1970 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 29th Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

MONDAY, MARCH 23, 1970

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page 707 ]

MONDAY, MARCH 23, 1970

The House met at 2 p.m.

The House proceeded to the Order "Public Bills and Orders."

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 61, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No.

61, Vancouver General Hospital Act, 1902. The Honourable the Member for

Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, I think earlier in this House

I indicated the disapproval that I felt at the existing legislation,

that a Private Bill governed the Vancouver General Hospital. And, the

reasons I pointed out for that objection are based primarily on the

fact that it has become a somewhat closed body, with the by-laws so

devised by that closed body as to almost rule out any fresh minds,

fresh approach from the citizens of the City of Vancouver who might

wish to give public service by supporting the Society.

The Private Bill that would be replaced by this Act was one which

led to that closed Society becoming unhealthy. Nothing worse than

having an unhealthy Society running a hospital. It seems to me that if

that was undesirable, and it appears that it was undesirable to the

point that the Government has seen fit to intervene by repealing a

Private Bill, a Private Bill that was passed at the request of a

Society, it follows from that that it must have been unhealthy indeed

for Governments to intervene in private statutes. When you consider

that this is done, the general rule is that a Private Bill that is

repealed, the Bill by which it is repealed should come before the

Private Bills Committee of this House, so that representations could

have been made by the persons affected who had the original Private

Bill passed, or their successors, by a previous Legislature. So this is

an extraordinary Bill, just looking at it at face value.

Now I can assume that the Minister has had representations made to

him by the Hospital Corporation, which obviously must have been

consulted. Nothing appears from the document itself to indicate to this

House why the Government is intervening in the affairs of a Society set

up by Private Bills.

But the thing that disturbs me most about the Bill is that it does

not guarantee within it that wider constituency, that wider democratic

control of the hospital affairs that one would expect, when you

consider that the Vancouver General Hospital is part of a Hospital

District and its affairs are a concern to the greater community than

the City of Vancouver. One would have thought that if the Government

was going to revise the structure of the Government of this great

hospital complex, they would have considered enacting within the terms

of this Bill, certain democratizing clauses such as representation by

the City of Vancouver itself, either by direct election of some of the

Board of Directors or secondly, appointments guaranteed under this

Bill, of representatives of the City of Vancouver, and thirdly,

guarantees of representation in the Regional Hospital District.

Now, it's well known that the Vancouver General Hospital is a

facility of such magnitude and sophistication in the field of medicine

that it is utilized by most of the Province of British Columbia, and it

follows from that that its affairs are not the narrow and ingrown

affair or interest of a small group in this Society. Now, I can hear

already the answers of the Minister of Health to that objection. He

will say that whatever the by-laws that are promulgated by this Society

may be, they will be subject to his approval or indeed approval of the

Government. In the provision, presumably, is a safeguard, any by-law is

to be approved by the Minister of Health. But, it seems to me that for

the sake of local government, for the sake of local responsibility, for

the sake of the local taxpayers, they need a greater guarantee of

representation on this great hospital board than is provided in the

Act. I would suggest that before this passes into Committee stage, that

the Minister give consideration to respecting that need for democratic

control or democratic representation at the local level and the

Regional Hospital level.

Other than that, really, it's a Bill that cannot be measured on its

face because the real strength or weakness of the government of the

Vancouver General Hospital will be determined by the nature of the

by-laws that are passed and approved by the Minister of Health.

Secondly, it will be determined by the scope of membership, the scope

of membership permitted by that Society under the legislation. If this

Society is operated as it has been in the past then I can only express

concern, and I say it is the duty of the Minister of Health to see that

the by-laws are such that he approves that they allow proper

representation by the citizens of Vancouver, by the Regional District

citizens, and by the Government.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I just rise very briefly to

support this particular Bill and make one or two observations to the

House. The first of these is that every great hospital in the world has

one thing in common, and that is a Board of Directors totally committed

to the furtherance of excellence in that hospital and to no other

objectives.

The Vancouver General Hospital has suffered to some extent in the

past because it has had a variety of objectives and has attempted to be

all things to all people. For one thing, it has a schizophrenic Board

of Directors, some appointed by the City of Vancouver, interested in

the finances of the City of Vancouver and the possibility that those

finances would be drained by the Vancouver General Hospital requiring

too much. Other members of the Board of Directors have been appointed

by the Provincial Government with loyalties not entirely to the

hospital, and still other members have been appointed by the Hospital

Society.

But if we are to have greatness in our hospitals, and I submit that

there is a useful purpose to be served for each one of us here and

every individual citizen of the Province to have that greatness, then

we are going to have to allow room for a total and complete devotion on

the part of the trustees for the furtherance of objectives of medical

excellence. This is not possible if the hospital exists to serve every

single doctor and every type of illness that might be requested of it

by any citizen. We are going to have to, as we do now, continue to

emphasize the distribution of hospitals in British Columbia, and

recognize that each hospital does not have to attempt to cover every

possibility in the field of health care. So I hope that the result of

this Bill will be to give a boost to the Vancouver General Hospital as

the largest hospital in British Columbia, and one of the largest

hospitals in Canada,

[ Page 708 ]

it will be able to take advantage of its size in

order to develop new methods of treatment, to use the great resources

that it will have at its disposal to pursue medical skills that would

not be pursued in any other hospital, even the teaching and research

hospital at the University of British Columbia, which we are hoping

will be with us in the next two or three years.

So, Mr. Speaker, we support the Bill, we expect great things from

it, and we hope that the Minister will give that hospital the

encouragement it deserves.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Minister will close the debate.

HON. R.R. LOFFMARK: Mr. Speaker, the honourable members

across have referred to two or three matters which I think deserve

recognition. The first one is that in respect to the nature of this

Bill, the honourable member is quite right in saying that the pattern

of treatment here of a Private Bill is somewhat unusual and may be

defended, of course, only on the basis that what at one time, at the

time of the passage of the original Bill, was a matter which is

justifiably dealt with under a Private Act, being a matter of concern

primarily to the community of Vancouver, it's long since changed, and

that now we can say that the activities of the Vancouver General have

long since passed into the realm of public business rather than private

business and therefore it deserves the attention of this House. It

should also be recognized that the Vancouver General is now the leading

referral hospital in British Columbia, it also has a very significant

place in the teaching programme of the University Medical School, and

to say nothing of the continuing community service that it renders, not

only to the City of Vancouver but to the Regional District of which it

is a member. One only needs to look at the activities in the emergency

department, the expanding psychiatric section, as well as the proposal

for ambulatory care, to recognize the importance of this.

Now, dealing with the one other point which deserves some assurance

from me, and that is the subject matter of these by-laws. I think it's

proper to advise the members that the Government is concerned about the

anomalies that have grown up in the management of the Vancouver General

Hospital, and honourable members in questioning me during my Estimates

raised this very point, and of particular concern to us is the

democratic process that applies not only to the members in the

representation from the community, but also among the doctors

themselves. It is most important that decisions relating to medical

matters in that hospital should be determined upon a broad democratic

basis so far as the medical staff is concerned. In that respect I will

assure members that the same standard of requirement for the

democratization of the medical membership that applies across the rest

of the Province must also apply in the Vancouver General. This is a

matter of great significance, and it should be to the medical staff in

the Vancouver area, because I think it's true to say that, generally

speaking, access to the active staff in the hospitals across the

Province has generally been good. It's only in one or two hospitals

where, such as the Vancouver General, a multiplicity of demands being

made upon it has, for one reason or another, resulted in a very much

restricted opportunity to the medical profession generally to be

admitted to active participation in the management of that hospital.

It's the proposal of the Government that in examining the proposed

by-laws that this matter be given every consideration, in fact first

consideration.

MR. SPEAKER: The question is that Bill No. 61, the Vancouver

General Hospital Act, be read a second time now. All those in favour

say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 64, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Public Schools Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on the second reading of Bill No. 64. The Honourable Member for Burnaby North.

MRS. E.E. DAILLY: Mr. Speaker, we do not intend to support

this Bill on second reading, primarily because inherent in this Bill

there is the principle of local taxation for colleges, and we on this

side of the House have made it, I think, quite clear, that we believe

that colleges should be treated in the same manner in financing as

other forms of higher education, our vocational schools and our

universities, because we believe that colleges are simply the

geographic dispersion of higher education. We do not feel that local

taxpayers should be involved financially and locally in the taxation of

these colleges, and therefore, as this Bill reaffirms this principle of

local taxation, we cannot in the Official Opposition, support the Bill.

We are also concerned about other sections of the Bill involving

sick leave, which I understand is causing concern with the Teachers'

Federation, and I was hoping when the Minister speaks he would be able

to comment on this particular area of the Bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver East.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, the Bill, as my colleague

has pointed out, includes provisions about sick leave which would

retroactively affect all the teachers' settlements and agreements that

have been made as of last December. In other words, after an agreement

has been arrived at, the Legislature would be coming in and vetting

those agreements to a very considerable extent in respect to sick

leave. I don't want to say very much about it at this stage. I do hope

that before this reaches Committee stage, that the Minister will

reconsider, and either withdraw it or repair it possibly to obviate the

Court decision, which may not have expressed truly the intention of

this Legislature, the decision of Gregory, J. But to leave the

section

as it is will surely be very unfair to teachers who have accumulated

these benefits, who have signed agreements in good faith, and we

shouldn't retroactively step into that picture. So I hope the Minister

will take another look at this

section before Committee stage.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. H.P. CAPOZZI: With due respect to the Minister, I have

raised the point regarding a

section of the treatment of the teachers

in the schools. It concerns the fact that the school trustee today, and

if the school teacher does not come to school without a reason, in

other words just does not come, there's no method for deducting his

salary. In other words, I am not talking about this, is there any

possibility that that can be included in the amendments to the Act? It

seems an unfair principle, or unfair set of circumstances, that

[ Page 709 ]

a school teacher who just decides to take a day off

on his own, cannot in any way be deducted or have that amount deducted

from his salary. I am not talking about a bona fide reason for being

absent, just talking about deciding to take a day off.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Member for North Vancouver–Capilano.

MR. D.M. BROUSSON: Mr. Chairman, this Act is mostly devoted

to some considerations and changes to our college system, and I think

we are certainly pleased to see this much attention given to it. It

certainly is time that all the matters related to our colleges be

pulled together, and a more detailed organization and direction be put

into the legislation.

But the real pity, from our point of view, is that we are not

looking at a completely separate Act for the college system. Our

college system is growing up. It is getting further away from the

public schools today in objectives and method of operation, and here we

are trying to lock them closer to the elementary and high school

system, just for administrative convenience, which somehow to us

doesn't seem right. Our colleges are beginning to fill a very special

and particular role, they are trying to find their own separate

identity, and here we are locking them to the elementary and public

schools with a different set of objectives.

Our neighbours in Alberta and in Washington have seen fit to pass

special College Acts, to set up special Provincial or State Commissions

to operate and direct their college system, they give it the status and

position which we think the colleges are entitled to. You must remember

that the colleges take the first two years of the university system,

and certainly they are entitled to the same kind of status, the same

kind of position.

Mr. Speaker, I think we should consider some of the items that have

been left out, because this is not a separate Bill on colleges. Some of

the matters are left in doubt that could be included if it was a

separate Bill. For example, the internal government of the college is

left very much in doubt. Surely some equivalent of a University Senate

is needed to properly direct the academic requirements of the staff,

the course development, and so on, of the college system. Remember

again, we are considering for probably a half or two-thirds of the

pupils in those colleges, people who are in their first two years of

university, and they are entitled to the same consideration of

curriculum, the same standards of teaching, the same standards of

course development, as they have at the university, or they would have

at a university.

Arrangements need to be set up for student government, which is a

different type of thing from a high school student government. It

should be set up on a much more formal and particular basis. In fact,

Mr. Speaker, faculty and students are hardly mentioned in this Bill,

they are hardly given any recognition, and my understanding is that

many of the faculty in the present regional colleges are concerned

about this because they wonder what their terms of employment are. Are

they going to be hired and fired and directed in exactly the same level

as the high school system, or are they going to be treated as the

teachers of higher education which they truly are? I think a teacher in

the first two years of university is a different kind of teacher than

one who teaches high school and elementary school, and should receive

different treatment.

Then, Mr. Speaker, there is obviously still no master plan for

education in British Columbia. The college system has to be, by its

very nature, very close to the university system. It is taking the

place of the first two years at the university at U.B.C., Simon Fraser,

U. Vic., and so on, and yet we are still trying to somehow within the

Department of Education — by whom I am not quite sure, the Act doesn't

really say — it finally does talk about co-ordination on a Provincial

basis which we have been asking for for several years, but it doesn't

really say who is going to do this co-ordination, how it is going to be

arrived at, who is going to be involved in making these arrangements.

The Academic Advisory Board for example, Mr. Speaker, which does do

some work in this area, does not have a single representative on it

from the college system, and yet this part of the college system, the

accreditation and so on, is handled by the Academic Advisory Board

which is a creature of the universities, but now the rest of the

college organization is somehow going to be tied to the high school

system.

Yet there is a tremendous effect here, Mr. Speaker, because the

colleges are taking the first two years of university. Consider first

of all the financial implications. This is taking a tremendous load off

the university from a financial point of view, and yet we are expecting

the local school board to do all the financing for it. Surely this is

not correct. On this 40 per cent–60 per cent formula, the local

community is financing the first two years of university for many, many

students. The universities no longer will have to worry about this

large number, but in the case of university financing, it is 100 per

cent Provincial Government. And to give you an idea, Mr. Speaker, of

the impact that the college system has on the universities, consider

what the Registrar of the University of B.C. says, "Student demand for

places at the university will become increasingly heavy at the third

year level, as students complete two years of study at the regional

colleges. In order to accept all qualified students into the third

year, it will be necessary to curtail somewhat the intake at the second

year level, and at the same time impose a slightly smaller quota on

first year admissions. So it is recommended that special studies be

made of the effect of all this in September, 1971," and so on.

The University is trying to recognize this problem, but because it

doesn't have a direct relationship with the college system, which is

now going to be tied even closer to the high schools, how can they

possibly do their planning? To the extent, Mr. Speaker, that the Senate

of the University of British Columbia is considering a motion, "That

it resolved that the University of B.C. recommends that this University

call upon the Provincial Government to establish a representative

Province-wide commission on higher education for the purpose of

developing an over-all master plan which will make provision for the

higher education needs of the Province over the next ten years."

U.B.C., Simon Fraser, U. Vic. don't know where they are going. They

don't know what student needs they are going to have to face, and here

we are, carrying on under the school board high school system, trying

to set up this separate college system, tied to the high school, giving

the universities no chance to co-ordinate their planning and their

direction. It seems to me that only with a separate Act which would

recognize the system and allow the planning, the proper planning to be

done, can we really solve the problems of higher education in British

Columbia.

Now I think, as I said, Mr. Speaker, we are glad to see these things

pulled together into one

section of the Public Schools Act, but how

much better if we had our own College

[ Page 710 ]

Act to recognize the status and the fine standards

that our college system is trying to set up for us. Let's take the

colleges away from the high schools and give them their own

independence.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Cowichan-Malahat.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. As a

part-time student in one of the regional colleges in the Province, I

have more than a passing interest in this particular Bill. I am

concerned about some aspects of the Bill.

AN HON. MEMBER: College drop-out.

MR. STRACHAN: Well, call me what you like — I do my thing.

Mr. Speaker, I heard the Minister of Education on the air the other

day answering a question as to why different school districts had

turned down school referenda with regard to operating costs, and

somebody says, Hear! Hear! which indicates they think that referenda

should be turned down when they are put by the school boards for

operating costs. The Minister said, when asked why they were turned

down, that there was an indication on the part of the people, and I

can't remember the exact words, the indication was that the people were

voting against force. Well, that was what I took from your statement.

His basic answer was the fact that in this Province we are spending

$1,000,000 a day on education, so what have the people got to complain

about, and I don't think he will deny that — that was at least part of

his answer.

AN HON. MEMBER: Spending $1,000,000 a day and getting nothing but complaints.

MR. STRACHAN: Well, Mr. Speaker, looking at this Bill, one

realizes it is going to do a number of things. One, it is supposed to

prevent duplication of services in the Province or in any given area,

and I understand why this happened, because of a local experience. But

it all depends on which way they are going to move to prevent the

duplication of services. If it is moved from the regional college to

the vocational school, then the Provincial Government will absorb the

total cost, but if the responsibility is moved from the vocational

school to the regional college, then again we are two-milling the

taxpayer to death, because it will mean an increased cost to the local

taxpayers for the operation of the regional college. And this is partly

why we are opposing this Bill, because of the wrong concept inherent in

this particular legislation, that the colleges should be part of the

general school set-up with part of the cost being loaded onto the local

taxpayer.

But basically we are opposed to this Bill because of the attitude of

the Government and the way they seemed to have locked themselves in to

operating the educational system. I agree that education is costing us

a great deal of money, but a large part of the fault, I think, must be

due to the attitude of this Government toward education. I am not one

of those who believe that all educational problems can be solved merely

by spending money, let me say that to begin with. But I think the

Government, in its concentration on the money aspect of education, have

lost complete sight of the objectives of education, and you are getting

yourself into deeper and deeper trouble all the time. The educational

system, because of the mistakes you have made in the past, and you

attempt to control, direct, and hold down the development of the

educational system in this Province, is costing more and more and more

money. You started up the wrong road. And this is one of the reasons

why we have Bills such as this which are an attempt to bring more and

more of the control and direction of education under this Government.

Under a different government it might be all right, but under this

Government which, as I say, started up the wrong road, and has refused

and turned back the attempts of school districts and educators in this

Province to freely evolve on experimental basis, systems of education

that might cost us much less money than it is now costing us. This is

the price you pay for the lack of freedom that you allow the educators

of this Province to experiment and develop. Because I am quite sure

that a superior form of education and a superior kind of education can

be made available in this Province at less than it is now costing. But

the first thing that is required of education is freedom, and this,

because of your initial and prime concern with the dollar aspects of

education, and because in the past you have refused the permission to

spend money which would have in the long run reduced the cost of

education, made a better kind of education, I think we are now paying

part of the price.

I went into some of it during your Estimates, I won't go over the

ground that I covered then, but we are opposing this Bill largely on

the basis that, one — it is not making our educational system any more

free than it now is, it is curtailing the freedom of the educational

system, and two — it is continuing up that long road that is going to

put an additional tax burden on the local taxpayer for the regional

colleges.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Revelstoke-Slocan.

MR. B. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, I just want to speak this

afternoon briefly to the aspect of the Bill dealing with regional

colleges, and in particular with some of the remarks made here this

afternoon by the member for Burnaby North and North Vancouver–Capilano.

The member for Burnaby North, the education critic for the Official

Opposition, stated that her party doesn't believe that the local

taxpayer should be involved at all in the operation of regional

colleges, in any aspect of post-secondary education. But as an answer

filed to a question which I placed on the Order Paper earlier in the

Session, it has already been indicated that of the operating costs of

regional colleges, the Provincial Government is paying 60 per cent, the

local school districts are paying only 22 per cent, and other sources

of revenue such as student fees are accounting for 18 per cent. I would

suggest that 22 per cent is a very small price to pay to have a say in

the type of course that the local college is going to be providing to

the regional area which it is set up to serve.

I repeat these figures which I gave earlier in this Session, that in

my particular area, in Selkirk Regional College, the two school

districts that I have that are participating in that, pay only one

penny of every dollar of operating costs, and in the Revelstoke School

District with the Okanagan one, 1.72 cents. We have a course at

Selkirk, Aviation Technology, offering the only pilot training east of

Ontario, in Canada, and a programme such as that undoubtedly would

never have been brought into being as quickly as it was, if it had been

[ Page 711 ]

necessary for a higher level of Government to weigh the pros and cons in the expenses involved with it.

You go and talk to anybody in Ontario that's associated with their

colleges, or in the Province of Alberta, and they will tell you that

they envy the British Columbia system, because they have no say in the

operations of those colleges. They're sitting out in hallways with

overflowing classes and everything, and they are not able to introduce

courses which fit in with the local needs and requirements because of

the fact that those who pay the piper call the tune, and their

Provincial Governments are clamping down on them in that respect.

The member for North Vancouver–Capilano expressed the point that he

didn't like the fact that apparently these colleges are knocked into,

as he called it, the elementary and secondary school system through

their connection with school boards. Well, the fact of the matter is

that who is in a better position to make sure that the students who are

leaving our elementary or our secondary school system are moving on

into courses that are of advantage to them and that reflects again the

local needs in the area? He seemed to concentrate, in his remarks, on

the university-bound students, forgetting that these regional colleges

offer technological programmes and now, of course, are being melded

with the vocational schools.

There's some good aspects in there. One of them which is going to

help to stop competition between these colleges in expensive

programmes, and when you have one institution, for example, Selkirk,

offering Aviation Technology, you certainly don't want at this stage of

this Province's development, every other college in the Province

getting into that field. The other point, too, is the fact that with

the school board being involved, school members, with the dedication

that they have, is the activity, of course, in your night school

programme and in adults re-training.

This Province has got a good programme in its college aspect and

it's making it better all the time, and it's the envy of elsewhere in

Canada.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for North Vancouver–Seymour.

MR. B.A. CLARK: Mr. Speaker, I'm always grateful when the

members from the opposite side participate in second reading in Bills

of this nature, because it makes me more and more determined to vote

against the Bill. Quite obviously the member who has just spoken hasn't

read the Bill before him. Because if ever there was a Bill that

consolidates the power of decision-making in education in our regional

colleges, it's this one.

But, Mr. Speaker, that is not what prompts me to oppose this Bill

initially. There is a distinct and sharp difference between our group

in this Legislature and the Government on education financing, and let

me spell it out very clearly once again, Mr. Speaker, for the benefit

of the member from Revelstoke who mentioned 22 per cent. This party

stands for the principle that education costs should not be borne by

the local taxpayer under any circumstances, at the elementary level, at

the high school level, nor at the regional college level, that the

local taxpayers should not be contributing to education costs through

his land taxes. And this Bill preserves the principle that is opposed

to that point of view, because it clearly indicates by what it doesn't

say, rather than by what it says, that the regional college is now

going to be putting more costs on the local land tax, and despite any

assurances of the Minister the Bill makes this quite clear.

Mr. Speaker, for that reason and other reasons that I have mentioned

I, for one, cannot support these amendments to the Public Schools Act.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Second Member for Vancouver East.

MR. R.A. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, we've just

heard from the honourable member from Revelstoke-Slocan, and it started

out something like a Roman candle. The point is, you know, he gave us

half of the answer of the Minister of Education, he didn't give us the

other half, about 40 per cent being borne by the local people, and

that's what we object to, on the capital costs of the regional

colleges. We object to that. We object to the 22 per cent, and to talk

about taking away the educational cost from local taxpayers, I suggest

is unrealistic to some extent. That's the direction we've got to move,

and that's where this party agrees with the honourable members on our

left. We believe that the place to start is at the higher education

level. We believe that there's a clear obligation on the part of the

Crown, Provincial and Ottawa, to meet all of the costs of higher

education in our Province. And we can't support the Bill on that basis.

Mr. Speaker, there's a taxpayers' revolt going on with respect to

education in this Province. It's partly brought about by the system

that this Government operates on, but I suggest that the further reason

is that there's a gut feeling amongst the population that some of these

costs shouldn't be theirs to bear, and amongst these costs are the

costs of higher education. So that's why, that's why it's reflecting in

the rest of the school system. That's why the kids in Nanaimo are going

to have to walk a couple of miles further every day to school. That's

why the people in West Vancouver have a fantastic dilemma because of

the vote in West Vancouver. That's why there's been a defeated

referendum in Creston, Kaslo, Burns Lake, Qualicum, Fort St. John, West

Vancouver, Nanaimo. In all of these communities the taxpayers have said

no. That's just this year. In fact, the "yes" vote was as low as 28 per

cent in West Vancouver, but in some of the communities only a minority,

20 per cent of the people, have spoken out. But that's what's

happening, and I suggest that the reason is that you're saddling the

local people with the costs of higher education unreasonably, that

there's no case at all for the costs of the higher education system to

be borne at the local level.

It's always very well for the members on the other side to say, well

the reason is we want a local say, and we can agree with a local say,

but in the very Bill itself you're taking away the local say. The

honourable member can say yes, we want this local initiative to

determine what courses are going to be given in our local community

college, but there's a

section in this Bill that can take that away,

the

section of this Bill puts it back in the hands of the Minister.

It's clear that the Government wants it both ways for themselves, they

want the burden of costs to rest on the local area and they want the

decision making with respect to curriculum to be made in the office

here in Victoria. We say you can't have it both ways, you shouldn't

have it both ways, that's why we're voting against the Bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Burnaby Edmonds.

[ Page 712 ]

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member at the

far corner of the House obviously is quite unaware that autonomy is

destroyed by the Bill, because no matter what estimates are drawn up of

expenditure and income by the local college district board, they are

removed by the provision that says it's all subject to the Department

of Education. Well now, the fact of the matter, Mr. Speaker, is a

provision in the Bill clearly means that there is a shadow board, a

shadow board in Victoria that determines what the budget will be, and

no other budget will be approved but the budget they say is the proper

one, and for the member to stand up and suggest that somehow they

preserve local autonomy when the very essence of local autonomy is

destroyed by that section, so that a shadow Minister, a shadow board,

is in charge, but in the shade, so it's naive to discuss that on the

basis of local autonomy. The second point that is clear is that the

curriculum of the district college or the regional college is really

subject to an over-all control from the bureaucracy outside the

district board. With these two things what have you got left except the

right to pay taxes at the local level? We say that if this is the way

you're running it then it isn't good enough, the Bill should not be

supported.

But there's one ironical twist to this, it makes it topsy-turvy, and

that is that this Government and this Minister have gone on record in

this House to say that they believe in the field of higher education

that the universities should not have to justify their budgets or,

indeed, publish their budgets, although the Provincial taxpayer and the

Government pay a substantial share of the cost of higher education so

far as the university is concerned. And you adopt in this proposal here

for the college the principle that they must disclose their budget and

all their estimates in detail to the Government, and you go a step

further than anyone on this side has ever suggested, you insist that

they not only disclose their budget, but you must allow the Department

of Education and this Government to decide whether that budget will be

approved at all.

Now I've never maintained that we should interfere in the autonomy

of those who run our universities, but I have said that when we are

voting as much as $80,000,000 to the universities, the least that we in

this House should know before that vote is passed, what their budget is

and what their estimates are, and that we are not supplied with. But

you want to go a step further than even that fair and sensible

precaution that does not mean control of the universities — it means

knowledge of what they're doing — you want to go beyond the stage of

knowledge of their budgets, you want to control them now at the local

level, thereby making a mockery out of the idea of local autonomy and

the right of real participation in the affairs of the regional college.

You're taking that away by this provision in the Bill which says that

the Department of Education has the final say on the approval of a

budget.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, this Bill is another Mickey Mouse measure by the Department of Education, because….

MR. SPEAKER: One moment, please. I think I'd like the member

to not use that phrase. I'm not going to ask you to withdraw it, but

I'm going to ask other members not to continue the usage of this

phrase. I know it's becoming quite current, but it's not good

parliamentary language.

MR. McGEER: Well, Mr. Speaker, I don't know quite how to

describe it. Let me say, then, that this creates super high schools,

because we're not creating colleges at all. All we're doing is

providing for Grades 13 and 14, and that's not my concept of an

educational advance. You know, the greatest difficulty that the student

leaving high school faces — I'm talking about Grade 12, Mr. Speaker —

in going to further his education, whether it's at a university here or

elsewhere, is the tremendous transition that that person makes from the

high school atmosphere to one with a different outlook, preparing the

student for a different outlook, preparing the student for a different

role, and Grade 13 doesn't do that. No change, really, between Grade 12

and Grade 13, and there'll be no change really between Grade 13 and

Grade 14.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about Selkirk College?

MR. McGEER: Yes, and I think it's time you thought of making

that a four year institution. Make it a real challenge. But as long as

it's under the Public Schools Act, as long as it's under the Public

Schools Act, it's a super high school run by school trustees and your

appointees financed by the local ratepayers, as the kindergartens and

the primary schools and secondary schools and, Mr. Speaker, this is

wrong educationally.

You know, it's quite possible to put up buildings, have people go

and spend time inside the buildings, hand them pieces of paper after a

prescribed length of time, let them carry around the title of whatever

degree you want, but it doesn't mean results will be there, Mr.

Speaker, and what we should be striving to achieve for all the money

that we spend in education is results, and the Minister isn't bringing

us results. His policies aren't bringing results.

But more than that, the Bill is wrong financially. We stated as a

policy in our party that we think education is a service to people and

not a service to land, and that any new burden of education on the land

is a retrograde step. They appear to agree with us in Social Credit

Alberta, where the regional colleges are financed 100 per cent by the

Provincial Government, as they should be. I'm talking now about the

portion not covered through fees and other donations. And, you know,

universities aren't financed by local taxation, and I think even the

member from Revelstoke-Slocan would be prepared to admit that they have

quite a bit of autonomy. Too much, says the member from Delta. He wants

to interfere. Well that is fine, but you wouldn't say that it requires

local taxpayers' contributions to increase the autonomy, he would admit

that. And, Mr. Speaker, I daresay the member from Revelstoke-Slocan

would admit they've got local autonomy. He may not approve of the

autonomy, but he'll admit they have it. So there's absolutely no

relationship at all between the idea of local taxation and the idea of

autonomy.

Really, what we're doing with this Bill is we're introducing

discrimination, educational discrimination, into the Province as

deliberate Government policy, because we are breeding inequality, a

regional inequality. We're misleading the people, Mr. Speaker, I would

submit, by leaving with them the idea that Grades 13 and 14 constitute

in some way a college, which they don't in any way, it's merely

prolonging high school, and they are paying through the nose for it.

They are not getting what residents of areas that are

[ Page 713 ]

fortunate enough to have a university are getting,

and the residents of those areas, of course, not needing to finance to

the same degree Grades 13 and 14, because universities are available,

will pay lower local property taxation, and, Mr. Speaker, it's all

wrong.

I agree with the member from Cowichan-Malahat that we can produce a

far superior educational system to what we have in British Columbia at

a lower cost. In order to do that, we are going to have to bring much

more intellectual discipline into our system than we have today. We are

going to have to plan it on a total basis so that we distribute that

educational system all over the Province. We are going to have to bring

in people to British Columbia with a different concept of what regional

colleges are. They have to have a completely independent system for

regional colleges under their own Act with their own faculties, with

their own advisory councils, with good co-ordination with the

universities of our Province, and not necessarily that much

co-ordination with our high schools. And the lion's share of the

financial burden must be borne by the Provincial Government.

This is an educational policy for today, not an educational policy

for yesterday, and I would suggest that the Minister withdraw this Bill

and introduce next Session something that is more suited to our times.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Kootenay.

MR. L.T. NIMSICK: Mr. Speaker, we hear a great deal in this

Province, you know, about the great progress that British Columbia has

made in the last 17 years, but this Bill is really a retrograde step.

It's a step back instead of a step ahead, and the whole idea that the

Department of Education has in regard to regional colleges and the

financing of them is a backward step, because years ago, before this

Government came to power, it was an accepted fact that higher education

was the responsibility of the Provincial Government. It was accepted,

and the expenditures were made on that basis, and since this Government

got into power there has been one step after another where they have

foisted costs of different things onto the local level. When there was

a suggestion that we should have regional colleges, I doubt very much

whether this Government accepted so much the necessity of regional

colleges as they accepted it to foist a further expense onto the local

people.

Because this Government, while they claim to be out of debt, they

have made every effort, any time there was any spending of money, to

try and put it on the local level. This starts out by the U.B.C., the

Victoria University, and Simon Fraser University. If you believe in the

concept that you are proposing in regional colleges, why don't you

bring a Bill in that these universities also be financed on local

taxpayers' money? Why don't you do it? If you think that this is proper

in regard to regional colleges, then why isn't it just as proper in

Victoria and Vancouver? What difference is it? Because the higher

education that these people get in the regional colleges, or supposed

to get, are comparative to the first two years at the university. When

Victoria was a college, the local taxpayers didn't have to raise the

money to operate that college, and then they raised it to the status of

a university and they still don't have to contribute to the university.

It is the Provincial Government, the taxpayer throughout the whole

Province that contributes to the operation of the university, and I

agree with this. I think this is proper.

But if you are going to go into regional colleges to assist the

universities due to their overcrowding, and if you are going to have

regional colleges throughout this Province, they must be all part and

parcel of the higher educational system in the Province, not run by

little groups here and there, but they must come under the over-all

picture of the university and higher education, the regional colleges.

So that a student that goes two years to a regional college should be

accepted into a university for the third year, and this to me is the

proper way of looking at the regional college system.

The big problem, ever since you adopted the regional college idea,

has been the financial problem. This is the reason all the battles have

been throughout the Province, over the regional financing of colleges,

higher education, because it remains definitely the responsibility of

the Provincial Government. I don't think that the people in the areas

in the interior of British Columbia would be worried if the Provincial

Government took the whole expense, any more than the people of

Vancouver are worried when the Provincial Government takes the expense

of operating the University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser

University and the Victoria University.

We are all taxpayers in the Province, and if we are going to pay for

higher education, then let's put it into the one pot and take it out of

the one pot, not on a restricted basis or discriminatory basis, but on

a basis for the whole Province. There is no question about it but this

is the policy that you should go ahead with, and the responsibility of

setting up regional colleges should be the Provincial Government's

responsibility, and not just say to the rural areas that they should

foot the bill for the regional colleges for the first two years, but

the people in Vancouver and Victoria have the preference. I again say

that it should be all one over-all scheme in higher education so that

wherever a person goes, whether it is to the regional college or the

university, the educational system should be synonymous so that it

wouldn't matter where they went they would be accepted in any of the

other places at the proper time.

I think that to try and pass the load onto the regional areas and

the local taxpayers is just another method of this Government that they

have adopted all down the line to pass extra cost on the local level.

The same as you did in the case of doubling the amount for social

welfare, the regional hospitals, and all this, you passed it on to the

property owners, so that they would have to keep financing these, and

that's why you set up the regional districts — it's all a pattern. It

was as plain when it started as it is today, and I said at that time

that this was a pattern that you were following. You were leading the

people, and you made a good case for these regional things to the

people to sell them on it, but the real idea was for the Provincial

Government to escape the costs in this regard. And I say, Mr. Speaker,

that this Bill should be opposed at every level.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Delta.

MR. R. WENMAN: Mr. Speaker, speaking briefly to this Bill, I w ould

like to comment first on who receives the benefit of education. I think

that the first of the largest benefits of education to our society

relates to the society in general, and because that benefit is due to

the results of what goes on at these regional colleges, benefits

firstly and most importantly the whole society. We have found that

where societies are well educated we have higher standards of living,

and so it is in the interest and, I believe, the responsibility of the

Province to share, certainly to the greatest extent, in the

[ Page 714 ]

cost of regional colleges.

But I think it should be pointed out that there is also a great

benefit to the individual regional district where the college is

located, there are benefits, be they cultural benefits, academic

benefits, and in fact economic benefits, as well. Therefore, if they

are going to have these economic benefits, these cultural benefits, and

these academic benefits, the community should be willing and be

prepared to share a portion of the cost.

The third area of benefit is to the individual student, because this

individual will be helped to develop a full life and will be helped to

be developed to the maximum of his capacity. Through the regional

college set-up we are going to keep more students in school longer and

provide more and more opportunities for more and more young people in

our Province, and increase in their standard of education, and I think

this is good. But let us remember, while the community will benefit,

probably the one who will benefit the most is the individual student

who receives the education, and I am sure everyone in this Assembly

would be in agreement with that point. So I would say that I think

there should be a cost-sharing, and it should be shared and the

students should pay fees at our regional colleges and at our

universities because they, in turn, will receive the maximum of the

most benefit from this education. I think also that the community in

general — we have talked constantly about community involvement in our

regional colleges and our schools, and I think that it is important

that they be involved — and certainly the most important way of

involving a person is by making a direct taxation on him or a just

usage of his money. So to promote this involvement, a direct taxation

or a direct cost-sharing, I think, will be beneficial.

One final point on the Bill, while I can support it certainly in

principle, because I agree that there should be local sharing and I

think, as a matter of fact, the cost-sharing principles in this Bill

are most generous, not the other way around. I think one other point

that needs to be looked at here, relating further in the Bill, to

providing teachers with incentives. If they can possibly attend they

should do so, because I think it is very easy to abuse the privilege of

sick leave, but if we take it to the point of saying after 250 days you

can't accumulate any more, everybody is going to go to the point of

249, or many will, and then they'll just continue taking those sick

days because there's no point in saving them anyway, you can't

accumulate them. I think we should allow them to accumulate as many

days as they can and as they will. This incentive might be further

passed on in the reward of sabbatical leave relating to the amount of

days that they acquired.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for New Westminster.

MR. D.G. COCKE: I have to be very careful, Mr. Speaker,

because I have just heard a condemnation, really, of the Bill more than

anything, because the previous speaker brought many points to my

attention that I just couldn't help but disagree with.

I think this Government has had an opportunity, a real opportunity

to move in the right direction, and they haven't taken advantage of

that opportunity, Mr. Speaker. You know, it's pay as little as possible

but call the shot, pay as little as possible but call the shot. I think

this is the thing that we're talking about here this afternoon, Mr.

Speaker, and this Bill is, I think, really a focus on it. What an

opportunity! What an opportunity! But you've missed again. You've

missed the opportunity and you'll go on missing your opportunities as

long as you have that kind of an attitude, waving around.

Mr. Speaker, it's he who benefits, you know, who receives the

benefit, and so on, the last speaker was saying. The whole society,

it's a great benefit. If the whole society in British Columbia is

receiving this benefit, let the whole society of British Columbia begin

in this area of financing higher education. That's who should be doing

it. And that's precisely what we should be doing, not this 60-40 or 22

per cent or 1.7. Get in there, call the shot if you will, but pay for

it, Mr. Speaker.

You know, the student is helped for life, and this student may go to

Angora for all we know. That's not the point. The fact of the matter is

the student is a citizen of this Province, and for too long now we have

had this business of a concentration of taxing in particular areas, and

I don't really agree with one speaker who said that Vancouver is

getting off completely, because we've got regional colleges in our

general area. But just remember this one thing on regional colleges,

Mr. Speaker, you've had a capital cost gift, mainly the regional

colleges are operated in the schools and that's been a great gift to

you. Now isn't that enough? Isn't that enough? I believe that we should

get on the right track, Mr. Speaker, and for heaven's sake go in, you

know, whole hog.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Minister will close the debate.

HON. D.L. BROTHERS: Mr. Speaker, we are very proud of the

college system in the Province of British Columbia. When the members of

the Opposition say it is moving slowly I don't think that they are

cognizant of the facts. The facts are that recently, in the last few

years, we have brought six colleges into being. This coming fall we

will have two more colleges coming into being, one in the Fraser

Valley, and most of the members over there must be aware of this

college, the Douglas College. It will start off with a student

population of around 1,500. We also have a college starting up in

Kamloops. Well, how can you say that the public aren't supporting these

colleges? We also are contemplating a regional college here in the

lower Vancouver Island. We're negotiating right now with the Victoria

School Board, so that within a period of five to six years from the

point of having no colleges in the Province now we'll have ten colleges.

I don't think that the member for North Vancouver–Capilano is really

aware of the intent of these colleges. These colleges are not to be a

stepping stone to the university, necessarily. We are hopeful that

these colleges will be about 50 per cent academic students and 50 per

cent technical students. As a matter of fact, if the universities have

any failing at all, it is because everybody seems to have the

university syndrome, that son or daughter must go to university because

they went to university. What we need in British Columbia is more

people who have vocational training and technical training. There are

lots of jobs for people that have these skills and abilities. And this

is what the regional colleges are designed to do, so that if you are

not doing well in the college in the academic

section you can transfer

over into the vocational-technical section, which you cannot do in the

universities, and this saves a lot of people from becoming drop-outs.

Now regarding the member, I think it was from Kootenay, who was talking about the difficulty students have

[ Page 715 ]

in transferring from course to course or from university to college

or vice versa, we have found, naturally, when we had only one

university in the Province, the University of British Columbia, it was

very easy to prepare courses, when you are going through the public

school system, to line them up with university courses. But with the

advent of many colleges who want to go their own way and do their own

thing, and have their own courses, naturally you are going to run into

some difficulties. Naturally Vancouver City College ran into some

difficulties with Simon Fraser, because they had different types of

courses, different types of French, for example, whether it was the one

method or the all method, it was naturally going to have some

difficulties. But over the years, through the Academic Board, many of

these confusing difficulties have been straightened out, and I think

that you just have to take a look at a study done on the Selkirk

students, and the students coming out of the Selkirk College, and

incidentally the leader of the Liberal party, the students in that area

are going to be pretty annoyed to find that you are calling them

glorified high school students. They are pretty proud of being members

of the Selkirk College.

Regarding the financing of these colleges, if you look at the Bill

you will find one of the purposes of one of the sections is to allow

the local school boards to have the most number of members on the

college council so that they will have local control of the school

boards, and they will have the right to set the direction of where the

colleges are going.

Incidentally, we went to California to look at the method of

financing colleges because this is really the birthplace of regional

colleges and district colleges was in California, and in California in

some cases, the local taxpayers have to pay as much as 85 per cent of

the operation of the college and the State only pays 15 per cent. When

I came back from California I recommended to the Government that we

change the finance formula, and now the Government is paying the lion's

share of the operational costs of these colleges. I'd like to now move

that the Bill be now read a second time, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:-

YEAS — 36

Messieurs

Wallace

Jefcoat

Wolfe

Ney

Tisdalle

Smith

Merilees

Bruch

McDiarmid

Marshall

McCarthy, Mrs.

Capozzi

Wenman

Jordan, Mrs.

Skillings

Kripps, Mrs.

Dawson, Mrs.

Chant

Mussallem

Kiernan

Loffmark

Price

Bennett

Gaglardi

Vogel

Peterson

Campbell, D.R.J.

LeCours

Black

Brothers

Chabot

Fraser

Shelford

Little

Campbell, B.

Richter

NAYS — 16

Messieurs

Brousson

Calder

Strachan

Gardom

Clark

Dowding

Cocke

McGeer

Nimsick

Lorimer

Williams, L.A.

Barrett

Hall

Macdonald

Dailly, Mrs.

Williams, R.A.

PAIR:

Messieurs

Williston

Hartley

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 69, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Regional Hospital Districts Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 69. The Honourable the Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, I'm going to defer my remarks on this to the committee stage, and I believe another member is speaking on it.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 70, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No.

70,

An Act to Amend the Elderly Citizens' Housing Aid Act. The

Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, very briefly, we are opposed to

this Bill increasing to 15 per cent the cost in respect of boarding

homes, low rental housing units. We think this is a dangerous

precedent. At a time of inflation in Canada, at a time of high cost

money, there should be a move by the Provincial Government to break

loose of its surplus fund to create employment and to create housing

both at the same time. We feel it's essential for the Provincial

Government, in the absence of positive leadership from Ottawa, to give

a new approach to housing in British Columbia, to give some relief to

the unemployment here in British Columbia, and take a direction in

policies that will go contrary to the inflationary attitudes of the

Federal Government.

Mr. Speaker, it's hardly worth comment that the Premier attacks

Ottawa for tight money, and creates situations that only add to that

tight money by asking the communities to pay a greater share for

housing that should be provided by the Provincial Government. There is

a serious shortage of all kinds of housing, and to add to the cost of

boarding home units and self-contained low rental units is not proper.

The 10 per cent on the low rental, self-contained units will remain the

same, but the 15 per cent on the boarding homes is a prohibitive

addition to the development of this programme. I suggest to the

Premier, rather than prohibit Provincial initiative, if we really are

against what Ottawa is doing in its

[ Page 716 ]

anti-inflationary policies, that we demonstrate that in our

legislation, and that's not being demonstrated in this Bill here today.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable Second Member for Vancouver East.

MR. R.A. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, what we need is legislation

that clearly puts the responsibility for initiation on the Provincial

Government. What we need is some initiative on the Government's side in

providing housing that is needed in the Province, and that it shouldn't

rely, it shouldn't rely on service clubs and a few do-gooder

organizations to get the ball rolling. The initiative must come from

the Crown, because there is a tremendous need in all areas of housing

within the Province, and it can't be met by small groups around the

Province occasionally seeing the need.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:-

YEAS — 42

Messieurs

Wallace

LeCours

Fraser

Ney

Chabot

Campbell, B.

Merilees

Little

Wolfe

Marshall

Jefcoat

Smith

Brousson

Tisdalle

McDiarmid

Gardom

Bruch

Capozzi

Weriman

McCarthy, Mrs.

Skillings

Kripps, Mrs.

Jordan, Mrs.

Chant

Mussallem

Dawson, Mrs.

Loffmark

Price

Kiernan

Gaglardi

Clark

Williston

Campbell, D.R.J.

McGeer

Bennett

Brothers

Williams, L.A.

Peterson

Shelford

Vogel

Black

Richter

NAYS — 12

Messieurs

Cocke

Williams, R.A.

Dowding

Hartley

Calder

Nimsick

Lorimer

Macdonald

Barrett

Hall

Strachan

Dailly, Mrs.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 63, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act, 1967)

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on the second reading of Bill No. 63. The Honourable the Member for Surrey.

MR. E. HALL: Mr. Speaker, this Bill before us — maybe I

should wait until everybody leaves — has been the subject of some

debate in the House. I think every member that spoke in the Throne Speech debate and in the Budget Speech debate dealt

with pollution. During the estimates of the Minister of Lands, Forests,

and Water Resources, by ruling and by desire most speakers did not deal

very much with the question of pollution other than a passing reference.

This Bill, Mr. Speaker, seeks to do in a not exactly acceptable way

that which this side attempted to do by amendment on a number of

occasions. I remember introducing myself, Mr. Speaker, a number of

amendments to start the Government up the road to control air

pollution. Those amendments were not accepted, and I think the passage

of time has made the problem of clearing our problems up that much

worse.

However, now we have the Bill in front of us. The principle of the

Bill is again varied. It deals first of all with the question of air

pollution, Mr. Speaker, deals with the powers of the Director, and also

takes into the Director's sphere of control some actions which were

previously held in the Department of Health. No question in my mind but

the fact that air pollution has become one of our number one problems,

and because of that, Mr. Speaker, we are going to support this Bill. We

still feel that the onus of responsibility is not in the right place.

We still feel that, as is traditional with the Government opposite to

us, they are shifting responsibilities to other areas that are badly

equipped to handle them. Other speakers will no doubt comment on the

problems in their own areas, problems of policing these laws.

In my own area, Mr. Speaker, we have passed already a municipal

by-law regarding air pollution, but because of the money situation in

the country, the municipality of Surrey can't afford to buy the actual

equipment required to do the work that's required by this Government,

either by the press releases by the Minister of Health or, in fact, now

by this legislation.

But leaving that alone for the moment, Mr. Speaker, I do want to

pass some comments on that

section of the Bill and the principle of the

Bill that takes into account duties which were hitherto dealt with the

Department of Health, and here I think we see, once again, the

weakening of the Department of Health and the Minister of Health's

position on pollution which has, from time to time in this House,

occasioned not only some anger from this side of the House but, of

course, the odd facetious comment. You will remember, Mr. Speaker, the

remarks in a couple of Sessions ago that related to the shooting of the

Minister of Health's horse when he was charging along the road of

pollution control, and here we see another bullet in that war in that

committee of three that appeared to be scrapping for the total

responsibility.

I don't know but what this Bill may eventually produce that which

members of the House have asked for, that is one man in charge of the

whole of the pollution control business. We've heard the Premier and

the Minister say that things are well in this system of ministerial

responsibility — Minister of Health, Minister of Lands and Forests,

Minister of Municipal Affairs. There seems to me that we are seeing the

gradual erosion, and that the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water

Resources is definitely winning the fight, definitely winning the fight.

There is one point that I want the Minister to perhaps answer now

before committee, and that is the principle of the Bill that deals with

the whole question of allowing a permit, or providing a permit to

somebody who wants to discharge waste, effluent, etc., etc. It seems to

me, Mr. Minister, that the possession of that permit in this new Act is

a complete and total defence to any action that may be taken

[ Page 717 ]

by any interested party, and in fact I think, stretching it further, by the Government itself.

As I read the Act, it seems to me that now we've changed the onus on

reporting rather than application, that the simple possession, the

simple possession of the permit is a complete defence to any further

action. In short, that while the

section that deals with the permits

makes it an offence to pollute without a permit, it is not an offence

under the Act once you have got a permit to violate the conditions of

the permit. In other words, once you've got a permit, Mr. Speaker, you

can violate the conditions of the permit at your pleasure, and if a

charge is laid, the ownership, the possession of that permit is a

complete defence. And depending on the Minister's reply, I will put an

amendment on the Order Paper to alter that particular principle of the

Bill.

I think it's serious, because we remember two years ago when we had

an amendment to this Bill, the Pollution Control Act, we left out, I

think I'm right in saying, we left out some of the penalty section, and

whilst I don't want to make the Minister responsible for drafting

errors and so on, I do feel that the principle contained in giving a

person a permit and then allowing him to do that which he wants appears

to be a bad one, and I think some amendment is required.

The Act, Mr. Speaker, definitely widens the control, the

observation, the research, the investigation into pollution, and of

course that's welcomed, long overdue but welcome. It doesn't however,

in my view, deal with the very important question that would be

contained in the event that we take positive action as a community, as

an industry, etc. Into the whole business of oil exploration and so on.

On Friday last, Mr. Speaker, and I hope you will guide me as far as

order is concerned here, we heard the Minister of Mines say that he

felt that the Government was taking a view that development of

resources could carry on at the same time. A multi-use philosophy was

expressed by the Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources. We see no

evidence, Mr. Speaker, in the past that this multi-resource development

philosophy can work, is even understood by the Cabinet opposite, and

when he went on to say that there's no interest in oil exploration, I

felt that he was doing less than justice to the facts.

It's been my information, for instance, Mr. Speaker, that we should

be looking at this question very seriously, at pollution from such a

development, because Canadian Pacific Oil and Gas have this weekend

asked for delivery of six electrically operated undersea boats to be

delivered to Vancouver, and if that doesn't indicate to me that this

industry is interested in taking advantage of the thousands and

thousands of acres by permits that have been given ever since the

member for Chilliwack was the Minister of Mines, if that doesn't

indicate, Mr. Speaker, that the industry is interested, notwithstanding

the remarks of the Minister on Friday afternoon, nothing does. For a

company to order and receive at some future date from General Dynamics

six underwater electrically operated submarines, if that's the correct

word — I suppose submarines are something of an exaggeration, let's

call them boats, underwater boats — shows to me that this industry is

indeed interested in these permits which start, Mr. Speaker, way back

in 1957. Whilst there's thousands of acres that have been given to

these companies Provincially, there are also thousands of acres being

given Federally.

I think that when we are talking about pollution we should have this

thing uppermost in our minds, and I think that the exploration that is

going on, the fact that sixteen holes have been drilled and are found

to be not as fruitful as they would require, still leaves two holes

unaccounted for, Mr. Speaker, in oil drilling in this part of the

world. And right now I can tell the House that there's a very great

interest in Permit No. 1513 which was given, Mr. Speaker, to drill

around Hornby Island.

I think the House should be very interested, and should not take on

face value that which was indicated on Friday, that there's no interest

because the Minister isn't receiving a multitude of phone calls and a

multitude of letters. When you've plastered the map, Mr. Speaker, with

permits, you don't need any more applications, you don't need any more

applications. I certainly feel that the correspondence I've got from

Gulf Oil and others indicate that we should be very concerned about the

whole question of this particular industry and its presence in our

coastal waters.

I suppose that every member in this House, Mr. Speaker, has a file

under the sub-heading or under the general heading of the Minister of

Lands, Forests, and Water Resources, entitled Pollution. I suppose

every member of this House has got the letters from the various

ratepayers groups, whether it be complaining about a development that's

going to put raw sewage into the Gulf Islands, complaints about Utah

Mines, complaints of every sort and shape and size, and it's obvious

that legislation is only part of the answer, only part of the answer. I

think we should take another look at one of the statements that was

made again by a Minister vitally concerned in this, namely the Minister

of Recreation.

I think it's fair to say, Mr. Speaker, that no legislation such as

the Pollution Control Act before us today can do the job that I think

every member in the House really wants to do about pollution. There has

to be a prior step, Mr. Speaker. The prior step is simply to get a

sheet of paper, financial paper, if necessary, that the Minister of

Finance knows only too well, and head the paper with the name of the

project that's up for discussion, whether it be Utah Mines, whether it

be the Elk Valley coal mining, whether it be the Utah Mine Development,

whether it be a sub-division on the Gulf Islands, whatever the question

before us is. We should put on one side of that piece of paper the

benefits that are going to accrue to society in the Province of British

Columbia, and on the other side of the piece of paper, Mr. Speaker, we

should put on the costs that are going to accrue to the whole of the

society of British Columbia.

I think it's fair to say that in case after case after case, if we

were putting into that piece of paper the intangible cost, the real

cost, the loss of recreation, the spoiling of natural resources in

terms of pleasure, bird life, swimming, vacations, leisure time, and

all those things that the House only knows too well, we'd find out that

a cost-benefit analysis like that, which would then be called social

cost accounting, would indicate to this Government that they should say

no to some projects, and I think we know what some of those projects

are. Pulp mills in the Okanagan. I'm one who firmly believes that Utah

Mines should not be allowed to go ahead yet. I'm one that believes that

the Elk Valley should not be allowed to be plundered in the way the

proposal indicates at this time.

So unless you've got a Government that's involved in social cost

accounting in terms of development and use of its resource, the

legislation really becomes somewhat meaningless, because the

legislation then is just a series of events to take place, the damage

that's going to happen once you've failed to do your social cost

accounting. So in short, it's not

[ Page 718 ]

just a question of laws — the Attorney-General and his Department,

Pollution Control Department, the Health Department, and so on — it's a

question of desire, it's a question of looking into the future.

Whilst we can all make the speeches that we made in the Throne

Speech debate and in the Budget Speech debate about certain individual

questions of pollution, and that would take us ages and ages, Mr.

Speaker, and I've no intention of going into that kind of debate, but I

want to get across the point to the Government, as indeed indicated in

a way only by one Cabinet Minister to date, namely the Minister of

Recreation and Conservation, that we are coming to the stage when we

are going to have to say, "No." As yet we have not said "No," and I

think the House must dwell for some considerable length of time on that

proposition.

Mr. Speaker, the powers of the Director, of course, will be dealt

with in committee, the efficacy of the law will be dealt with in

committee,

section by section, but I don't think we can do justice to

today or to the future, and to use all the clichés that this House

has heard of in years gone by, to the unborn generations. I don't think

we can do justice to that until we are prepared to get out a piece of

paper with the fine ruled lines and call it social cost accounting.

Somebody over there has to have the strength to say "No." Somebody over

there. has to have the strength to say to one of the big boys, whether

it be C.P., Kaiser, Utah, no matter who, "The answer is no, my friend.

The answer is no, my friend." Until. that's done, it doesn't matter how

many laws we pass entitled

An Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act,

they will not be sufficient. I think really, Mr. Speaker, in bending

the rules a little today, I've said really what should be said about

any Pollution Control Act that's before us, and I thank you for

allowing me to do that. We're going to support the Bill because we

believe it does strengthen the legislation, but I think without such a

statement of policy we're only really dotting the i's and crossing the

t's.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for North Vancouver–Capilano.

MR. D.M. BROUSSON: Mr. Speaker, this Bill, like so many that

come forward from the Government, is one that we welcome in very large

measure and yet one that also disappoints us. It does, as we've asked,

bring land and air pollution into the same Act, and really for the very

first time recognizes by law that there is land and air pollution in

British Columbia, and it recognizes that we do actually have

contaminants on our land and air.

As an aside, Mr. Speaker, I can't help questioning the definition of

contaminant. I remember three basic states of matter — gaseous, liquid

and solid — and I see in this Act we have an odorous state. I'm

wondering if this is the fourth state of matter that we haven't heard

of before.

Mr. Speaker, this Act does now, as we have asked, bring control of

sewage into the Pollution Control Act. So these are good things. But,

Mr. Speaker, the policy still is to issue permits to pollute, and the

whole effectiveness of this Bill is going to depend on the regulations

that are set up by the Minister, the Board, the Director, and the

interpretation given those regulations and, most important, the

enforcement given the regulations. The Bill therefore has nothing new

in this regard.

People of British Columbia have certainly a good deal of respect for

the Minister responsible for the administration of this Bill. As the

Minister of Forests, he's proven his ability to cut down trees and get

that job done well, but again and again we come back to the same point,

how can the same Minister who is responsible for the health and

well-being of some of B.C.'s greatest industrial empires, also be the

effective control on how well these industries treat their environment,

their environment that belongs not to the Government, not to the

industries, but to the people of British Columbia? How can the same man

be the judge, the prosecutor, and the defence lawyer?

Every side of this House has called on the Government for a

Department of Environmental Management. What a difference in approach

this would make. This Bill talks about pollution. In other words, the

approach becomes, for industry, and on the record to date for this

Minister and this Government — how much pollution can I get away with?

And so far they've been getting away with it. Wouldn't a better

approach, a more positive approach, come from a Department of

Environmental Management, which would think of the total environment,

which would consider the atmosphere, the wildlife, the natural

surroundings, whose first responsibility would be to look at each

problem as the ecologist does, who would ask how can I improve or

maintain the quality of our environment, not how much pollution can I

get away with?

Mr. Speaker, I look with envy at Bill No. 52 that's presently before

the Legislature in Alberta, and I would like to tell this House about

Bill No. 52 from Alberta. It's called

An Act Respecting Environment

Conservation, and it sets up an Environment Conservation Authority with

these objectives, "The following are matters pertaining to environment

conservation:

(1) The conservation, management and utilization of

natural resources.

(2) The prevention and control of pollution of

natural resources.

(3) The control of noise levels.

(4) Any operations

that adversely affect the quality or quantity of any natural resource

or that destroy, disturb, pollute, alter or make use of a natural

resource, and

(5) The preservation of natural resources for their

aesthetic value."

Those are very high objectives and they are objectives that we are

not providing in this Bill which says, how much pollution can I get

away with in British Columbia? Every side of this House has supported

our call for such a Department, but the Government has refused it.

However, Mr. Speaker, at least to an extent, some of these effective

areas are now being pulled together into one control centre.

We believe there will still be a major problem existing, but surely,

Mr. Speaker, because this Minister is so busy, because he has these

dual responsibilities that conflict with each other, these conflicts of

interest, if the Government will not set up this new Department,

perhaps at least the Minister would turn his responsibility over to the

Minister of Conservation who theoretically, at least, already has a

considerable responsibility to stand up for the rights of the natural

surroundings. Here, at least, there should be no conflict of interest,

and a strong Minister of Conservation could fight for the conservation

and improvement of our environment, and the question would no longer

be, how much pollution can I get away with?

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Richmond.

MR. E. LeCOURS: Mr. Speaker, I don't intend to take a lot of

time this afternoon, but I do want to bring a few points to the

attention of the Minister. I feel that, generally

[ Page 719 ]

speaking, our pollution control legislation is good, and perhaps as

good as any in Canada. However, I do feel that there is something

lacking in the enforcement of this legislation, and this is the point

that I want to deal with.

Now obviously, no one can expect that the Minister or any Ministers

of Government are going to go out and investigate any applications for

licences to pollute, which a member just mentioned. However, they do

have officials that they are expected to rely upon, and I have said in

the past, and I repeat, that I think the advice they have been

receiving from these officials has not been proper. I think these

officials have let the public down in providing either wrong

information, or not looking into the situation sufficiently.

I want to refer particularly today to the Iona Island situation, the

Iona Treatment Plant, because this treatment plant is now polluting

Lulu Island, and Sea Island, the two islands which make up Richmond

municipality, and polluting all the foreshore along there, which is

known as Sturgeon Bank.

Now just to give you some of the history, I want to run over quickly

some of the information I have here, contained in a report from the

municipality, concerning Iona Island. In 1957 the Greater Vancouver

Sewer Board applied to the Pollution Control Board for a permit to

discharge some sewage effluent from the City of Vancouver, from the

Iona Treatment Plant, primary treatment plant which by-passes into a

trench across Sturgeon Bank. On receiving notice of the public hearing

called by the Pollution Control Board, the municipality protested, and

appeared and strenuously opposed the application, and as said in this

report, largely on the grounds that the method of discharge by open

channel was highly objectionable.

As the Rawn Report at page 156 stated, the effluent channel would be

designed to control the flow during periods of low tide, when little or

no dilution is available on Sturgeon Bank, and all they did, Mr.

Speaker, was dig a trench out there, alongside of the treatment plant,

and then run the effluent right into this trench. Of course, at low

tide this effluent spreads throughout the area, and covers miles of

Sturgeon Bank and pollutes it to a very serious degree. The stench

around there, particularly in the summer time at low tide, is

unbearable, and these are areas which had been used as public beaches

by the people of Richmond and other people who had need for public

beaches in the summer months.

I think that the trouble in this case was both the Pollution Control

Board, and the Cabinet, and the people they obtained who provided them

with information. A gentleman by the name of Rawn who prepared a report

some 25 years or so ago on the disposal of sewage in the Greater

Vancouver Area, and there are other people along with Mr. Rawn, Dr

Tulley, and Dr. Hyde, who also gave evidence at the hearings which were

held with respect to the Iona Disposal Plant These people obviously

were hired, I haven't been able to find out exactly, but obviously they

were hired by the City of Vancouver to present their side of the story.

That's what they were being paid for, that's what they did. They

presented a picture that it would be advantageous to the City of

Vancouver, without any concern at all for the neighbouring communities

such as Richmond.

AN HON. MEMBER: Dr. Tulley?

MR. LeCOURS: Dr. Tulley, yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: I think he was employed by the Water Department of the City.

MR. LeCOURS: Well, he may have been, he may have been a

Federal or Provincial Government employee, I haven't been able to find

out exactly what his position was. But I want to run over some of the

evidence that was given at the hearing, and here is one referring to

cross-examination of Mr. Rawn on page 173, line 28, to page 174.

QUESTION: "I wonder if you could tell us a little more about

the experience which you have had in these trenches as part of an

outfall system." (This is a trench they were proposing to put out there

adjoining the outfall.) And Mr. Rawn's reply, "I have never had any."

QUESTION: "Is this proposed trench, then, the first that you

had experience with?" And his answer was, "This is an unique situation.

It is designed to meet the conditions which we found there, and the

conditions which we found there were that they didn't give a damn about

Richmond. Those were the conditions. They were enforcing their will on

the people of Richmond and they didn't care what Richmond thought about

it."

QUESTION: "I gather, then, the solution in other coastal

cities for reasons which I think you touched on earlier, is to pipe it

out to deep water." And Mr. Rawn replied, "Yes, as a rule that is the

answer."

This, Mr. Speaker, is what I have recommended in this House before,

and which I hope the Government will eventually insist upon for the

disposal of effluent from Iona and from many other similar areas,

because unless we pipe it out to deep water, we are going to have a

real problem with pollution of the shoreline.

A further question, "Has there ever been, to your knowledge, any

suggestions for constructing this sort of trench in any other

community?" And Mr. Rawn replied, "Not to my knowledge."

So although there is no previous experience for this, and although

it was pointed out by Richmond municipality that this would be

objectionable, they went along with it. The Pollution Control Board

went along with it, and eventually the Cabinet went along with it by

issuing an Order-in-Council agreeing to the issuing of the permit.

Now this cross-examination here, further on again of Dr. Hyde. I

can't identify Dr. Hyde other than to the fact that he was testifying

on behalf of the City of Vancouver, and the question is this, "What, in

your opinion, is the function of this channel? We spent considerable

time about this channel, and I take it from you that it apparently has

no function at all." And listen to this for an answer, and it is from

one of their witnesses. Dr. Hyde replied, "As I say, I may be a

heretic, but I think it isn't worth the money it costs. A channel is

absolutely useless. It does nothing to prevent pollution of the area. "

There is further cross-examination here of Dr. Tulley and I would

ask you to note how much time Dr. Tulley, or anybody else, spent in

studying the situation. It says, Dr. Tulley was asked to comment on the

effect of a pipe outfall beyond the edge of Sturgeon Bank. This he was

reluctant to do on such short notice. He was subsequently excused as a

witness to consider the question. Here is the key sentence. A little

later the same afternoon — you can imagine how much study was done — he

returned with some rough sketches, and testified that a pipe would

produce younger and more dilute effluent at the point of outfall, which

is quite logical. The

[ Page 720 ]

pipe would have to go out two or three miles perhaps, but I want you

to note now, after knowing that this was the same afternoon and how

much study could have been made of the situation in the meantime, I

want you to note now what he says.

QUESTION: "Doctor, you have heard testimony here today that a

great deal of thought, apparently, has gone into whether or not a pipe

could be put in instead of a channel. Have you ever been asked to make

this appraisal before today?" And the answer was, "Not in this detail,

not in this detail. We have discussed the point." And the question,"And

this, you describe as a detailed," and is broken off there, and he

says, "It is rather a more detailed." And the detailed meant simply a

couple of hours of examining the situation.

This is a detail of the study that they went into, and it is quite

obvious, Mr. Speaker, that these people had no concern for people in

the surrounding communities. They were only out to satisfy the needs of

the City of Vancouver, which was to rid their beaches of pollution and

pass them onto someone else, and I think that this is one way in which

we will perpetuate pollution rather than overcome it. It says here,

expense of Iona Beach, which the witness frankly admitted he had never

even considered as a recreation area, because he didn't know that this

was the area being used by the people of Richmond.

On April 2, 1958, the Pollution Control Board granted the Greater

Vancouver Sewage and Drainage District, Permit No. 23. Now, of course,

Richmond was unhappy about this, put up a very strong fight against it,

and on April 23rd, the municipality appealed the granting of Permit No.

23 to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. The appeal was heard on June

9th, 1958, and further written submissions were submitted subsequently.

As a result, Order-in-Council No. 2167 was passed in which Permit No.

23 was amended by adding a few conditions, and I think these conditions

are important, Mr. Speaker, and I think that this is where we fall down

in enforcing the things that we set down in our pollution control

legislation.

One of the conditions that they impose is that the plant be adequate

in design and appropriately landscaped to prevent impairment of the

recreation amenities of Iona Island and Iona Beach. Well, that was

quite satisfactory as far as the plant itself was concerned. Another

one was that there be no public nuisance by offensive odours from the

treatment plant and works, and in this one we fall down very badly, Mr.

Speaker. Because the odour, within a mile or two of there, is

unbearable on warm summer days at low tide, and that must certainly be

considered offensive.

Another condition was that the Greater Vancouver Sewage and Drainage

District shall — and this is where I hope the Minister will step in, if

required by the Pollution Control Board, and I hope the Pollution

Control Board will be more concerned about Richmond than they have been

in the past — rectify its method of operation, alter its plant, or

otherwise revise its procedures, where necessary, to carry out the

intentions and purpose of disposing of sewage in a manner to permit use

by the public of the beaches and recreational areas mentioned above. As

I say, in order for this to come true, it will be necessary for the

Minister to bring to the attention of the Pollution Control Board the

need for closer control on Iona Disposal Plant.

I have brought along a couple of samples here, Mr. Speaker, which I

want to send down to the Minister that he might see what goes through,

and this is what goes through at the best tides. This sample was taken

about a month ago, I took it myself one weekend when I was home after a

long, dry period when there was no flow through the overflow. When

there is a rain, everything goes through the by-pass and goes directly

into the channel without going through the plant, because the plant

can't handle it when there has been a lot of rain. As a result, this is

a very favourable sample. I took it during a dry period and you will

see how much stuff goes through it, at that, and you can imagine with

this taken at random at the outfall, you can see what would happen to

the surrounding area in a very short time. I have another little sample

here showing some of the ghuk on the shoreline over half a mile from

the outfall. I am not sending these down to embarrass the Minister, but

I want him to see for himself what they are pouring on the shore of

Richmond, and what must stop if we are going to stop this unnecessary

pollution of our beaches. Would you take these down to the Minister

please, to Mr. Williston.

Now in the fall of 1969, just last fall, a group of interested

citizens of Richmond went down, at the instigation of the Richmond

Anti-Pollution Association, and after three-tenths of an inch of rain

they noticed the things that were going through and coming out of that

outfall. I don't dare tell you about them here, I assure you, but it is

incredible that we should allow this. When the by-pass is being used,

there is a screen, a one and a quarter inch screen, and anything

smaller than an inch and a quarter goes through, and there are some

pretty unsightly things that go through there.

But in the fall of 1969, a group of citizens went down there to

examine the situation, and reported back to City Council, and the

Chairman of the Municipal Health Committee went into the matter, and

they made a report to the municipality. It's about 15 lines, and I

would like to read it, and I'll end my remarks there.

"Your Health Committee met on the Thursday, November

27, 1969, and discussed the matter of pollution at Iona Island and

Sturgeon Bank by the Iona Treatment Plant. The present coloform, count,

general turbidity, and sludge accumulation would appear to be in excess

of that authorized by the permit relating to the above plant.

"It is noted that legal action can be taken provided

that damages could be established, but it was felt by the Committee

that the first step would be to register a strong protest to the

Pollution Control Board of British Columbia, and ask this Board to

require the Greater Vancouver Sewage and Drainage District to improve

the operation of the Iona Treatment Plant to ensure that it meets the

standards prescribed in the permit, and also to express to the

Pollution Control Board concern lest the same errors be repeated at the

proposed Annacis Island Plant."

This, I implore you, Mr. Minister, must not happen. Iona must be at

least a secondary treatment plant and Annacis Island must be at least a

secondary treatment plant, if we are going to have any relief from this

degradation of the Fraser River and the area surrounding Richmond.

To conclude the last few lines of the report of the Health

Committee, "Your Committee also recommends that any further action

should depend upon the results achieved by the Pollution Control

Board." As I said, I have been disappointed with the Pollution Control

Board, I was disappointed with the former Director of Pollution

Control. I hope the present Director is an improvement. I hope the

Pollution Control Board has and will be up-graded further, and I hope

they will tackle the situation so that they will

[ Page 721 ]

relieve us of any unnecessary pollution of our beaches and other areas surrounding our municipalities.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Cowichan-Malahat.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The last member

who has just finished, drew our attention to a number of items relating

to pollution within the Province of British Columbia and as it relates

to his local area. He expressed dissatisfaction with the previous

Pollution Control Director. He expressed the hope that his successor

will be more forceful in enforcing pollution control but, Mr. Speaker,

civil servants reflect the policy and the attitude of the Government.

Civil servants reflect the policy and the attitude of the Government.

Mr. Speaker, like all the other members of the House, I have been

receiving letters, letters from nine and ten year olds in some cases,

saying, "Dear Mr. Strachan: Please do something about pollution,

otherwise there will be no world left for us to live in when we grow

up." I think all the members have been receiving letters of that kind,

and letters from adult organizations, drawing attention to specific

situations and quoting from documents and specialists in the field,

warning us of the dangers and the perils that face us unless we take

some definite and positive action.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column about the week in the

Legislature and I said it was an enjoyable week, an enjoyable

experience, because of certain things that had happened. I can't say

I'm happy about this legislation. Although the words are there, Mr.

Speaker, experience has left me with little assurance that the words

have any real meaning, that something will happen because of the words

in this particular piece of legislation, or because of the principles

outlined, because the history of this Department, this Minister, and

this Government in the field of pollution control is a sorry history, a

sorry history indeed.

I could have brought in the letters, the statements that went back

and forth between the Pollution Control Board and the pulp mill up in

Prince George, these documents that were tabled by the Minister himself

twelve months ago, which gives an indication of the record of the past.

We're told that six of the twelve pulp mills are operating without

permits, the Minister of Municipal Affairs goes around doing his usual

gandy dance about technological potentialities or something with regard

to pollution control, and the Minister of Municipal Affairs has a

tremendous ability to dodge around the issue and to appear as if he was

saying something without actually saying anything, and of course this

has been the record of the Government. They've appeared to be in favour

of pollution control but they actually haven't been, they actually

haven't been.

You know, and I think it was referred to earlier in this House, we

can get an idea of the opinions abroad in this country about the

attitude of this Government toward pollution control, when we read the

statement that the Eddy Company made in Ontario, when the Ontario

Government threatened them with stricter pollution control measures,

they said that the company was considering moving to British Columbia

if the Ontario Government insisted on imposing pollution control

measures on that particular pulp company. They'd already discussed with

some of their senior employees the possibility of moving to British

Columbia, and would they be prepared to move to this Province when they

did so. That's the kind of reputation we have in the field of industry.

That's the kind of reputation.

Now, Mr. Speaker, pollution and worry about pollution and a

realization of pollution is not something that has come upon us

suddenly. As long ago as 1965, the Canadian Institute on Pollution

Control laid down a policy — 1965 — and I won't read the whole of that

policy statement to the House, but it started off by saying, "Pollution

of Canadian water courses, coastal waters, and ground waters is a

continuing threat to the national health, comfort, safety and economic

welfare." That's five years ago, and in the last five years, despite

what's been happening, despite the growing public concern, we've had

this Minister and this Government refuse to face up to their

responsibilities in this regard. That's why, even though I'm going to

vote for this Bill, I'm not sure that we can trust this Government — as

a matter of fact I know we can't trust the Government — to carry out

the declared intent of this Bill.

This policy, which I say was outlined by the Canadian Institute of

Pollution Control in '65, says the administration of pollution control

must be firm, it must be effective, and it must be equitable. And in

all three of those measures the policy of this Government so far,

measured by any standard, has not been firm, we know it hasn't been

effective, and it hasn't been equitable because, though it may have

been fair to the company it wasn't fair to the people. Unless it's fair

to the people it's not equitable or equitable, whichever pronunciation

you prefer.

Another paragraph says, "The administration of provincial and

inter-provincial pollution control programmes should remain in the

hands of the provincial and interprovincial water pollution control

agencies. They shouldn't be shoved off to the regional districts or the

municipalities which must be supported," and this is important, "which

must be supported by appropriate budgets and adequately staffed by well

trained and compensated engineers, scientists and other personnel. The

rights of provincial and interprovincial agencies to control and

protect the water resources must be accompanied by equal

responsibilities to perform their functions effectively." Again, taking

any one of these measures as a yardstick, this Minister, this

Government, has failed to measure up.

Then it says, "While the primary objectives of pollution control

must be the protection of the public health, other objectives add

impelling reasons for protecting the country's water resources, such as

the need for use and re-use of surface and ground waters which must

receive and dilute liquid wastes."

Now, Mr. Speaker, we've had experience right in this Province, and

this is why I agree with those who say that this Pollution Control

Board and this Government's primary interest is not the prevention of

pollution, it's to determine or decide how much pollution they're going

to allow. Again, unfortunately, as they do in every area of Provincial

endeavour, they never look far enough ahead, they always take the short

term view. And even the good member from Richmond who just sat down was

taking the short term view when he talked about extending the outfall

further out into the sea, and thinking that would solve the problem.

Because, Mr. Member, Mr. Member, once you accept that philosophy that

the answer to the pollution control problem, whether it be from sewage

or from mill, is simply to extend the outfall further into the sea to

where the water is supposed to be moving faster, the tides move more

quickly, or there's a larger body of water, it assumes that there is an

unlimited natural capacity to neutralize toxic wastes within the water

[ Page 722 ]

body concerned, and I want to know on what basis we can make that assumption.

What's his name, Heyerdahl, who tried to sail across the Atlantic in

that papyrus ship, told us that out in the middle of the Atlantic he

found this great sea of pollution where the currents had carried the

outfall and the waste of western man all into one huge, concentrated

body — a Sargasso Sea of sewage and pollution which is bound to get

larger and larger and larger if we adopt this philosophy that all you

have to do is pile it further out in the sea.

We just had the people of the Victoria area a year or so ago decide

that instead of putting in a sewage treatment plant all we had to do

was carry the outfall farther out into the sea. But with the

continually expanding population and with the continued growth in

industry we have no assurance that the water ways that surround us have

an unlimited capacity to neutralize these toxic wastes. It's an

assumption that spells danger ahead, and it's on this assumption that

most of the pollution control permits are being issued.

And I say, Mr. Speaker, the policy which I read to you emphasized

the need for trained staff — engineers, scientists and other personnel.

It said the control must be firm, effective and equitable. We've a

second instance where the answer was supposed to carry outfall further

out, and it was the pulp mill at Crofton. We were sure that the outfall

was being carried far enough out that it wouldn't hurt the oyster

industry in that area. But we all know it destroyed the oyster

industry, and when one of the oyster growers took the case to Court the

case was settled out of Court, the case was settled out of Court, and I

don't know yet whether or not that particular company has a permit from

the Pollution Control Board. I think it's probably one of the six who

until now have not been required to have a permit.

We go up north into the Prince Rupert area, and here's a document

put out by the Fisheries Association of British Columbia, an employers'

organization reporting on what's happening in Prince Rupert, and this

is the issue of February 1970, just last month. "Problems at Port

Edward. Columbia Cellulose pulp mill at Port Edward continues to have

pollution problems. Porpoise Harbour in front of the plant is grossly

polluted, and efforts to carry the plant's effluent across Ridley

Island to fast-flushing Chatham Sound have been anything but

successful. The ill-starred pipeline built for this purpose some two

years ago has failed on numerous occasions, resulting in untreated

wastes flowing into Porpoise Harbour. The most recent breakdown

occurred on January the 12th," that's this year, "and it had still not

been corrected when it was reported on January 29th," that's seventeen

days later, "by W.R. Richardson, Regional Director of Fisheries, when

speaking to the fishing industry in Prince Rupert.

"No doubt Columbia Cellulose has spent large sums of

money trying to deliver it's effluent to Chatham Sound. So far the

attempt has been a failure. Perhaps the time has come, as it inevitably

will, to provide for biological treatment and retention of the effluent

before further damage is done to the environment in that area." This is

the Fisheries Association of British Columbia warning us of the dangers

we face in trying to think that, or adopting the philosophy that all

you have to do is build a pipeline further out into the sea out of

sight, out of mind, out of danger. That's a suicidal philosophy, an

attitude that cannot possibly bring real success to pollution control.

I said the other day, Mr. Speaker, that the only way we can

effectively have proper pollution control is when we decide we want it,

and when we're prepared to pay for it, and unless we're prepared to do

that then this legislation, or any other legislation, is completely

meaningless.

I picked up a report the other day as to what's happening in

Britain, and sure, there was an area where all of the great rivers had

been polluted, the air was polluted, the land was in many cases

polluted, and the sea around the island was polluted, but they decided,

they decided to take on this battle of pollution. This is a report

dated March the 15th, 1970, just a couple of weeks ago, from London,

and it says, "Since the Labour Government came to power it has put

through eleven national laws. It has seen to it that public authorities

spend 250 million a year on sewage and sewage disposal, and it has made

industries covered by the Alkali Act spend half that again on capital

expenditures and close to 750 million on running costs to keep down

pollution. It requires clean exhaust in all trucks," but that's another

Bill coming up.

"The picture that emerges is of a nation armed with

many controls against pollution and enabled to enact most of the rest

it needs. The obstacles to a clean environment are neither

technological nor legal, but simple economics. On whom do you saddle

the costs?" And the last paragraph says, "Within its economic limits,

Britain has decided to go ahead, because they have no option but to pay

up." We have been dodging that decision, Mr. Speaker, and in my opinion

we have no option but to pay up if we want to prevent, control, and

remove pollution from British Columbia, and I don't care what the cost

is, there is no cost that can be classified as too high in order to

maintain an environment.

So long as we can allow tax-free benefits to major corporations, so

long as we say they don't pay any corporation tax for three years after

they get into operation, as long as we allow all these depreciation

allowances, then there's no reason why industry can't make an adequate

expenditure to control pollution. As long as we're able to spend money

in many of the ways we now spend money as a people, as a society, and

as individuals, as individuals, then we have to face up to the fact

that if we want pollution to be controlled and eliminated, we are going

to have to pay for it.

I'm hoping, I'm praying, that this legislation means a change of

direction for British Columbia. I hope it's not just going to be

legislation that's going to be used to determine how much pollution

will be allowed, that it will be legislation directed toward cleaning

up British Columbia from pollution and keeping it that way.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Municipal Matters.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, I wanted to say a few

words on this question, because at one time it was not very fashionable

to talk about environment, it certainly wasn't very fashionable to talk

about pollution control, it wasn't very fashionable to talk about

pollution control in British Columbia. I'm going to take your minds

back to the first time that pollution control was injected into the

political life of British Columbia, because, Mr. Speaker, I sat in this

Legislature, along with the member for Cowichan-Malahat before 1966,

and if the members who were there, or here, can recall any subject that

was less discussed in this Legislature prior to 1966 I would like to

know what it was.

AN HON. MEMBER: Speak for yourself now, speak for yourself.

[ Page 723 ]

MR. CAMPBELL: No, I'll have something to say about you, too,

my friend before I'm finished. But in 1966, Mr. Speaker, at the initial

meeting of a Provincial election campaign in a place called Campbell

River, this Government nailed a flag to the mast when no one else was

nailing that flag. In that opening of that election campaign in

Campbell River, the Premier made it very clear that in the decade of

the latter part of the 60's, first of all, the machinery for pollution

control would have to be put together — and I'm going to have something

to say about that — and that by the year 1970 the number one issue, or

one of the number one issues in British Columbia, as it would be across

the nation, would be the issue of clean air, pure water, and clean

soil. Those were stated, those were stated as fundamental objectives of

this Government in 1966. You can talk about the statements made, you

can talk about the statements that have been made by the

Johnny-come-latelys across the way.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Ohhhhhh!

MR. CAMPBELL: …or, Mr. Speaker, you can talk about the

statements now made by the President of the United States in 1970, but

the first place where the issue of pollution and environmental

management was issued, was on the floor of this Legislature immediately

following that statement which was the opening statement of the 1966

election campaign.

You know, Mr. Speaker, it is kind of interesting to have the

interruptions by the member opposite from Vancouver East, because I

remember as we were bringing together this budget, and I introduced

into this Legislature the proposition that there had to be a

fundamental local structure on which environmental management would

rest in this Province, and in those days the old question of planning —

it was planning this, and planning that — was the order of the day. I

introduced in the Municipal Act and also placed in the Estimates the

issue of environmental management, and I think the member who is

laughing now was laughing then, he was laughing then, you'd better

believe it, because, Mr. Speaker, at that time he had no more concept

of over-all environmental management than he had of putting a man on

the moon, because he ridiculed the concept of environmental management.

He suggested that this Government was playing with words and now, if

you recall the debates in this Session of the Legislature, what was the

great word that was coming out all over the place? Environmental

management here, environmental management there, environmental

management everywhere. Not one word of planning. Where have all the

planners gone, my friend, the super planners, the mini planners, the

maxi planners — they have all evaporated like the summer dew.

AN HON. MEMBER: Words, just words.

MR. CAMPBELL: And you know, we are talking about

environmental management and I am going to tell you, my friend, what it

means because you are going to listen for a change because it's been

yak, yak, yak, from that side of the House and do, do nothing.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I am going to take objection to several things

here this afternoon, and the first thing I'm going to take objection

to, I had the experience just about three weeks ago to have brought

over a group of school students — they weren't from my area but they

were from a particular part of British Columbia which for now will go

unnamed — but they were a group of 35 children. I hadn't said anything yet,

but I suggested that they toss their questions to me if they would

like, and they were accompanied by a school teacher.

Mr. Speaker, after I had finished that conversation I was certainly

very depressed about the kind of approach that is being produced

throughout our school system on issues such as pollution and issues

such as environmental management. I had the first indication of this

not too long ago when I got a standard form letter, in this case from

one of the parts of my constituency, namely Port Hardy, and here we had

a group of Grade 3 students, 35 in all, signing what was a technical

letter on the issue of pollution, a complete and utter disregard for

the whole process of teaching, if I may be inclined to say so, and I am.

But, Mr. Speaker, on this particular day, during this particular

Session of the Legislature, I felt even more depressed about the kind

of teaching performance that is going on in this Province, because the

misuse of the educational process, to leave a climate of depression in

young minds is nothing short of being unethical and, in my view, a

completely intolerable situation in the school system, completely

intolerable. Because, Mr. Speaker, in reference to pollution, before

these youngsters, before these youngsters who are 15 and 16 years of

age had an opportunity to ask me questions about the urban environment

in which they hope some day to live, their particular teacher said,

"These people are depressed." He described them as depressed even

before they opened their mouth, Mr. Speaker, and he said, "These people

look forward to a world which has a pall of gloom surrounding it. There

is no daylight in the minds of these young people."

There is no hope, there is no understanding of the process of

stopping this fundamentally bad business of spending all our time on

the discussion and the definition of a problem, and not at least 50 per

cent of our energy on the definition of a solution. I will tell you,

Mr. Speaker, that in the decade of the 60's, if you want to figure out

why the young people of this country have been up tight about the

environment in which they live, then you don't have to go any further

than this constant parade of problem after problem after problem with

university professors in their ivory towers, with school teachers in

their cubicle classrooms, keeping themselves inside the cubicle and not

going out and saying, this world and the human being and the idea of

humanism is still fundamentally a good way of operating in this world

in which we live.

I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, that in the decade of the 60's, through

the aegis of university professors and school teachers who made it

their business to paint the most horrible type of landscape in the

hearts and in the minds of young people, have done damage which is

going to take, in my opinion, a long time to undo. I say that any

school teacher or university professor who wants to enter the decade of

the 70's and keep talking about problems and not talking about the

day-to-day problems of solving them, is doing exactly zilch, Mr.

Speaker, not only for the environment in which they live, but they are

doing exactly zilch for the young people who are, you make no mistake

about it, Mr. Speaker, the young people of this Province and the young

people of Canada won't listen to that kind of thing.

Mr. Speaker, I don't intend to paint a picture of depression in the

young minds and the young hearts of young people or anyone else, or

anyone else. And if you get a little political comfort, if you find

that there is a little bit of

[ Page 724 ]

political mileage in trying to broadcast that kind of philosophy,

then you go ahead. While you're talking, we'll be solving problems, my

friend.

Now, Mr. Speaker, speaking about the solution of problems because

you saw, Mr. Speaker, a very classic example of some of the ingredients

that will have to go in to this problem of solving problems of our

environment and particularly pollution control as recently as last

week, again, in my own constituency of Comox. I will tell you that kind

of performance will do 5,000 times more for the young people of this

Province and the older adults of this Province than any of the hay-wire

statements that I hear from some of the school teachers who play on the

minds of the three-year olds, well, the Grade 3's, you know what I

meant.

Mr. Speaker, I'll tell you what they did. As a community, as a

community, Comox Valley, they saw that there was a fundamental personal

responsibility on the part of the young, the old, and anyone else in

that community. And Mr. Speaker, what happened there? A community, Mr.

Speaker, mobilized itself, they did not wring their hands and say there

is litter all over the roads, which there was, they did not say that

individuals — and yes, my friend, the litter that was placed there was

placed there by individuals like you and me.

AN HON. MEMBER: I didn't do it. I wasn't even up there.

MR. CAMPBELL: Those people in the Comox Valley gave an

example of one of the fundamental ingredients that has to come into

this question of environmental management, bec