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October 12, 2000

37th Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcript 2000-Oct-12 (PDF)

L088 - Thu 12 Oct 2000 / Jeu 12 oct 2000

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

INQUIRY INTO POLICE INVESTIGATIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE AGAINST MINORS IN THE CORNWALL AREA ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 PRÉVOYANT UNE ENQUÊTE SUR LES ENQUÊTES POLICIÈRES SUR LES PLAINTES DE MAUVAIS TRAITEMENTS D'ORDRE SEXUEL INFLIGÉS À DES MINEURS DANS LA RÉGION DE CORNWALL

CHILD AND FAMILY SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES SERVICES À L'ENFANCE ET À LA FAMILLE

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS CENTRES

CRATE MARINE SALES LTD

OAK RIDGES MORAINE

TERRY FOX RUN

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS CENTRES

RENT FREEZE LEGISLATION

RENAMING OF MOUNT LOGAN

HATE CRIMES

MPP BACK TO SCHOOL PROGRAM

SPEAKER'S RULINGS

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

SOCIAL HOUSING REFORM ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR LA RÉFORME DU LOGEMENT SOCIAL

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY AND RESPONSES

GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE AND AIR QUALITY

VISITORS

DEFERRED VOTES

TECHNICAL STANDARDS AND SAFETY ACT, 1999 / LOI DE 1999 SUR LES NORMES TECHNIQUES ET LA SÉCURITÉ

ORAL QUESTIONS

COMPENSATION FOR VICTIMS OF CRIME

INVESTIGATION INTO CHILD ABUSE

WASTE MANAGEMENT

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT

TRUCKING INDUSTRY

MUNICIPAL RESTRUCTURING

GOVERNMENT MAILINGS

BRUCE GENERATING STATION

SCHOOL EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES

ONTARIO LIVING LEGACY

DOCTORS' SERVICES

CORRECTIONAL FACILITIES

TENANT PROTECTION

PETITIONS

NORTHERN HEALTH TRAVEL GRANT

REGISTRATION OF VINTAGE CARS

ONTARIANS WITH DISABILITIES LEGISLATION

HIGHWAY SAFETY

PHOTO RADAR

NORTHERN HEALTH TRAVEL GRANT

AGRICULTURAL LAND

NORTHERN HEALTH TRAVEL GRANT

REGISTRATION OF VINTAGE CARS

ORDERS OF THE DAY

RED TAPE REDUCTION ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 VISANT À RÉDUIRE LES FORMALITÉS ADMINISTRATIVES

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

OC TRANSPO PAYMENTS ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR DES PAIEMENTS CONCERNANT OC TRANSPO

OC TRANSPO PAYMENTS ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR DES PAIEMENTS CONCERNANT OC TRANSPO

OC TRANSPO PAYMENTS ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR DES PAIEMENTS CONCERNANT OC TRANSPO

The House met at 1000.

Prayers.

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

INQUIRY INTO POLICE INVESTIGATIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE AGAINST MINORS IN THE CORNWALL AREA ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 PRÉVOYANT UNE ENQUÊTE SUR LES ENQUÊTES POLICIÈRES SUR LES PLAINTES DE MAUVAIS TRAITEMENTS D'ORDRE SEXUEL INFLIGÉS À DES MINEURS DANS LA RÉGION DE CORNWALL

Mr Guzzo moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 103,

An Act to establish a commission of inquiry to inquire into the investigations by police forces into sexual abuse against minors in the Cornwall area / Projet de loi 103, Loi visant à créer une commission chargée d'enquêter sur les enquêtes menées par des corps de police sur les plaintes de mauvais traitements d'ordre sexuel infligés à des mineurs dans la région de Cornwall.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): The member for Ottawa West-Nepean has up to 10 minutes to make his presentation.

Mr Garry J. Guzzo (Ottawa West-Nepean) : We live in a great country and we live in a most cherished

section of that country, for which we should all be grateful. But what makes this country so desirable and great-the rule of law, the security of all citizens and the guarantees of equality-must surely be protected. They're merely verbiage if our police forces are not independent and are not willing to protect our citizens, thereby sacrificing their public trust.

The bill I introduced this morning addresses a problem in the city of Cornwall, which no one has yet denied. This bill speaks to a breakdown in our justice system, which no one has denied. This bill attempts to shed light on the operation of a pedophile ring which has operated for years in that city, which no one has yet denied and which continues to operate today as we stand here and speak.

If no one denies the foregoing, why would there be so much politicking and opposition to my bill? Why has there been continued opposition to the fact that I have raised these matters in a very professional and dignified manner and on a confidential basis? Why is this bill even necessary?

Three and a half years ago, I began by asking questions of those in authority-my Premier, my Attorney General and my Solicitor General-after I had uncovered information that I myself had difficulty believing.

In 1992, the Cornwall Police Service conducted an internal investigation and concluded there was nothing amiss and no charges to be laid with regard to allegations of a pedophile ring. In 1994, the Ontario Provincial Police did an investigation of the Cornwall force and made the same finding. On Christmas Eve 1994, at a press conference, the provincial police stated that they had left no stone unturned and could find no persons to charge and no evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of the Cornwall police.

But in 1995 and 1996, the Cornwall citizens committee, using their own funds and doing the work of the Ontario Provincial Police, turned up evidence to the contrary. On April 8, 1997, this committee served on the Attorney General of this province and the Ontario Civilian Commission on Police Services, after the Solicitor General had refused to accept service, four boxes of evidence, which included affidavits, statements and documentation which apparently had been totally overlooked in not one but two previous investigations.

The Ontario Provincial Police then quietly embarked upon Project Truth. The same two individuals who headed the initial investigation for the OPP in 1993 and 1994 were assigned to head Project Truth. As a result of Project Truth, as of October 1, 2000, 115 charges have been laid, and 112 of those, by my examination, took place long before Christmas Eve 1994. The evidence of all those 112 charges was clearly available when the two investigations by the Cornwall police and the Ontario Provincial Police took place.

Some 67 weeks after April 8, 1997, on July 31, 1998, the Cornwall citizens committee served on the lead investigator of the Ontario Provincial Police Project Truth copies of the documentation contained in those four boxes that had been left 15 and a half months earlier with the two agencies of the Ontario government, and the lead investigator, Inspector Hall, signed a letter on July 31, 1998, acknowledging receipt of those four boxes of evidence and stating he had not seen this evidence prior thereto.

He had heard comments on an Ottawa radio station, CFRA, from the sister of one of the members of the Cornwall citizens committee, and he stopped the brother on the street and said, "What is your sister talking about?" and he told him. As a result of that, four days later those documents were served on Mr Hall, and he signed that letter. A very experienced police officer signed the letter: "I've never seen this before."

Twenty-three months after April 8, 1997, after the serving of this documentation on two government departments, on March 8, 1999, I received a call at my home in Florida from a person who stated he was the number one person in the Ontario Provincial Police with regard to criminal investigation. He identified himself as Deputy Commissioner Frechette. He said quite clearly that he did not know of what I was speaking in my letter of February 23, 1999, to the Premier. A copy of this letter had recently come to his attention through the Solicitor General's department. At that point, he did not have my initial letter of September 18, 1998.

I make it clear that I believed Deputy Commissioner Frechette, and I arranged to have my file turned over to him upon my return to Toronto. But two weeks later, when I contacted the deputy commissioner, he advised me that he no longer needed to see me and no longer needed to see my file. He had now seen this evidence. He admitted, "I have it now. I'm the number one man for criminal investigation, but I didn't see it for 23 months."

The issues here are clear and easily stated, but they're difficult to understand. How is it possible that the Ontario Provincial Police went from zero charges on Christmas Eve 1994 to 115 charges on October 1 this year? How is it possible that for 67 weeks after the delivery of this documentation, on not one but two departments of the Ontario government, lead investigators on Project Truth had not been aware of the documentation?

How is it possible that 23 months after the service on the Ontario government, the number one man responsible for criminal investigation in Ontario did not know of the documentation and, in particular, did not know of the affidavit of one individual which, in my opinion, was an inculpatory statement? That man had not been interviewed by the police at that point in time.

We have here the makings of a very significant problem. Either the first two investigations were totally incompetent, or there has been a massive cover-up. There is no other possible answer. Why would there be a cover-up in a matter such as this? For what purpose? For whose benefit? I have received no answer to my questions in my confidential letters of September 1998 and February 1999 to the Premier. I do not wish to proceed in this manner, but six months after that first letter, I was advised by the chief of staff of the Premier that he had not shown my letters to the Premier, and I have to ask why. It's as strange an admission as holding a press conference on Christmas Eve.

In addition, I have written to the Attorney General and the Solicitor General individually, as lawyer to lawyer, for some assurance that our government, of which I am a part-admittedly an insignificant part-could not be held responsible for what was clearly occurring in Cornwall, and to date I have received no such assurances.

I have interviewed some 45 to 50 alleged victims. All of them approached me or were referred to me by their legal advisers. I have not accepted everything that each has said, but I have, however, no problem in believing a large portion of many of their statements. Some I have questioned on two or three occasions and they have held up well under cross-examination.

Some of these men have turned to a life of crime. Nobody should be surprised at that. Some of them have done exceedingly well, putting these issues behind them. Some of them have gone public and some of them haven't told their spouses or their children, and in one case, his aged mother. Some have vivid recollections and to some it's just a blur. I've had experienced lawyers and police officers with me on occasion when I've interviewed them, and one police officer, a veteran, was sick to his stomach after having to listen to one description of what had taken place.

In my life as a city councillor, a lawyer, my time as a judge, I have a record of dealing with children. I have dedicated some of my life to working with children and I've never witnessed anything as tragic and as questionable as this situation.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr John C. Cleary (Stormont-Dundas-Charlottenburgh): I am pleased to rise today in support of Bill 103. This has gone on far too long and I have run into the same stumbling blocks as the former speaker. I know that many of the people in my community are very supportive of what's being done here today and I know there are many innocent people on the list of names that is out there who have to be given time to heal.

Since last June 21 when this bill was introduced, many things have happened. This bill called for a public inquiry undertaken by the police forces that are investigating sexual abuse against minors in the Cornwall area.

No matter where I go in Ontario, I get this issue thrown in my face.

If the bill passes, a commission of inquiry will look at investigations undertaken both by police forces and private individuals. No matter what the fearmongerers in the community say, we have a good legal opinion that the two investigations could go on side by side. The commission will inquire into the following: whether the police force investigating complaints of sexual abuse after 1989 failed to conduct an investigation with enough diligence, why no charges were laid at this time and whether or not evidence was concealed.

The bill will also look into why private individuals decided to take on an investigation on their own and if these private investigations led to charges being laid by police forces.

In the early 1990s, an investigation into sexual abuse against minors began in the Cornwall area after the police services board received a number of inquiries. On that police services board are provincial appointees and municipally elected people. The Cornwall police looked into these complaints but claimed there was no evidence supporting the claims.

In 1994, the Ontario Provincial Police came in to review the investigation that the Cornwall police had undertaken into the sexual abuse allegations. In December they announced there was no evidence of any wrongdoing.

Between December 1994 and 1997, private citizens in Cornwall decided to investigate on their own and finally it prompted the OPP to come back into Cornwall and launch Project Truth. As a result of Project Truth, 115 charges were laid against 15 individuals.

I know we've run into many stone walls on this issue, the same as the previous speaker, and after the bill was introduced in the House last June 21, many of my constituents came into the office and wanted to know what they could do to support me and who was going to get to the bottom of this issue.

Some of the same correspondence and material that came to my office also came to Mr Guzzo's office. I spoke to Mr Guzzo in the Legislature last June and he told me that his number was coming up and he was going to introduce a private member's bill and try to get to the bottom of the issue that way. I told him I was very supportive at that time. That was on June 21, and before I could get back to Cornwall, the local press were calling every half-hour to try to get my reaction. I told them that my goal was to support the Guzzo bill and get it to an all-party committee.

Many of my constituents came to my office-very experienced people in law, education, public health, and I could go on and on-and wanted to know what they could do to support this issue. I said, "The best thing I can tell you is that we can have a meeting in my constituency office. I can bring you all together and you can decide. You know this community as well as I do and anything you could do to help, I would be very supportive of that."

So they did form an organization and they had one meeting in my constituency office. No matter what anyone back home tries to tell you, there was one meeting there. They found their own meeting rooms after that.

They brought back to me a petition signed by over 11,000 people supporting the bill. Opposition to that bill has had a hard time to muster 100. They wrote letters and they gathered information. They have worked very hard and they are the salt of the earth. I owe them a great debt for what they have tried to do to bring justice on this issue.

As an elected person for some 28 years, I never saw anything that divided the community like this has.

Our local press didn't help much on this issue. They've fanned the flames. They haven't shown a leadership role. There are things they could have done to try to solve some of these problems but they did not. We heard all kinds of issues from them. In other words, they fanned the flames.

The bill is before us and I am very proud to support the bill. I am very interested to hear what others may have to say. It's an issue that is not going to go away, and it cannot be swept under the rug any longer.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Peter Kormos (Niagara Centre): First, let me indicate quite clearly that the New Democrats will be supporting this bill. As well, let me applaud Mr Guzzo for his tenacity in pursuing this matter. This is an extremely troubling thing, not just because of what the various reports indicate may have happened, but because of what happened after Mr Guzzo began his efforts to bring some light to this matter.

As troubling as the prospect of a flawed or failed or corrupt police investigation is, it's equally troubling that not just one Attorney General but two Attorneys General would rebuff quite frankly any member of this Legislative Assembly who would bring such a serious matter to his attention, but in this instance one of his own colleagues, Mr Guzzo, a man whom I trust.

Although the Attorney General and I don't agree on very many things, I trust the Attorney General agrees with me in terms of my assessment of Mr Guzzo as a person who's extremely familiar with the areas of the law and as a person whose integrity, certainly in this matter, is beyond reproach. I trust him. That's one thing the Attorney General and I can agree on.

Is the matter of a corrupted police investigation beyond the scope of reality? Is the prospect of even political interference beyond the scope of possibility? This seems outlandish in this post-Watergate era, but I've read and re-read the Hansard transcripts of Donald MacDonald here in this Legislature when he rose in this assembly and confronted the Tory government of its day about the incredible litany of abuses that were taking place in training schools.

Please, refer to those Hansards. The response was one of laughter and derision. Donald MacDonald and the New Democrats were mocked for daring to suggest that the august leadership in any number of training schools would have had any role in sexual abuse of children and sexual assault-some of the most heinous sexual assaults, sexual assaults that resulted in pregnancies by teenage women who were placed into the custody of the state for so-called safekeeping, if you will. I read the Hansards, and I remember as a young person the phenomenon.

The New Democrats, as I say, were rebuffed by the government, some very senior members of the government-again, I appreciate that things have changed-who had direct involvement in the appointments of any number of the people to their positions of power and leadership in these various institutions.

So I submit it's not beyond the scope of possibilities that there can have been, in Cornwall, an inappropriate use of power, influence or control to suppress an appropriate investigation.

Let's be very clear, because I don't think there's any member of this Legislative Assembly who's going to in any way prejudge the guilt of those persons who have been charged as a result of a renewal of the investigation-by no stretch of the imagination. There's no intent here to prejudge the guilt of any of those people charged, or quite frankly any of the suspects who may have been named, and no interest in prejudging the outcome of the inquiry being proposed by Mr Guzzo. But that's exactly the point. We're dealing here with the most heinous crimes that can be committed.

There are two things, I suppose, that all Ontarians-I mean fair-minded or civilized persons-would find repugnant. One is that it's repugnant that a person who commits these crimes against these children should not be identified, prosecuted and dealt with. It's equally repugnant that anyone should have to live under a cloud of suspicion without being adequately cleared.

I'm familiar with small-town Ontario. The city of Welland is very much like the city of Cornwall. It's small-town Ontario, where people live pretty intimately, where people share what goes on in that community.

So, as I say, the cloud of suspicion over an innocent person is repugnant, but very repugnant is the prospect that guilty people could remain unapprehended and free of prosecution and justice, not only from the point of view of the community but from the point of view of any number of victims. There's no doubt, I suspect, in a whole lot of people's minds that there have been victims.

I read the reports of the role of Perry Dunlop. While I want to be very careful about prejudging or suggesting what facts may or may not be put forward to an inquiry, here's one about which I have little doubt, and that is that Perry Dunlop, as a police officer, had the audacity to suggest that in the instance-again, I don't think there's any doubt about it-of a deal struck by the employers of one of the perpetrators and the victim-a settlement, cash, to suppress the matter-one that was struck on the condition that there be no discussion or disclosure of the terms of the settlement.

Perry Dunlop said, "Fine and fair," although that sort of deal has been criticized subsequent to that, and then suggested that at the same time there's an obligation for the acknowledged or admitted perpetrators by virtue of the settlement to be reported to family and children's services for their registry of offenders. He not only was rebuffed; he was told to keep his nose out of it, as far as I read, and was told words to the effect of "the matter's done and over with; the case is closed."

Certainly there can't be any doubt about the fact that citizens felt compelled to initiate private investigations. What in God's name, in this kind of country, is going on when citizens can't rely upon their police force to adequately investigate a matter, to adequately investigate a crime, where they have to go and hire private investigators?

The courts had an opportunity to deal with that recently. You'll recall the recent fraud trial here in the city of Toronto. The victims of the fraud-the perpetrator was convicted-were compelled to, because in that instance the police were so understaffed that they said simply said, "No, we can't prioritize a fraud. We haven't got officers to work on it," and so they retained Brian Patterson, whom I quite frankly know well as a very accomplished forensic auditor and investigator.

They paid a huge amount of money for the work that was done-a whole lot of work and effective work, because it resulted in a prosecution-but the judge very, very clearly criticized the utilization of private-sector investigators for Criminal Code offences. He deplored it, as I understand the comments, as something that was "very dangerous" in terms of the whole criminal justice system, in terms of the integrity of the criminal justice system. I'm inclined to agree with him.

So if only for paragraph 5 in the proposals in the bill in terms of the terms of reference of the inquiry, if only for that-and that is the question whether private investigators contributed to laying the charges-and its predecessor, paragraph 4, the circumstances that led to the commencement of private investigations, I urge all fair-minded members of this assembly to support this legislation, and quite frankly to go one step further and to spare it the hypocrisy of sending it off into legislative orbit once it is passed so that it never sees a committee room.

It's imperative that this matter be resolved promptly. I reject any suggestion that this inquiry cannot take place while criminal charges are being laid and/or prosecuted because this is entirely separate and remote and distinguishable from that process. It's imperative that this be dealt with, dealt with promptly, dealt with in committee promptly and that an appropriate inquiry be established immediately.

Hon Jim Flaherty (Attorney General, minister responsible for native affairs): May I begin by thanking the honourable member for Ottawa West-Nepean for permitting me to speak for a moment or two about his private member's bill during private members' business.

We have a responsibility to do everything we can to protect society's most vulnerable members from the harm of sexual exploitation. This responsibility includes ensuring that, as a government, we do not engage in activities or other inquiries that would put investigations and prosecutions at risk.

The matters that the member for Ottawa West-Nepean is bringing before the House through his private member's bill are of great concern and should be taken very seriously.

As the Attorney General of Ontario and the chief law officer of the crown, I am obliged to inform all honourable members of the status of relevant criminal matters. There are currently outstanding criminal matters before the courts. Specifically, there are 12 matters, nine of which are scheduled for trial and three of which will be proceeding shortly. Holding a public inquiry at this time could interfere with these legal proceedings.

In the interests of justice and to ensure that we do not hinder these cases as they proceed, holding a public inquiry now could jeopardize these cases. In addition, criminal investigations and analysis are underway. The police have worked very hard and continue through Project Truth to invest their time, energy and skills to ensure that all matters are carefully and thoroughly examined. Holding a public inquiry at this time could jeopardize these investigations. I emphasize the words "at this time." This bill is, of course, at second reading stage and therefore not at the stage at which it would become law through third reading and receiving royal assent.

It is, however, my duty as Attorney General to provide honourable members with the information which I have provided to the House.

May I once again thank the honourable member for Ottawa West-Nepean for graciously permitting me to speak to his private member's bill as Attorney General.

Mr Richard Patten (Ottawa Centre): First of all, let me applaud my colleague from Ottawa West-Nepean. We have many encounters and joint endeavours throughout time. I know that given his background as a family court judge this bill was not done lightly. Any of you who have read the background material that's been sent out, any of you who have seen the reports on television, who have received the letters or e-mails or phone calls that I have received in my own riding, will know that this is something that is pervasive throughout.

I applaud the member. It has taken great courage and some risk at a time in which I know he went through a bit of a downturn in his personal health. Mr Guzzo, I applaud you for that.

I also know that my colleague from Stormont-Dundas-Charlottenburgh has received calls and has had, frankly, some pressure put on him to turn aside and not engage in supporting this bill.

I think this bill is an indictment, frankly, of the whole process of justice and investigative law officers, and obviously implicates people in powerful positions throughout many institutions, including the church. When we look, as was referred to, at the police officer who stood up and performed his duties, as one should, and then had to leave the community because of threats to his life and his worry about his wife and children, it's a sad commentary. So we must persist.

I am not a lawyer, so I am not sure about the legalities or the inhibiting factors of an inquiry into this matter. I hear some people say no, it can be done, with certain parameters. The Attorney General is here today, and given the facts of what is before us, I think he should call an inquiry. We should pass second and third reading of this particular bill immediately.

At the end of the day, what are we talking about? We are talking about children and young people who are being sexually abused. I'm sure all members have instances and know of personal situations from people in their own ridings of what happens when youngsters go through that, and the psychological and emotional trauma, where people have scars for the rest of their lives. That's what we're talking about.

I want to applaud the citizens' committee that did this, the good people in Cornwall who stood up and provided some information and helped provide Mr Guzzo with the information to continue to pursue this venture.

I will close on these comments: this is beyond partisanship. This is, first of all, a private member's bill, but it is an indictment of all of us. It is an indictment of the established order. It is an indictment of our system of justice and our law enforcement. We must get to the bottom of this. Who knows what is happening as we speak? This is not just confined to Cornwall. This is something that goes on even between Cornwall and other cities, and the United States of America, into Florida.

I support this. My colleagues support it. We would like to see this moved as quickly as possible so this can be addressed.

Mr Marcel Beaubien (Lambton-Kent-Middlesex): It certainly is a pleasure for me to rise this morning to speak on this issue, namely, Bill 103. I do not have a legal background, so consequently my comments are going to be somewhat different than those of my colleague from Ottawa West-Nepean.

Ayant servi pendant neuf années comme maire de notre communauté, ayant servi pendant neuf années comme membre de la commission policière à Petrolia-we call it the police services board today-quatre ans comme Président de la commission, c'est avec cette formation que je veux discuter le projet de loi 103 ce matin.

Vraiment, la situation à Cornwall se présente d'une façon différente de celle dans la région de Lambton-Kent-Middlesex. Mais ma principale raison pour adresser ce sujet, c'est qu'il faut que nous fassions reconnaître à ces personnes qui veulent prendre avantage de la position qu'ils occupent dans notre société aujourd'hui qu'il n'était pas acceptable dans la passé, qu'il n'est pas acceptable aujourd'hui, et qu'il ne sera pas acceptable dans le futur de se comporter de cette façon.

I am not a social worker and I have no experience in social work, but it is my understanding, and we have to realize, that when young people are abused they are scarred for a lifetime. That is not acceptable. That is a social cost we cannot afford. We must put an end to this type of abuse because we are short-changing and, more importantly, impairing these individuals from forging their own life destiny. It is a terrible legacy we are leaving, as they have to live with this on a daily basis for the rest of their lives.

I quote from an

article that appeared in a newspaper in Cornwall recently. I'm not going to quote names, but this individual was charged with sexually abusing a boy under his supervision. The judge, calling it an isolated event, sentenced him to four months in jail and 18 months on probation.

We all realize that we have roles to play in society. We all have responsibilities to assume. Surely, as we enter this millennium, we must send a strong message. We must take a firm position that we must put an end to the abuse of young, vulnerable individuals.

Mr Brad Clark (Stoney Creek): I'm going to ask the members of the House and the people who are listening to imagine for a moment what a child who has been sexually assaulted has to go through to come to their parents and advise them that they have been molested. Imagine the courage and the strength and the faith and the trust that that child needs in their parents, because pedophiles abuse the children not only physically but mentally. They put a tremendous amount of guilt and fear upon them so that they are afraid to come forward.

But at the end of the day, they come forward to their parents because they know their parents can make it right. They know their parents can make it better. Their parents embrace them lovingly and they reach out for help from the authorities.

Imagine, if you will, the parents now in the same position that the child was just in. They now need the strength and the courage and the trust and the faith in the authorities to step forward and ask for help. They know they can't protect their child alone. They have to appear before the police and ask for help from the people who serve and protect. Put yourself in the shoes of the parents when they step forward and the police come back after an investigation and state that there's no substance to the allegations.

Put yourself in the shoes of the child, who has stepped forward with great courage, and they've been told that there is no substance to the allegations. The parents reach out again and, through public outcry, another police body is brought in and again the answer comes back: they have left no stone unturned and there is no substance to the allegations.

Then the parents have to do something very unusual. They have to reach out into their community and do a covert investigation to prove that what their children were telling them was true and that something had gone dreadfully wrong in our justice system and had failed these children, had failed to protect them, had failed to bring the perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice.

What kind of message does it send to the community when the justice system fails our people? The police are the great defenders, the great equalizers. They are the guardians of the public interest. They are the guardians of law and order. When it fails children, we have a major problem that needs to be looked into.

I'm not going to ask members in this House to vote one way or the other on the bill. I'm going to ask you to ask yourselves one simple question: have we done everything we can do to ensure that justice prevails for the citizens in Cornwall? If you can come into this House and can answer honestly in your conscience "Yes," then you know how to vote. But if you come into this House and you answer honestly in your conscience "No," or "I don't know," then you also know how you must vote.

Mr John Gerretsen (Kingston and the Islands): Let me start off by congratulating the member who brought this private member's bill forward. It isn't very often that we do this sort of thing in the House by members of other political stripes etc, but I can tell you, when I read his brief yesterday, it literally sent shivers up and down my back.

The seven-page letter, in which he details his own involvement since he heard about this situation, how he tried to deal with it and what the people of Cornwall have gone through over the last 20 or 25 years, calls into question not just whether a public inquiry should take place here but calls into question the reputation of all our institutions. For a member of the government to take the courageous step to bring this bill forward so it can get a public airing, so we can collectively do the right thing, I think is not only courageous but he ought to be complimented for that.

Time will not allow me to go through each of the seven issues he outlined in his letter, but each issue on its own merits would require an inquiry to take place. I know the Attorney General is saying, "We can't have a public inquiry at this time because of the criminal charges that are still outstanding." I say that is absolute nonsense. That is just another way in which we can once again take this situation, which in some cases has gone on for 25 and 30 years, and push it aside a little further, hoping that people will forget, that people will die off and that this mystery surrounding what may or may not have been happening in Cornwall over the last 25 or 30 years will just continue.

Every now and then it takes courage in this House for any particular member to do something that may not be all that popular. I realize there are people on both sides of the issue in the city of Cornwall itself, those who want a full inquiry and those who don't want a full inquiry. It's a very contentious situation. I can well understand that. But to do the right thing and say to the people of Ontario that what these people have gone through and the cover-up-that's the only word I have for it-that has taken place within the Cornwall police department and perhaps by the Ontario Provincial Police as well-we have to get to the bottom of this.

I would urge each and every member of this Legislative Assembly to put our partisan differences aside, do the right thing and vote for this bill. Let's have an inquiry. There may be certain aspects that the inquiry may not be able to deal with because of the criminal charges, and that can be left aside until the criminal charges are dealt with, but the vast majority of the issues he has raised in his letter can be dealt with right now. The fact that there are criminal charges outstanding right now has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not an inquiry can take place at this point in time.

I urge each and every member of this assembly to do the right thing. Government is about transparency, and surely to goodness, with the kind of situation that has occurred there for the last 25 to 30 years, a public inquiry is demanded. The people want it and I congratulate the member for bringing this issue forward.

Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton West): At the outset, I wish to add my voice to those who have already complimented the member from Ottawa West-Nepean for bringing this forward. It's not the smartest politics in the world in terms of what happens within the caucus of the government, but I think it has shown to this House that this member, who in a former life was a judge, felt strongly enough to take the action he is taking. It doesn't happen very often.

If people are unsure whether or not there should be an inquiry, if you need no other evidence, then look at the fact that it's a government member, a former judge, who is bringing this forward. It's been supported by the Liberal member for the area involved. Our justice critic in the NDP caucus, the member for Niagara Centre, has lent his voice on behalf of our caucus to this cause, and for what it's worth, I want to add my voice, not just as a member now but as a former Solicitor General, in fact a former Solicitor General whose time was in the early part of this encompassing part of what's happening.

In fact, the initial investigation that took place was during my tenure as Solicitor General.

People will know that the Solicitor General in the province of Ontario has ultimate responsibility for all police because he or she is accountable for the legislation that provides the foundation for all policing. In fact, the Solicitor General is the de facto police services board for the OPP. The direct accountability back to private citizens, to the public, for the OPP is through the Solicitor General. The issues raised here are so important because they deal with not just the activities of local police but the provincial police. The OPP has a special place in our configuration of policing, and they're very unique.

It also gets into the area of public and political accountability in terms of Solicitors General and Attorneys General sitting at that time and now, and whether or not there are reasons why Solicitors General and Attorneys General haven't taken action before now-huge implications.

I have one minute left. Let me say very emphatically that I do not believe it is mutually exclusive that you can hold the greatest respect for the police and the work they do and still believe strongly that there has to be public accountability, because without public accountability, civilian oversight, the answerability to elected people, we don't have the standards that ensure we have the kind of policing that we have.

And let me say we have the finest policing in the world, but nothing is perfect. People aren't perfect; systems aren't perfect. If the citizens of Cornwall have not been able to find justice, in their opinion, through the existing procedures, then their last hope is this place, and if they don't find justice in this place, where are they going to find it? For the Attorney General to say that we can't do this because there's an ongoing investigation, let him make that submission to the inquiry. This inquiry needs to happen for the basis of democracy-

The Acting Speaker: Thank you. Further debate?

The member for Ottawa West-Nepean.

Mr Guzzo: I wish to express my thanks to the members opposite and my colleagues who have spoken on behalf of the proposed legislation.

I have to make a couple of comments. I have to interject with regard to the comments of my colleague the Attorney General. There are examples in this province and in this country where criminal charges have proceeded along with an inquiry of this nature, without disruption. Having said that, I also have to comment that if the OPP is looking at laying additional charges at this time, I don't think that's a legitimate excuse. I don't think we can sit back and wait. They have had since 1993, and the evidence in the most recent charges was available years before Christmas Eve of 1994.

I also want to draw to your attention that the Ontario Provincial Police have announced the windup of Project Truth on four occasions. Four times they have said to the press, "We'll be out of there at the end of the month." The most recent was May. They said, "We'll be finished by June." We're now told they're looking at additional charges. Every time they made that announcement, additional charges flowed.

I don't know and I can't explain and I would be speculating as to why I have been stonewalled on this and what the hesitation is in proceeding forward. I know the explanation of what happened in the 1950s. As a youngster growing up in the Glebe

section of Ottawa, I played in Lansdowne Park. I saw youngsters released from the Alfred training school and on the run from the Alfred training school come into the playground bruised from their hips to their earlobes, welts the size of footballs on their backs. They told us, and I listened intently, like every other kid, you know, about the physical abuse and the sexual abuse that was going on there. People knew. The late Bill Bestwick, sports editor of the now defunct Ottawa Journal, had children in the area. He took the issue to his publisher, the late Senator Grattan O'Leary, who interceded-a powerful man in government, a powerful man in the church-but to no avail.

I remember two neighbours of mine taking the matter up, two local members of the governing party-absolutely no action. I walk by the pictures of those two members every day as I walk from my office and come into this House, and it never ceases to amaze me. I never cease to ask the question, what possibly could have happened? How powerful were the forces? Quite frankly, I am at a loss to explain the forces that are taking place at the present time.

I've had calls and I've had pressure. It's been disruptive, I can tell you, both for me and my family. It's come from Cornwall, it's come from Ottawa and it's come from Toronto and elsewhere. It's come from my profession, it's come from my party and it's come from my church. But the pressure I have experienced, quite frankly, is nothing compared to the pressure that the member who lives in the Cornwall area, from Stormont-Dundas, has experienced. He lives with it every day. He set a standard in this House on this bill that has to be recognized and has to be appreciated.

It's something that each and every one of us should try and emulate. I thank him for that on behalf of the very vulnerable constituents in his riding that he so capably represents by taking that steadfast position and showing the strength of character that he has demonstrated.

If this were not on family-time television, if it wasn't possible for youngsters to be looking in, and if I was of a mind to try and inflame this situation, I would read to you extracts from some of the statements and some of the affidavits that were served on the Attorney General and OCCPS, every bit as tragic and every bit as brutal in description of what happened as the statements that were used in the tragedy that was the training school allegations, which resulted in our Attorney General, Jim Flaherty, standing in this House and offering that apology a few months ago.

I want to sum up and say to the people of Cornwall that I appreciate the support and strength they have shown by coming forward and offering support for this bill, offering support to their member and the other members of the House. It's not an easy issue. It does divide the community. There are two sides to the story. How far do you want to go back?

When Mr Flaherty stood in this House a few months ago and apologized three years after the payments to the victims of the training school, he said, "I apologize on behalf of every citizen, past and present, of this province." Is some Attorney General going to stand here in the year 2050 and apologize to the victims of the Cornwall situation and their families on behalf of us? I know how I remember the members whose pictures I walk by on a daily basis. It's not a positive feeling. Do we want to be remembered that way, and if so, why? Who is benefiting from what is happening?

In criminal law, when you get involved in situations, you know you can always follow the money. Follow the money and you get to the guilty parties. But in situations like this, there is no paper trail, there is money trail. Who is benefiting, and for what possible reason? Are we benefiting the victims? Are we benefiting the families of the victims? Are we really here to try to protect a pedophile group? Is that what this country is all about? Is that what the party whose government I represent is all about? I sincerely hope not.

The Acting Speaker: This completes the time allotted for this ballot item. The question will be put at 12 noon.

CHILD AND FAMILY SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES SERVICES À L'ENFANCE ET À LA FAMILLE

Mr Martin moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 118,

An Act to amend the Child and Family Services Act / Projet de loi 118, Loi modifiant la

Loi sur les services à l'enfance et à la famille.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): The member for Sault Ste Marie has 10 minutes.

Mr Tony Martin (Sault Ste Marie): Before I start, I want to thank some people who helped me prepare for today and put together the information I was able to share with members around the Legislature and to put forward this bill. My legislative assistant, Susan Walters; a person in research for us in the NDP caucus, Trish Hennessy; the Algoma Children's Aid Society and the executive director, Hugh Nicholson; and the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies and the encouragement I got from Sandy Moshenko there.

Over the last 15 years, the media has brought to our attention many situations in which children were physically and sexually abused by caregivers other than their parents. Many of these caregivers were trusted professionals such as clergy, teachers and residential supervisors. Some of the more dramatic cases in Ontario include staff from Sir James Whitney School for the deaf, the Sault Ste Marie Roman Catholic district separate school board, St Ann's Residential School, St Joseph's Training School, Grandview school for girls, St John's School for Boys, Pelican Lake Residential School, and the list goes on.

The Law Commission of Canada report prepared by Goldie M. Shea in October 1999 reports over 200 charges of abuse involving 47 caregivers in the 1990s alone. The Children's Aid Society of Algoma told me this number represents the tip of the iceberg. Many other cases are confirmed by them but never prosecuted in the criminal courts. In most of these situations, the abuse went on undetected for years. When victims came forward, they often were not believed and, in some cases, punished for identifying the problem.

We all want to believe these were isolated incidents and that this could never happen again, but history has proven us wrong. We can't ignore the fact that abuse by institutional caregivers is an ongoing reality. The current case in Cornwall is an example of this. There are some serious flaws in the system that allow these cases to go on undetected for so long. Unless we take a careful look at the system and address the problems that allow this to happen, our children remain at risk.

The criminal investigation and prosecution of the perpetrators is often the first point of public awareness. This, however, is far too late, as the abuse has already happened and the lives of far too many children have been destroyed. What Ontario requires is a strong prevention and early warning system. This system must have the power to investigate risk to children and the authority to take appropriate action to eliminate or reduce the risk.

Under

section 15 of the Ontario Child and Family Services Act, children's aid societies are responsible for protecting children and preventing abuse. The Child and Family Services Act outlines specific measures a children's aid society can take in investigating and protecting children at risk in their home. While the act also expects the children's aid society to protect children under the care of institutional caregivers, it fails to include any measure to support their role.

Considering the weakness of the Child and Family Services Act, it is easy to see why the detection and early warning systems have failed. The system will continue to fail these children unless the legislation is changed. Immediate action is required, because the longer it takes to make the changes, the greater the number of victims.

The Children's Aid Society of Algoma, in their response to the Honourable Sydney L. Robins report, Protecting our Students: A Review to Identify and Prevent Sexual Misconduct in Ontario Schools, identified the action that is required. In that report they said children's aid societies need (

a) a clear definition of their role and authority with respect to investigating and preventing abuse by institutional caregivers, (

b) the power to take action to prevent further abuse when children are at risk and (

c) the authority to report the results of investigations of institutional caregivers to the people in charge of the institutions.

In addition, the current duty to report children at risk needs to be clarified. The six-month statute of limitations in the Provincial Offences Act should come into effect only when the child is no longer at risk. This would increase the incentive of other people working in the institutions to report abuse, because the responsibility cannot be avoided through delaying.

The Children's Aid Society of Algoma has made a number of recommendations for changes to the Child and Family Services Act. In June this year, the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies' provincial board of directors supported the legislative changes recommended in the report of the Children's Aid Society of Algoma and, in August, sent a report to the Honourable James M. Flaherty, Attorney General of Ontario, recommending those legislative changes. To date, there has been no response by the Attorney General.

Bill 118 proposes amendments to the Child and Family Services Act that would make the change proposed by the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies while at the same time protecting the rights of the caregiver. With these amendments, families and children in Ontario can feel safe, because they know the province has taken steps to ensure the safety of children when they are under the care and supervision of others.

This bill will provide better protection for children against sexual abuse within schools and caregiving institutions. This bill would put children's aid societies in a better position to ensure children under the supervision of caregiving institutions are protected. The bill ensures that child protection workers have the authority to investigate allegations of physical abuse and sexual molestation of children by teachers and other caregivers.

It also allows child protection workers the authority to apply for appropriate court orders. It authorizes child protection workers to disclose the results of an investigation and information in the child abuse register. It places duty to report child abuse on persons performing professional or official duties with respect to children, a duty that remains in place until the risk of abuse ends.

Mount Cashel, Grandview high school-formerly Galt-residential school abuses: until the late 1980s, the systemic sexual abuse of our children within formal institutional settings such as schools and churches has remained cloaked under the darkness of secrecy. As a society, we were in deep denial. We simply refused to believe sexual abuse could happen. We refused to believe that people entrusted with the authority of teaching or caregiving would abuse their positions of trust by sexually abusing our children. Sexual abuse of our children simply wasn't talked about, it wasn't something we thought about and it certainly wasn't something we acted on.

As the reality of child abuse rears its ugly head, years and even decades after the origin of the abuse, it is becoming painfully obvious that we as a society have failed to protect our children from the very people who were employed or who volunteered to help them. The result is that many children suffered the indignities of abuse, and the system failed to protect them.

In Sault Ste Marie, my home community, layer upon layer of school and community officials covered up the abuses of a sexual predator for three decades before teacher Kenneth Deluca was finally brought to court and convicted of 14 separate sexual offences involving 13 victims. The crimes took place from 1972 to 1993. Each was committed while Deluca was a teacher with the former Sault Ste Marie Roman Catholic separate school board. All his victims were females. All but one were students. Their ages ranged from 10 to 18.

The Honourable Sydney Robins reviewed the Deluca case in specific and the situation of sexual misconduct in Ontario's schools in general. About Deluca, Mr Robins writes, "Deluca's crimes represent the ultimate breach of the trust reposed in a teacher. He was every parent's nightmare-a teacher who sexually preys on students. His conduct severely damaged his victims' physical and emotional wellbeing and, in some cases, has had devastating impact on their lives."

As early as 1973 complaints surfaced about Deluca's sexually abusive conduct. Students, girls as young as 10 years old, were cornered in supply rooms, were verbally harassed, were touched in sexually inappropriate ways, and worse. Dozens of students registered complaints. They were survivors. They told their parents. They told their teachers. They told their principal. They told school board members. They told the police. For three entire decades no one did anything to stop the abuse.

I am here today to ask my colleagues to now do the right thing. We have the power here today to take a move that will give the children's aid society the authority they need to investigate these abuses when they happen.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Bart Maves (Niagara Falls): It's a pleasure for me to rise today to speak to the member for Sault Ste Marie's Bill 118,

An Act to amend the Child and Family Services Act. I want to commend the member for this initiative. As he's mentioned, I think this stems out of a terrible situation in his riding where a former teacher with the Sault Ste Marie Roman Catholic separate school board was convicted on April 19 of 14 counts of sexual assault of 13 female students over 20 years.

The Honourable Sydney Robins was appointed by order in council to review the incidents and report back to the Attorney General. When Justice Robins went in and looked at that particular situation, he thought that it needed a broader look and indeed broadened the terms of his investigation and his report. From it came the Robins report on abuse by teachers of kids in schools. The report is an important one and perhaps has not been given enough attention by all of the adults in our systems: in our teaching system, in this House and elsewhere.

There have been very many recommendations made by that report that pertain particularly to a ministry that I am the parliamentary assistant for, the Ministry of Community and Social Services, and we've actually implemented many of those recommendations. Clearly, all members on this side of the House can understand why he would bring such a bill to try to react to Mr Robins's report and to tighten up the Child and Family Services Act in the manner in which he's proposing.

In my look at the bill, a lot of what is proposed in his bill is actually already covered in our legislation, the Child and Family Services Act, which we amended in 1999. We did a huge revamping, in actual fact. I can give some examples.

Bill 118, the member for Sault Ste Marie's bill, proposes to add that we should "investigate allegations or evidence that children in a caregiving institution who are under the age of 16 years may be in need of protection." The present

section 15 is actually broader than that. Children in caregiving institutions are already included.

There's the desire in the bill to actually list teachers and other caregivers who should be included under this. There's a danger there-and I believe some of the other members are going to talk about that-in starting to list people in legislation and missing some caregivers. The way the legislation reads now is that it's very broad with regard to "caregiver" and some argue that's a better way to have

an act read than to get too definite on who is covered.

Bill 118 proposes that the duty to report under subsection (1) continues each day until the risk to the child ends, which means we've put an obligation on a caregiver of the duty to report child abuse-professionals, teachers and others. This moves that that duty should continue until the risk ends. If you look at the Child and Family Services Act, the intention in that amendment is already covered in existing subsection 72(2), where it says, "A person who has additional reasonable grounds to suspect one of the matters set out in subsection (1) shall make a further report under subsection (1) even if he or she has made previous reports with respect to the same child."

That's just a quick glimpse at some of the sections of the bill that I think are already covered in the Child and Family Services Act. I think some of the proposals in the bill might in fact be detrimental to what's already in the Child and Family Services Act. But I definitely think it's appropriate that we discuss further what the member has put forward, because in some instances some of the clauses he has put forward may indeed enhance the protection for kids. It may indeed be an improvement to the Child and Family Services Act.

So I intend today to vote in favour of the bill. I encourage all my colleagues to do the same. I think we need to spend more time discussing the contents of the bill. As I said, I think a lot of it is already covered in the Child and Family Services Act. I think some of the content of the bill might actually weaken some of the provisions of the Child and Family Services Act, but I'm certainly open to a broader discussion of not only Mr Robins's report and the problem of child abuse in the province but any modifications we might need to make to tighten up the Child and Family Services Act.

Mr Michael Gravelle (Thunder Bay-Superior North): It's a privilege today to speak in the House on this important bill by the member for Sault Ste Marie. I want to certainly commend him on Bill 118. I think it's a very important bill. I know it's an issue that's very important to him in terms of the circumstances in Sault Ste Marie, but I do think it's fair to say that all members of the House should treat it with seriousness, regardless of the precise situation that brought this about for the member for Sault Ste Marie. It's important that we all support this, and certainly I'm looking forward to having that opportunity.

I want to just simply let the members of the House know that recently I was appointed by my leader, Dalton McGuinty, as my party's critic for community and social services. This is an enormous responsibility and I'm honoured to take it on. I look forward to the opportunity to speak very often on a number of issues related to community and social services.

I do believe that we as legislators are not speaking often enough and not taking enough opportunities to speak about social issues in this House, issues that affect the welfare of children, the poor and disadvantaged members of our community. I intend, through my work as critic, to raise many of those issues at every opportunity that I can.

Today we are here discussing specifically Bill 118, a private member's bill that proposes changes to the Child and Family Services Act-important changes, I believe. You will recall that we had unanimous consent in the House to pass the Child and Family Services Act a couple of years ago, but I think there were some missing parts to it and I believe that the member for Sault Ste Marie has addressed them with this private member's bill today.

It's an important bill because it goes even further than the provisions of the Child and Family Services Act. It's a bill that provides much needed legislative clarification so that the role and ability of Ontario's children's aid societies to investigate allegations of abuse by employees in a caregiver role is absolutely clear. I think that's what's so terribly important. It's a bill that I believe is ultimately intended to ensure that no child in Ontario endures the horrific breach of trust by a trusted caregiver that has been felt by too many children in this province's history.

We're not simply referring to incidents from the distant past either. Today's earlier resolution by the member for Ottawa West-Nepean spoke of the shameful situation in Cornwall, and certainly it was a timely resolution when you consider the daily news reports of the pain and suffering that continues to haunt the victims of abuse from that community.

The member for Sault Ste Marie has already spoken about how this bill is meant to address the kind of horrific incidents that took place in his home community. The member also spoke of how the system failed to protect children in his community from the indignities of abuse by continuing to shelter the actions of a repeat offender. We as a society know there is nothing more tragic than the loss of innocence of a child. Therefore, I believe that we as legislators must do everything we can to ensure the protection and well-being of all Ontario children.

It is for those reasons that I am supporting Bill 118. As you know, Speaker, this bill has been supported by the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies. Indeed, the association wrote to the Attorney General this past July, urging his government to bring forward legislation such as the legislation being brought forward by the member for Sault Ste Marie. They've also asked the minister to consider other legislative changes as recommended in the Robins report, and I can only hope that the minister will be doing so.

Bill 118 gives children's aid societies the clarification and the authority they need to protect our children. Without these changes, the CAS's role with respect to investigating child abuse by institutional caregivers is simply ambiguous. We can't have that. The children's aid societies' ability to conduct and communicate the results of an investigation is limited. Children's aid societies will have no authority to follow up to ensure that children are safer in these settings.

These are important issues, and I encourage all members of the House to support this bill today. The truth is, we are here to fight for and to protect Ontario's children. If I may say so, that means beginning to also address some of the issues and social realities that are continually faced by some of Ontario's most disadvantaged people.

Certainly we have the fact of the study by the Caledon Institute of Social Policy, which reported that many of Ontario's families are not better off despite the booming economy. We have the pure fact that one in five Ontario children continues to live in poverty, which is a shameful thing none of us should accept. There is the fact that government policies towards persons receiving social assistance are mean-spirited and without compassion at many times.

This includes policies that rip the national child benefit out of the hands of those who could benefit most from it; policies that require persons needing assistance to apply for it on the phone when they often can't get through on the phones; policies that place liens on homes and threaten the education funds of children of low-income families.

We have unbelievable and inexcusable delays in having cases heard at the Social Assistance Benefits Tribunal, and persons with disabilities having to wait a year and a half for assistance through the severely underfunded home and vehicle modification program.

The list goes on and on. There's a chronic underfunding of almost all of our social service agency partners, and their ongoing difficulties with pay equity.

These are all issues that we as legislators should be and need to be talking about more, and doing something about. As the member for Sault Ste Marie put it, Bill 118 is not the final word on what we, as legislators, can do for Ontario's children, but certainly it is a beginning.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Rosario Marchese (Trinity-Spadina): I want to take this opportunity to congratulate my colleague from Sault Ste Marie in introducing this bill and take the opportunity as well to thank the member for Ottawa West-Nepean for the bill that he introduced, because they're very similar. That bill was called Inquiry into Police Investigations of Sexual Abuse Against Minors in the Cornwall Area Act, 2000. He introduced it in the spirit of a member who is genuinely affected by what he sees as a cover-up and what he believes does no justice to the people who have been abused, and wonders who it is that we are protecting in that instance.

I'm on his side. I felt the emotion of Mr Guzzo's words and felt the fortitude that this individual has to be able to bring it forth in the context of a caucus that may not be supportive or only partially supportive. I admire that, to the same extent that I admire my colleague for bringing Bill 118 forward as a way of dealing with the ongoing issue of child abuse and sexual abuse, something that I'm reminded isn't a thing of the past but forever in our minds and forever in our lives.

One would like to believe that it was something that only happened in the past, but it happens over and over again. The perpetrators probably have become much more sophisticated because public attitudes have changed, as a result of which many know that they can't get away with these heinous crimes as they once might have, and still are, it seems, in the case of Cornwall. They know that their crimes have to be well hidden in order to be able to escape what they do. But it's just a question of time until society catches up to those crimes and deals with them effectively.

In my mind, sexual abuse is the worst violation of a human being that could be levied upon that person. It's the worst violation. It is an unspoken trust that people in official capacities have with having the care of young children, an unspoken, solemn agreement that they have between each other. The people who breach that agreement, in my view, are scum. They're slime. They're the lowest order of human life, in my mind. It is inconceivable that such crimes exist, that there could be people out there who could commit such acts against young people who are so vulnerable, so defenceless in those early years.

That there could be men that could take advantage of a young child, a young person, like that is to me unfathomable.

I know most members feel the same way. How could you not? How could you not, as a normal human being, see such acts or hear of such acts and not be so utterly disgusted? We know that when such things happen, they affect the being of that individual forever. It isn't just such a simple act of an abuse that can simply go away in a moment. It may be a moment of ugliness that is committed against a young person, but against that young person, that action is on his or her mind for a whole lifetime. It alters the human being. It alters the psychology of that human being. It alters the physiology of that being.

It affects his entire life in a way that some of us can't understand. But I understand that if it should happen to me, I could never, never forget it and could never leave it. That's why I say it's the worst violation against a young person that we could all be experiencing. So it's a duty on our part, as politicians, to make sure that we pass laws that protect the most vulnerable.

If the member from Niagara Falls says there may be things in this bill that might do more harm than good, let's investigate it in committee. I don't know how such a bill could do more harm than good-or might make it worse. I'm paraphrasing his language.

"The bill ensures that child protection workers have the authority to investigate allegations of physical abuse and sexual molestation of children by teachers and caregivers." I think that's an easy thing to understand.

"It also allows child protection workers the authority to apply for appropriate court orders." That's simple to me; I don't know how that could hurt more than it does good.

"It places a duty to report child abuse on persons performing professional or official duties with respect to children, a duty that remains in place until the risk of abuse ends."

I'm a reasonable-minded person and I think these are reasonable-minded proposals that my colleague puts forth. But if the member from Niagara Falls feels, on the basis of advice that he's gotten from ministry staff, that maybe there's something here we should look at, let's send it to committee and we can discuss that. I've got no problem with that. Our problem often is that such bills are sent to committees and they tend not to get dealt with. That's my only problem.

But I see this bill as a non-partisan bill. We're not protecting political parties. We don't have to protect anyone in this chamber-the government or opposition members or anyone. There's nobody that needs to be protected in this place more than the children that this bill attempts to do. So I see it as a very non-partisan issue.

If the government, at the end of the day, feels that somehow this is a good bill, it can appropriate it, put a different number to the bill, present it by their Minister of Community and Social Services, and it's done. We have no problem with that. In the end, if you believe this is a good bill, appropriate it and make it yours. No problem, because what comes, in my mind, first is the protection of our children.

On the other hand, if we're going to support this bill, children's aid workers are going to be needing help. Children's aid societies are going to be needing help because they're underfunded as it is and we have to make sure that if we support such bills there is appropriate financial support that comes with it so they can do the job appropriately. The job has to be done by human beings, and when they're understaffed and underfunded it can't be done very effectively. So if we do send it to committee and eventually it gets supported, we will hopefully see the government put some money into the bill as well.

But with respect to whether this bill is an appropriate one or not, I want to make reference to the fact that the Honourable Sydney L. Robins, whom my colleague from Sault Ste Marie made reference to, in his report Protecting Our Students: A Review to Identify and Prevent Sexual Misconduct in Ontario Schools, makes a number of recommendations that clearly point to the inadequacy of the Child and Family Services Act at the moment. That is why the member from Sault Ste Marie has proposed these changes. It is on that basis. It wasn't something that he invented on his own, but rather someone with a great deal of expertise, having studied the matter, said, "We need to make changes."

So if the member from Niagara Falls feels, on the advice of staff I guess, that maybe there's something else we should look at, we'd be more than happy to review that. But children's aid societies and this judge obviously have identified some problems and they are here in the form of Bill 118 as a way to correct some of those deficiencies or inadequacies of the Child and Family Services Act. So even if in my mind there is some doubt that what we are proposing might have merit, we hope that-

Interjections.

Mr Marchese: Tony's bill.

If you have doubt about the merits of this bill, even if there's the slightest doubt that somehow he might be right, I just hope the other members, the few that are here or the few that might be coming, will support the bill and, in doing so, send it to committee and, in doing so, hopefully deal with it and have all the appropriate amendments that need to be made. Have a full public discussion where we invite people like Judge Robins, invite children's aid societies and others who have an interest in this so that they can make appropriate recommendations or other suggestions they might want to make.

I congratulate the member for having introduced the bill. I think it's a good one. I think it moves in the direction of protecting our young people in the way that young people ought to be protected. I am convinced the members of the government will support it and we can move on to do what we need to do as legislators.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Joseph N. Tascona (Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford): I'm certainly pleased to join in the debate with respect to the member for Sault Ste Marie's bill. From what I understand, the bill's intention is to ensure that child protection workers have the authority to investigate allegations of physical abuse and sexual molestation of children by teachers and other caregivers and to apply for appropriate court orders. In addition, I understand the bill seeks to require that the duty to report continue until the risk to the child ends and to permit disclosure of information in the child abuse register to caregiving institutions and to employers of caregivers.

Certainly this is a very serious issue. The protection of a child is something that is entrusted, especially when you're involved in the school system, to our teachers.

The situation that arose out of this that the member from Sault Ste Marie refers to is a very serious situation involving a former teacher who was convicted in 1996 of 14 counts of sexual assault of 13 female students over 20 years. Arising out of that was the Honourable Sydney Robins's report, of which all the members are aware, and certainly I'm aware of it in my role as parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Education.

The Robins report goes a bit further in terms of the protection of a child to also deal with the College of Teachers and the school board's role with respect to that particular situation. I have experienced within my riding a situation that was fairly high-profile recently in Simcoe county with respect to a teacher who was involved in conduct of a sexual nature towards a young male in terms of passing on notes, 64 in total from what I understand. That matter initially, from my information, was handled by the children's aid society under their powers to investigate.

I think to bring this debate into context, the power of a children's aid society to investigate when a child is or may be in need of protection is provided by statute and regulation.

Subsection 15(3) of the Child and Family Services Act states that the functions of a children's aid society are to "(

a) investigate allegations or evidence that children who are under the age of 16 or are in the society's care or under its supervision may be in need of protection." The new regulation which was introduced on March 23, 2000, made under the Child And Family Services Act, entitled Procedures, Practices and Standards of Service for Child Protection Cases, states in

section 2 that "within 24 hours after receiving information that a child is or may be in need of protection, a society shall decide, in accordance with the Risk Assessment Model, whether or not a full child protection investigation should be initiated with respect to the child or any other child in the same family." So the act and the regulation taken together provide the mandate and set out the power of the children's aid society to conduct investigations.

Section 37 of the Child and Family Services Act, in clauses (

c) and (d), makes reference to a person having charge of a child committing the abuse or failing to prevent the abuse. It uses this language to indicate that actions or failures to act of all caregivers-that is, all persons having charge of a child-are grounds to find a child in need of protection.

Teachers and other personnel in educational settings are clearly persons in charge of children during the periods of time when the children are in school or in some other setting in which they are responsible for the care and supervision of the child. I would say that the ministry has always taken the position that teachers and volunteers are in a position of trust and authority vis-à-vis the children in their care, and widespread practice in the field and in the courts clearly supports this position. That's in fact what happened in the particular case that occurred in Simcoe county.

I think where the member is trying to address this situation, he has to be lauded for it. We want to make sure that we investigate all courses of action to make sure that a child's protection is mandated through law. I would say that certainly in the case in Simcoe county that in fact happened. When we look at all the circumstances of the case and you review the Robins report, the protection of the child has to be paramount in the calculation and the determination that's made by the group involved.

When we're dealing with teachers and caregivers who are dealing with the child, that covers the situation where the College of Teachers and also the school board put the primacy of the child's protection first, because I'm quite confident that in the situation in my riding, the children's aid society did their duty with respect to investigation and put the child's interest first.

So in line with the statements of the member from Niagara Falls, I think his comments are well taken and I'll support in principle what he has stated.

Mr Ernie Parsons (Prince Edward-Hastings): I am pleased also to rise and support this bill from the member for Sault Ste Marie. I quite frankly am surprised that there's a need for the bill. I did not realize that these requirements were not in the act. Given that the act was just revised back in 1999, I'm surprised it wasn't inserted at that time.

I'm aware that this is a very difficult issue, and I say that because I think every caregiver fears that there will be a malicious allegation. There certainly are some. In my years as school board trustee and in my years on a CAS board, I know that there have been allegations against staff members and against teachers that have proven to be unfounded, which has assured me that the justice system works. On the other hand, I believe that there are probably more incidents than we are aware of, so I absolutely concur that we need to give powers to have the investigation take place.

I am now in my 24th year as a CAS board member, and my family and I have fostered for 14 years. A majority of the children we have fostered have had sexual abuse in their lives-not all, but substantial numbers. Sexual abuse profoundly alters that child's life path. It is something that will never be forgotten and just completely changes the fabric of who they are and where they're going. It absolutely robs them of their childhood; it is gone forever. The worst thing that can happen for a child who has been abused is to make a report, make a disclosure, and have nothing happen.

It causes several things that come out of that: one is that they will probably never disclose again if no action is taken the first time, and they probably have talked with classmates or other children in the institution who will get the message out of the lack of action, that there's no point in them reporting either.

We have foster children who have reported and the assailant has not been convicted. Then another family member is disclosed and the child has said, "I'm not going to report again. I'm not going to be involved. Nothing happened last time, other than I was punished by my caregiver. I'm not going to have that happen again."

In my own area, and I'm a board member of the Hastings Children's Aid Society, but I know also for the Prince Edward County Children's Aid Society and for the school boards and the police in our community, we established a protocol that caused this to happen. Even without the legislation, locally it was put in place to ensure that the schools and the institutions work with the children's aid, because for someone who's accused, the best thing that can happen to them is to have an investigation. Better that than there being rumours or a whisper campaign.

It is best for the one who is accused to have the investigation. It is paramount for the child that we listen to them. I have to wonder why it wasn't already in the act for it to take place. I mentioned earlier that, naturally, there is concern about malicious allegations, but I believe the number of children who have been abused is probably far greater than we have a handle on. We simply don't comprehend how difficult it is for a child to make a disclosure. The words they have to use are embarrassing; the acts they have to describe are demeaning.

It is a tremendous responsibility on our part as a Legislature to empower them to make a disclosure and to ensure that there is a reaction to it involving a complete and full investigation.

I don't think there is anything better we can do in our lives than to protect our children. As other members have mentioned, sexual abuse against a child simply lingers in their mind forever and affects future relationships with so many other people that we simply must pass this amendment to ensure we protect the children who are in the care of institutions we are ultimately responsible for. I applaud the member from Sault Ste Marie for bringing this forward and I am most pleased to support it.

Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton West): Right at the outset I want to compliment my colleague Tony Martin, the member for Sault Ste Marie, for Bill 118. Anyone who knows Tony would not in any way be surprised that this is the sort of private member's bill he would bring forward.

There may be those who don't know that prior to coming to this place, Tony was the director of a food bank, well known and well respected in the city of Sault Ste Marie. As I have come to know him over the years, it's been clear to me that the reason he's here is because he sees public office as an extension of what he did before.

He has a vision of what Ontario should look like and his community of Sault Ste Marie within that. He believes that if the right kind of changes were made-where only the authority lies to do it, which is this place-then maybe food banks wouldn't be needed. For those of us who have got to know Tony over the last 10 years, everything he has done has been for the advancement of a better Ontario, and it's always, always, people-related. Having said that, let me also say that I think Bill 118 is exactly the culmination of what this place is about and what local elected office is all about.

You had a situation, and other colleagues have referenced it, that took place not that long ago, in fact from 1972 to 1993, and 1993 is not very long ago. It's still happening today. He took a local situation, realized that there were gaps in the law, that there were improvements that could be made, and took it upon himself to use one of the few opportunities an opposition member has to present a piece of legislation, to do something positive, progressive, something that actually takes things forward rather than just the role of being a critic and opposing the government.

In doing so he has brought to light, I think-and certainly from hearing from the parliamentary assistant-areas where there could and should legitimately be improvement.

The member from Sault Ste Marie has pointed out that for three decades a situation was allowed to continue that, if known by proper authorities, one believes would not have happened or would have been brought to a halt. But it didn't. There was a systemic problem and there was the fact that the board saw it as their initial responsibility to decide whether there really was merit to the allegations that were being made-a very difficult situation to put any organization in.

The bill we have here in large part says that where there are allegations, you not only have an opportunity but a responsibility, an obligation under law, to report those to the children's aid society, and the children's aid society would then take responsibility for determining through investigation whether crimes against children were being committed, and then provide steps so that adequate authorities can be brought in and that there is accountability.

To colleagues in this House, this is exactly what this place is all about. It's about being a local member, taking a local issue that matters to you and to your community, identifying why something happened and what can be done to prevent it in the future, and then using your opportunity here as an elected member, the honour we all have to be a member of this place, to rise in your place and present a bill that says, "Based on the experience in my home town"-in this case, Sault Ste Marie-"here's a bill that will make Ontario a better place."

To end my remarks where I began, that's exactly why Tony Martin is here. That's why the member from Sault Ste Marie is such an excellent representative, and I believe why he continues to get elected over and over, because he's here for the right reasons. Bill 118 is all about doing the right thing and I hope he will get unanimous support when we call for the vote.

Mr Garfield Dunlop (Simcoe North): I'm proud to be here today to speak in support of Mr Martin's Bill 118. I'd like to start off by applauding him for bringing it forth. I worked on Bill 35, the Franchise Disclosure Act, with Mr Martin and although I didn't always agree with everything he said, I certainly know how sincere he was in his understanding of that bill.

We all know why we're here today. We're here to discuss the protection of children, and the gravity of this issue cannot be overestimated.

The Sault Ste Marie former separate school board teacher Kenneth Deluca was convicted on April 9, 1996, of 14 counts of sexual assault of 13 female students over a period of 20 years.

The Honourable Sydney Robins was appointed by order in council to review the incidents and report to the Attorney General. That report was released last April. The report contained several recommendations concerning changes to the duty to report that a child is or may be in need of protection under the Child and Family Services Act. That is why our government took action to address the recommendations. The CFSA amendment act was proclaimed on March 31, 2000. Through this legislation we have strengthened the duty to report that a child is or may be in need of protection.

There are a few problems with Mr Martin's Bill 118. I think we all agree that the intent of the bill is good, namely, to better protect children; however, there are some problems with it as well. The notion of creating lists certainly opens a whole can of worms. Our current Child and Family Services Act defines caregiver in a very broad fashion. If you create lists, as this bill asks, you might, by definition, leave people off. This could create real problems afterwards. For example, what would happen if we forgot to put soccer coaches on the list and there was an incident of abuse between a coach and his or her player? Would they then be exempt?

I believe it is critical that the act remain as it is. The act is correct in broadly defining caregiver. Clearly, anyone looking after a child is its caregiver. The law couldn't be more simple than it is right now. It would be dangerous to go down the road of creating lists saying this person is on and that institution is off. We are only going to create problems down the road.

I'm confident our child welfare reforms, including our amended CFSA, are providing the greatest protection for the children of this province. I congratulate the member opposite for bringing forward this bill. Clearly his heart is in the right place: child protection should be the number one priority of everyone in this house. While I am very proud of the work our government has done in this area- the CFSA amendments and the ongoing child welfare reforms-I still support the spirit of this bill: to better protect children. It is worthwhile for this bill to go to committee. If there are good ideas contained in it, they should be carefully considered.

In conclusion, I'd like once again to thank the member for Sault Ste Marie for his private member's bill. However, I really believe our government has already implemented most of the recommendations contained in the Robins report. I still think, though, that if there's anything at all that's untouched in the Robins report, we should take a serious look at it through Bill 118. I look forward to seeing it go to committee and to supporting it here in a few minutes.

Mr Rick Bartolucci (Sudbury): I stand today in support of Bill 118, and compliment the member from Sault Ste Marie for bringing it forward. In many ways, the member from Sault Ste Marie is a voice for victims. I read with interest the 71 recommendations the Office of Victims of Crime made and then listened to the member from Sault Ste Marie, and I say he gets the message. It's important that we become the voice for victims.

That's what Bill 118 is all about. It's a very proactive way of ensuring that what has happened in the past won't happen in the future. Our children are our treasures. They are the community of the future, which will reflect and define the values of the present, especially our values, because we are charged with the wonderful task of promoting and passing legislation. Bill 118 sends a very positive message to the children in our society of Ontario. It says, "We care enough about you to make sure the tools are in place to protect you in many different environments."

I was blessed in my former job, spending 30 years teaching and associating with children. It is indeed horrific when you have to deal with a child who has been sexually exploited or sexually abused. Certainly, the emotional damage that is done is real, and the damage that child lives with for the rest of his life manifests itself in many different ways. Bill 118 ensures that another safeguard is put in place to make sure children fulfill their expectations in a caring, protective way, and that they reach their potential because of the positive reinforcement they've received. The member from Sault Ste Marie indeed deserves a lot of credit.

Let me offer at this time a challenge to the government to pass this legislation. But don't bury it in committee of the whole. Don't do that. Send it to the appropriate committee and deal with it. I am concerned with regard to my own Bill 6,

An Act to protect Children involved in Prostitution. It passed first reading on October 26, 1999, it passed second reading on May 11, 2000, and was referred to general government committee. I thought the government was committed to ensuring that children weren't sexually exploited or abused through pimps and johns. Yet it hasn't gone to committee yet. I challenge the government to pass Bill 118, send it to committee and bring it forth in committee. But I also challenge you to ensure that Bill 6,

An Act protecting Children involved in Prostitution, is brought to the general government committee, so that people from the Office for Victims of Crime, police forces, children's aid societies-every one-can come together, debate and ensure we have a strong agenda to protect children.

A bill like Bill 6 is a strong bill which protects children. Bill 118 is a strong bill which protects children. There is nothing wrong with the government members learning from this side of the House how best to ensure that children are protected. At the end of the day, the people of Ontario only care about one thing: that there will be proper laws in place. They don't care who takes responsibility or who institutes them. They want laws in place that will protect children.

Today is a day when we've heard several people who are voices for victims. In a very short time, the government as well as the opposition parties will have an opportunity not only to talk the talk but walk the walk.

The Acting Speaker: The member from Sault Ste Marie has two minutes to respond.

Mr Martin: I want to thank the members for Niagara Falls, Sudbury, Trinity-Spadina, Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford, Prince Edward-Hastings, Hamilton West and Simcoe North for participating in this very important debate this morning. I also want to thank, because I didn't at the beginning, all those wonderful people in the office of the legislative counsel, and particularly Catherine McNaughton, for the excellent work they've done in preparing this bill and having it ready for today's debate.

I agree with the member from Niagara Falls that this bill is not perfect, that it needs further discussion and that it needs, in fact, the full review that the process of this place lends to. I hope they will support the bill's going to committee, if it indeed passes here this morning. It sounds like all caucuses are supportive of the initiative.

Today, in the bright light of the new millennium, we as a society have come of age. We know now that sexual abuse is a systemic problem that is often upheld and maintained through the closed systems of our institutional structures. We know now that people in power may abuse that power. We know now that disbelief and denial are often the knee-jerk responses to allegations of abuse. We know now that we need to change the system if we are truly to protect our children.

Bill 118 enables simple changes to the law that could dramatically change how our schools and caregiving institutions handle allegations of sexual abuse. Too many children have suffered unnecessarily because of the inability of officials to do the right thing when sexual abuse was suspected. It sends a clear signal that sexual abuse of our children will not be tolerated, and it adds a layer of protection for our children so they will be a little less vulnerable within institutions designed to help and not hurt them.

As I said before, Bill 118 is not the final word on what we as a government can do to protect our children from sexual abuse. But it is a beginning. I appreciate the support of the folks around this room this morning.

The Acting Speaker: The time for this ballot item has now expired.

INQUIRY INTO POLICE INVESTIGATIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE AGAINST MINORS IN THE CORNWALL AREA ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 PRÉVOYANT UNE ENQUÊTE SUR LES ENQUÊTES POLICIÈRES SUR LES PLAINTES DE MAUVAIS TRAITEMENTS D'ORDRE SEXUEL INFLIGÉS À DES MINEURS DANS LA RÉGION DE CORNWALL

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): We will now deal with ballot item number 39. Mr Guzzo has moved second reading Bill 103,

An Act to establish a commission of inquiry to inquire into the investigations by police forces into sexual abuse against minors in the Cornwall area.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All in favour will say "aye."

All opposed will say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

We will take this division after I deal with the next ballot item.

CHILD AND FAMILY SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES SERVICES À L'ENFANCE ET À LA FAMILLE

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): Ballot item number 40: Mr Martin has moved second reading of Bill 118,

An Act to amend the Child and Family Services Act.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All in favour will say "aye."

All opposed will say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

We'll take this division following the division on ballot item number 39.

INQUIRY INTO POLICE INVESTIGATIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE AGAINST MINORS IN THE CORNWALL AREA ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 PRÉVOYANT UNE ENQUÊTE SUR LES ENQUÊTES POLICIÈRES SUR LES PLAINTES DE MAUVAIS TRAITEMENTS D'ORDRE SEXUEL INFLIGÉS À DES MINEURS DANS LA RÉGION DE CORNWALL

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): We will now deal with second reading of Bill 103. Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1200 to 1205.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Guzzo has moved second reading of Bill 103. All in favour will please stand and remain standing until their name is called.

Ayes

Agostino, Dominic

Bartolucci, Rick

Beaubien, Marcel

Bisson, Gilles

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Christopherson, David

Chudleigh, Ted

Churley, Marilyn

Clark, Brad

Cleary, John C.

Coburn, Brian

Colle, Mike

Conway, Sean G.

DeFaria, Carl

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Dunlop, Garfield

Galt, Doug

Gerretsen, John

Gilchrist, Steve

Gravelle, Michael

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hastings, John

Johnson, Bert

Kells, Morley

Kennedy, Gerard

Kormos, Peter

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

McGuinty, Dalton

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Parsons, Ernie

Patten, Richard

Peters, Steve

Sergio, Mario

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Wood, Bob

The Acting Speaker: Those opposed will please stand and remain standing until your name is called.

Nays

Cunningham, Dianne

Ecker, Janet

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): They ayes are 47; the nays are 3.

The Acting Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Pursuant to standing order 96, this matter will be referred to the committee of the whole House.

Mr Garry J. Guzzo (Ottawa West-Nepean): Mr Speaker, I'd ask that the matter be referred to the justice and social policy committee.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Guzzo has asked that the matter the referred to the standing committee on justice and social policy. Agreed? No.

All in favour, please stand to be counted. Those opposed, please stand. The majority of the House is in favour of having this matter referred to the standing committee on justice and social policy.

We will now open the doors for 30 seconds and then deal with the next ballot item.

CHILD AND FAMILY SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 MODIFIANT LA

LOI SUR LES SERVICES À L'ENFANCE ET À LA FAMILLE

Bill 118,

An Act to amend the Child and Family Services Act / Projet de loi 118, Loi modifiant la

Loi sur les services à l'enfance et à la famille.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Martin has moved second reading of Bill 118. Those in favour will please stand and remain standing until their name is called.

Ayes

Agostino, Dominic

Bartolucci, Rick

Beaubien, Marcel

Bisson, Gilles

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Christopherson, David

Chudleigh, Ted

Churley, Marilyn

Clark, Brad

Cleary, John C.

Coburn, Brian

Colle, Mike

Conway, Sean G.

Cunningham, Dianne

DeFaria, Carl

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Galt, Doug

Gerretsen, John

Gilchrist, Steve

Gravelle, Michael

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hastings, John

Jackson, Cameron

Johnson, Bert

Kennedy, Gerard

Kormos, Peter

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

Maves, Bart

McGuinty, Dalton

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Newman, Dan

Palladini, Al

Parsons, Ernie

Patten, Richard

Peters, Steve

Sergio, Mario

Snobelen, John

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Wood, Bob

The Acting Speaker: Those opposed, will you please stand and remain standing.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 54; the nays are 0.

The Acting Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Mr Tony Martin (Sault Ste Marie): I would ask that this piece of public business be referred to the standing committee on justice and social policy.

The Acting Speaker: Agreed? Agreed.

All matters being completed for private members' public business, this House stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock.

The House recessed from 1212 to 1330.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS CENTRES

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): While the Conservative government of Mike Harris appears to have millions of dollars to squander on clearly partisan, blatantly self-serving government advertising on television, radio, newspapers and pamphlets mailed to every home in the province, our community care access centre is in a financial crisis, unable to provide the kind of home care to which the people of Niagara are entitled.

Regulations imposed by the provincial government prevent community health care workers from delivering many services which patients and their families seek and expect. Inadequate funding from the Harris government, which is experiencing a huge and growing surplus, makes it impossible for our community care access centre to meet the real and genuine needs of often seriously ill patients outside of the hospital setting, while new provincial rules force those hospitals to discharge patients often before the patients themselves and their families believe it is advisable.

With severely restricted budgets, the CCACs cannot easily find nurses to take employment positions that involve what they consider to be inadequate pay and benefits, long hours of work and difficult working conditions. Wasteful expenditures of tax dollars on partisan advertising and public relations gimmicks, such as mailing $200 cheques from the Harris government, leave our community care access centres in the lurch and our patients in clear health jeopardy.

CRATE MARINE SALES LTD

Mrs Julia Munro (York North) : I rise today to pay tribute to a small business in my riding of York North. It all started 70 years ago with one man's love of fishing and a vision for success during the Depression. Today, Crate Marine Sales Ltd, located on the southeast shores of Cook Bay, is one of York region's most successful businesses, owned and operated by the Crate family for four generations.

Founder Fred Crate left Toronto in 1931 and settled in Keswick to start a small boat livery for perch fishermen. He called the modest business F.S. Crate and Sons. A boat builder by trade, Crate repaired small fishing craft, rented boats, sold bait and gave anglers a reason to visit the small cottage community.

Lloyd Crate took over the business from his father in 1947. Lloyd opened a sales shop and changed the name of the operation to Crate Marina. What started out as a small fishing operation 70 years ago transformed into a dynamic global operation operating from 35 acres of prime Keswick waterfront. More than 500 boaters call Crate's home. There is also a sheltered harbour and a recently completed public-friendly boardwalk.

Crate Marina was recently awarded the Excellence in Large Business honour by the town of Georgina, and in June was named one of the top 10 Carver boat dealers in the world.

It is an honour to salute this business in my riding of York North during Small Business Month.

OAK RIDGES MORAINE

Mr Mike Colle (Eglinton-Lawrence): Earlier today, representatives of Earthroots were here. Earthroots is an environmental organization that has been fighting to protect the Oak Ridges moraine and to protect it from unbridled development.

This government has refused to do anything to protect the Oak Ridges moraine. This government keeps on blocking legislation. There are three pieces of legislation that are before the Legislature. The Mike Harris government refuses to do anything about the Oak Ridges moraine except to allow development on the moraine.

As we speak, development is destroying the water of the moraine. It's not only the people who live in the Oak Ridges moraine who drink from the Oak Ridges moraine, but all of us who live to the south and drink from Lake Ontario or who live to the north and drink from Lake Simcoe get their water from the moraine, because all these rivers-the Credit, the Rouge, the Humber and the Don-feed the Oak Ridges moraine. As this government listens to developers and does nothing, the Oak Ridges moraine water is being turned into muck.

This water that I have here is the Mike Harris water that we see in the moraine because this government is refusing to do anything. I dare-

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): The member take his seat. Order. We can't have props in the House. I'd ask the Sergeant at Arms to take the water out.

TERRY FOX RUN

Mr John O'Toole (Durham): On September 17, thousands of people across Canada and around the world participated in the 20th Annual Terry Fox Run for cancer research, raising more than $20 million. My riding of Durham was no exception. Riding organizer Walter Gibson and members of his committee Willy Woo, Mary Tilcock, Moe Richards, Jack Munday, Marilyn Green, Joan Putnam, Donna Kay, Cathy McClure, Lee Ann Gibson and Derek Clarke all did an excellent job co-ordinating this event. And I might thank cancer survivor Jeff Flintoff for doing a wonderful job in his remarks.

Holding the ceremonial ribbon at the start of the race was 10-year old Courtney Haines. Over the course of the summer, Courtney has worked to raise awareness and funds for cancer research. In fact, her efforts have been remarkable. To date, Courtney has raised on her own over $4,000 for the Princess Margaret Hospital of Toronto. Her motive behind this was a very personal one because her mother, Heidi, is currently battling cancer for the last two years.

To begin with, Courtney went door-to-door in her neighbourhood to raise money. However, she wanted to do even more. Seeing her interest and determination, Newcastle residents Jack and Gloria Gordon offered Courtney their assistance to have a garden party in their backyard. According to Courtney's grandmother, Ellie Hartwell, this young girl raised $2,000 at the Tea and Sweets for Cancer Research picnic. As word of Courtney's cause got out, an additional $2,000 has been collected.

On behalf of the riding of Durham, I want to commend Miss Courtney Haines and her family and friends for her initiative, determination and drive for a very important, worthwhile cause.

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS CENTRES

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Thunder Bay-Atikokan): We know that community health care providers have been frustrated by funding restraints and regulations that limit the amount of care that can be provided, whether to people discharged from hospital and needing home care or to frail seniors living at home. Now we are learning that care is being restricted because there just aren't enough nurses.

In Thunder Bay last week, the community care access centre had to limit the number of new patients it could take on because there were not enough nurses to provide care. That meant, just in my own community last weekend, seven patients had to stay in a hospital bed instead of being sent home. That same nursing shortage has already led to the cancellation of the second-stage rehabilitation program for cardiac patients in my community.

We have every reason to fear that this is just the tip of the iceberg. We face a critical shortage of nurses and, once again, the source of the problem in this province is the short-sighted, disastrous, cut-everything approach of the Harris government.

The Harris government decided to cut the jobs of 10,000 nurses back when Mike Harris considered nurses to be as dispensable as hula hoops. Now Ontario has the distinction of having the lowest number of nurses per capita in the entire country. Mike Harris promised to hire 12,000 new nurses to make up for his mistake. The Minister of Health says that 6,000 new nurses have been hired, but it appears that only 1,300 new nurses are registered in the province. How many nurses are still being driven out of this province or out of the profession because of poor working conditions?

Part-time job situations and lower salaries for community care nurses make it particularly difficult to keep nurses in home care settings.

The government wants to claim that early discharge from hospital is a way of solving the crisis in emergency departments, but where will patients be discharged to if there are no nurses to provide the care at home? It's time for action now.

RENT FREEZE LEGISLATION

Mr Rosario Marchese (Trinity-Spadina): I want to talk about my bill that I introduced yesterday, the rent freeze on the tenants of Ontario. As you know, there are 3.3 million tenants in the province of Ontario. That's one third of the population, literally. I'm concerned about those poor people because, I tell you, some are very wealthy-some of your buddies are doing OK-but many of the 3.3 million tenants are not doing very well.

My point of introducing the rent freeze bill is to say that if the landlords have done so well in the last couple of years under your Tenant Protection Act, give a break to the tenants. Give them a break. They've had huge increases in rent in the last couple of years; thus, great profits for the landlords. All I'm saying is, give the tenant a break. It's a reasonable-minded proposal that says tenants are real people who have real income problems that you ought to be concerned about.

As you have given the landlords a serious break, give the tenants a little break. It's something I think a fair-minded Premier might want to look at. Hopefully fair-minded Ontarians will call into this government, the tenants of Ontario will call into this government, and say, "Support that bill and give us the desperate break that we need."

RENAMING OF MOUNT LOGAN

Mr Ted Chudleigh (Halton): Is it wrong to dishonour one man in order to honour another? My name is Edward Logan Chudleigh, and Sir William Logan was my great-great-grand-uncle. In defence of Sir William Logan and Canadian history, I am firmly against the suggestion to rename Canada's highest peak, Mount Logan, after the late Pierre Elliott Trudeau.

In the fullness of time, an appropriate tribute for Mr Trudeau will be found. Sir William Logan was a Montrealer. He was a knight of the realm, an explorer, woodsman, scientist, scholar and surveyor. After spending 27 years travelling the world, he explored the Canadian northwest, bringing back items now displayed in the national museum in Ottawa. He was the first Canadian named to the Royal Society in London, and he collected huge numbers of citations, honorary degrees, medals and awards from around the world.

Upon his death, the Natural History Society of Montreal said this about Sir William Logan: "No man is more deserving of being held in remembrance by the people. Just as statesmen and generals have risen up at the moment of greatest need, to frame laws or fight battles for their country, so Sir William appeared, to reveal to us the hidden treasures of nature, just at a time when Canada needed to know her wealth, in order to appreciate her greatness."

In memory of Sir William Logan, I am against the renaming of Mount Logan, Canada's highest peak, for the convenience of today and at the expense of our history.

HATE CRIMES

Mr Michael Bryant (St Paul's): Life, liberty, the security of the person, multiculturalism: these are the foundations upon which our province and our nation lives and breathes, yet it is these foundations that are in fact being threatened by the embers-

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Stop the clock. Would the member take his seat.

Order. The member for St Paul's has the floor and it's very difficult for him to do his statement with people involved with conversations. It may throw him off. He can either continue or start over.

Mr Bryant: Mr Speaker, I prefer to start over.

The Speaker: OK. My apologies to the member for St Paul's, who will start over.

Mr Bryant: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Thank you, members.

Life, liberty, the security of the person, multiculturalism: these are the foundations upon which our province and our nation lives and breathes in a free society, but it is these foundations that in fact are being threatened by the embers of hate burning here at home in the wake of tensions abroad, in the Middle East. I've been told in my riding of eggs and bricks being thrown at members of the Jewish community, hate flyers being distributed, synagogues and community centres defaced, and hate messages painted on Palestine House in Mississauga.

I know all members of this House condemn all hate messages directed at any community.

Last night, an overflow crowd of over 3,000 came together in a synagogue in Thornhill to express their solidarity in support of Israel and to express their hope for peace abroad and peace here at home.

Those in leadership positions must attempt to calm those waters, of course, but we in this province also have to prosecute and pursue the extremists who peddle hate. So I'm calling upon the justice ministers and I'm calling upon the Premier to double our hate crimes unit in Toronto and in Ottawa and to set up regional hate crimes units across this province, if only to send a message to all those who wish to fan the embers of hate in our multicultural society, to send a message to those peddlers of hate, that their days of cowardly acts are numbered.

MPP BACK TO SCHOOL PROGRAM

Mr Doug Galt (Northumberland): Last week in this House I raised a concern about the member for Parkdale-High Park's call for MPPs to visit a school this fall. At that time I expressed my hope that this project was not an attempt to bring politics into the classroom.

I'm saddened to report to this House that my initial reaction was correct. Parents, students and taxpayers had enough political game-playing during the debate on Bill 160. During that time, schoolchildren were used by the unions to carry home union propaganda on a regular basis. We now have a situation where the Liberal Party has forced teachers into using school property and school equipment to once again carry out a political mission.

Last week I received an invitation to visit a school in my riding. The invitation was faxed using a school-owned fax machine. On the fax was another fax number. When I looked it up, lo and behold, it turned out to be the Liberal education critic's fax number. What was the Liberal education critic's fax number doing on an invitation from a local public school?

Mr Speaker, it's reprehensible that the Liberal Party use the public school teachers and publicly owned, publicly funded school board property to carry out their political agenda. This is doing nothing to improve our education system.

As such, I think the Liberals and the Liberal education critic deserve a detention, a detention to be served at the local school where they should write at least a hundred times on the blackboard, "Bringing politics into the classroom is wrong. I promise I won't do it again."

SPEAKER'S RULINGS

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): I want to advise the House that I have received two notices of intention to raise points of privilege, one from the member for St Catharines about the by-election in Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Aldershot, as well as from the member for Prince Edward-Hastings relating to an internal matter.

Pursuant to standing order 21(d), I'm prepared to now rule on those points of privilege.

First, to the member for St Catharines, I must advise that the member's contentions, as arguments based on parliamentary privilege, do not have merit. This is so for two reasons.

First, a firm duty is imposed upon members to bring privilege to the attention of the House at the first possible opportunity. The member for St Catharines is referring to activities that, as his own submission makes clear, occurred some time ago.

Second, the member's point of privilege concerns activities relating to the conduct of a by-election. The member will be aware that Ontario has a codified set of rules that govern elections. The member contends that government advertising during the by-election campaign was designed to circumvent these very rules. I would suggest that if that is the case, then the appropriate potential remedy for this grievance lies with the courts rather than in this chamber. I therefore do not find that the member has made out a prima facie case of privilege.

To the member for Prince Edward-Hastings, the matter he raises is also not a matter of privilege. It does, however, fall under my administrative responsibilities and I would be pleased to meet with him at his convenience to discuss the matter personally.

I thank both the members for their points of privilege.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

SOCIAL HOUSING REFORM ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR LA RÉFORME DU LOGEMENT SOCIAL

Mr Clement moved first reading of the following bill:

Bill 128,

An Act respecting social housing / Projet de loi 128, Loi concernant le logement social.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

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

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

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

The division bells rang from 1348 to 1353.

The Speaker: If the members would kindly take their seats, please.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Arnott, Ted

Beaubien, Marcel

Chudleigh, Ted

Clark, Brad

Clement, Tony

Coburn, Brian

Cunningham, Dianne

DeFaria, Carl

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Flaherty, Jim

Galt, Doug

Gilchrist, Steve

Gill, Raminder

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Harris, Michael D.

Hastings, John

Hodgson, Chris

Jackson, Cameron

Johns, Helen

Johnson, Bert

Klees, Frank

Marland, Margaret

Martiniuk, Gerry

Maves, Bart

Mazzilli, Frank

Molinari, Tina R.

Munro, Julia

Mushinski, Marilyn

Newman, Dan

O'Toole, John

Ouellette, Jerry J.

Palladini, Al

Runciman, Robert W.

Sampson, Rob

Spina, Joseph

Sterling, Norman W.

Stewart, R. Gary

Stockwell, Chris

Tascona, Joseph N.

Tsubouchi, David H.

Turnbull, David

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

Young, David

The Speaker: All those opposed to the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Agostino, Dominic

Bartolucci, Rick

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Caplan, David

Churley, Marilyn

Cleary, John C.

Colle, Mike

Conway, Sean G.

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Gerretsen, John

Kennedy, Gerard

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Lankin, Frances

Levac, David

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

McLeod, Lyn

Parsons, Ernie

Peters, Steve

Pupatello, Sandra

Smitherman, George

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 48; the nays are 27.

The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

The minister for a short statement.

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing): Today, after muc