman phoned me this week. She's upset

about the gas tax. I'm not going to mention her name, but she lives in one of

those mobile home parks. You can say that on one level she's fortunate. She

inherited a 30-year-old mobile home from her mother. She lives on disability.

She's getting about 900 bucks a month.

Her pad rent has gone up. She's looking at a 15 percent increase

in her hydro rates. She drives a clunker, the kind of clunker this government

and all of us would like to see off the road, but she's not going to be able to

afford to buy a new hybrid. She won't be able to take advantage of any tax

credits or benefits that this budget talked about. When she gets her hundred

bucks, if she's lucky, because she owns that mobile home — or manufactured home,

properly speaking, I guess — she's going to have to plunk it down on the taxes.

She doesn't see any relief in this budget for her. She's not old

enough to collect CPP, and she's not well enough to work. She's on disability,

and she's going to be on it permanently till some other form of government

assistance kicks in as she gets older. There's nothing in this budget for her —

nothing.

What do you say to the 15-year-old who I'm dealing with now, who's

troublesome? He's a troublesome kid. The Ministry of Children and Families has

almost written him off. There's nothing in this budget for him. The youth centre

where he's been staying — longer than he should have, according to the rules,

because there's no place else for him to go — is threatened with closure and may

well have to shut its doors in the next few days. There's nothing in this budget

for him.

What is in this budget? Well, we've got continued moneys for

highway funding so that the wealthiest in Vancouver can drive up to the site of

the Olympics and visit their multi-million-dollar ski condos or ski chalets, as

the case may be. They're doing very well under this government.

Goodness, I think if I were one of those people, I'd be voting for

this government too. I'd be thrilled with the throne speech. My shares through

my RRSP in the Royal Bank, if I had them, would look really good after another

$220 million tax break.

But for working families, for the majority of the people in this

province and for the people who day in and day out have to struggle to get to

work through

[ Page 10060 ]

congested traffic because there isn't good transit…. They're looking at

increases in transit fares. When we want everybody out of their cars, we're

bumping up the cost of public transit instead of reducing it.

[1025]

That is just the kind of example that I've been trying to talk

about this morning and why I can't respond in a positive way to the budget

speech from the Minister of Finance. It is because at a time when we could do so

much more, we are in fact doing less.

I'm almost shocked that this government — here we are roughly 15

months from an election — has an opportunity to start dishing out the lollies,

so to speak — doing what governments historically, in their own cynical way,

always do. All governments are guilty of it. I'm not excepting anyone.

I would have thought they might have wanted to say to British

Columbians: "We're going to do something for those of you who face more

difficult times." I would have thought that after seven years of continuously

rising tuition, with post-secondary tuition in this province literally doubling

in the last seven years, they might have said: "We're going to institute a cap

on tuition fees. We've got the money. We know that education is crucial to the

future success of our economy." I thought they might have announced a cap on

tuition fees.

We know now that the average student debt at the end of four years

in British Columbia is $27,000. When I met with students the other day, they're

going to pay 11 percent on that money when they have to start repaying that loan

— 11 percent. That's a pretty shocking number.

Who are they going to pay it to? They're going to pay it to the

very banks that this government has just given $220 million more to, and that is

really something my constituents at Malaspina University College Nanaimo don't

quite understand. They just don't understand the logic of that.

It's at a time, as I've said, when we could be doing the right

thing, when we could be leaving the kind of legacy that the empty rhetoric of

the budget speech talked about and that the empty rhetoric of the throne speech

talked about, and at a time when we could be leaving a legacy with which this

generation could stand up and say with great pride: "We did the best we could

with the best times." Instead of that, it's just business as usual, and that's

the problem.

When we look for not simply visionary words but a concrete vision

created through legislation, through financial commitment, through a budget that

would do something for British Columbians, we get fine language, elegant words.

But the people who are the majority of British Columbians don't understand it.

They like the words too. We all like fine words, but they don't see the reality

of it.

They don't get the sense of that — as my friend the member for

Saanich South said the other day — as they're struggling to rush their kids to

day care and pay for exorbitant day care, as they're struggling to handle their

kids' problems in schools, as their kids struggle in classrooms where there

isn't sufficient support for teachers, as they see potential closures of the

schools in their neighbourhood, as they struggle to pay their taxes, as they

struggle to meet their mortgage or their rent payments, as they struggle with

feeding themselves and doing the basics of life, as they fear the future for

their children, knowing they won't be able to set aside money for their kids'

tuition if their kids are able and capable of going. Those people don't see this

budget as a big boost.

On the weekend The Vancouver Sun did a wonderful

section called "Going Green." The carbon tax on gasoline — everyone understands

it's the way the world has to go. Everyone understands that. To come back to

what I said about sharing, British Columbians are ready to share in the burden,

and they're ready to share in the benefit. But the burden is not being shared by

this budget. According to the

article in The Vancouver Sun , in

terms of greenhouse gases, which are measured in CO 2 equivalents….

[1030]

Just to give the members here some information they may not have,

the total in Canada is some 273,156,839 equivalent tonnes of CO 2 emissions. The

province of British Columbia is responsible for 12,316,337 tonnes. Do you know

what? We're doing really well compared to the province of Alberta. They're at

115 million–plus.

But of those totals, the Duke Energy Corporation's natural gas

plant at Fort Nelson contributes 1,250,387 tonnes. That's 10 percent right

there. I could go through the list of the cement plants and the gas plants. If

those figures are at all accurate, based on 2006 numbers, what they tell us is

that major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions in British Columbia won't be

touched by this carbon tax.

How can you talk about a green budget when the people who arguably

are contributing the least are going to see increases in gas taxes? Yes, they

say they're offset by income tax reductions. That's what they say. But the big

contributors to greenhouse gas emissions are given a free pass — a completely

free pass. British Columbians are not stupid. They understand what's happening

here. Tough luck for the little guy; great times for the rich and the powerful

and the big corporations.

I'm starting to sound like some old rhetorician of socialism from

the '30s and '40s. But the fact is that when you look at this budget — when you

look at the numbers, when you look at the facts — that's the truth. There's no

other way to put it. We're giving breaks to the big guys and chump change for

the little guys. It's pure and simple. Nothing has changed.

We had a housing budget a few years ago — that's what they called

it — which was just another big series of tax breaks. Everyone wishes to pay

lower taxes, but most of us understand that when you are dealing with the

hard-to-house, the private sector is not going to fill that gap. They are not

going to build housing, nor is the government prepared to pay social assistance

in sufficient amounts so that people could afford it, even if the private sector

would build it and manage it.

You know what, hon. Speaker? We had a choice in this budget.

British Columbians had a choice. This government, instead of taking the right

course and doing the

[ Page 10061 ]

right thing, made the wrong choice. This government, instead of committing to

building those housing units that are desperately needed, chose instead to give

further tax breaks; to diminish the ability of government; to provide the

services which are never, ever going to be provided by anyone other than

government — maybe private charities.

It is a shameful indictment of this generation. If the minister

wants to talk about a legacy, what kind of legacy is it that at the time of some

of the greatest creation of wealth in the history of this province, we have done

essentially nothing for the weakest, the poorest, the most vulnerable and

marginalized amongst us? That is no legacy, but it is certainly an example of

what you don't do.

If you have some moral centre, if you have some values, if you

have some compassion or if you take a religious faith seriously, this budget

fails on every test, on every level. There have been generations in this

province that faced up to difficult times and met the challenge. We're proud of

them.

For some of us who've got family that have lived here as long as

mine have…. I can point back in my own family to some of those generations. But

this generation, when it was given the opportunity with this prosperity to do

something, has failed miserably. It has set a poor example.

The only comfort I can take is that when I talk to my

grandchildren, I'll be able to say that at least I stood up and my party stood

up and opposed this budget in 2008. We stood up and spoke on behalf of the

people who need a voice, who don't have a voice and who obviously have not been

heard by this government, no matter how loud we've shouted on this side of the

House, no matter how often we've spoken about it, no matter how many delegations

have come and spoken to them and met and begged and pleaded and tried to cajole.

[1035]

The answer was that the doors to the vault of British Columbia,

the doors to the collective wealth of this province, held by government, were

slammed shut. It's as pitiful as that wonderful scene in A Christmas Carol

when Scrooge asked: "Are there no workhouses? Do the poor laws not operate?" If

it wasn't so serious, it would be ludicrously funny.

I would have hoped that the Minister of Finance, in what was going

to be her final budget, would have tried to have left office with a real legacy.

Even if they had done it for the most crassly political reasons, to try and win

some votes to ensure re-election of 2009, I think I would have been satisfied.

But there wasn't even so much as a single attempt.

When we faced the challenge of environment, we came up so short

that it's hardly worth mentioning. The carbon tax is not going to solve the

environmental problems facing British Columbia around greenhouse gases.

The budget does nothing to address the incredible poverty in which

thousands and thousands of our fellow citizens live. It simply guarantees that

the wealthy are going to continue to get wealthier, that the rest of you can

struggle as best you can, that the kind of society which we could have built

with this kind of revenue is not going to get started — certainly not in this

budget and, I fear, if this government is re-elected in 2009, certainly not in

this generation either.

We are the children of privilege in this province. We could do

better, and we should do better. I would have liked to have thought that this

government would have wanted to do better.

But that's the message of this budget. We don't care about our

example, and legacy is just an empty bit of rhetoric. We don't care. We're not

going to listen, we don't care, and we don't care what anyone says. To the

majority of British Columbians: tough luck.

Well, in 2009, I hope the majority of British Columbians will

stand up for once and demand from government what they're rightfully entitled

to.

D. Hayer: Before I respond to the speech, I just wanted to

say thank you to all my constituents in Surrey-Tynehead for their support, who

regularly come to my coffee meetings or meet me in Surrey, always supporting us.

I want to say thank you very much to the community organizations

of Surrey, their members, their volunteers and their directors, including the

Tynehead Community Association; Port Kells Community Association; Fraser Heights

Community Association; Guildford Community Partners association; Fleetwood

Community Association; Tynehead Pioneers association; Tynehead Women's

Auxiliary; Tynehead Historical Society; the Lions clubs of Surrey — there are

three of them; the Rotary clubs of Surrey, Cloverdale and Newton; Surrey Board

of Trade; and the Fleetwood Seniors Planning Committee Society.

I also want to say a special thanks to my wife, my children and my

family, and to all of the volunteers and supporters and members of my riding

association and directors, who are always helping us to make sure we do our job

in the constituency.

I want to say a special thank-you to my staff in my constituency:

Mark Rushton, Manuel Santos, Jean Anderson, Paul Keenleyside, Dharam Sidhu and

all the other students, the volunteers who always come in to help my

constituency office. Also, I want to say a special thanks to my constituency and

my legislative assistant, Cayley Brown, and all other staff in Victoria.

It is with the help of all the British Columbians and all the

policies of government that we have turned this economy around in seven short

years from the worst place in Canada to one of the best places. That is thanks

to all those British Columbians and all those businesses who are thinking so

positively.

Sometimes when you come in this House, you think some members of

this House live in a different world, but that's the way life is in politics.

It's not about reality. Some people think that we're something that is not a

reality, but this side of the House obviously thinks with reality.

Mr. Speaker, now I will carry on with my response to the budget

speech. The need to preserve our atmosphere

[ Page 10062 ]

knows no limits, no colour, no race, no religious boundaries. Newcomers,

immigrants, senior citizens and our children must have clean air to survive. Our

agriculture and ability to put food on our table needs an environment that is as

clean and pure as possible.

[1040]

We must clean up our atmosphere and make sure that generations to

come will not only see the mountains and the beauty of this province, but they

can breathe it in deeply and with purity.

That is what this budget is all about: preserving and improving

our environment for today and for generations to come, for the future

generations of our children and grandchildren. This budget not only speaks to

the future of British Columbia but for the peoples throughout the world, because

we are leaders in the world, in North America. We are setting the place and

stage for a worldwide action against global warming, against greenhouse gases,

against continuing degradation of the air we breathe and the air we need that

feeds our planet.

Unless someone takes the bull by the horns, progress, quality of

life and our existence will be in danger in just a few decades. In fact, without

climate change action, we are already in danger. We must slow the amount of

emissions we pump into the air and perhaps, in years to come, actually eliminate

them completely.

As we march toward that goal, we need to ensure that British

Columbia and the world takes its greening seriously. We need to see more trees

planted to absorb carbon outputs. We need to see industries capture their

emissions. We need to see vehicle traffic changing to the point that they will

continue with little or no emissions, which otherwise will eventually poison our

planet.

Over the past years our Premier has stepped up to the plate on

this issue. He is seen as a leader in North America for environmental

protection. This budget puts in place the first steps towards significant,

important and life-saving actions to combat the poisons that are spewing into

our atmosphere. That is why I support so strongly the move to place a carbon tax

on fuel, a tax that I want to make very clear is revenue-neutral. For every

penny a person contributes in income tax to this initiative, every penny, by

law, will be returned to the taxpayer.

That is commendable. It makes clear that while we all share the

fight against global warming, we can do it with innovation and thought. But the

NDP who say they will vote against this budget will be voting against clean air,

voting against the fight to stop global warming and voting against taking action

against greenhouse gases, and that is shameful.

However, while this budget, which the NDP wants to vote against,

focuses on environment and actions we must undertake to protect it, this

visionary budget contains a great deal more. It contains a great range of

benefits, programs and upgrades for health facilities in Surrey and in the

Fraser Valley, and more money for education, social programs, seniors,

low-income persons and homeless people. It includes initiatives to attract

skilled workers and expand the provincial nominee program.

As a parliamentary secretary for multicultural immigration, I'm

consistently reminded by the immigrants of the importance of these initiatives.

Every time I look at our incredible, powerful economy that this government has

created, with the help of British Columbians and our businesses, over the past

seven years, I know the importance of immigration and the role it has to ensure

that the prosperity and growth continue.

More than one million jobs are expected to be created in British

Columbia in the next ten to 12 years. Yet if every high school student who

graduates from our province enters the workforce and takes one job, there will

still be 350 jobs vacant — 350 positions unfilled — and 350 things not getting

done, unless we encourage and support immigration to fill those jobs,

immigration to continue our prosperity, immigrants to create new homes and new

lives in British Columbia and to develop a warm, welcoming and all-inclusive

society.

This year we celebrate the 150-year birthday of British Columbia.

That's 150 years of growth and development. With the help of our aboriginal

communities, all that growth and development has been based on immigration. Sir

James Douglas, in creating the colony of British Columbia at Fort Langley in

1858, understood clearly the role of immigration. In fact, he created the colony

because of a concern that American gold seekers in the Fraser River and Cariboo

gold rushes — in a sense, American immigrants — would call for the annexation of

this great land by the United States.

[1045]

Governor Douglas understood the need to create the colony to

protect its integrity, but he also understood the need for immigration to take

the new colony beyond a few scattered mining camps. He understood the value that

immigrants, settlers, placed on new lands — on the work, effort and pride they

put into working the land, creating new homes, establishing communities and

building British Columbia.

Some of that heritage still exists in my constituency where some

of those pioneers settled when they were creating communities and raising

families. They did such things as building community gathering spots. One such

place that still exists just celebrated its 100th anniversary. It's called

Surrey-Tynehead, the community that gave rise to the name of the Surrey-Tynehead

constituency.

While the worst place in B.C. was Fort Langley, it wasn't long

before settlers, immigrants, began establishing homes, creating opportunities

and founding communities adjacent to Fort Langley along the Fraser River. That's

where Surrey was born.

Surrey has Surry-Guildford, Surrey-Newton, Surrey-Tynehead,

Surrey–Port Kells, the Fraser Heights, as well as the Fleetwood area and other

parts of Surrey.

That entrepreneurial spirit of British Columbians is what caused

British Columbia to grow — the spirit and hard work of immigrants. British

Columbia's growth today, as it was 150 years ago, will be dependent on

immigration, on the new immigrant.

This budget provides support for those immigrants; $12 million

over four years, to attract skilled and knowledgable workers, to expand the

nominee program and

[ Page 10063 ]

to attract more entrepreneurs. The Skills Connect program for immigrants, as

well as enhancements and improvements to the accreditation process for

foreign-trained professionals, is both welcome and important.

The NDP wants to vote against this budget. It will be shameful. We

need trained professionals in all areas, particularly in health care and in the

speeding-up of credentialing programs and in recognizing the skills of people,

new immigrants.

We need to make sure we help immediately. We need the help to make

sure that we're meeting the shortages that are created because of a strong

economy. We want to make sure that areas that have concerns due to strong growth

in the economy experience redress, and we're doing that.

Along with a large settlement of the population, we also have

baby-boomers who are getting older and putting more stress on demands for our

social programs. We have to make sure that we look after them. Also, we need to

make sure that we bring in the new people to take those jobs that seniors are

retiring from.

This budget also contains $40 million to strengthen economic and

cultural links between British Columbia and Asia-Pacific nations. The NDP wants

to vote against that too. These links include expanding trade missions, business

networks and marketing opportunities for our products to be sent to those

nations and also to make sure that the exporters are aware of the incredible

advantages they can achieve by using our port facilities to ship their products

to the huge consumer market in North America.

British Columbia's ports, both in the lower mainland and in the

north at Prince Rupert, offer incredible advantages and save us days of

transportation time between Asia-Pacific nations and the rest of North America.

Our geography is our advantage. We will be, through this budget,

making those advantages clear to our trading partners in Asia. As those nations

become economic engines, they will be purchasing our raw materials and our

products, and North Americans will be buying their finished products. Hopefully,

most of those international transactions will be flowing through our ports,

boosting our economy and ensuring financial stability for all British

Columbians.

To ensure that our agents now and in the future will always be

able to call British Columbia "The best place on earth," this budget contains

dramatic provision for our environmental health. Beginning July 1 of this year,

B.C. will introduce a fully revenue-neutral carbon tax with built-in protection

for our lower-income British Columbians.

[1050]

That will provide $400 million for a one-time climate action

dividend and more than $1 billion for a broad range of climate action programs

and tax incentives. This climate action dividend will see each man, woman and

child in British Columbia receive $100 before the carbon tax takes effect. They

will be getting the money in June to help them reduce their greenhouse gas

emissions and, in the process, reduce the amount they will be paying in carbon

tax.

The NDP spoke against putting more money back into taxpayers'

pockets, and I was surprised. That's shameful.

At this point I also want to remind the House and the NDP

opposition that tax relief has always played a big role in our government. For

example, let me remind the member for Surrey-Newton, who is either forgetful or

confused, that one of the first actions our government took in 2001 was to cut

personal income tax across the board by 25 percent, and we cut an additional 10

percent in 2007. I also want to remind him that individuals earning up to

$111,000 a year will now pay the lowest income tax in Canada.

A family of four earning $70,000 a year now has more than $1,800

in annual savings, and more than 250,000 low-income British Columbians will pay

no income tax at all in Canada. It is incredible that we will have an individual

husband and wife who can earn up to $32,000 and who will pay zero provincial

income tax. That means 250,000 low-income British Columbians will pay no

provincial income tax at all in British Columbia.

We have housing support in this province. The budget is $360

million, the highest ever that any government has provided. That includes the

funding for more than 60,000 units where most residents pay no more than 30

percent of their monthly income in rent, but the NDP wants to vote against this.

That's shameful.

We created a rent supplement program which assists families with

incomes of up to $28,000. We have raised the threshold for the new homeowner

grant to $1.05 million, up from $525,000, to help protect those people,

particularly our seniors who have built this province and who have seen the

value of their homes skyrocket. The homeowner grant has also been increased to

$570 a year, for the first time since 1993. We've also increased the homeowner

grant to $845 for low-income seniors, veterans and disabled individuals.

People with disabilities in B.C. who are on income assistance now

have the third-highest monthly income in Canada. The shelter rates have

increased for the first time since 1992, and they are now the highest in Canada

for a single person, couples and single parents. We have doubled the school

startup supplement to help families on income assistance with the cost of

purchasing school supplies.

In health care, we have changed the Medical Services Plan,

resulting in lower premiums for 250,000 people, and protected or frozen rates

for 85 percent of our British Columbians. We have lowered the deductible for

280,000 people through a Pharmacare premium change, and we have invested $19

million in the Healthy Kids program.

We've increased the Shelter Aid for Elderly Renters, benefiting

more than 15,300 seniors, and we have created or committed to more than 4,000

assisted-living units, which provide subsidized housing options. We have renewed

the seniors supplement, which is worth nearly $600 yearly, for 40,000 seniors in

B.C.

Perhaps the NDP and the member for Surrey-Newton should think

again about what this government has done consistently throughout their seven

years in office. We have made life better for those most in need, unlike how it

was in the 1990s, when the number of

[ Page 10064 ]

people on income assistance and welfare skyrocketed, but the NDP just didn't

get it.

A strong economy allows more money to flow into a social safety

network, to improve lives, help cut poverty and protect the helpless, including

our precious children. If the NDP are to vote against this budget — and the NDP

says they're going to do it — they will say no to such things as providing $23

million over three years for a B.C. positive aging action plan, which will

create a framework over the coming decades to build a system of support for our

seniors. By voting against Budget 2008, the NDP will be voting against helping

seniors. That is shameful.

[1055]

Another large investment in our seniors is the inclusion of $370

million over the next four years to support and help develop the ambitious

transit plan recently announced by our Premier and the Minister of

Transportation. These funds will be directed to infrastructure investment,

including $101 million to improve the RapidBus program. But the member for

Surrey-Newton doesn't like this. He wants to vote against improving the transit.

That brings me back to Surrey-Tynehead and the transportation

infrastructure and transit plan contained within the throne speech and in this

budget — the plan that this province has for our future. It will be great for

all British Columbians. Surrey-Tynehead is host — unwillingly, I might add — to

one of the worst traffic snarls in the province — daily traffic jams that clog

Highway 1 leading up to Port Mann Bridge. Those traffic tie-ups and the hours

cars and trucks spend idling, spewing emissions, while they wait to cross the

Port Mann Bridge is an environmental mess that our government is fixing.

We are going to twin the Port Mann Bridge. We are going to widen

that freeway. We are going to build South and North Fraser perimeter roads. We

are going to add more buses, and we're going to make sure we add more bus lanes

to the Port Mann Bridge. We are going to build in that ability for rapid transit

on the twinned Port Mann Bridge and, through this project, will get traffic,

people and products moving quickly.

This will not only save the economy of British Columbia a billion

and a half dollars a year in revenue, lost due to the time wasted in clogged and

stopped traffic; it will clean up the air by removing tonnes of emissions now

entering our atmosphere. This is a good-news project eagerly awaited by Surrey

residents and by my constituents.

When the member from Lillooet was in power, he did not want to

twin the Port Mann Bridge.

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Member. Member.

Will we please allow the member who has the floor to give his

presentation. You'll all have an opportunity to reply to the speech.

D. Hayer: The member for Surrey-Newton wants none of that —

no improvements to Port Mann Bridge, no widening of Highway 1 — because the

leader doesn't support it. So they're not willing to stand up in the House to

say that Surrey residents and his constituents will be first, before his leader.

I hope that he changes his mind, and that other members, at least

from Surrey, will go and say: "Our constituents want the Port Mann Bridge and

Highway 1 widened. Please support us." Hopefully, before the next election they

will change their minds again to support twinning of the Port Mann Bridge and

the widening of Highway 1.

The member for Surrey-Newton also doesn't want to expand the

SkyTrain to Guildford, Tynehead, Fleetwood and Newton. Expansion of the SkyTrain

is greatly needed for families, students, commuters and businesses. He is

against the addition of 1,500 new, energy-efficient buses. He is against

doubling the number of buses in Surrey. He is against this budget.

On health care, he complains about the government building a new

ambulatory care facility in Surrey. He complained about Surrey Memorial

Hospital. He's against all those hard workers who work at Surrey Memorial

Hospital. When he was speaking here the other day, he seemed to be saying that a

few of those workers were so bad.

I was surprised to hear that somebody from that constituency would

be against the health care workers and his constituents. I hope he changes his

mind and starts supporting the health care workers at Surrey Memorial Hospital

and the emergency department. They are very hard-working people. Many of them,

when you talk to them, always say: "In the House, in Victoria, why is it that

the NDP is always against the health care workers?" I say that I don't

understand that. I'm sorry to hear that.

When the NDP had the dark days in government, not a single

hospital room was built in Surrey Memorial….

J. Brar: A point of order. I don't think it's appropriate

to mention a member who is not present in the House. Address his speech to the

member.

Interjections.

J. Brar: I'm talking to the Speaker. Members, you should

listen to the Speaker, not to me.

Deputy Speaker: Member, it's not a point….

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Excuse me, all Members.

It's not a point of order unless they mention that someone is not

in the House. They're able to speak about members of the House without referring

to them.

[1100]

D. Hayer: On health care, the member for Surrey-Newton

complained about this government building a new ambulatory care hospital in

Surrey. He complained about tripling the size of the emergency department at

Surrey Memorial Hospital. Yet during the dark days

[ Page 10065 ]

the NDP was in government, not a single room was added to the Surrey Memorial

Hospital or Surrey emergency. No expansions were done to Surrey emergency at all

when it was needed.

Yet our Budget 2008 allocates $2.9 billion more in new

funding for health care over the next years, and the NDP wants to vote against

it. I know the people from the NDP don't want to hear all the great news in this

budget. They are so upset about it….

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Member, just one moment.

Would the Member for Yale-Lillooet please refrain from making

comments. The speaker has the floor. You will have your opportunity to speak.

Thank you.

Please continue, Member.

D. Hayer: The members from the NDP want to vote against this

budget that provides additional funding than provided in the previous budgets.

The total amount of new funding for health care over the next three years will

be more than $5 billion dollars. I'm surprised to see these members want to vote

against the budget that has so many great benefits for all British Columbians.

[S. Hammell in the chair.]

Budget 2008 also contains $555 million in new dollars for

Pharmacare, Medical Services Plan and emergency services such as the B.C.

Ambulance Service. On top of that the Ministry of Health will be spending $1.2

billion to construct and upgrade new health care facilities across the province

over the next three years.

The NDP doesn't want to help people. They want to make sure health

care is not improved. The NDP doesn't want us to help people expand and increase

their health care protection. They want to vote against this budget, and that is

shameful.

This budget, this plan for British Columbia, demonstrates vision.

It takes action and leads the way to greater prosperity — more protection for

health care, more protection for education, more protection for transportation,

more protection for the social safety net, more protection for seniors, more

protection for almost everything else that British Columbians want and greater

encouragement for immigration. More importantly, it sets a course not for

British Columbia but for the world.

Most importantly, it sets the course not just for British Columbia

but for the world in climate action and protection. I hope all members of the

House who are listening to the great speeches from the government side will

change their mind and support the budget speech. I think it will be shameful if

they vote against what's going to put so much more money for health care, for

education and for social programs. It will be shameful that they don't want to

support the money going for the Surrey Memorial Hospital and transportation.

G. Gentner: It is indeed a pleasure to be here today

representing my community of Delta North.

I have to address the budget as the hollow budget. It's a budget

that's empty. It's void, it's vacant, and it's very depressing to see. It's

almost bipolar in its view that it is showing a division between the rich and

the poor. I've never yet seen a budget that displays that type of plurality in

this province. It's despicable.

What we are seeing here is the development and encouragement of

the hollow province. The hollow province believes in piracy. It's piracy that

believes in the selling off of our rivers, our water, our resources and our

power. Our power is being ripped from underneath us and being sold.

We have become the hollow province with a hollow government after

endless P3 initiatives — outsourcing. It is hollow because the Liberal

government has privatized to the point that there is no tangible content left.

Our assets are being sold. The shell is indeed hollow. Big

government has joined forces with big business to redistribute funds

accordingly, and it's going upwards. It's not going downwards. It's not finding

its way to the people who need the funds in this province. This government is

looking after their big corporate friends, and you can certainly see it in this

hollow, corporate budget.

[1105]

Selling assets is like lopping off limbs, one by one. The

privatizing initiatives of this government are cutting off our valuable assets.

B.C. Hydro is more than a limb. It's being completely decapitated by this

government with its initiative of what it calls independent power producers —

that is, major corporations. One, of course, is Plutonic Power. Here's a

corporation that will get windfall profits after this government has given away

our rivers, our power resources.

What's happened — and we are seeing nothing else — is cronyism.

What's happening is that B.C. Hydro has become an entry level where people will

now find employment at B.C. Hydro. One by one, the independent power producers

pick these people up with their expertise, and we pay for the training.

When Plutonic Power, this small private power producer, was

granted its licence, within one week General Electric had a cheque for $1

million to invest. Now, that side's going to clap. They're going to say how

wonderful that is. But I've spent some time on the east coast. I've been to New

York, the state of New York, and I can tell you the labour standards of a

corporation like General Electric.

This government in many ways has…. Look at the privatization of

health care. In many ways, in a subtle way, disease and epidemics can be

beneficial in that growth market. P3s are really becoming the fourth branch of

government. It's being encouraged by this government. We are seeing creep. It's

privatization mission creep. Incrementally, day after day, year after year, we

are seeing our resources sold. We are drifting towards a class-based system like

we have never yet seen in this province.

The hollow province is up and running. It is, indeed, a black hole

for those in the east end of Vancouver, for those seniors who are having a hard

time meeting their ends, day by day.

[ Page 10066 ]

Now, the Liberals deregulate. The free market province is doing

exactly what the Premier set out to do. But it's not a society with a harmonious

economy. It's turning the already wealthy into the super-rich and the organized

working class into the disposable poor.

That's what the hollow budget is all about. It's really called

trickle-down economics, and it is a disaster. You can have the trickle-down

economy thinking it's somehow going to find its way down through the hierarchy

of the masses, but somehow that money is being taken by their friends before it

gets to the people who need it most.

There's a veneer of respectability, but we have to strip away that

veneer and varnish. We have to go underneath this budget, this hollow budget,

and see what it really is. The hollow province is becoming the empty province.

Our assets are being ripped from underneath us.

The government's heart is also hollow. It is void of any

compassion for people. It is void of any compassion for seniors and for children

who need assistance most. Again, just do a drive down the east side of

Vancouver. We'll be there. And I'm sure the members opposite will be there

during the Olympics, waving at Main and Hastings, greeting everybody from the

world and saying: "Showcasing our province." That's the hollow province.

In my community, which is a bedroom community down in North Delta,

where it's hitting us hardest are the pocketbook issues. The pocketbook issues

are really deferred taxes. The government can say that it's holding the line on

taxes. It can take money out of your pocket and give it to you in other ways.

Incrementally, we're paying more and more when it comes to the

ferry increases, when it comes to transit user fees, when it comes to hydro

rates going up — soaring up 25 percent in the next years. Why? In order to pay

for private power.

[1110]

We are looking at dental costs going up for seniors. We are

looking at eye exams going up. We are being besieged by deferred taxes, whether

it be taking your family…. You remember in the good old days, when you could

take your family out camping and pull up your tent in any campground. Now you've

got to pay user fee on top of user fee. You've got to make that reservation,

because it's not going to be there. The good old days of going to see different

campgrounds is gone. You'd better reserve it three to four months in advance.

There is another deferred tax. You've got to pay tax for the wood.

You've got to pay tax for everything, just going to see the parks that you have

already paid for.

The budget puts the burden on tackling climate change on working

families, while big polluters get a free pass. The Premier's new gas tax is

unfair and will accomplish little in the way of actually reducing emissions. The

oil and gas sector is responsible for 21 percent of all emissions in British

Columbia, and they're getting the largest subsidy ever.

I quote from page 13 of the budget. Emissions "from industrial

processes such as production of oil, gas, aluminum and cement, as well as

emissions from landfills and other sources, will not be subject to the carbon

tax initially." Boy, what does initially mean? What does this mean? It means

they're going to study it and study it and study it, while the poor working

bloke every day will pay more and more for his gas taxes.

I see the member from up north is grinning, because he knows. He's

in a rural community, and his people don't have transit. They don't have the

luxuries of us here in suburbia. These will be covered under the cap-and-trade

program being negotiated by the western climate action initiative.

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Members. Members.

Continue, Member.

G. Gentner: You know, according to the budget, these will

be covered under the cap-and-trade program being negotiated under the western

climate action initiative. But we look at the GVRD, which has been delegated the

authority and mandated the authority to enforce air quality monitoring. However,

we have an environmental review board that has completely skewered the authority

of the GVRD and is allowing, for example, wood-burning waste in greenhouses.

How's that? That's a real green budget. It's phony.

They're going to burn, burn, burn. If we're going to deal with

that stack, you had better put monitoring controls on the stack rather than the

cumulative effect. This government has decided not to invoke its environmental

waste laws. The minister will say: "Well, we'll deal with it in two years from

now." Two years from now we'll finally deal with it.

The Ministry of Transportation, that's an interesting one. Let's

talk about real climate change with that one.

We can talk about taxing the poor bloke going to work every day,

but it takes more than just taxing people to save the planet. Where are the

rewards for a community to actually save farmland, have the green marshes,

forests that sequester the carbon in the air? Where is the reward for those

communities? Zippo.

This is the hollow budget. Zippo. There's nothing there. You know,

we can see it with the Ministry of Transportation. They're so green that they're

going to plow a freeway right through Burns Bog, the lungs of the lower

mainland. Isn't that something? They're going to plow a road right through it.

What did Environment Canada say? They condemned this action of the

government. But they're going to plow it through anyway, because this is the

green budget.

Oh yes, the Gateway program for the next three years, $438

million. For what? Land purchasing for the South Fraser perimeter road. They're

going to pave about 245 acres of farmland. That's a green budget. Oh boy.

It's not a green budget. It's empty. It's void. It's flat. It's

hollow. It's about land-flipping. It's about developers making money, who have

been in there first before the government can purchase. Oh yes, it's all

documented. But you know, you buy the land and then all of a sudden Environment

Canada condemns it.

[1115]

[ Page 10067 ]

Boy, talk about your poor friends. "Oops. We made a big mistake."

Now, if they follow what Environment Canada is recommending, they're going to

have to move the road somewhere else, and their friends who were up buying lands

could be in trouble.

Let's look at B.C. Rail. There's a green budget. We've already

seen 500 acres of the most valuable farmland in the province, if not North

America, gone. There's a denial that there is going to be expansion of Deltaport,

but do you know what? There's denial there's going to be a new rail yard. The

largest rail yard west of Winnipeg is going to be built on the most valuable

farmland in North America. The BCR Subdivision Ltd. has a budget. It's here in

this budget, the hollow budget. The carbon footprint that this green project is

going to bring us is unbelievable.

We're seeing port expansion by selling more assets. But wait;

there is hope. This government is investing in a public asset. It's called B.C.

Rail. This government are a bunch of socialists. They're actually putting more

money in B.C. Rail. You know, for some reason they couldn't sell off all the

assets of B.C. Rail on the tracks. I wonder why they couldn't do that. I wonder

why that was, Madam Speaker.

An Hon. Member: There's a story there.

G. Gentner: There is a story there.

We have now across from us a bunch of socialists who are putting

money into a Crown corporation. That's a new one for me. Yet this public asset

is going to be there to pollute. This green budget will purchase $44.7 million

of land for port-related activities. They're going to buy farmland, and they're

going to have to take it out of the agricultural land reserve, and they have the

audacity to call this a green budget. The very best agriculture in British

Columbia — the largest vegetable farm in British Columbia — is going to be

paved.

Now, $45 million may not seem much for those buying a condo in

False Creek, but that's a lot of farmland. Let's see, $45 million into 175

acres. No, by 2010 it's going to be $65 million to buy farmland. That's even

larger. That's about $300,000 an acre. No, that's not right. Farmland doesn't go

for $300,000. So I guess it's going to be more than 175 acres that they're going

to buy.

What a rail yard this is going to be, the largest rail yard west

of Winnipeg — diesel-spewing rail cars, engineers. Where is the gas tax on B.C.

Rail? Oh, the little guy can pay at the pumps, but where is it when it comes

down to the globalized spewing Deltaport?

You know, I think it was Johnny Cash who said: "I hear the train a

comin'." And it's a comin', all right — $65 million this year, an additional $70

million next year for yard development. The sequestering process that farmland

brings us is gone.

This isn't a green plan at all. They're spending, by 2010, close

to $200 million for a publicly financed Crown corporation that they will now try

and peddle as theirs. I hear that train a comin', Madam Speaker. If Johnny Cash

was here today…. When I think of Johnny and the B.C. Rail, I think of him

singing that same tune — I think it was Folsom Prison — "I hear the train

a comin'." If he was here today in B.C., he'd sing it to the inmates, probably

in Agassiz, and the Liberals would be clamouring to get through the gates to get

a ticket to hear him.

The B.C. Rail corruption scandal. Oh that little railroad that

could. Big expansion, big pollution. Some people like the smell of carbon. I

hear that train a comin'. It's pulling into the station right now. We can see it

comin'. All aboard. Who is the conductor? I don't know. Who is the engineer?

It's the Premier. I even hear there are whistle-blowers, when it comes down to

the B.C. Rail situation.

An Hon. Member: It's before the courts.

G. Gentner: It's before the courts.

The budget continues, yet it continues to harm rural British

Columbians as mills close down. It's interesting. You walk around Beacon Hill

Park, and you look across the way over Juan de Fuca, and you do see little

plumes of smoke. There are mills operating. They're probably cutting our board

feet on that side of the border.

The Premier's budget didn't even mention B.C.'s shameful record of

having the highest rate of child poverty in Canada. The budget includes a cut to

funding for policing and community safety. That's a very big deal in my

community. The budget includes another cut in student aid, even as the debt load

of British Columbian students grows at alarming rates. I think we're up to

$27,000 per student. Deplorable.

[1120]

It's a hollow, fruitless, vain budget. It has no compassion for

people. You know, it's interesting. In my area of North Delta–Surrey, we do have

a new campus. We have a campus that needs operating funds to look after the

demanding needs of students who are looking for opportunities. However, that

funding…. There'll be a major shortfall there as well.

As the seniors health critic, I have to tell you that I got a

phone call. I talked to a lady from back east who was headhunted by Retirement

Concepts. She's a head nurse at a similar facility. She was looking for work

here, and she thought she'd come from a poor province to this rich, affluent

British Columbia. She took one look at what type of health care we have for our

seniors, and she said she wasn't coming here. She would never come here, because

she thought she was coming to a richer province, but she told me that it was

like moving into the Dark Ages.

In this province you've got three nurses on the day shift, the

morning shift; you've got two nurses on the afternoon shift; and you've got one

nurse at night. Here you've got one nurse who's on call on a pager, and she's

also probably the general manager. It's a deplorable situation we have in

British Columbia, and it's all due to this hollow budget.

Seniors don't want to be coddled. They want self-respect and an

ability to maintain their dignity and autonomy. We're got to move away from this

patronizing but embrace their independence. We are dealing with

[ Page 10068 ]

chronic cases that gain media impact but very little to explain how the

senior got there in the first place.

Now the Minister of Health can talk about all the long-term care

beds he wants. The big promise of this government was 5,000 beds. We're now

hearing the language change. It's no longer beds; it's units. We're talking

about units — whatever that means. That's how they're going to inflate the

numbers. But the seniors of this province are still looking for what they truly

deserve: some greater impetus on where we're all going to be heading soon. This

government doesn't care.

We need more comprehensive housing, health facilities where

seniors don't have to move, no senior warehousing, and complexes closer to

communities. That's what we need. B.C. Housing appears to be geared towards

income. Government wants to direct seniors housing through the SAFER program,

which is really geared to the private operator and thereby to increase the

larger profit margins.

We need, in this budget, stability in health care costs, and you

do it through preventative health care for seniors. We need a universal system

for senior housing and a universal home care system, not this Liberal

hodgepodge. We've got community services dealing with seniors here. We have B.C.

Housing looking over an aspect over there, and we've got maybe a health

authority that picks up bits and pieces over there. We need a coordinated system

that works for seniors.

The private sector looks at independent living because they can

cream it. The biggest problem for the private sector is…. You know, we have a

lot of problems there. When a senior has a problem…. One of the biggest problems

seniors have — I talk to a lot of seniors in homes — is bladder control

problems. As soon as you've got a bladder control problem, if you're in assisted

living, many want you out.

We also need aging-in-place for seniors. We need support systems.

Seniors want companionship. They want one hot meal a day. But let's bring in the

carbon tax. What's the carbon tax doing to seniors? Let's give an example. It's

not helping the poor volunteer who drives for the Meals on Wheels program. Those

programs are falling apart. I've talked to people in Prince George. People can't

afford it anymore. So where's the break for them, the volunteers who are driving

around giving meals to seniors? They're not getting a break. The big corporate

oil companies certainly are. We have to turn the practice right side up in this

province, because this blank, artificial, hollow budget is not working for them.

We hear of many problems. There are no universal standards of care

throughout the province. We're seeing that basic care provided is not the same

anywhere. We have different standards. Performance standards are not in place.

We need more elderly co-housing.

[1125]

We need a denture system, a dental plan for seniors. We have a

state that basically will pull your teeth — you can get your teeth pulled when

you're a senior — but try and get some dentures. It's on you. Eye care is part

of preventative medicine. We can find out what's wrong with people if they have

equal access and good access.

I want to talk briefly about income. For example, seniors. There

are three major aspects to the problems with the seniors health situation. One,

of course, is health. One is income, and the other is housing. These are people

on fixed incomes. We have northern development funds, interior development

funds. That money should go and help out seniors in this province.

Pensions. You know, the government's going to introduce this

private savings account, this type of elitist Reaganomics, where you'd better

start saving money for your own health care when you get old. Forget about the

fact that you have to pay for a mortgage and all your user fees. You have to

pay, of course, for your RRSP. You might have a pension. Now the government

wants you to put money into this savings account.

Well, people who are living on a fixed income can't afford that.

There are expectations with a pension. Those pensions are being deteriorated.

Fees are going up from this government, forcing pension trustees to cut plans,

making working people vulnerable.

I really think we should seriously look at Ontario's pension act,

where they're allowing mobility for people to move their pensions rather than

being gouged.

Pensions. We need universal pension plans at work. The

participatory rate in pensions is declining, and we have got to address that as

a province. People have saved all their lives for a pension, and they're finding

out with a fixed income that the pantry is bare. It's bare because of this

hollow budget. We're going to see a court case coming forward where the pensions

were guaranteed. Hopefully, that will give us the right outcomes.

Quickly, as time starts to wind down. We've got to look at this

pharmaceutical business. Fair Pharmacare has been gouged by this government.

They have incrementally been taking Fair Pharmacare away from seniors. Seniors

who don't qualify for premium assistance are now charged $25 of the $275 a

prescription. Those who still can pay, pay up to $200.

The budget shows a clear reduction from $1.1 billion to a decrease

of $2 million. We have an increasing aging population, a need for Pharmacare,

and this government is slashing the Pharmacare budget. It's right there in the

budget. Now, some will say that this decrease is due to the attempt to manage

costs down and through this has appointed a new task force on Pharmacare, the

pharmaceutical task force set up by the minister in November 2007. Some of the

recommendations to government will be to optimize the decision-making process

for what drugs are covered under Pharmacare.

The nine people on the task force include Mr. David Hall, chief

compliance officer, Angiotech Pharmaceuticals; Susan Paish, chief, Pharmasave

Drugs National; Russell Williams, president of Canada's Research-Based

Pharmaceutical Companies, Rx&D.

When the Health Minister announced the names of the nine people on

this new pharmaceutical board task force, the government's press release

described the panel's chair, Mr. Avison, as a lawyer with experience working

with several ministries and noted that he was president of the University

Presidents Council. They

[ Page 10069 ]

did not include the fact that he also sits on the board of LifeSciences

British Columbia, a lobby group formerly known as B.C. Biotech that includes

dozens of drug companies. Now, was this a mere oversight? I don't think so.

It's a hollow budget because this task force that is dealing with

Pharmacare didn't even ask the seniors. They didn't ask the working people what

they thought about trying to reduce Pharmacare. Of course not — shameful. At

least five of the nine members have ties to the drug industry. It's bizarre that

the pharmaceutical representatives were put on this panel in this way. I think

it is very shameful.

The list goes on and on. The interesting thing is all the

donations that these same companies gave the Liberal Party of British Columbia.

Unbelievable. Pharmaceuticals — Angiotech, a member which gave the Liberals

$2,900. Many other drug companies are also donors: GlaxoSmithKline, Wyeth Canada

and Pfizer Inc. — $6,200, $5,400 and close to $4,000, respectively. It goes on

and on and on.

[1130]

Let's talk about the privileged sect in this province. We talk

about cronyism — almost $550 million giveaways to banks and big oil companies.

That's what it's all about. At the same time, the budget gives a $222 million

tax break to big banks and a $327 million subsidy to the oil and gas sector.

The Premier's budget gives huge tax breaks to big banks and oil

companies while it hits ordinary citizens. Theodore Roosevelt said that his

definition of privilege was unregulated financial power, with its panoply of

speculation lobbying. His target was men of wealth who find that they can

purchase politicians.

If that's what it's all about — I know we all are politicians, and

we receive campaign contributions — there is a problem here. The problem is

this. When the Premier of this province receives a stipend from the Liberal

Party of British Columbia for his personal expenses on the financial

disclosures…. When he receives money directly from that party, and that party

receives money from oil companies and big, big banks, indirectly or directly,

does that put him in a conflict of interest? I think it certainly does. Why

wouldn't it put him in a conflict of interest?

Here it is. You've got money coming from oil and gas companies

going to this holding type of political party. It takes the money and gives it

to the Premier. What does the Premier do? He's here to give us a budget where he

gives back to the oil companies and the big banks a benefit. That is a conflict

of interest. It's a sellout to this province.

On this side of the House we really believe it's time to put that

grey area in place and it's time to not only suggest that those actions are

wrong but that they help breed greed in this province, and that is what this

budget is all about. It's about greed.

R. Hawes: I thought I knew what I was going to talk about,

but after listening to this last speaker…. That's just so outrageous — the

things that are being said. You can't even comment on it. I think anyone who

listened understands, including…. I'm sure the members opposite are embarrassed

for what they just heard.

I just want to put one thing clear for that member. If he thinks

there's a conflict of interest, there is a process, a true process. Don't stand

up in the House and make wild accusations. Go see the conflict commissioner.

That's the process.

An Hon. Member: Drive-by assassination.

R. Hawes: Yeah, the drive-by assassination. That member is

quite famous for that kind of stuff. Let's move on.

I am very pleased to stand up and speak to what I consider to be

one of the most innovative, creative, forward-thinking budgets this province has

ever seen. In fact, it's been hailed as one of the best budgets seen in this

country in decades and decades, and that's not by the B.C. Liberal government,

although we all feel that way. Independent people from across the country hail

this budget.

I've listened now for several days to the opposition speak about a

lot of the things that are in this budget and, frankly, misstate what the budget

is saying and is trying to do and what is in this budget. A lot of it I consider

to be almost fearmongering when they talk about what's going to happen to people

of low income and what effect carbon tax has on them. It's a complete

misrepresentation, in my view, of what the budget actually is doing as far as

the carbon tax.

I want to start by first laying out what I think the public should

know, and that's the differentiation between where we are and what we believe

and what the other side, the NDP, apparently believe, although we can never be

too sure what they believe because it seems to change from day to day. Most of

the time they can't make their minds up.

A good example of that is how, over a day's debate on

supplementary estimates, supplementary budget, they speak against it,

apparently, and then vote for it. It's very hard to understand what they're for

or what they're against.

They've spent quite a bit of time speaking against this budget,

speaking against a carbon tax, but they've also…. Every time we on this side of

the House refer back to their record, they get very upset because they know that

the 1990s were a horrible time and that this province was run into the ground.

They keep saying: "Well, that was then. That's ancient history."

[1135]

I just want to talk for a moment about how we would take a look at

what they might do. What are the clues? In the 1990s the NDP government had a

long history — and it's very easy to see — of creating new programs without any

thought about how they would pay for that in subsequent years. There was no

forward planning at all.

New programs would be created that just seemed to be a whim. Big,

ongoing expenses would be created. Then the following year they would have to

scramble to find a way to pay for it, and a lot of times it was

[ Page 10070 ]

through deferring expenses to the following year. I'll give an example of

that in a minute.

As these program deficits kept building, they were finally in such

a huge deficit that they could no longer hide the deficit, although they

certainly tried in what they called the fudge-it budget.

Let's look at what they're saying now. B.C. Ferries is going to

sell a couple of ferries because we, for the first time in decades, have built

new ferries to replace an aging ferry fleet. There are a couple of ferries that

are going to get sold. When those ferries get sold, the aging ferries, the funds

from that would go into a capital account, presumably — and they would — at B.C.

Ferries.

But the opposition has said: "Well, no, that money should actually

go to reducing ferry fees." So we should take capital assets and put them into

an operating budget within B.C. Ferries, which is great. We would have a fare

reduction until that capital money was spent. Maybe a year, and then what? We

would probably — what? — raise fees again. Would we then just increase the

subsidy that B.C. Ferries gets from the operating budgets of the provincial

government?

That's exactly the thinking that got us into huge difficulty in

the 1990s. There is a $450 million climate action dividend in this budget. It's

$100 per man, woman and child in this province to help offset the implementation

of the carbon tax until such time as the income tax reduction takes place.

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Member.

Member, take your seat for a minute.

R. Hawes: The member for Yale-Lillooet had his turn

yesterday. I know the truth hurts.

However, the $450 million climate action dividend is in this

year's budget because it has committed funds.

Yesterday in this House, or the day before, I know that the member

for Surrey-Whalley was questioning the Finance Minister and wanted to know why

this money wasn't in next year's budget. He couldn't understand that it is

committed money and that under generally accepted accounting principles it has

to be in this year's budget. He couldn't understand that.

Under the NDP math and way of doing business, you create expenses

and defer them to the following year so that you can balance your budget this

year, even though you've created an expense. You're now going to create big

expenses in the following year, which is completely against generally accepted

accounting principles. But that seems to be a concept that the NDP still doesn't

quite understand.

The member for Nanaimo suggested that instead of giving tax

rebates we should probably….

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Member.

Members, it's genuinely difficult to hear.

R. Hawes: Madam Speaker, generally speaking, I don't mind a

little bit of heckling because it shows that they're at least listening. Perhaps

they might learn something.

The member for Nanaimo suggested that we should spend over $700

million this year on a housing strategy rather than giving tax reductions, but

then he very quickly said that he knows that that will create ongoing expenses

in subsequent years going on and on and on. That's the big problem with what the

NDP does. They embark on programs without any thought about how much it's going

to cost tomorrow.

[1140]

This province is full of tales of bankruptcies from businesses and

individuals who did exactly that: "Let's live for today. Let's create huge debt

and then worry about how we pay for it tomorrow, because tomorrow is a day

away." That's how you embark on the road to financial ruin. That is the road

that we were on throughout the 1990s, and listening to what these members say,

it's very clear that if they ever, God forbid, got power in this province,

that's the same road they would put us back on.

I want to talk for a moment about an issue that they keep raising

over and over. In fact, there was a private member's motion put forward on

Monday saying that the government should develop a comprehensive program to

combat child poverty. I just want to talk about that. Let's start by suggesting

this. I don't think of child poverty; I think of parent poverty. Children aren't

in poverty; it's the parents. Children aren't living on their own….

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Member.

Member, sit down for a minute.

Go ahead.

R. Hawes: It's not that children are in poverty; it's

parents that are in poverty. That's what creates what they call child poverty.

The best program — the first and best program to combat child poverty — is

creating employment.

If you look at the employment record that this government has

tabled over the past seven years, it is number one in Canada — the most jobs

created in this jurisdiction of any jurisdiction in this country. That's the

first way that you should combat poverty.

We have put many other programs in place, such as rental subsidy

programs…. We have increased rates for those on social assistance. We have

created disability payment increases. We have a SAFER program for seniors. We

have addressed this issue and have a comprehensive program, and I believe that

program is working.

These members keep talking about an issue and keep hanging their

hats on something that frankly is, I think, being addressed and being addressed

well — far better than it was through the '90s. The key is that having a strong

economy and understanding what builds an economy is what gives us the money to

be able to build a strong economy.

[ Page 10071 ]

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Member.

R. Hawes: I like to think that in 1999 and 2000, in their

dying years in government, every person in this province almost was in poverty,

because we were receiving equalization payments for the first time in the

history of this province. We were a welfare state created by these folks here,

who put us as one of the have-not provinces.

Shame. Shame on them. That meant we were actually the poverty

folks of Canada, along with Newfoundland. That is absolutely shameless.

One more thing about this budget that they keep talking about, and

I want to make this point very clear. If you understand what builds an economy,

you deal with how you create jobs and with where wealth originates. We have

something in this province that originated in 1988. We were very fortunate in

1988 to be named one of the two places in Canada that have an international

finance centre.

The potential for an international finance centre is incredible in

terms of building wealth for this province, if you understand how to do it. It

was largely ignored through the 1990s. It was ignored to the point that I know

there was beginning to be some movement in Alberta to move the international

finance centre from here to Calgary. Vancouver used to be the head office

capital of western Canada. Through the '90s that slid over to Calgary. In the

1990s Calgary became the head office capital of western Canada.

[1145]

I want to talk about an international finance centre and what an

international finance centre does. Well, first I'll start by saying — and I'll

look particularly at the United States — that there's a massive operating

deficit in the United States. They have huge debt. But they have a very, very

large capital surplus. Capital, if you know what capital is — wealth — really

has no loyalty. It doesn't worry about social programs. It doesn't worry about….

Capital seeks safe haven and good return. That's what it looks for.

But having capital, having investment in your province or in your

country, creates wealth for the citizens that live there. It's extremely

important. So attracting foreign capital to our province is very, very important

for us, for the jobs that it brings. The banking industry has 27,000 employees

in British Columbia — well-paid, nice, clean, safe jobs. They're not a polluting

industry. The banking industry actually is highly progressive and very

desirable.

Foreign banks. We have attracted some foreign banks. However,

there is a big impediment to drawing that foreign capital, and it's called the

corporate capital tax. It was put in by these folks in the 1990s, because they

didn't understand that wealth brings wealth with it for the citizens. So they

instilled a corporate capital tax. That's a tax on your paid-up capital in a

corporation. That's a tax on your assets, regardless of whether you're making

money. It doesn't matter if you're making money. You could be losing money, but

because you happen to have a large asset base, you're going to pay tax on that.

So banks were hit with a 3 percent corporate capital tax on their

paid-up capital over a billion dollars. Now, what does that mean? Well, the big

banks, if you were to go look at their financial statements, pay huge amounts of

income tax. That's our tax system in this country. When you make money, you pay

tax on it. And the banks do. They are some of our largest taxpayers.

These folks opposite don't seem to get it. The banks make a lot of

money because they're big. They're huge. I'll tell you what. I'll use Vancity

Credit Union. Vancity Credit Union — not as big as the major chartered banks —

tabled a profit a couple years ago of $45 million.

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Member. Member.

R. Hawes: But Vancity Credit Union pays corporate capital

tax because they have an asset base that was above the threshold, so they paid a

corporate capital tax. In fact, the member for Surrey-Whalley, until 2006, was a

director on the board of directors of Vancity Credit Union. In fact, he spent a

couple of years as the chairman of the board of directors.

We were lobbied, as were, I'm sure, members on the opposite side,

for years. Since the corporate capital tax was put in place, industry that was

paying the corporate capital tax has come to government every year and asked

that that tax be scrapped. They've explained what the impact of the tax is, in a

negative way, on our economy and what the positive side is.

Included in that group that was coming to see us annually was

Vancity Credit Union — the very board of directors that the member for Surrey-Whalley

sat on. That member got up the other day and asked how dare we give a $220

million, as he called it, tax cut to banks, which would include Vancity Credit

Union, where he sat on the board of directors, and who were lobbying for that

very tax cut. I just wonder. If that isn't the height of hypocrisy, I don't

really know what is.

But Madam Speaker, we did grant a change in the corporate capital

tax, and we removed the corporate capital tax, replacing it with a 1 percent tax

on paid-up capital for the largest banks, and that would be the largest bank.

[1150]

These members are getting up day after day saying that we gave the

banks $220 million. We did not do that. We did take out a regressive corporate

capital tax that has nothing to do with their earnings. We took that out

because…. We all probably remember when there was massive investment coming into

this province from Hong Kong. There was a promise about taxation, from former

Premier Mike Harcourt to the investors that were bringing money in, that they

would never, never face a capital tax on the money they were bringing.

Glen Clark, as Finance Minister, shortly thereafter instilled this

corporate capital tax, and there was a high degree of anger among Chinese

investors. Basically, the

[ Page 10072 ]

investment dried up. Why would they bring $1 billion-plus in capital here and

then have it taxed before they earned one cent? There would be 3 percent taken

every year as a tax just for having money. It's a wealth tax. That is so

regressive that it has stopped our international finance centre from becoming

what it ought to be. We have every opportunity in British Columbia to become the

number one financial centre in North America, and we can do that quickly.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

In fact, we are looked at now as one of the safest havens in the

world in which to invest money, but the impediment to that is corporate capital

tax. Without that corporate capital tax, we are going…. With the change that

we've made, we are going to see a massive influx of investment dollars. We are

going to see new companies come here, new brokerage firms. We're going to see

international banking move here in an unprecedented fashion, bringing with it

the wealth that banks bring. When they come, when they bring that capital, we

will see jobs and income for all of the people of British Columbia.

The $220 million change in corporate capital tax — which,

incidentally, is not a total $220,000 drop in revenue because of the 1 percent

tax that will remain on paid-up capital, paid-up assets over a billion dollars —

is going to repay itself over and over. I believe — and I know the Minister for

Economic Development believes — that this is one of the most significant parts

of the budget in years to come. A decade from now people will look back at that

move and understand clearly how important it was, how much wealth it did bring

to British Columbia.

But these guys don't understand any of that. They think in such

small terms that it is absolutely unbelievable. They think about today; all they

think about is today. "Let's invest a bunch of money today in operating spending

for the government. Forget about building an economy, about building for

tomorrow, about our grandchildren and about what's going to happen to our

province in ten years. Let's go back to being a have-not province, number ten in

the economy."

That's their move; that's where they want to take us. Everything

that they say says that. They talk about forestry. I'm looking here at an

article that is from ForestNet, written back in 1996. They created a

superstumpage fee that was going to rebuild forestry in British Columbia, which

was shrinking in the mid-1990s, and they were going to do all kinds of wonderful

things. They were going to have money for "thinning and planting, stream bed

repair, logging road cleanup and so on, to replace jobs lost as allowable

harvests are reduced."

"The scheme," as it says here, "was trumpeted internationally as

the way a modern forest industry should be run." It all would have been

sweetness and light, except they only think about today. They don't think about

tomorrow. They'd created all those programs.

"All of this occurred before the Clark people discovered that the

arithmetic in their provincial budget was wildly skewed. Just weeks after

touting its budget-balancing expertise while on the way to re-election, the

government faced an embarrassing cash flow crisis."

[1155]

What did they do? They began to rob the forest renewal fund. Money

that was to go to rebuilding the forest suddenly went into covering the

operating deficits which they'd created to pay for the programs that they'd put

in place, without any forethought at all, without thinking about how they would

pay for them tomorrow. They had to steal money from programs that would have and

could have done some actual good in the forests in this province. That money

went instead to programs to help their friends.

They talk about us. It's just the height of hypocrisy. The bad

thing, and the thing that scares me for my kids and my grandkids, is that the

thinking that they're trying to lay out here might be instilled somewhere in

some kids that are growing up. They might happen to listen to the nonsense being

spewed from that side. They might pick up an idea or two and think that there is

something that has a touch of reality to it.

None of it does. It's shameful. This budget has been hailed across

the environmental community from top to bottom. It has been hailed in other

provinces. Mr. Speaker, I'll tell you what: the Conference Board of Canada

recently called British Columbia a "job-creating machine."

Led by the construction and mining industries, B.C.'s economy is

expected to grow by 3.1 percent in 2007 and 3.3 percent in 2008. It says that

the domestic side of the economy will perform well due to strong job creation

and the provincial government's decision to cut personal income taxes.

Gosh. What a concept. Leave the money in the people's pockets and

let them make choices with their money — unlike the member for Delta North, who

is down there saying we should be taxing, taxing, taxing, so that the government

can spend your money and make all your choices and have probably 40 percent of

what you pay in taxes fall off the table in administration costs.

We, on the other hand, leave the money in your pocket. You earned

it; you decide how you want to spend it. According to the Conference Board of

Canada, who I think are actually pretty reputable, that creates a strong

economy.

I am not sure how much time I have left. I'm not quite finished.

Noting the hour, I will move adjournment of the debate, reserving the balance of

my time for when we return.

R. Hawes moved adjournment of debate.

Motion approved.

Hon. C. Richmond moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

Mr. Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 1:30 this

afternoon.

The House adjourned at 11:58 a.m.

[ Return to: Legislative Assembly Home Page ]

Hansard Services publishes transcripts both in print and on the Internet.

Chamber debates are broadcast on television and webcast on the Internet.

Question Period podcasts are available on the Internet.

TV channel guide • Broadcast

schedule

Copyright © 2008: British Columbia Hansard Services, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

ISSN: 1499-2175