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November 4, 1975

30th Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Hansard Transcripts

L006 - Tue 4 Nov 1975 / Mar 4 nov 1975

FEDERAL HOUSING PROPOSALS

PRIVATE INVESTMENTS IN HOUSING

FEDERAL HOUSING PROPOSALS

TORONTO TEACHERS’ NEGOTIATIONS

SERVICED LAND FOR HOUSING

MEETING WITH NEW YORK FINANCIERS

LABOUR RELATIONS AMENDMENT AGT

CRIMINAL CODE AMENDMENT

MUSTARD REPORT ON HEALTH SERVICES

DREE GRANTS

CLOSING OF RCA PLANT

TORONTO TRANSPORTATION FACILITIES

YORK REGIONAL COURTHOUSE

CREDIT RULES FOR MARRIED WOMEN

OTTAWA CORONER’S INQUEST

TORONTO AIRPORT NOISE LEVELS

CENTRAL ALGOMA MEDICAL CENTRE

MINISTRY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT

ONTARIO BILL OF RIGHTS ACT

ONTARIO HUMAN RIGHTS CODE AMENDMENT ACT

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE

ESTIMATES, MINISTRY OF EDUCATION (CONTINUED)

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Mr. Ziemba: I would like to introduce to the House a group of ladies representing the west end YWGA immigrant coffee group who are seated in the west gallery, and I would like to ask the members to welcome them.

Mr. Hodgson: On behalf of my neighbour from York Centre (Mr. Stong), I would like to introduce 76 pupils from grades 10 and 11 at Thornlea Secondary School under the leadership of R. K. Smith.

Mr. Bullbrook: Would you join my colleagues in welcoming 40 students of grade 10 from Sarnia Northern Collegiate who sit in your west gallery?

Mr. Speaker: Statements by the ministry.

Oral questions.

FEDERAL HOUSING PROPOSALS

Mr. Lewis: A question for the Minister of Housing. Has the minister any idea specifically what the impact on Ontario will be of the federal housing announcements yesterday and more particularly the amount of money which has or will be designated for use in this province under the AHOP programme or any other?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: No, Mr. Speaker, I can’t tell the direct impact. We received the information yesterday, a very short period before the announcement was made in the House. All that we have so far concerning that proposed programme is the statement that the minister gave. It is now being looked at by officials in the ministry to see just what effect it will have on the province and how much money will be available.

Mr. Lewis: By way of supplementary in two parts, first, do I take it as accurate that the government will of course continue with its mortgage rates credit programme, as announced during the election campaign, to reduce the effect of interest rates since there appears to be no useful intervention on the part of the federal government to that end in terms of Ontario’s needs?

Secondly, would the Province of Ontario also pass legislation requiring insurance companies and loan and trust corporations to direct some of their investment moneys or retained earnings into the housing market since, again, so much of the federal money will be excluded from Ontario by virtue of the maximum price?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, the first part of the question, the question of the mortgage interest subsidy, probably should be more properly addressed to the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough). I am not going to jump to the conclusion that the programme announced by the federal minister does not have some sort of impact in this area until we have had a chance to analyse the total impact of the programme.

As far as the second portion is concerned, I did advise the federal minister yesterday that Ontario would join with the federal government in approaching those financial institutions that are in Ontario to join in this programme and to follow the lead. I suppose, if legislation is necessary, then of course it will be just as the federal government has indicated.

Mr. Renwick: You were going to do that last spring.

Mr. Nixon: Can the minister make it clear? Do we have a provincial cost allowance programme that is supposed to run out as of December, 1975? If so, are we going to make arrangements more or less to support the federal initiative in this regard for rental housing in order to extend it for at least another year?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, I’m sorry, I can’t answer that. Perhaps the Treasurer can.

Mr. Nixon: Is there such an allowance?

Mr. Lewis: Supplementary: What happened to the very strong initiatives which were allegedly taken with the insurance companies, the loan and trust companies and the banks by the Province of Ontario prior to the last election campaign, supposedly to release the funds which the federal government is now re-releasing on our behalf? What happened to all those meetings and all those undertakings and guarantees?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, I am being repetitious. One would have to pass this question on to the Treasurer. I just don’t know.

Mr. Reid: Maybe you could answer both of them.

Mr. Lewis: Maybe I could pass it on.

Mr. Speaker: As the hon. member is still asking questions, it’s okay.

PRIVATE INVESTMENTS IN HOUSING

Mr. Lewis: It would be a new question then to the Treasurer, if I may. What happened to all of the meetings he had with the private investing field, I guess, to free money for Ontario’s housing market? How much money was actually freed in addition to commitments that had already been made and how will that jibe with the federal announcement yesterday?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: I am not sure about the second part of the question because I haven’t had an opportunity to read or to understand the statement in full.

With respect to the first part of the question, meetings were held with the chartered banks, with the insurance companies and with the trust companies. The problem was put in front of them and I thought there was a very excellent reception. I think we tabled that in the House at that time. In terms of statistics as to the growth, particularly by the banks, which, as we all know, just a few years ago --

Mr. Renwick: Oh, come on! We tabled that before your meeting.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- were not in the -- I think we had a very excellent reception from them. It is my recollection that they committed something in excess of $250 million, if memory serves me correctly, over and above what they were already committing.

I don’t think that has all been taken up because it ran right into interest rates. The problem in the last two or three months has not been the availability of funds from the lending institutions; the problem in the residential market, both in terms of single-family housing and rental housing, has been interest rates.

Mr. Lewis: A supplementary, if I may. If it hasn’t been a problem, why does the federal government feel it necessary to threaten by way of legislation the release of an additional three-quarters of a billion dollars? If all of the money is there, then how is it that the Treasurer is claiming an easy access to the money market which the federal government says it has to legislate about?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: As I read the statement yesterday or the newspaper reports as I said, I haven’t had a chance to read the statement in full, nor have I had a chance to discuss it fully with my colleagues -- what the federal government is proposing to do is in some way subsidize the interest rates, which means the money that is available will be taken up and they hope that an additional amount of money, whatever the figure was, will also be put forward. I think if there is some answer to the interest rate problem put forward in the federal proposals yesterday, then the existing funds which are available will be used very quickly and I think there will be a further demand for mortgage funds.

Mr. Shore: A supplementary to the first part of the question. In view of the statement made by the federal minister, could the Treasurer elucidate the announcement he made on government spending control:

“If there are any major new federal expenditures in housing, then I will serve notice now that we expect the federal government to adopt the same budgetary self-discipline that we and local governments, universities and hospitals are now exercising, and to find the money in existing low-priority programmes.”

Does that mean anything now that that announcement has been made?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: It certainly does. I think one of the large pressures on the economy has been government spending, and what we said to Ottawa was that if you’re going to move into --

Mr. Roy: You are starting to realize that, are you?

Mr. Reid: Your $2 billion has nothing to do with it?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We are partially responsible here --

Mr. Reid: It’s the first time you have admitted any responsibility.

Interjections.

Hon Mr. McKeough: -- and most of the clamour comes from you people over there not from us.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: What you promised during election would have cost billions more!

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Let’s get back to the question period.

Mr. Reid: Two billion dollars --

Hon. Mr. McKeough: I say to my friend from Rainy River, don’t come around talking to me about the problems of your --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Order.

Mr. Nixon: We thought you took “nice” pills.

Mr. Roy: Is that a threat? Now, Darcy --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Are there further questions? I think we had better get on to another subject. We’ve had several supplementaries --

Mr. Renwick: By way of a supplementary question to the Treasurer --

Mr. Speaker: Is it a brief supplementary? All right, we’ll allow it.

Mr. Singer: It’s all our fault, is it?

Mr. Gaunt: I thought the Treasurer had tried to change his image.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Renwick: By way of a supplementary question to the Treasurer, did the announcement by the Hon. Barnett Danson yesterday let the government off the hook with respect to its intention and obligation to introduce legislation relating to moderating the impact of mortgage interest rates in the province?

Mr. Lewis: By way of a new question, I would like to ask, did I understand that answer properly? Are you wriggling on the hook or off the hook?

Interjection.

Mr. Lewis: I haven’t asked you yet. Just relax for a moment; I’ll give you the full opportunity --

Interjections.

Mr. Breithaupt: Is this a supplementary question?

Mr. Speaker: It sounded like a question to me.

FEDERAL HOUSING PROPOSALS

Mr. Lewis: It’s a new question, Mr. Speaker. Is the Treasurer implying that the reduction of mortgage interest rates, the programme to which the government committed itself during the election campaign, may now be jettisoned in light of the federal announcement yesterday, which in fact will have a negligible impact on interest rates for those who wish to purchase homes in all of the major centres of Ontario? Does the Treasurer know there are only 20 AHOP homes available now in the entire Metropolitan Toronto area?

An hon. member: Good question.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, no, I wasn’t aware.

Mr. Lewis: Is the government going to reconsider its mortgage interest rate programme?

[2:15]

Mr. MacDonald: That was a pre-election promise --

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, what my leader said very clearly a couple of months ago was that he felt something had to be done about mortgage interest rates in this country. He said he felt that that was clearly the responsibility of the federal government, but if the federal government were not going to take action and not do something about interest rates --

Mr. Lewis: They are not.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- then we were prepared to do so. My friend has read the paper and has the answer to all the questions.

Mr. Lewis: No, I do not believe that AHOP stuff is going to work.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We have not yet studied what Mr. Danson said. Not being an instant expert like the hon. member, I am not quite prepared to throw the whole programme out the window --

Mr. Lewis: Particularly if it lets you off the hook.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- as the hon. member is, after reading this morning’s Globe and Mail.

TORONTO TEACHERS’ NEGOTIATIONS

Mr. Lewis: I have a question which I would like to ask the Minister of Education since he is appearing in the wings. If the Treasurer does not answer me more clearly, some columnist will call him a protestant underachiever.

Interjections.

Mr. Lewis: Someone convey that to Norman Webster, if he is not in the gallery.

I would like to ask a question of the Minister of Education. When is he about to intervene in the very critical Metropolitan Toronto high school board dispute?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I guess what we need is a definition of the word “intervene.” I am not sure what the hon. member means by intervening. If he means, am I concerned about what is happening in Metropolitan Toronto, the answer is yes. If he means, have I been speaking to the Education Relations Commission and its chairman, Owen Shime about what they can do and asking them to do all they can, the answer is yes. If he means, have I been meeting with the teachers ever the last few days and talking to them, the answer is yes. If he means, have I been meeting with the school board over the last few days, the answer is yes.

Mr. Lewis: Thank you very much. I have one supplementary. Is the minister prepared personally to bring both sides together in an effort to reach a settlement before the teachers walk out? That is what I meant.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, if I can usefully be of help I will bring both sides together to avert a walkout, if that is possible. I am not sure when the time to do that might be or if it ever will be, but that we will have to see.

Mr. Nixon: Supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: This could be asked as a new question. I think it is the hon. member’s turn to ask questions.

Mr. Bullbrook: Well, he can ask a supplementary.

Mr. Nixon: This is a supplementary, if you don’t mind.

Mr. Speaker: You can call it whatever you like. It is your turn to ask questions anyway.

Mr. Nixon: I will ask a supplementary, thank you, Mr. Speaker, of the same minister. Is he aware that when a similar question was put to the Premier (Mr. Davis) yesterday he indicated that the minister would have a statement or might have a statement in this regard? Can the minister indicate if there is still that hope that we can avoid a strike?

Would the minister undertake, if he brings the two sides together, to ask the Premier to accompany him in meeting the two sides and as well have a representative of the federal authorities, who have the powers of wage controls in this area, so that we can do everything we possibly can before the teachers walk out -- God forbid, but it appears that they will -- on Wednesday next?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, hope springs eternal. I always look for the bright side. I believe, notwithstanding the storm clouds on the horizon --

Mr. Lewis: Yes, such as the fact that we do not know the outcome of the vote.

Hon. Mr. Wells: -- we still may not have a strike. As I indicated in answer to a question from the Leader of the Opposition a few minutes ago, if and when the occasion arises that I should call the parties together, I will do it. How I do and who is present at that time will be something that will have to be decided at that time.

Mr. Nixon: Supplementary: Since we are all obviously concerned with this, perhaps the minister would indicate what would lead him to decide to bring all parties together.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I indicated in my answer to a question a minute ago that I had asked the Education Relations Commission to see how they were going to carry out their duties under the Act of this Legislature, which is to assist in arriving at an agreement between teachers and school boards. They are presently looking at ways that they can involve themselves to a higher degree in the dispute in Metropolitan Toronto. That presently is taking place.

I’m waiting to hear back from them to see just what they are proposing at this particular point in time, given also the fact that they are conducting the official vote tomorrow. That, I underline, is the official vote that will decide whether the board’s offer is accepted or not.

Mr. Lewis: Oh yes, the crystal ball vote.

Hon. Mr. Wells: My friend, the hon. member, is asking me who should be involved at that particular time when we call the parties together. It may be that I would want to involve the Leader of the Opposition and myself at that meeting.

Mr. Lewis: Oh, with pleasure.

Mr. Bullbrook: Why doesn’t the minister invite Jean-Luc Pepin? He has been doing most of the work for the minister anyway.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk.

SERVICED LAND FOR HOUSING

Mr. Nixon: I have a question of the Minister of Housing. Frankly, I rather regret that he did not make a statement to the House today, having been present at the announcements in Ottawa yesterday.

Is the minister aware that Peter Martin, the executive coordinator of OHAP, has stated publicly that the serviced land production for new housing in Ontario is nearly one year behind schedule? Is he further aware -- and I’m sure he is -- that one of the aspects in the wage and price control announcement was that the federal people are urging the provinces to move more rapidly in the servicing of land?

Would the minister not feel that it is incumbent upon him to make some statement, I hope an effective one, indicating that we are going to pick up the slack in the servicing of land -- which is, obviously, one of the more serious aspects in delaying the fulfillment of the housing commitments made by the minister’s predecessor?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Certainly I’m aware, as many are, that there is the problem of the necessary serviced land to provide housing in many municipalities. I can come here and make a statement, but I would much prefer that any statement that is made would be one that we can feel confident we will be able to carry out and make the programme work.

Mr. Reid: That is a brand new approach.

Mr. Roy: The minister has changed his mind before; five times on rent control.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: The statement by Mr. Danson yesterday indicates that the federal government, of course, are going to put up extra now and make money available to municipalities for servicing. Certainly, I’m prepared to co-operate in any way I can to see that more money goes into that very necessary servicing of land throughout the province.

Mr. Nixon: A supplementary: Since, in fact, there were housing funds available to us over the last two years that were not fully expended, and since three years ago we had a new Ministry of Housing established, we have had a succession of new programmes announced --

Mr. Singer: And ministers.

Mr. Nixon: And new ministers. Since it seems the real hang-up in this is the availability of serviced land, wouldn’t the minister agree that that is one specific area where we have almost an exclusive provincial responsibility and one where we’ve got to perform better than we have in the past?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I think we would find an unanimous feeling in this Legislature that we can always do things better; we can always make an improvement. I would have to agree that, in the case of serviced land, that has to be one of the most important parts of developing a continuing housing programme, to get land serviced in the municipalities.

Mrs. Campbell: That is a change.

Mr. Speaker: I believe the member for Brantford wishes to ask a supplementary.

Mr. Makarchuk: In view of the fact that in some communities there is an adequate supply of serviced land, but it is being held by the developers in order to control the prices, would the minister move into these areas and ensure that this land is released and put into housing so that the prices can be brought down?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, I’m not aware of any specific holdings such as those referred to that are serviced.

Mr. Makarchuk: I’d be prepared to give the minister the details.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Can I answer the question, and then the member can jump up and down? He has been here before, he knows the rules.

Mr. Foulds: He was in this House before the minister was; even before he was a Tory.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: If the hon. member will make the information available to me, I will be most glad to look into the situation. If we can get land released, we’ll get houses built on it. I hope the hon. member is also able to tell me that there are no delays being created by his own municipal council.

Mr. Singer: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Could the minister tell us what steps he and his colleagues are taking to impress upon reluctant and hesitant local councils that land should be serviced? Is the government prepared to take any action to bring councils to service land more quickly than is being done now?

Hon. Mr. Davis: The Liberal Party is opposed to that.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I believe in local autonomy, and I know the hon. member does as well. Heavens, we know that.

Mr. Singer: Oh, of course I do, but what is the minister going to do about it?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: We’ve heard all about that for 37 days.

Mr. Conway: Answer the question.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I also feel that the various municipalities should be convinced by us that they must play their role in the provision of housing. I was most interested to read in today’s Toronto Sun that the former member of this Legislature who is now a columnist, and was before, has become so enlightened in these matters since he left the New Democratic Party and became a columnist.

Mr. Singer: The minister still didn’t answer the question.

Mr. Samis: What was the question?

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, now that the minister has confirmed there is a one-year delay in the programme, could he explain how he could lose a full year in a programme that is only two years old, and give an explanation for the serious failure that is now revealed?

Mr. Lewis: You are lucky they didn’t lose both years.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, I didn’t confirm there was a one-year delay; apparently someone in the ministry has suggested that. I’m not confirming that.

Mr. Singer: Are you denying it?

Mr. Cassidy: Are you denying it?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I don’t know whether there is a year’s delay or not.

Mr. Lawlor: You don’t know much about this legislation, do you?

MEETING WITH NEW YORK FINANCIERS

Mr. Nixon: I would like to ask the Premier if he might report to us the concerns expressed by the financial moguls in New York that made it necessary for him and the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) to go and have dinner with them to allay their fears and concerns about the financial status of this province.

Mr. Roy: Who paid for the dinner?

Mr. Cassidy: Did you take John White with you?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I must say it was lunch, not dinner, and the Treasurer and I --

Mr. Breithaupt: Did the Premier go to a 10-star hotel?

Mr. Reid: The Premier’s lunches are our dinners.

Hon. Mr. Davis: It was lunch.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I would only say to the members of the House that we were invited to visit with certain people in the financial community in New York where this province does borrow, along with Ontario Hydro on occasion, at which time we had an opportunity to set out some of the very positive accomplishments of the people of this province.

Mr. Roy: Did that create a problem?

Hon. Mr. Davis: It was a very helpful visit and one that I am sure will be beneficial.

Mr. Nixon: Supplementary: Was one of the concerns expressed by those people at lunch that perhaps Ontario ought to cut back its spending spree that has been now in operation for four years; and that this has led the Treasurer to announce once again a programme of retrenchment?

Mr. Yakabuski: What about your election promises?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I think “the people in New York” over the years obviously have been quite impressed with the ability of this province and of the government of this province. I think that is very obvious.

Mr. Nixon: We are paying them 10 per cent interest. Why shouldn’t they be?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I think it is fair to state that people who are in the business today of lending capital funds are concerned about the economy generally, not just in Canada. I think part of it relates to a certain nervousness that we sensed when we were there. In fact it was that Friday afternoon when the teachers’ fund of all places, came to the rescue of the city of New York.

Mr. Foulds: Why “of all places”?

Hon. Mr. Davis: We were sitting there when the decision was made and I think it was 125 --

Mr. Nixon: We don’t have an independent fund. You have already spent the teachers’ money.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I told them how we did it here.

Mr. Nixon: No fooling around; just take it away from them.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I told them.

Mr. Lewis: No wonder they are dropping the rating.

Hon. Mr. Davis: But I sense, Mr. Speaker, as we all are concerned about the level of government expenditure, it was possible for us to point out that as a percentage of the gross provincial product, which I’m sure now has come through to the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk, we as a government are spending somewhat less than four years ago. I recognize it is always politically popular to emphasize the expenditure side of the government of this province and I really don’t want to repeat what the Treasurer said earlier.

I just thank heaven, in terms of ratings and everything else, that we are still here and the member’s party is over there, because we would have no rating whatsoever if it had ever formed the government of this province.

Interjection.

Mr. Roy: You were talking about three-star.

Mr. Renwick: A question of the Premier: Did the Premier take the trouble to allay their fears and concerns about the New Democratic Party when he was there?

Mr. Lewis: Imagine our rating if we had been the government.

Mr. Eaton: A minus rating.

An hon. member: Zilch.

Mr. Lewis: British Columbia has a double-A, which is what Ontario is getting tomorrow.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Yes and listen, did the hon. member notice there is an election in British Columbia? Did he notice they called an election in that great province?

Mr. Lewis: I saw that.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The hon. member saw that and I bet it came as a total surprise. It had nothing to do at all with the Premier’s decision to have a freeze in that province. Not at all related.

Mr. Lewis: Not a thing.

An hon. member: The freeze ends at the end of the year.

Mr. Nixon: Or the Premier’s decision to freeze the gas prices.

An hon. member: Leadership!

[2:30]

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Let’s get back to the question period, questions and answers.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t want the member for Riverdale to become upset, or his leader or anyone else on the other side of the House. I hate to inform him, but the subject of the New Democratic Party did not come up in our deliberations.

Mr. Lewis: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. On a point of privilege.

Mr. Speaker: Heavens.

Mr. Lewis: I have a message from the Treasurer which says, contradictory to the Premier, that, “We tried to reassure them -- mainly the New York financial moguls -- that under Lewis the Ontario NDP were a very light pink.”

An hon. member: It gets darker all the time.

Mr. Lewis: “Whether they believed us, remains to be seen.”

Mr. Speaker: I think we should get back to a serious question period.

Mr. Lewis: The Treasurer is quite right, by the way. The Premier may relax.

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: The Treasurer may have made that observation; I didn’t get into any discussion of the colour of the party opposite.

Mr. Speaker: We’re wasting valuable time here. The member for Yorkview.

LABOUR RELATIONS AMENDMENT AGT

Mr. Young: I have a question of the Minister of Labour, if I might. I wonder if I could ask the minister the status of Bill 111, 1975,

an Act to amend the Labour Relations Act? I realize she may not be entirely clear on all these bills yet, but I would ask if she is planning to proclaim this Act in the near future and if part of the delay in the proclamation may have to do with the definition of dependent contractor, and whether or not there is a feeling that the Labour Relations Act should be further amended in order to redefine that phrase dependent contractor so that groups like the dump truck owners might be able to bargain more effectively with their employers?

Hon. B. Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, while I thank my hon. colleague for his solicitude about my lack of preparation for this role, I can tell him that I am familiar with Bill 111. The delay in implementing that specific

section of the Act was promised by my predecessor in order to allow those groups within the labour force who had some concern about that specific paragraph and that definition to make their concerns known to the ministry.

We are at the process of hearing those concerns. We have two more groups to meet; when that has been completed we shall make a decision about that

section of the act and will announce to this House when it will be implemented.

Mr. Young: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: I want to congratulate the minister on her grasp of her ministry.

Mr. Speaker: Someone wished to ask a supplementary.

Mr. Good: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Just a supplementary? The member for Waterloo North.

Mr. Good: Does the minister see the proclamation of those sections dealing with dependent contractors as being in conflict with the task force that dealt with the whole dump truck industry in Ontario and the new legislation now before the House under amendments to the Traffic Act?

Hon. B. Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, there is some question of this. I don’t see it as a true conflict at the moment, but the application of the Rapoport report will have to be made to this

section of the Act and it will have to be considered in the light of the views of those who are concerned with this

section of the Act.

CRIMINAL CODE AMENDMENT

Mr. Singer: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Attorney General. Could the Attorney General advise us about the progress he has made in tightening up, or having the federal authorities tighten up, the drinking and driving laws? I have reference to the speech he made the day he was sworn, which got headlines in the Toronto Star.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: Firstly Mr. Speaker, I attended a federal-provincial meeting of Attorneys General a couple of weeks ago in Halifax and made representations to my federal counterpart with respect to a proposed amendment to the Criminal Code. The proposed amendment, with which the member is probably familiar, dealt with removing from the Criminal Code the power of a judge, in most instances it would be a trial judge, to make any order of prohibition arising as a result of a drinking and driving offence.

I indicated to the Minister of Justice that in my view this was not in the best interest of controlling or reducing the very serious problem relating to drinking and driving on our provincial highways and requested that that amendment be changed and that trial judges be given the power to make driving prohibitions up to a period of a lifetime for the appropriate case.

Secondly, I’ve met with certain of my senior officials with respect to programmes that we hope to introduce in the Province of Ontario which will again, we hope, reduce the incidence of tragedy arising as a result of drinking and driving. I hope I will have more to announce to the House in the near future.

Mr. Singer: By way of supplementary, surely the Attorney General would agree with me that the first step he mentions isn’t going to tighten up the whole problem or tighten up punishment insofar as that is concerned? Secondly, would he care to take the members of the Legislature into his confidence and tell us the kind of thing he has been discussing with his officials because we’ve heard about this kind of thing from him and his predecessors for, lo, these last 20 years? And nothing happens.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: Mr. Speaker, I’ve had fairly lengthy discussions with my officials and I don’t think it would assist the House if I were to take the time of the House to relate these in details. Other than to state that -- and I’m not sure of the precise thrust of my friend’s question -- I would agree with him if he is suggesting that punitive measures by themselves are not sufficient. I think we must embark on a very serious and in-depth educational programme if we are going to make any significant progress in this area.

Mr. Singer: That isn’t quite what you said the day you were sworn in.

Mr. Williams: Mr. Speaker, a question of the Minister of Health. Yesterday in the House --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I don’t see the Minister of Health.

Mr. Cassidy: You may not get an answer anyway, so go on.

Mr. Williams: The minister is returning to his seat.

Mr. Speaker: All right, the member may proceed.

MUSTARD REPORT ON HEALTH SERVICES

Mr. Williams: Yesterday in the House, I raised a question with the minister as to the status of the Mustard report dealing with delivery of health services within the province. He was kind enough to refer me to a manual entitled “Report, Reaction and Response” which I have now reviewed and as a consequence thereof it brings me to a further question. In the light of the very broad recommendations and very general nature set out in the summation of the report I am obliged to pursue the matter further in the form of a question to the minister --

Mr. Speaker: Would you ask the question please?

Mr. Williams: -- as to at what point of time and in what manner the minister intends to implement the recommendations in a more specific and precise way as set out in the general recommendations? In what form will there be a modification of programme based on the criticisms which arose out of the review of the Mustard report?

Mr. Sargent: You should rehearse these questions.

Mr. Good: Go and talk to him sometime.

Mr. Nixon: Okay, when is it, he says?

Mr. Cassidy: Yes or no?

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, there were a whole series of recommendations in the report, as I’m sure the member knows.

Mr. Nixon: Around the bush.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Some of them would relate to, say, the role of the health unit, its structure and reporting mechanisms. We have health units in various forms around the province and it would be our goal --

Mr. Nixon: Tell us all about those.

Hon. F. S. Miller: -- to have them gradually affirm the district or regional board approach. I can’t set a timetable because currently that issue is being studied in Metropolitan Toronto, for one example.

Another recommendation was the rationalization of secondary care services and this is something that is progressing as quickly as we can do it. I would suggest that in this year of restraint it may progress more rapidly than it has in the past.

The third dealt with manpower problems in the province --

Mr. Roy: Sounds more like a statement now.

Hon. F. S. Miller: -- such as doctors’ supply and we’ve agreed to go on a voluntary method of distribution using incentives rather than legislation. There would be another dozen of these and I suspect, in all honesty, that during my discussion of the estimates next week these may come under further scrutiny. I’d welcome detailed questions from the member and other members at that time.

DREE GRANTS

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the provincial Treasurer. Having regard for the excellent financial position of the province, does the minister recall a commitment he made to the K-C five, a group of five communities -- Geraldton, Long Lac, Nakina, Schreiber and Terrace Bay -- where he would provide infrastructure grants through DREE Ontario so that they could provide the infrastructure services for the $250 million expansion under way by Kimberly-Clark? What is the time frame and when can we expect some action?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, I don’t know that I used the word commitment. That may be a little hit too strong.

Mr. Nixon: A political promise, not a commitment.

Mr. Singer: It was before the election.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: In that riding? The member must be kidding.

Mr. Nixon: The Tories had a candidate and they thought he was going to win; he came third.

Mr. Singer: Why did you go there?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, through you to the member for Lake Nipigon, I will review that matter and see where it does stand. We have a number of DREE situations which we are trying to sort out and I would hope to have something more up to date in the next 10 days or two weeks perhaps. We haven’t lost sight of it though.

CLOSING OF RCA PLANT

Mr. Sargent: A question of the Premier: Further to his commitment to honour the hundreds of millions of dollars in promises during the election campaign, does he recall his famous barbecue with Mr. Winkler, where he promised $500,000 to keep the RCA plant open and said no one would lose their jobs; there would be full employment? It closed today and 300 men are out of work. The Premier has reneged on $500,000. I would like to ask him: If Mr. Winkler was elected would he have reneged on the $500,000?

Mr. Yakabuski: Tell the truth.

Mr. Eaton: Let’s hear the whole story; that was in committee.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Just going by memory -- and I don’t recall the hon. member being at that barbecue; he certainly would have been welcome, but I don’t recall seeing him there -- my recollection is that --

Mr. Roy: I guess not. You would have been better off to invite him.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- Mr. Winkler made an announcement. I am not familiar with what happened to RCA today, and I think the question should be properly directed to the Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Bennett), with great respect.

An hon. member: You made the promise.

An hon. member: We’ll spend an hour on it.

Mr. Nixon: It was the former Chairman of the Management Board who made the promise.

TORONTO TRANSPORTATION FACILITIES

Mr. Reid: I have a question for the Premier. In his meeting later on this week with Mayor Crombie and others to discuss transportation problems in Toronto, is the Premier going to commit the Ontario government to paying any of the capital cost for a park-and-ride facility at Eglinton and at Lawrence?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t know what other people I am meeting this week. I am meeting the mayor of the city of Toronto, that is correct.

Mr. Reid: A supplementary if I may: May I ask the Premier, is one of those articles for discussion the transportation system in Toronto and is he going to make any commitments on behalf of the government, particularly for parking facilities at the Eglinton and/or Lawrence ends of the Spadina arterial road?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, there is no question that I will be discussing certain transportation matters with the mayor, perhaps along with other matters. As far as any commitment is concerned as to, shall we say, off-street parking as it relates to rapid transit, this may be a matter that is raised. I can’t say specifically at this moment and I don’t know that there would be any discussion as to a specific location.

If the hon. member is suggesting that there should be provincial support for a particular facility at Eglinton and the Spadina corridor, I am delighted to have his observation.

YORK REGIONAL COURTHOUSE

Mr. Hodgson: A question of the Minister of Government Services.

Mr. Sargent: No!

Mr. Hodgson: At what stage are the plans at the present time with the architectural firm of Boigon and Armstrong as it --

Mr. Cassidy: And from behind as well.

Mrs. Campbell: When do we get out of the chaos we are in?

Mr. Hodgson: -- relates to the proposed courthouse and registry office in the region of York?

Hon. Mrs. Scrivener: This project, I believe, is at the design stage and the design is under consideration at the present time by the Ministry of the Attorney General.

Mr. Hodgson: A supplementary please.

Mr. Sargent: Sit over here!

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Hodgson: Are you relating to me -- that plans are not even at the architects yet? If not, are they at such a stage that the County of York Law Association --

Mrs. Campbell: If you can’t hook up a telephone you can’t answer that question.

Interjections.

Mr. Hodgson: I kept quiet when you were talking, Eddie.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Cassidy: His seat is so precarious.

Mr. Hodgson: Are the plans at the stage now where the County of York Law Association could review them and have some input?

Mr. Good: No, they are long past that.

Hon. Mrs. Scrivener: I believe the plans are in the hands of the architects. They are at the design stage and they are at this point being reviewed by the Ministry of the Attorney General. I think that the local law association will be involved at a certain point but they are not at that point as of yet.

Mr. Sargent: You should have a coffee with the member and tell him about it.

[2:45]

CREDIT RULES FOR MARRIED WOMEN

Mrs. Sandeman: Is the minister aware of the different requirements made for married women when they go to get credit from a credit union or a bank as opposed to those made for married men? Could the minister tell me when he is going to bring in legislation to end discrimination in credit rules?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Speaker, to the hon. member, I am certainly aware of some of the discriminatory aspects of credit granting practices on the part of certain institutions. As a matter of fact, I have just completed a set of guidelines which we are now putting out to the industry for comment. I hope to have an announcement to correct the situation before the end of November.

OTTAWA CORONER’S INQUEST

Mr. Roy: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Solicitor General involving the tragedy last week in Ottawa and the full coroner’s inquest which is being called on this. Would the minister try to resolve the differences existing apparently between his chief coroner and the federal Solicitor General about the appearance of certain witnesses at this inquest? Is the minister in a position to guarantee the public in the Ottawa area that we will have a full and complete inquest with all necessary witnesses in attendance?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: The Solicitor General has assured us of his co-operation in the matter and I will do my best to see that a proper and complete inquest is carried out.

Mr. Roy: Would the minister please advise his chief coroner that when he issues an invitation to the federal Solicitor General, he does so personally and not through the press?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: I am not so sure how that went, Mr. Speaker, but I will make some inquiries.

TORONTO AIRPORT NOISE LEVELS

Mr. Leluk: Mr. Speaker, a question for the Minister of Transportation and Communications: Has the minister had any meetings or discussions with the federal Minister of Transport, Mr. Lang, regarding what the federal ministry is doing at present or contemplating doing to reduce aircraft noise levels in the vicinity of Toronto international airport?

Hon. Mr. Snow: No, Mr. Speaker. We do have a meeting planned. A definite date has not been set up yet but my staff and Mr. Lang’s staff are trying to arrange an appropriate date for a meeting which I expect will be probably -- certainly within the next month, I hope.

Mr. Leluk: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Since the residents in York West riding and other adjoining ridings in the vicinity of the airport are directly affected by these noise levels, would the minister give me his assurance that when he has his meeting with Mr. Lang he will raise this matter with him?

Hon. Mr. Snow: Certainly it will be one of the items we will be discussing.

Mr. Reid: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker, very quickly. Can the minister indicate if, with the cancelling of the Pickering project, the air traffic at Malton will increase in the next 10 years so the noise levels are also going to increase? Is this so?

Hon. Mr. Snow: Mr. Speaker, I don’t think I could indicate what the aircraft movements at Toronto International Airport will be over the next 10 years off the top of my head like that.

Mr. Roy: No.

Mr. Reid: We don’t expect anything off the top of your head.

Mr. Roy: That statement is no surprise here.

Hon. Mr. Snow: There have been a great many studies done by the federal government. My ministry has not done any studies on aircraft movements at Malton; these are studies which have been carried on by the federal government.

Mr. Sargent: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please, we have to get on. No, there have been enough supplementaries. There are many members who wish to ask new questions. There are too many supplementaries and this is the reason many of the questions never get asked. I will call the member for Algoma, I think it was.

CENTRAL ALGOMA MEDICAL CENTRE

Mr. Wildman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for the Minister of Health: Does the visit of Dr. Copeman to Bruce Mines this week mean the government has any new proposals for staffing the Central Algoma Medical Centre or alleviating the very serious debt incurred by the construction of the centre at the encouragement of the ministry? Also, has he approached the federal government to request a review with a view to increasing its financial contribution to cover the labour on the project under the winter works programme?

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, I take exception to some of the wording in there; “at the encouragement of the ministry” is not really a fair choice of words. It’s very difficult sometimes to discourage people at the local level from spending a lot of money on similar health facilities. Dr. Copeman is visiting Bruce Mines this week. It’s a direct outcome of the meeting which the hon. member attended with the council, a meeting I promised when the cabinet visited Sault Ste. Marie just about a month ago. We investigated the problems of that community.

We know there are two doctors in it; one is supported by us and one is not. The doctor who is supported by us, as the hon. member knows, is not yet earning his keep. Therefore, it would be sheer economic folly to support another one. The hon. member also knows that we increased the rental allowance to the community to help them pay their debt.

We are sending Dr. Copeman there in the specific hope that we’ll find somebody such as an optometrist willing to locate in that area and again assist the community in paying the rent on their building. But we don’t underwrite optometrists; in fact, we don’t have a programme for them up there. We simply encourage them to go to areas like that. Further, we have confirmed that the doctors may dispense in that area and therefore solve the problems in that general jurisdiction. I think we have done just about all we can.

The component for winter works has been confirmed at $36,123, and that is accurate. There is no further flexibility left; if anything, we erred on the generous side in working it out in the beginning and I can’t do anything else about it.

Mr. Speaker: The oral question period has expired. Might I remind the hon. members that a supplementary question is surely not necessary in every case? The Speaker doesn’t like to rule them out of order all of the time --

Mr. Sargent: Tell the boys at the top that first.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I think hon. members will agree with me that if we cut dawn on the number of supplementaries, we can get around to more questions. Let’s try that, please. Thank you.

Mrs. Campbell: it would help if some of the government members would consult the cabinet themselves.

Mr. Speaker: I’m talking about supplementaries on all sides of the House, not just one side.

Petitions.

Presenting reports.

Motions.

Hon. Mr. Welch moved that commencing tomorrow, each Wednesday, with the exception of Wednesday, Nov. 12, will be reserved for meetings of committees, and that when the House adjourns on Friday, Nov. 7, it will stand adjourned until Wednesday, Nov. 12.

Mr. Roy: Mr. Speaker, I’d just like to make a comment on that motion. To my knowledge, this province is the only jurisdiction involving the legislative process where the Legislature doesn’t sit on Wednesdays. The purpose of the motion is stated to relate to the sittings of committees, but in fact I think the real motive of the motion is to allow cabinet to sit on Wednesdays.

Hon. Mr. Kerr: No, there are other committees.

Mr. Roy: My respectful submission to this House and to the member moving the motion -- possibly I should make this suggestion to the Premier (Mr. Davis) would be that we explore the possibility of having the cabinet meeting either on a Monday or a Friday. I would suggest a Friday, because the House only sits for half a day in any event. It would make it easier for the out-of-town members who do not happen to sit on any particular committee at least to sit all week and then have that part of the week for their riding work, be it Friday or Monday.

I would think it a more sensible approach, I say respectfully to this House and to the members, than to have the House broken up and not sitting on Wednesdays.

Mr. Cassidy: I’d like to make a comment much in the same vein, Mr. Speaker. The practical effect of having the House not sit on Wednesdays has been the following: the cabinet has been able to meet; and if it wanted to meet into the afternoon, it was able to without the trouble of having to come and meet the Legislature. Members within a 50- or 75-mile radius of Toronto have had a day in which they generally work within their constituencies.

Members from farther out of town, who had long or difficult or expensive trips back home, found themselves kicking around here, manning the committees in certain cases if committees were meeting, and at other times just catching up on work and then having to take time away from the Legislature at the beginning or the end of the week in order to attend to constituency business.

Mr. Hodgson: They never missed you when you lived on the Island anyway.

Mr. Cassidy: It is a legitimate function of a member, I would add. It is perfectly legitimate for members to spend a certain amount of time meeting constituents. It is also legitimate for members to spend time meeting with people in their community who happen to keep office hours and who therefore happen to prefer to meet with members during the course of a business day rather than during the course of the evening or on the weekends. There is a kind of discrimination there between the members who live in or near Metro and people who live farther away.

The third practical thing that happened was that, apart from the private bills committee over the last couple of years, there has been no committee of this Legislature which has made effective use of those Wednesdays. The estimates committees in general did not meet on the Wednesdays but met only concurrently with the House. Other committees on certain occasions would do so. I think the select committee on company law used that opportunity. But the vast majority of the members of this House, apart from the members of the cabinet, were cot in fact engaged on Wednesdays in committee work.

I would point out as well, that the Camp commission report -- I think it was No. 4 -- suggested very specifically that the hours of sitting of the House should be reconsidered. It certainly doesn’t seem to make an awful lot of sense in the middle of the week when most people in most jobs are at the most intense period of activity that this House has just got a great big vacuum and nothing is happening.

As we know, Fridays have become a tag-end day which is not particularly useful, a day which is devoted to the Throne Speech debate, the budget debate and to minor legislation. Sometimes in the past two or three years the House leader hasn’t really had any business at all because he couldn’t find a minister to come in on that particular day. The amount of sitting time on that day wasn’t very great either -- only two hours as compared to between three and 5½ hours on other days.

I simply commend to the House the point that I think it is no longer the case that the convenience of the cabinet should rule the Legislature as a whole. If cabinet is incapable of completing its work between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. or 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, then let it find another day of the week in order to have an additional sitting. I think the matter of constituency work and the balance between that and the work of this Legislature should be recognized so that the many members who wish to give a certain amount of time to their constituencies and who happen to live outside of easy commuting range of Metro are not forced into the position that I and other members are in --

Hon. Mr. Handleman: How about Friday night and Saturday, the same as everybody else?

Mr. Cassidy: -- of having to steal time from the Legislature in order to attend to our legitimate riding work. I think this should be looked at over the Christmas recess.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Where have you been for the last 10 days?

Mr. Cassidy: I would suggest strongly to the House leader that he indicate now that this is a temporary kind of thing for six weeks only and that he will very seriously consider other alternatives in future.

Mr. Speaker: The House leader.

Hon. Mr. Welch: In view of the comments, I think we should perhaps summarize things very briefly. We are in a session of a new Parliament. There have been consultations, as the member for Kitchener (Mr. Breithaupt) and the member for Wentworth (Mr. Deans) will indicate. This doesn’t restrict the opportunity for any member of this House to comment, notwithstanding the fact that there has been some understanding with respect as to how we would order the business in order to get on with our job.

This motion is not being introduced for the convenience of the cabinet. The wording of this motion is very clear. There are three select committees, involving 33 members of this House, who have to find some time to discharge the responsibilities which this House gave them. In none of the three motions establishing those committees are they entitled to meet concurrently with the House.

Mr. Bullbrook: That can only be described as hogwash of the worst kind.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Welch: The point is that these people have to have this opportunity for this particular session to do so.

Mr. Bullbrook: You mislead the House as you always do in these things.

Hon. Mr. Welch: If the member for Sarnia and others would go to their caucuses and explain --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Welch: If the member for Sarnia ever aspired to leadership, he’d better get his wick a little longer. That is all I would say.

Mr. Bullbrook: You and your friends are playing games.

Hon. Mr. Welch: I would think, too, that under the circumstances it has not gone unnoticed that the Camp commission did make some recommendations with respect to the organization of the House. We’ve constituted a select committee to do this. We can perhaps approach it at that time once we have the benefit of the advice from the all-party select committee.

Mr. Bullbrook: In a platitudinous fashion I speak to the motion.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member who introduced the motion wound up the debate on this.

Interjections.

Mr. Bullbrook: No. Wait a minute. Absolutely not. On a point of order then.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. This has been the custom on second reading and motions such as this. I’m sorry that I did not recognize that the hon. member wished to speak. I will allow him to make a few remarks.

[3:00]

Mr. Bullbrook: Yes, right. I want to say this to you. I think most respectfully of your position. You’re quite right in connection with the custom. The custom also is for the Speaker to address the assemblage and invite others to speak before the person putting the motion is asked to wind up the debate I wasn’t asked to speak. I want to say this to you, without any misunderstanding, the government House leader gets up with his pious platitudes about saying that anybody can speak to this motion but we’ve had our arrangements made. We’ll abide by any arrangement made by our House leader, that’s understood, but let this also be understood.

Interjections.

Mr. Bullbrook: I want you to understand this, Mr. Speaker. It’s very important that you understand it because as I understood it when you took that job reluctantly a week ago your reluctance was because it’s a difficult job to protect the interests of all the members of this assembly. I want to say this to you. It’s got to be known. The government House leader was prepared to have the leader of the New Democratic Party and our House leader offer to his colleagues the ability to meet on Wednesdays -- think of this for a moment -- and join in Throne debate without any question period.

I’m not prepared to sit in my place and accept the blatant statement that this type of rule, this type of involvement, had nothing to do with the cabinet. Of course, it has to do with the cabinet.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Just a minute. It is completely out of order.

Mr. Bullbrook: Let me say this to you. It’s for the facility of the cabinet; it exemplifies basically the problem this Premier has. It’s very similar to the problem another Prime Minister has -- he doesn’t understand the legislative process and its function in the government of this province. That’s basically it.

I wanted to rise to say this to you. I’m not going to accept that type of deflection, in effect, from what the true reason is. As my colleague from Ottawa Centre said, it’s for the convenience of the Premier of this province and his cabinet colleagues who really don’t like the legislative process; who really don’t like the question period.

Mr. Breithaupt: I must correct one impression which my colleague from Sarnia has left with the House.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Tell them the truth.

Mr. Breithaupt: That is, the suggestion with respect to the possibility of sittings which might convenience certain members to involve themselves in the Throne debate was made by me on the basis that we have had on several occasions in the past -- the occasional half-day --

Mr. Bullbrook: You still don’t want to sit.

Mr. Breithaupt: -- which would allow Wednesday sittings and give, I understand of course, convenience to the cabinet who had been meeting at that time.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Kitchener has the floor.

Mr. Breithaupt: As a result, Mr. Speaker, while that was a suggestion which has worked to some convenience in the House in the past, it was not proceeded with at this term. I must remind you, sir, that in that particular it was a suggestion I had made with the hopes that some members who might not otherwise be able to involve themselves in the Throne debate because of a lack of time might have that opportunity.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Speaker: Introduction of bills.

MINISTRY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES AMENDMENT ACT

Mr. Singer moved first reading of bill intituled,

An Act to amend the Ministry of Government Services Act, 1973.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Mr. Singer: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the introduction of this bill is to provide for compulsory tendering for construction, renovation and repair work and in the purchase of commodities or real property. This is the third time I’ve introduced this bill as a private member’s bill. It is my sincere conviction that the letting of contracts must be done publicly and everyone interested allowed to have an equal chance to make a bid.

ONTARIO BILL OF RIGHTS ACT

Mr. Roy moved first reading of bill intituled,

An Act to establish the Ontario Bill of Rights.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Mr. Roy: I’ve introduced this bill before. The Canadian Bill of Rights was enacted by the Parliament of Canada in 1960. It provides for certain human rights and fundamental freedoms but it is limited in the field of federal jurisdiction,

whereas this bill would have application to provincial legislation. In spite of the fact that we have moved positively toward human rights legislation, such as our new Ombudsman, I still feel that an Ontario Bill of Rights -- such as has been enacted in five or six other provinces -- is necessary in this province.

ONTARIO HUMAN RIGHTS CODE AMENDMENT ACT

Mr. B. Newman moved first reading of bill intituled,

An Act to amend the Ontario Human Rights Code.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Mr. B. Newman: The purpose of this bill is prevent discrimination on the basis of a physical handicap, where the handicap does not interfere with performance of duties. It’s based directly on the legislation that has been operative now in the Province of Nova Scotia for well over a year.

Mr. Speaker: Before the orders of the day I beg to inform the House that pursuant to

section 82 of the Legislative Assembly Act, I’ve been informed that the members of the Board of Internal Economy of this House are Messrs. Auld, Breithaupt, Deans, Morrow, Snow and Welch.

Hon. Mr. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, the members of the House have had placed on their desks a medallion. That medallion, I may say, is from a great area, a very historic part of Ontario known as Land of Lakes. It’s represented in this House by the member for Frontenac-Addington (Mr. McEwen) and the member for Prince Edward-Lennox. I wish to indicate to the members that the gift is from the association who visited these chambers this afternoon.

Mr. McEwen: I am honoured to join with the member for Prince Edward-Lennox in mentioning the Land of Lakes. I believe daring the last four years it was very seldom that the riding of Frontenac-Addington was mentioned; and I’m sure you --

Mr. Eaton: It was well represented until you came down here.

Mr. Yakabuski: How much money have you spent?

Mr. Singer: One by one you are going down.

Mr. Mancini: Look at all the cabinet material over there.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Orders of the day.

Clerk of the House: The first order, resuming the adjourned debate on the motions for an address in reply to the speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE

[Applause]

Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues are as enthused about my remarks when I have completed them.

Sir, I want to extend my congratulations to you on your re-election as Speaker. I have never been one who felt that we should have a permanent Speaker but the fact that you are here for a second term suits me. Your impartiality is respected on all sides and the fact that one of your political colleagues was a bit concerned about your decision during question period and almost interrupted the proceedings to bring that to your attention is an indication that if you are going to be unfair, you’re going to be unfair to both sides. I think that’s all right.

Also I am delighted that the Deputy Speaker has been selected from the ranks of the opposition and most specifically, that it happens to be the member for Lake Nipigon (Mr. Stokes). He is not in his place at this very moment, although he almost always is, in case an opportunity surfaces to speak for the great north. I think it’s an indication that when the Treasurer (Mr.

McKeough) was questioned about one of the political promises which had been made in that area, he said, “You must realize it wasn’t a political promise because we wouldn’t be wasting our effort or our money in that constituency” or words to that effect. We’re not really here to compliment the political prowess of the incumbent because these things change over the fullness of time, they tell me. I am very much convinced indeed that he will serve well and effectively and with fairness in such an important capacity as the Deputy Speaker and chairman of the committee of the whole.

Naturally, all of us are particularly interested in the remarks made by new members. Many members, before I sit down, are going to say, “Nixon is thrashing a bit of the old straw. We’ve heard his views on these matters before.” I was very pleased indeed to hear the member for Kingston and the Islands (Mr. Norton), who was selected by his leader to move the address in reply.

I sent him a note indicating my congratulations because I felt that aside from some of the over-complimentary remarks that seem to be de rigueur when these circumstances come along, particularly with reference to the Premier of the day, his comments were very apropos and valuable for us all. We tend to get involved in the political convolutions of the provincial scene and it is quite useful when a new member coming into the House indicates some broader perspective as to the requirements of the people -- the taxpayers -- those who from time to time look at what happens in this House.

I thought his remarks were valuable in that regard.

I listened to the speech of the member for Mississauga North (Mr. Jones) very carefully. Perhaps he was a little heavy on the support for his leader but, of course, there are so few people not in the cabinet that I suppose all the backbenchers, all eight or nine of them, are looking for some preferment. I was quite interested in his comments about his antecedents coming from a working family, as I think he described them, in Scarborough.

He used a phrase which is in common parlance. He was referring, I think it was, in criticism of the NDP, perhaps even the leader of the NDP who does not have a corner in speaking on behalf of -- and I use the member’s words -- the little men in this province.” Every time I hear the phrase I remember the comments made by the former member for Sudbury. He came second in this previous contest, Elmer Sopha, and he may yet find a seat here again.

[3:15]

Hon. Mr. Bennett: As leader?

Mr. Nixon: He would make an excellent leader of almost any party; there’s no doubt about that. Every time the phrase, “little man,” was used in this House he would get up on a point of order and call to the attention of everybody: “There are no little men.” I think perhaps it was advice that was good for us all. Certainly in the sight of God and in a democracy there are no little men. Actually when we see some of the wage settlements accomplished in recent weeks, we realize that these things have changed dramatically.

I was very glad to hear the views expressed by the mover and the seconder, and I want to offer my congratulations to them, but all of us, whether we are old or new members, must appreciate that this House faces more difficult problems than at any tithe since the Depression years of the 1930s. We can list them and they are in our minds always: The problems of housing, discussed briefly in the question period today; wage and price controls, which were the principal subject of the comments made by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr.

Lewis) in his remarks yesterday and which I will be talking about as well today; the dislocation in our community and our economy of energy supply and pricing; and perhaps some more perennial problems but certainly in the long run just as important.

There are also the basic problems of quality and standards in education; the continuing tendency to centralize the decision-making powers of government, both here and in Ottawa; and, of course, the costs of government and the budgetary problems that all of us face as taxpayers -- responsibilities that all of us bear as members of this House but which surely are the main responsibility of the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) and the incumbent administration.

I don’t want to talk at length about the election but I must be frank and express my disappointment at the outcome, because here I sit -- stand at the present time -- leading the largest Liberal caucus elected since 1937; and while the quality of the membership has never been surpassed, still it puts us in third position in this House. This in no way restricts our opportunities to participate in the debate, and I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, of our commitment to full participation. I believe that we will be effective.

I believe that we will show by our comments and our votes that we mean business on the basis of putting forward those matters raised in the election campaign and which we as Liberals hold as a body of principle which we must support, no matter what the consequences nor the problems associated with the political involvements in this regard.

I think I should point out to you, as I congratulate the members to my right --

Mr. Samis: Not too heavy on that word please.

An hon. member: Is the seat available?

Mr. Nixon: Do you want me to respond to that? Twice before in recent history the social democrats -- evidently they are in the process of changing their name again -- have had the special responsibility of being the official opposition. There are certain aspects of importance in this role; not only having the extra opportunities to toast Her Majesty, but also the emoluments of leadership and the special circumstances of having the opportunity to put amendments before other parties if they choose.

Twice before this has happened, as I say. The circumstance that I probably can remember personally better than any other was following the election of 1943 when under those circumstances the Liberal leader, who happened to be my father and was the Premier, came out of the election not having moved one step downward in the hierarchy but two steps downward; he found himself the leader of what the Premier will no doubt start calling a group, as soon as he thinks of it.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I have already.

Mr. Nixon: It was a group made up of only six or seven dauntless members. It was interesting as well that that was the last occasion in this House when the government of the day only had minority support. It lasted for two years, two sessions, and it was in fact on the Throne debate in the second session after the election that it was defeated by a vote of the Legislature. It is interesting to note -- I am not indicating that this is any prophecy but at least history has lessons for all of us, politicians and others -- that at the subsequent election the democratic socialists were more than decimated and returned with only a handful.

Mr. MacDonald: What about the Liberals in 1948?

Mr. Nixon: As a matter of fact, the leader himself didn’t make it. That was the beginning, of course, of the regime of Conservatism that has been so electorally successful now for well over 32 years.

George Drew was the Premier, and there was a change that he undertook which really was not in the best interests of any of us I would say -- and particularly not in the best interests of my friends and colleagues sitting crammed into the corner of the House. Before George Drew became Premier the arrangement of seating in this chamber was in a semi-circle. It was very possible and much easier, in my view, for any member to catch Mr. Speaker’s eye. I would think that, if anything, the debate was improved rather than stultified by having that arrangement. There was even room for a few extra seats, if it was necessary to provide them under those circumstances.

Mr. Drew, being a student of history himself, and feeling that the advantages of the British tradition should be brought, let’s say returned to this House, decided to have the alley as we see it here with the opposition separated from the government as it has been ever since. I would suggest that it would in no way interfere with an understanding of the democratic process if we had gone back to that semi-circular arrangement.

The other thing he did is just a matter of interest. His predecessor in the office left a good supply of stationery with the title “Office of the Premier.” Mr. Drew had that thrown out. I am told that it was replaced by stationery heavily embossed with “Office of the Prime Minister.” Well, at least the present incumbent set that straight as one of his first administrative and executive decisions when he came to office.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I used up the old stationery first.

Mr. Nixon: But I have a feeling that if he had to throw out the old George Drew remnants, that it wouldn’t worry these big spenders; nothing cheap about them.

Hon. Mr. Davis: There was still some of Mr. Drew’s paper left over.

Mr. Nixon: I don’t want to dwell on this, but of course we are looking --

Interjections.

Mr. Nixon: -- for some political comfort where we can find it. In the election of 1948 the same thing happened -- the democratic socialists were returned as the second party. But in the subsequent election that they were returned with, I think, only three members.

An hon. member: Two.

Mr. Nixon: Just two

Mr. MacDonald: And we are back again.

Mr. Nixon: They had the same strength as the Communist Party at that time. I wish that we, as Liberals, had something more to brag about under those circumstances, but there has been a shuffling back and forth.

I am sure that none of us can foresee the future, but I thought this background, under the present circumstances in which we find ourselves, would at least he of some assistance to me.

Mr. Laughren: We shall see.

Mr. Nixon: One of the interesting aspects of the last two elections, when I had the honour to lead the Liberal Party, was to listen to the spokesman from the third party, as it then was, talk about the popular vote. There was a certain satisfaction, sitting there as Leader of the Official Opposition, to say: “Well, you know, you won the votes but you didn’t win the seats.” I am now in a position where I want to talk about the popular vote.

I well remember and will never forget, of course, the events of election nights. I have had considerable training -- both as an active politician and as a supporter of the former member for Brant -- for election nights with almost all results, all except winning results. I drew some comfort, indeed, from the fact that the people of the province had turned in substantial numbers to the party which I lead, the Liberal Party. We found ourselves less than two per cent behind the government party, and 5.4 per cent in the popular vote ahead of the party on my right.

I hear a few groans up there, but it appears that 180,000 more people in the province voted for the Liberal Party than voted for the NDP. That is small comfort, but we did get that support.

Mr. MacDonald: How many of them were just negative votes?

Mr. Nixon: Even in the area of Toronto and district more people supported our party than the NDP. While I am prepared to congratulate the 14 members from Metro and as well the four members from Toronto and district --

Mr. Samis: There is something to work for.

Mr. Nixon: -- for their effort in support of my leadership and in support of the Liberal Party, I simply put that before you, Mr. Speaker, to say that I have some regrets about the outcome. But seats count; I don’t believe in the distributive ballot. The fact that Murray Gaunt got such an enormous majority, sort of dislocating this distribution, is a matter of some pride for him; and as well Hughie Edighoffer and many others who piled up these large majorities. We did substantially reinforce the basis of support and strength of the Liberal Party and I would predict to you, Mr.

Speaker, that my successor is going to stand in this House before you as the leader of a government and this may, in fact, happen sooner than later.

Interjection.

Mr. Roy: We are not going to miss the member for Renfrew South (Mr. Yakabuski) at all.

Interjections.

Mr. Nixon: Even Renfrew South is vulnerable -- Renfrew South particularly.

Mr. Ruston: And Middlesex.

Mr. Nixon: Renfrew South particularly.

Mr. Riddell: It just about happened this time, didn’t it, Bob?

Mr. Nixon: I must certainly say to you, Mr. Speaker, that while I wish all new members well in their participation in the debate and look forward to hearing this debate as it proceeds, I am proud of those men and women who were elected in the support of Liberal principles and the Liberal platform; and I can assure you, sir, that we will actively participate in the important problems which face this Legislature, which I want to deal with in the time remaining to me.

The first matter I want to refer to is housing. The Minister of Housing (Mr. Rhodes) disappointed me a bit that he did not make a more formal statement today, particularly in response to the new statement of administrative policy from Mr. Danson, the federal minister. Certainly, it takes some time to examine the ramifications of his statements, but I was interested to hear the Minister of Housing indicate that he was at least cautiously optimistic that the initiative taken in Ottawa would be of some assistance in Ontario.

The thing that concerned me is that even the rather inflated predictions of housing starts in the next year coming from Mr. Danson still leave, if the distribution of these housing starts is as it has been in the past, Ontario with only 80,000 starts, and this is substantially inadequate. The government has frequently said that anything less than 110,000 starts is not going to improve the crisis situation here and we must have some new initiatives taken at the provincial level here in the Province of Ontario.

The programme enunciated in Ottawa to provide some assistance with a goal of giving eight per cent mortgage money has been damned already by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Lewis). I felt at least the intention was one which is supportable on all sides and if, in fact, there isn’t enough federal strength to make that effective in this province, surely we can -- and it has been promised by the Premier (Mr. Davis) himself that we can -- undertake a programme here which, in conjunction with the federal programme, however inadequate it may be, will bring this to an effective reality in this province.

One of the areas which I raised in the question period and which formed a part of the policy statement made by the Hon. Donald Macdonald -- that’s federal Don -- having to do with wage and price controls comes from page 19 of the highlights. It says:

“In particular, measures to increase the supply of serviced land, including municipal action to speed up approval of subdivisions and provision of services, will be discussed with the provinces.”

I felt a certain degree of naïveté must have gone into that statement, since the federal government I believe must take some strong initiatives to provide financing for housing but surely all of the initiative in freeing up land for servicing and leading municipalities to accept their undoubted responsibilities in this regard lies with us in this House, and the government in particular. I am very much concerned that the initiatives of this government have so far been seen to be seriously inadequate.

We have seen the statements from the Premier establishing a new Ministry of Housing -- was that three years ago or four years ago now? -- and in fact ever since that time, as if it were a signal, the housing starts in this province have taken a nose-dive, not just because we have a Minister of Housing but in spite of the fact that the government has made this special commitment. We have had a number of ministers now and we have had a number of programmes, most of them being seriously inadequate and unsuccessful.

[3:30]

Obviously we as a Legislature must support any government initiative that is going to expedite approvals of applications for subdivisions and so on. I feel that there is still a serious overlapping in the planning responsibility here. We passed a bill a couple of years ago, saying that the Treasurer was the chief planner -- in case there was any doubt. It was just a five-line bill. It goes back to the days of Charlie MacNaughton when he, as some of us do from time to time, used to participate in the debates with his fist shaking and his face red; he would get up and say, “I am the chief planner.” I think this reflects in the bill which makes the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) our chief planner.

In some respects this is unfortunate because he’s been around now quite a while; and he’s taken a good many initiatives in his former capacity as Minister of Municipal Affairs and in other areas of responsibility. I can remember him participating in the extravaganza out at the CNE grounds when the Toronto-centred region plan was first enunciated. What an extravaganza! The house was in darkness, filled with people brought in from all across the province -- the mayors, the reeves and all the Tories who wouldn’t otherwise have been elected, or asked rather.

The house was in darkness, with the spotlight picking out the Premier himself as he came forward to make the statement that a great new planning initiative had been taken. You know, you get this feeling -- in South Dumfries we call it “déjà vu” -- that it has all happened before.

Hon. Mr. Davis: But would you point out how important that initiative was?

Mr. Nixon: I didn’t want to offend the member for Ottawa West (Mr. Morrow) by using French --

Interjections.

Mr. Nixon: But the same is true of -- what was John Robarts’ programme? The dynamic --

Mr. Bullbrook: Confederation for Tomorrow?

Mr. Nixon: No, no.

Mr. Singer: The Toronto-centred region?

Mr. Nixon: -- John Robarts had a programme that was similar to this, then the Toronto-centred region plan

Hon. Mr. Davis: It was TCR; they were both TCR.

Mr. Nixon: “Design for Development” is the phrase I was trying to raise. It was before the election of 1967, when the public relations experts had really fed it to the Hon. John Robarts. We had all sorts of programmes. Imagine the genius that came out with Home Ownership Made Easy. I can remember the Treasurer, when he used that at the time, he departed from his text to point out to any of us who might have missed it that that spelled HOME. I said: “My God, this is an election year for sure.” They had a programme called the Conservation of Wild Rivers. That was another good one.

Mr. Nixon: But Design for Development -- I can remember the Treasurer going around the province setting up these special groups of interested citizens, who met hour after hour to advise the government on planning in their own area.

Mr. Bullbrook: The member for Lambton (Mr. Henderson) used to go with him.

Mr. Nixon: I can remember when the Treasurer got up in the House and dismissed probably six years of hard work and millions of dollars of commitment of public funds with a stroke of his hand, saying: “That won’t work. We’re going to have a plan that will really do the job.” That was the Toronto-centred region plan. Well, that’s gone down the drain, Oh, yes it has.

All of the decisions that have been made about the Pickering airport, the North Pickering community; and the big sewer pipe, as it is called, that is going to be running down the east side of Metro -- all of those things flew directly in the face of the commitment made by the government in the Toronto-centred region plan.

During the interregnum when the member for Chatham-Kent was --

Mr. Breithaupt: In limbo.

Mr. Nixon: He was in limbo; he didn’t have his hands directly on the levers and wires of big government. During that time, a fellow named John White came out of the middle distance in London and spent a few months putting his mark on planning and development in this province. About a year ago now, he got up in the House and said: “We are going to have a land-use and development plan for the whole of the province.” He said, “It won’t be perfect [oh boy!] but I have instructed the officials in my department [and there are platoons of them] to put this all together and it will be before the House before the end of the fall session.”

That was in 1974. We never got the plan and John White isn’t here. We’re still coping with some of his decisions, however. It appears that as far as land-use planning is concerned we really haven’t got anything adequate as yet.

I would say there would be support on all sides for the concept of a land-use plan for the whole of Ontario, particularly predicated on the conservation of class 1 and 2 farm lands and the decentralization of growth from this major metropolitan urban centre. Unless we have this sort of a structure, we can never get to the point where we say to the municipal planning officials: “Go ahead. You have the power given to you from the Legislature to fulfil the general structured plan that is a plan for the whole of the province.”

Until we do that, there will always be the reference required to the nameless -- well faceless, though we talk to them on the telephone -- platoons of planners in the Ministry of Housing or in Treasury to which the members of the Legislature must take recourse when the delay goes on week after week and month after month.

John White tried to do one thing, and I give him credit for that since obviously he was concerned about these delays; he said it was going to be a priority for him to reduce the delay to 60 days or at most 90 days. He failed in that.

The other thing he tried to do was to get us into some direct contact with the platoons of planners in Treasury, Economics and Intergovernmental Affairs. We got an embossed invitation one day to attend some kind of a tea party over in the new parliament buildings. We were there to meet the members of Treasury who would have a planning function and the ones that we would contact directly to assist us in relaying complaints from those municipal people and individuals back home.

I can remember walking into that tea party. They had the very largest room in the new parliament buildings. They had several tea tables set up -- as a matter of fact I think there were three bars available. I couldn’t get over the fact of the numbers of the staff in the planning departments and branches of Treasury, which is now shared with the Ministry of Housing. There were all of these people -- well educated I am sure -- who sought us out as individual members.

I remember one very charming lady, who is no longer employed by the government, saying: “Mr. Nixon, I’m glad to meet you. I am the planner for south Brant, Norfolk and east Oxford;” or something like that. I thought, my God! She’s a great girl, no doubt she has some degree from somewhere, but if that is the way planning is done no wonder there are these serious delays.

We’re simply going to have to put that aside. We’re going to have to have a plan for the province. Within that structure we’re going to have to give power to and have confidence in locally-elected people and the planning boards responsible to them, to make the decisions which are going to reduce the delays which this government has not been able to reduce, though they try their best.

I’m saying to you, Mr. Speaker, that there is no other way to do this, that we must have more confidence in those locally-elected people. Until we stop the centralization of this responsibility, we will not come to grips with the problem that has dogged not only this Premier (Mr. Davis) but his predecessor.

There is a solution that is a democratic one. Let us have a plan for the Province of Ontario in a broad structured way and let it be implemented at the local level.

I am very much concerned that this government, having been in office 32 years, has got its thinking somehow entrenched. It is not prepared to look at the alternatives that are available to it. They are defensive about the inadequate decisions and programmes that have been an embarrassment in the past and they cannot bring themselves to use the initiative that is obviously necessary if we’re going to do something about this continuing series of delays.

It is typical, for example -- and this is another emanation from the jurisdiction of John White -- that the concept was that rather than fool around with the present municipalities we will build new cities: The idea of John White was to go down into Haldimand and Norfolk counties and look out on those broad fields and say: “Here I will build me a city.” It’s almost frightening in its biblical overtones; but there wasn’t anybody in the cabinet, even the Premier, to stop him.

We went down there and bought two city sites. We’re not even talking about the Pickering fiasco; which was such a serious waste of money and a dislocation locally, there’s no doubt about that. The

part I find almost incredible is that when it came to planning these new cities, John White appointed the present Minister of Government Services -- the member for St. David (Mrs. Scrivener); a Conservative member from the heart of downtown Toronto -- to go to Norfolk county and chair the planning committee. Members want to know why Jim Allan was beaten -- that’s why.

The other reason was the quality of the candidate we put forward who was nominated by the local regional council to sit on that planning committee and was turned down by the chairman. The chairman I had gone and consulted her master, the Treasurer or whoever it was, and came back and said, “No, we will not allow this sort of local input. We will consult with the chairman of the regional government of Haldimand-Norfolk.” Of course, he was appointed by the Tories down here in Toronto, fitting hand in glove with the requirements of the bureaucrats and the planners down here.

I’m telling you, Mr. Speaker, it’s got to come to an end. There has to be a decentralization of these controls. We’ve got to move toward some practical solutions if we’re going to have something better than what we have experienced in the last two years under the programmes approved by this government. The need is obvious.

In this province we are blessed with the resources to build homes. In fact, the unemployment levels in the resource industries are seriously high. Some of the sawmills are either shut down or working reduced hours. The plywood plants are the same. We have these resources. We have high levels of unemployment, not only there but in the construction trades in general. We’ve got the need; we’ve got the raw materials; we’ve got the people to do the building and we’ve got at least two levels of government thrashing around with programmes, some snore effective than others.

Surely we can solve the problem. We can build more than 100,000 dwellings in a year in this province and we must set our sights even higher than that. I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that one of the keys to the bottleneck where our responsibility impinges is to decentralize these decision-making powers and have confidence in locally-elected councils.

I want to say something about the decentralization programme which we did repeatedly talk about in the election campaign. We feel that the emphasis must come on local authority. The Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) has talked about deconditionalizing grants but still has not done sufficient in that regard. He refers to his commitment made in Calgary -- was it the Calgary commitment or the Edmonton commitment? It’s a sort of catch word -- instead of lacing into the federal government. It’s almost like Pavlov’s dogs. All he has to do is talk about the Edmonton commitment and the municipal officials are supposed to nod and say, “That’s right, the villains are federal villains.”

I believe the money should be passed on in part, as a part which is specific to a commitment, rather than leaving the municipal people at the mercies and the political whims of the Treasurer who from time to time says, “No more money unless it comes from Ottawa.” Or, if the spirit moves him and an election is imminent, he says, “We will break that rule but just under certain circumstances and just for certain areas which follow our leadership into regional government” for example; or it’s for “Regional governments which are experiencing budgetary problems.”

We believe there has to be a sharing of this particular resource which grows as the economy of the nation grows and, I suppose, as inflation expands. This is what we believe is the basis of decentralizing the authorities of government.

The government, instead of doing it that way, has caught some kind of disease whereby it feels compelled to set up so-called regional offices across this province. The Attorney General has eight regional offices; Correctional Services has four; Education has nine; Environment has five; Natural Resources has eight. Of course conservation authorities have their own overlapping responsibilities.

[3:45]

Housing has regional offices set up on three bases. They have regional offices for community planning; regional offices on another basis for subdivision control; regional offices on another basis for assisted housing programmes.

I suppose it would be too simple for the government to say: “All right, we are going to have offices out of Queen’s Park, closer to the community. We are going to establish regional boundaries which are going to be identical or nearly identical right across the province.” But no, that is not the way it has happened. We have the overlapping boundaries and the confusion which must be a continuing problem for people at the municipal level in dealing with government.

One of the things that concerns me is that even when they do contact the regional offices, so-called, if it is a decision of any importance at all it has to be referred to Queen’s Park anyway.

I personally believe that kind of regionalization is a snare and a delusion. It is simply a waste of money. Those regional offices for education cost $11 million to service --

Mr. Cassidy: You’re sure?

An hon. member: You’re certain of those figures?

Mr. Nixon: -- and in my opinion they have no useful function at all. We, as a government or as taxpayers, could save close to $50 million if we rationalized this regional procedure and in fact put the responsibility at the community level and withdrew the regional offices right across the board.

We believe as a party that this would serve democracy. It would emphasize the responsibility of the local community and, of course, it would save us money. And we are very much concerned with saving money. Even the Treasurer talks about it from time to time.

According to his recent statement his projection for the deficit -- or the net cash requirement I think he is calling it this year -- is $ 1.912 billion. One of his predecessors -- we’ve talked about him; Jim Allan, the former member for Haldimand-Norfolk when he was Treasurer didn’t like to use the word “deficit” either. He talked about a cash shortfall. Whatever it is, it is money we must extract from the economy of this community in one way or another.

It was interesting to talk about the teachers’ superannuation fund in New York saving that city from bankruptcy. We don’t have that alternative here because we have already sucked these funds dry --

Hon. Mr. Davis: With a slight distinction. They don’t make the same contribution over there either.

Mr. Nixon: -- transferred the funds from the teachers’ pension and the public service pension and also the Canada Pension Plan. All that money is used just as if it is revenue to the Treasurer, and there is no thought that the beneficiaries should have anything to say whatsoever about that, and, of course, we get that money at a very favourable rate of interest. Oh, yes, a very favourable rate of interest. Just over eight per cent -- what is it?

An hon. member: Eight and a quarter, I believe.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Currently?

Mr. Singer: What is the current rate?

Mr. Nixon: I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that it was just a year ago that the Treasurer himself indicated the access to these funds was a substantial monetary advantage to the financing of the programmes of this government.

I simply point out that we have used those funds, using the power that the government has extracted from the Legislature, as if they were general revenue funds.

I think it is very misleading indeed when the Treasurer simply says, “We have no deficits associated with that money.” We’ve got to pay it back and his friends that he has lunch with in New York are concerned about it as well.

I believe that triple-A rating is a holdover from old Charlie MacNaughton and John Robarts. We used to kid them. We used to call him “white-lipped and trembling,” because Mr. MacNaughton used to get up and say, “We face a fiscal nightmare unless something is done to bring the expenditures of this province under control.” He’s gone to sort of a Senate of the province; he’s chairman of the Racing Commission and maybe he’s not worried about it much anymore. But it seems to me there is nobody on the government side worried or concerned about those matters.

The deficit -- the net cash requirement -- is $1.912 billion and I would predict, and I think even the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) is even prepared to predict that this year when the accounts are all in the net cash requirement will be $2 billion. For all of his unctuous statements about cutting government costs, I predict we will have at least that large a net cash requirement next year and it will be in excess of $2 billion. Of all the posturing about saving money, the statement made by the Chairman of the Management Board (Mr. Auld) -- who is just returning to his office to sign important papers and otherwise rest --

Hon. Mr. Davis: He is meeting a delegation from Sarnia.

Mr. Bullbrook: They won’t get very far with Lorne.

Mr. Singer: Tell us exactly how many contract people there are in government employment.

Mr. Nixon: -- made much of the fact that our civil service complement has been reduced by 1,500. I defy anybody in this province to detect any pressures that have come on the community because of the reduction of this complement. Nobody even noticed that those people had gone away.

So much for the comments about saving money and, you know, “We’re going to cut the expenditure from government without interfering with the high quality of our government programmes.” Of course they’re not going to interfere with the quality of the government programmes because the money they’re cutting out is pure fat -- unnecessary in the first place. We have been treated on at least three occasions to statements by the Treasurer and his predecessor about how great and brave new retrenchment programmes will be undertaken to cut government costs.

They make these great statements and the sycophantic editors of the Globe & Mail say, “Isn’t this great?” and “Isn’t it too bad that Ottawa doesn’t do the same thing?” when in fact it just doesn’t make any difference to the quality of the programmes.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You borrowed that word from Stephen!.

Mr. Lewis: Yes, but he pronounced it correctly.

Mr. Nixon: I didn’t mean to offend the Sun in any way.

Mr. Lewis: No, no, no.

Mr. Nixon: Where’s your lunch, Clare? I thought you usually had your lunch when you came in here.

Mr. Lewis: My goodness, this is a nasty day.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He took his ugly pills.

Mr. Nixon: Anyway, Mr. Speaker, if I may continue, the Treasurer has made much of his commitment to cutting government costs, and yet in the mini-budget, just before the election, he announced that he was going to reduce the sales tax by two per cent, that he was giving a home ownership grant of what amounted to $1,500, that he was taking the tax off automobiles -- by the way, I bought a car for myself a few days ago, and it is nice to buy it without the tax --

Hon. W. Newman: Isn’t that a conflict of interest?

Hon. Mr. Snow: Got the tax rebate yet?

Mr. Nixon: I haven’t had the cheque yet, and unless they settle the postal strike I’m going to go over to the Treasury and pick it up.

Mr. Bullbrook: Lorne just sold his car. He has a chauffeur. He resides in Petrolia.

Hon. Mr. Snow: Why not? Better than Sarnia.

Mr. Nixon: It is so interesting to see a small note here, in the Quarterly Report of Ontario Finances, dated Sept. 30, and I quote from the third paragraph: “The greater than anticipated success of the government’s economic initiatives, such as homebuyers’ grants and car rebates, has also increased the deficit.” These initiatives were simply electioneering.

If the government had wanted to do something to stimulate the automobile industry it should have taken place a year ago, when the great layoffs in Windsor and other areas were taking place, but no, it had to wait until that economy was, in fact, beginning to recover before it took the tax off. We as Liberals believe we should not have sales tax as our principal source of provincial revenue and we think the sales tax should stay at five per cent rather than automatically go back to seven per cent.

For the Treasurer to talk about these economic initiatives, it’s interesting to note that they have cost us $423 million at last count and no significant cutback in government expenditures has taken place. We still have an inflated cabinet, we still have the policy secretaries, and one of them is here today. Really it’s like an appointment to the Senate. I don’t know what the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development (Mr. Irvine) is doing. I’m glad to see him here but I don’t believe his services are, in fact, necessary in that particular capacity. The cabinet would have surely been the place to start saving money.

Mr. Roy: His contribution has always been limited, you know.

Mr. Nixon: We have seen the example of the government, under Bill 100, hiring a fact-finder, a mediator, at $500 a day and now ignoring those recommendations completely. There has just been no commitment at all to some sort of a rational control of expenditures.

I was interested to hear the Premier (Mr. Davis) the other day in response to a question from my colleague and good friend, the member for Grey-Bruce (Mr. Sargent) who asked about the fulfilment of election promises. The Premier can think of only two -- one was a programme to subsidize mortgage interests and the other was to assist the elderly. Later he said, “Oh, yes, we promised to buy the grape crop, too.”

We’ve been trying to keep track of these things because during the election campaign we -- or I, as leader, -- would go into a constituency and they would say, “The government is going to build a new arena down here. If you are elected, would you build it, too?” I was really amazed that a government so concerned with the cost of its programmes would go through the province, having already made a special political commitment of $400 million in vote buying, and still feel it had to distribute this kind of electoral largesse.

The list I have is 55 promises of gifts banded out by the Premier and the members of the government. One of them was raised today. It was a commitment, a loan, to Kroehler to purchase RCA at Owen Sound. It was a commitment for $500,000 --

Hon. Mr. Bennett: It was a loan.

Mr. Nixon: -- made in Aug. 28 by Mr. Winkler, the former member for the area, who was Chairman of the Management Board. For the Premier to get up in his place and imply that unless he personally made the promise it doesn’t count is the same kind of answer we got yesterday when I pointed out to him that the election expenses commission had written him a letter saying that the actions of his government were in contravention of the intention of the Election Expenses Act. He said, “That’s just an opinion of one person.” It was the opinion of the election expenses commission.

It really is incredible that the Premier can get away with that sort of statement in this House. It really is incredible. I want to read some of these promises but I won’t read them all.

Mr. Singer: Read them all.

Mr. Nixon: Maybe I should.

Loans to developers of low-income housing, spokesman Donald Irvine, Aug. 11, $47.5 million.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Done.

Mr. Roy: Does that still apply?

Mr. Nixon: Prince Edward Region Conservation Authority, promised by J. Taylor, $3,000. He didn’t think he was in so much trouble. Eighty double-decker GO coaches promised by John Rhodes, approximately $25 million, promised Aug. 11.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: It’s done.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: It’s done.

Mr. Nixon: It’s not done. As a matter of fact it is not done.

Interjection.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We are still waiting for Mr. Trudeau’s promise of 1974 or 1972 was it?

An hon member: He’ll weasel out of it.

Mr. Nixon: It may be but meanwhile Mr. Godfrey, the chairman of Metropolitan Toronto, is on his way back from Amsterdam or Vienna or somewhere where he was looking at other light rail facilities rather than using the initiatives of the government of Ontario.

Here’s one I hope the Treasurer can say “done” for. Westminster Ponds Park in London, promised by Gord Walker, then MPP; $1.25 million, promised Aug. 13. Actually it was promised before the last election --

Hon. Mr. McKeough: That’s been reduced.

Mr. Nixon: -- but he was elected and they didn’t feel they had to fulfil it. This time he was defeated.

Mr. Singer: They don’t have to fulfil it now.

Mr. Nixon: They probably will feel they can renege on that, too. Is that one done? You haven’t done that yet?

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: Here is an interesting one. An OHM loan in Sarnia, promised by L. Henderson, MPP; $3 million promised Aug. 15. That was in Sarnia.

Mr. Singer: Yes, yes.

Mr. Roy: Very good, Lorne.

Mr. Nixon: And another one on OHAP grants in Sarnia. They were really out to get that riding. Promised by L. Henderson, $600 for each low-income home; $500 for each middle-income home; $450 for each above-average home, on Aug. 15. Is that what you are supposed to do? Is that really what you do as Minister without Portfolio? Are you in charge?

Hon. Mr. Henderson: I did those things as a private member.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: The leader of the Liberal Party will continue.

Mr. Nixon: Maybe the Minister without Portfolio is in charge of fulfilling election promises.

Mr. Foulds: Lorne, is that your first ministerial statement?

Mr. Cassidy: What do you do, Lorne?

Mr. Nixon: Otherwise he has become known as the minister for patronage. I’m not sure that is fair because since he has been in the cabinet we haven’t heard a damn thing from him.

Hon. Mr. Henderson: You haven’t been around much.

[4:00]

Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I want to go on with this list.

Cobourg senior citizens’ housing was promised by Russell Rowe at a cost of $1,195,000 on Aug. 19 --

Mr. Singer: Oh yes --

Mr. Nixon: Buses for the handicapped were promised by Mel Lastman at a cost of $45,000 on Aug. 20 --

Mr. Singer: Remember him? Whatever happened to him?

Mr. Roy: He was a bad boy.

Mr. Nixon: The Cape Croker Indians were going to get $5,000 from Eric Winkler, but his promises don’t count any more, the Premier said.

Mr. Cassidy: They never did.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: That was promised long ago.

Mr. Nixon: That was promised Aug. 20.

A study of wood waste as fuel was promised in Hearst by Dennis Timbrell.

Hon. Mr. Brunelle: They got it.

Mr. Nixon: There was no cost there. That was promised on Aug. 20.

Mr. Singer: That was the one they got, yes.

Mr. Good: That didn’t cost anything.

Mr. Nixon: A sports field in Napanee, valued at $14,000, was promised by Jim Taylor on Aug. 25.

Ontario Career Action -- 1,000 student jobs were promised by the Premier on Aug. 26.

A trauma centre was promised by the Premier on Aug. 26; no cost involved.

Mr. Foulds: That’s the Legislature.

Mr. Roy: That’s for his own members.

Mr. Nixon: A community centre in Durham was promised by Mr. Davis for $350,000. That’s in Eric’s former riding. They were really worried there and with good reason they promised all this.

Hon. Mr. Snow: None of those are in Oakville. Have you got any for Oakville?

Mr. Nixon: I have already referred to the Middlesex courthouse, promised by Mr. Stewart and Mr. White on Sept. 1; $2.7 million.

Georgian College in Owen Sound was promised $900,000 by a chap named Harron, the Progressive Conservative candidate, on Sept. 2.

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: A community centre in Atikokan was promised by the Minister of Culture and Recreation (Mr. Welch), $83,075, on Sept. 2.

Interjections.

Mr. Nixon: A new government building in Dryden; a new government building in Huntsville -- oh, the list is very long. Homes for the aged in Hawkesbury; a sports complex in Hawkesbury; a community centre in Rousseau; hospital expansion in Tillsonburg.

An institute of occupational health -- the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Lewis) would be interested in that.

Mr. Laughren: Do you think we will get it?

Mr. Nixon: An institute of occupational health was promised by the Premier on Sept. 6.

A tax rebate for seasonal farm workers, I say to the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. W. Newman), was promised by the Premier on Sept. 9; it was $150 per worker.

A Centre des Jeunes --

Mr. Roy: Was that in Ottawa?

Mr. Nixon: In Sudbury, not in Ottawa -- was promised by Mr. Welch -- $58,000 on Sept. 9.

Mr. Roy: No promises in my riding.

Mr. Nixon: Historic Timbertown was promised in Renfrew by Mr. Bennett -- $85,500.

Mr. Singer: That didn’t help either.

Mr. Nixon: A sports arena at Belle River -- $525,000.

Mr. Ruston: Oh yes! Right on.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Listen, do you want us to take back the money from Belie River?

Mr. Ruston: Oh no.

Mr. Nixon: I thought the Premier would be concerned and just so he won’t miss any of these promises, I would ask the page to take him this copy of the promises made by himself and his colleagues. We have retained a copy and we will be asking from time to time how the government is progressing, not only with fulfilling the promises but finding the money in this year of retrenchment; in this year when the Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) says we are cutting back; in this year when we receive in the mail, all of us as members, a publication of the Ministry of Treasury, Economics and Intergovernmental Affairs entitled, “Insight.” It shows a picture of the smiling Treasurer.

Mr. Roy: Oh, funny!

Mr. Nixon: It says, “Photos tell the story: A picture is worth 10,000 words, as the Chinese proverb suggests, and these photographs sum up election results for the two TEIGA cabinet ministers. Mr. McKeough won his largest plurality since entering provincial politics in 1963 -- ”

Mr. Singer: All the way up to 2,000.

Mr. Bullbrook: They love you, Darcy.

Mr. Nixon: “A total of 61.7 per cent of the 37,786 eligible voters in Chatham-Kent voted Sept 18. -- ”

Mr. Ruston: Small turnout.

Mr. Nixon: “Mr. McKeough received 10,146 votes, compared to 7,347 for Liberal Jim Cooke.”

An hon. member: Some plurality!

Mr. Nixon: If the Chatham-Kent Tory Association, or even the Liberal Association, wanted to put that up, I think it is great. We wouldn’t put it in blue, which evidently is the TEIGA colour --

Hon. J. R. Smith: True blue.

Mr. Nixon: -- but the taxpayers are paying for this baloney. When we open this up -- they are always looking for fillers --

Mr. Bullbrook: They are all the same.

Mr. Nixon: “What do you remember about the 1975 budget?” asks Hal Tennant, who no doubt is paid a substantial amount of money. He is a very able person; I thought they were very lucky to get his services, yet he spends his time making up quizzes.

“In April, budgetary expenditures proposed for the year amounted to -- almost $8 billion; slightly more than $9.3 billion; almost $10.2 billion; $12 billion; or none of the above?”

Mr. Breithaupt: Or all of the above.

Mr. Nixon: That’s right. It says in question No. 4:

“According to the Treasurer, the Ontario civil service increased 3.2 per cent since 1972, while the federal civil service grew by -- five per cent; 12 per cent; 19 per cent; 24 per cent?”

Well, well. It says:

“By announcing that a certain federal reduction in excise tax would be passed on to consumers, the mini-budget provided at least a small measure of joy for beer drinkers, wine drinkers, car buyers or racetrack betters.”

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: This is just most fatuous waste of public money. If the Treasurer wants to save money in the budget, he is going to have to start thinking in terms of cutting out this sort of thing, as well as unctuously saying: “Why doesn’t the federal government do as we do?”

The Treasurer is just asking for it. He is riding for a fall. This government has got so much fat in its expenditures -- and I won’t refer to anything else other than that -- but it has so much fat in its expenditures and its programmes that it could retrench by 20 per cent and nobody would ever know the difference.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, just on a point of order and information -- and I will be very non-provocative. The leader of the Liberal Party sent me a list; and if it is anything like some of the research that he has done, there are probably some items missing. I will try to fill it in, but I wonder if he would mark on this list those items that he feels should be totally eliminated from any consideration.

Mr. Nixon: As usual, Mr. Speaker, the Premier doesn’t want to be provocative, but as a matter of fact I would tell him --

Hon. Mr. Davis: We will get into his promises later.

Mr. Nixon: -- so that his platoons of researchers are not going to waste their time unduly, that the list was as complete as we could get it up to about five days before the election. That’s just when the Premier got desperate -- so God knows what was promised in those five days.

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: Actually, we are going to be following up on the commitments made. I would think that this government is going to have to concern itself very deeply with them.

I want to talk as well about a situation that concerns us very deeply -- wage and price controls. I felt that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Lewis) dealt very effectively with it in his remarks yesterday. I agreed with a good many of the things that he said -- that the government is selective as far as assuming responsibilities for certain areas goes and leaving the rest to the federal authorities. But I am very glad indeed that they did not leave the responsibility for energy costs anywhere but right in this House, because we must deal with it here.

We are the biggest consumers, and the stated federal policy -- and it comes from the statement of Mr. Donald Macdonald, the Minister of Finance -- is to allow the price of energy to continue to rise in a series of orderly steps. If their commitment is that the price of energy rises to the world price, then certainly I don’t accept that and I would hope that nobody in this House accepts that.

We believe very strongly that there has not been sufficient provincial or federal leadership in this matter, because we in this province are not devoid of energy resources. For us to be under the requirements that our costs are dictated outside of this province, particularly in Alberta, is unacceptable to us.

British Columbia has resources in natural gas and Saskatchewan has resources in oil and gas. We have resources in uranium and water power -- and certainly uranium in the long run may be more valuable than any other energy resources. The Province of Quebec, in the development of hydro resources at James Bay and elsewhere, has some of the largest developments in the world and already has surplus power. In Nova Scotia there are coal and water power resources. Newfoundland has Churchill Falls, which will be one of the largest water resources in the world when it is fully developed.

I want to say that we believe the government should have accepted and must in the future accept, a substantially lower increase for the cost of electrical energy than has been demanded by Ontario Hydro and approved by the Ontario Energy Board. The representatives of my party will make that position clear when it comes to the meetings of the energy committee. My point is this: Where it suits the government, it keeps the control of costs and prices within its own hands, using the powers of this Legislature.

The same is true for rents. It was indicated in the federal statement that all provinces would be asked to impose some sort of rent control. I’m very glad indeed that the policy of the government has been maintained and that there will be rent review associated with this. That leaves a substantial area of provincial responsibility which we and the NDP believe should still come under the direction and control of the government of Ontario utilizing the power and authority of this House.

The Treasurer has indicated that I am talking about letting teachers and civil servants come to the head of the line. I am talking about no special favouritism but a strong and even-handed application of the laws of Canada which allow obvious variations in the decisions of the wage and price review board. It is clear from every statement which has come out of Ottawa that there will be and there will be expected to be legal variations concerned with the timing of the last contract, historical relationships and, of course, the make-op requirements which are obviously a part of a fair application of any kind of wage and price controls.

We believe the 18-month delay the Minister of Education (Mr. Wells) referred to concerns those who should not be a part of these negotiations. We believe we are heading for a number of weeks of extremely troublesome labour relations in this province. I heard David Archer, the president of the Federation of Labour, say he is prepared to go to jail and he advised other labour leaders to accept his lead in this regard if they feel they are being treated unfairly by the manifestations and orders of federal regulations.

It’s interesting to note that the Ontario civil servants’ organization has just received full ratification and involvement under the aegis of the Ontario Federation of Labour. Those people are the employees of this government. Their labour leader has indicated clearly that he is prepared -- and he suggests that they should be prepared -- to go to jail rather than accept anything they feel or they believe to be unfair in the imposition of these regulations.

This must surely have an impact on our thinking. David Archer’s been around a long time and he is not given to irresponsible statements. What I gathered from his comment is that the Federation of Labour is going to take a strong and independent stand and that will include the employees of this province.

We know what happened a year ago when we were dealing with the employees of Ontario. For us to face a repeat of that situation in which the government can only say, “We can do nothing. This is in the hands of the government in Ottawa” is unacceptable and, in my view, unconscionable.

[4:15]

The second instance is even more emergent; that the secondary school teachers of this metropolitan area will, most reasonable people predict, be on strike beginning a week from tomorrow. Sure, we hope that it won’t be so. The Minister of Education has said that hope springs eternal. But under the circumstances as they presently are, there will be a strike.

The only way that strike will come to a conclusion, I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, is by the authority of this House, perhaps a month from now, maybe six weeks from now. I say to you. Mr. Speaker, that it is unconscionable and impossible that we be asked to use the authority of this House to put the teachers back in the classrooms after the elapse of some time if, in fact, we have abdicated completely our responsibility to assist at least --

Mr. Bullbrook: Right. Think of it.

Mr. Nixon: -- in the negotiations and the settlement which causes the strike in the first place. I hope that the Premier does not believe that this is some sort of a political posture. We are prepared to say -- and also listen to his non-provoca