1975 Legislative Session: 5th Session, 30th 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)

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 1975

Night Sitting

[ Page

381 ]

CONTENTS

Speaker's ruling Accuracy of facts in question period — 381

Routine proceedings

Budget debate (amendment)

The House met at 8:30 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. Members, I was asked to look up the

question of what is contained in questions in question period.

Just briefly, I would say that May clearly sets out that

questions should be of a nature that the Member asking them

takes responsibility for what is said actually in his question.

One can see in a serious case where it might, of course, lead

to some action by the government. But other than, say, an

inquiry or a committee appointed to look into the facts and the

allegations, it would not really be a question of privilege

because it wouldn't bear upon the Members' rights in the House,

although it might contain allegations against the government or

against a Crown corporation. Neither of those are fields in

which privilege develops.

However, I think in fairness to everyone, wherever there is

an allegation contained in a question, it would be better that

the Hon. Member concerned check the facts himself before making

a statement.

The House has said on various occasions in Britain — one

case that I've seen there, and it's referred to in May —

where the Member said: "May I ask, Mr. Speaker, that you would

call the attention of the Hon. Member to the fact that he has

responsibility for the statements in the questions. You will

recollect that the Civil Lord of the Admiralty has denied the

accuracy of the statements in the questions." Mr. Speaker

replied: "It is true that an Hon. Member tabling a question

bears personal responsibility for the facts stated in it. I do

not rule on the accuracy or not of the facts."

So the Speaker cannot, really, in each case make a ruling on

the accuracy of the allegations that may be contained in a

question. It must depend upon the Member himself. So far as the

allegation may be against the government or against an

individual, unless it bears upon his personal privileges, the

government has other remedies than on a question of

privilege.

Orders of the day.

ON THE BUDGET

On the amendment.

MR. W.R. BENNETT (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, before the

House adjourned we had just finished dealing with the rather irresponsible statements

of the Minister of Transport and Communications (Hon. Mr. Strachan) in which

he chose to involve a private citizen in this House. I'm sure that if he repeated

it outside, probably the discussion between them will continue. I have no way

of knowing. I do know this: that at no time have I made such

statements to that person. It will be interesting to know, when

the Blues are read tomorrow, whether the Minister may wish to

change any of the statements he made in the House earlier

today.

Dealing with the more serious aspect of the problems of

unemployment, the financial plight of our municipalities and

the lack of housing for many of our citizens in this province,

it may be that in their defence and in their renewing old

attacks and fighting old fights and quoting old statistics, the

government of today has lost sight of the fact that the year is

1975. They're responsible for the problems of today.

These three areas are not problems to be made light of,

they're not problems to be ignored nor are they problems that

can be solved by attacking unemployment statistics or quoting

unemployment statistics from 1961, or from 1951, or from 1941.

The fact is that in British Columbia in 1975 we have the worst

unemployment in numbers of people that we've had in years. Even

for one person who is able and willing to work, it's

unfortunate if they cannot find employment. For 100,000 it's

just not good enough in British Columbia.

We mentioned that one of the problems we also have in this

province is a shortage of housing for our citizens, for young

couples starting out and, indeed, for those citizens in British

Columbia who have been saving towards this end for many years,

no longer young, but trying to save a down payment so they can

own a home of their own — desperately saving, because that's

why they chose to live in British Columbia rather than in

England or in Europe or in some countries, perhaps, where home

ownership has never been made as easy and where, perhaps, the

privilege to own has never been financially possible. But here,

housing has been affordable. I think it's the responsibility of

all governments to bring it even closer to reality for the

citizens of British Columbia rather than to remove it from

reality.

Rather than excuses, I think the public want action. They

want the government to show leadership. They want the

opportunity to own in British Columbia.

One of the further problems of the creation of housing is

the problem of the financial plight of municipalities.

Municipalities should be a partner in solving the problem

rather than having to create roadblocks and put barriers in the

way of home construction in their areas because they do not

have the financing to solve all of the problems of servicing

those people in their communities in the Province of British

Columbia.

So before we adjourned for the dinner recess, I had

suggested that we needed revenue-sharing in this province and

in this country between all levels of government to allocate

those growth revenues to

[ Page 382 ]

municipalities to allow them to make a choice on housing in

their communities, not on a financial basis, but on the fact

that as government they have the responsibility to serve people

and provide services. No community and no citizen should have

their opportunity to build a home or own a home made on a

balance-sheet basis because the community doesn't feel it can

afford to service them. They are citizens of the province. They

are citizens of that community. They should not be denied that

right on a balance-sheet basis.

I quoted statistics which showed that the municipalities

weren't participating in the growth of revenues to levels of

government. This party advocated, last fall in this House

during debate, revenue-sharing as a commitment of this party.

It is a commitment that was developed at our convention and

endorsed by the party. It is a commitment we carry into this

House and to the electorate of this province.

Indeed, we believe that revenue-sharing will be the only

answer for all governments. It is a way out of the petty

bickering between federal and provincial governments now to

take a larger view and involve municipal governments. It is a

way out to put the concern of the citizens of the country and

of the provinces first, before the bickering on whether the

federal or provincial is entitled to the money and wants the

larger share and wants to build up their own little empire,

forgetting that government is only there for service to people,

and not there to direct or to grow like Topsy or to grow like

the Peter Principle, but to grow only as they can provide

better service to people. That is the only justification for

the growth of any form of government.

We feel that solving the finances of the municipalities,

providing realistic financial proposals, will aid in the

provision of serviced lots and will lead to construction of

housing in this province. Housing is something our citizens

want. We propose as well that rather than the Department of

Housing, which so far has not utilized the position or the

funds voted by this House last year to create housing for the

citizens of British Columbia — instead it has taken many of

those funds and bought existing projects, or bought

corporations, and bought projects that have failed financially,

or projects that were already being built — the funding that

this Legislature voted for that department should have been

used to create housing, to create and fill the void that is

there in British Columbia in many of the growth areas of this

province, to provide the housing, and not only provide it and

make it available, but provide it so it is affordable.

We all know you can build houses. But if you don't bring them within financial

reach of our citizens, if you don't make them affordable to our young couples

starting out.... You can build all the houses in the world, but the Department

of Housing has the further responsibility of making sure that they are affordable

and that our citizens can qualify for those mortgages and that those mortgage

rates will be rates that those citizens can live with year after year. I would

hate to see the citizens of this province continually tied down to high-rate

mortgages at excessive rates long after the mortgage interest rate has dropped.

It is bad enough that the provincial government has committed them to 10.25

per cent interest on $100 million from First Boston Corp. for 25 years at a

time when that rate would be two points lower now, Mr. Second Member for Vancouver-Point

Grey (Mr. Gardom).

He knows so well that one of the cruelest things this

government has done is to penalize the future citizens of this

province, and continuing citizens, to excessive interest for

many, many years — millions of dollars. Two interest points on

$100 million for 25 years would work out to well over — on a

progressive basis — $100 million. I am certain that although

the government may have been foolish in that financial

endeavour, we certainly don't want to penalize the citizens of

the Province of British Columbia in the same manner and allow

them to accept the same penalty personally. We know that

interest can be cruel in the cost of housing and one of the

excessive parts of the cost of housing.

If we could just talk about financing, I would suggest, Mr.

Speaker, that there is a time when governments that have

self-determination, that are liquid enough to have

self-determination, can go to the market, particularly when the

market and declining interest rates are predictable. The market

was predictable. Last year we had the highest interest rates in

North American history. Certainly every economist, with the

slowdown in the economy, knew full well that interest rates

would drop, as they have. Many governments and many

corporations withdrew offerings from the markets for the very

reason that it was too expensive at that particular time.

I would suggest that it is unfortunate that in British

Columbia, with the new high-priced exorcist, perhaps his

expertise in financial matters doesn't go beyond the printing

of the political pamphlet that explains how well the government

is doing in a time of crisis.

I would rather have seen in this budget money for housing

specified that would build houses. I would rather see a B.C.

housing corporation that could direct the activities from

interest rates to directing the construction of housing in

cooperation and direction to the municipal governments in this

province to take and show some leadership in the creation of

housing for our people.

It is a failure of this budget. It is a failure that this

budget didn't deal with the problems of the financial plight of

the municipalities, that it didn't deal with

[ Page

383 ]

the problem of no housing for our citizens, and it hasn't

dealt realistically with the problem of unemployment in this

province.

We can have the speeches and the wild attacks from such

Ministers as the Minister of Transport and Communications (Hon.

Mr. Strachan) but it will never cloud the fact that in this

province our people are unemployed and seeking work. Rather

than looking rosier and better — though the Premier and

Minister of Finance assures us airily-fairily that somehow the

market is going to turn around in May — the DBS just produced

figures that we had the worst quarter in Canada's history. B.C.

was one of the worst areas in Canada during that quarter when

the gross national product dropped and the real gross dropped,

and I wonder on what basis the Premier expresses his extreme

optimism of the future in his hippy budgets.

AN HON. MEMBER: He's not even here.

MR. BENNETT: And he is not here again tonight.

We are concerned about the budget that he presented to this

Legislature. The very real concerns the representatives of the

people have in these three key areas haven't been met, and no

leadership is being provided by the government that says it is

going to collect from British Columbians $3 billion in this

coming year. The government is taking credit for collecting the

money of the citizens of this province, and yet none of it

seems to be going to tackling the real problems in those areas

of municipal finance, housing and unemployment.

Mr. Speaker, it's unfortunate that this government is more

concerned with maintaining itself in office and dragging up old

arguments than with meeting the problems of today. It's

unfortunate they are not prepared to provide leadership and

it's unfortunate that even one of their better Ministers, the

Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Cocke), was moved to make some of

the foolish statements he made in debate yesterday. We had

learned to expect more from this Minister in this House, but

even he, running scared with the expectation of an election, is

resorting to the foolishness and irresponsibility that seems to

mark this government in this Legislature in this problem year

of 1975.

Mr. Speaker, I support this amendment. I support it and I

hope that those Members on the government side in the back

bench who have to go back and report to their constituencies,

rather than trying to defend an indefensible document, will

show some concern for those areas and will stand up and speak

in this debate. They may not have the courage to vote against

the government, but at least speak for the people of this

province.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): This amendment is by no

means a recital of all of the problems with the budget but it does focus on

three of the more important, those being the financial problems of municipalities,

the housing problems in this province and the general area of jobs. I will try

and stay within those perimeters, starting off on the subject of municipal affairs.

I was almost saddened to hear the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer), when he took his place in this

budget debate, suggesting that municipalities had been properly

dealt with by this government. In this area, this current

government is no better than the government it replaced.

MR. D.E. LEWIS (Shuswap): Oh, shame. How can you say

that?

MR. GIBSON: I am sorry, Mr. Member, but it is no better in

this area than the government it replaced. There have been

improvements made in some areas but not in this one — not in

municipal affairs. You've been sliding backwards.

As the Hon. Second Member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Mr.

Gardom) said earlier on in this debate, the municipalities are

cap-in-hand governments. They are cap-in-hand coming to this

provincial government, They are like vassals dealing with a

feudal lord; they are like junkies dealing with a pusher.

(Laughter.) As this government doles out the money in small

quantities keeping them on the ropes all the time....

HON. D.G. COCKE (Minister of Health): You're forgetting all

about when you were in Ottawa.

MR. GIBSON: I am not forgetting anything, Mr. Minister. This

government has kept the municipalities starved for funds. They

did one thing in this budget and one thing only. There was the

annual rather than five-year per capita adjustment — that's the

only thing. Nothing else, in spite of the pretence of other

Ministers who have taken their place in this debate. It is

going to lead to tax increases in the municipalities — taxes on

people, Mr. Speaker, that this government says they are so

concerned about. The increase is at least 30 per cent in my

constituency, and I venture to say probably higher in other

parts of this province.

There was nothing done to redress the injustice whereby the

British Columbia Railway does not pay any taxes to

municipalities. To the District of North Vancouver it evades a

responsibility of paying $125,000 per year at least.

HON. J.G. LORIMER (Minister of Municipal Affairs): How much

does the post office pay back?

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Minister, you look after the affairs of your

government! You have enough

[ Page 384 ]

problems with that — don't worry about other

governments.

We heard a Minister earlier on today read a headline saying

that the municipalities were going to get an extra $20

million. That's pie in the sky, Mr. Speaker, not a guarantee.

It's gas in the ground, as the Member says. The municipalities

need a tied guarantee to the revenues of this province.

Let's just start out with 1 per cent of the revenues of this

province. That would give the municipalities $30 million this

year. That would be something of a start and it wouldn't

subject them to the Premier's latest war with Ottawa. They need

a guarantee.

I was speaking to a municipal official today. I said: "How

much can you put in your budget for this year to cut the mill

rates on the basis of this so-called natural gas money?" He

said: "Not one penny."

Do you know why, Mr. Speaker? Because municipalities, by

law, aren't allowed a deficit. What are they going to say at

the end of the year if they've budgeted for this natural gas

revenue and it turns out they haven't got it, if it turns out

that this government doesn't deliver?

MR. A.V. FRASER (Cariboo): They would put them in jail.

MR. GIBSON: They would put them in jail for it. That's

right, Mr. Member. That's what they'll do.

What's this all about, Mr. Speaker, this natural gas

business?

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: Why is the Premier playing this kind of game?

The real reason is that this natural gas business is an

election setup. The Premier is going to go to Ottawa and he's

going to demand a price for natural gas. Now, depending on how

the Premier feels that week, he's going to make a demand he

knows is impossible or one that is reasonable. If his polls

tell him that this is a good issue and that now is the time to

go, he's going to make a demand that is impossible. He's going

to come back to British Columbia and say: "This is the issue,

my friends. We must have a mandate; we must have an election."

That's what this natural gas is about. It's for the political

benefit of this government, not for the benefit of the

municipalities in this province. He's setting up a phony

election issue right now.

MR. FRASER: Political gas.

MR. GIBSON: Political gas. Unnatural gas. (Laughter.)

MR. D.E. LEWIS (Shuswap): Are you saying the Liberals won't

live up to their commitments?

MR. GIBSON: It is not just a question of starvation of the

municipalities for revenue; it's a question of cost freezes as

well. In that context the government has to bear a very heavy

responsibility.

The Premier did his best to say in the budget that the

serious questions of inflation relate to other jurisdictions.

"It's Ottawa. There's not much we can do about it here in B.C."

He's busy shifting the blame on things like that that are

uncomfortable. But, as a matter of fact, the Premier and that

government are doing something very important ...

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. GIBSON: ... having to do with inflation. Fueling

inflation.

I refer to the trend in public service settlements on which

it has been so difficult to get the figures and on which we

still can't get proper year-over-year comparisons in spite of

the fact that they are supposed to be public documents which

come out so far.

Our party over the years has been in favour of proper wages

for the public service sector.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. GIBSON: But we have also suggested that the proper

relationship was for the government to take its lead from the

private sector of the economy and relate settlements to that

area, rather than trying to advance too far.

The reason for that has nothing to do with the merit of one

type of employment over another, be it public or private. The

reason for that is that British Columbia in this world — and

the way we all make our living — has to relate to what we can

earn and the price in Canadian dollars at which we can sell our

natural resources. That is what pays public servants' salaries;

it is what pays your salary, Mr. Speaker, and my salary. It all

comes back to that in the end. When government settlements

start to make a trend beyond that ability to pay, then this

whole economy is in trouble.

We have underway in Victoria right at the moment a civic

workers' strike which has gone on for some weeks. We may see

other strikes of this kind around the province. Can you blame

them when they see settlements in the public service so far

announced running 20, 30, 40 and in some cases 50 per cent,

plus COLA (cost of living adjustment)?

MR. C.S. GABELMANN (North Vancouver-Seymour): That's meaningless.

MR. GIBSON: The Hon. Member there says it's meaningless.

[ Page 385 ]

MS. R. BROWN (Vancouver-Burrard): Get the facts.

MR. GIBSON: I hope, Mr. Member, you'll stand up and explain

why it is meaningless. All I can do is look at the

order-in-council and say that was the wage before and that is

the wage now.

MR. GABELMANN: It's meaningless. Percentages are

meaningless.

MR. GIBSON: The average, I suggest to you, is going to be at

least 20 per cent, plus COLA.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: And I ask you whether or not any other trade

unionist in this province is going to settle for anything

less.

MR. P.C. ROLSTON (Dewdney): Would you work for that

wage?

MR. GIBSON: Because like it or not, the government sets a

target.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: You stand up and give your speech, Madam Member,

when you are ready.

MR. C. LIDEN (Delta): Never mind. He's a millionaire; he

doesn't have to worry.

MR. GIBSON: Like it or not, the government sets a target in

settlements in this province.

MR. LIDEN: Listen to the mining millionaire.

MR. GIBSON: Other workers say: "We deserve that much at

least because we're paying their wages. We deserve that much at

least."

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: If the other unionists are already getting more,

Mr. Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Hall), they will say:

"That's our proper place in the pecking order and we need more

again." You know that perfectly well. Nobody should know that

better than you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. GIBSON: Doesn't a responsible unionist do that?

Shouldn't he? Of course he should.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: The inflation and the strikes that are going to

happen in this province this year are directly attributable to

the settlements this government is making right now, without

any question.

HON. P.F. YOUNG (Minister of Consumer Services):

Second-class citizens; that's what you want them to be.

MR. GIBSON: You just explain that when the strikes are

running hot and heavy this summer, Madam Minister of Consumer

Services.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I wonder if the Hon. Member

would address the Chair. Addressing other Members of the House

always leads to quite a great deal of excitement.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: The government has a very heavy burden to bear

on what is going to happen to this economy this year, and it

has a heavy burden to bear on the settlements it hasn't made

yet since it ran out of money, and since it started putting the

screws on those components it hasn't settled with in the public

service.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: You put up or shut up, Mr. Minister.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: So that, Mr. Speaker, is what comes out of the

government's assistance to municipalities in this budget. It

denies the municipal government the revenues that it has to pay

the settlement it makes, and it sets a target so that the

municipal employees must get the same, and it denies the

municipalities the dollars they need to pay it.

MS. K. SANFORD (Comox): You should go to Ottawa and fight

for the municipalities.

MR. GIBSON: Now, Mr. Speaker, housing is the next subject. I

don't see the Minister of Housing (Hon. Mr. Nicolson) here.

Here are some facts on housing in the last three years in

this province. In 1973 roughly 38,000 units were constructed.

In 1974 roughly 30,000 units were constructed, a triumph for

the first nine months of the Minister of Housing. In 1975 the

forecast by the Employers Council of British Columbia is

22,000. That has to be upped. We cannot allow that forecast to

be right, because we need 40,000 units in this

[ Page 386 ]

province every year to take care of the 60,000 or 70,000

people that come in from other parts of the country and the

world, and to take care of the constant improvement required by

British Columbians in their housing starts. Something like 50

per cent, at the rate we're going, of the requirement is going

to be built.

The Hon. Member for Chilliwack (Mr. Schroeder) this

afternoon set out very well the problems of the average young

person trying to get housing today. The cost, as things stand,

is beyond their reach, and the answer is in the improvement of

supply. The Minister of Housing affects to improve the supply

by building government housing. He's not doing it very quickly,

and it's the wrong way to do it anyway. But perhaps, as long as

they have rent control on, that's the only kind of rental

housing they're going to get. They don't seem to understand

that. Something like 20,000 rental units a year are needed in

this province and, apart from social housing, since the rent

freeze went on last year, I challenge you to show me more than

2,000 or 3,000 rental units that have been started. I challenge

you to show me. We need housing as well as social housing. We

need housing for the ordinary people who are just looking for a

decent place to live because they just got married and maybe

they're going to have a child. We need that kind of housing

too. Don't you understand that? It's unbelievable.

MS. BROWN: There's no kind of housing for people who can't

afford to pay. There's no shortage of housing for people who

can afford to pay.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, I couldn't believe my ears. I just

heard that Member say there is no shortage of rental housing of

some kind.

Will you stand up and tell us what kind of rental housing

there is no shortage of?

MS. BROWN: May I, Mr. Speaker?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. If the Hon. Member is prepared

to yield the floor.... If he does, he loses his place in the

debate.

MR. GIBSON: You stand up as soon as I sit down, Madam

Member. I'll look forward to that.

MR. SPEAKER: I wish the Hon. Member would direct his

attention to the Chair in the proper way, and not to other

Members.

MR. GIBSON: Thank you, Mr., Speaker. It's so difficult with

the interesting comments coming from various parts of the

House. And I want to do all I can in the Hon. Member's campaign

for the leadership as well.

We heard earlier on both from the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer) and from the Minister of Housing

(Hon. Mr. Nicolson) today, in some muttered asides, what I took

to be attacks on municipalities; what I took to be loading the

blame on the municipalities by this government for refusing to

increase housing. They're blaming the municipalities.

The land is available — we all know that — literally

thousands of new lots, be it rental or owner-occupied

construction on the market this coming year. The land is

available to drive the price of lots down, which is what should

happen. The municipalities have to be encouraged, not hit over

the head by this government by the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer) implying that if it's necessary

they're going to take whatever Draconian measures are required.

The fact of the matter is....

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney-General): Why not?

(Laughter.)

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, the Attorney-General said: "Why

not?" He doesn't have his button on.

The fact of the matter is that the growth that's going on in

this province, that 60,000 or 70,000 people per year, is having

a differential impact on the different municipalities. Some are

being asked to bear a very heavy load and some are being asked

to bear a very light load.

It's a provincial problem, this growth. It's not a municipal

problem. It's not a problem that any municipality can solve by

itself. It costs money. It costs the municipality money to take

in a new resident.

The Minister of Municipal Affairs had some unhappy things to

say about impost charges. Mr. Speaker, I'd rather not see the

kind of impost charges we see being levied in some

municipalities of up to $2,000 per unit, because it just adds

to the cost of the unit, and therefore it adds to the cost of

all the other housing stock in this province.

But if it's going to cost that municipality $2,000 to take

in these new people, they can either load that on the existing

taxpayers and give a free ride to all those other places that

aren't receiving growth, or else it can protect its existing

taxpayers. What would you expect a municipality to do, and what

would you do if you were a municipal official? You'd protect

your local people.

It's up to the provincial government to take a broader view

and to say to all municipalities: "There's going to be a

certain amount of growth in British Columbia whether we like it

or not, and we want you to make possible the housing for those

people that are coming to this province and for our own

citizens who want to move into better accommodation at a

reasonable price. The way to do

[ Page 387 ]

that is that we will give you a grant in each municipality

in respect of the newcomers you receive in any given year. We

will give you a grant to take care of those extra costs for

roads and parks and school systems and so on."

It's a proper provincial burden, and that's the kind of

thing that this Department of Housing should be doing to unlock

the land that's needed. There's lots of land there. Within the

greater Vancouver region alone there are over 50,000 acres that

are properly urban designated and ready to go and ready for

servicing — in many cases, serviced. It just has to be

unlocked, and the key is within the hands of that group across

the way.

On the subject of jobs, I'll have more to say in my remarks

on the main budget motion. I'll just say now that the Ministers

across the way who have been reciting recreation and

conservation projects constituency by constituency around this

province, that are so nicely printed out in the budget, are not

answering the question. Those are very good things. I

congratulate the Minister of Recreation and Conservation (Hon.

Mr. Radford) for the things he's doing in the constituencies.

But it's not the answer to jobs in this province.

The fact of the matter is that whatever nice statistics the

government Ministers read out, there are 100,000 British

Columbians out of work. They don't deal with that. We don't

hear that phrase, "100,000 British Columbians out of work,

" from across there. They'd like to forget that. They'd

like to never even know it. But they have to deal with it; and

they have to deal with the fact that, try as they may, they do

not have the competence to produce the growth in investment and

productivity in this province to soak up that kind of

unemployment.

They have to encourage others, they have to work through

others, to make these things happen. They have shown a belief

that the expenditure of money on just about anything that

churns it around will create jobs. In fact, lasting jobs in

British Columbia are created by investments in solid things

like secondary industry, like forestry, like mining, like

construction — things that are going downhill in this

province.

MR. R.E. SKELLY (Alberni): The Liberals.

MR. GIBSON: We have a very strong economy in this province, Mr. Speaker.

It is an economy that, in spite of governments as they come and go, has been

able to provide a rewarding and growing standard of living for a growing population

in this province, and it will continue to do so, irrespective of the efforts

of that group. It will continue to be a good economy in this province. But over

the years we may have difficulties, and over the years we may have lesser growth

than we would have had otherwise if things are not properly managed. The 100,000

people out of work, and 16,000 in the forest industry alone, are not a sign

of proper management.

This budget doesn't encourage investment. I wouldn't call it

a job-security budget. I'd call it a job-insecurity budget.

HON. E. HALL (Provincial Secretary): Mr. Speaker, I was not

intending to join in this debate as I felt that part of it was

an exercise in repetition from the previous one. It was then a

continual mish-mash of percentage figures, which I think most

Members of the House are now realizing are susceptible to the

remarks of previous debate when somebody mentioned the famous

politician in England, the Rt. Hon. Winston Churchill, who,

when talking about statistics, made some rather uncomplimentary

remarks about his colleagues. I don't want to do that.

I may, however, refer gently to some of the competence

expressed by the previous speaker (Mr. Gibson) when he looks at

official documents. He seems to have some worries about our

competence. Mr. Speaker, may I say, as the Provincial

Secretary, having some responsibility for Vote 1, that I have

some real problems with the competence over there if the best

they can do when they get orders-in-council showing increases

is to come up with the kind of figures the Member just came up

with?

I entered the debate, Mr. Speaker, because I'm getting a

little tired of the mischief that's being done in this province

by those people who seize the opportunity to play politics with

an important subject like collective bargaining. I entered this

debate because I am fed up with Members who choose to take the

same irresponsible course as the employers' council.

MS. BROWN: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. HALL: Strange bedfellow, may I say, to see the

political activities of the employers' council and that of that

Liberal Party.

But first, may I remind you, Mr. Speaker, and all Members of

the House, that negotiations are continuing with a number of

public service groups? Those who make inflammatory statements

outside during those negotiations can be held accountable for

the disruptions that may ensue. That's part of our Labour Code.

I trust we all behave ourselves in here as we might behave

ourselves outside.

The speech of the Member and the questions the other day are

stimulated in part by the newspaper

article that the Member

seems to have read a number of times and which purports to give

details of settlements reached between the public service and

the B.C. Government Employees Union. They quote an employer

representative to the effect that those agreements will be

disruptive to private sector

[ Page 388 ]

negotiations.

I've got a private sector negotiation here, Mr. Speaker.

Just one. I think the Member knows well about it because I

think he asked me a question — at least, the group asked me a

question about it. This is a settlement that was made in the

Burrard Dry Dock, Co. Ltd., North Vancouver, and Yarrows Ltd.

Private sector. No Ernie Hall around there. No John Fryer

around there. The previous agreement agreed it was okay. That

was a 60 to 70 per cent increase, Mr. Member, that other

employers are complaining about in a telegram to this

government.

If you take the wages of a girl who just joined this service

and worked in a hospital, who was getting, say, $432 a month,

and you give her the bottom-end loading that most Members

applauded in this chamber the other day, and then you pay her

equal pay for equal work that everybody here bangs the desk

about, you may very well come up with a 53 per cent

increase.

Now, Mr. Member for North Vancouver, you write that girl a

letter repeating what you just said to the House. I challenge

you to do that.

Mr. Speaker, the largest private sector employer in this

province, the forest industry, and the largest private sector

union in this province, the IWA (International Woodworkers of

America), executed an agreement last year. You all said it was

good. You all applauded it here when we avoided the kind of

strikes that were characteristic of the previous 20 years every

two years. That provides a current base rate — and we're

talking about jobs — of $5.23 an hour or $900 a month. That

rate will be adjusted upward on April 1 in accordance with a

COLA by a further $20 a month. So $1,100 a month basic labour

rate, IWA. The contract expires on June 15 this year, before

many of the contracts that you make reference to expire. I

expect the union to be seeking an increase, being somewhat

aware of what's going on outside.

The construction industry. I realize there's a slight

difference because of the somewhat seasonal nature of some of

the construction industry, although this province has a record

of maintaining year-round capacity in that industry better than

anyone else in this country. Negotiated by CLRA (Construction

Labour Relations Association) — I don't think a stranger to

your group. November 1, 1974 — $7.12 an hour or $1,160 a month.

May 1, 1975 — our contract's going way past that — $7.98 an

hour or $1,300 a month, and more in November: $1,335.

I could go on citing rates like that for some time but I don't want to jeopardize

the efforts to resolve such current disputes as those that are going on between

municipalities and CUPE (Canadian Union of Public Employees). But I'll limit

myself to this: in the light of the labour rates established in the private

sector, the suggestion, Mr. Member, that a monthly rate of $720 for a draftsman

is disruptive, is very difficult to understand.

It is not the policy of this government, Mr. Member, first

of all, as it was of the previous government, and as it appears

to be of the government you support in Ottawa, to pay valuable

public employees rates which were so low as to qualify them for

welfare programmes.

MS. BROWN: Shocking.

HON. MR. HALL: That was what was going on here. I said that

in the throne speech debate and I will say it again: it is not

the policy of this government to do that. Members of the

opposition may have retained a sense of human values which

enabled them to be contemptuous of office staff, labourers, and

so on. Not this side of the House, Mr. Member. They may be able

to turn a blind eye to the predicament of low-income people

trying to find housing in the current real estate market,

trying to feed families as food costs escalate 20 per cent, but

they certainly were able to do so for 20 years under that lot.

The government doesn't have that sense of values. I believe

that your questions indicate to me, Mr. Member, and I say this

to you, through the Speaker, that you do share that value with

the previous government.

To establish minimum standards of physical welfare for

public employees, to establish appropriate relationships

between public and private sectors, to ensure the public will

be adequately served, required — and I've said this before, and

I'll say it again — substantial adjustment. To lay the blame for

that circumstance on the government which has had to effect

those increases is to really avoid what is terribly

obvious.

In the fall of 1972, when this government took office, the

basic rate for psychiatric aides at Riverview Hospital was $511

a month. Dietary aides received as little as $415 a month.

Those Members of this House who visited that hospital will

agree that there are few people in British Columbia, in either

the private or the public sector, who serve the public as well

in circumstances so trying as those people do in a job that is

so demanding. I am acquainted with a number of people in the

public service, a number of women, who were forced to raise

families on the meagre income provided by the previous

government for office staff. They were as low as $345 a month.

Draftsmen received $386 a month.

HON. MS. YOUNG: Shame, shame.

HON. MR. HALL: Does the speech imply, Mr. Speaker, that the

government did not have to do something to address those

situations? Does the Member's question imply that we should

have been

[ Page 389 ]

content with the relationship between those incomes and

those that have been quoted? The government has not accepted,

and won't accept, those views. The settlements will reflect our

view that the public employees provide a public service.

Mr. Speaker, he talked about leading. Where would the

Member's speech be if I told him that a junior clerk in the

provincial government service, after having signed the contract — and the Member is aware of it because he has the

orders-in-council — still doesn't get anywhere near what the

same person does at Hydro, or anywhere near what a clerk was

getting in the lower mainland municipalities when the contract

expired that is currently the series of a number of strikes?

What will the Member say then, when he does his homework and

looks at the figures?

What will the Member say if I tell him, and he finds it to

be true, that a secretary in the British Columbia government

gets less than Hydro and gets, in effect, about the same as the

secretary in Victoria or in Delta or in Surrey who is now into

a fresh contract bargaining situation? Those wages that I quote

have to go on for some time. What will the Member say about a

keypunch operator, and others? What will the Member say —

because he is interested in health — when I tell him that all

the hospital employees now have are comparable salaries to

those in the private sector of health care and that the

settlement reduces the discrepancy between men and women?

Three of the Members over there are members of the legal

profession and know what is happening in the corrections

branch. They all belong to the Liberal Party. They all

represent, and fought hard to get, I presume, the Liberal Party

ensconced in office in Ottawa. What will they say when I tell

them that the negotiations that he makes reference to as being

disruptive and leading don't even catch up with the federal

salaries in the prison service? What will he say to that? What

will he say when he examines the teachers' wages and the

biologists' wages, and others, and sees that, instead of

leading, instead of being disruptive, as he says, we have not

even caught up yet?

I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the negotiations that

have been handled by the Public Service Commission in the nine

or so components to date, we should be proud of them because we

are getting value for money. We should be proud of them because

we've got a catchup provision. We should be proud of them

because we've turned the corner on some of the shameful things

that used to happen. Mr. Speaker, I think the best that Member

can do, when he has got all his facts and done all his

homework, is to apologize for some of the inferences he

made.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): Not a word about 102,000

unemployed. Terrible, terrible.

Interjections.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): I get the impression that I am

about the only Member who didn't have a liquid supper

tonight.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

AN HON. MEMBER: It might help your speech if you did.

(Laughter.)

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: The Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Cocke) asks me

to withdraw and I withdraw the comment, Mr. Speaker.

The amendment mentions specifically the problem of the

budget not creating enough jobs and not dealing with the

financing of the municipalities. I don't know that the former

speaker went into great depth in any of these two particular

points. I think we would like to make our position clear on the

amendment, particularly in the first instance in relation to

the municipalities, and to relate my comments to some of the

resolutions that the party has already passed in relation to

municipal financing.

We believe that the per capita grant should be tied to the

income tax revenue received by the province and that the grant

be revised annually to reflect changes in the amount of revenue

received by the province as personal income tax.

We also support the point expressed many times in this House

that, since municipal taxes and payment for services are

received by all provincial properties, lands and buildings,

these provincial properties should also pay to the municipal

government equivalent taxation for such facilities as would be

paid by private property owners.

We go a little further in our attitude and philosophy toward

the municipal government, and we feel that the municipal level

of government should be given greater recognition as being a

third level of government and should have its powers,

responsibilities and authority acknowledged through more

appropriate federal and provincial legislation, and that it be

provided with additional sources of revenue in keeping with the

services demanded of it.

At this particular time, and this year, it is increasingly

difficult for the municipalities to reach a finite budget. I

understand, in discussion with UBCM officials as recently as

this afternoon, that they are caught in a double bind inasmuch

as they don't, most of them, really know at this point in time

what their expenditures will be, since many wage settlements

are outstanding and under negotiation. So, first of all, they

have great difficulty knowing what their expenditures may be.

To add to that problem, they also have great uncertainty from

the budget which we

[ Page 390 ]

are now debating. This I'd like to expand on a little in a

moment.

I'm sure the Minister of Finance, who doesn't happen to be

here tonight, has received a letter today from the Union of

B.C. Municipalities pointing out that the budget speeches and

the comments of the Premier himself have recognized that there

will be some increases of cost to the municipalities of a

presently unknown percentage. But certainly, I think the

Premier himself, and certainly the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer), mentioned a figure of 20 to 25 per

cent in the simple basic effects of inflation. On that basis,

the letter which has been sent to the Premier as of this

afternoon pleads that at least the Minister of Finance make

some basic minimum commitment to the municipalities now,

whether it be $20 million or $25 million or $30 million, or

whatever figure is finally calculated from the very nebulous

concept which the Minister of Finance attached to the revenue

from natural gas. The municipalities cannot be expected to

budget responsibly or to manage municipal affairs responsibly

when they know with accuracy neither their expenditures or,

even worse still, their social revenues.

This letter is couched in very clear and unmistakable terms

and makes a very rational argument for the municipalities at

this time. I would like to quote one paragraph just to

emphasize what I think is the very reasonable nature of their

argument in seeking municipal financing. They say, as

follows:

"Additional financial relief is immediately needed by all

municipalities, or at least an assurance of additional revenues

during the course of this year. In view of your confidence that

your anticipated price increase for natural gas will be

achieved, we respectfully request that, as the Minister of

Finance, you give the municipalities of this province an

assurance that a minimum sum of $20 million will be made

available to them in this fiscal year, flowing from the formula

proposed by you, or from other sources if results should not

meet your expectations. This is the only way that

municipalities can at this time proceed responsibly with their

budgeting and determination of mill rates."

I think that's a very fair statement to which this government should respond,

and to which the Minister of Finance should respond. We can all argue till kingdom

come about the pros and cons of using this social revenue or that social revenue,

or the formula for deciding the amount, or various other ways in which the government

can provide financing to the municipalities. But to leave the whole situation

hanging in mid-air with no finite figure being quoted is, I think, really insulting

to the municipalities when the government, both at election time and subsequently,

has said that it will correct some of the injustices to which the municipalities

were subjected under the former administration.

So, Mr. Speaker, that would be our basic initial proposal in

discussing this amendment. The government should surely respond

by at least guaranteeing a minimum sum which might be adjusted

upwards, depending on the success of negotiations by the

Premier.

[Mr. G.H. Anderson in the chair.]

The Minister for Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer)

mentioned earlier that impost penalties in some municipalities

are high and unfair and have the effect of depressing housing

construction. I think this only goes to prove, as the Member

for North Vancouver-Capilano (Mr. Gibson) pointed out, the

financial plight of the municipalities and the measures to

which they are resorting in order to cope with their financial

difficulties.

I do feel that the logical way to approach this problem is,

of course, to give the municipalities adequate financing so

that they do not have to resort to the use of imposts and other

devices which ultimately have the effect of reducing the amount

of residential construction.

The Minister of Transport and Communications (Hon. Mr.

Strachan) earlier on this afternoon talked about the fact that

the opposition only tears away and acts negatively and

destructively at the government proposals. I would like to

suggest that we have some positive proposals on this side of

the House which we would like the government to consider.

We are concerned about the proper use of the revenue from

the B.C. Petroleum Corp. Frankly, our concern is the same as

that of the Province of Alberta, faced with the clear prospect

of declining future revenues from a non-renewable resource.

Alberta's fight with the eastern Liberal establishment

arises because Alberta has determined that it must use these

revenues....

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: And the Tory Government of Ontario.

MR. WALLACE: And the Tory Government of Ontario. It must use

these revenues to create a new and more diversified industrial

base since the oil and gas wells will eventually run dry. In

British Columbia we feel that we are blessed with the

opportunity of continued economic activity, employment and

provincial revenues from renewable resources, including

recreational, water, agricultural and fishery resources, as

well as our basic resource industry, the forest industry.

We firmly believe that where revenues or royalties

[ Page

391 ]

from non-renewable resources arise, as with coal, copper,

oil and gas, it is essential that these funds be reinvested for

the future welfare of British Columbia and for the ongoing

benefit of our citizens.

We would like to make our position very clear that these

revenues from non-renewable resources should not be

consolidated into general revenues for annual operating

expenditures and thus readily squandered by the high-living,

high-cost operating expenses of various government

departments.

We believe the revenues from the renewable resources can and

should go into general revenue once sufficient expenditure has

been made to keep these permanent sectors of our economy in a

healthy condition. So we are proposing — as this is, I repeat,

an attempt to give the government the clear understanding that

we do try to provide positive alternatives to the budget

proposals which we feel are inadequate — that revenues from

non-renewable resources, including those from the petroleum

corporation, should go to the creation of regional

social-capital development funds. In keeping with our

resolutions at our annual convention in Kamloops that there

should be a decentralization of authority and administration

towards the municipalities and regions, we believe these

social-capital development funds should be under the

administration of regional and municipal authorities.

Many of the revenues are developed in the regions, and we

believe that the benefits, in large measure, should go back to

the regions. We feel that in view of the desirability of local

determination for local needs, they should be administered

within and by the regions themselves.

As a party which believes very much in conservation, we

believe that natural gas export prices should rise to a

competitive world level, as should all prices of all export

resource-based commodities produced, whether it be produced in

British Columbia or Alberta or Manitoba.

We believe that this is the only way to avoid premature

depletion and to encourage wise and unprofligate uses of these

resources. But we have never believed that these revenues,

which will decline, should be used up quickly and be wasted on

one-shot deals such as the politically cosmetic programme we

feel this present budget suggests and the rather airy-fairy

promise, or airy-fairy suggestion, that there will be municipal

aid of an undefined amount.

Our proposals would call for the capitalization of regional

social development funds and for the investment of these funds

at the maximum rate of return, and the use of the ongoing

stream of annual investment income revenue from these funds

year after year in projects for community and social benefit. I

would repeat that these programmes would be under the

administration of the people in the regions and the

municipalities.

Given the non-renewable resource revenues we project for the

fiscal year 1975-76, we would appropriate the initial regional

funds for the northwest quarter of the province, the northeast

quarter, the Kootenays, the northern half of Vancouver Island

and the central interior region from Quesnel to Kamloops. We

suggest that the initial funding for the northwest and

northeast quarters of the province would be of the order of $25

million each in the 1975-76 year.

It is our feeling and our conclusion from studies that have

been reported that these are the regions which, in their social

development needs, have experienced considerable lack and

considerable social neglect. Given the persistent neglect of

some of these outlying regions, a simple per capita formula of

municipal assistance, we believe, is not equitable and will not

work. All that happens is that population growth continues to

concentrate in metropolitan Vancouver where really it should

not occur if metropolitan Vancouver is to be a fit place to

live. As a result, our party has determined the need for a

series of head-start funds for those regions in which the

social capital requirements are already behind and increasingly

serious.

Again emphasizing our attempt to be positive and to analyse

the facts and figures and come up with our own sense of

direction for this province, we forecast that the non-renewable

resource industries will generate a total of $1.5 billion in

compounded provincial revenue over the next 10 years. Our

proposal is for an eventual capitalization of all regional

social capital development funds combined of $1 billion within

the next 10 years. Once these funds are capitalized, the

regional districts and municipalities of this province could

enjoy an additional $100 million year in and year out to spend

as decided by the residents in the municipalities and the

regions. Coupled with our long-standing policy of eliminating

the school tax on residential property, we feel that this is a

far better solution to the problem of municipal finance than

the Minister of Finance has presented to the House at this

time.

We feel that the kind of proposal we're putting forward

could still be considered by this government and appropriate

legislation brought forward this session.

I should state that our party regards the resource

industries of the province as efficient vehicles to carry

forward rational development policies. I believe we should

state very clearly the rights and the tasks and the obligations

of the public sector — and I referred to this in comments

during the throne speech debate — and also clearly recognize

the responsibilities of the private sector in the resource

field.

The fact remains, Mr. Speaker, that the resource industries

will only perform if there is the incentive to perform, and

it's the performance of the resource

[ Page 392 ]

industries which will create the jobs about which this amendment to the motion speaks.

The Minister of Finance made various references to the books of the

oil companies and the undisclosed accounts of multinational and outside

companies with subsidiaries operating in British Columbia. He referred

to resource profits from the private sector of the province. We would

like to — and we will — put forward our suggestion in the form of a

private bill, the Natural Resources Financial Disclosure Act. This bill

will require every company operating on Crown, provincially owned

natural resources of British Columbia, whether a public company or a

private company — or a Crown-owned company for that matter — to file

complete and properly audited annual income and balance-sheet

statements with the registrar of companies open for public inspection.

We have suggested that this would encompass a long list of large oil and gas,

mining and forest resource-based companies. Of course, while we believe in this

approach to disclosure, we recognize that disclosure alone certainly does not

create jobs; and the unemployment situation in the province, as has been mentioned

by many speakers, is serious.

We believe that the unemployment is entirely traceable to three

sectors in our economy which are functioning under capacity: the forest

industry, the mining industry and the housing industry. We really feel

that none of these need be operating under capacity and that British

Columbia really should never have to live in the constant fear of

unemployment. We, in this province, are living in a world where there

is a great demand for resources and what we have to do, really, is to

take advantage of this opportunity to plan a reasonable, soundly-based

economic strategy of improvement and diversification and balanced

growth.

During the throne speech I outlined some of our proposals regarding

the forest industry and I think they are worth quickly commenting upon

again. We would favour a system of average incremental and negative

stumpage royalties, using a forest industry stabilization fund, which

would accumulate funds in the good years and which would be available

to provide payments and keep people employed during the difficult years.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's their policy.

MR. WALLACE: Well, it doesn't seem to be working, Mr. Member. I don't

think they have a stabilization fund and they took a long time to cut the

stumpage even to the minimum. We believe that a stockpiling arrangements could

be worked out in a co-operative way between the provincial government and

the forest industry, and we believe that working capital provincial loan guarantees

should be made available to non-integrated lumber and other woods products companies,

and to independent logging contractors.

We believe there is a real need for a simplified and

equitable stumpage formula for all forest companies which would

allow for full and realistic cost allowance against stumpage,

which would account for regional differences in logging

development requirements, timber quality and operating costs

...

AN HON. MEMBER: We do that now.

MR. WALLACE: Well, you're not doing it very well .... and

which would extract certain environmental protection costs

which should be borne by the public sector and not merely by

the private sector. As we mentioned also in the throne debate,

we believe there is real potential for long-term marketing

arrangements with a wider variety of other countries for

lumber, plywood and other products.

This combination of programmes, in our opinion, is quite

sufficient to allow the whole of the forest industry of British

Columbia to operate at, or very near, full capacity every year.

We feel, in this way, that one of the main sources of

unemployment in British Columbia could certainly be, if not

completely resolved, greatly mitigated on a continuous

basis.

The amendment mentions the housing problem and the lack of

real plans to cope with the housing shortage. We believe that

one of the main problems is the lack of sufficient amounts of

capital, as I mentioned earlier, and the lack of incentives to

the investor, particularly in the light of rent control and

other measures which this government has introduced. I don't

feel that there need be any further great emphasis placed on

that in debating the amendment. We would prefer to speak mainly on the

unemployment and lack of job aspect of the amendment.

In mentioning that we have three main resource industries

which are functioning under capacity, the others that bear a

great deal of consideration are the mineral industry.... And

all the verbiage in the budget address notwithstanding, B.C. needs

development of

its reserves of oil and, particularly, natural gas. This province has

supply contracts with the

Pacific northwest and we feel that this government has taken a somewhat

cavalier attitude, particularly by the Premier and by the

Attorney-General

(Hon. Mr. Macdonald), in regard to be honour and sanctity of

agreements. We feel that we should make every possible effort

to meet the agreements which have been made with the United States.

Of course, regardless of the export situation, this province, Mr. Speaker, certainly needs natural gas for its

own use within its own boundaries, and we feel here is only one

way of assuring that enough of the

[ Page 393 ]

oil and gas reserves can be developed in the light of the

needs of this province. One of the ways is a higher net payback

to the explorers and producers of oil and natural gas. The

present price of natural gas, let alone a further increase,

allows for very substantial revenues to the provincial and

federal Treasuries. Our party has already proposed that when

the price is increased, as we believe it should be, the

additional revenues that flow to the B.C. Petroleum

Corporation, together with the present net revenues of the

corporation, should also go, in part, to the creation of

regional capital development funds ...

AN HON. MEMBER: How do you use those?

MR. WALLACE: ... and despite .... Well, these capital funds

would be used for some of the community, social, health and

human resource programmes which we feel should be more under

the control of the regional and municipal residents.

Even so, in certain contrast to the position explained by

the government, we feel a greater part of the price must go

back to the producer. We feel there is not much point in

negotiating a higher price for natural gas if the necessary

supplies of natural gas someday are no longer going to be

produced.

We recognize the concern of the Minister of Finance and this

government about excessive profits by the producers. We suggest

that if there are excessive profits made or likely to be made

from the production of oil and natural gas these could be

clearly revealed in the accounting required under the

legislation I have suggested, which is complete disclosure of

full and precise balance sheets of the companies I mentioned

earlier on.

There is great pressure to achieve self-sufficiency in oil

and natural gas, both in eastern Canada and the United States,

and we believe that unless there are some very realistic

incentives, the required amount of exploration and development

will not occur in British Columbia. We feel that we could learn

a great deal from some of the incentives which apply in

Alberta. But, of course, as soon as one talks about oil and gas

companies to this government, there is a paranoid response that

all companies are making excessive profits.

Our party has no brief one way or the other for the oil and

gas industry in B.C. We feel that any resource-based industry

should primarily be an efficient vehicle for provincial goals

and provincially determined policy, as a means of getting the

things done which we feel should be done for the people of

British Columbia.

We recognize, and I think the government recognizes, that we will not get things

done unless there is the opportunity through good management whereby companies

can earn an adequate rate of return on capital investment. Our estimate of this

adequate rate of return is less than the industry would call

for, perhaps, and I suppose it's more than the government, in

its present attitude, would accept. We feel the incentive rate

of return to the oil and natural gas industry is 15 per cent

after tax and interest but before dividends are paid. We're no

more interested than the government is in subsidizing the oil

companies' head offices in New York or Texas or wherever. We

are only interested in seeing that enough oil and gas are

produced to meet the needs and commitments of the people of the

province. We feel that to meet these needs there has to be a

much greater amount of incentive than we presently see in this

budget.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about our export requirements?

MR. WALLACE: One of the Members asks about export

requirements. One of the factors that puzzles me about the

government's proposal to pay the municipalities out of revenue

from natural gas is the fact that members of that same

government have, on occasion, said that maybe the day is not

too far off when we should not be exporting natural gas at all,

that it is such a vital natural non-renewable resource that we

should be using it for our own benefit within our own borders.

It seems to me unusual that we would tie the financing of the

municipalities to a social revenue which one day will decrease

and might disappear. I am suggesting that if incentives are

provided to producers and exploring companies, we will have the

necessary continuing discovery of new sources of natural gas

and oil which would make it feasible and possible to continue

to export these products and hence derive revenue for the

province.

We certainly believe that the resources are owned by the

people of the province and that there should be a fair rate of

return to the people of the province. But there has to be a

fair rate of return also to the companies and the individuals

who are active in exploring for new sources and developing

them.

We must continue to expand our resource-based industries. We

feel the expansion should be neither a wide-open boom-and-bust

approach; nor should it be along the lines we so often hear of

a no-growth policy. We believe that the long-term target of

this province should be a real growth rate of 6.5 per cent a

year, and that a rate of population growth which would be

suitable and desirable is 2.5 per cent per year.

Within this average, the population growth of metropolitan

Vancouver might be less than 2.5 per cent, but more than 2.5

per cent per year in the regions of B.C. where we would like to

see growth occur. At least 4 per cent real growth per year

should be allowed for increase in real per capita income with

the goal of doubling the real income for each B.C.

[ Page 394 ]

family every 12 to 15 years.

The population growth at the present time is 3 per cent, and

I don't try to overlook the fact that the rate at which

population grows is not an easy factor to control or to

regulate. But the result of a target of 6.5 per cent real

growth per year would be that the natural resource stock of

this province allocated to development could be expanded at a

steady rate of 5 per cent a year, and this rate would hold for

the next 10 years, by which time the necessary stimuli to

regional industrial diversification would already have been

introduced.

In certain commodities such as coking coal this annual rate

of resource release would be sharply higher than 5 per cent,

because we have indications that coking coal will be replaced

by alternative technological processes within the next 25

years. As far as the copper is concerned, the rate of resource

release might have to be less than 5 per cent if maximum sale

prices and optimum revenues were to be maintained.

But an effective and equitable mineral royalty structure

must account for exploration costs, investment costs and

production revenues and returns. We feel that this government

still has not recognized the serious situation in the mining

industry, and, as I said earlier, the Minister of Finance

prefers to put the cart before the horse and say that mineral

revenues, which are to be much less in the coming fiscal year,

are evidence of the fact that the mining industry is not being

taxed in a punitive way.

We feel that if we are to maintain mineral exploration and

future mining royalties, it's essential that the mining

industry in B.C. explore for more sources of minerals — and I'm

glad the Minister of Mines has returned to his place.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's not his place. I can tell you where

his place is.

MR. WALLACE: We believe there are still inadequate

incentives to both provide exploration and development of

mines, not to mention the jobs which have disappeared because

of the present slump in the mining industry. This is what the

amendment is really all about: the creation of jobs by the

judicious development of our resource-based industries.

Heavier investment costs in mining arise from the latter

stages of ore-body development than actual expenditures on the

mining and concentrator operations themselves. Since these are

the operations that generate continuing employment and

provincial revenues, no royalty should be charged during the

capital investment payback period.

HON. L.T. NIMSICK (Minister of Mines): No stumpage on timber

either.

MR. WALLACE: I'm talking about minerals. They're a little

different than trees, Mr. Member. Trees are renewable; the

mines are not necessarily renewable. I'm talking specifically

about mineral royalties, Mr. Minister, and I'm saying that in

our opinion .... Your neighbour on your left-hand side, the

Minister of Transport (Hon. Mr. Strachan), appealed earlier on

this afternoon for the opposition to come up with some positive

ideas instead of just tearing down the government. If you would

be so generous, you might just listen to some of these positive

proposals that I'm suggesting the government might

consider.

AN HON. MEMBER: Good. Let's hear it, Scotty.

MR. WALLACE: We feel that mining operations generate

continuing employment and provincial revenues, and we believe

that no royalty should be charged during the capital investment

payback period.

HON. MR. NIMSICK: Are you not working to pay taxes on your

home?

MR. WALLACE: For an efficiently managed operation, we would

calculate this period at four years. Thus royalty in the mining

sector would be charged according to a percentage of output

value after exploration and after the initial four-year capital

payback period.

AN HON. MEMBER: At today's prices you don't get paid back in

four years.

MR. WALLACE: No reduction in royalties should be entertained

on production after the four-year period unless all after-tax

profits are committed to future reinvestment in British

Columbia.

We feel that mining sector incentive and the royalty

structure have to be fair. It represents all the mining sector

needs and all it should get. But the incentive to the mining

sector should be directed to keep it exploring and developing

and producing and reinvesting for higher added value within

British Columbia. This sounds very much like the kind of ideas

I used to hear the present Minister of Mines expounding from

this side of the House when he was in the opposition,

particularly the attempt to have higher value added to the

original ore and the whole development of secondary industry

and other ways in which we could not only utilize our resources

to a greater degree but provide jobs in the process.

We believe that the structure of mineral royalties which we

are suggesting could generate upwards of $50 million per year

by the fiscal year 1978-79, instead of the paltry figures which

the Minister of Finance

[ Page 395 ]

is quite proud, apparently, to quote in the budget which, as

I say, he's getting mixed up with cause and effect.

We feel, Mr. Speaker, that these are some of the positive

proposals that in our resource industries would both make wiser

use of capital, produce more revenue and, more importantly

perhaps of all these goals, create jobs.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. Member, you're into the last two

minutes.

MR. WALLACE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would just like to end by commenting on the reply of the

Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Cocke) when he talked about the

intermediate-care problem yesterday. While providing the need

to the citizens concerned is certainly the primary motive, it

would not be out of order to suggest that the whole health

industry and the whole health field has become one of very

intensive employment for a vast variety of people with high

skills and other levels of skill.

It would seem to me, in trying to make positive suggestions,

that it is not just a question of providing a health service to

elderly citizens very much in need but it would have the

spin-off effect of providing employment in the construction

industry, particularly if we went into a programme like the

Alberta programme. Furthermore, once the construction is

completed, it would provide a sustaining and continuing amount

of employment in an industry which hitherto has been perhaps

not only neglected but looked upon as being less productive of

revenue for the province.

As the Minister has stated and as the Provincial Secretary

(Hon. Mr. Hall) mentioned, the wages in the hospital field and

other fields are at an all-time high, which means that the

recipients are certainly paying taxes and buying consumer goods

and contributing considerably to the revenue of the

province.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry, Mr. Member, your time has

expired.

HON. J.G. LORIMER (Minister of Municipal Affairs): First of all, I would

like to say that I realize why the motion that was put on a couple of days before

I spoke yesterday is here. I had expected, though, to see this motion withdrawn

after I had explained to the House yesterday that the municipalities, in fact,

had a bumper year last year — the best year they have ever experienced. This

year they will receive considerable amounts more.

They are now embarked on a programme-sharing situation with the province. This

year we expect that they will receive much greater sums of money than they did

even last year, and last year was a provincial record. It's an assurance from

the federal Liberal government, and I am certain that we can all take the word

of the Liberals in Ottawa as we can the Liberals in Victoria. So I don't think

there is any question about that.

But I do want to say that I am surprised at the source of

this particular motion and the subjects that they use in their

motion. For years the municipalities were in, I suggest,

dreadful shape under the Social Credit government. It's only

the time now that they've been taken out of the depression.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. LORIMER: The other

section is a

section dealing

with housing. In 20 years the Social Credit government never

built a house, and there's no argument about that.

I remember, when I was an alderman in Burnaby, that we

proposed to the government of the day six separate sites for

construction of housing that we were prepared to have go into

public housing. After a great amount of correspondence we

finally were told that we had to prove there was a need for

housing in the greater Vancouver area. It was pretty obvious

right from the war that there was a great need for housing

throughout that area of British Columbia.

Subsequently, approval finally came for one of the sites,

and the other five sites were turned down. Some two years later

the buildings started to go up, which was a joint effort for a

large 90-suite apartment block for the low-income families on

Stride Avenue in Burnaby.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS (West Vancouver–Howe Sound): Did you get a

better deal on Casa Loma?

HON. MR. LORIMER: No, Casa Loma was a good deal. Casa Loma

is only one of the deals. There's a great number of activities

in Burnaby in housing. Just down the street from where I live

there are eight duplexes that are presently just being

completed and occupied. They are a model type of home with

trees around them. Beautiful, a beautiful spot.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Who built them?

HON. MR. LORIMER: I'd like to say that initially, when we

became government, I did have the responsibility for a few

months in the housing field. Immediately, I went to find the

housing department in the old Social Credit government housing

department so I could introduce myself.

Of course, they did have one man. Jack Williams was the

housing department for the previous administration. Jack

Williams was a very fine gentleman, but I would suggest that he

did an awful lot of work as one man trying to run the

housing

[ Page 396 ]

operations of the Province of British Columbia. He had only

been there for three or four years, I believe. Before that, the

person in charge of housing was the Deputy Minister, Everett

Brown, who used to have time to spend about five minutes a week

looking after the housing problems of the Province of British

Columbia.

Here tonight we have this motion saying that the housing

problems are not being resolved by the government of British

Columbia, ignoring the fact that $90 million extra is being

spent on housing above what was being done just three short

years ago. It is almost ludicrous to be spending so much time

debating this type of motion from that particular party.

MR. A.V. FRASER (Cariboo): I just want to rise tonight and

say that I certainly support this amendment. I am very

interested in the interest taken by the heavy hardware from the

other side. I believe we have had the privilege or honour to

have four or five cabinet Ministers up here in defence of

government policy. So the amendment has hit the spot. They are

really jumpy about this amendment.

The other observation I have is that the Minister

responsible for a lot of this trouble has seen fit not to even

be here. I just wonder where he is when we are debating an

amendment to the budget address. I recall that two or three

years ago when we were debating this the other Minister of

Finance went away for a few minutes. The present Minister of

Public Works (Hon. Mr. Hartley) was very incensed and ran

around out in the hall, kicking people because the Minister of

Finance wasn't in the House. So I think it is our turn to run

around doing a little kicking because the present Minister of

Finance has seen fit to be away from this debate all day.

HON. MR. COCKE: That was during his estimates. What are you

trying to do — mislead the House again?

MR. FRASER: Well, he was gone for 20 minutes and the present

Minister of Public Works was really excited about it. You know

that. He wasn't away for two sittings.

HON. MR. COCKE: Go back out to the wilderness where you can

mislead people more easily.

MR. FRASER: Is that right? There goes that Minister of

Defence again. Chirp, chirp, chirp over there. You should look

after your own department and never mind veering in to other

things.

AN HON. MEMBER: Go count the seagulls!

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Would all Members please address the

Chair?

MR. FRASER: Regarding the amendment before us and the budget

itself — the huge sum of $3.2 billion — the increase in this

budget, of course, is coming right out of the taxpayers'

pockets. This government would like to make the public think

that it is coming from resources, but in fact it comes out from

the individual taxpayer through forms of personal income tax,

property tax, gasoline tax, and so on.

This year, I might say, Mr. Speaker, that in this province

there will be an increase in the property taxes of a minimum of

30 per cent net. After all the so-called credits that this

government say they are giving, it is noted that there is no

increase in the homeowner grant. I also note that throughout

the province — the Minister of Education (Hon. Mrs. Dailly), by

the way, spoke today and she didn't mention this side of it —

apparently there is going to be, because of an inadequate

finance formula for education, an increase in property taxation

for education alone of 10 mills and another increase of 10 to

15 mills for general purposes. The overall will be an increase

of 30 per cent. Somebody who last year had a net property tax

of $400 this year can certainly look at a tax bill of $500 to

$550.

There is another alternative to this: the municipalities and

the school districts can reduce the service to the citizens. I

don't know what they will decide to do but I don't think that

they will be able to get away with reduction of services to the

people. They will have to pass on the increase because of the

inadequate support that this government is giving the school

boards and the municipalities.

It was said earlier, I think, that the municipalities were

referred to as junkies; I would refer to them as beggars. As a

matter of fact, the leaders of municipal government are in

Victoria tonight begging, waiting for a meeting with the

Minister of Finance, with whom they can't catch up. They are

begging for more relief from this government. They are here

just begging, trying to evade the fatal day of taxes going

up.

I was amazed when the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon.

Mr. Lorimer) spoke yesterday — not at what he said tonight —

about them going to swing another club at the municipalities.

At least, he came up with threats that if the municipalities

don't stop the impost fees, or some municipalities don't, then

they will take provincial action to stop this.

Well, I have news for the Minister of Municipal Affairs. If

he would do his duty and communicate the problems of the

municipalities to the Minister of Finance, he wouldn't have to

use any big-club methods that he suggested yesterday that he's

going to use. The only reason these impost fees are levied by

the various municipalities is to get revenue to survive, due to

the fact that they don't get proper provincial support. I don't

like that veiled threat he

[ Page 397 ]

gave them. It is irony that today and tonight and tomorrow

the Union of B.C. Municipalities are here to see the Minister

of Finance and not the Minister of Municipal Affairs. There

seems to be a communication gap there. I would suggest that the

Minister of Municipal Affairs take that avenue to contact the

Minister of Finance, rather than further clubbing the

individual municipalities about their impost fees.

The fact of the matter is that with this budget of $3.2

billion the municipalities will be tickled to death to get an

extra $20 million this year. It is, in effect, less than 1 per

cent of this enormous budget, and they would be well satisfied,

I'm sure, with that. But they want to be assured of that.

I don't think this House realizes that the municipalities

must set their mill rates in ample time so that they can get

their tax notices out and get the revenue coming back in. They

certainly can't set mill rates under the airy-fairy scheme that

the Minister of Finance put before them in this House last

week. I refer, of course, to the natural gas deal.

While it is said that the federal government has agreed to

an increase in the price of natural gas, I don't think they've

agreed at all. It's a completely blank cheque, and I'm sure

that right now the Minister of Finance knows what answer he is

going to get when he gets to Ottawa. If he doesn't, he should.

I'd suggest the answer is: "Yes, we'll let you increase the

price of gas a little bit, but probably effective January 1,

1976 or 1977." So where does that put the municipalities in

1975? They get absolutely zilch out of an agreement like

that.

But, in any event, they must get their budgets firmed up now

within the next 30 days, and, of course, they can't put one

cent in the budgets from the natural gas sharing proposed by

this government.

Mr. Speaker, this party — the NDP — campaigned in 1972 that

they would give a better deal to municipalities. It is another

campaign promise they've broken, because right at this time the

municipal people and the citizens have never been more worried

about the increased taxation at the municipal level than they

are right now in 1975.

MR. LEWIS: That's rubbish and you know it.

MR. FRASER: This turkey farmer from up the road here says

it's rubbish. Well, I'm going on to another subject now that is

not rubbish but is garbage.

MR. LEWIS: You should get out and do a slow waltz with

Vander Zalm.

MR. FRASER: While the provincial revenues have advanced 60 or 70 per

cent since this government took office, due to inflation and a lot of other

reasons, the municipal revenues have not advanced one

fraction of that.

Right at this time there are several strikes by municipal

employees in this province and threatened work stoppages. Quite

frankly, I don't want to get into the dispute of how much they

should have or anything, but it's obvious that the civic

workers should have an increase in pay of some degree. I think

only one or two have settled. Several are out on strike and

more are threatening.

The fact is that the municipalities can't afford to make a

decent deal with their employees. Consequently, the municipal

citizen is being deprived of essential services such as garbage

collection, maintenance of water services, maintenance of sewer

services. I say — I think it was mentioned here once before —

that this is really risking the health of these communities and

is most unfortunate because of the lack of funds coming from

the provincial government.

I would relate that I'm sure all municipalities would be

happy, as I said earlier, with a $20 million increase. It's

amazing to me that it can't be provided out of this budget when

this government has provided over $80 million in salary

contingencies. I assume that is for salary increases in the

fiscal year 1975-6. Their salary contingency items are four and

a half times what the municipalities need from this government.

As I say, it's only less than I per cent and they haven't seen

fit to do anything about it.

The Minister of Finance referred to this as a job security

budget. I don't know who the job security is supposed to be

for. In the area of the province that I come from, right at the

present time there is 14 per cent unemployment rate, the

highest it has been up there since the early 1960s. I can't see

where this budget is going to help very much in that

respect.

I just want to close by saying that there is something that

could happen if this government gave direction to the forest

sector in the central northern interior. I refer to the present

stumpage rate which is the minimum under the statute of $1.10

per 100 cubic feet. This was put on to help mills run late last

fall. When it was put on it was announced that there would

probably be changes on March 31.

I would say to the government that they would help a lot if

they would announce now what changes there are going to be so

that the industry can assess their position. March 3 I is not

very far away. If they are going to have an increase in

stumpage, it's certainly liable to affect the job security that

this budget refers to. I think it's about time, in all fairness

to the industry at large, that they be told now what the rate

is going to be. Is it going to be the same or increased? If

it's going to be increased, how much?

Mr. Speaker, I certainly take great pleasure in supporting

this amendment.

MR. C. LIDEN (Delta): Mr. Speaker, it's rather

[ Page 398 ]

difficult to understand the opposition in the way they've

been conducting themselves on this amendment. They've stood up

here tonight and they've criticized the $3.2 billion budget.

"It's too much money." "It has increased taxes." Then they

criticize the amount of money that is being sent to

municipalities or being provided for housing.

You can't have it both ways, but that's what they're trying

to do.

MR. LEWIS: Wishy-washy.

MR. LIDEN: It was said here a little while ago that the

municipalities are beggars as a result of this budget. If

they're beggars now, I wonder what they were before for 20

years in the years that some of those Members who have spoken

tonight served on municipal governments. So did I; so did many

of us here. We've seen what is happening.

MR. G.B. GARDOM (Vancouver-Point Grey): They were beggars

then and they're sons of beggars now.

MR. LIDEN: Municipalities have never been better off than

they are today.

It is said that we campaigned in 1972 to provide better

financing for municipalities, and we have done just that. We

have improved the finances of the municipalities and you know

it.

We have heard tonight, though, some really strange things.

We heard a despicable attack, a really unbelievable attack by

the Member for North Vancouver-Capilano (Mr. Gibson) on the

working people of this province, particularly on the people who

work in the public service. That Member, I think, should be

making apologies to all the public servants in this province

after the things he said here tonight.

We have introduced something this year that has been talked

about in municipal circles not only in this province but across

Canada for many many years: the whole question of resource

revenues being shared with the municipalities. That's something

that has been taken up by the federation of mayors and

municipalities and been discussed over the years. For the first

time some provincial government has made a move in that

direction. And they're critical of it. They're critical of the

municipal policies; they're critical of the position that has

been advanced by municipal governments for years.

Revenue-sharing has been talked about in the budget, and it can

provide up to the equivalent of $ 10 per capita or $15 to $20

per capita, depending upon what comes out of that resource

revenue.

Interjections.

MR. LIDEN: That's the sort of thing they're critical of. One

day you're saying that there isn't enough money and now, when

we produce some, you're saying it's being done the wrong way.

Yet it's being done on the basis of what the municipalities

have asked for for years — the very policy they asked for.

Interjection.

MR. LIDEN: The whole field of discussion is not only taking

place in this House but also out in the public arena. We look

around and we see some political wanderers. There is certainly

one wandering around Surrey who's touched on a lot of bases,

been hanging around various political parties. Lately he seems

to have bought himself a ticket on the Titanic and joined that

group that is going down, down, down every time there is a poll

taken. You know, he's a great guy for getting headlines,

though, even though he's not sure where he is going

politically. The last I heard he wasn't sure whether he was

going to stick with the group he's with right now, that there's

a change coming. He may be back with you people. How would you

like that?

The mayor of Surrey: he's set himself up a straw man and got

headlines in the New Westminster paper. He's set up the whole

question of municipal finances and suggested much of the same

thing that's been said here today about municipal finance. Set

up a straw man and then start to shoot at it. But when you

start to look through his story, what do you find? You find

that they budgeted for an increase of $2 per capita, and in all

the figures that he presents, even the worst figure that's

presented by that mayor, it comes to $4.50 per capita — more

than double what they budgeted for — $6.8 million in that

rearranging of per capita grants in this province. That's an

average of over $3 per capita throughout the province, and

certainly that's the kind of thing that these people have been

shooting at.

I don't understand how all of a sudden they become champions

of the municipalities. They become champions at a time when the

whole thing is going the other way. Compare the old sewerage

assistance funding that the former administration had, where

you spent $250,000 in three or four years compared to the $5.5

million that was spent in one year as a result of the change of

government and the change in policy.

The same kind of thing in the community recreation

facilities grant: $32.5 million produced well over $100

million worth of recreational facilities in this province. You

know, that's 100 million times as much as was produced before —

100 million times as much. And these people are saying that

they are the champions of municipal finance, and they're

critical of this budget because it doesn't provide

[ Page 399 ]

enough in municipal finance.

MR. H.W. SCHROEDER (Chilliwack): $45 per capita.

MR. LIDEN: It is unbelievable the kind of arguments that are

being made here tonight, when all of the things that have been

done have really destroyed their argument. I think the Minister

of Municipal Affairs was quite correct when he said that he

would have expected that a reasonable opposition would have

withdrawn that amendment before they even presented it.

Mr. Speaker, these people can't have it both ways. The

movers of the amendment, the kind of speeches that we have had

from the Liberals tonight, their friends out there, the mayor

of Surrey — all on the same bandwagon; but they really don't

know what they want. They haven't come up with a proper kind of

proposition at all. And if we look back at what they did, the

municipalities starved for 20 years, and now, the first time

they are getting something, these people are moving amendments

and trying to set the whole thing back.

Mr. Speaker, there is just no question that this amendment

has to be turned down.

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): I rise to support

the amendment. I must say that while we've had a good

association in committees and so on, the previous speaker

astonished me with his statement, one statement at least, to

the effect that the municipalities have never been in better

shape than they are today. That simply is not correct.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. LEWIS: It's true.

MR. CURTIS: The significance today, Mr. Speaker, of the

Union of B.C., Municipalities executive coming to Victoria for

an emergency meeting, as has been referred to by the Member for

Cariboo (Mr. Fraser) and by the Member for Oak Bay (Mr.

Wallace), I think cannot be overlooked. The executive represent

all areas of British Columbia, and one does not call a meeting

of that executive on short notice without very careful

consideration of the urgency of the subject matter to be

discussed.

The amendment which has been proposed, and which we have been debating this

afternoon and tonight, deserves very serious consideration by this House and

by the people of B.C., because certainly, while we can admit that local government

in this province and in other provinces in the past have not had the kind of

breaks or assistance which it needed and deserved, the situation in this province

now is at a crisis stage, and this government, apparently, on the basis of what

the Minister of Finance has said, and what the defenders of the position taken

by the Minister of Finance have said, is simply unable, first of all, to recognize

the fact that a crisis exists and, secondly, to do anything about it.

A very simple choice facing local government in this

province right now is to pass along what has to be described as

an absolutely intolerable tax increase for general purposes,

and for education, or, as the Member for Cariboo said earlier

tonight, to consider for the first time seriously and severely

cutting back on those services which have traditionally formed

part of municipal operation. It is that serious for 1975.

You pass along an increase which is not acceptable to the

people who pay the bill — the taxpayers, the property owners,

the tenants — or you cut back services in a manner which has

not been seen in many years in B.C., if indeed it has been seen

at all in the past.

If, as the government speakers told us repeatedly this

afternoon and tonight, municipalities are so well cared for in

the year 1975, then why did the UBCM executive have to rush to

Victoria this morning — some 10 members, I believe — to meet in

special session and to prepare and deliver a letter to the

Premier and Minister of Finance? The Member for Oak Bay (Mr.

Wallace) also had a copy of the letter. I believe that it was

released to the press gallery, in fact, just a few minutes

after it was delivered to the Premier's office. And probably

the Premier and Minister of Finance, because of his absence

today, has not yet seen the letter.

The Member for Oak Bay quoted one very important paragraph.

There are a couple of others, I think, which should be put into

the record as we debate this amendment and as we discuss the

plight of municipalities. The letter requests, as others have

observed, a meeting with the Minister of Finance at the

earliest possible time. On the first page one paragraph

says:

"Our immediate concern relates to two basic proposals contained in your budget. These are (

a) your

recognition of the need for an updating of the per capita grant

payments of earlier years, and (

b) your revenue-sharing

proposal."

The executive, over the signature of the president of the

UBCM, goes on to say:

"Our preliminary analysis indicates that the updating

of census figures brings very limited benefit to most municipalities,

disproportionate benefits to a few and none at all to at least 23

municipalities.

It is, in any event, simply intended to make up for an admitted deficiency in the past. But" —

Mr. Speaker, the final sentence of this paragraph — "it will not even meet this

[ Page 400 ]

objective, in that it will still — leave a 40 per cent

shortfall due to the method of averaging used.

"The only indicated source of additional revenue which may

help municipalities to meet their budget commitments may be in

the revenue-sharing formula based on your expected increase in

the export price of natural gas."

Others have talked about this. The letter goes on to

say:

"This is an unknown quantity to us at the present time for

our immediate purposes."

Again, I have to ask Members of the government to recognize,

departing from the text of the letter, Mr. Speaker, that it is

an immediate situation within the next few weeks, as the Member

for Cariboo (Mr. Fraser) told you just a few minutes ago.

Budgets will have to be completed to meet the statutory date of

May 15; tax bills will have to be sent out. The municipalities

don't have waiting time while we wonder whether there is going

to be revenue from the sale of natural gas to be passed along

to local governments. They don't have any time. They are

working now on their budgets. They're not going to get any

money, but even if there was the slightest chance that they

would, Mr. Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. L.A.

Williams), they can't afford to wait. Well, I hope they've

realized that after their meeting today, and when they do

finally, hopefully, get to meet with the Minister of

Finance.

Interjection.

MR. CURTIS: One-third of nothing is still nothing. That is

correct.

That is the situation, as far as the UBCM is concerned

today, with a meeting called urgently and held in Victoria this

morning and a letter transmitted to the Minister of Finance,

and that is local government's response to the budget which has

been so highly touted by members of the NDP this afternoon and

this evening with respect to local government. That is what the

parliament of local government in British Columbia thinks about

the Minister of Finance's document delivered in this House last

Friday.

MR. LIDEN: How would you like to have Dan Campbell back?

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

MR. CURTIS: We've got a couple of examples which may also be of interest

to the House. I was chastised once for reading a lot of letters. I am not going

to read letters tonight, but in January I took the trouble to contact a number

of typical municipalities in British Columbia to ask them how they saw the 1975

mill rate situation as opposed to 1974. I tried to find a representative group

of small municipalities, larger cities (including Vancouver), those who have

rapid growth and those which are relatively stable. I will just quote briefly

figures only from the replies which were received:

Central Saanich, in the constituency I represent: for 1974,

general purposes, 28.8478 mills; provisional for 1975, 36.21

mills. The estimate of a final mill rate for 1975 over 1974 is

seven mills.

Village of Princeton: 1974 mill rate, 32.795; expected rate

for 1975, 38.545.

I asked in the letter: "How do you feel the municipality, or

village, or town concerned will be able to raise the revenues

which will be needed for this added mill rate?" Under this

point, Princeton replied: "No comment."

Here's Trail. General purposes last year, 48.03 mills. The

1975 provisional budget mill rates would be 59.19 for general

purposes. The 1974 budget in Trail was $5,012,500 — that's for

general purposes; education, $2,285,000; and the balance, which

would include debt, hospital finance and so on, $2,727,000. The

1975 provisional budget, $5,943,000; education up from

$2,285,000 to $2,742,000.

The District of Saanich: last year, a general purposes mill

rate of 40.98; facing this year a provisional mill rate, for

general purposes, of 52.34 — from 40.9 to 52.3.

Dawson Creek. General purposes 1974 mill rate, 36.33. The

provisional budget, general purposes mill rate for 1975, 41.33;

a general purposes increase of seven mills; school, six mills;

hospital and regional district, two mills. The total potential

increase in Dawson Creek, 1975 over 1974, is 15 mills. And, Mr.

Member for South Peace River (Mr. Phillips), as you know, the

mill rate in Dawson Creek produces approximately $23,000.

Fifteen mills potential increase.

Langley, another example of an increase, significant.

Mission ...

Interjection.

MR. CURTIS: I'll tell them about yours; very well then, Mr.

Member for Langley (Mr. McClelland), okay. General purposes

1974, 31.49 mills; 1975 provisional, 38.13. Put it all

together, including debt, school, regional hospital district,

MFA, the Central Fraser Valley Regional District and the

Vancouver-Fraser Park District, 1974, 71.14 mills; 1975

provisional budget, 79.36 mills.

Mission should be of interest. These are people taxes. This

is the narrow property tax base which has to produce virtually

all of the money available for local government purposes.

Interjection.

[ Page 401 ]

MR. CURTIS: I'm talking about the mill rate which ends up in

tax dollars, as the Attorney-General very well knows, Mr.

Speaker.

Interjections.

MR. CURTIS: Mission, 44.74 mills in 19 ....

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Tell the whole truth.

Interjections.

MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, the Attorney-General knows full

well that the assessment has been frozen this year, and there's

been relatively ....

Interjections.

MR. CURTIS: It's like squeezing ....

Interjections.

MR. CURTIS: Mr. Attorney-General, if I could help you .... I

realize that you have a degree in law, and I respect you for

that, but when you're dealing with property tax, if you squeeze

the balloon at one end, the other end breaks — that's the

problem. So if the assessments are frozen and there is

relatively little increase in assessment in many of the

examples I've quoted tonight, assessment increases can only

come through change of land-use, or new construction, as you

know.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Or increased values. And they've been

....

Interjections.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Come on.

MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, I think we should give the

Attorney-General a primer in municipal affairs, because he

obviously doesn't have all the information that is necessary to

participate in this debate. Now if I could carry on with one

more example....

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the Hon. Members allow

their own Member to proceed?

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Come on, he's one of you now.

MR. CURTIS: I'm trying to help the Attorney-General sort

this out. I know it is complex, Mr. Speaker, through you.

Mission, 1974: 44.74 mills; projected increase for 1975, 50 mills. Finally,

I thought from the District of Coquitlam, the area represented by the Minister

of Finance, the Premier of this province, Mayor Tonn, in his reply, gave me

the increases and said in the closing paragraph: "It is going to be extremely

difficult to meet the increased tax load projected for the new fiscal year,

and I sincerely hope the province is going to provide additional per capita

grants and reduction in welfare costs for 1975." Some hope, Mayor Tonn of the

District of Coquitlam, Mr. Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. L.A. Williams).

I have attempted tonight to point out that the situation in

local government is in a crisis stage. Let no Member of the

government side of this House attempt to tell us otherwise

today, tonight, tomorrow or next week.

I realize that the Premier is not here, but he probably

reads or is told about Hansard the following day. If, as

the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Lea) indicated in his

comments this afternoon, we are heading for a provincial

election this year, as he did in fact indicate — seriously or

in jest I'm not sure — I would suggest in the interests of his

party that the Premier make absolutely certain that the

election is called and held before British Columbia taxpayers

open their property tax notices.

HON. L. NICOLSON (Minister of Housing): It is a pleasure to

speak against this amendment.

MR. CHABOT: Tell us about the Casa Loma scandal.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: We have heard a great deal just now about

the municipalities. I think it should be very clearly on the

record that while that Member has talked about increases in

mill rates, there have been for years and years increases in

assessments. What is even more to the point is the record of

that group over there that seems to be washed anew. I don't

think it washes too much with the people of this province.

What was their attitude toward social assistance? They

increased social assistance payments and the burden on

municipalities or the share to municipalities from 10 to 15 per

cent. We reduced it. That is the record of this government as

against the record of that opposition group.

But that isn't all. The Department of Housing. When I came

into the Department of Housing and the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer) introduced me to the department we

had inherited, namely Mr. Williams, I found out that one of the

reasons it was thought that public housing was unacceptable to

the municipalities wasn't that it didn't pay taxes — public

housing pays taxes — but that the municipalities had to pay

12.5 per cent of the operating subsidies, the highest in Canada

at the

[ Page 402 ]

time.

We have reduced that to zero per cent. The province pays;

the municipalities do not have to pay for any of the operating

costs under

section 40 or

section 44 of the National Housing

Act. In fact, we are one of the only two provinces, I believe,

in Canada that make no charge to municipalities for public

housing. Public housing pays full municipal taxes. There is no

burden to the municipalities.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS: You speak with your hands in your

pockets.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: I am a school teacher; that is my

privilege to speak with my hands in my pockets, Mr. Member for

West Vancouver–Howe Sound. As a lawyer, you can put yours in

your vest. But I am not a lawyer. I don't have a vest.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS: Take the hands out of your pockets.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Another interesting contrast between the

policy of that group and the policy of this group is with the

Elderly Citizens' Housing Aid Act. They brought in a very fine

programme but they had a budget which was less than one-sixth,

about one-eighth of what our budget is.

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): Tell us about Casa

Loma.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: That is all they needed because they made

it a condition that elderly citizens' housing had to be given

an exemption from municipal taxation by the local

municipalities. It has been the position of this government and

of my Ministry that elderly citizens' housing should pay its

full way as public housing under

section 40 or 43. Housing

under

section 15 should pay its fair share of municipal taxes.

That extra burden, of course, should not fall on the senior

citizens; it should be borne by making

section 44 housing

subsidies available on

section 15 projects on which this

government, as the previous one, paid one-third of capital

costs. It makes a better contribution towards senior citizens

housing than any other jurisdiction in Canada.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS: Well, you are doing it, aren't you? That

is your admission.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: I made a position in my position paper in the federal

conference in Ottawa on January 30 of this year that, as we have such a great

preponderance of

section 15 housing, and the majority of our housing is made

under that vehicle. I said that we need agreement from the federal government

to participate in the cost of rent subsidies under

section 44 of the National

Housing Act for non-profit and cooperative housing.

As far as British Columbia is concerned, we are prepared to

pay 50 per cent of the cost of subsidies, and we expect Ottawa

to join us on an equal basis.

Although we prefer to generally develop our senior citizens'

housing by providing non-profit societies with one-third

capital grants, I would remind the federal government that a

much greater Central Mortgage and Housing Corp. Investment

would be required should they have to rely instead on

section

43 programmes.

I am proud to say, Mr. Speaker, that as a result of that

conference there has been one move made by Central Mortgage and

Housing. Two days ago the Hon. Barney Danson announced that

these very same

section 44 subsidies which I had requested will

now be made available for 25 per cent of the units in

non-profit sponsored housing, municipally sponsored housing and

cooperative housing. That is a victory for this government,

and it is a victory for the people of British Columbia and for

the municipalities of British Columbia, because it means that

more of these projects will be able to pay their fair share of

taxes.

I'd like to congratulate the municipalities, which even

today are granting some tax exemptions in order that these

things can fly.

We have also talked about the record of this government and

the sewage treatment plant assistance Act and the phantom

programme of that government that paid out just over $200,000

as opposed to over $5 million by this government, Mr. Speaker, when you add those up and you put those costs

into increases in per capita grants, the record of that

Minister who has spoken this evening, the Minister of Municipal

Affairs, and the record of this government stacks up so

favourably.

Hon. Mr. Nicolson moves adjournment of the debate.

Hon. Mrs. Dailly moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 10:58 p.m.

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