1995 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 35th Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

TUESDAY, MAY 30, 1995

Afternoon Sitting

Volume 20, Number 13

[ Page 14663 ]

The House met at 2:07 p.m.

[D. Lovick in the chair.]

M. de Jong: It's my pleasure today to introduce to colleagues a former colleague of many people in this House. Mr. and Mrs. Peter Dueck are with us in the gallery today. As you know, Mr. Dueck sat in this chamber for a number of years. He has a lifetime of service and contribution to his community and in fact to the province as well. He's obviously here to renew some acquaintances and also, I think, to find out how much longer I'll continue to bill lunches to his number downstairs in the legislative dining room. Please make Mr. and Mrs. Dueck welcome.

J. Weisgerber: I too would like to extend a greeting to Peter Dueck and his wife, Helen. Peter is obviously a good friend and colleague. I'd also like to introduce two guests that are here with Peter and Helen: Bruce and June Alsbury. Mr. Alsbury is the son of the late Tom Alsbury, former mayor of Vancouver. Would you please extend a very sincere welcome to Helen and Peter and to the Alsburys.

J. Dalton: I am pleased to welcome two visitors from Ontario: Dr. John Hopps of Ottawa and his daughter, Mrs. Margaret Officer of Brockville. For the members' information, Dr. Hopps is the developer of the pacemaker and has received the Order of Canada due to his efforts. They are accompanied by two constituents of mine, Janet and Gerry Morris, who happen to live a block away from my children's high school. So I welcome them all, and I'd ask you to do so as well.

Hon. G. Clark: I just noticed in the gallery a well-known author and a management employee of the Vancouver Sun: Gary Mason. I'd like to welcome him back to the chamber. I know he's busy discussing opportunities with the Times Colonist and elsewhere. So we're happy that he's come to visit the chamber today, and I'd ask all members to make him welcome.

F. Gingell: In the Speaker's gallery today is a lady who deserves the Order of Canada: my constituency assistant, Carla Perry, and her son. Her son has reached that certain age that all parents know, and he insisted that his mother bring him here today to listen to what lies in store for him in the amendments to the Motor Vehicle Act and what it might do to the timing of his getting that important thing: a driver's licence. I welcome them both and ask the House to welcome them.

Hon. J. Pement: I'd like to introduce today two people from that great community of Smithers, in the Bulkley Valley: Grace and Doug Brown. Doug is with the firm of Remax. Would you bid them welcome.

Introduction of Bills

CONSUMER PROTECTION AMENDMENT ACT, 1995

Hon. J. Smallwood presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Consumer Protection Amendment Act, 1995.

Hon. J. Smallwood: I move the bill be introduced and read a first time now.

I am pleased to introduce Bill 36. This important amendment to the Consumer Protection Act establishes strong safeguards for consumers who receive unsolicited services through negative-option offers, clarifies the act's definition of direct sellers and provides protection for consumers purchasing time-share contracts. This bill responds to a very strong vocal consumer revolt against negative-option marketing techniques in British Columbia. The new provision will ensure that consumers are not required to pay for unsolicited services provided through negative-option offers.

The legislation also provides that consumers who inadvertently pay for services will be able to demand a refund. These provisions are retroactive to January 26, 1995, the date the proposed legislation was announced.

Bill 36 also provides a seven-day cooling-off period to help protect customers against high-pressure sales tactics when purchasing time-share contracts in British Columbia for the use of houseboats, recreational vehicles or similar property located both in and outside British Columbia. This cooling-off provision parallels the cancellation period for time-share contracts covered by the Real Estate Act.

Bill 36 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

HEALTH STATUTES AMENDMENT ACT, 1995

Hon. P. Ramsey presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Health Statutes Amendment Act, 1995.

Hon. P. Ramsey: Bill 30 makes a number of amendments to existing statutes within the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health. A total of six statutes are being amended or repealed, and I will provide the details of those amendments at second reading.

I do want to draw the attention of the House to a number of key provisions in the bill. The Medical and Health Care Services Act is being amended in relation to the supply and distribution of physicians practising in British Columbia. The mandate of the Medical Services Commission is amended to clarify that it has the authority to use payment schedules to discourage the continued growth of the number of physicians in overserviced areas, and to encourage physicians to locate in regions that are presently underserviced.

The Medical Practitioners Act is being further amended in connection with matters of physicians' sexual misconduct. Since obtaining the unanimous support of members of the Legislature last year for a comprehensive package of amendments, a number of small but important shortcomings have been identified, and this bill rectifies those matters.

In addition to several items that are housekeeping in nature, there's also provision for repeal of the Dental Technicians and Denturists Act and the Nurses (Licensed Practical) Act. The three professional groups currently regulated under these acts are to be governed in accordance with the terms of the Health Professions Act.

I'm pleased to be able to table this legislation today. I move the bill be read a first time now.

[ Page 14664 ]

Bill 30 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

[2:15]

OFFENCE AMENDMENT ACT, 1995

Hon. J. Pement presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Offence Amendment Act, 1995.

Hon. J. Pement: I'm pleased to present to the House legislation that provides for interest on overdue fines. It's a measure that will encourage more timely payments. Currently, $133 million in outstanding fines is due this government. Well over 90 percent of the total stems from traffic violation tickets involving more than half a million motorists. The problem has mushroomed because there has not been any incentive to pay sooner or any penalty for delay. This has reduced the deterrent effect of fines and undermined police efforts to enforce traffic rules.

We are now taking corrective action, creating a strong incentive for those with overdue fines to settle their accounts quickly. While government will benefit through more timely receipt of money, more importantly, the public will benefit from the greater attention to traffic safety that this action is expected to promote.

Bill 34, Offence Amendment Act, 1995, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Oral Questions

DOUGLAS LAKE RANCH BLOCKADE

G. Campbell: The blockade of the Douglas Lake Ranch continues at this hour. Kids still can't get to school, and people still can't get to work. Unfortunately, under the NDP government, confusion is reigning supreme. Yesterday the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs told the House the government was attempting to mediate; the Premier told us that the government was trying to negotiate; the MLA for Yale-Lillooet said it was time to remove the blockade; and the Attorney General expressed the idea that he had no idea what was going on at Douglas Lake.

Deputy Speaker: Your question.

G. Campbell: It's clear what is going on at Douglas Lake: there is an illegal blockade, and there is an enforcement order has been issued.

Deputy Speaker: Could we have a question.

G. Campbell: My question is to the Attorney General, the chief law enforcement officer in British Columbia: can the Attorney General tell the House when the government will restore legitimate public services and access to the Douglas Lake Ranch?

Hon. C. Gabelmann: The RCMP obtained an enforcement order for the injunction, which was granted on Friday. The enforcement order was obtained on Saturday. The RCMP are in the process of determining how best they can ensure that that enforcement order is in fact enforced, and it is up to the RCMP to act independently from political pressure, whether from that side of the House or this.

Deputy Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition on a supplemental.

G. Campbell: I can assure that you the RCMP are not turning to this side of the House for leadership at this point, although they may well in the future. The fact of the matter is that the RCMP look to the Attorney General for leadership. The people at the Douglas Lake Ranch feel under siege; the confusion shown by this NDP cabinet, where three ministers are clearly saying three different things, encourages illegal activity and puts people at risk. To the Attorney General, once again: why does this government refuse to restore public services to the Douglas Lake Ranch and to clearly demonstrate that there is only one law for all British Columbians?

Hon. C. Gabelmann: The Leader of the Opposition may have learned how police independence in this country is protected by reading false headlines in the Vancouver Province. But, in fact, that is not the way it works. The Attorney General in this province -- as in any other province in this country -- does not direct the police as to when and how to enforce the law. The RCMP are obliged to enforce the law; they are doing so. If the member will respect the RCMP, he will learn that they're doing the job the way they are obliged to do it in this country of ours.

COST OF ROYAL INLAND HOSPITAL STAFF TRAINING PROGRAM

W. Hurd: I have a question for the Minister of Health.

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Order, members. I do want to hear the question.

W. Hurd: Hon. Speaker, the Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops sponsors a program for staff called Royal Care, which will cost taxpayers about $300,000 over the next two to three years: 1,400 staff at the hospital will take

part in a six-hour program that teaches such things as personal communication skills and making people feel welcome at the hospital. The question to the minister is: why does he allow and endorse the Royal Inland Hospital to fund personality improvement courses while patients are sitting in the hallway at that hospital?

Hon. P. Ramsey: I'll take the question on notice.

DOUGLAS LAKE RANCH BLOCKADE

J. Weisgerber: My question is also to the Attorney General. For months the government dithered at the Apex Alpine blockade. Now the government fails to deal with the blockade at the Douglas Lake Ranch. There is an injunction in place; the

[ Page 14665 ]

government has an obligation to act. The law is the law. Will the minister send a signal to the RCMP to indicate that this government wants to see the law applied evenly and fairly across the board?

Hon. C. Gabelmann: The Attorney General was in court on Friday, participating in the injunction application which was sought by Douglas Lake. As a result of that intervention, the court issued its order. The RCMP on Saturday obtained an enforcement order. I have been in discussions with the RCMP since that date, and I have no further comment to make at this point.

Deputy Speaker: The member continues with a supplemental.

J. Weisgerber: The situation at Douglas Lake is fundamentally different than it has been at other blockades around the province. There is no question here about right-of-way. The courts...

Deputy Speaker: There should be a question.

J. Weisgerber: ...have issued an injunction. The ministry, the government and the RCMP have an obligation to enforce that.

Deputy Speaker: Question, please.

J. Weisgerber: Will the minister act today? Will the minister make a statement to indicate that he and his government want this blockade brought down, and brought down immediately?

Hon. C. Gabelmann: The law is clear: the blockade is illegal. The RCMP have an enforcement order, and the RCMP will make their decision about how and when to enforce the law.

COST OF ROYAL INLAND HOSPITAL STAFF TRAINING PROGRAM

F. Gingell: The Liberal opposition has learned of yet another staff training fiasco at Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops. On February 9, March 2 and April 18 of this year, mandatory interpersonal training sessions were held for approximately 50 supervisors at Royal Inland. An American consultant, flown in direct from Oahu, Hawaii, conducted these feel-good sessions for Kamloops professionals. Recognizing the minister's responsibility to ensure that health care dollars are well spent, why has he allowed a Hawaiian consultant to be hired at taxpayers' expense to tell Kamloops professionals how to communicate?

Hon. P. Ramsey: I can only say that I wish the Liberal opposition were half as concerned about $800 million in federal cuts to health care as they are with staff-training and professional development at Royal Inland. I'll undertake to get the details of this training program and report back to the House.

F. Gingell: My mother told me that if you look after the pennies, you know, the pounds will look after themselves. The supervisors at Royal Inland spent 12 hours being trained about interpersonal relationships, at the cost to the taxpayers of at least $20,000 in wasted staff time. This $20,000 does not include the cost of flying the Hawaiian to and from Kamloops or her fees for this 12-hour program. The cost of this aloha session could buy Royal Inland Hospital at least one and likely two EEG monitors for patient care.

What action has the minister taken to ensure that taxpayers' money will not be wasted, when the patients in British Columbia deserve better equipment and better services for health care?

Hon. P. Ramsey: Every institution -- every hospital and long term care facility -- in the province has a budget for professional development and staff training. I will undertake to get the facts of this training program and report back to the House. I must say, though, that it strikes me as strange that we have a plethora of allegations coming out of Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops. It must be that there's a Liberal candidate there interested in health care.

SAM BAWLF AND B.C. FERRIES CAPITAL PLAN

G. Wilson: My question is to the Minister of Employment and Investment. On April 26, 1992, Mr. Bob Williams, then of the Crown corporations secretariat, indicated that the hiring of Sam Bawlf would in no way affect the development of the B.C. Ferries capital plan. In November 1994, this minister again reassured us that because of Mr. Bawlf's involvement with Cancat, which was a subsidiary of Incat and held the distribution rights, he was not involved in the development of the ten-year capital plan.

Information obtained through a freedom-of-information request indicates that Mr. Bawlf has been directly involved in the development of the plans with respect to the fast catamaran ferries throughout 1993, '94 and today. Will the minister please tell us: why did he indicate that Mr. Bawlf was not involved with Incat and the development of those plans? What assurance did this minister receive that Mr. Bawlf has in fact given up his sole distribution rights of Incat technology in British Columbia?

Hon. G. Clark: Mr. Bawlf has severed all relationships with Cancat Canada. In fact, I have a signed, sworn affidavit by Mr. Bawlf to that effect when he took employment as a contractor with the Crown corporations secretariat. Mr. Bawlf has been involved in assisting in the development of the capital plan. He was in no way involved in adjudicating the request for proposals internationally to look at the appropriate technology.

Deputy Speaker: A supplemental from the member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast.

G. Wilson: Information obtained through freedom of information indicates that in fact Mr. Bawlf was directly in communication with Incat to get the specs required to put that process to tender. Can the minister tell us on what date Mr. Bawlf in fact relinquished his rights to the distribution of Incat technology, and who bought those rights for distribution in the province of British Columbia?

Hon. G. Clark: Certainly I can give the member all of the information -- including comfort -- with respect to Mr.

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Bawlf's business relationship. We have all of that material. It's in the public domain, but I will certainly provide it for the member.

I can say that we are delighted to be proceeding with the construction of three high-speed aluminum catamarans to carry cars and passengers from Nanaimo to Horseshoe Bay and back. The trip will take less than an hour. This new technology will help to revitalize our shipyards and dramatically improve transportation from the mainland to Vancouver Island. We're very excited by the ten-year capital plan. I hope members opposite will support it.

[2:30]

REMOVAL OF B.C. SPIRIT LOGO FROM TRAVEL INFOCENTRE SIGNS

L. Hanson: I have a question for the Minister of Small Business, Tourism and Culture. Apparently, the government has decided to change the signs for travel infocentres this fall and remove the B.C. Spirit flag from the logo. Can the minister tell us why he's so hostile to the B.C. Spirit flag that he is going to the expense of having them removed from the travel infocentres? Can he tell us how much it will cost to change the infocentre logos and signs, which most taxpayers would agree is a waste of time and money?

Hon. B. Barlee: When you talk about tourism in British Columbia, we did come up $475 million last year over the year before. I do admit that the $5 million extra we received for tourism yielded $475 million, which is $95 to $1, and out of that $475 million, private entrepreneurs around the province got $405 million and the Crown got $70 million.

What we do -- unlike other governments, some of whose members are sitting opposite -- is to plan long into the future, with very good strategy, and part of our strategy is to have a wordmark that is recognized around the world. Our wordmark certainly is being recognized around the world. When you look at the business we've done overseas, it's all double digit, and the number of infocentres in the province locks in with this long-term strategy. Our strategy is obviously working extremely well, and I think the member recognizes it.

L. Hanson: I find the answer very interesting, but it has very little to do with the question. I suppose the old saying that this is question period, not answer period, fits in this place.

The cost of changing the travel info directional signs throughout British Columbia alone will be considerable. Why is the government doing this at great cost to taxpayers, when everyone but the NDP is perfectly happy with the Spirit logo for infocentres?

Hon. B. Barlee: The member should perhaps examine the increased revenue in tourism this year. I think our long-term strategy will result in an increase of another $600 million to $700 million in tourism. When we spend the taxpayers' money, with a few thousand dollars in each infocentre, and it works with the long-term strategy, I think you'll find our strategy is almost letter-perfect.

Orders of the Day

Hon. G. Clark: I call Committee of Supply in

Section A for the purposes of discussing the estimates of the Ministry of Health and Ministry Responsible for Seniors; and in the House, I call continued debate on Bill 22, the Farm Practices Protection (Right to Farm) Act.

FARM PRACTICES PROTECTION (RIGHT TO FARM) ACT

(second reading continued)

F. Gingell: It has always been important for government to recognize that if the use of land is going to be tied up, then the owners of that land have to be protected and assured that the economic viability of their operation is sound. When the government brought in the agricultural land reserve in 1972 -- which was, I believe, supported by most sides of the House -- at that same time a series of agricultural income support programs were created. Over the years those support programs have been cut here and changed there and gradually decimated.

That is the prime reason that most members of this House seem to be in support of this bill. If we are going to ensure that land is kept for agricultural purposes, then it is clearly important for us to ensure that farmers have the opportunity to operate their farms in a sensible and practical manner.

There are some issues that I would like to touch on very briefly so that the minister can give thought to them before we come back to discuss this bill in committee stage. The first issue that I'd like to deal with is the makeup of the Farm Practices Board. The Farm Practices Board, first of all, is going to be chaired by the chairman of the B.C. Marketing Board. Now, I would imagine that that's a pretty important and full-time job as it is, and this is an additional responsibility that is being placed on that individual's head. I believe that I am correct in saying that common practice is that the B.C.

Marketing Board is made up of people who are involved on a full-time basis in agriculture, and therefore one has to recognize that we're already dealing with a very busy individual. And why has the B.C. Marketing Board been chosen to have all of the members of their board sit on this commission? We must recognize that the B.C. Marketing Board does not represent 100 percent of the people in agriculture.

I appreciate that there are ten additional members to be appointed, and I'm sure that the minister will use discretion in arriving at who those appointments are. But I believe that it would be appropriate to ensure that certain bodies are represented in addition to the British Columbia Marketing Board -- the Agricultural Land Commission, for example, and organizations that represent local municipal or regional government -- to ensure that right in the legislation itself these authorities are represented.

This act recognizes, I'm sure, the problems that farmers face. Living in an agricultural community and having a large agricultural base in my constituency, you can be assured that I am kept well abreast of those issues. But it is also true in many cases, particularly as the technology of agriculture has changed in recent years, that the reverse can be true. One can have circumstances where homes or the operations of very small specialized farms are affected by large agricultural operations -- for instance greenhouses. These non-soil-based agricultural industries can affect them, and ongoing problems and discussions never seem to be resolved.

So I'm very supportive of a process being put in place that will allow these matters to be dealt with in a sensible manner. And the way they are dealt with and the credibility

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that the board gets through its first year or so of operations are going to be particularly dependent upon the common sense and the sense of balance that the minister brings to the appointment of the board members.

The act deals in some depth with many of the issues that are of concern. I'm particulary pleased to see that the issue of highways and roads and access has been dealt with. But if one looks at the particular sections there, it deals primarily with the issue of roads that increase access -- either necessarily or unnecessarily -- to agricultural land. I would like to suggest to the minister that, before this bill comes to committee stage, he consider bringing in an amendment that also deals with the issue of highways that restrict access to agricultural land.

This is an issue in Delta, where a new road is being built through lands which the province owns. They used to be known as the Roberts Bank backup lands; I think they are now called the Boundary Bay agricultural lands. That road, which is necessary to service the new container terminal being built at Roberts Bank, is going to have limited access -- at least until it gets to Highway 17. They are cutting through some working farms and creating some problems. The port of Vancouver and the federal government have not been as helpful, as cooperative, in this issue as we would like to have seen.

This is perhaps an opportunity to look at the other side of the issue, where access is being restricted by the construction of transportation infrastructure.

The member for Abbotsford, when he spoke in the first response to the bill, suggested that it's also necessary for the agricultural industry and farmers to have a means of defending themselves, not only against urbanization creeping up to their boundaries but against government itself and the bureaucracy. He mentioned particularly, I think, the issue of septic tanks for second homes on farms. It is an important issue for us in Delta, where many farming families don't have family growing on the family farm the way they used to, and they're having to go outside and hire farm help.

They want them to live on the farm property, and they're being restricted from building secondary residences on the farms for farmworkers. That's an important issue.

In dealing with the bureaucracy, another issue of importance to farmers in Delta is the issue of the Boundary Bay linear park. Here's a case where the Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks, in announcing the special acquisition of certain parklands in the lower mainland, have included in that acquisition some land that is adjacent to the dike at Boundary Bay for a staging area, to allow parking for automobiles, as well as washrooms -- toilets -- perhaps a small snack bar, and information boards to tell people what to look for and the main species of birds that can be seen there.

[2:45]

The Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks have found a site that was for sale. It's presently used as an air park. But it is right in the centre of the farmland that sits south of Highway 99, from the end of Highway 91, where it touches the water, all the way back to the South Delta community. The farmers have genuine concerns that this parking lot and staging area for the linear park on the dike at Boundary Bay will just bring more and more people into the middle of their agricultural area.

They will have concerns about when they can spray; they will have concerns about people breaking down their fences; and they'll have concerns about a major item, which is the throwing away of trash over the fence. One broken bottle in a pea field can have dramatic economic costs.

It's important that other ministries recognize the need for farmers to operate their farms in a sensible and efficient manner. It's not good enough for only the Ministry of Agriculture to be concerned; it's important for other ministries to recognize the effect that their actions have on farms. When one deals with the issue of moving farm vehicles and equipment around, I don't see any provisions in here dealing with the Ministry of Transportation and Highways and the problem of moving custom farm machinery over provincial highways.

There have been problems. One of the major custom operators services customers' farms with large, expensive pieces of equipment -- which farmers can't afford to buy and are much better to hire on a custom basis -- and he has customers in both Richmond and Delta. It's very difficult to get those pieces of equipment across the Fraser River at the right time, when the moment is right to do that work -- whether it be seeding or harvesting. Those problems are caused by restrictions placed on the movement of oversize vehicles on such structures as the Alex Fraser Bridge.

I would welcome an amendment by the minister that would bring into this bill a reference to the need for other ministries to recognize that farming in this day and age takes place not only on the actual land within the boundaries of the farm, and that there are all kinds of situations that require good access to and proper use of the highways that give access to these properties. It applies not only to custom operators but also to the vegetable-processing industry.

There are sections of this bill that deal with the issue of subdivision and buffer zones, and the importance of ensuring that those buffer zones are in place. I don't know exactly the way it should be done, but certainly I think that one should recognize -- and it would be good if this act could reasonably recognize -- that such proper buffer zones should be defined and would clearly be a cost to and a responsibility of the subdivider, not the farmer against whose boundary lines the subdivision lies.

This is an important bill. It's not an earth-shattering bill but it's a good one, and it was necessary because this government has gone through three years of governing recognizing the pressures -- or understanding, surely, the pressures -- that the growth of urbanization has brought to farmers, who are imprisoned in many cases on land which for 23 years now has been restricted in its use. It's important that these farmers be given a charter to allow them to operate properly.

It's important, too, that there be some reasonable process, in which the communities all have faith, that allows disputes to be settled in a quick and reasonable fashion. With those few words, I pledge my support to this bill and look forward to the committee section, where we can discuss many of the issues I've put out.

J. Doyle: I am pleased to rise and speak in support of Bill 22, the Farm Practices Protection Act, otherwise known as the right-to-farm act. This bill is solid evidence that the government supports farming and farmers. It is an important part of the growth strategies and land use planning initiatives that reflect the need to protect the economic sustainability of agriculture as well as resource sustainability.

I was raised on a small farm back in Ireland, and I have very good memories of working hard on that farm. I'm still

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doing that when I sometimes go back on holidays to visit my family. One of the most important things I can remember while growing up on the farm was that you never made noise as a child when the weather was on because, in a farmer's heart, as we know, that is one of the most important things you can do on any given day -- listening to the weather plays a most important

part in that.

One of the things I can remember, back 20 years ago, is when Dave Barrett initiated the ALR. Without a doubt, that was one of the most important pieces of legislation that the government brought forth. That legislation, by and large, survived the Bill Bennett and Bill Vander Zalm governments, with some changes. It is important for us as a province to grow or raise as much food as possible in our country.

Speaking of items in this bill, there may be some concern for local government about part of this legislation, particularly relating to bylaw approval. An intensive consultation process with key local governments has shown positive support, however, even with the clearly stated intention to require approval of bylaws. That process was the meetings the minister and his staff held with UBCM and with regional and local governments at all levels. This bill came out of those consultations that were conducted by the minister on the need for an agrifood policy for British Columbia.

The need to work with local government to further improve relationships between farmers and non-farm neighbours was identified as an issue requiring immediate attention.

Increased urbanization of farming areas is a major factor. The two triangular areas bounded by Osoyoos, Sicamous and Kamloops, and Hope, Parksville and Victoria, contain 77 percent of the gross farm receipts in British Columbia and 77 percent of the provincial population, but only 2.7 percent of the provincial land base. The most populated region, the Greater Vancouver Regional District, produces 27 percent of the value of B.C.'s farm production.

While several provinces have right-to-farm legislation, this bill is the only one to link the right-to-farm concept with the bylaw powers of local government. I spent some years in local government, and I feel the process that the minister has been through will have been most important when we get this legislation into law. This legislation demonstrates both the provincial commitment to the farm sector and a practical partnership among the province, local government and B.C. farmers.

The ministry will support those goals by developing public education campaigns through existing programs to increase the awareness of the importance of agriculture to our daily lives, encouraging industry to develop farm practice guidelines and then supporting their broad acceptance, providing information to land developers and real estate agents that informs buyers that farms are close to their neighbourhood, and will work with other agencies to ensure that the needs of the farm sector are recognized.

B.C.'s agriculture, fisheries and food sectors contribute $14 billion to our economy each year and employ 214,000 people in farming, fishing, food processing, food service, retail, transportation, wholesale and support services. Six thousand new jobs have been created since 1993 in the ag-fish food sector. At the primary level the agriculture sector employs 30,000 British Columbians.

The legislation that was introduced and became law 20 years ago, the ALR, has proved to be, through the last 20 years of government, something that was done for the right reasons. I am pleased to say that since we came back into government, we have taken away the right of the minister to hear appeals as far as land being removed is concerned. That is now done by the Agricultural Land Commission, and rightly so. We have also taken away the right to put golf courses on ALR land -- which was allowed -- where cows will never graze again. That has now been removed and is not allowed in ALR areas.

I am somewhat concerned that someone like the Leader of the Official Opposition, with his development ties -- development at any price -- would see a detriment in this law for the importance of the agriculture industry in our province.

[3:00]

There are thriving cattle-ranching industries in many areas of my riding, particularly in the Columbia Valley. Those people support the ALR. When I meet with them, they say to me how important they feel that legislation was. All they want is to put in place the right to farm on their ALR land. This legislation that is now going through the House is something that I know they will support. They've asked for some additional support for farming in our province.

No matter where one lives in our province or in our country, the food that we eat at our meals, which was mentioned earlier in the morning by the member for Nelson-Creston, does not just arrive in the grocery store. It's most important that as much as possible of that food is grown and raised right here in our province. That way we are masters in our own house as much as possible. I support this bill in second reading; I'm pleased to speak in support of this bill.

C. Serwa: It's a real pleasure to speak on this particular bill, Bill 22. It's also interesting to note all of the people who have spoken on the government side and on the opposition side who don't know anything about farming. When you listen to them, it's very clear that they are all venturing opinions -- I suppose the government side was written by Karl Struble, because there is a common theme running through everything; I don't know where the opposition parties are coming from -- on the right to farm. I find it interesting; I also find it humorous.

Voting against this bill, by the way, is like voting against motherhood and apple pie. The bill is not necessary, and there are reasons for it. I don't think that anybody who has spoken -- outside of the Minister of Agriculture -- understands why this bill is unnecessary. They've waxed loud and eloquent about the need and that finally this historical injustice has been attended to: the right of farmers to farm and to carry on with standards and practices. This big, long-nosed government has finally intruded into another field. Well, you're not new entrants into that field.

You haven't broken any new ice; there is already a bill in the British Columbia statutes that says this. Not one of you donkeys knows that; not one of you people who spoke on that is aware there is a bill already in the statutes. All this is is a cheap, partisan political ploy to win some temporary credibility with respect to the electorate. There is not a thing that has been mentioned here in the second reading discussion today that cannot be attended to by regulation in the existing bill. And what is the existing bill called? It's called the Agriculture Protection Act. When was this bill assented to?

June 28, 1989. It's already there, folks; we don't need to waste the taxpayers' time with this particular debate in trying to look good, because it all could have been

[ Page 14669 ]

attended to. The nuisance concerns and the regulations are all there; the right of the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council to make regulations is all there. It was not necessary. Any minor detail could have been attended by a simple amendment. But no, the government wanted to grandstand and make it appear that they are new entrants -- as many have been led to believe, succumbing to the words of the minister.

Interjection.

C. Serwa: We already brought a bill in, hon. member. This is just a shallow election ploy by a government desperate to successfully win re-election at any cost.

[G. Brewin in the chair.]

When I listen to the members, they're talking as if this is the be-all and end-all in agriculture. The government members have stood up, long and loud, and said: "We support agriculture. We're going to give farmers the right to farm."

Interjections.

C. Serwa: Oh, that's great. Thump your desks, hon. members. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. The first thing you did was withdraw from all the support programs. When the grain farmers up in the north, the Peace River area, were suffering from a drought and no crops, what happened? What did this government do? It turned away from them. What did the government do to the orchardists in the Okanagan? They have withdrawn all the support programs. "We stand for farming" -- baloney! Anybody who believes that has to be a card-carrying member.

Interjections.

C. Serwa: You haven't stood for anything, hon. members; you stand for absolutely nothing. Furthermore, you talk about economic viability. Economic viability is a necessity; it's the only ingredient that can ensure farming in British Columbia. No voice on that. They get up on their self-righteous high horse and say: "We've taken away the right of appeal to the minister's office." Perhaps the minister is lacking in discretion, or is perhaps not honourable enough to have appeals come to an elected member. All people believe that they should be able to appeal to elected members. If that's accountability, we don't have accountability today. Nevertheless, in the....

Interjections.

C. Serwa: We're going to get to this.

Not only did they lack any concern about economic viability, what did they do when they became government? They reduced the Ministry of Agriculture estimates. They cut down on the funding to enable and enhance the opportunities for the economic viability of those connected with agriculture. Some commitment! I say that's absolutely no commitment.

What did they do further? Well, they needed more tax revenue, so they changed the farmers' tax revenue in order to.... The first year they made a payment to the horticulturists in the Okanagan Valley. But do you know what they did then, hon. Speaker? They raised the land taxes by 6 percent, and they added another 6 percent of education taxes onto the agricultural community. "Economic viability. Caring for agriculture. A very necessary thing." Sure, it's fine for you who have nothing whatsoever to do with agriculture to justify your existence on the backs of those people.

In British Columbia we spend the lowest percentage -- and in Canada -- of our disposable income on food; the lowest of any industrial state anywhere in the world. That's some commitment. What we have here is a government that says: "Yes, we're going to protect your right to farm. " That's fine; I agree with that, because we've already passed legislation; it's already a statute in the province of British Columbia. But there is no concern from the minister, from that government and apparently not from the opposition, because economic viability has not been mentioned here today.

Economic viability, folks, is what it's all about. I don't care what you do with the agricultural land reserve; I don't care what you do with this particular piece of legislation. But I do care about sustaining farmers and farms. The only way you'll do that is with economic viability, and everybody stays away from that -- yes, indeed. So economic viability is the really important thing.

The Minister of Agriculture said that the B.C. Marketing Board is the appropriate group to adjudicate whatever the standards are to be in farm practices. But who makes up the B.C. Marketing Board? You know who, hon. Speaker? The commodity supply-controlled market organizations in the province are the B.C. Marketing Board. They're viable because of a certain facility they have, but they don't represent agriculture in the province.

They don't represent agriculture throughout the province of British Columbia; they represent intensive-farming agriculture, which is carried on predominantly in the lower Fraser Valley in the lower mainland. They have no conception of the challenges for farmers in a variety of areas throughout the province, which are not in that very neat, nice little, cosy, comfortable corner where prices are guaranteed.

They can go to a bank with 20 years' projections -- as they do in the dairy business -- and know that they're protected against inflation and that they will have an appropriate rate of return in order to pay off their debts and liabilities.

Why didn't the minister go to the B.C. Federation of Agriculture, which represents all British Columbians who are engaged in agriculture and a wide variety of perspectives in that organization? Why not a group representing all farming interests in the province? There is a great deal of concern about that particular area.

The minister knows full well that in the development of the types of standards that he is talking about, there are a variety of levels of agricultural management. Some of them are dictated by the type of economic return that the farmer can get. As you drive through the Okanagan, you can tell the types of pressures that are on orchards, because the heavy pruning is not being done and so we're not getting the colour and the quality in particular apples. It's sort of a law of diminishing returns: the most economically viable operation is the one that is putting in the least type of output and endeavouring to maximize profitability. That's the tragedy of the lack of economic viability.

The government fails to understand that the taxation load and the red-tape regulation load imposed on agriculture are making them non-competitive. If you look at other jurisdictions, they have a tremendous advantage over our people engaged in the agricultural pursuit. First of all, generally you

[ Page 14670 ]

have lower wage costs. You have lower input energy costs. In the Okanagan you have lower spray costs just across the line. Water taxes are somewhere around $8 to $10 per acre per year in the Columbia River Basin, and some of our growers are paying $60 to $70 per acre for water taxes in the Okanagan. All of these things add up.

The other thing is that our farmers are paying in a highly inflated local market, because they have to compete and get their input from a highly inflated local supply -- whether it's their accountants or other professionals like lawyers or other individuals whom they have to hire and pay for. We tell them to sell their products at a world market price. You can't sharpen your pencil sharp enough to make it work. It just doesn't work out; it can't happen. So all this is sort of window-dressing on the real ills in the agriculture industry.

A number of government members have stood up and talked about the agricultural land reserve, and they're very proud of the visionary move that they made. Well, I say this, hon. Speaker: it is the greatest single theft that any duly elected, democratic government ever bestowed or impacted on a population that elected them.

Interjection.

C. Serwa: Yes, it is, and I'm going to tell you why. The member for Delta South or Delta North doesn't understand why. I'm thankful for the opportunity to explain that.

First of all, it has done a tremendous disservice to the farmer. The only bargaining chip the farmers had to get adequate prices for the commodity they provided for the population of British Columbia or for export was very small. But it was a lever that they had, and it was the development rights to property under British common-law property rights. Property rights are not something the socialists talk about, because it's not something they agree with, and that's why they're fast and loose with that. It was one of the only levers they had on government and society so that they could maintain economic viability.

Right now they have no bargaining position. They can't do anything with it, and the government knows that. They have unilaterally taken away all support services and prices from agriculture, knowing full well that the people are trapped. They can't do anything else, because they're trapped on agricultural land. They can't get prices, because the loyalty of the consumer.... As I said, the lowest-cost item we have here is food. They can't get the prices, so they can't sustain any quality of life.

It's all right for you fat cats on the government side to stand up long and loud on agriculture. Except for the minister, not one of you has any great familiarity with agriculture, and that's the reality. The minister is in the cattle business, and that's fine. For the last ten years we have had good, positive returns in the cattle business, which is most unusual. Usually there's a boom and bust, and the bust occurs about every eight to ten years in the cattle business. But because of the relative difference in the American currency, the cattle market has been very strong.

But I'd suggest there's going to be a turnaround in the not too distant future. The cattle ranchers depend on ag leases and they depend on Crown range. By the time this government gets through with the negotiations in the aboriginal land claims they're not going to be able to rely on that resource much longer, so that's going to be very interesting. The minister is perspiring a little bit, recognizing that that's a sign of the future.

[3:15]

So you were not kind to the people engaged in agriculture, because what would retain land.... It has been said many times here today that the people engaged in agriculture like what they do. They're happy with what they do and they're good at what they do, but economic viability is the key component. As long as they can maintain and raise a family, comparable to the same economy that the rest of us live in in this dynamic and beautiful province, they will retain agriculture. Mandating something is not the appropriate way to go.

You can get them to do what you want by twisting their arms, but when you let it go they're going to do what they want, and this government has to learn that. So I wouldn't be proud of the agricultural land reserve, because that's a despicable way to provide leadership.

What has it done to the residential community? Earlier we heard the Minister of Housing talk about affordable housing and how this government cares about the people who need housing, especially those in need with respect to affordable housing, etc. -- and it went on and on. This government froze the supply of affordable housing land. From land prices that were $1,000, $1,500, maybe $2,500 a lot prior to the agricultural land freeze.... For $2,500 a lot there was a developer in my constituency who, for an extra dollar, would give you another lot free. For that price....

We're talking $60,000, $70,000, $80,000 or $100,000 for a building lot. How are young people going to build their dreams? How are they going to aspire to home-ownership? And you know what did it? The agricultural land freeze.

What did it do to communities? In my community of Kelowna, more than 50 percent of the land is agricultural reserve land -- right in the city of Kelowna. No big problem; nice green space; wonderful. So we've got a series of problems. We have agriculture-rural conflict, and we have the demands placed on a city for the hopscotch or leapfrog type of development. You can't develop one block or carry on your civic planning so that the city expands uniformly with a minimal cost to the service extensions. We haven't done anything for residential home-ownership; we haven't done anything for municipalities; we haven't done anything for farmers.

What about the environment? Ah yes, the government cares a great deal about the environment, and the environmental activists have a great deal of input in government. What did we do with the agricultural land reserve with respect to the environment? As we all know, the greatest environmental threat in British Columbia is deforestation; you don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand that. Here's what the agricultural land reserve did. Yes, we're protecting land, providing food and land resources -- which we don't need because of technology, and I'll get into that. So what did we do?

In my constituency we're forcing people to live higher and higher in the hills, up in the mountains. "It's no big problem; it's not agricultural land." They clear the land -- deforestation -- and: "It's no big problem; we're not worried about that."

But I'm concerned about it. Because what is the effect on the ungulates? British Columbia -- certainly the interior plateau -- has much high-level land: somewhere around 4,500-6,000 feet. There is lots of summer range for ungulates, but we don't have a great deal of winter range. The minister knows what winter range is all about; other British

Colum-

[ Page 14671 ]

bians should as well. We have limited valleys in our area that will provide winter feed for the ungulates -- for the game, for the environment.

Does anybody care? No, they don't care. We think we're doing the right thing. The people on main street in downtown Vancouver can impose their will on the people throughout British Columbia. But I'm telling you that if anyone is concerned about the environment, the agricultural land reserve certainly hasn't done a doggone thing to enhance the environment. I think that that whole effort to feel proud about something like that is very wrong indeed.

The right to farm has to have embodied in it the right to make a living.

Interjection.

C. Serwa: Yes, I think that if we cancelled it, it would be the best possible thing to happen for agriculture in the province of British Columbia. But, you know, the interesting thing is that there was talk.... Actually, the member for Delta South or Delta North.... I can't tell them apart; their politics are about the same -- one's a socialist on that side and one is a near-socialist on this side. But the near-socialist on the official opposition said something about setting up.... Rather than the B.C.

Marketing Board, which is at least representative of individuals who are involved in agriculture, he said that we should have a setting up of standards and that we should have representatives from the Agricultural Land Commission, we should have representatives from all levels of government, setting standards. He misses the point entirely. The point of setting up acceptable standards or standard practices, with normal latitude, has to be that they are based on experience, knowledge and background in the industry -- not academic interest or opinions voiced, or influenced in that manner.

That shows you the type of debate and dialogue that goes on in a bill like this. It really doesn't make much rational sense, and it shouldn't count for very much, considering the source of the input.

This particular bill, with the philosophy and principles, is a good bill. It is not necessary, because it is already a statute in the statutes of British Columbia. As said at the onset, it was merely a political ploy to make the government look good and to say: "We're really doing something for agriculture."

I've said everything that I could possibly say about this government doing everything in opposition to their word. The way the public out there is going to have to measure you guys is to determine the difference between your words and your deeds. It's as simple as that. Everybody has to be accountable for their deeds. They should be accountable for their words, but because there is an abundant supply of words, they come very, very cheaply. It is deeds that measure the mark of an individual, and it is deeds that measure the mark of a government. This government has not exhibited any commitment whatsoever to agriculture -- not the slightest bit over their history.

So when we talk about the philosophy and principles of this particular bill, I think that, as I said earlier, it's like motherhood and apple pie: they're fine, but they're not the be-all and end-all.

If this government is committed, they will do something about economic viability. They are not recognizing a reality in the details in this bill. The reality is that when we talk about different management levels -- and I'll talk about horticulture, because I'm more familiar with the Okanagan -- we have a series of problems with the urban-rural conflict and the utilization of unfenced orchards, vineyards, etc., by the resident local population, who are building on non-agricultural land immediately adjacent to agricultural land. It's not the minister's problem, but it's a real problem for those who are caught in it.

We have noxious weeds, and we have controls to a degree. Nevertheless, there's a much higher cost for those engaged in the agriculture industry with weed control, for example, because adjacent fields are not looked after or, as non-agricultural lands, are being held awaiting development. Whether it's knapweed, dandelions or anything else like that, the farmer is again victimized by having to look after it.

Throughout the Okanagan, from north to south, we obviously have a lot of home orchards with maybe one tree or maybe half a dozen trees in the various orchards. Yes, Social Credit brought in the coddling moth program, and we've brought in the concept of integrated pest management to reduce the need for pesticides. The reality is that unless you have all the trees removed from areas that are not commercially run, you're fraught with problems again, and it's another cause for a high additional cost. Sprays are very expensive in British Columbia compared to across the line.

It's another economic challenge for the economic viability of horticulturists, because while they may do everything possible in their orchard, the residential orchards have a great and negative impact, especially in close proximity to commercial orchards.

The potential of this legislation to turn around and bite people in the agricultural community is also there as well, depending on how the regulations are made up and where they're made up. The ability to apply them evenly throughout the province is of significant concern. When I mentioned the home orchards and the spraying, there's no protection there, so that the only time you can spray is perhaps when there is no wind drift. If a neighbour complains or refuses to give you permission to spray your trees, that's it. Otherwise, you're open for a lawsuit. There is no type of control there.

I'm speaking about a part of the industry that is very important to the Okanagan, but some of the realities will confront this particular legislation.

In drafting up standards, the concern is that with latitude in agricultural practices and with the economics of agriculture, the standards that are drawn up may not be able to be adhered to in economic downturn years in the agricultural community. While there are concerns, and I applaud the intent of the legislation, I have real and valid concerns with respect to the turning around and biting of those individuals that this legislation is designed to protect.

Everything was contained in the previous legislation that allowed latitude for this particular bill. The objectives are good, but the approach is very bureaucratic, and there are questions in my mind as to the British Columbia Marketing Board being the appropriate agency and not the B.C. Federation of Agriculture. One cannot help but support this legislation in principle and philosophy, and I will do that, but I will certainly ask many questions at the stage of Committee of the Whole.

[ Page 14672 ]

K. Jones: This bill is much needed. Bill 22, the Farm Practices Protection (Right to Farm) Act is definitely needed, and many of my constituents have been asking for this type of legislation for quite some time. It meets some of their needs.

There are still other areas that need to be addressed to make farming viable. There are areas that need to be addressed in dealing with the Ministry of Health, particularly with regard to septic field approvals, which they go through constant runarounds over. They're literally prevented from doing simple drainage fields on their property where they have large acreages, because they don't meet the same rules that would be required for a major urban development facility. That has to be addressed. I urge the minister to seriously look into this problem, where the Health ministry continues to harass people in the farm areas.

There are areas of the urban uplands drainage that have been a constant problem to many of our farm people, certainly in my riding where the people are living in the upper areas above the valley. The farmers are working in the valleys. The farmers are facing the continually increasing flow of water off the hills down through the various tributaries, creeks and streams into the main waterways, which then have had to be diked to keep the fields from flooding; they continually have to rebuild the dikes and upgrade the drainage systems off their fields, which are getting saturated from uplands water drainage.

This matter of diking also causes a problem for them in that the public likes to use the dikes. Unfortunately, sometimes the public isn't very cognizant of the impact of their presence or their garbage's presence along the fields, whether it's cans discarded into a field that cattle feed on, and they end up causing serious damage to them, or it's something caught up into a farm implement that causes damage there. It's just the general interfacing we have between the farming community and the urban community. There can't be any greater example of this problem than that which occurs right in the Surrey area. Certainly we have it very, very close. And we have many problems that come with it.

[3:30]

I really strongly support this bill in its present form. There is some need to make some modifications to it, because some of the areas still are not addressed.

One of the areas not addressed very well is the area of aerial spraying and how we protect against the overspray problems -- the effects we've had in the past where young people going to school were oversprayed by an errant wind or an errant aerial spray company, which then ended up bringing serious concern to the parents and possibly seriously injuring the young people as they were going to school, walking along a public road adjoining the farm fields. This is something we have to address.

We have to make sure we have that cooperation between our farm community and our urban community to protect both interests. A balanced piece of legislation is very essential in this relationship. It's not a we-or-they situation. We cannot continue to think that a right to do something is a right for only one party or one interest. That right has to be balanced with the rights of the other people, and their needs are to be also included with that.

It's essential when we bring this kind of legislation in that we have a very simple, very inexpensive mediation process set in place that will allow these types of disputes -- which will come; there's no question about that. No piece of legislation can prevent some disputes from occurring when you bring two different interests close together. Therefore we need to have a very simple, inexpensive process for getting these resolved, and I hope that I have confidence that the proposals here may do that. I would like to put them to a further test and see whether they can actually function without becoming cumbersome.

I think the intention of the ministry in bringing forward this process is that there be that form of bringing mediation to the dispute area. That is something that we certainly have to look at very closely. We'll go into further detail in the next reading of this bill.

We have to recognize that by having a bill that says "right to farm," it doesn't mean that people can put a whole barrage of bird cannons along the property line adjoining the subdivision next door and say they now have a law that says they have the right to do that. That would only bring a very negative response. We need to learn to work together, using tolerance and understanding on both sides of that fence, and hopefully we can work as friends from the urban area and from the farm area.

I have had many talks with members of our farm community, and I find them to be very open and wanting to work out the problem issues that people have. People in the urban areas have also expressed their willingness to work out a satisfactory relationship, one with the other.

There is one area that I'd like to go into a little more deeply. It's one that has caused a considerable concern within our area, specifically in the Cloverdale and Langley areas, and that's related to the Fraser Valley Mushroom Growers' composting plant located at 4369 - 190th Street. This plant goes back prior to 1971. There was a Supreme Court trial at that time in which the Mushroom Growers' Co-op -- which was promoting this and which still owns this through succeeding companies -- stated that they would be neither a nuisance nor an inconvenience to the area residents in conducting their composting operation.

I am reading from a letter from one of my constituents, Mr. Frezell, who wrote this letter to the Minister of Environment last year. In this letter he noted that:

"To date, well over 100 complaints regarding air pollution, illegal pumping of water from a salmon spawning stream, discharge of effluent into salmon spawning streams, failure to contain manure effluent from waterways, contamination of a residential well by neglecting to contain manure runoff, numerous complaints of noise, odour, excessive speed by dumpster-size and larger trucks serving the plant...."

All of these are their concerns and of the neighbours in that area.

"In 1990" -- and I want you to note this, hon. minister -- "after Boundary health hearings regarding this question of health and nuisance problems, which was demanded by the community, in the middle of these hearings the provincial government at that time changed the Health Act and stopped the hearings by changing the

interpretation of how this type of nuisance or health condition could be dealt with.

I have discussed this with you prior to this session, and I hope that your assurances will follow through that this legislation will not act to prevent this type of an operation from being brought up to the standards that we accept today, which means that they would not be allowed to continue to create a hazardous pollution to the atmosphere over a very, very large area of our community -- many miles are affected.

[ Page 14673 ]

I'd like to just give you a follow-up on this same letter.

"As you can see, Mr. Sihota, nothing but frustration over no solid improvement to the Fraser Valley Mushroom Growers' situation in over 20 years. Area residents are becoming extremely aware of a possible breach of the public trust in the apparent reluctance of government to properly intervene and cause a cessation of this rampant polluter. This operation is not -- I repeat, is not -- a farm. All manure is trucked to the site. It is then composted, creating a putrid fog and then is trucked away. The plant is an industry only.

They grow nothing but pollution and have not made any effort, with constant neighbourhood complaint, to clean up their act in over 20 years. I ask you, as a British Columbian, to intercede on our behalf to make FVMG comply with all haste to the industrial waste policy and rescind their falsely attributed farm classification."

Other constituents who live in the same area, Mr. and Mrs. Bladt, write in a letter to the same minister:

"How does it smell? This is the common greeting among the immediate neighbours living close to Money's Mushrooms composting plant on 190th Street. For over 22 years, they've been allowed to pollute our air to the worst degree without any restrictions nor concern for the environment and population around them. The unbearable stench that is emitted 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, is irritating citizens in a minimum 15-block radius around their factory. The emissions are so powerful and unbearable that children often do not play outside.

During all of our beautiful summer, we attempted to eat outside five times, and each time we had to retreat inside in order to complete our meals. We were too embarrassed to invite any friends for a barbecue. Windows cannot be opened for days or weeks. The pungent odour stays in our home, closets, crawl space, barn and cars. For example, being away over Thanksgiving in Penticton, we were surprised that the car kept smelling of Money's odour. The smell is so penetrating and influential that it comes back into our nose without even being close to Money's plant.

With over 16,000 tons of compost being fabricated at the plant, I can see how great the environmental impact is on our two fish creeks -- Armstrong and Ross -- our groundwater and health. Hundreds of citizens, including children, are severely affected by Money's pollution on a daily basis. The quality of our spare time, outdoors or indoors, is destroyed. Every citizen has the right to a healthy, relaxing and enjoyable spare time."

Once again, they appeal to the minister, and hopefully there will be some response to this in the near future. This was, again, a letter that was written last fall.

These are only a few of the people who have written. They have demonstrated and tried to draw attention to something that may be permitted once again, as was done by the previous government in blocking their attempts to have a rectification of this problem. With the way this bill is worded, it may be interpreted such that it causes the attempts of the GVRD's air pollution control group to bring some change to that situation to be blocked once again.

Hon. minister, I ask and urge you to make sure that this legislation does not give them an out from doing what is necessary to correct the problems, which are a constant, living nightmare for people, covering anywhere from 176th and further west to well into Langley. I've had letters from even the industrial areas of Langley that said: "If we had known that this was here, we would never have established our plant anywhere within this range." We have people constantly bringing that concern. I would urge the minister to find a way to confirm that this legislation will not allow this attempt to improve this situation to be cast aside again, destroying the hopes of all these people.

A. Warnke: I just want to make a quick comment. The way the bill is entitled.... If it were just simply entitled Farm Practices Protection Act, then as I go through the bill I would think that it's worthwhile and certainly supportable. This is the reason that a number of members have actually spoken to the bill and offered their support for it.

On closer examination, I have a few problems with the parentheses that appear in the title of the bill: Farm Practices Protection (Right to Farm) Act. The reason I have a few problems with that is that the concept of the right to farm seems to project here, once and for all, that we have

an act that is really going to address some of the fundamental problems facing farmers. Whether it's in Ontario or Alberta or British Columbia.... Obviously there are other provinces -- New Brunswick, Saskatchewan, Manitoba -- that have farming and all the rest of it.

[3:45]

The whole farming industry throughout the world is rapidly going through some sort of transformation. One only has to take a look at a couple of areas in the world. In the European community there has been a significant transformation of the agriculture industry. In the United States and Mexico.... We are part of the NAFTA treaty. We are part of something that's rapidly transforming itself and therefore putting on extra, tremendous pressure in addition to what the farming community has been exposed to for the last 20 years. So we're putting extra pressure on the farming community.

It is in that kind of background where the farming community.... Whether it's in Ontario, New Brunswick, Alberta or British Columbia, a number of problems have come to the attention of all people as to the future of the farming industry. We have observed that farmers have been putting forth the idea that they need something that protects the farming industry, especially the family farm.

What I see in the parentheses, which I take it will be the short form, is going out to the British Columbia public and saying: "This is the reason that we have a right-to-farm act." Something pops up involving the agricultural community or the aquaculture community. Some people on that side of the House.... I suppose all members, if they lend their support to this bill, are welcome to use this phrase. The phrase could often be used in public: "Well, this is the reason that we put forward a right-to-farm act; this is the reason that we've got a right-to-farm act."

Hon. Speaker, the problem is twofold. First, right-to-farm legislation, as it appears in the title, raises some kind of expectation among the agricultural community that finally something is being done. Secondly, it offers, I suppose, to politicians, a chance to say, "Well, we've tried to address the problems of the farming community through a right-to-farm act," when in fact on closer examination, what is contained in this bill? Well, what's contained in this bill on closer examination is something pretty straightforward. It conforms to what I see would be the proper title: Farm Practices Protection Act.

[ Page 14674 ]

That is, the one part dealing with the right to farm, which basically.... What's in it? It's not a comprehensive part at all. The so-called right-to-farm part just simply says that the farmers have some freedom from those who claim that they don't like your odour, they don't like the dust, they don't like some of the noise that farm machinery projects and all that sort of stuff. Well, there could be such chronic and nuisance botherations by people who do not like the farming community or what's being done next door to them. So there is a freedom from that.

Another aspect of the so-called right-to-farm

part is that you're allowed to conduct normal farm practices on farmland -- farmland being defined in the bill here. Then there is the establishment of yet another appointed board, the Farm Practices Board, which could hear, I suppose, applications and go through appeals and that sort of thing. And that's basically it under this particular part of the so-called right-to-farm act. That's good, and every member so far, from what I've heard, has got up and supported that. I don't have a problem with supporting that, unless there's something hidden that I wasn't aware of.

Our Agricultural Critic, the hon. member for Abbotsford, has got up and said basically that the farming community doesn't have a problem with that. For that matter, I suspect the public doesn't have a problem with it, either. So it's acceptable.

But what still bothers me is that the

part certainly could have been entitled something else -- "Practices of Normal Farms," call it that or whatever. What I'm a little bit concerned about is that the title of the part says "right to farm." "Right to farm" appears in the title, and it suggests something: that finally we're making a big breakthrough and that, really, we're protecting the farmers from those problems that have faced them for the last 20 years.

Again, if we stick to the principle of farm practices protection -- and that's the title of the bill -- then I would say yes, this is a pretty straightforward bill. Obviously, members support it. Obviously, I don't have a problem with it. But if the purpose is to provide substantial help to the agricultural community and to farmers, then I suggest there's really not much here at all, other than those very basic, simple things to help....

It's almost minor in some ways, other than to suggest that farmers should be free from being pestered by their neighbours -- that they're creating an odour or dust or too much noise in the community. I can appreciate farmers needing some protection from that, but in terms of real substantive help I just don't see it.

So I don't have any problem supporting the bill, but I do fear its intent -- that if we pass the bill, then the minister and the government are in a situation to say, "Well, we've passed the right-to-farm bill; now the farmers have the right to farm," and in fact it doesn't mean that at all. Those are just a few comments. Perhaps at some later date, maybe if there is another bill introduced into the House where we can get substantively into the linkages between the right to farm, in forms of legislation, and agricultural trade policies and that sort of thing, if we have that opportunity, I would like to speak to it again.

One final note: if the intent is to raise some sort of an awareness of the British Columbia community at large and I suppose conduct what we would call the politics of exhortation -- that we should maybe look at how we can enhance the farming community -- on that note it would have my enthusiastic support. Anyone who engages in the politics of exhortation to emphasize the problems facing the farming community certainly would have my support.

G. Wilson: I rise today with respect to Bill 22 and seek not only to put forward the position of the Progressive Democratic Alliance with respect to this bill, the Farm Practices Protection Act, or the right-to-farm act as it's being called, but also hopefully to broaden in a philosophical way the discussion around the whole notion of agriculture in British Columbia and where it fits in terms of its role in a larger context in North America and globally.

I realize that this bill is technical in nature, in the sense that it is attempting to put together an opportunity for farmers to practise their craft in a somewhat unmolested way as there is encroachment of residential and sometimes commercial or even industrial activities on what was traditionally farmland.

I should say, in terms of pedigree for this discussion, that I've spent a fair number of years involved in the hog industry and hog farming. I've certainly practised, in terms of small-scale agriculture at least, the issue of farming in an area that conventionally or traditionally would not be seen as an agricultural community. So I do know the problems that some farmers face regarding the concerns that people in the community may have for odour, for the trucking of livestock and often for aspects of farming activity that they may feel is less than desirable in a residential area.

I have followed this debate with some interest. I have heard the stories told by a number of MLAs with respect to what has been going on in their own communities in terms of the impact that farmers have had -- notably the member for Okanagan-Penticton, who talked about issues in his riding, and also the member for Delta North, who talked about matters in relation to the adjoining communities in Delta South. I have heard members of the official opposition in terms of their general support of this bill.

In all of it, I think, with the possible exception of the member for Okanagan West, who was the first member to really start talking about the economics of agriculture.... He takes a somewhat different perspective on the matter of the agricultural land reserve than I do. The Progressive Democratic Alliance believes that we should protect the agricultural land reserve. We'd like to do it in a different way; we'd like to establish an agricultural land bank to provide an opportunity for farmers to cash out in their later years so they can realize something from what they have done in terms of their industry.

[D. Lovick in the chair.]

[ Page 14675 ]

I think that one of the things we clearly need to find in this bill is the notion of how important agriculture is. In British Columbia we tend to take a lot of things for granted. I think that globally, populations -- certainly those in the developed world, and even those in the developing world that are more fortunate and are in the upper levels of their own income-earning powers -- tend to take for granted the fact that we have food and that we always will have food.

I think that is something we perhaps shouldn't do, because since 1986, world food reserves topped at 459 metric tons -- enough for, essentially, world consumption of about 101 days. It's sad to say that today, if we were to look at the diminishment of those estimated food reserves, we are down to less than 20 days. We forget how important agricultural land and the protection of the agricultural industry is in terms of the survival of human populations.

I want to put in context what we're attempting to do here by recognizing that those of us who enjoy the wealth and bounty of this province must be cognizant as we do so of the billion people in this world who live in absolute, abject poverty; of the 1.5 billion people who have absolutely no access to health care of any description whatsoever; of the 1.7 billion people who have no access to safe, consumable water and can't drink their water; and of the fact that one in three children in our world today is seriously malnourished.

These are facts of life in 1995, and while they're not apparent in this beautiful province, we as part of this global community have to recognize that we must have a role to play. One of the ways we have a role is to protect in our own lands the capacity and ability for us to provide food for ourselves in a self-sufficient way so that through surplus generation and production elsewhere, we can allow that food to find its way to those people who need it.

I heard, I think, the member for Delta South talking about the greenhouse industry. He talked about peppers and various other cash crops that are important in our economy. But clearly, we have to recognize that we need to get serious about the preservation and protection of agriculture -- not just as an industry, but also as an essential part of the survival of our human civilizations -- in order to adequately feed a growing global population which has passed the six-billion mark and will, within a generation, be approaching roughly 12 billion people.

As unthinkable as that is, even the most optimistic world population projections tell us that we're going to be looking at ten billion people by the year 2030. That's the most optimistic: ten billion people, all who have rising expectations for consumption of our resources; all who have a thirst, as we do, for clean, potable water; all who have a demand for food on a daily basis so that nutrition can be maintained and their lives can be kept in a manner that will support them in a reasonably healthy way.

[4:00]

We have to recognize that if we do not take steps today to protect the agricultural base and our ability to produce and to feed those of us today, we will in no way be even close to being able to meet the demand we might find 20 or 30 years down the road. And 30 years down the road isn't a long time. I'd certainly like to think that I will still be around as much as 30 years down the road. I'll only be 75 or 76 years old, and I'd like to be able to be consuming....

Interjection.

G. Wilson: What's that? And perhaps the embellishment of our age.... But nevertheless, I'd like to be around.

If we look at the number of people who are going to be there, we have to understand that the consumption of those populations, in terms of human consumption of food, is going to be absolute. This is not a projection or a theory. We must also know that one-third of the world's people today -- a full one-third of the people who populate the globe in 1995, at the end of May -- are under the age of 25. One-third of them are in their prime years of reproduction. This is not a mythical population. This is a population I like to call the "R" generation -- the generation of reproduction.

Those people are now actively involving themselves in their life force, which is going to regenerate, to double and to increase the demand on our agricultural land.

When I see a bill that comes in that says, "Farm Practices Protection Act," I'm pleased that we have at least started to address the critical and most urgent need we have in the province, and that is to take agriculture seriously as an essential component of a healthy community and a healthy society.

The member for Okanagan West was correct when in 1989 he said that the Agriculture Protection Act, 1989, brought in by the former Social Credit government, is already on the statutes. The question, therefore, is: what's the need? Why do we need to have this Farm Practices Protection Act, the so-called right-to-farm act?

Having put it in context in a global sense, let me try now to focus in on the local sense. I believe this will be a very controversial bill when it hits the public. It hasn't seen a lot of controversy here, because the elected members of this Legislative Assembly have been provided the opportunity to stand up and say to all the world how much they support farmers. They want farmers, because after all, let's be clear, all of us have farmers as constituents, and all of us would like to have the support of farmers as we march toward the next election.

Lest everybody think I'm too cynical on this, let me say that I think that this is in fact part of what we're doing here today. Long overdue as it may be, we are now trying to move at least one step in the direction of providing some protection for people who have their investment in the farm communities.

This will be a controversial bill, and it is going to cause some serious concerns in our communities. I anticipate that it will cause serious concerns because of the nature of two clauses in this bill. The first one is in the

definitions section, saying that a farm operation will also include "applying fertilizers, manure, pesticides and biological control agents, including ground and aerial spraying." That is clearly going to cause some concern. Notwithstanding the fact that many farmers adhere to the application of chemicals, and notwithstanding the fact that chemicals have become a functional part of farming, I happen to believe that we should start to move away from chemical farming. I think there are better ways for us to address those concerns without the use of widespread pesticide application, especially aerial application.

Let me say that the process that's been set up to regulate concerns around the use of pesticides has been set up by the Farm Practices Board. Where the controversy is going to come in is with another act, which is called the Pesticide Control Act, where there is an established board that has to make regulations and has to provide a licence for the application of pesticides.

I have in my office a number of examples where people have applied to try to put a prohibition on the application of

[ Page 14676 ]

chemicals in areas that have become residential. The areas were mostly farmland but are now residential, and people are concerned about aerial spray drifting onto schools. There is concern about contamination of well water in areas where application of pesticides is made above the drainage systems, so that it drains down into aquifers that are then pumped back up for domestic consumption of water. The board that regulates the Pesticide Control Act has taken a very pro-industry stand.

They have said that this is necessary for the economic well-being and economic welfare of people who require those pesticides and the application of them. But I signal to the minister that this is going to be an extremely controversial section, because the very people who are going to be making some kind of assessment on the basis of that are going to be people who come from the British Columbia Marketing Board and ten additional members who will be appointed by the minister to the Farm Practices Board.

The legitimate question that people are going to be asking -- especially those people who have young children who may be affected in areas where communities have grown up and there are children playing in or near or adjacent to areas where farmers are applying such a pesticide -- is: where is the public input into that process? Who from the public sits on that board? Where are the laypeople who are going to be able to make regulations with respect to what, in fact, does constitute acceptable farm practices?

That's going to be an issue that the minister is going to have to deal with, because those questions are going to be asked. The minister's response may well be -- and I look forward to it when it comes -- that the appointment of the ten additional members will be from the community and will provide those agencies and groups that have been active in these issues in communities an opportunity to sit on this board. If that's the case, then perhaps we'll need to explore that in some detail when we get into committee stage.

But we have to recognize that the right to farm does not mean the right to abuse that privilege of the provision of farming -- and all activities we do in the public domain are a privilege within our community and our society. The freedom to be able to practise them comes with responsibilities.

Think of the Farm Practices Protection Act and start to apply it perhaps to forestry. We implemented, and this government put in place -- and I give them credit for it -- the Forest Practices Code. The reason they put in a Forest Practices Code is that they wanted to protect the right of foresters, loggers, to go to work and practise their industry and craft in a sensible, environmentally sound way.

And the reason they put the code in is that past forest practices had depleted watersheds, had caused massive slope erosion, had denuded huge areas of land without reforestation and had wiped out salmon-bearing streams. They had involved themselves in all kinds of activities that back in the 1950s were certainly deemed to be an acceptable part of forestry practice, but in the 1990s we know better. In fact, we now say that these are not viable ways to proceed in the forest industry.

We have to look at the same concept with respect to the provision of a farm practices act. There has to be a code that is provided that allows us an opportunity to recognize that where, in the past, the chemical industry -- and keep in mind that most of the fertilizers that we have for the farming communities and the delivery of those fertilizers.... The agricultural schools of Canada are provided enormous amounts of research dollars from the very chemical industries that develop the herbicides, the pesticides and the chemical fertilizers, because it's big business. It's multibillion-dollar business.

Keep in mind, also, that much of the research that's done in terms of the types of crops that we can produce, in terms of the diversification -- the cross-breeding, the in-breeding, the genetic engineering of our crops -- is done also with heavy financing from the chemical industry, because the chemical industry has a vested interest in seeing those seed types and those crops produced, because they respond to the very chemicals that they produce and sell to farmers in order to expand their billion-dollar industry.

But it isn't necessarily the best way to go. It isn't necessarily the best environmental protection that we could put in place to simply give a free hand to those chemical industry companies to come forward and say: "Great. Now we have a free hand to apply whatever we want to apply to the land, whatever we wish to put into the air, whatever kind of herbicide or pesticide that may be deemed to be in our financial best interest in order to maximize the production of a crop." The control over our seed type and our crop type is falling into the hands of fewer and fewer corporations.

The opportunity that we have to diversify our economy in terms of agriculture is becoming less and less driven by the farmer and more and more driven by corporate enterprise outside of the borders of Canada.

Keep in mind that we have to also recognize that as we start to look at this new engineering and research within agriculture, there is an opportunity for us today to say that we are going to redirect our thinking with respect to the provision of protection for farming. And in redirecting that thinking, what we're going to start to do is put our emphasis on locally controlled, locally produced and locally maintained agriculture production in Canada. If we do that, we have a bounty that we are able to provide.

We are blessed with enormous wealth in terms of our opportunities, our water and much of the land that we have. Albeit a small proportion of the overall landmass of Canada, the agricultural land we have is excellent for the most part, and what we must do is provide an opportunity to make this a viable industry.

If I can come back by way of tying my first remarks together with this local question, given that we're dealing with a philosophical approach to it, I think back to the great threat of the green revolution. To those of us who were around at that time -- the late sixties and early seventies -- and watched it, we believed that this was a revolutionary period in agriculture in the world. The green revolution was going to turn all of the arable farmland into the production of a huge bounty to feed the world's populations.

It didn't happen. It didn't happen because it was driven largely by the large chemical corporations that put in place the kind of seed type, production and crop type that would only respond to the very expensive and narrowly controlled emphasis of those chemical corporations. It was a dismal failure. That's why today we've got 1.5 billion people who are starving to death in this world, who have no adequate nutrition whatsoever. That's why we as legislators, as people involved in the provision of governance and leadership in Canada, have to turn around and say: "Yes, we want to have a viable agriculture industry, but no, we're not going to repeat the mistakes of the past."

When we look at a bill such as this, and when we understand the definition of what constitutes a farm operation and what constitutes a normal farm practice, we need to address

[ Page 14677 ]

this in the context of what we know today in the modern world and how we can, through the biological assessment of our potential, put in place a more chemical-free agricultural system that doesn't require us to have the same kinds of toxins put into our soil, our water and the air. Those toxins tend to be cumulative and systemic in nature, and tend to build up in our soils. Through the greatest irony of all, they are going to deplete the agricultural land base that we are trying so desperately to protect through the agricultural land reserve. We must move in that direction; we truly must move there quickly.

The second area that has received no comment at all in this debate -- and I do want to touch on it, because I know that it's an area that's going to cause some concern in my own riding -- is under "farm operation" definition (h), which is the definition of aquaculture. Aquaculture and the right to farm in aquaculture.... The same kinds of provisions are going to be covered by this act. It is interesting that aquaculture is brought up again in

section 2(b)(iii), which talks about aquaculture "as permitted by a valid and subsisting licence, issued to that person under the Fisheries Act, for aquaculture...." It goes on to talk about matters with respect to the Health Act, the Pesticide Control Act and the Waste Management Act.

[4:15]

These acts have been woefully lacking in the protection of our marine ecosystem, with respect to some practices in aquaculture. I want to make a distinction here, because there are some very viable, very well-meaning and very well-intentioned farmers out there who are trying to introduce this new system. But in the Broughton Archipelago, there are serious concerns with respect to the use of antibiotics in the farming process.

Feeding fish these antibiotics seriously jeopardizes the local ecosystem, because much of what is fed into the net pens falls through, fouls the bottom and then is picked up and eaten by bottom-feeding fish, which in turn move up the food chain as they are picked up by predators such as seals, otters, whales, and so on.

Similarly, the location of net-pen aquaculture is of critical importance. This bill deals with the matter of noise, and I'm going to talk about that in one section. We must also recognize that noise and complaining about noise may be more than simply noise that local inhabitants and constituents who are nearby deal with. The location is critical, because if you put these net pens into or adjacent to or close to the mouths of salmon-spawning streams, when those salmon fry come down that river and into the ocean and swim through those net pens, they will be consumed.

It's ironic that you hear farmers say: "No, no, no, no. Our fish don't eat other fish. They just eat pellets." Well, that clearly isn't true.

Similarly, the location of those farm fish in terms of escapement is critically important, because we have allowed -- and I think this is a travesty, frankly -- the farming of Atlantic salmon in British Columbia waters. Notwithstanding the fact that there is a move for research by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans -- for biological control, for genetic management of these Atlantic salmon -- they do escape. They do survive, and they are being caught by commercial fishermen in their nets.

We do not know what is going to be the long-term implication of the escapement and survival of Atlantic salmon, as they breed with the species of Pacific salmon and potentially cause sterility and concern in that stock. So in this matter, because aquaculture is covered in Bill 22, we need to pay very careful attention in the committee stage debate.

Let me say also, on the matter of noise, that we have the formalized normal practice of the use of what are called seal scarers. I've raised this in this Legislative Assembly with the former Minister of Environment and with this Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, so this minister knows my concern. The seal scarer is essentially a high-pitched sonar device which they use beneath the net pen, to create such a tremendous noise as to put imbalance into seals, whales and other predators so that they will no longer come close to the fish farms.

We have no understanding of what the effect of these seal scarers on those mammals is going to be. Seals, sea lions and whales -- particularly orca, especially in the Broughton Archipelago, which is one of the principal areas for orca -- are affected by that high-pitched sonar, because it is part of their navigational and communications systems. We have no knowledge as to what happens when those high-pitched sounds create deafness which, according to some noted biologists, is now occurring in the seals in their study area.

Yet if the right-to-farm act allows that as a normal farming practice, because it clearly has been used from the onset of aquaculture in this province, then we've got a big problem. We have to know who.... I wonder if the Marketing Board, which has absolutely no concept of aquaculture whatsoever, is going to be in a position to even know whether it's a sensible or proper way to proceed. So I have serious concerns about that. We have to deal with that matter as it comes forward in committee stage.

Let me conclude by saying that we will support this bill in principle, because we have to spend a good deal more time trying to work out a system that will provide an opportunity for farmers in British Columbia to be able to make a living. We put forward a White Paper, which I know members of the minister's staff and others in the agricultural community have seen, with respect to the creation of the agricultural land bank. We and many farmers think that's a good idea. It provides an opportunity for partnership between the government and the farming community.

It alleviates the concern that I heard expressed by some people here today who argued that farmers are enslaved on their land because they cannot, because of the agricultural land reserve, sell their land off.

The agricultural land bank concept, as I've mentioned in this House before, provides an opportunity for farmers to cash out without sale of property. It does allow for orderly transfer from that particular group, who may wish to retire with some equity, to be able to provide for new farming enterprise to come in without a hardship either to the taxpayer of the province or to the farmer. So it's a workable situation. We'd like to advance that notion and get it into the thinking of this government, perhaps for future legislation.

Let me say also that we believe we can support this in principle because we fully acknowledge that, with the rise of population and the expansion of our residential communities, there is going to be ever-increasing conflict between existing farmland and the growing residential communities that are happening. This is not unlike the conflict that exists between residential communities and the forest land reserve. In many rural communities, where people live next to what they think is a pristine provincial forest, they wake up on a Sunday

[ Page 14678 ]

morning to see that there are slips on the trees and on Monday or Tuesday to find that a company is going in to harvest those wonderful trees that they believed were going to be there in perpetuity.

The same kind of thing is true of farming. People who buy into a community have to realize that farming is in large measure a seasonal operation and that there will be different times in that season of operation where noxious smells may be a problem, some noise may be a problem or there may be a problem with respect to certain activities that are common to that particular practice. I understand that there has to be protection for the farmer.

But in order to have adequate protection for the farmer, there has to be a greater degree of community input and control, and the community must become educated to recognize the working nature of the farm. Community members -- at least organizations within the community -- must be provided opportunities to sit on whatever board exists.

I will leave it to the member for Okanagan East to speak in more detail on this particular point, but we believe that the existing board that is structured for the Pesticide Control Act should be integrated with the board that is being recommended now. I firmly believe that the single greatest conflict that will happen in the years to come will be over the application and use of pesticides and the effect those pesticides are having on groundwater systems, on air purity and on air quality.

If we have a pesticide control board, it seems foolish to have those two boards sit and adjudicate on matters independent of each other. We should merge those boards and have one authority with respect to how those boards will operate. We'll deal with that in more detail as we get into the committee stage, and I know that my colleague from Okanagan East, who comes from a very agricultural community, will have more to say.

I thank you for this opportunity to put the Alliance comments on record. We congratulate the minister for coming forward with this bill. We do think there are some problems with it. We have outlined what they are, and we hope we will find the minister accommodating to some amendments that we'll be putting forward.

J. Tyabji: It's not often that I get to follow the Alliance leader in debate. They always say that he's not a good person to be following in debate, for obvious reasons. Having said that, agriculture is obviously something that some of us have taken a lot of time on in this House, and the majority of my response to the Speech from the Throne was specifically directed to agriculture. So I am very pleased to see Bill 22 before the House. I think it's a good first step.

The Okanagan is an area I have lived in since 1973. We moved there from Toronto when I was eight years old. I don't think a greater contrast could be found: to come from a city with superhighways, skyscrapers and cineplexes to what was at that time the sleepy little town of Kelowna, with roughly 23,000 people. At first my sisters and I weren't very impressed with the change in lifestyle, because we couldn't figure out how to get to the movies and see all the movies we wanted to. But as we grew up, we started to appreciate the orchards, lakes, sunshine and the richness of the valley.

I grew up on an orchard, and my family has continued to be involved with agriculture. I should declare in the debate that my father is quite involved with the fruit industry and that my sister is quite involved with the wine industry. Those are also industries I've spent a lot of time in. So I come at this debate with a very close, personal perspective on it.

Having said that, it's very important to recognize that in Bill 22 the amendment to the Land Title Act will probably be one of the most significant changes to the way in which development will occur in the agricultural sector. We live in a time when people tend to look at the bottom line and at financial interest as the way in which decisions should be made and as a last resort of decision-making.

It's very important to recognize that one thing the Land Title Act amendment does in this bill is necessitate, in considering development of a parcel of land, that we must now look to whether or not the anticipated development of the subdivision would unreasonably interfere with farming operations on adjoining or reasonably adjacent property.

That's a very important addition, and it will be very interesting in committee stage to see if the development agenda of the Liberal opposition is going to be able to support it. If this Land Title Act amendment had been in place for the last decade, we would probably have a different result in the Okanagan Valley. We've had a lot of rapid growth there; the majority of that growth has occurred on the valley bottoms. I have seen orchards that I used to play in as a child mown down for a series of walled, pink condominium developments, and parts of the valley that were primarily rural have now become strip malls and four-lane roads.

An Hon. Member: For that matter, where are the Liberals?

J. Tyabji: "Where are the Liberals?" is an interesting question. But I know we're not allowed to say in debate where the members of the House are, so I won't point out that they are not present.

I think we have to look at the larger picture. It's interesting; 1988 was my first step into the provincial arena in a provincial by-election in Penticton. At that time, the number one issue we brought forward under the leadership of the person who is the leader of the Progress Democratic Alliance -- at that time he was the leader of the other party -- was the issue of the free trade agreement and its impact on agriculture in Canada.

Too little do we debate what has happened to our agricultural industry in Canada since the free trade agreement passed. I will remind the members of this House that Canada used to be looked on with envy by the rest of the world for our agricultural resources, our vast wheat fields, the richness of the agricultural sector and the strength of the internal and domestic agricultural industry. At that time, the agricultural industry in Canada was unique in large measure because of the small bases of business. When I say that, I'm talking about the fact that there was family farming; family farming was the basis of the business in our agricultural industry. What has happened to that?

In those areas where family farming has continued, the personal debt load of the members of the families has gone up astronomically. The member for Okanagan West spoke very passionately on economic viability. It's important to recognize how precariously those families' personal finances are perched and the great cost of continuing to farm. The current situation is not the way it was a decade or 15 years ago, where

[ Page 14679 ]

one member of the family could go into farming as a career and that could be the main career. In fact, primarily the husband would be the farmer, and the wife would be at home in a support role with the family. Now what we have is both parents off the farm working in other areas in order to supplement the family income so they can continue to farm.

What strikes me as unreasonable is that there is an attitude in society, which we've mentioned before, that the greenbelt is there as a birthright of our communities, and that the farmers are lucky to be able to live on their agricultural land and therefore they shouldn't resent the fact that they have to work off the land in order to supplement their life on a farm. That's a ridiculous notion.

When we look at farming, we should look at the global picture, which has been articulated well by the leader of the Alliance Party, and at the fact that our food reserves are down and that agribusiness has been growing at an increased rate. We only have to look to the United States to recognize how multinational corporations now own the largest tracts of farmland. In addition, there are now food monopolists on the planet who are in very powerful positions and who are lined up just waiting to buy up large tracts of Canadian land so they can expand the food monopoly.

If I can get into my vein of thought to follow up on the free trade agreement, the Prime Minister at the time who was so pleased with the outcome of the free trade agreement, and who started the North American Free Trade Agreement, which was then endorsed by incoming Prime Minister Chretien.... It was Brian Mulroney who brought about the agricultural trends that are in existence today. He currently sits on the board of directors of ADM, the largest food monopolist on the planet. Why don't we ever see that reported?

Why don't we ever see how much money he's making now from the American corporations that benefited from the free trade agreement that he brought about? Why don't we ever see what happened to the farmers whose backs were broken by the deals he negotiated, the very deals that benefited the people who put him on the board of directors afterwards?

[4:30]

That's what infuriates me as a Canadian; we sit here and treat farmers as it they're welfare bums because they get the occasional bailout from a government that hasn't developed an agricultural strategy that's adequate to meet their needs. And it's not just the needs of the farmers, because the farmers only have needs if they're going to continue to operate agriculture as an industry. If we have made a decision that we don't welcome agriculture as a domestic industry, then let's acknowledge that; let's have them stop wasting their time beating their heads against the wall.

They can go away and do something else, and we can recognize that's just the decision that we've taken. But we haven't taken that decision. What we're trying to say to the farmers is: "We value agriculture; we like the greenbelt. Here's an agricultural land reserve -- you're stuck on it. Now we're going to protect your farming practices but we're not going to allow you to be viable.

We're not going to give you the kind of support that you should have in terms of land taxes, in terms of an agricultural land bank proposal that has come forward from the Progressive Democratic Alliance -- a workable proposal that would not be subject to GATT and that would not be considered to be an unfair trade subsidy by GATT." If we are going to develop an adequate agricultural strategy, we should do so with the recognition that as Canadians and as British Columbians it is part of our sovereignty to have some self-determination of our food supply.

What we don't talk about often enough is that we are in the second-largest country in the world, with a very small population; we have roughly 30 million people. The United States, which is a geographically smaller country, has ten times our population. The pressures to open the gates are going to be stronger and stronger as the developing world starts to see the opportunities in Canada.

If we allow our agricultural base to atrophy, as it has done, and if we assume that farmers are just whiners and complainers and a bunch of welfare bums, and that they're always getting bailouts, and we don't take the time to actually look at the situation, that farm income insurance was cancelled, to recognize that we do not have the support systems in place that the European community or the United States does, that every time we go before the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade we are hammered with respect to agricultural positions at the table, that we have not allowed an apple marketing board in the Okanagan when they've asked for one and asked for one -- and that we copped out from allowing that marketing board because we used the excuse that GATT was going to say supply management was no longer legal....

That was two years ago. We could have had an apple marketing board for two years. If we'd allowed an apple marketing board at the time it was first asked for, it would have been around for years now. That network would have been in place so that even if and when GATT finally rules that there will be no more marketing boards, that network would be in place anyway. That's an invaluable network, and they could do, informally, many activities that would not be deemed vulnerable to GATT.

What's interesting is that the very government that said there will be no apple marketing board -- and the federal government that said: "There will be no apple marketing board because we are worried that marketing boards might be deemed no longer legal under GATT" -- has actually built them into the structure of the Farm Practices Board. Obviously there is some indication that they will be around for a little while.

Without a comprehensive strategy and a recognition of not only the role that agriculture plays now but the role that it used to play.... In the role that it used to play, that could have been developed so that it could be so much greater than it is now. Without an adequate agricultural strategy, we are doing very little more than putting in place a new Farm Practices Board, putting in place some protections -- and the amendment to the Land Title Act that I mentioned is very important -- to farming in a structural sense.

But the structural sense will mean nothing if the personal debt load of the farmers is so high that they are forced into bankruptcy. Or worse yet, that they are forced into selling out to some sort of agribusiness, some sort of larger conglomerate, some sort of offshore or southern-based corporation that will end up being able to drive the agricultural industry in our back yards.

The leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance said very clearly that pesticides will be one of the most contentious issues raised under this bill. That is absolutely true. What is interesting is that the litigative advantage to any kind of challenge, either under the right-to-farm act or the Pesticide Control Act, will clearly be on the side of the pesticide corporations -- any kind of litigative advantage, because if we are

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talking about a member of the general public who wants to come forward and say.... For example, one of the main raisons d'etre of the group in Kelowna called EarthCare was to advance the public's interest in the application of pesticides, in order to counter large-scale applications of pesticides. In those cases, those groups are going to be at a serious disadvantage in trying to challenge anything under this bill, because they won't have access to banks of lawyers or to the kind of money that would be needed to challenge some of the provisions of the act. So that is going to be a problem.

More than that, we have to recognize that the pressures that will exist on our domestic agricultural industry to follow some of the foreign trends to buy into agribusiness -- where we will have genetic manipulation, as the Alliance leader had mentioned -- and to go against the seed banks, which we see happening.... As the minister is probably aware, if you buy a piece of produce that has come in from another country and you try to germinate the seeds, what happens? It doesn't work. Most of those products have actually been designed so that the reproductive controls are held by the people who produce them.

They have either been genetically engineered so that you can't reproduce them with the seeds you get from the produce at the store, or some of them have been irradiated so that you can't generate them from that produce.

What that means is that when we look at some of the seed banks that exist in B.C.... The minister may be aware that Salmon Arm actually has one of the largest international seed banks in the world for diversity and original genetic forms of seeds. Those small organizations are under so much pressure to cave in and allow the genetically engineered products to take over. In fact, the products produced from those seeds have a very limited market there. They're blocked out of all the large networks -- they're not allowed to trade on the same networks that the other growers are allowed to trade on.

That makes us vulnerable. In fact, those seed banks should be encouraged, because what we have there is the ability to allow for domestic innovation. We know that the seed stock that is in those banks is unique in that it is the original seed stock from which the other strains have been produced through genetic engineering. Those banks may end up representing our only opportunity to ever go back to the original stock if what we're doing in our genetic experiments -- our pesticide and soil experiments....

If those experiments fail -- if we find out that three generations of genetically engineered corn, for example, doesn't live or doesn't reproduce or has a problem or is somehow weak in a certain aspect -- where are we going to get the original strain? In most cases, those strains three generations away don't exist anymore except in these seed banks -- these small, privately run, non-profit societies -- where they're under a lot of pressure to give up their battle to try to contain some store of original products.

I flagged that because, although we talk very often about the Summerland Research Station and the Okanagan Valley Tree Fruit Authority.... In this bill, something that I find a little bit disconcerting -- but which I'll give the minister the benefit of the doubt on until we get to committee stage -- is that there are, actually enshrined in legislation, practices that make use of innovative technology in a manner consistent with proper, advanced farm management practices and any standards prescribed.

I recognize that we want to acknowledge that innovation has to be protected in the same way that other farm practices are protected, but the fact is that innovative technologies under normal farm practice is almost a contradiction. If it's innovative technology that's just coming on stream, it's hardly a normal farm practice, it's hardly something that's been going on for a while.

I'm a little concerned about that, because there's a lot of controversy within the domestic farm industry, the family-based farms -- the small, as we call them, mom-and-pop shops -- who are saying: "I'm not sure if we should be proceeding with all this engineering. I'm not sure if we should be forced to replant the hybrids that have come in from European stock, that we've put into a laboratory, that the laboratory has developed and that in one generation, are working." Now we're financing the replanting of a lot of strains that are not tested.

A lot of farmers who've been at it for a while are saying that's not a good idea. What I'm concerned about is that I don't know where we're protecting any of that -- any of the traditional roots of farming that exist -- or where we're making sure that we're not totally vulnerable to agribusiness and to international control of that, in the event that some of the experiments driven by the government policies fail.

I'd like to close my comments on this by focusing on the fact that we have a proliferation of bureaucracy in the environment, in agriculture and in forestry, which is unnecessary. A simple review of the statutes will show that, with respect to farm practices, we have the Agricultural Land Commission -- we could potentially have the Environmental Appeal Board -- the pesticide control board and the B.C. Marketing Board, which is going to be on the Farm Practices Board. The Environmental Assessment Act could come into play. The Environment and Land Use Committee, which is in the statute, could come into play.

The local health committees could come into play with respect to the water issue, and the Waste Management Act with respect to effluent and farm waste. There are regional managers of Environment who will come into play in some capacity. Local government, whether it's municipal or regional, have their own environmental officers, and they have bylaw enforcement officers. The economic development commission will come into play with respect to