May

24, 2011 HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS

Vol. XLVI No. 29

The House met at 1:30 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): Order, please!

Admit strangers.

Before we start routine proceedings, I would like to welcome a former

long-time Member of the House of Assembly and former Speaker of the Assembly,

Mr. Harvey Hodder.

Welcome to the House of Assembly.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

Statements by Members

MR. SPEAKER: The following members' statements will be heard: the hon.

the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North; the hon. the

Member for the District of Kilbride; the hon. the Member for the District of

Conception Bay East & Bell Island; and the hon. Member for the District of Mount

Pearl North.

The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure today in this hon. House to rise and

to congratulate the Grade 12 graduating class of Sacred Heart School in Conche.

I had the honour of attending the graduating ceremony of Sacred Heart School

on May 13 and was very pleased to watch three young individuals receive their

graduation certificates. They were Natasha Byrne, Shawna Flynn and Dawn Kearney.

Although the number of graduates was small, these three individuals certainly

have big aspirations. This was evident by the many quotes they had placed around

the venue. It was indeed a special moment that will surely be etched in their

minds forever.

Mr. Speaker, these students have done everything it takes to reach this

milestone in their education and I want to commend them for staying the course

and achieving this wonderful goal.

Special congratulations are also extended to Ms Natasha Byrne, valedictorian

of the graduating class, whose words touched all of those who were in

attendance.

These graduates are an important part of our future and I wish them much

success in whatever path they choose, whether it is furthering their education

or entering the workforce.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of this House to join with me in

congratulating the Grade 12 graduating class of Sacred Heart School in Conche

and wish them well in all their future endeavours.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Kilbride.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DINN: Mr. Speaker, I rise in this hon. House today to recognize

Nathan Whelan from the District of Kilbride who was recently named the 2011 City

of St. John's Youth of the Year.

Nathan, a seventeen-year-old Level III French immersion student at Bishop's

College, was chosen for this award based on his dedication to volunteering in a

number of areas. He is active with Debate Newfoundland, president of Allied

Youth, president of his student council, and he serves on the school council.

He has also been involved with a number of humanitarian and social justice

organizations such as Oxfam, Engineers Without Borders and the St. John's Gulu

Walk which raises money and awareness for children in Uganda.

Mr. Speaker, perhaps the most unique aspect of Nathan's volunteering is his

role as a coach for senior citizens blind lawn bowling. In the spring of 2010 he

took a team to Israel to attend an international blind lawn bowling tournament.

Nathan maintains a high academic average, has a part-time job and still

manages to make these outstanding contributions. He is certainly a testament to

the energy and potential of the youth of this city and Province.

To top things off last week, Nathan was one of the twenty young Canadians who

were awarded the TD Centre Trust Scholarship for Community Leadership valued at

$70,000. Nathan is the third provincial president of Allied Youth Newfoundland

and Labrador to win this award.

I ask all hon. members to join me in congratulating Nathan Whelan for being

named the 2011 City of St. John's Youth of the Year and for his TD Canada Trust

Scholarship Award.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Conception Bay East

& Bell Island.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BRAZIL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I stand today in this hon. House to congratulate a group of volunteers for

undertaking a very valuable project. Mr. Speaker, I speak of Radio Bell Island

which operated from March 14-20 at St. Michael's High School on the island. This

endeavour included a group of volunteers from the community, the town council

staff, but particularly students from St. Michael's High.

These individuals were responsible for the design of the broadcast,

programming, and all aspects of technical operations. These seven days gave

residents the opportunity to be educated, informed, and entertained, but more

importantly, engaged. The program included news, interviews, a talk show,

call-in song requests, a sports and history segment, and everything else to

catch the ear of preschoolers to seniors.

The station was set up with approval from the CRTC and financial assistance

from the Rural Secretariat and the high school. The station had listeners in all

parts of the country, and as far away as France. This is a testament to how

professionally it was operated.

While the whole of the community benefited from the operation of the station,

there was one group that gained immensely, these being the students of St.

Michael's High, who were trained in every aspect of the techniques of

broadcasting, from interviewing, to research, to use of technology. I am pleased

to say, Mr. Speaker, that a number of these students who volunteered have shown

an interest in a career in the broadcasting industry.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members to join me in congratulating all involved in

Radio Bell Island.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Mount Pearl North.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I have gotten used to having the likeness of my predecessor on

the wall behind me, but to have him here alive as well is making me a little

nervous, but I want to join you in welcoming him to this hon. House.

I rise in this hon. House today to recognize Ms Victoria Ralph, a resident of

Mount Pearl and a Memorial University Huskies wrestling coach.

Recently, on April 7, Victoria was honoured with three awards at Memorial

University's Athlete Awards Ceremony. She was named MUN's Female Athlete of the

Year and received the Butler Trophy award. She was also awarded the Graham Snow

Memorial Award, which is presented annually to the student who combines

excellence in varsity athletics with high academic achievement.

I would also like to mention that Victoria helped lead her cross-country team

to a third-place finish and became Memorial's third female medal winner in

wrestling, winning a bronze medal at the National Championship at Lakehead

University. For all her successes, Victoria was named MUN Wrestler of the Year.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of this House to join me in congratulating

Victoria Ralph on all her achievements, both athletically and academically, and

wish her all the best in her future endeavours.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Statements by Ministers.

Statements by Ministers

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Human Resources, Labour and

Employment.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise today to inform the hon. House that the Government of Newfoundland and

Labrador, through Budget 2011, continues to strengthen its commitment to

attracting and retaining immigrants.

Mr. Speaker, in Budget 2011 - Standing Strong: For Prosperity. For Our

Future. For Newfoundland and Labrador, we outlined our commitment to create

opportunities for more citizens to thrive and to prosper. In total, $705,000 is

included for grants to support immigration and multiculturalism initiatives.

This investment includes an increase, Mr. Speaker, of $50,000 in 2011, and

further enhances the priorities of the Province's immigration strategy, titled

Diversity ~ Opportunity and Growth, which was launched in 2007.

The strategy currently has an annual investment, Mr. Speaker, of

approximately $2.4 million.

Provincial government grant funding in 2011 will support many initiatives

community projects.

This past year, for example, the provincial government, Mr. Speaker,

contributed to forty-one organizations, including $48,000 to the Multicultural

Women's Organization of Newfoundland and Labrador, $30,000 to Memorial

University's International Student Advising Office, and $260,000 to the

Association for New Canadians.

Mr. Speaker, these are examples of the kinds of initiatives and investments

we fund aimed at increasing the number of immigrants who choose Newfoundland and

Labrador as their new home in Canada. By supporting our community partners, we

are working to ensure that the Province retains and maximizes the strength of

our newcomers while promoting inclusive prosperous communities across the

Province.

To that end, it is truly inspirational to see that the Province is home to

people from more than 100 different communities speaking seventy different

languages, Mr. Speaker. These highly-skilled individuals have settled in

forty-eight communities, with almost 50 per cent located in rural Newfoundland

and Labrador. When we encourage immigration and multiculturalism we build

vibrant communities, and we enrich our future.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, I am confident that the provincial government's

continued support of our partners through Budget 2011 will allow them to enhance

the cultural diversity, prosperity, and long-term vision we are all seeking in

this Province. Co-operation and partnership, Mr. Speaker, are critical to

connecting people and possibilities.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White

Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. Certainly, with

all provinces across Canada facing an aging population and a declining

population as well, coupled with an increased demand in the workforce,

especially in highly-educated, skilled workers, the attraction and retention of

immigrant workers is a vital issue.

We thank the minister for the update today on what his department is doing.

It is good to hear an update, of course, on the strategy. We recognize the vast

economic, social, and cultural contributions that new Canadians bring to

Newfoundland and Labrador. Certainly our communities are better off having them

as a part of our day to day life for sure.

That said, we have a long way to go in terms of attracting and retaining more

immigrants in the Province. I know the study is a little dated, but I believe it

was 2006 the Interprovincial Mobility of Immigrants in Canada study suggested

that Newfoundland and Labrador had the lowest retention of immigrants, somewhere

around 47 per cent or so compared to around 90 per cent or so in Ontario. We

certainly see that in rural Newfoundland, Mr. Speaker. I think of the health

care at the hospital, for example, in St. Anthony. It seems that just as you get

a good doctor come in and get used to the community and the way of life and so

on, you see them leave.

Any strategy that encourages them to not only come and participate, develop

and share in that setting for a while but to stay in the longer term is good.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi

Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I, too, thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. I was glad

to see in the Budget that there is a bit more grant funding to support community

groups involved with immigration and multicultural initiatives. It is a very

important expenditure. They play an important role in helping newcomers learn

the language and make contacts in the community. I am also glad to see that we

do have more new Canadians settling here in the Province. I know personally and

am aware of how well they are fitting in to some of our communities outside of

the urban settings.

I would like to note two outstanding barriers that make permanent settlement

more difficult, creating hardships for families not just here in our Province

but in Canada. One is the length of time it takes professionals to be able to

practise their professions in Canada because of having to get accredited, and

the other is the new federal immigration policy that makes it very difficult for

immigrants to bring their parents into the country. I trust that the department

is working with other agencies and levels of government to address these

matters.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

The hon. the Minister of Government Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARDING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am pleased to rise today to announce that Ms Amber Dyke of Gambo is the

provincial winner of the Canadian Securities Administrators' Financial Fitness

Challenge Contest. Amber is a Grade 12 student at Smallwood Academy who will be

attending Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador in the fall to study

pre-pharmacy.

Amber was one of 7,500 young people from across Canada who entered the

contest in February to prove their financial fitness knowledge through a series

of on-line questions.

The challenge was open to Canadians between the ages of fifteen and

twenty-one. Participants were asked questions about budgeting, saving and

investing, and were also encouraged to learn more about other smart financial

practices. As the provincial winner of the contest, Amber won an Apple iPad.

Mr. Speaker, contests such as the Financial Fitness Challenge is designed to

raise awareness about the importance of positive and healthy financial

practices. We believe that teaching our young people smart financial behaviours

now will help them remain financially responsible throughout adulthood.

Even though this year's contest is over, I encourage young people to continue

to visit the site, which is www.financialfitnesschallenge.ca , and to use its

interactive features to share important financial awareness tips and knowledge.

The Canadian Securities Administrators will offer this contest again next year

and I am looking forward to seeing even more interest by our young people.

I congratulate Amber for her success and I am sure that all hon. members will

agree with me that she has a bright future.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. It is good to see

young people involved in activity of course, whether it be as a volunteer or in

a sports activity, or an intellectual activity as we see here. It makes for

healthier individuals and, of course, that leads to healthier communities.

Amber's example is a showcase of the intelligence and the aptitude of the

youth in our Province today, as well as their ability to compete on a national

stage. Her involvement in this activity, in particular, draws attention to

something that has been problematic in Canada for quite some time, and that is

financial literacy. In fact, the federal government established a task force

back in 2009 to deal with this issue. Four out of ten Canadians right now lack

the basic financial literary skills. Canadians, of course, need these skills to

help them make informed financial decisions that will help them control their

own lives; hence, they do not need to rely upon government programming as much

if they have healthy financial lives themselves.

Again, we congratulate Amber. We encourage her to stay involved and we would

encourage others like her to get involved, be active and participate in

activities such as this.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi

Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. I am pleased to

join in congratulating Ms Amber Dyke of Gambo as the provincial winner of the

Canadian Securities Administrators' Financial Fitness Challenge Contest. I am

sure that the Apple iPad she has won will come in very handy in her first year

of university.

It is very important for our young people, and especially our young

high-school students, to learn about practising good financial habits as they

are preparing to enter into post-secondary training and education, and

eventually the full-time workforce.

Mr. Speaker, many students have heavy financial burdens as they proceed with

their post-secondary studies, for whom financial planning does not have very

much meaning because they are so heavily into creating debts and trying to pay

debts. I encourage the government to continue looking at the need for a full

needs-based grants program for our post-secondary students, Mr. Speaker. Again,

I am very happy to stand and congratulate Amber, and I know her parents must be

very proud of her.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers.

Oral Questions.

Oral Questions

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, Alberta, Saskatchewan and BC have all introduced senator

election laws. These laws enshrine the principles that senators should be

elected by the people of the Province before they have the right to go to Ottawa

to represent the people of that Province.

Mr. Speaker, we feel it is time for Newfoundland and Labrador to follow and

establish our own provincial Senate election laws instead of passively allowing

the Prime Minister to appoint and reappoint political favourites to represent

this Province in Canada's Upper Chamber.

My question today is for the Premier: Will you Premier commit to introduce

laws to facilitate the election of senators in Newfoundland and Labrador and

look to elect our first senator in this Province come this fall?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, appointments to the Senate are entirely within the purview of

the federal government. We will certainly make our views known as a Caucus to

the federal government as to how we feel about this.

In terms of applying any particular energy to this file, Mr. Speaker, my time

is taken up in the running of the affairs of this Province and promoting

wonderful projects like Muskrat Falls, and that is where my attention will

continue to be focused.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We know it is a federal responsibility, we are asking the views of the

government opposite knowing that other provinces in Canada have moved to elected

Senate, Mr. Speaker. We know that just recently with the retirement of Senator

Rompkey, the Combined Councils of Labrador passed a resolution in February

asking that the Senate seat be elected.

I ask the Premier if she supports that request and if she will make way for

it to happen?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this is the very first time I have heard these comments and

questions from the Leader of the Opposition. We have had any number of patronage

appointments to the Senate of Liberals in this Province over the years, Mr.

Speaker, and never heard a squeak.

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to be baited into this discussion. We will make

our views known to our federal counterparts, Mr. Speaker. That is the position

of this government. We have important things to discuss very important things

going on in this Province, Mr. Speaker and that is where I would like the

debate to be focused.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is about leading, I say to the Premier. Obviously if she is going to share

her view on Senate reform, it should be with the people of the Province and not

just with the Prime Minister.

Mr. Speaker, one of the greatest reforms to government operations in this

Province has been the introduction of the Public Tender Act. It commits

government to the lowest cost, transparent process in purchasing goods and

services rather than quickly approving contracts to friends of government. Mr.

Speaker, this act needs to be updated to remain relevant and effective. Since

2008, government has sat on a secret report recommending updates and reforms to

the Public Tender Act.

I ask the Premier today: Will you commit to releasing all the relevant

documents and reports you have in your possession on the issue of reforming and

updating the Public Tender Act?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the way that government purchases supply and services is

extremely important. A Conservative government in this Province brought in the

Public Tender Act and brought it in for a very good reason: so that there would

be accountability and transparency, and that there would be full access. Mr.

Speaker, that was done quite a long time ago. We are hearing from suppliers in

this Province that the Public Tender Act always does not work now. It is a bit

outdated and it needs to be looked at again so that it serves the principles

upon which it was founded, Mr. Speaker.

We have undertaken that process. It is a long process. It is an arduous

process, Mr. Speaker, and one that we need to approach very carefully. That work

is progressing and when we have something to put forward to the House of

Assembly and to the people of the Province, we will be more than pleased to do

so.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I can only take from that the Premier is not prepared to release the

information that she has in her possession, Mr. Speaker, on how the Public

Tender Act should be reformed.

What we do know, Mr. Speaker, is that the government is allowing for more and

more exceptions of public money that is being spent. That means, Mr. Speaker,

every year we are seeing the number of contracts being exempt from the Public

Tender Act grow. In 2004, there were 560 exceptions worth $34 million. In 2009,

which are our latest numbers, that nearly doubled more than doubled. There

were 1,379 exceptions worth $88 million.

I ask the Premier today: What steps is government taking to ensure that the

spirit and the intent of the Public Tender Act is followed in each and every

case, instead of allowing more and more exceptions to the act?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, the whole issue of public tendering is one

that is very important, not only to the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador,

but it is extremely important to the people of this Province to ensure that the

purchase of goods and services, on behalf of the people of Newfoundland and

Labrador, is done in an honest and transparent way. There are times when there

are exceptions required, because the way that the Public Tender Act is currently

written does not allow for special circumstances to be taken into account,

certain requirements to be taken into account. It is not unusual that the number

of exemptions would be double, Mr. Speaker, our Budget is double.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is not open, it is not accountable and it is not transparent, I say to

you, Premier. Since your government has been in power you have spent over $500

million of taxpayers' money without going to public tender. You have passed out

7,500 contracts for goods and services without any accountability for the

people's money in this Province.

I ask you: Why are you consistently going outside of the Public Tender Act to

award hundreds of millions of dollars belonging to Newfoundlanders and

Labradorians without accountability and without transparency?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, this is not the first Administration to

have exemptions to the Public Tender Act, and if you look back over the fourteen

years of our friends opposite, you will find quite a number of them.

In terms of accountability and transparency, Mr. Speaker, when we do not go

to public tendering we go to a request for proposals. Mr. Speaker, on top of

that, every exemption to the Public Tender Act is tabled here in the House of

Assembly, and our friends opposite have the opportunity to ask whatever

questions they would like on the issue and raise any issues that you might have.

I have not heard one question in this session with regard to exemptions on the

Public Tender Act, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Premier knows they are tendered after the fact and she knows that there

is more than $500 million in taxpayers' money gone out the door without being

tendered.

Mr. Speaker, earlier this month Quebec announced Plan Nord, a comprehensive

plan to develop the economy, infrastructure, and community well-being of

Northern Quebec. They are making their north a priority by investing $80 billion

in the region over twenty-five years, and a major aspect of the plan is

transportation. Quebec will be extending and rebuilding Routes 138 and 389 which

cross into Labrador over the next five years. Mr. Speaker, Quebec's plan will

have major effects on Labrador.

I ask the minister today: What communications he has had with Quebec to

manage and co-ordinate Plan Nord's vision for transportation as it pertains to

Labrador and will your government now commit to full paving of the

Trans-Labrador Highway?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the Province of Quebec for investing in their

north, and I am glad that they are taking lessons from Newfoundland and

Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Because certainly that is what we have done in the

last seven-and-a-half years, particularly with our Northern Strategic Plan, Mr.

Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I just want to remind the Leader

MS JONES: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, this government has invested over $3

billion in the last seven-and-a-half years in Labrador and we are going to

continue that level of investment.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition likes to

talk about the contentious relationship we have with Quebec around resource

development in Quebec. Another reason for investing in the north, Mr. Speaker,

is because 2041 is coming and you better be ready.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is fair to say that the money that was just announced for transportation

in Quebec will do more to grow the economy of Labrador, Mr. Speaker, than

anything the Premier has just said and why she is not committing to fully paving

the Trans-Labrador Highway is not even sensible, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: There is an alarming detail in the maps of Labrador being used

by Quebec in Plan Nord and all of those maps label Labrador's southern border as

non-definitive. Instead of using the border that was included in the 1949 Terms

of Union, they are using the border set by the Privy Council in 1927. Mr.

Speaker, I think we can all agree that Quebec's official approach to the border

is absurd. I think we all agree to that, even though you say they are good

friends.

I ask the Premier, Mr. Speaker: Before Quebec decided to promote the idea of

a shrinking border in Labrador, what communications and co-ordination did your

government have with them?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, the border of the Province of

Newfoundland and Labrador and the border between Quebec was set in 1927, was

reconfirmed again under the Terms of Union in 1949. They are the facts, that is

the law, and that is a history lesson for you.

Mr. Speaker, every time that Quebec raises this issue or incorrectly portrays

the border, it is brought to their attention. We have also raised this issue in

federal-provincial-territorial meetings, and we will not engage in discussion

around resource development anywhere in this country or outside this country

where those lines are incorrectly drawn.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The government said it was aware of the Plan Nord and said that they have had

dialogue with their partners in Quebec.

I ask the Premier today - because this is a serious issue. This border issue

is a serious issue when Quebec continues to lay claims to sections of Labrador.

I ask you, Premier: Why are you not protesting it, why are you not ensuring that

it is being corrected and that it does not happen again because it has been

continuing to happen under your watch and you have been continuing to ignore it?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this has gone on under a number of watches. I take comfort in

the Constitution of this great country. That border and the determination of

that border are protected within our Constitution, Mr. Speaker. Whatever Quebec

wants to do in its north is Quebec's own business in the same as

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: - what we do in our north, Mr. Speaker. The minute

they put one foot over that border, you will not have to ask where we are. We

will continue to correct misinformation every time that we have to deal with it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, the Premier might talk tough, but her actions are

something different. We have already seen the Quebec Innu cleaning out caribou

in Labrador while she stood by as the Minister of Natural Resources and did

absolutely nothing about it. That is the reason that we are concerned. We are

concerned about the resources in Labrador and the fact that this boundary issue

has not been cleared up.

Mr. Speaker, Plan Nord also includes major infrastructure improvements for

rail networks. We know that new iron companies in Labrador will be using the

improved rail networks to ship unprocessed ore through Labrador to a port in

Quebec.

Premier, Quebec's plan for improving the mining infrastructure directly

affects operations in Labrador West and on Labrador's border. What has your

government done to ensure that the benefits from the mining industry in Labrador

flow to the people of this Province first and not flow through the ports of

Quebec?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, the main plank of the platform of this

government has been no more resource giveaways, that resources are going to be

developed in this Province and the principal beneficiaries are going to be the

people of this Province. Now, Mr. Speaker, every resource development that we

have done has had an IBA attached to it. That includes Hebron, Hibernia South,

and White Rose Extension. Mr. Speaker, that also

MS JONES: (Inaudible).

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, I cannot hear myself for the Leader of

the Opposition.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: She wants to ask the questions and she wants to

answer them as well. Mr. Speaker, I would not mind if she gave a right answer

every now and then. She cannot even ask a right question most days.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier, to conclude her answer.

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, every resource development in this

Province has an IBA attached to it, an Industrial Benefits Agreement, which

ensures that the people of the Province get what they deserve.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It may be out of sight and out of mind for the Premier, but not for the

people of Labrador. Three new mines are coming on stream in Labrador producing

iron ore - new mine expansions. All of that mineral, Mr. Speaker, is being

transported out of Labrador and into Quebec. They are the primary beneficiary.

I ask you today, Premier: What is the long-term plan to maximize the mining

industry in Labrador to ensure that the primary beneficiaries are

Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, and not Quebecers?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, in terms of the direct shipping ore, there is nothing more that

happens to the ore other than it is mined and transported. The ore is of such

high quality that it does not require any more processing. In terms of who does

the work, how it is transported

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: and what kinds of royalties are associated with it,

the major benefits are in Labrador. Mr. Speaker, we are quite happy to provide

her with a copy of the IBA so she can see the great benefits that are coming to

the people of Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

What the Premier is not telling is all the benefits are flowing out of

Labrador because of the ore that is going out unprocessed and benefiting others.

Premier, you have said Muskrat Falls power is going to cost the residents of

this Province 14.3 cents per kilowatt hour. You also said excess power from

Muskrat will be sold into the Maritimes at market prices. Perhaps it would be

instructive to tell the people of the Province how much Nalcor is getting for

power in the market right now. Let's start with the recall power from Churchill

Falls that Nalcor is selling to New Brunswick Power.

Will you confirm in the House of Assembly and for the people of the Province

that Nalcor is selling that power for as low as four cents per kilowatt hour?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to provide to the House information with regard

to our power sales on the recall power out of Labrador. We are in the open

market and in the spot market and sometimes we sell high and sometimes we sell

low. What we need to ensure, Mr. Speaker, is that on average we are doing as

well or better than we were selling the power to Hydro-Qubec, which has always

been their plan. We do not want to talk about how much historically we sold

power to Quebec for and tied us into the contract and who might have been

responsible for that, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, Hydro-Qubec bought power from us because they could sell it in

the market and make a good return on it. We are doing it ourselves, Mr. Speaker,

and that return is coming to the people of the Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Nalcor and the government opposite, Mr. Speaker, are selling our power today

into New Brunswick at four cents a kilowatt hour. Now, Mr. Speaker, it might be

instructive as well to tell the people of the Province how that power is getting

to the New Brunswick market. The Premier has stood, Mr. Speaker, and said that

Quebec will not allow this Province to move energy through its jurisdiction.

If that is so I would like to ask the Premier: How is the recall power

actually getting into the New Brunswick market?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Now, Mr. Speaker, if there was ever a better reason for the Leader of the

Opposition to stop talking when she asks her question and start listening, then

she would have the information that she is looking forward to today. We have

transmission rights for over 250 megawatts of power through Quebec. Mr. Speaker,

a statement to that effect was made here in this House of Assembly. That fact

was celebrated in this House of Assembly, Mr. Speaker

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: because it was a historic day for Newfoundland and

Labrador. So you really should stop talking and start listening.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I will start listening when the Premier and the government has something to

say that is going to benefit the people of this Province, Mr. Speaker, and not

just because they want to pay lip service I say to the Premier.

Mr. Speaker, we know that the government right now and Nalcor are selling

power to New Brunswick our power for four cents a kilowatt hour. We also

know that five years ago they signed a deal with Hydro-Qubec to sell its power

from Menihek generating station in Labrador, Mr. Speaker. They kept the deal

secret for about two years and I am assuming it was because they were so ashamed

of the fact that they were giving them the power so cheap, Mr. Speaker.

I ask the Premier today if she will confirm for the House of Assembly that

Nalcor is actually selling Menihek Power to Hydro-Qubec today for two to three

cents a kilowatt hour.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, Menihek is an isolated system that was owned in Quebec. It

produces about eighteen megawatts of power and when they wanted to get out of

the power business they came to Nalcor and said will you buy this plant? We will

sell it to you for a $1. Not only that, we will cover all of your capital costs.

We will cover all your operational costs. We just want you to operate it for us.

Nalcor said yes because it does not cost us a cent. We have made $2 million a

year off that since we have done it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, we know that Nalcor and the government, signed off

by the Premier when she was a minister, Mr. Speaker, is selling power today to

New Brunswick for four cents a kilowatt hour, to Quebec, Mr. Speaker, for less

than three cents a kilowatt hour and, Mr. Speaker, we know that they want to

sell Muskrat Falls power to the Maritimes for something like seven cents a

kilowatt hour or nine cents a kilowatt hour. Mr. Speaker, all power being sold

outside of this

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: Province under the current government is being sold at a

fraction of the cost that they want to bill the people of Newfoundland and

Labrador.

You tell me Premier why does it make sense for the people in Newfoundland and

Labrador to pay double the cost of their electricity while you sell our power

dirt cheap outside of the Province?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, let's get back to Menihek. Menihek, with

eighteen megawatts of power that we bought from Hydro-Qubec for $1, Mr.

Speaker, for which they pay all the operational costs, all the capital costs,

all the upgrade costs and they pay us. There is only one customer available to

us it is isolated and that means we cannot sell it to anybody else because

there is no transmission out, that is what isolated means. Mr. Speaker, we did a

PPA with them that pays us over $2 million a year for our effort of generating

that plant for them. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is a pretty good deal. Mr. Speaker,

in terms of our sale

MS JONES: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. Leader of the Opposition asked a question, I assume she wants an

answer. I would ask her if she would respect the hon. Premier when she is

providing her answer within the time frame that is allowed by rules of the

House.

The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I do not think your assumption is correct. I do not think the

Leader of the Opposition wants answers, Mr. Speaker. She wants to continue with

this public relations campaign that spreads misinformation, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. Leader of the Opposition for her co-operation.

The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, they are the facts on Menihek.

Mr. Speaker, in terms of Muskrat Falls, Muskrat Falls is a good project. That

is being reinforced time and time again as we do our open houses across this

Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White

Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, judging from the municipal leaders I spoke to attending the MNL

Symposium in Gander a couple of weeks ago, there remains a lot of frustration

and unanswered questions regarding the implementation of the Waste Management

Strategy. One region that is particularly frustrated with the lack of direction

and progress is the Western Region, especially around the decision of whether

there will be a waste management site in the region or will their waste be

transported to the Central site in Norris Arm.

My question for the minister is this: When will government make a final

decision on the strategy for the Western Region and the Northern Peninsula of

our Province?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Municipal Affairs.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. O'BRIEN: Yes, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the hon. member for his

question.

Certainly, there has been a lot of work gone into the Solid Waste Management

Strategy in the Province. Eastern is up and running quite well. We have some

work to work out there as well, but Central will be up and running by the fall.

In Western, I would like the hon. member to know that we just appointed a new

Chair, Dr. Don Downer, to lead the implementation of that strategy. He will be

engaging in that process, I will be engaging in that process, and we will move

that strategy forward as it relates to Western.

In the meantime, this is a great strategy for the Province, very important to

the Province, very important to the environment, and we will take our time in

regard to the implementation process because it is such an important strategy

for our Province. Up to this to date, we have over

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi

Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the emergency medical service available in the Province is a

mixture of public, community, and for-profit services. In November, 2009, the

Minister of Health and Community Services said that we may have to start looking

at moving toward the type of ambulance service that they offer in other

provinces where there is not as much reliance on the private operators. Mr.

Speaker, other provinces have streamlined the provision of ambulance services by

putting them under one public umbrella.

I ask the Minister of Health and Community Services: When will this

government put in place a publicly funded and publicly managed ambulance service

so that the same standards of operations and services are provided to everyone

in the Province?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member opposite is aware, the ambulance service in

this Province is a combination of hospital ambulance, private ambulance, and

also community ambulance. Mr. Speaker, a lot of these private ambulances provide

services to rural Newfoundland and Labrador, as do the community ambulances. As

we look upon a review or what we are going to do with ambulances, Mr. Speaker,

one has to take into account the very significant or potentially significant

impact on rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, this government is not going to do anything that could hurt

rural Newfoundland and Labrador. In fact, Mr. Speaker, everything we do is to

benefit rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi

Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

That is why I was asking the minister what his plan is, and I did not get

what the plan was.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland and Labrador is the only Province in Canada where

an emergency medical responder can be the primary caregiver in an ambulance. In

other provinces, an EMR would have to be accompanied by a more highly trained

paramedic. In this Province, resources are not equitably allocated to sustain

paramedics on every ambulance.

I ask the minister, Mr. Speaker: How is this government going to adequately

resource the system so that every ambulance can have a trained paramedic?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, over the last number of years we have invested significantly in

the road ambulance service. The first memorandum of agreement with the private

and community road ambulances was established in 2000. Subsequent agreements,

Mr. Speaker, have increased the road ambulance budget by more than 300 per cent.

We recently, Mr. Speaker, entered into a deal, in 2010, where there was

approximately $30 million put into a contract. Mr. Speaker, we also had funding

for the four regional health authorities for ambulance services for

approximately $13 million. So that is $43 million, Mr. Speaker, we are putting

into the road ambulance system. Last year, we put defibrillators into road

ambulances.

Mr. Speaker, again, we have a vast geography and a small population. We are

trying to ensure that we provide the best possible services to the people of

rural Newfoundland and Labrador. We certainly are doing that, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi

Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I look forward to the day when they are going to put paramedics in all of the

ambulances.

Mr. Speaker, we are losing many of our rural paramedics to other provinces

because they are not receiving the same wages as public sector ambulance

operators. They are dealing with the same level of trauma, serious illness, and

vulnerability experienced by people in emergency as paramedics in urban areas

are and those working under the public system. As well, they are now required to

have exactly the same level of training.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the minister: Why aren't all of our emergency medical

services under a totally public system so that everyone gets paid the same and

that the same quality of care is provided to everyone in the Province?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

If I understand the member opposite correctly, what she is suggesting is that

private ambulance operators in this Province we should get out of that system

and not pay for them any more; so that all of the people, especially in rural

Newfoundland and Labrador, who are providing services, we should say to you that

we no longer need your services, and we should publicly fund the ambulance

service.

Mr. Speaker, if I understand her correctly she is essentially saying we do

not care what private ambulance operators in Newfoundland and Labrador do, get

rid of that system because they cannot provide the service needed. Is that what

she is saying, Mr. Speaker?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The time allotted for questions and answers has expired.

Presenting Reports by Standing and Select Committees.

Tabling of Documents.

Notices of Motion.

Notices of Motion

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for the District of Baie Verte-Springdale.

MR. POLLARD: I move, seconded by the Member for St. John's South, the

following private member's resolution:

WHEREAS the provincial government in October, 2005 published "A Provincial

Policy Framework for Mental Health and Addictions Services in Newfoundland and

Labrador" entitled "Working Together for Mental Health" an approach reflecting

the input of mental health professionals and public consultations involving

mental health consumers and advocacy and support organizations; and

WHEREAS in the 2004 Budget, the Province committed $1 million to take

immediate action on identified long-standing gaps within our mental health

system, create more access to mental health services and treatment, and work to

reduce the stigma that individuals suffering with mental illness face; and

WHEREAS in the 2005 Budget, the Province committed: $1 million to implement

the findings of the OxyContin Task Force; $740,000 to upgrade facilities; $1

million for enhanced mental health home and community supports; and $740,000 for

enhanced services for gambling addictions; and

WHEREAS in the 2006 Budget, the Province committed: $1 million to enhance

primary mental health services in the Province; $1 million to add nine new

addictions counsellors in the Province for primary prevention and treatment, and

to respond to needs identified in the Gambling Prevalence Study; and $1.1

million to construct a new provincial addictions treatment centre in Corner

Brook as part of a $3 million project to provide enhanced treatment for persons

with addictions, including non-medical detox services enabling a seamless

transfer from detox to treatment; and it also that year brought forward a new

Mental Health Care And Treatment Act; and

WHEREAS in the 2007 Budget, the Province committed $800,000 to implement the

framework for the new act; $800,000 to continue with implementation of the

policy framework; $575,000 to address problem gambling, particularly through the

enhancement of prevention and treatment services, creation of a public awareness

campaign, and funding for research; and $228,800 to establish a new Provincial

Eating Disorders Program; and

WHEREAS in the 2008 Budget, the Province committed $1.7 million for further

enhancements to services and programs for persons with mental health and

addictions; and

WHEREAS in the 2009 Budget, the Province committed $775,800 for the

prevention and treatment of substance abuse by addressing service gaps,

addictions problems in youth; and also invested $500,000 for the planning of a

residential treatment centre for youth with addictions, and $500,000 for the

planning of a residential treatment centre for youth with complex mental health

needs; and

WHEREAS in the 2010 Budget, the Province committed $2 million for the

planning and development of an adult residential addictions treatment centre in

Harbour Grace; $482,900 to enhance child psychiatry services at the Janeway

Hospital; additional funding for a new psychologist to enhance the eating

disorders treatment program at Eastern Health; $2.4 million for continued

planning and construction of a new residential treatment centre for children and

youth with complex mental health needs and behavioural issues in St. John's; $2

million to further the new residential treatment centre in Grand Falls-Windsor

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair is having difficulty hearing the hon. Member for the District of

Baie Verte-Springdale.

The hon. the Member for the District of Baie Verte-Springdale.

MR. POLLARD: for children and youth with addictions; $300,000 to

support new community-based projects primarily focused on mental health and

addictions issues; $3.2 million to increase the rural capacity to address mental

health and addictions issues; and

WHEREAS in the 2011 Budget the Province committed $4.5 million to begin the

replacement of the Waterford Hospital with a new specialized mental health

facility

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. POLLARD: $1 million to develop an interactive e-mental health

service to enhance tele-mental health services for people in rural and remote

regions, and to launch a provincial public awareness campaign to decrease the

stigma and discrimination, while increasing understanding of how and when to

seek help; $402,900 for enhanced programming, and the addition of two rural case

managers for adults in Placentia and Bonne Bay and two rural case managers for

youth in Corner Brook and Grand Falls-Windsor; $195,300 for two intake workers

to oversee and manage mental health and addictions referrals in Labrador West

and Happy Valley-Goose Bay;

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. POLLARD: $180,000 to enable the Canadian Mental Health Association

Newfoundland and Labrador Division to establish and staff regional offices in

Stephenville and Grand Falls-Windsor; $140,000 to enable Consumer Health

Awareness Network of Newfoundland and Labrador, known as CHANNAL, to hire four

peer support positions for the community mental health system in the central and

western regions;

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair is having difficulty hearing the hon. Member for the District of

Baie Verte-Springdale.

MR. POLLARD: and, $76,000 to enable Choices for Youth to operate its

"Moving Forward" program; $2.2 million to place five, full-time mental health

and addictions counsellors in Nain, Hopedale, Makkovik, and Natuashish and

provide the necessary accommodations and supports;

BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED that this hon. House supports the significant

actions this government has taken and is continuing to take to advance mental

health and addictions services throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Further notices of motion?

Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given.

Petitions.

Petitions

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I stand today to present a petition on behalf of women in

Newfoundland and Labrador who are calling on the government to reduce the age of

breast screening for women in our Province.

WHEREAS breast cancer is the most common cancer among Newfoundland and

Labrador women, excluding non-melanoma skin cancer, with approximately 370 women

to be diagnosed with breast cancer in Newfoundland and Labrador this year; and

WHEREAS we have one of the highest mortality rates from breast cancer and

breast cancer in young women tends to be more aggressive; and

WHEREAS the benchmark for Newfoundland and Labrador's organized breast

screening program is age fifty; and

WHEREAS women aged forty to forty-nine are not eligible to participate in

Newfoundland and Labrador's organized breast screening program, while women aged

forty to forty-nine are eligible in the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta,

Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Northwest Territories, and the Yukon; and

WHEREAS there is evidence that routine mammography screening of women in

their forties can reduce mortality from breast cancer at least 24 per cent, but

Newfoundland and Labrador still does not allow women in that age group to

self-refer into their breast screening program; and

WHEREUPON the undersigned, your petitioners, call upon the House of Assembly

to urge government to allow women aged forty to forty-nine to be eligible for

breast screening to begin at age forty and that all women be able to self-refer

through Newfoundland and Labrador's screening program.

Mr. Speaker, this petition has been sent to me by women from all different

parts of the Province. I think this one is mostly women on the West Coast in the

Stephenville, Kippens area who have signed this particular petition as well as

the Port au Port Peninsula.

Mr. Speaker, this is a concern for women all over the Province. It does not

matter where you live, everyone knows someone who has been diagnosed with breast

cancer at an earlier age. They feel it is important in Newfoundland and Labrador

that we would have a proper breast screening program. Mr. Speaker, they are

petitioning the House of Assembly simply because they know the evidence out

there in the country supports this and supports it as a means of saving lives,

of reducing the mortality rate associated with breast cancer.

Mr. Speaker, just recently the Government of Ontario announced they would

also be bringing in legislation to reduce the age which has been a benchmark of

age fifty in their Province to age thirty in terms of the particular programs

that they are offering.

What these women in Newfoundland and Labrador are saying to government today

is that we want you to act. We want you to reduce the age of screening for women

right across the Province. We want you to have a program whereby we can be

referred, self-refer under the program so we do not have to wait for a doctor or

someone else to tell us it is okay for us to have a mammogram; that we would

have a process in place that allowed us to have access to the tools in our

Province to make an early diagnosis. In doing so, Mr. Speaker, we know we can

save lives. We know the studies are saying that the mortality rate can be

reduced by at least 24 per cent in our own Province alone. That is 24 per cent

less women who will die from breast cancer as a result of this early screening

program.

Mr. Speaker, they are asking the government to bring forward this program and

to change the benchmarks in Newfoundland and Labrador so that more women have

access to mammography screening in our Province.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

The hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave.

MR. BUTLER: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

My petition reads: To the hon. House of Assembly in the Province of

Newfoundland and Labrador in Parliament assembled. The petition of the

undersigned residents humbly sheweth:

WHEREAS Coley's Point Primary is a wooden structure built in the early 1960s;

and

WHEREAS a consultant's report recommended that a new school be built to

replace Coley's Point Primary; and

WHEREAS the student population is increasing yearly and constitutes a K-3

system; and

WHEREAS this forty-nine-year-old - nearly fifty-year-old - wooden structure

should be replaced for the safety of both staff and students; and

WHEREUPON the undersigned, your petitioners, humbly pray and call upon the

House of Assembly to urge government to take action and proceed with the

construction of a new primary school for Coley's Point.

Mr. Speaker, I have to say, I do not know, it may be thirty or forty

petitions I have put forward over a period of time, I did not do any in this

session of the House of Assembly because I thought the ones that I put through

would get the word through to the powers to be and something would be done. I

kept it quiet and thought that would help and we would hear something in the

Budget this year, but unfortunately, that did not happen. I will be bringing a

few more petitions forward because that school is a wooden structure, as I

stated, and over the last two or three years there has been problems there.

I have to say that the minister of the day, of Human Resources, Labour and

Employment, when he was CEO of the school board, knows full well the situation

and they were pushing very hard for that school to be built. When the

consultant's report was done, the Government House Leader now was the Minister

of Education at the time. The report that came down, there were some issues in

it that were not prime and proper for the school board system so, as she said in

the hon. House of Assembly, the report was shredded. Unfortunately, that new

school was shredded with it.

I am calling upon the government, calling upon the Members of the House of

Assembly, to see that this issue is brought to the forefront again. Nobody

thinks that this is a school that the people need built just to say we have a

new school. The population is growing there; there are younger kids coming on to

go to that school. To go into this particular facility, this day and age, I

think it has to be dealt with.

We know it is not going to be built overnight. We hear of many good reports,

whether it is long-term care facilities, other schools or hospitals, it takes

some time. At least I thought, this year, there would be some preliminary work

done to just say that the groundwork and the design work might have been

considered.

Mr. Speaker, having said that, I call upon the hon. House of Assembly to urge

government to see what action can be taken this year, maybe there is money in

the Budget where they can get the preliminary work started because I can assure

you that the people in that area would greatly appreciate it.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I stand today to present a petition on behalf of the people of Labrador with

regard to the Trans-Labrador Highway.

WHEREAS the Trans-Labrador Highway is a vital transportation lifeline for the

Labrador communities, providing access, generating economic activity, and

allowing residents to obtain health care and other public services; and

WHEREAS Route 510 and connecting branch roads of the Trans-Labrador Highway

are unpaved, in deplorable condition and are no longer suitable and safe for the

traffic volumes that travel this route; and

WHEREAS Labrador cannot afford to wait years or decades for upgrading and

paving of their essential transportation route;

WHEREUPON the petitioners call upon the House of Assembly to urge government

to provide additional funding for much-needed improvements to Route 510 and

connecting branch roads of the Trans-Labrador Highway.

Mr. Speaker, what people in Labrador are asking is that the government commit

and put in place a full plan to pave the entire Trans-Labrador Highway. Mr.

Speaker, that is the main highway through that region of Labrador. It is a

highway that many people depend upon

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: I know the Member for Lake Melville would like to contribute to

the debate. Hopefully, this afternoon, he will have an opportunity to speak and

tell us the reason why he and his government are not committing to pave that

section of the highway.

Mr. Speaker, it is a concern for people in the Labrador region. People are

using this road, thousands and thousands of people, every year. The traffic

volume is going up. Now, Mr. Speaker, they are seeing tremendous optimism with

the highway 138 being constructed over the next five years, giving the Labrador

Straits a direct connection to Quebec City, Montreal, all that area, through the

Lower North Shore road. We see that as an opportunity to start bringing more

people into Labrador. We see it as an opportunity for the region and for the

communities, but it is an opportunity that can only be realized with a proper

transportation link. It is an opportunity where people will be able to really

feel the benefits if they have a paved road.

It is not just about what is happening today, the conditions of the road

today and the people who are having to use it, it is also about the future and

it is about building the region for the long term and capitalizing on that

opportunity. Why the government opposite does not have a vision for that

particular part of the Province - does not have a vision and does not have a

commitment to see that entire

section of road paved and for it to start

immediately is beyond me.

It is an area that will provide tremendous wealth to the Province. It is an

area that today provides tremendous wealth to the Province, but will provide a

great deal more. Mr. Speaker, in order for people there to realize the full

opportunities and the full potential that new link will bring to the Labrador

region, and to be able to increase their transportation of people throughout the

area, they need to have a paved road to do it. That is the reason they are

calling upon the government, and they are asking them to lay out the plan to

pave this

section of road, and to make a commitment to us. Do not delay it for

two, three, or four years with no commitment, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions.

Orders of the Day.

Orders of the Day

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to call, from the Order Paper, Concurrence Motions, 2.(

b) Resource

Committee.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Lewisporte.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is certainly a pleasure to be able to stand here this afternoon as, first

of all, the Member of the House of Assembly for the District of Lewisporte, and

also as the Chair of the Resource Committee, and to be able to enter into what

is the beginning of debate on concurrence in the Estimates procedure.

The Resource Committee, Mr. Speaker, looked at the Estimates for several

departments, namely, the Departments of Fisheries and Aquaculture; Tourism,

Culture and Recreation; Natural Resources, including the Forestry and the

Agrifoods Sector; we debated the Estimates for the Department of Environment and

Conservation; for the Department of Business; and also for the Department of

Innovation, Trade and Rural Development, including the Newfoundland and Labrador

Research and Development Council, the Status of Women, the Rural Secretariat,

and also Francophone Affairs.

So going through the Estimates for each of these departments was a very

interesting experience, as members of the Resource Committee asked questions of

the ministers and the ministers' officials throughout the process. Of course,

the ministers were very forthright with their providing answers to questions,

and if there were some questions that were asked for which they did not have the

answers directly there with them, then in all cases, if it was requested, the

information could be sent and dispersed at a later date.

What I want to do in the little bit of time that I have this afternoon, Mr.

Speaker, is I want to spend a little while talking about a couple of the

departments and a couple of noteworthy things that I thought we should put out

there this afternoon. Once I am done with that, then I want to take a couple of

minutes to talk about how it falls down and how it affects some things in my

district.

First of all the Department of Fisheries and we have heard a lot. Every

spring there is usually talk and there are usually some unsettling affairs that

happen within the Department of Fisheries as we look to get a settlement on

prices and quotas, the number of jobs and the number of people who are going to

be affected. That seems to be something that happens on an annual basis. I think

the Minister of Fisheries has certainly provided a lot of answers around that in

the Estimates procedure and provided a lot of good food for thought.

In the seafood industry, Mr. Speaker, we note that in 2010 it performed

really well. Our Province's total seafood production was valued at $942 million

in 2010 which was up 13.9 per cent from 2009. In general the improved global

demand for seafood, some higher market prices for crab, shrimp and also the

increase in aquaculture exports, contributed to the growth in 2010. In the total

landings for captured fisheries, approximately 301,000 tonnes; pretty close to

what it was in 2009. In the corresponding landed value, it is $439 million, up

slightly 3.7 per cent from 2009. The fisheries and it is one of the

departments as I said that we debated the Estimates for the fisheries and the

whole resource of the fishery contribute significantly to our economy.

I want to talk briefly about the Department of Natural Resources. It is a

really big department, Mr. Speaker. Again we heard Estimates relative to that

department and it was actually the longest meeting that we had. I think we

started at 5:30 in the afternoon and we went until about 11:30, I think, at

night as the minister and his officials were providing answers to a lot of

questions.

What I want to talk about briefly is my take as Chair of the Resource

Committee, as a member who sat in this Legislature for the past three and a half

years, as somebody who sat through this session and who has listened to

questions particularly around the whole Muskrat Falls, Lower Churchill Project.

I listened as the minister provided answers in Estimates and I have listened in

Question Period. There are a few things I would like to share, which is my own

perspective on this based on what I have heard and what I have researched.

The bottom line, Mr. Speaker, is that the development of the Muskrat Falls

portion of the Lower Churchill Project is an opportunity for brighter and

cleaner electricity. We are going to develop 824 megawatts of power in the

Muskrat Falls Project. Now, there is a conversion factor which in actual fact

comes down to something that we call five terawatts of power. So the development

is, like I said, about 824 megawatts. Gull Island is a little over 2,000. The

total development there would be in the 3,000 mark. We are going to do the

Muskrat Falls portion right now.

Mr. Speaker, that comes after years of planning and analysis. Newfoundland

Hydro, a Nalcor subsidiary, determined that Muskrat Falls is the lowest cost

option to a looming electricity shortage in this Province. It has been analyzed,

looked at and studied, and Muskrat Falls is the lowest cost option to a looming

electricity shortage. This is contrary to what the members of the Opposition

have said and may say throughout this debate, Mr. Speaker.

The fact is, in 2015 this Province will have a capacity deficit for

electricity. What it means when we say a capacity deficit, it means that at peak

times when we think of peak times, a peak time might be a February morning

when everybody is getting up and getting ready to go to school, and people have

their toasters on all over the Province. At peak times there will be a deficit.

So that is 2015.

Now, by 2019 we are told we will have an actual electricity deficit. That

means the electricity demand in the Province at that point in time will be

greater than the electricity we are producing. We have a problem, how do we meet

the demand? We have established through analysis, objective, fair analysis, that

there is going to be a deficit. Now we have to decide as a Province, how do we

meet the demand?

First of all, the demand has been growing; it has been growing for a number

of years. The demand has been growing because of economic growth. This Province

has been growing. Economic growth means we have a greater demand for power. We

have had more homes being built. We have had bigger homes being built. About 86

per cent of the homes that are being built, they tell us now, are using

electricity. Domestic demand has grown. That is something that is established,

this is something that has been verified.

I guess, Mr. Speaker, once you have established you have a potential deficit,

you have an actual deficit in 2019, you have established that we have a growing

demand for electricity, now the next step is to look at what type of option do

we use to bring and to meet that electrical demand. There are several options,

again from what I understand in the research I have done and in discussions I

have had with the minister and his officials and the information that I have

gotten in Estimates. We can look at an isolated island option. As an island, of

course, we are surrounded by water. How do we meet the demand if we look at it

just as an isolated island option? Well, we could develop more wind. We could

develop some smaller projects along the rivers, but the bottom line is that once

all of that is looked at, it has been determined that we will still not have

security of supply. How about if we combine that with importing some power from

the Maritimes, maybe from Quebec, or we had a bunch of smaller hydro projects?

Even when that is looked at, Mr. Speaker, we still do not have security of

supply. We will go back to, what are our options? Again, the best option is to

develop the Muskrat Falls Project. We have determined that; all that analysis,

all that study has been done by officials in Nalcor, and it has been verified by

independent bodies, and so we have established that the best option to secure

electricity supply for Newfoundland and Labrador in the future is to develop

Muskrat Falls.

So, what that does, in actual fact I guess it is a good thing that we will

bring in the power from Muskrat Falls we are looking at about five terawatts

of power that can be developed down there. To meet our demand, we only need

about two of those terawatts, to meet the demand on the island and in Labrador.

Emera has said they will build a transmission link to the island, and for that,

they want one terawatt of power an investment of $1.6 or $1.2 billion or so,

they want one terawatt of power. So, what we have is that we have established we

have a demand, we have a deficit, we need to meet that demand.

So, we are going to develop Muskrat Falls, and all of the added benefits that

come from that. We have not even talked about, I have hardly heard in the House

one question from the Opposition or one acknowledgement in the last while about

the number of benefits that are going to happen in the development of Muskrat

Falls during the development stage. We are looking at, first of all, we will

have an electricity project that is going to be 98 per cent carbon free. During

the construction, the project will see 8,600 person-years of direct employment

in Newfoundland and Labrador. More than seventy occupations of those 8,600

person-years 5,400 will occur in Labrador.

We have numerous jobs that will be created during the development stage. We

have numerous jobs that will occur after the project is completed. We have power

that will meet the demand in Newfoundland and Labrador. We have excess power

that we can sell to other parts of the country, and down into the Northeastern

United States, if necessary. By the way, Muskrat Falls being developed is the

lowest cost and the best option irregardless' of whether we sell that excess

power or not totally irregardless'. I have heard the Minister of Finance

explain this and he has talked about it. He said we will have two terawatts of

power for the Island; we will have one terawatt of power that will go to Nova

Scotia based on them building the total link across the Gulf. Then we have two

terawatts of power that we can sell and whatever price we get for it is a bonus.

Whatever price we get for it the government of the day can decide what they will

use that money for. We can use it to build hospitals, to build bridges, to build

better schools or we can use it to lower electricity rates. That is something

that the government of the day will decide.

So, Mr. Speaker, there has been a lot of fallacy, I would say, during this

session of the House. There have been messages that the members of the

Opposition have put out there. I think their messages are mistaken. What the

development of Muskrat Falls will do is it will mean that electricity rates into

the future will be stabilized. Electricity rates in the future will no longer

escalate at a rate that is totally dependent on the price of oil. If we need

other additional electricity, we do not have to ramp up Holyrood, we do not have

to increase production out there at a cost of fifteen, or sixteen, or seventeen

cents per kilowatt hour, because it all depends on the price of oil at the time.

This project, Mr. Speaker, means it will stabilize electricity rates. It

means it will increase all kinds of jobs and produce all kinds of jobs during

the construction phase. It means revenue to the Province into the future. It

means everything that is good and positive, Mr. Speaker. I certainly think it is

a great project and I look forward to seeing it start.

Now, Mr. Speaker, even though the Department of Education was not in my

Estimates, I have an education background. There is something that I want to

talk about for a few minutes before I close here. We have invested significantly

in education in this Province over the last number of years. We have invested

strongly in child care and education, in poverty reduction, et cetera, but I

want to talk about education for a minute, Mr. Speaker.

One particular part, and for some people it might not seem big, but as

somebody who has worked in the system it seems big to me. I talked just today to

two school principals in my district. I called them and I said: What does the

investment in new technology mean to you and your schools? I talked to Krista

Freake at Lewisporte Collegiate. This is a senior high school. She said: Well,

we just got a call from the school board that with this investment in technology

that school is going to receive eight SMART Boards, fifteen computers, and a

whole lot of monitors. Now, these SMART Boards are costing somewhere around

$4,000, $5,000, or $6,000 each. She said: It is a tremendous, tremendous boost

to the school and to the technology program.

I talked to Terry Spurrell, Mr. Speaker. Terry Spurrell is the principal at

the middle school. I said: Terry, what does this new infusion of technology mean

in your school? He said: Well, we just got a call. We are going to look at what

is called a multi-point system, which are four large computers hooked up to six

to eight more. It is basically, I guess, computers acting as servers. I will not

get into the technical piece, mainly because I do not understand it too much

myself. He said they are going to receive five SMART Boards. They are going to

go with the multi-system piece. They are going to get fourteen computers and

forty-nine monitors. I said: Terry, what does it mean to you?

It is interesting, Mr. Speaker, because he sent me a message and he said this

here: Switching from whiteboards to SMART Boards is like the switch from the old

slate to the exercise book. He said: You just took us from the Stone Age to the

information age. Mr. Speaker, that is just a comparison from one school

principal who says this infusion means big, big progress to them in their

delivery of education.

I could talk about some of the things going on in my district, Mr. Speaker,

which are phenomenal. We have a big new health facility going up in Lewisporte

during my tenure. We built a new stadium. There are all kinds of water and sewer

projects throughout the district. We have had a big infusion in educational

facilities. Lots of good things have happened over the last few years in my

district. I have been proud to be the member there. I have been really pleased

with the progress this government has made and continues to make. I am excited

about the Muskrat Falls Project, that portion of the Lower Churchill Project. I

think it is a great, great project that is going to mean more jobs for us in the

future, more revenue for government -

MR. SPEAKER (T. Osborne): Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that his time for speaking has expired.

MR. VERGE: Could I just have a minute to clue up?

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member, by leave.

MR. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the hon. members opposite for granting leave.

I think that the development of the Lower Churchill Project, the Muskrat

Falls portion, is going to meet our demands, it is going to stabilize rates, and

it is going to give us jobs. Mr. Speaker, there is nothing negative about that

project. It means great things for us and for our future.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to speak on

Concurrence and

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. VERGE: Yes, all of the options have been looked at I say to the hon.

member opposite, and this full project has been looked at inside and outside by

many objective sources and it is proven the test, time and time again. It has

proven the test and it is a great, great project.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White

Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is a privilege to be able to stand again this afternoon and speak for a

few moments on the Concurrence debate, particularly on the Resource Committee. I

was a part of the committee on several of the departments, in particular

Fisheries, INTRD, and Municipal Affairs. It is good to be able to go through the

Budget and through the Estimates and see exactly where the monies of the

taxpayers of the Province are being spent.

Mr. Speaker, it is easy, as we know, for the government sometimes to stand

and brag about how they are spending the money, but I would certainly concur

that it is not always being spent in the best interests of the people of the

Province. We certainly could look for ways to improve it.

I want to respond to some of the comments that the Member for Lewisporte said

in his opening remarks. In particular, he talked about Muskrat Falls. There are

two different opinions here in the Province in terms of Muskrat Falls. There is

the one of the government and there is the one of the people of the Province.

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest they are very different.

The argument that I have heard put forth in this House every day, as you

know, we have discussed and debated Muskrat Falls, particularly from the Leader

of the Opposition and the Premier. We have had that debate basically every day

that the House has been open. I believe it has been a good debate, it has been

an important debate. It has been important that we put the information out

before the people of this Province, so that when October comes, they can make

decisions based on what they have heard.

I would suggest, as my colleague, the Member for Burgeo & La Poile does at

times, that he does not want to be the one who is going to the door and saying:

I am the guy who is going to double your light bill. I can assure you that that

is not going to be a very popular thing to say to the residents of Newfoundland

and Labrador. When you hit people in their pocket, that is when it hurts. When

you hit seniors who are on fixed incomes, and other people in the Province who

are on fixed incomes, Mr. Speaker, and you tell them that, listen, this

necessity, one of the most expensive pieces actually of your monthly budget, we

are going to double that cost to you because of the development of Muskrat

Falls. The defence for that, I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, is very hard to come

up with.

What is interesting in listening to his words, and the debate of government,

and the position of government has been the fact that there is a growing demand

for electricity in Newfoundland and Labrador, on the island, in particular,

because that is where we are bringing the electricity. Mr. Speaker, I consider

myself to be at least average intelligence, and I have sat back at times in the

House, and away from the House, and so on, and tried to understand where this

growing demand for electricity in this Province today is coming from. We realize

that there was a paper mill that operated in Stephenville that would have

obviously burned a great deal of hydro power that closed. We know of another one

in Grand Falls, Abitibi of course, that closed just a couple of years ago. So,

Mr. Speaker, those two pulp and paper plants, in themselves, obviously would

have used a lot of electricity, but they are no more, they are gone, and there

will not be any more. We also realize, at the same time, that the Vale Inco

piece in Placentia area, that that is in place, and that will, as it comes on

stream, require power. We understand that, Mr. Speaker.

When we look at other things around the Province, and we look at other

developing businesses, and we look at the population trends in our Province, and

so on, not to be all doom and gloom, but I have to wonder where this growing

demand is coming from. We had, as you would know, we had briefings on Muskrat

Falls from Nalcor on at least three particular occasions. I know that on one

occasion in particular we put the questions to the CEO of Nalcor, Mr. Martin;

very clear, very specific, as to what the assumptions were based on that

indication that there would be this growing demand that really generated and

created the business case for the development of Muskrat Falls aside from Gull

Island.

Mr. Speaker, we were told very clearly by Mr. Martin that the figures they

were using came basically from the Department of Finance. In other words, it was

this government's numbers that drove the business case to develop Muskrat Falls.

Mr. Speaker, we have asked for those numbers but to this date that I know of,

Mr. Speaker, we have never seen the numbers, they have never been given to us.

They have never been taken and broken out so that it justifies, so that we can

see very clearly as an Opposition when we consider the Muskrat Falls deal, the

viability of it, and the necessity of it and so on, Mr. Speaker; that we can see

very clearly where this shortage of power that the member was just speaking

about and that government members speak from when they speak on Muskrat, that

yes, this is where it is. Mr. Speaker, to show that if we do not do this indeed

there will be a shortage, there will be a shortfall in the demand for

electricity in Newfoundland and Labrador by the year 2015.

Mr. Speaker, I would encourage the government and the minister that is

responsible for this particular project to table those statistics for us, to

show us exactly where it is. That indeed that not on some fly-by-night so to

speak projection or whatever, but based on solid, concrete data that we will

indeed be short on power by 2015.

Mr. Speaker, one of the other issues that I see from the point of the

development of Muskrat Falls there are many issues of course is the issue of

doubling of our light bills. There is the issue of whether there really is a

true demand, a growing demand that will exhaust our present electricity capacity

within the Island. Of course, Mr. Speaker, there is also the issue of the 20 per

cent that we are going to give to our partner so to speak in this project, being

Emera from Nova Scotia. Then the other 40 per cent, Mr. Speaker, that is

considered to be surplus power that can either flow over the river or can come

down through the transmission line and be sold into the Maritimes and into other

parts of North America.

Mr. Speaker, we realize there is a growing demand for electricity in certain

parts of North America for sure, in Canada and Atlantic Canada, as provinces

like Nova Scotia want to get off their dependency on coal and so on, and we

support that. That is a good thing, but, Mr. Speaker, when we hear numbers like

were presented here today being actual numbers - because the Premier certainly

did not defend the numbers or to say they were wrong, but when we hear numbers

suggesting that we are presently selling power to New Brunswick for four cents a

kilowatt hour and then we hear we are presently selling power to Quebec for less

than three cents a kilowatt hour, Mr. Speaker, I sit back as a resident of this

Province, as a taxpayer, as a consumer of electricity and I say: Why in goodness

gracious, why would this government expect me to be willing to pay fourteen-plus

cents per kilowatt hour for my electricity to support a $6 billion project that

is based on a demand that really has not been established, that has been based

on a demand that has been set by government to which it will not give us the

statistics at least? Why would I support, for me and my family, my children, my

grandchildren, be willing to pay fourteen cents per kilowatt hour and at the

same time allow through that same line, through that very same line that brings

electricity to me, allow it to be transferred over to my cousins in Nova Scotia,

so to speak, and sell it to them, for what, possibly four, five, six, seven

cents per kilowatt hour? Half of what we are paying to produce that power is

what we are saying we are going to sell it to our neighbours for.

Mr. Speaker, the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador have great issues

with that. I have difficulty trying to understand the reasoning, the

rationalization, the rationing of that. I have great difficulty with it, Mr.

Speaker. Quite frankly, again, I believe that development is good. No one is

disputing the desire to develop Muskrat Falls. No one is disputing the desire to

do a Lower Churchill project, I should say, that involves Muskrat and Gull

Island. It has been the wish of governments, certainly of Administrations in the

past to see that development. It was always seen to be a great economic driver

for our Province, where we would develop hydroelectric power, that we would sell

it on the open market, that we would make great returns on it and so on. No one

disputes that. Really, no one disputes developing Muskrat Falls if that is the

option and there is a need; but, please, Mr. Speaker, I would say to the

government, to the minister today, show us the need. Show us the numbers that

verify what this Member for Lewisporte was saying a few moments ago, that by

2015, if we do not develop Muskrat Falls, we are indeed going to be out of

electricity. Again, I just do not understand it.

Mr. Speaker, when we look at the investments we are making in Nalcor; again

this year, $386 million is being invested into Nalcor. I realize we own the

company. It is paid for by the taxpayers. We know very little about it. It is

about as secret as an organization or a company can be. Mr. Speaker, unless

someone can show me where the demand is going to be, this growing demand that

requires us to do this development today based on economics that it is going to

cost me fourteen cents, based on numbers that we are going to sell the others

for seven cents unless someone can show me where that is essentially so, that

it is absolutely necessary, Mr. Speaker, I personally cannot support a Budget

that would spend that kind of money into a company, kind of open ended, if you

will.

Mr. Speaker, the other piece I would like to speak to for a few moments in

terms of Muskrat Falls is the subsea cable that is coming across the Strait of

Belle Isle. Mr. Speaker, you would know that a fixed link has been an issue of

discussion for a number of years. Quite frankly, most people considered it to be

pie in the sky. They considered it to be just some figment of the imagination,

so to speak, and something that we would never see.

We do know the former Premier, when he came in office, committed to doing a

study on the fixed link across the Strait of Belle Isle. That study was done.

The numbers seemed to be high and so on, and the issue was dropped. It was

mission accomplished, it was promise kept, and it was shelved along with a lot

of other good reports and strategies that have been done along the way.

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest if we are moving forward with the development of

Muskrat Falls, the consideration that we are giving is coming across the sea

base of the Strait of Belle Isle and that we are going to come across there with

a cable. Those of us in particular who have lived our lives in that region have

watched the icebergs in the spring of the year that come down through there, the

enormity of them, Mr. Speaker, and what they can do to the seabed and so on.

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest if there was ever a time to consider a fixed

link between the Island and the Labrador portion of our Province, it certainly

would be now. Mr. Speaker, not only should it be considered in terms of its

connection to the transportation of power across the Strait of Belle Isle, but

when we consider what Quebec has recently committed to, in terms of the road

through the North Shore of Quebec, the road into Fermont, into the northern

piece of it, linking into Lab City and so on, and the expectation that within

short order we will see paved roads all throughout that piece of Labrador with

Quebec connected in through, it would make good sense to me that if there is

ever going to be a time to have a fixed link to the Island portion of our

Province, that time has come, that time is now. The government has not

considered that at all, it does not seem to be. It says it has considered other

hydro projects, other options in the Province that would supply the amount of

hydro that we are expecting and anticipating to need in the next few years, but

it certainly has not shown anything where it has considered that way of

transporting, making passage, so to speak, for the hydro from the Labrador side

of the Province through the Strait of Belle Isle.

Mr. Speaker, the opportunity that it would provide to the Northern Peninsula,

and indeed to the whole Island, but certainly to the Northern Peninsula, to have

a fixed link that links the Island of Newfoundland to the rest of mainland

Canada, I would suggest that potential is enormous. I have travelled the Quebec

North Shore for the last thirty years, down through Old Fort, St. Paul's, down

to St. Augustine, Tabatire, these areas, I am very familiar with them and have

lived in them for the past thirty years or so, back and forth. Mr. Speaker, when

that corridor is opened up, the change that will take place from the people of

Natashquan down through to Blanc-Sablon will be tremendous. In allowing traffic

to flow along the Quebec North Shore and to be able to come, uninterrupted, into

the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, the Island of Newfoundland, I see as

being just a tremendous thing.

So, I am not really sure why we are not seeing that. Obviously, the

government does not see the need, it does not see it as being a viable option,

and it does not see the economic upturn, in particular to the Northern Peninsula

but also to the Province. I would challenge the government today to go back and

look at that study that was done, to re-evaluate the numbers that were attached

to it in terms of being able to do it. I believe we would find out today, with

the advancements in technology, with just the education around the whole process

and so on, what we have learned by other countries and companies around the

world, I believe what we would find is that it is indeed a very viable option,

one that is much cheaper than what it was a few years ago.

Mr. Speaker, I do not have a lot of time left, but I would like to bring up

another issue that is of concern to me from the perspective of the Resource

Committee, because one of the departments in the Estimates was Fisheries and

Aquaculture. Mr. Speaker, one of the communities in my district that has been

devastated by recent decisions of this government through the Department of

Fisheries is the community of Englee. Mr. Speaker, today it sits in limbo, as

much as it did five years ago when this government decided to remove the fishing

licence from that community and to basically take away its livelihood. There is

no movement forward by this government to try to remediate that situation or to

try to help that community, not only find an economy for the future but, just as

importantly, to clean up the mess that is left by the decision that this

government made.

Mr. Speaker, if you were to visit Englee today, you would find a depressed

economy, you would find a dilapidated fish plant that is an eyesore, that is a

hazard, that is a large safety concern, that is an environmental issue. It is

sitting there and the community council, the municipal leaders, the people of

that community, have put proposal after proposal after proposal into this

government. They have written the minister, they have rewritten the minister,

they have written the previous Premier, and they have written the Premier of

today. Mr. Speaker, as of right now, there is still absolutely no commitment of

anything to the community of Englee in terms of where they can expect this to

go. They have done their little workforce adjustment program. The government's

commitment there has lapsed.

Mr. Speaker, today in 2011, as we are boasting about all the money we are

spending in the Province, that private member's motion, quite frankly, I believe

it was meant to be a joke and I think it is. It sure sounded like a joke to me,

to be talking about mental health and put in a three-page private member's

motion to talk about all the money you spent in the past ten years. To me, it is

just a boasting.

Anyway, nevertheless, not to get sidetracked too much, we have a community

that is looking to this government to find a way forward, that is all it is

asking.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DEAN: It is asking for this government to support it financially in

trying to accomplish what it sees as a way forward. It sees an opportunity in

tourism and it sees an opportunity in establishing a heritage site, of having

kiosks there, an interpretative centre sort of thing, Mr. Speaker. It is waiting

and waiting on this government. As of right now, there is still no movement.

Those are the kinds of things that concern me when I look into the numbers that

government is spending and the money that it is putting forth. Then we see

communities that are dying and the government is not willing to reach out and

commit to them. Then they want you to stand with them shoulder to shoulder, Mr.

Speaker, in this House of Assembly and support the Budget that they have put

forward.

Mr. Speaker, I am not able to do that for the reasons outlined, and I just

thank you. I realize my time is gone and I thank you for the privilege of

standing this afternoon to speak for a few moments.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

By leave, Mr. Speaker, I would like to return to Notices of Motion just for a

minute.

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave to return to Notices of

Motion?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Under Notices of Motion earlier when they were called, I was remiss when I

did not move Motions 5 and 6. I will do that at this time.

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. the Minister of Natural Resources,

to move pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not adjourn at 5:30 o'clock

p.m. on Tuesday, May 24, 2011.

Further to that, Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. the Minister of

Natural Resources, to move pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not

adjourn at 10:00 o'clock p.m. on Tuesday, May 24, 2011.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise in this House today to stand and speak

to the tabling of the Resource Committee report. As has been indicated by the

chair of that report, one of the departments that the Resource Committee sat in

Estimates with was the Department of Natural Resources and the Forestry and

Agrifoods agency. I, as minister, had to appear here in this Chamber and answer

questions that came from members opposite relative to the Department of Natural

Resources.

Mr. Speaker, given the limited time that I have, I am going to focus my

commentary on what the members opposite focused on during the Estimates debate

which was the Lower Churchill project, specifically the Muskrat Falls phase one

of that project.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to preface my remarks and to provide

some context for members in the House and for members in our viewing audience,

to say to them that when we do things as a government on this side of the House

it is done with a long-term vision and with a view to a long-term plan. The

decisions we are making impact the people of the Province so much that we cannot

be reactive. We try not to be reactive. We cannot be changing our minds sort of

as we go along. We have to understand where we are today. We have to look down

the road and see where it is we need to be, and then we create a plan to get us

there. Those plans typically are multiyear, many year plans; multi-decade I

would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker. We sometimes, because of our budgetary

process, have to do one, two, or three-year plans. Annually we have to submit

Budgets, but I would suggest to you that some of what we work on as a government

is long term.

The Lower Churchill Project, as people in our audience who are watching today

would know, is not something that just came to be in the last two, three, or

four years. It is something that has been in government's bailiwick for decades.

I remember as a small boy going to school hearing people talk about the Lower

Churchill Project.

What we have done though, Mr. Speaker, is we have gotten to a point now where

because of the duty of Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro to ensure that we have

consistent, reliable, low-cost power available to the people of the Province,

they do a study basically every year, a generation study, and they submit that

plan to the Public Utilities Board. It basically is a forecasting of the

electricity requirements for the Province. When they did that, what they

recognized was that by 2015 the Island was going to have a requirement for new

source of power. We were going to run out of power, basically. I heard someone

use the term earlier that there was going to be an energy deficit. Now, what

does that mean?

Well, you may remember a few short years ago in Ontario and in some of the

states of the United States of America, there were what people called brownouts

and blackouts. What that meant was there was not enough electricity available to

meet everybody's needs at the same time so power was rationed. Certain areas of

a province would be given power for certain hours of the day and other areas of

the province would not be given as much power. They were rationing power.

What the Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro energy study said was that we

potentially could be in a situation by 2015 where we may find ourselves like

that. By 2019, we would not be able to add any new systems or any new people

onto our electrical system because there would not be enough power if we did not

do something. That is because the Province is experiencing growth. As has been

referenced by other speakers - I will not go through all the details - because

of the fact that business growth is occurring, because of the fact that over 80

per cent of the new homes being built are using electricity, because of the fact

we have a hydromet smelter in Argentia, because there are expansions occurring

in other areas - the mining area is going to be expanding - we need more power.

When members opposite say you have not proven to me the demand for power,

look around you I would say to them, it is happening. The National Energy Board

of Canada predicts that by 2020 there will be a 23 per cent rise in electrical

consumption in the country. Mr. Speaker, just look at what has happened in this

Province over the last number of years. This Province has experienced growth, we

are experiencing prosperity, and we need to make sure that we have the basic

infrastructure available to allow that to continue so that the people of the

Province can continue to benefit.

Having a reliable, secure electricity supply is integral to what it is we are

going to do or any other government in the future is going to do as a Province.

We have identified there are going to be potential shortages. Certain

assumptions have to be made but there are assumptions that have been made by

electrical utilities all over North America, they are reasonable assumptions.

The assumption we have made in terms of growth is quite reasonable, quite

conservative, it is 0.8 per cent per year in electrical consumption.

These are not wild guesses. These are not things that we are pulling out of a

hat. This is not something we are doing not knowing what we are all about here.

It is being done, Mr. Speaker - with all due respect to the people at

Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro, Nalcor and our own internal people at the

Department of Finance who have looked at some of these numbers, these are very

educated, smart people who are used to doing these kinds of assumptions on all

kinds of other projects. They understand how to put this together so that the

people of the Province will have all of the infrastructure that it needs, the

electrical infrastructure that it needs, to be able to do what we want to do as

a government into the future.

We forecasted a demand growth of 0.8 per cent a year, not an exorbitant

amount at all, Mr. Speaker. We forecasted an energy deficit by 2015. By that as

I said, we potentially could be into we have a safe zone. There is a certain

amount of energy that we produce and we only use so much of that. You do not use

100 per cent of all the electricity that you produce; you have to allow yourself

a little bit of a safe zone. The reason for that safe zone is that if we have an

ice storm and you lose electrical lines or something like that, you need that

extra bit of power that you can ration it out to other areas.

By 2015, we will be creeping into that safe zone. By 2019, we will be maxed

out, there will be no safe zone and we will not be able to add anybody else to

the system. Should something happen like an ice storm or like Hurricane Igor, we

potentially could be in a very dire situation. Nobody thinks about it until you

lose your lights, until you lose your power. When that happens, people then get

upset. So, the preplanning work needs to be done five, six, seven, eight, ten

years in advance to ensure that we do not find ourselves in situations like

that. I just give that little bit of introduction, Mr. Speaker, because I think

it is important that people have the context upon which the Muskrat Falls

Project is being built.

Mr. Speaker, what did we do when we identified that shortage? We looked at

other alternatives. There were five that were looked at. We looked at building

Gull Island, a much larger 2,200, 2,300, 2,400 megawatt project with a link to

the Island. We looked at Muskrat Falls, 824 megawatts with a link to the Island.

We looked at what is known as the isolated Island option; the next best

alternatives I would call them. That is doing some work out at Holyrood, doing

some stream generation, damming some rivers run-of-river they call it - doing

a bit of wind power maybe. There are a whole bunch of isolated Island options

that are there. We looked at importing power from Quebec and we looked at

potentially importing power from the Maritimes by putting a cable coming into

the Western part of the Island.

There were a number of options that were looked at. Those options were

evaluated based upon criteria. The criteria looked at things like a security of

supply and a reliability of electricity. We wanted to make sure that we had

access to power and we wanted to make sure that we had access to it whenever we

needed it. Security and reliability were, I would suggest to you, the most

important.

There were also things like cost were included, risk associated with the

project, financial viability associated with the project, and environmental

impacts associated with the project. There was a whole bunch of different lenses

that were put on these five options. To cut to the chase, Mr. Speaker, the

Muskrat Falls option was deemed to be the best of all of those options. It was

deemed to be the best for a whole bunch of reasons. The other alternatives

either did not guarantee us security of supply, wind for instance. Wind is good

when you have wind if you are using it as a power source. If you do not have

wind, then you do not have power. It is an intermittent source, I guess, is the

way I would put it to you, Mr. Speaker. It is a good backup for hydro. It is a

good supplement to hydro, but it is not the one you would place in front of

hydro.

Some of them would be more costly. To build Gull Island would be a more

costly project obviously, require more. If we were going to look at the import

route, either importing power from Quebec or importing power from the Maritimes,

then there really was not security of supply because you were at the mercy, I

guess, of the places you were importing it. Should they have an emergency and

need the power, potentially we may find ourselves not able to access the power

that we wanted to access.

For those and a whole bunch of other reasons, Mr. Speaker, Muskrat Falls was

deemed to be the best option of the five options that I just outlined for you.

Muskrat Falls will meet the needs of the Province. Muskrat Falls will allow for

industrial development in Labrador. Muskrat Falls provides excess power for

sale. A bonus I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, gravy, so to speak, because

we are meeting our own needs and we also have some excess power right now that

we would be able to sell to other places.

I hear members opposite talk about, well, you are selling it for less than

what it is going to cost for our own generation. The point they are missing, Mr.

Speaker, is we have to look after ourselves. We need to meet our own needs.

Muskrat Falls is not being built to sell power to somebody else. Muskrat Falls

is being built to meet our own needs. If we do not meet our own needs, the rest

of it does not matter. We build the Muskrat Falls Project to satisfy our own

needs. So that when I walk to the electrical switch on the wall of my room, hit

it and turn it up, the lights come on. It may not happen if we do not do

something now to address the shortages we see coming in five, six, seven years

time.

We have to do something to address those needs. We have to do something to

allow industrial development to continue and commercial expansion to continue in

the business markets we have. To do that, we need power. It is a basic need. We

are addressing that need. The fundamental principle upon which we are doing

Muskrat Falls is to address our own needs, Mr. Speaker. It is going to cost 14.3

cents per kilowatt hour. That is more than we are paying right now. We are

paying about 9.5 cents right now.

Mr. Speaker, I have said it in the House many times before and I am going to

say it again. Our power rates have been increasing every year, year over year

over year, 38 per cent over the last ten years. I indicated to you I would go

and get my own power bill and see what happened to mine. I did that. It came

into be, I believe it was 36 per cent, 37 per cent. Very close to 38 per cent.

We are projecting that kind of an increase will continue in the years to come.

Power rates, if we do nothing, are continuing to go up. We estimate 4 per cent

to 6 per cent per year power rates will continue to go up for every ratepayer on

the Island and in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Those rates are

continuing to go up with or without Muskrat Falls.

By building Muskrat Falls, we meet the need that we know we are going to have

into the future. We allow for further growth. We allow for industrial expansion,

industrial development to occur, and commercial expansion to occur, and we also

have some excess power that we can sell. Whether we sell that for one cent a

kilowatt hour or fifteen cents a kilowatt hour, it is money going into our

pocket that is above and beyond what we are building Muskrat Falls for anyway,

Mr. Speaker. As has been eloquently said here in this House of Assembly by the

Premier in the past, that is money that future governments then, with the sale

of the excess power, can decide whether they want to build schools, hospitals,

lower the rates that are being charged after 2017, whatever it is they want to

do with that excess money.

The 14.3 cents is to look after our own needs. When we look after our own

needs, Mr. Speaker, I just want to give you some examples of what could happen.

We have done some projections. If your power bill today is $291, forget about

Muskrat Falls, you are going to be paying about $400 in 2017 - because Muskrat

Falls will not be on stream until then anyway. Just with the normal increase in

power bills, your $291 a month that you are paying today will go to $400 a month

in 2017.

Let's assume we do not do Muskrat Falls. Let's assume we do not do anything

to address our own needs. Besides the fact that you will not be able to add any

new people to the system, besides the fact that you will not have any industrial

capacity for development in Labrador, besides the fact that commercial existing

businesses will not be able to do any expansion, besides the fact that we will

not have any excess capacity so we will not be able to sell any, all of that

gone, the other thing that is going to happen to that power bill that today is

$291 a month and in 2017 will be $400 a month, by 2025 you will now be up to

$455 a month. That is the projection. Your $291 bill today is gone up to $455 a

month without Muskrat Falls.

If I want to go to 2040, another thirty or so years; let's talk about our

children. The $291 a month bill that you are paying today, that will be $400 in

2017, that will be $455 in 2025, will go to $625, Mr. Speaker, by the year 2040.

That is what is going to happen with just normal increases in the power bills if

we do not do Muskrat Falls.

If we do Muskrat Falls, besides having industrial development in Labrador,

besides meeting the needs of the Province, besides having excess power that we

can sell and use that revenue we are generating to do stuff with, besides the

fact that businesses that are existing here will now have the capability to be

able to expand and grow and hire more people and generate more economic output,

let's forget all of that if we do Muskrat Falls, which are all good things and

good reasons to do it, here is the best reason why we should do it, Mr. Speaker:

because that $291 bill that I have today, that is going to be $400 in 2017,

after 2017, which is the date Muskrat Falls will go on stream, instead of paying

$455 a month in 2025, with Muskrat Falls I will pay $415 a month, Mr. Speaker, a

savings of $40 a month. If I project that out, that bill which was $291 today,

$400 in 2017, $455 in 2025, and up to $625 in 2040, that $625 bill that my

children will be paying in 2040, if we do Muskrat Falls now, as we are planning

on doing it, that bill will be $470 a month. That is a saving, Mr. Speaker, of

about $155 a month to every ratepayer in the Province who is paying electricity

right now with an average bill of $300 a month. That is the kind of difference

we are talking about with Muskrat Falls. That is why we need to do Muskrat

Falls. It is for our own benefit.

Added on to that benefit of addressing our own need and keeping our power

cost stable, and having the lowest power cost that we can get, we also get the

industrial development in Labrador, we get the commercial development everywhere

else in the Province, for all of the businesses that are currently existing,

and, Mr. Speaker, we know it is going to I have not even talked about the

environmental benefits, in terms of what it does with Holyrood. There are all

kinds of other benefits: the construction that has been talked about, the jobs

that have been talked about, the benefits for Labrador, in terms of the Labrador

Aboriginal Training Partnership Program, and the people who are being prepared

to work on the project up there. All of those things, Mr. Speaker, are reasons

why we should be doing Muskrat Falls.

When the people of the Province think about Muskrat Falls, think about

yourself first, is what I would say to them. Personalize it. What does it mean

for me, because ultimately, I, as a ratepayer, am going to be paying that bill?

If people of the Province personalize it - and forget all the other things we

have talked about, all the other reasons why we should do it - you will be

paying $470 a month instead of $625 a month. You will be saving yourself

hundreds of dollars a month, Mr. Speaker. Your energy cost, with Muskrat Falls,

will go up 0.7 per cent per year, less than 1 per cent per year. If you do not

do Muskrat Falls, your energy cost will continue to increase 4 per cent to 6 per

cent per year.

So, Mr. Speaker, I will finish up by saying Muskrat Falls is a project we

should do for each and every person in the Province because it helps keep our

costs low in terms of electricity costs. It helps ensure a reliable, secure

electrical supply. Mr. Speaker, for those reasons, for the $625 versus the $470,

I want to do it for the $470.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I am going to speak for a few minutes on some of the

department's expenditures that have been presented with regard to the Resource

Committee. The Resource Committee, of course, looks at several departments of

government: the Department of Business; Environment and Conservation; Fisheries

and Aquaculture; Innovation, Trade and Rural Development; as well as the

National Research Council or the Newfoundland and Labrador research council; the

Rural Secretariat; the Status of Women; the Department of Natural Resources;

Agrifoods and Forestry; and the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, you are hearing people talk today with regard to

the Muskrat Falls Project, because it falls under the heading of one of those

particular departments. Mr. Speaker, of course government is using the

opportunity, as they should, to try and explain to people why they think Muskrat

Falls is a good deal and why they are going to have to increase the rates

substantially to people in the Province if this development is to go ahead.

Mr. S