1976 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 31st 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, JUNE 28, 1976

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page

3155 ]

CONTENTS

Routine proceedings

An Act to Provide for the Payment of Local Taxes by the British Columbia Railway

(Bill 86) Mr. Gibson.

Introduction and first reading — 3155

Oral questions

Bell Copper — CAIMAW dispute. Mr. King — 3155

Measures to combat school arson. Mr. Wallace — 3156

Termination of funding to Consumer Action League.

Mr. Gibson — 3156

Control of price increases. Ms. Sanford — 3156

Northern pipeline. Mr. Macdonald — 3156

Funding of Cowichan Valley alternate education school.

Hon. Mr. Gardom answers — 3157

Policy concerning AIB and teachers' salaries. Mrs. Dailly —

Embezzlement by welfare officials. Mr. Wallace — 3158

Motion

Adjournment of the House to discuss a matter of public importance.

Mr. Barrett — 3158

Mr. Speaker rules out of order — 3158

Mr. Gibson — 3160

Mr. King — 3160

Mr. Speaker — 3160

Mr. Lea — 3160

Mr. Speaker — 3160

Routine proceedings

Labour Code of British Columbia Amendment Act, 1976 (Bill 77) Second reading.

Mr. King — 3161

Mr. Gibson — 3169

Mr. Wallace — 3174

Mr. Hewitt — 3178

Ms. Brown — 3180

Appendix — 3186

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

MR. D. BARRETT (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I'd like to introduce two guests in the House today — one a working guest and the other a guest guest.

The working guest is a cub reporter with the London Times and a

former member of this Legislature, now reporting in London as

Agent-General and serving the people of British Columbia as he has done

for many, many years — Mr. Bob Strachan, who is in the press gallery.

Mr. Strachan is accompanied by his wife, who is sitting in the members'

gallery. We wish them a pleasant visit to British Columbia and we wish

them God-speed on their return to London in continuing their good work

for the people of British Columbia in that capacity.

MR. W. DAVIDSON (Delta): It is also my pleasure this

afternoon to introduce a friend of mine of some long standing, a

gentleman who is now a commissioner with the B.C. Forensic Commission

and for several years an officer with the Vancouver police force. In

fact, Mr. Speaker, had it not been for the cooperation and assistance

of this gentleman, many individuals like myself would never have been

able to have the opportunity to finish our university training. I would

ask the House to join me in welcoming former staff inspector, Mr. Dan

Brown, this afternoon.

HON. J.A. NIELSEN (Minister of Environment): Mr. Speaker, I'd

like to welcome three constituents from the constituency of Richmond to

the House today, Mr. and Mrs. Pirzek and their son Frank.

MR. S. BAWLF (Victoria): Mr. Speaker, I would like the House

to join me in welcoming Mr. Brian Small, manager of the Victoria

Chamber of Commerce, who's worked long and hard for this community and

indeed for the betterment of British Columbia as a whole.

Introduction of bills

AN ACT TO PROVIDE FOR THE PAYMENT

OF LOCAL TAXES BY THE

BRITISH COLUMBIA RAILWAY

On a motion by Mr. Gibson, Bill 86,

An Act to Provide for the Payment of Local

Taxes by the British Columbia Railway, introduced, read a first time and ordered

to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of

the House after today.

Presenting reports

HON. H.A. CURTIS (Minister of Municipal Affairs): Mr.

Speaker, I have the honour to present the report of the Department of

Housing — the second annual report for the year ending December

31, 1975. In so doing, may I explain to the House, through you, Mr.

Speaker, that this is a typewritten copy. The final printed form from

the Queen's Printer is not yet available; however, I did want to table

the report at the earliest time.

Oral questions

BELL COPPER-CAIMAW DISPUTE

MR. W.S. KING (Revelstoke-Slocan): Mr. Speaker, last week I

asked the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) whether or not he was

planning any intervention into the long-term dispute at Granisle

between Bell Copper and the CAIMAW union. The minister indicated that a

mediation officer had been appointed and that he was awaiting his

report. I wonder if the minister can now inform the House whether or

not he has that report and, if so, what precise intervention he plans

to bring this long-standing dispute to resolution.

HON. L.A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, to the

member, I do not have the report. I was advised by Associate Deputy

Minister Ken Smith that the report will be in my hands today. As soon

as I have that report, I will be discussing it with the associate

deputy minister and the mediation officer to determine what initiatives

may be taken.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the minister if he plans,

when receiving the report and discussing it with his officials...will

the minister be in contact with the union and with the management group

at Bell Copper to solicit their cooperation in a mechanism for bringing

about a final resolution?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, that will depend upon the

nature of the report. If the report indicates that that will be

advantageous, I will do so immediately.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, since this is a most serious dispute

which is having a profound economic impact on the community, I wonder

if the minister would undertake to report back to the House after he

has had an opportunity to receive the report from the mediation officer

and discuss the dispute with his departmental officials.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Yes.

[ Page 3156 ]

MEASURES TO COMBAT SCHOOL ARSON

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, this is a question

to the Minister of Education with regard to the continuing series of

fires in school buildings, and particularly the fact that in a space of

six days in fires at Surrey, Brentwood and Armstrong, total damage of $

1.1 million was inflicted by these fires. In view of the minister's

stated awareness of the serious problem during his estimates debate,

can I ask the minister if he has held any discussions with the school

trustees association since the debate on his estimates to initiate such

measures as resident caretakers on school sites?

HON. P.L. McGEER (Minister of Education): No, Mr. Speaker.

MR. WALLACE: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: since reports of

these fires frequently state that arson is suspected if not proven, and

in view of the increasing frequency of these expensive fires, does the

minister have any specific measures in mind, particularly for the

months of July and August when school buildings will be closed and

under even less supervision than usual?

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, traditionally the summer months

have not been times of difficulty with regard to the school fire

problem, but we will be meeting with the trustees over the summer to

develop, hopefully, better policies with respect to fire insurance and

the arson problem in schools. With respect to these three fires, I

haven't got reports yet to know whether arson is suspected in these

cases or not.

MR. WALLACE: A final supplementary: has the minister

responded to the request of the Richmond School Board, who recently had

a very expensive fire, in order to make it possible for them to finance

the rebuilding of the school with fire-resistant materials?

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, there's a finance formula for

the reconstruction of schools which apportions according to the cost to

the school district — the mill rate that the department will pay versus

the mill rate that's paid at the local level. We haven't suggested a

change in that formula, but I'll take the question as notice and find

out the specific details of any discussions that have taken place on

this particular subject.

TERMINATION OF FUNDING

TO CONSUMER ACTION LEAGUE

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, a question to the genial Minister of

Consumer Services, who is sporting such a splendid weekend suntan.

When the minister announced the Consumer Protection Act, he gave

special thanks to three people who had made a detailed, independent

study of prepaid contracts for his department. In view of the fact that

one of these individuals was Shelley Rivkin, president of the Consumer

Action League, will the minister reconsider the termination of funding

to that organization considering their valuation contribution to his

department?

HON. K.R. MAIR (Minister of Consumer Services): There is no

thought at this time, Mr. Speaker, to reconsidering any of the grants

made in the past year or any of the grants that were not made.

MR. KING: A neat way of saying thanks.

CONTROL OF PRICE INCREASES

MS. K.E. SANFORD (Comox): My question is to the Premier. Last

week on CBC "Hourglass" the Premier stressed that the government now

has the legal right to control prices in the province. Today we see the

latest price increase. It is in the cost of bread. When does the

Premier intend to use his legal right to control prices in order to

protect the public?

HON. W.R. BENNETT (Premier): Mr. Speaker, through you to the

member for Comox, I'll be in consultation with the Minister of Consumer

Services (Hon. Mr. Mair) and his staff who are monitoring prices. Such

recommendations as they and the people in the field may make, the

government will respond to.

MS. SANFORD: A supplementary. I am wondering, does the

Premier consider it more essential to abolish the mining company taxes

rather than protect the public?

MR. G.R. LEA (Prince Rupert): No answer?

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): No answer.

NORTHERN PIPELINE

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, to the Premier. Did the Premier

discuss with Governor Dan Evans of Washington the proposal of Trans

Mountain Pipe Line to build a pipeline across northern B.C. from the

Kitimat-Rupert area to Edmonton for about 500,000 barrels of oil a day

from Alaska, and did the Governor of Washington point out that that

would kill his plans for a multipurpose port at Port Angeles and mean

that supertankers up to 165,000 tons would come past Victoria into the

Strait of Georgia

[ Page 3157 ]

to Ferndale?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, as already reported to this

House — and I don't know if the first member for Vancouver East was

absent then — this subject was discussed at the meeting between the

Governor of Alaska (Jay Hammond), the Governor of Oregon (Robert

Straub) and the Governor of Washington (Dan Evans). It was one of

several items on an agenda, In a busy agenda at a first meeting in

which the Alcan proposal — or the gas pipeline from Alaska using

existing corridors through the Yukon and British Columbia — was the

main topic, it received no more than attention for further study. The

proposal was already under study in British Columbia both by the energy

board and by the departments in government as just another thing

government must look at.

MR. MACDONALD: To the Premier. Did not the Governor of

Washington express opposition to this proposed oil pipeline for the

reasons I have given and has not the government of British Columbia —

or have they — expressed support for that proposal?

HON. MR. BENNETT: The answer to the first part of your

question is no and the answer to the second

part is that British

Columbia has a neutral position until such a time as all the studies

are completed.

MR. MACDONALD: Does the Minister of Transport and

Communications (Hon. Mr. Davis) who has indicated approval of this,

speak for the government or not?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, it's under active

consideration by more than one department. Till such a time as it has

been reviewed and either approved or disapproved by any of the cabinet

committees, such proposals are speculative. But it's within the

possibility that any minister concerned about British Columbia could

speak out positively on the aspects that will help to create employment

in this province.

MR. MACDONALD: A supplementary. Does the Premier understand

that if this pipeline goes across the north it will mean that big

tankers will come into Ferndale right past Victoria? Has that factor

been taken into account?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, I have already told the member

that the B.C. Energy Commission, the B.C. Petroleum Corp. and various

government departments are studying it. We certainly don't want. the

type of off-the-top-of-the-head opinions or suggestions that come from

some members.

FUNDING OF COWICHAN VALLEY

ALTERNATE EDUCATION SCHOOL

HON. G.B. GARDOM (Attorney-General): Some days ago, Mr.

Speaker, the member for Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) raised a

question concerning the funding of the Cowichan Valley alternative

education school. I have received the following information from my

officials that the transition has taken place concerning the funding of

the programme between this department and the department of my

colleague, the Minister of Human Resources. Last year this department

funded the school to the extent of $15,000, and this year the

Department of Human Resources is picking up $10,000 and the $5,000 will

be the responsibility of this department.

MR. LEA: So it's down.

POLICY CONCERNING AIB

AND TEACHERS' SALARIES

MRS. E.E. DAILLY (Burnaby North): To the Minister of

Education. In view of the government's commitment to the retroactivity

policy of the AIB, and in view of the great uncertainty which the

school boards and the teachers of this province are in with reference

to their salary agreements, would the minister tell the House what your

policy is re the status of the teachers' and school boards' salary

agreements as they stand now?

HON. MR. McGEER: The policy of the government, Mr. Speaker, is that everybody is in the same boat with regard to wage-and-price guidelines....

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The hon. minister has the floor in reply to a question.

HON. MR. McGEER: Does he wish the reply, Mr. Speaker?

Therefore, the school boards, if they choose, have the right to refer

any settlements to the Anti-Inflation Board, and then it's up to the

Anti-Inflation Board to make whatever decision it feels is appropriate.

MRS. DAILLY: Is the minister, then, saying it's optional —

that the school boards can leave their salaries as they are, or not? I

gather that from your words. You said it's up to the school board, that

you're not taking any position on this at all. You're leaving it to the

school boards. It's optional whether they wish to refer it or not.

[ Page 3158 ]

HON. MR. McGEER: The Department of Education will not be referring the settlements. The school boards individually will be, Mr. Speaker.

EMBEZZLEMENT BY WELFARE OFFICIALS

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Human Resources:

in view of the investigation which has been reported to be taking place

at the New Westminster welfare office with regard to the misuse of

funds by staff — in one case an employee is reported to have

fraudulently obtained $40,000 — can the minister tell the House when

the investigation will be completed and if there is any evidence to

justify an immediate review of the business and accounting procedures

for all of the welfare offices across the province?

HON. W.N. VANDER ZALM (Minister of Human Resources): Mr.

Speaker, to the hon. member, I imagine that we should know something

within the next several days. Certainly within the next 10 days, we

hope to have all of the information complete. I would like to advise

the member also that one of the first things we did when we became

government was to establish an audit team. We in fact now have three

members and hope to have three more shortly who will be visiting all of

the offices throughout the province to assure that the procedures used

are accurate and that in fact such situations as appear to have

occurred in New Westminster will not be happening or be allowed to

happen elsewhere in the province.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, while I appreciate that answer, I

just wonder if the minister is in a position to tell the House and the

people of the province what total amount of money is involved in this

fraud and whether, in fact, criminal charges are in the process of

being laid against members of the staff at New Westminster.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, the investigation is not

complete so I can't provide that information. It's presently in the

hands of the Attorney-General and the police department in New

Westminster.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to move adjournment of

the House for a discussion of a definite matter of urgent public

importance, The matter is the release of information by the Minister of

Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) that ICBC now has a multi-million dollar

surplus at hand, proving that exorbitant rate increases were

unnecessary.

In view of the high unemployment rate and the depressed state of the

economy in general, these facts call for immediate refunds of the

excess premiums in order to stimulate the economy and alleviate the

hardship being caused by this government's policy.

The wording of the motion, Mr. Speaker, is that this House urge the

government to refund immediately the excess premiums charged to the

motorists of British Columbia resulting in a multi-million dollar

surplus to ICBC.

Mr. Speaker, in your ruling I would ask you to consider the

statements made by some leading British Columbians, including Mr.

Chunky Woodward, the head of the Woodward's Stores, who pointed out

recently that retail business in British Columbia is flat. "The feeling

is we won't come out of the slump in 1976, " he said. "The ICBC

increase in auto insurance premiums..."

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, Hon. Member.

MR. BARRETT: I'm relating information, Mr. Speaker, to point

out the urgency of the matter. Mr. Woodward says: "...and retail

sales tax to 7 per cent, as well as the ICBC rates."

Mr. Speaker, the urgency is related also to the fact that there is a

high number of unemployed in British Columbia. There is a method of

direct government alleviation, and that is why it's necessary for an

emergency debate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Order!

MR. BARRETT: ...as well as the tourist industry on Vancouver Island. I ask you to consider those reasons.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, In dealing with the motion placed

under standing order 35 by the hon. Leader of the Opposition, there are

a number of points before the motion qualifies on a matter of urgent

public importance. A number of these are outlined in standing order 35

and in the subsections contained therein. So in the initial instance it

is a decision for the Speaker to determine whether the request

qualifies on the basis of urgent public importance, I must say to the

hon. Leader of the Opposition that in looking at the motion I would

bring to the attention of the hon. members the following facts.

First of all, in order to qualify, the motion must be raised at the

earliest opportunity. I would say to the hon. members that this

certainly is not the earliest opportunity inasmuch as the matter of

ICBC rates has been discussed in question period by the hon. Minister

of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer), who is responsible for ICBC. He has

pointed out to the members of the House the fact that it is possible

there will be a savings or a reduction — there is a reduction, I

believe he said, in the number of claims — which may result in a

reduction in premium rates.

[ Page 3159 ]

But I would say to the hon. members that, first of all, the matter

has not been raised at the earliest opportunity, and in that respect it

fails on the grounds of immediate urgency.

Another fact that I would bring to your attention...I am quoting now

from Sir Erkine May, page 370: "A motion is not acceptable if it is one

involving hypothetical circumstances." Certainly it is hypothetical at

this time for anyone to try to determine what will be the results of

the current year's operation in ICBC.

Another point I would like to raise is the fact that the motion has

failed when facts are in dispute or before they are available. It is

certainly clear to me, as it must be to all of the members of the

House, that, part way through the current year in the operation, to

allow the motion would be to deal with the matter before the facts are

available. Having looked at the motion, I must now say to the hon.

Leader of the Opposition that in those three points alone, Hon. Member,

without taking anything further than that into consideration, the

motion does not meet the requirements of standing order 35 and

therefore is not in order.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, if I may point out to you on your three points, the information is new — it is new information.

Interjection.

MR. BARRETT: It is new information. Secondly...

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. BARRETT: ...because it is not hypothetical, the facts were given as new information.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. Member....

MR. BARRETT: The facts are not in dispute,

Interjections.

MR, BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, if I may have order, please.

Interjections.

[Mr. Speaker rises.]

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. Leader of the Opposition, the hon. member

well knows it is the position of the Speaker to determine whether the

motion meets the test of urgency under standing order 35. It is not

then a matter of debate; it's a matter of whether it has met the test

or not. I have indicated to you why your motion does not meet the test

of urgency; I therefore must rule that the motion is out of order on

the basis of the points I have made.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, with respect to your ruling, which

I accept, I find it difficult to accept reasons that are based on

government statements rather than on Sir Erskine May. However, if that

is your ruling, based on government statements, then I must challenge

your ruling.

MR. SPEAKER: There's no challenge, Hon. Member.

MR. BARRETT: Why?

MR. SPEAKER: Well, it's a matter of whether it is...

MR. BARRETT: You have ruled it out of order.

MR. SPEAKER: ...in order or out of order.

MR. BARRETT: It is a challenge of a ruling. Surely to goodness you can challenge a ruling.

MR. SPEAKER: It's a ruling that I must make, an opinion that I must deliver to the House...

MR. BARRETT: Right!

MR. SPEAKER: ...based upon the evidence that's before me, Hon.

Member. And it has been held not only in this session but in many

previous sessions, and it is not a subject of debate...

MR. BARRETT: Any ruling is challengeable.

MR. SPEAKER: ...or it's not a subject of challenge.

Interjections.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I'd like to know....

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

[Mr. Speaker rises.]

MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. Leader of the

[ Page 3160 ]

Opposition would care to check the records of the House, you will

find that not only in this session but in a number of previous sessions

the Journals of the House will show, both in this session and in previous sessions, that what I have said is correct.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I could bring to your attention, sir, the completely faulty premise based on statements....

[Mr. Speaker rises.]

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Would all of the members please take their seats?

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: It is not the intention of the Speaker to allow

any of the members of the House to engage in a debate on the issue. I

have given the opinion of the Chair as to whether the motion was in

order or out of order. It is not in order according to our rules under

standing order 35, so there's no further debate, hon. members.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

MR. BARRETT: I accept the ruling, Mr. Speaker. I now ask unanimous leave to allow the motion to be debated.

MR. SPEAKER: This is a proper procedure....

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! It is a proper procedure on behalf of the hon. Leader of the Opposition to ask unanimous leave for debate.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

AN HON. MEMBER: Afraid, eh?

MR. KING: They're afraid of the debate.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Leave not granted.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I could just have a

point of clarification on the ruling. I understood Your Honour to say,

first of all, that this was not at the earliest possible moment and

then, secondly, to say it was hypothetical. I'd just like to

understand: is it too early or too late? (Laughter.)

MR. KING: Point of order, Mr. Speaker: in your ruling you

indicated that it was the Speaker's discretion to determine whether or

not an emergency existed, and I appreciate that. But in coming to that

decision, the Leader of the Opposition asked you to quote the

authority. I quote to you, sir, rule 9 in standing orders which

requires, in my view, that in explaining a point of order or a practice

the Speaker shall state the standing order or authority applicable to

the case. I would appreciate the precise authority that the Speaker

used for rendering his decision, because this matter has arisen a

number of other times and I'd like to understand the procedure.

MR. SPEAKER: It's a matter of quoting the authority, and I'll

refer you to Sir Erskine May, the 16th edition, page 370: the matter

must be definite — and it goes down and lists a number of subheadings

down the full page....

AN HON. MEMBER: What page was that?

MR. SPEAKER: It's 370, Hon. Member...which I quoted from in making my decision.

MR. BARRETT: A $100 ripoff.

MR. LEA: Mr. Speaker, on a further matter of clarification:

as you so rightly pointed out, this isn't a matter for debate once you

have ruled, but I don't think there's any human being that cannot make

a mistake, and if you have made an honest error in coming to your

decision, and a member of the House can point that out, are you saying

that you do not want to hear about your honest error which could have

been made? Is this what you are saying?

MR. SPEAKER: No. I'm saying that I made my ruling based on the rules of the House and Sir Erskine May, page 370, Hon. Member.

MR. LEA: Mr. Speaker, I suggest to you that you made your

decision quoting from ministers and from government. That's what you

did. You said: "I will not allow this debate, because ministers have

said it's not necessary." That's what you said — "not necessary" by the

government. I just wanted to

[ Page 3161 ]

remind....

[Mr. Speaker rises.]

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

Orders of the day

HON. G.B. GARDOM (Attorney-General): By leave, Mr. Speaker, public bills and orders.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 77, Mr. Speaker.

LABOUR CODE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

AMENDMENT ACT, 1976

(continued)

MR. W.S. KING (Revelstoke-Slocan): I want to first of all,

Mr. Speaker, extend my thanks to the government for allowing the

weekend to study this bill, because it is a major and important

departure from the established policy of the Labour Code of British

Columbia. I appreciate being granted the extra couple of days to study

the bill and find out precisely what it does in terms of amending the

Labour Code of British Columbia.

Mr. Speaker, I find in this statute a major change, a major shift

away from the industrial relations policy which was contained in the

Labour Code of British Columbia as introduced by the New Democratic

Party government in 1973. I find two particular areas that are, in my

view, of great significance. One is the amendment which has the effect

of more precisely regulating the "hot" declaration which is used by

trade unions usually for the purpose of organizational activities.

Secondly, and I think perhaps the most profound, is the introduction

of an extended cooling-off period by amending

section 73 of the Labour

Code, and the arbitrary authority which the government is taking to

designate essential services in the province of British Columbia in a

holus-bolus way, in an open-handed way without respect to any

particular industry or any particular function.

Thirdly, and no less serious, is the introduction once again of government

supervision over the strike vote and indeed the lockout vote in industrial relations.

Mr. Speaker, we live in a time when almost any Act or enactment

which is seen as diminishing labour's strength is gleefully welcomed by

a large segment of society. The government has been urged by a number

of backbenchers, during the course of debates this year, to present the

kind of legislation we have before us now. The member for Dewdney (Mr.

Mussallem) and the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf) have openly worried

about high labour costs, apparently having forgotten that the other

side of the high-labour-cost coin is the ability of ordinary people to

afford the costs of goods and services.

Other members have urged that all transportation, and perhaps even

the forest industry, should be embraced in the essential-services

doctrine. There is an immediate and a simplistic appeal to this kind of

legislation, an appeal to the voter and hence to ever-pragmatic

politicians who, since they can be persuaded to adopt whole new

political philosophies in return for gaining power, can not

realistically be expected to resist the appeal of simplistic solutions

to industrial relations problems.

The people of B.C. deserve better, Mr. Speaker. At a minimum they

deserve legislation that is based upon an understanding or at least an

effort to understand the uniqueness of the B.C. labour relations scene.

It's easy enough to observe that the labour in B.C. is more militant

than it is anywhere else in North America and to wish, if one is so

inclined, that it would cease to be so. Designing legislation to

produce that alter reality is quite another matter, however.

It is said that a U.S. legislator in the last-century discovered

that his children were having trouble memorizing the value of pi to the

required number of decimal points. So he introduced a bill to reduce

that value to three even. The drafters of the legislation before us

share that touching faith in the limitless capacity of law to solve

every problem.

I represent Revelstoke-Slocan, Mr. Speaker, a mountainous

constituency in a mountainous province. I suppose that there are some

who wish that weren't so — that the mountains weren't there. Life, in

many respects, would be more simple — no avalanches, straight and

inexpensive highways and so on. But no one proposes legislation

declaring that henceforth B.C. shall be flat. I've often wondered, I

might add, if the Flat Earth Society doesn't have a major following in

the government benches.

In just such an elemental fashion the working people in B.C. are

militant. They're aggressive. They're not easily tamed to the

requirements of employers or legislators. That has been proved often

enough. Bill 33 stood on British Columbia law books for five years — a

vote-getter for its drafters, a permanent stain on the law and

lawmakers. For five years in this province trade unionists competed to

see who could defy that law most flamboyantly. In the offices of trade

unions, injunctions given under that law were measured by the depth of

the pile. Why did the law fail to change the reality?

Why is it that British Columbia employers and governments look so

wistfully at the relatively placid labour scene elsewhere? The seeds

for the chaotic

[ Page 3162 ]

labour scene with which we have had to live many decades, under all

manner of labour legislation, were planted in the last decades of the 19th century.

Unlike the settlers who came to farm the prairies or to work with

the farmer, people came to B.C. to work in the mines and in the

forests. In many cases they brought with them the traditions of British

and European trade unionism — traditions which were badly needed. They

came to work in the mines and forests and ships and railroads in

British Columbia — occupations which make even a violent picket line

seem a comfortable and easygoing place. Men lived in camps which

provided an easy environment for the growth of tough trade unionism. In

contrast with the farmhand who worked alongside his employer in the

same environment, the B.C. Industrial worker worked and sweated for

distant capitalists in far-off executive offices.

The working people of British Columbia, Mr. Speaker, are in the most

profound sense law-abiding. CLEU, the Co-ordinated Law Enforcement

unit, investigated organizations of this province and in their report

described the trade union movement as whistle-clean. Mr. Speaker, I'd

like to quote from an

article that appeared in the Victoria Colonist on

March 21 of this year and the headline states: "B.C. Labour Looks Clean

as a Whistle." Mr. Speaker, I read the following excerpts into the

record of the House:

"The B.C. labour movement has come out clean as a

whistle from a provincial investigation of its activities. 'The honesty

of B.C. labour unions provides us with the relief in our tale of

racketeering. Although this province has the highest proportion of

organization within the work force, it does not have the relationship

between unions and organized crime that exists in some parts of the

United States, Quebec and Ontario,' the report concludes.

"According to the report B.C. unions have a

sophisticated membership aware of issues and participating in the

elections to a greater degree than elsewhere. This prevents criminal

elements from establishing ties with the unions.

"Recently the trend has been for labour to take

complete responsibility for management of pension funds, but this in no

way suggests the lowering of their standards of integrity."

Mr. Speaker, the reason I read that report into the record of this

House was because, as the report states, it provides stark relief from

the organized crime relationship with the trade union movement which

has been unearthed in other provinces and other jurisdictions — not

only with respect to the trade union movement, Mr. Speaker, but with

respect to industries on a broad scale and on a far-reaching basis,

vis-a-vis the construction industry and many others.

I want to quote from that report and place on the record of this

House the findings of a judicial agency of this government that

conducted perhaps the most far-reaching investigation into labour

relations and trade unions in this province that has been undertaken in

recent times.

As a matter of record they are the findings and I think they're

extremely healthy. I think they are findings that the Minister of

Labour should have been extremely proud of. I think they are findings

and facts that the Minister of Labour should have used in resisting the

right-wing calls of some government backbenchers and his cabinet

colleagues to resist yet more restrictive intervention in the affairs

of trade unions.

Instead of drafting laws which presume guilt on the part of B.C.

working people, the Minister of Labour should have been praising them

for passing the closest legal scrutiny with flying colours. The loggers

and the miners and the railway workers, et cetera, of this province

have whistle-clean unions, possibly because they will not tolerate

anything less. That same spirit ensures the futility of bad,

politically motivated laws. Surely it goes without saying that a new

initiative by the government to regulate and interfere and intercede in

the strike vote that takes place within trade unions is notice. It's

public notice that the minister and his government do not trust the

trade union movement to conduct their affairs in an open and honest and

law-abiding way. Mr. Speaker, I say that flies completely in the face

of the report of the Co-ordinated Law Enforcement Unit, in terms of

their finding on the trade union movement just this year.

Bill 33 passed by the former Socred government was an affront to

law, lawmakers and the courts, because like the measure which is set to

change the radii between the radius and the circumference of a circle,

it was factional. It was a law motivated exclusively by the meanest of

political impulses, I submit, Mr. Speaker.

We had laws in this province up to the 40s which abused the oriental

population of this province, laws which were opposed by the CCF party

in that day. Those laws, Mr. Speaker, were not introduced or passed or

defended because any lawmaker thought they were just — not at all. The

lawmakers of that era thought they would serve to help solve a problem.

They were introduced by totally cynical governments seeking to exploit

a then popular anti-oriental sentiment. They were politically motivated

laws rather than laws brought before this Legislature for the purpose

of solving a problem.

Why did that sentiment exist in that era? Because of the need in

times of economic stress to have a scapegoat? The real problems of the

day — unemployment, labour strife, low wages, et cetera — were

difficult to deal with in any general way. If a

[ Page 3163 ]

government set up genuinely to solve the problems they could not

expect miraculous overnight results. Worse, a genuine approach to the

problem would have offended friends of the governments of the day — the

Dunsmuirs, the Robsons and the rest of those millionaires. What does a

totally cynical government do when faced with such a situation? It

identifies a scapegoat, Mr. Speaker — an object of the popular

discrimination — and passes laws against that scapegoat. In earlier

times it was the orientals. Today it's the trade unions.

These laws, of course, do nothing to solve problems, but that

doesn't matter. The resentment of the population is diverted from the

cabinet and its friends. It fixes on the object of discrimination and

that satisfies the objects of such a government. It keeps men in power.

Feeding prejudice is the easiest way to get votes and affords a single

response to any grievance. Is it the orientals again? Why, no, it's

organized labour again.

The Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) understands

that process, Mr. Speaker, and he understands it in spades. He's got a

political expedient in the current prejudice against welfare

recipients. He earns $44,000 a year from the treasury by exploiting and

feeding on prejudice against people who get $3,000 or $4,000 from the

same public purse.

The Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom), asked about support of legal

aid, replied: "Well, we're not sure we should be assisting these kinds

of people." These kinds of people — think about that. In order to

ensure that the message gets across, the Attorney-General even adopts

Bunkeresque language, not the diction that he learned in private school.

The Minister of Labour now has his political expedient, which is the

current unpopularity of organized labour. CLEU issues a report

pronouncing B.C. labour clean as a whistle. The minister passes a law

calling for supervised strike votes, citing vague, unidentified

rumours. Not one tangible shred of evidence is presented to this House

that there's been abuse but only vague whispers to justify this kind of

intervention into a free democratic institution in our province.

Mr. Speaker, it's the trade unions today — who will it be tomorrow?

What about the churches? They're a free democratic institution. I'm

sure there are many organizations in society that could use a greater

degree of democratization. But I say to you, Mr. Speaker, it's a

dangerous precedent and a dangerous intervention and a scandalous one

when the government decides that they must intercede to regulate the

internal affairs of private organizations.

A genuine Minister of Labour would, in my view, Mr. Speaker, be

proud of a report such as CLEU brought down in this province. He'd

speak of it often and act upon its premises. I venture to say that both

that minister and the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) would be mightily relieved to get such a CLEU report on the

Socred Party and its candidates. I challenge that government, Mr.

Speaker, to submit the conduct and the democracy of the Social Credit

League of British Columbia and all its constituency affiliates to a

searching study of the Co-ordinated Law Enforcement Unit and to come

out with a record stating that their hands are as clean as a whistle,

like organized labour did in this province. That minister sits there in

a sanctimonious way presuming to intervene and capitalize on popular

sentiment when there is no evidence and no justification for such an

intervention.

The minister must try to keep that report quiet and pass laws

impugning the honesty of labour in order to get the most he can from

his political expedient. It's rough for this minister because he has to

share his expedient with the Premier, Mr. Speaker. The Premier has an

income of about $150,000 a year and makes a third of it by talking

about the greed of people who have to earn between $10,000 and $15,000

a year.

No serious observer of public affairs from any political philosophy

can suggest any serious purpose in these postures — these laws — except

to exploit and feed on prejudice. The laws that the Minister of Labour

has brought before this House will increase strife. Ask any serious

practitioner of labour relations in this province, from either

management or labour, what contribution will be made by supervising

strike votes.

I defy the Minister of Labour to come up with one notable expert in

industrial relations who will support this kind of intrusion. Would

Bert Blair do it? Would Judge McTaggart? Would Judge Hank Hutcheon?

Would Mr. Clive McKee? All of these people are the topnotch industrial

relations experts in this province. I venture to say that there would

not be one vestige of support from any of those sources for this kind

of intrusion.

There is an underlying cause of industrial relations chaos in this

province. We have tough, determined trade unionists who have been

taught over the decades that greed is the operative principle of this

society. "To each his own, and the devil take the hindmost" — that's

what P.A. Gaglardi said when he was a minister of the Crown. It's

little wonder that the trade unions have adopted that philosophy! That

approach reduces our society to a dog-eat-dog fight. Working people

don't like that, because even under good, impartial laws they tend to

lose dogfights, Mr. Speaker.

Beyond that, it is fundamentally in opposition to the philosophy of

trade unions which depend upon cooperation in the last analysis. But

they know it's a dogfight. They know that if one dog in a dogfight

fails to fight back, that dog is dead. They know one other fundamental

thing: you can't follow rules in a

[ Page 3164 ]

struggle unless there is a neutral referee to enforce those laws.

Even if you happen to have the very best of rules, which we don't have,

we can't expect people to obey them without confidence in the

availability of a good, impartial referee. Hockey referees sometimes

have to work a game in front of rabid home-team fans. They cannot then

choose to be popular and partisan; they have to have the courage to be

unpopular. As far as the home-town fans are concerned, they can't

afford to cave in — they have to give up refereeing. The Labour

minister of this province lacks the courage to do either, Mr. Speaker.

This government, with Bill 22, Bill 77 and so on, has clearly

advertised that there will be no impartial referee. The man who should

be has just scored half a dozen goals for management. The government

has it political expedient — a vote-getter — and damn industrial

relations! Assurance of an impartial referee is a must in the search

for industrial peace in this province.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. KING: It is gone now irrevocably. That opportunity has

been traded in by the Minister of Labour for a meal ticket. The

government has its scapegoat, and B.C. has built-in, guaranteed

industrial strife.

It's important for the people to learn what has been traded away for

the political advantage of this ex-Liberal minister and his coalition

government of opportunists. We could have moved toward civilization,

away from Gaglardi glorified greed. We have that option.

We could have worked for enlightened management. We could have

worked with a sense of common purpose, human enterprise, toward a sense

of human dilemmas that finally bind us all, away from prejudice and

scapegoating, Mr. Speaker.

We could have been establishing in this House the groundwork for a

society motivated by some better human instinct than greed. That's

gone. Instead we have conflict and confrontation. It was traded by the

earlier B.C. governments for the opportunity to exploit the

anti-oriental feeling of the day. It is being traded in this era by

this government to exploit the same feelings against welfare

recipients, legal-aid recipients and trade unionists.

I ask the people of B.C. to consider a real possibility: suppose you

became the target of tomorrow's Archie Bunker, and that's a distinct

possibility — who will it be tomorrow? And it is an Archie Bunker

philosophy — a scapegoat. There is in our society an urgent need to

move against public injury for private gain. Good workable law to

accomplish that goal must move in an even-handed way against all of the

parties involved in such industry.

When we desperately need hospitals, private capital flows by the

billions into hula-hoops and battery-operated swizzle sticks. Will that

injury to public interest be stopped?

Interjection.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, the natural-resource industries of this province sustain huge salaries.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I need no instruction and no lectures

to understand industrial relations in this province — none whatsoever.

I need no crystal ball or advice to predict that the Minister of Labour

is setting the stage for unprecedented industrial chaos and strife in

this province over the next few years with his simplistic incursions

into the rights of private parties....

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, if that minister were interested in equity....

Interjections.

MR. KING: Listen to them. Not at all, Mr. Speaker; no gas on the fire.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The hon. member for Revelstoke-Slocan has the floor.

MR. KING: I want to point out, Mr. Speaker, that the

opposition in this House has cooperated in a rational way to deal with

disputes that have been before this province over the past months. We

have offered solutions. We have offered ideas for solving the problems.

We have not attempted to capitalize in a cheap political way, as this

legislation presumes to do — not at all.

I have said very often, and I repeat, that industrial relations

should be above the realm of partisan politics because it's a

discipline and an art unto itself.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The hon. member for Revelstoke-Slocan has the floor.

MR. KING: What we have, despite the protestations of the

Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) and those uncomfortable

ministers on the other side, is a red flag contained in this

legislation. I predict that not only the government will rue the day,

but all of the people of the province will rue the day that this

legislation, this statute, was

[ Page 3165 ]

introduced in B.C. It's unnecessary and it solves no problem. It's

an appeal, Mr. Speaker, to hysteria and an appeal to discrimination, a

populous kind of appeal to satisfy the whims of a certain group in

society that that government feels they can capitalize on to maintain

the office which they hold. That's all it is; it's not problem solving.

Mr. Speaker, I suggested that we need many new things. We need new

hospitals. We need a variety of socially oriented policies from this

government, and yet there's no intention, there's no direction to

intervene and direct the expenditure and the priorities of capital in

this province — none at all — but there's an almost hysterical concern

with lost man-days as a result of lockouts and strikes. Now surely if

you want to be even-handed in terms of social priorities and

objectives, the government should be setting some priorities, setting

some policies and some guidelines for investment policy in this

province as well. But no way; that's a taboo because that's the source

from which this party gains its funding and its financial support.

That's taboo because of the free-market system.

I remind the government that every worker in this province is a free

enterpriser with a commodity to sell — his labour — and if we're going

to hold as sacrosanct the investment policies of industry, then I

suggest, Mr. Speaker, there's no basis and no foundation whatsoever for

an incursion into the rights of working people to sell their labour for

what price they feel the market can afford either. I regret that the

government is not prepared to take an overall approach, because I

believe that greed is creeping very seriously into all considerations

in society to an alarming degree.

I think the government should look at natural resource industries in

this province. They should look at the huge salaries that these

resource industries render to their high executives. How can this

government expect workers to accede to restrictive laws, such as the

one before this House at the moment, and at the same time read in the

daily press and hear in the media where MacMillan Bloedel senior

executives last year won a salary increase, Mr. Speaker, of $60,000 — a

one-year increase 10 times the average per capita income in this

province, yielding a salary about 37 times the average per capita

income of most workers? Will we have legislation limiting the awesome

bargaining strength that yielded that result, Mr. Speaker? I witness no

proposition from this government which demands for the public interest

a greater say and a greater control over those boardroom decisions that

set those kinds of executive salaries.

The mining industry, which threatened in 1974 to show them who runs

this province, has just received a multimillion dollar gift from this

government in the abolition of royalties. Indeed, Mr. Speaker, it's

been revealed that the mining industry wrote their own ticket as far as

that legislation was concerned.

There's a shortcoming in the procedures of this parliament. We are

expected to debate each bill separately as though each were isolated

from all the others, and I suggest that is not the case. They're not

isolated from each other. Clearly, this labour legislation is a piece

of a jigsaw puzzle which diminishes the prosperity and the defensive

capacity of working people at every turn, while simultaneously gorging

the wealthy and powerful. All of the economic thrusts of this

government have to be looked at in conjunction with one another.

The minister has mentioned the propane heating industry as an

example of an essential service which might require the cancellation of

the freedom of working people to withdraw their labour. Will this or

some other minister of this government endorse a law prohibiting the

movement of capital away from that same essential service, Mr. Speaker?

He relies completely upon the benevolence and the freedom and the

unequivocal right of capital or industry to determine through their

investment policy whether, indeed, there will be a supply or not,

without any suggestion that there should be government regulation. But

let the workers step out of line and we see the heavy hand of a

government which is going to interfere and roll back the rights that

all citizens hold in this province.

The minister has mentioned that this is one area that could require

the greater and broader arbitrary power that he is taking unto himself.

I say, Mr. Speaker, that yes, we can have emergencies. We can be

confronted with emergencies in any given industry that we might not

anticipate, in the same way, Mr. Speaker, that we can be confronted

with any act of God which precipitates an emergency in this province,

be it

an act of industrial strife, be it a flood, be it a fire — and

that's what this Legislature is for. That's what this forum is for — to

come together as a group of elected members and to identify these

emergencies when they occur and to provide a remedy that's fully

debated and open to public scrutiny, not an arbitrary authority which

is seized on a perpetual basis for the Minister of Labour to activate

at his whim without the benefit of debate to determine even whether or

not a genuine, bona fide emergent situation exists, let alone whether

an equitable resolution is being provided.

That's what's wrong with this legislation, Mr. Speaker: it's

inequitable, it's punitive, and in terms of power — arbitrary power —

it's vesting far, far too much in the hands of the Minister of Labour

and his cabinet colleagues.

That is a serious question, because it happens all the time as far

as capital is concerned — as far as industry directing their capital

elsewhere. It's analogous to a labour dispute where a strike or

[ Page 3166 ]

lockout obtains. It is a serious question. It happens in response to

ads like the one to which I now refer from Puerto Rico which invites

the movement of capital away from the high-labour costs areas to such

limited environments as the Puerto Rico tobacco industry, which pays

the Puerto Rican worker in that industry less than half the U.S.

average.

I refer, Mr. Speaker, to an advertisement in Canadian Manufacturing

on June 12, 1976. It gives the comparative wage rates for Puerto Rican

workers as opposed to workers in the U.S.A.: "In the tobacco industry

in Puerto Rico the average wage is $2.21; in the U.S. It is $4.82; a

net saving on labour costs of $2.61. In the textile products, $2.24 to

the Puerto Rican worker; $3.50 to the U.S. worker, net saving $1.32."

And on and on it goes through printing, publishing, chemicals — and I'm

not going to run down the whole list.

I heard one of the Social Credit backbenchers a few short weeks ago

giving the same kind of analogy. He mentioned the State of Arkansas and

said how they have a competitive advantage over British Columbia in the

forest industry, and he's quite accurate. But I want to ask: is that

the direction of this government? Is that the motivation and the value

which this government and their backbenchers place on lives and the

respectability of working people in this province? They want to

introduce retrograde steps that will reduce working people's status to

that of the southern states, an area that is looked at with scorn from

all over the world in terms of their approach to industrial relations.

Mr. Speaker, I had occasion to attend the IAGLO conference in San

Diego two years ago, and talked to the Secretary of Labour from the

State of Georgia, where the whole debate evolved around whether or not

child labour laws should be introduced in that state. I say, my God! —

with a prehistoric, archaic philosophy such as that, I find it

inappropriate and shocking that a member of the government side should

be drawing comparisons and some reasonable analogy between what is

appropriate for workers in British Columbia and that area of North

America.

If that's the direction, Mr. Speaker, I suggest that we are in for

very serious and severe times in the province of British Columbia over

the next few years.

I'm considering two freedoms, and the advisability of constricting

those two freedoms. One of those freedoms is the freedom to move

oneself around to work for an employer, or when to work for an

employer. The other is the freedom to move capital around — no one owns

his body, his machinery, his money. Surely the former freedom is the

more profound one, the ability to move oneself. Surely, if we face the

need to restructure freedoms in the name of public interest, we would

at the very least move simultaneously with equal force against both of

these freedoms.

I'm trying to make two points. First, the moral one: if freedom is

supposed to be in given up to secure the public interest, then all

sectors in our society must be equally restricted. Secondly, and

probably one which will be more popularly received, is the practical

point: there is a strict logic and momentum in the clash between labour

and management in this province; it stems from the conflict which is so

real and so fundamental that laws which ignore it merely aggravate it.

It stems, as I have often said in this House, from the deepest sources

of human relationship. To ignore that conflict, to minimize it, to

protect the public interest against injury from it requires, above all,

the sense of all participants that there is an even-handed set of rules

and rule-makers which will move in an impartial way against the

transgressors from either side. It is that fundamental, and only that

fundamental, which will take us away from the jungle.

Participants in the struggle are not naive and they are not without

resources. If forced to do so, they will find machinery within the

letter of the law to protect themselves. When a government concedes, as

this one has, to move in every possible way against one participant, to

tax and to legislate, to invoke policies exclusively for the benefit of

one party to a conflict, that government invites the retreat further

into the jungle.

Mr. Speaker, over the past number of years, industrial relations in

this province has been a jungle. If one talks to practitioners, either

trade unionists or bargainers for industry, in their common, everyday

lingo, they refer to it as the jungle. How do you exist and function in

the jungle?

My appeal to the Minister of Labour — despite what has been a rather

hard-hitting presentation because I feel strongly about this — is not

to wave a red flag, not to develop approaches which create greater

approaches and confidence and respect and trust that will move those

parties away from the jungle philosophy.

The minister has talked about the concept of industrial democracy,

worker participation, worker involvement, call it what you will, and

this was a direction which our government was taking, However, that too

is viewed by some as being a simplistic gesture that can be

accomplished overnight, and that's not the case. It's a state of mind

and it's an approach and it's a gradual process which will lead people

away from the harsh confrontation of the bargaining table to a common

understanding that the health of an industry is in the common interest

of not only management, but the workers as well, because the tenure of

their security in terms of employment is tied to that industry.

Certainly in terms of the government and the public interest, the

revenue of the province which enables us to deliver social

[ Page 3167 ]

programmes is inevitably tied to the same process.

I wish, I just wish, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Labour might

have stood back for a period of time rather than capitulating to some

apparently popular but misguided and misunderstood public attitude that

by regulating the strike vote this is going to solve something. It's

going to solve nothing. The former Social Credit government introduced

that provision — supervised strike votes did obtain under the old

Labour Relations Act of the province of British Columbia under the

Social Credit government. It was found to be of no benefit. In fact it

provided obstacles to the success of the collective bargaining system.

It meant that it was a hurdle to be cleared — a supervised strike

vote. As a consequence, trade unions as a matter of course in this

province, before bargaining had got down to the wire where it was

possible to establish whether a strike or lockout would be necessary,

recognized that there was a hurdle to be cleared — a supervised strike

vote. So they hurried the point where they could get to and clear that

hurdle. The supervised strike vote just became a token — a token to be

cleared in the normal course of collective bargaining, the result being

that strike votes were taken in industries where they never would have

occurred — where a bargain settlement was obtainable without the device

of taking the strike vote or a lockout vote.

As a consequence of that understanding, the former Social Credit

government abandoned the supervised strike vote years ago. I find it so

retrogressive and so pathetic that this new coalition government in the

year 1976 is resurrecting a dead issue, an issue abandoned by that old

right-wing Social Credit government of W.A.C. Bennett.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: What are you afraid of?

MR. KING: I'm afraid of economic and industrial-relations

chaos in this province, Mr. Minister. I'm afraid of that, and the

people of this province are too. I think that the government should be.

HON. K.R. MAIR (Minister of Consumer Services): Are you afraid of the secret ballot?

MR. KING: Yes, I am afraid of the secret ballot, and if you

had been listening to what I say you would understand why. I am afraid

because it is a statement that this government does not trust the trade

union movement to regulate their own internal affairs, when CLEU, the

Co-ordinated Law Enforcement Unit of this province, has stated that the

trade union movement is clean as a whistle in terms of any criminal

activity or any shady practices.

I challenge the Minister of Consumer Services to subject his own

political party to that kind of test. I challenge him to do so, Mr.

Speaker, and come up with a clean bill of health like the trade union

movement in this province has done — if not, to subject the Social

Credit Party of British Columbia to government and public scrutiny in

terms of the votes and proceedings that they take at each and all of their constituency and provincial meetings.

HON. MR. MAIR: We'll be glad to have it done.

MR. KING: "Be glad to have it done," indeed! I can think of

a number of your colleagues, Mr. Minister, that would be shaking in

their boots. Shaking in their boots.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, the point is — that is one area — it's

a statement of distrust and mistrust by this government that will

accomplish nothing positive. That's the regrettable part. If the

ministers could describe to me and describe to the public of this

province what benefit supervision of the strike vote is going to

provide, then I would be willing to look at that device. But I

challenge the government to come up with any credible authority

involved in industrial relations that will support this kind of device.

I challenge the government's need to introduce this kind of device

when the trade union's record is so clean and so enviable in terms of

any criminal element. I say to you that rather than accomplish anything

positive, this device is a statement by the government that "we do not

trust the trade union movement; therefore we're going to intervene in

your internal affairs." To make matters worse, Mr. Speaker, to make

matters worse, by changing the definition, as the minister has done in

section 1, he has empowered such intervention in a strike vote by a

trade union to be initiated at the behest of the employer.

Mr. Speaker, when the trade union movement of this province

understand that their internal affairs can now be vetoed, and their

internal decisions can now be vetoed by the employer that they are in

conflict with, I say to you that our opportunity and our hope for any

industrial peace and serenity is extremely seriously impaired over the

next period of time.

I'm going to have a great deal more to say about this bill, Mr.

Speaker, in committee stage. There are provisions in it that I think

would be more appropriately discussed in committee, in precise fashion

and in detailed form.

section 1, Mr. Speaker, the minister changes the designation of

employers by substituting "person." And in

section 4(2), which amends

section 81, he provides that "where, upon the application of a person

directly affected by a strike vote or an

[ Page 3168 ]

impending strike," where, upon the complaint, that strike vote may

be interceded in and vetoed and overruled and regulated by the board.

That says to me that that complaint may come from the employer.

That's what the legislation says and empowers the employer to do. I say

that's extremely regrettable, because it's obviously a device in the

hands of the employers to further delay the process of collective

bargaining which it often benefits and strengthens them to do, as the

minister well knows. I hope that if that is not intended.... Quite

frankly, I hope it is not intended and I hope that the minister will

clean up the drafting in the bill as it's presented to us at the moment.

Mr. Speaker, there are a variety of areas that, as I say, I intend

to discuss in great detail in committee stage. I think the bill is an

unfortunate one as far as the regulation of the hot edict is concerned.

I submit that that's superfluous and redundant anyway. The Labour

Relations Board already had the power and the authority to deal with

any act or conduct which the board concluded upon complaint constituted

a strike action or an interference with trade and commerce. The

minister is spelling it out more precisely. I don't know why, and it

seems to me that the provision is superfluous.

The section, though, that gives to the minister the arbitrary powers

to designate essential services in any area whatsoever and to extend

the cooling-off period to 40 days will not be accepted by the trade

union movement. I suggest that, again, it's a red flag which is only

going to muddy the waters and make it more difficult to enjoy any

reasonable degree of stability in industrial relations in this province.

Before I sit down, Mr. Speaker, I just want to make one last point.

I'm not sure whether the government understands it completely or not.

That is the additional burden and the additional problem which the

Anti-Inflation Board programme has placed upon industrial relations in

this nation.

The Minister of Labour himself, Mr. Speaker, recognized the problem

in an early speech he made in Vancouver where he was critical of the

federal government, but unfortunately somewhere along the line he lost

his objections, and the provincial government has come in with a bill

accepting precisely and exactly the authority which the federal

programme sought over the public sector in B.C. But this programme,

superimposed upon all the intricate problems of industrial relations,

is a third dimension that has not up to this point been evident and

been problematic in the province.

It means, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Labour may appoint an

impartial third party as he did with the railway dispute — with the

non-operating portion of it: the teamsters, the operating engineers and

the maintenance of way employees. He persuades those parties to accept

as binding the report of the industrial inquiry commission or the third

party, whatever he may be, and I think that is fine. I have no

objections to that. They give up something, Mr. Speaker. They give up

their right to strike in return for an impartial third party appraisal

which they accept as binding.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: That's inaccurate.

MR. KING: Well, the minister says it's inaccurate. It may be in some detail, but I think in general terms it's correct.

Interjection.

MR. KING: Well, it should have come from you, Mr. Minister.

You lost the bet and you should have been advocating it, because I

certainly subscribe to that approach and have used it many times. I've

used it many times. Nevertheless the minister has, in other disputes,

certainly publicly asked parties to accept as binding reports of third

parties.

But the other point is, Mr. Speaker, that in this case, an impartial

third party, Owen Shime, a very well-renowned practitioner of

industrial relations from the city of Toronto, I believe, a

well-qualified and well-respected industrial relations practitioner,

brought down an award which was very high — 57 per cent, I believe,

over two years — and the unions thought that they had an agreement, a

valid agreement that was beyond defiance by any party. They had given

up a right to attain that agreement. They had given up their right to

strike only to find that behind that agreement the provincial

government came in and accepted the anti-inflation programme of the

federal government and subjected it retroactively to public sector

disputes which had occurred in this province since October last. This

means, Mr. Speaker, that those three unions on the railway had divested

themselves of their economic power in good faith, believing that the

government and the railway would stand by an agreement which was

arrived at, only to find that now it will be submitted to the

Anti-Inflation Board and probably rolled back.

Interjection.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I believe that those unions would

probably accept that. I believe they would probably accept that if the

provincial government were prepared to apply the same yardstick to

themselves. If the government was prepared to accept the same scrutiny

by the Anti-Inflation Board in terms of the rate increases that they

have visited upon those workers affecting their wage rates, then I

believe there would be a possibility that the unions would be quite

prepared to abide by Anti-Inflation Board scrutiny. But, Mr. Speaker,

under the circumstances it's inevitable that

[ Page 3169 ]

those unions view it as a stab in the back — a stab in the back —

what has happened to them as a result of accepting the minister's

persuasion to voluntarily accept as binding an agreement from a

ministerial appointment in the person of Mr. Owen Shime.

I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that that dimension visited upon

industrial relations in the province bodes ill for the future, because

I want to say to you that no trade unionist in British Columbia, after

seeing the deal that those three unions on B.C. Rail obtained from this

government — the double-cross — will be prepared in the future to

accept....

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: It's not a double-cross at all.

Interjection.

MR. KING: That minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, applied a rule...

Interjection.

[Mr. Veitch in the chair, ]

MR. KING: ...the binding rule and jurisdiction of the

Anti-Inflation Board retroactively to last October. I defy that

minister to stand publicly and say that those unions knew about it.

They say publicly they knew nothing about it. I believe that it was,

indeed, a stab in the back to those unions, Mr. Speaker — a stab in the

back.

What it's going to mean is that this government and the Minister of

Labour have lost the trust of the unions in the future. They are not

going to be prepared to temper their demands in the public interest

when they find that an agreement made is yet subject to some distant

agency in Ottawa — an agency which has the authority to roll back the

provisions of a signed and sealed agreement in the province of British

Columbia, an authority and a power which the provincial government is

not prepared to accept with respect to its own conduct, with respect to

the punitive rate increases that it has visited upon working people

through ICBC, ferry rates, sales tax and so on, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, Hon. Member.

MR. KING: That's the double-cross. That's the double-cross, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon, Member, could we kindly stick to the principles embodied in Bill 77?

MR. KING: That's the point, Mr. Speaker. It's difficult to

find principle in the conduct of this government when they have such

double standards in terms of regulating working people's wages in this

province.

Mr. Speaker, the minister has lost his credibility with the working

people of this province, and I regret it. I regret it because I think

it spells great problems for the future of the province and the public.

The public, who felt they were going to be served by some legislative

remedies, are going to find that the converse is true — that in actual

fact the minister's foolish and arbitrary interventions will only serve

to inflame the industrial relations climate in this province and create

the inevitable consequence of unprecedented economic and industrial

relations conflict in B.C.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, I

have the most profound difficulty with this bill. That difficulty is

not related to the contents, about which I will become more particular

later, but rather because of the lack of balance in the legislation and

the timing of the legislation. The bill is all one way. In every

article, in every clause it reduces the bargaining power of organized

labour in B.C.

I have great respect for the hon. member who just spoke. He has

articulated what I believe to be the feelings of the organized labour

movement in British Columbia with respect to this bill. The

forcefulness with which he has articulated them I fear may be some sort

of a harbinger of the way in which they will be received outside of

this chamber. There is a lack of balance and there is no clear and

present need that I can ascertain for the introduction of these

particular measures at this particular time, even though, as I said,

Mr. Speaker, I essentially agree with the measures. Their introduction

at this time will serve as a red flag to inflame a situation that we

had hoped would be cooling down, a situation where we had hoped that

the relationship between the parties concerned, labour and management,

would have some chance to improve without the bandages being constantly

torn off.

Therefore I would hope that in the interests of the province the

minister might see his way clear to some delay in this legislation,

some adjournment to the fall session of the House, with the possibility

in the interim of discussion with the parties concerned, with the

possibility of finding some way of redressing the balance. The balance,

as I say, goes all one way, because even though I happen to agree with

most of the issues in this bill, there are other things that can be

done and included in any kind of amendment to the Labour Code, and

which could be presented in a balanced way.

I want to say something about the background in which the

Legislature approaches this problem, Mr. Speaker. We have in this

province, as fully and as surely in the economic field as in the

political field, a very disruptive climate of polarization. We know how

[ Page 3170 ]

political polarization works in this Legislature; we know that it

leads to a tremendous amount of wasted effort and low productivity

because basically the parties don't trust each other. We know that

there's a lot of sterile confrontation because the opposition doesn't

really have a chance for a constructive input into the management of

business. And not to carry this analogy too far, we know that in a

situation like this the tone is set by the government, and any

conciliatory moves have to come from the government.

That carries over into the economic field where an equal kind of

polarization exists, and that stands as a challenge to management in

this province because they stand in the role there of government, as

being the people who have to make the first move if harmony and

conciliation are to be approached. Organized labour in the economic

sector is like the opposition in this House. The analogy isn't perfect;

organized labour is much stronger than the opposition in this House.

They have some enforcement power, but in a sense they are much weaker

because they never have a chance of being the "government" — they never

have the chance of being management.

Somebody has to make the moves in that situation, and let there be

no question as to the need for moves. Unemployment in British Columbia

is almost 10 per cent. Unemployment in May was a full percentage point

higher than in any May back to 1954. And that's as far back as my

reference book went, but I bet it is back to the great Depression.

That's the situation we're getting into in British Columbia. We know

what our international selling position is; it's bad and it's

deteriorating. The only answer to that is productivity, and the only

route to productivity, I suggest to you, sir, is cooperation.

I mentioned a challenge to management. Canadian labour in the person

of the Canadian Labour Congress, the CLC, at their annual convention in

Quebec City this year has put forward that challenge, They have said

that they want a share in decision-making. I say let management not

reject that challenge. It is a very big move for labour to take that

stand because there's an opposite side of the coin: any authority that

labour gains in the decision-making in economic affairs brings with it

responsibility. My opinion is that that segment of the CLC manifesto in

Quebec City represented an important way station in the progress of the

labour movement in Canada.

Can British Columbia management and labour rise to that challenge?

In our province both management and labour over the years have been

very conservative. In part that's personalities in history. In

part

it's been the high-capital intensity of our main industries that have

led some of the people in the business establishment to consider

capital questions as being their main problem, with labour a minor

factor in their industries and a little bit of a necessary nuisance, a

small component.

Can all that conservatism and defensiveness, the polarization, the

confrontation in labour management relations in British Columbia be

changed? I think it can. I think that fresh winds are starting to blow

through the Employers Council of British Columbia and through the B.C.

Federation of Labour. It's a little hard to look behind the closed

doors and know exactly what's going on, but there's some reason to

believe that there's an openness and a freshness of approach.

I like very much some of the things that Bill Hamilton of the

Employers Council has been going around this province saying about the

need to cooperate with organized labour. He means it, Mr. Speaker. I

think there are some possible fresh winds blowing. So let's be careful

not to put a stop, not to kill this tender plant that's starting to bud,

There's a bit of an agenda that has to be followed, in my opinion.

The first thing is to recognize the economic problem that exists and to

say that we are in economic trouble in British Columbia. Believe me, as

you look down the road a little bit and you see the growing

unemployment figures and you see what's going to happen to the

construction industry in the lower mainland in terms of office space

six months from now, and you see what's not happening in terms of new

investment in the forest industry and new job creation, those problems

are there.

Then the second thing is to recognize that the only solution to

those economic problems is productivity. Now productivity somewhat

comes from technology, but that same technology is available all over

the world. That's not how we're going to solve our problem here in

British Columbia. Productivity in our case — and that's the third thing

to recognize — is going to come about only through cooperation, and

constructive cooperation between labour and management in this province.

Then the next thing is to say "let's look for specifics" — things

that demonstrate a common interest between labour and management and

things that reduce areas of conflict.

What are some of these things? First of all there has to be a basic

philosophical emotional acceptance that both parties have a legitimate

place in this economy. Unions are here to stay. They are a good and

vital element of our society. Management has to recognize that working

people and their organizations can bring more than just their bodies to

the work place every day. They can bring their initiative and creative

energy, and that has to be an emotional commitment and an

understanding. From there on, we have to look at ways to improve the

common interests and remove some of the irritants.

I'll tell you one very specific irritant between

[ Page 3171 ]

labour and management in this province, and that's politics. Both

labour and management in this province have been highly political. We

all know what happened at the last election. At the last election there

was a close alliance between the business community — particularly the

big business community — and the Social Credit Party, and there was the

historic close alliance between the labour movement and the New

Democratic Party.

That's fine. That's everybody's business if that's the way they want

to play ball, But they have to understand that if you transport the

conflicts of one field into another, you're going to pay for it in

increased conflict, and it's not good for either the political side or

the economic side. If any labour leader is trying to serve political

ends at the same time he's trying to serve the ends of his membership,

he can be hampered in that. If any political party is trying to serve

the interests of one sector of the community rather than another,

because that's who they have a special relationship with, that's not

good for them either.

So to me, one of these conflicts and irritants that should be

resolved is a backing-off by both labour and management from the

political process and in more dealing with each other as political

neutrals. It can still be done and retain your political integrity. The

United States provides one example and Germany another of places where

the union movement is broadly oriented in a political direction, but

sees fit to maintain its links with all political parties.

To me the basic mechanism for bringing out not of conflicts but of

common interests is to get into the habit of routine meetings at all

levels in the labour-management relations area. By that, I mean

meetings that are regular and in a non-crisis atmosphere, that are

there for the purpose of exchanging thoughts and information and

problems.

With this kind of basic first step, when you get to know each other,

when you build a community of trust over the months and years, then you

have something to build on. The government should be involved in this

to some extent, that its good offices can bring this kind of regular

relationship about. It should probably be involved in some of the

meetings too, insofar as forecasting of the economic affairs and

problems of the province is concerned.

A second way of bringing the parties together in a long-term and

fundamental way in this province is getting some agreement on facts.

What are the basic economic indicators? What's the business climate?

Even so simple a thing as the value of any given package of wages and

benefits in any negotiation where you'll find the people on different

sides of the table saying "it's 13 per cent"..."no, it's 16 per cent" —

getting that kind of basic agreement reduces the number of things you

have to argue about.

You know, to help with that, Mr. Speaker, I wish we had the labour

college set up that we voted for in this House last year, because over

the long term that can do a lot for education in the bargaining process

in this province — to the extent that interest can be made mutual and

the situation will work better, to the extent that you can harmonize

economic interest through things like profit-sharing plans, through

things like the so-called ESOP — the employees' stock ownership plan —

whereby employees have not only the opportunity but the strong

incentive because of taxation laws to invest in a major way in the

firms where they work.

Harking back again to the German experience, as reported in the

Connaghan report, something like $200 per employee has been raised in

capital in an average year and an average firm in that province for

investment in those firms. Just in pure economic terms for investment

in British Columbia, that would mean over $100 million a year going

into very badly needed equity investment — in some cases debt

investment — in our province. It's the kind of thing that can serve

many ends but it serves, primarily, the end of the harmonization of

interest.

Mr. Speaker, why can't we look at things such as involvement of the

workers or their representatives in every important decision-making

forum in the firm, right from the top to the bottom — right from the

board of directors down to the job level? Management is very spooky

about that idea. So are many people in organized labour, because they

fear that could bring about some conflict of interest in their job of

being negotiator. But you can get around that. You can have different

representatives, because obviously anyone who was going to represent

the workers on a company board, for example, would have to be elected

at a separate election. It's just another way of making people able to

feel that they are really a part of the process.

Naturally we have to always look at improving dispute-resolution

techniques, and I think there have been some real advances on that in

British Columbia in the last two or three years. I think the Labour

Code has set a good framework for that.

In all of this climate we are burdened down with a particular set of

expectations, of which I would single out two. We have the

expectations, whether on the labour or the management side, of high

settlements, be they in wages or prices, and high settlements

invariably yield a high cost of living — and inflation. Any settlement

that is about productivity inevitably leads to that. It can't do

anything else. And that, inevitably, leads to high taxes so that more

is taken out of your higher pay cheque to pay the higher social

benefits for people who need them because of the higher cost of living.

That's one set of expectations that we have to live with these days. The

[ Page 3172 ]

other set of expectations is confrontation. That's just what you

expect in the labour field in British Columbia and that breeds more

confrontation. It's automatic.

In that context let us look at the specifics of this bill. How do

they fit into an atmosphere where there is a history of an enormous

amount of distrust and the hope, by many of the leaders in labour and

management alike, of gradually building some trust — and I hope in the

government, too, and I hope in all quarters of this House, because

without that things aren't going to work very well in British Columbia.

First of all, this bill assumes a very important role and a very

high stature for the Labour Relations Board because it puts additional

heavy duties of judgment on them. But that, Mr. Speaker, really does

not bother me because they have demonstrated in an excellent record

over the last three years that they are capable of carrying those kinds

of loads. So in looking at the provisions of this bill let us always

have in mind that there is a proven instrument there to administer many

of the discretionary factors that otherwise would be of concern.

The

section providing for the change in the cooling-off period from

21 to 40 days I believe to be a reasonable move. The 40 days, I think,

is permissive, not obligatory, but it does give the minister and the

government some additional manoeuvring time and a mediator some

additional time for study, if such be appointed during that period.

The change from the specific words "police, fire and health

employees" to the more general designation of "trade union" seemingly

opens up that

section quite a bit but, on the other hand, it's very

specific in the law. It remains a question of persons who are involved

with health, life and public safety only.

That section, to me, taken by itself is of no problem. To some

extent it takes the pressure off the public, and therefore the

government, to make fast moves in disputes of this kind. I think it's

always a good thing if third parties can be kept out of these disputes

as much as possible, both as to the adverse impact and as to

intervention in the affairs of the parties to the dispute.

The next

section which is one of some controversy is one that would

deal with the internal voting procedures of trade unions insofar as the

taking of a strike vote is concerned. It would replace an existing

section in the Labour Code and allow the government to prescribe by

regulation exactly how strike votes were to be taken. The minister has

not afforded us an insight into what those regulations might provide. I

presume they would indicate, among other things, who might vote, how

they're to be notified, the timing of the voting, the access to the

voting mechanism and that sort of thing.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Yes, but we don't have the detailed regulation, Mr. Minister.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Those regulations could be very similar. I'm

quite willing to admit that possibility. The minister said, during his

opening remarks, that he would be willing to discuss a draft of the

regulations with the parties concerned, and I think that's important.

I can still understand the trade unions' concern, being worried

about the fact that these rules, whatever they might be, are in

regulation rather than in law. Voting rules are a very sacred kind of

thing. We have taken care in the election of persons to public life —

be they to this chamber, or to municipal or school board offices, but

particularly this chamber — to ensure that the most minute detail of

the voting procedure is spelt out in law with very little regulatory

authority.

I can understand why trade unions would be concerned with the

blanket regulatory authority here. That is another reason why I would

suggest, in the interests of general harmony on the labour front in

British Columbia, that the minister might be wise to let this measure

lay over until he has been able to produce some specific wording in

terms of the regulations and hopefully incorporate them in the actual

language of the bill.

Aside from that objection, it does not seem to me wrong that this

Legislature should be providing some guarantees as to democratic

machinery in the taking of strike votes. I do not see that as an

accusation of dishonesty in the ordinary taking of those votes any more

than I see our elections Act as being an accusation of habitual

dishonesty in the taking of political elections. It is simply there as

a guarantee and a backstop that things will properly proceed, because,

Mr. Speaker, as long as trade unions are so important in our society,

which they will continue to be, their democratic functioning is

essential.

I might say in passing that now that we have done something, or will

be doing something, about the democratic voting procedures of trade

unions, I would hope that the government might see fit to turn its

attention to some of the democratic problems of corporations with their

pitifully small disclosure, the enormous powers in the hands of boards

of directors as opposed to the shareholders.

I'd like to know what the shareholders thought of the stupidity of

the MacMillan Bloedel board of directors in taking exactly the action

that the former Minister of Labour describes in his speech. During a

year when MacMillan Bloedel shareholders were losing money — not making

more, they were losing

[ Page 3173 ]

money, Mr. Speaker — the top executives of MacMillan Bloedel get a

raise. The shareholders should have a little bit of say in that — and

they don't. It's the directors. I think this chamber should not close

its eyes to the internal democratic practices of corporations either,

because they have an important role in our society too.

MR. G.R. LEA (Prince Rupert): Keep government out of corporations.

MR. GIBSON: But this measure, Mr. Speaker, will not, in my

view, seriously impair the bargaining power of the trade union

movement. It will not prevent a leader from getting a strike vote if he

wants it and needs it and has a good case. It seems to me a good kind

of guarantee and back-up machinery to have.

The final major thrust of the legislation would re-enact

section 90

to make it clear that the LRB has authority to deal with the so-called

"hot" declaration whereby goods or services of a firm that is...

HON. E.M. WOLFE (Minister of Finance): It's already there in 84.

MR. GIBSON: ...involved in a labour dispute shall not be dealt

with by other trade union members in the province. The suggestion has

been made that such power may already exist in the bill in

section 84.

I am not enough of a labour lawyer to know whether it does or not, but

if it does then we're doing nothing new. But let me simply speak to

what I see as being provided in the re-enacted

section 90.

To me, Mr. Speaker, the "hot" declaration has always been the exact

other side of the blacklist, and equally wrong for the same reasons. It

may be justifiable with an infant trade union movement having very

great difficulty in establishing itself, but just as a blacklist says

to the employee that you will either do what I say or you will not sell

your labour anywhere in this jurisdiction, a "hot" declaration turns

around and says you will either do what I say or you will not sell your

product anywhere in this jurisdiction. To me, Mr. Speaker, where there

is a rough balance of negotiating power, either technique is equally

reprehensible.

If we thought to take unto ourselves in this Legislature the power

to tell someone that either they could not work in this province or

they could not sell in this province, it would be thought dictatorial

in the extreme, and therefore I question that it should be in private

hands in a special-interest group without right of appeal. And that is

currently the situation. Currently the power to use that "hot"

declaration is arbitrary and capricious in its impact because there are

some areas where it can have enormous effect, depending upon the

unionization of the distribution sector of the particular goods, and in

some cases it is relatively ineffective.

There is nothing wrong, Mr. Speaker, as I see it, with a "don't buy"

campaign — don't buy product x or y because they're not fair to their

employees — that's fine. But when it comes to an enforcement power, and

not just advice to buy but making it impossible for anyone to buy

whether they want to or not, I say that that is a power which should be

lightly exercised. This

section does not prohibit it, but it does give

the LRB the right to oversee actions of that kind. I think that that is

not bad, and that is again an expression of my faith in the performance

of the LRB.

Mr. Speaker, in

summary, I am in agreement with each of the major

thrusts of this bill, but I am nevertheless extremely concerned about

the fact that it is unbalanced. It is all one way. It is all changing

the balance of power against labour, and nothing for. At this time of

hopeful reconciliation, I think it would have been good if the

government could have seen its way clear to bring in a balanced

package, even if that meant a little bit of waiting. And that's still

possible, Mr. Speaker. Where is the encouragement in this legislation

for the parties to get together? That encouragement isn't there. The

likelihood is that the business community will read this legislation

and say: "We won that round, boys."

Where is the tax incentive for profit-sharing or employee ownership,

things that are showing some potential for the harmonization of

interest? Where is there some redress in this particular legislation

for the bargaining power that is removed by the three main thrusts of

this bill? As I say, those are three thrusts that I happen to agree

with, but nevertheless they do remove some bargaining power from

labour. Where is that anywhere redressed by other potential changes?

Even if the government had come forward, or may yet come forward,

with a statement of their basic labour philosophy and a statement of

their intention to recognize the rights of workers in our society to be

intimately, fundamentally and from the very beginning and throughout

the piece involved in the decisions that affect their employment....

Even that kind of a statement would add enormously to the balance of

the package — which, as I say, does not exist at this moment.

Mr. Speaker, in the end, harmony and common interest must prevail in

this province. If they do not, we will find our economy to be one that

cannot provide the social services we would like for the sick and the

old, and education for children and the good life for the people who

are working,

Without that harmony, those things will not come to pass in the

degree to which we would wish it to be. I say it again: productivity in

this province and improvement thereof will only come about by genuine

voluntary cooperation between labour and

[ Page 3174 ]

management. I ask that the government do everything in its power to foster that kind of co-operation.

These measures here of themselves are correct, but the package is

incomplete. I beg the government to say, in the absence of urgency —

and there is no urgency in this bill, in my opinion — "we will wait yet

a little while; we will lay this over the summer. The session will be

adjourned for the summer; we will be back in the fall. At that time we

will look at this bill, bring it to the fruits of our discussion with

management and labour over the summer and see whether it might not be

improved in some important ways and above all brought into balance."

For all of these reasons, Mr. Speaker, I say to you that I have an

extraordinary difficulty with this bill, a difficulty which I believe

the government can resolve in the interests of everyone concerned by

waiting a while and improving it.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, the minister in

introducing this bill suggested there were a few minor changes being

introduced to the Labour Code. I have to assume he was exercising his

own sense of humour, but I notice he is shaking his head, so...

AN HON. MEMBER: He has a great sense of humour.

MR. WALLACE: ...that spells out the terms of reference of this

bill. I would not attempt to go into the detail that the Liberal leader

(Mr. Gibson) has gone in a very lucid and scholarly way to discuss many

of the other underlying aspects of our labour problems. But I think it

would be appropriate at the outset, Mr. Speaker, to recall that

governments tend not to lead but to react. In the labour management

field, this kind of bill that we now are debating is clearly based on

the thinking which follows certain deficiencies in the existing labour

laws of British Columbia.

It is interesting just to put on record the fact that while

countries like to be No. 1 at certain things, the latest statistics

published by the International Labour Organization show that Canada is

now No. 1 — but unfortunately for the largest number of days lost per

1,000 workers. A year ago we were being somewhat apologetically

grateful because we were second to Italy. But the latest figures show

that now we are No. 1.

These figures related to 1974. The International Labour

Organization, which studied 18 major nations, found that in 1974 in

mining, manufacturing, construction, transportation and communications

the average Canadian was on strike for 2.6 days, which is 2,600 days

lost for every 1,000 workers. It mentioned that Australia, which has

compulsory arbitration, was second with a loss of 2,510 days per 1,000 workers. At the other end of the scale was

Switzerland with 5 days per 1,000 workers. Sweden had 30, West Germany

These figures for 1974 are borne out by further figures that have been published

for 1975, The figures show for 1975 that Canada lost 0.5 per cent of its work

force's productive time through strikes or lockouts — 10.3 million man-days

were lost in Canada, which is 11 per cent more than were lost in 1974.

B.C.

is the worst province in Canada statistically. The average loss of hours in

British Columbia is seven-tenths of 1 per cent of the total,

whereas the rest

of Canada averages four-tenths of 1 per cent, The lost wages in 1975 in British

Columbia approximate $56 million.

Mr. Speaker, that gives some quick concept of the size of the

problem in British Columbia. This doesn't relate to what government is

in power, in my view. The former Minister of Labour (Mr. King)

mentioned in his remarks the other day that this kind of enormous

problem is a non-partisan, not a party-political problem.

He also mentioned that part of the problem is that we are living in

a dog-eat-dog society. I'm not certain that I agree with that, but if

that's the premise from which the former Minister of Labour (Mr. King)

proceeds to argue on this bill or any other bill, then I would suggest

he must have a very negative and sober and pessimistic outlook on the

hope that any government can solve such problems if they arise

basically from what he called the "jungle philosophy."

I personally recognize the complexity of the problem and the very

serious impact that it has on our provincial and national economy, but

I cannot believe that a sufficient number of citizens in British

Columbia live by a dog-eat-dog philosophy that we cannot, in fact, take

a somewhat more optimistic approach than was taken by the spokesman for

the official opposition. While in two or three of the specific respects

in this bill I do wonder if the minister is not guilty of overkill,

what I do sense is the minister trying to grapple with what is the

central challenge, and that is to establish balance not between two

parties but among three parties, being the unions, the employers and

the forgotten element — the public — who are neither employees,

unionized, non-unionized or management, but make up a vast percentage

of the total population of this province and this country. I hope this

bill — and any future bills this minister introduces — will always

start from that point, that we've got the rights and interests of three

basic groups of people to try and recognize and deal with in a fair and

equitable manner.

I agree on one point with the former Minister of Labour (Mr. King),

and that is that collective bargaining has lost a lot of its meaning as

a result of

[ Page 3175 ]

the wage-and-price control programme and the creation of the

Anti-inflation Board. But it is very much a chicken-and-egg problem,

Mr. Speaker, if you would just permit us to go back one more time and

use that phrase that's much overused in this House. The nation as a

whole, we're told by most provinces — perhaps not this province — is in

a state of emergency because of inflation. When you have problems of

relative severity you have to deal with the most essential one first,

and that is why we have a national programme of wage and price control

with a very definite primary purpose of saving this country from

economic disaster such as Britain almost faced right on the edge of the

cliff before they got to the point of trying seriously to deal with

inflation.

So I agree that collective bargaining has lost a lot of its validity

because of the ultimate decisions that are being made by the

Anti-Inflation Board, but there again, I don't think that in any way

should diminish this provincial government's attempts within this

province to create some kind of harmony in the labour-management field.

I was rather amused by the former Labour minister's recital of

history. He said that at the end of the 19th century many British

immigrants came to this province bringing with them a tradition of

British trade unionism. This may well be so, Mr. Speaker, but I have to

say in fairness to the trade unions in British Columbia that they're

far less militant and far less blatantly politically oriented than the

trade unions in Britain. Anyone who cares to follow the British scene

these days would be thanking whatever fate guides our destiny in this

province to know that we do not have union leaders in the British

tradition as they are at the present time.

Many people who are not actively on executives of trade unions but

are trade union members in Britain are deeply concerned about the

communist influence of many of the most influential leaders in many of

the powerful unions in Great Britain. I hope the spokesman for the

official opposition was not suggesting that what the trade unions in

British Columbia need is something more in the tradition of the British

union leadership. Heaven forbid! I would also say that it is and has

been much of the trade union militancy and political affiliation that

has led Britain to the disastrous state that it was in until recently.

The member for Vancouver Centre says nonsense, but it's interesting,

Mr. Speaker, that now Britain faces the disaster that it does, it's the

trade unions that are doing a great deal to pull Britain out of the

mess by accepting a 4.5 per cent ceiling on wage increases. But they

got Britain into a great deal of the mess in the first place.

Interjections.

MR. WALLACE: No, my friend, it's got nothing to do with

Scotsmen in government. As you've noticed in this province, it's very

difficult for a Scotsman to get into government. (Laughter.)

Interjections.

MR. WALLACE: I hope I am not branded as the member for Glasgow, because I didn't happen to be born or raised in that part of the old sod.

Mr. Speaker, there's responsibility on the part of management and

unions in this whole matter of trying to find economic justice for both

groups. We all suffer if either one pushes for an unfair advantage. I'm

saying that we have a lot that we could learn from Britain, regardless

of the degree to which individuals in this House may or may not agree

with what I've already said. There has been great militancy in the

unions in Britain, and much of the cause of distress in the marketplace

was the result of large wage increases that were negotiated.

All I'm saying now is that in fairness to the unions and in

recognition of their efforts now, they are showing some form of

responsibility and leadership by accepting the 4.5 per cent ceiling on

wage increases which, compared to increases which averaged 25 per cent

just over a year ago, shows a remarkable awakening of the British

people to the economic disaster that's just around the corner. I say,

in this province, do we have to wait until we are just looking around

the corner at disaster or do you learn from other provinces or other

jurisdictions and try to take preventive action or inject some measure

of sanity and wisdom into our legislation before it's too late?

I would also say that I hope the former minister of labour (Mr.

King) was not suggesting that this bill has anything whatever to do

with union corruption. He quoted repeatedly from a study which showed

that B.C. unions were clean as a whistle, and I give them full credit

for that. Again I say to anyone in this province, thank goodness we are

blessed with unions that have that kind of record of not being

corrupted. Mr. Speaker, this bill has got nothing to do with

corruption. This bill has to do with trying to minimize strikes and

lockouts, to shorten those strikes and lockouts which do occur, and to

preserve some greater measure of protection for that important third

party than has been the case hitherto — namely, the public. I make it

very plain that I see no relationship whatever to the matter of union

corruption and this bill.

I think that a measure of gratitude in that regard should surely be

very evident from the recent convention of the Teamsters' union when

Mr. Fitzsimmons made some of the most flagrant and inflammatory

statements that if the members of his union didn't like the way he ran

the union, then they

[ Page 3176 ]

could....

AN HON. MEMBER: What did he say?

MR. WALLACE: I wouldn't want to use four-letter words in this

House, Mr. Speaker, but he suggested that they go elsewhere.

(Laughter.) We've all seen some of the disastrous and distressing

effects of the worst kinds of union corruption, so I want to make my

position very plain: this bill has nothing whatever to do with any

suggestion of corruption that has to be corrected in B.C. by this

legislation.

This legislation is meant to deal with some of the problems that

have occurred in this province in recent years, and I believe that,

although it may go too far, it is a bill that is worthy of support of

this House, always mindful of some of the reservations that have been

expressed already this afternoon, and hopeful that the minister will

always be ready to back off in whole or in part by further amendments

at a later date if in fact some of these sections appear to go too far.

We've heard the Liberal leader (Mr. Gibson) comment about the high

unemployment in this province, and I sometimes wonder, when I read day

after day about the world economy, to what degree we can effectively

reduce unemployment. I believe that it can be reduced. It seems to me

sometimes, though, that we're all unduly optimistic in our expectations

as to how much government can do in our rapidly changing kind of

society and with all the technological problems that arise. But there's

one thing that is for sure, Mr. Speaker, and that is that strikes are

controllable. We may not be able to control unemployment, but we should

be able at least to modify, yes, both strikes and lockouts.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: The Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett)

interjects the word "lockout" and I agree that in this kind of debate

we all too readily just use the word strike. I accept that correction,

that we're talking about both strikes and lockouts.

At a time when we have high unemployment, which we can only control

to a small degree, strikes on top of unemployment are just one further

blow to an already injured body. It would seem that if this legislation

is going to go at least part way to preventing strikes which do occur,

or putting people back to work at least for a cooling-off period, while

all this is far from any kind of perfect solution to the problem, at

least it represents a conscious effort to try and minimize some of the

damage of the past.

It's disappointing to me that such words as "jungle philosophy" and

"dog eat dog" have been used this afternoon, because there's little

doubt that that's hardly conducive to any kind of harmony and trust at

the negotiating table. Quite possibly it is the jungle philosophy which

has led us to the present problems. If that is the case, then I would

agree with the spokesman for the official opposition that the outlook

is anything but bright.

Mr. Speaker, just to deal briefly with two or three of the main

thrusts of the bill, I happen to believe that the public of British

Columbia is totally and utterly frustrated by the series of strikes in

various important areas in this province. The public does not dispute

that the parties in these strikes have legitimate points to present and

that employees, whether they be in hospitals or B.C. Railway or

anywhere else, have every legitimate right to try and negotiate the

best deal they can to meet with the ravages of inflation. I don't think

any member of the public disputes that. On the other hand, the public

does not believe that it should be held to ransom any time that

negotiations reach a point where the two parties cannot reach a

settlement.

As I said earlier, politics is very much a matter of action and

reaction. If we had not experienced various strikes which very

seriously damaged the economy of this province and had the potential to

lead to a great deal of damage to individuals' lives and health, we

wouldn't be debating this bill today.

If this bill does go too far, Mr. Speaker, I don't think we can be

unduly critical of the government. We would be, and I would be, a great

deal more critical of the government if it had continued for very much

longer to take the intransigent attitude that it did during the

hospital strike — almost in the sense that until we proved that

somebody died because of the strike then there might be action. Now we

don't know if somebody died because of the strike, and we don't know

what damage or injury various people today might be suffering because

they didn't get the care at the time they would otherwise have received

the care. That's all rather incapable of proof.

What we do know, Mr. Speaker, is that if this is not a dog-eat-dog

society, and I don't believe it is, and that being so, there has to be

within the human sphere some very clear point in time when legitimate

management-labour grievances have to become second to the greater

interests of the people of this province as a whole. It's my belief

that in this bill the extension of the power to regard services as

essential is worthwhile unless it is abused by being applied in the

future to groups that really cannot realistically be regarded as

essential services.

The Liberal leader talked about the polarization in this province

and the polarization not only politically, but polarization with

management and one political party and the NDP with the labour

section

in society. I just have to plead for the "N"th time that we stop the

pendulum swinging and try to bring about a situation where there is

something more moderate than these two rather well-defined,

[ Page 3177 ]

clear-cut positions on either side of the spectrum.

Yet, Mr. Speaker, the reason this bill possibly goes too far is that

it represents a swing back of the pendulum in relation to essential

services, and it gives the power within this bill to designate somebody

in a relatively unimportant occupation in relation to essential

services being designated as such and being compelled to submit to

arbitration.

I don't think that will happen, but when I put myself in the

position of a union member I would be saying to myself: "Why go from

the limited position of firefighters, policemen and hospital workers

all the way over to the other side of the spectrum whereby you can

designate anybody as an essential service?" Now why is this amount of

change necessary? Would it not have made much more sense and would it

not have avoided provoking the union movement in this province if a

more specific attempt had been made to define categories of essential

service?

Either way it isn't easy; I realize that. The minister is shaking

his head. I'm not suggesting that what I am putting forward as an

alternative would be easy. What I am saying is that if I were a union

member looking at the new proposal, my immediate reaction would be that

this was overkill and that the minister has created power in the bill,

in effect, to take away the strike of any union that can be designated

as providing an essential service.

I just feel that is an overreaction by the government, but I want to

make it very plain that I believe very much in the fact that there are

certain essential services in this province and in this country, and

that the public as a whole should not be held up to ransom and probably

the risk of life and limb in these essential services that we've talked

about many times.

The cooling-off period — I can't really understand why anyone would

get uptight because it is being extended from 21 to 40 days. I couldn't

help but think of the fact that we're rather far behind in that in this

country anyway. The Taft-Hartley legislation in the United States was

introduced in 1947, nearly 30 years ago, so let's not get all excited

about cooling-off periods; they've been a useful piece of legislation.

In the most recent reference I can find in the library the legislation

states that strikes that may cause a national emergency can be delayed

for 80 days. So, there again, perhaps the Americans overreact

sometimes, Mr. Speaker. That isn't meant as an anti-American comment in

such a happy year as Bi-centennial year when we are all friends across

the border.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. WALLACE: One of my colleagues mentions, however, that if

you make cooling-off periods too long it reduces the intensity of

negotiation and that sometimes, unless you have this day-in, day-out,

knock-'em-down, drag-'em-out sessions for 12 or 15 days continuously,

parties to the bargaining lose some of their commitment to find the

solution. So within that context maybe 40 days is as long as there

should be.

With regard to strike votes, Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister

in winding up this debate could perhaps give us in more detail some

justification for the need for government regulations in the

supervision of strike votes. The minister is reported in the press as

having said that during the hospital strike he received letters and

telephone calls from employees complaining that the strike vote was not

properly taken. I wonder if that is the only strike where this kind of

complaint has surfaced or whether there may be other examples the

minister could quote to justify the reason for this amendment to the

bill.

In general principle it would be my feeling that if unions and

management are conducting various votes properly, then they should have

nothing particularly to fear from having it done under a more

specifically and more-precisely-spelled-out series of procedures. After

all, Mr. Speaker, when each of us goes to cast a ballot at municipal or

provincial elections, there are a series of procedures that you have to

fulfil to have the privilege of that very important right in society,

namely your franchise.

I know just how tough it is, because after living in one house in

Oak Bay for 12 years I went to try and vote in a municipal election,

and because the wheels of bureaucracy were either going backwards or

sideways I was denied my municipal vote because of the technical,

procedural foul-up. I think if we feel it's that important in the use

of our franchise at the provincial, municipal or federal level, then I

really can't be too concerned that a great measure of precise

supervision of strike votes should be considered wrong or unnecessary.

The last thrust of the bill, which I don't feel at all equipped to

consider in any detail, is the importance of allowing the Labour

Relations Board to determine whether or not goods are hot in the course

of a labour dispute. Again, in general principles, it would seem to me

that the Labour Relations Board under the new Labour Code written by

the former government has acquitted itself well in some very sensitive

areas.

I also understand from listening to debates in this House that

generally speaking — perhaps with some exceptions, but generally

speaking — both management and labour are satisfied with the move

towards the administrative law aspect of the Labour Relations Board,

rather than taking numerous disputes into court, seeking various

injunctions and all th