Manitoba Hansard — 23 March 1993 (Sitting 32, 35th Legislature, 4th Session)

35-4-32

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

MG-8048 Fourth Session • Thirty-Fifth Legislature of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba DEBATES and PROCEEDINGS (HANSARD) 41 Elizabeth II Published under the authority of The Honourable Denis C. Rocan Speaker VOL XLII No. 32-1:30 p.m., TUESDAY, MARCH 23,1993 ISSN 0542-5492

MANITOBA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY Thirty-Fifth Legislature Members, Constitue ncies and Political Affiliation NAME ALCOCK, Reg ASHTON, Steve BARRETT, Becky CARSTAIRS, Sharon CERILLI, Marianne CHEEMA, Guizar CHOM IAK, Dave CUMM INGS, Glen, Hon. DACOUAY, louise DERKACH, leonard, Hon. DEWAR, Gregory DOER, Gary DOWNEY, James, Hon. DRIEDGER, Albert, Hon. DUCHARME, Gerry, Hon. EDWARDS, Paul ENNS, Harry, Hon. ERNST, Jim, Hon. EVANS,Ciif EVANS, leonard S. FILMON, Gary, Hon. FINDLAY, Glen, Hon. FRIESEN, Jean GAUDRY,Neil GILLESH AMMER, Harold, Hon. GRAY, Avis HELWER, Edward R.

HICKES, George LAMOUREUX, Kevin LATHLIN, Oscar LAURENDEAU, Marcel MALOWAY,Jim MANNESS, Clayton , Hon. MARTINDALE, Doug McALPINE, Gerry McCRAE, James, Hon. MciNTOSH, linda, Hon. MITCH ELSON, Bonnie, Hon. NEUFELD, Harold ORCHARD, Donald, Hon. PALLISTER, Brian PENNER, Jack PLOHMAN, John PRAZNIK, Darren, Hon. REID, Daryl REIMER, Jack RENDER, Shirley ROCAN, Denis, Hon. ROSE, Bob SANTOS, Conrad STEFANSON, Eric, Hon. STORIE, Jerry SVEINSON, Ben VODREY, Rosemary, Hon. WASYL YCIA-LEIS, Judy WOWCHUK, Rosann Vacant CONSTITUENCY Osborne Thompson Welli ngton River Heights Radisson The Maples Kildonan Ste.

Rose Seine River Roblin- Russell Selkirk Concordia Arthu r-Virde n Steinbach Riel St. James lakeside Charleswood Interlake Brandon East Tuxedo Springfield Wolseley St. BonHace Minnedosa Crescentwood Gimli Point Douglas Inkster The Pas St. Norbert Elmwood Morris Burrows Sturgeon Creek Brandon West Assiniboia River East Rossmere Pembina Portage Ia Prairie Emerson Dauphin lac du Bonnet Transcona Niakwa St. Vital Gladstone Turtle Mountain Broadway Kirkfield Park AinAon La Verendrye Fort Garry St.

Johns Swan River Rupertsland PARTY. liberal NDP NDP liberal NDP liberal NDP PC PC PC NDP NDP PC PC PC liberal PC PC NDP NDP PC PC NDP liberal PC liberal PC NDP liberal NDP PC NDP PC NDP PC PC PC PC PC PC PC PC NDP PC NDP PC PC PC PC NDP PC NDP PC PC NDP NDP

12 57 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Tuesday, March 23, 1993 The House met at 1 :30 p.m. PRAYERS ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS PRESENTING PETITIONS Mr. Jerry Storie (FIIn Flon): Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Sharon Hagen, Bernice Tardiff, Stanley Tardiff and others, requesting the Fam ily Services mi nister {Mr. Gil leshammer) consider restoring funding for the friendship centres in Manitoba. Mr. Cllf Evans (Interlake): Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Harry Huebner, Marilyn Peters Kliewer, Adolf Ens and others, requesting the Fam ily Services minister {Mr.

Gill eshamm er) consider restoring funding for the friendship centres in Manitoba. Mr.John Plohman (Dauphin): Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Ivan Hagen, Douglas Ladany, Debbie Hagen and others, requesting the Fam ily Services minister {Mr. Gil leshammer ) consider restoring funding for the friendship centres in Manitoba. READING AND RECEIVING PETITIONS Mr. Speaker: I have reviewed the petition of the honourable member {Mr. Dewar). It complies with the privileges and the practices of the House and complies with the rules. Is it the will of the House to have the petition read? [agreed] Mr.

Clerk (William Remnant): The petition of undersigned citizens of the province of Manitoba humbly sheweth that:

WHEREAS the United Nations has declared 19 93 the International Year of the World's Indigenous People with the theme, "Indigenous People: a new partnership" and

WHEREAS the provincial government has totally discontinued funding to all friendship centres; and

WHEREAS the provincial government has stated that these cuts mirror the federal cuts; and WHERE AS the elim ination of all funding to friendship centres will result in the loss of many jobs as well as the services and programs provided, such as: assistance to the elderly, the homeless, youth programming, the socially disadvantaged, families in crisis, edu cation , recreation and cultural programming, housing relocation, fine options, counselling, court assistance, advocacy; WHEREFORE your petitioners humbly pray that the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba may be pleased to request the Family Services minister to consider restoring funding for the friendship centres in Manitoba. *** Mr.

Speaker: I have reviewed the petition of the honourable member for Flin Flon {Mr. Storie). It complies with the privileges and the practices of the House, and complies with the rules. Is it the will of the House to have the petition read? [agreed] Mr. Clerk: The petition of the undersigned citizens of the province of Manitoba, humbly sheweth that: WHE REAS the provincial government has without notice or legal approval allowed wide open Sunday shopping; and

WHEREAS the provincial government has not consulted Manitobans before implementing wide open Sunday shopping; and

WHEREAS the provincial government has not held public hearings on wi de open Sunday shopping. WHEREFORE your petitioners humbly pray that the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba may be pleased to request the Minister of Labour {Mr. Praznik) to consider holding public hearings on wide open Sunday shopping throughout Manitoba before March 31 , 19 93. BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Legislative Assembly be pleased to request the Attorney General to uphold the current law concerning Sunday shopping until public hearings are held and the Legislature approves changes to the law. * * * Mr.

Speaker: I have reviewed the petition of the honourable member {Mr. Hickes). It complies with the privileges and practices of the House and complies with the rules. Is it the will of the House to have the petition read?

12 58 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 Mr. Clerk: The petition of the undersigned citizens of the province of Manitoba humbly sheweth that:

WHEREAS the United Nations has declared 1993 the International Year of the World's Indigenous People with the theme, "Indigenous People: a new partnershipw; and WHERE AS the provincial government has totally discontinued funding to all friendship centres; and WHER EAS the provincial government has stated that these cuts mirror the federal cuts; and WHERE AS the elimi nation of all funding to friendship centres will result in the loss of many jobs as well as the services and programs provided, such as: assistance to the elderly, the homeless, youth programming, the socially disadvantaged, families in crisis, education, recreation and cultural progr amming, housing relocation, fine options, counselling, court assista nce, advocacy; WHEREFORE your petitioners humbly pray that the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba may be pleased to request the Family Services minister to consider restoring funding for the friendship centres in Manit oba. *

(1335) Introduction of Guests Mr. Spea ke r: Prior to Oral Questions, I would like to draw the attention of honourable memb ers to the Speaker's Gallery, where we have with us today Major General Tom Defay who is a Commander of the Land Force Western Area from Edmonton and the Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry, 2nd Battalion, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel J.F. Calvin. The batt alion leaves this week to serve in Daruvar, Croati a. On behaH of all honourable memb ers, I would like to welcome you all here this afterno on.

Also with us this afte rnoon, seated in the Speaker's Gallery, we have the Honou rable Hubert Hump hrey, the Attorney General for the State of Minne sota. On behalf of all honourable members, I would like to welcome you here this afte rnoon, sir. Seated in the public gallery this afte rnoon, we have 24 adult visitors from the Kirkness Adult Learning Centre. They are under the direction of Lenore Wiebe and Laurel Johnson. On behaH of all honourable memb ers, I would like to welcome you here this afternoon. ORAL QUESnON PERIOD Student Social Allowance Program Funding Elimination Impact Mr.

Gary Doer (Leader of the OpposHton): Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Rrst Minister. Mr. Speaker, fo rmer Premier Duff Rob lin, speaking to the MAST convention over the weekend, made some very profound stat ements about the need for education and the need for training. He spoke of the goal of having all students in Manitoba finish their high school.

He also talked of the costs of not having a skilled and trained workf or ce, th e costs in terms of higher un employment, in fact three times greater unemployment for people who are not trained and skilled in our society, and that cost would be borne by the individual and by our province for years and decades to come. Yet the government is cutting back on student social assist ance. It says, on the one hand, these students can stay with their parents. We find out that is not true for 900 to 1,000.

They say, on the other hand, there are other alternativ es, and then we find out that they are not el igible for educational opportunities under municipal social assistance . I would like to ask the Premier: What are the long-term costs of the decisions his government has made to cut back on opportunities for student social assistance and long-term careers for these 1, 000 people? Hon. Gary Fllmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, as in , many thin gs, this pro vi nce has to choose pnte�ection] The member for Radisson (Ms. Cerilli) obviously wants to answer the question for her Leader.

An Honourabl e Member: She would probably do a better job. Mr. Rlmon: Well, then, I will let her, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Mr. Doer: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the Premier: They have talked for a long time about long-term planning, long-term budgeting and long-term decision making. Yet we believe the governmen t is proceeding in a mean and shortsighted way for the students on social assist ance. I would like to ask the Premier to table the savings he believes he will have, which are of course passed on to the city of Winnipeg taxpayers and other municipal taxpayers, the savings he will have which

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 12 59 are passed on to the one taxpayer; on the other hand, the long-term cost to these people and to our society in the province of Manitoba for the decisions he has made to cut off student social assistance when they cannot get that student social assistance on municipal welfare. • (1 340) Mr. Fllmon: Mr. Speaker, as I started to say earlier, every government in this country is facing difficult choices. The

article that is in today's paper about the credit rating watch that is on for every province in Canada is symptomatic of the challenges that we face of trying to live within our means today in a very rapidly changing society, a society in which for the most part our revenues in the '90s are going to be flat at best.

As a result of that, the job that is being done by every single province in Canada is to ma ke judgments about what programs that may have been nice, that may have been beneficial to some, that were built into the costs of government in the '70s and the '80s, and are no longer sustainable today in the '90s given the revenue that we have. So, Mr. Speaker, very difficult choices have to be made about what things can be afforded and what things cannot.

When we look at something like student social allowances, we find that no other province in Canada has found that it can afford that program-difficult choices, difficult decisions that have to be made with the sense that what we really have to do is to try and preserve the ability of most Manitobans to continue to enjoy a reasonable lifestyle. If we raise their taxes, as the New Democrats did throughout the '80s and want us to do today, then we will plunge into difficulties significant numbers of people in our society, very large numbers of people and their children and their entire next generation.

We cannot do that, in all conscience and in all commitment to the taxpayers of Manitoba. We have had to make those difficult choices. We have said, look, if this is a program that cannot be afforded by any other province in Canada, how is it that Manitoba, not one of the larger, not one of the wealthier provinces, can ju stify sustaining it. Regrettably, Mr. Speaker, we cannot. Mr. Doer: Mr. Speaker, many of the innovative programs that have been established in Manitoba have been long term and cost-effective for our community, for our province and have been picked up by other provinces.

Look at home care which was started in Manitoba. We were the only province to start that program and now many other provinces are moving into that area because it is cost-effective. Maybe this is the very cost-effective program you should be keeping, as the only province in Canada, and let the other provinces follow our leadership to get people off social assistance and let them get working again with a long-term career. Let us use leadership, not followship, like this Premier. Manitoba Foster Family Association Funding Mr.

Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): I have a fi nal supplemen tary que stion dealing with long-term costs. Mr. Speaker, over last week's period of time when the decision was communicated to foster parents and foster families across Manitoba, there was going to be projected by a number of agencies to have-instead of kids going into the emotional and cost-effective care of foster homes, there is the contingency plan now by the province to send kids into receiving homes, hotels and higher-cost institutions like Macdonald hostel. Mr. Speaker, you will not save any money.

You will not provide any emotional care with these kind of programs. Will the Premier go back and negotiate and deal in partnership with the foster parents and the foster parents' association? It does not only make good emotional sense for our children, it makes good economic sense for our future. Hon. Gary Fllmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, tax and spend is all that the New Democrats want us to do. In response-{interjection] No, the Leader of the Opposition is not correct when he says that people want higher taxes and people are willing to have more government money spent.

The fact of the matter is, with respect to his earlier

preamble, that that program of student social allowances was in place for more than a decade. No other province picked it up because they did have alternatives for those people, alternatives with families, with friends, with part-time jobs, many other alternatives that have seen people throughout our society find the way to fund their education. In those

1260 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 circumstances, they found ways to ensure that they funded their education, and they do in all the other provinces. With respect to his second question, Mr. Speaker, this government, together with the foster parents, entered into an agreement that saw, over the past five years, foster parent rates in Manitoba go up to the second-highest level in Canada. For a province in which our cost of living is eighth highest In the country -w ay above the cost of living, proportionately.

Even with the reduction that is put through in this budget, they remain the third highest rates in Canada. We believe, given that our expenditures, our cost of living are the eighth highest, that is not an unreasonable position in which to be. I regret the attitude that is being taken by the foster parents' association, but we will indeed find foster care because there are many, many Manitobans who love and care for children and who will continue to provide that service for the funding that is available. •

(1345) School Divisions Clinician Funding Mr. John Plohman (Dauphin): Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Education has said repeatedly that education is a priority. She said that in the throne speech in December. The Premier said that educati on is the key that unlocks a world of opportunity and a future of economic growth and prosperity. The Minister of Education says that special needs kids are a priority.

Yet, when we asked her in this House on March 9 how then she could justify the laying off and cutting of 60 to 70 speech therapists, hearing clinicians, behavioural psychologists who provide services for special needs kids, she said: But we are enhancing the services; we are doing more; it will allow the school divisions to hire more clinicians than previously through our department. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask this minister: Is she saying in this House that it is going to cost the Department of Education, her department, more for special needs kids through the hiring of clinicians as a result of this change?

Is that what she is telling the House? Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): Mr. Speaker, the hiring of clinicians will now be the responsibility of local school divisions. The amount of money available to hire those clinicians flows through the funding formula by virtue of a formula. When that is then put forward to school dMslons, It does allow for the hiring of more clinicians than, In fact, were hired by the Department of Education. That flows through the funding formula. Mr. Plohman: Well, Mr. Speaker, It sounds like a classic case of double talk.

The Information that we have is that the total savings to the department will be $3.8 million and the cost will be $2.835 million, based on 63 clinicians times $45,000. I want to ask the minister whether in fact she is now going to acknowledge that she Is saving close to $1 million on the backs of special needs kids in this province. Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, again, I do not believe the member has the numbers of clinicia ns appropriate in the

preamble that he gave. In addition, we are looking for the services of clinicians to be provided within the local school division. We also know that a number of those clinicians have already received job offers from school divisions, and so we fully expect this service to be delivered in a way that provides the local needs to be met and to be dete'lll ined by school divisions on behaH of the special needs child and that child's family. Mr. Plohman: So the minister is saying that she is indeed saving a million dollars on the backs of special needs kids.

I want to ask this minister then: Will she now be prepared, since she is spending over $2 million on exclusionary elite schools such as St. John's Ravenscourt, over $2 million per year, who have not one of these special needs kids in those schools, will she now reduce the funding unilaterally or consult with the parents' groups there and ask them whether they will take a $1-million cut so she can put it to priorities to the speciai- Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, we do believe that we are recognizing the priority needs of special needs young people in this province.

The member is not familiar enough with the funding formula to understand, in addition, that we flow special needs funding for Level I, Level II and Level Ill needs students through our funding formula. We raised that amount of money by 42 percent last year. In addition, this year one of the changes to our funding formula was to include at the Level II and the Level

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1261 Ill the emotionally and behaviourally disordered young people and also those young people who are hearing impaired. We have taken several concrete steps to enhance the services to special needs young people. In addition, Mr. Speaker, I think that the member might like to rethink his statement in suggesting that our independent schools do not have special needs young people because we have just recently met with those school divisions. They most certainly do. * (1 350) VIdeo Lottery Terminals Revenue Reinvestment Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Inkster): Mr.

Speaker, my question is for the Premier. This government and this Premier made a promise to rural Manitoba. They introduced the video lottery terminals and said to the rural municipalities that any revenue that was generated through these machines would be in fact returned to the communities. I have had letters and the Leader of the Liberal Party (Mrs. Carstairs) has had letters from throughout the province from ma yors , from reeves , some 30 pieces of correspondence in the last week asking us why this government has broken its promise to rural Manitoba.

My question to the Premier, quite simply, is: Why did the Premier and this government break its promise and not give back the money that is being taken out of the rural communities? Hon. Gary Fllmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I do not know why the member for Inkster is asking questions about rural Manitoba. His Leader just said in the newspaper on the weekend that the Liberal Party is not going to win any seats in rural Manitoba until they look like they are going to win seats in Winnipeg. She says that they are like Quebec. They will vote the way they think that the government is going to go.

I think perhaps he should work on his leadership campaign instead of asking those question. No promise has been broken to rural Manitoba, Mr. Speaker. We committed $5 million from this year's budget, and we are spending $5 million from this year's budget to rural Manitoba, from VL T revenues. Mr. Lamour eux: This gove rnment made a commitment to return the monies that were being generated through the VLTs in rural Manitoba and all those monies would in fact be reinvested into rural Manitoba.

My question to the Premier is: Will he give assurances tp the rural mu nicipalities that 25 percent of the revenues that are being generated will be returned to those municipalities, because this way we have some sort of assurances that the VL T revenues are in fact- Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member has put his question. Mr. Fl lmon: Mr. Speaker, this provincial gove rnment is making commitmen ts to rural Manitoba every time that it spends money on hospitals, on personal care beds, on highways, on GRIP and NISA. There are hundreds of millions and billions of dollars being spent.

In addition to that, special programs with respect to the areas, for instance, in Brandon, the expansion to the Keystone Centre, the partnership agreement for water development- Mr. Steve Ashton (Thompson): The Southern Development Initiative. Mr. Fll mon: The Southern Development Initiative-thank you very much from the member for Thompson. All of those things are millions and millions, hundreds of millions, in fact, billions of dollars being spent in rural Manitoba each and every day that this government is in office.

No previous administration has made the commitment and spent the money that this government has in rural Manitoba. The City of Winnipeg Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Inkster): Mr. Speaker, what the Premier does not realize is that the VL T revenues are taking away from the commu nities much like when the government is now talking about bringing in VLTs in the city of Winnipeg. There is a cost to the VL T s that is coming directly out of the communities.

My question to the government is: Will the government, at the very least, sit down with the City of Winnipeg and come up with some sort of an agreement that if they are going to be going ahead with the VL Ts and taking out of the communities, there will be some sort of assurance that money is going to be going back into the community? This is another form of offloading- * (1 355)

1262 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member has put his question. Hon. Gary Fllrnon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, now, of course, we have the difficulty of the liberal Party trying to go out of a rural Manitoba issue and get into the city of Winnipeg and make a special deal for the city of Winnipeg. The Issue in the minds of the people of this province is, there is only one set of priorities.

When they say that health care, edlication and our social safety net are the biggest set of priorities, they do not want us to set aside 25 percent of Lotteries funds in a slush fund so that some mu nicipal government can set their own priorities. They want their funds spent on the priority areas that they determine are most im portant to all the people. Transcona-Sprlngfleld School Division Funding Formula Mr. Daryl Reid (Transcona): Mr. Speaker, on March 10, the Minister of Education said that her funding formula and Bill 16 are fair and equitable to school divisions.

Today the Transcona-Springfield School Division trustees met with the Minister of Education and told her, and I quote: The new edu cational formula introduced last year has fund ament al flaws , and the supp lemen tary component does not provide equality of opportunity for the pupils of the province because it fails to compens ate for the gross variation in per-pupil assessm ent across the province.

Can this Minister of Education explain to the House, the trustees and the parents in the Transcona-Springfield School Division, how her statements that this formula is fair and equitable to the school division equates and balances with what the trustees told her today? Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): Mr. Speaker, I did have the opportunity to meet with the Transcona-Springfield School Division today. We had a very long and a very good discussion where we did review the brief.

In that brief, I pointed out to the Transcona Springfield School Division that the past formula had really not been fair. Most school divisions across this province understood that it was not fair, including Transcona-Springfield, and that through the old formula they did receive a certain amount of money through the supplement ary. What I did go over with them today is that the new funding formula does not provide as mu ch to the supplement ary portion because it does provide greater equity in the front-end portion, where it does look at the assessment.

As we apply a uniform mill rate across all school divisions, then it does take Into account exactly how mu ch that mill rate will use, and the funding formula then balances off the issue in that way. I did explain that to Transcona-Springfield today. The member might not understand. Mr. Reid: Mr. Speaker, the formula was so fair it has taken this minister a two-year phase-in; if it is so fair I am sure she can understand that It would not take that long. Can this mi nister explain, Mr.

Speaker, because she committed to the trustees today to review the inequities in the funding formula and to adjust the funding to the Transcona-Springfield School Division to recognize at long last the large rural component, when can the division expect an answer from the mi nister specifically addressing the concerns and making this funding formula fair support for the school division of Transcona Springfield? Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, the member was not at the meeting, so let me tell him exactly what I said. I did say to him that this funding formula was a dynamic formula.

It has been discussed as that since it was first introduced last year. Last year we had the Education Rnance Advisory Commi ttee working on the funding formula, what their role was, to take the concerns of school divisions and then look at those concerns and see if they could be integrated fairly into the funding formula. In this year, we were able to do that. We took six priori ties that were recommen ded by that comm ittee, and we did adjust the formula.

My commitment to Transcona-Springfield today was that that committee will continue its work, that the concerns they have raise d, which were not accepted last year by that commi ttee, they are free to raise them again this year. Perhaps this year, with more experience of other school divisions, will be a year to consider those concerns. • (1 400) Mr. Reid: Mr. Speaker, by this mini ster's own formula, it is going to cost the school division $23 per home this year, something that the division can ill afford. How can this Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Rndlay), who represents an area, part of the Transcona-

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1263 Springfield School Division, stand idly by while his colleague the Minister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey) guts dollars from school programs In his own community? Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, let me just remind the member that last year his school division benefited by 6 percent. They have a very large increase as a result of this new funding formula that brought benefits to Transcona-Springfield. This year, through the changes in the transportation portion of the school funding formula, Transcona-Springfield benefited again.

Manitoba Intercultural Council Retention Ms. Becky Barrett (Wellington): Mr. Speaker, since the Filmon government was first elected in 1988, they have em asculated the Manitoba Intercultural Council, which has lost its granting authority and has lost programming and staff to the politically appointed Multiculturalism Secretariat. Now, the minist er is threatening to revoke The Manitoba Intercultural Council Act. Yesterday, the MIC executive stated that we support the re te ntion of The MIC Act and appropriate funding to ensure the survival of the MIC and its role in the communit y.

Will the minister make a commitment to the people of Manitoba today that she will not introduce

an act to repeal The Manitoba Intercultural Council Act in this session of the Legislature? Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister responsible for Multiculturalism): Mr. Speaker, the only government that ever em asculated the Manitoba Intercultural Council was that government when they were in power. The member for St. Johns (Ms. Wasylycia-Leis), who was the then-Minister of Culture, did not accept the advice of the Manitoba Intercultural Council.

Indeed, what she did was take someone that did not even belong to the Manitoba Intercultural Council and put them in as the chairperson, without the consent and without the recommendation of the Manitoba Intercultural Council. When we took over as government, I had a very angry organization on my hands as a direct result of what that member for St. Johns did. Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh. Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Ms. Barrett: Mr. Speaker, yes, it is wonderful if the government cannot answer a question; it reduces itself to personal attacks on memb ers of the House.

I await the Estimat es of this department with great glee, because' we will prove the inaccuracy of the stat ements of the Minist er responsible for Multiculturalism. Will the Minister responsible for Multiculturalism and, today anyway, the Minister responsible for The Multiculturalism Act, The Manitoba Intercultural Council Act, guarantee to the people of Manitoba that she will not introduce legislation revoking The Manitoba Intercultural Council Act this session of the Legislature? Would she please answer that simple question? Mrs. Mitchelson: Mr.

Speaker, indeed, the records will show, from the annual reports of the Manitoba Intercultural Council back in 1988, that the member for St. Johns (Ms. Wasylycia-Leis) did politically interfere with the appointment of the chairperson of that council, so the facts will bear it out. It is unfortunate that the now critic was not around at that time to see first-hand the devastation of that council as a result. Mr. Speaker, we comm issioned Don Blair to examine the role and the mandate of the Manitoba Intercultural Council. He held broad, ex tensive consultations and did a questionnaire throughout the comm unity.

His main recommend ation, and the recommen dation that we have accepted as government, is indeed to repeal the legislation and to turn the organization over to the com mu nity that it serves, and we will do that. Conference Cancellation Ms. Becky Barrett (Wellington): Mr.

Speaker, will the Minister responsible for The Manit oba Intercultural Council Act then cancel the biennial conference that is scheduled for the middle of next month, which has absolutely nothing to do now that she has said that she is going to go against her own Manitoba Intercultu ral Council executive, the majority of the people who actually spoke with Don Blair and six of the seven recommendations that Don Blair made in his report? Why even have the biennial that is put on by the totally appointed political appointees of the Manitoba Secretariat? Hon.

Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister responsible for Multiculturalism): Mr. Speaker, I do not accept any of the

preamble of the member opposite because indeed government appoints only one

1264 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 member to every two memb ers elected by the commun ity, so there is still a majority of people on the Manitoba Intercultural Council who are elected from the commu nit y and com mu nit y representatives. I do not know where she is coming from again because in fact the mini ster does not dictate to the Manitoba Intercultural Council when to have a biennial assembly. The council determines that, set3 the date and holds their own assembly. School Divisions Wage Freeze- Teaching Staff Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): Mr.

Speaker, on March 1 in this House, the Premier (Mr. Fllmon) suggested that if every teacher in this province were to take a pay cut, all of the teachers could still be em ployed and the quality of services maintained. He went on to sugge st that everybody else has had to have freezes and reductions and that teachers of the province should be no different. We have the Minister of Education, on the other hand, who is telling MAST that a wage freeze is not an option with this government. My question to the Minister of Education is: What is the governmen t's policy on this issue? Hon.

Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): From the time of the funding announcement in Education, I did refer to school divisions as empl oyers, and school divisions as empl oyers do have the right to negotiate with their own em ployees if a wagg freeze is what they would like to do. That is still their option as em ployers. We as a government have made our position clear. At this time, we are recommending that they also may in addition like to look at, or they may rather like to look at, what we are doing with our empl oyees, which is a workweek reduction.

We have said to school divisions, as another option as em ployers, that they might look at a version of the workweek reduction with their em ployees. Ms. Gray: Well, the position of this government is still not clear on that issue. Education System Professional Development Days Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): A supplement ary question to the Minister responsible for Education. Can the mini ster tell us, what is the policy of this government in regard to professional development days for teachers? Do they support the fact that teachers should take professional developm ent days and take them with no pay?

What is the policy? Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): We did recommend to school divisions that they might look at a version of the workweek reduction with their own em ployees, and some of those days that they might like to look at are the in-service days. That will be up to divisions to look at that. We as a governm ent, Mr. Speaker, continue to support professional development through our funding formula and to make available the kind of support to schools that we know is necessary. Ms.

Gray: This minister suggested that educators and teachers sho uld take a page from the government in terms of what they are doing with their em ployees. Civil Service Deputy Minister Seminar Costs Ms. Avis Gray (Cresce ntwood): My final supplem entary for the Minister of Education is-and I would like to table page 27 from the Annual Report of the CivH Service Commission, where It indicates that a new seminar program was Implement ed for deputy minist ers.

These short and topical semi nars provided deputies with an opportunity, not only to learn from the experts in management, but to exchange ideas amongst themsel ves which could im prove operating effectiveness. My question for the Minister of Education is: Were those semin ars for deputy minist ers paid for through the Civil Service Comm ission? Did those deputy minist ers receive salaries on the days they attended? Mr. Spea ker: Order, ple ase. The honourable member has put her question. Hon. Darren Praznlk (Mnlster responsible for The Civil Service Act): Mr.

Speaker, I would be delighted to answer that question because I think, quite frankly, if memb ers of the liberal Party have not quite woken up and realized it, that every area of government expenditure, every way we have done things in the past has to be re-examined. Yes, in the past those were paid for by the Civil Service Commission. There is a new budget coming and Education, Civil Service Comm ission, everyone has to undergo

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1265 the same review. I say to the memb ers opposite, wait and see what happens for next year. Transcona-Sprlngfleld School Division Funding Formula Ms. Marianne Cerllll (Radisson): Mr. Speaker, this governme nt's latest economic policy and attack on the public school system is unfairly penalizing students and their families in Transcona-Springfield.

How does the Minister of Education explain the disparity in class size in comparing Transcona Springfield School Division , which has more students per teacher, with other school divisions, when the Transcona-Springfield School Division is being one of the hardest hit under this education funding policy? Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): I will remind the member again that the new education funding formula provided a benefit to Transcona School Division last year, and as a result of that benefit Transcona School Division did determine their own budget.

They then made their decisions which would affect their special requirement. I think it is also im portant for me to recognize the hard work of the Transcona-Springfield School Division. I recognize that. I spoke to them about that today, and I recognize the hard work of all the school divisions across this province. * (141 0) School Divisions Funding Formula Ms.

Marianne Cerllll (Radisson): For the same min ister-will this government com mit to study the impact of this new funding policy on student retention so that next year at budget time we can see that the effect of cutting in Education will increase class size which will in effect cause more students to drop out of school? Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): The member is trying to tie together a number of events.

In making the funding formul a in the funding announcement we also said to school divisions that there were decisions to be made, and we asked that those decisions not affect students in the classroom and not affect programs. We do, on a regular basis, monit or the effect of the funding formula across the province. We also try to take into account the concerns that divisions bring to us as they affect the divisions by the application.

We have asked the assistance of our advisory committee, which is a representative group made up of trustees, teachers and superintendents across this province, to assist us to make that funding formula the most effective formul a it can be, but, I would also say, attempt to make it fair, because the old way was not fair. Ms. Cerllll: Does this mini ster understand that the policy of re ducing the base fundin g in neighbourhoods of modest homes and less ability to generate revenue will mean loss of resources to that neighbourhood?

Can she explain her definition of how that is fair and how that is in keeping with the policy- Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member has put her question. Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, again, where the assessment is low the funding formula then does provide a greater amount to that particular school division. That is what I was saying to the member for Transcona (Mr. Reid) earlier as well. In the past it was an inequitable, more ad hoc way to fund through supplement ary funding.

Now we attempt to fund that through the main part of the funding formula to ensure fairness to all the school divisions across this province. Selkirk Friendship Centre Invitation to Premier Mr. Gregory Dewar (Selkirk): Yesterday the Premier (Mr. Filmon) and the Minister of Fam ily Services (Mr. Gilleshammer) confirmed to all those who watched Question Period that neither of them have any idea what a friendship centre is and what goes on in friendship centres here in this province. In light of this, and following up on the request made yesterday by my colleague the member for The Pas (Mr.

Lathlin), I would like to ask the Premier and the Minister of Family Services to visit the Selkirk Friendship Centre which this year is celebrating its 25th anniversary. Hon. Gary Fllmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I do not believe that there was a question there. Funding Elimination Justification Mr. Gregory Dewar (Selkirk): Mr. Speaker, I have a question.

1266 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 Why did this Premier cut the funding to the friendship centres before the government even investigated what the friendship centres provide in this province? Hon. Gary Fllmon (Premier): The

preamble to the question is not accurate. Selkirk Friendship Centre Alternative Programs Mr. Gregory Dewar (Selkirk): Mr. Speaker, the friendship centre in Selkirk provides counselling services on domestic violence, suicide prevention, crisis management. What preparation has the Minister of Family Services made to cover the loss of these counselling services in Selkirk? Hon. Harold Gllleshammer (Minister of Family Services): Mr. Speaker, as was indicated earlier in the week, government provides these services in the commu nities.

The friendship centres have a mu ltiuse purpose around that and are able to enhance those services. I am aware, from looking at the annual reports of many of the friendship centres, of the variety of things they do. Probably the one in Thompson is the most successful in that they have a very large budget and have the Northern Inn and restaurant in Thompson as part of that. There are quite a variety of services that are provided across there . [interjection] I would point out to tile memb er for Thompson (Mr.

Ashton). we are responsible for 5 percent of the budget in the Thompson Friendship Centre, and I am sure they will manage quite nicely with the other 95 percent. Sunday Shopping Legislation Withdrawal Mr. Nell Gaudry (St. Boniface): Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism. As I just released a survey that I held in my constituency of St. Boniface, it is now obvious that Manitobans are not in favour of unrestricted Sunday shopping.

Out of the total of 1,146 replies in the survey, 723 or 63.8 percent said no, they were not in favour of unrestricted Sunday shopping, while 417, 36.38 percent, said yes. (interjection) You had a chance to ask your question. In light of the results of this survey that show clearly people's opposition to Sunday shopping, in light of the communique released on March 17, 1993, in which the Association of Christian Churches in Manitoba stated clearly their opposition to Sunday shopping, In light of the opposition to Sunday shopping by the- Mr. Speaker: Your question, please. Mr.

Gaudry: Could the minist er enlighten this House by accepting today to withdraw the proposed amendments to The Retail Businesses Holiday Closing Act presently before this House? Hon. Eric Stefanson (Mnlster of Industry, Trade and Tourism): Mr. Speaker, in response to the honourable memb er's question, the short answer Is no. As he well knows, this is a trial period that expires on April 5. The bill has passed second reading and will be at committee hearings shortly. Public Hearings-Rural Manitoba Mr. Nell Gaudry (St.

BonHace): Will the mini ster consider holding public hearings on the issue, unlike the federal Conservatives who push so many things down the throats of Canadians and Manitobans? Hon. Eric Stefanson (Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism): Mr.

Speaker, in response to a similar question some time ago from members of the opposition, we indicated that this bill, not unlike all legislation before this House, will follow the same process and procedure and will be at commi ttee hearings held here in this building in which all Manitobans who have interest in a particular piece of legislation can either attend in person or send a submission in by writing. Mr. Speaker: The time for Oral Questions has expired. Nonpolitical Statements Hon. James McCrae (Minister of Justice and Attorney General): Mr.

Speaker, I would seek the leave ofthe House to make a nonpolitical statement. Mr. Speaker: Does the honourable min ister have leave to make a nonpolitical statement? [agreed] Mr. McCrae: If I could have the attention of honourable memb ers, I have a very important message, Mr. Speaker. I do not know how many honourable mem bers know yet, but the May issue of Chatelaine magazine will, for the second time, name the city of Brandon as one of the 1 0 best cities in which to live in Canada.

_, March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1267 The honourable Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Doer)-and this is not political-may be referred to again in Chatelaine, but as far as I know he has only been referred to once and the city of Brandon has been referred to twice. Mr. Speaker, I am sure this designation by the Chatelaine magazine has a lot to do with the community spirit that is demo nstrated very often in the city of Brandon. We can point to so many achievements over the years which have called for a massive effort on the part of the volunteer community in the city.

I refer, of course, to the rece nt Scott Tourn ament of Hea rts curling competition, the Canada Games in 1979, World Youth Baseball. We are going to be ho sting the World Championship Curling in 1995. We hope to be hosting the Canada Games again in 1997. We have fine educational institutions in Brandon and medical institutes as well. I cannot be mo re eloquent than His Worship Mayor Rick Borotsik when he responded to this by saying, it is good stuff. *

(1420) Mr. Speaker: Does the honourable Leader of the Opposition have leave to make a nonpol itical statement? [agreed] Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I would like to rise and congratulate the commu nity and the people of Brandon again for receiving that prestigiou s designat ion from Chatelaine magazine. I know that Chatelaine has very good judgment on these decisions, and I know that they have chosen well by choosing Brandon again. I also heard the other day that Chatelaine had designated Grand Beach as a tourist attraction, as well, Mr.

Speaker, and I want to pay tribute to that wonderful, wonderful location in the province of Manitoba as well. Mr. Speaker, I think it is terrific that Brandon has again been awarded this judgment. I guess one would find it surprising that the honourable member for Brandon West (Mr. McCrae) wants to be so far away from Brandon, potentially in his future for four days out of five, but we say that in jest, not in any seriousness. I just was in Brandon recently attending the Dakota Ojibway Games, and it was a wonderful host for people from all across Canada.

I did not get an opportunity to attend the Tournament of Hearts, but I know that they broke all the attendance records and demon strated a tremen dous degr ee of volu nteerism and com mu nit y spirit that is unsurpassed in any com munit y in Canada, Mr. Speaker. · We wish the people of Brandon well, and I hope they are able to again capitalize on this designation. I think it is terrific that they have continued to put Manitoba on the national map in a very positive way, and I think it is great for Manitoba and great for the people of Brandon. Thank you very, very mu ch. Mr.

Speaker: Does the honourable Leader of the second opposition party have leave to make a nonpolitical statement? [agreed] Mrs. Sharon Carstalrs (Leader of the Second Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to also join with the Attorney General (Mr. McCrae) and also with the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Doer) in congratulating the city of Brandon. It really is a gem of a little city. There is no question about that at all. I was there last Friday, as I am sure the Attorney General knows.

Once again, as I came down that hill and up again over the bridge, I was struck by the attractiveness of the community and by the ma ny amenities that that communit y has to offer. The people who live there obviously live there in a spirit of great community, and that is reflected in their tremendous sense of volunteerism. I think we should also reflect on the fact that there are many other pretty little towns and pretty other commu nities in this province.

If there were similar categories with smaller number s and towns, per se, perhaps they also would qualify, because this is a very beautiful province, and all of us who live here recognize that. Committee Change Mr. Edward Helwer (Gimll): Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the member for Sturgeon Creek (Mr. McAlpine), that the composition of the Standing Committ ee on Economic Development be amended as follows: the member for Rossmere (Mr. Neufeld) for the member for Lakeside (Mr. Enns). Mr. Speaker: Agreed? Agreed and so ordered. ORDERS OF THE DAY Hon. Clayton Manness (Government House Leader): Mr.

Speaker, would you call the Supply motion on page 5 of the Order Paper.

1268 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 DEBATE ON PROPOSED MOTIONS Mr. Speaker: On the motion of the honourable Minister of Rnance (Mr. Manness), that this House, at this sitting, will resolve Itself into a Committee to consider of the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty , standing in the name of the honourable leader of the second opposition party. Mrs. Sharon Carstalrs (Leader of the Second OpposHion): Mr.

Speaker, I am pleased again to speak on the Supply motion, to move the motion tha t we consider Suppl y in this House and this motion which, of course, brings Into force and effect the est ablishment of th e Supply committee. As I have tried to explain over the last few days, one has to examine care fully why it is that the government wishes to go Into Supply at this particular point In time.

We have clearly stated to the Minister of Rnance , who is also the House leader, if he wishes to use this motion only to go into Interim Supply in order to ensur e that the government has the dollars it requires to make it s commitments to civil servants and to other agencies, that we are quite willing and able to go into an Interim Supply, but we would require certain guarantees from the Minister of Finance (Mr. Manness), the House leader for the government, if we were to do that.

We would require very clearly that this Interim Supply motion , which is what he would like to debate , would not be used as a mean s to facil itate the going into Estimates in this Chamber. We are opposed to tne discussion of Estimates in the province of Manitoba at this particular juncture because we are parting with a long-term tra dition in this House of prese nting the Main Estimates in their total form before w e are presented with and before we de bate the individual Estimates of specific departments.

As I have indicated in the past, the reason for our unwillingn ess to do that is because we do not fee l that our roles as critics would be appropriately met if indeed we are dealin g with an in dividual department in isolation of other departments, knowing that we do not have the information available to co mp are and to contrast the expend itures of other government departments. Mr. Speaker, I have in the past indicated to this Chamber that the basis for our objection is steeped in the history of Parliamen t and its whole tra dition which has come to us from the parliament ary system .

But I think it is fair to say that It is also part and parcel of any democratic process anywhere. Hone looksatthe democratlcsystem In the United Sta tes, for example, which is not a parliamentary tradition; if we look at the fact that while we have here what is called a "union of powers" and they have there what is called a "separation of powers ," there is still a process by which the economic value, the economic ability of a government to operate , must still be approved by the legislative body of that particular democracy.

I think It is Important for the members to recognize that, although in the United States the President presents a budget to the House of Represe ntatives and to the Senate, he cannot enforce that budget. Just like the Minister of Rnance (Mr. Manness) cannot get his budget, including his Esti mates, passed by this Chamber without a vote of this Chamber -i"181ther can the President of the United State s.

Although he presents, in terms of his budgetary presentati on, usually late in January. each year to the joint sitting of the United State Congress, he then has to do a great deal of negotiation because he is dealing with a House which is not as disciplined a chamber ,I would suggest to you, as is this parti cular parliame ntary syste m. Although sena tors and memb ers of the House of Representatives in the Uni ted States are som et ime s el ected in a presidential year, they are not all elected in a presidential year.

Presidents are only el ected every four years; mem bers of the House of Represe ntatives are elected every two years; memb ers of the Senate are el ected every six years; as a result, he has to deal with Individuals in the Senate and in the House of Repr esentatives who may have no allegia nce specifically to him. In other words, some of them were elec ted in Novembe r when Bill Cli nton was elected; some of them it may be said came in on his coat tails.

But, if the President is very unpopular two years from now, some of those members of the Democratic Party may still get elected, but they do not have any necessary allegiance to be directed towards the Cl inton administrat ion. Therefore , they are not necessarily going to approve the budget, even as is the case presently, the House of Representatives and the United States Senate are both made up predominantly of memb ers of the Dem ocratic Party.

March 23, 1993 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEM BLY OF MANITOBA 1269 There is also, of course, within the Dem ocratic Party, a split-what is often called the Northern Dem ocrats and the Southern Demo crats, and frequently Southern Demo crats are considered to be more Republican than some of the Northern Republicans. So the President of the United States cannot always turn, I would suggest to you, for support and for an automatic approval of that budgetary process. But that is the whole point. There is not automatic approval.

There are rules and regulations which that, another dem ocracy, has to abide by in order for the parliament ary process to function, but also for the so-called presidential process to function. That is all that we are asking from this particular government at this particular point in time, that process be respected, that our rights as MLAs be respected, that our rights to do things according to well -known and well -respected procedures of this Chamber be respected. And if we have an indication from the Minist er of Finance (Mr.

Manness) that those procedures will indeed be followed, as they have been followed in the past, then we will move with dispatch to giving the Minister of Finance what it is that he wishes to have on the Order Paper which is, of course, Interim Supply. If he does not want to move with dispatch into Interim Supply, then I will continue to speak on this mot ion until such time as the mi nister and the House leader for the New Democratic Party and the House leader for the Liberal Party can come up with a legitimate solution. * (1 430) Last week, Mr.

Speaker, I spent a great deal of time talking about the evolution of the parliament ary system and because, obviously, the lesson was not sufficiently well learned, I decided that today I would go back and delve a little bit further into the development of de mocrat ic tradit ions and responsibilities. I think if we are going to look clearly at the dem ocracy that we value in terms of the Canadian parliamen tary syst em, then it is appropriate that we go back to looking at the situation in Greece which of course even before the Mother of Parliament gave us the basic concepts of dem ocracy.

Just as one can easily compare the principles of democratic system within the need for the granting of Supply, one sees that even in the foremost evolutions of our original dem ocracy that in Athens, Supply again became a principal concept and one which caused the dem ocracy to be formed. (Mrs. Louise Dacquay, Deputy Speaker, in the Chair) I want to read from a book written by Roehm, Buske, Webster and Wesley called The Record of Mankind. "Among the gifts Athens left to the world, none is so important as the ideal of dem ocracy. Under the Athenian system of government every male citizen had a

part in public affairs. He might hold office, serve in the courts, and help make the laws. These privileges were open to rich and poor alike. The offices, moreover, were num erous (fourteen hundred in all), and most of them were for a term of one year. Election to office was usually by lot. This did away with favoritism and allowed the poor man a chance in politics equal to that of the man of wealth or of noble birth. It should be remembered, however, that slaves and foreigners were not citizens and therefore had no voice in the government. Furthermore, the women of Athens exercised no political rights. The proportion of the population who could take

part in the government was therefore small. This fact does not make the contribution of Athens less imp ortant. Never before had the world seen a government in which the people had so large a part. "The centre of Athenian demo cracy was the Assembly, which consisted of all male citizens who had reached twenty years of age. It met on the slopes of a hill called the Pnyx. The meetings were freq uently disorderly and ver y trying to the speakers." Well, I think, Madam Deputy Speaker, that is obviously clear that tradition has not been lost in this Chamber.

The mee tings of this Chamber are frequently disorderly and frequently very trying to the speakers. "Voting was by show of hands, except in cases concerning individuals, when the ballot was used." Like in this Chamber where we do not use a ballot, we tend on a recorded vote to stand at our places, and we are counted again, a direct connection between the Athenian democratic system and what goes on in this particular Chamber. To quote again: "Many officers and magistrates assisted the Assembly. Among these, the Ten Generals held the leading place.

They guided the discussions of the Assembly and carried out the orders of that body. Since the office of general was elective, it was open to men of ability and influence.

1270 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 Pericles served sixteen years in succession as one of the Ten Generals. "The courts were composed of citizens selected by lot. Any citizen mi ght present himself as a candidate. A court was both judge and jury. It decided by majority vote, and from its decision there was no appeal. Trials of public officers and disputes between the cities of the empire, besides all ordinary legal business, came before these bodies. "Dem ocracy, then, developed to a high degree in ancient Athens. The citizens ruled and they ruled directly.

This system worked well in a small city-state like Athens, but its benefits did not extend to the empire. The subject communi ties of the Delian League were not represented at Athens. They were ruled in a dictatorial fashion by the Athenians. "Athens had many skilled workmen -mostly foreigners-who produced fine pottery, metal wares, and objects of art. In the country districts of Attica people raised olives, grapes, and figs on small farms and large estates.

These articles and products formed the bulk of the exports of the city-state." Unfortunately, the city-states were not adequately represented, but what the Athenian government did was to present to the world, a form of government which has been copied, in many ways, and in many experim ents. But, in all of the copying that they have done, one principle and one principle alone has been main tained, and that is the right of duly elected representatives to participate in votes of Supply, votes that would determine whether a government would or would not be given the money that it needed in order to function.

That is the purpose of the motion before us at the present time. Without the ability to obtain Supply, a government cannot function. Government s that have not been able to get Supply have found themselves defeated in this Chamber, and as a result, have caused an election.

That is critical to our understanding of the dem ocratic process and our understanding of what is taking place in this Chamber at the present time when the government of the day would try and limit the opportunities and limit the abilities of the opposition parties to participate as fully as they can in the making of rights and laws in the province of Manitoba.

It was this Athenian democratic system that was im ported into Great Britain and which I addressed before, but which I want to address again, because I am not sure that the House fully unders tood the im portance of what it was that I was drawing to their attention in earlier times and because I do not wish to be repetitious, Madam Deputy Speaker, I have in fact the use of other documents to build the case that I built last week.

Again, quoting from the book entitled The Record of Mankind with respect to how Great Britain achieved political demoaacy: "Great Britain is an island consisting of England, Scotland, and Wales. Engl and is the largest, mo st populous, and wealthiest of these divisions. Wales, to the west of England, was conquered in the thirteenth century, and in the sixteenth century became a part of the English parliame ntary system. Scotland and England were combined under one ruler in 1603, when the Scottish king inherited the throne of England and became king of both countries.

This ruler was James I, the first of the Stuarts. By the Act of Union in 1707, Scotland and England came under a common parliament. In 1800 Ireland was united with Great Britain. Together they formed the United Kingdom. Since 1922 a large part of Ireland has been a seH-governing country .... Thus, from 1800 to 1922 the term English, or British government meant the government which controlled England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland and certain nearby islands. "In the early 1700's, Great Britain was still an undemocratic country.

The glorious revolution had preserved the liberty of the upper classes, but had not given most Englishmen any share in electing the memb ers of Parliament. The Legislative body was by no means democratic. The memb ers of the House of Lords composed of nobles and bishops inherited their seats or were appointed by the king. The memb ers of the House of Commons were indeed elected, but only by a fraction of the British peoples. "In the countries or shires only certain landowners could vote. In the towns or boroughs only a handful of well-to-do people could vote.

There were even some boroughs where a rich man, generally a nobleman, had the privilege of appointing a representative. For that reason, he was said to carry the borough in his pocket and his district was called a pocket borough. At the time in the British Isles as a whole only one person in a hundred had the privilege of voting for mem bers of the House of Commons. • (1 440)

March 23, 19 93 LEGISLAT IVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 12 71 "Elections to the House of Commons were also undemocratic because of the unequal population of the election districts. These districts had been set up in the late Middle Ages. Each shire and each borough, regardless of its population, sent two representatives. Since the Middle Ages, however, many of the medieval towns had disappeared and nothing remained of them but a house or two, a green mound, a park or a ruined wall. Yet, such a town still had representatives in Parliament who were appointed by the man owning the site.

Such places were called 'rotten boroughs.' On the other hand, the towns that had grown up since the Middle Ages had no represe ntat ion . Outs tanding examples were towns that had become busy manufacturing centres because of the industrial revolution. Among them were the flourishing cities of Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and Sheffield. "Restrictions on the right to vote and inequalities in representation would have been sufficient reasons for a reform move ment. In addition, however, the elections were accompanied by dishonest practices.

Because voting was not secret but public, individual voters were frequently bribed or intim idat ed. Rotten borou ghs and pocket boroughs were often sold outright to the highest bidder. "Efforts to improve these conditions began in the 18 th Century, but for a long time they accomplished nothing. Sober people alarmed by the revolution in France saw in the demands for parliamentary reform only radical plots against the government. After 18 15 , however, the Reign of Terror and Napoleon Bonaparte were no longer bugb ears.

Pu blic opinion steadily became more hostile to a system of representation which denied political power to so many educated, prosperous memb ers of the middle class. The Whig nobles also took up the Liberal cause and made it a party question. The Tories, on their side, stood firm against anything which looked like democracy. The Duke of Wellington, who had become Prime Minister, even declared that nothing better than the existing system could be devised 'by the wit of man.' This stubborn refusal to make the slightest reform caused the downfall of the duke's ministry.

In 18 30, the year of the July Revolution in France, the Whigs, under Earl Grey, returned to office. They promised to introduce a bill for parliamentary reform. "The events which followed showed how the parliam entary system works in England. The reform bill introduced by Earl Grey, the Whig Prime Minister, failed to pass the House of Commons. Parliament was then dissolved and a general election called to test the opinion of the country. The Whigs won and the Whig ministry or cabinet twice more tried to put through a reform bill. Each time, the House of Lords turned it down.

Popular excitement rose to fever pitch. England seemed on the verge of revolution. In one mass meeting after another, the lords were denounced as corrupt and selfish. The Prime Minister, Earl Grey, advised the king to create a number of new peers, or lords, who would favour reform. The new peers would, of course, be memb ers of the House of Lords and would vote for the reform bill. The king refused to comply with this request, and the Prime Minister and his cabinet resigned from office. The Duke of Wellington tried to form a Tory ministry but did not succeed.

The king then promised to create the necessary peers, and Earl Grey came back as Prime Minister. The king did not have to create new lords. The mere threat of doing so brought the House of Lords to terms, and in 18 32 the long debated bill quietly became law. "The Reform Act corrected some of the worst evils in the system of electing representatives to the House of Commons. In the first place, the act did away with the most rotten and pocket boroughs. This left a large number of seats through towns and countries which had too few representatives or none at all.

In the second place, the act gave the franchise a right to vote to all men in the towns who owned or rented houses worth $50 a year and to those who rented land of certain value in the country. These two provisions of the act were important steps in bringing political democracy to Great Britain. Nevertheless, the majority of the popu lation consisting of wor king men, farm labourers and women still remained without a vote. "The Reform Act brought about a great change in British politics. The revolution of 16 88-16 89 had transferred the chief power from the king to the up per class or la nded aris tocr acy.

The parliamentary revolution of 18 32 shifted the power to the middle class of merchants, manufacturers and professional men, the class corresponding to the French bourgeoisie. Henc eforth, for many years, the mi ddle class ruled Great Britai n. Furthermore, the events of 18 32 proved that the Tory aristocracy entrenched in the House of Lords could not permanently go against the popular will.

1272 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 The lords had yielded, however reluctantly, to popular opinion. Their actions meant that for the futur e , Great Britain would possess in her parliame ntary syste m a means for orderl y ref orm." I want to stop th ere for just a moment, Madam Deputy Speaker, because I think that is a significant state ment. Their action meant that for the future, Great Britain would possess in her parliamen tary system a means for orderly reform . If indeed that is what we want here, if indeed the Minister of Finance (Mr.

Manness) wants some reform of this Chamber, wants some reform on the basis by which we bring about changes to the parliamentary system as It is practised in this Chamber, then the process is to make sure that we have that orderly refo rm. There was no orderly ref orm in this particular motion by the Minist er of Finance, the House leader for the gove rnment of the day when he decided that he would do someth ing which in his own words was unparliam entary and unprecedented. He knew that he was doing something which was not orderly.

He knew he was doing something which had never been done before, and rather than try and obt ain some means by which such activity could take place , he chose himself to move such a motion in the Chamber, thereby violati ng all of the concepts of the evolution of a system and means for orderly reform .

This party to wh ich I am the Leade r and will remain the Leader until the 5th of June when we will me et together an d select a new Leader -that process leaves me here as the Leader of the party having to make decisions as to whether I will allow the gove rnment of the day in this province to circumvent the orde rly process of rules which Is so very much a part of our parliamentary traditi on . Let me continue with The Record of Mankind. "Even after the passage of the Reform Act of 1832, only about one ninth of the grown men in Great Britain could vote.

Farm laborers, day laborers in the cities, and many of the middle class were left without the franchise because they could not meet the requi remen ts laid down by the First Reform Act. The desire for further parl iamentary reform grew,

part icularly among the laborers . The depression in 1837 which threw many of them out of work deepened their dissatisfact ion. In 1838 a group of workers issued a document known as the 'People's Charter.' It dem anded annual meetings of Parliament, universal manhood suffrage, equal elec toral districts, the secret ballot, and other reforms considered radical at the time . The worki ngmen also made their wants known through mass me eti ngs and petitions to Parliam ent.

Chartlsm, as the movement was called, lost ground during the 1840 's becaus e some Chartists staged violent uprisings. • That is, Madam Deputy Speaker, not unlike what we experienced last week , and the horror of it on television when we watched people with , for the most part, very good motivation st orming the British Columbia Legislature, and losing their cause because of their violent actions. That is the sad part about it. Mr. Jack Reimer (Niakwa): Tree huggers. Mrs. Carstalrs: It is very sad that the memb er for Niakwa (Mr.

Reimer) would use the expression "tree huggers" with such disdain. because the concept of being a tree hugger and the concept of being a tree lover is not one which anyone should consider in a disdainful way. Because without trees our entire ecologic al syste m would be out of balance, and for those who believe in the preservation of trees, there should be no public condemnation.

What there should be , for all those who are interes ted in pursuing any movement, is the lesson that I thought all of us had learned from Mahatma Gandhi and late r from Martin Luther King, that you can be far more successful in nonviolent processes by which you achieve change than you can be through violent ones, because violence in itself breeds violence, but, more importantl y, it loses you supporters. I think that the whole environm ental movement in British Columbia, who could not identify many of those people who staged that protest, started with the nub of perhaps a very good idea.

The whole purpose of that assembly was to be a candlelight ceremony on the grounds of the British Columbia Legislature. We have had candlelight ceremonies here to celeb rate mem oria l days like the Montreal ma ssacre . They have never had a violent connotation. They hav e been important and significant, very significant in terms of their ability to make the point that people want a special note of recognition that their rights or their concepts or their beliefs have somehow rather been destroyed and they want a re-enactme nt of those. They want some hope that those idea s will be preserved. * (14 50)

March 23, 19 93 LEGISLAT IVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 12 73 That is exactly what the vast majority of those people, who the member for Niakwa (Mr. Reimer) treats which such disdain and calls them tree huggers, were doing. Unfortunately, it was a small minority who chose to act in a violent way and in that way hurt the entire evolution. That is what happened to the Chartists in the period of the 184 0s because they certainly had ideas which were ahead of their time, but Ideas that we certainly would not today consider revolutionary in any way, shape or form.

I mean which one of us in this House would consider that universal suffrage was a bad concept? All of us have it. All of us are grateful for having it. Who in this Chamber would argue against equal electoral districts? Who in this Chamber would argue against the secret ballot? These may have been radical reforms in the 184 0s, but they certainly are not radical today. They have, in fact, at least in our system of go vernmen t, received wide acceptance. · But the Chartists lost ground during the 184 0s, as I said earlier, because some of the Chartists staged violent uprisings.

Let me quote again from The Record of Mankind, and it is referring to the Chartists. "It ma de a te m porary comeback in the revolutionary year of 1848 , when a huge procession was planned to deliver a monster petition to Parliament. The government prohibited the parade, and it was found that the petition contained many forged signatures. The resulting ridicule put an end to Chartism, but almost all the Chartists' demands have since become a part of English law. "The death of the Chartist movement did not end political unrest.

The outcome of the American War between the States" - som eti mes called the Am erican Civil War-"was regarded by ma ny Englis hmen as a triump h for democracy. It encouraged their demands for popular sovereignty. It seemed absurd that the British workingmen should be denied the vote when it was about to be granted to former slaves in the United States. Moreover, two of the leading statesmen of Great Britain became supporters of further parliamentary reform. One of these was Gladstone, a leader of the Liberal party (formerly the Whig party).

The other was Disraeli, a leader in the Conservative party (formerly the Tory Party). "William Ewart Gladstone, the son of a Liverpool merchant of Scottish birth, had been educated at aris tocratic Eton and Oxford. When only twenty-four years old, he entered Parliament from a pocket borough." In other words, he was not elected. "To many he seemed the 'rising hope of the stern, unbending Tories.' His advancement was rapid, for he had wealth, family influence and attractive personality, wide knowledge of both books and men, enormous energy, and great oratorical ability.

All things considered, no Englishman of Gladstone's generation equaled him as a public speaker. He was an Impressive figure, whether in the House of Com mo ns or on the pl atfo rm . In time he disappointed his political backers by joining the Liberal Party. It was as a Liberal that Gladstone four times became Prime Minister of Great Britain." I must digress for a moment here to say that, of course, every now and then we are delighted that Tories come to their senses and join the Liberal Party as Mr. Gladstone chose to do.

Let me now look at The Record of Mankind once again: "Benjamin Disraeli belonged to a converted Jewish family of London. His father, a well-known author, had him educated privately. The public first knew him as a novelist. In book after book he would ridicule upon the upper classes and called attention to the sufferings of the common people. He entered Parliament as an independent radical. At first his flowery language and dashing clothes-as a young man he wore bright-colored waistcoats and decked himself with rings-provoked only amus ement.

Gradually, however, his intelligence, courage and intense patriotism overcame the prejudice against him. As he gained experience, he toned down his radical viewpoint and before long becam e a Conservative. Thereafter, he was a staunch defender of the Crown, the established church, and the aristocracy. However, he insisted that they serve the welfare of the people. His program came to be known as 'Tory democracy.' Disraeli was an expert in parliamentary rules of procedure and was always feared in debate. For thirty years he domina ted the Conservative Party and twice became prime minister.

"In 18 66 Gladstone, then Liberal leader of the House of Comm ons and the prime mi nister, introduced a bill providing for further extension of the right to vote. Gladstone's bill was defeated and his mi nistry overthrown. The Conservatives now returned to power with Disraell as the real Leader, though he was not Prime Minister.

1274 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 "Popular demonstrations throughout the country convinced Disraeli that an extension of the right to vote could no longer be delayed. With Gladstone's aid, he secured the passage of the Second Reform Act in 1867. Under this act, the voting population was more than doubled and most of the factory workm en were enfranchised. The agricultural labourers remained as the only considerable class of men without the vote. 'In the next election, after the Reform Act of 1867, the Liberal party returned to power with Gladstone as Its leader.

In 1872 he secured the passage of a bill providing for the secret, or Australian, ballot. The Ballot Act did away with the old opportunity to buy votes and to threa ten vot ers. Under Gl adstone's leadership democratic reform was carried still further in 1884 by the passage of the Third Reform Act, which gave the vote to farm labourers. After its passage, the United Kingdom enjoyed practically universal manhood suffrage, such as had already been established in France, Germany, and the United States" -and, I might add and digress, also in Canada.

"The following year another de mocratic step was tak e n when Gladstone's government made the election districts of the country practically equal in population." I think it is important, before I leave Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli, to read from perhaps one of the foremost writers on democracy, of course none other than Winston Churchill, who was himself a Prime Minister in Great Britain, but a Prime Minister who did not have an easy ride of it, a Prime Minister who was rejected by the people until wartime, was accepted by them during that wartime because they felt they needed his strength, his power.

When It appeared in 1945 that the war was coming to an end-it had already, in essence, come to an end in Germany and they were just waiting for it to come to an end in Japan-Winston Churchill was defeated by the people of Great Britain despite the remarkable courage which they had held him in and the remarkable opinion that they had had of him during the wartime. They rejected him because they thought he would be too tough for peacetime and they wanted a new face, somebody who would not remind them of the war that they had just been through.

We talked a minute ago, and just before I begin to read from Winston Churchill I must talk about the Reform Act and the introduction of the secret ballot. I would not want the Pages in the room to think that the secret ballot was as well protected throughout even the earlier parts of this century as the book would let you believe. I will recount to you a story which my husband experienced In 1950. He was a young man when he went to university. He was only 16, having just turned 16 in July of 1949. He went off to university.

That year there was an election in the province of New Brunswick, where he was a student at the University of New Brunswick. His landlord-he was living in a rooming house at the time-asked him If he wanted to work on the Liberal campaign. My husband, who had never been Involved in politics and did not know much about politics, said, well, yes, he would work on the Liberal campaign. It became more appealing when he was told that he would be paid $20 for the day. Being 16 and al ready somew hat of an entrepreneurial spirit, he decided that $15 or $20 was a good way to make some money.

He had to find out what he was supposed to do. The concept was the following: The polls opened in the morning and the first Liberal person who entered the polling station took his ballot, did not mark that ballot, dropped the ballot outside and passed it on. It was my husband's job to pick up somebody, drive them to the poll, mark that ballot he now had in his hand which was blank with an X by the Liberal candidate and pass it to the person whom they had picked up. That person went In, picked up a fresh ballot, dropped the X-marked baHot In the ballot box and then brought out the clean ballot.

If they brought out the clean ballot, they got a bottle of Scotch in the case of a man, or they got a box of chocolates if they were a woman. If, of course, they did not bring out a clean ballot, they got nothing. So they brought out the clean ballot and the process continued. The next person who was picked up would be given the X Liberal-marked ballot. They would deposit that ballot In the voting box and bring out of the polling station a clean ballot.

My husband would then put the X by the Liberal, give the individual a bottle of Scotch or a box of chocolates, and the process continued all day. * (1 500) Lest members of the Chamber think that just because we passed a secret ballot act back in the last century, secret ballots were in essence not well protected in this country until we ourselves went through electoral reform. Now it is very difficult for those things to happen in Canada but they certainly

March 23, 19 93 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 12 75 went on. I think the Atlantic provinces had more of a history of this, qu ite frankly, than the western provinces tended to have. Certainly, it was not a fait accompli just because Gladstone adopted the Australian ballot. Madam Deputy Speaker, I am reading now from Winston S. Churchill's book, A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, Volume IV, The Great Dem ocracies. We now enter upon a long connected and progressive period in British history, the prime ministerships of Gladstone and Disraeli.

These two great parliamentarians in alternation ruled the land from 18 68 and 18 65. For nearly 20 years, no one effectively disputed their leadership and until Disraeli died in 18 81 , the political scene was dominated by a personal duel on a grand scale. Both men were at the height of their powers, and their skill in oratory and debate gripped and focused public attention on the proceedings of the House of Commons. Every thrust and parry was discussed throughout the country.

The political differences between them were no wider than is usual in a two-party system , but what gave the conflict its edge and produced a deep-rooted antagonism was their utter dissimilarity in character and temperament. Posterity will do justice to that unprincipled maniac Gladstone, wrote Disraeli in private-extraordinary mixture of envy, vindictiveness, hypocrisy and superstition and with one comman din g ch aracte rist ic, whether preaching, praying, speechifying or scribbling, never a gentleman. Gladstone's judgment on his rival was no less sharp.

His doctrine was false, but the man more false than his doctrine. He demoralized public opinion , bargained with disea sed appetites, stimulated passions, prejudices and selfish desires tha t they migh t ma intain his influence. He weakened the Crown by appr ov ing its unconstitutional leanings and the Constitution by offering any price for democratic popularity. Thus they faced each other across the dispatch boxes of the House of Commons, Gladstone's commanding voice, his hawk-like eyes, his great power to move the emotions against Disraeli's romantic air and polished, flexible eloquence.

When Gladstone became Prime Minister in 18 68, he was deemed a careful and parsimonious administrator who had become a sound, liberal reformer, but this was only one side of his genius. What gradually made him the most controversial figure of the century was his gift of rousing moral indignation both in himself and in the electorate. In two great crusades, on the Balkans and on Ireland, his dominant theme was that conscience and the moral law must govern political decisions.

Such demand strenuously voiced was open to the charge of hypocrisy whe n, as so often happened, Gladstone's policy obviously coincided with the well-being of the Liberal Party, but the charge was false . The spirit of the preacher breathed in Gladstone's speeches. He was willing to break his party rather than to deny his conscience. Soon after his conversion to home rule for Ireland, he said to his lieutenant, Sir William Harcourt, I am prepared to go forward without anybody.

It was a spirit which was to mismanage men and split the Liberals, but it won him a place in the hearts of his followers of which Britain had never seen the like. To face Gladstone, Disraeli needed all the courage and quickness of wit with which he had been so generously endowed. Many Tories disliked and distrusted his reforming views, but he handled his colleagues with a rare skill. He has never been su rpassed in the art of pa rty management. In all his attitudes there was a degree of cynicism. In his makeup there was not a trace of moral fervor.

Large sections of the working class were held to church, Crown, empire and aristocracy by practical interests which could be turned to party advantage, or so he saw it. He never became wholly assimilated to English ways of life and preserved to his death the detachment which had led him as a young man to make his own analysis of English society. It was this which probably enabled him to diagnose and assess the deeper political cu rrents of his age. Long handicapped by his own party, he led it in the end to an electoral triumph and achieved for a period the power he had always desired.

Nothing created more bitterness between them than Gladstone's conviction that Disraeli had captured the Queen for the Conservative Party and endangered the Constitution by an unscrupulous use of his personal charm. When Gladstone became Prime Minister, Victoria was still in mourning and semiretirement for Prince Albert, who had died in 18 61 . She deeply resented his attempts to bring the monarchy back into public life, attempts which culminated in a well-intentioned scheme to make her eldest son the viceroy of

1276 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 Ireland. Gladstone, though always respectful, was incapable of inf usin g any warmth into his relationship with her. She once said, according to report, that he addressed her like a public meeting. Disraeli did not make the same mistake. The principles of the English Constitution, he declared, do not contemplate the absence of personal influence on the part of the sovereign and, if they did, the principles of human nature would prevent the fulfillm ent of such a theory. He wrote to the Queen consta ntly.

He wooed her from the loneliness and apathy which engulfed her after Albert's death, and flattered her desires to share in the formulation of policy. At the height of the eastern crisis in May 18 77, he ended a report on the various views of the cabinet with the following words: The policy is that of your Majesty and which will be introduced and enforced to the utmost by the Prime Minister. Victoria found this irresistible. She complained that Gladstone, when in office, never told her anything. Had he done so after 18 80 it might have been transmitted to the Conservative opposition.

From then on, she was not friendly to her Liberal go ve rnments. She dislik ed Gla ds tone and detested the growing radicalism of the party. But, in fact, little harm was done. Gladstone was careful to keep the person of the Queen out of political discussion, and none of their disagreements was known to the public. He grumbled that the Queen is enough to kill any man, but he served her patiently, if not with understanding. In any case , the developmen t of popular government based on popular election was bound to diminish the personal power of the Crown.

In spite of her occasional leanings, Victoria remained a constitutional monarch. Gladstone always said that his cabinet of 186 8 to 18 7 4 was one of the best instruments of government that was ever constructed. Driven by his boundless energy, it put into effect a long-delayed avalanche of reforms. This was the golden age when liberalism was still an aggressive, unshackling force, and the doctrine of individualism and the philosophy of laissez faire were seeking out and des troying the last relics of 18 th centur y government.

The civil service, the army, the universities and the law were all attacked, and the grip of the old landed interest began to crumble. The power of what James Mill had called the sinister interests shrivelled bit by bit as the public service was gradually but remorselessly thrown open to talent and industry. Freedom was the keynote; laissez fair e , the method. No undue ex tension of government authority was needed, and the middle class at last acquired a share In the political sphere equal to their economic power. • (1 51 0) Gladstone came in on the flood.

A decisive electoral victory in a country ready for reform gave him his opportunity. The Liberal Party, for a rare moment in equilibrium, was united behind him. The scale and scope of this policy directed at a series of obvious abuses was such that radicals, moderate Liberals and even Whigs were brought together in agreement. He began with Ireland. My mission. he had said, when the summons from the Queen reached him at his home in Hawarden, is to pacify Ireland.

In spite of bitter opposition and in defiance of his own early principles, which had been to defend property and the Ang lican faith, he carried in 18 69 the disestablishment of the Protestant Church of Ireland. This was followed next year by a land act which attempted to protect tenants from unfair eviction, but Ireland was not so easy to be pacified. In England, the government found no lack of work to do. After the electoral reform of 18 67, Robert Lowe, now Chancellor of the Exchequer, had said that we must educate our masters.

Voters ought to know at least how to read and write and have open to them the paths to higher knowledge; thus, the extension of the franchise and the general liberal belief and the value of education led to the launching of a national system of primary schools. This was achieved by W.E. Forester's Education Act of 18 70, blu rred though it was, like all education measures for some decades to come, by sectarian passion in controversy. At the same time, patrimony was finally destroyed in the home service .

Entrance to the new administrative class was henceforth possible only through a competitive examination which placed great emphasis on intellectual attainment. Ability, not wealth or family connection, was now the means to advance. In the following year, all religious tests at Oxford and Cambridge were abolished. The universities were thrown open to Roman Catholics, Jews, dissenters and young men of no belief. The ancient intricacies of the judicial system, so long a nightmare to litigants and a feeding ground

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1277 for lawyers, were simplified and modernized by the fusion of courts of law and equity. The judicature act marked the culmination of a lengthy process of much needed reform. For centuries, litigants had often had to sue in two courts at once about the same matter. Now a single Supreme Court was set up with appropriate divisions and procedure, and methods of appeal were made uniform. Offices that had survived in the reign of Edward I were swept away in a complete remodelling.

All this was accompanied by a genuinely sound administration and what was perhaps closest to Gladstone's own heart, a policy of economy and low taxation. The sufferings and disgraces of the Crimea had made it evident that the great Duke of Wellington's practices in the hands of lesser men had broken down. The Prussia n vic tories in France administered a shock to military and civilian opinion. Reforms were long overdue at the war office. They were carried out by Gladstone's Secretary of State, Edwar d Cardwell, one of the greatest army reformers.

The Commander-in-Chief, the Duke of Cambr idge, was opp osed to any reform whatsoever, and the first step was taken when the Queen with considerable reluctance signed an Order-in-Council subordinating him to the Secretary of State. Flogging was abolished. An enlistment act introduced short service which would create an efficient reserve. In 18 71 Cardwell went further, and after a hard fight with service opinion, the purchase of commissions were prohibited. The infantry were rearmed with the Martini-Henry (phonetic) rifle and the regimental system was completely reorganized on a county basis.

The War Office was overhauled, though a general staff was not yet established. All this was achieved in the space of six brilliant, crowded years, and then, as so often happens in English history, the pendulum swung back. Great reforms offended great interests. The Anglicans were hit by several measures. The nonconformists found little to please them in the Education Act. The army and the court resented Cardwell's onslaught. The working classes were offered little to attract them apart from a Ballot Act, which allowed them to exercise a newly won franchise in secret and without intimidation.

The settlement for $15 million of the Alabama dispute with the United States, though sensible, was disagreeable to a people long fed on a Palmerstonian diet. They began to suspect that Gladstone was half-hearted in defending British interests. An unsuccessful licensing bill prompted by the temperance wing of the Liberal Party estranged the drink interest and found an alliance between the brewer and the Conservative Party. Gladstone was soon to complain that he had been worn down from power in a torrent of gin and beer.

Disraeli, now at the height of his oratorical powers, painted this portrait of the ministry: Her Majesty's new ministers proceeded in their cares like a body of men under the influence of some deleterious drug. Not satiated with the spoilation and anarchy of Ireland, they began to attack every institution and every interest, every class and calling in the country. As time advanced it was not difficult to perceive that extravagance was being substituted for energy by the government. The unnatural stimulus was subsidized. Their paroxysms ended in prostration.

Some took refuge in melancholy, and their eminent chief alternated between a menace and a sigh. As I sat opposite the Treasury Bench, the ministers reminded me of one of those marine landscapes, not very unusual on the coasts of South Africa. You behold a range of exhausted volcanoes. Not a flame flickers on a single pallid crest, but the situation is still dangerous. There are occasional earthquakes, and ever and anon the dark rumbling of the sea. Nevertheless Gladstone's first government stands high in British history, but there were few fresh liberal ideas to expound when Parliament was dissolved in 18 7 4.

He fought the election on a proposal to abolish the income tax, which then stood at threepence in the pound, and to the end of his life he always regretted his failure to achieve this objective. But the country was now against him and he lost. He went into semiretirement believing that the great reforming work of liberalism had been completed. Most of his Whig friends agreed. The radicals thought otherwise. All of them were wrong.

The grand old man was soon to return to politics and return in a setting and amid a storm which would rend and disrupt the loyalties and traditions of English public life in a manner far more drastic than any of them had yet conceived. While his great adversary devoted his leisure to felling trees at Hawarden and writing articles about Homer, Disraeli seized his chance. He had long waited for supreme power. For 25 years, he had been the Leader of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons and now he was over 70. His

1278 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 physique had never been robust and his last years, made lonely by the death of his wife, were plagued by gout and other ailments. Power has come to me too late. There were days when on waking I felt I could move dynasties and governments, but that has passed away. But at no time had his problems been simple. Apart from the interlude of the Peel ministry of 184 1 to 184 6, an interlude which had ended in party disaster, the Tories had been more or less in opposition for close on haH a century.

Labeled the party of reaction, its mem bers mocked as the heirs of Eldon Sidmouth and other hard-shelled, old Tories, it now had to face a democratic electorate. The fact that the extension of the franchise had been sponsored by the Tory Leader made it no less a leap in the dark for them, but Disraeli had no doubts. He remained true to the spirit of the young England move ment which he had founded a generation before. He never believed that the working men of England were radicals or would be destroyers of the established order.

He saw clearly that although many of the new electors were attracted by the ideas of tradition, continuity and ordered social progress, such feelings would never ripen into electoral advantage un der the iner t conser va tism of his own backbenchers. He had only to win over the electorate, but also to convert his own party. Disraeli's campaign began long before Gladstone fell. He concentrated on social reform and on a new conception of the empire, and both prongs of attack struck Gladstone at his weakest points.

The empire had never aroused his interest and, though passionate in defence of the political rights of the working class, he cared little for their material claims. Disraeli on the other hand proclaimed, the first consideration of a minister should be the health of the people. Liberals tried to laugh this off as a policy of sewage. In his first full session after reaching office, Disraeli proceeded to redeem his pledge. He was fortunate in his colleagues, among whom the Home Secretary, Richard Cross, was outstanding in ability. A Trade Union Act gave the unions almost complete freedom of action.

An Artisans' Dwelling Act was the first measure to tackle the housing problem. A Sale of Food and Drugs Act and a Public Health Act at last established sanitary law on a sound footing.

Disraeli succeeded in persuading much of the Conservative Party not only that the real needs of the electorate, including healthier conditions of life, better homes and freedom to organize in the world of industry, but also that the Conservative Party was perfectly well fitted to provide them. • (1 520) Well, might Alexander Macdonald, the miners' leader, declare that the Conservative Party have done more for the working class in five years than the Liberals have in 50.

Gladstone had provided the administrative basis for these great developments, but Disraeli took the first considerable steps in promoting social weHare. The second part of the new Conse rvative program, imperialism, had also been launched before Disraeli came to power. Gladstone's passion for economy and all things military, his caution in Europe and his indifference to the empire jarred on a public which was growing ever more conscious of British im perial glory. Disraeli's appeal was perfectly tuned to the new mood.

SeH-government, in my opinion, he said, of the colonies when it was conceded ought to have been conceded as part of a great policy of imperial consolidation. h ought to have been accompanied by an imperial tariff, by securities for the people of England, the enjoyment of the unappropriate lands which belonged to the sovereign as their trustee, and by a military code which should have precisely defined the means and the responsibilities by which the colony should be defended and by which, if necessary, this country should call for aid from the colonies themselves. h ought further to have been acc om panie d by the in stitution of some representative council on the metropolis, which would have brought the colonies into constant and continuous relations with the home government.

All this, however, was omitted, because those who advised that policy, and I believe their convictions were sincere, looked upon the colonies of England, looked upon even our connection with India, as a burden upon this country. Viewing everything in its financial aspect and totally passing by those moral and political considerations which make nations great, and by the influence of which men alone are distinguished from the animals, well, what has been the result of this attempt during the reign of liberalism for the disintegration of the empire? It has entirely failed, but how has it failed?

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1279 To the sympathy of the colonies for the mother country, they have decided that the empire shall not be destroyed and, in my opinion, no minister in this country will do his duty who neglects an opportunity of reconstructing as much as possible our colonial empir e and of responding to those di stant sympathies which may become the sou rce of incalculable strength and happiness to this land. At first, Disraeli was brilliantly successful. The Suez Canal had been open for six years, and it transformed to the strategic position of Great Britain.

No longer was the Cape of Good Hope the key to the route to India and to the Far East. The foreign office had been curiously slow to appreciate this obvious fact and had missed more than one opportunity to control the waterway. In 18 75, Disr ael i, on behalf of the British government, bought for 4 mill ion pounds, the shares of the Egyptian Khedive Ismail in the canal. This Turkish shatrah (phonetic) was ba nkrupt, glad to sell. His holding amounted to nearly half the total issue. The route to India was safeguarded.

Possible threat to British naval supremacy was removed, and of faithful importance for the future, Britain was inexorably drawn into Egyptian politics. In the following year, Queen Victoria, to her great pleasure, was proclaimed empress of India. Such a stroke would never have occurred to Gladstone or indeed to the next generation of imperialists, but Disraeli's oriental, almost mystical, approach to empire, his emphasis on imperial symbols, his belief in the importance of outward display gave his policy an imagin ative colour never achieved by his successors.

His purpose was to make those col onie s which he had once condemned as millstones around our neck sparkle like diamonds. New storms in Europe distracted attention from this glittering prospect. In 18 76, the eastern question erupted anew. The Cri mean War had been mi sma naged by the soldiers, and at the peace, the diplomats had done no better. Most of the Balkans still remained under Turkish rule, and all attempts to improve the Ottoman administration of Christian provinces had foundered on the obstinacy of the sultan and the magnitude of the task.

Slavs, Romanians and Greeks were united in their detestation of the Turk. Revolt offered little hope of permanent success, and they had long looked to the czar of Russia as their potential liberator. Here was a fine dilemma for the British gove rnmen t. The po ssibi li ty of cr eating independent Balkan states, in spite of Canning's example in the small Greek kingdom, was not yet seriously contemplated. The nice choice appeared to lie between bolstering Turkish power and allowing Russian influence to move through the Balkans and into the Mediterranean by way of Constantinople.

The threat had long been present, and the insurrection which now occurred confronted Disraeli with the most difficult and dangerous situation for Great Britain since the Napoleonic Wars. Rebellion broke out in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where 40 years later, an assassin's bullet was to start the Arst World War. Germany, Austria and Russia, united in the League of Three Emperors, proposed that Turkey should be coerced into making serious reforms.

Disraeli and his foreign secretary, Lord Derby, resisted these plans, arguing that they must end very soon in the disintegration of Turkey, and to emphasize British support of Turkey, a fleet was dispatched to the Dardanelles, but these diplomatic manoeuvres were soon overtaken by the news of terrible Turkish atrocities in Bulgaria. Disraeli, handicapped by faulty reports from his ambassador at Constantinople, who was an admirer of the Turks, failed to measure the deep stir in public opinion.

In reply to a parliamentary question in July, he took leave to doubt "whether torture has been practised on a great scale among Oriental people, who seldom, I believe, resort to torture but generally terminate their connection with culprits in a more expeditious manner." This tone of persiflage fanned into fierce and furious activity the profound moral feeling which was always simmering just below the surface of Gladstone's mind.

In a famous pamphlet, Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East, Gladstone delivered his onslaught on the Turks and Disraeli's government: Let the Turks now carry away their abuses in the only possible manner, namely, by carrying off themselves. Their zaptiahs and their mudurs, their bimbashis (phonetic), the ubashis (phonetic), their kaymakams and their pashas, one and all, bag and baggage, shall, I hope, clear out from the provinces they have desolated and profaned.

This thorough riddance, this most blessed deliverance is the only reparation we can make to the memory of those heaps on heaps of dead, to the violated purity alike of a matron, of maiden and of child.

1280 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 There is not a criminal in a European gaol, there is not a cannibal in the South Sea Islands whose indignation would not arise and ove rboil at the recital of that which has been done, which has late been examined, but which remains unavenged, which has left behind all the foul and all the fierce passions that produced it, and which may again spring up in another more murderous harvest from the soil soaked and reeking with blood, and the air tainted with every imaginable deed of crime and shame.

No government ever has so sinned; none has proved itself so incorrigible in sin, which is the same so impotent for refo rmation. After this broadside, relations between the two men became so strained that Lord Beacons field, as Disraeli now was, publicly described Gladstone as worse than any Bulgarian horror. At the end of the year a confe rence of the great powers was held at Constantinople at which Lord Salisbur y as the British representative displayed for the first time his diplomatic talents.

Salisbury was the direct descendant of Queen Elizabeth's great servant, William Cecil, and of James l's minister, Robert Cecil, whose namesake he was . Over a period of 20 years in both Houses of Parliament, he had been highly critical of his chief. He had joined Disr ae li's go vernmen t only af ter much heart-searching, but in office gradually the two men grew together. Salisbu ry's caustic, far ranging common sense supplement ed Disraeli' s darting vision. As Secretary of State for India and later at the foreign office , Salisbury established himself as the next predestined Tory leader.

At Constantinople a program of reform for Turkey was drawn up, but the Turks, sustained in part by a belief that Salisbury's zeal for reform did not entirely reflect the views of his Prime Minister and the British Cabinet, rejected it. The delegates returned to their capitals, and Europe waited for war to break out between Russia and Turkey. When it came in the summer of 18 77, the mood of the country quickly changed. Gladstone, whose onslaught on the Turks had first carried all before it, was now castigated as a pro- Russian.

Feeling rose as month after month, in spite of heroic Turkish resistance, especially at Plevna (phonetic) in Bulgaria, the mass of Russian troops removed ponderously toward the Dardanelles. At last in January 1 878 they stood before the walls of Constantinople. Public opinion reached fever point. The music hall song of the hour was: We do not want to fight, but by jingo if we do, we have got the ships, we have got the men, we have got the money, too. We fought the bear before , and while we are Britons true, the Russians shall not have Constan tinople.

In February, after considerable prevari cation, a fleet of British ironclads steamed Into the Golden Hom. They lay In the seas of Marmara, opposite the Russian army for six uneasy months of truce, the whale, as Bismarck said, facing the elephant. *

(1530) In March, Turkey and Russia signed the treaty of San Stefano. Andrassy, the Austrian foreign minister, in anger called it an orthodox , Slavic sermon. It gave Russia effective control of the Balkans and was obviously unacceptable to the other great powers. War again seemed likely, and Lord Derby, who objected to any kind of mil itary preparations, resigned. He was replaced at the foreign office by Lord Salisbury who imme diately set upon summoning a conference of the great powers. They met at the Congress of Berlin in June and July.

Busi ness was domina ted by Andrassy, Beaconsfield, Bismarck and the Russian minister, Gorchakov, a quartet whose combined diploma tic talents WQUid have been difficult to match. The resuh was that Russia gave up much of what she had momen tar ily gained at San Stefano. She kept Russian Bessarabia, which extended her territories to the mouths of the Danube, but the big Bulgaria which she had planned to dominate was split into three parts , only one of which was granted practical independence. The rest was returned to the sultan.

Austria-Hungary, as we now call the Hapsburg Empire, secured in compens ation the right to occupy and administer Bosnia-Herzego vina. By a separate Anglo-Turkish conve ntion, Great Britain received Cyprus and guarantee d the territorial integrity of Turkey and Asia in return for yet another pledge by the suhan to introduce proper refor ms. Beaconsfield retu rned from Britain claiming that he had brought peace with honour. He had indeed averted war for the moment. Russia, blocked in the Balkans, turned her gaze away from Europe to the Far East.

The arrangements at Berlin had been much criticized for laying the trail to the war of 19 14 . But the eastern qu estion as it was then posed before the nations was virtually insoluble. No settlement could have been more than a temporary one and the Congress of Berlin, in fact, ensured the peace of Europe for 36 years.

March 23, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 1281 The followi ng week s saw the zenith of Beaconsfield's career, but fortune soon ceased to smile upon him. Thrusting policies in South Africa and Afghanistan led, in 18 79, to construction of a British battalion by the Zulus at lslandhlwana and the massacre of the legation staff at Kabul. These minor disasters, though promptly avenged, lent fresh point to Gladstone's vehement assault upon the government, an assault which reached its climax in the autumn of 1 879 with the Midlothian campaign.

Gladstone denounced a bigger risk, that is to say narrow, restless, blustering and self-assertive foreign policy. Appealing to the self-love and pride of the community, he argued that Britain should pursue the path of morality and justice, free from the taint of self-i nterest. Her aims should be self-go vernment for subject peoples, and the promotion of a true concert of Europe. His constant theme was the need for the nation's policy to conform with the moral law.

Remember, he said, Adelphi, that the sanctity of life in the hill villages of Afghanistan among the winter snows is as inviolable in the eyes of almighty God as can be your own. This appe al to mo ralit y infur iated the Conse rvatives, who based their case on the importance of defending and forwarding British interests and responsibilities wherever they might lie. They maintained that Beaconsfield policy had raised national power and prestige to new heights, but the force of Gladstone's oratory was too much for the exhausted ministry.

Moreover, their last years in office coincided with the onset of an economic depression serious enough for industry but ruinous for agriculture. When Beaconsfield dissolved in March 18 80, the electoral result was decisive. The Queen was forced to accept as Prime Minister for a second time the man whom she described in a letter to her private secretary, Sir Henry Possenby (phonetic), as that half mad firebrand who would soon ruin everything. While the duel between Disraeli and Gladstone held the centre of the sta ge, far-reaching movements were taking shape below the surface of parliamentary politics.

The Reform Act of 18 67, in granting the vote to virtually every adult male resident in a borough, killed the modified 18 th Century regime which had persisted since 18 32. The emergence of a mass electorate called for a new kind of politics. Sheer numbers rendered the old techniques ineffective in the large cities. Two things were required, a party policy which would persuade the electors to vote and an efficient organization to make sure that they did so. Of the two leaders, Gladstone was slow to see the implications of the new age. The great demagogue was bored by the ordinary everyday business of party.

Disraeli, on the other hand, produced both a policy and an organization. Twelve years earlier, he had appointed John Gorst as party manager under whose gui dance the Conservative Party was completely overhauled. The central office was establ ished, and an network of local associations was set up combined in a national union. The transition was remarkably slow, and although there were to be storms in the early 18 80s, the system created by Disraeli still remains largely at the present time. In the Liberal camp, the situation was very different.

Gladstone's coolness and weak hostility prevented the building of a centralized party organization. The impulse and impetus came not from the centre but through the provinces. In 18 73, Joseph Chamberlain had become mayor of Birmingham. Aided by a most able political advisor, Schnardhorst (phonetic), he built up a party ma chine which, althou gh based on popular participation, his enemies quickly condemned as a caucus. A policy of municipal socialism brought great benefits to Birmingham in the shape of public utilities, some clearance and other civic amenities.

The movement spread to other towns and cities, and a national Liberal federation was born. The aim of its promoters was to make the federation the parliament of the Liberal movement which would work out a radical program and eventually replace the Whigs by a new set of leaders drawn from its own ranks. This was a novel phenomenon. Unlike chartism and the anti-corn-law league, movements for reform needed no longer to operate on the fringe of a party. Radicalism was now powerful enough to make a bid for control.

This change was greatly aided by the clustering of the parties around opposite social poles, a process well underwa y by 18 80 and which Gladstone recognized in the course of his election campaign. I am sorry, he declared, to say we cannot reckon upon the aristocracy. We cannot reckon upon what is called the landed interest. We cannot reckon upon the clergy of the established church either in England or in Scotland. We cannot reckon upon the wealth of the country nor upon the

1282 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA March 23, 1993 rank of the country. In the main, these powers are against us. We must set down among our most determined foes. At the election, Chamberlain and his followers put forwar d a program of reform which was una cceptable to the Whigs and indeed to Gladstone. Their success exposed and proclaimed the wide changes which the new franchise had wrought in the structure of the party system. Gladstone and Disraeli had done much to bridge the gap between aristocratic rule and democracy.

They both believed that governments should be active and that the statute books for the years between 18 68 and 18 76 bulge with reforming measures. Elections gradually became a judgment of wha t the go vernment of th e day had accomplished, an assessment of the promises for the future made by the two parties. By 18 80, they were being fought with techniques which differ very little from those used today. Gladstone's Midlothian campaign, the first broad appeal to the people by a potential Prime Minister, underlined the change.

It shocked the Queen that he should make a speech about foreign policy from a railway carriage window, but her protest echoed an age that had already passed. TI1is was the way to become the people's William. Beaconsfield died a year later. His great task, taken on almost single-handed, had been to lead the Conservative Party out of despair for the period of 18 46, to persuade it to face the inevitability of democracy, and to endow it with the policies that would meet the new conditions. That he was successful is a remarkable indication of his skill in all ma tters rela ted to party.

He made the Conservatives a great force in democratic politics. The large scale two-party system with its swing of the pendulum begins with him. Tory democracy, working men by hundreds of thousands who voted Conservative, became the dominant factor. The extension of the franchise, which had hitherto threatened to engulf the past, bore it proudly forward.

Whereas the Whigs vanished from the scene, the Tories, though they were slow to realize it, sprang into renewed life and power with a fair future before them. Such was the work of Disraeli for which his name will be duly honoured. • (1 540) And that, Madam Deputy Speaker, brings us to the period of

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Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	35-4-32
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Volume / chapter	35th 4th hansardpdf 32.pdf
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