Manitoba Hansard — 19 May 1977 (Sitting 65A, 30th Legislature, 4th Session)

30-4-65a

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMB LY of MAN ITOBA Friday, May 20, 19 77 TIME: 10:00 a.m. OPENING PRAYER by Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER, Honourable Peter Fox (Kildonan): Before we proceed I should like to direct the attention of the honourable members to the gallery where we have 24 students, Grade 10 and 11 standing, from Kamsack, Saskatchewan, under the direction of Mrs. J. Hanaver and Mrs. Melville. We also have 10 adult students from the Red River Community College, under the direction of Mrs. Hawash. This school is located in the constituency of the Honourable Member for Burrows, the Minister of Continuing Education.

We have 70 students, Grade 8 standing, of Portland School from Mayville, North Dakota, under the direction Mr. Evanson. On behalf of all the honourable members, we welcome you here this morning. Presenting Petitions; Reading and Receiving Petitions. PRESENTIN G REPORTS BY STANDING AND SPECIAL COMM ITTEES MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Gimli. MR. JOHN C. GOTTFRIED: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Honourable Member for St. Vital, I beg to present the Third Report of the Committee on Economic Development. MR.

CLERK: Your Committee met on Thursday, May 19, 1977, to consider the Annual Reports of the Communities Economic Development Fund and Manitoba Mineral Resources Ltd. for the year ended March 31, 1976. Messrs. John Loxley and Albert Koffman, senior officers of their respective companies, provided information as desired by members of the Committee with respect to the Annual Reports and current operations of their companies. The Annual Reports of the Communities Economic Development Fund and Manitoba Mineral Resources Ltd. were adopted by the Committee as presented. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Gimli. MR.

GOTTFRIED: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honourable Member for Emerson, that the Report of the Committee be received. MOTION presented and carried. MIN ISTERIAL STATEMENTS AND TABL IN G OF REPORTS MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Health. HONOURABLE LAURENT L. DESJARDINS (St. Boniface): Mr. Speaker, I'd like to table an Order of the House No. 1, March 2nd, 1977, in the name of the Honourable Member for Roblin, re Fitness and Amateur Sport. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Mines. HONOURABLE SIDNEY GREEN (lnkster): Mr.

Speaker, I wish to lay on the table the Annual Report for the Year Ended September 30, 1976, of Manitoba Forestry Resources Limited. MR. SPEAKER: Any other Tabling of Reports or Statements? Notices of Motion; Introduction of Bills. ORAL QUESTIONS MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Morris. MR. WARNER H. JORGENSON: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct my question to the House Leader and ask him, to the best of his knowledge, how many more bills will be introduced? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable House Leader. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Speaker, other than those to which first reading has been given, which the honourable member will have notice of, and the financial bills which are the necessary requirements of completing the financial aspects of the session, I am not aware of any additional bills. Oh, the Elections Act, Mr. Speaker, the Elections Act, but I thought first reading had been given to that. Perhaps not, but the Elections Act. That's the only other one that I am aware of. MR. JORGENSON: Would it be the intention of the government to deal with all of these bills and complete all stages? MR. GREEN: Mr.

Speaker, my honourable friend is asking too much. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. L.R. (Bud) SHERMAN: Mr. Speaker, I have a question to the Honourable the Minister of Labour, which may really fall into the category of a supplementary to that asked by my colleague, the Member for Morris. I would like to ask the Minister of Labour whether he is considering pulling Bill65 at this stage or whether he will be introducing it for second reading? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. 3267

Friday, May 20, 19 77 HONOURABLE RUSSELL PAULLEY (Transcona): Mr. Speaker, I have no intention of pulling any bill. I am proceeding with them in the usual manner with normal business being done. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Roblin. MR. J. WALLY McKENZIE: ... to the Honourable Minister of Highways. I wonder if the Minister of Highways has recognized the concerns and the anxieties of those citizens who reside in the St. Ambroise area due to the horrible conditions that presently exist on public road number 430. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Highways. HONOURABLE PETER BURTNIAK (Dauphin): Mr.

Speaker, I believe that the honourable member should be aware that at this time of the year, with the dry season that we've had for awhile, and now with some areas with excessive rains, these things will happen and I am certain that the people in the area from our district offices are on top of the situation. MR. McKENZIE: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the Minister will send his highway staff in that area and discuss with those people some of the problems they have with that public road number 430. MR. BURTNIAK: Mr.

Speaker, as the member should know, we have 12 districts in the province and the district under whose jurisdiction that area happens to fall under, I'm sure they are aware of it. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Wolseley. MR. ROBERT G. WILSON: I have a question to the Minister of Labour in charge of fire protection. Would the Minister confirm that his department is classifying or recognizing certain smoke detectors to allow for reclassification of insurance rates? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Labour. MR. PAULLEY: Not to my knowledge, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Rock Lake.

MR. HENRY J. EINARSON: Mr. Speaker, I direct a question to the First Minister, because of the absence of the Minister of Agriculture again. I posed a question yesterday to both honourable gentlemen and it had regard to being hopeful of assurance that the farmers would be able to deliver their milk over the long weekend and, because of what I saw on the news last night, I'm wondering if the First Minister can confirm that the difficulties that have arisen between ManGo and the Manitoba Milk Producers Marketing Board, can the Minister indicate whether or not that problem has been solved at the present time? MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. HONOURABLE EDWARD SCHREYER, Premier (Rossmer e): Mr. Speaker, I believe that the Minister of Agriculture dealt with the question and did undertake to ascertain further information. I'll have to check whether he has. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Crescentwood. MR. WARREN STEEN: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister responsible for the Public Insurance Corporation, the Minister of Highways.

Can the Minister tell the members of the House as to whether the Public Insurance Corporation is contemplating a premium reduction for those persons who install smoke detectors in their homes? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Highways. MR. BURTNIAK: Mr. Speaker, having not received notice of the question, I will have to go strictly by memory here, but I do believe that the Manitoba Public Insurance Corporation insofar as the general insurance is concerned, was the first insurance organization that did allow a reduction in premiums to those people who did install smoke detectors in the Province of Manitoba.

ORDERS OF THE DAY MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable House Leader. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, would you proceed to call Bill No. 62 please. BILL (NO . 62) -

AN ACT TO AMEN D THE CITY OF WINN IPEG ACT MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 62, proposed by the Honourable Minister of Finance. The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. SHERMAN: Mr. Speaker, I wish to make some comments at this time on Bill 62,

An Act to amend the City of Winnipeg Act, which I think could much more accurately be entitled, Sir,

an Act to Dismiss the People from any further Participation in Community Affairs. The one redeeming feature of Bill 62, Sir, is the proposed reduction in the size of the Council, which 1 believe is acceptable to most persons generally because of the concept it suggests in terms of a rationalization and streamlining of the city structure and city operation. But, Sir, I suggest to the Minister and to members of government opposite that the reduction of the Council in size is an empty and a meaningless gesture.

I'm not opposed to the gesture being made because I believe that in many respects a 50-member central city council has to be inherently an unwieldy structure. But the reduction move, Sir, is being sold by this government to an unsuspecting public as a tremendous step forward in the rationalization of the affairs of this city that is going to benefitthe citizens and the 3268

Friday, May 20, 19 77 taxpayers of Winnipeg and in that respect it becomes merely the loss leader, as it were, in the sale of a particular bill of goods. In tact, both that loss leader, both that gesture and the rest of the bill beg the whole question of what is really wrong with the City of Winnipeg in terms of its government and its structure. The 50-member council, Mr. Speaker, is not what is fundamentally wrong with the City of Winnipeg and its structure.

What's wrong is the deterioration of services, the emasculation of community autonomy, the increased distance of that has been put between the individual citizen and his local government and the jungle of red tape at City Hall that now makes it virtually impossible to get anything done within anything like a reasonable period of time tor many many persons, groups and enterprisers.

Since nothing in this bill comes to grips with any of these fundamental problems and in tact the bill intensifies some of these unfortunate problems, I find it very difficult to work up much more than a tacit enthusiasm for the gesture being made to reduce the council's size. If this is the best, Sir, that the Provincial Government can do after six years experience with the monstrosity of the City of Winnipeg Unification Bill that they forced through this House in 1971, then all one can say is that they are really out of touch with the people, really out of touch with the people.

If they had contact and touch and communication with people in the individual communities, particularly in those communities that are described as the suburban areas as distinct from the central core they wou Id recognize that the major complaint that most citizens have with their current city structure and government in Winnipeg is that they no longer get the services that they once enjoyed under their former municipal structures.

The decline, the deterioration, the virtual disappearance of first class service is the biggest shortcoming, the biggest problem in the City of Winnipeg today and the biggest shortcoming in the Winnipeg Unification Bill that passed through this House in 1971. And when this government sits down and drafts amendments to that bill and fails to take into account that central problem, fails to introduce anything to deal with that central problem then, Sir, I suggest that fundamentally the bill is useless, the amendments are useless.

I don't know who members on the other side talk to, but if they talked to citizens in the differn different communities, I'm convinced that they would find very quickly that the decline of services is the number one aggravation.

People in my constituency, in my community, Fort Garry, and in many like it repeatedly confront me with their unhappiness over the decline in the essential services that they used to receive whether it be in the are& of snow clearing and snow removal in the winter time or in the area of street maintenance, lighting problems, parking difficulties, zoning regulations and simply accesss to their local government representatives in the summer time and all other times. There is a feeling that service has just literally gone to pot in many communities and I speak of the specific experience in my own.

Secondly, Sir, the complaint that comes most often to me with respect to the City of Winnipeg is that residents, local individual citizens, that is the people, feel they no longer have the kind of contact with their local government that they desire and that they deserve their contact and communication on a face-to-face level has been eroded to the point where it is barely existent for many citizens now.

Thirdly, Sir, the bill tails to come to grips with the lack of authority for individual communities, the erosion of that authority which was first instituted in 1971 under the original City of Winnipeg legislation. lt used to be that individual communities had some decision-making power and some autonomy and some rights in terms of developing their areas and their neighbourhoods. Now, Sir, anyone, with even a passing acquaintance of the machinery in the city today, is more than aware of the tact that the individual communities and community committees have been stripped of any meaningful power.

I have had as much experience, I suggest, sitting in the back row of community committee meetings in my community as probably many other persons in this House. I attempt to attend as many of those meetings as I can whenever it's practical, as I am sure most other city members do.

And 1 can tell you, Sir, that I have seen unfolding for the past six years a growing sense of frustration, a growing sense of virtual despair on the part of community councillors and on the part of community individuals insofar as their hopes are concerned for getting anything tangible done in the way of development and progress in their individual communities.

Because they sit down, they listen to delegations, they work out their local problems, they sometimes continue their meetings until one and two o'clock in the morning they arrive at decisions that are based on the knowledge and the experience of people who live within those communities, and then those decisions go downtown to be dealt with by others who have no connection with those problems, no experience with those particular conditions, and likely as not, they are reversed downtown. lf they are not reversed, they are pigeonholed.

If they are not pigeonholed, they are processed through such a multi-layered bureaucracy that the time period and the delay become intolerable and impractical and in many cases destroy and nullify the action that was going to be undertaken to begin with. So, Sir, those are the three problems that I experienced at first hand and that people in my constituency, my community, confront me with continually, that amount to the main dissatisfactions and main weaknesses of the City of Winnipeg legislation as it exists at the present time.

The deterioration of services, the decline of contact for the individual citizen with his local government; 3269

Friday, May 20, 19 77 and thirdly the lack of authority and decision-making power for the individual community itself. Now the bill does nothing to deal with any of those problems, to come to grips with them, to improve those situations, to remove those defects. Over and above that the bill adds three new hazards, adds three riew problems. That makes the bill worse than the present legislation.

Those three problem that are added are these, Sir- and they have been spelled out by others in this debate and others outside this House participating in this debate, so I don't intend to do any more than just mention them for emphasis at this point. Number One of those additional new defects is the fact that control and authority is now vested entirely in the hands of the Provincial Government, specifically in the hands of two all-powerful Ministers, the Minister of Urban Affairs and the Minister of Finance.

Secondly, the province will enjoy exemption from city bylaws and will be able to do whatever it wants to do in any community at any time. These innovations take a bad situation, Sir, and make it much worse. The Minister of Mines and Natural Resources says they always have been. That is nonsense. They have not always been. They have had to go through the municipal board. They have had to go through structures and processes where the citizens' rights were protected. In this case they go through Ministerial offices where the rights and interests of the Provincial Government in office are protected.

And those are the only rights that are listed. People suggest that MHRC will be able to move in and erect structures in any community that it wishes under this legislation. That is not the only thing that can happen. Under this legislation, on the say-so of those two all-powerful Ministers, anything can be built in your neighbourhood, anything can be built in your community. Local residents, at arm's length now, are going to be removed at miles' length from the process of decision-making and will have no meaningful say in those decisions whatsoever.

The third hazard, Sir, is the fact that representation tor the individual citizen is now diluted and eroded even further. Where the citizen once had representation based on a fairly manageable and a fairly reasonable numerical total, he now finds himself swallowed up in the kind of diluted representation. Because of the growth in population, in the centralization of the authority, and the consolidation of community committees, he or she now find themselves in a situation where they had a representation that is diluted beyond the point of being responsible.

So I say, Sir, that these are the three difficulties injected into the bill to go along with the three basic defects that were already there in the legislation, and that makes six reasons why I suggest this can be described as an anti-people bill, and why I suggest it should be retitled "An Act to effectively disenfranchise the people of Winnipeg insofar as their local government participation is concerned." I want to say this, to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and the Minister of Mines and Resources, and the Honourable Member for St.

Johns, and others who may have had a hand in this legislation, so I may be permitted the opportunity to paraphrase another speaker from another time, that the Conservative Party is not here to preside over the dissolution of the City of Winnipeg; we are not hear to preside over the dissolution of the municipality and the rights of the individual citizen in that municipality. Sir, there are some aspects of the bill, such as those that I have referred to, that make it impossible tor me to support this bill on second reading.

I suggest that there are a great many others in this House who feel the same way and I know there are a great many in the community at large who are hoping that members of this House, and particularly members of the Conservative Party, will take a stand on this disenfranchisement of local individual taxpaying citizens in the City of Winnipeg that is taking place under this legislation.

I have been, as I say, Sir, at Community Committee meetings and seen the frustration when decisions were honestly arrived at and then were lost in the layers of bureaucracy downtown or reversed downtown by persons who had no knowledge and no experience with the conditions on which the decisions were based in the first place.

And what is happening here, is that process is going to be worsened because instead of the community committees that were unweildy and were restricted as it were under 1971 legislation, we now have consolidated the community committees that will make the whole process even more diffuse and even more meaningless. What ever happened, Mr. Speaker, during preparation of this legislation? What ever happened, I'd like to know, to consideration for people? Don't people count anymore in the thinking of this government opposite?

I suggest, Sir, that this legislation simply writes them off. lt says: Good-bye people, you live here, you pay the taxes, that's fine; but we don't want to see you. We don't want you cluttering up our administrative halls; we don't want you getting in the way when we are making the decisions in our administrative think-tank. We'll make those decisions, you'll pay the bills, but just stay out of our way. All you are is a mere citizen. All you are is people. Well that's a tar cry, I suggest, Sir, from the heady days of 1971 when we were exposed in Fort Garry and St.

James and Charleswood and communities throughout the city, to the flying aerial circus promoting Unicity starring such frontline performers as the Honourable Member tor St. Johns, the Minister of Mines and Natural Resources, the former Attorney-General of this province, 3270

Friday, May 20, 19 77 Mr. Mackling when they came out to our public meetings and they came front and centre on the stage and they put on their wonderful performances, socialist sleight-of-hand, and they dispensed their elixir about more democracy, closer contact with the people and more people participation, and the wonderful new Jerusalem that was going to be built here in the unified City of Winnipeg. A tar cry from that, Sir, I say, when you look at what they are doing to people today in this legislation proposed circa 1977.

Where has all that tine talk about people and democracy and local government and local participation gone? Well, let's take a look at the logic of their position, Sir. Members opposite, at least informally, have claimed that the City of Winnipeg legislation of 1971 was merely the first stage in the legislative evolution of the new unified city; that it was always to be followed ultimately by amending legislation, the kind of thing that we have in front of us today. All right, it that's the case, they can't have it both ways.

If that's the case, then we can only conclude that that 1971 sales pitch about local democracy and people participation was never anything more than socialist rhetoric and empty rhetoric at that. Never anything more than a kind of snake oil, to use the Minister of Mines and Resources' term, that was designed to mesmerize the electorate, who didn't know what they were getting into. That in fact, Sir, this government has not now and never had any intention of giving local government to the people of Winnipeg. Theydon't want the people to run their city. They want to run the city.

And on the basis of what is in Bill 62, they can't deny it because they have taken local government and participation further and further away from the people. As far as local democratic participatory government, all those things that we heard so much about in 1971, Bill62 is plainly and simply an anti-people bill, Sir, and it underscores the deception that was practised and foisted off on the people of Winnipeg and the opposition in this legislature when the Unicity bill was sold to us in 1971.

If indeed, they had intended that it should expand and enlarge the people's place in local government, then they wouldn't be bringing in this kind of amending legislation and saying now, as they have said, that this was always the concept, it was always our idea to unify the city in 1971 and then amend and streamline the legislation later on. They're caught in the corner of their own argument, in their own statements. They can't deny that it is anti-people legislation and it was designed ultimately to become anti-people legislation.

And if anybody opposite thinks that that is an exaggeration, I ask them, Sir, to consider fairmindedly what this bill does to the people, to the individual taxpayers of the city. In the first place as I've said, it dilutes their representation, even further diluted than it has been since 1971.

In the second place it removes them further from local government because of the consolidation and centralization and the vesting of control in the ministries of the provincial government to which I have referred. lt gives the Provincial Cabinet, the two Ministers to which I've referred, the right to do the planning in an individual citizen's community, and that was once the right of individual citizens through their local councils. lt gives the Cabinet control over finances that individual communities once had to a large extent and in fact, as I've said, it gives them the right to override by-laws and build anything in the neighbourhoods that they wish against the wishes of the individual citizens in those neighbourhoods. lt preserves two of the most undesirable features of the 19711egislation, two situations that should have been corrected first in any amending legislation.

The bureaucratic structure of committees and administrators at city hall which creates that impenetrable blockade for getting things done as far as local neighbourhood action goes and it preserves the limitations on decision-making in the individual communities.

Limitations of that sort must be relaxed if the community committee and the individual citizen is to have any meaningful function at all in local government. lt further centralizes the control of the city's affairs, somethi ng that has to be decentralized if individual citizens are to enjoy any contact, Sir, with the decision-makers and any input into the process. 1 suggest, Mr. Speaker, to the Minister and his colleagues that the bill will go further than that. lt wi 11 make it extremely difficult, so inconvenient as to be corn pletely unattractive for individual people even to take

part in community committee meetings albeit those meetings will be relatively meaningless as tar as decisions go. But even for those who want to take

part in community committee meetings the inconvenience now will make it completely unattractive to do so. I ask you to consider the situation, for example, of East Kildonan vis-a-vis Transcona or St. James vis-a-vis Assiniboia or St. Boniface and St. Vital; or in my own community area, a community committee that is to become the Community Committee of Assiniboine Park-Fort Garry which will include under the proposed legislation Fort Garry, Osborne, Crescentwood, River Heights, Tuxedo and Charleswood.

Well, Sir, 1 just ask for practical reasons that you, and through you, that the members of the government opposite consider the situation where you have for example Fort Garry and Charleswood participating in the same community, in the same community committee meetings. Where are those meetings going to be held? They are certainly going to be distant from many residents in the community who used to be able to go to their local municipal hall and participate.

I remind members opposite of the weather conditions of the enviornment in which we live and I suggest it will be extremely difficult and unattractive for many citizens, particularly the elderly to 3271

Friday, May 20, 19 77 cross these huge consolidated community areas to participate in community meetings miles away from their homes at 30 below temperatures in the wintertime; Some of those community committee meetings go on until 2:00 o'clock in the morning; some in Charleswood have gone on until 4:00 o'clock in the morning because of delegations waiting to be heard, waiting to make presentations. That is when you had a community committee that was limited to a much smaller area.

What is going to happen now when Fort Garry, for example, and River Heights and Charleswood and the others that I've mentioned - or take another community committee, St. James-Assiniboia, when all the various communities that exist historically in an independent way in that area find themselves consolidated and lumped into one huge new community. What is going to happen to people who want to come and getthings done and appear at those community committee meetings and make applications and deal with problems?

Where they once perhaps had to wait until 11 :00 o'clock at night or midnight to be heard or to get on, it now will be hours beyond that. I suggest that for many elderly persons who want to take part and want to pa to participate , that just takes the thing right out of consideration. That just makes it totally illogical and impossible tor them to participate, and particularly, as I have suggested, in the wintertime or during adverse weather conditions. So you can just say good-bye to the people.

That's whatthis bill does. lt kisses them off and says good-bye to them, because it's not going to encourage anybody to participate in his or her local community affairs if he has to come out or she has to come out, as I've suggested' in those conditions of inconvenience and try to participate and get on in terms of making a presentation or be heard or take

part in a discussion having to do with development or zoning in the community when he is confronted with that huge consolidated new type of operation. Lastly, Sir, and perhaps most important of all, for persons who reside with pride in areas like some of those that I have mentioned, the proposed legislation will very seriously erode in my opinion the local, historic identities of many of these individual communities. These are individual communities that have grown up as distinct components of Greater Winnipeg and in their unique identities I suggest they have given the city much of its flavor.

The Minister of Public Works with his usual brilliant response says, nonsense. The Minister of Public Works doesn't know what he's talking about, he's demonstrated that before in this House. I suggest to him that the unique communities and the unique community identities are important to people, those things are important to people. I don't expect the Minister or his colleagues to understand that. Those things are important to people, people who live in Fort Garry, in St. Boniface, in East Kildonan, in Charleswood, in St.

James, in Transcona, have taken pride in their individual local identities for decades and as such have added from their distinct components a real flavor to this city. This legislation is going to erode that situation. This legislation, Sir, is going to diminish and seriously weaken that individual local community identity of which many many citizens are so proud. How long are those individual communities going to be able to exist and maintain that particular identity when they find themselves lumped into the new consolidated community committee relationships proposed in the bill to which I have referred.

So I say, Sir, that not only does this bill say bye-bye people but it also says bye-bye Charleswood and it also says bye-bye East Kildonan and bye-bye Fort Garry. That's what it's saying. We want one big centralized City of Winnipeg run by the Cabinet of the Province of Manitoba and nobody is going to have any say or any input from a local citizen level because that's the sort of thing that gets in the way; that bothers us, that interferes with us, with our planning, and we're planning for you, we're planning for your lives in this city and you'll do it our way. Mr.

Speaker, the Minister of Urban Affairs is a fair minded man, and I think if he considers the aspects of the bill to which I have referred he's got to recognize the conclusion that it's an anti-people bill as far as local government goes. We've got the great self-styled "people's government" here, so called, the NDP, caught red-handed now trying to pass legislation which writes the people off and I don't think that the Minister can deny that if he considers the aspects to which I have referred.

What they're saying is that when it comes to such an important matter as running the City of Winnipeg we've got something here in our NDP planning rooms that is far too important to be entrusted to people. The smaller we can keep people participation, the better as far as this government is concerned. The smaller the input from people, the smaller their role, the better for our plans. That's a general dismissal of the people, it's a general indifference. lt cuts across all the communities in this city but nowhere more stridently than in the so-called suburban communities as distinct from the central city. Mr.

Speaker, I emphasize the position that I and many of my colleagues take in opposition to this legislation is a result very largely of the attitude expressed towards people and local participation by the government in the legislation as it presently stands and is also a result of our unhappy response to the defects already existing in the bill that have not been corrected, and the additional hazards for proper government and proper local representation injected into the legislation through these amendments. Let me just give you one case in point, in terms of my argument that local representation and local 3272

Friday, May 20, 19 77 participation is reduced and diluted here, Sir. My own community, the community of Fort Garry, finds itself going through the following transition. From a community of some 20,000 persons with six local municipal councillors and its own decision-making authority to a community committee of some 25,000 persons in the early 1970s, with three councillors on the new unified Winnipeg Council; to a part of a new community committee under Bill 62, in which arrangement it will have, at most, two councillors and probably only one, while its population has grown well in excess of 30,000.

All the while a part of a new structure that, in any event, offers communities and community committees no meaningful decision-making authority anyway. So, Mr. Speaker, I don't wish to be parochial about it, the same argument can be applied to many other communities, Assiniboia, St. James, many other communities. So, how in the name of heaven, can anyone say that there is consideration for people and their individual desire to be part of local government in this kind of situation, Sir? lt is a piece of legislation that just removes local government from that sphere of people and people participation altogether.

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to repeat my speech for the benefit of the Minister of Public Works. For the benefit of the Minister of Public Works, if he doesn't understand what I am getting at, he will have to read it in Hansard. Finally, Mr. Speaker, let me say that the vesting of the authority and control and power in the Provincial Government that's taking place under this legislation, or proposed under this legislation, is totally unacceptable to this side of the House, purely on the grounds of freedom and democracy.

Regardless of what government is in office, we don't think it is a healthy thing for th at kind of power to be vested in a provincial ministry. We cannot accept provincial control over planning and over financing and unless those features of the bill are changed, we cannot accept the bill. If there are some improvements -(Interjection)- I would rather have a board than an individual minister, I would. If there are some improvements at committee stage, Sir, we may well find it possible to support the legislation.

We are not closing the door on the legislation in toto at this moment; hopefully there will be some improvements, there will be some deletions that will eliminate some of the problems I have talked about; there will be some new amendments that will eliminate some of the defects in the area of services and decision-making that have existed since 1971. If those things take place, we could find ourselves looking much more favourably on the legislation. At this point in time, the legislation seems to contain only one redeeming feature to us and that is the one I have mentioned, about the reduction in size of council.

So, pending that kind of review and improvement, Sir, we will have to reserve final decision. But at this point, because it is

an Act to take the people out of the picture, because it is

an Act to disenfranchise the individual person in terms of local government and local government participation, we have to be against the bill, Sir, and that's why we will be taking a stand in opposition on second reading. MR. SPEAKER: Before we proceed, I should like to direct the attention of the honourable members to the gallery, where we have 80 students of the Roseau Valley Collegiate, under the direction of Mr. Deveson. This school is located in the constituency of the Honourable Member for Emerson. On behalf of the honourable members, we welcome you here. The Honourable Member for St. Johns. MR.

SAUL CHERN lACK: I wonder if I cou Id sub m it a question to the honourable member who just spoke. Having heard his extensive criticism pointing out the negative features of the present Act and this bill, does he have the slightest idea of what a Conservative government would do if it had the persuasive power to carry out its proposals today? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. SHERMAN: Yes, I have a very clear idea of what a Conservative government would do.

Instead of concocting a theoretical scheme in our back caucus room, we would meet with those who have had experience in the administration of the city to develop a workable plan. MR. CHERNIACK: 1 just have one more question, if I may. Does that then mean that the Conservative Party has not yet formulated a policy on this question? MR. SHERMAN: lt doesn't mean that at all. We have formulated a policy, it is to defeat this government in the next provincial election. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister for Mines and Resources. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Speaker, what the honourable member is saying is that the policy which is formulated by the Conservative Party and announced, is snake oil and that the people shouldn't believe it because their only policy is to become the government, and that they have no policy on urban Winnipeg and when they become the government, they propose to have a consultative process 3273

Friday, May 20, 19 77 and that they propose, Mr. Speaker, that if that consultative process, in which they go around to discuss with the City of Winnipeg, that if a large number of people say that we should have ten councillors in the City of Winnipeg and that those ten councillors should run the city, and that we should eliminate any sections with regard to people participation, and that we should make the Provincial Government the authority to plan, that will be the Conservative policy. -(lnterjection) Well, Mr. Speaker, that is what the honourable member has said.

He says that we are going to find out what a group of people want and I assume that he is going to do it with an open mind; I assume that he is going to do it on the same basis, you know, that the Chamber of Commerce came in and proposed the way in which land policy should be decided is that they should go to group of experts and ask them what the land policy should be; and that they have no pre-ideasof what that program should be.

And when this group of experts come in and say what is best, if they happen to say that it is best that the government be a public landowner and lease it out to farmers, that that will be the position of the Chamber of Commerce. Now the honourable member knows that that's a bunch of junk, and he knows thatthe suggestion that they have no policy vis-a-vis the City of Winnipeg is incorrect and that he would be embarrassed if that were the position; and that the Conservative policy has got a position. The difficulty is, Mr.

Speaker, that they are embarrassed by their own position because their own position is to go back to a two�tiered metro form of government and, Mr. Speaker, that is what their provincial policy says and that's what the Member for Sturgeon Creek says should be the position, Mr. Speaker, should always have been the position, and the position that we should revert to. -( Interjection)- Well, Mr. Speaker, read the policy and if that's a lie, Mr.

Speaker - the Honourable Member for Sturgeon Creek says it's a lie -t hen SteveJuba is a liar becauseSteve Juba has said- and it is the Member for Sturgeon Creek who is calling him a liar- because Steve Juba has said that he has looked at the Conservative position and the Conservative position amounts in principle to a return to Metro. That's not coming from me, Mr. Speaker, that's coming from the Mayor of the City of Winnipeg - (Interjection)- Certainly. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Sturgeon Creek. MR. J.

FRANK JOHNSTON: ... the honourable member read my speech when I said that our position of our policy convention was not the position of this caucus? MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, the fact is that the position of the Conservative Party is not their position. The position of the policy conference is not the Conservative position. -( lnterjection) Let me then qualify that, that the Conservatives will not accept the policy position of the Conservative Party; that in government they will not do so. -( Interjection)- Mr. Speaker ... MR. SPEAKER: Order please. MR.

GREEN: Let's at least have the Conservatives throwing out the Conservative policy position. But what is the replacement? The replacement is no position. The replacement has been given by the Member for Fort Garry. -( Interjection)- No, they have thrown that out and they are embarrassed by that; they realize that that is contrary, despite their innermost feelings that it is the right thing. The Member for St.

James, the Member for Fort Garry, the Member for Sturgeon Creek, their innermost feelings are that we should be back to a metro system so that our taxpayers can gain at the expense of the taxpayers who live in lnkster and the taxpayers who live in St. Johns. We can't possibly win with such a position, so let's say that the Conservative policy position adopted by the Conservative Party and distributed in literature- I believe I have a copy of it in my office -( Interjection)- That's a bunch of hogwash.

Well at least we have the Conservatives saying that that position of the Conservative Party is a bunch of hogwash. Now what is the alternate position? The alternate position is that the Member for Fort Garry says that they will do some type of polling, they will try to find out what the people want, and that will become the policy.

And if the public of the Province of Manitoba tells them in some type of sounding board that they would like ten councillors, that they would like a completely centralized administration, that they would eliminate the RAG committees, that they would eliminate the community committee boundaries, that's the Conservative position. Mr. Speaker, if that's the Conservative position, then what has been all of this talk in the speech by the Member for Fort Garry indicating that they believe that this bill throws out the people, disenfranchises the people of the City of Winnipeg? Because he is prepared to do that.

He has indicated that that's what he will do, Mr. Speaker. He has indicated that that's what he will do if the consultative process that he says that he would go through results in that kind of advice from the people with whom he consults. Now, Mr. Speaker, there is an out for my honourable friend. He will consult those people who will give him the opinions that he already now has, and therefore the policy will come out as he wants it, and not as this sham consultation which he has spoken of determines. You can have it each way.

You can have it, either the Conservative position as adopted by the Conservative Policy Conference, and we throw that out. We could have no position, based on a consultative process which can determine anything, which can determine a bill much more than centralized this position. And the Member for Fort Garry throws that out. Or we can engage in a grand 3274

Friday, May 20, 19 77 fraud and deception. We can say that we are going to consult with people, but the people that we will consult with are those whose dispositions are predisposed to ideas that we already have, but are not mentioning because they are unmentionable, Mr. Speaker. And then we will adopt that position. Now those are the three Tory platforms, and on any of those three Tory platforms, Mr.

Speaker, I am prepared to go out to the citizens of Greater Winnipeg, present the principle of this bill which you are now being asked to vote on, as against the Tory position, and I will have no difficulty about what the judgment of the people of the City of Winnipeg will be. Because we have heard a lot of rhetoric on this bill, Mr. Speaker, as if this is the only problem that has existed in the municipal government during the period of our political lives. Well, Mr.

Speaker, I believe that the true position of the Conservative Party is that we go back to a two-tier metro form of government, that we go back to a form of government which permits the citizens of Tuxedo to ride on the backs of the citizens of lnkster. And you know the biggest argument of the Member for St. James is that our taxes in St. James have gone up. But what does it mean, Mr. Speaker? lt means that in St. James, there was a preferred position for the taxpayers of that community against the position of the people in all other parts of Greater Winnipeg.

Mr., Speaker, I don't believe that that was a position coveted by the individual citizens of St. James. I believe it was a position coveted by the councillors of St. James who wanted to show that they were doing the best for their citizens. But I have not found citizens of St. James to be of that view. The citizens of St. James regard themselves as citizens of Winnipeg. I do not agree with the Member for Fort Garry when he says that there are distinct social and cultural identifications between the citizens of Fort Garry and the Fort Garry Council. Mr. Speaker, I know the citizens of Fort Garry.

I know the citizens of St. James. Many of them have moved there, Mr. Speaker. -( Interjections)- All right, I will take out the word "cultural" and say ... at least my honourable friend will now say there are no cultural distinctions. And, Mr. Speaker, I don't know what flavour means if it doesn't mean culture. We are going to try to find the word, Mr. Speaker, and it is going to escape my Tory friends because there is no such word. There is no such word. There is, I will concede .. .

I will concede to the Leader of the Opposition that there is one feature of Greater Winnipeg which this bill protects, we said would be protected in the City of Winnipeg Act. That Winnipeg is a miniature example of Canadian culture because in Winnipeg we are fortunate to have a significant French tact in the St. Boniface area. And until the City of Winnipeg Act, Mr. Speaker, that fact was protected by no legislation - by no legislation - so we have said that Greater Winnipeg is like a miniature Canada, and we will preserve that fact as part of our legislation. Well, Mr.

Speaker, historical local identities - I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that many of the citizens of Fort Garry and of St. James come from North Winnipeg and they have a local identity with North Winnipeg, and that they have not changed in character as a result from moving from North Winnipeg to Fort Garry or to St. James or Charleswood. -( Interjection)- Of course. Mr. Speaker, the fact .. . yes, some of them wanted bigger lots. Some of them will now move beyond the boundary of Greater Winnipeg to live on five-acre lots and not live within the City of Winnipeg.

That's a phenomena which they will adopt whether they live in St. James or live in North Winnipeg, depending on their future. Mr. Speaker, what I am trying to analyze in these remarks is: What is the Tory position on this bill? Really, Mr. Speaker, the Member tor Fort Garry has said that there is one good feature of the bill, the reduction to 28 councillors, but everything else destroys citizen participation. Now, Mr.

Speaker, if ne is talking about a closer citizen participation by means of representation and by means of more community committees, then it is completely contradictory to his suggestion that the reduction in councillors is a good idea. So he is faced with a problem, Mr. Speaker. He knows that the great majority of citizens in Greater Winnipeg believe- and I believe- that the operation of the City of Winnipeg can be conducted with a smaller council.

He knows that that is a popular feature. lt is against his grain to accept the bill, and therefore he looks to other features of the bill to present his argument against what he really is trying to establish, and that is, Mr. Speaker, and that is, the Conservative policy position, that we revert to a metro form of government, which, Mr. Speaker, the Member for St. James, the Member for Sturgeon Creek, the Member tor Fort Garry have coveted ever since it has disappeared. And what was that metro form of government?

You know when you talk to the Member for Fort Garry, when you hear his speech, you would think that prior to the unification of Greater Winnipeg, that there were thriving and active and energetic and publicly-participated in municipal councils throughout Greater Winnipeg. Mr. Speaker, I was a peer at municipal council meetings in St. J�mes, in Fort Garry, in St. Bonitace, in Transcona, in West Kildonan, in almost every one of the th1rteen municipal governments that existed in Greater Winnipeg, and the suggestion that there was a flurry of citizen participation in those governments is not true. lt never was true.

Why was it not true, Mr. Speaker? Well, Mr. Speaker, I am now telling you where I was and where I participated. And I was there. And I was at your council meetings. -(lnterjections)- MR. SPEAKER: Order please. 3275

Friday, May 20, 1977 MR. GREEN: I was at your council meetings, Mr; Speaker. -( lnterjections) MR. SPEAKER: Order please. MR. GREEN: Let's examine it, Mr. Speaker. -(lnterjectio.ns) MR. SPEAKER: Order please. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, I am suggesting to you that in terms of municipal government and the average participation of the citizen, that there is approximately the same now as there was then. As there was then. But, Mr. Speaker, let's follow it through. -( lnterjections)- MR. SPEAKER: Order please. MR. GREEN: Let's follow it through, Mr. Speaker.

Municipal governments, prior to unification, had no say whatsoever in planning. Not a word of say. lt was all done by the metro government. And what was the effect? So now we are talking about us having put municipal planning to some extent at a community committee level, which is much more than there was prior to unification, and the honourable members opposite have the audacity to say that we are removing the local participation in planning. There wasn't one word of planning in the municipal government. And what was the effect of that, Mr. Speaker.

Let's try to remember what happened under the previous municipal government. If we, at Metro, zoned a property for a service station in Charleswood- the Leader of the Opposition is now a candidate in that area- we had Mayor Hilgenga coming down to our meeting telling us that if we permitted a service station at that area in Charleswood he would cut off the sewer and water for that service station.

We had a member of the council in Assiniboia saying that if we gave a building permit they would not permit the connection of sewer and water until that builder came in and agreed as to what would be the bricks on the building that was being built. This was municipal government in GreaterWinnipeg before the Metro situation. These things happen. These are not lies. I'll give you the names and the places. Mort Nemy came to our meeting and said that after you give a permit, we get that builder in and say that unless you do it our way you're going to have trouble with our municipality.

We have Mayor- (lnterjection)- Well, Mr. Speaker, you say that now it is the Minister. The Minister and the procedure with regard to major planning is now decided upon by the Municipal Board. We have had the councillors of Greater Winnipeg come to us numerous times and say that we do not want the Municipal Board. Why should our elected position be defeated by a person who is not elected? So the Minister in yielding Mr. Speaker, these have been the complaints of the City Councillors. Mr. Speaker, they have said vis a-vis the Municipal Board.

By the way, right now it is not the Municipal Board with regard to planning, it is the Minister who has to approve second reading. And you can refer it to the Municipal Board. That's right. But the Minister has to approve second reading now. On the Capital Expenditures it's the Municipal Board. That is what they complained about, and we had delegations from the City of Winnipeg coming and telling us that they don't want the Municipal Board.

The members opposite agree that there has to be some provincial lid on municipal spendings throughout the Province of Manitoba because it's our debt as well as theirs and we ultimately would have to pick it up. The City of Winnipeg Councillors say they don't want it to be an appointed board, so the Minister has indicated that it will be okay. lt will be an elected official who will have to justify his position to the citizens of Winnipeg in the same way as the Council. Now is that a backward step? Does that remove people participation? That improves people participation.

The honourable member says that the Municipal Board is more people oriented than a Minister of the Crown who has to answer for it. Mr. Speaker, he has to answer to all ofthe people in the Province of Manitoba. Because what he does will reflect on my voters. That's right, Mr. Speaker, and the Municipal Board has to answer to nobody. Now let's look at the extensive participation at municipal councils under the Conservative administration. Over 55 percent of all municipal expenses were in the hands of 10 people, not 28.

Major sewers, major roads, major parks, transit, bridges, planning, 55 percent of all municipal expenditures. They had no say in it. None of these councillors had a word to say about it. lf you add to that, Mr.

Speaker, police and fire, which all the reports agreed should be centralized and should be handled under one unified administration, over 90 percent of all municipal expenditures would have had nothing to do with the say of the municipal council, because when you took Metro and you took the others, that included - and you took police and fire - there was nothing left for these great thriving energetic publicly participated-in municipal councils to do. So what did they do, Mr. Speaker? Were they trying energetically to run their own Municipalities?

Is that what the Member for Sturgeon Creek did when he came to Metro begging the big administration to take over Ness Avenue? This was in their local municipality, Mr. Speaker, you would think that they would be wanting to have jurisdiction over this street. But, no, the major activities of the municipal councils in the pre-unification days was to see how much of their work they could get paid for by the other citizens of the City of Winnipeg. That was the position of the people in Fort Garry and I can quote you

chapter and verse how they wanted it, Mr. Speaker. lt was incredible. We t?uilt a water reservoir on one side of the street. The City of Fort Garry owned most of the property on the other side of the street. You know what they did? They took a public improvement by- 3276

Friday, May 20, 19 77 law, and they were the only voters to vote that that street should be paved so it would be paid for by the reservoir which was situated on the other side of the street. That's what they did. And that was the position of the municipal councils; that was their energy and that was their great participation. Well, Mr. Speaker, what happened was, that for years the people of all the City of Winnipeg, because of the incessant bickering that took place- and do Members have such short memories? Do they not remember the bickering between Metro and Winnipeg, and Metro and Fort Garry and Metro and St.

James, and the Bonnycastle and Ju ba? Municipal politics consisted of nothing but a continual attempt at one-upmanship between members of various municipal councils and Metro. (Interjection) - Well, Mr. Speaker I am giving my opinion and I suggest to you that if you will read the headlines of the newspapers between 1962 and 1965, there is much more substantiation for the opinions that I am expressing than there is substantiation for the opinions that have been expressed by the Member for Stu rgeon Creek and the Member for Fort Garry. I ask, any , Mr.

Speaker unbiased observer to review those headlines and see whether that is not the case. - (lnterjection)- MR. SPEAKER: Order please. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, now you see. The New Democratic Party in 1969 annoyed the Conservative Party no end by doing an astonishing thing. lt was a government that kept its electoral promises. lt said that it was going to reorganize Greater Winnipeg. What the Conservatives said, is thatyou know when you make these promises you'r e not really supposed to do that. You're supposed to get elected and then you're supposed to qualify them and undo them and forget about them.

But we decided that we would keep our electoral promiees and we came up with a program, Mr. Speaker. And everybody knows - it was said on repeated occasions and the Honourable Member for Fort Garry will not be able to find one word in any remarks that I have made to substantiate the suggestion that this was held up as an ideal and that there was a deceipt in the way in which the program was sold. There was, Mr. Speaker, there was admittedly a compromise and a pragmatic problem- two things.

The compromise was that there were numerous people who suggested that one of the effects of unification of Greater Winnipeg would to some extent have some problems vis-a-vis the identity of local people to their municipal council. And we said, we don't know whether that is so. I certainly did not agree that it was so, but in order to make assurance doubly sure, Mr. Speaker, we said that we would provide within the structure, not only as much but a more meaningful means of participation than existed under the previous council, and that nobody could then say that he did not provide the availability. Secondly, Mr.

Speaker, we had to move from 14 administrations to one administration overnight. And that's not using eloquent language, that is the fact. lt was not overnight, it was from 12 midnight to the next moment in time. There was a movement from 13 administrations to one administration, and we said that there had to be a mechanism to be able to go from that position to the next position.

Therefore, we were going to maintain administration in the community committees that then existed within the bou ndaries of Greater Winnipeg, so that there would be no interruption and no difficulty with the continued delivery of service. We were also going to provide for a means of citizens participating on the understanding that somebody suggested that this was going to be destroyed. But, Mr.

Speaker, if the honourable member will read at least my speech on Thu rsday, we said that it could go either way, that after a period of five years- and it was directly provided in the Act -t here would be a review of the administration, that we would then see what was the logical move to be made from that point on. And I will concede that some people thought that there could be far more local citizen participation at an actual administrative level than others. 1 happen to be of the opinion, Mr.

Speaker, that the average citizen of Winnipeg wants to elect a councillor, hopes that that councillor will look after things such as the running of the city, and will become intensely involved when something is happening in the city which directly affects him, which affects zoning in his riding, which affects some things that are happening very close to his home, then at that point he will become intensely involved. And, Mr. Speaker, I have no criticism of the people of the City of Winnipeg for having that view with regard to municipal politics.

If I have the choice of going to a football game or watching the North End aldermen argue about how many times a week garbage should be picked up, I'd go to the football game hoping that if my councillor didn't properly represent me, I would do something about it next time. However, if there were, in my area, a major new development which was going to affect the character of my residence, I might become one of the petitioners or one of the spokesmen wllo appeared at a community committee. But the actual day-to-day administration of the city, I think that the citizens want their elected representatives to do that.

But, Mr. Speaker, we have never, we have never foreclosed the possibility that there may be people who think differently and who may want to have a much more active role. And we have provided that within the mechanism. But that certainly wasn't in the mechanism in the pre-unification days. Mr. Speaker, I will tell you this. I attended most of the council meetings. I was at meetings of the 3277

Friday, May 20, 1977 councils of Old Kildonan, of Winnipeg, of St. Boniface, of Fort Garry, of St. James, and the average council meeting consisted of the councillors running throughtheir agenda and doing their work. And there is nothing wrong with that. Why should anybody be ashamed of that? That was what a council meeting was like, anc:l that's what a council meeting is still like in the smaller communities of this province. But I consider that to be the democratic process. I consider that to be the participation of citizens.

I consider the Member for Sturgeon Creek a citizen whether he thinks he is a citizen or not. I think he is a citizen. A MEMBER: You have no idea how it works. MR. GREEN: Mr. Speaker, I believe I have a better idea of how it works than does the Member for Sturgeon Creek. I believe I have a better idea as to how it works. And I believe that he yearns for the good old days.

I believe that what I said at the beginning of these remarks, and that his desire to go back to a system where citizens of Winnipeg were divided into various groups, each contending with each other to get an edge against the other, and that's what the biggest activity of municipal councils was. The most important activity at any municipal council meeting was: How do we get this out of Metro? Mr. Speaker, the honourable member says that that is an insult. I am telling him that given the nature of municipal politics, if they didn't do that, they weren't properly representing their citizens.

Why does the Member for Sturgeon Creek come to us and ask us to take Ness Avenue? One should be patriotic about Ness Avenue. lt's an old St. James street. Our citizens have an identification with this street. We love it. We should be patriotic towards Ness Avenue. Why do they come and put it on Metro? Why do they want Metro to take it over? Because, Mr. Speaker, they knew that the citizens of St. James were far less patriotic about Ness Avenue and that they wanted it to be paid for by the other citizens in the province of of Manitoba. You know, Mr. Speaker, there was only one exception to that rule.

There was only one exception to the rule that you tried to get ... . Charleswood certainly did it. Fort Garry certainly did it. West Kildonan certainly did it. And I don't argue with the member. West Kildonan did it with Salter Street, sure as I am standing here, and why wouldn't they? Why wouldn't they say that Salter Street is a major thoroughfare in Greater Winnipeg and it should be paid for by the others, other than West Kildonan. If they didn't do it, you say it's an insult, I say it's an insult to councillors who didn't do it, Mr. Speaker, who didn't do it. Mr. Speaker, I have no problem.

I have said at all times that I believe that the City of Winnipeg is one social, economic, geographical unit, that the citizens of Winnipeg as we now know it should equally bear the cost of the administration of all of Greater Winnipeg. -( Interjection)- Mr. Speaker, the honourable member has asked me how I saw it. I have never said anything different. I have also said that if people want a means of participating in the local government, the means is there. The means is there, and what has been said against it, what has been said against this- and, Mr. Speaker, I hope that I have been consistent.

When Metro was considering zone tares, all of a sudden the people of Transcona, the councillors of Transcona, the councillor forT ranscona and the municipal council of Transcona, some of whom said we want to maintain patriotism in Transcona, said this: They said Winnipeg is one unit, that the people of Transcona should not have to pay an extra fare to go to Winnipeg. The transportation from Transcona to Winnipeg should be the same for everybody, and if there is a deficit on that, it shou Id be shared by all the citizens of Greater Winnipeg. I believe, Mr.

Speaker, that I am one of the only councillors - that may be an exaggeration, but certainly I was one of the councillors .... I know what it was now. I was one of the councillors who had no constituents paying zone fares, not a single one. And up until the time I got on council when a vote was taken on the question of removal of zone fares, it was always against the removal of tone fares because there was always enough who had no zone fares who would vote against the removal of zone tares because it cost their constituents money and got them nothing. Mr.

Speaker, when I was on the municipal council, I voted for the elimination of zone fares. lt was a cost to my constituents. lt got them nothing, except, Mr. Speaker, it made a greater recognition of the tact that we are all part of the social and economic and geographical unit of Greater Winnipeg, and that ultimately it would be to their advantage. And I voted that way on the zone fares, and, Mr.

Speaker, I went into lnkster constituency and fought and defended the position that this governme nt took on the hydro rates, that they had to be equalized on the basis that you cannot expect people to equalize taxation which is their advantage and you not equalize hydro rates which happens to be your advantage. 1 think that Greater Winn ipeg and the citizens of Greater Win nipeg are better off by the unification of our city. Now, Mr. Speaker, these things have been improvements to Winnipeg. They have been improvements to the people in lnkster constituency.

There are those who resent them, and the greatest resentment has been expressed by those who stopped getting the tax edge, who stopped beihg in a position where they could say that the people in lnkster constituency are bearing most of the load and they are getting off easy. 3278

Friday, May 20, 19 77 I have no apology for removing that situation, Mr. Speaker. If anybody has to be in politics on the basis that he can sponge off the others, he is in a very weak position. And if that's their position, Mr. Speaker, I have absolutely no difficulty in rejecting it. So what did we do and what is now being attacked?

We've said that the first step will be unification, that unification will provide for those people who are suggesting that there is no participation. lt will also provide for the uniform planning, uniform taxes, and it will provide for an orderly transition of administrative services from thirteen administrations to one administration. And we will also provide right in the Act that this is not intended to be the last word. it's not intended to be the last word.

The last word- not the last word, but a further word- a further word will come after we see how this proceeds for the next five years, and then we will bring in additional changes. The changes we have brought in, Mr. Speaker, in substance are agreed to by my honourable friend. -( Interjection)- Pardon me? Well, we'll bring them in. They are agreed to by my honourable friend, because in substance what we are doing is rationalizing the size of council, more consistent with the number of people required, putting more power in the hands of the councillors to run their own administration.

The two features which my honourable friend says impose provincial control, one of them changes the Municipal Board to the Minister, and I can tell the honourable member that is not a serious thing. I am quite certain that if you prefer the Municipal Board or the City of Winnipeg councillors prefer the Municipa i Board, it is not a matter of great principle with us. We were encouraged to change it to an elected person rather than an appointed person. And the last one, Mr.

Speaker, merely reverts to the previous situation before Unicity. lt has always been the position in Greater Winnipeg that the Province of Manitoba was not bound by the provisions of their zoning by laws. Now, the change sugg ests that this could apply to a provincial agency. But certainly the doctrine of royal prerogative is not something new in municipal politics. lt was always there under the Conservative administration. it's we who changed it. it's we who changed it. We made it available, that the Crown would be bound, but problems have occurred, Mr. Speaker.

Problems have occurred and they are not the kind of problems that my honourable friend refers to. A problem occurs when the Minister of Municipal Affairs has to go through a charade to get the right to build a washroom in a provincial park, something that is required by health regulations. A problem occurs in the City of St. James when we have a piece of land which is zoned to permit private construction of approximately 52 suites - zoned to permit it. The public wants to build much less than that, 38, and the City of Winnipeg says, "No, we are going to stop you," and did effectively stop the project.

And we called the City of Winnipeg in, Mr. Speaker, (and I will just be a couple of minutes) and we said, "You name the places." Yes, Mr. Speaker, "You name the places." -( lnterjections)- MR. SPEAKER: Order please. The Honourable Minister has one minute. MR. GREEN: You see the honourable members opposite see no problem in the City of Winnipeg discriminating against the public of the Province of Manitoba, see no problem in that, where they would give a private developer the right to build 52 suites, but refuse to give 36 to the public. The honourable members see no problem in that. I do, Mr. Speaker, I do. I do.

And that's the difference between us. -( Interjection)- Well, Mr. Speaker, that's fine. That's the difference between us. They see no problem in that. I do. And I say to you that if the City of Winnipeg is going to discriminate against this public agency, then we will go back to the Conservative rule. And the Conservative rule, Mr. Speaker, wasthat there is a Crown prerogative. And there still is a Crown prerogative vis-a- vis the Federal Government. The Federal Government is not bound and the Province of Manitoba was never bound under the Tories. They were never bound under the Tories. And all we are doing, Mr.

Chairman, is going back to that situation. So if the honourable members on the other side of the House are going to oppose this bill, they are going to oppose it, not because of the things that they have already agreed to and were in force under their administration, they are going to oppose it because they want to return to the Metro form of government and the people of the City of Winnipeg won't accept that. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Flin Flon. MR. THOMA S BARROW: Mr. Speaker, if no one else wishes to speak, I move that debate be adjourned, seconded by the Member for St. Matthews.

MOTION presented and carried. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable House Leader. MR. GEN: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honourable Minister of Public Works, that Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a Committee to consider of the supply to be granted to Her Majesty. MOTION presented and carried and the House resolved itself into a Committee of Supply with the Honou rable Member for Logan in the Chair. 3279

Friday, May 20, 19 77 COMM ITTEE OF SUPPLY ESTIMATES - MINE S, RESOU RCES AND ENVIRONMEN TAL MAN AGEMENT MR. CHAIRMAN, -Mr. William Jenkins (Logan): I refer members to Page 43 of their Estimates Book, Resolution 81 (a)

(2) Salaries $164,800-pass? The Honourable Member for St. James. MR. MINAKER: Mr. Chairman, I don't know whether the Minister was finished with his

summary and presentation yesterday. Is the Minister finished with what he was covering in his Estimates? Mr. Chairman, I listened with interest yesterday when the Minister introduced his Estimates to the Committee and again with pride indicated to us that it was a stand-fast type of Estimate.

And I recall almost the very same words to that same general presentation last year when we dealt with the Minister's Estimates, and we were at that time, as we are now, going through an inflationary time where we wanted to see the government cut back in spending and we welcomed at that time the Honourable Minister's remarks, and we took him at his word. And also this year we took his remarks again and we welcomed them. But, Mr.

Speaker, what happens when we take the Minister at his words last year and he presented Estimates to us, that at that time he indicated to us was going to be something like $18,821 ,900.00. That's what he asked for, and it was a reduction from the year before. But lo and behold, when we look at the Minister's Estimates that he is presenting to us this year, it doesn't show $18 million, Mr. Chairman. lt shows all of $21 million that he spent last year in his Estimates, an increase of something like, I believe, eleven percent. Not a reduction, Mr.

Chairman, but an increase in what he asked for, presented to us as being a reduction, saying it was a reduction and a stand-pat Estimate, and now we find out, Mr. Chairman, that somewhere along the line there was another something like $3 million or $2 million-plus that his department decided to spend. So, Mr. Chairman, I don't know whether I can accept the Minister's words this year, that it is going to be a stand-pat Estimate, because we took his words last year, and now lo and behold before us we see that in actual fact, there was 11 percent more spent.

I hope that the Honourable Minister will explain to us the reasons for the changes that have occurred. Mr. Chairman, we listened with interest, the Minister indicated that his department is following the policies of the government to have greater public participation in the general development of our resources in the province. Mr. Chairman, the Minister so glowingly indicated that there was a major turn that had taken place. Mr.

Chairman, I'd advise the Honourable Minister that while this Minister is working on his philosophy, government philosophies, that employment is occurring, while he's merrily driving down his road to socialism and taking that big turn, there are people in our north that are looking for work, there are people in the south looking for work while he toys with their lives because he firmly believes and he's mentioned it very many times in this House that he believes in socialism. He believes in government ownership.

As a result we have before us today the problem of not only the experienced but also the young, looking for work. Why I spent a bit of time on this, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that - and I'm sure the Honourable Minister knows this - that we in Manitoba depend very heavily on the mining industry. lt represents something like 8 percent of our gross provincial product. Mr.

Chairman, I'm not pul ling these figures out of the air, I'm using the figures that were used in the 1976 Budget Address. it's very clear there that something like $533 million that they have shown and again has been confirmed in other Canadian statistics is the amount of dollars that the mining industry brought in. That's something like 8 percent of our gross provincial product. So it's quite obvious I would think and would be a fair comparison to reflect that it is obvious a good proportion of our employees in this province depend on mining. But there are other interesting figures that have happened, Mr.

Chairman, since this Minister and his government has decided to take the approach to the development of resources in our province in their past eight years of responsibility. I'm again reading from Mining in Canada, Facts and Figures 1976. There's an interesting figure that occurs in here and the sources are Statistics Canada Catalogue No. 26202 and 26201. it relates to the mineral production of Canada by provinces in 1965 and in 1975, a comparison in that 10 yearspan. Mr. Chairman, Manitoba in 1965 had 4.8 percent of the total dollars that were earned from mineral production.

Today they have 4 percent of the Canadian figure, a drop-off of 20 percent because of this government's toying. Now immediately the Minister is going to say that's because the production of oil is down. And I'll answer that in a few minutes as to why I think the production of oil is down in our province. But it is a 20 percent drop-off. But does the Minister know what that means to our provincial product, that 20 percent of that $533 million or whatever. I suggest, Mr.

Chairman, that the Minister and his philosophy, and his government's philosophy, the Province of Manitoba $100 million in lost revenues from mineral productions as the years have gone on. Because that's what 20 percent of that figure of $533 mil lion, or $500 milli on in production represents. That we could have had - potentially this Minister has taken that cavalier attitude, his government has taken that cavalier attitude, that go on, if you want. If you don't want it, then we'll do it ourselves. And again this Honourable Minister has come forward with his legal truths, half-truths, 3280

Friday, May 20, 19 77 statements like, "The mineral exploration is still as high as it ever was." But he failed to mention that the private exploration has dropped off between 1975 and 1976. -(Interjectio n)- "So what," the Minister says. By 25 percent, it has dropped off. -( Interjection)- Sure, he says, there is something like $9 112 million in exploration taking place but he fails to say that 60 percent of it is government exploration, public money, rolling the dice and looking for the resources. He fails to say that it is now 40 percent private money that is looking for it.

What impact does that have on our province? I'd suggest, Mr. Chairman, that it means that we now have less people working because of this attitude that this Mi nister and this government have taken with regard to this cavalier attitude they have. Come along if you want. If you don't want to come along, we'll do it ourselves. -( lnterjection)- Mr. Chairman, I welcome the comments from the Honourable Member for Flin Flon because that type of attitude that that member has, Mr. Chairman, is why we are getting the private enterprise people, the private developer is afraid to come into our province.

Because when I gave a speech the other day, a budget speech, I was relating to the concern that the industry has with regard to nationalization. And the Honourable Member for Flin Flon said, "We're next." Deny that he said, "We're next." That's exactly what he said when I gave that Budget Speech. So what kind o-1 attitude is that for a member of the government when you are trying to encourage money coming in? What kind of attitude is that, when a sister province of the same philosophy threatens to nationalize the petroleum industry in its province? What kind of attitude is it? MR.

GREEN: I wonder if the honourable member would tell me, in the figure of 4.8 percent whether pretroleum is included. Of 4.8 percent of the total, is petroleum included in that figure? MR. MINAKER: Yes, I would say it is included. -( lnterjection) MR. CHAIRMAN: Order please. MR. MINAKER: Mr. Chairman, I would love to answer that question to the Honourable Minister and I wi 11.

Because if the Honourable Minister wou Id acceptthe fact that there are oi I producers in this province who would come in and work, and water-flood, and produce 40 percent more oil than we are today potentially, and he won't even accept their consideration three years ago. Now you tell me why, Mr. Chairman. Why is that cavalier attitude? Because, Mr. Chairman, this is the attitude of this government, the attitude of the government that they are not interested in the development of oil in the corner of our province. What has happened? Mr. Chairman, what has happened? Everything has gone up proportionately.

Sure, the price of oil has gone up. But how much has the price of oil gone up between 1975 and 1977. Okay, we're talking about 1975 figures, Mr. Chairman, in this book. Mr. Chairman, what has the government's attitude been in the past few years with regard to development of resources? Well, I've mentioned the cavalier attitude which I feel the political climate is there that the people are afraid to come here, the private industry. They are afraid to come in. lt's a long-term investment. They want to see some kind of stability. You know, what kind of return are they going to get on their money?

Are they going to be in business today, or is the Member for Flin Flon going to be influential to the point where they will nationalize the companies? Will they take on the attitude that the Province of Saskatchewan has taken on? They are of the same philosophy. We know tli e attitude of the Mi nister of Mines. He would love to control all the resources in the province. He'd love to be the king miner; we know that. There's no doubt about it, that he would love to be the king miner of the province. So what have we had after eight years of this government, particularly in the mining industry?

Well, we get comments from people related to the industry that there is a confrontation attitude. There is a negative attitude toward the industry by the government. If you want to come along, fine. if you don't, so what? This is what has happened. So what is the result after eight years, Mr. Chairman? Who is doing the exploring now, the majority of it? The government. Who is expanding? Where is this great expansion? Where is it happening? Sure, mines have closed down and I agree with the Honourable Minister. When an ore runs out, bloody well the mine should stop; it has to stop.

You can't mine dirt or waste, as Mr. Koffman said last night. But it's a long-range development, this stop-gap that is occurring now in the development of mining, it's going to hurt. it's hurting now because the mines are running down. As you know it's a non-renewable resource. But what is happening? Where is that exploration by private industry? Where is that exploration by the small prospector now? He has been pushed right out the door. The only prospectors left now are those that are employed by the government or by the mining people themselves.

We now have an instance in our province where there are more geologists probably employed by the Mines Branch, by the government, than there is by the mining people themselves in the province. This is what has happened. And as a result of this lack of expansion, we have got the unemployment problem. And part of the unemployment problem relates to this attitude of the government towards not only mining but other areas. So that we have a very wide range effect occurring and particularly in northern Manitoba. · 3281

Friday, May 20, 19 77 Northern Manitoba is dependent on mining. lt can't depend on year-by-year, or every five years, of a Hydro project coming in. lt won't survive on that. lt needs the mining. lt needs that competition of development of mines. They don't want necessarily one-mine towns; they want development. But this government's attitude that the small prospector is gone now; the idea of finding that pot at the end of the rainbow; the only pot at the end of the rainbow that this government is promoting is sweepstake tickets.

That's the only inspiration that seems to be with this government any more and how much employment do we get out of sweepstake ticket sales? Not very much. Not only that. Where have the small mining companies gone? Where have they gone? Where is their development? But, again, this government in its attitude, and the presentation by the Honourable Minister yesterday said, "Some of our regulations haven't touched those Orders-in Council because we felt that they were a special privilege." Very convenient explanation, Mr. Chairman, very convenient explanation on the immunity of the major companies.

Yet people who had leases- 21-year leases- were just wiped out, literally wiped out. I suggest, Mr. Chairman, that this results in selective grading and selective development of mines in our province when you have major areas where the major mining companies can sit back and wait and decide when they want to develop that particular body of ore, or go after it, because they are immune. But in the meantime, the smaller mine companies do not have that particular special agreement. The government decides to leave the major ones a way. lt makes it very comfortable for a government, Mr.

Chairman, to only have to deal with two or three people in a resource or an industry where they might want to nationalize it, rather than having to deal with a lot. lt is a very convenient way of setting the pattern, not for today, but maybe three years from now or four years from now, if an NDP government was the administration and wanted to nationalize the mineral industry or the resources. So this attitude, Mr. Chairman, has resulted in less competition in the industry now, other than that you have got the government. And you've got three or four major mining companies involved.

What choice has that left for the miners, the people, the employees? I'm sure they want to have a chance to choose where they work, and who they work for in the north, or in the different mining towns. lt has also resulted in the loss of exploration and development, there is no doubt about it. The Minister will argue that point and say, "Well it hasn't fallen off." But who is spending the money? Who is throwing the dice in the crap game now? Why are we throwing that dice? Why not let the private people gamble?

If we can get the tax from them, we can get the revenue from them, why do we turn around and throw the revenue back into holes? The Minister has tried to paint a very beautiful picture, or paint a very bright and colourful picture, but paint does not cover up cracks; it does not cover up holes. And there are a lot of cracks and holes in the Minister's approach to this problem, in our opinion - a lot of cracks and holes. And one of the major ones is unemployment. One of the major ones is the lack of additional new money coming into our province that's needed. Mr.

Chairman, I know that the Honourable Minister will never accept the principle of the fact that private development is better if it's considered that private money is much more efficient and much more profitable than government-operated companies. I'm sure the Minister will defend that one, too. But look what has happened, Mr. Chairman, when government has got involved in buses, or got involved in planes. Mr.

Chairman, what I'm suggesting is that if the private industry wants to do it, if we control the regulations to a point that we make sure that they don't high-grade, we make sure that they don't rip off the province and the people, then let them do the gambling. Let them go out and look. What has happened in B.C? Exploration went almost to nil and now look how it's going in B.C. Why? Why aren't we matching it? Because I suggest, Mr. Chairman, that we have every bit as much potential to find resources here as they do in B.C.

Yet, for some reason, now it's 60-40, 60 percent government exploration and 40 percent private. What will it be next year? If it has fallen off 25 percent in one year, what will it be next year? The participation of the private industry has fallen off, Mr. Chairman. In percentage of participation it has fallen off. -(I nterjection)- There are the half-truths again, Mr. Chairman. When you are talking about dollar for dollar, then you compare the percentage of participation, Mr. Chairman.

For some reason the Minister thinks that whether you spend a dollar this year and a dollar last year, that if you compare the two dollars on the same year .. .. That's what you're doing. (Interjection)- All I know, Mr. Chairman, if you spend $600 million on exploration this year and the private industry spends $400 million, then they have only got 40 percent of the participation. If the year before they were doing $600 million in exploration, and you were doing the $400 million, they were doing 60 percent of the activity and the government was 40, and that's what has happened. Mr.

Chairman, that's what has happened; it has fallen off 25 percent, the participation in the one year. I ask the Minister to try and deny that fact. Mr. Chairman, I would suggest that the Minister's attitude, he is obviously never going to change it. The people of Manitoba know that. The mining industry of Canada know it and the mining industry 3282

Friday, May 20, 19 77 and the people are the people that are being hurt. The Minister figures he is doing the right thing. I know he feels that and I respect his feeling on that. That's where the difference in philosophy lies, that we believe that it would be much better for private people to go in and do that gambling and do the development and the people will benefit through employment, through taxes, and he will come back and say, "Yes, but what happened before? " I suggest, "What's happening now?

" So he has increased the tax revenue from his approach but he is tiring it back into holes, tiring it back into mines, and I hope for the sake of the people of Manitoba we start to find some min es. But what happens after we find the mines? He says that he will get the money. He will get the $100 million or $200 million that is required. But what happens it we have to develop a Hydro station that year? Where are we going to get the money? -( Interjection)- No problem, he says. And what happens when you have a condition that is happening right now where the mines' incomes have dropped oft.

Well, the people accept that. How are the people going to accept these losses? How have they accepted the losses of Saunders? How have they accepted the losses in Flyer? How is the Minis ter going to stand up with his colleagues in Cabinet and say, "I need that money." And they say, "Well, we can't politically put it through this year." So, Mr. Chairman, how will the people of Saskatchewan develop the potash? These are the questions. There are a million of us to pay tor it. In the meantime, there are a lot of us unemplo yed, a lot of the people of Manitoba unemployed. And I suggest, Mr.

Chairman, that this cavalier attitude that this government and this Minister is taking in this particular department, that represent 8 percent of our provincial product, only second to the agricultural industry in terms of resource industries in our province; second only to agriculture, is being adversely affected and as a result, we are looking at the problem of development in the North. lt cannot only depend on government development and exploration through mining or through Manitoba Hydro, it has to have that private money in there.

The province has to have the private development if we want to maintain a healthy province, a healthy North, not only physically, but also in terms of employment. And I think that the Minis ter has to recognize this and will not either admit it or he is too blindfolded in his path to socialism to realize it; or he is too blindfolded in his approach to trying to control this department and trying to control the mining industry and the resources industry in Manitoba. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Mines. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chairman, the honou rable member who is generally very friendly, despite our differences of opinion, has decided that this year he is going to feign real anger with the Minister to see whether he can rile him up. Mr. Chairman, I don't accept the fact that he is as bitter as his remarks make out and I will have no diffi culty dealing with them. Mr.

Chairman, the member says that I am determined in my philosophy that the public of the province of Manitoba can do a better job and realize better results out of the development of its own natural resources than has been the pattern of the past and that is to depend on private industry. In that respect, Mr. Chai rman, he is absolutely right. I am determined in that, believe me, and I will push that belief as tar as I can in the hope that it is consistent with the beliefs of the majo rity of the people of the province of Manitoba.

And I have absolutely no difficu lty in confirming the honourable member's assessment in that connection and furthermore, confirming that that's where the difference of opinion lies. The honour able member says that this province and its people are dependent for the development of its mineral resources on the private sectors and that if we do not realize that dependency, we are going to suffer. I say, Mr.

Chairman, that the people of the province of Manitoba are not ultimately dependent on the private sector, that they have the capacity, the intellig ence and the competence to develop their own resources with much more benefits accruing to themselves than have accrued in the past if they assume their responsibility in this connection. And we are going to debate that issue, we are going to debate it continually, and that debate will go on, not only, Mr. Chairman, in this country, but it will go on in many many other count ries.

The honour able member starts off by suggesting that somehow I misled this House, and I believe that he doesn't really think that but that's sort of a good starting point on which to talk. That we came here with Estimates of some $18 million and that we spent$20 million. Now, thehonourable member will be aware that the Estimates last year were in the ...

In the same session and I believe it was explained, supplemented by Supplementary Estimates, which were revealed to the House, and which were passed by the House, and had to do with things that we were waiting for approval from from Ottawa and I believe, although I couldn't swear to this, that I said in my Estimates that there may be some mor e money coming, if we get certain things approved. And we did, Mr. Chairman, get a mineral sub-agreement approved. lt was not signed prior to the preparation of the 1977 Estimates and it was subsequently signed and was added from Supplementary Estimates, $1,1 00,000.00.

We also had flood damage reduction as an agreement that we made during the year with the Federal Government. We had a flood damage reduction agreement which started last year. I don't think that that was in Supplementary Estimates- ! am not sure, I think maybe a Special Warrant. I am advised by the administration that it was in the Supplementary Estimates, therefore it was passed by 3283

Friday, May 20, 19 77 the House last year, $240,000.00. We had an ARDA program put in, to be provided to the department if required on Water Resource projects, of $294,600.00; totalling $1,634,060.00. After that $509,000 which is a result of the collective agreement, and you have your figure. Now there is your figure, Mr. Chairman, $18,821,000 passed in the Supply debate, $509,000 as the result of a collective agreement- will he call me a liar and say that I'm misleading on the basis of $509,000 signed in the collective agreement?

Will the honourable member say that I misled the House because we did say not include the $509,000 which was in the collective agreement, which is added to everybody's Estimates? Is that what makes me dishonest? Will he call me a liar because I have added to it $1 million, or will he say it's a half truth or we are not going to believe this Minister any more, which is what he said, which is a little less harsh? But since we are being harsh, I may as well use what the term means.

That he misled the House, that he told us it was stand-pat, that it was a fake- he didn't say fake, but you know, that was the kind of pitch- for a Supplementary Supply of $1,634,000; is that the amount that he says that I misled the House on? Because that was dealt with in Supplementary Estimates. And there is your figure, Mr. Chairman. it was a stand-pat budget.

The mineral sub-agreement, we wanted and I indicated in the House that we are trying to get it and trying to get it signed; and we did get it signed and it means $550,000 from Ottawa and I believe that's the agreement under which we made the uranium reconnaissance flights which have resulted in numerous private firms going in and studying uranium. Is that what he is complaining about? Is that the half truths or the misstatements that I made to the House in presenting my Estimates?

I believe that the honourable member really doesn't feel that I misstated the thing but, you know, it is a cute thing to take the figure of $18 million, was approved, and we spent $20.9 million which is $2 million higher, that's true. I think that the honourable member could have said, "Why the difference?" But I think he was anxious that there was going to be a tough attack on the Mini ster and he's really not going to hold any punches, which is fine.

But then, when he throws punches, he should be aware that his guard is down and that he is throwing some pretty wild punches, and that the man who throws wild punches ends up on his back. Because of all the mi struths, Mr. Chairman, of all the mi struths and misstatements the most serious one is this suggestion that our mining production has gone down, because our percentage of minerals sold on the world market by Canada has gone down; and he has taken it from 4.8 percent to 4 percent and then I asked him if he includes petroleum, and yes, he does include petroleum. Well, Mr.

Chairman, with that one reduction in poundage and there hasn't been in 1975; in 1974 and 1975 the poundage was going up. Our resource development was increasing but, yes, our share of what was sold was going down. Because, I would suggest, Mr. Chairman, and I am now guessing - I am going to throw a wild one - that the share of Ontario went down, because Ontario is essentially hard rock minerals and Alberta and Saskatchewan must have gone up. And he says on account of me, account of me - he blames me- $100 million has been lost, because that's the amount that has gone down. But will he blame Mr.

Bernier if theirs went down from or 5.2 percent to 5 percent, because they didn't have any oil production which went up considerably in price? Is it because of the Tory government in the province of Ontario that they have deliberately cost the people of Ontario that amount of money? And I would venture to say that the share of New Brunswick would have gone down. Does he say Mr. Hatfield cost the people of that province millions of dollars? I would guess- and I don't have his sheet- but if that is what he is basing it on, then Alberta must have gone up and Saskatchewan must have gone up.

Did Saskatchewan's go up because of the New Democratic Party government in the province of Saskatchewan? -( Interjection)- Alberta's gone up, Saskatchewan's gone slightly down. Alberta's is all petroleum and Saskatchewan's is part petroleum and part other products, potash. Potash prices went down and they have a considerable amount of potash.

And when the price of potash goes up, whether it is a New Democratic Party government or a Saskatchewan government, is the honourable member, in throwing a wild punch because he wants to throw some wild ones- is he going to say that the share of Saskatchewan's mineral resources, that the Minister of Mines of that province has given the people of the province of Saskatchewan $100 million?

Is he going to go back to the 1973 or 1974 when the price of nickel and copper were pretty good and maybe our share went up, is he going to say that in that year Sid Green gave the people of the province of Manitoba $100 million? Of course he's not. Let's look at some of these other wild punches, Mr. Chairman. ! think the wildest punch of all is the suggestion that the private activity has gone down because the percentage has gone down. Now let's look at that and let's see what the honourable member wants to say.

Let us assume the private activity in the province of Manitoba in the year 1975 was $2 mi llion and that they were the only explorer, a hundred percent. Let's assume the next year they went up to $4 mil lion and we added six, so that there was $10 million in exploration rather than $2 million, and they doubled theirs; but their percentage has gone down from 100 percent to 40 percent. Is it a wild punch to say, Mr. Chairman, am I exaggerating , that their activity has gone down? That is absolute nonsense, there activity has gone up.

And the fact that the Crown has augmented that activity, if he is interested in exploration, should 3284

Friday, May 20, 19 77 be something that would satisfy the honourable member, but not when he is in the mood that he is in today, where he has got to throw some wild punches and he has got to be bitter, and he has got to feign real anger whether it is there or not- and I suggest that it is not there. Mr. Chairman, if it is there, if it is there, then he is translating a City of Winnipeg speech into the Estimates of the Department of Mines and Resources -( Interjection)- Well, he said, "Not after what you have done this morning." -( Interjection)- Well, I thought that was what ...

I thought that that the spirit of hostility stemmed from the speech that was made on the City of Winnipeg. Well then, I don't know what it is based on. I thought it was something about what was said this morning. But, Mr. Chairman, if it's there, let the honourable member realize that, despite what he thinks of me and despite the hostility that he wants to have, it is not going to help his case to throw outrageous wild punches and we won't call them half-step truths or mistruths or dishonesty, we won't resort to that, Mr. Chairman, we'll call it rubbish, honest rubbish but rubbish nevertheless.

Look at the things that have been said. That we misled the House about $2 million being spent. (Interjection)- Well, Mr. Chairman, I say that these Supplementary Estimates were last year's, last year in the House. Mr. Chairman, we passed these Supplementary Estimates in the House last year. -( Interjection)- Well, they do not appear in the Estimate Book, the Supplementary Estimates. (lnterjection)- MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for St. James. MR.

MINAKER: We had a supplementary list given to us and there it is there, that I handed to the Minister and he put over to the left, there is no department of his in there. MR. GREEN: Mr. Chairman, I didn't see the list. Mr. Podolsky tells me that you have the wrong list. You have for the fiscal year ending March 31st, 1976, and the Estimates that you are discussing are for the fiscal year ... That's another wild one but that's kind of an error. We can excuse the honourable member for that. We'll excuse him and we won't even call that rubbish.

But the other statement is rubbish, the statement that we somehow came here and pretended a stand-pat budget and then spent more money, is rubbish. lt is not dishonest, it is not a half truth, it's rubbish. We passed in the House $1,100,000 for a mineral sub-agreement; we passed flood damage reduction of $240 million; we passed an ARDA program of $294,000; that is my impression. We passed them at Supplementary Estimates and my department people are nodding in agreement. I hope that they are right. In any event, that is what the money was spent for. And if the question was asked, I would have given it.

The other $509,000 is the collective agreement. So that is wild punch number one which misses its mark and subjects the honourable member to winding up on the seat of his pants. Wild punch number two, a suggestion that a reduction from 4.8 percent on the national sale of minerals to 4 percent is attributable to our mining policy. If he says that, he will have to agree that when it went up it wasa creditto our mining policy. What had happened, Mr. Chairman, is the price of petroleum went up and we are a very small producer of petroleum. Wild punch number two.

Wild punch number three, that we could have increased the oil production and that we would not be down by 4.8 percent. Now that is really a wild one. If we trebled, if we trebled our oil production, it wouldn't have an effect on that figure of 4 percent. Do you know how much our oil production is? lt's .5 percent, not 1 percent, .5 percent of the total oil production of Canada. Now let's say we trebled it, it wouldn't mean anything to the figure of 4 percent but that's wild punch number three. A MEMBER: $50 million. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Chairman, the $50 million - you say if we trebled our oil production and if it was $50 million - and I have said trebled and nobody has suggested that it could be trebled- it would not affect the figure of 4 percent, because $50 million, in the billions that is being received for the sale of oil, wouldn't affect that figure. But, Mr. Chairman, how does he say we could have trebled that figure? He says, Mr. Chairman, that we could have increased it. I have given a wild increase- there is no way that we could have increased it by three times. We couldn't have increased it, Mr.

Chairman, because the honourable member is suggesting that if we had somehow given better tax concessions to the oil industries we would have increased it. The taxes in Saskatchewan are much worse than ours and they have increased their oil figures, mainly because of price; and the taxes in Alberta are, if not worse, almost as bad as ours, because they were 65 percent on the incremental basis and they have increased their oil production. So that's wild punch, Mr. Chairman, number four, which the honourable gentleman finds himself on the seat of his pants with. He says, Mr.

Chairman, that the percentage- let's get to the next wild punch -o f private industry has been declining. And he works that out, Mr. Chairman, by saying their percentage of total exploration- and I've indicated, Mr. Chairman, that if one takes that position then he has to take the position that if they were doing one million dollars and were 100 percent, that that's a reduction than if they were doing $5 million and it was 50 percent, that that would be a decrease. and I'll ask him for that. Talk about exploration activities, one million is better than five million if the Crown is left out of 3285

Friday, May 20, 19 77 it, because if it's all private, one million would be better than 10 million if the Crown was putting up 5 million. Now look where ideology is leading him. Talk about dogmatic ideology and impractical position, if we happen to increase, and we haven't , and I wouldn't suggest it, but if you use the percentage figures it's perfectly logical.

If we happen to increase private participation by putting up $5 million in public participation, the honourable member would say it's a decline because previously they had a 100 percent of the action and now they've got 50 percent and their activity has been decreased by 50 percent. Does the honourable member really want to say that, or in his mood of hostility and throwing wild punches he happens to come to that position? Because what has happened in the exploration field, Mr.

Chairman, is exactly as I stated yesterday, that the private sector has been reducing the amount of its contributions and maintaining the level of its activity because now it gets twice as much done with half as much money. And they have a partner in the public of the Province of Manitoba. What my honourable friend is really upset about, is that there is that partner, not the level of activity, but any activity is bad if it's conducted by the public and we have to write it off. But if we look at what the private sector is doing - Mr.

Chairman, that's two wild punches because that is the wildest of all statements - the honourable member, if he's going to make a reduction out of an increase, he's going to do much better than people have suggested that I do, make black appear white. He's going to do what the Member for River Heights used to do, he's going to make a flood out of a reduction in water levels. That's what the Member for River Heights used to say, that if you reduced water levels by two feet then you have created a flood.

What the honourable member says, that if you increase exploration activity from eight million to $16 million, and the private sector goes up from four million to six million, that's a reduction in activity. Well, Mr. Chairman, you have to be a pretty good magician, a pretty good debater, a pretty good user of the language to convince that to the people of Manitoba. I'm prepared to go anywhere. I'm prepared to go to St. James and stand on a platform and argue with my honourable friend about that proposition. -( Interjection)- Oh yes, I will win, because the people of St. James, Mr. Chairman, the people of St.

James want a nickel of our money invested -o f our money, all of ours- and we will have no difficulty with it, Mr. Chairman.

You know, the Honourable the Leader of the Opposition always ignores the fact- and I don't really like to make too much out of it because it's still Treasury money- but the fact is that as the result of the policy which we have adopted in maintaining the integrity of our tax policy, which couldn't be maintained if we were not doing what we are doing, the amount that we are spending is more than made up by the amount of increased revenues we get from the mining company as a result of the policy that we are adopting -( Interjection)- it's more than made up, including inflation. MR.

CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Leader of the Opposition. MR. STERLING LYON (Souris-Ki llarney): If the burden of his argument as he expresses it so vociferously this morning is true, why does the President of Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Company come to Winnipeg and say, because of the policies of this government, we are putting our investment money in other jurisdictions and we are not developing Manitoba the way it could be developed. MR. GREEN: Because, Mr. Chairman, the President of the Hudson Bay Mining Corporation would love to get us out of government so that he could have the free ride that he used to have.

But insofar as the activities .... You know, I don't like to do this, Mr. Chairman, but if it's going to be used against me then I have to use it against the people who are doing it. Hudson Bay Mining Exploration Company. These are the projects: No. 7, total program costs $39,000- provincial share $19,000 - the balance is Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Corporation, 50 percent. No. 8, $100,000 - $756,000; their share 50 percent; No. 8(a) $60,000, their share 50 percent. No. 9 $24,000, their share 50 percent.

No. 9(a) $44,000, their share 50 percent; No. 10 $56,000, their share 50 percent; No. 11 $39,000, their share 50 percent; No. 11 (a) $36,000, their share 50 percent; No. 12 $178,000, their share 50 percent; No. 12 (a) $21,000, their share 50 percent; No. 13 $60,000, their share 50 percent. These are all Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Corporation's. No. 14, $225,000, their share- (lnterjection) - Well, they would prefer- there is no doubt that the notion that they are going out and they are not investing here, is something that they would say. Mr.

Chairman, it is not peanuts, it is as much as has been invested before. Mr. Chairman, compared to their capital investment- when they put money into the Centennial Mine next year, or the money that they are putting in now, then they will increase their capital investment as well, but the level of activity, Mr. Chairman, if it has gone down, it has only gone down because of the fact that they have a partner and for the same amount of activity they have to invest less money. I haven't finished. Mr. Chairman, here are the peanuts. - (Interjection) - I haven't finished.

No. 14, $225,000, their share 50 percent; No. 15, $140,000, their share, 50 percent; No. 15 (a), Mr. Chairman, - the honourable member doesn't like to listen- $14,000, their share 50 percent; No. 16, $11 2,000, their share 50 percent, Mr. Chairman, and they would love to have been a partner with the provincial government in the grandest exploration project which is under the shadow of the their mine; they would have been very happy to participate 50 percent and very happy to be a contributor to the development costs of that project in the Province of Manitoba with the 3286

Friday, May 20, 19 77 socialist government, with the present Minis ter of Labour, with the present Minis ter of Mines, with the present Mines policy, if they had been fortunate enough to have been part of that project. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Leader of the Opposition. MR. L VON: If that is true, why doesn't the President of the Company come here and not endorse the plan. Because he doesn't want to. MR. GREEN: I'll tell you why, Mr. Chairm an. The answer is very simple.

The President of Hudson Bay Mining comes in- if he can only convince the people of the Province of Mani toba to elect my honourable friend as its Prem ier, he knows that they will get the money. They will not have to participate and they will get anyth ing they ask for. Mr. Chai rman, if that is the question that my honourable friend is asking, as to why Hudson Bay w�ld prefer the Leader of the Opposition to this government, is very simple. Because Hudson Bay knows that if the Leader of the Opposition is the Premier of this Province, Hudson Bay will make more and the people will make less.

He knows that if we are the government of this province, the people will make more and Hudson Bay will make less, and that's a very simple answer, Mr. Chairman. That is the answer. That is the answer, Mr. Chairman. So if the honourable member wants to know why the President of Hudson Bay would endorse his position, it's because it's good for Hudson Bay. And the reason that I Chairman, endorse this position, Mr. is that it is good for the people of the Province of Mani toba. MR. LYON: Why doesn't he endorse your position? MR. GREEN: Because, Mr.

Chairman, our position leaves more for the people of this province and less for him. Mr. Chairman, it's not as if it doesn't leave anything for him, and the very fact that he is participating - and I don't, Mr. Chairman, I really don't like to sort of use his participation in the program as an endorsement, but my honourable friend, I do have to correct the record. I do have to correct the record when it is suggested that they are not involved. Not only is Hudson's Bay involved, but SherrittGordon is involved; Mclntyres are involved and many other companies are involved. Mr.

Chairm an, you know, it's not as if they asked for it. Mr. Chai rman, the people of the Province of Manitoba, in my opinion desire to have a much greater participation in and share of the development of their natural resources -(I nterjection) - Well of course. Mr. Chairman, the honourable member wasn't here.

We started of off this discussion by conceding that the Conservative Party believes that the development of our natural resources in the mining indu stry, that for th is development the people of Manitoba are largely dependent on the private sector to ini tiate risk, to take the steps that lead to exploration and development and to make a profit, and that our role should be to try to collect some taxation and otherwise be as encouraging as possible. We concede that. I'm not arguing. That's why you're in one political party and I'm in the other political party. But that shouldn't bear saying all the time.

We believe, we believe and we go to the public, and we believe that the people will endorse us on it, and we believe that the people did endorse us on it, because this policy was announced in '73. We believe that the public of the Provin ce of Manitoba believe that they have the capacity, the intelligence and the initiative to play a much greater role in exploration for and development of their natural resources and to thereby accrue much greater the natural benefits. Now the honourable member is shaking his head. I know he doesn't agree with that.

Of course he doesn't agree with that. -(I nterjection)- The honourable member has said that it has never worked anywhere in the world. I can tell the honourable member that it has never worked anywhere in the world to the benefit of the people in terms of getting wealth from their natural resources, the policy that he has outlined. If there was ever an example of it, Mr.

Chairm an,- not in terms of the wealth that they get from their natural resources; if there was ever an example of it, one can go to the Middle East, where that was the policy of the development of the natural resources, and one could have seen the poverty in the Mid dle East as compared to the amount of wealth that was taken out of it by the resource companies for the development. - (Interjection)- Pardon me? Mr. Chairman, the honourable member asks me whether I am supporting cartel.

I will tell the honourable member that if there is going to be five or six companies in the nickel industry trying to see to it that the price of nickel is maintained , and I am one of those companies, I'm going to be pushing the price too. That's right. I've never said anything against it. But, Mr. Speaker, then it will be the public who'll gain, because I suggest to you, is that not what Mr. Lougheed is doing, and is that not what Mr. Blakeney is doing? And, Mr.

Chairman, for the honourable member's edification, we in Manitoba, despite the fact that it's only .5 percent of the total, we're not selling our oil for cheaper than what we can get for it. And the world price is set by cartel. That's right. And I'm telling the honourable member, that if there are a few small producers, then it is inevitable that they are going to try to engage in what the call supply-management. honourable members Mr. Chairm an, that is what lnco has been doing. That is what Falconbridge have been doing.

They engage in a subtle form of supply-management and they try to get for their product the price that it will receive. I'm suggesting to you that if the people were part of that sale and development, that they would get that. They are paying supply-management prices for almost everything they buy. They are paying adminis tered prices for oil , the people in this province. They are paying a price for oil that amounts now to $9.00 a barrel for which three years ago, four years ago, sold for $2.75 with almost no 3287

Friday, May 20, 19 77 increase in the cost of development, no increase in the cost of production, no labour costs. They can't blame the dirty trade unions for increasing the price of oil, and no real AI B control, and the people of this province have been paying it. and we expect the people who are vendors to try to sell it. MR. CHAIRMAN: {)r der please. The Honourable Member's time is up. MR. GREEN: I'll finish with one sentence Mr. Speaker.

The fact is that the people of this province, when they have a resource and have to sell it to people who are paying for other resources, will have to try to get the best price that they can get, yes. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Leader of the Opposition. MR. LYON: I'm sorry my honourable friend has exhausted his time because I was enjoying him thoroughly, but I know he'll get up and I've only got two or three minutes. But what he points up in his argument - that which I have been exposed to this morning - Mr.

Chairman, is the clear and distinct division - and I'm happy that he says it in such clear and articulate

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	30-4-65a
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	30th 4th hansardpdf 65a.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	70e7c08ea8ffcc8a54e40a24ab35a93eb383012f

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