Manitoba Hansard — 16 December 1982 (Sitting 11A, 32nd Legislature, 2nd Session)

32-2-11a

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

ISSN 0542-5492 Second Session - Thirty-Second Legislature of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba DEBATES and PROCEEDINGS 31 Elizabeth II Published under the authority of The Honourable D. James Walding Speaker VOL. XXXI No. 11A- 2:00 p.m., THURSDAY, 16 DECEMBER, 1982. Prtnted by the Office of the Queens Printer. Province of Manitoba

MANITOBA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY Thirty-Second Legislature Members, Constituencies and Political Affiliation Name ADAM, Hon. A.R. (Pete) ANSTETT, Andy ASHTON, Steve BANMAN, Robert (Bob) BLAKE, David R: (Dave) BROWN, Arnold BUCKLASCHUK, John M. CARROLL, Q.C;, Henry N. CORRIN, Brian COWAN, Hon. Jay DESJARDINS, Hon. Laurent DODICK, Doreen DOERN, Russell DOLIN, Mary Beth DOWNEY, James E. DRIEDGER, Albert ENNS, Harry EVANS, Hon. Leonard S. EYLER, Phil FILMON, Gary FOX, Peter GOURLAY, D.M. (Doug) GRAHAM, Harry HAMMOND, Gerrie HARAPIAK, Harry M. HARPER, Elijah HEMPHILL, Hon. Maureen HYDE, Lloyd JOHNSTON, J.

Frank KOSTYRA, Hon. Eugene KOVNATS, Abe LECUYER, Gerard LYON, Q.C., Hon. Sterling MACKLING, Q.C., Hon. Al MALINOWSKI, Donald M. MANNESS, Clayton McKENZIE, J. Wally MERCIER, Q.C., G.W.J. (Gerry) NORDMAN, Rurik (Ric) OLESON, Charlotte ORCHARD, Donald PAWLEY, Q.C., Hon. Howard R. PARASIUK, Hon. Wilson PENNER, Q.C., Hon. Roland PHILLIPS, Myrna A. PLOHMAN, John RANSOM, A. Brian SANTOS, Conrad SCHROEDER, Hon. Vic SCOTT, Don SHERMAN, L.R. (Bud) SMITH, Hon. Muriel STEEN, Warren STORIE, Jerry T. URUSKI, Hon. Bill USKIW, Hon. Samuel WALDING, Hon. D. James Consti tuency Ste.

Rose Spring field Thompson La Verendrye Minnedosa Rhineland Gimli Brandon West Ell ice Church ill St. Boniface Riel Elmwood Kildonan Arthur Eme rson Lakeside Brandon East River East Tuxedo Concordia Swan River Virden Kirkfield Park The Pas Rupert sland Logan Port age la Pr airie Sturgeon Creek Seven Oaks Niakwa Radisson Cha rleswood St. Jame s St. John s Morris Roblin-Russell St. Norbert Assiniboia Gladstone Pe mbina Selkirk Transcona Fort Rouge Wolseley Dauphin Turtle Mounta in Burrows Rossmere lnkster Fort Garry Osbo rne River Height s Flin Flon Interlake Lac du Bonnet St.

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LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Thursday, 16 December, 1982 Time 2:00 p.m. OPENING PRAYER by Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER, Hon. J. Walding: Presenting Peti- tions Reading and Receivin g Petitions Pr esent ing Repo rts by Standi ng and Special Committees . MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS AND TABLING OF REPORTS MR. SPEAKER: The Ho nourable Minis ter of Health. HON. L DESJARDINS: Mr. Speaker, I'd like to table the Annual Report of the Alcoholism Foundation of Manitoba for the Fis cal Year 19 81 /82. MR. SPEAKER: The Ho noura ble Minis ter of Transportation. HON. S. USKIW: Mr.

Speaker, I want to make mention of an occurren ce of yesterday for which I think I should apolog ize. especi ally to the members of the media and that is that the media received the wrong pie ce of information with respect to the bill that was introduced in the Hou se yesterday. Of course, they were logically confused as a result and there was some mixed reporting as to the nature of the bill that was introduced in the Hou se yesterday. It was not our intention to indicate any new legis lation that would be forthc oming at this time but they received the orig inal draft which was scrapped some time ago. MR.

SPEAKER: The Honoura ble Member for Pem bina on a point of order? MR. D. ORCHARD: No, I'm responding to the Minis terial State me nt. The Minis ter of Hi ghways and Transportation did indeed provide information to the mem bers of the media that was not pro vided to mem bers of the Ho use and that has been the subject of a matter of privile ge which is presently before you, Sir, and I commend the Minis ter of Highways and Transportation for being so forth right .

Now, having est ablis hed that the Minis ter of High ways and Transportation acknowledges an error, the question that obviously comes to mind, Sir, is now that he has floated the trial balloon on helme ts and seat belt legislation in the Province of Manitoba, can we expect that legis lation to be forthc oming in another bill of amendments to The Hig hway Traffic Act, or will it be a separate Act? This, of course, is of conce rn to all Manitobans in the est ablis hment of such compul sory legis lation. -(I nterjection)- MR. SPEAKER: Order please. We have not yet reached Oral Questions.

The Ho noura ble Minis ter of Education. HON. M. HEMPHILL: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to table the Annual Financial Report from the Unive rsit y of Manitoba for the year ended March 31 , 19 82. MR. SPEAKER: Min isterial Statements and Tabling of Reports . Notices of Motion. INTRODUCTION OF BILLS HON. R. PENNER introduced Bill No. 23,

An Act to ame nd The Rea l Prope rty Act. (2); and Bill No. 25,

An Act to repeal the Statute of Fr auds; Loi abrogeant la loi intitulee "Statute of Frauds". INTRODUCTION OF GUESTS MR. SPEAKER: Before we reach Or al Questions, may I direct the attention of honoura ble members to the loge on my left, where we have two former memb ers of the Legislature, Mr. Sid Gr een and Mr. George Henderson. If I can refer the attention of honoura ble memb ers to the gallery where we have 75 students of Gr ade 9 standing from the Carman Co lleg iate under the direc tion of Mr. Jones and Mr. Joh nson. The school is in the consti tuency of the Honourable Me mber for Pe mbina.

On behalf of all the members I welcome you here this afternoon. SPEAKER'S RULING MR. SPEAKER: Further before we reach Or al Ques tions I took a proposed motion under advisement yes terday and I'm prepared to give an answer at this time. On December 15 , 19 82, the Honourable Me mber for Turtle Mounta in rose in his place to allege that the Honourable Minis ter of Agriculture had misled the Ho use on December 14 th, with regard to documen ts tabled in the Legisl ature. The Honourable Me mber for Turtle Mounta in concluded his re mar ks with a motion of privile ge.

After rec eiving the advise of several members I took the matter under advisement to review the rele vant documents. When considering the matter of privi lege Beauchesne makes it quite clear that only the Hou se can decide whether a breach of privi lege has occurred and that the Speaker is limited to decid- . ing (1 ) whether the matter has been raised at the ear liest oppo rtunity; and (2) whether a prima facie case has been demonstrated. 271 The first condition was satisfied by the Honourable Me mber for Turtle Mounta in raising the issue on Wednesday afternoon when Tuesday afternoon's Hansard was available.

On the second condition Hansard shows that the Minis ter of Agriculture said, on page 217 , "The honourable mem bers obviously don't like the method that I have used in terms of providing them with as much information as I will be distri buting to the public of Manitoba." The operative words being "as much information".

The documents tabled in the Ho use and referred to by the Ho nourable Me mber for Turtle Mounta in con sis t of a two-page press release entitled Farm Lands Ownersh ip Act Now Before The Hou se; and some 25 pages stapled together of state ments. maps, letters distri buted at the Minis ter's Press Conference. The use of the words "as much information" by the Ho n ourable Minister of Agriculture imply an equal ity of

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 information in the two sets of documents. To deter mine whether this is the case would re quir e a compar ison of the contents of the two sets. which would constitute a consideration of the issue itself. A prima facie comparison would indicate that two pages do not const itute as much information as 25 pages. I. ther efore. find that the req uired two conditions have been met and that the House should now decide the matter. MOTION presented. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Memb er for Arthur . MR. J. DOWNEY: Mr . Speaker.

I am somewhat sur pris ed in the Min ister of Agricultur e not standin g to speak to defend himself on this par ticular motion of Hous e privi lege. I can only further point out to the people of Manitob a that it is a use of their majorit y power in this Legislatur e that will, in fact, dictate and rule the people of Manitoba without giving Her Majes ty's Loyal Opp ositio n the oppor tunity to tru ly know the full story as I am sur e that each and every one of us would have liked to hear. Mr .

Spe aker, as has been mentioned by many members of the media, this is not the fir st time that the kind of privi lege that has been referred to has hap pened in this House. I find, Mr. Speaker. in speakin g to this motion of privile ge that it is becoming mor e of a practice of the governm ent tha n I think the House should be prepar ed to deal with. and par ticularly those people who have elected us to this Assem bly, and par ticularly the people who elected a majority government.

I have to say that it is not a very good sit uation to ask Opp ositio n members to continue to come into this Ho use and keep their cool and be able to debate and put forward constructiv e objective ideas on government policies and legislation if they're not given the true straig htforward facts, as we have to have them . Mr . Speaker. to inform our constit uents and tru ly act as a Loyal Opp osition. Mr .

Speaker. the Memb er for Turtle Moun tain the other day, in pointing out the fact that ther e was a very brie f outline of a pie ce of legislation, Bill No. 3, that does have major significance, not only to Ma nitobans, but to 23 million other Canadians that have their rights taken away from them by this par ticular Governmen t of Manitoba and this Min ister of Agricultur e thr ough enacting Bill No. 3. I think, Mr . Spe aker. with all respect to the pe ople of Manitoba and the media, that should truly be under stood and clearly explain ed.

But firstly, I think that the people who have elected us, people who are paying for our time. and the con tributio ns of our many members who have sacrificed thei r own personal and their own day-to-day home lives to be here to do just that, and make sur e that honesty and fai rness is presented. not only in Mani toba but as it affects other Canad ian. and should be carried out. The Minister truly is in breach of tha t and the pr ivi leges that we have so trad itiona lly held here in this Assem bly. So, Mr .

Speaker. the fact that we have been given a very brie f amount of information; the Minister of Agri cultur e walking out of this Assembly dir ect ly to a news conference. Mr . Speaker. I cannot su bstantiate this 272 but would only say, at this par ticular time, that there is some reason to belie ve that the same documentation that was presented to the media was in the Minister's hands and available and could have been distribu ted , as wel l. to this par ticular House at the same time as he distribut ed it to the news service. Mr .

Speaker. and that rea lly is wher e we're in a qua ndary and suppor t the motion of privi lege and that could have been done. I'm sure. I refer to this docume nt which, again, was tabled, with several pages. The other difficult y, Mr . Spe aker, that I think the Min ister is in breach of his privile ge, is tel ling us that he was not going to give more to the media and to the pub lic than he gave to us. But when he gave that package to the media and public, Mr .

Speaker, I bel ieve -certa inly, in my es timation and I think partic ularly the majority of Manito bans - it would as wel l have been in their best interests, the media and thei r respon sible reporting, that the total package of some of the th ings tha t have been presented to the Minister in that briefin g that took place. Mr .

Speaker. as I read yesterday in ques tion period. we have the Manitoba Farm Bureau -and I'll refer to it as a document that again should have been part of it; I tabled it yesterday and I won't read it again. just one part of it - the Farm Bureau said to the Min ister of Agricultur e on October 21 , 19 82: ". . that only for eign spe culators from pur chasing farm land in Manit oba." That's who they re ally didn't want buying land; they would not support legislatio n which would deny the right to own farm land in the provin ce to other Canadi ans who are not Manitoba reside nts. That, Mr .

Spe aker, as I'm indicating, was not made available to the media and the public at that par ticular time. As wel l, Mr . Speaker. in indicating the Farm Bureau paper, that rep resents probably the largest number of farm people in the province thr ough their memb er ship and their organizational memb er ship thr ough the Ma nitoba Pool Elevators. the United Gr ain Gr owers, the cattle producers and all the many co-operatived, parti cularly co-operative farm movements and mar keting board organizations. In fact, Mr . Speaker, I may not be quite correct but the Minister can certainly straighten me out.

I even think that the Minister of Agricu ltur e, thr ough bein g a turkey producer himself and a member of the market ing board or marketing through that board - that the Turkey Mar keting Board is as wel l, Mr . Spe aker, a member of the Farm Bureau thr ough that kind of a membersh ip connection. So I think he wou ld be well aware of that. As wel l. Mr . Spe aker. ther e was anot her pie ce of information I think is fairly pertin ent to the amount of information that has been passed out, and the privi lege that could have been as well table d in this Hous e. and given us more background information.

The Min ister keeps referring to meetings which he held thr oughout the province, or claims he had hearin gs or meetings, and who attended them and what was said at those meetings. There is, as wel l, a fairly strongly put forward document by a farmer, Mr . Speaker. from the area of my colleague from Pe mbina, which strongly op poses the kind of action that is to be taken by the government. As wel l, a brie f or a presentation made by the Manitoba Farm Business Group, which is made up, I have to say, of mainly young farmers. beg inning

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 farmers in the pr ovince who were str ongly opposed to what is taking place. That kind of information should have fir st been distri buted with the exp lanation of the bill, both si des of the story to be fa ir to the peo ple of this Hous e. as well both sides of it to the media, Mr . Speaker. So I. in standing to supp ort this motion of privile ge, Mr.

Speaker. have to say that I would hope in futur e practices carried out by this present govern ment, if we're going to have a return of the proper kind of decorum in a proper deba ting kind of manner, all the information that is necessary so that both side s of the Chamber - and I have to ask the quest ion of some of their backbenchers. Mr .

Speaker, is ther e not a qu es tion in their minds at this par ticular point that they are not get ting the kind of info rmation that they need to talk to their constitue nts and tel l them; or are they pr epared to be as part of this kind of, I would say, pro viding information for convenience sake, of the kind of pol icies that this Min ister or these Min isters want to put toward the peo ple of Man itoba. I don't supp ort that, Mr . Speaker.

I supp or t the motion of privi lege that has been pr esented and I would hope many other mem bers would stand and speak out, par ticularly some of those backbench members that should speak out to protect the parl ia mentary system which, by the way, they are here to represent their constituents. MR. SPEAKER: Or der ple ase. The Hono u rable Minis ter of Agricu ltur e. HON. B. URUSKI: Thank you, Mr . Speaker. In dealing with the motion that is before the House, Mr .

Speaker, with respect to the information that was provided to this House and the statement that I made, I have to say that in terms of when the full package of information was distribu ted to the media, that I would apologize to the honourable mem bers that that package was not given to them. It was distrib uted to their caucus and given to their caucus at the time my press conference was on, on that por tion, Mr . Speaker. However, dealing with the specifics of the informa tion, Mr . Speaker.

I instr ucted my staff to provide cop ies of that information to all mem bers and to the respective caucus rooms that I gave to the media. Now let's deal with the specifics of the info rmation that was alle ged tha t members of this House were somehow misled, that all of the information wasn't given to them, Mr . Speaker. The information that the honourable members talked about in terms of deal ing with the brief of the Mani toba Farm Bur eau, which was subm itted to myself, they indicated that I should have released that infor mation to them as well. Mr .

Speaker, that information that was rel eased to the public of Man itoba by the Man itoba Farm Bur eau was availa ble to everyone after the y had presented the brie f to myse lf and we had meetings with them. So that information was made publ ic. Tt;e information that they didn't like, Mr. Speaker, was infor mation that was made available to the then Minister of Agr iculture from the Ma nitoba Farm Bure au, from the Women's Institute, and from his own board , rec ommending change s to the then pie ce of legislation; information that I had no knowledge of, fv'r.

Speaker, because all the files, when I came into office, had disappeared. There was not a pie ce of information in my office, Mr . Speaker, when I came into office. Mr . Speaker, we got this information from the department, with respect to the information they are now crying about that we should have released to them. In fact, Mr . Speaker, this information was released to the public in Ju ne when the original Bill 54 was tabled in this Hous e, this information was made public last June - and not that we have hidden it today -this information was released to all Man itobans, Mr .

Speaker, when we had the mee tings, when we tra velle d across the western part of the province; this information was made pu blic to all of them, we handed this information out to them . Now the members of the Op position indicate that I somehow breached the privi leges of the House. I do acknowledge and I do apologize to them that, with respect to the information I gave to the media, was not del ivered to them at the time -and I indicated yesterday that it was not ready - but they did get a copy because the Memb er for Turtle Mo untain received and table d a copy of this informa tion ther e, Mr .

Speaker, and that information was made public before. So I have not hidden anything from this House and from the people of Manit oba. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Member for Pembi na. MR. D. ORCHARD: Thank you. Mr . Speaker, I cer tainly want to add a few comments to this matter, this serious breach of House privi lege that the Mi nister of Agricultur e has given us in his pr ess conference. I want to reiterate, Mr .

Speaker, tha t the Min ister of Agricu ltur e, when being que stio ned in this Ho use on his press conference, said he would give the people of Ma nitoba as much information as we received in this Chamb er. He then turned ar ound, Mr . Speaker, and presented at his press conference this series of doc uments, including a ministerial statement. Now he says we received this info rmation at the same time. We ll, we did not. It was not tabled in this Ho use. It arri ved at our caucus room, after we requested it, the fol lowing morning after his press conference, Mr .

Speaker; that is when we received this in our caucus · room . What kind of a misle ading statement is the Min ister giving us here today? 273 He furthermore says, Mr . Speaker, that this informa tion was not available to him in his office because the file s were gone. I might dr aw his attention to a Mani toba Women's Institute letter, the last one in the series of information he gave to the media but would not give to us, there is a stamp on it wh ich says 'M inister's Office Februar y 11, 19 80' and I suggest, with all due respect, Mr .

Speaker, that this Minister has just misle d the Hous e again. -(I nterject ion)-- But clear ly, Mr . Speaker, the Minister of Agricultur e attempted to mis lead the House in quest ion period two days ago in terms of the information he was pro viding to us versus the information that the media received at his press conference. There are a number of concerns. The First Minister raised his concerns over the method of why were we bei ng touchy about his Min ister ta bling a bill 15 min utes before he calls a press conference to explain it, when trad itions of this Hous e say that 48 hour s later

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 you expl ain the bill in Second Reading and then you call a press conference. The Minister tried to defend the indef ensible and he tried to defend it by saying that from lime to time Min isters of our government and pre vious governments have made comment in the hall about a pie ce of legislation they've intr oduced for First Reading. So be it, Mr . Speaker. and on each and every occasion when it was a major breach of privi lege of this House those Ministers were duly censored.

Well, this is an awfu l lot different from step ping out into the hall and answe ring quest ions posed by mem bers of the media. This is a Min ister who tables his bill and within a half-an-hour is downstairs at a press conference he has calle d to explain the bill to the media and to Manit obans before he has the nerve to explain it ir i this House; that is a major breach of privile ges of this House. Mr . Speaker, the important part to consider in this informa tion. the important fact in this is that the Min ister has very selectively chosen what information he wanted the media to receive.

That is as close to manipu lation of the media as we can come in this House. He tables some letters that he claims he didn't receive but the Min ister's office stamp is on them -he says he didn't have them but the Minister's office stamp is on them - and he tables only information which will supp ort his case. He fails to table such information on the background of the bill, such as, the Man itoba Farm Bur eau subm ission referred to by my colleague, the MLA for Ar thur ; very very selective information that the Minister is willing to table. Mr .

Speaker, I can full wel l rea lize why this Min ister sele c tively tables and avoids the Opp osition in introdu cing this pie ce of legis lation . He intr oduced it properly last time and he received the kind of objection that that kind of a terrible bill deserved and. as a re sult of that, this Min ister did not want to face the Opp osition when he brought in his new Farm Lands Protec tion Bill; he did not want to face us in the House.

He tables the bill; scu rries down to a press conference in the hop es that he can get the wrong impr ession out to the people of Man itoba again about the intent of his le gislation. He refused to debate it in this House in the normal pro cess, to allow a balance d representation to be made to the people of Manitoba on this bill. Mr. Speaker. if that is not misleading this Ho use then.

Sir, I don't know what is and I would hope that memb ers in the back bench, who might have one straw and semblanc e of freedom running in their vei ns yet, will vote for this motion to censur e their Min ister of Agricultur e for misle ading the Ho use. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Attorney -General. HON. R. PENNER: Mr . Speaker, I propose to be brie f. It's amusing to listen to the Memb er for Pembina go on at length with much wind and wabbit twacks.

I only hope, and might expr ess my than ks, that there aren't 75 mem bers from a high school of the Memb er for Lakeside in the gal lery. maybe his speech will be a little shorter. The motion which is before us, which is the basis of the debate. reads - and I drew this to your attention yesterday, Sir, and to the attention of the Hous e� that the Min ister of Agricult ure be cens ured," and I go to the su bstantive part. "in the matter of information 274 made avai lable to the media and withheld from members of the Legislative Assem bly." That is the substance of the allegation.

It was clear yesterday from the information provided by the Min ister of Agri culture; it is clear from the record; it is clear from his explanation today that the information which was provided to the media had, even prior to his introduc tion of the bill, been provided or sent to the Leader of the Op position - who may deny it if he wishes - and was provided to members of the Legis lative Assem bly. What we re ally have is a lot of postu ring about nothing.

They cry about freedom of info rmation; that information was made available to the media after - and this is the point - it was made available to the media afte rt he bill was intr oduced to the Ho use. After the Minister spoke the bill was intr oduced and an expla nation was given in the di stribution. -(I nter jection)- We ll. there was. There was a copy of the pr ess release cir culated with the bill so that all members of the House had, in fact, the two docu ments. the bill - and that was not news to them; they had been fam iliar with the main component s of the bill.

If ther e was ever a pie ce of legislation in this par ticular session of the Legislatur e tha t has received full discussion, full debate, it was this par ticular pie ce. So they received the bill: the y received the press release which was the Min isters explanation of the bill. They had - if not actually in their possess ion, it had been sent to their caucus room - the suppor ting documents, and prior to that ther e had been informa tion provided to the Leader of the Opp osition.

So I say, and that's all that's going to be said from this side, that you have, in this motion, a motion that is a lot of wind and a lot of pos turing but does not call at all for the ce nsuring of the Minister of Agricultur e. We will, as one. oppose this motion. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Memb er for Lakeside. MR. H. ENNS: Mr . Speaker. I rise on this motion of censur e not to in any way condone the action of the Minister of Agricu ltur e but to simply commiserate with them to this extent, that I understand why he did it. I under stand what really prom pted this course of action. Mr .

Speaker, more importantly, your ru ling today is important for the way we will conduct public business in this Chamb er, because it is my contention that this govern ment intended to make the pr actice that was introduced or tried by the Honour able Minis ter of Agricu ltur e into common practice as a way of intro ducing par ticularly controversial pie ces of legis lation into this Chamber. Why is that, Mr . Speaker? Because. Mr. Speaker, my honour able friend, the Minister of Agricultur e, isn't bereft entir ely of some natural common sense.

He knows that when he hits his head against a brick wall it starts to hurt after awhile and he will not try to do it agai n unless he can help it. Mo re importantly, Sir, his advisers, and indeed the advisers that are advising this government, are without the rest ra ints that used to at least be there when a fo rmer Me mber for lnkster was sti ll with them who had some competence with respect to being able to present the matters in this Chamb er and not rely on Government Information Services. on glib propaganda machines, on expert writers to pres ent the case for them . These gentle men opposite r1ave

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 come to the conclusion that rather than repeat what happene d last time, par ticularly on this bill - he will rec all it. members of the media will rec all it - we stopped this Minister dead in his tracks from the day he introduced this bill, a similar bill in this Chamb er, and he never recovered from it.

So his advisers have now said. okay, let's do an end ru n on the House; let's get our pol ished writers to put out the package: let's get it into the hands of the farm press, into the hands of the media generally and then, no matter what happens in the Chamb er, we at least get started on the right foot from his point of thinking. We ll, Mr . Speaker.

I appre ciate that that's what he was doing -as my Leader says getting started on the left foot as compar ed to perhaps others star ting on the right foot I can understand them want ing to do that but I appr eciate, Sir. your ru ling in this regard because I think it was fully the intention of the government to utilize this tech nique in a far gr eater way. I don't get re ally concerned about whether all the pages of information were the same or some thing like that You have to rea lly understand why they chose this appr oach.

The reason why they chose the appr oach was to avoid the head-on initial clash in this Ho use which did. in fact. on this par ticular matter set the tone for the bill thr oughout the last sess ion. which caused them to back away from the bill, which caused the government to withdr aw shamefacedly from the bill because it's wrong legislation. It was wrong legis la tion then. it is st ill wrong legislation and, Sir, we're going to make him back away from it again. MR. SPEAKER: Order ple ase, order please. The Hono u rable First Min ister. HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker.

I think a word or two is important in respect to the motion that has been made by the mem ber across the way. If the Mi nister of Agricultur e is indeed to be faulted he is to be faulted for giving too much informa tion. I do not know, Mr . Spe aker. of any other single pie ce of legisl ation or of government proposal that has not been preceded by the gr anting of so much information to Man itobans, information to members across the way, information to mem bers of the press. Mr . Speaker.

I reca ll very few instances where it could be said that ther e's been as much consultat ion in respect to any piece of legis la tio n.

A program and a pie ce of legislation intr oduced in this Hous e that was preceded by a large number of meet ings in various parts of Ma nitoba, parti cularly in the constituencies of members across the way, in communities that are represented by mem bers across the way, in which members of the Treasury Be nch, including the Min ister of Agricult ure did not hesit ate, as the Memb er for Lakeside would have us think, to avoid or to be afraid of a head-on 'clash', as I bel ieve the word was. but rather. Mr .

Speaker, mee tings in which info rmation was provided. details were pr o vided throughou t the intervening months prior to the conclusion of the last session and the commence ment of this short sessi on. Mr . Speaker, the Min ister of Agricu lture has indi cated that he has given mem bers across the way informa tion. not only in this Ho use but. in fact. deli vered info rmation to their caucus roo m, Mr. Speaker So what are we ar guing about in this Chamb er? Are we ar guing that less informat ion should have been given to the publ ic?

Are we sugges ting that it is expected that this government ought to be less open, less the provider of information to Man itobans, both inside and outside this Chamb er? Mr . Speaker. there may very well be some governments that want to opi:,rate on that bas is. Indeed , Mr . Speaker, I know it is tempting for all governments from time to time to be less open . Let us trust, Mr. Speaker, that we can resist that tem ptation on this side to be less open with the public of the Province of Man itoba. MR. SPEAKER: The Ho nourable Me mber for La Verendr ye. MR. R. BANMAN: Thank you, Mr. Sp eaker.

We have just heard the Fir st Mi nister using the argument that they were tryi ng to dissemina te more information to the public and that's why they took this course of action. He asked what were we ar guing about. Mr. Speaker, what we are ar guing about is the importance of parli ament. The First Minister should just read back into Hans ard about some of the orders or the matters of privi lege he raised when he was Leader of the Op posi tion.

All he has to do is go and look at Ha nsard, April 30, 19 79, wher e he had asked some que stions and he belie ved that the Min ister later had answered some of those ques tions to the reporter, ra ther than to this Ho use.

At that time the matter of privi lege was raised and the Memb er for Concordia , the former Speaker, then indicated that, even though Beauchesne didn't have anyth ing in the ru les about this par ticular matter, it was important because the trad ition was est ablis hed in this Ho use that all statements, all information that is asked for and req uir ed by this Ho use, should be given in this House and not outside. Mr .

Speaker. the former Minister of Health and the Minister of Health now, back in '78 raised a matter of privilege because he also belie ved that some informa tion had been given outside the Hous e by the then Minister of Health to some reporters, to a quest ion that he had asked within this Hous e. He char ged the Min ister then of not giving the proper informa tion inside the Hou se.

So all members on both side s of the ·House, thr ough the years that I have been there, have acted as watchdogs to protect the integrity of parl ia ment. to make sur e that what happens in here. happens first in here and then outside later. 275 Now the Mi nister of Agricu lture, I just want to make one point, the Minister of Agri cultur e, as the Member for Lakeside has pointed out, has used this tool, and I think if this tool is not checked and stoppe d here rig ht now, is going to be used by many. of those Min isters.

But all you had to do right after that pr ess conference, just to show you how well orch estrated this PR snow job was supposed to be, you phoned the Propaganda Hotline number of this government. that's at 944-4287. and a few minutes after he had that press conference you picked it out and it was all laid out. You had the Minister on ther e, his whole press conference on this. Mr . Speaker, they had orch estrated this thing because they are concerned. They know the Opp osi tion is mounting to any rest rictions that will be placed on Canadian residents in owning pro perty.

I want to say to the members opposite that history has shown in

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 this Legislature: that when there are things happening in here that should be kept in here and should be dealt with in here. we should not go out and speak to the press or put out different press releases dealing with matters. So. Mr . Speaker. second read ing. if it had been intr oduced properly would have given the members of the Op position a chance to debate the bill right there. That was pr ecluded by the Min ister doing what he did and I suggest to you. that his whole PR machine was geared up to try and help him out of a difficult spot that he found himself in a year ago. MR.

SPEAKER: The Hono urable Minister of Heal th. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Thank you. Mr . Speaker. The memb er that just took his seat I think referred to some discussion that we've had in the House, wher e I have complai ned that a special ques tion , a dir ect question that was asked a Min ister of the Cr own, was not ans wered in the Hous e. and then the answer was given outside of the Hous e and I certainly agree that is the case. I would stand by tha t and I hope that all the members of the Hous e would also.

Now I think it is very impor tant, especi ally when we are in ses sion. that the informa tion should come to the Hous e first. I sa id that a few days ago. Now the con cern is not just because of trad ition, because if we don't dr aw the line there everybody will want a little more and that's a danger ous situation . I also said. Mr. Speaker. a few days ago, that the important thing is the information should be available in this Hous e and this is rarely done. But the Minister of Agric ulture gave the information in a copy of a press release, enti tled Press Release. He didn't play game s.

He didn't head the paper by some thing else. he said press release and before it was given to the press he brou ght it in the House. It was distri buted with the bill-(lnter jection) right, two pages. Then I was told that, fine, that was given to the press but ther e was added informa tion. I must admit that I was concerned when I heard that, but the expl anation is very clear and I certainly take the word of the Min ister. All the added information was informa tion that was already public proper ty. It was already public.

Now if that isn't the case, I would probab ly disagree with my colleague and I would say maybe he should have br ought the informa tion in the Hous e. But if some thing has come out, if some of the info rmation we had. or the fo rmer govern ment had, and they did it for some reason and that's their privi lege I guess, they'd want to make it known, and if other informat ion was information given by a different organ ization that he would repeat, I can't see where the Min ister can be faulted at all.

Now I think it's much more se rious because that is steali ng property that isn't yours; then ministers, when ther e is a change of govern ment, would take all the files with them or destroy the files and this has happene d in many departments. It has happ ened in -(Interjec tion) - no, it's not a red her ring, it's a fact. I think that's much more important. I would say that I understand ther e are some cer tain things that are internal matters. but those re main unless they are strictly personal files, this information should be stated.

Well then I don't know what certa in ministers did if 276 every thing was a personal file, what the hell did they do for the pub lic of Manit oba, because all the files were gone in certain departments. I re mem ber some depar tment ther e was a little pie ce of pencil in the desk and that was all. I could quote some people, here sitting across from me, that held the res ponsib ility as ministers and they didn't leave any files, including the last one that spoke. -(I nter ject ion)- Not a bit, that's right and I think that is much more serious.

If we're talking about open government; if we're talk ing about files that are public property. then that should have stayed ther e, not try to make a big thing, not try to disrupt this Hous e by talk ing about certain things that have been public knowledge for a long time, that's pub lic property. and another copy was given to the press.

So I certainly am in favour , and I hope that we will be very careful to make sure that while we're in ses sion, and people from both sides of the Hous e at times have been forgetful, I'll be charitable on that and I am talk ing about both sides of the Hous e being forgetful, they forgot it was brought to thei r attention and I certainly agree with it.

But I'm taking at face value the info rma tion from my colleag ue who's saying that what was given to the press was the bill that was passed in the Hous e, a copy of the press release plus other informa tion that was public knowledge, that had been public for some reason or another. I don't think there is any reason of wasting any more time of the Hous e. MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the que st ion? The Honou rable Leader of the Opp osition. HON. S. LYON: Mr .

Speaker, in the time honoured trad ition, I can say that I had not intended to par tici pate in this de bate until I heard some remarks from the Attorney-General, and those in turn re minded me of some comme nts, some implication that the Min ister of Agricul tur e made in his stat ement yesterday, to the effect that I had been provided informa tion, pre vious to the Hous e sitt ing, of the same nature as he pres ented to the pr ess, but not to the Hous e, the day on which he met with the pr ess in full and flagrant breach of the long-established trad itions of this Hous e with respect to second re adings of bills being given in the Hous e first, and then full explanation to the press ther eafter.

Mr . Speaker . I don't think there is any necessity follow ing upon the rem arks that the Mi nister of Heal th, follow ing the partial apology of the Minis ter of Agri culture, follow ing upon, may I say, the honour able app roach that was taken by the Minis ter of Transporta tion today to admit an error. We all make err ors: we're human beings; we're God's imperfec tions; we all make mistakes from time to time.

It takes a person with a cert ain amount of integ rity to admit that, and I think that the Minis ter of Transportation this afternoon perhaps gave us an exampl e of the kind of integrity that we wish was manifested in a gr eater way on the other side of the Hous e, particul arly on the Treasury Bench. May I call his exam ple to the atten tion of his collea gues in order that they may benefit from it Mr . Speaker, the motion is very simple. The motion says, of course, that the Minis ter gave to the press things that he said were the same as what he gave to

16 December, 1982 the Hous e. The evidence is clear. It's open and shut; he didn't. He gave a two-page press statement to the Hous e, gr ound out by the propaganda division now conveniently located in the Premi er's office. He said, you're getti ng the same full information that I'm going to give to the pub lic thr ough the press. Well, that turned out to be a pate nt untruth. That is why we have the motion here today. There are those may glibly say, wel l, what has this got to do with the busi ness of Man itoba? What has this got to do with the unemplo yed , and so on? This has to do, Mr .

Speaker, with keep ing parl iament hone st. The fact that in the last 10 days, the Opp osition on thr ee different occasions has had to bring motions of this natur e to the att ention of the House, all of which, by the way, Sir , were in or der and all of which were followed by substantive motions, is a very very sorry comment ary upon the absence of candour , for thright ness, integrity and truth on behalf of the fr ont bench of this present transitory govern ment. So, Mr .

Speaker, as I said in a debate the other day, if mem bers of the front bench insist on going ar ound shooting holes in their own feet, they mustn't stand in thei r place and try to suggest that the Opp osition is the one loading and pointing the rifle. They are the victims of their own untruths and we will continue to call to the attention of the House on every occasion when we see them resor ting to prevarications, to half truths, to shadings of facts and so on; misle ading the people of Man itoba.

We will call it to the attention of this Hous e and we will have a substantive debate and we will, sooner or later, make them an hone st government. Now, Mr. Speaker, some reference was made to corr es pondence and informa tion that was provided to me by the Min ister of Agricult ure. I think after we have been read the little lectu re by the Fir st Min ister, who has a very convenient, selective and short memor y on things of this nature, perhaps it would be instructive to the Ho use to find out just how forthcom ing, how free with informa tion this par ticular govern ment is.

I think tha t this might be a small case in point, a small cameo exam ple of how we can demonstr ate it. As I said, I didn't intend to raise this matter, but it was raised as a subs tant ive answer. It's no answer at all; it's an ir rele vancy; it's a red herr ing tha t they're tr ying to dress up as a mock form of response or def ence to a re solution in this House which is patently proved. Mr . Speaker, I'll take a bit of time of the Hous e to detail the kind of information that I got and how I got it from the Minister of Agricultur e. Mr . Speaker, the Hous e adjourne d here -when, on the 30th June 19 82?

On the 9th of Ju ly. some 9 days, 10 days after the House adjourne d in 19 82, the Mi nister of Agricultur e turn ed out a press bulletin through the Prem ier's pro paganda office. the Informa tion Services Br anch. The head ing of it is. "Farm Lands Own ersh ip Act to be discussed. Uruski reiter ates need for prote ction." This was a document that was turned out, as I say, by the propaganda bran ch. Shortly after that, to be exact on the 15 th of Ju ly, 19 82, I wrote to the Min ister in these terms. "Dear Mr .

Uruski: Duri ng the de bate on The Farm Lands Owner ship Bill, you may reca ll my request that you prov ide the Ho use with all of the available statistics with respect to farm land owner ship in Man itoba. It is crucially important, in any review of such legisla tion, that all MLA's be work ing from the same statistical base. As I point ed out in my remarks, the term 'absen tee owner ship', even if used in a pejorative sense, does not always connote fore ign or out-of-province owner ship." Nor indeed can it be said to be always undesirable ownersh ip.

"I note that Statistics Canada have rece ntly tu rned out sta tis tics based upon the 19 81 census. From a cursory review of these statistics, the refined informa tion on Man itoba does not appear to be available. I would the refore appreciate rec eiving from you, as soon as possible , all of the up-to-date sta tistical informa tion you and the govern ment have on farm owner ship in Man itoba.

I note in your release dated Ju ly 9, you state that 'between 19 78 and 19 81 - non farm ing corporations acq uired about 206,000 acres of farm land, much of it prime agricu ltur al land.' A re finement of this kind of information is what is needed before we embark upon fur ther studie s of for eign owner ship in our prov ince. "Thank you for your co-operat ion in this matter. Your s very tru ly." I signe d the letter. Mr. Speaker, the next day with pr omptne ss. I received an acknowledgement from the office of the Mi nister of Agricultur e signe d by his secretary, Mr s. E. Ham erton.

"O n behalf of the Hono urable Bill Urusk i, Minister of Agricultur e, I wish to acknowledge your letter of Ju ly 15 , 19 82 re gar ding The Farm Lands Ownersh ip Bill. "Your correspondence will be br ought to the atten tion of the Min ister and be dealt with as soon as possible." That was the 16 th of Jul y, Mr . Speaker. Noth ing having tr anspi red in interv ening weeks, on the 23rd of Septem ber, 19 82, Mr . Speaker, I wrote to the Mi nister of Agricultur e, in these terms and the file is available. I'll table it gladly after the debate is fin ished.

"I would appr eciate it, if you could advise when I might expect to hear from you in reply to my letter of July 15 , 19 82, regard ing The Farm Lands Owner ship Bill." That was a letter written on the 23rd of September, Mr . Speaker. Nothing having come from this forthco ming Minis ter of Agricu ltur e - the one that the Prem ier stands up and says he's giving too much information - I wrote the Min ister of Agricult ur e again, Mr . Speaker, on ·No vem ber 10, 19 82, addressed to the Honour able Billy Urusk i, Minister of Agricultur e, and this time, Mr .

Speaker, I sent a copy to the Fir st Minister because I thought that might jar them out of their lethargy and maybe get some thing going. Here's the letter that I wrote on the 10th of November, Mr . Speaker. 277 "O n Mo nday, June 28, 19 82, I spoke in the debate on The Farm Lands Owner ship Biil (see Han sar d, Page 362 1 , et se q.). Dur ing that debate l requested that you provide the Hous e with the latest availab le stat istics relati ng to farm land owner ship in Man itoba.

It is my impression that, from your seat, you agreed that these statistics would be made available as soon as possible so that we would all be work ing from the same statisti cal base in our consider at ion of farm land owner ship legislation. "Subseq uently on July 15 th I wrote to you rene wing this request, pointing out that Statistics Canada had recently turned out new material based on the 19 81 census, and asking to receive from you, as soon as possi ble, all of the up-to-date statistical information

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 ----------·-------- you and the government have on farm ownersh ip in Manitoba. On July 16 th, I received only an acknowl edgement to that letter. Subsequently on September 23rd I sent you a tracer, again renewing my request for information concern ing the statistical information previously requested. To date I have had no response to that letter. "f. therefore. ask you again to provide me, and all members of the House with the most up-to-date statisti cal information available to you and the government with respect to the ownership of farm land in Manitoba.

It is imperative that this information be in the hands of all Mem bers of the Legislature prior to the House recon vening on December 2. I note that you have rece ntly been reported as saying that a Farm Lands Ownership Bill will be reintroduced into the House. I am sure you will agree that it would be irr espo nsible for members of the House to be asked to consider such legislation with out first having been informed of the contemporary sta tistical facts about farm owner ship. "I, ther efore, trust I will hear from you at your earlie st convenience." Signed by myself, copy to the First Minister.

This is the government, Mr . Speaker, that's so forth coming with information that's just dying to tell every body every thing about farm land owner ship in Mani toba, as the Premier just finished saying from his place in the House, yes. -(l nterjec tion)- Mr . Speaker, on the 16 th of November , 19 82 I received the following letter: "Thank you for your letter of November 10th, in refere nce to the latest available statis tics relating to farm land owner ship in Man itoba.

Your correspondence has been placed on the Minis ter's desk for his soonest attention and reply." Fine, Mr Speaker, placed on his desk on the 16 th of November and now finally we got the mini jackpot, we finally heard from the Minister, Mr . Speaker, finally heard from the Minister. I want to be very clear about this: On November 22, Mr .

Speaker, I was pleasantly surpr ised to find that there was a letter on my desk bea ring the signatur e and the letterhead of the Minister of Agriculture - this is the Minister who's been so forthcoming with information for all the people of Manitoba about farm land statistics and so on, the one that the Prem ier just stood up and defended so well - and here is what he said: "Dear Mr. Lyon: Please be advised that, further to my November 19 th letter to you," pardon me, November 19 ? November 19 . sorry.

"I wish to acknowledge rece ipt of your letters, request ing statistical information on farm land owner ship in Man itoba." Reading from a letter dated November 19 . "Statistics Canada, unfortunately, does not compile an extensive amount of information on farm land owner ship patterns Researchers at the University of Manitoba, though. have prepared some useful informa tion on the subject. J.0. Magnusson and Dr. Daryl Kr aft in a study. 'The Influence of Non-Resident Investment on Farm Land Prices in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, have estimated the extent of absentee ownership of farm land in the provi nce.

They define an absentee owner as one who is not actively engaged in farm ing and who is not a resident of rural Man itoba. Using this defini tion as a basis, Magnusson has shown that absentee ownership of Man itoba's farm land increased substan tially during the 19 70's-from 1.1 million acres in 19 71 to 278 1. 8 million acres in 19 77. Owner ship of land by absentee landlords varies con siderably among individual municipalities.

In the latter 19 70's it was par ticularly heavily concentr ated in the following municipalities,"' and then he proceeds, Sir, to list the municipalities." I'll table the letter so the informa tion will be on the record. The source, as given, is Mr . J .0. Magnusson, Influence of Non-Resident Investment Farm Lands, and so on. There's a small table at the top of the page.

"While my staff have not updated Magnusson's and Kr aft's data to the present, they have developed, over the past few months, estimates of the amount of land trans ferred to non-residents of Man itoba and to non-farm corporations over the period 19 78 to 19 82. Acquisitions of farm land by these two categories of absentee owners were as follows": then he gives the table demonstra ting his alleged data finding. "Over the first six months of 19 82, approximately 20,000 acres of land were acquired by non-residents of the province and over 20,000 acres were acquired by non-farm corpor ations.

You should be aware that in calculation the 'costs' associated with absentee ownership of farm lands, this government has been very concerned about the flow of capital from farmers to non-farming interests. Based on the following assumptions; (

a) that 2.5 million acres of land is controlled by non farm ing interest; (

b) that the average price of land is $400 per acre; and (

c) that the average rental rate is 5 percent of the market value of land; "we have calculated that the annual outflow of capital from farming to non-farming inter ests is approxi mately $50 million per year. A signifi cant portion of these funds, it appears, are directed to owners who reside outside of Man itoba. I trust these statistical data will be of use to you. I look forward to our upcoming debate on 'The Farm Lands Ownership Act."' Signed, Billy Uruski. Mr .

Speaker, I add by way of parenthesis, he wasn't looking forward to the upcoming debate so much that he would not run off to the press and try to manipulate the information on it before he got into the debate in the House. Copy, by the way, to Premier Pawley because I supp ose the original copy that went to him had elicited some response about, why don't you answer your mail? Then, Mr . Speaker, on the 22nd of November a final letter from the Minister of Agriculture to myself.

"Please be advised that further to my November 19 th letter to you concern ing absentee ownersh ip of Manitoba's farm land, one figure should be corrected. Acquisition of farm land by non-residents of Manitoba is estimated to be 70,000 acres rather than 80,000 acres, for 19 80 (see Page 2). "Also, for your information, I have attached two maps, which show - (

a) the extent of absentee ownership of farm land by municipality, and (

b) acquisitions of farm land by non-farm corporations over the period 19 78 to mid-1982 I trust this information will be of use to you." And attached, Mr . Speaker, were the documents that the Minister said, Absentee Ownership of Farm Land in Manitoba, three paragraphs on it; two maps were att ached, and that, Sir, is the sum and substance of this deluge of information that the Attorney-Gener al and the Minister of Agriculture have seen fit to refer to as be ing

the kind of comprehensive information that I was given after repeated requests trying to extract information, as one member to another, so that we would be work ing from what? For partisan advantage? No. So that we would be wor king, Mr . Speaker, from the same statisti cal base, so that we would know what we're talking about when we come to deal with something that is as fundamental as private owner ship in Manitoba. Now, Mr . Speaker, we'll get into this topic in the debate on the bill in due course.

I know what animates and motivates a lot of the feel ing across the way, not all of it. but a lot of the feel ing across the way. It is that mean, narr ow streak of envy which says that the only people who should own land are the state. That's what motivates the kind of tactics that we have seen; that's what militates the Minister of Agriculture in this province to try to do an end run on the Legislature; that's what animates him to do that, Mr. Speaker. My honourable friends can deny that all they want because we will look forward with a great deal of interest, Mr.

Speaker, to see how well they support the concept of private land ownersh ip in a pr oposed amendment to the Charter of Rights which was spoken to yesterday by the Attorney General. We know what lies behind their concern on farm land ownership. It is an animus against private owner ship, we know that. And when all of the clouds have blown away, all of the dust, all of the red herrings and everyt hing of that nature, Mr . Speaker, that's Square One that we're going to get down to in the debate itself.

But I participate in this debate merely following upon the remarks of the Attorney-General and par ticularly the remarks of the Premier which were irrelevant, which were misleading and which did not deal with the sub stance of this reso lution before the House, Sir, which is that the Minister deserves to be censur ed because he said something in the House and then went and did something else. The Premier tried to draw a red herring over the trail and say, oh, we're giving too much informa tion, we nice fellows over here. Taint so, Mr . Speaker.

I've taken a little bit more of the time of the House to explain how it isn't so and to ask the First Minister if he can explain how he can stand before the people of Manitoba and say that he believes in open government. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Memb er for Turle Mountain will be closing the debate. MR. A. RANSOM: Mr . Speaker, I reg ret that it has been necessary for the House to take this amount of time this afternoon to deal with this question but, Sir, there has been altogether too much misleading information com ing from the government.

Perhaps the backbenchers on the government side should begin to exert some influ ence upon their Cabi net Ministers and urge upon them the necessity of being for thright with information and being direct in their answers when questions are placed to them by members of the Opposition. Mr. Speaker. I was disturbed by the action of the Minister of Agriculture in what I believe was mislea ding the House two days ago and that is why I brought the motion before the House to censure the Minister for that. I am equa lly disturbed today by, first of all, the government's react ion.

They, first of all, were simply prepared to stay in their seats and use the tyranny of the majority to simply vote it down. They were not even going to rise and attempt to clear the record of the Minister of Agriculture. Then, Sir, when they were finally forced to their feet to attempt to justify it, they gave the sort of justification which concerns me as well, Mr . Speaker, because it didn't deal with the real quest ion; it attempted to obscur e the real issue by dra gging red herrings across the tr ail, as my Leader said the Fir st Minister had done, and indeed he did.

Let me deal with each of the arguments put forward by the Ministers opposite. The Minister of Agricultur e tries to say that indeed we had the information. Mr. Speaker, it was clear to us, and I believe it was clear to you that we did not have the information. We did not have the infor mation that the Minister gave to the press when he left this House two days ago. He now tries to tell us that, oh, he sent the information later on. Indeed he did, Mr .

Speaker, when he found out, when he realized that he had indeed made an error and that he was going to be called on it, he then sent the information to us; I don't know whether he sent the information to all the members of the House. And what we're talking about here, Mr. Speaker, is not just a privilege of members of this side of the House; it's a privilege of every member in the House. The Minister of Agriculture stood in this House and said that he would provide the same information to the pr ess which he had provided to the members of this House. That was clearly not the case.

The statement which the Minister made to the press, the ten-page (sic) pri nted state ment which he made to the press, was clearly the type of state ment that wou Id have been made on second read ing in this House. That was not provided to us at any time and no similar information was pro vided to us at any time prior to the Minister distributing the bill in the House and distributing the two-page press release. The Minister of Health seems to believe that somehow when a question is placed in the House it is important that the Minister not give any response to that question outside of the House.

He seems to believe now as he did in 19 79 that that constituted a point of privilege. Mr. Speaker, I don't believe that a question asked in the House is any more important than the matter of dealing with a bill which the government hopes is going to become part of the laws of the province. Surely, if the Minister of Health had a matter of privilege when he rose · in 19 79, there is a matter of privilege when the Minister of Agriculture tries to bypass the legislative pr ocess and misleads the House while doing so.

The one point, Sir, which I acknowledge is not rele vant to this debate but it has been raised by the members opposite and since they were not brought to order, I wish to deal with it. Two Ministers at least raised the matter of not finding ministerial files in their offices when they assumed government. I want it to be clearly on the record, Sir, that the Minister of Agriculture when he assumed office in 19 81, received exactly the same amount of information that the Minister of Agriculture received in 19 77.

When we assumed office in 19 77, ther e were no ministerial files in the office of the Minister of Agriculture. Since ther e were no ministerial files in the Minister's office, the Member for Arthur assumed, that being the practice , there was no necessity of leaving files when he depar ted in 19 81 . Similarly the Memb er for La Verendr ye when he went to his office in 19 77, the office vacated by the now Minister of Community Servi ces and Correct ions, there were no ministerial files, Mr . 279

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 Speaker. Let these Ministers not rise now and try and tell the public that somehow we. in the Opposition. prac tised someth ing that they had not practised previously, Sir. The Government House Leader. Mr. Speaker, attempts to use the same argument that the Minister of Agricultur e used, that the information had been pro vided to the House. I believe I've dealt with that. Clearly the information had not been provided to the House.

He also said someth ing that I find rather disturbing and I'm going to have to review the transcript care fully to see exactly what he said, but he seemed to indicate that we should somehow be satisfied with a bill being dis trib uted along with a press release, that that should be sufficient for us. That's the information that we req uire, but the Minister is then free to go out and make whatever statements he wishes outside the House and to distrib ute informa tion. Mr . Speaker, we'll read the record. I believe if the Attorney-General looks at the record he may find that that indeed is what he said.

But the response of the First Minister, I think, con cerns me more than the response of any of the other Ministers. Mr . Speaker. because the Fir st Minister either missed the point of the motion which is before us today, or else he understands the motion and was indeed attempting to drag the red herring across the path, because what we are talking about here is one of his Ministers misleading the House - one of his Ministers misleading the House, Mr . Speaker. He should not con done that in any way, shape or form.

I gather from his answer today that he is less than for thright in condemn ing that action by his Minister. He seems to indicate that somehow, simply because he and his Ministers have been conducting extensive consultation with the public, directly with the public. that somehow that allows the First Minister and his Ministers to bypass this Chamber. Mr. Speaker, that is something which we find unaccep table. He mistakes the presentation of information to the public as being a replacement for dealing with this House and pro viding information to these members. He seems, Mr .

Speaker. to be going the route of our Prime Minister and we know that over the years the Prime Minister. remember the catch phrase of partici patory democracy. which was simply another way for the Prime Minister to bypass parliament and attempt to go directly to the people and not to deal with the elected represen tatives of those people. Now I have absolutely no objection to the First Minis ter and his government carr ying out extensive consulta tion with the public and pro viding the public with infor mation but that should not be an excuse to bypass the ele cted representatives.

You can contact all the people directly that you want but, nevertheless. the 23 members of our party that sit on this side of the House are the members who have been elected to represent those constituencies and you must deal with us, the govern ment must deal with this institution. Sir , and I hope that our Fir st Minister is not going the direction that Prime Minister Trudeau has gone. Mr .

Speaker. there is an opportunity here for some of the backbenchers. at least, to express their dissatisfac tion with the sort of actions that we've been getting from the govern ment and to support this motion in censuring the Minister of Agriculture for misleading the House. QUESTION put, MOTION defeated. ·�� . 280 MR. A. RANSOM: Yeas and Nays, Mr . Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: Call in the members.

It is moved by the Honour able Member for Turtle Mountain, seconded by the Honour able Memb er for Arthur, THAT this House do censure the Minister of Agricul tur e for a breach of the privileges of its members by misleading its members in the matter of information made available to the media and withheld from members of the Legislative Assembly. A STANDING VOTE was taken. the re sult being as follows: YEAS Messrs. Blake, Brown. Downey, Driedger, Enns, Fil mon, Gourlay, Graham; Mr s. Hammond; Messrs. Hyde, Johnston, Kovnats, Lyon, Manne ss, McKenzie, Mercier, Nordman; Mr s. Oleson; Messrs.

Orchard, Ransom, Sherman, Steen. NAYS Messrs. Adam, Anstett, Ashton, Bucklaschuk, Corri n, Cowan, Desjard ins; Mr s. Dodick; Mr . Doern; Ms. Dolin; Messrs. Evans, Eyler, Harapiak, Harper; Mr s. Hemph ill; Messrs. Kostyra, Lecuyer, Mackling, Malinowski, Para siuk, Pawley, Penner; Ms. Phillips; Messrs. Plohman, Scott; Mr s. Smith; Messrs. Storie, Ur uski. Uskiw. MR. ACTING CLERK, G. Mackintosh: Yeas. 22, Nays, 29 MR. SPEAKER: The motion is accordingly defeated. The Honour able Member for La Verendrye. MR. R. BANMAN: Mr . Speaker, I was paired with the Minister of Finance.

Had I voted, I would have supp orted the motion. ORAL QUESTIONS Higher deficits MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Leader of the Opposition. HON. S. LYON: Mr . Speaker, a question to the Fir st Minister. Reading the material presented yesterday by the Minister of Finance which, presumably, he is giving to the meeting of the Ministers of Finance today as Man itoba's position and read ing in that mater ial. Mr .

Speaker, the statement that higher deficits are appr op riate for Canada and for Manitoba at the present time because of the high unemployment situation and other economic problems. can the Fir st Minister tell us now. this statement is being made I take it seriously to the Government of Canada, can he tell us now the size of a deficit that he considers to be ap propriate in the circum stances that we face in this province today, one year after he took office, saying that he was going to turn around the economy? MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able First Minister.

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 --�-------- ---- ---- ------------ ------------------ HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr .

Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for the question because it provides me with the oppor tunity to discuss briefly the th rust which the Minister of Finance is providing by way of leader ship on his part to the Finance Ministers' Conference and, I believe, a thr ust that will be joined, indeed, by a number of the counterparts from other provinces: that if we are to overcome the short-term difficulties in Canada of rising unemployment, of dropping reta il sales, then it will be unnecessary for an over all co-ordinated and strategic effort on behalf of all 11 governments in Can ada in order to overcome the present economic debacle.

Mr . Speaker, that has been the position of Man itoba, Februar y 2, 19 82. It was the position of the Man itoba Government in August of 19 82.

I am pleased to note that the Federal Government, finally, after some 11 months, appears to be coming around to the same point of view and, in addition, that same point of view has been sup ported, it appears, by statements that have been made in the last few hours by some of the other Finance Minis ters, including the Finance Minister for the Province of Ontario, that has made it very very clear that he, too, accepts the fact that for the short term it is inevitable that governments do, indeed. increase their capital borrow ings even if it be at the price of some additional capital deficit, in order to launch a co-ordinated and full-scale attack upon unemployment.

Mr . Speaker, if there was a war declared tomorrow there would be no problem in finding the money to put people to work in order to conduct a war. Mr . Speaker, at the same time there is no reason why we ought not to be in a position to find the money to utilize the resources in Canada in order to put people to work in peace time, to end unemployment and to bring about economic recovery. HON, S, LYON: Well, Mr . Speaker, we, of course, appr eciate the First Minister's dilations upon his view of the state of the economy.

The question, however, Sir, was: what level of deficit does he and his Minister of Finance, and presumably the front bench and the cau cus -if indeed, they're consulted on matters of this sort what level of deficit does he consider to be appropriate to supp ort the statement that is being made by his Minis ter to the other Ministers of Finance of Canada today? What is the level of deficit? Because clearly, if the state ment is made that Canada and Manitoba should both be having higher deficits, then the First Minister must have something in mind as to a figure. Is it $750,000.00? Is it a billion?

What is the size of the appropria te deficit that the First Minister is advocating? HON. H. PAWLEY: It would be quite simplistic on my part to be giving figures to the Leader of the Opposition.

The amount that will be involved will be dependent upon (1) the need which is reflected by the amount that is re quir ed to again get the economy of Canada stimulated to restore consumer confidence, so that we will conse quently have public and private investment again in Canada: (2) it will depend a great deal insofar as what Man itoba would do as to the extent of co-operation, the extent of co-ordination, the extent of strateg ic develop ment of joint effort on the part of the Federal Govern ment in all other 10 provinces.

Man itoba cannot do it alone, but Man itoba is prepar ed to do its fair shar e if, indeed, 10 other provinces and the Federal Government 281 together all join in a concer ted effort to turn the econ omy around, to create employment, to restore consu mer confidence so we get back on the path to proper economic prog ress in Canada. Unemployment increase HON. S. LYON: Mr . Speaker, I'm sure that all Canadians would support the ideal of a fully employed work force in Canada, which we all want.

All Canadians, of course, Sir, particularly share the concern for the unemployed in this country at the present time, par ticularly the 52,000 unemp loyed in this province, some 24,000 more people unemp loyed than there were a year ago at this time. But, the very simple ques tion, Mr.

Speaker - with respect, it is not a simplistic question -to the Fir st Minis ter is, first of all, what level of deficit does he intent to rec ommend to the people of Manitoba to supp ort the thrust of his Minister: secondly, if he is unable or unwil ling to give a figure, will he say that there's no limit at all to the size of the deficit he's prep ared to reco mmend? HON. H. PAWLEY: I believe that question was posed just a few moments ago and I'm delighted again to respond to the question. Mr .

Speaker, the amount that is req uired depends upon, as I indicated before, the degree of co-ordination that is agreed to by all 11 governments in Canada, the extent to which all 11 governments are prepared to commit funding towards an all-out effort. I'm pleased to see, Mr . Speaker, that the Minister of Finance, at least by way of musings, prior to this Finance Minister's Conference has indicated that indeed that is the thrust now of the Federal Government. It's interes ting that on Febr uary 2, 19 82, the Federal Government denied that there was any major problem pert aining to the economy in Canada.

In May and June of 19 82, the Federal Government indicated the major problem was inflation and all we needed was 6 and 5 and the economy would be turned around. Mr . Speaker, I am pleased now that there's a recogni tion on the part of the Federal Government, as indeed we have said for months and months - and I know criticized by members across the way for our analysis - that the problem confronting Canada is not principally -one of inflation, but is principally one of unemployment, joblessness within this land. The amount that is req uired, Mr.

Speaker, depends of course upon the amount that is req uired to stimulate the economy and (b), insofar as Man itoba is concerned, the extent of participation and involvement by the Federal Government and all other Provincial Governments in Canada. Mr . Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, if war was declar ed tomorrow and Canada wa.s in the thick of war fare, we would not be debating how much money was re quir ed in order to wage war. We would find the money in order to successfully defend the country. Mr .

Speaker, in the same way, it is ess ential and crucial for Canadi ans, wher ever they live, whether they be of the Mari times, whether they be of Central Canada, whether they be of the Prairies or British Columbia, to similarly com mit themselves to ending joblessness in this land during peace time. HON. S. LYON: Well, Mr. Speaker, as I've said earlier, we all, with some interest, note the oratorical dilations of

the Fir st Minister. Would he please direct his waning atte ntion however. Sir. to the question. which is: is he saying in effect that ther e is no limit to the amount that this province can borrow or pledge the credit of yet unborn Man itobans for? Is that rea lly what he is saying in the course of these red herrings about states of war and so on? We're talking about Manitoba. 19 82. December of that year. 54.000 unemployed, 24.000 more than last year. Is the Fir st Minister saying there is no limit to the amount of deficit that he will load unto the backs of the people of Manitoba? HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker.

I welcome the ques tion from the Leader of the Opposition because it pro vides me with an opportunity to present what I think is a position that is, if I can say so. in dire need now. not only in Canada. but throughout the North American route. Indeed, if you check country by country, you will find that those governments that have best dealt with unem ployment, best dealt with their economies, have been countries such as Austria, West Germany and other nations of the land that have indeed followed activist and social democratic appr oaches. Mr.

Speaker, I say to the Leader of the Opposition that if the present recess ion is not turned around and if the present recess ion continues to deepen, as indeed it appears in some quar ters as though it is continuing to deepen, the recess ion will bring about larger and larger deficits thr oughout the en tire North American and western world economies. Mr .

Speaker, if we are indeed to reach a point where we can ensure that ther e be economic recovery, so that again governments can reach a point of lessen ing their deficits and moving towards more balanced budgets, whether it be in jurisdictions in Canada or elsewhere, there will have to first be a concerted effort in order to overcome the joblessness, the lack of consumer confi dence, the lack of investment which is taking place. The laissez-faire appr oach, Mr . Speaker, will mean greater and greater and greater deficits.

We are against the continuation of greater and greater deficits, as are the inevitable re sult of the present policies that are being pursued. HON. S. LYON: Mr . Speaker, I quote from the brief that was presented yesterday by the Minister of Finance this brief quotation and ask the Fir st Minister if he supports this position. I'm quoting from Page 1 of The Unem ployment Crisis in Canada; Man itoba's Proposals for a Co-ordinated National Response.

"Respons ibility for the unemployment crisis now facing Canada cannot and should not be assigned totally to a single circum stance. a single policy, a single sector, a single govern ment or a single order of government. There have been many causes and there are no simple solutions." Mr. Speaker, if that is the position of the Government of Man itoba today, why, a year ago was the Fir st Minis ter, on a signed document that he gave to the people of Manitoba, saying, "We can build a dynamic future in Man itoba, we can turn around the harsh economic cir cumstances of the past four years." Mr .

Speaker, I would like to find out from the Fir st Minister, has he now totally disowned this piece of election literatu re? Which state ment are we to believe? HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker, again I am pleased that 282 the Leader of the Op position has referred back to the period a year ago because a year ago we had just come through the period 19 78, 19 79, 19 80. and into the early part of '81 when Manitoba was suffering a mini-recession in this province, a recession indeed that was not shared by the rest of Canada, a recess ion that was introduced, Mr .

Speaker to this province because of the policies of acute pr otracted restr aint pursued by the previous administration in Manitoba. Mr . Speaker, it is unfortu nate that the recess ion in Manitoba was then joined by the worldwide and North American rece ssion in 19 81 compounding the overall problem. Now, Mr . Speaker, I would like to read on from where the Leader of the Opposition had read in the document which was released yesterday, just for his benefit and so we can obtain the total picture in the Chamber.

The paragraph following continues: "Without doubt t'1e high interest policy of the Federal Government and the Bank of Canada has played a dominant and damaging role in dampening economic activity, re ducing employment and erod ing consumer investment confidence across the country. However, there have been other significant contri buting factors as well, including less-than adequate co-ordination among governments on a national basis in planning and implementing an all-out effort to encourage recovery, restore confidence and create jobs. Mr .

Speaker, we recognize that there is a problem in the land that re quir es co-operation and co-ordination of all levels of government, that re quires levels of govern ment, re quir es peoples to put aside some of the partisan bickering which has taken place over the past, to join together in order to overcome this crisis during peace time insofar as joblessness is concerned. HON. S. LYON: Mr. Speaker, I think every member in this House is concerned about the social damage that is done to unemployed persons in all parts of this country.

My honourable friend need not think that he has any monopoly on that kind of concern. I merely wish to ask the Honourable First Minister, Mr . Speaker, when the 24,000 more unemployed people in Manitoba today - 24,000 more than ther e were a year ago -what can he tell them when they ask, why did you tell us that you could turn around the harsh economic circumstances of the last four years? Mr . Speaker. those 24,000 people all had jobs a year ago, they haven't got jobs under this stumbling government. What's he going to tell them now? HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr .

Speaker, I want to advise the Leader of the Opposition that I, for one, have no prob lem discussing joblessness and the present state of the Manitoba economy with those that are unemplo yed. I went to Leaf Rapids, went to Lynn Lake, went to Thomp son and other areas so that I could speak directly to the unemp loyed in the areas that are hardest affected. But. Mr . Speaker, what I have noticed -and I am proud of this fact -that Man itobans are intelligent; they are sophisti cated. We sometimes in this Chamber don't give Man it obans proper respect for the intelligence they indeed possess. Mr .

Speaker, what i ilave said to Manitobans is, we can overcome the economic mire that we're in. What is req uired are policies, and I have enunciated those policies in this House, and what is req uired is an all-out concerted effort not only on the part of Man itoba, but

req uired on the part of the Federal Government, the other Provinces of Canada. and together, if we put aside this partisan bickering - because it sure is time that we do that. Mr. Speaker - we can overcome the present joblessness in the country. I have every confidence that with that kind of appr oach thr oughout this land, thr oughout Canada, we can indeed turn around the harsh economy that presently exists. HON. S. LYON: Mr . Speaker. we all want to co-operate in helping the unemployed in Manitoba and across Canada.

Can the Fir st Minister tell us when he is going to renounce the false statements that he made to the people of Manitoba a year ago telling him that he can turn around the harsh economy? When, Mr . Speaker. is this kind of trave ling snake-oil salesmanship going to end and the truth emerge? HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr. Speaker, I cert ainly don't mind providing what may be another repetitious answer to what has been a further repet itious question, if that indeed is your wish. Mr. Speaker, I indicated earlier, Manitobans are fully aware of the root cause of the present economic debacle.

They are quite aware of the fact that not just Manitoba, but other parts of this coun try share even more difficult circumstances. In fact, Manitoba has stood quite well by way of comparison; the Conference Board Report cert ainly confirms that, Mr . Speaker.

What Man itobans also recog nize is that there is addi tional unemp loyment in this province, but they also know that there is a government in this province that does not accept a passive appr oach but an activist approach. a government that does not support tight money and high interest rate policies but supports a different monetary appr oach to the economic problems confronting this country.

They know that ther e is a gov ernment in this province that is prepar ed to declare quite openly that if the Federal Government is prepared to undertake certain actions that we will not be hung up on narrow jur isdictional or political lines, but we will join hands with those in the Federal Government in order to work co-operat ively to overcome the problem.

They know that we have a government that is prepared also, if we can obtain this kind of supp ort from other provinces, to work with other provinces to overcome the present difficulty Manitobans know that there is in Man itoba a govern ment that is prepared to work towards this objective, a government that states very clearly, and has stated for the last ten months that jobs are the major problem in Canada - not inflation, but jobs, Mr . Speaker -and are pr epared to develop programs, positive programs to overcome those difficulties. Mr . Speaker.

I must just say by way of comment that as I indicated, I've had opportunity to speak to hundreds of the jobless in this province in the last few months and I share with them, as all Memb ers of this House share - I am sure the Leader of the Opposition feels the same concern - the plight that they're in, the loss of self este em, the psychological and emotional distress that this causes, but at the same time, Mr.

Speaker, the unemployed know full well the root costs, the monetary syste m, the lack of action on the part of so many governments of the world in order to deal with the depr ess ing and archaic situation that exists in the world. MR. SPEAKER: Order please. The Honour able Mem ber for Turtle Mountain. MR. A. RANSOM: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Fir st Minister. Has the Fir st Minister recommended to the Federal Government that if the provinces don't co oper ate in a co-ordinated program, that the Federal Government should force them to do so? MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Fir st Minister. HON. H.

PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker, I would not expect that that be the case. I think the provinces in Canada have reached a point where they recognize. only thr ough co-operative federa lism, only through co-ordinated and joint approach can this be overcome. Mr . Speaker, if indeed the provinces of this country don't respond to a co-ordinated and joint effort, then I think the Federal Government will have to find ways and means of utilizing its proper respons ibility, the govern ment chiefly re sponsible for the economy, will have to find ways in order to deal with that.

Specifically answer ing, no, I have not communicated any such advice to the Federal Government but in fairness I say to the member that if the provinces don't assume action then at some point the Federal Government will have to assume action. Headingley bypass MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Assiniboia. MR. R. NORDMAN: Mr . Speaker, I have a couple of questions, through you, to the Minister of Highways. The Minister of Highways and I have been in conversa tion on several occasions, not only with him but with his office, with regard to the proposed bypass in the Head ingley area.

I have a group of very concerned people out ther e that would like to know, first off, has there been a definite route esta blished for the bypass? MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Highways. HON. S. USKIW: I don't believe that the surveys have been completed to the point where we can define a plan · for expropriation, it's somewhere in the process, but I don't believe it's ready. 283 MR. R. NORDMAN: Mr . Speaker, through the rumour mill I understand that ther e is some land that has already been expropriated, or in the process of being exprop riated, and some land being purchased. Is that correct, Sir?

HON. S. USKIW: Well from re collection, Mr . Speaker, I believe there was a property on which ther e was going to be some structu res built and in that instance we decided that we had better move quickly in order that we not be faced with the proposition of having to exprop riate structu res that are yet to be built. So ther e has been some pur chasing, or offers of pur chase. I'm not sure if the pu rchases have been completed. MR. R. NORDMAN: Finally, Mr . Speaker, in view of the concerns of the citizens of the immediate area of Head ingley, would you assure me that a public meeting will

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 be held to consider their concerns in the very near future? HON. S. USKIW: Mr . Speaker. I have attempted to respond to every individual and every group on that question and the office is open for any group that wants to meet with me. I want to indicate and reinforce the tact that the decision was made some time ago. that we will eventually construct a new route. At the moment all we are doing is land banking and it will be some other government some day that will decide when to proceed with the construction. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member tor Pembina. MR. D. ORCHARD: Thank you.

Mr . Speaker. It would seem from the Minister of Highway's answers to my colleague's questions that indeed a route has been established. that a plan of survey is in the pr ocess of completion and certa in properties are being acquired. In view of that fact I would like to ask the First Minister to explain why in his letter to Councillor Stefansson, dated November 22nd. 19 82, this in reply to a reso lution from the City of Winnipeg. and a letter to the Premier from Councillor Stefansson in which Councillor Stefansson indicates.

"I am send ing this to you r attention because the Minister of Highways has not replied to date and has also not returned telephone calls," this being in regard to the construction of a bypass around Headingley. The Premier indicated to Mr . Stefansson that when the exact status of the No. 1 Highway has been deter mined by Mr . Uskiw. that information will be available to everyone on an equal basis since it is quite evident that the location of the bypass has been established.

Can I ask the First Minister why ther e has not been a meeting with the re sidents of Headingley as he has indicated in his November 22nd letter that information would be provided when available? MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Fir st Minister. HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker. I apologize, I didn't hear the earlier line of ques tioning from the member. But insofar as the commitment respect ing the Head ing ley bypass. that depends upon the need tor proceed ing with that bypass timewise. It may be a number of years before any construction work would take place in respect to that bypass.

It's my unders tanding that an exact or precise route has not yet been determ ined so, Mr. Speaker. I'm not quite conscious of what the member is tr ying to es tablish. MR. D. ORCHARD: Well, Mr . Speaker. with all due respect to the Fir st Minister I would suggest that if a plan of survey is being completed and properties are being acquired, indeed a route for the Head ingley bypass has been chosen.

What the citizens of Head ingley and the constituency of Assiniboia wish to have. and the First Minister has assured them they will have that by his reply to Councillor Stefansson. is that those citizens will have the same opportunity to be heard by this govern ment as to the location of the Head ingley bypass as the residents in the Logan area have had with this govern ment in the Industrial Park concern. Can the Fir st Minis·· ter assure the citizens of Heading ley and Assiniboia that such an informational meeting will take place to listen \o 284 their concerns before the route is chosen, not after the fact?

HON. S. USKIW: Well. Mr . Speaker, the member was obviously not listening when I gave my first answer to the Member for Assiniboia, wherein I indicated that an announcement had been made to the effect that a relo cation plan was already decided upon. but it's a futuris tic decision and the construction of that new route will likely not take place within the life of this government and we don't know when it would take place.

But in the meantime, because of the development s that were tak ing place in the area, we wanted to bank land in that area for a new route, and it's merely a land banking exercise at the moment. We have provisions in The Expropriation Act which allow for any citizen to challenge the wisdom of that decision when an order of expropriation is filed. That is the process, I believe, the First Minister would be allud ing to when he said that the normal process of hearings would be undertaken. It's provided for in The Expropria tion Act.

One can argue a case for or against the loca tion, or whatever variation the reof, or the need of the project if ther e's an inquiry officer appointed. So nothing is final until that pr ocess is complete. That is due pro cess, well esta blished in this province and we don't intend to violate that. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr . Speaker, thank you. I refer a question then back to the First Minister. We are not discussing the process of Head ingley res ident input after the decision on location has been made. What the First Minister has indicated to Councillor Stefansson is that they will have input on the decision.

That apparently will not happen and I ask the First Minister, will he allow the citizens of Headingley in the constituency of Assini boia the opportunity to be heard and their concerns to be listened to by this government on the location of the Headingley bypass similar to the method in which this government listened to the citizens of Logan in consti tuencies held by members of the New Democratic Party?

Will he give constituents and residents of Assini boia, a constituency held by a member of the Opposi tion, the same oppor tunity of equal access to this gov ernment in attempting to help it make its decisions? HON. H. PAWLEY: I should refresh the honourable member's reflection that it was the previous government that had cut off an inquiry officer from holding hearings under the legislation pert aining to Logan.

It was the concern of this government +hat ther e be fair and proper hearings that caused the appointment of an inquiry officer and, I believe. the honourable member across the way was part of the Treasury Bench at the time that must have partici pated in an agreement to waive the hearings under The Expropriation Act pertai ning to the Logan Avenue expropria tion. I just want the record to be clear. Also. I want the record to be clear on another point because ther e is an insinuation in the member's state ment that this is a government that's not concerned about ridings across the way. Mr .

Speaker, let me assure honourable members across the way that I've spent more time in communities this past year, and I've enjoyed it very much. represented by honourable members across the way. I've spent time in Boissevain. 111 Mel ita. in Souris, in Virden. in Russell. in Gilb ert

Plains. in Roblin, in Minnedosa - in fact. I could go on and on to Morris and other com munities. So, Mr . Speaker. let there be no implication left in this Chamber that this is a government that some way or other only represents a part of the Province of Man itoba. We're interested in all of Manitoba. Mr . Speaker, insofar as the concerns expressed by the Member for Pem bina I would share those concerns. I believe that prior to proce eding with construction of any bypass that that work ought not to be proceeded with until ther e has been a proper opportun ity for discus sions with the residents involved.

The Member for Lac du Bonne t. the Minister of Transportation, has indicated that ther e are no immediate plans to proceed with con struction of the highway. So, Mr . Speaker, I don't know what the discussion is rea lly all about. in view of the fact ther e are no immed iate plans to proceed with construct ion. Co-op housing MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Memb er for La Verendrye. MR. R. BANMAN: Thank you, Mr . Speaker. I direct my question to the Minister in charge of Co-operative Development and would ask the Minister if he has hired any additional new staff to deal with co-op housing? MR.

SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Consumer and Corp orate Affairs. HON. J. BUCK LASCHUK: Thank you, Mr . Speaker. I'm not aware of any new staff having been hired. I'll take that question as notice. MR. R. BANMAN: A suppleme ntary question to the same Minister. Mr. Speaker. Has the Minister given any grants to any new housing co-operatives or has he implemented any new policies or programs with regard to co-op housing? HON. J. BUCK LASCHUK: Thank you, Mr . Speaker. I'm not aware of any new grants that have been going out to any new co-operatives at this time but I'll take that as notice as well. MR. R.

BANMAN: In light of the re sponse to that ques tion, I wonder if I could direct a further que stion to the Fir st Minister and ask him, in a report tabled by him, I believe, several weeks ago, a report on action taken by the NDP Government in their first year in government they say part of the action includes increased assistance to co-operative housing. I wonder if he could explain what that assistance has been? -(Int erjec tion)- MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able First Minister. HON. H. PAWLEY: I'm afraid I don't catch the joke across the way, Mr . Speaker -(I nterjec tion)- well, I don't want to be impolite.

There have been enough members being imp olite these last few days without adding to that, Mr. Speaker. In August, if members will refer to the announcement re the $50 program re expansion of housing, we indi cated very clearly that the housing program would be of a mixed nature; that it would involve homes in Manitoba; it would involve additional initiative pertai ning to Critical Home Repair and for Renovation Programs. Also, Mr .

Speaker, we would be prepar ed to provide funds re the development of co-op housing projects and that is cer tainly part and parcel of the overall housing program that was announced, I think, it was last August 7th or 8th. Seat belt legislation MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Memb er for Elmwood. MR. R. DOERN: Mr . Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Highways and ask him whether he can confirm that Newf oundland has become the fifth province to introduce seat belt legislation and that over 80 percent of all Canadians now live in provin ces with such legislation? MR.

SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Highways. HON. S. USKIW: Well, Mr . Speaker, to the extent that I believe the written word, written by the media, I suppose I can confirm that. I haven't researched it through the department, Mr . Speaker, but I believe that to be accu rate and that, indeed, the vast majority of Canadians now live under that kind of re gulation with respect to the operation of motor vehicles. Co-op housing MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Me mber for La Verendrye. MR. R. BANMAN: Mr . Speaker, a further question to the First Minister.

In light of the report which he tabled to all Man itobans showing the so-called action that was taken by the New Democratic Government in Man itoba between December'81 and November '82. could he now confirm that even though the action that he has said the government has undertaken, that particular action as far as co-op housing is not a factual statement? HON. H. PAWLEY: Mr . Speaker, I believe the Minister of Housing wants to add some further information.

The · state ment is very very accurate and I'm pleased that the Minister of Housing wants to elabor ate further and pro vide the honourable member with, apparently, some information that the honourable member is not con scious or aware of. I reg ret that, because it means that maybe the constituents in La Verendr ye have not been informed of some programs that they should be. 285 MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Housing. HON. J. STORIE: Mr.

Speaker. as the former Minister of Co-operative Development should recog nize, if he had been involved at all in co-operative development in the housing area, you simply cannot develop a co-operative housing program overni ght. Fir st of all, you have to identify a group that is inter ested in co-op housing, then you have to have them develop some expertise in the area of co-op housing. Mr. Speaker, since the announcement in August, the individuals re sponsible for co-operative housing in the Department of Co-operative Development have met

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 with myself. have met with staff at MHRC to initiate action in co-op housing. We have also had contact with a resource group and currently they are negotiating a contract with the MHRC to provide the kind of liaison between the co-operative groups out ther e and MHRC. Further. Mr . Speaker, we have had assurances from CMHC that they will fund co-operative housing in excess of the present non-profit allocation that is com ing to this province so that we can be assured that non-profit housing, the co-op housing, will be taking place in the near future. MR.

SPEAKER: The Honour able Me mber for La Verendrye. MR. R. BANMAN: Well, Mr . Speaker. a question to the Minister of Housing. What new programs that were now already in place, the high impact grant, all these things were in place over the last, I believe. eight years, and CMHC has provided funding for that and we were involved in that - but what new initiative has this government implemented, Mr . Speaker. implemented, taken action on, since they have taken office other than existing programs that were there before? HON. J. STORIE: Mr .

Speaker. if we're talking about the number of units, there are approxi mately 1, 400 co-op units and there is ongoing support to those co-ops. I've just indicated to the honourable member that you do not develop a co-op program overn ight I have indicated that we are in the process of negotiating with a resource group to co-ordinate the activities. Those actions have been undertaken. There is also a need and activity on our part, and I have met with community groups interested in co-op activity. Co-op housing is continuing in the province. MR. SPEAKER: Order please.

The time for Oral Ques tions having ex pir ed, the Honour able Memb er for Rhineland. HANSARD CORRECTION MR. A. BROWN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise on a point of privilege. On Page 252 of Hansard, Wednesday, 15 December, 19 82. under the heading "MACC -interest rate," and the second sentence of the question that I asked, "The Farm Credit Corporation has dropped its interest rates on regular farm loans to 9.25 from 15 75." That should be 13 .25. The 9.25 should be changed to 13 .25. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Mem ber did not have a point of privilege. but his correction is duly noted. ORDERS OF THE DAY MR.

SPEAKER: The Honour able Government House Leader. HON. R. PENNER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. would you call Bills No. 2 and 14 first. please? 286 SECOND READING - GOVERNMENT BILLS BILL NO. 2 - THE LAW ENFORCEMENT REVIEW ACT HON. R. PENNER presented Bill No. 2, The Law Enforcement Review Act;

Loi sur les enq uetes relatives l'application de la loi, for second re ading. MOTION presented. MR. SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister. HON. R. PENNER: Mr .

Speaker, The Law Enforcement Review Act is intended To promote a high standard of profess ional conduct among police officers in Man itoba; To guarantee each citizen in Man itoba opportunity for independent investigation and review of complaints against municipal police officers; To provide a mechanism for the reso lution of those complaints in a manner that is fair both, Sir. to police officers concerned and to citizens, and To ensure that the conduct of police officers is con sistent with the rules of law and the ideals of a demo cratic and open society.

The Act will in no way diminish or limit the rights of citizens and police officers to secure remedies at law in either civil or criminal courts; nor, Sir, is it intended to interfere with existing procedures in matters of police discipline which do not involve private citizens. The scope of the Act is as follows: The Law Enforce ment Review Act will deal only with citizens' complaints against the police. Where no citizen is involved in a police matter, the existing internal disciplinary proce dures will apply.

Conversely, wher e a citizen is involved and in the event of a conflict between the Act and inter nal disciplinary procedures, the provisions of the Act will prev ail. Under the Act, one member of the public will be entitled to complain about police treatment of another member of the public. However, a citizen will not be entitled to complain about the speed or thoroughness of a criminal investigation. Such complaints will be chan nelled elsewhere, as they are now. The Act will only affect those members of a police force who are in day-to-day contact with the public through law enforcement operations.

Thus, where in the Act we have terms like "member" or "member of a police departm ent," the definition of that will be such that any person emp loyed by a pol:ce department, having the powers of a constable or of a peace officer, or employed as a peace officer by any municipality in the Province of Manitoba, will be within the de finition. The Act will expr essly affirm the authority of munici palities to regu late their own police forces and of chiefs of police to issue directives with respect to discipline within the force and the maintenance of law and order in municipalities.

However. these powers will be subject to the provisions of the Act concern ing citizens' com plaints and any regulations made under the Act The review process conte, ,1plated in the Act will be initiated by means of a complaint defined as a complaint by a member of the public respect ing the conduct of a member of a police department towards the complain ant or some other member of the public.

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 There will be a Commissioner and the Commission er's Office will be a clearing house where all citizens' complaints against the police; that is, for example, any complaint made to a police officer or to the chief of police must immediately be referred to the Commis sioner, so it becomes a clearing house. The Commissioner 's initial role will be to investigate all complaints made by citizens against the police. The Commissioner will have all of the powers of a Commis sioner under

Part 5 of The Man itoba Evidence Act, so that the Commissioner may make reasonable inquiry into any relevant matters. The Commissioner, Mr. Speaker, will have the power to utilize whatever resou rces he or she may deem necessary in investigating a complaint. However, except as otherwise provided in the Act, that is, at the request of the complainant himself or herself, the Commissioner shall not employ for purposes of investigations any per son who is or was at the time of the occurrence, which is complained of, a member of the police force involved in the complaint.

That person is excluded from the inves tigative procedu res. At the written request of the complainant, the Com missioner may refer the matter to the police department for internal investigation, so that if the citizen has filed a complaint with the Winnipeg force, for example, and upon being contacted by the Commissioner who states that he would rather it be invest igated by the Winnipeg internal investigation unit, then that shall be done.

When that investigation has been completed, the internal investigation unit, however, must report to the Commis sioner and the Commissioner will consult with the com plainant in order to determine what, if any, further action is req uired. After there has been investigation by the Commis sioner, the Commissioner may deal with the matter in a number of ways.

Fir st of all, and this will re ally be prim ary, that is an attempt to resolve the matter informally among the complainant, the member and the chief of the force involved; or the Commissioner, in order to weed out what might be frivolous and merely vexatious, may dismiss the complaint if it appears to the Commis sioner to be frivolous or vexatious or to be outside the param eters of the Act. Before making such a ruling, in order to observe the req uirements of due process the Commissioner must give the complainant the opportu nity to be heard.

Wher e the Commissioner has dis missed the complaint, the complainant will be able to apply to the Man itoba Police Commission for an order re quir ing the Law Enforcement Review Board to con duct a hearing into the complaint, but that will then be the decision of the Man itoba Police Commission and in that case will be final and not appealable. Where the Commissioner believes that a disciplinary default may have been committed and that informal re solution is not possible or desirable, he or she will refer the complaint to The Law Enforcement Review Board for adjudication.

When making any referral to that board, the Commissioner must specify the maximum penalty, if any, to be assessed against the member and the Commissioner will determine the appropria te max imum penalty after consulting the Chief of Police and after exa mining the member's service record of disci pline and of course the board adjudicating, if it finds that the member was at fault, may assess less than the max imum.

The purpose, Sir, of that provision, as has been 287 tested for some years now in British Columbia, is that many police officers when advised that the maximum penalty stipulated is relatively minor may dispose of the matter without formal adjudication. At all times dur ing the investigation by the Commissioner the member will have the protect ion of due process. For example, he or she will have the right to see any documents held by the Commmissioner, subject only to the rules of privilege.

Also, a member will have the right to retain counsel at any stage of the review process including investigations by the Commissioner. No member against whom a complaint is made shall be bound to make any statement to the Commissioner or to answer any questions asked by the Commissioner or asked by anyone emp loyed by the Commissioner in the course of an investigation. The right to silence is preserved in this Act. The member will be entitled to see copies of any state ments made by witnesses in the mat ter.

All state ments made by the member to the Commis sioner during the investigative part of it are privileged at the member's request. Now in order to facilitate what is a prime thrust here, that is, informal reso lution of as many complaints as possible, any statement made either by the complainant or the member to the Commissioner for purposes of resolution will be privile ged for all pur poses, including privileged for purposes of a hearing by the Law Enforcement Review Board and privileged with respect to any civil matters arising out of the complaint.

The Act will authorize the Commissioner to recom mend changes in any organizational or administrative pr actices which may have contributed to any discipli nary defaults by an individual police officer. Finally, Sir, with respect to the Law Enforcement Review Board itself, the Cabinet will appoint, for such term as it directs, seven persons to constitute the board. Now, these are not full-time appointments; these are just persons who will constitute in a panel available for adjudication.

The seven board members will include a chairman and a vice-chairman, both of whom must be legally trained and have at least five years at the Bar. Either the chairman or the vice-chairman will preside over a hearing and three members of the board will constitute a quor um, so the normal hearing will be three persons, one of whom shall be either the chairperson or the vice-chairperson. The board will have all the powers of the Commis sioner under Part (5) of The Man itoba Evidence Act. Evidence will be given under oath or affirmation, as the case warrants, and evidence will be recorded.

Both the complainant and the member will have the right to be present at board hearings to call witnesses, to cross examine witnesses, to be represented by counsel. A member who faces a complaint will not be compellable as a witness at a board hearing. So all of the normal attribut es of due process, pr otect ion of a person who is alleged to be at fault, will be preserved. All board hearings, and this is important, will be public unless the board believes that the maintenance of order of the proper administration of justice or the ends of justice re quir e an in-camera hearing.

The burden will be on the complainant to prove that the member has com mitted a disciplinary default; the standard of proof will be the balance of probab ilities. Finally, the Commissioner shall submit an annual report to the Attorney-General and to all police employing authorities in the province, and the Attorney

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 General so table the report in the Legislature. I commend this bill to the House. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER, P. Ey ler: The Honour able Member for St. Norb ert. MR. G. MERCIER: Mr. Speaker, just a question to the Minister for clarification, because I don't believe I heard any reference to it in the Attorney-General's remarks. Could he indicate what effect this bill would have on the collective agreement of the City of Winnipeg Police Association with the city? HON. R.

PENNER: Yes, it is mentioned in the spe aking notes, a copy of which the member has, conversely where a citizen is involved, and in the event of a conflict between the Act and internal disciplinary proceed ures, the pr ovisions of the Act will prev ail. More specifically, and it does appear in the Act, that where there is a complaint of a citizen against a police officer and it is going thr ough the law enforcement review process, then that pr ocess, the law enforcement review process, takes pr ecedence over the collective agreement. MR. G. MERCIER: Mr .

Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honour able Member for Sturgeon Creek, that debate be adjourned. MOTION presented and carried. BILL NO. 14 -

AN ACT TO AMEND THE ELECTIONS ACT MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Attorney General. HON. R. PENNER pr esented Bill No. 14 ,

An Act to amend The Elections Act; Loi modifiant la loi lectorale, for second time. MOTION presented. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Attorne y General. HON. R. PENNER: Thank you, Mr . Deputy Speaker. My remarks in introducing this bill will be briefer than those in introducing the last bill. Bill No. 14 contains several amendments which are of a rather substantive nature and a much larger number of technical amendments.

Virtually all of the amendments are being introduced by the government in response to rec ommendations contained in the review of The Elec tion Act prepared by the Chief Electoral Officer and submitted to the government. The Chief Electoral Officer's review of The Election Act was conducted immediately after the 19 81 provin cial general election and many of the changes he has recommended are in response to difficulties which occurred during the administration of the Act during that election. These amendments, ther efore, are not unusual and the pr ocess that preceded it is not unusual.

The last election was conducted under a new Elec tions Act passed by the previous government in 19 80 and that legislation, which was sponsor ed by the Member for St. Norbert when he was Attorney -General, 288 was essen tially a complete rewrite of an old, and at that time, archaic piece of legislation and the fact that Bill No. 14 in fact contains so few amendments attest to the fact that we're dealing with a relatively new statute.

The technical amendments deal with such things as the rules for publishing and posting of election procla mations, the fixing of Tuesdays as polling days, changes in the withdrawal procedure, changes in oaths or the provision for oaths for incapacitated voters, clarification of marks allowed on ballots at the count and several other similarly technical amendments. The major policy amendments include the adoption of the, what we believe to be, successful federal election practice of a continuous advance poll held in the retu rn ing officer's office. This allows their appeal of provisions for continuous revision.

In addition, the bill provides that the occupation of the candidate will no lon(J3r be req uired on the ballot paper. It is the governmen t's wish to provide maximum opportu nities for eligible voters to partici pate in the process: ther efore, the re quirement that voters who have been left off the list at enume ration and revision will no longer be re quir ed to bring two enumerative voters from the same constituency to the poll with them to swear their knowledge of that voter and of that voter's re sidency.

This practice tends to disqual ify many people who, although res ident in the consti tuency, do not know other qualified voters who are resident in that constituency. Since many of the amendments are of a technical nature, I will be prepared to discuss the detailed impact to each par ticular sect ion and both, of course, in debate on second re ading, but more particularly, when the bill goes to committee. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Member for St. Norbert. MR. G. MERCIER: Mr.

Speaker, the Ho nou rable Attorney-General referred to a report by the Chief Elec toral Officer: I don't believe we have a copy of that. I wonder if the Attorne y-General wou ld be kind enough to sup ply us with a copy of it. I note that ther e is in this bill somewhere a provision that there be an annual report from now on which is a good idea. Perhaps this is someth ing along that line, and I would think we would like to have the benefit of having a copy of that report. HON. R. PENNER: Yes, I will be pleased to provide the Memb er for St.

Norbert with the report, to which I alluded, being the report of the Chief Electoral Officer. MR. G. MERCIER: Mr . Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honour able Memb er for Fort Garry, that debate be adjourned. MOTION presented and carried. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Attorne y General. HON. R. PENNER: Mr. Speaker, will you call in the following order Bill No. 6, then Bill No. 7, and finally Bill No. 3. BIL L NO. 6 - THE PESTICIDES AND FERTILIZER CONTROL ACT HON. B. URUSKI presented Bill No. 6.

An Act to amend

Thursday, 16 December, 1982 The Pesticides and Fer tilizer Control Act, for second read ing. MOTION presented. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Agriculture. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr . Speaker, it is my intention to be very brief on this piece of legislation. It is essentially housekeep ing amendments. Their purpose is to clar ify the

definitions as they apply to commercial applicators and fer tilizers and to improve the procedure for monitor ing the use of pesticides and fertil izers in our pro vince. The present Act provides a procedure for licencing of retailers and commercial appl icators. This procedure includes tr aining courses and examinations to ensure that retailers and commercial applicators fully under stand the safe handling and usage of pesticides and fer tilizers before they are granted a licence. The amendments that are proposed in Bill No. 6 are to strengthen this procedure. MR.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Memb er for Arthur. MR. J. DOWNEY: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Member for Pembina, that debate be adjourned. MOTION presented and carried. BILL NO. 7 - THE DAIRY ACT HON. B. URUSKI presented Bill No. 7, The Act to amend The Dairy Act, for second read ing. MOTION presented. MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honour able Minister of Agriculture. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Speaker, the pu rpose of the amendments in Bill No. 7 is to formally establish the Man itoba Dairy Board and to authorize remuneration to be paid to board members who are non-civil servants.

I have to say to the honourable members, we've been appointing the Dairy Board for years and years but ther e's never been a formal authority in the legislation to approve it. Well, Mr. Speaker, we have had the board for many years giving advice. I don't know, maybe my honourable colleague, the Mem ber for Arthur , never even knew that there was such a board but ther e is and there has been. The main purpose, Mr . Speaker, of the Dairy Board is to determine the economic liability of proposed dairy plants in Man itoba and to advise the Minister.

The board takes into consideration such things as location, volume of production, marketing facilities and other factors that may affect the deve lopment of the dairy industry in the district to be served by a proposed plant. After rec eiving the recom mendation that a proposed dairy plant is via ble, the Minister may then make the decision to issue a permit with estab lishment of the plant. The board also may make rec ommendations to the Minister before he issues a permit for the proposed enlargement or alteration of a plant or installation of 289 eq uipment in a plant. Should the appl ication for a perm

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	32-2-11a
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	32nd 2nd hansardpdf 11a.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	40b14b99363b4e0d9750b5bd0ad6249c5dcb9529

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