1974 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 30th Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes

only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 1974

Afternoon Sitting

[ Page 3947 ]

CONTENTS

Afternoon sitting Routine proceedings Economic Policy Analysis Institute of British Columbia Act

(Bill 158).

Hon. R.A. Williams.

Introduction and first reading — 3947

Oral Questions

WCB purchase of Jiminy Crickets Kindergarten. Mr. Wallace — 3947

Institution of survey on 1974 rental housing starts. Mr. Gibson — 3947

Glanford Avenue property offered to Saanich municipality.

Hon.

Mr. Lea replies — 3948

Moving of cattle from flood-potential areas. Mr. McClelland — 3948

Musqueam Indian band claims. Mr. D.A. Anderson — 3949

Veterans' Land Settlement Act requirements for Crown grants.

Hon.

R.A. Williams replies — 3949

Expansion of teacher-training programme at UVic and UBC.

Mr. Wallace — 3949

Possible vendetta against Northwood Pulp and Paper. Mr. Chabot — 3950

Task Force Recommendations for Jericho Hill School.

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 3950

Police Act (Bill 91 ).

Report and third reading — 3950

Income Tax Amendment Act, 1974 (Bill 102).

Report and third reading — 3950

Real Estate Amendment Act, 1974 (Bill 124).

Report and third reading — 3950

Motor-vehicle Amendment Act (Bill 138).

Report and third reading — 3950

Assessment Authority of British Columbia Act (Bill 147).

Report and third reading — 3950

Institute of Technology (British Columbia) Act (Bill 134).

Committee stage.

Amendment to

section 5.

Hon. Mrs. Dailly — 3950

section 6.

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 3951

Amendment to

section 8.

Hon. Mrs. Dailly — 3951

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 3951

Amendment to

section 12.

Hon. Mrs. Dailly — 3951

Report stage — 3951

Assessment Act (Bill 151).

Withdrawal from committee stage.

Hon. Mr. Barrett — 3951

Public Officials and Employees Disclosure Act (Bill 85).

Second reading.

Mr. Rolston — 3951

Mr. Fraser — 3953

Mr. Gibson — 3954

Hon. Mr. Barrett — 3955

Mr. Morrison — 3956

Hon. Mr. Macdonald — 3958

Division on second reading — 3959

Mineral Royalties Act (Bill 31 ). Second reading.

Mr. Gibson — 3959

Motions Motions and adjourned debates on motions On motion 32.

Hon. Mr. Hall — 3982

Mr. Chabot — 3982

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. D.D. STUPICH (Minister of Agriculture): Mr. Speaker,

one of the important things about 1974 is that it is the 100th

birthday of the City of Nanaimo. One of the ways of marking

that occasion was for the community to select a centennial king

and a centennial queen from among the members of the native

sons and native daughters organizations.

In the gallery today we have this royal couple, along with

some other visitors from Nanaimo: centennial king Cece

Mulholland, born in Nanaimo in 1897 — he has been there most of

his life — whose particular interest is sports, and the

centennial queen. I won't say how old she is, but she was born

in Nanaimo 89 years ago. She has been a teacher in that

community for quite some time; and one of the students at one

time in her career was the wife of Cece Mulholland. I would ask

the Members to join with me in welcoming this royal couple and

other visitors from Nanaimo.

MR. D.E. LEWIS (Shuswap): Mr. Speaker, seated in the

Speaker's gallery today from the beautiful riding of Shuswap is

Mr. Ernie Arsenault, alderman for Salmon Arm. I would like the

House to welcome him.

HON. W.L. HARTLEY (Minister of Public Works): Mr. Speaker, I

would ask you and all assembled to welcome one of your former

babysitters. Bill Shaw of Spences Bridge is here along with his

sister, who used to babysit our Speaker. I would like to

welcome Bill Shaw of Spences Bridge.

MR. SPEAKER: Order! (Laughter.) Hello, Bill.

Introduction of bills

ECONOMIC POLICY ANALYSIS

INSTITUTE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA ACT

Hon. R.A. Williams presents a message from His Honour the

Administrator: a bill intituled Economic Policy Analysis

Institute of British Columbia Act.

Bill 158 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be

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

sitting of the House after today.

Oral questions

WCB PURCHASE OF JIMINY

CRICKETS KINDERGARTEN

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, I'd like to ask the Minister of Labour if he could tell the

House whether the Workmen's Compensation Board purchased, after

appraisal, property at 3410 Shelbourne Street, Victoria,

formerly known as Jiminy Crickets Kindergarten?

HON. W.S. KING (Minister of Labour): No, Mr. Speaker.

MR. WALLACE: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: could I ask if

the purchase was made and then turned down by cabinet

decision?

HON. MR. KING: No, not as far as I am aware, Mr.

Speaker.

MR. WALLACE: A final supplementary: I wonder if the Minister

would be kind enough to look into the matter, since the

information I've been given is fairly specific. I would like to

know if, in fact, the appraisal took place and an agreement

signed, contingent on cabinet approval — which was done six

weeks ago and has not been confirmed.

MR. SPEAKER: Excuse me, Hon. Member. Is this not a matter

for a different department?

HON. MR. KING: Purchases by the Workmen's Compensation

Board, Mr. Speaker, would be submitted for cabinet approval

through my office.

I am aware that the Workmen's Compensation Board was seeking

property in the City of Victoria for a claims office. To my

knowledge, no deal was consummated. A number of properties were

appraised. To my knowledge, none have been secured at this

point.

If the Member for Oak Bay has information that there was in

fact a deal made which was subsequently not consummated, then

I would be very happy to receive that evidence.

INSTITUTION OF SURVEY ON

1974 RENTAL HOUSING STARTS

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, to

the Minister of Housing: pursuant to questions that I've asked

him previously and in view of the possible or probable effects

of rent control on the rental housing market, could I ask the

Minister if he has instituted any kind of a special survey,

either through his own department or any provincial or federal

agency, which would determine the present situation in terms of

1974 rental housing starts as compared to previous years?

HON. L. NICOLSON (Minister of Housing): As I've said before,

we're still hiring staff. Probably the last thing we'll be

doing is hiring staff to get statistics

[ Page 3948 ]

to point out the obvious to us.

We do have a programme, however, to build 2,000 units of

rental housing in the greater Vancouver and Victoria areas.

MR. GIBSON: On a supplementary, Mr. Speaker: what I was

asking the Minister is whether he has any programme to

determine how many apartments are not being built in the

free-enterprise sector.

MR. SPEAKER: I don't think that that's within his

jurisdiction.

GLANFORD AVENUE VICTORIA PROPERTY

OFFERED TO SAANICH MUNICIPALITY

HON. G.R. LEA (Minister of Highways): Mr. Speaker, I believe

it was on Friday that I was asked a question by the Hon. Member

for Saanich and the Islands (Mr. Curtis) in regard to some

property between Pat Bay Highway and Glanford Avenue. Because I

felt there was a certain amount of emotion attached to it, I

felt that I should get the answer as soon as possible. So I'd

like to answer that question, Mr. Member.

First of all, I'd like to go over a little bit of the

history. We've reviewed some of the history. You may recall

that prior to the widening of the Pat Bay Highway the area

lying to the west of the highway near the present pedestrian

overpass was a very unsightly swamp area. It was being filled

with private wastes from construction sites.

At the time of the highway widening the department

approached Saanich with a proposal to install a pipe system to

carry the drainage from the area. At that time Saanich was not

prepared to go ahead with a proposal whereby the department

would excavate the ditch and install the pipe, and the

municipality would supply the pipe.

The water draining into this area is coming almost entirely

from property under municipal jurisdiction. The department then

constructed an open-ditch system on the Crown property,

leveling the old disposal area, and seeded the area. Now I'd

like to mention…. You were concerned about safety also.

Interjections.

HON. MR. LEA: You don't want the answer?

Interjection.

HON. MR. LEA: I didn't get a letter; I got an oral question,

Mr. Member.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the ditch, which is 10 feet deep in some places, has been

fenced off. I don't know whether the Member was aware of that. At this point

we have offered to the Municipality of Saanich that property, which has cost

the provincial government to date in the neighbourhood of $140,000. We've offered

that property to Saanich for a park. They said they would take it only if we

spent another $30,000 to do some work. Personally, I feel that when we're offering

a gift of $140,000 worth of property, the municipality can pick up the $30,000.

MOVING OF CATTLE FROM

FLOOD-POTENTIAL AREAS

MR. R.H. McCLELLAND (Langley): Mr. Speaker, a question to

the Minister of Agriculture: could the Minister advise us what

plans are being made to assist farmers in the flood-potential

areas to move their cattle if it becomes necessary? Or will the

onus be left entirely on the farmer?

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, there is a cabinet committee

looking after this problem. The Minister of Agriculture is not

a member of that committee, but certainly when the need arises

to give that sort of thing consideration, the Minister of

Agriculture will be involved. At this present time there are no

plans for moving cattle.

MR. McCLELLAND: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: is it true that

the farmers have now been told through agents of the government

that there will be no assistance for them, that they will have

to handle all those provisions themselves?

HON. MR. STUPICH: I have not received that information, Mr.

Speaker.

LIVESTOCK PREDATOR-CONTROL PROBLEMS

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): I would like to

thank the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Lea) for his detailed

answer to that question. Perhaps we can pursue it later.

To the Minister of Recreation and Conservation: I wonder if

the Minister could tell the House if he has been made aware of

a recent increase of predator attacks on livestock,

particularly sheep, in the area between Duncan and Nanaimo.

HON. J. RADFORD (Minister of Recreation and Conservation):

No, I haven't.

MR. CURTIS: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: can the Minister

tell us offhand the geographical area assigned to the

predator-control officer who would have responsibility in that

smaller area between Duncan and Nanaimo? Does he cover a much

larger area?

HON. MR. RADFORD: It is actually from

[ Page 3949 ]

Nanaimo, Mr. Member. When you talk about predators, we've

had a lot of problems concerning sheep on the southern part of

Vancouver Island and we've found that it is mostly caused by

dogs.

MR. CURTIS: In the event that it is determined anywhere on

Vancouver Island that a cougar has attacked livestock, to whom

would the Minister's department turn for control?

HON. MR. RADFORD: We have our own people who are involved

with the predator problem of cougars on the Island. We have

cougar hounds and we have the predator-control people to look

after that.

MUSQUEAM INDIAN BAND CLAIMS

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): To the Minister of Lands,

Forests and Water Resources: may I ask him whether he and his

department have rejected the claim of the Musqueam Indian band

to the foreshore on the river and hunting on their reserve? If

he has rejected it, who indeed does own this property?

HON. R.A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources):

The short answer is, yes, Mr. Speaker, these tidal lands are viewed as Crown

provincial land, and actually are under the bed of the river, the north arm

of the Fraser. We indicated to the Musqueam band representatives and their manager

that we were prepared to enter into a long-term leasehold agreement with them

that would not have been at a market rate, but would have some relation to the

market. That is, there would have been a beneficial interest in that regard.

It is my understanding that that was unacceptable to the band.

VETERANS' LAND SETTLEMENT ACT

REQUIREMENTS FOR CROWN GRANTS

I have the answer to a question from the Hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr.

Bennett), Mr. Speaker. While he's not here again today, I don't know if I should

follow his pattern and not provide answers when he's not here. However, his

question was with respect to the veterans' land Act and Crown grants in relation

to the federal-provincial agreement. I would state that the agreement is still

enforced and the following guidelines which prevail have not changed — they

are: the maximum acreage is 160 acres for agricultural purposes; the parcel

must have reasonable access and must have a minimum of 50 per cent arable land;

the minimum acreage is three acres, or two acres if the veteran is disabled

— these are primarily for home site purposes and land must be suitable for that

purpose and also have reasonable access. Further, applications are not approved

if our examination discloses that guidelines noted are not satisfied or that

the Crown lands are under a reserve for any purpose or that the location and

value of the Crown lands are such that the public demand and interest indicates

disposition by public competition or if the lands contain valuable timber stands

or are waterfront land, and the Crown lands do not comply with local zoning

and land-use codes.

The policy has not changed, Mr. Speaker.

MUSQUEAM INDIAN BAND LANDS

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: A supplementary to the previous reply of the Minister.

May I ask the Minister of Human Resources, who is generally responsible for

matters affecting Indian bands, whether he will be providing financial assistance

for the Musqueam band to appeal the decision of the Minister of Lands, Forests

and Water Resources and his department with respect to the ownership of the

foreshore lands fronting on the Musqueam land which have no access except over

the reserve itself?

HON. N. LEVI (Minister of Human Resources): Mr. Speaker, I

haven't heard anything from the Musqueam Reserve. I can't

really comment on the Member's question; I haven't heard

anything.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: Right. Well, you will.

POSSIBLE EXPANSION OF

TEACHER-TRAINING PROGRAMME

AT UVIC AND UBC

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, I ask the Minister of Education

with regard to the teacher-training programme at UVic and UBC:

in light of the fact that 1,500 applicants applied for 275

places, is the Minister considering any expansion of the

programme?

HO&. E.E. DAILLY (Minister of Education): I'd like to be able to

say that we can do something about it immediately, but I'm sure the Hon. Member

realizes it is impossible for the staff and the facilities to be geared up for

this summer any further than they have already done.

We will certainly be prepared to assist them in expanding

next year, if the need is there next year. But it's certainly

pleasing to know that we have that number of interested

applicants. I regret they all couldn't get in.

MR. WALLACE: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: with the teacher

shortage and the plans the Minister has announced, can she tell

the House if she has any plans to utilize the training and

expertise of unemployed teachers, such as Mrs. Blanchett who

has been picketing the front door of the Legislature? And to

save a moment, could I just ask also if she has any

[ Page 3950 ]

plans to discuss with the B.C. Teachers' Federation the

right of a teacher to accept employment in a lower

classification if this is the teacher's wish while

unemployed?

HON. MRS. DAILLY: I am always prepared to discuss with the

B.C. Teachers' Federation any area of necessary change. But I

think it has to be pointed out to us that this is a necessary

area to change. At this moment I'm not convinced of that.

The second point is: as you know, as Minister I have no

responsibility for the direct hiring or firing of teachers.

POSSIBLE VENDETTA AGAINST

NORTHWOOD PULP AND TIMBER

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): A question to the Minister

of Lands, Forests and Water Resources: is there any truth to

the charge made that you are carrying out a personal vendetta

against Northwood Pulp and Timber because of their

noncompliance with your order to deliver wood chips to

Eurocan?

HON. R.A. WILLIAMS: I am shocked at the suggestion, Mr.

Speaker, and I'm sure that the Hon. Member for Columbia River

is as well.

MR. CHABOT: Supplementary question: when will they be

awarded a timber sale on which they were the only applicant in

the Houston area, which has been pending for some time?

HON. R.A. WILLIAMS: I would note that the company did not

comply with all the terms set out for bid proposals, and that

is a matter of some concern. The decision will be made

shortly.

TASK FORCE RECOMMENDATIONS

FOR JERICHO HILL SCHOOL

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: To the Minister of Education: is the

Minister now in a position to indicate what steps will be taken

to implement the recommendations of the task force on the

Jericho Hill School so that the staff can be increased and the

student-teacher ratio can be lowered to at least the Canadian

average for schools for the deaf?

HON. MRS. DAILLY: Just the beginning of your question…but with reference to the situation at Jericho, I informed the

House before that I am having a full report prepared for me.

That is now with me and I'm going to make an announcement with

reference to that report, hopefully tomorrow.

Orders of the day

HON. D. BARRETT (Premier): Public bills and orders, Mr.

Speaker. Report on Bill 91.

POLICE ACT

Bill 91 read a third time and passed.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Report on Bill 102.

Bill 102 read a third time and passed.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Report on Bill 124, Mr. Speaker.

Bill 124 read a third time and passed.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Report on Bill 138, Mr. Speaker.

Bill 138 read a third time and passed.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Report on Bill 147, Mr. Speaker.

ASSESSMENT AUTHORITY OF

BRITISH COLUMBIA ACT

Bill 147 read a third time and passed.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Committee on Bill 134, Mr. Speaker.

INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

(BRITISH COLUMBIA) ACT

The House in committee on Bill 134; Mr. Dent in the

chair.

Sections 1 to 4 inclusive approved.

section 5.

HON. E.E. DAILLY (Minister of Education): Mr. Chairman, I

move the amendment standing in my name on the order paper on

section 5. (See appendix.)

Amendment approved.

Section 5 as amended approved.

section 6.

[ Page

3951 ]

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): Mr. Chairman, in the second

reading of this bill I asked the Minister a few questions about

the relationship of the people employed at BCIT as teaching

staff, and how the new situation and the new bill would deal

with this. The Minister may want to comment now, or perhaps

during

section 8 she would like to say a few words, make a

statement so that the many questions which I have raised over a

fair length of time….

Interjection.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please! The Hon. Minister has indicated

she will comment on

section 8.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: Oh, that's fine.

Sections 6 and 7 approved.

section 8.

HON. MRS. DAILLY: Mr. Chairman, I move the amendment

appearing in my name under

section 8. (See appendix.)

I would just like to comment on that, Mr. Chairman. The

purpose of this amendment is to ensure that the intent of the

legislation can be carried out legally. The intent here, of

course, is to give the opportunity for the staff of BCIT to

decide on the union of their choice. Unless this amendment had

appeared they would have remained under the BCGEU. This now

gives them, once it is proclaimed, the opportunity to decide on

the union of their choice.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: I would like to thank the Minister for

her statement and also for the amendment. It's a point that

I've tried on a number of occasions in this House. She's

clearly been listening to our representations and of course

representations also for the amendment. It's a point that I've

tried to make on a number of occasions in this House. She's

clearly been listening to our representations and, of course,

representations from the people directly concerned, the staff

involved. I appreciate the fact that she has taken this to

heart.

Section 8 as amended approved.

Sections 9 to 11 inclusive approved.

section 12.

HON. MRS. DAILLY: Mr. Chairman, I would like to move the

amendments appearing in my name after

section 12. (See

appendix.)

Amendments approved.

Section 12 as amended approved.

Section 13 approved.

Title approved.

HON. MRS. DAILLY: Mr. Chairman, I move the committee rise

and report the bill complete with amendments.

Motion approved.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

Bill 134, Institute of Technology (British Columbia)

Act , reported complete with amendments to be considered at

the next sitting of the House after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Committee on Bill 151, Mr. Speaker.

ASSESSMENT ACT

The House in committee on Bill 151; Mr. Dent in the

chair.

HON. MR. BARRETT: I ask leave to withdraw the bill from

committee, Mr. Chairman, until the amendments are printed.

Leave granted.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Speaker, the committee requests leave to

ask that Bill 151 be withdrawn from committee.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, adjourned debate on second

reading of Bill 85.

PUBLIC OFFICIALS AND EMPLOYEES

DISCLOSURE ACT

(continued)

MR. P.C. ROLSTON (Dewdney): I just wanted to add there's

been a lot of discussion I realize on this and people have had

a chance to be hysterical, some people, but most of them have

been quite rational and I'm sure that everybody in this House

will vote for this bill.

But I want to say something about another aspect which I

don't think has been really emphasized. I want to tell you very

briefly a very true story, and I'm lifting this out of a sermon

that a colleague of

[ Page 3952 ]

mine preached about a year ago.

Last June, a year ago, Mr. Speaker, at what is probably if

not the most prestigious university in the United States, one

of the most prestigious, Princeton, there was a graduating

ceremony. It was the day of the Honours grads getting their

degrees. There was a moving thing happened which I think

underlines my concern that this is not just disclosure by the

elected people in this province and senior staffs as designated

by municipalities. They are not the only people that are always

in trust with this beautiful province and its wealth.

I want to comment about all of the people, because I think

this goes beyond just those people to all of us. At this

graduating exercise I guess the students didn't realize that

there was going to be an Honorary Doctor of Law given to George

Schultz whom you remember, Mr. Speaker, was the secretary of

the American Treasury, and I guess ranking with Mr. Kissinger

(U.S. Secretary of State), one of the most powerful people in

the U.S. cabinet, a man who just a few weeks earlier as the

most powerful financial man in the United States had refused

money to nearby neighbourhood self-improvement projects and

many others, I think, very innovative projects. At that time

money was seen going to very questionable projects.

At the closing of this ceremony at Princeton, Mr. Schultz

came up to the podium to receive the Honorary Doctor of Law,

and quietly but very deliberately and very politely many of

those Honour students left that assembly hall. My colleague's

two sons who were receiving an Honours degree also very quietly

left their seats. They just couldn't see George Schultz, this

very powerful man, this man who many people saw standing for

everything they didn't want to see in the United States,

receive a degree.

These people left, and my friend, I guess like many people,

was torn as to whether he should stay. But he did stay. And

later on he questioned whether he shouldn't have got up and

disclosed how he felt about that man and about the questionable

practices of this very powerful person.

You know, I think that as we talk about Bill 85, I see now

that the amendments are incorporated in the bill for us to look

at. But a lot of people have got to see that it's not just the

elected people and the pressures on them and the temptations on

them and the often difficult decisions they have to make. I

gather that at the municipal level it is especially

tempting.

There are constant delegations asking for favours. They might not say they

are favours, but they appear to be favours — whether it's approving subdivisions

or whether it's approving utilities to go into subdivisions. Certainly the people

at the municipal level, even more than these MLAs here, are constantly barraged

and pressured. At times, in a very subtle but sometimes a very clever way, they

can be manipulated. That is a pressure.

I believe that all elected people and people close to the…. I'm thinking of the approving officers and the planners

and the people at the senior staff levels of municipalities. I

think that they are going to welcome this kind of release, this

kind of sunshine, this kind of recognition of their pressure — that they are encouraged and will be expected to disclose their

ownership and any possible conflict of interest they might

have.

But it's not just with them that we talk. We talk about all

the people who, I feel, need to be honest with themselves — who

are at times sometimes using their influence and their

opportunities. A lot of people, even some municipal people, Mr.

Speaker, say that you can't trust a politician.

I've met municipal elected people who say that, well,

they're not a politician — usually meaning, first of all, that

they're not a member of a political party or they're not a

partisan mayor or alderman. But they're often sometimes saying:

"You know, we are honest in that we are not politicians. We are

honest." That's subtle, but I think it hurts. I think it would

hurt a lot of the Members here.

It's just a misunderstanding of what it is to be a

politician. I'm sure the Member for West Vancouver–Point Grey

has heard this, that even elected people say they are not

political. The word "political," as I understand it, or

the word "politic" is simply people. Maybe people-power is a

description of what politics is about.

So I believe that this legislation is going to really give

us greater sense of dignity. I hope it's going to help us with

the apathy and indifference and the cynicism that elected

people are under — the gossip, especially in smaller towns.

I was even told by one person last week that I hadn't cut my

grass; it had rained so much that I hadn't had a chance to cut

the grass. There's even that kind of small talk. I'm referring

now back to a fairly significant person in my home town who was

saying: "Well, you know, Rolston, you don't even cut your

grass."

Now we sometimes have to deal with that kind of smallness.

So it's my hope that this material before you, which is a

disclosure, which is not just something in a sealed envelope…. It's a disclosure, and presumably it will be available to

read in the Gazette or whatever.

Interjections.

MR. ROLSTON: Or in The Vancouver Sun or the Mission

paper. It is a straight disclosure and I hope that it will

create a greater sense of trust and confidence. I see that two

of the candidates for the federal election in Victoria, if I

quote the paper right,

[ Page 3953 ]

are shocked at the apathy and indifference and the lack of

trust in politics.

I hope that this does something to get all of us off of our

seats, just like at that assembly, and having a greater

confidence in the parliamentary system that we operate in.

Of course, none of us, as elected people, are private

citizens any more. Our telephones ring at odd hours. We are

under scrutiny. We do live in a goldfish bowl, and that's part

of the cost of being an elected official. I think it's

appropriate that yesterday we had first reading of the

Constitution Act . I certainly hope that there isn't cynicism

about the sensible, businesslike arrangement where we'll be

paid quarterly.

I noticed that sometimes the same cynics about this Act

earlier were the same people who were cynical about MLAs being

paid a decent, proper salary of $16,000 a year. So I support

this and I hope that it gives greater self-esteem, greater

confidence. I realize that with this disclosure we are hoping

that we are preventing frauds.

We are hoping in a sense that this is a protection not just

to the elected official but to the people in his jurisdiction.

By being honest and straight with the people whose business we

are entrusted with, and by disclosing, we can hopefully — and I

don't want to be naive as I say this — elicit some kind of

trust from them that there can be some kind of responsibility

from them.

Interjection.

MR. ROLSTON: Yes, many do but some don't. So I believe that

this is most appropriate.

I want to finally assure the House that I wrote every school

board and regional district and municipality. I received, I

think, about four helpful letters. Many of the suggestions of

those letters have been incorporated in the amendment. I trust

that all MLAs wrote and got some material from their elected

people.

Interjection.

MR. ROLSTON: I'm sure. But I believe that this is a very

constructive, positive thing. You know, unless we support this,

I think democracy will suffer.

MR. A.V. FRASER (Cariboo): I think that I should say a few

words on this — first of all, to say that I'm certainly in

favour of Bill 85 as amended. I also want to say a few other

words.

First of all, I can't equal the record of the Minister of

Mines (Hon. Mr. Nimsick) in public service; but at the present

time this is my 24th consecutive year in public life. I would

just like to give some of my thoughts to the House about this

bill.

I think, Mr. Speaker, it's a myth to say that our citizens

feel that most public people are crooks. I don't think the

public feel that way at all about the majority of or all of the

public service people. I hope that there was no intent in this

bill as it is amended that intimated that.

While I'm quite critical of the Attorney-General and the

manner in which he brought in a bill a year ago, it was

withdrawn. Then he brings in the original Bill 85 this session

and repeated his same mistakes all over again. I'm very

critical of that and I think public life has suffered because

of this procedure in the way this bill has been handled.

I refer to the commotion that went all over this province

when Bill 85 was brought in, making the reliable elected people

come down and beg for amendments. I can't understand why

submissions weren't asked from reliable elected bodies in this

province prior to the introduction of Bill 85. I particularly

refer to the Union of B.C. Municipalities and the B.C. School

Trustees Association.

Really, the bill was brought in and they were asked for

their advice after. That was the cause of the amendments. As we

all know, the amendments change the bill completely.

Another thing that's happened, Mr. Speaker, with all this

fumbling, burnbling around by the Attorney-General, is that

we've lost some good — I assume, good — people in public life.

You know, I don't support their view; they have resigned from

office and they're gone.

Apart from the individuals concerned, there is one village

in my riding where I don't think they've got a civic government

today, and I blame the Attorney-General for that. Two of the

aldermen resigned and the mayor is away and they can't even

call a council meeting. With the two that resigned there are

only two left, and they haven't got a quorum with that council

to do the business. I refer to the Village of Cache Creek.

I want to read you part of a letter of one of the aldermen

that has resigned. He has no intention of ever serving again,

as I understand it. It's very interesting, Mr. Speaker. This is

a letter from Charles Roberts, ex-alderman, Cache Creek. It's

written to members of the Press of the Province of British

Columbia. I wish to open this letter. It was addressed:

"To my supporters in the municipal election of 1972 to my position as alderman for the Village of Cache

Creek, and their continuing confidence since that time. I wish

to advise that I have submitted my resignation to the village

clerk at 9 a.m. this date.

"As you are probably aware, I was a strong supporter

of the New Democratic Party, both provincially and federally, during

the past number of elections, since 1969, having served a term of

office as president of the Cache

[ Page 3954 ]

Creek-Cariboo provincial constituency."

Just an interjection here, Mr. Speaker: this man knocked on

doors against me in the 1972 election.

"I take this opportunity to publicly state that I am no longer associating myself with the NDP, either

provincially or federally. The straw that finally did its job

was the present legislation before the House, Bill 85, the

Public Officials and Employees Disclosure Act .

"I find this bill completely opposed to my principles and after much reflection on the ramifications of

such legislation on the personal affairs of any person within

the jurisdiction of the, bill, I have concluded that we no

longer have a people's government, but the imposed will of the

legislators in power.

"This party in pre-election campaigning preached a platform of democratic socialism. However, it

would appear that they are using their office to destroy the

democracy of individual freedom, and are setting themselves in

a position of Big Brother. And in my case, as no doubt in many

others, I literally have been assassinated politically by Big

Brother."

I say, Mr. Speaker, that it is rather ironic — this man was

a good public servant and because of Bill 85 in its original

form he's gone, one of his colleagues resigned and another man

has gone. I'm amazed the Member for Yale-Lillooet (Hon. Mr.

Hartley) hasn't got up to say something — the mayor of Ashcroft

has resigned.

Really, what has happened is that because of the sloppy

drafting of Bill 85 and its original intent, it has put

municipal government in a turmoil.

Now I don't know when the Village of Cache Creek can pay

their bills because they haven't got a quorum of council. I

blame the Attorney-General, through the original filing of Bill

85, completely on that. I say to him that surely the local

elected people, whether they be at municipal level or school

board level, have many problems these days running their

different municipalities and school boards. And I don't think

this sort of treatment should be inflicted through what has

happened in the drafting of this bill.

I would remind the people…. I think a few have said

something, but people who assume an elective office in this

province take an oath of allegiance and an oath of office, and

they were not just running on the seat of their pants, there

were lots of guidelines. I think over the years we've had

excellent public people here.

I would just say in conclusion, Mr. Speaker, that I hope this bill doesn't

discourage other well meaning people from seeking public office, whether it

be MLA, school board or municipal council, and that it will increase people

who will come forward. And I can assure you that with the amended form the

bill is in, I will be voting for the bill.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, the

principle of this bill has been well canvassed and I will be

brief, just adding a couple of, hopefully, new ideas.

First of all, I support the principle and motion of

disclosure. I see, however, some problems with the way that

principle is manifested in this bill. The first problem is the

way it was introduced, as was just raised by the Hon. Member

for Cariboo. The fact that this bill had first reading on May 2

and had a deadline for public officials on May 31 forced many

good public servants around this province to come to untimely

decisions resulting in some cases in their resignation. The

Hon. Member for Cariboo mentioned some. I think as well of

Mayor Oscar Johansen of Ashcroft and others around this

province.

There's no way now that can be redressed, unfortunately, but

it is a matter to be noted with sorrow. And I hope in

introduction of future legislation that this government will

seek to avoid those kinds of time pressure points which do

force untimely decisions.

The second point I would raise is that this bill fails to

make a distinction between legislative public servants and

executive branch public servants. The theory may be that all

MLAs in this chamber are equal, for example. But the fact of

the matter is that a backbencher on the opposition side has

much less influence over the course of the government, and in

particular the executive actions of the government, than does a

Minister or even a backbencher on the government side.

It seems to me that disclosure requirements ought to take into

account the far greater powers held by Members of the executive branch.

It seems to me in particular that Ministers and senior public servants

should be subject to even closer disclosure requirements than are other

public servants throughout the Province of British Columbia

because they do have such enormous power at their disposal.

The Act provides for designation of specified public

servants as failing within its purview. I would ask the

Attorney-General when he closes debate on second reading if he

could give us some outline of the kind of persons that might be

designated and how soon these designations would be made. I

would assume, just naturally, that Deputy Ministers, Assistant

and Associate Deputy Ministers and those sorts of officials

will be included. But will he be including Crown corporation

presidents? Will he be including executive and special

assistants to Ministers? Will he be including special advisers

and consultants to Ministers? Special advisers to, say, the

Minister of Housing and the Minister of Public Works can make

recommendations of enormous financial consequence that ought to

be as readily protected by

[ Page

3955 ]

disclosure as are the other persons covered by this Act.

I would ask him as well if he could, in closing debate on

second reading, do his best to explain to this House why there

should be a differential in the treatment between senior public

servants who are not elected and elected persons, to the extent

that elected persons are subject to complete public disclosure

whereas non-elected public servants are subject to only

conditional disclosure — that is disclosure to their employer,

to the head of the particular department, municipality or

whatever might be involved.

I would ask the Minister what is the reason for this

difference because in many cases these senior non-elected

public servants will, in fact, wield more power through their

membership in the executive branch than will the elected people

in this Legislature or in the councils and school boards of

British Columbia. It seems to me that's a differential that is

rather hard to sustain. I wish that the Attorney-General would

explain why that is in there. I personally must question that

aspect very much indeed.

I believe as well with the leader of my party, as he noted

yesterday, that it's better to have disclosure to a trustee

clerk at each level of government rather than at each level of

government.

HON. G.R. LEA (Minister of Highways): Who is your

leader?

MR. GIBSON: The only leader of my party, Mr. Minister.

In other words, a kind of a conditional disclosure to the

clerk of each council or to the secretary-treasurer of the

school board, to the Speaker and Clerk of the House or

whatever.

With all these what I see as defects, I nevertheless support

the principle of the bill, and would appreciate the comment of

the Hon. Attorney-General on the questions I've raised.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I intend to support the bill.

I never had any intention other than to support the bill. But

when we have the kind of debate that we've had on this bill, I

think it's important to have a few words on the record.

The history of this bill was that a draft was brought in one

year ago. The total community of the Province of British

Columbia was apprised at the fact that this government had

intended to move toward a disclosure bill. The Attorney-General

brought it in, asked for community discussion, withdrew the

bill and let the matter rest for a year. So for anyone to claim

ignorance, that they didn't know this government intended to

have a disclosure bill, I have no sympathy for them whatsoever.

There was a whole year.

Secondly, once the bill was introduced, the immediate

emotional response of some Members of the official opposition,

namely one Member, the Member for South Peace River (Mr.

Phillips) who labelled this bill as Gestapo tactics….

AN HON. MEMBER: Right on!

HON. MR. BARRETT: Now he's labelled the bill as Gestapo

tactics, but I'll bet you my bottom dollar his party will vote

for it.

MR. D.M. PHILLIPS (South Peace River): Vote no, after five

pages of changes.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Well now, we'll talk about the changes,

Mr. Speaker. They are using the amendments, which have

strengthened the bill, as an attempt to get away from their

original position. If anybody was stampeded into resigning it

was because of the irresponsible statements of the official

opposition.

I was on a radio hotline show when in the City of Kamloops

shortly after the Member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) had

been in that town speaking to a very large crowd of some 40-odd

people and the former Minister of Highways and Minister of

Human Resources (Mr. Gaglardi), who resides in that town — that

would make 45-odd people. (Laughter.)

The Member got on the radio apparently and left the

impression with this radio hotliner that this bill was

dangerous, this bill was going to destroy democracy in the

Province of British Columbia. The radio hotliner, responding to

these comments, said, "You've got to withdraw this bill." I

said to the radio hotliner, "Have you read the bill?" He said,

"No." Now I wonder how many municipal people and how many

Members of the opposition read this bill before they ran out

into the corridor screaming, "Gestapo tactics."

We tell you this: if you are against this bill, don't stand

up in this House and tell us that you're against the bill, you

don't like the idea, you don't like the way it was done, but

you're going to vote for it when the debate is over.

Interjections.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, all the interruptions, all

the yelling, all the uncomfort of the official opposition won't

erase the record that when the bill was introduced that Member

in that corner called it Gestapo tactics. At this very moment

while we are debating this bill the Liberal government in the

Province of Quebec has brought in a bill that is much stronger

than this one.

HON. R.M. STRACHAN (Minister of Transport

[ Page 3956 ]

and Communications): Stanbury told me his was much stronger

than ours.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Much stronger than this one, Mr. Member,

through you, Mr. Speaker. The Liberal bill in the Province of

Quebec goes much wider. It involves wives and spouses. You

can't have it both ways, Mr. Speaker, to run around the

countryside and say that they are Gestapo tactics but come back

in the House and vote for the bill. If you really believe what

you are saying stand up and vote against the bill.

Interjections.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You know, Mr. Speaker, I love to hear all

the interruptions…

Interjection.

HON. MR. BARRETT: …all the bad manners of the official

opposition, all their giggling, all their laughing, but it's

all guilt inspired. They've made a mistake.

I can hardly wait for the division bell to ring on this bill

because every single one of them will stand up and vote for it.

Every single one of them will stand up and vote for it and

we'll have to sent the record out to those municipal officials

who quit and say: "Look here — the Socreds voted for this

bill, Look here — the Liberals did and the Tories did,

too."

MR. PHILLIPS: Wipe that smile off your face.

HON. MR. BARRETT: The Tories said they would.

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): Get that on the

record.

HON. MR. BARRETT: That's right. The Tories said they would

and I said that on the record. The Liberals never took the

position that the official opposition did. The official

opposition played it both ways and now we'll have a chance to

see how they go on the record.

Interjection.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Oh, Mr. Member, all the loud hollering and

yelling and interruptions you do won't take away that headline

when you deliberately set out to create fear in this

province.

Interjections.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Yes, and the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Bennett)

stated that this was the worst bill that the socialists had brought in.

AN HON. MEMBER: He won't be here.

HON. MR. BARRETT: How would you know? He doesn't spend any

time in the House anyway.

MR. PHILLIPS: That really bothers you, doesn't it?

HON. MR. BARRETT: Not at all, Mr. Speaker, but if a man is

going to take a position and run for public office, make public

statements against a bill and then not come to the House and

back up his statements and have his party vote contrary to

those statements I ask the public to measure them very

closely.

MR. N.R. MORRISON (Victoria): Small wonder that people get

upset about this kind of bill.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Vote against it.

MR. MORRISON: I don't propose to vote against the amended

bill. But let me tell you some of the things that you've taken

out of that bill that upset people and annoyed them and

infuriated them.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Vote against the bill.

MR. MORRISON: Let me just talk about one

section — and there

are others equally as bad but let's just talk about this one….

AN HON. MEMBER ., Vote against it.

MR. MORRISON: I don't intend to vote against it. I've said

that from the beginning. I didn't intend to vote against it

when it was first put out. But I must confess….

AN HON. MEMBER: Your leader said it was the worst bill that….

MR. MORRISON: I didn't say it was.

AN HON. MEMBER: Well, what party do you belong to?

HON. R.A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources):

I heard you were going to resign.

MR. MORRISON: I'll tell you frankly that I seriously

considered resigning because of it. Let me read you some of the

reasons why I considered resigning. Let me just talk about

section 3 on page 2 of the original bill — not the amended

bill. The bill

[ Page 3957 ]

affected people who were in business, who had limited

liability companies and who were required to disclose those

companies. Now, I have no objections about disclosing the fact

that I have shares in a company. But some of the sections that

you have removed from this bill were the requirement that in

any company in which an individual owned more than 30 per cent

of the voting stock, which affects a high majority of people

who are in small businesses and they are limited liability

businesses…. This doesn't affect people who are in giant

corporations but it does affect people in small businesses.

Interjection.

MR. MORRISON: Those companies where they have more than 30

per cent of the voting stock were required to publish an

audited balance sheet. Now, maybe you've never read a balance

sheet of a small company.

MRS. P.J. JORDAN (North Okanagan): He wouldn't know how,

obviously.

MR. MORRISON: Further, not only did they have to publish an

audited balance sheet every six months…and people objected

strenuously to have to do it a second time. It's bad enough to

have to pay an auditor once a year to have an audited balance

sheet but to be required to do it twice a year was incredible.

And then that balance sheet further had to list — and this is

the

section which most people were most irritated about,

section 3(3)(d) — a list and description including the

location of every asset owned by the corporation or by a

subsidiary within the meaning of the

section of that Act.

When I spoke to the Attorney-General when this Act first

came down — I'm not referring to the amended Act but to the

original Bill 85 — the very first question I asked him was:

"Can you give me a description of an asset?" The

Attorney-General was unable to give me a description of an

asset. I don't find it in the

definitions

section of the

amended bill because that

section is removed.

Furthermore, the

section removes the requirement for a

shareholder of a limited liability company who owns more than

30 per cent of the voting shares to file an audited balance

sheet. I don't think there are any people around who object to

knowing where their interests lie. I have no objection to

telling you or anyone else the shares of the companies in which

I have an interest. But I do have an objection, and I want to

tell you how strongly I feel about it, to file an audited

balance sheet which can be made public, published in the

newspaper and available to anybody. Those of us in business all

know that we do now file, under the Companies Act ,

audited balance sheets.

MR. PHILLIPS: Those were the Gestapo tactics.

MR. MORRISON: But we also know who has access to those

balance sheets.

AN HON. MEMBER: The public shareholders.

MR. MORRISON: The shareholders have access to them and

people with sufficient reason for a court order have access to

them. But even after they have had access to them that

information is still private. It cannot be published. But this

section — the

section which was so offensive, the

section which

most people seriously objected to — has been removed in the

amended bill. And all the flak that we've heard here as we

discussed this bill is just exactly that — flak. Once you

removed that offensive

section from the bill, there isn't a

reasonable individual, I'm sure, that would object to filing

where his interests lie. I don't blame that man for saying what

he said. I thought it, and I'll be frank on the record that I

thought exactly that. I didn't say it but I thought it.

I may go further and tell you on my own particular instance

many, many years ago I formed a limited liability company in

which I gave some shares to my family. Over the years those

shares have appreciated in value. At this moment none of my

children are minors. But while they were minors I did not see

fit to disclose to them what those shares consisted of and what

their net worth was.

MRS. JORDAN: Right on!

MR. MORRISON: Now, since they are no longer minors they have

the right to go to the company's registered office to look at

that balance sheet and to look at those assets to know exactly

what they consist of. I assure you that my children have done

exactly that. They know where they stand. But while they were

minors I did not see fit to tell them or to show that balance

sheet to them because I acted as their trustee. I'm sure that

the people out in the Province of British Columbia today who

were affected by that

section felt exactly as I did. Now I am

glad to see that the Attorney-General listened to them. He has

removed that offensive section.

Interjection.

MR. MORRISON: They've not disclosed their shareholdings.

That's a completely different situation.

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney-General): And their land and

their shares in other companies.

MR. MORRISON: No one is quarrelling about that section. The

Attorney-General singles out what to me is a most curious

section. The only piece that he

[ Page 3958 ]

seems to be concerned about is their land. It seems strange

to me that that threat follows through in everything they do.

There are many other assets, Mr. Attorney-General, besides

land.

Interjections.

MR. MORRISON: There are many other things that people are

just as interested in as land. But that strange, curious thread

continues to turn up in bill after bill. It's an absolute

obsession.

AN HON. MEMBER: Vote against it.

MR. MORRISON: I've told you that I don't intend to vote

against the amended bill. But I assure you that if you brought

that bill in and left it the way it was I would vote against

it. And I assure you that I would seriously consider resigning

because of it.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, there have been some points

raised in the debate that I would like to briefly reply to and

then say something about the main point that's being made by

the Member for Victoria (Mr. Morrison).

The leader of the Conservative Party (Mr. Wallace) said the

person who sought information from a disclosure return should

sign his name and give some reason for doing so. I really think

that is a ridiculous suggestion. I would hope and expect that

the important returns would be publishable in newspapers.

There's power under the bill for us to direct that they be

published in the B.C. Gazette . Why should an individual

have to go into an office and give some reason as to why he

wants to look at what is essentially a public document? What's

he going to say? "I suspect the veracity of so-and-so and I

want to look at the return"? I just hope that suggestion of the

leader of the Conservative Party will go no further.

These returns should be open to the people concerned, and

they are the voters of the province. That's the basic issue on

which the official opposition over there refused to bite the

bullet. They wanted, as this Member for South Peace River (Mr.

Phillips) says already, disclosure in secrecy. Yes, let there

by disclosure, but keep it secret. Clubby, closeted, friendly,

cosy, and ultimately corrupt. Yes, that's what you're

saying.

MR. PHILLIPS: That's a false accusation and you know it.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: That's what you're saying. But you felt the political

winds blowing and you're trying to pull yourself together. You're afraid to

vote against this bill. In your hearts you hate this bill. In your hearts you

still hate this bill but you're afraid to vote against it.

MR. PHILLIPS: Your own party made you change it.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: We strengthened the bill, do you know

that? (Laughter.) We did what democracy says that we should do.

We filed the bill a whole year beforehand.

AN HON. MEMBER: You bungled!

HON. MR. MACDONALD: We heard from the Union of B.C.

Municipalities; we heard from the school trustees all through

this year. When we filed the new bill we listened again. We had

demands out in the community that the bill should be extended;

it was not sufficient that elected people should file

disclosures but that it should apply to candidates. We thought

that was a perfectly valid position and we extended the bill.

We extended the bill to municipal officials who may have zoning

powers in their hands and who also want to be designatable by

municipal councils. That's what most of the amendments are

about: extending the bill in those two important

directions.

If you thought, Hon. Member, that it was Gestapo tactics in

the first place, why isn't it worse than that — if you could

find the right word — now that we have fortified and extended

the principle?

The Member for Victoria is simply saying this: we made some

technical amendments to

section 3. They were valid but they

were not matters of principle. We are still determined that in

the personally-held corporation, into which otherwise a

politician could hide his assets from disclosure, light will

penetrate. So we have written it right out in this Act. Whether

you try to hide behind a personal holding company or not, you

must disclose the shares of that company, the nature of its

business and the land that it holds. We do attach importance to

politically elected people disclosing their land holdings, No

doubt about it; nothing sinister about it. We do attach

importance to that kind of disclosure.

There has been a lot of political hanky-panky revolving

around land deals in the Province of British Columbia. Where we

have the chance to do something about it, that's exactly what

we will do — whether you cry Gestapo tactics or whatever other

phrases you use.

I heard Mayor Vander Zalm, that great new recruit of the

Social Credit Party, going on the radio in Vancouver and

resurrecting the late Adolf Hitler, saying that this was a

Hitler bill and it was Nazism all over again; and how the poor

fellow had come from Holland, which was so close to the Nazi

heel. He

[ Page 3959 ]

came here and the disclosure bill was the same thing all

over again. Now he has joined your party. He hates this bill in

his heart of hearts, just as your leader (Mr. Bennett) hates

this bill. He has said so in the papers and he is afraid to

turn up here today to vote for it.

He won't be here to vote for it, will he?

AN HON. MEMBER: No sir!

HON. MR. MACDONALD: And after the statement he made, how

could he? Your leader has denounced this bill because he has

been afraid of the whole principle of disclosure. He has filled

the order paper with the kind of clubby, closeted, cosy

disclosure in secrecy that he was willing to opt for. Look at

his amendments. If he believes that, why is he supporting the

sunshine principle of this bill?

The opposition are being dragged kicking and screaming into

voting for this bill, which in their heart of hearts they hate.

But a little sunshine should be as good for them as it is for

anyone else, Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. D.E. SMITH (North Peace River): I've got a point of

privilege.

MR. SPEAKER: Will you kindly state your point of

privilege?

MR. SMITH: During the dissertation we've just listened to,

the Hon. Attorney-General inferred that anyone who did not like

the first draft of the bill was, in his words, "a person or a

Member of this House who would become eventually corrupt." I

ask the Attorney-General to withdraw the inference that any

Member of this House is or will be eventually corrupt in their

dealings with the public.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: That is an implication I had no

intention of making. I withdraw it unconditionally. I don't

think I said that; but if I did, I certainly didn't intend

to.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: I'm sure the Hon. Members would not take

it on either side that that was intended. I think that is

perfectly clear.

Motion approved unanimously on a division.

Bill 85, Public Officials and Employees Disclosure Act , read a second time

and referred to Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting

after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Adjourned debate on Bill 31, Mr.

Speaker.

MINERAL ROYALTIES ACT

(continued)

MR. GIBSON: I brought along a few notes on this bill, Mr.

Speaker. I'm glad the Premier's here today. I hope he's not

leaving right away, because he has a chance to recant on some

of those numbers he was using.

HON. MR. BARRETT: If you will allow me, Mr. Member, I was

incorrect in quoting on Kaiser figures. I had those transposed.

I wish to correct that error.

MR, GIBSON: And perhaps with Bralorne too?

HON. MR. BARRETT: No, Mr. Member, I'm advised that the

figures we used on Bralorne were absolutely correct.

MR. GIBSON: Except for the fact that it didn't come from

mining revenue in British Columbia.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Their

interpretation be as it is….

(Laughter.)

AN HON. MEMBER: Come on, Davey!

HON. MR. BARRETT: The figures I gave were absolutely

correct.

AN HON. MEMBER: What a transposition! (Laughter.)

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Where's your leader?

MR. GIBSON: There seems to be a moderate difference of

opinion on that one, Mr. Speaker. I think the record will speak

for itself on that one.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Okay.

MR. GIBSON: The Premier in his remarks the other night

missed a good deal of the point of what this debate is all

about. I'd like to just briefly go over some of the things he

said. He said that we were talking about control and husbandry

of the mineral resource and that those who opposed this bill

were opposing that kind of concept.

Of course, that's nonsense, Mr. Speaker. What this bill is

about is the taxation of the mineral resource of this province,

and in what way, in what manner, the

[ Page 3960 ]

tax funds should best be returned to the people of this

province.

I think that there will be found very widespread agreement

in this House that there should be higher tax revenues in years

of extraordinary profits in the mining industry.

He quoted a 1971 statement by the Mining Association of

British Columbia Price Waterhouse report to the effect that the

mining industry in British Columbia as seen from that point was

slowing down and that the mining industry itself expected

investment to go down. "Therefore," said the Premier,

"what should be more natural than that we should now see signs

of the investment going down?"

I don't know if he read that report completely, Mr. Speaker,

but he didn't quote the entirety of it. Because it did say,

indeed, that forecast expenditures for 1972 totalled $104

million, while those in subsequent years are expected to reduce

even more sharply from the record 1971 level as Fording,

Gibraltar, Utah, Lornex, Similkameen, Noranda and other

committed properties approach completion.

But what he did not say, Mr. Speaker, was the following

sentence: "Not included are preliminary projections and

tentative plans for '73 and subsequent years, which

expenditures in part will depend upon the results of

feasibility studies, exploration activities and financing

negotiations currently in progress, as well as on such factors

as world market conditions."

Mr. Speaker, because of those enumerated factors such as

world market conditions, such as feasibility studies and

exploration activity, there had been, up until the day that

Bill 31 was introduced in the Legislature, far from a decline

in projected investment in the mining industry in this

province, a sharp rise of at least $1 billion worth in projects

that were all ready to go. There's the Minister of Mines (Hon.

Mr. Nimsick), and he knows that, Mr. Speaker. They were all

ready to go. This is completely a red herring saying that in

1971 the mining industry itself was forecasting a decline.

He went on to suggest that those who opposed this bill are

defending the mining companies against the people. Mr. Speaker,

the people who are opposing this bill are defending the people

against this government; that's what they're doing. I'm going

to outline that very clearly, Mr. Minister of Health (Hon. Mr.

Cocke), and outline what this bill's going to do to the jobs in

this province.

He talks about a sales tax that every industry should pay and that the mining

industry should pay. He chided the Minister of Mines for only charging them

5 per cent. Mr. Speaker, I ask the Premier, through you: do the loggers pay

5 per cent on the trees they take off? No, they pay a stumpage rate, which is

based on their profits — an appraised royalty, Mr. Minister, which takes into

account cost and is based on profit. Do the farmers pay a 5 per cent sales tax

on their produce that comes up through the ground and is harvested? They don't,

and you know they don't.

Do the fishermen pay 5 per cent tax on those fish they take

out of the ocean? Of course they don't.

Five per cent sales tax is a complete, entire red herring.

What the Premier is suggesting by this sales tax concept is

that the government could say in effect: "I'm going to get mine

first in this industry. Whatever else happens, I'm going to get

mine first. I'm going to get mine before the people who should

have had the employment in operations affected by that won't

get theirs first."

The government in imposing this kind of taxation has to do

an overall social accounting. They can't just do a mean, narrow

accounting of what precisely are government revenues. They have

to take the accounting of what the jobs are.

The Premier finally stated that the mines are still hiring,

and cited that to this House as evidence that naturally Bill 31

wasn't doing any harm. The mines are hiring because some of the

mines, as the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. King) told us the

other day, particularly in the north, have 400 per cent

turnover every year. Naturally they're still hiring. Mines

aren't going to be closed down by this bill, not right away.

Mining employment will continue. But they are going to close

down sooner than they would have otherwise. I'll be

demonstrating that too, Mr. Speaker.

Some people say: "Why should we bother to fight this legislation? — because

it's going to pass anyway." Well, maybe it will, Mr. Speaker. I raised the other

night the possibility that even if it does pass, it may not be proclaimed —

that it may be just a bargaining counter for use in federal-Provincial tax negotiations.

But even if it is going to be passed and be proclaimed, it still has to be fought

because it is the most important piece of economic legislation in this session,

bar none, including the budget. It is the most important piece.

Therefore, it has to be discussed at some length. There is a

problem of procedure here. The Minister of Mines should have

referred this bill to a standing committee. He should have

agreed to do that and hear the expert testimony that people who

work in the industry — the unions, the industry itself, the

financial sector of the economy, economists, people from all

around British Columbia — are anxious and eager to provide to

the Minister and to his colleagues and to Members of this House

as to the effect that this very complex legislation will have.

But the Minister doesn't want the facts.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Well, Mr. Minister, you don't seem

[ Page 3961 ]

to have considered the facts. You've been getting a lot of

representations. I've read copies of some of t hem and you sure

haven't shown any sign of paying attention to them. Because the

Minister has made this choice, Mr. Speaker, on a bill of this

complexity that should have gone to committee, we're going to

have to introduce in this House a lot of the evidence that

should have been handled in other ways and would have led to

better legislation had it been handled in other ways.

Part of this is based on a set of preconceptions. One

preconception is this word "royalty." The Minister is hung up

on a royalty. He's just got to have a royalty. The Mining

Association came to see him and said: "What can we propose as

an alternative way for this tax?" The Minister sent them back

and said: "You come back with any proposal you like, but it has

to be a royalty or I won't even bother looking at it." He's

hung up on the idea of a royalty.

He shouldn't be saying royalty. He should be saying there is

a right to a higher public return in times of excess profits.

Take that approach and you go down another road and it doesn't

lead you to royalty and it leaves you the same revenues.

He should be open as to his objectives. Maybe the Minister

has been open as to his objectives, Mr. Speaker, but I question

whether the government has. If the government in this bill is

against the private sector, why don't they just say so?

AN HON. MEMBER: They are.

MR. GIBSON: I think it's clear that they are. They are

against things in this economy being done by the private

sector.

If they want a government equity share in the mineral

industry of this province, why don't they say so? Are they

trying to hide that, Mr. Speaker?

And if they want a full government takeover, why don't they

say that, too, if that's the end objective of this legislation

we have before us? Some of the statements I'll be reading later

on on the New Democratic Party theory will indicate that that

is indeed what they have in mind.

The real issue in this debate and in this bill and in

mineral taxation should be: how do we get the greatest benefit

for the people of B.C. from this resource? The real issue

shouldn't be NDP dogma, which is what it is with this royalty

idea.

This isn't the first NDP government in the country to get

itself into this kind of problem, Mr. Speaker. In Saskatchewan

they don't have much in the way of minerals but they do have an

oil industry, so the NDP government there tackled the oil

industry. Exploration has just absolutely gone to zero in

Saskatchewan, just as it's doing in our mining industry.

Do you know what they have had to do in Saskatchewan, Mr. Speaker? They have

had to set up a group called the Disruptive Circumstances Assistance Board.

You're going to have to do the same thing here, Mr. Minister, because you have

just caused some disruptive circumstances with Bill 31.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: You sure have. What are those disruptive

circumstances? The fact that already exploration in this

province has dropped by half compared to last year, and last

year was lower than the year before. You've seen the figures

and you haven't given a single reaction to them, so far as I

know, produced by the B.C.-Yukon Chamber of Mines several days

ago.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The Hon. Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound

(Mr. L.A. Williams) asks who benefits from the disruptive

circumstances Act, and that is indeed the service industries,

the exploration service industry which has been very badly hit

by Bill 31. So the government destroys the industry and then

starts paying money to try and prop it up. Are you going to do

the same thing with the exploration industry in B.C., Mr.

Minister? Maybe you're going to have to. Up to April 30, 1974,

only 3,836 claims were staked in this province as compared to

8,405 in the same months in 1973 — a drop of 54 per cent.

Mr. Minister, how can you retain a smile on your face with

those figures? How can you do it? You say that's no criteria.

Would you explain to the rest of the world why that's no

criteria? Everyone else in this province had thought that

mineral activity had something to do with exploration

activity.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: The figures aren't unfounded, Mr. Minister. If

you think they are, you stand up later on and say how they are

unfounded.

The issues that are being talked of so far in this debate

are only some of the important ones. The talk has been of

profits and of manner of taxation and of mineral reserves and

the appropriate rate of exploitation.

Those things are all important, but there are other

important factors that haven't been talked of. The world

mineral picture is important. We're not very big in the world

mineral scene, Mr. Minister, and we could die away in that

scene pretty quickly.

The question of overall social accounting and not just

government tax accounting is important. Maybe if you collected

a couple of million dollars less in tax and at the same time

provided for $10 million or $20 million more worth of wages in

this province maybe

[ Page 3962 ]

that's a good trade-off. That's what I mean when I say

social accounting instead of just straight, selfish, government

tax revenue accounting. You get that tax revenue in the end

anyway. Those people spend their money and pay sales tax and

pay income tax and it all comes back to you in the end, so you

are better to have a higher level of economic activity even if

you don't get as much on that first kick at the cat. That's not

been talked about.

The downstream effects in terms of time of your policy just

aren't being talked about.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes, they have.

MR. GIBSON: Where do you think mines come from in this province? They

come from the fact that somebody found them and staked them out and developed

them.

HON. L.T. NIMSICK (Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources): The mines

have never been lost.

MR. GIBSON: There is that Minister again, Mr. Speaker,

saying the mines were never lost.

AN HON. MEMBER: He's losing the whole bunch right now.

MR. GIBSON: I don't know what the Minister has lost. He's

certainly lost a lot of votes of the mining workers in this

province. I know that.

The Minister knows perfectly well that mines have to be

found and if somebody isn't going out exploring and staking

claims they aren't going to be found. And as existing mines run

out of reserves and there is nothing behind it to take their

place, he is leaving that problem to a future government and to

a future generation and he's sitting here with his extra

royalty revenues and thinking that that's going to make a

better world. It's not, Mr. Speaker. It's going to make a lot

worse world for our children.

There's not much talk about the implicit remedies to Bill

31. The Minister has never given us a set of alternatives — ways and means that he thinks that this tax could be otherwise

imposed or some of its effects lessened. He's given us no

thoughts about tax relief for particularly hard-hit properties

or incentives for exploration.

He has given us a little bit of hint about one remedy he

sees and that's maybe the government going into the business.

He wants to start out with stockpiling ore. But I bet you some

of his colleagues have got in the back of their minds that the

government is going into the business.

If they frighten away all of the private people in this province and the mineral

industry continues its nose dive, especially on the exploration side, do you

know what this government is going to say, Mr. Speaker? They're going to say

private industry has failed. They're not going to say we've scared them away.

They're going to say private industry have failed in their duty and regretfully

we have to take up the gauntlet and carry on. That's the story.

There hasn't been enough talk with respect to Bill 31 so far

about foreign control and benefits and how we can improve that

situation in British Columbia.

There hasn't been enough talk from the government about

federal-provincial tax relations and why they have sunk in this

particular area to the lowest state I've ever seen them.

There hasn't been much talk by representatives of the

government of delegation of legislative authority to tax — the

kind of thing that the Bar Association of British Columbia in

a statement of great urgency and rare concern said was just

disgraceful. I'm going to read from that statement, too.

He hasn't talked about the enormous exercise of Ministerial

discretion that's implicit in this bill and the two things that

that does to the mining industry: (1) the uncertainty that it

creates in an industry whose whole search, always, is to reduce

uncertainty; and (2) the enormous scope of latitude that this

discretionary authority gives for the making of special deals

with this company or that to make them go that way or that.

Deals are always suspect, Mr. Minister, and discretionary

authority, particularly in the taxation field, is always

suspect as well. Most Ministers try to avoid it. Most

Ministers try and make it as cut and dried as they can.

Does this Minister really want the enormous power over the

industry, the enormous detailed power over any individual

company in this industry that this bill will give him? I say it

is a bad thing for this province that he should have it.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's right. It's too much power in one

man.

MR. GIBSON: During the debate, when the Minister opened it

and later on when he spoke on the amendment, I got from him the

impression that he didn't think that the number of people

employed in the mining industry was very large or that the job

impact of the industry was very great. I want to make an

argument to him that it accounts for about 20 per cent of the

jobs that we have in the Province of British Columbia.

Throughout history every society has produced some goods and

some services and some primary level and some secondary

processing but our society has gone further than any other in

building up jobs in the service sector on top of the secondary

and on top of the primary industry. Here in British Columbia we

have leap-frogged much of the secondary employment and gone to

service employment in a lot

[ Page 3963 ]

of ways. But that whole complex structure of service

employment is held up by the basic fact that there are some

people in British Columbia who are cutting down trees or

getting something out of the sea, from the fields, or from out

of the ground.

It all comes back to that. It all comes back to those

primary industries. That's the way in British Columbia and in

Canada we earn our way in the world. These primary industries

are the foundation. The mining industry is 20 per cent of the

foundation of British Columbia.

That's why we are so rich in this province, Mr. Minister. It

would be nice to say that we are rich because we are very smart

or because we work awfully hard. There are lots of British

Columbians who are clever and work hard but not so much more so

than the rest of the world. The reason we have the good fortune

to be rich in this province is that the good Lord gave us some

resources. One of the main constituents of those resources is

our mineral resources.

HON. D.G. COCKE (Minister of Health): What's the use of

having resources if you don't get anything out of them?

MR. GIBSON: That's exactly it. The Minister says: "What's

the use of having resources if you don't get anything out of

them?" I thought you wanted to leave it in the ground. What you

should get out of those resources is jobs — not a narrow-minded

concentration on a royalty tax. That's what you should get out

of those resources.

AN HON. MEMBER: Why don't you leave it in the ground?

MR. GIBSON: Our resource base in minerals and in forestry,

as far as that goes, is far from being the richest in the

world. Far from it. But because in British Columbia we have had

the good fortune, prudence and hard work to have a head start

on other parts of the world, we've gotten a little bit ahead of

them and we've got a good base. Forestry and mining are what

hold the whole structure up at its present level. That includes

wages.

HON. MR. COCKE: What's the unemployment in B.C. now? It's at

its lowest level.

MR. GIBSON: It improved this month. It sure did. I'm looking

ahead, Mr. Minister.

The wage rate that we are able to enjoy in this province and

with which we are always vying with Ontario for either the

first or second in Canada is supported by our resource

industry — particularly by the mining industry.

I've tried to draw an analogy of what the primary industries mean to British

Columbia. I've tried to compare it with a small town. To keep it in British

Columbia proportions I assumed that first of all there was nobody in that town

at all. Then along came a forest man and a mining man and there wasn't an ice-cream

dealer there yet, Mr. Member for Little Mountain (Mr. Cummings) — he came later.

The forest man brought in, say, about 65 jobs to work in the

woods and in the mill. There were another 25 or so mining jobs

and maybe another 10 of the other basic industry jobs. That

gives 100.

Then some carpenters had to come in and help build the

facilities and the new housing required and to make some

furniture and some castings out of the metal.

After a while people would bring their spouses and their

children. You need a school, a town hall, a bar, a laundry, a

barbershop, a supermarket, a dentist, maybe a newspaper and a

hospital, an assay office, a scaling office and an ice cream

stand, and some civic workers on the roads and the water works

and an automobile dealership, radio stations, a hardware store,

a church, and a fix-it shop, and a lot of things.

Pretty soon, on that basis, Mr. Minister, you'd have about

800 people working in that town and about 2,000 people living

in that town. You know what it was all built on? It was built

on the primary industry jobs — those 65 forest jobs, those 25

mining jobs.

Do you think you can build something like that up — a house

of cards — and then take away the bottom card and have the rest

stand? You know it won't, Mr. Minister. You know that if you

took away those 25 mining jobs out of your 100 basic jobs your

population would come down by 2 5 per cent. It just wouldn't go

down by 25 jobs; it would go down by 500 people. That's the

impact of the mining industry in the — Province of British

Columbia.

Any implication that you or any other speaker in this debate

may make that there are only 15,000 jobs in mining overlooks

that fact, Mr. Speaker. That is one of the reasons why Bill 31

must not pass.

Mr. Minister, I don't know if you were given one of these

bumper stickers that says "Mining: British Columbia's second

industry." Do you have one on your car? It's a good sticker,

says the Minister — "Mining: British Columbia's second

industry." I think it is worthwhile making that point and the

impact that mining has on our economy.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I think you'll find, Mr. Minister of Health

(Hon. Mr. Cocke), that mining is the second industry in British

Columbia when you take all of the associated jobs. When you

look at all of the associated jobs there is no question of

it.

What's the current contribution of the mining

[ Page 3964 ]

industry to British Columbia? Before looking at the current

income effects you should look at the exploration effects. The

exploration expenditures that have been underway in this

province in the last few years have been bringing into our

inventory of assets in British Columbia literally hundreds of

millions of tons of economic ore, adding values in the billions

to the net worth of British Columbians. That's the longer range

effect. In the shorter range as to what happens year after

year, the best sources of figures we have are three: one is the

Mines department report; one is the annual report of the B.C.

and Yukon Chamber of Mines; and one is the annual survey of the

mining industry done by Price Waterhouse. The Price Waterhouse

document is the most complete in terms of economics so I will

take a good number of my figures from that.

The 1973 revenues for the industry were about $935 million.

That was up from about $530 million in 1972 and $420 million in

1971. That jump was due both to an increase in the price of

copper and several new copper mines coming on stream. That

metal now accounts for about $500 million of our mineral

product. It is copper, Mr. Minister, which your bill would most

viciously attack — over half of our revenues. All of these

figures, incidentally, are net of freight and smelter charges.

Even without those added in that amounts to about 7 per cent of

our gross provincial product.

For wages and employment, the '73 figures aren't available

yet, at least from the Price Waterhouse study, so we have to go

back to '72 when they were much less than they were in '73,

because as I say, there were new mines in '73 and higher wage

rates. But even in that year direct mine wages accounted for

around $190 million. That's direct employment without any

reference to the services and goods purchased for construction

- about 15,000 people, 2 per cent of the labour force, and

paying 3 per cent of the wages. Good wages paid in that

sector.

In the same year — still '72 figures because '73 aren't

available — that industry purchased about $365 million worth in

goods and services all around this province, all of that from

within this province except $45 million in imported ore.

In addition, taxes were paid at the federal, provincial and

local levels, and the provincial receipts in 1973 and 1972

respectively were $71 million and $33 million. These aren't the

tax figures the Minister brings to this House when he talks

about the provincial revenue from mineral taxation. That

doesn't count municipal taxes of about $5 million,

incidentally.

Quite apart from Bill 31 and the federal budget, incidentally, Mr. Minister,

as you know income taxes of all kinds on mines will rise steeply in 1974 because

on December 31, 1973, the three-year mining tax exemption was ended. That was

a good thing because that exemption had been abused in some cases in the past.

It probably should have been set up in such a way that it would provide for

the payout of the capital expenditure only, but it didn't always work that way,

and there were times when the value of the mine was paid back many times over

on that three-year exemption. So that's an improvement.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: That Minister, Mr. Speaker, is apparently not

agreeable to capital being returned.

HON. MR. COCKE: Not through taxes.

MR. GIBSON: We'll get on to the magnitude of the resources

later on, Mr. Minister. We haven't even started on that

yet.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's a shocking bill.

MR. GIBSON: It's a very shocking bill.

AN HON. MEMBER: I'm more shocked that you're shocked.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): You need to shock me to keep me

awake! (Laughter.)

MR. GIBSON: There's some to come yet, Scott.

This is without any consideration of the construction

employment, Mr. Minister, which your policies have just about

killed. Construction employment a lot of people scorn and say

that's not really industrial employment because it's not

continuing. But proper scheduling can make it continuing, and

improper scheduling of the kind that Bill 31 has caused can

cause it to just go dead, just like that. And that's what's

happened to the construction in the mineral side in British

Columbia.

The financing, incidentally, inflow into British Columbia in

the 10 years, 1963-1972, again from the Price Waterhouse

report, was $2.1 billion. Mr. Minister, a lot of that has stuck

in British Columbia. There's been a tremendous amount of work

for people in the financial industry. I think the government

doesn't have a great deal of use for the finance industry. Let

me just read this statement:

"The total value of mining issues traded in 1972, was

almost nine times the value traded in 1963 and represented 59 per cent

of the value of all shares traded." That's on the Vancouver Stock

Exchange.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I was comparing 1972 to 1963, Mr. Minister, to

give an indication of the growth of this

[ Page 3965 ]

industry over that period. And in 1972 it represented 59 per

cent of the value of all shares traded. That gives an example

of the importance to the jobs in the financial community.

Let me quote from a talk by Mr. Len White to the meeting of

the B.C. and Yukon Chamber of Mines you weren't at, Mr.

Minister. You were invited to go to it. I guess you were afraid

to show up. There were 1,500 people there who wanted very badly

to hear from you, and you should have been there instead of

spending your time at a meeting a month later with an audience

you knew to be friendly up in Kamloops, of a handful of people.

You should have gone over to that meeting to explain and defend

your policies.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. GIBSON: If you had been here you would have heard Mr.

White say this:

"In '73, 14,500 Workers were directly employed by mining

companies. In '73, 34,000 workers were indirectly supported in

other industries by mining expenditures. In '73 more than $600

million was expended on the purchase of equipment, materials,

supplies and services.

"In the decade '63-'72 the net capital inflow amounted to

$2.1 billion. The recent prosperity of B.C. can largely be

attributed to the fact that of this amount $1.5 billion was

recorded in the period 1968-1972.

"You will be interested to know that since 1971, when the

last new mine construction programme commenced, the number of

workers supported by mining has been reduced by some,

15,000."

That's that construction effect I was speaking of. That's

what the lack of new mines does, Mr. Minister.

"Since 1971 the income effect of mining expenditures has

been reduced by $150 million a year. There has been a clear and

detrimental effect on British Columbia as a result of previous

statements and legislative initiatives of the current

Provincial government. Passage of Bill 31, failure to remove

other damaging legislation, and continued uncertainty will

produce a steady erosion of the benefits to all British

Columbians from mining.

"In 1972, six new mines went into production. Each was the

product of earlier encouraging mining and tax laws. Since 1971

no new mine construction programmes have been announced.

Further to the last new mines and prior to the legislative

initiatives of the present government, 26 potential metal

producers, with a combined milling capacity of 335,000 tons of

ore per day and seven potential coal mines have been placed in

a deep freeze. These properties could more than double the existing milling

capacity of 292,000 of ore per day, and greatly increase the

value of production, employment and taxes for the people of

British Columbia.

"At a time when improved metal prices and markets would have

created a mining boom unlike any in the history of B.C., Bill

31 is absolute folly."

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The Minister called across the floor, Mr.

Speaker: "Do you think we should get rid of it as quickly as we

can just because the price is high?" Mr. Minister, we should

mine out minerals at a sound and reasonable rate, and we've got

lots left, as you well know.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: No, sir. You're cutting it back very, very

seriously. Very seriously indeed.

I want to talk a little bit about the nature of the

industry. Sometimes the Minister talks as if metals aren't

important to the world, and yet they go into everything that

helps to make ours a good civilization and they go into

everything that the third world, the undeveloped part of this

world, needs for a better living for themselves. And it's part

of our duty, I think, Mr. Minister, to try and provide those

things as well and as quickly as we can, not only to our

benefit, in other words, but to the benefit of the rest of the

world.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Minister, you keep talking about that book,

but if the result of that book was Bill 31, I don't think much

of it. I think you must have misinterpreted it. You could write

a book about Bill 31, though. It wouldn't be very happy

reading.

AN HON. MEMBER: R.I.P ., by Leo! (Laughter.)

MR. GIBSON: What are the things that make this industry a

bit different from other industries? It is very different, Mr.

Minister — I think you would agree with that.

I don't know if the Minister got a copy of this letter which

was sent to the Premier — I hope he got a copy — by Mr. Peter

Sevensma, a well-known and respected mining consultant in

British Columbia. He certainly doesn't think much of Bill 31,

does he?

You have a high regard for him, I guess, Mr. Minister, and

for his perspective on the mineral

[ Page 3966 ]

industry. Let me read out a little bit of what he says.

"Dear Mr. Premier,

"As an independent consulting geologist with 26 years

experience in mineral exploration in British Columbia, 15 years

of which I've spent mostly in northern B.C. north of 56

latitude and in the Yukon, I wish to present to you my

observations concerning Bill 31 in its present form. I do not

belong to any political party and my views are my own.

"Besides experience in British Columbia, I've worked all

across Canada and in a number of other countries in the world.

Since World War II I've been employed by Cominco until 1965 and

have been independent since that time, working mostly in

mineral explorations but also in hydrocarbons." Perhaps it was

at Cominco that the Minister met him.

"Firstly, I wish to outline briefly the trend in exploration

in mining and how it has changed over the years in Canada,

particularly in B.C.

"In the early 1900s, a prospector would discover a mineral

deposit, usually a narrow vein, say, from four inches to 10

feet wide. These occurrences, especially quartz vein, resist

erosion and can relatively easily be found by visual

exploration. Staking of one to four claims of about 50 acres

each was sufficient to cover the discovery which could then be

worked by tunneling, preferably at various elevations. A small

mill would take care of the relatively small tonnage that could

be mined. If the grade of ore disappeared in any one working

place, mining would continue in another place. These operations

would be high cost but quite flexible and tended to die a

natural death when tunneling failed to find more ore.

"Gradually, core-hole drilling was developed, enabling an

earlier assessment of the potential and better planning ahead

of the operation, culminating in long-hole stopping, a method

applicable mostly to steeply-dipping and wide veins, say 40

feet or wider.

"Tunneling was by now concentrated in the adjacent wall

rocks, and mining operations could be planned several years

ahead. The cost of mining dropped, the flexibility of the

operation decreased, and the initial investment before a pound

of ore was mined increased considerably.

"For a number of years in the late 1940s and early 1950s,

I've been closely associated with the development and implementation of these

methods. The outstanding characteristic of this method is that most of the mineralized

rock can be mined clean, leaving very little, if any, behind and thereby advancing

good principles of conservation as compared to the initial techniques of following

the ore which lead to high-grading, leaving the lower-grade, mineralized rock

in place."

Note that word, "high grading" there, Mr. Minister, because

we're going to hear a lot of it later. He continues:

"Also, exploration would follow more tenuous leads than in

the earlier days, and geophysical techniques would assist in

delineating drillable targets that might reflect the presence

of ore undetectable by any visual means. As a consequence,

smaller finds had a more economic promise. The prospector would

have to stake more claims, perhaps 10 to 20 as a small find

would lead to an investigation of a larger areas."

Now, however, comes that time of transition. He gets to the

following:

"In the early '50s, open-pit mining of large, low-grade

masses of rocks became gradually an economic method for an

increasing number of deposits which may not have had much of a

surface expression at all, except perhaps a patch of rusty rock

half a mile across.

"In effect, under favourable climatic conditions, as, for

example, in Arizona, the valuable copper content of the rock

would be dissolved and would percolate downward to be

re-precipitated at a deeper level. From the surface down there

would be a near-barren layer of rusty rock, perhaps a few

hundred feet thick, then a high-grade layer, perhaps another

200 feet thick, followed by original, unaltered, mineralized

rock of relatively low grade.

Whereas originally the high-grade

layer was the main economic target, technology was developed

which rendered the deeper low-grade economical to be mined,

i.e. mineable to the surface."

That deeper low-grade, as the Minister knows, is exactly the

material that is rendered uneconomic by royalties. To

continue:

"Thus, over the years by wise husbandry the economic grade

in copper required in a body of rock to make it mineable

dropped from around 2 per cent copper, or 40 pounds per ton, to

around 0.4 per cent copper, or eight pounds per ton.

"Mining-wise, these operations require extensive planning

and a large capital investment before the operation can start.

Whereas few people are directly involved in the mining,

substantial ancillary services spring to life in supplying the

operation with the necessary equipment, services and

maintenance. These mining operations are the core of many

[ Page 3967 ]

secondary manufacturing operations. In comparison, the vein mining

in the earlier days required hardly any supporting services at all."

That's why, Mr. Minister, your comparisons with past mining

employment and present mining employment fall short of the mark.

"…the vein mining of the earlier days required hardly any supporting

services at all. In other words the jobs you listed were just about all

there were in mining. But in modern mining, the jobs in the mine are

just a small part of all the jobs supported by mining. He continues:

"Returning to British Columbia, similar low-grade deposits

were gradually discovered, usually with some leached, barren

rock with no significant enriched zone and often covered by

thick layers of gravel and sand overburden deposited by recent

glaciers or rivers, i.e. a number of disadvantages not

encountered in warmer climates, putting our deposits at a

competitive disadvantage."

They are, Mr. Minister. They're not only of low grade;

they're some of the harder deposits to mine in the world.

"The discovery of these deposits was mainly due to

persistent prospectors, geologists, geophysicists and engineers

working with minor clues discovered over large areas. A

prospector would now have to stake perhaps 50 to 80 claims,

working on a small outcrop of rusty rock here or a minor

copper-moly deposit there.

"Sophisticated methods combined with sound exploration

instinct and much money raised by promoters with a great deal

of faith were required to prove the economic value of these

deposits. Sometimes four or five large mining organizations

would spend considerable sums in succession without discovering

the deposit. Usually it would have to be faith and right

instinct of one or two individuals to allow the enterprise to

succeed in the end."

The Minister knows the history of many of those projects

too. The whole Highland Valley. How many times was it walked over, and how much faith and hard work and lost money and time

had to go into that valley before the first mine opened?

Continuing with the letter:

"This, Mr. Premier explains why prospectors 50 years ago

staked only a few claims

whereas now a block of perhaps 100 or

more claims is required to find these elusive deposits.

"It therefore appears highly unfair to label these men as

speculators and promoters. They have that special spark and persistence required

to find these deposits. To levy rentals and taxes that will keep them out of

business, even if they have performed all the requirements of work to keep their

claims in good standing, is poor economics."

That's another part of the Minister's policies.

"Regardless of what sheltered academics and promoters of

scientific methods may state, the visual inspection carried out

by prospectors and mineral explorers — straight grassroots work — is still essential for discovery in many parts of Canada, and

especially in the cordillera of western Canada. In many cases,

a large and expensive airborne survey will only confirm a

discovery made by prospecting, though it may add to the value

of the discovery by providing information on the geological

framework in which it has been made.

"I now return to Bill 31 and its super-royalty features.

The royalty is what the King collected when he leased a mining

royalty to his subject, i.e. he collected in kind part of the

metal or mineral mined. As it often proved more practical to

let his subjects do the selling, the royalty was then collected

in cash. In essence, therefore, a royalty is part of the metal

mined and it spreads the cost of mining over the metal which

remains the property of the producer.

"A large low-grade body containing copper may be pictured as

a roughly cylindrical, pipe-like body a few thousand feet

across, standing either vertically or at an angle within the

wall rock. Usually the metal is distributed around a smaller,

higher-grade core with a few layers of diminishing grade around

this core."

In other words, Mr. Minister, these large,

porphyry-type copper deposits are things that taper off.

They have some high-grade 1n the middle and then a lot of

low-grade on the outside.

Continuing the letter:

"After detailed drilling and studies, including

environmental impact and probable ultimate reclamation

potential of the pit area, and an expenditure probably in the

order of $5 million plus or minus 50 per cent, the body may

total something like the following tonnages which is a typical,

average body under average conditions."

He gives a little table. The core area would contain 50

million tons of 0.7 per cent copper; the first shell around the

core, another 100 million of 0.45 per cent copper; and the

second shell around the core 150 million tons of 0.35 copper.

This total deposit — this typical, hypothetical deposit then — would represent 2.64 billion pounds of copper, shown to be

economically recoverable if no or a small royalty applies.

Now listen to this, Mr. Minister:

"If a high royalty applies, the feasibility study will show

that mining of the second shell is uneconomical and the 150

million tons of

[ Page 3968 ]

0.35 per cent copper, containing 1,050,000,000 pounds of copper

is now a waste, and not mineable. My figures are conservative" — says the author

— "and it is more likely that more than half the ore and about half the copper

will have to be left."

That's leaving it in the ground with a vengeance, Mr.

Minister.

"There will not be, of course, any royalty paid on this

billion pounds of copper left in the ground.

"It cannot be left for future generations either, if the pit

is to be reclaimed properly, and it is lost forever to the

economy of British Columbia, to the copper smelter you would

like to see built and which would require very long-term supply

of metal, and especially to the secondary manufacturing that

could process this copper into other products. This in a

nutshell is what is wrong with Bill 31 economically."

He goes on to mention that very many people in this

province are very disturbed by Ministerial discretion and the

lack of recourse to the courts embodied in Bill 31 and in many

of the other bills passed or to be passed by the

Legislature.

Mr. Minister, that is a man who is concerned about

Ministerial discretion who is a friend of yours. What about the

day when the Minister of Mines isn't you, who is a man he

knows, but someone else? What about Ministerial discretion

then? Then we'd have to really be worried.

The author goes on:

"We know that a small body of opinion has been impressed by

the report of Mr. Eric Kierans on the non-renewable resources

industry recommending, in essence, expropriation by

taxation.

"It is interesting to note that the Russians are looking

for foreign capital to develop one of the largest

copper-porphyry deposits in the world in Siberia, as well as

their giant Siberian gas fields. This suggests that Mr. Eric

Kierans is wrong on all counts and his report is at best an

exercise in futility."

Was that report an impressive one to you, Mr. Minister? Did

you read the report he did for the Manitoba government?

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I presume you must have read it. I wonder how

much it had to do with Bill 31.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: He got his ideas from you, did you say? Ah,

well there is an interesting revelation! Mr. Eric Kierans got his ideas from the Minister, Mr. Speaker.

Watch out, Manitoba! But they withdrew their bill, of course.

They withdrew their bill that was based on the ideas that Mr.

Kierans got from the Minister, if the Minister's account is

right.

HON. W.L. HARTLEY (Minister of Public Works): The Liberals

have been withdrawing for 100 years and that's why they are

where they are today.

MR. GIBSON: They withdrew that bill in Manitoba and the

Minister should withdraw the bill here. The letter goes on

somewhat more, but that's the main thrust of it.

We are in a worldwide industry, Mr. Minister. You know that,

and you know the extent of the reserves that we have and that

we have to live in the world market. We don't control the world

market. So it's all the more important that we retain our

flexibility here and that we retain a perspective of what is

happening in the rest of the world, because if we supply only 5

per cent of the copper in the world and other parts of the

world can find ways of supplying that 5 per cent more cheaply,

then we're out just like that. We don't have any kind of

monopoly. That's why anything that you do that lowers the

amount of ore that can be taken out of the ground economically

is not just a blow to British Columbia this year but a blow for

many years in the future.

You'd better believe, Mr. Minister, that there are other

parts of the world that are eager and ready and willing to take

up the copper production that British Columbia might slack off

on.

The Association of Professional Engineers, Mr. Minister…

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you worried about that, Leo?

MR. GIBSON: …submitted a brief on the subject. It's

tremendously rare that the professional engineers have

submitted a brief on a political question like this.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Why don't you cite the brief that you prefer?

The brief disagreed with Bill 31, Mr. Minister…

HON. MR. NIMSICK: I know.

MR. GIBSON: …and you know it. The official brief of the

Association of Professional Engineers disagreed strongly with

Bill 31.

They pointed out that as we move around that great rim of

the Pacific there's a tremendous amount of copper available at

a higher grade than we have

[ Page 3969 ]

here in British Columbia — 3.2 billion tons of .44 copper

according to their figures here in British Columbia. And all

around the rest of the Pacific Rim the lowest on the western

side is the southwestern USA at .61 per cent; Mexico, .64;

Panama, .7; Columbia, .8; Peru, .85; Chile, .9. On the other

side in the Philippines, Indonesia, Papua and New Guinea are

rich deposits. Most of them are still unexploited, often

because of unstable political conditions, but maybe the

political conditions in those countries are getting to be more

stable than they are here in British Columbia. And maybe — not

just maybe, surely — some of those deposits are now going to be

exploited in preference to ours.

AN HON. MEMBER: I sure hope they get the royalties out of

it.

MR. GIBSON: They'll get jobs and taxes on profits out of it,

Mr. Member. That's what they will get out of it.

HON. MR. NIMSICK: They pay mighty small wages over

there.

MR. GIBSON: The Minister says they pay mighty small wages in

those countries. The development of those resources will allow

them to pay good wages, just as it has allowed us to do here in

British Columbia, and you want to take away the base for paying

those good wages.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: That's exactly where you are headed. It's only

the phenomenon of open pit mining and the constant lowering of

costs by the industry and the geologists and the engineers in

this province that has made it possible for our industry to

develop the way it has.

When Bethlehem was brought in in 1962 1.18 per cent was

needed in those days. They are now mining .56 there. Granisle

was brought in in 1966, down to .56 per cent of that point and

now down to .44. Utah in 1971 brought in at .52 per cent;

Lornex in 1972 at .42 per cent; Gibraltar in 1972 at .37 per

cent. That's a story of progress, Mr. Minister, over these

years that we should be proud of here in British Columbia. We

shouldn't be trying to chase those people away. We should be a

lot prouder of it than you seem to be.

HON. MR. NIMSICK: We're so proud that we want to share in

their good fortune.

MR. GIBSON: The Minister says so proud we want to share in

their good fortune. Mr. Minister, you do your sharing in the

right way through excess profits tax and we've got no quarrel.

Just say that. Just say: "We'll tax the excess profits and not the royalty" and I'll

sit down right now. Just say that. I beseech you, for the good

of this province.

The next thing we should look at, Mr. Minister, having

looked at the competition we have from around the Pacific is to

look at the competition we have from the floor of the

Pacific.

This undersea mining over the next generation I think has to

be the greatest threat to the copper industry in British

Columbia. It has to be a threat because undersea mining shows

the capacity when the technology is worked out of producing

from a higher grade ore than we have here in British Columbia

at lower mining costs.

MR. D.T. KELLY (Omineca): How long do you think these

resources are going to last?

MR. GIBSON: The Member for Omineca (Mr. Kelly) says: "How

long do you think these resources are going to last?" Let me

tell him something about the copper resources on the seabed of

the Pacific Ocean. The estimate of those copper resources, Mr.

Member, is a 1,000-year supply at present consumption.

MR. KELLY: We're doubling every day.

MR. GIBSON: A 1,000-year supply at present consumption.

HON. MR. NIMSICK: Who told you that?

MR. GIBSON: And that takes over pretty quickly from the

little 5 per cent of the copper that British Columbia produces

in this world, I'll tell you.

We have to look to our future, of course, and that is why a

reasonable mining rate is the right rate and the rate that the

Minister is shooting for is a quick tapering off in this

industry just like the exploration has already got.

Exploration is the life blood of the mining industry. I want

to quote…and this is not a British Columbia source but a

national source, a Mr. Charles Elliot, who is the present of

the Mining Association of Canada and who said in Vancouver on

February 23:

"Clearly we have failed to communicate the absolutely essential

role of the exploration function in our industry. Exploration is mining's future.

No government should permit itself to be lulled into believing that because

the mines continue to operate — yes, with today's prices even thrive — the industry

is not seriously affected by progressively heavier tax burdens. Exploration

is based on incentive and when you remove or diminish substantially this element

in the mining equation stagnation sets

[ Page 3970 ]

in.

"Mines already, in operation will continue so long as any

recovery of invested capital is possible, thus creating the illusion of continuing

production and prosperity."

But he warned:

"There will be a day of reckoning if taxes and regulations

under which the mining industry must operate either in this

province, or anywhere else for that matter, become too onerous

and too burdensome. Exploration activity will dry up and the

industry will die with the inevitable exhaustion of known ore

bodies."

I think that's pretty clear, Mr. Minister. So will these

known ore bodies continue to be found?

At that same meeting of the B.C.-Yukon Chamber of Mines that

you didn't feel up to going to, Mr. Tommy Elliot made a

statement that was very heartfelt on his part. He said:

"During the 43 years I've been associated with the mining

industry in this part of Canada, I've witnessed the building up

of what will go down in history as the most efficient

mine-finding and mine-developing body of people that ever

existed anywhere on this planet, concentrated mainly here in

Vancouver but existing also in many other parts of British

Columbia."

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I beg your pardon, Mr. Minister?

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The Minister says "don't tell me he has no

monetary interest." Mr. Minister, I hope you aren't questioning

for a moment the sincerity of Mr. Tommy Elliot in making this

statement. I hope you aren't. I hope you aren't because I was

there, the way you weren't and I saw him make that statement.

And he believed it and I believed it.

"But existing also in many other parts of British Columbia,

we have today a very substantial group of prospectors,

engineers, geologists, geophysicists, geochemists,

metallurgists, assayers, diamond drillers, practical miners,

entrepreneurs and mine financiers, all of whom have played an

important role in uncovering the mineral resources that lie

buried beneath the surface of this vast and rugged land. From a

small beginning, these men have built an industry that's

produced $1 billion in new wealth for the people of British

Columbia last year. And that could be only the beginning.

"With encouragement from government, federal and provincial,

the B.C. mining industry could increase its yearly production to $2 billion

within the next decade. Anyone who will take time to study the facts will find

that by far the largest portion of this production of new wealth is left in

British Columbia and Canada and that instead of being rip-off artists as some

politicians like to state, these mining people are major contributors to the

province's overall prosperous economy and they are without doubt one of the

most valuable assets British Columbia possesses.

"To consider that the existence of all these people and

their value to the community is today being threatened by

unwise and unnecessary government legislation is in my

considered opinion a condemnation of the trend in our modern

society. No government body can ever hope to fill the vacuum or

replace this mass, of mining expertise once it is

destroyed."

And you're destroying it, Mr. Minister. You're moving it out

of the province. I got some letters, case examples, I'll be

reading later on which make that abundantly clear and it's

abundantly clear from the claim staking figures you have.

Abundantly clear.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: The whole nature of the mining business as I

said to you before, Mr. Minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, has

to be the reduction of uncertainty — that initial uncertainty

when the prospector goes out and there's just one chance in

1,000 or 10,000, and then the uncertainty when he brings back

what's maybe a find, and you have to do some drilling and

development work and it's maybe just one chance in 100. If that

proves up and you get the money and the market looks all right,

then you've got a chance of making a profit if the reserves are

as large as you think they are and if the market holds up, and

so on.

There's uncertainty all through that process, and what

you're doing by Bill 31 is adding to that uncertainty rather

than reducing it. That to me is very, very wrong.

You know, it's not as if this was an isolated phenomenon

that only affects a few parts of this province. I've got a map

here showing the mines of this province and showing the ridings

of the province on those maps.

I just checked out which were in which riding, which Members

should be concerned. The Member for Omineca (Mr. Kelly) should

be concerned. He has five producing mines in his riding right

now. Maybe that's why they have that petition asking him to

quit. The Member for Atlin (Mr. Calder) should be concerned. He

has two producing mines in his riding,

[ Page 3971 ]

and it's a pretty small riding.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: You hear that Minister, Mr. Speaker? One

Minister said: "How many mines in your riding?" Another one

said: "Lots of speculators, lots of promoters." That's what

these men think of the mining industry in this province, Mr.

Speaker. They think that they're a bunch of rip-off artists,

they think they're a bunch of promoters and speculators. I want

to tell you they're hard-working people who have brought a lot

of benefits to this province.

Let's look at the riding of the Minister who had to say that

about the speculators (Hon. Mr. Hartley). Yes, Lillooet. He's

got Ashcroft in his riding. Got another mine up here, the

Similkameen Mine which is a big low-grade producer. Royalty

will cut a lot of ore out of that, cut the reserves of that

mine by a lot.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes and a lot of votes, too.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: The Hon. Member for Kamloops (Mr. G.H. Anderson)

I don't see him right now, but he's got quite a few mines in

his riding, three, one on the boundary line there.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The Hon. Member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy)

has got one or two. Nelson Creston (Hon. Mr. Nicolson) the same

thing. The Hon. Member for Kootenay (Hon. Mr. Nimsick) has got

four, that's about right. The Hon. Member for Cariboo (Mr.

Fraser) well he appreciates the mining industry, he's got two

or three mines there. None in Delta, but the Hon. Member for

Delta (Mr. Liden) can stand up and have his say when he feels

like it.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The Hon. Member says that most know what they

have in their constituencies. That's why I wonder how the NDP

caucus works, Mr. Speaker. I'm just astonished that all of

these Members with the mining industry so important to the jobs

in their ridings shouldn't have been able to convince the

cabinet to pull this one back, to look at it.

Maybe it's just the cabinet's unresponsive, Mr. Speaker,

that's the only thing I can think of. I will say the

backbenchers are very loyal. They're very loyal to this foolish

idea. They're not responsible to the needs of their ridings,

but they're very loyal to the foolish idea embodied in Bill 31. I will give them credit for that if that's credit.

AN HON. MEMBER: Keep on talking about it and we'll be

raising mineral royalties.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, there's a threat.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's right, the heavy hand of state

socialism rearing its ugly head. It's the rough end of the

road.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: I'd like to say just a little bit about profits,

Mr. Speaker, before getting on to other things.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: Something said by the president of the Institute

of Chartered Accountants, April 19. He said:

"Profit is not a dirty word. It's a word that spells activity,

jobs, opportunity, social systems to care for the handicapped, the sick and

underprivileged. Governments must join business to explain the situation instead

of criticizing business and threatening the stability of the country."

HON. MR. LEA: We want them to make a fair profit.

MR. GIBSON: "We want them to make a fair profit, "

says the Minister. I'll come back to that in a minute.

"Inflation," he pointed out, "distorts profits where

companies exercised depreciation to reflect the gradual

obsolescence of the buildings and equipment and all business

must relate its income to the income of the ordinary investor.

A profit, however large, is not satisfactory and never will be

if it is less than the return the business could have got in a

risk-free investment such as a government bond. A company

making a percentage of return less than a risk-free investment

is in fact making a loss and not a profit at all."

Now what did the federal leader of that party have to say

about profit, Mr. Speaker? He thought 8 or 9 per cent was

pretty fair. That's not as high as a Canada Savings Bond — 9

per cent is. He thought that in the special, dangerous

situation of the resource industries, maybe 10 or 11 per cent

was fair.

Now the Minister over there who was just talking