1980 Legislative Session: 2nd Session, 32nd 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)

THURSDAY, JUNE 19, 1980

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page

2927 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Oral Questions.

Northeastern coal development. Mr. Lauk –– 2927

Ministerial Statements

Standard and Poor rating upgrading.

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 2929

Incidence of cancer in British Columbia.

Hon. Mr. Mair –– 2929

Routine Proceedings

Committee of Supply; Ministry of Education estimates.

On vote 54.

Mr. Cocke –– 2930

Mr. Lea –– 2931

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2933

Mr. Hall –– 2933

Mr. Brummet –– 2935

Mr. Howard –– 2937

Mr. Lauk –– 2937

Mr. Nicolson –– 2940

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2942

Mr. Lockstead –– 2944

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2944

On vote 55.

Mrs. Dailly –– 2945

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2945

On vote 56.

Ms. Brown –– 2945

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2945

Mrs. Dailly –– 2946

Mr. Nicolson –– 2946

Mrs. Wallace –– 2946

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2946

Mrs. Dailly –– 2947

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2947

Mrs. Wallace –– 2947

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2947

Ms. Brown –– 2947

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2947

On vote 57.

Ms. Brown –– 2947

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2947

Mr. Hall –– 2947

Mr. Cocke –– 2948

On vote 59.

Mr. Hall –– 2948

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2948

On vote 61.

Mrs. Dailly –– 2948

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2949

On vote 62.

Mr. Howard –– 2949

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2949

On vote 63.

Mr. Cocke –– 2949

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 2949

Social Services Tax Amendment Act, 1980 (Bill 3). Committee stage.

section 1.

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 2949

section 1 as amended.

Mr. Howard –– 2949

Report and third reading –– 2950

Appendix –– 2950

THURSDAY, JUNE 19, 1980

The House met at 2 p.m.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

Prayers.

HON. MR. CURTIS:

Leading us in prayers today is, frankly, one of the finest men I've

ever had the pleasure to meet and to count as a friend: Father Bernard

Hanley of St. Joseph's parish. He's here often; would the House welcome

him again today.

MR. LAUK: In the gallery today is a

special visitor, a very well-known broadcast personality from the city

of Vancouver. I'm sure everyone has heard the morning program of Frosty

Forst. He's sitting up in the gallery today, and I ask the House to

welcome him. He's taking a holiday and watching show business at its

best.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: I was pleased to have a

visit from a long-lost cousin, his wife and their daughter. In the

gallery today are Steve, Jane and Chris Heinrich from Seattle.

Oral Questions

NORTHEASTERN COAL DEVELOPMENT

MR. LAUK: I was going to try the Premier again today, but I suppose we can go to the second string.

Interjections.

MR. LAUK: Why are they heckling, Mr. Speaker?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Maybe they're waiting for the question, hon. member.

MR. LAUK: Judging from yesterday's performance, I really doubt that.

I have a question for the minister of industry and little development.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. member, we must address members in the House by their proper titles, and the member is aware that....

MR. LAUK: I'd be expelled from the House if I did that, Mr. Speaker.

the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development: on Tuesday the

Premier took as notice the question of the price at which coal from the

northeast is being offered to the Japanese. New information from

undisclosed sources has been published in the press. I wonder: is the

minister now able to name a price or a range of prices being offered to

the Japanese?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: My answer to the little member for Vancouver Centre.... It's unfortunate that that member doesn't understand normal business

practices. It is the ultimate responsibility of the private enterprise coal

developers — who will be investing some $1.2 billion in this great project to

create thousands and thousands of jobs for British Columbians and more economic

activity all over Canada — to go to Japan and sign the contract, because the

government doesn't do this. This isn't a socialist government. This

is a free enterprise government. I'll say again today, as I've said

in this House and in these corridors before, that anybody who sends the price

of that coal to Japan, to the steel companies, before the people who have the

ultimate responsibility for selling that coal do is being mischievous. I want

to tell you, I'm not going to be mischievous in or outside of this House.

MR. LAUK:

I have a question for the same minister. It has been reported that a $4

per tonne surcharge is being suggested to the private companies on

behalf of the provincial government, which is investing almost $1

billion in the total project. The shareholders of that investment, the

taxpayers of this province, are entitled to know what you are doing in

Tokyo before the deal is signed. Can the minister confirm that the

government has suggested the sum of $4 per tonne as a surcharge?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

The member who used to be Minister of Economic Development and who

failed to put this project together and is very jealous today because

after four years of hard work by this government the project will

probably go ahead again is being mischievous in this House when he

mentions that the government of British Columbia will be putting $1

billion into infrastructure, because that's not so. I would suggest

before the member asks any questions that he get his facts straight.

They are available. I would suggest that I'm neither going to confirm

nor deny the $4 surcharge.

MR. LAUK: I would agree

with the minister. I would like to get my facts straight. Could the

minister confirm what total investment the provincial government is

prepared to make in the northeast coal project with respect to

infrastructure?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I would be most

happy to make those figures available in due course, but we are talking

about very broad, general figures at the present time. In 1979 dollars,

it will cost $215 million to build a spur line. I want to tell you, Mr.

Speaker, that these are not BCR engineers, nor are they engineers who

work in the Ministry of Industry and Small Business Development; these

are good British Columbia engineers, the same type of engineers and

expertise that's been here for ages and that they darned near drove out

of the province when they were government. Also built into that figure

is a contingency for overruns on the line. But I want to re-emphasize

that those were 1979 dollars when the engineering and cost studies were

done. We're looking at the vicinity of $140 million of infrastructure.

That

group over there, which continually says that we're not creating any

employment in this province, every time we bring forth a project that's

going to employ people, is good for the economy of this province, is

negative, negative — a negative, harping opposition. They don't want to

build up. I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, this project is an investment in

the future economy of this province and in the future economy of Canada.

MR. LAUK: To the same minister: on Tuesday the Premier was unable to supply a figure for the cost of deliver-

[ Page 2928 ]

ing coal to the Japanese. Have the minister's officials estimated the total cost per tonne for delivery to the Japanese?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

Well, Mr. Speaker, let me tell you this in answer to the member's

question. The coal companies have now been provided the freight rate by

the CNR and by the British Columbia Railways. The freight rate will

return great profit to the BCR, and it will return more profit to the

CNR as a national railway.... They're the chief beneficiary of this;

that's why they should have built the line in the first place. They

have been provided, by the National Harbours Board, a throughput charge

at the port; they have been provided the surcharge, and they have also

been provided the formula for the recovery of our infrastructure. Never

in the history of Canada or any province or any state or any place in

North America have there been so many tonnage guarantees to get a

little bit of infrastructure and a small spur line going.

MR. LAUK:

I wonder if the minister could tell us when he estimated the total

investment to the British Columbia government in this project as $355

million, with some unstated figure for overruns in addition to that.

Does the minister's estimate include the delivery of hydro to Tumbler

Ridge townsites, to the spur lines which require special investment

from the provincial government, and from the townsite to the minesites?

Does it include roads in and around the minesite and townsite areas

which the provincial government has agreed to contribute to? Does it

include the contributions in agreements that have been made with

respect to the tunnels that have to be built along the Anzac line? Is

the $215 million still firm? In other words, are his estimates upon

which we based a $4 per tonne surcharge still relevant?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

Mr. Speaker, you know, the member asks a specific question without

taking into consideration the broad general economic development and

potential of this area. The reason the federal government wanted their

infrastructure cost recovery is because they are afraid of a bonanza in

the price of coal — something that I've been telling them could happen

— and they're afraid of the tonnages; they don't want the coal

companies to have a bonanza. That's why they wanted the recovery. To

your general question, sir, I would say that we took all those things

into consideration when we gave the companies the figures on Monday.

MR. LAUK:

Taking all those things into consideration, is not the infrastructure

cost from the provincial government more in the neighbourhood of $750

million?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, there again

I would suggest that the member doesn't have his facts straight. I told

him what the estimated infrastructure costs were.

There is

one point to this whole deal that everybody seems to be forgetting.

Certainly the opposition would seem to be forgetting that before one

tonne of coal is hauled out of that area, the private sector has to

invest about $1.2 billion of their own money. When you look at other

private investment in hotels in Prince Rupert, additional investment by

the private sector in Prince George, Chetwynd, Dawson Creek and in the

new townsite of Tumbler, you're looking, my friend — and I want you to

get this figure — at a possible investment by the private sector of up

to $3 billion. I'll tell you that's a ratio of almost ten to one,

government investment versus private investment. I'll tell you, when

you can get that kind of ratio, in my economics that's good business

for the government. It's a good investment in the future of this

country.

MR. LAUK: Yesterday the minister is reported

as saying that the private sector in spinoff investment would be $5

billion. We've lost $2 billion in 24 hours.

HON. MR. BENNETT: That's almost up to your record as government. [Laughter.]

MR. LAUK: That's very good.

Mr.

Speaker, could the minister inform the House whether or not the

government has conducted a study on the impact on southeast coal

producers if the northeast coal project proceeds?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

Well, Mr. Speaker, you don't have to be very smart to know that if we

have two ports, two railway systems, and two separate coal mining

developments Canada will be the beneficiary, because we will sell more

coal. I also want to enlighten the member for just a moment and tell

him something — and this is why the southeast was saying: "We want you

to get an extra price for your northeast coal." If we succeed in

getting this deal it will be of great benefit to those in the

southeast. Because the more coal you sell to a country, the more that

country relies on you and the more you have to say about the price of

that coal. That is something else that everybody seems to forget. So I

would say that this development of northeast coal will indeed be of

great benefit to those producers in the southeast. I'll tell you, I

would rather see us get that extra tonnage than have it go to Australia

— and that is probably where it would be.

MR. LAUK:

The Teck report of this year, the Canadian-Japanese Council newsletter

and the Halverson report recently mentioned in the press all indicate

that Canada's share of the supply of coal to Japan will not be

sufficient to reach the projections of the government insofar as

northeast coal is concerned, and would stop all of the southeast's

further potential for expanded production and export to Japan. Does the

minister agree with those reports?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

No, Mr. Speaker, I do not agree with what the member has said. Although

we have been talking basically about the sale of coal to Japan, if the

member has read any of the world reports.... There are several of them

around now. As a matter of fact, while we were progressing on our

studies of the northeast, the federal government and my department did

a study of world demands. Since that time the Boston institute of

technology and World Coal have issued reports. There is going to be a

demand for coking coal in ever-growing, continuing quantities up to

1990. There is no doubt in my mind that the price of coal will rise,

and I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, there are eight billion tons of

coal in the northeast.

What we're really arguing about is

building a 115-kilometre spur line. That's what all the argument is

about. That coal is going to come out of there someday and in my books

the sooner we build it the cheaper it'll be. The benefits will be for

future generations and more jobs once the railway is built and paid off

— for the young people who are growing up in

[ Page 2929 ]

this

province and in Canada. That's economic development and investment in

the future. Thank God this little government has had guts enough and

courage enough to go ahead and to see into the future" to make that

investment and to take those challenges that face us today. That's what

makes this government a lot different from that government; they sit

back and criticize and they harp and are negative, my friend. That's

why they're in opposition, Mr. Speaker, and that's why they'll stay in

opposition.

STANDARD AND POOR RATING UPGRADING

HON. MR. CURTIS: I rise to make a ministerial statement. We have just received word from New York that now....

MR. LAUK: They took one of your As away?

HON. MR. CURTIS:

I trust the members opposite are speaking in lighthearted jest, because

British Columbia has now batted 1,000. We've just received word from

New York that the second rating firm in the United States, Standard and

Poor, has upgraded the ratings of the province of British Columbia from

AA to AAA.

MR. LEA: What does this do to pay-as-you-go?

HON. MR. CURTIS: Well, Mr. Member, you've asked the question three times now. I'll assist you someday with the answer.

the basis of the brief information which I have received, the

evaluation upward has been based on marked improvement in the financial

status of the province in recent years; apparently excellent financial

controls in place; good prospects for the British Columbia economy

because of continued economic diversification and an abundance of

energy resources. This rate applies as guarantor, and Standard and Poor

are also, at the same time, upgrading to AAA the ratings on issues by

the Municipal Finance Authority of British Columbia, and therefore

provincial credits as well, including British Columbia Hydro.

Mr.

Speaker, when I made the first announcement several weeks ago about the

Moody's upgrading, I thought it was fair and gracious of the member for

Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich), who is not present today, to express his

pleasure that an AAA had been achieved. I know that he, as a

responsible member of this House, would be happy to say something about

this latest good news from New York. I'm also pleased that I am able to

share the news first with the members of the Legislative Assembly. It

has been asked what this means for those issues which are outstanding

in the United States at the present time. It is difficult to put a

precise saving on this, but I think that members would be well guided

if they considered a saving of something around 30 to 40 basis points.

In other words, it is a saving of many, many millions of dollars in

interest over the years to come on issues which have been placed and

issues which may be placed at some time in the future.

There

were no further upgradings in our ratings to come. We sought Moody's

and Standard and Poor. These firms take their own time and they conduct

rigorous and careful research and, as I say, the credit is to the

people of British Columbia.

INCIDENCE OF CANCER

IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

HON. MR. MAIR: Since there is no response to that ministerial statement, I rise also to make a statement.

Yesterday

the second member for Victoria (Mr. Hanson) issued a press release, the

meat of which was contained in a letter addressed and delivered to me

yesterday. It concerned, generally speaking, a federal Health and

Welfare Bureau Statistics Canada report entitled "Mortality Rates in

Canada." This press release, I might say, has raised a number of

concerns among the general public. The problems he raised, arising from

this report, were as follows. There are four areas in British Columbia

with a high incidence of cancer: firstly, Strathcona-Comox, which has a

high incidence of lymphatic cancer in males only; secondly, Central

Okanagan, which has a high incidence of lymphatic cancer in males and

females; thirdly, greater Victoria, which has a high incidence of

ovarian cancer; and fourthly, greater Vancouver, which has a high

incidence of lung cancer for males and females.

I've had the

opportunity of having my ministry look into the press release and the

letter that the second member for Victoria has given me. After

reviewing the document prepared by National Health and Welfare called

"Mortality Atlas of Canada," I would like to respond to the four

specific areas.

1) Strathcona-Comox. It is correct that the

Strathcona-Comox area has a higher incidence of lymphatic cancer in

males than other parts of British Columbia. I think this is important.

The report states that it is not statistically significant. Those are

not my words; those are the words of the report that the member quoted.

This level could have been achieved by chance, as there is no

difference between the incidence of lymphatic cancer for females in

this area compared with the rest of the province.

2) Central

Okanagan. Again it is correct that the central Okanagan area has a

higher incidence of lymphatic cancer in males and females than other

parts of Canada but, once again, the report states — and these are the

words of the report — it is "not statistically significant. "

Greater Victoria. It is correct that the southern Vancouver Island has

a higher incidence of ovarian cancer than other parts of British

Columbia but, once again, the report states it is not statistically

significant. It's interesting to note that the central Okanagan has a

significantly low rate of ovarian cancer.

4) Greater

Vancouver. It is correct that the Greater Vancouver area has a

significantly high incidence of lung cancer in both males and females.

However, it should be noted from the report that it is also

significantly high in Regina, Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa. All of

these locations are major urban centers in Canada. The report therefore

suggests: "They have large referral centres providing diagnostic and

treatment services." That is perhaps more important in answering the

question than the particular location itself.

In closing I

might say that I'm sorry the member opposite chose to issue a press

release and thus raise the concerns of people before giving my ministry

the opportunity of answering these concerns. However, the concerns are,

I hope, now satisfactorily answered.

Orders of the Day

The House in Committee of Supply; Mr. Strachan in the chair.

[ Page 2930 ]

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

(continued)

On vote 54: minister's office, $191,886.

MR. COCKE:

Thank you, Mr. Chairman; you're a new boy, but just before some of

those cabinet ministers leave, I'd like to congratulate them on their

behaviour this afternoon. It's been absolutely marvellous.

Getting

onto the Minister of Education's estimates, there are a couple of areas

that I'd like to deal with. I note that the minister, as distinct from

the previous minister, has at least shown some concern and some

positive direction with respect to the Jericho Hill School for the

Deaf. The former minister decided that decentralization of the

educational opportunities for profoundly deaf people was the order of

the day, and the present minister is indicating that he is interested

in going the route of at least taking a good, hard look at Jericho Hill

as it might serve that community.

Mr. Chairman, I've had a

fair amount of experience — and I'm not going to go over past speeches

or research or past family and personal experience with this question —

but I will say that I think our province is big enough in population,

big enough in terms of the demand and need for possibly two or three

central programs for educational facilities for profoundly deaf people.

Incidentally,

I noted the people the minister has placed on the committee. Their

backgrounds are diverse and their interest in this particular question

should be of a level, I think, that will provide the minister with a

good deal of positive information. I do hope that the report, when it

is forthcoming, will be made available, because there are many of us in

the House and in the opposition particularly with concern over the

direction we were going with respect to the education of the deaf.

have explained, and have had it explained to me many times, the whole

area of socialization of deaf people, where they are totally without

the ability to communicate because of our inability to communicate with

them. When we put seven or eight of them in a public school, unless

they happen by coincidence to be in a normal peer group — that is,

relatively the same age and having to some extent similar interests —

then they are little islands unto themselves. I have found, when moving

around the province, we do not have people with the background of

instructional expertise in quantity sufficient to look after the needs

of these people. Jericho Hill School has performed well over the years

in this province. It has been a resource that, as far as I am

concerned, has put many, many people today in a very productive

position with productive capacity beyond which they couldn't have even

envisaged achieving had it not been for that background and the support

of that school.

I would hope, while the minister is looking

at it, that we can look at one or two other areas in the province — a

semi-centralized program where many of the people in the north could be

brought in to, say, Prince George, where their family would at least

have some access to them. It's a long, long way for a person in the

Peace River to come down to visit a child in the lower mainland at

Jericho Hill or, for that matter, for the child to go whipping home.

The same thing, too, holds with the central interior. Kamloops or

Kelowna or some place like that could very well serve the purpose, or

somewhere in the Kootenays.

But I certainly am pleased with

this new announcement, and I do hope that after three or four years of

wondering and waiting and to some extent seeing Jericho de-emphasized

and to some extent phased out.... It was a major concern. So I would

just like to say, on behalf of those of us in the opposition who have

taken a particular interest in this area, we want to congratulate you

for your initial efforts and hope that the outcome will be such as to

provide the greatest service to those individuals.

Now, Mr.

Chairman, I would like to be less complimentary. The Minister of

Education who enjoyed that portfolio — and so he did; he always had a

smile on his face — before this minister took office established what I

consider to be a very, very bad precedent. He turned his back on the

Home and School Federation. He denied them access to a grant which they

had become....

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Yes, our Pat, dear old Pat — the guy with the rowboat on Skaha Lake.

denied them access to a grant to assist in their good work in this

province. The reason that he denied access to that grant was that they

were not directly involved in education or the delivery of education.

What utter and sheer nonsense; it just has to be that. Here are people

giving voluntarily of their time and, for heaven's sakes, their money.

Both time and money are important; but beyond that, their care and

their concern over our education system.... Incidentally, many of them,

beyond even those that are involved directly in the delivery of service

at some levels.... To say to them, "We think that you are significantly

unimportant," is the damnedest insult I can imagine.

What

the government and the minister should be saying is: "For heaven's

sake, go on with the work you've been doing. Try to put it together in

such a way as to give us some further information. We are not

all-knowing here in Victoria." For those of you who don't remember,

Home and School was an outgrowth of the parent-teacher associations. It

used to be called PTA; now it's Home and School. That group takes one

day each year and comes over here to Victoria to talk to politicians,

both in the opposition and on the government side. They take countless

evenings and days and time within their own communities, assisting,

trying to help create a better school system.

What was their

demand? Absolutely, utterly insignificant. Here we have a department of

government with an estimate before us now for something in excess of $1

billion, and the cheapskates can't come up with $20,000 for the Home

and School Federation in this whole province. I can't believe it, Mr.

Chairman, and I'm sure you can't either. If you weren't in the chair,

you would be jumping up right now, giving a speech, indicting that

minister for following that formidable practice set by the previous

Minister of Education. We could almost forgive the previous minister.

We knew his heart wasn't in the job. We knew that his heart was totally

at the university level — what there was of it.

AN HON. MEMBER: He has no heart.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Member, I don't agree. He does have a heart because I've heard it pounding across the floor.

[ Page 2931 ]

any event, I believe that this new minister should set a new practice

for them. Continue the practice of the previous government before this

government took office. That was to assist a very positive group to do

their work on behalf of all the children in this province. To say that

they're not directly involved in education begs the question beyond

words. This minister should see to it — if for no other reason than to

show something less than contempt for the home and school associations

— that he goes back to the original practice and assists them.

don't particularly want to make a hero out of this guy more than any

other Socred, but I do think that he would gain a tremendous amount of

respect in a community that is very important. Like any other minister,

he has a constituency, and I'm not talking about a political

constituency. That looks to be in pretty fair shape at the moment, but

heaven knows, if they keep making the same number of mistakes that

they've made in the last little while, it may not be safe either. He

has another constituency. That constituency is teachers, school boards

and others that are voluntarily, directly or indirectly, involved in

education. I just can't imagine a government so totally disrespectful

of a group of people who have provided so much over so many years.

Would

I be right in suspecting that this government wants to see the Home and

School Federation fall apart and die? If that is the case, let the

minister stand up in this House and tell us that's what he wants. Does

he want the Home and School Federation to fall apart and die? Does he

want no more PTAs? Does he want no more advice from parents and other

interested people in the community? Is that advice embarrassing to this

minister? Is he going to continue on with the centralized,

bureaucratic, all-powerful Victoria in education? Or is he going to

look back to the community for advice that they should be giving?

Mr.

Chairman, it is at the community level that we can really draw some

real conclusions, because it is at that level that the problems exist

and are known. Some of the people with the best experience of dealing

with these problems are those very people that he is turning his back

on. He does condescend once a year to go down to the little theatre

behind the museum to give a speech for 20 minutes to half an hour.

Isn't that marvellous? Isn't he grand? He goes and gives them a little

speech, but that's it. That's his only input into that organization in

terms of anything positive.

MR. LAUK: Politeness costs him nothing.

MR. COCKE:

He was polite. I admit this too. I didn't go down to listen to his

speech, and I am sorry for that, but I am the health critic. I

understand that he was polite and that he was at least a head above the

previous minister in his ability to communicate with those people. But

he has absolutely no excuse on earth for turning his back on their need

for some financial assistance. He can say, as this government so often

does: "Let the community support them; after all, they are

community-based."

I want to take him back to a little

history. The community is more involved in education now than they have

ever been. This government has dumped the cost of education on the

local community as we have never seen before. Here am I in poor little

old New Westminster, a town ravaged by the Socreds with hardly a tax

base left, and we are paying 100 percent of our operating costs in that

town — 100 percent and $200,000 or a little more this year,

unfortunately, back to you.

AN HON. MEMBER: Do you want to eliminate equalization?

MR. COCKE:

No, I just want a fair formula and I want you to set a decent mill

rate, that's all. You guys have been increasing that mill rate

arbitrarily ever since you've held government. You talk about

responsible government! I've never seen such total irresponsibility in

my life.

Getting back to the Home and School Federation

situation, don't dump that one on us. As a result of the actions of

this government, we're absolutely poverty-stricken when it comes to

education. It is little enough to ask that this government go back and

apologize to the Home and School people for ignoring the need, and say

to them: "We'll not only give you that; we'll give you more for other

activities, because you are very important to the people in this

province, to the children and to education per se."

If the

attempt to kill the Home and School Federation is successful, all I can

say is it is just another blot on the face of this province, another

misdeed in the name of whatever — good management? Good nothing, as far

as I am concerned. This would be money to really save money. He might

check with the other provinces; they do it. The other provincial

Ministers of Education assist Home and School, but not us.

just ask the minister to rethink that situation. Just because a pattern

was set by his predecessor doesn't mean that he has to follow it. Let

me give you one good argument why he shouldn't follow that predecessor.

If you were to do a survey in the province of B.C. and ask the folks

how they liked Dr. Pat and what kind of a job they think he did as

Minister of Education, that, Mr. Chairman. would be something that

minister should read. Because if he wants to walk in those footsteps,

he's going the right way with respect to this decision, and those are

not good footsteps in terms of education.

So can the

minister answer that question: is he going to rethink this whole

question of assisting and being more cooperative with the Home and

School Federation in this province?

MR. LEA: I'd like

to talk about the former minister for a while too, because if this

minister wants to be a hero, I'm quite willing to make him one — a big

H on your sweater: "Hero." I had a commitment last year during the

educational estimates from the Minister of Education, and he didn't

keep the commitment. It's in Hansard . As a matter of fact....

AN HON. MEMBER: You just happen to have a copy of it.

MR. LEA:

Yes, I do. This all started two and a half years ago when I had the

first inquiry from citizens of a small community in my riding called

Oona River. In Oona River there are approximately 15 families and there

are not enough children from those families to form a regular school.

What they are asked to do is to have every child take correspondence

courses. But what really happens is that they would like to, if they

can, if they're able to, have a little better education for their

children, so they want to get however many there are — seven or ten

children, depending on the year — and have someone help these children

with their correspondence lessons. Now under

section 20 of the act

there is some provision

[ Page 2932 ]

for that help, but it also says that it cannot be for instruction, only for aid to help these children.

I've

been raising this by correspondence for some time; in education

estimates last year I had a commitment from the minister that he would

look into this. I'd like to read you a letter dated August 16, 1979.

It's from Pat McGeer. It says:

"Dear Graham:

"This will acknowledge receipt of your letter

dated August 8, 1979, regarding

section 20 allowances for tutoring of

correspondence courses. I recall my personal guarantee and shortly

thereafter requested my assistant deputy minister, Mr. Jim Carter, to

investigate and report to me on this matter. I'm awaiting his reply,

but rest assured that I will be in touch with you in regard to this

matter as soon as possible."

The people in Oona River who

remember Dr. Pat McGeer with a great deal of fondness when he held the

post are now listening to the radio in Oona River. They've heard that

minister announce tunnels; they've heard the Premier announce B.C.

Place; they've heard about billions of dollars being spent on coal. You

know, they don't really want very much. But they begin to wonder about

the priorities of a government that worries about putting, as the

member for Vancouver Centre says, "the biggest exhaust pipe ever"

between here and the mainland, when all they want is a little help —

and not much — in educating their children.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hartley Dent wanted to build a tunnel from Vancouver to Prince Rupert. That makes this other one look small.

MR. LEA: Absolutely correct.

MR. CHAIRMAN:

Order, please. Hon. members, I will remind all of you that we are on

vote 54, the Minister of Education's estimates for 1980-81. The member

for Prince Rupert continues.

MR. LEA: Mr. Dent also had another recommendation: we put you in the tunnel and plug both ends.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. member, vote 54.

MR. LEA:

Now I have a letter that I'd like to read into the record, because it's

from one of the teachers who taught or instructed under

section 20 in

Oona River. It was not written to me but to the former minister's

executive assistant, Jim Bennett. It says:

"Dear Mr. Bennett:

"Regarding

section 20 allowances, the Oona River community association has been

communicating with the Hon. Graham Lea regarding the upgrading of the

funding for students under

section 20 of the Public Schools Act. When

the matter comes up for review by the management committee of the

schools department, it may assist you to be aware of the following

points. "

Now I don't know whether it ever came up in front of that review committee.

"

a) The duty of the

section 20 instructor is to instruct

students to enable them" — these are the words of this instructor — "to

complete correspondence papers. In the care of primary-age students, particularly

in grades 1 and 2, the instructor must teach each lesson, as these children

read only minimally. As each child studies seven subjects, the instructor is

working full time.

"

b) Intermediate-age students are able to work more independently,

but they do require explanation of difficult concepts, opportunities for discussion

and enrichment in social studies and science, as well as general supervision

and discipline.

"

c) The instructor we employ supervises seven students, four of whom are in

grades 1, 2, and 3. He also has one kindergartener. He works a full

school day and also some evenings and weekends preparing lessons and

planning remedial and supplementary work. It seems there should be some

provision for a more adequate financial compensation for such full-time

professional positions. As you know, an instructor is required to have

a valid B.C. teaching certificate or a letter of permission, but there

are few teachers who can exist on the $350 a month which our instructor

receives from the province — that's $50 per student — under

section 20.

Our parents supplement the salary at $60 per student. This often

results in a heavy financial burden, particularly for parents with more

than one child of school age. Even so, each parent feels that our

teacher is grossly underpaid.

"

d) It should be

noted that

section 20 of the Public Schools Act states that funds are

to be paid towards the salary of any person who is employed with the

sanction of the minister to give instruction — I understand that's how

the act reads — in the prescribed courses of study. This would indicate

that the job is seen to be one of an instructor, not merely a

supervisor. From personal experience I can state that the job of

instructor is a challenging and demanding task. I have taught both in

the public school system and under

section 20. My duties in each case

were somewhat different, but the amount of time invested was comparable

in both cases. In both cases I had to take the printed curriculum and

make it understandable to the students. Presently I'm teaching my own

child through correspondence, and I find that just one child requires

three to four hours of my time per day. Our child does not attend the

Oona River

section 20 class, due to the distance we live from the

school. In determining whether the present funding for

section 20 is

adequate, it is interesting to note that a child-care worker receives

$5.60 per hour, or approximately $600 per month, to work with

individual children under the supervision of a classroom teacher,

whereas a correspondence instructor receives only $50 per month for

tutoring each child. As there must be other schools operating under

section 20, we would be interested in corresponding with such schools

to see how they cope with the insufficient funding. We would appreciate

it if your department could supply us with the addresses of other

section 20 schools."

Mr. Chairman, this is really a ridiculous situation. There are small

communities throughout the whole province who face this kind of

problem. I would think that if adequate funding were given to these

communities for the instruction under

section 20 it would be such a

minimum amount of money coming out of a $6 billion budget that it's

ridiculous that I have to be up here again for the second year trying

to get some money for these people.

[ Page 2933 ]

I'd like to hear what the minister has to say before I continue. Maybe there's a solution.

HON. MR. SMITH:

The member doesn't need to say more because I certainly agree with him.

We are going to increase immediately the amount from $50 to $100 per

student and to authorize the supervision of these individuals under the

local school board so they can tie into other local resources. That

will go into effect at the beginning of the term in September. I regret

that it hasn't happened earlier. He certainly was given that

commitment. He may rest assured that that will take place and is in

place, and that I will be sending out directions to the field

immediately in that regard. Right now it affects six remote

communities, including Oona River, the one he's particularly concerned

with.

As I think the member knows, most of the supervisors

do not have the qualifications of the gentleman he cited. This

gentleman is overqualified for the job in relation to others. It is

regrettable that this is all he will earn, but he will double the

amount he'll receive. I know how he feels. For years I've done

part-time lecturing at universities, and sometimes put in as many hours

a week lecturing as the full-time people did, and I was paid about

one-eighth or something like that. So you don't always get remunerated

for what you do. But in relation to all the other instructors who do

this, he's overqualified, and I'm sorry that's the case. But we are

going to double the allotment and let the school districts administer

and decentralize it.

MR. LEA: I thank the minister

for his reply. Does the minister have any idea of the average cost per

student per month? What would it cost to educate one student, say, in a

school in Victoria?

HON. MR. SMITH: Roughly $235 to $240 per month.

MR. LEA:

I don't know how the minister came up with $100. I welcome the $100,

but I don't know what kind of a formula was in place to say we're going

to double it. I don't knock the doubling. I wonder whether the minister

has given any consideration to putting some sort of automatic

escalation clause in there. For instance, five years from now am I

going to be standing up in the House trying to get it up from $100 to

$150, or is it going to be done automatically in some way?

HON. MR. FRASER: You won't be here five years from now.

MR. LEA: No, I'll be over there.

Mr. Minister, is there an escalation clause in this so that this is done automatically?

HON. MR. SMITH:

Not at the present, but I think it's a figure that's reasonable to

review regularly and not have the situation that occurred where it was

stuck at $50 for a number of years.

MR. LEA: How long

was it at $50? I know the minister and the department have the best of

intentions on this, but we all know that isn't the way it works.

HON. MR. SMITH: Five years.

MR. LEA:

Five years it's been at $50. It would have to be $100 to keep up with

the average inflationary rate. So they're back at the five-year level,

and for years 2, 3, 4 and 5 of the last five years they've been grossly

underpaid. There's no retroactivity, but I think they could live with

that as long as they had some guarantee that there was going to be an

automatic.... It seems to me that it would be easy to tie into the $100

a month some sort of formula that would give them an automatic raise

each year. To tie it into the cost-of living indexing wouldn't seem to

me to be a bad idea to keep it going. Those of us who have been here

for a while know that automatic reviews end up like me trying to get

this up to over $50; it just doesn't happen. The best of intentions

will be there; there'll be higher priorities — tunnels, what have you —

and I'm afraid that these correspondence course instructors are going

to be forgotten in the swirl of coal deals, tunnels, B.C. Place, and

just generally fighting with the federal government. So I'd like to ask

the minister if he would consider taking back to his department a

suggestion that you look at some sort of automatic indexing of raising

those wages.

MR. HALL: By coincidence I received a

phone call this morning which has brought me the only good piece of

news I've had about education in a long time. I was told that my son

had passed grade 12. That's about the best piece of news I've had about

education for a while. It might be the only good piece on education the

minister might hear today from me.

I've attended debates on educational estimates in this House — some on the other side will say too long....

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Agreed.

MR. HALL:

I've got my "applause" card down here and my "boo" card down here. Do

you need me to bring them up every time, or can you do it automatically

now?

I remember the first debate on education in which it

was pointed out that we were spending roughly — that was back in 1967 —

$1 million a day. We must be nearly double that amount now. The fact of

the matter was that if we expressed in gross terms the success of the

program, we could ascertain that not half of the people that entered

the program finished it. We had, in effect, a 50 percent failure rate.

That's a gross expression in both senses of the word. Roughly 15 years

have passed since the days when that kind of program was put forward,

and some 13 or 14 estimates have passed since that comment was made,

and I'm not sure that any improvement has been made in that kind of

gross criteria. What I'm bothered about is that somehow, somewhere

along the line we appear to have, as a society, not measured up to the

requirement of being able to interest, to turn on, to inspire a great

number of our young people within the educational system. I know we

have excellent students.

I attended the convocation at UVic

not too long ago, along with the minister, and in fact we attended the

dinner at which the person who made the speech in estimates was

honoured, and I referred to some 15 years ago. I don't see any real

improvement in terms of those figures and it worries me. I don't want

today — the third day of your estimates — to get into that kind of

philosophical debate. I think I may do it next year. I want to do a bit

more research, a bit more thinking, because frankly I'm changing some

of my own viewpoints about education that I've had over some years.

[ Page 2934 ]

have spent some time, when I was on, as it were, a leave of absence

from this chamber, travelling and examining educational opportunities

elsewhere, looking at students in other countries and dealing with

relatives — nephews and nieces in other parts of the world — some of

them are involved in the educational field in Europe and south of the

line. Also, I've had the benefit of talking with — like the member for

Prince George North (Hon. Mr. Heinrich), the Minister of Labour — a

long-lost cousin. I have one who's just come from South Africa to

British Columbia, who is now teaching at university. He's been involved

in another country altogether, South Africa, finding out what's going

on in educational systems there.

But I'm not happy. I'm not

satisfied. I don't think the minister is. All I'm saying, in short — in

that comment prefixed by some success in a personal sense and in a

family sense — is that I don't think we've anything to be very happy

and smug about, because we've not seen much progress in the 15 years of

debating estimates in this House.

Two areas of real concern

now — in detail. One I'd like the minister to take under a kind of

general examination umbrella. I'm going to do it myself as an MLA by

adopting a course of action of interrogation. That is the whole

question of counselling. I have become acutely aware over some years

about the need for counselling and about a general area of

dissatisfaction with counselling. I wonder whether or not we really

know where we're going with the whole question of counselling. I know

we've got local options, and I know that you can say there's the second

member for Surrey being a centralist. He's laying down the law; he

wants more regulations; he wants this, he wants that. Well, you know, I

don't see proper career counselling in many areas. I'm bothered about

some of the counselling I see which is not career counselling. I'm not

talking about the special counselling of handicapped youngsters. I'm

talking about the more social counselling that is carried on by people

who I don't think are qualified. I can be argued; I can be debated; I

could be persuaded to change my mind. I'm not happy with some of the

things I see, particularly in the two districts with which I am perhaps

most familiar.

I think it's time we had a look at that whole

counselling system. I don't like it. I feel uncomfortable with it. I

know that if I wanted to — as the government itself did a short year

ago, starting to list its complaints in the Ministry of Deregulation,

if you remember; it analyzed the letters it was getting — analyze my

letters and my complaints, I think I'd find that I get just as many

complaints about the kinds of things that happen with counselling in

the educational system as I do about other things in the educational

system. It bothers me to think that that's one area in which I think we

should be absolutely proficient and be very tight and really know what

we're doing.

The other area is the question of career

counselling, and I prefer to deal with that in a different way by

coming at it through the Ministry of Labour estimates.

I'm

very concerned about counselling and I hope the minister may have some

general response to me about what he's noticed as a new minister, if

he's seen anything, if he's got anything going in terms of studies. I

know that new ministers tend to always have that magic word

"reorganization" when they get into their portfolios. It seems to me to

be a good excuse to do nothing for a while but to reorganize. Perhaps I

except a couple of ministries from that. There is a famous quotation

about reorganization which takes the place of activity, and one which I

could remind the minister of; but I'll give him the benefit of the

doubt and say that I hope he has got some comments about counselling,

without just simply telling me that the local districts do this and the

local districts do that, because I feel that the Ministry of Education

has to take on much more of a leadership role in some of these areas

than it has been doing up until now.

The last comment I have

deals with my own riding. It is one with which the minister, I think,

is familiar, and it raises the whole question of what is going to

happen in a district which has an increasing school population, as

distinct from most districts in the province, which have a decreasing

school population, when the minister's own rules require — to put it at

its extreme case — that children be at the door before the ministry

will do anything about it. That's the extreme case. I know that's not

quite the case in Surrey, but that's almost what your rule book says.

Certainly that's the refuge behind which most school districts will

tend to flee when faced with public pressure. If I could say that the

other way round, it is the ministry that gets the blame when the local

parents arrive in their dozens in front of the school board meeting

hall. Indeed, the school board will point the finger of blame at the

minister's rules and regulations regarding new school construction and

capital expenditure programs. They will say there's nothing that can be

done, because the ministry says that until the kids actually arrive,

lunch bucket in hand, smiling faces at the door, on the first Tuesday

after Labour Day, that is it.

In South Surrey, now spreading

into Newton and also into North Surrey, we have a real problem of

overcrowding. It all started with official notification to this

hallowed place a year and a half ago. It has taken a year and a half

before anything has been done. I suppose I'm going to add to the

congratulatory notes that the minister has already had from some people

by saying that he's the first minister who's done anything about it.

His predecessor simply ignored it. His predecessor's executive

assistant not only ignored it; he didn't even reply to the letters.

This minister has at least acknowledged it, first of all, grappled with

it secondly, and thirdly, I'm pleased to say, has dealt with it as best

he can, given the completely hopeless pieces of information that were

provided his department by a school board that was hopelessly staffed

in terms of planning and figure determination.

That brings

me to the point I'm trying to make. If the rules you've got will allow

that kind of idiocy to develop, why haven't we got better rules that

will take care of those kinds of things? We must have inspectors and

regular reports. Surely to goodness we're paying the piper; why don't

we insist on school boards of the size of Surrey having planners? Why

have we allowed school boards of that size not to have fully

professional planners? Why in heaven's name have we not said to them…?

We don't have to pass a statute in here,

an act regarding a planner for

School District 36. The minister's got clout. Why didn't somebody go

into School District 36 and say: "Hey, you're now the second biggest

school district in the province; get a planner, if you know what's good

for you"? What happened with your predecessor? Why didn't we do that

when we first received the intimation, to which there was no reply by

the member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Hon. Mr. McGeer), the previous

minister, in February 1979?

You'll be pleased to know I've got nearly nine pages of

[ Page 2935 ]

diary

which account for contacts, letters of communication between the South

Surrey parents — which reflect nearly 15 schools in South Surrey — and

the ministry and the school board. I've gone through it and I've noted

all the contacts — not with the school boards, because that is

altogether a different fight we can have. In my view, to a certain

extent they stand condemned. I want to point out that since November of

last year — I think something happened in November that we got some

attention — we've been getting somewhere with the problem. In February

and April 1979 there were follow-up letters and no reply. There were

night letters to Premier Bennett outlining concerns in Surrey schools.

One acknowledged it after one month. That is the kind of record of

achievement we've got in terms of answering an association of

consultative committees representing all those people in South Surrey —

a riding formed following redistribution; a riding that used to be part

of the Delta riding, not part of the old Surrey riding; a riding that I

have become the member of since redistribution and since re-election; a

riding which is the fastest-growing area in the lower mainland and

maybe even in the province, now equalled, in some respects, by what is

happening in Newton.

More is yet to come. By the

government's own statements, to be found starting off in the throne

speech and following through in the budget speech and others, there are

more things happening in that area. I can't talk about Bill 7, which is

before us, but the very arrival of the third crossing of the Fraser

River will again put more people into that area. It will again mean a

heavier requirement for schools. It will again mean more land being

sold for housing, more development and more voters voting one way or

the other, Mr. Chairman — Mr. Chairmen. I'm sure one of the Chairmen

hopes they'll be voting one way particularly.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

have some evidence before us that the Annacis Island bridge proposal is

not all it's cut up to be — and I use the words "cut up to be"

advisedly, as we look at some of the areas that the bridge is going

through. The land development proposals already being assembled and

talked about in South Surrey are immense. If this can be done, I want

to know why we don't have a better method of dealing with it at a

ministerial level. I'm prejudging the minister's reply. I hope he

doesn't simply say that we just accept what's given to us and we can't

do anything unless the school boards give us those figures. I've proven

that there's been two years' delay. It's now going to cost us more

money doing it this way. Is there no kind of administrative discipline

that can be exercised, requested or required in the regulations in the

School Act? It seems to me that it should not be left almost to chance.

As I say, it was a fateful Tuesday morning in September when 2,000

students appeared to fill 1,200 desks. The minister's move now to

accommodate some of the problems with portables and so on.... It seems

to me that we've got to do better than that.

In short, Mr. Chairman, I'd like to have the minister specifically address

changing our basic approach to this in that the ministry won't recognize

any projections other than actual student counts in approving CEPs. That's

question number one. Secondly, the ministry, when it approves CEPs, won't

recognize local characteristics, such as a district class size formula, which

is lower than the ministry guidelines. It won't recognize locally developed

special education programs like social adjustment classes. Remember what I'm

talking about? I'm talking about Surrey. The minister knows when he

examines — as all the members do — human resources problems, the Attorney-General's

problems and other problems, that when we look at our institutions, our hospitals,

our special education programs, School District 36 or the municipality of Surrey

is always shown as the largest contributor per capita of any of those problem

areas. There should be some special arrangements made for those districts with

those kinds of problems.

I'm

told the ministry will not approve local acquisition of portables under

any circumstances unless your student numbers are met. Again I ask if

that's correct, given these emergency situations. I do want to

congratulate the ministry by pointing out that the ministry has offered

to speed up the needed construction by cutting some of the red tape

that's gone on. I've already paid tribute to what's happened in the

last four or five months. The acquisition of portables has been a great

success.

Those are some questions, starting off with a basic

worry about the counselling system and the whole Surrey crowding

problem. Now, lastly, there's one irritant which I think is totally and

utterly unnecessary. It's happened two years on the run and I just

wonder if we're going to go through it again. I wouldn't have raised

it, but I see one of the officials is with us today and I didn't know

whether he was still with us. I mean, I wasn’t sure whether Dr. Soles

was still on board totally — 100 percent full time. I just didn't know,

Andy. This is regarding the whole deal with the Bridgeview adult

education program. I welcome Dr. Soles and say good afternoon to him.

For

two summers on the run now that excellent program in the north end of

the riding has been delayed. The students have been worried and the

teachers have been unable to satisfy themselves on whether they're

going to have work. I wonder whether a community that's really trying

to do a job for itself in one of the worst parts, economically, of my

riding should be asked to put up with that kind of administrative

nonsense — and I use that word deliberately — that they were asked to

put up with this last fall. They were waiting to know whether they were

going to get the money from the school board, Douglas College, or

anywhere else. I really feel that is absolutely unforgivable. While

there was no break in the delivery of the service following November, I

think that it was almost an imposition on the people who delivered the

service to put them through that kind of thing, and I certainly hope it

doesn't happen again.

MR. BRUMMET: It's with some

temerity that I rise in this debate on education, because generally the

experts come from without the system rather than from within. However,

I can't resist the impulse to say a few words, at least, about

education. Since the minister has been faced with a number of demands

and requests, I'd like to perhaps express a few cautions that I would

like the ministry to consider while they're considering all these

demands and requests. I recognize that, in the interest of brevity, my

explanations would not be full, and so my remarks can certainly be

misconstrued. However, it's a risk that's worth taking.

know that many studies have been advocated. There have been questions

about what the objectives and the philosophy are about education. as

though there were simple answers to this. I too, when I first started

teaching some 28 or 30 years ago, quickly became an expert on solving

problems

[ Page 2936 ]

education. I got less expert as I went through the years, because one

recognizes that education is a very, very complex business and can't be

solved by simply having a month's study to set up a new philosophy or

to spell out a philosophy. I speak from some experience because I have

had to write the philosophy for a school, and I have participated in

the writing of district philosophies. It's always a problem to get

everyone to agree. We get into a lot of values.

Something

was mentioned about counselling. Several of the members opposite, I

think, were concerned about counselling and career counselling in

particular, because that's the present catchword. I know that many high

school counsellors have done a great deal of career counselling.

However, if the members opposite mean that counselling is to tell a

pupil exactly what career he should train for, what career will be best

for him, what career will give him all the guarantees and so on, then,

yes, counselling is failing. I think in many respects we have

unrealistic expectations of the educational system. Ask any successful

person who has a job how they got the job, and most of the time the

survey will indicate it was by their own merit. It's only when they're

not successful in obtaining a job that it's because the counsellors

didn't direct them correctly.

I have been in the same

community for enough time to know pupils in the system from grade 1

through to grade 12, and many of them in the work field afterwards.

Very rarely do they realize — and I don't think it's conscious or

deliberate.... Naturally if you go get a job you get it yourself; if

you don't get a job, well, somebody didn't help you. That's the kind of

result you get in surveys. Nobody will ever be satisfied with

counselling — if that's any help.

To move on quickly, there

have been suggestions for all kinds of extra programs into the school

curriculum: sex education, family-life education. Unfortunately the

simplistic solution is sought, and what is ignored often is that there

are different values with respect to this. It is almost impossible to

get people to agree on those values, and therefore it is difficult to

put sex education programs into the schools. As far as physiological

features of the human body, I think those are fairly well covered in

the schools. It's when we get into the values part of it that we get

into difficulty with the program.

Others have suggested

there be more physical education, more vocational training, more

academic training, and a great many more programs into the school

system, at the same time as we're expecting schools to come up with

better academic education and spend more time on almost everything. You

cannot keep adding things into the school program without something

that's already there suffering. It's one of those things that is hard

to accept. Most people when they want something added to the school

curriculum have a vested interest and they want to get the schools to

do their job. Surely society does not want the schools to take over

every facet of what society stands for and every facet of training. I

think it would be unrealistic; I think it could be dangerous.

The

other thing that was mentioned was curriculum guides being too

restrictive. I've heard this remark so often. Most of the curriculum

guides I've ever had any experience with said: "Please treat this as a

guide, not as a rigid prescription." Most teachers went ahead with that

particular content and used that guide and used their own imagination

and their own particular skills, and they did a fine job.

What

we hear often from the people, I suppose much like many bureaucrats, is

that if you stay by the book you're perfectly safe, and so the easy way

is to stay by the book and then criticize the book rather than take any

initiative. I find it almost humorous sometimes, particularly from my

own experience where I taught courses backwards, forwards, from the

middle, any direction 1 felt like it; I never had anyone tell me:

"You're doing it the wrong way." As a principal, if teachers were

teaching the course, I didn't care whether they used a textbook if they

were teaching the concepts, and yet I've heard so much of how

prescriptive things are.

We had quite a bit of comment about

special education. It's such a diverse and complex field that I'd just

like to toss out a couple of cautions or considerations. I'm not so

sure whether some special education is for the pupils or to salve our

own conscience. It makes it much easier for us, for people with

particular interests — vested interests, if you like, or genuine

interests — to be able to say: "We did more for those who needed it

more." I'm not so sure that it's always a consideration for the pupils,

if they be unconscious.

I do know that much has been said

about lack of early diagnosis. Here again, I have taught special

education myself, so I am familiar with problems. In a classroom

situation I have deliberately taken on what are known as "problem

groups" and found that maybe they weren't such problems when you looked

at their particular needs rather than the needs of the system, the

teacher or the community. But what I am concerned about is that if we

get too expert in our diagnosis, one thing that we have to remember....

The first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) put on quite a impassioned

plea for segregating the brighter pupils, and that too concerns me. I

know that we cannot take the attitude.... I don't believe we ever have;

I don't know many teachers who've taken the attitude: "Well, they're

smart enough, forget about them." People are concerned; most teachers

that I know and have known were quite concerned. But I also know that

there were some pupils....

Let me first of all say this: if

you follow this diagnosis of special education to its illogical

conclusion, we have to recognize that 50 percent of pupils are above

average and 50 percent are below average, so that nobody is left as

normal, if you get the screen fine enough in the diagnosis. I also know

of a number of pupils who thought they were normal until somebody came

in and diagnosed them. Once they were put into special situations —

whether for a short period or a longer period — they wondered ever

after why, all of a sudden, they were no longer normal. That concerns

me, because it's quite normal to be shorter, to be taller, to be

stouter, to be thinner, to be a faster runner, slower and so on. In

good intentions for special needs, all of a sudden it is no longer

considered normal to read a little slower or to think a little

differently than others. It bothers me, and I'd like to just suggest to

the minister and the ministry that you might consider not moving too

quickly into trying to get everybody's special needs covered. There are

a lot of normal pupils in there.

Secondly, teacher training

for special needs makes many teachers who thought they were good,

normal teachers wonder what's wrong with them, because all they are

doing is a good, normal job with all the pupils in their care. I think

that has to be considered. It almost gets to the point where, unless

you've got some special courses, you can't possibly teach properly. Yet

tender loving care, consideration and empathy for students have gone a

long way amongst many teachers I have known.

I think that often people in positions of authority want the

[ Page 2937 ]

continuation

of certain requirements or almost the status quo, In other words, if

you ask how you can improve a system, you improve on what you have

rather than make any changes. We have pressures from many minority

groups, as I've mentioned, often groups with particularly vested

interests. So we start to develop in trying — politically, if you like,

or whatever way — to meet all these expectations, and we end up

demanding unrealistic performance from the school. What generally

happens is we do a great deal of tinkering to improve functions which

perhaps the school cannot properly achieve.

We're trying

sometimes to perfect an illusion that we can do certain things better

than parents can, better than society can, and so on. In many cases we

can't. For instance, I happen to believe that it's partially an

illusion that we can train secondary students to be better in academic

skills at the same time as we add more vocational training, physical

education, driver instruction, sex education, etc. I don't think

realistically that it can be done, and we will spend a great deal of

time and effort in trying to improve an impossible situation.

So,

again, perhaps partially as a devil's advocate, or as a caution, I'd

like to suggest that we take a look.... We look at all the faults. We

tend to say, "Well, this is inadequate, that is inadequate," and we try

to improve that. Maybe we should recognize that there's a lot of good

things going on out there. I'd like to suggest that these great

scientists, Mozart and many of these people that were used as examples,

somehow or other became thus without special education programs. But

maybe in this day and age that can't happen. I think there's plenty of

scope for people to get special education without special education

programs.

Just a brief comment about Indian pupils. I've

seen it from the early fifties when integration in the schools first

started. I've seen it happen — better, worse, various situations. I

think one of the problems that we often have is that we try to

integrate Indian pupils into the schools according to our standards,

our set of values, our expectations, and I think what we have to do is

recognize that the child who grew up on the reserve does not fit into

that neat antiseptic classroom structure that we want him or her to. I

think if we really want to meet their needs we've got to recognize

their wishes, their objectives and their goals much more, instead of

trying to convert them into our own way of life. We just work at it and

have unrealistic expectations and then wonder why they don't work.

Finally,

I'd like to comment briefly on the apprenticeship program, or the

vocational skills training. A lot has been said, and I think all of us

acknowledge that we do not have enough of a training program in our

province to train the skilled people that we need. Again I think we may

be working in the direction of trying to improve on an unrealistic

program. We have fairly rigid structures in place by management, by the

rules, by unions, etc., and I think — a personal opinion, if you like,

not documented — that the only way we are going to really achieve

skills training is to be a little more patient and take it in smaller

steps. I think at the final levels of a journeyman training program,

the training has to be intensive under skilled journeymen, under proper

conditions. You cannot train a machinist at the final levels if he's

not working in a machine shop. But I'd like to suggest that if we break

it down into levels, if you like, with the continuous progress type of

thing, we can have someone start out playing with wrenches at level one

and working from there. There could be various stages of development

broken down into separate levels that do not need to be on a continuity

program.

I say this partly because right now employers will

often hesitate to commit themselves to three- and four-year programs on

a continuing basis. Young people are reluctant to make a three- or

four-year commitment, and unless they do it's hard for them to get into

the apprenticeship program. What is wrong with a would-be mechanic

starting out at level one serving gas and checking the oil at the gas

pumps? Then when he gets adept at that he could get a certificate for

level one. Then if he decides to try something else for a while, he

could come back to level two perhaps a year later and learn the next

step, and so on.

I haven't worked it out entirely, and

certainly I don't want to take the time here to spell it out, but I

think we can break it down into smaller steps, almost a programed

learning type of thing which could get us some results, and could get

us into a one-man shop — a person could start in a one-man shop. So I'd

like to suggest that we do it in stages or steps, and that we, with a

little more patience, could probably get many journeymen.

I'd

just like to conclude by saying that there are many good, sincere and

interested teachers in the school system, to my knowledge. Given some

guidelines they will do a good job. I'm afraid that we're accepting

pressures from too many different groups to try and make the schools

all-encompassing. I feel that we can t possibly come up with the ideal

school system which will look after all of society's needs. I think we

do have to go back to other agencies as well.

MR. HOWARD:

I would like to pose a question to the minister, who I'm sure is taking

many notes of things that are advanced. I wonder if he could outline

for me, when he does reply, the various proposals and thoughts that

have been put forward and what procedure a group of people would follow

who may want to either ally themselves with a different school district

from the one within which they may be located, or alternatively who may

want to establish a separate school district embracing that particular

group of people. Wouldn't the minister mind setting out what procedure

there is, what sort of criteria are established and what expectations

the ministry has that such a group of people should try to meet?

MR. LAUK:

First of all I want to express my appreciation to the hon. member for

North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) and advise him that I agree that so

often when we embark upon special needs programs we forget the effect

that the structure of the special needs programs have on the students

and the teachers themselves.

It occurred to me as I was

listening to the speech from the first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber)

to wonder what special needs programs Mozart and Einstein had. When you

have special needs programs — and I don't wish to put down teachers or

the ministry officials or anything — who makes the judgment on who the

potential Mozarts and Einsteins are?

We're assuming that

we've got people in place who can make that judgment. and we know full

well that the way things go we sometimes miss identifying so-called

gifted children. Generally speaking, most of us on this side of the

House feel that all children have special gifts. Some have different

gifts than others but they all have special gifts. The job of a school

system, the teachers, and all of us involved in

[ Page 2938 ]

the

education of ourselves and our children is to create a learning

environment where the gifts of people are enhanced, where individuals

are encouraged to try their best to fulfill themselves and to

contribute as much as they can to society. I don't wish to see

unnecessary divisions take place identifying special needs groups,

underachievers and high achievers and so on. As the member for North

Peace River indicates, it sometimes creates more problems than it

solves.

I wonder if the minister could advise us when Bill

20 is coming back into the House. It's a strange history. The

amendments to the schools act....

HON. MR. SMITH: As soon as we finish these estimates.

MR. LAUK: That's fine. I want to point out some other mistakes in the Bill 20 that's been discharged from the House.

HON. MR. SMITH:

Mr. Chairman, these are better brought under Bill 20, surely, aren't

they? I would prefer these to be brought up when the bill is before the

House.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Matters involving legislation are not discussible at this stage.

MR. LAUK: The bill has been discharged; it's not on the order paper.

MR. CHAIRMAN: That's immaterial though, hon. member.

MR. LAUK: It's discharged. I wanted to be helpful to the minister.

MR. CHAIRMAN: One moment please, hon. member. Bill 20 is still on the order paper, hon. member.

HON. MR. SMITH: The bill has been discharged with respect to one

section only.

MR. LAUK:

Well, before they bring the bill back I wanted to tell the minister

that there are other things wrong with it that we haven't pointed out

that are quite serious.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please,

hon. member. That cannot be done. As much as the member would like to

bring this to the minister's attention, it is out of order in Committee

of Supply.

MR. LAUK: All right, thank you. I'll press on to something else then.

have some general remarks about the minister's office. The opposition

notes that his ministerial vote has increased by 27 percent. It is

always helpful to point out how this contrasts to the overall increase

in his budget, which is 15 percent, and point out that in public

schools the funding is only up 6.7 percent against an overall increase

of 15 percent. We must look at the 9 percent inflation rate that we're

told is prevailing today.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

seems that schools, as far as the budgetary pie is concerned, have got

short shift. I pointed out last day that we stand ninth out of all the

provinces as far as expenditures on education are concerned. I know

that the minister is now the junior minister in relation to his

predecessor, who is now the superminister of education in our province.

In short order the junior minister becomes the senior minister and gets

some more money for the schools. I don't think he should allow himself

to get pushed around by that big bully from West Point Grey, who has

graduated to a position where he can charge the public purse to supply

him with the various little toys that he has to play with now — dishes

and tunnels and so on.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. member, vote 54....

MR. LAUK:

You know, it would help if you would listen and not interrupt, Mr.

Chairman. I was referring precisely to the vote and I was referring to

the contrast in the budget in the minister's office.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The administrative actions of the minister, please.

MR. LAUK:

That is precisely what I was doing. It seems to me that a stronger

voice in his office would get the funds necessary for the expansion of

services in schools.

One of the specific points I want to

raise has to do with student aid programs, including scholarships. This

has suffered a great deal of neglect since the Social Credit

administration took office. I think the minister should direct his

attention to student aid programs through the ministry. For example, in

1975 the total of student aid including scholarships was in the

neighbourhood of $12,584,000. That was what was available. In 1980-81

the sum has, after all these years, decreased. Instead of increasing,

it has decreased to an amount of $10,982,000. In 1975 the amount for

student aid was $11,664,000, and about $917,000 in scholarships. The

figures for student aid last year are that there was $10,500,000 for

student aid and $1,263,000 for scholarships. Although scholarship

amounts have risen modestly, the student aid expenditures in the other

column have decreased. At the same time it should be pointed out that

the amount of money expended to advertise student aid and scholarships

in 1976 was $37,200. The amount of money spent in 1979-80 to advertise

student aid and scholarships was $78,750. We are spending a lot more

money on advertising scholarships and student aid programs to students,

but we're spending a lot less money on the students themselves. This,

to me, is the kind of mistaken priority of the ministry that has

occurred over the past four or five years.

Why is the sum

decreasing? There is not declining enrolment, overall. The number of

students in post-secondary enrolment, from the department's own annual

report, was 67,753 in 1975. In 1977-78 there were 82,139 students. That

is up 21 percent from 1975, and I wonder if the minister wouldn't have

a hard look at that. The number of students in post-secondary is up 21

percent, but the amount of student aid and scholarships is down by 13

percent. That is a shortfall of 34 percent, and we're falling behind.

It seems to me that the minister should have a look at that.

Mr.

Speaker, I want to raise a question involving a person by the name of

Archie Gaber. There's a lengthy problem involving this teacher, who has

had correspondence with the ministry about his particular grievance;

but I want to raise a

[ Page 2939 ]

specific

question with the minister, if I can have his attention, It directly

involves his ministerial office and what perhaps could be seen to be

improper conduct on either the minister's part or on the part of one of

his staff. I'm told that Mr. Gaber made known his intention, somewhere

in the chronology of these events involving his grievance, to run for

the school board in his area, Kamloops. A Mr. Tucker of the minister's

office contacted this person who had a grievance in the system and told

Mr. Gaber that if he stood for nomination in the upcoming school board

election, it would complicate their efforts to fully correct his

situation. I want to repeat that for the minister, because this is a

rather serious allegation that should be cleared up. In other words,

the allegation is that Tucker, a ministerial assistant, contacted Mr.

Gaber, the complainant, and suggested that if he ran for the school

board or stood for nomination, this would complicate the ministry's

efforts to fully correct his situation.

As a result, Mr.

Gaber wrote to his lawyer in a letter dated April 18, and this letter

was transmitted to Mr. Tucker. I would take it that.... Gaber says in

the letter to his lawyer:

"I have, with

considerable reluctance, decided to accede to the Ministry of

Education's request not to stand for nomination in the upcoming school

board election, to again extend my full cooperation and to avoid any

complication in their efforts to fully correct my situation. I

therefore returned all campaign contributions to my supporters. There

was some unhappiness and disappointment, which I hope doesn't result in

lack of support for future elections.... In view of my compliance, I

would appreciate it if you would inform the ministry that I shall view

their request with utmost mistrust and public action if they fail to

deal properly with the problem reported to them, or else provide

adequate corrective compensation in line with the dual objectives I set

out in my notes to you on Monday," etc., etc.

That letter

went to the Ministry of Education for the attention of Mr. Tucker, with

a covering letter from Mair Horne Janowsky Blair, lawyers in Kamloops,

which said: "Re Archie Gaber. We enclose herein letters we have

received from our client, Mr. Gaber" — a letter to myself on April 18,

along with the one I just read.

So I'm assuming that that

letter reached the ministry, and making the allegation, it would have

been refuted at that stage. Therefore the lack of action on the part of

the minister to refute the allegation means, to my way of thinking,

that the allegation was correct. If the allegation is correct, I wonder

if the minister can explain why a ministerial assistant would be

interfering with the democratic process in Kamloops, on the basis of

holding out a hope of favour if the aggrieved party would not continue

his efforts to be elected as a school board member.

Another

point that I want to raise — which was raised before, but wasn't

adequately replied to — is the abolishment of the committee on sex

discrimination. It's very important apropos the comments that I made in

my opening remarks on these estimates, that we have such a committee or

similar group that will be an ongoing review of the materials — the

curriculum — presented to our young students, so that we can culturally

reinforce, through our educational system, our widespread and common

view that equality of the sexes is a desirable cultural goal in our

society. That committee or advisory group would review such materials —

textbooks, curriculum and what have you — to ensure that the concept of

equality of the sexes is properly presented in such materials and not

the more traditional unsavoury approach that we used to take. So when

this committee, which was established by our administration, was

abolished, it received widespread attention among many groups which

expressed disappointment.

There's another specific question

for the minister regarding Douglas College, Winslow campus, in

Coquitlam. My understanding is that there's an unfair labour practice

in progress out there. Evidently they hired a right-to-work contractor

named Hil-Ron, a member of the ICBA — that well-known group that's not

identified with the New Democratic Party, I think it's safe to say —

not to say that only groups associated with the NDP should have such

contracts, but I think it's a well-known problem in hiring union

personnel on such campuses. I wonder if the minister can report on that

situation and assure us that there'll be no labour relations problems

as a result of that probably unwise move in hiring a right-to-work

contractor.

I think, Mr. Chairman, those are the issues that

I wish to raise. I wish to remind the minister of the medication

problem.

section 110 of the School Act says that the Minister of Health

shall prescribe the rules for medication administered within schools. I

wonder if the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Mair) has issued a directive

to the Ministry of Education setting out the procedures, and if he

hasn't, is the School Act being technically violated? Should this be an

ongoing violation tolerated by the government, or should the School Act

be changed or what? It seems to me that if the minister has not

provided for such procedures as required of him — because the word is

"shall," not "may" prescribe the rules for medication administered

within schools — that should be done forthwith or an explanation given

to the committee.

Before I take mv seat — I'll be leaving

the chamber for a while this afternoon — I want to compliment the

minister on his announcement with respect to allowing school districts

to make their own employment decisions on superintendents, which is

probably the only piece of hard news we've heard. That's not to say

that the minister's undertakings are not sincerely given, I'm sure, but

we're hoping to see that completely in place soon.

The last

question, Mr. Chairman, has to do with the forums that the minister

will take this fall. I'm no clairvoyant, but we have a feeling that

some of the briefs might say something along these lines. I wonder if

the government will change its position on centralization of education

control, if the public indicates at this autumn's hearings that it

wants less centralization under the ministry and more local autonomy

under school boards. In other words, is the minister prepared to give a

commitment to the chamber today that he will take the forums as a firm

guidance for policy for the Government, or is he just going to shelve

the criticism or take piecemeal the suggestions made?

wonder if he could outline for the record which items of education

policy really are up for grabs, if you like, in the autumn forum

reviews, and which educational policies are sacrosanct from the outset

and we shouldn't even approach making submissions on them. I think it's

fair for the minister to present that outline to us today — fair to the

people who are interested in presenting briefs, because it's a heck of

a waste of money and time to prepare material and research oil issues

that the minister really isn't going to change anyway.

I'd like to tie the minister down to some timetable for

[ Page 2940 ]

rewriting

and tabling a new act after the forum hearings are completed. I've

complained in the chamber this spring to the minister and cautioned him

not to use such forums to delay necessary action on a complete revision

of the School Act. I don't like saying School Act, you know; I should

add that. I like saying Public Schools Act. I feel that because of a

politician's natural paranoia he worries about changes like that. If

you take away the term "Public Schools....."

AN HON. MEMBER: That's a lawyer's paranoia.

MR. LAUK: The lawyer's paranoia — whatever you like.

the way, there are problems in the new School Act because you've

eliminated "Public Schools" but the expression "public schools" is

still used in some sections, causing some confusion. Anyhow, I don't

like the dropping of the term "Public," because that might get us back

to that old proposition that your leader and Premier argued, that was

quickly shelved: that the independent schools will come under school

district administration. The school districts reacted very strongly

against that proposition, and I wonder whether the change of the title

of the Public Schools Act is a harbinger of that old proposition

surfacing again. I want to caution that we would be opposed to that.

those are the questions I have. If I'm not here to listen to all the

answers the minister may have, I will certainly make every effort to

read the Blues and see what he has to say.

Mr. Chairman, I'm

going to wait until the members opposite have asked more questions and

then try to respond to them in my closing remarks. I've got a number of

them here I'm going to respond to; I'm not going to just leave all

these things. I've got notes coming out of my ears to respond to.

MR. NICOLSON:

Mr. Chairman, I think it would have been a little bit better if the

minister had responded in bits. It would have been accepted with more

enthusiasm on this side that he might dispose of matters raised by

other members, but I guess our official critic has left the House for

the time being.

Mr. Chairman, I'd first like to say that I

am pleased that the ministry has responded with a little bit better

pace than has been customary to schools that have been burned and

destroyed. The actions taken today with Hume School in Nelson and the

Prince Charles Secondary School in Creston in terms of bringing in

temporary facilities — which I think will probably be ready for next

fall at Prince Charles — have been commendable. There were some slight

delays with Hume School reconstruction, but that has gone ahead a

little bit better than par for the course, so there is improvement in

dealing with this type of tragic situation.

I would say to the minister something that I've always felt; I really would

like to know what a cost-benefit analysis might yield if we were to look at

the possibility of having 24-hour supervision on plans that are worth many millions

of dollars, and I would hope that the minister would undertake to do that. Maybe

some small elementary schools don't warrant it, but there must be some level

where 24-hour on-site custodians would produce a predictable benefit and saving

in not only the cost of replacing a building, which, I think, would be the yardstick

that we would use, but I would hope that we would also consider the tremendous

benefit in terms of the very disruptive effect when in a small community the

entire senior secondary program is put out of business and there is no option,

such as there might be in Vancouver, of dispersing students temporarily to other

schools, but simply relocating to a recreation centre, if you have one, such

as we did in Creston. So that's question number one: would the minister

consider such a cost-benefit analysis to see if there is a rational argument

for placing 24-hour custodians in some of our school plants?

Secondly,

I'd like to just say something about the matter of transportation,

particularly of children to and from kindergarten. It seems to come up

in different parts of my riding — and I'm sure it's something that all

rural members find — that while the ministry will pay a travelling

allowance for automobile transportation of children, it is just not

satisfactory in this day and age when we often have two working

parents. In rural areas where there are not the forms of

transportation, children cannot walk home to get back to a babysitter

or whoever is looking after them. With the kinds of problems that we

run into, I would urge that the minister have a fresh look at the

possibility of extending the transportation of kindergarten children.

I'm thinking most recently of letters which have gone to the ministry

from parents from the Crawford Bay Elementary School, but it's a matter

which has come up in Salmo and I'm sure it has come up in other rural

areas at other times.

The third item I would like to bring

up is the matter of computer science. The ministry does have a pilot

program, and with the cooperation of the B.C. Systems Corporation they

have been able to acquire Apple computers for which a great deal of

educational software has been written and there are programs. But what

I find very odd and, I think, very inequitable, is that.... I'm not

going to say this is a matter of small schools versus large schools,

because one reasonably small-sized school district in Golden has, under

Mr. Miller, an excellent program of computer science with four Apple

computers. I think that their MLA might be very pleased to know that.

In other areas with larger-sized schools, for some reason or another

some curmudgeons on the school board seem to find that computers are

threatening and that they are a frill or something, and they constantly

vote down budget items such as some investment in computers. Yet they

will readily recognize that something which costs just as much, such as

an IBM Selectric typewriter, should replace the old antique Underwood

typewriters, which is a good investment because that is what the

students will be using when they get out in the workforce today.

The

computer, the microprocessor and the whole field of electronics and

electronic technology is the wave of the eighties. If we do not give

them the best that can be given today at a very economical rate, if we

do not give all students some preparation in terms of computer

science.... Commerce students, mathematics students, science students,

vocational students — every student in the school — should and can

easily be exposed to some computer science in order that they not think

that a computer is Hal of Space Odyssey 2001

but a useful tool which most of them will be using and dealing with in

one way or another. In fact, I'm really amazed that your predecessor,

who would pretend to be so enthusiastic about scientific endeavours,

would have left this field in such disarray. If anyone knows anything

about computer science they would realize there is a pun in there.

The

biggest expansion of technology is going to be not even in the building

of hardware, particularly in electronics, but in the building of

software technology. In the eighties

[ Page 2941 ]

factories

are going to get smaller, offices are going to get larger and

eventually the offices will get smaller because the offices will be

moving to the home of the worker. The electronic revolution which is

taking place while we sit in these marble halls is something which is a

tremendous opportunity and it is the opportunity for people in British

Columbia and in Canada. We are going to be falling miles behind if we

don't get going on this almost instantaneously. The cost of putting in

and equipping a computer science lab need not even be more than $30,000

or $40,000 per school. In fact, if you want to get by very cheaply, you

can get one computer for less than $1,000. You can do quite a bit with

that. You can get more flexible systems. You could have your senior

commerce students doing some word processing. They could be learning

how to do accounts receivable using computers. They could be learning

how to address files, set up files, using floppy discs and the things

which a great number of computer hobbyists have already found their way

to because our school systems are very much lacking.

As I

say, there has been a start. There has been a sort of experimental

reaching out, but I think the time has come for the ministry to put

forward an intensive capital program in order to make a full computer

science laboratory available to every senior secondary school in the

province. It should not follow very far behind that it should also be

made available at the junior secondary and even at the elementary

levels. We cannot afford not to. Really, within ten years' time, or

perhaps much less than that, there will be very few people that won't

be using these.

Lawyers are using computers. Lawyers can

pretty well be automated now. Conveyancing can just be done by a quick

little program. Get your floppy little discs whirling around and you

merge a couple of paragraphs and there's your conveyance contract. Many

lawyers, I think — a couple of people probably, like Mr. Jabour and

other progressive types — have probably already gone very heavily into

that area. So I would ask if there is going to be a pretty well uniform

curriculum set up. I don't think the minister need worry about

training; in-service training could certainly handle the job with a

good, intensive two-week course or so, because I know that in many

schools there are trained computer programmers teaching math and

science who don't have any computer labs in their schools. I think

there are more trained people out there today than there are in terms

of equipment. So we've really got the software; we don't have the

hardware for the program.

The other situation that I would

like to bring up is that of Creston-Kaslo School District 86. The

Duncan Dam in that school district is not assessed for school tax

purposes, and I think the minister could rectify this situation, and

maybe a few of the others, at no great expense to the ministry. In

fact, I think it would actually be of benefit to the ministry — a

benefit to the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) — but it would

require that some money be taken from B.C. Hydro.

order-in-council 1135 of April 9, 1968, the Peace River project was

exempted from taxation, because B.C. Hydro is required to pay grants in

lieu of taxes — that is their policy, but it was exempted. According to

the submission of B.C. Hydro and Power Authority to the commission of

inquiry on property assessment and taxation back in November 1975....

At that time, at the 1975 tax level, the estimated annual school taxes

applicable for the Peace River project would have been $6,253,000; yet

the school district — which I imagine is probably Peace River North

school district — gets not a bit of that. The Columbia River Treaty

storage projects — the Duncan Dam, the Keenleyside Dam and the Mica

Darn — were exempted, and since that time the Kootenay Canal in School

District 7, Nelson, was put on, and the Seven Mile Dam in the Trail

School District is paying taxation or grants in lieu of taxes.

think that it's particularly unfortunate for School District 86 that

this order-in-council remains in place as is. It has a fairly low

assessment rate per pupil. The assessment rate in 1980 was, I believe —

I might have picked up the 1979 figure by mistake, but at least the

comparison is correct — $25,247 per pupil assessment, and the

provincial mean was $29,643. I didn't use the ministry's report; I

think the BCSTA 1980 thing is probably pretty close. The mill rate in

School District 86 — and this is the 1980 figure from this source — was

58.791 mills compared to a provincial mean of 51.380. The previous year

the disparity was even a little bit greater; it was actually just about

a complete set of mills. The difference in this most recent year is

about 6.5 mills higher, and it's not that the cost per pupil is really

out of line; it has a high cost per pupil because we have some very

small high schools. We have to have a high school in Kaslo; we have one

in Crawford Bay as well as in Creston. Those are small, isolated

communities. It would be over an hours' drive on very tortuous and

slippery roads in the winter if one were to bus those students

elsewhere. The cost per pupil in 1980 was estimated at $2,371; the

provincial mean was $2,282.

So in spite of the fact that

it's a very difficult district to service, and we do have to have small

classes to offer programs, the cost per pupil has been kept only $91

above the provincial mean. The taxes that would have been estimated by

that 1975 submission by B.C. Hydro were $552,000. I guess we have to

compare apples and oranges a little bit. The present budget is about

$3.17 million, so that would appear to be quite a bit. But what would

that actually do in terms of the grant from your ministry? Well, first

of all. It would increase the assessment in the district. That means

that the amount of money raised locally by the statutory mill rate levy

would increase. So the amount of money that would have to be donated by

your ministry and placed in your budget would actually go down, Mr.

Minister.

At the time we got the change in 1975, when we

first made the commitment on the Kootenay Canal — the decision was made

fairly close to the 1975 election — I can say in all honesty that we

were within weeks of making the same adjustment on this Duncan Dam. I

guess I'll leave the Hugh Keenleyside Dam to my colleague from

Rossland-Trail. I know that those changes were in the wind at that

time. I can say that. because we did chance policy in terms of placing

the Kootenay Canal under full taxation. It has been continued by the

commitment which the member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy) and from

the Minister of Finance for the Seven Mile Dam.

So, Mr.

Minister, my question to you is: would you please make the strongest

representation in order to rectify this anomaly of order-in-council

1135 of April 9, 1968, which affects the Peace River project and

Columbia River treaty storage projects? We're now in the strange

anomaly where dams built by the old B.C. Electric, such as the Bridge

River Dam in the Lillooet school district, pay full tax. We have other

dams, such as the Kootenay Canal and the Seven Mile project, which are

paying their grants in lieu of taxes. but we have the Columbia River

Treaty darns and the Peace River project which are not. I think that it

is perhaps ludic-

[ Page 2942 ]

rous

that, say, a full $6 million goes to one school district.... If those

numbers don't work out, I would hope that the ministry could work out

something that is equitable and at least as fair as the benefits being

shared by and enjoyed by other school districts such as the Lillooet

school district, my Nelson School District 7, Trail school district and

many others in the province. The Bunsen power project pays its way. The

rest of them....

HON. MR. HEINRICH: That's my old hometown, Nicolson.

MR. NICOLSON: I guess you knew.... Well, we'll have that conversation elsewhere.

Mr. Minister, that is my question on that matter.

would like to say that I very much share the views and concerns of my

colleague the first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) about the

education of the gifted. He talked about the burden of their gifts.

That might sound like a contradiction in terms, but I have had the very

enjoyable experience of having taught students at the grade 7 level in

elementary school, and then having taught those same students in grades

10, 11 and 12 in senior high school. Mr. Minister, I have seen some

very gifted children fall by the wayside, largely, I think, because

they were not challenged. I know that it is a real problem to come up

with something special for them without falling into the trap of

elitism. But if we recognize the problems that gifted children face in

terms of having to play down their aptitudes, in terms of deliberately

underachieving, then, Mr. Chairman, I feel we are missing the

opportunity to keep this country as great as it is. We have in this

chamber at least one Rhodes scholar. I suppose that was the singling

out of one.... Possibly we have more....

Mr. Chairman, I

think that we do have to find ways and means to combat the problem

where students deliberately underachieve, particularly girls or women

in the secondary school. I don't think that it's anything genetic that

explains why girls are probably way ahead in elementary school and then

boys tend to get ahead in a lot of the subject areas in the high

school. I think that it's an attitude towards excellence, and I think

that we have to come up with ways of encouraging our students to

achieve the best that they can at the earliest age.

Students

don't have a great deal of time to learn what they have to learn before

they should be out in the work place. I've said it before in this

House. Two of the brightest modern mathematicians died at a very early

age. Abel, who was one of the discoverers of modern mathematical

theory, died when he was 21. Another fellow with a French name, which

for the first time in my life I've forgotten, died when he was 19 years

old. These two people were pioneers in mathematics. In their day and

age they made as important contributions as did Gauss in terms of group

theory and things in mathematics. At 19 and 21 they had untimely

deaths, and yet they left their mark. So we can't afford to have

brilliant students sort of held in a holding pattern when they could do

other things. It doesn't mean that we have to isolate them or create

elitist groups, but we do have to find ways of letting them go ahead at

their own speed.

On the matter of scholarships, I was

pleased to see the amount has been brought up. It has been eroded and

I've said that in the past. The $1,000 amount is very welcome. I would

like the minister to consider a return — not a complete return in terms

of the district scholarships, but in terms of the academic

scholarships, the competitive ones that are marked here in Victoria —

to allowing students to pick out their specialty areas and not be held

every year and I think I said it when the member for Burnaby North

(Mrs. Dailly) was minister. For instance, in looking at the graduation

list from SFU — I just happened to be looking through and, of course, I

naturally tend to look at computer science, mathematics, chemistry and

physics — I was impressed with the number of students with obvious

Chinese names. They were hardly a minority. They were almost equal in

number to others in those subject fields. Of course, they gravitate to

that area because a great number of them have a language difficulty;

especially those who immigrated at an early age have a language

difficulty. I say this from my years of experience in school. I have

seen many people, not only Chinese but other ethnic origins, excel in

even do very well in French, strangely enough, but have difficulty

students. I think it's a crime if engineers go out in the world and

really have no philosophy, no sense of humanity. I would think that in

the area of scholarships we're really not going to do much except

penalize a few gifted students who really do deserve that scholarship

and that $1,000. They've worked darned bard for it through their

high-school career, and they deserve not the money but the recognition

that is due to them. I leave that with the minister.

HON. MR. SMITH:

I'm going to try and deal with most of these, and if I don't deal with

them all you can come and beard me personally on them. The last speaker

from Nelson-Creston invites us to put in fire supervisors, and I must

say I thought that was a good idea too. I began, but with 1,600 schools

and the cost of a commissionaire or a supervisor it works out to

something like about $58 million a year, so we're going to have to find

some other way to cut down arson other than having round-the-clock

patrols.

I agree with a lot of his comments on computers. We

do have a pilot project of a hundred computers in eight school

districts, and I'm hopeful that we'll move to a much wider

dissemination and use of computers in the secondary schools.

You

would not expect me, I don't think, to comment on the inequities of

assessments; I would be in trouble with the Minister of Transportation

and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser). But I am well aware of what he speaks

of because it used to concern me a lot when I was mayor of Oak Bay —

how the tax base is different. The Minister of Finance should really be

the one that he directs that to.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

The

member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) asked me about how school districts can

change their boundaries or a new school district be formed. There is

really not very much difficulty with changing the boundaries if the

boards involved agree on it. It is pretty matter-of-fact. If the boards

involved agree on the new division of districts and it makes any

rational sense at all, we approve it. I've approved a number of them

already. If they want to form a new school district, I wish I could say

there were clear criteria. There aren't. We consider mostly the

community of interest. An example of a new school district created that

had a commun-

[ Page 2943 ]

ity

of interest but wasn't very large in numbers, of course, is the Nishga

district. We don't just take an arbitrary rule based on geography or

population. Community of interest is the dominant one. If he's got

something in mind or people in his riding do, we'd be glad to work with

them. I don't think there's much problem in changing boundaries of

boards. That is done quite regularly.

I should make mention

of a few of the matters the opposition critic raised. He raised the

matter of Douglas College and the Winslow school and the contract

there. Those, of course, are let by the college board, not by the

Ministry of Education. The Ministry of Education doesn't prescribe who

should get the contract. That contract was done on the basis of a low

bid.

He asked me about my educational forums across the

province, and if I would be bound by what I heard. I'm certainly going

to listen to what I hear in these forums, and I would expect to

implement a considerable amount of it. As for what the goalposts are, I

don't really consider that there are any sacred subjects out there. I

hope it will be a general discussion on all aspects of education. He

invites me to set deadlines as to when an amended School Act might come

forward. Unlike him, I don't believe that legislation cures all the

ills of the world. I hope that a lot of the things I hear out there can

be implemented by administrative changes, and I would do so; but if

legislation is needed it will be prepared.

He mentioned a matter of a Mr. Gaber of Kamloops. Mr. Gaber was a

supervisor in Windermere school district whose position was eliminated

by the school board. He was entitled still to be employed by that board

in another capacity, but resigned. Therefore, as I understand it, he

was not entitled to the statutory review procedures of the act. He was

given, first of all, a ministerial review. Then he was given a special

review by Mr. Stan Evans, a respected member of the BCTF who went over

his case very, very thoroughly and made some recommendations, all of

which were carried out. That did not satisfy Mr. Gaber. Mr. Gaber at

one time used to send me telegrams on a weekly basis. He was one of my

telegram pen pals. Mr. Gaber is getting a further review from me, but

it was never threatened or promised that he would get that if he didn't

run for school board, nor indeed would I presume to tell anybody to run

or not to run for any office. Also, my executive assistant never spoke

to Mr. Gaber or communicated with him; they had some discussions

through Mr. Gaber's solicitor. It would seem to me quite obvious that

if Mr. Gaber were going to run for school board he would have done so,

and he still can. This would not depend on his review. But he is

getting a third review. I just don't know what more you can do. If

there has been a lack of due process there will be action on it, but he

was never promised he would get that if he didn't run or did run.

Some other

matters of education were raised by the member for North Peace River

(Mr. Brummet). I thank him for that and particularly for his comments

on vocational training and the need to use patience there, and also his

sensitive comments on special needs of Indian students and the

importance of not lumping them into ''aseptic classrooms," as he put it.

The

second member for Surrey (Mr. Hall) made some comments about

counselling and asked me what we were doing on it. There is a task

force study that has been completed and will be released shortly. It

looks at counselling overall and is quite a good study. We are going to

be considering some sort of overall policy for counselling. It may well

be that we will try to better define the qualifications needed for

counsellors, and try to establish a core curriculum for counsellors. We

certainly would hope to expand both the choice of program and the

work-experience program.

The second member for Surrey also

mentioned the special problems his district has with respect to

declining enrolment. I am very happy that both the second and first

members for Surrey and myself have really worked together as a

non-partisan team in trying to address the capital needs of Surrey and

the problems with increased enrolment. Surrey is one of those districts

that goes against the provincial figures and has very, very significant

growth in certain areas, particularly in south Surrey.

trying to address those needs I did meet directly with that school

board to tell them that I would expedite approvals, if student

enrolment proved to be as high as was projected, to install portables

immediately on a shareable basis; also, that we would review the space

requirements of that school again in September. I also allowed them to

submit a revised capital-budget submission. In the capital approval of

Surrey, as the member knows, we actually approved a major expenditure

there that the board hadn't even asked for in its original submission.

In that district they are in the process of obtaining a new

superintendent. With the work that the members have done, I hope that

there will be better coordinated planning — that is what he talked

about in his address — between the school board and the municipality.

This is a matter that I know my colleague, the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), is concerned with generally across the

province.

The member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) made a

couple of comments about Jericho Hill School for the Deaf, which I

thank him for. I assure him that the review committee is a broadly

based. sensitive committee and there is absolutely no reason why there

cannot be some decentralization of these facilities if that community

wishes such a decentralization. Some decentralization has already

occurred because I was able to open a group home for the severely deaf

not too long ago in Vancouver, This is the first of its kind; it is the

first move to an experience of taking the deaf children out of

dormitory living and having them live in other surroundings. It is in

the Vancouver area, that is true, but there is absolutely no reason —

if that is not an acceptable experiment to the deaf community — why

these couldn't be more decentralized in different parts of the province.

Interjection.

HON. MR. SMITH: I know you want me to just sit down. I have this compulsion to answer everybody's questions. It’s very unpopular, I know.

hope that I answered some of the queries of the member for

Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) about counselling at the same time as I

was responding to the other member.

I should also perhaps

say something about some of the comments that were made and the issues

that were brought forward by the member for Esquimalt–Port Renfrew (Mr.

Mitchell) and the hon. government Whip (Mr. Mussallem). Regarding the

need for vocational training, I certainly agree with the need to

identify and train people who wish to pursue vocational programs. We

have been encouraging pre-career programs in grades 11 and 12, working

towards ensuring that these people do have secondary school graduation.

and also a marketable skill. Thirdly and of great importance is that

they

[ Page 2944 ]

have

some advanced standing in an apprenticeship program or in a college

career program. One of the ways that this is brought about is through

work experience. The work experience programs in some of the school

districts are excellent. There is a particularly good one in Burnaby.

These programs go far beyond the regular industrial and commercial

education programs.

I think I have answered most of the

outstanding matters. If I have not answered matters, I hope members

will bring them to my attention.

I am just reminded that

there were some comments on student aid. There may be some

misunderstanding from looking at the estimates, but grants for student

aid are up this year and not down. I think the member was perhaps

reading the wrong figures. They're up from $10.1 million to $10.9

million. The amounts, of course, depend on the demand. If the demand

were greater than those amounts budgeted, I can tell you that I

certainly would have no hesitation in seeking a necessary warrant.

There

was some mention on the vote of my office. I think it's just about up

to what my predecessor of two ministries before, the member for Burnaby

North (Mrs. Dailly), had in level of staffing if I were to fill those

positions.

I want to thank the members for their many constructive remarks during the estimates.

MR. LOCKSTEAD:

Mr. Chairman, I have a few very brief questions of the minister. I

don't intend to go through the whole debate again on the issues already

raised over class sizes and all of these various local issues. But we

do have one unique issue in the riding; that is School District 49. As

the minister is aware, one of the larger communities in that school

district is closing down, resulting in the loss of 40 percent of the

student body. The teachers' association and the board of trustees have

expressed a number of concerns. Perhaps the minister, particularly for

the record, would take a few minutes to answer some of these concerns

under this particular vote.

For example, it would appear

that many of the families — although the community of Ocean Falls at

the present time is shut down completely — will be staying on in the

hopes of perhaps getting employment in this proposed