Manitoba Hansard — Sitting 31B (31st Legislature, 4th Session)

31-4-31b

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

Time : 8:0 0 p.m. LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Monday , 7 Ap ril , 1980 CONCURRENT COMMITT EES OF SUPPLY SUPPLY - FITNESS , RECREATION AND SPORT MR . CHAIRM AN, Albert Driedger (Emerson ): Order please . Call the commit tee to order. (l) ( a)- -pa ss. The Honourable Member for St . Boniface . MR. LAURENT L. DESJA RDIN S: Mr . Chairman , before we were so rudely inter rupted by the 4:3 0 bell I think I was commenting on some of the sta tements by the Minister . He seemed to say that the TCI were brought in.

He doesn 't deny that they were given special treatment of something that three other partners had started to work hard , then they come in with special treatment and the reasons given were this: That they were breaking the law and this way it would stop them from breaking the law. Well , I don't think that the province has the respons ibility when somebody els e is breaking the law . When they ar e given a licence to run a lottery they know what the law is and they know what they 're entitled to do and what they 're not supposed to do .

These are the same groups pretty we ll ; some of these middle men presented a brief to Law Amendm ents Committee a number of years ago during my temporary forced absence for a few months and had quite a few things to say about the lottery and they made the accusation at the time that we were ruining a good thing .

It 's obvious now to everybody that with other provinces coming in with lotteri es , that those smaller lotterie s and the lottery only in a place like Mani toba , for instance , could not survive and especially if we had done - which we weren 't able to anyway - but if we had tried to get a deal with other provinces that we could sell our lottery in theirs and they can sell ours here , how could we compete with the lotter ies in Ontario , and so on , when the prices are so much higher? So , Mr . Chairm an , I don 't accept these reasons . The Minister said he wants to set it up properly and I agree with that .

And if he wants to say that he wants to stop their pr olif eration and try to cut some of the lotteri es , I agr ee. But the Minister also said something that surprised me greatly . I was under the impression that th€ Minister was one of them that felt that we had too many lotteries here . I can say that although for a number of years I was responsible for lotterie s in Manitoba when we were in government - I might say that I was the first chairman of the Western Canada Lottery Foundation - but I also always said that I felt that we were in lot tery too deeply .

There 's nothing we could do because then they would sell other lotteries if Manitoba wouldn 't be in. So as a kind of a self -defence or to take care of ourselves , we went in and offered those tickets for sale because they were being sold all across Canada. But the Minister mentioned something as instant lottery awhile ago and the way he said it I understood him to sayit that is the coming thing. I know that the Min ister responsible for Western Canada for years resist ed that . I know what the Western Canada Lottery Foundation want s, this is their job.

They 're not resp on sible to the electorate in their respective province . But does the Minister really think we need more lotteries here? Is Manitoba then going to be the bet ting capital of North America? Are.we going to have casinos? We seem to be going in that direction ; there 's more and more instead of having less . Wel l, there 's more temporary permits given. They 're talking about off -track betting. That might come in. And le t's examine the lotteries that we have now .

You know , this was the idea of getti ng the four provinces together to co-ordinate that and try to save money , to have uniform regulations all across the west , and now when the - 2033 -

Monday , 7 April, 1 980 provinces took over Leto , well then , they 're partners in the we st for some lott er ies and they 're als o partners with the Maritim es , Ontario and Quebec in the Leto Lottery . And you know, for the population of Manitoba , don 't we have enough lot tery when we have the Leto Lottery ; we 're turning over how many milli onaires in how many few months in the Leto Lotter y? We 're doing the same thing in the Provincial Lo ttery ; how many mill ionaires? You know, there 's only so many ; and if you keep on doing that , you 're going to run the NDP out of business.

There won 't be any room for social ism ; everybody will be a mill ionaire in canada , so you know , you 've got to watch that. That would be a tragedy if we did th at. So , Mr . Chairman , I'm making a point to show that I don 't think any other country has more lotteries than we have here and I would suggest to the Minister that he should go with his colleagues in western Ganad a, we go easy in all these lotteries . Sure , they might be successful but then you 're going to saturate everything with lotteri es . There ar e so many lotteries now , there 's a limit.

And if you have those lott eries ; that 's no excuse to have one partner more equal than the other. They can be retailers of that ; anybody can be retaile rs . They had that right even though they were running their lotte ry . They had the right to be retailers befor e. Anybody can be a retai le r. But that 's not the part that I'm agains t. I' m against the part of them be ing partners in the wholesaling operation with three others and then starting their own wholes aling besides that in compe ti tion to the ir partner ship . This to me doesn 't make sense .

I don 't know anywhere else in the business world where this would be allowed and I think that 's wrong and I think that 1 s going to come back to haunt the present Minister and on any future Minister it 's going to be very difficult. As I said ear lier , I don 't think that you can change that. Once you give somebody , it 's a lot harder to take away . I think the Minister was in the driver 's seat . If they came to him and wanted a partnership their lotte ry can't be doing that we ll. The Minister ran the amount of $3 million .

I would ask the Minister, how much net did the organization of TCI have , that 's net , to give to their members of that corp oration , and I sus pect it wasn 't ·that much . I' m talking about net now. And another question. I would like to hear the Minister tell us something about the middleman . I don 't think there is any need in this kind of operation where you have a bear er 's ticket, where you have a system of retaile rs ; there is no need for a middlem an . What will the middlem an do? You know , that company has a budget to advert ise . They have a budget to do that and to sell; that 's their job .

Why do we need a middl eman? And the whole thing , I say this without fear of contradiction - there might be contradiction but nobody will prove it - I am posi tive that this whole thing , this whole system was done with one thing in mind - to protect the middleman. I know that some of these middlemen were quite act ive in the different political campa igns and I know what party they support ed , and I think this is a payo ff. It is an awful thing to say but I think that this is a payo ff.

I can 't see any other reason in this system where you have to keep on with middle men , and I' d like the Minister to tell me what the role of the middle man is. When you have the retailers all over the place , and you have the whole sal er , why do you need midd lemen? What are they going to do? Coming in on some thing that they said could not exist , they said that this thing would go belly -up . What are they going to do here now to earn their money?

I am not against this money going to these organiz ations , as I said I would like to see each one studied , I think that some of them , al though they are good organizations , shouldn 't belong in there. I think that should be checked and I think the Min ister should give direction on that , in other words not just a group that is going to be a very small group that could be we ll organ ized and could make a lot of money for a limited number of people .

I' d much sooner it go to sport s in gener al , the culture in gener al , and let the Sports Feder ation, let the govern ment , let the Manitoba Ar ts Council decide, the United Way , let them decide , if at all possible . But I am not going to prolong this I just want to know why you need the middleman and I think somebody mentioned or it is in here somewhere , that a middlem an can 't make more than 40% or something like that . Did I dream that or is that in there? I didn 't hear that maybe the Minister can correct me on that , and when he does , I wonder if he can give me the page if this is in there .

But I know, I made a mental note at this time that this was too much for one person to make a killin g on the growth of these organizatio ns . - 2034 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril, 1980 Now these organizations don 't have to do anything . When these lotteries were brought in the House , when the Members of this House voted for the lottery , they had the impr ession that every li ttl e organization would be very active , that you would run around if you were a membe r of the Kiwani s you would be running around with some tickets and trying to sell them to your frie nds, like we were used to . Its not that at all . These organ izations do not lift a finger , haven't lifted a finger for a long time .

They have paid people working , and this is why this lottery has become such a big business. And Mr . Chairman , no matter who partici pates in this lot tery you have to be careful because there is greed , there is so much money around tha t there is greed . Now a lot of people feel tha t the end jus tifies the means ; if it is for a good cause everything is al lowed . I don't happen to believe in that and I know that some people are not too pleased with me . My Alma Ma ter , for one , are not too ple ased with me because I think that if you 've got a good cause I don't think that anything justifies the means .

And I resent and I don't think this is prop er, a lott ery set up by a government where you es tablish the middl eman . This is the same thing , you 're hiding. I was talking about districts earlier , in areas and districts that you had in Quebec and Ontario and so on where friends of governm ent were getting that. Well now it 's middlemen that are get ting it, and that is hidden in there somewhere . I would like to know what justi fies the retaining of these middlemen in this new setup .

If the middleman wasn 't there and if they were equal partn ers , then I would have nothing but praise for the government and the Minister , because I am afr aid , and the Minister will see the greed there is when you talk about lotteri es. And I think the Minister was in a • • • You just paid somebody to bring you , what is it , an examination or a commission of one to look int the lotterie s. The Minister says he wan ts to start things right , why do you start with something like this then, that you invite trouble and it isn't fa ir .

The only reason the Minister said yes , I am right , when I mention that we shouldn 't go back. to a non-bearers ticket but he is saying we ll , if it wor ks , it 's not going to happen anyway ; why put it in there? If it doesn 't happ en , why put it in there? Why is it needed? And if it happens , well , then its wrong . And again I say you don 't owe these people anything . You 've set them up to run a lot tery ; they 're going to make an awful lot more money now . This ye ar was the time to do it , not wa it and say "I 'm going to review this in two years ", too la te.

Your politi cians , you are going to have so much pressure by politic ians that its going to be practically impossible to do , and you are going to have all these non-profit organizations that 'll be pushed by their middleman that 'll do the same thing as they did a few years ago , and if you resist and try to set up a fair thing you know what 's going to happ en. Mr . Chairman I' d like to hear the Minister comment on some of these things and I think he has some information for me now , that he receiv ed , about the per centage of what I call the "middle man ". MR . BANMAN : I understand , Mr .

Chairm an , on the third last page of the agreement it spells out that nobody can make more than 50% of gross revenu es . But I would like to point out several other things . The

part icular group that we are dealing with , with regards to TCI , in 1978 -79, the best information that I have , they sold roughly $2 .4 million worth of sales , gross receipts to the agencies was $960 ,000 .00. In 1979 • MR . DESJARDI NS: Excuse me . Gross , is that bef ore they paid , that 's before they paid the middleman and all that. Okay , can I have the net then? Say that again; say that aga in. wor th . MR . BANMA N: These are the figures that I have . They sold $2 .4 milli on MR . DESJAR DI NS : For the year? MR . BANMA N: For the year , on their draws , and it was $960 ,000 to agen cies . MR . DESJAR DINS : That 's gross? $960 ,000 gr oss. - 2035 -

Monday , 7 April, 198 0 MR . BANMA N: In 197 9-80 , because of the negotiations , they didn 't run as many lotterie s and they dropped to , let 's say , $1 . 7 million and gross to the agencies was roughly $680 ,000 .0 0. So out of that , Mr . Chairm an, I want to point out the member made several statem ents with regards to getting into more lotter ies. I think one of the benfits of this agreement , which is at tractive to me , is to see two lotteries suspended and being taken out of the system. You know, we have a lot of concern about the amount of advertising that 's going on and things like that.

This particular group was spending , I think in that one year , spent close to quarter mill ion dollars on advert ising , that particular lottery . It spent something like $100 ,000 to print those particular tickets . I think to that extent, this is a very positive move . I just have to rei terate again to the Member for St .

Boniface , that in the whole scheme of things , as this thing is evolving and as I see it hap pening , is that what should be happening - and this is one of the indications that the Haig Report came out with and one of the recommend ations which we ' re looking at very seriously now ,.. is to form a Lot teries Licensing and Gaming Commission which would encompass all the aspects with regard to gaming , whether it 's the licensing of new lott eries , the operation of the existing governme nt sponsored lotteries or the licensing of casinos .

Be cause as the member has stated and as I have stated on many occasions , is that when a grou p, when the Festival du Voyage ur , when the Ukrainian Dancers , or who ever , gets a casino lic ence , what happens is there is large sums of money in volved . I understand that the Festival du Voyageur made something like $180 , OOO this year on their casino licence . That far outstrips any kind of money that we 're talking about with regard to middle men or anything that 's involved in this thing.

The monitoring of those particular sport s grou ps , or particular groups that receive that money , I think should be done very caref ully , and I agree with the member , but if you give somebody a casino licence and they can make up to $150 ,000 to $200 ,000 , there should be some kind of follow-up by the government to see how those funds are being ex pended , and this is where I think a Lotteries Licensing and Gaming Commission would come in very handy .

That all aspec ts , a number of items that are big and were identified in the Haig Report are things like it 's estimated roughly there 's $13 milli on spent in Manitoba on things like Bingo, Nevada car ds , on the casinos as we ll as addit ional lott eries li cence , never mind what the government is running . So I think there should be an umbrella group which will work this whole thing togeth er.

We think that with this agreement we 'll be able to tie down , to see what the sales agents that are operating on behalf of some of these groups will be gett ing ; we will have the authority to , upon occasion , if the commission feels that the moneys aren 't expended prop erly , or there is exorbitant bills being submitted to the different agen cies , that we will have the right to go in and check those books . That is something which I think is something new that we will be able to get a good handle on. Now I come back again.

I have no magic formula in trying to solve some of these problems but I think we are moving in the right direction and hope that we can consolidate this. Far be it from me to consider expanding it but there are certain things that ar e creeping into the system that I think are much better con troll ed under one central body . I think that will give the people of Manitoba protection and avoid some of the problems that we have had in the past . MR . CHAIRMAN: The Member for St . Boniface . MR. DESJARDIN S : Mr . Chairman, I think the Minister is throwing up a smoke screen.

Some of the things are not related to what I said at all. I am not deny ing many of the things that were said . The Haig Report recommended an overall body to license and police . Well , it wasn 't that bad what was exist ing. Now the thing is , it 's small and it has to be increased because lottery is now big busi ness. Now the thing is that this is not something new. I don't think we needed the Haig Report at all to be honest with you . I don 't think they said anything that we didn't know . Now this suggestion was made before .

In fact , my boss at the time suggested that the Lottery Licensing Board be combined with the Manitoba Lottery Commission and that I would accept the responsi bility and I ref used . And I'm not talking out of school because I mentioned in the House why I refuse d, that - 2036 -

Monday , 7 Apri l, 198 0 I could not accept when there was not fu ll accoun tability of tickets. I wanted no part of it. Maybe I was in a hu ff and I didn't accept that . Now , the thing is it 's not so bad that the Lottery Licensing Board is under the Attorney-Gen eral , for one thing , maybe if you have that body the whole thing then should go , especially if the government is not going to take any revenue in it, maybe the whole thing should go to the Attorney-General because I think it has to be enforced . I agree with him on that . I agree , and I agree that you have to be caref ul . But I have a solution .

I wouldn 't allow Bingo , not Bingo , I mean , God , I' ll get thrown out of my church if I say that. I wouldn 't all ow a casino , and I can get thrown out of St . Boniface for that too because the Voyageur did quite well . You know, this easy money is all so danger ous, Mr . Cha irman . And try to get that away from the Voyageur now ; see what happens . You can 1 t do it. That 's exactly my point . Now if you give it to the Voyageu r, why not to the Plum Coulee lumberjack or somebody else . I think that that could be done and that is danger ous for a place like Manitoba . You 're going to attr act crime here .

You know , that looks corny and square when I say that . You 're going to attract crime . When there 's easy money , crime comes in. It 's okay to co-ordinate and have a body that will supervise it but it 's a hell of a lot better not to allow all these things in. That 's the point. But going back to this contract , that has nothing to do with this contract . You know , the Minister talks as if this group did us and did him a real favour by becoming partn ers.

Their lotte ry wasn 't doing well and the Minister knows it He says that they were coming down because of negotiation ; that isn't that at all , they ran the ir lott ery . And it 's just that there is too many lotteries and the others are well organized and they couldn 't compete ; and the Minister is givin g me the gross , not the net. I' d still like to have the net ; how much goes to the - and that 's the important thing , that's what the members ar ound this table want to know. How much do you have to raise? How many tickets do you have. to sell?

How much money has to be spent to give what to these associations? You know , you start with $2 .4 milli on , you 're already at 960 , and you 're talking about the middlem en getting 40 or 50 percent of the take . So what 's left? What 's left for the organization? MR . BANMA N: That 's precisely the problem. I don 't know because the Attorney-General looks after that . MR . DESJARDINS : Well, all right , all right ; you don 't know. Well , okay . MR . BANM AN: You know, that 's what the whole argument is about . MR . DESJARDI NS : But you negotiated with this group , you should know.

When somebody negotiates with me I want their books open . I thought you were a busi nessman . If somebody negotiated with me , they 're not going to pul l anything over my eyes , I can tell you that . But they sure pulled something over your eyes , over the Minister 's eyes , with this. I am saying fine , bring a fourth partner but bring an honest - you know , you were in the driver 's seat and you had to give the whole thing away . Why didn 't you just bring him , very simple? You say , you want to come in; I' m not saying you should step on them , help them out , they were told that before .

They didn 't agree ; they could run it better . And then they realized with the competit ion all over the place they can not keep on. The same with the Sports Federa tion. It is not viable so they came to you in trying to join some thing that they tried to des troy and you were in the driver 's seat . I' m not say ing shove their noses in the mud. I' m saying get them in as an equal partn er. But that 's not what you did and I' m not going to prolong this because you 're not bringing in any reason for that at all. You 're talking around and I can disagree with you in some of the things you want .

I think you want to go in the right direction and I suspect that this was dictated by somebody el se . I can see the writ ing on the wa ll with this thing and that's unfortunate , and I think it 's my duty here to bring this up . It 's after the fact if you wish , but this is some thing that 's going to cause the government only problems . I'm not against the partners hip. I' m not against trying to get everything under one Minister if you want ; it has some advanta ges . I' m not against being careful in le tting any new games come in or any of these things and I hope that - 2037 -

Monday , 7 Ap ri l, 198 0 you 're not ju st going to open the doors and give everybody that requested a li cence for a casino . If you 're going to do that , heaven forbid , you might as well have an organized casino , tha t you 're going to have the proper man in there be cause who has experience in running a casino here? You get the fly-by-night operators that you don't know. They come here and you don 't know how much they 're stealing you blind and that 's a very , very dange rous thing and I couldn 't agree more with the Minister that somebody has to be able to look at that .

But the Min ister hasn 't given me anything , he hasn 't mentioned the middl eman at all . Why do we need a middleman in this? But he 's got all kind of provision in that to help the middleman and he could make up that certain amount of money . Why? I thought this lot tery was to help spor ts, culture , groups in the United Way and other ass o ciations , non-profit organizations . They start with wha t? 2.4 ; they 're down to 960 and what? They 've got about ha lf of that net? Not a hell of a lot more than that. Look at how much money and how much energy is spent to ra ise that.

It makes sense to go in with the other thing as a partner but don't destroy something that 's working we ll. This group wasn 't working we ll so we 're going to destroy something that 's working well or endanger something that 's working we ll to please them , to try and rec tify. When something is wrong , you correct what is wrong . You don't change what is right , and the Minister hasn 't said a word against the Manitoba distributors . It 's working.

So why didn 't you just give them a partners hip , an equal partnership like the others and take less money , like you already said and I agree with you 100 perc ent , take less money as revenue for the pr ovince and give it to these worthy groups? But my main complaint , well my only complaint now , is that you are talking about , you are starting on one of the first page s, talkin g about four equal partners and then you do everything to show that one is more equal than the others , and I could never accept that , Mr . Chairman. MR . CHAIRMAN : The Member for El mwood . MR . RUSSELL DOERN : Mr .

Chairm an , there 's one very significant point that the Member for St . Boniface keeps me ntioning and I still haven 't heard a comment from the Minister in that regard , and that is the fact that it is possible for middlemen and frontmen and promoters to earn up to a 40 percent commission and this just str ikes me as absolutely incredible .

If we were to talk about administrative costs for a business or for a govern ment operation where we 're always trying to measure in some sort of quantitative terms what would be reasonable in relation to gross income and profi ts, and so on , if anybody ever talked about 40 percent I think they would find that stagge ring. When you get to that type of a breakdown where some org anizati on , a participating organiz ation , might receive 60 percent and the promoters receive 40 percent , I think the question has to be ask ed , whose benefit is this for?

Who 's receiving the ben efits under a breakdown where it 's a 60-40 split? And the question becomes at that point , who 's fronting for whom or who 's working for whom? And the Minister said ear lier in a debate sometime this afternoon there 1 s always fighting going on , and I don't know the person alities that are involved here in some of the history but I think they 're fighting over the spo ils . I mean , there 's big money involved here .

There are lucrative contracts and I don 't see anything that would really prevent somebody from making under-the-table payouts to a promoter so that some sharp promoter could come to an organization and say , "I 'll handle everything and I' ll take so much and so much under the table and you just loan me your name . We 'll use your name and you 'll get some money ", and this person will get the bulk of the benefits .

I think that 's a very dangerous situation and I think the Minister still hasn 't said a word on how he can mora lly justif y or logic ally just ify a system whereby a so-called public organization gets 60 percent and a so-called promoter gets 40 perc ent . I think that 's something that is beyond me and I don 't see any justi fi cation for al lowing that kind of a profit taking or rip -off, or whatever it is, because it 's no longer a lottery for the bene fit of the publ ic ; it 's a lottery for the benefit of the prom oters . MR . CHAIRMAN: The Honoura ble Minister . - 2038 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 198 0 MR . BANM AN : Well , Mr . Chairman , if I can just brief ly reply to that. One of the problems - and the mem bers opposite will re alize that - when you license a lottery , when you li cense a casino , if you license it for a group or whatever it is , the problem that we 've had in the past is to have proper control on that par ticular item , whether it be $100 ,000 lott ery run by a group of individuals or whether it be a casino which has been traditionally receiving a licence for the last five or six years .

And what I am saying to you here today is that I think, by this agreem ent , we will be able to find out exactly where the money is going and have the powers to step in and find out where those moneys are going. The member can say that is an exorbitant rate . I think that we will be able to, by controlling the contracts that are made with the diff erent groups as we ll as the different people , be able to bette r control it. If you issue somebody a licence to run $100 ,000 lott ery , the controls on that are very , very limited .

The promotion , as I mentioned before , they 're spending a quarter of a million dollars on advert ising . These are dupl ications which we hope to overcome and to try and tighten down the system in order to try and bring a littl e bit of harmony with regard to this here. We feel that this is a step in the right direct ion, to try and get the accountab il ity up front so that everybody knows what 's going on . Now I know we can sit here and arg ue , I guess , until the cows come home on this particular ma tter .

But all I'm saying to you right now is that I think the public of Manitoba will be better off in the long run for having sat down and negotiated this type of agreement so that we do have a handle on it and can come down on people abusing the system rather than the other way . But coming back to the point that the Member for St . Boniface raised before , I share the same concerns with a number of casino lic ences that are issued . But let me say again to the Member for St . Boniface , I do not have control over that ; the Attorney-General does.

I look after the Manitoba Lo tteries Commission, and this is my own personal concern, I think that it would be good for one Minister to know what. ' s happening throughout the whole scheme of lotteries things . Now that 's my own personal view. MR . DOERN: We ll , I just wanted to ask one question here of the Minister and that is , why did he allow such a high profit to be taken by the promoters? Was it not possible to limit that to 10 percent or 15 percent? I mean , why do you allow a 60-40 split? That strikes me as excessive . MR . BAN MAN : Well , Mr .

Chairm an , you have to also take into consideration 40 percent of what? And that is the question that will have to be deter mined in negotiations with TCI, how this structure is set up. It does not mean that be cause an age ncy will sell 25 percent of the tickets that are sold by TCI , that they are automatically entitled to 25 percent of the profit s. We have said all along that we want this to become a vehicle where non-profit groups can get involved and that means that some people will be able to apply to this organization on a basis of need , and other things .

Those figures have not been estab lished yet by the Minister and the Ministerial group that 's looking at this, as well as in consultation with the Manitoba Lotteries Commission. So we 're saying 40 percent . I say to you that the rates are not struck and I belie ve , with this agreement we will be able to control the type of moneys we are talking about, and I think that is one of the benefits of the agreeme nt . We didn 't have any control before and I think now we will be able to control the whole situation and take some lotterie s out of the system . MR . CHAIRMAN : The Member for Transc ona . MR .

PARAS IUK : Mr . Chairperson , I will pass because I know my colle ague , the Member for St. Boniface , has some points relating specifically to this topic , and I' ll put my name down at the bottom of the list because I do want to return back on the general topic of Lo tteri es. MR . CHAIRMAN: The Member for St . Boniface . MR . DESJARDINS : Mr . Chairman , I would like the Minister to try to under stand something. He is saying that if he brings in everybody in the same lottery - 2039 -

Monday , 7 April , 1980 and if they co-ordinate that it is going to work. I couldn 't agree more . The Minister had a unique opportunity to do just that and to do away with a lot of this extreme , a lot of this needless cost , very easily . You invite or accept TCI as a fu ll partner , peri od . This is what the partners do - for the members of the committee who are not too familiar with this - the organ ization , TCI in this in stance , would give three names to the Minister and he would select two who would go on the board of direct ors , and then TCI is out of it as far as that is con cern ed .

The same goes for the Sports Feder ation , the United Way , and the Manitoba Arts Council. Now, they have an organizat ion, they make the pro fit of this , the four partne rs . They ar e in the wholesale business ; they have an exclusive , the wholesale business in Manitoba . They have paid employe es ; they promote the tickets ; they have a network of retailers all across the province ; they sell the tickets. And then there is a cheque whenever the amount comes in, there are four che ques , equal cheques going to the four partners . All right .

Then you would eli minate all these other things and they would be doing the same work as the United Way is doing now. They would name two members to the board . They would receive their cheque . They would decide how to spend that money. And it would all be net , no expenses to them at all , the same as the United Way . You have the situation at hand . You can do that .

There is no need to have a duplicate wholesale organization that will spend more money to adver tise , that will be competing against itself, that will have more middlemen , more people , that will have another system of advert ising to try to induce the people to buy from them instead of the partnership they are in. They are going to compete for the kiosk ; they are going to compete for the retailers ; that 's what they are going to do . Let me refresh the memory of the Minister, to say the things that I am con cerned about .

I have a copy , and I am not going to read the associa tion , I don 't think it would be fa ir. It is only an exam ple , and I' m not going to read the name . This is a contract that was in force when, not this Minister but when this government took over , and I have no reason to think that it is not in force . And tell me , even the most partisan member of this committee , tell me if you think this is fair , and I' m just taking some of the things in there ; it would be too long to read.

"Stubs from lotteries , bingos , etc. , that is being conducted by the Winnipeg off ice of this association will remain under the control of the middle man and should not be turned over to the association . The association agrees it will refer all professional fund-ra ising prog rams to the middleman ." Okay . "The middle man should be paid a management and consulting retainer fee in the sum of $20, OOO per year .

The middle man will , in addition , receive a car al lowance of $150.00 per month , which does not include the payment for gasoline ." He will get $150 .0 0 so he can beat the tax and then they will als o pay his expense besides that . "All business prom otional expenses and receipts for gasol ine , 75 percent of gasoline rec eipts , are to be renumerated as included in the budget.

A percentage arr angement of 25 percent of net revenue , af ter expens es , and payment of salary to the middleman will be pa id to the middleman. this percentage payment to be calcu lated on a quarterly period subject to adjustment aft er annual au dit.• • Retro active pay , okay . "The association agrees to pay the middle man for expenses incurred in the amount of 25 percent of all revenue received from the corpora te , business , priva te , and donations in kind. " Any donation .

For instance , under this contra ct , if this group receives something fr9m TCI , he is entitl ed to 25 percent of even the ret roactive thing , according to his con tra ct , and there is nothing that anybody can do. It is a legal contract with an association , unless you spell it out , and it isn't spelled out anywhere here at al l. They can put a middleman that will work for the TCI and there is nothing you can do because TCI is a wholesale r. And it is just repeat ing, repeti tious .

For instance , this group that made $2 .4 million , we still don't know how much went to the ass ociation but we know that the maximum of half a milli on doll ars , out of 2.4 mill ion. Mr . Chairman , if you think this is fair. Everything that the Minister wants - he wants to co-ordinate this - I' m with him 100 percent ; he wants to stop their prolifer at ion of lott eries - I'm with him 100 perc ent ; he wants to be able to regulate where the money is, he can make arran gements the same as had been made with the United Way , with the Sports Federat ion, he can do the same thing.

Why then , does he let somebody in that trie d to de stroy the system , that - 2040 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 198 0 could not make their system work? Why does he say , you are coming in as equal partne r, but you can do this, you can do this, you can do this that the others can 't. That is my point and the Minister can talk all around it . I agree with him on most everything that has been said about the casino . This has nothing to do with this contract . And what he wants to achie ve , I' m all for it , but there was no need to have this kind of thing.

The Minister was in the driver 's seat and I say that they would have been very happy to come in as an equal partner and in stead of having less than half a milli on dolla rs , they would have had $1 milli on. You are practically doubl ing what they would receive , and that 's without lifting one finger . But this thing is set up for the middlem an ; that 's all it is doing . MR . CHAIRM AN: The Member for Trans cona . MR . PARASI UK : Does the Minister know - has he checked up any contracts like that? Is he aware of their existe nce? Does he have any pol icing mechani sm? MR.

BANMA N: We are not aware of a contract like that , no . MR . PARA SI UK: I think that the Minister should , if he is going to get in the proc ess of establishing general contracts like that , he surely should investi gate these type of charges because I think that if you are into a situation like that, basically the lotteries are in fact being set up for the middleman , espe cially since they are designated specifically as middlemen .

I would lik e to ask the Minister if he knows if Manitoba Lottery tickets are being sold in states where lotteries are not al lowed , and is this il legal and are various publi c organizations in Manitoba , then , acting as fronts for illegal acti vities in other states? MR . BANMA N: We are not aware of any , Mr . Chairm an , and if the member has any informa tion to that effect we would appreciate hearing from him because that 's precisely the things we are trying to tighten up on and we don 't want the extra -provincial, especially into the States , sale s. MR .

PARASIUK : Has the Minister made any attempts to determine from any of the sellers and the wholes alers , where the tickets are being sold? Has the Min ister made any atte mpt to determine where they are being sold? MR . BANMA N: The tickets , the WLMD , which is the Manitoba distr ibutor , only sells tickets to Manitoba retai lers . MR . PARAS IUK : So no one is selling them by mail to - they don 't have out lets in Chicago or other places like that? MR . BANM AN : They are not supposed to. MR .

PARA SIUK : Are they specifically prohibited from doing this in any of their agreements that the Minister has signed with them? MR. BANM AN : Ye s, everybody that is a retailer has to abide by the rules of the Western Lo tteries Foundation , and one of those rules is that ex tra-provincial sales are not to be conducted, and this is the problem that we have fac ed , whether it be Winsday tickets coming into Manitoba or Wintario tickets coming in. But the rule is that you are not supposed to solicit tickets outside of the jurisd ictional limits of Manitoba . MR .

PARASIUK : I would like to ask a couple of quest ions relating to the whole concept of gaming. You raised that term in some of your earlier answe rs. I would like to know if the Minister has a definition of what is acceptable gaming or gamb ling and what is unacceptable gaming or gambling, from the governm ent 's point of view? MR . BAN MAN: Mr. Speak er, this is the same problem that we were talking about , and I think the member was here . I am not responsible for the licensing of - 2041 -

Monday , 7 April, 1980 lotteries in the Province of Manitoba , the Attorney-General is. I am in charge of running the Winsday and the Provincial tickets , in other words , the government -sponsored lot teri es . But the licensing of bingos , Nevad as , other lott eries , does not come under my jurisdi ction , and I don 't have an input into that except through , of course , the Executive Council .

There is no magic way in which you move departments around , and I think that we would all have our own ideas , but I think it would be good for the Minister who is in charge of the government -sponsored lotte ries , also be resp onsible for the other things , to know what is hap pening with regard to other things . But I cannot give him any specifics , because I do not deal with those . MR . PARAS IUK : I raise the question in tha t you yourse lf had tal ked about the Haig Report , and you talked about some of the problems , and you raised the matter of gaming licen ses .

Now I feel somewhat frustrated when you say that you are interested in this topic and then you say you can 't prov ide any answers .

I am in a position right now where since we have passed the At torney-Gener al 's Esti mat es , it is virtually impossibl e to get a defin ition , unless of course we go on an emergency debate , because it is a critical issue ; or secondly , unless I ask you questions , an d other people who are sitting at this table and are participating in this committee proc ess , decide that they would like to involve themselves in the committee proce ss and give me a definit ion of what acceptable gambling is and unaccep table gambling , from the government 's point of view.

If you are not in the position to do that , perhaps other members of the Executive Council who are participating in this Est imates process in this committee could give me that definition on behalf of the Executive Council. MR . CHAIRM AN: l. ( a )- -pass - the Member for Transcona . MR . PARASIUK : I see that the Attorney-General is sitting here . I don 't know if he is sitti ng in on the committee discussions.

He is, I assume , partici pating in the-committee discussions , and I would just lik e to note that he is the Minister responsible for lott eries licensing , but is choosing not to participate in the committee process and provide an answer to this question which in fact the Minister of Fitness and Amateur Sport has raised himse lf in his own answers . Again, I feel frustrated tha t the Attorney-General can in fact provide the answer but chooses not to at this

part icular time . MR . CHAIRMAN : l. (a )--pass ; Resolution 68 : Resolved that there be granted to Her Ma jesty • • • The Member for Transc ona . MR . PARA SIUK : Excuse me , I have some difficulty shooting this arm up quickly ; I hope the Chairperson will be a bit indulgent . I then would like to make a comment on the fact I think it is rather unfortuna te that the government doesn 't have a public pos ition on the whole questi on of gambling . I think tha t we are moving beyond just a que stion of lotteries and bingos.

I think we are getting into a stage where we are talking about gambl ing, and when the Minister himself throws out a figure of some $160 ,000 being de rived from a gaming licence of a very short durat ion, then I am very concerned that we in fact can become a target for organized crime , and I think that 's a dange r. I think it is very important for the government publicly to state what it feels is acceptab le , what it fee ls isn't, before any momentum starts developing with respect to legaliz ing gambling on a broader scale in the province .

I raise this because a couple of months ago there was an art icle in the Weeken d Magazi ne , and they were talking about gamb ling as if it was inevitable , that some how we would have legalized gambling in Canada . They talked about certain prov inces running short of revenue and finding themselves in a difficul t, tight situa tion - that sounds somewhat familiar - and that one of the ways out here would be to legalize gambling . We have the exper ience from the United States , in certain states , in decid ing that they would like to follow the lead of Nevada and they recently have leg alized gambling.

Aga in, there has been a great debate in the United States as to whether or not that move to legalize gambling has been fol lowed by a move of organized crime into places like Atlantic City . When you start talking about numbers like $160 ,000 , and then when you start talking about figures - 2042 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril, 1980 like $13 mill ion, you start presenting a target that certainly isn't out of line with past dollar amounts involved in ill egal distribut ion of liquor , or it isn't out of line with dollar amounts involved with drug traf ficking. We know that there has been some type of an organ ized attempt at drug trafficking. So I ask the Minister to take this up with the Executive Council so that we can get a clearer statement from the government as to what its position regarding gambling is. I think we should be cutting back on these types of activit ies.

I think we ar e developing a momentum on the casino side , which is disturbing , be cause we are reaching a stage where various we ll- intentioned organizations are looking at a casino licence as some type of panacea , as some easy way out of deal ing with a money probl em. Perhaps the budgetary problem exists because there has been government restraint or because people aren 't fully behind that organ ization, or because of a number of factors.

But , you know , if the public , either through the groups that they belon g to or publicly through the Treasury , isn 't prepared to support a number of these organiz ations , then maybe they do n't have sufficient public support to continue.

But if in fact we get a type of front for them which then is able to get casino licen ces and do a good job or prom otion , do a good job of inviting anyone in to get involved on casino ·night ; and if we start talking about figures of $150 ,000 , and if in fact on the Lotteries scene we have situa tions where a professional organization of middlemen do exist to run the lotter ies , and the lot teries seem ed like a pretty blas e type of an operat ion, a pretty bland type of operation compared to a casino operation ; if we 've already had the firm intrusion of middle men into that area. then I shudder to think what is going to happen if we have a continued proliferation of gamb ling.

Is the Minister in a position to indicate whether the revenues derived from licensed gamb ling has increased over the last two or three years and does he have any numbers in this regard? I think that 's an area that he could provide us some answers with. Is he in a position to answer that particular question? MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister. MR. BANMA N: Mr. Chairman, without sort of ge tting into specifics because as I mentioned , I am involved with specifi cs , but I agree with the member that , No. 1, I don 't want to see the proliferation of lotteries or casino licences happen.

There have been a number which have been es tabli shed over the last four or five years , and as we all know ar ound this table here , is that , for instance , if you'd pull the licence on the Festival du Voyageu r, the organization would literally fold. So you would be faced with the responsibility of having created a need and then try ing to pull that , sort of the rug , from under them and you would have to come up with an alternate source of money. So I agree with the member , I know that the government has been very careful in not trying to expand the number of casinos that were operated.

As far as legalized gambl ing is concern ed , I am definitely one hundred percent opposed to that and I belie ve that is the general feelin g of my colleague s, even though the point has never come up for discussion, because it just hasn 't been considered by the government. But the expanding of the whole system is one which I have indicated repeatedly that I am not for. MR . PARASIUK : Well I'm glad we can get the Minister 's individual position on this matter.

I'm sorry again that the government representative who is direct ly responsible for this matter doesn 't feel obl iged to present the government 's position with respect to the continued proliferation of legalized gambling , be cause I do beli eve that there has been an increase in the number of licences is sued for gamb ling purposes in Manito.ba over the last three years. I' m just saying that this is a very dangerous trend. I am against it very much. I think it starts getting beyond the stage where certain groups would find that they wouldn 't be able to carry on if these lic ences were withdrawn.

I think we start develop ing a frame of mind , a certain att itude , whereby as a society we start relying on that more , and we can reach a situation where we can start talking about the economic implications to the province , as I am pretty sure the people in Nevada would start talking about the economic implications to the State of Nevada if they started withdrawing gamb ling licences or tightening up procedures. And you know , in the last few years , there is that drif t developi ng that really does concern me. I think that it 's important for the government to make a clear - 2043 -

Monday , 7 Apr il , 1980 unequivocal statement that they are against the further pr olif eration of legalized gambling , that maybe what 's required is some type of rationalization and cutback on what 's been taking place to date , rather than some type of a continued expan sion.

Becau se one of the difficulties , I am quite certain that exists is , that if a couple of organizations have licences , then what about those organizations that don 't have licences and possibly feel that they are just as entitled to a licence as the group that alr eady has a licen ce , and then in that situation , you don't have an obje ct ive definition of gambling. Then it becomes a relative definition, where gambling is legal if sponsored by a certain type of group , but gambling is illegal if sponsored by another type of group.

Then who is going to make those types of decisions as to which group is a good group to run a gambling operation and which one isn't; which one is in sufficient financial difficulty to run one and which one isn't? And those are tremendous dilemnas of an administrative nature , but I think beyond that , they are very much moral dilemnas which I think reflect the value system that exists in society , and I think that politi cians and legislators and legislatures and governments have to take fairly strong positions on these types of moral issues.

I think that my own position is if we are going too far with them , I think it 's time for us to cut back. There ar e many othe r ways of raising funds , possibly more diff icult , and that gambling is an atte mpt to fol low the path of least restraint in terms of rais ing funds. It caters to the vices of people rather than to their virtues and I think we can star t trying to shift our values back in a different type of direction by stopping them.

Again , I' m sorry to hear that the Att orney- General has been consp icuous by in sile nce in this discussion and I'm sorry again that we have gone pas t the Attorn ey-Genera l's Est imates be cause this is an issue that I think warrants comment by the At torney-General as the of ficial government spokesperson with respect to this particular issue. MR. CHAIRM AN: The Member for Winnipeg Centre. MR. J. R. (B ud ) BOYCE : Mr.

Chairman , just before passing this item , I want to put on the record once again my opposition to lotteries in gener al , and to publicly confess my guilt that I was responsible as one of the people who voted for the Centennial Lottery Bill some ten years ago. I really got sucked in on that , as a lot of people did , hat there was a one-shot effort and had a self destr uct clause in it and that would be the one-time effort and it would be a fun thing. But , Mr.

Chairman , I wish it were the case that somebody had put in a can all of the advertising which was done by the gambling interests in the State of Nevada in the election of 1956 in the State of Califor nia , at which time they had a Proposition No. 6, and they spent milli ons of doll ars advertis ing the bad points of gam bling , billboards with parents with their children in rags , dumping their lif e savings into slot machines, and they were successful in their campaign in Calif ornia in defeating Proposition No. 6, which would have legalized gamb ling .

Albe it there is some legalized gambling , once again in Ca lif ornia , where I think five-card poker games are leg al. I sympathize with the Minister in a sense that once something has been started , it 's very difficult to reverse it. But that brings it into the area , my general opposition , to such ways of funding , that 's what perhaps we should do in the first thing , by everybody taxing ourselve s, because there is certainly no relationship at all between the ab ility to pay and those who pay.

Because those people who have the wherewithal take their few dollars and gamble with much more certainty in stock marke ts and the rest of it than they do in Provincials or Lotos or Sil ver Sweepstake s, or anything else. This money , I am pos itive , that the little re search which has been done , and will be substantiated , that this money is taken from a group in society that can ill afford it.

So with all Jue respe ct to the Fest ival du Voyageurs and all the rest of the agen cies , which I think should be funded if there is some need for these organiza tions to have public funds, then it should be done on the abili ty to pay by all of us in society. It shouldn 't rely on lotteries. I know that there is a resolution before the House at the present time which is being considered that we can argue further in this regard.

But the continued reliance on lotteries to fund things which are in the social interests of us all , I think is an error , and it will take political intestinal fortitude to reverse the tide. I will confess also that even - 2044 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 1980 King Canute confessed his humanity , that he coul dn 't hold back the tides . But just to keep suggest ing that it 's inevitable that gambling will exist , and to use that as an excuse for continuing to fund legiti mate social involvements in our community through , in my terms , conning people into thinking that they 're going to catch the brass ring , I think is an error . And some of the advertising which is used I think is dece itful . I notice in the ads that appear every Wednesday , they print out some numbers and they say that there are so many winners.

That 's if every ticket is sold , that 's how many win ners there are . You got twenty winners of this, and forty winners of this , and a hundred of this, and I think that they should account to the public on a week-to -week basis just how many people do actually win money on these things . Well , as I said , I just wanted to put on the record my opposit ion to it gener ally , and I'l l save some of my arguments for the debate on the resolution which is before the House . Thank you , Mr . Chairm an . MR . CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . MR.

BANM AN: The unfortunate problem I gue ss, dealing with lotte ries , Mr . Chairman , it 's a little bit like the proh ibition on liquor . Manitoba is one of the jurisdictions I guess that we could say we were not going to have any lo tter ies any more , but I think the Member for St . Boniface , who was one of the Western Lo tteries foundation, to try and make sure that the ticket sales between provinces stayed within their own jurisdictions .

I agree with the member that some of the advertising leaves something to be desir ed and is not in the taste that I think it should be , but we are caught in the bind, I gu ess , of being in the position that if we would outlaw sales in Manitoba the same as if we outlawed the sale of alco hol in Manito ba , I think we 'd only be kidding ourselves if we didn 't think that we would have lott eries coming in under the table like the Iris h Sweepstakes used to be years ago . So I say to that extent , we are trapped the same as with the liquor sal es.

I would be one of the first ones to agree with the prohibition if it would work , but indeed from past experien ce , didn 't work , and I think it 's much better then for governments to make sure that they have a pretty tight handle on what 's happening . So unfortunately , I guess we 're so far down the tube that we can't say we can get out of it totally , but I agree with the member that certain things could be done to try and minimize the ef fects that they have on the people in society. MR . BOYCE : Mr .

Chairm an, if we follow that reasoning on every piece of legislation which is before us, we wouldn 't get too far. I think I had argued in another debate that it wasn 't my position to prevent people from building beer troughs on Portage Avenue , my opposition was to the extent that they shouldn 't convince peopl e that they have to drink it. I think that all the provinces and the people within the provinces should put pressure on the federal government to amend the Criminal Code , in that it takes us back a bit prior to the amendment which has al lowed the pr olif eration which has taken place .

I agree with the Min ister for one province to stand alone won 't get us very far , but nevertheless to ado pt the attitude that there is nothing we can do about it , is just taking us further and further down the road into an ar ea which is causing problems as point ed out by my colleague , the Member for St . Boniface , that I didn't get an answer to some of his questions that he raised , relative to the contracts which are being given to middle men . But , Mr .

Chairm an , I think that we all have to try and convince our col leagu es , legislators all , to take a darn good look at where we are and perhaps see if there isn't some way of Canada , as a na.tion, taking a look at this , in co-operation between the provinces and the federal government to take a look at the whole con cept of holding false hopes be fore people who can ill af ford the money which is being squandered in this area . MR . CHAIRMAN: l.( a) --pass . The Member for St . Boniface . MR . DESJAR DINS : Mr .

Chairman , before you pass this , if there is nothing on the lotte ry before we leave the Department of the Minister 's Salary , I have one - 204 5 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 1980 other point . But I want to make sure that we have finished the lottery first . If the lottery is finished , there is a very short point I would like to make . We ll , Mr . Chairman, I was quite impressed with the Minister ea rlier , who I think we both agreed on the importance of the fitness and of working towards that in sport s in his dep artment , and I was shocked by the answers of the Minister of Education when he was questioned re the gym in the schools .

I think the Minister , earlier in this debate while we were talk ing about lottery , repeatedly mentioned how important it was to coordinate this and bring it under the same Minister , and I would hope that he would see the value now of something that I suggested to him , something that was in existen ce , that was taking place and that has in advance since this government took of fice , that is in interd epartmental a committee to look at the question of fitness.

The Minister went to the rouble of tell ing us that he 's funding - we ll throu gh lotter y now, through the share of the Sports Federation - no , I think that is still through the Est imates of the Minister in Preventiv e Sports Medicine , the Minister made a very big point of this and I agree with him . I think the Minister should look into th is. I think it is his re sponsibility . If he 's the man who 's looking af ter the fitness of the people and the prevent ion of injuries in spor ts , I think that he should get in the act and get involved and talk to his coll eague , the Minister of Education.

And it 's quite obvious the Minister of Education never played anything but tiddl y winks or snakes and ladders because he would know that you can 't just put a mattress be low a net , that people trip in it . A basketball player jumps in the air , something five feet high is not going to protect him ; these mattresses the way they are now , could be more dangerous than no mattresses at all . --(I nterjec tion )-- Yes, sure they ' re on the wa lls . They come in and --( Interjection )-- They 're not on the wal ls. They 're not on the wal ls.

He 's talking about what happens now, and on the wa lls when they 're about five feet high that 's not enough for anybody that understands anything about basketb all. We were talking about all these milli ons of doll ars coming in through lotter ies. I think . that the Minister should look into this and I would suggest quite strongly to him that he take an . . MR . CHAIRM AN: Order pl ease . The Member for St . Boniface . MR . DESJARDI NS: Mr . Chairm an, I don 't want to interrupt the others but I'd like to know what s being said and I can 't do that while I' m talkin g to you . Now, Mr .

Chairman, some of these mattresses then are - even if they were on the wa lls - are too low. The padding has to be done in certain places and any new gyms that are constructed - I'm not saying that you have to condemn all the gyms that are now - but certain basketball gam es, certain lea gue games should not be held in these places if it 's going to be danger ous. We have a coroner 's report on that and different sugge stions, what 's the point of having these people making these studies and that? It 's a dangerous thing.

It is not affording the protec tion • Sometimes when you think there 's protection and it 's only partial prote ction , sometimes it 's worse than none . So I would just suggest to the Minister that you cannot talk about fitness . The Minister cannot , in his own department , try to promo te fitne ss if he doesn 't receive help from the Minister of Health and Prevention of Injuries , also from the Minister of Health and the Minister of Education .

These are the two that I think of now , and I would hope that the Minister , if he has n't done so alr eady , would take some interest and look into this matter immediately . MR. CHAIRMAN : 1 (a )--pa ss. Resolution 68, Resol ved that there be granted to Her Majesty a sum not exceeding .$348 ,3 00 for Fitness , Recrea tion and Sport- -pass. That concludes the Estimates of the Minister of Fitness , Recreation and Sport. MR . DESJAR DINS : ••• I move that Committee rise. MR . CHA IRMAN : Move Committee rise? Committee rise . - 2046 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril, 198 0 SUPPLY - NATURAL RESOURCES MR. CHAIRM AN , Abe Kovnats (R adisson ): This committee will come to order . I would direct the honourable members ' at tention to Page 84 of the Main Estimates , Department of Na tural Resources. The item under discussion is Clause 13. Acq uisition ; Resolution 11 2. 13 --pass. The Honourable Member for Rupertsland. MR. HARVEY BOSTROM : Mr .

Chairm an, just before we concluded for the supper break , the Minister had indicated to the House that he would be seeking more in formation regardin g the quest ions we were direct ing to him regarding the purchase of the Grandome Hotel. I wond er if the Minister has his material with him now. MR . CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister. HON. BRIAN RANSOM (S ouris-Killarney ): No , Mr. Chairm an, I undertook to get a complete report cin the situation from the Attor ney-Gener al 's Department and that 's what I'l l do.

I can assure the honourabl e ·member , however, that his alle gations about other people that he named earlier are untrue. MR . BOSTROM: Mr . Chairman , one of my colle agues mentioned to me , he thought the Minister had indicated the name of an owner or owners of the facil ity. I didn 't recall him making that statement to the House . I wonder if he could indicate if he has det ermined at this point to who the owner or owners of this fac ility were. MR. RANSOM: Ye s, Mr . Chairm an , I think this is about the third time that I' ve provided this information. It was a Mr. Klus, spelled K-1-u -s. MR .

BOSTROM : Mr . Chairm an , can the Minister indicate if this was the only owner of the facility , an d if this was the person who owed the debt to the mort gage company whi.ch the de partment paid of f? MR . RANSOM : facility. To my knowled ge , Mr. Chairman , he wa s the owner of the MR. CHAIRMAN: Clause 13 .--p ass ; Resolution 11 2--pass. Resolved that there be granted to Her Majesty a sum not exceeding $8 ,6 47 ,7 00 for Natural Resour ces. Acqu isition/Construction of Physical Ass ets , $8 ,6 47 ,700- -pass. MR . ENNS : P�ge by page , Mr . Chairman? MR. CHAIRMAN: Page by page.

It doesn 't seem that we have complete agree ment. I saw a shake of the head . Do I have a "nay" or just a shake of the head? --( Int erjectio n)- - I have a "nay". I would ask the honourable members to revert back to Page 78 of the Main Est imates , Resolution No . 10 5 , Item 6. Lands , (

a) Administration ,

(1) Salaries--p ass. The Honourable Minister . MR. RANSOM: Mr. Chairm an , there were 51 staff man years in the entire Lands Division. In the Administration Item, there were 3 staff man years - the same class MR . CHAIRMAN: Rupertsland. Item 1. Salaries--pass the Honourable Member for MR. BOSTROM : Mr . Chair man , as I have done in the past , I propose to ask general questions for the entire Land

Section under this item and would not ask detailed quest ions on the other sections unless it speci fically relates to those . My first quest ion to the Minister on this is does he have a def inite policy with respect to the sale and/or lease of Crown lands? Can he give us an indica tion o what his policy is in this respect? - 2047 -

Monday , 7 April , 1980 MR . RANS OM : Perhaps it might fac il itate discussion , Mr . Chairman , if the honourable member would like to place a number of his questions . He has indicated he has several quest ions; perhaps he would place them and then we will at tempt to deal with them all. MR. BOSTROM : Mr . Chair man , I would propose to ask the spec ific quest ions and lead into discussion on each of those , if there is to be a discussion on each individual issue .

This is one issue that I would like the Minister 's comments on , if he could indicate to us if the government has changed the policy with respect to the sale and/or lease of Crown lan ds. I would follow that , if he would give us that informat ion , with some specific questions. MR . CHAIRMAN: Order plea se . If I could just take the time of the honour able members for a minute . On Tuesday , March 25 , the Honourable Minister of Natural Resources had brought up a point of order and I said that I would make a ruling after I had had . a chance to purview the Hansard .

It was on a point of order where the Honourable Minister said , "The point of order was with ref erence to materials to do with the Jarmoc case , was what the honourable gent leman was refer ring to. He has al leged that we filed incomplete orders of return and that we burned or destroyed papers .

That is a very serious allegation and I think that the honourable gentl eman should either be prepared to substantiate it or withdraw it ." Now , the remarks from the Honourable Member for Rupertsl and were : "When asked for an order of ret urn , there didn 't seem to be very much information available ." I' m sorry , it 's on Page 1626 of Hansard , dated Tuesday , March 25. At the top of the page : "When we asked for an order for return , there didn 't seem to be very much information ava ila ble .

The Minister 's department has been prac tising file burning or book burning , or whatever they do to destr oy such fil es, shredding maybe ." I should think that the honourable member really was making a remark that pos sibly wasn 't meant to be made in regard to the actual accusation of the Minister 's department practising file burning or book burning , or whatever they do to destroy such files and I would think that on looking over the mat ter , that the Honourable Member for Ruperts land was out of ord er in making such a remark without proof to substantiate it .

I would hope that the Honourable Member for Rupersland would re flect on it and withdraw his remarks. The Honourable Member for Rupertsla nd . MR . BOSTROM : Mr . Chairman , I beli eve the way it was printed in Hansard is not the way in which I said it but I was phrasing the remark at the time , if I recall , more in the way of a quest ion to the Minister as to what exactly was happening to information from the departme nt ; and as I rec all , we were discussing the issue of the all eged missing information regardin g the park policy . And I beli eve , if you recall , Mr .

Chairm an , we were discussing a proposed policy , a policy which I said was in existence in the department when the Progressive Con servative Government took office , and this minister was not able to find that information in the files , or at least he indicated that it had not come to his attention . And I believe I was discussing this by way of question s, and wondering what happened to the information that was availab le. So I would suggest that I should withdraw the information as it is printed in the Hansard , but that is not the way in which I phrased the question. MR .

CHAIRM AN: Withdrawal of the remarks as printed in Hansard . The Honour able Minister. MR . RANSOM: Mr . Chairman , there have been some changes made in lease sale policies but still I wonder if the honourable member woul dn 't like to • • he said he wished to deal with this sect ion in a general fashion and then go on to the spec ific question s. I would like some direction from you , Mr . Chairman, are we going to deal in a general way then , and I would as sume that would involve raising a number of questions from the members oppo site , or are we going to deal point by point with specific topics. - 2048 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 1980 MR . CHAIRMAN: To the Honourable Minister, and to all the member s, we are under Sec tion 6 Lan ds, and Item (

a) Administrat ion, which covers quite a latitude of questi ons that could be asked and answered under this particular dep artment , under Administration

(1) Sal ari es. I think if the honourable members would care to spec ific quest ions, then the Honourable Minister would be prepared to answer speci fic question s. The Honourable Member for Ruperts land . MR . BOSTROM : Well , Mr . Chairman , I am asking a spec ific question and the quest ion is, what is the Minister 's policy , the government 's policy with respec t to the administration of Crown land , and with spec ific reference to the policy of the government regarding the selli ng or leasing policy .

I phrase that as a gener al question , and I think it is specific enough that he would be able to give us what exact chang es , if any , they have made in the policy of the government since they 've been in office with respec t to lea sing and/or sellin g of Crown land . MR . RANSOM: There have been a number of changes announced , Mr . Chairman .

I believe that the honourable mem bers are probably familiar with them , one being that of making agricultural lands available to the long-term lease holders on those agricultural lands in order that we might strengthen the basic land-holding system which has been the foundation of our agricul tural develop ment in this prov ince , and indeed throughout the country .

One policy which was not being pursued which was in fact being reversed by the previous administrat ion, members opposite are probably aware that we have re implemented a policy some time ago which al lowed for persons holding long-term leases on agricultural lands prior to the ls t of June , 197 7, to have the option to purchase those lands at an appraised market value , or to continue to lease them if that was the ir desire .

The terms under which the land would be made available for purch ase , of course , had a number of built-in protective devices to see that lands that were subject to perhaps exces sive erosion , or lands which the local government was not prepared to service , didn 't agree with the sale polic y , that we had built into the system a means of apply ing those sorts of checks . In addit ion, we have moved to all ow the purchase of commerc ial sites in north ern communities which previously had only been available on a lease basis.

It is our intention to provi de , or we are providing the opportunity for people to pur chase recreational lots in subdivisions outside of provinc ial parks , and indeed some remote commerc ial sites be available for purchase as we ll, providing that the neces sary surveys , etc. , can be carried out by the purchaser. MR . CHAIRMAN: (a )--pa ss. The Honourable Member for Ruperts land . MR . BOSTROM: Mr .

Chairman, I would like to ask the Minister , with respect to the sale of Crown lan ds , there is one aspect of Crown lands which was under some consideration for resolvement when we were in governm ent , that is , the LGD Crown lan ds. These were , as the Minister may be aware , lands that were adminis tered by the department , by the Crown Lands

Section , but were in actual fact lands that belonged to the LGDs in question, and some of the LGDs were applying to have these lands returned to their jurisdicti on . Some were requesting that the lands be put up for lease and/or sale . Some were already being leased by the depart ment , but some people were requesting purchase of them. I wonder if the Minister could give us a descrip tion of the status of those lands at this time , and what his department has done or is doing or planning to do to resolve that issue? MR . RANSOM: We are in the pro cess , Mr .

Chairm an , of transferring lands back to the LGDs , lands which were held in trust for the LGDs under a 1964 agree ment . We have at this point transferred several thousands of acres back and we are processing Orders-in-Council quite frequently as we turn lands back to indivi dual LGDs at their reque st . MR . CHAIRM AN: The Honourable Member for St . Johns . - 2049 -

Monday , 7 April , 1980 MR . CHERNIACK : Mr . Chairman , I wonder if I could ju st revert back to the discussion that took place this afternoon dealing with that burnt-down hotel that the government took over, to find out whether it is under this item that we would discuss with the Minister the disposition of that parcel which they acquir ed , as he described this af ternoon. Now , I don 't want to shuffle around too much , but I' d like to know from the Minister , is this where we should be discussing the expected disposition? MR . CHAIRMAN: Allow the Honourable Minister to answer . The Honourable Minister. MR .

RANSOM: No , Mr . Chairman. MR . CHAIRM AN : No . The Honourable Member for St . Johns . MR . CHERNIACK : That 's helpf ul , Mr . Chairm an. Would the Minister indicate just where he is prepared to discuss that. MR . RAN SOM : We ll, it should originally have been raised with the Parks item , Mr . Chairman . We passed that . It was then raised under the Capital item . I assume that the next time when it would be discussed would be under the Min ister 's Sala ry . MR . CHAIRM AN: The Honourable Minister has made a commitment to supply some answers , and they would come under Minister 's Salary .

The Honourble Member for St . Johns. MR . CHERNIACK : Mr . Chairm an, you said that it would come under Minister 's Salary . Has the Minister committed himself to producing the material before we deal with his salary? MR . RANSOM: Yes , Mr . Chairm an , I think I' ve said perhaps four times now that I' m prepared to get a detai led amount of background informat ion and make it available to the members opposite . MR . CHAIRM AN: I would say to the Honourable Minister that I might have made a remark that was confusing when I said that the answers would come under Minister 's Salary .

The Honourable Minister has just made his remarks . The Honourable Member for St . Johns. MR . CHERNIACK : Yes , Mr . Chairman , and al though he did not say it , I assume he means that it 'll be made available to us for review before we deal with his salary . I think I have a right to as sume that . If I' m wrong , he 'll correct me . Mr . Chairman, I' m not talking about the acqu isition of the parcel which he has agreed to file with us , the particulars of which he 'll file with us. I' m not talking about the disposition of that .

And it seems to me it comes under lands , the administration of all Crown lan ds , and he 's al ready talked about the sale and lease of Crown lan ds . Now , this is a parcel which the Crown has acquir ed, and we will yet get informa tion and discuss the manner of acqu isition. I' m not talking about the intention as to disposition and I don 't know of any place other than administration of all Crown lands and the disposition of it, that it seems to me it comes in right here , certainly not under his salary . MR . RANSOM: The quest ion which we were discussing previously , Mr . Chair man, was not one of land .

It was one of buildings. MR . CHERNIACK : We ll , Mr . Chairm an, if we 're going to get involved in this kind of a discussion , then I can debate that with the Minister , too . I wonder if he knows that the build ing that we 're talkin g about is situate on Crown land , and I want to know whether he 's going to deal with the Crown land or just with the building. Is he talking about selli ng the fire ruins of a building? Is that what he 's talking about , and therefore doesn 't call it Crown lands? Or is he talkin g - 2050 -

Monday , 1 Ap ril , 198 0 about the disposition of the land along with the building , or the building along with the land , either by way of lease or by way of sale? MR . RANSOM: I' m wondering , Mr . Chair man, at how many points throughout the Estimates are we going to deal with this item? MR . CHERNIACK : Mr . Chairman , I don 't know whether the Minister was ad dressin g you and ask ing for a respon se , or addressing me . If he wants a response from me , I would say that the Minister should supply us with the information under the relevant res olution.

I realize he may be not clear on just where it is that he is accounta ble , but I would say that we 're now dealing , I bel ieve , with the item involving the administration of Crown la nds. And I heard him say this after noon , loud and cl ear , that this building , this hotel , was on Crown lan ds .

And I am asking the Minister - I don't know why it should be so difficult for him to respond - whether or not there is any intention of disposing of that Crown land , that parcel or the buildings separately and therefore he doesn 't want to call it Crown Land but rather Crown building , and what is his reluc tance to tell us about the plans for disposition . Mr . Chairman , I think I · made it cl ear - he is going to tell us all about the acquisit ion - I am not ask ing about the acquisition , I am asking about the disposition of it. MR . RANSOM: Mr .

Chairman , if the honourable member had been present during the discussion of the parks item , he would have heard what action we were taking to call for proposals on how we would deal with the buil dings, and what sort of new facilities might be put in their pla ce . He should also be aware that lands that fall within the provincial park are not generally considered in the same category as Crown lands that fall outside the park , that Crown lands within a park cannot be sold because of the provisions in The Provincial Park Lands Ac t. MR . CHERNIAK : Mr .

Chairman, I would just point out that if the Minister had been prepared to give us the information at the time I was involved in asking questions , I would have been here to hear his rep ly. But fail ing that , it is not for him to decide when any member should be present in this House , and it is really a matter for him to justif y his Estimates . And if he refuses to answer the quest ion as to the intended disposition, then he has I suppose , yes , of course he has the right to ref use , and he is accountable to this committee for whether or not he is co-operat ive in respon se .

He said that there is the suggestion that there will be proposals request ed. In what way would there be this effort made to get proposals submitted, and what has the government or this Minister thought about the manner in which this proper ty is best improved and made available for the benefit of Manitobans? Is it that they are only asking for proposals? They did have a proposal from one Jarmoc on one occasion . Do they just sit back and wait for proposals to come in?

Or do they themselves make plans of any kind , saying , we would like to see this property developed in a certain way, and then on that basis , ask for propos als . But surely a person can 't make a proposal unless he had some idea as to the limitations or restrictions that the government has for the development of' Crown lands . As I say , if the Minister wants to go back and say , we ll , that was something he wanted to discuss in park lan ds , he has a right to refuse . Nobody can force him to answer a quest ion. MR . CHAIRM AN: (1 )--pas s. The Honourable Member for St. Johns. MR. CHERNIACK : Mr .

Chairman , I as sume by the fact that the Minister , al though present in the Committee , did not rise to respond , that he does indeed to refuse to deal with that at this stage . MR . CHAIRM AN: The Honourable Minister on a point of order . MR . RANSOM: It has always been my as sumption, Mr . Chairm an, that the Esti mates are set out in an itemized fashion so that we may go through them in some type of logical order , some type of logical fashion , and that the procedure is to go by those items rather than according to the convenient times for the members - 2051 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 198 0 oppos ite when they wish to ask quest ions. As it happen s, we went through the items , item by item , we dealt with the parks quest ion , there was some discussion of that particular topic , and I can refer the honourable member back to Hansard to see what questions were asked and what answers were given. If we are not to pro ceed in that kind of what would seem to be an orderly fa shion, Mr. Chairm an , then I fear that we are going to face a lot of difficu lties in trying to provide the information when it is requested. MR. CHERNIACK : Mr.

Chairman , I appreciate the Honourable Minister 's es ti mation of what was always his assumption. I would only have to tell him that experience has shown that his ass umption is not well founded. Regardle ss of that , I made the comment that I thought we were dealing with the Administration of Crown Land s, and I said it would appear from the failure of the Minister to rise to respond to my question that he is refusing to deal with this item at this time. My statement was correct , and the Minister 's point of order which , as you know, Mr.

Chairman , was not a point of order even though he was permitted to make his state ment at great length , that all he did then was to confirm my statement that he was not prepared to deal with this item at this time , which of course leaves it , Mr. Cha irman, to his Salary , because that is the only place that we can discuss his administration of his departmen t, in view of his failure to respond to my quest ion now. I don 't fau lt him. If he fe els that Parks was the one place that he wanted to discuss it , then that 1 s fine. He cannot be compelled to answer otherwise.

That 's an assumption he can make and accep t , that he is not bound to answer anythi ng. He is not here on that basis. I will read Hansard , but I have a feeling that I won 't read much more than what he said , "We are going to ask for proposals. 11 And the Member for Rupertsland has opened the quest ion as to the future policy or the announced policy of this government as to how it is going to deal with Crown lands. Now he make s some distinction. Am I to as sume that under this item deal ing with the disposit ion or leasing of Crown lan ds, that he is not discussing any land that is in provincial parks?

Do I a.lso as sume that the land we are referring to is clearly within the provincial parks and will be dealt with in a separate procedural way? Is that a �air quest ion that the Minister can respond to? MR. RANSOM : Lands within parks , Mr. Chairm an , are dealt with under provi sions of The Parklands Act. That Act does not all ow the sale of any lands within parks and therefore obviously it is impossible to dispose of land through that means , within a provincial park. Otherw ise , it is some form of lease. MR. CHERNIACK : Mr.

Chairman , I am just bound to point out to the Minister that leasing is a form of disposition. He may not be able to sell it outrig ht but he could certainly lease it for 99 years , I assume , under The Parks Ac t, and as I say , it is something that should have been discussed earl ier , so we will wait for his Salary. MR. CHAIRMAN: (1)- -pass - the Honourable Member for The Pas. MR. RONALD McBRYDE : Mr. Chairm an , I wonder if the Min ister could indicate where the Land Acqu isitions Branch ap pears. Are we in that

section now or is that in ••• ? MR. RANSOM: The Land Acq uisition Branch is not in this dep artme nt , Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Flin Flon. MR. THOMAS BARROW : Thank you , Mr. Chairman. Due to the fact that you are sel ling leased lots to cabin owners outside of par ks, my quest ion is how do you value these lo ts , by the ir size , locati on , whatever? MR. RANSOM: That will be done , Mr. Chairm an, by land apprai sers , accord ing to the system that land appraisers use to try to arrive at evaluations. I am not familiar with all the individual measurements that go into determining it but of - 2052 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril, 1980 course there are lands being evaluated all the time and it 's a pretty standard procedure . MR. BARRO W: Wel l, then , if I want to buy my lot , I get in touch with a land appr aiser . Where do I find him and who is he? MR . RANSOM: We simply ask peop le, Mr . Cha irman , to contact the Lan ds Branch when they have a piece of land that they feel they would lik e to purchase and if it would be el igible under the policies . Then they would be contacted with the details .

There are some situa tions , I' m sure , that the people will prefer to continue leas ing rather than to take the route of purch ase . They would have that option. MR . CHAIRMAN : To the Honourable Minister : Would this be the same discus sion as what we had under Parks previously? --( Interj ections)- - I just wanted to find out for my own information. The Honourable Member for The Pa s. MR . BARROW : I see . The Minister referred me here for this questi on , Mr . Chairm an. Then the Minister can 't give me any direct ion of how these lots are valu ed .

I mean , would you pay the same for a waterfront lot as one five blocks back? Would it go by size? MR . RANSOM: I think it stands to reason, Mr . Chairman , that those factors would be taken into consideration by an appr aiser , that a standard waterfront lot is worth more money than one that is farther back , given tha t other factors are the same , access and that sort of thing . There may be other factors that would enter into it. In some cases , it could make a back tier lot more valuable than a lakefront lo t. But the evaluations are carried out by qualified apprai sers. MR .

CHAIRMAN: (1 )- -pass; (2 )- -pass - the Honourable Member for Rup ertsl and . MR . BOSTROM : On this

section , the Minister did give us some general com ments regardin g a policy of the government regarding the sale or lease of Crown lan ds. On at least one of those us es , the residential use , we were proceeding to adopt that policy and in fact were practising the sale of resi dential land where it applied to MHRC housing in northern Manitoba and other areas where people required ac tual owner ship of the land in order to apply for mortgage financing because of the CMHC requirement s.

I would ask the Minister , in that speci fic area , what the stat us is of the land in the Great Falls area , which was in the process of being surveyed at the time of the change of government and it was proposed that that land be of fered for sale to the residents of the area . From my informat ion, people in that ar ea are still waiting for the government to take ac tion on that. I wonder if the Min ister could indicate what is the reason for the holdup in that ar ea. MR . RANSOM: I am advised that any holdups are not a matter of policy , Mr .

Chairman, but there apparently are some environmental concerns and some discus sions under way with the Local Government District about servicing. The policy as such continues in place and we , from time to time on a fairly frequent basis, transfer lots under that policy , or sell lo ts. MR . BOSTROM : In the area of leasin g as we ll , Mr . Chairman, I would like to ask the Minister what his policy is with respect to the leasin g and/or otherwise disposing of the wild rice concessions in the province of Manitoba? MR .

RAN SOM : Well , that 's a topic that we have had under discussion with a number of the individuals and groups involved in the rice industry . Generally , it would be our intention to move towards long-term leases with individuals or with corporations with indentifiable entities , and that 's essentially the way we 're moving . It 's only within the Whiteshell Park , in particular , but there may be some other situations as we ll where it 's not quite that simple because of other - 2053 -

Monday , 7 April , 1980 potention conflicting uses, and so there has to be some more ext ensive involvement and supervisions by the department . But , gener al ly, it 's a question of moving towards long-term leases , so that people have some security of tenure . MR . BOSTROM : I would ask the Minister what his intentions are with respect to the long-term leases which were made available to Indian bands in Northern Manitoba which gave them access to wild rice areas in the area that they tradi tionally harvest wild rice.

That is, as a general rule of thumb , when we were in government we used the trapping zones or trapline areas of a comm unity to be the basis of the economic or resource base of the community , and the wild rice re source in that area was assigned to the communities on a long-term basis by way of a lease . I wonder if the Minister can indicate if he 's intending to change that policy and to allocate those areas to individuals and corporat ions, or is he going to continue to make those areas available to the Indian people? MR.

RANS OM : We still have , I think , some 15 community leases that we 're involved in at this time . I think there were 14 last year , so there 's one ad ditional one there ; plus there were a number of leases that the Algonquin Company had held previously and they were able to transfer those to the new corpor ation , Manominiki Corporat ion, so that there were some 22 leases there , I believe .

In the long term , I think we have through discussions with the native communities , and the individuals and corporations involved , we would prefer to work towards having some kind of recognizable legal ent ity holding the leases. MR . BOSTROM : In the case of the Indian bands , does the Minister not rec og nize the Indian bands as a legal entity to which the government can relate in terms of leasing? MR . RANSOM: Well , it depends whether they choose to operate through a structure that 's established for that purpose , or whether they 're operating as a band .

It 's my understandin g that they 're simply operating as a band , that it does create some difficulties in terms of lease-holding. MR . BOSTROM: We ll, could the Minister indicate what those difficulties are and if he is attempting , in any way , to have his department work towards resolu tion of the difficulties that may aris e? And if he bel ieves that some other sys tem will be superior to th at , I would ask him to ind icate to us what he bel ieves to be a superior system . MR . RANSOM I think I indicated , Mr .

Chairm an , we ' re continuing to have discussions with the bands and , as we ll , with othe r users of wild rice and it 's simply our hope and intention that the wild rice resource would be utilized to the fullest extent possible . One of the best ways seemingly to bring that about is to have individual people directl y involved in the harv est. Now we recogni ze , of cour se , that has not been the traditional fashion that Indian people have used to handle the harvest of rice , so we don't intend to simply move in and change that system overnight .

But in the long term - the member asked what 's a better system - I think a system where individual people or owners of a corporation have direct intere sts in that corpor atio n . I think that proves to be a better system in terms of produc tion. MR. BOSTROM : In view of the Minister 's enthusiasm for individuals and individual corporatio ns, can the Minister indicate if he will give a priority to the leasing of tradit ional wild rice areas . These are natural wild rice stands. They are not stands which require a great deal of work .

They have been growing for centuries in their present state with very li ttle , if any , man-made improve ment of any kind . I' m asking the Min ister if he will give priority to Indian people in the leasing of these areas . And I ask this because , Mr . Chairm an , there is no other wild resource which is as cl osely related to the Indian people and their cult ure than the wild rice . Traditionally , they have been the only harvest ers of the wild rice resour ce ; and they have harves ted the resource as a part of their economic livelihood , as we ll , it has served a social and cul tural purp ose .

It has brought peo ple together during that harve sting period of the year when they - 2054 -

Monday, 7 Ap ril , 1980 would gather at the lake , whether it is the Whiteshell or in some of the northern lakes and would work together as a group in a social or cultural setting in the harvest of wild rice for a period of two to three to six weeks in the late summer and early fall of each year . In recent years , Mr . Chairman , private businessmen have noticed the lucrative return that is possible from the wild rice resour ce ; a very fast return that can be achieved with a minimum of labour and a maximum return on capital investment .

If one were to put a machine picker in a wild rice lake , where there 's a natural stand of wild rice, it 's not unusual for a person to make several hundreds of dollars per day harvesting wild rice . The native people of Manitoba tend to look on that resource as one of the last areas that they still have access to , to make an income for themselves and their families, and I must say they resent the fact that the government seems to be moving in the area of leasing some of these prime wild rice areas to individuals who forme rly were not involved in the wild rice business .

I will not mention any particular names here , but I think this is an impression that the native people have of this governm ent, that this government has an intention - if it has not al ready done so - to move towards the leasing of these wild rice areas . And they 're traditional · wild rice are as . They 're not something that requires a great deal of improvem ent . They 're not farms that need cultivating and planting and a lot of preparatory work to make a good harv est .

They 're areas where the wild rice grows in a natural way , and one can go in in a short period of time in the fall of the year and make a very good income from harv esting the wild rice. I would ask the Minister if he could answer those fears and concerns of the native people that they have of the direction in which his government appears to be moving . I would appreciate him tel ling me that I' m wrong , and the people that have talked to me are wrong in that regard , and that the government is not moving in this direction.

I would expect that they would be better advised to be moving in the directi on of making the wild rice resource more available to the Indian people and give them some assi stance in being able to make a reasonable income from this resour ce s, rather than taking that resource away from them as we ll as other re sources that they 've taken away and given to Ab itibi and whoever els e may be operating in northern Manitoba . I would ask the Minister to answer that speci fic concern . MR . RANS OM : There have been no resources taken away from any native peop le , Mr.

Chairman, contrary to the allegations of the honourable membe r. And it certa inly is not the intention to do that in this case . But it is the inten tion to provide the native local communities with the first opportunity to utiliz e the resources that are available in their area . That does not mean though , in the long run , that it 's possible for them to tie up the resource without utiliz ing it. I don't think that 's in the interest of Manitobans generally , that there be a resource in the province that could be utilized and not be utiliz ed .

So when I say that the first opportunity is to be made available to the native groups and to the local communities, we also have to recognize that there will of necessity be some performance criteria involved as wel l. But I think that it 's fair to say that at the moment that the traditional wild rice areas are already under the control of the community groups or the native groups of rice harv esters . MR . CHAIRMAN: (1 )--p ass . The Honourble Member for The Pa s. MR . McBRYDE : Mr.

Cha irpers on , while we 're talkin g on wild rice I just want to remind the Minister that a number of people have been traditional harve sters of wild rice that are not immediately adja cent to the resource itself and it 's been a cultural pattern and a cultural habit for hundreds of years for people to move into the wild rice areas for the harvest season . As the Member for Rupertsland said , it 's been a social cultural occasion when people meet together with old friends. Mr .

Chairperson , I know that in a number of reserves that are presently in The Pas constituency, there are many people there who rely on the wild rice harvest for part of their income throughout the ye ar. Mr . Chairm an , I just want to remind the Minister of that in all ocating this resour ce . As I understand the Ministe r, he 's not making any immediate changes in alloc ation, al though , if I understand the - 2055 -

Monday , 7 Ap ril , 1980 Minister corre ctl y , he 's hoping that in the long run he might be able to make some change in how these licences are all ocated . While I'm on my feet , Mr . Chairpers on , I would just hope that the Minister would - if and when he decides to make changes in the licensing system - that he would use a li ttle bit diff erent approach than he used with announcing the fishing regulations by letter to fisher men and then having to change his mind when the pressure came on him in terms of that particular pol icy of that particular pro gram . So those are my comments on wild rice , Mr .

Chairman. MR . CHAIRMAN : (1)- -pass ; (2) --pass . The Honourable Member for Rupertsland . MR . BOSTROM: Mr . Chairm an , before we leave this general

section , I wanted to ask some general quest ions before we get into the specif ic areas under consi deration here . With respect to the overall administration of the Crown Lands Branch I would wonder if the Minister could indicate if they are moving towards having a central Crown lands re gistr y for all Crown lands in the province of Mani toba , and if that is going to be on a computerized system. MR . RANSOM : There are really two parts to that question , Mr . Chairman, the automated registry and the central Crown lands regis try .

In the immediate future it is our intention to work towards an automated re gistry for the lands that are direc tly under the administration of this department . There are other Crown lan ds , of cour se , that ar e held by other agenc ies of government and even other branches and other departments that don't fa ll within our regis try . But in the long term we would have to move towards having that one central area where it 's possible to get information on any and all pieces of land held by government and its agenc ies.

But in the immediate future we are simply working on the automation of the system that we have now because , you may not be awa re , Mr . Chairman , that it 's rather an outdated system where there is only a single entry avail able . It 's quite time consuming and laborious in making I believe some 25 ,000 entries a year by hand , and that security could be a problem with that kind of system. MR . BOSTROM : Before we leave this

section , Mr. Chairm an , I'd like to make so�e com�ents regarding general administration of the Lands Branc h.

It 's one that relates to ',the Honourble Minister Is comment . - "That no resour ces have been taken away from people ." It certainly may not be directly re lated to this sec tion, but it certainly relates to a lar ge area of Crown land when one considers the Ab itibi agreem ent , which this government signed , which certai nly took away a large chunk of resources from the ef fective control of the people that live in the area , and that area extends from the Winnipeg River north almost to Popular River on the east side of Lake Winnipeg .

Those resources are now ef fectively controlled com pletely by the Abitibi Paper Company and the people there can 't even go to their own government to request cutting perm its . They must go hat in hand to the com pany . And that 's a result of Progressive Conserva tive pol icy . With respect to the wild rice resour ce , one finds reports coming from the out ly ing areas that certain wild rice lakes have been leased by this government to people that have not traditionally been involved in the wild rice harvesting busi ness.

I would ask the Minister is he is not aware of those leases having been awar ded , that he make himself aware of that and check into the policy to ensure that the policy that he has outl ined to us is ac tually being fol lowed by the department , because there are reports of individuals who are involved in other kinds of businesses - garages and lumber yar ds , and so on - that have app lied for and received wild rice leases on the east side of Lake Winnipeg. These are non native people . And , Mr .

Chair man, I indicated to the Minister that I hoped he would continue the policy of making those wild rice resources available on a first priority basis to the native people that live in the area . He indicated that is the policy they are followi ng . Now, in at lea st those cases that I am referring to , certa inly it has not been made aware to me and to the people that informed me , that these lakes were poste d, so to spe ak, to make people aware that they were available for lease bef ore they were , in fact , leas ed .

So , I would ask the Min ister , if he is not aware of those cases , to check into it and to ensure that his - 2056 -

Monday , 7 Apri l, 198 0 wild rice policy as stated to the House here is being fol lowed by the people tha t are administering it. MR . RANSOM: We ll , I' m not familiar with the situation that he is referring to , Mr . Chairm an , but I would have to draw a distinction, as he did , between traditional, what might be called tradit ional areas , and areas where culture of wild rice might be applied . And I don 't believe I said anywhere that there would be any exclusive hold on the industry generally for native gro ups .

It would not surprise me that other people , be they garage owners or woodcutters or far mers , that might hold lease s. That in itself doesn 't surprise me . I should als o point out to the honourable member that it certainly should not be the case that any individual has to go cap in hand , as he says , to Abitibi Paper Company in order to acquire some cutting right s, and no doubt we 'll get into this in more detail in the forestry operation . They have the right to approach the department with grievances if, in fact , it 's necessary to approach a company cap in hand , as he says. MR . CHAIRMAN: (2)- -pass .

The Honourable Member for The Pas . MR . McBRYDE : Yes , Mr . Chairpers on , in the Minister 's Report , it mentions the acquiring of land for the use of other departments , and I wonder if he could give us some idea of the - and it mentions specifically that the requests were made by the Departments of Highways , Northern Affai rs , Municipal and Urban Affairs - I wonder if he could just give us some idea of the kind of acqu isitions that this

section would be looking after for the Department of Highways and for the Department of Northern Aff airs . MR . RANSOM: We don 't acquire lan ds, as I underst and it , for other depart ments , Mr . Chairman. Perhaps if the honourable member could refer me to the item he is speaking about , I can perhaps give a better explanation. MR . McBRYDE : Yes , Mr . Chairpers on , I am referring to page 75 of the Annual Report of the Department of Mines , Natural Resources and Environment for the year ending Ma rch 3lst , 19 79 . The paragraph says , "Re que sts for surface leases con tinue to be filed by Crown lands

section , which also administered agreements with Ducks Unlimited Canada . Other provincial departments or agency required land for public purposes such as provincial parks , recreat ional housing subdivisions, public roa ds, municipal garbage dumps , transmission lines , gas pipe lines , and underground cables for Manitoba Telep hone System , requests were made by the Department of Highways and Northern Aff airs , Municipal Aff airs and Urban Affair s, as we ll as the Parks Division , Manitoba Hydro and Manitoba Telephone System ." And , Mr .

Chairman , I am not sure then exac tly what that is referring to ; whether it 's the permit to use the land , Crown land , or whether it 's for surveys for these other departments - if the Minister could clarify that further pleas e. MR . RANSOM: It 's already Crown land , Mr . Chairman , and it 's being provided to the other Crown users by some means of reserv ation . MR . Mc BRYDE : Yes , Mr . Chairman , then my origi nal que stion would apply . I wonder if the Minister could give us some indication of the kind of lands that the department would permit the Department of Highways and Northern Affairs to use .

What is this

section referrin g to then? MR . RANSOM: Mr . Chairman , that 's either a specif ic questi on , I assume , asking for a report on lands that actually have been made avail able , or els e a very general one saying under what circumstances would they be made ava ilable . And if it 's the general one , then it's hard to anticipate but if Highways had .•. obviously they were going to be building a road and needed to build it on Crown land and needed a reservation on the land , then they would get it. And I suppose that other agencies might require it as wel l.

If Parks were proposing to designate a new park land , and it would have to be other users of Crown lands taken into consideration before that des ignation was mad e, and the Crown lands branch would be brought into it to determine , for exam ple , what other reservations - 2057 -

Monday , 7 Apri l, 1980 might have been placed on that land by other users , so that it would serve essen tially as a clear ing house to facilitate the Crown agency getting the use that they wanted . MR . CHAIRM AN: (1 )- -pass. The Honourable Member for The Pa s. MR . McBRYDE : Ye s, Mr . Chairpers on , what would be the procedure then for another department , let 's say Highway s, has a road that is going to cross Crown land as well as private land that they are acquirin g?

What is the procedure that they go through , and then what is the procedure that his dep artment goes through before the permission or before they are legally able to build a new road on Crown land? MR . RANSOM: Well , there is a process within the government whereby the interdep artmental planning board would look at that sort of thing to try and resolve the confl icts within the governm ent .

And in some cas es, of course , it would go further to the environmental impact asse ssment and review , depending on whether or not the pre liminary discussions with the interdep artmental planning board indicated that a furth er , more detailed asse ssment was req uired . MR . McBRYDE : Yes , Mr . Chairm an, I would like to underst and the procedure a littl e bit better . So the Department of Highways is going to put a road through . Do they then make a formal request to the interdepartmental land use committee?

If that committee says it looks all right with them , then it goes to the environ mental asse ssment people to look at? I would like to have an unders tanding of the process that 's necessary for this . MR .

RANSOM: • their application to the lands branch first of all , and then it would be considered by the interdepartmental planning board , and only in situations where that board dec ided that some further assess ment beyond that which is available through general internal discussions , where some additional informa tion had to be gathe red , then there might be an environmental assess ment and review process appli ed. MR. McBRYDE : Mr . Chairpers on , this

section is the one that allows , as I understand it from the Minister 's answer , that reserves be placed on certain land ; that is, if a department has a future use they might put a reser ve on that part icular piece of land so that it is not used for another purpose of Crown Land , and there was a problem. I think I have raised this with the Minister before , and I don 't think it is fully resolved yet , in terms of Manitoba Hydro reserves on Crown Land , the problem , Mr .

Chairpers on, being that Hydro would do a very rough estimate of some lands at some time or other they may have to change water level s, and just draw a line on the map to indicate that they would like those to be under Hydro reserve , those particular areas . There was no thorough surveying done and there was a real problem for many communities who happen to fall within that reserve because then they had trouble getting access to land because it was in a Hydro reserve .

There was also a problem of getting Hydro to pay for a detailed survey to determine elevations to decide which lands could be released from the Hydro reserve that Hydro request ed , a nd I wonder , Mr . Chairm an, if the Minister could fill us in in terms of what has happened with that particular situation . MR . RANSOM: Well , Mr .

Chairman , I think the honourable member re ally is referring to a general situation rather than a particular one , and it is a problem ·n that power reserv es, as initially appli ed before severance lines are arrived at are very general and cover thousands and thousands of acr es , and so it does place a restr_iction on potential develop ments that take place .

So what we have to do , I think, is try and deal with specific situations as they arise Those communities that w·r e already in an area before the power rese rve is applied then they have a different sort of status than people who are applying for a new use to take place within a power reserve . In some situations we have provided long-term leases , as last year, I be lieve , when we settled some of the land clai ms to do with the Grand Rapids Forebay at Easter ville . We provided the community with acc ess on a lease basis to get to the - 2058 -

Monday , 7 Ap ri l, 1980 water and to be able to construct build ings and docks , whatever was requir ed , but of course the Crown not being held responsible for what happened if the water was to rise within the limits that were set for the management of the forebay . That is a very general descr iption, if the honourable member has some spec ific situation that he would like to have us investigate , fine , I would be happy to look at that . MR . McBRYDE : Mr .

Ch airperson , my recollec tion was that there were a number of specif ic situations that were being dealt with in 1977 , the last time that I had anything to do with it . My reco mmenda tion was that unless Hydro was will ing to do the survey s, because Hydro was the one that wanted the reserve on it in the first p:ace , that the restrict ion should be lif ted . But the position that Hydro has taken is that the province , out of general revenue or throu gh the departmen ts , should pay for the surveys for their requirements in terms of putting a reserve on the land .

I wonder if the Minister could say what is the position at this time , in those cases where a survey is required that hadn 't been done before but the reason that the survey is required is very specifically to get elevations because of the Hydro reserve , and whose respons ibility that is now and what position the Minister is taking . MR. RANSOM : I would have to get specific information on that , M • Chairman, I can 't answer that just offhand . MR . McBRYDE : Mr . Chairpers on, it is my understandin g , and the Minister can correct me if I am incorrec t, that this is the

section that also deals with agree ments with Ducks Unlim ited . Mr . Chairm an , I wonder then, if that is the case , if the Minister could give us some understanding of how those agreements are reached at and not the specific but what is the general nature of the agreement and what is the abil ity of the prov ince once an agreement is signed if they become dissatisfied with the procedu re , with the work that Ducks Unlimited is doing. Then added to that , Mr. Chairm an, how does the Minister deal with spec ific concerns that I am sure have been expressed to him , th�t he is aware of?

The case I am thinking of is the Ducks Unlimited agreement near The Pas , and I am trying to remem· .e r the proper names , I think it 's in the Reed Lake area , I am not sure if it is part of the Saskeram or not , but there was an agreement there with Ducks Unlirr:::ted and the province . So I wonder if the Minister could tell us how the agreement comes to be arrived at , in a general way the nature of the agreem ent , and the· what is the abilit y of the province to change or to af fect what Ducks Unlimited does if they become dissatis fied with what they are doing. MR . RANSOM: I think, Mr .

Chairm an , that the areas in the agreements that the honourable member refers to probably are of some consider able standing , in terms of years , and I would have to refer to those spec ifically but I am sure that we could make copies of the agreements availab le , but , without having the agree ment in front of me , I would be certain that the agreement says that if the terms of the agreement are not adhered to then the agreement could be cancel led .

Now in situations where the terms of the agreement entered into are no longer judged to be good terms , then I am not certain what position the government would be put in, I assume it would be one of at tempting to negotiate some changes in terms .

We are looking now at an agreement and proceeding to develop an agreement dealing with the area east of The Pas and I know that has involved discussions with local people and with the native communities , and generally those people who have some interest in the resource . there , and we beli eve that the terms of the agreement are such that they would be met with general satisfac tion, but it will be quite a long-ter m agreem ent .

It 's a commitment to land use for that primary purpose and in order for Ducks Unlimited or any other agency to make the sort s of investments that are required to bring about the water management and hence the resource managem ent , it requires a substantially long-term agreement . MR . CHAIRMAN : (1 )- pass - the Honour&ble Member for The Pas . - 2059 -

Monday , 7 April , 1980 MR. McBRYDE : Mr . Chairman , I wonder if the Minister could give me a litt le bit more detail on the spec ific agreement that 's under negotiation at this time and the method for consulting and involving the various interested people in the area in terms of their input into the nature of that agreem ent . MR . RANSOM: Well , the agreement hasn 't been completed yet so I gue ss there are other steps that can still be taken , but it is my understanding that there have been discussions with resource users .

Now , I am not certain who specifically carried out those contacts and whether they were publicly -held meetings or whether they were privately-held meetings with band officers and that sort of thing . All I can give , the assurance at the moment is the assurance that has been given to me that there have in fact been consultations and some explanation of what the purpose of the agreement would be , that it would be a long-term commitment to managi' g in the area for waterfowl and for the other wildlif e resources that benefit from water management regimes that are good for water fowl .

I could get add itional information if you want the precise details of what types of meetings were held. MR . McBRYDE : Mr . Chairperson , I wonder if the Minister would do that because there are , that I am aware of, two Ducks Unlimited areas now , one east and one west of The Pas and one in an area that is somewhat margina lly affected by the Grand Rapids Foreba y between The Pas and Moose La ke. There has been some concerns that I have heard on that one , Mr .

Chairm an , but in the last three years , I have had nothing but complaints from both native people and sport smen in terms of the Ducks Unlimited management west of The Pa s. So , Mr . Chairm an , I would appreciate it very much if the Minister would get the information on the new agreement because there is quite an interest in the The Pas area on that subject. MR . RANSOM : Perh aps , Mr . Chairm an , when we come to the Wildl ife Bran ch , then we will see that we have some more information available at the time . That really would be an appropriate place to discuss it. MR . McBRYDE : Mr .

Chairm an , I would like to just state my general concern in terms of the province and the deal ings with Ducks Unlim ited . Ducks Unlimited , being basically American - financed by American wildlif e migratory bird hunters whose purpose is to come into Canada and to improve the breeding grounds to increase the number of ducks that are available to be hunted when they fly south.

Of course , the problem of governments is that the government is always wanting to do something to improvement the wild lif e situation and governm ents are al ways looking for new money , or money that they don't have to spend from their tax pay ers ' dollars to bring about improvem ents . But , Mr .

Chairm an , there is a real ques ti-n in my mind in terms of do we in fact get the real benefit to Manitoba and to Canada from some of these agreement s, from some of these pro jects , or is Canada just the base that bene fits people outside of Canada but , in order to have some money spent in our province, that we go ahead on the basis that it was going to b

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	31-4-31b
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	31st 4th hansardpdf 31b.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	84f05b0c8ab66fadb4ee7ee3bccf95de0985c86e

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