1987 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 34th 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)

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 17, 1987

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page 1823 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Ministerial Statement

Canada Post strike. Hon. Mr. Veitch –– 1823

Mr. G. Hanson

Oral Questions

South Moresby national park reserve. Mr.

Miller –– 1824

Mr. Williams

Premier's former association with

electoral boundaries commissioner. Mr. Sihota –– 1825

Industrial Relations Reform Act, 1987

(Bill 19). Committee stage. (Hon. L. Hanson) 1825

Mr. Gabelmann

Mr. Lovick

Mrs. Boone

Mr. Harcourt

Hon. Mr. Couvelier

Mr. Miller

Ms. A. Hagen

Ms. Smallwood

Mr. Sihota

Appendix –– 1844

The House met at 2:04 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. REID: Mr. Speaker, I'd like the

House to offer a special welcome today to Mr. James Randall. He's the

vice-president of Inland Natural Gas, one of the corporations strongly

supporting the Summer and Winter Games. He's here to offer the

government support again for the Summer Winter Games.

MR. HARCOURT: Mr. Speaker, I would like to

have members of the Legislature join in a very warm welcome to not just

a distinguished British Columbian but a distinguished Canadian and a

member of the international community, Dr. Hugh Keenleyside, who is

here today.

He is, as you know, the first ambassador to Japan, established

in Tokyo — our first embassy. He is one of the world's experts on

Canada-United States relations. On top of that, he was a distinguished

public servant at the UN and was our ambassador to the United Nations.

As well, we’re all aware of the fact that in 1959 he returned to

British Columbia, where he was the chairman of the B.C. Power

Commission. He is a recipient of the Vanier medal and the Pearson Peace

Medal, and is a Freeman of the City of Vancouver. He is retired now but

still writing books.

To assist is another very distinguished Canadian, Miss Janet

Craig, who is his editor; she is also an editor for many other

well-known Canadian authors, including Pierre Berton. I would like you

to welcome Dr. Hugh Keenleyside and Miss Janet Craig.

MRS. BOONE: Mr. Speaker, it's not very

often that I get a chance to welcome people, as they seem to have a

rough time making it down from Prince George. But I'm happy to tell you

that today I have here my husband Art and my two daughters, Sonia and

Tanis, his brother George from New Brunswick, and a friend, Kim

Gallant, also from New Brunswick. And up in the gallery I see that we

have a good friend and a good constituent of ours, Bev Christiensen.

Would the House please join me in greeting them. Thank you.

HON. MRS. JOHNSTON: In the gallery this

afternoon is Ray Vital, who was born and raised in Victoria and is now

visiting to celebrate his parents' fifty-fourth wedding anniversary. He

is now residing in Wellington, New Zealand. I would ask the House to

please give him a warm welcome.

MR. GABELMANN: In the gallery this

afternoon from Kyuquot are two good friends of mine, Richard Leo and

Gail Muir.

HON. B.R. SMITH: Not being here when Dr.

Hugh Keenleyside was introduced, I’d just like to add from this side of

the House the welcome and the acknowledgment of his tremendous career

in the public service, not only of British Columbia but also of Canada.

He is a distinguished diplomat and author, and he served so well in our

utilities field.

I would like to make an introduction. I would like to

introduce the parents of one of our research officers, Christine

Rushforth. Her parents are here with guests from the United Kingdom on

holidays. Her parents are Rob and Margaret Mackenzie-Grieve from

Cadboro Bay, and their guests from the United Kingdom are Fred and Gwen

Kendall. Would the House please make them welcome.

MR. SIHOTA: In the not-too-distant past I

served as president of the B.C. Young New Democrats.

Interjection.

MR. SIHOTA: In 1979, actually, for those of

you who are interested.

In any event, it was something that I enjoyed. I'm pleased to

note that in the gallery today is a very active member of our B.C.

Young New Democrats. I would like to have the House join me in

welcoming Stuart O'Grady here in the gallery today.

MR. DE JONG: Mr. Speaker, in your gallery

this afternoon, accompanying my wife, is Mrs. Anne Jaarsma. They came

to the Abbotsford area about two years ago. Her husband is a teacher in

the Abbottsford Christian High School and teaches the second language

in Canada. And by the way, it's not Dutch.

MR. RABBITT: Mr. Speaker, in your gallery

today, for the first time, the love of my life, the mother of my

children, my dear wife Eileen. I would ask the House to give her a warm

welcome.

MR. SERWA: Mr. Speaker, this is an

announcement under the good news category. Unless the media can pull

something off and influence the Premier to hold a special cabinet

meeting, the big challenge match — the softball game between the Social

Credit caucus and the media — is on for tonight.

Ministerial Statement

CANADA POST STRIKE

HON. MR. VEITCH: I rise to make a

ministerial statement. I wish to advise the House today that during

this most unfortunate Canada Post strike, the government, through the

postal services branch of my ministry, will extend to the public of

British Columbia greater facilities to receive mail addressed to

provincial government offices. The government is prepared to provide to

every constituency office of every MLA who requests it a mail bag or

other mail receptacle to receive mail from the public destined for

provincial government offices within the province.

The public of British Columbia should be entitled to

communicate by mail with the provincial government without having to

engage expensive courier service or to employ some equally expensive

alternative means. The public, in its dealings with the government, is

the innocent victim in this dispute between Canada Post and its union,

and the procedure that I am now proposing would mitigate this

inconvenience as far as mail directed to the government is concerned. I

stress again that this service will be provided only to those

constituency offices that wish to be included.

I would ask that through your respective caucus offices you

please advise my office as soon as possible, preferably

[ Page 1824 ]

by 6 p.m. today, which of your constituency offices wish to be

included in this very worthwhile service.

MR. G. HANSON: First, I would like to thank

the Provincial Secretary for notice on this ministerial statement, even

though the notice was just a matter of seconds.

This is a very serious dispute that is occurring in Canada,

and I think all members of this House recognize that a speedy

resolution depends on good faith bargaining on the part of both parties

involved in this matter. Certainly no member, no elected person

anywhere not involved, should be inflaming or aggravating this serious

subject. I know that the government will take measures to ensure that

social assistance cheques, GAIN cheques and other requirements and

entitlements of the seniors, disabled and so on of the province will be

picked up — as the member has indicated, that's already in place, with

consultation with his own employees.

I thank the member for the statement, and we hope that this

matter is resolved with the greatest dispatch. All members of this

House can contribute to that by not making inflaming or gratuitous

comments on this subject.

Oral Questions

SOUTH MORESBY NATIONAL PARK RESERVE

MR. MILLER: My question to the Premier

concerns the failure of negotiations with regard to South Moresby.

There was a request from the Speaker of the House that those decisions

be delayed pending an opportunity for the Premier to talk to the Prime

Minister about this subject. That has not taken place; the Premier has

declined to phone the Prime Minister. Will the Premier assure this

House that he will call the Prime Minister, request a personal meeting

and get the negotiations back on the rails for a national park reserve

in South Moresby, which will not only provide significant benefits to

British Columbians and people of the Queen Charlotte Islands but bring

some international status to British Columbia as well?

[2:15]

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, I have

the opportunity to speak with the Prime Minister or the Deputy Prime

Minister fairly regularly. As a matter of fact, I call Ottawa on such

issues as a more equitable share in highways moneys for British

Columbia, as a part of those moneys allotted throughout the whole of

the country. I call the Prime Minister or the Deputy Prime Minister or

others with respect to DRIE moneys to ensure that industry here is

considered equitably with industries in other areas. Recently I called

the Prime Minister with respect to the Vancouver Island gas pipeline

and the fact that a billion and a half has been spent in Quebec alone

while no moneys have been committed or allotted.... Nothing has been

received by British Columbia with respect to these requests.

In this particular instance, the establishment of a park on

South Moresby is important to all Canadians. Certainly when I visited

Toronto a few months back, the issue was raised again and again by many

people in the Toronto business community, and similarly by the business

community in New York. During the past number of weeks, I have had

calls from people throughout eastern Canada, and I even received a very

lengthy telex from Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands.

If the Prime Minister is going to call me, I'll be ready for

his call.

MR. MILLER: Supplementary to the Premier on

the same subject. It seems to me, Mr. Premier, that you should be proud

of getting that national and international interest. That's what we

want — that kind of interest in British Columbia.

My question is in regard to the difficulty I and others have

in accepting the sincerity of the government in terms of their

commitment to negotiate a national park reserve on South Moresby. We

seem to have been given a number of statements: it's on, it's off, it's

on, it's off. The Premier himself said on May 15 that there would be a

cruise-ship dock built in Sandspit and that there would be economic

benefit. Would the Premier assure this House that he was sincere right

from the beginning in trying to negotiate, and that he is committed to

having a national park reserve in South Moresby?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, British

Columbians are more sincere as a people about parks — national and

provincial — than people anywhere in Canada. The proof is in the fact

that we have more park per capita in British Columbia than they have

anywhere else in Canada. As a matter of fact, we have more park than

the size of Nova Scotia, and the park we're proposing to establish

provincially on the Queen Charlottes is bigger than Prince Edward

Island.

So British Columbians are very sincere about parks in British

Columbia, but British Columbians are also concerned about the economy,

and we can't toss away jobs that presently exist in the forest

industry. We've got to pay more than just lip-service. We've got to

show that we're concerned about jobs, and not every time there's a call

from eastern Canada for still more parks to be added, to simply say

we'll do so without due consideration to those loggers who are

dependent on paying their mortgages and on meeting their other

commitments. Their jobs are at stake. I and every member on this side

of this House are concerned for those jobs, and frankly I must think

about those loggers before I concern myself too much about downtown

Toronto.

MR. WILLIAMS: To the Premier. Mr. Speaker,

if this government was sincere, it would not use rubber numbers in

their negotiations with the federal government, like the Premier talks

about today and during the negotiations. Will this government create

3,700 new jobs related to parks over ten years, which the feds have

agreed they would do as a result of their work, and $75 million in new

labour income as a result of the park over ten years? Will this

government equal the feds in terms of those proposals and those dollars?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, I don't

know the question, except some remark with respect to 3,700 jobs in

parks. No wonder that particular member has been so confused on the

other numbers I've heard him quote over the last while.

The fact is that annually the return to the province, aside

from the jobs that I've mentioned and the importance of them, is worth

$50 million per year forever. These facts and figures are available in

the ministry. They've been raised time and time again by the member

sitting independently on the other side of the House.

Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member asking the question about

these 3,700 jobs should look at some of those eastern

[ Page 1825 ]

writers quoted in the paper this morning. They mentioned $12

million for the ten-year period that the federal government was

prepared to commit to the development of the park. If that's $12

million over ten years — if the hon. member across the way translates

this into 3,700 jobs — they're going to get a lot less than minimum

wage.

MR. WILLIAMS: That's 3,700 person-years

over the decade — backed up with sound economic analysis. I ask the

Premier, will this government spend $50 million on a Queen Charlotte

Islands development fund that will include money for tourism, airports,

roads, navigation, culture, small business development, facilities at

Queen Charlotte City, Sandspit, South Moresby? Will this government

have a $50 million fund for development and diversification in the

Queen Charlotte Islands, as the federal government will?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, again

the figures that are being used by the member are.... I don't know

where they come from, but certainly there has been talk in these

negotiations about a sum of money to be set aside for development on

the Queen Charlottes to help the tourism industry — or the potential of

it — over the years. The total figure that has been quoted is $106

million, and this is taken from a letter sent to me by the Deputy Prime

Minister. That figure is to take care of the third-party interest. That

figure is to take care of replacing at least some portion of the

resource lost. That figure is also to take care of providing for the

loggers who are going to be displaced, unemployed. And that figure is

to take care of tourism infrastructure and park development.

When you split it all up, I can assure the hon. member that

we, in our request from the federal government, are more than fair.

Contrary to all of what I've read in the papers by some of the armchair

journalists in their offices in Ottawa, I can assure you that in making

that offer we as a people are presenting Canada and the world with a

gift.

MR. WILLIAMS: To the Minister of Forests,

Mr. Speaker. Is it not true that the province took the position that

the third party should be compensated by some incredible $61 million

for their forest interests?

HON. MR. PARKER: The negotiations have been

with the Minister of Environment, and I defer to him, Mr. Speaker.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: No number, in terms of

third-party compensation, was ever stated by the government of British

absolving the issue of the transitional logging — which they couldn't

go for on Lyell Island — in terms of the Western Forest Products TFL,

in terms of the economy of Frank Beban and a smaller timber licence

held by Mac-Blo, we would go to an independent accounting firm and have

them determine what the economic loss would be. No number was ever

mentioned; just an offer that it be independently and fairly determined.

PREMIER'S FORMER ASSOCIATION WITH

ELECTORAL BOUNDARIES COMMISSIONER

MR. SIHOTA: As everybody knows, His Honour

Judge Fisher has been appointed to make recommendations with respect to

electoral boundaries. My question to the Premier is this: has the

Premier had any business associations with His Honour Judge Fisher in

the past"

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: I believe that it was

about 1968 or 1969 when the hon. Judge was a lawyer and did some legal

work for me. If the hon. member across the way is inferring from that

that there is something wrong, I would suggest he immediately make an

apology to me and to the judge.

MR. SIHOTA: Mr. Speaker, we will see as

this story unfolds who will be making the apologies.

Will the Premier answer this question then? Is it true that

the duration of the Premier's association with Mr. Fisher is in excess

of 20 years? Is it not true that the Premier was involved in business

and legal arrangements with Judge Fisher for 20 years before his

appointment in 1977 to the bench?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, I have

had no business arrangements other than that Judge Fisher back in

1968-69, and before then, did legal work for me. I don't know the exact

date, but it certainly goes back to about then — maybe further. If the

member is inferring from that that there is something wrong or fishy

about the work the hon. Judge is doing. I would suggest that he

apologize not just to me, but to the hon. Judge.

MR. SIHOTA: Mr. Speaker, it is not me who's

on the defensive.

Another question to the Premier is this: will the Premier

confirm that his association with Judge Fisher goes as far back as 1955?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Mr. Speaker, I call

committee on Bill 19.

INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS REFORM ACT, 1987

(continued)

The House in committee on Bill 19; Mr. Pelton in the chair.

section 62 as amended.

MR. GABELMANN: Mr. Chairman, the members

should know that the Minister of Labour indicated to me privately that

he would be absent from the House for the next 15 or 20 minutes. Let me

just say that I understand that; and further to that, let me say that

the Minister of Labour's participation in this debate to date has been

exemplary. He has been here throughout, with the occasional smoke

break, but we've had the first member for Vancouver South (Mr. R.

Fraser) to help us out on those occasions. It's been a long debate and

a difficult one, and I think that we want to take no political marks

from the fact that the minister needs to be away for a few minutes now;

we recognize that. Unfortunately, however, it's going to delay a little

bit the proceedings this afternoon, so I hope his time away will not be

particularly long.

[ Page 1826 ]

When we finished yesterday afternoon, Mr. Chairman, we were

discussing, as you mentioned,

section 137.96 of the Code, which is

about halfway through

section 62. It's the

section entitled "Factors to

be considered," and these are factors to be considered by arbitration

boards when making final and binding settlements in labour disputes in

the public sector. I started yesterday afternoon by talking about some

of the issues and matters that the arbitration board would have to

consider when making their award. I got as far as the end of subsection

(1) and had not yet reached subsection (2).

[2:30]

Subsection (2) is a

section which brings back the whole

concept of ability to pay. This is a concept that was established in

February 1982, in fact in the television address by Premier Bill

Bennett of that day. It was enshrined in legislation in the

Compensation Stabilization Act which followed and which was in place

for the last five years or thereabouts. Ironically, of course, that

same act was administered by Mr. Peck, who is now going to be in charge

of this legislation.

When the minister introduced for first reading Bill 19 way

back on April 2, one of the things he said was that there would be, as

a result of this legislation, no more compensation stabilization

program. The implication of that and the message that was taken to the

public as a result of that statement was that wage controls in the

public sector were gone. What we see in this

section of the bill is

that wage controls in the public sector are not gone whatsoever but in

fact are here in place and in stronger measure than they were before.

The only difference is that the employer has to go through a tortuous

process to get an unresolved negotiation into arbitration.

That's a simple enough objective, and I think — and others

agree — that any public sector employer who is determined that the

dispute be resolved by arbitration will have no difficulty whatsoever

in getting the dispute into arbitration. Once it's into arbitration,

the board or whatever other process might be selected for resolution

will have no option but to follow the law as defined here in this

section, and this law will put all kinds of constraints on the

arbitrator as to what kind of collective agreement can be reached as a

result of arbitration.

These constraints will deny totally any opportunity on the

part of an arbitrator to reach a settlement that that arbitrator feels

might be appropriate and might be reasonable between the two parties,

because all reason is gone. I say that because, as we see in the

wording of this section, "the ability of the public sector employer to

pay shall be the paramount factor." So all of the factors that I talked

about yesterday, which were onerous enough in their own right, are

subservient to this overwhelming factor, which is the ability to pay.

Every public sector employer in this province can very easily

demonstrate that their ability to pay is constrained by their revenue,

or by other factors. Most of those public employers will have their

argument made for them by the Minister of Finance, because he will say,

as has been said over the last few years, that there is no money this

year for wages. He'll say: "You might get an increase for equipment;

you might get some capital spending; you might get some other revenue

or budget for matters relating to increased staff or other issues. But

there will be no money to the hospital or to the school for wages, or

to whatever other public institution controlled by the Ministry of

Finance."

Once that is said, then the arbitrator, under this law, will

have no choice but to say: "The ability to pay is not there, and

therefore there can be no increase." Even though the cost of living

might have gone up 3 percent, 4 percent, 5 percent or more during the

previous year or two, even though comparable employees in private

sector employment might have had pay raises, even though the prevailing

level of increase is at a certain percentage, it doesn't matter. If the

Minister of Finance — and the Minister of Finance alone — makes a

decision that there shall be no money that can go to wages, then

there can be no arbitrated settlement that includes an increase.

The Minister of Labour and government members have said that

the compensation stabilization program is dead. If I were outside of

this House, I would say it was a lie, but since I'm inside the House I

can't say that. I have said it outside, but inside the House it's

unparliamentary. If I've left an impression that I did, I withdraw.

MR. LOVICK: That's about as convoluted as

the writing of the bill.

MR. GABELMANN: One has to do those crazy

things to get away with being in order in this place.

Wage controls in the public sector are in place, and there is

no process other than the Minister of Finance making a decision on what

the wage increase could be if it goes to arbitration. If the Minister

of Finance says he'll allow 1 percent this year for a wage increase, it

will be 1 percent. If the Minister of Finance says it's going to be 10

percent, it'll be 10 percent. The arbitrator will be required to read

this legislation and he will be told that the ability of the public

sector employer to pay shall be the paramount factor.

Let there be no mistake about the fact that wage controls in

the public sector in British Columbia are not only alive and well but

are more in place than they have been during the years of Bill

Bennett's restraint program. That is unfortunate for this province. We

are already losing trained and skilled people in the professions who

have worked for various agencies of government. We know that there is

an outflow to Ontario of a variety of skilled persons. Why? Because

their remuneration has not followed the market. There has been no

marketplace economics in respect of wage and salary negotiations in

British Columbia for these past five years. The marketplace has been

eliminated by Social Credit. Ironically, Social Credit is the party

that claims to believe in the marketplace but obviously does not when

it comes to the economics of wages and salaries.

Unfortunately, as a result of this particular bill and this

section, that wage control program will continue. Only the Minister of

Finance will have the ability to make judgments about how much should

be put on the table. With that in place, permanently by this

legislation, we will have a situation where more of our skilled people

will leave. Our public services will continue to deteriorate, as they

have under the restraint program to date. That cannot be good for the

citizens of British Columbia.

MR. LOVICK: I'm sorry the minister isn't in

the House at the moment. I notice that two of his advisers are here,

and I hope they shall pass on the concerns that we have about this

particular

section of the bill.

In another incarnation in another life, when I was a college

instructor, I used to teach something about informal logic, as we

called it, which also meant straight thinking or good reasoning. The

terminology that we used to use in talking about logic and straight

thinking was this: we coined

[ Page 1827 ]

the phrase "the non-controvertible hypothesis." A

non-controvertible hypothesis is one that you can neither prove nor

disprove and therefore there is no point in debating or discussing. The

predicament I want to suggest in 137.96 is that we are presented here

with the terminology that is precisely a non-controvertible hypothesis.

The problem with that particular section, Mr. Chairman, is that the

point made in this

section of the bill is nevertheless treated by the

government as if it is significant and important and has some capacity

or intrinsic ability to solve a problem in negotiation. The tragedy is

that it does not. I'm referring specifically to the phrase quoted by my

colleague from North Island (Mr. Gabelmann), namely "ability to pay."

I want to refer the members of the House to the specific

sections — two of them in 137.96 — subsection (2) and subsection (4),

so that we all understand what we're talking about. Subsection (2) of

137.96 says: "Where the ability to pay of the public sector employer is

in issue, then, notwithstanding subsection (1)" — in other words, all

those other measures we use to adjudicate terms of settlement — "the

ability of the public sector employer to pay shall be the paramount

factor." Look closely, Mr. Chairman, at what triggers the paramountcy

of ability to pay. What triggers it is the simple assertion: "where the

ability to pay...is in issue." Let's ask ourselves in all honesty if

anybody can for one moment suggest to us that ever in the history of

the public sector the ability to pay has not been in issue. The answer

to that is clearly, demonstrably and resoundingly no. Always, indeed,

the ability to pay has been primary.

Further, if that by itself isn't sufficient to demonstrate the

strength of that particular clause, the point is reinforced by sub (4).

Let me quote sub (4), where we have an effort at definition —

ostensibly definition: "For the purposes of this Part 'ability to pay'

means the current ability of a public sector employer to pay based on"

— and let's look at these again carefully — "existing revenues,

requirements of any fiscal policies to which the public sector employer

is subject and the impact of increased costs on the maintenance of

existing levels of public service."

Well, if there were ever an absolutely classic case of carte

blanche, surely that's it. This is the wide open field writ large.

Clearly almost anything we can think of falls into the classification

of "ability to pay." Certainly existing revenues are never enough. We

know that every civic administration — every government administration

— always looks beyond the horizons to other things and other jobs that

ought to be done, but always comes up directly against the problem of

insufficient revenue. Thus we have tax revolts. Thus we have people

always complaining about too much in the way of taxes. In short, the

current ability to pay based on existing revenues is a bogus argument,

if we want to suggest that it's an argument that will only be invoked

on certain occasions. My suggestion is that it will always be invoked.

Necessarily, indeed, it will be invoked. That's just a fact, it seems

to me.

[2:45]

The other point, of course, is the requirements of any fiscal

policies to which the public sector employee is subject. Pretty

clearly, that means every program that one is contracted to provide;

everything, in short, one does, not to mention of course accommodating

those programs and ensuring their continuation despite growing

population, despite decay of public service infrastructure and despite

inflation — which means we need more dollars to provide the services we

provided earlier. In short, just as in the earlier clause, Mr.

Chairman, the second one about fiscal policies to which the employer is

subject also provides us, I suggest, with an absolutely

incontrovertible case that says that every public employee can. as a

matter of course — and with every justification, I might add — say that

ability to pay is an issue in this dispute. Therefore ability to pay,

by the wording, by the logic of this

section of the bill, will become

paramount.

Before I draw a conclusion from all that, which conclusion, by

the by, is really merely a restatement of the points I've been making,

let's look at the third one, just to emphasize and perhaps reaffirm the

point: "...the impact of increased costs on the maintenance of

existing levels of public service...." Again, what we're talking about

once more, I suggest, is simply a means whereby any government can say

that ability to pay is an issue and therefore necessarily paramount.

The question, then, is whether ability to pay ought to be the only

thing at issue in a dispute between the two parties.

I think the case I have presented, accurately and fairly, Mr.

Chairman, is that given the language, and given the case I've sketched

out, albeit briefly, the only conclusion we can draw is that there is

one criterion for judgment evident here, only one means of adjudicating

the dispute, only one factor to be considered, notwithstanding the list

of others that are presented to us. The question is simply whether that

one factor is sufficient for any kind of meaningful collective

bargaining to take place.

I want to suggest that it is not sufficient. The reasons it is

not sufficient are substantially the same as those I have delineated in

my comments about the flaw of the language itself: namely, that you

cannot ever demonstrate clearly that the public sector employer has the

ability to pay. How can one do that? I would suggest that, using the

criteria listed in (4), any public sector employer could quite

legitimately say: "Sorry, friends, we can't afford to pay." They could

invoke the ghosts of each of those three items I referred to, as it

were.

The conclusion to all of that, then, it seems to me.... Again,

I want to put the matter as charitably as I can. The conclusion to

derive from all of this is that what 137.96 misleadingly referred to as

factors to be considered means, in fact, that there is one factor to he

considered, and that is ability to pay. I'm sorry, friends who are

looking for higher wages and improved working conditions, you don't

have a hope in Hades of getting improved working conditions or better

wages, because never in the history of conflict between labour and

management has it been the case that the management side of the

equation will say: "Sure, we can afford to pay more."

The point, I would suggest, is fairly solid, fairly

substantial. I hope that the minister's advisers will indeed pass that

on, if for no other reason than that I would hate to repeat all that

stuff.

MRS. BOONE: Mr. Chairman, I feel that this

section really did affect me. It affected me considerably, as I was in

a dual role in my previous life, I guess one could say, as a trustee. I

was on the school board, faced with trying to deal with, from the

administration point of view, from the employer's point of view, public

service restraint — the compensation stabilization program. Then, as an

employee of the government, I was having to deal with the compensation

stabilization program controlling my wages. I found it very frustrating

at both levels. I found it frustrating, as an employee of the

government, to have my expenses increasing —

[ Page 1828 ]

my hydro, telephone and all of these things — yet to know that

there was absolutely no hope of ever receiving a wage increase that

would compensate for any of those increases that I was suffering.

On the other hand, as a trustee I felt very frustrated because

the government was saying to us: "This is the number of dollars that

you have. You may not give your employees a raise, but go and negotiate

with them anyways." That was probably one of the most frustrating

periods of my life, as we went through a period of going into

negotiations with teachers saying,"We need more money; our expenses

have increased," and we saying,"We have no money," the teachers

saying,"We need more money," and we saying: "We have no money."

This went on for several years and it was a ridiculous

situation. The bottom line was that the government did control the

purse-strings and the government did control what was available to pay

people. The silly part of it is that at the same time as we were saying

the government has no money, that there was no money there, the

employees of ours, and I as an employee, looked around and saw expenses

going up. We saw the Coquihalla being built and we saw Expo being built

and we saw northeast coal being built. We saw all kinds of things

happening.

What it comes down to is a matter of the government then

making decisions as to where their priorities are; and if the

government makes a decision that their employees do not take

precedence, that their employees do not warrant a wage, then all they

have to do is not budget for it. It is a very simple process. You don't

budget for it; therefore your ministry, your education department,

whatever it is, has no money. Then they have no ability to pay, and it

is right here. At that point you have no ability to pay; therefore

there are no wages given to you.

So it is a frustrating situation. Given the fact that here the

ability to pay of the public sector employer is at issue, then the

requirements of the regulations and guidelines under the Compensation

Stabilization Act to pay shall be the paramount factor in determining

whether a contract will be approved.

That means that every public sector wage will be controlled by

Treasury Board; that negotiations that will be taking place between the

BCGEU and the governing bargaining agent will be a sham; that school

boards will no longer be able to negotiate, that they will be in the

same situation that they have been in the past of spending government

money, public money in a process that is a total sham. I said that when

I was a trustee; I say it now. It is a sham when you go into a

bargaining process knowing that you have no ability to bargain, you

have no ability to negotiate. And there is no ability to negotiate as

long as the government controls the purse strings and can either

say,"We are going to put some money into this budget for salaries" or

"We are not going to put money into this budget for salaries."

Therefore there is no ability to pay.

One of the frustrating parts about that whole thing was that

they said that under the restraint program public sector wages had to

be controlled because they were being increased at monumental rates and

therefore were adding to inflation, high inflation. So wages were

controlled and they were kept down. It ended up that inflation

eventually overcame the wage increases but inflation did not go down.

Inflation never went beneath what the wage increases were, which shows

that inflation was not tagged to the increases in the wages of the

employees.

We are seeing some of the results of that capping of the

wages, of the holding down of wages that this province is suffering

right now. You can see that when you look at your social worker wages,

when you look at the problems that we are having in maintaining our

social workers and keeping them in their professions and in recruiting

social workers. We are not able to do that because their wages were

controlled, because their wages have not been kept up to inflation.

We are seeing that with our nurses right now, and for the

first time our nurses have a slight increase. But we have a tremendous

nurse-shortage problem in this province.

HON. MR. PARKER: It's easy for you to say.

MRS. BOONE: Yes, it is easy for me to say.

We have a tremendous problem. It used to be that it was just a local

problem in the northern half of the province, but it now occurs

throughout all of the province, and that is happening because nurses'

wages have not kept up. They are not comparable to other parts of the

country, and they certainly are not comparable to other parts of the

U.S.

We see that with our teachers; we see that with

physiotherapists. You can go through just about any professional group

that has been involved in bargaining with the government and all of

them are in the same situation. They have wages that are below what

they have in other parts of the country. They have wages that are below

what they have in the United States. We are losing our professional

people at a tremendous rate and we are not recruiting any new ones.

That is a shame for this province. It's a shame we are not recognizing

one of the most powerful assets we have, the asset of our people. The

money that we put into training those people....

[Mrs. Gran in the chair.]

Out of the physiotherapists whom we trained at UBC last year —

and that is a program that cost this province money — one of them

stayed in British Columbia. The rest went to other parts of the

country, regardless of the shortage we have here, because their wages

are better, their conditions are better and they are not overworked.

The same thing goes for social workers. Twelve social workers came up

north into the Prince George area and were interviewed. One stayed and

11 went to Alberta, where they had a wage that was far better than what

we could even hope to offer them. So our social workers continue to be

pressed, continue to be overworked.

This is just an incredible thing, and it's something I spoke

about yesterday. I spoke in terms of honesty and I was called to order.

So I'll do what my colleague says: I'll retract that at this point. But

there is a problem here because the government is saying that the

compensation stabilization program has been removed. It was in great

announcements to the public when they announced that this bill was

coming in. They said: "The compensation stabilization program has been

removed. Government employees be happy, teachers be happy, because this

thing that has been around your neck has been removed." Yet here you

have put in a

section 1n this act that is the very epitome of what the

compensation stabilization program was about.

It is important that people understand what this will do. This

is not something that is going to add to the province; it is

[ Page 1829 ]

going to add to our problems. You in the government will be

making all decisions regarding wages in the public service. You can

pretend and you can say that school boards will have the ability to

negotiate. You can pretend and you can say that government agents will

be able to negotiate with the BCGEU. But the fact is that it's already

written. It's right here in black and white that you have the ability

to set the budget. Therefore you have the ability to determine how much

anybody is going to get in a wage increase, and that no wage increase

will be given to anybody unless the ability to pay is proven.

[3:00]

The other

section I just want to go back a little bit on here

is 137.96(l)(b) — it's not back too far: "...the need to maintain

an appropriate relationship between occupations or classifications

within the employer's employment...." That part says to me — and I

think some of my colleagues have already mentioned this — that this

virtually eliminates any opportunity to implement a wage equity

program. Wage equity is something that our party is committed to. There

is definitely a disparity in wages, and I don't think anybody out there

would deny that. The average traditional female job is paid much, much

less than the traditional male job. This

section of the act would make

it impossible for anybody to implement any program that would try to

take care of that disparity, to lessen the gap, so that women would be

able to earn wages equal to their ability, so that women would be able

to earn wages that put them above the poverty line. This

section says

that you need to maintain that appropriate relationship. I say that we

need to change that. We need to reduce that. We need to have programs

that will make sure that wage disparities are reduced, so that people

are paid according to what they are worth. But this

section does not

allow that to happen.

It's unfortunate the minister is not here, but I'll.... Here

he comes, just at this time. He must have known I was wrapping up.

Thank you for coming, Mr. Minister. I will end at this point by saying

that I hope that you read the Blues, and that you understand what this

section means to public service employees, and how much control you are

giving the government. If you really felt that this was important, why

not just do away with your bargaining committees and allow your

government employees and teachers to bargain directly with Treasury

Board? Because henceforth it will be Treasury Board that will be making

all decisions regarding wage increases for any of the public service

employees.

MR. HARCOURT: Madam Chairman, I am here to

give three problems that we face with the ability-to-pay matter in

section 137.96, and two areas in particular. One is that "the ability

of the public sector employer to pay shall be the paramount factor,"

and the impact that has on municipal governments. The second is

137.96(l)(b): "the need to maintain an appropriate relationship between

occupations or classifications within the employer's employment."

We would hope that this

section would be reconsidered, because

it has the following negative impacts: (1) the ability-to-pay provision

severely harms the public sector; (2) this

section breaches a United

Nations treaty obligation of Canada; and (3) it severely impinges upon

any potential pay equity legislation and is anti-women: it is going to

make it very difficult for women to break out of the economic and job

classification ghettos that they have been in for far too long.

The first problem that this

section raises is that it

continues CSP. It's really CSP II. Jaws II is what it is: it munches up

the public sector once again. Now we've gone through three years of

compensation stabilization, and we're extending it.

Basically what we're looking at is a repeat down the line of

what happened in this country from 1976 to 1981. I can tell you, as

somebody who was on the firing-line in 1981, it is a disaster. It is a

disaster for morale and for the effectiveness of the public service. In

1976-81 we had the three years of wage and price controls extended for

two years into the provincial sector, a huge increase in inflation and

living costs, with a lid being kept on the public sector. It

dramatically distorted the relationship of the public sector employees

to the private sector. So when they were taken off in 1981, there was

this pent-up demand from employees in the public sector to get back

some of the lost standard of living that they had suffered through over

the five years when their living standards were cut dramatically.

All public sector employers faced a very dramatic time. For

example, we in the lower mainland, Vancouver, had a

three-and-a-half-month strike. It was a bitter, nasty strike that

severely harmed the relationships between the employers, the elected

councils, and the employees and the public.

This is where we're headed again. All this does is forestall

that imbalance that is created between the public sector and the

private sector. It's Jaws II: it's going to come along like a great big

white shark and munch away at the public sector in big bites when it

comes off. All it's doing is forestalling the inevitable conflicts that

will come. I don't like to see that happen, because that negative

impact in a public sector is something that we as British Columbians

should not want to encourage.

I think most British Columbians realize that public sector

employees and employers, mostly elected people who are on councils, who

are on school boards, who are involved in hospital boards or are here

as Members of the Legislative Assembly and the government, like to have

a good working relationship. This doesn't make that possible. It

basically allows us to cop out, to be not accountable to our electors.

It says we throw up our hands, we don't have any money to pay for the

necessary increases in the cost-of-living increments to our employees.

It says we can't introduce any new programs. If we do that, it pits

teachers against parents and the needs of the children. It pits the

citizens against their engineering staff, or maintenance installers.

And it sets up a whole bunch of very negative conflicts in British

Columbia.

On top of that, it ignores well-established traditions we've

built up in this province. A number of us here are from municipal

councils, and we know that the public sector does not lead in terms of

compensation. We all work on a very complex averaging of wages and

salaries — a composite of the public and private sector. If we need to

have any more information, I'm sure Graham Leslie, the former Deputy

Minister of Labour under both this government and the previous

government, could give full information on that. He was the chief

negotiator for the regional district when I was the mayor of Vancouver.

We went through this during the very difficult three-and

a-half-month strike, which was basically a catch-up after five years of

the compensation stabilization program and the wage and price controls

that the Prime Minister at the time, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, said he

would never introduce. This government said it wasn't going to

introduce this continuation of

[ Page 1830 ]

wage and price controls. It was going to be a "fresh start."

Well, the fresh start isn't happening. We're continuing with that

injustice, and those inequities are going to explode back at the public

sector and public sector employees somewhere down the line.

We urge the minister to reconsider this copping out and

pushing off the burden of dealing with the imbalance between the public

and private sector to a future Legislature. Let's deal with it now.

Let's prevent that problem from happening right now. Let's deal with

those injustices.

It's also a practical problem, Madam Chairman, because what

happens when you create an artificial lid on the public sector is that

it makes it more difficult to keep good people working for the public

sector because they get behind their counterparts in the private

sector. We all know that the public sector now is not composed of a

bunch of clerks with quill pens. People in the public sector now are

very highly skilled technicians, trades people and professionals.

I'll just run through a municipality like the city of

Vancouver, where the police now have to go through an extensive

training program through the Justice Institute of B.C. They have a

six-month training program and another year after that. They take

upgrading programs all the way along the line. They have a very

difficult, complex technological job, as well as moments of extreme

risk.

Fire officials have to deal with new forms of construction and

new materials and safety standards. They have to deal in a big city

like Vancouver with the congestion. They have to deal with highrises.

They have to deal with industries on a strategic waterfront. They have

to deal with a risk factor that is the highest of just about any other

occupation, including falling and logging.

Look at the kind of talent it takes in a planning department

now — the range of people it takes to deal with earthquake standards,

zoning problems at an interface of commercial, industrial and

residential neighbourhoods. Look at the kinds of skilled people you

need to deal with multibilliomiollar developers, who come with all

their high-priced help, to make sure that it's quality development.

We're not just talking about clerks with quill pens; we're

talking about very talented, skilled professionals. Finance departments

have accountants and computer programmers for some of the most

complicated record-keeping around. The internal-external auditing,

which we could use a lot more of here at the provincial level to deal

with some of the problems that one of the members here has faced in the

past about allowing travel allowances to build up.... That would never

happen at the municipal level because of the very sophisticated

controls with the internal/external auditing that takes place. Those

people could go into the private sector if there are not commensurate

wages and salaries in the public sector.

This artificially depresses the salaries, wages and benefits

of very talented and absolutely essential employees. It will make it

harder for public sector employers to maintain the quality of their

staffs and the ability to run municipal councils. I could say the same

thing for school boards, hospital boards and this provincial government

— when you look at the change in the nature of the public sector

workforce over the last ten to 20 years. This provision will distort

salaries and benefits, and make it difficult to attract and keep good

people. I don't think we want to see that diminution of the public

sector. Combined with other provisions in Bills 19 and 20, where there

has been a loss of the security and protection that has been built up

over the last 40 or 50 years, it's also going to make it increasingly

difficult to maintain the morale and continue the employment of our

very skilled public sector employees.

[3:15]

As well, it's going to turn elected people at the local level

into financial eunuchs. It's going to take away their ability to be

accountable to their electors. More and more, at the school and

hospital level, budgets are entirely determined by Victoria, and the

ability-to-pay argument is entirely dependent on what the treasury in

Victoria gives people. And that is basically going to mean that they

throw up their hands: "We're just here to pass messages back and

forward between the provincial government and our employees." So people

are going to lose, not the enjoyable thrill — sometimes — of balancing

accountability to electors and the needs of employees.... but the

ability to make decisions in a field where their reason for being

involved in public life is a substantial one rather than that of just

sitting there as a financial eunuch, with no ability, to set budgets or

negotiate. They're just severely restricted by this provision in Bill

19,

section 137.96(2): "Where the ability to pay of the public sector

employer is in issue, then, notwithstanding subsection (1), the ability

of the public sector employer to pay shall be the paramount factor."

This

section 1s going to harm the public sector and the citizens of

this province for all of those reasons.

It also, as I said, Madam Chairman, is a breach of Canada's

United Nations treaty obligations and responsibilities under

article 3

of the 1948 International Labour Organization convention. I think we

should, instead of breaching those treaty obligations, be trying to

meet them and trying to find ways for employers and employees to

improve conditions for people who work in this province. Rather than

taking away, we should be trying to improve. I think it's unfortunate

that we are a backwater of reaction in this area, that we are breaching

this UN treaty obligation. I don't think that's what we should be doing

in this province.

But just as important.... I would hope that the minister would

remember, when this bill is reconsidered by himself tonight and by the

caucus this weekend, the impact it's going to have on over half the

population of this province — the women of this province. It is going

to freeze women into the ghettos they are in in terms of low-paying

jobs. It is going to make it very difficult, if not impossible, to

introduce pay equity programs. I would hope that this

section would be

removed. "The need to maintain an appropriate relationship between

occupations or classifications within the employer's employment" makes

it next to impossible to look at equal pay for work of equal value, to

make those very complex assessments that employers are making all over

this country now. I don't think you're going to be doing the women of

this province any favour if that provision stays. So I would urge that

it be given full consideration by the minister, as another area to

amend or withdraw, so that we don't have women being kept in the

unequal position that they have been in for far too long.

HON. MR. COUVELIER: Madam Chairman, I'm

delighted to have this opportunity to make a few comments in response

to some of the points being made by the opposition during discussion of

these sections. One of the difficulties I've had in learning the

practices and customs of this House is the almost total abuse of facts

and truth that are exhibited by

[ Page 1831 ]

most of the debaters, primarily on issues that are so easily

verified and determined upon a little bit of investigation. I soon

stopped trying to keep track of the outrageous statements of alleged

fact that were being made by the members of the opposition, because I

didn't have enough paper and I didn't have enough ink in my pen. It

doesn't seem to have any relevance; fact doesn't seem to have any

bearing whatsoever. All you've got to do is keep the lips moving and

consume the time available, and sooner or later you can sit down. But

to make sure that I don't fall into the same temptation, easy as it is,

I just want to talk about some specific points I heard mentioned here.

It was said that the Minister of Finance will be determining

the settlements henceforth in the public sector because of this

ability-to-pay question, and it was said that the ability-to-pay

question will always be an issue. Ipso facto, given the fact that

municipal governments and most local elected bodies have a budget to

work with, and they're not allowed to print money or exceed budgets,

ability to pay will always be an issue. But the speakers have totally

ignored the fact that these sections deal only with issues when they

get to this point of arbitration.

Surely, if the concern of the opposition members is so great,

it seems to me ipso facto that the participants in a dispute would be

eager to settle it through the normal collective bargaining process,

which is what this government stands for, which is what we said the

bill was intended to do and which is what the bill will do — get some

sanity back into the collective bargaining process. Surely the issue

suggested here — that all of these points will be considered in a

collective bargaining issue — is not the case.

We're only talking about these being applicable points at

matters of arbitration. Anybody walking in and listening to this thing

would assume automatically, listening to the speakers from the

opposition, that it applied to all labour negotiations. It certainly

does not. It applies only to those cases where they can't reach a

settlement.

Someone has to bring some sanity back into these discussions,

and we're laying out the criteria by which sanity will be restored.

You're saying that it will be abused and misapplied. Surely you have to

at least let it try.... Let's see if that evolves. You're always taking

the position that it will never work.

Madam Chairman, I heard some comments here by one of the

speakers that he was on the firing line in earlier days, so he speaks

with great knowledge. He was not on a firing line; he was sitting on

the Maginot Line. If you want to look at settlements in the public

area, we've had more problems in trying to get some relativity into

that whole process by some of the awards that have been made in the

Greater Vancouver Regional District settlements.... Firing line,

baloney! Maginot Line is a more accurate description.

This same speaker talked about public sector living standards

being cut "dramatically." My goodness, what does he think has been

going on out there in the real world? The private sector has been

unemployed, let alone wondering how much money they're going to get as

a wage increase. Where have you been? You've been in this little cocoon

that seems to have no relevance whatsoever to what's going on out

there. People are having — were having, in those times — a difficult

time holding onto their jobs. They were not prepared to waste a lot of

public time and effort talking about how much more they were going to

get. They just said: "For goodness' sake, keep us employed." My

goodness! Cut dramatically — of all the absurdities!

You also said this will make "financial eunuchs" out of public

employers. Madam Chairman, if the compensation stabilization program

did not make financial eunuchs out of public employers, how is it in

the wildest stretch of imagination that this change could do so? This

only applies in cases of arbitration. It isn't universal, and the free

collective bargaining process will work, providing it's given a chance.

There was some comment about women's issues. Madam Chairman,

clause (

c) here, as I read it, enshrines in legislation the fact that

"the skill, effort and responsibility required of the employees and the

nature of the work performed" have to be recognized. So surely this is

a step forward. This is a move to ensure that there is some balance,

some relativity maintained, some recognition of the fact that the

public does not have a bottomless purse. Furthermore — I'll say it

again — it only applies in cases of arbitration, where the collective

bargaining process has failed.

Madam Chairman, I think these sections are well written, well

researched, and well thought out. The objections I've heard by sitting

in for the last hour don't impress me in the least.

MR. HARCOURT: Madam Chairman, I hope that

the hon. member will turn up his speaker, as he retires to do some deep

breathing and to meditate upon the exaggerations which he has just

uttered in such an utterly inane way. I was hoping to remind him that

when he was the mayor of Saanich, the settlements that we got out of

that municipality used to drive the rest of us in British Columbia wild

trying to keep up — part of the problem we faced in this province with

him just shovelling the money off the back of the truck to his

employees. For him to stand up here now and make these holier than thou

pronouncements is a little much, to say the least.

Talking about the real world in regard to this bill, I hope

that these

section 137's and the ability to pay, and the way it has

restricted the emancipation of women, is something this government

caucus will consider as they retreat to fantasyland this weekend, as

they retreat into the castle and draw up the drawbridge to escape from

the alligators in the moat.

MADAM CHAIRMAN: Hon. member, I really don't

feel that those comments are relevant or called for in this debate.

MR. HARCOURT: Madam Chairman, I'm

commenting on the

section before us. Your colleague from Saanich and

the Islands is the one who thought we should be dealing with the real

world, and I'm saying that the Social Credit caucus should do just

that. We're going to be meeting in the Biltmore, which is a good hotel

in Vancouver in my riding. That is not getting me any publicity

whatsoever.

The point I'm making is, in that fantasyland please cogitate

about some of the fine arguments you have heard here today and during

the days that we have debated

section 137.96 and all the other sections

in this act about how this particular

section and the bill are going to

harm British Columbia. They are untenable; they are unworkable. They

are going to do a great deal of harm. So have a little moment of

reality as you retreat into fantasy this weekend.

MR. MILLER: I will be brief, Madam

Chairman, because some of my colleagues want to express their opinion

[ Page 1832 ]

further on this section. In view of the remarks by the

Minister of Finance — rather hyperbolic remarks, in my opinion — I

wonder if the Minister of Labour could respond to the Minister of

Finance talking about sanity and whether we could refer to

section

137.96 as the sanity clause in this bill. We will be looking forward to

further comments from the Minister of Finance on the theory of

relativity when we get into dealing with the health estimates.

[3:30]

HON. L. HANSON: I appreciate the courtesy

given me by the opposition. Certainly I was listening to the speaker

and the kind remarks of my critic. I would also like to acknowledge

that the debate, although sometimes maybe a little repetitious in my

opinion, has certainly been a good one and well thought out. I

recognize all the members on the opposite side for that.

I would have to agree that the debate has piqued the interest

of the Minister of Finance. I think it's excellent that this House

carries on in that manner. I would also have to acknowledge, in

listening to my critic, that he did acknowledge that the ability to pay

only comes about as a result of arbitration. But I would like to point

out that arbitration also comes about if the two parties agree to go to

arbitration, or if the commissioner is told to stop a dispute, a work

disruption. Certainly parties can reach an agreement on their own, and

there is no doubt that a lot of agreements will be reached; and the

question of ability to pay, of course, doesn't come into consideration

when the parties have reached such agreement.

There is no question that arguments may be made on ability to

pay during the negotiations, but if the parties do agree, that doesn't

become an issue. In requiring an arbitrator to pay attention to the

ability to pay if it is an issue in the bargaining, all we're really

doing is ensuring that the third party, the arbitrator, produces a

decision that is as close as possible to one that the two parties might

have negotiated on their own. But that is a requirement.

It is interesting to note that the province of Manitoba has

just introduced a bill — I think it's titled in their legislature Bill

61 — which is

an act to amend their labour relations act. I just might

point out that in it, if I can quote from it, it says: "Factors to be

considered in making a decision in the case of...." I should just

preface that with saying that the statute introduces a new

section

dealing with a final offer selection, In the final offer selection, the

factors to be considered in making a decision is where, in the opinion

of the selector, the employer has provided sufficient information in

respect of the employer's ability to pay. So it's interesting to note

that the concept of ability to pay in British Columbia is being

considered by the Manitoba legislation.

I'm not sure which members mentioned these various things, but

there was some concern about the need to maintain an appropriate

relationship. I think the suggestion was made that that will kill pay

equity. Pay equity certainly will be considered under

section

137.96(l)(a), but considered in light of, as an example, rates in

similar

industries. If I can use the example of the health care community, pay

equity can be considered in that as an example.

It's also considered under

section 137.96(l)(c), in which

the words "the skill, effort and responsibility required of the

employees" appear. Speculation that that will, in fact, remove any

ability for pay equity in terms of.... I think the reference was to the

ladies in the working community. I really can't get that

interpretation, nor can I agree with that conclusion that will result

from that. Certainly in the negotiation that goes on between the

management and organized labour they will continue to consider those

things, I am sure, in their negotiations across the table; but we're

simply making it clear that it's a requirement in the case of those

arbitrated settlements, as I mentioned earlier.

I just want to add that the suggestion that Victoria is

controlling — and I think the Leader of the Opposition made that

suggestion — municipal budgets.... I think the provincial government

does have a responsibility to peruse municipal budgets, but I am sure

that most municipal councils would be quite upset to know that they

couldn't set their own budget within their means.

MR. GABELMANN: Just a few comments. First

of all, I must say I was delighted to have the Minister of Finance

enter the debate; we had a more spirited response. That's not to

criticize the Minister of Labour; it's a different style, and we all

have different styles. It's nice to have a little bit of energy

injected into the debate once in a while, too, even if everything he

says is wrong. It's also interesting, Madam Chairman, that the Minister

of Finance was here, and was listening. The Minister of Labour was not

here. The Minister of Labour heard what was said, and the Minister of

Finance did not. So the logical conclusion of that is: it's better not

to be here, if you want to hear what was being said.

Certainly the Minister of Finance ignored totally the fact

that we started this afternoon by saying that ability to pay only comes

into play when there's an arbitration or an imposed settlement. We

acknowledge that. If it's a freely reached settlement, then it doesn't

come into play. We accept that. He didn't listen, though.

MR. MILLER: The ability to listen.

MR. GABELMANN: Yes. That's something you

can't legislate either, I guess: the ability to listen. However, I

don't want to make too much light of that. I just want to deal with

some of the issues.

First of all, in response to Manitoba's legislation. It should

be known — and I'm sure the minister knows, because he's got the bill

in front of him; I don't have it in front of me — that the final-offer

selection mechanism, which can come into play in two certain stages of

a dispute, only comes into play when both parties accept and agree to

it, when both parties say: "Yes, that is the mechanism that we choose

in these certain days of the dispute. We choose to use that final offer

selection as a dispute resolution mechanism." And that's very

different, because here, of course, the decision to go to final-offer

selection or any other kind of final solution is one that is made by

the commissioner or by the IRC. That kind of power is not being given

to the government, the Ministry of Labour, or any other agency — the

Manitoba labour relations board, or anybody else — in their legislative

amendments. Further to that, the legislative changes that are being

proposed in Manitoba are as a result of direct requests from both

management and employee groups. Both trade unions and employers have

asked for these particular changes, and they flow from that. Again,

that's a very different situation from that which exists in British

Columbia.

Both the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Labour make a

lot of the point that ability to pay only comes into play

[ Page 1833 ]

if there's an arbitrated settlement. It's a little more

complicated than that. It's true that if there is a freely reached or

freely negotiated settlement that does not attract the attention of the

IRC, then ability to pay is not in place. Of course, if there is a

directive from the Ministry of Finance that says there's no money this

year in the budget for wages, then it's going to be very difficult for

the public employer to provide that kind of settlement. We're not

talking so much here about municipalities as about school boards,

hospitals and other services that are more directly funded by the

province. In fact, it's not just in pure arbitration that factors to be

considered come up. They come up in various sections of this. Fact

finders are required, in their fact-finding, to follow the criteria

established by 137.96. Fact-finders can be appointed in respect of a

collective bargaining dispute. There may not be a strike; bargaining

may still be continuing. It may be that the parties have decided that a

strike or lockout is not in their best interests, so they continue to

try to reach some resolution even though there's obviously a dispute. A

fact-finder can be appointed at that point, and any recommendations

that the fact-finder comes up with must take into account ability to

pay. Similarly, the duties and procedure of a public interest inquiry

board are also...the inquiry board is also required under that

section to have due regard to the interest arbitration criteria

established by

section 137.96.

Throughout this whole series of available mechanisms, if a

public sector dispute ends up being dealt with by the IRC, then ability

to pay comes into place. That is, I think, an unassailable argument

which the Minister of Finance chose either to ignore or not to

understand. The fact is that any public sector employer who either

doesn't want to give a wage increase or feels they can't, given the

budget that they've been allocated by the government, will end up

having to go to some form of resolution through the IRC and will

therefore have the ability to pay imposed upon them. Clearly, ability

to pay is the major factor, and it's going to happen more often than

not in public sector disputes, given a continued policy of the

government to say to those public bodies: "These are the number of

dollars you're going to receive. These are ones you can use for wages,

and these are ones you cannot use for wages."

If that kind of a policy continues — and it's in place now —

then we're going to have more, not fewer, public sector disputes. Those

disputes will end up in front of the IRC, and when they do, ability to

pay will be the principle. When that happens, you have wage controls.

That's essentially our argument, and despite what the Minister of

Finance says — or others — I think that argument is actually

unassailable.

MS. A. HAGEN: The context in which we are

dealing with this particular clause is some kind of a transition from

the Compensation Stabilization Act and its guidelines. One of the

things the minister advised the public about in the first press

releases that he made in respect to this act was that this act is

disappearing. I want to note that, because as my colleague for North

Island has just stated, we really have a fairly pervasive element of

ability to pay in this act. I think it is going to have an effect on

labour relations in a significant number of ways. I want to try to

develop that for a few moments, and then ask the minister some

questions about how he sees the Compensation Stabilization Act aspect

of this bill being implemented.

[3:45]

When you look at this clause that we're debating, and also at

clause 66, there is within the province a very large number of bodies

associated with government through its own government employees'

organization; associated with government because this Legislature

passes the laws which govern the activities of municipalities, regional

districts, school boards, hospital boards, universities, etc. The

schedule in

section 66 involves a whole range of other bodies: Crown

corporations and governing bodies such as regional districts, and some

strange inclusions like the Glendale Lodge Society, which must in some

way be different from a community care facility, which is listed among

the

definitions in the first part of this particular clause. We're

talking about a very large number of people who will be affected by

this public sector clause. I have no idea of the number of employees

who might be involved. I'd be interested to know if the minister has

any idea from his advisers of the total number of employees who come

under this particular clause and public sector dispute resolution.

We're coming out of the Compensation Stabilization Act and its

implications, and there is no question that that phrase "ability to

pay" and the way in which it has been manifest is going to have an

effect on our industrial relations and our bargaining for a good deal

of time. I support the position that the second member for Nanaimo (Mr.

Lovick) took earlier in our discussion this afternoon, that the ability

to pay has always been a major factor. But it has been altered. Those

words mean a different thing in people's minds now. They do not mean

that the employer, freely negotiating with his employees, establishes

his ability to pay, and then that is discussed across the bargaining

table. In fact, ability to pay has come to mean to people what the

government says: it will provide for wages in the various ranges of

public sector employment listed in this act. It has very much come to

mean in the public's mind something that is established on the basis of

a unilateral decision that may or may not relate to cost of living,

that may or may not be something that can be examined on the basis of

information provided to the parties. It is a unilateral statement of

ability to pay, and that has given to that phrase a whole range of

perspectives that make it, in the coin of the realm, a very abused

phrase and one in which there is no trust as to the real ability to pay.

I see that from the perspective of having worked on a school

board from the time of the six-and-five regulations that applied in the

federal wage guidelines through to the period of the Compensation

Stabilization Act, which will, if I recall correctly, be phased out in

the education sector in October 1988. I came to know that that

particular phrase, as it was used in the context of the Compensation

Stabilization Act, had very little meaning related to ability to pay.

It was something that was convoluted around finance formulas and

changing regulations, and I think there is a very real fear that that

whole realm and range of dealing with negotiated fair wage settlements

is going to continue. I don't think the minister has been able to

persuade us, either through the legislation itself or through his

pronouncements, that ability to pay will not be simply something that

stems from a Treasury Board decision that these are the amounts of

moneys that it will make available. In many instances those will be

direct grants, whether it's to the Metro Transit Operating Company,

health care facilities, hospitals or school boards.

Then we get into the whole issue of comparability of wages and

how we can rectify about ten years of ability-to pay and wage restraint

arguments. How will we arrive at

[ Page 1834 ]

settlements that will be fair and equitable when we look at

the disparities that exist between various professions within the

province at this time? If we were to take an objective look at wages

paid to teachers, nurses, social workers, physio- and occupational

therapists — just to name a few of the people who are highly qualified,

who have extensive training, usually four or five years' minimum at the

university level — we would find, as a result of some of the factors

that have been in play with ability-to-pay arguments, that there are

absolutely amazing discrepancies in the wages that are paid in these

areas. This clause, I fear, will entrench those kinds of discrepancies

even further.

The result of that is going to be the result that we see very

often these days, and that is that people in those particular

professions, trained in this province at very considerable cost to us

and very necessary to us in the provision of services, are going to be

leaving for climes where the industrial relations legislation that

governs collective bargaining is more open and more prepared to deal

with some of these issues.

When we look at this legislation and the convoluted way in

which the IRC can intrude on any phase of bargaining — that it can use

that ability-to-pay issue in any phase of bargaining, through

fact-finding, mediation and so on — knowing the very many actors who

are a part of those collective agreements, even if it's not the intent

to have the results that we predict, I'm sure that that is in fact what

those results are going to be.

I'd like to ask the minister to look specifically at a couple

of the subsections of this clause and give us some further indication

of how he interprets the compensation stabilization continuation at

this time. Under subsection (3) it is noted that: "An arbitration board

shall not, to the extent that the employee compensation and benefits

under the collective agreement are subject to the regulations and

guidelines under the Compensation Stabilization Act, make an award

inconsistent with the requirements of those regulations or guidelines."

Could the minister advise us whether this particular sub

applies only to the coming into effect of

section 71, which we haven't

as yet debated and is the phase-out and repeal of the Compensation

Stabilization Act, or are there regulations that will be continuing

following that time?

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

I ask that too because, as I read 71, there seems to be some

considerable latitude here about the course of that repeal, whether it

in fact may be repealed. Can the minister talk about (3)(

a) and talk

about it in the light of 71 and the phasing out of the Compensation

Stabilization Act, and advise us what will live on after this full act

comes into place in respect to the Compensation Stabilization Act?

MR. CHAIRMAN: The member for New

Westminster continues.

MS. A. HAGEN: The minister is indicating

that he'd like me to continue with one or two other questions, so I

shall do so, knowing he finds it more comfortable to answer a number at

one time.

Will the act, then, Mr. Minister, be phased out by regulation,

and can you give us some indication of what reliance we can place on

this, given the lack of consultation up until this time? Is this really

a tactic that is designed to confuse us about the status of the

Compensation Stabilization Act and its regulations and the ability to

pay that is enshrined in that act?

I'd like the minister to give us some indication, because if

he has some answers around this, I may want to pursue this line of

questioning. If not, I want to move on to another area, but I would

appreciate having some feedback from the minister on the status of the

Compensation Stabilization Act so I can be advised from that whether to

pursue this line of questioning. I'll sit down and hope that the

minister may be prepared to reply now.

HON. L. HANSON: Mr. Chairman, first of all

I think the member asked how many employees are affected, and certainly

I will have some research done and advise you how many we estimate will

be affected in the public sector. But I'd like to point out that as it

relates to ability to pay, hopefully very few and maybe none, because

we believe a lot of agreements are going to be reached voluntarily.

The reference to (3) is strictly a phase-out reference, and

certainly the discussion probably will get more in-depth when we do

reach

section 71 for discussion.

MS. A. HAGEN: Then I'd like to move on to

the issue of pay equity, in relation to the ability-to-pay argument,

and ask the minister, in connection with subsection (1), where there

are two and possibly three clauses that may have some implication

regarding pay equity, whether all of these will be considered equally

or whether there is potentially, in the arbitrator's use of those

clauses, the ability to choose one rather than others to make a

determination about the kinds of balances that exist in occupations.

employment with similar occupations in the relevant community in the

Province outside the employer's employment." I think arbitrators have

always looked at this particular kind of comparability when they are

deciding what fair settlements might be.

Certainly if you're at a bargaining table, you'll get

information about other teachers' districts, about what's happening to

the IWA in your community, about what's happening in other public

sector areas. However, when you look at clause (b), "the need to

maintain an appropriate relationship between occupations or

classifications within the employer's employment," then one is left

with the question: what will, in fact, determine what those appropriate

relationships are?

Will there be in the ability of the arbitrators a potential to

deal with pay equity arguments where there are discrepancies between

work of equal value within that sector? If we have a traditional

disparity within the industry and we get to arbitration, are we going

to be looking at historic patterns or are we going to be able to have

the arbitrator look at some of the newer methods that are being

considered as we consider the comparability of jobs?

In respect to the issue that I just raised, in the public

sector we have nurses, social workers, therapists and teachers, for

whom there are very major discrepancies in pay levels, and they have

been historic. Will there be any means for employees to address those

issues through arbitration if they are not able to conclude those kinds

of agreements through their collective agreement?

How will that ability-to-pay argument act as a leveller that

will prevent some of the kind of restitution that needs to come to

workers, most of them women, who have been, in traditional fields of

employment for women, underpaid in

[ Page 1835 ]

relation to their skills and training? Will we see the skill,

effort and responsibility of people genuinely looked at, or will the

ability-to-pay argument of the government prevail because, as we have

heard so many ministers say when we've asked questions about services

and programs, there is no money?

Is there to be no kind of attention paid within this bill to

justice and fairness and equity when we come to looking at some of

these issues that are a part of the industrial relations scene that we

need to see addressed? Is the minister prepared to make some

commitments at this time that if we are not able to work through the

IRC, he will be open to other means — public sector legislation — of

dealing with some of these issues that obviously, because we have

raised them so often on this side of the House, we consider to be of

such great importance in the field of collective agreements and also in

the field of arriving at a fairer and more equitable distribution of

resources, through pay to people who deserve it on the basis of their

skill, on the basis of their training, on the basis of their

responsibility?

[4:00]

HON. L. HANSON: I think I've answered these

questions before, but I'd like to point out to the member that "the

arbitration board...shall have regard to the respective merits of the

positions of the parties and to...." That is very clear to me: if the

parties negotiating at the table have a pay equity issue within their

negotiating program, certainly it would be part of the consideration.

As it relates to ability to pay, it doesn't have any

relationship to the differential between the various employees; it is

simply a reference to the ability of the employer to pay the result of

a settlement. To suggest that it has some relationship to an inequity

or to a position that.... I just don't understand it. I have answered

that question several times.

MS. A. HAGEN: I'd like to move to another

section of this clause if I may: clause (10). This is a

section that

enables the commissioner to review the arbitration award. It notes that

within seven days of receiving an arbitration award, the commissioner

may review it on the grounds that the decision "is inconsistent with

the principles expressed or implied in subsections (1), (2) and (3)" —

these are the ones that we have been discussing around the parameters

of the arbitration board — or that "a party to the arbitration has been

or is likely to be denied a fair hearing."

One of the aspects of the compensation stabilization

commissioner and of that act was that we were on a perpetual treadmill

in order to arrive at a settlement. Again I use the process that we

were involved with in school boards, where we negotiated; if we were

not able to reach an agreement, we went to an arbitration board; once

we got to an arbitration board, we went to the compensation board.

First of all, it appears to me that one of the things occurring in this

particular clause — and it's been referred to before — is that we have

this constant — I think the word has been used — merry-go-round that

never gets us off the treadmill. I'd like the minister to comment on

what marvelous powers we anticipate the commissioner is going to have

to bring to bear on this, after an arbitration board in its good sense

and with its skills has come to some conclusion within the act, and

what will be the result of his review of that particular arbitration.

I'd also like to ask how we can have the commissioner

reviewing an arbitration on the grounds that a party to the arbitration

is likely to be denied a fair hearing, when we have presumably had the

hearing and the arbitration board has brought down its particular

ruling. Is he going to rule in retrospect that he anticipated that it

might not be a fair hearing? Is there some drafting error with this

clause, or is there some

interpretation of that language which I am not

able to comprehend, as I pursue the various sections of this very

lengthy clause?

Finally, in subsection (13), what does the minister anticipate

the role of any arbitration board is going to be if we have not only

the right of the commissioner to review the arbitration award but the

fact that the commissioner, again in subsection (13), may give

"directions to the arbitration board and the parties, which in his

opinion are necessary or appropriate to achieve compliance with

subsections (1), (2) and (3) or to afford a fair hearing"? Is there

implicit in this, again, some lack of trust or faith in the role of

arbitrators who have already had their independence and ability to

arbitrate so seriously compromised under the Compensation Stabilization

Act? Is it not implicit in this that everything comes back to the

commissioner, that the commissioner is to be all things to all people:

to the parties to the dispute, the arbitrators, and presumably the

fact-finders, the mediators, the public interest inquiry board, and

everyone else involved? Can the minister give us any suggestion about

how this can work, as he so often appealed to us to let it do, when we

are leaving so much in the hands of the commissioner to be both the

instigator, the guide, the interpreter, the director and the final

arbiter of every dispute that comes to his doorstep?

I'll listen with very acute ears to some reassurances from the

minister that we can in fact rely in any way on this legislation

working in the interests of good industrial relations.

HON. L. HANSON: I think I can deal with

that very simply. The answer is no, and it's simply a review process.

MR. MILLER: First of all, I want to start

out with a question regarding the increments. The minister may be aware

that a problem developed because of CSP and their inability to deal

with special circumstances, and perhaps the inability of the Minister

of Education to have some influence. The traditional relationship that

had existed in the northern and rural school districts for years and

years had conceded a higher rate to the northern teachers; and in

addition to that, because some of the smaller districts had a fairly

high turnover, they were stuck, really, with these teachers. In terms

of the increments, a large number of teachers were entitled to the

incremental increases that had previously been negotiated and, of

course, in the course of negotiations, given that the CSP at that time

was fairly inflexible and said,"Here is the ceiling," what happened is

that the incremental costs were deducted from the overall settlement.

As a result of that, I believe in one year the school teachers in my

district got a settlement of something in the order of

point-something-one percent — very, very minuscule.

Excuse me, Mr. Chairman, I was distracted by the discussion by

the members in the back benches. I am once again reminded of the

debate: when we talk about ability to pay, as somebody said, we should

all have the ability to listen as well.

[ Page 1836 ]

In any event, as I read it, this

section under (1)(

d) would

allow the recognition of that relationship, and hopefully a return to

the traditional situation that has existed for many years in regard to

the more remote school districts and the school teachers in those

districts in the province. Perhaps the minister could respond to that.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The member for Prince Rupert

continues.

AN HON. MEMBER: He's taking notes.

MR. MILLER: He's taking notes? He'll

respond all at once? Good.

My second question has to do with subsection (9) of this

section: "Where it is shown to the satisfaction of the arbitration

board that the arbitration board has failed to deal with any matter,"

etc. Although later sections deal with this — and perhaps that might be

the minister's response — it seems to me that you're asking the

arbitration board that made the original decision to overrule

themselves; and just in terms of a fundamental system of appealing, is

it not better to have that appeal heard by different parties? For

example, when you appeal a court decision, you don't go back to the

same judge. That's kind of a fundamental basis for appeal.

Dealing with

section 137.96(4), the wording that exists with

respect to ability to pay, the minister earlier read the wording or the

proposed wording from a statute that is going to be introduced or has

been introduced in the province of Manitoba with respect to this

ability to pay. As I listened to the wording as he read it, it seemed

to me that in fact that was allowed to be a consideration, but it's not

nearly as restrictive as this section. This section, taken literally,

which I assume is the way it's going to be interpreted....

Interjection.

MR. MILLER: One would hope so, as my

colleague from Nanaimo suggests, although we all know that there's

always a dispute when it comes to

interpretation. But when you read the

wording, it's almost incredible; it's so confining. It means "the

current ability of a public sector employer to pay based on existing

revenues, requirements of any fiscal policies to which the public

sector employer is subject and the impact of increased costs on the

maintenance of existing levels of public service."

Now when you're dealing with ability to pay, I'm not going to

stand here and suggest that that's not a consideration. Certainly it's

a consideration in any set of negotiations, no matter where they take

place. The person who is paying obviously has to consider their ability

to do that. That argument is put forward quite often and, I would

suggest, is a mainstay argument used in negotiations. Certainly you

can't ignore ability to pay. It would be foolish to suggest that that's

not a factor in negotiations.

I guess that negotiations to some extent break down or reach

agreement over the parties'

interpretation of ability to pay. I've seen

very detailed explanations put forward by unions, worked on by

economists in terms of the situation of a particular company or group

of companies — their profitability, the kind of profits they're making,

the health of the companies, if you like. On the other side, I've seen

employers make some fairly detailed arguments in terms of their

financial position: "No, we can't afford to pay this much. The market doesn't look good over the next little while. Our

debt load is so much. We can't afford to do this." After all that

process you come down, hopefully, with an agreement. Most of the time

we come down with an agreement. Sometimes it breaks down, and sometimes

there's a strike, but generally those matters are resolved.

[4:15]

But here you've boxed public sector employers and employees

into a very narrow, confining definition of ability to pay. It becomes,

I think, a more difficult subject to deal with in the public sector.

I've been on city council. I know the difficulties that a council has

in setting its budget, trying to determine its priorities in capital

projects and the various requests for funds that come into any

municipal council. It's the responsibility of the council to juggle

those demands, to give more weight to some than others, and at the same

time it's the responsibility of that council — that school board or

whatever — to negotiate with its employees for a new contract.

I've seen the argument used by public sector employers: "No,

we can't afford to pay." What then comes into the equation is the

taxation policy of that particular public sector body. Certainly

municipal councils and provincial governments, or any taxing authority,

have the ability, and hopefully the common sense, to make a number of

decisions about budgetary items, including any increases that they may

be prepared to offer their employees. It's not a simple matter whereby

the union, for example, would come forth and say: "You've got the

ability to pay. Go raise taxes." The thing is worked out.

When you confine it to the ability to pay based on existing

revenues, it seems to me, you've tied the body's hands in terms of

raising additional revenue. Certainly this government is familiar with

additional methods of raising revenue, because we've seen a budget

introduced at the beginning of this year that raised a considerable

amount of revenue from some sources that caused a considerable amount

of concern. Senior citizens certainly weren't happy about additional

levies that they had to pay. The real estate people were not happy

about increased taxes on property transfer. Nobody's very happy with

those things, but as a government you've made some decisions; and as a

level of government, municipal councils and school boards can make some

decisions. When you confine them to existing revenues, it seems to me

that they have the opportunity to say no, existing revenues are such

that that's it; there's no money. When you further add on the

qualifiers in terms of that public sector employer and its ability to

maintain existing levels of public service, you further tie its hands.

So, taken literally and interpreted literally, and used in

that fashion, you can virtually tie the hands of a public sector

employer, in terms of sitting down realistically and negotiating in

good faith with its employees. I think that's worth hearing some

response on, because it could lead to a great deal of frustration at

the local level when it comes to bargaining. It could needlessly

hamstring an employer. Certainly an employer could be capable of

saying.... Let's assume we're talking about a municipal council: "We

think it's reasonable that we give our employees an increase. The

overall cost of the contract that we've negotiated is 5 percent. We

also have some public works projects we're proceeding with this year,

and we've got some additional operational costs in Prince Rupert.

They've built a brand-new theatre, and that's going to be additional

operating costs which they

[ Page 1837 ]

haven't faced in the past. In light of all these factors,

here's our total budget. It's more than it was last year, therefore

there's going to be a tax increase."

Presumably a reasonable public sector employer could make that

determination, and their hands would not be tied by this clause.

Conversely, a public sector employer could say: "There it is in black

and white. We don't have to raise taxes. We're going to maintain the

existing level of service. I'm sorry, there's no more money." In fact,

depending upon the vagaries of the economic situation in this country

with respect to inflation and a number of other factors, you could use

this to ask for a cut.

If it's tied in with the rest of the

section in terms of an

arbitration board using those kinds of guidelines, you've created a

situation where those employees could be so confined that the

bargaining process becomes quite meaningless, which leads me into the

next part of the argument. It's an old one. It's been made in many

instances, that is, that as much as possible, the negotiating process

should be free from encumbrances. The best negotiations take place

between employees and employers who realize they're not there to fool

around. They've got to sit down; they've got to come to an agreement,

and hopefully with a minimum of fuss. Any time that you introduce

impediments to that process — impediments that could be used to

needlessly frustrate the process — you create a situation that at some

time or other will boil over. It has been said many times that you can

deny people the right to strike, but at some point that may happen; it

may happen in violation of that restriction. And I think it happens.

Again, my experience is that most labour relations disputes happen as a

result of some frustration that's built up over a particular amount of

time. I don't think simply writing a rule that says,"You can't do this

any more," really solves the problem.

Briefly restating it, certainly ability to pay is a factor,

but in a narrow, confined, restrictive description such as the minister

has included in this bill, it will be used — or potentially could be

used — simply to frustrate the bargaining process.

I think I've asked three questions in that dissertation.

Should I call it a dissertation, Mr. Chairman? However, I'd be pleased

to listen to the response of the minister.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm really finding it quite

difficult to talk to the minister about this section, as I have found

it, quite frankly, on some of the other sections. I find it difficult

to understand some of the minister's responses, or lack of responses.

This particular section, "Factors to be considered" — many

other speakers have talked about it — very clearly inhibits the ability

of women in the public sector to increase their wages or their benefits

to a status equal with their male counterparts. Unfortunately, it is

even more insidious than other sections in this legislation in

restricting the ability of working people in this province, because it

goes the next step. It not only restricts them, it not only takes away

from them their ability to bargain, but it then goes the next step:

instead of the traditional comparison of wages within an industry, in

this

section it talks about "a comparison of overall terms and

conditions of employment with similar occupations in the relevant

community." This is taking it outside of the industry and putting it

into the community.

Within the trade union movement in this province, negotiations

have traditionally been limited in wage comparisons to industry

comparisons. That has enabled the union movement, when negotiating....

I think I'll wait until the minister finishes his conversation

so that he can more appropriately respond to some of my questions.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I suggest that the member

continue, because she might lose the floor otherwise.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The point I was trying to

make — and I hope the minister will choose to respond to it — is that

there will be a pressure, a downgrading, in this comparison that allows

community comparison, where a negotiated wage level of a clerical staff

person in the public sector compared to a clerk in a retail store,

perhaps, rather than have the effect of possibly increasing that

person's wages, would argue against it, because the person in a similar

occupation in the retail sector would not have had the opportunity of

previous negotiations and work done within organized labour.

I have a difficulty, and I have tried to point it out to the

minister before. Who is this legislation targeting? Who is it

restricting? I've been trying to understand some of the things

government members have said about the need to restrict the public

sector. I look over at the advisers to the minister, and I wonder if

that was what we were talking about. Are we talking about restricting

these gentlemen's wages?

Surely the intent of any legislation, as we've heard from

other speakers, is to control this situation that is out of hand, these

wages that are skyrocketing. Is that what we're talking about?

Interjection.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Well, no we're not. We're

talking about the people working within the public sector who are not

excluded staff. We're talking about the ordinary rank and file member —

not management, certainly not senior management, certainly not the big

wage-earners. We're talking about the ordinary rank and file members

who are not making enough money to support a family.

If the minister — and I see him smiling — had done his

homework to see who he is targeting by this, he would understand, for

instance, that he is talking about a warehouse worker or a clerk 3 who

makes $707 every two weeks. If that clerk 3, be it male or female, has

to support a family — pay a mortgage and all of the things that a

typical B.C. family does — they're in pretty tight straits.

Yet the minister has seen fit to bring in this legislation,

and again I refer to

section 137.96. The minister talks about not only

the ability to pay but also "the need to maintain an appropriate

relationship between occupations or classifications within the

employer's employment." This is the only government in Canada that has

not recognized and is not working towards breaking down some of those

barriers.

[4:30]

Instead this government is institutionalizing and bringing in

legislation that supports those barriers. It says that there must be an

"appropriate relationship" maintained. What is "appropriate"? Is it

appropriate for a woman that is running the minister's office, a

secretary in that office, to be making less money than a senior

management person? Is it appropriate that somebody out in the.

municipal works yard on a road construction or repair job should be

making more than somebody responding to correspondence in a mayor's

office?

[ Page 1838 ]

The minister either refuses to respond or doesn't understand

what is going on in the real world out there — or else is cognizant of

how vicious and damaging this legislation is. I would like to hear from

the minister exactly why he feels it's necessary to put a clause in

this legislation that identifies the need to maintain "appropriate

relationships." What is "appropriate"? Can the minister tell us that?

Is it appropriate the way the world is divided right now?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Before the minister responds,

if he chooses to do so, hon. members, I would like to talk to everyone

for just a moment in a nice, quiet way about relevancy in debate. We

have a standing order, 61(2), which deals with this subject, and which

deals specifically with it as it applies within the Committee of the

Whole. The requirement is not just for relevancy in the normal sense of

the word; it says that we will require strict relevancy in dealing with

items in Committee of the Whole.

I had some difficulty, during the discourse by the last

member, of really associating some of her remarks directly with the

section that we are dealing with. I don't say this as a reprimand in

any way, sense or form, but just to remind members how very critical it

is that we have relevancy in debate, especially in Committee of the

Whole. It has been recognized by people such as Beauchesne that we must

always be prepared to ensure that everything is canvassed thoroughly in

this kind of situation, but in respect to serving this House well and

canvassing all of the various aspects of a bill such as this, I think

relevancy is very important.

Having said that, does the member for North Island wish to

comment?

MR. GABELMANN: Very briefly, Mr. Chairman.

I appreciate the comments and the tone in which they are offered; it is

quite appropriate. However, in this case the member for

Surrey-Guildford-Whalley was, I think, entirely in order in respect to

137.96(l)(b). The whole question of the need to maintain an

appropriate relationship between occupations or classifications is one

that has been talked about in general terms but has never been

thoroughly canvassed in the debate so far. Not that we are going to

take a lot more time on that particular clause, but there needs to be

some further clarification of those words. That is what that is about.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Does the member for Surrey

Guildford-Whalley have something else to say?

MS. SMALLWOOD: Yes. I will try to respond

in equally subdued tones, although I have to admit that when we are

talking about issues such as this, I find it very difficult not to get

angry about them.

I also want to thank the Chairman for his comments and add my

own. I am sorry that the Chairman was unable to understand the

relevancy, because what I was trying to do is put in human terms

exactly what this legislation means and who the people are that it is

affecting. I think that's extremely relevant, and I think that all too

often we tend to deal with legislation in technical terms and overlook

the actual lives the legislation is affecting. So, with all due

respect, I will continue to try to put before the House those people's

lives and those issues which I feel are of crucial and fundamental

importance to this legislation.

HON. L. HANSON: I am certainly not trying

to subdue the debate of the member opposite and subdue her ability to

put her position before the House. I just at times have seen that these

questions are quite repetitious in the sense that I have answered them

several times from various members. I am not concerned that the member

wants me to answer; I think that is fair and fine. But I think that at

some point these questions have been raised a number of times, and they

keep being raised. You may express them with some different words, but

certainly they keep being raised.

I think your major issue is a couple of points. You read into

this

section a discriminatory thing that is going to maintain a

situation that you have great concern over. I would like to read to you

again that the arbitration board shall, in settling the terms and

conditions of a collective agreement, have regard to the respective

merits of the positions of the parties. Certainly that says to me that

if an issue that is placed on the bargaining table is a parity

situation, or whatever, there is a requirement that the arbitration

board consider it. There is nothing here that says that that is not

part of the consideration. If it is an issue placed on the table, then

certainly it will be part of the consideration.

"A comparison of overall terms and

conditions of employment with similar occupations in the relevant

community in the Province outside the employer's employment...." That

refers to a relevant community, and it's intended to allow arbitrators

to consider pay equity arguments within similar industries. Again, I

point out the example of the health care community that I used earlier.

I'm not refusing to answer. I've just answered the question

many times.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'd like to pursue the issue

that the minister just raised, that in this situation we can deal with

pay equity and with comparisons of like skills and look at a relevant

community.

Does the minister recognize that in Manitoba, Ontario, Prince

Edward Island, the federal government.... All of these governments have

undertaken programs of pay equity. It has been a program that the

government has initiated. There is a whole field of expertise in

evaluating skills and abilities, a whole field of expertise dealing

with comparative studies. It takes time, money and a commitment from a

government. Can you tell me how, with this legislation in place, that

kind of work will be done to ensure those comparisons? Without that

kind of work, commitment and investment by the government, and that

direction to the industries, it has not happened. All you have to do is

look at history to see that. It has not happened in this province. It

has not happened anywhere unless the government has taken some

initiative to involve itself in that process. Without that kind of

commitment, there is no way that these two clauses of 137.96 will do

anything but inhibit and restrict, because there will be no comparison

and no support data in place that will allow those women or those

low-paid workers to break out of those ghettos.

The minister insists that with this legislation he is

encouraging pay equity. Can the minister explain exactly how that's

going to work?

MR. CHAIRMAN: The member continues.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'd like it on the record

that the minister has chosen not to respond. Once again, either he

[ Page 1839 ]

does not have the answer or the answer he is prepared to give

this House is not one that he feels the House is prepared to hear. I

think that the answer is that the minister understands that under this

legislation women will never improve their...or encourage pay equity

in their lives. I think that by not answering, that is exactly what the

minister is saying. It makes a total mockery of the government's

position on supporting families in this province.

HON. L. HANSON: I don't understand the

relevancy of this. We're discussing

section 62. We're not discussing

pay equity legislation. We may have it at some in point in time. You

may introduce it; somebody may introduce it. That's not in this section.

The member said that I said that this would ensure pay equity.

I didn't say that. I said that there's nothing in here that would stop

pay equity if it was an issue on the bargaining table.

MR. SIHOTA: Mr. Chairman, I was going to

use far stronger language, believe you me, and I chose not to because

I've been cautioned in the past about particular language. But let me

put it this way: I totally, fundamentally disagree with what the

minister has to say.

I guess the starting point, before I start to talk, is to ask

the minister one very simple question: is the minister in principle

committed to pay equity? Yes or no. After I hear an answer to that,

I'll talk about the section. But is the minister, as a representative

of the government in labour matters, committed in principle to pay

equity?

MR. CHAIRMAN: The member continues.

MR. SIHOTA: They have a saying in law that

if someone is silent, you draw an adverse inference from that. The

adverse inference from....

MR. CHAIRMAN: This line of questioning is

totally unacceptable, hon. member. I have mentioned previously....

MR. SIHOTA: Mr. Chairman, with all

respect....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Would the member mind taking

his seat.

MR. SIHOTA: Sorry.

MR. CHAIRMAN: It's quite all right.

I said just the other day that any questions you desire to ask

can be posed, but there's no requirement that they be answered. When we

reflect, perhaps in an obtuse way, on the character of someone on the

basis that they haven't responded, I don't think that's really

acceptable. Continue, please.

[4:45]

MR. SIHOTA: The minister is suggesting that

he doesn't quite see the relevancy of pay equity. We're talking about

section 137.96, subsections (1)(

a) and (1)(b), which talk about the

employers and the "need to maintain an appropriate relationship between

occupations or classifications within the employer's employment."

Surely the minister must see, to bring it into relevancy, that those

two clauses touch very directly upon the heart of the pay equity

dispute.

If you want to maintain the existing classifications, which

are going to be the same across the board whether you want to look at

CUPE or the BCGEU or private sector payments, let's say, for clerical

staff, then you're going to keep those wages depressed. Because you're

asking in your own legislation that you look at all of those other

classifications, which in our view are depressed. If they're depressed,

and if you want to maintain those differences in wage scales in various

occupations, and if you recognize that pay equity tries to do away with

the depression of those wages and tends to make validations in the

complex terms that the member for Surrey Guildford-Whalley (Ms.

Smallwood) just talked about, you inhibit that, totally frustrate it,

and in fact end up denying it in the language that's contained in

section 137.96 (l)(

a) and (b).

In my mind that raises a fundamental question as to whether or

not this government is committed in principle to pay equity. Without

making an allegation or impugning the minister one way or the other —

if you can impugn someone in a positive way! — the point still remains

that a government committed to pay equity or to the principles of pay

equity would not introduce into labour legislation the type of language

that appears in sections 137.96 (l)(

a) and (b). It's totally

inconsistent and not harmonious at all with the objective of pay equity.

Understanding that, the minister must then understand that

there is indeed relevancy between what's stated in (

a) and (

b) and the

comments we're making on this side of the House. How can you possibly

have pay equity when you want to maintain the appropriate relationship

between classifications of employees? How can you possibly have pay

equity when you're saying that you have to compare the wage scales with

similar occupations in the relevant community within the province? It's

an impossibility. Therefore the only inference that I can draw,

logically put — and I invite the minister to point out where this logic

is flawed — at the end of the day is that this government is not

committed to pay equity. If that's the case, then it's shocking.

You know, it's interesting. I've often heard the Premier and

other ministers say in question period: "Well, we want to show

leadership in British Columbia. We want to move into new areas, new

territory. and be at the cutting edge of change in this province."

Well, conservative Ontario — eastern Canada — has introduced

legislation, among other provinces and the federal government. Why is

this government not willing to take the same leadership that the feds

or the province of Ontario have taken?

Clearly, if there was a will or a commitment to pay equity....

Let's not forget which classifications or socioeconomic groups in

society suffer the most when we get down to pay equity issues: women —

foremost, women. No two ways about it. Women have been traditionally

underpaid — as well as underemployed — in this society. They're the

ones who stand to benefit and who ought to benefit from pay equity

programs. By far and away, women.

Secondly, the poor. Of course, it only stands to reason that,

given depressed wages, they're going to find it difficult to get out of

their situation.

Thirdly, immigrants. A government with a sensitivity to pay

equity is a government that has a sensitivity to improving the human

condition that working people find themselves in. This section, for

those who are employed, for those who end

[ Page 1840 ]

up in disputes, for those who end up in disputes and

arbitration.... They are going to find it very difficult, if I want to

put it diplomatically, and impossible, if I want to make a submission,

to be able to achieve pay equity. So in a funny sort of way this

section just continues those traditional difficulties that women and

immigrants and poor have had in this society. I think that all of us

expect a little more leadership from this government than is

demonstrated in these sections.

MR. GABELMANN: Mr. Chairman, it was my

intention to move on to 137.97, unless the member for Surrey

Guildford-Whalley has another brief interjection to make.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I want to head off some

comments perhaps from the Chair or from some of the back-benchers on

relevancy. What I want to do is again talk about who this anti-pay

legislation

section is going to affect. I want to remind the minister —

and we have brought this to the House before — that the people he is

affecting, as the previous speaker said, are women, and that 61 percent

of all Canadian families would fall below the poverty level if it

wasn't for women's wages in that family. What the minister is doing by

restricting their ability to improve their wages is ultimately

restricting the ability of 61 percent of Canadian families or B.C.

families to struggle above the poverty line. That is who he is talking

about.

On the issue of pay equity — and again I am talking about the

restrictions that the minister is imposing in this legislation — what

we are talking about is figures such as.... They are bandied around,

and I am sure everybody has heard them: women make 65 percent of men's

wages. I have done a really interesting sort of tabulation on the

women's wages in my riding. My riding is a very working-class riding.

We have a lot of working poor in our riding, a lot of single-parent

families. When you look at the comparison of male to female wages in

Surrey-Guildford-Whalley, what you see is that we aren't even up to the

national standard of these 65-cent dollars. Within working families and

working communities, women make 48 cents on the dollar. That's for a

whole variety of reasons. It has to do with education level; it has to

do with access to job opportunities; and it has a lot to do with the

kinds of contracting out the government has done with some of their

services, because what that has meant to women is that they now have

the option of part-time jobs rat