Manitoba Hansard — Sitting 104 (27th Legislature, 4th Session)

27-4-104

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF M.i\NITOBA .9:30 o'clock, Tuesday; May 11th, 1965. Opening Prayer by Madam Speaker. MADAM'SPEAKER: Pr esenting Petitions Reading and Receiving Petitions . Presenting Reports by Standing and Special Committees Notices of Motion Introduction of Bills Orders of the Day 2605 MR. ELMAN GUTTORMSON (St. George): Madam Speaker, before the Orders of the Day, I wonder if the First Minister has an answer for my question that I directed yesterday. HON.

DUFF ROBLIN (Premier) (Wolseley): Madam Speaker, we have come across no reason to suppose that these persons are not subjected to the taxation like anybody else. MR. GILDAS MOLGAT (Leader of the Opposition) (Ste. Rose): Madam Speaker, before the Orders of the Day, I'd like to address a question to the Minister for Municipal Affairs. Does he approve of all the by-laws that are passed by local government districts? HON. ROBERT G. SMELLIE, Q.

C. (Minister of Municipal Affairs) (Birtle-Russell): Madam Speaker, I don't see the by-laws personally, but they do come in to the department and are scrutinized by the officers of the department and approved there before they come into · effect. MK MOLGAT: Madam Speaker, a subsequent question. Is there a relationship made then when they are scrutinized between the by-laws of one local government district and another, and also between the by-laws of local government districts and those that are normally passed by cities and towns. MR. SMELLIE: Not necessarily. MR. MOLGAT: Madam Speaker, a subsequent question.

Has the Minister received any complaints regarding By-law No. 272 of the Local Government District of Consol regarding the licensing of taxicabs in that district. MR. SMELLIE: I'm not aware of any, Madam Speaker, but I'll take the question as notice. MR. MOLGAT: Madam Speaker, my information isthat the Local Government of Consol under that by-law set a fee of $100 for taxicab licenses plus a $50 license fee, plus a $15 per cab fee and a $10 operator's license, and it is felt that this is out of line with what is being charged in other cities and towns.

This is my reason for asking the Minister if the're was a relationship inade with other by-laws. ORDERS OF THE DAY MADAM SPEAKER: Committee of the Whole House. The Honourable the Provincial Secretary. HON. MAITLAND B. STEINKOPF (Provincial Secretary) (River Heights): Madam Speaker, I beg to move, seconded by the Honourable Minister of Municipal Affairs, that Madam Speaker do now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a Committee of the Whole to consider the following bill: No. 110,

an Act respecting payment to Members of the Legislative Assembly and Ministers of the Crown upon their· ceasing to be Members or Ministers of the Crown. MADAM SPEAKER presented· the motion and after a voice vote declared the motion carried and the House resolved itself intb a Committee of the Whole with the Honourable Member for Winnipeg Centre in the Chair. S::OMMITTEE_Qf THE. WHOLE HOUSE MR.

CHAIR1V1AN: Before we adjourned, the question was brought to the attention of the committee as to whether or not we had·the right to vote on Bill110 which provides for payment to Members of the Legislative Assembly and Ministers of the Crown upon their ceasing to be Members or Ministers,· ahd I would like to point out that members must vote on these questions because there is no one else to v0te on them.

When the Legislative Assembly Act is amended to provide for indemriities or increased indemnities or smaller iridemnities, we all vote on that question and that is the only way' that' the indemnities can be changed, because there is no one else to decide the question other than· members of this House. Furtherm ore, when we iJas·s our �

2606 May 11th, 1965 (MR. CHAIRMAN cont 'd) .... , .. estimates, one of the items provides for payment of living allowances and expenses to members, and again all members of the House vote on those questions as there is no one else to decide on those questions which apply to all members of the House.

In May's Parliamentary Practice, the 17th Edition, at Page 435 we have this statement: "In the Commons it is the rule that no member who has a direct pecuniary interest in a question shall be allowed to vote upon it, but in order to operate a disqualification this interest must be immediate and personal and not merely of a general or remote character. On the 17th July, 1811, the rule was thus explained by Mr.

Speaker Abbott. 'This interest must be a direct pecuniary interest and separately belonging to the persons whose votes were questioned and not in common with the rest of His Majesty's subjects or .on a matter of state policy.' On occasions when the objection of personal interest in a vote has been raised, which came obviously within the exemption from the application· of the rule defined by Mr. Speaker Abbott, the Speaker or the Chairman has overruled the objection or has decided that a motion to disallow the vote would be out of order.

" And on Page 436 there is an example given of a case where a motion to dis allow the vote would be out of order or was overruled in the·case of.voting salaries of members.

In Beauchesne 1 s Parliamentary Rules and Forms, 4th Edition, 1958, at Page 44 there is Citation No. 66, clause (2) which reads as follows: "A member •s right to vote on a question on which he is personally interested is one of those matters that must be decided by the House and not by the Speaker." It would seem to me that this is a matter to be decided by the House and I propose to call in Madam Speaker and ask her to ask the House to decide on whether or not the members of this House have the right to vote upon Bill 110 and matters connected with it. MR. DOUGLAS L. CAMPBELL (Lakeside): Mr.

Chairman, before that is done, I would like to say a word on this question. First and foremost, I think that you would agree with me that so far as quotations from Beauchesne and May are concerned, they operate only in cases where we do not have a rule ourselves. Where we have a rule of our own, we don't turn to anybody else. Our own rule operates, and our rule, it seems to me, states very distinctly what the situation is. Now for

interpretation of what it means or how it would be applied, it might be that for that

interpretation or for the application that it would be well to consult what has happered in the Parliament in Canada or in the Parliament of the United Kingdom; but as far as . our own rule is concerned, if we are in any doubt of what it means then it seems to me that the proper place to go to is the court and not to a parliamentary authority, because in Manitoba the

interpretation of statutes and all such go first of all to the courts in my opinion. And for you to suggest that, as May undoubtedly does, that this is for the House to decide, is just another case of where we have a rule that seems to me to be very clear, and then if we have doubt about that rule, then once again we come back to the very people who are the beneficiaries of it to decide it, and I think once again this places the members in an invidious position.

I would think that what we should do, it would be better when this Rules Committee meets, we'd better decide in the Rules Committee exactly what we want some of the rules to mean and try and put them in some language that would be beyond the p.eradventure of doubt. In the meantime, we1re faced with this one and I would submit, with all respect, that this is a matter that seems to me to be quite clear, and that if it isn't clear, that we don't have to -- the House can make the decision because there we are back in th e same case again of the people who have the personal interest being asked to make the decision.

Somebody has to make a decision on this. Let yourself or Madam Speaker take the responsibility of making it, and I suggest to you that Madam Speaker is the proper one because after all you, like the rest of us, are personally interested. Madam Speaker is interested too, but at least she's in this different :)osition, that the House sets apart the Speaker as the one person that, by virtue of the position, is clothed with a certain amount of authority and is supposed to be completely non-partisan.

So first and foremost I say to you, with all due. respect to Beauchesne and May; they do not apply where we have a rule of our own. Our rule is paramount and basic where we have one. I think it 1 s quite proper to go to them for

interpretation, but I don 1t think we have to agree in that

interpretation as applicable to conditions in this province, and I suggest to you that if there •s any question about the meaning of this rule, the proper place to-refer it is to the court. MR. ROBLIN: I would like to say a brief word-on this point, Mr. Chairman, because I couldn 1t disagree more with most of what my honourable friend has said. It is absolutely absurd to suggest that we should refer the rules of this House· to the court. This House is the

May 11th; 1965 (MR. ROBLIN cont'd) .. ..... master of its own rules. There's no higher court in this province than this Legislature, and to refer to some outside body for

interpretation is to my mind a very poor piece of advice indeed. I think it iS quite proper that if there is any doubt about the rules that we should ask Madam Speaker to make a ruling, and I for one am prepared to abide with whatever her ruling should be. But if there is doubt about the rules, this House With Madam Speaker working together is the body that determines the rules. After all, we made them in the first.place and we make them arid unmake them from time to time as we go along, and to suggest that it be referred to a court to my mind is a proposition without merit.

I would also like to say that it strikes me as exceedingly odd that members opposite discovered this flaw in our procedure at the present time. They sat there all these many years and changed other sruaries or other emoluments or other remunerations respecting · members of the House with never a thought of conscience, never any doubt about what the rule should be.

It is obvious it seems to me that the rule cannot be an absurdity, and the rule would be an absurdity if it were to be interpreted to mean that we could not deal with matters affecting the salary or remuneration or other financial matters affecting members of this House. If it were the right rule, if the

interpretation were correct, how on earth in the beginning did we ever set a salary for this House? Obviously it would be impossible to do it. How on earth did we ever change salaries; how on earth did we ever bring in expense allowance; how were any of these things ever done in the past if the rule was as my honourable friends opposite seem to think it to be. · Well the question answers itself. The rule is intended of course to stop people from dealing with matters in whic h they have an individual personal concern in themselves as per sons as distinct from members of the Legislature.

I think there isn •t any question about the way the rule should be interpreted, but if the Chairman is in any doubt about it and he wishes to refer it to Madam Speaker, I certainly would have no objection to that, but I really can •t say that I follow the argument advanced across the way in any particular. MR. CAMPBELL: Mr. Chairman, I would expect the Honourable the First Minister to think that any suggestion was absurd that took-- (Interjection)- -I beg your pardon? MR. ROBLIN: I really don't think that every suggestion made from the opposite side is absurd, just this particular one at the moment. MR.

CAMPBELL: Well his batting average seems to be pretty high recently for thinking that they're absurd on this side of the House, and it's quite in keeping with his arrogant attitude that he should say--(lnterjection)--I beg your pardon? -- quite in keeping I suggest, Mr. Chairman, with his arrogant attitude and with the arrogant attitude displayed by the front bench in connection with this particular legislation where they are attempting to rush through the House a piece of legislation that's palpably benefiting the front row and is tailored to fit their situation.

Now I'm quite cognizant of the fact that the amendments that are introduced now make a difference in that situation, but as far as the bill that we still have before us - the amendments have not even been considered yet - as far as that bill is concerned, it's palpably designed to place my honourable friends in the position where they have already qualified for a very large pension and --(l nterjection)-- Yes, this is quite right, and what I 'm saying is that I'm just corn m enting on my honourable friend 1s attitude.

Now of course we make the rules of this House, of course we have the authority to niake the rules of this House, of course we•re the highest court in the land; but when we have diffi culty of interpreting our own rules - and there •s certainly difficulty in interpreting this one - when we have difficulty in interpreting our own rule, then for goodness sake who are the right people to refer it to - the court. We're not asking the court to make a rule for us, but we frequently have to find that we have to ask the court to interpret the statutes that we have put on the books. .

It •s just as nbsurd for my honourable friend to say that' that is absurd as it would be to say that we •re the ones who should decide what a case means when it domes before the court, that we should interpret our own laws. Of course we make the laws, but who interprets them - the courts. Here we are in this position that certain ones of us have qualified - we are al ready qualified for a pension under this legislation - certain ones of us.

There are lots who aren •t qualified and consequently their interests may be a potential one, but in the case of some of them that are already qualifi.ed, even according to the amendments that are here, we•re already directly concerned in this question. ·

May 11th, 1965 MR. G.UTTORMSQN:. )Yir. ChaJrman, on the point that the .First Minister has raised, I might.:temind him of a few years ago when we passed leg�slation in this House dealing with • legal entiti.es, and before any cases came befoJ;"e the court, this government referr.ed it to the court for an

interpretation of the law that this House itself had passed. HON. STERLING R. LYON, .Q. C. (Minister of Mines and Natural Reso)lrces) (Fort Garry): Mr. Chairman, on. the point raised by the·Member for Lakeside and reiterated again by the Member for St. George couldn •t b.e further· off the mark if they tried. The Honourable Member for - I always want to say Brokenhead, but I mean St. George, The question of referring legislation to a court is one matter and a separate matter altogether.

Never have I run across in Beauchesne, and my reading of Beauchesne is probably as extensive as that of most members of the House, never have J seen a case where a court is called upon to interpret rules, and if I may say so, I think my honourable friend from Lakeside knows that fact. If he •s sat in this House for 42 years and doesn't know it, then his education is rather sadly lacking.

The point that was raised by the Member for Selkirk, if there was any merit to it I wo1,1ld say that it is a legal absurdity, and he. knows when we talk about legal absurdities - there are other absurdities in this House, but we•re now talking about a legal one - and this would be a legal absurdity if the House could not presume to deal with matters relating to its own member ship, to emoluments, pensions and so on, because the law abhors a vacuum and you can't have a situation where no one can deal with it. If we can •t deal with it, who can?.

So in that situation you would have a legal absurdity so ergo the question is answered by asking it. There. is no disability attaching in my humble opinion to anybody in the House voting on this question. MR. LAURENT DESJARDINS (St. Boniface) : Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that on this point of order - of course we"ve heard· from the legal adviser of the House - but it seems to me when there is any debate like this, that there's an easy way out. There's already a motion asking that this be referred to committee where you'll have some outside advice and so on.

I think thatit would be very easily done to send this thing to committee and then to report next session. This is ·another thing that can be looked into also. It just shows that we •re trying to rush into something. It's all right to say we decide here -we decide here - but this affects a lot of people in Manitoba, not only 57 people - because we •re the ones collecting - but there 1s the question of those that are paying in that will pay the shot.

I think that it is another reason, again if we •re unsure of this and if we want to be fair, especially in view of the fact that it •s so important to us that are so vitally interested. The Honourable First Minister said I could see if it did something to a person personally and not as members, well when a fellow is out of this House and he1s collecting, I think it's helping this man personally, not as a member - he•s no.longer a member ..

I think it's the. least that we can do, if this government doesn •t want to keep on being arrogant the way it •s been and if it doesn •t want to railroad this thing through, if it's really sincere, if it's trying to establish some part of pension - some of the people here .said they did agree with pension - I think that the least they can do is quit this ridiculous pressure that they're trying to put on to push this thing through and send it to committee where some people that are not concerned at all personally can have a chance to look at it and tell us ·nrst of all if the pension is .a good one; if the pension should be paid to everybody; or if the pension should be paid for those that need it, like we have in England and like you suggested, Mr.

Chairman. MR. RUSSE LL PAULLEY (Leader of the New Democratic Party) (Radisson): Mr. Chairman, may I apologize to the committee for being late. It happened that my little red Rambler ran out of gas, otherwise I would have been here at 9:3 0. Time has taken its toll on the Member for Radisson - he can 1t even watch his gas tank now. As I understand it, Mr. Chairman, the point of order before the House is whether or not a member can vote on a matter in which he has a direct pecuniary interest.

Is that correct, or is the motion before the House the motion for referral of this matter to a committee? --( lnterjection)--Well then, Mr. Chairman, may J.ask on what basis was the point of order raised on the motion, because it appears to me that there is two matters under consideration.

We have a motion before us as I understand it proposed by one of the members of the Liberal Party that this· bill be referred to a committee, ·and I would respectfully suggest in all due respect to those who have participated in the point of order, that on the motion that we•re concerned with, namely, whether or not this matter should be referred to a committee, that every member in thi's House is not concerned insofar as the. pecuniary return so -far as the motion that we have before us is concerned. If we were d!Oaling with the· sections of the bill as

May' 11 th, 1965 2609 (MR. PAULLEY conttd) ...... . to whether or not a pension should be paid - and there �re ten of us as i'understMd jt iri this House who m ay have a direct pecuniary interest - but only on that motion, not on the motfon that is on the floor at the presEmt time. I think we all have a right whether we m ay or we may not be now eligible for the pension, so I suggest to you, Mr. Chairman, that the point of order should be on the direct motion concerning the bill rather than on a 1notion to refer this matter to the committee. MR.

CHAIRMAN: I 'm still of the original opinion that I gave to this committee that it would be absurd that if under this rule we eouldn' t increase or decrease our indemnity - and we have certairily increased or decreased the indemnities in the past - and if we couldn •t do· it who else could?" No one, if that rule is to be taken as applying in this case.

Secondly, in the estimates, Appropriation No. 2 is an appropriation that we pass each year, year after year, which provides for travelling expenses, living allowances and area allowances to members, and if this rule is to be interpreted as honourable members of the Opposition think to be correct, we could never pass that and neither could anyone pass it.

So in my opiniori we are dealing here with a matter which is similar to living allowances, travelling allowances and area allowances or indemnities, something that applies to all members of the House who qualify, just the same as this would apply to people who qualify for living allowances and travelling expenses, and that in accordance with Beauchesne, Citation 66, clause (2), this is a matter which must be decided by the House. Committee rise. Call in the Speaker. IN SESSION MR.

CHAIRMAN: Madam Speaker, the question has been raised in Committee of the Whole under Rule 12 as to whether or not members can vote on matters respecting Bill 110 which provides for payments to Members of the Legislative Assembly and Ministers of the Crown upon their ceasing to be Members or Ministers. I have ruled in accordance with Citation 66, clause (2) of Beauchesne •s Parliamentary Rules and Forms, that this is a matter which must be decided by the House. The Committee has instructed me to refer this ruling to you, as to the correct ruling to be followed in this House at this time.

MADAM SPEAKER: Members of the House have heard the ruling of the Chairman. Shall the ruling of the Chairman be confirmed? MADAM SPEAKER put the question and after a voice vote declared the motion carried. MR. ROBLIN: Madam Speaker, if that is understood that the ruling is that we have the right to proceed with this bill, I would then suggest that the Chairman resume his seat and that Madam Speaker leave the Chair so the Chairman of the Committee can resume his place. MADAM SPEAKER: Would the Honourable Member from Winnipeg Centre please take the Chair. COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE HOUSE MR.

CHAIRMAN: The motion before the Committee is that this Committee recommend to the House that Bill No. 110,

an Act respecting payments to Members of the Legislative Assembly and Ministers of the Crown upon their ceasing to be Members or Ministers of the Crown, be not further proceeded with at this session but be referred to the Standing Committee on Statutory Regulations and Orders. I think we have had a very full discussion on this motion and I' think that we have come to the time when we should put this question . Are you ready for the question? MR. LEONARD A. BARKMAN (Carillon) : Mr. Chairman, before you place the question, I would like to say a few words on this bill.

I agree there has been a lot of discussion on it but I think this bill needs quite a bit of discussion. I for one, four or five days ago I don •t think I would have had anything to say, but after all these amendments and the change in so many things, I feel that I must say something on Bill 110, or on this Pension Plan. I want to assure however the Members of this House that the few words I want to say are without prejudice against anyone.

There are certain points" in this bill that coricerrt me sincerely in regard to some of the -poirlts that have been brought up. · I realize that this is not a popular thing to speak about in this House and possibly very popular outside of the House, but I wish to speak on the subject with an aim that it shall not make any difference to me whether it is popular or unpopular. I believe the prinCiple - of l do believe there is a principle involved here and I have a special respect for allthe older members, especially the 11 that have been mentioned and again discussed a few miriutes ag o,· but I believe

26 10 . May 11th, 1965 (MR. BARKMAN cont'd); ....... the facts are clear, . Much has been said of the high mortality rate of some of the politicians and. I agree with a lot of those statements, but, Mr. Chairman, I think that I would like to discuss or mention a few of the questions that are in my mind on this plan, and possibly .the number one question is this: why was the figure eight years chosen in the first place? Why not five years or 10 years as it is proposed now? Well I think we know the answer in this case, but what I am concerned about is this.

Let us say if this pension plan or proposed pension plan is needed and has been needed the last eight years, or possibly for more years, why was it not presented to this House? Why was it not presented by former members, or for that matter, ours.elves? You must agree it could have been, but 1 cannot convince myself that we have a clean-cut right to go back even just for one year.

While that does not seem to be the opinion of most. of this House, I feel that way and my thinking here is this, If the people representing all the Members of this Legislature in the past years - and there have been many - did not see the need, and I am of the opinion that there could have been a need - this I shall not discuss - but I as ,one individual have the right to help pass laws while I am sitting here as a m.ember, or may in the future which I do not know, but the question is why wa.sn 't this bill passed long before?

It keeps on bothering me and I know that my conscience will not allow me to say that past members that have been sitting in this House made a mistake in not introducing a plan. To me, my responsibility toward the pension plan or any other bill begins when a bill is intro duced and I am one of the members at that time, or I am present - or might be present possibly in the future - or if I am a member at that time.

I feel strongly about making this type of a retroactive, and somehow say in my mind that it ought to have been made a long time ago, We are certain the members before us were just as capable, if not much more capable, of thinking of this if the need was there. So you might ask what right have I got to take this attitude, Well I just come back to this and say there must have been many reasons or they would have done it before. I'm not just speaking of former members, I'm speaking of the present members here in this House who could have passed a bill similar to this within the last eight years. Mr.

Chairman, or present members, you and I today know we could have brought this plan in sooner, but I think the answer is quite obvious. We just simply did not see fit and thought it necessary until now, so how can we now honestly say it ought to have been done eight years ago when the plain facts are we did not. Also, I am against a plan of this nature. For that matter, I would go as far as to say not necessarily a type of a pension plan for the future, one that the Honourable Member from Lakeside mentioned, the people know what we are going to do and we tell them what we intend to do - fine.

So could we or anybody go to an insurance company for example - and one of the members mentioned that the other day - or for that matter any other company and get a retro active pension plan as we are trying to get on this basis. I think the answer is no. I believe there are a few cases where this is possible, but certainlynot on the same basis, so let us think soberly and pass legislation and not claim that this should have been done long ago or eight years ago, but ask ourselves the other question that I wish to present. Is it fair to the people of Man itoba to pass this type of a. bill? Yes, Mr.

Chairman, somebody will say as far as I am concerned it is easy for me to say this as a young member - you have not donated or contributed anything or very little corn..: pared to some of the older members - this is very true, but if this pension plan was needed sooner, I come right back again and I ask you again, all of us in this House, why was legisla tion not passed accordingly? The fact that if we believe a pension plan is needed today gives me in my humble opinion no right to say it was needed before today, so how can we. take such responsibility when we didn't pass it before.

Maybe we say they shouldhave, but the fact is and I come back to it again, and I might be sounding like a broken record by now, but the fact is we did not - this Legislature or th e one before did not - and in my humble opinion we have no right. I think the principle is wrong in accepting this type of a retroactive plan. Possibly - possibly- or unless the public has a chance to have a hearing or if they approve of such a plan w�en we go to them. either in the next election whenever it may be, then I wish to change my mind if they okay this. Mr. Chairman, let us study some of the other principles of this bill.

Are the securities or the proposed amounts in this plan not still out of line, even with.all the amendments, especially considering, as too often has been said, some of the Ministers. Much has been said in regard to what they are going to get and what they are not going to get, but mostly what they are going to get, and I don •t intend to go into that. I had intended before, but I think enough

May 11th, 1965 2611 (MR. BARKMAN conVd) .... .. . has been said about that. But I doubt very much if the people of Manitoba are really ready to accept. this type of a financial responsibility, and I •m sure that a lot of us have been thinking that -if w.e deserve this type of a pension plan, what about our municipal people? What about the school trustees? You could go on and on for the m any people that are serving publicly. I •d have to say if I run as a candidate. in the next election and had voted for this bill, . I 'm very much afraid I need not even bother trying to be a candidate.

But the latter part.does not bother me at all; I just simply believe for myself, I cannot feel free at this time to support a bill ofthis type. Mr. Chairman, my attitude, as some others have said on this side, and mine also, in regards to all the new taxes that have been suggested and enforced since last summer - and we know there have been quite a few of them - that I have most sincerely opposed these increases. How then can I vote for an increase for myself? I know I cannot, for the present time especially if this bill - or any future bill for that matter - calls for this type of retroactive type of pension.

I am of the opinion that the Ministers and the private members of this House today are getting sufficient indemnities and salaries, and if we•re not, at least we have the right to re quest for more. So we cannot blame this on the taxpayer. lt's up to us if we wish to ask for more. Therefore I cannot see why there is a feeling that there should be possibly a subsidiza-, tion -- that Ministers especially and some of the members should be subsidized by a retroactive pension plan. Mr.

Chairman, another point I have concerning this bill is in the principle of giving members, or Ministers for that part, only one year's time to join this pension plan. I wonder if there is an explanation. I am sure the Honourable Ministe r will possibly have O[le, but I cannot see the reason for this time limit. Surely it's not meant to scare or to rush somebody into this. Possibly I just don •t understand it, but I can •t understand any other reason than that and I don •t think that it •s necessarily right to do that.

Again I have to come back to what the Honourable Member from Lakeside, my colleague, said when he mentioned, 11 What right have we in thinking, 11 as he said, 11to take a plan like this when we were all not working full-time. " Well I guess we would have to admit the same thing applies to all of us except the Ministers, who in my opinion I believe are getting their difference of worth with their salaries.

Who in the world would think - or who in the world, in the municipal field, especially in the rural areas - I would not say in the city centres - would think of a pension plan; or even if they did, I doubt very much if many municipal people, or for that matter many school trustees, would even try to attempt to get a pension plan from their own people in their own areas. And why? Why cannot they look for this type of a pension plan?

So much has been said about wishing that people would not have it bad in their ol<;ler years and I'm sure that all of us could think of so many .reeves and so many councillors that really are not in the position that they ought to be, and here, while I think we •re in a much better position in this House than they have been and they've served for much less, we wish to take a pension plan and don't even think of them.

But I think the answer is simple, because we all know that these people, the municipal people and the school trustees - and again I have to agree - they do not necessarily and should not necessarily get this type of a pension plan be cause we all know they•re not working full-time. Mr. Chairman, I agree with the Honourable Member from Lakesidewhen he said the other day, and also, Mr.

Chairman, yourself, that we don •t have to worry too mu eh in regard to encouraging better people to run for office - encourage them with a pension plan - and that a member who gets defeated later has such a rough time to find a job or a position. Maybe if we thought of MPs instead of MLAs, possibly the danger might be a little bit more there be cause of their full-time job and because of them losing their connections at home, but I cannot see it in the case of - most cases - in this House of an MLA.

And to the latter I would like to say, although I might have to eat my own words some day but I hope not, that I do not think that this present group - and I think I know most of them - I don •t think any of this present group need fear this is going to happen to them at all. Mr. Chairman, somehow I have the feeling we are trying to protect the people most that need the protection least.

I am sorry to say, but I believe that the Ministers 1 salaries - and much has been said so I don •t want to say too much - should be high enough without subsidizing it with a pension plan; and if it isn 1 t high enough, let •s raise it but not subsidize it with a pension plan. I feel sentimental towards what the Honourable Member-for lnkster had to say

2612 May 11th, 1965 (MR. BMKMAN cont•d) .. ...... the other day, but I believe the solution here is found that the bill has put an age .lii)Jit on the plan now- and as was suggested at that .time maybe age 55.or age .· so - now of course it's set at 55. Again, what does an ordinary pension plan call for? We know it •s age 65. and you cannot even start collecting at age 65 if you are stiil earning $900 or more and you have to wait till age 70 before you can collect.

I am certain all of us here in this House would like to see the Honourable Member for Inkster retire honourably and comfortably - I 'm not bringing it up for that reason - but we could also suggest that with the confidence the people of his constituency have given him for such a long time and the fact that he 'served well, and at the age he is now, I don't feel that anybody in his constituency or in this House even would let him down.

I have not exactly the same feeling as the Honourable Leader of the NDP Party when he mentioned in his speech- and for a while I thought it was quite a passionate speech - that he had lost a whole year of pension rights. I think the Honourable Leader would also have to admit that he gained more than one year of pension rights by having been a member in this House for the time that he has, and the fact that he mentions the CNR had just started their plan three years ago makes me think again that it was not necessarily mature or necessary to have this plan sooner. So why a retroactive plan for this Legislature?

I will admit that I think the honourable member is one of the harder workers and I would also wish him well when he does retire - and I for one do not necessarily wish him an early retirement, I do not say it for that reason - but as a fighter and. as a champion of the people as he has claimed in here so often, I cannot see how he can take the position that he does in supporting this bill. Mr. Chairman, I agree with the Honourable Member of St. Matthews that we could have a plan, including a plan for the Ministers, but I cannot agree that they are not necessarily underpaid and I think I've said enough on that.

If they are, I do not believe again that they should be subsidized with a pension plan. When the Honourable Member mentioned a retire ment allowance - fine, I certainly agreed with him; but I cannot agree with the method that this bill suggests. Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, I am not necessarily completely against a type of a pre sent or a future pension plan, but I am against this unbalanced type of a retroactive pension plan.

While quite a few Biblical quotations have been given in this House in the last while, something stayed on my mind and I couldn't get it off my mind and possibly some of it is still there. I believe it's in the Second

Chapter of Corinthians - in the Seventh

Chapter I believe -- in the Ninth

Chapter it is, where there is a quotation that says something like this: "Those that sow sparingly shall reap sparingly; those that sow bountifully shall reap bountifully. " I believe that this Bill 110, or the proposed pension plan, would not be a Biblical truth. I think here in this bill we are sowing sparingly and have an opportunity to reap bountifully in many cases, and I would have to go along with the motion that a committee should be set up. MR. CHAIRMAN: All those in favour of the motion ...... . MR.

GUTTORMSON: Mr� Chairman, the last amendment that was introduced by the Ministe1 : who brought this bill in regarding - that •s Motion No. 15 - it seems to me that Cabinet Ministers who leave the Cabinet are still entitled to a pension even if they remain in this House. Now I'll quote the part of that motion which makes me believe that. It says, 11Any allowance payable under I or

Part II shall be discontinued during any period when the person to whom the allowance is being paid: (

a) is a judge or is receiving an annuity under The Judges Act (Canada) or holds a full-time judicial or semi-judicial appointment; or (

b) is a member of the Senate or the House of Commons of Canada or of the Legislature of any other province of Canada. " This doesn 1t say. .... . . · MR. CHAIRMAN: The Motion 10 above that refers to a member of this Legislature, it has the effect of preventing a member from this Legislature collecting a pension. MR. GUTTORMSON: Pardon? MR. CHAIRMAN: Motion 10, which is above Motion 15, is an amendment which has the effect of preventing a member of this Legislature obtaining a pension at the saine time that he is a member. MR. GUTTORMSON: Thank you. Mr.

Chairman, when the Minister who introduced this bill replied to 13ome of the criticisms of the bill, he accused us on this side of the House of being political and. other uncomplimentary remarks, and I would suggest to the Minister that if we were so political and we were so wrong, as it was said, then I think thilt he shouldn •t have brought in the amendments? If we were just political and ev.�;rything was right, he should have let the bill stand as it was. It's obvious that we were right and that the criticisms were

May 11th, 1965 (Mr. GUTTORMSON cont'd) .. .. -sincere and well thought out. Of course yesterday he had a change of he.art and he .said they were excellent. After a;ttacking the same criticisms on Satur day, last evening he said they were excellent and they were going to follow some of them. . Perha ps he would consider following some more .. 'fhe Leader of the Opposition suggested with dr awing the bill. This seems to many would be an excellent suggestion but the Minister hasn' t seen fit to answer it yet. He said that they took years to study it.

Nvw it's difficult for me and I think for many members of the House to believe that it was studied for years,· and then when they bring a bill into -the House and in·the space of three days they bring in three amendments, some .of them making some major changes to the bill that was introduced. The Leader of the Opposition said that the bill was poorly planned. l'm not so sure I agree with him on that point because it indicates to me that it was well planned because of some of the provisions that wer.e contained in the bill. It seems that they couldn't possibly have been in there unless it was devised.

According to some of the members of the Conservative caucus the major architect of this plan, the Minister of Mines and Natural.Resources, has accused us of everything under the sun. He hasn't made any remarks in this debate without being vindictive, If we say we disagree with a provision in the bill, he jumps us in a vindictive manner. However, this is not unlike the Minister ofMines and Natural Resources. Earlier this session I introduced a resolution calling for the rescinding of the heat tax.

Although some of the members across may feel that this is unnecessary, that it wasn't hitting many people, I'd like to tell the members of this House that in my constituency it was felt by a great number of people, and proof of the pudding that this is hitting a lot of people in Manitoba was the announcement by the Minister of Welfare that he was going to increase the welfare costs. to the welfare recipients in view of the increase, because it was felt that they would suffer as a result of the increased tax. Last evening I, like I presume most of the members in this. House, received their drive.r's licences.

For my wife and I, it's going to cost me $10. 00, where it would have cost $4. 00 in 1958 . I'd like to ask the Minister what wouldbe wrong, and if he can give us an explanation why it would be so wrong to refer the subject to a committee. In view of the fact that we have made a number of suggestions and the government has seen fit now to bring in E!Ome .changes, surely this is proof that the bill isn't satisfactory, and perhaps upon further study by a committee who have time to examine all the clauses, bring in a bill which would be satisfactory.

I don't know, but I can't see the rush in implementing this bill at this time . Surely no one in this House is going to suffer by not passing this bill. The chances are that there'll be no election this year and therefore no member -of this House who decides to retire or is defeated will not suffer be cause they 'll still be around. We still have another full session to . discuss. the matter. I would suggest that he. take our advice and withdraw the bill, and if he still feels it should be introduced, do so at the beginning of the session next year after proper study has been given to it.

Another matter I'd like to ask the Minister when he gets on his feet-to explain is the de finition of the word "year". When he introduced the bill, .in

Section 2 we have

definitions of all the different words; contribution, Deputy Speaker, Leader of the Opposition, member, minister and so on - session .., but we have no definition for the word "year" -- (Interjection) -- The Minister of Education tells me it's 365 dayE!. We. have the government's definition of the word "upon", and I think in view of the definition-of that word, I think which means a year or more, I think it's fair to ask the government to nefine this word . .

I'd like to ask the Minister for example how it would affect those members such as him self and othe.rs in this H_ouse who were elected on December 14, 1962. Just for purposes of clar ity, .supposing some of that group came into the House initially at that date, would they not . be eligible unless they sat say to December, 1972? Just what is meant by year or could he explain that to me please . I think thq.t the Minister would be well advised to follow ,the advice and withdraw it.

I think the majo.rtty of the membe.rs of this House wol,lld agree with us; I. think the Minister would get cr edit for withdrawing the bill and acce pting the advice of this group to do so. He made a re mark yesterday that he had h13ard .from his constituents that they were all in favour of this bill - or those that he had talked to. Well I think that the Minister would agree in all fa;irness that the constituents that he represents, the situation of mos.t of them are different from some other parts of the province.

That constituency has the good fortune to be -- the residents. are reason ably well-to-do or .comfortably fixed in relation to many other areas. I think it would be

2614 May 11t h, 1965 (1\ffi. GUTTORMSON cont'

d) reasonable to assume that the feeling doesn't necessarily prevail tJv'oughout the province . I kno'w that there are other sections of this city, other parts of.the pro vince that wouldn't find it nearly as accep taple' as he implled yesterday.

A great deal has been made of the pension given by the Federal Government, but I'd like to point out to him that in the federal field there is no special pension for Cabinet Ministers as such, As I understand the legislation, all members are treated alike, that whether a man has been a Cabinet Minister for 15 years or a backbencher for 15 years, he 's treated in the same mannero If I'm incorrect -- I would be subject to corre ction.

If I'm not mistaken the city aldermen brought in a bill, or asked this Legislature to give them pe rmission to implement a pension plan for the aldermen, and if my memory serves me corre ctly, the members of this House turned this down and wouldn't have any part of it, so it would indicate that we 're not being too consistent in this matte r. , When the Minister replies, I would suggest that he deal with the matters that have been raised on the bill and try to refrain from being vidictive and personal, as we are . I've not called anyone any names.

I've found fault with the bill and I would suggest that the Minister should treat the matter in the same light when he sees fit to reply to some of the remarks that have been made on this side of the House. MR. STEINKOPF : Mr. Chairman, I will reply to the questions just posed to me by the Honourable Member from St, George and I hope that I will be able to reply in the same friendly vein in which he has just presented these questions. His first question was why would it be wrong to refer it to. a committee and what is the rush. There doesn't seem to be any rush.

The, next question or suggestion was that the bill was poo rly thought out or poorly planned, and I think all of these three questions could be bulked together and a reply made that would cover all three of them. No one who has had anything to do with this bill would agree that it has been poorly planned or poorly put togethe r. The mere fact that the bill is rather concise and neat and speaks forth its suggestions in plain and unfettered language, must I thirik be attributed to the fact that the research on the bill was done and was done prope rly. The bill was divided into three parts.

Part I has Sections from 3 to 8 and they deal with the retirement allowances for members, and it is not very difficult to follow the thinking and the planning of those eight sections.

Part II is almost a replica of

Part I, save that it deals with the Ministers, the Speake r and the Leader of the Opposition, and includes the Deputy Speaker.

Part Ill is a general statement on the bill, rather short, concise explanation or details of the operation of the bill. The amendments that have been made may appear to some -- the two and a half or three pages that were received last night really constitute the full group of amendments that were made. The amendments that were brought in the second time included the amendment that was made the first time, the amendment that had the age start at 55, and that is included on Page 2 of the amendments.

The sheet that came with them, or came a little later , is a more detailed explanation of the amendments in the first group of amendments. Now having gone through the process of having the bill put togehter, and again I would like to probably fault myself if there is any fault coming, in that I didn't in explaining the bill go over the bill

chapter and verse and explain each one of the sections of the bill. I did feel at the time that the bill was brought up the first time ,and the explanations were given and I had done so in a rather general way, but in a kind of a generality that would include everything, and so once the bill was presented it would be a simple matter to figure out the benefits that could be derived by any member or any group of members and what their payments would be . The underlying principle of 6 % on payments and 3% on indemnities or 3% benefits is con stant and is the same throughout the bill.

Therefore, when you would bring it into the House, one would hope to get some suggestions. I don• t think it's the kind of a bill that one 'Yould want to criticize it for the sake of criticizing it. One is either in favour of pensions or is not in favour of pensions, and there are those who are definitely opposed tothem.

The.re are those who are opposed to pensions for legislators at any level, whether they be at the federal level, the provincial level, the municipal ievel - including school trustees, and if that be their thinking, why cer tainly no one can find fault with it, but it certa irily must be a very modern concept if 8 out of 10 Legislatures in Canada today have pensions plans. These pension plans are not too old in the light of Canada's history, some of them only a few years, mos,t of them less than ten years in existence, so the.

Legislatures of Canada have been slow in adopting the practice that business and the industry have, followed for some years. It isn't very long ago that - certainly in the memory of the Honourable Member for

May llt h, l965 26 15 (MR. STEINKOPF cont'

d) Inkster that old age pens ions were being talked about in this House. I wasn't here but I understand almost since the day that he came into this House around 1940 that he, had a perma nent re solution on the Order Paper requesting old age pensions, and I gather that each year the party that w -_a in power took just a little _bit more rec ognition of those re solutions be cause they saw what was happening around them and that the changing society re quired this kind of se curity to perish the thought of the old folks home that one used to read about as a child.

Not that I suggest that a pension is brought in here for need; I think this is part of a package deal. It is part of a way of life today and it is part of a way of life for men who spend two months of their year, maybe a little longer, in this House - a great majori ty of them not only away from their business but away from their homes, a complete dislocation of their life.

It may be a pa rt-time job but it is certainly not the type of a part-time job that one really thinks of as part-time jobs in the normal sense; and it certainly isn't one night a week or two nights a week to a council meeting where business can be conducted very close to the Ci ty Hall Chambe r or wherever it is, and even conducted while at the council meeting. There is also a real premi um charged here on those who do not attend regularly.

Anyone who is not in the Chamber or is cer tainly within the building, cannot do justice to this job, and to jus tify the pens ion and to bring up and to think out a re asonable type of pens ion for this House was not - we didn't come to it easily - but when I sugge sted that much thought had been given to it, I didn't mean nece ssa rily myself or this House.

Much thought has been given to it by the other Legisla tures in Canada and we strive not for uniformity for the sake of uniformity but for a uniform standard of living in Ca nada; a uniform thinking in Canada; and if we are cap able of passing uniform legislation, cert ainly there should be some degree of uniform ity in the salaries and the pensions that the members of this House get. Now I'm not suggesting that as we are being paid as one of the lowest Houses in Ca nada that this is a bad thing.

This is the consensus of opinion, and people in Manitoba - legislators are prepa red to acc ept it and I see no reason why they should be paid more than what they them selves think they are worth. We now feel that this pension plan is something that the members are entitled to and they are worth it, and this is the consensus of opinion of this side of the House and that is why the bill is presented. The bill has now been before this House many many days. There is no rushing through of this bill. We are as patient as you would like to be, to give us your suggestions.

We have al rea dy shown that we will accept them in the same spirit in which they are given. Any sugge stion that the bill is being railroaded or is being push ed through the House I think can be discounted by anyone who has sat here since the debate has started, and the debate will continue I hope on the same basis as it started out today at least, where we again are getting the real opinions of the Honourable Members of the Opposi tion without getting into the pers onalities. So for that reason, or for those reasons, I see no reason why the bill should be sent to any committee.

We are the people who have been elected to make the decision. We have done our homework on the bill - it is here . I don't think that there is a pens ion plan in the country - you can consult any group of people who know their busine ss on pensions and I'm sure· that they will come up with the same suggestion that we have recei ved time and time again, that the best thing to do is to pattern it after the plan in the other provinces.

This we did, and if you will check the charts that are before you, you will find that almost on every score we are in agree ment and cer tainly within the principle of those pensi on plans . After the pension plan has been in operation a number of years, then I'm sure that those who are sitting here at that time will take another look at it. It may have served its purpo se; it may have not. It may have been too rich for the taxpayers of Manitoba, but that's something that can be controlled. It isn't an uncontrollable factor .

On the other hand, as I really believe, it will turn out some 10 or 15 years from now not to have been sufficient. Some of the benefits that have been sugge sted I too would like to see if it were not for the fact that the costs of the bill would go up, such as payment to widows and orphans of members of this House. Some time if the community can afford it, they may add this benefit to the plan before you, and for probably any members who are in the House at that �ime. The definition of the word "year" - I think I understood what the Honourable Member for St ..

George me ans - it would be from December 14, 1962 to December 14, 1963, that is from ele ction to dissolution of Parliament and those would be counted as years. There could .be a part year in this opera tion or a lag between an election if someone was out. . I don't think there were any other specific questions. There was a reference made to the

2616 May 11th, 1965 (MR.

STEI NKOPF cont'd) ..• , , . constituency of River Heights, and the general impre ssion I gue ss one w.ould gather is that River Heights isn't really an average constituency, it probably would be a little. above the average , that is so far a s the e.conomic standing of the constituents are concerned, This. may be so and ! would not argue that point, . but notwithstanding I would think that in.River Heights; particularly on either side of Ce ntennial Street and the streets run ning three or four· blocks on either side,· there are any number of pensi oners, people who. have worked hard all their lives and who have ea rned a pension: people who have worked for organi za tions that have paid for pensions,. who have contributed to their pensi on plan and the�· know the worth of a pension, and I think that many of them are finding it as difficult today to meet the risi ng cost as in any other constituency in Manitoba.

In talking to these people and in discuss ing with them too the question of heating tax, where their tax in some cases is paid on heating costs of anywhere from $100 to $15 0 per house, they have expre ssed to me a very distinct willingness to absorb that tax because they are the ones that will benefit on the other things. Th,ey are not the ones that are buying the cigarettes or the liquor or having a couple of cars and using up a lot of gas for driving around, and also will get the benefit of the .rebate on their taxes.

Now I would suggest that the members continue as they have, to give me any other sugge s tions or direct que stions that they have and I will continue to try and answer them. MR. BARKMAN: Mr. Chairman, I would like to set the records clear as far as the state ment I made . about the Honoura ble Leader of the NDP par ty in regard to the plan that I mentioned of the CNR, He says that I must have mis understood him and I take his word for that, so I wish to retract that part. The other qu(lstion that I believe the.

Honourable Minister d.id not answer was the question that I tried to place - and I gue ss I didn't make it very clear - why the one year or approximately one year time limit on the acceptance or joining this plan. MR. STEINKOPF :. Mr. Ch airman, this is for the retroactive feature -t hat you can join the plan at anytime you'd like, that is from this day forward, but in order to have a cut-off date at some time, for a retro active position, it was decided to make it a yea.r - June 1, 1966. MR. MORRIS GRAY (Inkster) : I'll only be one minute. Did anybody say "hooray"?

As far as the Opposition claims - I don't know how they found it out - but about eleven members here are eligible for the pension at the moment. As far as I am conce rned, I'm not applying for the pension and I' m not very much interested and I do not intend to state what I'm going to do between the two years . By that time I may be the late Mr. Gray. Anyway, if they feel that they have eleven, take it for ten. I will not decide on whether I will accept the pens ion to which I have to contribute a certain amount in many .hundreds of dollars, in order to get it.

So instead of eleven, please, use the figure ten, beca use one definitely is out, for the time being. We have two years to go. So the whole thing, is -w ell, two yea rs , not one . All right, as far as I am concerned, I am going to support it but not beca use I am per sonally, directly interested. I am not starving, I have enough to eat and I don't spend too much, so don't worry anything about it. So next time when you argue about it - because we have :repeated it dozens of times, by every speaker of the Official Oppos ition - worrying very mu ch, how much it costs and so on.

I rose just to answer one accusa tion about refusi ng the aldermen to get it. First of all, I don't recollect any time re fusing in the last quarter of a century that I'm here, every time that a request came in from the city col,lncil for legs Uative per missi on to do some thing, I always argued, they are just as entitle.d in this House, being public repres entatives elected by the people, I always argued, I always sugge sted that they ask for a homerule charte r, so they don't have to come to this House every time whether they have an approach, or they forgot about any little small details.

The matter is too important, the council is to() important - elected by the people - they could have their own. So you cannot charge me or the group for it because we have never refused yet, anything, to my re collection, for giving the council anything. So !t hink pe rhaps, let' s quit now; its very difficult to stay here at this time, too much longe r. The Opposition made their point, rightly or wrongly, it's not for me to judge - �y ju dgment will never be taken anyway. So. let's se ttle the whole, thing now, . instead of staying another week.

And not as an old politician, but not as an old .statesman, but as an old individual who has. seen life perhaps as much or more than any honourable member in this Houi';e, feel that, let's maintain our .democracy; .demand your rights - each member ha s a right to demand their rights, but I don't think he has ju stification to compel me to stay here long after they have made their point. And their point may be right. I am at liberty to disagree with them . Bu t they may be right. So I hope that the whole thing .is now settled, and after all .its the House under our

May llth,, ,,l965 , 26 1 7. ' (MR. GRAY cont'd) ...... d�mocratic system that has the final say. Let's find out and let's get on with the busin ess so we could perha ps, at least the farmers could perhaps go to their farm and cultivate tl:�e necessa ry food that we' require for us and the hungry world . ' lVlR. JOHN P. TANCHAK(Eme rs on) : Mr . Ch airman, I have spoken on this once but' I feel I should say a few more words . And commen ting on the prese ntation or the speech made by the.

Honourable Member for Inkster, I say that I agree with him that this should come to· soine' kind of a settlement, and I'l l be the first one to say, "I agree " that we should term inate this; but the solution is very very simple and that is that the sponsor of this bill, the Honourable the Minister, �hould get up and announce in this House that we will agree to the amendment that is before .us that this should go to the comm ittee, and I assure you that if the Minister did make that statement, I do not think. that the Opposition will oppose any more .

So the solution to that is simple and I agree with the Honourable Member for lnkster that we could terminate this and tl�en as he says some of our farmer friends would be able to go back and put their wheat and their oats in, prov iding the weather permits . I menti:oned.the sponsor, the sponsor of the bill, the Honourable Minister who is defending it, the bill . I.know it is very difficult for him to defend the bill, as the one that 's presen ted to us here, because this bill was not designed properly, it was not well thought up. But I do not envy hirn his pos ition. I know he has to defend it.

He is the sponsor. But l'm not going to blame him entirely for this bill beca use I am su re that he and he alone did not des ign the bill by him self. There was a suggestion made here that the designer of the bill probably was .the Minister of Mines and Natural Reso urces beca use he had most to say about it and defend it. But there's one. thing that I'm wondering about -w e had the Leader of the House here, the Premier of the Province of Manitoba, and the Premier himself controls the purse strings - I'm just \VOndering why this was unloaded on the shoulders of the Provincial Secretary.

I woulc:l think that since he 's the controller of the purse and he 's the Leader of the House, that the Prem ier should have introduced this bill and probably the Premier has more el{}lerience than his Cabinet Ministers, and he might have been able to defend this bill, if he thought in his opinion this was a good bill. But I notice that the Premier, most of the time, sits and doesn't even sit in this House while - most of the time, I'l l say - when the bill is being discussed.

It seems to me that he is not too concerned whether this bill is the prope r bill, whether it should be accepted by the House or not, be cause he has said, if anything very very little as far as this bill is concerned. I would like to he ar the Minister's view, the Premi er's views on this bill.

It would be interesting to listen what he has to say, not only his subordinate s the Cabinet Ministers - and lw ould say that it is not fair to the Cabinet Ministers who are defending it, to defend it when he is re- sponsible, more resp onsible, than the Ministers who have spoken so far,forthe introduction of this bill,by virtue of be ing the leader ,because lain sure that if he does not think this bill was the proper thing,the proper kind of abill ,that he could have vetoed it in his caucus .. I do not attend the caucus of the Conser vative Party and I do not wish to do so.

But that's my opinion and I for one, would like the Premier to make some kind of a comment on it and try and defend this bill. I'm looking forward to it. Now we have already madc ::::>me progre ss and good pro gres s, by debating, by opposing this bill - and when. l say this, I am referri ng to the amendments that were brought forward by the government, as a result of the Libera l Opposition in this House . And I would like to say - this word was mentioned before, that this bill would be more consci onable now. It was referred to as. an urwonscionable transaction, and it was an unconsc ionable transaction.

There was some objection to it, In my opinion, it was - the way it was introduced in the first place . And why ? What .is .it? Because in the way it was introduced, before the amendments were placed before us. I wou1d like .to consider it as a guaranteed annual wage for the Cabinet Ministers , because that's exactly what it was , if it was to have been passed in its or iginal form.

It was so designed that the Ministers could have made a financial killing in this, beca use - some flash cards were flashed betore us several days ago and it indicated that it was possi ble , the way the bill was in troduced in the first place, for a young cabinet minister to pretty near realize a quarter of a million dollars by the time he was through on this ea rth. I .myse lf, one of the Liberal group, am very happy that we took the stand as we did in this House , on this bill. The results prove it, as I said before, the amendments before us.

If we had taken. the s:;tme stand as the rest of the members in this House, and supported the bill, the bill would have become law, and the government now agrees with us that the bill was not a proper bill, because thei� amendments were brought forward. Weil we must have been right. We must have been, fighting for what we believed was right, and the. government now does agree

261 8 May 11th, 1965 (MR. TANCHAK cont'd) .. , .. .. . with us, in part, by bringing forth these amendments. I think that if this bill would have been acc epted in its original form, it would have had a degrading effect on all the members of this House . Listening to the news, listening to the radio, the television, reading the pape rs, that's just the impress ion that I get, that if the bill was acc epted in its or iginal form it would just have done that. Why do I say it ?

Bec ause many people, ri ghtly or wrongly, believe that our politicians are not sincere and you hear that quite often - Oh, politics, it's so and so - I'm not going to use the word that they do - and this would have added to it. They wouldn't have had faith in the people that conduct their affairs . And I say if it wasn't for the Liberal Pa rty, all the legislation would have been under question and suspic ion; not only this bill but any other legislation that was passed or to be passed in the future, would have been questioned.

I for one am very happy that we did take this stand beca use we have ac complished something. Now I think I'd like to ask a few questions. I don't know if they'll be answered. I'm just wondering whether the backbenchers knew when the bill was ori ginally introduced that they were only thrown the cr umbs, if the bill would have gone in its ori ginal form, while the Ministers would have a feast. That's exactly what it was . I' m just wonder ing if they knew it. I wonder if it was properly caucused. Something else. Did they know that one could have dra wn two pensions from the same employer. Did they know that ?

And did they agree with that, the backbenchers ? I'm just wonder ing. Pre sumably the Cabinet Ministers knew. I do not know. Now they would get I said, a double pension; they would have gotten a double pension, And who was the employer in that case or would have been the employer? The people of the Province of Manitoba would be the employers of this - probably you say it the government, the Premier and so on - but it's still the people of Manitoba. And I'm just wondering, to make such a blunder, such a boop, was it an overs ight on the part of the Cabinet Ministers ? It could have been, but I'm wondering.

If it was an over sight on the part of the Cabinet Ministers then we are right in insisting that this bill be sent to a committee to study, because if the Cabinet Ministers were incapable of designing a proper bill, how can we trust that the Cabinet Ministers would finalize -t here will be rules and regu lations - how can we trust the Cabinet Ministers to make a good job on this ?

Now on the other hand, we can look at this wa y: That the Cabinet Ministers did know what they were doing, that they did know what implicatio.'ls this bill was going to produ ce; then if that was the case, they did know, so I would say that I could accuse, and all of us, the people of Manitoba, could accuse the Ministers pf the present government, of the Conser vative Govern ment of scheming to feather thei r beds at the expense of the people of Manitoba. So there's only two - either they knew or they did not know - it was an oversight. Now what is it ?

Was it an overs ight or was it purpo sely done to benefit a select group in this House ? Now we have an amendment before us, why should this bill be referred to a committee to study it ? And I would say so that if a pension scheme is developed, it may be an equitable one, fair to the pensioner - fair to the recipient, I mean; fair to the people of Manitoba and one - this is very important - that the Province of Manitoba could afford at this time when the citizens are being so heavily taxed, espec ially in this year. How could we be sure this is the case with respect to the proposed pension plan ? We don't know.

We ha ven't had enough time and proba bly some of the members of this House haven't got the means at their disposal to study it and haven't got the time. The only way, I submit, is to have exhaustive study of this before this is passed in the House. Where is the best way to do this ? I would say the best way to do this would be in committee. This is the reason why we say, send it to a committee. In committee this would be thoroughly studied. People could make pres entations and recommendations could be made to the Legislature and maybe if a pension bill is desira ble it would be a bill wo rthwhile accepting.

Just as an example, when this bill was introduced even the sponsor was confused, the sponsor of the bill was confused himself at that time. We have had several figures given to us and ea ch figure was different. Now, probably we haven't got the figures as far as the ten year period is concern ed. They may be conflicting and confusing too, There was a conflict in figures between the Minister and one of our local pape rs here, Winnipeg papers. The Minister seemed to disagree· with the figures given by the daily pape r, and the paper disagreed with him. I don't know how that is going to end.

I for one do not know who is right, but I would say - one may say that we should accept the statement of the Minister, it's quite proper in this House, but we have experienced in the past some examples where the Minister wasn't quite right, and here, as far as this bill is conce rned we have witnessed the same thing. So in the conflicting figures given by the Minister and' the paper, I would say I'm inclined to accept the

May 11th, ·1 965 261 9 (MR. TANCHAK cont'd) ...... latter's figures, because surely a paper, with. subscriptions in the thou sands, which covers thousands of citizens of Manitoba, would really thoroughly study the problem. I don't thin-k that this news media would like to confuse thousands and thousands of people in the Province oi Manitoba; while the Minister here, probably in the first place is only confusing 57 of us here plus a few attend ants and so on.

So I cannot believe that any news media would purposely try to mislead tlie people of Manitoba - and I am not suggesting that the Minister is, but I think that the Minister himself is a little confused, therefore I think we should ask the House to accept the recom mendation that we are giving, our amendment, and send it into com . ., mittee to have it studied. I have a book here, and I'm just going to refer to it as I speak, and it says "Pens ions - "C anadian Handbook of Pensions and Welfare. Plans " and it gives you some reasons here why a pension plan is desirable, if it is so.

One reason, the first one says; "An approved pension plan allows the ac cumulation of a fund, the earnings of which are not subject to income tax. " MR, CHAIRMAN: Please keep to the motion before the committee and that is whether or not this bill should be referred to the Standing Comm ittee .... MR. TANCHAK: That's exactly what I'm doing. MR. CH AIRMAN: And your quotations have no reference to this motion before the com mitte e. MR. TANCHAK: No, but I would like to differ with the Chairman.

I'm trying to give reasons why, and these are the reasons why this bill should go to committee, I'm going to out line the whole ..... MR. CHAIRMAN: You're getting away from the motion before us. MR. TANCHAK: No, I would like to differ, with due respect, but here are exactly the rea sons I am trying to place befor e us why we should send this bill to committee and if you'll bear with me we '11 go ahead and see the relation here. This is one of the reasons why there should be a pension. There are only two, it won't take too many anyway.

Another reason: "An approved pension plan is the only practical method whereby contributions can be collected from employees to reduce the cost of pensions." Another reason. Now, there 's reasons why employers propose a pension and some of the se things would be studied in committee. I'm sure that the com mittee would pick up a book like this and they'l l study and everybody interE:sted will study to find out what is the best pension plan; why should this pension plan be introduced and when it should be introduced.

The employer may be forced to put a pension plan as a re sult of collective bar gaining whether he likes it or not. That's one of the reasons, they say. Now in t:1is case I wonder where the demand came and this is what should be studied, Was - in the opinion of the committee is a pension plan neces sary. To form or to give a pension to anybody, it is necessary that somebody ask for that pension plan. Now I would like to know in this House, who approached the government, who asked for the pension plan? I know that none of us on this side have asked for a pension plan as far as I remember. I wonder who did it?

Was it the Cabinet Ministers who approached the Minister, the Premier, or was it the backben chers of the Conservative Party who asked for a pension plan. If ther e was no request for the pension plan, I would suggest that this committee would consider it if it was in the comm ittee . They would consider this. Is it advisable ? Who asked for it ? I didn't ask for it and as far as I know I haven't heard of anybody asking for it. That's one question that the committee would consider. Who asked for it? Now another one .

"The existence of a pension plan makes it less embarrassing for the employer to get rid of an employee who has outlived his usefulness. " Now if he had outlived his usefulness, it makes it easier for the employer to get rid of him; but the employer in this case does not, the goverment does not get rid of anybody. It's the people who get rid of .... , so I do not think the people of the Province of Manitoba are concern ed in this. But here is another question. Why was this pension introduced ?

Was it the intention - I'm not trying to put words in the First Minister's mouth - is it the intention of the First Minister to retire some of his Cabinet Ministers and that would make it easier for him; less embarrassing for him as in the ir employer, since he 's the First Minister, to get rid of some of his de adwood, and then naturally they'll expect a fancy pension and. it would be easier for the employer to retire the se Cabinet Ministers. "The employer is held in higher regard by the community.

" The employer, if he provides a pension, would be held in high re gard by the community - I don't think in this case that it does apply. We are taking of our own and the Leader of tlie House probably agrees with a pen sion scheme.

May Jlth, 1965. (MR. TANCHAK cont'd) '.'A good pension. plan improve s the employee's competitive position in bidding for labour. " It· improves· his comp etitive' posi tion in bidding for labour . ln the ffrst place , I wonder whether we could be termed' labour - although I don't say we don't work in here whether we could be termed labour, but what coni petition, unless you take it as a whole during the election - and there was quite an ·arg ument made on this - competitive position in bidding for labour.

I disagreed with that in the first place that an:y pension sch eme - that mone�· should be the in' centive to bring good people ·in, "A pension plan provides an orderly sc hedule of promotions for younger employees and the atmosphere of the organization remains youthful and progre ss ive .

" I don:•t think that in this case it would apply at all, because the people who are introducing this bill have no say in this whether the people who enter this would be youthfuL ''A pension plan gives security to the employees if the' firm iS wound up.'' Gives se curity to the employe es. !· sugge st that as far as this House is, it wouldn't wind up as such beca use the affairs of Manitoba must continue and there will never be a winding-up of - well of the sessi on, yes , but not of the House -- (Inter jection) -- yes, I would sugge st the people could wind me up, fine -- I'm not too worried about that and I'm not too worried that when I do wind up that ·r wouldn't be able to take care of my selL It's the will of the people and if they so desire, I' ll thank them for it.

Now there are others. "If a pension plan is funded in an unorthodox manner it usually re quires the investment of large sums of money. " So this is another thing that could have been studied, Now I'm not going to bore the members of the House with more .... There are more reaso ns why this problem should be put in the hands of a committee to study the situation. And I do not see anything wrong with that. I think that we could surely wind this up as I said before, if the Minister got up on his feet, or the Premier and said yes, this is a good suggestion we agree to it. We'll send it into committee.

I am sure that the resu lt would be different. There are five specific que stions here before I close, that I don't think were fully answer ed and somebody should answer it. I would just like to hear the Premier do it. He probably knows mote about it, unless he 's not interested in it at all. Why should this be retroactive ? Why should we go ahead and provide for a pension for ourselves 'i' Why should we do it ? I think we 'd be more modest if he said this: "let us provide a pension to commence after the next elec tion.

" And none of us as the Honourable Member for Br andon suggested they might wind me up, none of us are sure that we '11 be here again, so we are providing for future members of this Legislature and if some of us are lucky to be ele cted again, of course we'll benefit, but at least we cannot be accused of feathering our own nest, our >wn bed. So why make it retro active '? Why not make it in the future for the people who come after us, make it for th em. Why m:i.ke it retroactive so that a few years back, ten years back, so that it would catch some of us in this House .

The Honoura ble Member for lnkster himself just told us now that he 's not interested in it so naturally we are not doing it for his benefit and he would be a deserving person. The· former leader of the Liberal Party, made the same statement, that he is not interested. And we are not doing it for the elderly members of this House , for the two most elderly members , be cause they say that they do not wish to take advantage, if this did come in. So I again say, why do we have to make it retroactive ? Maybe this committee would say that I'm wrong, maybe they'll say I'm right, but let's find out, let's find out.

That 's the problem . Another thing that's never clear. The Minister seem s to dangle the figure of $23, 00{) on an aver age in the future some time per year that this would cost us. How do we know that it's right. He himself says that he can't arri ve at any definite figure, it's just guesswork. Maybe this committee with more time to work it in would be able to give us closer figure s, actual figure s. A fourth question. Ca n Manit<>ba afford it at this time? I would say no if we have to re sort to new taxes.

In the last seven years o:r so, every year we had to impose, or the Legisl ature had to impose new taxes on the people, so·ev ident!y there was more money needed, much more money needed; and even last year a tremendous sum was needed to pay for the services: that the people wished. Therefore , ifwe had a huge surplus, if we didn't rieed any more , to collect any new taxes, it may be ju stified. But can Manitoba afford it? That 's another question that.this commi ttee could answer. Maybe Manitoba cannot afford it now, I don't know. And I would say why can't we build :inore dust-free roads.

Tha t's quite a question. We can't. The Honourable Minister of Highways told us that it is impossible to do it, and I agree with him �- .•. , cover all of MaiJ.i toba. . . MR. CHAffiMAN: .... The Honourable Member will please keep to the resolution.

May l:lth, :1965 26 21· • J.I4R. TANC HAK: Well these are just specific que stions. I'm just about finished, ,,., I think nm speaking to the .re solut ion. These are que stions that the comm ittee should answer .. I don't: think I'm,out of order. When I mention dust,. I say why can't we build dust-free roads, maybe this CO.Jl1mittee . .. >.,. MR. CHAJRMAN: .. ... memb!=!r please keep to the question. MR. TANCHAK:· .. , . mavbe this committee can answer which is more, where the prior ity is, is the. pension first, or the dust-free roads first.?

We're doing this fo.r ourselves and I would suggest that . we do more ·:or the people of Manitoba rather than go ahead and take care of oursel ves. There was -- my honourable minister who has just spoken, he seemed to reject completely the idea of pensi ons for widows of membf,!rs who may pass away .and leave their children ?-nd wive s in desp!',!rate situations ..

I :would say that it isn't in) po ssi ble to do it, · and I would say that as long as the member is retired from this House, retired by elect ion, I am sure that all of the members could still take care of themselves, and their wives and their children if they have any at the time. But, when one of the members passes away and he is the bre adwinner, , then this family may be in dire need, they may be destitute. So why couldn't we incorporat e so mething in here that rather than we get the pension, why not the. widow, why not the people that we are re sponsible for, why not the families.

I don't think it would be too difficulto Maybe this .com mittee would go ahead and reco mmend something like· that, probably instead of six percent deductible from our salaries, or indemnities, maybe seven percent would take care of it and wouldn't cost the people more , .I for one, if I accepted this pension, and if the amendment was brought in, I'd be just too happy to pay another two perce nt "if" this was part of the bill .

I'm not saying that I'm supporting the bill, but I say "if" I would be just too happy to give protection to the women, to the wives, to the children and so on, rather than go after the -- take the money for myself. Of course that would include the family too, But the man is the brea d winner of the family and if he is gone, those people could suffer. So there 's many many things that qould be discussed in this comm ittee and I do not thinktha:t this amend ment that we are discussi ng pre sently is one that should be lightly taken.

I think that it is quite in order to do as .we are doing, the Liberal Party here, asking the House. to refer this to a commi ttee to give it a thoroug h study and maybe it would be pos sible to come out with a pen sion that would be a credit to this House and not a shame. MR. NE LSON SHOE MAKER (Gladstone): Mr. Chairman, I don't think that I can be accused of prolonging the debate of this particular motion, I may have spoken ten minutes yes terday on this motion and brief ly the othe r day. However, I must say this Mr.

Chairman, and I think that you are. one of the few members that will agree wi th this, because you were one of the first ones to speak on this, that, we are not wasti ng time here "if" the debate that has. re solved around this whole is sue is any indication of the importance of the iss ue . We have had a healthy debate and l think this alone prove s that it is something that needs to be discussed.

The very fact that the daily papers have played it up at some length, given .it headlines, is an indication that. it needs to be diewussed -- (interjection) ·-- pardon -- the papers -- my honour able friend the man that clips off the dinosaur wings has just said that. all we 're after is pre ss cove rage . The press don't have to report anything we say. The press generally print what they think is news. regardle ss of what my honourable friends oppo site think. They generally pri nt what the conceive to be the news of the day. Read their editorials and see what they say. And then again, Mr .

Chairm an, I don't suppose that my .honourable friends are in the habit of listening to the B,-L ine or Beefs and Bo uquets, the last three or four days, I don't suppose they're. doing that.

But if they are, then there mustbe a clear indication that the people are concerned., If these three things; the debates in the House , the news in the Press, the ra dio Beefs and Bouquets and B-L ines and other news stories is an indication, registers the pulse of the people at all,. then ce rtainly we have all kinds of evidence, all kinds of evidence to show that this. is . an important thing, and trying to rush through it is not the prope r thing for we "supposedly" responsible people to do .

Re gardle ss of what my honourable friends oppo site say, I don't think. that we are a breed apart from everybody else in the provin ce. I don't think. we ar e,. An.d yet this lygis lation is cer tainly de�ig ned to provi de fo r a dass of people that.are a breed apart from the common folk, the common folk that pay taxe s.

Why is it that most pension plans, for instance, are designed to Jlrovide for some means upon retirement from working years, ·Why the - and. certa inly it is - the Canadian Pension Plan has been improv9d - someone suggested this morning that they supposed that the Ho nourable Member for Inkster was in this House ahout the time .that the. "first" national plan was imp lemented and he no doubt · in his many.ye(,lrS in the Hou.se has seen many many exte1;1sions in this field qf soc ialism , You 'r:e

2622 May 1ith, 1965 (MR. SHOEMAKER coht'd) . , , . right, he has, and it is improved; and in three or four years hence eve ryone in Canada will be rece iving a national pension at 65. Most people that buy pensions, that elect to buy pensions of their own, buy them at age 65. Here we have one that . starts at 55. Well I want to ask my honourable friends and indeed the Minister, does he look forward to the day that every member of the House will retire at 55 ? Does he think that this is the time, that we have served our usefuiness in this House at age 55 ?

Why not set it :__ does my Honourable Member for Brandon want to suggest -- (Interje ction) -- I'm not talking about $50 per month -- (Interjec tion) -- At age 55, cer tainly. I'm going to say to my honourable friend - and I'm only prompted to say this because he has mentioned it Mr. Chairman, and I have no reflections on any member of the House - but I want to say this about the government gene rally. This government, one of the first things that they did was look after their own - look after their own.

They provided cabinet posts for most of the "senior" men of their group - and by that I mean senior in years, of service, not in age - their older members of the House.

And true, true, there wasn't enough to fill the Cabinet posts, but what did they do with my honourable friend from Brandon and the one from Morris, put special legislation through the House to enable them to act as Directors on Telephone Systems and Hydro and so on; so in addition, so in addition to their re gular indemnities, their $200 a day at the spec ial sessions - and that 's what we got, someone said here and repeated it two or three times, at the last session of the House, specia l session if you want to call it that - in fact there is no special session· - but we had a session that lasted 9 days, last August.

We got $1800; that's $200 a day. -- (Interje ction) -- Cer tainly I took it, certa inly I took it. I don't suppose there is a member in this House that didn't take it, that didn't take it. So this government are ex perts at taking care of their own. But when you add up your membe rs' indemnity, if you are a Director on some of the se Boards and Commissions,your special sessions, your allowances and eve rything else, we're not starving to death.

Someone asked me in the hall at least half a dozen time s in the last week -J' Shoemaker haven't you got anything at home that requires your time back home to look after ." Mr. Ch airman, I'm one of the fe�J.ows that prides myself on having my business in pretty capable hands, and I put it there. I suggest that my honourable friends opposite, if they haven't got their own bread and butter business in fairly capable hands when they are in here looking after the peoples' business, this points up that they shouldn't probably be here, that they are ncit the kind of men that should be here.

If they are not able to look after the ir own business then they are ce rtainly not abie to look after the peoples business -- (Interje ction) -- The same with the ir pensions, absolutely. I'm one of the people that hope that I don't have to go on relief. Mr. Chairman, I want somebody to answer this question before we leave, because I'm going to continue to ask it. The Honourable the Minister of Welfare one of the first Ministers to speak on this bill said that there was in fact, four members of this House that had gone on relief following the election in 19 58. I think he said "Ministers" .

Well if that is a facti want him to tell the House who they were. There 's no shame in it. If he doesn't want to name them in the House, send me a note . Tell me who they were so at least I'll be satisfied . Because these are pretty serious charges. This is one of the things that my honour able friend the Minister of Welfare said, one of the thingS that prompted the government to give this whole matter of pensions a long serious hard look because' he felt that it wasn't right for former ministers and members of the House to go on relief after they were through here.

Well I don't know -- I'm just an or dinary com mon member and last year, when you consider the $48 00 indemnity we got a year ago, the $1 800 we got at the special session and the $600 living allowance, I'm sure, I'm sure that that quite apart from my bread and butter business, was far. more than the average wage earner of this province, far more, and surely to goodness I can buy a pension of my own if I want to with that money. And if I haven't got enough money then there is something wrong with my spending habits.

There's something wrong with my honoura ble friends' spending. habits too. if they can't provide a pension of their own, on $17, 500. 00. . Now I wasn't going to say this, but my honourable friend the Minister who introduced the bill told about a pension plan that he has and named the number of it. Mr. Chairman, I can't give you the number of it, but I have a Canadian Government Annuity that I start drawing on next March - and at the risk of giving my age away, in 46 years I'll be 100, so I'll put you to some bother. I know the se fellows pre tty -- (interje ction) -- in 46 years I'll be 100, and' .

I bought this C.anadian Government Annuity - get your pencils out; Mr. Cha irm'an, I see a lot have the ir pencils out now, because that's really going to be a problem for the se fellows to

May 11th, ,1965 2623 (MR. SHOEMAKER cru:t'd) ..•. figure out. A MEMBER: Is it retroac tive ? , MR. SHOEMAKER: .• and !b ought and paid the first prem ium in 1957 to pay me $50 a month at age 55. I was pre tty hard up in those years and that cost me around $330 a year - 1947, the last payment to come due in 1965. I then doubled it up in five or six years after that to obtain the maximum that is obtainable under a Canadian Gove rnment Annuity plan; which as you know is $100 -- (Inte rjec tion) -- $100 a month, yes.

So it cost me, in fact every year I get a statement from the goverP,ment showing the amount to my credit, and it cost me in the neighborhood of $12, 500 in annual premiums. I'm not as fortunate as my honou�,·able friend the Minister that introduced this bill. He paid one single premium of - what did he say, $7, 800, and purchased a deferred annuity of $iOO commencing at age 55, exactly the sam� as mine. The difference between my honourable friend and myself is of course, that he had the money "at hand" in which to lay out cold cash of $7, 800 in one fell swoop. Well, Mr.

Chairman, that proves that at least there 's one fellow opposite that doesn't need a pension, and it's my honour able friend that introduced this bill. He doesn't need one and eve rybody knows that; everybody knows that. Now, Mr. Chairman, I intended to ask a bunch of questions -- I'm going to get around to them eventually .

My honourable friend the Minister - it was him that prompted me to get up - the Minister that introduced this bill, because in his opening remarks today, said that he could not understand we folks over here contradicting and criticizing a nice little, neat little bill with 5 pages in it - oh it was a nice little, neat little thing. It was one day, a nice little neat little bill - about 10 days ago.

In addition to knowing what "upon", the definition of "upon", because it has taken on a completely new me aning since this legislature met - it means 12 months now - I want to know what neat means - what does ''neat" mean in his - you can write that down Mr. Attorney-General if you like - write and tell my honourable friend, he isn't in the House - ask him to explain what "neat " is, because if this is what he means by now a nice little neat little bill, well then he 's got an entirely different definition to neat than I ever conceived in my day. -- (Interjecti on) -- Neatsfoot oil my honourable friend says.

Well maybe if we pour a little oil on this it wouldn't take away from it. Another question I want to know - and I see I've got two Ministers writing over there now - is that everybody agrees we have three sheafs of amendments, right ? Surely we can agree on that ! We'v e got a bill and three sheafs of amendments. MR. DESJARDINS: I don't agree with that at all, Mr. Chairman, on a point of order. We have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight -t here's eight sheets of amendments. MR. SHOEMAKER: Well, Mr. Chairman, I stand cor rected.

But there again this is the tr ouble you get into when you start asking for

definitions, because I said sheaf - s-h-e -a-f; sheaf of amendments, and he thought it was "sheets ". It 's my false teeth I'm having trouble with perhaps. MR. DESJARDINS: I thought it was your Fr ench accent. MR. SHOEMAKER: It's like my honourable friend the Member for Lakeside one day - he won the "sheaf tying" contest at the Austin Museum, and my honourable friend the First Minister who profe sses to be an expert on agriculture thought he said sheep - s-h-e-e-p - it was a sheep tying conte st, instead of a sheaf tying conte st - you remember that Mr. Chair man, because we had a lot of fun over that one .

And we are apparently having a lot of fun over this one because I said we have "three sheafs" of amendments. And in addition, Mr. Ch airman, we have two other sheafs, I'd better be careful with my -- (Interjecti on ) -- Mr . Chairman, this one -- this famous document here dated May 3rd, 1965, says Pensions Funds payable to Cabinet Ministers and Members of Legislative Assembly, pension funds page No. 2. Wher e's page No . 1? Where is page No. 1? -- (Interje ction) -- Well where is your page No . l Mr. Attorn ey-G eneral ? A MEMBER: He 's got it locked in jail I guess. MR.

SHOEMAKER: Pa ge No. 1 is missing here, I'd be interested to know what did appear on page No. 1. And furth ermore, this was laid on our desk on May lOth yester day at about 3: 20 p. m. according to my notations on it, and yet the sheet bears the date May 3rd. Where has it been for seven days? Where has it been for seven days and where is Page No . 1. I want to know that . Where was it for seven days and where is Page No . l? MR. SMELLIE: If my honourable friend would really like and answer to that question, the provinces, British Columbia to Ontario appeared on Pag e No . l and the balance of the

262'4. May 11 th; 1965 (MR. SMELLIE cont'd) . , . provinces appeared on Page No. 2 but they .were both reproduced on one page for the sake of convenience . MR; SHOEMAKER: We ll I want to thanli; my honourable friend the· Minister of Municipal Affairs •. It ::;hould be page la nd 2. It actually constitutes both page 1 and page 2? So that if I folded it in two like that, and called the first on� page l. and then turned it over, I'd have page 2 .. Or if I took a pair of scissors and cut it down .. ... MR . SMELLIE: If it would be easier for my honourable friend to understand that way that'll be correct. MR.

SHOEMAKER: Well, prior to the explanation, we all had to guess. So I guess I'll fold it this way and I'll Mark No. 1 over there . Now that settles that one -- (Interjec tion) - Well, if my honourable friend would just tell me where -- (interjection) -- If I cut it in two, it will make a sheaf, beca u::;e the definition of sheaf is more than one, I think. Mr.

Chairman, my honourable friend the Minister of Municipal Affairs negle cted to tell me in whose desk this Pa ge 1 and 2 edition has been since May the 3rd - up until the time we got it -b eca use it answers a lot of questions that we asked in the last seven or eight days. Where has it been for seven days ? The date on here is May 3rd; we got it on May lO th. Does he want to answer that now, Mr . Chairman.? MR . SMELLIE: I have no idea. MR . SHOEMAKER: Oh, you have no ide a. Well that's a pretty stra ightforward answe r. Now as you know, Mr.

Chairma n, I'm .one of the few people in this House ti:tat read these In for mation Services bulletins, pretty thoroughly, pretty thoroughly; I have sa id that the sub Ecription price is nil and they're worth all you pay for them. So when I went home on Sunday, I was so ce rtain that the.re would be an information services bulletin out on the pension plan - a propaganda sheet. out on that - that I searched all through the ones that had accumulated in the last week or two, and 1 could not find one.

And quite apart from the fact that they are straight propaganda, they are as the name implie::;, informative - slanted information most of the .time , but they are informative and I suppose that my honourable friends by this time, surely has put out one or two propaganda sheets on the pension plan, and I can't find mine. So I wonder if one has gone out and I've lost it, and if I have then I wonder if they could table another one today, before we sit here later on. Would they table the one that I've lost, apparently ? If they -� (interjectio n) -- oh, I can rea d it for myself, Mr.

Chairman, but I want it tabled because surely there is one out by this time - an information services bulletin on pensions . Now I went all through the orange sheets, couldn't find one; and then I come along to the green sheets and I said, "Lo and behold, here it is. Dates to remem ber. " And I went all through the dates to remembe r and I couldn't find it there so I wrote one at the top . "From May ls t to. ll th, PCPP , Legislative Buildings. " MR. CHAIRMAN: Would the honourable member please keep to the resolution before us. MR . SHOEMAKER: I will if they will supply me with an information ... .

I will guarantee MR . CHAIRMAN: ... talking about eve rything under the sun. You should have some respect for the rules of this House . MR . SHOEMAKER: Well, if my honourable friends opposite had any re spect for the tax payers I might have some respect for the rules. So that makes us about even. Now I want that information Rheet, I want a definite answer from the Minister of Welfare to name these people tha t have been on relief. You will remember, Mr.

Chairman, that another real reason that the members opposite said that we simply had to have a pension plan, was because the characte rs in this Legisla ture in particular had dete riorated to the point that they had to do something really conc rete to attract better members in here .

It was getting terrible, they said; that we were not worthy of representing the people and oh, this was awful . .And when I asked my honourable friend - he's not Lll his seat now - from Rhineland last night, did he - because he was rel ating to the House you reca ll, the way they operated their Legislature in North Dakota and Minnesota -I asked him point blank whether he thought the quality and the character of the members down there was worse than it is here, because they only get about a.t hird of the pay. than in this House . He was not able to answer that.

But my honourable .friends opposite they snickered away and they thought that was a real joke . Well. then it was, must be a real joke, this whole· point of - this reason that they said. The real reason - two reasons - was to keep mem bers off relief, because we don't want members on relief. Give them a pension; that will .keep them off relief. The other one was it will attract a .lot of better people into this House . It 's· getting terrible, the quality of people we have here is terri ble . Let's pay them something and

May l.ltb., 19�[); · · 26 2 5 (MR. SHOEMAKER cont'd) ...•.. g�t some good people in for a change. It would ch3:ng� the face of Manitoba, Well) want to know whether this stm hofds true . . Another thing that we are entitled to know, as member,s of the, Opposition, Mr .. .Chair man, and � want somel)pdy to write this down, because my. honourable friend isn't there. We want to know what we have saved the taJ{payers in the last s�ven days with the int:r;oduction of these amend;rnents.

As suming that t}le bill goes through, as amended, assuming that it \\;OUld have gone through with no amendments - because cer tainly it would have gone through with no am.endments if we hadn't objected� Now what would be the saving to the taxpayer by way of the amendment s? Somebody should be able to tell us this. I see my honour().b�e friend com ing in. now; maybe I should repeat that, for his benefit. I think I should. Mr. Chairman, and my honourable friend the Minister who introduced this bill, the Pr ovincia,l Secre tary, the question that I asked was this -I just got done asking it ..

Mr, · Minister, some of your Ministers on the front bench have been courteous enough to take no.tes of some questions and I think they are going to turn them over to you. But this. on�, I will repeat . .I made the statement that there was no doubt but that if no opposition had been r().ised from this side , bill 110 would have gone sailing right through the House and bec.ome la'f , as is. I mean nobody is going to argue about that . Now - not even the NDP - everybody was quite happy; that's a whale of dandy deal.

And then we clipped the wings off my honourable friend - the dinosaur wing clipping Minister of Mines and Natural Resources, saw that ill}mediately - whacked thousands off of his pension. It did the same for a lot of other people 's. My ques- tion, Mr. Chai:rman, is, my question is: how many dollars has the amendments saved today of the taxpayers' money ? Ce rtainly there 's been some major changes made, from no age limit to 55; whacking down ceilings; limiting the length of time and all this. There must have been a real genuine saving. About that time and prior to the amendments, Mr.

Chairman, you must ha ve .. noticed -- all of you people opposite that get the. Tribune and certainly you get it during the. sesl)ion because it doesn't cost you anything, despite what you've been saying about it- - quton the editorial page of Saturday, May 8t h, there's a nice little picture there of the Mother <;>f the Y�;Jar, x:eading a card that says, "Hi Mom, thanks for taking care of us. " "Gratefully signed by all the MLAs in the Cabinet.

" !:fow I think in all fairness, my honourable friends opposite should send another card to my Mother of the Year and say, "We're a little disappointed mom because you didn't get away with it. You've whacked it in two and that isn't the way - we wouldn't have even sent you a card in the first place if we thought you were going to do, that. " MR . JAMES H. BILTON (Swan River) : The card includes you. MR. SHOEMAKER: I know it does. I know it doe s. But I didn't get a card from him and my honou�able friends I guess have been writing him cards all the time because - Mr.

Chai.r man, that rais.es. another point and I'm trying to stick to the qu estion. If it wasn't for the se i.nterjec ti.ons I would have no problem at alL But it does point up what my honourable friend . the Member forVirden , is it ? Elkhorn,what's that constituency ? Mr. McGregor, The Honour able - Virden. He was the first one of the back benchers to get up and I'll bet you if he was in the House now he'd have s.omething to. say. Do you remember the. only re solution. that he brought in this year, in fact I ,think it's the only one .he ever brought in.

And he said, "Boy, am I having trouble with my members over here. " That's exactly what he said. �- (interjec tion). -- When qid he tell me that ? I' ll tell you when he told the House that .

He told the House that on April 6th and he said, "I think sometimes we 've got to stand up here knowing that there 's going to be some opposition to this resolution, but when right is right" he sai<:l, ."I believe you've got to go beyqnd re gardless of your colleagues, regardless of the buck involved." -- (Interjec tion) -- It was a hundred perce nt; he was able to conv ince. you eventually and I .. imagine that myh onourable friends opposite are going to convince you and all the rest that · you're going to v;ote :;;olid for this do,dad, this time .

And he said that, "And if neces,sary, regardless 0f your friends" . . What's he saying? He is saying, "!.am having trouble with my colleagues and they 're trying to buy me off. " MR· P. J. McDONALD (Turtle Mountain): . • . . . . MR. SHOEMAKER: Mr. Chairman, he's not in his prope r seat and I d.on't know whether . I should recognize the question from P.J. or not. But my honourable friend. said, and I have one of his calling cards, that if Duff won't do it, P. J. will. Mr. Chairman, , I am going to. ask P.J, now, will he withdraw this bill? He says, "If Du�f won't do it, P.

J . wil l''· I'm . asking him now, the only favour I have ever asked him since he gave me one of his calling cards and he ,said he, w,ould do .it if Duff wouldn't. I want him to get Of! with the business of Manitoba.

2626 May 11th; 1965 MR. McDONAl.D: .... .. few of the things we were able to do. MR . SHOEM AKER: Mr. Chairman, I'm prepared to let -- I didn't hear that ..• , . MR . McDONAl.D: .•.. few of the things we were able to do. MR . SHOEMAKER : There is quite a few calling cards out. I don't doubt that. Because I think he bought several thousands of them. Mr.

Chairma n, another thing that I think will follow if this plan goes through, is that reeves and mayors and councillors and the like, metro councillors, will say if the members of the House ca n implement a pension plan for themselves, we 're far more deserving than they are and they will immediately proceed to do something for themselves in this regard.

My honourable friends opposite always look up to another province when they want justifica tion for putting in a plan of this kind - always - they either look to Mi chener or some other province, because for about a year they said they weren't going to do anything - they wouldn't even comment on anything beca use they were going to wait and see what Michener had to say. Did Michener have anything to say about putting - was this one of Michener's 72 recom mendations ? I don't know whether it was . Is it? It was one of his recom mendations ? -- (Interjectio n) -- I wouldn't lindersta nd my friends opposi te.

I sure don't under stand my friends opposite, Mr . Chairma n, on many occasions, I don't understand them. MR . E. R. SCHREY ER (Br okenhead) : Mr. Chairma n, would the honourable member permi t a question ? MR. SHOEMAKER: Cer tainly. MR . SC HREYER : Just a few minutes ago the honourable member made reference to the possi bility of municipal representatives asking or expecting a pension.

I would ask him if he doesn't feel that a good case could be made for an appropria te pension for these people if they serve for say 10 or 12 or 15 years, including some sort of small compensa tion plan in case they're injured while on their work ? MR . SHOE MAKER: Mr. Chairma n, I think I did say that they were just as justified as we were, they were just as justified. You can go out in the rural areas and I think that you will find that by and large their life of service to the community is greater in years than the members of the House, in many many cases, in many many cases, that this is so.

But the members opposite and the government opposite has said, has pointed up, well, the very fact that there 's only two prov inces in Ca nada that now has no pension plan of any kind, it is justification for Manitoba to have one, quite apart from the other reasons that they have named on which I want some .• , . .. MR . SC HREYER : ...• subsequent question? I would ask him if he doesn't consider it right that matters be considered in relation rather than in isolation. I'll repeat it Mr. Chair man.

I asked the honourable member if he doesn't consider· it right that matters such as this, and other matters, be considered in relation ra ther than in isolation. MR . SHOEMAKER : Well that may be so, but where do you dra w the line ? Where do you dra w the line ? If you say that every school board -- should every member of the school board at some time deserve a pension ? Should every reeve, mayor, council member in the province· be provided with a pension ? But if we have one in this House there is more likelihood of them having one I will say that because we do crea te preced ents here. MR .

STEINKOPF: May I ask the honourable member a question? MR. SHOEMAKER: Ce rtainly. MR . STEINKOPF : I didn't understand his reply. Is he or is he not in favour of pensions for municipal councillors ? MR. SHOEMAKER: Are we discussi ng a pension bill for ourselves, or one for the mem bers ? Do you want to open up a whole new field ?- (Interje ction) -- Okay . Fine and dandy. I will repeat what I said before , Mr.

Chairm an, that by the very implementation of a pension plan here, and no doubt my honourable friends will proceed to push it through -'they will not likely go along with the motion that is before you - they will probabiy proceed to push it through - and if they do, if they do it will set an example for the school boards - and I say they are just as deserving. I will say this in answer to my honourable friend, I will say they are every bit as dese rving as my honourable friend the Ministers over there. They spend a great deal of time and their own money and everything else . MR .

STEINKOPF: ...•..• subsequent question? MR . SHOEMAKER: Certain ly. MR . STEINKOPF: Does the honourable member think it is a bad thing to set a good example ? MR . SHOEMAKER: I'm not saying this is a good example. I'm not saying this is a good example.

May 11th, 1965 (MR. SHOE MAKER cont'd) . 2627 'Mr. Chairman, I wonder if my honourable friends are going to answer some of the ques tions that I have put to them. Mr. Chairma n, I see the Minister of Welfare is here now. I can repeat that question to him, because he said, one of the real reasons for implementing a pen sion at this time was that there were two, I think he said, Cabinet Ministe rs that were actually on relief following the '58 election. HON , J . B. CARROLL (Minister of Welfare) (The Pas): No, no. My friend is again putting words into my mouth that I did not say, MR. SHOEMAKER: What did you say ?

MR. CARROLL: If he wasn't sufficiently interested in what I said, then he shouldn't comment on it. MR. SHOEMAKER : Well, we'll have his Hansard this afternoon, I suppose. I wonder what's holding up the Hansards because they're about five days behind now and it would be kind. of interesting to get them. I started out by saying Mr. Chairma n, that I didn't consider that we in the House were a breed apart from everybody else . We'r e not a breed apart from everybody else.

My honour able friend the First Minister on March 3rd - that's oyer two months ago - speaking on the Throne Speech, made quite a strong criticism of the proposed Canada Pension Plan and he went to great lengths to say that it would do nothing for the little fellow ea rning less than $600 a year. And he mentions that throughout his speech different times. Why I get $600 a year expense account. And then he talks about $600 -- well what is the aver age income of the wor ker of the province now ? $1500. 00 ? -- Something like that? The aver age wa ge for the province, per capita wage.

The aver age per ca pita wage is what ? -- (Interjecti on) -- The per capita income is $1500 he says . And the aver age wage is what ? -- (Interje ction) - $3, 000. OO?Le ss than $3, 000. 00. Less than 3, 000. My honourable friend the First Minister seems very conce rned because the Ca nada Pension Plan will do nothing for the little fellow. My honourable friends opposite, I wish that they would listen to what the First Minister has to say in this regard, because they seem really conce rned about a pension for the people that's earning nearly $20, 000 a year. Well, theyboth can 'tb e right.

My honourable friend that introduced the bill said he had a lot of phone c alls over the week-end complimenting he and the government upon implementing this pension plan for these people that are re ally in need over here. I had some phone calls over the week- end and I had a very staunch Conserva tive visit me over the week-end and he wasn't very much in favour of it. He wasn't very much in favour of it. And I said to him - and I'd like my honourable friends to hear this - I said, in all fairne ss I don't believe that this pen sion plan was the bra inchild of the Premier. I don't think it was .

I said I don't really believe it was . I believe that the Cabinet, in particular, had a hard time selling this to him and I think some of the backbenchers had a hard time selling it to him. I re ally believe that. Mr. Chairman, why should it go to a committee ? My honourable friend the First Minister and some of the Cabinet Ministers has, as I stated before, raised quite a storrri over the proposed Ca nada Pension Plan and they have delighted in quoting what Mr. Kilgour, the Presi dent of the Great-West Life had to say in this regard . Some of it was read yesterday. And do you know what Mr.

Kilgour had to say on the second last page of this addre ss, this wonderf ul address that he made in appraisa l of the Canada Pension Plan? I'm going to read one paragra ph to show that I'm not taking it out of context. I'm quoting: "If every member of Parlia ment has to addre ss two or three public meetings in his own constituency on why this plan is good for Canada, and answer search ing questions from interested people who go io these meetings, the spotlight will be very revealing.

Our members" -" and he's talking about the members of the House - "Our members also need a public inquiry so that they may understand the pros and cons without which sound legislation cannot be re ached ," So I suggest that, let the taxpayer have something to say about it and send it to the committee , My honourable friend who introduced this bill has repe atedly said when we asked him, why the hurry, what would happen if we delayed it for a year ? He gave exactly the same reason as my honourable friend the Attorney-General said about the heat tax - no spec ial reason.

He sa id nothing would happen, he didn't suppose, if it was delayed. But it was a nice little, neat little bill and we should get on with it now and forget about it. Well, if nothing is going to happen, if it's po stponed or delayed, then for heaven's sakes let's send it to a committee or withdraw it - one or the other. Let's give it a little more thought. Surely, surely in the light of the debate that has taken place, the pr ess coverage, the TV coverage, the "beefs and

262 8 May 11th; 1965 (MR . SHOE MAKER cont'd) . , , ... bouquets", what people are saying, they all suggest and indicate that it should be given more .thought. Most of them are saying it shouldn't be given any thought at all - that':;; what most of t.h(lm are saying .. The rest of them are !?aying, give it some more thought. Consider the fellow, as my honourable friend the First Minister says, consider the fellow with the $600. 00 pension - don't consider the fellows with the $17,. 000 a year job.

My honourable friend the Minister of Welfare says we can't procla im any more sections of this.new jet age, dynamic Act because we haven't got the money, MR . CARROLL: Mr. Chairman, if my friend persists in twisting and distorting and completely falsifying what members on this side say, I think we should ca ll him to the Bar of the House. Mr. Chairman, I ask him. to retract the last statement which he made . MR . SHOEMAKER: Which one was that? -- (Interje ction) -- I said my honourable friend was speaking on his estimates. MR . CARROLL: He doesn't know what he's saying. MR .

SHOE MAKER: I said my honourable friend in speaking on his estimates said that the reason that they c:>uld not proclaim all of the sections of the Soc ial Allowances Act was because they couldn't do it all at once , they needed more money. Isn't that right? MR . CARROLL: No, Mr. Chairman, that is not right. And my honourable friend I think knows it. If he doesn't I suggest that he refr ain from referring to things that he knows nothing about, obviously. MR . SHOEMAKER: Well surely my honourable friend knows what he said.

What did he give as the reason for not proclaimi ng the whole Social .Allowances Act operative now ? What did he give as the reason? MR . CARROLL: You read it in Hansard and then you'll know, my friend. MR . SHOEMAKER : Well, don't you remember what you said ? MR . CHAIRMAN: ....• getting far away from the re solution before us. MR . SHOEMAKER: Well,

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	27-4-104
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	27th 4th hansardpdf 104.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	64ed915597d930629ff29a53019e4a3b8213a5a0

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