Manitoba Hansard — Sitting 25 (29th Legislature, 5th Session)

29-5-25

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 2:30 o'clock, Thursday, March ,15, 1973 Opening Prayer by Mr. Speaker. INTRODUCTION OF GUESTS 641 MR. SPEAKER: Before we proceed, I should like to direct the attention of the honour able members to the gallery where we have 40 students of the Manitoba School for the Deaf. These students are under the direction of Mr. R. Reeves of the Manitoba School for the Deaf and Mr. Don Krause, Mr. Fred Tucker, and Mr. Steve Leavitt, of the Saskatoon School for the Deaf. This school is located in the constituency ot the Honourable Member for Charleswood.

We also have 85 students of Grade 8 standing of the Lincoln College. These students are under the direction of Messrs. Zacharias, Bedar Wilson and Mrs. Nowak. This school is located in the constituency of the Honourable Member for Assiniboia. On behalf of all the honourable members of the Legislative Assembly I welcome you here today. Presenting Petitions; Reading and Receiving Petitions; Presenting Reports by Standing and Special Committees; Ministerial Statements and Tablmg or Reports; Notices of Motion; Introduction of Bills. There are two on the Order Paper the honourable members aren't pre sent.

Oral Questions . The Honourable Member for Riel. ORAL QUESTION PERIOD MR. DONALD W. CRAIK (Riel): I'd like to direct a question to the First Minister. Can he advise tne House Whether the government has any information on or can provide inform ation on a report done for the Feaeral Department ot Indian Affairs Northern Development regarding the Cross Lake Community which indicates that the Hooding ot the community will be at the rate of 80 percent ot tne active area, it would be sub)ect to tlooamg of 80 percent of the active area of the community periodically? MR.

SPEAKER: Order, please. 1 do believe the question is stating an opinion and in that context it really isn't fair. The Honourable First Minister. HON, EDWARD SCHREYER (Premier)(Rossmere): Mr.

Speaker, if the question is in order I'd like to attempt to reply by simply indicating to my honourable friend that the inform ation that I have in that respect is that any potential flooding conditions at the community of Cross Lake are not envisaged to be of any signifi cance, that is to say, over and beyond what can be contemplated as natural flooding, and of course that is something which very quickly becomes imponderable. Insofar as the direct measurable effect of Lake Winnipeg regulation is concerned relative to flooding at the community of Cross Lake, I am advised that there is no significant such effect.

There's been some concern raised with respect to the so called devel opment line, or flood line, but that, Sir, I'm advised has to do with an effort to demarcate a line below which any development or building might be subject to flooding damage on a frequency of once in 1000 years. And so therefore, Sir, I think that my honourable friend to, to satisfy his curiosity with more precision would be advised to ask the chairman of Hydro at the Utility meeting next Monday or Tuesday. MR. CRAIK: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.

Does the government have access to or a knowledge of the report done by Van Dillen & Company for D . • . with regards to the Cross Lake Community? MR. SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, such a report, if in fact such a report has been for warded, I would assume would be in the possession of Manitoba Hydro, and I will make inquiry. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Wolseley, Leader of the Liberal Party. MR, I. H. (Izzy) ASPER (Leader of the Liberal Party)(Wolseley): Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Mines.

Has the interdepartmental task force that he said he would be setting up to study the Kierans Report, has that task force been formed? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Mines and Resources. HON. SIDNEY GREEN, Q.C. (Minister of Mines, Resources and Environmental Man agement)(Inkster): Not formally yet, Mr. Speaker. MR. ASPER: Will the Minister be advising the House of the members of the task force once it's been established. MR. GREEN: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

642 March 15 , 1973 ORAL QUE STION PERIOD MR. ASPER: Will the task force be reporting to the Premier, or to the Minister of Mi nes, or to the Planning and Priorities Committee of Cabinet, or to this House ? Will this House receive that report ? MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, the task force will report to the government. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourabl e Member for Lakeside. MR. HARRY J. ENNS (L akeside): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. May I direct a question to the Honourable the Minister of Northern Affairs. Can he indicate to the House what the present population figure is of the community at Cr oss Lake? MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Mi nister of Northern Affairs. HON. RON McBRYDE (Minister of Northern Affairs)(The Pas): Not offhand, Mr. Speaker. MR. ENNS: Mr. Speaker , I direct another question to the Minister of Northern Affairs. Can the Minister tell us what information he had, or on what information he based his state ments on December - that he made on December 14th in his news release at that time , that indicated that the winter roads facilities for the hauling of freight to the north were nearing fully operational stage and is considerably further advanced than ever before at this time of the year ? MR.

McBRYDE: Well, Mr. Speaker, there are a number of roads and some of them were completed ahead of normal schedule; some of them were completed .behind normal sched ule. All of them were completed, although the warm weather has caused the closing down · of at least one of the roads. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourabl e Member for Rupertsland. MR. JEAN ALLARD (Rupertslan d): Well, Mr. Spealer, I have a question for the Mi nister of No rthern Affairs.

Will he personally this weekend investigate the winter hauling setup in Ii ford and specifically, the question of whether there is adequate machinery to do the hauling and not whether there are adequate roads , but whether the supply of machinery and . . . res idents is adequate to do the work that is to be done? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourabl e Mi nister of Northern Affairs. MR. McBRYDE: Mr.

Speaker, the Department of Northern Affairs has assumed the responsibility in the hopes of assi sting northern res idents by lowering costs in their commun itie s; and we have assumed the responsibi lity for the construction of winter roads and main tenance of winter roads , and have contracted out with various persons and firms for this work, and done some dire ctly ourselves. The freighting on the winter roads is the responsibi lity of the freighter who has the contract to hau l the goods in.

In the case of the Ii ford road , the road is open and has been open for a number of days and we have been urging the freighters to hurry up and get all their equipment in there and get on the road with the goods. I understand they are doing this. My Assist ant Deputy Mi nister will be in IIf ord if not tomorrow then the day after , and we have a man on the spot there full-time , Mr. Speaker, to try and make sure things keep moving on that road. MR. ENNS: A further question, Mr. Speaker, directed at the Mi nister of Northern Affairs.

Can he indica te to us at this time the number of air contracts, or contracts let for the hauling by air freight supplies that are not now be ing able to be moved by the road method? MR. McBRYDE: Mr. Speaker, I think I understand the full import of the question; if I missed some of it maybe he could ask a supplementary. Again the Department of Northern Affairs has assumed the responsib ili ty for the construction of air strips and of winter ice strips so that the very largest planes coul d get in to these communities. I am aware on an incidental basis of a number of the air contracts that have taken place.

I know that a number of companies have been hauling to various communities, and also which strips have been completed and are operational. I talked to one of the freighters yesterday in concern to the Isl and Lake Road and if the we ather doesn't turn cold the re will be some supplie s that will have to be flown into that area. But the freighter is making his own arrangements to supply those goods by air freight. MR. ENNS: A final supplemen tary question, Mr.

Speaker , directed to the Mi nister of Northern Affairs , again relating to a statement that he made on December 1st from his own Information Services group. Can he indicate, or can he give the House any indication at this time tha1 what he told us on December 1st that perhaps the cost of freighting the goods into the northernl communities could be reduced from the 7. 17 cents normally charged by the pri vate haul ers , would be reduced to perhaps as low as 3- 1/2 cents as indicated in his releas e. Can

Ma rch 15, 1973 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD 643 (MR. ENNS con t'd. ) . . . . . he - will the actual cost of the goods now being supplied to the north , is the cost being reduced? MR. McBRYDE: Mr. Speaker, with regards to that specific question the figures were quoted in that news release, were quoted in the poss ibilities of the road from Hole River or Wanlpigow to Island Lake area, to the comm unities in the Is land Lake area. When the road was opened it is my understanding , Mr.

Speaker, and again it's a contract between the freighters and the people who want the supplies haul ed, that the rates were coming in at about half the cost of previous freight hauls. However, Mr. Speaker, with the unseasonably warm weather and if there's a necessity to hau l in by air freight, then our original estimates of air freight costs would have been the same cost by air freight as las t year's road haul costs. So that means that if there is some need to haul in by air freight, the cost will not be half the cost that it was last year. MR. SPEAKER: The Honoura ble Member for Wolseley. MR. ASPER: Mr.

Speaker, to the Mines Minister. Can he tell us or can he indicate to the House more detail on the structure of the task force that he's estabiishing to study the Kierans Rep.ort indicating when the report will be -rather when the comm ittee will be struc tured and indica te to the House whether or not he intends to make that report available to the members of this House? MR. SPEAKER: The Honoura ble Min ister of Mines. MR. GREEN: No, Mr. Speaker, I can't indic ate. MR. ASPER: Is it the intention of the government to the Mini ster of Mines to make the Ta sk Force report available to this Hou se? MR. GREEN: Mr.

Speaker, I'm unable to make that commitment at this time. The Ta sk Force Report to the government will be in the nature of a departmental report to the responsible political authorities. As to whether such a document is or is not released is, always has been, in the discretion of the political authority. MR. ASPER: To the Mines Minis ter. Will the Task Force be com posed exclusively of civil servants or will outside experts serve as members such as in the case of the Task Force on Post Secondary Education. MR. GREE N: Mr.

Speaker, I believe the intention was to set up an internal admin istrative task force for the purpose of considering a specific document which made recommend ations to the government for mineral resour ces policy. It is not the intention to set up another wide-ranging comm iss ion to consider that policy but an internal tas k force to consider a spe<- ific proposal. What will be announ ced, and what will be made ava ilabl e to the House, and to the people of Manitoba of course, is the position of the government with respect to the rask Force once such a position is arrived at. l MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Rupertsland. , MR. ALLARD: Mr. Speaker, I hav e a question for the Minister of Northern Affairs, somewhat similar to the one I asked. In view of the very lateness of the season and the sky rocketing cost of an emergency airlift, would he guarantee to the House perhaps not only his Deputy, his Assi stant Deputy Minister, but at least his Deputy, perhaps his own presence in Ilford, because the fact that little of the freight has · been hauled in Ilford and there is some thing very funny going on ? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Northern Affairs. MR. McBRYI;>E: Mr.

Speaker, it's sort of in slight relationship to winter roads but I did have an appointment with my lawyer for Saturday; it's indirectly related to that. Mr. Speaker, if there are problems that are not solved or straightened out by my Assi stant Deputy Minist er, Mr. Thompson, and his staff that are on the spot there now , then I would certainly go. up there and make sure but I have full confidence in them to straighten this matter out, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Member for Assini boia. MR. STEVE PATRICK (Ass iniboia): Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Honourable Minister of Labour.

In view of an announcem ent by the Ontario Gov ernment that it will impose compulsory arbitration to end the elevator strike joining B. c, and Quebec, would the Minister make a st atement to the House with respect to the prospects of ending this strike, elevator strike in Ma nitoba ? MR, SPEAKER: The Honourabl e Minister of L abour.

644 March 15 , 1973 ORAL QUE STION PERIOD HON. RUSSE LL PAULLEY (Minister of Labour)(Transcona): Yes, Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to make an announcement insofar as the position of the Minister of Labour in Manitoba is concerned in respect of this strike. I just two minutes ago, Mr. Speaker, was in telephone communication with Ontario, and that is the reason I was delayed in getting into the House, in connection with this strike.

The Prime Minister of Ontario has indicated that he will bring about compulsory legislation introducing OOfiiiPUlsory arbitration in respect of this strike when the Ontario Legislature resumes its deliberations Tues day next. I was speaking to the Minister of Labour for Alberta by telephone a few moments ago and there is :provisionapparently in Ontario, in Alberta Legislation for compulsory arbitration, which isn't the case insofar as Manitoba , is not now, and has never been, in re spect of strikes dealing with - between union and management in areas such as the elevators.

The Union, so I am informed, were prepared to undertake voluntary arbitration and binding with management insofar as the elevator strike was concerned. This was rejected by management. Management have st ated that they were prepared to enter into voluntary arbi tration, providing it did not interfere with management rights. What management rights in this particular incident or case would be I leave to my honourable friends opposite, and I would suggest that by that and the attitude of management it would mean providing --(Interjection) Well, Mr. Speaker, I bow to the intelligence of the Member for Lakeside.

If he doesn't want to hear the story then I'm prepared, I am prepared to sit down and not answer the question --(Interjection)--All right it's agreed that I should sit down. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. Order, pleas e. A supplementary by the Member for Assiniboia? MR. PATRICK: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the Minister would be able to tell what is the total value of construction projects that have been delayed because of the strike in Manitoba? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR.

PAULLEY: I would suggest to my honourable friend from Assi niboia that if that is his only interest in this particular case , I suggest to him that he supply or produce an Order for Return asking for that specific. I was attempting, Mr. Speaker , before the interjection of Lakeside to give to the House the information that I think that the House should receive in respect of the elevator construction . • • MR. PATRICK: Mr. Speaker, I have another supplementary. I thank the Minister for the information. Ca n he tell us the number of workers that are affected in Manitoba ? MR.

PAULLEY: According to the records that I have 110, and incidentally the lowest strike record of any province except P. E. I. in the whole of the Dominion of Ca nada. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. EDWARD McGILL (Brandon West): Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Honoul' able the Minister of Mines . The Ontario Minister of Mines is reported in today' s Globe and Mail as favouring the calling in the near future of an interprovincial conference of Mines Min isters to determine a national minerals policy. My question, Mr.

Speaker, to the Minister is: has he had any communications or any conversations with his counterparts in other provinces about the calling of such a conference to determine a national minerals policy ? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Mines. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, the Mines Ministers of Canada met at the end of August , or the beginning of September, in that isolated island of capitalism in western Canada, the Province of Alberta; they then met, the Mines Ministers, in Toronto in November of this year.

At the urgings I believe of many ministers , including myself, there has been a desire of the Mines Ministers to meet in a form other than the annual Mines Ministers Conference which, although they are very useful things, are heavily industry oriented -- I'm not saying that as a criticism I'm saying that as a fact -- and I presume that the Honourable the Minister of Mines in Ontario is now accepting the same attitude towards this question that I have been pursuing in the last 15 months.

I don't believe that he has been in touch with me but I haven't seen my mail for the last two days for reasons which are obvious. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Rupertsland. MR. ALLARD: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the First Minister. In view of the deep concern and distress that I found on a fou!'-day visit to Ilford and Split Lake and Cross Lake and Thompson over the weekend on the question of the effects of the hydro· development,

March 15, 1973 645 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD (MR. AL LARD cont'd. ) . • • • • could he tell the people of the north and the members of this Hoose exactly what the government's policy is going to be in terms of poss ible compensa tion for certainly South Indian and Split, Nelson, Cross and Norway , and even the people of Thompson, who have some concern about what might happen . . . MR. SPEAKER: The Honoorable First Minister. MR. SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, there are of course a number of parts to that question, and I may say that they're all important of course.

I believe, if I understand my honourable friend correctly, he is referring in the first instance to Cross Lake, the community of Cross Lake again, and Norway House , and the concern with respect to a development line. or hydro line, floodline So-called.

I can advise my honourable friend, as I tried to in response to the Member for Riel, that the so- called development line is of meaning only in the sense that it is intended as a guideline to the community below which level or line there ought not to be con struction of any structure unless they were prepared to face flood damage of an estimated frequency of once in 1, 000 years. And it has , you know, therefore little practical meaning.

Perhaps the easiest way, Sir, is to simply indicate to the Honourable the Member for Ruperta;_ land that the information given me from Manitoba Hydro is that the mean monthly level, the mean monthly level of Cross Lake at Cross Lake would be affected by three inches, three inches , and hopefully therefore in layman's terms, Mr. Speaker, it would be as sumed that if the mean monthly level would be affected by. three inches, then whatever would normally be constructed in that community would be. constl\Jcted in any case bearing in mind that three inches , it should be three inches higher.

A(ldtliei::ef�e it's of not much practical concern, Mr. Speaker, really, Now again I invite my honoorable ;Iriend the Member for Rupertsland to pursue this specific at the Utility Meeting, whether h¢ b!:l ,a:inember of Utilities Committee or not. He can be there certainly as a member of the Asse�ly to pursue that point.

Now with respect to the< muiili larger question of comi>ensation, and I'm getting some what apprehensive about the ruies> Sir, ab�t the length of reply because the Member for Lake side might object, but if I am given another 30 seconds, another 30 seconds , I would simply indicate to the Member for-Ruperlsl_and that it is certainly policy, self-evident and stated form ally in the past, that the eXtent to which there is· an impingement or a loss of revenue, of live lihood to residents at or around Southern Indian Lake, or any other part of the whole Nelson River development, the extent of loss of livelihood or reduction of amount of livelihood would be quantified and compensation wouid be paid, will be paid, in accordance with a formula in the case of fish and fur not unlike the formula used in agricultural stabilization policy.

That's about the quickest way I can summarize it. Records exist for making the quantification of differential, Sir, and so that is a matter of clear policy. With respect to any structural damage, compensation would be paid as well" pursuant to adjudication or arbitration throogh county court mechanism or the same mechanism as applied in the case of Red River Floodway construction and the expropriation of 533 properties, etc. , etc. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Rupertsland. MR.

ALLARD: Well, I'd ask the First Minister if it is true then that what the line really means is that residents are advised as they've flooded once in the last 1,000 years, they may flood once in the next 1, 000 years. Is that correct? MR. SCHREYER: It is bas ically correct, in fact ess entially correct. MR. ALLARD: It is only advisory; it is not . MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. MR. SCHREYER: Th at is precisely correct. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. L. R. (Bud) SHERMAN (F ort Garry): Mr.

Speaker, my question is for the Mi n ister of Municipal Affairs in his capacity as Minister reporting for Autopac. Is the Manitoba Public Insurance Co.rporatioil going into the towing business, the tow truck business? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Mi nister of Municipal Affairs. HON, HOWARD R. PAWLEY (M inister of Municipal Affairs)( Selkirk): No, Mr. Speaker. MR. SHERMAN: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Is the Minister -- does the Minister have knowledge of a contract awarded to Stern GMC Trucks Limited for the supply of tow trucks to the Manitoba Public Insurance Co rporation? ·

646 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD MR. PAWLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: I didn't hear the answer. MR. PAWLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker . . MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. March 15 , 1973 MR. SHERMAN: I heard the answer, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister advise the House what business these tow trucks will solicit ? - MR. PAWLEY: Mr. Speaker, the tow trucks in question, two in fact, that were awar(} ed by way of an award from Stern Trucks to the Ma nitoba Public Insurance Co rporation just recently, are involved in internal towing involving the Pa net Road sa lvage centre.

Specifically they are not involved in police calls. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Rupertsland. MR. ALLARD: I have a question for the Mi nister of Health and Social Dev elopment. Could he advise the House whether he has set any meetings with the Council of Nur sing Home Associations in reply to their request for such meetings over government policy, specifically over the question of admiss ion control which is one of their big conc erns. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Mi nister of Health. HON, RENE E. TOUPIN (Minister of He alth and Social Development)(Springfield): Mr.

Speaker, there was a meeting scheduled this morning at 10:00 o'clock. It had to be can celled by both parties unfortunately. It's reschedules, I believe, for next week. :MR, SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Wolseley. MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, to the Mi nes Minister. Will the task force that he's es tablishing on the Kierans Report, will it hold some form of hearing , or public hearings , with the poss ibi lity existi ng of the cross-examination of Mr. Kierans and the presentation of sub miss ions to the Task Force which has been set up to advise the government? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Mi nister of Mines.

MR. GREEN : Mr. Speaker, that is not the nature of the type of task force that the government was intending to set up. It was an internal task force to give. advice to the govern ment on the Kiera ns Report.

May I advi se the honourable member that in the past three years since I have been Mi nes Mi nister I have had conserva tively speaking, to use a bad word, at least -- well a dozen meetings with members of the mining industry at the pri vate level, the unive rs ity level, and the public level, and that there has been to my understanding more con sultation and willingness of government to listen and discuss these things with that group than there has ev er been in the past in the Province of Ma nitoba. MR, ASPER: To the Mines Ministe r, Mr. Speaker. If the Task Force doesn't . . . MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

The question is hypothetical. MR. ASPER: In view of the statement that Ontario has called for a national conference for the development of a new national energy policy, will the Government of Manitoba place before this Assembly its position for debate by way of White Paper or policy document prior to attending such a conference so that that policy can be debated? MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, the Mi nes Minis ters have met once a year for the past 25 years I believe , maybe 22 years.

They have also met consi stently at variou s other occas ions other than at their annual meeting; they have continuall y discussed national and provincial minerals policy. I can recall no time in the past when it was done or suggested that prior to a Mines Mi nisters conference, or a Health Ministers conference, or a Fi nance Mi nisters conference , that there be tabled the Manitoba position so that it may be debated in the Assembly. But what has occurred, Mr.

Speaker, and apparently the honourable member needs some assis t ance as to when he can debate matters within the Assembly, may I therefore advise him that he has an opportunity to debate the mines policy of this government during the Throne Speech debate, during the Budget Speech debate, during the debate on Estimates, going into Es tim ates, by Priva te Members' Resolutions , and on other occasi ons , which I don't need to tell the honou:r able member becaus e there are some debating secrets which I would like to keep for myself. MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Mi nes.

In view of the fact that he has said that the Government of Manitoba is in the process of formulating an energy policy and a mi nes policy, can he indicate to this House whether that policy will be made available to the public or to this Legis lature prior to the conclusion of this government's term of office ? MR. GREEN : Mr. Speaker, I indicated that if a new policy is reached with regard to mines that that policy would be announced. The fact is that the existing policy was announced

March 15, 1973 647 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD (MR, GR EEN cont'd.) . . . • . on previous occasions within the House, without the House, and, for my honourable friend's memory I put it again on the table, to the honourable members during discussion on the Minister of Mines' estimates. That policy then becomes a matter of public debate; and so that my honourable friend will have some idea of what the democratic process is all about, it is debated in this House in the many ways which I have previously suggested, and then it is debated, Mr.

Speaker, at a thing that occurs every four years that they call an election campaign where the honourable members go out to the people and say, this is what we believe, and I presume that the Honourable Member for Wolseley will go out and say this is what they believe, and the public will choose for the next period of time, which can last as long as five years but which may be terminated at any period in between there if the government loses the support of the members of the parliamentary assembly, or if the First Minister for reasons known to himself decides to as k the Lieutenant-Governor to call a new election, that becomes the position of the people of Manitoba.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Osborne. MR. IAN TURNBULL (Osborne): Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Attorney General. Before I risk my neck by returning to my barbershop, will the Attorney- General explain why his department will not prosecute the City of Winnipeg for refusing to comply with a provincial statute . . . the Barbers Act? --(I nterjection)-- MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Attirney-G eneral. Order, please. --(I nterjection)- HON. A. H. MACKLING, Q. C. (Attorney-G eneral)(St. James): Mr.

Speaker, after the answers have been given from the members opposite from their seats, I am now prepared to indicate to the honourable member that I too risked my neck when I had a haircut but recently and I know the concern of the barbers in connection with. this matter. However my department did not refuse to launch prosecution but they recommen ded to me that it would be preferable if the Barbers Association themselves brought this action before the court. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for P0rtage -- supplementary? MR. TURNBULL: I have another question, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: Supplementary? MR.

TURNBULL: No, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Portage la Prairie. MR, GORDON E. JOHNSTON (Portage la Prairie): Mr. Speaker, I direct my question to the Minister of Northern Affairs. With respect to the construction of the winter road system in the north, is it not a fact that the conditions for construction were more favourable this fall, or last fall, than for many years in the past? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Northern Affairs. MR. McBRYDE: The answer to that question, Mr. Speaker, is yes and no.

In the early part of the season with the cold weather and little snow the conditions were quite favour able; in the last three weeks the conditions have been very unfavourable. MR. G. JOHNSTON: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Could the Minister advise the House as to when the Hole River Island Lake Road was available for travel and what was the approximate cost of building it? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Northern Affairs. MR. McBRYDE: Mr. Speaker, if the honourable member would consult with his friend, our mutual friend, he might get some information.

I can't remember the exact date that that road was opened, Mr. Speaker. ary. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Portage la Prairie. Last suppleme nt- MR. G. JOHNSTON: Mr. Speaker, would the Minister undertake to supply the inform ation either during the question period or during his estimates? MR. McBRYDE: Mr. Speaker, I'll provide the honourable member with the inform ation as to the total number of winter roads built, the cost of those winter roads, and the dates on which they were opened. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Winnipeg Centre. MR. J. R. (Bud) BOYCE (Winnipeg Centre) : Mr.

Speaker, I wonder if the Minister of Labour could inform us as to whether or not the elevator workers are willing to submit their case to compulsory -- or binding arbitration rather? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour.

648 March 15, 1973 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD MR. PAULLEY: I trust 9n this occasion that the Honourable Acting Leader of the Conservative Party will not prevent--(lnterjection)--Yes, you'll get the answer and you won't like it. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the honourable gentleman just state the answer. MR. PAULLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I will. And as I indicated I'm sure that the Conservative Party of Manitoba will not like the answer. A MEMBER: Just give the answer. MR. PAULLEY: Will you listen?

The unions were prepared in Ontario to agree to voluntary binding arbitration providing that all of the points in dispute were under consideration but --(Interjection)--Oh of course, I know how you stand in matters of this nature. But Mr. Speaker, the companies were not prepared to accept voluntary arbitration because as Mr. Tuff --I'm not sure whether he's resident in Canada or in New Yprk, U. S. A. --Mr.

Tuff being the Chief Negotiator for the Elevator Construction Industry, stated that the companies will not permit arbitration or even collective bargaining on management rights; the companies turned down voluntary arbitration because they would not risk losing these issues.

Apparently now, the Prime Minister of the Conservative administration in Ontario is going to impose, by legis lation after the Session starts, which could effectively agree to the position taken by the United States dominated company that would not infringe upon such rights as the employees having an opportunity to say what their particular involvement in a collective agreement should be, and Mr.

Tuff says that the union's main conditions were that all•unresolved issues be subject to arbitration, and that several court charges pending be dropped, but the union is determined to preserve its members' jobs instead of prefabrication in the United States of America of elevators, the position that the unions in Canada have taken that their jobs are at stake, and in particular the members of the union in Western Canada, including Manitoba, are determined that their jobs will be protected; that they will have an opportunity under a collective agreement to decide whether the elevator components are made in the United States of America as against the jobs for Canadians, and that is the issue at stake at the present time.

And if my honourable friends opposite would agree that the position of the union is untenable and that the construction component should be assembled in the United States, then I ask them to stand up in this House and so declare. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Order, please. I should like to indicate that a question, it is desirable that they be answered but they should not be debated, and I would ask all members of the As sembly to adhere to the rules in this regard. The Honourable Member for Osborne. MR.

TURNBULL: Okay my question is for the Minister of Municipal Affairs, and the Minister responsible for the Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation. Ho.v many senior citizens have been prevented from occupying high rise senior citizens' homes built by MHRC as a result of the elevator operator companies refusing to negotiate in good faith with their employees? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Municipal Affairs. MR. PAWLEY: I'll take thatl!J_uestion as notice, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Lakeside. MR. ENNS: Mr.

Speaker, I wonder if the Honourable the Minister of Labour could indicate whether or not the employees involved in this labour dispute belong to an international union? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would indicate . MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. MR. PAULLEY: Are you answering, or do you want an answer from me? You know, Mr. Speaker, sometimes my honourable friend from Lakeside there proposes a question - you don't want to hear the answer? I'll give you the answer. MR. SPEAKER: 0-rder,. please. Order, please. MR. PAULLEY: Mr. Speaker, I ... MR.

SPEAKER: I would request that all members conduct themselves with some decorum. If they have further questions, they'll have the opportunity to ask them. If they wis h to hear an answer and I would like to hear it also, I would appreciate if there would be no

March 15, 1973 649 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD (MR. SP EAKER cont'd.) . . . . . interjections. I have enough difficulty with the static on this earbug without the remainder of the assembly giving me more. I would appreciate if every one would conduct themselves gentlemanly and with decorum. The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question of the honourable Act ing Leader of the Conservative Party and I am pleased to inform him and the Assembly that the employees belong to the International Union . . . MR, SPEAKER: Order, please.

The Honourable Member for Lakeside state his matter of privilege? MR, ENNS: Yes, my point of privilege Mr. Speaker, is the incorrect reference to my person. I am the Deputy Leader of the Conservative Party. MR. SPEAKER: That is not a matter of privilege. The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Mr. Speaker, may I apologize to the Honourable Member for Lake si de, I thought he was the Acting Leader of the Conservative Party and I withdraw reference to him being an actor, and suggest that his definition of his occupation may be correct as being the deputy leader of the party . . . MR.

SPEAKER: Order, please. MR. PAULLEY: My answer Mr. Speaker, is ... MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The -Honourable Member for Thompson state his point of order. MR. JOSEPH P. BOROWSKI (Thompson): Mr. Speaker, my point of order is, that when the Minister is asked a question he should answer it instead of giving a lecture to the Opposition. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Mr.

Speaker, may I say to the Honourable Member for Thompson if I had of been allowed to give the answer, I would have, without interjection, and for his benefit and all other members of this House, I inform the House that the Union is represented by an organization by name, the International Union of Elevator Constructors, and that I am informed that the Union and its representatives in Canada have complete national jurisdiction over their operations in Canada without any imposition from the United States of Americru, which in my opinion is not the case with the construction companies themselves. MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Morris. MR. WARNER H. JORGENSON (Morris): I should like to direct my question to the Minister of Labour, and ask him if he realizes that his intemperate outburst has now cleared the gallery of Grade 4 students who were sitting there just a moment ago and . . . will prob ably receive another letter of censure. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Order, please. The question is very improper, I would hope the honourable member would think the next time he says it. The Honourable First Minister. MR. SCHREYER: Mr.

Speaker, pursuant to questions asked_earlier today by the Honourable the Member for Rupertsland and the Honourable the Member for Riel relative to Cross Lake elevations, I have given the ,information as best I can within the time permitted under the rules but if honourable members would like to have the full hydrographic data pertain ing to Cross Lake levels --I can't table this document, Mr. Speaker, but I would simply inform the two honourable members that if they requested, I believe, through the Department of Mines and Resources, and/or Manitoba Hydro, it will be made available.

It is called "Program for Regulation of Lake Winnipeg". It has hydrographic<ilata re Cross Lake. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Riel. MR. CRAIK: My question to the First Minister is with reference to the report which he's holding up here which I had examined when he answered a previous question and I believe - the question I would like to direct to him, is not the increase in level that he said is three inches shows on the hydrograph as being one foot? But the questions earlier --(Interjection)- Well, Mr. Speaker, the report is right here and I spent the last ten minutes reading it --but the question Mr.

Speaker, I would like to direct further is, would the government undertake on behalf of the Members of the Legislature to obtain the report from the Federal Government that has been done with regard to the transportation relocation in Cross Lake, in view of the pro posed flooding, or water controls, and provide it to them so that we might use it, if it's possible,

65 0 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD (MR. CRAIK cont'd.) . . . . . for the hearings next week. March 15, 1973 MR. SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, most definitely. If this document I have just referred to has not already been made a public document. and I believe it has been; I was merely inform ing my honourable friends that if they don't have a copy, or not one conveniently available, that they could request it. I believe it's already, however, been distributed.

With respect to this other report now that my honourable friend refers to, of course we will as k for the report and once we have the report I can assure my honourable friend, they will have the report. It's as simple as that. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Crescentwood. MR. CY GON ICK (Crescentwood): I have a question for the Minister of Health and Social Development.

Would the Minister inform the House as to whether or not pensioners, old age pensioners, receiving provincial welfare will be getting the full benefit of the announced federal increase in pensions, or whether the provincial allowances will be decreased to some degree? · MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Health. MR. TOUPIN: Mr. Speaker, I'd rather take this question as notice and be more precise in the answer. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Industry and Commerce. HON. LEONARD S. EVANS (Minister-of Industry and Commerce)(Brandon East): Mr.

Speaker, the other day the Honourable Member for Assiniboia asked me a question regarding the Unity Bank and location of its head office, or an office in the Province of Manitoba. I believe he inferred that I had given a commitment to meet with its Board of Directors. I have now checked Hansard and I gave no such commitment.

However, I can inform the members of the House that several months before the question was asked in this House that my deputy minister, acting on my behalf, was in touch with the shareholders of the bank during the time of hearings before the Federal Committee on Banking, while it was before the Federal House, in an effort to persuade them to have its head office in the Province of Manitoba. Unfortunately our proposals met with no encouragement, they were to of no avail, and in the meantime they have been incorporated with head office in Toronto.

They have announced, the company has announced, that it plans to open five branches in its initial year of operation, and I believe Winnipeg was mentioned as one of the possible locations. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Osborne. MR. TURNBULL: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Health. When did the Minister last meet with the executive of the Manitoba Mental Health Research Found ation, and did he at that time, or subsequently, make any commitment to give them part or all of the $ 300, OOO grant that they had asked for? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Health. MR. TOUPIN: Mr.

Speaker, I personally have not met with the Board of Governors. I had my deputy minister meet with them, no commitments were made for any funds. MR. TURNBULL: Could the Minister give the House a reason why no commitment was made? MR. TOUPIN: Well, Mr. Speaker, first of all the estimates of the Department of Health and Social Development will be discussed in this House; and secondly, it is definitely a matter of policy for the government to decide. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Wolseley, Leader of the Liberal Party. MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, for the Minister of industry.

In view of the fact that Unity Bank announced the preference for locating its head office in western Canada and sub sequently met with Premier Lougheed of Alberta, can he explain why he, or the First Minister of this province, didn't meet with the directors of Unity bank in order to try to convince them to come to Manitoba? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Industry and Commerce. MR. EVANS: Mr. Speaker, I don't know whether that type of a question requires an answer.

I think we have made sufficient efforts to interest them in the Province of Manitoba but they have obviously had their minds made up, I understand the principal shareholders are members of the Liberal Party; maybe my honourable friend opposite might have had a little more influence than myself. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. Order, please. The Honourable

March 15, 1973 ORAL QUESTION PERIOD (MR, SPEAKER cont'd.) . . . Member for Wolseley state his matter of privilege? Order, please. 651 MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, the point of privilege is this: I don't know who the dir ectors of the Unity Bank are and I'm the Leader of the --excuse me, excuse me --and I'm the Leader of the Li beral Party, and if the Minister intends to suggest that members of the Liberal Party guide the destiny of Unity Bank, then it is incumbent upon him . MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. MR. ASPER: . . . to prove that statement. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. That is riot a matter of privilege.

The Honourable First Minister. MR. SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, as I recall the question, not the alleged point of privilege, the question was, why did I not meet with the directors of Unity Bank? The question was why the Minister of Industry or I did not meet with them. I believe that the Minister has met with representatives of the Unity Bank as he has clearly indicated earlier today. The Leader of the Liberal Party asks why I did not meet with directors of the Unity Bank as the Premier of Alberta met with them apparently.

Now we understand that the Unity Bank has headquartered itself in Toronto as all good banks in Canada have done historically and it's - the question is entirely academic, because had I met with them I am sure I would have met with about the same su ccess as Premier Lougheed has done. The bank is not in Edmonton, it is headquartered in Toronto. MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, to the First Minister. Is that the policy then of his government that he doesn't believe he can . . . so he won't try. MR. SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, the answer is definitely not.

But the Minister of Industry and Commerce has met with representatives of the Unity Bank, offi cia ls of the depart . ment have met with certain representatives of the Unity Bank, but what is the point of the question, Sir, since it is admitted that in other provinces in western Canada such meetings took place and the Unity Bank, true to form with other Canadian banks, has headquartered in Toronto, ho doubt on James Street or Bay Street. A MEMBER: Like all true Liberals , eh! MR. ASPER: Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Industry, since I may not have under stood his answer.

Could he tell us how many meetings took place between he and the president or the directors of Unity Bank? MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The Honourable Minister of Industry and Commerce. MR. EVANS: Mr. Speaker, I indicated in my answer very specifically what took place and I needn't repeat that, but I would also inform the hon ourable member, and reiterate, that while he asked the question last year, the bank had already been established with its head office in Toronto, it was already incorporated into its Charter, so the question was three months out of date at that time, MR. ASPER: A supplementary.

The reason I asked this question is because I thought we've.had two answers, one from the First Minister and one from the Minister of . . . MR. SPEAKER: Would the honourable member not debate the issue but ask the quest- ion. MR. ASPER: The question is, did meetings take place, and if they took place, how many meetings? MR. SPEAKER: Orders of the Day. The Honourable Member for Souris-Killarney. MR. EARL McKELLAR (Souris -Killarney): Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Health and Social Development.

Would the Minister inform the House whether he would consider issu ing a temporary licence to operate a personal care home in Ninette Sanatorium? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Health. MR. TOUPIN: Not at this stage, Mr. Speaker. MR. McKELLAR: . . . question. When can this House expect the tabling of the Clarkson Commission report on Mental Health? MR, TOUPIN: Fairly soon, Mr, Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. McGILL: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Honourable the Minister of Educa tion.

Having been apprised of his willingness at all times to hold meetings on subjects of public

652 March 15, 1973 ORAL QUES TION PERIOD (MR. McG ILL cont'd) . • . • • concern, would the Minister agree to meet a delegation from the Brandon School Board on a subject of publ ic concern, namely the tender price for the Brandon Vocational High School some time within the next two or three weeks at his convenience? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Education. HON. BEN :!IANUSCHAK (Minister of Education) (Burrows): Mr. Speaker, I had met with the Brandon School Board on many a previous occasion. I'm well aware with the details of this particular matter.

The Brandon School Division at the time of the letting of the contract was advised that the Department of Education through the Publ ic Schools Fi nance Board will support to the extent of the lowest tender which appeared to have been proper. However, in its wisdom the Brandon School Division chose to ac cept the se cond lowest tender rather than the lowest one; and therefore the board was advised that if that is its decision, which is within its jurisd iction of course the question of awarding of tenders, therefore Brandon School Divis ion will have to find ways and means of paying the difference.

So therefore, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that nothing further appears to have happened to have in any way Ghanged this ei tuation I am not all that certain as . to what could be accomplished by any further - - by a further me�t ing or meetings. MR. McG ILL: Supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, to the Honourable the Minister. In view of the fact that the Brandon School Board takes the pos ition that the lowest tender was invalid, would the Minister not be prepared to discuss the subject with them at this time ? MR. SPEAKER: The question is really argumentative. The Honourable Member for Morris .

POINT OF PRIVILEGE MR. JORGENSON : Mr. Speaker 1 on a point of privilege, I don't know how that particu lar quest ion could be argumentative. He's si mply asking if the Minister would be prepared to meet with them under new circumstances . MR. SPEAKER: Order please. Order please. If the honourable member will look at Hansard he will find out that there was a qualification placed in the question which makes it argumentative in my opinion. The Honourable Member for Morris. MR.

JORGENSON : I ask you to take particular note of some of the answers that are given that are far more argumentative than the questions that are being asked. MR. SPEAKER: Order please. I appreciate the honourable member's concern and I can agree that poss ibly this is taking place. I would also assist the honourable member in helping me so that both the questions and the answers could be monitored so that they would all conform with our rules . I cannot monitor all of them totally. I must have the co-operation of all the members. The Honourable Member for Portage la Prairie.

The Honourable First Minister on the point of order. MR. SCHREYER: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

For this particular occasion, and for future reference for the orderly conduct of this House, the Member for Morris contends that if a question is ruled out of order because it is argumentative, and Beauch esne does make reference to quest_ions being ruled out of order for reason of being argumentative, he suggests that there is therefore a corollary to that that certain answers are to be ruled out of order for being argumentative, and there is nothing in the rules nor in citations of Beauc hesne that I am aware of, that bears on that point.

So if the matter could be taken under advisement, perhaps it is a point worth further elaboration at some future si tting date of this House. ORAL QUESTIONS (cont'

d) MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Emerson. MR. GIRARD: Yes Mr. Speaker, I'd like to address a question to the Honourable Minister of Health and Social Services and ask him when are the people of Vita going to get some definitive answers on their request which they submitted to your depa rtment over two years ago. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Hea lth. MR. TOUPIN: What requests, Mr. Speaker? MR. GI RARD: The people of Vita, Mr. Speaker, requested cons ideration of building an extended care home and the Minister should be well awa re of that.

March 15, 1973 653 ORAL QUE STION PERIOD MR. TOUPIN: Mr. Speaker, the Minister is well aware of many requests from that area and all over the Province of Manitoba. Pe rta ining to the extended care home, it is under active review. MR. GIRARD: Mr. Speaker, might I ask a suppleme ntary question and ask the Minister approximately how much time the active review will be necessary ? MR. TOUPIN: Well, Mr.

Speaker, in all due respect to yourself and to the honourable member who is asking the question, the request was made, I hazard to say at least ten years before we came in office. - - (Interj ections) - - In answer, the people of the board that's composed in that area will receive an answer as soon as it is possible. MR. SP EAKER: The Honourable Member for Portage la Prairie. MR. G. JOHNSTON: Mr. Speaker, my questi on is directed to the Minister of Northern Affairs. Could he . .. MR. SPEAKER: Order ple ase. MR. G.

JOHNSTON: Could the Minister confirm or deny that the Manitoba Indian Brotherhood has asked for over $90, OOO of payment for construction of certain winter roads which were not authorized by previous contract or agreeme nt ? MR. SPEAKER: Orders of the Day. The Honourable Minister of Northern Affairs. MR. McBRYDE: Mr.

Speaker, the Department of Northern Affairs has entered into a two - - three contract with the Me Ke Se Construction which is associ ated with the Manitoba Indian Brotherhood; and we are discuss ing with them also the poss ibility of work on some roads that were tractor train roads or are tractor train roads, bringing them up to standard where they could become a winter truck road. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Cresce ntwood. MR. GONICK: I have a question for the First Minister. Does he have word for members of the House with regard to Mr.

Kierans presen ting a - - discussi on of his brief to the Economic Developme nt Committee ? MR. SPE AKER: The Honourable First Minister. MR. SCH REYER: Mr. Speaker, I did convey the request that was implicit in my honourable colleag ue's question of several days ago. It's my understanding that Mr. Kierans will be in Winnipeg today, later today, and there will be some effort made to as certain when he might be available. Of course there is also the necess ity of trying to so

schedule committees of this House so that we can proceed with sort of required and pressi ng Hous e busines s, to make an effort to try and reconcile those two conflict ing desires and requirements. MR. GONICK: I have a question for the Minister of Mines and Resources . Has the Man itoba Federal Study Board initiated studies on the life style cultural values social and economic cost benefits and other aspects referred to - - in the terms of reference of the Study Board. Has that program been initiated yet ? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Mines. MR.

GREEN: The Chairman, barring any difference with regard to the actual words used by the honourable member, the Study Board is embarked on programs within the terms of reference of the Study Board with regard to social impl ications. Now just at what stage this has reached, I am unable to say but I can as sure the honourable member that my impression is that the Study Board is moving on that particular phase of the study. ORDERS OF THE DAY - ORDERS FOR RET URN MR SP EAKER: Orders of the Day. Orders for Return. The Honourable Member for Assi niboia. MR. PATRICK: Mr.

Speaker, I beg to move, se conded by the Honourable Member for La Verendrye, that an Order of the House do issue for return showing: l. How many applicati ons have been received by the Department of Labour for Remembrance Day work permits for each of the preceding three years, 1972, 71, 70? 2. How many Remembrance Day work permits have been issued by the Department of Labour for each of the preceding three years, 1972, 71, 70 ? 3. For each permit and applicati on during the preceding three years, provide

a) location of business of applican t

b) type of business of applic ant

654 ORDERS OF THE DAY - ORDERS FOR RET URN MR. SPEAKER pres ented the motion. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Mr. Chairman, we are prepared to accept this reques t. MR. SPEAKER: So ordered. The Honourable House Leader. March 15, 1973 MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, would you call the se cond reading of the bill which is on the Order Paper please. INTRODUCT ION OF BILLS MR. MACKLING pres ented Bill No. 2,

An Act to amend The Garage Keepers Act for se cond reading.- MR. SPEAKER pres ented the motion. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Attorney-G eneral. MR. MACKLING: Mr. Speaker, Bill No. 2 is a relatively short Act and the questions of principle contained therein are relative ly straightforward. The bill -provides that a county court judge may extend the time for registering a claim of lien beyond the 20 days that is now provided in the Act. This therefore will provide flexibil ity in the otherwise rigid timing that is pres ently prescri bed for the regist rat ion of liens.

To this extent it will facilitate the garage keepers in se curing their lien. Further provisions make it poss ible for a person who has an automobile with a garage keeper to recover and take possessi on of the car upon his paying into court the amount of the claim that the garage keeper is making. Thus it will be poss ible for an individual who disputes the amount of the bill that a garage keeper may pres ent him with to' get recovery of his vehicle without admitting to the amount claimed. It will then be up to the garage keeper to commence ac tion to recover the amount of his claim within 30 days.

This again provides therefore for reason able protection both of the garage keep er, who has a right, a garage keep er's lie n, and also affords some reasonable bargaining power on the part of the individual owner of the car who might otherwise have to submit to full payment of the claim in order to get his vehicle and then bring an action in court if he disputed the amount of the claim.

We think that this will work as a greater measure of equity in favour of both the garage keeper and the owner of the vehicle because there have been si tuat ions where there have been very, very se rious hardships occurred without I'm sure any ill intent on the part of the garage keeper. Honest garage keepers have nothing to fear by this amendment to the legisla tion which will preserve theifr rights of lien but afford an individual owner the right of repossess ion providing he pays the money into court. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Swan River. MR. JAMES H. BILTON (Swan River) : Mr.

Speaker, I move, se conded by the Honour- able Member for Riel that debate be adjourned. MOTION pres ented and carried. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Mr. Speaker, I beg to move, sec onded by the Honourable - - (Inter jection) - - Mr. Speaker, I beg to move, sec onded by the Honourable Minister of Mines and Natural Resources, that Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a Committee to consider of the Supply to be granted to Her Majes ty. MR.

SPEAKER pres ented the motion and after a voice vote declared the motion carr ied and the House resolved intself into a Committee of Supply with the Honourable Member for Logan in the Chair.

March 15, 1973 655 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURC ES MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolu tion 82 (a) (1). The Honourable Leader - Liberal Party. MR. ASPER: Mr. Chairman, I am going to try to continue the thread of the argument I was making two or three days ago when we ran out of time, and I want to say, Mr. Chairman, that I recognize that this subject seems to provoke considerable controversy and debate and some emotion perhaps, and that for my part, Mr. Chairman, I shall try to co-operate with you in hearing the debate through. I had said, and I had dealt with the mis

interpretation that I felt had been put on the letter that the Premier had tabled from Cass Booy and we had moved from there to the comment by the Minister of Mines that he was either upset or disappointed, or .did not relish or encourage the idea that staff of government should be in some way able to participate in the debates in this House through having their words spoken by Opposition members, or som ething to that effect, Mr. Chairman.

And I might say that it is a sorry st ate when members, or rather employees, or st aff of government, become so frustrated that they find that they have to communicate, having spent many years in government se rvice, and find that so many things are happening that are incons iste nt with what they believe are in the best interest of the province. That may very well be, Mr. Chairman, the reason that the people have been prompted to speak openly, more openly, than they might otherwise with Opposition. Now, Mr.

Chairman, we engaged in quite an exchange the other night and the Minister has taken a considerable amount of time explaining the reason for the lack of :plresence of Dr. Cass Booy on the Wat er Commiss ion, and I'm sure he would want, Dr. Cass Booy to have the broadest opportunity to express his point of view, as he says he is doing , and therefore I would encourage him to invite Dr. Cass Booy to the Public utilit y Committee hearings and to be permitted to testify and' make a pres entation to it. This will certainly be raised on Monday. Mr.

Chairman, I hope the Minister will deal with that in one of his frequent resp onses on this debate. The subject of whether or not he will, or that the government will permit, or the committee will be allowed to have not only the Chairman of Hydro, but those who take a different view than the Chairman of Hydro. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the Minister of N'.lrt hern Affairs for his retraction of the statem ent that had appeared in the Win nipeg Free Press in which he had indicated that I had said som ething about a low level diversion.

I wanted that record cleared up because it is a fact that I have never spoken on this issue favouring a low level diversion, nor have I said anything but, in my opinion, Mr. Chairman, that there is now enough evidence from people of goodwill, people who have the best interest of this province at heart, and who have no political axe to grind, that there is a need for a new look. Mr.

Chairman, I differ from the Minister of Mines who said that he has not stifled or trampled upon, or muzzled debate; I differ from him in the sense that maybe not directly, but when I read off the list of people who had objected to this government, or objected to its position, and for one reason or another are no longer in government employ, the point I was trying to make was, how objective will the st udy on the environmental impact of the South Indian Lake flooding and Churchill Diversion be when it's pr_epared in House by employees of the Minister who have alm ost been told directly by the Minister of Tourism, Minister of Mines perhaps, certainly the impression one must get from the debate is that if you don' t agree with the government and you work for the government, get out.

That's basically what the Minister of Tourism said.

And so therefore what kind of an independent report on the environmental damage can we expect froI!l having fired the independent people, the University of Manitoba Study Group, and gone to an in-house employee task force or study group, because I regard the firing, or the dismissal, or the non-renewal, whatever we call it, of the university st udy group on the Churchill River diversion environmental loss as a very significant event, as a very alarming event, because we all had interpreted, certainly many of us believed that these people had been engaged because they would give an objective, independent report, because it was a controversial issue and that no one who was influenced by government, or dependent upon government for his continued living, would be called on because this university group was independent, or at least was more independent than an employee of the department.

Mr. Chairman, I believe -- I still believe, in spite of the protes tations of the Minister, that there is a campaign of fear, whether it' s deliberate or not. But people who disagree with the government on this iss ue, who have a point of view, have expressed to me their

656 March 15, 1973 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. ASPER cont'd) .. , .. concern and their fear to stand up and say, stop it there's a mistake being committed here. We want the public hearings that the Liberal Party has been insisting upon, And, Mr. Chairman, I don't understand if the Minister is so absolutely sure of his ground, that this is the right thing to do for Manitoba, why he continues to say, there will be no public hearings. Why if we are so mad, so insane, those of us who make the other case, does he not seize the opportunity to hold public hearings to discredit them?

We don't think he can discredit them, but we don't say that we have all the answers either and that's why we want the public hearings. Mr. Chairman, I'm reminded of the debate in 1969 throughout this whole piece. I wond er if we ever got the answer for example to a question that was put by the now Minister of Educa tion, who was then in Opposition, the Honourable Mr.

Hanuschak, who said in this House on March 25 th, 1969, who asked: "What concerns me is, if there should be a marketable mineral deposit in ihe bed of South Indian Lake, or what may become, eventually become the bed of South Indian Lake, could the Minister of Mines" -- and that was the former Minister of Mines- "indic ated to us what would be the loss in terms of either inability to extract the ore because of water or because of added costs in the process mining the ore because of the presence of water over top?" And we want to know the same thing today. A MEMBER: I gave him the answer at that time. MR.

ASPER: We want to know, we want to know what inventory surveys have been taken, and perhaps the Minister will be able to tell us that. perhaps the Chairman of Hydro will, but we haven't been able to find out to date what resource exploration has taken place on the area that will be covered by water, and what economic costs may be suffered in the subs equent extraction of that ore, or the subsequent exploration of that ore? We want to raise -- draw attention to what the Minister said when he was in opposition in this House, on April 14th, 1969, because what he said then is precis ely true of his government.

He said, "T here are some times when a de mocratic government because it has power will do things that it shouldn' t do. It's happened in the past and it happens when a government gets into a box and this government is in a box. " Mr. Chairman, I am suggesting that the Minister think of his own words because they apply now today more than ever to him and to his government. And he said at the same time, the same day in the House, "M r.

Speaker, we see some difficulty if the government pursues this program, and we say that they are in a position where they are psychologically incapable of looking at it objectively, and that's our main objection, that they have put them selves into a position where they can' t exercise good judgment on this issue. " And, Mr.

Chairman, that is precis ely the position we're in today and I could do no better, I could offer no better advice to the Minister, as the advice in the same words that he offered to the then Minister, that they have psychologically put themselves beyond the capacity to make a reasoned judgment, a stubbornn�ss, an intransigeance that --(lnterj ection)_:- MR, SPEAKER: Order. MR. ASPER: Question?

The question is the use of the words "looking at it objectively" because the Minister in 1969 was concerned with objectivity on this issue but whenever offered objectivity on this issue today as the Minister, he seems to reject it. The University Study Group, an objective study that began objectively, is not being retained to carry on. An in house group will do the study. The Environm ent Commission offered to hold public hearings. There are no public hearings.

The Environment Commission -- sorry the Environment Council reques ted public hearings, They held a meeting and they made a judgment at that hearing that there should be full hearings, that the project should be stopped, and there should be hearings --(I nterjection)-- Now I don' t know what report the Minister got. My understanding of the Environment Council's position is that full scale hearings should be held. Certainly that is the position of the chairman, and that is the position of the vice-chairman. Now, Mr. Chairman, the Premier made a great Circus act out of tabling a series of studies in this House.

But we ask, and we still ask --and we are not asking for further studies by the way -- he made a speech about how many studies do we have to have? And he pounded the table showing all the studies that had been done. We aren' t asking for studies, Mr. Chairman. We don't want our position misunderstood. We want the authors of those studies ; we want the people who say those studies are inadequate all brought into a room, sworn under oath by an independent inquiry, and given the opportunity to make their case, to be J

March 15, 197 3 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR, ASPER cont' d) ..... cross-e xamined, so that the truth, that surely this House wants, will emerge. 657 We want to know where are the other studies, and if there aren't any, why aren't there.? Where are the studies of alternative use s ? Has the government studied them ? Solar power, nuclear power. Have they studied a change in cons umption patterns? If so, can we see that study ? If not, have any values been put on the losse s that may be suffered as a res ult of not having that information?

We'r e not asking for years of study be we do make the point that this government rec ently spent somewhere between one and two hundred thousand dollars, we understand, to advertise on radio and television to the people of this province --(I nterjection)-- 600, OOO, an honourable member su ggested 600, OOO. But whatever figure, to adverti se to the people of this province on radio and television that this government in its generosit y was going to give those people back some of their own money. Now that' s a debatable issue, whether the government should have done that.

But if we can spend that kind of money to tell the people that we're giving them back some of their money, surely we might spend a fraction of it, say 10 percent, in the holding of public hearings that would deal with the subject of spending up to $230 million, not $2 0 million as the fax rebate involved. And, Mr. Chairman, I become very concerned now when I read that Manitoba Hydro, and I think perhaps members of government, may be saying, there is going to be a power shortage if we don't do this . There's going to be brownouts, power rationing. Mr.

Chairman, I hear that kind of threat, that kind of intimidation with supreme contempt. That' s the kind of blackmail where the ordinary Manitoban reads his newspaper, and reads v.i th some authority that an official of Hydro or of government says that we can' t debate this ; we can't have public hearings, we can't delay this, because we'll be without power. You will not be able to have toast because you won't have a toaster that can be plugged into an electric outlet, or what have you. Mr. Chairma n, we all remember 1969.

We all rem ember the same veiled threats when Hydro said, government said, that if we don't do this high level diversion imm ediately, there will be brownouts, rationing, power fai lures by '72 or '7 3. Mr.

Chairman, in the period intervening we did n't flood\ we didn't do the project; we increased our power consumption by 36 percent, the vast majority of whi ch wasn' t for the people of Manitoba in the individual sense but was for industry, which might have been required to pay a nominal amount more for the power if we had use d another source, and we had no brownouts, no blackouts, no power shortages, and the veiled threats were just that, veiled threats.

And it is this kind of thing that I would ask the Minister to instruct both the members of his government and the members of the staff of Hydro to stay out of this debate. The members of Hydro have no right publishing a pamphlet whi ch went at public expense to every home where hydro power is consumed last month saying how necessary this proj ect was. I don't have the pamphlet with me; I think I've given it to one of the other honourable members, but I'm sure the Minister is familiar with it. Excuse me. (Have you got the Hydro pamphlet ? Have you got it here? okay. ) I'll bring it in at a later point. Mr.

Chairman, we want to know what geological su rveys have been made -- I don't mean mapping, I mean actual geological su rveys. We want to know whether an adequate answer has been given to the question rais ed by the Honourable Mr. Hanuschak in 1969, And we want to know how the Minister reconciles what he said in 1969, again in his speech of April 14th with his present position.

Because at that point he said, "In view of the diff iculties which have been experienced with this project; in view of the fact that a government is willing, is commit ted to a program, is bound to look subje ctively at its errors and not be willing to change them even though all the intelligent information before it demands a change. In view of those things we can't see how this government can look with objectivity on the questio n. " And, Mr. Chair man, that is precis ely the case today.

That this government would rather spend millions of dollars, or cause millions of dollars of damage, rather than concede that it may have made a mis take, rather than hold the public hearings at which another view may gain prominence. . . . with some veiled threats the whole $2 billion project of the diversion we say is an unfair repres entation of the case. Then, Mr. Chairman, we have the exchange that took place on the subject of, what are

658 March 15, 1973 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR, ASPER cont'd ) ..•.. we doing this for ? Are we doing this for the people of Manitoba ? Are we doing this for the industrial plant of Manitoba ? Has the industrial plant of Manitoba been asked whether it's prepared to pay a higher price and make.this concess ion, this gesture to the environment ? Have we, or are we producing this power perhaps for export? And oh no we weren' t. I understook the _Ministe r of Northern Affairs to have said on television and he may correct me if I'm wrong, but that was what people who obs erved the show told me he said.

That therefores is tantamount to having said it if people take that impress ion, that we are producing --(Interj ection)-- Well the Attorney-General says I accept hearsay at any time. I don't know what, Mr. Chairman, the Attorney-General accepts that led him to the very peculiar cours e of conduct he followed in a recent criminal case, but that's another subject for another time. A MEMBER: Well let's talk more about that. MR . ASPER: Yes, we certainly will. MR. CHAIRMAN: • . . the debate. The debate is on Mines and Natural Resources, not the Attorney-General 's Department. A MEMBER: . . . the.

Attorney-General had no business interrupting, MR. CHAIRMAN: I have already called him to order. MR, ASPER: Mr. Chairman, --- excuse me, how much time have I. MR. CHAIRMAN: Order. MR. ASPER: How much time have I got, Mr. Chairman ? MR. CHAIRMAN: Six minutes. MR. ASPER: How much ? Six ? MR . CHAIRMAN: Oh pardon me. You have more than six minutes, you have eleven minutes.

MR, ASPER: We were told that there was not going to be -- at least we were led to believe there was not going to be any export of power, and then we produced evidence in this House-- we were led to believe that we were not going to be producing power for long -t erm export to the United States. that at some times at peak periods with interchange, and so on, that we would have su rplus , and we would of cours e market it, which makes economic sense.

But then we had the evidence put before this House that a very reputable American magazine on the hydro subject was sug gesting that there were negotiation for sale of 15 years of power, not su rplus power, but negotiations to build the plant in advance to produce power for export and that there would be a 15 year contract poss ibly st udied and at the end of the 15 years Manitoba would want that power back. Now, Mr. Chairman, the chairman of Hydro entered this discuss ion on Wednesday, March 7th of this year -- I'm referring to Mr.

Bateman speaking at a publ ic meeting of some sort, and he said, contrary to what we have been led to believe or what we surmised from the Minister of Northern Affairs ' statemen t, that yes we are looking at the export of power. He said, "W e are looking at the prospect of developing one of our hydro sites earlier to permit export of a block of power to an American utility. The economics of this looks very promisip.g. " Now, Mr. Chairman, we are entitled to know before we do this project, what are we doing it for ? Are we producing power for the United States ? And if that's it, pleas e understand, Mr.

Chairman, that I am not anti-American; that I am prepared to sell my goods to the United States if it will create jobs in Manitoba. But, Mr. Chairman, we have to be extremely careful when we start talking about selling power to a nation which is power thirsty, power hungry, and I'm talking about energies rather than political. power, which is another debate, because what assu rance do we have that we'll get it back when we want it. We want to know the details of any such negotiations that have stim ulated this project or influenced this project in any way. Because I su ggest to you, Mr.

Chairman, that should we make a 15 -year deal with the United States , at the end of the 15 years it would be the height of naivety to believe that it would be easy to get it back, and that's our concern. Because when we go to the United States 15 years later and say .now Manitoba needs the power, give it back, and the Americans say, sorry we need it, and we say I know but we need it too and it's our power and the contract is 15 years, give it back.

They say, that's right - General Motors or whoever it may be at Duluth or :Who.ever it may be who is using our power says, that' s right you're entitled to take it back. But we've made the point that suddenly Air Canada is advised that it can't land at O' Hare Airport any more. And

March 15, 1973 659 SUP PLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. ASPER cont'd) ..... suddenly the Ministers in ottawa are told, we want to renegotiate the autopac between Detroit and Windsor, and suddenly the rest of Canada leans on Manitoba and says, for heaven's sake you' re disr upting our normal relations, serious economic loss will occur if these other events happen, give them the power. And that's why we want to know the details of that kind of a commitm ent before we engage in the project if that's one of its purposes. Mr.

Chairma n, we express concern that the government is in its now typical pattern of proceeding without the benefit of law, whether it' s building outhouses, or whether it' s building buildings on Broadway without permit, again symptomatic of the roughshod treatment of any law or person who gets in the way of this government, is letting contract, proceeding with the project, even though it is , axiomatic that you must have a licence from the Fe deral Government to divert the waters of the Church ill. And this government now concedes that it 's a Fe deral jurisd ict ion by having applied for the licence. What, Mr.

Chairman, will happen if the Fede ral Government rece iving the applic ation, the Premier assu res this House that he had the authority or the Fe deral Government has always been committed to the project. How many ministers ago was that? And how many elections ago was it ? MR . GREEN: They had a contract with us ... MR. ASPER: Mr. Chairman, the Minister says the Federa l Government has a contract with the Government of Manitoba. I read that contract. And no where in that contract is there nor can there be, nor can there be, a commitm ent by the Fe deral Government legally as to what it will do in the futur e. MR.

GRE EN: That is absolutely incorrect. MR. ASPER: You'l l have your opportunity to dispute it. Now if the Federal Government having four more years or six more years of information, of environmental study, and of education as to public values on the subject of the environment, says we won't give the licence without a public hearing. There may be a public hearing at that level.

And suppose that p'.lblic hearing turns up evidence that the damage, the loss is greater than we expected, or that the public values involved have changed so the project makes no sense or less sense, or there are better alternatives, and suppose the Fe deral Government doesn' t issue the licence. How many millions of dollars of contracts, damages, how far will we go before we find out whether we 'r e going to have a federal licen ce? These questions have to be answered. Mr. Ch airman, there are distu rbing acts of this government all through the piece.

They are letting contracts, spending public money at a time when they race a lawsuit which if -- and there are other lawsuits that have been talked about, threatened -- a lawsuit which if successf ul has as its objective the stopping of this project, and if the project is stopped by the Court of Queen' s Bench I don't know whether the Attorney -G eneral will abolish the Queen's Bench or what he'll do, but we will have an injunction against the Province of Manitoba ff the lawsuit's acceptable, and millions of dollars of damage will be su ffered. MR. CHAIBMAN: The Attorney-General, point of order.

MR, MACKLING: In reply to the question and a point of privilege. The honourable member has taken great licence in his remarks and I think he' s gone beyond the bounds when he su ggests that the Attorney-General will abolish a court. I think he should withdraw that statement. He makes a lot of asinine statements that he gets away but he shouldn't get away with that one. MR. AS PER: Mr. Chairman, a point of privilege.

The Attorney-General's operations are so uni que, if I may say, that nothing he did would surpri se me and it' s not beyond the realm of possibility that if the Court of Queen' s Bench su pports it he would abolish it. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Leader of the Liberal Party -- for the honourable members information it is not wi thin the powers of the, Attorney-General or this Legislature to abolish the Court of Queen' s Bench. MR. ASPER: Mr. Chairman, the remark was made demonstratively as opposed to in seriousn ess. Mr.

Chairma n, there are studies tabled in this House last week that indicate that there is more damage to the town of Thompson through this project than we had originally been led to believe. MR . GREEN: That is absolutely not true. MR. ASPER: The progress report No. 2 dated December 31, 1972 of the study board

660 March 15, 1973 SUPP LY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. ASPER cont'd) ..... raises some doubt as to how, or questions, serious quest ions as to how the project will affect Thompson. For example, if there is protection required on the Thompson-Lynn Lake Highway, because of the flooding, has Hydro taken that cost into its account, and if so, what is the cost? If the Burntwood River is expanded to absorb a consider able portion of the Churchill River, as the plan calls, what are the specifics of the damage that the report refers to and what are the costs associated with it ?

We have some information in the Underwood-McLellan report but we can't determine the basis on which some of that information was assembled. How much and in what way, what technique was used at arriving at these stated environmental and resource laws, and only by our ability to examine and cross-e xamine the people who prepare these reports, can we determine whether we should reJy on those reports.

The effect on the town of Churchill we don't know, but we know that if you stopped the flow of the Churchill or slow it down considerably, obviously more salt water from Hudson Bay will flow into the town of Churchill or through the Churchill River, and it's been su ggested that the salinity will be increased for seven miles down the river. A MEMBER: We hope so. MR.

ASPER: My honourable friend the Minister says that will keep the p:>rt open longer, which is a valuable thing, but what effect will it have on tides which -- you may have an open port but if you change the tide level you may have a port into which shipping can't come. We are not prepared to.accept the "trust me" view that the Minister expresses. --(l nterjection)- l'm running short of time. Mr. Chairman, it raises the question, the salinity in the Churchill River by loss of flow, as to where the town of Churchill will get its water supply.

Will the water sup ply have to be moved downstream, -- or upstream rather ? \Uhat is the cost and who is going to pay that cost ? What impact will this have on the habit of the.Baluga Whae from coming into the Churchill harbour or into the estua ry? We don't know, nor does the Minister know. What effect will this have on the shitefish with the increased salinity of the water ? Will they disappear, will they come back? We don't know. We don't know a lot, nor does the Minister or if the Minister knows, we are not prepared to ac cept his trust me concept. --(l nterjection)- Mr.

Speaker, may I have one minute to conclude the ... MR. CHAffiMAN: The honourable member have leave? MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, not to continue, just to finish his thoughts as ordinary members are often given. MR. CHAffiMAN: Order, please. I am in the hands of the House. If the House wishes the honourable member to have extra time, then leave will be granted. Order! Does the honourabl e member have time to finish one sentence? I hear someone saying no. Leave granted? Leave is not granted. ( MR. GREEN: The honourable member will have another opportunity because of the debate. Mr.

Chairman, I want the honoura ble member to know that I was prepared to let him go ahead but this House is guided by the rules and any honour able member is entitled to say so. Mr. Chairman, I want the honourable member to notice one thing. That he was not interrupted on points of privilege. And the reason that he was not interrupted on points of privilege is not because I exercised some additional restraint, it's because he didn't say that yesterday Mr . . Speaker, the Minister of Mines strangled his wife and expect me to sit still, Today he spoke on how he felt about the program.

He gave his arguments, he did not attribute things to me that I didn' t do. And most interesting of all, Mr. Speaker, he didn't explain the point that he left off with, which I am sitting here patiently to hear. He got into a discussion last week about all the people who had been kicked out of the way, you know one of them is Cass Booy, who he says was kicked out of the way. Cass Booy has been neither stifled nor kicked out of the way. He remains a member of the Water Commission. The other fellow who was kicked out of the way is Bob Newbury. It's interesting, Mr.

Speaker, that Bob Newbury who was against the program was taken on by the Department, but we get no credit for that. We took on an engineer who we knew was in principle against the South Indian Lake program, because we respected his ju dgment as an engineer. He was never kicked out of the way, even though the honourabl e member says that they are terrified of us. The problem arose, not because of Mr. Newbury's expertise and desirability on the pr�gram;

March 15, 1973 661 SUPPL Y - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR, GREEN cont'd) ..... the problem aros e because Mr. Newbury became heavily involved politica lly in the program. Which is perfectly legitimate, Mr. Chairman, and I make no argument about that, but when a person is working on a program which is desig ned to achieve certain things and becomes politically very much involved against the program -- and I use the word "politic ally" in its best sense -- then, Mr. Speaker, he really in conscience should say, "I'm sorry I can't .work on this program.

I am going to go out and fight it. 11 And if the honourable member sees something unusual in that, then I repeat the example that I used to him. If Inco had hired the Universit y of McGill to prepare a program for it on how it can best get mineral resources out of government, and Eric Kierans was one of the McGill team and he said "yes, I'm working on this program but I think that the government should nationalize Inco, and I think that it' s ridiculous for companies to get more out of government." The honourable member says that lnco would say, yes, Mr.

Kierans, pat him on the head, continue to work on this program and we will renew your next contract. Now, Mr. Chairman, that is absolutely ridiculous. The honourable member would not behave that way if he was the First Minister, if he had decided that there is to be a tie-in between Manitoba and Saskatchewan, whi ch is what Dr. Lansdown proposes, and he got a univ ersity group to work on this tie-in, and one of the members of the group in working on it said this tie-in proposal is ridiculous, that what they should be doing is flooding the Church ill River, and that Mr.

Asper is an arrogant insane person for not flooding the Churchill River, then what Mr. Asper says is that his objectivity vis-a-vis the program is not affected. Now I really can' t believe that the honourable member believes that. I just don't understand him trying to make that as a credible presentation to the government. But nevertheless, Dr. Newbury wasn't kicked out of the way, he was taken on to work on this program. When he decided, whi ch is his right, that he wants to engage in a politica l campaign against the program, then, Mr.

Speaker, I think the Department is entitled to review its position and say we would like the balance of it to be done in-h ouse. The honourable member says that he knows people who are afraid to say anything. Let me say this, Mr. Speaker,. that there is a point which a civil servant can go to and apparently the honourable member has had a lecture in politi cal science, I'll give him another one about the public servi ce. My director of water works is sitting upstairs, his name is Tom Weber. He knows what the government position is. He knows what he is being asked to do for the government.

He gives his professional opinion to us on everything that he is asked to do and the government makes the decision. He may dis agree with it entirely, but he continues to give us his best professio nal advice and he has never been told otherwise.

If Tom Weber said I'm going to give the government my professional advice but tomorrow I'm going to go to the Stop, Look and Listen program and preach against what the government is doing on the Churchill River Diver sion I think he would expect to be told" Tom, that's fine, if you want to campaign politically against the program you have a perfect right to do that, but you cannot then be a part of the government whose policy it is to proceed with this program. " Does that appear so unusual to my honourable friend'? He says it is unusual. Well then everything, Mr.

Speaker, everything that I know, then I know. that when the Leader of the Liberal Party says if he becomes Premier of Manitoba and he has on his staff a minister of fina nce who is on his staff -- who is a minister of financ e, who is a member of his staff, and he says that we are to have tax cuts $24. 00 a month to every family in Manitoba, then he says that the Minister of Finance can run around Manitoba saying the premier is an ass per. He says that that will not affect the fact that this man is his minister of fina nce or the deputy minister of financ e. Mr.

Speaker, is it credible, is what he is saying credib le? Now, Mr. Chairman the honourable member -- and I was waiting very carefully-- the honourable member said we lost a deputy minister. That's where the House ended on Tuesda y. And he said, I didn' t mean that the Minister kicked him out of the way, he had gone through this enti re process, this person was kicked out of the way, that guy was shoved aside, and Mr.

Chairman, we have lost a deputy minister, and I got up on a point of privilege and su ggested that the honourable member was making the su ggestion that I had gotten rid of my deputy minister for some improper reason.

662 March 15, 1973 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. GREEN cont'd) . . . He said "you didn't even let me finish the sentence, you never let me give subject, predicate, verb and you are already raising this point of privil ege" . Mr. Speaker, he had a chance to finish the se ntence, he could have finished the se ntence, he could have finished the paragraph, he could have finished the story.

He preferred to leave on the record his st atement which fol lowed all of thes e other st atements of people being kicked aside, and the st atement we lost a deputy minister, with the inference that some how Winston Mair was scared out or kicked aside by his Minister, Mr. Speaker, that was the clear inference of what he said. He wanted to finish the sentence. He didn't finish the sentence, he left, --(Interjection)-- no, Mr.

Speaker, I'm not going to accept the fact that the honourable member will because I am now coming back to where in all honour he should have finished that thing which left a cloud over my position vis-a-vis my deputy, and he never. Because the honour able member is probably not properly described by the adjective with which I have to describe in talking in this House, because he never finished the se ntence and he wanted to leave it that way, leave it in the newspapers and leave it wherever it was. Mr.

Speaker, it is not good for a cabinet minister to be asking for endorsements of his staff or to talk about his relationship with his st aff, or to talk about whether the st aff agrees with him on this issue or that issue, or likes him or dislikes him, because its irrele vant; and once a cabinet minister starts behaving in that way, then I say he ceases to be a proper cabinet minister. But the honourable member wishes to introduce that kind of thing in debate, and because Mr.

Mair was, I think, a friend of mine, and because I phoned him and got personal permission to do so, and because the honourable member was willing to leave that kind of thing on the table without completing it, I have a letter from the honourable member, from. the deputy minister, after he left the se rvice, when it was no longer, as the honourable member describes it, necessary that he ple ase me in order to :make his living. Mr.

Speaker it' s not the kind of a letter that wo�ld be would be written by a man who does what the honour able member suggested by that inference which he refused to clear up, and I su ggest that he refused it, Mr. Speaker, and we can draw this inference, knowing that he had left that thing there and he wanted it there. MR. ASPER: Point of privilege, Mr. Chairman. A MEMBER: Now listen to whos e got a point of privilege. MR. CHAIRMAN: The leader of the Liberal Party on a point of privilege. MR. ASPER: The point of privilege, Mr.

Chairman, is that the Minister is ascribing motives which ap:irt from the impropriety of ascribing motives are not correct, and if I may take this opportunity to say to you Mr. Chairman, the issue that he raises will be dealt with satisf actorily. MR. GREE N: I did not, Mr. Speaker, I said that we in this House, and if the ho nour able member will read my remarks he will find out the distinction between ascribing motives and saying that a reaso nable conclusion can be drawn, which needn' t be drawn or can be drawn.

If the honourable member says that is we look at the Minister of Mines we can surmise from that, looking at him and liste ning to him that he beats his wife, I have no point of privilege, because everybody can look and they can make that inference or not. If the honourable member says the Minister of Mines beats his wife, I have a point of privilege, and that is the difference.

And I said that the honourable member, the way he behaves leaves the inference or can leave the inference with all of the .members of this House that he knew he made that statement, he had the opportunity of finishing the sentence, proceeding with it 'and his failure to do so can be taken as a reasonable inference that he intended to leave it right there, and there is no point of privilege. Because you needn' t, the Member for Lakeside maybe doesn' t agree with me, and I am making arguments, I' m not making charges .

If I said that the honourabl e member did intend to leave that inference that is another point and I would with draw it. Mr. Speaker, the honourable -- and again, it' s distas teful, it has never happened in the se ven years that we have been here that we've been engaged in this type of revelation, but I'm afraid that I have to. Yes terday I put on the table the inter-d epartmental corresp ondence between myself and the Commission to show that what had occurred in private was no different than what was said in publ ic.

March 15, 1973 663 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURC ES (MR. GREEN cont'd) •. ... Now, Mr. Speaker, and only because Mr. Mair said go ahead and do it, will I read his personal le tter to me, after he left the service, and when he didn't depend on pleasing the Minister to earn a living, which is what the honourable member su ggests is the attitude of Mr. Tom Weber, Mr. Ness Mudry, Mr. Bert Gobert and all of the other civil se rvants , they' re all here saying ahah to the Minister in order to please him in order to earn a living. Mr. Speaker, the honourabl e member has somet hing to learn.

The Civil Service is made of sterner stuff. They will tell me what they think and they will know what government policy is and they will continu e to tell me what they think but they will not go out and campaign politically because they understand what a civil service is. Mr. Mair says "I cannot leave Manitoba without trying at l east to express my thanks and appreciation for your leadership, and I think friendship over the period we worked together. I suppose we are both loners to some degree but I felt a very strong tie with you and felt we understood one another well.

Jn any event, the period while you were my Minister was a highlight in my working years and I want you to know how deeply I appreciated and liked you". Now, Mr. Speaker, there are other remarks which deal with -- well, Mr. Speaker, you know, if the man felt that he was being intimidated and had to shut up and was not working with us I don't think he would have said "in any event the period while you were my Minister was a highlight in my working years and I want you to know how deeply I appreciated and liked you".

I don• t like reading this type of st uff into the record, but the actions of the honourable member have led to the kind of revelation that shoul d never be required and he should not make the kind of charge which he knows requires that type of thing. Mr. Speaker, there are other parts to the letter which are personal. If my honourable friend feels that I am somehow misl eading or withholding information to him, I table the le tter and he can read it all to see whether or not I've taken something out of context. Now, Mr.

Speaker, I don't think that a deputy minister whom we have lost because of some terrorism of the Minister would write that kind of thing. MR. ASPER: Point of pr ivilege. . . . Mr. Chairman, the words of the Minister are, I don't think that a deputy minister which we have lost because of some terrorism on the part of the Minister and that' s where he stopped. Mr. Chairman, I have said, on the point of privil ege, that I have never su ggested nor did I say that the Ministe r, the 'li>eputy Minister in question had been terrorized. If you look at Hansard, Mr. Chairman, Mr.

Chairman, if you look at Hans ard where this began --(Interj ection)--, the Member for St. Johns is asking the Page --(Interjection )-- Tuesday, March 13, .1973 ... MR, CHAIRMAN: Page numbers are at the bottom of the page for the honourable : members .. ; MR. ASPER: I'm well aware where the page numbers are, thank you, Mr. Chairman, Page 586 , Mr.

Chairman, carrying on 587, on the point of privilege that was raised by my' honourable friend the Minister, there is a period , and after a very lengthy interjection that evening which is not reported in Hansard, the le ngth, I began a new se ntence, I began a new sentence in which I mentioned the name of the Deputy Minister and started to mention --(Interj ection) -- I'll have to read the whole thing. --(ln terjec tion) -- MR, ENNS: Mr. Chairman, I wonder if there would be any possibility for other members to enter into the debate while the Leader of the Liberal Party . . .

MR, GREE N: Maybe the honourable member will sit down, he really doesn't have a point of privilege . MR. ASPER: The point of privilege, Mr. Chairman, is this, that the Minister continues to state as a fact what I was going to say, when I have decided not to ... MR. GREEN: No, no, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, let me continue. All I said was that the honourable member started to say and did say, 'how Mr. Speaker or Mr. Chairman, we have lost a deputy ministe r and"--(l nterjection )-- exactly. That's all I ever said. I said that the leading up, Mr.

Speaker, was about how this person was kicked out of the way that person was kicked out of the way, all of the people were running in terror Irom the Minister and then he said, after some ... "N ow, Mr. Chairman, we have lost a deputy Minister. " I got up and objected. He said: "Le t me expl ain, let me finish the sentence. No subject no predicate no verb." Am I quoting you properly ? Mr. Speaker, I waited. The

664 March 15, 1973 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR, GREEN cont'd ) ..... honourable member had a half hour that was the last sentence that he made. I waited and I said that his failure to clear up that point where he was pre vented from speaking the other day would lead to the inference, on my part and I think on many members in this House, that he wanted that statement to stand, that he wanted it to stand in the context in which he put it and he had no intention of clearing it up, that that is the inference one can draw. Mr. Speaker, there is --(I nterjection)-- Well ... MR.

ASPER: On the point of privilege, Mr. Chairman. MR , GREEN : The honourable member says he never rises on points of privilege to interrupt. MR. CHAIBMAN: The Honourable Leader of the Liberal Party on a point of privilege. MR , ASPER: In answer, Mr. Chairman, I said to the Minister that night that if this is the technique he adopts then we will correct him as he goes along. Mr. Chairman, the point on page 588 is dealt with when I said, "Mr. Chairman, I inferred no such thing. " I have said on the record that I inferred no such thing. Why does the Minister continue to flog the horse. MR. GREEN: No, Mr.

Chairman, there is no point of privilege. MR. CHAIBMAN: Order, please. I would refer the honourable member to Page 96 of Beauchesne, bottom of the page. "A dispute arising between two honourable members as to allegations of fact hardly fulfils the conditions of a privilege question and if dee med to be a matter to be at once entertained it is more convenient to postpone other business rather than extend the area of privilege. " Cita tion 154 of Beauchesne. MR, GREEN: Listen to this . Let' s listen to whether the me mber is wrongly being accused. You know, here is a member who is wrongly being accused.

Maybe he'll listen too, maybe he'll listen to what he is wrongly being accused of. "Mr. Chairman, I' m expressi ng opinion based on the following facts which I elucidated before. I express the opinion that he who dis agrees with the Minister mysteriously, su ddenly dis appears ; and I su ggest, Mr. Chairman, that it is in no way, in no way ari impropriety for me to su ggest that a member of his staff, having see n this parade of dismissa ls would not be somewhat intimidated. : The Minister 's honour is satis fie d, Mr. Chairman, Mr.

Chairma n, in the past few months we have lost a deputy minister, Winston Mair and we have lost Bob --" and that was where the interjection took place. Mr. Ch airman, then he went on to say that I inferred no such think and he is now saying that he expects me to believe him, that he inferred no such thing. Well, Mr. Speaker, I was giving the opportunity to the honourable member to believe him.

So I sat down and waited for thirty minutes for him to explain when he says he "i nferred no such thing", and I said that as a resu lt of the honourable member refusing to pick up from where he left off that I say this House can draw the inference that he meant to do exactly that, he meant the inference that the man had been kicked out of the way, that he meant the inference that somehow he had been intimidated, and I ask,. Mr. Speaker, the Legislature to make that conclusion. They don't have to and that is not a point of privilege. MR. ASPER: Mr.

Chairman, on the point of privilege, I refer you to a previous ru ling by the Speaker in the last day or two where he - or perhaps it was your ruling -- that where a member stands in his place and says something as a fact, that that is what he says is a fact, it is taken by this House as a fact. MR, GREEN: Mr. Chairman, I waited for the honourable member to explain what he meant and the fact is that the honourable member didn't explain. We' re not now discussing facts, we're discuss ing inferences and I'm saying that the honourable member says he infer red no such thing.

I am asking the gentlemen of the House on a subject matter which is not ascertainabl e about fact, to draw the inference. And I don't think that the honourable member has a point of privilege. But Mr. Speaker, lets deal with the -- and I say again that I regret that that type of thing has to be done but let' s deal with some of the things that the honourable member has said. He has said, Mr. Speaker, that when I was in Opposition I said that the Provincial Government was in a box, that they had to proceed.

I said that they were in a box because they had called public hearings, that the public hearings were ostensibly to determine · whether or not the program should proceed. In the middle of the hearings the Minister knew

March 15, 1973 665 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. GREEN cont'd) .•••. that that wasn't a· re asonable basis for him to have called public hearings, and I acce pt the fact that he says that it was accide ntal and that it shouldn't have happened. That's what he's told me outside of this House and inside of the House and I apologize to the honourable member if I' m revealing any confidences. I think he said it in the House when I asked him last year. That the notice was a mistake that it was never intended that the hearings would be involved in whether or not you have the Hydro project.

The hearings were for the purpose of dealing with the results to the people and how those res ults would be affected. The honourable member is nodding his head. That then he said that no matter what the hearings decided they were going ahead, and I said that that is an improper hearing, that that is a fraud, that it appears that what the government wanted to do is hold a pretense of hearings and then do whatever they want to d<l. That is a harsh crit icism and the Member for Lakeside knows that I'm enti tled to make it. It is some thing that people can draw an inference from.

And he will fight against it and I respect his right to fight against it. Then they brought a bill into the House. The honourable member doesn' t understand the legislative proce ss. They brought,a-- he doesn' t understand! Because - Mr. Speaker, one •. of two things, either he doesn't understand the legisla tive process or he is determined that he is going to misrepres ent it. They brought a bill .into the House, the bill called for the granting of a licence.

Though granting of a licence was ordinarily an administrative act, they said that they wanted the Legislature to grant the. licence and I believe the reason was that they didn't want to be involved with the co urt hearing because ·t he hearing was aborted and the best way to clear it up was in the House. We said if we are to be part of the administration we must be privy to the docum ents which the administration has when it makes a decisi on, and that if we are not privy to thos e docum ents, you cannot ask us to associate with you.

And that' s when I said some times thes e things are done by a commission, and if, Mr. Speaker, that is the same thing. as calling public hearings, if that' s what my honourable member wants to repres ent then all I can say I differ with him. I say that if we brought a bill for you to pass this as an administrative Act, we would have to either give you some thing or give you a commission or give you some fact-finding board upon which to base your decisi on.

But we have not brought a bill into the House, we have taken it to our own control, what the Legisla ture ent rusted us to when they permitted us to do this by regulation, and that's some thing els e that the Honourable Member for Lakeside I'm sure will disagree with me, although in this respect I don't say that he's given me information in this connec tion. That had he kb.own that he could do the same thing by changing regulations that he was asked to bring a bill in he would never have brought a bill in, he would have changed the regulation.

I firmly believe. that that' s what the Member for Lakeside would have done. Now he doesn't have to comm ent on it and I'm not asking him to. But that was the circumstance in 1969, and because I said that the government was in a box then; does it logica lly follow that the government is always in a box, and that what said in 1969 applies at the pres ent time. We have not brought a bill into the House. We announced a program -- look at the difference. We announced a program in September 1970. Rather than there being crit icism of it there was no criti cism of it. The criticism came in the Spring of 1971.

And was the criti cism of the program, Mr. Chairman, was the criticism of the program? The criticism was that we weren't flooding high enough or fast enougq! --(Interjec tion) -- Well -- the honourable member saya.not him. MR . CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister has five minutes. MR . GREEN: I must say that I have some respect for re sponsible government and the elected repres entativ es of the people.

There are some people in the community and I believe that some members would like to try to inspire them, who believe that governments are foul and evil and that by virtue of a person being elected to repres ent people in this House he can no longer be trusted. I have always, in opposition or otherwis e, resp ected the democra tic process and although I criticized the Roblin administration, I said that they were the repres entatives of the people and they had the right to govern.

There are some people who say that the people and listening to the people means listening to everybody else except the· elected repres entativ es of the people.

666 March 15, 1973 SUPPLY - MINES AND RESOURCES (MR. GREEN cont'

d) Now we have the elected repres entatives of all the people of Manitoba, we announced a plan, the only criticism of the plan was that we were not flooding the Churchill River. There was one other criticism, the Member for Churchill did say that he hoped that we wouldn't have to proceed. But other than that, Mr, Chairman, all of the elected repres entati ves of the people pract ica lly unanimously agreed that the program would have to proceed.

The only difference was whether it had to proceed in associa tion with Lake Winnipeg regulation or on its own without Lake Winnipeg regulation, in which case it was to go higher and faster. The honourable member says we are not listening to the people. Mr. Chairman, is this also a public hearing ?

Is this an avenue for lis tening to the people, because if we are lis tening to the people then aside from one person I haven't heard a sin gle other Liberal get up and adopt the position that' s being pursued by the Member for Wols eley, the Leader of the Liberal Party, not the Member for Portage la Prairie, not the Member for Carillon, not the member for Assiniboia.

The only elected repres entative of the people who has said that you should not flood the Churchill River, or that you should now hold hearings on this project which is se ven years in the making and already decided upon and decided upon two years ago is one electe d repres entative of the people. So what the Member for Wolse ley said is that you should ignore 55 elected repres entati ves of the people and go and hear people who are not the repres entatives of the people. Mr. Speaker, what is public hearing? Is not this the most sophisticated form of public hearing that is known to the democratic proce ss ? Mr.

Chairman, the honourable member would change the democratic process by having people elected, abdicate their authority and go hear people who haven't been electe d and haven't got the guts to get in and try and get elected. Now I say that those people want to change the Churchill River Diversion, it's their duty to go to the place where the decisio ns are made and I would welcome the battle that' s goiig to take place on the hus tings with regard to these people. And I will - mayben ot welcome, depends on how it goes. But I would acce pt a decision as being the way in which the democratic process operat es .

The honourable member won't do that. The honourable member says that he is going to hold public hearings. Mr. Speaker, in his speech today he gave us 100 perc ent evidence that he will not hold public hearings. And I'll tell you, I'll tell you, I'll show you , Mr. Speaker, through his own mouth how he has said that. He said that the government shouldn' t proceed becaus e there was a lawsuit claiming an injunction -- and it' s i.nteresting that on the points of law his submission was the weakest. He' s a lawyer. But on points of law his sub mission was the weakest.

He said that there is a statement of claim filed for an injunction to stop you and you are proceeding in the face of that statem ent of claim. Every lawyer knows that anybody can walk in and pay what -- the fee used to be $5. 00 I guess when I was practi cing, maybe we raised it to 10 -- file a statement of claim and request an injunction. And the honourable member is saying that if any citizen of Manitoba asks for an injunction regardless of how many years it will take to decide, regardless of the merits of the claim the project should stop. Well, Mr.

Speaker, that was the position put by the honourable member, and he doesn't deny it. If that' s the case, Mr. Speaker, what happens when one citizen of Manitoba files a statem ent of claim enjoining the government not to proceed with the public hearings. MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. MR, GREEN: May I continue, Mr. Chairman ? MR. CHAIRMAN: Does the honourable member have leave ? (Agreed) MR, GREEN: What happens, Mr. Chairman, when one citizen of the public who dis agrees with the honourable member and says that there should be a diversion and it should be held immediately.

What happens when one person walks into the Court of Queen' s Bench, p:.its down a statement of claim, and asks for an injunction res training the honourable member from holding the public hearings which he has committed to hold for the people of Manitoba. Well he says, Mr, Speaker, by his own mouth, well if there is a statement of claim filed :i.n the court, well then of cours e I will not proceed with the public hearings because there is a statem ent of claim.

And, Mr, Speaker, the honourable member by inference says that with regards to every sin gle aspect of Liberal program, that if some body walks into court and files a statement

, March 15, 1973 667 SUP PLY - MINES AND RESOUR CES (MR. GREEN cont'd) •..•• of claim and says that we should n' t give this $24. 00 reduction, then of course we will let the courts go through the issue of deciding· whether we give the $24. 00 decrease in taxes before we give the decr ease, because somebody has raised it in court and until it's declared to be legal, of course it is illegal. Mr. Speaker, that is the most astonishing discours e on law that I have heard in all of my years in the legal profession.

Everybody knows that the filing of a claim for an injunction does not affect the activity who receives the statement of claim and that• s why -- and if I have to lecture again to the honourable member -- we have what is called an interlocutory injunction, or an interim injunction, which is another document which is filed after you file a statement of claim and sug gests that the issue is so important that before this matter is decided an injunction should be iss ued to see what would happen, or as to whether it should be decided. And that's the only basis upon which an activity is halted.

And if the honourable member doesn't know that then I inform him of it. If he knows it then he is misl eading everybody in this House, and you can take your pick, Mr. Speaker. Either he is ignorant, or he is misl eading, because it' s one of the two, It can be no other way. The Honourable Member for Lakeside wants to speak, I haven' t finished but I think · other peopl e should get into the debate. MR. CHAffiMAN: The Honourabl e Member for Lakeside. MR. ENNS: Mr. Chairman, I have had already the occasion to speak on the Minister' s salary and •Jn this particular su bject.

It's not my intention to dwell on it at any length, but rather very briefly for the public record correct a few inferences that in the course of the Honourable Ministe r's statem ents that have been made that I believe are nonetheless important. Mr. Chairman, I believe that probably on this point we will agree, that my respect for the correctness in bringing matters before this Chamber and his are probably very identical.

He su ggested in the course of his remarks just a few moments ago that because a matter was one that could have been de alt with by the administration, or administratively, that therefore it may not probably come into this Chamber.

I don' t know whether he really meant it in that way, at least I certainly, Sir, while not arguing with his belief for the reas o:lS �hat we brought a bill into this Chamber de aling with this very important de velopmental matter iJn the Provinc e of Manitoba at that particular time might have been for various reasons, · and I can concur that sure ly part of that reason was the one that he suggested, But, Mr.

Chai.rman, let the record be very clear that the Progressive Cons ervative administratio"a at that time makes no apology none at that time nor now, that this issue , this very important issue which is still before the people of Manitoba, was not one that didn' t deserve or could not have been decided in this Chamber, by. the capacity of this Chamber. Furthermore, Mr. Chairm

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	29-5-25
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	29th 5th hansardpdf 25.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	28c4d0def366524ae1833f7bc9d9f7d6d8a911fa

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