Manitoba Hansard — 24 May 1977 (Sitting 66B, 30th Legislature, 4th Session)

30-4-66b

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

TIME: 2:3 0p.m. THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY of MANITOBA Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 OPENING PRAYER by Mr . Speaker. MR. SPEAKER, Hono urable Peter Fox (Kildonan): Before we proceed, I should like to direct the attention of the honourable memb ers to the gallery where we have 52 students Grade 5 standing of the Greenway School under the direction of Mr. Falconer, Mrs. Beau lieu and Mrs. McMi llan This school is from the constituency of the Honourable Member for St. Matthews. We have 60 students Grade 6 standing of the Van Bel leghem School under the direction of Mr. Kepron and Miss Wick.

This school is from the constituency of the Honourable Member for Riel. On behalf of all the memb ers, we welcome you here this afternoon. Presenting Petitions; Read ing and Receiving Petitions; Presenting Reports by Standing and Special Com mittees; Ministerial Statements and Ta bling of Reports; Notices of Motion; Introduction of Bills. ORAL QUESTIONS MR . SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Ga rry. MR. L. R. (Bud) SHERMAN: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Honourable the Minister of Mines, Resources and Envir onme ntal Ma nagement.

I would like to ask him whether he can confirm that in the case of spraying, for exam ple, for Forest Tent caterpillars and other plagues of that kind, that the City is now able to undertake that kind of program on their own and no longer needs permission from the Provincial Government? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Min ister of Mines. HO NOURABLE SIDNEY GREEN (lnkster): Mr. Speaker, the matters are as provided in the legislation last year.

There are certain conditions under which the City, within its own jurisdiction, and on the basis of the spray not moving to another area, filing a program with the Department, are able to engage in the use of insecticides which are approved by the Federal Department that is responsible for permitting these drugs, or prohibiting them from appearing on the market. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Attorney-General. HON OURABLE HOWARD PAWLEY (Selkirk): Mr. Speaker, I had undertaken to give a date, as soon as I could possibly obtain same, re inquest Portage fire.

I have been advised that, although the final dates haven't been established, the date of the inquest will be likely three days in the final week in Jun e and the arrangements are being made as to the exact dates within that last week in June, are being made today or tomorrow. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Mem ber for Birtle-Russell. MR. HARRY E. GRAHAM : Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Attorney-General a question then. The final three days may be dependent on whether or not an election is called in that period, is that right? MR. PAWLEY: Mr.

Speaker, the only inquest that hopefully would take place in the final week of June is an inquest into the policies and programs of the Official Opposition. MR. GR AHAM: Well, then I can take it from the Attorney-General's remarks that that inquest will take place the last week in June. MR. PAWLEY: Yes, I have been assured that it will take place during the final week in June, as to the exact three days which is expected the inquest will take- Oh, I'm sorry, I was led right into that. That's up to the Premier to indicate. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Ass iniboia. MR. STEVE PATRICK: Thank you, Mr.

Speaker. I have a question for the Min ister of Industry and Commer ce. Can the Minister of Ind ustry and Comm erce give us a report as to the success of the Job Creation Program where the emp loyers get paid half the salary for employees up to three employees. Can the Minister indicate how many have been hired under that program? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of In dustry and Comm erce. HO NOUR ABLE LEONARD S. EVANS (Brandon East): Mr. Speaker, I would hope to be able to inform the mem bers of the House eventually, in the near future I would trust, as to some numbers that have been approved.

I can only report at this time, Mr. Speaker, that there have been several hundred active inquiries from smal l business entrepreneurs in the province. MR. PATRICK: A supplementary. Can the Min ister indicate to the House, is he satisfied that the program to this day is satisfactory? MR. SPEAKER: Asking for an opinion. The Hono urable Member for Rock Lake. MR. EINARSO N: I direct this question to the Mi nister of Agriculture.

I would like to ask the Minister if any negotiations are going on at the present time between the Man itoba Milk Producers' Marketing Board and Manco to solve the problem of price that has been going on for some time. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister for Agriculture. 3327

Tuesday, May 24, 1977 MR. USKIW: Well, Mr. Speaker, I am aware that there has been a meeting this morning, and I believe they are reconvening this afternoon. But apart from that I have no further information. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for La Verendrye. MR. BOB BANMAN: I add ress my question to the Min ister of Renewable Resources and would ask him if he could inform the House as to what extent of damage is being done by these forest tent caterpillars to the forests in eastern Manitoba. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister for Renewable Resources. MR. BOSTROM: Well, Mr.

Speaker, I expect that the damage will be similar to that which the forest experienced last year in which the leaves were eaten by the foresttent caterpillars, and later on in the summer they seemed to appear again, and with no real apparent damage to the trees. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister for Agriculture. MR. USKIW: Mr. Speaker, this morning I had indicated to the Member for Fort Rouge that I would indicate to the House the new measu res that were announced by the Federal Minister of Agriculture with respect to preparedness for a possible drought this sum mer.

Main ly there are three or four different programs that have been ag reed to between the Government of Canada and the provinces affected by the drought, or potential drought. One of them deals with a cost-sharing arrangement on commun ity wells, where it is a 50-50 arrangement as between the Federal. Government and the provinces involved, with federal participation up to $1 5,000 per such well. The Farm Wel l Program has also been enriched so that farmers are now able to receive subsidies up to $950, for the drilling of deep wells up to 440 feet in depth.

There is also an agreement that, should it become necessary, we will also become involved in assistance for transportation of feed and cattle, and perhaps even the purchasing of feed. But that is premature at the moment in terms of making a definitive statement, since we don't believe we are in a drought situation at the moment. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Well, Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for his answer.

I wonder if he could give some, at least, preliminary indication of what extent this particular program may be applied in the province, and what matching funds may be requ ired, and how the Minister would apportion them to deal with this particular new arrangement. MR . SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Agriculture. MR. USKIW: Well, Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of the Me mber for Fort Rouge, we have been very much involved in an emergency way over the last twelve months here in the Province of Man itoba.

We now appreciate the added assistance com ing from the Government of Canada for a program that we are already ongoing and for, indeed, new programs. So we have spent considerable sums of money in the drilling of new wells in the last twelve-month period. I believe somewhere in the order of 30-odd wells were constructed or drilled in the last six or eight mo nths.

We have 70 all together in our program to date, so that we appreciate the assistance that is given to us through this particular announcement, and I don't think I should want to quantify at this point in time, what that will mean in total dollars, because we don't know the extent of our drought situation, if indeed, we are going to have a drought. Lately it has been rather on the wet side, Mr. Speaker. MR. AXWORTHY: Well, Mr.

Speaker, in the reports that were issued from that meeting there seemed to be an indication that the dry season that we experienced in the early part of the spring provided sufficient warning, that we should recognize the need to undertake a more comprehensive water development program in the prairie region.

I wonder if the Minister can indicate, as a consequence of those meetings, if there are any specific steps that are being taken now to put together the planning and implementation of a major program for water supply to human settlements, which I believe seemed to be indicated in the report from that meeting of last Friday. MR . USKIW: Well, again, Mr. Speaker, I did indicate that for comm unities we now have an agreement on a community well program, water supply program, with maximum dollars attached as far as the Government of Canada is concerned.

We have been involved in such a program for some time in this province, Mr. Speaker, in fact for the last two or three years so it is not new for us. lt is rather new for the Government of Canada to the extent that they have made this most recent announcement. I don't know that I have much more to add to that, Mr. Speaker. We are very much aware of the situation and we are prepared to cope with it in the best way we can and hopefully with the involvement of the Government of Canada, it will be a more extensive approach to the province. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr.

Speaker, I don't believe the Min ister understood my question'. lt wasn't what the immediate response to the particular problem would be but it was my understand ing from the newspaper reports of that meeting, there was an acknowledgement that the dry conditions of this spring signalled a general problem of water supply overall on the prairies and that as the populations get shifted around and all these other things take place, there is going to be very severe demands requiring major expenditures of money over the next five or ten years for new distribution systems and so on.

I am wondering, did the federal and provincial authorities come to some agreement as to 3328

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 how they are going to begin working towards a plan for the prairie region so that we can ensure that there is adeq uate water supplies in the next five or ten years. MR . USKIW: Mr. Speaker, I think it is obvious that there are plans under way and that there is a federal task force headquartered in Regina, set up to do this very thing, in co-operation with the drought committees of the provinces which are involved. So, yes, they are looking far into the future on this question. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. EDWARD McG ILL: Mr.

Speaker, my question is for the Honourable the Minister of Education in his capacity of Chairman of the Management Comm ittee of Cabinet. I refer him to Order-in Council No. 550 appointing an assistant secretary of the Ma nagement Comm ittee of Cabi net and in which it is indicated that it is impracticable to have a competition which is required under the Civil Service Act. Mr. Speaker, my question to the Min ister is, what are the circumstances of this appointment which make it impracticable to have a competition? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Education. HON OURABLE IAN TURNBULL (Osborne): Mr.

Speaker, it is not normal, I don't think, for Chairpersons of Cabinet Committees to respond in the Hous e but in this case I think it is a matter of personnel that perhaps could be dealt with. The reason is, quite simply, that this is an executive appointment. MR. McG ILL: Mr. Speaker, then a supplementary question. Could the Minister tell the House if this is policy of this adm inistration to make appointments at this level without competition? MR. TURNBULL: Mr.

Speaker, it is not policy in all cases, no, but very often where individuals have been performing the work involved for some length of time at the level that we're talking about here, particularly for a central agency, this government has made appointments in this way, as have previous administrations made similar appointments of similar people in senior civil service positions. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Arthur. MR. J. DOUG LAS WATT: Mr. Speaker, I direct a question to the Min ister in charge of Provincial Parks.

I wonder if the Minister could indicate to the Hous e why, for the protection of the people within provincial parks, the practice of locking gates instead of using police protection is used. Locking gates, which locks people out but locks people in. MR. SPEAKER: The Hono urable Min ister of Tourism and Recreation. HO NOURABLE BEN HANUSCHAK (Burrows) : Mr. Chairman, I will take that question as notice.l am not aware of the exact nature of the problem that this creates by locking some out and locking others in. If it is a problem, we will have that remedied. MR. WATT: A supplementary then.

I wonder if the Minister would also take as notice the factthat the people from Winn ipeg and the people from Brand on and I think other people were locked into the provincial park at Oak Lake on Saturday night and were unaware that at ten o'clock they were going to ... the question is, would he take this question as notice, that they were unaware and that they were locked in there and that they had to destroy provincial property to get out or sit there all night. MR. HANUSCHAK: I shall see to it that the people from Wi nnipeg and Brandon are not being discriminated against in that fashion. MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Ind ustry and Commerce. MR. EVANS: Mr. Speaker, the other day the Member for Gla dstone asked a question with regard to Neepawa Ha rrow Works to the effect of our involvement in assistance to the company. I am advised departmental assistance has been provided to the owner or partner back to the year 1971 and we have recommen ded various courses of action.

I believe the company is still having difficulty; I wouldn't wish to discuss the details of that company because it is their particular purview; it's their particular concern but we have done whatever we have been able to in this particular instance. ORDERS OF THE DAY MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable House Leader. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honourable the Attorney-General, that Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair and that the House resolve itself into a Committee to consider the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty.

MOTION presented and carried and the House resolved itself into a Comm ittee of Supply to consider the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty with the Honourable Mem ber for Logan in the Chair. COMMITTEE OF SUPPL V ESTIMATES - MINES, RESOURCES AND ENVIRONM ENTAL MANAGEMENT MR. CHAIRMA N, Mr. William Jenkins (Logan): I refer honourable members to Page 43 of their Estimates Book. Resolution 82 Envir onmental Mana gement (

a) Admin istration

(1) Salaries and 3329

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 Wages $259,700.00. The Honourable Mem ber for St. James. MR. GEORGE MINAKER: Mr. Chai rman, when we left on this particular item just before our break, the Minister had indicated that the total dissolved solids from effluent water from the City of Winn ipeg entering the river system had increased. ! was wondering if his department has actual facts on whether or not the salt being applied to city streets which enter the storm sewer system are, in fact, starting to take effect on the quality of the river water and also making its way to Lake Winnipeg.

Can the Minister advise if his department has any information relating to this subject? MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Mi nes. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, I don't know whether I said that the total dissolved solids entering the Red River from Winnipeg has increased. What I did say was that when one considers the changed effects north of Winnipeg, it would be the storm sewers as well as the sanitary sewers and that this would include the salt but I am not sure that the total dissolved solids has increased.

As to the effect of the salt, as to whether that is becoming a problem, nothing has been brought to my attention other than the totality of the problem which I have indicated is much less than it was in previous years. MR. MIN AKER: Then, Mr. Chairman, can we take from the Minister's answer that there hasn't been any really close look at what effect it might have and there aren't actually any measurements or any research done on this subject to date? MR. GR EEN: Well, Mr. Chairman, I can't say that there hasn't been measurements and research done on the water quality north of Winnipeg.

I haven't had brought to my attention but I will ask for it specifically, what the effect of the salt is but there has been research and certainly close monitoring of the water north of Winnipeg, but I will determine for my honourable friend whether the salt has a particular effect and I will give him the information as soon as I get it. MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Ste. Rose. MR. A. R. (Pete) ADAM : Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just on that point of usage of salt to melt snow on city streets and probably not only in Winnipeg but perhaps further south.

I believe I brought this to the attention of the Assembly perhaps four years ago. All the snow is dumped on the river and 1 believe at that time it was 80,000 tons that the City of Winnipeg was using at that particular time. I stand to be corrected on this but it was an awful lot of salt. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Mem ber for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Chairman, continuing the questioning on this question of water standards.

About two or three weeks ago, a report appeared publicly of a speech given to the Manitoba Environment Council annual meeting which indicated that the major problem in the province related to the total lack of any water quality standards and that the province had not been setting any standards in this area and that, therefore, the Clean Environment Com m ission was being required to deal on each case in terms of applying a permit or recommenda tion in each instance and that there was a tremendous backlog of six months and that ma ny of the applications were not receiving the attention in that there was not any basic water quality standards that had been established and that, as a result, the ability to determine the merits of each and every individual application was that much more complicated and that much more tortuous and probably that much more ineffective because it didn't relate to any basic standard as to what we assumed to be the qualities that we would want in each of the water bodies that were being looked at.

So, I would really like to ask the Minister in this case whether the government is now going to take steps to begin elaborating a very specific program of water quality standards that would be applied across the province under which anyone putting contaminants in the water would then have to measure up against and perhaps he could indicate whether the problem as reported to the Man itoba Environment Council in terms of the backlog of the Clean Envi ronment Comm ission in dealing with these applications is being looked at and is going to be corrected? MR. GREEN: Mr.

Speaker, there is considerable argument and I think always will be as to whether a law, no matter how many contingencies it takes into effect and no matter how flexible and how broadly ranges are permitted within the limits, is better than having a hearing as to the particular fact at the particular time. The drafting of regulation is not a solution to the problem. The drafting of regulations merely means that the government, through its technical people, set what the limits are and it ceases to be a matter that is argued on an individual case before the Clean Environment Comm ission.

I don't agree that there is a problem with respect to the Ma nitoba water quality standards which puts us behind what other areas are. l do agree that there is a problem with regard to water qual ity standards in that the Clean Environment Comm ission has been having to deal with them as they come up on each occasion. Mr. Speaker, this is very satisfactory in some respects because they have had to deal with different kinds of applications.

They have had to deal with what shall be the permitted discharge in terms of domestic sewage systems on the Burntwood River where it is going into Hudson Bay and there is very little usage upstream and there are very few people upstream and there is a certain cubic feet per second in the Burntwood River. They have had to deal with similar problems in Minnedosa where the water, once it leaves Minnedosa, comes to a different locality and we have permitted evidence to be given with regard to each of these areas rather than 3330

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 suggesting one standard will apply to all of them. I am not completely satisfied that that's not the best way of doing it but in order to see whether general standards can be arrived at, we have asked the Clean Environment Commi ssion to conduct hearings into water qual ity standards. I believe that notice has been given to all municipalities and various peoples affected. The hearings start two days from today; two or three days from today and there will be an attempt by the Clean Environment Comm ission to recommend to the department as to how standards can be drawn .

The reverse has been happening up until now. The department has attempted to recommend general standards to the Clean Environment Comm ission, and my recollection is, in the last case these were not accepted by the Com mission which applied a different measure than that suggested by the departmental people to the system at Minnedosa. So havi.1g your idea as to what the standards should be, doesn't necessarily mean that this will work.

There also is pending before me, an appeal from the Clean Environment Comm ission from an order relating to Thompson, where the Thompson Council was not satisfied with the lim its set by the Clean Environment Comm ission and asked us to take into account the increased flow of the Burntwood River as a result of the Churchill River Diversion; and also the fact that one should not look at waters flowing straight from Thompson into Huds on Bay in the same way as waters flowing from Minnedosa to the next rural community.

Now, whether my honourable friend agrees with this or whether I agree with it or not, it is argua ble. This doesn't mean that we are behind. This doesn't mean that the Commis sion cannot do its job. This means that we and others are struggling with the attempt to come up with satisfactory arrangements. I am not at all sure that satisfactory arrangements are a set of regulations passed by Order-in-Council. I think what we will do is get closer and closer to general guidelines and perhaps regulations with parameters or discretion allowed to the Co mm ission.

But in order to deal with the subject, in addition to the manner in which it is being dealt with at the present time and that is, that our departmental officials made appearances and recom mended steps to the Com mission, we are asking the Comm ission to hold hearings of a general nature, and to report to us with their recom mendation. MR. CHAIRM AN : The Honourable Memb er for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr.

Chairman , I thank the Min ister for the answer. l perhaps could raise a point or two with him, going back to some comments he made this morning, but also indirectly to the answer that was given this afternoon; that perhaps regulation of establishing standards that are applied to large water bodies may not be the best way because the complication and the implementation gets into being fairly heavily embroiled with red tape.

I am wondering if the Minister or his department have looked at the alternative of providing effluent charges, or charges for those who put discharges in the water bodies themselves, as a way of controlling the contami nation of water bodies or others. And that in a sense, Mr. Chairman, it is well recognized that one of the ways in which you can best control the behaviour of individuals and corporations and compan ies, is to put a true and accurate cost on them as to the nature of what activity they undertake.

Now, the basic standard in our society, up until very recently, has been that industry, for example, or even municipalities could contaminate waters without any cost to them; and the water was a free given, nothing was char ged against them for the use of that sink in which they could pour their waste. We are now attempting to control it by regulation and by permit which involves hearings, which may I think ... Probably the more that we compl icate our own society, the more you are going to find a complication in numbers of hearings and the kinds of decisions, and the intermix of different kinds of regulations.

I would want to know whether the department is considering, as an alternative to that system or as a mix between the two, establishing the notion that you pay for what you pollute; and that as a result then, manufacturers and so on, mun icipalities, which want to continue it realize that they are going to have to pay a heavy cost. Of course, one of the reasons for that, Mr. Chairman, is that the problem with regulation, even the way that we do it in the Clean Environme nt Comm ission, is that we take the given art of technology dealing with pollution as a given, they don't attempt to improve upon it.

One of the incentives that can be given to the effluent discharge model would be to provide an incentive for developing newer, perhaps, technologies we haven't heard of, to control pollution simply as a way of alleviating costs, being I think, a primary incentive for that notion.

And so, without saying that it is the only answer, it is certainly one that is now being exam ined by other systems who are dealing equally with the problem and I would like to know, whether in fact in this province, we are beginning to exam ine that idea of charging for the rate of pollution that individuals, a company or a municipality puts into water bodies, so that the proper costs can be apportioned and that they then know really what the true cost to themselves and society are of their particular form of contamination. MR. GREEN: Well, Mr.

Chairman, we have not considered that appropriate means of doing things, and I rather suspect that one of the reasons that we don't do that is that I am afraid of the criticism that 1 would get from my honourable friend if we did a thing like that. Because what he would be in here 3331

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 saying, is that you have told people that if they are willing to pay they can pollute the environment; and that if a person has got enough money and is able to pass on his costs, perhaps in the form of increases and charges to his products, or is in a superior com petitive position, that we will accept a price for the pollution of the environment. We have decided to approach it in the other direction; that we say we are going to look for acceptable standards.

Those acceptable standards are going to be continually reviewed and looked at. lt is not a case that we assume that the present technology cannot be approved upon. We are continually trying to develop new technologies and we are asking people to improve their technologies when new systems are developed. So we consider that it would be a weakness to our system if we said, provided that the industry is capable of obtaining it, that we will permit them to pollute the environment on the basis of paying an additional charge.

If one looked at the situation in Flin Flon, we rather suspect that if we had a charge as against reducing the limits of pollution, that it might be quite satisfactory for the mining compan ies to pay the charge, and we don't think that that is an appropriate system. We are trying to proceed on the basis that the level of emissions will not damage the environment. We are not at this point, and I hope that we don't reach the point where we are prepared to say, "Yes, you can damage it provided you pay the government and increase our revenues." We prefer the approach of determining what could be reasonable limits.

MR. AXWORTHY: Well, of course, Mr. Chairman, that's not what I said. The Minister did not (Interjection)- No, I did not say that. What I did say was, that there would be a combination of standards which would set whatthe limits would be and set the guidelines beyond which there would be no allowable. But as the Minister acknowledged in his own remarks several times this morning and this afternoon, that even with the permit system under the Clean Environment Com mission, many municipalities and compan ies are still polluting, are still putting contamination into the water.

Oh yes, he has said that- it's on the record, he said it this morning and repeated it again this afternoon - that it is not a perfect system ; that there are still amou nts of contamination being issued into the Red River by the City of Winn ipeg; that there is still contamination going into the water bodies up north by the mining compan ies; there are 10 1 other different kinds of sources of contamina tion, many of which are not being captured by the Clean Environment Comm ission, and for one reason, because there is a backlog - a major backlog - in even deal ing with each application; thatthere are probably more applications coming in than are being dispensed with simply because, as industry grows and as we develop a more complicated economy, there will continue to be that kind of major and growing number of sources of potential contamination in water, and in air, for that matter; and that the regulatory system, just relying exclusively upon a regulatory system, is in itself, not sufficient.

I think that there is that admis sion the Minister himself made this morning in response to the Member for Ste. Rose. And what I am suggesting is, that rather than relying upon one method, whether in fact there should not be a combination of methods, one which would utilize, fi rst, the establishing of water qual ity standards for major water bodies so that you would know exactly what the level within the water body itself is, not what is com ing at the pipe, so that you can have something to measu re agai nst, which we haven't now.

I think that's one of the major difficulties with the operation of the Clean Environment Commis sion, they're exam ining each case individually and have little capacity to look at the cumulative effects or to determine that while a little bit of pollution on the part of one municipality or one industry is sufficient, you're starting up all those little bits, all of a sudden you find that the cumulative total effect in a river or a lake, or whatever it may be, is too much or is beyond its absorption.

So, not only should we have those standards but also determine whether in fact, a certain kind of pricing mechanism should be used . I think the Minister is wrong. I realize he doesn't have the same faith as I do in the pricing mechanism as a way of altering the way people behave, but I think that it does work, and it's been proven to work time and time again.

When labour costs go up, the first resort of the man ufacturer is to try and develop a new cost-saving machinery in order to save on labour costs, and therefore develop an alternate technology, and I think the whole growth of our agricultural industry is testimony to that particular effectiveness of a pricing system, of the way of beginning to alter behaviour and alter the way in which they conduct their business.

I'm simply saying without saying it's one or the other, or black or white, which I know there's a tendency to fall into that kind of trap in these kind of debates, what I am saying is, are we looking in major areas, particularly areas like the City of Winnipeg where there are large numbers of discharges into the waters, whether a form of pricing system might also be applicable. MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chairman, I'll start my remarks as the honourable mem ber started his.

Of course, 1 didn't say that, what he attributed to me - that despite the fact that the Clean Environment Comm ission is in existence, there are still people polluting the environment and that there is a great backlog. What I said was that the Clean Environment Commission deals with the following types of effects: (1 ) new attempts to obtain standards, and (2) on a progressive basis, people who have been doing it, who are brought before the Clean Environment Comm ission, either progressively or as a 3332

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 result of co. There is laint nothing in his suggestion which would not have exactly the same effect. You would not be able to set these charges until a person came before the Clean Environment Com mission, so we wou ld be no further ahead with those people if we adopted the honourable mem ber's system.

All we would have is a system whereby they could get out of the limits if they paid the charge, and if we had two companies, side by side, and both were involved in putting effluent into the environment, and one could pay and the other wouldn't, we would accept it from the one who could pay and we wouldn't accept it from the one who couldn't. I don't believe that would be a good system. I believe that my honourable friend would be up in his seat condem ning this government if we adopted such a system. We don't happen to have it, so he condemns the system that we've got, but he would still condemn.

And we have to be able to defend it on the basis that when the Clean Environment Comm ission sets standards, we want them to set standards which will result in the capacity of the environment to deal with the capacity of the emission, and we don't want them to set a system when this can't happen and charge the company to permit it to happen. it's not a question of black and white, as my hono urable friend says that we are in the trap of getting into.

From time to time and in different places, the Clean Environment Com mission will do different things. it's pointed, as I indicated earlier, the standards that you would set for the Town of Churchill, some of whose effluent may reach the Huds on's Bay, would be different from the standards that you would set for the City of Winnipeg, wh ich is sending water into populated areas north of Winnipeg. That is inherent in our present system.

If there are general standards that can be devised , we have asked the Clean Environment Comm ission to look into it, but we have not, at this point, and I, frankly, hope that we don't - one must never say never - I frankly don't agree with the philosophy that is suggested here.

We've also had it recommende d to us that we provide tax avoidance for the purchase of pollution abatement equipment, and we say that once society comes to the conclusion, through a reasonable process, that the pollution is not acceptable, then it's up to the firm involved to provide the equipment that brings them into the limits that are set. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr.

Chairman, I think that the position of the government, though, is still one that is not acceptable from the point of view that without recommending the step, it seems to me a little bit blind-sided not to be exam ining it as a potential alternative, and to be dism issing it out of hand for philosophical reasons or whatever.

In fact it should be looked at to determine whether in fact, as a part of the arsenal that one brings to bear in deal ing with pollution because I still come back to the point that the Min ister said this morning, that there are still a number of sources of contamination going into major water bodies in this province which the Clean Environment Comm ission has not yet been able to cope with, or, in fact, has allowed.

The permits that it has given still allow a degree of contamination to be issued, that may be considerably within allowable limits, but as we all know, limits change, standards change, and there is certainly the problem of accumulation. I' m still wondering why - I guess I know why with this particular Min ister- why, in terms of looking at alternatives, one would be so easily dism issed without seeing how it shouldn't be perhaps part of a complementary package. I do think, Mr. Chairman, that the condition as expressed by the Minister about the way in which the system works, is not one I will agree with.

I don'tthink it works as well as he thinks it does. I don'tthink we've got as good protection as we should have in terms of water standards in this province. I think there are a lot of things happening in our water which we don't know about. There is an ac cumulation of different kinds of contaminants, and I think some of the exales that we have seen, where odd tests being done by individual scientists in the Un iversity all of a sudden point out the existence of certain kinds of chemicals.

We shouldn't be qu ite so cock-sure, as the Minister appears to be, about how good the system is, because there certainly is enough evidence around that you begin discovering that there are a lot of foreign bodies in there that are coming into the water.

I' m simply asking, at this stage, we've had the particular environme ntal program in existence now since what, 1971 , I guess, when the bill was passed, the Clean Environment Com mission, with a few minor amendm ents, whether it isn't time to do a more careful review of the effectiveness of that system to determine what the degree of water standards are, and even the kind of thing that the Minister talked about this morning, where they're now going to do a major study on Lake Winnipeg.

I think it's a good step forward, but there are certainly many other water bodies in the province, other than Lake Winn ipeg that could stand the same kind of exam ination and have certain standards applied to them, which we don't have. That is really the question. lt is not recommending one step over another. it's simply recom mending that we take a look at how effective our present system is and whether in fact there shouldn't be some major changes in it. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 82(a ){1) Salaries and Wages $259,700-pass;

(2) Other Expen ditures $10 ,300-pass. 82(

b) Environmental Control

(1) Salaries and Wages $1 ,888,1 00.00. The Honourable Member for St. James. MR. MIN AKER: Mr. Chairman , there is indication that there has been some studies and 3333

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 surveillance done with regard to the National Air Po llution Surveillance Prog ram and I understand that there is comparisons being done with regard to cities in Canada. I was wondering how the City of Winnipeg compares to other cities with regard to the level of air pollution and so forth, in the city. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Mines and Resources. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, it used to be very good the last time that I had knowledge ofthis. l am indicating that with regard to foreign matter that it used to be good.

There has been a dust problem in Winnipeg which is not as favourable as with others I gather. That would be not related to polluting industries; it would relate to the winds and the streets, etc., the prairies, the more natural conditions rather than contamina nts. The reason for this is not because we are better managers; we happen to be luckier in Winnipeg, that what industry there is is a little later on the line and probably better managed with some exceptions and secondly, that we have less industrial development in this part of the country than we have in some of the other major cities.

Together with that, we are trying to see to it that the compan ies that we do have are dealing properly with the environment. But, as far as the comparisons are, they used to be very good. The last that I heard the only, or at least the one area where we had greater pr oblems was a natural area rather than a contaminant area, that is the area of dust. MR. MI NAKER: Mr. Chairman, in this surveillance and comparison, do they rank cities with regard to the qual ity of air? Where would we rank? MR. GREEN: Mr. Chai rman, I know that they did rank cities.

I will get the information as to where we rank; I don't have it at my fingertips at the moment. MR. MIN AKER: Mr. Chairman, I was wondering if the Honou rable Minister could advise, the research work that is being done under this particular environment control branch, how it ties in with other government agencies. I am thinking of how does his department tie in with, say the Department of Labour, wher e they are dealing with workmen 's safety and regulations and so forth? Is there a duplication?

Does the Department of Labour have its own particular branch of inspectors and surveillance or does this department provide that service to the Department of Labour? MR. GR EEN: There are three groups involved in occupational research of the nature that the honourable member is referring to, that is the Workmen' s Compensation Board through the Department of Labour, our department and the Department of Health has also been involved in occupational safety.

So there has been a co-ordinated com mittee type of research program which deals with levels in plants, in smelter works, etc. lt's called the Inter-departmental Research Com mittee but it involves those three groups. Also, for instance, Mr. Chairman , under this vote, there is the federal-provincial inspection agreement, meat inspection. You will recall the hiatus that existed for certain meats.

Under this program, we are have a co-ordinated effort with the Federal Government and also there is an agreement with the Ma nitoba Cancer Research Foundation with regard to research on radiation protection in the Province of Man itoba. This is in co-ordination with the Man itoba Health Services Commission so there are just some examples of how the research dovetails with research done in other branches. MR. MIN AKER: Mr.

Chairman, I wonder if the Minister can advise us what kind of control his department would have with regard to say the research type of work that is going on, I understand, in the Whiteshell reactor area where they are looking at the storage of nuclear waste above the ground in a special type of concrete silo. Is there any liaison that goes on between his department and the federal research and are they aware of what the federal agency is doing at the present time in the Whiteshell? MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chairman, we are not specifically involved with the Pinawa Research Plant. We are advised and consulted.

For instance, the Memb erfor La Verendrye asked me about the removal of waste from East Braintree to the Pinawa site and our people were certainly advised as to what was going on and we have a certain amount of technical assistance either way. We have been in commun ication with the Federal Government with regard to hazardous waste generally because there are other wastes in the Province of Man itoba which require different treatment than normal wastes and we feel that this is not a responsibility totally of the Province of Man itoba.

Given the fact that we are going to need to deal with our own hazardous wastes and that there are other hazardous wastes that are related to Federal Government activities, we are now in consultation with the Federal Government to see whether there can be a program, sponsored either by the Federal Government or by the Provincial Government, which will deal with some hazardous wastes. I emphasize that that is not the radioactive wastes at Pinawa because they are dealt with on an atomic energy basis.

I am talking about other hazardous wastes that can accu mulate in the Province of Man itoba for one reason or another. MR. MI NAKER: Mr. Chairman , is the Minister saying that if an agency like the Whiteshell Nuclear Research establishment is experimenting on storing of spent fuel and are now looking at a new technique where it is above the ground in concrete storage columns, that his department is not concerned or is not involved as providing that it is on a government agency facility such as this? MR. GR EEN: Well, I would not say that we are not concerned, Mr. Chairman , we are concerned 3334

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 but the responsibility for the program and the jurisdiction of the program would be entirely federal under the Atomic Energy Research authority. I would hasten to say that the Federal Government you know, we consider them to be a government that is responsible and that we can look to for dealing with these problems.

I would also indicate that people from the Province of Man itoba, 1 am sure, would be in contact from time to time with the people from the federal authority, so that they are dealing with the progress of the science but that we would not be specifically the, let's put it, the supervising or surveying agency. This is something that falls within the jurisdiction of the Federal Government. MR. MIN AKER: Well, Mr.

Chairman, can the Honourable Minister advise if any of his department officials or members of his department have viewed these particular devices for storing the spent fuel? lt seems to be a different approach from all of a sudden going from a buried type of underground system to a surface type and I am just wondering, shouldn't there be some concern not necessarily in terms of the research into it but the fact that the surface type of storage is being experimented with in our province, that we should be concerned in terms of at least being aware of what is happening and advised by the technical people with regard to its safety and its long-range effect and so forth.

MR. GREEN: Well, Mr. Chairman , I would be surprised if people from our department have not seen it. I have seen it; I have been to the site; I have seen the internal storage and the liquid tanks and I have also seen exam ples of the above ground concrete storage. I would be surprised if memb ers from our department had not seen it. I would think that they have and I am advised that they have because they are all engaged in the science and would want to be kept abreast of things.

But we are looking to the Federal Government, the elected Federal Government of Canada, to try to deal with this problem in such a way as to protect the citizens of our country, including those in Man itoba. MR. M INAKER: Mr. Chai rman , I wonder if the Honourable Minister cou Id advise if his department has had any formal contact by the federal agency with regard to going into this type of storage prior to them constructing the storage facilities, and in actual fact, experimenting with them.

Did his department receive any formal correspondence to the advice, and are they being kept up to date with regard to the results of the test to date? MR. GR EEN: Yes, Mr. Chairman . I can't remember, but it must have been several years ago that I recall being personally advised, at the ministerial level, of the Government of Canada engaging in this experimental storage work; and also I was called to the site, I think at that time, to see it. Also, done at the technical level as well. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 82(b)

(1) Salaries and Wages $1 ,888,100.00. The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHV: Mr. Cha irman , I wonder if we could raise with the Min ister the question of the role of the Environmental Imp act Assessment review procedure. In several questions in the House over the past month and a half, it became pretty clear that the number of departments whose activities would normally be considered falling within the guidelines that the government set out last summer were not referring any of their projects to the Environmental Im pact review procedure. And furthermore, Mr.

Chairman, when the Manitoba Environmental Council asked for an assessment of a number of provincially-sponsored programs which were environmentally sensitive, again according to the guidelines set out- and I can read the list: the Moose Lake-Le Pas Highway, Thomp son-Split Lake Hig hway, Jen peg-No rway House Hig hway, Easterville Road, the 500 kV line from Winnipeg to Brandon, the Red River Recre ationConservation Corridor, Assiniboine, Polar Gas Line, several others- in none of these cases have the project descriptions even been subm itted, and in many cases explanations as to why they weren't subm itted were just simply not available.

Now what it seems to indicate, Mr.

Chairman, is that the procedure itself is a faulty one, and if the Minister recalls going back to debates of some two years ago when we had occasion to raise the issue of how to do an environmental impact program in the province, it was recognized at that time that at least certain parts of the procedure be manda tory, certainly those projects which could have an effect upon the environment and fell within the guidelines, should at least be required to be subm itted, or at least mini descriptions of the projects be submitted so that officers of the Environmental Im pact Assessm ent review could then determine whether in fact there was a range of potential environmental dama ges or effects that should be examined and then the procedure could take over.

Now as it appears, Mr. Chairman, basically the procedure is almost well-nigh useless and again, in the sake of economy, one wonders whether it wouldn't be almost better not to have the procedure than to have really a procedure which is nothing more than an empty one being elaborated. My own preference, of course, would be to strengthen the procedure to make it a more effective one, to require those departments- in fact not those departments, but those agencies that receive provincial funds whose form of works could have a major impact upon the environment - to be brought under the guidelines of this procedure.

Mr. Chai rman, the point 1 really want to raise with the Min ister is whether in fact he intends to 3335

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 strengthen the procedure to make it wo rk rather that going through the kind of charade that it is now going through. MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chai rman, if anything is requ ired to make this procedure work, it is to do less of what my honourable friend says, not more, and that is where the dispute has been from the very outset. I indicated in this House that I will not adopt the word "environment" and environmental assessment and review

definitions that my honourable friend would adopt. He would adopt it as it relates to aesthetics. He would adopt it as it relates to traffic. He would adopt it as it relates to nearness to other activities. He would adopt it as it relates to the word "environment" used perhaps in its broadest possible sense, and other administrations have done that. The Department of Environment has cla imed jurisdiction over every other department over where a road should go, over how high a building should be, over what traffic should be permitted on a particular street.

And my honourable friend, who talks about people wanting to be empire-builders, that is the biggest empire building that is taking place in Canada with regard to the departments of the environment. With regard to our department, it deals with contam inants related to the air, land or water, not environment as it affects the most aesthetic location, not environment as it affects the permission of the sun's rays to land in a certain place, not environment as it affects the nearness of a road to an area where there is wildl ife. Now that doesn't mean , Mr. Chairman, that we are not concerned with those things.

We are concerned with those things, but the Department of Environmental Protection is not the department which has j•Jrisdiction. And we have fallen somep lace in a comprom ise and I will admit to my honourable friend that the procedure hasn't been as concise as he would like it to be in terms of its broadness. lt hasn't been as concise as I would like it to be in terms of its limits.

What has occurred is that we have indicated that the Environmental Protection Branch is willing to act as a network for other departments who have concerns with regard to provincial activities, that our one concern and the one which we wi!l have jurisdiction over, is as it relates to contaminants entering the land, air and water.

But if the Department of Renewable Resources wishes us to have in our guidelines for any particular program something that may affect them, such as wildlife, they can include it and that will be put into the guidelines to be sent to the agency that is dealing with the program, so that when it is reviewed by the Environmental Review Board, all of these things will be there. But the Environmental Protection Branch will not rule on those questions.

They will indicate to the agency that has submitted the program that Renewable Resources has a problem with regard to ducks, and that problem will have to be dealt with, or we would like you to deal with that problem, and if the agency says, which it can say. "We are obeying all provincial laws. We are obeying zonings. We are expropriating land. We are obeying whatever ordinances are in effect. We intend to proceed"- and there is still a difficulty, then the protection agency can , at the instance of the Cabinet order of inquiry, or the Cabinet can make a decision as to what should happen.

One of the examples of how this has worked - if the honourable member won't accept the proposition "worked well," at least how it has worked without a subjective adjective or adverb - the Hydro transmission line went first to the PLUG Comm ittee, which is the Provincial Land Use Pla nning Committee, and that committee had to deal with the problem of the agricultural use of land or whether it was close to roads or whether it was close to wildlife areas, and they satisfied the Provincial Land Use committee.

There were still matters which other groups had sent up which required concern, which have been put into the guidelines for the transmission line and Hydro will be, I assume, responding to those. But if the honourable member says that nothing has come to the process, it is not correct. The Manitoba Hydro transmission line has come in, the Manitoba Hydro Churchill water supply, a water resources program at the Dog Lake outlet channel, a Black Lake Campground, Tourism, Recreation and Cuitural Affairs, the Water Resources Vermillion Dam program. All of these programs are involved in the process.

Nopiming Provincial Park is involved in the process; Churchill Provincial Park is mvolved and although there is no description received to date, various capital works projects of the North lands Agreement are going to be involved in the project. Polar Gas would be involved in the procedure. There is, admittedly, a problem of growing pains to see how this procedure is going to work but l, for one, don't want it to be as broad as my honourable friend wants it to be.

I don't think that a nc>rmal provincial road, which is not contami nating the environment, which I don't consider to be a major project, should be part of the ERB process. Nor do I believe that the road should be built without reference to the Department of Renewable Resources and what it is passing through. But that is not the kind of project that I think will be the main concern of this agency. So, yes, I will concede that the agency is not doing - and in my opinion wi!i not and should not do - what my honourabie friend suggests.

On the other hand, we are certainly broader than what I would have expected in the first place and the broadness is that we are acting as an agency for other departments in castihg a net to find out whether other departments have concerns with regard to a particular program. We do not think that the Environmental Protection Branch should suddenly take over the 3336

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 jurisdiction of the Department of Renewable Resources with regard to wildlife. But if Renewab le Resources wishes us to use this process so that there be only one process, not four or five of them throughout the government, to have their concerns dealt with then we are operating in that way. I'm not sure how it will operate. I know that the Federal Government environmental protection and review process has hardly operated at all.

So there are different groups and different groups are having difficulties in determining how this process will work and certainly I will concede to the honourable member that in other provinces they appear to be going more his way than my way. But that doesn't mean that I agree that his way is correct. I say that they will get themselves into serious difficulties and that the Province of Manitoba will try , consistent with good environmental practice, to have an agency which doesn't rule it over all of the other agencies of government. MR. AXWORTHY: Well, to begin with, Mr.

Chairman , I would dearly love to take responsibility for having set these different standards but unfortunately I can't. Those broad standards that the Minister alludes to were set by his department, not by me.

Last summer - well if he hasn't seen the document, I suggest he should start reading his own documents. -(I nterjection)- I suggest that you read it. -(Int erjection)- Well, then I think that maybe it's a question of "evil in the eye of the beholder" because the fact of the matter is the Department of Environmental Mana gement put out a series of guidelines last year, last sum mer, which enunciated the exact conditions which I put forward. They were not mine. They were the department's. So all of a sudden the Minister is now saying that now all of a sudden I have to take responsibility for them.

Well, I must confess, Mr. Chairman , and to this House, I had nothing to do with the drafting of those guidelines. They were drafted presuma bly under the Minister's direction otherwise they would not have gone out. And what they did simply point out, and I don't object to them, I think that theywere good guidelines, they made sense, not like the Minister who doesn't make sense in this field. They did make sense because they did point out one basic fact of life.

The environment is not divisible into several different parts and you can't have little slices and pieces taken out of it and say that belongs to that department and that belongs to that department. What they did point out, that there is a relationship between land and the things that grow on it and the creatures that inhabit it. And in order to do a proper assessment one must look at the interdependencies of those factors. You can't look at it in bits and pieces. That happens to be a fact of life and it is not the wild conjurings of some environmental freak.

That happens to be the way it is and to have an agency which is responsible for looking at those interdependencies of different parts of the environment and determining whether in fact that road, which the Mi nister says he has no concern about going through a wildlife preserve, may in fact have an im pact upon that area, is required. I think, Mr. Chairman , the fact of the matter is that the clear demonstration of why this procedure is not working, issued from the Minister's own statements. He's not interested in making it work the way an environmental impact assessment procedure should work.

When roads are built up north in a very delicate and sensitive terrain which is subject to a lot of repercussions which have to be and should be measured, then it does require someone to look at it and not just simply to have the engineers in the Department of Highw ays decide on their own merits whether they think it's going to work or not.

I think if there is any lesson that again came out of the findings of the Berger Comm ission , it is that those major kinds of public works' constructions , particularly in northern areas, require a high degree of sensitive approach to it because they have large scale and sometimes undiscovered consequences. And to simply rely upon the proponents for doing the project is slightly insane, Mr.

Chairman . it's the kind of thing where, I guess ifwe wantto use the argument that's used in respect to the Garrison Diversion, if we're allowing sort of the Bureau of Reclamation or the Army Corps of Engineers to decide whether a dam is good, then those things would continue being built without any protection at all. it's only when you're having an independent body provide that kind of observation and assessment that is removed from the internal workings of the department that you get the kind of independent and objective datermination of whether in fact there is something to look at or not.

The list I just read out, Mr. Chairman , are exactly those kinds of projects. We're not talking about aesthetic qual ities, we're talking about major projects being built through very sensitive areas which could have impacts upon water, upon flora, upon fauna' all things which are part of the environment, however, the Minister wants to deny it. A good case in point, Mr. Chairman, is one where when the Department of Tourism and Recreation was putting together its programs on Hecla Island and built causeways in that area, causeways which began to affect a very important wildl ife area dealing with water wildl ife.

And it affected the road itself to the point where they had to go back and it cost them an extra $100,000 reclama tion work afterwards. If they had subjected themselves to this kind of review then you wouldn't have had that kind of expense and I think, Mr. Cha irman, you could probably repeat that exam ple many many times over. So the fact of the matter is that if you're going to have an environme ntal impact assessment, have 3337

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 one that, if nothing else, simply requires individual departments which are undertaking those kinds of projects to submit those projects or descriptions of them to an agency which has a degree of independent capacity to determine whether then a next step of a much more detailed impact assessment is therefore required. lt doesn't seem to me that that is somehow a major travesty in the realm of a British parliamentary government. lt doesn't seem to me that it is such a radical step to take. We certainly require many other departments ...

We have a set of boards, like the Public Utilities Board where at least previously some agencies were required to come to them for subm ission to them and even this ... I agree that if the Min ister wants to maintain the control within his own hands, at least he should know what's going on and not simply rely upon some other department to decide whether in fact they want to submit their project.

Because I think that evidence has certainly proven time and again that you're not likely to get proponents of projects submitting it to a procedure which they think may in fact hold it up or provide for an alteration of it. There is a certain degree of protectionism in these agencies and that's why you have an environmental impact assessment review. And I think, Mr.

Cha i rman, the kind of machinations that have gone between Man itoba Hydro and the Environmental Imp act Assessment Agency is again a clear exam ple of that, where there had to be a degree of tugging and pulling to get them to agree to go under the program. I don't think that transmission line, simply going to the PLUC group is again sufficient. That looks at land use.

There are other examples of transm ission lines and one which we discussed here, or at least tried to discuss, about the hazardous effects of transmission lines upon the air and other people around it.lt was not the kind of thing that was going to be exam ined by a PLUC group. lt could have been legitimately and squarely looked at by the proper environmental impact assessment review procedure. So I don't accept the Min ister's position at all, that even in terms of its own guidelines, it is not doing the job it set out to do.

I think that the reason for it is that we should go about sort of revising the · procedure to get a better system. We've had two years to see if it's working . I think the evidence is clearly it is not working. So maybe now is the time to change it. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, I suppose it would be facile to say that the proposal of my honourable friend is insane. I mean that's the way he attacks a position, that it's insane. I suppose that he would consider his position devastated if I got up and said that the position advanced by my honourable friend is insane and leave it at that.

I mean that's his style of argument. If he will read and understand the Environmental Protection, - if he will read and understand the policy of the process - and I'm reading from it, perhaps he hasn't read it. "The Department of Mines, Resources and Environmental Management is vested with the responsibility governing activities relative to the protection of Man itoba's environment and its controlled improvement. In accordance with this mandate an environmental assessment and review process has been established within the Provincial Government to ensure the following: "1 .

Environmental assessments are carried out for all proposed provincial projects that may significantly alter or affect the environment as a result of contami nation of air, water and soil." And everything else, Mr. Chairman, that is in this book .... -{I nterjection)- Mr. Chairman, I have read the whole book. The honourable member has read the last page. -{I nterjection)- I have read the whole book. Mr. Chairman, you know the honourable meer likes to call people insane; he likes to call people ridiculous. But he won't sit, Mr. Chairman .... Hew on'tsit in his chair and ....

You know, he has indicated that evil is in the eye of the beholder and he is the beholder and evil is in his eye. Mr. Chairman , I have read the whole book. I have been involved in the preparation of it. (I nterjection)- Mr. Chairman , I have read the last page and I indicate to my honourable friend, who will not understand- and I'm beginning to think not it's because he won't understand. ! used to think that the honourable member just wouldn't understand, that he blocks his mind even though he is capable of doing so.

I am now of the opinion that the honourable member hasn't got the capacity to understand and that it would be well to say, as the answer to his position, that he is insane. Because that is his answer to any position that he doesn't agree with, and if one says that and if one applies his arguments then maybe he will understand. Because that's the kind of language he understands. This policy, Mr. Chairman, which was approved by the Cabinet, said that that will be what the process is to review. We have then indicated, Mr.

Chairman, and I indicated this in my earlier remarks, that the process has been made broad enough to include concerns of other departments which this department would not necessarily adjudicate upon but which other departments could submitto us, and that these concerns of other departments would not necessarily be under the jurisdiction of the Environmental Protection Branch. I, for one, am glad that they will not. You know the honourable member says I want everything in my control and then complains because I am not prepared to control everything.

Because I do not believe that the Environmental Protection Branch should control everything. I say here without any difficulty, and I'm prepared to say it to the people of the Province of Man itoba, that the Environmental Protection Branch, which is responsible for the areas of pollution and respo nsible for contami nants affecting the land, air and water, should not have 3338

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 control over where a road goes through in northern Mani toba if it is not contaminating the land, air or water. I have absolutely no difficulty with that. Those environmental protection Ministers who want that authority throughout the provinces are different from myself. I don't want such authority. 1 don't believe that a department should have that authority. That doesn't say that 1 am not concerned with it. The reason that I don't want that authority is that I am concerned with it.

I am concerned that the Department of Highw ays, the Department of Renewable Resources and the Land Use Comm ittee make sure that if a project doesn't contamina te the land, air or water that it still should proceed in a sensible way. There are other government agencies - provincial agencies, federal agencies and mun icipal agencies - who are required to see that that occurs. Now, having said, Mr. Chairman, that we will be a net for other departments who want their concerns expressed, we then put in the kinds of projects that should go to this agency.

And that is the page that my honourable friend is referring to. But I say that insofar as our branch is concerned, we would only be dealing with these projects as they affect contami nants to the land, air or water. And if other programs of this kind come in, we would be used only as an administrative facility for other departments to have their concerns brought forward and also looked at in a co-ordinated way. Now, the honourable mem ber says that that is insane.

I suppose you need somebody who doesn't agree with him to say that his position is insane and then we have two insane positions fighting with one another. I don't believe it's insane; I believe it's a good position. I'm prepared to deal with that position as being the position of the government of the Province of Man itoba. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 82. The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Yes, Mr. Chairman.

This Minister has a unique capacity, 1 think, to avoid what is said to him and simply to rely upon the kind of hopeful tactic that by blunderbussing his way through it he will be able to explain something that is not really explainable. I understand what he is doing. lt doesn't take an awful lot of brilliance to understand that the program isn't working. You don't have to have a superior I.Q. to know that your Environmental Impa ct Assessment simply isn't working. That doesn't take a great deal of capacity.

The evidence is clearly in front of anyone who sim ply asks which departments, and how are these departments organizing their own affairs to determine whether, when they build roads, or transm ission lines, or Hydro projects, or major public works, that they are taking into account environmental impact. They are not taking into account environmental impact. Therefore, the procedure is not working. And therefore, Mr. Chairman , that's why we are asking for some changes.

If the Department of Renewable Resources was reviewing and assessing the iacts of its activities, or the Department of Tourism and Recreation, or the Department of Highw ays, or Man itoba Hydro, then the Minister might say there is no reason for us to have any kind of agency which has responsibility. The other ones are doing it. But, Mr. Cha irman , they are not doing it. They have no intention of doing it. They will not do it because there is no requirement for them to do it.

And so we're simply saying, "What is wrong with having an environme ntal impact procedure in this province which ensures adeq uate protection for environmental matters by ensuring that, at least as a bare minimum, each individual department would be required to submit its plans to determine if there is some consequence that should be exam ined." Now that, Mr. Chai rman , doesn't strike me as being all that much to ask does it? I think the reason forth at is I don't think this Minister really is interested in environmental protection.

The actions of this government have not shown it in the past for them to have a great deal of interest in it; I don't think they will have a great deal of interest in the future. lt simply is a way to get off the hook. I think that if they were really interested then they would have a procedure that had some teeth in it. That doesn't mean that the Minister has overweening control. He would be the last Min ister in the world.

I wouldn't want to give him the control of anything. ! hope that will be taken care of in short order because I don't think that he has much flexibility of mind or much ability to understand other than what his own preconceived notions give him. I don't think that that is the kind of administration that is required in environmental matters. I think that you do require a degree of willingness to see things in a broader formation.

The fact of the matter is that we now have going on in this province, a number of major projects initiated by Provincial Government agencies, or by people who are receiving Provincial Government support, which has no environmental impact attached to them whatsoever because the individual departments and agencies are not prepared to do it.

Now take that one step further, that those guidelines that are on the back page of the book which the Min ister wouldn't read were good guidelines because they do indicate that the environment is something that stitches together, that it is not something that just deals with contamination. When a road goes over a certain area it can affect the vegetation in that area seriously. lt can affect permafrost in those areas. lt can affect wildlife in those areas.

That's what the whole argum ent about the pipeline up north is about. lt isn't aboutthefactwhether a pipeline on a piece of ground is going to destroy that ground but it does mean to say that it will have an enormous iact in the whole arena surrounding it- the ecological system that surrounds it. That is a scientific fact of life. 3339

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 So all we're simply saying is that in this Province of Ma nitoba we should have a procedure that first works on that premise that the environment is an interdependent system, and that therefore any of those major projects should be viewed in terms of how they are going to affect that system. And if the Minister doesn't want that control, fine. At least let's get the procedure going so that those projects are subject to that assessment and then si El y if the people simply say, "There is a problem here", then the individual departments can go back and prepare their own iact statement.

That's fine; I don't argue with that. But at least let's get the thing into the hopper to begin with. Let's get started through -the procedure. it's not happening. Here is a list of major projects which haven't even been considered whatsoever. Now that is the evidence, not whatever particular likes or dislikes I have about this particular Minister or his attitude. The evidence is there and signed by his own Deputy Minister asking what kind of projects have been subject to review and revision and you say none. Mr.

Chairman, this is just the top of the iceberg. lt doesn't begin to take in all those that the council didn't even know about and I'm sure that are there. So that's all we are asking for is a procedure that begins to work, that makes some mod ification into it. I begin to suspect that the reason why we are not getting that kind of reorgan izing is because the willingness and interest in ensuring that there is proper and effective protection is really not paramount with the particular gentleman who occupies the ministerial portfolio at the present time. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chairman , I don't expect really a gentleman with the inflexibility of mind and lack of capacity to understand, such as is the Member for Fort Rouge, to understand our programs. You know I don't expect him to be able to understand this because he is an inflexible person. He doesn't have any breadth of approach. He is kind of shallow. And therefore I don't expect him to understand what we are doing. And really I don't have to answer that on any other basis than what he has answered.

And that is that the person he is talking to doesn't have the capacity to understand and therefore he doesn't expect anything from him. Well, I don't expect anything from the honourable member because he is a shallow, incompetent and has lack of flexibility. The only ideas that he believes in are his own preconceived notions. He is unprepared to listen to anybody so why should he understand? Because really that is the answer to his question, in his own mouth. That's his position. And that's him.

The honourable member says that I am the last person in the world who should have control of a thing like this, something which he soon expects to be rectified. Well fortunately, Mr. Chairman, he is the last person who will ever, ever have any chance at control and makes no protestations even to the effect of com ing into control. So we're saved from him and we don't have to worry about that. I mean that's the answer to his question in his own words. He starts off with the assumption that there is nothing before the process. There are things that are coming before the process and that the process is looking at.

I have said from Day One if 1 didn't have the ability to understand what the honourable memb er is talking about, I at least had the ability to understand from Day One that he would say that the process is not embracing enough and doesn't do enough, and doesn't control enough. And that's what I said when I introduced the process, that it will not satisfy the Member for Fort Rouge. So at least if I don't have the ability to understand the process, I have the ability to understand that, which I did understand and said would occur. Mr. Chairman, we are in a new field. Various people have entered into it anew.

I am not saying that it works perfectly. The honourable member says that it doesn't work at all. I say that we are using it, that departments are moving to it, that if some departments don't move and are affecting other departments the other department can refer the problem to the process. There are certain areas that are before the process at the present time. The Hyd ro transm ission line is before the process.

But if the honourable memb er is suggesting that we override everything else and that environment means everything that a person does, then I am telling you that I am glad that he is not the Environmental Minister and that people will not make him the Environmental Min ister because that is the kind of control that no single department should have. And because my department might not like the colour of bricks on a certain building as they face the sunlight, should not mean that that has to go to the environmental process. Whether the honourable member agrees with it or not, that is what he is suggesting.

That is the ultimate logic of his position. -(I nterjection)- Mr. Chairman, not if I can help it. There are zoning laws. There are laws which are building restrictions. There are laws which permit people to use their property in a certain way provided that they comply with known regulations.

And the honourable memb er says that above those known regulations there is a system of subjectivity which he alone understands and which he alone will apply when the time comes and that, besides everything else, there is going to have to be a compliance with some God-like, divine authority that can say that after you have obeyed every other law, you have to obey my law. Well, Mr. Chai rman , maybe I don't have the ability to understand my honourable friend. But I have some knowledge of history, some knowledge of the political process, and some knowledge of what destroys individuality and how power can corrupt.

I'm suggesting that this process has within it the possibility of corrupting power. We have no intention of doing that. 3340

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 That is not to say that I am not concerned with the environment. That is not to say that I am not concerned that a road should not go next to a wildlife authority. But I am satisfied that the people in the Department of Highways and the people in the Department of Renewable Resources can get together on that- and the Land Use Com mittee- and if they don't they can ask that it be reviewed by this environmental process. But to make this process the gods over all other departments is not my intention. The honourable memb er says that that's what I am trying to do. I am not trying to do that.

I find it difficult in talking to somebody with inflexibility of mind, a preconceived idea that the only ideas that are good are his own preconceived notions, and a person who has no breadth and is shallow and therefore should not be really subject to a great deal of concern or debate. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Chai rman, I think that the Minister has been looking in the mirror too long in terms of the kinds of characteristics that he acq uires. Let's avoid, for a moment, the snideness that the Minister uses for an argum ent. Let's avoid it for a moment.

Let's realize that the evidence that we are presenting, which he doesn't deal with .... He doesn't deal with it at all, of course. When you present evidence he says, "That doesn't count. Let's go on to the personal things." -(l nterjection)- The fact of the matter is, Mr. Chairman, that the evidence that we presented about the fact that the process is not working, the Minister hasn't dealt with. -(I nterjection)- Well, okay, he said that doesn't count. He says I didn't bring any evidence forward. Well, I recall, Mr. Chairman , asking explicitly, what about the procedure. How does it work?

Recit ing the projects that haven't been brought forward. That's evidence that the program is not working. Mr. Chairman, the fact of the matter is that no-one is asking him to be God. No-one is asking for great control, overweening power, imperial precedents. One is simply asking, in very si le terms, that there be a procedure in the province which is able to require environmental impact of major projects; that's all. Because it doesn't happen right now. Such a procedure does not exist right now. The procedure does not exist. lt does not exist. lt is not required.

In the Minister's own words, he said the departments do not have to submit to this. And therefore there is not a procedure. Because a major project can be built by the Department of Hig hways without ever submitting it to an environmental impact assessment. That happens to be the fact of the matter. And if he can go through a mental convolution to come up with somehow you can build a major highway through northern Man itoba without subjecting it to assessment to say that we also then therefore have a proper procedure and grounds' then that really is beyond me.

That's when I do begin to sort of wonder what kind of mental process is going on. Mr. Chairman, I'm not suggesting that we establish an agency which is going to control everybody else. What I am saying is that when you consider the nature ofthe environment, not as I have defined it but as scientists define it, not as the Mi nister defines it, but as people who are working in the field of biology and natural science and physical sciences have defined it.

We're not talking about a new field, we're talking about fields that are rapidly evolving and they say it's not possible to divide it into segments and parts and pieces. And I'm not talking about the aesthetics of yellow bricks on stone wa lls but I am talking about vegetation and animals and other forms of major impacts upon the environment. That's what I'm talking about. So let's not take the arguments to their absurd logic as the Minister likes to do.

Let's take them as they are, that when we build highways or causeways or major hydro projects, as they require in the Saskatchewan assessment guidelines - which maybe the Min ister should also read- they set down the different criteria for different for different forms of projects and they say things like ... They have ten categories of projects and an environmental assessment is required under every form; energy production and transm ission, major roadways and so forth. Now those are the kind of things that begin to make a little bit more sense.

That's all, we're just simply asking for a program and procedure that begins to make some sense so that when we go about building, constructing major public works projects, major transmission lines, major highways, in areas where there is some sensitivity in that environmental system, there is a way of determining what the potential impacts will be. What the department does about it then may be up to them. Maybe then you use the degree of persuasion that we're talking about, but at least someone should be exam ining it.

And the fact of the matter is right now, as this very letter from the Deputy Minister points out, a number of projects are going through exactly that kind with no impact assessment at all being done, no explanation why they are not being done' no submission being made. Now that is the qua rrel that I have with the procedure.

And we're simply saying with some improvements and major steps simply requiring, setting out classes of projects that should be subm itted for initial exam ination to determine whether impact statements are required, then if the departments want to do them, then fine; if the government wants to take on the responsibility of ensuring that they're done, that's fine. lt doesn't have to be the Minister himself, it can be Cabinet, it can be individual Min isters in their own departments, but at least they start out with a basis of - knowledge, at least they know what the impact is going to be. lt doesn't seem to me that we're asking for all that much simply to get adeq uate environmen tal protection for these kinds of projects in this 3341

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 province. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, the projects, every single one of them that my honourable friend refers to has to go through government agencies. They don't necessarily have to go to the environmental protection and review process. But if a person wishes to build a highway in northern Man itoba he has to get a land use permit for the building of a highway and he has to go to the Minister of Renewable Resources for that.

And when the Min ister of Renewable Resources is discussing the land use process for the building of the highway, he is concerned with that highway and where it is going and how it is going to af, ect wildlife. Therefore that process is taken care of. And the honourable member's suggestion that up until today, up until several years ago, that projects could proceed without any environmental impact assessment is not correct. You know that is an assumption that I don't accept. The fact is that these projects do have to go th rough a process.

The difference now is that with regard to certain major programs we expect them to go through a co ordinative process where our department is responsible for contamin ants and that we will act as an administrative agency for other departments so that there will be a co-ordinated effort. That is working. The honourable member says it's not working. lt is working. lt is not working for every government project and it is not required for every government project.

The very list that he refers to as being excellent guidelines says, "highways of four lanes or more." So that would refer, to my knowledge, to one major highway in the Province of Ma nitoba ... Well, perhaps more than one. There are four lanes going north from Winnipeg, there is Highway 59 and there is the Trans Canada Highway. But if there is a four lane highway or more, it is the kind of highway that is dealt with by this process.

If it is an ordinary highway or a road from The Pas to Moose Lake then it has to be the subject of a land use permit from the Department of Renewable Resources which presuma bly knows about wildl ife, knows about the problems in the area and knows about where the highway should go. And if there is an argument it could be subm itted to this process. Now we don't have an argument, so perhaps it doesn't have to be submitted to the process.

But just because my honourable friend doesn't find that everything that is happening in the government doesn't find its way through this process doesn't mean that the process is not working. I indicated to the honourable member that there are several projects that are now in the process of going through the environmental impact process. So he should n't say that there are none. There are projects. There are four. Well, Mr. Chairman, I would think that's quite a few. l didn't know that major programs involved the building of a road, a road joining two commun ities in northern Man itoba.

I believe that could be handled by the departments involved, yes. And I say that the environmental impact process is not one which envisaged that type of project coming. So four major projects is a considerable number of projects and means that the environmental review process is doing something that is very useful with regard to four major projects. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr.

Chairman , can the Minister then, if he says the process is working, explain to me what exact steps were taken to determine the impact of the transmission line between Winnipeg and Brandon, the 500 kilowatt transm ission line between Winnipeg and Brandon, or let's say the DC line from Nelson River to Winnipeg? Could he tell us exactly what kind of procedures it went through to determine how it looked, about the different potential of impacts and dangers, in those two major hydro electric programs? MR. GR EEN: Mr.

Chairman, with regard to the transmission lines, that particular project hasn't come in yet, but the other one, the 500 kV International Transm ission Line, I can tell the honourable member, sitting at the PLUG Comm ittee, that the Department of Renewable Resources to whom that program went first, said that they have never in previous history had such good co-operation for the establishment of the location of a hydro line than they have had with regard to that line. So it went through the PLUG Committee, also we issued guidelines for it and those guidelines have been sent to Hydro.

Hydro has submitted the same information that it subm itted to the National Energy Board. Our people at the ERB process are reviewing that information. They say that there are some deficiencies and they're going to ask Hydro to supply the information for those deficiencies. That's how it's working. With regard to the Winnipeg to Brandon line, that one has not come in yet, but it will go through the same process. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Chairman, perhaps the Minister could tell me about the DC line that ran from Nelson River to Winnipeg. What procedure did it go through? MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chairman, if it is the one that has already been put in, the DC line that was put in some years ago, then it would not have gone through this process. If there is a new line to be put in, that line will go through the process. But I rather think that the direct current transmission line is the original transmission line that was set up many years ago with the development of the Nelson River. Is that the line that he is referring to? The line that we are now receiving power from? I believe that line was set up before this process came into existence. And, Mr.

Chairman, despite the factthatthis will improve the situation, I would think that line too, that they had to deal with land use permits, as to where it was going, that there was discussion about it, that it wasn't put in in a completely arbitrary way and with no reference to other needs occurring. I disagree, Mr. Speaker, with the honourable member's implication, that until 1975, that people 3342

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 building anything did not take into consideration the environment around them. 1 think that the processes were not as good but the notion that these were built in a completely arbitrary manner and without any reference as to how they would affect the environment is not, in my opinion, correct. MR. CHAI RM AN : Resolution 82{b) (1). The Honourable Member for St. James MR. MIN AKER: Yes, Mr. Chairman, through you to the Honourable Minister.

There is an indication with regard to waste disposal sites and the mon itoring of groundwater in the relative general areas otthese land fill sites or solid waste disposal sites and there was an indication that some basic regulations and parameters were going to be set up for the qual ity control and so forth and I am wondering if the Honourable Minister can advise, have these regulations been established and what they are. MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister of Mines. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chai rman , there are regulations with regard to solid waste disposal sites. ltwas filed in September of 1976. lt specifies the location and operation of waste disposal grounds on the basis of size and also indicates the standards which these sites have to be built by. That's a good example, Mr. Chairman , of what happens with the Comm ission when this is done. The Comm ission used to set limits for every solid waste disposal site on an individual application basis.

When these regulations came in it meant that they didn't have to go to the Comm ission, they had to abide by these regulations which is the normal process of development of what you call the comm on law and then the statute law, that once a thing is done on numerous occasions and when you want it to apply generally then you enact a statute and they no longer have to get their limits set by the Clean Environment Comm ission. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 82{b)

(1) Salaries and Wages $1 ,888,1 00.00. The Honourable Member for St. James. MR. MIN AKER: Mr. Chairman , maybe the Minister misunderstood my question. In particular, his year-end report for '77 indicated that the groundwater qual ity was going to be checked and also that, "a regulation under the Clean Environment Act respecting occasional operational waste disposal grounds as being developed." That was for the year ending 1976, my understanding. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman , despite the fact that they say the regulation is being developed in that report, I really believe that that regulation has been enacted.

And I don't know why it would continue to say it is in the process of development, but the presence of groundwater and the insurance that it will not affect the groundwater would be dealt with in the regulation by specifying the various levels of gravel fill, etc. that have to be used in order to deal with that question. But I believe that the regulation has been enacted and I can give my honourable friend a copy of the regulation tomorrow. MR. MI NAKER: Mr. Chairman, I thank the Minister for his answer and I'll waitfor that information.

I'm wondering, these regulations with regard to solid waste disposal and the general waste program, would they also apply to northern Man itoba or is it the Min ister's department that governs that or is there any overlap of the northern departments. MR. GREEN: No, Mr. Chairman , it applies generally and I believe the Department of Northern Affairs has proceeded under the regulations for solid waste disposal because they would be the municipal department in northern Man itoba so they would proceed in accordance with that regulation. MR. MIN AKER: Mr.

Chairman , a few months ago there was concern, I think, in the Northwest Territories with regard to old mine tailings from gold mines, with regard to a potential hazard with regard to arsenic poisoning in the groundwater systems. I was wondering, has there been any investigation into our own province where we have a fair number of gold mines, or closed down gold mines, whether this threat is a possibility here in Man itoba as well. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chai rman , I'm advised that whatever gold mi nes we have, we don't have any that used the metallurgical process of arsenic in the gold mines, so that it wouldn't be a factor here. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 82{ b)(1 )-pas s;{b)

(2) Other Expenditures, $995,1 00.00. The Honourable Member for St. James. MR. MIN AKER: Mr. Chairman , I was on my way upwhen you called the pass on 82(b) (1 ). 1 wonder if you would permit a question. With regard to the technical services under this particular environment control, there is an indication that Computer Services continues its activities in the design and and development of the Man itoba environmental data retrieval system. And I was wondering is the cost of the computers that were included in our request for information, is that included in that $87,000, I believe the figure was. MR.

GREEN: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I believe we gave them the entire computer cost under Other Expenditures. MR. CHAIRMAN: 82{b) (1 )-pas s;{b)

(2) Other Expenditures $995,1 00-pass; 82{

c) Research, Salaries and Wages $1 07,700.00 The Honourable Member tor St. James. MR. MINAKER: Mr. Chairman, in the year-end report for the Min ister's department, under Research there is a statement, "In the final quarter of the year, about 80 percent of the Research Branch was transferred to the Department of Renewable Resources and Transportation Services." 3343

Tuesday, May 24, 1977 I'm looking at Page 28. I was wondering why the general salary and wage level has seemed to be retained in 1977 as well as 1978. 1n fact, I believe there was an increase from something like $72,400 in '76 to $1 03,000. in '77. I was wondering why the increase in this Research Department when it indicates that 80 percent of the Branch was transferred to Renewable Resources. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman , about 80 percent of the people engaged in that department were in the wildlife area. I'm not sure I understand my honourable friend's question. ls he saying there hasn't been a reduction?

The reduction is there. The reduction is ... -(I nterjection)- That's right. (I nterjection) - Pardon me? Mr. Chairman, the amount that would be shown on last year's Estimates would be the amount that we were left with and therefore this year there would be no further reduction. But last year's Estimates would show the amount that we were left with after the reduction. The honourable memb er asked for the amount of people that were removed, etc. to the Department of Renewable Resources. Under Lands, Forests, and Wildl ife, there were 629 staff man years, $14, 015 ,000.; under Administration 44 staff man years.

Remember I said there would be some staff man years, and $556,000.00. Under Research, which is where we are today, right now, 37 staff man years, that's 12( 2) (c) , etc., (1 ) and (2) and $572 million. The reason that you will not show a decrease is that your previous figure, I believe, is the decreased figure. You're dealing with a decreased figure as of now. I would suppose if you went back one year previous you would find a much higher figure. I think that you're dealing with the reduced figure on your comparison. MR. MIN AKER : Then, Mr.

Chairman, what the Honourable Minister is suggesting then in the 1977 Estimates, that the figure shown of $72,4 00 for 1976 Estimates is a reduced figure. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, we always compare apples to apples and once they put in the previous figure, they put it in as to what it would have been if it were the same service. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWO RTHY: Mr.

Chairman, I wonder if the Mi nister could tell us what the policy of his department is in respect to releasing research reports done under this department, and I ask in particular reference to the study that was done on the hazards of electrical transmission lines, which was not released or was not divulged at the NE B hearings for some reason called Crown reasons or Crown prerogative. Can he indicate whether in fact it is a policy of his department not to release research studies or to withhold certain of them? Can he give us what the criteria are when they do withhold research? MR. GR EEN: Mr.

Chairman , I don't know that it's the policy of our department not to release research studies. We have released, for instance, all of the studies that were done vis-a-vis the Churchill River Diverision, etc. There may be an individual study which has not come forward in any mean ingful way. The particular study that my honourable friend refers to was sent to Hydro for information. Hydro has indicated that it did not wish to table that study before the National Energy Board. Unless Hydro gives me good reason, I would have no difficulty in releasing that study to my honourable friend.

Unless somebody sh ows me that there is something in that study that is a problem. But the position of Hydro before the National Energy Board may be an entirely different position vis-a-vis its legal position before that board. The Hydro people took the position that they would not release that study to the National Energy Board . lfthe Hydro people to whom we gave that study do not give me a salient objection as to why it would not be released, I would have no difficulty in giving it to my honourable friend, of releasing it. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr.

Chairman, in that particular case was it not also the decision of the department which he heads not to release the report, and was there not reference made with the department to see if the report would be released, and that they also refused to release it? MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chairman, unless there was a misunderstanding, that is not my information. My information is that we gave it to Hydro. We told Hydro it is up to them whether they wanted it released to the National Energy Board or not at the hearing. This was at the hearing that we left it in their discretion as to whether they would release the report.

Now perhaps they had misunderstood that. I have no reason to know that they misunderstood that. I understand that they took the position that they were not releasing that report to the National Energy Board . If Hydro has no objection to it being released, then I don't see that we would have any objection to it being released. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Chairman, it comes back then again to the same kind of issue - as I gathered, the Minister says that unless Hydro has a reason tor not releasing it, then the department would release it.

Yet the tact of the matter is that at a National Energy Board hearing which was assessing the merits of a proposal on transm ission lines, the study that related in a very germane way as to whether in fact the proposed route may or may not have had those hazardous potentia Is which the study was purported to deal with was not subm itted as part of evidence, and in fact was withheld. Now it strikes me, Mr. Chairman, that that again doesn't make all that much sense. That's the time when such a study is required.

I'm sure I would find it fascinating reading but it doesn't do me much good. lt does do someone much good when they have to adjudicate on whether in fact transm ission lines should be built where they may be close to huma n settlements and that therefore there may be 3344

Tuesday, May 24, 1977 some hazardous potentials. I believe, Mr. Chairman, that probably there is a requirement to establish some pretty firm guidelines when a study is done, perhaps, as to the disposition of it. Again, going back to our previous discussion where it looks as if he doesn't want to be responsible, have someone else acting for him or he acting for them, here's the case where in fact there is one agency acting tor another and making decisions for it, which is a contrad iction to the position he took beforehand. I believe, Mr.

Chairman , that probably in the first instance that study should have been released publicly in any event, and not simply be for the private use of Hydro. MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chairman , I have never recognized that the National Energy Board has any jurisdiction as to the location of the power line in the Province of Man itoba. l don't know why the honourable memb er said that I am relying on that jurisdiction.

I have stood up in this House and said 1 challenged the National Energy Board's assumption of jurisdiction in that area, that if I had carriage of the Hydro case, I don't know whether I would give them that information at all, and I understand that all Hydro's evidence has been put in with the caveat that they don't recogn ize the jurisdiction of the National Energy Board .

The program still had to come to this government, and still has to go through our Environmental Protection review process, and went through the PLUC Comm ittee, and that committee was very, very happy with the co-operation that they received vis-a-vis where this is going. Now the report in question deals with, as I understand it- and I have seen it but I haven't read it, I've seen it physically but I haven't read it- I remember Margaret Konantz once said I saw a report and then when pushed had to admit she didn't read it.

We ll, I saw it physically; I've never read the report- but deals with the dangers of electrical em issions from hydroelectric lines in the area in which they were constructed . I believe that this is available in public magazi ne or textbooks on the subject, that it is not a hidden science, and therefore when my honourable friend refers to it as being some type of a problem, if that was a problem, Mr. Chairman, it is so commonly referred to in various scientific publications that I would be surprised if somebody took it as a rev elation.

There are problems associated, I think, with the electricity and where it moves from the line itself, that it can have an effect on people. There are problems, Mr. Chairman, suggested problems, with television microwave towers. I had a case - I'll tell my honourable friend my personal experience - where we were suing the CBC because they caused death to chickens in the vicinity of the microwave tower.

So if you are talking about some hidden problems, I can tell my honourable friend that there are no hidden problems, that the report deals with the current knowledge of the subject and was sent to Hydro - I assume that they also would know of it- but I have no difficulty in giving my honourable friend a copy of that report and making it public. it may be that Hydro feels that its position before the National Energy Board would some way be affected by its subm itting that report to them.

I said unless they have a very salient reason for me to suggest that that report is kept private, I would have no difficulty in releasing the contents of that report which my honourable friend can read in numerous scientific publications which are public now, which are public now, that he can find that. it may be that their solicitor feels that it may in some way prejudice their position either in court because I think that they are in court, I think that they have challenged the jurisdiction of the National Energy Board in a court - so this is a legal question.

But the contents of the report, that there are dangers created by electricity from the transm ission line, I don't think is new. I will have no difficulty revealing it to my honourable friend or to anybody else. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Chairman , I thank the Min ister for his offer to release the report. I think that would be a help. The question that I still have is the procedures that we follow in making this kind of information ava ilabie to determine whether projects like these transm ission lines go ahead or not.

The question I would raise without getting into the debate as to whether the National Energy Board has jurisdiction or not, the fact is that that's what the hearing was about, the question of the export of power, which does take a transmission line to get there. Okay. But the point is: Where and who decided on the routing of the transmis sion line, and in fact was this report part of the evidence that was portrayed?

Because if the report, while it was simply corralling available scientific evidence about hazards, what's much more germane to us is the recomm endations that such a report would make in terms of whether such a line should be built at all, or whether it should be built in alternative places to where Man itoba Hydro would want it to be built.

That really is the question that would have to be raised, and where in fact then, if that recomm endation is part of the findings of such a report, does it get into the public forum which is then able to assess whether that evidence should be weighed against the representations of Hydro concerning their engineering requirements. And that would be the value of such a research when in fact it has the opportunity to be brought to bear in that kind of a forum. ! wou ld be interested to know where that forum is. MR. GR EEN: Mr. Chairman , I don't ag ree.

If it bears repeating, I don't agree that the National Energy Board has got anything to say about where the line goes, and I believe that them assuming 3345

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 that jurisdiction is doing exactly what I suggested previously in my debate. They are assuming a power which they have no business as suming. Mr. Chairman, now the honourable memb er says, "Who is doing it?" The Provincial Government has a responsibility for seeing to it that the line proceeds in the most prudent manner, taking into account all of the considerations, namely land use, wildl ife, hazards, etc. The question as to whether that becomes a decision of a public hearing is something that my honourable friend would like to say that that should be decided by a public hearing.

I say that that should be decided in accordance with the Provincial Government taking into account all of the evidence and then deciding where the transmission line should go, in the same way as roads are built and the same way as many other projects are built. We are not engaged , and I suggest that we will not be engaged, in government by public hearing.

The public hearing is the willingness of the government to take responsibility for its actions, and I am willing to take responsibility for the actions of the Man itoba government in permitting an electric transmission line and in doing it in accordance with the most prudent methods possible, having cognizance of all the evidence, one of the features of the evidence being that transmission lines are said to have a danger with regard to electricity. My honourable friend should know that next year on the Trans Canada Hig hway there are going to be at least 400 deaths. I think that those are the figures.

If I am wrong, I am wrong by 50. And there are going to be 400 deaths in the following year. Our transmission line will not have that effect. There may be some danger of radiation. I will tell you what else is going to happen. There is going to be a storm and that transmission line is going to be broken in a certain place and the wires are going to cause da mage, and they could cause damage to human habitation. That is one of the features of transmission lines. And the government, in planning its transm ission line, is going to have to take all of those things into consideration.

The process that we have involves the PLUG Comm ittee process, where it was dealt with by the people responsible to the public for dealing with it and deciding which way it should go, and if one group said it should go through agricultural land, the other group will say it should go through wild life land. And we are not going to decide that question by a vote in an assem bly hall or by the pressure from an environmental group or an agricultural group or by another group. We are going to have to take into consideration everything, and there will be some dissatisfied people.

That is one of the hazards of government. We hope that we will act in such a way thatdespitethefactthattherewill be some dissatisfied people, we will commend ourselves to enough to retain the reins of government. But if one thinks that they can govern in such a way as to satisfy everybody, I can tell my honourable friend that we agreed to fluoridate the water many years ago . I don't know thatthere was a public hearing on fluoridation.

I know that there was all kinds of evidence that came in, and I am telling you that there are groups today who are dead set with the notion that we are poisoning people every day by this fluoridation. Well, we are not going to be able to satisfy everybody, but the evidence that hydroelectric transmission lines can emana te electric currents of one kind or another which can be a hazard - there is no way of hiding that; no one would want to hide it. Butthegovernmentthat is responsible for deciding on the line will have to take that into account, and doing it in the most prudent way possible. MR. AXWORTHV: Mr.

Chairman, I take some exception to the Min ister's description because there was a way of hiding it. Until the matter cam e up at the National Energy Board hearings, accidentally, through cross-questioning, there was no inkling in the minds of the public that there was such a report available, that this research had been done, and that such a report may have contained recommendations against the location of that transm ission line. Now that happens to be a fact.

Certainly there is general scientific evidence, but we are talking about the fact that a piece of research was done in the Province of Man itoba which raised doubts about the question of transmission lines and their hazards. Now the question is that the only place in which the decision was made was inside the closed room of a Cabinet Comm ittee or the Cabinet itself, and that, unlike the case of fluoridation where there were a number of pieces of evidence one way or the other, in this case the issue was never raised.

I never heard the Mi nister himself or the Minister responsible for Hydro say, "We are building a transm ission line. We want you to know that transmission lines can be hazardous, and that these different locales where the line may be passing by should be forewarned of that." That research was not made avai lable to those communi ties.

They were not given access to that document, to the point where the decision was a closed decision and while one can say, "We can rely upon the accountability, the responsibility, of those making the decision," if there isn't any public protection on the other side provided by their total lack of information or knowledge, that that is an issue that has to be taken into account in such a decision, then the public can't react. They have no way of holding one of you accountable, or government accountable, because in fact they don't know.

And that is again the point about whether in fact we ma ke this kind of information and research from the outstart publicly available with its recomm endation. Then if you want to say as a government legitimately, that the report tells me that there are dangers associated with transmission lines, but that we feel that the particular engineering 3346

Tuesday, May 24, 19 77 arguments or the requirements for power or whatever it is outweigh those, and that we will take certain steps to ameliorate those hazards or whatever it may be, then that becomes a basis for the public saying they are doing well or they are not doing well. But if it is not known at all that that is even an issue that is taken into account, or an issue that has been raised by the public service whose job it is to provide that kind of advice and recomm endation, then the accountability isn't there. lt's not the same, you know.

And there are many examples where in fact decisions can be taken without the kind of information being made available that suggest what factors and what criteria are being used in making that decision. And it would be very easy for the government to say, "This is the route for the transmission line," and saying no more, and therefore no one says, "Well, sure, that's fine." That is kind of issue that I am raising, Mr. Chairman.

I think that it should be almost automatic that this information become public so that if one wants to raise it at an Energy Board hearing, or if there is some legal reason for not doing, at least make representations to their MLAs and to the Cabinet saying, "You shouldn't build that line or you should build it in a different place because we are concerned of all these hazards." At least they know that that is an issue. lf it never sees the light of day then they don't know. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman , I wish to try to credit the honourable member's position.

He is saying that in the absence of this report there is no public knowledge that the transmission lines carry electric currents which can emit into the atmosphere in certain ways. I be lieve that that is .... MR. AXWORTHY: I' m afraid I would like to clarify the

interpretation that the Min ister is making. I didn't say that there is no knowledge of those dang ers. I am saying that the lack of knowledge is that there has been a report prepared by people in the environm ental research staff, which suggests that this is a major factor in making a decision and what their recom mendations are. lt is what they are recommending on the basis of their evidence that is the important factor. MR. GRE EN: Mr. Chairman, that matter will be coming through the environmental review protection agency process.

If it is considered a significant feature, we have provisions for calling a public hearing. If it's not, then we will have to deal with the matter just as my honourable friend suggests. We will have to indicate that this thing has gone through the process and that because that there are features of it which the public should be aware of, and which we have taken into account in determining that the matter should proceed.

Because I have no doubt that there are going to be transmission lines in the Province of Man itoba and that some of them are going to carry electricity and that the features of electrical transm ission lines that are well known throughout the world will also be a feature of this transmission line. And that we are going to have to convince the public that we had the line dealt with in the most prudent way possible. I question very strongly whether the most prudent way possible is that we have it decided by somebody in an audito rium as a result of representations that are made one way or the other.

We are going to have to deal with that question. I concede that. I will also concede that we are not going to deal with it in such a way as to try to keep secret the transmission lines. l don't know if it can be kept secret. Is it not an open general knowledge at scientific levels that transmission lines have this type of affect? I have not read the report but I do not know that there is anything new. However, if it goes through the process, which I am a part of, if there is something new it will certainly be brought to the attention of the government. MR. CHAIRMAN : Resolution 82(c)

(1) Salaries and Wages $1 07,700-pass; (c)

(2) Other Expenditures $47,8 00-pass; 82(

d) Waste Management

(1) Salaries $1 17 ,10 0.00. The Honourable Member for St. James . MR. MI NAKER: Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the Hono urable Minister can advise us if the storage of hazardous waste- chemical wastes - that are not being able to be handled in certain parts of the province are still being stored at the Gimli In dustrial Park. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Mi nes. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chai rman, th.is is a real problem area and we are trying to work with tile Federal Government for de aling with this area as well.

At the present time, there is a storage area for hazardous wastes at Gimli, which was established in 1971 , utilizing 250, 000-gallon former aviation fuel tanks. The material that is stored here is not suitable for disposal in existing facilities in the province. There is an attempt to obtain Federal Government involvement. I know I have written to the Federal Minister and received a reply which indicates that he is prepared to continue the discussions in this area, where they do believe that they have to accept some responsibility. Apparently, there is a comm ittee

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	30-4-66b
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	30th 4th hansardpdf 66b.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	43d1cb1ffed37f8d82673c13a6fc1d64339a405c

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