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June 22, 1989

34th Parliament, 2nd Session

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Hansard Transcripts

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

EAST METRO TRANSPORTATION

REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY

EAST METRO TRANSPORTATION

REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY

AFTERNOON SITTING

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

FARM TAX REBATE

LISA ORCHARD

BAIT FISH INDUSTRY

ROUGE VALLEY

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

ROTARY CHILDREN’S CENTRE

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

FIRE AT INDIAN SETTLEMENT

RESPONSES

FIRE AT INDIAN SETTLEMENT

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

RESPONSES (CONTINUED)

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

ORAL QUESTIONS

PATRICIA STARR

CANCER TREATMENT

TAX INCREASES

PENSION FUNDS

ELECTRICITY DEMAND AND SUPPLY

DARLINGTON NUCLEAR GENERATING STATION

SALE OF BEER IN STADIUMS

ELGIN-WINTER GARDEN THEATRE

CORRECTIONAL WORKERS’ LABOUR DISPUTE

LANDFILL SITE

ROAD MAINTENANCE

PETITIONS

NATUROPATHY

SECURITY IN PREMISES USED BY PUBLIC

WORKERS’ COMPENSATION

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION

NATUROPATHY

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

LANDLORD AND TENANT AMENDMENT ACT, 1989

ORDERS OF THE DAY

DEVELOPMENT CHARGES ACT, 1989 (CONTINUED)

POWER CORPORATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1989

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

The House met at 1000.

Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

EAST METRO TRANSPORTATION

Mr Cousens moved resolution 12;

That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing the negative environmental impact that the proposed east Metro transportation corridor may have on the Rouge River Valley system, the government of Ontario and, in particular, the Ministry of Transportation should conduct a detailed study in conjunction with Metro Toronto, the city of Scarborough, the town of Markham and the region of York, to determine an appropriate east Metro transportation strategy whereby transportation needs for the greater Toronto area and environmental concerns are not mutually exclusive.

The Deputy Speaker: Mr Cousens has moved a resolution standing in his name. The member has up to 20 minutes to makes his presentation and may reserve any portion of that for the windup.

Mr Cousens: I am pleased to have this opportunity to have debated in this Legislature a matter that is increasingly important, and that is the environmental concerns of people around the Rouge River Valley system as well as the needs of those who are commuters or will be commuters coming in and out of the greater Toronto area.

I see in this resolution a need to re-evaluate the possible transportation corridors that link up the north and south with Metro Toronto. I believe that there is a need to appreciate a balance where those of us who live in these areas can act locally and yet think globally, having the long-term interests of our community and society at heart.

I believe as well that we all must be environmentally conscious. It is a time in which people today have put a stake in the ground and more and more people are showing a genuine, sincere interest in the environmental concerns of our society. I guess one of the reasons for that is this book, Our Common Future, by the Brundtland commission. I have read it and I hope more and more people will read it. We are not concerned just with what is happening in Brazil and other parts of the world. We have a chance to do something within our own community and so that must be.

There is a problem right now. Several years ago several alignments were set aside and identified as north-south transportation corridors. Only one of those alignments has been protected and that is the present one that is on the map just to the west of the Rouge Valley system. It would be wrong for us to say that there is going to be an environmental assessment on this one route.

If you have just one option on which you are going to have an assessment, that is just an impact study as to what is going to happen if and when a transportation corridor is constructed there. If we act quickly and intelligently, I think we are faced today with an opportunity to come up with a long-term solution to the needs for our society and for people and also for the environment.

If we are left with only the one option, where there is one road that has been set aside by the Ministry of Transportation -- and that is going to be the north-south corridor between York region and Durham into Metro Toronto -- I believe that this is a mistake. Such an impact analysis does not begin to live up to the potential possibilities that would come out of an environmental assessment whereby we would look at a number of different options. There is more than a subtle difference between environmental assessment and impact analysis.

In order to address and resolve the concerns behind this great subject, I believe that time is our number one enemy. There are many pressures that are being brought to bear on the east part of the greater Toronto area. There is no doubt that tremendous new plans are taking place, not only in Scarborough but also north and east of Scarborough in the Seaton community.

The growth that is going to take place in the east end of Markham is just going to add to the already serious problems of getting people in and out of the greater Toronto area. We are faced with the possibility that the Ministry of Housing could well be coming forward with proposals for a housing development on the Rouge Valley system. We are faced with garbage dumps and landfill sites that are coming into the Rouge system as well.

We have an opportunity to go with the federal government and have a heritage park designation in the Rouge River Valley system, yet I fear what is going to happen is that the provincial government of David Peterson will postpone making any decision about a heritage park until there is an election. That is going to be one of the first plums he throws out to the people of the greater Toronto area.

Mr Faubert: What a great announcement.

Mr Couseus: Yes, but make it now and start planning around it, rather than just using politics for the sake of getting votes. I think it is time for this government to give leadership and not just be in a mode that says, “We are going to try to buy you.”

I also believe there are problems and pressures at this point that have to do with the planning that is going on in the Markham area and York region as to what is going on in Scarborough. The alignment of the roads that are being built and planned in one community should somehow link up with the other.

If we do not do something that is wise and good now, we are going to be faced with Fulton’s Freeway coming right up through the centre of the Rouge Valley system. It is going to be the option where he says, “Hey, I was left with no other choice.” I am saying now that we have options open to us if we consider seriously some of the benefits of having the study that I am proposing.

Good planning processes would mean that we are looking at the long term. So often, we are in a reaction mode. Planning departments and communities sometimes get the title that they are just reaction departments. Instead of being development-led, I want to have it led by the people and by people in politics who are really concerned, not only with 10, 20 and 30 years down the road, but with 100, 200 and 300 years down the road, where we are able to learn from our past mistakes and not just allow to happen in the Rouge Valley system what has already happened in the Don and the Humber.

Let’s take ownership of our future by becoming involved now in a very sincere and honest way, where we can put environmental concerns in balance and harmony with the needs of people. I think a good planning process begins, first of all, with a commitment to the future and the long term. That would be one of the first criteria I would like to see addressed.

I would also like to see us have a basic understanding of environmental land use, where we can take into consideration the needs of society, where we are understanding of the opportunities that exist within the eastern part of the Metro Toronto area, but also of the constraints. Some areas are more fragile than others. Let’s not just work in isolation. There are many things that have to be considered, not only the movement of people but also the preservation of a very beautiful natural park.

A good planning process should also assess and analyse all the options and alternatives that are open to us: what is going to have the least impact; what is going to do the greatest amount of good.

I think we have to recognize that there is no perfect route to link up Metro and the eastern and southern parts of York region. There will be tradeoffs. There are going to be extreme points of view. Some people will say: “Hey, we do not need the car. Let’s just get other ways of transportation.” Maybe we can have better commuter transit and better services, but the fact is that, through the study process that I am proposing, we would begin to screen out what is the best alternative.

What is needed right now more than anything, I believe, is a clean process that incorporates all that is good in an open, honest review of the options; where we have a proactive approach; where we incorporate all the benefits of what is now available through the Planning Act and the Environmental Assessment Act.

We can take and do both of the public review matters that come out of good planning and environmental assessment and begin that through this study. This study would begin to truly react to what we have called for in environmental planning and good planning. What we would then be in a position to do is understand the environmental impact and the land use impacts that are being affected.

Many questions will be answered. It would begin to allow the people who are running this province and running those communities to work together and come up with some long-term plans and strategies.

I know my own communities, the town of Markham and York region, are looking for a Markham bypass. I ask the question, where is that going to hook up? I do not think that has been resolved. Such a study as I have proposed would allow us to look at how we can best link up the Markham bypass with areas that are south of Steeles Avenue.

What are the projected load figures for the traffic that is going to take place in the north-south corridors in east Metro Toronto and the greater Toronto area? I know that with the development of this plan in Seaton, Markham and parts of Scarborough, we are going to see increasing traffic. Rather than react after the traffic has arrived, let’s do it ahead of time.

Let’s have some proactive planning that allows us to say: “Here is where the roads are going to go. This is how we are going to get the people in and out of the greater Toronto area.” Then we have done something for the long term while at the same time protecting that which is valuable.

I would like to ask that we would begin to understand through such a study what are the alternatives to going through and around the Rouge. Are there some other routes that should be looked at that are farther east, and what can we do to begin now to plan those routes?

I am concerned as well with the Morningside connection. How is this going to be hooked up to the Markham bypass? I have mentioned that earlier, but I would like to know where the east Metro transportation corridor will go after all this is done. Where is it going to link up to?

I would like to know through such a study what the government’s plans are for alternative transportation services. Will there be an expansion to GO Transit? Will there be expansion to public transit? How can we begin to make sure that we are moving people better than we are today?

It is just dreadful what people have to suffer through to get to their work in downtown Toronto or to go to a game or anything else. If we were in a position to be planning the future, as we have the option now, using time wisely we will be in a position to know that the future in Ontario is preserved by the kind of study and analysis we have begun.

I do not know, and maybe this study would begin to find out, how we would handle the traffic of people in and out of Seaton. I would like to know in such a study how the office of the greater Toronto authority will fit into this. Is the government going to impose a solution or is it going to allow the different communities and the people who are involved in those communities to help this government come up with a solution?

I do not know where this government stands. I do not think they know where they stand right now. But such a study as I am proposing would help all of us to work together in the best interests of all the community, to develop a solution that does harmonize with the needs of the environment, with the needs of people and the needs of our whole community.

It would allow us to bring together the city of Scarborough, the town of Markham, Metro Toronto and the region of York, and under the auspices of the province we would begin to be able to have a much better idea of what all the options are that pertain to the movement and transportation of people on the east part of Metro Toronto.

If we just allow it to lapse and just allow it to happen, there is one line up through the map, just on the west side of the Rouge. It has been the only one that has been preserved after the study that was done a number of years ago. I would like to see us look at all of the options and do it in an honest and clear way. Let’s allow it to happen now before it is too late. If we do not begin to react in an intelligent way, we are going to be forced to react to what development and everyone else has done around us.

We have a chance. We have a chance to be leaders; we have a chance to lead into the future in a wise way. I just hope that as we look at what is available there in the Rouge Valley system, we will consider that it is not just a small area that has no value. I have to say there is just tremendous value to be attained by retaining the beauty of the Rouge Valley system.

The water quality and the fish habitat are there. We also know that if the highways are allowed to drain into that river system, there will just be increased erosion and sedimentation. The water temperature changes. We know that the whole Rouge system is very susceptible to erosion problems. We also know that the east Metro transportation corridor across and adjacent to the lower Rouge River could jeopardize the plans of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Scarborough to enhance the Rouge’s existing trout, bass and other game fish populations.

We also know that in the Rouge Valley system the proposed highway would have irreversible impact on the lower Morningside forest, the Finch meander forest, Milne’s forest, Sewell’s forest west and Sewell’s forest east. Construction activity, with the salt spray, exhaust fumes, light and noise, would disturb the deer and the bird breeding areas, the wildlife habitat of these areas. We also know that it would disrupt the wildlife movement and we know that car exhaust emissions would degrade a beautiful stand of white pine that is there.

We are faced with noise pollution and light pollution. We are talking about the desecration of native Indian archaeological sites. I believe that the destruction of the Rouge would be compounded as one of the negative impacts of having a highway that can go right up through that area.

All I am asking for is that we take into account in a balanced way an understanding of the needs of environmental concerns which are very, very real; that instead of threatening those concerns and allowing them to be destroyed, we instead develop a strategy that has the long-term interests of that heritage park and also the needs of the community in harmony and balance,

We can do it, but let’s not just do it by having some person who sits in an office and has never walked through the Rouge, has never come along and understood just how beautiful it is, come along and say: “Hey, that’s where the road’s going to go.” It will not be an environmental assessment on what is happening. It will be an environmental impact on what is happening. It will not be something that really has the balance to what we want in our society.

We have a chance to do it right now. Let’s hope that through good planning and a real sense of dedication to environmental concerns and the concerns of our community and our people, we will come up with a resolution that allows us all to be proud of what goes on in the east Metropolitan Toronto area.

Mr Speaker, I will reserve a few moments for a final comment.

Mr McGuigan: I want to begin by commending the member for bringing forth this resolution. In this day of recognition of environmental impacts and recognition that in the past we have not done the forward planning that perhaps we should have done, I think his resolution is certainly in order and is one that should be carefully considered.

I guess I have to say at the outset that personally I am not going to support the resolution, not because I disagree at all with the content of it, but because the question in my mind is whether we lay down an extra level of bureaucracy and lay an extra layer of study. I have to point out at this time that one of the things the government is continually criticized about is the allegation that we study and study and do not do anything. I have some reservations in my mind whether bringing together a large group of people and conducting endless studies will resolve the problem.

I must confess that I have not had the experience the member has had in the area of’ transportation but one similar thing that comes to mind, and I have had considerable political experience in it, is a matter of trying to find systems of waste management and sites for waste management. In spite of all the studies and all the goodwill that we start out with, eventually we come to a position where a decision has to be made that is going to impact adversely, or at least is seen to impact adversely upon someone and that whole system breaks down.

But certainly from our government members’ standpoint, I want to indicate that as far as the government is concerned, as always in private members’ hour, they are quite free to vote as they wish.

I want to indicate that because of the discussions that have been taking place, the ministry, the Minister of the Environment (Mr Bradley) and the whole government are very much aware of the environmental concerns the member has brought out to try to save the natural features of the Rouge Valley. It is certainly something we ascribe to, but we believe the processes that are in place will do their job.

The minister has met and he will continue to meet continually with Scarborough and Metro officials. We also have people from the various ministries, such as the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Ministry of the Environment, meeting with each other. These are ongoing discussions.

The Save the Rouge Valley System and others have raised this issue to such a level that everyone, including the government, is very aware of the political issues. Believe me, we are prepared to keep a close eye on all aspects of any road work, and even more so perhaps in sensitive areas like the Rouge.

If we stop and think of the development of any city, they naturally pick out the more suitable sites to build the cities -- the houses and the stores and the factories and so on -- and they stay away from the river valleys. As the city spreads out and develops, it just becomes a natural corridor that has been left and suddenly the roadbuilders come along and decide: “Well, that’s a beautiful corridor and an easy place. We don’t have to buy buildings and move such things as churches, cemeteries and so on.” So they naturally pick upon that area.

What I am saying is that the government is very well aware that roadbuilders choose the easy route and we are as much concerned about it as the member is.

A great deal has already been done through the .Environmental Protection Act and the Environmental Assessment Act process. A thorough study is important. I question whether another bureaucratic group is needed or whether this would add an extra cog, extra time, to what is already a very heavy process.

I have to note in passing that the member has boasted, and I think quite justifiably, about how long and hard he fought for Highway 407. I am sure all of us would recall some of the criticisms we received from him about the delays. We are a bit concerned that the suggestions he is making today, while made for very good reasons, might also perhaps result in delays to that process.

It is unfortunate that through this whole process it is natural that the rhetoric has been raised to quite a high pitch of fever, and some of it is not altogether accurate. Some groups are saying this is a proposal for an eight-lane highway. I suppose members could project things into the future and say it could be a 20-lane highway. But surely by the time we reach those heights, we will have figured out other ways to move and transport people. Certainly, for the present time, all that is being considered is four lanes.

It has been alleged that the highway would go right through the valley. In fact, it is a bridge going over a very narrow

section of the valley and it is in the west end, away from the most sensitive areas.

On the use of salt, of course, we all recognize the damaging effect the use of salt has upon vegetation. There have been court cases among some friends of mine in the fruit-growing industry where they have won cases against the use of salt because of the damage to their orchards. The minister has always said the most environmentally safe method at the time will be used to clear the roads in environmentally sensitive areas. One can perhaps think of a greater patrolling with trucks that physically remove the snow and the ice.

Also, there are chemicals today that while quite expensive, could be used in small areas that are environmentally sensitive. So I think the argument about salt is probably not a very strong one.

Already, there are 29 incursions into the valley, including the busiest routes of Canadian National Railway and CP Rail. Three environmental effects and impacts have to be recognized and considered. Some may have been mistakes.

I suppose this government is not immune from making mistakes, but certainly from what we have learned in the past and with the processes we have in place, we are trying as best we can, as best as any humans can, to look into the future to try to avoid mistakes, by continuous consultation, study, concern and awareness of the environmental issues, and by the sensitivity that is displayed daily by the Premier (Mr Peterson), the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of Transportation (Mr Fulton) and the entire policy direction.

In the few moments I have for closing, I would just like to wrap up by saying we do not feel the member is suggesting a policy we oppose with all our political force and all our political might. But we certainly do want to lay upon the table the question of whether the process he is suggesting is really in the best interests of trying to solve what is a very sensitive and very important issue.

Ms Bryden: I am going to support the motion in Orders and Notices of the member for Markham (Mr Cousens). I think it is high time we had a re-evaluation of what is known as the east Metro transportation corridor. Actually, it dates back a number of years and was first proposed for original reasons that are no longer relevant. This is the first reason it must be re-evaluated.

It is argued that it would relieve traffic congestion between Highway 407 and Highway 401, but it would actually create traffic; it would attract traffic into the area. The proposal is another example of the Minister of Transportation pushing forward outdated projects where circumstances have radically changed. It is another example of transportation and traffic taking precedence over the environment. It is another example of the refusal to listen to people who say we must preserve a unique wilderness area.

The Save the Rouge Valley System group has been telling us for 10 years how unique this area is. I recognize that the east Metro transportation corridor only touches a small part of the Rouge Valley, but it goes through the whole Rouge River system to the east and to the west, and that must also be preserved if you are going to preserve the valley itself.

The Save the Rouge Valley System group has pointed out that this area contains the last of the Carolinian forest stands, which were the original trees that were growing in this country when the white man moved in. I think the native people were here when they were growing. The Save the Rouge Valley System group has also pointed out that there are unique flora, fauna and wildlife habitats in this area. There is a last opportunity for people in the greater Metro area to enjoy a wilderness experience in an area where sports fishing is still possible. The river is clean enough for that. It is an area where they can get away from the congestion, fumes and pollution in the Metro area.

It is another example of the fact that we do not have a proper environmental rights act in this province. I myself have introduced one and the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore (Mrs Grier) has also introduced one. but both times the governments in power have turned them down. If we had such a law, as they do in the United States, the residents or the persons who feel they are losing their environmental rights could take the minister to court and he would have to prove he has not violated their rights.

We actually had one minister of highways in the previous Conservative government who ignored the requirement for an environmental assessment on a highway and had to pay a fine. Now we do have fairly close conforming to environmental assessment needs, but I think a full environmental assessment of this project, and I mean a full one where alternatives would be considered, would show that this is not a proper use of the area for the kind of transportation that is envisaged.

The possibilities that have been proposed, I think, are very worth while considering and that is another reason why we must have a study. It could be either a provincial or a federal park. Most of the land is provincially owned or owned by provincial agencies such as Ontario Hydro and the Metropolitan Toronto and Region Conservation Authority. It could be a Canadian heritage park, which is a federal park classification. This kind of park was recommended for the area by the federal Department of the Environment’s Task Force on Park Establishment. It could be a joint federal-provincial park.

All of those alternatives must be considered before we allow this kind of intrusion into a very sensitive area.

I think we also must remember that this kind of area is not suitable for the development of estate mansions, huge houses of $1 million and more. It seems to me that with this shortage of affordable housing, we must see that all our housing resources go to developing affordable housing in areas where there are no flood plain hazards, of course, and no other hazards, but also preserve a unique and very much needed protected area for the residents of the surrounding area.

I hope that is not what the minister has in mind when he proposes to build this kind of transportation corridor. It is true he may be talking about only a four-lane highway at the moment, but I should point out to him that the Scarborough city council just this last year voted to take the east Metro transportation corridor out of the official plan. Its planner, Ed Watkins, stated that the upgrading of existing arterial roads such as Neilson Road, Markham Road and Morningside Avenue would suffice for any traffic demands in this area. The traffic volume did not justify the highway.

The Minister of Transportation voted against the original plan when he was on Scarborough council, before he came into the Legislature. I would like to ask him to tell us why he has changed his mind and is thinking of an eight-lane highway through the tablelands surrounding the Rouge Valley.

It is possible to make the connection between Highway 401 and Highway 407, which is to be built where Highway 7 now is, farther east. It is true it may require a few more kilometres of travel, but it would save a very important area and would direct traffic away from this very sensitive area. That is another important aspect that must be studied: the possibility of rerouting the traffic.

I really think the Minister of Transportation should be on the hook to justify to us the reason he is pushing forward an outdated idea and an idea that will do great damage to our environment and our unique area in this community. I think future generations will hold him up to contempt if he goes ahead with this plan.

There are important archaeological locations in the whole Rouge River Valley, not just in the valley itself but in some of the other areas to the north and the south. Some of them are Indian villages, unique records from our past, and those must be preserved. This highway will not make it easy for people either to take

part in the digs that will be necessary or to go and visit the results when they find this unique part of our heritage. For all those reasons, the Minister of Transportation must justify why he wants to do what is really a gross intrusion into our environment.

Mrs Marland: It is with pleasure that I rise this morning to support the resolution of my colleague and friend the member for Markham, recognizing that he obviously has, unfortunately, more foresight than the current Liberal government, because if that were not the case, this resolution, which basically is a common sense resolution, would not even be necessary.

He is simply asking that alternatives be looked at to handle the future traffic needs of this large Metropolitan Toronto area, obviously, where he is stating in his resolution:

“That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing the negative environmental impact that the proposed east Metro transportation corridor may have on the Rouge River Valley system, the government of Ontario and in particular, the Ministry of Transportation, should conduct a detailed study, in conjunction with Metro Toronto, the city of Scarborough, the town of Markham and the region of York, to determine an appropriate east Metro transportation strategy whereby transportation needs for the greater Toronto area and environmental concerns are not mutually exclusive.”

The most important aspect of this resolution is that this government has really demonstrated in its four years its lack of ability to make a decision. The fact is that the direction of growth and development around the greater Toronto area has changed quite radically since this original transportation corridor was considered, and I must say there are a number of areas in the last four years that the people of Ontario recognize the current Liberal government is unable to make decisions on.

How ironic that here is a decision that has already been made for them. The fact is that the people of Ontario own almost 90 per cent of the lands that are under discussion. The Rouge River Valley is in public ownership, to the greatest percentage.

Mr Faubert: The top of the tablelands isn’t.

Mrs Marland: Excuse me. Mr Faubert, you will have your chance to speak and I object to your interrupting me.

Mr Faubert: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: According to the standing orders, you address by riding, not --

Mrs Marland: No, you are not going to interrupt me on a point of order, because you are down to speak and I think it is --

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please. There will be no interjections. Only one member at a time will have the floor and the only member who has the floor right now is the member for Mississauga South, who may proceed in peace and quiet from the other members.

Mr Faubert: She’s statistically inaccurate; grossly inaccurate.

Mrs Marland: I say to the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere that I really think that is small-minded of you, because you are down to speak this morning. You are going to have your opportunity, but you cannot tolerate hearing the truth. You obviously cannot even tolerate hearing your own name in the record.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please.

Mrs Marland: Obviously I am touching some sore points, so you cannot wait to get up to speak.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please.

Mrs Marland: But in any case, I guess I will have my opportunity to interrupt that member when he is speaking --

The Deputy Speaker: And you will address your remarks through the Speaker, of course.

Mrs Marland: -- except I probably have more class than he does. This member was a member of Scarborough council, the same council which has voted very strongly in the affirmative -- in fact, a vote of 16 to 1 -- to preserve the Rouge Valley as a recreational area.

It is really interesting when we have the current Liberal government ministers stand in this House and answer questions. I may say that a number of those questions have been mine, to the Minister of Government Services (Mr Patten), the Minister of the Environment and the Minister of Transportation. Indeed, I have asked the Premier the same question: Will this Liberal government agree to preserve the Rouge River Valley and the tablelands?

Mr Furlong: What were the answers?

Mrs Marland: Always, the answers have been, “We have no intention of destroying the Rouge River Valley.”

Where the tablelands extend to is always part of the debate. In fact, I have had a minister in this House answer questions on the Rouge Valley and he has not even been there. He has not even visited it. How anyone can discuss the necessity of preserving the Rouge Valley without having been there is amazing to me. Anyone who would ever consider destroying this natural preserve without having been there, in my opinion is totally irresponsible.

Bearing in mind that the Premier himself has assured me that the Rouge River Valley and the surrounding tablelands will be preserved, having been told that in this House, it is probably amazing that we even have to stand here this morning and discuss this resolution.

I think what is happening is that we again have this Liberal government on the ropes of indecision. They say what they want to say when they are campaigning. When they are making promises, it is one picture. When it comes to making a very real decision, then they get to the point where they simply back off and will not give a definitive answer.

If I may quote for a moment from a Toronto Star editorial of 22 April 1989, it says, “Premier David Peterson should pay careful attention to today’s ‘preservation’ rally in Scarborough’s Rouge Valley, especially since his government alone holds the key to the area’s future.” I would hope that his government, and particularly the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere, will represent the wishes of his people and stand in this House this morning and speak on behalf of his people to preserve this area.

This area will not be preserved if we have a major transportation corridor permitted through it. As my colleague the member for Markham so rightly says, we cannot allow one proposal to go to the Environmental Assessment Board without other alternatives being presented.

It is very funny how the games and the rules change. I will tell the member for Markham that the region of Peel established a location for its landfill site, and because it had only one location it was not allowed to go forward to the Environmental Assessment Board; it had to have other alternatives. How interesting that in this game now, where we are dealing with this subject, the fact of the matter is that it may go forward without the other alternatives for which the member’s resolution is asking.

I think it is terribly important to recognize that the federal government has made its commitment to save the Rouge River Valley by an allocation of $10 million. That promise was made before the election last November, and it has been reconfirmed since the election of last November that they will commit $10 million to preserving the Rouge.

The other fact is that this land, because it has already been decided that it should be preserved, should not even really be up for discussion.

In closing, I want to quote what the Save the Rouge Valley System publication says. It says, “In October 1988, Ed Fulton, the minister responsible for the proposed east Metro highway, said, ‘The province is not looking to run bulldozers in and destroy the place.’”

Having heard the member for Essex-Kent (Mr McGuigan) this morning say that this is indeed a very sensitive and important issue, I hope the Liberal government for once will be very sensitive to this important issue, vote in support of the resolution of my colleague the member for Markham and for once make a decision.

Mr Faubert: I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on the resolution of the member for Markham regarding transportation in the Rouge Valley, but I am sorry that the member for Mississauga South is so partisan that she actually is losing this resolution for the member. I think he probably will see the results of that when the vote comes.

Let me first state that the preservation of the Rouge Valley is of personal interest and importance to me, not only as a member of this Legislature but as a long-time resident of Scarborough. Frankly, there are many residents in my riding who are concerned about the preservation of the Rouge, but quite honestly I think the members have received very few direct requests, letters or inquiries related to this matter, because I think many people realize that this is not just a matter for Scarborough. It is a matter for all Ontario.

My affection for the area comes from personal experiences as well as sitting on Scarborough council and dealing with this over the years, because I have very fond memories of hot summer days -- and I will not say how many years ago that was -- spent with my grandfather, fishing the Rouge and hiking in the Rouge Valley.

If one knows where this is located in relation to Toronto, Scarborough and Metro Toronto, one knows that the Rouge Valley has been a much valued source of recreation for many residents of Metro Toronto. Indeed, that was the experience of my own family as it was growing up.

I can assure the member for Markham and all members of the Legislature that I would be opposed to any proposal, be it a dump, housing or a freeway, if it was shown that it violated directly this government’s direction committed to preserving the Rouge Valley.

However, I am pleased to advise members of the House that this government has reiterated that it remains committed to preserving the Rouge Valley. Our Premier, in response to my question in this House on 26 January, stated that I could reassure my constituents of the government’s “strong determination to preserve the Rouge.”

Mrs Marland: The river, the valley, the tablelands, or just the Rouge?

Mr Fauhert: Someone who is talking about lack of class should read the standing orders.

Over the months this determination for it has been backed by action. In fact, the provincial government has offered significant financial support for the preservation of the lands. I would suggest that the members listen very closely to this.

The Ontario government’s province-wide commitment to preserving the Carolinian forests in Ontario resulted in $2 million to fund studies, which included the Rouge lands, where exists an excellent example of a Carolinian stand.

The Ministry of Government Services has provided funds in the amount of $120,000 for a planning study of the area. The Ontario government transferred 276 acres of Rouge lands worth over $828,000 to the conservation authorities. The Minister of Culture and Communications (Ms Oddie Munro), and I am happy to see the minister here today to hear this debate, recently funded a $114,000 study of the archaeological resources of this area of northeast Scarborough. This particular study resulted in the discovery of 40 new archaeological sites, bringing the number of such known sites in the Rouge now to 63.

These are 63 Indian villages and campsites which were discovered, and some are so old they date back to 1000 BC. A Seneca Indian village also discovered in this study, which was earlier dated about 1650, is stated to be of international significance.

Not only is the Rouge Valley an area rich in archaeological and historical significance, but it is also an oasis in the urbanized community of Metropolitan Toronto, where families can go for relief from the fast pace of big-city life. A walk through this area at any time of year can be an escape from the stress of urban living.

Indeed, if there are any members of this Legislature who have yet to visit this or who are unfamiliar with the Rouge Valley -- and I would suggest, after hearing some remarks today, that some members are actually unfamiliar with the valley and where it is even located -- I would advise them to go out for themselves. I would even include the Premier in that invitation. They will be pleasantly surprised. I think they will find this is truly a miracle that this haven of natural beauty of environmental, historical and archaeological significance has survived the pressures of urban growth.

It is incumbent on all members of this Legislature to ensure that the Rouge Valley is fully protected and preserved in its natural state for future generations to experience and enjoy, and any alternative that would endanger the preservation of the Rouge would be clearly unacceptable.

However, as I mentioned previously, this is not the indication that has come from this government. Indeed, the opposite is true. The government is committed to saving the Rouge. It is committed to preserving it for future generations to enjoy. One way to accomplish this would be to designate it as a park, as suggested by many, including the member for Markham. But this is not something that can be done overnight and the issue is far more complex than many members appear to realize.

First, there are a number of ministers who are involved in this. There are the ministries of Housing, Environment, Natural Resources, Transportation, Government Services and Treasury. The member for Markham is quite correct when he recognizes in his resolution that there is a necessity to consult the surrounding municipalities and regions. However, the one reality of consultation is the danger of becoming impatient with the process and acting unilaterally and that, interestingly enough, is what some members of this House appear to be calling for.

The region of Metro Toronto has yet to deal with this. It is very interesting; it has yet to deal with the resolution that was passed over two years ago by the city of Scarborough.

By the way, another determination in establishing a park in this area is the precise boundaries of the park proposals, which seem to be ignored by many. This park is not just in Scarborough; it encompasses three regions. It encompasses Metropolitan Toronto; it encompasses York; it goes all the way up beyond Bruce’s Mill. It also affects the region of Durham, which unfortunately the member left out of his resolution.

He calls for a detailed study to determine the appropriate east Metro transportation strategy. However, I would suggest this is already taking place. The Ministry of Transportation is updating its information. It is updating amendments to official plans that lead to changes to project residential, commercial and industrial growth, which of course affects traffic volumes in all the affected regions. Interestingly enough, the city of Scarborough, which deleted the east Metro transportation corridor from its official plan in July 1988, should also bear some responsibility, because it has yet to suggest viable and effective alternatives.

Indeed, the government’s consultative process extends beyond the resolution. It is not only consulting the regions of Metropolitan Toronto and York, the city of Scarborough and the town of Markham, but it is consulting the town of Pickering in the region of Durham East, which for some reason, as I mentioned, is an essential region to this resolution yet is left out of it.

I just would say that I am supporting the resolution. I believe it is important that all alternatives to the east Metro transportation corridor be fully considered, and it is also important to ensure that any alternatives chosen be environmentally sensitive so as not to jeopardize the preservation of the Rouge Valley. In spite of the comments from the member for Mississauga South, I would urge all members present to adopt and support this resolution.

Mr Cousens: I would like to just thank other members in the House for participating in this debate. I am particularly grateful for the support of the member for Mississauga South who, at a meeting the other night, Hazel McCallion said is a true environmentalist

One of the points the member for Mississauga South made is the problem that Mississauga got into with landfill sites, because it only proposed one site and not having alternative sites, there was not any success in its environmental assessment that allowed it to proceed with that site. I am seeing the same kind of problem here with the east Metro transportation corridor. There are no other options at present in the government’s mind, and if we would begin to look at what those options could be we could begin to come up with a long-term strategy for transportation.

I would also like to thank the honourable member for Beaches-Woodbine (Ms Bryden). I think the member made a number of excellent points in support of the full environmental assessment. I see this as something that could come through the study. There has to be that openness so that everybody who has any kind of concerns would be able to participate in it. Behind her suggestion is included the thinking that people from Durham and Pickering, and everyone else who has any kind of concern about this, would be part of it. So I thank her for that suggestion.

I also think the member for Beaches-Woodbine brings to the table a sense of the future when she says future generations will hold this present Minister of Transportation in contempt unless he comes along with some kind of alternate strategy, although he is a nice man. I believe he has a chance for leadership. The Fulton expressway will be coming ahead unless there is something to look at what options are available for our society.

I thank the member for Essex-Kent for his comments. He is always a gentleman, and although we differ on the end result of this one, I do know the concept behind my motion of having a study would allow the full Planning Act and Environmental Assessment Act processes to go to work, so that we would begin to see what the future holds for transportation in east Metro.

In answer to many of the questions I tried to raise earlier in my presentation, I do see it as a major challenge for us to plan into the far distant future, not just two, three or five years into it. This kind of study is the kind of thing that could come out with some options that would be available for the future.

I notice, on the one hand, my good friend the member for Essex-Kent is not in support of studies, and yet the member for Scarborough Ellesmere is so proud of the fact that the Minister of Culture and Communications has just invested in other studies for archaeological sites.

I think studying, if it is done properly and correctly, can lead to a better future for all of us. It is not a matter of -- and I do not think the member was doing this -- just saying, “Don’t have studies.” This is an example where, if all the processes go to work and we get Durham, York and Metro in, everyone who is going to be partners to this, then along comes a long-term solution to it.

That is a study which can in fact lead to an implementation of a plan that gives the best solution to all. I know there is not a perfect solution. I wish there were. There is not right now, and so there are going to be tradeoffs. When we work this through we will begin to at least satisfy the needs of the greatest number and yet keep in balance the needs of the environment as well as the needs of society.

I thank the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere for his comments and for his support of this important plan. I know that he, like many others, has wandered through the Rouge Valley system and knows how important it is, and yet he also understands how complex this whole matter is. I am not satisfied that when the Premier said he was going to protect certain areas of the Rouge, he really had a full intent of doing that, because the Minister of Housing (Ms Havoc) continues to bear in mind that she might have a housing project and there is continued interest in having landfill sites.

Until we begin to make this a heritage park, we are not going to be able to really do what we want to do. The question is, where does the government stand and where do the people stand? Through this study, we will begin to know what is best for all.

REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY

Mrs Sullivan moved resolution 14:

The Acting Speaker (Mr M. C. Ray): The member is reminded she has up to 20 minutes for her presentation and may reserve any portion thereof for a windup.

Mrs Sullivan: For many people across Canada, the federal government’s April throne speech carried welcome news. That was the announcement that a royal commission would be struck to examine reproductive technologies and the issues surrounding the high-technology reproduction of human life.

The calls for a royal commission came from a deep sense of unease that there is a serious lag between our social policy and our technology and that the gap is widening every moment. The fast pace of medical, scientific and technological developments in the new reproductive technologies has outstripped public debate and scrutiny on the issues. The complexity of the legal, moral and ethical questions increase with each scientific advance.

I believe Ontario has much to offer in assisting in the development and definition of a national consensus. We have highly skilled medical and scientific workers who are engaged daily in the practice and research associated with the new reproductive technologies. We have people, some parents and some not, who have participated in assisted parenthood programs. The sharing of their experiences would be of great value in the national dialogue.

We have ethicists who have examined the thrust of many of the moral choices surrounding the artificial creation of new life or the monitoring of new life. We have hospital committees which have developed standards of practice at our own institutions and which monitor new developments in the field. We have legal professionals who have examined the legal implications and

interpretations from our own and other jurisdictions. We have articulate representation from organizations of women who have carefully delineated our reproductive consciousness. We have a government which has already set an interministerial committee to work on the difficult public and social policy questions which surround the area.

In coming to terms with the very complicated issues before us, it is clear that there is no one single source on whom we can rely for answers. Alvin Toffler has summed up the need for a concerted public approach to the social construction of change in the biological and medical sciences. I would just like to quote from him:

“The issues are far too important to be left to the decisions of judges, who may base them on obsolete precedent ...biotechnology businessmen whose commercial instincts may override humane concern...specialists who may be too confident of the technologies over which they preside...or regulatory bureaucrats. Each may have a role to play, but no one group is wise enough, or selfless enough, to make decisions of this order.”

A national dialogue is necessary and a national consensus is necessary. That is why I put forward this motion.

The new reproductive technologies may involve the creation of new life or they may be used to monitor new life. Many of them, such as artificial insemination, have been known for generations and are technically simple procedures. Others are new and require enormous skill and involve complicated procedures. Still others are techniques which have evolved from combinations of existing technologies.

Those which monitor new life may be most familiar to those of us who have borne children. Ultrasound, amniocentesis, foetal monitoring, chronic villus biopsy, foetoscopy and in utero medical intervention are all medical devices that are not considered unusual today. Many of them carry risks for the pregnant woman and for the foetus. All of them are intrusive and cause discomfort for the pregnant woman. They can contribute to assuring that a healthy child is born or that appropriate medical actions are taken after birth so that the child can live.

Most pregnant women know these medical aids as tests. Few potential mothers refuse the tests, but fewer yet know the kinds of questions to ask about the necessity, risks, repercussions and choices that might lie ahead. Most women who are taking the tests are in high-risk pregnancies and hope becomes a great motivator. As well, medical practitioners, whether the family physician or the obstetrician, have an enormous personal stake -- psychological, emotional and professional in the delivery of a healthy child.

They want to be able to use any medical and technological advantage available to them and to have a broad scope for making medical decisions from information that the technological advances provide.

The tests place a heavy level of accountability on both the physician and the pregnant woman. They may lead to a requirement for decision-making that might not have been anticipated from lifestyle constraints to medical action. But many physicians, religious leaders, women and politicians are asking needed questions about the ramifications of diagnostic tests.

What do we know, by example, about the physical and mental development effects of foetal monitoring on the child? What do we know about the psychological effects of diagnostic testing on the mother? What support systems are or should be in place when parents must face the results of a so-called negative test?

Dr Bernard Dickens wrote in the December 1985 Canadian Forum an

article that raised very serious questions, and I thought it was a thoughtful piece. The questions relate to the question of choice versus compulsion. I would like to put some of his observations before the House. He asks:

“Can we insist by law that women use available means of prenatal diagnosis for the sake of protecting their foetuses? One diagnostic method that has received a lot of attention since it was first introduced over a decade ago is amniocentesis. Amniocentesis is a medical technique for monitoring foetal development. The procedure, which involves inserting a tube into the abdomen of the pregnant woman, is known to be associated with a fairly low risk of injury to the woman and of spontaneous abortion. In safe hands, the risk is about one half a per cent; in less experienced hands perhaps one per cent, Nevertheless, there is still a risk.

“The question arises whether the woman has to be forced to endure that risk for the sake of a foetus that can be assisted following prenatal diagnosis. It could be this is something we would find offensive.

“Chronic villas biopsy, a relatively new technique in which extra-embryonic material is tested, has a range of ethical and social considerations that differ somewhat from those associated with amniocentesis. Though it is invasive and uncomfortable, to date it appears relatively safe (we don’t yet know the figures). It seems to be associated with a three to five per cent rate of spontaneous abortion but we are not yet certain of cause and effect relationships; the women on whom it’s done have a relatively high rate of spontaneous abortion anyway, and it’s not clear whether the increased rate is triggered by the process.

“The risks of ultrasound imaging are as yet unknown. It seems not to be uncomfortable, but it may be too early to judge its safety.

“Foetoscopy is not too different from amniocentesis and is often used in conjunction with ultrasound, which aids precision of intrusion into the abdomen in both amniocentesis and foetoscopy.

“All of the above technologies, which may assist a foetus, carry with them certain discomforts and risks for the pregnant woman. By comparison, blood sampling seems innocuous, almost a paradigm minimal-risk medical procedure. If it’s not invasive, if it’s not uncomfortable and if it’s not life-threatening, why not compel it to be done?

“The problem is that by making certain tests compulsory, society would be limiting women’s autonomy, their choice not to have such a procedure done. On the other hand, since maternal serum screening is not unduly burdening to a woman, and could benefit the foetus she bears, to ask her to give a blood sample could well be part of a fairly routine, conscientious prenatal diagnosis. We have a number of tests that can detect prenatal genetic conditions in the developmental stages of the child growing in utero. They raise the question of what we may then do for the foetus, once having gained this knowledge.

“One option may be to do nothing, to let the child be born and then deal with the conditions the child has, knowing beforehand what to be ready for. There may be, for example, bowel obstructions that are not menacing to the child in utero, but ought to be dealt with quickly once the child is born. With the use of prenatal tests, one would be prepared for the condition.

“In some cases, the longer the pregnancy endures past viability, the worse it is for the child after birth. It may then be that inducing labour, inducing pre-term delivery, is appropriate for the foetus. But what about the woman? Must she endure induced labour or can she refuse it? Can she say, ‘No, let nature take its course’? The mother may decide to give birth naturally, to place herself at the disposal of medicine, not to have things done to her that are unnatural, that wouldn’t occur in the ordinary course of events.

“What about compelling a woman to have a caesarean delivery? This could be indicated in some cases. If a woman is affected by venereal disease, it could well be that to let the child be born through the birth canal in the ordinary way would have a damaging effect on the child, perhaps injuring sight and other senses. What about the conviction that the mother cannot give natural birth, or should not give natural birth, if the child might suffer stillbirth or injury?

“We now have the prospect of foetal surgery in which the abdomen of the woman is opened, the child made accessible and either treated in the uterus or, even, physically removed for treatment -- for instance, reorganization of the limbs, insertion of shunts to drain accumulated fluid on the brain or perhaps to empty the bladder. Must a woman undergo foetal surgery? What of a woman who refuses? Can she be forced to accept it?”

Those are questions which cannot be left solely to the technologists and the medical practitioners. We must be asking them of ourselves.

For many people, creating and carrying a child to birth is difficult or impossible. Infertility caused by low sperm content, blocked fallopian tubes or whatever other reason occurs at an estimated rate of one in 10 people of childbearing age. We value parenting. We may overvalue, however, the reproductive capacity itself and the need for being a natural mother or father,

None the less, the new reproductive technologies have changed despair to hope for many people. What we do not know enough about is what happens to those people for whom the technology has not provided a solution when the very hope offered by technology is dashed.

The world’s first test-tube baby is now 11 years old. The joy, the shock and the dismay which accompanied the birth of Louise Brown in England in 1978 has since been repeated about 3,000 times in many countries. What was then seen either as a miracle or as an aberration today does not even rate a headline.

In vitro fertilization may well be seen as glamorous or modern, but it is certainly not seen as new. It is but one of the technologies concerned with artificial reproduction, donor insemination, cryobanking of eggs and sperm, embryo freezing, storage and transfer, surrogate motherhood, in vitro and in vivo fertilization, cloning and parthenogenesis. These are some of the medical techniques of procreation into which the practice and research exists in Canada and is expanding.

The speed of technological advances and the refinements of existing technology which lead to such techniques as sex selection or selective reduction adds to the depth of issues and choices for which society must come to terms.

For many years, sperm collected from donor males has been frozen for later use in the process of artificial insemination. In February of this year, Chedoke McMaster Hospitals in Hamilton announced that they will operate Ontario’s first anonymous egg donor program for infertile couples who want to become parents. It is the first female equivalent of the sperm bank, and while we have been accustomed to the anonymity of the biological father, this is the first time in Canada that the anonymity of the biological mother has been added to the legal and ethical question.

To questions which have been put about sperm donor programs, we now add those same questions about egg donor programs. What rights do children have to know about their genetic parent, their medical records, their physical and mental attributes? Should there be a register of donors accessible to the children? What right does the donor parent have to maintain anonymity? What is the legal status of the child of a gamete donation? What is the legal or ethical obligation of the donor biological parent to that child? What time limits ought we to place on the utilization of frozen eggs or sperm? Who owns the eggs or sperm? Who has the right to destroy them?

We have all seen the stories of happy couples, some of them Canadian, who are celebrating the birth of babies produced through in vitro fertilization. What we hear less of is how surprisingly unsuccessful the process is in producing live births. We hear far more about pregnancy rates from conception in vitro than birth rates.

In IVF the male sperm and a female egg are combined in a Petri dish and the fertilized egg implanted into the woman’s womb, sometimes not the same woman who produced the eggs. To have greater assurance of a successful pregnancy, doctors fertilize as many eggs as possible from a woman who has been treated with hormones to superovulate.

The strategy is a practical one, but it presents many ethical dilemmas. When the embryos are not implanted, the storage of surplus embryos, the extent to which research can or should be conducted on them and indeed the question of ownership of the embryos can become problematic.

When a number of embryos are implanted, however, multiple pregnancies can result. The technological catch-up, selective reduction, is sometimes used to prevent the loss of all foetuses in a multiple pregnancy, but because it is a medically and technically proven technique, it can be used to reduce the multiple pregnancy from twins to a single child as readily as from sextuplets to triplets.

The long-term effects of the fertility drugs themselves on mother and child are unknown. We do not know how many women are physiologically and psychologically damaged in the process of in vitro fertilization. We need parameters for the storage and destruction of embryos. We need to resolve questions relating to the status of children following embryo donation. We need to discuss time limits on the use of embryos in vitro for research and the bounds of that research. Is cloning acceptable to us? Is research directed towards overcoming physical or mental disabilities appropriate?

We should also be looking at the costs of these procedures. Should they be state-subsidized as they are in Ontario? If so, should they be universally available as a matter of right to women regardless of family or marital status? If not universally available, who should make the decision as to whether the procedure should be made available to a specific woman: a physician, a committee, a bureaucrat?

Further, at a time of pressure and change in our health care system, how much money and how many resources should be diverted to IVF technologies, which are accepted but are still, to the layman, experimental? How will we account for the volume of IVF activity, for its success and failure and for the researching process associated with the technology?

At a more basic level, we should be weighing the justification for exposing women and their possible future children to the risks of in vitro fertilization, particularly when the success rates, judged by live births, are variously reckoned at 10 per cent to 13 per cent. How will we make judgements about when to say yes and when to say no?

There are many more questions in the field of reproductive technologies. In the time available, I will not be able to pose questions about the debate over contractual versus natural rights in surrogate motherhood, of the development of reproductive services generally, including counselling, or of issues relating to sex selection. Those are the issues that I hope the royal commission will have to tackle. It is difficult to frame legislation against fast-moving medical and scientific development. It is even more difficult when there is an evolving ethical perspective.

I believe Ontario has a singular role to play in considering the ethical, legal and social implications of the new reproductive technologies. We have much to offer in the discussion of the public policies and the safeguards which must be part of our national conscience. The mandate and the terms of reference of the royal commission have not yet been placed before the public. When they are, I believe that Ontario should play a full

part in the deliberations.

Mr Reville: The member for Halton Centre (Mrs Sullivan) raises a large number of very important issues, reproductive issues, and of course I will be happy to support her resolution. It would be difficult not to support a resolution that suggests that we should co-operate with the royal commission on reproductive technology.

Our constituents are passionately interested in these kinds of issues, which are social, ethical, legal, medical and political. They are passionate issues, too, and it was with a bit of surprise that I listened to the member for Halton Centre’s remarks, because they were delivered with about the same kind of passion that health classes used to be conducted by the football coach. I have memories of meaningless diagrams and a monotonous delivery out of which we got somewhat less than we might have.

There is no question that we must not leave these questions to the technologists, because they are questions that, in the end, are political questions.

The technology quite often develops in the absence of a comforting amount of scrutiny by ethicists, moralists and the public. Indeed, it is technically possible to clone various kinds of tissues. I, for one, would be very concerned if it were possible to clone Liberals. I would fear for our future if that ever were allowed to occur.

There are so many reproductive issues that it is not surprising that the member for Halton Centre had to talk about them so quickly to get them all into her 20 minutes. For instance, in the city of Sudbury, if you are interested in having vaginal delivery and you have already had a caesarean section, you have to leave Sudbury. This is a shocking situation.

The obstetricians in Sudbury do not believe in the V-back and will not perform it. There is a group of women who have all had C-sections, some of whom thought they should not have had the initial C-section but that was convenient because of somebody’s golf game, and then for ever afterwards they were going to have to have C-sections because they could not find an obstetrician who would do a V-back.

I think that is shocking and it indicates the kind of vise-like grip certain medical practices are allowed to have on the lives of people. I think that is wrong.

There are devastatingly difficult ethical questions about rent-a-womb and what we should do, as a society, about that and whether or not that creates an incentive to oppress vulnerable women. There are women who are economically disadvantaged, and one of the ways that they can get some money is to rent out their reproductive system to a couple with money who, regrettably, cannot have a child safely themselves.

I think those issues trouble us a great deal. It is right that we should be troubled about them because they are difficult but important questions.

A week or so ago, I was getting some heckles from over on the other side when I was talking about the length of the chancellor’s foot. Nobody seemed to understand what I was talking about, which is not unusual.

Mr McGuigan: Sorry, I didn’t. I wish you would explain it.

Mr Reville: Thank you very much. I knew you would understand.

I suggested that people should read a book. That was a bit cross of me. Picking up on the read-a-book theme, I suggest that if one book is all members can manage, they read this book. This is called Second Opinion: What’s Wrong with Canada’s Health-Care System and How to Fix It, by my friends Mike Rachlis and Carol Kushner, both of whom lived in Riverdale, of course, and both of whom are members of the New Democratic Party.

They have some interesting things to say about in vitro fertilization on page 74 under the title “Missing the Boat.” What they have to say is, as the member for Halton Centre indicated, that in vitro fertilization is a very flashy, high-technology procedure which is not really successful. It works about 10 per cent of the time: one in 10.

Quoting Michele Landsberg, the authors point out the perspective of a patient who had gone through an IVF procedure as “A painful, protracted emotional rollercoaster, traumatic and chancy.” One IVF candidate who, like the vast majority, failed to conceive, said, “The process gets us addicted to hope.”

Wanting to have a baby is so natural and human that obviously a society should move heaven and earth to see if the conditions could be created where people could have a baby; no question about that. But I think it is wrong to respond to despair with false hopes. It is not just a question of consumer protection. It is much more elemental than that.

If we buy a toaster and it does not pop up, we can go and buy another one and we have not lost very much. But if we are told that this technology will result in a live birth and in fact we know that it does not do that very often, then I think we have a different kind of problem and a problem that needs to be addressed.

One of the things that Kushner and Rachlis say in their book is that one of the most common causes of infertility is sexually transmitted disease. They point out the irony that it took the AIDS epidemic to get doctors to actually begin to recommend the use of condoms to people.

They also point out that pelvic inflammatory disease, which may result in blocked fallopian tubes, is very easy to detect and very easy to treat in its early stages, yet we do not have those preventive techniques in place. While we are busy talking about the wonders of technology, we are ignoring a much lower-tech process involving a swab. If we could get our practitioners and our public interested in preventive medicine, we could have these simple tests, we could treat pelvic inflammatory disease and similar diseases in their infancy and we would have much less infertility to deal with than we do currently.

I was astounded to know that 15 per cent of all women under the age of 30 will develop pelvic inflammatory disease, which is absolutely preventable. It is preventable using a diaphragm with spermicidal jelly. It is preventable using a condom. In fact, should those preventions not be used, it is detectable and treatable early and it can be cured early.

I think it is just another piece of evidence indicating that we have to focus much more strongly and energetically on prevention and that we all should understand our reproductive systems and those things that will attack them. We should be learning about that in a reasonable way when we are about the ages of those pages and before.

I suspect that a lot of the kind of education we are still getting in school is not particularly relevant. If you stay up late and watch Talking Sex with Sue, you will learn a heck of a lot more than you learn in most schools, and I would recommend that to people who do not already watch that program.

I see that the time has elapsed. I will support the resolution. There are important questions to be dealt with, and I look forward to seeing the report of the royal commission when it is ready.

Mr Beer: I rise in support of my colleague’s motion which is before us. I think in terms of many of the issues which she and our colleague the member for Riverdale (Mr Reville) raised, one recognizes that there are a great many issues raised by this whole question and how important it is that we in Ontario co-operate and have the opportunity of co-operating with the federal commission once it has been established.

It seems to me that we have here an issue that brings together some of the most difficult kinds of choices which we as a community have to make. On the one side, we have the rapid technological advances which have been made in the medical area, which open up all kinds of new vistas in terms of reproduction.

But each one of those raises so many fundamental, ethical, moral and religious problems and dilemmas that we risk having technological change move so quickly that we will lose control over how we bring to bear those kinds of values that we think are important to us as a society in terms of this whole issue and how we want to see relationships between men and women and among families set out in not only a legal context but I think with a very clear sense of where we wish to head ethically and morally.

The only way that we are going to be able to bring together a consensus among Canadians is to ensure, as my colleague the member for Halton Centre said, that this discussion is not left just to those who have some specialty, be it medical or legal. We really need to involve all elements of our community, not just the medical profession, the legal profession, the bureaucrats or the politicians.

It may be of interest to some to note that four years ago, the Ontario Law Reform Commission came out with a two-volume report on human artificial reproduction and related matters. It is interesting to have a look at some of their recommendations in the context of this issue and where we should be going. Many of the issues which they raised and which have been raised in the House this morning need to be looked at in a much more public way.

Professor Jacques Testard, who was the head of the team responsible in France for their first test-tube baby, as we refer to it, left his work and called for a moratorium on in vitro research to get his message across. He said: “Let’s stop pretending that all research is neutral, that only its applications can be called good or bad. Ethical choices must be made before and not after discoveries.” In effect, he put his job on the line and lost it, but he wanted to try to underline how important it is that we, as people, in our various countries and communities deal very specifically with this issue.

When we start to identify what the issues are, the other thing that emerges is the difficulty we have in even beginning to determine what kinds of questions we need to ask. We know that at the present time, as the federal government wrestles with the mandate of the commission, one element of that has to be: “What are the kinds of questions that can be put to this commission? What are the kinds of questions that we have?” In part through this debate and others, perhaps we can begin to identify what some of those questions are in some of the areas we are going to want to explore and try to come to some consensus and conclusion about.

I would like to mention and deal with three areas in the time that is available to me this morning: in vitro fertilization, surrogate contracts and artificial insemination.

First of all, with respect to in vitro fertilization or what we more commonly refer to as the test-tube process, now, as has been mentioned, that is a fairly accepted practice. Every time the procedure is done, we know that many more eggs and embryos are taken than are needed. The extras are frozen to be thawed and implanted in the mother if the first implantation does not work.

This procedure raises a number of questions. What should be done with extra embryos? Should they be destroyed? Should they be given up to other couples? Should they be used for experimentation or transplantation of embryo tissue which, incidentally, already happens? Who is to decide these issues: the couple, the doctor, the hospital? How do we track embryos to ensure that mother and daughter are not actually siblings? There are many troubling questions around this issue.

One senior official with the World Health Organization raised another important question which in vitro fertilization raises. Does a couple have the right to have a child at any cost to society? At great cost, about eight per cent of couples in any country can be helped by in vitro fertilization, with considerable risk of not ending up with a healthy baby. But every child born, it is estimated, costs something in the order of $50,000. Where do we go in this respect? Does that become a right which every health program should support?

Second, the issue of surrogate mothering. Again, although surrogate mothering is a very old practice, the legal, ethical and social issues have only recently been faced and challenged. We are all familiar with the case of Baby M. The case and the ruling raise important questions. Is a surrogate contract really the same as any other contract? Consequently, is reproduction capability to become just a commodity? Do we not recognize the biological tie between a mother and a child?

Who should have access to this option of having children? At the moment, it tends to be wealthier couples commissioning poor women. There now exist private profit clinics. Should people be allowed to make a profit from reproduction? Should all clinics be nonprofit? How should this practice be regulated? Should biological mothers have some time to decide whether or not they want to keep the child, as is the case in adoption?

A recent

article in the Atlantic suggested that surrogate motherhood might become an option for couples who did not want to interrupt their careers. How do we decide questions like these? Surrogate mothering also raises other unresolved questions relating to artificial reproductive technology. What happens if the commissioning parents decide they do not want a child who is born with some kind of disorder? What happens to the child if both parents die, as happened in Australia where the parents were killed in an automobile accident before the child was born?

There are also questions that arise after the child is born. Is a father who has donated sperm responsible for custody payments for the child? How much should children be able to find out about their biological parents or the mother who carried them?

It is these sorts of questions that make it so important for everyone to get involved, to talk about the issues and to follow the work of the royal commission on reproductive technology. It is also why I support this resolution. I believe it is tremendously important that the people of Ontario need to review these issues and discuss them openly. We need, as a community, to consider the social, ethical and legal implications of medical and scientific developments in this field so that we can recommend policies and safeguards to address the issues raised by these developments.

Dr Richard Neuhaus, who is the director of the Rockford Institute Centre on Religion in Society in New York City, put it this way: “What we mean by ‘mother,’ ‘father,’ ‘child’ and ‘family’ is a question so foundational to any society that it must engage the best thought of all who are entangled in an interconnectedness that aspires to being a political community.”

While we will not find all the answers through the commission, it will force us to look at what the questions are and what the facts are and to try to come to some kind of consensus as a community as to how we should proceed. Right now, without that, things are happening in an ad hoc way that we cannot be happy with.

Recommendations for laws and regulations that may come out of the commission may protect those who are least able to protect themselves or who are unaware of the implications of their actions. In the end, it is to be hoped this will help to protect society from its own folly.

These are fundamental issues that are raised in any discussion of this issue. I think the resolution will show very clearly the kind of support we want to give to that work, and that we want to be very much involved in it.

Ms Bryden: Certainly, a resolution of this nature is one that most of us would support. Who can oppose a royal commission on a subject of such importance? It is a subject that has social. ethical and legal implications and it is a subject that is of great concern to a very large proportion of the population. It relates to the desire, which is almost universal, of men and women to have a child. It is therefore a very sensitive subject and one that we cannot ignore.

I do have some concerns about the wording of the resolution. I think the first part, that the people of Ontario should participate in the royal commission, is really not needed, because they certainly have the right, as people residing in Canada, to participate in any royal commission. Therefore, we do not need to assert that right.

It should also be clearer on what is the role of the government of Ontario that the resolution is urging. It asks the government of Ontario to co-operate to the fullest extent in seeing that people are involved in this royal commission. There is absolutely nothing set forth on how this can be done. I do not think the mover of the resolution outlined that in any detail.

There is also an instruction that government of Ontario institutions should participate in the royal commission. It refers to Ontario institutions that are engaged in the delivery of reproductive technology. You could say that almost every institution in Ontario is engaged in that. Schools have sex education. Social work agencies deal with people who are having problems with reproductive rights and with children. The medical ministries and agencies, of course, are all concerned. The high-tech development agencies are concerned with whether resources should go to developing reproductive technologies.

Almost every Ontario institution is involved in some way, so again, the resolution is very vague on what institutions the member is calling on to become involved.

The third thing is that these institutions are asked to consider the social, legal and ethical implications of medical and scientific developments in this field of reproductive technology. That is a very tall order for any Ontario institution to undertake. I am sure there will be much discussion of the social, legal and ethical implications of medical and scientific developments and technologies over the coming years, but I do not think Ontario institutions will be the sole participants or the sole leaders in this particular debate. It will be all of society that will be involved.

Again, I think the resolution gives rather woolly advice to the Ontario government as to what it can do. I hope we will have a statement, not just from the Minister of Health (Mrs Caplan), but from all the ministries as to how they think they can participate in the work of the royal commission.

What we need is Ontario government action to ensure that all women throughout the province have equal rights to exercise freedom of choice in reproductive matters. This means full coverage by the Ontario health insurance plan of procedures connected with the exercise of these rights.

There should be no denial of services to poor women, women in rural areas, women on Indian reserves or any other women who find there are barriers to participating and exercising their full choice in reproductive matters.

We also need an ongoing review of all medical procedures provided under OHIP to see which ones should be added as technologies change. We also should be studying which ones should he revised to meet modern conditions, such as the rules that lead to the ordering of excess tests by many doctors. We should be looking at the cost of experimental work, not only in the reproductive field but in all medical fields, and working out methods of weighing how we can prioritize which sort of experimental work will be costed or will have allocations of funds.

Instead, also, I would like to suggest that more attention should be given to the opportunities for infertile parents to adopt children from the Third World and the developing nations. Those who have this very strong desire to have a child, and I can understand that desire, should have more opportunity to adopt a child who is already born and perhaps in that way do a great deal to improve conditions in the Third World and to make opportunities available for those children.

My colleague has also mentioned that we must do more preventive work, both in medical care and in developing healthy lifestyles, because if we had more preventive medicine there would be fewer people who may become infertile, and there would be fewer children who potentially would be damaged or have disabilities when they are born. This is something you have to consider when you are considering increasing fertility, whether you would want to use that power to prevent disabilities.

We still have a lot of work in other areas before we spend all our time just on the royal commission work. I think that it is not nearly broad enough in this field and that if we want to give every man and woman who wants a child the right to have one, we have to think of all sorts of ways of making it possible for them.

Mr Offer: I am pleased to rise and speak in support of the resolution put forward by the member for Halton Centre. I have read this resolution very carefully and thought over this resolution for a number of weeks. If I might, I would like to read part of the resolution which I think is of extreme importance, and that is encouraging “participation with the royal commission by Ontario institutions which are engaged in the delivery of any aspect of reproductive technology in considering the social, ethical and legal implications of medical and scientific developments in this field, and to recommend policies and safeguards to address the issues raised by these developments.”

What we are talking about in this particular field is an area that by any objective standard is, I would think, relatively new not only in terms of the legal, social and ethical implications, but also is one where the medical procedures themselves are relatively new. I have been involved in some way with this particular area in a personal capacity for about 15 years. As I think back over the last 15 years, I must say that about IS years ago I think there were but two what may be called fertilization clinics in the city of Toronto. One was located in Mount Sinai Hospital and the other in the Toronto General Hospital.

Since that point in time there has been a growth in fertilization clinics, for instance. These are clinics that are designed to come to the needs of numbers of individuals who are having difficulty in conception. Also, there has been increasing awareness by the general public as to, in many cases, the widespread difficulty in terms of fertilization. From that, we have had a technological advancement in terms of in vitro fertilization, surrogate parenting and foetal sex preselection. These are areas that 15 years ago were unheard of.

Because of this technological advancement in the field of medicine we, as a government and certainly as the general public, are left with vexing questions dealing with the social, moral and legal implications of this type of advancement. So the question becomes, “Do we allow technological advancement to outstrip our ability to come to grips with these questions?”

I think the resolution put forward by the member is one that is necessary on the one hand, and timely on the other, because we can no longer sit back. That type of medical advancement in terms of reproduction is one that is calling into question many issues.

I know that in the throne speech on 3 April, the federal government announced there will be a royal commission to examine all issues surrounding high-technology reproductive human life: artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, embryo transfer and surrogate parenting. And yes, as has been indicated most eloquently by the member for Halton Centre, although there have not yet been terms of reference for such a commission, it is an important first step that such a commission has been established.

Because of the establishment of that commission, one must ask, is there and should there be a role for, for instance, Ontario to play? I think this resolution comes to grips with that and says that there should be, that there is such a role to play, and we, by this resolution, are endorsing that role of the government of Ontario to play in such a royal commission, because it deals with areas, questions and issues that are going to be important, not only today but for many generations to come. It is important work and it is necessary work.

I know from my reading that it is barely 10 years ago that there was this in vitro fertilization, this test-tube baby, and that was heralded and remarked upon across the world. Yes, we realize there are great odds in the success of such a process, but we are also becoming more and more aware that that process, as well as others, is providing success. I think it behoves us as legislators to keep in mind the psychological concerns and impact on those persons who are having fertilization problems, the questions they have and the direction they need. We have to come to grips with the very human aspect of this issue.

We have an opportunity. The royal commission has provided an opportunity. This particular resolution has provided a further opportunity. Working with and hand in hand with such a commission, we can come to grips with some of those very important issues, some of those social, legal, ethical and moral questions we are going to have to grapple with. We are going to have to do so with a focus, keeping in mind the very real questions that men and women having difficulties in terms of fertilization go through.

The technology will continue to advance. The questions will continue to increase. We now have a forum in which we can address not only the questions and concerns we have heard today, but I dare say questions and concerns we have not yet thought about, have not yet discussed or analysed. Accordingly, I would like to support this resolution and commend the member for Halton Centre for a very important resolution on a very important issue, one that will have great impact on the future of this province and indeed of this country for many years to come.

The Speaker: I believe the member for Halton Centre reserved approximately two minutes.

Mrs Sullivan: In closing the debate, I would like to thank my colleagues the member for York North (Mr Beer) and the member for Mississauga North (Mr Offer), and my friends the member for Riverdale and the member for Beaches Woodbine (Ms Bryden) for indicating their support of the resolution.

The member for Riverdale spoke of the passion associated with reproduction. The technologies themselves that are being used in artificial reproduction have no passion attached to them. It is the people who are affected by the technologies who have the passion.

Reproduction is one area of our lives that has been bound with rules -- religious and secular -- with mystical approaches, with heavy emotional burdens, with a sense of success and failure from time immemorial. The introduction of the new reproductive technologies brings with it fundamental and vexing questions. I hope that members will support the resolution and that the royal commission will be able to benefit from the experience we have had in Ontario, the expertise we have and, indeed, our suffering and our hope.

The Speaker: That completes debate on ballot item 9 and ballot item 10.

EAST METRO TRANSPORTATION

The Speaker: Mr Cousens has moved resolution 12.

Motion agreed to.

REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY

The Speaker: Mrs Sullivan has moved resolution 14.

Motion agreed to.

The House recessed at 12:01 p.m.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1330.

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

Mr Philip: Today members of the Legislature and community leaders are participating in ceremonies and receptions marking the 492nd anniversary of the discovery of Canada by Giovanni Caboto, or John Cabot as he is called in so many of our Canadian history texts. We join other provinces such as Newfoundland, which celebrates Newfoundland’s discovery day on 24 June, commemorating Giovanni Caboto’s arrival in the new world.

Today our lives are enriched by an estimated 700,000 citizens of Italian descent living in Canada. Giovanni Caboto was the first Italian in North America and displayed the same qualities of all immigrating peoples to follow: tenacity, perseverance, curiosity and courage.

Just as the space explorers of our time are challenging our view of the world and broadening our perspectives, so Caboto’s voyages totally changed the perception of Europe. Europeans soon came to realize that this was an immense continent with enormous potential, and we are the beneficiaries of this.

Last, may I congratulate the National Congress of Italian Canadians and other groups for their efforts in reminding us of this important event in history.

[Remarks in Italian]

The Speaker: Please look at standing order 19(a).

FARM TAX REBATE

Mr Villeneuve: Nothing typifies this government’s abandonment of Ontario farmers any more than last Friday’s late-afternoon release of details to slash the Ontario farm property tax rebate program by over $20 million. I can tell the minister that the timing of his announcement, which he no doubt hoped would go unnoticed, will not help him explain the Liberal Party’s betrayal of Ontario farmers.

I can also tell him that it does not help when his official press release, received by members of this House, failed to include the one page labelled “Guidelines and Changes” which was received elsewhere.

The real insult, however, has been to farmers and their farm organizations. Regardless of what the minister may have said in this House, no farm organizations were consulted about these changes. Many farmers expected their interim farm tax rebate cheques to arrive, and the cancellation of interim payments will not help farmers on tight budgets.

Surely the Liberal government knows that the farm economy is not in very good shape. If the government had wanted to exclude a few large corporations from receiving the rebate, surely some other method could have been found.

Of course, it is nice to talk about excluding weekend farmers, but when the government tries to define what a farmer is by basing those

definitions on an income test, then we are surely in trouble. It is simply wrong for this government, in tough financial times for agriculture, to dictate to farmers how much they should be earning off their farms.

LISA ORCHARD

Ms Hart: I rise today to welcome to the member’s gallery Lisa Orchard, Leaside High School’s recipient of the 1989 Provincial Member’s Award.

Last year, the member’s award was established to recognize the accomplishments of young people who stand out in our community. The award is presented annually to a student from each high school in York East who has shown innovative leadership, having both initiated and implemented a project which has enriched the lives of others.

Although she is just 17 years old, Lisa already has a long history of helping those less fortunate than herself. Last summer, while working at Stop 103 food bank, Lisa decided to organize a food drive at her school. In October, the students at Leaside High School collected 600 cans of food which were then distributed to the needy and the hungry in the community.

I would like to commend Lisa for her fine work and heartfelt concern for others. It is indeed encouraging to know that there are young people like Lisa who are eager to tackle the problems and the social inequalities which exist in our society. Congratulations, Lisa. You are a credit to all of us.

BAIT FISH INDUSTRY

Mr Hampton: We all remember how this government said in 1987 that it was opposed to a trade deal with the United States that would give away our interests, such as our economy, our environment or our culture. Do members remember the words , “There can be no deal”?

Now the trade deal is impacting directly on some of our communities in rather unique ways. Under the federal Fisheries Act, provincial governments are delegated the authority to make regulations limiting the importation of live bait fish into the province. The reason such regulations exist is to guard against the unique parasites and diseases that travel with bait fish from other places, upsetting the ecosystem of our lakes and rivers and destroying our important sport and commercial fishing industries.

Earlier this year, Ontario’s regulations limiting the importation of live bait fish were struck down under the trade deal. It has been some time, and one would have thought that the Ministry of Natural Resources would have quickly gone to Ottawa and spoken with the federal Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to get new regulations in place to limit the possible damage.

Alas, there has been a lot of dithering and this has not happened. As a result, foreign bait fish are now entering certain parts of the province and do threaten to contaminate our lakes and also threaten to drive the Ontario bait fish industry out of the market.

ROUGE VALLEY

Mrs Marland: I would like to take this time to congratulate my colleague the member for Markham (Mr Cousens) for his resolution this morning on the environmental impacts of the east Metro transportation corridor on the Rouge Valley. I was pleased to speak in support of his resolution.

I was also pleased to see that members from all three parties supported the resolution, which called for a comprehensive and environmentally sound strategy to deal with the transportation needs of the greater Toronto area. This is an indication that we are moving in the right direction to preserve the Rouge Valley lands for future generations.

It is, however, unfortunate that this government is moving so slowly towards this goal. The Premier (Mr Peterson) is dragging his feet on making a decision. Do the people of north Scarborough have to wait until the next provincial election two years from now to see the Premier keep his word, perhaps with an election goodie, a promise?

The decision is easy. It was already made over 10 years ago by our Progressive Conservative government, that the Rouge Valley should always be preserved as park land. The Premier should not even be considering reversing that action and that decision.

I suggest that we get on with the job, that we let northeast Scarborough out of limbo. The province should give its go-ahead for a park in the Rouge Valley land immediately and save the continuing efforts by the group of volunteers who fight on a day-to-day basis for the preservation of what already has been preserved, but this Liberal government will not agree.

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

Mr Leone: I am happy to read the proclamation of Giovanni Caboto Day:

“Whereas Giovanni Caboto was a skilled navigator who was admired and revered as an expert mariner and ingenious craftsman of maps and globes; and

“Whereas this world-renowned Italian adventurer, with a crew of 18 men in the ship Matthew, landed on the eastern coast of Canada on the morning of 24 June 1497; and

“Whereas Caboto displayed great tenacity and perseverance; and

“Whereas the daring exploits and deeds of this famous explorer are of great historical significance not only to Canadians but to people throughout the world,

“Therefore, on behalf of the government of Ontario, we are pleased to recognize 24 June 1989 as Giovanni Caboto Day and commend the observance of this historically relevant occasion to the people of this province.”

At this time, I would like to acknowledge in the gallery the presence of the representatives of clubs and associations of the Italian community who have come here to celebrate this great event with this House.

ROTARY CHILDREN’S CENTRE

Mr Farnan: The Rotary Children’s Centre, which serves my riding of Cambridge as well as the Kitchener-Waterloo area, has a waiting list of almost 200 children, children who desperately require treatment but will wait for up to one year for care. Almost 200 little children whose lives are already complicated by their disabilities are being denied treatment which is fundamental to their development and wellbeing.

The Rotary Children’s Centre is hopeful and anticipates that the Ministry of Health will resolve this and that the waiting list will be reduced in the near future. I urge the Minister of Health (Mrs Caplan) to act quickly to rectify this intolerable situation. Every passing week is vital to these children. For them, time does not stand still. One year lost in the life of a child has an immeasurable impact on that child’s future.

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

Hon Mrs Caplan: Emergency health services is one of several specialty care areas mentioned in the recent throne speech in which my ministry is concentrating its resources.

Earlier today I was pleased to announce an $18-million province-wide program to enhance the quality of emergency health services. The funding will be made available this fiscal year. This additional funding will improve the coordination of services from the time a patient is picked up by an ambulance, arrives at the hospital emergency department and, when necessary, is transferred to a critical care or trauma unit.

The initiatives from this additional funding include $9 million for additions to ambulance services in 26 communities in response to population increases. The remaining $9 million will be used to:

Implement guidelines to help hospitals improve the efficiency of their emergency wards;

Designate seven new regional trauma networks to co-ordinate regional hospital beds and services to ensure that severely injured patients will get prompt access to the types of specialized care they need;

Expand standardized information collection on emergency patients province-wide, and

Establish a trauma patient registry to provide research data on injuries and treatment outcomes.

My ministry will soon send the emergency department guidelines to hospital boards of governors. Implementation of the guidelines will ensure that emergency care is available at all times and that emergency patients get priority over elective cases.

I would like to commend the Provincial Emergency Health Services Advisory Committee for its efforts in developing the guidelines.

I am also pleased that the guidelines have received positive reviews from many of our partners in health care such as the Ontario Hospital Association, the Ontario Medical Association and the Emergency Nurses Association of Ontario.

Hospitals that will be asked by my ministry to take a leading role in setting up new regional trauma networks are London’s Victoria Hospital, Windsor’s Hotel Dieu of St Joseph Hospital, Thunder Bay’s McKellar General Hospital, Hamilton General Hospital, Kingston General Hospital and Sudbury General Hospital. In Ottawa, the district health council will name a hospital this summer to take a leading trauma network role.

The development of regional trauma systems includes the identification of the levels of care at hospitals in a region and the roles that each of them will play in the treatment of seriously injured patients.

The new regional communications systems will eliminate the need for doctors to call several hospitals in search of more specialized care. Instead, a regional centre will have an inventory of services available. A doctor seeking a transfer for a critically ill patient will be connected with a doctor at a hospital where appropriate care is available.

Data from the emergency department information system and the trauma patient registry will be used by the ministry and hospitals to plan further improvements in emergency and trauma care.

I have no doubt these initiatives will play a significant role in enhancing the quality of care of severely ill or critically injured Ontario residents.

As members know, I previously announced as part of my ministry’s specialty care initiatives a province-wide breast-screening program for cancer and new funding for cardiovascular care, AIDS treatment and education, kidney dialysis treatment and care for mothers and the newborn.

Let me conclude by saying this reaffirms our government’s commitment to accessible, effective and universal health care.

FIRE AT INDIAN SETTLEMENT

Hon Mr Kerrio: I would like to bring to the attention of the House a fire emergency which has caused the evacuation of the settlement of Lansdowne House, located about 300 kilometres north of Geraldton.

A fire was reported south of the Lansdowne House settlement late yesterday afternoon. It appears to have been started by lightning. My ministry is certainly responsible for fire suppression, and for safety reasons we recommended evacuating the community.

At 7 pm the Department of National Defence began airlifting people out of the settlement and into Geraldton. The operation was completed by 10 pm. One hundred and fifty-nine people are now being housed in a church hall in Geraldton and are being looked after by the Geraldton Community Emergency Response Group.

The Ministry of Natural Resources has dispatched a CL-215 waterbomber, as well as two fire crews, to the scene and we are working in co-operation with the people of the settlement to bring this fire under control. Some of the residents of Lansdowne House are trained in firefighting techniques and they have remained in the settlement to fight the fire and protect the buildings.

At last report, the fire at Lansdowne House had affected about 150 hectares of land but no buildings have been lost.

Yesterday I told this House about the emergency evacuation of the settlement of Webequie due to the serious fire situation at the edge of that community, which is 350 kilometres north of Geraldton.

That evacuation was a complete success, thanks to the efforts of the Department of National Defence, the Geraldton Community Emergency Response Group and my ministry. More than 400 people were safely transported to the town of Geraldton and are being housed in the town’s community centre.

The fire at Webequie is currently under control and does not appear to be posing a threat to the community. However, community members who were evacuated will remain in Geraldton until it is safe to return home.

The ministry has implemented emergency-area orders centring on the two settlements. The enactment of an emergency-area order gives the ministry complete authority over the emergency areas and empowers MNR to take whatever action is necessary to protect human life and property and to suppress the fire.

Members will be interested to know that across the province 108 fires are burning, affecting 4,300 hectares. So far this year there has been a total of 604 fires, affecting some 10,000 hectares.

The weather is the most important factor in the provincial fire situation. We expect thunderstorm activity in the area that will help ease the situation in northwestern Ontario and in some of the north-central areas.

Because events happen so fast, just a brief comment: Alberta and Saskatchewan have sent in four CL-2 15 waterbombers to help us fight the fires in that area, and I want to give them a great vote of thanks.

RESPONSES

FIRE AT INDIAN SETTLEMENT

Mr B. Rae: It really is rather extraordinary listening to the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr Kerrio). This is now the second evacuation of a whole community that has taken place in two days. I think it is probably difficult for many members who have never visited any of these communities, or for many Ontarians who have never been in the far north of our province, to understand the poor housing conditions, the enormous poverty which surrounds those communities and the complete isolation of these communities which requires the total evacuation as a result of the outbreak of a fire.

While commending the members of our national defence team and natural resources team, who obviously worked so quickly, as well as those members of the Lansdowne House band and community who stayed behind in order to fight the fire and because sometimes repetition is necessary to make a point, I simply want to say once again that we in this House are going to have to make a decision as to the overall conditions that exist in these communities. It simply is not enough to be there at a time of emergency evacuation.

We have to provide decent housing, a clean environment, sewage treatment, running water and opportunities for education. The provincial government cannot say simply that these are all the responsibilities of the federal government, because if we say they are, then we are saying in effect that nothing will be done.

Perhaps something good will come out of these tragedies, the tragedy at Fort Albany, at Webequie yesterday and at Lansdowne House today.

Perhaps the very fact that the minister is making these announcements in this House will cause some members of the media and others to take some interest in events that are occurring in our far north because it is only when that focus and attention come from the citizens of the affluent south that we will begin to understand that in Ontario we are all one family, and that some members of our family are hurting very badly and desperately need the rights, support, brotherhood and sisterhood, and friendship of people all over this province in order to give them a rightful place at the very centre of Ontario’s work and life.

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

Mr Reville: I want to respond to what I hope is the last announcement from the Minister of Health (Mrs Caplan). A lot of us have been wondering when the series of staged announcements from the ministry of information would come to an end, and I understand that this is the last one. This kind of incomprehensible gibberish I refer to as health-speak. It is sometimes called Barkin’s barkin’.

As we say in this place, I have in my mind 11 previous Ministry of Health releases which might well account for half of this money already, so we are getting half of it reannounced today. The minister is shaking her head, but she does not have the faintest clue about what is going on in her own ministry.

Will this approach mean that attending nurses no longer have to stuff blankets into cracks in the fuselages of aircraft so that their patients will not freeze in the air ambulances of this province? Will it mean that ministry directives that come out and shut down ambulances from service, called “down-staffing,” will end, so that they will not have to pay overtime?

Will it mean that the sometimes nonexistent trauma management which is sometimes bizarre will end in the province, where a victim gets orthopaedic services in one, neurological services in another and internal medicine in yet another hospital so that the patient has to recover three times from three operations in three different places? It is hard to say.

We have seen the pattern where the minister makes announcements onsite, in the Toronto Star and then in the Legislature. Sure, emergency services and trauma management can put this money to good use, but I do not think the minister really is fooling very many people.

Mr Brandt: Mr Speaker, may I beg the indulgence of the House for a moment? Our party missed the rotation on the response to Giovanni Caboto Day.

Mr Reville: There was no rotation.

Mr Brandt: Was it not, in fact, done earlier?

Mr B. Rae: We did it under members’ statements. We did one and they did one.

Mr Brandt: What I would like is to ask for unanimous consent to use up part of our time to make that response now, if I could, on behalf of our party.

The Speaker: Is there agreement?

Agreed to.

GIOVANNI CABOTO DAY

Mr Brandt: I would like to thank the members of the House because I do want to join with all the parties in the House in recognizing Giovanni Caboto Day which is being celebrated, as all members of the House know, to recognize the tremendous contribution that Italian immigrants have made both to Ontario and to Canada as well.

Over a long number of years I have appreciated a very close association that I have had with the Italian community. During a former calling, when I was in my own private life in private business, I had many associations in Italy. I grew to develop a very close association with many members of the Italian community, as well as many businesses in that part of the world.

There has been an absolutely outstanding contribution made by the Italian community to life in Ontario. The culture, the heritage and the richness that this community in particular, because of their very large numbers, has contributed to Ontario has made this province a much better and a much stronger place.

I want to join with all members of the House in recognizing what we are focusing on here, a celebration of success, a celebration of contribution and a celebration on the part of those Canadian people who have welcomed a very fine and law-abiding community that has done so much to make this province the very attractive place it is to live in.

RESPONSES (CONTINUED)

EMERGENCY HEALTH SERVICES

Mr Eves: I would like to respond to the statement made today by the Minister of Health (Mrs Caplan). Although I suppose it is difficult to take issue with some motherhood and apple-pie statements in the minister’s statement today, I would have thought that a lot of these things go without saying.

To make sure that emergency care is available at all times: I would have thought, I would have hoped that we would have had that system in Ontario for some 50 years. If we have not, and the minister is shaking her head, I would like to know what she has been doing in the last four years of her life.

Emergency patients get priority over elective cases: I certainly would have hoped that that would be the case, and that goes without saying. I do not think we have to spend $18 million to come to commonsense conclusions. Any doctor I have dealt with certainly knows what hospital to call and what other specialized physician to contact in terms of needing specialized care.

We get to talking about spending $9 million to improve emergency departments around the province. I can tell the minister that in my home community of Parry Sound, the Parry Sound District General Hospital has had a request in to her ministry for some period of time requesting over $1 million worth of improvements to its emergency department alone. There are 222 hospitals in Ontario. How far is $9 million going to go? The minister could spend it all on Parry Sound, one of those 222 if she cared to do her job appropriately.

With respect to improving ambulance services in Ontario, perhaps I have just missed these places on the list, but I know of places that have requested improved ambulance services that are not on the list -- North Bay and Parry Sound. For the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay (Mr Black), who seems very proud of this announcement, the municipalities of Bracebridge, Grayenhurst and Huntsville are mysteriously missing from the minister’s list of places she is going to help.

Mr Black: They’ve already got excellent ambulance service.

Mr Eves: Is the member happy with all his health care services?

Mr Black: What’s that got to do with ambulance services? Don’t you know the difference?

Mr Eves: That’s funny, the obstetrician requirement for the Bracebridge area and the Gravenhurst area has been there for some time. The Minister of Health has said that she cannot be all things to all people, that the people in that area do not deserve an obstetrician, but perhaps the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay should go on record as saying that he is not in favour of that, either. He cannot have it both ways. He is either in favour of it or he is not.

ORAL QUESTIONS

Mr B. Rae: I have questions for the Premier (Mr Peterson) today. I also have a backbench question for the Minister of Health (Mrs Caplan). I do not know what my colleague has, but I will wait until the Premier comes.

The Speaker: The member is requesting to stand down his two questions?

Agreed to.

Mr Brandt: I can go with one of my lead questions. My other question is to the Premier as well, so I will stand that down.

PATRICIA STARR

Mr Brandt: My question, if I might, is to the Minister of Tourism and Recreation and it is again with regard to Ontario Place.

The Premier has stated that he is most anxious to get all the facts on the table as they relate to Ontario Place and the investigation that is under way with regard to some of the activities that took place at Ontario Place. I wonder if that in fact is the wish of the government and of the Premier, who has now just arrived.

Would the minister indicate why the standing committee on public accounts tabled a request to have Patti Starr appear before that committee so that she could respond to the very legitimate questions that members of this House want to place to her?

Hon Mr O’NeiI: Although I am the Minister of Tourism and Recreation, I do not direct the business of the House.

Mr Brandt: I understand full well that the minister does not direct the business of the House. However, I am sure the minister would have some input and/or some knowledge as it relates to the activities of a committee that is interested in dealing with the Patti Starr issue.

My next question is that during the course of Ms Starr’s tenure as chairman of Ontario Place, there were a number of staff