Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

MONDAY, APRIL 21, 1997

Afternoon

Volume 4, Number 1

[ Page 2651 ]

The House met at 2:05 p.m.

Prayers.

Hon. M. Farnworth: In the gallery today are a number of distinguished guests. The head of the UBCM, Mayor Gillian Trumper of Port Alberni, is here. Along with her are members of the joint council. They include Mayor Steve Thorlakson from Fort St. John; Joanne Monaghan, past president of the UBCM; John Ranta, mayor of Cache Creek; and Steve Wallace, mayor of Quesnel. Also accompanying them are: Jim Abram, a regional director from Vancouver Island and a member of the UBCM executive; Mayor Jim Lornie of Campbell River; and Mayor Pat Boname of West Vancouver. Would the House please make them welcome.

L. Reid: In the gallery today is Mr. Greg Halsey-Brandt, the mayor of the city of Richmond. I would ask the House to please join me in making him very, very welcome.

Hon. G. Clark: I have in the gallery today some friends, or I guess, more appropriately, parents of friends of mine from my constituency: Ruth and Dick Stravers from Holland, Michigan, and Arnold and Joan Tigchelaar from Esquimalt. I'd ask all members to make them welcome.

R. Neufeld: It's a pleasure to rise in the House and introduce someone from my constituency. I don't have that opportunity very often, but again, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Municipal Affairs sent you a note and scooped me. I don't think that's fair, but I would like the minister, along with the Premier, to pay particular attention to Mayor Thorlakson's comments today -- and take them to heart and listen very carefully. I'd like to welcome Mayor Thorlakson.

H. Lali: I, too, would like to join the Minister of Municipal Affairs. One of eight mayors from my riding, Mr. John Ranta, the mayor of Cache Creek, is here. Would the House please make him welcome.

B. McKinnon: I would like to welcome approximately 30 students and adults and their teacher, Ms. Thomas, from Lord Tweedsmuir Secondary School in Cloverdale. I ask the House to bid them welcome.

H. Giesbrecht: Like the member for Peace River North, it's one of those rare occasions that I get to introduce somebody from my riding. This is the first one this session, I'll have you know. I'd like you to welcome longtime councillor Joanne Monaghan of the district of Kitimat, who is also past president of the UBCM. She is here attending the local-provincial council meeting. Would the House please make her welcome.

G. Abbott: Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to see that you noticed me. I was starting to suspect maybe some of that satanic stuff from the Shuswap was making me invisible, but I'm relieved that you've . . . .

We on this side of the House would also like to welcome the delegation that's here from the UBCM: mayors, councillors, directors and so on. They're here, of course, for a meeting of the joint council and the Premier to discuss a variety of issues, including transfer cuts. I'd also like to have the House make them welcome.

J. Kwan: There are two very special guests here today. One of them is Mike Walker, who is the coordinator for the Tenants Rights Action Coalition. He is also on the Woodward's co-op committee. He was here for my "MLA Report" on Rogers today, reporting on the Woodward's situation. As well, we have Ken Lyotier, who is a founding member of United We Can, a recycling depot in the downtown east side that provides not only environmental measures for the community but also employment opportunities for many people who are deemed to be unemployable. Would the House please make them very welcome.

Hon. S. Hammell: I'd like to introduce in the House today guests who have joined us for the launch of Prevention of Violence Against Women Week: Tracy Porteous, coordinator of the B.C. Association of Specialized Victim Assistance and Counselling Programs; Greta Smith, coordinator of the B.C.-Yukon Society of Transition Houses; Jill Hightower, executive director of the B.C. Institute on Family Violence; Doug Lepard from the Vancouver city police and head of the criminal harassment unit; and finally, Dr. Randy Kropp, a forensic psychologist. They are here to launch this week with us, so would the House please make them welcome.

G. Campbell: I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce the organizers of the "Heritage Tennis Tournament, No. 8": Lorern Stubbs, the director of Vancouver Island Providence Farm; Jean Aten, president of the Cowichan Valley Arts Council; Toti, a renowned Canadian artist, and she's joined by Gordon Oppen; Steve Armour of SHL Systemhouse; and, of course, Chuck Johnstone, the man who coordinates the event year in and year out, giving us an opportunity to bring both MLAs and the press gallery together so that those of us who are in the House can trounce the press at least once a year.

Hon. U. Dosanjh: Present in the gallery are 85 grade 11 students from Sir Charles Tupper Secondary School with teachers Mr. Dougall, Mr. Patterson, Mr. Stassinopoulos and Ms. Mauch. Would the House please make them welcome.

E. Gillespie: I'd like to add my voice in welcome to Mayor Jim Lornie, who is here with the Association of Vancouver Island Municipalities. We've seen much of Mayor Lornie in these precincts so far this session, and I look forward to seeing much more of him as the session continues. Please join me in welcoming him.

J. Wilson: As with the member for Peace River North, it is with pleasure that I have the opportunity to stand on the odd occasion and welcome someone to the House from my riding. I would like to take this opportunity to welcome Mayor Steve Wallace. Would the House please make him welcome.

Hon. C. Evans: Actually, I get to introduce people all the time, but this is the first time this year that they aren't demonstrating against the government. [Laughter.] Well, I really like it, hon. Speaker.

In the gallery is my friend and co-worker Sandy Korman. But more unusual, visiting today is her son Shawn from Creston. He is a political science student at Simon Fraser. Hon. Speaker, his mom makes me read all the papers he writes, and I want to tell you that his level of analysis consistently exceeds our own. Please make them welcome.

[ Page 2652 ]

Introduction of Bills

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE PREVENTION ACT

L. Stephens presented a bill intituled Domestic Violence Prevention Act.

L. Stephens: This bill will afford victims of domestic violence greater access and protection through the use of a justice of the peace. The removal of the offender from the home, rather than removing the victim and children, is a major innovation. In addition to the removal of the offender, an emergency intervention order and a victim assistance order can provide for the comfort and safety of the victim and other family members who remain in the home.

In the judicial system, the onus will be on the respondent to demonstrate why such an order should not be in place, and the focus will be on greater protection for the victim. Provisions for the respondent to be restrained, removed and/or compelled to attend counselling or therapy are also included.

Bill M204 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

STATUTES AMENDMENT ACT, 1997

Hon. C. Evans presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Statutes Amendment Act, 1997.

Hon. C. Evans: I move that the bill be introduced and read a first time now.

Motion approved.

[2:15]

Hon. C. Evans: This bill amends a number of statutes administered by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, and the majority of the bill concerns amendments to the livestock statutes. It amends the Livestock Brand Act and the Animal Disease Control Act and repeals the Livestock Public Sale Act.

The amendments are a key part of my ministry's budget management plan. In reviewing the ministry's programs to see how we could make more efficient use of our resources, we determined that some services that government currently provides to the livestock industry could instead be delivered directly by that industry. These amendments will give the livestock industry the opportunity to operate a registry for brands and an inspection system to track the movement of livestock.

The bill also amends the Farm Practices Protection (Right to Farm) Act and the Municipal Act.

Bill 11 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Oral Questions

SCHOOL DISTRICT FUNDING

G. Campbell: Tonight the Richmond school board is meeting to discuss the elimination of 100 jobs from its schools. In spite of increased enrolment and increased costs, the government is providing less money per student in Richmond this year than it did last year. The Richmond school district has received only $276,400 in addition to its grant. Of that $276,400, $275,000 must be used for teacher pay increases. That leaves $1,400 to support 242 new students in Richmond.

My question is to the Minister of Education. Can the minister tell the parents and students of Richmond how the school district is going to provide quality education to those additional students at a cost of $5.75 per pupil?

Hon. P. Ramsey: The school district in Richmond will provide quality education the same way other school districts in the province will. That's why they will be taking the highest per-student grant provided to school districts by any government in this country. They will take the additional grants for special education, which remain untouched. They will take the grants for ESL, which remain untouched. They will take the funds for technology, which remain untouched. They will take the funds for aboriginal education, which remain untouched.

And they will do at the local level what we have done at the provincial level: find savings in the $800 million that we do not spend in classrooms, in order to provide high-quality education within classrooms.

G. Campbell: All the rhetoric in the world is not going to change the fact that tonight in Richmond they are going to decide that teachers will lose their jobs, they're going to decide that support staff will lose their jobs, they're going to decide . . . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, members. Please proceed.

G. Campbell: Students and parents in Richmond are going to watch as the quality of public education is reduced. That's the fact.

The Minister of Education tells us that education is a priority for this government. So I ask the Minister of Education: will you commit today to eliminating all advertising that tells people that education is a priority for you, and take every single one of those dollars and put it back into the classrooms of British Columbia?

Hon. P. Ramsey: Well, what a difference a couple of days make, hon. Speaker. On Sunday, I believe, the Leader of the Official Opposition and the critic for Education attended a meeting of the B.C. School Trustees Association and spoke to them about their concerns. And the critic said to that organization: "Education is too important to play partisan political games with." What a difference a couple of days make.

Here we have this opposition standing up again and criticizing a government that for six years has increased funding and maintained the highest per-student funding in the country. Now, contrary to their election platform, where they were going to cut, cut, cut, they say spend, spend, spend. These games have got to stop.

G. Campbell: Let's first of all be clear. In terms of education, this side of the House proposed the addition of 2,500 new teachers in British Columbia, not the reduction of teachers in British Columbia. Over the last six years, funding per student has gone down by over $400 in the province of British Columbia. It has not gone up.

[ Page 2653 ]

Students are at the top of our list, unlike the government's. So my question to the minister is . . . . You say you want to eliminate the rhetoric, and you want to eliminate the politics. Great. Will you commit. . .?

Oh, we're going to have a pinch-hitter here, hon. Speaker. That's a good thing, I'm sure. Because the Premier can commit for you, I'll change it to the Premier. Will you commit, Mr. Premier, to eliminating all of the advertising and all of the propaganda, and putting those dollars and those cost savings into the classrooms, back to the students of British Columbia?

Hon. G. Clark: Hon. Speaker, what staggering hypocrisy from the Liberals! Listen to them now, today, asking us to spend more when every day, day in and day out, for six years they have attacked us for spending money on health care and on education.

Our record is a 20 percent increase in funding for education over the last six years -- a 20 percent increase when every other province in Canada has cut spending, including all those Liberal governments across the country. We have increased funding every year including this year. In spite of financial challenges, we are continuing to invest in education and giving more money, not less, to every school district.

Where have they been? Suddenly -- suddenly -- crocodile tears from the opposition about our increased funding for education. I want them to stand up and say they're going to vote against the budget because there is not enough money going into health care and education. For once, be consistent.

G. Plant: The people of British Columbia know where the hypocrites are; they're on that side of the House, not this side of the House.

Eight-year-old Rhianna Coyle has severe epilepsy. She attends school in Richmond, thanks to the hard work and dedication of her parents, the full-time attendance of a classroom assistant, and other professionals. Here's what Rhianna's parents have asked me to tell the Minister of Education about what NDP education hypocrisy is doing for Rhianna: "Fifteen percent cutback in classroom assistant hours, 10 percent cutback in learning assistance teachers, and 10 percent cutback in speech and language therapists." To top it all off, Rhianna's mom is herself a classroom assistant and will have her hours and income cut by 15 percent.

My question is for the Minister of Education: when will he admit that his government's promise to protect education is nothing more than a cruel hoax?

Hon. P. Ramsey: Let's get some of the facts on the table, and then maybe we can deal with the rhetoric.

We spend close to $400 million a year on assisting children, like the one the member opposite refers to, to get a level playing field and an equal opportunity to acquire skills and education. This funding is based not on some global budget but on needs identified by individual school districts identifying individual students. If there are more students that require high special education assistance, they get it. There's been no reduction in this budget this year.

G. Plant: Well, this individual student is getting hammered. There are faces and there are lives behind the cutback figures. There are real people who will be denied opportunity and who will be hurt by cutbacks in education. The Education minister claims he's protecting education, but in fact he's harming it. Rhianna Coyle's example shows us that those who are the most disabled will suffer the most. My question for the Minister of Education is: what will his government do for Rhianna Coyle?

Hon. G. Clark: I want to be absolutely clear in answer to this question. There are no cuts to special needs in the province of British Columbia -- every single year. Our record is second to none anywhere in Canada. There are no cuts to special needs. There is $400 million of funding going to special needs. We have not cut it, in spite of repeated requests from the Liberals opposite that we should cut government spending. We maintained spending on education and increased it this year. We maintained spending on special needs -- the only place in Canada to do so.

We expect school boards to manage with this increased funding by cutting administrative costs, which they promised to do -- cut administrative costs and put money into the classrooms. That's what we expect school boards, including the school board in Richmond, to do.

L. Reid: We know that when it comes to education, this government makes some grandiose promises; but when it comes time to deliver, they come up short every single time.

The Richmond school district has an $8.5 million shortfall. Again, the district is voting tonight on the individuals that will lose their jobs, whether they be teachers, custodians, library assistants or maintenance workers. All of them are on the block. Can the Minister of Education tell the people of Richmond how shortchanging them of $8.5 million and cutting 100 workers into the bargain will somehow improve education?

Hon. P. Ramsey: Let's get the record straight. Funding for education is going up this year in this province. In the next school year, our school districts will have $34 million more to put into classrooms. They will be hiring 625 new teachers to deal with those students in those classrooms -- more teachers, hon. Speaker.

And yes, we are asking school districts to do at the district level what we have done in this government: cut other services to protect education; cut bureaucracy to protect the classrooms. We are asking them, out of $800 million spent on out-of-classroom services, to find $27 million. They said it could be done; we say it could be done. It's time for them to do it.

[2:30]

L. Reid: I don't believe this minister when he talks about protecting education. The predicament in Richmond is the predicament across this province: the budget crunch because of NDP mismanagement. Will this minister confirm that education funding across this province is down by $43 per student? Can this minister confirm that, if he's so convinced he knows the facts?

Hon. P. Ramsey: Well, this is wonderful. I could have sworn I heard one of the other members stand up and say that funding in Richmond had gone up this year. We'd better check Hansard to make sure of that, but I could have sworn that that was what they said. And here, this member now stands up and says that their budget has been slashed by this government by $8.5 million. Get your facts straight. The budget for education is up this year. We are recognizing the increased number of students in our schools; we're

recogniz-

[ Page 2654 ]

ing it with increased funding. And we are saying to the school districts: make your efficiencies so that we do not affect the quality of education. Our kids are too important. We ask them to protect education as we have done.

L. Reid: The question was very simple: can this minister stand up today and confirm that there is a reduction in school base funding by $43 per student? Yes or no.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, members, please.

Hon. P. Ramsey: We have told school districts that we expect them to find $27 million in reductions in out-of-class services. This is a target that was set last year when these same school districts -- including Richmond, hon. Speaker -- came to us and said: "Don't amalgamate us. Don't force us to become merged with some other board. Keep us separate, and we'll find those efficiencies outside the classroom."

Well, we can do it. We've done it in this government, and when school districts can get it right, they can do it, too. We can have high-quality education for all children in British Columbia, and this government is committed to that goal.

HEALTH BOARD CEO CONTRACT

S. Hawkins: Mr. Speaker, we've obtained the contract for the CEO of the North Shore health board, Inge Schamborzki. Ms. Schamborzki has been hired for a two-year contract, and after 18 months each party must state whether or not they want to renew the contract. To quote the contract, it says: "If the parties do not reach an agreement on the terms of an extension, the agreement will expire and terminate, and the employee will be entitled to continuation of salary and benefits for 12 months."

Can the Minister of Health tell us why this CEO should receive a full year's severance for only two years' work, when patients are on waiting lists for life-saving treatment?

Hon. J. MacPhail: I'll have more to say about the whole issue of severance and CEOs and hospitals at, I think, 3 o'clock today. So that's advance notice for those who are interested.

But I would also say that this same North Shore health board is putting in place some administrative savings that are substantial, and there are doctors -- there is no question -- that are represented by the Liberals who disagree with those savings. But it's so funny to stand here and spend 14 minutes in question period, talking about how we need to spend more, and in the one area of our government where we are saving millions and millions of dollars -- $24 million alone in the regionalization of health care -- this Liberal Party does nothing, says nothing and won't put their position on record. It's really shameful how they can speak out of both sides of their mouths around cost-saving.

The Speaker: The bell terminates question period.

Tabling Documents

Hon. M. Farnworth: I have the honour to present the 1995-96 annual report of the B.C. Housing Management Commission, an agency of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

Petitions

D. Symons: Mr. Speaker, I have been asked to make heard the voices of 628 people who are opposed to no-fault insurance. They are concerned that it will remove or limit their legal rights, and that would be a disservice to the people of this province.

L. Stephens: Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition. This petition is from the Saltspring Island Transition House, concerning a funding cut by the government to this facility after April 30, 1997.

Orders of the Day

Hon. J. MacPhail: I call Committee of Supply in Committee A, and for the information of the Legislature, we will be debating the estimates of the Attorney General. And in this House, I call Committee of Supply. For the information of the Legislature, we will be debating the estimates of the Ministry of Women's Equality.

The House in Committee of Supply B; G. Brewin in the chair.

The Chair: Just before we start, I would like to offer a few observations, if I might, as Chair of Committee of Supply, about how we function. It won't take but a minute. We are sitting for the first time, obviously, and I think we should look at a few of the items.

One, for those of you who are new to this, is that the rules of the main House apply in Committee of Supply, except for the point about the number of times one may speak and address the Chair and ministers and ask questions. Otherwise, all other rules are to be adhered to.

The rule of relevancy requires that speeches be strictly relevant to the item or clause under consideration. I'm sure you need no reminding of that.

In keeping with practices of this House, general discussion of a ministry's policy and administration will be permitted under the office vote of the minister, and subsequent votes will then have to be strictly relevant.

The administrative actions of the government will be open for discussion, but not legislation or the need for legislation.

Then, under standing 43, it is the prerogative of the Chair to intervene where it perceives that the member is persisting in tedious repetition. In all other respects, the normal rules of debate will apply. These comments apply equally to committee on bills as to Committee of Supply. So enough of all that, but these are the points that will be made from time to time as we proceed.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF WOMEN'S EQUALITY

On vote 56: minister's office, $373,000.

Hon. S. Hammell: It is my pleasure to present the estimates of the Ministry of Women's Equality for 1997-98. Before I begin, I would like to introduce the staff members from my ministry who are here to help me with this process: Val Mitchell, co-deputy minister, who job-shares the position with Eloise Spitzer -- the only job-sharing arrangement of a

[ Page 2655 ]

deputy minister in Canada, may I say; Linda Martin, assistant deputy minister; and Scott Seivwright, director of finance. As well, we have with us Kristi Falconer and Mary Warner, who are sign language interpreters and will be signing this afternoon. I would also like to recognize the dedicated work of other ministry employees and the work of people in communities all over the province.

The 1997-98 budget for my ministry reflects our government's commitment to B.C. women and their families. Our government has made women a priority, because what's good for women is good for everyone in British Columbia. Everyone is entitled to be paid fairly and equitably, everyone is entitled to a life free from violence and the fear of violence, and everyone is entitled to have their health issues taken seriously. However, until women can enjoy a walk down the street in complete safety, until they know matters important to them will be held in the same balance as those of everyone else . . . .

For as long as those issues are out there, the need for a ministry devoted to women's issues cannot be emphasized enough.

Our commitment to women and their families is not new; it has been reflected in our actions since this government was elected in 1991. We work with women in B.C.'s communities, and our programs are respectful of our province's diverse population. The contributions of women of all origins, ages, ethnicities, races, religions, abilities, sexual orientations and marital status are equally sought and valued. Further, we bring the voices of B.C. women to the decision-making tables of government. Today, after five full years, we are proud to continue building on the progress we've made.

In the coming year the work of the ministry will focus on three key areas. First, I would like to talk about economic security and equality for women. Over the coming year the ministry will continue to advocate on behalf of women so they might move even closer to the same economic benchmark as men, for as long as women lag behind men on the salary scale -- and the research shows that women earn 73 cents for every dollar earned by a man -- it means we are penalized for our gender.

As long as women receive pensions smaller than men after the death of their spouse, it means we are valued less as elder members of our community. As long as women lose seniority or status at work because they have taken time off to raise families, it means that young girls and teenagers will learn that men are owed more respect than women in the world.

Therefore, to continue this government's progress toward economic equality, we will continue to lobby for programs that give women the extra strength they need to shatter the glass ceiling.

We will build on the progress this government has made toward economic equality, such as the four-step increase to the minimum wage up to $7 per hour, recognizing that 60 percent of minimum-wage earners are women; such as the $86.6 million in pay equity adjustments for women in the public sector; such as the B.C. 21 projects that have created training, business and job opportunities for street women, transition house residents and aboriginal women; such as the family bonus program, which supports low- and middle-income working families.

[2:45]

My ministry will continue to provide bursaries for women enrolled in post-secondary women's studies and in academic and vocational programs where women are underrepresented. We will work with the electronic information highway project, which will introduce more than 3,000 women and 80 women's service agencies to the Internet. This project will get women on line and networking and communicating with other women and services in the province and around the world. We will integrate a job strategy for women into the B.C. government's job strategy program. We will continue to advocate for gender equality in industrial training and apprenticeship programs throughout B.C.

Our second significant area of work this year will deal with stopping the violence against women. Violence against anyone in any form robs society of its humanity. But violence against women becomes more poignant when it makes us outcasts because we can no longer find safe refuge in our own homes. Violence against women makes us virtual prisoners when we cannot walk safely down the street.

Violence is costly, too. The economic cost of violence against women, with police and legal costs, approaches $385 million in a single year. If the costs of lost days and wages and other areas of impact such as health are added in, the cost could easily soar past $1 billion in a year. The Ministry of Women's Equality will therefore devote more than $31 million this year to programs aimed at recognizing and ending violence against women.

Our action plan includes direct service and public education, because we must change the behaviours and attitudes that allow violence to happen in the first place. This morning I launched a provincewide public education campaign about criminal harassment, also known as stalking. The launch coincides with the Prevention of Violence Against Women Week, a week which was proclaimed in perpetuity by the government three years ago. The material on criminal harassment will be distributed throughout B.C.

It provides valuable information to women and men who are being stalked and describes what we can or should do to protect ourselves and our families. It also explains the steps the community can take to support women and men who are experiencing harassment.

Make no mistake: information and education are only one of the approaches we are taking on this topic; enforcement and services to victims are also on top of our priority list. Our ministry will continue to provide support for sexual assault and women assault programs, treatment programs for men who assault, programs for children who witness abuse, counselling for women who have experienced abuse, aboriginal family violence prevention programs, transition house programs and community-based projects focused on breaking the cycle of violence against women.

Such non-profit projects respond to the needs of women by providing services ranging from clothing exchanges to hot-meal service to job entry programs. The projects will also add to the transition houses, safe homes and second-stage houses already in operation across the province, including B.C.'s first specialized transition house to serve abused women with alcohol and drug use problems.

The Ministry of Women's Equality will continue to maintain regional offices throughout the province to provide an important link between Victoria and women in rural or isolated communities across the province. Our regional staff will be available to support many community-based programs, which are often the only beacon of hope for women lost in a stormy sea of violence.

Our third area is that of women's health, for if we are healthy and safe, then we are able to fulfil ourselves and contribute to our homes, families and communities. The Ministry of Women's Equality wants to renew emphasis on a health care system that is respectful and responsive to the

[ Page 2656 ]

health care needs of women. To that end, and in partnership with the women's health bureau, the ministry will develop a public education program on the attitudes and economics of women's health.

Our ministry will fund public education projects about the health consequence of violence against women. Too often women ignore their health concerns or allow others to come first. Women are often too busy caring for the needs of their families to take heed of the many early warning signs that their own health is suffering. For example, more women than men die from heart attacks, but more men than women are given heart transplants. Our work will also focus on promoting findings that improve health policy and programs for women.

In conclusion, I am pleased to present the Ministry of Women's Equality budget estimates for 1997-98. In a fiscal climate dominated by deficit control and budget restraints, some reductions have been necessary to protect programs and services for B.C. women. To manage our government's financial plan and to protect services for women, we have reduced administrative staffing, management and communications budgets within the ministry. This is a budget that shows careful management of limited resources. It shows a very strong commitment to women. It is dedicated to moving ahead the agenda of equality for women.

Our vision is of a society where women and men experience equality in all aspects of their lives.

L. Stephens: I want to thank the minister for the briefing that we received last week, welcome the minister's staff here and extend my appreciation for all of the work they've done and the information they have been able to deliver to the official opposition.

There are many different realities for women in British Columbia today, and these realities are a result of not only gender but also age, race, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, mental and physical disability, religion, language and the region of the province in which they live. Working to bring about equality for all women means that we must reduce the barriers that limit women's opportunities and choices. In order to remove those barriers, we need to change attitudes and to change the system itself.

Previous generations of women worked very hard and made many improvements in the lives of women today. Indeed, there is no question that women and men have a better quality of life because of advances in gender equality. We must continue to be committed to adopting strategies that promote gender equality, help women achieve greater economic choices and provide security from violence. Women must also participate in government decision-making, to define those processes and events that shape their lives.

Equality rights are really human rights, and change has always happened because a critical mass of women and men believe in and work for social and economic justice. Life, freedom, equality and opportunity have always been taken . . . . Today women want to be free from poverty, violence, harassment and discrimination.

The latest statistics and surveys -- plus, from my speaking with women's groups -- show that women believe that government is doing very little to protect women and children. It is all talk and no action. Violence against women has increased in the last ten years, and 67 percent of both men and women in surveys agree that the justice system is doing a poor job of protecting victims from violent partners or ex-partners. The Ministry of Women's Equality's own study in May of 1996 estimates some of the costs of violence against women to be $385 million.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the next battleground will be the issues of poverty and violence. This is shared worldwide, and women are coming together from around the world to form a critical mass, to make positive changes in the lives of women and children everywhere.

In spite of the equality rights that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees, social attitudes and behaviours continue to reflect the fact that women in British Columbia receive unequal treatment. On average, full-time working women in British Columbia earn only 73 percent of what men earn. If society and governments are sincere in addressing the very serious issue of poverty, we must put more effort into closing that wage gap.

More children are living in poverty than ever before, so helping poor parents means that we can help poor children. Early intervention and prevention programs designed to serve the needs of families should be a top priority. I want to stress this: serving the needs of families and looking in a holistic way at providing programs and early intervention around families . . . .

Education and special job-training programs for lone-parent families on social assistance must be developed and supported by governments and local communities as well. The skills upgrading programs for the employed poor would also be of benefit to women trying to provide a better life and future for themselves and their children. Improved enforcement for child support, community-based health and housing programs, and more affordable, accessible, safe care are desperately needed.

New public policy decisions, particularly in social and economic reform, need to be based on a careful analysis of their impact on real women's lives. The unintended outcomes of government policies and legislation on women's lives need to be further directed at making sure that what governments, agencies and organizations put forward as improvements to women's lives are in fact improvements and do not, at some point in time, cause more stress than what women already have to endure. So women's progress toward economic equality depends on how legislation, policies and programs deal with women's social and economic realities.

Lisbeth Schorr, author of Within Our Reach , says: ". . .it lies within our reach, before the end of the twentieth century, to change the futures of disadvantaged women and their children." Some of the things the minister talked about are economic issues, violence issues and health care issues for women.

Let's talk a bit about violence first. I think community-based police and policing initiatives is one of the ways we can approach solving some of the family violence issues, because there's a huge amount of human suffering and social problems out there, as the minister knows. I believe a large part of it often begins with and is fostered through domestic violence.

Substance abuse, a lot of youth crime and child prostitution are problems rooted in domestic violence, and much of the violent crime that exists today in our society has been learned or nurtured by violence in the home. So we must intervene at the earliest possible moment, because we cannot allow such violence to be learned and practised in our future.

[3:00]

It's appropriate, I think, that we are debating the estimates of Women's Equality during Prevention of Violence Against Women Week in British Columbia. There's been a lot

[ Page 2657 ]

of rhetoric around protecting women from violence; there have been a lot of studies done. I'm sure the minister will agree that the number of studies would probably reach from here to the east coast of Canada and back again twice. Yet nothing seems to happen. B.C. has the highest rate of violence against women in relationships. An average of 110 women are killed each year by their partners or their ex-partners, and assault by a male partner or ex-partner is the single most common cause of injury to women. In British Columbia in 1995 there were 9,300 spousal assaults.

Eighty-one percent of those assaults involved a male offender and 10 percent a female offender, and in 1 percent both the male and female were charged. A women is nine times as likely to be killed by her spouse than a stranger.

The government has a policy from the Attorney General's office called Violence Against Women in Relationships. I want to stress to the minister that even though there were some revisions made to this policy in August of last year, I think it needs to be looked at again. I think we need to look at better education on what domestic violence is all about. These are some of the issues I would encourage the minister to consider, because women don't trust the justice system to protect them. We need better training for police, lawyers, judges and victim services workers to understand the dynamics of domestic violence and what it's all about.

There are many different kinds of domestic abuse: physical, sexual, emotional and economic. Also, I'd like to talk a little about -- and I will ask the minister this -- whether or not her ministry is looking at multicultural programs, because I'm sure the minister knows that different cultures view family violence in different ways, so there needs to be appropriate mechanisms and appropriate programs built around those particular issues. Those are some of the things that I want to talk about.

I also want to highlight to the minister some of the concerns that women have expressed to me around what happens when they come into a situation of domestic violence. What they're saying is that they still depend on the police for enforcement, but it's not happening consistently around the province. Some women have been asked to take lie detector tests. I'm not sure if the minister is aware of that, but that's what is out there, and that's what is happening. They tell me there's a lack of coordinated victim assistance services around domestic violence.

They tell me that street people, aboriginal women and prostitutes have no power and no advocates, so they receive no protection or service from police.

Women have been given a false sense of security by a lot of the talk -- and a lot of the musings, perhaps -- and some of the policies that have come forward, particularly from the Attorney General's ministry, around violence against women. I think there needs to be this ministry's active participation in the Attorney General's ministry to talk about some of the things that need to be addressed and need to be rectified as far as protection of women is concerned.

I have some questions that I would like to ask the minister around those three areas that she spoke about: economic issues, violence issues and health. The first question I would like to put to the minister -- to get this one out of the way -- is about the policy and evaluation committee. We're going to pretty much follow the ministry's estimates briefing that I received from the deputy minister, and we'll go through it in that manner.

You have in front of you the description of the branch's performance and what it does: reviews issues affecting women, including research and information-gathering; evaluates program initiatives and assists in the coordination and development of policy and legislation related to women's equality initiatives; and reviews governmentwide policy proposals and their impact on women.

We're going to go through this in pretty much that manner, because I understand that the ministry is a central agency and does advocate and form partnerships with other ministries to advance the aims, goals and purposes of protection of women and the equality of women. It's very likely going to be a wide-ranging discussion that will cross ministry lines. Whenever that is not appropriate, I'm sure the minister will let me know, and I will pursue that questioning with those particular ministries.

As this central agency function that your ministry performs, would you please talk about some of these reviews and issues affecting women that you are currently doing research and information-gathering on?

Hon. S. Hammell: Because our signers are not here to sign the question, as a general rule I'll try to repeat the question so that it's a little easier for anyone who happens to be watching to understand the flow. The question, as I understand it, was: given that we are a central agency, you are curious about how we move projects and policies forward.

When you are a central agency and much of your business is in the area of working in partnership or influencing other ministries, the sky is the limit. What I'll do is just come down under a few titles. An example of working as a central agency would have been the announcement that we made earlier today about stalking. In partnership with the Attorney General, we developed a program that we believe will inform women that stalking is illegal, that it is a crime and that they have the right to be heard and to expect help; that the information will go out to numerous community service agencies, police stations and doctors' offices and will be available for women.

Another example of a central agency role -- and I'll move from violence over to economic development or the gathering of information or becoming more competitive or knowledgable within the current sort of milieu of our world -- is our Internet grants. We identified the fact that only 20 percent of the users on the Internet were women. We saw that was unacceptable as positioning for women to take into the future. So in partnership with B.C. 21 and the Ministry of Employment and Investment, we put up a program where we are training, where grants are given to community groups that will commit to training women and to having them get into the Internet program.

Again with Employment and Investment, we have worked with them to develop a job strategy program, with the target being women that will be integrated into the job strategy program of the province. Also, through B.C. 21 and some of their projects, we have worked with other ministries, such as Employment and Investment, to ensure that equity-seeking groups are included in such projects as the Island Highway project. In fact, the same model used in the Island Highway project was taken into the Kootenays, into some of the Columbia basin work. Again, the employment-equity-seeking groups were included in the contracts that were let for some of the major construction programs.

We work in partnership with Skills, Training and Labour with institutions like BCIT to include more women in their apprenticeship programs. They have programs such as Trades Discovery for Women -- I think that's the name of the program that gives women a look at some of the choices they could make in terms of employment in non-traditional areas. I

[ Page 2658 ]

was delighted just prior to Christmas to go to a graduation ceremony where 13 women welders graduated and then moved on to work on the fast ferries -- a wonderful opportunity for those women to secure employment in a non-traditional area that is oftentimes higher-paying than some other choices they could have made.

So we work in our role as central agent not only on specific programs but also to influence policy and direction. We have developed a gender lens that allows government to look at decisions, see what kind of impact they have on women and take that information into account when decisions are made.

L. Stephens: Thank you very much, minister. Before we go much further, I would just like to say that if we had known that there was going to be signing ability for the government, we would have made an effort to provide the same. However, we were not aware that it was going to happen. So it's unfortunate that we're going to have a bit of difficulty here with understanding and communicating with those out in the audience that may be listening to us.

I wonder if the minister would talk a little bit about some of the issues around reviews of governmentwide policy proposals and their impact on women. I'll use the example of no-fault, for instance, because we all know that no-fault has a huge negative impact on women. I'd like to know if that's one of the pieces of advice that the ministry has given to government as a whole during deliberations around changes to ICBC insurance, and whether or not the ministry had an active role in putting forward the concerns that many women around the province have around, for example, a no-fault scheme.

Perhaps the minister could tell us a little bit about how her ministry deals with that kind of initiative coming forward from government.

[3:15]

Hon. S. Hammell: The gender lens looks at the impact of decisions that government makes and then looks at their impact on women. We provide that lens to all ministries in government. Sometimes we take a look at a program or a policy and apply the gender lens; sometimes that work is done within the ministry. Major decisions are looked at through the glass of how they impact on women.

The gender lens is a very important part of the development of the ministry's work and has not only been used in this government but shared at the interprovincial level and used in other jurisdictions, as well as by the federal government. It's specifically around major issues, such as the ones mentioned, that this lens has been used and an analysis has been taken forward.

L. Stephens: If I understand the minister correctly, she simply looks at the programs that her ministry is delivering and at the programs being considered by her ministry through this gender lens to determine whether or not they are appropriate for what her ministry intends to do, and do not flow over or spill over into other ministries. . .and the government as a whole direction on a particular policy that has an impact on women.

What I want to know is: does this ministry actively participate in reviewing and developing policy, practices, procedures and legislation in order to advise on the effects of those policies, practices or procedures on women, whether or not there is a formal or an informal group of interministry people who assist the ministry in this regard?

Hon. S. Hammell: First, let me repeat the question. Where are we, and how do we influence the general work of government? -- if I can sort of sum it up.

Like any other work that you do, you have to set your priorities. Because women are everywhere, doing everything, you have to choose the areas that you try to be present in and affecting the direction of. In some areas we are directly involved, and the minister herself sits at the table where decisions are being made. Other times, we are involved indirectly, through our staff sitting at tables or at places where decisions are made. Sometimes we do the work of . . . . We take a policy or program from another ministry, and we do an analysis of the impact on women.

Sometimes the analysis is done in the other ministry with their own staff. So it depends on our resources; it depends on our priorities. But we review the major decisions of government to see how they impact on women.

L. Stephens: Thank you very much. That helps clarify how involved the ministry is in reviewing government policy through that gender lens that the minister spoke of.

I'd like to move along to the programs delivered directly by the ministry. Transition houses, second-stage housing and safe homes fall under that category. Could the minister talk a little bit about how many transition houses will be in these estimates that we are currently debating -- whether in fact there will be some increases, what they may be and where they may be? We'll talk about the counselling programs later, but right now what I want to know is the number of houses, second-stage housing and safe homes. What is planned or included in this set of estimates for the '97-98 year?

Hon. S. Hammell: I have been asked to describe the current state or situation as it relates to transition houses, second-stage houses and safe-home programs. Currently we have 59 transition houses, seven second-stage houses and 16 safe-home programs operating, totalling 82 houses within those three categories. We also have under development two other transition houses. One I alluded to earlier is the house that is targeted at abused women who also are dealing with drug and alcohol problems. Another one that is in the development stage is a transition house on Haida Gwaii.

L. Stephens: Could the minister talk a little bit about the number of applications or the number of groups who seek to develop transition houses, second-stage housing and safe homes in the province -- whether the services that are needed are in fact being developed, or whether we're pretty much in a state where we've got things under control as far as transition houses and second-stage housing requirements are concerned? Could the minister talk a little bit about the need that is out there now?

Hon. S. Hammell: In answering your question around what the need is out there now, I would not for one moment think we have met all the needs in the communities of British Columbia. Whenever I get out into communities, I hear that people would like a transition house, that they would like more second-stage housing or that their community should have backup through safe homes. So there is more need than we have yet met.

We have worked with three or four communities who have actively looked at putting up another transition house. We are working with the two communities that are currently developing the two houses I just described.

L. Stephens: Last year during estimates we talked about putting controls in place, about audits, about a baseline of data that the ministry could use to plan their funding, to plan their

[ Page 2659 ]

service delivery. Could the minister give us some information about the transition houses? What kind of monitoring systems are in place? Does the minister know how many women are being served or how many children are being served? How many might that be?

Hon. S. Hammell: The question -- how many people does our service touch? -- is a very good question. I'd like to come back to that after just a slight

preamble.

When we look at transition houses, I think it's often important to recognize a particular transition house when we talk of these. In the member's own constituency is the transition house called Ishtar. Ishtar was one of the very first transition houses ever begun. In fact, we often refer to Ishtar as the mother of all transition houses, because the notion of that transition house, throughout Canada and North America, spread the practice of having transition houses as a safe place for women and children fleeing from abusive relationships.

The history of Ishtar, I think, is most instructive, because Ishtar was started by women in the community with no funding at all, other than the commitment -- of themselves and their community -- to women who they felt needed support. They were prepared to provide the political will to ensure that they had that support when needed. Throughout the province, that has been to some extent the history of the transition house -- coming from a volunteer base, often being assumed by the Ministry of Human Resources and sometimes by the Ministry of Health. Through that sort of topsy-turvy method, the needs of women who were leaving abusive relationships were met.

When this ministry came into being, we managed to bring the transition house program home to our ministry. Over a period of time we have built -- through very careful work, very carefully tendering a kind of trusting relationship between our ministry and the women who are out there providing the service to the abused women -- and established trust, and established contracts that are consistent across the transition house program and have now managed to establish a system of reporting the number of people that are using the service.

As I said to the member last year, we were looking into a program where we would have, over time, the numbers of people using the service. The numbers I'm going to give you are for approximately a six-month period; they are the first six months that this has been done. What we have done is annualized the numbers, so I'm going to give you a yearly number based on that first six months.

Our transition house program provided approximately 122,000 beds to service over 14,000 women and children fleeing from abusive situations in 1996-97. In addition, day services were provided for almost 10,000 women. So if we break that down, it is over 7,000 women served, with over 6,000 children served.

L. Stephens: Could the minister talk a bit about the contract reform underway and what it entails? I think this is probably part of what she's talking about, the data management and contract reform of the non-profit societies. So could the minister talk a little bit about what it entails?

Hon. S. Hammell: I'm sorry. The contract reform project was initiated in May 1994, in response to the Korbin commission recommendations that government reform and coordinate community health and social services contracting practices. It was established as a government policy by Treasury Board in 1996.

The contract reform emphasizes continuing -- rather than annual -- service contracts and a clear framework for accountability and performance expectations. Contracting agreement policy emphasizes mutual service, accountability, service continuity and ongoing working relationships between government and contractors. We will implement continuing agreements for women's centres, transition house programs and counselling programs during the process of contract renewal in the fall of 1997.

Our management information system, MIS -- which is the one I'm referring to when I'm talking about the transition houses -- is used for Stopping the Violence services. It will collect data on use of the services provided by transition houses and STV counselling programs for women who have experienced violence.

[3:30]

L. Stephens: Along with the contract reform, is the ministry moving to a more comprehensive plan and program to deal with not just providing the physical plant of a transition house, or second-stage housing or safe homes -- or counselling programs within them -- but also providing other services? As well as the Stopping the Violence or the Children Who Witness Abuse, is the ministry looking at using the contract reform -- and the other gender lens view of women's issues -- to provide other programs, perhaps, or other services in transition homes that are not presently covered by one of the other ministries?

Hon. S. Hammell: The reform is a government policy and so is driven across the spectrum of ministries. The Ministry of Women's Equality programs that we deliver through Stopping the Violence -- and that's where our program area is, the services that we deliver -- are all impacted by this policy. So what we are doing is working through CSSEA. Through that organization, contract reform is an ongoing policy that the government is pursuing. We in particular are pursuing it within our programs.

L. Stephens: I'd like to ask some questions around the Provincial Rental Housing Corporation. Could the minister provide me with any facts and numbers on any association that the ministry has with the Provincial Rental Housing Corporation? Are there any beds, or is there any subsidised housing available to the ministry clientele?

Hon. S. Hammell: Yes, we have an arrangement -- or B.C. Housing Management Commission has a policy -- that women leaving transition houses have the right of placement in subsidized or government-sponsored housing through B.C. Housing. So there is an arrangement with B.C. Housing that respects the fact that women leaving abusive relationships often need that extra support and will be placed, if possible, in government housing.

L. Stephens: Are these the units where women coming into the transition houses -- who need a permanent place or perhaps a transitional place to stay, and they have exhausted their amount of time in the transition houses -- can sort of jump the queue, if you like, into provincial rental housing? Or is that only available to the second-stage housing? Tell me the difference between second-stage and the B.C. Housing policy.

Hon. S. Hammell: The transition house has a limited period of time that anyone can stay. The prior figures that I gave you average out to nine days' stay per person in a

[ Page 2660 ]

transition house. Then there are what are called safe homes. They are often in places where you do not have a transition house, so you will have a service agency that will refer people to a safe home. This is often a room within a house that is occupied by a couple. They make available one of their rooms to someone who will stay with them temporarily when fleeing an abusive relationship. It could be a rental apartment, it may be a private home, or it may be a hotel unit.

The second-stage houses help women who leave abusive relationships make long-term plans for independent living. Women and their children usually stay in second-stage housing for nine to 12 months. So it is a more permanent home for a longer period of time, to help the women and children make that adjustment -- to give them the long-term stability that they need so they can move off into an independent living arrangement, such as B.C. Housing would be.

L. Stephens: How many of these second-stage housing units are available? And where would they be?

Hon. S. Hammell: The question was: how many second-stage houses are there? There are seven. I know that at least one of them is sponsored by the YWCA of Vancouver: Munroe House. There are a couple of others. What I will do is get the details and come back to you with that.

L. Stephens: How much money goes from the ministry to the second-stage housing organizations? What do you have in your budget for this coming year that would be going to the second-stage housing organizations, in any way and for whatever purpose?

Hon. S. Hammell: For second-stage housing, we have $650,000 in our budget.

L. Stephens: Could the minister break down for me what that money would be used for?

Hon. S. Hammell: Well, the second-stage houses are the houses that women go into . . . . They've left the abusive relationship, and they're going to make long-term plans for independent living. So like the transition houses or the other forms of safety, they're for the house: for the operation of the house, the staffing of the house and the services that are provided within the house. They are the core funding for the house to run.

L. Stephens: Is there any ratio of core funding to salaries? Or does the second-stage house get a lump sum and simply have to make do with whatever it gets? The second question is: are these second-stage homes unionized? If so, are they subsidized in any way? Or what is the rate of pay?

Hon. S. Hammell: The service is contracted out, often to a social service agency within the community. That agency is the employer, and a contract is agreed upon by the ministry and the agency. They are required to meet certain wage guidelines, but not all are unionized -- some are, some aren't.

L. Stephens: Could the minister elaborate on the wage guidelines and also what. . . ? I'm assuming that these contract reforms have been developed to deal with this kind of a situation and that all of the different non-governmental groups and organizations that the ministry deals with on this contract basis are quite significant and quite extensive. So I wonder if the minister would tell me what changes there are to this contract arrangement, particularly around what is now required from these non-governmental organizations or non-profit groups in order to receive funding from the Ministry of Women's Equality.

Hon. S. Hammell: I would be pleased to give you a contract that itemizes all the requirements and conditions of the contract that we and the servicing agency get into. We'll provide that for you.

L. Stephens: That would be very helpful. I appreciate it and look forward to receiving a copy of that. Perhaps the minister could just outline some of the high spots of what that contract now includes, and perhaps even speak to the question of why this contract reform was done. What was the rationale behind it? What did the minister hope to achieve by contract reform?

Hon. S. Hammell: I'd like to reiterate what drove contract reform. It was driven by the Korbin report. If I recall, the Korbin report looked at what was considered the third area of government funding. It was the funding that government gives to communities through their service agencies. They found that there was a lack of consistent contracting practices: societies were faced with different documents, reporting requirements and service expectations from different ministries. So it was felt that we needed to be consistent across the board. And so we have moved forward through CSSEA into contract reform.

If you want me to, I am quite happy to go through the contract with you, but it has . . . . Let me just go through a number of the highlights as I see them. If you start off with safe homes . . . . I'll deal with the contract as it's before me.

"The contractor will provide safe home services. . .as described in this schedule. Persons eligible to be referred for the services are adult women who have experienced or are at risk of abuse, threats or violence -- and their dependent children. Women shall be entitled to independence from the religious, political, social beliefs or affiliations of the contractor, its employees and volunteers."

It sets out a general framework, and this would be true across the board in terms of how you have to be respectful of people coming from the diverse population we have in our community.

[3:45]

It goes on to make specific requirements. They may be specific to that service which it is providing. They may be general to contracts across the board.

For example, in this safe home service contract, the length of stay is indicated: ". . .provide the services to women for a temporary period that will typically not exceed five days." It will deal with hours of access: ". . .provide the services for" -- so many hours, and then you would insert that as you develop this contract -- "per month for the term of this contract, including access to safe homes 24 hours per day, seven days per week." It goes through service principles; it talks about service guidelines; it talks about the description of services; and it deals with some of the general notions around a contract.

I am quite happy to give you all this information and the contracts so that you can go over them and see what we're doing.

L. Stephens: Thank you very much. I look forward to receiving the information.

[ Page 2661 ]

I want to talk about the sexual assault and women assault centres. I wonder if the minister could outline how many there are, where they are, what their mandate is and a little bit about what kind of programs are delivered from the sexual assault and women assault centres.

Hon. S. Hammell: Before I describe in more detail the sexual assault centres, let me close this area we are talking about by going back and giving you the names of second-stage housing. There's the Cridge Centre, and that's a second-stage house; the Greater Victoria Women's Shelter Society; Munroe House, which is the YWCA; Burnaby, second-stage housing; Atira, second stage; Sunshine Coast Community Services, second stage; and Trail, a second-stage house. That's seven.

Now, to move on to your question around sexual assault and women assault centres, they provide support to survivors of sexual and physical assault and to adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse. Services include crisis intervention and counselling, information, advocacy and emotional support. The Ministry of Women's Equality continues to partner with the Ministry of Attorney General on this service. We annually transfer funds to the Ministry of Attorney General under a memorandum of understanding.

So 11 sexual assault centres out of a total of 19 are funded by Women's Equality; the remaining are funded by the Attorney General. Eight sexual assault centres are delivered by the Attorney General.

L. Stephens: If I understood correctly, 11 are funded by Women's Equality and eight are delivered by the Attorney General. This is what is so confusing about what goes on here. Who is responsible for the money? Who is responsible for the facility? Who's responsible for training? Of the 11 sexual assault and women assault centres funded by Women's Equality, could the minister explain what some of the programs are that are available in those particular centres and whether or not there are other ministries that deliver the programs there as well.

Hon. S. Hammell: The services delivered at the sexual assault centres include crisis intervention, counselling, information, advocacy and emotional support. We fund the counselling. We fund the sexual assault centre to deliver support to people currently in a state of crisis but also to people dealing with childhood sexual abuse.

L. Stephens: The people who are dealing with the childhood sexual abuse . . . . Could the minister talk about whether or not programs are delivered there or whether these individuals are referred someplace else -- to another part of government? Just what kind of counselling is provided for these particular people at the sexual assault and women assault centres? What kind of counselling is actually provided?

Hon. S. Hammell: I can't detail every single assault centre, but I can tell you that in visiting some of the sexual assault centres, much of their work is around counselling. They work with people who need counselling to deal with the fact that they have been assaulted. They also do crisis intervention: they deal with people while they're in crisis; they help them find the supports they need; they direct them through the services; they support them while working with the police and moving through the judicial system, if necessary. So they provide information and advocacy, as well as emotional support, to people who are often quite traumatized.

Let me move to a

schedule that may give a little more detail.

"In delivering the services, the society will provide direct services to actual or potential victims of sexual or woman assault as follows: staff or volunteers will be available at all times to provide immediate crisis intervention, support, information and, where appropriate, to provide immediate referrals and accompaniment through medical, police and court systems. Follow-up contacts and counselling will be provided where the society has the capacity.

Where, in the opinion of the society, the victim requires extended personal counselling or other services not appropriately given by the society in the particular circumstances of the victim, the society will provide referrals and, where appropriate, accompaniment and assistance to the victim for these referrals."

L. Stephens: We talked a little bit about this last year as well, and that's benchmarking -- trying to find out if there are mechanisms in place to determine whether or not the programs that are being delivered are appropriate and in fact delivering the service that is needed by the appropriate people in the appropriate way and, hopefully, with an eye to the costs of that. At that time, the minister led me to believe that there were some reviews in process to set up that kind of a benchmarking system.

Could the minister talk a little bit about whether that has happened and whether it has happened around sexual assault and women assault centres, transition houses and safe homes -- all of those facilities that keep women safe and that provide counselling services to them? Does the ministry know how effective and efficient the programs are around transition houses and those kinds of services to women?

Hon. S. Hammell: The question is: what are the programs that we have for accountability in sexual assault centres, transition houses and second-stage houses? As I mentioned before, these programs were transferred to the ministry. Over a period of time, we have built trust with the community that has served women who have left abusive relationships. Over a period of time, we are putting in contract reform and the MIS system, which is an information system that gives us information on how frequently the transition house is being used, what the service is and how the service is being used in the community.

We are also developing, with the transition houses and sexual assault centres, counselling guidelines, and that is moving forward, as is contract reform.

To review, let me go through the three pieces that we are moving on. Contract reform is making the contracts that we engage in with our service agencies in the community more consistent throughout the system. The MIS program, which I reported to you . . . . We have six months of data in; we have extrapolated that to a year. I've given you the information around that. The third point in this program is our counselling guidelines that are currently being . . . . We are in consultation with the Ministries of Attorney General and Health.

Health has been working with the Stopping the Violence counselling service providers to describe the scope of those counselling services. We're identifying good practice guidelines based on examples from the field. We set out options available for supporting the counselling-consultation needs of counsellors. A draft set of counselling practice guidelines for Stopping the Violence counsellors is currently ready for regional discussion tables. So that is in process.

[4:00]

L. Stephens: Does the minister have a time line on when these guidelines for counsellors will be available for implementation? Will these guidelines entail training, certain academic qualifications of counsellors, and what are some of the counselling services that will be provided? Is there a time line on those issues?

[ Page 2662 ]

Hon. S. Hammell: It's always dangerous to assume a time line when the discussions are at a table beyond your immediate ken. However, we target those guidelines to be finished and presented by the end of the year.

L. Stephens: This information on the MIS data collection, the guidelines for counsellors and the contract reform is quite helpful. This helps to put some parameters around what goes on in Women's Equality, because it can be very confusing with the different programs that are here, there and in some of the other ministries.

The minister talks a little about alcohol and drug treatment programs. I think this is one area that needs to have further discussion and certainly further development. I wonder if the minister could talk about that particular program. If I remember correctly, there is a transition house that is going to be dedicated to this particular program. So could the minister talk a little bit about drug and alcohol abuse, where the program will be delivered, what it entails and what is in this year's estimates budget for this particular program?

Hon. S. Hammell: There are actually two transition houses. We have one currently in place and one that we are developing this year for women who are abused and who also have drug and alcohol problems.

It is a unique concept, because oftentimes transition houses are not equipped to deal with this extra level of crisis. So in these houses, the transition house service is the same, but they have available a counsellor who can deal with these other problems -- the problems of drugs and alcohol. What I want to make clear is that these are not detox centres. They are not there for women to dry out. They are specifically targeted to women who are leaving abusive relationships who have the additional problem of drug and alcohol abuse.

There are two of them. One is Peggy's Place; it's in Vancouver. The other is Atira. There is a very special name for the Atira one, which has left me. But it is the second Atira house, and it is targeted to women who are leaving an abusive relationship but who have either one or both problems of drugs and alcohol.

L. Stephens: I wonder if the minister could elaborate a little bit. It seems to me that if a woman is in the process of leaving an abusive relationship and she has a double burden, if you like, of drug and alcohol abuse, the most appropriate thing to do would be to try to direct her to a substantive program where she is able to have a fairly sure rate of success -- something that is fairly intense to help her overcome these two addictions. Because they are very, very, very difficult. It takes more than simply talking and discussing the issue to overcome these.

I know there are prescription-abuse addictions. Perhaps that's what the minister is referring to. That is not quite as severe as perhaps heroin addiction and those kinds of things. So I guess there are degrees, if you like, of drug and alcohol abuse. Perhaps these are some of the programs that the minister is talking about. If so, would she explain to me just what these kinds of programs entail? Because to me, these are extremely serious, and they need to have a very solid, very intense counselling program around them. You don't fix them just by counselling. I wonder if the minister could explain.

Hon. S. Hammell: You know, I appreciate the question because I think the area needs to be explored more. One choice a woman may make in trying to deal with an abusive relationship at home may be to escape through alcohol. Therefore the abusive relationship is compounded by the fact that the person may become addicted to the alcohol and have another problem to deal with. The design of the house, or the intent of the house, is to provide a safe place for that woman fleeing an abusive relationship. You first deal with the safety of the woman.

This house is not a detox centre, nor is it an intensive alcohol treatment program. It is there first to deal with the safety of the woman leaving the abusive relationship. If this woman has . . . . It welcomes women and does not turn away women who have drug or alcohol problems as well as the problem of leaving an abusive relationship. They are equipped and prepared to deal with that second level of abuse, unlike a lot of the other transition houses whose focus is first on the safety and who often are not able or trained to deal with drug abuse or alcohol abuse.

So I would expect that in the counselling programs at these houses, a woman would be referred on to programs that would then deal in depth with any kind of addiction that that woman may have and provide the support and counselling which is needed. But that is not the intent of the house. The intent is to receive the women, deal with their safety, provide immediate counselling and refer them to much more intensive programs where they'd hope to get more support.

L. Stephens: The reason for this line of questioning is that I would not like to see a patch, patch, patch -- a patchwork of programs. If we're going to be funding, and if we're going to be saying that these issues are serious, then we should have programs in place that really deal with the issues and that provide some substantive help for these women.

I can understand, and I would suspect, that in a regular transition house you have women coming to it with all kinds of difficulties that they need to deal with. I guess what I'm saying is that a drug and alcohol abuse program in this sense is a misnomer; it is not, in my view, a drug and alcohol abuse program. It could be that there are individuals who staff that particular facility and who have more of an awareness of what the difficulties are around drug and alcohol abuse.

But again, it seems to me that these are serious issues and that these particular individuals should, at the time, be referred to a program that has the proper counselling, that has the proper programs and that will do some good for them -- and not just patch, patch, patch.

The other thing I'm concerned about is the funding, because you can get all kinds of add-ons to organizations, and you ask yourself: what kind of effect are these programs having? Are they in fact making a difference, or are they just something that somebody thinks is kind of fun, or whatever? But are they in fact serving a purpose? And if they're not, then we have to look at what kinds of funds are going there.

Does the ministry monitor the programs and the counselling services that are provided by these transition houses to make sure that they are in fact cost-effective or, more importantly, that they provide a focused, disciplined service to these women who are coming there for help? Or are they just sort of a Mickey Mouse kind of patching for serious problems that should perhaps be addressed in other community services?

Hon. S. Hammell: I'm going to assume that I have not explained this very carefully or very well. The transition house provides the basic transition house service. It receives women and children who are fleeing abusive relationships.

[ Page 2663 ]

But what makes these two transition houses special is that they welcome women who have the additional burden of being either drug or alcohol dependent, and they provide . . . .

At Peggy's Place, nursing staff is available, and at Atira, an alcohol and drug counsellor is provided by the Ministry of Health. This is not a detox centre, nor is it a place where intensive, behaviour-changing, earth-moving counselling is provided. It is a safe place that women can go to, where they can be helped and welcomed to, despite the fact that they have this extra burden of being dependent either on alcohol or on heroin.

We have not brought these programs in from on high. What we have done is responded to the community's description of a need for this type of transition house. You respond to your community, and after they have identified a need and made the case, you come in and provide that funding for them.

Women with heroin problems or cocaine problems or serious alcohol problems are often found to be very disruptive and very difficult to deal with in a normal transition house, although I'm not saying for one minute that many transition houses don't try to assist women who have those extra dependencies. But these two places are specialized in assisting these women who not only are leaving abusive relationships, but have this extra burden of being addicted to either drugs or alcohol.

L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's remarks, but I believe some additional clarification is required. Are we to understand that women who have drug- and alcohol-related problems would not be welcome at other transition houses in the province? Would they indeed be directed to the two specialized houses that the minister has spoken of?

Hon. S. Hammell: It would depend entirely on the policy of the transition house.

[4:15]

L. Reid: Certainly my understanding of the minister's comments earlier today is that some 10,000 visits to transition houses are recorded annually.

Interjection.

L. Reid: I welcome some clarification on that.

Can the minister give us some sense of the percentage of those women, any visits to transition houses in the province. . .? What percentage of those women would be requiring specialized drug and alcohol services?

Hon. S. Hammell: The transition house program provided approximately 122,000 women and children with a safe place, and the average length of stay when they went to the transition house was nine days. The transition houses provided a further almost 10,000 day services to women who accessed the services of the transition house, so that's the full overnight service as well as a day service at the transition houses. Of the two specialized transition houses that I'm talking about, one is in the development stage and the other is up. I do not have the number of women, in particular, for the first one that's up.

L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's clarification. The question was: what percentage of the overall women's visits in the province to transition houses. . .? What percentage of those women would be impacted by drugs and alcohol? I appreciate that the minister may not have the number today, but if that can be forthcoming . . . . What I'm hearing the minister say is that two communities have come forward with a proposal that requires specialized intervention. I would appreciate knowing the study or the relevant data that supports that.

Is this a larger problem across this province and we're recognizing it in two communities, or will the answer come back that only a very small percentage of women are impacted by drugs and alcohol?

The minister also made mention of a registered nurse being on-site at the Atira house, I believe, in Langley. Is drug use permitted on those premises?

Hon. S. Hammell: There were a number of questions, and let me see if I can scroll backward and find them. There will be an alcohol and drug counsellor at the Atira house, provided by the Ministry of Health. The nursing staff at Peggy's Place are available.

Now going backward to the percentage of women who have an alcohol and drug problem, I do not have that information, nor do I think it appropriate that that question be asked of all women who come into a transition house -- to then be further asked whether they have a drug and alcohol problem. What I do know is that the community has supported the notion of having specialized drug programs. It seems to me that common sense tells us that there are some women who not only are fleeing an abusive relationship but may have an associated problem of either drugs or alcohol, and these two transition houses are specially equipped to deal with those additional problems.

L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's comment that additional specialized staff is in place. If indeed those numbers are available, again I would appreciate receiving them. I appreciate the minister's clarification that they're not available today. I don't have a problem with that.

In terms of the reference to the nursing staff person being on site, is that at Peggy's Place? And if so, is drug use permitted on those premises?

Hon. S. Hammell: The question is whether drugs are allowed in that facility, and I don't believe they are. But I will confirm that.

L. Reid: Again, I want to paraphrase the minister's remarks. If indeed the women who come to these transition homes are not asked questions about drug and alcohol abuse, what is the current policy? Are they required to self-report that they wish to be seen at one of these two specialized transition houses because they have related drug and alcohol dependencies? How is that information sought and utilized by the ministry?

Hon. S. Hammell: What I will do is confirm this answer also, because I'm going to give you what I think is an intuitive answer. When people go to a transition house and it is clear that they have -- or they describe themselves as having -- a drug or alcohol problem, they are referred to this specialized house that has the skill to deal with those additional problems.

L. Reid: Just for my own information, the person in question, who believes they have a dependency on drugs or

[ Page 2664 ]

alcohol, would first appear at a transition house in the province and from there would be directed to one of the two specialized settings. Is that the process in place?

Hon. S. Hammell: The specialized house, Atira Transition House, is in the lower mainland and would probably receive referrals from all over the lower mainland. I do not think for one minute that it would be practical for someone from Prince Rupert to be referred.

L. Reid: The point I'm attempting to make with this minister is whether or not this is a two-step referral process or a single-step referral process. If the woman needing the services of a transition house appeared at X house somewhere in the lower mainland and it was determined that this individual had a drug and alcohol dependency problem, is it at that point that they are channelled to the specialized setting? Is there any way to discover the referral process by telephone, or are most of these individuals appearing on the doorstep and then being redirected?

Hon. S. Hammell: That's a very good question, and I'll find the answer.

K. Krueger: I have a particular interest in the issue of gaming and gaming expansion, and how it will affect British Columbians and certainly how it will affect women and their homes. So I'd like to ask the minister whether the ministry has received the benefit of any studies projecting the effect on women and their home environments of the announced gambling expansion.

Hon. S. Hammell: The questions around gaming should be directed to the minister responsible.

K. Krueger: I certainly intend to direct questions to the minister responsible for gaming, but there is a focus. Perhaps I'll explain by expanding a little on why I think it's pertinent that these questions be considered in these estimates.

The minister in her opening comments dealt with the concern for the economic security of women, and that's certainly a concern of everyone in this House. Also, there has been considerable discussion already around the health of women, the problems to women posed by addictions. Gambling addiction is already an issue in British Columbia. It already affects women, and it certainly affects their homes.

There have been significant discussions of the problems of alcohol and drug addiction, and very often there are cross-addictions between alcohol and drug addiction and gambling addiction and their effect on people's homes. There's been considerable discussion -- and rightly so -- of violence against women, and the issue of gambling addiction gives rise to violence against women and against children in their homes. So I intend to ask several more questions of this minister in these estimates concerning gambling expansion and how it affects women and their families and their homes.

Doubtless this minister values the work done by women in their homes that's often unpaid, and the need to safeguard families against financial ruin, whether there are two income providers or only one, because when a gambling addict bankrupts a family, everyone in the family is brought down.

The University of British Columbia has provided the official opposition with a list of studies that have been done on the effect of gambling addiction on the addicts themselves and on their families, and we have provided that to the Minister of Employment and Investment.

These include particularly serious effects on women: statistics such as the prevalence of certain very serious health ailments being eight times as high in the wives of male gambling addicts as they are in the normal female population; the frequency of suicide attempts among spouses of male pathological gamblers being triple what it is in the general female population; and a general discussion of the destruction of families and the effect on families' economic security when they are brought low by gambling addiction.

So I would ask whether or not this ministry has had any opportunity to forecast the effects of the gambling expansion on the people for whom this ministry is responsible.

Hon. S. Hammell: I would ask you to refer your questions on gambling to the minister responsible.

L. Stephens: The mandate of the Ministry of Women's Equality is to provide services for women and to advocate on women's behalf, and as the minister herself pointed out, that covers a broad range of services and areas of our daily lives. Gambling is one of them. Surely the minister has considered this. I'm sure that it has impacted or will impact on women's lives to a great extent, as the member for Kamloops-North Thompson has pointed out. The estimates are to determine what is before us for the coming year, and by all intents this appears to be an issue that is before us.

I think it's an appropriate question to be asked, and for a variety of reasons it's appropriate for the minister to answer the question -- or attempt to answer the question -- if in fact she is able to.

But I think that because women -- 50 percent of the population in this province . . . . All of these issues affect women, and I think we have an obligation to talk about these issues. I will just simply say that because in this province we have a freestanding Ministry of Women's Equality that is focused around the issues of women, it has a very high profile. It is one that is supposed to be looking at all aspects of women's lives. So I would simply make that submission and try to convince the minister that perhaps she should reconsider whether or not she would like to make a comment on this aspect of women's lives.

Hon. S. Hammell: At the beginning of this debate I was asked to identify the areas that I should refer to other ministries because they rest in their mandates, and I'm doing so. You should refer all questions on gambling to the minister responsible, the Minister of Employment and Investment.

L. Stephens: I accept the minister's direction to ask about specific programs that do fall under other ministries. But I think when we're talking about initiatives and issues that concern women, that have an impact on women's lives . . . . If we go back to what the minister talked about earlier, we had a discussion around the policy and evaluation

section of this ministry, which performs reviews of issues affecting women. It's clearly stated here that this branch performs reviews of issues affecting women, including research and information-gathering. It also evaluates program initiatives, assists in the coordination and development of policy and legislation related to Women's Equality initiatives, and reviews governmentwide policy proposals and their impact on women.

[4:30]

I don't think the question from the member is unreasonable, given the briefing that members of my staff and I received, which clearly outlines what the ministry does.

[ Page 2665 ]

Again, I would simply ask that perhaps the minister could comment on whether in fact there have been any studies or reports related to the effects of gambling on women.

Hon. S. Hammell: I'm very, very proud of this government's commitment to women and its commitment to a freestanding ministry dedicated to women's issues. One of our areas of concern is that we close the income gap between men and women in B.C. and make the workplace more responsive to women's needs and circumstances. The ministry has worked with partners across the government to do that.

I think I mentioned prior to this that we have initiated four increases in the minimum wage since 1992, totalling $2 an hour for B.C.'s 80,000 minimum-wage earners, 60 percent of whom are women. We've also added $86.6 million in pay equity adjustments for women in the public sector. We have put $32 million into wage increases for low-paid workers in the health and social service sectors, most of whom are women. There was some referral to the contracts around transition houses, and this is where we're talking about some of the wage requirements that we have put forward in the wage redress program.

We have increased child care support to help parents access training and jobs so that they can support their families. We've added a new family bonus program that offers free dental and vision care for children of low-income families, and that has impacted on single women significantly -- 26 percent have moved up and beyond the poverty level because of that program. This is another area where we're working very hard to support women.

We have changed the Employment Standards Act and extended coverage to live-in domestic workers, most of whom are women. We have added $200 million to the Skills Now program to help British Columbians get the skills they need for jobs in today's economy, including funding to improve access to child care and to implement campus safety programs for women. We have put $1 million through B.C. 21 to open up training and job opportunities for aboriginal women, street women and women on income assistance.

As I mentioned before, we have moved into the electronic highway project, and we will introduce the Internet to over 3,000 women through 80 women-serving agencies. Because they are over half the population, women are everywhere, and every program affects women. As I've said before, and as my colleague has directed me to tell her when she should refer questions off, again I say to her: please direct questions you have around gambling to the Minister of Employment and Investment, and he will answer those questions for you.

K. Krueger: With respect, the minister has just done an excellent job of laying out many different ministries which she feels quite free to comment upon as she discusses issues that affect women -- and rightly so. We're simply looking to her to answer, from her unique perspective, some questions about some basic groundwork that we hope has been done with regard to the gambling expansion issue and its effect on women. I won't flog this beyond your patience, hon. Chair; I don't intend to do that.

But when we talk about this ministry commenting on issues involving children and families, social services, health care, education, skills and training, labour, the Attorney General ministry and all of those ministries that the minister feels quite free to deal with, hon. Chair . . . .

I'd just like at least a couple of basic questions answered with regard to this particular brand-new aspect of society in British Columbia that so many people are fearful of. Indeed, there will be effects on families involving poverty and spousal violence and health care and worse: women will die in British Columbia because of gambling expansion. That is what the experts tell us. These things occur as gambling addiction becomes a greater and greater force in a jurisdiction, and that happens with the expansion of gambling venues. These are independent experts that tell us these things.

I ask the minister whether her ministry has any specific strategies at all for dealing with women affected by gambling expansion.

F. Gingell: I sat and listened with interest to this discussion. Clearly, it would seem to me that this minister is responsible for issues that deal with women. We believe that expansion of gambling affects women. It's not up to the Minister of Employment and Investment, who is dealing with gambling, to look into the issue of whether an expansion of gambling affects women. And the Minister of Employment and Investment won't look into the issue of whether it affects health; the Health minister will.

It seems to me, hon. Chair, that the issues to do with expansion of gambling that affect the justice system and crime won't be looked into by the Minister of Employment and Investment; they will be looked into by the Ministry of Attorney General.

So I think the question is fair, and I sincerely believe that it should be answered. The question is: has the Ministry of Women's Equality done any research, or considered any research, in relation to the issues of expanded gambling and the effects of that on women of this province?

The Chair: Hon. members, I might just caution . . . . I'm conscious that this is the sixth time a question of that sort has been asked. I'm not ruling it out of order, but I'm noting that it is becoming repetitious. It's up to the minister to choose about answering questions.

F. Gingell: Hon. Chair, it is simply not acceptable for this minister to sit and not respond to this question. This is a question that is at the hearts and souls of British Columbians. For the minister to sit there and answer it not at all is an admission that this ministry has done nothing -- absolutely nothing. We will have to assume that that is the answer the minister is giving us. Now surely the minister doesn't wish to leave us with that impression. Therefore I beg the minister to respond to the question.

K. Krueger: Even if the minister chooses to disregard the questions or to reroute them to a ministry that, in the view of the opposition, plainly does not have the same interests at heart as the minister is supposed to have, I wish to have a couple more questions put on the record, and then I have some other questions that don't relate to gambling expansion.

If the minister's ministry is not taken seriously by this government, then that would be a reason for her not to want to deal with the gambling expansion issue in this debate. But we do take the ministry seriously, and we certainly take its mandate seriously. We don't want it to be an impotent ministry that only comments on what the executive will allow it to comment on. So I would like to ask the minister if she has had any budget allocation to deal with the issue of the effects of gambling expansion on women.

Hon. S. Hammell: I would like to get back to an answer that I said I would bring forward to the member. Is that in order, hon. Chair, or should I. . .? You can call me out of order if I am.

[ Page 2666 ]

The member asked whether it was a one- or two-step referral. It is not a two-step referral. In all cases, including the specialized programs, women can self-refer or be referred, so it's neither one nor the other. Also, the police can refer. So there are a number of places through which the referrals to the specialized programs are made. In the case of alcohol and drugs, if detox is required, a referral is made to an appropriate place off site. It's a case of whether, when the person goes to the specialized place, either through referral . . . . Other programs may be referred either from there or from somewhere else.

Now, I do want to come back and clarify Peggy's Place. Peggy's Place focuses largely on mental health problems rather than addiction problems. Peggy's Place is for mental health, so that's where we are working in concert with the mental health program. A person who has mental health problems who would not necessarily find it suitable to stay in a regular transition house is referred to the specialized home, because they have people with special skills to deal with those unusual circumstances.

K. Krueger: Just wrapping up the series of questions on gambling expansion, since none of them seems to elicit any answer, I'll ask the last three at the same time in the hopes that at least one of them will be answered. Given that it is going to be on the conscience of this assembly that we were in the seats of this legislative chamber when gambling expansion went forward, and when the victims begin to come forward as well, and when women and children do end up dying because of gambling expansion . . . .

In the hopes that there will be something there for women as these issues come up in their lives, referring to her most recent answer, my first question to the minister is: where will women who come to this ministry as victims of gambling expansion and gambling addiction be referred? Has there been any consultation with this minister or her ministry at all on that very serious subject? Does this minister or her ministry have any plan at all to deal with the victims of gambling expansion who are supposed to be protected by her ministry?

Hon. P. Priddy: A point of order, hon. Chair, and you'll clarify for me if I am in the wrong place, because I don't rise very often on these.

It seems to me that when this ministry was established, one of its prime principles was to say that across this government every ministry had a responsibility to look at the issues in women's lives and that not all those issues lie solely, if you will, within the Ministry of Women's Equality. Every ministry had a responsibility to look at the issues in women's lives. I think the minister has responded to these questions on gaming in an appropriate way. If people have questions on women and health, I'm sure they're going to ask the Minister of Health.

If they want to know about women in logging, I'm sure they're going to ask the hon. Minister of Forests, etc. So I think this question probably has been canvassed fairly well. In the same way they will ask other ministers about women's issues as their responsibility, they ought to do so around the minister responsible for gaming.

[4:45]

K. Whittred: I hope that my questions are not going to fall into the same category as the gambling questions. I would like to say, hon. Chair, that the simultaneous translation makes me feel very much at home. Before this experience, I was a teacher at Burnaby South, which is also the provincial school for the deaf, and it was commonplace there, of course, to have a translator in my classroom.

I want to ask the minister two questions, both of them related to economics. I am well aware that these are not questions that would be the direct responsibility of the ministry. I am extremely conscious of that, particularly since on this side of the House I am the critic for Seniors and, as you know, hon. Chair, the seniors area is as broad as it is long. I think these are two extremely important questions, and I am most anxious to know what role the Women's Equality ministry plays.

The first of these has to do with the responsibility for elder care and its effect on the economic status of women. We all know that women bear the brunt of care, whether it be elder care or otherwise: 80 percent of the care that is given in the home is given by families, and three-quarters of that is given by women. There have been exhaustive studies carried out by Simon Fraser University and by the University of Victoria which show that even given those inequities, the expectations on women are greater.

In other words, if you have a particular task to do and in one instance you have a man and in the other you have a woman, the expectation is that the women will spend more time and more energy at that task.

Now, how does this affect women economically? The way in which it affects women economically, of course, is through their having to take time off work, through having their pensions reduced and through a whole syndrome of factors that ends up with those women having a much lower income as they mature and retire. The end result of all of these factors is that women are significantly poorer when they reach retirement age.

One of the factors that I have been proudest of in my lifetime, in my generation, is the elimination of seniors' poverty -- almost. One of the most frightening statistics we have seen recently is a significant increase in poverty levels for women over 80. That is perhaps one of the things I am talking about.

In any case, my question to the minister is: what kinds of advocacy roles is this ministry taking with other ministries? I know that these responsibilities fall within the Ministry of Health and perhaps Human Resources, and perhaps even in negotiations with the federal government. But is this ministry, which is concerned with advocacy issues for women, taking any initiative in addressing this issue I have raised?

Hon. S. Hammell: I'm very pleased that you have raised this area, because the essence of what you're talking about is the wage gap and how the wage gap widens as women get older. There is a difference in income when women retire. We, all of us, know -- and it has been referred to -- the fact that women make 73 cents, on average, and a man makes $1. Now, unfortunately, when we go out into the marketplace, things are not 73 cents for us and $1 for our male counterparts. So the amount of money we make through our lifetime often impacts on how much we have when we retire.

Let me be very specific around a couple of issues. Recently we had negotiations between the federal and the provincial governments around pensions. As the Canada Pension Plan exists right now, if you and your spouse retire and the contributor to the pension plan dies, your spouse who is a non-contributor gets 60 cents of that pension. If the non-contributor dies, the contributor keeps 100 percent of the pension. In actual fact, when we take that into reality, we say that the man is often the one who has contributed over the

[ Page 2667 ]

lifetime and the woman has stayed home. If the woman dies, the man keeps 100 percent of the pension. If the man dies, the woman gets 60 percent of the pension. So immediately there is a gross disparity for senior women when they retire.

We took the argument to the Finance minister, and through to the federal government, that the pension be rounded off at 80-80. It doesn't matter who dies; it doesn't matter who contributes. In the end, you want a pension that recognizes that both people contributed to society and they both deserve an equitable pension on retirement.

We didn't win that fight. The federal government did not amend the pension plan to recognize the 80-80 principle. So that situation continues to exist for older women. We will continue to advocate to the federal Liberal government that they should change that policy so that there would be an even split in the pension. And we don't care who contributed. All we care about is that our seniors are treated equitably.

One of the major contributors to being poor when we are seniors is the fact that women break their career paths. What we have to do is encourage people and institutions to recognize that women are making a contribution to society in general when they leave their employment to have children and that the time they take out to have children should be recognized if they return to employment. This is often done in areas where women dominate a particular sector of the workforce. Let me give you the example of teachers who work for four or five years and then may leave for a few years to have children.

They come back into the workforce, and the time spent prior to leaving is recognized and bridged to their seniority, which they then have for the rest of their career. We have to do more things like that in our system, in our society, in our institutions.

We have to look at part-time work. Sometimes, for women to maintain their career path, what we need is part-time work through the period when the family has child-rearing responsibilities.

Above all, we have to value the work of women. That is where we get into the fact that we in this government have put money into the low-wage program. We want to redress the fact that some work has traditionally been undervalued, and it has largely been women's work. We are also into pay equity, where we push the envelope and we move the work of . . . . We talk about giving equal wages for work of equal value.

So yes, we do advocate. It doesn't matter whether you're talking about women, senior women or teen-age women; our interest includes women of all ages, and we try to be as inclusive and as diverse as we can.

K. Whittred: I would just like to point out that I think the policies of different ministries sometimes almost fight against each other. In this instance we have the policies of this ministry perhaps fighting a little bit with the policies of the Ministry of Health. There is no doubt that the Closer to Home program has added to the responsibilities of families as more and more care is assumed by families, and of course that care is largely falling into the hands of the women in the families.

In addition to the economic outline that she gave me, can the minister specify any particular programs that she is working toward which could be described as family-friendly programs, particularly for mid-career people? I am thinking particularly of a person who came to see me. This was a woman of, probably, about 60, in a very, very good position. She had to leave that position to care for her elderly parents and ended up, of course, losing that position, not being able to get back into the workforce and having the reduced retirement benefits and so on that both I and the minister have alluded to. I think we're both aware of that particular situation.

My question to the minister is: where are we in terms of your assessment by your ministry of encouraging what we would call family-friendly kinds of programs?

Hon. S. Hammell: That's quite a general question, and let me try to be specific with it. The family bonus program targets working people no matter what age they are, so it would span the level of ages. That program comes in to support families of working people who qualify -- the people at the lower end of the scale who are working -- by providing bonuses for children as well as the free dental and free optical programs. That is a program that supports families.

We also made changes to the B.C. Benefits standards act, which legislates pensions for part-time workers and the portability of plans through different employers, and we included shorter vesting periods and minimum survivor-benefit requirements. So these again supported the notion that one member of a family may go out and work part-time to support the family in general.

It is a very broad question. In many ways everything we do tries to support women, who often, in turn, are in the position of supporting the family. I know that your particular question around health care, where . . . . Your home care worker is also one of those areas where you provide money to an indirect service provider that then provides the service out in the community. Those again are wage conditions and working conditions being addressed through CSSEA, which oversees and provides a voice at the table for that group.

[5:00]

In general I would say that we are concerned about programs that do support families. I've identified a few, and if you could be more specific, I'll try to answer any further questions.

K. Whittred: I wasn't aware that I was being so non-specific, so I do apologize for that. I was thinking specifically of programs that . . . . If a woman is employed and has to leave her employment to look after an aging parent, is there a program in place that would allow, for example, pension benefits to continue? Now, this does happen in some particular jobs. That would be a specific one. Or is there legislation that would ensure that women do not, for example, lose their position if they are required to take a leave of absence for six months or a year to look after an aging parent?

Those are the kinds of specific programs that I was alluding to. I'm wondering if there has been any work done or any progress made in those areas.

Hon. S. Hammell: I guess the parallel that we could make is between someone requiring maternity leave and someone requiring leave to look after parents. Oftentimes, that is negotiated at the workplace between the employee and the employer. At this moment in time, I don't have any programs that I would be able to offer you or to say that we have initiated around that, but I will check to make sure that I'm not missing something.

K. Whittred: I will conclude. Actually, I had a second question regarding the CPP, but the minister did answer it quite adequately, so I won't continue with that. I hope the

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minister does proceed with some work in looking at those kinds of benefits that we've spoken of. There is a good deal of research that points out that the parents of the baby-boomers haven't yet hit the age where they require care. In the next few years this issue is going to be much more on the front page than it is at the present time.

L. Stephens: We were talking about women's centres a little bit earlier. I'd like the minister to talk a little bit about the total funding for this budget that is included in her estimates, where the money is divided up and what kind of percentage is going to counselling services.

Hon. S. Hammell: Women's centres receive core funding to provide services and conduct activities under the general categories of community coordination and leadership, information and outreach, and awareness and prevention. Usually available at women's centres are information and referral; drop-in crisis support; resource libraries; self-help support groups; workshops on, say, legal rights, assertiveness, income assistance rights, self-esteem; advocacy and accompaniment; and public education -- for example, films and videos, speakers and forums.

Virtually all centres are involved with their community in organizing for International Women's Day, Take Back the Night or December 6 commemorative events. There are 38 centres throughout the province, and they receive approximately $41,000 each.

L. Stephens: Could the minister tell us whether there has been an increase or a decrease in the funding for this coming year and what the amount is?

Hon. S. Hammell: There has just been a small increase for the low-wage redress.

L. Stephens: Could the minister say what the percentage is or what the amount is? I need some numbers, please.

Hon. S. Hammell: The budget has gone from $1.603 million to $1.627 million.

L. Stephens: The increase amount has only been for increased wages. Is that correct?

Are these centres unionized? I'd like the minister to clarify whether or not these centres are unionized. Is this a subsidy or what? Is it a contract settlement? Where is this increased funding coming from? Why is that increased funding there for wages?

Hon. S. Hammell: If you recall, I said earlier that there was $32 million in wage increases for low-paid workers in the health and social service sectors, most of whom are women. It's the low-wage redress program. It is a program of the government addressing needs out in the community. This is one of the areas where people work for a very low wage, and therefore that's where some of the money has been targeted.

L. Stephens: Well, there is a minimum wage in the province, which presumably women's centres and everyone else pays. Are we talking about pay equity? What are we talking about? A low-wage supplement? Is that we're talking about? Could the minister be more specific on what exactly this is? Is it pay equity, and if it is, what is the comparable group that these individuals are being funded to the level of?

Hon. S. Hammell: If you recall -- I said it at another point in time -- we had $86.6 million in pay equity adjustments for women in the public sector. So those are the women that are covered by a collective agreement in the public sector. They are direct government employees. We also have $32 million in wage redress for low-paid workers in the health and social service sectors, most of them women. These are the indirect employees of government, often employed by a service agency that is in the community. And there is $32 million in the fund to ensure that their wages are kept at a level higher than minimum wage.

We have governmentwide guidelines, which I can provide you. I think we sent you last year's guidelines; we'll do so again.

L. Stephens: If I understand the minister correctly -- and if not, I'd like clarification -- the direct government pay equity is $86.6 million. That's direct government. What we're talking about here is organizations that receive their complete funding from government. What I'm understanding that the minister is saying is that those organizations are now being topped up, if you like, to a pay equity ratio that is the same as direct government jobs, direct government pay equity. Is that what the minister is saying?

Is the minister saying that there is now parity between direct government jobs and non-governmental, arm's-length organizations, which are now being extra-funded to bring those salaries up to the same level as direct government-funded jobs? Is that what I hear the minister saying?

Hon. S. Hammell: No. First off, I'd like to go back to what you think I said and clarify some of it. These are not necessarily places that get all of their money from us. I want to be very clear about that, because lots of women's centres and other groups that operate from community service agencies do fundraising. They get money from the private sector; they may get money from the federal government; they may get money from municipal governments; they may get money from us. So I don't want to leave the impression that we are the only people that ever fund these groups.

And no, I am not saying that there is a direct parallel. What I am saying is that in the past this government committed to a $32 million wage increase for low-paid workers in the health and social service sectors. And that sector is the indirect sector. It is not the sector that is covered by the collective agreement for government workers; it is the indirect sector that is employed by the