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May 19, 1988

34th Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

L066 - Thu 19 May 1988 / Jeu 19 mai 1988

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

ONTARIO HEALTH INSURANCE PLAN

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

ONTARIO HEALTH INSURANCE PLAN

AFTERNOON SITTING

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

COMMUNITY SERVICE ORDERS

D & E WOOD INDUSTRIES LTD.

TRAILMOBILE GROUP OF COMPANIES LTD.

FRANCOPHONE COLLEGES

TABLING OF INFORMATION

ONTARIO FOOD

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

VISITOR

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

CORPORATIONS INCOME TAX COLLECTION AGREEMENT

RESPONSE

CORPORATIONS INCOME TAX COLLECTION AGREEMENT

ORAL QUESTIONS

APPRENTICESHIP TRAINING

HOME CARE

RIVERSIDE HOSPITAL OF OTTAWA

EXPENDITURE SAVINGS AND CONSTRAINTS

NUCLEAR POWER

HOUSING SUPPLY

SPECIAL EDUCATION

CIVIL SERVANTS’ CONFLICT OF INTEREST

RENT REGISTRY

LIQUOR LICENCE

TRUCKING SAFETY

NOISE BARRIERS

WORKERS’ COMPENSATION

EDUCATION OF YOUNG OFFENDERS

PETITION

RETAIL STORE HOURS

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

PUBLIC LANDS AMENDMENT ACT

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS IN ORDERS AND NOTICES AND RESPONSES TO PETITIONS

ORDERS OF THE DAY

BIG CEDAR ASSOCIATION ACT

CHARTERED INSTITUTE OF MARKETING MANAGEMENT OF ONTARIO ACT

OSHAWA PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION ACT

L F P MANAGEMENT LIMITED ACT

CITY OF SUDBURY ACT

CITY OF MISSISSAUGA ACT

HAMILTON CIVIC HOSPITALS ACT

KINGSWAY GENERAL INSURANCE COMPANY ACT

ONTARIO MUNICIPAL MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE ACT

MID-CONTINENT BOND CORPORATION, LIMITED ACT

UNITED CHURCH OF CANADA ACT

GENERAL HOSPITAL OF PORT ARTHUR ACT

CITY OF NORTH YORK ACT

MACHIN MINES LIMITED ACT

UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO ACT

PROW YELLOWKNIFE GOLD MINES LTD. ACT

TOWN OF OAKVILLE ACT

CITY OF TORONTO ACT

WINDSOR UTILITIES COMMISSION ACT

CITY OF HAMILTON ACT

BUDGET DEBATE (CONTINUED)

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

The House met at 10 a.m. Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Mr. Allen moved resolution 27:

That, in the opinion of this House, in order to enhance the capacity of Ontario’s young people to appropriate their cultural past, to cope with questions of meaning and values and to understand and respond to issues of a global society and an increasingly pluralist Ontario, the government of Ontario should be encouraged to develop and promote for Ontario schools a multigrade, multifaith religious education curriculum similar to that in place in a great many publicly supported schools in Great Britain, to be taught by certified teachers with appropriate training; and this House suggests that in preparation for such an undertaking, the government should establish a religious advisory council and initiate at an early date a few pilot projects in typical board settings in co-operation with the local community involved.

The Deputy Speaker: The member has up to 20 minutes to make his presentation, any amount of which he may reserve for the windup.

Mr. Allen: Not being able to predict exactly how much time I will take in the introduction, I will attempt to reserve a few minutes for response at the end of the list.

Religious education in Ontario today is unfortunately out of harmony with the nature of Ontario’s contemporary society, having become a very multicultural, multifaith place. It is unfortunate that, taken together with

section 235 of the Education Act, which charges teachers with promoting, enhancing and inculcating Judaeo-Christian values, and with the elements of regulation 262, which relate to opening exercises, religious education is tilted in a single-faith fashion and, therefore, I believe, is inherently exclusionary and unfortunately does not open up for Ontario’s young people the full riches of their community, nor can all of them find an appropriate place within the structure of religious education as it is offered in Ontario schools today.

As I thought my way through what I would say this morning, I was tempted to jot some of it down on paper. My written speeches are never great, so I often simply try to speak to notes, but I did have some written remarks about the significance of religion and education that I want to take directly from my notes.

It is incomprehensible that any education at any level that pretends to comprehensiveness and pretends to teach the whole child should ignore or minimize religion. A cursory glance at the world around us indicates the prevalence and persistence of religion. A publicity sheet for a recent book, for example, declares:

“With massive forces lining up on opposite sides of the abortion debate in Canada, eastern bloc communism struggling with the questions of a Polish Pope and Soviet Jewry, Anglican bishops confronting apartheid in South Africa and zealous fundamentalism boiling in the Middle East, the inexplicable relationship between religion and politics becomes an unavoidable altercation which must be confronted and resolved.”

True, the issues named often exhibit religious pathology. Religion can get sick, like anything else, but religion, as the root of the word implies, also binds societies and civilizations together. It heightens awareness and lends dignity to life. Our literature, art and architecture are so full of it that instructors in our schools and universities have to resort to short courses in theology to interpret them. From the youngest child’s “Twinkle, twinkle, little star” and the most elegant statements of science arise questions that demand a religious response.

Religion is normally the foundation of the values that we profess, compromise them as we may; it lies at the root of the sense of authority that pervades our political system, corrupt it as we may. To deny systematic attention to religion in our schools, I submit, is to truncate religion, promote alienation of students and young people and give way to the reign of commercial and utilitarian values.

I submit that unless in our schools and in our religious education system, as we develop it, we are able to respond positively, we will find, on the one hand, either that children will respond in that context with intelligence and sympathy to the new Ontario and to the world around them, or they will respond either with unfortunate indifference or, even worse, with ignorance and hostility to the disadvantage of us all.

Our present situation in the province is a very contradictory one with respect to religious instruction. On the one hand, there is a substantial retreat from religious education in the schools. I think that is fairly evident if one looks at the survey the Ontario Public School Trustees’ Association undertook recently, with 46 boards responding to its inquiries.

They discovered that at the elementary level religious education was in a parlous state at best. Only a few boards have specific policies. Only one third of the schools in these boards had classes in religious education. Discretion is largely left to the local school and generally with the principal. Only eight boards control the curriculum to any degree. Usually, it is set by school staff, sometimes in consultation with local ministerial associations.

More frequently, the program is taught by lay persons or clergy rather than by teachers, although the specific and preferred instruction in the regulations is that teachers should do that. Most of the boards have allotted only half the regulation time to teaching religious matters and all of them have allowed exemptions.

At the secondary level, the situation is even more serious. Notwithstanding most people’s views that religious studies are easier to handle at the secondary school level, the situation is dramatically worse. For example, only three reporting boards have a religious education policy for secondary schools. Only 10 of them offer a credit course in religious education. Eight of those are in comparative religion and world religions. In addition, a number have tried moral values programs in the place of religious education.

At the same time as there is that retreat from religious education in the schools, there is an apparently increasing tendency for the practice of religious education and its teaching to fall into the hands of the more sectarian members of our religious community. Thus, we have had the recent court cases that have focused upon instances where children have felt so tyrannized by the instruction, so traumatized that they have had serious, recurring nightmares which have been extremely disturbing to them. That is not the case in just the one court case in question, but there are other reports of that as well.

I submit that religious education in a compulsory public school system cannot and never should be of an indoctrinating kind. It should not generate the kinds of pressures that result in those kinds of traumas for children. It cannot be, in principle at least, exclusionary. It ought at all points to be inclusive. It must at all points respond to the reality of the community from which children come. When that community is as multifaith and as multicultural as Ontario society now is, that program of study cannot and must not bed down on a single-faith tradition. To do so is to shortchange our children and to undermine in important ways the quality of their education.

In response to this situation, there are three positions that have been taken. One is that religious education is of necessity indoctrinating, inculcating, faith-developing and nurturing; therefore it should be practised, and can only be practised, in the way in which it is present in the schools now. Those who take that position defend that position very strongly. They tend to be of the more sectarian wing of religion in Ontario, although I submit that where multifaith religious education programs have been attempted, as they have in Great Britain, it has often been possible to incorporate those groups in an understanding way within the system developed.

On the other hand, there are those who say exactly the same thing but oppose religious education. For example, that tends to be the position of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and it tends to be the position of the Jewish community in Ontario, although they tilt their arguments a little bit in one direction and another on that subject. But there are those who simply say that is the only way you can approach religious education and, therefore, it must go.

What I am proposing to this House today is that there is a third, nonindoctrinating, nondominating, multifaith approach to religious instruction that is acceptable, inclusive and enriching for both students and our society.

We have to recognize that Ontario today is not the Ontario of Egerton Ryerson’s day. We have to recognize that it is not even the Ontario of a generation or two ago. Religious instruction in Ontario has gone through three broad phases, which I will not attempt to delineate since there is not time today. In some respects, that has broadened. At the same time, I think one would have to say that what I propose is to respond to the new reality of Ontario in something of the same way that Egerton Ryerson responded to the multiplicity of sectarian groups of his day.

Egerton Ryerson attempted to build a public school system that transcended the sectarian differences of his time and got the broad support of the community for a broad approach to Christian elementals, a practical Christian or religious approach to life that would be broadly fielded in that school system. He also wrote: “To teach a child the dogmas and spirit of a sect before he is taught the essential principles of religion and morality is to invert the pyramid.”

What I am saying today is that we have come in a new way to a situation similar to that which Egerton Ryerson confronted in his day, namely, we have that multiplicity of beliefs and multiplicity of faith communities in our midst and somehow we have to reach out to them all in the best spirit of the religious traditions that are part of this province. In doing that, we must, I think, at the very least explore and develop a religious education program and curriculum which is essentially multifaith and inclusive in its character. We cannot solve the problem by walking away from it. We will shortchange our children and our province if we do.

The voices of concern that have arisen around this question do not come simply from those new arrivals in the different faith communities. One would have to point out that it is almost 20 years since the Ecumenical Study Commission on Public Education, representing the major Protestant and the Catholic churches of this province, asked the Ministry of Education to undertake something of the kind of thing I am proposing today, and they have repeated that request over the years with no substantial response whatever.

One would have to note that the Keiller MacKay committee report of 1969 proposed a broadening approach to this subject and emphasized that religious education in the schools was not to be indoctrinating, and yet there was no immediate response to that document either.

When we came to the Davis announcement of separate school funding, it was amazing to see that at that time an issue that should have been raised in the context of the completion of separate school funding, namely, the whole question of religious education in public schools, was nowhere mentioned in the comprehensive response Mr. Davis proposed at that time, Mr. Davis preferring to include the question of the funding of private schools. That was quite astonishing.

When my colleague the member for Scarborough West (Mr. R. F. Johnston) and I, and indeed the member for Burlington South (Mr. Jackson) and others, were part of the Bill 30 hearings, we heard Protestant parents who came from long-standing families in this community coming before us time and time again and saying: “The reason we are principally unhappy with what is happening is that we see one faith community having funding for programs of religious education in the context of its school system, which is now expanded and completed, but we are not getting it in ours. Nobody is responding to our needs.”

They felt very grieved about that. They did not want to go back to the old structure or even continue the present or existing structures of religious education. They agreed almost unanimously. I do not recall anyone dissenting from the notion that the new approaches to religious instruction in the schools must be on a multifaith inclusionary basis. They were happy with that. They just wanted their children to have that kind of education in the context of their schooling.

At the same time, directors of education told us they had been trying for a dozen years to get the ministry to respond on this question, that they had time and time again proposed that something like what the ecumenical study commission had proposed was what they felt had to happen in Ontario. A few of them took the steps of developing multifaith readings for their schools, but the whole question of response from the ministry was very laid back.

At last something is happening. Anyone who has perused the clippings in this field in the last year will realize that board of education after board of education has been discussing the question. They have been pressed in some measure by a statement from the Anglican Church of Canada in which the members of that church said: “If we cannot get religious education in the schools, we may well have to look at our own schools; we may have to develop our own independent religious schools. We would prefer to stay with the public school system, but we would like the minister to move on this question of multifaith religious education.”

Boards such as the Peterborough County Board of Education picked that up and circulated other boards. Other boards began discussing it. The Ontario Public School Trustees’ Association and the Association of Large School Boards in Ontario had their curriculum committees look at the question and circulate and survey their boards, so at last there is a significant response coming in from the field. I would have to say that most of it moves in the direction I am suggesting and I think there is a new consensus being formed.

May I respond briefly to two or three of the issues that are raised in this context, however.

First, I think one must insist it has been possible, certainly at our universities, to move in the last generation from church-based theology to secular studies in religion. We have had countless numbers of Canadian young people go through those programs. They understand what it means to instruct in a religious education context that is not judgemental about the truth, or otherwise, of given religious systems. We have the capacity to respond and therefore it seems to me we must.

Second, does multifaith instruction leave Christianity behind? Well, of course not. How could it? Christianity and the Jewish community in our province are part of the historic dimension of our own tradition, so they have to be considered, they have to be a substantial part and parcel of all that.

On the question of church and state that many people are hung up on, the separation of church and state was meant to preclude the domination of church by state or state by church. It was never intended as a doctrine, in my view, to argue that publicly funded institutions should never have anything to do with religion in the broad sense of the term. Quite the contrary, it was precisely because religion was so important that this mutual domination was not to take place, but that otherwise the community through its public agencies had every right to look at an interest in and the development of religious sensibilities.

I hasten to say that must include the examination, not only of belief but of unbelief, because nonbelief and the rejection of belief is part and parcel of the whole issue.

Members will see my proposal is very modest in that it only proposes the setting up of a multifaith council to advise the minister and some pilot projects. I hope that will be taken by the government as an indication that we want it to get moving. I hope other members will stand with me and move them in the same direction.

Mr. Jackson: I rise to support the resolution put forward by my colleague the member for Hamilton West with great conviction. I am delighted and honoured to stand and support him this morning.

It was almost three years ago that my colleague the member for Cochrane South (Mr. Pope) presented a concept similar to this resolution, a concept of incorporating into the school curriculum a multifaith religious study program with an emphasis on values education. The plan was very similar to the content of this morning’s resolution by the member for Hamilton West.

The member at the time was running for the leadership of our party and it is fair to say that during that period of time, the late summer and fall of 1985, the entire province was caught up in the tension and emotion surrounding the Bill 30 debate. We wanted to incorporate into the school curriculum a program which would allow students to look upon religion in a more positive way, to look upon it not as something that divides, but as something that promotes common values among people, no matter what their creed.

I remember that during the public hearings on Bill 30, which I had the privilege of participating in for over a year, at that time many families and educators expressed support for the main elements of this resolution. I remember that delegates from across the province to our leadership convention were also very supportive of the ideas set out in this resolution. They saw a clearly defined need for a curriculum which would combine Ontario’s tolerance and multicultural diversity with an understanding of religions around the globe. I venture to say this same favourable response can be found not only among those people, but throughout the public here in Ontario.

Before explaining why I will vote for this motion, I want to remind members that it is important to understand exactly what the substance of this resolution is all about. The resolution uses the phrase “religious education,” but this should not be a source of confusion. We are not talking about indoctrination. The motion will not force schools to instruct students in the tenets of any particular faith. Religious education will not teach students about God or even whether or not He exists. Students will remain free to keep and practise their own faith, whatever it may be. Those who think otherwise simply do not understand this resolution.

The resolution clearly states that the curriculum will be multifaith. All creeds will be studied and examined. Students will not be taught that one church teaching is right and another is necessarily wrong. Students will not be told what to believe; rather, they will be told about the beliefs of others around them.

This bears repeating: the difference between religious studies and theology is like the distinction between political science and ideological indoctrination. Students of political science examine the histories, tenets and applications of all philosophies, but they are not coerced into accepting any particular one. In the process, students gain a greater understanding of the world around them.

Religious education will likewise expose our students to a variety of perspectives, building within our schools a climate of tolerance, mutual respect, and of course, understanding. As the member for Hamilton West has pointed out, a comparative religious program will offer benefits over and above the academic learning in and of itself. For one thing, children will learn that in spite of religious differences, there exist values and concepts common to all of us. They will come to realize that charity, human dignity, peace and compassion transcend sectarian barriers.

In their studies, students will gain a sense of the ethical and moral values or moral norms which govern the conduct of human beings everywhere. Moreover, in this multicultural society, it is imperative that our children grow to understand the history and content of the religious beliefs and practices of their peers.

As I think of my own daughter, who is growing up in a diverse and ever changing society, I am even more convinced of the merits of this motion. When my daughter, Amy, enters school I want her to understand and respect the fact that some of her friends may observe special deities or proudly wear the symbols of their own faith. When some of her classmates cannot come out to play because they observe a different holiday or a different day of worship, I want her to be accepting of and sensitive to those practices.

In the same way, I would hope that programs like this would make my daughter not embarrassed but proud of those religious customs which set even our own family apart, like the fact that between her two grandmothers she celebrates Christmas on two separate days, two weeks apart.

Does this resolution violate the concepts of separate church and state? Not at all. Religious beliefs exist as a matter of fact and therefore should quite properly be the subject of academic study.

Does it violate the charter? According to a recent decision of the Ontario Divisional Court, it does not. On March 28 of this year, the court upheld regulation 262 under the Education Act which allows for religious education, provided that issues of a controversial or sectarian nature are avoided. All three judges, including the one dissenter, agreed that while it is unconstitutional to impose on students a particular religious view, it is certainly constitutional to expose them to all creeds and faiths.

The enabling legislation is already in place.

Section 50 of the Education Act allows religious instruction in the classroom and regulation 262, which I have just mentioned, establishes the appropriate procedures.

Unfortunately, this Liberal government has failed to enforce the provisions of the existing regulations. While only 12 school boards have been granted an exemption from the religious education requirement, these rules, for the main, remain ignored by Ontario high schools and are adhered to by just one in three elementary schools. The Liberal record on this issue has lacked a certain degree of action. Perhaps today’s resolution will spur the new Minister of Education (Mr. Ward) to action.

Will members of all religions, organized and unorganized, be entitled to participate in the religious advisory council and to have their beliefs made part of the curriculum, as set out in this resolution? I respond that implementation of the resolution will have to be subject to the Religious Freedom Act.

This proposal already has the endorsement of many church leaders, representing quite a number of denominations. Indeed, one of my own constituents from the great riding of Burlington South, Archbishop John Bothwell, the Anglican Metropolitan of Ontario, has been a prime mover behind the call by the Ecumenical Study Commission on Public Education for an interfaith religious program in the classroom. At our last meeting, Archbishop Bothwell presented me with materials, including a pamphlet provided by the Anglican Church, which sum up better than I can the need for such programs.

The pamphlet asks the question. “What should be the proper place of religious education in the public schools of Ontario?” The church document answers that question and goes on to explain the whole philosophy of this proposal: “In a pluralistic society, the social fabric will split unless students are exposed to each other’s beliefs and values. We believe that religious issues and values must be presented and explained objectively and sympathetically.” That just about sums it up.

Before concluding. I would like to quote from a letter dated April 29, 1987, sent by the then Minister of Education, now the government House leader, the member for Renfrew North (Mr. Conway), to one of my constituents, J. J. Bud Hanna. The minister wrote about two competing principles at work in this debate. He said: “I agree with you that it is appropriate to foster respect for morality and religion. However, in our pluralistic society, we must take into consideration the wide spectrum of cultures, religions and races that make up our Canadian identity.”

I suggest to all members of the House that the two different objectives mentioned by the then minister, the teaching of religion and the respect of cultural diversity, are not incompatible. We can find a way to do justice to both. The resolution presents such a way. I am very proud to stand and support it not only as a legislator, but as having been a trustee for 10 years in Ontario at a point when, on one occasion when we looked at changing the objectives for the Halton Board of Education, we inserted a line for our students which said we hope to foster in a student the moral sensitivity necessary to contribute to society. I support the resolution.

Mr. McGuinty: I am delighted to speak in support of the resolution moved by the member for Hamilton West. I think it is a resolution relevant in the sense of being important and timely in a vital sort of way. It is important to note what this resolution proposes -- that is, a nonconfessional, multifaith curriculum for all grades -- and to state clearly what it does not propose. The aim is not to nurture children in a specific religion, which could be offensive in our pluralistic society.

It is not the purpose of this bill to introduce religious education, in the sense that the selection and

interpretation of materials would be conditioned by any one religion, into the public school system. It is not the purpose of this resolution to detract from our public school system as secular, and this is as it should be. Secular public schools belong in a society like ours because the educational system should reflect the character and outlook of society. I do not take the word “secular” to be a dirty word. The sector of society with a secular outlook is entitled to have publicly supported secular schools, but many people in our province believe that our secular schools are failing in the area of religious studies, as they fail to impart religion as a body of information.

It was 20 years ago that the ecumenical study commission drew attention to this point. Other world religions have done so, directors of public schools have done so, the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation has done so, many non-Catholic parents have done so. and during my 16 years as a public school trustee I saw recurring efforts on the part of parental groups to have this type of thing introduced into the schools.

The growth of alternative schools in Ontario, I think, reflects this need. I have no recent figures on alternative schools, but I know that a few years ago they numbered 350 with well over 50,000 students. They are increasing at the rate of 20 a year and a majority of them have been established to support this need. They cannot be dismissed with a respectful wave of the hand; they are simply and factually significant in number and size and quality. They are a long way from death through discouragement or indifference or the blight of obsolescence.

It is the purpose of this resolution to establish a program in our schools which will work to enhance the capacity of our students to appreciate our ethnic and cultural past, to cope with questions of meaning and value, to understand and respond to issues of a global society in an increasingly pluralist Ontario, and to develop an understanding of the experience, attitudes, beliefs and religious practices of mankind.

Education that pretends to be comprehensive cannot ignore religion. It will come into the school system in any event, either as prejudice or as informed sensitivity. Respect for what others believe should be an essential part of everyone’s education, for all of us in this global village share common concerns.

Traditionally, education has been thought of as a process of enculturation. a means whereby the values of the past have been transmitted to the present and the future. It is a means whereby the older generation protects itself from the younger. In a pluralist society, this poses real problems for the public school with regard to religion, for the public school must serve children who come from families divided into hundreds of religious and antireligious bodies. This is pluralism with a vengeance. This is a fact and that fact has implications.

With students and teachers of diverse convictions, public schools must attempt a so-called neutrality on the great issues of life as far as the teaching of religion goes. It must operate within limited horizons, but this program would extend those horizons in a legitimate way, and the something of value that this program would impart is of great value to our society. There are ways in which the fortunes of a free society are intimately linked to the fact of a morally informed, sensitive citizenry with information and sensitivity of the kind this program would impart.

Some children may find support of faith through religious education in the school, as this program would supplement what they bring from their synagogue or their temple, their mosque or their church or their chapel. But the subject is also concerned with developing sensitivity and a sound knowledge, understanding and awareness of all religions, and asking basic questions which we all must face. Who am I? What does it mean to be human? What are my relations to man, to nature, to God, to gods? The influence of the Judaeo-Christian tradition and the other great world traditions, in so far as they pose answers to these questions, would surely be something of value to our young people.

A spinoff effect of the program would be to develop values and standards, which are more than mere habits, that go down below the soil of custom into the rock of clear conviction and are founded on the philosophy of life.

The liberal state depends upon the morality of its people. The state cannot create this morality, it has to take it for granted; and the time when we can live off moral capital seems to be past. This is primarily a function of the church and the home, but the state that is not cognizant of this fact may very well deprive itself of the kind of citizens it needs for survival.

I think the added dimension this program would bring would satisfy an important need, a need I saw in my 31 years as a university teacher. Youth are frustrated because modern life is not responding to their longings for an understanding of the place of religion in our world. Bookstands announce loudly they are turning to primitive practices, ancient cults and witchcraft, astrology and spiritualism, fortune telling, the very things which the Judaeo-Christian tradition and the other great world religions would clarify. The very dress of youth reveals its frustration. You see young people, whether it is in Munich or Berlin, San Francisco or Vancouver or, indeed, on Yonge Street.

Our day knows only two kinds of state: the liberal and the totalitarian. The totalitarian state quite definitely does not want its children educated in the role which religions have played in our world. The totalitarian state is itself the god of its citizens; it wants its children to be educated in view of itself. But the liberal state does not choose to be the god of its citizens. It wants its children to be educated not in view of itself but in view of their own nature, their hunger to cope with questions of meaning and value.

The children are only educated in view of their own nature when they are educated in view of the ultimate end of their nature, and that is what the great world religions are all about.

The state sometimes wants to leave this ultimate end alone, and perhaps in our pluralist society it pretty well has to in terms of teaching religion formally. But the nonconfessional, multifaith curriculum proposed would make a valuable contribution to the education of our youth. It is good that our ministers of education and multiculturalism are working together to establish a multifaith committee to look at the issue of religious education in our school system.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: As a young man -- part of my sordid past that most members will not know about -- I was inclined towards entering the Anglican priesthood. Either I fell down a slippery slope or I saw the light after that. For a period I became angrily antireligious, and now I would consider myself a blithely irreligious person. But I am standing today to say I am rising as such a person to support the resolution proposed by the member for Hamilton West, and I do not think it is any contradiction in terms of my value structure to do so. I am also a democrat, a civil libertarian and a pluralist who happens to share --

Hon. Mr. Mancini: And a socialist.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: And a socialist, yes. I happen to share most of the underlying principles which most people from the Judaeo-Christian tradition would consider themselves to have as part of their ethics.

I like the resolution of the member for Hamilton West for a number of reasons, which I will come to. There is one thing I would love it to have incorporate, but I realize why, in practicality, it could not incorporate it, and that is an absolute eradication of one

section of the Education Act and a whole set of regulations around the Education Act that presently exist before we move to the much more enlightened approach towards the discussion of religion and the role of religion in our school system.

The sections I think need to be wiped out are as follows:

“235(

c) It is the duty of a teacher to inculcate by precept and example respect for religion and the principles of Judaeo-Christian morality and the highest regard for truth, justice, loyalty, love of country, humanity, benevolence, sobriety, industry, frugality, purity, temperance and all other virtues.”

I just am very grateful. speaking personally and not on behalf of the rest of the members here, that we do not have those kinds of qualifications required for members of the Legislature. I have talked to several of the pages here about their teachers and I am happy to report that all of their teachers happen to have this wonderful combination of attributes.

But it is an absolutely ludicrous

section of the Education Act, as many members who have been teachers might know. It is also offensive in terms of the new pluralist society that we have in this country to suggest that somebody who would be coming from another faith -- from the Islamic faith, for instance -- should have to inculcate the principles of Judaeo-Christian morality as part of his or her function in our school system. As far as I am concerned, the sooner that

section can be struck from the Education Act the better it will be for all of us.

I think it is vital that we separate out the notions of religious observance in our school system from instruction about religion, which is what I think the resolution of the member for Hamilton West allows us to do. The tradition of religious observance in our schools is one which I would like to see ended. It has a major bias towards the particular sectarian position of the Protestant Christian approach to religion, and I think for that reason it needs to be ended.

I would just refer to some statistics recently taken from the Ontario Public School Trustees’ Association, which surveyed and received responses from 46 of its members, and this is what is happening in our schools today: Thirty-nine out of the 46 use the Lord’s Prayer every day. It may be a surprise to some members to know that the Lord’s Prayer is not something that transcends all religious beliefs; it happens to be a Christian prayer.

Thirty-two of them use readings from scriptures, from the Bible, again something which, I would suggest, does not pertain to all of the students we have in the system at the moment. Only half of them have any kind of religious instruction at all, and I will come to that in a minute.

The sections of regulations that have made this come about are regulation 262, as amended. Let me read to members some of the things that exist now which, in my view, are offensive to people like myself who are irreligious and to people who have religious viewpoints other than a Christian viewpoint in our public schools. It says: “A public school shall be opened or closed each day with religious exercises consisting of the reading of the scriptures or other suitable readings and the repeating of the Lord’s Prayer or other suitable prayers.”

As I have indicated, what is done by practice in our elementary schools at this point is that the Lord’s Prayer is used and Christian scriptures are used. That is the predominant usage, and the same kind of ratio takes place even in our secondary education institutions in the province of Ontario.

“The religious exercises under subsection 1 may include the singing of one or more hymns.” Again I would just like to raise with members the question of what particular religious affiliation hymns attach themselves to.

“

(6) Instruction in religious education shall be given by the teacher and issues of a controversial or sectarian nature shall be avoided.” I take it, as the member for Hamilton West was saying in his speech, that it is in fact the controversial issues that, one hopes, will get kids to understand more about religious precepts and ethical bases for various communities, and they can be quite useful.

The passive inculcation of the Protestant Christian perspective is not dealt with here. That is happening, in my view, by virtue of the way we handle these religious observances.

Subsection 10 says that any kid who does not wish to take this can step into the hallway and not be involved, can be segregated; can, one hopes, withstand peer pressures to participate with people of other faiths and hold strong to his own values, whatever those may be, an aspect of our regulations which I find totally offensive and which I hope will be struck down in the courts in the coming months.

The need to have discussion of religious premises, of the varying points of view of religions around the world, is vital, in my view, in terms of the evolving Ontario, in terms of discussion of multiculturalism and antiracist curricula. That is why the resolution of the member for Hamilton West is so important for us to deal with at this time.

We tend to shove heritage-language courses off to one side, outside the school system, at this point and to demean them in terms of their importance, and we have a view of religious observation that is basically biased towards a Protestant Christian approach. What we need to do is bring into the curriculum an interfaith approach to religions that will make all the kids in the school system understand the connections as well as the distinctions between the various communities of the world and, I am happy to hear the member for Hamilton West say, the whole question of belief or unbelief in terms of why people make the kinds of decisions that they have in terms of their religious preferences.

This kind of approach has been tried in England and, I think, with some good measure of success. The member for Hamilton West is suggesting only that we have an advisory council to look at this, to develop a curriculum and to develop a few pilot projects around Ontario to see how they would work.

I say it is high time we did this. It is high time we did it in a spirit of pluralism, which has been referred to by other members. As somebody who has no particular connection with any of the sectarian groups within our society and who is widely irreligious, as I said, I can support that kind of notion. I would just hope that the government, as it follows that, will then move away from the kinds of prejudices which are inherent presently in the Education Act and its regulations to this much more progressive approach to religious education and its role in our society. I applaud the member for Hamilton West for bringing this forward today.

Mr. McLean: I am pleased today to have the opportunity to express my feelings on this resolution brought forward by the member for Hamilton West. I should let the member know right now that while I support the concept of the freedom to worship and the instruction of religious education, I must add that I believe that whether our school system is the proper place for full instruction to fully accomplish what his resolution would determine in the end is a concern to me.

It is part of the whole, and we should be wary of its becoming a part of the whole curriculum. Because of that, I fear that other important subjects are bound to suffer. There are only so many hours in the school day and only so many teachers providing instruction in our school system.

I want to say that this is primarily the reason I have some concerns with the very principle of religion within the curriculum of our school system in Ontario. I strongly believe that our schools exist primarily to equip pupils and students with a range of practical skills and factual information. As I noted earlier, it is beyond the role and responsibility of our schools to seek to educate pupils and students in an area of experience -- namely, religious education -- which is uniquely personal and on which subject there is no single accepted collection of writings or knowledge.

I know that the wide range of religious beliefs which now form part of the overall diversity of religious experience in Ontario today is one of the most vivid manifestations of the diversity of our society. I know there are a significant number of Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and members of other faith communities living in this province. There are also large numbers of Christians and Jews.

These religious groups, of course, cross ethnic divisions. Many West Indian immigrants and other descendants are Christians, including Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Methodists and members of Pentecostal churches and other denominations, and the Asian community also includes Christians as well as adherents of the major eastern faiths. Of the European minorities, for example, the Italians are Roman Catholic, the Greek Cypriots are Greek Orthodox and the Turkish Cypriots are Muslims.

It is important to recognize that the faiths of these minority communities are in no sense minority religions but are major faiths which have often played a leading role in shaping world history. One cannot, for example, fully understand the contemporary world without some knowledge of the influence of Islam.

In my view, one of the major aims of education should be to broaden the horizon of all pupils to a greater understanding and appreciation of the diversity of value systems and lifestyles which are now represented in our society, while at the same time assisting ethnic minority communities to maintain what they regard as the essential elements of their cultural identities.

It is clear to me that for many ethnic minority communities, especially those from the numerous faiths within the Asian community, respect and recognition for their religious beliefs is seen as one of the factors, and in some cases the central factor, in maintaining their community strength and cohesiveness. This emphasis is perhaps a case in point for having religious education conducted in a home or church atmosphere rather than in the school system, except, that is, in a historical and social context.

Any consideration of religious education must recognize that there has long been an emotive and often compassionate debate about the role of schools in relation to religion in society, a debate to which the multifaith character of schools with substantial ethnic minority populations has now added a further dimension.

Religious education is an aspect of school life which involves far more than just the imparting of a particular body of knowledge to the pupils. since it raises complex questions relating to the spiritual and aesthetic development of the individual young person as well as impinging very directly on the essential beliefs and values of his or her family and community.

I do not believe our teachers, with all due respect -- and it would have to be proven to me; they would have to be properly trained, prepared and equipped to carry out such a religious mandate -- I am not so sure they want to get involved in an area of instruction in the first place. Again, the realm of religious instruction or education is best left to our religious leaders or the parents of the students.

Saying that, I recognize that it is essential that we do have some instruction in the morning. I do believe in the Lord’s Prayer and I would have no objections if a verse or two were read, but I am a firm believer that the home and the community and the setting within that community is where the basic instruction should come from.

After spending a considerable amount of time discussing my concern with regard to this resolution on the grounds of the apparent conflict between the terms “education” and “religion,” on the grounds that it should be taught in the home or within the religious community itself rather than in our school system and on the grounds that more practical and useful subjects will suffer if we approve the instruction of religious education in our schools, I would now like to spend a little time focusing on other reasons for my concern: namely, the exorbitant cost of establishing religious programs, education programs, the cost of extra teachers and teaching material and resources and the increased burden it will place on our taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, you are well aware, and most people are today, of the education costs in Ontario when you pay your tax bill, senior citizens who are paying the exorbitant tax and everyone else. It is of concern to me. That is why I say it belongs in the home and in the community, and I said earlier I certainly have no objections with some minor teaching in the classroom in the morning.

I think this resolution put forward by the member certainly indicates that he wants a study to look into the feasibility of it, but I think that within our school system, within our school communities, the community school boards should be able to determine what they feel is the most important aspect of the teachings which we should be placing upon the students in Ontario.

Mr. Velshi: I do support this resolution, mostly in view of the fact that it is coming from a person who belongs to part of the dominant culture and religion of this province.

I tend to disagree with two items suggested not by the member who is putting this resolution but by the member for Scarborough West (Mr. R. F. Johnston). Let’s not do away with the little we have in religion. I think we always tend to choose the path of least resistance in saying, “Instead of introducing something new, let’s do away with what we’ve got and be nondenominational.” I do not agree with that.

In terms of the Lord’s Prayer, as a Muslim, and the only Muslim in the House here. I have no problem with reciting the Lord’s Prayer. I would hate to see that disappear from the scene. What I would like to see is, let’s improve on it and introduce the other cultures and other people to other religions. I think that is more important.

I will support the resolution if that is the intent. If the intent is what the member for Scarborough West has said, I will not support this resolution.

Mr. Allen: First, may I thank all members participating in the debate. I think they have all made very moving and often personal statements which are of consequence. I particularly call the attention of members to the fact that two of the statements have come from school trustees who have great experience in the field and whose statements I would commend to their colleagues as they wrestle with this question around the province. It will be in their hands ultimately to dispose of this question, and they have some good examples here.

May I say to the member for Simcoe East (Mr. McLean) that, yes, the home and the church are the places where religious nurture and the formation of faith take place, must take place, will take place; the school is not the place where that can happen properly and well. I think one has to make that distinction in order to work through this particular problem. But the member is quite right that religious education in the schools will raise further questions that have to be addressed and will be addressed, hopefully, in the homes, churches, synagogues, temples and so on, around the province.

I want to say very briefly to some persons who might be concerned about what happens to their children that I, as an active Protestant seeking bilingual education for my children, sent them to a Catholic separate school, which was French. That was a great adventure and a great experiment in our family life. It was very interesting that they participated in the full range of the religious activities of that school. They were even part of the confirmation process that all the children took

part in. I was delighted to see that they were received.

My youngest son was not able, of course, to complete that process because we are Protestants. Throughout the whole of his schooling, he consistently believed that what we did as a family in our own church was the way it should be done, and that is the way we still do it. But he was asked by his teachers and colleagues if he would play the organ at their confirmation. I think that is the kind of inclusiveness on a multifaith basis that we are looking for in personal ways for our families in the education system, and that is the spirit in which I present this resolution.

ONTARIO HEALTH INSURANCE PLAN

Mr. Harris, in the absence of Mr. McCague, moved resolution 29:

That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that the Ministry of Health is developing new computer systems for OHIP and recognizing that these systems will keep records for every person receiving health coverage under OHIP and recognizing that the billings under OHIP system are climbing at an alarming rate, the government of Ontario should incorporate in the new system a method of issuing regular statements to subscribers of OHIP in order that they more accurately see the total costs of the health care coverage they receive from the OHIP system.

The Deputy Speaker: The honourable member has up to 20 minutes to make his presentation, of which he may reserve any portion for the windup.

Mr. Harris: Thank you. Mr. Speaker. I will not reserve any time. Whatever time remains may be used by other members who wish to comment on the resolution. I thank the House for allowing me to move the resolution on behalf of the member for Simcoe West (Mr. McCague). The member has been enjoying the use of our health care system for the last couple of days. He is now at home, doing fine, and will be back next week. I think members will be pleased to note that.

However, it was his wish that the resolution go forward in his absence. While I know not nearly as eloquently or nearly as precisely as he may have commented on the resolution, I will attempt in his absence to put forward some of the arguments why the member for Simcoe West thinks this resolution is important and why I too think it deserves the support of the House.

It is very timely for a number of reasons. We are wrestling with utilization in the health care system right now. We find it ironic that the only area of utilization that the Ministry of Health or the minister or the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon) is prepared to comment on at this time is the hospital system. We find that passing strange because when we look at the hospital system and the amount of money that it costs the health care system, there are far greater problems based on utilization or costs escalating very rapidly, or the percentage of the budget that is going towards health care costs.

Quite frankly, many of the areas, in our view, are being ignored and the emphasis is being put on the wrong syllable.

The emphasis, we feel, is not going into the areas where the costs appear to be out of control. We do not see health care costs in the hospital system as being out of control. We do not on this side of the House think that there are not problems there that have to be addressed, but we do find it ironic that the main problems and the lack of control, as the Treasurer has indicated, of the open-endedness of the system are not being addressed at this time. So the resolution is very timely because of that.

The resolution is also very timely as noted in the body of the resolution in that we know the Ontario hospital insurance plan’s computer system in Kingston is out of date, that there are problems there, that it served its purpose at one time but the time has come when it must be updated or it must be replaced.

While the ministry is looking at what kind of computer system could be put into place there, this resolution suggests that that system should allow for what the resolution is calling for, that is, for the users of the system, those who are billing OHIP, to be able to have an accounting of what those services cost regardless of who is paying for them. As we know, at this time it is 100 per cent paid for out of the tax dollars collected either through general taxation or through OHIP premiums.

That is the context and the timing of this resolution, and I think it is timely. It is one of the reasons why the member for Simcoe West felt it was important to go now in those contexts.

I want to give the members a few interesting statistics. I do not want to bore them with statistics. but we are into an area that I think is relevant when we look at trends. In 1977-78, from the health care pie 52 per cent of the money spent went to hospitals and 24 per cent went to OHIP billings. Ten years later, the hospitals get 44 per cent. Eight per cent less is going into the actual hospitals and eight per cent more, 32 per cent, is now coming out of the OHIP billings.

We can see that the percentage of the pie over 10 years that hospitals consume is falling rather dramatically, particularly in relation to the OHIP billings, which have gone from 24 per cent to 32 per cent. It is that 32 per cent that this resolution addresses, the OHIP billing portion of the health care pie. It is the area that is growing the fastest, whether OHIP is billed for tests and doctors’ fees directly or other services that are covered under OHIP. This is the area that is mushrooming the fastest.

What this resolution suggests is that it would be beneficial -- and I think it might have been a difficult resolution to implement 10, 15 or 20 years ago -- to investigate; that we should look at this computer system. In my view, seeing the sophistication of computer systems, this ought not to cost any more than putting in a system. We are saying to make sure it is adaptable to that.

It gives rise, of course, to all kinds of variation. One of the principles is that if people know what it costs the system every time they go to the doctor -- the doctor orders two or three tests, and they have to go the hospital for a laboratory test and they have to go back to the doctor -- they will have a better appreciation of how their tax dollars are being spent.

It may be that there are some things where one’s viewpoint is: “Well, the government is going to spend the money anyway. I might as well be double-extra certain, cautious of my own health care, because if I don’t use the system, somebody else will.” Or “They’re going to spend this money in any event.” The other expectation is: “Well, the money is free. It’s there. The system is sitting there just waiting for me to come in.”

Of course, one of those appears to be true of this government. We would like to think the first one is not true, that in fact if funds are not necessary in a certain area, the government will not figure out a way to spend them. That has not been the case for three years, but we think that with the effective opposition we have been putting up on spending being out of control, the government is going to change. If it wants to get re-elected, it will; if it does not, then another government will have to change it.

The second one, though, is a fallacy that many believe, that the system costs this amount of money “whether I use it or not.” That, of course, is not true, because the system is based on utilization. Most of the costs are based on that. So we think that by getting a billing for the use of the services, people will have better appreciation. If that is coupled with some government control on expenditures and government control on itself, we think that will lead to far greater efficiencies in the system.

How would it work? I do not know. This resolution does not say it has to work this way or it has to work that way. Obviously, we would be calling for the most efficient way for it to work while the computer is being put into place, but it may be that quarterly billing or a quarterly notice goes out to users of OHIP. I do not think that would be particularly difficult to do.

But a lot of other things could come into play, and I think the government should look at what options may be there. I am not in a position to know what will work and what will not work. This says: “Will you explore these options? Will you look at other jurisdictions?” We know there are some others that do this. The government should look at what is working for them and what is not working for them and see if it will work for us here in Ontario.

There are a number of other things, in my view. I would now like to acknowledge to the member for Simcoe West that I am putting forth a few of my own views. There are a number of other things that I think could be considered at the same time. One of them is that instead of issuing everybody a number, we issue them a credit card. When they take that card to the doctor, the doctor has to run that through, write the charge on it and sign it, and the patient signs it. That is what the doctor submits to OHIP to be reimbursed with. I think we should look at that.

That, then, would not necessitate a billing or any extra cost on behalf of OHIP to notify the patient. He would know right then and there. Any other service is done that way, whether the individual pays for it, his company pays for it or, in this case, the government pays for it. I do not know any other system where somebody can send in bills without the actual user knowing.

The computer in Kingston does not know who used the system, and the way the system operates now, the patient does not know either. I think patients might be shocked to learn sometimes when they go to the doctor that there is $15 here, there is another $32 for a test and there is another $45 for a test. I think we should know that.

I do not want members to construe anything I say as being critical of the medical profession, but there is a suspicion that some doctors are sending in more billings than the actual services they perform. Whether it is true in one case or a million cases does not matter. The suspicion is there because we do not know, the government does not know, OHIP does not know, the public does not know, nobody knows. There is no control mechanism, and that is what usually leads to suspicions.

Members have all probably heard the story that goes around. I do not know where these stories start, but we hear there is some doctor somewhere in some home for the aged who goes through, walks up and down the halls, just says “Hi, Mary” and “Hi, Jack,” waves at them all – “How are you feeling today?” “Fine.” “Isn’t that good?” -- and thirty chits go in. I am not accusing anybody of that, but I am telling members that they have all heard the stories. I am also telling members that they do not know whether that can happen or not.

They have to send people an OHIP number anyway. When they get their new computer in, I assume we will all get new numbers. Why do they not send us a number on a card? Then, whenever the system is used, when we go to the hospital -- and most of us now have hospital cards anyway that they give us, that they run through with our number on it -- they would run our card through and they would have to tell us what it is the system costs. I think there is a lot of sense in that and I am suggesting that this resolution would allow the government to look at that possibility as well.

There are a number of people who are suggesting that another way to control utilization is through user fees. I do not know whether that is right or wrong or whether that is what Ontario wants or not, but I know we do not have a system in place to accommodate that.

For example, everybody has a credit card, so you sign the chits and the doctor sends them in. Now you know what the doctor is sending in. People with an income of $40,000 or over, for example, could pay $5 every time they use the system, to a ceiling of, say, $100. If it could be shown that in fact that does help to control costs and that only those people earning $40,000 or more would want to go with that option, if it could be shown that could cost them $100 a year -- it could cost them nothing but, for sure, if they do not do it, it costs them $200 in taxes -- people at that income level might say, “This makes sense to me.” I know that is a dirty word for a lot of people.

We have the Premier’s Council on Health Strategy studying utilization and various health committees that are all looking at it now. In my view, I do not think any stone should be left unturned as we look for ways to deliver services in a more efficient and upfront way, in a way that everybody understands.

Those are some things that I am not saying are right; I am saying they should be looked at. I am saying that as the member for Nipissing, not as the member for Simcoe West. This resolution allows the government to take a look at a whole host and a whole range of options at that end.

Let me give members a few other statistics. I said the OHIP payments had risen from 24 per cent to 32 per cent. On February 18, 1988, the Ontario Nurses’ Association told the press that one of the reasons for increased OHIP billings has been the increase in after-hours surgery. After-hours surgery rose by 20 per cent between 1986 and 1987. OHIP pays 30 per cent more than usual for surgery performed between 5 p.m. and 12 p.m. and 50 per cent more between 12 p.m. and 7 a.m.

If we are doing nonemergency surgery during those times, we should be taking a look at the utilization of our system at that end. Keeping a record of the billings and knowing when things take place might provide surprising figures to hospitals, doctors and patients. This type of tracking system that we are talking about helps you look at those types of things.

Both doctors and the ministry blame the increase in after-hours surgery on the increase in demand for surgery. Are we being penny wise and pound foolish by saying no to more operating rooms? At the same time, operating rooms are being used perhaps more around the clock. Is that costing us more? If every operation is 50 per cent more, perhaps it is. I think we should be looking at some of those things.

I have mentioned that the OHIP computer is obviously having problems; that it was installed in the early 1970s and those of you who keep track of computers realize what can occur. I had one installed in my office last year, and now the Board of Internal Economy tells me it is out of date and it should be something different. This seems to be happening to those who rely on computers; whether it be accountants particularly, they seem to be replacing the things every year. I do not think there is any question it is out of date and has to be looked at.

Perhaps now is the time to look at a system whereby, if it can be done at a reasonable cost -- and in my view I do not see why it cannot be done at no extra cost -- it may, in fact, save a significant amount of money.

I want to mention a couple of other things. There were some quotes from this government when it banned extra billing. I am not suggesting that we go back to extra billing. I think the government has taken a direction and the public has responded to that direction. Among the things the government said was: “Federal funds withheld from Ontario amount to $53 million. These penalties will be enough to build a 300-bed acute care hospital.” Since the government has done that, it has cancelled plans to build an acute care hospital in North Bay, of fewer beds than that. So, obviously, that is not where the money went even though the government said it could do that.

It could pay the cost of running five perinatal clinics for high-risk infants. Those are being cut back. We know it and we have seen in the headlines where children now are being flown to the United States because we cannot handle them.

I cannot think of one physician who would pass up a chance to have these needed health care facilities. Right; $53 million per year will go a long way towards helping us address these problems.

This resolution is dealing with utilization in that system. What happened to the $53 million per year? The billings went up half a billion dollars. The government saved $53 million and they went up a half a billion dollars -- not a total half a billion; half a billion more than the government budgeted for. The Treasurer is the guy who says, “A budget is a budget is a budget.” That is what he tells the hospitals. But what does he do to himself? He has been over budget billions of dollars in the last three years.

These are utilization problems and I think it is fair that it be pointed out to the government that we do have problems there. We understand the government is concerned about them and we understand it is setting up a committee to look at them. I have mentioned some of the things that have happened since the government has taken office. In my view, this resolution is an attempt to help address the overall health care cost. I think it would be very beneficial for all members to support it.

Mr. Fleet: I am pleased to rise today to support this resolution and to encourage all of my colleagues to support it as well. I would like to congratulate in particular the honourable member for Simcoe West, who unfortunately is not able to be with us today, as well as the honourable member for Nipissing (Mr. Harris).

I think the most important aspect of this resolution is an acknowledgement that the people of Ontario deserve to know how public moneys are being spent. They also deserve to know how much it costs for the services that they use. The resolution suggests a means of doing that. I think its benefit is primarily that of an educational tool.

Approximately a third of the provincial budget is spent on health care. There is no doubt that hospital costs and medical costs generally are rising very dramatically. The average cost for a stay in a hospital varies across the province according to what is required for an individual, but it is something in the order of $200 to $500 a day, which is certainly a sum that most individuals could not afford to pay for directly themselves.

The honourable member for Simcoe West and his colleague are interested in educating people. I think that is highly desirable, but I do pose the question: What exactly is it that people would be educated about if this proposal were accepted by the government?

There are two possible benefits, I would submit. I suppose one is that people will be struck by the extreme costs and therefore use the health care system less. The second option is that people will be more sensitive to what those costs are and perhaps appreciate more carefully the relationship between taxes and the health care services that are provided.

In short, it would be a situation where a better environment would be more likely to occur for intelligent discussion and ultimately better decision-making about health care services and expenditures, and that environment potentially would be improved at all levels, not simply at the level of the provincial government, but also at the level of the district health councils, individual hospitals and individual decisions made by doctors and patients. I believe the second result is far more likely to occur.

With a few exceptions, I suppose, I doubt very much if people would go less frequently to a doctor or to a hospital as a result of some system of giving them notices. I do not believe that people for the most part abuse the health care system, certainly not on a conscious basis and, generally speaking, I would say not on any basis at all. Those people who might be considered by some to be abusers, I suspect would not likely be deterred anyway. There may be any number of reasons why they may go and seek out health services more than, objectively, might be desirable.

I think we also have to bear in mind that it is not just a question of knowing about the costs that automatically is going to control the rise in the costs. Rising health care service costs are a result of a number of fairly complicated factors, not the least of which is that we now have an increasing ability to deal with health care problems that we did not have in the past. Really, that whole debate is certainly one that goes beyond the scope of the resolution that is before us today.

I would also like to add, because it was brought up in the speech of the previous speaker, that deterrent fees, also known as user fees, are not in my view desirable at all, particularly in the case of what we would loosely describe as the working poor, people who do work, and probably also the middle class, particularly families, for whom even a small fee may serve as a deterrent to going for proper health care. That is not the objective of the system currently, that is not the objective of this government, and I do not think that is the objective of the proposal, although it was referred to, as I say, by the previous speaker.

Now without withdrawing any of my support for the proposal, I think it is fair to note there may be other ways to accomplish the same goal that may be more effective. I understand there are hospitals now that provide information to people who have attended at the hospital to inform them about the costs that are involved. That may be a more efficient way of alerting people to the costs in a way that does not drive up administrative expenses.

There was a comment made by the member for Nipissing that I thought was quite interesting. He suggested that perhaps a bill be signed by the individual before being sent to the Ontario health insurance plan That strikes me as something that might be quite efficient to do, and if it is efficient to do, I would certainly encourage the Ministry of Health to take a close look at that.

But there are other problems in terms of providing this information. The first one is the question of confidentiality. The second one is the administrative cost of preparing information and then mailing it out, even with a new computer. The third one is a question of accuracy. That really goes to the heart of the inadequacies of the existing computer system. The auditor has reported on this and I would like to deal with some of the comments that he made to try to explain the problems that are encountered.

“Participant’s identification on an incoming claim is compared to participant’s identification previously recorded. A match condition results when the first name, sex and birth data agree. Where, however, a match does not occur, a new participant is created. Submission of inaccurate or differing information by the provider of the service can, therefore, result in a participant being recorded more than once.” When one keeps in mind that there are some 81 million claims per year, one can understand quite quickly how even the most minor differentiation in the data produces a very difficult problem in terms of data entry and then producing the results.

This is a notion that I put forward on behalf of myself. It may be that the solution is not to provide individualized responses about expenses in terms of if you have gone to the doctor, what does it cost you for that particular trip, but rather to provide standardized information about the average trip to a doctor in that area, or the average stay in a hospital or for perhaps that type of service. That may be far more efficient in terms of the production of information to inform people and it would still achieve the goal involved.

One of the things that I think is also notable for all members of this House and for the public is the prompt action that has taken place with the Ministry of Health and the Minister of Health (Mrs. Caplan). On November 18, 1987, she sent a letter to all district health councils requesting their input to assess a possible new system that would be called the unique personal identifier system. That new system would involve, potentially, a new registration number for every individual in Ontario, either assigned at birth or at the institution of the system, if it were brought in, or when somebody would be emigrating into Ontario.

The kind of data that they would require would be date of birth, the sex of the individual and an address, something so that they have a better system of matching up. I would point out that there are some technical problems with this because there is a right of privacy for every individual and there is a personal right of access to information about an individual. That has to be preserved and, of course, that is inherent in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act and one of the principles of this government.

Secondly, there was a report in mid-February of this year to a legislative committee about the status of this. I understand there is a submission now being made to Management Board and this is something being actively considered although it is still in the discussion stage.

In summation, I would again urge all members to support this proposal. Again, I congratulate the member for Simcoe West. I think we do have to look for innovative ways to address the question of costs. I do not think we want to sacrifice any important services in the health care area and, therefore, we need a well-planned system to be an efficient system. That is exactly what the Minister of Health is endeavouring to do and is doing currently. I again urge all members to support this resolution.

Mr. Reville: It is a pleasure to join with colleagues such as the member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Fleet) and the member for Nipissing in support of the resolution from the member for Simcoe West. I am pleased to share with the House the information that the member for Simcoe West will be back with us shortly. I am pleased to hear that the health care system seems to have come through for him.

A number of the recognitions in the resolution have been commented on by the member for High Park-Swansea and the member for Nipissing. There is no question that a new computer system for OHIP would be a good idea. I think it is somewhat bizarre that there are around 26 million names in the system in Ontario, particularly in view of the fact that there are somewhat fewer than 10 million people in the province. I think it is high time we reduced the number of hysterectomies performed on men. Correcting the OHIP computer system would have some beneficial effect thereon.

I also understand that large swarms of computer fixers are required just to keep that system from collapsing and sighing totally. I understand as well that there is a man in a kind of closet there in the OHIP centre in Kingston with an eyeshade, arm-suspenders and a kind of quill-pen on a chair. He is not somehow connected to the computer, but he sends a bill to Ottawa every now and then for about $4 billion. He is sort of scribing this away with his quill-pen. It is lucky we have him there.

The other recognition the member for Simcoe West draws our attention to is particularly important. He says billings under OHIP are climbing at an alarming rate. That, actually, is somewhat understated. It is a rare occasion when a politician actually understates things. I think the member for Nipissing referred to some of the numbers. They really are dramatic.

The increase, 1982-83 over 1988-89, is 117.8 per cent. That is a huge amount. That makes me want to say yet again that the government’s gimlet eye on the increase in expenditure on hospital and related facilities perhaps misses the point when we are looking at significantly more increases in the amount of transfer payments for services provided by physicians and practitioners.

The reservation I have about the resolution of the member for Simcoe West, although it does not appear in the words of the resolution, is that there is a tiny implication that patients may somehow be to blame for the increased utilization of doctors. I have a suspicion about what we will shortly hear if the Scott task force reports to us on an interim basis. Perhaps it will not report to us for many years; I do not know.

The Scott task force, members of the Legislature will recall, is the task force set up by the Minister of Health (Mrs. Caplan) under the chairmanship of the former Deputy Minister of Health. It is said to be a co-operative venture, another one of these famous co-operative ventures undertaken by the Minister of Health, in which the Ontario Medical Association and a number of health bureaucrats will sit down and scratch their heads about why it is that OHIP transfer payments have increased so dramatically.

I fear that one of the first things we will hear from that task force is that the problem is patient utilization. If anyone is not familiar with that jargon, it means consumers are demanding services from doctors they should not have but that doctors have no choice but to deliver, which I think is an absurd proposition.

Perhaps in advance support of such a claim. I was speaking with a doctor from the OMA last evening, who told me three of the patients she had seen that day had come to her office because they had seen something on television about a new treatment and dropped in to have an appointment with the doctor to check it out. Whether that happens on a regular basis, I do not know.

Interjection.

Mr. Reville: My colleague from the riding I call Windsor-Riverdale but which is really Windsor-Riverside (Mr. D. S. Cooke), an excellent former Health critic, reminds me sotto voce that there is a huge increase in the amount of the second flavour of utilization, which is the utilization of drugs. The first flavour is utilization of doctors; the second flavour is utilization of drugs.

He is quite right, of course. There is an even more dramatic increase in the drug benefit plan. That has gone up, 1982-83 over 1988-89, by 168.9 per cent, which is a gigantic increase. Of course, the physicians are somewhat involved in that as well because they are the only people who are allowed to write out one of those little bits of paper that one gets to take off to the pharmacy, and at that point the pharmacy takes a hit and then sends a very large amount of money to a pharmaceutical company.

If anyone is interested, in the 1987-88 in-year changes, that is the amount by which the Treasurer underestimated the expenditure, the winner is OHIP, which is the payments to doctors. That was $198 million more than was budgeted; not far behind the Ontario drug benefit plan, overspent by $52 million.

I was quite taken with the approach suggested by the member for Nipissing that, rather than sending statements to subscribers, if the system were to be implemented, one would get a credit card slip when one got the service. That has some advantages, at least from my point of view. One is concern that if statements were sent to users of the system, there might be included in those statements procedures that a person would be just as happy if other persons in their household or perhaps the holder of the card did not know about.

One can think of, for those of the members who are fortunate enough to have teenage daughters, perhaps they were getting birth control pills from the family physician and did not want to tell dad or mom about that. Then the method of giving that patient a receipt at the point of service would be more appropriate than sending a letter to me saying my daughter had just been at the doctor’s getting birth control pills. I want members to know I discussed the matter with my daughter and we were all agreed that she had made an appropriate decision in that regard.

The member for Nipissing said we should leave no stone unturned in trying to determine the reason for costs in our health care system. I do not disagree with that. I think we should always be careful, though, that when we are turning stones none of them falls on the patients in Ontario.

With that, I shall conclude.

Mr. J. M. Johnson: I am very pleased to have the opportunity to support the resolution of my colleague the member for Simcoe West.

I would like to emphasize the importance of the resolution in my mind. I will just read it: “That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that the Ministry of Health is developing new computer systems for OHIP, the government of Ontario should incorporate in the new system a method of issuing regular statements to subscribers of OHIP in order that they may more accurately see the total costs of the health care coverage they receive from the OHIP system.”

I think it is most important that people are aware of the costs. It simply means that the resolution encourages government to make the public more aware of the tremendous escalating costs of our health care system. It is unfortunate that the member for Simcoe West, who put so much work into this resolution, could not be with us today and indeed ended up in the hospital because of all his efforts in trying to bring in an excellent resolution. I am sure the members will appreciate that. It is unfortunate he is not here, but it is very fortunate he has recovered and will be with us next week.

In any event, while he was in the hospital, I think he likely checked out the costs of the health care system while he was there. Knowing the tremendous work he does, I believe he will have all the facts for us next week. He never quits working. I might mention that while the member for Simcoe West was Chairman of Management Board he was always vitally concerned about the costs of the ministry and kept a close control. Indeed, I suggest that the government could do much worse than to engage the member for Simcoe West in assisting it to control its expenditures.

By coincidence, I spoke on this very topic of making the public more aware of the rapidly escalating costs of our health care system during the budget debate on May 9. Since most of the members never pay any attention to the budget debate, I would like to just mention a couple of the comments I made on that particular day. I said:

“There is a misconception about health care. Many members of the public think that Ontario has a free health care system. This budget drives home the point that health care is far from free. The Ministry of Health will spend $12.7 billion on health care this year, an increase of $1.2 billion over last year. This represents spending of approximately $1,350 for every man, woman and child in this province. If we paid our health care costs directly instead of through taxation, it would cost my daughter’s family of five $6,750 this year, and likely more next year and in the future.”

My question was, “Why does the Ministry of Health not make people aware of the tremendous costs in our health care system?”

I go on once more to offer “my very positive and constructive advice as to a partial solution to the soaring health care costs in this province,” and I make the suggestion that we “make the users of health care knowledgeable about the costs of being confined in a hospital or having an appointment with the doctor. A simple mechanism could be put in place. A patient, on checking out of a hospital or on visiting a doctor, would receive a statement similar to Visa or MasterCard, stating the amount of the billing. The patient would sign the same and receive a statement. It would not cost the patient anything, but would impress on that taxpayer that health care is not free.”

Does any member of this Legislature know the cost of staying in a hospital? Is it $200, $300, $500 or a $1,000 a day? I think people would be encouraged to try to be more considerate of their needs if they realized the tremendous costs involved. It makes sense to follow the advice of the member for Simcoe West to incorporate a system to make the public more knowledgeable about their individual costs to the health care system.

In a recent issue of a Ministry of Municipal Affairs publication, under “Notes from the Provinces,” it states that Saskatchewan was to introduce computerized health cards. It says: “Health Minister George McLeod has announced that the government is planning to introduce a computer-readable plastic health card. Mr. McLeod said, ‘A computerized system also offers the potential for more effective monitoring of prescription drug abuse and greater access to information in emergency medical situations.’ He goes on to say, ‘It will also bring efficiency that will help reduce overall costs in the health care system.’”

That, I think, is what we would all hope to achieve. I might mention that we should be aware that health costs have increased dramatically over the last four years. Four years ago, it cost the average Ontario citizen $884 -- at least it cost the government $884 for this citizen. The cost today is now over $1,247, compared with the national average increase to $1,191 from $927 during the same period of time. Surely we would all agree that we cannot allow this trend to continue. If we keep adding more to this health system, we cannot do the many things that we have to do.

On a personal basis, I would like to give one example concerning a constituent of mine in the riding of Wellington. On Tuesday, May 10, I brought to the attention of this House, through a member’s statement, the problem that David Elgie, who lives in the town of Fergus, has. He requires surgery to replace an artificial hip joint. It is worn and broken. It was implanted several years ago and it now has to be replaced.

He consulted with his doctor, Dr. Hugh Cameron, at the Orthopaedic and Arthritic Hospital on Wellesley Street. Members know the results of that because they were well documented last week. They cannot provide any surgical operations to replace hip joints and they advised Mr. Elgie that it would be one year: he must wait until April 4, 1989.

It is rather unacceptable to wait that long, but what really added to the problem is that he was advised just a few days ago that they have now changed the date and, instead of moving it up, have moved it back. David Elgie will now have an opportunity to have his surgery on June 12, 1990. That is two full years of suffering, and the possibility of infection and of having to use crutches. This in the finest health care system in the world?

We now have a government with three ministers who should be concerned about this issue. We are talking about a disabled senior citizen, so I would suggest the Minister of Health, the Minister without Portfolio responsible for senior citizens’ affairs (Mrs. Wilson) and the Minister without Portfolio responsible for disabled persons (Mr. Mancini) should all be concerned about issues such as the one I have brought to members’ attention.

Quite frankly, David Elgie is placed in a very difficult position. He cannot tolerate the unbearable pain of his deteriorating artificial joints, which were implanted, as I mentioned, several years ago. He needs an operation and he needs it now, not two years from now.

He has asked me a question and I do not know how to answer him. He has asked me if he should make arrangements in the United States for his operation. He feels that our Ontario health care system has failed him and he must seek an operation out of this country.

I have been terribly disappointed that the government would allow this to happen when all the arthritic hospital needs is $1.6 million to be able to obtain the artificial joints it requires. The government, through its banning of extra billing by Bill 94, achieved a so-called saving of $50 million. Surely some of this $50 million could be directed into helping to keep David Elgie in Ontario, instead of forcing him to go to the United States to solve his problem.

Mr. Keyes: It is a pleasure to rise today and to speak on this particular resolution. I regret that the member for Simcoe West is not here with us so he could see that there is government support for his motion. We do know that he is investigating at first hand the health care system, the finest in the world, and will be returning to us tomorrow. He will have great comments to make. I am sure, about the care he received.

Perhaps he might even ask a special favour to endorse his resolution. Who knows, maybe part of his plan is to actually bring back the bill from the hospital, which will give the value of the services he has received while he was there. But at the end of his bill, where it says “balance owing,” he will see these great big zeros, indicating that this health care system is the best: he does not have to worry about payment at the hospital before he leaves.

My regret that the member for Nipissing is not here is the fact that in speaking on behalf of the resolution, he is endorsing the government initiatives but at the same time, while he may not want to have his remarks taken that way, he was acknowledging that the former government certainly did not keep up with its computer systems in order to meet the needs of the health care system.

I want to assure the House that within the Ministry of Health we are looking very closely at this particular issue, because the initial planning for the redesign of the Ontario health insurance plan computer has been completed. Improvements in technology available to us today make it possible to modernize and update the current OHIP system. It will be possible to have a registration system with strengthened security to prevent and protect individual privacy and confidentiality while providing improved access to personal health information.

Members have heard the minister say many times -- they will hear it again today -- that we need a well-planned and well-managed system. While it seems to bring forth some sighs, they seem not to understand that is what we are doing, even in this particular field. With our redevelopment of the computer system, we will have an integrated health information-data records system that will provide a very reliable basis for the analysis, planning and management of the health care system.

We heard reference today to a credit card system, which gives us some concern, but certainly we intend to issue a personal identifier number for health purposes on a card for every resident of Ontario. It could very well be in the same format as what we receive for identification purposes in the House at the present time.

We know that money is being put towards it. While the member for Nipissing was concerned about the extra money collected by the Treasurer. he should also be aware that 40 per cent of every new dollar collected in this province goes towards the health care system.

We know that the auditor said we should improve our system. The member for High Park-Swansea referred to the fact that we have some 81 million claims a year that are processed, we make payments out to some 20,000 physicians, and that amounts to in excess of $3 billion for those claims.

The system that we have is the most complex system in the government of Ontario today. It was designed, however, some 20 years ago. It needs to be updated. Over the years, it has undergone numerous changes and enhancements, but much more needs to be done. That is what is in the planning at the moment, which will certainly cost somewhere in the vicinity of $50 million.

The whole focus of providing additional knowledge base and database on which to plan our system stems from the work of the Evans, Spasoff and Podborski reports. I trust that all members have spent some time, particularly looking at the Evans report which has given us some of the concerns of the health care system which are being addressed.

Mr. Wildman: I read it every time I want to get to sleep at night.

Mr. Keyes: I am sure the member takes it to bed with him, and maybe someone reads it to him.

Within that system, “the provision of rights should be linked to the acceptance of” patients’ “responsibilities.

In our universally accessible health care system, individuals should accept their responsibilities to use our health care system appropriately.” Further in the report, Evans makes reference to the fact that the consumers of health care services are increasingly interested in being better informed and in participating in decisions affecting their health.” But at the moment there are “relatively few tangible and acceptable measures by which patients’ rights could be balanced with patients’ responsibilities for judicious use of services and for sharing the general problem of reasonable cost control.”

In conclusion, the OHIP system is being redesigned in order to provide more comprehensive information for planning purposes in the future to ensure that patient providers and community health planners have an improved information planning base in the future. The Ministry of Health looks forward to receiving ideas from the providers of health care, from the district health councils and others on the types of general information that might be made available in order that both the public and the providers are better informed of the most cost-effective approaches to ensure quality health care systems.

We do have some institutions that provide the information as to what services have cost as a patient leaves, but they also indicate that there is no balance owing. Perhaps if we provide information on the costs, we should also provide information on how much they contributed through their OHIP premiums, which would be about 18 per cent.

This resolution is simply one of the approaches that we in the ministry are giving considerable consideration to in recognizing the importance of ensuring that the confidentiality of patient medical information is completely protected. We in the government will support this resolution of the member for Simcoe West, who I am sure will report back to us next week on the excellent health care he has received.

Mr. Allen: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I believe this would be an appropriate way of calling your attention to the fact that in reading the text of my motion, an awkward portion rang in my ears that I did not quite catch at the time, but the word “in” in the fourth line should read “and.” It does not substantially change the burden of the motion, but it is a typographical error that should be corrected.

Mr. Speaker: I am certain all members have made note of that change, unless we need another debate on it.

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Mr. Speaker: Mr. Allen has moved resolution 27.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Allen: May I request unanimous consent of the House to have this referred to the select committee on education?

Mr. Speaker: Is that agreed?

Agreed to.

Resolution ordered for the select committee on education.

ONTARIO HEALTH INSURANCE PLAN

Mr. Speaker: Mr. Harris, in the absence of Mr. McCague. has moved resolution 29.

Motion agreed to.

The House recessed at 12:03 p.m.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1:30 p.m.

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

COMMUNITY SERVICE ORDERS

Ms. Bryden: Many judges today are imposing community service orders when sentencing young offenders. CSOs must be administered by an agency which seeks work assignments for the young offenders and supervises them with a view to their rehabilitation into the community.

Community Centre 55 in my riding sponsors a CSO operation which has built up a reputation over several years for providing young offenders with innovative rehabilitation programs. It has been funded by the Ministry of Community and Social Services.

At this time, the operation is in jeopardy because the current grants from the ministry do not cover the costs of two full-time staff members, which is the bare minimum to operate an adequate program. It would be a disaster if this CSO program was discontinued when an experienced agency is needed for the current case load of 170 young people, plus a possible increase due to the new alternative measures program of the Attorney General (Mr. Scott) for young offenders.

I urge the minister to review funding for all CSO operations in the province to see that they are able to meet the need adequately and help our young offenders to become law-abiding, self-supporting members of our society.

D & E WOOD INDUSTRIES LTD.

Mr. Pollock: Mr. Speaker, yesterday when you, the pages and the staff were trying to bring some dignity to this assembly, I was touring a combiboard plant in my riding of Hastings-Peterborough. This was a progress tour of the plant, which is located in Herschel township just outside of Bancroft. The plans are for this to be completed in four to five months, which will certainly be a boon to the area.

Both the federal and provincial governments gave equal amounts of money, $6.75 million in interest-free loans, and I would like to thank the taxpayers of Canada and Ontario for their assistance to my riding. The municipal council and the economic development committee of the area also worked hard.

However, 70 per cent of the financial burden of this falls on the shoulders of D & E Wood Industries Ltd., along with the full responsibility of bringing the plant into production. I would like to pay tribute to the owners of the plant, the consulting engineers and the construction workers for their efforts thus far and hope that they complete this plant within the scheduled time frame.

TRAILMOBILE GROUP OF COMPANIES LTD.

Mr. Neumann: I would like to share with the House part of a resolution recently passed by Local 397 of the Canadian Auto Workers in Brantford.

“Whereas the 13 per cent unemployed community has suffered enough by the Mulroney government’s lack of compassion for Brantford workers; and

“Whereas the federal government’s Ministry of Consumer and Corporate Affairs’ recent decision in making Trailmobile divest itself of the van assembly line and rejecting Trailmobile’s request to withdraw the requirement that forces it to sell this line in exchange for approval to purchase Fruehauf Canada; and

“Whereas this community has lobbied for and supported the request by Trailmobile through a number of parties, including all levels of government in opposition, the trade union movement and some of the largest buyers of this company’s products;

“Therefore

be it resolved that this

chapter of the Canadian Auto Workers’ retiree’s council condemns the recent decision by the Ministry of Consumer and Corporate Affairs to block this merger; and

“Be it further resolved that this

chapter calls on the federal government to order the bureau of competition to rescind its decision by allowing Trailmobile to buy Fruehauf, thus enabling Trailmobile to remain competitive and thereby protecting the 300 families supporting Brantford incomes that are most certainly threatened by the current requirement.”

Our federal government, while promoting the free trade agreement with the United States, severely penalizes Canadian-owned industry which attempts to prepare for this challenge through consolidation. I urge them to reconsider this ill-conceived decision.

FRANCOPHONE COLLEGES

Mr. R. F. Johnston: I want to implore the government to consider the establishment of francophone colleges in Ontario. Last March, the minister at the time suggested a five-year plan of expansion of dollars to bilingual and francophone programs would be brought into place. Two task forces were announced, supposedly to report in time for this April’s budget, which we did not see.

Members of the Liberal caucus will know that their own conference recently in Ottawa passed a motion supporting a francophone college in eastern Ontario.

I would say it is time for this to take place. At the same time as we wait for this to happen, we are seeing that Niagara College and Sheridan College are actually cutting back on programs for francophones, of which there is a dearth in southwestern Ontario. It is really time the cabinet and the Liberal government of Ontario finally put some community colleges under the direction of the French community to run on their own for their own students, so that finally those students will get the same kind of education that anglophone students have expected as a right in Ontario.

TABLING OF INFORMATION

Mr. McLean: My statement is for the Minister of Government Services (Mr. Patten), but it actually applies to most of the government ministers. This government’s shoddy record and arrogant attitude about responding to inquiries in Orders and Notices continues.

I asked the minister on December 15, 1987 -- and that was so long ago now that he may have forgotten about it -- to provide the costs for the new furniture and television sets for the offices of all ministers, their staff, and all members of the Legislature since June 1985.

His interim answer, dated December 29, 1987, in case he has forgotten -- it is such a long time ago -- was, “The ministry requires additional time to provide the information required by the question. The answer should be available on or about February 29, 1988.”

It is now May 19, 1988, and I still do not have a reply to the original question I asked five months ago. If the minister’s strategy is to offend me by not providing this information, his strategy is not working. If his strategy is to anger me, his strategy is not working. But if his strategy is to keep this information from the public, then I must say his strategy is certainly working very well. But there is a serious flaw in his strategy and that is the fact that the people of Ontario have a right to know how this government is spending taxpayers’ money at a time when it has plucked $1.3 billion from their purses and their wallets. It is shameful and disgusting.

ONTARIO FOOD

Mr. Dietsch: Since my election, I have been consulting with members over the use of Ontario food products here in the Legislature and have received a favourable response. I have recently received a survey circulated by the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly which asks questions concerning the legislative dining room and cafeteria. It is my feeling that Ontario boasts countless Ontario food products of excellent quality: wines, fruit juices, fruits, vegetables and cheese, for example. We, as members, should be supportive of this industry.

I believe strongly that Ontario wines and juices should be used exclusively at all Legislative Assembly and government functions, as well as listed exclusively on the wine list and menu in the legislative dining room. The same applies to fruit juices being served in the cafeteria.

Second, Ontario food products such as fruits and vegetables should be used exclusively, served within the cafeteria, legislative dining room and all other functions, when in season.

Third, the menu used in the legislative dining room should feature the Foodland Ontario symbol beside each menu item that boasts Ontario food products and establish a county or region day whereby different food products from different counties or regions would be featured each week.

I urge all members, if they have not already done so, to complete these questionnaires and incorporate these ideas, or if they have already done so, to send a letter of support and show by example for all to see that good things do grow in Ontario.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

Mr. Farnan: The development industry is responding to the call of the Premier (Mr. Peterson) for a world-class Ontario. The Premier will be pleased to hear that the development industry is building a world-class community in Oakville. This advertisement from last Saturday’s Star has homes for $309,000. It is interesting to note that this requires a simple down payment of $46,500 and an annual income of over $100,000.

This is a tragedy, when we read the housing sections of newspaper and we find an overabundance of world-class living accommodation, while for ordinary Ontario families a much more modest, affordable home is still unavailable. Surely the Premier and this government must get their priorities right. Affordable housing is what is needed, and not world-class living.

VISITOR

Mr. Speaker: Before we go on with the routine proceedings, I ask all members of the assembly to join with me in recognizing in the Speaker’s gallery a member of the National Assembly of Quebec, the Minister of Municipal Affairs responsible for housing, the Honourable André Bourbeau.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

CORPORATIONS INCOME TAX COLLECTION AGREEMENT

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I advised members on November 18, 1987, that I would seek further advice concerning the feasibility of a corporations income tax collection agreement with the federal government. I have now received the report by Professor Harry Kitchen of Trent University, and I now table it in the Legislature.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Did Harry do that? Good man.

Hon. R. F. Nixon: We paid him for it; a very good report.

Mr. Speaker: Any responses?

Mr. B. Rae: I thought I would read the report before making a reply to the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon).

RESPONSE

CORPORATIONS INCOME TAX COLLECTION AGREEMENT

Mr. Harris: In view of the fact that the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon) has not read the report yet and is not prepared to comment on it, it is very difficult for us to comment, other than to perhaps --

Hon. Mr. Elston: That never stopped you before.

Mr. B. Rae: Oh, he’s got five minutes.

Mr. Callahan: It gives you greater latitude.

Mr. Harris: I have not said anything wrong so far. There are some who say that members of the opposition, in performing their critical role of being in opposition and criticizing, never have anything nice to say. We on this side of the House have been very critical, particularly in the area of reports that are commissioned, paid for by taxpayers -- I am going to be a while now; I think I will do up my jacket and try to do this right -- and then hidden from the public domain, hidden from the eyes of the media, hidden from the Legislature.

We have had example after example of this. A lot of them were reports that were done before the election that did not make the government look quite so good, so they sat on them for two, four, six months, in some cases nine or 10 months. It probably would be appropriate, given that there have been hundreds of examples of this by various ministers, the Office of the Premier and the Treasurer’s office in the past, at least to congratulate the Treasurer. He has acknowledged he just received the report. He has not read the doggone thing yet, and he is actually going to table it today without knowing what is in it.

When you look at the terms of reference of the report, it is one of those reports that is not likely to be very controversial as far as anything the government is bungling or hiding or covering up is concerned. None the less, it may be an example for the Premier (Mr. Peterson) and other ministers to follow. When they pay for these reports with public dollars, they should be tabled right away. We should all get an opportunity to look at them at the same time, without the normal vetting they go through in a ministry and a minister’s office and, of course, the concealing and hiding of documents from public view.

I think it is fair that, in my own inimitable style, I congratulate the Treasurer on tabling this report today.

ORAL QUESTIONS

APPRENTICESHIP TRAINING

Mr. B. Rae: In the absence of the Premier (Mr. Peterson), I would like to ask a question to the Deputy Premier. I ask him to cast his mind back to the summer of 1987, in fact to August 31, when, I am sure he will remember, after a cabinet meeting the Minister of Skills Development at that time announced a major program. In fact, the leader of the Liberal Party, and now the Premier, announced a program on August 31, 1987, on the question of apprenticeship, as no doubt the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon) will recall some 10 days before the meeting with the voters on September 10, so perhaps we are entitled to look at that date as one having some significance.

Some very specific commitments were made to working families and women with respect to the future of apprenticeship programs.

Mr. Speaker: Question?

Mr. B. Rae: In light of that very specific promise made by the Premier, I wonder if the Treasurer can explain why, in a cabinet submission dated April 27, 1988, which is before cabinet, the Ministry of Skills Development would say as follows:

“The Ministry of Skills Development has not been allocated the resources originally requested to implement the initiatives. The ministry wishes to inform cabinet of the implications of that decision, to put forward new options for proceeding and to seek guidance on these options”?

I wonder if the Treasurer can explain why it is that several months after a promise made by the Premier, which was to take effect in January, there is still no such program?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I do not think it is appropriate that I comment on a cabinet document. Having said that, in general terms I think the honourable member would be aware that there have been instances in the history of the province where commitments made by leaders of governments and even leaders of the opposition are not kept in a timetable that suits everyone, and that there are in fact commitments that sometimes take weeks, even months, before they are fully committed.

Mr. B. Rae: Let me be quite specific. The Premier made some very specific commitments, particularly to women. He announced, first of all, that particular dollars would be spent; they have not been spent. He announced that certain programs would be started; they have not been started. He announced that changes would take effect in apprenticeships for women; that has not happened.

Is the Treasurer aware of the fact that there are three options before cabinet, two of which mean that the province will be breaking the promise that it made on August 31 to the women of this province? The government was committed to 5,000 women training in apprenticeship programs by 1991-92. It now appears that promise is going to be broken very specifically by this government.

Mr. Speaker: Question.

Mr. B. Rae: I ask the Deputy Premier, if it was good enough for an election promise on August 31, 1987, good enough to buy the Liberals votes and get them elected, why is it not good enough for the women of this province when they are waiting for the government to keep its commitment?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I do not get my blood coursing in response to the instant indignation of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. B. Rae), which he cranks up every day. It does not even seem to make his face flush either. He is getting quite used to it.

I say again, I am not going to comment on a cabinet document. That goes without saying. I am not even going to comment further about it, other than to say that the Premier is highly respected and well known for keeping his commitments in an orderly and fiscally responsible manner. If the Leader of the Opposition says otherwise, the Leader of the Opposition is wrong.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Rather than dealing with that particular document, perhaps the Treasurer will explain to us why it is that none of the $14 million that was promised for these programs -- most of which, as the news release of August 31 says, were to be implemented by January 1988 -- has been spent and where the government’s commitment on apprenticeship has gone?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: It might have been wise for me to refer the whole matter to the Minister of Skills Development (Mr. Curling), since it is not possible for me to report to the honourable member what the status of any changes in skills development or apprenticeship programs happens to be. Perhaps the honourable member, having pursued it on a different tack in the first two questions in this area, might, when the official opposition goes to its second official question, direct the question to another minister.

HOME CARE

Mr. B. Rae: I have a new question for the Minister of Community and Social Services. The minister will no doubt have been aware of the dialogue that has taken place in this House between our party and other parties and the Minister of Health (Mrs. Caplan), in which the minister has stated on so many occasions that the reason the government is cutting back on hospitals is that it wants to make sure there is funding for other health care initiatives.

I wonder if the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Sweeney) perhaps could comment on comments that are now being made by those working in the social service field in the Waterloo region, who have just heard from his ministry that their request for a real home care program in the region that will do a service to the community has been rejected, that the budget they have proposed to his ministry has been turned down and that, as a result, the administrator of the region’s home care program is saying, and I quote: “There might be some people that might have to stay in hospital longer.”

I wonder if the minister can explain just what is going on when one minister says, “We are cutting back on hospitals because we want to provide care in the community,” and when his ministry is saying, “We are cutting back on care in the community so people are going to have to stay in hospital”?

Hon. Mr. Sweeney: The honourable member would be aware of the fact that there has been a significant growth in home care opportunities in a number of communities in the province -- 18 to be exact. Waterloo region was one of the first in the province to access this growth. The difficulty we are facing is that the growth is greater than we had anticipated.

Over the last two years, we have not only met the original increase, but we have also met the increase above and beyond what these municipalities had asked us for. That is part of the record and easily checked. However, this year, we have indicated to them that there has to be a limit to the amount of the increase, given the resources we have. There is an ongoing discussion between the Minister of Health and my ministry, which I am sure would not surprise the honourable Leader, as to how we can integrate our services to avoid what he described happening.

I expect that some time within the next two months I will be able to share that with the leader of the third party. but right now, the process is ongoing. In fact, it is expanding. There is extra money in it this year, but it is not possible in the short run to expand it as quickly as some of the regions want us to.

Mr. B. Rae: The minister should know that the budget for Waterloo region, which they say is necessary to keep people at home and out of hospital, has been cut by his ministry by some $3 million. As a result of that cut, they say, and I quote: “These cuts mean the number of nursing visits and homemaker hours per client would be cut down, a waiting list would be imposed and nearly 11 full-time staff positions due to start this year would be eliminated.”

Does the minister not realize that what we are getting from this government is gobbledegook, that we have people who are in hospital, who cannot get out of hospital because there is nowhere else for them to go, that we have people at home who are getting sicker and who are having to go to hospital because there is no care for them at home, and that both he and the Minister of Health are doing the same thing? They are both cutting back, they are making sick people sicker and they are making sure the hospital system is going to be overcrowded. That is what they are doing. That is what the ministry is doing and that is what the chaotic planning on their

part is causing.

Hon. Mr. Sweeney: To put it mildly, what the honourable leader has just described is an exaggeration of the reality that is out there. As I am sure he genuinely knows and understands, the word “cut” is often used in different ways. In this situation, as in all of our programs, there has been an increase in the resources that are made available. The term “cut” is often used when the amount of the increase is not what someone requests. I can cite for him a number of programs where that happens.

In fact, in Waterloo region, as in many other municipalities in this province, the number of people who are no longer in hospitals but are being serviced in homes has increased every single year since this government has been in office and it will increase again this year. The fact that we are not able to meet every request of every municipal