1996 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 36th Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

TUESDAY, AUGUST 6, 1996

Afternoon

Volume 2, Number 13,

Part 2

[ Page 1471 ]

The House resumed at 6:43 p.m.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

Hon. J. MacPhail: In Committee A, I call Committee of Supply. For the information of the House, we will be debating the estimates of the Ministry of Employment and Investment; Municipal Affairs and Housing; and Small Business, Tourism and Culture. In this House, I call Committee of Supply, and for the information of the members, we will be debating the estimates of the Ministry of Education, Skills and Training, and then Labour.

The House in Committee of Supply B; G. Brewin in the chair.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF

EDUCATION, SKILLS AND TRAINING

(continued)

On vote 20: minister's office, $460,000 (continued).

[6:45]

W. Hurd: I have a brief series of questions for the minister this evening on funding issues in the Ministry of Education. I want to ask the minister if he can provide the committee with an update of the program that was announced by the previous minister on reviewing the administration expenses of school districts in British Columbia. It's my understanding that an offer went out to school districts in British Columbia to have the ministry review their administration expenses. I wonder if the minister could tell us how many districts availed themselves of that opportunity, and what that review might have determined.

Hon. M. Sihota: It's my understanding that very few districts took advantage of that offer.

W. Hurd: I wonder if the minister could elaborate as to why he thinks that might be the case. Does that mean that the committee is to conclude that the administration expenses are in line? Did the ministry follow it up in any way, or was the offer just one that was on the table for a brief duration and then removed? I wonder if the minister could advise the committee of the ministry's position with respect to administration expenses in the 75 school districts at that time -- I guess it's now 57.

Hon. M. Sihota: I expect that it was a statement of independence on the part of boards.

W. Hurd: I wonder if the minister can advise us, then, whether the ministry takes any active interest in the administration costs of boards or whether the policy was experimental. I'd certainly welcome some sort of explanation from the minister -- or from the staff -- who obviously, at one time, thought the program had some merit. It even included a suggestion to boards that they avail themselves of some sort of ministry audit or initiative.

I just wonder whether, besides the autonomy of the boards -- which he has identified as maybe the reason why they didn't take advantage of the opportunity -- the ministry is concerned about administration costs of boards; whether they intend to pursue, in any way, a review of those costs; whether in the view of this minister and ministry, the costs are now totally within the purview of the boards; or in some cases, if the costs were to soar to unrealistic heights, whether that would be an issue the ministry would necessarily focus any attention on.

Hon. M. Sihota: Yes, we do take an interest in it. What we've done now is cap the administrative costs so they only get a set amount for administrative purposes. That seems to me a relatively effective way to deal with one of the issues. Of course, the amalgamation process is another example of our efforts to reduce administrative costs.

W. Hurd: I wonder if the minister could elaborate on the status of Bill 21, which I think had a three-month duration ending in late July, in terms of a settlement in the Surrey school district. I think it also affected a CUPE settlement in Coquitlam.

I assume that the provisions of that bill are now over. I just wonder if I could ask the minister whether the settlements that were imposed under that bill, or the mediator's recommendations that were imposed under that bill in Surrey -- and I guess obliquely in Coquitlam -- represent, in the ministry's view, a guide for future CUPE settlements in other districts in the province or whether that was just an isolated settlement that was imposed by the government, obviously through the provisions of that bill in those two districts. I wonder if the minister could tell us how many districts were affected by the provisions of that bill and how many settlements resulted from it.

Hon. M. Sihota: The hon. member has been around this House long enough to know that any agreement which is the result of a process -- with or without intervention -- becomes the benchmark from which other agreements will work, both up and down.

W. Hurd: As the minister knows, the situation in Surrey was an imposed settlement based on the mediator's recommendations. I wonder if the minister can advise the committee of what research the ministry might have done with respect to that particular agreement, since he has indicated that it could form a benchmark for other CUPE settlements in the province. Did the ministry at any time analyze the impacts of that settlement on this particular district? Is it prepared to review the impact of the settlement on other districts -- given the fact that we may be dealing with what amounts to a benchmark settlement for other districts in the province?

Hon. M. Sihota: No, we haven't. We don't typically do a systemwide analysis of every agreement to see what impact it would have, because you'd be doing that 120 times -- supposedly because every one could be a benchmark. Generally, I think the system acknowledges the cost of an agreement and how that may impact upon them in a subsequent agreement.

W. Hurd: The minister will recall that the settlement in Surrey was actually imposed by the government mere days after the passage of the legislation in this House. I wonder, again, if the minister could tell us whether it's the practice of the ministry -- since the minister does hold the Labour portfolio -- to impose a mediator's recommendation with serious cost implications for a school district, without doing the kind of analysis that might be required on the part of the employer.

[ Page 1472 ]

Or is it going to be the practice of the ministry not to bother about analyzing costs of the mediator's recommendation on the district? I'm just trying to clarify in my own mind whether it's the decision of the ministry to simply impose a settlement without referencing in a cost way the mediator's recommendations, given the implication for other districts, or whether, based on the experience of Bill 21 and based on the fact that that settlement may in fact prove to be a benchmark, as the minister has predicted, we can expect the ministry to embark on a policy of attempting to assess some of the costs of that agreement across the system.

Hon. M. Sihota: It seems to me that if the mediator's recommendations fall within the range of other negotiated agreements, those agreements have as much influence on the agreement as anything else. As a matter of general policy, we always look at the implications, and so does the mediator. I guess if it falls within the range of what settlements are coming in on, that's one thing; if it's outside the range, it's another. My understanding of this agreement is that it fell within the range.

W. Hurd: Just to refresh my memory, is the ministry aware of how many other districts in the province have settled based on the imposed settlement in Surrey? It's my understanding that Coquitlam did arrive at a settlement -- not necessarily an imposed one, but based on the settlement that was reached in the Surrey school district. Is that what I am to assume, or are we dealing with other settlements -- with the Canadian Union of Public Employees in other districts -- that have been guided by that imposed model in Surrey?

Hon. M. Sihota: There have been subsequent agreements settled, but not necessarily based on Surrey.

W. Hurd: Since the ministry and the government did impose a settlement on the district of Surrey, is any attempt going to be made on the part of the ministry to follow up, with the district, the cost implications of the agreement? I'm sure the minister will be aware of the concern expressed by the trustees about the impact of the settlement on that particular district, which is growing so rapidly -- and certainly other districts that may use it as a model, such as Coquitlam, parts of Vancouver, I guess, perhaps even Vancouver Island, certainly Richmond.

I'm just trying to determine, since we did embark down the road of imposing a settlement, whether the minister feels any obligation on the part of his ministry to attempt to track the cost of those agreements across the system.

Hon. M. Sihota: On tracking, I think I've answered that question already. We track to some degree, and, as the evidence points out, there have been a number of agreements, as I've said, that haven't followed every "i" and "t" in the Surrey agreement -- so I've answered that portion of the question.

With regard to the question, as I understood it, of any new money to Surrey in light of the fact that the government, in the member's words, "imposed agreement," there will be no new money given to Surrey to deal with the cost implications of this agreement.

W. Hurd: A couple of additional questions on funding and the funding formula. Can the minister tell us how many districts in the province exceed their allotted funding for special needs education?

Hon. M. Sihota: We don't have the exact number, but a large number of the districts do.

W. Hurd: Isolating some real challenges with the existing funding formula, I'm sure the minister agrees that where there is a block fund available for special needs education and the district is required by need to go beyond that, the money has to be taken out of ongoing program funding within the district. If the minister doesn't have the numbers of districts that do have to go beyond their budget allocation, could he perhaps apprise the committee before this set of estimates is over whether that information is available?

If it is, are there any plans on the part of the ministry to deal with that particular issue, particularly in districts that are growing rapidly and where I'm aware they're spending many millions of dollars more than their allocated ceiling amount? I understand the legislation provides for the districts to spend a mandatory amount of money, but most go well over that. Could the minister elaborate, first, whether the ministry intends to identify the number of districts that are over their allotment, and then, what steps we might expect to deal with that critical problem, particularly in fast-growth districts?

Hon. M. Sihota: I will provide to the member in writing a list of the districts that have surpassed the targeted amount, and remind him that they do that by a decision they make at the local level.

W. Hurd: I guess the other question I have would relate to the ESL block funding. I'm sure the minister will correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe there is a provision made within the legislation to provide a target level of funding for that as well. I wonder if the minister....

Interjection.

Hon. M. Sihota: I recognize that there are districts, like the Surrey district, where there are exceptional needs for ESL programs. We have a budget allocation of $60 million that makes provision for that.

[7:00]

W. Hurd: I wonder if the minister can tell us, then, in terms of the number of districts that face ESL challenges, what.... Is that $60 million allocated across the system? Is that the...? ?

Interjection.

Hon. M. Sihota: It's calculated out at the rate of about $1,000 per student, based on the estimates that we receive from districts. Approximately eight to ten districts, mostly in the lower mainland, take up the bulk of that -- it's $64 million.

[ Page 1473 ]

W. Hurd: I have just one other question with respect to ESL programs. Is there an allotment from the federal government for ESL programs? Do they provide funding support?

Hon. M. Sihota: Not for children in the K-to-12 system.

G. Wilson: I appreciate the opportunity to be able to get into this debate. I have five primary areas of concern. I'm going to try to get through them as quickly as I can and be as specific as I can in my comments to the minister.

Taking up from where the member for Surrey-White Rock left off on formula funding, as the minister knows, it has been certainly the position of this member and the party that I lead that formula funding doesn't work. It's inequitable in the sense that there are, for some reason, inequities built into the system based on enrolment that seem to be varied by a whole series of different factors.

I draw the minister's attention to some statistics which are generated from 1996 data -- May 14 of this year. I just want to demonstrate the kind of inequity I'm talking about. For example, Central Okanagan, with an enrolment of 21,221 students, has a per pupil allocation of $5,404. Right next door to it, Penticton-Summerland, with an enrolment of 7,102, has a per pupil allotment of $5,797 -- some $300 more. Vernon has 9,968, which is a per pupil allotment of $5,800. Kamloops-North Thompson, with a student enrolment of 17,000, has $6,000 per pupil.

I can go all the way up until I get to the provincial average, which is $5,849. By looking at the provincial average, we find Central Okanagan left well behind.

When you look at the history of that particular school district -- school district 23 -- it's hard to fathom why the ministry would continue to underfund that particular district. If you look at the 1996-97 budget year for school district 23, with a $5,404 per pupil funding, you will see that in fact there is a $36 reduction per pupil compared to the '95-96 funding level. I think this district now is ranked 71 out of 75 districts in terms of its pupil funding, yet it's one of the faster-growing school districts, certainly in the interior of the province, if you exclude the faster districts in the lower mainland.

Clearly, formula funding is a problem. I use Central Okanagan as my first example. I'd be happy to get into more detail, as we've done a fair bit of work on this, if the minister would like. We'd like to hear from the minister whether or not there is going to be a commitment to review those dollars, and in particular to review Central Okanagan, which seems to very definitely be suffering at the hands of a formula that appears to be driving dollars away from classroom delivery and leaves them with an unacceptable level of funding for students who need that service. Perhaps we could hear from the minister.

Hon. M. Sihota: For the record, I have already indicated in estimates that the funding formula is under review.

G. Wilson: That's useful to have restated. I wonder if that means that formula funding is going to be reviewed in terms of the formula. Or are we going to get rid of formula funding -- which would be of great benefit to us -- and move toward a four-year-based financing system that would allow multiple-year financing so that school districts could carry dollars from year one to two to three to four and do long-range, more equitable planning?

If you look at the $3 million shortfall that Central Okanagan is facing now, unless some swift action is taken to rectify that problem, in the '96-97 and '97-98 years those shortfalls are going to compound themselves into some very significant and very real problems in terms of educational delivery for students. Perhaps the minister might clarify: is it just the formula that's being adjusted or are we going to actually get rid of formula funding and move to a more progressive way of financing our schools?

Hon. M. Sihota: I understand the hon. member's points with regard to continuity of funding and some sense of where the world is going. That's an issue that I also struggle with, but for the time being all I will commit to is a review of the funding formula -- in other words, the formula. That's not to say that I haven't been thinking over the past few weeks about greater stability.

G. Wilson: Perhaps I could seek some advice from the minister. Where would, for example, a board such as the one representing the central Okanagan...? ? How would they best be able to communicate to the minister what clearly is a serious and urgent need for review of that formula? As the minister reviews this formula, is there an opportunity for meetings with ministry officials? If so, when and how, and what are the dates?

Hon. M. Sihota: We met with them a month ago.

G. Wilson: It will come as no surprise to the minister to learn that I know that. There is not a great deal of confidence yet, because even though the minister knows as well as I do -- because I'm certain he has these figures -- that even though there was a meeting and the issue has been articulated to the ministry, prior to allocation of dollars through the next school year we have to have some clear indication that this issue is going to be rectified.

As a result of those meetings, I'm wondering if there are going to be some subsequent opportunities to be able to make sure that in the allocation of dollars in the next round, not only are those dollars going to be brought up to par but the $3 million shortfall is going to be addressed.

Hon. M. Sihota: They should work in conjunction with the finance and facilities advisory committee, which I referred to earlier in my estimates.

G. Wilson: I for one am enthusiastic about the opportunity. I hope the minister is enthusiastic; he certainly appeared enthusiastic in his response. I'm hoping that he is enthusiastic about the opportunity to review this iniquitous situation and make sure these issues are dealt with, and that would be good.

If I might, I would like to add to the list that was prepared for the minister by the member for Okanagan-Vernon. I was watching this in my office. I had a meeting, but I was trying to jot them down, and I'm not sure that Glenmore Valley Elementary or George Elliot Secondary were on the list provided to the minister -- if they're not, they should be -- with respect to capital funding freezes in the central Okanagan. If the minister would like, I could get into a list of a few in Powell River that we are expecting to have released as the freeze on capital programs is dealt with.

I would like to move to a second issue, if I might. I think it is a issue of growing concern, and it deals more with the philosophy of education than with funding details. It has to do with the need for the establishment of national standards. There are growing concerns over the degree to which provinces are entering into educational curriculum development. There is also concern over the lack of a concerted national plan for dealing with those issues. There appears to

[ Page 1474 ]

be a lack of commitment to establishing national standards on education that would allow for equity in terms of the delivery of programs for young people who move from another province and wish to enter a school in this province. Some have had their first five to eight years of education elsewhere. I'm wondering if the minister might want to enlighten us about what the plans are for the upcoming....

Interjection.

G. Wilson: Hon. Chair, I'm absolutely delighted that I'm getting such an enormous response from the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. He's clearly as anxious as we are to set national standards.

But perhaps the Minister of Education, Skills and Training might want to enlighten us as to what is being done. I know that some meetings are being planned for the national stage, but I don't know the degree to which British Columbia has participated in the development of their agendas. I hope that it has participated, and more than by simply being a participant. We could lead the way in terms of setting these national standards.

Hon. M. Sihota: The hon. member knows me well enough to know that I never go to national meetings if I don't have an agenda -- and usually that agenda is well known. I can assure him that I will go to those meetings with a clear agenda. One of the issues that we will deal with there is the issue of national standards. I'm pleased to advise the hon. member that just recently -- I think it was about two weeks ago -- we signed an agreement for standards with the four western provinces.

G. Wilson: I do know this minister well -- well enough to know that he always has an agenda at work in some capacity or other. Notwithstanding that, I am surprised that I haven't heard what the national agenda might be for the upcoming meetings. I'm delighted to hear about the protocol that was established by the western Premiers; I think that is a step in the right direction. But the biggest concern that we have -- and it's a serious one that I would flag for the minister as an issue that we need to discuss -- concerns Ontario and Quebec. It does not necessarily spawn out of a concern in the western provinces.

The difficulty that I have is that Ontario standards, which are often centralist, are applied as the norm in Canada. There are some serious difficulties in respect to students who transfer from Ontario schools to B.C. schools. I don't want to get into a long list of them, because I know that the minister was apprised of some of them as they occurred.

I'm delighted that we have a protocol with the western Premiers, but perhaps the minister might be more forthcoming in respect to the initiatives we're going to take on the national stage -- particularly on the K-to-12 issues and the Ontario curriculum, which is now being drastically altered, as the minister knows, in a direction that I'm not sure is really in our best interest.

Hon. M. Sihota: First of all, let me say that I understand this problem very well. As the member knows, I represent Esquimalt -- and by the way, I welcome him to my constituency; I understand that he lives there. As I told him the other day, that's another house with another sign location for the NDP in the next election campaign. The member is going to take a sign of mine next time.

The other point I want to make -- and the reason that I know about this acute problem -- has to do with representing a military constituency. About a third....

Interjection.

Hon. M. Sihota: I'm sure that all hon. members would be interested in hearing this debate.

In Esquimalt, we have a lot of military families that move in from all parts of Canada -- let alone the world -- and particularly from Ontario and the maritime provinces. On a firsthand basis, I've seen the difficulties involved in being able to adapt to these standards. So I understand that issue, and I'll make it an issue. I don't know to what extent the federal government is interested in it, and I'll ascertain that when I am there.

With regard to other issues, I want the hon. member to know, because he asked me about the agenda, I will be making a significant issue nationally out of the amount of violence that is on television. I'll let him know, so that he has some sense of perspective, that that will be a more dominant issue than this issue of standards.

[7:15]

G. Wilson: I'd love to enter into that philosophical debate; however, I won't yield to the temptation to do that now. I think that is a very big issue, a huge issue, and it does speak to some of the broader questions that we have with respect to the philosophy and general direction that education should be taking.

One of the issues that I want to raise, because it is now being raised with great seriousness in Ontario.... I think the member for Okanagan-Vernon alluded to it earlier on. Unfortunately, I was in a meeting and I had one ear to the meeting -- I shouldn't say that, because the person I was meeting with would be quite upset -- but I did have one ear to the monitors as well. I do believe that the member for Okanagan-Vernon at least alluded to, if not introduced, the concept of private partnership in education.

This is something that is being very seriously considered now in Ontario and it is something that is being seen right across the United States. It may not necessarily be all negative, but it could be quite problematic. To the degree that private partnership, in terms of capital construction, is concerned, certainly there may be some opportunity with respect to the construction of schools or other facilities which then could be leased back, and there could be opportunities of cost being reduced to the public sector with respect to the provision of physical plant space.

Having said that, I would be seriously concerned if we moved to the degree that this grade 10 chemistry class is brought to you by IBM, or is brought to you by Hooker Chemicals, or somebody else. I would certainly not want to see corporate sponsorship of classroom delivery service as we are starting to see now -- the only one I've been exposed to is in Chicago. In Chicago now, you've got whole grades that are brought to you by GM and Ford.

This school's grade 11 and 12 are brought to you by General Motors, and out of that class comes all of these little people who are now being trained and prepared to go to work for General Motors. I have some serious concerns about that level of corporate partnership.

What I've painted for the minister is really a picture of two extremes. On the one hand, when I am talking about corporate sponsorship of capital plant -- that is, construction of buildings, whether it is under the fair wage or whatever they call that program.... I don't want to get back into that debate, because I think we've had it. However it is done, it seems to me that there may be a role for private partnership in terms of capital construction. But I would not want to cross the line and say that there is a place for private partnership

[ Page 1475 ]

with respect to curriculum development. Yet in Ontario now that seems to be a matter of very serious consideration. That's why I raised this matter of national standards. It's something I really don't want to see spill over out of the boundaries of Ontario, if they actually adopt it, and contaminate the rest of Canada.

Hon. M. Sihota: I don't share the right-wing, neoconservative approach of the Ontario government, and that's well known. I think people in this chamber know me well enough to know that I have strong opinions with regards to that issue and that government, and who it is that this government is to represent.

Second, I should let the hon. member know that I don't want schools to look like the Atlanta Olympic Games sites with inflated Coke bottles hanging outside every school -- that won't happen.

Third, I remember -- I was thinking about this -- being in class, and I think the maps of Canada that we used to have had a little Jersey Milk bar insignia. I remember -- but it had no influence on me -- that even back in the sixties there was a little corporate stuff that had sneaked in.

Generally, these are things that I am not particularly fond of. We are looking at public partnership on the capital side and a leaseback. We're doing a pilot project in Burnaby, and there might be lessons for everybody to learn from that. I don't think every time you go to the gym you should be told that it's brought to you by Reebok. We'll look at these issues, but I think you've got a flavour of my biases.

G. Wilson: I'm absolutely stunned and amazed that this minister doesn't adhere to whatever that philosophy was in Ontario that he said there was. I'm just joking. I know full well that there is a right and a left on the spectrum and I know when I've hit the left, and that's when I'm debating this minister.

Having said that, I think private partnership is something.... Certainly we can see enough corporate advertising on the general outfits of most of the kids who are attending school. I always found it rather strange that people would pay more to run around in sweatshirts advertising some product -- Nike or whatever it would be. All that kind of corporate advertising is already well advanced in the clothes that are the general fare of most young people today.

I do think the pilot project in Burnaby that the minister alludes to is an excellent opportunity to study what might be a very real advantage with respect to private partnership in capital construction. I know that we've taken some fairly bold steps with respect to infrastructure plans. We're now talking about private partnership on bridge construction, private partnership with respect to rapid transit -- now being considered seriously with respect to rolling stock being picked up by private enterprise and allowing the government to hold rail rights-of-way -- and so on.

It seems to me that there is an opportunity for us to seriously look at some very significant cost savings on that kind of private partnership. So I'm delighted to hear that the pilot project is underway, and we look forward to hearing from the minister what kind of information comes out of that particular project.

I would like to move now to two other very brief issues with respect to K-to-12 education. This is a rather serious matter. It is a matter that is somewhat delicate and I want to approach it with a caveat that suggests to the minister that my inquiry is really one of procedure, not anything else at this point.

It is difficult for people and constituents to contemplate, to understand, how there can be a more accessible and open public audit of school district accounts. I raise this matter because I think it is a serious question that the people need to have some serious answers to and it needs the contemplation of this minister. Clearly, there are staffing issues and personnel issues that should rightly belong in the protected category.

There are also situations where public moneys -- especially moneys that have been provided through grant applications through B.C. 21, for example -- have gone to community-based organizations that have then been administered through school districts, through the board or through the agents of the board, such as the superintendent, and where the community societies wish to have an accounting of those moneys and can't get it. They find, in fact, that these dollars have been advanced and that projects have been completed, presumably on or under budget.

Where there is surplus in those accounts, they can't get access to them for application to whatever other parts of the project they may want. Yet they find it almost impossible to get a full accounting from the board as to how those moneys are applied.

My question -- and it is a somewhat sensitive one, because I don't want to make any allegations other than those I've already alluded to -- is that it seems to me there is an opportunity for this minister to look at, in a more broadly based way, a manner by which the public can get a more full accounting of the operations of the board, including the amount of money they're spending on litigation and legal fees. One of the areas that rarely ever shows up on a budget is the amount of dollars that school boards are actually putting into that kind of litigation and legal fees.

When you have a tight budget and you have special needs kids being cut out or you have other programs that are not being delivered and yet have several thousands of dollars being directed to legal bills, I think the public has a right to know why. If the minister has some thoughts on that, I'd like to hear them.

Hon. M. Sihota: We do audits. Each school district appoints an external auditor to audit the accounts, the transactions of a board. That is forwarded to the ministry, and then the ministry makes that information public. If the hon. member is saying that the scope of those audits isn't as deep as it should be, then I'd like to have him so advise me, in writing, and to give me his suggestions. I'd be happy to look into it. I don't have any difficulty with that. If the hon. member points out that dollars aren't being spent as well or as carefully as they should, then we need to know about that.

It's not beyond me, never has been beyond me, to take action when it's required, even though it may touch some sensitivities of independence. So if you are aware of cases, I would encourage you to meet with my staff and we'll look into it.

G. Wilson: I'll take the minister up on that offer. I won't protract this particular part of the debate any more than to say that I do believe there needs to be a better auditing system because, effectively, all that happens is that the auditor looks to make sure that the books, as presented, are as they say they are. The audit doesn't look beyond that.

One of the things that I learned in my term and time here on Public Accounts, and listening to the auditor's reports, and looking at how we are now changing the manner by which we are looking at the auditing of public accounts generally, is that there has to be a much deeper look at value for dollars. There also has to be a much better look at how these dollars are being applied and whether or not they're being applied within the lines that they are supposedly being directed at. So

[ Page 1476 ]

I won't protract that debate, except to say that, having served notice to this minister and being offered the opportunity to meet with staff, I'd like to do that soon.

My last set of questions, then...? I think the issue of the capital freeze has been well-enough addressed, and I don't want to go back on that, except to say that in Powell River we're anxiously awaiting the release of dollars for a couple of projects that are currently approved but frozen. We're anticipating that the.... I'm not sure if it was the minister or the Premier, or maybe both, who said that whatever was approved before the freeze is likely to be given a green light when the freeze is lifted if the project was underway.

Interjection.

G. Wilson: I'm hearing now from the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, who wishes to get into this debate, that the answer to that is no. If the answer is no, then maybe we need to go back and talk about this a little bit. It seems to me that dollars were announced, they were announced through project funding for.... The member should get into trouble from his back bench for protracting this debate. It's interesting, hon. Chair, if that, in fact, is not true.

Because we have, for example, child care facilities that were approved, given grants and ready for construction, and we had anticipated them being open in September in Powell River. Perhaps the minister can tell us, then, what is the status of that, and whether or not we are going to see that come forward after the freeze or not.

Hon. M. Sihota: I want to make this absolutely clear: any hon. member who heckles another hon. member automatically loses any capital funding for projects in their constituency. So that's fair warning to the minister who has now left, for good reason.

I have already committed to two things. First, with regard to minor capital, within seven days of the passage of these estimates, I will make public a list of those projects which are approved. I don't know if that will mean the Powell River projects will get funded or not. We'll go through a process, and I'll do that. So within seven days of the passage of these estimates, I'll make that commitment publicly.

Second, any member on either side of this House who wishes to see a capital project go in their riding, will have to write me a letter saying that they want the debt increased in this province in order to fund that project. And that has to be explicitly stated. So I will be requiring that of all hon. members.

[7:30]

G. Wilson: Always the consummate politician, ready to have us commit in writing to increasing the debt -- something that the minister can then hold up and say: "See! This member is trying to increase the debt, to be ingratiated with the people who elected him or her to office." But there are other options. For example, we could cancel an $800 million capital project for the B.C. Ferry Corporation, to save ten minutes of sailing, which could put $800 million into educational funding. There's an option; that's a really good option. I'll tell you, there are several others we could get into if the minister would like.

Perhaps what we should do is that each of the opposition members should make a list of the wasteful projects this government has embarked upon. And we should match that wasteful list with the more appropriate expenditure of dollars on educational facilities that we would like to see. We can put that match together to prove to this government that a more conscientious and more fiscally sound capital plan would provide the educational facilities that we need without increasing the debt.

Wouldn't that be a novel thing for this province: to actually have a capital plan that effectively does provide for the people without increasing the debt? I'm sure that every opposition member would be happy to assist this minister in the administration of his duties by providing such a list of projects. I know I certainly would be.

However, it's a wonderful seven days for the passage of this budget, which could be -- who knows? -- one week, two, three, four.... The summer goes on. I see the estimates are moving along, and I don't want to protract them unnecessarily here tonight. Let me offer an invitation to this minister on the eighth day, his having, I assume, announced on the seventh day where he will rest. I'm assuming, judging by the responses we're getting from this minister, that upon the eighth day he may come and cut the ribbon on the new facility in Powell River, which he will, of course, have provided funding for.

Because we're that confident that this minister sees the wisdom of those dollars going to that project.

My last comment or question has to do with school district amalgamation. I know, once again, that that's an issue that has already received some attention. I just want a commitment from this minister that we're not now going to see a revisiting of that issue in light of the Health and Social Services boundaries being once again looked at.

Clearly, we've just heard today that this government wants to introduce 81 seats into.... I mean, look around us, hon. Chair. We can't even adequately finance 75 constituency associations right now. This government is dragging its feet on giving us a little bit more money so we can adequately finance our constituency associations. They want to go for 81.

I want to make sure that this minister is not going to entertain a revisiting of the boundary amalgamation issue, in which the people of Powell River-Sunshine Coast fought so hard to introduce wisdom into the process, so that the ministry recognized that the proposed amalgamation was absolutely ludicrous. I understand that there is some rediscussion of Health and Social Services boundaries, which is causing a lot of concern. I want to make sure that this minister commits tonight that Education boundaries will not be part of that review.

The Chair: Hon. member, I think you've been here long enough to know that future policy is future policy. I'm sure your comments are well appreciated, and the minister will take that....

Interjections.

The Chair: All right. I recognize the hon. minister.

Hon. M. Sihota: I know that the hon. member has as much respect for the rules of this chamber as I do. Therefore I'm assuming he wasn't asking me about future policy but about whether or not the amalgamation process that was already announced by government is going to proceed. That's the way I understood his question. The answer to that question is: it is proceeding. Letters have gone out to school districts telling them that the amalgamation of, I believe, 59 districts is proceeding, and I don't think that impacts on Powell River, if I remember.

[ Page 1477 ]

The other point I was going to make is that I have no difficulty with members writing a letter to me saying which capital projects they would consider to be wasteful, as long as they include in that letter projects in their own constituencies which they consider to be wasteful.

G. Wilson: That's challenging. I must say, that' s.... Boy, I'm not sure I can think of one in Powell River-Sunshine Coast that's wasteful. You know, hon. Chair, what's interesting is that the minister says that I have the same respect for the rules as he does. I have more, I think, having watched him over the years -- I think maybe I have a little bit more.

I just want to close my questions to the minister by asking this rather direct question. I don't think that this is a future-policy question. I know that a constituent of this minister has requested him to provide some example of how one introduces reading material into the school curriculum. I wonder if the minister might tell us how one goes about taking reading material of a B.C. historical nature, which should be on the school curriculum, and having that material advance, so that it can be considered and reviewed. This is a question that comes from, I believe, a constituent of this minister.

Hon. M. Sihota: I appreciate the constituent's interest. The hon. member points out that it is a constituent of mine. That constituent should just walk a little bit further into my constituency, onto Viewfield Road in Esquimalt. There sits the learning resources branch. At the learning resources branch, that constituent can then make their submission, and we will make a determination as to the appropriateness of the inclusion of that material in the curriculum. I know the issue of which the hon. member speaks, so I am sure that it will get attention.

G. Wilson: This is my last comment, and I just want -- because I know that that these Hansard s are so widely read by the people of British Columbia and are distributed so freely around the province.... The minister alluded to the fact that I now live in his riding. This issue as to where my domicile was came up in the last election. I just want to clarify that this is true. It is true that while attending to business in Victoria I do have a residency in this minister's riding. But this minister is really, really dreaming in technicolor if he ever thinks there is a lawn sign opportunity at that area, and that should be on the record in perpetuity.

D. Symons: I have just a few questions to the Minister of Education. One of them alludes to the question that the member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast raised about what we'll call innovative funding for schools. The Richmond school district, which I represent, certainly has often been in the forefront in this province in looking for various innovative and interesting ways -- and in going along with the minister or the Education ministry -- of attacking the problems of giving quality education to the students. Our area has gone into effective scheduling, if necessary, in order to look after overcrowding.

They also looked into the issue of using stock plans for elementary schools before it was more or less mandated by the ministry.

They've done a lot of these things in order to look at ways of funding the schools that we so desperately need in Richmond. They've also been one of the first districts, I believe, to get involved in the school sites acquisition legislation that was passed last year. So our district -- I'm just trying to point out to the minister -- has been at the forefront of many of these particular innovative and, I think, necessary methods of dealing with funding of education. But for a length of time now our board has also been asking the ministry to look at something else that they've been bringing forth.

I'll just read from a letter that was sent to the Minister of Employment and Investment, and you'll see the relevance to Education in just a moment. This is from our school board:

"The board is pursuing a concept that generates income by leasing the space to businesses that are complementary to the school's programs and, combined with other fundraising initiatives, will contribute significantly to the funding required for a new school. The board has written to successive Ministers of Education seeking support and direction for our initiatives. The only response has been the assurance that Ministry of Education staff would discuss with your ministry the policy of providing matching grants where private sector funding is obtained, as is the case in post-secondary capital projects.

"We understand that the provincial government is studying a number of ways of using public-private partnerships in order to reduce the capital funding demands on the taxpayer. The board is most willing to work with the government to share the experience we have gained to date in order to be able to proceed with any of our proposed school expansions.

"We would appreciate knowing the current status of the P3 initiatives, particulary in regard to the possibility of our district being involved, as we have a number of elementary and secondary schools in the planning stages that are urgently required in order to meet the needs of increased enrolment."

My question to the minister, then, would be: have those discussions taken place with the Employment and Investment ministry, and what was the outcome of those discussions?

Hon. M. Sihota: The hon. member is not new to this chamber. It is not for me to answer questions that relate to the Ministry of Employment and Investment; let's make that clear. The question was: do I know if the Ministry of Employment and Investment engaged in that dialogue? Ask the Minister of Employment and Investment. In the case of the Ministry of Education, I can tell the member that we have told Richmond to proceed and that we will continue to engage in a dialogue with them on this concept. We have made it very clear that they should move along in terms of their work on this.

That doesn't mean we have bought into the concept in its entirety. I have some concerns, but basically -- conceptually -- it's okay. We should proceed.

D. Symons: I think the minister misinterpreted what was said in the letter, because the letter says: "The only response has been assurances that Ministry of Education staff would discuss this with the Ministry of Employment and Investment." I'm asking whether your ministry discussed those issues with the Employment and Investment ministry and what the outcome of those discussions was.

Hon. M. Sihota: Our officials have conveyed, through Education, that they should proceed. That's the operative point here, I think.

D. Symons: Just a few more questions, then. As is the case in many other districts around the province, I gather that we have some very serious overcrowding problems which have certainly been caught by the project freeze. I note that one of them is in my portion of Richmond -- the J. N. Burnett Junior Secondary School. The part that's legally going ahead, and which is legally committed, is supposed to increase capacity from 450 to 1,000 students. The school now has over 1,000 students, but one of the freezes under review is at the same school, and phase 2 of the plan is supposed to increase capacity from that 1,000 up to 1,200 students.

[ Page 1478 ]

Burnett is sort of unique in the sense that it has serious seismic problems. In the process of upgrading the school and adding capacity, the project also included increasing its capacity to withstand earthquakes. It would seem only logical, I think -- both from doing that and from an economic viewpoint -- that after completing phase 1, you should continue on into phase 2 rather than have a stall between the phases. A stall would result in the problem of bringing crews back in and would cause more disruption to the school.

I wonder if the minister can give me some idea as to the advisability of putting that particular portion of this project under review. It's common sense, I think, that that particular project should be continued in order to finish off the construction at J. N. Burnett.

Hon. M. Sihota: I'm sure that the hon. member doesn't want to break any promises he made to his constituents when he asked for their support, and I'm sure that during the course of the last election campaign he went out of his way to say to them that we needed to deal with the debt in this province. If the hon. member tables a letter to me asking me to increase the debt in order to deal with that project -- and also, perhaps, an election pamphlet in which he made a commitment to increase the debt for that purpose -- I'm sure it would have an impact on my thinking.

D. Symons: I think that the minister, in his nonsensical answer, is basically missing the point here: it was his government that made the promises to carry through with these particular projects. It was his government that was saying this, and it was his government that was making many promises around the province during the election campaign. It was also his government that was breaking those promises as soon as they were elected; that's the issue. We're simply asking you to carry forward the promises that you had made before the election.

Obviously, a government of integrity would do so and would not go around and say: "I'll just try to turn this stone over and blame the other side for what's going on here." That's not the issue here.

[7:45]

If you want to save money, you've wasted $500,000 on firing a very good man who was head of B.C. Transit. Would the minister explain the nonsense of doing that? You had a man in there; you brought him in. You had him go through a series of interviews and chose this particular person to bring some common sense into operating the B.C. Transit system, and within seven months you fired him. You were sued for wrongful dismissal, and that misadventure cost the taxpayers of British Columbia, or the transit users, $500,000. Those are areas where you can save money; those are areas where money can go into the schools.

I won't go into all the other areas where this government is wastefully using money. If you want to build schools, let's use proper sense and proper perspective in the use of the money you have -- the taxpayers' money. Don't try to blame the opposition by saying that we have to raise taxes to carry the projects that you should be doing, while at the same time you're carrying forward your favourite insider deals that you've got going with many of the organizations you're working with. That's not the issue. I assume the minister doesn't want to discuss these things in a rational way. He's simply going to throw out these threats and idle challenges instead of discussing things properly.

The Richmond school board asked on July 10 to have a meeting with the minister to discuss their urgent needs within the district of Richmond. I gather that you probably have had similar requests from many other school districts. If these projects in the list of the government's freeze on things are under review, it would seem only prudent that the minister concerned would meet with the people involved in the projects, in order that they could discover which of the projects should indeed go forward. I wonder why the minister was not able to meet with them. The answer they basically got was that he's too busy.

Somewhere between the time that the six months are going to run out and the beginning of that freeze, the minister must meet with all the boards of all the projects that are caught in the freeze and discuss with them their concerns for the projects in their districts. Will the minister be doing that?

Hon. M. Sihota: I cannot physically meet with every group that has capital allocations within this portfolio. When I look at universities, colleges and all the schools in the province, I cannot, practically, from a purely physical point of view, meet with every project that's out there. I'll make choices.

With regard to the hon. member's earlier comments, if he thinks that we are wasting money on debt in his riding, he should give me the list of projects that he thinks we're wasting money on in his riding and the ones that he would like to see go ahead in his riding. That would be very instructive for me, and I would hope that he would do that.

D. Symons: I enjoy the minister's challenge. But, of course, being on the opposition side, we haven't had the same largesse shown in our ridings as maybe some of the NDP ridings have. We haven't got commuter rail running through Richmond right now; we won't have the fast ferries running in Richmond. There are a great number of areas around the province that haven't had that largesse given to them. In my riding there is very little I can point to that this government has done, good or bad, in wasting money or spending money.

I can point to some of the other parts of the province and some of the areas where NDP members happen to sit where you might be able to save some money. Commuter rail might be one of them, to begin with. We certainly have the fast-ferry project, which I think is very questionable. We seem to have the Victoria-Seattle ferry, which the government is now willing to off-load, because they discovered they made a mistake in initiating that. If you want some examples of wasted money, there you are, but they don't happen to be in Richmond. Richmond needs a little more of the government's largesse, I suppose.

I have one other question. We're certainly off the topic of what I really intended to discuss with the minister, because he's not giving sensible or even responsible answers, I don't think. I'm reading from the May 23 to May 26, 1995, issue of Victoria This Week , from the B.C. government communications office:

"A new $100 million five-year school technology plan aims to increase B.C. students' access to technology. The plan calls for all B.C. school districts to develop three-year technology plans and sets goals of having one computer for every three secondary students and one for every six elementary students within the next five years."

This was a commitment by the previous Premier, Mr. Harcourt. I wonder if the minister might tell me if plans are made in each of the districts. Is the ministry monitoring this program? Can he give us a progress report?

[ Page 1479 ]

Hon. M. Sihota: With regard to the member's opening comments, I have noted that some Liberal ridings have done very well on capital, and others haven't done as well. Perhaps that's more a reflection of the effectiveness of the MLA than of anything else.

With regard to the plan, this year's budget makes an allocation of $10 million, and districts are submitting their plans for technological assistance from the capital side. As they come in, we are making the funding determinations. Again, if the hon. member has specific requests for his constituency, he should notify me.

A. Sanders: This is a hard act to follow, hon. Chair. I'd like to get back to the basics, and certainly to advise the minister that his ergonomic position in the chair there is not going to suit him well by 10 o'clock tonight.

Nevertheless, with a new Education minister in this portfolio, I'm interested in what the 1995-96 goals of the Ministry of Education are and how their outcomes will be measured.

Hon. M. Sihota: I don't smoke and I don't eat high-cholesterol foods; I just sit kind of weirdly in chairs. But I'll take any medical advice I can get any time I get it, especially when it's free. I could go on, but I won't.

I think it's easier for me to talk about my goals for the ministry versus the ministry's goals for itself, which sometimes are at variance until the minister gets a better grip on what's happening in a particular portfolio.

On the K-to-12 side, I want to be in a position where, two years from now, people are saying.... And that's how I'll measure it; I won't measure it on anything other than that.

I have to take it to the point where, two years from now, there's a general acceptance in society and a deeply held belief that the education young people are getting in their schools is relevant, in the sense that it's relevant to the marketplace as it's evolving, so there's a sense of confidence among parents and the consumers of our services, students, that what they're being taught indeed prepares them for opportunities in the marketplace.

I'm not sure in my own mind, and certainly from what I hear, that the sense of confidence around that issue is as high as it should be, so it's very important to deal with what I call the relevance gap and the skills gap. That will mean that there will be some changes, I guess, perhaps even to the curriculum, but certainly in terms of structure and approach.

What I'm going to do, and what I have been doing, is drop in unannounced at schools -- I don't want it to be announced, because then people are prepared -- and talk to kids first, just talk to them about their sense of what they're learning, particularly grade 11 and grade 12 students, and get them to reflect on their experience and also to talk about their expectations after grade 12. That helps shape the policy determinations that I will be making, and I will continue to operate on that basis. It's the same with regard to dropping in to staff lunchrooms.

I'll continue to do that fairly regularly, again unannounced, to measure their sense.... Inasmuch as there is a relevance gap and a skills gap that students can speak to, as well as parents, when I drop in unannounced to parent advisory meetings across the province.... I'm going to gauge to see whether or not those comments are there two years from now -- they'd better not be.

Teachers also have some strong feelings about the ministry and the degree to which the ministry supports the work that they do, interacts with them, attends to their concerns, has a sense of what's required in the field by way of academic versus.... I shouldn't say academic, but artificial determinations as opposed to practical determinations. I will not consider it a success if I'm still hearing those complaints two years from now. So that's important, in my mind.

There are obviously some structural issues as well. Collective bargaining matters have to be resolved. That has been a matter of debate here. They'd better not be sitting here two years from now. That's an important issue, in my mind.

I've taken a look at issues like CAPP, because we got too many comments about the CAPP program. The report cards, as we said prior to the break, in terms of the in-progress side of report cards -- that's very important to me. The way in which we deal with special needs children and with the pressures in the classroom as a result of special needs children; how we take this policy that was introduced in 1989 and deal with the pressures that have been created by it, both fiscal and emotional, and from an education point of view -- that is going to be yet another goal that we're going to take a look at. So special needs will be a factor.

Also, in terms of outcomes, I don't mean just the raw numbers of where students go after they leave grade 12. I think I have to be able to convey to students a sense that they have a chance, as I said right at the outset, going right back to my opening comments, of getting a post-secondary education. It troubles me enormously to see so many students rule that out as an option at such a young age. So we're going to do something along those lines. In fact, I'm in the process of talking to a number of role models for young people that can assist me in conveying a message in that regard. So that's another goal that we hope to set for ourselves.

I want to also deal with, of course, some administrative issues and administrative cost-related pressures. So that will be on the plate. Those are the goals, randomly, that I've laid out, and we'll assess them.

Finally, I found in previous portfolios that it is better to set those subjective measurements as opposed to necessarily objective measurements. There are always objective indicators of the degree to which you've been able to achieve these goals that you've set for yourself, but at the end of the day -- and I know the hon. member used the word "feelings" -- I think that subjective variables are very important. So that's the approach.

A. Sanders: I appreciate the minister's comments. I, specifically as a consumer within the educational system, would like to see that this minister conveys to the ministry and its staff some objective criteria for evaluating areas such as intellectual development, for implementing in a very sound way examination results and assessments in provincial learning programs. I'd like to see human and social development made into some objective criteria, with achievement in physical education and fine arts, and attitudinal and behavioral outcomes, in student surveys.

I'd like to see a career development arm of Education that is objectively defined, as we seem to be moving in that way. I have some concern about subjective analysis of these areas, in that my subjective analysis and the minister's subjective analysis of what is right for our children and society in general may be different. I would be very encouraged to hear that we do have objective parameters in which to measure these results.

[8:00]

Looking specifically at the quality of education in British Columbia, I am interested in the science and mathematics exams written in British Columbia over two years ago. I do not have any results later than the international math and

[ Page 1480 ]

science achievement tests in '91, which showed British Columbia eighth or ninth in the ranking for 13-year-old children. My understanding is that the science and mathematics exams written two years ago by British Columbia students are still not available, and I wonder if that is in fact the case.

Hon. M. Sihota: Let me make a couple of points. First of all, I appreciate the hon. member's comments, and I don't want her to leave with the impression that there won't be objective indicators. There have to be objective indicators. Let me give a simple example. I think that all members of this House, regardless of their partisan background, will agree that this government did a good job in terms of environmental protection. That's the subjective sense that people have. But obviously you don't get that subjective sense without any objective indices that give you that sense.

Using the Environment again, I'll give another simple example: 161 new parks is the objective measurement that leads to that subjective sense.

I have to have objective parameters to make sure that we're moving in the right direction, and I will begin to delineate the subjective parameters: some that the ministry has, and I might want to put a different focus or emphasis on those; some that I have that aren't part of the mix. But I want to emphasize that what parents and students say to me when I travel around the province is critical. They will have more impact on my thinking than any other stakeholder interest in the system. I have always made it a practice to be out there doing that, and I'll do that. So that's that.

With regard to science and math, I have no explanation as to why the information isn't out. During the course of your question, I asked staff to make sure that it is out with dispatch. So we'll get that information out.

[T. Stevenson in the chair.]

A. Sanders: The minister has very kindly provided information on a number of areas for me today, which is forthcoming. I would hope that would be expedited and could be received tomorrow, so that we can make closure on those areas that are not finished at this time and on which additional information is required.

I do have interest in the B.C. science and mathematics exams, in that a number of people have suggested to me that we have done very poorly and that our ministry is covering up poor performance by our students by not releasing these examinations. There is an addendum question that's important to me in terms of understanding the plasticity of education and how we change, in reference to finding out information from the studies we do.

If it takes so long for us to provide the information to the public about how our students are doing, how does that provide a quick response, in that upon receipt of the information it would take somewhere between two and five years to implement some kind of final analysis or change in direction? Does the minister have any comments on that lag time and perhaps on how to change that?

Hon. M. Sihota: We also do other measurements within the province. I mean, the international math and science exam is not the only measurement. We do other measurements in the province to see how we're progressing; so we do have far better data. In my view, it is a valid point that we need to get this information out in a more sensible time frame, and I accept that point. It's a very valid point.

A. Sanders: The importance of that point which the minister has raised.... We are in a global economy, and these young people who do train in British Columbia do not compete in British Columbia; they in fact compete in the world.

In a 1994 study from a Michigan university, for example, the average time of math study for a Canadian student was 2.5 hours a week;

whereas in China it was 6.7 hours, and in Korea and Taiwan, 5.1 hours. Whether that's right or wrong is irrelevant. What I'm more interested in is in having some kind of expedited results of the math test to see where we stand, based on what we're putting into our program.

What I was interested in, in reference to these kinds of quality-education issues, was: what kind of mechanisms do we have for fast-tracking changes that are necessary in the system? As many of us who taught in the seventies have seen, there have been very large amounts of change. We've gone from one set of curriculum and projects in education to a second. We've moved from Education 2000 to something new. What kind of stability will there be over the next two years, in terms of education plans and correction of deficiencies?

Hon. M. Sihota: So that the hon. member understands, we have brought forward a substantial change in the curriculum over the last two years, to the point where, quite frankly, we're being criticized for the pace with which we brought about change to the curriculum to respond to the changes in our global economy. Everywhere I go in the province I'm told by trustees, teachers and even parents that the pace of change in the curriculum to try to achieve this relevance that I think we're both speaking of is happening too quickly. So I'm going to slow it down in terms of stability. There will be far more stability in that context in the system; there are no two ways about that.

I wouldn't want to leave anybody with the impression that the system has not tried to reconfigure itself to deal with the economy as it's evolving. As I said earlier, this is the best investment we can make in people, and we have to make sure that the system is relevant. That's a driving variable.

A. Sanders: I'd like to, instead of this broad focus on the quality of education in B.C., look specifically at reading and writing achievement. If we look at the last period, '93 to '94, I believe the statistics show that 20 percent of British Columbia students did not meet basic reading and writing expectations. These are the expectations of comprehension, sentence structure and grammatical correctness -- I hope that's grammatically correct. What is the ministry doing to rectify what many consider a serious problem?

Hon. M. Sihota: Interestingly enough, those numbers are very consistent with the pattern right across the country. I say that just to put them into some perspective. It's not as if British Columbia is in any way materially worse in the delivery of these programs than any other province in the country. It seems to me that obviously all of us would intellectually take the view that that number should be zero, not 20 or 30 percent. And obviously, to the degree to which we can bring that down, we should. At this point I don't have a solution that I can offer except that I can tell the hon. member that those kinds of statistics trouble me, as well, and that they should trouble us as a nation.

Now, one of the things we are also trying to do is to make sure that these people get the kind of training they require at some point in their lives. That's why we've moved to the system that we have now in terms of lifelong learning. Youth Works is in part designed to deal with some of these deficiencies, if I can put it that way, as well as with our ability to offer

[ Page 1481 ]

some of the programming required to offset these concerns to people after they've left school, after hours, or through our colleges or other institutes.

A. Sanders: Looking at the annual report of '93-94 -- again mentioning that I don't have a '94-95 report and certainly not a '95-96; looking at the last available report -- students were taking longer to graduate.

The hon. minister is short of oxygen. I see him yawning as I am talking here.

What I am interested in specifically is: do we have any idea why people are taking longer to graduate in British Columbia?

Hon. M. Sihota: I think it may be because some people who have left the system are coming back into the system, and that may be picked up in the numbers that you are looking at. That would be my guess.

A. Sanders: I would be interested in the actual objective criteria there. In '93-94, of those who came into grade 12 at the beginning of the year, 72 percent graduated. They actually finished grade 12,

whereas earlier it was a lower percentage.

The other area that's concerning me -- and I wonder especially if the staff have some enlightenment in this area -- is computer science 11. It has steadily declined since 1989-90, to a low of 16 percent enrolment in '93-94. To me, this is an integral part of education for youth who are graduating from our school system at this time. What does this figure mean from an objective point of view?

Hon. M. Sihota: What that means is that we have tried to integrate technology into other programs and throughout the entirety of the system. That may cause students to be less interested in the specific class, because those technological skills and that knowledge base are something that students can capture in other courses.

A. Sanders: Do we actually have any way of quantifying that? For example, there are potentially other scenarios. It could be that young people are taking computer courses elsewhere in the system. It could be that we are educating so many of our senior students in portables that they don't have the access to computer skills and thereby do not actually get to participate in the computer technology.

The concern is the statistic that 62 percent of students felt schools didn't teach computer skills well. What I am looking for is: what objective findings do we have to say that those young people are getting computer skills in courses other than computer science 11 -- which may well be the case? What other ways are we able to quantify that so that we know that those people are in fact leaving the system trained, as opposed to presupposing that they have gotten the skills in another course?

Hon. M. Sihota: Well, we can get you the information that shows the number of hours a student will spend in front of this kind of technology, learning those technological skills outside of the computer science 11 program.

For example, my son, who is going to school, really, for the first time now -- he did kindergarten last year and he's doing grade 1 -- and my daughter, who is in grade 4.... I am actually impressed with the amount of time they've spent in front of computers -- in his case, in the first year, and in her case, in the first four years of their program. This is not a school that's particularly endowed with computers. It offers the programs.... I'm amazed, and very impressed as a parent, as to the degree that that's available. Now, you can't take a specific situation and generalize it; I know that.

But I'm just trying to give you another indication. When you see it as a parent, in the kindergarten and grades 1, 2, 3 and 4 levels, you know that they're not waiting until computer science 11 to begin to pick up these skills -- and that's good.

[8:15]

A. Sanders: Again, some hard data in that area would be very encouraging.

Hon. M. Sihota: We'll get you that.

A. Sanders: Another area that to me is very important and that I feel is going by the wayside is the physical education requirement after grade 10. My understanding now, and this has changed again since my original involvement in the school system, is that after grade 10, physical education is no longer required. Is this in fact the case in B.C. schools?

Hon. M. Sihota: That is my understanding, as well.

A. Sanders: My second understanding is that statistically, physical education can be achieved in grades 11 and 12 through elective courses, but students aren't doing those, either. In fact, it's declined 30 percent from the year previous to when the '93-94 report was written. Do we have an explanation for that significant decline?

Hon. M. Sihota: My sense of it is that students -- certainly the ones I've talked to as I make my way around the province -- are far more concerned about the relevance of their training, as the member pointed out earlier on, with regard to academic, vocational and technical learning. I think they're more obsessed than when I was at school about getting a job. So some of the options fall by the wayside.

Also, I think it's fair to say that students do a lot of that stuff on an extracurricular basis -- I think more than was the case a couple decades ago -- and that's encouraging. To let the hon. member know, if I may, one of the things I've asked staff to do is to report back to me on the thing that actually bothers me more than physical education: their awareness around health and nutrition. It's amazing. You know, I'll often go to a school and I'll ask kids: "Tell me what your gall bladder is." You might find one kid who could tell you in a year of asking that question. So just in terms of nutrition and.... The Minister of Transportation is wondering....

Interjection.

Hon. M. Sihota: She lost hers a long time ago, so she knows exactly where it is.

I've asked staff to give me some ideas on what more we can do in terms of health and nutritional information. In my view, there's an unsatisfactory lack of knowledge around those areas. There are areas where I think we could all agree that you'd like to see them do more.

But students do want to make some choices. My observation has been that, given their concern about what may happen to them from a vocational point of view when they leave school, they're very much inclined now to reject options like physical education and take options like computer science.

[ Page 1482 ]

A. Sanders: I think the importance of this issue cannot be underrated. As a health practitioner and former teacher, I can tell you that one of the primary conditions I see in elementary children now -- and most definitely in adolescents, specifically in adolescent females -- quite often is disorders related to obesity and, through the spectrum, to eating disorders.

The concomitant health risks that come with those disorders start with smoking to keep weight down, for example; concomitant diabetes; poor self-esteem; and other lifelong health risks such as heart disease and stroke that come from the use of substances to control weight or the onset of obesity. They could all be controlled to a larger extent by some institution of daily physical education, as opposed to where, once you get to grade 10, when your body stops growing, you also stop playing or competing or doing physical activity of whatever kind.

I think that career choices are important for many young people, but we need to avoid nailing them into little boxes so tightly that they don't have any room to move. In fact, from my daily observations in the medical office, for kids in high school, most of their issues relate to self-esteem: how they see themselves, how they're presented, how much they weigh, what they look like and how they look to their peers.

I think that not only from a health point of view, and to keep our health care system in order and have reasonable funding for it, but also in terms of avoiding cigarette-smoking and other things, we would be well advised to revisit that old issue of looking at PE for all of our children and keeping them active.

For example, in the school where my children go, kids have PE once a week; that is the amount of gym time these children are able to have. They make up for that by going cross-country skiing and doing other sporadic activities that depend on the season, but those kids are sitting in a desk from kindergarten to grade 7, five days a week, with one hour of PE per week. I don't think that's appropriate for learning. If I wanted my children to learn the best way, I'd have them active every day. That's my soapbox.

I'm interested in school completion rates. Completion rates were declining, with student enrolment in grade 12; on September 30, they were dropping. We talked about the different ways that these trends could show increased part-time students and an increase in older returning students. In terms of the curriculum for this kind of change in how we're seeing student enrolment in senior grades, are there curriculum reforms that have been designed to meet the needs of part-time students and older returning students, or are we giving them the same curriculum that we give children who go from K to 12?

Hon. M. Sihota: The curriculum and education outcomes are the same, and to some degree you need that for transferability into colleges and universities. However, the focus has -- correctly, in my view -- been on being far more flexible in terms of access. So there's far greater opportunity to access the system at just about any point of entry, in order to get that knowledge base.

I'm not going to let the comments about physical education pass without getting onto that same soapbox. I agree and disagree with the comments the hon. member made. Look, I don't have a problem -- in fact, I'm an advocate of.... I'd like to see more physical education, but I also understand why kids make the choices they make in terms of wanting the academic courses that are there. I want to make a number of points. I think that physical education clearly does assist in self-esteem, and there's a lot of leadership and team skills that people can pick up by being involved in that kind of activity. I know that my own experience has been such that that's the case.

Where I disagree is that I don't think they would stop showing up at doctors' offices if they just did more physical education. I think kids lack basic nutritional and health knowledge. I'm just amazed at how naïve we are, by the time we leave grade 12, about how our bodies function. That concerns me. I'm not a physician, so maybe I look at it from a different point of view, but I have to say that it concerns me more than the amount of time or opportunities available for physical education.

The other point I want to make -- and it's a different soapbox, but I think it's an important point to make -- is that I believe that there are some real responsibilities here for parents. Sometimes we put too much onto the school system. We all have responsibilities as parents. I think teachers spend five, maybe six, hours a day with kids, which leaves a lot of other time for parents to pick up some responsibilities. I think parents have an obligation to see that their children are physically active and involved in opportunities that allow them to get a physical education in a different context.

I think that's very important. I just don't think that that happens to the degree that it should. Sometimes we can't lay these deficiencies exclusively at the feet of the school system.

Now, I don't think the hon. member is being that black-and-white, but I just wanted to have a chance to comment on the soapbox. The answer to your question is that we do measure learning outcomes, and we do provide for flexible access to the system.

A. Sanders: I do appreciate the minister's comments on these points. My rebuttal would be that although children do require nutrition and health advice, we are talking about children who are at an age where they don't want their parents giving them organized activity. They're 14, 15 or 16. They're not going to be going out and doing aerobics with their mother. They are going to require something within the integrated context of school, or it's not going to happen. I think most of us who have teenagers at home will concur.

I'm interested in touching a bit on the CAPP program, which the minister has alluded to. My understanding is the career program requires 100 hours of work experience, and that it is available in British Columbia schools. First of all, is that the correct information? And second, how many schools are participating in the CAPP program?

Hon. M. Sihota: The information is wrong. It's 30 hours, not 100, and they're all participating.

A. Sanders: I had trouble hearing that. Did the minister say that all schools are participating -- so 100 percent of senior secondary schools are participating in '94-95?

Hon. M. Sihota: It's not 100 percent, only in the sense that there hasn't yet been full implementation.

A. Sanders: What is the cost of the CAPP program in the '95-96 estimates? Where do I find it, first of all? Secondly, what is the incremental change for the '96-97 year?

Hon. M. Sihota: It's not broken out. It's part of the block grants, so we can't break it out that way for you.

[ Page 1483 ]

A. Sanders: So this would occur, hon. minister, under the $5,000, or whatever it is, per student.

I have some questions specifically with respect to the ministry. In the Ministry of Education there have been some substantive changes.

Whereas in the past we were talking about elementary and post-secondary education, now we have skills development under the umbrella that is Education. I have some questions about this particular change in the structure. How many of the full-time-equivalents that have been added to the ministry as per the estimates are specifically allocated for Youth Works, how many are allocated for Welfare to Work, and so on?

Hon. M. Sihota: We'll have to get that information. That's more of a technical question.

A. Sanders: Again with the ministry, looking at the number of FTEs.... From the breakdown of the ministerial area, how many assistant deputy minister positions are here?

[8:30]

Hon. M. Sihota: Five.

A. Sanders: And how many deputy ministers?

Hon. M. Sihota: One in Education.

A. Sanders: How many deputy ministers have been in the Ministry of Education in the year 1996?

Hon. M. Sihota: Three.

A. Sanders: That's almost more than the number of months, hon. Chair. Could the minister give me some indication as to why there is such a large turnover in the deputy minister position?

Hon. M. Sihota: Well, sometimes people want to move on to other functions within government; sometimes they're reassigned to other responsibilities.

[G. Brewin in the chair.]

A. Sanders: Again, for the interest of the critic, in general, are the deputy ministers who come into the Ministry of Education individuals with skills in administration, or do they concurrently have skills in education?

Hon. M. Sihota: I think generally what we look for is people who have good skills in policy development and administration. Typically what one looks for is someone who has a good handle on understanding policy and can make sure the ministry is administered in an efficient way. It's not an easy job, but that's basically what we often look at.

A. Sanders: Do we produce these people in British Columbia? Do they come from our school system? Do we have the opportunity to have them here?

Hon. M. Sihota: Yes, there are people from our school system who work their way up the system and bring good field experience to the ministry.

A. Sanders: Is our deputy minister today from British Columbia?

Hon. M. Sihota: I don't know what you mean by that. He is a resident of British Columbia now. He has had a career in the civil service. If you want his CV, we can send you a copy of it.

A. Sanders: Specifically, what I am fishing for is this: there is some concern that many of our deputy ministers come from other NDP provinces, and not specifically from British Columbia. I was interested in the minister's opinion of whether that statement was correct or whether most of our Deputy Ministers of Education were products of the B.C. system.

Hon. M. Sihota: My current deputy worked in Saskatchewan for the Devine government.

A. Sanders: I would like to see, in the next tenure of this ministry, some stability within the Ministry of Education. I think that's how we get things done. Three deputy ministers within a period of less than half a year is excessive, and it provides a lack of continuity. People from Saskatchewan, such as myself, I will raise no further points about.

Other things that I am interested in have to do with examination-marking. This has been a very large problem this year, in that we've changed the way things have been done. Every time you change or alter the way things are done, it creates a certain amount of consternation. What is this minister's feeling about the philosophy of testing? Is this a minister who believes we should be testing more than we are now? Should we be testing less? What is the minister's mandate in this area?

Hon. M. Sihota: My own view is that testing is a necessary and essential part of the school system. I think it teaches students many skills. Just knowing how to deal with pressure, and how to prepare, and the focus and discipline that comes from writing tests is very important. We do live in a competitive world, and there's some sense of competition that comes from testing, which, again, is relevant.

I am reasonably satisfied with the level of testing within the system now. I would not want to reduce the amount of testing within the system.

A. Sanders: The corollary to that question would be: will this minister be increasing the amount of testing, or will it be staying the same?

Hon. M. Sihota: The jury is out on that matter.

A. Sanders: Do you place value on professionals teaching a subject and in addition marking grade 12 provincial exams? In other words, should those who teach the course mark the exams?

Hon. M. Sihota: You would like to see many people who are involved in classroom instruction do the marking of the exams. This year we have had some problems, in light of determinations that were made as a result of issues raised in this House.

[ Page 1484 ]

Hon. M. Sihota: Let's deal with this issue in some sequence. Some time ago, the opposition and others were critical of the fact that this government was bringing people down to Victoria to mark exams. The opposition at the time took the view with Minister Charbonneau that there had to be a more efficient way of doing it. As a result of those demands, the government made some changes and went to the structure that we went to this year to see if it was more efficient, cheaper and, from a quality point of view, the same. That's why this year it's what it is.

A. Sanders: Do those numbers reflect the four designated regional marking areas -- Kelowna, Vancouver, Victoria and Prince George -- or just the Victoria area?

Hon. M. Sihota: It is the total. Therefore, of the cumulative total that we required originally.... We required 562 markers, of which we had 543; only 39 were people who did not teach in that subject.

A. Sanders: That information is of great help. What has happened, in the change over this year in the marking circumstance, is that this government did not issue T4 slips for teachers who were marking exams over the past two years. Revenue Canada subsequently issued slips to say that they required taxation for income earned and that this made the remuneration less suitable to the teachers, in terms of their hourly rate or what they anticipated based on their daily contract in their own district. If this was the case and we were looking to decrease the amount of money spent on marking....

One of the very experienced markers, who has written to you as well as to the Times Colonist , a Mr. Derek Peach, suggested that if anyone whose university application required a certain score was displeased with their mark -- if they found that this mark had been the product of a novice marker recording their test result -- they would have reason to request a re-mark, or to request some grievance. What does the minister think about this kind of statement from one of our experienced markers?

Hon. M. Sihota: I think I should caution you that just one letter to the editor does not a situation or a practice make; people write letters to the editor all the time. I don't think the opposition should simply rely on one letter to the editor. The fact of the matter is, as I've laid it out, that as a result of these changes, we've saved about $159,000.

A. Sanders: I was looking more specifically from a theoretical point of view rather than from one of a practical, single case. I don't disagree that one case does not make an example. However, should we have difficulty.... I think this is the turning point where we're going to have more difficulty finding provincial markers. I think teachers are recognizing that this is a good learning experience for them in terms of professional development -- coming to Victoria.

If we have the same or more degree of difficulty next year finding markers because we're paying a $100 honorarium that now has a T4 slip attached to it, what are we going to do this time next year? It's not that far away. Specifically, we're going to be having exams halfway through the year.

Hon. M. Sihota: This is perplexing, because the opposition creamed this government -- or tried to cream the government -- for the way in which things were done, without making the very points the member is making. It's ironic, because at the time I think the minister made many of the arguments the hon. member is making -- and I realize that elections happen, and people don't have a corporate memory of what previous critics might have said. Having said that, the facts are that this year we did quite well. But I am also aware of this concern, and I will.... It's under review, but at this point I'm not about to make any determinations, except to say that it's under review. I may not change it.

There are many questions I want to ask about the effectiveness this year versus the effectiveness last year. We've just come out of a system this year, and if I'm going to go back to the old system, then I'm going to have to be confident that there are compelling policy reasons for doing it. At this point, we've just gone through this exercise this year, so now we'll go and compare apples to apples. I'll look at those apples and make some decisions.

A. Sanders: As alluded to by the minister, those who do not know history are condemned to repeat it. Many of us who went into this school system in one set of organized ways are now finding that that's back. First it's whole language; now it's phonics; now grammar is back. I think that's part of the perpetuity of education and part of the frustration of being in government -- you will see old ideas recycled and coming back.

I'd like to touch a little bit on special programs. These relate more to the social issues affecting schools. Specifically, in terms of special programs, could the minister give me the figure for the total budget in the estimates for 1996-97?

[ Page 1485 ]

[8:45]

Hon. M. Sihota: I assume that the hon. member is talking about school meals and inner-city programs, not special needs. The school meals program is $14.8 million; for inner-city schools, it's $5.5 million.

A. Sanders: In terms of the $5.5 million for the school meals program, my question to the minister would be: from an objective point of view, how are we evaluating how that is working in terms of its outcome?

Hon. M. Sihota: We do evaluations of those programs. We've done two of them. I'm quite happy to have staff make them available to the hon. member if she's interested. She can see the objective indices that we apply and the evaluations that occur, and can respond back to me on that. If she wishes, we'll make that information available.

A. Sanders: I'd appreciate getting that information, and forthcoming from that, if there are any questions, I will pose them as the session comes to closure.

Hon. M. Sihota: It is 12 percent.

A. Sanders: Subsequent to that question, if it's gone from 13.9 percent in 1993-94 to 12 percent in 1996-97, what percentage of the total student population in British Columbia is enrolled in ESL? My understanding is that it was an increase of 6.6 percent from '91 to '94. Where has that percentile gone, in terms of the total population?

Hon. M. Sihota: The 12 percent was the total population.

A. Sanders: What is the 1996-97 funding total for ESL? It is not broken down in the votes. My understanding was that it was $58.2 million for 1993-94. What is it for this estimate?

Hon. M. Sihota: It is $68.9 million.

A. Sanders: The minister loves those short, snappy answers.

Following on ESL, what is the student-teacher ratio in ESL classes?

Hon. M. Sihota: Actually, we don't set those ratios; the school districts do. I don't have any numbers that would speak to what those ratios are.

A. Sanders: I'd appreciate getting those ratios, but in a generalized way. Are they anticipated to be the same as the regular classroom, or are they substantially different?

A. Sanders: I would appreciate any information I can have from staff.

I would like to talk a bit about special education -- education for the gifted or the disabled, as opposed to special projects. What percentage of the enrolment in public schools requires special education?

Hon. M. Sihota: It's approximately 11 percent.

A. Sanders: Again, for my understanding, is the Jericho school under this ministry's mandate?

Hon. M. Sihota: Only the educational component is.

A. Sanders: My understanding is that under special education in the Ministry of Education, we have gender equity programs. Could the minister tell me how many staff, how many FTEs, are employed in gender equity programs?

Hon. M. Sihota: It's about half an FTE.

A. Sanders: In 1992-93, 36 equity grants were awarded to 18 schools and 13 educational organizations. Could the minister give me an example of what such a program would be?

Hon. M. Sihota: School districts would put forward proposals to increase participation of young women in non-traditional courses, for example.

A. Sanders: What would be the typical cost for such a program to be instituted?

Hon. M. Sihota: The grants are pretty small; they're in the neighbourhood of $5,000 or $10,000 each.

A. Sanders: I'm quite interested in these programs. How would these programs delineate identifiable change, so that when all is said and done and the dust has settled, you would know that they had made any difference? What would be the quantifiable aspects of such a program?

Hon. M. Sihota: I don't think it's easy to quantify. There are just so many influences on the human being; these programs can influence the thought process, perhaps, for some time, and the participation rate. But whether they ultimately have a long-lasting effect, I don't know. I think it would be hard to quantify that from a sociological point of view. We don't track a young woman all the way through the system to make sure that she makes certain career choices.

You don't know where to do it: do you take it to grade 12, or to what post-secondary institution program they take, or to employment, or to success in employment, or to equal pay for the kind of work -- engineering, let's say? I don't know where you'd stop doing it. We are trying to change behaviour and influence thinking.

A. Sanders: I think this is an important point, in that if we're looking at 36 equity grants at $10,000 each -- $360,000 -- and we cannot identify any changes and we can't measure the outcome, I think we need to have something concrete that would provide a little bit more accountability to the taxpayer. Again, I would be interested if staff could provide me with one such equity program so that I could perhaps have some idea about what we're talking about here. It's very unclear.

Interestingly enough, in the report by this ministry, when they surveyed grade 12 females, they achieved better grades

[ Page 1486 ]

than males in most subjects. I was wondering where the gender equity initiatives were and whether they were for the wrong gender, in order to bring our grade 12 boys up to equity with the young women.

Something along the lines, again, of special education: how many students in B.C. are involved in distance education in 1996-97?

Hon. M. Sihota: There are 5,900.

A. Sanders: Along the same lines, I find from my own constituency and from the parents I see in my medical practice that more and more children who do not live in rural environments are being home-schooled. How many students are being educated in a home schooling program in British Columbia in '96-97?

Hon. M. Sihota: Less than 5,000.

A. Sanders: From the annual report, the enrolment had increased 3 percent between '93 and '91. This number of children seems to be increasing yearly. In the opinion of the minister, what would be motivating parents to provide home schooling for children when public schools are accessible, within walking distance?

Hon. M. Sihota: From the parents that I've talked to, it varies. It's a lifestyle choice. It always goes down to lifestyle and social influences, and these are individual parenting decisions. I don't take it as a comment on confidence or the lack thereof in our system -- more a reflection of lifestyle issues, changes and desires that parents have.

A. Sanders: I have some very straightforward questions so I can peruse the numbers in the estimates a little more clearly. How many students are enrolled in British Columbia's schools in '95-96?

Hon. M. Sihota: It was 591,000.

A. Sanders: What is the change from the '95-96 figure to the anticipated estimates for '96-97?

Hon. M. Sihota: Approximately 10,000.

A. Sanders: What percentage of student enrolment is in the actual, regular, public school?

Hon. M. Sihota: Put it another way. I don't know what you mean by regular, but they include home schooling. Are you taking that out, or are you just talking about private, or are you just asking how many kids are in the independent schools?

A. Sanders: The percentage.

Hon. M. Sihota: In the neighbourhood of 88 to 89 percent.

A. Sanders: Of that 88 percent that are in the regular public schools, not educated elsewhere or home-schooled, etc.... What percentage of those 591,000 children, with a 10,000 increase for this year, are in the elementary category, and what percentage are in the secondary category?

[9:00]

Hon. M. Sihota: Sixty percent are in elementary.

A. Sanders: What percentage of our students now, in the '96-97 projections, are being educated in independent schools?

Hon. M. Sihota: Eight percent.

A. Sanders: In terms of teachers, what is the number of full-time-equivalent teachers in British Columbia in the '96-97 year?

Hon. M. Sihota: Thirty-four thousand.

A. Sanders: What is the average age of educators in the '96-97 year?

Hon. M. Sihota: Forty-three years.

A. Sanders: It seems that the average age of our educators is increasing quite significantly. I can certainly remember a time when the average age in a school or a constituency was a good ten years less. Does this present any concern for the Ministry of Education?

Hon. M. Sihota: Yes. Some districts have an older population, even, than the average, so it does present a concern. We're looking at programs like early retirement to deal with some aspects of the problem -- to allow younger people to come into the system, for example.

A. Sanders: It would be of interest to me what percentile of areas.... I know that in my own area, 43 does reflect very accurately the average age of the educator. Is this something that predominates in certain districts, or is it pretty well spread across the board in terms of age?

Hon. M. Sihota: It's spread out across the system, but there are some districts -- for example, like Victoria -- where you have a higher number. That needs to be dealt with.

A. Sanders: Specifically, looking at teachers, we talked a bit before about whether there was an interim agreement or whether there was provincial bargaining, and so on. Touching back on that a little bit in terms of teachers, do they have a code of ethics? If so, how does that work? And if not, why not?

Hon. M. Sihota: They have a code of ethics, and it's administered by the College of Teachers.

A. Sanders: What is the dismissal rate for teachers within our education system?

Hon. M. Sihota: That information is individualized in different districts; we don't have that information. If you're saying dismissal because of conduct by the College of Teachers, that's one thing; if you're talking about.... We'll get that information for you.

A. Sanders: Again, just for my education, in terms of an individual brought before their own college for correction of a behaviour considered unethical, what is the course of action that occurs within...? ? Is it something that occurs at the district level? Is it within the ministry? How does that work?

[ Page 1487 ]

Hon. M. Sihota: The college is an independent, self-regulating professional agency, so it wouldn't be done at the district level. They'll do it at the provincial level, as a college.

A. Sanders: In terms of funding schools, what percentage of the Education budget is primarily salaries and benefits?

Hon. M. Sihota: In the school districts, it's 89 percent.

A. Sanders: I'm interested, in that the report on 1995-96 funding to schools.... The percentage quoted in one of the ministry's documents was 93 percent. I'm just wondering if that is a misinterpretation on my part.

Interjections.

Hon. M. Sihota: I just want hon. members to know, because there are new members in the House who haven't been here before, that earlier on I said that if anyone heckled, they would lose all capital funding for their constituency. I'm going to extend that to any unnecessary and particularly provocative speeches.

The hon. member may be referring to the ministry, as opposed to school districts. That may be the reason for the discrepancy.

A. Sanders: I will not be heckling, I can see.

I'm interested in the funding to technology, specifically with regard to the principle of equity. I'm interested in knowing what this minister feels could be a guiding principle to bring equitable technology to all districts in British Columbia.

Hon. M. Sihota: Those comments about heckling weren't directed towards you, hon. member. They were directed towards the two gentlemen who just left.

We're trying to do it through the $10 million technological agreement.

K. Whittred: I really only have one question, and then I'll pass this on to a colleague. Earlier in the evening there was some discussion surrounding corporate partnerships and that sort of thing. It occurred to me at the time that one thing that is even more insidious, I think, is that with the advent of various technologies in curriculum application and the effect they have on the culture -- I'm thinking particularly of CD-ROMs, videos, the Internet and the amount of money that goes out of Canada to American television stations, for example, to pay for taping rights for KCTS-9, the Knowledge Network....

It's not the Knowledge Network; it's the other one. It has escaped me for the moment; it's channel 17 at home.

An Hon. Member: PBS?

K. Whittred: It's not PBS.

Anyway, taping rights -- schools tape all the time.

An Hon. Member: It's Arts and Entertainment.

K. Whittred: Arts and Entertainment, that's right.

My question is: the ministry has obviously given some thought to the nature of problems surrounding private partnerships in education. I'm wondering, though, what the ministry has thought of in this area. My experience as a classroom teacher is such that I don't think anybody has thought of it at all.

Hon. M. Sihota: I want to make sure that I understand the question. You're talking about the commercial application of knowledge-based education and us taking it, as a province, and utilizing it in the classroom, or someone else taking our information and putting it on air through, let's say, Arts and Entertainment?

K. Whittred: I'm speaking of the use of these applications in instruction. The Internet is one. There are all manner of CD-ROMs. Many of them commercially produced; many of them are in fact produced by foreign countries. Similarly, this relates to videos. There are many, many videos which are taped off-air. I am not for a moment presupposing that we're going to have any massive kind of control over this; I am simply asking whether the ministry has given any thought, or very much thought, to the direction of this kind of instruction.

Hon. M. Sihota: I can't say that we have.

R. Masi: I'd like to get back to the average age of educators, for obvious reasons. In my experience, I've noticed a startling decline -- and this is generalizing -- in the effectiveness of many teachers as they hit their fifties. My feeling is that the ministry could be looking at some incentive programs in order to alleviate or perhaps make more flexible the position of teachers who have been in the field 20 to 25 years. Is there any initiative coming up in regard to this?

Hon. M. Sihota: Yes. We are looking at a number of options. I can't tell you exactly what option we'll select, but we are doing that. Of course, in the collective agreement that was executed, there is about $10 million for this purpose, as well.

R. Masi: I'm certainly glad to hear that, because I think it is a serious situation. It would certainly do away with some of the insurance situations where people who are off on stress leave aren't really that stressed but perhaps need some help.

I wonder if the ministry has considered more flexible scheduling in schools that would allow more positioning in terms of free time for teachers during the day and during the week. It's very much like the Legislature: when the bell rings, you jump. I'm not sure this is an appropriate way to live or to take

part in a profession.

I notice you commented on year-round schooling, and you've commented on extended days. Is the ministry seriously looking at this and at putting some motivational teeth into it? I realize that these things are not new. They've been put forward over the last ten to 15 years, but without some motivational approach to it by the ministry, districts or schools don't bite.

Hon. M. Sihota: Some of us jump to bells a lot quicker than others do in this place.

Yes, we are looking at some of those issues. For example, on the allocation of capital we will give a higher priority to funding for something like a year-round school or a school that makes some provision for greater flexibility. We use capital as a variable. One of the reasons we're doing that is that

[ Page 1488 ]

districts themselves have been somewhat more reluctant than the ministry. We've been more proactive in moving on these types of issues. By tying some of these things, let's say, to year-round schooling or better utilization of school facilities, in order to provide some flexibility models, they'll get a higher priority.

[9:15]

R. Masi: Further, on the same theme, it's my understanding that some of the difficulties that come up relative to even a simple

schedule like the semester can be more or less inhibited by the teachers' contracts. This, of course, gets into the whole realm of contracting, and working and learning conditions, which I alluded to before in terms of making progress in developing these changes. I guess what I'm asking here is: how are you going to deal with the difficulties faced in terms of union contracts?

Hon. M. Sihota: Through the collective bargaining process, if properly driven, I am confident that one can achieve some creative outcomes. That's been my experience, but it needs to be driven.

A. Sanders: I'd like to talk about amalgamation, which is something I think many of the constituencies will want to address -- specifically, the interests in their own area. But I would like to look it over in a broader context, in terms of the correspondence I've received with respect to this issue.

My understanding was that there was a bulletin that was to be put out to keep boards abreast of circumstances as they evolved in the amalgamation process. This was originally, I understand, to be a joint publication between the ministry and the B.C. School Trustees Association. One opinion has been that the ministry did not make a timely effort to get their part of the job done, and it was taken over by the B.C. School Trustees Association for want of communication on the issue of amalgamation. What are the minister's comments with respect to this? Was this something that the areas were not kept abreast of, or is this something that has been misinterpreted?

Hon. M. Sihota: I think the member's information is stale-dated. I have sent out a letter to districts, my deputy has sent a letter to districts, and a meeting has been arranged for trustees this month.

A. Sanders: Does the ministry appreciate having a sensitivity to the amalgamation process?

Hon. M. Sihota: Yes.

A. Sanders: Could the minister elaborate on how he perceives that sensitivity and how he feels the response to the sensitivity would best be deployed?

Hon. M. Sihota: Well, the sensitivities, of course, centre around people's desire to keep the system as it was. That is no longer the case. It will now be changed, and we will proceed with amalgamation. I know people have strong feelings about this issue, but we've made our decision. We have facilitators that are working with the ministry who will involve themselves both with districts that are amalgamated and those that are non-amalgamated, to achieve the efficiencies that we expect to achieve with the changes that we've made.

A. Sanders: Again, for the historical aspect, for my own edification.... The amalgamations of Chilliwack, Campbell River and Vancouver Island West were cancelled. Could the minister explain to this member why that was the case?

Hon. M. Sihota: Those decisions were made before I became minister, so I'm not too sure what thoughts rattled through the head of my predecessor. As I understand it, representations were made, and they made some determinations. But I didn't go back and ask my predecessor why. I just took the file as I found it.

A. Sanders: This is a point of interest to me, in that many districts, when bringing forth their case as to why they should or should not be amalgamated, will use as reference points those from the past who somehow managed to scoot under the bar and avoid the process of joining ranks with another geographical area. Would that information be available to me during the course of these estimates, so that I could procure it and try to make some sense of it?

Hon. M. Sihota: There are a number of issues: the representations from the committee that went across the province, as I recollect it, and concerns around aboriginal funding, which impacts on some of the districts that the hon. member referred to.

To be candid about it, I felt it was a decision that should have been made -- to amalgamate. Therefore, when I took over the portfolio, I didn't really want to revisit many of the decisions that were made. They were made, the verdict was in, and those districts all had an opportunity to have their say. The adjudicator at the time, who was my predecessor, made the determinations. I didn't want to revisit that issue. I just wanted to implement the decision that was made, given the time lines that were there, given the impending election in November. I just went ahead, so I can't help the hon. member too much there.

A. Sanders: Was there any political intent in ridings where amalgamation was curtailed, as opposed to those where it continued or proceeded forward?

Hon. M. Sihota: Not that I'm aware of.

A. Sanders: Is it possible that there was but the minister is not aware of it?

Hon. M. Sihota: I'd be surprised if those were the considerations.

A. Sanders: A number of districts have asked if there will be an appeal process for amalgamation. Does this minister have any intention of setting up such a process?

Hon. M. Sihota: None whatsoever. The decision is made and we're proceeding.

A. Sanders: My only concern, again trying to look at the big picture, is the finality of it. A number of districts have written letters. They are not my constituencies at all: Golden; Windermere; Kimberley -- an NDP riding, I understand; the area of school district 55, Burns Lake; school district 56, Nechako; the school district of Kitimat; and school district 21, Armstrong-Spallumcheen, amalgamating with Salmon Arm. Many of the districts that have written have presented quite extensive briefs on why it is not appropriate for their district to be amalgamated, discussing in many ways that in fact

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amalgamation will cost them revenue due to melding contracts from different districts, the loss of federal revenue from enlarging the area, the moneys they get for aboriginal students, and severance packages -- not even including the additional $50 million that would go into the two-year agreement with the B.C. Teachers Federation.

My concern here, as someone looking from the outside, is that we are missing something. None of these areas said they would not restructure. In many of the reports they've suggested ways or mechanisms of how they would restructure, in order to integrate their focus with other things in their community, such as their hospitals, and so on. For them, that restructuring process would make much more sense than having a school district that was three hours in breadth, driving from one end to the other.

My concern in looking at the process of amalgamation is that I don't want to see us, in education, have another New Directions, where we started something in 1991 because, "This is what we're going to do, and we're going to put it through, and that's all there is to it," without some kind of mechanism to look at what the glitches in the system might be. This government is now changing gears with New Directions and looking at what is going wrong.

There is something going wrong, and I have a feeling, using my retrospectoscope, that perhaps we'll look back on this in three or four years and say: "Maybe we should have read some of those reports. Maybe we should have looked at what some of those districts gave as options to the direct amalgamation of their area with another area." I'm looking for some feedback on the relevancy of perhaps opening up the circumstance a little bit, so that we might all learn something -- if there is something to be learned.

Hon. M. Sihota: When I get into a portfolio, everything is open for review, and when I got into this portfolio, this issue, in many ways, was open for review. It was open for review in terms of the status quo of 75. It was open for review in terms of bringing that number down to the 30-whatever-it-was that someone had originally suggested.

I asked staff about many of these issues. I flipped through many of these same letters -- read them. I wouldn't be standing here if I wasn't satisfied that the decision that was made was an appropriate decision. I'm satisfied that it is. I heard many arguments at the time as to why the sky was going to fall. Looking at it retrospectively, things tend to work out much better than people would have forecast -- normally. I anticipate that to be the case here.

There are no more appeals; there is no more re-examination. The decision is made; the letters are out; the boundaries are redrawn; the orders-in-council are filed. It's done, and it's time that people started now to do what the public wants -- namely, to find the efficiencies that are either accrued through amalgamation or that are in those that weren't amalgamated -- where people made the argument retrospectively that they could get the financial savings in another way. The job now is for them is to get those savings. We're determined to get those savings, because as I said earlier on, we're under fiscal pressure.

A. Sanders: Again, I need to expand, to expound. I need to do something more with this issue, because it is one that I think needs more dialogue. A typical letter that the hon. minister received -- July 26 -- which has been sent to myself as well as to Don Wright, Deputy Minister of Education, states.... I will paraphrase it, but again, I think it's important that it be included in the record:

"Dear Sir,

"We recently received a copy of the budget speech...? it was with amazement, though, that we read page 3: 'Listening to the People of B.C.... It states: 'Our commitment, clearly, is to listen to the people of B.C. We have promised to act on their priorities, to be guided by their concerns, to respond to their needs.' "

The writer then goes on to say that the ministry has listened to no less than 1,600 submissions from concerned parents, teachers, students, staff, communities and school board members regarding amalgamation of school districts.

"Your own restructuring team advised you not to amalgamate any school districts, as it was 'not in the best interest of students and would not achieve significant financial savings.... ' Our communities are opposed to the amalgamation, the loss of our local district.... " They do not feel that you have listened to them or acted on their priorities. "Recently we, like you, have become aware of the exorbitant costs of joining existing local contracts -- in our case, well over a million dollars, and at an estimated cost of $11 million for the entire province. If you postpone these provisions until a provincial agreement is reached, you merely postpone the associated costs.

"New committees, task forces, forums and the Legislature are all adding to an expensive process, which could have been avoided. There are no savings in this process, yet you appear to push ahead regardless of what school districts want.

"You are not listening to the people of British Columbia. If you had, you would have called off the amalgamation process and announced a restructuring process that would truly save dollars while leaving local boundaries in place. You have, so far, only been guided by political concerns, not by a genuine caring for what happens in our schools, to our educational system or to our children."

This is signed by the chairperson of school district 21.

[9:30]

I have received a number of these letters. They all are pretty significant in terms of the concerns. Good arguments have been outlined. I feel that somewhere, some kind of hearing process for these people would go a long way toward making peace and would pr