1981 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 32nd Parliament

Hansard

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

( Hansard )

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1981

Morning Sitting

[ Page

6693 ]

CONTENTS

Reading and Receiving Petitions

Clerk-Assistant –– 6693

Orders of the Day

Speech from the Throne

On the amendment

Hon. Mr. McGeer –– 6693

On the main motion

Mr. Macdonald –– 6697

Mr. Kempf –– 6701

Mr. Stupich –– 6703

Hon. Mr. Hewitt –– 6707

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1981

The House met at 10 a.m.

Prayers.

MR. KEMPF: Mr. Speaker, if not in

the gallery, in the precinct this morning is a group of people I would

like to acknowledge and have the House welcome. It is the small but

very hard-working staff of the Committee on Crown Corporations: our

acting director, Colin MacPherson; Yves LaRue and Ken Bayne, our

corporate analysts; and Pat Dexter, our administrative secretary. I'd

like the House to make them welcome.

Reading and Receiving Petitions

CLERK-ASSISTANT: In the matter of the petition presented to the House

on November 26, 1981, by the hon. member for Burnaby-Edmonds (Ms. Brown), said

petition is irregular in the following respects: namely, the form thereof does

not comply with the standing orders of the House. Although it is endorsed by

the hon. member, it does not bear the signatures of the petitioners and does

not contain a prayer.

All of which is respectfully submitted,

Ian M. Horne, QC, Clerk of the House.

Orders of the Day

SPEECH FROM THE THRONE

(continued debate)

On the amendment.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Mr. Speaker, good morning. I might say how pleased I am that the Leader

of the Opposition has made the time available in his

schedule to attend

the debates of the House. I would commend to him to study Hansard with care so that he can become familiar with the policies expressed by his elected members.

AN HON. MEMBER: Name two.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Well, I'm going to name a number, Mr. Speaker, because I think the

Leader of the Opposition should perhaps give some account of the

policies of his party. I can recall — being very long in the tooth in

this House — the debates that took place many years ago, prior to the

1972 election, that disastrous election for the people of British

Columbia in which the NDP gave a clear indication of what they would do

if they came to power. The only trouble was that the public of British

Columbia never knew that. They weren't being told what the NDP said in

this House.

What I want to see done now, while there is still time, is for the story put

forth by the NDP to be told to the public of British Columbia. You see, Mr.

Speaker, many of the people who should have been telling the story didn't

want it to get out, because they went to work for the NDP. I can remember John

Mika when he was president of the press gallery. He wasn't telling the public

of British Columbia what the NDP was saying. He went to work for the NDP, and

his contribution was to help run ICBC and bring it to a $185 million loss in

its first two years. Peter McNelly was a columnist for the Vancouver Province .

He wasn't telling the story either. He went to work as the financial adviser

to the then Premier of the day, Mr. Barrett, and brought financial disaster

to this province.

want to tell you, I read today about how the NDP has learned its

lesson, how they're moving to the middle of the road, how the Leader of

the Opposition wears three-piece, pin-stripe suits. I want to tell you,

when you come on to the floor of this chamber and hear what the NDP has

to say, their story hasn't changed one bit. They're honest, Mr.

Speaker. They tell you what they're going to do, and then — God help us

— they do it. I want the public of British Columbia to realize that all

of that experimentation, the messing with the levers of power, the

damage that was done, is going to be repeated, because they're saying

right now, over here during the debate this week….

MR. BARRETT: On a point of order, I want the member to realize that he's accusing the opposition of telling the truth.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I doubt whether this is a point of order.

MR. BARRETT: Well, coming from him, Mr. Speaker, it's a point of order.

MR. SPEAKER . Order, please. Hon. members, it is not only disorderly

but unruly to interrupt a member while he is speaking, and to raise a point

of order which could be called a fraudulent point of order is grossly disorderly.

The minister has the floor.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Well, Mr. Speaker, I'm just pleading through this Legislature to the

public of British Columbia to listen to what these people are saying,

because they didn't listen before and the public had to pay the

penalty. They've learned no lesson. They've not reformed. They've not

moved to the middle. They've not come up with any sensible policies for

the future. In debate this week, they have come up with a formula for

disaster.

May I explain that the mover of this

non-confidence motion, which any sensible person would reject, the

member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea), said that he was against any kind

of development of our natural gas industry. He doesn't want a liquefied

natural gas plant here. He doesn't want to make use of that resource.

He wants to leave it in the ground. Isn't that right, Mr. Member? You

don't want a petrochemical complex in British Columbia. You said you

were against it in debate. He was against the liquid natural gas plant.

MR. LEA: I'm against that.

HON. MR. McGEER: You're against that. Fine. Put that down on the record. The NDP is against it.

Then

there was the member for Atlin (Mr. Passarell). He hasn't been back in

the chamber since he gave his speech, but he said he was against dams

in the north. He was against damming the Stikine River and the Iskut

River and the Laird River.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's right.

HON. MR. McGEER: The member for Prince Rupert says it. The member for Atlin says it, and let's have the Leader of the Opposition say it.

[ Page 6694 ]

HON. MR. WOLFE: I'm making a list.

HON. MR. McGEER: Make a list.

Then

we have heard the NDP say they're against the Hat Creek power plant.

Isn't that correct? When the Leader of the Opposition was the Premier,

he said: "We're not going to build any damn dams." He'll recall that. I

don't want any more talk about that.

Mr. Speaker, I know

there are some people in British Columbia who believe that the

electricity in their home comes somewhere out of the atmosphere and if

you just plug in there will be 110 volts. I expect a lot of those

people would vote NDP, because that's the only way they're going to get

power if this group here ever gets into office.

At the present time we are building an enormous dam on the Revelstoke Canyon.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who started it?

HON. MR. McGEER:

Not the NDP. They were against it. But any of you who've been up there

will see that, as with the other power projects of the past, the

dimensions of it are truly awesome. That project will last British

Columbia for exactly two years in terms of growth. If you're going to

supply the power to this province, you're going to have to do it by

taking the two-thirds of the inherent water power in this province that

is now wasted and harness it for our utilization, or you're going to

have to develop some alternative.

It could be

thermo-electric power plants or nuclear power, but it has to be

something. If you're against nuclear power, thermo-electric plants and

hydro-electric dams, then please explain to the people of British

Columbia how they're going to get 110 volts when they plug in their

electric light cord and how the industry of this province is to obtain

the power that it needs to operate. And don't say wind power from your

debates here in the legislative chamber. Come up with your program for

power development in this province and let the public of British

Columbia know how you're going to do it.

Many times in this

House I've criticized the things that we did in the name of power

development in British Columbia, because we could have made all of the

projects that have been developed in the past an enhancement to our

environment rather than a detriment. That could have been done, but

wasn't done. It must be done in the future. But to take the attitude

that the New Democratic Party have taken — that we shouldn't build

this, and we shouldn't build that, and we shouldn't build the other

thing, because damage has been done in the past — is simply to bury

your head in the sand and leave British Columbia helpless on the ropes.

When you were in power, you destroyed the mining industry in British Columbia.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: And the petroleum industry.

HON. MR. McGEER: And the petroleum industry.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: And the forest industry.

HON. MR. McGEER: And the forest industry.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: And the manufacturing industry.

HON. MR. McGEER: And manufacturing. Yes, all those things are true.

Mr. Speaker, if the policies that the NDP are now advocating in this particular

non-confidence motion are brought forward in this province, you will destroy

not just one or two or three industries, you'll destroy everything. That's

the consequence of the policies you're advocating. I say to all the people

of British Columbia: don't let it come as any surprise, because the things

that you did when you got into power in 1972 didn't come out of the blue;

they were stated right here on the floor of the chamber, and the people who

should have been listening weren't listening. Some didn't care to listen,

and some didn't want to believe. But it's all there: all of the irresponsibility

that the NDP ever presented to the people of British Columbia is there to listen

to now, the things that caused the NDP to be rejected in 1933, rejected in 1937,

rejected in 1941, rejected in 1945, rejected in 1949, rejected in 1952, rejected

in 1956, rejected in 1963, 1966, 1969; and then that horrible mistake was made

in 1972.

AN HON. MEMBER: Never again.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Never again. The people of British Columbia let down their guard in

1972. All I can say to the people of British Columbia is: do not let

your guard down again. Listen carefully to what these people have to

say. Do not believe all of the myths, all of the false stories that

have been perpetrated.

AN HON. MEMBER: The image-making.

HON. MR. McGEER:

All the image-making. It's false. We learned our lesson. No, you

haven't learned your lesson. We wear three-piece suits now — you don't

wear three-piece suits. The red underwear is still there.

Mr.

Speaker, in rejecting this motion, as it surely must be rejected, we

should do so not merely on the basis of the irresponsibility of the

arguments that the New Democratic Party has once more put forward in

defence of the non-confidence motion, but to give some thought as to

what our status here in British Columbia will be in the future and why

we find ourselves today in the unhappy circumstance of having almost

one-quarter of all of our forest workers laid off, with many of the

industries upon which we count for our prosperity running at less than

full capacity….

MR. BARRETT: Social Credit!

HON. MR. McGEER: The NDP is very quick to blame Social Credit.

MR. BARRETT: Well, you were quick to blame us in the same situation.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Yes, because I can't say it any better, Mr. Speaker, than my former

colleague in the House, Gordon Gibson, once said it: the New Democratic

Party when they were in power had pulled off a miracle. The miracle was

that in a time of record mineral prices in the world the NDP had

managed to create despair in the mining industry in British Columbia.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Record demand and record prices both.

[ Page

6695 ]

HON. MR. McGEER: With record demand and record prices, they produced

despair in the mining industry — a miracle of politics. Now when that kind of

thing happens….

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the hon. minister just pause for half a minute until we restore order in the House.

think it is time we remind members of the practice. An occasional

outburst is tolerated perhaps, but if it becomes an interruption, it

must be controlled. Hon. members, the minister has the floor. We shall

not interrupt him. Please proceed.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Mr. Speaker, the lesson of that circumstance of the New Democratic

Party, which they should surely have learned by now, and which all of

British Columbia should understand, is that we are not an island in the

world of economics — we live by international trade. We do not operate

our own currency; we must compete for investment just as we compete for

the goods which we sell abroad. Those are mandatory terms of reference

for any government that holds power in British Columbia. If we manage

our affairs well, as we are doing today, then we fare better than our

cousins across Canada and our counterparts in other areas of the world.

we manage our affairs badly, as we did from 1972 to 1975, then we fare

worse. In difficult times good management can make us do slightly

better; bad management at any time can leave us far worse off. That's

what we faced with the NDP. But when the Leader of the Opposition tries

to blame a world recession on Social Credit, all he's doing is saying:

what a pity it is that everywhere in the world there aren't governments

like the one here in British Columbia, so that we could avoid the

global problems that we have today.

MR. BARRETT: Are you bragging?

HON. MR. McGEER: We have got something to brag about, Mr. Member.

The

world is facing difficult times, but British Columbia is still, despite

all the harshness of today, and all the poverty and all the suffering,

doing far better than most jurisdictions. In a sense, British Columbia

is the Detroit of the housing world, because it's here that the 2-by-4s

are made that form the basis of the housing market in North America and

to an increasing extent in some other parts of the world. Just as when

the purchasing of cars goes down Detroit does badly, so when the

purchasing of homes goes down British Columbia industry suffers.

what has happened in the world today that has led to record inflation

and the uncertainty that plagues British Columbia, Canada and the

United States? In my view, the major contributor to world inflation

today is OPEC. They are the ones who have produced this enormous

imbalance in world trade, where we have one nation, Saudi Arabia, with

less than seven million people taking $110 billion a year from the

Western world — money which cannot be managed in their economy, or even

passed before the noses of their people without causing a great deal of

social unrest. That money is cycled back into Western Europe, some of

it from Canada.

Canada contributes some $4 billion a year to that global OPEC pool. If you

wish to prorate that across the country, you can say that the taxpayers of British

Columbia are forking out, each year, about $400 million to satisfy the greed

of OPEC. It's a tax for which we get nothing in return, except exhaust fumes

at the end of the year.

you accumulate that tax or contribution which goes from western nations

into the pockets of OPEC, you run somewhere over $300 billion a year,

of which Saudi Arabia receives a loan of over $100 billion. That money

does not come cycling back to our country. It doesn't come to the

United States again; it doesn't come to Canada; it rests with the great

banks in Europe as Eurodollars, or Euro-Canadian dollars. Now there are

Euroyen and Euromarks, if you can manage all those terms. The world's

currency is no longer under any nation's or any central banking

control. While the Federal Reserve in the United States or the Bank of

Canada may set rules for our domestic banks, that money which goes out

to OPEC is entirely outside of anything that those banks can control.

As a consequence, paper money around the world is multiplying at a rate

which inevitably leads to inflation and cannot be curbed until we begin

to withdraw the payments that are currently going to OPEC.

It's

a global problem. It's one that we suffer from in British Columbia. So

what moves are some nations making to compensate for that? One of these

is being undertaken in the United States, where record interest rates

mandated by the United States government are being put forward to draw

that capital back into the United States. As it does so, it draws

capital out of Canada; it draws capital out of Western Europe. It

places it in the United States, but at a penalty. That penalty is the

high interest rates which now put homes, which now put automobiles and

which now put the expansion of many businesses beyond the means of the

people who are expected to make the wheels of industry turn. Of course,

as that happens it takes away the markets for our basic goods — just

like it takes away the markets of the automobile manufacturers. We have

to attempt to weather that particular storm while economists of the

world begin to try to understand what has happened to the paper money

of the world which is suddenly out of control as a result of unilateral

actions taken by OPEC.

I personally do not believe that the

world's currencies will be brought into balance again until these

payments to OPEC are halted. They cannot be halted until the world

begins to find alternative energy sources to operate our transportation

fleet in North America. There is only one source of fuel that can be

used to replace OPEC oil; that source of fuel is methane, or natural

gas. This is why we are embarking in British Columbia on a program of

substituting oil with compressed natural gas to operate our automobile

fleet.

MR. BARRETT: And then sell it to Japan.

HON. MR. McGEER . Certainly we can sell it to Japan, because we've

got much more than we can possibly use now and into the future.

MR. MACDONALD: Burn it all up.

HON. MR. McGEER:

Now we're getting right down to the NDP policy. We're getting right

down to the point where we can separate that party from this party.

Interjections.

[ Page 6696 ]

MR. SPEAKER: Order!

HON. MR. McGEER:

I want the people of British Columbia to listen to the nonsense that's

coming from the Leader of the Opposition and his lawyer friend sitting

to the right. Since they do not understand our sources of supply,

they're going to lead British Columbia into ruin. It's because of the

counterparts of the Leader of the Opposition in other governments

around the world that we've got a world monetary system today that's in

difficulty.

Yes, we have adequate supplies in British

Columbia and Canada. There are thousands and thousands of gas wells

capped, to the point where there is no longer any purpose in looking

for new gas, because we can't sell what we've got. Sometime, centuries

down the way, if we do run out of all that gas, we can still make it

cheaper from coal than you can now buy OPEC oil. We've got at least 25

billion tonnes of that coal in British Columbia. But the NDP doesn't

want to develop that coal. They don't want to sell the coal. They're

against the northeast coal development. Are you not against the

northeast coal development?

Interjections.

HON. MR. McGEER:

The member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) shakes his head. The member for

Prince Rupert is in favour of northeast coal. Is there anyone else in

your party that is? Tell it to Mr. Leggatt, the member for Coquitlam;

he's against northeast coal. Tell it to your former industry critic,

the member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) ; he's against northeast

coal. You're against the coal development and you're against the power

development and you're against natural gas development, yet you want

more money for all of the services that the member for Burnaby-Edmonds

(Ms. Brown) wants to put forward — asking for more money every day.

Where's it going to come from if you're against all industrial

development in British Columbia? It's not going to fall out of the air

and it's not going to be brought….

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I'll never finish my speech in time, with all these interruptions.

want to say that we in British Columbia are not in a secure energy

position, because we, like others in North America, are still dependent

upon OPEC oil. You may think that there will never be a disruption in

the Middle East and that the flow of oil will continue indefinitely

into the future, even at the extortionist prices of today. If there is

a sudden cutoff of that OPEC oil, not only will we face gas rationing

in British Columbia, but within the next few years we will face power

shortages as well, because we have not got enough power to substitute

for all of the oil we're burning. Our transportation fleet is dependent

upon that oil. So take warning: we in British Columbia and in Canada,

as in the United States, are dependent upon OPEC, with no choice but to

pay these extortionist prices. And as we pay these prices we contribute

to the very world inflation that makes the prices of meat, eggs and

butter go up in the grocery stores in British Columbia and places the

ownership of a home beyond the average citizen. It's a curse upon the

world. Yet the policies of these people would put us in bondage to

OPEC, because you do not have the imagination or the courage to develop

what British Columbia has within its own boundaries. That's the whole

point. It's the difference between Social Credit and the NDP. So we can

only hope that our substitution program will take full effect in time.

We can only hope that the rest of Canada and the rest of North America

too come to their senses in time. If they do, not only may we get a

grip on our energy future, but we may, as well, get a grip upon

galloping inflation, which exists today because there is no world

currency and no method by which any of the strong currencies in the

world can be protected by their own reserve banks.

These are

perilous times, not times when any nation or any province within a

nation can indulge in nonsense or negative policies. We are not secure

enough. We are richly endowed; we enjoy a very privileged standard of

living. Our purpose and our position is being undermined by

circumstances around the world. If we manage our affairs well, we will

do better than most, if not all. But if we manage our affairs badly, if

we believe the false prophets on the other side, if we're careless

enough not to pay attention to what they say, if we leave them in the

state of their abysmal ignorance about the development of the economy

of British Columbia — as they stay today — then we are inviting

disaster for our province.

So I say to British Columbians:

wake up, listen to what your opposition is saying, think about the

future of our province, and continue with the wisdom you have shown in

the past — stay with Social Credit.

HON. MR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, may I have leave to make an introduction?

Leave granted.

HON. MR. SMITH:

In the gallery this morning, Mr. Speaker, are seven students from the

Executive Secretarial College in Victoria, together with their

principal, Ms. Debbie Jelich. They are: Alex Bentley, Patrice Wagher,

LeighAnn Arscott, Shelley Moen, Lisa Mulhuren, Cherrie Gokey and Marsha

Gray. I'd ask the Legislature to make them welcome.

Amendment negatived on the following division:

YEAS- 21

Macdonald

Barrett

Howard

King

Lea

Stupich

Dailly

Cocke

Hall

Lorimer

Leggatt

Levi

Sanford

Gabelmann

Skelly

Barnes

Brown

Barber

Hanson

Mitchell

Passarell

NAYS — 30

Waterland

Hyndman

Chabot

McClelland

Rogers

Smith

Heinrich

Hewitt

Jordan

Vander Zalm

Ritchie

Richmond

Ree

Davidson

Wolfe

McCarthy

Williams

Gardom

Bennett

Curtis

Phillips

McGeer

Fraser

Nielsen

Kempf

Davis

Strachan

Segarty

Mussallem

Brummet

[ Page 6697 ]

HON. MR. PHILLIPS:

Mr. Speaker, I rise this morning on a very serious point of order. I

feel that this House has just committed a very great mistake. We

allowed this amendment to be defeated without giving the Leader of the

Opposition an opportunity to support the member for Prince Rupert (Mr.

Lea) by speaking in support of that frivolous amendment.

MR. SPEAKER:

Order, please, hon. member. This is not a point of order, but is

perhaps a speech which would have been in order under the amendment

itself.

On the main motion.

MR. MACDONALD:

Mr. Speaker, I disagree with you. I think that was a great point of

order of the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development. It

was much better than the speech he gave the other day. It had far more

content and thought, and was factually correct. But you have a rival,

Mr. Minister, in the member for Point Grey, the Minister of

Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer), who

competes with you in demagoguery in this House. What happened to the

longest exhaust pipe in the world that was going to come…? What's the

next slightly hare-brained thing that's floating through the mind of

the scientist from Point Grey? Running cars on methane and coal would

be next, eh? Using an irreplaceable precious natural resource to have

those cars racing like little beetles through the streets, and at the

same time talking about increasing that traffic fleet and denying

public transit funds which would do something serious about the OPEC

threat — to the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm).

We're

back in the throne speech debate, and I have to say it's the most

threadbare throne speech that's ever been produced in this House. How

can we criticize that government? They're not doing anything. What are

we here for today in the late fall, having a throne speech debate, when

there is no legislation and no proposals to deal with unemployment or

the suffering or the housing crisis that is in this province of British

Columbia? There is none of that. Here we are on this Friday morning

debating an empty throne speech, which puts you almost in mind of the

little circle that was sitting around in the mental asylum. One of them

finally says: "Why are we all here?" And another one replies to that

after a moment's reflection: "Because we're not all there."

Mr.

Speaker, I suppose we should welcome these people from Ontario because

they're our fellow Canadians — the guys from the Big Blue Machine of

Premier Bill Davis. All the lollapaluzas of the Big Blue Machine that

won in Conservative Ontario are coming out to British Columbia to

brainwash the people of this nice province on the other side of the

Rockies. They're going to move in, and the ministers sitting over there

will have nothing to say about their portfolios. If what's-his-name

Kinsella tells the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) to

shut up about her convention centre, she shuts up.

Orders

made in Ontario: we don't want them in this province. We don't want the

latest political techniques practised on the people of this province.

Take a poll before you take a position about anything. Show no

leadership. Find out what people want. Analyze them psychologically

with the latest political techniques. Improve the Premier's image

through these grey-flannels from Ontario working throughout this

government. It's a Herculean task, but that's what they've embarked on.

You

know, there's a serious aspect to it, Mr. Speaker. It used to be that

we could say, with confidence, that our deputy ministers were not

politically motivated. But then we had one who went to a Social Credit

convention at Harrison Hot Springs, and the crumbling of that kind of

an independent public service was already underway when Doug Heal went

to Harrison.

In the Vancouver Sun , welcoming Pat

Kinsella with a picture of Bill Davis and the Big Blue Machine, it says

this: "Pat Kinsella Hired by Bill Bennett to Organize Social Credit

Campaign."

Now if you had said that about any other deputy

minister for the past few years in the public service of British

Columbia, there would be a very considerable complaint from that public

servant. But what was being said there was true and the complaint was

never heard. That's a kind of corruption in the politics and in the

government of British Columbia. They're spending public money on hiring

political operatives within the government. It's totally wrong. I say

send them all packing back to Ontario and back to Bill Davis. We don't

want "made in Ontario" politics in the province of British Columbia.

have a number of things I wanted to say, Mr. Speaker. I wanted to refer

to something that means a lot in Vancouver East: we've got the PNE

there. It sits in the middle of a residential area and every year the

traffic congestion is creeping up. The fair itself is becoming more of

a honky-tonk, commercialized, asphalt-covered area. The management of

it, under Erwin Swangard, who was appointed by this government, has

simply gone to pot, to the extent that in the natural fairground of

that kind, where we had hundreds of children playing minor hockey and

being off the streets and being taken by their parents, early in the

morning sometimes and in the evenings, to learn a physical sport

instead of acting up on street corners…. Everything was good about it.

But what went? Minor hockey was ousted from the Forum to be replaced by

trade exhibits. Increasingly, we're seeing commercialism creep over

that PNE.

I say the time has come to scrap the board and

begin planning to tear up some of that asphalt and tear down some of

those old decrepit buildings and create there the kind of Tivoli

Gardens experience that in Copenhagen means that families use it. They

"walk abroad and recreate themselves," as Shakespeare once said. Then

it becomes a family-community asset once again — a playground that

would be appreciated.

I'm going to say just a word or two

about housing, because the contrasts in the society in which we all

live are sometimes appalling. People think I have money to invest. They

look at my new suit, and they say: "Well, we'll send this little

prospectus to Macdonald." I get a MURB prospectus through the mail —

here's somebody with an opportunity which I didn't take advantage of,

Mr. Speaker. I'm bringing this up because the Housing minister (Hon.

Mr. Chabot) and all the ministers over there think this is pretty good.

These are tax shelters for the very rich. This fellow shows an example

of a 62 percent tax rate, which is considerably above mine, and he's

buying this apartment for $108,000. He pays $31,000 over four years —

about $10,000 each year — but when he's done that, with what he saves

on his tax he has in his pocket $26,000 in cash. The first year he

saved $1,400 and so on from his tax that didn't go into the public

treasury of the people of Canada, and he ends up with cash in his

pocket of S26,000 and he owns the condominium, and there is some

[ Page 6698 ]

tenant

there who is paying the rest of it out of the rent. He owns a $108,000

condominium, and the capital appreciation doesn't go back to the people

of Canada, who did most of the workhorse financing through CHMC. This

kind of tax benefit to the rich is so terribly wrong today,

particularly when this government is cutting down the allowances of

mothers bringing up children in a period of raging inflation.

Mother-bashing is the other side of it; that's the other thing that's

going on in a very ugly, capitalistic society that has to be replaced

by something that has some measure of humanity, equity and fair play.

They

once had a royal commission in Ottawa — they have so many and they

never do anything about them back there. The Carter commission on

taxation said: "A buck is a buck." If it's a buck earned by a

workingman in a sawmill on an edger, it should be taxed; and if it's a

buck earned by a professional it should be taxed — not all these tax

loopholes and so forth.

Is that the way to build housing?

Are there no other ways in which to build housing? The experience of

other countries belies such a proposition. Of course there are other

ways.

One of them was the B.C. Housing Corporation, a

corporation such as all of the provinces of Canada and every European

country have, which was killed in its infancy — a brawling, bustling

baby that was beginning to assemble land, clear it, service it and make

available by sale or lease or otherwise condominiums, apartments and

houses for the people of the province. It was killed off by this

government. It could have broken to some extent the rise in rents and

interest rates that has taken place in this province — not solved it

completely, but made a very useful contribution. I say this Minister of

Housing we have over here, that do-nothing minister, is worse than this

nice minister from Ottawa, Cosgrove. When Paul Cosgrove, a disaster

item in himself, comes out here and helps our Minister of Housing to

get something off the ground, we are in trouble.

So we don't

agree with this kind of society where in so many of the programs of

government we're rewarding the rich and destroying any kind of

principle in our society. I put it down in a ditty form here. I don't

know how it works in right now as a little verse, but I'll read it

anyway, Mr. Speaker. This is the way they operate across on the

government benches:

We're not against the truly needy;

Throw them a crumb, for goodness' sake,

But don't forget the truly greedy,

And give us cake.

That's

what's happening ever since they repealed those succession duties and

contributed to their wealthy friends, their estates and families. How

much? In some cases $1 million, sometimes only $500,000, sometimes $2

million or $3 million, while this other thing is going on in the dark

spaces of our society. "Give us cake," cry the rich, and it is answered

by this government.

The Minister of Universities, Science

and communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) talked about good management, and

we agree with that — you know, in your megaprojects.

Interjection.

MR. MACDONALD:

Well, now let's just see. That is the problem, and I just want to run

through some of the bad management, which is what we're against in

these so-called megaprojects. We're not against the development of coal

in the northeast, We're not even against sports stadiums or convention

centres and so forth. But the kind of megamania that is being practised

by this government is marked by one thing consistently, and that is

poor management. You wonder whether anybody is really minding the

store, whether there is any business sense there, or whether all the

ministers are off in their own little comers with their particular

little megaprojects, just working away with no coordination, no

planning and no idea what the costs are going to be.

Take

B.C. Place. On the best information I can get — there's nothing wrong

with B.C. Place, properly planned — it will be 1986 before the Minister

of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) will have a demonstration

ALRT line on Terminal Avenue. In the meantime, you will have traffic

congestion piling up. It's unbelievable now in the city of Vancouver,

all around that downtown area. If there was planning and good

management, you would put in the necessary public services. The

necessary public infrastructure would be a first priority, not a last

priority. That's the story of B.C. Place.

The convention

centre is being placed at the foot of Granville and Howe in the most

inaccessible part of Vancouver. Already the roads are choked. There's

no way further buses can be moved in that area, because buses are

already filling the streets. Yet that area is picked by the Minister of

Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) for a convention centre. If you

had the planning that would put in the transportation services first —

as you have, say, in the city of Montreal, where you have a Metro that

everybody should be proud of, where the people can come and go, and

sometimes they never come up and see the sun if it's a rainy day…. If

you had that kind of planning, there's nothing wrong with the

convention centre there.

What has happened in all of these

things is that there is no idea of the costs. The convention centre is

very obviously the little plum of the Minister of Human Resources. When

she lost Tourism — and she was in quite a huff for a few days about

losing Tourism and being put into Human Resources, like poor Gaglardi

was, as a punishment, years ago — the Minister of Human Resources said

to the Premier: "I want to keep that convention centre. I'll go, I'll

take my punishment, but I'm going to have my convention centre, even if

the pips squeak" — so far as the taxpayers of this province are

concerned. That's what's happened.

She's running around with

that nice old Gordon Shrum nice old couple — bustling around, trying to

put this thing together with a different cost estimate every day. They

write a letter saying, "If the feds will give us this much money, then

that's all we'll ask for," and six months later they're back bashing

the feds and saying, "Why don't you give us more?" It's one of the

great comic little experiences we've had in British Columbia, but it's

costly.

Transpo '86. These junketing ministers, who spend so

much time on jet planes to Europe and China and France and all these

other places junketeering, go off to Paris and bid for Transpo '86 with

not the faintest idea of what it's going to cost. Then when they have

the land for it and B.C. Place, the Premier says: "I'm going to sell

off that land and make a quick cash profit on the land of B.C. Place" —

and there's not even a site for Transpo '86. The federal government,

who are blunderers in their own right, are rubbing their eyes when they

look at this bunch of ministers. They can't believe it.

The Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. McClelland) gets up and says: "There will be no

[ Page 6699 ]

hearings

before my new utility board, but there will be a natural gas pipeline

to Vancouver Island." He's all bustle — all muscle in his head and

bustle when he speaks. Well, that thing was never there. The cost

estimates have never been done. It's dead. You know it's dead.

MR. BARRETT: Not the minister.

MR. MACDONALD:

No, the minister's not dead, but the pipeline is dead. It was never

planned, never thought out. So when some of the real facts of the thing

begin coming through, it's postponed for a year — but it's clearly

finished.

I want to say just a couple of words about

northeast coal. I think the key that we're talking about is good

planning and good management. The BCR suffered one of the worst

disasters of any railway anywhere in something called the Dease Lake

extension. When W.A.C. Bennett decided he would win one more election

against the NDP, and he announced this line that was to go, there were

no surveys as to what freight might be carried by the railway on that

line. There was no consideration that you were running through an

Indian reservation and apt to get scalped because they had never had a

settlement for their claims; it just happened to them. There was no

idea of the costs. In fact, there were court cases that found that the

government had fraudulently misrepresented the costs. So what you

really had was a political decision instead of economic planning.

That's the characteristic of the old government, and it's the

characteristic of the government we see opposite us right now.

terms of northeast coal, I would just like to give a very brief review

of what we're in for financially. Knowing that, you'll have a better

chance perhaps to decide what should be done and when it should be

done. If you look at the Tumbler branch line, to be built by the BCR,

it's obviously the most expensive item. The Crown corporations

committee's excellent staff, some of whom are with us in the gallery

today, have come up with pretty good cost estimates — something I've

never heard from that minister with the loud voice and the bluff manner

over there.

The costs of that line in 1981 dollars, I think

it is, is $423 million, but the interim financing for it is $70

million. So you're looking at $500 million. The interest on that money

— let's say 16 percent; it may be a little less or more — is $80

million a year. The surcharge, with Quintette paying $2.50 and $3 and

Teck paying $2.50 for the first five years, brings in a revenue against

that interest charge of about $19 million. In other words, in current

carrying charges, based on that 7.7 million tonnes, we have a financial

haemorrhage of about $60 million a year, without beginning to consider

repaying the province for the $500 million they're going to put up and

take preference shares for from the BCR.

So the very serious financial costs there….

AN HON. MEMBER: They wouldn't have supported that in the old days.

MR. MACDONALD:

Look at BCR struggling with a debt load of $800 or $900 million now.

The rate that they said we must have to get that coal moved along the

new Anzac spurline was $4.88 a tonne. But it wasn't good enough for

Teck and it wasn't good enough for Denison, so they gave a special

developmental discount. They're going to haul it for $3.88 for the

first five years, and they're going to lose money. They can't possibly

do it on that basis. So in addition to what the province is pouring in

there…. I haven't mentioned the townsite, and I haven't mentioned the

hydro line. Those things can sometimes pay for themselves if the

townsite is there. I haven't mentioned the cost of the road down from

Chetwynd. I've mentioned the railway, the $500 million we're putting

in, how much it costs just to service that kind of a debt and what we

get back. What it adds up to is a tremendous burden on the finances of

this province.

You say it's a great development, and it

certainly is. The NDP would say it is. We shipped out the first test

shipment from the Sukunka fields back in 1974 to British Steel, and it

was fine metallurgical coal, as good as any in the world. But the fact

of the matter is that right now there is no chance of increasing the

sales in the foreseeable future — by which I only mean three or four

years — much beyond that 7.7 million tonnes. You would need at least

three or four times that much of a shipment to begin to pay the

carrying costs on your money.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair].

the meantime, you're competing with the fields in the southeast of the

province of British Columbia and in Hinton, Alberta, which have the

same kind of coal and the same kind of market. B.C. Coal Co. is now

moving into the Greenhills project, and Alberta is expanding as well.

The result is that the intervention in the northeast in this vast

public way has suppressed and brought down the cost of the coal in the

southeast. It's made it more difficult for them to sell it and get a

better price. The public, under this kind of harum-scarum planning of

this government, is taking almost all of the risks of the project and

getting none of the equity when the coal finally becomes valuable on

the markets of the world. All of the risk and none of the equity. Teck

and Denison get all of the equity. The taxpayer shoulders all of the

financial burden, and it's the public's coal. So I say we're not

against it, but I would think that a realistic look at that thing would

be that it was being brought onstream before its time.

have no doubt that the time will come when coal will be king again in

the markets of the world; the prices will increase and this will be a

good financial, businesslike venture, but not now. It's totally

unplanned and has not been thought out in the smallest of particulars.

should complete what I was saying about coal by bringing the House up

to date on what's happening in Prince Rupert. Again, what is happening

is kind of funny. It's not quite as comic as the Pier B-C convention

centre — the longest seagull landing strip in the world — where they

tore the sheds down. Do you know it's about three years while all this

has been going on, without any idea of the cost. At Prince Rupert

there's no deal on the handling charges in the new Port Authority. You

will remember February 10, 1981, when the Minister of Industry and

Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) stood up and said: "We

have a contract for the sale of our coal to Japan. It's the greatest

thing that ever happened to the province of British Columbia, and much

the biggest export of resources of any province anywhere." It was going

to be this and it was going to be all that. There was no contract; they

hadn't settled the handling charges then. The minister was misleading

the House. Maybe he believed what he was saying. Even today the

companies haven't signed the contracts. There's a letter of intent,

signed last February; that's all. So you now have this picture: the BCR

— under their good president, Mac Norris, and under orders

[ Page 6700 ]

from

this government — is going ahead with the construction of the Anzac

spur, with $53 million in contracts already out, and no contract. The

$3 handling charge at Prince Rupert is only for the first five years;

after that, the companies, very reasonably, say: "Well, we must know

what the future is." Here again, as in B.C. Place, are all these other

blunders that this government so ill-planned, like the natural-gas

pipeline — I'm glad to see the minister in his place — that you

announced with such confidence, until you got the facts. When you got

the facts, you had to shoot it down. He got shot down. It never was

there. Blunder, blunder, blunder! Bad management, bad management, bad

management! Waste of millions on megamania. You just don't know what

you're doing over there on that side of the House.

Interjection.

MR. MACDONALD:

Never mind whether there were public hearings. You just didn't know

what you were doing. You had no idea of the costs. You were shot down

by your own colleagues in the cabinet. When the facts came in, the

minister was exposed as not knowing what he was doing. It's just as

simple as that. What's one more blunder from that government! That one

never got off the ground, so it didn't cost nearly as much as some of

these other things that have been going on.

In the northeast

coalfields what has happened is that the order has come to halt, even

though there is $53 million in contracts. There are no more tunnelling

contracts to be let until they try and sort this thing out. That is

harum-scarum planning. That is bad management. It is something that is

of great financial concern to this province. There should be proper,

businesslike planning; we see no exhibition of that whatsoever from the

government benches.

I want to say something about the

necessity of a code of public ethics in the province of British

Columbia. I don't want to be sanctimonious about this. I think there is

a serious erosion of the confidence of people in the credibility of

politicians and the political process. I think that's a very dangerous

thing. Once people feel that governments are putting something over on

them, are up to tricks and are helping themselves, then they begin to

drift away and they never again rebuild that confidence in democratic

processes. It becomes very serious. I think politicians today are in

ill repute. They were in King Lear's time too, it's true. He questioned

their sincerity, when he said on the blasted heath: "Get thee glass

eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see the things thou dost

not." Today politicians are in ill repute; lawyers are too —

deservedly, in many cases. They've got an awful lot to do.

Very

quickly I can tell you about a case of some young fellow who was a boat

person from Vietnam. He got into a domestic case through the courts.

I'm saying it very quickly: custody of one child, separation, and how

much he should pay his wife. He was a working guy, making not a bad

salary of $20,000 or $30,000. He ended up with a 14-day trial over

those two simple propositions in the Supreme Court of British Columbia

and a bill from his own lawyer for $45,000. He's broke.and his child

and wife are starving. The legal system is far worse than any problem

that had to be addressed. The remedy was far worse than any disease.

The medical profession. I feel sorry for the good doctors that I run into throughout

the province of British Columbia. When guys like Dr. Ray March, no matter how

privileged they may be, ask for more, whine, complain, when there are other

equally deserving people in this province, they should recognize that to some

extent they have a position of privilege. The leaders of the B.C. Medical Association

are giving a lot of very good doctors throughout this province a bad name. I

get tired of hearing them complain.

what should a code of this kind contain? I would say the first point is

that we have to…. Sometimes it requires a law, and sometimes just a

rule of conduct. But the first one I would say that we should address

ourselves to is rules that would check the use of public money for

partisan purposes of the government party.

That B.C. Government News

that was issued with overtime and the special printers and everything

just at the time of the last election in April 1979 was an example of

what I'm saying. The current one, which I won't go through, is

politics, full of the cabinet tour in the Kootenays and the Okanagan.

The free meals — since when is it legitimate for a government to use

taxpayers' money to feed and to give drinks to their friends at large

luncheons and political gatherings?

I know that when a

government provides information services it is not always easy to draw

the line as to what is legitimate public information and what is

subliminally and very often deliberately political propaganda paid for

by the taxpayer. But obviously we've got to find that line and we've

got to draw it.

Second, there should be control of patronage

in the public service, apart from the ministerial assistants, who are

political, and we recognize that. But the public service competitions

are becoming a bit of a joke. Merit is not being considered in

government appointments. Increasingly, politics is the criterion. I

recognize that any minister, if he's got a social program to carry out,

should have somebody sympathetic to that program. But the real test has

to be merit as well as willingness to work through that program.

Third,

there should be impartial bodies in open hearings in place of closed

appeals to political friends. I refer to what has happened in the case

of neighbourhood pubs, where a political appeal was allowed so that the

friends of the government could be rewarded with neighbourhood pub

licences after they had been turned down by the impartial tribunal

known as the liquor control administration. I've given those examples

and I'll give them again. I refer to the politics that was allowed to

creep into the agricultural land reserve so that releases can be

obtained by friends of the government, and always wealthy friends,

through the political process, by going to their friends in cabinet.

That is wrong. We've seen land slip out of :that for partisan political

purposes, as a reward. The Minister of Energy (Hon. Mr. McClelland) —

who made that fine speech on behalf of Gloucester and then suddenly got

very pure and said, "but I'm not going to vote," after counting the

committee and seeing that his vote wasn't necessary — is one of the

worst offenders.

Point number four is freedom of

information: to guarantee by law public access to public documents. I

don't believe that should be accomplished with a large office of

government set up in a bureaucracy. I think it should be a simple law

that enables somebody in a disputed case to go and make a simple court

application to see whether or not that information should be released.

Some of the suppressed documents of this government, of which I suspect

volume two of the coal report by Armstrong is by far the most

significant, have had terrible effects in terms of the economy.

[ Page 6701 ]

You

know, that report, with its recommendations, was suppressed, and then

the reserve was taken off the issuing of coal leases, and on an

over-the-counter basis without any bidding, in a period of two months

500 square miles of the coal lands of British Columbia were alienated

forever — mostly to great international oil companies from foreign

parts — and volume two of the coal report was suppressed, with its

recommendations as to how we should have acted in that situation to

protect the equity of the people of the province of British Columbia.

Thirdly,

electoral boundaries should be set by known rules, impartially, with

judicial review where requested. It makes me laugh, as we look at the

comic scene…. One minute. I've got to do this quickly. When Eckardt

takes the fifth amendment, something is rotten in the state of British

Columbia. Did he give the ombudsman his name? All he's ever said about

his report is that the worms are coming out of the woodwork.

would like to talk more about that, but I think it's disgraceful that

we appoint a public servant and he fights to be able to refuse to say

what went on in his commission and hires a lawyer and takes the fifth

amendment. It's disgraceful.

The sixth — because I'm running

out of time — is laws to limit and disclose campaign contributions so

elections can't be bought and so that corrupt influence would not be

brought to bear on government.

So I'm throwing these things

out, and I'd appreciate consideration of them from all members on all

sides of the House and from the public. I think there should be certain

basic rules of conduct — again, trying not to be sanctimonious about it

— where an individual could say: "I will not be part of a government

that doesn't live up to these simple rules." What I'm suggesting is

that we embark on consideration so that we can begin the process of

restoring confidence in the integrity of government, politicians and

the democratic process.

MR. KEMPF: Mr. Speaker, I

don't know how I'll follow the act that we've just seen on the floor of

this House, but I'll try. I don't very often agree with the second

member for Vancouver East, but I certainly must agree — and I know

we're not debating the justice system here this morning — with that

member when he says we have problems in this country and this province

with the justice system. I'd just like to read into the record a little

quote that I keep close at hand and read from time to time when I read

of certain circumstances that have happened in our courts: "Sometimes

the failure of justice is worse than the crime itself." Mr. Speaker, I

certainly believe that a lot of that is happening in our society in

Canada here today.

It is once again my great pleasure and,

certainly, my privilege to stand in my place in this House and speak on

behalf of the people of Omineca. It is a privilege because the people

whom I represent are proud, hard-working people. They are proudly

Canadian and proudly British Columbian, believing, without question, in

the right of the individual, whether or not that individual be male or

female, Indian or white and, certainly, whether or not that right be

enshrined in a constitution and whether or not that constitution be

lodged in London or Ottawa.

Mr. Speaker, charters of rights do not rest in legislation alone or in a constitution

but rather lie in the hearts and minds of all people. In this country, no act,

pact, treaty or organization can hope to preserve human rights without wholehearted

support and commitment from all of the people of Canada.

The

people of Omineca believe without question in the democratic process,

the system within which we all here in the chamber are given the

responsibility to speak for our constituents in a democratic way and in

a Canadian way, not believing in the way in which, all around us today,

we see that very democratic process abused, our freedoms eroded, our

very individual rights placed in serious jeopardy by irresponsible

groups in our society out to get their way, irrespective of anyone

else's rights and by whatever means necessary.

The citizens

whom I represent abhor that kind of action. It's dangerous, not only to

the rights of the individual, but also to the very foundation of the

democratic system itself. I've said that the people of Omineca are

proud people, and they are. I'm proud to represent people who have such

a philosophy and who are generally not looking for government handouts.

They are, rather, a people who wish to be left alone to their own

devices, with as little government intervention into their everyday

lives as is possible, asking only for the right, which in my mind is

the primary, basic human right, to be able to live in an atmosphere in

which they as the citizens of this province may have the right to

choose whether or not they can make it on their own. They ask the

government to provide only the basics: a fair and equitable justice

system, and we talked about that earlier this morning; good health

facilities; programs to take care of the elderly and the handicapped; a

proper, well-kept transportation system. As I mentioned previously,

it’s an atmosphere in which individual enterprise and initiative can be

shown.

Mr. Speaker, in His Honour's opening speech of last

Monday, he speaks of these kinds of initiatives, steps to assist those

with a little of their own personal initiative to own their own home.

That's another basic human right: the right of ownership — not

government ownership, as philosophized by some of the members opposite

— not all of them, but some of them — but the right to personal

ownership.

His Honour's speech spoke of optimism on the part

of this province and this government about the future of British

Columbia. It spoke not of doom and gloom, as some would have everyone

believe, but rather of optimism. We should be optimistic. In fact, Mr.

Speaker, we should be jubilant in British Columbia, for we have

everything going for us in this province.

Certainly there is

at present a downturn in our economy. There is all over the world.

However, we in British Columbia can be very thankful at this point in

time for having had a fiscally responsible government in office for the

past six years. We are most fortunate indeed, for we find ourselves,

because of forethought, planning and fiscal responsibility, in a very

enviable position, not only in North America but all over the world.

Yes, our mining and lumber industries are hurting. But were it not for

the stability which we have seen under this government in this province

for the last six years, and the upgrading, retooling and reinvestment….

They set an atmosphere for those industries to embark upon. Had it not

been for that, those companies which operate today…. Yes, some of them

have cut back to four days a week, but had it not been for the economic

stability that we've seen in the past six years, they would have been

shut down now. Had it not been for the vision of this administration,

we would not at this time have had the jobs created by a strong private

sector to carry us over the difficult times. Had it not been for brave,

forward planning by this government,

[ Page 6702 ]

we would not at this time have to take up some of the slack created by a worldwide economic downturn.

Projects

such as northeast coal, B.C. Place and many others are creating

thousands of jobs all over British Columbia in times of worldwide

economic downturn, enhancing not only the gross provincial product but,

as well, the gross national product as well. Had it not been for fiscal

responsibility in the province of British Columbia for the past six

years, what would the provincial treasury look like? Where would the

money come from for these kinds of job-producing projects? Yes,

government has to provide seed money for such projects, but they're

job-producing projects.

I found it funny when I listened to

the NDP this morning speaking against ploughing government money into

job creating projects. I thought that was their philosophy. They don't

ever care whether they're going to get a return, but I thought it was

the philosophy to plough the money in. I find it difficult to believe

the kind of debate that I hear from that side of the House this morning.

What

would this provincial treasury look like today had it not been for that

kind of forward thinking? What if we had spent like drunken sailors, as

we have seen others do while government in this province? Where would

the people of this province of ours be now under those circumstances? I

think those are interesting questions, not only to ask in this chamber

but to ask all over this province. We have much to be thankful for, but

all we can hear from the official opposition is doom and gloom.

When

things get a little tougher in the north, we just dig in and work a

little harder. Work, Mr. Speaker — it's never hurt anyone. In fact, it

gives one an awful lot more to be proud of.

His Honour's

speech talks of self-sufficiency in food production in British

Columbia. I certainly support that philosophy. We have a solid

agricultural industry in Omineca. I'm particularly proud of those

engaged in that way of life, for they are true individual enterprisers.

Self-sufficiency in food — a commendable goal in British Columbia. In

order to attain that goal, every effort must be made to protect and

retain bona fide farmland. Just in passing — and as you know, I

couldn't pass up the opportunity — I must once again remind this House

of the many thousands of acres of land, which will never be farmland,

never contribute to the self-sufficiency in food which we seek, land

that is still locked within an archaic, ill-conceived agricultural land

reserve brought in by a former government of this province not as a

tool to protect farmland, but rather as a means of land control in an

effort, to carry out their philosophy of total government ownership.

Land which is not farmland and which never will be farmland must be

removed from this reserve, eliminating a fictitious land shortage

facing the people of British Columbia and eliminating as well a

fictitiously high price of land in this province.

Mr.

Speaker, I was pleased to see in His Honour's speech mention of the

appointment of our colleague, Hon. Stephen Rogers, to the Cabinet

Committee on Planning and Priorities. This could be a positive step in

ensuring the people of the Nechako Valley that the proposed Kemano

completion project gets the scrutiny it so justly deserves.

The

Aluminum Company of Canada recently embarked upon a province-wide,

multithousand-dollar advertising campaign, designed for no other reason

than to brainwash the people of British Columbia as to the merits of

their proposed smelter project prior to providing the people who live

along the Nechako River answers to three simple questions, which I

would like to get into the record here this morning:

1. How much water do you have, given your outdated water licence?

2. How much water do you want to satisfy your total needs?

3. How much water will remain in the Nechako River on a daily basis after Kemano Completion?

These

three simple questions are not yet answered by the Aluminum Company of

Canada. It's a brainwashing campaign, Mr. Speaker, prior to giving the

people in the area concerned the answers to those three simple

questions, and prior to clearing any further hurdles here in Victoria

or going to the people in public hearings.

I beseech the

minister as a member of that committee to remember that Kemano

Completion is no ordinary hydroelectric project, no ordinary

development. It calls for the diversion of waters from one watershed to

another, and in the same process, the possible devastation of a total

river system.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

I see

proposed in His Honour's speech new legislation to deal with the

protection and preservation of our wildlife and waterfowl. On behalf of

sportsmen, ranchers and anyone else in this province who truly loves

and understands the outdoors, I applaud such a positive step, a step

which must be taken — and taken soon — if we are to even retain the

wildlife which we presently enjoy in British Columbia. Unless this is

done and unless that legislation is drafted to include a positive

predator-control program, we will have no wildlife in this province.

Unless we as legislators have enough intestinal fortitude to do what

must be done, we will have no wildlife to protect in this province. A

proper predator-control program is an integral part of good, sound

wildlife management. Unless we have the courage of our convictions,

unless we are prepared to do a complete job, we need not take wildlife

management as our goal, because we will have no wildlife to manage.

Logic and truth must prevail if we seriously believe in protecting our

wildlife heritage.

That same logic and truth, and not

prejudice, must prevail in relation to the trapping industry in British

Columbia. I realize, Mr. Speaker, that I would be out of order to dwell

at length on this subject in this debate, and I'll address the subject

later in the right form. We in this chamber must tread carefully with

any policy which would bring about the loss of an entire industry in

our province. That is the ground on which we tread when we look to the

elimination of a device used effectively — and as humanely as devices

suggested to take its place — for some 200 years in our country.

Eliminating that device before a usable alternative is found — that is

the ground on which we tread when we talk of banning the leghold trap

in this province. Mr. Speaker, I'll have more to say about that in the

future.

There are many other positive moves which I see in

His Honour's speech. The continued vigorous highway construction and

maintenance program. Increased emphasis on health-care facilities.

Tougher laws for the drivers of this province, in order to curb the

terrible carnage now taking place on our highways. Still more emphasis

on programs for our elderly and mentally handicapped. Pension reform.

Electoral reform. Further emphasis on the arts and sports and

recreation. These are positive moves for a positive province, a

province on the move, in spite of the economic downturn which is

worldwide — positive moves which I can support on behalf of those whom

I represent here in this House.

[ Page 6703 ]

closing, I would make reference to a few words in His Honour's speech

which may have gone unnoticed by many, and which I believe enunciate a

policy which if instigated, would be most significant, most beneficial

to the people of this province. They are the words, few in number but

large in meaning, which allude to the privatization of some government

activities. Big government is not necessarily good government, and any

move to reduce the size of government will receive my wholehearted

support, my undivided support, my total support. We must, particularly

now, get serious about reducing the size of government, and any move in

that direction is certainly a positive one.

Mr. Speaker,

before taking my place, I wish to quote a few words written by two

well-known authors and economists. I heard the member for Prince Rupert

(Mr. Lea) mention one of them the other day, and I know that, because

of the member's philosophy, he cannot ever agree with Milton and Rose

Friedman's philosophy. I know the Friedmans are correct in their

philosophy, and I pray that in this quotation, which I take directly

from one of their books, their sense of timing is correct also.

"Fortunately

we are waking up. We are again recognizing the dangers of an

overgoverned society and are coming to understand that good objectives

can be perverted by bad means. Reliance on the freedom of people to

control their own lives in accordance with their own values is the

surest way to achieve the full potential of a great society.

Fortunately also we are, as a people, still free to choose which way we

should go, whether to continue along the road we have been following to

ever-bigger government or to call a halt and change direction."

MR. STUPICH:

Earlier today in the gallery there was a group of 11 students from

Woodlands Junior Secondary School in Nanaimo, led by their teacher

Peter Crest. I was hoping to get an opportunity to welcome them when I

rose to speak, but they have gone, I believe. I would simply like to

recognize the fact that they were here, and hope that they learned

something from the exchange so far today — not as much as then would

have learned had they stayed a little longer.

Briefly I

would like to comment with respect to one issue raised by the hon.

member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf). It's a favourite topic of his.

Certainly he's in line with the thoughts of the Premier on this

subject. Unfortunately, he's in line with the thoughts of the Minister

of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt), and, prior to that, with the Minister

of Environment (Hon. Mr. Rogers) — that is, with respect to the

agricultural land reserve policy. It's okay, Mr. Minister, you've heard

me before. You know how I feel about it, and I know how you feel about

it.

The hon. member for Omineca talks about taking out of

the agricultural land reserve land that has no business being in there

and will never be of any use in food production. He applauds the fact

that I am recalling his words in the way he intended them to be heard.

He wasn't in the House when we had the long debate and discussions on

bringing in the legislation.

MR. KEMPF: No, but I was out there.

MR. STUPICH:

He was out there where the work was being done in the field. He may

have been aware at the time that when the land was first frozen the

only land included within the boundaries of the so-called land freeze

was land that had been previously zoned as agricultural land by local

government, or land on which individuals had been paying taxes at the

farmer rate of tax because they claimed it was good farmland. Those

were the only areas included within the boundaries of the original

freeze.

He may recall that when the reserve boundaries were

first proposed by the Department of Agriculture and sent out, they went

first to the regional districts. In almost every case, the regional

districts cut back the boundaries from those originally proposed. Even

his regional districts had this opportunity to do so. He may recall

that every municipality was persuaded to exclude from the proposed

agricultural land reserves enough land to provide for five years of

in-filling. He may recall that; he may not. He may recall that there

were public hearings sponsored by every regional district. There was

the opportunity for people to come and put their case to the regional

district. When the boundaries were presented to the Land Commission,

they were much smaller than were the original boundaries sent to those

regional districts by the Department of Agriculture. He may recall that

in almost every instance the Land Commission itself cut those

boundaries back even farther, because it was aware of developments that

were not always well known in the regional districts. He may recall

that when it finally went to the Environment and Land Use Committee, in

most cases there were further cutbacks,

I don't deny the

fact that in some instances there is land in the agricultural land

reserve that shouldn't be there. But for him to suggest that when the

total arable land in the province is something less than 4 percent of

our total area and that by excluding from the existing land reserve

boundaries the land that shouldn't be in those land reserve boundaries

we would then have enough land for the housing needs in the province

and enough land available that the price of land would decrease, is

simply closing his eyes and his ears and his mind to all the facts that

are known by everyone else in the province.

If the total

percentage of land in the agricultural land reserves were released,

even land that anyone would consider unsuitable for agricultural

production, it would have no effect on land prices and no real effect

on the amount of land available for housing. He knows these things, Mr.

Speaker. The Premier knows them and the Minister of Agriculture and

Food (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) knows them. Yet they keep talking about the

opportunities to remove that land from agricultural land reserves. When

they talk about those opportunities, they don't talk about the

Gloucester estates land removal. They don't talk about the Spetifore

land removal. They don't talk about those large areas of top-grade

agricultural land that can be removed.

The hon. member for

Omineca (Mr. Kempf) said the land is locked in. Mr. Speaker, you know

and he knows that all he has to do if he has a bit of land that he

wants taken out is get the ear of the cabinet minister and have him put

it through by order-in-council. It's just that simple. If he's a friend

of a cabinet minister or if he has a friend left in cabinet, he can go

to him and have that land removed. It's just that easy. Unfortunately,

the land is not locked in. I would that it were locked in. The member

for Omineca knows this as well as everyone else and prefers to talk

about the agricultural land reserves in the hope that the government of

the day will eventually have the courage of its own convictions and do

away with that land protection completely — go back to the days when

first-

[ Page 6704 ]

come,

first-served covered up developed agricultural land for so-called

higher uses, get rid of the problem and get rid of the problems of

serving the agricultural industry as well.

The Minister of

Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer), spoke

earlier in the debate today. I made a note of one of the questions he

put to us. "If you are against nuclear power…." Well, there's certainly

no question where we stand on that. We are against it. But I wonder

where he stands now. There has been some doubt in the past about that

particular minister — well, not too much doubt, I guess. I think as far

as he's concerned, he is in favour of nuclear power. He's not saying

too much about it these days, but certainly when he puts the question

to us there's a unanimous voice from this side of the House. We are

against nuclear power development in the province of British Columbia.

We make that very clear. There's no question about it.

spoke of his former colleague, Gordon Gibson. Well might he call him

his former colleague. I think that Gordon Gibson would not be so proud

to speak of the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications as

his former colleague. He probably would prefer to forget that they were

colleagues at one time, in view of that minister's record in politics.

But at least one can say that Gordon Gibson did stay true to his

political colours when he left office. He still represented the same

party that he did when he came into office, and to the best of my

knowledge he still supports that party even though he quarrels with

some of the decisions taken by that party.

Interjection.

MR. STUPICH: You say he changed? Did he join another one?

Interjections.

MR. STUPICH:

There speaks one who was once very prominent in the Conservative Party,

when there used to be a Conservative Party in the province of British

Columbia. Then a politically opportunistic opportunity arose, and that

member suddenly found that his convictions had changed. So easy to drop

one jacket and change colour, and now he calls himself a Social

Crediter. Are you really a Social Crediter? Mr. Speaker, I should be

talking to you, not to him.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Let's return to the debate.

MR. STUPICH:

I seem to have touched a nerve there, Mr. Speaker. I feel for some of

those people who once had political principles and chose to shed them

for political opportunism.

The Minister of Universities,

Science and Communications said a curious thing to me about running out

of natural gas centuries down the road. If he really thinks our

supplies of natural gas are going to last for centuries, then certainly

he's much more optimistic about the long-range possibilities of natural

gas than anyone else that I've ever seen or heard from. I've heard

people talk optimistically about several decades — to the turn of the

century, or something like that. That's just twenty years away, but he

talks about natural gas in B.C. lasting for centuries. He's basing

B.C.'s future energy requirements on that and planning how we're going

to drive our automobiles and drive our industry? His belief is that we

have practically inexhaustible supplies of natural gas. Mr. Speaker, is

that really what he meant to say? I hope later in the debate there'll

be an opportunity for him to tell us if that is really what he meant. I

can't believe that anyone would believe that we have centuries of

supply of natural gas.

In the throne speech itself, I

suppose I could come back to agriculture as one of the examples of

industry that has been let down by this present government. I'm

thinking particularly of a plant that is just on the verge of closing

completely. I know there have been a lot of jokes in the house about

the acquisition of Panco Poultry. Mr. Speaker, when we acquired Panco

Poultry for a price of $4.1 million, we acquired an asset that was

worth on the market, even in those days, in excess of $10 million. It

was a good purchase for the people of British Columbia. We maintained

in operation a processing plant that would have closed down had we

stood idly by. We maintained employment. The plant was operating; the

people were working. This government came into office and started its

policy of privatization, as I think it's called in the throne speech,

and was determined to sell Panco Poultry and did, for a net gain to the

people of British Columbia of some $13 million with no strings. That

great American company, that benefactor of B.C. agriculture, came in

with apparently no strings at all and bought the processing plant and

the hatchery and is now selling out and closing down. So we're losing

the employment, we're losing the processing facility, and how much

money is Cargill going to make out of this deal that it made with the

government of British Columbia? People lose work. The processing

facility is lost. The government made money on the deal and has blown

it since. Cargill, no doubt, will make a lot of money out of the deal,

but B.C. is the loser.

That's the kind of help that this

government is prepared to offer industry in the province of British

Columbia. Agriculture is only one example of it. There are others, but

that's the one that comes to mind right now, with those people, some of

them with 18 years' experience in that one processing plant…. Where are

they going to go to find work? It doesn't really matter to this

government; they're not concerned. The loss of the processing plant is

not important to them. The only thing that matters is that a deal that

we got into for $4 million, they were able to get out of for $14

million; turn a handsome profit and they're out of it. There's no

responsibility at all for the poultry industry and no responsibility at

all for the people who were working there. Some of them are still

working there, but they've all been told they'll be finished by January

MR. RITCHIE: You bungled up the industry.

MR. STUPICH:

While I was there, Panco Poultry continued operating — at a profit. The

people in the industry were making a living. They were offered and

accepted farm income insurance. The agricultural industry was doing

much better in those days than it's doing today. Certainly, coming from

the agriculture committee, as you do, you know that the agricultural

industry was doing much better under the NDP administration than it is

under the lack of assistance from the present administration.

want to get on with perhaps one of the main areas of promise in the

throne speech, and that is to do with something that I think everyone

would agree is the most serious problem

[ Page 6705 ]

the province right now: the lack of affordable housing. I would think

there's more reference to that one problem in the throne speech than

there is to any other problem. There's not really that much promise of

what's going to happen, but a lot of vague hints, and that's not

unusual for a throne speech. I'm not being critical on that point.

What

I had hoped, Mr. Speaker — and I've made this point in other debates —

is that sometime during the throne speech debate, possibly sometime

during the budget debate, the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing

(Hon. Mr. Chabot) would take time to embark upon an immersion course

with whoever it is that has drawn up these ideas about housing, so that

he will have some idea as to what he is supposed to be talking about in

housing and so he can come into the House and tell us, so that we'll

all know and so that the public will know just what the government has

in mind.

It would appear from newspaper accounts of a

special press conference he called to explain the program that he had

forgotten to be briefed before he went into that press conference. He

couldn't explain the program, didn't know what it was all about, and

really admitted that, unless Ottawa was prepared to carry the ball,

little would be accomplished in the programs hinted at in this speech.

The

government is concerned about the shortage of money to get going on

these programs. The hon. member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf) mentioned the

reference to the highway program — continued emphasis on highway

programs. Just this morning I saw in the paper that the Minister of

Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) was saying that he could

cut back on highway and bridge construction. They can cut back on those

programs. They can cut back on housing programs. They can cut back

minimally in Health. The Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander

Zalm) said that he could cut back on urban transit development. There

is some reference in the throne speech to the importance of proceeding

with this urban transit.

There is also this vague reference

in the throne speech to "privatization" — read that word and see just

exactly what it is — of select government activities. One wonders

whether this has something to do with highway construction, house

construction or any of the other programs that the government would

like to embark upon but finds itself too financially strapped to do so.

This government has been in office for some six years during a period

of unparalleled prosperity. During this period of time B.C.'s budget

has more than doubled. The total revenue collected in the year ending

March 31, 1976, was just short of $3 billion. We don't have the actual

figures for 1981-82, but the estimate for the year ending March 1982 —

and it isn't going to be far short of that — is $6.6 billion. That's an

increase of almost two and a quarter times.

They've had all

this money to work with, and now because there is a turndown in the

forest industry they have to talk about curtailing government

activities, cutting back on programs and withdrawing services, urging

the ministers to come in with recommendations as to what services can

be pulled back completely and which can be cut down — all of which is

going to cost the people of the province something. They talk about the

optimism. They talk about the medium-term security, how well the

province is endowed with natural resources and how bright the future

is. Yet because there is a turndown in this one year, they come here

and admit that in the last six years, having collected over $30

billion, they are in no position to keep the economy moving until the

forest industry turns around, and they expect that to happen next year.

Having taken in all that money, they can't keep the economy going for

less than a year until it turns around, as they expect it will.

They

talk about a balanced budget, but they have absolutely no hesitation in

borrowing if they borrow it out of the other pocket. If they borrow it

in the name of one of the Crown corporations, that's a different

matter. They talk about privatization. Are we to see the Highways

ministry turned over to a Crown corporation so that they can then

borrow money? It won't mean going into debt. That won't be deficit

financing. They create the Crown corporation and then they can borrow

and add to the contingent liabilities. Are they going to do that with

some of the other government services? Are they going to privatize

health care so that they can borrow fantastic amounts of money there

and still run a break-even budget? What does that mean? No one on the

government side of the House has bothered to explain this. Why put it

in there if it doesn't mean anything? Why put it in there if no one on

that side of the House is prepared to stand up and tell us what it

means?

Contingent liability to the province — that is the

money borrowed out of the other pocket — on March 31, 1976, stood at

$4.5 billion. Just six years later, by March 31, 1982, the government

tells us that the figure will be just short of $10 billion — again,

more than doubled. An additional $5.5 billion was borrowed in this six

years under the name of Crown corporations. It would seem as though the

total is unlimited as long as it is done in the name of some Crown

corporation rather than in the name of a government program. Is that

what the government means by privatization? Apart from wiping out

special funds, apart from drawing down on other special funds, apart

from calling on Crown corporations to make grants or to repay loans or

whatever, the government is also going to privatize something or other.

seems to me the government has a responsibility to tell us just what is

meant by these things that are thrown into the throne speech. What is

meant by privatization? What is meant by the housing program that the

minister had to admit he couldn't understand, couldn't explain, didn't

know about, hadn't had an opportunity to find out about? What do they

mean by these programs" What's the point of putting them in the throne

speech and then having cabinet minister after cabinet minister stand up

and make political speeches without elaborating on the words that they

have had included in the throne speech?

Was the whole of the

throne speech written by the experts of Ontario? Was there no dialogue

between the ministers and those experts — or whatever you want to call

them? Some of them, it would appear, are not as expert as they were

thought to be. Surely there was some opportunity for dialogue between

the various ministers and the people writing the speech. Surely there

was some opportunity for them to get to know what the speech means. If

the ministers themselves don't know enough about it, aren't convinced

about the announcements in the throne speech and aren't able to stand

up and explain to the members of the House just what is going on — and

those outside experts don't have an opportunity to stand in the House —

when are we going to find out what this government has in mind for the

people of British Columbia to deal with the problems that are facing

us? Certainly housing is the most important problem, but we don't have

any answers. After reading the throne speech, and having heard from

those various cabinet members who have stood so far in

[ Page 6706 ]

this

debate and from the hon. member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf), all we have

are more questions as to exactly what the government has in mind.

Certainly

we have questions about the future of industry, finances and

development in the province, but we're not getting the answers. All of

us have questions about our own ridings. The Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) was in Nanaimo and promised help for

downtown development, and I'd like to think that that minister will

deliver that help when the city of Nanaimo comes to him with detailed

plans. But having heard of the memo which the Minister of Finance (Hon.

Mr. Curtis) sent out, I wonder whether, in spite of his best

intentions, there just won't be any money.

I'm wondering

about the road development plans that the Minister of Highways (Hon.

Mr. Fraser) has been discussing with the people from Nanaimo. Does it

mean, when the plans are ready, that the Minister of Finance will say

there's no money for that? I'm sure every member in the House has

concerns about what isn't going on in his own riding that needs to be

done. And yet we're told that there will be no money.

Yesterday

we were talking about forestry and the fact that some 20 percent of the

IWA workforce is unemployed right now. I'm sure they'll be encouraged

to read in the throne speech that there are going to be a lot of jobs

in coal production in the Peace River — 6,000 jobs in the construction

period, 5,000 permanent jobs thereafter. Every announcement I've seen

scares me, because they say that when those jobs are opened we won't

have the trained people in the province of British Columbia ready to

take those jobs. We're going to have to import the workers. At the same

time as the IWA members are unemployed, we're going to be looking

around the world for people to take these permanent jobs that are being

offered in the northeast. Why aren't we training those people? The

government admits that they're going to be short of the skilled workers

necessary for that northeast coal development.

. There's

been no denial that the contracts have not yet been signed. We're

spending all that money — and who knows whether or not we'll ever get

anything out of it? Who knows whether we will ever recover the

subsidies that are going into that northeast coal development? We just

don't know at this point. The government hasn't seen fit to give the

details of that discussion to the people of the province. The people of

the province are being told that they're going to have to subsidize it

to the extent of…how many billion? We aren't even told that. I think

the budget speech said in the spring of this year that it was in excess

of $1 billion; but one wonders just how much we are going to pay to

create 5,000 permanent jobs in the Peace River. How much are we going

to pay so that the Japanese will be able to buy our coal cheaper than

they'll be able to buy somebody else's? Now that's great for the

economy.

We've said over and over that we're not opposed to

northeast coal development, but we are opposed to paying anyone to buy

our coal. We are opposed to creating jobs for people when we don't have

the people to work in those jobs, and at the same time doing nothing to

create jobs for the people who are able, willing and anxious to go to

work in this province.

The Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr.

Waterland) admits that there are things that he's doing right now and

that he could be doing further than he's doing if he had more money. A

couple of years ago a range and forest improvement fund was set up. I

believe it was $140 million. Now, when there are unemployed IWA members

who could work thinning trees, limbing trees, preparing land for

planting trees and all of the work that could be done in the forest,

the minister has that money sitting, ready and available. Is he going

to wait until the economy turns around and we get into another boom and

then start spending that fund? Or has he spent it already? We've heard

nothing from the Minister of Forests as to exactly what he's doing.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Come to the Legislature.

MR. STUPICH:

The minister invites me to come to the Legislature. Mr. Speaker, I'll

come to the Legislature, and when I'm not able to be present, I'll keep

an eye on what the Minister of Forests is saying. And when he does

speak, I'll be interested in seeing what he has to say about putting

the unemployed 20 percent of IWA members to work at useful projects in

the province of British Columbia at a time when the forest industry has

turned down to the extent that it has.

I have faith in the

future of the forest industry of this province. I'm satisfied that

markets will develop and that they'll want our product. We shouldn't

close our eyes to that situation and say we're going to wait until

everybody goes to work, and then we're going to compete for those

workers to put them to work in the forest. Now is the time to be

putting those unemployed people back to work doing the kind of work

that has been neglected in this province for decades. We speeded up the

process during the short time we were in office and more has happened

since during the six years that this minister has been in office, but

if there is any honesty in him, he will have to admit that much more

remains to be done. He is in a position now to be able to do something

about that problem — about the thousands of acres of forest land that

have not been satisfactorily restocked, about the various programs that

could be gone into in forestry and about the $100-odd million I hope he

has left in that fund that could be used for some of these projects.

But what is he doing? Is that money being saved for northeast coal as

well or for some of the other megaprojects?

Mr. Speaker, the

government seems to be determined to sit back and wait for the economy

to improve before it does anything, to urge people to cut back and urge

restraint, at the same time as the budget increases. As I pointed out,

over $30 billion has been collected in the last six years, and what do

they have to show for it? With all of that money having come in, the

moment the economy turns down the government has to tighten the screws

and start urging the cutback of programs. Mr. Speaker, they have let

down the people of this province. They've let down the employers of

this province, let down industry and let down the workers — they've let

down British Columbia. While they've been arguing about the

constitution in Ottawa, people in British Columbia have been suffering.

The Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr.

McClelland) yawns about it; he is not at all concerned.

Interjection.

MR. STUPICH:

He's yawning at me? I am pleased, Mr. Speaker, that he has something to

contribute to this debate, even if it's just a yawn at me. I think

that's about all he will have to contribute to the debate. I don't

recall him making

[ Page 6707 ]

any

contribution at any other time. I'd like to hear him say something

about the natural gas pipeline to Vancouver Island, to bring us up to

date. However, I expect that will bring forward another yawn, Mr.

Speaker. In yawning, he is saying as eloquently as anything else can

say everything that this government is prepared to do to improve the

economy, to provide jobs and to provide affordable housing in the

province of British Columbia. All we can expect from that minister,

from his fellow ministers and from this government is one big yawn.

HON. MR. HEWITT:

Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to rise in my place today to support the

throne speech. In the few minutes we have left I'd like to touch on a

number of issues that come to mind after hearing the people across the

way make certain comments.

For example, the member for

Nanaimo raised the question about the agricultural land reserve. Just a

few days ago I was in Cranbrook where I guess some people may say I

took a little heat. But I have to tell you that at one point in time,

Mr. Speaker, I sat behind the member for Nanaimo, who was in the

audience. He should have been here, of course, because the House was

called, but he was up there in the audience at the convention. The

Leader of the Opposition was holding forth in his usual manner.

The

Leader of the Opposition is quite a performer. But I have never seen —

and I hope I don't see again — a politician get on a hook that he

couldn't get off. First of all, he didn't have too much to say but,

secondly, what he did say only got him into deeper water. He commented

on what they had done when they were in office, and he made the comment

about the agricultural land reserves. He was expounding in his usual

manner and then he stated at one point in his address: "The people came

out and they marched on the lawns of the Legislature. All those real

estate farmers came down on the lawns of the Legislature and yelled and

screamed." Well, I have to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the member for

Nanaimo who was sitting in front of me just shuddered. He took off his

glasses and put his head down. I'm sure he said to himself: "What has

this man done now? Why did he bother showing up in Cranbrook?" The

statement that the Leader of the Opposition made to the assembly of

farmers who were sitting there…. I'd suggest that probably 50 percent

or 75 percent of those people sitting in that room were down here on

the lawns of the Legislature at that time. They were the same people,

the bona fide hard-working farmers of this province, and the Leader of

the Opposition calls them real estate farmers. They told him, because

when they asked him questions at the end of his speech, they were mad.

Those people questioned the Leader of the Opposition. They said he'd

made a nice speech, but how could he stand up there and call them real

estate farmers, when these are the people who provide our food in this

province? That's what the Leader of the Opposition thinks of them.

They're farming real estate. I think that's shameful, and he should

apologize to the Federation of Agriculture of this province.

They went on to point out to him and to the former Minister of Agriculture,

I'm sure…. I think he shuddered again when he heard the name Tilbury

Island, because this morning he talked about the comments that were made by

the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf) about land that is in the agricultural land

reserve that shouldn't be. But a colleague of that former Minister of Agriculture,

the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk), who was the minister of economic

undevelopment at that time, took Tilbury Island out of the reserve — class 1

land — and converted it into an industrial area. Yet they're standing up

there, and this member across the way and his leader said: "We preserve

the good farmland forever and a day." They took out class 1 land at Tilbury

Island. The farmers at Cranbrook let them know that they took that property

out. There are other cases — Milner Valley and others. My colleagues around

me are giving me all sorts of names.

they talk one way, Mr. Speaker, but they certainly act another when

they are in a position of power. I think the people of this province

should recognize that.

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to spend a few

minutes on Panco Poultry, because I think it's important that I make a

few comments at this particular time. The member for Nanaimo is correct

that Panco Poultry is, at the present time, cutting down production. If

there isn't a purchaser, it will close down. One of the problems we've

had in the agricultural sector, particularly in the production and

processing of poultry, is that we basically have had three processing

plants when we should have had two and a half, and that makes it very

difficult. When Cargill determined that they could not continue to

operate after they had spent about $2 million in capital expenditures

and, since they purchased the plant, I believe, had suffered a loss of

about $2.5 million, we met with them — when I say "we," I mean I and

the ministry staff, the marketing boards involved, the poultry

associations and Cargill — to discuss whether or not Panco could

continue and, secondly, if not, what our plan was to take up the slack

with regard to processing facilities in this province. We met two

months ago. We've developed a plan for the worst case, which is: if

there is not a purchaser for that plant, then we will be moving to

absorb that production into the remaining two plants. If in the long

term the plant is not purchased and does close down, then we will be

making moves to ensure that we can handle that production by improved

lines, additional equipment, etc. in the remaining two plants.

MR. STUPICH: By January 15?

HON. MR. HEWITT:

The member for Nanaimo shouts across the floor: "By January 15?" Well,

I can tell the member for Nanaimo that in the discussions we've had in

the past and in the work that's been going on, we identified the worst

case first of all. We identified the short-term problem, which was how

to handle that production, and then we identified the long-term

solution — if Panco Poultry does in fact close its doors. We are

working with the industry on this. It's not like the NDP walking in,

purchasing a plant, and then getting involved politically. I don't have

to tell you that. The NDP talked about jobs: "We bought the plant to

protect jobs." Then in 1975 they turned around and used those same

employees…. Do you remember when the member for Surrey used those

employees, and basically said: "If that Social Credit government gets

elected, you're going to be out of a job." That's what he said.

MR. COCKE: That's exactly what happened.

HON. MR. HEWITT:

Can you believe that it's six years after the fact, and the member for

New Westminster is still saying that's exactly what happened? That was

the forecast that the man who was running in Surrey attempted to put

across, using people. I think there was a lesson to be learned. I know

the people from Surrey recognized just what he was saying, and they

said: "We don't want that kind of politician in our area. We don't want

him." So they turfed him out, and

[ Page 6708 ]

brought

in the now Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), who

has been here since 1975. The only reason that the other member got

back into the House is that there happened to be two seats in Surrey,

which allowed him to get in. Then they criticized us for changing the

number of seats in the House, and redistribution and all that, and one

of their members snuck in the back door. Why did we do that? The member

for New Westminster says that's exactly what happened. What he doesn't

say is that government interference in the economic community, which

they haven't understood yet…. The member for New Westminster, when he

was involved in ICBC and got the government influence right in there in

the works, said to everybody: "You can have car insurance for $25."

Then he literally watched that organization go zoom, zoom, zoom all the

way down to where, when we came in, the now Minister of Universities,

Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) had to go in there and

clean up a mess of a magnitude never before known in the insurance

business.

He, who calls me a bookkeeper from time to time,

bless his heart — he's supposed to be an insurance man, a knowledgeable

man in insurance. I don't know where they get their education from. For

some reason or other they think that governments should automatically

go in and prop up every business around — or if not prop it up, buy it.

It's true; I want to show you. I've got it here somewhere. Here it is:

"NDP Will Buy the Mills." Now this is what the Leader of the Opposition

said because we had a mill closing down on Vancouver Island. Very

unfortunate, but closing down.

HON. MR. GARDOM: When did he say that?

HON. MR. HEWITT:

Oh, not too long ago: November 4, 1981, as a matter of fact. He said:

"We'll buy the mills." So he's going to take the taxpayers' money from

an economy that's got to generate revenues to provide taxes for

services to people, such as health, education, and human resources;

he'll take that money and go out and buy a mill. If another one fails,

he'll buy that one. If another one fails, he'll buy that one. He'll buy

them all, but where's he going to get the money? Tinkertoy economics.

He doesn't recognize the fact that there just isn't an endless supply

of money.

You know what the Leader of the Opposition said in

Cranbrook? I'll tell you what he said. He said to the farmers, when

they asked him what his policy would be…. I wish I had the exact quote.

I have a tape of the speech, by the way; I should bring it in. He said

they would buy the farmland. One of the farmers came to me afterwards

and said: "I appreciate that, because I know now where I can sell the

property. I don't want to work any more, and I can't find a buyer for

my property, but I can sell it to the government." He said: "I've got a

problem, though. If they get back in again, they won't have money to

buy anything. So I lose it if they get in and, the way the economic

system is at the present time because of the federal government's

fiscal policy, I'm losing now because of high interest rates and

increased costs."

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: Will the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) please come to order? Please proceed.

HON. MR. HEWITT: Mr. Speaker, I just want to close on a light note because it's Friday afternoon. [Applause.] They may not clap after this.

This is called "The Birdwatcher's Guide to Parliament Hill," and it identifies the various birds:

"Endee Peewee (socialistus creeponus) .

Habitat: this tiny, fierce bird is found in small numbers everywhere in

Canada. Its loud voice, startling in so diminutive a creature, makes it

seem more numerous than it really is. Markings: ranges from light pink

to deep red. Diet: for many years this carnivorous bird has subsisted

largely on old crow. Song: 'nationalize, nationalize, nationalize,'

sung shrilly. Some observers believe the bird to be weak in the head."

Mr. Speaker, on that humorous comment I would move adjournment of debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Gardom moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

MR. SPEAKER:

Before we adjourn, hon. members, yesterday the member for

Burnaby-Edmonds (Ms. Brown) sought to move adjournment of the House

under standing order 35 to discuss a matter of urgent public

importance, namely ratification by the federal government of the United

Nations convention on the elimination of discrimination against women

and requirements of ratification by the provinces.

The power

under standing order 35 to set aside the regular daily business of the

House to discuss a definite matter of urgent public importance has only

been exercised under strict controls, as by its very nature it involves

an interference with the assigned business of the House. Sir Erskine

May's Parliamentary Practice ,

seventeenth edition, page 365, indicates that the matter must be

urgent, of recent occurrence and raised without delay. It says: "The

fact that a grievance is continuing is not sufficient if it is not of

recent occurrence. The fact that new information has been received

regarding a matter that has been continuing for some time does not in

itself make the matter one of urgency."

The member, in her statement, which I have gleaned from the Hansard

transcript, stated that the province has not ratified an agreement,

thereby indicating an ongoing situation which has the effect of taking

the matter outside of the scope of standing order 35.

would point out also for all hon. members that it is necessary under

the standing order to hand a written statement of the matter to the

Chair. I note in this case that the only document received by the

Speaker was the proposed motion of adjournment.

MS. BROWN:

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to say that I accept

your ruling, because discrimination against women is certainly not a

recent occurrence. It has been going on for many generations.

HON. MR. GARDOM: You're out of order. The whole time the government had done it, and you knew it. It was a spurious motion on your part.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MS. BROWN: You don't like that, do you? Imagine not ratifying equal pay for work of equal value. You're a disgrace.

MR. SPEAKER: Would the member please come to order.

HON. MR. GARDOM: I move the House do now adjourn.

The House adjourned at 12:40 p.m.

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