role="main" class="main-container container js-quickedit-main-content" id="main-content">

June 7, 1990

34th Parliament, 2nd Session

< Previous sitting day

Next sitting day >

Hansard Transcripts

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

WASTE DISPOSAL

CRIME PREVENTION

WASTE DISPOSAL

CRIME PREVENTION

WASTE DISPOSAL

AFTERNOON SITTING

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

PRIVATIZATION OF LABORATORY TESTING

NATIONAL UNITY DAY

AIR QUALITY

GOOD NEIGHBOUR AWARDS

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK

HERITAGE CONCERT

TAXATION

MINISTRY OF NATURAL RESOURCES STAFF DAY

TOWN OF DRYDEN

PORTUGUESE NATIONAL DAY

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK

ONTARIO SPECIAL OLYMPICS

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

RESPONSES

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK / SEMAINE NATIONALE POUR L’INTÉGRATION DES PERSONNES HANDICAPÉES

ONTARIO SPECIAL OLYMPICS

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK

ORAL QUESTIONS

PATRICIA STARR

FOREST MANAGEMENT

PATRICIA STARR

CHILDREN’S MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES

FARM TAX REBATE

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

EMPLOYMENT STANDARDS

EDUCATION FUNDING

NORTHERN HEALTH SERVICES

SECONDARY SCHOOL CURRICULUM

CHARITABLE GAMING

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

MOTIONS

STANDING COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

PUBLICATION REQUIREMENT

SELECT COMMITFEE ON EDUCATION

PETITIONS

RECYCLING

LANDLORDS’ RESTRICTIONS ON PETS

DIABETES TREATMENT IN NORTHERN ONTARIO

SENIOR CITIZENS’ DENTAL HEALTH

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

TOWN OF NIAGARA-ON-THE-LAKE ACT, 1990

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

ORDERS OF THE DAY

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 1990

The House met at 1000.

Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

WASTE DISPOSAL

Mr Morin-Strom moved resolution 53:

That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that municipal solid waste should be reduced as much as possible so as to eliminate the need for more landfill sites, and recognizing that each region of the province should solve its own waste problems, the government of Ontario should adopt a policy that no municipal or other garbage from southern Ontario should be shipped to any location in northern Ontario for treatment or disposal.

Mr Morin-Strom: I believe this is an issue which faces communities right across Ontario, and it is one which is particularly disturbing to rural Ontario and residents of northern Ontario. We cannot allow southern Ontario municipalities to take an out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach to their garbage by shipping it to rural Ontario or shipping it to the north for disposal. What we need instead are efforts by this government that municipal solid wastes should be reduced as much as possible so as to eliminate the need for more landfill sites across the province.

Surely each region of the province should have to solve its own waste problems rather than be able to foist them on to other regions, whether in rural southern Ontario or in the north. Right across Ontario, environmental groups are very strongly opposed to this concept, as proposed by the greater Toronto area particularly, which would like to get its garbage problems out of its own area and foist them on other regions of the province.

We know the greater Toronto area has tremendous financial resources. Its ability to be able to buy its way into smaller municipalities, areas of the north, with attractive offers of what they would call “economic development” should not be foisted upon people across the province who feel they want to protect their own regions and do not want the garbage generated in another area to be foisted on them.

A coalition of environmental groups across Ontario has taken a strong stand opposing plans to haul waste from the greater Toronto area. Last year this coalition responded to the proposal from the greater Toronto area by stating quite emphatically that hauling waste will not solve the waste problem. It will merely transport the waste to communities that have not created it.

They pointed out that some of the rail-haul proposals claim that they can recycle and compost mixed garbage after hauling. The province has already tried this at the experimental resource recovery plant in Downsview where it was found to be totally unsuccessful. Successful recycling depends on separating waste at source through programs like the blue box program. This is where the efforts of the province should be focused.

Recently the province announced some new funding for recycling over the next 11 years. This funding is on the order of $200 million. However, the estimate for the cost of the rail-haul proposal is potentially over $1 billion per year. Surely, as a province, we should be putting those kinds of resources into recycling and reusing materials in the province.

Some of the groups opposed to this kind of proposal in the environmental coalition include Pollution Probe, the Citizens Network on Waste Management, the Canadian Environmental Law Association, Environment North, Citizens’ Coalition to Maintain the Environment, Nipissing Environmental Watchdog, Northwatch and Algoma-Manitoulin Nuclear Awareness.

Transporting garbage long distances for disposal is not only a waste of non-renewable energy supplies, but it tries to solve the garbage crisis by simply finding more places to put our trash. The real solution is to create less garbage in the first place in order to remove Canada from the dubious distinction of being the largest producer of garbage per person in the world.

Our party has taken strong positions in this Legislature asking for initiatives in this regard. Last December, a resolution presented by our Environment critic, the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore, was adopted unanimously in this Legislature. That resolution listed policies and laws to reduce garbage through less packaging, more refillable containers and more durable consumer products. It called on the government to introduce the needed legislation at the opening of this sitting of the Legislature.

When the Liberals failed to act on that, the New Democrats stepped in again this spring session. Last month, my colleague the member for Hamilton West presented Bill 165, which set out very specifically the kinds of regulations that government should pass under the Environmental Protection Act so that we can tap the real potential to reduce garbage in the province.

That bill, which was passed on second reading and is currently in committee of the whole, although it has not been called by the government to be addressed and is not on the government’s priority list for items to be addressed in the balance of this sitting, would in fact take us a major step towards dealing with the waste problems in Ontario.

That bill called for new regulations which would include some of the following items.

First, it would establish provincial programs to help municipalities achieve a 50% reduction of garbage going to landfills by 2000.

Second, it would establish timetables for prohibiting the disposal of certain wastes in landfills so that they must be either reused or recycled.

Third, it would lay down a plan for phasing out the use of containers and packaging, for example, non-refillable soft drink containers, for which there are already waste reduction alternatives.

Fourth, my colleague’s bill would have designated disposable products for which non-disposable substitutes are available and would have prohibited the use of such products as, for example, disposable razors.

Fifth, it would have prescribed durability standards for consumer products such as small household appliances as hair dryers.

Sixth, this resolution would have required municipalities to establish blue box recycling programs. At present, these programs are only voluntary and do not exist in all the communities across this province.

This proposal would have required all residents to separate their recyclables. This bill is still alive. It had been past second reading, and I would call upon this government, if it takes waste management seriously, to call that bill into committee so that we can deal with it as a Legislature and have it passed into law before we complete this sitting of the Legislature.

If the government really took waste reduction seriously, no municipality across Ontario would even have to entertain the desperate idea of shipping its garbage hundreds of kilometres away. If the government does not get tough now on waste reduction, there will we no end to the steady stream of proposals for northern and rural dumping of big city garbage.

Last year, the government called for submissions from the Solid Waste Interim Steering Committee with regard to long-term systems for disposal of garbage from the Metropolitan Toronto area. There were 86 proposals in total presented. There is no end to the list of big developers, big-interest corporate people who see an opportunity to make money off a very serious problem that the government should be dealing with itself.

This list of 86 proposals includes some eight proposals from northern Ontario. Shipping southern garbage to the north is not just a general fear raised by northerners, it is a very real threat. For example, the Ontario Northland Railway proposes to haul garbage from the greater Toronto area by rail to landfill or to incinerate it near Kapuskasing, New Liskeard or Kirkland Lake, and several rural southern Ontario farm communities have been targeted quite specifically by entrepreneurs as sites for greater Toronto area garbage, including two sites in Lambton county, one in Kent county and one each near the towns of Orillia, Marmora and Cayuga.

Even within these communities where there may be some economic interest -- they want to make a buck on the waste, stinking garbage from the city of Toronto -- there is opposition to this movement. Environment movements right across the province have been formed. RAGE, Rural Action on Garbage and the Environment, in particular, is an Ontario coalition of eight rural citizens and environmental groups that opposes Metro’s plan to export millions of tons of garbage to rural Ontario. They advocate legislated, mandatory waste reduction, reuse and recycling on the basis of municipal equity.

These communities include those two communities in Lambton, the ones in Kent, Simcoe, Hastings, Haldimand and Norfolk. Also represented in RAGE are two communities in northern Ontario, Kirkland Lake and Timiskaming, and Kapuskasing in Cochrane district. These areas, which have been specifically targeted by the greater Toronto area and this Liberal government as areas for waste disposal, are very strongly opposed to this kind of proposal.

Rural communities outside Metro Toronto face an environmental crisis. Despite their unconditional opposition, Metro Toronto continues to plan for the export of its garbage to those communities’ neighbourhoods for landfill disposal. They are asking that Toronto not be allowed to ship its garbage to distant, unwilling communities or to be able to expropriate land in those communities.

Rural Ontario and northern Ontario both have the right and the responsibility to protect farm land and to protect our northern wilderness areas from the exploitation of those resources. Landfill sites create serious environmental threats to water, air and soil. Toronto must solve its own garbage crisis within its own area and not export its garbage to rural Ontario.

Mrs Marland: As I rise this morning to speak to ballot item 53, I want to read into my own record the resolution because I am in support of the resolution partway through the wording. The resolution says, “That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that municipal solid waste should be reduced as much as possible so as to eliminate the need for more landfill sites, and recognizing that each region of the province should solve its own waste problems, the government of Ontario should adopt a policy that no municipal or other garbage from southern Ontario should be shipped to any location in northern Ontario for treatment or disposal.”

The second part of this resolution in fact contradicts the first part. In the first part, the member for Sault Ste Marie is saying that each region of the province should solve its own waste problems, and I agree with that completely. But we cannot say, on the one hand, that every region of the province should solve its own waste problems and then go on to say that one region may not ship garbage or transfer garbage to another region.

Obviously, if there is an agreement with a willing host to ship from one region to another region and both those regions reach an agreement as a willing exporter and a willing importer, if you want to phrase it another way, obviously then they are making their own decisions and managing their own garbage.

In fairness to the member for Sault Ste Marie, his main argument about the reason we are in a garbage crisis today is one that I wholly support: the fact that we have a Liberal government in Ontario that will not make any decisions on anything until it is pushed against the wall and finally has to either climb over it or along it or make a decision. Unfortunately, in a lot of circumstances this current government does a lot of fence-walking or wall-walking, or whatever term you want to use.

It does not want to rock any boats by making major decisions and taking the leadership role that a provincial government with the largest population of any province in this country should be taking. What happens is that decisions are not made and we get into a crisis or we get interference where it actually accelerates the crisis.

I can only give you, Mr Speaker, a very good example on the same subject of waste management in my own region of Peel. I have told this House on a number of occasions that the region of Peel had its own waste management process well in hand.

They were all the way down the road to a date being set for the hearing on their site selection for their landfill site and at the midnight hour received notice of order from the Minister of the Environment that they had to go back to the drawing board and bring to the hearing a number of alternative sites and that they would not be permitted to proceed to the hearing with only one site, although they had done an assessment of other alternative sites and in fact had at that point spent quite a lot of money reaching the conclusion for the recommended site and had very valid arguments about why that should be the preferred site.

It was rather ironical because although Peel was put back to the drawing board, at a cost in excess of some $4 million to go back and reassess other sites, it was being treated differently than a crown corporation of this government of Ontario, namely the Ontario Waste Management Corp, which was allowed to proceed to an environmental assessment hearing on its site selection with only one site.

So, on the one hand, we had Ontario Waste Management Corp going forward with one site; on the other hand, we had the region of Peel going forward with one site and then having the door closed in its face and put back three years and $4 million and then being lumped into all the other Metropolitan Toronto regions with the major garbage crisis.

Mr Speaker, I give that to you as an example of how far wrong the situation of waste management has gone today in Ontario. We all understand very well the 3Rs. Some of us understand a little better the 4Rs, and speaking on behalf of myself and my residents, we are not yet supportive of the fourth R of recovery, which is mainly incineration.

Although the Minister of the Environment has stood in this House a number of times and said he understands that the member for Mississauga South supports incineration -- no matter how many times I correct that for the record -- I do not at this time support incineration because we do not yet have a state-of-the-art process for incinerating garbage that is proven not to add any risk to the environment through the stack emissions.

I certainly understand that when technology is developed and science becomes more sophisticated in the industry, it is entirely possible at some time in the future that we may have incineration; but today I do not support it.

We do have a lot more information today in terms of reduction and reuse and obviously recycling, and I wish that instead of putting pressure on any community in this province where decisions are made by those communities in a crisis, more support and more leadership could be given by this government to those municipalities to help them with programs in reduction and reuse. I wish this government would bring in legislation that had mandatory requirements on the reduction of packaging in this province.

We all understand in this House very well what excess packaging is doing in terms of using up unnecessary space in our landfill sites and also the excess packaging is very often in the plastics area, which is not a product necessarily that is able to either be reused or recycled.

In fairness to the member for Sault Ste Marie, I think I could support his resolution if he had just made the statement that the government should adopt a policy of support to municipalities in resolving their garbage crisis and that, while recognizing that each region of the province should solve its own waste problems, there would be some support from this government. But in fact what this government is saying is, “Go find your solutions.

We will grant you interim landfill sites in the greater Toronto area without full environmental assessment,” and if anyone in this House disputes that fact, I would remind them of the announcement made by the Premier -- not by the Minister of the Environment, which I think is pretty significant.

I respect the Minister of the Environment because he did not make this announcement. The Premier of this province announced in August of last year that the interim landfill sites in the greater Toronto area would be exempt from the full impact of the Environmental Assessment Act and shortcut and be considered only under the Environmental Protection Act. Anyone who knows those two acts well knows the difference between the two and recognizes very readily that it is not a full environmental assessment unless it is under the Environmental Assessment Act.

So we have the government saying, “We’ll give that exemption in order to expedite a solution in the greater Toronto area,” but what we are saying is, it can streamline the process without shortening the process and risking the environment. Because the government has not taken seriously yet the crisis of over 100 municipalities in Ontario today in terms of what they are going to do with their garbage today and tomorrow, we have a major, increasing problem.

Since we are limited in time in this debate this morning, I regret that I cannot present the rest of my arguments which are only partially in support of the member for Sault Ste Marie because of the final part of his resolution, where he is actually making a statement for northern Ontario. Maybe eastern or western Ontario feels the same way about Metro garbage.

I think it is up to the municipalities to make those decisions. If there are willing hosts and it is an economic benefit to one municipality to have an industry such as waste management within its boundaries when another industry is dying, that is up to that local municipality to decide. We certainly are aware that there are letters from Kirkland Lake and other municipalities in northern Ontario where they are now quite willing to have some of their abandoned mines used for garbage, but that is up to them.

Mr Adams: I listened with interest to the member for Mississauga South. I am very interested in joining this debate on this resolution on waste management in Ontario from the member for Sault Ste Marie.

As the previous speaker noted, there are really two halves to this resolution. The first one deals essentially with how we should manage waste in our society and particularly stresses reduction. As the member for Mississauga South pointed out, the reduction part of waste management is particularly important. We reduce, we reuse, we recycle wherever we can, in that order. To reduce is very important at the present time. That is why this government is interested in the national packaging standards.

If and when that program comes through, it will have an enormous impact on the amount of garbage which is generated in our society. We certainly must support that program when it comes and take all action that we possibly can to reduce before it comes.

The second of the 3Rs, reuse, in fact very often really results in reduction. We have the 3Rs and it is a useful concept, but very often they lead to the same thing. For example, if we buy a durable product instead of a disposable product, it simply means we reduce consumption. We use a cup twice, three times, five times instead of once. That actually reduces, through reuse, the amount of the garbage.

It is not an example that I use lightly, but the really good example of reuse in our society is in the beer industry in Ontario where roughly 98% of beer bottles are reused and the remaining 2% very often go back and are actually recycled. Think of the extraordinary saving that is involved in this one particular industry from that fact. It arises of course from the way we handle beer in our society. The Brewers’ Retail has essentially a monopoly. It distributes beer in our communities and it receives that beer and returns the bottles for reuse to breweries which are located in various parts of the province.

The same applies -- unfortunately not at the moment, although we are making great progress -- in the area of soft drink bottles and reuse. The province has mandated a production ratio whereby 30% of soft drink containers are to be reusable. We have mandated reduced costs for reusable soft drink bottles, we have mandated that they should be available in stores, etc, and we have mandated that their availability be advertised. So we have really promoted reuse, and it is very important that we do. As I say, that sort of reuse results in reduction, the first of the 3Rs.

Then, of course, as the member for Mississauga South pointed out, there is recycling, which has received such an enormous emphasis in this province. Our blue box program has been recognized internationally. It now is in two million homes and spreading to apartment buildings and other locations. It is resulting in the diversion of a quarter of a million tons of waste every year into productive use.

The Student Action for Recycling program, which is now being taken up by the school boards, will eventually involve every school board in Ontario so that students can be involved not only in recycling the standard blue box recyclables, but various types of paper and different types of plastic, etc. That is spreading.

In the recycling area we have our recycling technology fund which is encouraging people to come up with innovative ways of recycling different materials. For example, we recycle aluminum cans to achieve incredible energy savings. One of the figures that is used is that to make an aluminum can from recycled cans uses only 5% of the energy that was originally required to produce that can, and we do the same with steel. We recycle oil and of course we recycle paper and some plastics, and we are experimenting with recycling of different types of plastics.

Of course, both the previous speakers are right that only after all the possibilities of the 3Rs have been exhausted should we move to landfill and then that landfill should be as safe and secure as is humanly possible. That is the idea we are aiming for, a situation in which every possible usable part of the waste stream is used and that the remainder, which we hope will be a very small amount, will be disposed of in a safe and appropriate way.

The government’s targets are 50% diversion within 10 years; 25% within a few years. We believe that is achievable, although many people in other jurisdictions say it is impossible for us in such a short time to achieve a 50% diversion of waste to useful uses. We believe it can be done by the year 2000 and figures suggest, and the progress, for example, of the blue box program and industrial recycling programs suggests, that we are well on track.

The second part of this resolution actually addresses something completely different. It actually says that each region should be responsible for all of these things that I have been describing, in isolation from others.

For a region, a municipality or an individual to be responsible for its own waste in the sense that it should see to it that the 3Rs are developed as fully as possible in that region and that municipality or, if it is an individual, in the individual’s household, is it really appropriate or possible that a region which receives goods from outside should be responsible for the recycling, reuse or whatever of all of these goods which have come to it, not only from other parts of the province and other regions, but from other provinces, other countries and, indeed, from around the world?

In fact, could a region do that?

Let us take the case of the beer that I described. The distributor, Brewers’ Retail, should be responsible for the collection of those bottles. By accident, it is one of the ideal situations we have in our society for reuse. But, of course, it is the breweries that have the capacity, I assume, to sterilize and recap those bottles. Can that be done in every region? It strikes me that is impossible.

Let’s take the case of oil, which is increasingly recycled. The service stations in a region should take back oil, but can we expect the service stations in a community to recycle oil? There are plants in the province of Ontario which recycle oil extremely effectively. The oil that was skimmed off from Hagersville, for example, was recycled into bunker C. Can that be done in one community, in one region?

Let’s take the recycling of paper. In the recycling of paper, can we expect that there will be mills which can deal with all the papers that are collected around the province in every region? Again, with aluminum cans, can we have smelters in every region? I think not.

The free flow of goods and services is one of the great strengths of our society and we are at last recognizing implicitly, in the 3Rs, that large parts of the garbage stream are in fact goods. They are useful products and this is something which is widely recognized. It is recognized in the schools and it is recognized by industry. In fact, it is recognized that it is not waste at all. We are dealing with products. Free flow of products is a feature of our society.

We are also recognizing at last that the processing of this so-called waste is an extremely valuable and important service in our society. The free flow of goods and services is a feature of our society. Surely we should foster the idea that these parts of the waste stream are goods and that the processing of the waste stream is a valuable service in our society. I think we should foster this way of thinking as a way of dealing with our so-called waste management problems.

I cannot support a resolution which would reduce the effectiveness of our handling of garbage and which would restrict the free flow of goods and services in the province of Ontario.

Mr Wildman: I must say that the previous speaker, the member for Peterborough, obviously did not read the resolution.

I rise in support of my colleague the member for Sault Ste Marie because I am dealing with the resolution. The resolution deals very clearly with two very important matters in our society today.

The first one the member for Peterborough did deal with briefly, and that is reduction of waste in our society. Obviously, as a society that produces more garbage per capita than any other society on earth, we must reduce, because the other matters that were dealt with by the member for Peterborough cannot take up all of the refuse that we are producing unless we do in fact reduce the amount of refuse. Recycling and reuse are very important, but they are not dealt with in this resolution directly.

The member for Sault Ste Marie at no place in this resolution is suggesting that every region of the province must have a recycling program, although I am sure he would be in favour of that if it were possible, and the blue box program is spreading from one area to another. He is not suggesting that every region of the province or every community of the province must have its own reuse programs for every type of product that is produced and can be reused. That is not what is suggested anywhere in this resolution.

The resolution says that we must reduce, which I certainly agree with, because we must resolve this problem of the amount of waste that we produce. But then, in dealing with the waste for which we do not have reuse possibilities or which we cannot as yet recycle, the resolution says we must not ship that type of garbage from southern Ontario to northern Ontario. I support that completely.

The problem is that in northern Ontario we have a situation, and it has been historic, where we have shipped our resources, often, too often, in raw form to southern Ontario for manufacturing. While doing that we are not just shipping away the resources from the north; we are shipping jobs out of the north; we are shipping wealth out of the north to the south.

Then we are told, “Fine, the tremendous wealth that we have in the greater Toronto region, for instance, built largely on the resources of the north, should justify the shipping of the refuse from the greater Toronto region back to the north that has already been raped for its resources.

The member for Mississauga South indicated that while she certainly supported the reduction of garbage so that there would not be more landfill sites in the province, she felt that this was a matter that really should be dealt with by the local municipality with regard to the acceptance of waste from another region. She brought out the concept of a willing host, a willing importer of garbage.

Inevitably, what happens in this province is that the communities that are chosen to be asked if they would be willing hosts or willing importers of garbage are those communities that are desperate for economic development and jobs. We never get a prosperous community going to a another prosperous community and saying: “Look, would you like our garbage? We’d be happy to send you our garbage.” I have never heard of that. I have never seen a community that is doing well, that has lots of jobs, approached by another wealthy community that says: “Look, we’d like to send you our garbage. Would you like it?

I’m sure you’ve got a few holes in the ground, a few old mines or something that you can dump it into.”

No, they always go to the communities where everybody is out of work and they say: “Look, you guys have nothing. You’re desperate for work. We’ve got something for you. We’ve got an offer you can’t refuse.”

As a northerner I appreciate the beauty of the north, the important tourist value of the north and the important value of the forests and the water resources that we have in the north, but I am not someone who argues that we must always maintain the beauty of the north in its pristine, original form. I am in favour of development. I want development. I want economic development for the communities in the north. But I want it to be development that means we are going to be able to process and manufacture our resources so that we have worthwhile, good jobs in the north, not a situation where we have to accept the garbage that is produced in other areas that do indeed have the good jobs.

My colleague talked about the proposals that have been made for shipping garbage from the greater Toronto region into certain communities in northern Ontario. There is another development that is taking place across northern Ontario right now at the federal level. The Atomic Energy Control Board has approached a number of communities across northern Ontario, again inevitably the communities that are in trouble economically, and said to them: “Look, we’ve got some low-level radioactive waste from Port Hope and we’d like to ship it to your community.

What do you think?” It has also said, “We, as a federal government, would be interested in providing you with all sorts of grants to help you develop your community, just as long as you take this radioactive waste along with the grants.”

In some of those communities they have even determined that the soil and rock formations are not adequate for burying this waste, so they have suggested that those kinds of communities could build some kind of great big concrete tower above ground and put this radioactive waste in it.

They have set up a number of committees to talk about it and a number of those committees have rejected the idea, but then the AECB has gone to the local municipality and said, “Despite the local information committee’s decision, would you still be interested in taking the waste?” In some cases, the municipality says, “Yes, we’d like to continue looking at this possibility.” I suppose, in the terms of the member for Mississauga South, that is a willing host. Many of those willing hosts, I think we have established what they are; we just have to establish now what the price is.

I support my colleague. We must reduce garbage. We must not leave it to others to deal with our garbage. The garbage that cannot be recycled or reused but must be disposed of must be disposed of by the community that produces it. It must not be shipped somewhere else to a willing, desperate host.

Mr Pollock: I just want to make a few comments on this resolution. I agree with the Environment critic for our party when she says we can agree with the first part of the resolution. However, I do not particularly agree with the last line in this resolution where they do not want it in northern Ontario. I can assure members we do not want it in eastern Ontario either. I do not know about western Ontario. Western Ontario can speak for itself. Anyway, we certainly do not want it in eastern Ontario.

I just wanted to place on the record that I certainly do not agree with the member for Peterborough on his comment that we reduce and recycle and then put in a landfill site. I have said loud and clear on quite a few occasions in this House that there is no proof out there that over the next 50 or 100 years -- landfill sites are every bit as damaging to the environment as incinerating garbage. Right now they have incinerators that are supposed to be environmentally safe. I am talking particularly of the one out in Burnaby, British Columbia, where they have admitted that it is environmentally safe.

Landfill sites, as far as I am concerned, are just a cheap fix for some of the big municipalities, so therefore I am totally not in favour of landfill sites.

Mr Brown: Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to participate in this debate. I appreciate the resolution from my colleague the member for Sault Ste Marie, which I think epitomizes the NIMBY syndrome, not in my backyard, to the hilt, only this backyard is 90% of the province. The resolution brings the NIMBY syndrome to new heights, or new depths, a syndrome I think and believe often obstructs rational and considered thinking on many issues.

To be clear, northerners are in the forefront of environmental issues. The people of the north, because of their close association to the land, care about the environment. Northerners are committed to making the 3Rs, reduce, reuse and recycle, the first principles of waste management. We believe everyone has a role to play in waste management. Industry must take responsibility for the waste it creates. Governments must become model waste managers. Consumers must choose products that are not overpackaged and municipalities must ensure a careful selection of waste management facilities.

But to say that we cannot have garbage -- the member talks about but never defines what garbage happens to be -- defies, at least in my humble mind -- that means MacTier cannot take garbage from Midland, cannot recycle products for Midland, cannot do those kinds of things, yet we can have Kirkland Lake shipping to Kenora, a couple of thousand kilometres, anything it wants.

As a northern member, I think what is really important is that we deal with environmental issues in a reasonable fashion, recognizing that sustainable development is what is really important in the province as a whole, in Canada as a whole, in the world as a whole. I think that is what is really important. I know in my own small communities on Manitoulin we are taking dramatic steps in terms of reducing. Private groups, private individuals are organizing composting bees, if you want to call it that. They are building composters just out of their own feeling for the environment. They want to help reduce waste and they are taking those kinds of steps.

Just the other day I had the opportunity to talk to a paper company, the paper company that is in the forefront of recycling newsprint in this province. They tell me that if the facilities they see coming on stream in terms of de-inking and recycling paper occur, by the next century Ontario, not just northern Ontario, will be importing newspapers from other jurisdictions, American, Quebec, perhaps Manitoban, into this province just to make those plants work and to be environmentally responsible. I think there are opportunities in recycling and reuse.

Mr Morin-Strom: That is not garbage.

Mr Brown: I think it is. The member has not defined what he is talking about here. I think there are opportunities. I have a ream of resolutions from municipalities that are interested in recycling projects, in energy reuse, in a number of things, that are saying, “We want the opportunity.” The north, being 90% of the province, has many different views in many different places. I just have to go on record as saying that I believe that the municipal people, the people in the area we are talking about have every right and should have the right to make their own decisions about what they believe to be practical.

Miss Martel: About a year ago the controversy around Metro garbage really spilled over into this House, and at the time there were some jests and some comments made about how we should transport the garbage to northern Ontario. Since that time the issue has become more explosive. I am glad my colleague has taken the opportunity to raise it for some debate in this House today.

There are two points I want to make. First, shipping southern Ontario garbage to northern Ontario is not going to solve this province’s garbage problem. My colleague reminded us of the old adage, “Out of sight, out of mind.” I suppose if we put garbage on buses, trucks and trains and shipped it to northern Ontario, that would reduce some of the controversy here in the greater Toronto area around garbage, but that is not going to get to the crux of the matter, which really is that this government has to come to grips with this serious environmental issue.

This House unanimously endorsed a resolution by my colleague the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore on 7 December on the hierarchy of the 3Rs; that is, reduce, reuse and recycle. Since that time the Minister of the Environment has gone at it all backwards and instead of putting the emphasis on reduce and reuse has focused almost entirely on recycling. In fact the problems in those other areas still continue.

On reduction, for example, my colleague the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore raised the point last week that a typical Canadian household consumes one ton of packaging per year, that 38% of what we send to landfills and incinerators for disposal is packaging and that 82% of the packaging used in Canada is disposed. Less than 20% is reused or recycled. She talked about the steps Ontario could take without the federal government. In fact, on packaging or reducing packaging of items, soft drinks, beer, domestic liquor and milk, all of these things should be returnable, refillable at best and at least have deposits.

This has not been done by this government.

Second, the problem about reusing: There has been a constant controversy around refillable pop containers versus pop cans. We have said that the only legislation that is workable on soft drink containers is one that places stiff deposits on all non-refillable containers to discourage their use or one that prohibits their use altogether in favour of refillable, returnable containers. The Minister of the Environment is totally opposed to this.

He has said that in letters to municipalities even though those same municipalities, through the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, endorsed last year, first, having a refundable deposit fee in Ontario, and second, ensuring that the government of Ontario prohibit the sale of non-returnable drink containers including those now used for soft drinks, milk, juices and all kinds of alcoholic beverages. The minister is far behind what the municipalities in this province think is the answer to the problem.

Third, there are all kinds of problems around recycling. My colleague the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore talked about that, about how far we were away from actually getting a recycling plan that into place that would getting at all the garbage in this province.

Instead of spending our efforts trying to figure out where we can hide garbage in northern Ontario, it seems to me that the thing we should be doing is focusing double, triple our efforts on reuse, reduce, recycling and trying to come to terms with the garbage crisis in Ontario for all of Ontario.

But the second point I want to make -- this is far more important -- is that garbage disposal is not an alternative to long-term, stable economic development in northern Ontario. Many of my colleagues represent single-industry towns. We are always at the mercy of boom and bust in the economy, whether it is up and down prices of nickel or other resources, or the up and down of the value of the Canadian dollar, or the fact that there is the introduction of new taxes like the softwood lumber tax, which again hits at industries and people working in those industries in northern Ontario.

We in this party have said for many years that it is the responsibility of the government of this province to establish a long-term plan for economic development in northern Ontario, one that stresses diversification so we get away from the boom and bust in single-industry towns.

But garbage disposal is not the way to achieve economic diversity in northern Ontario. It is neither stable nor long-term as an employment source. What has happened is that many communities in northern Ontario that have been hit by reductions and closures of mines, or that cannot get the access they once had to timber plots in this province, are so desperate to take any type of employment to reduce some of the pressures in their communities that they would grab at anything. Indeed, they would grab at southern Ontario garbage as the way to have some kind of employment in their communities.

Take, for example, the Sherman mine closures, the Adams mine closures: 700 people thrown out on the street. Take a look at Elliot Lake: 2,000 people to be laid off this August. The Premier and the Treasurer have been there; not a word said about what this government is going to do to reduce the pressures in that community because of that unemployment and because of those layoffs. The Premier has not said a word.

It is not as if northern Ontario does not contribute anything to the economy of this province. In fact, if you take a look at what we do, we contribute enormously to the profits and the wealth of this province. For example, stumpage fees and other forestry revenue are going to be $100 million in 1989-90. The mining profit tax alone is going to provide $197 million of revenue in the fiscal year 1989-90.

What do we get back? In northern Ontario we get a mere $30 million over 12 years through the northern Ontario heritage fund and that is supposed to produce and promote economic development in northern Ontario. That is it; that is all.

Where has the government been on important issues like a fertilizer plant in northern Ontario, like a northern medical school to produce employment, like the manufacturing of dental and surgical equipment that we could do, using the resources we have in northern Ontario? There has been no leadership by this government when it comes to the northern economy. That is why I blame this Liberal government for putting northern communities in the position of having to take garbage as the only source and the only way that they can have employment in their communities.

In

summary, the garbage crisis is not going to be resolved by shipping garbage to northern Ontario. We need proper economic development in northern Ontario so that no municipality feels it has no choice but to accept southern Ontario garbage.

The Speaker: The member for Sault Ste Marie may wish to use the final two minutes.

Mr Morin-Strom: This resolution, I feel, and northerners feel, is a vitally important one that sets a principle that this government should be acting on. We want a government committed to the reduction, the reuse and the recycling of materials right across this province to the extent that is possible, but when it comes to that leftover garbage that has to be disposed of, that has to be the responsibility of the regions in which it is generated.

The people of the north are not going to become a wasteland for southern Ontario, and northerners find it an insult that the members of the Liberal government support the concept and the proposal from the greater Metro Toronto area that 25% of its leftover garbage should go to northern Ontario. The north will not accept that as a solution. We are not a wasteland for the south. We are an area that needs real economic development. We have a quality of life that northerners appreciate. We want to maintain that for our children and for future generations.

This is an issue where the government has to decide whose side it is on. Are they on the side of the public or they are on the side of the big developers down here in the greater Metro area who see the opportunity to make millions of dollars on the garbage generated by the population in this area? Surely rural Ontario and northern Ontario should not be foisted with this particular problem. These areas have not generated the garbage. We may have 90% of the area in the north, but we did not generate 90% of the garbage in this province and we should not take the responsibility for cleaning up the mess that Toronto is creating.

Give us real economic development in the north and allow us to maintain the quality of life we all appreciate in our area of the province.

CRIME PREVENTION

Mr Daigeler moved resolution 51:

That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that the Canadian Criminal Justice Association in their 1989 paper on safer communities has called on the provinces to play a major role in the promotion of crime prevention through social development, the government of Ontario should accept crime prevention as a significant and integral part of public policy, especially in education, housing, social services and health, and continue to create a social environment that nurtures respect for the law, peace and security of its citizens, but also addresses the root causes of crime.

The Speaker: As is the custom and as stated in the standing orders, the member has up to 10 minutes to open the discussion.

Mr Daigeler: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. As usual, you are very generous with your allocations.

It is indeed a privilege to address this House on a topic that has been dear to my heart for many years. Already in my previous work as the researcher for the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops. I was keenly interested in weaving a social fabric that promotes personal strength and responsibility and prevents crime from entering a person’s mind in the first place.

Crime prevention is an approach to fighting crime. Crime prevention through social development is an approach that overlaps, but is different from law enforcement. Most of our present efforts in Canada to fight crime tend to be through law enforcement. They use the justice system, police, prosecutors, courts and prisons to find the offenders and bring them to justice, to punish or to rehabilitate them. There is a growing recognition, however, that reduced crime in the future will come less from adding police courtrooms and cells than from measures to prevent crimes from happening in the first place.

Crime prevention programs can therefore be examined from three perspectives. The first is the so-called target-hardening. Such programs make potential victims less vulnerable. For cities there are urban designs that discourage robbery and violence. For homes and businesses there are better locks, better designs and reinforcement of vulnerable structures. For automobiles there is encouragement not to leave keys in the cars and to lock them when not in use. And of course, for people there are self-defence programs for minors, women and others often targeted for assault.

Second, there are volunteer participation programs. The best known in Canada are, of course, the Block Parent program and the Neighbourhood Watch program. These are in wide use already. I am very pleased to say that they are very, very effective in that in fact Neighbourhood Watch programs can result in lower insurance premiums for home owners, because they have been proven to be so effective.

Finally, there is the approach to crime prevention called countering deviants. The increase in antisocial deviant behaviour requires us to look at major shortcomings in our society and especially in our family and community life. Often enough, young people no longer receive the consistent and kindly guidance they need in early life to nurture development as normal and responsible members of the community.

Obviously such failings by society do not justify in any way criminal behaviour, nor, and I would like to stress this, do they explain all criminality. A high percentage, nevertheless, of crimes is attributable to a relatively small percentage of the population who have certain characteristics in common.

It is possible to supplement and support the development of this particular group with programs that give them a better chance of normal, fulfilling, contributing lives. In other words, improving the fabric of society where it is found to produce alienation helps us to prevent crime.

Federal and provincial governments so far have focused on the more traditional models of crime prevention: target-hardening and opportunity reduction, combined with a recent emphasis on citizen participation -- the cops, courts and corrections approach. I do not wish to discredit the value of these older models. Rather, my motion simply establishes social development as an essential complement, an action orientation to these traditional models.

I feel that the timing for this particular motion is a good one since as we all know, our legislative standing committee on administration of justice is currently studying a new Police Act. In fact, the committee will be sitting again this afternoon to hear from the public. One of the avowed purposes of this new law, according to the minister’s press release, is to make crime prevention, education and community-oriented services as much a part of policing as law enforcement.

In my motion and my speech today, I am pleased to draw on the work of my federal colleague, Bob Kaplan. As Solicitor General in the Trudeau cabinet, and since then, Mr Kaplan has worked tirelessly to broaden our approach to fighting crime and to alert the different levels of government to their broad responsibilities for crime prevention.

I am also heavily indebted to the Canadian Criminal Justice Association and its 1989 paper entitled Safer Communities: A Social Strategy for Crime Prevention in Canada. This association has called for a coherent, systematic strategy for effective crime prevention by tackling the social situations that cause crime.

Before I describe in greater detail some of the factors that may lead to crime, let me say three important words of caution. As I mentioned already, my resolution is complementary to, not in competition with, opportunity reduction approaches. Second, we must not ignore white-collar offences and new areas of criminal behaviour when we ask for services to those most susceptible to crime. Finally, and most importantly, every effort must be made to avoid the trap of automatic correlation.

A number of social factors can combine to increase the likelihood of a person becoming delinquent, but there is certainly no definite or automatic cause and effect relationship. Being poor, being a single mother, living in a disadvantaged area increases the risk, but these factors are but factors, by no means inevitable causes of crime.

Let me describe some of the factors that should be considered in any crime prevention effort. First, there is age. The peak period is in fact the 15- to about 18-year-old range, with persistent and serious delinquents likely to have started at an earlier age and to go beyond 18 in their delinquency. In Canada in fact, the rate of young males charged in 1981 -- the most recent statistics -- rises steadily from 10 per 1,000 at the age of 11, to 80 per 1,000 at age 14, to 165 per 1,000 at age 16.

A person’s sex is another key dimension to look at. Males are much more likely to be involved in crime than females, and that is hardly anything to be proud of since I am a representative of that sex. Of the 92,000 juveniles charged in 1981 with Criminal Code and federal offences, 83,000 were male; in other words, nine males charged for every female. It gives us something to think about.

Obviously we cannot change a person’s age or sex. The point here is to call for prevention efforts that are specifically targeted towards the most vulnerable group, namely, the segment of our population that is approximately between 15 and 25 and male.

According to studies analysed by the Canadian Criminal Justice Association, other factors that can make a big difference include early childhood experiences, parenting styles, circle of friends, education, employment, housing and marital relations.

The parenting characteristics most strongly associated with delinquency are parental criminality, inconsistent, uncaring parenting, family discord and disharmony, and weak parent-child relationships.

Since we are getting very close to the time allocated for me, let me conclude my point here by saying that crime prevention through social development will require many changes in attitudes, programs and plans. It means carefully targeted intervention in the family, schools, youth employment and housing. It means co-ordination of our policies for justice, teaching, training, health, leisure and social welfare. Above all, however, it means our determination at Queen’s Park to make crime prevention through social development an important focus of our priorities. I invite members’ support for this effort.

The Speaker: The next 45 minutes will be divided equally among the three parties.

Mr Kormos: Mr Speaker, I should tell you and the member that we will be supporting the resolution. We applaud its spirit. We applaud its intent. It brings to mind the old Anatole France quote. It has been quoted many times, but as many times as it has been quoted it has been misquoted, so maybe it is time to put on the record the correct comment made by Anatole France just prior to the turn of the century, “The majestic egalitarianism of the law, which forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.”

This resolution, with its intent, brings that old, oft-used quote to mind, but it also brings to mind some of the immediate shortcomings and some of the things that the member, in moving his resolution and in speaking to it, really brings to the forefront.

We have had imposed upon us, by virtue of the political will of the federal government, a Young Offenders Act. The member is quite right. There is a grossly disproportionate number of young people, youthful people, children involved in the criminal justice system. The Young Offenders Act, in an attempt to address that, of course embraces youngsters up to and including the age of 17.

There are whole big chunks of people out there in the community who find little solace in the fact that it was but a young offender who broke into and vandalized their home, who assaulted them, who caused mischief to their property or who robbed the corner store, the Becker’s, the Mac’s milk or the 7 Eleven in the late hours of the evening.

The young offender who is 16 or 17 years old may well be a six-foot 200-pounder with the names of any number of previous paramours tattooed on his biceps. There are big chunks of the community who find it difficult to understand how that particular type of offender should be accorded special treatment, especially when the courts in this country have, prior to the passage of the Young Offenders Act, given special treatment to and shown leniency towards youthful offenders and among others, as others here will know, to youthful first offenders.

Let’s forget for the briefest of moments that perhaps to consider a 16- or 17-year-old, at least in many cases, a young offender is an absurdity in the minds of most people.

Let’s look at the potential that the Young Offenders Act created for the type of intervention that has been spoken of, because what the Young Offenders Act did for offenders from the age of 12 onwards was to provide that there could be an emphasis on rehabilitation rather than punishment, that there could be an emphasis on treatment and addressing problem areas rather than merely imprisonment for the purpose of creating deterrents. Sadly, the responsibility for generating those programs, although the responsibility was created by the federal government, rests with the provincial government. What do we find in this province now?

We find open custody facilities lacking, day after day, month after month, from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. We find judges wringing their hands, receiving psychological reports about these 12-, 13-, 14-, 15-year-old children describing the emotional and psychological problems that can and should be addressed. We find judges wringing their hands because the facilities are not being provided by this province.

If we want to talk about disproportionate representation, yes, there is a disproportionate number of young people involved in the criminal justice system. When you look at those young people, you find kids who are illiterate, kids who are dyslexic, kids who have been abused, mishandled and mistreated in any number of ways. The government has an opportunity to intervene. It has an opportunity to change their lives. It has an opportunity to steer them towards treatment or education. It has an opportunity to influence them with positive role models.

I am prepared to accept that this was at least in part the intent of the Young Offenders Act and the fact that it created open custody facilities and the variety of dispositions that are available to a sentencing judge. Yet it remains that as I said just moments ago, it is true today, right now, in the province of Ontario, it being 11:15, I know there are young offender judges sitting in despair with a youngster, a child in front of them who cannot be helped, and those judges have to say to themselves, and as often as not are saying it publicly, that the province has failed in its responsibility to provide these programs.

There is absolutely no excuse for a province as affluent as this is to have youngsters 12, 13 and 14 years old who remain illiterate. There is absolutely no excuse for young people to suffer from disorders like dyslexia and not be able to obtain treatment. There is absolutely no excuse for youngsters to be abused and mistreated and to show the symptoms and the scars of that, if only in their misconduct, and yet to be denied the therapy, treatment and care that should rightly be theirs.

It is not some long-term goal that we should be looking at here, and that, quite frankly, is what this resolution implies. It is the reality of the present moment when this government, these Liberals, the Premier and his cabinet, have deserted those young people in need of care, treatment and assistance.

It does not take a whole lot of investigation to understand, and there has been a lot of writing and learned discussion about this, that once a kid gets into the criminal justice system and gets labelled, gets marked, the recidivism factor starts to become effective almost immediately. You find kids who may well not be able to remove themselves from that criminal justice system, who find themselves caught up in what is virtually its revolving-door syndrome.

The fact is that in 1990 Ontario there is little room for kids or young people or adults who are illiterate. The fact is that these people do not fit into the mainstream of the community and find themselves on the margin, on the periphery, time after time and subsequently find themselves forced into activity which is criminal.

Again, none of this is to diminish the unfairness of all this to the victims. We have to become increasingly aware of the importance of responding to victims’ needs. It is ironic that this resolution by a Liberal member would come so soon after 31 May, and indeed 30 May, when there were questions and statements in this Legislature about one Timothy Garland.

Do you remember that, Mr Speaker? He is a 27-year-old convicted child molester who is due to be released some 20 days after that date. He is going to be out in a matter of a week or so, untreated, uncared for, uncontrolled, a man who in his prison cell had started writing a list of the names of the little girls who were going to be his next victims, actually describing the horrors that he was going to impose on them.

Yet this government was unresponsive to questions and to issues raised when concerns were expressed. The people of the city of Brampton are concerned. That is where this Garland is from. This creep is going to be roaming the streets of Brampton, and who knows where else in southern Ontario, untreated and committed, quite frankly, to committing more sexual crimes against children.

Here was an opportunity to perform some effective intervention to save some victims and to participate in treatment, but for Garland there was no treatment forthcoming. The government just shrugs. The government just says, “Well, maybe next time.” That is simply not enough because that is not an adequate response to the victim of next time and to the parents and family of that victim of next time.

So the spirit of this resolution we support. But at the same time we point out -- and one would only hope that the government members would be sensitive to it as well, not just be sensitive but do something about it, act on it. The opportunity is there. The fact is that for young people who are being drawn into the criminal justice system, the legislation provides for treatment, rehabilitation, therapy and educational programs right here and now. But the Premier and these Liberals and this government have been thoroughly irresponsible. They have been delinquent, they have been criminal, in their refusal to develop those same programs as they ought to have.

Mr D. W. Smith: I want to make some comments and express support for the private member’s resolution put forth by the member for Nepean, a resolution on crime prevention. With the rapid growth of urban centres, the ready availability of dangerous illegal drugs and what some would describe as a decline in traditional family values in our society, it is more important than ever that government strengthen its stand in support of crime prevention.

As parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Correctional Services, I am honoured to be part of an administration that is active in the prevention of crime. In this role, I have been exposed to the suffering of those whose lives are touched by crime, those who have suffered personally as victims, those who have suffered indirectly, such as the families and friends of victims, and those who are themselves caught up in the criminal justice web. It touches even the average citizens of this province, who are called upon to support police, the courts and correctional programs through their tax dollars.

There are a good many reasons for the government to become involved in programs geared to preventing first offences, particularly among our young people, who may be more likely to be lured into criminal activity by curiosity, peer pressure or boredom, and I would just like to expand a little bit on those three things.

I think of the three children that we have raised or are raising -- our youngest is still 16. You have to keep children at that age, I would say from 10 to 16 or 18, entertained. You have to have them doing something because their minds are very active, and certainly they have got lots of energy to burn off. I think it is a parent’s duty to work at those young people or with those young people as much as they can. I know in some cases this is very difficult, but I think there is a big onus on us as parents to deal with them.

I can think back to my younger days. If I am going to put that age bracket there, I guess I am going back at least 40 years. When you think of the different opportunities you have had from your own peers to maybe put a dare to you and say, “Do you want to do this? Will we go and try and steal an apple?” or something like that, that sometimes is the start that gets us all into trouble.

But I want to say too to those young people that you have to be able to evaluate just what is good for you at that moment and what may be good for you in the long run. I certainly think if you have got into trouble once, maybe you have run amiss of the law, you should not take the attitude that they are out to get you after that, because we all get into that wrong place at the wrong time from time to time. So I think I am going to say in my own personal way that we, as parents, have to do a lot in the crime prevention area.

But I believe in developing such programs. There are some lessons that can be taken from the correctional system in its attempts to prevent the recurrence of crime. We see in the correctional system people who are poor, people who lack the basic educational life skills to cope with the working world. We see people who are functionally illiterate, a term that describes as many as 70 per cent of those under institutional custody in this province. We see people with learning disabilities that have not been addressed by the mainstream educational system.

We see people who are mentally and emotionally handicapped, people who have suffered abuse and neglect, people who are addicted to alcohol and drugs, people who have never been exposed to constructive leisure-time activity.

Education is certainly one answer to crime prevention, ensuring that citizens know and understand the law, ensuring that young people are aware of the pitfalls of negative lifestyle habits such as drugs and alcohol, ensuring that drivers are plainly aware of the consequences of impaired driving in graphic detail. I believe the police has a video now that you can take. If you have been given a certain charge, you may not have to pay the fine if you are willing to go and watch this very graphic video. It may teach you a lesson so that you will not want to do the thing you have just been charged with.

Deterrence may also have some effect on crime prevention. The range of sanctions available to provincial judges presently include probation, community service orders, restitution orders, electronic monitoring, community residential supervision and institutional custody. But also the ministry is committed to expanding the range of options, particularly those in the community where the deterrent value of restricting personal freedom can be coupled with positive opportunities for rehabilitation.

Treatment can be a major contributor to crime prevention, making sure those with mental health problems have access to clinical services and support networks that they need in order to keep them out of trouble with the law.

Community participation is another important force in crime prevention. This has been demonstrated through programs such as Neighbourhood Watch, Block Parents, police auxiliary and other areas. In Correctional Services we have actively sought and received the support of thousands of volunteers to work with offenders both on the streets and in our jails and correctional centres. At this moment we have over 5,000 volunteers who are willing to work with the clientele we have in some of our correctional institutions and jails.

As a society, we have many responses to the problems to crime, but it is not sufficient to address these problems after the fact. The solutions need to be incorporated as part of a comprehensive preventive strategy in every facet of government interaction with the public: education, health care, social services, labour practices, culture and recreation, even tourism. I sometimes think myself that the sectors of society are so out of balance one with the other that that may be the real economic problem that causes some of our problems out there.

By sensitizing all areas of government to the need to adopt crime prevention strategy as part of their programs and service delivery, I believe we can make a positive difference to the safety and security of every Ontario citizen.

Mr Wildman: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Just before I intervene in the debate, I would like to know, if the members of the Conservative caucus are not going to participate in the debate, is it possible to share their time with other members of the other two caucuses?

The Deputy Speaker: Yes, it is possible.

Mr Wildman: In that case then, how much time would I have?

The Deputy Speaker: Fifteen minutes.

Mr Wildman: I am not suggesting that I should take all of theirs. I am suggesting it could be shared between the other two.

The Deputy Speaker: I think we shall wait until the end in case some Tory members come up at the end. If at the end there is still 15 minutes, then at that point I shall share among the members the time.

Mr Wildman: But then people who have spoken would not be able to speak a second time.

Mr Kormos: Maybe the Conservatives are not concerned about crime.

The Deputy Speaker: Does your party still have some time left?

Mr Wildman: We have four minutes, but that is all.

I will participate briefly then. I commend the member for bringing forward the resolution. I understand the intent and I am very much in favour of it. But I think there is a danger in concentrating on statistics, because statistics can indeed show us that crimes, particularly violent crimes or crimes against property, are more often committed by young males who perhaps have not functioned well in our education system, for instance, than by other groups in society.

It might also indicate that certain ethnic groups might more often be charged and/or convicted than others, and there is a danger in extrapolating too much from those statistics. In my area of the province it could indeed be argued that if you are a young male Indian, you are more likely to become involved with the criminal justice system than if you are an older female of Anglo-Saxon background.

I think that is a very dangerous line to get into. Surely the intent of the resolution and the purpose for bringing it forward is to look at the reasons why certain groups might become involved with the criminal justice system more often than others and then to move to determine how we deal with those reasons and what should be done in our education system, in our provision of housing, in our training for jobs and in our economic system to try to change those propensities.

In essence, what we are talking about, I think, in this resolution is a social and an economic revolution, because if one were to argue that people who are poor are more often likely to become involved with the criminal justice system, or people who do not have a lot of work skills, or people who speak a different language or do not have the proficiency of literacy, or people who live in substandard housing or have suffered from family violence or have been exposed to alcoholism or drug abuse, then what we are saying is that we have to move to a better education system that meets the needs of those people, a social system that integrates those people into society, a system of provision of housing that ensures that those people are provided with decent housing and a system that deals with the problems of socialization that will deal with violence in our society.

In essence, what we are talking about is empowering the weak, and our system would then be threatened, because by empowering the weak we threaten the powerful. I am in favour of doing that. I think that this society indeed in many ways needs to be turned upside down, but I doubt very much that this government or any government, despite its good intentions, is prepared to do what is necessary to make those enormous changes in society that might indeed deal with the alienation that many groups feel in order to feel that they are integrated and are part of this society and have a role to play.

Mr Kanter: I am going to be speaking in support of the motion. I note that it deals with crime prevention and talks about a number of different public agencies that should be involved in crime prevention. While I certainly agree that education, housing, social services and health have significant roles to play, I would like to focus particularly on the important and positive role that the police can and should play in crime prevention.

I would like to speak briefly about community-based policing as an approach, about initiatives of the Ministry of the Solicitor General in the area of community-based policing and about some of the specific initiatives of Bill 107 with respect to community-based policing and crime prevention.

I think the philosophy, the approach to crime prevention is of particular importance here, and I think it raises some very basic questions. What is our best defence against disorder or crime? I would agree with the mover of the motion that it is the family at base. It is community institutions, schools and hospitals.

But I would submit that the police do have an important role to play. I think that policing is more than law enforcement or responding to calls for service. I think that the police have a role to play in helping people to improve and protect their neighbourhoods, that the police should work with citizens and help them identify and solve their problems.

What happens when crime occurs or perhaps occurs frequently in a neighbourhood? I think that community-based policing then has an important role to play. Community-based policing is not soft on crime, and I think that community-based policing makes law enforcement more effective.

Some very interesting research on this subject has been done in some jurisdictions, and I would particularly like to bring the attention of the House to a series of publications called Perspectives on Policing, which are published at Harvard University. They result from seminars between police officers, police chiefs, local municipal officers, academics and community leaders.

I think that kind of interchange between the police and various parts of the community on subjects like crime prevention is extremely helpful and should be done more frequently here in Ontario. I think that this research shows that more criminals are caught by information provided by citizens when policing is done in a community-based way.

Police forces in Ontario have established an excellent reputation for integrity and efficiency, but to maintain that reputation I think police forces have to put more attention on problem-solving, consultation with the community they serve and accountability to the community they serve, and I think that is starting to happen.

I would like to spend the rest of my time outlining some of the initiatives of the Ministry of the Solicitor General and some of the initiatives in Bill 107 that promote crime prevention from the police perspective, bearing in mind that it has a broader perspective, the perspective that the member for Nepean referred to in his motion, of other community-based institutions as well.

The Ministry of the Solicitor General has recently established a new division, the policing services division. It has the mandate for crime prevention initiatives in this ministry. I think it is important to note that this government has shown leadership in the responsibility for initiatives in policing. That is something that did not happen before. I had the privilege of serving in the past as parliamentary assistant to the Solicitor General and it was a time of great change and expansion within the ministry.

Rather than just reacting to the problems that particularly some smaller local police forces experienced, it was a time of taking initiatives, at looking at standards, new programs and new organization to reflect this new concern.

There is now a new policing services division. It has the mandate for crime prevention initiatives. A project manager has been assigned. There is a province-wide network of both police and civilian practitioners known as Crime Prevention Ontario which is supported by the provincial Ministry of the Solicitor General. The ministry is putting more emphasis on crime prevention programming. It is developing resource manuals, both for police officers and community groups, and I understand these will be released later this month at the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police conference which takes place, as I said, later this month.

The ministry is working with other groups concerned with drinking and driving, anti-drug strategy, the crime prevention committee that I mentioned and the Retail Council of Canada loss prevention committee, so the Ministry of the Solicitor General is getting involved in crime prevention. The ministry recognizes the importance of crime prevention and is actively pursuing the concept of crime prevention through community development, one component of social development that the resolution speaks to.

The idea of community-based policing -- and I think, again, the mover of the motion referred to this -- the fact that there are different ways of approaching community-based policing, some of them things like target hardening, others a more preventive approach.

I must say, as a municipal politician before I was elected to this Legislature, I certainly took

part in Neighbourhood Watch programs and programs of that type. I was concerned that their perspective, while important, may have been limited and incomplete, and I think the motion recognizes the complete range of initiatives we have to take if we want to be effective in crime prevention.

I want to conclude my remarks by making a few comments about Bill 107. It is important, I think, as our committee hearings progress, that we spend most of our time listening to deputations. There has not really been a lot of opportunity for members to speak to this point, but I want to emphasize at least three ways in which crime prevention is very explicitly promoted by Bill 107, as we move from a Police Act that emphasizes law enforcement responding to crime to a Police Services Act that includes crime prevention as one of those services.

First, in terms of the responsibilities of the Solicitor General, he has a very much expanded responsibility to develop and promote programs for community-oriented police services. As I have said, community-oriented services include crime prevention. Second, there is a clarification, a very substantial clarification, of the role of municipal police services boards, the successors to the police commissions, a civilian group which must be in place in every municipality to direct the policy of the police force. This municipal police services board has explicit responsibility under the act.

Section 31: “A board is responsible for the provision of police services and for law enforcement and crime prevention in the municipality,” and it goes on to expand and elucidate how that should be done. Again, that is a major initiative.

The third aspect is probably the most significant. The bill spells out the obligations of police chiefs and police officers for the very first time. The duties of a police officer occur in

section 42 of the bill, “preserving the peace,” and clause 42(1)(b), “preventing crimes and other offences and providing assistance and encouragement to other persons in their prevention.”

I support the motion. I think that the philosophy behind it has been ably explained by my colleague, and I think that the importance has been recognized by the Ministry of the Solicitor General, particularly with the introduction of Bill 107, which is now before the standing committee on administration of justice.

The Deputy Speaker: As there is a 15-minute period available to the third party and nobody is here yet, I would like to be as fair as possible. I would like at this time to find out who would like to have some of that 15-minute period. The member for Algoma has indicated, even though he has already spoken, that he would like part of that 15 minutes. Is there unanimous consent to allow him to speak?

Agreed to.

The Deputy Speaker: Who else would like to speak, if anybody else?

Mr Wildman: Give some to the member for Nepean.

The Deputy Speaker: Of course, the end closure for the two minutes.

Mr Wildman: We could give him more time.

The Deputy Speaker: Would the member for Nepean want more time than his two minutes to end up?

Mr Daigeler: Yes, if possible.

The Deputy Speaker: How much?

Mr Daigeler: Well, we will just go on, and if there is time left --

The Deputy Speaker: In that case, why do we not split the 15 minutes both ways? Would that be fair enough? The member for Algoma for seven and a half minutes.

Mr Wildman: I appreciate the agreement of the members to allow us to use the time and to allow me to speak a second time, which is quite irregular. I am sure the absence of the members of the third party in this debate is not an indication of their feelings about the motion. I know it is out of order to talk about the absence of a member in the House. I would just say that it probably means acquiescence and agreement to the motion.

Mr Daigeler: That is putting a good face on it.

Mr Dietsch: So when you miss the votes, that means you agree.

Mr Wildman: I would not extrapolate too far. I was talking about the danger of doing that a moment ago.

I do want to raise a couple of other problems that I think are spoken to in this resolution. I think my friend the member for Nepean indicated that in his view, I think he used the term “cops, courtrooms and cells” had not been very successful in dealing with crime in our society, and I agree with that. That is not a criticism of the police or the people who serve the bar, the people who serve on the bench, or the people who are involved in the correctional system. It is just that in dealing with policing we are talking about enforcement, we are talking about after the fact; we are not talking about prevention.

It is almost similar to the health care system, where we deal with curative medicine and do very little in preventive health care.

The Deputy Speaker: We have a Conservative who has just shown up.

Mr Wildman: The problem with the resolution is, I do not know how we identity the cause of crime or the causes of crime in our society. For that matter, we do not even define what we mean by “crime.” Are we talking about a whole spectrum, all the way from youthful vandalism, a minor crime against property, all the way up to more dangerous types of criminal activity or unlawful activity, illegal activity, such as break and enter, robbery, stealing, to violent crimes of assault and even murder? What do we mean by “crime”? Are we being all-encompassing?

Frankly, a number of the things that many of us may have done in our youth which may have violated municipal bylaws or have even been a minor violation of the law to protect property, in my view, does not make the perpetrators criminals.

Oftentimes, people become involved with the justice system and are convicted of offences simply because they are unaware of their own rights before the justice system. Many times people pay the price of poor education or being unaware. I think that we have to be very careful in this resolution as to what we mean by crime and also in identifying what causes people to become involved with the justice system.

I said that I agree that cops, courtrooms and cells have failed. They have failed in our society because we have an enormously high recidivism rate. People who are convicted and serve time, more often than not, within a not-very-long period of time are back before the justice system, before the courts, and are incarcerated once again. Rehabilitation, for whatever reason, has not been successful in most cases.

Most people who are convicted are, in fact, incarcerated with little or no psychological treatment. We are, in fact, just punishing people or keeping them off the street for a period of time; we are not in any way empowering them or influencing them to a different approach to life after they are released. We do not provide the facilities and the personnel that is required to educate people and to deal with their psychological and social problems. If we do not do that, we cannot fulfil the purpose of this resolution.

It is not just money. Obviously, we need to provide more funding for these kinds of services in our society. It is partly attitudinal, as the member for Nepean indicated. We have to be willing to do that, to be concerned about it. We cannot just want to punish people or keep them locked away. We have to try to determine why and who might become involved with the justice system, who might become a problem for himself or herself and for the society, and then be able to deal with those people.

This is a very, very big issue. I congratulate the member for bringing it forward before the House.

But I want to ensure that we all recognize that we are talking about major change, not just adjustments in how the police operate, in our society. Perhaps crime, like the poor, will always be with us. But as long as we accept that the poor are always with us, I submit that crime indeed will always be with us. Are we willing to attack the type of economic and social system that we have for so long accepted that indeed means that some people are poor, ill-educated and vulnerable in our society, while others are wealthy, well-educated and strong?

I appreciate the additional time.

I note that there is a member of the third party here. I hope that person will be able to participate in the debate.

I appreciate the member for Nepean allowing me to participate, as I have done.

Mrs Marland: Mr Speaker, I assume that although our party missed its turn, I may have some time. Is that correct?

The Deputy Speaker: We have seven and a half minutes on the clock. Is there agreement to that?

Agreed to.

Mrs Marland: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I will leave time for the mover of the resolution to sum up since he was anticipating that. May I apologize, first of all, that there was not anyone here from our caucus to speak in the normal rotation this morning. In my own case, we have had a small emergency in our office, so I am here pinch-hitting.

I want to read into the record, however, preceding my comments, the resolution of Mr Daigeler: “That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that the Canadian Criminal Justice Association in their 1989 paper on Safer Communities has called on the provinces to play a major role in the promotion of crime prevention through social development, the government of Ontario should accept crime prevention as a significant and integral part of public policy, especially in education, housing, social services and health, and continue to create a social environment that nurtures respect for the law, peace and security of its citizens, but also addresses the root causes of crime.”

This is a very creditable resolution. I congratulate the member for Nepean for bringing it to the House. I think it is also significant that the member for Nepean is a member of the government and he is giving a message through this resolution to his own government. I think it is important that a statement is being made here that we look at, as the words say, “the root causes of crime.”

It is encouraging to note that in the wording the “especially” emphasis is in education, housing, social services and health. It is really refreshing to see for once that we are not attacking the policing of our province or the police officers throughout all the forces in Ontario with the problems of crime prevention.

I see this as a progressive approach to thinking, because too often -- I may emphasize far too often -- in the last few years the attack on the police forces in Ontario when we are dealing with crime has been, in my opinion, unjust. We have had situations where police officers are in fact dealing with the end result of the voids in these areas that are so well addressed in this resolution, those areas of education, housing, social services and health. If we were to deal with those areas as priorities, I am quite sure that the job of policing in the total package of crime prevention would be made easier.

I always stand with pride to commend those people who are at the end of the problem dealing with criminality in our communities. Those people who serve to enforce law and keep all of us safe never receive the recognition that they deserve.

I know there are different problems in different areas with different individuals, as there are in every job and vocation in this province today, but I feel that we should make the emphasis that is being recommended in this resolution in terms of crime prevention, and make the job easier at the other end in dealing with those people who commit the crimes and the people who serve to deal with those people in the criminal events.

The police officers, the men and women of this province who serve to protect all of us, I am sure, would be very happy today to see a resolution of a government member suggesting that there are other ways to deliver programs of crime prevention in Ontario today. I look forward to supporting the resolution.

Mr Daigeler: Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak. I guess I have four minutes now, with my closing two minutes and the two minutes that are left.

The Deputy Speaker: Three and a half.

Mr Daigeler: Let me thank, first of all, the members and the member for Mississauga South in particular who came in and I would say perhaps saved the credibility of the third party, because I do think the issue I raised is a very important one for public policy generally in this province and in fact in the country. It is recognized by the criminal justice association of Canada itself that we have to look at crime in a global and comprehensive fashion.

I would like to particularly thank as well the member for Algoma. As it happens, I must say I agree with him quite a bit. Perhaps one of the reasons I agree with him so much is that he has some very close relatives from Nepean and in fact those relatives are good Liberals. Perhaps that is where the connection comes in with the member for Algoma.

When he says we have to be very careful about statistics and drawing correlations too quickly, I absolutely agree with him. In fact, I stressed this in my speech. The member may not have been here at this particular point. It is certainly not in any way an automatic relationship between certain social characteristics such as poverty or single parenthood that they automatically lead to delinquency.

Nevertheless, we cannot fail to recognize the statistics that show, on the one hand, that we have certain factors -- very highly concentrated public housing areas, income levels that are very low, education levels that are not very advanced -- and, on the other hand, that we have people who have committed crimes. So while we have to be very careful not to say that if you are poor, therefore it will lead to delinquency, that we must avoid that, at the same time, and here again I agree with the member for Algoma, it does point out that we must be reformist or, as he has said, radical in our approach towards social policy.

While we may not have started a revolution and while we may not be able or want to start a revolution, I do agree with him that we want to start a reform. In fact, one of the purposes of my motion is to encourage the continuation of the reform that we have already started, especially the social assistance reforms that, with the support of the whole House, were initiated by the former Minister of Community and Social Services, the member for Kitchener-Wilmot.

I do simply, with my motion, want to encourage all of the different ministries to look at their efforts towards social change in a very, very broad perspective, that it is not just of interest to their own particular ministries but that it has impact even on such things as delinquency, in particular also in the area of education, where early childhood education is so extremely important to set people on the right road towards responsibility in life later on. I am very pleased that the throne speech in fact has those goals set out.

The Deputy Speaker: This completes the time allocated for the debate on Mr Daigeler’s resolution.

WASTE DISPOSAL

The Deputy Speaker: We shall first deal with Mr Morin-Strom’s resolution. Mr Morin-Strom has moved resolution 53.

All those in favour will please say “aye.”

All those opposed will please say “nay.”

In my opinion, the nays have it.

We will have the vote deferred for a few minutes.

Vote deferred.

CRIME PREVENTION

The Deputy Speaker: Mr Daigeler has moved resolution 54.

Motion agreed to.

WASTE DISPOSAL

The House divided on Mr Morin-Strom’s motion, which was negatived on the following vote:

Ayes -- 13

Allen, Bryden, Charlton, Farnan, Hampton, Kormos, Mackenzie, Martel, Morin-Strom, Nixon, J. B., Philip, E., Pouliot, Wildman.

Nays -- 28

Adams, Bossy, Brown, Carrothers, Cleary, Cordiano, Curling, Daigeler, Dietsch, Elliot, Faubert, Fleet, Hošek, Kanter, Keyes, Leone, Mahoney, Mancini, Marland, Miller, Oddie Munro, Owen, Pelissero, Pollock, Ray, M. C., Reycraft, Roberts, Tatham.

The House adjourned at 1213.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1330.

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

PRIVATIZATION OF LABORATORY TESTING

Mr Kormos: Mr Speaker, let me tell you one more

chapter in the health care horror show that the Liberals here in this provincial government are creating for people in Ontario.

As of 16 April 1990, at the Welland County General Hospital all lab testing of non-pre-operative patients is being contracted out. These services, which were originally provided internally and for which the facilities are there, are ones for which the hospital does not receive subsidization from the Ministry of Health. At the same time, when they are contracted out so that patients have to travel to private labs operating in the city of Welland, OHIP will pay for the lab procedure on a per-procedure basis.

It is incredible. In fact, some five employees have been displaced in the hospital as a result of this transfer of responsibility. In the last two years, five jobs have been eliminated because of what amounts to privatization of a service that ought to be provided by the hospital. It is nonsensical and indeed it is stupid that the Ministry of Health would be paying private labs to do a service that could be performed properly and appropriately in the hospital, but the problem is that it would rather finance and subsidize private corporations than its own health care system.

NATIONAL UNITY DAY

We encourage our national leaders, who are struggling daily with the current constitutional crisis, to take note of this very special event.

AIR QUALITY

Mr Tatham: The Los Angeles basin contains some of North America’s dirtiest smoggy air, but they are going to try three small activities to fight smog. The most unusual is the electric street planned for a

section of Los Angeles by the city’s department of water and power and Southern California Edison, a local utility. Each is putting up $1 million.

It will involve stringing electric cables beneath 1,000 feet of roadway in a West Los Angeles development called Plaza Vista. The cables would be used to power electric vehicles that run on the roadway and to recharge their batteries. Initially, two modified vans and a specially designed electric passenger bus will ply the street. The vehicles are expected to operate within about a 20-mile radius of the development.

Second, Santa Barbara will soon be operating two electric buses, no wires overhead or underground, using self-contained batteries.

Third, Unocal, a Los Angeles-based oil company, will spend $5 million by giving $700 to the first 7,000 people who come forward with pre-1971 clunkers. The sellers will also be provided with a free bus pass for one month.

High-watt highways would be difficult in freeze-thaw Ontario, but fresh air is precious.

GOOD NEIGHBOUR AWARDS

Mr Farnan: Today I wish to applaud the leadership of the Cambridge Times for organizing the 1990 Good Neighbour Awards. These awards recognize the outstanding contributions of individuals, groups and businesses to environmental awareness in the Cambridge community.

Brian Reid, the editor of the Cambridge Times, was the driving force behind this project. His concept was accepted and supported by the Times publisher, Jim Merriam, and his staff. The response of the Cambridge community was enthusiastic.

The purpose of the project was to get beyond the enumeration of the threats that exist to our natural environment and to celebrate the vast number of local citizens who have altered our lifestyles or developed new ideas and projects to help turn things around. These range from new corporate policies to changes in family lifestyle to students’ environmental projects. The award recipients ranged in age from elementary school children to seniors, and the awards ceremonies were well attended and meticulously planned.

It is expected of a community newspaper that it keep the residents informed on matters of community concern, and the Cambridge Times does this very well indeed. However, the community is blessed when the media go beyond this role and in a constructive and positive manner highlight the accomplishments of environmental role models.

So often we feel overwhelmed by the enormous environmental problems that we must face. However, the Good Neighbour Awards program initiated by the Times gives us hope that we can meet and overcome these environmental challenges. I would urge the Times to make this an annual event, and on behalf of the entire Cambridge community we salute the management and staff of the Cambridge Times.

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK

Mrs Marland: Sunday 10 June marks the beginning of National Access Awareness Week, which has been designated to inform the public about the problems facing disabled persons. The theme for the week is, “Independence -- That’s Living.”

It was a very special Canadian, Rick Hansen, who proposed National Access Awareness Week as a means for the public to learn about the importance of integrating persons with disabilities into all areas of society. We have come far in accommodating the special needs of disabled persons in Ontario. For instance, access to public and commercial buildings has been greatly improved, transit services have been developed in most urban areas, and employment opportunities have been broadened.

But we still have a long way to go. Disabled persons living in rural areas do not have adequate transportation services, and those in some urban areas have to book rides several days in advance. The number of people requiring attendant care exceeds the supply by 3 to 10 times. We are waiting for the government to fulfil promises regarding employment equity, integrated housing and support services.

During National Access Awareness Week, it is important for us all to review access to employment opportunities, financial security, transportation, buildings and recreation. Only with full access can disabled persons achieve the independence that is necessary to lead a full and enriched life.

HERITAGE CONCERT

Mr Dietsch: It is with great pleasure that I rise today to inform my colleagues in this House of a very special concert taking place in my riding this evening. The Peninsula Music Club Orchestra and I are proud to co-sponsor a heritage concert to benefit the British Methodist Episcopal Church restoration fund.

The church, located at 92 Geneva Street in St Catharines, will be celebrating its 135th anniversary in November. It has played an integral role in the history of our city. Originally built by runaway slaves who had fled the American south, the church was closely tied to activities of Harriet Tubman, one of the most famous conductors of the underground railroad during the early and mid-l880s. Today the church continues to serve as a place of worship as well as a guardian of black heritage and culture in our community.

The program will feature the talents of the Peninsula Music Club Orchestra, the Laura Secord Quintet, the Garden City Brass Quintet and the Workman Gospel Quartet as well as performances by the members of the British Methodist Episcopal Church congregation.

I would like members to join with me in expressing my deep appreciation to the numerous businesses within our community who so generously donated to the fund to help make this evening possible. We give special thanks to Helen Smith of the BME church, whose drive and determination will make this restoration project a reality.

TAXATION

Mr Hampton: From time to time in our work representing our constituents, we meet a constituent who focuses our attention on the real world. Recently I received a letter from a constituent who asks, “Why is our tax system the way it is?” She gave me permission to read part of her letter, because I think it says a lot about the tax system we have here in Ontario. She says:

“I have a problem to understand about taxes, why the poor have to pay more taxes than the wealthy. I am a widow. I live in my own house. My pension is only $11,940 a year. I am 64 years old. I had to retire last year on account of poor health. My back gave out. I used to be a housekeeper in the hospital.

“They say that the poverty line is $15,000 a year, so it means I live under the poverty line. I don’t have any other income, only my pensions: Canada pension and a hospital pension. When I filled out the income tax this year, I had to pay $967. How come?

“I cannot live in poverty. I cannot eat good. One pension I save to pay property taxes and house insurance. At the end of the year I need $2,000 just to pay the property taxes, the house insurance and the income tax. The other pension I live on. But I don’t eat well. I don’t eat meat. Last week I went to the doctor because I wasn’t feeling well. He told me it’s because I’m not eating very well. I should eat better.”

MINISTRY OF NATURAL RESOURCES STAFF DAY

Mr Jackson: I read in today’s Toronto Sun newspaper that the Minister of Natural Resources has cancelled her now-famous fun-in-the-sun staff picnic which I raised in the House two days ago. At that time, I suggested to the minister that forcing civil servants to attend an all-day pool party and steak barbecue could hardly be considered a service to the taxpaying public. I can only assume from the minister’s decision that she agrees with me.

The minister has indicated that the focus of that day, as opposed to the cost, was her primary concern. We are reminded on an annual basis by the Provincial Auditor that the cost to the taxpayer has never been a major concern to this government, be it the cost of a picnic or a policy, the dry-cleaning or the Christmas parties of cabinet ministers. The Premier and his cabinet seem to think that simply because they hiked tax revenues by 132% since taking office they can spend it any way they please.

That attitude is unacceptable, particularly at a time when, because of those tax hikes, taxpayers have to do more with less and when in spite of those tax hikes our hospitals, universities, school boards and other agencies are being asked to do more with less.

The minister’s decision provides us with a rare demonstration of common sense on the part of a member of the Peterson cabinet. However, like the Premier’s own sudden case of pre-election morality, I suspect that this decision is more the product of political expedience than it is of good judgement.

TOWN OF DRYDEN

Mr Miclash: A couple of weeks ago I took pride in handing out to my colleagues in the House a supplement to Trade and Commerce magazine 1990, entitled Dryden, Town of the Decade.

Dryden is truly the town of the decade. Situated in the centre of my riding, it services some 10,000 people. It has grown and prospered with a solid foundation in the forest industry. As well, the town has been blessed with insightful leadership and more than competent municipal administration to create an appealing and privileged community, complete with all the amenities of any major community.

When it comes to the people of Dryden, I must only refer to the comments made by my colleague the member for Peterborough, who after his first visit to the town said, “I can report that the residents of this important part of the province are enthusiastic, hardworking, well organized and extremely well informed.” I share his comments.

During visits to Dryden by my fellow caucus members, cabinet members and the Premier, we are often quoted the town’s motto: “Dryden is carved from the wilderness and progressing with the wise use of natural resources.” The mayor, Tommy Jones, is always quick to point out that its most valued natural resource is its citizens, and as witnessed by both visitor and resident, Dryden is a great little town with a sense of community.

Might I ask that my fellow colleagues join me in congratulating this, the first ever town of the decade.

Hon Mr Ward: I wonder if we could have unanimous consent to honour Portuguese National Day.

The Speaker: I will put your request to the members. Is there unanimous consent?

Agreed to.

PORTUGUESE NATIONAL DAY

Hon Mr Wong: Today marks the annual celebration of Portuguese National Day. It is a time to celebrate Portuguese life in Ontario. It is also a time to stop and reflect on what it means to live in our great province.

This government is committed to ensuring that all the people of Ontario have the opportunity to participate fully in our multicultural society while retaining and sharing their identities and cultures. As Minister of Citizenship and minister responsible for multiculturalism, I have the responsibility to oversee our progress towards this goal and to serve as an advocate for our multicultural communities to my cabinet colleagues.

Multiculturalism is a reality in Ontario, lived daily by people of diverse cultures and races. It embraces the rich cultural and racial heritage of every person in our province. This dynamic concept of multiculturalism embraces those in the Portuguese community.

It is especially significant that by celebrating Portuguese National Day we are not commemorating a battle of war but the memory of Luiz de Camões, Portugal’s national poet, whose legend has survived long since his death in 1580. This is an example of the pursuit of peace and harmony through one’s nationhood. This day honours a true cultural hero and not a latter-day warrior or political liberator. This exemplifies the ideal to which the people of Canada and Ontario aspire: a society of peace, acceptance and understanding. This is a goal we all share.

On behalf of the Ontario government, I extend best wishes for a successful national day weekend.

Mr Farnan: If there is one fact I want to stress in recognizing the national day of Portugal, it is the warmth of the Portuguese and Portuguese Canadian people. I am not just referring to the wonderful and colourful religious festivals, processions and fetes; I am talking about their everyday kindness, generosity and friendliness. They are our co-workers, our neighbours and especially our friends.

I happen to represent the riding of Cambridge, and in that community we have approximately about 14,000 Canadians of Portuguese origin. In Ontario we are probably talking of some 300,000 Canadians of Portuguese origin.

I happen to live in a neighbourhood in which the vast majority, certainly well over 50% of my neighbours, would be of Portuguese descent. I think of my next-door neighbour, Carlos, and his fine family, Tina and Leo across the street, Maria and Antonio down the street, and I can say that one could not wish for better neighbours.

But it goes beyond that, it goes way beyond that, because the Portuguese community in Cambridge, as in other communities across the province, has made a very significant contribution to the economic prosperity and the social and cultural fabric of our province and of our communities.

Among the traits of the Portuguese community, I would say that foremost is the strong family commitment, the love that exists in the family, the manner in which they strive to create opportunities for the advancement of their children, encouraging them to work in the educational system and encouraging them on into the fields of business, the professions and academia, their strong tradition in their religious beliefs and their pride in preserving the unique heritage of language, music, dance and celebration and encouraging the continuance of centuries and centuries of customs and traditions by passing them along from generation to generation.

In Cambridge, our Portuguese community is looking forward to celebrating next year the 25th anniversary of the Portuguese parish. In order to celebrate that anniversary, they decided they wanted to do something tangible and worth while for the community. That is typical of the Portuguese within Cambridge.

So they decided they wanted to build a housing project. This was the inspired idea of Father Antonio Cunha, and he has put together a board, including José Sousa, Germano Bairos, John Raposo, José Escobar, Edouardo Madeiros, Virginio Pacquette, Edouardo Pareira, Adelino Pinto and José DaRosa. What a monument to their presence in Canada that they would want to be at the forefront in addressing the housing needs of this province and of their own beloved community of Cambridge.

The minister is quite correct; when the Portuguese people looked to choose a national hero, they did not choose a warrior. They did not celebrate a war. They chose a poet. Luiz de Camões is a celebrated poet of the Portuguese people and the greatest figure of Portuguese literature.

There is so much in the history of Portugal, from the age of discovery on down. Indeed, Luiz de Camões wrote an epic poem, Os Lusiadas, in which he wrote, “The Portuguese gave new worlds to the world.” We are extremely proud to have within Ontario and within our communities people of Portuguese descent. I personally am very proud to represent one of the largest communities in Ontario.

Mrs Marland: On behalf of the Progressive Conservative Party, I am delighted to pay tribute to all Ontarians of Portuguese ancestry as they prepare to celebrate their national day this coming Sunday 10 June.

Many countries observe national days which commemorate past glories, battles, revolutions or independence. Portuguese National Day commemorates its illustrious lyric poet Luiz de Camões, who died on 10 June 1580. This tells us a great deal about the soul of the country and the people. It is said of de Camões that his epic narrative of Portuguese achievement, Os Lusiadas, is the greatest of all Renaissance epics, patterned on the Roman poet Virgil. No others approached de Camões in inspiration or poetic gifts.

Large-scale Portuguese immigration to Canada began after 1950. Since then, a steady stream of people have been coming to Ontario in search of opportunity for themselves and their families. Most of them settled in greater Toronto, others in cities throughout the southwestern part of the province. The first Portuguese club in Toronto started in 1956 and became a popular centre for community activities. Many other clubs and associations have since been formed to fill cultural, recreation and social needs. These organizations also help newcomers to adjust to life in a different country.

In my city of Mississauga we are fortunate to have a large and dynamic Portuguese community that is an integral part of our cultural mosaic. When Jack Almeida, one of the central figures in the Portuguese community of Mississauga, passed away last January, we all mourned the loss of one of Mississauga’s most outstanding citizens. He was the founder of the Portuguese Club of Mississauga, and Jack was also a key organizer of Carassauga and a member of the immigration and refugee board.

Our province has been greatly enriched by various ethnic communities, and the vibrant people of Portuguese origin have made an important contribution to the quality of life wherever they have settled. An example of a typical quality of family life which stands as a role model for us all is the family of Maria and Manuel Goulart and their two sons. Their example is to all of us who came to this country as immigrants.

We are very happy today to extend our best wishes on this wonderful occasion to all our friends in the Portuguese communities around Ontario.

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK

Hon Ms Collins: Starting Sunday, people will be celebrating National Access Awareness Week across Ontario and across Canada.

This is the third annual National Access Awareness Week, and 50 Ontario towns and cities are holding special events across the province. Government, disability organizations, business, municipalities and community groups are working together to ensure that the progress towards integration continues.

Our combined efforts are necessary if we are to remove the greatest barrier to integration for people with disabilities: outmoded public attitudes. When people with disabilities are excluded from the mainstream of community life, we all lose. National Access Awareness Week promotes better understanding of the contribution and the still greater potential that people with disabilities bring to Ontario’s social and economic life.

This special week is an excellent example of community-based participation and involvement. While government can do a great deal to remove obstacles for people with disabilities, growing public acceptance and support for integration ensures that gains will continue to be made.

Ontario kicks off National Access Awareness Week this Sunday afternoon at Queen’s Park. Members have been invited to attend the ceremony, which opens an important week for all of us who believe in equality.

ONTARIO SPECIAL OLYMPICS

Hon Mr Offer: It gives me great pleasure to announce the fourth annual Ontario Law Enforcement Torch Run in support of the Ontario Special Olympics. The torch run is a volunteer fund-raising activity of Ontario police departments and is sponsored by the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police.

As part of the windup of weeks of fund-raising runs across the province conducted by the police, a ceremonial run around Queen’s Park will be held later today. About 20 Ontario Provincial Police officers and Ontario Government Protective Service officers will be taking part.

The Ontario Special Olympics provides training, fitness and recreational programs for persons with disabilities. Currently, there are almost 5,000 people registered as Special Olympians in Ontario.

Last year, 3,200 police runners raised more than $310,000 in support of the Special Olympics in a series of relays totalling more than 5,000 kilometres. This year, there are eight relays comprised of representatives from every participating police service in Ontario. A ceremonial final relay will lead into the SkyDome before tonight’s Toronto Blue Jays game. Tonight at the SkyDome, 700 Special Olympians accompanied by 800 police officers will be on hand to cheer on our Toronto Blue Jays.

I hope the people of Ontario will join the police of the province in supporting the Special Olympians and join me in cheering the good efforts of the police. The direct involvement of police volunteers has brought new opportunities for Special Olympians. The training and recreational activities resulting from this volunteer effort have improved and enhanced the physical development and quality of life of those with developmental disabilities.

I am sure that all members of this House will join with me in thanking the police who volunteered to help the Special Olympians.

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

Hon Mr Phillips: I would like to advise the members that later today I propose to bring forward a number of amendments to Bill 208,

An Act to amend the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

Of those amendments, there is one that I would particularly like to bring to the attention of the House. That is an amendment which would improve the ability of public sector employees to respond to health and safety risks in their workplaces. Currently, these workers are excluded from exercising these responsibilities.

The workers that will be affected by the amendment include police officers, firefighters, correctional officers and most health care workers. This amendment would give these workers formal mechanisms similar to those that have been in place for private sector employees for the past 10 years. This would include the right, within certain limitations, to avoid occupational hazards. At the same time, we have carefully built in assurances that recognize that public health and safety will continue to be placed first and foremost.

Public sector workers will have the right to refuse to do dangerous work provided certain conditions are met: (1) if the refusal does not endanger the life, health or safety of another person; (2) if the danger in question is not an inherent part of the employee’s work, and (3) if the danger in question is not a normal condition of employment.

For example, a police officer could not refuse to intervene in, say, a robbery attempt on the grounds that the suspect was armed and therefore the work dangerous, nor could the officer refuse to police a particular area or location because it was considered dangerous. Such situations are inherent in the job. However, a poli