·;• VOL. 3 NO. 15 THI~D SESSION OF THF THIRTY-NINTH GF.NFRI\L ASSEt!BLY OF NP.~·TFOUl'TDJ...ANT1 PRP.LDU!'lAP.Y UN:SDITED TPJ\NSCRIPT HOUSE OF ~.SSEHLBY FOP. THE PERIOD: 3:00p.m. - 6:00 p.m. MONDAY, APRIL 2, 1984

April 2, 1984 Tape 567 PK - l The House met at 3:00 P.M. Mr. Speaker in t~e Chair. MR. SPEAKER (Russell): Order, please! ORAL QUESTIONS MR. SPEAKER: The bon. Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, before I address my question to the Government House Leader (Mr. Marshall), I have to draw to the attention of the House that he did not have the courage to show up the other night for the Confederation gala. He would have been welcomed even if he was carrying a·· protest placard.

He did not want to sing 'O Canada', I suppose that is : why he did not come, or he might have had to say,' I atn a proud canadian'. - - . -- - -· --In connection with this little brochure , Mr. Speaker, ~remise Proposal, in the first ·: proposal , in parqgraph one, 'When the Right Han. Joe Clark was Prime Minister the Government of Newfoundland proposed 1 and Mr. Clark agreed,that the offshore would be treated the same -. as if it were on land, That _:is to say, we'd haye ownership and ·-:.41 · • _ r control like the other oil and gas producing provinces.

However, when the Trudeau Administration was re-elected they rejected the Clark position.' Now, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that the Tories nationally have adopted , the same position as the Liberal J Government in Ottawa,this brochure is misleading and should be withdrawn. Now, Mr. Speaker, will the bon. gentleman tell the House if it is the intention of the administration there opposite - -----------·-- ·- !.ffi. TOBIN: MR. NEARY: Who are you asking the question t~? ~ I am asking the Government House Leader, the gentleman responsible far Energy.

If this brochure that is costing the taxpayers of this Province so much money is now misleading , well it was always misleading, ,/ but mareso now since the 1533

·: April 2, 1984 Tape 567 PK - 2 MR. NEARY: Tories have adopted the same position as the Liberals -well it be withdrawn? Will there be another prochure issued to correct the misleading statements that are made in this brochure, Mr . Speaker? 1534 I ,.

-- ---- -·-· . --- .. April 2, 1984 Tape No. 568 SD - 1 MR. SPEAKER (Russell): The hon. President of the Council. MR. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker, there are no misleading statements in that brochure. They are accurate, they are factual. The federal Progressive Conservative Government was prepared to treat the resources the same as if they were on land. Mr. Trudeau tore up that understanding· Then we negotiated from the point of view of joint ownership. They would not hear of. that. Then we tried to negotiate from the point of view of a sensible joint management regime,and they would not hear of that.

So instead of the han. gentleman getting up and making statements of that nature which . have no foundation whatsoever ,I would suggest that he would better serve the people of this Province if he would press the federal . government of the day and ask .wh .en it is prepared to treat Newfoundland with fairness and equity in the offshore and on the other matters,or does he prefer to do what the present representative in the federal Cabinet apparently did over the weekend 1 and get up and exult over the fact that the federal government were going to do it all be themselves, all alone?

Does the non. gentleman think that that is a great stance for somebody to take who is supposed to be representing Newfoundland rn the federal Cabinet of Canada? MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The han. Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEARY: Mr. . Speaker, I was coming to that 1 but before I' come to that the han. gentleman should take a look up in th .e gallery over the Speaker ts gallery and -rnayoe he should buy a shirt like that, drape hlmself in ~e flag , as he is attempting to do again this afternoon. He should get a shirt with the Newfoundland flag. Now, Mr.

Speaker, will they be i:s ·suing a brochure now to the schools and to the liquor stores and to all the oth .er places in Newfoundland, will 1535

April 2, 19.84 Tape No. 568 so - 2 MR. NEARY: they be putting out another brochure saying now'first proposal shot down by the national Tories,' that the position of the Tory Party of Canada is identical to the position of the Government of Canada? Will the non . gentleman be issuing another brochure t6 that effect? MR. SPEAKER ~uss el1. )_: MR. MAR:SKALL : The hon, President of the Council. No, Mr. Speaker, because that will be unnecessa~ .

No government or no party in Canada could treat another province with as must contempt as to put an offer of the nature that is being put forth oy the present Liberal Party of Canada to the people of Newfoundland through the governm ent. You know, that is the situation.

I think the hon. gentleman would better address hi~self to the rnadequac tes of the offer made with respect to the offshor& oy · the federal government and indicate that he is a Newfoundlander who is prepared to apply the same pressure to hi~ eederal colleagues ±n Ottawa as the provincial government does to realize justice and equity from this resource for Newfoundlanders . MR. NEARY : Supplementary, Mr . Speaker. 1536

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 569 NM - 1 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The hon. the Leader of the Opposition, a supplementary. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. gentleman is not prepared to state the facts to the school children and to the people of the Province, is the hon. gentleman prepared to send along with his package, with the brochures, is he prepared to send along the statement that was made by the Prime Minister at Memorial University that the Government of Canada, of which Mr.

Trudeau was Prime Minister, that the Government of Canada would treat the offshore, immaterial of the court decision, treat the offshore the same as if it was on land, that we would get 100 per cent of the revenue until we became a have Province? Is the hon. gentleman prepared to include a letter to that effect? I can give the hon. gentleman a copy of the letter. Is he also prepared to send along in any future brochures, and any future packages, a very generous offer that was put on the table by Mr.

Chretien, where there would be a joint management committee where 75 per cent of the revenue would go to the Province and all kinds of other goodies that were not in the Nova Scotia agreement? Now, if we are goinq to be factual and we are going to ask the taxpayers to pay for these brochures and the brainwashing and the propaganda, is the hen. gentleman prepared to show the other side of the story by including these things in any future brochures or any future package that goes out to the schools or the liquor stores or any other place in Newfoundland? 1537

April 2, 1984 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : the Council. MR. MARSHALL: Tape No. 569 The hon. the President of We are not concerned with statements,we are concerned with performance . And the hon. the Prime Minister of Canada 1 the hon. gentleman alleges him to say what he did not say. All we know is that there is a marked difference between what the hon. gentleman alleges his Leader in Ottawa said and the performance. You know,it is certainly rejected.

The only thing I remember at the university the Prime Minister of Canada saying was lecturing young Newfoundlanders on the fact that they were selfish to ask for a fair deal on the offshore. And I think he said, "You are much more selfish than your forebears." NM - 2 Now on the business of the generous offer by Mr. Chretien, Mr. Speaker, where does the Liberal Opposition stand? It was just the other day that the han. member for Mount Scio (Mr.

Barry) was getting up and indicating that he agreed in substance with what the Province of Newfoundland was doing with respect to the offshore, and here is the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neary) now urging us to accept Mr. Chretien's so-styled generous offer. So I do not know where the hon. gentlemen stand as between themselves. So, Mr. Speaker, all the hon. gentleman is doing is attempting to confuse as much as he possibly can. The issue is serious. Most people in the Province know the facts that are at stake and we are not -· -····- --- - -- going to allow the hon. gentleman to confuse it in any way.

The fact of the matter is that we had put a year ago a very sensible offer on the table which would have assured equality to all Newfoundlanders with respect to the offshore, 1538

.· . April 2,1984 Tape No. 570 ah-1 MR. MARSHALL: and would have had an effective joint management system. And the other fact of the matter, Mr. Speaker, is that that has been rejected and to date has not be delivered. MR.NEARY: Mr. Speaker. MR.SPEAKER {Russell): The hon. Leader of. the Opposition. MR.NEARY: Mr. Speaker, I wa:nt to say to the hon. ~en~!_eman_that __ the answer .that he just ---- -~ ------ ----- -- r . - -- -- gave is false and incorrect. Mr.

Speaker, I have here the position that was outlined by the Prime Minister over at the un_iversity in a letter to me -dated Ottawa July 6, 1_981, signed by the Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker, And I want to ask the hon. gentleman is he aware that the Pr:ime Minister stated at the university and confirmed to: me in writing that coastal provinces would derive maximum benefits from offshore'?Accordingly, Mr.

Speaker, a system of administrative arrangements involving both the federal government and each coastal province was pro.po-sed and that a coastal province should receive the same kinds of reven~es as are derived by provinces from onshore resources until it becomes a have Province. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is in direct contradition to what the hen. gentleman just said. Is he aware that that statement was . ---- made at the university ' and confirmed in writing. PREMIER PECKFORD: He broke his word. MR.NEARY: The Premier is saying,' he broke his word,'but here it is in writing. I am prepared to table this , Mr.

Speaker. ~ PREMIER PECKFORD: You'tabled it before. MR.NEARY: No, you have not tabled it because you do not have a copy of it. But I am prepared 1539

April 2,1984 Tape No. 570 ah-2 MR .NEARY: to table it. Is the hon. gentleman and the hon. Premier aware that a coastal province, according to the Prime Minister,would receive the same kinds of revenues as are derived by provinces from onshore resources? MR.SPEAKER (Russell): Order, please! I think the Chair has allowed the hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neeary) quite a lengthy

preamble to what is suppose to be a question. SOME HON .MEMBERS: Oh, oh! MR .NEARY: Well,there it is. I am prepared to table it. MR. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The hon. President of the Council. MR. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker, as the Premier says the Prime Minister did not deliver on his word. It was as a result of .that statement that we entered into negotiations in the first place. PREMIER PECKFORD : That is why we negotiated after the statement. MR .

MARSHALL : And we found that what the Prime Minister said he was not prepared to deliverjand neither was his . government prepared to deliver . then or neither have they delivered it since. Maximum benefits are alright to the hon . gentlernan,but what does he mean by maximum benefits? He_ just means by maximum benefits that equalization and welfare payments will be paid from the resources that we have brought into Confederation with us rather than through the central government. So the han. gentleman is not seized of the issue, he does not know, he just does not understand it. Mr.

Speaker, his every word shows, I have 1540

- April 2,1984 Tape No. 570 ah-3 MR. MARS HALL: to say, that he continues to be a willing handmaiden of Ottawa. SOME HON.MEMBERS: MR. NEARY: white. 1541 Hear, hear! Heve it is in black and

April 2, 1984 MR. SPEAKER (Russell): MOUnt Scio. MR . BARRY: - --- ·~ ....:- · ~- Tape 571 EC - 1 The hon. the member for Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Premier. In light of the fact that negotiations have broken off with Quebec-Hydro on the Upper Churchill contract and 1 presumably, on other matters relating to future Labrador hydro development, I would like to ask the Premier whether he would put before this han.

House and the people of the Province the reasons for this latest failure by his administration to conclude and negotiate a settlement on an important issue affecting this Province, specifically, what was the offer of Quebec and how was this inadequate as far as our Province is concerned? MR. SPEAKER: The han. the Premier. PREMIER PECKFORD: Mr. Speaker, first of all, the han. the member for Mount Scio is erroneous in his

preamble. Negotiations have not broken off. We have indicated in our statement of Friday the Government of Newfoundland tended to not agree to defer the Water Rights Reversion Act decision by the Supreme Court of Canada and v1e indicated in that same statement that we wish to continue to negotiate with the Province of Quebec over our mutual problem, that being the question of hydro power in Labrador and specifically the question of the Upper Churchill contract. So negoti­ ations have not broken off but we have taken a particular position as of Friday as it relates to the Water Rights Reversion Act. MR. BARRY: MR.

SPEAKER: member for Mount Scio. MR. BARRY: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary. A supplementary, the hon. the I would like to ask the Premier, in light of the fact that the Province will not consent to 1542

..... -::· .. · April 2, 1984 Tape 571 EC - 2 MR. BARRY: a further deferment or postpone- ment of the Supreme Court of Canada's bringing in its decision, whether the Premier has any indication how long it will take for that decision to be brought down and whether that will give sufficient time to the Province and to Hydro-Quebec to conclude an agreement should, in fact, both parties be desirous of so doing? MR. SPEAKER (Russell): The han. the Premier. PREMIER PECKFORD: Mr. Speaker, as the han. the member for Mount Scio (Mr.

Barry) must know, being the lawyer that he is, we have no particular knowledge of how· long it will take the Supreme Court of Canada to decide and render its decision. That is an unknown to us, in the same way as it was an unknown to us as to what time they would bring down the decision on the offshore reference. We have no particular confidential or secret information as it relates to how long it will take the Supreme Court of Canada to render a decision on the matter. MR. BARRY: Mr. Speaker. 1543

-·, . · ... ... ~ . April 2, 1984 Tape No. 572 MJ - 1 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The hen. the member for Mount Scio. MR . BARRY: Mr.

Speaker, if 1 in fact,it is possible that the Supreme Court of Canada could bring a decision down within the next week or two 1 would that not in the Premier's opinion bear the risk, and a very grave risk- although there is,I believe, a better case here than there was on the offshore presentation, better odds for the Province -- is there not a very grave risk, as in any court case, that the decision could go against the Prov ine~ and would not then the Premier have lost any opportunity of negotiating with the Province of Quebec or be faced with negotiating from a position of weakness having lost another court case?

MR. SPEAKER: The hen. the Premier. PREMIER PECKFORD: Mr. Speaker, that is a very hypothetical question, if this happens then a whole bunch of things flow from there. We do not know whether it is going to be a week, whether it is going to be two weeks, wfiether it is going to be three weeks, whether it is going to be a month;so the han. member is concocting a hypothetical situation and obviously there are all kinds of things that can be said about hypotheses of · that sort. So I do not intend to engage in some kind of hypothetical situation here today.

If the hen. member has a direct question to ask me,well,then I am prepared to answer it,but as far as a hypothetical situation is concerned, who knows? MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: '!he hen. the !lEll1ber for the Strait of Belle Isle . !1P. CARTF:R: ?\ stranger in the Hause! MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, I would rat..'ler be a stranger, in the words of m¥ friend from St. John's North (Mr. Carter) 1 then to be strange 1as he is. 1544

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 572 MJ - 2 MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, let me ask a question of the Minister of Fisheries (Mr. Morgan), who I know will treat the matter a little more seriousl y than would his colleague from St. John's North (Mr. Carter), which,of course,is why the minister is the minister and the gentleman from St. John's North is not. St. Anthony and the Northern Fisheries Development Corporation, could the minister bring us up to date on the situation?

I understand some proposals have gone in from the administration here to the Government of Canada,but I wonder if he could tell us in what form those suggestions were made, were they oral or were they written, and could he tell us 1 more importantly, what response if any there has been? MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The hon. the Minister of Fisheries. MR. MORGAN: Mr. Speaker, as oer the agreement in the restructuring,there would be a Northern Fisheries Development Corporation established and both governments would pursue the objective of having it done as quickly as possible.

We developed - and when I say ~e· I mean the government, the administration - a policy position and a proposal for the formation of such a corporation to take over the Northern plants, the plant at St. ~~thony and indeed the plants along the Labrador Coast. The Deputy Minister of Fisheries was assigned by Cabinet as the man to head up the Committee to ca~ry out the negotiations wiUh the federal officials,and the federal officials.mostly involve ~~e federal Department of Fisheries, people like i' 1545

April 2, 1984 Tape 573 PK - l MR. MORGAN: Dr. Art May in particular,who is the deputy for that department. The proposal was put forward to the federal officials approximately a little more than two weeks ago at the first of such meetings to commence the negotiations and discussions for the . formation of a Northern fisheries corporation. So at this time I can say that the negotiations are ongoing between the two levels of government, as I say, at the senior official level ..

And as for the content of the proposal put forward 1I think it would be wrong for us to indicate publicly what the content of the proposal is, because it would be unfair to commence that kind of a_ negotiation and have public discussion when we have these kind of very important discussions ongoing privately. MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : of Belle Isle. MR. ROBERTS: The hon. member for the Strait Mr. Speaker, I quite concur with the hon. gentleman that we should not negotiate in public and I certainly would not ask him what is in the proposal.

And I appreciate the fullness of his answer, but I am not sure that he answered either of the two questions, so let me simply give him another opportunity. Could he tell the House, Sir, in what form the proposals were made? Where they simply state~ents communicated to Dr. May by Mr. Andrews, the minister's deputy,during the meetings which were held in Ottawa? If so, that is fine; you know, I will let it go at that. And,secondly, could he tell us what response, if any, the Government of Canada had made? Because the matter, as he will appreciate , and I know he understands the situation, is rather dragging on now.

Here we are well up into the Spring, it is the 2nd day of April. MR. SPEAKER: MR. MORGAN: The hon. Minister of Fisheries. Well, Mr. Speaker, not being at that meeting I am not sure whether the document that we devised as an administration was left with the officials, but I know the 1546

0 •• April 2, 1984 Tape 573 PK - 2 MR. MORGAN: document was assigned to the Committee chaired by Mr. Ray Andrews 1 the deputy minister,for the Province. But I am of the understanding that the document was left with the officials. It was discussed in detail. MR. ROBERTS: (Inaudible) or anything else. ....-' MR. MORGAN: So it was a document 1then 1 that was discussed at that meeting.

And I further understand that the federal officals involved 1 and in fact one of them was at the --- .J · conference last week over in Nova Scotia, where he indicated he was looking forward to further meetings and discussions with my deputy to carry on the negotiation. As for the present status of the plant,may I inform the House and the member for the area that the Interim Management Committee,which consists of the Deputy Minister of Development, Mr. Clarke, on behalf of the Government of Newfoundland and Mr.

Gordon Slade on behalf of the Government of Canada from the Federal Department DRIE, and an official ,. from the Bank of Nova Scotia, that interim management team are indeed meeting today to discuss the operations of various plants, one of them being St. Anthony, because, as you know, it was - -- - -- --- ----- _,-~ -S.:..G opened a few,weeks ago to get in readiness for the upcoming inshore season and the employees who were then hired had<"to be laid off -· again. But I understand they cannot f~resee any problem -- ----------- "' ~ · 1547

April 2, 1984 Tape No . 574 so - 1 MR. MORGAN: of getting everything in place and the plant would be then operated by Fishery Products International until the Northern Fisheries Development Corporation comes into play. MR. ROBERTS: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER (~ussell): Supplementary, the han. member for the Strait of Belle Isle. MR. ROBERTS : Mr. Speaker, I will not ask the minister about the operation of the plant pending the out­ turn of this meeting this afternoon,but I will tell him that all has not been well at the plant and he migh .t want to look into it from that aspect.

Although h.e ga-ve an undertaking to the people of St. Anthony it would be opened and some moves were made 1 I can tell him that his undertaking has not been honoured 1 but I hasten to say I am not laying responsibility for that on the minister •·s shoulders. Again, could he tell us where we are on the negotiations? What he has· told us is that there was a meeting and there was a document left. I gather there has been no further or no supplemental response, so I take . it the document represents the Government of Newfoundland's pos -ition, fine. Has· there b·e.en any response?

I am not asking him for details of what goes on, I very carefully a;Voide.d that, what I need to know · is is the matter moving and, if so 1 is· it moving with any speed other than that of a glacier? . MR. SPEAKER: · ~ •. .MORGAN: The hon. Minister of Fisheries . Mr. ~peaker, again the understanding is · that now- that the firs ·t meeting has taken place at the seni ·ar official level and the position of the Newfoundland government was discuss-ed at that meeting,that a further me .eting will take place. And I am of t.he understanding as well that that meeting will take place in the. very near ;future.

I am convinced that these ~inds of 1548

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 574 SD - 2 MR. MORGAN: discussions and negotiations are best in the form of meetings, face to face meeting, more- so than exchanges of correspondence back and forth and letters, telexes, etc. So the understanding is that there will be a further meeting take place in the very near future involving, as I say ,th.e people assigned by this administration, and the people assigned by the federal government to sit down and further pursue the discuss ·ions along the lines of getting in place the Northern Fisheries Corporation. MR. WARREN: Mr. Speaker. MR.

SPEAKER (Russell): The hon. member for Torngat Mountains. MR. WARREN: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Education (Ms. Verge). Considering the terrible way that the federal government is treating New£oundland , r would like to ask the Minister of Education a ques-tion. Now that the federal government has made a presentation to the Government of Newfoundland of Smallwood's Volume rand IT 1 could the han. minister advise when the government that she is part of will see fit that Volume I will go out into all the schools and educational institutions in th..e Province? MR. SPEAKER£ MS. VERGE; The hen.

Minister of Education. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, I understand that on the weekend at Mr. Rompkey•· s gala observing our 35th. Anniversary of Confederation for thls Province , the federal government announced that it has purchased V~lumes r and II of Mr. Smallwood '·s encyclopedia for each of the schools in the Province as well as · each . of the post-secondary educational institutions. Mr. Speaker, I understand, although I have not heard thi.s directly,, that those volumes · will be handed over to t.he . pr-ovincial government for distribution to the schools...

There are approximately 650 schools across the 1549

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 574 so - 3 MS. VERGE: Province and I assure all hon. members that the officials of my department will expeditiously distribute these books 1550

April 2, 1984. Tape 575, Page 1 -- apb MS. VERGE: the sci:ools for which they are intended as soon as the department receives them. MR. BARRY: Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER(Russell): The han. the member for Mount Scio. MR. BARRY: Mr. Spealer I would like to address a question to the Minister of Development(Mr.Windsor).

I wonder if the minister would confirm whether he has been refusing to return the telephone calls of this Texas businessman,who is seeking to establish a business in Newfoundland, as reported in The Evening Telegram of March 30. r wonder whether he agrees with this businessman tha~ "Many people are saying Newfoundland and St. John's is not a good place to locate because there is not a friendly investment atmosphere there", and I wonder if his refusal to respond to this telephone call is doing anything to improve this investment atmosphere? MR. SPEAKER: The han •. the Minister of Development. MR. WINDSOR: Mr.

Speaker, it is obvious the han. gentleman agrees with ~he Evening Telegram, and, also, that he does not do any more research than they do before they print an· article. I found it interesting, in fact, in looking at that Evening Telegram on Friday, I believe it was, to find a fairly large

article dealing with the phone call from this gentleman in Texas and a very small

article dealing with a very major press conference I held on Labrador, announcing a regional office of the Department of Development. So that shows where the pri9rities of The Evening Telegram and the han. gentleman lie. As it relates to the facts in that article, Mr. Speaker, there was one phone call: that we cari record, to my office about a week ago, when I was not in my office. I was contacted by phone and told that this gentleman had called and would like to speak with me. I said that I obviously could not speak 1551

·. April 2, 1984, Tape 575, Page 2 -- apb MR. WINDSOR: with him then and I had my Assistant Deputy Minister, who is a very senior and a very capable official of the department, contact him by phone, which he did, gave him advice and told him what to do. Apparently the hon" gentleman says he tried to call back again, but I have no record of it. I would not consider that, Mr. Speaker, as ignoring the wishes of anybody who wanted to develop here.

I think that putting him on to a very senior official in the department, and having it followed up very quickly,was certainly a very appropriate action, and I am sure that anything that needed to be done, that could have been done, has and will be done for that hon. gentleman, -Mr. Speaker. As it relates to the second half of the hon. gentleman's question 1 I certainly do not agree with this gentleman that people who come to this Province are discouraged, just the opposite is true.

We have had a number of trade missions recently, in fact just last week we had a trade mission from Sweden here who were very, very pleased with the reception that they saw. A number of our businessmen, in fact, met with those people and had some very good dialogue with them. We will be taking a trade mission to New Brunswick tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

Some eighteen of our businessmen will be going there as a follow-up to a trade mission from New Brunswick which came here last year, and those people have had a very good response, as well as hundreds of others who have met with the department~ and I can table a whole list of them if necessa~y. MR. BARRY: Mr. Speaker. 1552

. .;....•. . . ; . .-; April 2, 1984 Tape 576 EC - 1 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The hon. the member for Mount Scio. MR. BARRY: Yes, MI. Speaker, we all realize that the minister is working very hard on his trade missions around the world, and we all see the way we are deluged, Mr. Speaker, with investment as a result of those. It is not safe to walk the streets, Mr. Speaker. MR. NEARY: • Money coming out of your ears! MR. BARRY: Yes, you are going to be run over by all the people trying to get in from the airport to invest!

I would like to ask the minister, even if he feels that the public employees of government are all that someone calling in to talk to the minister deserve, whether he does not think that even though this may mean only five or six jobs, would he not come down out of his ivory tower for a minute and possibly, if this is what this gentleman wants before he is prepared to invest in the Province, would he be kind enough to make a little phone call - even though it be just a short phone call, Mr.

Speaker - to this gentleman who seems to be sincere in his wish to get information, who seems to be interested in talking to the minister directly? Is the minister saying he will not talk to him at all? Finally, :tr. Speaker, does the minister agree that there is this concern in the Texas area,as reported, that many businessmen in the area have heard of the potential off Newfoundland shores but are skeptical about investigating possible potential for their own businesses because .of an accepted belief that St. John's is going nowhere?

Is the minister aware of this atmosphere in the State of Texas and if in fact this atmosphere is there, is he doing anything to counteract it? 1553 "' ..... :" ~ .. "':" ...

April 2, 1984 Tape 576 EC - 2 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The hon. the Minister of Development. MR . WINDSOR : Mr. Speaker, look who is talking about ivory towers! The hen. gentleman spent most of his political career trying to find his ivory tower. He has not yet identified which one he wants to partake of. SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear! MR. WINDSOR: Mr. Speaker, I am quite ready to speak with or meet with anybody who wishes to meet with me to develop any development opportunity in this Province and I have proven that time and time again over the past two or three years .

I am quite happy to meet with this gentleman or speak with him. But, you know, I have not been in my office for three ·days, I have been travelling on other government business. It is not unreasonable when somebody calls my office and I am not there for an assistant deputy minister or somebody of that qualification or that stature in the government service to return that call. If that gentleman wants to talk with me, I am only too happy to talk to him but he is taking a very poor approach in trying to get a development going in this Province.

I know that he has been given whatever information he needs and I am sure that he has the information available to him no"t-T on how to follow up ~uite properly. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The hen. the Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEAR Y: Mr~ Speaker, I would like to ask 1554

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 577 MR. NEARY: the Minister of Education (Ms. Verge) a question, You know,it seems to me that the Tories have a tendancy to shut things down before they have alternatives in place to take care of the removal of these services and so forth. And I refer here to information-that was sent out for students interested in pharmacy.

Hon. gentlemen are aware we had a phararnaceutical course over here at the College NM - 1 of Trades, the Department of Education did away with it and they were going to start:up a four year course at Memorial 1 Is the hon. minister aware that students have been notified that there is going to be a delay in the implementation of this course and students who have already completed the courses that were prescribed for pharmacy, who wish to pursue a career in pharmacy have no option now but to apply to Dalhousie University for entrance for the next four years? Is the hon. minister aware of that?

And if the hon. minister is aware of it, how long has the minister been aware of it? Why· "'as it not possible, rather than have this breakbetween the course that was run over at the College of Trades and Technology before the course got going in the university, why did they discontinue one without having the other one ready to go? MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : Education. MS. VERGE: The han. Minister of Mr. Speaker, yes 1 I am aware of the situation regarding the offering of pharmacy training and education programmes in this Province. Until now, Mr.

Speaker, the College of Trades and Technology has been the only institution offering a programme in pharmacy. That programmes leads to merely a diploma following three 1555

.. .. . - -- ~ ·.-...: __ ...~ April 2, 1984 Tape No. 577 N11 - 2 MS. VERGE : years of study. A couple of years ago, Mr.

Speaker, it was mutually agreed by the College of Trades and Technology and Memorial University, with the involvement of the Department of Education, that Memorial University would take over responsibility for providing a training and education programme in pharmacy and would elevate the status of that programme to a full ­ fledged degree programme following four years, or five years of study to give Newfoundland and Labrador pharmacists the same qualifications as pharmacists studying and qualifying in otherProvinces of Canada so that pharmacists receiving their education in this Province would in future be able 1556

April 2,1984 Tape No. 578 ah-1 MS VERGE: ------- · to move across the country and have their qualifications recognized by other jurisdictions in Canada. Mr. Speaker, according to the original agreement .. the College of Trades and Technology discontinued taking students into their diploma pharmacy programme in favour of the university's picking up the pharmacy programme and beginning to admit students.

Hovever,there has been a delay in the .university's . - ---- t begining their pharmacy degree programm and officials of my department are now conducting discussions with people at both the university~ the College of Trades and Technology to try to arrange for the reinstatement of a pharmacy programme ,preferably going ahead with the original agreement of having the full-fledged degree programme at Memorial University. Mr.

Speaker, I understand the reason for Memorial's delay in beginning the degree programme is a desire on the part of the university to significantly expand the programme to not only embrace a teaching programme for students but also to add on quite a sophisticated research programme for which 1 in the opinion of the university admin~stration,additional facilities are required at the university above and beyond the present square footage. And, Mr.

Speaker, as I said before,officials of my department are now conducting discussions with people at the university as well as the College of Trades and Technology to try to come to terms with the situation and reinstate admissions into a pharmacy education programme of students for the next academic year. MR.SPEAKER (Russell): Order, please! The time for the Question Period has expired. Before we continue 1I would like to welcome two groups to the gallery; a delegation from 1557

.· April 2,1984 Tape No. 578 ah-2 MR.SPEAKER (Russell): the town council of Belleoram led by the mayor,Orlando Tibbo and William May, as well as a group of students from the Herdman Collegiate in Corner Brook,and their teacher 1 Mr. Derrick Chaulk. SOME' HON. MEMBERS : MR.NEARY: MR.SPEAKER: Hear, hear! A point of order, Mr.Speaker. The hon. Leader of the Opposition on a point of order. Apparently we have to do this every session, Mr.Speaker, and Your Honour keeps telling us that it is not a point of order. But we are not getting any answers to the written questions. Now, Mr.

Speaker, I ask for the guidance of the Chair on this because what is the point, Mr. Speaker, of putting written questions on the Order Paper if we are not going to get any answers? Last session fifty, sixty or seventy questions went unanswered. Now, Your Honour. can probably give us some direction on this. What does Beauchesne and what do the Standing Rules say? We are wasting our time putting written questions on the Order Paper if the administration and the ministers ' do not have to answer them, ·Mr. Speaker. The only way I can raise it is through a point of order. MR. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker. MR.

SPEAKER: The hon. President of the Council. MR.MARSHALL: Mr.Speaker, that is not a point of ord~r. The:hon. gentleman is not allowed to get up in the House and make a speech of that nature:·ldthe guise of a point of order when he gets . up and says, 'I know it is not a point of order.' MR.NEARY: Well ,I did it. 1558 ... :

April 2,1984 Tape No. 578 ah- 3 MR. MARSHALL: The fact ·of the matter is, Mr . Speaker, just by way of i.nformation,up to last Wednesday , a few days ago,there were merely eighteen questions en the Order Paper and of that eighteen , I think approximately 40 per cent of them have already been answered . And they will all be answered or most of them in due course . MR.SPEAKER' (Russell): Order, please! ------ - 1559

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 579 HJ - 1 MR. SPEAKER (Russell) : The Chair did recognize the han. the Leader of the Opposition (~tr. Neary) who rose on what he called a point of order; indeed it 1..ras not a valid point of order. I am sure the han. the Leader of the Opposition is aware that both oral or written questions a minister is not required to answer if he does not see fit to. HR. MARSHALL: MR. SPEAKER: ORDERS OF THE DAY Order 2, Mr. Speaker. Order.2. On motion, that the House resolve itself into Committee of ~~ole on Supply, Mr. Speaker left the Chair. COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : MR.

NEARY: MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please! Mr. Chairman. The han. the Leader of the Opposition on a point of order. MR. NEARY: Mr. Chairman, before you proceed with the calling of the items that will be debated in the House,I wonder if we could establish the ground rules? Now 1 we know the ground rules we used in debating !nterim Supply, but what ground rules apply now, Mr. Chairman? The same ground rules as in Interim Supply or will it be the Standing Orders of the House? ~e have used both by the wav. ~he Premier can shake his head, we have used both. MR. MARSHALL: Mr. Chairman. MR.

CHAIRMAN: The han: the President of the Counci:l. 1560

April 2, 1984 Tco.pe No. 579 ~J - 2 HR. HAP.SHltLL: It.is really incredible, Hr. Chairman. Here it is set out in the Standing Orders of the House. I mean,the hon. gentlman gets up year after year, almost day after day and asks questions 1 but it is there for the hon. gentleman to see.

I do not know if the han. gentleman can read or not,but if he looks up page 37, that is the one with the 3 before the 7, and looks up Standing ·order 118 and you come down, not (1), not (2) , not (3), not (4) but you come down to (5), paragraph (5), you will see, "Notwithstanding Standing Order 49, the Minister introducing his estimates and the member speaking immediately in reply shall not speak for more than fifteen minutes and every other member sha·ll not speak for more than ten minutes at a time during Committee of Supply" - and that is where we are now, I1r.

Chairman, Committee of Supply - "or during the debate in a co!!lr:littee or committees established under Standing Order ll7." So, ~-1r. Chairman, it is there for the han. gentleman to see, it is there for the hon. gentleman to read; they are they same rules that have been here for a number of years. These are the reformed rules of the House, Hr. Chairman. SGr1E HON. MEMB~~.S : HR. r-t ... ARSH:..lU.L: HR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : Oh, oh! So, Head I. order, please! Head I. HR. NEARY: ·;· I presume, Ur. Chairman, ~.re are going to get an explanation or some kind of a statement from the minister. MR. CHAIRMAN: MR.

HARSHALL: DR. COLLINS: The han. the Minister of Finance. He has fifteen minutes. !1r. Chairman, I will certainly sit down if the hon. the Leader of the Opposition O·:r. Neary) was recognized by the Chair but I do not think the hon. Leader 1561

April 2, 1984 Tape ~1o. 5 79 HJ - 3 DR. COLLINS: ~1as recognized so I do not know· what that gratuitous remark ~.,as all about. Does the Chairman wish to rule on that in any way? ~1R. CH!>.Iru-t..P .N (Ayh,ard) : Well the point of order raised by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition O·!r. Neary) has been ex!'lained by the Government House Leader mr. Harshall) • We are operating under Standing Order 118 (5) just to clarify that point. Ne are doing Consolidated Funds, The hon. the ~!inister of Finance. DR. COLLINS: ~-1r.

Chairman, Consolidated Fund · ... · Services, this covers expenditures made from the consolidated Fund for the management expenses and service costs to government of maintaining the public debt and also the funding for the pension plans of government and government agencies.

In other ~.,ords ,the Consolidated Fund is really the composite fund of revenues of government and out of those funds we must pay things like debt expenses and so on,covering our necessary borrowings 1 and,of course, we also must take out of tha .t our responsibilities to cover the pensions of the public emT?loyees, employees of the Province and the employees of agencies. !tt. Chairman, the total amount in the Consolid~ted Fund is very nearly $336 million, just a little bit less than $336 million.

Of that, $312 million relates to the public debt and $23.5 million approximately rela~es to the pension matters I just mentioned. ~~a~ers of the Committee will note that the vast majority of the expenditures under this heading are statutory. In other 1562

April 2, 1984 Tape 580 PK - 1 DR. COLLINS: words,they do not require a vote. The authority has been in Statutes for these payments to be made so we do not require a vote in this Committee. As a matter of fact,of the total amount, as I mentioned nearly $336 million, the amount to be voted is only $1.9 million and that relates to ex gratia payments for pension purposes. Mr. Chairman, I think the main estimates as circulated give fairly clear .information on what these various statutory expenditures are about.

I might just mention one or two 1though 1that might give rise to some wonderment, under Treasury Bills, Debt Expenses, it wi .ll be noted that the expenditure this year has approximately doubled that in previous years. And the reason for that is quite simple;in previous years we used to auction of .$5 million of Treasury bills each week for thirteen weeks of the year. Last year a decision was made to increase the size of that offering and it was increased to $10 million a week. I might just say, Mr. Chairman, that the Treasury bills provide government with short-term cash.

It is a fairly reasonable cost, Treasury bill auctioning, a fairly reasonable cost to government, but it is short-term money. And we did feel that it was to our advantage to raise a greater amount of short-term money than we previously raised. So that is why the debt expenses are greater but,as I say 1 it is related to twice the amount of money being raised. Another one that might <:ive rise to a question is related to; Temporary Investment Revenue. The Budget,when it came down in 1983-1984 ' estimated revenues and ~rary ·Investment Revenues would be about $10.25 million.

Now this revenue arises from the fact that we have cash on hand pretty well at all times, the cash coming from revenue inflows or from borrowings for capital accounts. we often have cash on hand, sizable amounts quite often, so we invest that until such time as lf!e need 1563

April 2, 1984 Tape 580 PK 2 DR. COLLINS: it. And, of course, when we invest we get a return, and that is where this revenue comes from. We estimated we would get $10.25 million in the budget~last year. In actual fact,we got only $7 .§ million . And the reason for that was that there was a delay in our borrowings last year so we did not have as much cash on hand. That was the main reason. The reason for the delay in borrowing was that we went to the market when we felt that it was most advantageous to do so, and that turned out to be later in the year.

We originally thought that the interest rates would be suitable in the early part of the year. That did not turn out to be the case, so·rather than borrowing at relatively high rates we delayed our borrowing until the rates came down a bit later in the year. The amount this year we are estimating is $12.8 rr.illion. Those are the revenues we will get from investment of our cash on hand. And we are estimating that increased amount because we will be doing some increased borrowings this year. Another one that may be worth commenting on now is Recoveries.on Loans ·and Advances.

Last year .' 1 -- -- . ·...:S bon. members will remember , of course, that we converted to equity some of our outstanding loans to fish companies, particularly Fishery Products and Lakes. At the beginning of the year,of course,we projected that we would get revenues, we would get interest on those loans. Now when those loans were converted to equitY, 1564

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 581 SD - 1 DR. COLLINS: that gave rise to our part ownership in the restructured large fish company, and, of course, we did not get the interest then when we converted those loans to equity. So that is why there was a drop from our projected $6.5 million in the budget to an actual approximately $4 million.

This year we are projecting $13 million ,and the $13 million is related to the fact that in the accounts of the Fisheries Loan Board and the Farm Development Loan Board there were amounts, shall we say, lying idle, these were amounts that were not required to give further loans, it was an excess amount so that was brought into the Consolidated Fund. Mr. Chairman, Issues under Guaranteee Perhaps I could just comment briefly on that. There are amounts that government had to pay out where a guarantee was given. If everything goes well, of course, government is not called upon to honour the guarantee.

Now sometimes we do have to honour the guarantees and this is why there is an amount this year. We budgeted for $40,000; in actual fact the amount of pay-out was $881,000. MR. NEARY: DR. COLLINS: was $881,000 approximately. You budgeted for $1 million? No, only for $40,000 and it Now .there were a number of reasons for that. The main reason is that certain fish companies did get into difficulties so we had to honour our guarantee to the bank.

Now when we honour a guarantee to the bank like that 1obviously we pay the bank the money but then the amount we pay out is entered on the books as a direct loan to that company. So it is not, shall we say, a total loss to government. If thos ·e companies in subsequent years turn a profit, of course, that amount we 1565

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 581 SD - 2 DR. COLLINS: paid out has to be returned to government because ~t is entered on the book as a loan. Now, of course, if a company goes bankrupt,obviously it will not return it. But in those cases we will repossess any assets, we will take over any assets, that are available from the company that went bankrupt. I think those are the main points I would comment on at this time, Mr. Chairman.

I am sure there will be other points come up, points that are germaine to this heading,and probably things that are not germaine to this heading1and no doubt we will have to answer ques:tions on matters that are far flung from the Consolidated Fund Services. But,anyway,at this point in time1I think those are the points that hon. members of the Committee may wish information on just from looking at the figures in the main estimate~and the other ones, r think, are fairly self-evident. MR. NEARY: Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN (_AylWard): The hon, Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEARY: Mr.

Chairman, after such a lesson in financial matters r hardly know where to start. No doubt about it 1 we are into heavy financina, Mr. Chairman, we are in heavy financing. And one would have expected as is only natural in this hon. House,for the hon. gentleman to deal with the provincial debt.

You would have thoughct that the Minister of Finance (Dr, Collins) when we are talking about consolidated revenue, heavy financing, life or death as far as the Province is concerned, r know it may sound pretty dry to people listenicncj1 but we have to deal with consolidated revenue, which has under its heading the provincial debt. One would have thought that the minister would have outlined how the administration there opposite is managing to cope.with the provincial debt. We know that th.e provincial debt is $31600 million., Now 1566

April 2, 1984 Tape No . 581 so - 3 MR. NEARY: the han. member fo.r Trinity - Bay de Verde (}fr. Re±dL may think that that is only loose change, that may :Oe only, Mr. Chairman, a drop in the bucket,but as they say in the United States, ''That ain•t hay•,. $3,600 million is a lot of do-ra-me. Mr. Chairman, it gives Newfoundland the dubious and the distinct honour of having the highest personal per capita debt in the nation.. Is the fion. gentleman aware of that? MR. REID:. Yes.. MR, NEAl~X: The rum. gentleman is aware of it. Mr, Chairman, is the hon. gentleman aware that every man, woman and child in Newfoundland today, 1567 ...

I ·' April 2, 1984 Tape No. 582 NM - 1 MR. NEARY: children who are born this very day will be in debt approximately $7,000 . when they see the light of day, born this minute, approximately $7,000 in debt? Mr. Chairman, the provincial debt is a pretty tlefty debt. MR. TULK: Staggering. MR. NEARY: Staggering it is. · I will go as far as to say that it is unmanagable, and only for we are a Province of Canada, if we were not a Province of Canada today my han. friend is aware that we would be bankrupt. Is my han. friend aware of that, that the administration there opposite cannot pay their bills?

They cannot pay their ordinary housekeeping,day-to-day expenses, ~ the han. gentleman is aware of that, is he? MR. REID: Who set up our debt from the beginning? MR. NEARY: Who set it up? Well 1 let me deal with that. Now I have dealt with it on previous occasions 1but I will deal with it again just for the benefit of the han. gentleman who was decent enough to ask me. MR. TULK: He seems like a half intelligent gentleman. MR. NEARY: Yes, he seems like a half intelligent gentleman who understands high financing. In 1972, when the government changed hands - MR. TOBIN: Before-that. MR.

NEARY: No, we will go back to 1972. The total provincial debt at that time was between $700 million and $800 million. I know the han. gentleman knows that but he asked me so I will be good enough to present him with the figures. Somewhere close to $800 million. 1568

April 2, 1984 MR. NEARY: under a Tory Administration - MR. CARTER: MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : member for St. John's North. Tape No. 582 NM - 2 Now fourteen years later, A point of order, Mr. Chairman. A point of order, the hon. the MR. CARTER: I think it is important that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nea~) relate that figure of $800 million in 1972 dollars to the greatly inflated 1984 dollar. There must be a multiplication factor of four or five of 1972 dollars in terms of 1984 dollars. That should be taken into consideration. MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

To that point of order, each member of the House will have the opportunity to debate the figures that are mentioned, so I rule that there is no point of order. Opposition. MR. NEARY: The hon. the Leader of the Mr. Chairman, I was pointing out for the benefit of my hon. friend, who was good enough to ask me a question, and I am glad he did because he knows that there may be hon. gentlemen over there who may not understand the provincial debt. MR. TULK: Such as the member for St. John's North. MR. NEARY: Such as the member for St.

John's North, who just got up and tried to sidetrack me and made a complete jackass of himself. Is that parliamentary, Mr. Chairman? No, I withdraw it. It may not be parliamentary. MR. TULK: A fool. A fool. MR. NEARY: either. No, you cannot call him a fool 1569

April 2, 1984 Tape No . 582 NM - 3 MR. NEARY: But anyway, I am not going to be sidetracked. I want to qive the information to the hon. gentleman if I can. It was below $800 million, but then the Tories took over in 1972, January 18. And since January 18 , 1972 the pr ovincial debt has climbed, escalated, skyrocketed to $3.6 billion . An ast .ronomical figure, $3,000,600 million. MR . TULK : Five times as much. MR. NEARY : That is five times as much as it was in 1972, and not a thing in this world to show for it , that is the tragedy of it. MR. CARTER: That is not true! Not true! MR. NEARY: N::M, Mr .

Chairman, for the benefit of the hon . gentleman , again, who was good enough to ask me, let me point out three items for the bene ·fit of the hon . gentleman, t::tree items that added substantially to the provincial debt, three i terns only that had nothing to do with Mr . Smallwood, had nothing to do with a Liberal Administration, ;nothing at all in this world, but aecisions made by a Tory Administration 1570

April 2, 1984, Tape 583, Page 1 -- apb MR. NEARY: there opposite, three items alone that cost over $1 billion added directly to the direct debt of this Province. And what were these three items? What were they? The han. gentleman,I am sure 1 knows and if he could get up would give me the answer. Three items that added $1 billion that had nothing to do with the Liberals. Number one was the nationalization of the Churchill Falls Corporation. NR . RID EOUT: That had a lot to do with the Liberals. MR.

NEARY: The han. gentleman supported an administration that took the unprecedented step of nationalizing the Churchill Falls . Corporation and kicking out of Newfoundland the best corporate citizen we had at that time. What did that cost, Mr. Chairman? I am not sure of the exact figure, _and I want the Minister of Finance(Dr. Collins) to tell us, but I would have to hazard a guess. The han. gentleman should produce the figure now and put it on the table of the House. I would s~y so far it has cost $400,000,000 or $500,000,000 and, as Mr.

Smallwood said the other day, not a mouse kilowatt of electricity to show for it, not a thing to show for it, nothing. It accomplished nothing. MR. CARTER: It turned his (inaudible). MR. NEARY: Mouse power. Not one kilowatt of mouse power let alone horsepower. AN HON. MEMBER: That is dangerous ground. MR. NEARY: Is it dangerous ground?

And let me say this to the Committee, by the way, in case it escapes the attention of han. gentleman over there who are experts in high financing, that this year we would have had $10 million or more, upwards of $10 million going directly into the treasury as revenue fro~ the Upper Churchill, $10 million profit, cash, going into the provincial coffers if they had not nationalized the Churchill Falls Corporation. 1571 ..:

April 2, 1984, Tape 583, Page 2 -- apb MR. NEARY: But now, instead of having $10 million revenue in we are having millions of dollars going out in interest on the principal. I doubt if we have paid the principal, but millions going out on interest. So .instead of having a profit this year of $10 million or $11 million, that we could use, it is costing 'the taxpayers more than we are taking in this year. Now, the han. gentleman would have to agree that that has to be one of the colossal blunders in Newfoundland's history.

I would not mind if we accomplished anything, if we got more horsepower or if got control of the head\'Taters, or rivers or whatever it was they were trying to do at that time. If we had accomplished that I would say well and good. But we accomplished nothing except we are paying out on the dead taxpayers' money

whereas we should have a surplus this year, a profit of $~0 million. The han. gentleman I am sure is aware of that. I should not have to say it. But these are the facts. DR. COLLINS: I hope this garbage does not get in the papers. MR. NE ~ : It is not garbage, Mr. Chairman, it is an absolute and irrevocable fact and the han. gentleman cannot deny it. Now I have two more items I was telling the han. gentleman about down there.

One other item was the setting off of two explosions on either side of the Strait of Belle Isle to start commencement of the development of the Lower Churchill before the 1975 general election. The han. gentleman surely must remember that. Was ~hat Mr. Smallwood who did that, who went down and pushed the - what do you call those things you push that sets of an explosion? 1572

..... .. ~-- ----~ ---------- April 2, 1984, Tape 583, Page 3 -- apb MR. NEARY: What do you call these? Not batteries,chargers - is it? - set off the chargers. DR. COLLINS: Plunger. MR. NEARY: Plunger. Was it Mr. Smallwood who did that? What that a Liberal who did that or was it Mr. Frank Moores who did that? Now, Mr. Chairman, how much did that cost the taxpayers of this Province? These two holes in the ground, one at Yankee Point and one at Pointe Amour, how much did these two holes in the ground cost the taxpayers for Mr. Moores and the Tories to try to win that election?

Would hon. gentlemen care to hazard a guess? And now they are auctioning off the eq~ipment, the bunkhouses, etc.,they had down there. L1R. TULK: MR. NEARY: $100 million, I would say. Mr. Chairman, my hon. friend may be close, but I would say at the moment that is closer to $200 million, between $~50 million and $200 million, and the hon. gentleman should lay that figure on the table of this House unless he is too ashamed to do it. So now we are talking there about a half billion dollars, between these two little projects, these gigantic blunders. But, Mr.

Chairman, the hon. gentleman may also be interested,because it has been the subject of great controversy in this House, . the nationalization 1573

... ·. ·.- April 2, 1984 Tape 584 EC -1 MR. NEARY: of the Labrador Linerboard mill and the logging operations. Does the han. gentleman know how much that cost the taxpayers of this Province? HR. REID: .MR. NEARY: DR. COLLINS: one up! .MR. NEARY: I have not heard. A half a billion, $500,000,000 . You have a nerve bringing that Yes, I certainly have got a nerve to bring that one up, Mr. Chairman, it was unnecessary, should not have been done; it was foolhardy and stupid. It was one of Mr. Crosbie's vendettas. DR. COLLINS: A ~onument to carpetbaggers. MR. NEARY: Mr. Crosbie's vendetta, that is what that was.

So these three projects alone: the Linerboard ~ill would have gone ahead if we had not nati.onali.zed it as quickly as we did -$500 million of taxpayers' money down the tube; three projects $1,000 million, $1 billion, and not a Liberal involved. Now, that is the sort of mismanagement and gross error in judgement that the administration there opposite should - DR. COLLINS: Those are not all the costs. MR. NEARY: Pardon? DR. COLLINS: I could bring up a few other costs. MR. NEARY: Well, bring up a few other costs, Mr. Chairman. Bring them up! Put them on the table! $1,000 million for these three projects!

Is it any wonder the hon. gentleman, when he ~ntroduced Consolidated Revenue, '>'JaS'too ashamed to talk about the provincial debt and how they are managing it? And what is happened to the sinking fund? Do we have a sinking fund anymore? !liR. ¥1ARREI1: How about Come By Chance, 'Steve'? 1574

April 2, 1984 Tape 584 EC - 2 MR. NEARY: Corne By Chance? Well, at Corne By Chance we lost $47 million as a result of the continuation of Mr. Crosbie's vendetta. DR. COLLINS: I forgot that one. MR. NEARY: Yes, you forgot that one. Another vendetta. No need of it being shut down. It was shut down because it was Liberal, because they did not like the gentleman who was close to Mr. Smallwood. Mr. Chairman, do you realize what the personal, political vendettas of l•lessrs. Crosbie and the present Government House Leader (Mr. Marshall) have cost the people of this Province?

No wonder they do not want the press to pick up what I am saying! It is factual and true anq can stand scrutiny in this House. They can use weasel words and they can play with words all they want, the fact of the matter is that it is a matter of public record, Mr. Chairman, and there is no way that they can weasel their way out of it. What about the sinking fund? Have we given up the sinking fund? We no longer have a sinking fund, at least I do not see it here in the estimates, Mr. Chairman. MR. WARREN: What about the Murray Premises? MR.

NEARY: Well, we are not going to talk about the Murray Premises and all the industries that have been closed down. to a couple of things - MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : elapsed. MR. NEARY: MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Chairman, let me come back Order, please! The hon. member's time has Fifteen minutes, Sir? Fifteen minutes, yes. 1575

- ~-- - April 2, 1984 Tape 584 EC - 3 MR. WARREN: By leave? By leave? MR. NEAR Y: No, that is alright, I will come back to it again. MR. CARTER: Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : The han. the member for St. John's North. MR. CARTER: Mr. Chairman, I think the House ought to be made aware that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr.

Neary) suffered a rather severe car accident this morning on his way to the committee meeting and,therefore, although he did not damage his head directly, there must have been a certain amount of whiplash involved and,there­ fore, that may explain why he is making a little more sense than he usually does; but I think he should be excused for his outburst becaus .e of that accident. Perhaps in a few days time after some rest and if he sits down long enough with. his Liberal colleagues, th.at may help him to recuperate. Now, Mr.

Chairman, one of the points that ought to be made - I make it every year; it is seldom picked ~P in the press and yet it is implicit in th.e figures that are presented to us in the budget - is that Newfoundlanders pay Ottawa each year something in excess of $1 billion cash money out of our pockets, and the figures are here to prove it. I will go over them very briefly. This afternoon seems to be a time for talking in billions of dollars. Gone are the days when we used to talk about millions. Really, if you look after the millions, the billions will -look after themselves.

On page eleven of the Budget book that we use, it says here that the retail sales tax brings us in $345 million, it is projected to bring us in $345 million this year. 1576

•. Apri l 2, 1984 Tape 584 EC - 4 MR. CARTER: Now, Mr. Chairman, in addition to retail $ales tax there is also a federal sales tax, and the federal sa _les tax is on rather more things, on m:ore iteins than the provincial sales tax; therefore, I am taking a very loose figure; ~since the provincial sales tax is projected to bring ·in $345 million, I am taking a very conservative, loose figure of $300 million for the feQ.eral excise tax. That is $300 million . 1577

April 2, 1984 Tape 585 PK -l MR. CARTER: that we pay out of our pockets each year on the things we buy. So that money was in our pockets, it came out of our pockets and it found its way to Ottawa. This is not a book entry. This is not money we might have gotten; this is money we had, money we spent and money that went straight to Ottawa, $300 million. The next item is personal income tax. Personal income tax here , Mr. Chairman, projected for this year is $280 million.

I am suggesting that since provincial ~ncome tax is 59 per cent of the federal tax1 -~ --------_ _..:oo" therefore I am projecting a figure of $400 million of federal income tax. This is money that people earn as salary. It presumably goes into their pockets,or would have gone into their pockets,but1 no1it goes straight to Ottawa~$300 million and $400 million make $700 million. The next item is gasoline tax. We are proj,ecting to take in $67 million this year. Again I have been conservative,and I am saying that the federal share of the gasoline tax is about $50 million.

So each time you pull up to the tank and fill up your car you are paying cash money to Ottawa. Some of that money that you pay for gas goes directly to Ottawa and I think I would be safe in saying that around $50 million goes to Ottawa from that one item. The tobacco tax is projected to bring in $41 million to Newfoundland. There is also a federal tobacco tax. And I would suggest there that $25 million is a fairly conservative figure. I am rounding these figures, I may be up a bit in one and down in another,so I think I am safe in saying $25 million to round it off.

Corporate income tax is ~ ... ---- projected to be $40 millie~; 11 per cent of the corporate tax comes in provincially. So that $40 million represents 11 per cent. So I think we are safe in saying about $200 million goes to Ottawa to pay the corporate income tax. Now a corporation cannot pay their tax unless they have made money. They cannot make money --------- 1578

April 2, 1984 Tape 585 PK - 2 MR. CARTER: unless people have spent money, and if people have spent money 1 that money has come out of their pockets,gone to the corporation and gone into Ottawa as corporation tax. So there is one more heading here, the Newfoundland Liquor Commission,projected to make $70 million. I have put down a figure of $50 million as Ottawa's share.

Now the total of those few items,and I have left out some other items that are rather smaller for the sake of brevity, is $300 million for retail sales tax 1plus $400 million for personal income tax, that is, $700 million, plus $50 million for gasoline tax, $750 million, plus $25 m~llion for the tobacco tax, $775 million, for corporate income $200 million, that is $975 million, for Newfoundland Liquor Corporation $50 million, that is $1 1 025 billion, I will round it off, No .one will argue with me if I .I say it is $1 billion, $1 billion of cash that comes out of our pockets and goes straight to Ottawa; not a book entry, cash , it comes right out of our pockets.

Then, Mr. Chairman, what is it that Ottawa pays us back directly? It pays us back $569 million, this is projected for this year,that is the tax equalization; $203 million for the established programmes financing grant, that is a total of , give or take a few million, $750 million. So $1 billion goes to Ottawa and they pay us back three-quarters ·of a billion. I would ask who is making the profit? Who is doing well out of it? There is a deficit of $250 million.

Not it is perfectly true that Ottawa pays the federal civil servants, it operates Air Canada, it operates the Canadian National Railway, ·--- -·- there is the old age pension and the baby bonus. No one is sugg.=sti .ng these are not worthwhile items. But we cannot talk about the unemployment insurance. Even th:lugh that is a federally administered l - --- .. 1579

April 2, 1984 Tape 585 PK - 3 MR. CARTER : corporation, it is suppose to be self -financing, it is not entirely, but it is suppose to be. So the fact that we may get great benefits from the Unemployment Insurance Commission cannot enter into any sum that any one would care to talk about. So there is $1 billion,and I have been very conservative on this . We have $1 billion paid out and three -quarters of a billion paid in , $250 million profit from direct collection from Newfoundland to Ottawa, and we are suppose to - - be a have-notprovince.

I would love to get the figures for Ontario and perhaps I should. -I am sure I could, so perhaps .i I should . And I would ask the Minister of Finance (Dr . Collins) at some point to put one of bis offic ials to work on these figures so that the precise figure can be gotten , I had to round it off, I do not have access to the exact amounts, the dollars and cents. .}. 1580 _ f

April 2, 1984 Tape !>lo. 586 !-!J - 1 DR. COLLINS: I have rounded it off, I have been very conservative, I am sure that the actual figure is much higher than that. Well 1 there you have it. One billion dollars paid out, $750 million taken in,and I think there is a definite deficit charged up against Newfoundland. It is too bad, it is a poor way to run a railroad,and I think it is a pity that Newfoundland should have to suffer from such a formula. Surely a more equalized equalization formula could be thought up.

Forgetting about the offshore, forgetting, for the time beinq,i about the Churchill Falls fiasco, we lose $250 million on our dealings with Ottawa as far as this budget is concerned and I think it is a crying shame. HR. NEARY: Hr. Chairman. HR. CHAIIDfAN (Aylward) : The hon. the Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEA.'R:Y: My advice to the hon. gentleman is to go down and join Mr. Devine in his crusa~e to lead !'1e~"foundland out of Confederation, because really that is what the hon. gentleman is saying indirectly.

He does not have the couraqe to say directly what -he means, ~rr. ----- ---- Chairman, he says it indirectly. Now if the han. gentleman had nP.en a man he would have been down the other night even -----if he carried a placard outside of Hotel Newfoundland. At least he and the Government House Leader (~tr. ~~arshall) there opposite should have turned up for that Confederation gala because, r-~r. Chairman, the hon. gentleman who just got up and made these silly, irresponsible, stupid, nonsensical statements gets half his salary from the people of Canada.

Fifty per cent of the hon. gentleman's salary in this House comes from the people of Canada. Fifty per cent of the Premier's salary, my salary, all the members salary :,50 per cent comes 1581

April 2, 1984 Tape !-To. 586 HJ - 2 HP.. NEARY: from the people of Canada, a cheque sent down every month to the public treasury, sent down by the people of Canada, Mr. Chairman. Now, the han. gentleman conveniently left out federal public servants, federal buildings, railroad eMployees. Mr. Chairrnan,he conveniently left 300,000 cheques. Th+ee hundred thousand federal cheques flow into this Province every month from the C~vernrnent of Canada. In case it has not sunk in yet, 300,000 cheques.

Now these are all indirect payments.- these are payments that the Province benefits by, that is \V'hat I mean by indirect .• These . cheques come directly from the people of Canada to t_he people of ~1ew:i:oundland and Labrador; family allowances, Canada pension, old age pension, veteran allowances, unemployment insurance benefits, disabled allo..,.;ances. Mr. Chairman, 3 0 0, 0 0 0 cheques a month. It would boggle the mind "Ylhen you think about it, 300,000 of these cheques. But in addition to that, in addition to these cheques going into wages in the public servants pockets - federal public servants, Mr.

Chairman - in addition to that we have equalization grants, a cheque made out every month by the people of Canada deposited ~·Ti th the Hinister of Finance (Dr. Collins) in this Province. Almost $600 million this year. Established programme funding, I will put the two of them together, you are talking about close to $BOO million. These two items alone, cheques sent down to the Hinister of Finance v1ho deposits it in the Bank of Hontreal on behalf of the people of the nrovince. fiB .·COLLINS': Are we the only province ~vho gets those? r1R. NEARY: No we are not. MR. POWER: B.C. is getting~~~ ' HR. NEARY: Yes.

As a matter of fact 10ntario 1582

April 2, 1984 Tape No . 586 ~- 3 NR. NEARY: qualified as a have -not province but refused to take equalization payments there a couple of years ago . I do not know if they still do or not. But the point I am making, ~. Chairman, is this, that the people of Canada every year, this year, last year, next year, send here to Newfoundland somewhere between $3 billion or $4 billion, somewhere in between, to the people of this Province. MR • C.l\.RTER : Would you mind documenting that? MR . NEA..~Y: Yes, I could document it if I want<=.~f .-.~"'~. tffi.CARTER: You cannot. MR . NEARY: It is very easily documented. Mr .

Chairman, the bon . gent:.' . ~man says he has not been quoted . He is complaining, whining because the press has not picked it up. Ris stat ement s are so silly and so foolish and so stu pid that no wonder the press do not report him . --- -- 1583 . . - }

April 2,1984 Tape No. 587 ah-1 MR.NEARY: If they did report him the hon. gentleman would only show himself for what he is,and that is a financial ignoramus. So let us hear no more. As anti-Confederate and as anti-social and as anti-Canadian as the Government House Leader (Mr. Marshall) is 1 he would never make a statement as silly and as foolish as that one. The han. gentleman has better sense than to get involved in high financing when he knows that the han. member for St. John's North (Mr. Carter) was in over his ears. Now, Mr.

Chairman, I want to come back to acouple of things that the Minister of Finance (Dr.Collins)said earlier when he introduced his estimates, when he introduced this topi0 Consolidated Fund Services. I would like to know about the sinking fund~ What has happened to the sinking fund? Do we have one now or has that bee~ abandoned by the administration there opposite? There was always a sinking fund. So much every year would be taken out of Consolidated Revenue and put into a sinking fund to service the provincial debt. What has happened now?

We are just taking it out of Consolidated Revenue as we need it, that is what it looks like to me. That is not a very pleasant situation. Now -the han. gentleman also told the House about l:Jans and guarantees/ and I believe '• the hon. gentleman ~as issued 1 indirectly, under his breath 1 he was sending out a message, he was sending out a warning to all those peopl~ who owe money to the Farm Loan Board and to the Fishery Loan Board.· - -- --- - - ·--'\. Beware ·, the ' han. gentleman told us . HR.PATTERSON: Beware the Ides o£ March. 1584

·. April 2,1984 Tape No. 587 ah-2 MR.NEARY: The government budgeted last year in loans and - ---- guarantees Eor $40,000 and they ended up paying out $881,000 in loans and guarantees. In other words,fish plants and other businesses that the government have gone on the back of a note for could not even pay the i~terest 1 because when the bank calls on the government to honour their note, to honour their commitment or their guarantee 1that means they cannot even pay the interest on them let alone the principal.

So $881,000 had to be lashed out last year in loans and guarantees for businesses that could not honour their commitment, their obligation to the taxpayers of this Province. r1R. DINN: How many businesses have one year loans? Would you call .for a one year loan? MR.NEARY: Hr.Chairman, I arn not arguing whether it is for one year or ten years or what it is for.

The fact of the matter is,the figures are there, we cannot dany it, they budgeted for $40,000 and they ended up paying out $881,000. ;, But what the minister said under his breath, this year, he said, this year we are going to crack down on people who owe money. Because what he said was that they would be lying there. He said some of these loans and guarantees have been lying dormant there and have not been collected. Now the first question I have to put to the minister on that subject is give us a list of .the companies that defaulted on their loans and guarantees last year.

The Committee is entitled to have that. The minister already told us about the big fish companies 1but I 1585

April 2,1984 Tape No. 587 ah-3 MR .NEAR'l: would ~agine there are a lot of small independents and companies other than fish companies inv olved here,and the minister owes it to the taxpayers who are footing the bill to give us a list of these companies where the government had to pick up the tab for the $881,000 in loans and guarantees. And the hon. gentleman, Mr . Chairman, when he is on his f~et,should also give us a list and the amounts outstanding , the statutory amounts that are outstanding. I am interested , for instance, specifically here ,in Confederation Building . I believe 1586 ,\ ___ __ _ ... '"''"'

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 588 MR. NEARY: this year or next year Confederation Building will be paid for. Mr. Chairman, the hon. Minister of Labour and Manpower (Mr. Dinn) looks across at me like Buggs Bunny. Mr. Chairman, am I right or am I wrong? I am asking the Minister of Finance (Dr. Collins) to make a note there, to give me the information, is Confederation Building paid for? Will it be paid for this year or next year? DR. COLLINS: This year. NM - 1 MR. NEARY: This year. What a magnificent accomplishment.

I remember when Confederation Building _ was opened, when the Tories were brought up into the light of day from the dungeons down in the old Colonial Building, the darkness and the drugery of the old Colonial Building, and brought up into the light of day, Mr. Jim Greene was Leader of the Opposition at the time, who came in and condemned the government, both him and the hon. W.J. Browne who was a member of the House at that time, told us, "This is the end of Newfoundland. She is gone.

The governmen~ is gone berserk, they are gone off their heads. 'Iiley have camri.tted the people of Newfoundland to paying for this building, this monument to Liberalism. The people will have to pay for it, we will never get out of debt again." Crosbie came later. Mr. Browne and Mr. Greene ranting and raving here I remember it so well, sitting down where the member for Windsor-Buchans (Mr. McLennan) is sitting now, I came in after the building was open :, telling us, "You are gone mad. You are going to bankrupt · the Province • " MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward): Order, please! The hon. member's time has elapsed. 1587

April 2, _1984 Tape No. 588 NM - 2 MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : The hon. the Minister of Finance • . DR. COLLINS: Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neary) asked a number of things and I·will try to cover them as to the extent I can in the time allotted. First of all 1 just let me comment on his accusation that every time someone in this Province stands up for our rights under the Constitution, our provincial rights, you know, we are called an anti-Confederate, you know,as though we are the only ones to do that. I presume that if the hon.

Leader of the Opposition was in Alberta, from 1910 to ·' 1930 when the Albertans were saying, you know, "The federal government own our natural resources here, all other provinces own their own natural resources, we should have ours. " He would have said, "Oh, well, you Albertans, you are just anti-Confederate." And if he was in Saskatchewan in the same period and they made the same argument,he would obviously come out and say, "Oh, you are just anti-confederates, wanting something from the federal governmen~ 1 even though you are only asking what every other province has gotten.

Or if he was in Quebec, for instance, when Quebec was making a pitch that they -- - - -- - --· - would get the Northlands before 1912, and Ontario too, and they were making a pitch to get these, I presume he would have said, "Oh, you are just anti-Confederates," and so on. Or would he? I suspec~, if you really pinned him down,he would say, "Oh, no, no, I do not mean the other provinces are anti-Confederate, only Newfoundland, and only the PC Party in Newfoundland are anti-confederate." 1588

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 588 NM - 3 DR. COLLINS: He would have a very unique type of

interpretation on what .is an anti-Confederate. If a Liberal in Saskatchewan claims something he is not anti-Confederate, if a PC in Newfoundland claims the same thing he is anti-confederate. I think that is the way his reasoning would work. I Anyway 1there is no one on this side of the House who is an anti-Confederate. But I will tell you what we are, we are anti the present Terms of Union and we want to get them changed.

The present Terms of Union were negotiated by what ultimately turned out to be a federal administration and they have been proven to be the most abject nonsense,whereby we gave away our fisheries without any control over it, we gave away any claim we had to the offshore without any control over it, we gave away the possiblity of transmitting power out of the Province without any ability of getting rights to transport it across provincial boundaries.

I mean,the Terms of Union are so abjectly bad for this Province that it is incredible that the so-called Fathers of Confederation are not run out of the Province on a rail. But ultimately we will get our Terms of Union changed so that we will have the rights in Confederation that all other provinces have. Now getting down to a few specifics, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neary) mentions that we have the highest per capita debt of all provinces 1 that 1589

.. ... .. -···"- ,._. April 2, 1984 Tape No .• 589 SD - 1 DR. COLLINS: if you take our total debt, our total public sector debt, and divide it by the population , that it co~es out to the highest figure of all the provinces . Now,like so man y of the things the hon. Leader of the Opposition (.Mr. Neary} says , that is total, utter rubbish, that is -not true. You know, so many of his facts are so rubishy and so incorrect that, you know, it takes all of your time to keep up with him.

I would like to point out that our public sector debt at the most recent calculation available, on a per capita basis is just less than $6,000 per capita. It is $5,960.90 to be precise. Now let us look at Quebec •· s per capita debt. What do you think Quebects is? Quebec's is $6,775.10. Now in my books $6,775.10 is greater than $5,960.90. Perhaps T am going by the old math ., but I 'suspect that even by th .e new math or the old math that is correct. So Quebec has a higher per capita debt than we have. Now let us look at Manitoba. Manitoba's is $6,0 .08.

Again 1by my books, I think $6,008, that is the per capita public s-ector debt owed in Manitoba, that seems to me it is higher than $5,9 .60,90. So Manitoba is greater than ours. And then we come to Newfoundland and then we look at New BrunsWick. New Brunswick is less than Newfoundland, Newfoundland is · $5,96'0.90, New Brunswick''s is $5,775.90. In other words,there is a difference there of less than $20.0. The next one is · Nova Scotia ,and again they are over $5,000. s-o we are not the highes~, we are the third highest and there are two other provinces very close to us.

Now -is that not a somewhat different impression than what the Leader of the Opposition said? Now T hope one does not see in the newspapers,'Newfoundland has highest per capita debt in the country,' T hope we do not see that, although. we tend to see any statements made by the Leader 1590

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 589 SD - 2 DR. COLLINS: of the Opposition (J1r. Neary) in certain newspapers written as the gospel truth. I hope we do not see that. r hope we will see facts and not garbage. Now, Mr. Chairman, the han. Leader of the Opposition also left the impression that our public sector debt is · out of hand. MR. NEARY: Right on. DR. COLLINS: r would just like to bring a few points out on that if r can find them here. Yes, here we are. When this administration took office the public sector debt was roughly $2.4 bill~on. MR. NEARY: I beg your pardon? DR.

COLLINS·: $2.4 billion when this administration MR .. NEARY: Back in 1972? DR. COLLINS·: We did not take office i:n 1972, this · administration took office in 1979 .• MR. NEARY: 1972 your administration took office. DR. COLLINS: took office in 1979. MR. NEARY: am talking about. DR , COLLINS: No, no, This administration The Tory administration I No, r am talking about this administration. I mean, you can talk about any administration you want, r am talking about this administration, This administration is the Peckford administration. MR;. NEARY: That is amazing! MR; •. CHAIRMAN(.Aylwardi: Order, please~· DR.

COLLINS: And as far as I· know · the Peckford administration took office in 1979. MR'. NEARY: You are disassociating yourself from Premi :er Moores. 1591

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 589 SD -3 DR. COL.LINS : So when this administration took office in 1979 the ;>uolic sector debt was $2.4 billion, approx.imately, it was actually $2,411 million. Now-the ne.xt year it went up to $2,567 million. Now, Mr. Chairman, that was an increase of 6.5 per cent. In that GJne year the puolic sec.tor debt went up 6. 5 per cent. Now-, Mr. Chairman, what did the CPI go up that year, w.hat did the cost of living, whlch is an index of the value of money', go up? AN BON. MEMBER: 11.2 per cent. OR, COLLINS: No, 1592

.- --:--:·· :·- .~.:_ .. ~·- · -::.;: .. ~ .. .,-~-- April 2, 1984, Tape 590, Page 1 -- apb DR . COLLINS: that particular year it went up 7.5 per cent' That was 1978/79. So our public sector debt 6.5, CPI went up 7.5. In other terms, in relative terms, in real terms the debt carne down. Now, Mr.

Chairman, if you run through the various years you see the public sector debt going up 6.2 per cent when CPI went up 8.1 per cent, public sector debt went up 6.3 per cent when CPI went up 9.8 per cent, public sector debt the next year, I am now from 1981 to 1982, went up 8.4 per cent, CPI went up 11.6 per cent. 1982/83 it went up 8.5 per cent, public sector debt, CPI went up 13.4 per cent. In other words, the point I am making is that up to last year the public sector debt increased yearly on a percentage basis less each time than the CPI. So the debt is not out of control.

The debt in actual fact, in real terms is corning down and it is due to the good management of this government. SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear! DR. COLLINS: Now, Mr. Chairman, I said up to last year. Last year for the first time the public sector debt went up by 7.4 per cent and that was greater than the CPI, because the CPI is estimated to be 6.8 per cent. So except for the depth of the depression - we can call it the depression, but certainly a very severe recession, except for the depth of a very severe recession our public sector debt decreased in real terms ever since this administration has been in office.

MR. CHAIRMAN(Aylward): elapsed. MR. NEARY: MR. CHAIRMAN: MR. NEARY: Order, please! The hon. minister's time has Mr. Chairman. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition. Mr. Chairman, first of all I want 1593

April 2, l984, Tape 590, Page 2 -- apb MR. NEAR~: to deal with the -anti- Confederate, anti-Canadian statements that I made, that I am prepared to stand by, because I believe there are two categories of members on that side of the House . There is one category who believe in what they are doing, that are sincere. Now they may be wrong, Mr. Chairman, they are positively wrong, but they believe in what they are doing. But there are three gentlemen over there in particular and I will name them if you want, Mr. Chairman, three in particular~ There is the Minister of Finan~(Dr.

Collinsl, there is the Government House Leader(Mr. Marshall), and there is the member for St. John's N or~(Mr. Carterl. I do not think by any stretch of the im~ginatiori that you could say that ei~her one of these gentlemen are a good Canadian. Now, the Premier and his lap­ dogs, Mr. Chairman, I think they believe in what they are trying to do.

They are wrong, and their judgement is wrong, and they are on a disaster course, and their policies are wrong, and,unfortunately in the process .the Premier,in trying to brainwash people,does sometimes make statements that would lead one to believe that he is anti-Confederate and anti-Canadian, no doubt about that. There is no doubt about that, Mr. Chairman. And that is unfortunate and tragic _, becaus,e :i:_ t sort of fans the fire of discontent and gives comfort to anti-Conferates, to Mr. Devine and his group. And no doubt the member for St.

John's North will be down with his pledge, if he has not already been down, to Mr. Devine. But the three gentlemen to whom I referred, the Minister of Finance, Mr. Chairman - I do not believe Your Honour is an an~i-Confederate, or is anti-Canadian, and if Your Honour could speak and tell me I am sure that he would say ,, 'Nc, I am a good Canadian.' I 1594

April 2, 1984, Tape 590, Page 3 -- apb MR. NEARY: do not believe the member for Explmits(Dr. Twomey), who as a young doctor travelling the outports of this Province 1595

. ~ April 2, 1984 Tape 591 EC - 1 MR. NEARY: saw conditions the way they were in Newfoundland, who tried his best to deliver health care services to people in need, to sick people. The han. gentleman, if he wanted to, could get up and tell us horror stories in this han. House, Mr. Chairman. And I am sure that han. gentleman is not anti-Canadian and not an anti-Confederate. But these three I single; out, 1-tr. Chairman, and the Hinister of Finance (Dr.

Collins) by his very statement in this House this afternoon; he told us that the Fathers of Confederation should be run out of town on a rail for negotiating the Terms of Union. DR. COLLINS: Right. r.m. NEARY: Now, Mr. Chairman, let me remind han. members of this House that none other than the Emperor himself, sitting across from me, when he came back from the Conference on the Constitution, when he returned from the battlefield in Ottawa, he told us that he was the one who managed to work out the formula, the compromise for the adoption of the constitution.

It was he, and he alone, he told us, and I do not know but there were Tories gat~ered at the airport to 9reet h}m when he arrived. UR. DOYLE: They did, yes. MR. NEARY: That is right, a handful. I>U~. DOYLE: And rightly so. MR. NEARY: And now the Minister of Finance ~ is telling us, what the Minister of Finance is saying, Mr. Chairman, is, 'Mr. Premier, you let us down.

You had an opportunity to renegotiate the Terms of Union1to get things put into that constitution, but you were so anxious, you were so carried away; you were so anxious to show t·Q __ the rest of Canada what a great man you were, that it was your formula that brought about the c_ompromise, that you. 1596

·-· -. April 2, 1984 Tape 591 EC - 2 MR. NEARY: overlooked getting all these things into the new Constitution of Canada that we should have had in the Terms of Union.' That is what the han. gentleman is saying. Mr. Chairman, how silly and foolish and nonsensical can you get? You know, it is a wonder I do not get an ice cube in the side of the head today for some of these things that I am saying to contradict 1rmat the bon. minister said. .I thought last week we would have to start wearing hard hats in this House. I will dispense with that. I think I have exposed the han. gentleman for what he is.

Why does he not·get up man-fashion and say that he is an anti-Confederate and that he is anti-Canadian and have the Government House Leader ·(Mr. Marshall) and the member for St. John's North (Mr. Carter) do the same thing, Mr. Chairman. Now, Mr. Chairman, let me deal with the matter of the personal per capita debt. I do not know what figures the han. gentleman used, but if his figuring is the same as he uses in the budget, Mr. Chairman, no doubt he has cooked the books again. The official popu- lation of this Province is 565,000 souls. DR. COLLINS: No, _you are 'way out! MR.

NEARY: Oh, I am 'way out! - 565,000 souls divided into $3,600,000 will give you, Mr. Chairman, a per capita debt of almost $7,000, a little less than $7,000 for every man, woman and child in this Province. DR. COLLINS: Not correct! MR. NEARY: It is correct. Nobody can deny it, Mr. Chairman. DR. COLLINS: Do you know what the population was in June? MR. NEARY: The han. gentleman is manipulating the figures again, cooking the books as he did last year and 1597

April 2, 1984 Tape 591 EC - 3 MR. NEARY : the year before when we told him there was going to be a deficit in current account, three years in a row, a deficit in current account; he cooked the books and now he is trying to cook the figures again. Mr. Chairman, let me say this, by the way, that the hon. gentleman again tried to disassociate himself, to put distance between this administration and the last Tory administration.

The statement that I made was, since the Tories took over on January 18, 1982, the provincial debt has gone up five times what it was on January 18, 1982 - not one time, not twice, nqt three times, not four -times, has gone up five times. DR. COLLINS: MR. NEARY: Mr. Chairman. 1972, not 1982. Incred .ible. It has gone up five times, And the hon. gentleman gets up and says to us, 'Since we took over the debt has only gone up by a little over $1 billion, $1,000 million.' Now, Mr. Chairman, are we getting senile or do we have cataracts that we cannot see the other side? SOME HON. MEMBERS : Oh, oh! MR.

CHAIRMAN (Aylward): Order, please! MR. NEARY: Or have we been here too long? Is our memory too good for han. gentlemen? Because I have a feeling, Mr. Chairman, that the Government House Leader (Mr. Marshall) was a member of that previous administration. 1598

April 2, 1984 Tape 592 PK - 1 MR. NEARY: .. And I have a feeling there are a number of ministers over there, including the Premier/who was a lapdog for Mr. Moores, who now will not acknowledge him , will not accept his phone calls, will not let him in the office for an appointment, will not talk to him about anything. Mr. Chairman, what gall! They have the face of a robber's horse to stand over there and tell you.that this administration only increased the public debt by a little over $1 billion, $1,000 million. Mr. Chairman, even the Government House Leader (Mr. Marshall) has to smile at that.

That is the slickest piece of maneuvering that I have ever seen by the Minister of Finance (Dr. Collins), although he had a job to get up to it. I know that his hands were trembling and his voice was trembling and he had a job to get it out with a straight face. · ~-:o: ··-= _6:_. He knew he was trying to dupe the / people, trying to get some figures quoted in the press that will neutralize what I am saying here today, that _would be a rebuttal. ~ --I At~east he would try to neutralize it.

The fact of the matter is the .that the blazing headline in the newpaper3 tomorrow should -·----· -- be Provincial Debt_ $3,600 million. ~;Unmanageable. The personal per ;'; - _ .. ::~'" capita debt almost $7,000 for every man, woman, and child. That _, _., should be the headline, and not a thing to show for it. DR. COLLINS: no 'doubt it will be. __ y Keep that up and it will be the heacl.lines, J MR. NEARY: If we only had an investigative -~ newspaper in this Province, and some investigative reporters - DR. COLLINS: Hear, hear! I totally agree.

MR.: NEARY .: • so they could trot out the figures and hold them up on the . television screen to the people of this Province, and say, Look, Mr. Taxpayer, 1972 when the Tories 1599

April 2, 1984 Tape 592 PK- 2 HR. NEARY: took over your provinical debt was this much~$750 -millio~ -~r $800 million; now it is $3,600 million, $3.6 billion and what do you have to show for it? And, Mr. Chairman, I am not sure,perhaps the han. gentleman can tell me, but I do not believe the debt of Newfoundland Hydro is included in · ,that. rn.iTlion •. The debt of Newfoundland Hydro is $1 billion, $1,000 DR. COLLINS: That goes in public sector debt. MR. NEARY: $1,000 million owed by the Newfoundland Hydro. Is it any wonder that they sock it to the consumers of electricity in this Province. MR.

CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : Order, please! The hon. member's time has elapsed. The han. Mi'nister of Finance. DR. COLLINS: Mr. Chairman, as I say,you really have to work hard to keep on top of the misinformation the han. -Leader o·f the Opposition (Mr. Neary) gives. Now he said the population of the Province is 565,000. I have it in front of me in 1980 it was 566,000. So I do not know where he gets his figures. I hope that no one pays any attention to what the Leader of the Opposition says. MR. NEARY: It went down. They all left to get work. -- --· --- - ·-- -- ~ - MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please! DR.

COLLINS: All right, 1980 it was 566,000; 1981 it was 568,000~ 1982-569,000; 1983-578,000,and this is 1984, so we are just over 580,000 now. So the han. Leader of the Opposition has ~ rubbishy figures, I hope no one with any sense pays any attention to him,an~ ~~y the media. Because I am afraid the media has been paying attention to the han. Leader of the Opposition 1600

April 2, 1984 Tape 592 PK - 3 DR. COLLINS: and you see the most outrageous statements that come out and 1when they are in the paper,some people tend to think they have sam~ validity to them. Now I say if people are going to write something in the newspapers , they should c.o-sorne investigation and just get the honest facts. Now the facts I gave you about provincial public sector debt , per capita public sector debt are available.

We did not make it up ourselves. '*'- -· _. - Our debt management people just got it available from the public record 1 and if anyone in the media wishes to check it 1 all they got to do is get out the budgets that are brought down by provinces each .. - -- - -~ year , made public each year, and the figures ane in there. Now, Mr. Chairman, where else do we go from here? First of all,the public sector debt does include Hydro. The Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neary) wondered •-- -· ~ if it did.

Now a man who has been in this House for twenty-three years, . or whatever it is should know the public sector debt -- -- - -· - - --- ------ ../ includes everything,including the kitchen sink when it comes to debt 1 and it certainly includes Newfoundland Hydro. He asked if we have a sinking ..-fund? Yes, we have a sinking fund. Our sinking fund now is approximately $500 million. MR. NEARY: Where is it here? Where is the sinking fund shown here? MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward): Order, please! DR. COLLINS: I am absolutely not interested on what page it is on.

I am telling you that it is approximately $500 million,our sinking fund. MR. NEARY: The hon. gentleman knows it is not here. DR. COLLINS: Now, Mr. Chairman. the hon. Leader of the Opposition makes a great point, he makes this every year 1 about the difference between 1601 /

April 2, 1984 Tape No .59 3 MJ - l DR. COLLINS: the public sector debt in 1972 and the present time, and he compares one with the other. Now, you know,any student in about Grade IX in school knows that you have to compare likes with likes. Nhen you are talking about debt you relate debt to three things. First of all you relate it to population and,of course,that is what 'we did when we talked about per capita debt, then you relate it to revenue. For instance,if_a person is making $10,000 a year and he owes $1,000 he is in some risk, if a oerson is make $100,000 a year and he owes $1,000 he is in risk.

So you have to relate it to revenues. And ,thirdly, if you are comparing debt in one year with another year you have to relate it to the value of money, what happened to the value of money in the meantime. For instance,ten dollars that you owe in 1984 is considerably less than ten dollars you owed in 1972. Now,as I say,children in sChool, Grade IX or even less, know these sorts of things. So when the Leader of the Opposition (Mr.

Neary) compares a figure with 1972 and 1984 and does not qualify it in an y way with the change in the value of money, the change in the revenues of the Province in the meantime,and the change in the population in the meantime 1 you have to ignore these sorts of things. You have to ignore those simplistic,foolish comparisons. Now, the Leader of the Opposition also made a point that the debt has gone up because of certain things and he made a big point about, -we nationalized the Upper Churchill.

And he said, 'One thing ·, I am saying is th1s had nothing to do with the Liberals.' Now,that had everytfuing to do with the Liberals,of course,because if the Liberals had not got us into that foolish Upper Churchill contract we would not have had to -not nationalize, we 1602

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 593 !1J - 2 DR. COLLINS: provincialize it - we would not have had to provincialize it, we would not have had to take it over. It was in the hands of the Province of Quebec, of Hydro Quebec, ~.,rhen the Hoores administration - not this administration, the previous administration - came into office,and it was not only in the aands of Hydro Quebec but the power contract was so foolish, it was so as±nine to have entered into such a contract that something had to be done about it. He mentioned that we should not have bought out BRINCO.

BRINCO wanted to develop the other water power in Labrador, on the Lower Churchill. They came in and they spoke to the Moores administration about developing it. Do you know what they wanted to do? They ~~~anted to develop it and ' sell it to Quebec at the same rate as the Uppe~ Churchill,or at least our return from the development of the Lower Churchill would be no greater than the return we are getting on a per horsepower· basis than on the Upper Churchill.

Now,you know,anyone who _did that would not only be foolish but they would be the accomplice after the fact of the villainous sin thing,when the Upper Churchill was entered intc,and the Moores administration, quite rightly, thre"YT the proposition out the window. The Leader of the Opposiiton (~x. !'eary) also said that the public sector debt went up because of a ·~ouple of explosions up on the Great Northern Peninsula and the Southern _Labrador Coco.st, and he says that +-'tis "'as a total loss, this vtas a terrible thing to do and he cannct understand why we got into those expenditures up there. Now : Mr.

Chairman, the hon. the Leader of the Oppos±tion, I· think, may have heard of LCDC, Lower Churchill Development Corporation,and that is a funded corporation and our equity in that corporation is the expenditures made ·up there. Now, 16(13

April 2, 1984 Tape No . 593 MJ- 3· DR . COLLINS: ttr . Chairman, who do you think is the other shareholder in there? ~Jhn no you think matched that equity, and of course validated it by matcning that equity? Who but the federal governm~nt. The Leader of the O~position (l<f-r . Neary) tries to make the point that this was a total loss when the federal government itself says that it is worth something,to the extent that we are going to equally fund LCOC on the basis of your equity. And that was our cost of beginning that development up there . 1604

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 594 DR. COLLINS: I will hardly make mention of the Labrador linerboard. I mean,you have to have a _ face like a robber's animai. For a Liberal to come up and say that the PC administrations lost money on the Labrador linerboard, when the Labrador linerboard was one of the biggest fiascos in this world,entered into by no other than the last Liberal Premier with the willing NM - 1 accomplice, the member opposite, entered into an arrangement with a carpetbagger who has no more validity than some outlaw down in Central America which, I believe 1 is where he is at the present time.

So the Labrador linerboard was loaded onto the back of the Moores' Administration when they came into office, this terrible thing that the Liberal Administration had gotten the people of Newfoundland into, and it cost us an arm and a leg, there is no doubt about it, it cost us an arm and a leg to take that foolish project and turn it into something which is now a credit to the Province, and it is one of the most modern papermaking operations in Eastern Canada. Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition (Mr.

Neary) forgot to mention other costs that we have had to face, both this administration and the previous PC Administration. We had to face costs over the fishery, enormous costs over the fishery. And one of the costs we have had to face recently was something like $35 million in trying to get a piece of the action of the fishery. In other words, we had to try to buy- back our own fishery that the Liberals,when they were last in power, gave away. The Liberals when they were in power gave 1605

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 594 NM - 2 DR. COL LIN S: our fishery away to the federal government and we have had to, in the last seven years, struggle and pay out nonies to get back our own resource . Similarly, we have had to expend considerable amounts of money in legal fees and studies and consultations , in whatever, to try to get a piece of the action of the offshore, something that was totally given away by the Liberal Government when they did not write into our Terms of Union proper terms.

The Newfoundland people thought there were proper terms in there. ~he Newfoundland people, until the supreme Court decision came down, thought they entered Confederation on the basis of having been a dominion, they had dominion status and,of course,a dominion had rights offshore. This is what the Newfoundland people thought. Lo and behold we find when i't is put to the test in the Supreme Court of Canada that the Supreme Court rules otherwise. Now,this was a pure dissembling to the Newfoundland people. MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : Order, please! The hen. member's time has elapsed.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEARY: Mr. Chairman, this could evolve into a continuing debate~ I am not going to get bogged down on three items,but I just want to deal briefly with what the han. gentleman said about Labrador linerboard. Mr. Chairman, it is now a well-known and established fact that it was not necessary .to nationalize Labrador lineboard. That is an absolute fact. The same gentleman who started that mill, and the hen. gentleman gets over there and boasts now and says, "What a modern paper mill it is, " there would not be anything there if it were not for the Liberals and for the 1606

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 594 NM - 3 MR. NEARY: gentleman who promoted that mill. They would not have anything there. They have spent $60 million or $70 million to convert a $500 million mill into a paper mill. If it was not there they would not be able to convert it. It was put there for them. And then they gave it away, gave it to Abitibi-Price for God only knows what in return, gave it to them. It did not cost them a penny, not a cent. It cost the taxpayers o~ this Province $500 million to keep it going.

And there is still some pretty shady wheeling and dealing in connection with that that has never been accounted for. MR. CARTER: A point of order, Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : A point of order, the hon. the member for St. John's North. MR. CARTER: We are so.used to hearing the han. the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Neary) emulate the late Senator McCarthy that I sometimes think his soul must .have penetrated his hulk,that whenever we hear there is something shady,or whenever we hear MR. STAGG: Ask him are you now or have you ever been? MR.

CARTER: Yes - whenever we hear an accusation we are so used to hearing it we let it roll off our backs like water off a duck's back, But I have to point out, Mr. Chairman, or I 1607

.. '• . !1-pril 2.1 19,84 Tape No. 5 95 SD ... 1 MR.. CAR'.l;E'R; should not have to point out that in this· Rouse there is the press, they do not come in all that often,or all of them do not come in all that often, there are strangers in the gallery, and I do not mean this pejoratively1 there are people here for the first time, they hear these absurd and wild charges and ·same of them may be inclined to believe that where there is smoke there is fire. Now I think, Mr. Chairman, that whenever the han.. member gets on like that he should be brought to order very quickly and very severely.

We are all so used to it we tend not to hear it, but r think occasionally some of-us should get up and point it out. MR. NEARY: MR. CHAIRMAN (~ylwardl: To that point of order, Mr. Chairman. To thati.·point of order, the hon. Leader of the Opposition, MR. NEARY: Mr. Chairman, th.e han. gentleman - of course, I do not have to tell Your Honour -does not have a point of order, but in the process· of squirting his venom acros·s the House the han. gentleman used an unparliamentary term, Mr.

Chairman, and he should be made to w~thdraw it or he should be named and flung out of the House for referring to me as a disciple of Senator McCarthy. You cannot, according to the rules of this !rouse, you cannot say through the backdoor what you cannot say through the front door. McCarthyism is an unparliamentary term, Mr. Chairman, and the hon, gentleman should be made to withdraw what he sai·d or be· named by Your Honour , MR.

CHAIRMA;N': Order, please~ To that point of order 1 each meil)ber i:n the House will haye the opportunity to debate th.e figures· and statements· made by other members_ s·o I rule that there ±.s· not a paint of order~ Th.e fact that a certain word is clai':med to be unparLiamentary, I will haye t.o check 1608 ~· ....

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 595 so - 2 MR. CHAIRMAN [Aylward) : is not. it, I do not know if it is or The han. Leader of the Opposition. MR. NEARY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The han. gentleman can try to use up my time all he wants with his silly, foolish points of order but the fact of the matter is that we will stay here as long as is necessary on the Consolidated Fund, that the hon. gentleman would not understand. He probably thinks it is something you have for dinner - Consolidated Fund Services. He does not understand it and if he does not like the heat let him get out of the kitchen. But, Mr.

Chairman, that linerboard mill need not have been nationalized, it was a blunder, it was an error in judgment~ The han. gentleman was part of the administration that did it and it cost the taxpayers $500 million. And,Mr. Chairman, then they · gave it to Ab±tibi-Price who converted it into a paper mill. At least they had something to convert. If it was not there they would have had noe1ing to convert and the people out in the Bay St. George area would be like the rest of the people throughout the Province, they would have nothing. And, Mr.

Chairman, the man who started that mill also started roc, Wabush Mines and they did not have to nationalize that, Th.ese two great projects succeeded and as a result they named a house over here on the campus' of Memorial Univers·ity after the gentleman who _th~y a~e so hot to trot after all the time. H..tl.. DAWE: Carpetbagger house. "-MR. NEARY·: Not only that, gave him an honourary degree, by the way. That 'same gentleman was given an honoura:11y degree from thi's uni:vers ·ity, Oh:~ th .ey would lo .ve to have hi'm back.

Mr, Cha:i:rman, the problem is they probably would not be able to find . a judge to hear the case. because they would all be in conflict of interest~ they 1609

. . - ~ - ···--- -·-- ·'····-- ··-· April 2, 19 .84 Tape No. 595 SD - 3 ··MR. NEARY: MR. CARTER: MR. CHAIRMAN (Aylward) : would have to bring a judge in. A point of order, Mr. Chairman. Order, please: for s·t. John 1's· North. MR.

CARTE·R: A point of order, the han. member You know, we may criticize each other, we may criticize the general public, we may practically say anything in th:i:.s House,but one thing we may not do in this House is criticize the judiciary, you know, and I think the member is suggesting that all the members of the judiciary could be in conflict of interest in connection with some of the Doyle shenanigans. That is the most unparliamentary thing that has ever been uttered in this House. ·MR. NEARY: To the point of order, Mr. Chairman. · MR. ClflURMAN: Order, please!· To the point of order, the han.

Leader of the Opposition. · MR '.

NEARY ·: Mr, Chairman, I believe when these gentlemen were. in the practice of law in this Province a good many of them had something to do with the Iron Ore Company of Canada, the Wabush Mines, the liner board mill, Ca.nadi:an Javelin; Jubilee, I wou.Ld have to say a large number of them~ And r am not casting aspersions on the bench or on the judges, r am merely making a statement of fact, that it may be very difficult to find a judge to hear the case because of a conflict of interest situation and a judge may have to be brought in from outside,which pro .bably would be the first time in Newfoundland's hls ·tory. -MR, CHA;I'RMAN: point of orderr MR. ~Y·: 1610 Are you finished on that Yes, I am.

-·· .. April 2, 1984 Tape No. 595 so - 4 MR. CHAIRMAN {Aylw ard) : To that point of order the hon . member explained the point he was trying to make and he certainly made it clear that he was not tryin g to cast aspersions on the justices of this land. Tne hon . Leader of the Opposition. MR. NE·ARY : That is the ho n. gentleman's buttoned - down,bigoted, small-mindedness, Mr . Chairman, the narrow-mindedness that we get from the opposite side of the House , th.e smallness like we saw the other day with the airplane when r was down in Stephenville 1611

April 2,1984 Tape No. 596 ah-1 MR. NEARY: and down in Port aux Basques. How small can you get? Mr. Chairman, they are so low that they could probably crawl under a reptile's belly. That is how low-down they are over there. Now, Mr. Chairman, I hope I have dealt with the Linerboard. The other thing the hon. gentleman could not justify was these two holes in the ground. But , Mr. Chairman, I noticed the hon. gentleman kept referring to the Upper Churchill, 'that foolish contract' , he said. And I asked the han. gentleman, I interrupted and I said, ·~·iho negotiated that contract?' He did nat answer me.

You see,here is the brainwashing and here is the Hitler-like tactic that they use when .they are talking about the Upper Churchill. I am asking the hon·. governernnt House Leader (Mr.Marshall) to stand up in this House man-fashion, be a man, do not be a mouse and tell the people of the Province, because he has tried to lead them astray, mislead them, who negotiated the contract? Who negotiated it? Does the Minister of Finance (Dr.Collins) know who ~egotiated that contract? Who negotiated it? DR.COLLINS: Lesage, Smallwood and Pearson. MR.NEARY: The hon. gentleman said, 'Lesage, Smallwood .and Pearson'.

Well,how come the government's lawyer, when they went before the Supreme ---- -- Court on the water reversion rights 1 said that Mr. Smallwood or the government did not have anything to do with that contract,neither did they see it? How can the hon. gentleman answer that? And how can the han. gentleman answer that Newfoundland Hydro put out a brochure and said the government did not negotiate · 1612 ..

April 2,1984 Tape No. 596 ah-2 MR.NEARY: the contract, they had nothing to do with it, they had no right to have anything to do with it and they did not see it? Now go and ask Mr. Leonard Martin. As a matter of fact, I have sent for the document from the Supreme Court and I have it down in my office somewhere and I have the brochure. Even John Crosbie,as brazen, as narrow- minded and as bigoted as he was, when John Crosbie stood in this House he told the House that the government had nothing to do with that contract. MR.CHAIRMAN (Aylward): Order, please! The hon.member's time has elapsed.

The han. the Minister of Finance. DR.COLLINS: Mr. Chairman, the han. Leader of the Opposi~ion (Mr.Neary) says that the government at that time, that is the Liberal government who was in power at that time, with one of the biggest projects going on,a project that was going to affect the Newfoundland people for sixty-five years, they just turned their back on it, they turned a blind- eye to it. I mean, that_ is an incredible admission to make.

Is he serious in saying that the Smallwood administration, when the Upper Churchill project was being put into place, that _they knew nothing about it, that they turned their back on it, that they turned a blind-eye to it? Something that was going to haunt the,Newfoundland people £or sixty-five years, something that was going to take our resources and transfer the wealth therefrom to another Province and they knew nothing about it, did not pay any attention? l.ffi.. SHIMS: After the way it turned out I would not be surprised. 1613

April 2,1984 TApe No. 596 ah-3 DR.COLLINS: I mean, what exactly were the Smallwood administration doing? What were they there for? I mean,there are members on the opposite side who were in the Smallwood administ~ation at that time. Did they say that they were so uncaring about their responsibilities that they paid no attention to what was going on in Western Labrador when one of the biggest hydro electric generation sites in the world was being put in place and being put in place on the backs of a resource owned by the Newfoundland people? And they did not pay any attention to it.

They did not know anything about what was going on. They did not care.It is fantastic. MR.MARSHALL: 1<7hen he was in government, you see, he dared not ask a question so he assumed ·~t was all right. DR.COLLINS: So he assumed. Right. Now ·, just supposing you accepted that ridiculous statement, supposing you accepted that, who would have negotiated it? Who else was there? We know that Quebec were on one side. I persume they did not negotiate with. a phantom. There had to be someone on the ather side. So who would it have been? Would it have been BRINCO? It could nat have been BRINCO. Sure the han.

Leader of the Opposition (Mr.Neary) said that BRINCO was the greatest thing since sliced bread and the PC administration had holes in their head to get rid of BRINCO. It could not ~ave been BRINCO, this paragon of virtue that the han. Leader of the Opposition said that we we.re dastardly to have gotten rid of. It could not be those people who negotiated away the 1614

"'- April 2,1984 Tape No. 596 ah-4 DR.COLLINS: resources of the Newfoundland people in that foolish deal. It could not have been them. Anyway, whoever it was there ~ras certainly a foolish , foolish contract entered into,and if the Smallwood administration could not do anything about it they should have been taken out and shot like dogs in the street,because that is what they were elected for . They were elected to protect the interest and the resources and the possession 's of the Newfoundland government. And if they did not protect them -- . _.i 1615

April 2, 1984 Tape No. 597 NM - 1 DR. COLLINS: they should be drummed out of the Province. MR. NEARY: Who negotiated the contract? DR. COLLINS: Now, Mr. Chairman, what else do we have here? oh;yes, the Leader of the Opposition has given us an insight into what is called the Liberal way to develop things. It goes something like this: First of all you go out and make a horrendous mistake that costs millions. That is the first thing you do, such as the linerboard. You set up something that is stupid and asinine like the linerboard, that is the first thing to do.

You put yourself down in the hole, you put yourself in debt, you enter into a contract that is so silly that even certain merchants down on Water Street, and some of them are si ·lly enough, even they would not enter into it. Now having done that, having put yourself way down in the hole and put yourself in a loss position, then you throw it open to someone else and ask them to turn it around for you. Now,that is the Liberal way to develop things. And it is a useful insight to have.

I hope the press picks it up and lets the people of this Province know what they are in for if they ever let the members opposite get back into power and start developing Newfoundland again. That is what they will do. First of all they will give it all away and then,having given it all away and the people in t