Manitoba Hansard — 24 June 1980 (Sitting 86B, 31st Legislature, 4th Session)

31-4-86b

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 Time - 8:00 p.m. BILL 31 (Cont'

d) THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS ACT MR. SPEAKER, Hon. Harr y E. Graham (Birtle Russell): Bill No. 31. The Honour able Member for Rossmere has 12 minutes. MR. VIC SCHROEDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When I had left off I was discussing the fact that this Bill 31 does not recognize the training, the experience, the dedication and ability of our teachers in our public school system. In fact, I suggest that it doesn't recognize either the abilities and dedication of the others involved in the education field, the principals, the superintendents, the school boards.

A certain segment of this Act provides, for instance, that these field representatives who have been given tremendous power over education, that they have the right of entry onto properties without warrant for any cause; they have access to the records of schools, school boards, and even municipalities. They have the right to demand that any one answer questions of theirs, including not only teachers or superintendents, or principals, or employees of school districts, or even parents, but any one in the community. I would suggest, Mr.

Speaker, that in fact this Act, which we oppose, has been written by someone who obviously wants to become a field representative. I would suggest that a more appropriate title would be a teacher with inquisitorial tendency or twit for short. There have been many names given to these individuals, but the kind of power asked for in this bill is something that we would never be prepared to provide willingly to any group of people in this province. The bill indicates how the government views the responsibility of the school boards and the teachers as opposed to others in our society.

The Advisory Board, which controls curriculum in various other areas of education, is made up of a number of ind ividuals, for instance, one appointed by the University of Manitoba Senate, one appointed by the Un iversity of Winnipeg Senate, etc. But for an appointee of the teachers for the school boards, you have to have two appointees for every one that the Minister will appoint because he doesn't trust them to appoint the right people. He says, you name me six people and I'll appoint three onto this Advisory Committee. He doesn't say that to the University Senate, but he says that to the school trustees.

School trustees who were elected at large by the public, not appointed by the government as senators of the universities are. That is the kind of respect that this government shows for the people involved in education. I'm somewhat surprised that this Minister, who used to be a superintendent, would allow the kinds of powers he is allowing to field representatives over supervisors and over school principals. This Education Act, after many referrals and comments by the government, contains not a single change in education financing.

It is surely one of the most crucial areas to be dealt with and it says nothing, absolutely nothing. It is a bill, in short, which is barren of any new ideas. It's a bill created by the bureaucracy for the bureaucracy and again, Mr. Speaker, in terms of where this bill would take us, it would take us absolutely nowhere. It does nothing to im prove the quality of education. No t one single additional program is being funded -(I nterject ion)- The Minister of Government Services indicates that it's not true. I would ask him to stand up and tell us what additio nal program is being funded?

For instance, transportation, the Minister made a big deal about transportation, and yet this act states quite specifically that it does not require any school board to transport children beyond the boundaries of a school division, regardless of what the Minister says. Now it may well be that he is putting something into the regulations, that may well be, but when you can put things into

an act telling teachers that they have to disarm kids with offensive weapons, if you're going to get that specific with

an act in terms of what teachers have to do, then I would suggest that the least the Minister could do is say, the public of this province is going to fund the transportation of children, and he could say it specifically without going into any kind of a regulation.

Again, supporting this bill would merely create a situation where people would think that something has happened when nothing has happened; not one single dollar extra will be created for education as a result of this bill, not one single extra dollar by the province, and until such time as that happens, we are not going to have an improvement in the quality of education in this province. -(lnterjectin)- The bill does absolutely nothing to ensure qu ality education, education appropriate to the needs of the children of this province, nothing.

We wind up with all of those children who are in difficulty now, all of thos e children whose parents came to this government last year, when you tried the first time to pass an inappropriate bill, those people will be back because you have given them absolutely nothing. If you want to say that there is a difference because now we give an education - an undefined education - well, they had that before. What they were asking for was an appropriate education and that is not being provided second time around by this act, and I would hope that the government would withdraw this bill.

Possibly, third time is luck, possibly maybe the third time they will do a proper job of providing an education act which will give the students of our province the right to appropriate education,

an act which will demonstrate that we, in this province, believe that our teaching profession is a group of people who are dedicated, who are able, who are qualified, who are experienced and who have the training to do the job without having a gestapo-like organization of 16 people covering them, with the right to ask questions of anyone in this province, including people who are not involved in the 5069

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 education system. We're asking for a system,

an act, which will provide as well for adequate education financing, and when you bring that back to us then we will support the bill. Hopefully, the third time around, you will do it right. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for St. Vital. MR. JAMES D. WALDING: Mr. Speaker, I beg to move, seconded by the Honourable Member for Ste. Rose, that the debate be adjourned. MOTION presented and carried. MR. SPEAKER: The Ho nourable Acting Government House Leader. HON. EDWARD McGILL (B randon West): Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Ho nourable Minister of Government Services that Mr.

Speaker do now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a comm ittee to consider the supply to be granted to Her Majesty. MOTION presented and carried. SUPPL V - ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND TOURISM MR. CHAIRMAN, Abe Kovnats (Radisson): This comm ittee will come to order. I would direct the honourable members' attention to page 37 of the Main Estimates, Department of Economic Development and Tourism, Resolution No. 49, Clause 3. Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation, (

a) General Programs- pass; - the Ho nourable Minister. HON. J. FRANK JOHNSTON (Sturgeon Creek): Mr. Chairman, prior to getting into the full discussion of the MHRC Estimates, I would like to take a few moments by way of highlighting some of the more notable aspects of MHRC activity. On the housing management side, Mr. Chairman, I can report that we are continuing our efforts to maintain our housing stock at a high standard and operate the units in the most efficient manner possible.

Our 19 80 housing units operations budget, the biggest single item, is being increased by 9 million over 19 79, 1 million of that sum is going toward the provision of smoke detector devices in all of our units, to ensure that our tenants in buildings have optimum protection as afforded by modern standards. Also we are continuing our efforts in the energy conservation area to stream line the mechanical systems in our buildings to achieve the most energy efficient operation possible. On the housing marke t side, Mr .

Chairman, demand for public housing accommodation, both in the province generally and specifically in the city of Winnipeg, continued to decline during the course of the last budget year and into the current year. In the province overall, applications on hand at the housing authorities totalled 2,849 at the end of March 19 80, broken down into 1, 801 senior citizen applications and 1, 048 family applications, compared to a total of 4, 17 5 at the end of March 19 79, which included 2,566 senior citizen applications and 1, 609 family applications.

On the basis of more up-to-date figures for the city of Winnipeg, low income applications on hand at the end of May 1980, at the Winnipeg Regional Housing Autho rity, totalled 1, 032, including 356 family applications and 676 senior citizen applications. This compares to a total of 1, 653 applications on hand at the end of May 19 79, which included 718 family applications and 535 senior citizen applications.

To further emphasize the decline in unserviced applications, I might add, that as at the end of May 1978, there were about 2,300 active applications on file at the Winn ipeg Regional Housing Authorit y Central Registry. The decline in waiting list applications over the last year was therefore in the order of 32 percent for the province as a whole and 38 percent for the city of Winnipeg. Family applicants in the city were down by 50 percent, while senior citizen applications were down by 28 percent.

Further analysis shows that the length of waiting periods before tenanting for applications in 19 79, was on average, half of 19 78. Specifically in the city of Winni peg, down from the previous six-month average waiting time, for a family application, it's down to three months at the present time. One of the reasons for the steady decline in the waiting list demand would appear to be the effects of the introduction of the SAFER program under which 2,400 senior citizens were receiving benefits at the end of May.

Also the overall rental market situation continues to be very competitive for families as well as elderly consumers. This is evidenced by the latest CMHC vacancy figures which showed a Winnipeg rate of 4.8 percent in the private market, only slightly down from 5 percent level in last fall's survey, and still by far the highest vacancy rate in any major city in Canada. The actual vacancy rate is probably much higher when you take into account the new units which have come on the market for the first occupancy in the last six months. They are not counted in the CMHC vacancy figures.

These figures generally bear out the concern of the industry that the market may be overbuilt. At the same time, of course, they also reflect the improvement in the situation with respect to renters including those who live on a moderate income. Even if the large numbers of new units coming on the market have higher rental structures, they still have a significant impact on the market as a whole because movement into these units results in older, good quality, lower-cost accommodation being freed up for others.

In addition, because the average rise in rent level in 1979 was below both the general rate of inflation in prices and increase in incomes, better quality rental acco mmo dation at reasonable rents is available for more people. The general analysis is borne out by the major changes in the profiles of our public housing waiting list applicants in 19 79 as com pared to 19 78.

The numb ers of mod erate income applicants, that is, applicants who qualify on income criteria but at the upper end of the income qualifications scale, predominantly elderly couples with two sources of pension income or two-parent families, fell off tremendously in 1979 in terms of proportion of total applicants those groups have represented in the previous years. This means that 5070

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 more lower-income people are finding good quality affordable accommodation in the marketplace. At our present level of 4,500 family units and our current turnover rate of 27 percent in units becoming available on an annual basis, there could continue to be little difficulty in serving the low-income family applications with reasonably short periods of time in most areas of the province. On the senior citizens side, with an analyzed turnover of 8 percent for some 8,000 units, there are still longer waiting periods in some areas.

In that respect, I can advise that MHRC completed in 19 79 a housing needs survey of many small rural communities which identified some 350 qualified senior citizens, of applicants who could not be serviced for lack of existing accommodation in their community. We will be embarking on a delivery of some 100 units to these communities during 1980, with that number being limited only by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and basically what they are willing to allocate to us under

Section 40 of The National Housing Act, which is the only remaining NHA program under which funds for direct public development are still being made available. We have indicated to them that we will utilize additional units if they are willing to make them available. Other incentives to the continued development of senior citizens' housing units include our Non-profit Housing Assistance Program under which grants equal to 5 percent of capital costs are available to CMHC approved non-profit projects.

To date, since the program was put into place in early 19 79, some eight projects representing 458 units, at a value of 743,000 in gr ants, and a total capital of approximately 15 million have been approved for various parts of the province. The level of the takeup under this program is gratifyi ng in that it demonstrates that the non-profit volunteer spirit is far from dead in this province and that government does not have to do everything for the people.

The availability of the SAFER program, of course, makes all of these units potential low-income housing in that SAFER subsidies are related to the needs of people and not to the agreements regarding the units themselves, as was the case with the respect of the provincial participation under the former non profit housing program. The SAFER program, as you are all aware, will be significantly enhanced to ensure that the maxium benefits will be available to those most in need.

As I mentioned earlier, to date some 2,400 persons are in receipt of SAFER benefits, represent ing about 30 percent of the originally projected numb er of potential clients. Although this level of takeup would appear to be low, it is not when viewed within the context that it took two years of British Columbia's program to reach the 50 percent takeup level. Our program has only been running for five months. The average SAFER benefit under the current program is about 48 per month.

With the enhancement of the program announced in the Budget Speech, including additional eligible groups and enriched benefit levels, we can anticipate a rapid acceleration and applications for this program. I might point out that the adoption of the original 27-1/ 2 rent-to-income base and the sliding scale formula, made Manitoba's Shelter Allowance Program the most progressive and generous in Canada sinc e its incepti on. These further improvements, the expansion of the program to pensioners over the age of 55 and low-income families, further confirms Manitoba's leadership in this program area.

The new low-income family component of SAFER to be introduced in January, 1981, will go far in serving the needs of groups to be identified by the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg as being, in their opinion, the greatest need of shelter assistance, single parent families, the group which has formed the largest compon ent of MHRC unserviced applications for family housing. Of great concern to us has been the rapidly escalating costs of operating subsidies for public housing.

While we describe the public housing as low-cost housing for low-income people, it cannot be accurately described as low-cost housing to the public purse. Our subsidy requirements, the amounts required to cover the difference between the actual operating costs of the public housing and the scale of rate that the tenants pay, has continued to increase by substantial amounts. The major reason for this is the fact that units subsidized under the program are almost exclusively newer expensive stock.

Thus, those least able to pay have been housed in high cost rental stock while cheaper existing good quality stock has not been utilized. This point was documented by the Social Planning Council in their study of Winnipeg housing conditions two years ago. They found and indicated confusion at the fact that the low-income senior citizens overall were housed in better quality stock than many moderate income households. Because shelter allowance subsidies represent income transfers to individuals and not units, the system permits the utilization of the widest band of stock.

In the longer term, this will result in a greater number of senior citizens and low-income families receiving assistance they require to meet shelter costs than is presently the case, at the lower average cost to the taxpayer and a broader ranger of choice for the recipient. By concentrating on housing problems from the standpoint of affordability in the first instance, the shelter allowance approach should allow for a generally clear understanding of the needs and the other components of the housing market. What this means is that we are continuing to concern ourselves with considerations on the supply side.

Guidelines are being built into the expanded SAFER Program to ensure that units with unmet upgrading orders will be required to carry out repairs immediately unless no other appropriate unit is immediately available in the market or from our public housing stock for the tenant. Also, we will continue to pursue rehabilitation program ming, particularly the mor e effective utilization of funding under the federal Residential Rehabilitation Program, as well as continu ed provincial initiatives to conserve as much of our existing stock as possible.

We fully intend to fulfil! our responsibilities to ensure that an adequate supply of good quality housing stock is maintained in the future. Public sector initiatives, if and when necessary, will continue to be taken in tight-supply situations either by way of incentives to the private 5071

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 and non-profit sectors or through direct development. I might remind honourable members that we had no hesitation in fully utilizing the CMHC public housing budget allocation in 1978 for provision of some 500 public housing units, mostly in the core area of Winnipeg, where our waiting lists are still high and officially CMHC vacancy figures are still quite low. The point is, however, that those supply side initiatives will be far more effective if low-income households are in any case obtaining some degree of relief by way of receipt of shelter allowance benefits.

The maintenance of SAFER Program statistical records will allow for a more sensitive and accurate reading of rental shifts as they affect those who are the object of our greatest concern, low-income hous eh olds, than is presently available for the existing data sources and will be very important in singling out the necessary for supply of incentives where rent increases are excessive in the relation to income and income changes. We have previously expressed our commitment to the inner ity revitalization in that last year we have taken initiatives to act upon it.

We have more than dou bled funds available for neighbou rhoo d improvement projects under the Communi ty Improvement Program including specifically funding for three new areas in the city of Winnipeg. We have also approved the provision of 1 million in seed money for the Winnipeg Housing Rehabilitation Corporation, as well as having extended benefits of our Home Ownership Assistance Program to any sale units reno vated and put on the market by that corporation. All of these actions have been undertaken in fulfillment of the commitment given in our urban policy platform statement of 19 77.

At that time, we critic ized the previous administration for having a much too one-sided, extensive approach to the housing field. We diversified our program min g reports considerably so that our variety of options and strategies can be open to us in dealing with housing problems as required. I think, Mr. Chairman, it can fairly be stated that the housing consumer in Manitoba is better off now than he or she has been in many years. Thank you very much. MR. CHAIRMAN: (a)- pass - the Honourable Member for Wellington. MR. BRIAN CORRIN: Mr.

Chairman, we thank the Minister for his broad outline of the activities of this corporation over the past year. Mr. Chairman, in saying that we feel that it must be recognized that there are certain problems which pervade the housing area in Manitoba, and particularly in Winnipeg, which in our opinion, in our submission, have not been addressed in the past year, or for that matter the past three years. Mr. Chairman, most specifically we regard the problem of the inner city of Winnipeg as being one that demands immediate attention by government. We say this, Mr.

Chairman, because the problems which present in the inner city of Winnipeg are ones that are by and large the by product of conditions throughout our province. The fact that the housing stock in the neighbourhoods of the inner city of Winnipeg have become a repository for disadvantaged persons and have been allowed to deteriorate to such a great extent is indicative, Mr. Chairman, of the vast inequit ies as between our peoples living in various areas of the province. And, Mr.

Chairman, the fact of the matter is, as I am sure many members are aware, that by and large many of the people who come to live in the inner core of Winnipeg are indeed immigrant from other parts of the province, people who come here to find easier access to social allowance assistance, people who come in the prospect of finding employment, some sort of assistance which they otherwise would be denied in their home commun ities. Indeed, Mr.

Chairman, one could say that many of the people who reside in the inner city have come from much further afield, many having come and travelled from other lands foreign to Canada in the hope of findin g a better way of life. So, Mr. Chairman, we're talking about the needs of people who are at the very least disadvantaged, and who are unable to guide and shape their own lives in the way that many other of our peoples are. The situation in the city of Winnipeg that I have been referring to, Mr. Chairman, has been stewing for a very long time.

It's not a problem that has just emerged, it's not a problem which was unknown to the last government or the government before that, and I daresay, Mr. Chairman, it was a problem that was grappled with a generation ago. But, Mr . Chairman, there is no denying that the problem has become exacerbated, that the problem is becoming grave and very severe indeed. We need only look, if we're going to use empirical data, Mr. Chairman, we need only look at the objective data that has been provided to us in recent evaluations of the inner city housing stock. We find that in the core of the city of Winnip eg, Mr.

Chairman, that some 9,000 dwelling units, or one fifth of all the dwelling units in the inner city area, are now rated to be in poor condition. We find that some 209 buildings out of 802 units have recently been described by an urban institute study as abandoned. These, Mr. Chairman, are derelict units in the heart of our city. Mr. Chairman, when the Ho nourable Mini ster presented his preJ?ared statement, he, with some delicacy I thought, rather deferen tially skir ted the issue of this particular problem. He indicated that there was less demand for housing; he indicated, Mr.

Chairman, that there was some effort to dove tail his corpora tion's programming with those now being conducted by the federal government, particularly through CMHC. But, Mr. Chairman, he didn't tell us what it was that this province was going to do in order to galvanize, in order to provide a precipitating catalyst that would bring together all the various energy and activity that has been put forward with respect to this problem. Mr. Chairman, for years I have had the privilege of participating in public policy formation relative to housing policy in the city of Winnipeg. Mr.

Chairman, in the few short years that I have been in politics, we have seen the creation of the RAP program federally, NIP, NHA provisions have been brought in which provides special funding access through CMHC. We've now found that the city of Winnipeg has created a Non-Profit Housing Corporation. Mr. Chairman, I've participated in meetings of the city of Winnipeg Environmental Comm ittee. I've 5072

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 :>articipated in meetings relative to housing and �ommunity comm ittees on a local basis. Mr . 8hairman, the one thing that disturbs me is that in all the time that I've been participating and working towards solutions in this area, I have yet to see any serious effort to integrate and synthesize all the various activities that take place, all the various governmental inputs. And, Mr. Chairman, I don't say that, thinking that there has been no effort, that behind the scenes there hasn't been very serious effort to do that, but, Mr.

Chairman, I can tell you that I've seen very little in the way of constructive resolution of these difficulties. I've seen competing interests, essentially bifurcate responsibility for this very vital area of government responsibility. So, Mr. Chairman, I suggest that the first and foremost thing that should be in the minds of all of us when we address ourselves to these estimates, is the question of how the government of Manitoba can provide responsible and authoritative leadership in the field of housing revitalization. Mr. Chairman, I think to do tha t requires firstly good will, and, very obviously, Mr.

Chairman, tremendous governmental effort. Now I thought, Mr. Ch airman, of alternative strategies because, Mr. Chairman, I believe that if we're going to encourage anyone else, be they a private citizen, be they another level of government, to participate in this undertaking, that we first must show the way. I believe that we must innovative; I believe that we must be forthcoming in creative redevelopment strategies directed at this problem. Mr. Chairman, it occurs to me that the first thing that we must do - and I am sure that members on both sides of the House can agree with me - is sit down with the city of .

Winnipeg and· map out a redevelopment strategy for the inner core of the city of Winnipeg. In 19 70, Mr. Chairman, this House created a piece of legislation which provided for community planning input in the formation of actionary plans. That is to say, Mr. Chairman, we provided by way of legislation, a tool, a mechanism through which people could assist in co-operation and in participation with government to plan the restructuring and rennovation and redevelopment of their own neighbourhoods. Mr.

Chairman, it's with some sadness - and I think with a note of tragic irony - that we must appreciate and accept that virtually nothing has been done with respect to this particular planning tool. There has been absolutely no action taken by city council, or various members of that council, with respect to this very important matter. Mr. Chairman, I think that is deplorable. I think that it represents a lack of responsibil ity and leadership on the part of thos e elected representatives. It's particularly deplorable, Mr.

Chairman, when we have seen over the years some concerted action on the part of city council with respect to the development of the suburban areas of our city. We have seen, and I don't deplore it, Mr. Chairman, but we have seen efforts to bank land in suburba n areas. We have seen fairly intensi ve transportation planning with respect to suburban areas, but yet, Mr. Chairman, there has been virtually no effort, no initiative put to the problem of inner-city redevelopment. Mr.

Chairman, it is tragic, because as a result of that, I would suggest that there is a logical and incremental correlation that has been leading to the dereliction and abandonment of that area, and those statistics I placed before the Ass embly, Mr. Chairman, are indicative of that. When we have a situation where some 209 residential buildings are standing vacant in our inner city, there is something very much the matter. I can think, Mr. Chairman, in the area in which I live, the Wolseley com muni ty, of a very fine apartment block that was owned by the Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation, that was torn down.

It was demolished a few short weeks ago. I would like to know more about that, Mr. Chairman. I am sure that there must be some good reason why that was allowed to happen. But I can suggest, Mr. Chairman, that it seems tragic that a fine venerable building with that sort of character, and I think structural integrity, and I may be wrong, had to be razed. Mr. Chairman, I can indicate, in the absence of anything, seemingly anything to replace it, in a time when we should be conserving our housing resources. And I say that, because it costs a lot of money to replace it. Mr.

Chairman, I don't want to become too tangential. With respect to an integrated planning approach for the inner city, there has been no action taken with respect to the provisions of The City of Winnipeg Act, and I suggest, Mr. Chairman, that if we are going to do anything effective, we have to encourage the city of Winnipeg council to take immediate action in that regard. Mr. Chairman, in this regard, I can indicate that I don't think that that can happen, in the absence of a more co-ordinated and a more structured approach towards housing and urban affairs policy in this provinc e. I am one, Mr.

Chairman, who cannot understand, who is unable to appreciate how it is possible for the Minister of Economic Development to effectively" synthesize and integrate housing policy with general urban development policy when he has the heavy burden of Eco nomic Development to shoulder on a daily basis. It seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that it's absolutely imperative and essential that there be some effort to integrate and dovetail the responsibilities of the Housing portfolio with the Urban Affairs portfolio.

I don't think that the Minister of Economic Development is in a position to do anything responsive to the needs I have mentioned unless there is that sort of structured and administratively sound approach adopted by the government. Mr. Chairman, if that were to happen and if there were to be action area plans for the inner city of Winnipeg, I would suggest that there are some very important things that could be done, and things that should be undertaken immedia tely. I would, for instance, Mr.

Chairman, suggest that there be an early effort to contemplate the possibility of down zoning many of our inner city neighborhoods. That is to say, through the auspices and intermediary of the City of Winnipeg Council, I am suggesting that we could downgrade zoning in the inner city in order to make the inner city less profitable for those who would prey on its housing stock as opposed to renovate it. 5073 p c C a

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 I am suggesting, Mr. Chairman, that there is no reason in many of our communities to have zoning standards that are so loose that any number of dwelling units can be placed by an absentee landlord in a home. That, Mr. Chairman, has for at least the past 25 to 30 years been a very serious problem. Mr. Chairman, as you are probably aware, during the war it was necessary in the city of Winnipeg to relax the zoning standards that pertained prior to that time. As a result of that, Mr.

Chairman - well, before I say that, I should indicate there was good reason for it, and that was because there was a housing crisis, it was necessary to sub-divide homes in order to afford people access to housing. Mr. Chairman, after the war the former zoning standards that applied and pertained in those areas were not upgraded, they were allowed to continue as they were during the war, and that, Mr. Chairman, led in time to exploitation. Many of those houses, Mr. Chairman, became the subject of absentee landlord speculation, over the years they were divided and sub-divided over and again. An example, Mr.

Chairman, I suppose a good example would be the home next to my own. Mr. Chairman, it is in all respects identical to the home in which I live. There is only one difference; that home contains five distinct residential units, five apartment units. Now, Mr. Chairman, I am not suggesting that there is anything wrong with housing being used in that respect, but there is something wrong when housing of that sort is sim ply the subject of commercial speculation. And that often is the case, Mr. Chairman.

The situation is exploited, the landlord is absentee, not a re sponsible mem ber of the community, not community-oriented, and as a result of that, Mr. Chairman, you have situations arising where you have one home on a block that deteriorates substantially and that leads generally to the deterioration of the entire area. Mr. Chairman, one of the first things that can be done in this regard is an action plan to down-zone substantial portions of the inner city of Winnipeg. Any other init iatives taken to redevelop or to implement a redevelopment strategy, Mr.

Chairman, would have to include the expanding of recreational resources in the inner city area. Speaking for my own area, Mr. Chairman, the area in which I live, in that constituency there is only one publicly accessible park area. It is located at the far end of the constituency, it is not accessible to most of the people in the area, it is not within walking distance and, Mr. Chairman, it is very small, it is very simple and very small. The inner city, Mr.

Chairman, was built long before the competing pressures of the automobile and the areas and neighborhoods were never built with a view towards the high-density population that has now resulted from the deteriorating zoning of the area. So as a result, Mr. Chairman, you have very little in the way of recreational resources. So, Mr. Chairman, it would be absolutely imperative that the Minister, in conjunction with other departments of government and the city of Winnipeg, take some concerted action in order to try and establish recreat ional and leisure areas for the inner city communi ties. Mr.

Chairman, this is absolutely essential. You know that in the new suburban areas because of the legislation that was brought in in 19 70, there is required a ten percent dedication from each developer who wishes to sub-divide land for the purposes of doing business in those communities. As a result, Mr. Chairman, the city has been able to accumulate fairly large sums of capital, which they in turn dedicate towards the acquisition and dedication of public park space in those communities. Mr. Chairman, it is obvious that the inner city has never had that sort of experience.

The community committee in which I participated for some three years, Mr. Chairman, virtually had no dedicated funds for these resources, nothing. Mr. Chairman, it was a matter of some harsh debate on the floor of Council that these mo neys that had been accumulated in some of the suburban area be the subject of sharing, ratable sharing, equitable sharing, as between the various commu nity areas. Regrettably, Mr. Chairman, I must report that never has been the case, that the suburban-dominated Council has resisted all efforts of inner city representatives to share those funds. And as a result, Mr.

Chairman, we still have an anomalous situation whereby millions of dollars have been withheld in banks, much like the Alberta Heritage Fund, for suburban recreational purposes, unspent, Mr. Chairman, because there is nothing to spend them on, because those areas are by and large planned commun ities. And regrettably, Mr . Chairman, you have inner city areas with no financial resources, no fiscal resources at all in this regard, unable to gain access to the suburban stockpile, so called He ritage Funds, and as a resu lt, Mr. Chairman, no initiative, no action has been taken in this regard. So, Mr.

Chairman, something must be done if we are going to redevelop the area to provide recreational resources that will in turn induce people to relocate them selves and plan families and build commun ities in the inner city of Winnipeg. There has been a lot of discussion, Mr. Chairman, about relocation of the rail yards, and this seems to have become a cause celebre. It is as if, Mr .

Chairman, I suppose and I say so with all respect to those who have very strong feelings either way in this issue, that the issue didn't exist for the past 50 or 60 or 70 years, it has been rediscovered and there is nothing wrong with that, Mr. Chairman. But I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, that before they redevelop those rail yards, they can start to provide decent housing on a unit-by-unit basis on many of the streets in the inner city.

Before we look forward to the broad brush stroke of government intervention, and we look forward to the day when we have beautiful housing tracks and park areas along the thoroughfare, the right-of-way, now occupied by the marshalling yards and main line of that railway; we can look to ways that we can provide commun ity resources on a street-by-street basis on the streets which many of us represent. That, Mr. Chairman, will be a long step forward. And I say that, Mr. Chairman, with respect to all thos e who have high aspirations for that ambit ious project, because I say to them, Mr.

Chairman, that if they lived on those streets and they were with those children and with those people, they would understand that much of their benevolence is misdirected and misguided. Mr. Chairman, I can also say, that if it comes to pass that I am able and privileged to participate in 5074

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 the government, I can assure you that the question of rail relocation will be high in my priorities, but not, Mr. Chairman, not to the exclusion of other priorities in the inner city. Mr. Chairman, in going on, if we are going to design a rennovation strategy for the inner city, if we are going to do that in conjunction with other responsible authorities, I say . . . MR. CHAIRMAN: The member has 5 minutes. MR. EVANS: I say that we have to be creative in our approach. It will be necessary for this government to dovetail some of its activity with the private sector. I, Mr.

Chairman, have had some discussions with private sector development interests. I for some time have been interested in determining whether they would be willing to do rennovation projects in the inner city of Winnipeg; whether or not they would be willing to participate in attractive market-oriented , consumer-oriented redevelopment projects in the inner city, and Mr. Chairman, much to my surprise I found out that they were. I found out that indeed it was the case that some of the firms would very much like to participate in that sort of activity. I was told, Mr.

Chairman, and it's common sense that it's obvious that there will be a lifestyle trend against the suburb, just as there was a bias towards the suburb in the past 10 to 30 years, Mr. Chairman. That will now turn about in these high energy cost times and, Mr. Chairman, it's thought that the inner city with a proper service infrastructure, easy accesibility to the workplace and shopping, may well provide the home milieu and ambience for the future generations of large cities. This is already the case, Mr.

Chairman, in some American centers, but where that has happened with the co-operation and in conjunction with the private sector, Mr. Chairman, government has had to be bold. Government has to be willing to take risks. One of the things that I would suggest, is that the government is going to have to consider, Mr. Chairman, the creation, the establishment of pilot projects, demonstrating the viability of this sort of housing approach in the inner city. To do that, Mr.

Chairman, they are going to have to do as was done in France and in West Germany and in other areas, they are going to have to assist the private sector by acquiring some of the old housing stock for them. They only way that this sort of approach will work, Mr. Chairman, if it is going to be broad based, and if it's going to appeal to young people in the consumption-oriented market that exists, is not through the aegis of public housing, not just in housing infill for the very indigent, the very poor, but that we are going to have to direct our strategy towards the middle income groups. To do that, Mr.

Chairman, I think we are going to have bank land. We are going to have to bank land and premises. I suggest, Mr. Chairman, that the way to approach this is to look to specific areas that migh t well be preserved for their heritage considerations. I can think of some very gracious areas, for instance, in the north end. I can think of some beautiful areas in the Wolseley community. Mr. Chairman, in doing that we could acquire some of the properties that have been allowed to deteriorate, not by the resident owners, Mr. Chairman, but by the absentee landlords. Mr.

Cha irma n , we can in conjunction with the private sector, rennovate those structures and sell them with perhaps assisted mortgage supplements or subsidies to the young family sector. We are also going to have to look, as has been the case in other areas, Mr. Chairman, at preferential mortgage interest programs, plans and programs which would provide some sort of easy access for young families to this sort of housing stock. We are going to have to, I think, look at municipal tax abatement for rennovations, and most certainly, Mr. Chairman, we are going to have to look at critical housing repair extension.

The current program is conceptually sound, but it's simply not enough, Mr. Chairman. It simply doesn't meet the need, and it doesn't match the contribution of the federal level of government, Mr. Chairman, and this is, I think, quite regrettable. We have a very special problem in our inner city, Mr. Chairman, and I think if we are going to attack it, if we are going to approach it meaningfully . . . MR. CHAIRMAN: Order please. The Honourable member's time is up. The Honourable Member for Crescentwood. MR. WARREN STEEN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I must say, Mr.

Chairman, that I think that my friend the Member for Wellington has been most generous in his compliments of the Minister. He has spent some time talking about housing problems, etc., etc. He has not been critical of the Minister, and I guess the reason why, Sir, is that it is difficult for the Member for Wellington to be critical of the Minister.

I recall a few years ago when I was chairman of comm ittee of supply when we were meeting in Room 254, the same member was somewhat critical of the Minister because at that time he wasn't spending enough money within his budget on the Manitoba Housing. and Renewal Corporation, and of course this year with an increase from 21 million to 30 million it becomes rather difficult for the honourable member to be too critical, plus the fact that the Min ister has over the past numb er of months, introduced a number of new measures that have assisted our people that are wanting housing stock, whether they be senior citizens or else.

The Honourable Member for Wellington talks about the inner city versus what we call th e suburban area. He and I were both members of the city council, and we both represented what we would both refer to as inner-city seats. He is quite correct when he says that the shift appears to be towards the suburbs now as opposed to some 20 years ago when the political power perhaps at that time was with the inner city. That is where the population seems to lie today. If he and I both look at the revised map of the provincial seats for the next general election, Mr.

Chairman, you can see a general shift in ridings towards the suburban areas from the inner core areas. That's where the people appear to be wanting to move and to locate themselves in. The honourable member speaks of that great neighbourhood I refer to as Wolseley, where he resides in, and the Member of lnkster resides in, and 5075

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 an area that I know fairly well, and he talks about lack of green space and parks and so on. I feel, considering that's an older part of the city of Winnipeg and so on, that that area does fairly well in the way of parks. You have the Vimy Ridge Park on Portage Avenue where Broadway almost meets Portage, you have the Omand's Creek area which is considered, in my opinion, one of the . best play areas, an organized area for sport, and there is really nothing wrong with the Laura Secord school grounds.

They are school grounds of a large size, that when he was a councillor, he was part of the community comm ittee that went out and sought to see that that Laura Secord area was built up with a reasonably good recreation building. I'm sure that my honourable friend remembers being part of the opening ceremonies at the Laura Secord winter building, and if you come a little bit further east, there's the Broadway Optimists area. This, Mr. Chairman, is an area within the inner city that I feel is reasonably well served in the area of recre ation.

It's not overly served, I would agree with him that it doesn 't have the open spaces that perhaps he and I would dream that an area should have. Some of the suburban areas in Winnipeg perhaps have greater space, but I feel that when you try to be rational and have green space versus acreage that is used for housing, that the particular area that the honourable member was speaking of is reasonably well served. He talks about the downtown area. Well, Mr.

Chairman, I want to say to you, and it's been said by members of the government side and members of this side in the past, that this government is committed to doing what it can in the downtown area, and I might say that I was at a meeting recently where we were being criticized for permitting the city council, of whic h the Ho nourable Memb er for Wellington and I both served, we were being criti cized for permitting shopping centres to be developed in the suburban areas of Winnipeg, that the city council and the provincial government should never have permitted the large shopping centres from being developed at the rate that they were, that we should have been out there making laws to preserve the downtown area.

Well, as I said earlier this afternoon during Pr ivate Memb ers' Hour regarding the seat belt thing, I prefer not to have any more laws made to control my lifestyle than need be. And I think that the law of supply and demand will look after the shopping centres. But this particular government is comm itted to trying to restore the downtown area.

I think one of its best moves which was recently taken was to go into the Eaton Place development and occupy a lot of space in that particular building so that the people redeveloping the Eaton Place would carry on and continue the development of that very large, old, Eaton's warehouse that used to be there for their mail-in order business, and turn that into a viable operation.

And therefore, if we get some more business back in the downtown area, we'll get some more demand for housing in the downtown area, and the Member for Fort Rouge has made a number of comments and remarks regarding shopping centres in the way of grocery services to provide for senior citizens and downtown personnel, and the Member for Wellington, I am sure, is very much aware of the development in the last year, year-and-a-half, by the Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation on Furby Place. I'm sure he has no objections to the development of Furby Place that went in in place of the old Strathcona Curling Club.

Perhaps the honourable member, I see him looking in kind of a state, oh, I didn't know that that took place - well, there is a fine building over there that is housing a number of persons. It is on the north side of Portage Avenue, perhaps it's not where the honourable member lives, but it's towards the area that he represents. And that's where the old Strathcona Curling Club used to be, and today there's a very fine housing project in there with two and three bedroom units.

And then there's another one on Ellice Avenue that perhaps he's aware of where a tragic fire took place some years back, about eight to nine years ago, that he, I'm sure is very much aware that stayed vacant for a number of years, and so on. So this Min ister, with his leadership and his guidance, and so on, there has been development in the inner city area, in the housing area. There is today, Mr. Chairman, not quite the demand for apartment space as there was a few years ago. The apartment vacancy rate is nearing the 5 percent rate, as the Minister said in his opening remarks.

There is some flexibility for persons to look for lodging and housing and have some comparison as to whether they choose the first location that they might look at or choose the second or the third or the fourth. There is some choice available today that didn't appear to be available a few years ago. Our Minister has introduced a number of programs to help persons hopefully stay in their own housing stock, whether it be in homes or whether it be in apartments through rental assistance and so on, so that the demand would ease somewhat on public housing. One area, Mr.

Chairman, that I am very much aware of and that I'm sure the members opposite, who do represent jnner city seats would like to see embarked on, and I have the assurance of this Min ister and others that when mone ys become available that it would be embarked on, was a commitment made by the Progressive Conservative Party in the last election, was what they had hoped to do in the inner city area where there was good housing stock, was to see if we could get young families, and encourage young families to move back into those areas, and encourage them to upgrade that housing stock through home renovations, etc ..

And the government was hoping to embark on a program where we could help finance and help the people meet their commitments to renovate the homes that they would like to buy into and move back into older areas of the city and renovate these homes. Unfortunately, interest rates haven't been attractive in the last couple of years, and therefore embarking on this program in a big way has not been easy to accomplish, but it is a commitment that I am hoping, and I expect the government to carry out.

I can foresee areas in the now Crescentwood constituency off Pembina Highway, west to Stafford Street, where there are a lot of good, two-storey and story-and-a-half homes that would make ideal homes for young couples to buy into if the mortgage rates 5076

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 were reasonable, make some renovations on these hom es, hopefully do some of the repair work themselves, and to go back into these neighbourhoods and make these neighbourhoods a more family-oriented, viable force.

As the Minister of Education will tell you, there are a number of older schools in that particular type of neighbourhood, in the west end of the city and so on, that are ending up with vacant classrooms, the families are growing up, they're moving to the suburbs, and nobody is coming to replace those families in the age group of the younger people who would have children that would be of school age.

And in order to take full advantage of the west end of the city of Winnipeg, which is an area I' m reasonably well familiar with, or the older parts of south Winnipeg, the Fort Rouge, the Crescentwood area, there's a lot of good housing stock in that area that I would like to see occupied by our younger people that are finding it very difficult to buy new homes in new subdivisions. I was just reading, Mr. Chairman, in a political magazine from the United States called U.S.

News and World Report, they did a survey in some 20 major American cities where it says that the average cost of operating a house in these 20 cities is 550.00 a month. That's including your payment and your utility costs and your taxes, 550.00 a month. There's many many young couples today that just couldn't afford 550.00 a month, and this is what is considered in 20 of the larger cities, using a survey on their so called inner city areas, that the cost of operating their household is 550.00 a month.

If we, through government and through leadership in the communi ty, can get these older homes in these areas made available to our younger families and try and make use of our community centres, as I mentioned to the Memb er for Wellington, the community centres that exist in the Wolseley area, which is not his area nor my area, but an area of which he knows very much about and an area of which I know a fair amount about, if we can get full utilization of those community centres, those schools, and the shops in the area, the people with their purchasing power back into the community and getting a proper mix rather than having it overly emphasized in the way of senior citizens, but getting the proper mix back into those areas, we will get that type of community spirit that the Member for Wellington thinks would be desirable for those areas and the type of persons and the mix that I think would be desirable for the inner city area.

I think, as I said earlier, Mr. Chairman, that this Minister has been doing an excellent job in trying to handle this department. I might close in saying to the Honourable Mem ber for Wellington, I recall a couple years ago when he was criticizing this Minister and I was the chairman of the committee at that particular time, he said, all you have got to do, Mr. Minister, is look after the Manitoba Housing and Development - we would expect greater things of you. Today he is being critical of the Minister because he carries with the Manitoba Housing portfolio, he carries the Economic Development and Tourism.

So two years ago the Mini ster wasn 't busy enough for this particular member; today the Minister is too busy. So I don't know when the Member for Wellington is ever going to be satisfied with the Minister, perhaps never would be satisfied, but I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, that two years ago when it was my privilege to chair a number of the Minister's estimates through the second comm ittee, which was in 254, that I don't think a Minister came to that particular committee ever better prepared than the present Minister of Manitoba Housing.

He came to those commit tee hearings knowing more about his department, having more answers ready before the questions were even asked. Today he is being criticized because he does too good a job in that department. He has only had a 30-some odd percent increase in his budget and he is being critici zed. He knows the department frontwards and backwards and now, because he carries with it Tourism and Economic Development, he is being criticiz ed because he is carrying too heavy a load. He is spending more money in the area of housing.

He is seeing more housing being developed in the inner city, and yet the members opposite are never satisfied. I don't know what it takes to please the members opposite but I think, from the comments that I have heard from the Member for Wellington during the 40 minutes that he had available to him -(Interje ction)- That's right, as the Honourable Member for Fort Rouge says, they will never be happy regardless what I say. Oh, yes, yes. I am sure, to the Honourable Member for Fort Rouge, who, Mr.

Chairman, said to me the other day that, "I would hope that when we conclude the Honourable Minister of Economic Development's estimates," that she would like to see a smile drawn on his face. And I assured her yesterday morning that the Honourable Minister, when his estimates are passed, when his salary is passed, that she will see a smile on his face. I might conclude my remarks, Mr.

Chairman, by saying that I don't know how you are going to keep people like the Honourable Member for Wellington happy, but this Minister, I don't know how he does it, but somehow or other he has had a 30 percent or greater increase in his budget, he has had some great programs introduced in the last 12 months, somehow or other he has got some persuasive powers with caucus and with his colleagues in Cabinet, and in my opinion has done an excellent job.

I might say to the Honourable Minister that I doub t if he will ever please the Mem ber for Wellington, unless he was to go into the constituency that that member represents and pave the streets in gold. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Elmwood. MR. RUSSELL DOERN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, just on that last note, I don't see much hope for the present Minister ever becoming a smiler, but I would give him a tip as to how he might achieve that.

I think that if every night when he went to bed, he slept with a banana in his mouth, I think that over a period of time he could certainly develop a toothy grin. -(I nterjection)- Mr. Chairman, I am not going to repeat the intimations of the Member for lnkster. I just wanted to make a few remarks about the actions of this Minister. His department in discussion now is on Manitoba Housing and Renewal, but I think that that can also be looked upon in the broader context of construction and in the broader son

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 context, again, of economic activity in the province of Manitoba. Mr. Chairman, I would like to read, for the benefit of the commit tee, a few construction statistics, only to set the context of my remarks, because the last statistic that I would like to read concerns ho using starts in the four western provinces. I think in that way we can get a picture of what is happening with this administration in office as it relates to housing, as it relates to construction, and as it relates to economic activity.

I am looking at a brochure that we received from Inland Cement -(I nterjection)- No, I wouldn't say that. Inland Cement, from Edmonton, Alberta, publishes a bi-monthly newsletter called "In Form." I want to read from the last page, just to show you how poorly Manitoba is doing when it comes to economic activity and housing in particular. - (I nterjection)- As my friend says, "The concr ete facts." Number one, on contract awards, I want to point out that when it comes to building construction, every province is up 12, 13, 66 percent; Manitoba is down 6 percent in the past year, from April, 19 79 to April, 1980.

Saskatchewan is up 12 percent; Alberta is up 13 and B.C. is up 66. Mr. Chairman, the engineering construction is 44 percent off in Manit oba; 7 percent off in Saskatchewan; up 13 in Alberta; and 20 percent off in B.C. But the one who is dragging and lagging is Manitoba. In terms of housing starts and units, from Thunder Bay - actually these figures are from Thunder Bay to Victoria - they range from the positives of 48 percent up in Vancouver, 50 percent up in Thunder Bay, 126 percent up in Victoria, and then they go from 34 percent down, and lagging at the tail end is Manitoba, Winnipeg, 79 percent off.

In terms of building permits, we have the lowest rate of 25 percent off, in terms of dollars. Thunder Bay is a little worse. In the percentages, we are 27 percent off; Thunder Bay is 38 percent off and Regina is 36 percent off, so they are a little higher in that statistic. But everybody else is up. Now I come to the final set of statistics, Mr . Chairman, which I think are the most interesting and the most shocking. In the past year - let's first of all look at contract awards and then, secondly, housing starts.

In contract awards, Alberta is up 20 percent; Saskatchewan is up 77 percent, and B.C. is up 66 percent. So just a fast calculation, you could say they are up about an average of almost 50 percent in those provinces. Manitoba is down 23 percent. So we're bucking the trend. Now we look at the most important one that we are talking about in the specifics, and that is housing starts. Alberta is down 15 percent; Alberta is off. Saskatchewan is up 152 percent. British Columbia is up 73 percent. Mr. Chairman, Manitoba is down 70 percent; 70 percent.

If you looked again and you averaged those statistics, it would show that the other provinces are up about an average of around 70 percent, but Manitoba is down 70 percent. Mr. Chairman, these statistics, I think, are quite shocking. They come from the private sector; they don't come from the New Democratic Party. - (Interjection)- No, not from us socialists. They don't come from my colleague from Brandon East, who is a capable economist. It is in this setting that this Mi nister has to be condemned, because his administration must get the credit or the blame for the general context of economic activity.

They are the ones who can pull the levers of power; they can set the general framework. They are the ones who determine, to the extent that they can - I'm not unaware of North American trends and international effects - but they can, in whatever way possible, affect for better or for worse, the economic activity in Manitoba. I say that the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Economic Development and Housing, these are the people we can point fingers at. I say that there has been no action in the private sector. There has been high unemployment. There has been high out-migration.

I read yesterday in the paper, or the day before, that some of the big Canadian corp orations, including Great West Life, in spite of all the urgings and the policies of this government, are going to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in the United States. They are not going to invest in our province, even though they are headquar tered here, or in western Canada, which is booming, they are going to the States. As my friends will readily say, "What about those succession duties; what about that context; what about that new government? What about 'that government is best which governs least'?

This government is governing the least of all, and yet, when the results roll in from the Manitoba Bureau of Statistics, or Statistics Canada, or from Inland Cement or from anybody else, it just shows that without government involvement, without the government playing a positive role, that we are in serious trouble. I conclude on this point, Mr. Chairman, that from 19 69 to 19 77, we had high economic activity in Manitoba. We had high activity in the construction sector and we had high government activity.

Now, in the past two and a half, two and three-quarter years, we have had low government activity and we have had low construction activity. There surely must be a correlation between the two. So I say, Mr. Chairman, that the Minister and his government have failed both in philosophical terms and, in particular, in practical terms. They have done what they said they would do, only the results have not corresponded to their hopes and their dreams. Their whole argument, their whole philosophical approach was, "Let's sit back and the private sector will pick up the slack.

If we pull out of housing, they will move into housing. If we pull out of construction of buildings, they will move into that area." Well, it hasn't worked, and I think that this specific example provided by the private sector demonstrates that point. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Fort Rouge. MRS. WESTBURY: Thank you, Mr. Chairperson. You know, I am beginning to think that when you talk about housing, it's like talking about raising a family, everybody becomes an expert, and I guess I'm just one of those people as well.

We all have our own particular views on what should or could be done about the housing situation. When I try to imagine why this particular Minister, what interests he has that would have qualified him for being the Minister respon sible for Manitoba Ho using and Renewal 5078

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 Corporation, Mr. Chairperson, I can only think that the intention was that nothing should be done with Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation. Because as far as I am concerned, I had hoped that with the change of government and with some of the exciting architectural things that have been done in this city in the past 10 years in Osborne Village, in Highgate, in Old Market Square, and some of the other his toric and heritage and preservation programs, that perhaps some exciting things could be done in the preservation of housing and in the provision of new housing.

I am aware of very little new housing that has been provided that was initiated and planned under this government. Most of the housing that has been provided, of which I am aware, Mr. Chairperson, was initiated by the previous government. I find that extremely disappointing. Now, the Minister said there has been a decline in the demand. I suggest, Mr. Chairperson, that there has been a decline in demand for the kind of housing that has been provided, in other words, something new over on Mayfair, that was more imaginative than the high towers that we are used to seeing provided.

That was sort of encouraging to me, but I haven't seen very much along those lines produced. I wonder if there has been a decline in the demand - I don't think so - for handicapped housing. I know that some handicapped housing has been provided in the past five years or a little more than that perhaps. I know that there are people waiting for more handicapped housing and I have asked questions on this before in the House, under another Minister in his estimates, and received not very satisfactory answers. I am wondering when the second phase of the handicapped housing program will be initiated.

The first phase has been successful and I would like to see more - never mind what I would like - the handicapped in this city would like to have more of that kind of housing provided, because it enables them to live independently and enables them to feel as though at last society is accepting them as equals socially and making it possible for them to live independent and productive lives, instead of society treating them as though they ae lifetime patients, which of course they are not. Now, we have an increase here in spending, to which the Member for Crescentwood referred, of 8 million.

I tried to listen to the Minister's opening remarks and I think somebody the other night described his tones as unctuous. Unctuous tones. Anyway, they were a little too unctuous for me to get the point of where this 8 million is going to be spend. I wish he would be specific on how many new units are going to be provided, how many new units will be rehabilitated. Will they be equal family housing; will they be for mixed housing, which is what I would prefer to see; will they be in areas needing rehabilitation; will they be senior citizens' housing, and so on?

The Minister said there has been a decline in the demand for family housing, I think he said, and senior citizens' housing. Well, I suggest that in the case of senior citizens, as with handicapped people, perhaps they don't want to be isolated into structures such as are usually described as ghettos, into structures where they are with another 10 0 or 200 people who are just like themselves. Maybe they would like to go into mixed housing. Maybe they would like to be in housing which is shared with families and with handicapped seniors and singles and so on.

I would suggest that perhaps we should be altering our view of the kind of housing that we are providing in order to accept our responsibility to our city, among other things, as well as to the people who live in the city. We have a declining core area, a very sadly declining core area over the past few years, since unification of this city, I suggest, and government has a responsibility. We can't pass it all off to the private sector and say, yes, land costs are high but private sector provide.

I suggest that the government has to provide some incentiv es, the government has to show some initiative, and I have not seen much initia tive coming from this gover nment, Mr. Chairperson. I suggest that, oh, we have had a half hearted acceptance of federal money, which we have half-heartedly spent, and without a great deal of excitement or imagination. I have in the past, and I will again tonight, speak about the rehabilitation of older dwellings. The Member for Crescentwood referred to the fact that this would be done, that people would take on older dwellings if the tax breaks were there.

I am saying that they are doing that already. People in his constituency, I suspect, and in mine, because they are continguous, already are buying housing which have been used as R3 or R2 uses in the past and they are restoring them to R1 use, very beautiful restoration jobs going in there, but very very slow because of the costs and because they are not getting any assistance from government.

Some of this rehabilitation could proceed much more quickly if we could have a freeze on the incr eased assessement for a limited period of time of, say, three, four or five years, to enable some of these people to move more quickly with their renovation and restoration, which is so successful where it is happening. It is happening particularly in my constituency, I think, where there are some very beautiful, fairly modest older homes which can be successfully restored in the way that I have described. I think there have been some very good comments made tonight by previous speakers.

I would like to say that I do endorse much of what has been said and I am trying very hard not to repeat what has been said. But I really must talk about the treatment of senior citizens, who are the tenants of Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation in the core area of the city. I have found this Minister to be lacking in compassion, in consideration of these people. He is lacking in sensitivity, in understanding of what it is like to be old and alone and living away from the people you grew old amongst, away from your old neighbourhood.

You are downtown and you want to go and buy your groceries, because you want to be independent, and there is no place for you to buy your groceries except - you know, there was one week I was going around one of the - 18 5 Smith as a matter of fact in my constituency, and this was after the Safeway store had been closed and the people in there told me that in the Safeway ads that week tomatoes - and a lot of these people are told to take their vitamin C by natural means because 5079

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 they find it difficult to have it in the vitam in supplement, and tomatoes are one of the cheapest ways they can do that - the tomatoes in Safeway's store had been 55, I think it was, a pound. At Eaton's basement they were 68 a pound and in the little convenience store across the street they were 85 cents a pound. They want a grocery store. They want a. full-service grocery store in their area, Mr. Chairperson, and when I mentioned - I was sti ll trying to be reasonably polite in those days before I took my seat in this House, and I was trying to talk to the Minister about the problem.

I thought maybe he didn't know about it. I found he knew about it and he just didn't give a darn. And I phoned him up and I said, what can be done about these people, because they are suffering. They are being driven away from the home that they have which they had hoped they'd be able to live in for a few years until they die or until they have to into personal care or something, and he said, I don't think the government should be in the grocery business. Well, my gosh, what kind of an answer is that? I don't think the government should be in the grocery business either, Mr.

Chairperson, but I do think that where the government has a demonstrated need to the people who are dependent upon that government, that they should move themselves to provide for a grocery store if that is what is needed, or whatever is most needed in the area to be provided to these people. They can move themselves. They can make arrangements. They can go to a series of grocery stores, the chains, and say to them, come to us with some development proposals. We have a need, what do you suggest? Has this government done this? I don't know, because he won't answer any questions.

Everybody in the House knows that one day a few weeks ago, I had one question to ask him and because he didn't want to answer it, I dragged that question out for six days, two or three questions a day, before I finally got the information out of the Minister, with some help from the newspapers. - (Interjection)- Mr. Chairperson, what I wanted to say was, if only the Minister would be frank, but the trouble is the Minister is Frank, and - that was too much for me, a little bit of a wit. MR.

CHAIRMAN: While the honourable member is waiting for some water to clear her throat, I would just like to remind her that I shopping at Penner's, just down Broadway this evening, and tom atoes are 2 pounds for a dollar. MRS. WESTBURY: I'll let them know. How do they get there, Mr. Chairperson? How do they get there? MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MRS. WESTBURY: Thank you. The honourable members on the government side have said they should walk to Penner's and buy, well some of my elderly friends will interested in that remark, Mr. Chairperson.

They can walk a block or two blocks or they can - on canes they can go a block or two blocks. Some of them can't get on a bus, some of them really can't get on a bus, but they can walk a few blocks. When you get a little arthritis in the hips, one person said to me, Mrs. Westbury, you can't get on a bus carrying a bag of groceries, and you can't get off a bus into a snowbank. We have to think a little bit, smart remarks don't answer these people. We are talking about human beings.

We are talking about human beings who have cried, who have been told that if they work hard all their lives they will be looked after when they get old, and they are trying to stay indep endent and healthy in their own apartments. Some of the apartments I don't think are really good enough for some of these people but they are trying, but they do need to be able to get out and do their shopping and I'm suggesting, Mr. Chairperson, that there has been a very serious lack here. The Minister says the senior citizens don't need additional housing.

I agree they don't need additional housing of the type they are getting. Personally when I get old if I'm a widow, I don't want to live in one room with a bed in it. I would like to have something a little more imaginative than that. Mr. Chairperson, what about personal care homes? I have a strong suspicion there is need for more personal care homes in the downtown area. Could not something like that be built in conjunction with a grocery store? I know there are needs. We all know there are needs. Anyone who walks through this side of the river knows that there are needs in this area for housing.

Why can't we have a little imagination, a little compassion, a little sensitivity, and a little caring from this Minister? Why can't he go out into the community and say, what are the needs in this area, apart from a grocery store? Let's combine so that we can provide for the needs of the people in this area and make a better city and increase the land values if they put in a commercial use on the ground floor of housing. We get a little money back, and to some people, I agree, there are people to whom only the economic factors matter. If that is what is most important, let's put that in as a provision.

Let's have every housing - and this would be not difficult to do. I'm no architect and I am sure I could come up with some preliminary design on how you could put commercial use on the main floor and housing above it. I can only repeat what I said earlier, that when it's so obvious that the Min ister doesn't care, one wonders why he was the Minister put in charge of this department, Mr. Chairperson.

And I think that the people of this province are finding the answers to some of these questions, that when you put someone who doesn't care into a department, it's because you hope that the department will just stay at a standstill, that nothing more will happen, that they'll let it ride. I'd love to see him get a little excited about the provision of housing, as excited as he gets about the office in Mexico.

Wouldn't it be nice if he stood up and enthusiastically said, guess what, we've got an exciting new housing concept for the area north of Portage, that derelict depressed area, or we have an exciting new housing concept which will include this greatly needed grocery store for the area between Assiniboine and Portage Avenue. Mr. Chair person, not only would I like to see him smile, I wouldn't even know if he smiled. Look at him. He's got his back to me again. That's all right. I can understand if he doesn't like to look at me, sometimes I don't like to look at me either. Never 5080

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 mind smiling, if he could only get enthusiastic about his job, if only he could say, we are going to do some exciting and wonderful things for the people who are dependent upon us, the government. I would really have a lot more admiration for the Minister, Mr. Chairperson. In conclusion, I have to say I hope we'll get some information on where this 8 million is going to be spent.

I hope the Minister will get around to telling us how many units have been completed or commenced or even are in preliminary planning in the past year, or in the past nearly three years sinc e this government took office; how many of those proposed units are going to be in rehabilitation, how many are going to be in housing, how many are going to be in apartments, and are they all going to be dependent upon federal contributions or is the provincia l government going to show some initiative?

I don't mind if there are federal contributions as long as they are doing something exciting and imaginative and special with the federal money instead of just sort of drabbing it out in drab little places. And when we provide, if provide housing, are we going to make sure that there are service industries around so that the people who live in that housing can live independent and healthy lives? Thank you. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Wolseley. MR. ROBERT G.WILSON: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a few brief comments pertaining to housing.

I' ve had a great deal of success with this Minister and certainly with a number of groups, have an indication as to some of the incentives that are going to take place in Wolseley despite city council. I believe the annou ncement of at least anywhere from two to three to four senior citizen complexes in the Wolseley riding, is certainly an incentive to offset and to give the senior citizens and elderly people in the area some form of relief from the unbelievable puzzle of being able to stay in their homes, and I look forward to the Greenwood United Church complex on Portage and Greenwood.

I have an indication from some joint developer, possible property management and the United Church are maybe looking at an area on Maryland Street. I have an interest of the Lion's Manor in the Cornish and Furby area, but will be met with some resistance if they come in with the type of complex that they originally envisioned, and I think this is where government has to get involved in the core area, is to try to allow the people to have the type of situation that is going to be acceptable to the community.

So with that type of incentive in an area like Wolseley, that the Member from Wellington spoke about is the type that is a positive move and we welcome it together with an increased supervision over the post-psychiatric homes and personal care homes that are very prominent in the Wolseley area, and a more general concern of the halfway houses that are there, better superv 1s1on, more concentration on who does get the passes and who gets an early parole and that type of thing. But there is something that is happening that we have been - in housing we have been sold out by the suburban councillors.

We've been sold out to such a degree that I'm afraid if this government doesn't step in and sort of do something in the way of a lecture or demanding that city council have a plan for the inner core of the city, the downtown area of the city. I've seen all types of wonderful plans in the future, the greater Winnipeg development plan, and all th ose other plans, only to see certain councillors, certain pressure groups do a complete flip flop.

I remember the pains that I went to and the many meetings that I went to, to acquire all the land between the junction of the Red and the Assiniboine leading up the Parliament Building, the Legislative Building, and the first thing we did was see several of the old metro councillors put the pressure on and lo and behold we abandon the Gu erton Paint Building. We abandoned that with some grandiose scheme that we were going to be given the land behind the Guerton Paint Building and then all of a sudden an architectural building goes up next to the Czechoslovakian restaurant.

And yet I was envisioned and told with some of the great plans that we were going to have that particular area as an open space green area which would have been a compliment to the already demand by senior citizen housing and condom inium housing for the more affluent senior citizens to want to be in an area that has all the amenities that I would want if I was an elderly person, and that would be the parks, the Legislative Building, the river, the entire amenities of the art gallery and all the wonderful things that you have when you live in a downtown setting that has completely been gutted of slums.

However, then you have a particular person for some strange reason who either through lack of caring, or possibly more higher aspirations, and I refer to the Liberal councillor from the area who allowed the city welfare offices to move en masse from the Main Street area to 705 Broadway without an environmental impact study, and it has completely wiped out the entire residential concept of that area. You can see it happening. The developers and the investors are gr abbing all those houses along Portage Avenue. They are grabbing them for land value.

I guarantee you within two or three years you will see the complete zoning rechange after that McGregor-Sherbrook Overpass is built; it will all commercia l in there, thos e old houses will all disappear and be replaced with parking lots, and the rest of it. We spent four years getting rid of the massage parlours; we prohibited the pinball games south of Portage Avenue, we got rid of all the uses that were not the type that the Gordon Bell High School, and the Mulvey School, and Wolseley School and Laura Secord, the type that they wanted in their area.

That was the type of living that we wanted, and lo and behold we get rid of them and without an environmental impact study the councillor for the area accepts en masse the entire social service department of the city of Winnipeg. When those people get rejected and they are on alcohol, they come out, and the incr eased rate of crime, the stabbings, the muggings, the robberies, the women that have been attacked in that area, is increasing, and I challenge the city of Winnipeg Police Chief to look at the records that are happening in that particular area.

I am speaking out against this and it is going to cost me an awful lot of support, but I do it because it 5081

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 is the truth. There should have been an environmental impact study, there should have been some consideration for the residential concept and makeup of the area.

Here is where I think that if the MHRC is looking to support a community that is going downhill, then they should exactly what they are doing on Ellice Avenue, they should come in there and buy up some of that old housing stock that is decaying because it has absentee landlords; it is decaying because the people have bought it for land value only, and that is the type of thing the government is going to have to package together and they are going to have to throw in something in there to save the community.

An example of what the government did in a positive way, they looked at the corner of Wolseley and Lenore and they know that the area is an area, because it is a very activist area, there are so many envious radicals that live in my particular constituency - because they don't own anything, they are envious radicals, they come in and stir up the people and then they leave and go on to another province, or go to another district; or they get fired as the Political Science Professor at the University of Winnipeg or wherever, they dropped in here.

These type of people come in and they activate, they get people all excited, and I disagree with the Member for Wellington, we got an awful lot of potential in that particular area with what we have. We have to have a return on what is coming into the Palmerston west end of the area. The city of Winnipeg fathers, namely the suburban councillors, have destroyed the east end of Wolseley; they will be dr iving a freeway right down Sherbr ook and Maryland, so we are going to be cut in half and that other area is going to be neglected unless there is some caring for that particular area.

We are getting a boost, Great West Life is building on one particular end of it, and we do have the Colony Squa re Development in there, but unless we can do something with the particular government involved and the city councillors recognizing that the investors are grabbing this land for land value and letting the housing stock deteriorate, because you have in one area of my riding fantastic potential of young people retu rning, and with the Critical Home Repair Program, homes being fixed up, and a constant fight with the first three or four houses off Portage Avenue being gr abbed for land value, because of the pressures for parking lots by the businesses that are along Portage Avenue.

The government did a very generous and a very worthwhile thing that is helping me. They tore down an unsightly block at the corner of Lenora and Wolseley; it is something that was really wanted for a long time by the residents of the area, and it was worthy of note that a Liberal campaign manager and the futuristic Li beral candidate for the area called a meeting and gave out this questionairre and what have you, and they didn't once write to the MLA for the district asking what are the plans for this site, when are you going to tear it down?

At least the New Democra tic Party was two years ahead of the Liberals, because they wrote me back in the early part of 1979 and sent a copy of the letter addressed to the Minister in charge of Manitoba Housing and Renewal; we are a group of concerned citizens - of course, they are easy to recognize, Professor Allan Mills, Michael Deeter, Kathleen Taylor, they are all either New Democrats or Bolsheviks, they are all people from the area that are well known to me. They are all well known to me.

You know, I thriv e on the active participation politically in the area, and they do force me to work and to try to convince my Minister that something has to be done with that site. His staff is most cooperative whenever you bring a problem to him. If you have a senior citizen that needs a home repaired or anything, you can down and see him and ask him to put his name on the list, he fills out the forms and everything else. You try to talk to every senior citizen that wants to move out of his home, and you ask him what are the reasons. Crime is one of the big reasons and fear is another one.

We just don't seem to have in certain sections of my riding the same confidence that we do have in other parts of the riding. I don't know what I can do for the east end of the riding, I really don't know, and I urge this Minister to have a look at that particular

section of the riding. I believe the New Democratic Party owns a house in that very area that is going to be affected, because we have moved the entire City of Winnipeg Welfare Department onto the Broadway site. What they have done is increased all the values of the property.

I own property there, it is doubled probably in value, because it is going to be commercial, but I am saying I would rather have the area saved and I would rather have the value of my property stated, because I bought it because I have a small office, a constituency office there, I do a little business out of that office and yes, I gain a little revenue. The point that I am trying to say, is that by living and working in the area, I get the feeling of the pulse of the area, and I think really when you look at what we have in the downtown core, it is about time that our city fathers gave us an assessment freeze.

We have all the traffic going through where we live, we are constantly saying to young people, with gasoline head ing for 1. 50, 2.00 a gallon, move back downtown, look at the amenties we have, and then they pick up their daily newspaper and read the crime rate, and lo and behold, where is most of the crime taking place. I am not suggesting that we transfer the crime out to the suburbs, but I am suggesting that there has to be some consideration. I can guarantee you that on a Sun day you won't see a police car going to Assiniboine Park, because it takes 45 minutes to go through there.

It is like a city unto itself on the weekends, because they all have a timetable, a schedule, but there doesn't seem to be any plan for the inner city. You either see five police cars in one block, you never see the police there on Friday night after the Westminister closes, or on Saturday night, and that is when we need the protection, because a lot of these particular problems are alcohol related.

With thos e few remarks and giving a slight presenta tion, hoping it will give some sort of direction towards the inner core of the city, the one I represent, because l am very much afraid that particular area, and I don't want to crystal-ball this, but if we don't do something now that we have got the problem that the councillor dumped in our laps, if we don't do something with that particular area, you say goodbye to the R1 planning. One of the greatest problems that you have, if the R1 planning 5082

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 for that district is going to go, don't be wishy-washy about it, have a plan, make a decision. Maryland Street will become commercial. Sherbrook is showing signs of becoming commercial, there is little shopping centres going in there, and people like Sooter Studios are buying up houses for parking for their customers. So you can see the pressure is there. If it is going to happen, don't waste time, let it happen.

Don't let other people be able to speculate and be able to grab up all the houses and then be able to - in other words, if a person who has lived in an area for 30 years applies for rezoning and is rejected, and looks and see a large developer have that particular same site rezoned for commercial, I think that is unfair. I think the city has to have a plan and let the people know that now that the City Welfare Office has moved into that area, we are going to have a commercial pressure for the surrounding area for so many streets in a certain section, and that is what would happen.

Because what we have now, developers are telling me that the city councillors come into Charleswood and say, build a shopping centre. The person builds a shopping centre and he gets a client for the shopping centre, and now the councillors for the area have to decide, well we have got too many grocery stores in the area, we don't need another grocery store. I think at some point in time there has to be amendments made so that people can get on, otherwise we are driving them to other cities across the province and across the country.

There is something lacking at City Hall with the development of this city, encou ragement for the particular entrepreneur that wants to come in and develop, and I think that there has to be an overhaul in the Urban Affairs Department of this government to give direction and give advice, and call meetings to get what are other cities doing that is causing this exodus of Manitoba capital to Saskatoon, to Edmonton, now Toronto is starting to take off again. You have to ask yourself, why? Is it the red tape at City Hall? With those few remarks, I am sure that the civil servants will find the answers. MR.

CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for The Pas. MR. RON McBRYDE: Mr. Chairman, it is always interesting to listen to the Honourable Member for Wolseley, especially when he is going after the ICEC, his former colleagues on City Council. Mr. Chairperson, what I would like to do, I want to address some remarks in terms of the Rural and Native Housing Program. What I would like to do, if I don't lose my place, is ask the Minister some very specific questions.

He has had some general questions and general comments this evening, but I would like to get some specific information and give his staff a chance to earn their salaries this evening, because they haven't had that much to do so far. Mr. Chairperson, the Rural and Native Housing Program is a federal-provincial program for the subsidy part of the program, for those people that need a subsidy in order to get into rural native housing, and the federal government puts up 75 percent and the provincial government puts up 25 percent.

The original plan at one time was that the federal government would deliver part of th e program and the provincial government would deliver part of the program. My question then is, in terms of the MHRC as a contractor, as a builder of houses under the Rural and Native Housing Program, I wonder if the Minister could tell us how many houses MHRC will be building under the Rural and Native Ho using Program themselves as the delivery agency this year, how many have they completed this year, and how many will they be completing? I wonder, Mr.

Chairman, if the staff could trace that back a little further - how many did MHRC build in 19 79, 19 78, 19 77, 1976, and I wonder if the Minister could give us some indication if it is his plan, his intention, to have MHRC in or out of the construction part of that program. Another question for the Minister, Mr. Chairperson, is related to the applications that the MHRC now has for the Rural and Native Housing Program.

The application procedure, as I understand it, is the external agency, whether it be MHRC or MMF , assist people to make out the applications for this program and then the application, once it has gone through the outside agencies' procedure to make sure the application is complete goes then to CMHC , the federal agency, and now within the last while, the applications then go to MHRC. So I wonder if the Minister could tell us how many of those applications are now within the hands of MHRC and how many applications have been approved in 19 80?

How many applications were sent in 19 79, and how many were approved in 1979? How many were sent in 19 78, how many were approved in 1978? How many were sent in 19 77 and approved in 1977, and the same for 19 76? I think as part of that, Mr. Chairperson, I would like to know how many applications under that program are now outsta nding, how many applications are in MHRC's hands, and are waiting for their approval, for the signature of the General Manager of MHRC before they can proceed. Part of that, Mr.

Chairperson, is the number of applications sent back, because an external agency first of all approves the applicati on, CMHC approves the application, and MHRC is the third one to get it for revue, but my understanding is, a number of those have been sent back for further revision for a number of reasons. The other question is in the direct allocation in the Mini ster's budget for the rural native housing program. How many dollars have been allocated this year? And how does that compare with allocations over the previous number of years? The other question, Mr.

Chairperson, and I'm hopeful that the Minister will be able to answer these questions and then I'll be able to make further comments when he does answer those questions, is now that the province, through MHRC is directly involved in the approving of the applications, which has been a change that this Minister has brought about, or has come about during his term of office, I wonder if the Minister could tell us two things about the program. One is, if the staff there have with them the original guidelines and the original agreement, or the original terms of reference for the program.

What was this program designed to do? What were the intentions of the province and the federal 5083

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 government when the program was announced and agreed to by both levels of government? And then I would like to know the new guidelines established recently by MHRC by the Minister, that says who is eligible for the program and who is not eligible? How does MHRC decide who is not eligible for this program? On what basis do they make their decisions, and what are the guidelines that they use for that decision? So, Mr.

Chairperson, this is a program that was started a number of years ago, first as an experimental housing program, then as a remote housing program, and then changed to the rural and native housing program, and then the Minister and MHRC have made changes in how the program was administered in recent times, so I'm hopeful that the Minister, sort of looking over in that direction, Mr. Chairperson, to see if that information is fairly readily available to the Minister, and I would like him to answer as much as he could at this time before I make additional comments on this particular

section of the estimates. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for St. Matthews. MR. LEN DOMINO: Mr. Chairman, I wouldn't want to disturb the train of questioning of the Member for The Pas, but I do have some comments to make. I wonder first, Mr. Chairman, I hope you 'r e not offended by my refer ring to you as Chairman. There's nothing at all sexist in my remarks.

I think you are a very competent Chairman and certainly a fine gentleman and a fine man, and I would choose to call you Chairman and I hope that you won't be offended, because I note that in the Oxford English Dictionary, the latest edition, the term Chairman is considered to be a generic term which has no sexual connotation at all, sim ilar to mankind. Mr. Chairman, I do have some comments to make though, to this Minister on his estimates. I note first that some members have accused this Minister of being unimaginative and of being someone who shies away from new or creative ideas. Mr.

Chairman, I think that in the area of housing, this Minister has introduced into the province of Manitoba probably the most imaginative , forward -looking, creative program that Manitoba has seen in housing in at least a decade. And that's the SAFER program. I think it's an excellent program, it's a new approach to housing, and it's one which was totally ignored, the whole approach, by the last government. Mr. Chairman, I am indeed concerned about the core of Winnipeg and about the problems that the core area has, and I have a personal stake.

One, of course, I represent a core area riding, one that's being described here tonight as a decaying, beaten area. Not at all true, it's a rather glib generalization by the Member for Fort Rouge. The neighbourhood that I represent, which is north of Portage, is every bit as nice a neighbourhood as the area of Fort Rouge. It's just as nice a place to own a home, to bring up children and to live in. And the second reason for which I'm particularly concerned about what happens in the downtown part of Winnipeg is that I' ve made a commitment that's substantially stronger than just words.

Several years ago, four years ago to be exact, I moved into the downtown part of Winnipeg, and my wife and I bought a house on Langside Street. It was the worst house on the block, and since I've moved into that house and I've started to some restoration and some repairs, I' ve noticed that here have been five other houses that were all, in sequence, the worst house in the block, they were all purchased by young families, and the construction process has begun. So the first thing that I want to say is that the core area of Winnipeg is not dead, don't bury us yet, there is still hope.

There is improvement that's taking place even now. There are certain things I believe the provincial government and the city can do which would assist the process, but I want to say, Mr. Chairman, that I find the area north of Portage a fine residential area, and that I believe that over the next few years the trend will be towards moving downto wn. The trend will be for families and individuals who don't have children to move back to downtown.

That's not to say th at we don't have some problems, and I thought the Member for Wellington, in his opening remarks, I thought his remarks were on topic and I thought he had something to say that was very valuable. I also appreciate the fact that, at least in his opening remarks, he shied away from creating any unnecessary acrimony in the House, and that he spoke to the questions, rather than attacking the Minister personally. I think it's unfortunate that all the members didn't follow that same approach.

I think it would be much more constructive if we discus sed the estimates rather than attributing motives to the Premier, rather than attributing motives or casting aspersions on this Minister. I think there is no reason to believe that this Minister has any less compassion than any other member in this House. I think he's done a fine job, he's introduced a very imaginative and a forward looking program, and I think we're going to see some more action out of him, too. I'm sure we will over the next six or seven months. There may be even some announcements forthcoming tonight, or tomorrow, or the next day. Mr.

Chairman, we do have some problems though. Let's not gloss them over and pretend we don't have problems. Some of the housing stock in the inner city is decaying, and I would agree with the Member for Wellington that if you want to locate the housing stock that's in decay, you don't have to even walk down the streets and look at the houses. Just go to the city tax rolls and see who owns those houses. Where you'll find an owner-occupied home, you will almost, in every case, find a home that's being improved, or certainly one that's being maintained.

Where you find the home that belongs to a slum landlord, or as he was a little more polite in calling them absentee owners, you'll almost always find a house that's being let rot. It's a fact, Mr. Chairman, that since the second world war, all across North America, families and in particular middle-class families, have been leaving the downtown sections of all of our cities.

I notice that trend is being reversed in some of the major American cities and in some of the larger Canadian cities in recent times, and Winnipeg being a smaller city, isolated from the heart of what's happening in North America, I would hope that that trend will work its way into Manitoba, into Winnipeg. I notice the 5084

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 Mem ber for Wellington, being one example I suppose, and myself being another, and many of my friends, I hope that we're just the vanguard of what will be a large number of young, aggressive families moving in and rehabilitating the downtown neighbourhoods. We can help solve that problem. One of the problems, at least in the neighbourhood I represent, north of Portage, is a problem with green space. The Member for Wellington again mentioned that the area in which he lives, south of Portage, has a problem with green space.

But compared to the lack of parks and open space in that neighbourhood known as the west end north of Portage, Wolseley is very fortunate, because if you take a look at the number of residents per acre of green space, - (I nterjection)- so I'm a little behind, you'll find that north of Portage, we suffer a great deal more. The Memorial Area Report prepared by the city a few years ago detailed the problem and it certainly identified the constituencies which are represented by the Member for Wellington and myself as being those hardest hit.

The city and the province have to come to terms with that, because families are not going to move into an area that doesn't have sufficient green space. Another problem we face and which has to be dealt with before we can expect larger numbers of young people to move back downtown is the traffic problem. Winnipeg, for many years - at least, I was proud as a university student and later when I travelled to other cities such as Calgary and in the United States, I was proud of the fact we didn't have large freeways cutting our city up.

But we pay a high price for not having freeways, and the price is that we have, in effect, turned many of our downtown streets into freeways without any of the protection which those people who live in Ottawa or Calgary, who live near freeways, are allowed to have. As a for instance, already, the Member for Wolseley mentioned that he was worried about what would happen to Sherbrook and Maryland Street once the Sherbrook-McG regor overpass was completed. I'm concerned about what's happening to it right now.

Five years ago, the last traffic count that I have available to me, demonstrated that there were 24,000 cars that travelled up Sherbrook within 200 yards of my house every morning, and another 24,000 cars that went back down Maryland Street at night. That's an awful lot of noise and other chemical pollutant that's dumped into the air, right in the neighbourhood that I'm trying to make my home. The neighbourhood where I plan to bring up my children. One of the key problems that we face in the core area is that many of the citizens have become demoralized.

Sure enough, we're facing a situation where over the last 20 years there has been a slow decay, but the media has latched on, in the last few years, to this problem. It has become popular, I don't know how many stories I've read in the daily papers or heard on the CBC or on CJOB about the core area and its problems. This is being inculcated into the minds of the core area citizens that they live in a slum. If you tell people that things are hopeless and growing worse by the day, you tell them that continually, they will eventually begin to believe it. And that, in itself, will make the problem worse than it is.

There are lots of good thin gs about our neighbourhood, positive things. We've got active - at least in my constituency we've got two of the most active and aggressive, strongest community clubs in the whole city of Winnipeg in Isaac Brock and Orioles, they're alive and they're vigorous and they're doing better, and they're serving the commun ity in a much more effective manner than many of the communi ty clubs in the suburbs. And I know, because I represent, as a person, a reversal of the historic trend since 1946, when the first suburban subdivisions were built in Long Island, New York. I grew up in Transcona.

I am a product of a suburb who chose, when I became an adult, to move with my family, my wife and I, back downtown. Mr. Chairma n, somebody else said something about imm igrants earlier, I'm not sure which member, and they suggested this is a problem, and I'm sure that some immigrants are a burden on a neighbourhood. But in the community I represent, almost all of the reconstruction - you can walk down Beverley and Simcoe and Victor and you'll find not one, but you'll find six or seven houses per block that have been rebuilt. These aren't mansions.

I'm not sure if the Member for Fort Rouge would find these houses worthy of reconstruct ion, they're small houses, often, but they've been repaired by the people who came to this country from Italy; and by the people who came to this country from Greece and Portugal; and by the people who came from eastern Asia. These people, maybe they don't read the papers, maybe they don't know that they're moving into an area that's decaying and that's on the downward slide. -(I nterjection)- I'm not so sure. The Member for Wellington was not the most negative member tonight, not by a long shot. Mr.

Chairman, I want to keep my remarks short. I want to make suggest ions to the Mi nister, suggestions he has heard from me before. I'm not sure if he has heard them in public before; some of them he has, others I have made to him in his office, across the desk. One, Mr. Chairman, I think that something that can be done immediately by this government is we can revamp the Critical Home Repair Program. It's an excellent program and I give the former government full credit for it. It's a good program.

And I give this Minister credit for not dumping it, for accepting it as a good program, supplying the funds and continuing it. We have now reached the point though, Mr. Chairman, where what the Critical Home Repair Program needs is a new infusion of money and we need to allow people now to apply for the second time. Many people have applied and used up their eligibility.

We now have to come in and we have to say, you'v e got a second eligibility and you are allowed further assistance from the government, because this is one of the very real ways senior citizens can keep their houses in good shape, can keep the housing stock livable. Mr. Chairman, I also have some harsh comments for the city of Winnipeg. The city of Winnipeg and the councillors in this city, if they had had the courage to abide by their own rules, the problem would not nearly be so severe as it is today.

Several years ago, the city adopted the basic principle that most high-density dev elopment would occur downtown and then they proceeded to consistently 5085

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 make exception after exception and allow high-rise development and high-density development, which should be used an in-fill downtown, they allowed it to occur on the Perimeter, or near the Perimeter, or in the suburban areas. That has contributed to the problem that the downtown area has. Mr. Chairman, another major problem we have is a problem like the apartment problem in this city, and I think the Mi nister was very correct when he diagnosed the problem with senior citizens and low inc ome people. It is not a shor tage of proper accommodation, but rather an affordability problem.

The proper accommodation was available, but low income people and senior citizens couldn't afford to rent it, so SAFER steps in and SAFER meets that demand. It allows the individual to have freedom of choice as to where he wants to live and it allows the individual then to purchase on the private real estate market the homes and the housing wherever he wants to go. We could do this very same thing with housing. We now have a situa tion, particularly in my neighbourhood, where the population is old, old in terms of age and that those people have lived there, many of them for 25-30 years and they are retiring.

What is happening is that because of the media coverage and, as somebody said, because of the nature of the neighbourhood, at this point we can't find people to buy the houses of the senior citizens and they are often stuck. Often it forces the price of the houses down. New families can 't move in because those families who might be attracted to the neighbourhood can't afford to get into the housing market there.

A program such as the Ho me Ownership Assistance Program, which has been initiated in a very small way in this province and which the Minister stated in this House last May that he hoped to expand but has been unable to do for a number of reasons, one of which is the interest rates, because the program deals with interest rates and supplies in effect a second mortgage to people so they can afford a down-payment and so they can afford to fix their houses. That program has got to be expanded and it has got now to be applied to all housing in what is called the core area of Winnipeg.

If that was done, we could get hundreds of young families of modest means to move back downtown, to refurbish the houses, to allow the senior citizens who want to leave their homes because they can no longer maintain them, to sell them and move on into other rented accommodation or whatever they choose to do. Mr. Chairman, that must be done and I would like to suggest that to the Minister as some advice. Mr. Chairman, I want to mention one other point too, and that's that we've got an enforcement program. The city bylaws and city codes I think are adequate.

I'm not sure, they might do with some stiffening up in some cases. But we right now have an enforcement program. When I get a call from a constituent who says, "I 've got a problem with noisy neighbours," or "I 've got a problem with a landlord who won't maintain the property next to my house," so that one or two houses on the block are being allowed to rot while everyone else is trying to fix up their houses. It is a very real problem.

I call the city and I say, let's get on this, let's do something, and the city officials then proceed to explain to me the difficulty with getting those slum landlords to the court, the difficulty with enforcing the safety and the health regulations, because they haven't got enough staff and because they haven't got access to the courts, because it is too time-consuming and too difficult and there are too many delays that a slum landlord is allowed in court.

What we need is for the provincial government to supply direct aid to the city so that they can afford more lawyers, and so they can prosecute these people, and so that it doesn't take six months to prosecute a slum landlord, they can do it in two months and -(I nterjection)- Mr. Chairman, this may be even a good idea, like block funding, this may be something that has got to come above and beyond block funding. Mr. Chairman, further, it's not just a matter of money.

I believe it is a matter of the province making it a priority and of the provincial court system making it a priority and of the provincial government, the Attorney-General, and this government saying it's a priority to prosecute slum landlords because they are destroying the core area of our city and because they are working against what the natural trend is and we are going to make sure that court space and court time is available to these people. Mr. Chairman, I have an awful lot more to say but the hour is late, and with these very few suggestions, I would hope the Minister would take them to heart.

I think he has done a fine job so far. I don't share the Member for Fort Rouge's opinion of this Minister at all. I think he has done a good job with a very difficult problem, and a problem which he inherited and which the previous government inherited yet, a problem which started after the second world war. Mr. Chairman, I hope that we can continue with this debate and I hope that people will offer some positive approaches to solving the problem, because it's not just this Minister's problem, it is all of our problem, because Winnipeg is the heart and soul of Manitoba. Rural members will understand that.

If Winnipeg suffers and if Winnipeg is hurt, all of Manitoba is hurt. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Winnipeg Centre. MR. J.R. (Bud) BOYCE: It seems that Wolseley constituency is getting an awful lot of attention tonight and it has prompted me to say a few words relative to the area. Mr. Chairman, the Member for Wolseley mentioned about law enforcement in his remarks. There is a problem.

A week ago last Saturday, my wife and I returned from shopping and my neighbour said, "Don't go in the house, somebody has broken into your house and is in there and the police have been called." The events proceeded, the police arrived, and it was a young woman who was stoned on something. I couldn't smell alcohol but she was really out of it as far as I am concerned. The two officers who attended did a marvelous job, in my estimation, and the thing was dealt with. The damage was minor in that there was only about 8.00 worth of glass broken in getting into the house.

It's regrettable that neither one of the constables or my wife or I noticed that she was wearing a pair of shoes that my daughter had paid 12 5.00 for. 5086

Tuesday, 24 June, 1980 Mr. Chairman, the Member for Wellingon, in his remarks, prompted me to enter the debate because what he has said is right on. It brings to focus the lack of planning, really. I live today two blocks from where I lived in 19 36. I grew up in this particular area. In 19 36, we had green space, and in that whole area, it was single-family dwellings. There were large families; families were larger then. But we had ample green space in that you had empty lots on the corners all over the place. As was mentione d by one of the mem bers opposite, there are some parks.

There is a park dir ectly across the street from me on Preston Avenue, Vimy Ridge Park; there is a park there, and there are school yards and things of this nature. Nevertheless, from 19 36, that's 44 years, how society has changed and how people come up and say, you know, if you proceed in a particular way, certain events will take place. For the last 15 -20 years, there has been irrefutable evidence that if you pack people closer together and don't give them a way out to express themselves or do whatever, they get sick in the head, incidents of crime increase, suicides increase, all these things increase.

The evidence is there. But planners, for some reason or other, refuse to accept and look at this evidence and lead in the direction which will reduce these incidents which are increasing. The focus given by the Member for Wellington is an excellent point to start, because this is but a manifestation of the whole problem, the ignoring of irrefutable evidence. Mr. Chairman, you and I are of an age - some people tell me I'm getting on but I don't think I am - but nevertheless we are of an age that we used to park along Portage Avenue and Main Street and watch the people go by. There used to be people around.

What we are talking about in this regard is people. Somebody brought into this debate shopping centres. You know, our generation, believe it or not, in my estimation, had more sense in planning without all the sophisticated tools that they have available, because what it used to be, if they built a shopping centre, which was the corner store, they built the corner store on the ground floor and they put a residence above it. You take a look at the shopping centres which are being built today, the cost of these things, single storey units.

Up and down Sargent Avenue, Ellice Avenue, all over the city, they are building single storey units. All it is based on is strict economics. It has got nothing to do with social problems or the problems which will accrue as a result of having vast areas - take for example St. Vital

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	31-4-86b
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	31st 4th hansardpdf 86b.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	4962c8de40649587d6e5d77bee1a297fe160f7f1

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