Manitoba Committee Hansard — 23 October 1979 (Public Expenditures Committee, Sitting 4, 31st Legislature, 3rd Session)

31-3-pe4

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

ISSN 0542-5492 Legislative Assembly of Manitoba STANDING COMMITTEE ON PRIVILEGES AND ELECTIONS Chairman Mr. J. Wally McKenzie Constituency of Roblin Tuesday, October 23, 1979 10:00 A.M. Office of the Queen's Printer for the Province of Manitoba

ime: 10 :00 a.m. Hearing Of The Standing Committee On Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 19 79 :HAIRMAN, Mr. J. Wally McKenzie. IR. CHAIRMAN: Committee will come to order and I'll call on Mr. Norm Harvey of the Manitoba ,ssociation of School Trustees. •R. ALLAN ROUSE: Good morning, gentlemen, my name is All an Rouse and I'm· the President f the Manitoba Association of School Trustees. I will present this brief on behalf of the trustees nd I will call, from time to time, my colleagues to speak on certain areas of this brief.

We have ,assed out for you a copy of the brief and we will add supplements as we come to those so you 1ill not have to take notes. IIR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Sir. I IIR. ROUSE: The Manitoba Association of School Trustees appr eciates this opportunity to comment I m the contents of Bills 22 and 23. Approxima tely 43 changes in Bill 22 from the present Public ichools Act have been identified by this Association. We will not be commenting on all of these, 1ut we do want to register our suppo rt for some and our opposition to others. We have got them r1 order if you are following them and we will deal with

Section 5(1) and the Transfer of • .ands. Our position is here the right of a council of a municipality to request a land transfer and have t considered by the Board of Reference has been deleted. We agree with this change. Land should lOt be trans ferred from one division to another for economic gain but should only be trans ferred I it is going to enhance the educational opportunities of the children affected. Therefore, we support his

section as proposed in Bill 22.

Section 5(4) - Appeals. The right of a council of a municipality to appeal the award of a Board >f Reference has also been removed and MAST agrees with this. Therefore, again, we support this :hange.

Section 22 - Qualifications of Trustees. The qualification "other British subject" has been deleted which means the right to be a trustee is extended only to Canadian citizens. The Local Authorities ::.ection Act provides that British subjects who became residents of Canada prior to January 1st, 1971 and ha ve conti nued to reside in Canada since that time are considered to be Canadian citizens. Ne agree with this change, the refore, we supp ort such change.

Section 25(5),

Section 29(1) - Commencement of term of office, and the First meeting.

Section 25(5) provides that a trus tee, duly elected on the 4th Wednesday in October, commences his term )f office 14 days later.

Section 29(1) states that the first meeting after a regular election must be r�eld not later than 14 days after the election. At the first meeting a chairman and vice-chairman are elected. There is a question about the legality of any decisions made at this first meeting if it is held before the term of office for new trustees commences 14 days after the election.

Section 25 (1) states that the old board is still in effect until the next one takes office which pre sumably is 14 days after the elect ion. We would suggest clarificat ion by adding at the end of

Section 25(5) the words, "or on the date of the first meeting, in accordance with

Section 29(1), whiche ver comes sooner". This is a clarification and amendment we would propose to Bill 22 and I would ask Norm Harvey, our Executiv e Director to highlight a little more in this section. Norm please. MR. NORM HARVEY: Mr. Chairman and gentlemen. MAST suppo rts the flexibility which is provided here in that a newly elected Board can meet any time between the day after the election and 14 days after, but it must meet within that 14 days. We support this. However, as was pointed out here

Section 25(5) states that the new Board shall not take office until 14 days after, so if the Board decide to hold a meeting within the 14 days it presumably would be with the old Board, 87

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 and the Act also provides that at that first meeting the Board shall elect a Chairman and Vice-Chairman. So either the old Board will elect the Cha irman and Vice-Chairman for the ne) ensuing year or the new Board will illegally meet and perhaps illegally elect a Chairman an1 Vice-Chairman. So we believe that our suggested amendment here would resolve tha problem. MR. ROUSE: Dealing with

Section 26(1)- Filling of Vacancies. We agree with the inclusion of thi

section in the Public Schools Act. Many people who needed to use this

section did not have 1 copy of the Municipal Act available. Therefore, we support this as proposed in Bill 22.

Section 29(3) - Tie Vote. We would request that the second line read, "determine by lot anc in a secret manner who shall cast the deciding ballot". In the interest of good harmonious relation: on the Board it is important that nobody knows who cast that deciding vote. We are, therefore requesting an amendment to this Bill 22. Now, to give you an example of what happened in my own school division last year, in Rive, East. Due to sickness we are running with a Board of Trustees with 8 people. When we got dowr to elect Chairmen of Standing Committees we had to follow the Public Schools Act and the Busines!

Administrator dipped into the hat and drew out a trustee. Obviously every body knew at this timE what that trustee had voted before so he was not going to change his vote, so right away, anc fortuna tely it didn't happen on our board, but you could see you could end up with two campf on a school board if there was dissatisfaction and that's what we want to prevent, and the refore that's why we request this amendment.

Section 32(1) - Rules of Procedure. We suppo rt the fact that school boards should operate under by-laws establishing rules of procedure for the conduct of school board meetings. Boards will have to be informed that the new Act has deleted the refere nce to quorum and that this will have to be covered now by board by-laws on meeting procedures. We support this amendment.

Section 32(2) and 32(3) - Reversal of Decisions. Clarification is needed of the definition of a "whole board". Does this mean all of the trustees to be elected in a divisio n? What if one or more trus tees resigns, is the balance to be considered the whole board? Also in this

section provision is made that in order to reverse a decision made by a board a notice in writing must be given from at least one meeting to another. What does the word "reverse" mean? We suggest it be replaced by "res cind". We also request that the words "or modify" be deleted. lt should not be necessary to go through this procedure just to amend a motion because most boards deal with Robert's Rules and they are self-sufficient. We would ask, th erefore, clarification and an amendment, and I would ask Norm Harvey again to highlight on this sectio n. Norm, please. MR.

HARVEY: The statements as outlined by President AI Rouse are fairly self-explanatory. The definition of a whole board is the important thing here. I think most people will know what "reverse a decision" means, however it seems to us that rescind is really what is being done here, you rescind a motion, and if, to take the extreme case, a board had nine members and two of them had moved out of the division and were no longer trustees, does "whole board" then mean seven or does it still mean nine? lt could be a rather important factor.

So I think the words "whole board" really need some clarification in the Act and also the other important thing is that the word "res cind" or rather "reverse" be changed to "resc ind". I think it is more meaningful.

Section 41(1) - Certain duties of school boards. The present Act contains a duty of school boards which we feel is very important and would ask that this be included in Bill 22. lt reads au follows and I quote: "Every school board shall determine the number, kind, grade, and description of schools to be established and maintained ". We request this amendment.

Section 41(1)(c) - Certain duties of school boards. This subsection makes reference to su bsection 54(4). We assume this is a typographical error and should make reference to 53(4). If we are right, we would simply ask for a correct ion, and I believe we are.

Section 41(5) - Special Programs. lt was agreed that MAST Executive should establish a special committee to study this section. We will give you a handout on our position on this. The handout has been given to you and I will read it.

Section 41(5). The Committee on Privileges and Elections will be receiving requests from many individuals and organizations to have the ph rase "as far as is possible and practicable in the circumstances" removed from this section. This would make it read similar to

Section 9(2) of Bill 58 which was passed by the Legislature in 1975 but has never been proclaimed. MAST agrees with the phi losophy contained in Bill 58 but has consistently been oppo sed to having it proclaimed until such time as the government has clarified how school boards would be reim bur sed for the costs which are now being paid by either the Department of Education or the Department of Health and Social Development. This problem has still not been clarified to the 88

Privi leges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 f school boards in this province. For this reason, MAST is in favour of the wording which now ppears in Bill 22. We would, however, suggest an amendment which would indicate who is !sponsible for the child if the school board decided that circumstances were such that it could ot assume responsibility, and also would provide for an appeal to the Minister in the event that dispute arose over the decision of the school board. We would appeal to the Minister in the event that a dispute arose over the decision of the school oard.

We would suggest that a new subsection be added immediately following 41(5) which would �ad as follows, and 1 quote: "Where a school board decides that circumstanc es are such as to make it impossible or np ractical to provide or make provision for a resident person who has the right to attend school nd requires a special program for his or her education, the Minister shall assume responsibility )r such person; and where a dispute arises over the decision of the school board, the Minister hall decide and his decision shall be final and binding." And I'm going to ask Mr.

Har vey to highlight a little more on this, please. IIR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, the important thing here is that no children who have a right to attend chool are left out, no children are ignored as a result of this. We believe that by incorporating he wording as appeared in the old Bill 58, simply making school boards responsible for the education 1f all children, this places a financial burden on school boards in the case of some children, and ve believe that the government is prepared to pay the additional costs to school boards to have hem responsible for providing or making provision for the education.

However, the way in which this is being done has not yet been resolved. We don't want any :hildren to be left in limbo so we're saying that if a board decides that it's impra ctical or impossible or it to accommodate one or more students in the divisio n, the Minister then would assume esponsibility. And if an appeal was made to the decision made by the board that it was impossible )r imp racticable for it to assume responsibility, if somebody wanted to appeal that they could go o the Minister, the Minister would then decide whether the board should do it or whether he or ;he would do it. III R. ROUSE:

Section 48(1)(o) - General Powers of school boards. MAST supports this

section which �utho rizes school boards to collect the net residual costs from parents of non-resident pupils. lt s important that the Minister "define net residual costs." We would suggest to you that this requires :1 clarification amendment. Mr. Har vey will highlight our position. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, the problem here is that each school board may calculate net residual cost in a different way. There is no stand ardized system of accounting yet within the school divisions of this province.

We believe that if there was a substand ardized system of accounting then it would · be a simple matter for each division to calculate residual costs which we assume to be those costs in addition to grants received, it would be a simple matter for each division to calculate those residual costs in the same manner. Tha t is not the case at the present time.

So we would suggest that somehow or another net residual costs be defined in the case of students who leave a division to go to another division for a course in which they cannot receive instruction in their own divisio n, the board is entitled to collect the residual cost and in that case, the Act spells out that if there is a question about the residual cost, the Minister shall decide and his decision shall be binding. In 48(1)(o), that provision is not there. Perhaps that would suffice, but we would prefer that the term "net residual cost" be defined so that it would be equitable in all divisio ns. MR. ROSCOE:

Section 48( 1) (x), General Powers of School Boards. The Manitoba Association of School Trus tees is anxious that The Public Schools Act be streamlined and updated in content and format in order to incr ease its accessibility to all people in general and to all persons within the education system in particular. The streamlining and updating must however, be proceeded with cautiously in order to ensure that no restrictions are placed upon the tru stees' ability to protect the public interest while discharging their duti es under the Act.

Therefore, we are asking and requesting that an amendment be to delete this and I would call upon my colleague, Mrs. Lam b. MRS. LOUISE LAMB: Mr. Chairperson and members of the Committee, MAST has a supplement to the brief at this point which I'll be referring to later on in my presenta tion. MR. CHAIRMAN: May we have your name again please? MRS. LAMB: Louise Lamb. 89

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you. Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MRS. LAMB: I'm wondering if a member of your staff could perhaps distribute th supplement? MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes. Proceed, Madam. MRS. LAMB: Thank you, I'm going to be reading from the original brief that you have and the I'll be moving on to the supplement. To continue from where Mr. Rouse left off, and I'm readin from the middle of page 3 of the original brief: Su bsection 48(1)(

x) reads: "Su bject to the regulations, a school board may notwi thstanding an other provision of this Act," and that ph rase is empha sized, "enter into agreements, collective c other wise, and make rules and pass by-laws concerning employer-employee relati onships."

Section 48 (1)(

x) makes collective bargaining the primary and transcending obligation of scho« boards. lt renders every aspect of education potentially dependent upon bargaining outcomes rathe than democratic control, because the "employer-employee relationship" can encompass what sha be taught (curr iculum); who shall be taught (class size, assig nment of pupils); who shall teach (issue of staffing and layoff); where teaching shall be performed (issues of transfer, physical workin conditions); when it shall be performed (allotment of teachers' time between preparation time an instructional time), as an example of tha t kind of issue and why it shall be perfo rmed, in othe words, educational policy and go goals.

While The Education Department Act and the regulations cover certain aspects of these issue� they do not begin to encompass the majority of them, or even all aspects of any one item. Ha ving established tha t the employer-emp loyee relationship in the educational sphen encompasses much more than monetary compensation, why do trus tees say that teacher collectiv1 bargaining that is virtually unlimited in scope is not protective of the public interest? In an enterp rise such as education, which is the fundamental cornerstone of our society, th1 public interest must be paramount.

In a democratic society, the public inte rest includes all legitimat• private inter ests. The pu blic interest is the sum of all private interest and must be higher than an« prior to any one such interest or any combination thereof. No private interest equals the publi« interest, for the pu blic interest is the inte rest of all. lt is the sum of private interests' wants anc needs. Unless negotiations in education are limited by definition to exclude the possibility of some private org anization's sharing or limiting the decision-making powers of public bodies, then the public interest is compromised.

Th.e Manitoba Teachers' Society and its member local associations are we submit, representa tive of a private interest, the welfare of teachers. Teachers' associations are not accountable to the public as school boards are.

The collective bargaining process under The Public Schools Act is designed, as is The Labou1 Relations Act, to create equals at the bargaining table, and where the parties cannot reach agreement, teachers can exercise what is, in effect , a veto power and force the issues in dispute before an arbitration board for binding resolution, and of course, an arbi tration board is no1 accountable to the public either.

As we've indicated, where a pri vate interest shares an equal voice with the public interest in determining matters of pu blic policy, or where tho se matters are dictated by an independent party, such as an arbi tration board, decision makers are no longer accountable to the public for their actions, and democratic control, we submit, is destroyed.

While it's true that certain aspects of teacher bargaining for example, matters of dir ect compensation are more fundamentally associated with teacher interests than with the public interest, the other aspects of teacher bargaining which are contempla ted by subsection 48(1)(x), in other words, the what, how, who, when and why of education, are surely of equal or higher importance to the pupils and the public. Accountabi lity must, therefore, be retained. Let's return to the specific wording of subsection 48(1)(x). lt has been suggested that the word "may" in that

section retains a discretion on the part of a board as to whether it will bargain any particular aspect of the employer-employee rela tionship, rather than creating a free-for-all in which teacher bargaining agents can advance any proposals at the table. We submit that that

interpretation is a fallacious one which ignores the thr eat to democratic control of education. Now I'm moving down to the middle paragraph. The rea sonable interp retation of subsection 48(1)(

x) and one which we submit a court would adopt, is that the

section is enabling, in other words,

whereas school boards may now perhaps assert that certain items are not bargainable in view of the paramount express and implied powers and duties set out in other sections of the Act, teachers will, under the proposed legislati on, be able to turn to this subsection 48(1)(

x) and state, 90

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 :>u're wrong. There are no restrictions on what you can bargain. The

section enables you to bargain nything relat ing to employer- employee rela tionships, notwithstanding anything else in the Act. You annat set your other duties, duties relat ing to the public interest, above your duty to bargain :>llectively with your employees. We submit that there is no need for subsection (1)(

x) in the new Public Schools Act, and perhaps - and I'll be moving on to that in the supplement, there is a need for another type of provision 1 the Act.

Part VIII of Bill 22 which is identical to

Part XVIII of the present legislation, preserves the right ) bargain, and I'm quoting from the Act, "terms or conditions of employment of the teachers, 1cluding provisions with reference to rates of pay". Teachers are thus enabled to bargain at least 1ose aspects of the educational enterprise which are more fundamentally the interests of teachers ather than of the public. The important question is whether they are unable to bargain more.

Where teacher interests trespass into areas which are of equal or higher interest to the public uch that the protection of the public interest must be the paramount concern of school boards hen boards must be able to turn to their larger public duties set out elsewhere in the Public Schools 1ct. Boards should be able to rely on those larger duti es as autho rity for refusing to share decisions elating to those duties with a private interest group such as teachers.

This does not mean that eachers cannot have an input into those larger decisions as teachers share with all citizens the ight to exercise their vote in school board elect ions. Teachers also have a strong provincial orga nization which does not hesitate to put its views >efore the public through the media. These means of influence are sufficient we submit. To give eachers a gr eater influence would be to violate the democratic principle of one person - one rote.

I am going to make a few additional comments to supplement the ideas in the brief, namely, hat there is a thr eat posed by open scope or unlimited collective bargaining rights, and that that hreat is posed to democratic control of our educational system. The second point I am going to dwell on is the uncertainties that we submit are inherent in he present public schools legislation, the uncertainties as to what teachers may bargain; and I am }Oing to deal with what MAST advocates be done about that uncertainty. First of all I want to stress that this is a real problem tha t is facing school boards now.

In fact )ne school division with the support of member boards of MAST has taken one aspect of the issue :o court. This action was taken in response to an arbitration award which ordered the school board :o bargain criteria for teacher layoffs with the local teacher association. The tr ustees felt tha t this )bligation imposed upon them by the Arbitration Board was an interference with their obligation to protect the public interest. Layoff of course has to do with the selection of teachers, in other Nords, who is going to remain in the classroom as enrolments decline.

The Manitoba Teachers' Society advocates strict seniority-based layoff, the trus tees feel that the discretion must remain · Nith them to retain the best teachers, not necessarily the most senior teachers. There are other issues faced by trus tees at the bargaining table including class size, what teachers shall teach what subjects and general teacher dut ies during the school day. These are the encroachments on that which I referred to earlier as the who, what, how, when and why of education.

Part of the problem is that collective bargaining with teachers is subject to a combination of circu mstances which makes it different from all other bargai ning situa tions. The operation of schools is a highly labour-intensi ve industry and the labour force consists mainly of teachers. Teaching is the central function of a school system and only teachers do the teach ing. Every activity in the school system, facilities, maintenance, transportation and administration is ancillary and carried on only to provide the environment in which teachi ng can take place.

Almost, without exception then, every decision taken by a school board or administrator to some degree effects the effective ness, convenience or comfort of the teacher's job. As a result conditions of work broadly understood include virtually everyt hing about a school system and its operation. We submit that to take the simplistic view that employees should be able to bargain conditions of work means that in the educational context teachers, either thems elves or through arb itration boards, can exercise the power of veto on every aspect of the educational enterp rise.

To preserve public control over education our legislation should, we submit, contain a clear and unequiv ocal statement of what should be bargained and what absolutely cannot be bargained. At this point I'd refer you to the supplement - and I'm read ing from the second paragraph. Indeed, we believe that a const ructive change to The Public Schools Act, in keeping with the protection of the public interest and the retention of local autonomy within the school system, would be the inclusion of a clear statement as to what issues would be bargainable.

The Education Act 1978 of Saskatche wan provides a useful model, we submit, and I have included an excerpt from that legislation which is attached to the supplementary brief. lt outlines those provisions which shall be bargained in Saskatchewan; it makes provision that providing the parties can agree they may 91

t"nvneges ana t:leCtlons Tuesday, October 23, 1979 negotiate other items; and finally, it contains a proscription on the last page, Su bsection 4 at th• top, as to what issues cannot be bargained. And now l;m m I'm moving back to the supplementary brief itself, the third para graph. What is important to note is that the Saskatchewan legislat ion sets out clearly that those matter: which must be bargained are unequivocally matters of compensation or related matters which ca1 be characterized as more fundame ntally associated with teacher int erests than with the publi1 interest.

The legislation provides a specific list of items which shall be bargained. And if you rete to the excerpt from the legislation, subsection 232(1)(

a) and subsection 232(2)(a), you will find 1 list of those items which it's manda tory to bargain; and those include items such as salaries administrative allowances, superannuation of teachers, group life, duration of the agreement, sicl leave and any matters ancillary or incidental to those issues which, of course, are fundamental!] compensation issues. Other issues which must be bargained include sabba tical leave , educationa leave, substitute salaries, pay periods, and special allowanc es.

The Saskatchewan legislation also provides that the parties can bargain additiona l matters i they agree to ngotia te them. In other words, one party cannot be forced to bargain beyond thE manda tory list of bargainable items. Also, and very importantly, despite this right to agree to bargair on additional items this right is limited by a specific proscription in the Education Act which states that no collective bargaining agreement shall contain terms regulating the selection of teachers. the duties of teachers, or the nature or quality of an instructional program.

And again I'd refer you to the last page of the supplementary brief, at the top of the page you'll see that very prosc ription, and I'm quoting, "No collective bargaining agreement shall contain terms regulating the selection of teachers, the administrativ e and instructional duties of teachers or the nature or quality of an instructional program. We would submit that this proscription ensures that educational issues, as opposed to teacher compensation issues, remain responsiv e to the public will. We propose that similar legislation be enacted as part of the Public Schools Act.

That completes the submission on Su bsection 48(1)(x). MR. CHAIRMAN: There was one document that you read from there, I don't think the members of the committee had a copy of it. Could you leave it with the Clerk and we could have copies made of it? MRS. LAMB: Yes, I can provide that . . MR. CHAIRMAN: And then we would return the original to you. MRS. LAMB: Okay. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you kindly. MRS. LAMB: Thank you Mr. Chairp erson. MR. ROUSE: We now go to the top of Page 6.

Section 48(7) - Group Life Insurance. MAST would suggest deleting the words "under the terms of any agreemen t". If these words were left in it would force school boards to enter into agreements with all employees, eVfm where none presently exist, in order to provide a group life insurance scheme for employees. This we would ask as an amendment and I would asl< Norm Ha rvey to highlight on that sect ion, plea se. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, we assume that there is a possibility that the word "agreement" might mean "collective agreeme nt".

School boards do not have collective agreements with all of their employees, and yet they may wish to contribu te towards a group life insurance policy for them. Ther efore, we are saying rem ove the reference to an agreement, just in case it does mean "collective agreemen t". If it doesn't mean collective .agr eement, if it simply means just a verbal agreement with non-teaching employees to share with them a group life insur ance policy, then there is no problem, but I think it could be interpr eted to mean "collective agreement". MR. ROUSE:

Section 57, Su bsection (1), (2), (3), (4) and (5) - Alteration of wards and number of trus tees. The wording of this

section is unclear. In Su bsection (1) a board is required (shall) pass a by-law in accordance with Su bsections (2)(3)(4) and (5). Su bsection (2) states that the board must act "in so far as it practicabl e". Su bsection (4) states that a board "may" take such acti on. as may be required to giv e effect to Su bsection (2). We would suggest that the word "shall" in Su bsection (1) should be changed to "may" in order to be consistent with the other 92

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 The idea of representat ion by population makes sense generally but it does present problems some school divisions. For example, Brandon School Division has a considerable rural area 1rrou nding the city. The division is divided into four wards with ten trustees. Ward 1, the City · Brandon, has approxima tely 22,000 electors who are represented by 7 trustees elected at large, · approxima tely 3,150 electors per trustee. Wards 2,3 and 4 have approxima tely 1,500 electors 1presented by 3 trustees or approxima tely 500 electors per trustee. If

section 57 were implemented f this division, the rural part of the division may be with out any trustee rep resentat ion. Other divisions have a similar situa tion, e.g. Transcona-S pringfield, but most of them are not f the same magnitude as Brandon. We would rec ommend that these Subsections be amended to allow for a continuing strong rural lpresen tation. I am going to ask at this time Roy White, my colleague, to highlight a little more of this sect ion. oy, please? JR.

ROY WHITE: Gentlemen, I think that the explanation is rather clear, uut I think that I want > just point out to you that it not only applies to Brandon and Transcona, but to almost every ivision with a considerable rural component. If you take a division with a large centre, and most f our divisions were planned around a town with a large population centre, you will have, where ou have representation of 11 trustees on the board, five or six of them coming from the large entre and the rest coming from the surroun ding area.

At the present time you have two or three coming from the large centre and the rest repres enting 1ards in the rural areas. Now this was done at the time that divisions were formed into divisions ,nd I suppose it was a bi of a carrot to say to them, well, you will continue to have representation 1 your district, or your school district or your area. But it is going to cause a great deal of difficulty, think.

So the principle is fine, we are not against representation by popula tion, but we think that some ormula has to be worked out or some discretion has to be given to the local board when they tpply this formula to rural divisions. III R. ROUSE:

Section 60, Subsection (2) - Agreement for other services. MAST has adopted the ollowing policy with respect to private schools. 1. That the Minister of Education develop criteria for private schools in Manitoba. 2. That all private schools now in operation or any additional private schools meet said criteria md be ap proved by the Minister of Education. 3. That teachers in private schools teaching the curriculum offered by the public schools have 1 valid tea ching certificate. 4.

That the program offered in private schools include a curriculum and a standard of education �omparable to that described by the Department of Education for the public schools. 5. That private school facilities be appr oved by the Public Health authorities and the Fire 0ommissioner. 6. That any funding of priv ate schools be by stated formula and by agreement between the priv ate school and the Minister of Educa tion.

We would like to point out that this policy suggests that the Minister of Educat ion should develop criteria for private schools and appr ove their establishment. lt also specifies that any public funding of private schools should be by formula and by agreement between the pri vate school and the Minister of Educa tion. The policy does not commit school boards one way or the other on the question of funding private schools with public money. lt does, however, say that school boards should not be required to appro ve wha tever funding the government decides to make.

We are suggest ing that an amendment be that this policy be implemented as an amendment to the proposed Bill and I would ask Mr. Ha rvey to highlight further on this area. Mr. Ha rvey, please. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, at the present time the only requirement to establish a private school is that the facilities meet the specificiation of the Fire Department and the Department of Health. MAST certainly is not speaking in opposition to the establishment of private schools.

Our concern is with the standard of education which is being maintained in the private schools and we would suggest that certainly the Minister should app rove the establishment of a private school. Also this app roval should be based on certain criteria that the private school must meet before being established. The second major factor here is that any funding tha t goes from the government to a private school should go dir ectly to the private school from the government and not be through an agreement between the private school and the school board. At the present time, as you are aware I am sure, 93

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 any funding to a private school must go to a school board, the school board must agree to collec that money for the priv ate school and then turn it over to the private school. At the same time the school board has no authority whatsoever over the standard of educatio being maintained in the pri vate school. Some school boards are sayi ng, "We cannot be accountabl to the public for the expenditure of that money which we are giving to the pri vate schools.

W cannot be accountable to our electorate for that money, therefore we are not going to spend i1 Ther efore we will not collect it and turn it over to the pri vate school". So we are saying that if the government, in its wisdom, sees fit to giv e money to priv ate school then it should be given directly to the priv ate school by the government and that school board should not be inv olved in this transac tion. MR. ROUSE:

Section 70 - Purchasing Procedu res. MAST in in agreement with the genera relaxation of the requirements with respect to purchasing. We would ask, however, that the won "emergency" be defined. So that would require an amendment.

Section 79 - Langua ges of Instruction. The parents of more and more childr en are asking schoo boards to institute programs which would use a language, other than English, as a language o instruction. Provision is made in this

section for the use of English or French and for any othe: language for pilot courses as determined by the Minister. MAST asks that the provisions in this

section be expanded to include the following and quote: 1. a definition of French language schools and French immersion schools. Mr. Chairman, WE expect this would include the 50-50 proposal. 2. a transportation policy that would provide accessibility to designa ted French language 01 immersion schools and to any other special pilot courses ap proved by the Minister. This could include Ukrainian and German, which are very strongly taught in my school division. 3. establishment of an appeal mechanism that would hear appeals and make rec ommendations in the settling of local disputes regarding French education. We would propose such an amendment.

Section 79(4) - Minister's discretion for fewer pupils - MAST is in general agreement with this subsection but if the Minister requires boards to make arrangements for the use of English or French as the language of instruction where there are fewer than 23 pupils, he should be required to pay the additiona l costs which would be incurred by the board. We would recommend an amendment accordingly. ection 79(9) - Composition of Languages of Instruction Advisory Committee - MAST suggests that a representative of the Manitoba Association of School Superint endents be a member of this committee.

The other educational organizations are represented and it would be advisable to have rep resentat ion of superintendents. We would ther efore request an amendment according ly.

Section 81 - Hours of instruction in religion - MAST is in agreement with the flexibility provided in this

section for the time of day when religion may be taught in the schools. lt should be amended, however, to provide a maximum of 2 % hours "per student" per week. And I'd like to ask my colleague, Mr. White, to highlight on this please. MR. ROY WHITE: I don't think it requi res too much clarification, but perhaps it is a littl e confusing. What we're saying is that this would give more flexibility to the school system on the times in which specific religions were giving instruction in the school. lt would n't be limited to the 2 % hours per school per week, but 2 % hours per student. MR. ROUSE:

Section 82 - Non-participation in instruction in religion - There is no provision for students over the age of majority being excused from instruction in religion. lt is probably assumed that these students can excuse thems elves. If this is the case, it should be spelled out similar to the wording of

Section 84(4). This would require a clarification amendment, Mr. Chairman.

Section 92 (1) and (2) - Teachers' Agreements - The main problem with these two subsections has been when employing substitute teachers. Norma lly substitut es are employed on a day-to-da y basis and no contract is signed. Just recently, a preli minary judgment of a court case indicated that, for the purp ose of determ ining tenure, a teacher is considered to be employed from the date of signing the contract. At this time, the full implications of this award are not entirely clear.

Obviously the intent of a two year probationary tea ching period is for the pu rpose of eval uating a teacher's performance in the classroom and this cannot be done if the teacher is not in the classroom. MAST would recommend that the Act be clarified to . exclude substitute teachers from signing cont racts and specify that the contra ct becomes effective on the teacher's first teaching day.

Section 92(5) - Action on Termination of an Agreement - Our concern with this

section arises 94

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 ut of lines 7 and 8 wherein it states, "and where the school board termi nates the agreement of teacher who has been employed by the school division for more than two school years, the following ause applies:" This sect ion dealing with teacher "tenure" would significantly alter the tenure provisions of the urr�nt Act. School boards use the two years provided by this

section to assess a teacher's ompatibil ity with the division and its objectives, as well as the individu al's abilit y to teach the rogram. The evalu ation can only be accomplished during actual teach ing time and over the years nmediately prec eding the granting of tenure.

The wording of Bill 22 would grant tenure to a teacher who had previously taught for one year 1 a division, left to travel, or to teach elsewhere, and who had returned and taught a second year. would also grant tenure to teachers who had been employed by the school board for two onsecutive school years but who have taken a significant portion of that time for one or even NO maternity leaves.

The teacher who has gained tenure and left the division many years earlier, 1ould also be given immediate tenure upon his or her return to the same school board years later. 'his provision could also include part ti ll)e or substitute teachers who are employed by the division rom time to time over a period of two years. The two year period provided for assessment of a teacher's suitability for permanent employment �ith a division is not designa ted for the benefit of the board, but for the protection of the public !ducational system and the benefit of the school childr en.

In view of the task delegated to trustees )y the Public chools Act to secure not merely a tea ching staff with some minimal level of competency, )Ut rather a staff which can offer the best avai lable level of teach ing skills, we strongly reco mmend hat the two year evalu ation period, and I emp hasize this, consist of two consecutive years of actual eaching time.

This can be accomplished by deleting the objectionable wording and replacing it with the allowing: and where the school board term inates a teacher's agreement that has been in effect for more han two consecutive years, and the teacher has taught the equiv alent of 400 paid days during :hat period, the following clauses apply: ection 92 (6) - Right of a teacher to recover sal ary - We request that this

section be amended )Y striking out the words "because of unlawful or impr oper termination of his agreement by the school board" and replacing them with the words, "as may be deter mined by a Board of Arbitration Jnder this

section ". We have an amendment here to be substituted. Would you distribute it, please.

Section 92(6) - Right of a teacher to recover salary. Our comments on this

section would require amendments on sections 92(5)(

d) and 92(5) (e). We would suggest that 92(5)(

d) be amended to read as follows: The issue before the Arbitration Board shall be whether or not the reason given by the school board for terminating the agreement constitutes cause for terminating the agreement, and if the Arbitration Board determines that the reasons giv en do not constitute cause for termination, the 1'\rbitration Board may substitute suchtther penalty or remedy, in lieu of termination, as the Arbitration Board deems just and rea sonable in the circums tances. We would suggest that 92(5)(

e) be amended to read as follows: Where, after the completion of hearings, the Arbitration Board finds that the reason given for terminating the agreement does not constitute cause for terminating the agreement, or for any other dete rmina tion made under clause (d), it shall dir ect the agreement be continued in force and effect and subject to appeal as provided in the Arbitration Act, the decision and direction of the Arbitration Board is binding upon the parties. I woul ask my colleague, Roy White, to comment on this. MR.

ROY WHITE: Just a word about 92(5) if I may before I comment on 92(6), if you adopt our suggested change, it would require the new form 2, clause 6 to be amended. Regard ing 92(6) - The right of a teacher to recover salary- the reason we are asking for the change in

Section 92(6) is that in the event that a teacher has any salary or other remuneration due to him as a result of the arbitration decision, the school division should be able to show that the teacher could have reduced his losses in wages by seeking or taking employment pending, during or up to the day the arbitration board makes its decision. This is not inconsistent with other labour legislation in the province, namely, The Labour Relat ions Act,

Section 69(6). There are two immediate examples that come to mind in this and one, a present case before an arbitration board, the teachers worked in the mines and has earned income. His income in the mines could be estimated at about $15,000 a year or $60,000.00. We say the arbitration board should take into account those moneys that he has earned at the other job. Under the present legislation, if he is to be reinstated, he would then get that moneys plus the other moneys he would haveeearned if his contract had been in force in effect, which would be approxima tely $72,000, 95

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 which would be a total of $132,000 that employee would get for four years of work, or out of work as the case may be. In support of our submissions for

Section 95 and 96 I would quote from a recent arbitratior award: "He re it might be observed that members of this Board of Arbitration, like members of simila1 boards, have occasion to regret the nature of the decision entrus ted to them by the Public School! Act. "U nder most other arbitral modes of dealing with the question of employee discharge, a boarc of arbitration has at its disposal, a more varied armoury of potential dispositions.

An empl oyee who has been less than satisfactory and has been discharged may sometimes be found entitlec to reinstatement, but penalized by the loss of pay as a mode of discipline less severe than discharge. "F urther, such an employee is expected to mitiga te his loss and the board is entitled to take into consideration what efforts have been expanded in that regard and what results have flowed from such efforts. "Alternatively, an employee may be awarded several months pay but not reinstated.

Only under the present Act is the board confronted with a flat decision involving only the upholding or reversal of a termination. This either/or approach can create real difficulties for the parties. "I n a case such as the present, an order reje cting cause for dismissal must result in reinstatement of the teacher even although the next school year is more than half completed." Thank you. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Wh iteway, would you table a copy of that document to the Clerk and then we could have copies made for the committee. MR. WHITEWAY: Certainly. Cer tainly, Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you. MR.

ROUSE: Just for the record, Mr. Chairman. I should have properl y introduced the last speaker. His name is Ray Whit eway and he is the Director of Economic and Personal Service for the Manitoba Association of School Trustees.

Section 93 - Sick Leave. MAST is in agreement with the principle contained in this section, that sick leave is earned. There is, however, a need to specify in the Act the fact that a teacher's accumulated sick leave is reduced by each day a teacher is sick. Suppose a teacher has accumulated 75 days of sick leave, teaches another nine days, and then is sick for one day. One might interpret the Act to mean that the additional nine days of teaching entitles the teacher to the one-day sick leave and therefore the 75 days should remain untouched.

We would submit that it should be reduced to 74 days and this should be spelled out in the Act and we would therefore request an amendment accord ingly. I would ask Mr. Ha rvey to highlight on this. Norm, please? MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, Bill 22 increases the maximum entitlement for teachers' sick leave to 75 days, from the 60 days in. the present Act. MAST is certainly not questioning that. School boards in most cases have negotiated beyond the 60 days anyway. So we are in agreement with the entitlement - Teachers' Sick Leave entitlement - being incmased to 75 days.

We are also very much in agreement with the clarifica tion in Bill 2� of the fact that sick leave is something which is earned as a result of services rendered. However, our only concern with this

section is the fact that it is not clear, it is not spelled out in the Act, that when a teacher has accumulated an entitlement of 75 days sick leave and takes one or more days sick leave, it's not clear tha t the 75 days is reduced by the number of sick leave days taken. We think that this should be clarified and then the resu mption of teaching would again accumulate the entitlement up to the 75 days again. MR. ROUSE:

Section 96 - Duties of a Teacher. We urge that the following be added to the list of Duties of Teachers: (

a) That the right of the Board of Trustees to seek division property from the teacher's possession; (

b) The right of the Superintendent to seek and receive information connected with the operation of the schools from any teacher; (

c) The duty of a teacher to keep and supply all records or reports as required either by regulations or the school board; (

d) To care appropria tely for libra ry materials and textbooks. 96

rnvm::t gll:f5 i:IIIU Clll:ft;; IIUJ15 Tuesday, October 23, 1979 We would request an amendment, and this would be an addition, and I would like to ask Roy 'hite, the Director of Education and Communications for MAST to speak on this. Roy, ease? IR. ROY WHITE: Gentlemen, I would like to just point out to the committee that these are in 1e present Act, and had they not been in the present Act we probably wouldn't ask for them being eluded. But when you remove right or duties, then there's some quest ion about whether or not 1ose are really duties.

I don't think anyone would argue, teachers or you people, tha t the board ouldn't have the right to seek division prop erty from a teacher's possession or the right of a Jperintendent to seek information, etc., etc. But we think that by leaving this in the Act we may rev ent litigation over - future litigation - over duties of teachers or boards may be forced to o to litigation where before it was clearly stated out under the Duties of Teachers as in the previous .et. So we would, with that explana tion, request that these duties remain as they were in the present ,et. IR.

ROUSE: I'm sure, gentlemen, you'll be glad I'm getting to the last page. No. 10.

Section 191(1) and (4) - Appeal of division appor tionment and time for ap peal. The wording of these two subsections is not clear and is open to different interpretat ions. lt hould be clarified to clearly indicate that the Municipal Board cannot hear an appeal until 30 days 1fter the school board and affected municipalities have received notice that the appeal is being nade. We ther efore request, Mr. Chairman, an amendment clarificat ion, and I'd like Mr. Ha rvey to 1ighlight on this sect ion. Mr. Ha rvey , please. III R. HARVEY: Mr.

Chairman, as a result of a considerable number of phone calls, I am satisfied hat that meaning, which was enunciated by Mr. Rouse, is the meaning which is supposed to be :ontained in these two subsections. But it is absolutely unfair in my view, and this is the time when t should be clarified. If I read

Section 191(1), it says, "Where a foundation municipality, a foundation local government jistrict or a foundation special locality, is affected by an apportionment made in any year under his Part by a school division, it, or in the case of a foundation special locality, the Minister of 'Jorthern Affairs, may, on giving 30 days notice in writing to (a)the school board making or giving the apportionment, allocation, requirement or notice; :md (b)each foundation municipality, foundation local government district, foundation division and. foundation special locality that is affected by the apportionment; appeal against the apportionment to the Municipal Board.

So that provides for an appeal and it provides for the foundation municipality giving 30 days notice to the School Board and the other affected municipalities that the y're going to appeal.

Section 191(4) says, The Municipal Board shall not hear an appeal under this

section unless the notice required under subsect ion (1) is given within 30 days of giving the notice by the School Board. lt would take a Philadelphia lawyer really to interpret that section, Mr. Chairman, and we would suggest that it be clarified. MR. ROUSE:

Section 227, Empl oyees and pupils. MAST agrees with this section. No employee or pupil of a school division should be enti tled to serve as a trustee of tha t division. We suggest that this is an excellent amendment.

Section 245, Appointment of arbitrator to decide issues. MAST agrees with this method of settling issues, where school boards disag ree. We the refore support, Mr. Chairman.

Section 268(3) Complia nce with notice. MAST agrees with the incr ease to $500 of the maximum fine which may be imposed on a parent for failing to send his child to school. We wh olly support this, Mr. Chairman.

Section 271, Prosecution before a magistrate. MAST agrees with this section, having cases for failure to send a child to school heard by a provincial judge provides school boards and school attendance officers with much more support in their efforts to enforce compulsory school attendance. We support that, but I would suggest that

Section 271 would have more weight if it read "before a provi ncial judge" than a "mag istrate" because a magistrate could be a layman magistrate, am:! I would think that this could be a weakness. "Bill 23.

Section 3(1), Powers of the Minister. A clause should be added to this subsection to incorporate 97

PriVIleges ana Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 the following provisions with respect to the establishment and operatinn of private schools: 1. the Minister develop criteria and appro ve the establishment of all private schools, and 2. private schools must teach the curriculum as it is set out for public schools and the tchen who teach the curriculum must have a valid teaching certificate. We are propo sing, Mr. Chairman, that this amendment be added in Bill 23.

Section 3(1)(h), Powers of the Minister" and this applies to Bill 23 too. If this clause does not give the Minister the authority to enter into an agreement with a private school, then it should be amended to do so. The provi sion of grants to pri vate schools should be by agreement between the Minister and the private school. Mr. Chairman, I empha size to you and to the committee that the private schools are a matter between the government and those private schools and should not be entailed by the school boards of this province with the public school system. I would call upon Mr. Harvey to speak on this. MR.

HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, gentlemen, what we're asking here is that provision be made in Bill 23 to giv e the Minister the power to app rove the establishment of private schools and to require that private schools teach the curriculum and that the teachers who are teaching the curriculum be required to have a valid teaching certificate. Now, we're not saying that those teachers who are teaching subjects other than the required curriculum for public schools, we're not saying that those teachers must necessarily have a valid tea ching certificate.

If they're tea ching religion or some other subject which is not part of the regular school prescr ibed curriculum, then it's not necessary that they have a tea ching certificate. But if the y're tea ching the academic subjects, they should have. So I previously went over our policy with respect to private schools and all these amendments do is giv e the Minister the power to act on implementing our suggested policy. MR. ROUSE: Mr.

Chairman, in closing I would like to thank you, sir, and the mem bers of your committee for this opportunity for the Manitoba Association of School Trustees to be present in the best int erests of the children in this province to present our feelings on these amendments and if we can supply any suppl ementary mterial or answer any further quest ions to make your task easier, please do not hesitate to call upon us. Thank you very much. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Rouse, there will be some questions. Mr. Hanuschak. MR. BEN HANUSCHAK (Burrows): Mr. Chairman, to Mr. Rouse, with reference to your comments regarding

Section 227, that no employee or pupil of a school division should be entitl ed to serve as a trustee. What is your definition of "a pupil"? I don't believe that "pupil" is defined in the Act or in the Bill before us. MR. ROUSE: I'll let Mr. Harvey answ er that. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Ha rvey. MR. HARVEY: Mr.

Chairman, the Act provides that anybody running for the office of school trustee must be 18 years of age, and our thought here that "pupil" would be someone who is attending school, att ending a public school within the division, and if that student was 18 years of age they, under the Act at the present time would be entitl ed to run as a school trustee and serve as a school trustee in the same school division in which he or shH was a pupil in the public school. MR. HANUSCHAK: Mr. Ha rvey, would you include one enrolled on a part- time basis as being a pupil? MR. HARVEY: Mr.

Chairman, my thought on that would be "yes", as long as they were enrolled as a student in the public school. They would have a vested int erest. MR. HANUSCHAK: Would you include one enrolled in an even ing school taking practica lly a full year's program; might be taking about 60 or 70 percent of the year's work at even ing school? it was limited to two and a half hours per week per school. This would giv e the school board the authority to make variations in that as long as no student was giv en more than two and a half hours per week. MR.

HANUSCHAK: In determ ining the number of students that one would apply in this formula, do 1 take it then that you really mean the total enrolment of the school? In other words, if your 98

Privil eges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 chool has an enrolment of 1,000 students then what you are asking for is 2,500 student hours tf reli gious instruction per week. Now, if out of that 1,000 only half the students, half the enrolment, 1re obtaining religious instruction then, in fact, they would be enti tled to five hours per week of 1struc tion. IIR. WHITE: Well, what we are talking about here is a local control and local resp onsibility and 1oards are responsible bodies; it would take that into consideration. What we are saying is that he other one gives no flexibility wh atsoever.

You've taken it to the extreme where there could be, ts you say, that many hours of instruction, but only each student would only be in there for two tnd a half hours. III R. HANSUCHAK: Very well. III R. WHITE: lt's ready to provide flexibility and I think it does that. VIR. HANUSCHAK: Well then, as a final question on this point, are you asking for a degree of lexibility that in some way would allow you to provide more than two and a half hours. VIR. WHITE: No. VIR. HANUSCHAK: Very well. Now I wish to ask a number of questions, some related to the :ducation Administration Bill before us.

The first one - I would imagine, Mr. Chairman, that MAST, n perusing this bill, had noted that the Education Administrative Consultant or policeman, as he Nas described by a spokesman last night, will not be appointed by the Civil Service Commission nachinery but rather he will become a political appointee, an appointment made directly by Cabinet. fias MAST any concerns or apprehensions about this form of appointment of those who will be :>versee ing the education program and repor ting back to the Department of Education. MR. ROUSE: Well, Mr. Chairman, in answer to Mr.

Hanuschak, we always have concern, but I think it depends on who the government is of the day, and the government of that day is accountable to the people of this province for the education, so I would say it's in the hands of you people, Sir . MR. HANUSCHAK: Would MAST be prepared to offer us some guidelines or direction as to the type of person that you feel should be appointed to such a position, or should it be left wide open to Cabinet, and if Cabine t chooses to appoint defeated Conservative candida tes, so Jet it be. MR.

ROUSE: I would not want to get into the political aspect of it, but if somebody requests that the Manitoba Association of School Trustees to give an opinion, or in the best interests of the children of this province, we'd be glad to do so, but I would n't want to answer it on a political basis. MR. HANUSCHAK: Would you recommend that a person acting in this capacity should have an education background, some training and experience in education? MR. ROUSE: My personal opinion would be this would be an advantage, but not necessarily, but I think probably it would be a big advantage. MR.

HANUSCHAK: If the education administrative consultants will be the overseers or the policemen of our education program in Manitoba, does MAST have any concern about this, in effect, politicizing the school system, having the chief departmental officers out in the field being poliiical appoin tees? MR.

ROUSE: Well, I would have to see who those people are and see how it would work before I could answer a question like that. lt would be hypothetic al at this time and I would think that the government of the day, wh oever it is, would be very careful in who they assigned these duties to, and they would have to work with that particular school board or there would be problems. MR. HANUSCHAK: Does MAST endorse

Section 270 and 273 of the Public Schools Bill which giv es this political appointee the right to init iate, to seek information such as he considers necessary to assist him in carying out the provisions of this Act; and if one fails to provide such a politic al 99

Privi leges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 appointee the information he requests, that political appoin tee has the right to initia te action t put you in jail? MR. ROUSE: We have no objection to it but I don't define on the word "political appoin tee" MR. HANUSCHAK: Has MAST any comment to make on the apparent discrepancy between Sectio - I'm ref erring to the Education Administration Bill - and I'm looking at

Section 3, betwee1 Subsection (

f) and Subsection (

k) of the same Section, one which giv es the Minister the power t1 sell books and instructional materials to teachers, pupils or other persons, but definitely include pupil s; and (

k) which states that the Minister may purchase text books for free distribution thereo to pupils? ne which, in effect , seems to assure the provision of free textbooks to pupils and th1 other

section which gives the Minister the power to sell texbooks to pupil s. Is there not som1 discrepancy between the two? MR. ROUSE: Our position would be what the Public Schools Act says. lt states that free text book1 should be supplied to the students free, and tha t would be our position. MR. HANUSCHAK: I would like to refer you to

Section 4(1) (

e) of The Education Administratior Act to which the Minister had referred yesterday as being a slight change of something which wa! contained in the previous Act, and that is the addition of the word "public" to this

section whict removes all doubt that may have previously existed that the Minister seeks the right to charge or impose a user fee upon the pupils in our schools. Does MAST have any opinion to express or legislation opening the door to the imposition of a user fee on the pupils in our schools? MR. ROUSE: Mr. Chairman, I'll have Mr. Ha rvey reply to that question please. Mr. Ha rvey. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, through you to Mr. Hanuschak. Yes, I suppose that MAST would have a concern about the addition of the word "public" there, however, we're, so to speak, hanging our hat on provisions of The Public Schools Act

Section 75 of the Public Schools Act says: "Except as otherwise provided in this Act, no school board shall charge tuition fees". And the only other reference in The Public Schools Act to charging is

Section 48(1) which says, "a school board may charge fees for even ing schools, summer schools and day schools established for special purposes with the consent of the Minister and for special courses by agreement with the Minister." Those are the only conditions in the Public School Act that I am aware of wh ere a school board can charge fees. Otherwise, according to

Section 75, "no school board shall charge tuition fees," and I would think that that would have to be changed before the Minister could act on this particular

section of the Education Administration Act. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Hanuschak. MR. HANUSCHAK: But would you not agree, Mr. Ha rvey, that the Public Schools Act, if it governs the conduct of the operation of our schools insofar as it relates to the conduct and the duties of school trustees, teachers, pupils, taxpa yers and the like, insofar as legislation giving the Minister authority to do what he may or may not do, or chooses to do, then he comes under the provisions of The Education Administration Act? Ther efore I see no conflict here or no protection.

Would you not agree with me that there is none because all The Public Schools Act says is tha tyou may not charge a fee, but doesn't say that the Minister may not charge a fee. The Minister may charge a fee and appoint you as his agent to collect the fee. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Ha rvey. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, I'm afraid I can't comment any further on that because we have not discussed it. So I would renege on that one. MR. HANUSCHAK: Now, as you had indicated , Mr. Ha rvey , you are hanging your hat on a

section of The Public Schools Act with the hope that this

section of the bill will never come into being. If it does come into being, two parts to my question: Would it have any effect on the level of funding that you may hope to receive from the provincial purse, No. 1. No. 2, the second part of my question: I' d like to hear your comments on the effect that user fees may have on the quality of public school education in the sense that if a user fee is charged then it would narrow the gap between what one has to pay to attend a public school as opposed to a private a school, and hence may encourage siphoning off of students from the public school 100

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 rstem to the private school system, if the gap narrows. IR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, I really haven't thought of the fact instituting a user fee. I'm not Jre how the Minister can make a regulat ion requiring school boards to charge a user fee when says in The Public Schools Act that "a school board shall not charge tuition fees." Now, of course, lis may be looking away off into the future when there is a completely different system of financing :luca tion. Perhaps the time will come when it is somebody's opinion that public school education 1ould not be free.

I don't know. I would hate to see that time come. I would hope that it would lways be free for those students who have a right to attend school. But I am at a loss to under st andhhow you resolve what seems to be a discrepancy between 1ese two Acts. IR. HANUSCHAK: Perhaps Mr. Chairman, when we deal with this bill clause by clause, the Minister light be able to provide both of us with answers. One further question with respect to

Section 274 of The Public Schools Bill. You will note, Mr. touse, that this deals with the matter of appeal from any order, decision or dir ection of an education dministrative consultant, school attendance officer or principal of a school. Any person aggrie ved 1ereby may appeal ther efrom to the Minister. Have you any comment to express on this

section >ecause my concern is that there might be decisions made of a purely administrative nature that >erhaps could best be and should be resolved within the school division by the superintendent, 'Y the board, by who mever. But this

section seems to bypass the senior ad ministra tion, bypass the school board, and pecifically states that if an education administrative consultant or one of the others makes a lecision, someone is dissatisfied with it, then one ought not appeal to your superintendent, ought 10t appeal to you, but ought to appeal directly to the Minister. Have you any comment on hat? ,R. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Rouse. IIR. ROUSE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. While read ing

section 274, which I've read before, I still ake the position we, as trustees, have a certain res ponsibility and we are accountable to the atepayers, too. But the Minister has to be accountable to the people of the Province of Manitoba or the education.

So if any order, decision or dir ection cannot be dealt with a school board, then t's got to go to the Minister and he's got to be accountable, and that's the position I would take. f we can deal with it at a school board level, fine, but there are many things we cannot and ther efore, t must be the Minister of wh atever government of the day, has got to be held accountable to the · >eople of this province. lttR. HANUSCHAK: Yes. But, Mr. Chairman, if I may clarify my question. My concern is that this ;ection seems to shut the door to your super intendent's office, to your office.

If I have a child enrolled n your school and I am dissatisfied with a decision that a principal of my child's school made with ·espect to my child, then this

section specifi cally states that! cannot appeal to the assistant ;uperintendent or to the sup erintendent, but it says that, "any person aggrie ved by any order, :lecision or dir ection of an education administrative consultant, school attendance officer or princi pal :>f a school." Now, suppose 1 am the one who has ag reed by a decision or a dir ection of the principal :>f the school in which my child is enrolled. Now if I wish to appeal, it simply states tha t I may appeal if I choose to do so, but if I do, if. I do appeal, Mr.

Chairman, then the appeal cannot be to your superintendent, cannot be to you, but it must be to the Minister, and it might be a very trivial matter. MR. ROUSE: Mr. Hanuschak, to respond to you. That's your int erpretation of 274 but I don't interpret the same way as you you do. I don't see that there's anything in this Public Schools Act or this bill that I've seen that prevents a person from appealing to the school board. I read 274 as not "shall", "may" appeal. But I don't think that we have lost our jurisdiction in any way or form, that a person cannot come to that school board and appeal, in my opinion. MR.

HANUSCHAK: I'm glad, Mr. Chairman, that the President of MAST takes that int erpretation. But my concern is that one may have a chairman or a superintendent of a board who may not take that

interpretation, who may read

Section 274 to me and who may say, "L ook, Hanuschak, you want to appeal the princi pal's decision. Don't talk to me, don't talk to the Chairman of the board.

Section 274 says if you want to appeal go to the Minister." That is my concern. 101

Privi leges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MR. ROUSE: I can apprecia te your concern but then again I say that is in the realm of that particul� area. But I could not be excited about it because I don't think anybody would overstep the schoc board and I've never seen it happen yet. Unless that word said "sha ll" - if that word said "shall I would have a different position - but "may" appeal, Mr.

Hanuschak, interpr etation of a sectio like tha t is always open tor a debate and I would suggest to you that any school board chairma in this Province of Manitoba would probably speak to tho se people if they overstepped the boarc I'd be surprised that it could go past the school board to the Minister without the board bein aware of it. I would hope that we know our employees well enough that that would n't happen MR. HANUSCHAK: Just one final quest ion on this point, Mr. Chairman.

Would you not agree tha the word "may", which is permissive, is the only word that could be used there simply to indicat' that there is a right of appeal if one wishes to exercise it, and hence the word "may"? But tha the person to whom the appeal is made is quite definite and specific, that if one is going to appeal if one chooses to appeal, tha t the appeal must be to the Minister? MR. ROUSE: Again, Mr.

Hanuschak, I would say that's int erpretation because you and I both knm from experience that people who write legislation , lawyers and people who change words here and there, I don't know what was in that pers on's mind as proposing that word of "may" or "shall" lt's still

interpretation in my opinion, and I say there's a heck of a big difference in law betweer the word "may" and "shall". MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Hanuschak. Mr. Boyce. MR. BOVCE: Mr. Chairman, through you to Mr. Rouse. I wish it were as simple as that. Yesterdal in trying to eesolve in my own mind on the word "shall", the Legislative Counsel made a COPJ of some precedence from Stroud's Judicial Dictionary. We're about the same generation and tc me it's imperative, "shall" means do it now. But this isn't the case. lt's got a list of cases wherE it's imperative and a list of cases where it's perm issive. MR.

ROUSE: lt's interpreta tion. MR. BOVCE: So as you say, your opinion is just as good as mine of whether it is imperative or not. MR. ROUSE: That's true. MR. BOYCE: But I have a problem, through you to Mr. Rouse, and perhaps Mr. Rouse can be of some assistance in this. This committee is sitting as a result of instructions from the Legislature. Obvi ously your brief, or one of the people who presented a brief, spent considerable time the case is well taken in the public interest.

But read ing from the Votes and Proceedings of the Legisla ture of the Province of Manitoba, which is the public's inte rest, "B ill 22, The Public Schools Act, be not now read a second time but that the order tor second read ing be discharged, the bill withdr awn and the subject matter thereof referred to the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elec tions." That's what we're doing here, the subject matter of The Public Schools Bill.

And what prompted me to start a few quest ions in this vein was that you - with the t�xcaption of the handicapped representation yeste rday - were the first ones who had mentioned the children in this syst em. 1 guess, Mr. Chairman, I think back to Autopac debates. I think back to other great debates when this room and the halls were filled with people. This is one of the most important issues before us and I'm not fault ing the government or us or the press, it's just that people are ham mered with so much that they're not hearing what's going on and how we can rectify this, I don't know.

Because the representatives of the various organizations, some 58 of them or something, are trying to make responsible represen tations to this committee. So how we can get the public aroused - because this is what we're supposed to be doing is listen ing to the public - yourselves as representatives of the public but nevertheless the public. And Lincoln said that the price of freed om is eternal vigil ance and our people are so hammered with $1.30 gas and every thing else, they can't hear anything.

With reference to your presentat ion on negotiations, you made a suggestion relative to the public interest, but is it not the case that in tree negotiations, free bargai ning, it's a matter of one side being able to muster the public support and the other side being able to muster public support, and in the final analysis the public will support one side or the other whether it's a lockout or a 102

withd rawal of services. Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 I use for example, one case we have locally where they withdrew the services from two of the local newspapers and as I understand it the strike is still officially on. So that strike didn't prevail. Is. it not in the pubiic interest to have more things included in negotiations rather than less? MR. ROUSE: I don't quite agree with that, Mr.

Boyce, not when it touches upon management's pr erogative because I have to account to the people of Manitoba where I am elected for that area the same as you have got to account to your constituents when you're elected into the Legislature here. And I feel if you bring everyt hing at the bargai ning table, then what do you want school trustees for? Maybe we don't need a government either. MR. BOVCE: Well, Mr.

Chairman, speaking from experience on both sides of the table where I had the dubious distinction of being - I don't know whether it was the first Minister to have withd rawal of services, I hope it's the last one - but nevertheless I personally empa thize the position of the Manitoba Association of School Trustees. I would rather ntt be inv olved in that kind of negotiations where it is difficult, I would rather have some statute which says I can't negotia te that.

But nevertheless if we, as legislators, asked those people who seek the office of trustees, to undertake that kind of negotiations, albeit we understand the difficulty, there may be withd rawal of services and all the other things that are implied in such negotiations. If we, in our opinion, think that that is in the public interest. Do you think it would be difficult to get capable, competent people to stand for the office of school trustee? MR.

ROUSE: I would hope that regardless of what you do, that there w ill be always people who will stand for school trustee, and they'll stand to speak up for the rights as they see fit. I think that those are things that you're going to develop as you go along. Both of us have had experience. I've sat on both sides of the fence, too. At one time I negotia ted the salaries for the civil servants of this province, and I've also negotia ted for teachers - not for teachers, but on the other side, for management. So I know what you're sayi ng.

But I think the best part of negotiation is, those people that set up guidelines on a mutual arrangement at a bargaining table brings better results than having somebody say, this is what you can do and this is what you cannot do. And especially if you're going to tie the hands of school board people, and especially when you're dealing with the childr en of the province of Manitoba. Childr en are not in the same area as other things in industry. I think we've always got to remember, and we always seem to keep forgett ing tho se childr en.

They're No. 1, and I think this is something that both teachers and trustees better smarten up and think about. it's the chil dren of the province of Manitoba that we're going to hurt if we're not careful what we do. MR. BOVCE: Mr. Chairman, I'm familiar with Mr. Rouse's background and this is why I'm asking some of these questions, because I respect his opinion in this regard, and I'm glad that he reinf orces my feeling that we will always be able to attract resp onsible people. And I think that we have been fortunate that we have re sponsible teachers and re sponsible trustees at the present time.

To proceed to another quest ion, on the private school, this quest ion has been ever before us in one form or another. Is there any possibility of moving towards a system whereby all schools are public schools, all schools who get funds from the public purse, really should be in some way accountable to the public for the expendi ture of the funds? There seems to be a movement towards more freedom, freedom in the sense of reflecting the community in which the school exists. lt exists to some degree already, that St.

John's High School is a different milieu than Grant Park, for example, because of the nature of the community and the teachers who choose to operate there and after a number of years the milieu exists. So is it not possible to move to some type of a system where all schools are public schools, because we had representation yesterday from an association which speaks for a number of these private schools, that they do not necessarily restrict their school to any theological belief, or any ph ilosophy, in fact one school said it was on a first come, first served basis.

So is it not possible, rather than try and sovee this problem once again by putting it back in the Minister's lap, can we not have other criteria which we could establish by virtue of contract with any group which reflects a need within the community, whether tt be - I don't know what a viable unit would be in present day terms. But if we had a group of parents who wanted to start a school with 300 enrolment - I'm just throwing that out as an example - would it not be possible for us to, within the community context and under the authority of the local board, have such facilities function? 103

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MR. ROUSE: Mr. Boyce, I think it's possible, but is it practicable? I don't know. I think this is something that you people have to give the leader ship in this area, and we would have to respond to it. But I always have a belief in life, anything is possible. But I'd like to see the formula first, before I would commentoon something like tha .. But I would still say, is it practical?

I've still got to take the position right now, and we go back, and I don't care what government is in power, trustees have sent letters to the former Minister of Educa tion, to the present Minister of Education, to try and find out where we sit with private schools. lt'snnot a very comfortable feeling to find out that you're just a bookkeeper, and that's what public schools are finding out wha t they are toda y. And proba bly if this had been challenged in the courts of this province, and it would have probably been such a politi cal issue, I don't know, but I would have loved to have seen that

section of the Public Schools Act before it was amended, challenged in the courts of this province. Because I strongly believe that our school boards acted illegally in those days, and I still believe that, although the present government has made it in a position now that we can act, and I feel quite comfortable with it. But I still take the position on behalf of the trustees in the province of Manitoba, that the private schools, and that situation is between the governmet of the day and tho se schools, and it is not the respo nsibility of the trustees, the responsi bility with public schools.

And that is our position. MR. BOYCE: I won't comment on your legal opinion, but if I was a trustee, I would resent being put in that position, also. I would agree that, 100 years, the resolut ion of this particular question was difficult. 50 years ago it was difficult, even 20 years it was difficult. But the milieu has changed, and perhaps we should go through this, even in present-day terms, difficult decision. I guess, Mr. Chairman, it has something to do with my ancestry where they managed to keep the Boyne River boiling for 300 years.

But nevertheless, in Manitoba, in the spirit of co-operation which exists in the present time, if people would address thems elves, could we not possibly go down this route, even if it is difficult, rather than the jiggery-pokery which has taken place over the last 15, 20 years. MR. ROUSE: Again, Mr. Boyce, I must say it's possible, but again is it practicable in the situation that we are. I think we have to have some leadersh ip.

I think every body is giving opinions, maybe philosophies, but I don't see anything of a proposal, concrete, coming before me and sayi ng, this is what I think we should do, this is where I think we should go, this is what I think will happen. Until I saw something like that, I'd just be joining a bunch of other people in the province of Manitoba and giving a personal opinion. Really, I think that's what we've been doing for a number of years.

I think your comments are va lid, but I have seen nothing concrete to say, this is how we should handle the situa tion, this is what we should do, and I would challenge you people should be giving the leader ship on this. MR. BOYCE: I would return the challenge, through you, Mr. Chairman, to all elected officials, all leaders of the community, that we give the people the impression that we are going to address ourselves to this problem, and let the argument take place, and hopefully we can resolve it in the next five years or so. I don't expect an immediate solution to this problem.

This serving on boards of teachers who teach within the system, JOLI would like them prohib ited from servi ng on the board. There is a movement which is gathering momentum in the concept of industrial democracy, where the people who are trying it have good things to report on the utility of having somebody from the operational side of the functional, be it manufactur ing, other things like that, serving on the boards of directors, so is this not somewhat of a regressive stand in this regard? MR.

ROUSE: We come to the same position where we run into conflict of int erest. it's always the same story, conflict of interest. And then do you let your own personal feelings run away with you or can you just take it from your mind and put it away and make an honest assess ment and an honest decision, or are you still going to have that conflict of interest come up? This is what 1 think is always going to be the re. it's pretty hard. Can you honestly say to me, Mr.

Boyce, that there are times when you sat in the Legislature that you don't feel a conflict of interest and sometimes you've had to tear yourself apart to make a decision? I know I've faced it, I face it every day. And 1 think I'd rather not be put in that position that I've got to have a conflict of int erest. I think there are many, many people in the world who will offer their services here, so therefore why should we have to put somebody in the position of a conflict of int erest. 104

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MR. BOYCE: I can understand the basis of your apprehension, but nevertheless I have to speak from my propensity, I suppose, that given an opportunity, people will behave res ponsibly in this regard. The duties of teachers, I see that you're not advocating that they look after the horse and carry in the wood and all the other things. I'm being facet ious, of course. But why is it necessary to even include the ones that are in there already? MR. ROUSE: We just feel that it's in the best interests of the trustees and the children. That's the only comment I can have.

I feel it should be there. You spell out what I have to do in my res ponsibilities as a civil servant. MR. BOYCE: That leads to the next question. Here, once again we're dealing with one of the two main components in the provision of educational services to our young people in this province, and that's the statute under which it acts, the province acts. And then the other being the financings that we deploy to operat e that system. lt's been kicking around, and in some areas the government is to be commanded on some of the things that they've gotten rid of.

But nevertheless, we're faced with redes igning and bringing the whole system up to date, not just a piece of legislation. So we're talking with the teaching profess ion, the duties of teachers. From the 1950s when we had the big influx and all of a sudden people got concerned about having more profes sional teachers in the system, which a person could demonstrate by rela ting the number of permanent teachers in the province in say, 1956 to 1979, I don't know how many still exist, but I imagine it's a small number.

What other profess ional service is provided in the province of Manitoba where they tell the teacher the things that you have asked to be included. What other profession - do they do that with doctors? Do they do that with lawyers? What other profession do they do that? I don't think there's any. And where I'm going - in 1969, when we first came in, the MEA died because really there was no reason for it to exist except it was a pla ce for educators to get together and discuss educational matters.

We reached a point where some body would be empowered to deal with what teachers are and what they should be doing, profe ssionally within the province of Manitoba. MR. ROUSE: Mr. Boyce, my answer would be to you, sir, is, do the lawyers have a collective agreement? Do the doctors ha ve a collective agreement? Do the engineers have a collective agreement? But teachers say they are profess ionals, and I respect that, yet they want a collective agreement, so if you're going to ride two horses, sir, I ha ve a hard time to put it in the same class as lawyers and doctors and engineers. MR.

BOYCE: Do you say that the lawyers have a collective agreement? MR. ROUSE: No, 1 say they don't. Who does a lawyer have a collective agreement with? The Law Society of Manitoba? MR. BOYCE: As 1 understand it, they have a standa rd tariff for the provision of services within the province of Manitoba, and they have an appeal mechanism built into that. They ha ve a process by which they establish their fees. The MMA has a very successful, effective, ipso facto contract with the people of the province of Manitoba for the provision of services through Medicare.

And you go down the list of it, and the tari ffs which are established are usually established by the negotiating arm of the profes sional organization, where the MMA is effective in dealing with the contract with the people of the province of Manitoba and the College of Physicians and Surgeons deals with the matt ers to which I am referr ing. MR. ROUSE: That's all right but I don't put that in the same class 3S a collective agreement. I think there's a big difference between a collective agreement between and employee and an employer, than there is in the example that you're giving.

I don't call that a collective agreement. I call that an agre ement, and that may be negotiations, but I don't put tha t in the same terminology as a collective agreement, that the trustees go into with the teachers of this province. MR. BOYCE: I guess I'm from the school that a rose is a rose. If it is operationally collective, what does collective mean? lt means it applies to everybody. And it's a broader collective agreement than the teachers have, because the teachers negotiate division by division, and I'm not suggesting, in my questioning, there'd be a provi ncial rate for all teachers.

I'm not talking about the negotiations part of salaries because if we go back to our parallel, I understand that there are differing rates within all the other professions tha t we mentioned from community to commun ity. I'm thinking 105

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 of, in the public interest, saying who, is a qualified teacher and who is not? MR. ROUSE: Possibly I should reverse it to you, Sir, and say why are you feeling so uptight - maybe that's not the word - but your position on why that should not be in the Act, let me put it that way to you, why would you have apprehensions about something like that that simp ly spells out wha t we expect? MR. BOYCE: Well, I don't know if we're in order questioning back and forth. MR. ROUSE: Well, I think that, Sir, with respect, that's a fair quest ion.

You're asking me and drawing me into collective agreements and you're going ahead and opening up the subject matter, so I think I should be entitled to ask you your opinion. MR. BOYCE: Well, we're probably both out of order, Mr. Rouse ... MR. ROUSE: I think we are. The Chairman's been lett ing you go so far so I think I should have the same respect. MR. BOYCE: To be quite candid, if it has been in the statute I could live with it; it was taken out of the statute - and if I came to work for you and you asked me to do that I wouldn't work for you. MR. ROUSE: I beg your pardon, I didn't catch that last part. MR.

BOYCE: it's in the statute, you know, it exists in the statute, I can get along with it. MR. ROUSE: Yes. MR. BOYCE: If you took it out of the statute and you negotia te whether I should work with you or not , and you sti pulated that, I wouldn't work for you. MR. ROUSE: Yes, that's democracy. MR. CHAIRMAN: Any further quest ions? Mr. Wald ing. MR. D. JAMES WALDING: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Rouse I should compliment your organization on a very well prepared brief. lt didn't leave us too much to ask quest ion about, but there were a couple of things that I noted in here that I wanted to ask you about.

One had to do with a matter of school attendance and truan cy. Are your school divisions now responsible for school attendance in private schools within your divisions? MR. ROUSE: No. They may be in some parts of the province I'm not aware of but in my own school division answering no, I don't think so. Are we? I had better let Mr. Har vey speak, he's more informed on this than I am. MR. HARVEY: Mr. Chairman, the School Attendance Act requires a s �hool division to appoint a school attendance officer to enforce school attendance within the division and that includes attendance at pri vate schools. MR.

WALDING: Does this new proposed Act retain that provision or is there a change in it? MR. ROUSE: He says it retains it as far as he knows Mr. Wald ing, we think it retains it as far as we know, Sir. MR. WALDING: The reason 1 ask is a representative from another organization told us yesterday that the school divisions don't have and he doesn't know who is respo nsible for the attendance at pri vate schools. That's the only reason I brought it up. MR. ROUSE: Well, to the best of our knowled ge we are responsible and as far as we know it is retained in there. MR.

WALDING: Your concerns about representation by population at some school divisions. I'm 106

t"nvueges ana 1:.1ecuons Tuesday, October 23, 1979 Jlad that you accept the principle there although you seem to raise problems. 1 don't really mderstand why you say that a part of a division may not have represen tation. Su rely ever yone IVho lives within the division is represented by one or more school trustees for the geographic area n which he lives. III R. ROUSE: I think the point being, Mr.

Wald ing, that there are certain school divisions that may 1ave elect ion of their trus tees on the overall school division and it would be possible - for instance, n the old days when I first became a school trustee in the East Kildonan-River East area of this :�rea, before we went to the Ward system, it was possible the whole school board could come out :>f the City of East Kildonan and all of us could live together.

In fact one time when I was first elected to the board thr ee out of six trustees lived on the same street, two lived on the next street, and that was one area of East Kildonan that was just represented, so the whole board came from one sect ion of East Kildonan, for an example. So what we are concerned about, that if you had an area, say, like in my own area, like the Rural Municipality of East St. Paul, supposing we didn't have a Ward system, I don't think it would be fair that the trustee coming out of East Kildonan should represent the people of the Rural Municipality of East St. Paul and St.

Clements with their problems. I think it is important for the children's sake that we have repres entation from all areas of the province, and if, for exampl e, in my area, if 60,000 people happen to live in what we call the City of East Kildonan, North Kildonan in the old days, and there are only 300 people in East St. Paul, tho se 300 people should have a good say and not have a person, say, like myself who may not understand the problems that exist in the country. I might just see it from the city aspect and I think to have a good school board that is a necessity that every body is represented. MR.

WALDING: That would result in some of the voters being overrepresented in terms of the value of their vote, as opposed to other voters in the area. MR. ROUSE: Could be. MR. WALDING: Okay, one other point. I gather from your brief that 48(1) (

x) is of some importance to MAST; you devote a fair bit of print to it. MR. ROUSE: Yes, Sir. MR. WALDING: Where you are making the point here, if I understand, of the importance of a school board being responsible, as an elected body and that is really to the people who represented it, . the importance there. MR. ROUSE: Yes. MR. WALDING: I would like to compare that with something that you say on Page 7, under Langua ges of Instruc tion, where you say that there should be an appeal mechanism tha t would hear appeals and make reco mmendation, settling of local disputes.

Now, is this not taking away the decision-making of the local board and putting it into some other area? Are not these two proposals in conflict? MR. ROUSE: Are you refe rring, Mr. Wald ing, to

Section 79? MR. WALDING: Yes. MR. ROUSE: I think

Section 79, though, is the protection to the area where there are other languages than English, and that is of specific import that they should have this right. And I think we're refe rring here into the area of French, German or Ukrainian may be the point specifically. MR. WALDING: But, wha tever the purpose it's for, is it not possible that a democratica lly elected school board will say, this shall be so, and someone takes it to an appeal procedure which is not an elected body and which can say it will be the opposite of what the school board says. MR. ROUSE: 1 guess that's possible, I mean, I wouldn't know until I experience this, it's p ossible I supp ose. 10 7

ri iYI I'C'!::fi'C'O GIIU �I'C' .... IIUIID Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MR. WALDING: Are you not arguing two opposing points of view in the same brief? MR. ROUSE: I think (3) is the important point in this, "the establishment of an appeal mechanism that would hear appeals and make rec ommendations in the settling of local disputes regard ing French education", it's a rec ommendation. I see your point. I'm not arguing against the other side, I think here we're emphasizing, it's a re commendation ... MR. WALDING: Yes. One final quest ion, and this is a matter of perhaps opinion from you.

Given that the school boards are facing gr eat financial difficulties, particularly with declining enrolment, teachers are being laid off, courses are being cut and we're even hearing talk about schools being closed, yet on the other hand the province has doubled the amount of funding to pri vate schools for some 6,000 or 8,000 students, yet the purchasing power of the grants from the provincial gove rnment for some 200,000 children is declining this year from last year, does MAST have any opinion as to whether this is the correct state of priorities? MR.

ROUSE: Well, MAST has not discussed this along those veins. Our only position has been that there is never enough money for education but we have to look at what the economy dictates and it doesn't matter which government is in power I think the school trustees will always come here and say, to you, we're not getting enough money for education, because, after all, that's the biggest investment we'v e got in this country. We can argue about oil and gas and everyt hing else but you are still going to have to remember children are still the biggest investment you've got in this country. MR.

WALDING: That being the case, if there is an additional million dollars in grants for the provincial government to giv e out, is it more proper tha t they give it to the public school system for its 200,000 children, or to the pri vate school system with its 8,000 children? MR. ROUSE: Of course, I would only answer this persona lly. If you are going to giv e it to River East I'd gladl y accept it. MR. WALDING: Thank you, no more quest ions. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Boyce. MR. J.

R. (Bud) BOYCE: In thinking of what I said I have to take out a little insurance, I've got to hedge my bet because the Winnip eg Centre Constituency disap pears and I may be looking for a job. lt would be incumbent upon me to convinceyyou that you didn' t have to tell me to return the library books. One of the things that concerned me was when Mr. Wald ing was asking some questions. Indications are that the enrolment in priv ate schools is going up, generally.

In Ontario, I think, it is accelerating at a highrr rate than it is in Manitoba, but in looking to the south of us where the public, the politicians have been forced into a position to react to certain social demands in changing the system, that many more people are opting to send their youngsters to private school. Now, Mr.

Harvey even would ask the quest ion whether, you know, dducation should be free? lt prompts me that, is it not more imperative that, in light of hhe incr ease in rate of people leaving the public system, in light of declining enrolment and the rest of it, that we address ourselves to the resolution of this particular quest ion of aid to priv ate schools. MR. ROUSE: Well, I think, I have to accept that what you are telling me is correct, I haven't really studied that and I don't know if there is that big of an influx into the private schools of Manitoba. I'll be honest with you, I don't know.

A declining enrolment is the fact of life today and maybe it's because most of us can't make enough money to survive with one spouse, I don't know. it's a question that's hard to tell; probably if we run into good days then probably the school enrolment will go up, I don't know. MR. BOYCE: Well, Mr.

Chairman, I'm not just express ing my own opinion, one of the representa tions tha t was made yesterday - it will appear in the printed record, it was the Association Incorporated, I forget the name of it, I'm sorry - who made representation on behalf of the private schools yesterday, said that the enrolment in private schools was going up. MR. ROUSE: That could be, I don't know. MR. BOYCE: And there are several reports in the Province of Ontario which indicate that it is 10 8

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 �oing up also and reports from down south indicate the same thing, so it's not just a personal )pinion. !II R. ROUSE: If I may ask you, Mr. Boyce, did they giv e you a reason why it's going up; I'm not aware of this and I am asking you, Sir, because you were here yesterday, did they give any inclination why the enrolment in private schools is going up? MR. BOYCE: I don't think that question was asked, Mr. Chairman. MR. ROUSE: I think, Mr. Chairman, that would be a very impor tant thing for the Province of Manitoba to know.

If pri vate school enrolment is going up maybe we should be looking at things and find out why. Is there something wrong with the public school system? I don't think there is but this may be a question that we should be looking at. MR. BOYCE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN: Any further questions? Mr. Walding. MR. WALDING: Just one, Mr. Chairman. I would like to ask Mr. Rouse if the school trus tees requested of the Minister that Remembr ance Day be no longer a school holiday? MR. ROUSE: I'm not aware of such a request being made and I would certainly hope not. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. McBryde. MR.

WALDING: lt is now a regulation that it is not a holida y. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. McBryde. MR. RONALD McBRYDE: Yes, Mr. Chairperson. I wanted to just doublecheck my understanding of what you've presented this morning. In the area of the pri vate schools you used the ph rase that we are bookkeepers basica lly for the funding going to private schools, and I wanted just to clarify that school boards see thems elves as that right now, and they would see them selves as that under this legislation. MR. ROUSE: We see that as we are now.

I don't know for sure under the new legislat ion, I ha ven't studied how it will change the picture but right now I say to you, we get money from the government of the day; it comes to the school boards; the school boards in turn pass a motion to pass it on to that private school. MR. McBRYDE: That means that there is basically then no control over those fundings, you just pass it on. MR. ROUSE: I don't feel we have any control at all, no. MR.

McBRYDE: Then your solution to that situation, if I understand your brief correctly, and that's what 1 want to check out, is that basically what the government has dumped on to you you want to dump back. The government says you are responsible for this area of private schools and the school boards will only be responsible for public schools, we don't want to have anything to do with that. MR. ROUSE: That's right.

The position of the trus tees of this province in the public school syteem is that pri vatessc hools should be dealt strictly with the private school and the government and we, as Board of Trus tees, should have nothing to do with it wha tsoever, that is our position. MR. McBRYDE: The other question, I sort of get the feeling listening to people and prohib ited by legislation as is being rec ommended. MR. ROUSE: Maybe on the other hand too - that's true - and maybe on the other hand the trus tees may have a position that we may not want to do.

I mean we still got to look after tax dollars and I don't know, maybe our position will be something tha t a lot of people won't app reciate. 109

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 MR. McBRYDE: Maybe I could rephr ase the question because I am not sure I clearly understanc where the school boards or MAST would like to move in terms of declining enrollment. Do you see it as a barga ining item, or it is going to come up as a bargai ning item even though you don'1 feel it should be, but for example, one of the delegations, at least, yesterday mentioned that with declining enrolment it should be possible now for us to provide better services to special needs stude ts, because the resources would be more available.

I just wonder what sort of discussions MAST has had or whether they just say thattthis is a fact of life and we just have to reduce our educational facilities because of declining enrolment, or what sort of other dir ections you have looked at as an organiza tion. MR. ROUSE: I don't think we have discussed reducing that, and I would suggest to you that requirements for handic apped children and the needy in these areas of special euccation should have enough money anyway, declining enrolment shouldn't have any bearing on it.

We should be supplying this at any time and declining enrolment is something we are going to have to face, but I don't necessarily think that education is going to be lowered because of a declining enrolment. I mean every body has their own ideas, I know that every body gets the impression that there is going to be a problem with education. I hope not, but it is like any business that comes along.

If the Manitoba Government, whiche ver govern ment is in power, and we don't give the services to the people of Manitoba, you are not going to keep civil servants sitting around here doing nothing and that is one of the problems. Hopefully, we will find things to do for them and hopefully we will overcome this problem of declining enrolment and nobody will suffer. But I can't answer that at this stage. lt is things that we are going to have to thoroughly discuss and look at. There are certain school divisions in the Province of Manitoba who will feel the declining enrolment heavily.

There are other school divisions that haven 't even got a declining enrolment. They are stayi ng pretty well level. I think this is one of the things that we are going to have to face and it is a most unfortunate situation and hopefully the economy will change to help out of this. I don't know. I think this is something that all of us are going to have to look at and it is something we know we are going to have to face, going to have to do a lot of homework on, and I don't think, up to this stage, that any of us have really done our homework. in looking at the welfare . . . it is easy to yell "wol f".

Anybody can cry "wolf" depending which side of the fence you are on. Instead of crying "wolf" I think we should be sitting down, all of us, and I think Mr. Boyce hit upon it earlier, maybe we need a real community effort and frrget what side of the fence you sit on, politi cally or otherwise, or whether you are a school trustee, a councillor, an MLA, and let's all sit down and look at a problem that is really facing the people of this province, and that is one of them. MR.

McBRYDE: I guess my quest ion was sort of to get some insight as to the homework that you have already sort of done or your preli minary homework I guess you could call it, but in effect there is not that much homework been done yet in the area of declining enrolment. MR. ROUSE: I can suggest to you that we are studying it, we are working on it, but I hav en't got an answer. I would appreciate maybe if somebody else has they could give us some input, we would appreciate it. MR. McBRYD E: Well, I was hoping that you would give that to us. A final question, Mr.

Chairperson, in the area of the special needs students. Your presentat ion is fairly clear in terms that you would like the legislation, or you are happy enough with the legislation as it reads. I suppose I read something else in the re and I wanted to clarify it, that if in fact you knew the resources were going to be available then that that condition, the loopholes that are put into the present Act to take sort of the pressure off the school boards, that if you knew the resources were going to be available then you could accept that those conditions be deleted. MR. ROUSE: And it would solve many problems.

To Mr. McBryde, I'm sorry, Mr. Chairman. Yes, it would, but as 1 say, special needs, if we had the money it would solve a lot of problems for every body.

But we feel that as far as special needs are in this province, it shouldn't matter what the situation is today it is important that those children are looked after and the money should be found one way or another, and it shouldn't take a declining enrolment or anything else to bring it to the attention of any government of the day. lt is a responsibility that we must accept and the trustees in this province feel very uncomfortable that there is not enough money at any time to cover that problem. MR. McBRYDE: I think that that is fairly clear. The

Section in there that says, "wherever practicable" 110

t'r1vneges ana EleCtions Tuesday, October 23, 1979 >r wh atever it exactly says, is sort of an outlet because we know that the resources probably won't le available. We really don't need tha t sect ion in there if you were satisfied that the resources IVOuld be available? IIIR .. ROUSE: Well, of course, the only person that can answer that question to me are you �entlemen sitting here. MR. McBRVD E: Or at least one of two of them. That is all my questions, Mr . Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Hanuschak. MR. HANUSCHAK: Mr. Chairman, just a couple of quest ions which had slipped my mind earlier with reference to instruction in relig ion.

Section 81 of the Bill states that instruction in re ligion may be offered by a clergyman, priest, etc., or a representative of parents, recognized by the school board as constituting a religious group. Now, my question to you, Mr. Rouse, is this - how do you interpret this

Section in terms of the responsibility that it places upon you as a board? Are you going to, as a board, determine whether that particular group of parents is a recogn ized group, viable group, one whose request you could honour, or are you going to consider the question of whether their religion is a recognized religion? MR. ROUSE: Well, I think that would depend on the group of people who had come to the Board of Trustees if there is a probl em. Right now I haven't experienced a problem like you are suggesting, Mr. Hanuschak. Is there one that I am not aware of, that exists like you are suggesting? MR.

HANUSCHAK: Well, yes. For example, a group of people, they might be adherents of the Moonies, and they want religion taught in their own way, and a gr oup of them petition you for permission to provide religious instruc tion. So, which of the two quest ions are you going to deal with? Are you simply going to say, "Well, we want to satisfy ourselves that that is a recognized group of parents whose request can be honoured? That is one thing, you know, number of children, etc. , their location and residence, schools they are located in.

Or are you going to ask yourself, "Well, before we deal with that are we going to recognize the Moonies as a recognized religion?" which is quite different. MR. ROUSE: Well, Mr . Chairman, to Mr . Hanuschak, I don't think I can answer that for MAST.

If you asked me as a trustee and happened to deal with this on an ordin ary school board, I would have to respect people's beliefs and people's rights, and if a person came from a certain school, for example, from the River East School Division and said we have got 45 students who want some type of religious educa tion, then I think the school board will have to deal with that particular request at that particular time. Until I had such a thing before me I don't know what I would do at this moment. I would research it, consider it, but I have to respect every body's belief or their religion as they see fit. MR.

HANUSCHAK: So, do I understand you then, Mr . Rouse, that you would not concern yourself with the quest ion of whether it is a re ligion that you would recognize - you would recognize all. MR. ROUSE: I would concern myself, Mr. Hanuschak, but I don't think I can set myself up as an individual or a board of trustees to tell somebody what their religion is or not. MR. HANUSCHAK: Second quest ion: Ha ve you any comment on the fact that this

Section seems to give somewhat broader powers, or a power to delegate authority or delegate responsibility to a cler gyman, a pr iest, a Rabbi, or other spi ritual leader, but the same power is not extended to a representative of a group of parents? Let me explain, because to put it in its proper context, what I am really refe rring to is the fact that this

Section allows for religi ous instruction by a clergyman, priest, a Rabbi, or other spiritual leader or representative of parents, or by any person, including a teacher, duly authoriz ed by such clergym an, priest, Rabbi or other spi ritual leader, but not or by a representative. Now, my point is this, that there are religious groups which have neither clergymen nor priests nor Rabbis nor spiri tual leaders. There are congregations within the Unitarian faith in smaller communities that they ha ve no one within their group whom they recognize as a 111

r-nYIIti!Qti!5 anu Clti!CIIOn5 Tuesday, October 23, 1979 spiritual leader; they organi ze their religious affairs in such a way that many participa te in the conduc1 of their religious activity, but none of whom is recognized as a spirit ual leader.

Now, are you suggest ing then that, or are you in agreement that a religi ous group that does not have a clergyman, priest, Rabbi, or other spirit ual leader, but merely a representative, that tha1 rep resentative ought not have the same rights in determ ining who is going to conduct their religious instruction program as one who is ordained as a clerg yman, priest, or Rabbi. MR. ROUSE: Mr. Hanuschak, I don't think I could deal with that problem until the actual individuals who were reques ting this came before that particular board.

I would suggest to you as a trustee I would probably have it researched by the Superintendent's Department, with a proper re commendation to come forth, and I would suggest probably the Department of Education would have to giv e leadership in this. So I would not make a rash decision nor would any trustee in the Province of Manitoba witho ut resea rch.

I understand what you are getting at, but I would suggest tha it is hypothetical at this point and to make an opinion on something I haven 't heard or a delegation to know what we are talking about is just sheer conjecture and I am not prepared to make and answer to a quest ion like that, because I don't know what I would do until I am faced with the matter, but I would assure you that something like that would be researched by every trustee in the province before he made a decision. MR. HANUSCHAK: Thank you., MR. CHAIRMAN: Any further questions. Mr. Boyce. MR. BOYCE: I just want to put on the record , Mr.

Chairman, the organization to which I referred was the Manitoba Federat ion of Independent Schools Incorporated, a company incorpora ted under the Statutes of the Province of Manitoba known as The Companies Act. lt was presented by Mr. Joe Stangl. Through you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Rouse might find it interesting to read the presentation in light of the argument on page 4 of the brief, the Private vis-a-vis the Public Interest. MR. ROUSE: Mr. Chairman, through you to Mr. Boyce, thank you Mr.

Boyce, and I will assure you that we will do this and the Manitoba Association of School Trustees you can be assured will read this brief and any others that are presented that concern the children of this province. Now it may be a lot of homework but I agree we've all got a big job to do. MR. CHAIRMAN: Any further questions? We thank you, Mr. Rouse, and MAST for your presentat ion, sir. MR. ROUSE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, it's been a pleasure. MR. CHAIRMAN: I call Mr. Marshal!; George Marshal!. Mr. Marshal!, I have an indication from the committee they would like to rise. Could you appear at 2:00 o'clock? MR.

JACK QUAIL: Mr. Chairman, my name is Jack Quail. I am Chairman of the Board and Mr. Marshal! is with me, and we have no objection. Ha ve we, Mr. Marshal!? MR. GEORGE MARSHALL: None wh atsoever, sir. MR. CHAIRMAN: Well, we have a problem. We've also committed ourselves to the Manitoba Teachers' Society at 2:00 o'clock. Is your brief rather lengthy? MR. QUAIL: Not really, sir. 1 would surmise it's probably half an hour. Mr. Marshal!, do you agree with me? MR. MARSHALL: I think we should go now if we have to wait until later. MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, proceed. MR. QUAIL: As I said, Mr. Chairman, my name is Jack Quail.

We present this as a divisional brief on behalf of the Transcona-Spri ngfield School Division of which I am presently the Chairman. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Minister, and honourable members of the Legislative Assembly; we thank you. Some of our concerns have been already outlined by the Manitoba Association of School 112

Privileges and Elections Tuesday, October 23, 1979 nd our prime purpose for seeking audience is to confirm and rein force the Transcona -Spring field chool Division No. 12's position on Education Finance, and on changes and alternatives which 1ay be under considera tion. In particular, the Division wishes to stress the need for the continuation of the Greater Winnipeg ducation Levy since it is fundamental to the equitable co-existence of ten separate school divisions rithin the single corporation of the City of Winnipeg. I'd like to outline, sir, what we support. As a background for our presen tation, we would like ::> reaf firm our support of the following princi ples: (

a) We support the Foundation Program introduced by the Honourable Dr. George Johnson in 967. The Foundation Program was the prime initia tive and attempt to bring equity th rough the 1and of the government to the rev enue capabilities of the many school divisions of the same 1rovince. (

b) We support in principle the idea of more equity in terms of revenue capability should be 1ursued by the government to strengthen assessment-poor divisions in order that every student night have equal opportunity for education in Manitoba. (

c) We support the princi ple that individual school divisions should continue to be responsible or the residual levy. In the urban area, education costs on pro perty are equalized across Winnipeg >nly to the lowest pupil cost, thus leaving a residual levy to fall on the individual urban school iivisions. We believe that this is sound since it makes individu al school divisions sensitive to idditional costs. (

d) We support the government's formula for delivering the

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Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	31-3-pe4
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	31st 3rd hansardpdf pe4.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
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