Alberta Hansard — 17 March 2003, Evening sitting (20:00) (Legislature 25, Session 3)

20030317

Alberta — Debates (Hansard)

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 527 Legislative Assembly of Alberta Title: Monday, March 17, 2003 8:00 p.m. Date: 2003/03/17 [The Deputy Speaker in the chair] The Deputy Speaker: Please be seated. head : Motions Other than Gover nment Motions Incentives for First-time Home Buyers 503. Mr. Shariff moved:

Be it resolved that the Legislative Assembly urge the govern- ment to establish a financial incentive program to encourage first-time home ownership. [Debate adjourned March 10] The Deputy Speaker: If you’re ready for the que stion, the hon. Member for Calgary-McCall to sum up. Mr. Shariff: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I want to take this opportunity to thank all the speak ers who s poke in fa vour of the motion and the two members who raised concerns about the motion. I think this is a good motion. This will help young Albertans save money.

This is not a motion that’s proposing any grants or subsidies be given, a nd I hope th at my colleag ues will look at the young Albertans of today who need to start savi ng money fo r a home, which is the most important investment a family can make. With those words, Mr. Speaker, I call for the question. [Motion Other than Government Motion 503 carried] Regional Police Service 504. Mr. Griffiths moved:

Be it resolved that the Legislative Assembly urge the govern- ment to take the steps necessary to establish its own regional police service including a regional police commissioner by 2007. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Wainwright. Mr. Griffiths: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my pleasure to rise this evening and introduce Motion 504 to the Assembly. Motion 504 is designed to encourage the government to take the steps necessary to establish regional police services in Alberta before negotiations of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police contract, which begin in 2007. I’d like to begin, Mr.

Speaker, by indicating that Alberta has a long and proud history with the RCMP since 1932, when the RCMP took over provincial policing in Alberta. The RCMP has done an excellent job, a nd Albertans respect them f or what the y do. T he RCMP has served this province with commitment and dedication, and in no way is this m otion i ntended to be a reflec tion on the RCMP. The problem is not with the RCMP; it is with the f ederal government and the contract we have with them. The problem we face will arise in the upcoming contract negotiations with the federal government in 2007.

As many members know, the current contract for the RCMP expires in 2012, but negotiations will begin in 2007. It’s imperative th at the pro vincial gove rnment takes t he steps necessary to prepare for those negotiations so that our RCMP can be well-funded and that Albertans get the best policing possible. I’d like to point out , Mr. S peaker, that policing is an are a of provincial jurisdiction and that t he province should therefore take more responsibility for the policing needs of this province.

As with so many other areas of jurisdiction, however, the federal government has used contribut ions to incre ase th eir influe nce in are as of provincial jurisdiction. That influence has led to policy decisions made by the federal governm ent that do not reflec t the values and needs of Albertans and the local governments. More specifically, Mr. Speaker, municipalities have been waiting for the federal government to provide more funding and to provide more officers to meet their policing needs.

If the municipality needs more officers, they must wait for the federal government to come up with more money, and they must wait for the federal government to hire more officers based on federal hiring criteria, not on local needs. The provi nce coul d more re adily and quickly meet the needs of municipalities and could more appropriately co-ordinate with local needs rather than federal direction. If history has taught us anything, it is that the federal government will continue with cuts to the RCMP funding contract, just as they have in health and just as they did with the last RCMP contract, in 1990.

Those cuts and the layout of the current contract, which gives p aramount hiring aut hority to t he federal governm ent, leav es ou r muni cipalities in a preca rious position from which there is no reprieve, except in being prepared for the next round of negotiations in 2007. Currently, confusion reigns as three levels of government pay for the RCMP, and we can all agree, Mr. Speaker, that confusion is not a good idea w hen it comes to policing. Who g ets the final say in hiring? Who do officers report to when three governments pay those officers?

Who determines priority areas of policing in municipalities in the provinc e? Those are good que stions, and a ll need to be answered to make policing in Alberta the most effective it can be. That can only be done if Alberta is prepare d for neg otiations in 2007. It ’s imperative that t he gover nment be in a position to negotiate if it is to affect these improvements. That position will not come from walking into negotiations with the federal government for RCMP contracts without any option s. Frank ly, w e have t o be prepared.

We have to have a choice or another option or accept the deal the federal government puts in front of us, a deal which is likely to shortchange the province’s needs, the needs of the municipalities and, most importantly, the needs of the police, w ho are such an integral part of community safety. Mr. Speaker, in 1985 the provincial government considered plans for an Alberta regional police service. The idea arose because of the extensive difficulties the province had in renegotiating the RCM P contract i n the early ’80s. The idea wa s later dr opped with the introduction of the new Police Act in that year.

However, the notion resurfaced when, once again, the contrac t ne gotiations be gan in 1990, and again extreme difficulties were experienced. In both cases the federal government cut its share of funding for the RCMP force but continued to maintain ultimate control. It’s important to point out that as federal funding declined, the province and municipalities made up a larg er share of funding but with no in creased say i n management. That is a situation we can no longer tolerate if we are to assure ourselves of effective policing.

I need to iterate at this time that this notion does not demand the province form a provincial police force, nor does it c all on the provincial government to opt out of the current contract. The motion asks the governmen t to take the steps necessa ry to be ready to establish regional police services by 2007 so t hat when w e begin negotiations, we will have an option if necessary. We may need to move to a provincial police force. We may find the federal govern- ment’s deal impossible to resist.

Either way, without a choice we will find it dif ficult to negotiate, and we will find that we will ge t exactly what we prepared for and what we deserve. Mr. Speaker, municipalities pay v arying shares of RCMP

528 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 contracts. Cu rrently some coun ties pay noth ing for po licing. Municipalities can pay 70 percent, and still others p ay up to 90 percent. The varying and disparate contracts are creating concern, confusion, and bitterness among municipal ities, and tha t’s being expressed to this provincial government. It is this government’s job to be a leade r in resolving these issues. Currently Alberta pays 70 percent of policing costs in the province, which amounts to over $100 million on policing. An Hon. Member: How much? Mr. Griffiths: One hundred million dollars. Mr.

Speaker, a significant amount of money is spent on policing by the two levels of government alone, with little control of hiring, little discretion over meeting local needs, and i ncreased concern expressed by municipalities. Following this motion, beginning this process of es tablishing regional police services will allow the government to address with municipalities the concerns that are arising from current contracts either by allow ing us to bar ter a bett er contrac t in 2007 or by allowing us to tackle the issues head-on from a local and provincial level should the neg otiations fail .

There’ s an added be nefit, however. Setting up a regional police commission encourages us to begin aligning our own enf orcement agenci es so that we are organized and more efficiently run regardless of the outcome of the 2007 negotiations. Regional police commissioners would allow for co-ordination of activities, organizations, and enforcement. Mr. Speaker, Motion 504 is the first step in becoming prepared for the renegotiation of our RCMP contract. The more prepared we are, the better the outcome will be. There are many steps in preparation for 2007.

Th e government may want to beg in to save money for start-up costs of regional policing in Alberta. The latest estimate I could find put sta rt-up c osts at $45 m illion in 1994 dollar s: a significant amount but e asy to acquire ov er the nex t five years, before the negotiations begin with due diligence. The government may inc lude as a step more stu dying of t he b est way t o set up provincial se rvices with reg ard to total and ongoing c osts and differing policing scenarios. Many steps are possible, but we must take the first steps. In

summary, Mr. Speaker, Motion 504 asks us to prepare for the future, the future of policing in th is province. I hope all hon. members realize the impor tance of this ma tter, an d I urge a ll members to vote in favour of Motion 504. Thank you. 8:10 The Deputy Speaker: The chair wondered whether or not the hon. minister wished to speak in his turn because of the evident enthusi- asm with which he was meeting everything that was being said. Ms Blakem an: I, too, a m looking forwa rd to the Minis ter of Economic Development getting up and debat ing on the re cord on this one. That could be quite interesting. Mr.

Speaker, this is an interesting motion because I don’t know that the motion that’s before us is r eflected in the debat e that the sponsoring member just gave us. I’m going to read the motion text into Hansard.

Be it resolved that the Legislative Assembly urge the government to take the steps necessary to establish its own regional police service including a regional police commissioner by 2007. I listened carefully to what the member said, and he seemed to be saying – and I was able to jot som e notes as he talked – that really what we wanted to be doing was prepare f or negotiations which would commence in 2007 for a contract which ended in 2012.

This motion is actually saying “take the steps necessary to establish its own regional p olice service includ ing a regi onal police commis- sioner.” So this m otion is say ing: done dea l by 2007. A nd the member seemed to be saying in his statem ents that this was a preparation, a l ead-up, to beginning a discussion with the federal government. He noted that municipalities didn’t have choice or that somehow the municipalities and the province were waiting for the feds to put in more money for policing.

Well, if more money is truly needed for policing, then I’m assuming that the province, as well, could step up to the plate and put more money in. So I ’m wondering why the member felt tha t only the federa l governm ent could solv e this problem. Why w asn’t he look ing for a contribution f rom th e provincial government? He raised some issues around the three different levels of payment, coming from the municip alities, t he provin ce, and th e fe deral government, and who determines priorities. What improvements is the member looking for?

W hat priori ties d oes he think are not established currently that he believes would somehow be resolved through instituting a regional police service? I’m certainly quite comfortable with the concept of preparing for negotiations with the federal government. I think that’s a fine idea. We certainly need t o go into the ne gotiations with our ducks in a row, but he seemed to be saying something else when he was talking about that because he seemed to have already set the direction in his mind, is what I’m trying to say here. So it didn’t seem that there was much negotiation left.

He was talking about saving for start-up costs for, I’m assuming, a provincial police force or a regional police service or setting money aside for a study on setting up a provincial service. So that str uck me as being inconsistent with his pr evious statements of saying: we want to prepare to go into these negotia- tions. He keeps saying that he wants to p repare for these negotia- tions and then talks about all of these things that he’d like to see set in place.

I’d actually sent a note to the mem ber asking for clarification when I first read this because I think there were a number of different directions that could be gleaned from i t. Was he talking about setting up a provincial police force? So this would be a province- wide police force similar to what they have in Ontario with the OPP. Mr. MacDonald: The APP? Ms Blakeman: Yes. In this case we’d be talking about the APP, the Alberta provincial police. Or was he talking about a regional police service; in other words, grouping together several communities?

For example, Lethbridge, Coaldale, Taber, Cardston could all enter into an agreement to have one police force that covers all of their area, and we’d probably have to have the counties involved in that as well. Then he talks about a reg ional police commissioner. T hen I thought: well, may be he doesn’t really want the regional service; he’s looking for something like the regional health authorities or the regional children’s authorities. Is that what he was looking f or?

Again, I listened carefully to the remarks that he made, and he seems to be advocating most strongly – although he mentioned all of those possibilities, I think, si milar to the RHA setup – for the regional police service. I’m wondering what the member finds objectionable with sections 2 4 and 25 and 26 in the existing Police Act. What’s the problem the member has with that? I’ll actually read

section 24(1) into the record. Subject to the prior approval of the Minister, [which I’m assuming the minister would give] the councils of 2 or more mu nicipalities

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 529 may enter into an agreement to be pol iced by one regional police service. Now, isn’t that exactly what he’s seeking? It’s available now. It’s available now under the Police Act that’s currently in force, so why does he want to do this again somehow? The next

section is: The Government of Alberta may be a party to an agreement referred to in [the previous subsection] if the region to be policed under the agreement include s an area not contain ed within the limits of a municipality that is subject to the agreement. Thus, we’re able to bring in the counties and some of the rural areas. It talks about the ability to establish a regional police commission, which the me mber was also ta lking about. That’s

section 25( 1).

Section 25(2) talks about the appointments of members to a regional police commission and h ow th ey can be revok ed or not. T hen it talks about an oath. Then it goes on in

section 26 to talk about the responsibilities of a regional police commission. So is there some u nhappiness tha t the me mber ha s with the existing clauses under the Police Act, that he would like to change this or he would like, in fact, to have this in place? If this is what he wants in place, then just say it or lobby his own minister to have it put in place. It’s with the permission of the minister, the Solicitor General, to do so, and he’s certainly free and has an inside track to speak to the Solici tor Gene ral and h ave thi s put in place .

I’m curious as to why he feels he needed to take this additional step, and I’m not sure exactly what that additional step is. I don’t think the member is talking about establishing regional police authorities along the sam e lines a s regiona l healt h a uthorities. I f he is, I sincerely hope not, beca use I don’t think that would work well to serve Albertans.

If we ar e talking about the re gional police services – and as I pointed out, that is not difficult to accomplish given the existing act and with the permission of the minister and the interest of municipal- ities and counties that wa nt to get inv olved in this – then a f ew things, if I might, that I would like to se e considered in a regional police service: ensure proportional representation from the munici- palities that are utilizing the police service; ensure that representa- tives to the commission are appointed by the municipalities, not by the province; make it clear that the prov ince is responsible for the funding of t he regio nal police s ervice under the Cons titution of Canada.

It seems possible, given the amount of fed-bashing that the member got involved in, that maybe he feels that he wants something changed under that, and perhaps that’s under sections 24 and 25. I would not w ant to see the sam e downloadi ng of a s ort of responsibility and even bl ame that happens from the gove rnment occasionally with the RHAs, whe re we ask a q uestion of t he government and they throw their hands up and g o: have to ask the RHA. We’d like to have direct accountability. There are som e regional police serv ices that work v ery well, a couple of examples.

One would be the Niagara Regional Police Service. There’s also an example in Ont ario, th e Peel Regi onal Police force. Actually, this has worked very well. In Niagara they have a number of units that usually only a very large city would be able to have; for example, they have a DNA unit, and they have an explosives disposal unit and a marine unit. You wouldn’t usually find those in the smaller centres. So they’ve really been able to take advantage of this thr ough that re gional police service, a nd it does incorporate the municipalities of . . . [Ms Blakeman’s speaking time expired] Thank you very much, Mr.

Speaker. 8:20 The Deputy Speaker: The Member for Calgary-Buffalo. Mr. Cenaiko: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my pleasure to rise and speak in favour of Motion 504. I think this motion is very important for the people of Alberta. It’s a motion that has long-term implica- tions for this pr ovince, implications that will no doubt benefi t all Albertans. I think we should be clea r on o ne thing about Motion 504 and what it is asking for. Motion 504 is asking the government to take the steps necessary to establish a regional police service a s well as a regional police commissioner. A s the ho n.

Member for Edmonton-Centre stated, the current Police Act, under sections 24 and 25, provides the legislation to proceed with regional p olicing, but I think it’s extremely important that all hon. members realize that this motion does not ask the government to set up a police service but, rather, take the necessary steps. Members may ask: w hy must we be taking steps to est ablish a provincial police se rvice, e specially by the year 2007? This i s because the province must be prepared for the renegotiations of our RCMP contracts. We don’t have a clear idea of how these negotia- tions are going to go.

In 2012 the contract the Alberta government has with the RCMP is going to end. Hopefully, by that time we will have negotiated a new de al that will carry us for another 10 or 20 years with some portion of the present contract that’s in place now. But the negotiations are going to be taking place beginning 2007, so the gove rnment of Albe rta mus t have a ll areas covered before beginning negotiations. By 2012 based on the federal government’s rate of $132,000 per RCMP officer at only 3 percent increases for the next 10 years, the cost could be as high as $177,000 per officer.

I’m not sure which municipality can afford that. The history of negoti ations wi th th e federal governm ent with respect to policing in this province has become very expensive and difficult. Problems with police funding have risen to the forefront of the discussions. Over the years the federal government has cut their level of police funding to the provinces by significant amounts, and if history tells us anything, it is that when we begin to renegoti- ate our contracts with the RCMP, we should have a plan in place.

This is because it is likely that the federal government will cut their share so drastically that we w ill be left to take ca re of most of the funding for our polic e agenc ies if, in fact, the 10 to 30 percent subsidy to Albertans is based on a true cost. If this is to be the case, Mr. Speaker , sh ould we not pr epare ours elves f or the probable outcome? The answer, of course, is yes. We should be prepared. Mr. Speaker, the best way to prepare ourselves is to look at all the options and have a plan in place that will give us an opportunity to have our own regional police service should the need arise.

This will help us immensely in negotiations with the RCMP. As well, we will be in a much stro nger negotiating position. If the f ederal govern- ment tells us that they are going to cut funding completely or charge provinces a hundred percent of the cost, we won’t be left high and dry if we have a plan in place. We will be p repared to transfer policing over to reg ional serv ices that municipa lities throug hout Alberta have agreed to. This is not to say that we are unsatisfied with the current agree - ment with the RCMP. In fact, the opposite is quite true.

Most Albertans would agree that the RCMP does a great job i n policing our province. They are trusted memb ers o f ou r co mmunity, especially in our rural communities. They are active in the commu- nity, in sports, in teaching, as mentors in the community. The issues that many Albertans have with policing is not with the RCMP but, rather, with the federal government and their level of support. This being the case, we should prepare ourselves for what I feel is the inevitable. Mr. Speaker, I think it’s prudent that we also l ook at the MLA policing review that took place.

A draft report was released in July of 2002, and in it there were a number of recommendations regard-

530 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 ing a provi ncial police service and/or regional. Ho wever, recom- mendation 33 of the J uly 2002 report did state something that has implications for what we are doing here today. The recommendation states that in preparation for the next provincial policing agreement in 2012 an external study of provincial policing be conducted to determine the effi ciencies and l evels of service of alternative methods of policing Alberta.

These could include retaining the RCMP, forming a provincial police service, or regionalization of policing throughout the provi nce, o r combi nations of the se fo rms, [in cluding the RCMP]. This study should be led by an MLA committee. Mr. Speaker, this sounds like a necessary step for the government to take. It’s another way for us to prepare ourselves for the upcom- ing contract negotiation.

Now, granted, the recommendation is from the draft report of the committee and the final report and the final submission from the Solicitor General have not been released, yet I am confident, however, tha t the rele ase of the final report w ill be very similar in tone and that recommendations will not be changed substantially. Therefore, we should se riously consider the motion that is before us today, especially after reading that recommendation. We must have all the information that can be provided to us before we can decide whether or not we continue on with the RCMP. Mr.

Speaker, the MLA Policing Review Committee took a number of submissions from many people across Alberta, and it’s no secret that many of the submissions asked for the Alberta government to set up its own provincial police service. I believe that many Albertans would support Motion 504. I think that many would feel comfort- able with a di fferent policing arrangement, especially if it ca n be proven to be more efficient than our current arrangement. We have many policing challenges that we as Albertans are facing, and these challenges will not slip quietly away. They must be met head-on.

Some of these cha llenges in clude th e policin g of ne w technological advancements, su ch as the Internet, photo enforce- ment, information technolog y, DNA testing. Even th ough these seem like very large-scale problems, we are the ones that must solve the problems, problems that could possi bly be faced easier with a different police service, one set up by our government.

Of c ourse, we don’t know that for sure, and therefore we should be looking at how best to dea l with those upcoming policing cha llenges so that when we m ust negotiate our c urrent policing a greement, we will have al l the inform ation that w e need to m ake an i nformed and knowledgeable decision. Mr. Speaker, many Albertans are already questioning the current RCMP agreement. Many municipalities are in fact doing the same. There have bee n a nu mber of juri sdictions a round Albert a who question the usefulness of the current arrangement for their specific communities.

Regions i n southern A lberta ar e t alking a bout regionalizing certain police agencies to deal with the new challenges that have arisen. Again, it’s not because the RCMP have done a poor job in policing our province, but rather new and more efficient ways of policing are being investigated, and Alber tans feel that if there are better ways, they must be tried and true. Mr.

Speaker, I would like to reiterate what I said at the outset of my speaking time, and that is: this motion does not ask the govern- ment to set up its own provincial police service by 2007; rather, it’s a means for us to be prepared for the renegotiations that are going to begin that year. The more prepared we are, the more Albertans will benefit. I have numerous f riends and f ormer c olleagues in the RCMP that would be more than happy to continue to live and work in Alberta under a new Alberta policing model.

It’s for these reasons that I support Motion 504, and I urge all members to vote in favour of the motion. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Riverview. Dr. Taft: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s always great fun to engage in these important debates. Ms Blakeman: No, it’s not. It’s crazy-making. They don’t make sense. Dr. Taft: The only problem with this, I’m told by Edmonton-Centre, is it doesn’t make sense.

I’ve been listening to the comments from all three members so far, and I think ther e’s some mer it on all sides , but I do find m yself puzzling over this particular motion. Bot h of the g overnment members have talked about this motion setting the stage for negotia- tions that commence in 2007, yet the motion doesn’t say anything about negotiati ons. It doesn’ t say anything releva nt to this. It doesn’t talk about jurisdiction wit h the fede ral gove rnment. It doesn’t talk about funding formulas. Indeed, it’s so oblique as to be unclear what its purpose really is at all.

Indee d, the w ording of it isn’t clear whether we’re talking about regional police forces that might cover a regi on that encom passes, say, an area of southern Alberta or easte rn Albert a or we ’re ta lking about an A lberta provincial police force. What are we doing here? I would like the sponsor of the motion to consider going back and thinking it through more clearly, getting more specific on the purpose of it. If it’s about negotiations, let’s talk about negotiations.

If it’s about jurisdiction, let’s talk about that. 8:30 It seems to be a k ind of back door way to sta rt probing public opinion about the support for establishing a provincial police force in Alberta, and that kind of direction concerns me. It concerns me for a few reasons. First of all, as a born and bred prairie Canadian I have a deep appreciation for the heritage of the RCMP, as I’m sure every member of this Assembly does.

The history of the RCMP goes back well over a hundred years to the days of, well, the North-West Mounted Police and the earliest days of this country’s existence, and it is an extraordinarily credible, well-respected police force. We may not agree with everything they do or every procedure they follow, but nationally and internationally the RCMP are a great institution for this country. When we look at province s li ke Ontar io and Quebec tha t have their own police for ces, w e see a ll kinds of problems.

I don’t believe that either one of those provincial police forces are terribly well respected frankly, or I certainly hear doubts about that. I also am very concerned that we would be introducing confusion around the mandate. Do w e need yet another police service? We would ha ve the RC MP. Whether or not we e stablish an Alberta provincial police force, we will alw ays have the RC MP, just like there are RCMP in Ontario and Quebec. They do handle f ederal issues.

So if w e brought in y et another pol ice service, we would have the RCMP, we w ould have the municipa l forces , from the confusion and the wording of this motion maybe we’d have regional forces, and then on top of that we’d have an Alberta police force. I don’t think that’ s necess ary. I think, indee d, it runs the risk of driving up costs, confusing mandates, and adding an entire new layer of bureaucracy. So if that’s the direction that this motion is trying to nudge the pr ovince, I disagree with it. I just don’t think it’s necessary.

I am f rankly also conce rned about the move hinted at here to increase the centralization of power in the provincial government. In my view, this is a governmen t that has a h istory of centralizing power. We can look at school boards, which have been the subject

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 531 of some active debate in this Assembly recently. Their power goes back generations, really. It traces back to the British North America Act of 1867, I bel ieve. School boards have a tremendous history. This government, this sitting Alberta government, remov ed the power of school boa rds to raise local revenues, and by doing t hat, effectively . . . Some Hon. Members: No. Dr. Taft: Okay; I stand corrected.

It greatly curtailed and meaning- fully removed the power of school boards to raise local taxes, and as a result sc hool boards do not have a great de al of m eaningful independence anymore. We have also seen the treatment of the regional health authorities. Before there were regions, there was a vast number of boards, and arguably – I think the government was right in this – there were too many boards. But t hose boards reflected a huge number of voices that were very broadly based. Now we have a handful of regional health aut horities, all domi nated b y peo ple han dpicked by this government.

It’s very centralized power, and I am concerned, Mr. Speaker, that we will see the same trend with an Alberta police force. It’s a centralization of power if we are going in that direction. So tho se are a handful of concerns I have her e. I’ve heard the expressions of concern coming from the government members about the federal government in 2012 pulling their funding and leaving the province unprepared to fill in the gap. We don’t know if that’s a risk or not. That’s almost 10 years away.

But I am concerned that some figures I h ave from the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association suggest that the province as it is is on ly fundi ng a ver y sm all percentage of police expenses provincewide, and I’m wondering if the province really wants to accept the full cost that would go along with accepting full responsibility. I think we’d have to think long and hard ab out ad ding perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars in extra expenses to the provincial budget . Al l of these areas need study, they need debate, and it isn’t clear to me that that sort of work has gone on in the preparation of this motion.

Mr. Speaker, there were a couple of other comments I would like to get in here before we’re done. I do notice that, as other members have pointed out, the Police Act does alre ady make provision for regional police forces, so again the purpose of the motion is not clear to me at least as a member of this Assembly. Well, we could go on, but I see we’re down to the last 20 minutes or so, and I think there are other members who would like to participate. With those com ments and those questi ons, I look for ward to a response from t he sponsoring member at the appropriate time. Thank you.

The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Lacombe-Stettler. Mrs. Go rdon: Thank y ou very much, Mr. Speaker . The hon. Member for Wainwright has brought forward a motion, and I think what the hon. member is trying to do is make us aware, aware of the expiry of Alberta’s contract with the RCMP in 2012 and the need to plan carefully for the upcoming negotiations and possible changes to the co sts th e pro vince might b e asked to in cur.

Now, these negotiations will probably start five years prior to this being signed, so I think he is telling us: let’s look at all of our options; let’s plan ahead; let’s see what can be done. Obviously, the member is a rural MLA, serves a very vast area in the eastern part of the province, and, I’m sure, has talked and heard from many of his municipalities. As the hon. Member for Calgary- Buffalo stated in his discussion, for the last number of months there has been a committee that has been doing a lot of work on policing. The hon. Member for Calgary-Buffalo as well as the hon.

Member for Dunvegan were two members on the committee, and I chaired the committee. The hon. member talked about a report that was released in July 2002, and it was the Alberta MLA Policing Review Commit- tee, and subsequent to that report, we heard from a number of people that wanted some clarification, wanted to come in and talk to us. We received written submissions, and we met with a number of stake- holders when they requested a meeting with us, an d this has now formed the basis for another report called Listening to Stakeholders. We feel this is an excellent report.

The Solicitor General has it, and I do know that in the next few weeks we hope that this report will be released. Municipalities talked to us, and they said that there are inequities in the ability of municipalities to fund policing. There are inequities in the costs municipalities are asked to bea r. There ’s the whole consideration o f what w ill happen in 2012 a nd the negotia tions leading up to that and the increasi ngly c omplex and evolv ing policing practices and legal framework that impact how policing is carried out.

If you look at where municipalities are in this province, I believe the system is v ery complex, lack s logic, and is i nequitable. For example, cities and towns with populat ions betwe en 2,500 and 15,000 who have a provincial contract for RCMP municipal policing pay 70 percent of the cost with a 30 percen t fed eral contribution. Towns and villages with populations under 2,500 pay nothing. The province pays a hundred percent of the policing costs for municipal districts, some counties, towns, villages, and summer villages when they’re policed by the RCMP provincial police service.

Cities with over 15,000 people and RCMP municipal policing agreements pay 90 percent with the 10 percent coming from the federal contribution, and cities and towns who have their own municipal police services pay a hundred perc ent. Present ly in the province w e have e ight municipalities with their own municipal police f orces, and one of them just happens to be the town of Lacombe. 8:40 The town of Lacombe has for a number of years operated its own police service, and I would tell you what May or Bill McQuesten pointed out t o me and to th e commi ttee as wel l.

Citize ns of Lacombe are very, very proud of their police service. Unfortunately, because there are so few municipal police services operating in the province, the debate on policing issues among smaller municipalities inevitably focuses on arrangements with the RCMP. During these debates the awareness o f the alte rnative of a munic ipal service is lost. Many smaller municipalities are also concerned about the level of policing they receive.

W e were told repeatedly that these smaller centres were less concerned about contributing towards the costs of policing but expected that if they did pay more, they would receive better service. Though I ha ven’t sat down wi th both parties and gone in depth on this particular area, I will relate a story to you. The town of Blackfalds, which is 15 minutes south of Lacombe, hit that number where t hey were over the 2,500 threshold. They needed to then by law put into place policing.

Now, being that they would fa ll und er the 70 per cent/30 perc ent, wher e they paid 70 percent of the c ost and 30 perc ent w as picked up by the federal government, they did not spend considerable time, money si tting down and discussing, looking at a regional police service with the town of Lacombe, because if they had done th at, their cos t would have been a hundred percent. Lacombe is paying a hundred percent. Going with the RCMP, they could contribute 70 percent; the feds would pick u p 30 percent. N ow, th e Lacombe police a re in the business of policing. They do a good job a nd have done s o for a

532 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 number of years. What I think the hon. member is saying, which is something that we have said in our report, is that we hope this type of thing will be encouraged and not discouraged. We believe that there’s little inf ormation available right now t o municipalities on policing options and the benefits of developing their own police service or forming a regional police service. The information is not there.

We believe the Solicitor General should devel op and compi le information and a template on establishing and operating a munici- pal pol ice service, regional police service, RCMP, just so those municipalities that must go through this will know what’s involved, what the cost is, what is necessary, and what they can do that is best for thei r citi zenry. This wo uld a ssist them in id entifying their communities’ needs and t hen determining and implementing their best policing options. So this is one thi ng the hon. m ember is saying: regional police could be looked at.

Lacombe is in a position today – they’ve been policing long enough that they could very nicely tie into quite an area there and look at regional policing. So I’m saying that it should be encouraged, not discouraged; it should be prescriptive rather than restrictive. Yes, it’s in the P olice Act, b ut it would be ni ce if we could sit down with these municipalities as they have to move ahead and something could be done. As I said, I think the hon. member is very correct in saying that we need to look at all of this before the contract co mes up again.

An external study of provincial policing should be conducted to determine the efficiencies and levels of service, alternate methods of policing Alberta. The hon. Member for Edmonton-Cen tre ta lked about Ontario. W e looked a t Ontario. Ontario has a provincial police force, it also has regional policing, it also has the involvement of the RCMP, and I think there are some things here we could look at. I, just like the hon. Member for Edmonton-Riverview, am very proud to stand anywhere and say that we have RCMP in Alberta and in Canada. The RCMP can still be part and parcel of all of this.

It’s only that I think everyone should know what their options are, what their community needs a re, wh at their c rime rate is, w ho they’re identifying, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Only by looking ahead, planning, studying, researching this are we going to know. I think that is what the hon. member is asking for. I’m sure that he could list a number of municipalities, because the committee certainly has heard from them, that are very, very, leery right now and have some concerns as to how they’re being policed. Policing is the cornerstone of Al berta. It i s important for all our citizenry.

We m ust make our communities safe. Let’s open it up and take a look at it. That’s all the hon. member is asking. There’s one oth er thing. I do hop e that we will hear from t he Solicitor Genera l as to w hat is happe ning with the comm ittee’s report and in regard to the hon. member’s motion. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDon ald: Thank you very m uch, Mr. Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and enter into debat e this evening on Motion 504. I will as sure the Spe aker th at I w ill direct my r emarks to the Assembly through the chair.

Now, after listening with a great deal of interest to what the hon. Member for Wainwright had to say regarding this motion, I would like now to rea d it into the re cord because I couldn’t understand where the hon. member was coming from.

Be it resolved that the Legislative Assembly urge the government to take the steps necessary to establish its own regional police service including a regional police commissioner by 2007. That’s the motion that’s printed in the Order Paper. I don’t under- stand in the hon. mem ber’s remarks w hat this has to do with negotiations with the federal government. There was certainly this rant on the federal government and any number of perceived slights by that government to this province.

At this time I have to caution all hon. mem bers of t his Assembly that we need to be a little bit more responsible and perhaps a little bi t more temper ed in our comments. There’s a public health care system to fix, and the word “public” is very important in that . I think w e should be w orking with the federal government, not getting involved in this contest to see who can hurl the loudest insults. Nothing is going to be accomplished that way. We have softwood lumber disputes. We hav e the hon. Member for West Yellowhead; this directly affects his constituency. We have the hon.

Membe r for W hitecourt: job losses in that community. We should be working with the federal government to try to resolve these issues, not going on these confusing rants. Also, another issue, Mr. Speaker, that’s going to be coming into focus very soon is: after we have run out of our own natural gas liquids, what share are we going to get from the natural gas liquids as they come down from Canada’s north?

If we have this belligerent attitude toward the federal government, regardless of whether it’s a Progressive Conservative government or a Liberal government or an Alliance government or maybe even a New Democrat government or a PQ government, there is a responsibility and a duty. I’m afraid that in the initial comments this e vening from the hon. member I just don’t understand where the remarks were coming from, because the text of this motion is quite confusing, in my view.

The motion, generally speaking, has an intent to establish regional police services, but there’s no idea conveyed as to how that should be done. Now, we can look at police forces across the country, a s the hon. member from Ponoka . . . Mrs. Gordon: Lacombe-Stettler. Mr. MacDonald: Lacombe. Ooh, the Lacombe police are going to be after me. The hon. Member for Lacombe-Stettler was talking about regional police services. Certainly, there is a police service in Lethbridge. Perhaps, you know, there could be some sort of poli ce service for Coaldale, for Taber, for Cardston, the southern end of the province.

When we look at what we have now with the RCMP, I would have to say that if we had an Alberta police force, I’m sure they wouldn’t wear tunics. They would wear sweaters. That would be part of their dress; I’m certain of that. It would n’t be a tunic. It migh t be th e Alberta tartan, but it would be a thick sweater. They could hop in and out of the cars and write tickets and things without getting cold. [interjection] Well, there could be a number of things that they could do in the ir o ff-hours, as desc ribed by t he hon.

Mem ber for Edmonton-Highlands. 8:50 Certainly, whenever we think of what initiatives can be developed for the betterment of this province, we should recognize that we have to work in a larger community, and that community is this country. Instead of just banging the drum that someone else is causing all our problems, we should look at ourse lves and r ecognize that we are blessed with unlimited wealth as a result of our natural resources, and we should consider ourselves lu cky.

It’s not bec ause of the Progressive Conservative government in this province; it’s despite the Progressive Conservative government in this province. Thank you. The Deput y Speak er: The h on. Memb er fo r Dra yton Val ley- Calmar.

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 533 Rev. Abbo tt: Thank y ou, Mr. Speak er, for a llowing deb ate on Motion 504, as pres ented b y the hon. M ember for Wa inwright. Excellent speech earlier, by the way, hon. member. I strongly – strongly – support Motion 504 primarily because it represents an opportunity for Alberta to take more control of its own destiny by having its own law enforcement agency in the province.

Second, I suppo rt Motion 504 b ecause the history of the polic ing contract between our government and the RCMP leads me to believe that the federal government will want to pay even less for their share of policing in our province when the next contract comes due. If we are going to be paying the bulk of policing cos ts in our prov ince anyway, we may as well have our own police force in Alberta so that we can make t he necessary policing decisions to help be nefit our province. Mr. Speaker, this idea has been gaining some steam for the past 15 years or so.

It g ained its i nitial prom inence w hen t he RCM P instituted a hiring freeze, which tied the hands of the government in the area of hiring mo re police of ficers in certai n parts of this province. This idea has continued to gain support but for two new reasons. First, m any Albertans have argued that ha ving our own police force will be a sign to the rest of Canada and Albertans that we are serious about law enforcement here in Alberta and that we are serious about ensuring that our communities and roadways are kept safe.

Other Albertans in the context of asserting a strong role within Canadian Confederation have st ated that starting our own police force will b e a sign to th e federal government that we are serious about asserting our provincial jurisdictional rights. So I agree with both of these arguments, Mr. Spe aker, and I’d like to spend the majority of my time this evening discussing these issues. However, as a disclaimer I’d like to note that I personally have no objection to the work of the RCMP officers who currently police the majority of our province.

The RCMP in the Drayton Valley-Calmar constituency are first-rate officers – I know because I live next door to one – who do their best to ensure that people feel safe and secure in our area and that they tru st the regio n’s police force. They’ve been there for all the residents in our riding, as I’m sure they have for all the citizens of Alberta. The point about starting our own police force, therefore, ought to be made with a grea t deal of respect towar ds our RCMP officers.

These officers should know that the provincial advantage of having a police force is not a slight against the good work that they do but is a step tow ards improving the way that policin g is done i n our province overall. Indeed, I along with many other MLAs would be honoured i f many of the federal RCMP officers chose to join an Alberta police force. Mr. Speaker, the reasoning behind my support for the initiation of an Alberta police force has more to do with the advantages of having such a force in Alberta and less to do with any complaint with the work of the RCMP.

In showing this point, I’d like to talk a little about the history of the contract with the federal government with regard to the RCMP. As it stands, the Alberta government through the Solicitor General’s office contracts with the federal g overnment for the R CMP to provide policing services in Alberta. We’ve been doing this since 1932. T he last c ontract we signed w as in 1994 and, a s has be en spoken about today, is set to expire in 2012. Mr.

Speaker, when we first entered int o this agreement, the federal government agreed to pay a great dea l of the c ost of polic ing becaus e we e ntered the agreement during the Great Depression, when times were tough in this and other provinces. As subsequent contracts were signed, the federal government agre ed to pay less and l ess. So as it s tands today, they now pay only 30 percent of policing costs in Alberta. An Hon. Member: How much? Rev. Abbott: Only 30 percent, and if historical trends are anything to go by, they will likely want to pay less the next time around. In one sense, Mr.

Speak er, while it may be surprising to so me members of the Assembly, I do not have a problem with the federal government wanting to pay l ess for policing. Providing polic ing services, after all, is an area of provincial jurisdiction, and while that consideration has not stopped the federal government from trampling provincial rights in the past, they may be in the right by attempting to reduce their financial role. As it is our responsibility, we should pay the freight. However, if that’s the case and we’re going to end up paying for policing, then why would we not jus t have our own force? If I may, Mr.

Speaker, I’d like to draw a comparison here to the federal intrusion into the hea lth care system. This prov ince right- fully gets annoyed when the federal government attempts to tell us how to run our health care system, especially when they don’t pay for the right to tell us what to do. Now, the same principle applies in this case. If the federal government isn’t paying a lot for policing, then why would we employ thei r policing service, which operates under their rules, instead of starting our own? Ms Blakeman: Mr. Speaker, a point of order. The Deputy Speaker: We have a purported point of order.

The hon. member. Point of Order Relevance Ms Blakeman: Thanks, Mr. Speaker. Under Standing Order 23(b): “speaks to matt ers other t han . . . t he question unde r discussion.” This is a motion t hat is talki ng a bout re gional polic ing, and the member has now decided to expose his views on the federal funding of health care. Please, Mr. Speaker, let’s stick to what’s in front of us. The Deputy Speaker: The chair would s hare the s ame consider- ations. However, it did seem cle ar to me that he was draw ing a parallel: on the one hand this and on the other hand that.

So in the limited period of time that’s available, I think it’s just as well to let the hon. member conclude. The hon. Member for Drayton Valley-Calmar. Rev. Abbott: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. That’s a very fair ruling, even thoug h I didn’ t get a ch ance t o spe ak in my own defence. Debate Continued Rev. Abbo tt: This is not to sugges t that the R CMP would not continue to operate in Albert a but only that its scope would be reduced. It would serve to enforce federal laws

whereas a provincial police force would enforce our provincial laws. It makes sense. We all know about the great co-operation and communication that we now have between various police forces, and I believe that that can be enhanc ed even further be tween t he RCMP and the Alberta provincial police force. Mr. Speaker, before I conclude my remarks this evening, I’d like to talk about a few of the costs associated with Motion 504. There are, of course, some concerns to be raised with respect to this matter, the most prominent being start-up costs.

To set up the infrastructure that would be neces sary to run a sta te-of-the-art police force or possibly to buy some of that infrastructure from the R CMP would not come ch eap. Aft er all, the province would have to purchase

534 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 headquarters, stations, a fleet of vehicles, weaponry, radio towers, and new technology, just to name a f ew. We shouldn’t fool ourselves; the cost w ould be signif icant. I k now that the town of Drayton Valley would like to house the provincial training centre for the new provincial police f orce, and w e trust tha t the Solicit or General’s department would c onsider tha t when the time comes.

Now, a new force would incur new costs, and we should be aware that many Albertans will question whether these costs are costs that the governm ent should be s houldering ins tead of c ontinuing to utilize the RCMP. Thank you. The Deput y Sp eaker: I regret that I hav e to interrupt the hon. Member for Drayton Valley-Calmar, but the time limit for consider- ation of this item of business on this day has concluded. 9:00head : Government Bills and Orders head: Second Reading Bill 27 Labour Relations (Regional Health Authorities Restructuring) Amendment Act, 2003 The Deputy Speaker: The hon.

Minister of Human Resources and Employment to move second reading. Mr. Dunfo rd: Yes. T hank you, Mr. Speak er. It is, in deed, a pleasure to move th is eveni ng Bill 27, the Labour Re lations (Regional Health Authorities Restructuring) Amendment Act, 2003. Now, the purpose a nd the reas on for this bi ll is for the health authorities to streamline the collective bargaining process by making rules governing health ca re bargaining si mpler, more straightfor- ward, and easier to understa nd and administer for both employers and unions.

It is time to bring the r ules gove rning healt h care bargaining in line with the changes to the health system. It is time to streamline the coll ective bargaining process by reducing t he number of collective agreements from over 400 to 36. The legisla- tion enables government to establish four functional bargaining units to represent employees in the regional health authorities. These will consist of nursing ; auxiliary nursing; paramedical, technical, and professional; and the f ourth, general support services. Bargaining will be regionw ide.

Sim ply put, t his means that the ni ne health authorities will each bargain with four functional bargaining units. This means that employe es at dif ferent sites doing t he same job would be subject to the same collective agreements, and this w ill bring certainty and clarity to their terms of employment. Bill 27 considers health ca re in the re gional author ities to be essential. Strikes or lockouts compromise patient safety and patient care. This is true no matter where y ou are working in the hea lth authority.

Removing the right to strike from community health and mental health authorities’ employees in the health regions means that they will be subject to the same provisions in the Labour Relations Code as police officers, firefighters, and close to 90 percent of health workers that currently do not have the right to strike. The government still believes in the collective bargaining process, where parties negotiating arrive at solutions, and in the r ights of employees to be represented by unions. Mr. Mason: Gee, that’s great. Mr. Dunford: That is good. Yes, I agree.

This legislation does not pre-empt the MLA review of emergency medical service workers. Paramedics not employed by the regional health authorities will continue to have the right to strike. The scope of practice of nurse practitioners has grown in the last couple of years. Removing nurse practitioners from the bargaining unit will give health authorities the flexibility they need to proceed with primary health care reform.

Under changes in Bill 27 these employees will not be entitled to severance, neither the stability or the existence of their employment is threatened, and their terms and conditions remain substantially the same. Legislation will ensure that severance is not used for purposes it was never intended for. The changes under Bill 27 w ill not happ en overnight . The legislation outlines a transition plan and grants s pecial temporary powers so that the board can deal with issues that arise because of the legislation. Now, this will be a fair process for all parties as we move forward with the changes.

This le gislation is im portant for health reform, treats workers fairly and cons istently, reduces the burden of administration. Now, Mr. Speaker, I have been talking about Bill 27 in the public now for a week or more, and I’ve tried to emphasize something that is called the greater good, and what we mean by that little phrase is the fact that this government takes very seriously its responsibilities to deliver a high-quality health care system and to be able to do that in a timely fashion.

One of the th ings that comes with the accep- tance of that responsibility is to then move all of the different aspects of legislation or regulation into line with that type of vision and, of course, that direction. Clearly, I don’t know if there’s anyone here in the House, including my NDP friends, that would be able to arrive at an argument that would convince anyone that a strike or a lockout is good for the deliv ery of health care. If there was a situation of perhaps an overwhelming m ajority cu rrently hav ing the rig ht to strike, well, then maybe this would be something that we’d have to look at.

But, again, despite all the rhetoric, despite all the reaction that we’ve had from various groups around the province, the fact of the matter is that we’re talking about a pproximately 10 percent of employees that would be working for these regional health employ- ers. So it’s very, very important, I think, on that particular matter, but also of course there hav e been public d ocuments that talk about wanting nurses at the bedside and also at the operating table rather than at the negotiating table, and I think this is something to really keep in mind.

Fo r those o f us that do have som e experience in labour relations, we know how long it takes to negotiate agreements, but that is a very small portion of the time that is actually spent, then, in labour relations. I know that I haven’t ever calculated in my own mind the amount of time that I spent at bargaining tables and then what percentage that was of the time that I had to spend in adminis- tering the collective agreement through its lifetime, but it probably is certainly 1 to 4, one h our bein g in barga ining to fo ur hours administering. It might even be as high as 1 to 10. There may be studies, Mr.

Speaker, that have looked at that. In any ev ent, you k now, if it is 1 to 4 or s omething of t hat particular magnitude, then it doesn’t take too long to do the m ath. With over 400 collective agreements currently in effect, if we are to reduce that, then, to 36 in total throughout the province, I think that the logic and the reason behind this move would be fairly obvious, and it’s only the emotion of critics of anything, basically, that this government does when it comes t o h ealth car e that w ill be lef t.

Emotional arguments can be traumatic at any particular given time, but over time, of course, we’re going to have to rely on the logic and the reason and the science of things. With that, Mr. Speaker, I look forward to the ensuing debate at the various levels on Bill 27 but really would hope that all members of the House will keep the seriousness of the bill and its provisions in mind. Keep als o in mind th e fact t hat collec tive barg aining is currently ongoing. Many of the collective agreements are to expire

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 535 on March 31. So I think there’s a timeliness that needs to be looked at, and I hope that we could expect and count on the co-operation of all parties he re in the H ouse for a spe edy movement through the process of this bill. The Deput y Speaker: The hon. Leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. Dr. Nicol: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise this evening to speak to Bill 27.

I guess that just at the end of the minister’s speech there was a little bit of a contradiction from what he started off his talk w ith where he said, y ou know, tha t this is s omething tha t th ey’re not going to rush into, that they’re not going to try and implement all at once. Then he said: there’s a real urgency to it because we have to have it done by the tim e this curr ent round of ne gotiations a nd contracts gets put in place.

But, you know, the thing that we really have to look at as we go through Bill 27 and look and see what it really means to Albertans – I’ve already had a number of Albertans come up to me and ask what the minister is talking about when he says: w e need this t o promote safety and g ood h ealth deliv ery. T hey’re asking: is the minister trying to tell us that because of the current configuration of the labour contract negotiations, the relationship between each of the regions and their respective bargaining units, there’s some implica- tion the re that w e’re not getting safe, quality health care?

I hope that’s not what the minister is trying to talk about, but it’s a percep- tion that’s being left out there with Albertans, and the minister really needs to talk to some of these issues and try and make sure that when he puts messages out into the public, he’s not dealing with messages that lead to any kind of a comment or any kind of a n implication about the dedication and the ap proach t aken by the workers in our health care systems. 9:10 As we look at this bill and deal with some of the background in it, the whole concept of labour relations is trying to develop a working process that allows for employee s and employers to come to an agreement over working conditions and remuneration, but that whole process in itself really takes into account the fact that we do have to have a degree of consultation, a degree of give-and-take, a degree of: let’s put all the i ssues on the table and s ee where we’re going and what the optio ns are that we’ve got.

Ye t in developing Bill 27, it appears that there was very little, if any, real consultation with the affected parties i n terms of wha t their ex pectations were for t he process. I understand, Mr. Speaker, that there were a number of voluntary negotiations already going on to try an d amalgamate some of the bargaining units and m ake the system mor e eff ective and more conducive to good relationships between all of the bodies involved.

I think that if we’re going to look at that, that probably should have been the proces s that w as used, e ven if i t might have taken, yo u know, one extra negotiation period or something to actually achieve it. It basically say s that this is a participatory type of rel ationshi p that we’re trying to develop between the employers and the employ- ees rather tha n the top-down, heavy-handed approa ch that w e’re seeing here with B ill 27. Tha t doesn’t lead to good re lationships with any of the bodies involved.

The main aspect that comes up every time we talk about this bill and that we get into debates about is the implication, as the minister said a few minutes ago, that there is a right-to-strike withdrawal for the rema ining healt h care w orkers w ho are invol ved wit hin the public systems, but it doesn’t, in effect, create equity either, because it ignores those workers that are in the private -sector employment delivering the same kind of a service.

So they’re selling this bill on the idea that it is supposed to put some degree of equity into it, yet it doesn’t, and this is how we need to make sure that we should be going back and allowing the labour unions, the negotiating groups, to sit down and talk about how they want to see these kinds of things work.

But if we get to the actual idea of whether or not it is part of the option for the unions to take and withdraw their services, this creates a real inequity in terms of the negotiation and the bargaining power of both parties that are involved when the employees don’t have a right to withdraw services when they want to. I think it w ould be more appropriate and is something that I’d like to throw out to the minister: should we not be talking about trying to define an essential level of service rather than an essential service?

In this way what it does is it basi cally says that we know tha t health ca re in this province is essential to individuals in a critical state, in an accident state, for individuals who need treatment in a timely fashion. There’s a lot of our health care delivery, also, that is optional, that is voluntary, and that we could use as the median to deal with how we handle fair power-brokering in terms of trying to put out a point and trying to get a point established in connection with negotiations. If the employees do n’t have a right to str ike, they don ’t have th e mechanism to really push for their wishes.

In the end what it’s going to do is it’ll go to arbitr ation, and w e saw how this g overnment handles arbitration cases when they dealt with the teachers last year. They created conditions that would allow the arbitrators to come to a settlement which didn’t give full disclosure or full discussion of all of the options that were being raised as part of the i ssues of that strike situation, that contract negotiation situation.

You know, we have to make sure that if we’re going to deal with looking at trying to withdraw the option for individuals to use the ultimate withdrawal of service, then we have to make sure t hat, in effect, they do have some power to balance the power of government, even if it’s through the Labour Relations Board, to appoint the arbitrators or to put the mandate, put the direction to the arbitrators. This doesn’t give the process the same degree of balance that it has if the option is there to withdraw services.

You know, when we go through this and look at what, in effect, is happening with the implementation of this bill, we end up with some questions being raised about whether or not there’s going to be fairness or equity put into this. A lot of people have already said to me: “Okay. So what?

If you take away the right to strike, it doesn’t effectively prevent the withdrawal of services.” That is another issue that we have to watch, as well, because it has an impact on how these individuals can use the system to push, but it doesn’t help in terms of labour relations when you have one group hav ing their actions defined as illeg al, when the Labour Relations B oard through it s arbitrators can put conditions out as well that don’t necess arily appear to deal with any degree of fairness. The next issue that comes up is this whole idea of amalgamation of the bargain ing units.

I’ve already mentioned briefly that, you know, there w ere some negotiations already under w ay to tr y and bring together some of those units i nto a larger group and a more common group, but by doing it in a heavy-handed way like this bill does, it really, in effect, doesn’t give the relative units a chance to fully discuss an d fully work out the issues t hat are invo lved in amalgamation, and that w ill cre ate the pos sibility for a de gree of “what would have happened if” and “you got this” and “we lost that” kind of give-and-take in the situation.

T hat doesn’t lead to good working relationships as thes e groups come together and ha ve to deal with trying to get on with the delivering of health care. I guess that the thing we have to look at, as you go through that, is that they’re trying to amalgamate a number of them, yet they’re

536 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 going to break out nurse practitioners. What we need to do is make sure that there is an option in there for them to develop an associa- tion or develop some kind of a gr oup s o that they can deal with working conditions and their relationsh ip to the reg ional health authorities. You know, this is the kind of thing that has to come out of this when we have other groups that are being singled out of the system. We have to give them an option to organize as well.

If that means th at we’ll have the n urse p ractitioners tr ying to form a professional association like the Alberta Medical Association for the doctors, that’s the kind of thing that we need to be looking at. What options will be available for those nurse practitioners? The implica- tions of the minister’s comments at the start were that we expect to see a lot more of those career opportunities develop for the nurse practitioners in the futur e as they play a different role and a more unique role in delivering our health care systems.

We have to kind of make sure that all of those options are really handle d and dealt with in the context of where this kind of a system will take us as we go through the process. 9:20 The thing that we need to deal with also is that if we look at how these amalgamations are going to come about, there’s no indication in this legislation about how the relative contracts will fit together. This is all left in many ways to the regulations or to kind of the will of what would probably end up being an arbitrator because people will have to be brought together and sort those things out.

If we look at this bill, as much as anything, Mr. Speaker, what we see is a lot of the characteristics that are really common with the way this government has been dealing with a lot of legislation in the past. There are some basic principles set down in the piece of legislation, and then almost everything else is left to a set of recommendations. That comes out there, you know, as we look through what’s going on in the whole idea of that

section 162, where they’re talking about all of the different regulations that the Lieutenant Governor in Council can pull to gether. These are, in effect, go ing to di ctate and be a heavy-handed, dictatorial type of approach to how these unions have to bring together their co llective agreements, how they ha ve to evaluate the relative merits of ea ch of the different contr acts, who gets what, how they deal with issues of seniority, all of that, and it doesn’t seem to be in a way giving anybody a sense of expectation other than the fact that there’s a lot of uncertainty out there.

If the minister really wants to see this implemented by the end of the month so th at he can star t these processes in place by the next fiscal year and put it in place for these contract negotiations that he was just talk ing about, Mr. Speaker, I challe nge him to bring the regulations forward. Let us see them.

Let us have a look at them while we’re debating the bill, while we’re dealing with them so that we can truly see what, in eff ect, these regulations will do to the implementation of this bill, to the actual way it’s going to make these relative bargaining units work with each other or how the relative regional authorities will be empowered to dea l with the rela tive union contracts that they have to handle. This is one of the things that I think the government is real ly try ing to, in es sence, hide behind almost. They keep saying: you have to wait for the regula- tions.

Well, Albertans really saw what that meant with the Natural Gas Price Protection Act. They sell the bill on one set of parameters, and then when it comes time to implement it, the regulations create a whole different environment for the operation of that bill compared to what it was when they implemented it. So you can see that those regulations really do provide for the meat of any kind of a bill that we have to be able to look at in terms of evaluating: is it going to be good or is it not going to be good for the process at hand?

When we start going through this b ill and look at a ll of the different aspects and how they can be brought together, we see that almost everything here is undetermined. We don’t know where it’s coming from. We don’t know where it’s going. All we can see i s that they’re saying that the Lieutenant Governor in Council will have that power to dictate a whole series of things that eith er can be directly put into regulations and imposed on the process or can be directed through the L abour Relations Board and imposed on the process.

I think it’s incumbent on the minister to make sure that Albertans truly see those regulations while we’re debating the bill, and that’s important. If we don’t see those, we do n’t really know how this i s going to be implemented, how this is going to be p ut together, and what relative effects it will have in terms of bringing forward different aspects of that amalgamation. You know , this is the kind o f thing again, Mr.

Speaker, that’s a very heavy -handed approach in the sens e that the y’re not telling t he relevant groups what the rules are, but they’re saying that there’s a set of rules you’re going to have to follow, so buy into it. Well, that’s not a very open, accountable process. You know, if government is supposed to be open to the people who are being governe d, we shoul d be te lling th em what we’re dealing with here, what we’re asking them to deal with, or what conditions we’re putting on their ability to negotiate with each other.

If we don’t do that, we’re, in effect, trying to make sure that these individuals are buying into a process where they don’t know what the rules are for. That’s just not the right way to make legislation. That’s not the right way to get groups to start working together. It’s not the right way to accomplish what could be a simple process if we just let the g roups negotia te with each othe r and put com mon courtesy, common practice in place and let them come up with an objective.

I’m sure and I know from talking t o a number of the union members that they ’ve already seen that am algamations woul d be beneficial to some of them in a numbe r of are as, and they w ere willing to do it. So why do we have to be so heavy handed on it and not give them the option that we’ve talked about here? Almost every one of these regulation subcategories says that the regulations will determine which trade unions are eligible for a vote by employees, will determine how the collective agreement will be selected. Why don’t we let the workers make those choices themselves?

The health care workers are out there. They know t heir working conditions. They know w hat they want. T hey know what the y need t o b e effective in their job. Let’s let them make those choices rather than have these kinds of regulations imposed on them. That doesn’t help make the system work better, provide for a good working environ- ment. We’ve got to make sure that that kind of thing is available on a voluntary basis, on a basis that truly lets the workers who are out there delivering our health care ser vices i n a very competent w ay have some buy-in to this, lets them have some say in the process.

The minister went thr ough and said that there ’s going to be a common dispute proce ss, yet ho w do you buy into it w hen it’s imposed? You know, will people feel comf ortable using it, either the employers or the employees? If there is a dispute that comes up, it’s got to be something that the participants in it have in effect bought into by havi ng some kind o f p ower a nd some kind of a process to help design it. Yet this is one of the t hings that’s going to be imposed through the Labour Relations Board.

So we need to make sure that these kinds of things that we get in place are not done without really making sure that the groups are there. If we’re going to have an effective operation and an effective moving forward by this whole pro cess, we’ve got to make su re that ev erybody feels comfortable with it, a nd this kind of top-down ac tivity by the government doesn’t lead to that and doesn’t promote that very much.

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 537 9:30 I guess that even when we get to lookin g at the fo ur functional bargaining units that the a ct define s – the nursing ; the auxil iary nursing; the paramedical, technical, and professional services; and the general support services – this is one of those things that we see: why didn’t they consult with the health care workers to decide how they saw thos e things f itting together?

T his is on e of the thin gs where they’ve just gone out and defined a set of processes without saying: maybe there are unique characteristics, unique aspects, that come about in different areas that would allow or would encourage or would make for better labour negotiations if the workers that were there had a chance to decide how they wanted to work together.

You know, this doesn’t deal with a lot of that kind of buy-in generation, and what we’re going to see is, in effect, the government being the driving agent for all of this rather than the true democratic process that usually comes about and f ollows colle ctive ba rgaining pro- cesses. The idea that we’re going to have enforced bargaining units at each of the heal th regions also, you know, I think opens up so me questions that we need to look at because what we want to make sure is that there is some continuity.

Some of the bargaining units right now probably do represent geographic or functional areas of service within a health authority that can see themselves being or wanting or needing conditions that are not there in the broad perspective. What we’re going to end up with, Mr. Speaker, is a whole bunch of subunit bargaining groups as oppose d to th e concept t hat we’re talking about here of only having four. So we need to make sure that those kinds of things g et put in place and mak e sure tha t the approach that gets taken leads to some kind of a buy-in type o f relationship.

The other aspe cts that c ome up in c onnection w ith th is, Mr . Speaker, have to de al with the way the government is going to, in effect, administer the act, bring about the proper consultation, and I would really hope and would suggest that it would help the process a lot if the minister makes a commitment to, in effect, go out, take the regulations, deal with the relevant groups that are there, make sure that they get a chance to be participants in developing those regulations so that we end up with a true process that’ll work.

You know, the government thought it was going to develop some kind of a process with the teachers last spring, and all it did was create chaos and disaster. We don’t want that kind of thing happen- ing here, but this is what the government is leading to.

When they make sure that all of this goes on behind closed doors, doesn’t get done with t he openness that should be t here, what we’re going to have is, in effect, second guessing – why didn’t you do this; why did you do that? – and that doesn’t lead to a productive settlement of any of the kinds of things that we need in m aking for appropriate and proper delivery of our health care services.

You know, the idea that we want to make sure that this provides us with a productive health care system I think would be a lot better if we could reflect on it from the point of view of this is something that is built and pu t together by the system instead of a top-down, real heavy-handed approach that we see in Bill 27. It’s not going to lead to that kind of operational smoothness that the minister tal ks about when he gives us an overview of the bill. When you look at the kind of regulations that are in it, it’s really indeterminate at this point exactly how it’s going to work or any of the other aspects. Mr.

Speaker, in closing, I just want to call again on the minister to make sure that the regulations that are out there are made available so that people can see ho w this bil l will w ork, how t his bill w ill actually fit together, because the way it’s put together here, it’s very top down; it’s very invas ive to the spirit that really is behind the process of collective bargaining. Where it should be a collegial “let’s sit down and talk” type of relationship, the government here has just given us a system of take it or leave it. That ’s their ap- proach: take it or leave it; you’re going to have to live with it.

That’s not right, so I would encourage everybody in the room not to vote for this because we’ve got to have a process put in place that will, in effect, get buy-in from all of the groups. Let the groups be a determinator of their own futures and their own working conditions. That’s what democracy and freedoms are all about, and that’s what we should be try ing to prom ote through this l egislation. I don’t expect that this w ill achieve that, and I would really hope nobod y would support that as it moves forward. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Minister of Health and Wellness. Mr. Mar: Thank you, Mr.

Speak er. As we m ove forward with health reform, we need to be flexible in how and where our health professionals provide se rvice. Health re form i s all about be ing responsive to the needs of Albertans and to the needs of health care providers. Now, we have already done much to make the health care system more efficient and more responsive, but more remains to be done, and we need to pick up the pace. When we first created health regions in 1994, we streamlined 200 separate hospital boards into 17 regional health authorities.

Those 200 boards came with 400 sep arate collective agreements, all of which were transferred straight over to the new health authorities. Last November we contracted those original 17 regions to nine so that they c ould move for ward w ith efficiencies in health service delivery. Now we need to bring the labour structure in step with the rest of the health reform process, and Bill 27, the Labour Relations (Regional Health Authorities Restructuring) Amendment Act, 2003, does that. [Mr.

Lougheed in the chair] It releases the regions from the administrative burden of negotiat- ing 400 separate collective agreements. It frees health care workers from the inequities caused by agreements which reflect the health system t hat we replaced nine years ago. As a result of those inequities, it is not unusual for one health employee to have the right to strike while another does not. It is not unusual for two employees in the same region to earn different rates of pay for the same work. That is not right.

We need a system that makes sense, one in which all employees are treated fairly whether they work in a hospi tal or out in the community. Bill 27 gives us that system. The regional health authorities tell us that the current bargaining structure must change so tha t they can continue to meet the cha l- lenges that come with health reform. My colleague will speak to the specifics of Bill 27, but I can assure you that the bill gives the health system the labour flexibility that it requires. Mr.

Speaker, we cannot ask health authorities to continue moving forward with health reform and then tie their hands when it comes to the effective use of their workforce. Bill 27 is the right legislation at the right time. It creates a system for health bargaining that makes sense. It sim plifies the labour env ironment a nd creates a level playing field for health ca re em ployees. It protec ts health c are workers from the unfairness of inconsistent labour agreements. It ensures patients receive the health care they need when and where they need it .

It giv es regional health a uthorities the flexibility to build a team of health professionals w ho can del iver new and innovative models of c are, and that is the reason why I ask for the support of this Assembly for second reading of this bill.

538 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 The Acting S peaker: Questions? Do you wish to spe ak, or questions? Mr. Mason: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have some questions for the minister under rule 29(2). I would like to ask the minister why the right to strike for public health nurses is taken away, why the government considers those people to be essential in the sense that emergency workers are considered essential. 9:40 Mr. Mar: Mr.

Speaker, I think that a compelling argument has been made in the past by workers within the health care system that they are an integral part of an overall system, so it matters not whether we are talking about a pers on who wor ks as a nurse within an emer- gency room or whether we might be talking about support staff that work within the hospital environment. This is all part of an overall system, and they work together hand in glove, and any set of workers who have the ability to legally strike can jeopardize and compromise the safety and delivery of service of health care within the system as a whole.

The Acting Speaker: The Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, have a question at this time for the hon. minister of health. How much money will your department save with the streamlining of the bargaining units? Mr. Mar: That is a difficult figure to ascertain at this time. I can give, however, examples of the types of onerous administrat ive burden that rest with regional health authorities.

As an example, the Calgary health reg ion with its newly constituted boundaries, including those of the former region of Headwaters, will have the responsibility for 16 dif ferent s ets of ne gotiations gover ning something in the rang e of 44 col lective agreements. Mr. Spe aker, one can on ly imagin e that the n eed to admi nister all of those contracts would be administratively burdensome.

Now, having said that, the exact figure associated with the nine regions is diff icult to as certain, but I can a ssure th e member and members of this Assembly that the intention is that any administra- tive savings which can accrue should be directed towards frontline delivery of services. The Acting S peaker: The Member for Edmonton-Highlands. Question? Mr. Mason: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

To the Minister of Health a nd Wellness: can the minister tell the Assembly what specific health reforms he has in mind when he says that the labour relations arrangements envisioned in this act are necessary in order to proceed to the next stage with health reforms? What specifically are the health reforms he has in mind, and how does this act facilitate them? Mr. Mar: Well, one example might be our intention, as stated and set out in the Maz ankowski report, to give health care workers the ability to work within the full scopes of their practice. One example of that, of course, Mr.

Speaker, addressed in this particular legisla- tion is the subje ct matter of nurs e practitioners. W e think that it would be most appropriate given the independent clinical decision- making type of role th at nurse p ractitioners have that their rol e is much more like that of a physician than that of a nurse. I think that most people would find it a surprise if they were meeting with their physician but had to change when there was a shift change.

So the consequence is that we would view that the role of nurse practitio- ners would be more like that of physicians and that regional health authorities should be able to use them in a manner which is much more flexible than a c ontract tha t might be more appropriate for nurses. The Acting Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Yes. Than k you, Mr . Speaker . Aga in to the minister of health, please. The Acting S peaker: Hon. memb er, the tim e has ex pired for questions. Any mem bers wi shing to deba te? Th e hon. Mem ber for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It’s a pleasure to rise and get a chance to participate in the debate this evening on Bill 27, the Labour Relations (Regional Health Auth orities Restructuring) Amendment Act, 2003. When we look at com bining mult iple collective agreements coveri ng the same type of employees and employers to produce the same results, one has to be quite concerned with this legislation. Certainly, I think at this time that the key to not only the public health crisis but the nursing crisis and other health care professionals in this province is negotiation, not confrontation.

I s ee this bil l as being quite conf rontational tow ard a grou p o f Albertans who have worked very, very hard to keep the entire system together during the last decade. It has been very tough, and I don’t think this is the way to treat the health care professionals across this province. We look and we see in the government’s own press re lease that Alberta had the second lowest rate of work stoppages in the country in 2001. We look at the Ca nadian Feder ation Of Inde pendent Business, their issues, the issu es tha t are hig hest on their list of priorities, and we see – and I’m going to li st them, Mr.

Speaker – what’s on their mind: total tax burden, government debt and deficits, employment insurance, government regulation and paper burden, workers’ compensation, shortage of qualified lab our, cost of local government, availability of financing, and at the bottom of the list is provincial labour laws. The labour laws don’t seem t o be a problem for the majority of Canadian Federation of Independent Business. They certainly have more concerns about the shortage of qualified labour, and I’m afraid we’re going to m ake our situation in this provi nce worse.

Health care professionals a re needed across North America, and they’re going to vote with their feet on this legislation and leav e thi s jurisdiction for plac es where they will be treated with a l ot more respect. When we talk ab out h aving f air and bala nced labour relations, this is not, Mr. Speaker, how to do it. How will this foster fair labour relations?

We h ave a whole series of regulati ons which a re going t o be drafted in the p rivacy of the c abinet room , far f rom any of the interested parties, whether they are the public health care employees themselves or whether they are members of the Official Opposition or the Member for Edmonton-Highlands. It’s going to be removed from them, and it’s going to be in the cabinet room, I would suspect, with curtains drawn. Now, when we look at these regulations – and we’re certainly going to look at t hem in a great d eal o f detail in committee – we are just enabling this government to govern more with regulatio ns.

Out o f harm’s way we’re giving, in my view, further wide-sweeping powers to the Labour Relations Board. There are some initiatives in here, and we’re probably never going to know th e details until some Friday afternoon when we s ee an

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 539 order in council come across the fax machine. How are we going to improve employer/employee conditions in this province by “autho- rizing the Board to make bindi ng determinations as to ter ms and conditions to be included in a receiving collective agreement where the pa rties ar e unwilling or unable to do s o”? Ar e we g iving arbitration or mediation a chance, or are we g oing directly to the board? 9:50 Now, the idea th at we have removed ent irely the righ t to strike from thi s group of Albertans: we c annot take this lightl y, M r. Speaker.

The rig ht to strike is a funda mental human rig ht and should not be taken away by any government. An Hon. Member: A human right. Mr. MacDonald: Yes, it’s a human right. When you consider the rights that we all take for granted, whether they’re the right t o associate, the right to have freedom of speech, these rights are very, very important in a democracy. We’re so quick to remove them. [interjection] I’m going to look forward to the hon. Member for Edmonton-Castle Downs’ views on this bill. Certainly he seems, Mr.

Speaker, anxious to partic ipate in the debate, and I welcome that because we need to hear all sides of the argument here. Earlier, when previous speakers were speaking about this, it was to mak e everything simpler and f airer, I be lieve, were the w ords used. Straightforward was another description, and it was for the greater good. But I’m afraid that this new law, as w e see it before us, will make c ollective bargaining in this provi nce tougher , not easier. It will be much harder to come to a contract.

We look at what we have done to the regional health authorities and the fact that the elected representatives lasted hardly a year and a half. After a long period there were some elections to the regional health authorities, and now we have a wide-sweeping brush taken to the elected authorities. [interjecti on] I hear th e comment that 60 percent are still elected. Well, Mr. Brian Bechtel is not among that group, nor is Ms She ila McKay from Edmonton-Gold Bar. The y were a good voic e on their re gional health autho rity. T hey were elected by the people; they were not selected by the government.

There’s a big difference in that. We have forgotten about that, and I have to wonder what part these selective regional health authorities had in writing this legislation, Mr. Speaker. [The Deputy Speaker in the chair] Now, we all know that there was a committee, and many labour groups were very , very pleased. The h on. Mem ber for Olds- Didsbury-Three Hills and certainly the Member for Edm onton- Calder and the hon. Member for Calgary-Buffalo were on a commit- tee that wa s str uck by the Minister of Hum an Resourc es and Employment that was going to study changes t o the labour code.

Where are the results of that committee? Has there been an interim report presented to the minister? What parts of Bill 27 are part and parcel of that interim report? Or was their work completely ignored? We have the powerful, secret cabinet committee, that was struck at an undetermined date, c haired by the Mi nister of Innovation a nd Science, and oddly enough we had the Minister of Learning, we had the Minister of Health, we had the Minister of Human Resources and Employment, we had the Minister of Justice.

Now, what is being cooked up here, not only for hea lth care professionals but for teachers and other unionized workers in th is province, that could not ha ve been di scussed by the previ ous committee that I tal ked about? All this is important in rel ation to Bill 27, because if we are going to h ave fair, balanced l abour relations in this province, the labour groups have to have confidence in the sy stem. When w e act in this man ner and we strike these powerful, all-secret committees, that is not going to give very much comfort to the unions.

They need to be part of the process, and from what I understand and the research I’ve done, I’m afraid they have not been part of this process. We talked about the fairness of all this. Well, how is it fair that in some nursing h omes in this province, the private nursing homes, employees, if they’re organized, can still go on strike, but if they’re receiving paycheques from regional health authorities, the staff no longer – they do not have the right to strike? How can I say that they no longer hav e the rig ht to strike ? They do not have the right to strike.

Now, also, I under stand that t here was to be a s tudy done on essential servic es. Perhaps in debate he re the hon. Me mber for Calgary-Buffalo is going to enlighten not only this member but other members of the House. What happened to that study? Where is it? Perhaps at some time – and this w ill be coming later in the spring session – paramedics are to be swept into the fire services, in with the firemen. When we look at the past pattern of this government – and this is to me appalling, Mr. Speaker – this government likes to get one group fighting with another. An Hon. Member: Divide and conquer. Mr.

MacDonald: Divide and conquer. The Progressive Conservative book is to get one g roup fighting against another, and here w ith this bill I ’m afraid what’s going to wind up happening is that CUPE and t he AUPE will be forced to fight it out for members and for jurisdictional, if I can use that word, authority. When we have only this one bargaining unit per health authority, this is w hat’s going to happen, and the government is going to be able to sit back and watch these two groups have a fight over members and jurisdiction. Won’t that be a pattern that we have seen before? Certainly the hon.

Member for Edmonton-Centre has seen that. There are so many issues, but we will have lots of time, Mr. Speaker, in committee. As I said earlier, in these regulations the labour board, I’m afraid – it is m y

interpretation and the interpre tation of ot hers – wi ll be used to do th e government’s business with the health care profes- sionals. Now, there are many people who have asked me: how will these changes affect the current round of collective bargaining? Mr. Speaker, we know that in the past the Provincial Health Authorities association had significant concerns. There were certainly worries in the past, going back three and four years, that the trend of aligning community health and f acility-based w age rat es could pro duce significant wage increases for some classifications.

I would like to know in the course of this debate which classifications they are and how much of a wage increase we are looking at here. We are told that there’s going to be significant administrative savings here, but we don’t know, and I certainly would think that somewhere someone knows because we have a crisis in this province. It’s not caused by poor labour relations; it’s caused by poor government management when you look at how you have been planning to train and retain our health care professionals in this province. This has been an ongoing problem.

One only has to look at overtime rates. 10:00 Now, I have been told in the research that I have done – and if this is wrong, an hon. member from the government could please come forward with the correct statistics – that there are 30,000 over time hours worked a week in this province by health care professionals.

540 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 Thirty thousand overtime hours a week. The issue of overtime costs is not going to be res olved w ith this bill. We need long-term planning, not poor labour relations. Thank you. The Deput y Speak er: The hon. Mem ber for Edm onton-Castle Downs on comments and questions. Mr. Lukaszuk: A question. The Deputy Speaker: Okay. Mr. Lukaszuk: I’m just wondering, for a point of clarification, if the member could advise me under what charter of human rights I would I find the right to strike. Mr. MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, at this time I would advise the hon.

Member for Edmonton-Castle Downs to send someone to the library and brin g up all the covenants that are there from the United Nations, and he’ll certainly find what he’s looking for there. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: Hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands, on comments and questions? Mr. Mason: Yes, on comments and questions, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the hon. Member fo r Edmonton-G old Bar if he could elaborate somewhat on the nee d for longe r term planning in the health care system and how it relates to this bill. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDon ald: Yes, Mr. Spe aker.

T he hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands brings up an ex cellent point, and that i s the fact that we have in this province a health care workforce that faces many shortages, whether i t’s different types of re gistered nurses: intensive care unit nurses, com munity pub lic health care nurses, emergency room nurses, general duty nurses, sexual health nurse s, coronary care nurses, facility or acute care nurses, home care nurses, medical/surgery nurses. T he list goes on and on a nd on. I would encourage all hon. m embers of this A ssembly – ag ain, it’s in the library where I found this document.

It is a study on the emerging and current he alth work force is sues in A lberta, a nd this was conducted three years ago by Alberta Health. They concluded then that there were three issues reported in order of importance: health workforce recruitment, the quality of the work life of those employ- ees, and the need to examine quotas to address the lack of quality or adequately trained new health care profession graduates. Now, the health care workers in this province received a needed increase in wages so that they wouldn’t be leaving this province and going to work in other jurisdictions.

This happened before the last election, when this government wanted labour peace. Now, two years into their m andate, they’re waving this Bill 27 a t the healt h care professionals. If anything, it’s going to destabilize the work- force. For this gov ernment to complain about rising public-sector salaries – th ey’re so concerned about it now, and before the last election it was their cash, not the people’s, and the p ublic-sector unions and, to be spe cific, the registered nurses were just play ing catch-up. If y ou want the m to w ork in Al berta, you’ve got to be willing to pay them. Thank you.

The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands in however much time we have for questions and comments. Mr. Mason: If there’s time remaining in his five minutes . . . The Deputy Speaker: As long as the bell hasn’t gone, you’re on. Mr. Mason: I would ask the hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar if he might want to comment on the large scope for regulations and the problems that ma y be foun d wi th setting what should be regulations behind closed doors at the cabinet table. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Sp eaker. I can assure the hon.

Member for Edmonton-Highlands that I do have a l ot of concern about this series of regulations and the fact that, you know, from the government’s point of view – and this is not my point of view or the Official Opposition’s point of view – the ideal situation is to have these regulations discussed or amended in the privacy of the cabinet room. For reasons which I discussed earlier, it’s out of harm’s way, it ’s not in any discussion, and on some quiet Friday afternoon when per haps the re porters ha ve go ne home f rom the gallery down below, there’ll be an order in council issued.

All of a sudden we will have a series of regulations that will en tirely destabilize our negotiating strategies. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands to speak on the bill. Mr. Mason: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Well, I’m pleased to rise to spe ak to Bill 27, w hich I think i s a very, very important bill. It’s important because it shows what the government is capable of in its labour relations, and it shows the way the government treats workers in this province with contempt. Let’s start w ith how the bill ca me about, Mr. Speak er.

The minister has talked about the desire of health authorities, that is to say in this case the employers, for changes that are included in this act. Now, it’s clear from that that this government consulted closely with the employer, with the health authorities, in this bill. Mr. MacDonald: No. Mr. Mason: It is true, hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. It’s apparent that this bill was brought about at the request of the health authorities themselves, and that must have involved, I think it’s only logical to assume, a considerable degree of discussi on with those players.

Now, these players are the employers in this case. If you look at this as a la bour relations bill, whic h it clear ly is, t hen th ere are always two sides, and the g overnment has a res ponsibility to treat fairly both sides. W e know from this government’s record that it does not do so as a matter of course, but normally the government at least tries to maintain some sort of appearance of evenhandedness between unions and em ployers. That is certainl y, I think , the generally accepted view of how a minister of labour – in this case the minister is not called that, but t hat’s what he is.

He has chosen to work very closely with the employer and to keep the employees and their unions com pletely in the dark , and he has indicated further- more, Mr. Speaker, that he’s not prepared to consult with unions, has not consulted with them in the drafting of this, and apparently will not consult with them in the drafting of the regulations under this act. So it’s clear from the outset that this bill was a setup job to give the health author ities what they wanted i n order to dea l with the

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 541 unions in the way they wished, and the unions were left completely in the dark as to the development of this legislation. A secret cabinet committee was established that worked with the employers in this case to draft the dream legisla tion tha t they w ished in order to manage the labour relations in their sector as they wished. What do we g et out of tha t, then, Mr. Spe aker? What kind of legislation comes as a result of this? Well, it excludes nurse practitioners from the right to join a union or to engage in collective bargaining.

This obviously would make them more attractive for private health providers, who would like to avoid unionized labour.

It may in fact be used by public healt h authoritie s, but it clearly opens up the door for private hea lth care pr oviders, w hich is of course one of the objectives of this government. 10:10 Now, the United N urses has argued tha t the disent itlement t o severance and term ination pay could me an that if servic es are divested to private interests, employees will not be enti tled to any compensation, including the potential loss of pension contributions and any negotiated severance or termination payouts.

So we asked the minister of health earlier, after his speech, about that, and he saw the exclusion of nurse practitioners from the definition of employee as a desira ble thing in or der to provide greater flexibility for the employer with respect to their services. That can only mean a step backwards for that particular group of employees. One of the biggest features of this piece of legislation, like just about any piece of legislation the governm ent has recently intro- duced, is the enormous scope for regulation.

Things that should be legislated, that should be debated public ly by a ll the parti es who have representation in the Legislature are being del egated to the cabinet, which of course, as we know, meets behind c losed doors without public scrutiny and without any opposition MLAs to provide constructive criticism. The result is that the regulations very often are very one-sided and completely without balance. I understand that the minister has said that consultations with the unions did not and wi ll not occur r egarding these re gulations.

I f that’s not correct, then pe rhaps t he minister will correct me, but I don’t s ee him heckling me at the mom ent, so I as sume f or the moment that that’s a correct statement. Let’s look for a minute, Mr. Speaker, at what kinds of things the government can regulate under this act.

Section 162.1(1)(

a) allows regulations to establish “region-wide functional bargaining units” for all RHAs.

Section 162.1(1)(

b) allows regulations to determine how bargaining agents a nd collectiv e agree ments a re slo tted i nto the regionwide units. This includes authority to determine whether there will be votes by employees, the types of collective agreements from which the final agreement will be selected and how those types will be determined, authority to determine which unions are eligible to select a bargaining unit by vote and the circumstances of that vote, and determination of how any votes will be conducted.

Well, I’m sure that the employees of health authorities are sleeping easier tonight knowing that the c abinet has unfettered discret ion t o determine those matters. But, Mr. Speaker, the act goe s on. It all ows reg ulations to continue current collective ag reements. It allow s regula tions to require employers and bargaining units to bargain in good faith and, without limitation, establish processes by which contentious issues are resolved. It allows regulations to authorize the board to hear and resolve complaints arising from

section 162.1. It allows regulations to authorize the board to impose binding determinations if the parties are unwilling and unable to do so. It furthermore allows regulations to authorize the board to treat affiliated locals as a single union. It allows regulations to require that af filiated locals a ct as a sing le union. It authorizes via reg ulation the boa rd to perfor m any action prescribed by the boa rd or by r egulation which th e u nion or the employer refuses to do. It al lows regulations to be made on any other topic th at the Li eutenant G overnor in Counc il considers necessary.

Ha rdly sw eeping, is it, Mr. Spea ker? It allows, via regulations, the chair or the vice-chair of the board to act alone with all of the powers of the board, and the board, via regulat ion, is not required to wait for an application to act and can intervene any time it sees fit. So, Mr.

S peaker, obv iously we hav e compone nts of an e ntire labour act as it applies to health care workers embedded in the ability of the cabinet to make the decision without appeal, without input, clearly, from all of the affected employees or the ir representatives, and it completely leaves health care employees subject to the dictate of the cabinet. Other things about this bill that cause concern, Mr.

Speaker, are that provisions of the act will take away the right t o strike for any employee of a regional health authority, and the cabinet will be able to unilatera lly change the e nd date of collective agree ments and could extend them for months, years, or even indefinitely. Now, I don’t know about some members, but I think thi s is a very serious situation, when you take a way the rights of employees. The hon.

Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar talked about it being a human right, and I believe that it is, but I do know one thing, that it is a civil right and that this country is par ty to international agreements that recognize the right to strike. Now, any right of human beings in a democratic society is subject to some limitations, including even the right to free speech. So the question is: how do y ou define whose right to s trike should be in some way abridged? The gov ernment hasn’t looked at that.

Y ou know, you have people in here who are having their right to str ike taken away whose s ervices are not r equired on week ends, for example. So if y ou don’t need someone on a Saturday, are they really considered an essential service? There are tests that could be applied to this, but the government has refused to debate that. It’s refused to define it. The government feels quite comfortable taking away the right to strike of anyone it deems fit, and it doesn’t have a consistent policy or test that is applied t o worke rs to deter mine whether or not their right to strike should be in some way abridged.

Well, we over here, Mr. Speaker, don’t believe that people’s right to strike ought to be tak en away, and if it is taken away, there had better be a really valid and strong reason for it and some insurance for those employees that they will be able to obtain fairness in their collective bargaining through some other way. This act is miles from doing that. The act talks about regionwide bargaining units, and it proposes four units for e ach RHA: direct nurs ing and nursing instru ction; auxiliary nursing; paramedical, professional, and technical services; and general support services. Now, it’s interesting, Mr.

Speaker, that the Labour Re lations Board wa s seek ing consens us among the stakeholders about the number of bargaining units and was supposed to make a decision by November of this year. The RHAs requested that the province override this process, and, surprise, surprise, the government was only too willing to do so. Why is that? Why is the government prepared to throw out consultation, collaboration, and collective decision-making between employees, their organizations, and their employers in favour of w hat the minister has called a – what did he call it? An Hon. Member: The greater good. Mr.

Mason: He calls it the greater good, but we know it’s only the good of his friends. He called it – well, I’ll come back. Maybe if somebody wants to

542 Alberta Hansard March 17, 2003 ask me a question, I’ll remember what he called it, but I know that he’s being tough with unions i n ord er, h e says, to protec t health services in this province, and it’s absolute nonsense, Mr. Speaker. 10:20 Now, the government, through regulations again, gets to determine every aspect of the transition from 400 bargaining units to 36, which is four units for each of the nine RHAs. It includes whether voting will take place, what types of collective agreements there are and how they’ll be assimilated.

Despite the authority of regulations to provide the framework for how and when v otes occur, there is no provision saying that votes must occur. The board or even the chair or vice-chair of the b oard wil l be able t o simply assign a union to represent unions w ithout a vote. In the transition pe riod any agreements on severance or termination are null. Now, Mr. Sp eaker, to have the chairman of the authority deter- mine which union workers have to belong to is a travesty of any sort of concept of labour relations that we have developed in this country.

It reminds me of the corporatist model that was developed in Italy during the ’20s and the ’30s, where under Mussolini’s government they set up industr y leaders, which were the big c orporations and employers, who determined the whole scope of . . . [Mr. Mason’s speaking time expired] Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Comments and questions? The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Yes, please, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands.

Do you think that the fact that unions may now have to negotiate amnesty at the end of a job action will in any way jeopardize labour relations or perhaps prolong job action as a result of the draconian legislation here in Bill 27? Mr. Mason: Well, thank you for that, hon. member. I do be lieve that this will just add to the tension and the burdens and the discord that the government seems to be so keen on creating with its heavy- handed approach to labour relations. By the way, hon. mem ber, thank you for jogging my memory. That’s, in fact, the term that the minister used that I wanted to recall.

He admitted that the govern- ment wa s taking a heavy hand with uni ons and em ployees with respect to this bill. So, yes, I do believe that there’s going to be a lot of unrest for some time to come, and the labour relations climate is further going to be aggravated as a result of this action. I guess the problem that I have, Mr. Speaker, to the hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar, is that there was a process already in place where every body wa s negotia ting a re duction in the numbe r of bargaining units in the health system, and there was good progress being made.

The gov ernment has just thr own that all out t he window, and I guess a question that both employers and unions will have to ask in the future is if there’s much value in them trying to develop a long-term collaborative relationship in this industry or in any other one if the government is just going to arbitrarily intervene on behalf of the employers, throw out all of their work, and impose a settlement directly. The Deputy Speaker: Further questions and comments? The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar. Mr. MacDonald: Please, Mr. Speaker. I have another question for the hon. mem ber.

Giv en that the regional health authorities acknowledge that rev isions to thei r boundaries c ould have a significant impact on collective bargaining, the resulting transfer of services and employees from one health authority to another could produce challenges in the areas of seniority, porta bility of entitle- ments, and compe nsation agr eements covering the sa me types of employees as they’re combined or negotiated to produce si milar terms and conditions of employment. Does he have any idea how much that’s cost us? Thank you. Mr. Mason: Mr.

Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question, and I don’t have a precise figu re, obvi ously, but we ca n only estimate that there are going to be considerable costs and consider- able time wrangling over these details, sorting it all out. You know, I think ultimately the workers a re going to be w anting to try and maintain their union of choice, and this option won’t be available to them. So I think that quite clearly this is just another example. You put your finger on it. There are going to be large costs of resolving all of thes e d isputes, and it will t ake a l ot of tim e and a lot of wrangling.

The Deput y Speak er: Edmonton-Gold Bar, any com ments or questions? Mr. MacDonald: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Again to the hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands: does the member feel that Bill 27 in any way, shape, or form is going to alleviate the chronic shor tages of health care professionals in this province? The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands. Mr. Mason: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. No, I do not.

In fact, I think the government’s other agenda in health care, which is privatization, is going to set up a competition for existing profession- als that wil l be draw n away from the public hea lth c are system leaving us with a public health system that is lower in quality and more short of key staff and professions than even it is today. So I think the hon. member has again put his finger on a very important point, and I commend him for doing that. Mr. MacDon ald: Mr. Speake r, again to the hon.

Me mber for Edmonton-Highlands: does the hon. member feel that nurse practitioners have the right to collective bargaining? The Deputy Speaker: Time is up. The hon. Member for Edmonton-Centre. Ms Blakeman: Thanks very much, Mr. S peaker. I’m glad for the opportunity to speak in second read ing to Bil l 27, th e La bour Relations (Regional Health Authorities Restructuring) Amendment Act, 2003. This is an important bill for all of Alberta, I think.

We need workers in this prov ince from many different levels, and I’m always a little s urprised at the gove rnment’s attitude tow ards the working peopl e in this provinc e. I’m not a me mber of a union. Coming from a theatre background, we have a guild, but it doesn’t provide all of the services of a union. But all of my family are union members: my mother in the teachi ng union, my father had five tickets and was a member of the union for every one of those trades, and both of my brothers are very active in the ironworkers’ unions.

So I’m certainly surrounded by union members and have very strong feelings about support for unions and for the concept of collective bargaining and the protection that it offers workers. So I was very interested in this legislation. I can’t say that I was impressed by it or that I was looking forward to it, but I sure was interested. The health author ities have already collapsed from the st arting

March 17, 2003 Alberta Hansard 543 number down to the nin e we’re now looking at. With it, as an excuse I suppose, the governm ent is looki ng at colla psing the collective agreements that went along with the originating hospital boards and then the R HAs an d now down t o the nine RH As. So they’re talking about coming down from 400 se parate collect ive agreements to 36, four bargaining units for each of the nine health authorities.

I’m not in favour of this legislation as we debate this in principle in seco nd r eading, an d fra nkly I don’t see what the gov ernment could do to ame nd this act t hat would make it palata ble to me . I think that the right to strike i s a fun damental one to uphold that relationship between wor

Document details

Collection	Alberta — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	20030317
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	L25 S3 20030317 2000 01 han.pdf
Language	en
Format	json
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	957d82c45e5f41bcf11e7a9437cb57131f484a65

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