1983 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 33rd Parliament

Hansard

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

( Hansard )

THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 1983

Morning Sitting

[ Page

103 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Throne speech debate

Mr. Campbell –– 103

Mr. Barnes –– 103

Hon. Mr. Phillips –– 108

Hon. Mr. Richmond –– 112

Mr. Rose –– 114

THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 1983

The House met at 10:06 a.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, it is a rare privilege and a

pleasure for me this morning to introduce, by way of best wishes for

farewell, a person who is very well known to all members of the

assembly, Mr. Jim Matkin, the former Deputy Minister of Labour and as

of tomorrow night the former Deputy Minister of Intergovernmental

Relations. Mr. Matkin has performed long and in a most dedicated

fashion, under two different administrations, always in the interests

of the general public of our province. He's been a dedicated public

servant. I would very much like to wish him and his wife and his three

charming daughters well. Great success to you in your future, sir.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, along with the House Leader and

Minister of Intergovernmental Relations I'd like to join in wishing Mr.

Matkin all the success in his new venture and his new vocation. He has

left behind him a legacy of a bureaucracy in the Ministry of

Intergovernmental Relations which parallels very much that set up by

Prime Minister Trudeau in Ottawa, and I hope that the bureaucracy that

he left behind really will serve the interests of the public and not

just the interests of the minister.

HON. MR. CHABOT: We have in the members' gallery some

distinguished visitors who have met with Expo 86 officials and are here

to meet today with the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon.

Mr. Gardom) and the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development

(Hon. Mr. Phillips). These people are from Ottawa. First of all, His

Excellency Dietrich Hammer, head of the delegation of the Commission of

the European Communities, and Mrs. Hammer; and Mr. Frank Deeg of the

commission. I'd like the members to join in welcoming them here today.

MR. STRACHAN: Would the House welcome the chairman of School District 57, Mr. Gordon Ingalls, who is with us today.

Orders of the Day

SPEECH FROM THE THRONE

(continued debate)

MR. CAMPBELL: As I said yesterday, the throne speech is a

great document. It clearly lays out the future policies of this

government, and I support it.

MR. BARNES: It is a delight to be back. My, it's been a long

time. Where does an oldtimer like myself begin with something really

new and different after about eleven years?

I would like to indulge the House, because I feel this is a very special session.

It is different from any other session since 1972, when I first came to the

House, and I'm not in too big a hurry to jump into any spats. I'm going

to take a long, careful look at what's going on on that side of the House.

In fact, just before the last session ended, the Premier of the province caught

me in the hall and said: "Mr. Second Member for Vancouver Centre, what

will you be doing after the next election?"

HON. MR. BENNETT: You said you'd be number one, and you are.

MR. BARNES: Here I am, Mr. Premier, and I see you're still

over there wondering what I will be doing after the next election, and

here I am trying to figure out myself what would be the best way to

keep an eye on you now that you are back.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: We'll get to that as well.

But we have got to do things a little differently this time around,

because those members on the other side, the government side, are not

going to be sharing with us all of their strategies and their plans. In

fact, I am of the impression, after listening to some of the remarks by

speakers on that side of the House, that they've even programmed the

content of their statements to be made in the House. It looks as though

everything is very organized and coming from a central source. We'll

see whether that is in fact the case.

[10:15]

But I would like to first — before I make my remarks with respect to

the throne speech — make a few comments about the friends that are no

longer with us. We've lost some of our very good members. Bill King was

a strong member of the NDP who is no longer with us. We will certainly

miss him, and I would like to express my regret at his loss, and that

of Jim Lorimer and Ernie Hall. And we understand that Mr. Levi has been

unsuccessful in his efforts to return as well. But they were all good

members and served this House well, and on behalf of their party I

would like to note their loss. The first member for Victoria, Charlie

Barber, retired, as well as the member for Coquitlam-Moody, Stu

Leggatt, who is now a county court judge.

In any event, Mr. Speaker, we have had some changes. I can't name

all of the new members who are here and who will be making their

presence known in due course. Nonetheless, I would like to congratulate

them on their successes in the various constituencies throughout the

province. There is one, however, that I should specifically comment on,

and that's the second member for Vancouver–Little Mountain (Mr. Mowat),

who has made a commitment to get cooperation from the mayor and the

council of the City of Vancouver by attacking them. I was a little

concerned, because he suggested that that elected body of officials —

democratically so, I might add — must get on the right side. I'm not

sure what he means by the right side, but presumably we will be finding

out in due course what he means as well.

As I said, I'm not sure just where this session will go or what this

thirty-third parliament is up to, but the 22 of us on this side of the

House are committed to keep our eyes open, our minds sharp, and to

listen to the public as they try to follow this government in some of

the statements it's making about its mandate.

The throne speech reiterated some of the thrust of the campaign.

Premier Bennett seems to think he has a mandate to restrain everything

that moves in this province. I'd like to say first that I'm going to

depart from what has perhaps been a safe political stance and ask the

Premier and all members of

[ Page 104 ]

this House this: do they really feel they should

separate one part of the public from the other in its attempt to make a

case that restraint is a one-sided proposition? I would ask all of us

to reflect for a minute. I'm not the best one to give the historical

background of developments in British Columbia, but I would suggest

that the public service, one of the most established and consistent

systems in the province as far as providing experience and expertise in

carrying out the services we all rely upon, has been identified as

culprits to be undermined in the name of trying to improve the economic

stability of the province.

What I'm really saying, Mr. Speaker, is that the Premier, through

the Lieutenant-Governor in the throne speech, should have made it clear

that while the taxpayers appear to have a direct responsibility for

paying for the public service — the departments and the individuals who

are involved — they should understand that those individuals in the

public service are you and I. They are families. They are British

Columbians. They are people who have attended our high schools and our

universities. They are people who aspire to develop careers and to have

security, and to enjoy the amenities of British Columbia the same as

everyone else.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

I personally take offence at this blanket statement that the public

servants are the culprits in society and must be reduced to whatever

manageable numbers are required by the government, as though they are

faceless numbers and not people, not families, not British Columbians.

What offends me is not the fact that we want an efficient public

service and not the fact that we've got to do better and cooperate and

try to recognize that there are limitations on tax dollars. What I

don't like is the fact that when we make these blanket statements about

the public service getting too large and too cumbersome and too

expensive, we don't relate the services being provided to the delicate

nature of our society. Probably more important than all of that is that

most public servants are consumers of goods and services in this

province. They are the ones who pay the taxes. They are the ones who

pay the mortgages and the ones who buy the food and drive the cars and

go to the cultural events and affairs in this society. They are the

ones who are really the unidentified small business people in this

community, the people who spend their money. Let's not get carried away

with this idea about their costing; they also spend.

So I'm a little bit offended when we make these generalized

statements about the public service. By all means, I think every public

servant respects the need for restraint, but it's about time we stopped

and said: "Hey, who are these people we are cutting back?" The

government — Mr. Premier and his cabinet — a few years ago were saying

that we had to have new programs. They created Crown corporations and a

variety of commissions. In fact, the public service has increased

substantially since 1975, when the Social Credit government was

elected. Those initiatives were considered to be foresightful. There

was enlightened wisdom on the part of the government that these were

new programs, new ministries, new concepts that the government now says

they were wrong on, and they now want to tell us that they have mended

their ways the same as they have about their doctrinaire commitment to

balancing the budget. Now that they have discovered that it's okay to

have a deficit, they've started printing treasury bills at $60 million

a week, and they've gotten so carried away with that that they've

started to create their own unelected government. They do that through

appointments, by disregarding the Public Service Commission, through

orders-in-council, by not having sessions in order to allow the

opposition to debate decisions on the part of the government, and by

not bringing down budgets. There are all kinds of ways in which this

government has decided it can run things much more efficiently.

It's very much the way they run their party, Mr. Speaker. The Social

Credit Party is one of those parties that doesn't believe in the

democratic process. It believes in management by executive council. It

has a few meetings here and there, and a few constituency associations

that occasionally come together once a year, but they don't involve

their rank and file the way the NDP or any democratic organization

does. Now they want to run the government the same way — by executive

decree. I think it's about time we understood what this Premier and his

executive council are all about. It's about time the people of British

Columbia understood what the real initiative is in this province and

what the silent purveyors of public money are doing — those people whom

we do not know, the ones who are unidentified.

That's what the thrust had better be in this province, that's what

we'd better do in the opposition, and that's what anyone who cares

about the protection of a parliamentary privilege — the first bill on

the order paper — is all about. Parliamentary privilege is a very, very

delicate and important concept in a free society. In fact, I think we'd

better take a very careful look at why it was the first piece of

legislation to go on the order paper, in order to protect us in case

someone tried to move a motion to destroy this very first piece of

business. The very first piece of business is one that the people of

British Columbia had better take a look at as well, because I can

assure you that, unless we have some better explanations on why the

public service is being cut, not merely on the basis of saving dollars

but on the basis of services.... We don't need the dollars more than we

need the services — or the people that the services benefit.

We'd better have some debate, some rationalization and some reasons

why we're cutting back. Where are we cutting back and for what purpose?

What are we replacing it with? It's easy enough to say that the private

sector will bail us out. It's okay to cut off 5,000 jobs and say that

the government can no longer afford it, but what happens to the 5,000

people? What about the responsibilities to those people? What about the

planning? What kinds of programs do you have to replace those jobs?

MR. BARRETT: Well, Tozer's all right.

MR. BARNES: We'll be getting to Mr. Tony Tozer and to others as well.

Mr. Speaker, I am personally offended on behalf of the people of

British Columbia, not so much that the Lieutenant-Governor brought a

message of restraint that we all have to agree with, but because I feel

I'm being duped by a very clever, conniving, diabolical organization

that knows the right words, phrases, clichés and the right manner in

which to market them. They've hired the very best people they can to

ensure that they're right by polling information. They have the very

best experts. Unfortunately those people in the community are being

lulled to sleep. They've figured out what they will respond to as well.

They pick the right phrases

[ Page

105 ]

and say them in the right way, and they can just about steal a whole program

without a single complaint or murmur.

The people do not understand that we are really seeing a

transformation of the parliamentary system by a government that is

very, very determined to take over and run everything with a minimum of

participation by opposition. You can be sure that if they spend half a

million dollars to try to eliminate the first and second members from

Vancouver Centre, who were doing nothing more than their duty by

working daily on the streets with the people in Vancouver Centre and

trying to do their job, there's got to be a reason for it. I can assure

you it's not for better government on your behalf. You think about it

for awhile. Well, just what is going down, Mr. Speaker? What's really

going down?

[10:30]

The Premier has said that we've got to cut back. First of all,

several years ago he told the MLAs that they'd have to set an example.

He asked us to take a 10 percent cut in our pay. We took the 10 percent

cut, and I can assure you that with inflation, with the way things are

going and the way this government is operating, that 10 percent cut

will be the last action you'll see with respect to MLAs' salaries for a

long time unless it's to take another 10 percent. They certainly won't

be going up. I think that's loud and clear. So when we start talking

about poverty, we'll be talking about the opposition, not the

government side. They've got their ways of making money. Most of those

people over there, I'm sure, have other activities besides their MLA

jobs. I won't start calling names but I'm sure they have their fingers

in various activities from time to time. We won't go too far and

elaborate on that. I don't want to suggest that I know what your

business is, but I suspect that if you're not over there yelling and

screaming about increases and wanting to maintain some kind of living

wage as hard-working MLAs, then there's got to be a reason for it. I

can tell you it's getting very tight on this side.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: We shall see. Before 1972 MLAs were making

something like $12,000. I'm sure former Premier W.A.C. Bennett's plan

was to keep us poor and hungry. It's almost like barefoot, broke and

pregnant, something along those lines, so that we don't have any time

to do anything else. They are working a very similar scheme, and I

don't anticipate we will get much more in the way of financial

resources on this side of the House to carry out our business on behalf

of the public. We'll see in due course what the scheme is.

The most important thing right now is this diabolical plan, this

smokescreen under the guise of restraint, whereby they intend to

destroy the public service by a method called "privatizing services."

We shall see if that transition will be smooth. We shall see how many

people will lose their jobs, without any hope of compensation or any

opportunity for future employment. We shall see if the public service —

that is, the so-called private sector.... I find it more and more

difficult to differentiate, the more years I'm in the Legislature; it

seems to me the private sector does best with public assistance.

However, the private sector had better bail out those public servants

as they become unemployed on behalf of this government. There had

better be something in place.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: He says they're doing it now. We've just had two

federal-provincial programs wiped out — community development projects.

One was in forestry; 5,000 people are laid off as of today, I believe.

What's going to happen to those people? Is the private sector going to

pick them up or are they going to be back on welfare? We shall see.

What about the $700,000 going to a program in Richmond? Where is the

Richmond MLA? Is he standing up to fight for that children's program?

The government is wiping it out, saying they aren't going to supply

funds, because the society would not follow their guidelines. I wonder

if that's not just another smokescreen to get rid of a group of people

who are doing something for the public which we can no longer afford.

I'm sure the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) will

clarify that situation.

They've been harping and carping over there about B.C. Place.

They've been saying, "Mr. End-zone Emery Barnes." They think it's a big

joke. After 18 years in football, one thing I do know is the size of a

football field — American and Canadian sizes. It doesn't matter how

your PR people cover the end zones, move them around and play games,

the facts will speak for themselves. The rules are the rules. You

people can change them whenever you please, but they remain the rules.

It is an official fact that a football field in Canada is 110 yards

from goal to goal, and there are 25 yards in each end zone — not 15,

20, 12 1/2 or 13, but 25, in the official rule book of the Canadian

Football League. That's a fact. Mind you, Social Credit doesn't care

about the facts; Social Credit does it its way. It builds the stadium

to fit its budget and its scheme, then has the commissioner of the

Canadian Football League change the rules to fit the stadium. That's

what we've got in this province. They change the rules, and then

condemn me for standing up and saying the field is not the right size.

They also conned the B.C. Lions and everybody else into playing on that

field, saying: "Now look, don't make a big deal. You've got a brand new

stadium. It doesn't matter about five yards here or five yards there."

That's quite true, it doesn't matter. As long as you don't care about

the rules, change them.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: That's all I'm telling you. I'm sure you know

that I'm right, Mr. Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot). But it

doesn't matter. Let's get on to something else.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You weren't a very good football player, and you're doing worse as an MLA.

MR. BARNES: I would like to spend some more time on this. I'm

enjoying this. Now he's going to give me a chance to talk about myself.

I wasn't going to do that, but one of the longest runs ever in Canadian

football was made by Neil Beaumont, who set a record of 118 yards. You

do your own mathematics. On most regulation-size fields, there would be

some possibility of breaking that record. But I can tell you that it

will be much more difficult in that new stadium. It won't be too easy

there, because he's going to be just about standing out of bounds to do

it, because the field is just a little too short. But we won't get into

the details; we'll just change the rules. Maybe we can change the

records by regulation too — do that by order-in-council.

Interjection.

[ Page 106 ]

MR. BARNES: Well, I happened to be pulling the key block. But

this is too serious a matter to be frivolous and have fun. Let's get

down to business.

I attended the opening of the Whitecaps' game against the Seattle

Sounders, and I also went to the first B.C. Lions game against the

Calgary Stampeders.

HON. MR. RITCHIE: As ball boy?

MR. BARNES: No, not as ball boy! But the former ball boy is

now the general manager of the B.C. Lions, and he was a ball boy when I

played, and that's Bobby Ackles.

HON. MR. RITCHIE: You were there for the roof-raising too.

MR. BARNES: That's right. They pushed a lot of hot air in there and they kept her up.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: Look, I'm not going to knock the stadium, because

it involved a lot of honest people who worked very hard — engineers,

all kinds of people. But I will just say this about the stadium. Marvel

though it is — it is visible from the farthest of places — it is also a

constant reminder that that's free enterprise deeply in debt with the

public, and the Premier has been saying: "Oh, no, this is a self-paying

program. It's independent. It's private enterprise." Except they had to

borrow $200 million or so for the B.C. Buildings Corporation on a loan

that I hope they will be paying interest on. But we don't need to worry

about that one either. That's just a small detail.

Do you know what you also did with B.C. Place stadium? You created

one of the largest pubs in the province, perhaps in the world. You can

now drink booze in the corridors and the concourse, and I can tell you

that I don't see anyone checking the IDs of those people drinking that

booze. I certainly hope they are all of legal drinking age. I'm

worried. I was down there and I saw more people out in the corridors

than inside the stadium watching the game. They were doing an awful lot

of drinking and they were very young. I certainly hope that you have

got that under control.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: I know you have. I know you will be looking into it.

But let's talk about restraint.

HON. A. FRASER: We won the election on it. Go ahead.

MR. BARNES: I'm not going to talk too long. I'm just going to talk for a few more minutes.

Let me run down for you what restraint looks like: get rid of the public service

and beef up the Bill Bennett, Social Credit, private government. I'll just

read you a few notes that I have here. Most cabinet ministers have several order-in-council

appointments in their offices and they usually have a ministerial.... I have

a note here about hacks in their constituencies, but I don't think we'll

call them hacks. Let's just say they're working for a different public

service than the regular one. As well as a constituency secretary and a number

of politically appointed order-in-council.... This government has hired well

over 100 throughout the various constituencies. These are various private orders-in-council.

I don't have the names of all of them. I don't care to name all of them.

I don't have the salaries they are all receiving, but I bet you that if

we were to add up all of the order-in-council salaries of all of the people

appointed by this government throughout the province, we would have a very interesting

figure that is probably not subject to the Ed Peck compensation stabilization

program, or to any other restraint programs that this government claims it is

diligently trying to implement on behalf of the taxpayers of this province.

I will read you just a few, to generalize how serious the problem

may be. Take the Premier's office for instance. Mr. Patrick Kinsella is

the principal secretary to the Premier and he receives $65,000 per

year, as of March 1982. I don't know what he is getting today in the

way of gratuities, or bus fare, plane fare, eating fare, or whatever

he's getting. He's probably picking up a few dollars more somewhere

along the line, but I don't know if he will be subjected to any kind of

restraint program.

Mr. Tony Tozer, whom we've been hearing quite a bit about, is the

executive director. He worked out of the constituency office in Kelowna

at a salary of $49,452. He had a travel allowance of $27,722. He is now

hired as government agent in Kelowna at a top-scale salary of $43,116.

Let's go on. We have Joy Williams....

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Why don't you say what kind of cut he took? Why

don't you be honest?

MR. BARNES: Why don't you be quiet? You'll get your

opportunity to stand up in the next few minutes. Why are you panicking

and getting so excited? You've been in this House a long time and you

should know better than that by now, not to interfere when a member is

on his feet. Try to show some respect, at least for the members in the

Legislature, if you don't have any for the people who put you here.

What's wrong with you?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: We have a few little problems here. First of

all, I will ask the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development

(Hon. Mr. Phillips) to withdraw the reference to honesty with respect

to the other member.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, certainly, I will withdraw any imputation. I meant being dishonest with his policies....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you. The withdrawal is accepted. Order! Now I will ask the hon. first member for Vancouver Centre to remain temperate.

MR. BARNES: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

Joy Williams, information administrator. Job description: public

liaison and correspondence; $27,720. I see another lady here: Norah

Laity, public information officer, $22,704. Let me skip down a little

lower. There's another female: Doreen Heighten, administrative

assistant, $25,726; and Jas Gandhi, secretary to the Premier, $28,000.

Terry McLean, senior executive secretary, $21,720. These are all in the

Premier's office. The reason I skipped over.... There are a few men

here as well, but the disparity is interesting. The Premier is paying

his female appointees considerably less

[ Page

107 ]

than the men, I notice. I don't see any of the

women in any of these high-paying jobs. But nonetheless, they do have

some job security. Robert Hobson — oh, they've got him down as an

administrative assistant. He's only getting $22,491.

Michael Bailey — ah! Now Michael Bailey was executive assistant to

the Premier at $29,757. He spent $5,593 on travel in his first three

months on the job. He is now elevated to the position of executive

director at $45,000. Isn't that fantastic? Michael's a very fine

person. I've known him for years. In fact, I knew Michael when he was a

young man. I was a social worker in the West End. He reminded me of

this when he was working as a butcher out in Colwood not too long ago

and I was buying meat from him. He gave me a real good deal. It's

amazing. My, how it pays to be on the right team.

Anyway, I want to congratulate my good friend Michael Bailey.

Michael Bailey is a very hard-working person. He was good as a butcher.

He sold products which were fresh and first-class, and I always enjoyed

them. And I'm sure he's doing a first-class job for the Premier. But

the point is not to reflect on Bailey, or on any of these other people

in a negative sense, because all of those people, I'm sure, are honest,

hardworking Canadian citizens, and they're just trying to make a living

like everybody else. But do they deserve preferential treatment? That's

all I'm asking. Do they deserve it any more than the public servants?

Why do we pick on the public servants?

[10:45]

You've got a nameless group of people who don't want to get involved

in politics, who try to keep their mouths shut, who are scared bloody —

blank, blank, blank, blank! They are scared out of their wits about

what's going on with this government. What are they going to do to us?

The rentalsman doesn't know whether he's going to be here or not. The

ombudsman doesn't know whether he's going to be here or not. Nobody

knows whether they're going to be here or not. You guys are starting to

scare the you-know-what out of everything that moves. And if you don't

believe me, pick up the telephone and try to get some information from

one of these so-called government information services and find out how

difficult it is to get a word out of them. I'll tell you, it is not

funny. You people have the parliament buildings and everybody in them

under seige. That's what I'm telling you.

There is a conspiracy going on. Even the Premier is trying to pass

messages through his Speaker. The Premier is attempting to use the

Speaker to peddle his garbage. Some of the words I've heard from...

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, order, please.

MR. BARNES: ...the Speaker, I do not believe came from anybody other than the Premier of this province.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Reference to the Speaker will have to be withdrawn immediately.

MR. BARNES: I withdraw it, Mr. Speaker, and make reference to the member

for Delta (Hon. Mr. Davidson). The member for Delta is passing on messages from

the Premier and you know what they are. They have to do with the Spetifore land.

They have to do with Dawn Development Corp., and some of those things that are

going on in that area. I believe that the things the member for Delta has been

saying do not come from his mouth, but come from the Premier, the only person

capable of that kind of subterfuge.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. A reference to the member for

Delta will also have to be withdrawn. The member for Delta is the

Speaker. That is my ruling.

MR. BARNES: Well, the Speaker won't....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member please withdraw the references to the Speaker and....

MR. BARNES: I have no desire to argue with the parliamentary

procedures and processes, and if you ask me to withdraw, I will

certainly withdraw, because I'm sure that people will be drawing their

own conclusions about what's going on with this government.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Speaker, there is a whole lot going down

these days. There are a lot of people who are upset in the community. A

lot of people are saying: "Please, go to those people and tell them to

show some restraint on their impetuousness, show some restraint on

their arrogance. Tell them to show some restraint and not be taken away

with the awesome power we've given them to work on our behalf because

we believed in what they were saying, but they seem to have been using

it as a gimmick to do something else. Just what's going on? Please keep

your eyes on them." That's what we're trying to do. We're trying to do

it, but I'll tell you, it's going to be difficult with a government

that refuses to give us access to information, that is smug when you

ask them about the processes we use in this system. You can be sure

that we are all going to be paying dearly in the next few months as

this government begins to unfold not as it should but as it is doing,

unless we find some way to alter the direction in which it's going.

I will say this, Mr. Speaker, in all humbleness, because this is

still the democratic process and I, for one, intend to respect that

process and respect the rules by which that process operates, and when

I'm in this Legislature I will expect to be treated as a duly elected

member of the Legislature, with the rights and privileges provided, and

will expect that the government will not look on me as an individual as

much as a representative of one of the 50 electoral districts in this

province, and will provide the information we need. We are in a very,

very serious situation in this province. We have nearly 200,000 people

unemployed. They don't care about your statistics; they don't care

about my statistics. It does no good to someone who is out of work to

tell him that the economy is improving and that we are now beginning to

get a reduction in the statistics — that the numbers are less and less.

As long as one single person is out of work you cannot expect that

person to be happy with those statistics. That person needs a job to

pay their own bills, to raise their own family.

That is what we've got to be caring about, and this is why I say

that when you start using sweeping generalizations about how many

people are going to be removed from the public service, you'd better

talk about the names of those people, the jobs they are doing and your

concern about their right to access to the amenities and to the good

life we have in this province. Stop telling us that we are doing it on

behalf of

[ Page 108 ]

efficiency. Efficiency, my eye! You people are

spending money so fast it is incredible. You've already abandoned the

only principle you ever had about balanced budgets. Now you've learned

how to spend money and you're spending it, but you aren't spending it

on behalf of the people. You are doing a dirty, dirty deed to the

public, and I hope that we will have all of those points amended in due

course.

Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for your attention. Once again I'd

like to congratulate all members on their success at the polls, and I

hope that we will be able to put into practice some of those principles

of co-operation that we've all talked about so much.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, I was hoping that the first

member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Barnes) would have stayed in his seat

for a moment, but I guess he intends to cut and run, which I wouldn't

say is typical of that member, but certainly it is typical of a number

of the speakers from the opposite side who come in and make great

charges against our great government over here and then run because

they don't want to have any true debate. Usually, when there has been a

great decision to be made in this Legislature, it has been typical of

the socialist members opposite to run to their offices and hide. It has

happened more than once.

Mr. Speaker, I want to say how proud and happy I am to be here in

this first session of our thirty-third parliament, representing the

great constituency of South Peace River. I listened a couple of days

ago to the member for Cariboo (Hon. A. Fraser) saying that the

constituents in the Cariboo had been voting for the government since

1952. I want to say that the constituents of that great, dynamic area

of the province that I represent have also voted Social Credit since

1952, and they will continue to do so, Mr. Speaker, because it has been

the policies of this government that opened up that great area to the

rest of the province.

The socialists opposite were against extending the highway system

into that great area and against building the railway extension into

that great area and against the great pipelines being built that bring

the wealth of that dynamic great area to the rest of the province and

indeed to the international markets. I remember, Mr. Speaker, that when

I tried to foster the development of the great gas fields of that area

by building the Grizzly Valley pipeline and the Pine River processing

plant, the socialists opposite were against it. That's why the

arguments from the other side are a little shallow when they stand up

and talk about the unemployed in this province. I want to tell you that

the socialists opposite were against every project that has taken place

in this great province, yesterday and today — the projects that are

going on, that are gainfully employing literally hundreds of thousands

of people. So I find their arguments about unemployment very shallow

and hollow indeed, like most of their policies.

Mr. Deputy Speaker, I would like you to convey to the Speaker my

very good wishes for a successful thirty-third parliament while he has

the opportunity to reign as the Speaker. I also want to congratulate

you, the member for that great constituency of Prince George South, on

being nominated by the unanimous voice of this House to that place of

very high esteem.

I would like to welcome all of the new members on the Social Credit

side of the House. I want to tell you that your constituents have

elected you to this great position with the greatest political party

that has ever been in British Columbia. It wasn't too many years ago

that I came in here as a back-bench MLA on the government side of the

House, and I had the opportunity to listen and learn. Then I had the

opportunity — and a terrible experience it was — to sit on the opposite

side of the House for three years during those dark, terrible days in

the history of this great province. But I'll tell you, right survived

and the people of this province realized in 1975 the error they had

made, and of course since that time this province has gone nowhere but

forward.

I see that we have another visitor from Ottawa on the opposite side

of the House. Well, we have them from time to time. They don't last

very long, and they find....

MR. ROSE: What about Jack Davis?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, we've got one on our side of the

House as well. But we've found that on the opposite side of the House

they don't last very long. They come and go, getting disillusioned with

the policies. They realize that this is the world of reality. Anyway,

it's nice to see you here sit, and I look forward to the day when you

will be leaving and joining your other buddies who have come and gone.

MR. ROSE: I was accused of being you yesterday on the street.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Were you? I welcome you here. I feel a

little sad for you, because I know that you will soon become

disillusioned with the rump group that you have over there fighting

among themselves. But I hear that you're a very intelligent individual

— I can't understand why you're on that side of the House — and we look

forward to being kind to you while you are here.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

There has been a lot said about the great team and about the

leadership of our Premier, but when I say that I'm proud to be back

here I really mean it. I'm proud to have had the opportunity to serve

under the leadership of our Premier. I can remember when our Premier

was first elected as the leader of the Social Credit Party, and I can

remember the scorn and the abuse that was heaped upon him by the now

lame-duck leader of the socialists over there. All for nought, because

our Premier has shown to the rest of Canada that indeed he has vision,

courage and brains. He's been able to pull a team together and he has

shown the rest of Canada that he is indeed a great Premier.

As a matter of fact, it was a little shallow for the Prime Minister

to go on television the other night and say what a great job Ottawa has

done with regard to restraint. Like my colleague, the member for

Cariboo (Hon. A. Fraser), I was in Ottawa for the first ministers'

conference when our Premier pointed out to the Prime Minister and to

other cabinet ministers in Ottawa, and indeed to the other Premiers in

Canada, that we were facing an economic recession and that restraint in

government was going to become a necessity in order for the system to

survive. He pointed out that the private sector could no longer be

milked, that there had to be a cut in government. The Prime Minister

wouldn't buy it, because he didn't have the intestinal fortitude to

stand up to the other Premiers at that time and say, yes, we should go

along with it. He didn't think that it would be politically astute to

do so.

[ Page

109 ]

[11:00]

But when our Premier and

our government led the way, and it was recognized that, indeed, the

whole population was going to be in favour of what we were doing, that

even our civil servants knew that there had to be some cutbacks in

government spending, and when it was deemed to be popular, then Ottawa

came along with a program that was stiff and rigid. Now they're trying

to say that they were the leaders. I'm proud to be on the Bennett team

because the Bennett team has shown leadership, and not only in leading

Canada in restraint. Thank heaven the people of this province

recognized on May 5 that British Columbia — in many areas, not only in

the constitution or leading Canada into the Pacific Rim, export trade

or many other areas — had a role to play. What they used to call that

sleepy little province to the west of the Rockies was leading Canada in

many areas. They recognized that had they rejected the policies of this

government and rejected restraint in government, no other provincial

government in Canada would touch it and probably the national program

would have gone by the wayside.

I have a great deal of faith in the intelligence of the voters of

the province of British Columbia. Not only did they vote for the

policies of restraint, but they voted for the leadership that this

government has shown in bringing about dynamic expansion in the lower

mainland area, the southeast coal fields and the infrastructure which

will assist the rest of Canada in exporting our goods and services in

the next decade. They backed the dynamic leadership of this government

in developing the northern part of this province. That was their stamp

of approval on the vision and the courage that our Premier had in

seeing that this great project — the only major project going ahead in

North America today — continues to grow.

Again, the arguments being put up by the opposition are very shallow

when they say they're concerned about unemployment. They have been

against every project — including northeast coal, which today is

employing about 12 percent of our construction labour force in the

province of British Columbia. So their arguments are shallow, and the

people of British Columbia recognized that their arguments were

shallow, that their policies were hollow and that they had no

leadership. What our Premier has been able to do is to tap the energy

and the vision of the citizens of this province to work together for

the good of all. That's what leadership is all about.

There's a lot of strength in this province. There's a lot of

entrepreneurship. There's a lot of individuality, and what we and our

Premier have been able to do during this time of crisis is to pull that

together. That's why British Columbia came through the downturn in the

economy, and that's why British Columbia will once again lead this

nation in economic revival. If there is one thing that we as citizens

of this great province have learned during the recession, it is that

the arguments and the beliefs of the socialists are very shallow and

hollow. The young people of this province have recognized that there is

no free lunch. The young people, and many others who believed in

socialism, believe and know from experience that the world doesn't owe

them a living. This is a myth which has been perpetuated in this

province by the socialists opposite. I want to tell you that if you go

out and talk to the young people in the province as I do, you will find

that they want their freedom. They don't want the government to give

them a living; they just want the ability and the opportunities — the

same as we had when we were growing up — to do their own thing. I'll

tell you something further. They want the right to work, and they don't

want any union leader telling them whether they have the right to work

or not.

I was listening yesterday with a great deal of interest to the

member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) when he talked about coalitions.

Well, I want to tell you, if there was ever an unholy alliance, an

unholy coalition, there has been one in this province for a number of

years. But it broke apart at the seams during the last election because

the workers recognized that maybe some of their NDP leaders weren't

acting in their best interests. That has been an unholy alliance if

there ever was one. I have challenged publicly before, and I challenge

again, the labour union leaders to start working for the good of the

people they represent and not for their own political beliefs. You talk

about an unholy alliance: I remember getting the IWA Barker — that's a

little magazine put out by the International Woodworkers of America —

and it was telling their workers how to vote. Talk about ads in a free

paper called the British Columbia Automobile Association magazine,

which goes to everybody in this province! The messages from the NDP

that were contained in their rags that went out to their union members

only, telling them how to vote, didn't work. They sent one out to the

teamsters who were working on the northeast coal project, telling the

teamsters' union members: "Oh, my heavens, if you want to keep your

job and if you want to do anything for anybody, you know, vote NDP."

I'll tell you, those teamsters' union members used their intelligence,

because they recognized that they wouldn't even be working today if it

wasn't for the Social Credit government.

I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, you talk about alliances: well, it

didn't work for the NDP this time, didn't work at all. So when I listen

to the member for New Westminster who stands up here — I don't know

whether I can use the word "pontificate" or not; I can use that word —

the man who, as the Health critic, last year was the author of "rent a

disaster".... Every second day he would come into this Legislature

and talk about some great disaster in the health-care system of this

province. Every time he was proven wrong. Did he ever apologize? I'll

tell you, that member — I don't know how he got elected; it must have

been the union or somebody — has been the author of working against

those who might possibly be afraid of something happening in the

health-care system; working on fear, promoting in this province, among

the aged and those who may need our health system, fear when it was not

warranted, because this government has brought about in this province

the best health-care system of any province in Canada.

What we are saying is that we want, in our health-care system, value

for the taxpayer's dollar, and to anybody who is human enough to

recognize that a little bit of fat creeps into any system we're saying

that we just want to ensure that our health-care system continues to be

the best health-care system, and that we are devoted to that. We also

recognize that in order to have the best health-care and education

systems, and the best services to all of our people in need, indeed we

must have a growing and dynamic economy. There again, the members

opposite who stand up and preach about all the great services for

people and how we need more services for people fail to realize that

it's the private sector that provides the tax dollars we use to provide

those services.

So I find that the arguments emanating from that side of the House

are the same arguments they had prior to the last election. For the

first two or three days it was calm over there,

[ Page 110 ]

and I thought maybe there were going to be some positive

suggestions, which we have asked for in this Legislature time and time

again. "Please come forward, Mr. Socialist Party, with your positive

suggestions and assist us in the job of running this province." Instead

of that they have fallen back into their old habits of being nothing

but harping, carping critics. You know, they talk about jobs, and yet

they get in bed with somebody on the GVRD and kill a major housing

project. And tomorrow they'll stand up in this House and say: "Oh, this

government hasn't done anything to provide housing." My, oh, my, they

are the same old shallow group with the same old shallow policy. I just

have to wonder if they're in bed with some of the GVRD people who can't

find a place to put their garbage. I have to ask you, Mr. Speaker: do

they want to put the garbage on the Spetifore property? Is that the

reason why the GVRD voted yesterday against that? As I said yesterday,

we have had thrust upon us by the socialists opposite that old theory

that the world is going to starve to death. It's a bunch of garbage!

I'll tell you, the biggest problem they had when they were putting

together the European Economic Community was a surplus of food. How

long have people lived in Europe or England? Today the big fight in the

European Community is how to distribute the production of the farmers,

yet the socialists are teaching us and trying to tell the young people

of the world: "Oh, we're going to starve to death. California won't

have room to grow tomatoes, potatoes and those things." If you make

agriculture economically viable and pay the producer what it cost to

produce, agriculture in this province could feed all Canada.

In the great Peace River country we have literally millions of acres

in the Fort Nelson area that still have to be brought under production,

but they wanted to close down the railroad that would serve that area.

When you start really analyzing their policies, they are pretty shallow

and very hollow. That is why socialism in Canada has dropped from 26

percent to 19 percent to 16 percent and dying. The people are becoming

intelligent and are seeing through the shallowness.

They talk about being great Canadian citizens and supporting British

Columbia, but when something comes up in Ottawa that affects Ontario,

where do you find the NDP members voting? They're voting with

Broadbent. Our future and the future of Canada depends on international

trade. There are probably more than two million people employed

directly in Canada, and a greater percentage in British Columbia, in

production for international trade. Freer trade among all nations is

going to provide jobs in Canada. Yet we have the NDP leader....

AN HON. MEMBER: Which one?

[11:15]

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: In Ottawa. Well, the whole group is

getting together. You don't hear the lame-duck leader from the

socialists in British Columbia standing up and fighting to see that the

Crow rate goes. You don't hear him standing up in this Legislature,

saying that the greatest portion of international trade with Japan

comes from British Columbia, that freer trade as a policy has to go.

They don't condemn the Ottawa Liberals when they are going to bring in

immoral and illegal measures to curb trade with Japan. That's why the

public of British Columbia, indeed the public of Canada, are looking at

the policies of socialism. At your convention in Regina this weekend I

challenge you to sit down and take a good look in the mirror. The

opposition in this province and in Canada has a direct responsibility

to the public to offer alternative suggestions, not just to do anything

or say anything that you think will perpetuate you in power. I

challenge you at your convention to sit down and take a good look. I

challenge all of those NDPers who are involved in civic politics,

whether on the GVRD or in regional districts, to quit playing politics

and start serving the good people whom they were elected to serve.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Interjection.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: We don't need any side comments from the pretty boy from Victoria. You will have your opportunity, my friend, in due course.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, please, personal references are unparliamentary.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I withdraw that. He's not a pretty boy at all.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That's also unparliamentary. Please continue with the response to the throne speech.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I want to talk for a few moments about

that great northeast coal project. I really wish the project were not

so far away from the population of the lower mainland. Unlike B.C.

Place, the stadium, the ALRT, all those great things that this great

government is doing in the lower mainland, this major project is many

miles away from the bulk of the population in this province. I wish

there were some way to take the population up to the area, which I

visit regularly because part of it is in my riding.

The last time I visited Prince Rupert I stood on one of the grain

elevators being erected about ten stories above the ground on an island

which 12 months ago was nothing but swamp and bushes and muskeg. I

stood on that cement structure which will facilitate the shipment of

Canadian wheat farmers' grain into the international marketplace, and

looked at that beehive of activity — Canadian workers putting together

the second international port on Canada's west coast, fulfilling a

dream the city of Prince Rupert has had since 1910. As a Canadian and a

British Columbian, my heart filled with pride that this government had

the courage to force Ottawa to bring about that great development for

all Canadians. It was the medium of northeast coal that fulfilled that

dream, and I'm glad I was part of a team which had the vision and the

courage. Had the socialists been around it never would have happened,

and I wonder where those people who are so gainfully employed today in

that project would be working.

Some recent articles in the paper said maybe the international coal

market is fading. During the election campaign the lame-duck leader of

the socialists tried to work that dynamic area of the southeast of the

province against the northeast. Thank heavens that sane heads

prevailed. He didn't tell anybody in the province that while northeast

is going ahead, new contracts for millions of tonnes have been signed

in the southeast. He didn't say that three new mines are presently

being developed in the southeast while the northeast is going ahead. He

thought the only way he could get some votes and replace that dynamic

member from the

[ Page 111 ]

Kootenays was to work the southeast against the northeast and the

rest of the province. I'm proud of that member because he worked

against tremendous odds, going around his constituency telling the

truth, telling the facts to his constituents. The project is on stream,

on budget, and I hope that in early December we will ship the first

trainload of coal out of the northeast. History will prove that that

project could not have been built at a better time in this province,

when the jobs and economic activity were needed, when those thousands

of small contractors and fabricators throughout the province have been

able to get contracts from this great project.

I am very pleased to report to the House today that the Japanese

steel industry is starting to look up. Signs of recovery of demand for

Japanese steel are appearing on many fronts, improvement being

currently led by export demand, notably from Pacific Rim countries. But

there are also tentative signs of improvement in some important

domestic sectors. Until they are satisfied that sustained recovery of

domestic demand has occurred, the Japanese steel industry is, of

course, being very cautious about predicting crude steel production

levels greater than 95 to 96 million tonnes. The view of our embassy in

Tokyo is that for the year 1983 production could well approach 100

million tonnes.

We have predicted time and time again, Mr. Speaker, that when the

northeast project comes on stream the economy will be back on the move

again, there will be more demand and more coal projects will proceed in

this great province. None of that would have been possible, Mr.

Speaker.... British Columbia and, indeed, Canada would not have

been able to take their rightful place in supplying a larger portion of

the coking coal needed by the steel mills, not only of Japan but also

of the other countries of the Pacific Rim — and, indeed, in the

European market — had it not been for the vision and the courage of our

leader to see that this project went ahead.

You know, we get a lot of yapping criticism from the other side of

the House about us taking sojourns in the international marketplace. I

want to tell you a story. I went to Korea for the first time,

representing the province of British Columbia and the taxpayers of the

province of British Columbia, in 1978, and I started talking to them

about some purchases of coking coal from the province of British

Columbia. They said: "We're not going to buy coking coal from the

province of British Columbia, because we went to British Columbia in

1974" — and you know who was government in 1974 — "and we were

interested in buying coking coal from your province at that time. We

were left in the Four Seasons Hotel to cool our heels, and the message

finally came through that the government of the province of British

Columbia was not interested in selling coal to our country."

MR. REID: Who would do a thing like that?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: That was when the socialists were in

government. I had to overcome that image of British Columbia that had

been left by the socialists when they came here. We didn't go there;

they came here to buy. At that time we were selling practically zero

percent of the coking coal requirements of Pohang Iron and Steel — the

Korean steel industry. I am pleased to say today that because of the

work of the private sector in conjunction with the leadership the

government has given in that area, we are supplying Pohang Iron and

Steel with over 32 percent of their coking coal requirements.

I am also pleased to say that the same thing basically happened with

thermal coal. Korea Electric Co. were buying zero tonnes of thermal

coal when this government sent their first mission into Korea. Today

we're selling them over 28 percent of their requirements. And, Mr.

Speaker, the Premier was in Korea when the first deal was signed. Today

hundreds and hundreds of people are employed in the southeast part of

this province producing both thermal and coking coal for the Korean

market. And then that lame-duck leader of the socialists goes down

there and tries to work the northeast against the southeast. But our

member down there told the good people of his constituency what this

government had done to keep their jobs and to provide jobs for the

future, and that's why he's here today.

I must say, Mr. Speaker, that when the economy of the world

increases and is on the move — and it's on the move now, although it's

very fragile.... That's why our policies, as outlined in the throne

speech, will nurture that fragile economy, will help it forward with

kindness and tenderness and less milking from the government. That's

what it's all about. We will nurture and assist with government

policies where we can this fragile economy and the fragile private

sector, which has lost billions of dollars in profits in the last few

years during the recession. That's what government is all about. We

will not compete, but we will assist and we will nurture it. The same

is happening in many other countries in the world.

I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that because of the policies of

this government, because of the infrastructure we have built, because

we have sold abroad.... We want investment in British Columbia.

We're not like the socialists in Ottawa, who say: "We don't want any

investment from foreign lands; it's bad business." We have built up an

attitude in British Columbia that is: "You come and you bring your

money. You keep British Columbia green. You come and bring your money

and you invest. You come and you create jobs for British Columbians.

for our young and growing labour force." We've created that climate

here, and as the economy increases and as it grows, not only in British

Columbia but also in Canada and the United States and the other

international marketplaces around the Pacific Rim, British Columbia

will be in a position to serve those markets because we made those

bold, dynamic decisions that were timely. We went ahead while port

facilities and railways in other parts of North America were cancelled.

We saw that the window was open. We made the decision when it was

necessary.

[11:30]

We talked to the Japanese steel industry, and we did it when it was

timely. After all of the criticism about northeast coal, I didn't hear

the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett) or any of the socialists

condemning the Gregg River mine in Alberta. I didn't hear them saying:

"Oh, that's competing and the Alberta government shouldn't have allowed

it to go ahead."

There are a number of things I wanted to say about many things, but

I see my time is up. There will be other opportunities, I'm sure, for

me in this Legislature. Once again I want to pass on my congratulations

to you and all new members of the House, and say that in the weeks and

months ahead I will be so proud to be part of this great government

which has shown leadership not only in this province, not only in

Canada, but is being looked at by the entire free world.

[ Page 112 ]

HON. MR. RICHMOND: I'm indeed pleased to take my place in

this throne speech debate. Like the rest of my colleagues, I would like

to take a moment to congratulate you on your re-election as Deputy

Speaker; I trust you have enjoyed yourself thus far. My congratulations

also to Mr. Speaker.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank publicly the people

of British Columbia in general for returning this good government to

Victoria. In particular, I would like to thank the people of the

Kamloops constituency for the faith they showed in not only this

government, but in myself. I thank them sincerely, and all those

workers who worked so very hard for myself. I would also like to

congratulate those who ran in this election and were not successful,

and all the people who worked very hard for them. I know what a

disappointment it must have been. I do commend them for the effort and

for keeping the democratic system alive.

The people of Kamloops and this province voted for a government that

would encourage the private sector, that would see we had recovery

where it belongs: through the private sector and the creation of

permanent jobs, which is happening in this province. As the Minister of

Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) said, it is

fragile and is happening slowly, and we must nurture that recovery,

which we have every intention of doing. The thrust of this throne

speech — and what the people voted for, in my opinion — is that they

want less government in their lives. They want government to stay out

of their lives as much as possible, and therefore out of their pockets,

and this government is going to see that it happens — that we stay out

of people's lives wherever possible, stay out of their pockets and

encourage the private sector, not make-work projects.

They also would like to see government doing those things that only

government can do, or that government can do much better. Things that

government can do are things such as you saw the other morning. I was

very proud to be on the stand when the Premier pressed the button to

start the ALRT system. I think it was a proud moment not only for us,

but for all British Columbians: to see a system that is not only

state-of-the-art today, but which will remain state-of-the-art for

public transportation well into the next century. I don't think I would

have been nearly so proud to stand there and watch a streetcar go by,

as was proposed by one member of the opposition late in the last

sitting.

MRS. JOHNSTON: He's not here anymore.

HON. MR. RICHMOND: Maybe it's because of that type of thinking that he's not here.

This system is a system conceived and built in Canada; moreover, it

is a system that is in place, and will be in place for a long time to

come, because someone had the courage and vision and, if you like, just

straightforward guts to say it's time we did it. And we did it and got

on with it.

Another project that could only be done by a government, and a

government with some foresight and guts, is B.C. Place. I don't think

there is a British Columbian today who isn't proud to drive by that

stadium and point it out to their friends or to go to a football game

in there. Yet I remember the negative comments from that side of the

House — from that philosophy over there — that it was a waste of money.

I don't hear any of them knocking it now, including the mayor of

Vancouver, as he did before. In fact, quite the opposite is happening

with the opposition and the mayor of Vancouver.

Indeed they are trying to take credit for the project rather than knocking it.

The same goes for every megaproject — that seems to be the popular

term — that this government has either initiated or assisted in. They

were against them. The Minister of Industry and Small Business

Development has spoken at length about northeast coal, another

generator of dollars for this province. Yet those people would turn off

the generators. They have a great penchant for spending money, but they

don't seem to know where it comes from or how to earn it. The

generators in this province, thanks to the leadership of our Premier,

are in place and will be for a long time to come. I am proud to say

that the northeast coal project alone is providing thousands of jobs

for British Columbians and other Canadians. Many people in my

constituency are working on the northeast coal project, so it is not

only benefiting that one sector of the province.

It's providing a deep-sea port at Prince Rupert that has been

promised for many, many years. But even more than that, it is opening

up an area of the province that many people have never seen and would

never see if it weren't for the infrastructure being put in place by

northeast coal. It is opening up three new provincial parks that will

attract many, many visitors to the northeast sector of this province.

It will benefit tourism immensely.

I want to touch on two aspects in the throne speech that were

mentioned briefly and expand on them. One is the tourism business in

British Columbia — the hospitality industry. I think during this

downturn in our economy of the last two years we have seen what a

stabilizing influence tourism has been on our economy. When the primary

industries are suffering, as indeed they have, they suffer very badly

when their markets dry up. Tourism, although it suffered in the last

year or so, doesn't suffer nearly the upturns and downturns of the

primary industries. It has become a stabilizer in the economy, and

although it suffers ups and downs, they are not nearly so drastic. It

is responsible for providing approximately 70,000 jobs to people of

British Columbia who have very diverse backgrounds — from the highly

skilled, highly trained people to those with little or no skills. This

is all through the private sector, I might add. The effects of losing

those jobs are very drastic. We must realize the value of tourism and

the hospitality industry, and the fact that 10,000 private businesses

in this province depend on it to stay open.

British Columbians are still our largest tourism market. Therefore

my ministry has undertaken a program to encourage British Columbians to

travel within British Columbia. They account for nearly 50 percent of

our tourism dollars. We have launched a program called Vacation Road,

which has had a tremendous response thus far from the public, in spite

of an unfortunate error in the insert in the newspaper, an error which

happened to get by several different people. I apologize for it. But in

spite of that error the program is very successful to date. I guess if

something good comes out of an error, it's the fact that we have

received a tremendous amount of publicity — thanks to the media — for

our insert called Vacation Road. I thank the media for that because we

have received some front-page coverage, which we would normally not

receive.

I would like to congratulate the British Columbia Association of

Broadcasters for cooperating with us in this program. They have come

forward and realized the need for tourism, and for British Columbians

visiting British Columbia, and have cooperated with us on a series of

two-minute

[ Page 113 ]

travelogues for the various regions of the province. The response

has been tremendous. I have had several members of this House come up

and tell me that they have had a good response from their constituents

to the Vacation Road program running throughout the province on the

various radio stations.

I'm happy to say that the number of visitors — particularly from the

United States — to British Columbia is up considerably this year. The

vehicular traffic thus far is up in the neighbourhood of 20 percent

over last year. So 1983 is looking a lot better than 1982. One of our

principal assets in the tourism industry...

Interjection.

HON. MR. RICHMOND: Well, besides a stable government. ...is

the people in this province. One of our number one assets is people. We

haven't ignored the front-line troops who meet the tourists — the

persons who serve them meals and gas and meet them in hotels — and we

have launched a resident awareness program to make those people feel as

important as they are to our industry. Without those people meeting the

visitors and meeting them with the right attitude, our tourism business

would soon disappear.

I also want to talk for a moment on another item mentioned in the

throne speech, and that's Expo 86. It's just another project initiated

by this government under the leadership of Mr. Bennett, who had the

foresight several years ago to approach the Bureau of International

Expositions to host a world fair in our principal city in 1986, with

the theme of communications and transportation. It's a very fitting

theme, as that year marks the anniversary of the Canadian Pacific

railroad coming to our shores and endeavouring to unite this country.

[11:45]

Expo 86 will probably be the most significant event to happen in

British Columbia in a long, long time, perhaps in 100 years. It's an

event that will make all British Columbians proud to be here, and it

will help unite this country. It will make all Canadians proud to be

Canadian, and it is taking place right in beautiful downtown British

Columbia, Mr. Speaker. It's a very special and very complex project

that is little understood by many people. It is a project — when you

look at the complexity of it — that makes many other projects pale in

comparison and look like child's play. It is fraught with the problems

of international politics, which many of us do not understand, but we

are fortunate to have a person in the personage of Mr. Patrick Reid,

the commissioner-general, spearheading the international sales of Expo,

and to date he has managed to sign up 16 foreign countries to

participate in Expo 86. By the time the fair is in place, we will have

signed up somewhere between 30 and 40 countries — countries that will

be proud to display their technology and their culture, among other

things, in British Columbia.

The international complexities of Expo are only one thing — dealing

with the foreign countries and the sites and their locations on the

fairgrounds. The fair is fraught with problems such as land

acquisition, which is virtually behind us; putting the services in;

erecting, on a very stringent timetable, 200 or more separate buildings,

which must all be serviced and which must be placed in strategic

locations; building a seawall of incredible proportions and complex

problems; running into budget problems that one cannot foresee that you

have not budgeted for; plus being ever cognizant of the fact that it

must be a first-class and entertaining show. There must be the show

business aspect; it must entertain people, it must inform them, it must

satisfy everyone who comes. I'm confident that with the board of

directors we have, made up of top business people of British Columbia,

and with the people that we have put in place, they will pull this

project off, on budget and on schedule, in spite of very stringent time

constraints. There is no flexibility, Mr. Speaker, in the opening date

of Expo. Other projects might have some flexibility on when they must

open, but Expo 86 must open at 10 a.m. on May 2, 1986.

Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to take those few moments to point out to

everyone what a tremendous and very special and complex project Expo 86

is. Based on very minimal figures of 15 million visitors, which are the

most conservative figures available to date, the provincial government

revenues alone will be in the neighbourhood of $125 million — just

direct revenue to the province. The wages and salaries paid by Expo,

based on that very minimal figure, will be in the area of $715 million

— job creation by this government. The total economic activity that

will flow from Expo 86 — incremental economy activity, if you like —

will be somewhere between $2.1 billion and $3 billion to this province,

and in employment alone it will produce in the neighbourhood of 49,000

person-years of employment. This is just another example of the

tremendous foresight and planning that has gone on by this government.

Yet we heard from the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) over there

yesterday that there is no planning or foresight by this government.

The very projects I've listed off alone account for thousands and

thousands of person-years of employment and billions of dollars of

economic activity in this province — the generators of money, the

motors that keep our economy going.

In this throne speech we are also asking all others who spend public

money to become our partners in restraint. We're asking them to show

some responsibility when they're spending the taxpayer's dollar. I

think that, too many times, they lose sight of the fact that just

because it comes from another level of government, it still comes from

the taxpayer's pocket. I don't care whether it's a hospital board, a

regional district, a municipality, a school board, a federal

government, or whoever, it's coming out of your and my pocket. We're

asking them to show the same restraint and responsibility that is being

shown by this government under Premier Bennett, who initiated restraint

in this country. We're asking them to show the same responsibility as

we are showing, not only when it comes to actual spending, but when it

comes to negotiating contracts, to planning elaborate sewer systems, to

anything that they do that requires public money — to remember where

that money comes from and to show a little bit of restraint. This

province, as I have said, under the leadership of Premier Bennett, has

led the way in this country on restraint. As the Minister of

Transportation and Highways (Hon. A. Fraser) pointed out, long before

the feds got onto their 6-and-5 program, Mr. Bennett and Mr. Fraser

were in Ottawa trying to convince the rest of the country and the other

premiers that restraint was needed.

But the main thing is that it's working. British Columbia is leading

the way out of the recession. We're not following, we're leading the

way out, however fragile we are on the recovery, and we cannot and will

not destroy that fragile recovery by imposing a greater tax burden on

the people of this province. That to me is the easy way out: when

you're short of money....

[ Page 114 ]

AN. HON. MEMBER: That's the socialist way

HON. MR. RICHMOND: That's exactly right: that's the socialist

way out. When you're short of money, spend some more and just reach

into the taxpayer's pocket a little bit deeper to come up with some

more money. We're not going to do that; we're not going to dip into the

taxpayer's pocket and make him dig just a little bit deeper and give

away a little bit more of his earned money to government.

I don't even know the right words to use when I read articles like

the one about the gas station makeover being set. I start thinking of

the difference between a free-enterprise, private-sector government and

a socialist government that thinks the government should own and

control everything. When I start reading — and this is the federal

government, which has been practising socialist policies for about the

last 13 or 14 years.... When I think of what this will cost you and

I as taxpayers — when I read about Petro-Canada planning to spend $30

million to convert some old gas stations that they bought for $347.5

million because they want to be in business, in competition, with the

private sector — I can't help but think of the thinking that comes from

across there when I listen to the member for New Westminster along

these same lines, who was shocked at the thought of — and he's

speculating on this — 35 employees going to be gone from the Ministry

of Tourism, when he was speculating about the magazine Beautiful

British Columbia . It seemed abhorrent to him that 35 jobs should be

transferred from the public sector to the private sector.

AN HON. MEMBER: He doesn't understand.

HON. MR. RICHMOND: That is the whole thing: he said he didn't understand

the word "privatize," and I believe him.

I think that that kind of thinking pervades that party and that side

of the House. I can't understand the thinking that says people have to

work for government instead of the same people doing the same job but

working for the private sector.

When you're short of money it's very easy to raise taxes for the

money you need, or to borrow, or both, because one precipitates the

other. If you go and borrow more money than necessary, you're going to

have to pay it back and you're going to have to raise taxes. The

difficult way, the way that takes guts, foresight and courage — biting

the bullet, if you want to use a cliché — is to cut government

spending, reduce the size of government, and therefore reduce the

burden on the people of this province. It's the difficult way, because

the decisions are tough and difficult; they're not palatable to anyone,

but they are necessary. It sometimes takes a little courage to make

those difficult decisions; anyone can make the easy ones. The tough

ones are where you separate the socialist from the private enterpriser.

I challenge everyone on either side of the House to look around and

see the differences in jurisdictions in this country and throughout the

world, between socialist thinking and private enterprise thinking. Show

me a place where socialist thinking is working. Take a look at Quebec.

Take a look at the federal government and the tremendous debt being

built up. And they are still spending as though they had the money. As

I pointed out, with an

article in the paper the other day, they're

still spending as if they were flush, as if the economy were booming

and they had all kinds of money. The debt is mounting and mounting, and

we're going to have to pay it back.

Yesterday I listened to the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke).

He accused the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) of still

fighting the election, and then he went on to do the very same thing

himself. In fact, all the speeches I've heard from the other side are

doing the same thing: refighting the election. In case they haven't

heard, I've got news for them: it's all over. And guess what?

MR. COCKE: The people lost.

HON. MR. RICHMOND: Isn't it funny how when things don't go their way they say the people weren't wise enough to elect them.

The other day a phrase came from that member: we're climbing out of

the recession on the backs of the working people. Quite the opposite is

true: we're providing jobs for the working people and allowing them to

keep the money they earn. We're trying to allow them to keep a good

percentage of the money they've earned, instead of taxing them to death.

The course of action, taken by the throne speech and by this

government is not only what is needed at this moment; it is what is

wanted by the people of British Columbia.

I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to take my place in this

debate. Like the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development

(Hon. Mr. Phillips), I will have many opportunities in the coming weeks

to further debate many individual programs, which I think will prove

very interesting. I fully support the contents of the Speech from the

Throne, the leader of this province, and this government.

MR. ROSE: In this, my first opportunity to speak to this

august body, I would like to say that it is a pleasure to be here. For

a moment I thought I was going to have to shout a lot, because when I

heard the Member for South Peace River (Hon. Mr. Phillips) I thought

that was the pattern in here. I wondered for a while why we needed

microphones. I noticed that the Minister of Tourism (Hon. Mr. Richmond)

was much more moderate at least in his tone, if not in his ideas, and

therefore I think I'll try to match that. Most of the time I'm not much

of a shouter or screamer. I know I'm going to have to learn a new style

here, and I'm prepared to do that. If that's the way it operates,

that's the ball game, and I'm quite pleased to do that.

[12:00]

It's a great honour to be elected to public office. I think too few

women and men have that opportunity. I consider it a public trust. It

is probably the highest honour that the community can bestow on anyone.

The fact that it has happened to me six times — four times federally,

once municipally and now once provincially — is a tremendous honour,

and I thank the voters of Coquitlam-Moody. I'd be less than frank,

though, if I led this House to believe that I left Ottawa to take this

particular chair. I don't think anybody would believe that. Lots of

people have left the federal House to run provincially. I can think of

a number, including the member for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis).

For instance, T.C. Douglas left to become Premier of Saskatchewan. Ed

Schreyer left to become leader and Premier of Manitoba; Gerry Regan

left to become Premier of Nova Scotia; Frank Moores — it even happens

to Tories — left to become leader in Newfoundland; Bob Rae of our party

left to become party

[ Page 115 ]

leader, if not yet Premier, in Ontario. What about Don Jamieson? He

left the federal House to become leader of the Liberal Party in

Newfoundland — a great honour to him. As a matter of fact, I'm one of

the few people who left the federal House to become a back-bencher.

AN HON. MEMBER: Don't forget Jack Davis.

MR. ROSE: He didn't leave the federal House voluntarily, remember. He didn't quit. He was fired by the voters.

Anyway, I've made some progress. At least I'm now a member of the

official opposition. I must admit, though, that the night my party lost

the election and I won, I was seriously thinking of demanding a

recount. I haven't yet accustomed myself to this place, but I'm not yet

persuaded to run in my own by-election. I don't think I'll be doing

that. Some people have been kind enough — or unkind enough — to suggest

that probably the only way I'll ever be a minister is if I enrol in

theological school. Somebody else said: "Well, they probably wouldn't

have you anyway."

That's politics, though, and nobody can quarrel with that. Elections

are often a matter of luck. Who gets where in politics is often a

matter of timing and luck. I congratulate the Premier — not for being

lucky, but for running a very good election campaign, a technically

perfect election campaign. I congratulate the people who were elected

along with me. I think it shows that democracy is still at work

regardless of how much it is threatened. I don't think you can say that

people voted for a particular person or that — and we don't like it on

one side or the other — somehow the people were stupid. I don't buy

that at all. As is the case in elections, to the victors go the spoils.

Some of those spoils sitting over there I can't agree with. Some of

them, I'm sure, are fine people, and perhaps even well motivated. Let's

say they are well motivated. I think — my way of thinking anyway — they

possess a very insular, blinker view of the world and what's happening.

That doesn't make me all-wise and all-knowing, full of wisdom and

sagacity, if that's the word, but I think we're going into a world in

which the old answers won't prevail. I don't care whether they're the

old free-enterprise answers or the old socialist answers. I think we'll

have to look for new answers. Anybody who doesn't see that probably

hasn't done enough thinking about the subject. I don't think the old

slogans are any good anymore for anybody, regardless of side.

The government over there has been returned with a satisfying,

comfortable majority. The job of government is to govern, and no one

quarrels with that; but don't be after this side if we oppose, because

that's our job too. Out of all the hype on the one side and the

criticism coming from the other is supposed to come good government. It

wouldn't without us. It won't without the opposition. We've had

one-party states in Alberta, two or three of them. You don't get

anywhere with a one-party state; democracy is lost. If you're sorry you

didn't win all the seats, I'm not, because you don't win anything and

the people don't win anything if you have a big, arrogant government.

I caution the government not to read too much into this election or

the results. Let's look at the election results. Of every 20 people who

voted, 10 voted for the government, but 9 voted for this side. That's

hardly a rolling and snowballing kind of majority. It was just that

close. I don't think the people of this province emphatically gave the

government carte blanche to slash and privatize everything in sight.

That's not my reading of it when it's merely 10 to 9. I don't think the

people of this province gave this government the right to slash and

destroy and pick away at all the social gains we've made over a

generation. I don't think that is what the government's mandate is, so

I'm going to be watching very closely. The gains we've made in

standards of living and human dignity over the past 25 years are not to

be swept away with slogans from anyone, and we're going to make sure

that they're not. If privatization and cutbacks and staying out of

private enterprise and not intervening in the economy is so great, why

did we have the Great Depression? We had a Bennett once called R.B.

Bennett. He was going to blast his way into the markets of the world,

and do you know what happened? Two of the parties that sit in this

House were invented during those years because of the reluctance of the

old-line governments to intercede when people in western Canada — in

fact, all over Canada — were in serious trouble.

We must have learned something over the last 50 years. This silly

rhetoric about the glories of private enterprise and the dead hand or

bogey of socialism is just nonsense. Everybody knows that both sides of

this House believe in a mixed economy.

AN HON. MEMBER: No.

MR. ROSE: Certainly they believe in a mixed economy.

Everybody knows that the road to social Utopia isn't by nationalizing

everything in sight. The kinds of things and approaches that we made in

the thirties are not necessarily appropriate for today, not in any way.

Does the government wish to privatize ALRT?

AN HON. MEMBER: We will.

MR. ROSE: Who are you going to sell it to — the B.C. Electric? Does it wish to privatize the domed stadium?

AN HON. MEMBER: Probably.

MR. ROSE: Are you going to sell it to Peter Pocklington? Does

the government wish to privatize B.C. Place? Is it going to privatize

the schools? Nonsense! Unless we have substantial and continuing public

support in things like those that I've mentioned — plus the member for

South Peace River's (Hon. Mr. Phillips') pride and joy, the Tumbler

Ridge project — unless we keep pouring public money into those things,

they're going to collapse. They need public support, so don't get up

and prattle on about the jobs of private enterprise, because it's a

hollow thing. Maybe the pollsters tell you it's good, I don't know, or

maybe you're just into that habit. I am not quite as ideological.

On the one hand the government brags about its job-creating,

publicly funded projects, and then it claims in contradiction in the

throne speech debate that you can't spend your way out of recession.

Well, I'll give you another little bit of information: you can't

restrain your way out of recession either, because what you're doing is

restraining on the weakest members of society, and we're not going to

put up with that. So that's a fact. We can all support motherhood

statements about cutting red tape. Everybody is in favour of cutting

red tape. We're all in favour of increasing productivity. What's new

about that? Did this party invent feather-bedding? Of course it didn't.

[ Page 116 ]

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

What about cutting red tape? What does it mean? Does it mean getting

rid of "regulatory roadblocks"? Does it mean cutting out pollution

inspections — is that what you mean by it? Does it mean that developers

are going to be free from now on to rape the farmland? If those are the

regulatory roadblocks and you're going to eliminate them, then I

don't think the people are going to buy it. You won 10 to 9, and half

the people, or every second house out there in the streets, vote for

us, so we're not as irrelevant as you might think. If the Tories or

federal Liberals could win with 45 percent of the vote next time,

they'd be deliriously happy.

What about productivity in education? Is that going to mean larger

classes? Obviously if the teacher teaches bigger classes he's more

productive, right? Now there might not be much learning there, but he's

more productive. Does it mean we are going to have a longer school day,

or a longer school year? Is that how you do it? If you pay less for the

services, therefore you have less capital investment for an output —

whatever that is — and therefore you are more productive. Do you think

the people of B.C. want that for their children? I don't think so.

We are really a little concerned about some of those buzzwords that

are in there — high tech is another beaut. Think about Consolidated

Computer. That went to the wall for $125 million last year in Ottawa —

public money, by the way.

Mr. Speaker, this side will be watching very carefully to make

certain that restraint isn't just a buzzword or a byword as an excuse

to cut services needed by people. We're going to be watching very

carefully that education is not savaged — that we don't all end up as

keypunch operators in our schools and computer tappers, while all the

humanities, the fine arts and all the programs that make us human are

abolished. We are not going to allow that sort of thing to happen.

We're going to scream about that.

I don't know why or how these victims are picked out. They are often

teachers, let's say, people on welfare. Does some number-crunching

pollster say that these people aren't currently very popular, so

therefore we can hammer them with impunity? That's called the lazy

bastard theory of social welfare: obviously they've got to be lazy or

else they wouldn't be out of work. That's just nonsense. It's kind of

silly and ideological, and I think for the most

part it's drivel. I've

heard it all week long from the other side. However, the other side has

no monopoly on drivel; I'll grant you that. We all get hooked into our

own sort of word patterns.

I was interested in this whole thing written by Gary Engler in the Vancouver Sun .

It is a sort of sarcastic or satirical way of expressing how some

members of the public feel about the kind of ideological claptrap —

that's with an '1', Mr. Speaker, not an 'r'; the suffix is 'trap' —

that we hear so often. Now this is satire; you've got to be very

careful, because you might not get it. "Canadian workers would be

better off if they were paid less." We hear that all the time — you've

got to get lean and mean.

"Poor people must be given less money, and that will

make them work harder. Rich people need more money to expand the

economy. Rent controls cause rents to be too low, which is bad. Free

market causes land prices to soar, which allows speculators to buy

hockey teams and baseball teams and football teams, which is good. High

interest rates are necessary to reduce inflation, make work for

bankruptcy lawyers and create opportunities for the happily unemployed.

Unions are going to destroy this country by fighting for better

pensions, proper health care, safety legislation, medicare, equal pay,

the minimum wage for farm workers, decent maternity leave. B.C. forest

workers should take wage cuts in order to expand the American economy

and get more houses built."

Tighten your belts, Canadians, and expand the military — tighten

your belts and compete with the dollar-per-day militarized, beaten,

tear-gassed South Koreans that the member for South Peace River (Hon.

Mr. Phillips) loves so much. Cut back social services. Isn't life

wonderful?

[12:15]

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Engler brands such lunacies as unfair, unworkable

and wrong-headed, and I happen to agree with him. But I hear it all the

time. This almost becomes a theology, and I don't understand it. Well,

I understand it, but why should anybody try to solve the problems of

the rest of us by attacking the weakest members of society, not the

strongest? That's what we're about, and that's where we differ

ideologically from the people across the hall.

Contrast that approach to the recent musings of the council of

Catholic bishops. What did they have to say about the economy? Now

these aren't wild-eyed socialists....

HON. MR. CHABOT: Pinkos.

MR. ROSE: Pinkos. Bishop Remi de Roo of Victoria is a pinko?

The Provincial Secretary is calling the Catholic bishops of Canada

pinkos. Shame! That's almost the same as telling the Catholic bishops

to go to hell. I hope you visit confessional next Sunday. You're going

to need a lot of forgiveness. You'd better count those beads. Tote that

barge and lift that bale. You'd better do that.

AN HON. MEMBER: He's past redemption.

MR. ROSE: He is, eh?

Anyway, this is what Remi de Roo, the bishop of Victoria, has to say.

First: "Unemployment rather than inflation should be recognized as

the number one problem to be tackled in overcoming the present crisis."

That's what he had to say first. He talks about the number of jobless.

I'm not going to carry on with all the quotes. "While efforts should be

continually made to curb wasteful spending, it's imperative the primary

emphasis be placed on combating unemployment." How are you going to

create employment by throwing more people out of work? I don't

understand that kind of logic. I don't understand that kind of economic

thinking.

Second: "An industrial strategy should be developed to create

permanent and meaningful jobs for people in local communities. To be

effective, such a strategy should be designed at both the national and

regional levels, and it should include emphasis on increased

production." You'd agree with that, Mr. Minister — creation of new

labour-intensive industries for basic needs, and measures to ensure job

security for workers, not scare the hell out of them. Who's going to

lose his job next?

Third: "A more balanced and equitable program should be developed

for reducing and stemming the rate of inflation, and this requires the

shifting of the burden for wage controls to upper income earners, and

not lower ones." Now I hope

[ Page 117 ]

that doesn't sound too radical, and too pink, and too offensive,

because for the last 50 years the distribution of income in this

country, in spite of medicare and unemployment insurance, hasn't

changed. The top 20 percent of Canadians still get 42 percent of the

income, and the bottom 20 percent — the poor, downtrodden — get about 4

percent. And that's just not fair.

I know that over on this side we're gloom-and-doomers. We're told

that all the time. We're just downers, somehow. And the optimism is all

over there: life is wonderful. Well, it may be for some people — for

most of us, in spite of all we say. Certainly for some of us sitting in

here — a rather privileged group — it's a pretty great country, and

it's a pretty great province too. Nobody's going to deny that, So we

shouldn't get so preoccupied with hacking up one another that we forget

that what we have is perhaps the envy of the world. We've got to admit

that one, too.

But anyway, the bishops — the pinko bishops, according to the

minister over here — go on to say: "Greater emphasis should be given to

the goal of social responsibility in the current recession. This means

that every effort must be made to curtail cutbacks in social services,

maintain adequate health care and social security benefits, and above

all guarantee special assistance for the unemployed welfare recipients,

the working poor in one-industry towns suffering from plant shutdowns."

A perfect example of that would be Port Alberni.

Fifth: "Labour unions should be asked to play a more decisive role."

Look, industrial democracy is not all that foreign, you know. We don't

have much of it here, but in West Germany union heads sit on the boards

of directors of many corporations. I think that's important. That's

known as social responsibility, or industrial democracy. "This requires

the restoration of collective bargaining rights where they have been

suspended, collaboration between unions, the unemployed and unorganized

workers, and the assurance that labour unions will have an effective

role in developing economic policy." Now when the bishops say that,

what they're saying is: how can we develop a social contract if all we

have is conflict? Unless you get people working together on these

problems, how on earth can you ever come out of this? We're just going

to have the adversary system heaped upon us forever and ever and ever —

like we have in this House. That's no way to work. It's not going to

work that way. And I don't think anybody believes it ever will work.

Anyway, these aren't pie-in-the-sky musings. I think that a great

number of people believe what the bishops had to say. Certainly they're

compassionate men. Does that make them idealists? Not hard-headed? Is

compassion out of fashion? Are we so hard-headed that we have no

feeling for anybody else?

Anyway, I suggest that maybe the whole paper could be read by

somebody who's interested in what's happening in the world, because I

think we ignore the warnings at our peril. Three countries, Mr.

Speaker, control the economies of the western world. If three countries

get together — the U.S.A., West Germany and Japan — they will decide

when our recession is going to be over. God didn't make the recession,

you know; men did. And it doesn't matter what this government does, or

what it says. It will be when those three countries.... When the

United States decides it's had enough of the recession — the people who

operate and are behind the Reagan government — that's when it'll be

over, regardless of what we do here.

If the Premier and his party wish to take the credit for our

recovery, then I don't see how they can escape the blame for the

recession. You can't have it both ways, because I think it will be

largely beyond their control. That's what I think are facts, and those

are my views on these topics. I think that perhaps I sound a little bit

preachy — not quite as loud as my friend from South Peace River (Hon.

Mr. Phillips), but I can be fairly loud.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Well, you said you were going to be kind to me. Are

you kind to your enemies too? I heard you say earlier that you were

going to be kind to me; you said that you were going to take me up to

Prince Rupert or Tumbler Ridge or something.

MR. LEA: He didn't say you were coming back.

MR. ROSE: One-way ticket.

I'd like to turn now for a few minutes to some more of the

traditional aspects of a maiden speech, and offer the hon. members a

description of my riding. This won't be an extensive travelogue, I

hope, because outlining the beauties of Coquitlam-Moody is probably a

bit redundant, since all of British Columbia is beautiful — even

Kelowna, where I lived next door to the Premier for some five years. I

didn't get contaminated. It didn't contaminate him very much either.

But, anyway, he was a very good neighbour.

I guess in some ways Coquitlam-Moody is a microcosm of Canada.

Bounded on three sides by water, it has a rail line, a port, lots of

fishing, light industry, lumber mills, and it has lots of problems, too.

One of its problems — I wish the Minister of Highways (Hon. A.

Fraser) were here — is traffic stagnation. We have a big railyard and

a lot of dangerous cargo there. That's of concern to people, because

Port Coquitlam stands right in the way of anybody trying to go on the

north side of the river up the valley, and that's where the railyard

is. So we're concerned about that, because we don't want another

possible Mississauga in Port Coquitlam. We lack public transit into the

new subdivisions — and we have new subdivisions in Coquitlam. And we

have some urban intrusion into rural land. As we press up the valley,

the pressures are going to be intense far more intense than they are in

the delta region.

I would like to talk about four or five municipal areas that come

within the boundaries of Coquitlam-Moody and what some of their

particular problems are. In addition to the bookend ones — that's

Coquitlam and Moody — there's Port Coquitlam; there's the new village

of Belcarra-by-the Sea — it's beautiful; plus some unorganized

territory in Anmore and Buntzen Lake. Each of these areas has splendid

amenities. They are close to Vancouver and yet just far enough away.

I would like to highlight some of these today. The village of

Belcarra was formed four years ago because the residents wanted to keep

their quiet way of life. They didn't want to be absorbed into the

larger urban scene, so they formed their own municipality. The people

of Anmore and the unorganized territory feel the same way about it. The

district of Coquitlam, whose concerns I share with whoever wins the

court case — and I think it's the....

AN. HON. MEMBER: Mr. Parks.

[ Page 118 ]

MR. ROSE: Are you allowed to call him Mr. Parks in here, or

the member from Maillardville-Coquitlam? Whoever he is, I'll just say

that we face a serious landfill problem. Coquitlam has been taking

other people's garbage for years — like Delta — and now thinks it's

somebody else's turn. It's a major problem as far as we are concerned.

That mountain by the river is not natural; that's a landfill.

Incineration and recycling is the modern way, but they are still going

to need lots of assistance — those five municipalities that supply that.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Nobody wants anybody else's garbage, though. That's

the problem that everybody faces, but the problem has to be solved.

Pitt Meadows doesn't want it, Texada Island doesn't want it, but

Coquitlam has had all it can stand. It's a very serious problem.

Port Coquitlam wants me to say to this House today that it wants to

draw to the appropriate minister's attention that among its major

concerns is traffic congestion. As the population goes up the valley

eastward, on the north side of the Fraser, we get severe traffic

problems. We've got a Bailey bridge there serving what was supposed to

be the Mary Hill bypass. We need to complete that; otherwise the

problem is only going to intensify. I'm quite sure the member for

Dewdney (Mr. Pelton) would want to see that Mary Hill bypass completed

as well. It's not just NDPers sitting there, getting mad in their cars,

as they wait for that Bailey bridge. There are probably some Social

Crediters as well. I heard there was the odd Social Crediter up there

in Dewdney — and some even ones as well, perhaps.

Mr. Speaker, I want to tell the Minister of Highways that during

peak hours this city of Port Coquitlam, because it stands right in the

way, cries out for solutions that are beyond local control. Trucks

going to and from the CPR yards have to wait because there's a

single-lane bridge right in the middle of town. Anybody who wants to

take a helicopter ride over that place during rush hour can see how

difficult it is. The local people can't look after that.

A similar thing is happening in Port Moody. Port Moody is a logjam.

Anybody going to Burnaby or to Vancouver along the Barnet Highway is

right in the middle of town. I know that a lot of these things are

really not very gripping. They're not things that you can get very

emotional about, but they are local concerns, and I think it's the job

of the person who represents a community to express these local

concerns.

The local city council was really nervous the other day because of a

newspaper

article in the May 29 Province . This newspaper

article is

headed: "ALRT High Cost Derailed Commuter Railway Service." I looked on

the map the opening day of the ALRT — the grand opening of the B.C.

Spirit....

AN HON. MEMBER: The Spirit of B.C.

MR. ROSE: The Spirit of B.C. Well , as long as it's not

mean-spirited. I'm sure the federal government might think it's a bit

mean-spirited. I noticed in the two-page ad that was in the Province

for this grand opening that the commuter rail service is on the map.

This is part of the great traffic pattern down here, but a few days

earlier on Sunday, May 29, the Province published this with the musings

of the head of the Transit Authority, MLA Jack Davis, who said: "I

personally don't think commuter rail has much of a future." That's what

he said to the people of Port Moody. Then he goes on to say: "With the

government in the red, I don't think it would be willing to add another

$40-odd million to supply commuter rail from Coquitlam down to the

SeaBus."

[12:30]

Further on he says: "The ALRT will eventually go all the way to

Coquitlam anyway, and so it would be a duplication." Anybody who knows

that area at all knows that if you look at where the commuter rail is

going to go sometime after the year 2000, if it gets there then, it's

going to end up in Maillardville. What are people going to do in Port

Coquitlam when you can't get through the place now? Where are they

going to park?

One of their own supporters — I won't name him because he would be a

little bit embarrassed about this — has written the head of the Transit

Authority with the following argument. He's the head of the transit

committee of the city of Port Moody. He wrote Jack Davis, saying: "We

have been assured on numerous occasions of the commitment of the

provincial government to commuter rail," but after reading the

newspaper he's wondering what happened. He made the following points:

"The official community plan is being developed to

reflect a commuter rail station; Port Moody's excessive rush-hour

traffic is expected to be alleviated somewhat by the community rail,

which is to be taken into account in a provincial highways-funded

study. He makes a further point: Port Moody's participation in Expo 86

is centred around commuter rail as one of the convenient transportation

aspects, since this city will be just 20 minutes away from the Canadian

pavilion, compared with an expected 45 minutes by ALRT"

The people in Port Moody are worried. They feel betrayed that this

is likely to go anyway. The minister in charge of transit was out to

Port Moody for the Golden Spike Days last Saturday. I'm sure she got an

earful from the local council. It's not a partisan issue. People on

both sides of the political spectrum are concerned about this issue.

She was out there because we have a little ceremony called "driving the

golden spike," commemorating the completion of the terminus of the

CPR. She hits the spike with a 10-pound sledgehammer — that is, she

gallantly hit at the spike, and caused one local mayor, who is a bit of

a wag, to suggest that the minister should be nicknamed "Lightning"

because she has never struck twice in the same place. Anyway, she tried

her best. I hope she got an earful and that she knows how the people of

that area feel.

For the remainder of my speech in the time I have left I would like

to talk a little bit about the critic area that I have inherited — that

is, of Education. I, like the minister, have a lot to learn about

education. Oh, there he is over there; I'm pleased to see him. I didn't

recognize him over there because I couldn't see through the Premier;

lots of people can but I.... I'd like to congratulate him on his new

appointment, and tell him that I'm really pleased to be his critic,

since we're both old Mission boys, and we're all conciliators and

compromisers and get along well with people. All Mission boys do that,

with one exception: Phil Gaglardi came from Mission, but he wasn't

quite the same personality.

We know that in future years we're going to be facing an

increasingly sophisticated world. It's going to depend on skilled

people, lots of skilled people. We know that there's a

[ Page 119 ]

recent U.S. study that pointed out that American education is in an

appalling state. Because of the complex nature of education we know

that you can't scapegoat teachers. There are all kinds of problems, in

addition to teaching problems, that cause schools to be less effective

than they might be. If your society is chaotic — lacking in form or in

any kind of reasonable values — how can you expect the schools to be

much different? This business of blaming the schools for the ills of

society, or blaming the teachers for it — going out and nuking

teachers, like the minister's predecessor did — is not good enough.

The minister has made a fine start, a fine recovery in de-escalating

the kind of tension that developed between teachers and trustees over

the past year. He's going to have a honeymoon for a while, but in my

view he won't be able to sweet-talk his way out of it forever. He'll

have to make some reasonable changes to give teachers a feeling of

some kind of security, boards a feeling of some kind of self-worth and

autonomy. Don't brand everything and stamp these things out district

after district just like cupcakes, as if one formula is going to work

in every instance, because it's not going to. We welcome the minister

and congratulate him on the work he's done until now, but we're going

to be watching him.

You know, Mr. Minister, the province's share of educational funding

has been dropping over the last 10 years. The share is now appallingly

low — one of the lowest, by a lot of indicators, of any province in

Canada. You can keep taxes low, but as a former alderperson would know,

it isn't going to help them if all you do is pass it off to the local

residents. All you're doing is shifting the burden; you're not changing

the tax. We arrange our rich provinces in education from very low to

dead last in some very important measures. Boards are worried, I am

told, that certain financing formulas are being contemplated which

might cause them great difficulty. It might be based on productivity

and costs vary a lot between boards. Things like heating bills — the

minister comes from the north — transportation bills, number of

immigrant children in classes, all cause per-pupil costs to vary. So we

look for a flexible kind of approach. If you have a lot of teachers who

are senior on the salary scale.... When I first went to Kelowna as

a teacher, everybody was young. Ten years later I moved to Westminster,

where they weren't 10 years older, they were about 30 years older,

because that was a stable society and there wasn't much change. So if

you have a lot of senior teachers on your staff, your costs are going

to be higher than if you have a lot of younger ones.

I think the worst thing about it all is the uncertainty in

education. We're been through the soft cop, tough cop routine twice now

in education in the last few years, so we want to know whether you're

going to be the soft cop or the tough cop, and which tough cop will

follow you if you're too soft. We'd be interested to know that; we

don't now.

I think this uncertainty was pretty well illustrated recently in a

little news story, quoting Dan Lupini of the largest district in the

province. He says: "Now for 1983 we still don't have a budget. We know

we have a cap on it of $169 million, but we still don't have a

settlement for our teachers, and we don't know if that settlement will

cost too much and if our staffing will be effective." Uncertainty, Mr.

Minister.

I'm told that my time is about to run out. I will close by saying

that I'm sorry I couldn't say something more about students and their

problems with student loans. I would like to close by saying to the

minister that I wish him well. I hope that when we're talking to him

we'll be talking to Edgar Bergen and not Charlie McCarthy, because

people want to talk to the organ grinder; they won't be satisfied with

the monkey. He's got a big job, he's going to need all the help he can

get, and I really appreciate the fact that we will have this

association and wish him the best of luck.

Just before I close may I pay a tribute to Judge Stuart Leggatt, my

predecessor, who served municipally on the school board, federally and

provincially, and is now on the bench. He's my predecessor, and he's

done a great job. He's an outstanding British Columbian and an

outstanding Canadian, and I'm pleased to have had the honour to follow

him representing Coquitlam-Moody.

Mr. Segarty moved adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Nielsen moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 12:41 p.m.

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