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November 5, 1992

35th Parliament, 2nd Session

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Hansard Transcripts

The House met at 1002.

Prayers.

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

NORTHERN ONTARIO SENATE REPRESENTATION ACT, 1992 / LOI DE 1992 SUR LA REPRÉSENTATION DU NORD DE L'ONTARIO AU SÉNAT

Mr Ramsay moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 84,

An Act to provide for the Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada / Loi prévoyant la représentation du Nord de l'Ontario au Sénat du Canada

Mr David Ramsay (Timiskaming): I'm very pleased to be able to rise today, to finally have my turn come up after seven years in the Ontario Legislature, to have the opportunity on our Thursday mornings to present a private piece of legislation, as we do.

As you know, my bill is about allowing northern Ontarians to choose their own Senate representation. Of course, this was given great debate as Canadians across the country, coast to coast, were discussing how we were to change our Constitution. As people will remember now -- it seems fleeting after the referendum of last week -- we in the country and the politicians felt that we needed a new Senate and that we needed to reform how the Senate was chosen. This movement really started in Alberta.

People have asked me today, now that the referendum has said No to the full constitutional package, why would I continue to pursue the idea that northern Ontarians be allowed to select their own senators in a new Senate? We're certainly going to talk more about this later on, but I just want to state right now that it is very important that northern Ontarians have the ability to choose their senators.

I want to put that on the record and allow other northerners to put that on the record, so that when we do revisit the issue of Senate reform, which I'm sure we are going to do in this country in the next few years, it will be on the record that the people of northern Ontario have spoken and would like to be allowed to choose their own Senate representatives.

I would like to dedicate this bill this morning to a senator from northern Ontario who passed away on Tuesday. He was Senator Rhéal Bélisle, who had served in the Senate of Canada. He died at the age of 73 after a lengthy illness. That leaves from northern Ontario, if you count Mr Kelleher, one senator out of 24 today. I think it reinforces the point of how important it is that we get on with the work of reforming the Senate of Canada and that the regions of Ontario have the ability to choose their own senators.

I think it is important that when the discussions came that we would have an elected Senate from the different provinces across the country, it became very apparent that if we in the north were to participate in an election at large -- that is, to elect six senators, as was proposed, throughout all of Ontario -- it would become very difficult for northern Ontario to elect a representative of its own.

I believe it would have been difficult for many reasons. As you know, in northern Ontario we are 10% of the population, yet we represent 90% of the land base of this great province. It's very difficult for us to travel in the north. It's very difficult for us to garner the resources to mount a province-wide campaign. I am sure, and I am sure all northerners would agree, that it would have been very difficult for the north to elect one of its own in a province-wide election.

Therefore, I felt it was important to make the point now, so that when we do enter discussions later on in regard to Senate reform, northerners would have put on the record that whatever reform package eventually comes forward, we would like to have the opportunity to elect our own.

For that reason I kept the premise of this bill very simple, because a lot of people have many ideas about Senate reform and I certainly don't want to conflict with those. I am here today to make one point and one point only, that whatever number of senators may be decided upon in future senatorial reform, the north have that opportunity to elect its own.

I have to tell you, as people in the north certainly realize, that this is not an idea that has originated with me. This idea came from the city of Timmins and the Save Our North committee. Steve Perry, with whom I met last night, actually, on other matters in regard to the mining industry, heads a very active group of northerners throughout all northern Ontario in regard to economic development and political representation in the north.

It was the Save Our North campaign, once hearing, as I did, the suggestions in the Charlottetown accord, that felt that northern Ontarians should be able to elect their own senators. In their particular proposal they had decided that they would like to have three out of the six.

In my discussions with people across the north and across the rest of northern Ontario, it seemed to me that the perception outside of northern Ontario was that maybe it was just a tad too greedy on behalf of us to say that we would like 50% of the representation, when quite frankly, as I've said, we represent only 10% of the people here in Ontario. I went back to Save Our North and said, "I would really like to support the principle of your bill, but I would like to change it to two out of the six senators proposed." They certainly agreed it would be a good idea to bring that forward if it was more acceptable.

I believe it is more acceptable, because this now leaves room for other regions of Ontario to share in the six or how many senators are eventually decided upon.

And I think that's right, because what I'm talking about today is not just for northern Ontario; I'm trying to make the point that the regions of Ontario should be able to elect their own representatives in the Senate of Canada. That's the basis of what the triple E principles are all about. It's about regional representation. It's not about representation by population, which we try to assume here in this House and our House in Ottawa. We try to do that, but the Senate is very different.

The Senate is that chamber of sober second thought, as they say, and the idea of a new reformed Senate is to give the Senate some authority, some teeth, if you will, especially in regard to resource matters.

That's why I'm here today and why groups from northern Ontario are supporting my private member's resolution, because we are, as you know, primarily a resource-dependent region of Ontario. We from the north must have a say on resource taxation, as has been proposed for a new, more effective Senate. That's why it's very important that we're going to be able to choose our own.

In notifying the many municipalities across northern Ontario, I have been able to get tremendous support from municipalities right across northeastern and northwestern Ontario. I'm very pleased for that support, and, as I have requested, many of those towns have contacted their local MPPs to ask them to support this bill. I'd like to read an excerpt from one of those letters, from the township of Emo, a tremendous farm area that is very much like my own in Timiskaming, except this is in the great riding of Rainy River. They say in their second paragraph:

"We realize that with the No vote, Senate reform is probably on the back burner until a new constitutional endeavour. We think it is very important for various regions in Ontario to go on the record concerning any possible future makeup in the Senate. In this manner, any future provincial negotiating team will know in advance that regional and gender representation will be a requirement."

I think that's very important, because what happened, I think, with the Charlottetown accord is that our politicians nationally got out there maybe a little too far in front of the people of this country in making their deliberations. I know it's very difficult when you get into that negotiating situation, that the pressures are on you and you start to make your deals and make those compromises. I think, by stating on the record today what especially the people from northern Ontario would like to see from a Senate, that this would give our future negotiators much more certainty in entering those new negotiations.

Again, that is why I will continue today with this and hope to garner the support of many members in the House, because I think it's an important issue. I'd like to thank those municipalities that have responded and are responding at this moment to this bill.

This is, I guess, just one of many battles that we who are elected from northern Ontario, from all political parties, always have to face. There are 16 of us in this House representing, as I've said, 90% of the land base of Ontario, albeit 10% of the people, and it's very difficult for us, from all parties, to make the point down here with a bureaucracy that is primarily centred in Toronto, of the importance of northern Ontario and what our needs and desires are.

This is just one more tool, and I would like to be able to say, when I have completed my career, that I have been able to work towards putting institutions in place, making some fundamental changes, to make it easier for the people who came after me to make that representation to Toronto for northern Ontario.

One of those, I believe, that our government started and that the new government is continuing, is the transfer of public service jobs into northern Ontario. I certainly salute the new government for continuing that endeavour our government had started. This was an idea that René Fontaine and many of us in the Liberal government had felt was good, and we've been able to convince the new government to continue that. That is going to make our jobs easier in the future too, because we will now be coming in contact with civil servants who have lived in the north, who understand the problems of northern Ontario and have that experience.

Mr Speaker, I'm going to surrender the floor right now and will be back to sum up at the end of the debate.

Mr Rosario Marchese (Fort York): While I respect and sympathize with the member's intentions on behalf of his constituents in northern Ontario, and while I support the principle of wanting regional representation of the north in a new Senate, I must state that I have some serious difficulties with Bill 84.

It was my intention last night, as I reflected on speaking to this bill, to speak specifically to the provisions of Bill 84, but I decided differently. The problem is this: The member opposite introduced Bill 84 in the context of a specific constitutional proposal, the Charlottetown accord, which for all intents and purposes is no longer a living document. Therefore, the fundamental flaw in the member's bill is that it's no longer relevant.

In my view, it would be unwise for this House to pass a bill respecting provisions for Senate representation without knowing what kind of Senate model we are talking about. The set of constitutional proposals to which it is tied and upon which it relies for its rationale is no longer the basis for discussion.

For this reason I must speak against Bill 84 as it is presented at this time. While I can understand the member's intent in seeking a form of regional balance of Senate seats within Ontario, I want to be the first to acknowledge that the train has left the station. Constitutional reform is no longer on the agenda at the moment, and I believe there is broad consensus that this matter should not be reopened for at least the foreseeable future.

This House has other business to conduct at this time, and I recommend that we get on with it and defer this discussion until there is consensus to reopen this issue.

Mr Michael A. Brown (Algoma-Manitoulin): I'm pleased to participate in the debate today, particularly because of the strong efforts of the member for Timiskaming on behalf of northerners.

Having listened to the member opposite, just briefly, I guess I understand: The train has left the station but the train will come back to the station some day. It is important for us to understand that under the referendum proposal, the Senate of Canada was to have had special powers with regard to resource issues. I and northern members are particularly concerned about resource issues because our economy is strongly based on resource issues.

It seemed to me that when Save Our North came up with the idea of having three senators from Ontario to deal with those specific resource issues on behalf of the communities in Ontario that are most affected by resource issues, the member's proposal made ultimate sense, and whether it's two, three, four or a percentage of a third of whatever Senate may appear, it seems to me that in the Parliament of Canada there needs to be strong representation from the northern part of our province.

Northerners do exist on 90% of this land base. We are, I think, only 9% of the population now. Most of that population is concentrated in the five major centres of northern Ontario. It leaves about 2% of the people of northern Ontario out across the rural north. These people need representation.

We have seen many federal initiatives that have not been, in our view, in the interests of northern Ontario. We have seen the cancellation of flow-through shares, for example, in the mining sector. We have not seen the replacement of that initiative with something that would help a very ailing industry. We have seen, over time, a problem with the forestry industry, where I'm sure that if the federal government was getting more representation in the Senate from resource-based economies like Ontario's north, we would have more voice in pushing that agenda along.

I believe the member has provided a useful function. I believe that it's important to Ontarians, and especially northern Ontarians, to be able to get their views across to the federal politicians. I say that also with regard to the provincial politicians. As the member for Timiskaming pointed out, there are but 16 of us, from all parties, in this House of 130 members. I think we do, from all parties, a good job of raising the issues. We win some and happen to lose our share also, but I think that, at least in terms of our voices, we are relatively well heard, but I'm not so sure sometimes how much we really affect public policy, just because of the sheer numbers.

Members will recognize, especially northern members, that there have been movements afoot over the years to create a province of northern Ontario. While I'm not an advocate of that, I can understand, when I'm out talking to my constituents, that there are some real issues that real people see quite differently from the view from Elliot Lake or Espanola or Mindemoya than they see from Toronto or Sarnia or Windsor. Their view of the world is different.

Our economy is basically different, and while we are attempting to diversify that economy -- I think the former government took some great steps in that direction -- I know that northern Ontario people feel they are not getting their message through as loudly and as clearly as they should be.

This small step of suggesting that in what was to be a Senate with a resource-based prerogative, northern Ontario, the resource-based communities, should have a say, I think is what the member for Timiskaming was trying to talk about.

In one of my communities, Elliot Lake, for example, we have had terrible difficulties over the last couple of years. Our mines have shut down. This government has laid off 1,600 workers directly. The federal government, to its credit, has supplied a vast amount of training dollars, as it should under the Constitution and under constitutional arrangements. But just this week, we have learned that the federal government has withdrawn funding for 30 workers who were to be retrained, who were back at school, who were hoping to get on with their lives. The federal government, through Employment and Immigration policy, because it has not had enough money, has cancelled a program.

I do not know what those workers are to do. I know that in the House of Commons our members will be speaking to the government about this, but I think in particular that having a stronger voice in the Senate, while it may not alleviate the problem, will certainly add weight to what northern MPs are saying to Brian Mulroney these days.

I know the member has support across the north for his initiative. I know in my communities I have been talking to the mayor of Espanola, to people from Spanish -- that's officially the township of Shedden -- who are telling me that this is a good idea and that we should be doing this. While I guess the question is at the moment moot, I think the philosophy that underlies what the member has done here is basically sound and should be supported by all members. We should not use the excuse, "Well, the train has left the station." Let's vote on the issue.

What we're really voting for is for people in the resource area of this province to have a voice in the resource decisions that affect this province.

I thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity today to participate in this debate and I look forward to interventions by other members.

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): I'd like to start off by saying that in regard to the proposal here before us in Bill 84 put forward by Mr Ramsay from Timiskaming, I think there isn't really any problem in supporting the idea in principle of having representation from northern Ontario in a Senate.

But I'd just like to say a couple of things. First of all, there is a difficulty; that is, on October 26, the people of northern Ontario, like most other people across this nation, voted No to the constitutional accord that was agreed to in Charlottetown, which leaves us with a little bit of a dilemma. I just want to go through this somewhat.

If we take a look at the results that came in on the referendum during the night of October 26 and we look at northern Ontario, there was a higher than normal percentage of people voting No in northern Ontario than in most other regions of the province of Ontario itself. I think we should listen a little bit to what the people in the north were telling us.

One of the things that I think all of us, if we would admit it, heard very strongly when we went around talking to our constituents in the north was that most people in the north support the abolition of the Senate. I think it's fairly safe to say a lot of people in the north, probably like other regions in the country, feel that the Senate in itself, the way it is now, serves no useful purpose and were somewhat hesitant to make the leap of faith of going to an elected Senate that effectively would become an effective Senate when the 1995 or 1996 election would happen when we would elect them.

I think we need to listen to what people are saying. One of the difficulties I have is that even though I'll support this motion, because I agree with the concept, I think we need to listen to what people in the north were saying and I just want to bring that point out.

I'd like to touch on one of the points Mr Ramsay raised at the very beginning, that this is an initiative, yes, that came from the people of Save Our North, and I'd like to use the name of Mr Steve Perry, who is really probably the leader on this issue, who contacted probably most northern members. I know he contacted me and obviously Mr Ramsay in order to talk about this issue. I think it's important that the House understand and that the people out there understand why Save Our North and people within the mining industry and forestry industry think it's important to have this kind of concept.

If we take a look at the powers the new Senate was going to be given, if it would have passed on October 26, the Senate would have really had a lot of power when it came to resource decisions. Since northern Ontario is a resource-based economy, where mining and forestry is the mainstay of its economy, it was felt that it was very important that we have good representation from Ontario out of the six senators who would have been underneath that accord, to be able to speak on resource-based issues.

In effect those six senators from Ontario, like six senators from any other province, would have had an effective voice when it came to the federal government deciding policy on questions of resource.

As such, the idea of Save Our North was that, senators, obviously out of the six who were elected, we should make sure that we had senators from northern Ontario who understood the resource sector, not just understanding it from a reading perspective and taking a look at the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Sun -- God forbid, not the Toronto Sun -- and the Toronto Star, but people who actually lived in northern Ontario who understood what the mining industry and the forestry industry really are all about, who understand not only the bottom line but the human equations of those industries and how important they are to our community in northern Ontario.

Because of that, I think we don't have any problem supporting that particular motion, but there are couple of other things that have to be said.

As was mentioned by colleague Mr Marchese, one of the difficulties of this debate -- I understand why Mr Ramsay is putting it forward. I imagine that he wanted this to come out before the referendum. That was probably what the intention was and that's why this particular bill came forward at this time. It was just a question of timing within the House.

But again, I just have to point out that at this point God knows what's going to happen. What's going to happen in the next round of negotiations? Will there be negotiations when it comes to a renewal of Canada? I certainly hope so.

On the question of the Senate, what's going to happen? Are we going to end up in a situation where the majority of Canadians are going to take the view that we should abolish the Senate? Who knows? I just want to point out that it's a little bit premature to be talking about representation, but I do think it's important that if ever we get to the area of having elected senators that we have fair representation from northern Ontario.

Some of my colleagues within the New Democratic caucus -- it's interesting -- had a bit of a discussion when we talked about this, exactly about where the boundaries of northern Ontario should be, because there are also other regions within the province that feel somewhat alienated when it comes to the question of how they're viewed by Queen's Park.

It's not the fault of this government or the past government or the government before that; it's just the reality of the geography of Ontario. People who live in rural Ontario, either in southwestern, southeastern or central Ontario, have probably some of the same concerns as we do in northern Ontario when it comes to access to important services such as health care, when it comes to access to government generally.

In some ways we probably do better in northern Ontario, because of something that was introduced under the Conservative government and followed through by the Liberals and ours, which is the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines. That particular ministry gives a voice to northern Ontario that probably most other regions within the province don't have.

One of the things that would be interesting -- and I will stick my neck out a little bit -- is maybe what should be happening is having some sort of a similar model for some of those other regions within the province to have a voice and be able to bring forward their issues, because the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines really is sort of like the catalyst. It's like the one-window approach to government services in northern Ontario where a municipality or individual says: "I'm having difficulty with my business.

I want to be able to approach the government for assistance." If it's a municipality having to do with fixing roads or it's a question of health care or it's a question of social services, the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines sort of acts as that one-window approach.

I think we should be fairly proud and fairly happy that we have such a service in northern Ontario, a ministry that is viewed probably as one of the better ministries in the north, mainly because of the functions it runs, and also, I think, because of the size of the ministry. It's not so big that it's become bureaucratic. It's very much a hands-on, grass-roots type of ministry.

The other thing I want to get back to very quickly is the question of the importance of the resource sector. I think all of us here from the north, on all sides of the House, and I would invite Mr Eves who is here from the Conservative caucus to maybe concur with me on this, agree that there is a great deal of underestimation on the part of some people in this province when it comes to the importance of resources in our province. It's not because of anything malicious; it's just because most people really haven't had the chance to sit down and think about it.

If you're living in London, Sarnia, Windsor, Ottawa or wherever it might be, not many people think of the important role the forestry and mining industries play in our daily lives and their importance to the economy of this province. As such, what ends up happening at times is that those particular industries, especially because of the hard economic times we're going through right now, when they try to bring forward some of their concerns about where they're at as industries, they sometimes feel a little alienated and sort of left aside.

I think it's something we as members really have to start talking about within our constituencies, not only in northern Ontario but also outside of the north: the importance those industries have.

The communities I represent -- Timmins, Iroquois Falls and Matheson -- are all touched very, very closely to what these industries mean. Mining is a daily part of our lives in northern Ontario. I've worked in the mines; most of my friends either work in the mining industry or the forestry industry. They really are highly technologically advanced industries. Mining is probably one of the the most technologically advanced industries within the province.

If you take a look at the developments that have happened around instrumentation, around some of the technologies we use in mining, they are very much advanced of other industries. Yet some people look at mining as a labour-intensive industry that has no technology within it. I say that just in passing, because we need to understand that mining requires high technical skill. One of the difficulties we have, obviously, is that we have to be able to communicate to people the importance of the industry, but also what the industry actually is.

The industry itself has been going through -- I would say it started probably about 1982-83, from what I recall, working within the industry -- a really tough time, especially the mining industry.

First of all, we've seen the depleting of prices of metals on the foreign markets because of what happened with the bringing on line of new mining properties in different places across the world. We've seen the prices of copper, gold, zinc and other metals drop in price, which means that obviously the costs of operating these mines have become a lot more marginal when it comes to making a profit.

The other thing that's obviously happened as well is that there have been many changes in what's happened within the industry itself over the years. A lot of the reserves we've had in the past, because there hasn't been the money to spend on the exploration end of it, are fast depleting. We need to send a message out there to build the confidence within the industry in order to make sure we invest in bringing on line new developments in exploration, so we can replace some of those reserves that have been depleting in the mining industry up north.

To that end, the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines, in partnership with groups such as Save Our North and others that speak to this proposal, has been working to address some of the concerns to try to change the really systemic problems we have within the industry itself.

The Save Our North committee brought forward five particular points to the government that need to be addressed to try to fix some of the systemic problems we have in the mining industry. One of them was the question of permitting. In the past, when you were looking at getting permitting on mine lands, you had to approach three various ministries in order to get the permit to do that work. They asked us to bring forward a one-window approach, and last spring we signed agreements with the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Ministry of Labour in order to bring that to a one-window approach through the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines.

One of the other things they had talked about was the question of incentives. We just recently, in September, released a document called New Directions in Minerals Incentives for Ontario, to be able to bring forward a good discussion within the industry about how best to tailor-make incentives for the mining industry so that they're the most effective possible.

On that note, we've had really good response from the mining industry; it's been a very constructive dialogue. Some really exciting times, I think, are coming in the future in regard to that whole initiative. I just want to say that, because this government really believes it's important that we support the mining industry and forestry industry for people in northern Ontario.

I speak of this for the simple reason that I think people need to recognize where this particular motion comes from. It comes from the sense of alienation of the people of northern Ontario because of the way they've been viewed from Queen's Park. Some of that is real and some of it isn't, but there's obviously a message coming through this motion, and I think most people in the north would agree.

So I ask members in the House to think on that a little bit, even though they may have some difficulty with regard to the timeliness of this motion; that's understandable. Obviously the decision of October 26 in regard to the referendum debate really decided the question of what happens with this bill, and it's not the vote in this House that will really make the difference.

But I ask people to at least support the bill on its principle, because the principle is something that I think is acceptable to most people, and it's very important, especially if the Senate ends up being the body which will have the power to make decisions around resource-based industries for the province. With that aim, I will support this motion.

Mr Ernie L. Eves (Parry Sound): It's my pleasure to take

part in this debate in the chamber this morning. I would first like to say that I have some difficulty with respect to the proposed bill from two different aspects.

The first aspect I have difficulty with is that it does not include the federal riding of Parry Sound-Muskoka. That perhaps is a problem that this party here has had, the provincial Liberal Party, consistently failing to recognize Parry Sound as being part of northern Ontario, and it's done it again here in this proposed private member's bill.

The members may be interested to know that Parry Sound-Muskoka is indeed considered, by the federal government, to be part of northern Ontario. In fact, it has rather good representation on the Fednor board and takes

part in those programs; indeed, it does now with the provincial government as well, for the most part, with the exception of a couple of ministries, which I am still pursuing.

Having said that, the other aspect of this proposed bill I have difficulty with, despite the fact that I consider myself to be a northerner and from northern Ontario, is the idea of a quota system. I am not in favour of quota systems when you elect people, for anybody. I'm not in favour of quota systems for women, I'm not in favour of quota systems for racial minorities and I'm not in favour of quota systems for geographical regions. I think I've been fairly consistent in that.

When you are electing people, you are electing them, hopefully, on the basis of merit and representation, and the person the electorate has the most trust or confidence in is indeed the individual who should be elected.

Having said that, though, I have no problem with, for example, setting out constituencies for election to a Senate. Perhaps that is the best way to address the problems I just heard my friend talking about, to ensure that northern Ontario, which does have special interests and does have special concerns and often is overlooked -- I don't care what government has been in power, be it Conservative, Liberal or New Democratic, as we've seen in the last 26 months.

The ministers from the north certainly have a problem getting their message through to the powers that be, be it from treasury or wherever, and getting their fair share. A lot is extracted from the north in terms of taxation etc, and not even as much as is taken out is given back in terms of expenditures in northern Ontario.

Perhaps the best way to address this problem, not only for northern Ontario but, I say to my friends from southwestern rural Ontario and I say to my friends from eastern Ontario, perhaps the best way to address an elected elected Senate would be to indeed have election of senators on the basis of geographical regions or constituencies. That would ensure that every part of the province gets representation.

There are more important things, and I know I'm going to hear the people from Metro Toronto screaming already, "We have some three million people out of 10 million people in the province, and therefore we should have half the Senate seats." Well, first of all, there's no such thing as a perfect representation by population, even within this chamber. I represent a riding that's the fifth largest in the province geographically, for example, but I'm sure is way below the provincial average in terms of population; indeed, a lot of my fellow northern members experience the same difficulties.

You have to be able to represent your constituents, and your constituents aren't just individual people. Quite often they represent geographic areas of the province, obviously, but they also represent, for example, a rural background, or an agricultural background in the case of a lot of southwestern and northern Ontario, eastern Ontario as well, for that matter.

That's perhaps the best way to address the problem we have before us. I do support the principle of what the member for Timiskaming is saying, because I understand his frustration, as indeed a lot of us from northern Ontario do, and I think we also have to appreciate the problems that are particular to other regions of the province as well, such as eastern Ontario and southwestern Ontario.

I would also like to say that even under the current system, where the province of Ontario currently has some 24 senators, who are appointed, I think northern Ontario quite often has been shortchanged in its representation in the upper chamber in Ottawa. This doesn't speak well of either existing or previous federal governments' approach to making sure that northern Ontario interests are adequately represented. As we know, the Charlottetown accord has been denied by the Canadian electorate at large and we also can see that there may not be, in the near future, an elected Senate in this country.

I would urge the federal government to at least, if we're going to continue with the current system for the time being, to make sure that the region of northern Ontario is adequately represented in that chamber, in the Senate.

I understand where a lot of people are coming from with respect to wanting their special interests represented in a Senate. I have received correspondence, as I'm sure my other colleagues from the north have, from Save Our North, for example, asking that no less than 50% of the senators, or three, under the Charlottetown proposal, be elected from northern Ontario.

I just want to say that, while I have some sympathy for my fellow northerners, I don't see how you can justify having three out of six senators in the entire province come from the region of northern Ontario, as indeed I don't see how you can justify having three of them come from Metro Toronto or any other region of the province.

Interjection: His bill says two.

Mr Eves: I know his bill says two, but Save Our North says three. I understand their frustration and I understand their concern, but then I say to them, "What are you going to say to the people in southwestern Ontario or eastern Ontario, or Metro Toronto, for that matter?"

I note that the leader of the Liberal Party, Ms McLeod, opposes a quota system. She made that quite clear in a quote in an

article in the Globe and Mail on September 11 of this year, talking about allocating half the Senate seats to women. "'I am extremely concerned that the Premier seems to have made a unilateral commitment to a quota system,' Ms McLeod told a press conference."

Interjection.

Mr Eves: I understand that, but it's still a quota system. I think you have to remain consistent in these things. As much as some people might not understand this, I am against the quota system, as I said, for elected representatives. I don't think that works. If you want to divide it up into constituencies and you want to make sure different areas of the province are represented, that's one thing and I fully support that; in fact, I think that would be the only way to do it.

If you had a province-wide system of electing senators, then the people coming from the most moneyed and populous areas of the province -- let me put it that way -- would obviously have a tremendous advantage, and probably virtually every senator would be elected from the Metropolitan Toronto or at least the Golden Horseshoe area.

I don't think that's what a Senate is supposed to be there for. A Senate is supposed to be there to protect different regions, not only of the country but indeed individual provinces, and a Senate is supposed to be there to protect minority interests etc. That is the whole reason why a Senate is part of our bicameral system in the parliamentary system we have, in the first place.

So I am fully supportive of the member's principle. I have a couple of problems, obviously, as he's not included Parry Sound-Muskoka in his definition of northern Ontario, but I am fully supportive of the principle that, as a region, northern Ontario has indeed been underrepresented in the past in the Senate, when it was appointed -- and perhaps that will continue to be the case for the near future, at least. In the future, if indeed we do have an elected Senate, which I firmly believe we should have if we're going to retain that body, then I think every geographical area of the province should be represented and northern Ontario certainly should be no exception.

Mr Frank Miclash (Kenora): It's a pleasure for me to participate in this resolution this morning,

An Act to provide for Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada.

Let me start off by saying that I must disagree strongly with what the member for Fort York, or what we know as "Trawna" up north, has said. He indicated that the train has left the station. If he'd done a little bit of research he would have found out that the federal government has taken the train out of northern Ontario. It has not only left the station but it has left northern Ontario.

I think that points to a very important fact: that people from the Toronto area are not really familiar with what's happening up there. I must say that I'm quite disappointed when I hear statements such as that from people who represent this area without much research going into it, without much background of the issue or knowledge of the issue. I hear that every day from this government and in this House and it concerns me greatly. So again, I think it just points out the importance of what the member for Timiskaming is trying to bring forth.

Yes, we know that the referendum is over, it's past, it's history, it's on the back burner, but I think we have to make a statement in this House that we need effective representation in not only the provincial government, in the federal government, but also in the Senate, a very -- well, we're not sure really what kind of an institution, but an institution that I see as very important to this country today and I'm sure we'll find out how important it will become over the years to come. But again, we're hearing from all of our municipalities suggesting that we have to have on the record the fact that we do need representation in that body.

I'd just like to go on to quote from the Toronto Star. It's August 16, 1992. The headline reads, "The Abandoned North." Let me just quote a few lines from this very important article. It was an

article written by somebody here in Toronto. It's an

article written around Timmins, a city in northern Ontario: "More than a year ago, a group of Timmins-based geologists realized that the lifeblood of their industry -- mineral exploration and development -- was draining out of Canada to South America, especially Chile, and also to Mexico. More shocking, the geologists realized also that no one seemed to know or to care." I think that points out a very important fact: that often in northern Ontario we are forgotten.

The

article -- again, a very good

article -- goes on to quote Alan Pope, a former Conservative provincial cabinet minister: "A most forceful expression of this sense of abandonment comes from Alan Pope, former Conservative provincial cabinet minister and now a lawyer in Timmins. He says: 'We've fallen off the political map. It's as if the nation has decided, out of guilt about resource extraction, that the north now belongs to us alone, no longer to it.'"

I think there's a very important message in that quote from a former provincial cabinet minister who served at one time in this House. We've fallen off the political map. I think that says a lot.

The member previously spoke about the mining industry -- as most members in the House will know, an industry that's very near and dear to me, representing an area which has possibly two of the largest gold mines in North America. When the member goes on to tell us all about the beautiful things that are happening in the mining industry, all he has to do is take a look at the facts, the statistics that are before him. Revenues from mining in 1989: We looked at $7.3 billion in revenue from mining for the provincial government. In 1990 that decreased to $6.4 billion. In 1991 we're looking at $5.1 billion.

I can't emphasize the importance of the drop in that revenue and the importance that the government must look at that industry, an industry in the north and one that I really feel would be promoted by an effective Senate.

We talk about cancellation of flow-through shares, cancellation by the federal government of an extremely important program that was put in mining throughout northern Ontario, put in prospectors in northern Ontario and boosted the economy in northern Ontario like nothing else before. I must say, people were excited about the program, people saw it working, and all of a sudden the federal government has again ignored the needs of northern Ontario by dropping that very important program.

If we take a look at employment in mining and again how important the mining industry was to us when at one time it employed an estimated 30,000 people -- that's going back to the early 1980s -- I say today that we are down to approximately 20,000 northern Ontarians being employed in that industry now. If the federal government can't see the importance of that program to us in the north and can't see what's happening in the mining industry throughout the north, I think we need maybe a little bit more of a voice.

The member for Timiskaming indicated earlier that out of 24 senators we're now down to one representing northern Ontario. I don't think that is effective in any way in representing those people of the north, those people who face unemployment rates of 18% or 20% throughout. I have communities in my riding that face up to 80% unemployment, and I am sure that there are many members, especially the member for Fort York -- Toronto as we know it up there -- who have never been to a place, a village, a community in my riding with unemployment of 80% to 85%. I'm sure he just can't imagine what that community would be like.

Again, I think we have to bring that forth not only to this provincial level of government but it has to be brought forth in an effective manner to the federal government. I must say we can only do that through effective representation, not only in our federal and provincial governments, but again, effective representation in the Senate, whatever form it might want to take following the back burner of the referendum when it does again come to the forefront.

I must say that many of the communities throughout my riding have put forth some support for this important resolution. They know that the referendum is a dead issue now, but they know this lack of representation that we're facing in the north.

In conclusion, I would just like to thank the member for Timiskaming for bringing forth this very important issue on behalf of northerners, on behalf of the northerners who represent the province in this House and, as I say, on behalf of the many people who cover 90% of the land mass of this province. Even though we're a small percentage in population, we are a large land mass. Again I thank the member for bringing this issue on to the record here in the provincial Legislature.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): The time allotted to the opposition has already been exhausted; you used your 15 minutes and so did the government. There are five minutes left. If anybody wants to use it, you're free to do so. If not -- would you like to use it?

Mr Ramsay: Yes, I would.

The Deputy Speaker: Fine. Is there unanimous consent? Agreed? Agreed. So therefore you have seven minutes.

Mr Ramsay: The first thing I'd like to do is thank all members of the House who have agreed to unanimous consent to allow me to use up the extra time the Progressive Conservative Party had let to this House this morning on private members' business. I appreciate that.

The next thing I'd like to do is to thank all those members of the House who contributed to this debate. I obviously want to give special thanks to the members for Kenora and Algoma-Manitoulin, who made the case with me today. I'd also like to thank the member for Cochrane South for speaking and contributing to the debate and agreeing with the principle of this bill. I appreciate that very much. Also, to the member for Parry Sound, I certainly sympathize with some of the things the member for Parry Sound had said and I'd like to address some of those issues.

I must say that when I had considered bringing this bill forward, the biggest question for me was, where do you draw the line? Where do you draw the geographic region of northern Ontario? Since this had to be formulated in regard to federal ridings, as that's how we would elect a Senate -- through federal election in our federal constituencies -- I had to make that line based upon federal constituency borders.

So that proposed a bit of difficulty for me, because instead of having to go with the definition of northern Ontario as defined by the province and the government of Ontario, I had to find my own border. What made it very difficult for me was the inclusion of the area of Muskoka. I would just like to say to my good friends who live in Muskoka that it's one of the most beautiful areas of Ontario; I have a lot of good friends there.

Most of us in the north don't have that northern relationship with the people of Muskoka as it's so close to the city of Toronto and southern Ontario, so it was very difficult for me to include Parry Sound and Muskoka as a region of northern Ontario. Also, we're not resource-based in Muskoka as we are in the rest of northern Ontario, so we found that a bit difficult.

In conclusion, I would just like to comment on the remarks made by the member for Fort York, the first member today to respond to this private member's bill. Quite frankly, it really saddened me, and I guess I would have to say "Touché," with regard to why I'm here today as one of the representatives from northern Ontario, bringing forward a bill such as this that espouses the principle of northern representation.

I say "Touché" because the first member who gets up is a member from one of the most populated areas of downtown Toronto, to say that northern Ontario shouldn't be getting this sort of special privilege and that this matter is not important. I have to tell you, as a member from northern Ontario, that this matter is very important, and in a sense it is very important because northerners want to have a say.

We don't, in northern Ontario, want charity. We want to be able to live our own lives and to have strong representation and to provide a livelihood for own families and especially for our children, because our problem is that we do not have the opportunities in northern Ontario and our children leave us. That's something that doesn't happen as much in any other region of Ontario as it does in the north, and that's the sad thing.

This bill, if the member would have looked at it more closely, is really a cry from the wilderness, from us who represent northern Ontario. It's a cry to be recognized, a cry to be represented in one of the chambers of our political system here in the country, the Senate of Canada. So it's a cry that we no longer want to be dependent: dependent upon big business, big unions and big government. We want to be able to provide our own livelihoods for ourselves and our families.

I will be here in this House as long as the people of Timiskaming allow me the privilege to be standing in my place and speaking on behalf of northern Ontario. I think it's a great challenge for the members from northern Ontario to do that, as we're tremendously outnumbered, 16 in the 130 members that we have here. But I see that as my job, and I will continue to do that while I have that privilege.

The Deputy Speaker: The time allotted for this ballot item has expired.

LABOUR RELATIONS AMENDMENT ACT, 1992 / LOI DE 1992 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES RELATIONS DE TRAVAIL

Mrs Witmer moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 76,

An Act to amend the Labour Relations Act / Loi modifiant la

Loi sur les relations de travail

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): You have 10 minutes to make your presentation.

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): This bill, which I first introduced on November 7, 1991, makes the secret ballot vote mandatory for certification, ratification of a collective agreement and the decision to strike.

You may ask why I am putting this bill forward. It's most appropriate that I put this bill forward particularly today, as we vote this evening on Bill 40, because the right to a secret ballot vote has been requested by thousands and thousands of groups and individuals throughout the province as we debated labour law reform. Yet this government has refused to include this request in the Bill 40 reforms.

Today this government has one final opportunity to demonstrate to the people of this province that it is responsive to the people's concerns. I'd like to read a letter that I received from a gentleman in Guelph. I have to tell you that I have received several hundreds of letters and communications. He says as follows:

"I have been manipulated by unions and businesses alike during 20 working years. I never believed I had all the facts on the rare occasions I was allowed to cast a vote. If you truly want workers to exert control over their own destinies, give them the right to a secret ballot vote whenever possible. By making this a mandatory provision, you will force businesses and unions alike to ensure that the workers receive all of the information necessary to make an informed decision.

This provision will fulfil Mr Gord Wilson and Mr Mackenzie's stated intent -- specifically, to advance the interests of working people, to make the workplace more open, responsive and democratic and to eliminate threats to these worthy goals."

He concludes by saying in his letter to Bob Rae: "Please demonstrate your belief in the ability of Ontario's working people to make rational decisions when provided with complete, factual information."

That's one of the reasons I am putting forward this bill today. He reflects the feelings of thousands of workers in this province. I'm also putting this bill forward because it is an attempt to restore balance and fairness to labour relations reform and to restore some of the workers' rights which have been removed by Bill 40.

Under Bill 40, the ease by which a union can be certified is such that employees who do not want to belong to a union must join. The bill does not require a secret ballot, it eliminates post-application petitions and it eliminates the adequate-membership-support condition in the case of a perceived unfair practice. In the process, this legislation is going to give the Ontario Labour Relations Board the power to certify a union even if the required level of support is not met. In short, the amendments in Bill 40 will alter the certification process from determining the true wishes of employees to facilitating union certification.

I strongly believe that if we are to have the fairness and the equality that the Minister of Labour has talked about for almost two years, all workers in this province should have the right to a free and democratic vote. Workers should have the right to decide for themselves, free of any interference or intimidation from any source, whether or not to have a union represent them, to accept a contract or to go out on strike. Obviously, a secret ballot vote is the only fair way of allowing them to do so.

Furthermore, our society has long recognized a secret ballot vote as the only truly satisfactory way of enabling one to freely express one's opinion. Why is this government so opposed to a secret ballot vote?

As I said before, Bill 40 restricts the right to oppose unions by taking away an employee's right to revoke a membership card after the union has applied for certification and to petition against the union's application. Further, under Bill 40, only 55% of the employees in a bargaining unit need to sign cards in order for the union to be certified. What about the other 45% of the people who may not want to join a union? Their freedom of choice has been eliminated. They will be forced to join the union. What about the workers who change their minds after signing the union card?

They do not even have the same rights and protection as a consumer dealing with a door-to-door salesman. The consumer, at least, gets a three-day grace period to change his or her mind. It is unbelievable that employees who sign a union card will not, under Bill 40, have the same basic consumer rights that the rest of us take for granted.

Given that Bill 40 seriously infringes on freedom of choice in joining a union, the certification process must be amended to ensure that it respects the fundamental principles of fairness, freedom of information and protection of privacy. All employees must have freedom of choice through a secret ballot vote. A secret ballot vote is also important because certification of a union dramatically changes the workplace. When a union is certified, it is granted exclusive bargaining rights, and the individual workers lose any individual right to bargain with their employer. It is a critical choice that workers must make, and it should be made as fairly and as honestly as possible.

The same argument applies in the case of ratification and strike votes. I am surprised that this government has not exhibited faith in the collective judgement of workers. Why is this government so afraid of properly conducted secret ballot votes? It is time to change the law if we are to move forward in this province. In all other decision-making situations, we allow individuals the freedom to choose after hearing all sides of an issue.

We have political campaigns that try to do that. We have advertising promotions. We have independent consumer product evaluations. We have many laws to protect the individual's right of free and informed choice in such situations. Now is the time to fully extend those same protections to every individual in the workplace. The employee must have the opportunity to make his or her choice by means of a secret ballot vote. There will then be no doubt that whatever position is taken is the freely expressed view of the people involved, and that, I would like to tell the government, is going to strengthen the credibility of the union that is representing the employees.

You're going to tell me, and you've already said, "We have some votes." Yes, I know that some unions do have secret ballot votes, but it's not mandatory. Surely now is the time to move forward and take a look at what's happening in the rest of the world. It's time for this government to recognize that individuals have the right to make their own decisions about their own futures. The time has come in Ontario for self-determination in the workplace.

People working in this province today are informed and are able to think for themselves. They are able to understand the consequences of joining or not joining a union and they need to be given the opportunity to express the choice. I ask this government today, why do you continue to deny the people in this province the freedom of choice? Why do you deny them the basic democratic right of a secret ballot vote?

Ms Sharon Murdock (Sudbury): I'm pleased to speak against this motion this morning. First of all, it's incredible to me as I listen to some of the conversations that I've heard over the past 22 months on this basic secret ballot vote argument, and most of it is because they talk about -- and I'm going to quote here from the member opposite -- "having faith in the collective judgement of the people who are going to be making the choice as to whether or not they want to join a union." That's exactly why we are not going with a mandatory secret ballot vote and why we oppose it and will oppose it to the nth degree.

In spite of years of lobbying by the business community for mandatory secret ballot votes, neither the Progressive Conservative government for the some 40-odd years that its was in power nor the Liberal government for the five years that it was in power ever changed it to a mandatory secret ballot vote. They certainly had the opportunity. The question to ask, I guess, is, why didn't they do it when they were in power?

Secondly, the thing is that the experience of mandatory secret ballots is probably most expressed in the United States of America. There it's very evident that there is no democratic process allowed. The only industrial democracy in the world where it is used is the United States. BC just threw it out last week. In fact, what has happened is that they have ended up with more terminations during an organizing drive, with a steady increase in the interference in the balloting and certification process, resulting in a 750% increase in unfair labour practices alone, just in that.

Industrial specialists have claimed that and have stated, no matter what their political stripe, that the secret ballot process impedes the collective bargaining process.

The free expression of the individual people is that in signing the cards they are saying, "I want to join this particular union." I have the sense when I listen to some of the people talking about mandatory secret ballots that a union organizer walks into the plant one day and says, "I've come to organize you and we're going to organize you in the next 24 hours and no one has a chance to change his mind or anything."

The reality of that is that, first of all, union organizers from the larger unions don't have access on to the floor of the plants. So someone has to come to them and ask them: "We'd like to join the union. How do we go about doing that?" Then those people within the store or within the plant or whatever it is that's being organized have to go and find out who's working, what their names are.

They have to do an awful lot of work in trying to go and see these people and they usually don't do it in the workplace, because the employer frowns upon any kind of union organizing being done in the workplace, and people are usually penalized for doing so. So it's done after hours, in their homes, wherever they can meet so that they can, unfortunately, sign these cards in a clandestine manner.

But the opposition seems to want to have its cake and eat it too. They want all the organizing still to be done by the union organizers, but then they want a mandatory secret ballot for everything, regardless of what percentage of union cards are signed. In the Ontario Labour Relations Act right now, if it's 45% to 55% there is a vote. Anything over 55%, it's an automatic certification, they get the union.

That's saying that if there are 100 employees and the organizers sign up 90% of the 100 employees and then they bring it to the Ontario Labour Relations Board and the board decides that 30 of those cards aren't valid, they're down to 60; they're automatically certified. If they find out that 50 of those cards aren't valid, they're down to 40 and they can't form a union. But if they find out that there's something between that 45% and 55%, then they send it back and the whole workplace votes, in a secret ballot manner, on that certification. So we do have a form of mandatory secret ballot, and I think the arguments by the opposition are specious.

Mr Steven Offer (Mississauga North): I'm pleased to join in the debate on this bill. Let me say at the outset that it is an amendment which the member has brought forward at the committee stage as we dealt with Bill 40. At that point in time, I had indicated and signified my support for the amendments and certainly would signify my support for the bill.

I do have some reservations in doing so. As I believe it is an important piece of legislation in bringing forward the secret ballot or the right of a worker to freely choose as to how his workplace is to be governed, I do not believe it goes far enough. In that respect, I think it is important to note that under this legislation, if there are 45% of union cards signed by workers, that would trigger a secret ballot vote.

We in my party brought forward an amendment in this area but lowered the trigger point from 45% to 30%. In other words, if there were 30% of the men and women in any one workplace signing union cards, that signified to us a significant level of support which could and should warrant a secret ballot vote, where the workers, all workers, would be able to decide how their workplace is to be governed, and the decision would be carried by a majority.

As a result, I support the principle embraced in the legislation. I would certainly like to have seen the legislation altered to allow a reduced threshold before a secret vote was triggered, but that is not the position of the Progressive Conservative Party. I do, however, support the legislation.

I am quite certain, however, that the government members will not be supporting this piece of legislation. The parliamentary assistant has already indicated that they won't. The NDP members did not support a lowered threshold of union support from 40% to 30%, so I can't imagine how they would support something in the area of 45%.

But I do think this particular piece of legislation is important, as it speaks to a principle, and the principle is, are we ready as legislators in this province to give to workers in this province the right to decide how their workplace is to be governed? It is not a magical and mystical principle. The question is, are we as legislators ready to allow workers to decide how they wish their workplace to be governed? Not as we in this chamber feel their workplace should be governed or how we in this chamber dictate how their workplace is to be governed, but rather to put in process the framework under which workers can make that decision.

It is abundantly clear to me that the NDP government is not ready to take that step. If they were ready to take that step, they would have agreed to changing Bill 40 to allow a lower threshold and giving to the workers of this province the right to decide by a majority vote, with full protection against coercion and intimidation, how their workplace is to be governed. But they are just not prepared, if not ill-prepared, to take that step.

I listened yesterday to some of the debate that went on in the chamber on Bill 40. I noted that a number of comments were made by NDP members on the rights of workers. We are here today on Thursday; today is the day that Bill 40 will most likely pass into law, notwithstanding the very deep and genuine concerns of many hundreds of thousands of people in this province.

It seems to me that it doesn't matter how many times you say it. it just doesn't seem to sink in to the government members: It is not a question as to whether one is in favour of or opposed to unions; it is a question in principle, Madam Parliamentary Assistant, of whether the government is going to allow workers to make that choice.

Bill 40 takes away the rights of workers in how their workplace is to be governed. If there is anything that people in this country, let alone this province, understand, it is the right of democracy, the right of majority rule. It is clear that Bill 40, not only in the organizing situation but in a variety of other ways, takes away the very basic right that many people share in this country, that is, the right to decide by a majority rule how their workplace is to be governed.

We of course brought forward amendments dealing with giving workers notification. It is one thing to say you have rights under the Labour Relations Act, but the question is, if you do not give to workers notification of what their rights are, then those rights, I suggest, are hollow indeed.

They are there, for workers to look through the Labour Relations Act, but it seems to me that if we want to build a more harmonious relationship of cooperation and consultation, we must make it mandatory in legislation that workers be given notice of what their rights are: what they can do, what their employers can do, what organizing unions can do, what their employers cannot do, what organizing unions cannot do, and the penalties if an unfair labour practice takes place.

It seems incredible in this year of 1992 that a government would vote against giving workers that type of notice. The record will show that the NDP government members voted clearly against that notification of workers in this province.

Mr Randy R. Hope (Chatham-Kent): You're absolutely right.

Mr Offer: Now the government members on the other side say I'm absolutely right; thank you very much. Absolutely, they did vote against giving workers notice of their rights under the Labour Relations Act. They voted against enhancing and protecting the rights of workers in an organizing drive. They voted against making certain there were protections for workers in the area of intimidation and coercion and they voted against giving to workers the democratic right to decide how their workplace is to be governed.

They did so, I must say, by characterizing the opponents to Bill 40 and to the principles embraced in the bill before this Legislature as somehow a hysterical response to labour relations change. I won't dwell too long on that area, but we all know there isn't an NDP member who does not stand up on this bill at some time or another and say: "Boy, that darn big business community.

They were there with billboards and they were there saying how difficult the labour relations changes were going to be." But you never heard the same concerns voiced by the government members over, for instance, the ads put out by the Ontario Federation of Labour or the Steelworkers union on this issue. If the government members were so concerned about one group putting out a message, why were they not concerned about another group putting out a message?

I must say, I was less concerned with that. I hope the people who are watching will recognize that if there is a group or an association or a community that has a concern with a piece of legislation that's brought forward by any level of government, I would hope it would still be permissible in this province that they could express those concerns in the way in which they feel is most appropriate within the bounds of law.

I am very concerned when government members see this as somehow a slap in the face, that goodness gracious, some people who were opposed to a piece of legislation had the audacity to take those concerns in the way they felt was best able to reach the general public. I was not concerned, in many ways, with the business community doing that. I was not concerned in the way in which the Ontario Federation of Labour or the Steelworkers brought forward their position on the bill.

I felt, and still feel, that in a hopefully free society, individuals, groups and associations would be able to do that without for some reason incurring the wrath of government members who say, "How dare you issue a freedom as to your position on a particular piece of legislation?" It is absolutely frightening when a government stands up, member by member, and says, "Goodness gracious, I saw terrible billboards, I saw terrible publications, I saw terrible advertisements." What were they? They were just a group of people who had concerns about a piece of legislation and how it would affect them.

I never heard the government members stand up and say, "Not only was it bad for the business community to do that, but I think it was also bad for the OFL or the Steelworkers to bring forward their position on the bill." I disagree with that also. I think groups and associations, within the bounds of law, should be able to bring forward their concerns in the way they think is necessary.

I believe the reaction government members have had to people expressing their own concerns, expressing their own opinions on a piece of legislation, is one which is absolutely shocking to many people across this province who take freedom of speech, freedom of choice, as something that is the example for all others to follow. I do hold this government accountable.

I hold this government in the most critical terms when it thinks it is absolutely necessary to castigate and criticize groups and associations for, my goodness gracious, having an opinion that -- let's hold down the fort -- is different from the government members'. My goodness, the height of arrogance is across the chamber at this point in time.

So we are left with a principle, a principle which is embraced in this legislation: Are we ready to allow workers the freedom to choose how their workplace is to be governed? Are we going to allow workers to make an informed choice to decide what is in their best interests, to decide how they wish to be governed, to make that decision free of intimidation and coercion? Are we going to allow a piece of legislation which embraces that principle to move forward or are we going to have it cut down by the government?

I believe this principle is one that should go forward. I have indicated to the member who has brought forward the legislation that though I agree with the principle, I am a little concerned with some of the substance around it. I would have liked it to have gone further, but I believe that notwithstanding my concerns, it is still one heck of a lot better than the way in which the government is seeking to move in the area of Bill 40. It is an issue of workers' rights. It is an issue of workers' choice.

It is an issue of freedom of workers in this province to make a decision on how their workplace is to be governed. I am content to leave that decision up to the workers of this province. This bill and the principle under it does so, and I will be supporting this legislation in principle.

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): I will be supporting this private member's bill by my colleague Elizabeth Witmer, who is our Labour critic. I'm very pleased she's brought it forward, because it's very much a response to requests we heard as we sat through the Bill 40 hearings. The bill is designed to protect individuals' rights to decide, free of interference; a very simple concept. They wanted to be free of interference and free of influence from any source, whether it be the union or the company, whether they want to go on strike or whether they want to sign a contract or whether they want to in fact be a member of a union.

It goes to the fundaments of democracy. Anyone who cares about the democratic process and wants to ensure that the true wishes of an employee are known should not have any problems with this bill. I notice that my colleagues on the New Democratic side seem to be heckling a little bit. They don't like this democratic idea.

I'd like to quote from Ramsey Clark from 1990. He was speaking about the US Democratic Party, but I think it goes very much for this New Democratic Party. He said, "The Democratic Party is a party in name only, not in shared belief."

That's more and more abundantly clear every day. This is simply to allow workers to express their choice. They want to be able to express their choice -- they told us in Bill 40 -- as to whether certification should take place. It's a question of whose rights are more important, the employees' or the union bosses'? Quite obviously, from the comments we're hearing from NDP members, they think the union bosses' are more important. The rights of employees should always outweigh the rights of trade unions but, apparently, under the NDP that is not the case.

I'd like to quote from Professor John Crispo, when he said: "I know why unions don't want votes. They can't win them."

Let's just examine the circumstances under which the few votes exist today in unions. Typically, a strike vote is taken six or more months before a strike occurs and the workers are just giving, in principle, backing to the union. They are not talking about the details of the union contract. Often they're quite outraged when they have to go out on strike, but feel they have to.

The question of fairness and equity for all workers should be the guiding light in deciding how you vote on this. Should workers have the right to decide in a free and democratic vote on issues that affect their livelihood? I don't think there can be too many doubts about what that question is. It's very simply, are they allowed to choose their own destiny?

The perceived good of greater unionization does not justify infringing on employees' civil liberties, as indeed we have seen under Bill 40. This will restore some balance, because Bill 40 takes away the rights of individual workers. It takes away the right to petitions to get out of unionization when they have in error signed to join a union.

They've taken away the right of certification only where the employees agree. Under Bill 40, certification can take place where it's considered that unfair labour practices have occurred. These may have occurred through an error on the employer's part, which is particularly prevalent with small companies that don't have the expertise in negotiating that large unions do. We're not talking about large employers; we're talking about small employers.

This government has allowed itself to be more concerned with maintaining and indeed enhancing the power of union bosses, not just at the expense of employers but of the workers too. This government is being controlled by special interest groups -- we've seen this over and over again -- particularly union bosses.

Quite frankly, Bill 40 is payoff time for the NDP, for the support it has received over the years, the money which is checked off from union contributions and goes to the NDP. A lot of workers, as we've seen in certain test cases, object to that money going to the NDP.

Our laws protect consumers against high-pressure sales tactics. If you buy a settee and three days later you decide you've made a mistake, you can go back and say, "No, I didn't want to do this." But this government does not want to allow members of a union the same kind of protection as consumers of products, which cost an awful lot less than the payments made to a union over the years.

Bill 40 is an unacceptable violation of the most democratic rights and freedoms we've come to expect. It's only that union membership is a payoff to the NDP.

Governments spend money informing consumers as to their rights, yet this government does not want to allow those rights to be extended to those who inadvertently join a union or who may be in a union and don't want a strike. That seems to be fundamentally unfair. Democracy: a very simple process where the majority of people decide, something this government has consistently denied to workers of this province. I will be supporting Mrs Witmer's bill.

Mr Hope: It's one good morning to be participating in this debate, especially when I read the bill. Where do you begin?

We've been going through this for five weeks and I hear the Liberals and Tories talk about democracy and the rights of individual workers. I remember a bill called Bill 208, where workers wanted to exercise their right and their democratic right to shut equipment down that was unsafe for them and could cause death. But the Liberals and the Tories, in their dramatic way, said, "No, the employer will tell you whether that workplace is safe or not, or that machine is safe." So it's hard to get the balanced perspective. It's amazing when you find out when they're in government what they say.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. If you want to make any comments, do so from your seat. The member for Chatham-Kent.

Mr Hope: Thank you, Mr Speaker. It's unfortunate they have to do that, but again, when we talk about workers' democratic rights, when they talk about the protection -- I read this piece of legislation. They talk about the right to vote. Well, it says, and I heard the comment made, that it protects the employer and the employee in their democratic rights. Who's going to protect that individual who wishes to join a trade union or an organization -- forgetting how the chamber of commerce is an organization -- to represent his interests in that workplace?

We sit here and look at this piece and it says it's going to protect everybody's rights. What about the individual who is coerced by a supervisor and put on dirty jobs? How do you prove that, changing around? How do you protect the democratic rights of those individuals who want to exercise -- inside the workplace, being threatened with their paycheque each week? How can the individual make a good decision, having a paycheque waved in front of his face when they're saying: "If you vote against the union you'll keep your paycheque. If you vote for the union you'll be searching for new employment come the end of the year"?

It's very disheartening to hear some of the comments coming from the Liberals and the Tories. What I hear out of their mouths is that they're saying the workers of this province are stupid people. That's the reference they're making to the workers in this province. They're calling them stupid individuals.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. You've had your chance to voice your opinion. It's now his turn. The member for Chatham-Kent.

On a point of order?

Mr Offer: On a point of order, yes, Mr Speaker: The member made a statement as to what the Liberals, I being a representative, stated. In fact, that could not be further from the truth. We believe the workers should have --

The Deputy Speaker: The member for Chatham-Kent.

Mr Hope: One of the other important issues is about individuals having the right, when they do sign the card, to allow them to exercise their rights without coercion. One of the important things is that an individual always has the right. I believe the working force of this province is well educated on trade unions, as we see in our own communities, what trade unions do when they sit on United Way boards of directors and provide community programming and help out there at the social service end of things, fighting for workers. So the knowledge base of individuals around unions is very high.

One of the issues that I think is very important is to make sure the workers themselves have an ability to exercise, without having -- it's bad enough that they have their paycheques threatened. When we talk about the individual having the right to determine what goes on in the workplace, if it wasn't for a federal policy that's come into place called free trade, when we talk about giving workers individual rights, when we see plants that are making profits closing, those workers in that workplace don't have a say, because the company tells them what's best.

I'm sorry to say that when I read this, it does nothing. You can see where the Liberals and Tories are coming from. They're supporting the business community, hopefully, the same ones who are telling us jobs are being lost through this legislation, the same ones who, I clearly remember, in 1988 were telling us about all the jobs that were going to be created under free trade. I remember that.

Mr Cameron Jackson (Burlington South): Come on. You were still in high school. You were on that six-year course.

Mr Hope: Maybe I was still there in high school.

Mr Jackson: You were.

Mr Hope: Unfortunately, the Tory members think they're so knowledgeable, but we saw what happened with Tory policies when they took place on free trade in 1988.

There's one important thing I really want to say. I support recycling programs, and this is what I think should be done with the legislation.

Mr Jim Wilson (Simcoe West): I'm pleased to rise and speak in support of the bill put forward by my colleague the member for Waterloo North. The member for Waterloo North's bill seeks to give workers democratic rights that do not exist in the current Labour Relations Act.

The bill requires unions to hold secret ballot votes for certification, for ratification of collective agreements and for all strike votes. The secret ballot vote enables workers to decide for themselves, free of intimidation or harassment, whether or not to have a union represent them, whether or not they want to accept a contract or whether or not they wish to go on strike.

Under the NDP's labour reforms, the certification process is shifted from an emphasis on determining the true wishes of employees to an emphasis on facilitating unionization. Post-application petitions, which currently represent the only way in which employees can articulate their desire not to join a union, will be eliminated under the NDP's Bill 40. A secret ballot would help restore what Bill 40 eliminates: the right of workers to have choice. A choice on whether to join a union, a choice on whether they want to agree on a contract and a choice on when to go on strike or to go on strike.

A government that pretends to represent Ontario workers seems to have lost sight of the most important issue confronting labour in this province and that is finding and maintaining a job. Each day we lose 500 jobs in this province. There are now more than 609,000 people in Ontario collecting unemployment insurance and 1.2 million collecting welfare. Adopting a secret ballot might alleviate some of the concerns of business that Bill 40 is designed to promote and facilitate unionization.

Business already feels under siege with the replacement workers provision of Bill 40. This provision severely limits the number of employees who can perform work that needs to be done during a strike. This will do great harm to an employer's ability to continue to operate during a strike and fill customer orders. Even employees who voted against a strike would be forbidden from crossing a picket line to return to work. So much for workers' rights.

In the two minutes remaining, I just want to quote from a number of concerned people in my riding. Jim Rennie of Collingwood writes: "My company, Rennie Publications Inc, has grown from a one-man operation to an employer of seven to eight people in Collingwood during the 1980s. We have another big expansion in the works for this summer. Trust me, if the NDP brings in this labour law, I will start a US branch plant and publish this new venture from there. I cannot and will not expand in Ontario in the face of these proposed regulations."

Ken Havens of Collingwood writes: "Small business in the last few years has been the brunt of unpopular legislative decisions, but the latest change to the Labour Relations Act, if passed, would have profound effects on our already fragile provincial economy. Even though small business operators are a minority in a voter line, they have to be heard. Colleagues aware of the act share my views and many will begin dismantling and perhaps moving their assets."

Jean Smart of Creemore writes, "If this law comes into effect, I will probably lay off all of my staff and work it alone with one employee, probably my bookkeeper, to be sure your tax dollars keep going in." She's writing to the Premier. "This would be a loss of six jobs."

The list goes on and on. My colleague's bill -- my colleague from Waterloo North -- gives workers rights and sends a message to the business community and to individuals that someone at Queen's Park is listening. This bill represents just one of some 94 amendments put forward by Mrs Witmer on behalf of the Ontario PC caucus. Workers want jobs. Bill 40 kills jobs. The greatest dignity you can give an individual is the opportunity and the dignity that comes with a job. Bill 40 does not do this and it should be scrapped.

Ms Jenny Carter (Peterborough): I'm delighted to have this opportunity to speak in favour of Bill 40 and against the amendments suggested by the member for Waterloo North. Throughout the debating of amendments to the Labour Relations Act, both in this chamber and in the wider world, there has been a kind of unreality. In Bill 76 we have a continuation of that unreality. Those who oppose Bill 40 are like Don Quixote: They're tilting at windmills. The disastrous act that opponents have conjured out of thin air does not exist.

What we have in reality is a very reasonable bill, a bill that has been modified as a result of a long and thorough process of consultation, a bill that contains nothing that is not already operating well and without dire consequences in other jurisdictions.

I know that working people in my riding and all over the province have been asking that certain injustices be put right. They wanted some obstacles to unionization to be removed and they wanted no repeats of the situation where, when a workplace was struck because workers had no other recourse in order to get fair treatment, busloads of replacement workers could be brought in. The confrontation caused by this practice sometimes led to a deteriorating situation, violence and injury. Workers knew that if they were to be able to bargain fairly with their employers and if relations were to be cooperative and friendly, this situation had to be avoided.

Instead of a reasoned reaction to these moderate and reasonable changes, we have witnessed deliberately induced and carefully orchestrated hysteria. Vast sums of money have been spent and experts have been hired to spread lies about the probable consequences of Bill 40. Far from the provisions of this bill endangering the economy of Ontario, it is this hysterical opposition which might prove a self-fulfilling prophecy and become the direct cause of job loss and damage to the economy in Ontario.

Small businesses in my riding have written to me and visited me because they were concerned about this bill. They believe that union organizers will be on their doorstep the day after the bill becomes law, that they will be forced to pay wages they cannot afford and that their businesses will be ruined. But the supposed facts and figures which are motivating them are phoney.

Small businesses have been subject to unionization for a long time. There will be no drastic change. I can only advise those business people to resist panic, continue to treat their employees as the fellow human beings they are and work with them for the success which benefits employer and employee alike.

I am puzzled as to the relevance of Bill 76. It has supposedly two purposes: to provide that representation on strike votes and ratification votes of a collective agreement is mandatory in all cases and to require secret ballots in all such votes. However, the Ontario Labour Relations Act already requires a secret ballot vote where membership support is below 55%. Bill 40 does not change this. The act already provides that when dealing with votes or accepting a contract, any employer may require its final offer to be submitted to a secret ballot vote before a strike or a lockout begins.

Also under Bill 40 there must be a mandatory strike vote by secret ballot resulting in a show of support by 60% of those voting in order for the replacement provisions to apply. It is already customary for union constitutions to require that strike votes be taken before a strike is called. So what is the fuss about?

This bill is as insubstantial and unwarranted as the rest of the opposition to Bill 40. I suggest that those who view labour as a mere commodity should have their noses rubbed in what that concept, if freed from laws and regulations -- and, yes, unions -- really means.

They could start by reading John Steinbeck's great novel, The Grapes of Wrath, the story of what happened to a hardworking family of Oklahoma sharecroppers when tractors took over and they became mere encumbrances on the land that they worked. What is the point of modern technology, of higher productivity, if it doesn't lead to shorter working hours and a higher standard of living for all, but instead to the impoverishment of the many and the advantage of the few? On those terms, "progress" could become a synonym for "disaster."

We need to dismiss the campaign against Bill 40 as the mirage it is and keep moving towards greater fairness and greater prosperity for all. I look forward to the passage of Bill 40. Essential services will not cease to operate; jobs will not be lost; businesses will not be destroyed. Bill 76 is an irrelevance and I shall not be voting for it.

The Deputy Speaker: The member for Burlington South.

Mr Jackson: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I'm very delighted to stand and respond in support of my colleague the member for Waterloo North.

First of all, let me say that I admire the work she has done in communicating very clearly and cogently the issues and concerns around Bill 40. I also admire her commitment to the principles she believes in.

I've known my colleague for many years. Prior to her arrival here, I watched her as a trustee on her local school board and I knew that she brought with her at that time a sense of balance between the interests of the teachers' federation, the interests of the children she served, and her taxpayers. She comes very much from that kind of a background and an understanding and awareness, and she has applied it today to something she believes very strongly in, which is democracy and the right of privacy and protection under the law in order to exercise your voting franchise.

It's interesting that not one NDP member discussed this issue. They wanted to talk about the fearmongering around Bill 40. I don't wish to talk about Bill 40; I simply wish to talk about what the issues are around the democratic right of a vote for a worker in this province.

Why is it that the labour union bosses are so frightened of losing control of their membership? I have to believe, and history will show, that left-wing radicalism is no better or no worse than right-wing radicalism, wherever it is exercised on the face of the Earth. Frankly, when we can go to any number of Communist countries who take their manifesto directly from Marx and Engels and others, it's very clear that democracy is an inconvenience. They're very proud of the fact that, "We have democracy, we have a ballot box, but there's only one candidate." We know that history shows that balloting and democracy are a great inconvenience to socialism.

Let me illustrate my point. The fact of the matter is that on the issue of Sunday shopping in this province this party stood by its principles and said, "We will not support it." But what have they done? They've been playing poker with the future of retail workers in this province. What do they do? They say, "Look, we'll pass Bill 40 for you union bosses but we'll abandon the workers in the retail sector." That is the kind of brokering and trading that is going on with the leadership. They're losing thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars in union memberships because of unemployment.

Do they want to sit down and talk about how to resolve that problem? No. Their interests are, "Let's get out there and certify a couple of hundred thousand workers and get our bank accounts topped up." That's what this is about, and you would play with the principle of democracy.

This so-called social democratic party would play with the fundamental principle of protection of a secret ballot in order to control those kinds of offensive outcomes and brokered deals behind the backs of rank-and-file workers in this province. They know, each and every one of them, that those kinds of deals --

Mr Hope: Tory policy. Your federal Tory policies.

Mr Jackson: The member for Chatham-Kent -- it was interesting. You talk about waving a cheque in front of their face. I just remind the member, a noted parliamentary assistant, that we're still trying to figure out what he does around here, but he certainly has a big paycheque waved in front of him from his party bosses who have told him how to vote on this issue. The issue is about democracy and the protection for workers who wish to become unionized or who wish not to become unionized in this province -- nothing more, nothing less. It's a vote on democracy, and we're going to vote for it.

The Deputy Speaker: Mrs Witmer, you have two minutes.

Mrs Witmer: I appreciate the debate that has taken place and I'd like to assure first of all the member for Sudbury that the Ontario PC Party, of which I am a member, will certainly introduce a mandatory secret ballot vote when we are elected in the next election. I pledge to make that a priority.

I'd like to also thank my colleagues from Burlington South, York Mills and Simcoe West for their support of my motion this morning. I would like to say to the members in the opposition: I have brought this motion forward this morning on behalf of individual workers in this province. I have not brought it forward because of the business community.

It's because of the letters and communications I have received from working people throughout this province, working people like my own parents, and I would like to tell you that this government needs to recognize that individuals do have the right and are very capable of making their own decisions about their own future, and that the time has come in this province for self-determination in the workplace.

People working in this province today are well informed, they are able to think for themselves, and they are able to understand the consequences of joining or not joining a union. Because of this, they need to be given the opportunity for a secret ballot vote. When you are making changes now to labour relations reform, let us truly move forward into the future and recognize workers, recognize that they are able to make their own decisions about their own futures.

I say to this government today: Demonstrate to the people that you do care about freedom of choice; demonstrate that you do care about democracy. Give them the right to a secret ballot vote.

The Deputy Speaker: The time allotted for private members' business has expired.

NORTHERN ONTARIO SENATE REPRESENTATION ACT, 1992 / LOI DE 1992 SUR LA REPRÉSENTATION DU NORD DE L'ONTARIO AU SÉNAT

Bill 84,

An Act to provide for the Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada / Loi prévoyant la représentation du Nord de l'Ontario au Sénat du Canada

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will deal first with ballot item number 29, standing in the name of Mr Ramsay. If any members are opposed to a vote on this ballot item, will they please rise.

Mr Ramsay has moved second reading of Bill 84,

An Act to provide for the Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Pursuant to standing order 96(f), the recorded vote on this ballot item is deferred.

LABOUR RELATIONS AMENDMENT ACT, 1992 / LOI DE 1992 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES RELATIONS DE TRAVAIL

Bill 76,

An Act to amend the Labour Relations Act / Loi modifiant la

Loi sur les relations de travail

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will now deal with ballot item number 30, standing in the name of Mrs Witmer. If any members are opposed to a vote on this ballot item, will they please rise.

Mrs Witmer has moved second reading of Bill 76,

An Act to amend the Labour Relations Act. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the nays have it.

This vote is also deferred.

Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1157 to 1202.

NORTHERN ONTARIO SENATE REPRESENTATION ACT / LOI DE 1992 SUR LA REPRÉSENTATION DU NORD DE L'ONTARIO AU SÉNAT

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Will the members please take their seats.

Mr Ramsay has moved second reading of Bill 84,

An Act to provide for the Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise and remain --

Interjection.

The Deputy Speaker: Mr Kormos, you have to take your seat, please. You cannot be in the House without taking your seat, sir.

Mr Peter Kormos (Welland-Thorold): Then I'm sorry, sir; I should be escorted out.

The Deputy Speaker: I have no other choice than to ask --

Mr Kormos: I don't want to vote --

The Deputy Speaker: Sergeant, will you please remove the gentleman from the House.

Mr Kormos left the chamber.

The Deputy Speaker: I will repeat the second reading. Mr Ramsay has moved second reading of Bill 84,

An Act to provide for the Representation of Northern Ontario in the Senate of Canada.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise and remain standing until their names are called.

Ayes

Arnott, Bisson, Brown, Callahan, Daigeler, Eddy, Haeck, Hansen, Martin, Miclash, Morrow, Murdock (Sudbury), Offer, O'Neil (Quinte), Poirier, Ramsay, Sola, Villeneuve, Wilson (Simcoe West).

The Deputy Speaker: All those opposed to the motion will please rise and remain standing until your names are called.

Nays

Abel, Carr, Carter, Cunningham, Dadamo, Drainville, Farnan, Fletcher, Frankford, Harnick, Harrington, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jackson, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Lessard, Malkowski, MacKinnon, Mammoliti, Mancini, Marchese, Marland, Mathyssen, Mills, O'Connor, Owens, Rizzo, Stockwell, Sutherland, Tilson, Turnbull, Ward (Brantford), White, Wilson (Kingston and The Islands), Winninger, Wiseman, Witmer.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 19; the nays are 40.

The Deputy Speaker: The ayes are 19; the nays are 40. I declare the motion lost.

Mr Remo Mancini (Essex South): Mr Speaker, on a point of order: This is private members' hour. We've never had a roll call done by party, and I resent the fact that this roll call was done by party.

The Deputy Speaker: You have a valid point. It was a mistake by the Clerk and we apologize.

Interjection: Point of order, Mr Speaker.

The Deputy Speaker: You have no point of order. You have been named. I have asked the Sergeant at Arms to remove you, and this is my decision.

Interjection: You don't know whether I've got a point of order until you let me articulate it.

The Deputy Speaker: You have been removed from the House, and the order sticks. Sergeant at Arms, please.

Interjection: Am I being denied the opportunity to vote on this issue?

The Deputy Speaker: You have been asked to leave the chamber.

Interjection: God bless. Incredible.

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): Mr Speaker, on a point of order: I think this is an issue of importance to all the members in this House. I have previously been in the same position as the member for Welland-Thorold, where there are two votes being taken and I have not wanted to be in the House for one of those votes. I'm sure it must be an option for a member to be in the House for one vote and not the other. Mr Speaker, I simply ask you to give a ruling on how it can be facilitated that a member may vote on one vote when it's being recorded and not another.

The Deputy Speaker: To the member for Mississauga South, you have an extremely valid point, but I must point out to you that when the member for Welland-Thorold was sitting in the gallery, I asked him to come down, which he refused to do. Because of that negative response on his part, and in my opinion, also not observing the decorum in this House, I named him and I asked the Sergeant at Arms to bring him out.

The member should be aware that if you don't wish to vote on an item, like this morning, you stay outside the House. Then after the vote is cast, the doors are opened. It is then for you to come in, the doors are closed and you must take your seat. This is quite clear in the orders.

It's extremely difficult for any Speaker to evict a colleague. At the same time, my responsibility is to make sure the procedures are followed very closely. That's it.

Mrs Dianne Cunningham (London North): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: On behalf of many members of this House, it should be noted that I don't think it was the intent of the member for Welland-Thorold. It was just a misunderstanding and I think he was confused and that's why he was asked to leave.

Also, I'm not certain that when you asked him to leave that you did name him; I didn't hear you say, "The member for Welland-Thorold." But you may have done that and Hansard will show it.

I think many of us are confused as to the procedure this morning. I've been here for five years and I did not know this.

The Deputy Speaker: Please take your seat. You raise a very valid point. On the other hand, you have to make a decision when an incident occurs. I may not have said that I named him. On the other hand, it's always that you have the power here to decide if Mr Kormos should be brought back in and I leave that up to you. I have named him afterwards and I don't want to play with that. These procedures are extremely strict, but at the same time, I just want you to be assured that my decision, as far as I'm concerned, was made, and I want to maintain it that way.

Mrs Marland: Mr Speaker, as the person who raised the original point of order and speaking as someone who has been in this House for eight years, I did not know the explanation until you gave it, that we were allowed to come in and leave or come in after the first ballot, because I've never been aware that the doors were physically unlocked between the two ballots.

Now, having that understanding, after my eight years, I'm hearing other colleagues in this House agree with me that they didn't know those were the rules. Knowing that the member for Welland-Thorold was elected at the same time I was, I would move unanimous consent that the member for Welland-Thorold be permitted to return to the House at this point and take his chair for a vote of his choice.

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I want to bring to the members of the assembly just the one point, that the Speaker is in a difficult position. I understand what the members are saying, but I feel it's important that we maintain the decision of the Speaker because he has the responsibility to keep decorum in the House. I'd ask members to keep that in mind, as much as I agree with some of the things they're saying.

Mr Cameron Jackson (Burlington South): In all matters of parliamentary democracy, the Speaker's decision is final and the members of this House will respect that decision. That is very clear and at no point would a single member advocate that you relinquish that historical responsibility of the Speaker now to determine, in some form of straw vote or motion, whether or not one of our members, one of our colleagues, should or should not be here.

We can, Mr Speaker, because of your nature, prevail upon you to reconsider the decision you made, which, in fairness to you, was difficult because there was not the order and the decorum in the House at the time. You were put in a difficult position and we believe that on review of Hansard and with the guidance of the Clerk, you would determine that the member for Welland-Thorold was in the process of raising a point of order. We believe, sir, that he was not given an opportunity to raise that point of order, but he had by his attendance in the House made it abundantly clear that he wished to vote on this important issue.

In

summary, the members of this House very much will support your final decision in this matter, but you have within your power, sir, the opportunity to review your decision, and your decision only, and to invite the member back to the House, since he was not named, and then convene the vote. I would ask, Mr Speaker, simply if you would consider that recommendation from the members of this House.

The Deputy Speaker: I have asked for help from the Clerk and, of course, he said it is my decision.

I don't like to evict a colleague from the House; it's not a pleasant duty. On the other hand, to be fair, to be fair to anyone, I think now the message would be abundantly clear that when a vote is conducted on a Thursday morning, you're allowed to stay outside of the House for the first vote. The doors are then opened after the vote. You can come in and vote on the second vote. We did that. So I will abandon this decision and will allow Mr Kormos to come back in.

LABOUR RELATIONS AMENDMENT ACT, 1992 / LOI DE 1992 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES RELATIONS DE TRAVAIL

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will now vote on Mrs Witmer's bill.

Mrs Witmer has moved second reading of Bill 76,

An Act to amend the Labour Relations Act.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise and remain standing until their names are called.

Ayes

Arnott, Brown, Callahan, Carr, Cunningham, Daigeler, Eddy, Harnick, Jackson, Mancini, Marland, Miclash, Offer, O'Neil (Quinte), Poirier, Ramsay, Sola, Stockwell, Tilson, Turnbull, Villeneuve, Wilson (Simcoe West), Witmer.

Nays

Abel, Bisson, Carter, Dadamo, Drainville, Farnan, Fletcher, Frankford, Haeck, Hansen, Harrington, Hayes, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, Kormos, Lessard, Malkowski, MacKinnon, Mammoliti, Marchese, Martin, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, Murdock (Sudbury), O'Connor, Owens, Rizzo, Sutherland, Ward (Brantford), White, Wilson (Kingston and The Islands), Winninger, Wiseman.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 23; the nays 37.

The Deputy Speaker: The ayes are 23; the nays are 37. I declare the motion lost.

All matters relating to private members' business have been exhausted, and I will leave the chair until 1:30 of the clock.

The House recessed at 1219.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1331.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

NATIVE YOUTH SUICIDE

Mr Frank Miclash (Kenora): I rise today to bring to the attention of members of this Legislature the state of emergency that the Nishnawbe-Aski Nation has declared due to the significant rise in suicides and suicide attempts within their first nation community.

Suicides by northern native youth have reached alarming proportions. It is tearing at the social and cultural fabric of first nation communities. In the past year alone, 11 native youths have committed suicide within this nation's area of responsibility. During recent visits to the northern first nation communities in my riding, there were many concerns raised about the mental and emotional health of youth. Due to the characteristics of life in a northern community, young people are susceptible to boredom and restlessness, which robs them of their sense of being and belonging.

Grand Chief Bentley Chee Choo has made repeated urgent appeals to both the federal and provincial governments for cooperation to assist in ensuring appropriate opportunities to help young people develop into positive and productive members of their communities. To date, the required support and cooperation have not been forthcoming.

We need to go beyond simply treating the effects which these suicides are ravaging upon the community; we must find ways to cure the illness. Once again, I am calling on this government to respond immediately and in a positive and cooperative manner to the requests of Grand Chief Chee Choo and other first nation leaders and bring an end to this tragic epidemic.

ANTI-TOBACCO LEGISLATION

Mrs Dianne Cunningham (London North): Just last week, Dr Stan Hill, the past president of the Ontario Lung Association, reminded me that this government has not come forward with one of its promises. More than 120,000 children join the tobacco market each year in Canada, more than 40,000 in Ontario. Of all the 15-year-olds currently smoking cigarettes, tobacco use will kill eight times more than all car accidents, suicides, murders, AIDS and drug use combined.

Every month that the introduction of the promised anti-tobacco legislation is delayed, 3,000 children will join the tobacco market in Ontario. Most of these children will become addicted to tobacco products and about one third of these will die from their dependency. Some 13,000 Ontarians die annually due to tobacco-related illnesses. Over 30,000 have died since the government assumed office.

In 1991, the NDP government promised to deliver anti-tobacco legislation for Ontario. It was promised again by the Health minister and by the Treasurer in the 1991 budget to justify the large tobacco tax increase. Minister, the facts support anti-tobacco legislation.

As the member for London North, I strongly urge the government and the Minister of Health to quickly introduce anti-tobacco legislation before we lose more lives to this most unfortunate addiction.

I think we should all commend the Lung Association for Ontario for the good work it does and for the good advice it gives us as elected members.

LITERACY

Mr Mike Farnan (Cambridge): I would like to congratulate the Cambridge Reporter, the daily newspaper in my riding, which has sponsored a series of seminars to train teachers to use newspapers in the classroom as part of their literacy program.

Recently, 10 city elementary teachers participated in such a program, led by Jennifer Densure. All of them said afterwards that they would start using the newspaper as a tool to make classroom lessons relevant to topical situations.

Through this seminar, the teachers now envision further using the newspaper not only to help direct classroom discussion in social studies, geography and math classes but also to inform them about their community, about city services and parks and about the environment.

I am drawing attention to this project today for two reasons: It is Literacy Week. By giving a real-world application to students' newly acquired reading skills, it may help some students stay interested in reading and develop a reading habit. Secondly, this activity will make current events awareness and discussion a part of children's lives.

I'm sure all members of the House would want to join me in commending the daily Cambridge Reporter on this fine initiative.

CHILD CARE

Mrs Yvonne O'Neill (Ottawa-Rideau): I rise today once again to bring to the attention of this Legislature the absurd priority-setting of the NDP government. The victims in this instance of ideological insanity are the children and parents of Ontario.

Nearly a year ago the day care sector was told that subsidies had been virtually frozen except for a very few specially targeted spaces. At that time, in fact on that very same day, an allocation of $75 million was put aside for the conversion of child care centres from private ownership to non-profit, tax-supported spaces. This $75 million brings not one new space for mothers and children in need in this province.

Municipality after municipality has passed resolutions disagreeing with the NDP policy of conversion. They see the waiting lists grow while available spaces in their communities go unused for lack of subsidies. Individual potentials continue to be unrealized.

The Ministry of Community and Social Services' own documents state that access to service continues to be one of the most persistent problems in the children's service system, yet this NDP government continues to spend its very limited resources on conversion for conversion's sake -- ideological insanity -- rather than on the provision of much-needed subsidized child care. This is simply an ineffective and unacceptable response to the needs of the children of this province.

SPECIAL SERVICES AT HOME PROGRAM

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): I rise today to remind the Minister of Community and Social Services of the ongoing crisis in the special services at home program in my community of Kitchener-Waterloo.

The Ontario government has cut back on the amount of relief for more than 30 families in Kitchener-Waterloo who care for their developmentally and/or physically disabled children at home. This has caused tremendous hardship for their families.

I would like to draw the minister's attention to one case which was recently reported on in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record. Ms Deb Moskal, a single parent who is currently studying to become a social worker, is trying to raise her son Robert, who suffered a stroke after birth, is brain-damaged and cannot use the left side of his body.

Ms Moskal has been receiving support from the special services at home program to have a trained worker help care for Robert 20 hours a week. She has now been told that she will have her level of support reduced to only 15 hours a week. This will save the government $2,000 this year, but this reduction will force her to reduce her course load at university and means she will have to be on welfare one more year because she has to delay her graduation. Welfare costs $12,000.

When the NDP was in opposition it understood that home-based care is more humane and economical than life in an institution. I ask the minister to remember that humanity and provide the resources for this program.

MICHELLE WRIGHT

Mr Pat Hayes (Essex-Kent): I stand in the House today to congratulate a former constituent of my riding of Essex-Kent: Michelle Wright. This woman, born in Chatham and raised in Merlin, has achieved recognition for her singing and songwriting talents on a national level.

In September, at the Canadian Music Awards, Michelle Wright won the best single for "Take It Like a Man," best female vocalist, best backup group, best county video, as well as the celebrated Country Music Person of the Year.

Ms Wright, as anyone who watched the World Series will remember, sang the national anthem in Toronto, spurring the Blue Jays on to victory. She is a source of pride for the community of Merlin, for Kent county and for this country. I congratulate her excellence and wish her continued success in the future. She has made us all very proud in the rural community of Essex-Kent.

PROPERTY ASSESSMENT

Ms Dianne Poole (Eglinton): The Minister of Municipal Affairs is announcing today that the NDP government is proceeding with legislation to give Metro Toronto the power to make decisions about taxation in the city of Toronto. As a member representing the city of Toronto, I am totally opposed to both market value assessment and this plan. For the NDP government to give Metro's plan the green light with such unholy haste is not only irresponsible; it is obscene.

The minister can talk all he wants about municipal autonomy, but I can tell this government one thing: If you agree to let Metro council run roughshod over one of its largest member municipalities, then the people of Toronto will remember; we will remember a government that is willing to wash its hands and say that the destruction of Toronto is Metro's responsibility.

I ask the minister: Where are the economic impact studies of this plan? Where are the studies of its impact on jobs? Where are the studies of its impact on business? Where are the studies of its impact on the people of Metro Toronto?

This scheme affects the largest municipality in Canada and billions of dollars in taxation, with estimates coming out daily on the devastation it will cause the city of Toronto. Yet -- can you believe it? -- there are no studies of its impact. It is incredible that this minister and this government intend to rubber-stamp it anyway. If this NDP government truly cares about the city of Toronto, it must demand that real impact studies be done. This government must also agree to public hearings; 600,000 people in the city of Toronto demand nothing less.

ONTARIO HYDRO

Mr Leo Jordan (Lanark-Renfrew): Ontario Hydro has reached a new apex of economic disarray and turmoil. Currently, Hydro is saddled with a $36-billion debt. When asked to account for this fiscal disaster, the NDP government's only response is to blame past administrations.

They blame past governments for the cost overruns at Darlington, but the fact remains that it was an NDP-Liberal coalition government that placed a moratorium on Darlington. They delayed the construction for two years. That moratorium, along with the anti-nuclear sentiment perpetrated by the New Democrats, is the problem that has led us to delays in the production of Darlington. This, in turn, brought about cost overruns.

Now that Hydro has a $36-billion debt and customers are paying for it, the government must put aside its anti-nuclear ideology and bring Darlington and Bruce A generating stations into full capacity. Both of these plants are capable of producing energy at a very low cost level. Darlington will generate power at an average cost of 4.5 cents. Bruce A will generate power, after it's rehabilitated, at 2.8 cents. Both of these prices are well below the average price of 5 cents per kilowatt-ho