2004 Legislative Session: 5th Session, 37th 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)

MONDAY, MARCH 1, 2004

Afternoon Sitting

Volume 21, Number 2

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Page

Tributes

Toni Onley

K. Stewart

Introductions by Members

Introduction and First Reading

of Bills

Education Statutes Amendment Act,

2004 (Bill 12)

Hon. T.

Christensen

Statements (Standing Order 25 B )

Business costs in Canada

R. Sultan

Opening of Victoria Sobering and

Assessment Centre

S. Orr

Black History Month and African

immigration

H. Bloy

Oral Questions

Emergency physician staffing levels

at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital

J. Kwan

Hon. C.

Hansen

Police access to Legislature for

search of Finance ministry office

J. MacPhail

Hon. G.

Plant

Impact of contracting-out of hospital

services

J. Bray

Hon. C.

Hansen

Mining task force report

P. Nettleton

Hon. P. Bell

Tendering of contracts for

assisted-living units

Halsey-Brandt

Hon. M.

Coell

Committee of the Whole House

Ministerial Accountability Bases Act,

2003-2004 (Bill 10)

J. MacPhail

Hon. G.

Collins

Report and Third Reading of

Bills

Ministerial Accountability Bases Act,

2003-2004 (Bill 10)

Throne Speech Debate (continued)

K. Krueger

J. MacPhail

R. Nijjar

B. Lekstrom

J. Kwan

M. Hunter

[ Page 8891 ]

MONDAY, MARCH 1, 2004

The House

met at 2:04 p.m.

Mr.

Speaker: Good afternoon, hon. members.

Introduction

of guests?

Hunter: I don't want to introduce guests, but I do want to make a couple of

announcements. Firstly, in my family, today is a very important day. I married

into a Welsh family, and today is St. David's Day, so I'd like to say hi to all

the Welsh folks in British Columbia — people with Welsh roots.

[1405]

Secondly,

over the weekend in Nanaimo…. I want to report that the Malaspina Mariners

women's volleyball team won the provincial gold medal for the sixth straight

year. This year they defeated the Capilano College Blues. The member for North

Vancouver–Seymour has shed a few tears from that, but his team and mine are

both going to be going to Humber College in Etobicoke to represent British

Columbia at the national championships later on this month. I hope the House

will congratulate the Malaspina Mariners volleyball team.

Tributes

TONI ONLEY

Stewart: It's on a sad note that I announce to the House today that, after a

plane crash yesterday in Maple Ridge, Toni Onley, a very noted artist in British

Columbia, was the person identified as the pilot. Unfortunately, they've yet to

recover a body. I know that a great sadness will be felt not only among his

family but among many of the people in the art community not only in British

Columbia but across the land. Toni was very supportive of our local arts

community, contributing a number of paintings over the years. I'm sure he will

be sadly missed. I'm sure there will be more on this later.

Introductions by Members

MacPhail: We all join in grieving the loss of such an eminent painter.

We are

fortunate in the opposition to be joined by three life-savers, our interns, so

everybody else should be very concerned about that. It more than quadruples the

talent in our bench. We are joined by Amy Hinterberger, Byron Plant and Sara

Irvine. I would ask the House to please make them welcome on their first day

with the opposition caucus.

Hon. C.

Hansen: I think over the last number of years we have witnessed some

absolutely tremendous science that is being done right here in British Columbia

— work that is being done at the B.C. Cancer Agency that is truly setting

standards that are being noticed worldwide.

I would

like the House to welcome a couple of key people who are involved with the B.C.

Cancer Agency and the B.C. Cancer Foundation. They are Dr. Victor Ling, who is

the vice-president of research at the B.C. Cancer Agency and the B.C. Cancer

Research Centre; also Mary McNeil, who is president and CEO of the B.C. Cancer

Foundation; and Mary Erickson, office manager and the driving force behind the

weekend to end breast cancer, which will be taking place on August 20 to 22.

We had an

excellent briefing from them earlier today. I certainly hope that all members

will encourage and support this very important event that will be taking place

in August. Will the House please make the three of them welcome.

Introduction and

First Reading of Bills

EDUCATION STATUTES

AMENDMENT ACT, 2004

Hon. T.

Christensen presented a message from Her Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill

intituled Education Statutes Amendment Act, 2004.

Hon. T.

Christensen: I move that the bill be introduced and read a first time now.

Motion

approved.

Hon. T.

Christensen: I am pleased to introduce Bill 12, the Education Statutes

Amendment Act, 2004. This act makes a number of changes to the School Act and

the Independent School Act. Those changes include allowing school districts to

implement generally accepted accounting principles, commonly known as GAAP, by

correcting or removing terminology and practices that are inconsistent or

redundant in relation to GAAP. The act will also require school districts to

provide financial reports so that they can be included in the government

reporting entity as required by the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act.

These

changes will enhance the financial accountability of British Columbia's public

education system. The province will assist school districts as they make these

changes that relate to generally accepted accounting principles. School

districts will receive $35 million a year to help with the implementation of

generally accepted accounting principles.

This act

amends both the School Act and the Independent School Act to remove and replace

references to the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Revenue. These changes

are of a housekeeping nature and reflect current government financial practice.

I move that

the bill be placed on the orders of the day for second reading at the next

sitting of the House after today.

Bill 12

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.

[ Page 8892 ]

[1410]

Statements

(Standing Order 25

b) BUSINESS COSTS IN CANADA

Sultan: Recently the international accounting and consulting organization

KPMG commissioned a study of cost competitiveness of starting and operating

businesses around the world. They looked at 121 cities in 11 countries across

North America, Europe and Asia, involving 12 separate industries and 27 separate

cost categories. They generated cost profiles on 2,000 individual, real live

businesses in the world. This is big-time, big-dollar surveying. The result:

among all these jurisdictions Canada is the overall cost leader. Canada's costs

are 8 percent to 9 percent below those in the United States, and between 7

percent and 23 percent lower than costs in the European G-7 countries.

The reason

Canada is so competitive is due to many cost factors, including the fact that

our tax rates — corporately and individually — are not particularly high.

The study even encompassed that great municipality of Chilliwack. The Minister

of Economic Development was no doubt pleased to learn that Chilliwack's costs

are even lower than the Canadian average and 3 percent lower than Vancouver's.

Some have

stated that KPMG's findings merely illustrate low and declining wages in B.C.

Nonsense. Vancouver is, in fact, one of the best-paying jurisdictions in Canada,

and average wage rates have been increasing. High and rising wages

notwithstanding, we maintain our significant competitive edge while, as

headlines today remind us again, we enjoy just about the highest quality of life

in the world.

KPMG

commissioned Vancouver-based MMK Consulting Inc. to do this research. It cost

over $1 million and was eight months in the making.

Thinking of

locating a new business anywhere in the world? Look no further. You've found the

right place.

OPENING OF VICTORIA SOBERING

AND ASSESSMENT CENTRE

S. Orr: In

my opinion, every member of this House leads a fairly privileged life. We all

have a roof over our head, food in our stomach, family and friends around us,

and we are all relatively healthy. This is not so for many people who live every

second of every day with the horrors of addiction. Addiction can rip away your

health, your family, and your whole life can be ruined.

I am

pleased to tell this House that as of last week, some of these people now have

somewhere they can go, and maybe — just maybe — they can start on a road to

recovery with the opening of the new Sobering and Assessment Centre right here

in Victoria. This facility is located in a central downtown area and is open

24-7. It has 20 beds, and in addition to that, they have observation, treatment

and seating areas. It has been developed to address the health and safety needs

of people who are under the influence of alcohol or drugs. It provides

short-term shelter, but most importantly, people will be treated at all times

with dignity and compassion.

This new

centre will offer access to a range of services and health services. This new

centre is operated by the Vancouver Island health authority. It receives an

operating budget from the authority of $750,000, and $1.3 million of capital

funding was provided through VIHA by the Ministry of Health Services.

This is yet

another piece to the picture that the government is working on when they made a

commitment to treat addiction as a health issue.

BLACK HISTORY MONTH AND

AFRICAN IMMIGRATION

H. Bloy:

Thank you for allowing me to speak today about Black History Month. First I

would like to thank Mr. Godwin Eni, president of the Vancouver Multicultural

Society, for hosting a very entertaining evening. I recently attended the Black

History gala with some of my colleagues from Vancouver-Kingsway,

Coquitlam-Maillardville, Burnaby North and the Minister of State for Immigration

and Multicultural Services. I'm sure that you'll recall the statements by the

member for Coquitlam-Maillardville about black history in B.C. I would like to

talk a little bit about some history I learned that evening.

[1415]

At this

event my wife and I met a young lady. Florence has been living in Canada for

about two years, and she's now 20 years of age. She was so excited to tell us

story is truly amazing. Her parents died when she was ten years old. She became

the main caregiver to three siblings. Their home for a number of years was

living in a forest with no roof over their head — seven years of living on a

bare existence.

One day she

met a lady from France who took a liking to her, and sometime later she was

called into an office close to where they were living and told that she would go

to Canada. She thought: "What is Canada? Is that a food?" "I

really didn't know what Canada was," she said. But she was excited. She and

hopes to work in the health care profession. She also works part-time to send

money back to her two siblings in Burundi.

What a

great country we live in that we can allow a lady like Florence to work and to

take care of her family, to go from a desperate past to a bright future. We

should be proud of the province we live in where we give all our people these

kinds of opportunities. It was truly an enjoyable evening.

Mr.

Speaker: That concludes member statements.

[ Page 8893 ]

Oral Questions

EMERGENCY PHYSICIAN STAFFING

LEVELS AT NANAIMO REGIONAL

GENERAL HOSPITAL

J. Kwan:

In June 2003, six months before the Nanaimo doctors' dispute came to a head, the

Nanaimo doctors met with the Vancouver Island health authority, and everyone

agreed that workload levels for emergency room physicians were similar to

Victoria's. But the minister has stepped in and put huge staffing cuts on the

table, putting patients at risk and creating, in the deputy Health minister's

own words, "the most frightening experiences" in her career.

Can the

Minister of Health explain why his government forced a dispute to the brink when

the Vancouver Island health authority had already agreed that emergency workload

levels in Nanaimo matched those in Victoria?

Hon. C.

Hansen: Just to go back a little way, one of the problems we had that we

inherited as a government was the one-off deals around the province that were

signed by some health authorities and some hospitals under the previous

government. Every time you had one of those little one-off deals, you had

neighbouring communities saying: "Wait a second. We're not getting our fair

share compared to that particular community."

We brought

in a framework that said every hospital and every group of physicians in the

province were going to be treated fairly. In applying that framework, it came

down to differences of how you calculate that particular formula. We looked at

acuity levels from three different perspectives. One of them, for example, is

the fact that only Nanaimo had a growing level of very low acuity cases compared

to virtually every other hospital in the province. We also looked at the

doctors' own billings that they sent in to MSP where they themselves have to

classify their patients as level 1, level 2 or level 3 acuity. Those also showed

differences in acuity.

I'm glad it

was resolved. I still do not believe that the physicians had any justification

in withdrawing care from their patients in an emergency room setting. Clearly,

we have to find better ways to resolve these issues.

Mr.

Speaker: The member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant has a supplementary

question.

J. Kwan:

Despite what the minister says, every time the government came back to the

negotiating table, the minister proposed big cuts to emergency care with the

full knowledge that the Nanaimo emergency room was just as busy as Victoria's.

How do we know this? Because it has come to light that the government has two

agreements with the Nanaimo doctors. One agreement — the agreement that this

minister likes to brag about — cuts staffing so that the government can save

face. A second agreement is an agreement that brings staffing levels up to what

was before the dispute started.

Again to

the Minister of Health: can he explain why he put patients at risk by proposing

big cuts to staffing levels when today, after the dust has settled, those

staffing levels at the Nanaimo emergency room are virtually the same as what

they were before the dispute? We have the second agreement before us, so we know

there were two agreements that the government is trying to hide — the dispute

and the crisis situation that was created in Nanaimo.

[1420]

Hon. C.

Hansen: This is actually a shift that the doctors were going from — what

was a fee-for-service model to an alternate-payment model. They were going onto

a salary. We did not reduce staffing levels. We never proposed to reduce

staffing levels, and at the end of the day, we did not reduce staffing levels.

What the physicians were putting forward was their

interpretation of what they

thought was in place in terms of FTEs. We can actually show you documentation

that shows what was actually funded for that hospital in the past and what had

been agreed to. In fact, the staffing levels that are now there are an increase.

We had argued that right from the start of that dispute. There was absolutely no

justification…

Interjection.

Mr.

Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. C.

Hansen: …for those doctors to withdraw care from their patients. We are

pursuing those very issues with the College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Mr.

Speaker: The member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant has a further

supplementary.

J. Kwan:

Let's be clear. The Nanaimo doctors had an interim agreement with the government

that was in place in June 2003, when everyone agreed that the emergency room in

Nanaimo was just as busy as any emergency room in Victoria. Now we've learned,

after putting patients at risk, that the government has signed two contracts

with doctors in Nanaimo, bringing their staffing levels back up to what was

agreed to six months before the government forced the confrontation.

The

government insisted that the staffing levels should be 14.6 FTEs. The doctors

said that it was closer to 17 FTEs. The first agreement, the one that the

minister likes to talk about, was at 14.6 FTEs. The second agreement, which I

have before me, brings the staffing levels back up to 16.7 FTEs. Given that the

health authority agreed to staffing levels that existed before the government

tried to cut emergency care, will the minister admit that he was wrong, that he

deliberately provoked a fight to inflame public opinion in the larger

negotiations between the province and the BCMA, and that that was the real

reason why he put patients at risk in Nanaimo?

[ Page 8894 ]

Interjections.

Mr.

Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. C.

Hansen: I work very hard to make sure that patients do not get put at risk

in this province. After looking at the data around Nanaimo, which we discussed

thoroughly with the doctors in Nanaimo, what it showed was that there were many

more low-acuity patients using the Nanaimo emergency room instead of going to

see their own family doctors, other clinics or other options in the community.

There was a much higher level of level 1 services being provided in Nanaimo

compared to any other hospital on the Island and particularly in regard to

Victoria.

What we

agreed to at the end was a temporary increase in staffing levels while we

transition and ensure that patients can get better access to care in other

community services rather than using the emergency room in cases of low acuity

for which the emergency room should not be used.

It was an

extremely difficult ten days for everybody involved. I believe it is totally

inappropriate for physicians to withdraw care from their patients because they

are having a dispute with government over how much to put in a budget to pay

doctors. We clearly need to find better ways of doing that.

We worked

hard to make sure that patient safety was put foremost in that particular case,

and we will continue to make that our priority throughout the province.

POLICE ACCESS TO LEGISLATURE FOR

SEARCH OF FINANCE MINISTRY OFFICE

MacPhail: Mr. Speaker, I ended last week questioning the Finance minister

about his mentoring of the next generation of young Liberals. Today I'd like to

focus on the recent raids on his offices, which media reports say involve young

Liberals, marijuana, organized crime and wiretaps.

The

Solicitor General involved himself in those raids. We know that he consulted

with you at least once, Mr. Speaker, prior to the raids. I assume he did so

because this place has certain privileges.

Maingot, an

authority on parliamentary practice, has carefully written on those privileges.

This House has exclusive authority over the affairs within the precinct. Maingot

says, for example: "Police may not lawfully intercept private

communications within the precincts without the permission of the House."

[1425]

Will the

Solicitor General please advise this House what standard he used to decide

whether it was appropriate for the police to enter into the precincts? Will he

also tell us today what argument he brought forward to the Speaker to allow the

police access to the precincts on this matter?

Well, I'm

not quite sure why the Solicitor General won't stand up and answer the question.

He was more than forthcoming in the media at the time of the raids. I assume now

the Solicitor General doesn't want to be too closely associated with the news on

this raid. He has had advice to distance himself, I assume. But he did insert

himself early on. He admits that he spoke to the Speaker. He spoke to the media.

He admitted that he briefed the Premier and Martyn Brown. Clearly, he knows more

than he is prepared to admit here today.

We have a

right to expect that the Solicitor General and the Speaker didn't allow the

police to raid the Finance minister's office on what Maingot cites as

"fishing trips." They're specifically precluded in the Legislature.

Indeed, partially based upon direct evidence of Mr. Maingot, a 1980 report on

wiretapping in this precinct concluded that there must be evidence that the

conduct in the precincts is "directly implicated in the commission of a

crime" before the police are allowed in.

Will the

Solicitor General please confirm for this House that evidence that someone was

directly involved in criminal activity was the test he used to justify allowing

a police raid on the Finance minister's office? If he didn't use the standard

test, what test did he use to allow the police in the Finance minister's office?

Hon. G.

Plant: My understanding is that the police were executing a search warrant.

The matter of the search warrant is before the courts, and we'll let the courts

decide.

Interjections.

Mr.

Speaker: Order, please. Order, please.

IMPACT OF CONTRACTING-OUT

OF HOSPITAL SERVICES

J. Bray:

No issue comes before my constituency office month in, month out than health

care. Last week, on several news reports, organizers for the Hospital Employees

Union were on television stating that only the HEU can keep hospitals clean and

keep patients safe. Subsequently, I heard from many constituents who were

concerned about both the number of 1,000 hospital employees being reduced and

the issues of hospital cleanliness. My question is to the Minister of Health

Services — if he can tell me what impact outsourcing of these services will

have on hospital employment in the southern Island area and also what impact it

will have on hospital cleanliness.

Hon. C.

Hansen: I certainly had discussions with HEU workers around the province,

who I think do a great job of providing services to our health care sector. As I

have said before in this House and elsewhere, we had a cost structure that was

considerably out of line. We had to make sure we brought those costs under

control so that patient dollars could be put towards patient care, which it

needs to be first and foremost.

With the

initiatives that are being taken by the Vancouver Island health authority, first

of all, the cleanli-

[ Page 8895 ]

ness and standards for cleanliness are not being compromised and in fact in

many cases are being enhanced. When it comes to employment, I recognize that

that does impact on some individuals and some families. Clearly, there are new

people being recruited by the contractors, so the employment base will certainly

be comparable to what it was before. As I said, we will make sure that

cleanliness and standards are upheld.

MINING TASK FORCE REPORT

Nettleton: The government wouldn't listen to me when I was requested by the

Premier to bring forth a recommendation on B.C. Rail some years ago. As reported

in the Vancouver Sun last week, the Premier is ignoring, as well, the

findings and recommendations of a task force of 15 MLAs he appointed to study

the mining situation in B.C. Why? Well, I suspect the facts don't fit the

Premier's agenda, and apparently 14 of those MLAs were off message according to

the Premier and the Minister of Energy and Mines. It seems that someone the

Premier trusts to be on message is his new Minister of State for Mining, the

member for Prince George North, the fifteenth member of that task force.

[1430]

Mr.

Speaker, my question is to that Minister of State for Mining. How did he get it

so right while the 14 other members of that task force got it so wrong?

Hon. P.

Bell: I am actually very pleased to be able to report that the mining task

force report was an excellent piece of work. It's something that the Premier has

asked me to take and develop into an action plan. We know that mining left this

province through the 1990s. We know that one out of every two jobs through the

1990s was lost due to the policies of the previous government.

I'm excited

about looking forward to mining. We're going to have a great action plan,

working with the members of the task force report, to revive this industry.

TENDERING OF CONTRACTS FOR

ASSISTED-LIVING UNITS

Halsey-Brandt: My question is to the Minister of Community, Aboriginal and

Women's Services. I understand that the Independent Living B.C. strategy is a

cooperative effort between B.C. Housing and the health authorities. While a

commitment of some 3,500 beds is admirable, there has been some confusion in

Richmond regarding the tendering of contracts for these units.

Could the

minister tell the House and interested agencies in my constituency three things:

how are applications for contracts solicited, what criteria are used to evaluate

them, and who has the final call on awarding these contracts?

Hon. M.

Coell: It's an open process. There are ads placed in the paper. It's also

posted on the B.C. Bid website. The criteria for evaluation are quite broad.

They look at the capacity of the society that has put in the application, their

corporate experience and governance. They also look at the housing concept. That

could be everything from site and location — they try and spread that around

the province — and the number of units and the amenities that are also

suggested. They look at the financial — the capital budget, the operating

budget — and the final selection is a joint decision by a health authority and

B.C. Housing.

[End of question period.]

Orders of the Day

Hon. G.

Collins: I call Committee of the Whole House for consideration of Bill 10.

[1435]

Committee of the Whole House

MINISTERIAL ACCOUNTABILITY

BASES ACT, 2003-2004

The House

in Committee of the Whole (Section

B) on Bill 10; J. Weisbeck in the chair.

The

committee met at 2:36 p.m.

On

section

MacPhail: What was the salary for 2003 for the Minister of Agriculture?

Hon. G.

Collins: I believe ministers receive an additional stipend, as members of

the executive council, of $39,000. I don't think that's changed.

MacPhail: How many days of the $150 capital city allowance did the Minister

of Agriculture claim for 2003 — and was paid?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm not aware of that. Second of all, I'm not sure how it pertains

to the legislation. Perhaps the member can explain that to me.

MacPhail: Well, this is legislation about exempting ministers from a penalty

because of expenditures. I'm just wanting to know how big the penalty would have

been in relation to the overall compensation. It's matters of compensation.

Mr. Chair,

I might also say that I don't have any questions for the Solicitor General in

this particular legislation, so the Solicitor General can go. Sorry, I don't

mean that. I don't have any questions on this legislation for the Solicitor

General.

Hon. G.

Collins: My understanding of the legislation, which I've just had confirmed,

is that the 20 percent holdback in ministerial salary applies to the $39,000.

The additional indemnity or compensation is provided to ministers of the Crown

or a minister of

[ Page 8896 ]

state, which I think is $25,000. It does not apply to other expense claims,

etc., that may occur during the year. It only applies to that 20 percent of the

$39,000 that ministers are paid over and above their MLA pay.

MacPhail: Perhaps the Minister of Finance could clarify for me. When he

changed the regulation…. No, I guess actually it was the law he changed to

allow cabinet ministers to claim $150 every night they're overnight in the

capital city outside of their constituency. Did he make that…? Is that now

accounted for as a travel expense? How is it accounted for in the ministerial

budgets?

Hon. G.

Collins: Mr. Chairman, I believe that question is out of order. It has no

relation to this

section of the act whatsoever.

MacPhail: I understand that the Minister of Finance likes to run the House

with an iron fist, but perhaps he could allow the Chair to actually be the Chair

and the Speaker be the Speaker. Instead of directing his ministers to just refer

questions to the Speaker, maybe he could allow those venerable offices to look

after themselves.

The

minister changed the legislation around the $150 per diem.

Hon. G.

Collins: Mr. Chairman, I was just trying earlier to perhaps provide advice

to the member opposite that that's not relevant to this section. Seeing as she

didn't take that opportunity, I just raise a point of order that the line of

questioning the member is pursuing has no relationship whatsoever to

section 1

of this bill.

The

Chair: Just to remind the Leader of the Opposition to keep her questions

pertinent to

section 1.

[1440]

MacPhail: Maybe I could explain to you, Mr. Chair, how I think this is

relevant. It's that this legislation is exempting three cabinet ministers —

the Minister of Agriculture, the Minister of Forests and the Minister of Public

Safety — from having a penalty awarded against them. Actually, it's the

reverse — of not getting their bonus of 20 percent of what they get as a

cabinet minister because their budgets will be overbudget.

I don't

have any problem with expenditures related to floods, BSE, avian flu or forests.

What I'm trying to find out is: what is the bonus that these ministers are

obtaining? The government changed the rules so that now cabinet ministers get a

benefit that they didn't previously have — prior to this government. I want to

know whether that benefit is now considered, with this government, to be a

benefit that's specific to cabinet ministers — whether it's included in the

stipend; and why not, if not.

Hon. G.

Collins: I answered the member's question with my first response to her.

I'll do it again for her in case she wasn't paying attention. The 20 percent

salary holdback that occurs at the beginning of each fiscal year, which is

contained in the ministerial accountability act, is $39,000. It consists solely

of the additional amount of money, or pay, that ministers make for being a

member of the executive council. As far as ministers of state, it's $25,000.

That does not include any additional expenses — expense accounts, as the

member mentioned.

I've said

this already. I say it again. It's the $39,000. It is strictly the additional

pay a member of the Legislature receives for being a member of the executive

council. It does not apply to any other items — not travel expenses, not per

diems, not taxi fare, not anything. It only applies to the $39,000. That should

clarify that for the member opposite. If she has any further questions on that,

I'd be glad to answer them.

Perhaps

while she's doing that and looking in the legislation, I can refer her to the

legislation of which she was a part: Bill 28, 2000 — the Balanced Budget Act

— which her government introduced back then. In fact,

section 4(2) has an

additional 20 percent provision that was there, and it applies to salary as

well. There's not any difference, in that regard, with what's in our legislation

versus what was in her legislation. It's 20 percent, and it applies to the

salary as a member of the executive council.

MacPhail: Well, I appreciate the Minister of Finance pointing out that his

government didn't do anything better than the previous government. He likes to

make such great claims that, oh, we've got ministerial accountability, and now

he admits it's exactly the same as what the previous government did. Hurrah.

Finally the minister has to fess up that they don't have any more accountability

or any more transparency than the previous government.

My only

point is that this government, very early on when they arrived in office,

changed the rules by legislation about what a minister gets paid — not

government caucus members, not members of the opposition….

Point of Order

Hon. G.

Collins: Point of order, Mr. Chair.

The

Chair: The Minister of Finance on a point of order.

Hon. G.

Collins: I think this is the third time I've risen on the same point of

order. The member opposite keeps raising this issue. She knows full well it is

not contained in this

section of the bill and is out of order.

The

Chair: I would just remind the member once again to keep her questions

confined to

section 1 of this bill.

Debate Continued

MacPhail: Well, we're off to a very testy start, and I'm not quite sure why

the Minister of Finance

[ Page 8897 ]

wants to limit debate when he's supposed to be so open and accountable. Well,

tell me: where is salary defined in this legislation, then?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm glad to do the research for the member opposite. If she looks

at the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act, it refers to the

Legislative Assembly salaries as well. She can pursue it back through those

various pieces of legislation. That's normally the research a member of the

opposition does before she gets to the floor of the House.

[1445]

MacPhail: Actually, salary isn't defined in the legislation, so perhaps the

minister could refer me to where it is.

Hon. G.

Collins: That took me about 22 seconds. The member could have done it

herself. Otherwise, if she goes to the Balanced Budget and Ministerial

Accountability Act and looks at

section 3(1), there's a definition of it there.

MacPhail: Yes, except that those sections of the legislation include the

salary and the stipend of the ministers.

Hon. G.

Collins: If she believes that, she can find the

section and point it out.

MacPhail: I don't understand why the minister is so…. He's testy today.

I'm not quite sure why he's so testy.

All right.

Let's just say it's about the $39,000, so 20 percent…. Let me ask the minister

how it's worked in '03 for the holdback on a minister who is not affected by

this legislation and for one who is affected by this legislation.

Hon. G.

Collins: Again, that's not part of this section, but I'm glad, for the

member, to explain to her how it works. As I've said previously about four times

today, members receive, if you're a member of the executive council — as

she'll well remember from the time that she served — $39,000 a year over and

above….

Interjection.

Hon. G.

Collins: It's exactly the same amount. Over and….

Interjection.

The

Chair: Please, member. Through the Chair.

Hon. G.

Collins: The member can go check that fact as well, because I'm sure she'll

find that she is wrong. The reality is that we receive $39,000 over and above

the salary that's granted to Members of the Legislative Assembly. That is the

salary for being a minister of the Crown. It has not changed, and it's 20

percent of that. I'm sure she can do the math.

MacPhail: Well, I'm just trying to figure out in real dollars, if the

minister would like to admit how the real dollars work. It's just on the 39,000

bucks that a cabinet minister and all of these…? I don't know why we're

talking about ministers of state, because these three are full ministers of

cabinet — $39,000….

recall…. I don't know. Call me crazy, but we had a 5 percent takeback on our

stipend, and it was never reinstated at all. The 5 percent takeback was on the

$39,000.

Interjection.

MacPhail: Yes, actually, it was. Could the minister just stand up and say in

real dollars then…? Is the 20 percent held back at the very beginning, and

then is half of it returned and then the next half returned? How did it operate

in '03?

Hon. G.

Collins: The member can check the Hansard record from the time that

legislation was debated in the House.

MacPhail: No, I'd like the answer now, Mr. Chair.

Hon. G.

Collins: Mr. Chairman, I just gave it to her.

MacPhail: Okay, Mr. Chair. These are legitimate questions. I'm not quite

sure why the minister thinks he can introduce a piece of legislation and answer

no questions on it. I'm not sure why the minister thinks it is beneath him to

answer these questions. Is he nervous about…?

Oh, Mr.

Chair, sorry. I'll ask the Minister of Agriculture directly. To the Minister of

Agriculture: can he explain how the salary takeback has worked for him?

[1450]

Hon. G.

Collins: The member will know…. I don't know if she's wasting time or

what. Maybe she's run out of other things to say to criticize the government.

I've already explained this to the member earlier in response to her questions.

There's a 20 percent holdback on the $39,000 that is normally paid to a member

of the executive council, over and above their salary as an MLA. They earn that

back when the public accounts are released, which she can go and look in the

legislation for the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act. They

earn that back at the end of the fiscal year, once the public accounts are

printed. She can go and look and read in the legislation. It's sitting right

there on her desk. If it's not on her desk, it's on the cabinet behind her. Most

members of the opposition do this research before they come to the floor of the

House.

MacPhail: I don't know why the minister thinks that he doesn't have a right

to answer questions just

[ Page 8898 ]

because the opposition has done research. It's all very well and good for the

opposition to know, and I know that this Legislature operates like a private

little club for the Liberal government. They don't like anybody to ask any

questions about what goes on inside this chamber. But it is ridiculous for the

Minister of Finance to stand up and somehow say he is not obligated to answer

these questions because it's in legislation.

Well, let

me ask the Minister of Agriculture directly, then. This

section deals with the

Minister of Agriculture. The legislation says: "The salary otherwise

payable under

section 4 (6) to (8) of the Legislative Assembly Allowances and

Pension Act to each member of the Executive Council must be reduced by

20%."

Then

section 4 goes on to say: "Half of the 20% reduction in salary under

section 3, for a fiscal year, becomes due and payable to a member of the

Executive Council on the next day after the public accounts for that fiscal year

are made public, in the case (

a) of the fiscal year 2002/2003 or 2003/2004 if,

in the main estimates for that fiscal year…."

Could the

Minister of Agriculture please tell us how he would have been affected if this

legislation had not been passed?

Hon. G.

Collins: The member just answered her own question.

MacPhail: I understand completely why the Minister of Finance is so rattled.

He has every right to be rattled, with the state of affairs in his government. I

understand why people like the Solicitor General won't reveal the rules that

apply to this House. I understand why the Minister of Finance tells the

Solicitor General to go to the Speaker if they want any questions answered.

The

Chair: Minister of Finance on a point of order.

Point of Order

Hon. G.

Collins: This is a pretty simple piece of legislation. I think it's got

three sections. I'm more than happy and prepared and enthusiastic about

answering any questions that are the least bit relevant to any of those three

sections. So far I haven't heard very many.

The

Chair: Just to remind the member once again to confine her questions to

section 1 of Bill 10.

Debate Continued

MacPhail: With respect, Mr. Chair, I fully am following your advice. These

are all relevant to the legislation. All of them are relevant. I'm not quite

sure why the Minister of Agriculture can't answer for himself. I fail to

understand what the difficulty is here.

This

legislation is the second time this government has exempted cabinet ministers

from the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act.

Can the

minister tell us how it operated for the Minister of Forests the last time this

was applied? When did the Minister of Forests get his full salary in 2003?

Hon. G.

Collins: If the member re-reads the

section that she just read to the House,

she'll get her answer — the day after the public accounts were released.

MacPhail: So, if I FOI this issue, it would be what date that the Minister

of Forests got his money?

Hon. G.

Collins: Same answer.

MacPhail: Can the minister not tell us what date that was?

Hon. G.

Collins: It was the day after the release of the public accounts in 2002-03.

MacPhail: Okay. Well, I'm sure that British Columbians are finding this

debate extremely enlightening. First time the government has to debate some

legislation in the House, and the Minister of Finance is cranky, obstinate,

insulting and, in fact, refuses to engage in any discussion that would show how

accountable his government is being.

What is the

total value of the exemption in this legislation?

Hon. G.

Collins: Ten percent of $39,000.

MacPhail: Well, there are three cabinet ministers affected, so could the

minister actually give us a figure for it, please?

[1455]

Hon. G.

Collins: It's 10 percent of $39,000, which would be $3,900 times 3.

MacPhail: Does this pay that doesn't include the 150 bucks that the cabinet

ministers get to claim each day they're here in the capital city, which no other

government ever gave cabinet ministers…? It doesn't include that. Does this

exemption, the payment of the salary, come out of which budget —

contingencies?

Hon. G.

Collins: It comes out of the budget for the ministers.

MacPhail: Mr. Chair, just if I could ask…. Am I to ask questions about the

Minister of Forests and the exemptions under that of the Minister of Finance or

the Minister of Agriculture? Whom am I to ask those questions of?

Hon. G.

Collins: This bill is under my name. I am prepared to answer every question

that I can. If I can't, then I'm glad to refer them to other ministers if

perhaps they have more detail.

MacPhail: I was just curious, Mr. Chair, because the Minister of Finance is

very reluctant to answer any

[ Page 8899 ]

questions and seems to be extremely defensive. I'm so nervous about going

into this next area, not knowing what temper tantrum he may demonstrate against

the people of British Columbia.

Oh, let me

ask another question before we move on from

section 1, Mr. Chair, and then we

can pass

section 1. In terms of the allocation of moneys for the fiscal year

'04-05, how much money has been allocated to deal with the BSE crisis in order

to avoid a repetition of this kind of legislation?

Hon. G.

Collins: That would be an appropriate question for the estimates of the

Minister of Agriculture, which will be coming up sometime later in this session.

MacPhail: Oh, gosh. Either I'm not doing my research, or I'm not in the

right place. Whatever it is, the Minister of Finance just doesn't want to answer

the questions. Well, how much money…? I already know because I had an

excellent discussion with the Minister of Agriculture under the supplementary

estimates about the money being paid to BSE. My question is completely

appropriate. What is this government doing to avoid having to provide exemptions

to ministers in the future?

Hon. G.

Collins: We forecast as best we can. We try and make sure that they are

conservative forecasts in estimates throughout the year. However, from time to

time there are either unforeseen circumstances — natural disasters, which we

saw this past year — or, in some cases, additional opportunities as we had

last year with the Ministry of Forests, in an effort to restructure the forest

sector.

Government

sets a budget to the best of our ability. Issues may arise during the fiscal

year for which we think it's appropriate to come back to the House for

additional supply. In that case, we defend those supply estimates as you saw

last week with the debate between the member opposite and the Minister of

Agriculture that related to the year for which the supply was being asked. The

debate around what supply is granted to the Minister of Agriculture for next

year's budget will appropriately happen during the estimates for the Ministry of

Agriculture later in this session.

MacPhail: Well, the Minister of Agriculture was far more forthcoming than

the Minister of Finance, but I understand this is a troubling week for the

Minister of Finance. I totally understand what a troubling week it is for him.

What are

the forecasts, Mr. Chair? Or are we in a situation now where, in this

Legislature, unless we obey the rules to the exact point, there will be no

questions answered about past budgets or future budgets? Is that the rule the

Minister of Finance is laying down right now?

Hon. G.

Collins: Just to put it on the record, I actually had a great

weekend, and I'm feeling pretty good. I'm just trying not to waste the member's

time and my time, and I'm trying to make sure we stay in order.

Mr.

Chairman, as I said earlier and I'll say it again, the estimates debate around

the supplemental estimate for the Minister of Agriculture happened last week. I

thought it was a good exchange between the members. The estimates for next year

for all these three ministries that are itemized or mentioned in this bill will

take place later in this spring session. That is where the estimates take place.

This is not an estimates debate. This is not an estimates discussion. This is a

discussion around a piece of legislation for which there are three sections. If

the member has questions that are in order for those three sections, then I'm

more than happy to answer them.

[1500]

MacPhail: It's interesting how this Government House Leader likes to follow

the rules when it is to his advantage, but at other times, when perhaps members

are offended by the way he conducts business in the House or his government, he

says: "Oh, got nothing to do with me, absolutely nothing to do with

me." Doesn't reply to motions of privilege. Doesn't explain how he allows

raids on the Legislature here by the police. None of that…

The

Chair: Member. Member.

MacPhail: …has anything to do with him.

The

Chair: Member, I ask you once again to keep your questions relevant to this

section.

MacPhail: Yes, Chair, and I will.

This

government tabled a three-year fiscal plan. The three-year fiscal plan has

always been debated, since he bragged so much about bringing in a three-year

fiscal plan. Is he now saying that there cannot be any questions about what

preparation this government has done about the BSE crisis, which is an extremely

serious and ongoing crisis amongst cattle ranchers in this province?

Hon. G.

Collins: It sounds to me like somebody else didn't have a great weekend. I

did.

The debate

around what's in this year's three-year fiscal plan which starts April 1 will

occur in the Ministry of Agriculture estimates as it has from time immemorial in

this House. The member will have more than ample opportunity to ask any

questions that are relevant to the Ministry of Agriculture estimates and the

BSE. She should feel free to do that. I can't wait for that debate. I'm sure it

will be scintillating. That's the appropriate place for those kinds of

questions.

MacPhail: Well, it will be interesting to see whether this government

actually wants to examine its three-year fiscal plan, something that they

bragged about so much when they introduced their budgets: "We've got a plan

for three years, and we're in charge, and feel good about the fact that we're

planning." Now

[ Page 8900 ]

the Minister of Finance refuses to answer questions about it. Isn't that

interesting? Not exactly the openness and accountability that the government

promised.

Hon. G.

Collins: The fact of the matter is that there will probably be several

hundreds of hours of debate in the Legislature during this spring session with

regard to the estimates, not just from the Minister of Agriculture but all the

other ministries as well. That's where they're in order. They're not in order

for this bill. That's just the way it is. She may not like that, but that's the

fact.

Section 1

approved.

On

section

MacPhail: Is the Minister of Finance going to answer questions about

Firestorm 2003 in this debate, or is he rejecting that as well?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm more than happy to answer any questions that are relevant to

the

section that's before the House.

MacPhail: What were the expenditures by the Ministry of Forests that have

led to this legislation exempting the Minister of Forests from the ministerial

accountability act?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'd refer the member to page 120 of the budget and fiscal plan

which was tabled, I think, two weeks ago tomorrow. Table 4.5 actually lists

those.

MacPhail: Could the minister read it out, please?

Hon. G.

Collins: If the member wants, I can do this for her, but I'm sure she has a

copy of this.

For the

Ministry of Forests, in the budget there was — in the third quarterly report

which also came out on budget day — $375 million for direct forest fire costs

and forest remediation of $15 million.

MacPhail: Part of the issue here is that the public gets to participate in

the dialogue and the debate around here. Referring to documents is probably a

little bit disrespectful of the public.

Can the

minister break down the $375 million for me, please?

Hon. G.

Collins: I think what's disrespectful of the public is not doing your

research before you come to the floor of the House from very basic government

documents that are available on the website for the public to see as well.

Interjection.

[H. Long in the chair.]

Hon. G.

Collins: Mr. Chairman, I would assume the member hasn't done it because

she's asking for information contained in a public document as well as the

website.

[1505]

MacPhail: Doesn't play well, Mr. Chair.

Please,

could the minister break down the number for me?

Hon. G.

Collins: I have some revised estimates for the member which are up to date

and were prepared recently. For salaries and benefits it was $21.029 million;

operating costs, $297.917 million; government transfers, $25 million. There were

external recoveries which would offset those costs to the tune of $2.136

million. The current numbers total is $341.810 million.

MacPhail: Then is the $15 million separate and apart from that — the $15

million that the minister listed outside of the $375 million in his first

comments?

Hon. G.

Collins: It's included in there.

MacPhail: So on the budget day the estimated cost was $390 million total,

and we now have an estimated cost of $341 million. The minister said they're

more recent costs.

I'm glad

I'm asking these questions. Gosh, even an update. What's the latest estimate

date?

Hon. G.

Collins: These questions are relevant. That's why we're actually getting

good information.

That is

relative to February 25 of this year. The third quarter report came out with the

budget on February 17. That's the third quarterly report for the year we're in

as well. Those numbers would have been locked in, in January sometime probably.

This is a more recent estimate.

MacPhail: Can the minister explain what government transfer costs of about

$25 million include?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm advised those are transfers to local government.

MacPhail: And what were they for?

Hon. G.

Collins: Firefighting.

MacPhail: What aspects of firefighting, please?

Hon. G.

Collins: Municipalities were heavily involved in helping to fight these

fires, primarily because a great many of them were interface fires — i.e.,

they were right up against communities. Local governments were involved in

helping to fight those fires, and I believe — and I've been advised — these

are transfers to those local governments to offset their costs.

MacPhail: Well, it is a $25 million expenditure, and this isn't the federal

Liberal government, so I assume there are more details to the cutting of those

[ Page 8901 ]

cheques. How much went for firefighting equipment? How much went for policing

costs? How much went for municipal firefighting costs? How much went for

interface firefighting costs? If the minister wouldn't mind giving me those

details.

Hon. G.

Collins: I have broken them out in general terms for the overall budget. I

don't have the information that breaks out the $15 million for the member, but I

would certainly be pleased to get that and get it over to the member. I don't

have it now.

MacPhail: Could the minister break down the operating costs for fighting

fires in terms of the nature of the operating costs? The costs for salaries are

separate. I'll get to that in a moment. Over what period of time does this

expenditure of $297 million occur?

[1510]

Hon. G.

Collins: Well, it would have taken place…. The statutory approval that the

House would have given for this $297.917 million would have taken place during

the firefighting season. They would have run their budget, they would have

reached the end of their budget during the fire season, and at that point the

statutory provision for funding kicks in. They would continue to do what they

needed to do to fight those fires for the duration of the fire season. It's

unlikely that there will be more fires before the end of the fiscal year, but I

suppose that's possible. For the most part, these would have been fought during

the summer and fall last year.

MacPhail: Well, I'd actually like specific dates. That's why we're here.

When does the first penny of the $297 million get spent? And to what date does

it get spent? I want to know how long the original allocation of funds lasted,

so dates are very important here, Mr. Chair.

Hon. G.

Collins: The budget for the Ministry of Forests for firefighting would have

been used until such point during last year's fiscal year that they went over

that amount. At that point the statutory provision — I think it's

section 16

of the Forest Practices Code — would have kicked in, and they would have had

statutory approval to spend additional funds. I can try and have somebody do the

math and figure out what day that was, and get back to the member.

MacPhail: Well, I'm not quite sure why we're not prepared to have this

discussion now, Mr. Chair. It's these expenditures being made in a fashion that

is so necessary that is providing the impetus for exempting the Minister of

Forests from the ministerial accountability budget. This is the place where we

get to ask these questions.

Well, the

minister did his first quarter report. How much money was spent as of June 30,

2003, by the Ministry of Forests in their fire protection budget, or whatever

the…? I think the line is called fire protection.

Hon. G.

Collins: My job is not to do the research for the member opposite. She can

go to the first quarterly report and find that number. I believe, if I'm

correct, that it was about the middle of the third week of August that the

ministry actually had, at that point, fully expended its forest fire fighting

budget. I believe it was about the middle of the third week of August.

MacPhail: Well, I'm going to assume it was the middle of the third week of

August. I don't know why the minister didn't answer that question when I first

asked it. At what rate did the $297 million for operating costs get expended

after the third week of August?

Hon. G.

Collins: I think, if the member recalls the first quarterly report

discussion, the second quarterly report discussion, as well as open cabinet, as

well as the public pronouncements of the various ministers, as well as the media

commentary of the time…. At some point during the forest fire season, we were

expending money at the rate of almost $10 million a day, I believe — at the

very height of it. It was around that figure.

Of course,

that would have gone up and down depending on the day and the hour, for that

matter. Some days it would have been less; some days it would have been more. It

would depend on the winds and the weather, how many lightning strikes there were

the night before — all of those things. Throughout the season, it ranked from

probably not zero but close to zero to up to $10 million a day, as I believe the

figure was at about the height of it. So it would be different. It wouldn't be

just a straight line up and a straight line down through the season. It would

vary day by day and, indeed, hour by hour.

MacPhail: Well, does the minister have an accounting of that? I'm not

talking about salaries here; I'm talking about operating costs.

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm sure that if the member wants a day-by-day breakdown of the

forest fire fighting season, we can certainly provide her with that. I expect it

would take staff some time — if not some days perhaps — to gather that

information and put it together in a format that was usable to the member. We'd

be happy to do that. We just can't do it right this minute.

[1515]

MacPhail: Well, the Firestorm 2003 report by the Hon. Gary Filmon, which was

released to the public on Friday, talks about assignment of equipment and the

pace at which equipment was assigned. I would have assumed the government, in

lessons learned from the forest fire season…. In no way do I begrudge any

expenditure in fighting the fire season of 2003 — or any year, for that matter

— but what I'm wanting to know is, given the government's expenditure in 2003,

what lessons they have learned and how they're applying these lessons to

meet….

What I

think the Premier said was that he was going to embrace every single

recommendation of the

[ Page 8902 ]

Filmon report when he first appointed Mr. Filmon. What I'm trying to figure

out is, given the fact that the original Forestry budget ran out in the third

week of August — which would have been the beginning of the third week of the

major firestorm in this province — and I think the forest fire budget was only

about $55 million from '02-03 in the original estimate: how did the operating

costs unfold from that time? It's so that we can learn whether the operating

costs were expended in a meaningful way in challenging the forest fires.

Hon. G.

Collins: The Premier said at open cabinet last Friday, as did the two

ministers who were involved in this — the Minister of Forests and the Minister

of Public Safety and Solicitor General — that government obviously will be

planning a response to what we did learn from the Filmon review, which I think

was very helpful and beneficial. I expect when the estimates of those two

ministers come up, they'll have more to say in response to some of the

recommendations of the Filmon report.

MacPhail: The minister is suggesting that the questions around the Firestorm

2003 report by Mr. Filmon are best answered when?

Hon. G.

Collins: The report was released on Friday in open cabinet. Both ministers,

I believe — and I certainly know the Premier was — were asked questions

about it, as was Mr. Filmon. The ministry has only had…. I think this report

was presented to government — I'm not sure — about two weeks ago or a week

and a half ago or something. I'm not positive on that. I expect it will take the

ministries some time to go through that report and take whatever lessons there

are.

They may be

able to learn some lessons virtually overnight and implement them overnight.

Others may take longer. In fact, I think some of the interface challenges we

face deal with building codes and zoning in local communities, which may take

years perhaps. I hope it doesn't take that long, but that could happen. It's

really in their hands. I'm assuming that everybody who has anything they can

learn from the Filmon report will be taking that to heart and trying as best

they can, in as timely a fashion as they can, to build on those recommendations

and try and avert any future damage to the extent that we can.

MacPhail: We're also discussing this in Public Accounts, where there have

been dozens of recommendations around interface forest fires as well. Now the

public has the Filmon report, and I recall that the Premier said, when he

appointed Mr. Filmon, that he would implement all of his recommendations. Now

I'm trying to find out, in terms of money expended in '03, what money may be

available to expend to meet the recommendations of Mr. Filmon. That's all I'm

trying to do here.

When did

Mr. Filmon meet with any cabinet member — either the Premier or cabinet

committee or cabinet — over the course of his report?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm not aware of any meetings he would have or might have had. I

just don't know that.

MacPhail: When was the first time Mr. Filmon's report was discussed by

cabinet or cabinet committee?

[1520]

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm trying to think what my memory is on this. The issue of the

Filmon report obviously was discussed shortly after the appointment was made —

and the work he might do. I don't recall that discussion other than the fact of

being made aware that it was occurring. As far as a discussion with regard to

Mr. Filmon's actual report, to my knowledge the first time that was discussed in

any big way would have been probably prior to the open cabinet discussion, but I

don't recall that directly. To be honest, I haven't attended every cabinet

meeting in the last while. I've sort of been busy with budget and other items.

MacPhail: When did Treasury Board first discuss the firestorm…? When did

Treasury Board deal with Mr. Filmon's proceedings?

Hon. G.

Collins: It has yet to deal with Mr. Filmon's report.

MacPhail: No, I said his proceedings.

Hon. G.

Collins: Perhaps she could tell me what she means by his proceedings.

MacPhail: The actual cost of him conducting his proceedings. Who was

actually monitoring — if anybody — Mr. Filmon's progress around the

province? There were public servants presenting at every public hearing,

practically, of Mr. Filmon's. That monitoring was going on. We had reports at

the Public Accounts Committee that the bureaucracy was monitoring it. Those

aren't any secrets.

When did

Treasury Board deal with the bills that arose from Firestorm 2003, or have they

yet? Is it that the Minister of Finance is saying he isn't personally aware of

any discussions that the cabinet had around Mr. Filmon's progress and report, or

is he saying it didn't occur?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm not sure to what extent I'm permitted to comment on what goes

on at cabinet meetings, so I'll be a bit cautious here, other than to say that

as far as Treasury Board goes, we have yet to deal with the report that was

issued by Mr. Filmon.

Certainly,

throughout last year Treasury Board staff worked closely with the Ministry of

Forests and the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General in monitoring

— as best you can in those very difficult, challenging times — the

expenditures, the possible expenditures, etc. They kept us at Treasury Board and

me, in

[ Page 8903 ]

particular, as Minister of Finance apprised of the general status of how much

money was being spent. I made it clear, as did the Premier, that the fires

needed to be fought and that government would do what was necessary in order to

put the fires out and ensure public safety to the best of our ability.

MacPhail: I'm sorry. I wasn't questioning that last part. It was around the

proceedings of Mr. Filmon. Is the minister aware of any meeting…?

The

Chair: Member, stay relevant to

section 2, please, to do with Forestry.

MacPhail: Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. Perhaps just for your information, Mr.

Chair, I'm trying to figure out how long the government is going to take to

prepare for fighting forest fires or has taken in terms of examining the

expenditures that occurred during '03.

Is the

minister aware of any meeting that Mr. Filmon had with any cabinet members prior

to the release of his report, including the Premier?

Hon. G.

Collins: I've already answered that. I'm not aware of any. I just don't

know.

The

Chair: Leader of the Opposition on

section 2, because….

MacPhail: Okay, I did ask that. I was repeating the question I asked that

the minister didn't answer — whether he was aware or if he's saying they

didn't occur. So it's that the minister wasn't aware of any meetings personally.

In terms of

the briefing the cabinet received from Mr. Filmon and the explanation of his

report….

The

Chair: Member, please. This has nothing to do with the

section we're dealing

with now. Would you stay relevant to

section 2, please.

MacPhail: At what point did cabinet discuss in detail the costs arising out

of fighting the forest fires of 2003?

Hon. G.

Collins: We certainly discussed them during last year's fiscal year as they

were occurring. It was one of the items that came forward whenever it was

appropriate as part of the general briefing on the status of the fires. I think

it's fair to say that at cabinet, it was an item for discussion in general while

they were ongoing. I can certainly recall advising cabinet at various stages

throughout when those discussions were happening, in general terms, of what we

thought the current expenditure was and what the likely expenditure might be at

the end of the fiscal year.

[1525]

MacPhail: Did Treasury Board and/or cabinet do its own investigation into

the costs of the forest fire season of 2003 from October onward?

Hon. G.

Collins: Obviously, Treasury Board staff were responsible for working with

ministries to track expenditures to ensure that expenditures were made in the

most cost-effective way possible, and we've been doing that on an ongoing basis.

Even during the fire process, there was a certain amount of that being done, but

obviously the objective there was not to get in the way of having the

appropriate resources at the appropriate place at the appropriate time — a

very challenging job. We did try to keep abreast of those costs as best we could

throughout the year, without getting in the way of the people that were actually

trying to get the resources in the right place.

MacPhail: Did Treasury Board come to any conclusions separate and apart from

the Filmon report?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm trying to think of any. There was not an investigation done, as

the member put it earlier. We obviously tracked the expenditures.

We try to

make sure that expenditures are made in the most cost-effective way possible. We

do that on a daily basis, and I expect that on a daily basis we find areas we

can improve. If we do, we try to improve that day if possible. It's really an

ongoing process.

It's not as

though Treasury Board staff did an investigation or anything like that and there

was a report with findings. We always viewed that as the job of the public

review that was going to be done by Mr. Filmon, but Treasury Board staff, as

well as the ministries, have been working right from the first day of the fires

to the last day — and probably the same next year — to try to make sure we

get the best value for the dollars that we spend.

MacPhail: Then I take it Treasury Board was relying on the work of Mr.

Filmon to determine the value of the expenditures. When did Treasury Board meet

with Mr. Filmon?

Hon. G.

Collins: I'm not sure how that's relevant, but I'll try to answer it as best

I can. Treasury Board itself…. The members of Treasury Board — myself and

those cabinet members and other members who sit on Treasury Board — have never

met with Mr. Filmon directly. He was conducting an independent review. He was

conducting public hearings. He did that. He's made a report to government.

Obviously,

Treasury Board and Treasury Board staff will be looking at that review. We will

also be expecting submissions from the various ministries that are involved for

how we respond to the recommendations of Mr. Filmon and how that might impact

the budget next year.

MacPhail: Well, let me tell you how it's relevant, Mr. Chair. I just asked

the minister whether Treasury Board did its own investigation of $341 million of

taxpayer money being expended. He said they didn't. They were keeping track on a

daily basis, but they were relying on the Filmon report.

[ Page 8904 ]

Well, I

have read the Filmon report. I do confess that I haven't read it a second time,

but I don't see anywhere here a line-by-line breakdown of the examination of the

expenditures by Mr. Filmon. By the way, it's a gratuitous comment, but I think

Mr. Filmon did an excellent job in his report. There's no line-by-line breakdown

of the expenditures for which we are now exempting the Minister of Forests from

the ministerial accountability act, so Mr. Filmon didn't do that work. I don't

recall him being required to do that work.

Point of Order

The

Chair: Point of order, member. What you're questioning the minister on at

this time has nothing to do with

section 2. The Filmon report really has nothing

to do with

section 2 in this area. If you'd like to carry on, Leader of the

Opposition, on

section 2.

Debate Continued

MacPhail: This is going to be a long sitting, I can tell — a long sitting.

Interjection.

MacPhail: Well, it might be your last one or second-to-last one, member from

Nelson, so I don't think you have to worry. You can relax.

I am trying

to find out what lessons were learned from the expenditures around forest fire

fighting that are now leading to the exemption of the Minister of Forests from

the ministerial accountability act. I am trying to find out what the government

itself — separate and apart from the Filmon report, which does not go into

detail about expenditures — has learned. That's the link, Mr. Chair.

[1530]

I'm sorry.

I don't know any other way to ask the question. If Mr. Filmon doesn't deal with

the expenditures that are leading to the exemption of the Minister of

Forests…. I'm trying to find out from the Minister of Finance what lessons he

has learned.

To the

Minister of Finance: in preparing for the budget of '04-05 — I'm not asking

him to reveal cabinet confidentiality or Treasury Board confidentiality —

where there has actually been a reduction in the fire protection expenditures,

did he do a line-by-line examination of operating costs?

Hon. G.

Collins: The lesson we've learned as it applies to this piece of legislation

is that last year was an exceptional year for forest fires and their associated

costs. We are seeking an exemption from the members of this House to the salary

holdback provision for the members as a result of those exceptional costs. The

issue about what we've learned and how we're going to implement that in the

years ahead obviously is going to be part of the discussion for the Ministry of

Forests estimates for this year.

The Filmon

report came out on Friday. It's now Monday. The ministry will be responding to

that; government will be responding to that. I expect that we'll hear from the

Ministry of Forests and the Solicitor General as part of this year's Treasury

Board process — probably relatively soon — what they think the implied or

embedded costs might be in the recommendations Mr. Filmon has put forward and

how government might respond to them.

As for

lessons that we've learned, I expect we probably learned lessons every hour of

every day throughout the forest fire season on how to fight them, how to deal

with administrative burdens, how to expedite payments and how to do all of those

sorts of things. We're probably in an ongoing learning exercise from within

government and within local government as well.

We would

obviously, as I said earlier, be putting those lessons into play as soon as we

could. There is no internal report that's been done inside government that I'm

aware of, which says: "Here's what we learned from the forest fire season.

Here's what we'll do differently." I expect there've already been changes

implemented with regard to Mr. Filmon's report. I expect there will be

additional recommendations implemented and followed through in the years ahead.

But as it relates to this

section of this bill, the lesson learned that requires

the exemption is that last year was an exceptional year for forest fires. Under

the statutes we're required and permitted by the House to flow the funds

required to put those fires out. We've done that. That pushes the ministries

over budget, and that's why we're asking the House for an exemption for those

ministers, given the extenuating circumstances.

MacPhail: There's a saying that the exception proves the rule. What I'm

trying to figure out from the minister is what rules he has applied to last

year's budget that may be replicated or changed in this year's budget.

Let me ask

through you, Mr. Chair, then. I'm very worried about this expenditure falling

through the cracks of what seems to be a fairly rigorous and autocratic

enforcement of the rules of the House. Is it the Minister of Finance's point of

view, then, that I will be able to ask a detailed question on expenditures

relating to the money that is now being exempted from the ministerial

accountability of the Minister of Forests in estimates?

Hon. G.

Collins: I can do a little better than that, so perhaps we can have a more

informed debate around the Ministry of Forests or Solicitor General's estimates.

If the member wants to put specific questions in writing to me about the

breakout she'd like of those expenditures, as I said earlier, we'll try and put

that together and get it to her. If she wants more detail as to how the money

was spent over the last year as we fought these fires, I'd be glad to provide

that to the member in written form so she can analyze it, she can look at it and

she can determine her questions. Then when the ministry's estimates come up, I

would expect that a question to a minister about what's changed and what they're

going to try and do in the year ahead would be perfectly in order.

[ Page 8905 ]

[1535]

MacPhail: Here, I'm putting it to the minister now that of the $341 million

expended to February 25, 2004, I would like a detailed accounting of the

expenditures. I don't want the Treasury Board or the Ministers of Forests or of

Finance to have to go into more detail than they already have available, but I

would like the expenditures in as small calendar portions as they have provided.

That includes the salaries, the operating costs, the government transfers and

the external recoveries. I would appreciate that. I will be using that in

estimates to ask the Minister of Forests questions on comparisons last year to

anticipation this year.

Hon. G.

Collins: As I said, I think that is entirely appropriate, and we will gather

the information for the member. She may get more than she wants rather than less

than she wants, because there is a great deal of data. I will be glad to provide

that to her, and we will try to do that as quickly as we can, knowing that

estimates for those ministries will be up some time before the end of May. So,

we'll try and get those to her in a timely fashion.

Section 2

approved.

On

section

MacPhail: What areas of service were provided that are listed as the cost

for exempting the Solicitor General from the ministerial accountability act?

Hon. G.

Collins: I think that's probably the same question she asked about Forestry,

so correct me if I'm wrong. Again, on page 120, table 4.5 of the third quarterly

report for government last year and the fiscal year we're in right now, the

numbers for Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General were $58 million for

emergency response and $5 million for related compensation. I can try and get

the member an updated number. I think that's the update. It's $55 million and $5

million instead of $58 million, so it's come down by $3 million.

MacPhail: I recall the Squamish flooding. What other services were provided

in what other areas of the province to warrant the overexpenditure?

Hon. G.

Collins: Again, if the member were to go back to page 120 of the

budget/third quarterly report, table 4.5…. For floods, it says prior-year

floods and others, $12 million; 2003 floods, $13 million; for a total of $25

million. The amended numbers are…. Actually, they're the same. I don't believe

that number has changed. Sorry. It has changed a little bit. That total has come

down. Let me check for the member. I'll get an update on it.

Sorry.

Those numbers are essentially unchanged.

MacPhail: What does "prior-year flood" mean?

Hon. G.

Collins: Each year, I expect, there are floods of some kind — we hope

none, but they seem to be just about every year. There are the costs you

actually incur and pay for in dealing with the flood and emergency response.

Once you close the books on that year and you're into the next fiscal year,

there may still be diking or other things that need to be done as part of the

response to the floods. Those get booked in the year you are in because the

accounts would have closed for the previous year.

MacPhail: That was $13 million of the $55 million? As I recall, it's the $13

million of the $55 million. Is this done every year in this fashion?

Hon. G.

Collins: Yes.

[1540]

MacPhail: Perhaps the minister could just tell me…. Well, actually, I will

ask for the same detail. This discussion probably is more appropriate…. If the

minister, as Government House Leader, is making the same commitment to allow

this discussion under the Solicitor General estimates, then I would ask for a

breakdown of the costs in the detailed fashion that the minister has, with an

additional factor — on a per-incident basis. Maybe he will offer this for

forest fire fighting as well.

Hon. G.

Collins: I will try to have it broken out on a per-incident basis. I'm not

sure how big a task that might be, but I will certainly try to do that if the

information is available and if we can do that.

Just for

information purposes, on an annual basis we budget approximately $17 million a

year for previous-year cleanup of additional floods — those types of things

— going forward. Each year you have some of this that falls over from previous

years. The number in the budget is about $17 million for that.

Yes, I

certainly will undertake to get more detail for the member. I think that just

helps to enlighten the debate in estimates when it actually happens. If the

information is available on a per-incident basis, then we'll try and break that

out as well — although given the member's earlier comments about not wanting

to create a huge task for ministry staff, if it's not available, we'll try to do

the best we can with the information. I don't think it will be a wise use of

their time, but it's up to the member to ask. I will try and get her what we

can.

MacPhail: If the government budgets for a previous-year cleanup related to

provincial emergencies — the minister said that for the budget of '02-03 they

budgeted $17 million, and we now have an additional $13 million being allocated

for this ministerial exemption — does that mean there was a total of $30

million in previous year adjustment? Why is this $13 million included in this

exemption for the Solicitor General?

[1545]

Hon. G.

Collins: I will try and walk the member through this as best I can. If one

looks at floods for the

[ Page 8906 ]

Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General for this year's budget,

'03-04, we started the year with a forecast of $9 million for the prior year,

plus $3 million for a little bit of the stuff we thought might be coming — so

for a total of about $11 million there. Sorry, 9 and 3 make 12. Then we had

approximately $7 million in the budget for the current year for flooding —

direct costs of flooding that would be booked this year — which gets us up to

approximately $19 million.

The actual

number came in…. At the second quarterly report we were forecasting about $29

million at that point in time. That number has come down to $25 million. There

is about $14 million left in the budget there, because $3 million of that would

have gone up because the emergency response for floods and fires is sort of

together. The actual amount in the budget for this year would have been $14

million, which requires the additional burden of $11 million for fighting the

floods for the emergency response this year. If you want a bigger breakout, I

would love to get it for you.

MacPhail: Mr. Chair, I'm sorry. I do confess I didn't understand that, and

it's not a criticism. I just don't understand what the minister is talking

about.

Here's my

question. The Solicitor General can answer this in estimates. I want to know

what money is expended on previous-year adjustment for flood expenditure that

was over and above the budget of '03-04 for previous-year adjustment.

[1550]

Here's why,

Mr. Chair. I want to know whether the Solicitor General was within or under his

original budget.

Hon. G.

Collins: According to our discussion here, the amount that was budgeted this

year we're in right now, 2003-04, for prior years was $12 million. That's in the

second quarterly report as well as the third quarterly report. It has not

changed. That was what was in the budget, and that was what was expended. The

prior year's stuff is on track. It's this year's expenditures that are over.

MacPhail: So did the minister misspeak himself when he said that about $13

million of payments was for previous-year adjustment?

Hon. G.

Collins: I may have. It would have been $13 million for the current year. It

was $12 million for prior years. I'm referring to page 120 of the quarterly

report. It's possible I could have mixed up the two when I was reading them to

the member.

Let me be

clear that the prior year in "other" was $12 million. For the current

year, at the second quarterly report it was up to $17 million as a forecast. It

came down. The estimate of that came down by approximately $4 million between

the second and the third quarterly report to the point where that number —

floods — for the current year, 2003, is approximately $13 million. I may have

mixed up the 12 and 13. I don't recall, but that could have happened.

MacPhail: I will appreciate an accounting that includes prior-year

adjustments for fighting floods — prior-year adjustments for '02-03, what was

estimated and then what, if any, prior-year adjustments are included in the

supplementary estimate passed last week.

Hon. G.

Collins: We can certainly provide that to the member. In response to the

last part of her question, in the

schedule to the attachment that was passed

last week, which included the statutory approval, there was an additional $5

million for this fiscal year for possible and anticipated flooding between

February 25 when we put that estimate, the schedule, together and the end of

March — so the last five, six, seven weeks of the year. Certainly, if you had

expended the money at this point…. You could still get another flood in the

spring, so we wanted to make sure they had provision for that.

We hope,

obviously, we don't have to draw on any of that, but just to make sure the

member is aware that there is an additional…. If she were to go back and

compare it with the schedule, there would be a $5 million additional amount put

in there. That's for the year we're in right now. Certainly, we'll try and break

this out for the member and provide a bit more detail perhaps, if she'd like,

than what's on table 4.5 of the third quarterly report.

Sections 3

and 4 approved.

Schedule

approved.

Title

approved.

Hon. G.

Collins: I move the committee rise and report the bill complete without

amendment.

Motion

approved.

The

committee rose at 3:54 p.m.

The House

resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

[1555]

Report and

Third Reading of Bills

Mr.

Speaker: When shall the bill be read a third time?

Hon. G.

Collins: By leave, now, Mr. Speaker.

Leave

granted.

Bill

10, Ministerial Accountability Bases Act, 2003-2004, reported complete without

amendment, read a third time and passed.

Hon. G.

Collins: I call Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne.

[ Page 8907 ]

Throne Speech Debate

(continued)

Krueger: A lot of good things happened in British Columbia in February. One

of the best things, the thing that got a lot of them rolling, was the Speech

from the Throne on February 10. The throne speech kicked it all off for us with

its tremendous message of hope and opportunity for British Columbians.

As a person

flips through it, the accomplishments of the government over the past several

years, particularly the incredible accomplishment of delivering on our

balanced-budget pledge, have set the stage for a lot more good things that are

coming down the pike. Looking at the area of bringing out the best in

partnerships with first nations, we think of the four agreements-in-principle

that have now been arrived at, the 124 economic measures, the 150 treaty-related

measures and other agreements involving first nations in resource management. We

see British Columbia finally shaking off the shackles of this problem that we

have had in helping first nations people become empowered as genuine partners in

the economy — having the resources to build their capacity, having the ability

to deliver a better working and living environment for the people on their

reserves and in their communities.

Bringing

out the best in transportation and northern development. I grew up in Peace

River country, and my family had the BCR run through our homestead, which was 20

miles north of Fort St. John. We had developed that farm from bushland, and it

was a great day when the BCR came through our farm.

When I made

my remarks in this House about the BCR partnership, the lease arrangement, I got

an e-mail from a fellow who had worked for the BCR when it came through our

farm. He had been involved in the conveyancing and worked with my parents on

achieving the right-of-way. He was so pleased — he was a long-term,

over-30-years man with BCR — with the government and the direction that it was

taking, and so are the people of the north.

I still

have a piece of my heart in the Peace River country — always will. I am just

delighted with the benefits that are flowing to the north as a result of the BCR

agreement. I'm so pleased with what the government plans to do with the proceeds

and with the way that is going to revitalize places that I have been to many

times and care about tremendously, like Prince George, Prince Rupert, Terrace

and the Cariboo. We live in a wonderfully diverse province, and it hurt to see

it brought to its economic knees the way it was in the 1990s. It's great to see

these good things happening.

Bringing

out the best in B.C.'s forest economy. I have worked for eight years to try and

free up the salvage loggers of the North Thompson Valley to actually be able to

bring the logs out of the forest to eliminate the fire hazard and the bug

infestation hazard that dead logs lying in the forest bring about, and to

realize the economic opportunities. I've had salvage loggers come to me in total

frustration because they have the equipment, the knowledge and the abilities,

but they haven't been able to get the permit to work in the bush. A group of

MLAs from this government worked long and hard on the small-scale salvage

logging committee. We brought forward recommendations to the Minister of

Forests, and he listened to them. We worked through that whole process. Now we

see the money set aside in the budget to deliver on that opportunity at last.

[1600]

I have felt

very badly to see our pine forests decimated by the pine bark beetle over these

last years. We saw the problem coming out of Tweedsmuir Park when everything got

rolling with the pine beetles. Once again, we didn't see enough of a response by

the government in the nineties. Now we have a lot of dead trees to deal with,

but it's a huge economic opportunity. It's a big economic opportunity for my

constituents particularly, again, in the North Thompson Valley, whose economy

was decimated first by the NDP in the nineties and more recently by the changes

brought about by the forest fires and by the market issues that we have

worldwide around dimensional lumber and the pricing of it, the rise in the

Canadian dollar and all of those issues.

I was very

pleased to get the commitment of the chief forester, Larry Pedersen, that the

Kamloops TSA would be the first to have consideration of an uplift, and also

very pleased when that uplift turned out to be 1.67 million cubic metres a year

for three years. I anticipate there will be more after that, because we aren't

getting ahead of the pine bark beetle. That's a real opportunity for the people

of the North Thompson Valley. I've told them I will work hard and I am working

hard to get community forests for Barriere and Clearwater, and also to get a

non-renewable forest licence, if possible, to assure some income stream to the

community and give us the ability to create more jobs, to bring value-added

manufacturers and to get some things going in the North Thompson Valley to make

up for the primary manufacturing which we've lost. Once again, it's a

forward-thinking throne speech, an inspiring throne speech and one that gives

hope for the future to people who have been caught in a time of great economic

change in that valley.

Bringing

out the best in energy and mining. It's been wonderful to see our energy sector

pick up the way it is. I'm very pleased that the Premier created a Ministry of

State for Mining in order to make sure the mining industry also has this

opportunity, which the energy sector has already been prospering with, to once

again be the major economic player in our province that it was, that it can be

and that it will be again.

Bringing

out the best in the Spirit of 2010. What a wonderful time we live in, the

buildup to the Olympics. My wife and I were present at the great announcement in

Vancouver on July 2. Ever since then, the ideas have been percolating throughout

this province. Gradually out in the heartlands people are realizing what huge

opportunities there are. They hear the stories of the Kootenay sweater-knitting

company that has done so well because of its start with the Salt Lake

[ Page 8908 ]

City Olympics, the Cariboo log home builders who also have had their order

books filled because of their experiences and their marketing at the Salt Lake

City Olympics. We see just a ton of opportunity coming our way.

Best of

all, really, is the inspirational aspect of the Olympics for our youth —

something to really look forward to. Youth were pretty despondent in the 1990s.

I know this because I would go out and talk to them in the high schools. They

saw people leaving British Columbia, they didn't see much of a future, and that

was very sad. I grew up in British Columbia, and all my life I felt that I could

be anything I wanted to be. I could do anything I wanted to do, and whatever

career I picked I could certainly pursue and succeed at. People weren't feeling

that way. Young people weren't feeling that way in British Columbia in the

nineties, but now I think they do again. They've got the Olympics to look

forward to. They've got all sorts of opportunity. Young people who want to make

a living in the trades are going to have huge opportunities — they do already

— and employment prospects everywhere.

I'm proud

of our government's record on education and the fact that we continue to funnel

more money into education even though we have declining enrolment. We've not

only kept our commitment not to reduce the budgets of health care and education,

but we've put a great deal more in. I believe it's about $900 per student

funding more now than it was in the middle-nineties.

I was

thrilled with the announcement that we're going to create another 25,000 spaces

in post-secondary education. Mr. Speaker, as you know, the University College of

the Cariboo is one of the leading lights of our economy locally. It has close to

a thousand foreign students at any given time. It has thousands and thousands of

spaces for Canadians as well. It's an institution that's been tremendously

successful, and I see a very bright future in this document for UCC.

[1605]

goodness, it was a great news day when this throne speech came down. The fact

that we're going to make sure that students with a B average have access to

university — that's a great plus for me. I was a young man growing up in the

Peace River country on that farm. My family was not very well-off. Everything we

made, we plowed back into the farm. My mother supplemented my father's income by

selling World Book encyclopedias for over 30 years. They gave away two

scholarships a year in Canada. She told me early on: "The only way you're

ever going to make it to university is to win one of those, so make sure you get

the marks." I had my nose to the grindstone from grade 8 to grade 12 to get

straight As. I won one of those two scholarships the year I graduated, got down

to UBC wanting to become a doctor and found out to my chagrin that the chances

were pretty well zero that that would ever happen. There just weren't enough

spaces, and the ones that were assigned tended to go to the offspring of alumni

or the offspring of doctors.

This

government has created medical schools for Victoria and Prince George and has

doubled the number of spaces for doctors. Again, I'm tremendously pleased to be

part of a government that has opened up the way for people from the heartlands

to become doctors.

I like the

emphasis on sports, music, culture, and all of our plans to bring about Olympic

legacies for the people, particularly the young people of British Columbia — a

great message of hope and opportunity.

Another

good thing that happened, of course, in February was the balanced budget —

balanced against all odds, despite all the tremendous setbacks that the world

economy has had and certainly our economy has had to struggle with, be it the

9/11 horror and the way that it impacted the world and certainly our important

tourism sector, BSE, SARS, avian flu or forest fires. It seems like it's been

one thing after another, but this government has come through with its balanced

budget.

Then, of

course, another happy thing that happened in February was the kind gift of

Carole James and the NDP in publishing their alternate budget — the CCPA

budget, that is. This is an organization that's very much an appendage of the

NDP in everyone's mind, I think. Looking at their press release the day they put

that out, you read, "The solutions budget six-year plan restores the

province's fiscal capacity (tax revenues)," and that's where it takes off

from. Once again, it would be an attack — this Carole James NDP budget — on

the people who create jobs in British Columbia, the people that have at last

started coming back. Even talking about something like this or having it on the

CCPA or NDP websites is probably discouraging investors from considering B.C.

now, until the next election is over.

It struck

me, reading it, that the socialists who create this type of economic framework

must pretty much take the artful dodger point of view: you've got to pick a

pocket or two. They're certainly waiting for another opportunity to pick those

pockets. It's certainly not something that encourages anybody looking at British

Columbia to come here.

It goes on

to say that the CCPA, NDP and Carole James would like to create a meaningful

plan to stimulate private investment. They have only to look at their success

rate in the 1990s and how well they stimulated private investment then to know

that this is a tremendous mistake. But it's clearly a mistake that they're

prepared to make.

They say in

their press release of February 12 that there is no boom in private sector

investment on the horizon. Well, there certainly is, Mr. Speaker, and it's

already here. As you know, our construction rate in Kamloops in 2003 was double

what it was in 2002, and British Columbia is building — building for the

Olympics and building for the future.

The

CCPA-NDP budget talked about a fully funded early childhood education and child

care program. Well, that's something I'd love to see too, but even the NDP, who

said they were going to deliver it, never

[ Page 8909 ]

presumed to pretend that they had any budget for it — promised it, but

never set aside any budget for it at all.

It talks

about — well, my goodness — 25,000 new spaces in B.C.'s colleges and

universities. That's a familiar number. We certainly agree with that, and not

only have we committed to do it, but we have demonstrated that we have the

capacity to fund it. We will do that.

The CCPA

and NDP talk about increasing gasoline taxes $300 million. That would absolutely

incense the people of the heartlands. There's no way my constituents want

anything like that happening. We've got to drive to get to work, and my

constituents have to drive great distances in the forest and in their various

occupations. Increases in gasoline tax to that tune are certainly not welcome.

[1610]

There's all

sorts of talk in the CCPA budget about spending money, and clearly they're

willing to increase debt. They say they would balance the budget by 2010. That's

a far-off target, and it would be marching into the past to embrace the way the

NDP, Carole James and the CCPA propose to go.

They talk

about steeply progressive tax structures for incomes over $100,000. Well, once

again, those people don't have to stay in British Columbia. They certainly don't

have to come here, and they simply won't. They would leave the way that they did

all through the sad decade of the nineties.

We're

finally getting in-migration from across Canada again. In the last quarter of

2003 we had, I believe, 2,600 more people come to British Columbia than moved

away. That's a wonderful thing to see. We're seeing an uptake in real estate.

We're seeing a tremendous increase in construction. We're seeing these things

because of changes this government has brought about. British Columbians, I'm

confident, certainly won't want to march into the past with Carole James and the

NDP.

It was

generous of the NDP to fund the CCPA by giving them $200,000 of taxpayers' money

just as the NDP were being booted out the door. I've always viewed that as one

of the final thumbings of the NDP nose at the taxpayers of British Columbia. I

think it was a reprehensible thing to do.

The Carole

James–NDP–CCPA budget once again demonstrates that leopards really can't

change their spots. It's crafted by the same sort of socialist theory that

shipwrecked British Columbia's economy in the 1990s, and surely British

Columbians would never want to go back to those approaches.

I think

British Columbians got a wake-up call recently when the polls said the NDP and

the B.C. Liberals are in a dead heat at 40 percent each, of those who are

declaring their intentions to the pollsters. There have pretty much always been

about 40 percent of the people of this province who are persuaded that the NDP

has a philosophy that would work for British Columbia. The fact that there still

is, after the grim experience of the 1990s, is kind of confounding. It suggests

to me that a lot of those supporters live in the land of wishful thinkers —

people who just do not accept that socialist economics don't work.

They didn't

work in eastern Europe. They didn't work in Ontario, where the Bob Rae

government ran up $60 billion in debt in five years — $1 billion a month while

he was the Premier. They certainly didn't work in British Columbia when we saw

an absolute boom decade for all of North America. The only place that was doing

as badly as British Columbia in the 1990s was Chiapas, Mexico. It was a time

when we could have had our debt paid off; when we should not have had deficits;

when we should have built infrastructure and not had deficits in things like

seniors beds, extended care beds, highways — all the things that were allowed

to build up as hidden deficits in the nineties. None of that was necessary. We

should have been making hay while the sun shone, paying off debt and preparing

for a bright future for our children and grandchildren and all the generations

to follow. Instead, we had the sad results we did.

I'm sure

job creators are not at all interested in joining that 40 percent of people who

think that the NDP are the right way to go. The job creators don't want to stay

and will not stay where their pockets are going to be picked.

I don't

really think that any British Columbians want to go backwards, but people who

saw us forfeit that boom decade of the nineties are now saying again that

they're willing to take another look at the NDP. At least, that's what 40

percent of the people are telling pollsters.

There was a

Sunday school teacher who was talking to her class one time, and she said:

"What is it that is red and climbs trees really well and stores nuts for

the winter?" She went on with a few more hints. One little boy put his hand

up and said: "Well, I'm going to say Jesus, but it sounds like a squirrel

to me." He said that because quite often in Sunday school, children feel

they're pretty well obliged to give an answer that relates to scripture.

It strikes

me that perhaps when these people say they do support the NDP, regardless of the

CCPA, the NDP and the Carole James budget…. Regardless of them saying they can

balance a budget when we have their sorry record for all to see, those people

are saying: "Well, I'm going to say NDP, but it sounds like a squirrel to

me."

[1615]

When I was

three and a half years old, my mother went into hospital to have my brother, and

my dad cooked for us. This was a traumatic time for me. It seemed as though my

mother had left a vat of Spanish rice. I was only three and a half, so it

probably wasn't as big as it is in my memory, but it seemed gigantic to me, and

it seemed never-ending. It probably wasn't true, but according to my memory, all

we ate the whole time my mom was in the hospital was Spanish rice and lettuce

with French dressing on it. He'd take his great big carpenter-farmer's hand and

take a great big head of lettuce. He'd saw off a lettuce steak about an inch and

a half thick. He'd slather French dressing on that, he'd lay it on my plate, and

then he would give me a big dollop of Spanish rice. By the time my mom came

[ Page 8910 ]

back from the hospital, I'd made up my mind that I was never, ever going to

have French dressing or Spanish rice again, and I never have. I think that is

how people feel in their hearts about the NDP, so I can't believe they'd ever

come back, and I sure hope they never do.

We have a

government that has brought British Columbia to the point of being number one in

Canada in job creation and number one in housing starts — and we know there

are 2.3 jobs for every house that's started — that has the most competitive

tax regime in Canada, where the ratings agencies are commending us on our

performance and actually telling the government: "We're surprised that

you're doing it — that you're actually balancing your budget." The result

of that has been that we now have the lowest borrowing percentage of any

province in Canada, and that is quite a testimonial to the success of this

government.

We have the

first budget in British Columbia's history that is balanced according to

generally accepted accounting principles. No longer can governments in British

Columbia legally hide debt in Crown corporations and shuffle the books around so

that it looks like there's a balanced budget or something close to it when it

isn't true. During the nineties I always noticed that the NDP would admit to a

certain level of deficit, but the debt was always rising at about triple the

rate of the declared deficits. People would ask me: "How can it be that the

debt has more than doubled when we're actually supposed to have had some

balanced budgets and the deficits don't add up to that?" Well, it was

because of those ways of keeping the books, and that is a bygone thing from a

bygone day — unless, of course, you get a government one day that does away

with our law about generally accepted accounting principles and about balancing

the budget.

No family

could borrow for 20 years of 25 or more and not go under financially. Families

know they have to live within their means. I'm so glad we have a government that

is doing so now too. It hasn't been discussed much that in the $100 million

surplus for which we've budgeted, we're committed to paying down $50 million in

debt. That's a great thing to finally be reducing the debt of this province,

because I'm ashamed that we've left a debt for my children, who are just now

established in the working world, and their children, who are on the way. I'll

be a grandfather three times by the end of June. I'm ashamed that they're

saddled with that debt. They should never have to pay our bills or the bills of

the people who went before us.

We have a

government, as I mentioned, that is opening the doors of higher education to

B.C. students with a B average and better. We feel we owe that to British

Columbia students, and we think governments of the past owed it to them too.

This false economy that we had in the nineties, with the NDP freezing tuition

without providing for the needs of the post-secondary institutions, resulted in

people taking five years to get four-year degrees, people not being able to get

into the classes they wanted, people not being able to meet their educational

goals. That's going to be a thing of the past.

Our

unemployment rate is below the national level. Our economy, which had been

bombed down to last place from first place in the nineties, is on the rebound.

In many of the economic measures, only Alberta is our rival. British Columbia is

on the rise again. I believe that a rising tide lifts all boats. I've heard a

lot of fearmongering from the dark side, from the NDP — things that have

frightened some of my constituents who are vulnerable. I really resent that,

because the changes we've made and the things this government has accomplished

are good for all British Columbians and are causing the fortunes of those people

to actually improve, but they're being told something different.

[1620]

When I hear

people criticize health care advertising, I say to them: "Don't you realize

that all this negativity, all this false news, all this fearmongering where

people are telling seniors that they're going to be turfed out of their beds and

put out on the street with nowhere to go are things that are tremendously

stressful to seniors? They make them sick, and it's wrong." We have to

respond to that in some way. Advertising is an appropriate way to respond,

because stress on seniors is a health care issue, and reassuring them of the

facts is a benefit. I'm not at all uncomfortable with the health care

advertising, and I want to see more of it until people have the truth about what

we're doing in health care in British Columbia.

We just had

the presentation today at lunchtime by the cancer research people, and the

tremendous reports of B.C. being in the vanguard of cancer research as we are in

many areas of medical research. I'm thrilled with that and delighted that once

again in British Columbia, things are moving.

We're a

government that clearly has kept its commitments, met its goals, funded the

things we said we'd fund, and we're seeing these kinds of results. I think it's

great that we have this very clear priority to work with first nations people

and empower them. I really enjoy working with the first nations in my

constituency, and I have quite a few.

The

Secwepemc people — the Shuswaps, they call themselves — are very

progressive. They have partnered with Sun Peaks in building the housing for the

employees at Sun Peaks and in a lot of other ways. They're moving forward on a

lot of different economic fronts. Recently our Forests minister signed over a

million cubic metres of the burned wood from the forest fires this summer to the

Shuswap nation tribal council and the Little Shuswap Indian band. Chief Nathan

Matthew, who is the chair of the Shuswap nation tribal council and the chief of

the North Thompson Indian band, received a large portion of that for the North

Thompson Indian band. It's great to see them economically empowered by these

sorts of changes.

Chief

Matthew has agreed to sit on the economic development advisory commission, which

I chair for the North Thompson Valley. He is a tremendous individual to work

with — very intelligent, very gifted,

[ Page 8911 ]

highly educated. He and I drove up to Williams Lake and flew out to Anahim to

have a look at the Carrier Lumber portable sawmill there, because we've been

talking to Carrier about bringing one of those units to Barriere. I hope to see

that come about.

I hope to

have a primary manufacturing facility there again to break down the logs if

we're successful in achieving the NRFL that we've applied for and also to work

with the wood that's going to flow through all the new entrants that are going

to come about as a result of our timber tenure takeback. We want to double the

number of woodlots in the North Thompson Valley.

I have a

very progressive woodlot association who have come to me and given me a map of

where they'd like to see that AAC allotted. I've given that to the ministry and

hope to see it come about. We will see a permanent allotment to the first

nations from that takeback allocation and, as I mentioned, to the community

forests in Barriere and Clearwater that I've requested. I want to see some of

that timber milled in the North Thompson Valley, and I'd like to see a log sort

where our value-added manufacturers and those we hope to attract actually have

the opportunity to bid on the particular size, species and quality of fibre they

need for their particular mills.

Mr.

Speaker, I know that you, in your past, were a forestry consultant and a Forests

minister at one time. You have heard, as I have, from value-added manufacturers

over and over that they simply cannot get the opportunity to buy the logs they

need for their particular operations. Anytime they do get that opportunity,

they're willing to pay more than anybody else for that specific fibre they need.

I think a log sort yard at Barriere or Louis Creek may well be the answer to

that concern from my constituents.

The small

business program. Of course, the allotment to that from the tenure takeback will

also help in this regard. The economic development advisory commission made a

decision recently to fund the process of doing everything we need to do to get

to the stage of construction of a snowmobile trail the length of the North

Thompson Valley from Sun Peaks to Blue River and back on the other side. I'm so

pleased to have the opportunity to bring on that sort of economic activity.

In the past

it's been the case with a lot of my hospitality and tourism constituents that

it's a boom-and-bust cycle year in and year out. They're busy in the summer;

they're quiet in the winter. Snowmobilers come in and spend their money freely,

use their Visa cards and purchase the services that those people provide. It's

going to be a great thing for the North Thompson Valley.

[1625]

The Premier

sent the Solicitor General to talk to me, and they asked how they could directly

help the people of the North Thompson Valley in the aftermath of the fires. I

went away with $5 million in cheques in my briefcase. Two million dollars went

to the hardship fund, so that people who have had hardship as a result of the

forest fires can get a grant of up to $10,000 per person or business. Another

million dollars went into the North Thompson Community Skills Centre to ensure

its long-term viability and the ability to retrain people for the jobs we're

hoping to create in the North Thompson Valley.

Another

million dollars went into the Thompson-Nicola regional district in a trust fund

for the long-term employment of an economic development officer, and we have

just completed a recruitment process for that. A further million dollars went

into the North Thompson Relief Fund, to be matched by them in providing the seed

money that's needed for some of these economic development-redevelopment

projects.

This

government is working very hard with me in a very cooperative way to try to

secure the Tolko properties in Barriere and Louis Creek by means of a land trade

for Crown land, and we want to see that bequeathed to the valley as a long-term

legacy.

There's a

tremendous amount of opportunity for all of us in British Columbia, and we're

working hard to bring that home in Kamloops–North Thompson. I congratulate the

government for the throne speech and the budget.

MacPhail: I am rising to the respond to the Speech from the Throne. This is

the fourth Speech from the Throne in the mandate of this government — a

mandate to deliver on a platform that promised much: economic renewal, health

care revitalization, democratic reform and greater equality.

Despite

those promises, this government has delivered little — a mandate subsumed by

the Premier's faith in one big idea, big tax cuts, and his government's seeming

helplessness in the face of the failure of that idea; a mandate that has been

overtaken by scandal that simply won't go away, with questions swirling about

special treatment for friends and insiders, loans and penalties that magically

get written off, and about what led the RCMP organized crime and drug squad to

raid the offices of key political staff in this very building. Swept to power on

a promise of change, the Premier and his ministers put their confidence in a

harsh, neoconservative, right-wing agenda that is as dated as it is tired.

Blind to

the lessons of history, the Premier believed that the only step required of his

government in particular was to reduce the capacity of government in general.

But like most big ideas born of ideological fervour rather than reasoned

analysis, once they are tested against reality, they fail, and little of

substance remains.

As we

approach the third anniversary of the Premier's election win, the foolishness of

his plan is evident. Big tax giveaways have not paid for themselves. They have

not spurred economic growth. They have not resulted in more resources for health

care and education. They have not led to better, more accountable government,

and they most certainly have not ushered in a new era of hope and prosperity.

From the

continuing economic hardship in resource communities to overcrowded classrooms

to a faltering

[ Page 8912 ]

health care system, the B.C. Liberal government has failed British

Columbians. Indeed, today, as a result of those huge tax giveaways spent on

their very first day in power, middle-income and working British Columbians have

been hit again and again with big tax increases. Just to name a few: MSP

premiums up, sales taxes up, property taxes up, sin taxes and gas taxes up —

all under this government.

[1630]

The

Liberals have not cut taxes. They just changed who pays. As a result, they are

making it harder and harder for British Columbians to make ends meet. Three

years into the Premier's mandate, B.C. is a more polarized, less prosperous and

less confident province than it has been for a long time. It's more clear every

day — and again with this Speech from the Throne — that the government

doesn't have a clue what to do about it, except to stick with the failing

prescriptions and inflated rhetoric, hoping that someday soon they will

magically cure their self-inflicted wounds.

This

government has failed to address the problems that most British Columbians face

— paying for the soaring costs of post-secondary education, saving for

retirement, balancing work and family. The government has burdened, betrayed and

abandoned middle-income and working British Columbians. Now, completely out of

ideas and consumed with scandal and intrigue, the government is adrift,

uncertain, unsure what is going wrong and not up to the challenge of government.

This is not

what British Columbians expected of this government. This is certainly not what

they voted for, and it's not what they deserve. Only a thousand and one days

into this government's mandate, British Columbians are once again looking for

change — for a practical, moderate and trustworthy alternative; for stability;

for honesty; for a government that reaches out and builds consensus around

necessary reforms.

The New

Democrat opposition is ready to provide that change, to set a new course for our

province, to build a new consensus for change, to meet the challenges of this

young century with new ideas bringing British Columbians together in a common

project to build a better, more democratic, more just and more prosperous

province. We are ready to provide that alternative, to work with ideas rooted in

community, not imported from right-wing American think tanks; grounded in the

needs and the aspirations of ordinary working people, not designed simply as a

reward for political support; and embedded in a compassionate understanding of

our collective responsibility to each take for each other and in a dynamic

encouragement of individual initiative and drive, not in blind adherence to

trickle-down ideology where government operates in the interests of the few, not

the many.

While this

government and this Premier have been hunkered down in damage control, our new

leader and our caucus have been travelling the province, listening and learning

from British Columbians, listening and learning from your constituents — from

young high-tech workers in Burnaby to students in Kamloops to small business

people in Port Alberni to health providers and seniors in Kelowna to truck

loggers in Smithers. In every corner of our province, we've been reaching out to

build a new, modern, inclusive and progressive agenda of change, renewal and

hope for British Columbia.

The Premier

has said that this cabinet and this throne speech will take him to the next

election. I look forward to it. I look forward to an election fought on the

Premier's record of failure — an election where the old, tired ideas that the

Premier subscribes to are put up against a modern New Democrat vision of change.

I look

forward to the Premier's explanation for the decline in average weekly earnings,

when he promised higher paycheques and a thriving private sector economy. I look

forward to the Premier's explanation for the crisis in the delivery of services

to children and families, when he promised that those services would improve. I

look forward to the Premier's explanation for rising crime rates — and I'm not

talking about inside the Legislature — when he promised safer streets and

safer schools in every community. I look forward to the Premier's explanation

for millions wasted on advertising, on failed pet projects like the internal

portal and on untendered contracts for friends and insiders, when he promised

responsible, accountable management of our public resources and tax dollars.

[1635]

The

Premier's record will be measured against his rhetoric, and the reck