1985 Legislative Session: 3rd Session, 33rd Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

TUESDAY, MAY 14, 1985

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page

6101 ]

CONTENTS

School Amendment Act, 1985 (Bill 35). Hon. Mr. Heinrich

Introduction and first reading –– 6101

Oral Questions

Cowichan School Board. Mrs. Wallace –– 6101

B.C. forest resource. Mr. Williams –– 6102

Hospitals funding. Mrs. Dailly –– 6102

Bingo operations. Mr. Hanson –– 6103

British Columbia Railway Dispute Settlement Act (Bill 39). Second reading

Hon. Mr. Segarty –– 6104

Mr. Gabelmann –– 6105

Mr. Macdonald –– 6108

Mr. Lea –– 6108

Mr. Howard –– 6109

Hon. Mr. Waterland –– 6111

Mr. Lauk –– 6112

Hon. Mr. Brummet –– 6112

Hon. A. Fraser –– 6114

Hon. Mr. Segarty –– 6114

Division –– 6115

Committee of Supply: Ministry of Universities, Science and Communications estimates. (Hon. Mr. McGeer)

On vote 75: minister's office –– 6116

Mrs. Wallace

Mr. Rose

Mr. Nicolson

Mr. Passarell

Mr. Davis

Ms. Brown

TUESDAY, MAY 14, 1985

The House met at 2:05 p.m.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Speaker, we have eight Ontario

legislative interns and their director visiting the B.C. Interns for a

three-day stay in Victoria. These university graduates will be meeting

with numerous government officials and watching our Legislature. Would

the House welcome Beth Arnott, Dave Docherty, Marilyn Domagalski,

Catherine Fooks, Ron Hoffman, Joydeep Mukherji, Tim Welch, Michael Yeo,

and Dr. Fred Fletcher, the director.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition would

certainly, with pleasure, associate ourselves with that welcome to

those visiting us from Ontario, and bid them a pleasant stay and a safe

journey home — with added information to impart to the government of

Ontario from British Columbia.

HON. MR. CHABOT: Mr. Speaker, we have in the galleries today

from East Kootenay Regional District: Jim Smith, chairman; Stan Wilson,

director; Margrit Thierback, director; and Wayne McNamar,

administrator. I'd like the House to welcome them here today.

MR. ROSE: Mr. Speaker, I'd be grateful if the House would

welcome old friends of mine from Mission — once called Mission City,

but now called Mission: Mr. and Mrs. Jack Campbell. They're here today

visiting the Legislature with a group of friends.

MRS. JOHNSTON: On May 5 one of our eight legislative interns,

who is currently working for members on this side of the House, was

involved in a cycling accident in which she fractured her skull. Haidee

Parker spent five days in Royal Jubilee Hospital and is now home

recovering from what was a most frightening accident. Fortunately there

have been no complications. She will be returning to work very soon. On

behalf of the government side of the House I would like to ask everyone

to join me in wishing her a very speedy recovery, as Haidee is in the

gallery this afternoon.

MR. REID: Mr. Speaker, I would be ever grateful if the House

would welcome a special friend of mine from Everett, Washington, Dr.

Paul Moore.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, visiting today is a

constituent of mine and good friend. He is the president of the Social

Credit constituency association in Yale-Lillooet. Would the House

please welcome Hal Billings.

MRS. JOHNSTON: Mr. Speaker, I have one other introduction to make. In

the gallery and in the precinct today we have 20 grade 11 and 12 students visiting

us from the Bible Fellowship Christian Academy in Surrey. I would ask the House

to please welcome these students.

Introduction of Bills

SCHOOL AMENDMENT ACT, 1985

Hon. Mr. Heinrich presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor:

a bill intituled School Amendment Act, 1985.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: This particular bill removes teachers from

the Public Sector Restraint Act, Bill 3, and incorporates the

administration of terminations and layoffs within the School Act. The

purpose of the legislation is to break an impasse that has prevented 21

school boards and teacher associations from negotiating the terms of

necessary teacher layoffs. Under the provisions of the School Amendment

Act, 1985, school boards and teachers' associations will continue to be

able to negotiate agreements covering layoff procedures, but in the

absence of an agreement, an agreement in legislation will apply.

The legislated agreement will require that boards take into account

the demonstrated ability and qualifications of teachers, as well as

seniority, in determining which teachers to lay off. Seniority will be

considered on a school district basis.

Many boards have complained that the present arrangements are

unworkable. I have received innumerable requests from the B.C. School

Trustees' Association to introduce legislation to make this change. If

a board and its teachers are unable to reach an agreement, no layoffs

could take place even though enrolment had fallen. A number of boards

and teacher associations have been reluctant to sign agreements and

were thus stalemated on how to make necessary staff cuts. The

amendments provide a fair way out of this impasse for both teachers and

boards.

It is fundamental to a sound system that the most qualified teachers

remain in the classrooms. It is critically important, therefore, that

abilities and qualifications be taken into account along with seniority

in considering layoffs.

Bill 35 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on

orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House

after today.

Oral Questions

COWICHAN SCHOOL BOARD

MRS. WALLACE: I have a question for the Minister of

Education. The Cowichan School Board, when it existed, recognized the

minister's legal right to impose a budget and were willing to

administer that budget. They were not willing to be bullied into voting

against their conscience. Now that the compliance budget is in place,

will the minister reappoint the board to administer the district's

business?

HON. MR. HEINRICH: The answer is no.

MRS. WALLACE: Two hundred concerned parents have indicated

their support for the action of their board, and their officers of the

home and school association have so informed the minister by telex. Has

the minister decided to stop his campaign to override the democratic

process?

[ Page 6102 ]

HON. MR. HEINRICH: Mr. Speaker, the comments made by the

member, I think, are unwarranted. The budgets for 73 of the 75 school

districts were submitted — compliance budgets. Unfortunately, two

districts refused to submit compliance budgets; hence the action which

followed.

B.C. FOREST RESOURCE

MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, a question to the Minister of

Forests, who has, I believe, a bumper sticker that says happiness is a

well-managed forest. To the unhappy minister a range of questions in

view of the fact he wasn't in the House during Forestry Week. We have

non-satisfactorily restocked forests in British Columbia where the

lands have either been not replanted or regenerated. Could the minister

advise if in British Columbia it's on the scale now of, say, the size

of the state of Luxembourg or the country of Holland; that is, NSR land?

[2:15]

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, no. I can't advise.

MR. WILLIAMS: It's my understanding that it's a swath 50 miles wide and 200 miles long. It is the equivalent of the country of Holland.

A further question. Mr. Speaker, the amount invested in the forest

industry — that is the capital applied per metre of wood — is critical

in terms of generating wealth in the forest economy. Could the minister

advise us in terms of the capital applied to the forests of British

Columbia compared to Sweden, for example? Would it be 40 percent or

equal or 70 percent?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, I think anybody who tries to

make a simplistic comparison like that between the forests of Canada

and the forests of Sweden is rather naive.

MR. WILLIAMS: The answer, I believe, is 40 percent, and that indicates the lack of wealth in British Columbia.

Could the minister advise us, in terms of intensive silvicultural

activity in British Columbia, how we compare with the state of Finland?

Would we do a quarter or would we do a half or would they do four times

as much as us in terms of silvicultural activity on their lands when

they cut almost the same amount of land as we do?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if perhaps the

member would review the purpose of question period. The member asks

questions and then proceeds to answer himself. Perhaps if he would go

into a closet somewhere he could have a good little conversation with

himself.

MR. WILLIAMS: Maybe part of the problem is that they don't have the answers and it's time for those who do have the answers.

Finland treats four times the amount of land that we do silviculturally.

Could the minister advise us what percentage of our newsprint machinery in British Columbia is now more than 35 years old?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, I think we should ask the House statistician that question.

MS. BROWN: Who is that?

MR. WILLIAMS: It's my understanding that the number is 58

percent and that Sweden is only 7 percent. That's why we're failing

competitively. Could the minister advise the House how much we spent on

pre-commercial thinning in British Columbia last year?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: This last year the amounts of money spent

on various silvicultural applications will be presented in the next

annual report of the Ministry of Forests.

MR. WILLIAMS: It's my understanding the amount was nil. Could

the minister advise us how much was spent on seeding in British

Columbia last year?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Over $80,000.

MR. WILLIAMS: The answer is nil. Just a final question. Could

he advise which of the following experts have advised all the public

and the government of British Columbia that we face a 30 percent

decline in productivity in our forests if we maintain what we've been

doing under this administration: Mr. Bill Young, the former chief

forester, Prof. Les Reed or Prof. Sten Nilsson?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: If we did no silviculture work in British Columbia, I'm sure we could predict an even worse disaster.

MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I think we all know what the answer is —

all of the above. All of the experts predict a 30 percent decline under

this administration.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: I wonder if perhaps that member for

Vancouver East, when he was Minister of Forests, did everything he

possibly could to discourage the investment in the forests of British

Columbia. I wonder if the Speaker could advise that member of the

purpose of question period, and perhaps if he did the members in the

opposition would not appear to be such a completely incompetent bunch

of nincompoops as they have been in question period so far this year.

MR. WILLIAMS: Methinks he doth protest too much, and I think the rating was zero and the grade would be E.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. members. This is question period. The time is limited.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: I withdraw the word "nincompoops."

HOSPITALS FUNDING

MRS. DAILLY: A question to the Minister of Health. The

government's restraint program for hospitals is obviously continuing

with a vengeance since the recent announcement of the hospital

operating grants for this fiscal year.

[ Page

6103 ]

My question to the minister is: in light of the general concern from

the public and from the workers in our hospitals regarding the ability

of our hospitals today to provide quality care to their patients

because of the Socred restraint program, will the minister initiate an

inquiry into our hospital situation in B.C.?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: If the wording were not almost precisely

the same as the ads carried by the nurses' union, I would think that

the member perhaps had developed the question herself.

Mr. Chairman, the

preamble to the member's question is wrong. There

is no need for an inquiry into what is perhaps one of the best hospital

systems in North America.

MRS. DAILLY: I just wish the minister would pay attention to

the content of my question, instead of having to make some specious

remarks about the creator of the question. But Mr. Speaker, I wonder if

the minister, in rejecting an inquiry into the hospital system, is

saying to the public of B.C. that the money that is presently given is

quite adequate for good quality care. Is that what you're saying?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Speaker, I am saying to the public of

British Columbia they have every reason to expect the best level of

hospital care available, as they have for many years and will in the

future. Yes, we are providing adequate funding for our acute-care

hospital level in British Columbia. This year it's approximately $1.8

billion, and the hospitals are getting along quite well. I know it's

disappointing to the opposition that there haven't been great

complaints from the hospitals since they had their budgets.

MRS. DAILLY: I'm tempted to reply, but not to that kind of a statement that is not helping the situation in our hospitals whatsoever.

But Mr. Speaker, I want my next question to be off the paper,

completely original, as all my questions are. Mr. Speaker, my next

question to the minister is: in light of the fact that the hospitals

are experiencing an almost 4 percent increase because of inflation,

they need that increase in their budget. In light of the fact that the

minister's increase, barring some new formula, still only comes to

around an average of 3 percent for most hospitals, and in some even

less, how then can the minister possibly say that hospitals which are

already down to the bare bones in operating can possibly give good

quality care?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Quality care comes from the people who work

in the system. I can assure the member that those people are quite

capable of providing quality care.

The hospital budgets have been reasonably well-managed over the past

number of years, and I can assure the member they are not down to the

bare bones.

BINGO OPERATIONS

MR. HANSON: I have a question to the Provincial Secretary. Another major

organized commercial bingo chain called the Bingo-Go Emporium has opened up

in Prince George and in Abbottsford. These new bingo parlours have caused major

havoc among charitable organizations, especially in Prince George. My question

is: what consideration has the minister given to the detrimental effect of his

policy of allowing major organized commercial gambling to operate without provincial

regulation in the province?

HON. MR. CHABOT: What was that? I'm always surprised by the

NDP who ask questions about large bingo halls in British Columbia when

they operate the biggest one in Nanaimo in this province. I'm really

surprised that they're so concerned about other people doing the same

thing as the NDP is doing in Nanaimo. Two officials of my ministry have

gone to Prince George to meet with various charitable and non-profit

societies in that community, and I am awaiting a report from them

either today or tomorrow.

MR. HANSON: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Many charitable

organizations in this province are trying to pick up the pieces from

this restraint program of this government. There are Elks, Eagles, all

sorts of charitable organizations, the Legions and so on — all of them

— and it just so happens that these organizations which are strapped

for revenues.... In fact, in Prince George they're having difficulties

maintaining a seniors activity centre because of a loss of revenues.

He may think it's funny, and he may want to draw an inappropriate

analogy with a private bingo operation in Nanaimo, which is not

appropriate whatsoever; there is no comparison whatsoever. These

charitable organizations, Mr. Speaker, are lacking revenues because

you're allowing large-scale commercial bingo parlours to come in and

strip away those needed revenues. My question is: what has the minister

decided to do to adopt the recommendation of several service clubs for

an inquiry into the new commercial bingo operations, requested by those

organizations?

HON. MR. CHABOT: Mr. Speaker, the member fails to understand

that bingo licences are issued to charitable and non-profit societies;

they're not issued to people that rent halls to charitable and

non-profit societies. The laws that exist vis-à-vis Prince George, and

all the lotteries that take place there, are done under the auspices of

charitable and non-profit societies, the same as at pinko-bingo in

Nanaimo.

There is absolutely no need for an inquiry. I'm getting a report

from officials in my ministry, either later today or tomorrow. An

inquiry is strictly a figment of the imagination of the NDP.

MR. SPEAKER: The bell terminates question period.

Hon. members, the member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) having advised the Chair, he wishes to raise a matter under standing order 35.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to move the adjournment

of the debate, pursuant to standing order 35, for the purpose of

discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely the

indication and fact that this current government looks upon the forest

industry as a sunset industry, and that the government's agenda is

seedlings for tourists and soup kitchens for citizens. Given the

desperate need here in British Columbia to plant seedlings in our soil

to provide jobs now and forestry for the future in this province, and,

inasmuch as we have just heard of the action by this government to

acquire and transport to Japan some 500,000 seedlings to give to

tourists in that country, there are already indications that there will

be a shortfall of seedlings in British

[ Page 6104 ]

Columbia for our own use — something in the

neighbourhood of eight million fewer seedlings than was anticipated —

and that the gift to tourists in Japan constitutes about 6.5 percent of

that shortfall. The government has spent some $135,000 in acquiring

these seedlings and getting them transported to Japan. If that....

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, at this stage the Chair must inform

the member that you've gone well beyond the need to fill us in on the

essentials for the 35, and now clearly are entering into the realm of

argument and debate to sustain the very motion which the member is

asking the Chair to rule upon. Therefore, without further ado I ask the

member to now take his place and give the Chair opportunity to review

the matter and bring a response back at the earliest opportunity.

[2:30]

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. GARDOM: Second reading of Bill 39, Mr. Speaker.

BRITISH COLUMBIA RAILWAY

DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT

HON. MR. SEGARTY: Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to take my place

in debate and move second reading of the bill. I'd like to make a few

comments before concluding on second reading.

I want to say first that as a government we're fully committed to

the process of collective bargaining in British Columbia. It's an area

where the government moves with extreme reluctance. It's a process that

has been chosen by the parties as a means of arriving at the terms and

conditions of their employment. It's always regrettable, we feel, when

government is obligated to intervene in the collective bargaining

process, removing or limiting the rights of strike or lockout and

giving direction to the parties involved on the type of settlement that

they should achieve. These are areas that are granted to the parties

under the Labour Code and which government encroaches upon with extreme

reluctance.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Translated into the context of the present dispute, the rights

granted to the parties under the legislation always remain subject to

the legitimate requirements of the broader public interest. The

government is now concerned that the present labour dispute at B.C.

Railway and the broader public interest has been threatened by the

bargaining impasse which culminated in last Sunday's breakdown of

negotiations between the parties. As legislators we are the custodians

of the public interest. In industrial relations matters we have a

responsibility to determine how and when to act. In fact, in all

matters dealing with public interest, as legislators we have to

determine how and when to act.

In other earlier times the common wisdom was that it was acceptable

for all of us in the key sectors of our province to allow the full

process of collective bargaining, including lockout and strike, to take

its course, on the theory that after the parties had suffered some pain

and had inflicted some pain on each other, a new collective agreement

could be reached and everything would return to normal, with lost time,

lost revenue and new markets readily and easily accessible. Times have

changed. Our businesses and industry have worked hard to create new

employment opportunities for our people over the past few years, to

find new markets in an extremely tough and competitive world with

extremely tough and competitive world competition. Our coal mining

industries, our forest industry, our pulp industry, have struggled

hard, and all are participants in the private sector over the past few

years to gain new markets that were lost to them by the downturn in our

economy.

The transportation sector is one of those key areas where efficiency

and reliability are the basis of British Columbia's economic prospects

and trading reputation abroad. With an even keener competition in world

markets for our wood products, coal, mineral resources and manufactured

goods, our province and our country can ill afford to have our

credibility suffer and trading opportunities lost to our competitors

through uncertainty in the key transportation sector of our economy. A

shutdown at the British Columbia Railway would have a tremendous impact

on British Columbia, our industry and our private sector, and thus

tough decisions have to be made. Labour uncertainty of the kind now

created by the prospect of a British Columbia Railway dispute affects

not only the future of our economic recovery program, but also the

immediate effect of our economy, the lookout and concern of British

Columbia communities and the livelihood of all individuals across our

province.

The British Columbia Railway carries more than 665 carloads of

traffic per day. The current traffic breakdown per day is as follows:

coal, 23,000 tonnes; lumber, 8,700 tonnes; pulp, 3,700 tonnes; plywood

and veneer, 1,000 tonnes; grain, 4,000 tonnes; other materials, 13,200

tonnes — a total of 50,000 tonnes per day. That's not counting the

traffic into Roberts Bank and the port of Vancouver, where traffic

moves from southeastern British Columbia to our export markets. The

value of this product to shippers is approximately $7.5 million per

day. That would be the amount of money lost by direct customers if the

British Columbia Railway were to serve shutdown or lockout notice, or

if there were to be disruption in that area of our economy. A shutdown

would result in the loss of thousands of jobs across our province — in

forestry and in mining, in the northeast and the southeast of our

province.

Following a strike or lockout, we know that the loss in production

could be made up after the dispute, and we know that our industrial

capacity could handle that makeup. But the question that we've got to

ask ourselves today is whether those markets will be there after the

dispute is over and after the parties have inflicted pain on each

other. That is the question that we've got to answer in the next couple

of days. It is my belief that, with the tough competition our industry

has faced across our province over the past couple of years, those

markets would not be readily accessible after the parties had inflicted

pain on each other in order to achieve collective agreement.

I think that the employees recognize the consequences of a strike,

and the employers have recognized the consequences of a lockout. So

both parties have worked hard to negotiate for the past 15 months under

the provisions of collective bargaining, with the assistance of our

mediating services, our deputy minister and the full resources of the

Ministry of Labour. Both parties have recognized the serious

implications of a strike or lockout for our province. So they

[ Page

6105 ]

too are to be congratulated for working hard to achieve a collective agreement over the past 13 to 15 months.

But British Columbians cannot afford the loss of our trading

partners and investment in new opportunities in the key resource sector

of our province. Nor can we allow British Columbians whose livelihoods

are tied to the railway to be harmed by the continuing uncertainty of

an actual work stoppage on the British Columbia Railway. So I

introduced a bill yesterday that I hope will be able to solve the

dispute between the parties involved in a fair and even-handed way. The

collective agreement on the British Columbia Railway expired 15 months

ago. Since that time the parties have continued bargaining, and

of the old agreement — the same basis on which employment will continue

under the new bill, once it is

an act.

The mediator was appointed last August to assist the parties in the

bargaining process. Mr. Speaker, some progress was made, but an impasse

developed, which has resulted in the parties delivering to each other

lockout and strike notices on May 6. Last Wednesday, as hon. members

will know, I announced that I would release the mediator's report. I

decided to take this action at the request of the parties, to allow

them an opportunity to negotiate under the pressure of deadlines, in

the hope that they would achieve a settlement under the bargaining

process.

In making my announcement, I asked the parties to use the time

between then and the weekend to recognize the interests of their

customers, their membership and their families, and the broader

interest of the British Columbia economy I spoke of earlier on. I

reminded them that people in the resource sector of our province,

people who work in the private sector, have been hard hit with the

world recession over the past few years, and that a strike or lockout

would have a devastating effect on the parties involved, on our

economic recovery program and on our future employment prospects.

Unfortunately, even with the assistance of the mediator and my

deputy minister, Graham Leslie, along with Clark Gilmour, director of

mediation services, the parties were unable to work towards a

collective agreement. Although some issues were resolved, it came to an

impasse. As I suggested earlier on, in the transportation sector of our

economy a premium is placed on reliability of service, and the very

threat of a work stoppage is cause for uncertainty, economic loss or

harm to our reputation as a supplier, just as surely as if a shutdown

had already occurred. The uncertainty and loss and harm we simply

cannot afford in the 1980s. So we needed to take swift action as soon

as it became evident that a negotiated settlement without strike or

lockout was not forthcoming.

As for the form of intervention, the bill takes the existing dispute

resolution mechanisms available under the Labour Code and makes them

mandatory. The mediator shall report to the minister, and the minister

shall appoint an inquiry commission which shall submit binding

recommendations on matters referred to it, unless they are settled by

the parties. The purpose here, again, is to bring a greater measure of

certainty to the resolution process, while at the same time not

preventing the parties from continuing to negotiate towards a

settlement while the inquiry process is underway.

In doing so, I hope that they will continue to avail themselves of

the services of the Ministry of Labour. I hope that they will avail

themselves of those services on an informal basis. I feel that this

would help in achieving a settlement and reaching a collective

agreement. As for the binding nature of the industrial inquiry

commissioner's recommendations, it is true that this approach has in

the past only been adopted with the concurrence of both parties. But in

the present circumstances, where bargaining has gone on for so long

with no resolution, the government believes that binding

recommendations are necessary in the interest of harmonious and

productive relations between the parties in future negotiations.

I hope that all hon. members and parties will support this

legislation in the hope that it will work out with them a way of

achieving a collective agreement and get the parties back to working

with each other, to bridge those gaps that may be lost if the

negotiations continue. It's dangerous for both groups when both sides

heat up and uncertainty in the workplace continues.

I've been out in the workplace quite a bit myself. The worst thing

you can have out there is uncertainty and people saying we should do

this, that, or the other. It doesn't do anything for the industrial

relations climate.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

There is always the danger, too, that the eventual settlement will

not be acceptable to either party despite the efforts of the

arbitrator. For this reason we have adopted a slightly different

approach in the present case. We have indicated in the legislation

itself that the provisions allow for the parties to vary, by agreement,

any term or condition of the collective agreement resulting from the

IIC's recommendations. They have maximum opportunity under this

legislation to reach agreement before the commissioner brings forward

his recommendations.

Mr. Speaker, I move second reading, and I urge all members to support the recommendations.

MR. GABELMANN: In his first test, the Labour minister has

failed. He says he's fully committed to collective bargaining and then

introduces legislation before the process has even completed its normal

course of action. He says he's reluctant to move, but he introduces

legislation within days of the mediator booking out, and before there

was any indication that either party wished to strike or to lock out.

In fact, there is indication to the contrary. He says it's regrettable.

It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that if it's regrettable, he doesn't need

to do it.

I suggest the minister has failed. I'm going to talk about that in

terms of the legislation itself in these comments, but I think he's

failed in another way. I think he's failed to live up to the mandate

that is required of the Minister of Labour in this province. That

mandate requires that that minister protect the collective bargaining

system in this province. That's a major mandate of that minister. He

was faced with cabinet pressure: "Terry, make sure that railway doesn't

shut down." Instead of saying: "I have some long-term collective

bargaining interests to protect, " he said: "Yes, sir, whatever you

want I'll do. I'll bring in a bill saying there shall not be a strike

or a lockout on the B.C. Railway, even though one has not yet

occurred." In fact, one may not have been imminent judging by the mood

of both parties, neither of which particularly wanted to hit the

bricks, if what we hear can be believed.

[2:45]

[ Page 6106 ]

Mr. Speaker, let's just assume for the moment — and I don't — that

it was necessary to make sure today that B.C. Rail continue to operate,

that there be no strike or that there be no lockout. The minister had

every remedy that he could possibly desire at his disposal with the

Labour Code and the Essential Service Disputes Act. The only remedy

that was not directly and clearly spelled out in either of those

statutes is the remedy to impose a binding arbitration award. It's the

only one. Yet the Essential Service Disputes Act allows for that

mechanism should one of the parties desire to move in that direction.

Interjection.

MR. GABELMANN: Mr. Speaker, I think you're asking me if I'm

going to be the designated speaker. I think I'm going to have to tell

you as we go. I doubt it. I do intend to be brief, but we'll see.

Mr. Speaker, to make the point again, the minister has shown in the

last couple of days that he has an inclination to use

section 122 of

the Labour Code — the industrial inquiry commission section. I applaud

him for that, because I think that's a useful

Section 1n the Code. It

was developed in the early 1970s under our government. I think it is a

section that has not been used to its full potential over the years.

But in this dispute, unlike apparently the police dispute in a nearby

municipality, the purpose and the procedure under

section 122 of the

Code has been thoroughly sabotaged by making — by government or

legislative order — a report of that industrial inquiry commissioner

mandatory without the parties' agreeing that it should be made

mandatory, which is a provision of 122. That process could have

happened. An inquiry commissioner could have been appointed. The

railway could have been kept running, if that was the concern, and I

recognize there's a concern about that in terms of the economy of this

province. The railway could have been kept running by using

section 8

of the Essential Service Disputes Act.

But no, the government said to the Minister of Labour: "Look, we're

in trouble. We're in trouble on education; we're in trouble on the

economy; we're in trouble on northeast coal; we need a diversionary

tactic. Do something so we can make it look as if we're really taking

some action on the economy." That's what this bill is about. We don't

need the legislation, except to try to make the government look good.

That's the only reason. The minister fails in his responsibility to

defend collective bargaining and to defend the industrial relations

community in this province when he succumbs to that kind of political

pressure from his colleagues.

The government would wish that the bad publicity would go away. It

wishes that it could get out from under its economic bungling. It

attempts to divert. It does it by circuses and by gimmicks like this.

It's not good enough for the Minister of Labour to abdicate his

responsibility, as I said before, in protecting and enhancing the

interests of the collective bargaining system.

While there may be some political gain for the government in this

kind of move — bringing a bill to the Legislature which isn't necessary

but forces a debate; which isn't necessary because he could go and do

the same things anyway — there is no long-term economic advantage

whatsoever, because, as I've said many times before in this

Legislature, when governments intervene in labour disputes it becomes

easier and easier to do it again, more often and in situations less

demanding of that requirement. What happens then at the bargaining

table? One of the inevitable results, and we've seen it time and time

again, is that one party or the other — and it can be one party or the

other — says to itself: "We don't have to negotiate an agreement giving

up some things our members want or our principals want. We can continue

to be the good guys in the eyes of our principals or in the eyes of our

members by not giving up those rights or giving up those points,

because we know the Legislature or the government will come in and bail

us out."

I've seen that happen from both directions, Mr. Speaker. When that

begins to happen in our society, and it happens increasingly.... W.A.

C. Bennett never found the need to do this kind of thing. With all the

many criticisms I had of his labour-management or industrial relations

policies, he didn't find the need to do this kind of thing. But as

we've been doing it increasingly and more frequently, it becomes a

self-fulfilling prophecy. We will have to do it that much more

frequently in the future, because one side or the other will say to

itself: "Why do we have to bargain? We can look like good guys, and if

we know we have the ear of the government, we know we can get what we

want."

In this case, as in so many others, not only does the employer have

the ear of the government; it is the government. Members of that same

cabinet who ordered the Minister of Labour to bring in this bill are

the employers, members of the board of directors of B.C. Rail. Don't

you think they might have whispered a word or two in the ear of their

negotiators? "Hang tough. Don't give up anything. Don't feel you have

to conclude an agreement. We'll bail you out. We've done it before. We

don't do it if poor people are deprived of their transit services; we

don't do it for months then. But if it is threatened that one piece of

wood or one ton of coal might not move at some point in the future,

we'll do it right away." It's hypocritical. It's totally political.

The minister talks about being custodians of the public interest,

and then proceeds to tell the House that the only public interest is

the economic interest. I agree that it's a major element of what the

public interest is — protecting, enhancing and promoting the economy of

the province — but the only time this government seems able to do

anything, by its own definition in terms of enhancing the economic

wherewithal of the province, is when it says we have to send people

back to work, or we have to prevent them from going out on strike or

being locked out. They can't seem to do it in any other economic or

developmental policies. The public interest doesn't matter a damn when

it comes to reforestation, or to proper development of our industries,

or enhancing the value of our resources, The public interest is

irrelevant. But now it suddenly becomes important.

Well, the public interest is not something that finishes a few days

or a few weeks or a few months or a few years from now. The public

interest is something that lasts and lasts. It goes on forever, and the

public interest requires of at least one minister in that government

that he protect the public interest when it comes to free and

democratic collective bargaining in our society. The government, with

some exceptions, no doubt, would argue strenuously against this kind of

involvement in private contracts. They're prepared to interfere

frequently, willy-nilly, without thought, without the necessity of

doing it, when it comes to a contract between an employer and the

delivery of the labour, but they don't make the same kind of

interventions when it comes to the goods or services that that employer

might purchase.

[ Page 6107 ]

The government would be appalled by a suggestion that the community

out there should have its contracts vetted by this Legislature. There

are so many contracts to buy a certain number of widgets, and the

government says: "Oh, no, we didn't like the deal you made. We're going

to veto it. We're going to bring in a bill saying you have to buy fewer

widgets, and you have to pay more, or the other way around." What

nonsense! But somehow labour gets treated like that.

Now that's not to say that there aren't occasions — I've said this

before; I feel I need to say it again — when the Legislature has a full

and proper responsibility to intervene in the collective bargaining

system. I regret when that happens, but I agree that it has to happen

on occasion. But it only happens as the last resort. It should not

happen at this stage of the process.

The last time we had a serious industrial relations dispute on B.C.

Rail, the current Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Heinrich) was the

Minister of Labour — in late 1979, the beginning of 1980. I give that

former minister a lot of credit for the way he handled that dispute and

some others. He didn't come crying to the Legislature saying: "I've got

to have a bill to make sure they don't go out on strike." He had the

guts and the courage to demand that the parties came down here, sat in

one of the committee rooms and bargained, with his presence either

directly or hovering.

Now a minister of the Crown has a fair amount of clout and a fair

amount of influence. He shouldn't get involved too early, but there is

a time when a minister needs to be involved. Under W.A.C. Bennett's

regime, the Premier himself got involved occasionally, and I remember

when parties were quite impressed and quite prepared to have a look at

what they were saying at the bargaining table, quite prepared to take a

thorough look at the whole situation because the Premier of the

province had invited them into his office to talk about it. You don't

do it very often, but when you do it, if you do it sparingly, it works,

and it enabled that Premier to avoid having this kind of legislation in

whatever form it takes being introduced in this House.

The bill takes a different approach, and I've alluded to some of it

before. It thoroughly discredits the role of an IIC and, I think, makes

impossible the proper fulfilment of what an IIC would do under

section

122 of the Code. Because the recommendations aren't mandatory as a

request of the parties; in fact, they're mandatory as a request of a

third party who's theoretically not involved, or theoretically involved

as an independent.

Unfortunately in this case, of course, the government is involved as

a principal, and that makes very difficult the proper work of an IIC

and — I think history supports this — makes very difficult future

improved industrial relations on the railroad. Because what's going to

happen inevitably is that the parties are going to be given a contract

that they're not happy with; one or the other, or both — most likely

both. And there are going to be provisions in the collective agreement

which aren't dealt with by 7 (2) of this bill; provisions that one

party will find repulsive and repugnant, and another

section that the

other party will find the same way. Then you're going to have that

chafing and complaining — I don't want to use the word that comes to

mind — that goes on when people live under a collective agreement that

they haven't been party to and haven't been part of resolving. You will

then be back to the bad old days of B.C. Rail labour relations, which

we began to get away from post-1980. We began to see, with the

industrial relations policy developed by the railway in the last few

years.... Unfortunately, those policies came to an end last year as a

result of the death of an individual who played a very important role,

I think, in beginning to put industrial relations back on track, as it

were.

Rather than attempting to continue those policies by using its role

as the employer, the government let B.C. Rail slip back into the bad

old days. Fifteen months now, or whatever it is, without a collective

agreement; a year and a half of bargaining. I don't want to get into

the issues that are involved, because I don't think that's an

appropriate item for discussion in this House. But when I see what some

of the issues appear to be.... And none of us knows. Not having sat in

on those negotiations, we don't know for certain what went on. When you

see what appear to be the issues involved, when you see what seems to

be an intransigence build up on both sides, one can only say that B.C.

Rail has slipped backwards in the last year or so, back into the bad

old days when disputes were rarely resolved amicably.

[3:00]

You know, Mr. Speaker, if the government really wanted to ensure

that good days were ahead in industrial relations on the BCR, they

would not have brought in this legislation. They would have worked to

make sure that the bargaining team that works for the government and

the industrial relations policy of that railway were modern and

perceptive to the needs of the situation; that's obviously not

happened. Anytime a bill like this is brought in, it's an absolute

admission of failure. In this situation in particular, it's an

admission of failure tenfold when the bill is brought in before there

is even a strike or a lockout; only the potential of one, in the sense

that both parties are free to strike or to lock out. All kinds of

labour disputes in our society are in the situation where people are in

a legal position to strike or to lock out. Sometimes it goes on for

months. The bargaining continues, the pressure is on.

I was pleased last week when the minister said he was going to allow

the mediation officer to book out. He felt that after God knows how

many months of the mediator's presence there was no possibility of

resolution with the mediator being involved, and therefore the strike

or lockout option being precluded. I was pleased with what I thought

was a sense of maturity, an indication of a new era in labour relations

in this province, when the minister allowed the mediator to book out.

He even made a press release about it, which I thought was a bit

unusual. I saw the press statement. The mediator books out on the

weekend, and on Monday we get a bill. There hasn't been time for the

pressure to begin to work. Let it go for a while. And if — I say "if" —

a strike or lockout did develop, then the minister has, as I said

before, the option of the two pieces of legislation that can apply in

this situation.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

The beauty from his point of view — if not mine from a philosophical

point of view, but perhaps the good point of view for many people in

this province; certainly many people in this House — is that the

Essential Service Disputes Act allows for what the minister wants to

accomplish, without having a binding collective agreement imposed on

the parties by some third party, an IIC. I regret very much, Mr.

Speaker, that in his first test the minister did not stand up for

collective bargaining, but decided instead to stand up for the wishes

of those of his colleagues who do not understand that we're

[ Page 6108 ]

talking about people who work for a living. These

are people whose very livelihood depends upon these collective

agreements, whose place of residence depends upon the conclusions of

these collective agreements. Very important issues. Not issues that I

intend to judge — I don't believe that's my role — but important issues

to people; and they want an opportunity to talk about those issues and

to resolve them. When people resolve an issue by talking about it face

to face — even when the result is an unhappy one — they are more likely

to live with it than if it's imposed on them. What the minister has

done is to take us back to the dark old days of bad labour relations on

the BCR, and it will be a long time in recovery from this kind of

legislative interference.

Mr. Speaker, I intend during the committee stage to take a little

bit more time on some of the specific aspects of the way in which the

legislation is worded. It's a departure. It's unlike the NDP

legislation in 1975 which simply ordered a cooling off period and

required that the parties bargain and reach their own agreement. It's

different from the last two pieces of legislation, the one on pulp and

the one on transit, that were brought in by the former Minister of

Labour, inasmuch as the legislature is not given, directly at least,

the right — the cabinet does, that bill really implies — to impose a

collective agreement.

So it's a different approach, but it's no better. In some weird

ways, Mr. Speaker, it's worse, because as bad and as repugnant as I

found the pulp bill and the transit bill, at least there was an immense

pressure on the parties to try to reach an agreement, which they did in

both cases, because the very worst thing that could happen to workers

in this province — and most employers would agree privately — is to

have that cabinet impose a collective agreement on anybody. So they had

that kind of pressure on them. As bad as I find that, at least it was

an intense pressure to resolve the dispute.

The minister has, in this bill, tried to walk a middle kind of road.

He has rejected the cabinet determination of a collective agreement,

trying to win favour by appearing to use a good

section of the Labour

Code. But in doing so — in trying to walk that middle ground — he's got

nothing. He has done a dastardly disservice to collective bargaining on

one hand, and he has given no incentive to the parties to put it

together on the other hand. So what have we got?

We've got a minister bringing in a political bill, at the political

direction of his cabinet because they're suffering in the polls, just

to try to recoup, if they can, a few points — especially between North

Van via Squamish up to Prince George and on to Tumbler Ridge — in the

opinion polls. That's all it's about. Mr. Speaker, that does disservice

to one of the basic democratic freedoms in our society, the freedom to

Mr. Speaker, the bill and the minister are a disaster.

MR. MACDONALD: I think the minister, Mr. Speaker, is being awfully jumpy.

I don't think that's going to be good for labour relations in this province,

as the member for North Island says here. Look, the Labour Code, which has passed

as the law of the province.... I think

section 122 says that we can have

the report, at this stage, of an industrial inquiry commissioner. Why shouldn't

we be allowed to read it, sitting here in the Legislature, before we're

jumping away ahead of ourselves and passing this particular legislation? During

that period, nobody can strike and nobody can lock out. That's a fairly

limited period, I agree, Mr. Speaker. I think it's 14 days.

But then you've got another piece of legislation on the statute

books, the Essential Service Disputes Act. You go to the back of that,

and you see right written into the

schedule as the affected industry

British Columbia Rail. Has the minister read that? Why hasn't he used

it? There's a cooling-off period, if that's what you want to call it,

of 90 days. Why are we so jumpy? Why are we launching our boat while

the tide is still out? There's no strike. There's no lockout.

The minister hasn't even met with the parties, as I understand it

from listening to the hon. member; he can correct that if he likes, but

I don't think he has. Have you had the parties in for a tongue-lashing

in your office, Mr. Minister? Have you said: "This is an important,

vital public utility" — which of course it is — "and you'd better get

down to business and settle"? You didn't even give the trustees a

tongue-lashing; you gave them a leave of absence. But at least the

Minister of Labour, before he jumps at.... My heavens, we're going to

have all kinds of labour disputes in this province during the remaining

month or two of your administration, Mr. Minister of Labour — of your

occupation of that office. Are you going to jump at them before there's

a strike notice issued? Well, there are strike notices out, but

nobody's intending to go on strike right away.

It can be prevented by using existing legislation. Now this is a

jumpy minister. You're jumping too soon, you're jumping too fast.

You're going to do more harm in the field of industrial relations than

good.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the hon. member direct his comments to the Chair.

MR. MACDONALD: But the Chair is not jumpy. Yes, I will, Mr. Speaker.

I guess I've said what I meant to say. I think it's a shame that we

should be asked here.... Is this a bit of light summer theatre that

we're engaged in here? Get up at the end and tell us whether any

legislature has been asked to rule at this stage of a dispute, when

there can be cooling-off periods — 90 days under the Essential Service

Disputes Act; 14 days at least under the Industrial....Has any

legislature anywhere been asked to go through this kind of exercise? My

gosh, to prevent a divorce before there's a marriage — before the

baby's born.... I think we're jumping at things. This has got to be

political theatre on the part of the government. But it's bad theatre,

because when you get jumpy in that Labour portfolio, you create waves

out there that always cause more harm than good.

MR. LEA: Mr. Speaker, this legislation, in my opinion, is not

designed to deal with a labour dispute in any way. This legislation is

designed to inflame. There are provisions in already existing

legislation that can deal with the impending problem on B.C. Rail. The

Essential Service Disputes Act is one that can be used. There is no

need for this legislation. There may very well be a need for government

to step in at a later date. That would be the prerogative of this

Legislature, and something that has been done before under every

government. But why, you have to ask, does the minister bring in a bill

that isn't needed when he already has the power within legislation to

deal with this situation?

Mr. Speaker, there can only be one answer. If the minister already

has the power under legislation, then this legislation that we're

dealing with here is nothing more than a political game. They've read

the polls. The latest Decima poll shows

[ Page 6109 ]

that 63 percent of the people in this province are

more than a bit discouraged with the leadership in the labour movement.

Whether their opinion is correct or not, it is their opinion. The

government has access to those polls. They are taking advantage....

They did it with the teachers. Every time they take a poll where they

find that the majority of people are against the minority, this

government will act on that information. They divide in order to

conquer. They bring about confrontation where cooperation would be

better suited. It is a shame on politics in this province. I don't

believe that this is the minister's legislation anyway. He just happens

to be the willing messenger who has brought it forward.

[3:15]

There is a design, not by the elected officials in this House — with

the exception of the Premier.... The Premier and his non-elected

advisers are the people running this province. Even ministers have no

sway within their own council. Ministers have ended up being lackeys to

public servants and the Premier. I cannot believe that this minister

does not believe, as we do, that it is a political ploy, that it is

nothing more than doing something in this Legislature with which they

hope to catch the imagination of people who are prone to bigotry —

nothing more, nothing less. The legislation is there to deal with this

situation, or any situation that we can imagine arising out of these

negotiations between management and labour on the B.C. Railway.

This bill is a political sham and I for one will not be voting for it. As the only member of the United Party in this House....

MR. HOWARD: Ever.

MR. LEA: Maybe ever, maybe not. I'm sure people probably said that to the people who founded the CCF: maybe never — never up until now.

There are two areas where I could probably have walked out of this

House a hero. I could have been a hypocrite on the pay raise in this

House and stuck it to both the major parties and walked out with people

saying: "Isn't Lea a good guy?" I could probably vote with the

government on this legislation and take advantage of bigotry and

ignorance around this dispute and the kind of legislation that's

already available.

I don't have to shave in the morning, but I still have to look at

myself in the mirror. I will not be part of this political sham. That's

what it is, Mr. Speaker. The minister knows it; the government members

know it. It is short-term politics. Surely we have a bigger obligation

to the people of this province than we have to our own political

parties. There isn't anyone in this House, in my opinion, who will vote

for this legislation in good conscience. There will be people, however,

voting for it. I won't be one of them.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I suppose always, when a member is

elevated to the cabinet, there is a generosity on the part of other

members in the chamber to wish that person well, to hope that his first

formal efforts in that office bring forth something that elevates that

person's stature. That's the nature of the chamber: to give a new

member or a new person time to find himself, and hope that the

individual comes out for the better in his first efforts. Regrettably,

that ain't the case here. The first formal act, as much as we would

have hoped otherwise, makes all of us wish that the minister was made

of something better, and that he had brought forward something better

to serve the public.

What this indicates, as others have said, is that the minister has

immediately become absorbed in and become a part of and a spokesman for

the concept of manipulating public opinion for his own party's good.

He's become a part of and a spokesman for the concept of confrontation

and attack against groups in society. If there is something that

identifies this government over the past number of years, it is simply

that: manipulative and confrontational, seeking to divide and conquer,

to divide and rule. The minister has proved immediately that he's a

part of that foul game, of that foul part of politics in this province,

and that's unfortunate.

He says one thing but does another. He follows the course of saying,

"I do this reluctantly, but I do it for your own good," as if people

don't know what is in their own best interests. In addition, either the

minister does not trust himself or the Premier doesn't trust him,

because in the bill, looking at

section 6 and without referring to it

in detail, Mr. Speaker, and looking at

section 122 of the Labour

Code.... This bill says: we don't trust the minister to carry out his

options under

section 122 of the Labour Code, so we'll spell them out

for him; we'll remove the options available to the minister by nailing

down precisely, if he does seek to opt under 122, what he's required to

do. That means the minister either doesn't trust himself to make the

value judgment about his options under

section 122 — or he wouldn't

have incorporated that in here — or he is reflecting the lack of trust

that the Premier has in that minister for those options under

section

122; otherwise they wouldn't be in there. That doesn't speak very

highly, I would think, of what we are seeking to accomplish in this

chamber to the benefit of collective bargaining and the benefit of

society.

We've had collective bargaining in the province of British Columbia

by provincial statute for something like 40 years. It's had its ups and

its downs, and under the collective bargaining process and under the

statutes that have existed there have been lockouts by employers,

strikes by employees, and simultaneous or mutual actions by the two of

them at given times. And there have been excellent collective

agreements bargained for under whatever our legislation was over the

years, indicating that it is possible for fair-minded people in the

collective bargaining process to reach a mutually acceptable and a fair

agreement that's available to all.

I think we all know that in difficult economic times the group that

has the power in any set of collective bargaining primarily is the

employer. That power is stronger, generally speaking, than that

obtained by the working class, through their organizations. In bad

economic times the power of the employer increases. Those are the times

when we should be extremely careful about what we do as legislators to

intrude into that collective bargaining system. As the member for North

Island (Mr. Gabelmann) pointed out, every time we intrude we make the

next intrusion that much easier. Every time we intrude we injure the

collective bargaining process. Every time we intrude we diminish the

process; we make it less workable, less manageable. We give a signal to

both sides in the collective bargaining process that maybe it isn't

worth bending every effort for a mutually acceptable collective

agreement, because government will stand in the background and will

offer to intrude.

We will attract employers who want to be that way or workers who

want to be that way. We will attract them to be intransigent in the

collective bargaining process. We've done it already. We are saying to

them: you really don't need to try to come to a fair settlement between

yourselves, because big

[ Page 6110 ]

government will move in and bail you out, deciding

for you what's best for you. The result will be an unhealthy, injured

collective bargaining process, not a vibrant and a healthy one, which

is what we all desire.

The minister — I wrote down his closing remarks — said that he hoped

for harmonious industrial relations in the future. In order to have

that, I'd suggest the minister and the government stay out of the way

and stay out of the process until all other attempts have failed and

there is no other recourse left. Don't get into the process partway

through it and say: we're going to fix it for you; you don't need to

bother. If the minister truly, honestly believes that he has a hope for

harmonious industrial relations in the future, I'd suggest to him his

course of action is to withdraw this bill at the moment or set it to

one side, but not to proceed with it. By proceeding with it he will

injure his own expressed hopes. Whether he actually had those hopes is

another question; I won't embark upon that.

In order to have that harmonious industrial relationship, there has

to be a will to do it and a will on both sides involved in the

collective bargaining process — employers and workers and workers'

organizations alike. Sometimes it's there; in fact, most times it is

there. We only see and have drawn to the public's attention the times

when it doesn't work. But mostly it does. It works because in the past

there has been an approach on the part of government and on the part of

legislators — it goes back as well to the time when the New Democratic

Party was the government — that the moment of involvement was only when

all else failed and there was an obvious inability or refusal on the

part of the people involved in the process to come to mutually

acceptable terms. Only after ministers had called both parties

together, sat them down in a room, beat their heads together and said,

resolve this; only after mediators got into the picture; only after

industrial inquiry commissions; in some instances, only after free

collective bargaining had been permitted to run its full course, and

there appeared to be no other choice available, did government intrude.

This bill is a departure from that historic position, and it's a bad

and injurious departure.

Collective bargaining, we know, has as its foundation a kind of

confrontational atmosphere itself. There is an adversarial aspect

involved in which people physically indicate that they are adversaries

by sitting on opposite sides of the table. They don't even sit next to

each other and try to work cooperatively that way. That's the way it

is, so it has that atmosphere about it.

[3:30]

We have a government here, Mr. Speaker, that wants to continue that

adversarial complexion to collective bargaining; it likes to see it

continue and be available, hoping that confrontation will be the rule

of the day in collective bargaining and that collective bargaining in

given instances will fail so the government can step in and impose

itself upon that situation. That's what the government seeks to have

happen. It does that by doing things that it is doing now, and it does

that in periods where there is relative harmony in collective

bargaining. It does that by being silent about the whole process, and

only steps in when it seeks to have it be to the advantage of the

government.

Either side in collective bargaining can exploit the process, and

has exploited it in the past. There was a time when we had in this

province a step-by-step mechanism of conciliation officers — direct

collective bargaining. If that failed, then either party could take the

next step to a conciliation officer. If that didn't work, either party

could proceed to the establishment of a conciliation board. It had

hearings, and if that didn't work, either party then had a vote on what

the conciliation board recommended, and eventually there might be

strike votes, lockout decisions and so on. In some instances,

participants in that collective bargaining process then deliberately

did not bargain in good faith at any of those stages, because they

thought: "We can get a better deal at the next stage." They can do that

today.

I see the minister nodding his head, and I take it that he is

nodding in agreement with what I have just been saying. If he is

nodding in agreement with what I am just saying, then he'd better nod

in agreement with what I said earlier. That is, every time that

government steps into the picture it's enticing the participants in

collective bargaining to delay and not to collectively bargain in good

faith, because they know the government's going to step in and maybe

they'll get a better deal when the government steps in. If you agree

with one, then you have to agree with the other. If you agree with what

I've just said about not bargaining in good faith in the earlier days,

hoping to get a better deal later on, then you've done the wrong thing

by bringing in this bill, because that's precisely what you're enticing

people to do right at the moment.

I don't know what happened in B.C. Rail's activities. I was a

member, and other members in this House were too, of the now defunct,

destroyed, eunuched Crown Corporations Committee, and a few years ago

we had the opportunity to have a number of meetings with B.C. Rail

officials with respect to the operations of B.C. Rail. We were

delighted at the progress that had been made within that company and

within its council of unions with respect to collective bargaining in

the post-1979-80 difficult period. The committee was overjoyed to hear

that.

That came about — I'm not attempting to lay blame here now on

anybody — because B.C. Rail had then, perhaps in the aftermath of those

horrendously difficult times they had in 1978-79, 1980 — somewhere in

that period of 1979 and 1980 — the foresight to employ a very

personable, knowledgeable, determined and committed vice-president in

charge of industrial relations, who knew the history of collective

bargaining from the trade union point of view and from the employer's

point of view. He brought to that corporation common sense and was able

to effect a very harmonious set of circumstances with respect to

collective bargaining. Regretfully he's gone now; he's not around any

longer to do that.

What I'm saying doesn't say anything at all about the person whom I

believe is named Foley, isn't he? The vice president of industrial

relations, Brian Foley; I don't know that person at all. I've no

comment about his capacity or anything else. But I do know what

happened before, and I do know there were harmonious relationships, and

I do know that there can be again if government will keep its long nose

out of the affairs, if government won't accelerate the whole system.

Here's a group that's been without a collective agreement for 14 or

15 months, a long period of time. Here is a group — employers and

employees, through the member council of the trade unions — that had a

difference of opinion last fall about crew size on the trains. How long

that difference of opinion existed I don't know, but they made a

decision in the process of collective bargaining to refer that subject

matter to arbitration. The union and the company finally concluded, as

a result of collective bargaining: "We can't resolve this at the

bargaining table for one reason or another. Let's ship it off to

[ Page 6111 ]

arbitration." The annual report of B.C. Rail, which

appeared in our mailboxes today, points out that hearings began early

in 1985 and a ruling is expected in May on that one subject.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

I say that if this group can exhibit — that is, B.C. Rail and its

council of trade unions — a few months ago the cooperative spirit of

sending one subject to arbitration, then they can cooperate together to

do other things, regardless of how difficult those times may be or the

feelings may be between them. Interference by the government for

whatever ulterior motive the government may have, whether it's rotten

crass politics or PR or a diversionary tactic to take the minds of the

public off the horrendous mess this government has got the economy in,

whatever its reason, will injure the process by proceeding with this

particular bill.

There are other ways of approaching things. I submit that B.C. Rail

and its council of trade unions, even though they have been bargaining

collectively for some 14 or 15 months and even though that may be

frustrating — and I know from personal experience that it is — and even

though hard feelings may develop between them.... If the word is given

to them by the minister: "You guys figure this out yourselves. You've

done it before. You did it just a few months ago with crew sizes. You

figured that one out yourselves without any legislation, You determined

that you'd send that one to arbitration. Obviously you have the

capacity to do it. Obviously you have the desire to do it in one

instance.... Indicating that desire in one instance indicates that

there is desire in other instances as well.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is not worthy of support. It does not have

anything whatever to do with whether one has a particular bias about

corporate strategies or trade union strategies with respect to

collective bargaining. I say from the outset that I don't, that I'm not

a handmaiden to one or the other in this House or anywhere else. I'm

talking in the purest sense of what is decent and fair and correct for

this government and this minister to do.

Interjection.

MR. HOWARD: The hallmark of this government's activity has

just been blurted out. It's to be confrontational, attacking and

manipulative — three words that identify precisely what this government

is all about and what that muttering ninny over there is saying. That's

what they believe in. That's what they do every day of the week, and

here it is again.

I say to the minister, maybe this government won't change its ways,

and that looks to be the case; then the only solution is to change the

government. And the sooner we have that opportunity the better.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, I'm afraid I may not be as

eloquent as the member for Vancouver Centre. However, I would like to

make a comment or two about this bill.

Unfortunately the two parties to the bargaining process have not been able

to agree. Unfortunately, also, there is another party or group of parties who

would be very seriously affected by disruptions of that very critical transportation

system in British Columbia. They've gone through a very difficult time these

last few years — our resource industries — and recovery is slowly taking place.

Our markets are slowly improving for our forest products and for the other commodities

transported by B.C. Rail. But more important than day-to-day transportation

of goods is the reputation that our province has in the marketplaces of the

world.

A couple of years ago when I was in Beijing in the People's Republic

of China a very brief lockout took place. I believe the Tahsis Co. was

involved. That morning I and my associates on the trip had a meeting

with the China National Light Industrial Products Import and Export

Company, which is responsible for the import of pulp and paper into

China. The people in that agency knew within 15 minutes of that lockout

taking place, and when we entered the meeting we were asked

immediately: "Will that lockout have any effect on your ability to

deliver pulp and on the contracts that we have with your country?"

No matter whether a labour disruption takes place or whether it is

anticipated, whether it's for one day or three months, any indication

to the world of a labour climate of disruption in British Columbia that

would make it difficult for us to deliver to those world marketplaces

will give our competitors an advantage over us and make it more

difficult for us to sell into those world marketplaces. Not only is the

reputation of our province as a reliable supplier of goods at stake,

Mr. Speaker, but the very recovery that is taking place throughout the

central part of British Columbia in the forest products industry and in

the mining industry is at jeopardy. The union members on the railway

have been working steadily throughout this difficult economic time, but

many of their union brothers employed in other industries have had

extremely difficult times indeed. There have been layoffs. There have

been temporary plant closures, and in some places permanent plant

closures. Now as these people are once again enjoying relatively stable

employment, I think it unwise and really unfair that one sector of the

economy should once again put them out of work, or be a party to

putting them out of work.

We so often approach the labour situation in British Columbia, as

the member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) said, in an adversarial way. I think

there is a gradual change taking place in British Columbia — and I

think it's a change for the good — and that is the realization that the

employers and the employees really depend upon the same enterprises for

their well-being. Without healthy competitive industries there would be

no jobs in British Columbia. Without being able to deal effectively in

world marketplaces, we'd have a difficult time maintaining the

industrial levels that we have, particularly in our resource industries.

I don't think that we can have B.C. Rail go on strike, even for a

moment, because when it does, that word is immediately broadcast about

our market areas and makes it more difficult for us to convince the

world that the problems that they perceive in British Columbia are more

perceptual than real — because we quite frankly have been rather

reliable, and it's been very seldom that British Columbia's products

have been delayed from marketplaces and that contracts haven't been

filled as a result of labour disruptions. Nevertheless that reputation

is abroad and we are not favourably looked upon. Wherever I go

throughout the world trying to help the promotion and sale of our

forest products, these questions are asked. 1, with some degree of

confidence, tell them yes, there have been occasional strikes in

British Columbia, but normally they are among smaller groups of

[ Page 6112 ]

employers and employees and they don't really drastically affect our ability to deliver.

I think it's unfortunate that at times the collective bargaining

process does break down. But when it does, I don't think it very

appropriate that we allow our very reputation as a province and a

country to suffer. I don't think it appropriate that those people who

will be hurt, and who are not present at the bargaining table — those

other workers and enterprises that depend upon that transportation

system — be forced to suffer any more than they have in previous years.

[3:45]

I think the Minister of Labour, even though he is relatively new in

his portfolio, has demonstrated a willingness to listen, to hear both

sides of stories and to understand the problems that he has to deal

with. That minister was up in my constituency last week in the mining

communities of Logan Lake, Ashcroft and Cache Creek, and he met with

members of the employer group and with employee groups as well. He was

very well received, and people from both sides — if there have to be

sides — acknowledged the fact that here is a minister who wants to

listen and to understand, and to make the system work.

I think that we, as members of the Legislature, not only have a

responsibility to the collective bargaining process and to the two

sides of a dispute, but we have a greater responsibility to the economy

of British Columbia and to those other people who from time to time are

hurt and who are not a party to the individual collective bargaining

that hurts them. I have no hesitancy whatsoever in supporting the

minister's bill.

MR. LAUK: The Minister of Forests indicated in the first part

of his remarks that he was worried about the attitude of some of our

customers. It's little wonder to me that a totalitarian administration,

without the democratic institution of free collective bargaining, would

be wondering what free collective bargaining was all about. I find the

first part of the minister's remarks totally unacceptable, because his

suggestion is that there should be no free collective bargaining on the

B.C. Railroad. That's what he's saying.

Without taking an overly sentimental view about working people — the

vast majority of people in this province, who work with their hands and

with some skill to provide the wealth in this province — they're one of

our democratic institutions. All of our democratic institutions are

very — comparatively speaking — expensive. They're expensive in terms

of the total commonwealth. They're expensive in terms of time, and wear

and tear on the nerves. They require patience, judgment, wisdom,

tolerance, shared civil liberties, shared responsibilities in

protecting our neighbours' rights as well as our own — protecting our

neighbours' rights because we're protecting our own. That's a

democratic system.

I'm not surprised that the Minister of Forests would make such an

uneducated remark — uneducated and unappreciative of the integrity of

the democratic institutions of our country. It's incredible to me that

people like this are elected and re-elected in a democratic system, and

they have nothing but contempt for the very democratic system that has

elected them. I appreciate the Minister of Forests' remarks that other

people suffer when there are shutdowns. Yes, there is some evidence

that people in the forest industry and in some related industries are

now experiencing slightly more stable employment, and we do not want to

risk that stability for the sake of a labour dispute that some may

interpret as irrational or rational.

Democratic institutions arc expensive. If we're to take the point of

view of the Minister of Forests, we can abolish all of the democratic

institutions and go to a form of totalitarian government; then we'll

have stable employment, stable economic conditions. Our customers

around the world can be assured of delivery of our product, but we will

not have a democratic system of government. We will not have a free

economic system in our society, and you put the stability — the social

and governmental stability — of our system in jeopardy. It's no longer

the ballot box; it then becomes the gun. It's this attitude on the part

of the government that concerns me.

Every once in a while people take office and they rise in office — I

think that's the expression used; and every once in a while people take

office and they lower the office itself. As Plato said, "A measure of a

man is how he uses power, " not whether he has it or not. He could be

gracious; he could use it sparingly, with wisdom and in a timely way.

If he uses it like a bludgeon, he reveals his own innermost weaknesses,

his lack of skill, his lack of training in his office. He uses power to

hide the fact that he's afraid and lacks the courage to be steady at

the tiller and go through those tested steps that other people in that

office went through before him. He could add to the prestige and the

strength of his position, but if he acts in a mean-minded way or, as in

this situation, Mr. Speaker, in a transparent political ploy that has

misused the power of his office, then it is a mark of Cain in political

life that he'll have to carry with him and pay the price for. In the

final analysis he makes that decision. The office is given to him by

the Premier, but how he handles that office, and how he stands up to

those about him is watched, is recorded, and will not be forgotten.

In this situation, Mr. Speaker, the move of the government is

decidedly premature. It's embarrassingly transparent as a political

ploy and should not be forgotten. I will be voting against this bill.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: I certainly welcome the opportunity to be

able to support this bill in, if you like, very broad terms but also

because of a very parochial interest. The area that I represent,

northeastern British Columbia, is very dependent on rail transport as a

means of maintaining the industries in that area. I know that applies

to many parts of the interior. I'm certainly amazed at some of the

specious arguments that have been made so far by members of the

opposition. They seem to be unaware that many industries in the north

absolutely and entirely depend on rail transport. The farmers had a

very difficult season last year. They've managed to rescue some of the

grain this spring because of good luck, and now to have B.C. Rail, the

only method of shipping the grain out of that area, shut down would be

a catastrophe on top of an already catastrophic situation. We must not

let that happen.

The lumber industry, particularly in Fort Nelson and in Fort St.

John, is to a large extent dependent on the shipment of chips. That's

what keeps those companies alive. You cannot afford to ship those chips

any other way than by rail. So the jobs of people in those industries

in that area are completely dependent on B.C. Rail. Every time there is

a suggestion of B.C. Rail's closing down, it affects hundreds if not

thousands of people in my area. Just the threat of it has a harmful

effect.

[ Page 6113 ]

The petroleum industry ships a lot of petroleum products north and

south from the refinery at Taylor. Many other operations are dependent

on whether that fuel gets to Fort Nelson in tanker cars from the

refinery at Taylor and from other places. The products they manufacture

there, the byproducts of the petroleum industry, have to be shipped

south. Certainly some of the products go by pipeline. But some of these

have to go by means of rail transport, and that is the only way.

So what we're talking about in this situation is the vested

interests of a small minority in our society being able — for their

democratic rights, as some of the opposition members state — to put all

of those other people out of work, not just for the period of time that

they shut down the rail, but if those markets are lost........

Remember, these shipments that I'm talking about depend on somebody

buying those products, and if those people quit buying those products

because they can't rely on the shipments arriving, or because the cost

becomes prohibitive because some other method of transportation has to

be brought in, then those people could lose those jobs over an extended

period of time. All it would take is one major industry to shut down

because of a loss of markets, and you would have another catastrophe.

Remember that it may not seem that important to people who live in the

heavily populated southern portion of the province, because of the

diversification available to them. But certainly those areas of the

province feed that diversification, and our resource areas are very

important to the total economy of the province and must not be

jeopardized.

When I hear a member, like that member from Vancouver with a tiny

little constituency — with a diverse situation dependent on the

resource development in this area — talk about the democratic rights of

a small minority........ Democracy to me was always defined as the

rights of the majority of people in our society. If you're going to

talk democratic rights, then does that mean that those democratic

rights are exclusive to a small group who can undermine the democratic

rights of the rest of the people in this province? I cannot accept

that, because if democracy means anything at all, then one individual

or one small group does not have the right to undermine the livelihood

of all of the rest of the people in the province.

For that reason, what this bill is doing is supporting democratic

rights. I know the opposition, with their debt to small groups, believe

that democracy consists of total support for one small group. Do you

ignore the rest of the people? I don't see how you can talk democracy

when you say that the power that's vested in democracy should be the

exclusive rights of a small minority. If power in a democracy has any

meaning at all, then it must consider the rights of the majority of

people and the rights of others, as well as those with a particular

vested interest. I think we must keep that in mind. I'm certainly proud

to be part of a government that will not let one small contingent of

our society destroy the rest of the rights of livelihood for the others.

[4:00]

Interjection.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. The member for North Island

(Mr. Gabelmann) will come to order. Also, the Speaker has a requirement

to maintain decorum in the House, and I'll ask the member for North

Island not to put his feet on the chair. Thank you. Please continue.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: Members of the opposition constantly refer

to this sacred collective bargaining process. The collective bargaining

process, at any price to the majority of the people in this province:

is that what you support? Well then, no wonder you'd never get elected

as a government.

I think we've had statements that this is a rotten diversion,

protecting jobs of thousands of people by taking some collective

bargaining process which hasn't worked out and saying to people: "You

must settle this." That member also said something about: "You should

go to them and say, 'You work it out yourselves."' After 15 months! One

of the ways that they were going to work it out was to shut down a very

critical and major transportation link in this province.

Interjection.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: It would certainly appear that was it. And

it still, in this bill, leaves it open. For instance, the bill does

recognize that any agreement that can be reached between the parties

will not be affected by this legislation. So they still have the

opportunity to reach that agreement, and yet protecting jobs of

thousands of people in this province is called by that opposition a

rotten diversion. Well, I think it's a courageous move; I think it's a

necessary move. We could not afford the shutdown. The threat of that

shutdown has done enough harm to the people in my area and to the

people in the central interior, and we cannot do that.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

I'm just appalled at how the very people over there who decry

confrontation tactics foster and feed them in any way possible, because

what they try to promote is the confrontation tactics. I know that some

of them would love to see B.C. Rail get into difficulty. I know that

some of them would love to see northeast coal shut down, because that

would suit their partisan political purposes, but certainly not the

purposes of the people who work in that area, who make their livelihood

from it and who provide a lot of revenue to the province.

So, certainly, I can easily and readily support this bill, because I

think it's necessary because it protects the rights of the majority of

people in this province who have the right to make a livelihood. That

maintains the democratic rights of the people of this province, not at

the expense of the democratic rights of a small group. I will never

accept some of the things that are happening in the Charter of Rights —

that an individual has the right to drive drunken and accumulate points

and drive dangerously in British Columbia without considering the

victims. That's what we're talking about here, the same principle:

because of the rights of one individual or a small group, the rights of

others should be taken away. No, that is not democracy; that is anarchy.

Certainly I would hope that some of those members would reconsider

and support the fact that other people in this province want to work

not only now but in the future, and that this bill assures that, while

at the same time saying that anything that is reached by agreement

between the parties will not be affected by this bill. I think that is

about as far as they can go without letting B.C. Rail shut down, and we

certainly cannot let that shut down for the broader public interest.

Interjections.

[ Page 6114 ]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the member for North Island and the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing come to order.

HON. A. FRASER: I would like to say a few words under Bill

39, and I want to give a little history — it will take me two minutes —

of the railroad. I've lived along the railroad all my life at Quesnel,

my home town, and that used to be the terminus of the railroad. This

railroad has had quite a turbulent history. To bring you up to date, it

used to be called the PGE. We in the interior said that meant "pigs

going east" and it also meant "Prince George eventually." I was in this

Legislature when we changed the name to the British Columbia Railway.

So that's what we're talking about.

Just a minute more on history. Since the railroad started and over

the years we have built this into a very vital transportation link in

our province, from North Vancouver to Fort Nelson, with branch lines to

different other places. All British Columbians, I am sure, are proud of

that railroad today. I can recall debates in this Legislature when

safety was a big factor, and, believe me, in those days they had

something to complain about, the working people of the railroad. That

railroad has all been brought up to high safety standards and

modernized in every respect, including electrification of the new

branch line into Tumbler Ridge, really leading the nation in that. I

just want to put that on the record.

Dealing with Bill 39 itself, first, as the MLA for Cariboo, in my

riding we are the largest shippers of the railroad, no matter what the

products. Whether it be forest products, agricultural products or

mining products, the Cariboo riding contributes more than any other

area of the province to the commodities that they haul, northbound or

southbound. They are the lifeline not only of the Cariboo, but also the

Peace River. It's vital that this line be kept in operation.

Dealing specifically with Bill 39, I support it fully. We don't want

the railroad to stop at all — "we" is the government of British

Columbia that I'm a part of. I would make the observation, Mr. Speaker,

that probably both sides, not only the union but the company....

They've had 14 months to settle this, and they haven't been able to do

it. It's not a case of jumping in, as the other side has been trying to

imply; they've had 14 months. I'm not very happy that with all that

expertise, they haven't been able to settle it.

We're saying in this bill that it goes to an industrial inquiry

commission, and that will be the final way it will be settled. But the

big point is, we won't lose any time in the operation of the railroad.

Quite frankly, we can't afford to, with the jobs and so on that are

affected. I think it's safe to say, on behalf of the people that work

on the railroad, that they don't want to lose any work either. I think

we forget that. They want to be gainfully employed. They don't want to

go out and, as they say, hit the bricks.

With this high-priced expertise not being able to settle in a period

of 14 months, certainly we as a responsible government, in the interest

of the economy of our province and the general welfare of the province,

have to do something. I'm amazed, Mr. Speaker, at the attitude of the

NDP. I'll give you a little history. They ordered this railroad back to

work in 1975 when they were government. We haven't heard anything about

that today. They called a special sitting of this Legislature in

October 1975 and ordered these people back to work with a bill; the

Legislature was called specially to do that. Now they switch right

around and say that we're the bad guys. I just would like to remind you

of that, Mr. Speaker.

Dealing with the member for North Island (Mr. Gabelmann), I would

give you a little more political history in regard to labour. When his

party was the government and they brought the bill into this

Legislature to order that railroad back to work, which was on a

nonsensical strike at the time, they acted responsibly, But that member

for North Island voted against his own government; he was one of three.

That's why he never made the cabinet. Anyway, it all worked out fine.

They did that in October 1975, and then we pitched them out of office

in December 1975. So everything worked well.

I want to congratulate the Minister of Labour for coming up with a

proper and sensible solution to this, and to remind the House that this

railroad is no longer a tinkertoy train. It's a well-established

railroad with 2,600 employees; they get a reasonable salary. It serves

the export market, and all British Columbians — even the ones from

Vancouver Centre, I might say — rely on the revenue that we get out of

exports. This railroad hauls forest products, grain, coal — you name it

— to our export markets, and gets it on its way. It's a real part of

the total economy of our province.

With those few remarks, Mr. Speaker, again, I am happy to be part of

a government that will take this leadership in these times and make

sure that none of the railroad employees will lose any work, and that a

reasonable solution will be arrived at.

HON. MR. SEGARTY: I appreciate the comments of all members who took

part in the debate.

Just to rehash a little, the member for North Island (Mr. Gabelmann)

talked a bit about alternatives. Certainly there are always

alternatives.

The members also talked about me not being willing to meet with the

parties. I guess I should go back a little bit to what I said earlier.

The dispute started 15 months ago, and both parties engaged in

collective bargaining through that period of time. All of the

assistance and support of the Ministry of Labour and the provincial

government was put at the disposal of the parties to reach an agreement

through the bargaining process. Mediator Fred Geddes, who worked night

and day and weekends with the parties to try to resolve the outstanding

issues in the dispute, helped some but a collective agreement didn't

materialize. The parties served lockout notice and strike notice on

each other on May 5.

On the weekend prior to last Wednesday, both parties asked me to

withdraw the mediator from the dispute. I did so in the hope that it

would provide the stimulus necessary for the parties to reach a

collective agreement. The director of mediation services was involved

with the parties in trying to reach resolution of the dispute, and my

deputy minister, Graham Leslie, was working with the parties in an

effort to resolve the dispute.

Yesterday morning I phoned Mr. Foley and Mr. Farley and asked them

to meet with me. One of the parties said it was inconvenient for him to

meet with me, so I proceeded with the legislative action that I took

yesterday. I would have liked to have had the agreement of both parties

to submit the outstanding issues to binding arbitration, but I didn't

have the agreement of both parties.

Members talk about bad labour relations. The worst labour relations

that can develop are from the frustration of individual members of

unions out in the community trying to do their jobs, wondering when

they're going to be on the job or off the job. Their customers come to

them calling them all

[ Page 6115 ]

sorts of names,

not knowing what kind of security they're going to have in getting

their products to market, and there are fights between various unions

in the community. That's the other side of the labour relations aspect

that the member didn't talk about.

The members are careful to talk about one side only having a

responsibility in the area of labour relations. They went to great

extent to mention the need for improved labour relations at the company

and employer level. But as I understand it, there's a responsibility on

all parties to work at achieving a healthy labour relations climate in

our province. It's not exclusive to management, nor is it exclusive to

employees or government. It's a daily, weekly and monthly process that

you need to develop. We need to work slowly at eroding old barriers,

breaking down old traditions and putting away suspicion and emotion to

try to work out a relationship in which both parties can achieve their

mutual interests.

[4:15]

The member for Vancouver Centre also talked about the democratic

process and the need to look at our province and not use the power of

this office or the power of government. I don't look at it as a

situation of power. Only the member for Vancouver Centre would use the

word "power" in any of these circumstances, because with that power

goes responsibility. I have a responsibility not just to the two

parties involved but to all British Columbians who have gone out and

worked hard to achieve market success over the course of the past few

years.

People who work in the private sector — whether it's in our mining

communities or leaders in the mining industry, whether it's in the

forest industry or small business — have gone out and have worked hard

over the course of the past few years. Yes, they've had some tough

decisions to make with respect to the management of their facilities

and their plants. They have made those tough decisions. They have made

sacrifices in the course of making those tough decisions. It would be

the height of irresponsibility for me or the government of British

Columbia to allow a work stoppage of this nature on our economy and our

province at this time. This dispute doesn't just involve two parties or

two people; it involves the whole industrial complex of our province.

It involves a major transportation network servicing all of northern

British Columbia, north central British Columbia, northeastern British

Columbia and northwestern British Columbia. It also ties up vital

transportation links to southeastern British Columbia. Our industrial

leaders and our steelworkers, mineworkers and operating engineers have

gone out and made those tough decisions over the course of the past few

years. Yes, our markets were eroded due to the tough economic

recession. We have achieved new markets. Our coal mining industry has

gone out from southeastern British Columbia and sought new markets for

their coal in Brazil, Korea, China, Taiwan. In northeastern British

Columbia they've done the same. A tie-up of this vital transportation

network would put that industrial development and those markets in

jeopardy, not just for today but for years to come.

People who work in the IWA, in the pulp unions across our province,

have done the same thing. Our industries have done the same thing.

They've gone out in a very competitive tough market, and they've sought

new opportunities to keep their employees employed, and they've done a

good job, and they've made sacrifices. It would be the height of

irresponsibility of me or the government of British Columbia to allow

our competitors throughout the world to come and erode those markets

today. The same with plywood; the same with grain and a number of other

commodities across our province. So when the member for Vancouver

Centre talks about power, I prefer to look at it as responsibility: the

responsibility of all members in this House to accept the

responsibility for which they were elected: that is, to keep the people

of British Columbia employed and to help them provide new opportunities

for the many people who are out of work across our province today. We

accept that responsibility.

I intend to work with the parties involved to see if we can't still reach

a resolution to this conflict. Today, while this bill is being debated in this

House, I would like both parties to get together and to work toward a solution

to the problem. Seventy-two hours after the bill becomes law, they have an opportunity

to reach a settlement, and I put my faith and trust in them last week by asking

the mediator to pull out and file his report. I put my faith and trust in them

and in the collective bargaining process in our province, and I hope that

they will put the same faith and trust in the process that they believe in and

come to a resolution of this agreement before this bill becomes law. In the

meantime, we will carry on our responsibility as elected representatives on

behalf of all of the people of British Columbia and not to a special interest

group who may be the concern of some people. Our interests have to be the broader

interests of the economy of British Columbia and Canada as we adjust to a changing

world economy.

So I would hope that we would put our self-serving goals aside and

work at trying to get the agreement resolved. As I said earlier, it was

easy in days gone by, or acceptable, for one part of the economy to

inflict injury on another to achieve a collective agreement. The

question is, can we afford that in 1985, and can we afford to have

scars placed on each other? While we talk about sharing the pie, our

competitors throughout the world are in there stealing our markets at

every opportunity and creating an even worse unemployment problem

across our province and across our country. That is a position that I

cannot take.

I accept the responsibility for the actions that I have taken, and I

hope that the parties will continue to work at reaching an agreement

under the collective bargaining process while this bill is being

legislated and indeed while the industrial inquiry commissioner is in

place — to help him, and he will help them come to a resolution of the

dispute.

Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to move second reading of the bill.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Motion approved on the following division:

YEAS — 29

Waterland

Brummet

Rogers

Segarty

McClelland

Heinrich

Hewitt

Pelton

Michael

Johnston

Kempf

A. Fraser

Parks

Chabot

Nielsen

Gardom

Smith

Curtis

Phillips

McGeer

R. Fraser

Davis

Mowat

Reid

Ree

Strachan

Veitch

Reynolds

Schroeder

[ Page 6116 ]

NAYS — 18

Macdonald

Dailly

Cocke

Howard

Skelly

Stupich

Lauk

Nicolson

Sanford

Gabelmann

D'Arcy

Brown

Hanson

Rose

Lockstead

Wallace

Blencoe

Passarell

Bill 39, British Columbia Railway Dispute Settlement Act, read a

second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for

consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Committee of Supply, Mr. Speaker.

The House in Committee of Supply; Mr. Strachan in the chair.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF UNIVERSITIES,

SCIENCE AND COMMUNICATIONS

(continued)

On vote 75: minister's office, $127,740.

MRS. WALLACE: I just want to deal briefly with a subject that

I think has been covered to some extent but I want to return to it

briefly, and that is the UBC School of Rehabilitation Medicine. I have

been approached by people in my constituency, particularly people

involved with the hospital there, where they are extremely concerned

about what is happening with that program. This person who writes to me

about it has worked for 16 years in the rehabilitation medicine field,

and has worked from Nova Scotia to B.C. The case made is that this is a

very cost-effective service to the public. They help people to remain

at home rather than in hospital, and facilitate their earlier return to

a home environment, all of which is cost-effective. There is a shortage

of qualified therapists in B.C. There are very few trained here. At

Cowichan District Hospital alone, there are both full- and part-time

vacancies and no applications for those vacancies.

[4:30]

The other issue is that those people who are currently enrolled in

these courses — the students who are enrolled and have invested one or

two years of their time in taking that course — are really concerned

about being faced with the disappearance of that course from the

curriculum and a total waste of the years that they have invested in

the course.

It's obviously a false economy to do away with that course. Here are

just a few statistics. We know that there are shortages of both

physiotherapists and occupational therapists. The therapists'

association advises that in their journal some 13 vacancies on average

are advertised each month, and the average rate for occupational

therapists is eight per month. We are the third largest province in

Canada, but we train the lowest number of both physiotherapists and

occupational therapists. We are only training 20 per year; 73.2 percent

of B.C.'s physiotherapists were trained outside B.C. and 58 percent of

our occupational therapists. A maximum of 20 physiotherapy and 20

occupational therapy students are accepted at the school. In 1983-84,

the last year for which we have any records, of course, there were 288

applicants, which meant the entry criteria.... That's 255 hopeful

physiotherapists and 63 occupational therapists.

The question I would ask the minister is: why are we relying on

foreign trained therapists? Why should the sons and daughters of

British Columbians not have the opportunity to train for these

positions and these skills in this particular role in the field of

medicine whether there's 100 percent assurance of being employed? Why

are we relying on other schools to train those young people for those

classes, and why are we putting those young students who have those two

or three years invested in the position of not having that particular

field available to them? It seems most strange to me. I know the

minister will probably get up and say it's all the universities' fault,

but it boils right down to the fact that the minister is not providing

enough funds for those courses.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Chairman, the government, through the

Legislature, provides approximately $180 million to the university.

This is a university program. The universities demand autonomy. When we

provided more money to the universities, it was not used in the fashion

the member describes. You can't have it both ways. Either you're going

to interfere with the universities' affairs and say, "You will spend

your government allocation in this fashion, " or we're going to give

them autonomy and say: "Do what's proper." We've got to do one or the

other.

Having said that, I want to agree very much with what the member

says. It makes absolutely no sense in British Columbia, when there's a

shortage of physiotherapists, that we should be bringing in — what is

it? — 73 percent from outside. I think it's a matter that we will have

to take a very close look at to try and find some other solution. It

may be that the appropriate solution is to establish new programs in

different educational institutions. I think that may be the most

effective method of solving this problem. I don't know whether the

member would agree or disagree with that. But I doubt that the 73

percent who come from outside are being trained in university programs.

They've got the qualification and therefore they're being hired. Our

problem may be the type of training program that we have opted to

introduce.

The only comparable situation, I guess, is in medicine, where

exactly the same applies. We did make special funds available to expand

the faculty of medicine, but this was very vigorously resisted. Indeed,

the funds that were supplied never reached their objective. We're still

bringing in almost three times as many doctors per year as we graduate.

That may be reduced now that Bill 50 is before the House. That may not

be a bill that the opposition supports, but the fact remains that in

medicine we're still denying our young people opportunity while we're

providing that same opportunity for a very excellent living to be given

to those from outside.

What applies to doctors applies to physiotherapists, but there may

be an easier way to solve this problem, which is to get on with

something not at a university where the necessary skills can be

supplied in a very directed fashion, and therefore the opportunities

that you talk about can be made available to British Columbians. But I

want to say in principle that I understand what the member is saying,

and I agree that it is an educational situation which is inexcusable.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Briefly again, the committee is cautioned about offending the rule of anticipation with respect to

[ Page 6117 ]

a bill on the order paper. That's to the benefit of the minister, not the member for Cowichan-Malahat.

MRS. WALLACE: Just briefly in response, the minister brought

up the question of the medical faculty. What was the point in

expanding...? I understand there was some political pressure put on UBC

to expand that medical faculty, to train doctors that we don't need

here when we've got too many doctors. Yet there is an inference also

that there's been political pressure put on UBC to do away with these

courses. If the minister has something else in mind for training those

people, then he should tell us and not just wipe out those courses and

destroy the opportunity of those young people who have invested time in

them.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Chairman, to the member, the objective

of expanding the medical school was to give our British Columbians an

opportunity to go into the practice of medicine. If it were only for

the need to obtain doctors, we wouldn't need a medical school at all —

if that were the only reason. But our youngsters can't get into medical

schools elsewhere. The demand to get in is always so high that there is

geographical protection. So British Columbia youngsters can't get into

medical schools in Ontario or in other jurisdictions, The medical

degree is too highly prized as an earning opportunity. Everywhere the

demand is there, because the education supplies an unparalleled

opportunity to earn. That's what goes with the degree.

Yes, I admit to the member that pressure was put on the university

to do its duty by our youngsters. The same argument applies to

physiotherapy: duty should be done. Duty is not being done. It may be

that the big problem is where the program itself is located. You can

say: "It's all your fault, because you didn't give the money." How do

we know the money is going to go to rehabilitation medicine? If we gave

$10 more or $1 million, would it go to that or would it go to something

else? If you say you'll only give it for this, then what we're into is

program funding. We could program fund. We could determine how much

money should go to each individual program in each university. We could

also dictate the size. All of that's a possibility. But then what you

have is government running the universities. That's a possible option,

because after all the governments are putting up 85 percent of the

money, but one has to decide one's choice. Should we let the

universities run it themselves, or will we run them?

I said earlier today, Madam Member, that I felt the universities,

because they're 85 percent supported by the taxpayers, should have

accountability not to politicians but to the public who put up 85

percent of that money through the government. Perhaps a different

government might have given a little more or a little less, but if you

look across the country, about the same amount of money is being

supplied in each province via the taxpayer. They're the ones who should

be asking the sharp questions of the universities — the parents who

want their youngsters to have first choice in the program that they

desire to have, knowing there's employment down the line. They should

be able to get that.

All I can do is say to the member that in the case of physiotherapy,

the system is not working well, and we need to seek solutions to that.

I will certainly undertake to explore the options, because I agree with

the member that we have a bad problem here.

On the other hand, the universities have the money, and if they had

wanted to put this at the top of their priority list, they have $180

million to do it. You have to decide where the first dollar goes and

where the last dollar goes. If you're taking the most important program

and giving the last dollar to that, then I say the management is just

unforgivably bad. The most important programs, the high-demand

programs, should be the ones to get the first dollar.

MRS. WALLACE: Just a final comment. Obviously the minister

takes a hands-off policy as far as university management goes in

everything except the medical faculty — the training of doctors — which

is an elitist situation that can only be afforded by those children

from wealthy families. It's just prohibitive for the average citizen to

get into that particular faculty. Yet he's prepared to make spaces

there and through his limited budgeting sets up a situation where we

have other young people refused the opportunity for education.

[4:45]

HON. MR. McGEER: I don't think I said that, because that's

absolutely not true. The medical training program admission is based on

academic competence and nothing else. The subsidies that go into

medical training are comparable to the subsidies that go into every

other program. They're extremely generous, the one difference being

that people going through medicine can take out loans and they have

been able to get grants and their fees have been very low compared with

the cost. Their subsidies from society have been very high. The one

difference with medical graduates — and it's available to the people of

the most modest means in British Columbia.... Don't start that class

warfare business, because it's absolute nonsense, and I'm not going to

listen to it and accept it as reality. It simply isn't. It's the NDP

revealing its prejudice that has such dangerous effects when it gets

into power. The one difference about medical graduates is the speed

with which they can pay back whatever loans they have taken out. As the

Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) knows, the earnings for people in

medicine are very high compared with every other profession.

MR. ROSE: I wonder if I could ask just a very quick question

on subsidies, since the assertion by my honourable friend seems to have

caused him some emotional stress.

HON. MR. McGEER: Just the class warfare garbage.

MR. ROSE: I wonder if the minister wouldn't agree that within

the university itself there are cross subsidies where certain courses,

in terms of the fees, are used to cross subsidize other more expensive

courses, such as education, for instance, and arts, Are the fees of

students there completely returned to those faculties, or are they not

used to subsidize higher-cost courses such as engineering or medicine

or pharmacology or whatever? There are all kinds of subsidies, and so

for the minister to say that the subsidies available in medicine are

exactly the same as in every other faculty or for every other

particular area of interest is simply not true.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Member, no, I was referring to subsidies

to the student. Sure, the marginal cost of courses in any educational

institution varies a lot according to the

[ Page 6118 ]

course, and one of the reasons why universities

like to get a lot of first-year arts students is that, by their own

admission, they can make a profit on those just from the fees, because

they are the lowest per unit cost to deliver. The universities, I

believe, quite properly state that they can deliver these courses — I'm

talking about courses like first-year arts — cheaper than the colleges

can deliver them. That's true, they can.

But the colleges have been built not because it was the most

efficient way to deliver the service but because it was the fairest way

in terms of spreading the educational enterprise around British

Columbia. From the point of view of cost — setting aside the student —

doing it right there on a university campus is by far the cheapest way

of doing it.

MR. ROSE: I wonder if the minister, then, since he has agreed

that first-year art students are very profitable in terms of their fees

and what is delivered back to them in cost.... Is that why the

university this year for the first time is sending out application

forms to every school district in Washington seeking applicants for the

first year program?

AN HON. MEMBER: I didn't know they were doing that.

MR. ROSE: Well, they are.

MR. NICOLSON: It's the University of British Columbia.

Well, the minister in responding to my colleague for

Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) again used that same argument about

autonomy, you know. But the fact is, I guess, that some universities

are more autonomous than others. When the participation rate in the

province is well below that, when we are graduating fewer people and

granting fewer baccalaureate degrees and fewer graduate degrees among

the young people than other provinces, and when we rank tenth in the

country in terms of the degrees that we're granting to 24- to

29-year-olds, the fact is that there is much less scope to exercise

autonomy.

And there is a crying need not only for maintenance of many of the

excellent programs that are offered — such as rehabilitation medicine,

as was mentioned by my colleague — but also there is a need to expand.

We should be thinking in terms of new programs like optometry, maybe,

at the University of Victoria or Simon Fraser University, since it's

pretty obvious the medical faculty won't allow it to take place at the

University of British Columbia.

You know, we just aren't doing enough. We aren't doing enough on a

per capita basis; we aren't doing enough on a per student basis; we're

not doing enough in terms of students between ages 18 to 21

participating and entering first year; we're not doing well enough in

terms of the people that we're graduating; we have slipped to number

ten on just about every criterion. Statistics from Statistics Canada:

we have gone through that; we have demonstrated that in this debate.

Now before turning to communications, I'd like just to say something

about what is happening with foreign students, and I'd like to caution

the government. You know, university means universal. One of the

experiences that one has in going to a university is meeting other

young people from other countries — some from the United States, some

from outside of this continent, many from the Caribbean, as I recall in

my days at UBC, and now we have the phenomenon of students from the

Pacific Rim. And we hear so much about the importance of the Pacific

Rim.

Yet we are discouraging and putting a caution fee or a disincentive

on one of the most positive things that we could possibly do in

encouraging communication links and in building up the networks that

will be the economic and political networks of tomorrow, by making it

very difficult for young students to come here and take educ