Manitoba Hansard — 27 April 1976 (Sitting 89, 30th Legislature, 3rd Session)

30-3-89

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA 2:30 p.m., Tuesday, April 27, 1976 Opening Prayer by Mr. Speaker. 2881 MR. SPEAKER: Presenting Petitions; Reading and Receiving Petitions; Presenting Reports by Standing and Special Committees; Ministerial Statements and Tabling of Reports; Notices of Motion; Introduction of Bills. Questions. The Honourable Member for Birtle Russell. ORAL QUESTIONS MR . HARRY E. GRAHAM (Birtle-Russell): Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I Wluld like to direct a question to the First Minister in the absence of the Attorney-General.

I would like to ask the First Minister if there is any limitation to the actions that would be proceeded with by the Crown against former Judge Pilutik. Having once instituted action, is there any limitation to any further action • • . MR . SPEAKER: Order please. The honourable member is asking for a legal

interpretation. The honourable member wish to rephrase his question? MR. GRAHAM: Yes, Mr. Speaker, then I would ask the First Minister. Does the province plan to take any further action against Judge Pilutik, having once initiated action? MR . SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. HON. EDWARD SCHREYER (Premier) (Rossmere): Mr.

Speaker, I might indicate that the Attorney-General is here, or should be here momentarily, but to at least to try and help the Honourable Member for Birtle-Russell in terms of what is involved, it is my understanding that any action would necessarily fall into one of three categories: Action to remove, but that is now academic; action that would flow from charges of a criminal nature; or thirdly, action taken internally by the Law Society with respect to the right to practice. The latter is, however, not involving the Crown. MR. GRAHAM: A supplementary question to the First Minister then.

Has the Government of Manitoba contemplated any further action to reinstate Judge Pilutik in the absence of any further charges against him ? MR . SCHREYER: No, Mr. Speaker, I'm certainly not aware of that. I believe that is being put forward in a hypothetical or theoretical sense and it's probably obviated by the fact that the person in question did tender his resignation. MR . SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. L. R. (Bud) SHERMAN (Fbrt Garry): My question, Mr. Speaker, is to the Honourable the First Minister.

I'd like to ask him whether he will be reconsidering the province's position with respect to the AIB order rollback on the INCO price increase at Thompson, whether the Minister will be considering intercession on behalf of the workers involved. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. MR. SCHREYER: Mr.

Speaker, I have been in communication with persons directly involved or interested in the matter, and it is not felt to be opportune to inter vene in any way as a province until such time as the Anti-Inflation Board has itself had an opportunity to deliberate denovo on the matter, which I understand they are intending to do. Therefore, any statement by me at this time would perhaps be also academic in the light of their reconsidered possible decision, which I understand, if it takes place, will take place this week some time. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Roblin. MR . J. WALLY McKENZIE (Roblin): Mr.

Speaker, I have a question for the Minister in charge of the Lotteries Commission. I see that the Minister is not here, so I'll maybe direct the question to the Honourable the First Minister. I wonder can the Honourable First Minister advise the House of the projected profit that we can anticipate from the $3.00 Western Lottery which is scheduled for April 30th. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. MR . SCHREYER: Mr. Speaker, I must apologize to the Honourable Member for

2882 April 27, 1976 ORAL QUESTIONS (MR. SCHREYER cont'd) ....• Roblin. When it comes to matters pertaining to lotteries, I am completely the layman and, furthermore, I find all of the praise and the criticism of lotteries to be beyond my understanding. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Garry. MR. L. R. (Bud) SHERMAN (Fort Garry): Mr. Speaker, I have a question to the Minister of Consumer, Corporate and Internal Services in his capacity as Minister responsible for Communications.

I'd like to ask him whether there will be any meetings between his colleagues and counterparts in other provinces and himself and federal authorities with respect to the decisions and statements taken in the last few days by the Canadian Association of Broadcasters and by the Federal Minister of Communications with respect to violence in televisi on programming. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Communications. HON. IAN TURNBULL (Minister of Communications)(Osborne): Mr.

Speaker, there are always ongoing discussions between myself and the Federal Minister about various matters, but we haven't discussed this particular topic of violence on TV; and there are as I recall scheduled meetings both inter-provincially and federally-provincially for Ministers of Communications. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for La Verendrye. MR. BOB BANMAN (La Verendrye): Thank you, Mr.

Speaker, I direct my question to the Minister of Industry and Commerce, and would ask the Minister if the Manitoba Government will be presenting a brief to the Canadian Transport Commission hearing on the proposed elimination of one of Canada's Trancontinental passenger trains. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Industry and Commerce. HON. LEONARD S. EVANS (Minister of Industry and Commerce) (Brandon East): Yes, Mr. Speaker. MR. BANMAN: I wonder if the Minister could inform the House as to what particular attack the Manitoba Government will take with regards to this hearing. MR . EVANS: Mr.

Speaker, our position on rail passenger service is similar to the position being taken by some of the other western provinces. I can say that because it was discussed at a recent meeting of western Ministers of Transportation Policy. Briefly it is twofold: No. 1, we believe that the existing Transcontinental rail passenger service should be maintained and indeed improved where possible; but secondly, we believe that there is room for a regional inter-city service connecting cities such as Winnipeg, Regina, Calgary, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Edmonton.

We believe there is considerable room for a very practical energy efficient economic rail service to be put in place and when that is put in place then possibly we would see ourselves to agreeing to certain changes in the transcontinental service. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. LLOYD AXWORTHY-(Fort Rouge): Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Urban Affairs. Can the Minister indicate whether his department or he himself have had any representations concerning the provision of special transit facilities for physically handicapped people or older people in the City of Winnipeg?

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Urban Affairs. HON. SAUL A. MILLER (Minister of Urban Affairs) (Seven Oaks): No, Mr. Speaker, my department hasn't received to my knowledge any requests of that nature. It would go to the City of Winnipeg itself, the Council of the city. MR. AXWORTHY: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister indicate whether the present formulas for transporation systems to the City of Winnipeg would include provision for such special services similar to that they provide for DASH and for Dial-a-Buses. MR. MILLER: Yes, Mr.

Speaker, if the City came forward with a proposal then certainly the existing formula is broad enough to encompass anything of that nature. MR. AXWORTHY: Mr. Speaker, based upon that statement of the Minister, can he indicate whether he will be raising the matter with the City of Winnipeg officials to determine whether such a program would be studied in terms of its feasibility. MR. MILLER: Mr. Speaker, I wouldn't be raising it. If the city has indeed

April 27, 1976 2883 ORAL QUESTIONS (MR. MILLER cont'd) .... . received a submission from interested groups, then I assume the city would raise it with the province. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Urban Affairs. MR. MILLER: I was wondering, Mr. Speaker, if you'd start with the Adjourned Debates on Seconding Readings starting with No. 23. ORDERS OF THE DAY GOVERNMENT BILLS - SECOND READING MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. Proposed motion of the Honourable Minister of Agriculture, Bill No. 23. The Honourable Member for Lakeside. MR. ENNS: Stand, Mr. Speaker. MR .

SPEAKER : Bill No. 30, proposed by the Honourable Minister of Mines. The Honourable Member for Morris. MR . JORGENSON: Stand, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 37, proposed by the Honourable Minister of Consum er, Corporate and Internal Services. The Honourable Member for La Verendrye. MR. BANMAN: Stand, Mr. Speaker. MR . SPEAKER: Bill No. 39, proposed by the Attorney-General. The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Stand, Mr. Speaker. MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 52, proposed by the Honourable Minister of Municipal Affairs. The Honourable Member for Birtle-Russell. MR. GRAHAM: Mr.

Speaker, could we have 52 and 53 stand, please. BILL NO. 47 - THE HIGHWAY TRAFFIC ACT MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 47, the Honourable Minister of Highways. HON. PETER BURTNIAK (Minister of Highways)(Dauphin) presented Bill 47,

An Act to amend The Highway Traffic Act, for second reading. MOTION presented. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister. MR . BURTNIAK: Mr. Speaker, most of the provisiOns of this particular bill deal with

Part 8 of The Highway Traffic Act, under which the Motor Transport Board regulates and supervises the motor carrier industry as well as commercial trucks. The Highway Traffic and Motor Transport Board as constituted under this Act has a dual function, namely regulation of the motor carrier industry and the administration of the Highways Protection Act, as well as certain functions under the Highway Traffic Act respecting speed zones, approval of traffic signs, and control devices.

For all practical purposes it has been found necessary that the Board sit in two sections when dealing with matters under the two different Acts. Accordingly, amendments are pro posed providing for the formal separation of the Traffic Board and the Motor Transport Board, each Board would be constituted under the Act over which it has primary super visory powers. Many of the amendments are therefore of a technical nature giving the effect to this particular principle.

An in-depth examination of the operation of the Motor Transport Board has revealed that much of its time has been taken up with purely administrative and enforcement matters, some of which overlap or duplicate functions performed by other parts of the Department of Highways. One of the consequences has been that the Board has been unable to devote sufficient attention to more important matters affecting the trucking industry. To relieve the Board of such administrative and enforcement responsibilities, the inspection staff has been transferred to the Highways

section of the department. Certain amendments are required to fully implement this transfer of responsibilities, also the registration of Public Service Vehicles is to be transferred to the Registrar, who is now responsible for the registration of all motor vehicles. The Board would of course retain full regulatory powers respecting such vehicles.

2884 April 27, 1976 BILL 47 (MR. BURTNTAK cont'

d) Further provisions of this Bill provide for the strengthening of requirement for filing returns by motor carriers. The Board in the exercise of its regulatory and supervisory powers must have access to information on the basis of which it can make the determination as to the efficiency, adequacy and general performance of a particular carrier. The Act now requires carriers to file such returns before the end of each registration year. Some carriers fail to comply and there is no effective means of enforcement. A provision is also included in the Bill permitting continuance of a hearing. I feel, Mr.

Speaker, this is rather important, the continuance of a hearing by remaining members of the Board where a quorum may be lost by reason of resignation, illness or death of a member. At present, in the event of loss of quorum, the hearing must be suspended and a hew hearing commenced putting the applicant and those opposing the application to considerable additional expense. And amended as proposed, also providing for a single member representing the entire Board in cases of joint hearings with boards of other jurisdictions. This is consistent with the practice of other provinces in Canada. MR.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for La Verendrye. MR. BANMAN: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the member for Gladstone, that the debate be adjourned. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister for Urban Affairs. MR. MILLER: Mr. Speaker, I would move that Mr. Speaker now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a committee to consider of the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty, Industry and Commerce in Room 254, I believe, and Education will be here in the Chamber. MOTION presented and carried, and the House resolved itself into a Committee of Supply, with the Honourable Member for Logan in the Chair.

COMMITTEE OF SUPPLY - DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 46 on page 19 of your Estimates Book, 46(b)1 - Salaries. The Honourable Minister of Education. HON. BEN HANUSCHAK (Minister of Education) (Burrows): Mr. Chairman, yesterday I had promised the Honourable Member for Brandon West, two things: One, an organizational chart of the Department, and that should be available during the course of the afternoon. As soon as it's brought down it will be distributed to honourable members of the House. No. 2, he wanted to know the number of persons on contract at the present time. MR.

HANUSCHAK: At the present time there are 43 on contract. On fee for service, now that we could only provide as of for the year 75 - 76, there were 32, the majority of whom, 18, were in the Correspondence Branch, 2 in Libraries, 7 in the French section, four in Administration, one in Child Development and Support Services. That's the breakdown of the 32 that I have mentioned. There's 63 employed on term: and secondments for the present time, we're still working on that, that is not available.

Then the honourable member made some reference to some fantastic increase in Administrative staff over a five-year-period, he used the figure of 60 and some odd, to an increase to 130 some odd, if I remember correctly 134, 136, and really, Mr. Chairman, I, you know, I must repeat my question again. I'd be quite happy to provide the honourable member with an explanation. Either the figures that he has given me are wrong, or if they are not wrong, if he would at least indicate what he means by Administration.

The closest that I was able to get to getting some definition of a term Administration is his reference to a salary figure of $15,000 a year. Now, I don't know, Mr. Chairman, which year he is referring to? Is he referring to the present year's salary or that of five years ago? Because it will make a difference. Because those positions that may have been paid at the rate of $15, 000 a year, if that's what the honourable member is going to compare, then the salary for comparable position today will be far in excess of $15, 000 a year. If he means $15, 000 today,

April 27, 1976 2885 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) ••..• that'll have to be scaled down accordingly to what ever the figure was for those positions in 1970. Or does he mean $15,000 a year in each of the two years? Then that, Mr. Chairman, is leading to a comparison of apples and oranges, because those earning $15,000 a year today were not then, and so hence the today $15,000 a year plus group will include a far greater group of employees than $15,000 a year plus of five years ago. So I really would appreciate an explanation from the honourable member what he means by Administration.

I take it that he was referring to all branches of the department and not just to what is !mown as Administration. Mr. Chairman if I just may pause at this point in time, I did promise to hand out an organizational chart, if the Pages would leave a copy with you and distribute one to each member of the House. So, now if he's referring to Administration in terms of managerial function, well that information I could obtain for the honourable member and give him some comparable data on that, provided that I !mow what it is that the honourable member is seeldng.

Now, if the honourable member is referring specifically to what is headed as General Administration - and of course before I come to that, as I did indicate last night, as we proceed through the Estimates, the staff man year count in the various categories would gradually unfold itself as we proceed resolution by resolution. I did do a very quick check of staff man year count in the department, and I want to indicate to you, Mr.

Chairman, that this year's total staff man year count is 414.28 staff man years, as compared with 426.28 staff man years of last year, of the fiscal year just ended, which is a total reduction of 12. In the area of General Administration, there are 66,26 staff man years contained in the Estimates before us. For the fiscal year just ended there were 66.26 staff man years. In 75-76 there were 59 staff man years. And here too as we proceed through the Estimates -.vith some of the re-organization of a department, and that essentially accounts for the increase in the five staff man years.

So it isn't really five new slots provided or stacked on top of the existing staff man year count, but rather a reorganization of the existing, because the net overall result as I had pointed out a few moments ago resulted in a decrease rather than an increase in the staff man years. West. MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 46(b)(1). The Honourable Member for Brandon MR. McGILL: Yes, Mr. Chairman, let me ac!mowledge the Minif'te:t>'s explanation in respect to some of the questions that were left with him from last evening's consideration.

I thank him, too, for part of the answer to the problem of determining just how many people are in the term appointment category on contracts, secondments and fee for service. Now we have some numbers, but we don't have the amounts paid to each of these groups. That was also part of the question, Mr. Chairman, and perhaps the Minister can also include that in some further answers to questions that he provides. He also referred to the question relating to the organizational chart which is contained on page 1 of his report for 74 - 75.

Really what I was asldng, therefore, were the names which now fit in, if there are any changes in responsibility. This document that has been distributed has a chart but does not include names. I presume they are available by searching through the chart itself so that we will be able to examine this to determine if in fact there is any real basis for the generally held feeling that there's been a great deal of change in the supervision in his department. Mr. Chairman, he also referred to a question and a comparison I made with respect to administrators in the department.

And just to review those figures, I suggested that in 1970, there were 46 people who might be characterized as administrators. Now that is a general term. Mr. Chairman, there is also a Directory of Personnel and Services in his Annual Report, and this has been included in Annual Reports for the last five years. I presume that these people that are named here are entitled to a general name of administrator or supervisor or whatever, but if he goes through these directories of Personnel and Services with the named members of

2886 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. McGILL cont'd) • • . • • his department and compares it with five years ago, then he will be able to relate the figures which I have given him which indicate that in 1970 there was something like 46, and in 1975, 126 listed in the Directory of Personnel and Services. And I pointed out too that during that period of time the total enrollment in his school system had declined, in round figures, 246,000 to 230,000. Mr.

Chair man, again it was a matter of getting some explanation from the Minister how this administrative growth could be justified in view of the stability or even decline of his total enrollments. So perhaps, Mr. Chairman, with those further explanations the Minister may be able to deal more precisely with the questions that are being put. Mr. Chairman, we were talking, I think when we left off last evening, about the policy of decentralization which the department has undertaken and in fact taken to the classroom itself, and to the teachers the authority and the development of curriculum.

I believe the Minister through his Deputy is suggesting to teachers that they'd like to see them take the leading role in the establishment of curriculum in our province, and that suggests to me that it may indeed be going at cross purposes with the stated long-term policy of the Minister to provide equal educational opportunity and equality of opportunity in the province. How, Mr. Chairman, can we achieve that kind of equality if in fact we are breaking down to many many kinds of standards and many many kinds of establishing curricula in our province?

I noted that the quality of education in a division would vary with changing trustees and that sometimes the tenure of rural superintendents is rather brief, and so it would seem to me that the direction in which this department is now taking the school system is going to move farther and farther away from educational opportunity. Now, Mr. Chairman, specifically I'd like to ask the Minister at this time, specifically I'd like to ask the Minister at this time, what happened to the proposed decentralized delivery system which was planned for services in the Morden area?

Has the Minister got an up-to-date report on the success or otherwise that's being achieved in that area? I think it's appropriate to the discussion of this whole policy of decentralization and I think the achievements there would be interesting to hear from the Minister at this time. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: Mr.

Chairman, the Honourable Member for Brandon West certainly poses a valid question, one which should be answered during the debates of my Estimates, but may I draw to your attention and urge the honourable member that it would seem to me that the whole matter of decentralization, equality of educational opportunity and local control could properly be more effectively and more fully dealt with under 5 on the next page, Program Development and Support Services. At this point in time all I would want to do is assure the honourable member that it can be built then.

The honourable member may recall my remarks in my opening statement last night when I did point out that the establishment of the three review committees, one at the elementary level, one at the Junior High and one at the second ary level, whose function it would be to monitor the development and changing patterns in the education program and co-ordination on a province-wide basis.

So I would really urge the honourable member that this issue could better be dealt with under item 5 than under General Administration because under General Administration, really this is the central office component of a department, which does not involve itself to that great a degree and that directly in the matters raised .by the honourable member and, as well, the Morden matter as the area entitled as Program Development and Support Services. MR. McGILL: Mr.

Chairman, if that is indeed a point of order raised by the Minister I would suggest that what we're talking about here is the administration of his Department and the kind of leadership and direction that should be achieved from this rather impressive staff which is retained by the Minister for this purpose. We're talking about the shifting of the responsibility from that administrative staff to the school classroom and I'm trying to determine how far this is going to go and what the Minister has in mind and when really does this plan become an abandonment of

April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCA TION (MR. McGILL cont'

d) responsibility by his own administrative staff? 2887 Surely then we should be discussing this specific matter to determine just how far this decentralization is compatible with the whole announced policy of the equality of educational opportunity. Mr. Chairman, in that respect I think that it might be wise to remind the Minister or at least get his confirmation of the kind of discussions that take place with the council of Ministers at the Canadian Education Association.

I believe that it's been the practice for a number of years at the time of that conference for the Ministers, the Council of Ministers, to discuss matters relating to curriculum --(Interjection)-- At the Canadian Education Association. Well the Ministers do meet and discuss matters of that kind. Is the Minister denying that that is not the usual practice at the Canadian Education Association Meetings? --(Interjection)-- Well, Mr. Chairman, I'm not suggesting the two terms are synonymous. I'm suggesting that councils of ministers do take place during this Canadian Education Association Meeting and Convention.

The Ministers meet at other times during the year and one of the topics that they frequently discuss is the concept of a national basic curriculum. They're talking not in terms of provincial standards or basics in curriculum, they're talking about achieving eventually some national standards. It seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that it would be very interesting to know what the Minister of Education for Manitoba contributes to these discussions, whether he is in favour or in general supports the principle that we should be working towards some national basic standards in curriculum.

It would then again be interesting to determine how he reconciles that broader global approach to the rather unusual and different approach that he is taking within his own province where he's pro ceeding to not have even a provincial standard or basic curriculum and is breaking it down into a classroom sort of operation. So, Mr. Chairman, I would like to hear the Minister's comments on how he feels about the whole concept of national basic curriculum standards and how he reconciles this with his policy presently of decentralizing to the classroom. MR. HANU SCHAK: Mr.

Chairman, if I may again point out to the honourable member that under General Administration, although I suppose one could relate the matters raised by the honourable member to this item on our Estimates, but the fact of the matter is, Mr. Chairman, the 65.26 SMYs that we're talking about here consist by and large a quarter, seventeen, come under the heading of Administration which is the secretarial staff, the stenographic staff, typists and so forth. The Public School Finance Board staff also accounts for another 14 of the 65, in the Personnel Branch four, in the Accounting Branch 9 and so forth.

That is the reason why, Mr. Chairman, I have been repeating the point that some of the matters raised by the Honourable Member for Brandon West at this point in time could more effectively and properly be dealt with under other items on the Estimates. Mr. Chairman, the Honourable Member for Brandon West obviously wasn't listening. At no time did I say that the matter of curriculum planning and development is simply left to the individual teacher.

In fact as recently as about three minutes ago I reminded the honourable member of the establishment of the three review committees into which I'll go into greater detail at the point in my Estimates that I've indicated and I'll explain that to the honourable member and to other honourable members of the House. So there is a co-ordinating function and a monitoring function existing in the Province of Manitoba. Now the honourable member says that this works at crossed purposes with the C. E.A. I cannot be held accountable for the operations of the C. E.

A. which is a voluntary educational organization made up of all those interested in education: home and school associations7 trustees, teachers, various other educational groups that are interested in education and they are members in the C. E.A., as well as departmental staff people from various provinces. The Council of Education Ministers of Canada is not wedded to the C. E.A. The Council of Education Ministers of Canada does not meet at the same time as the C.E.A. meets, nor does it necessarily meet at the same place.

From time to time by coincidence and for convenience sake, because some of the support staff attending With the Minister may also be delegates to c. E.A. and it may be that the Council of Education Ministers of Canada meeting may immediately precede the meeting date of the

2888 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) •••.. c. E. A., one will i=ediately follow it but that does not always happen so. I've attended meetings of Council of Education Ministers at differ ent times and in locations quite removed from that of the location of the C. E. A. meeting. So there is not that relationship between the two organizations. Hence I cannot be held accountable for what may be - and I don't lmow whether in fact it is but if the honourable member says that that is the policy of the C. E. A. I'm not going to quarrel with him at this time.

I do not feel it incumbent upon me during the consideration of my Estimates to defend the policy position of the C. E. A. I want to inform the honourable member that when he speaks of the c. E. A. position being one advocating a national educational curriculum for Canada that that is not the position of the Council of Education Ministers of Canada. At no time have the Education Ministers of Canada come out in support of a national educational program. We do recognize the fact that the needs of the provinces differ from one to the other and hence the need for a separate education program. But having said that, Mr.

Chairman, I also want to point out to the honourable member that when it comes to the basics the differences are not that great. What are the basics of mathematics? What are the basics of English grammar? The basic principles of any course in Science aren't determined by a Minister of Education; they're not determined by the Honourable Member for Brandon West nor by anyone else in this Chamber but that that is the product of the general evolution of knowledge of Science or whatever other discipline it may be.

Hence there's no way that you could teach one grammar, one set of grammatical rules in one part of Canada and an entirely different set at another, or one set of mathematical principles, arithmetic principles in one part of Canada, in one province and a different one in another. That just cannot happen and it does not happen. So, insofar as the basics the differences are not that great.

Where the differences may occur - and even then this would not affect the teaching of the basics because as I've said a moment ago, the general content of the basics cannot change in many cases, nor can the sequence in which they are taught change or vary all that much. In the teaching of arithmetic there's a certain very definite sequence and order in which you teach certain principles. There is no way that one could deviate from it because that's the logical nature of that particular discipline. So the differences are not that great.

Where the differences do arise is whatever additional may be injected into the curriculum, that which may reflect local culture, local needs on a provincial level, on a school divisional level, or what-have-you, but the basic differences or diff erences in the basics, they just are not there to the extent that they are imagined to b:e by some. MR. McGILL: Well, Mr. Chairman, I'm really not getting the kind of answers that I was hoping the Minister would endeavour to give. I suggested to him that Ministers meet and discuss these problems and that they frequently meet during the period of the C. E.

A. meetings. --(Interjection)-- Well, Mr. Chairman, I didn't give him a precise number and if he wants to say that they only meet occasionally I'll accept it. If he wants to say that they meet every week I'd even accept that but I would have some difficulty. However it isn't important to the thrust of my question, Mr. Chairman, for him to sa y that they meet sometimes.

I merely asked him if they did indeed discuss the advantages, possibly, to be gained by some consistency across this country of ours in the various standards and basic curriculum subjects so that there would be some portability for students who move from one place to another. I asked him specifically if he was generally in favour of that kind of a development. I didn't say that they'd announced that they were in favour of this sort of thing; it's I would expect, several years away from actual implementation. But surely, Mr.

Chairman, we can get some straight answer from the Minister as to whether or not he has considered the advantages of such a development, such a trend and whether he supports it in principle. I didn't ask him whether he had announced publicly he was in favour of it. Then I further asked him whether this was not inconsistent with what he's doing in the Province of Manitoba. Surely, Mr. Chairman, that is not a very difficult question for a Minister of Education to deal with. MR . HANUSCHAK: The answer to the basic question, yes, Mr. Speaker. MR .

CHAIRMAN: Resolution 46(b)(l) - the Honourable Member for Brandon West.

April 27, 1976 2889 SUPPLY - EDUCATION MR . McGILL: The Minister has chosen to retire into his shell and is going to give us the treatment. But we'll proceed again with further questions in respect to the whole problem, as I see it a problem, of decentralization in Manitoba and suggest to him that a recent survey of elementary teachers by the Elementary Review Committee of the Manitoba Teachers Society produced certain information important to the depart ment. One was that 60 percent of the teachers feel that the basic computational skills: spelling, grammar and writing skills have declined.

Another one was that 93 percent of the teachers want the Department of Education and the Department's Elementary Guidelines expanded to include skill lists keyed to materials and sample test items. Now the Minister has already mentioned that he has some people working on the development and the production of skill lists which the teachers will be able to use in their classrooms in order to determine if the results of their teaching is bringing their class up to the required standards. I think that if that is under way in the department that certainly is a move in the right direction.

But in all this matter of decentralization surely the Minister has consulted with the teachers and I would be very interested to know if, in general, teachers are enthusi astic about the idea of being given the responsibility for the development of curriculum in the classroom. · MR . CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: Yes , Mr. Speaker, in general the teachers are extremely enthusiastic.

If the honourable member would read the resolutions adopted by the delegates of the Annual General Meeting of the Teacher's Society, he would find that for years and years , the teachers have been asking for the opportunity to assume an increased role in curriculum planning and development.

Now on the matter of standardized curriculum, I did reply to the honourable member before he rose to his feet ju st a moment ago, yes , to the basic question; and mean that yes, the Council of Education Ministers had considered the matter , is well aware of the fact that there may be curricular diff erences - does see to it that a similarity and the basic content is maintained by an interprovincial curriculum committee of its own, but beyond that point there are provincial diff erences.

And this of course, in maintaining those similarities does provide for portability of credits which occurs daily amongst thousands of students moving from one province to the other in this country, and as has occurred in the past and is happening today and no doubt will continue into the future. The honourable member did ask me another question which I had overlooked replying to earlier, and that was his particular concern about - that was a pilot program and perhaps I could indicate, Mr.

Chairman, that when it was initiated, the attempt was directed more at perfo rming a regulatory func tion rather than offerin g a support service to teachers. Now in the process of decentralization we always do work in close liaison co-operation with those affected namely the school divisions and boards, and the teachers employed within them. And there was not the type of interest that was antici pated there would be in the surrounding divisions , and hence the project is discontinued.

Now this year we are taking a different approach toward this, and in two or three areas staff will be working directly under the local authority rather than under the arrangement that was in Morden where the Field Offi cers were still under the authority of the Department of Education - they'll be working directly with the local people in the development of their education program which we feel is a more meaningful step towards decentralization.

The survey which the honourable member cited, and I'm not aware of such a survey being done by the Manitoba Teachers' Society - there may be one of which I am not aware, but there was such a survey being done by my department. And the member ship was composed primarily of non-departmental people, true, involving teachers.

And it is a result of that survey which has led the department to acting on those matters which I had mentioned in my opening statement and namely, the basic skills list which is one step, and this of course, will continue in response to the :illformation that we obtained from that surv�y and from others related to the development of our education program.

2890 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION MR . CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. McGILL: Well then if 93 percent of the teachers are asking the depart ment for some guidelines, I don't know how you can reconcile with the statement you made that by and large teachers are enthusiastic about the decentralized authority and standards within their own classrooms. It seems to me that what they're asking for is assistance and direction and leadership from your department.

And you're giving it to them now and that's a good thing because you are preparing some skill lists which they'll be able to use _in their classrooms, and then they will be able to concentrate more directly on the quality of their own teaching and in bringing their students up to some standards which you are presumably going to supply to them within the next short time. And Mr. Chairman, you did mention the Morden decentralization project.

You spoke of it in the past tense so I assume that it is now no longer operational; that it has ceased to function and I imagine you have some evaluation of that, some report on the whole operation which you will reveal to us in due course. It would be interesting to know why the program is now no longer functional, if it is in fact, if I'm interpreting your words correctly. And in the debriefing of this whole program, what reasons we!l:'e given for the failure of the project to become a successful model? Now, Mr.

Chairman, during the past months there have been successive statements from the Minister and members of his department that basics are relatively unimportant, basics are in good shape. But there is mounting evidence to the contrary. There's evidence from business people who employ the school product, from university professors, from senior high school teachers, former school inspectors, the general public, and there is evidence on many hands. In our public day-to-day operations, we notice some increasing difficulties with what should be really the basic training of the student in our public and high schools.

Some school divisions have continued to administer various types of standardized tests, particularly in reading. And I think, Mr. Chairman, it would be interesting to compare those results as we have them for one of the major school divisions in Manitoba, for the years 1967 to 1975, and this is for Grade 3. 9, that would be the ninth month of the third year; and this chart gives the percentage of pupils below the grade "norm". In 1967 in word knowledge, 37.51 were below; and in reading 43.65.

From '67 through years '71, 173 to 175 the percentage of pupils who fell below the grade "normal" in word knowledge rose from 37.51 to 49.59 percent. From 1967 to 1975 the percentage of pupils who fell below the grade "norm" in reading went from 43.65 percent to 62. 72 percent. Mr. Chairman, all of the reassurances of the Minister arrl his staff to the contrary, this metropolitan reading test for Grade 3 that has been applied during those years by one of his larger school divisions, would indicate certainly that there has been a decline in both word knowledge and certainly in reading.

The number of pupils tested in 1967 was 3,462 and in 1975 - 2,460. --(Inter jection)-- Well, those numbers should be self-explanatory, those were the numbers of students who took the tests in 1967. If the Minister didn't get that I'll repeat it; 3,462 and in 1975, 2,460. So there has been a steady decline since 1967. Another example from one of the major school divisions on the question of whether or not we have gone downhill in the basics, is in the Stanford Intermediate Reading Test. This is for Grade 6.

And it was taken in the fifth month of the sixth year, and these figures are from 1968 to 1975; and these are average scores. Paragraph reading dropped from 6. 57 in 1968 to 5. 82 in 1975, showing a more or less steady decline in those years. On word meaning, the score average dropped from 6. 24 to 5. 60, and an average reading from 6. 41 to 5. 70. From 6. 41 to 5.70. --(Inter jection)-- Where? We're talking about one of the larger school divisions in the Province of Manitoba, and this was the Stanford Intermediate Reading Test. Well, if it's important, this was Winnipeg School Division No. 1.

The approximate number of pupils in 1968 was 3, 350; in 1975, 2, 800; the percentage of pupils below the normal in the fifth month of Grade 6. In 1968, in the month of January - 51.28 were below normal in paragraph reading; 56. 64 in word meaning, and 54.68 in average reading. In 1975, the figure in paragraph reading

April 27, 1976 2891 SUPPLY- EDUCATION (MR. McGILL cont'd) .••.. percentage had increased from 51.28 to 69. 99, This is the percentage of pupils below the norm. --(Interjection)-- Well, we're talking about the Stanford Intermediate Reading Tests. --(Interjection)-- Well, Mr. Chairman, again the Minister of Education seems to prefer the role of asking questions and I have always felt that that was the proper function of the opposition. If he would prefer to be in this role, I would suggest that perhaps if they continue on their present course he shouldn't have too long to wait.

In 1975, as compared with 1968 average reading, the percentage of pupils below the normal increased from 54.68 to 70. 27. So, Mr. Chairman, I would point out to the Minister that in 1975, 70 percent of the students were reading below the grade normal of 6, 5. Approximately 50 percent were at or below Grade 5. 5 and 20 percent at Grade 4. 5 or lower. And I would point out, Mr. Chairman, that all these pupils below the norm would be moving on to Grade 7 where the reading requirements in the content subjects are much more demanding.

Now, it's interesting to note that following the 1975 tests where the information was pretty clear that the decline was rather startling, the board decided to discontinue standardized tests. Now, Mr. Chairman, I don't know why that decision would be reached except that such kind of information was rather unsettling and it was better not to have it than to have to expose this kind of decline to public scrutiny.

But I can say that one year later, the board is not re-establishing those tests, because they are as convinced I think, as many many more people in this province are convinced, that the standards in the basics are certainly declining. Mr. Chairman, I have attempted to provide the Minister with specific evidence from one major school division of the kind of decline that's taking place in the average abilities of the school children in certain subjects.

And I would like him to try to explain to me how he can continue to say that there is no cause for concern about the standards that we are achieving in our school system. Here is one division that contin ue to use standardized tests. And the results were somewhat upsetting as they would indicate by the action of the board in discontinuing the tests, but now fortunately it's going to be resumed. I wonder if the Minister would comment on that. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: Mr.

Chairman, you may recall when a number of significant changes and the rules for the debate of the Estimates were made, it was felt that the approach that we're. taking now is a more systematic and businesslike one which would enable the honourable members to consider all the items in the Estimates, and then at the end return to the Minister's salary. Now, I did, Mr. Chairman, I think indicate to the honourable member in very clear terms, the general function of the item known as General Administration. The title is General Administration within the Estimates.

And I think that I did point out to the honourable member that many of these items could more properly and effectively be dealt with under their proper category in the Estimates rather than under this one because I do find it difficult to relate this to personnel, or to accounting, or to General Administration to the function of my secretary in my office, or that sort of thing, --(Interjection)-- which Mr. Chairman, I would suggest to you there is no point of order. order. MR . CHAIRMAN: Order please. The honourable member state his point of MR . McGILL: My point of order is that, Mr.

Chairman, we have dealt with this matter and we explained our positions relative to administration and by your silence I accepted your compliance and we have been debating this specific subject for 30 minutes. And now the Minister, when he finds a question is rather difficult, is resuming the debate on a point of order. And I think it's already been decided. MR. HANUSCHAK: The honourable member has no point of order.

The point that I have raised now I had been raising repeatedly ever since the debate of my Estimates commenced, and I do regret that the honourable member's memory is that short, that he does not recall the fact that this point had been raised previously. And

2892 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) . • • • . I would urge the honourable member --(Inter je ction)-- I would urge the honourable member to reserve his comments on many of these issues for the - under the appropriate heading within the Estimates and then they could properly be dealt with. The honourable member reminded me that I spoke about the Morden decentralization program in the past tense. Yes, I well do remember that and I also know that basic of grammar, I did use the past tense.

Because I did indicate to the honourable member that it was a pilot project which was ended and I did indicate to the honourable member why it was terminated and what is being done in its stead. I did indi cate to the honourable member that the approach that was taken was one of performing a regulatory function rather than a support function to ·teachers. And I did indicate to the honourable member that there was lack of interest in neighboring div isions for that type of a project and that hence now, the approach is one of offering a support service rather than merely a regulatory one on a decentralized basis.

Now , the honourable member went a great length in reciting statistics and ask him , whose norms is he referring to? Because., Mr. Chairman, I do not know whose norms the Winnipeg School Divis ion used as a guide. There are norms and there are norms.

If one were to test the reading ability of honourable members of this House and use wha t one would find and establish a norm on that basis, one would find that the reading ability of 50 percent of the members would fall below that norm and 50 percent would fall above that norm. --(Interjection)-- Because everybody's reading ability is not at the same level, so if there's an average or a mean, if there's an average or a mean, then of course, roughly 50 percent would fall above it and 50 percent would fall below it.

And similarly , if it's a norm established by the Winnipeg School Division for its own purposes , of course, approximately one-hal f depending on whether it's a recently es tablished norm for that current year or one in relation to a previously established one to de termine how the students are faring as compared with their performance in previous years. So that was the reason why I asked the honourable member whose norms is he referring to?

Because if the honourable member will check with the Winnipeg School Division he will also find - and perhaps he should do that during the course of this debate or have someone from his office check - he will find that the Winnipe g School Divis ion most likely, as most school divisions do or many school divisions do, they may have two or three sets of norms. They may be guided by three sets of norms , national, provincial, and locally established ones.

Now the honourable member wished to attach a tremendous amount of credence to the data which he has just read out to a committee a few moments ago, and a similar study was conducted on a somewhat broader basis in the province, also testing Grades Ill and Grades VI classes as measured by the Canadian test of basic skills , and it was done , not just on the basis of comparing students• performance of one year as opposed to another year, but in an attempt to obtain a more valid and a more me aningful assessment over a five-year period, from 1970 to 1975.

And it has been found that the stahdards are not declining but in fact are increasing, and it's been found that the Ma nitoba students on -the average perform slightly above the Canadian average. For example, on that test, the Canadian standard score for Grade Ill is 3. 8; and for Manitoba it was 3. 95, 3. 91, 3.99, 3. 97, at all times above the 3. 8 score. Grade VI the Canadian standard was 6. 8 and for the first two years it came very close to the Canadian standard in the years 1971 - '72 at 6. 79, and in the years '73 and '74 it was 6. 82 and 6. 83.

Now whatever testing the Winnipeg School Divi sion proposes to do now and this is not uncommon where a survey of this kind is done , one test is used and then another test is used as a cross check to determine the validity of the method of measurement. And I know that at the present time the Winnipeg School Division and the St. James Assi niboia School Divis ion, the Grade V students will be tested on the basic skills in mathematics using the Metropolitan Achievement Test,

April 27, 1976 2893 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) .•..• which I regret, Mr. Chairman, I've forgotten whether that was the test that the honourable member referred to or not, and if it was, so it will be redone and for comparative purposes. That will complete the asses sment in the urban school divisions. And in the other urban divisions wherein a testing program of this kind was launched, it was found that there were really no significant differences in student scores among the divisions.

And point No. 2, it was also found that the scores were rated very closely, a bit higher than the Canadian norms and significantly higher than the u. s. norms. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. McGILL: Mr. Chairman, the Minister seems to have difficulty with what are the norms, what are we using here ? The important thing, Mr. Chairman, is that we're using the same standard to compare 1967 perf ormance with 1975 per formance, and I have for '67, '71, '73 and '75. It doesn't really matter what the norm is.

The significant fe ature of this graph is that in 1976, 43.65 were below that norm whatever it was, and in 1975, 62.7 2 were below it. Now, that is the signif icant fe ature of this information which I am giving to the Minister to establish what many people have been saying what they believe to be true and that is that the standards are falling. I also quoted from the Stanford Intermediate Rea ding Test, and again the significant thing is that the mean scores were dropping significantly from 1968 to 1975. And the percentage of pupil below that norm for 1968 fell from 54.68 to 1965 - 70. 27.

Now all of the evidence that the Minister may give about how we're doing as compared with national performances is insignificant to me in terms of what has been happening in decline in the ability of pupils in the schools to deal with exactly the same kind of test as they did seven years ago. Mr. Chairman, I don't think there is much more evidence we need on that score to indicate that something definitely is going down in respect to the ability of the students, and it's up to the Minister and his staff to determine how that can be recti fie d. Now, Mr.

Chairman, there is one other item that I would like to just mention before we conclude our discussion of this No. 1 appropriation under his Estimates; it's the matter of the revision of The Public Schools Act. Since 1970 the officials of your department have worked on that revision. A number of them have spent most of their time for three or four years on that task, and I would like to ask the Minister at what stage this revision is and when we may expect it to be presented in the Legislature? MR. CHAIRMA N: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: Mr.

Chairman, to get back as a matter of courtesy to the Honourable Member for Brandon West because as I had pointed out last night and repeated again this afternoon, I really do feel that there is a more appropriate place in the Estimates where this issue could be dealt with, and I would suspect that when we come to it, the honourable member will want to repeat the same debate and you may have some difficulty in ruling at that time as to whether he will allow any repeti tion or not.

I simply want to point out to the honourable member that in a school division such as the Winnipeg School Division, attempting to formulate some sort of a compari son of performance of students at a given grade level extending over a period of time - and I emphasize the point - a school division such as the Winnipeg School Division be cause there are certain characteristics unique to it that are not common to many others.

I' m sure that the honourable member is well aware of the fact that there's been quite a significa nt - in fact there's always a very significant change in the popu lation makeup of a large urban division such as Winnipeg. During the past few years we have seen some very very significant changes in the composition of the population of a school division, and that in turn, Mr. Chairman, is reflected in the performance of the pupils on standardized tests. And in fact, again I make this point out of cour tesy to the honourable member at this time because this too is not the best place to

2894 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) • • • • • deal with this in my Estimates but the honourable member will recall that we made a special grant to the Winnipeg School Division in rec ognit ion of the uniqueness of some of the problems facing it related to immigrat ion, re lated to a migrant population, all of which would be reflected in a test in a survey being done of this kind.

And also, I would like to remind the honourable member that with the continuous revision of our education program that the content of course, and in particular, of reading , is gradually rising, is gradually increasing. What was expected by way of performance at a certain grade level five years ago would be far less than adequate today. And what is expected of them today, I'm sure is far less than adequate than what will be expected of them four or five years from now.

At one point in ti me , it was customary to retain pupils if they did not perform satisfactorily in one year then you know the expression "repeat your grade", and at every grade level there'll be a significant number of students who would be repeating, commenc ing right from square one, repeating the whole process, the whole program for that par ticular grade in the subsequent year. Now you have a number of them redoing a test which they have done the previous year or one designed very similarly to it, and that of course would boost the average mean performance of a student . Call it what you wish.

Standardized tests also, Mr. Chairman, particularly discr iminate against those whose first language may not be English; disc riminate against those - they are culturally oriented; dis criminate against those who may be from social economic level of some thing less than middle class, and that too is a fact that must be borne in mind when as sessing the performance of a student population from a school division such as Winnipeg.

In closing, on that particular point, I want to remind the honourable member that teachers and principals, all of those associated with education find that standardized tests have really very little if any, diagnostic value. Because it has been found that there are many children particularly of the inner city area who may score low on tests of that kind but they really offer no assistance to the teacher in determining, in identi fying problem areas , areas in the educational program of a child that should be stressed. So with those comments, as I've said, Mr.

Chairman , I'm quite certain that we'll be back debating the matter of basics of academic performance of students at another point on the Estimat es . So I think that it would, at this point in time, those are about all the comments that I care to make without transgressing the rules. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. McGILL: Mr. Chairman , I'd just like to remind the Minister of the final question in respect to the Public Schools Act. MR. CHAIRMAN: I'm sorry. the Honourable Minister of Education. MR.

HANUSCHAK: Revising legislation such as - and a large piece of legis lation such as - the Public Schools Act is not a process that can be completed overnight. What happens is, is that as you go through the process of revision, one finds new problems emerging that is felt by some that should be covered by legislation and that of course prolongs the whole process. I ce rtainly do not anticipate, in fact, I know that I'm quite certain that this session will not see a bill bringing in a revi::ed Public Schools Act, and we'll certainly work on it as quickly and as rapidly as we can. But I do want to add this, Mr.

Chairman , that I am not aware of anything that any school division may wish to do, which it cannot do because its hands are tied by the existing legislation. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Brandon West. MR. McGILL: Mr. Chairman , with respect to the revision to the Public Schools Act, I agree that it is not possible to produce such a document over night. But I suggest, Mr. Chairman, to the Minist er that from 1970 to 1976 is not exactly overnight. There have been a large number of people working on it for a number of years and I'm simply asking, at what stage is the revision ?

And after six years have gone by since this was undertaken, surely we should be entitled to know what kind of progress is being made and when we may expect it to be presented in the Legislature. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: I told the honourable member that he may not expect it to

April 27, 1976 2895 SUPP LY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) • • • . • be presented during this ses sion. It may be present ed during the next ses sion. I also told the honourable members that as desirable , as necessary as it may be to revis e the Public Schools Ac t, I know of nothing - and I'd be glad to hear a comment from the honourable member , I'd be glad to hear him tell me that there are certain things that school boards want to do but they can't do because of the existence of the present legislation. There' s need to change it, and I have not heard the honourable member say anything of the kind.

However, we are proceeding with the revision of it as quickly as we can and hopefully at the next session will see a bill be brought into the House. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge. MR. AXWORTHY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really hadn't intended to speak on this particular section. A MEMBER: I was waiting for you. MR. AXWORTHY: Well, Mr.

Chairman, I was so enthralled by the fact that the Minister of Education was actually speaking and had broken his vow of silence which he had seemed to follow up to now on the topic of education, that the fact that we were now hearing something about what was going on in the schools was such a shock to my system that I felt that while at least there was a slight admiration in the normal pattern of incommunication that I didn't want in any way to disrupt it be cause it may be the last opportunity, who knows, when the veil of secrecy will once again descend upon the Legis lature in the field of education.

There were two areas that came in the discussion this afternoon which I thought may perhaps bear some commentary. One is in the very last invitation that the Minister erupted with in terms of the revision of the Public Schools Act. He said, to what degree has there been any repres entations about the changes that could occur in the Public Schools Act and in fact in the reorganization of schools in the province that he hasn't heard? It really leads me, Mr.

Chairman, to suggest that that's part of the problem, that there really hasn't been the opportunity to engage in any kind of open debate about the nature of the reorganization of schools in the province, partially be cause of the procedure that we follow where in fact there isn't any change contemplated until the bill itself is brought into the House, at which time it's usually too late to get really an active kind of dialogue going and the bill is passed and we have a fait accompli before we realize what the kind of reorganization really should be .

Now I would simply want to suggest perhaps to the Minister that considering the time that has elapsed it may be in order for the Department of Education and the govern ment to bring forward something in the nature of a White Paper on education that would set forward different propositions that could be examined in pu blic, give school boards , trustees, parents, different other kinds of organizations the opportunity to look at some of the possible changes that should be introduced, engage in that kind of debate and then be able therefore the next year if a new bill was to be brought in, have it based upon some sense of public attitude and opinion.

I think in particular, Mr.

Chairman, of the Royal Commission of Nova Scotia that reported last year, the Graham Commission, which included a number of proposals for reorganizing schools in that province, including the concept of a school council which is designed to incorporate what I think is an increasing demand in certain school levels , and that is to provide ways by which school trustees, parents and teachers can join in a semi -formal decision-making body at the school level to make school choices about curricul um, development and programming in the individual school and do so on some of the official auspices as delegated by, at least in this case, a regional school board.

It would seem to be such a concept carries with it some fairly radical notions, but at the same time is a response to the frustration that is felt by many people both in the school system and outside of it about the inability to affect decisions on education. And if in fact the idea of a s.chool council would be a way of ameliorating or dealing with that frustration, then it's something that should be worth considering. But I for one would not want, Mr.

Chairman, to deal with a proposal as far-reaching as that or as significant in change without having had the opportunity to see what is on the public mind and have

2896 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. AXWORTHY cont'd) • • some debate amongst the different associations. But it's very difficult to do within the restricted procedure of introducing a new bill having to go to Law Amendments where you get hasty representations made within a matter of weeks and then, zippo, it's through and the government feels committed because it's got a ma jor ity and you wouldn't want to be defeated or change too much in an election year and that kind of thing.

So that rather than setting up a rigid system of change I much prefer to have us look at the question of changing The Schools Act done within those contexts and where we could utilize some time to make a debate; and I think if in fact we had been engaged in that sort of debate in the province for the past year or so it might have been a much healthier debate about education than the one that is now taking place, which seems to me kind of has somewhat mean and nasty overtones to as opposed to one that is looking to a fairly progressive change, it seems to be one that di rects itself to venting its frus trations as opposed to contemplating more progressive outlooks.

At the same time, Mr. Chairman, I think that in addition to the notion of the school council, I think it's probably long overdue for the re-examination of school bound aries in this province.

But an issue that we dealt with to some extent last year was the problem of declining enrollments and the way it af fected school finance, the way it affected the ability of different school divisions to offer options and alternative education programs that obviously smaller divisions with declining enrollments and smaller numbers of students were finding it increasingly more difficult to engage in the problem of - or pardon me - the practice of offering a full range of options. This is particularly true in the rural areas, it's certainly true in some of the smaller school divisions and the urban divisions.

You know, it's a thorny problem and a ticklish problem and certainly one that is not po litically palatable. It certainly is time that we looked at the whole question of reorganiz ing boundaries, at least to the extent of finding out what is reasonable . We should also be examining the degree to which school boards themselves should be working in closer conjunction with municipal local government jurisdictions as well. Those kinds of issues , Mr.

Chairman, don't necessarily lend themselves to the somewhat combative approach that takes place in this Chamber, where you entrench yourself from one side to the other, and I think it .rather lends itself to a more formal process, one that can be undertaken in a way of representations or perhaps through a legislative committee that would have a White Paper to deal with or some form of document of that kind and then be able to lis ten and do something both at more leisure and perhaps with the less of a political bite to it. So, Mr. Chairman, in terms of the Minister's invitation, that would be my response to it.

But I think that there is a long overdue debate on education in this province, both on the structure and the organization, boundaries, and in the development of ways of coping with the way decisions are made in school divisions.

I've been in volved I guess in the past year or two, to studies in school divisions and I'm absolutely flabbergasted - if that's a word that's still considered acceptable in the school, in edu cation these days - absolutely flabbergasted as to the almost total lack of knowledge we have about the way school boards operate and there's been almost been virtually no eval uations or assessments done on the decision-making procedure involved in school divisions; that there's a variety of ways, in terms of electrol boundaries, in terms of the structure of the organizations themselves, in terms of the boundaries - and no one, virtually in this country, I can recall trying to get from • • • I guess, which is the fount of all educational knowledge in this country, at least it says it is , asking them what has been done in terms of looking at the way decisions are made in the school divisions.

And I think that aside from some MA thesis that was done in Alberta in 1967, it's about all they could come up with. So, Mr. Chairman, I would say that the time is way overdue, but I would pre fer perhaps before a new bill is brought in or a Public Schools Act that we have an in termediate form of debate, something that say takes place with less of the bite and the flavour of a partisan dispute and I think that we could be well served by that kind of at titude. And I know, Mr.

Chairman, that other jurisdictions, it's not as if I know that someone on the other side is bound to get up and say, oh, my God, he's talking about

April 27, 1976 2897 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. AXWORTHY cont'd) •••.. some form of American gimmickery again. Well, the fact of the matter is , I suppose, both the Federal Government has used the idea of White Papers and Green Papers and Orange Papers, as has the British House of Com mons in many cases, to in a sense put forward for public examination and discourse those kinds of issues that need to be debated on a more community-based level. Mr. Chairman, in saying that, I'll leave that particular topic, but I do want to come back to this question of standards.

I know the Minister said that he expects us to get back into it. But I was interested in the statistics brought forward by the Member from Brandon West, particularly, Mr. Chairman, because in the last couple of weeks I visited the schools in my own riding to ask them that very same question, have standards been falling, declining or changing ? And what you can't perhaps measure statistically, perhaps you should measure in a qualitative way , and the answer I got from schools was that the first question you have to ask is how the school population itself has been chang ing.

I think that the Minister alluded to this, but there's no question that the composition of students and the kinds of students that are in our school system in the Winnipeg School Division, certainly in the city area, are quite different; in many ways astoundingly dif ferent, in terms of the background with which they come into the school, the family background in part, and many of them are coming in from family backgrounds which are, while maybe motivated towards education, don't have any of the benefits of a home or family background in which learning is encouraged or a part of the growing-up experience.

Furthermore, Mr. Chairman, the thing that bothered me a great deal was that the schools I visited, one school in particular had a transiency rate - turnover rate might be a better way of describing it - of 12 0 percent. In other words the kids who came into the school in September weren't there in June, in fact many of the kids who were transferred in in November weren't there in February. And if anyone tries to tell me that you can educate children in a school setting in which it's really a revolving door rather than a school classroom, then I can understand why there is a decline.

It seems perfectly logical that if, in fact, large numb ers of students ranging anywhere7from schools I visited or looked at, ranging anywhere from 60 percent to 120 percent turnover, that is not education any longer, that it' s perhaps a mild form of babysitting, and that's really what it was in many respects. So I think it would be wrong for us in this House to de bate the question of standards, le gitimate as that debate may be, purely on the level of standardized statistics.

I think those statistics have to be informed and broadened to in clude other kinds of factors, particularly the population ones and the changes going on in families, the changes going on in the schools themselves and particularly the changes going on in specific areas of school divisions. But I don't think, Mr.

Chairman, that that lets the Minister off the hook nec essarily, be cause the. issue that we have tried to bring forward in this House over the past two years now, perhaps even three , is that those changes are going on in the inner city of Winnipeg, they are affecting the performance of students and that we're frankly not doing very much about it. There are a couple of pilot projects.

There's an at tempted one which I am complimentary about, and that is the nutrition program, I think nutrition does have something to do with school performance, but in terms of any kind of effective overall approach to the problem of inner city schools, whether you're dealing with immigrant children, or second languages, or dealing with children who have migrated from rural areas, dealing with people who are poor, dealing with children from split homes, broken-up homes, whatever the cause may be, the fact of the matter is that our school systems in many places are not being able to cope with it.

And trying to puzzle that problem through, Mr. Chairman, it's not an easy one and I agree, I'm not so sure the answers are more pilot projects, or the answers are more experimental ventures, or the answers are to find some new panacea that will all of a sudden change basically a semi -illiterate child into a genius. I think perhaps the problem really is1 as I have tried to cope with it, is that in many of these schools just simply reducing the number of children that the teacher has to teach.

In other words, put the onus on the teacher in the classroom, and the the allo cation of money and resources should go into those efforts, not into the gimmickery that we have used now. That doesn't sound all that dramatic I guess, it maybe goes back to

2898 April 27, 1976 SUPP LY - EDUCATION (MR. AXWORTHY cont'd) • • some fundamentals. But it seems to me that if there is to be any way of dealing with the variety of learning difficulties that emanate for family environmental background reasons, that the most useful answer to that is to ensure that the teacher has enough time in that classroom to deal individually with those specific kinds of problems, and if it's a matter that a child can't speak English well enough, then that classroom teacher with the aid of some resource teachers would be able to cope specifically with that problem.

But they can't do in a classroom which has 35 or 40 kids in it. Mr.

Chairman, the way in which the debate in this province is going, the kinds of get-tough attitudes which we' re all party to, I guess we have all used that lan guage at one time or another, simply means that the amounts of resources applied to schools will be restricted as they are now being restricted; that will mean that the only way that you can compensate is to increase class sizes which means that the ability therefore of the school system to deal with those particular kinds of problems and im prove the performance of the children will be reduced.

Now as I say, that perhaps is at least the first stage of my own thinking about how you deal with a particular problem of improving the performance of students in the school division, at least which falls in under my provincial constituency. And I don't think there is any • • • to that. I'll have some further comments perhaps elaborating upon that.

But it would seem to me that should be the nature of the issue, not simply to register the problem but also to begin looking at, are we exacerbating the problem, are we making the problem more severe by the kinds of things that we're doing in the other parts of the school system? And that finally leads me, Mr. Chairman, to one short comment about admin is tration which I suppose is the appropriation item that we're on. Because I think it does come back to administration really, that administration is something more than a technical function.

It's simply not a matter of shuffling paper around and deciding who gets the school automobile this week or, you know, how the gas is paid for when you go out visit ing. I think administration is very much a question of allocating resources where they'll do the most good. It really is I guess a way of deciding how you get more bang for the buck. I would suggest, Mr. Chairman, that this is the worst feeling of our present school system, both at a provincial and local level, is that we are not administrating well.

And by that I mean that we are not allocating the scarce resources, and they are scarce for education, to the places and ways by which we will get the most effective use of them. Again it goes back perhaps to a somewhat simple proposition about putting more of the emphasis in through the teacher in the classroom. But it seems to me that we have spent an awful lot of time proliferating the educational directions , that we have been going off on a number of tangents.

We have been doing a lot of experimenting, and I'm not against experimenting, but I am against it only to the point where you have to stop experimenting at some point and decide that that is going to be a fixed part of the program, or it's going to be a fundamental part of the program, and then you have to put the resources to make it work. It seems what we've been doing, if I tried to analyze it, that we've been in

part infected by the exuberance of the 1960s, where we're looking for some fast solutions; we were looking for some easy ways; we were experimenting with different methodologies and technologies, and all the rest of it. We went through that period kind of branching out in a number of different ways, but we haven't pulled in at this stage.

We took all those different tan gents, let them go in different directions , reach a certain stage where they became in structive, they became certain guidelines and directions given to the individual schools saying, there's what we think we should be doing, here's a variety and range of things in curriculum, and a variety and range of things in resources , and a variety and range of things in programs, and then we dissipated the resources into all of them; giving a little bit here and a little bit there so that you were really in a sense putting a lot of money in small bits and pieces, none of which really worked effectively, and rather than taking your resources and deciding on one finally, that this is going to be the way that mathematics will be taught, and then you put the resources into that area you go back into the classroom.

It seems to me that we have dissipated the resources by trying to not administer well by determining finally what the priorities are and allocating the

April 27, 197 6 2899 SUPPLY -E DUCATION (MR. AXWORTHY cont'd) • • • • • money to it. And I think that's the stage that we're at now in terms of the administration of the school system, is that we've got a number of these trails that have been mapped oub all of which lead down to certain kinds of goals and objectives, but we have n't really decided what goals and objectives we want to serve so we're trying to serve them all, and as a result there aren't enough resources to serve them all well so we serve them all in effect badly. And it seems to me that that is the kind of administrative problem that we face.

When the Minister says that the educational system has certain goals, most of which are laudable or the equality of opportunity, and community development and rele vance, there is one goal that he didn't mention which I think is strange coming from an educator, and that is he didn't mention the goal of excellence in the school system.

And in showing that not only does it have all these other kinds of sociological concerns but that there is a certain excellence in the learning environment that takes place, that we do still believe that excellence - by that I don't mean to say that you just promote the brightest kid in the class but that every student whatever range of abilities that that is the goal that they should be aiming at. Whether it is in the manual arts or in the aca demic arts or whatever that may be, but that should be what they should be gearing themselves towards , and that that would be the best preparation for any occupation.

Rather than trying to develop a number of fancy sort of counselling services and all the rest of it, we should simply be aiming at giving that sense of satisfaction in the appli cation of whatever skills a student may have, and that absence of that goal may be an absence simply by inadvertenc e. But it would seem to me maybe that' s the priority, the goal that we should be establishing but in a more forthright way. If so , he may then give us some clues about how we should administer the resources of the department.

It may mean that we in this House wouldn't kind of have to sort of jockey around trying to get a grab on this thing over education, that if we knew really what the priorities were, then we could then make some proper assess ment as to whether those priorities were being well served. Though we have so many priorities, and so many goals, and so many directions it's not possible to really get a fix on which ones are being served. I think that that would be a criticism that would be supported, Mr. Chairman, by people in the teaching profession, the ones that I've talked to.

They feel that they really are being turned around. It's almost like being in a circus fun house, that you're kind of looking in a number of mirrors and getting all kinds of different shapes but you don't really know how to get your way out of the maze, and that every time you turn around there'a a new directive about a new approach or a new program or a new curric ulum and yet when they get around to applying it there isn't the resources there to do it.

We've talked and we pa ssed a bill last year on Special Needs , and ways of in tegrating kids with special needs and mainstreaming them into the school program. But there's no money to do it with, you know a $2, 000 planning grant or something. And yet here are teachers who are absolutely petrified in part by that problem - and I hope we'll have some opportunity to talk about that problem in more depth - because they don't know how they're going to do it and they don't know where their resources are coming from.

And yet we set that as a goal for an educational system without talking about how we're going to pay for it and how we're going to make it manage. So, Mr. Chairman, those would be my comments in terms of this particular appropriation item, as I say sparked more by the Minister's invitation to comment be cause I was more intrigued actually to listening to him at this s�ge than listening to myself. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister of Education. MR. HANUSCHAK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to assure the Honour able Member for Fort Rouge that I did not swear to a vow of silence.

And really I don't know on what basis he arrived at that conclusion that I did --(Interjection)-- The honourable member says, only during question periods. If the honourable member would ask more questions , then he would receive answers. And every question that is asked, that has been asked of me, it received the answer it deserved, Mr. Chairman. I'm sure that you know that as well as everyone else in the House does.

2900 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'

d) I did listen to the honourable member with great interest. I'm pleased, Mr. Chairman, that at least when the Honourable Member for Fort Rouge commenced his re marks that he did adhere very closely to the item that's a matter of debate on our Esti mates at this point in time, because those matters do come under the general purview of those personnel, of some of those personnel who are the key personnel in my depart ment and this is their general responsibility because this is not assigned to any particular branch of the department, mainly the Public Schools Act.

I must indicate to the honourable mem ber that the suggestion of a White Paper preceding a bill does rather intrigue and interest me, and it's somet hing that I in govern ment would want to consider. Whether that in fact would be the approach that we would take, I cannot say at this point in time. That is one approach, that's true.

The other, maybe introducing a bill for first reading and referring it to a committee for study inter sessionally which will give opportunity for public debate, which will give opportunity for representations from all concerned, teachers, trustees, parents , students, and taxp�yers in general, because after all education is a subject in which well, really, I don't think that any of us know very many who do not have an interest in education. And so it should be, because I think that education is important enough for everyone to have an in terest in.

And it may well be that the matter of school boundaries might be something that we would want to look at. Although on that point I'm not saying that there is any immediate need for revision but perhaps a study of the boundaries as they presently exist. And whatever the effect that the boundary structure has upon the quality of the education program that's delivered within each unit, it may perhaps lead us to want to bring about some changes by whatever method or means the legislation would allow.

I agree with the Honourable Member for Fort Route that over the past years , particularly ·in our urban communities, there have been some very significant population changes and these of course do have an impact, do have an effect on the education pro gram in a variety of ways; they do vary the needs of the community that is being served, they do present problems - the honourable member mentioned the high transiency rate in many schools , and this I do know, Mr. Chairman, I know that from my own personal experience. My wife taught school.

She taught at Victoria Albert School and by the time the month of June rolled around the roll call appearing in her class register was entirely different from that which was recorded on the first of September when the school year commenced. And that is a problem. But the solution to that problem, and I agree with the honourable member that this is a matter to which I as Minister of Education have to address myself to, but it's a problem that the solution to which is not entirely within the domain of a Department of Education or .of a Minister of Education.

Cer tainly I cannot turn a blind eye toward that problem and one must do whatever one pos sibly can to cope with it. But it's a problem of a much broader nature involving a host of socioeconomic factors to which my government has been addressing itself and much of which has come up as a subject for discussion in the Estimates of the Department of Health, in the Estimates of the Minister of Urban Affairs, in the Estimates of many other Ministers within our government.

It was suggested to me by my department that perhaps the problem created by the high transiency rate could be reduced somewhat if in working in co-operation with the school divisions and arrangements would be made, or the parents would be encourag ed to, if they're moving from one school district - and I'm speaking of the local school district - from Norquay School District to David Livingston School District, or whatever, or Aberdeen, that the children continue with their education in the school in which they first enrolled.

That suggestion sounds rather attractive and certainly has merit, but it does raise some questions in my mind, Mr. Chairman, that it may resolve one problem but it may create another - I don't know. Perhaps this is something that we ought to take a close look at and perhaps something that we ought to try. The problem that I could see it creating is a sociological problem but it might work. You know all the kids in the block they go to that school at 8:30 in the morning and this one kid because

April 27, 1976 2901 SUPPLY - EDUCATION (MR. HANUSCHAK cont'd) • • • • • he happens to move in Novemb er or December, you know, hikes five or six blocks down the street to another school. Maybe it's not a problem, I don't know, and I really cannot answer to the honourable member one way or the other, and I'm not a sociologist, there may be other problems that such an arrange ment may create. On the other hand the benefits may far outweigh any of the disadvant ages of it. With respect to programs dealing with inner-city problems, here again, Mr.

Chairman, I would like to draw to your attention and remind you, and you of course I'm sure you know, and honourable members that many of the programs related to inner city and problems and programs designed to cope with and deal with other problems that may exist in other parts of the provi nce, comes under Roman Numeral XXI, and No. 2, Eval uation Research and Policy Analysis, and some under 3(

f) and when we reach those items on my Estimates, Mr. Chairman, I will be in a position - and I would want to deal With them in much greater detail than I would care to now at this particular point under 1(

b) of my Estimates. The honourable member in his debate then did go back to administration and he said that really the key to an effective and meaningful education program does rest with administration, that administrators are more than just paper shufflers, paper pushers, and the payers of gasoline bills and what have you, and he is quite correct. Then he went on in support of the statement that he made. The example that he used is in our experimentation we seemed to be going off in all directions. Well, Mr.

Chairman, I think that you will find, as I'm sure that you have found in previous years and we will demonstrate it to you once again, in the consideration of my Estimates for the forthcoming fiscal year - which has already commenced a month ago - that the ex perimentation that is being undertaken, that had been undertaken and that which is con tinuing, and this may even become more meaningful and relevant when we consider both deparbnents , Education, and subsequently Colleges and Universit ies, that it is focused on I suppose about three main areas.

One, the primary one, the provision of an education program meaningful and relevant to the disadvanta ged. Because for far too long our ed ucation program in the province ignored the disadvanta ged; ignored the disadvantaged for economic reasons , or who were disadvan taged because of economic problems; ignored those, the disadvanta ged, because of a language barrier; ignored the disadvantaged for whatever other reasons there might have been. You will find, Mr.

Chairman, that the experimentation is designed to develop programs that would result in an enriched education program for the native people, for the immigrant people, for the people in the north, for the people in rural communities, for the people living in small communities, attending smaller schools which my not have access to many of the facilities that a larger school may provi de, and that sort of thing just to mention a few.

And I do not wish to go into great detail on that point at this time because there will be opportunity to deal with this . in a more orderly fashion at a later point in time, In terms of the development of our education program, another area of concern, and this is the general direction in which we are moving as one of our aims and ob jective s. The honourable member feels that there do not appear to be any aims and objectives. The first one that I've mentioned, developing programs for the disadvanta ged.

Moving toward local control, make it possible for greater parti cipation and in volvement for those at the grass roots lev el, as it were in a decision-making process. Because - well it is true that when the school divisions came into being, you know, practical.ly overnight from the host of and a multitude of one, two, three, four, five , six classroom school districts that we had, suddenly 47, 48 school districts came into ex istence.

First the secondary, some became unitary from the day of their inception, others became unitary in '6 7 and the years following, the last of which became unitary, Garden Valley, two or three years ago. But we do recognize the fact the the policy making process, that the role and function of the school trustee in the larger school division, is quite different and more demanding and calls for •.• It's quite different in what it demands and requires of a trustee from that demanded of him by his former 3, 4, 5- room school district of which he may have been a trustee.

Hence perhaps that too calls for a very careful examination and re-examination, not only by legislation,

290 2 April 27 , 1976 SUPPLY - EDUCATI ON (MR.

HANUSCHAK cont'd) • because I would hope that the bill that this House will eventually see revising the Public Schools Act will in fact reflect new thrusts, a general philosophy of our education program and will not be just a tidying up of amend ments of the Public Schools Act which may have come into being over the years and, you know, put them in their proper sequential order to avoid having to flip flop through the pages, which is necessary too but that assists the administrator and not really the man on the street to give him any indication as to the direction we ought to move.

On the matter of special needs, that too we will have an opportunity to discuss in more detail, but I want to point out to the honourable member that at this point in time there is evidence to indicate that there is need for a tremendous amount of prepar atory work before a full scale program is launched to meet the special needs of our children. All school divisions , even if you were to give them the money tomorrow, are not prepared to cope with the problem tomorrow and deliver a meaningful program. MR.

CHAIRMAN: The Private Members' Hour having arrived, pursuant to Rule 19(2) I am interrupting the proceedings of the Committee and shall return at 8:00 p. m. this evening.

April 27 , 1976 2903 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & COMMERCE MR . CHAIRMAN (Mr. Walding): Order please . There being a quorum the Committee will come to order. I would refer honourable members to Page 36 in their Estimates Book. Resolution 72, Programs and Productivity Groups: (b) (1) - the Honourable Minister . MR. EVANS : Mr. Chairman, last night we were discussing the Unemployment Insurance Commission, raised by the Member for La Verendrye. I did get an answer at that time saying there 's been no direct representation made to the Federal Government on their general policies .

I attempted to explain that we do work with the Canada Man power Department to try to bring unemployment insurance applicants into the labour market . We do this on a very specific basis, company by company. We've particularly directed our efforts towards identifying employers who would hire and train what we refer to as special needs persons. That includes people who are socially, physically or mentally handicapped, possibly; in some cases ex-prisoners , people with alcoholic prob lems or any person with a chronic problem preventing them from finding or keeping employment.

We identified in the past year 78 firms who would hire and train special needs persons and of these 78 firms, together with Canada Manpower and our Depart ment of Health and Social Development, we managed in this co-operative way to place 10 1 persons, special needs persons, in these firms. I believe the question was asked as to how the department was integrating its Manpower efforts with the federal people, federal officials. I can say that the depart ment has heavily supported the Canada-Manitoba Manpower Needs Committee.

It's a joint federal-provincial committee and we participate in matters relating to immigration, the labour market analysing and forecasting and also in the field of industry based train ing. Under the Canada-Manitoba Manpower Training Agree ment,

part 3, which relates to industrial training, this department is working continuously and co-operatively with Canada Manpower to assist employers in training new staff upgrading present employees, training supervisors and managers in human resource development skills. In addition we have departmental human resource development consultants who work with individual employers to assist them in planning their manpower requirements and improving areas such as personnel practices , training functions, working conditions , and so forth .

Programs have been jointly funded by both departments, that is the federal and the provincial departments that I talked of, for example, the hotel management program, which we now have under way and the garment industry supervisory and management program. We have also, because of gaps in The Manpower Adult Occupational Training Act funded such programs as the small business management program in rural areas and six programs have been completed to date, namely in Steinbach, Roblin, Swan River, Grandview, Boissevain and Brandon. Courses are also being planned now for Stonewall, Thompson, St .

Pierre, Killarney, Altona and also because of its size, for a second round, in the City of Brandon. It should be noted also that great effort has been taken not to duplicate services being offered by the Federal Government or any other provincial department but rather to supplement such efforts. This is true generally in the Manpower field not only with respect to this department in Canada Manpower but as I said, with all provincial departments and agencies.

We have of course a mechanism within the Provincial Govern ment, namely our Manpower and Employment Cabinet Sub-Committee, which attempts to co-ordinate these efforts at the provincial level and we have, the committee I referred to earlier, the Canada-Manitoba Manpower Needs Committee which co-ordinates the efforts between the province and the Government of Canada. MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Minnedosa. MR. BLAKE : Yes, Mr. Chairman.

I might have missed, I wasn't here at the start of the Estimates but I wondered if the Minister had introduced the people that he has with him and what their function is in the department . It might be useful to us . MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister. MR . EVANS : I'm not sure if I know everybody's names or if I'm going to get them mixed up but I could start with a few and then maybe my deputy could help me on some of them. We're outnumbering the committee .

290 4 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & COMMERCE MR. BLAKE : Are they all on salary or on contract? April 27, 1976 MR. EVANS: On my left there is Mr. Bill Gallagher, the Deputy Minister of the Department. We also have with us two As sistant Deputy Ministers, Mr. George Bowman, also on my left , and Mr . Murray Armstrong, Assis tant Deputy Minister in charge of Trade and Industry Development. Mr . Bowman is in charge of Policy, Research and Economic Planning. Unfortunately Mr. Blicq is not with us , the reason for which we were discussing here last night. We also have some other key personnel with us , Mr .

Wally Mialkowski, who is Director of Administration, and we have beside him, Mr. John Norget who is the Chairman of the Manitoba Design Institute, and a little closer to myself here, is Mr. Les Tough, who is Director of this particular group that we're talking about now, the Management, Productivity and Manpower Group, We also have under Science and Technology, Doctor Gordon Trick, who is the Director of that branch Maybe I'l l let Mr. Gallagher introduce a few others . I think I know their names , Jim Feindel, Would you like to introduce some of the others ? MR.

GALLAGHER: Jim Feindel is with the Management and Manpower group, Mr. Allison is with Mr. Tough's group. Sitting down we have in the first row three Directors from the Trade and Industry group. On the far left , Mr . MacNeill, Mr. Werner. Just behind him is Mr. George Hayes. We also have (inaudible) MR. EVANS : So if we can't answer the questions there must be something wrong, MR. BLAY>..E: Thank you very much, MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for La Verendrye, MR. BANMAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would thank the Minister for the reply to that question, Another question that I would ask the Minister is : the labour supply as far as the projections for Manitoba within the next five years, I think there is a rising concern among industries and especially the labour intense manufacturing and the service industries about possibilities of certain labour shortages that we'll face in the futu re .

Our population is relatively stagnant as far as growth is concerned and this is a concern that has been voiced, I think, not only by people such as the garment industry but people related in diff ered service industries . I wonder if the Minister's Department has done any projections as far as what the future hold s for us as far as labour supply is concerned, MR. EVANS: Well, Mr. Chairman, we do attempt to make varying forecasts but it's a very very diff icult task.

The business in forecas ting economic trends has got to be one of the most diff icult jobs anyone could undertake, You can forecast but whether that forecast is reliable is another question, We do endeavour to look ahead to see to what extent Manitoba has certain labour requirements, We're more interested in this in a microsense rather than a macrosense. We tend to be more concerned with what is the requirement for each particular industry rather than the province as a whole. But we do have estimates from time to time of the total picture of supply, labour supply. MR.

BANMAN: I would imagine that the Minister's Department of course, when we do have people coming in and enquiring and I refer specifically to larger manufa cturing companies whose prime concern, of course, in location whether it be in rural Manitoba or in Winnipeg is of course the labour force and this is my question now: what our projec tions look like for the next five years as far as our labour supply because I'm sure it would have a bearing whether a company is going to locate here or not. MR. EVANS: Mr.

Chairman, my experience has been that if the job opportunities arise then there's a tendency to obtain the labour supply. We have a very mobile popula tion in the prairie region as a whole and if worthwhile job opportunities come along we do assist industry in obtaining workers.

I can't say at the present time that that is a problem, We may have some figu res, you know, on projections but I haven't got them at my fingertips • But again even if we did have some forecasts of what we think this situa tion might be five years from now I wouldn't want to say that these will be lOO percent reliable or accurate because we live in a very fluid world, a fluid economic situation and times do change, There is obviously shortages in some categories and there always perhaps will be when there is considerable developments taking place, for example in the Alberta Tar Sands and so on, that type of personnel will be demanded, That is personnel

April 27 , 1976 2905 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & CO MMERCE (MR. EVANS cont'd) ••••• for more or less remote construction projects. These industries do attract people and do give difficulties to other provinces in Canada in acquiring such sldlled people. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Roblin. MR. McKENZIE: Mr. Speaker, I just have two or three questions of the Honourable Minister. I wonder if he can give us some idea of what the experience has been with the stay option plan. Is it functioning?

Is there statistics to give us some idea that they are in fact staying in the rural areas or moving out from the urban areas ? My second question would be: I'm wondering if the Minister has made any representations to the Government of Canada regarding the amalgamation of the Unemploy ment Insurance Commission and the Canada Manpower Office, to put them under one department. Maybe the Minister could express his views on that. The third question would be: how many new people have we got in Manitoba in the labour force today? I notice at the hotel where I'm staying, the St.

Regis, there's many new people there from mostly Asiatic countries that are working in looking after the rooms and things like that. But almost a complete staff is people that are not I would say basically they come from the Asiatic areas of the world. I wonder if he has any idea how many of these people are coming in and are there more coming in and what the result has been of their joining the work force in Manitoba. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Minister. MR. EVANS: We have some general information on labour supply.

I don't know whether we can answer it exactly in the way that you put it but I'll leave that with the staff for the time being. With regards to your first question the answer is no, we haven't made any representation to Canada on the organization of their Canada-Manpower and Unemploy ment Insurance offices. I think some people have expressed views on that but that is a federal administrative problem. I believe the Provincial Ministers involved with Manpower problems have made their views known at various federal-provincial confer ences but that is a federal administrative matter.

With regards to the stay option, the difficulty we have is that the basis for most of our population calculations has been the Canada census and the Canada census comes out every five years. There will be one in June of 19 76 . That information probably won't be available for five or six months thereafter so the latest that we have for the census is the 1971 and many of the figures here that we work with in these documents on rural towns and rural communities relates to the period - the latest period would be 1971. A similar question was asked, Mr.

Chairman, last night of me by the Honourable Member from Assiniboia and we undertook to obtain some information and to disseminate some booklets, etc. , that we have. We can do so now. Then I'll get on to answering the Member from Roblin's question. We have two working papers: Written Paper No. 2, which is an Analysis of Community Functions in Relationships. This comes from the Regional Analysis Program for Southern Manitoba and some of the books at least have a map in there which gives you some interesting information as to the retail and marketing zones of influence of various towns and cities in Manitoba.

So you can find that in Working Paper No. 2. We also have Working Paper No. 3 that we can distribute to you which is called an Analysis of Community Services and Facilities. There's a considerable amount of information and it covers many many towns, the very small towns as well as the large towns. I think that the documents speak for themselves.

In addition, we have what we refer to as an update of some of this material and I don't want to smother you with statistics, gentlemen, but we've got not only in formation on population, but we've got information on employment by categories, in various towns, in municipal areas, Lac du Bonnet, Lawrence, Lorne, Louise, Macdonald, McCreary, Miniota, Minto, etc. Morris. It's quite an extensive resume. It gives you information taken primarily from census and federal sources.

But it does put it together and I think these are very useful books for any of you who are interested in rural popula tion trends and rural economic trends. It talks about farm sizes, the value of building construction in these towns, and as I said, employment by category and so on. That's

2906 April 27 , 1976 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & COMMERCE (MR. EVANS cont'd) . . • • • in this white and green document which is an update and it's called Volume II, Update . I don' t know where No. 1 is . MR. CHAIRMAN: Resolution 72 - the Honourable Minister. MR. EVANS : In addit ion, Mr. Chairman, I want to remind members that we put out this compendium of community data sheets. They normally have a cover, but we have some of these if anyone on the committee is interested. This gives you facts on the towns, all of the larger towns in Manitoba.

It's descri ptive, it also gives you information on the municipal officials , the population figures that are updated by the Manitoba Health Services Commission. The Manitoba Health Services Commission is now providing us with annual figures on population changes. We have some difficulty because the basis of their tabulations is somewhat different from Census Canada. Nevertheless it's useful to have them at any rate and through time I think they'l l provide a much more up-to-date basis for indicating trends . I'll just use for example Altona. That happens to be at the top of the heap here.

Altona, see the population back to 1956. 1971 its population is shown as 2, 122 people; in 1974 we've added in the Manitoba Health Services estimate of 2, 524. I must say they tend to sli ghtly overstate but not that much. There's a tendency for the MHSC figures to be slightly higher than the census figures but not significantly so. So I could surmise from this item on Al tona that Altona has grown quite substantially between the years of 1971 and 1974.

In addition there's other desc riptive information that you might see on the utility rates; water, sewage, electricity, gas, oil and information on local facilities. There is a resume of business and profess ional services and there's a listing by name of companies showing the major industries in the town including the number of employees. Now that is for - well we don' t know, but there's a lot. Pretty well the towns of what, 500 ? Five hundred and over. Every town in Manitoba of 500 population and over. This is available every year. This is the 1975 set.

The 1976 set is available to you free of charge and will be out in a couple of months. These documents can give you many more answers than I can in the time that we have usually in the House but I'd invite you to examine the documents and if you have any questions at any time please feel free to contact us . In answer to the question both of Mr.

Patrick yesterday and also an attempt to answer Mr. - I'm sorry, the Member from La Verendrye and the Member from Roblin's question on what is happening to rural trends , I'd like to in dicate that again, based primarily on the census information that those communities that have 500 or more people have experienced increases in population in the period 196 1 to 19 71 . The major urban centres of Brandon, Dauphin, Portage, Sel kirk and Steinbach together had the greatest absolute population change.

Urban centres with population ranging between 1, 000 and 4,4 99 or 4, 500 also experienced significant absolute population increases . The group of urban centres be tween 500 people and 999 people, that is between 500 and 1,0 00 people, increased only sli ghtly in the ten-year interval. Those settlements under 500 as a group underwent a decrease in population. The information, as I said, from MHSC, the Manitoba Health Services Com mission, is not on the same basis and therefore it is somewhat difficult to link it. We'v e attempted to do this bringing you up to 1975.

If you take the major urban centres of Brandon, Dauphin, Portage, Selkirk and Steinbach between 1971 and 1975 - this is all Manitoba Health Services Commission figures - there's an increase in those communities taken together of 9. 1 percent. In other words , between 1971 and 1975, those five major urban centres in southern Manitoba increased by 9.1 percent. Between 1971 and 1975 the communities between 1, 000 and 4, 499 - or if you like 4, 500 people - increased by 14. 8 percent. That includes centres such as Altona, Beausejour, Boissevain, Carberry, Souris, Minnedosa, Neepawa, Swan River, Virden, Winkler.

I could read them all off if you wish but I'm just giving you an idea of the kind of communities. Communities between 1, 000 and 4, 500 people increased, as I said, by 14. 8 percent.

April 27, 1976 290 7 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & COMMERCE (MR. EVANS cont'

d) Communities between 500 and 999 people or 1, 000 people which includes places such as Arborg or Birtle, Gladstone , McGregor, McCreary, for example, Shoal Lake, Treherne, Wawanesa. These as a group between 1971 and 19 75 increased by 11. 7 per cent. Now if you go into the towns below 500 you find that population is not growing but this is not a reversal of the situation that existed between 1961 and 1971. For example the settlements between 50 and 500 people in the years 1961 to 1971 showed a decrease of 10. 4 percent, a decrease of 10. 4 percent.

I don't have information on those particular towns in this document but I don 't believe that there has been much of a change from that type of pattern. MR. CHAffiMAN: Resolution 72(b) - the Honourable Member for Assi niboia. MR. PATRICK: Can I ask a couple more questions? I wonder if the Minister would have any information about the employment or the labour force in the manufactur ing sector in Manitoba. There's some statistics we had recently that there's a decrease on the national scale . I wonder if he has any indication what that would be.

If he hasn't got it now maybe he can get it later, particularly in the manufacturing sector. The other question that I wish to pose to him now: he gave us some indication about management development and manpower training last night. Can he indicate what is the assistance that's given at the present time to the small business community be cause I know the Minister must be concerned. In my opinion the small businessman is sort of disa ppearing and I still feel he's the one that provides services; he 's the one that provides competition and if anything, I think if we should do more in this area.

He states in the management productivity and the manpower branch that there is small business assistance. What kind of assistance ? MR. CHAffiMAN: The Honourable Minister. MR. EVANS: You ask what kind of assistance. Practically all of our programs are des igned to assist essentially the small and medium sized business . The bulk of our assistance is in terms of free consultant service.

You know we'v e got experts, whether they be manpower development experts or marketing experts, design experts , et c. , the bulk of our assistance is in providing that help by means of - I would categorize it as a free consulting service. But in addition we do have various grants. We have grants to assist business attempting to get DREE incentive money; We have grants available on technology up grading. These are relatively small grants but nevertheless significant. We have some money to assist in design, upgrading the design or the quality of the product and we have assistance of course in trading.

Now I can go into some more detail later but we have assistance to encourage Manitoba manufacturers to exhibit their products in trade fairs outside of Manitoba with the hope that they might be able to expand their sales . In the area of manpower productivity most of our work is in actually putting an officer or a consultant into the company to work with them and als o to assist them in getting manpower training grants through the Federal Government. I might also add that we have now in our Budget moneys for some provincial supplementary manpower training grants .

This is not meant to du plicate what the Federal Government does but it is meant to fill up some of the gaps that we see in the Federal program. We work very closely on behalf of companies to assist them in getting manpower training grants. MR. CHAffiMAN: The Honourable Member for Assi niboia. MR. PATRICK: Small business assistance, something that we talked about yesterday, would it apply to - I understa nd there's some 20 small businesses engaged in health foods , you know, in the province, vegetable foods .

Now has any assistance been given to the people that are in the industry now because the way I understand it, in the matter of a year and a half the sales in the United States went something like from half a million dollars to $3 billion sales in this area. Now it looks, in the vegetable and grain that Manitoba may be losing some of this market if some of these people that are very small in this province are not given any assistance. Are they providing any kind of research, where the markets are, where can they sell and so on?

2908 April 27, 1976 SUPPLY - INDUSTRY & COMMERCE MR. CHAffiMAN: The Honourable Minister. :MR. EVANS: Yes , the service is there for the asking. We norma lly expect a company to come to us and tell us that they have a problem. In some cases we get information about opportunities and we try to relay the information. I know this matter of health foods was raised last night and perhaps we could defer some discussion of that till we get to the Science or Technology group because I believe it's that group in the department that has been most involved in this health food field .

There was a question asked by the Honourable Member from Roblin on immigration. We don't have any numbers by origin, country of origin, but I am adv ised that the number of immigrants coming to Manitoba has tended to drop. At least between 1974 and 1975 there was a drop in immigrants coming to Manitoba. The immigration, which is primarily a federal responsibility but does involve consultation with the province, is ess entially limited by the Federal Government to those oc cupations and skill trades where there's a true domestic or local shortage.

I must hasten to add that we have not encouraged, at the provincial level we have not encouraged the Federal Government with regard to low paying or low skilled occupations. We do feel that given the amount of unemployment we have now that we should do everything we can to give those who are unemployed opportunities. My experience has been and the figures show that the bulk of the unemployed are usually the unskilled. We do have information. We were asked about where are these immigrants going, into what kind of jobs ? We can tell you that in 1975 temporary employment visas were given to 3, 450 persons.

Yes, these were temporary. Landed immigrants, there was 3, 093 persons. That's January to November. So that's 11 months for landed immigrants; 12 months for temporary employment visas. That's a total of roughly 6, 600 approximately. Now we can show you a breakdown of this but I maybe can talk in general terms. One of the biggest categories has been professional and related occupation. That includes entrepreneurs, managerial types, natural science, social science, religion, teaching, medicine, health, artistic, literary, performing arts, sports and recreation.

That is referred to as professional and related categories and they make up approximately 31 percent, in 19 75, 31 percent of all the landed immigrants and just about 60 percent of those .on temporary employment visas . In the sales and service and clerical areas we had among the landed immigrants, they cont:

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	30-3-89
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	30th 3rd hansardpdf 89.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	db5f1447287841580ba6f9dcbbd8275e7d35df47

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