Volume 4 PROVINCE OF NEWFOUNDLAND THIRTY-SIXTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF NEWFOUNDLAND 4th. Session VERBATIM REPORT TUESDAY, APRIL 1, 1.975 SPEAKER: THE HONOURABLE M. JAMES .RUSSELL Number 22

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 875 The House met at 3:00 P.M. Mr. Speaker in the Chair. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please: STATEMENTS BY MINISTERS: MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister of Fisheries. Page 1 - mw HON. JOHN C. CROSBIE (Hon. Minister of Fisheries): Mr. Speaker, I think we should take note of the anniversary date today, this is the twenty-sixth anniversary of the Province's Confederation with Canada. Of course, last year was a special occasion on the twenty-fifth anniversary. But I do not think we should let the day go without officially noting that this is our twenty-sixth year of Confederation.

And I am sure that all members of the House hope that we will have another good year this year as a part of the Canadian Confederation as we have had in increasing measure over the last twenty-five. MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Leader of the Opposition. AN HON. MEMBER: Just take note that Joey is in good health. HON. E. M.ROBERTS (Leader of the Opposition): He is getting ready, getting ready. SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible). MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, on this side, we would like to join in taking note of the anniversary.

Actually, Your Honour, it is twenty-six years and one day today, because, as is well-known, Confederation did not come on this first day of April, but rather at one minute before midnight on March 31, 1949. Confederation has been not only good for Newfoundland, it is hard to conceive where Newfoundland would have been today without Confederation. It has shaped our lives,and it has shaped them very much for the better. The years ahead, I would hope, will be even more productive for Newfoundland, . more productive as a member of the Confederation. 2608

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 875 Page 2 I also feel, Mr. Speaker, that the next twenty-six years will and I hope in fact they will bring, I believe they will see and I hope they will bring a change in the nature of Confederation. The last twenty-six years, Sir, and even ~oday we have been a"have-not"Province. I would hope that during the next twenty-six years, Sir, Newfoundland will become a'have"Province and thus play an even fuller role in Confederation than we have. But I think the House Leader is well-advised to take note of it.

It was an auspicious day in Newfoundland's history, a day that has brought betterment and brought joy and brought better conditions in every way to all the people of Newfoundland. I think it is only fitting that we, as a House of Assembly, should commemorate it. And I think also we should commemorate, without getting into current politics, both present and wishful on the part of honourable gentlemen opposite, to commemorate the role played by, both by Mr. Smallwood and by the men who worked with him.

We would not have had Confederation in 1949 if it had not been for the work of Joey Smallwood and the men who worked with hilll, including, I may say, the honourable gentleman's father who, although he did not sign the Terms of Union for reasons which he stated publicly at the time, worked long and hard to make Confederation come once the decision of the people had been rendered in the two Referendums, particularly the second one,and then after Confederation worked equally hard at being a good Canadian and making Confederation work and making Newfoundland a part of the Canadian Confederation.

So in noting the anniversary, we should note the contribution of those who J111ade it possible. I think it is only fitting that this House, on this anniversary, should note both these events, the men and the event itself, and I would hope would recognize them in an appropriate fashion. Thank you. MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister of Forestry and Agriculture. HON. H. COLLINS (Minister of Forestry and Agriculture): Mr. Speaker, in view of several misleading statements that have been given to the press during the last couple of days with regards to the operation 2609

AoTil 1, 1975 Tape no. 875 Page 3 - mw of Eastern Provincial Airways in Gander, I would like to try and clarify the situation. First of all, l would like to say that the President of E.P .A., Mr. Keith Miller, announced some weeks ago that his company intended to consolidate their mainland operations from the various points, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec into Halifax for the simple reason that it made good economic sense. At that time the President, Mr. Miller , saw fit to come to the Province, the provincial government.

He also had meetings with the Gander Chamber of Co!!llllerce, I understand, and certainly with the Gander Town Council to explain to the people involved just what was happening so that nobody would misunderstand the approach which E.P.A. was taking to the overall economic problem . The people who are moving into Halifax, it is not a case of providing new jobs, it is a case , Mr. Speaker, of consolidating the operation , moving people from the ends of the various routes into the Halifax area fo r resting purposes and for training purposes.

I might add that within the next two or i.hree days, certainly within the next week, the headquarters of E.P .A. at Gander will be moving into a new facility , a new building, not a new building, but a building which has been renovated extensively to the tune of about $2 million. ill their headquarters staff will be moving in there within the next week. I would also 2610 f '

April 1, 1975 Tape No, 876 NM - 1 like to point out that negotiations are now in progress with this government, the provincial government, with the Government of Canada, in connection with the establishment of a major maintenance and servicing facility at the · Gander Airport. The idea behind this is that all the maintenpnce work on the six 737 jets and the additional jet which is coming in pretty soon, plus all the other different types of aircraft which are used on the Mainland to service Mainland points, all those aircraft will have all their maintenance done at the Gander facility.

In addition to that what is known in the trade as "D" checks which heretofore has been done in Vancouver, or at the factory in the US, all those checks will be made available and - not make available, all those checks will be performed at the new facility when it is provided. In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, the provincial government, always cognizant of what is goin g on with EPA, the need for maintaining the growth of EPA activies in Gander, sometime ago gave approval to a major extension of the Gander District Vocational School.

I think the cost is in the order of $1 million and one of the main reasons for that is to provide facilities for training young Newfoundlanders in the trades of aircraft mechanics and aircraft frames mechanics, that is aircraft angine mechanics and aircraft frames mechanics. EPA anticipate that when those services are performed at Gander that an additional eighty to ninety top paid mechanical types, engineerin g types of jobs will be made available.

Now with the extension to the District Vocational School in Gander, we hope to be ahead of the game to the extent that young Newfoundlanders will have beer. in there, will have obtained their degrees, their certificates, whatever it is they do obtain at the vocational schools. The courses are acredited by the Department of Transport so that when 2611

April 1, 1975 Tape No, 876 NM - 2 those jobs come on stream, young Newfoundlanders will be readv to p,o in there and take the jobs, My reason, Mr, Speaker, for brining up this, I think that a lot of people have been a little mischievous, if you might call it that 7in trying to stir up some doubts in the people's minds, Certainly in Gander during the years there has been enough doubts, adequate doubts stirred up, people have been tormented by statements here and statements there, what is going to happen and what is not going to happen and I want to put it on record that this government reaffirms its faith in EPA by doing everything in their power, along with EPA, to ensure that the company not only maintains its Gander operation but that the thing grows and expands, MR.

SPEAKER: The honourable member for Bell Island. MR, NEARY: Mr, Speaker, the honourable Member for the District of Gander did not make it clear, Sir, whether he was speaking as the government's representative on the Board of Directors of EPA, if in fact he is, if in fact the member is on the Board of Directors of EPAJor if he was speaking as a minister speaking on behalf of the government or speaking as the Member for Gander District. The minister did not make that clear, Sir, because I am not quite sure whether this matter comes under the minister's department or the Minister of Industrial Development.

The minister, Mr. Speaker, also did not make it clear whether or not the Province had made a bid to get this new hangar that is being constructed in Halifax at the cost of several million dollars) if the provincial government here in Newfoundland had made a bid to get that moved to Gander. When they werenaking the move, Mr. Speaker, the honourable minister did not make it clear, the move was going to be made anyway, did the Government of Nova Scotia outbid the Government of Newfoundland, did they give any concessions to EPA? Why, if it was being moved, could it not be moved to Gander?

This is the question, Sir, this is the thing that is bothering people. Why? If they are 2612

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 876 NM - 3 going to consolidate why not consolidate a movement to Gander and move - MR. COLLINS: Inaudible, MR. NEARY: Yes, I listened to what the member said, Sir, and I could see no justification at all for consolidating the operation in Halifax when it could have been consolidated in Gander just as well. All the facilities are there and the minister did go on and tell us, Sir, about the expansion to the vocational school and all the other wonderful things that are being done in Gander to accommodate EPA and so forth. So why not?

We are just as good as Nova Scotia, Sir, Our people are just as well qualified. Why not consolidate in Gander rather than Halifax. The minister, Sir , did not clarify this matter at all. As a matter of fact all he did was muddy up the water a little more. MR. COLLINS: Mr. Speaker, I will see if I can clear it up a little bit for the honourable member, he just - AN HON. MEMBER: Inaudible. MR, SPEAKER: Order, please: Order, please: Ckay the honourable Leader of the Opposition - MR.

ROBERTS: I think Your Honour is about to make a ruling on the point I raised without my needing to raise it, but the honourable gentleman has no right to engage in a further debate with the gentleman from Bell Island anymore than the gentleman from Bell Island has no right, nor did he, enter into a debate with the gentleman from Gander. MR. SPEAKER: That was the point I was about to make. I think the point might be able to be raised at another time, but I am afraid we could get into a debate on the whole matter at the present time. Before I recognize another honourable member 2613

April 1, 1975 Tape 877 (Afternoon) PK - 1 I would like to welcome to the galleries today Mr. William Wiscombe, Mr. Frank Kennedy 1 two councillors from the Marystown Council and Hr. Danny Cochrane 1 the Town Manager of Marystwon. On behalf of all honourable members I welcome you here. The llon. Minister of Manpower and Industrial Relations. HON. E. MAYNARD (MINISTER OF MANPOWER AND INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS): Mr. Speaker, I have two short statements here, one regarding the appointment of an l\ssistant Deputy Minister of Manpower. .lfter the appointment of Mr.

May,the former Assistant Deputy Minister of Manpower to the Chairmanship of the Workmen's Compensation Board, ads were run in various papers inviting applicants to fill the vacant position. Thirteen applications were received and a selection committee of senior government officials was set up to interview the applicants and to make recommendations. The Committee reported to me a few weeks ago, and I am now pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. Robert K. Langdon as the new Assistant Deputy Minister of Manpower with the department.

The appointment comes at a fairly critical period when the Province is deeply involved in the formulation of comprehensive manpower oolicies. Mr. Langdon's background will serve well in that category. !le was born in 1936, a• native of Northern Arm North, Botwood. Hr. Langdon has held various jobs with provincial and federal governments over the years. He is a former Field Apprenticeship Supervisor with the Newfoundland Department of Labour. He has been Principal of two vocational schools.For the last seven years he has been serving in various categories with the Canada Manpower Department in Eastern Canada.

At the present time he is a training consultant for Canada Manpower in Newfoundland and Labrador. The appointment will become effective in mid-April. I would also like to make a short statement regarding the appointment of members to the Buchans Task Force. On February 15, 1975 a meeting was held at Buchans to discuss,in general, procedures to be used to investigate and report on the future viability of the town, as per the recommendations of the Dyer Industrial Inquiry 2614

April 1, 1975 Tape 877 (Afternoon) PK - 2 Commission Report. There were sixteen people from government and various organizations in the area, union, town councils etc. at the meeting.

The concensus was reached at that meeting that the best procedure to be followed would be the establishment of a Task Force consisting of the following; three representative of government, one to act as chairman, one representative of the town council, one representative of the company, one representative of the Development Association, one representative of the union, and one representative of the town at large to be drawn from the area of the Town of Buchans which is not represented by the elected council. I do not have the names of all of the members being appointed by the various bodies at this time.

But they have made their selections) as I understand them. The three government members of the Task Force will be Mr. Langdon, whom I just made an announcement on, is to be appointed the Assistant Deputy Minister of Manpower, and he will act as chairman. The other two members will be Mr. J. A. Brennan, Assietant Deputy Minister of Forestry, and Mr. John Allston, the Senior Planner with the Department of Municipal Affairs and Housing. I will be asking the Chairman to convene a first meeting of the Task Force as soon as possible and he will be in contact with the other parties involved within the next few days.

We are hopeful that the Task Force will present a report to r,overnment by the end of 1975 but in any case we are asking that the Task Force report back within a period of one year at the most. The Task Force will be directed to decide on various alternatives measures that government may take to ensure the future of the town in the event that the mines may close in the next three to four years. While I am on my feet, Mr. Speaker, I would like to make just a very short announcement, I have been informed by the union, the fishermen's union,the President,Mr.

Richard Cashin, that the dispute with Bonavista Cold Storage Company with their plants in Grand Bank 2615

April 1, 1975 Tape 877 (Afternoon) PK - 3 and elsewhere has been settled. The Bonavista Cold Storage Company has agreed to accept the same terms and conditions as the other five companies. I would assume that the strike is going to be over. 2616

April 1, 1975 Tape no • 878 Page 1 - mw MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Leader of the Opposition. MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, first of all with reference to the minister's third announcement,that we, of course, welcome as enthusiastically as does he the news that the hold-out company, the Bonavista Cold Storage people have now agreed to make and to accept the same settlement that the other five companies involved in the trawlermen's dispute accepted last week. I know that will be welcome news to all concerned, the people of Grand Bank, the people of Fermeuse and the people who are affected directly by those operations.

Now with respect to the statement the honourable gentleman made about the Buchans Task Force, Mr. Speaker, we are delighted that at long last the minister has been prodded into action with respect to this important subject. He has doddled and doodled and dipsied and dandied but at last he has acted, and I would hope that the few gentle reminders advanced by my colleague from Bell Island during the debate on the Manpower estimates last week, helped somewhat to prod the minister. The announcement, however, Mr. Speaker, does not really deal with the problem.

This is not the place to debate it but it is the place to say, Sir, that the conmunity of Buchans, according to the Dyer Report- and nobody has seriously challenged the evidence put forward and the conclusions arrived at by Professor Dyer in his report - thecomnunity of Buchans is under a death sentence. That report says that known reserves of the mine will run out in a period, I believe, three to five years but a very short period indeed. It suggests that the appointment of the Task Force as being a positive and forward looking step that the administration could take.

It has taken the government a number of months? I do not have the precise number here, but it has been the better part of a year to do something 2617

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 878 Page 2 - mw as simple as appointing a committee. When they have done it, they still have not done enough. It is not enough, Mr. Speaker, to say that the government hope that the Task Force will report to the government by the end of the year. I think the Task Force should be mandated to hold public hearings in the Buchans area to begin with. They should be mandated to make recommendations with respect to the future of Buchans and to what can be done to provide alternate employment. The only reason people went to Buchans to live was the opening of the mine there some fifty years ago.

If that mine is to close there will have to be an alternate source of employment provided for the people of Buchans or there will be no economic reason to have a Buchans. The minister's statement is an extreme disappointment. It has taken him too long to come to it. He has not put a deadline on it for recommendations. He has not asked nor directed the commission to hold public hearings so that the people of Buchans and any others who are interested can be involved.

I find it amazing that there is no representation from the Department of Mines and Energy which persumably would have had a major,and hopefully will have a major imput into the work of the committee. The Department of Industrial Development is not involved in the membership in the committee. I said we have one man from Manpower and a very fine man indeed. He sounds to be. Secondly, we have Colonel Allston, the planner, a municipal planner, a man skilled in making regulations and administering regulations about land use and the like. Who is the third? AN HON. MEMBER: Mr. Brennan. MR. ROBERTS: And we have Mr.

Brennan, one of the senior foresters and a man very knowledgeable in the field of forestry. Maybe all these men have something to bring to that Task Force. But, Sir, the Industrial Development Department should be there 2618

Jlpril 1, 1975 Tape no. 878 Page 3 - mw and so should the Mines and Energy Department • ~. Sp~r, let me conclude by saying thst in this Province, the history of these task forces, be they federal or be they federal-provincial or be they entirely provincial, has not been at all a hsppy one. We all remember the situation at Placentia and the Placentia area a few years ago. We all recall the on~going saga of Goose Bay where the Task Force to date seems to hsve produced very little. I would hope the Buch.ans Task Force w1.ll not follow this precedent.

We are facing the possibility of a very re.al tragedy at Buchana, the whole reason for existence of a conmunity of 3,000 people being removed, it is incumbent upon the government to act and to ac·t now, The Task Force is but a very tiny step. I would hope the minister, shortly, will be in a position to take major steps and certainly we will be prodding to do that. 2619

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 879 NM - 1 MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! I do not know if the honourable Member for Bell Island is rising to speak to this statement. AN HON. MEMBER: Inaudible. MR. SPEAKER: It has been the custom of the House to allow replies to ministerial statements by the Leader of the Opposition or representatives of that particular portfolio. I think the honourable Leader of the Opposition has made a few comments with regards to this announcment. I am not prepared to recognize anybody else at the moment. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, the minister made three statements, Sir, in one, three in one. MR.

DOODY: - the Leader of the Opposition. MR. SPEAKER: Order• please! MR. NEARY: My colleague commented on two, Sir, two of the statements. AN HON. MEMBER: Inaudible. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please! The Chair has made a ruling. It is not prepared to recognize - MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, do you mean to tell me I cannot comment on the first part of the minister's statement. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! That is correct. MR. NEARY: What have we got, closure, Sir? MR.

SPEAKER: Although the names of the honourable gentlemen have not been brought to my attention, I have been informed that we have some councillors from Summerford and New World Island in the gallery and I would certainly welcome these gentlemen to the galleries today. REPORTS OF STANDING AND SPECIAL COMMITEES: MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Fisheries. MR. CROSBIE: I would like to file several copies of the Fish Inspection Amendment regulation of 1974. ORAL QUESTIONS: MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Member for Bell Island. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Social 2620

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 879 NM 2 Services, Sir, would the minister care to tell us if this situation that developed down here at the parking lot of the stadium yesterday in the give-away Santa Claus-like parade, the situation like the Da Nang situation, if that has been corrected? MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! MR. NEARY: Has the minister taken steps to correct this situation where they had a free for all down there? MR. MURPHY: Inaudible. MR. SPEAKER: Order, pl~ase! The member's question is out of order, It is very argumentative. MR. NEARY: Well, Mr.

Speaker, I wonder if the Minister of Tourism, Sir, could tell us when he expects the Norma and Gladys to set sail for Japan? MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Tourism. HON. T. HICKEY 1 MINISTER OF TOURISM: Should I take two weeks 1 I wonder? Mr. Speaker, I am sorry I cannot inform the House at this point. There are still negotiations going on with the federal government and I anticipate in about a week to two weeks there will be an official and final announcement on the world cruise. MR.

NEARY: Supplementary question for the minister, Sir, Would the minister care to tell us if the Norma and Gladys will be sailing to Japan under a Canadian flag or under the new Newfoundland flag? '.'IR. HICKEY: Mr. Speaker, I do not know how long I have to answer that but I could go on for the next week and give the honourable gentleman a dissertation on flags. But if he has got a suitable one, we are easy to get along with. We are open to consideration. MR. NEARY: Sir, supplementary, would the minister care to tell the House how much this voyage is going to cost to send this ship to Japan to take

part in the Expo 75 Celebrations. MR. HI CKEY : Mr. Speaker, I have already stated, I am not in a positior , to confirm or deny at this poir.t that there will even be a trip t o Japan by th e N orma and Glady f . There has been a number of 2621

April 1,_ 1975 Tape No. 879 NM - 3 statements indicating that we are hopeful of such a trip, of such a voyage. When a final decision has been made and when the negotiations are completed, complete details as to cost, trip, the whole bit package will be given. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, I wonder when the minister releases the details if he would include,include in these details,whether or not she will be carrying a load of flippers or whether they will be eating rice when they get to Japan. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please'. This question is certainly out of order. MR. NEARY: Mr.

Speaker, I wonder if I could direct a question to the Minister of Transportation and Communications. Would the minister care to inform the House if the stretch of road between Bunyan's Cove and Port Blandford, that ten mile stretch that has been closed for the last two weeks is open yet or is it still closed? MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Transportation and Communications. HON. J. ROUSSEAU, MINISTER OF TRANSPORTATION AND COMMUNICATIONS: No, actually Bunyan's Cove to Port Blandford is closed to all vehicular traffic. MR. NEARY: Mr.

Speaker, would the minister indicate when this stretch of road will be open? 2622

April 1, 1975. MR. ROUSSEAU: Tape 880 RH - 1 As soon as possible. Men are working down there and we are trying to get the roads open and keep them open. They are soft. We are trying to get the crushed stone and shale on all the roads and get them in passable condition. As soon as it is possible, we will. MR. NEARY: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Would the minister care to tell the House whether there is any equipment working on this stretch of road yet? What kind of equipment is thereland is it graders or bulldozers? lvhat kind of equipment is being used to try to upgrade this road and get it open? MR.

ROUSSEAU: I do not have any idea. I really do not. There is equipment down there - MR. NEARY: The minister would not be laughing - MR. ROUSSEAU: What equipment is down there, I do not know. You know, there is equipment down there and it is working on the road. MR. NEARY: Well, Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister could tell us on another stretch of road, Sir, that has to do with the same area, on the stretch of road between Bunyan's Cove and Musgrave town where only trucks, I understand, can use that road.

Now, what is being done to upgrade that road so cars can move back and forth freely over it because that is the last hope the people have to get out of that area down there? MR. ROUSSEAU: Mr. Speaker, if I may. I will give the full report and then he can, you know, - and this is the morning's road report. All roads on the Avalon Peninsula, Clarenville and Central Newfound­ land are open except Bunyan's Cover to Port Blandford which is closed to all vehicular traffic. In Western Newfoundland overnight snow has blocked the following roads: the junction of Roddickton Road to Green Island Cove; Green Island Cove; St.

Anthony air strip including Cook's Harbour; St. Anthony air strip to Goose Cove; St. Anthony to L'Anse-au-Meadow; Raleigh including St. Carols; Port au Port Peninsula; Blanc Sablon; Pinware; Pinware to Red Bay. Side roads are blocked in the following areas: Daniel's Harbour to the junction of Roddickton Road, Codroy Valley. All snow clearing equipment is working. The roads are expected to be opened to day. Trans-Canada-Highway from Baie Verte junction to 2623

April 1, 1975. Tape 880 RH - 2 Port aux Basques is very slippery due to freezing rain overnight. Most gravel roads are on half load limit restrictions and some are rough and soft. Fairly good driving conditions. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Could we have the steamer report? MR. NEARY: Celsius or Fahrenheit? Celsius or Fahrenheit? Mr. Speaker, I have a question for my honourable friend and colleague, the Minister of Social Services. MR. MURPHY: Inaudible. MR. NEARY: I beg your pardon? MR. MURPHY: Just ask the question. - MR. NEARY: Well, here is the question.

I thought we were great friends, Sir, Would the minister care to comment on public state­ ments made by the superintendent of the UC Home that all the children over there in that Home have not yet been looked after? Would the minister care to comment on that? MR. MURPHY: Yes, very pleased to, Mr. Speaker. With reference to that I was phoned by The Evening Telegram on Sunday, I believe, at my home, with reference to this position of the children out of the United Church Rome on Hamilton Street into other areas.

I did tell them, Sir, that all arrangements had been made some months previously for to look after these children. I was rather surprised to read in The Daily News this morning that the lady who was an employee there, a trusted employee, had apparently contacted someone and said this is not so. So , I did check and apparently the group Home on Patrick Street had experienced some sewerage problems over the weekend and a transfer could not be made of eight. One child had been already ready for adoption, I will not go into it, but for medical reasons just was not allowed at this moment to be taken out of the Home.

We have a brother and sister there who are being placed outside of St. John's in a foster home, but again, for medical reasons they were asked to keep the couple of children, the brother and sister within easy reach of the Janeway Hospital for certain 2624

April 1, 1975. Tape 880 RH - 3 reasons. So, for that reason, Sir, we could not immediately affect the changes that had been looked after or had been arranged for to take place over the weekend. So, that is the story on it, Sir. As soon as the Patrick Street Home is ready, that could happen in twenty minutes, half an hour this afternoon, that will look after the eight for the group Home. The others, Sir, are really dependent on medical advice and for no other reason,but arrangements have been made, but the children's welfare comes first. So, the best laid plans of mice and men, you know, so on and so forth.

So, there is no need for consternation, no need to line up in the Avalon Mall to get petitions or anything else on this Home. Everything is under control, Sir. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Rehabilitation and Recreation.

Would the minister care to indicate to the House, Sir, whether or not he has received a request from a senior citizens' home, privately operated in Porterville, in the great District of Lewisporte, for financial assistance and if so, if the minister has received a request would the minister care to indicate to the House what action has been taken on that request? 2625

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 881 Page 1 - mw MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister of Rehabilitation and Recreation. HON. T. DOYLE (Mini ster of Rehabilitation and Recreation): Yes, Mr. Speaker, such a request was received and the request, as such, does not qualify under the existing specifications of my department for such funding and the applicant has been so advised. MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary question. Is the minister aware that if financial assistance is not forthcoming that this home will be forced to close?

It will either be sold or closed, leaving about twenty-odd senior citizens out in the street with nowhere to go. Is the minister aware of that? And if so, what alternative plans does the minister have to take care of these senior citizens who will be forced to leave that home if it closes? AN HON. MEMBER: A hypothetical question. MR. DOYLE: Yes, Mr. Speaker, that is correct, it is a hypothetical question. First of all I should state very clearly that the home in question is a privately operated home, and it is not operated by my department nor any other department of government.

And the owners of the home have in the past requested assistance from government and government at this point in time does not have any programme of the type of assistance which this owner is requesting. It has been operated purely and simply as a commercial enterprise, libich there is nothing wrong with that. And to the best of my knowledge, whether or not the home is going to go out of business if certain funds are not supplied is purely specu1ative and hypothetical and one that I am not going to comment on. MR, NEARY: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary. Has the minister received any recent communication from Mr.

Porter, who operates that home at Porterville? Because it is not speculation, Mr. Speaker. I am trying to find out from the minister, Sir, if he - 2626

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 881 Page 2 - mw AN HON. MEMBER: To a point of order. MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! MR. NEARY: - has this correspondence - MR. SPEAKER: Order, please: Order, please! The Hon. Member for Bell Island is certainly free to ask a question, but he is certainly giving a long

preamble to asking a question, a supplementary question. MR. NEARY: My point is that this is not speculation. Does the minister have the recent - MR. CROSBIE: MR. NEARY: MR. SPEAKER: MR. CROSBU:: To a point of order. Does the minister have the recent - Order, please! The honourable gentleman is not asking a question. He wants to make a speech. MR. NEARY: Ah, sit down! MR. CROSBIE: He is not asking a question, MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker - MR. SPEAKER: The Chair has already said that it feels that the Hon. Member for Bell Island is having a long

preamble and thus making a speech. If he wishes to ask a supplementary question, it should be very direct and very precise, MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary question, Does the minister have the most recent piece of correspondence issued by Mr, Porter,say about three or four days ago? When was the last time the minister had contact with Mr. Porter, either personally in writing or otherwise? MR. DOYLE: Mr. Speaker, from memory, the last time that I have personally had contact with the gentleman in question, either correspondence or verbally,was approximately two to three weeks ago. I have seen no correspondence in the last three or four days in this matter. 2627

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 881 Page 3 - mw MR. NEARY: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the same minister Sir, is yet in a position to divulge the financial comDitment made by the frovince towards the summer games? I have asked the minister now about fifteen ti.JD.es for the answer to that question. I do not have it yet. Does the minister have the infcrnmation he promised the House? MR. DOYLE: Mr. Speaker, I would like to correct that statement somewhat. The honourable member did not ask me fifteen ti.JD.es. He asked me on several occasions.

In the interim the budget speech was presented in this House and in that speech and the estimates contained therein, is a figure for the 1 77 Canada Summer Games to be held in St. John's. MR. NEARY: MR. DOYLE: MR. NEARY: total commitment? For this fiscal year? That ia correct. What is the total amount? What is the MR. DOYLE: If the honourable member, Mr • Speaker, would let me finish, I will do so. I would be delighted, Mr.

Speaker, when the opportunity presents itself, and I hope it will within the next coujlle of weeks in doing the estimates of the Department of Rehabili~ation and Recreation to give full plans of this government's forward thinking policies in recreation, including the SUDDer Games of 177. SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear! Hear! ORDERS OF THE DAY: On motion of the honourable the Minister of Justice. a bill, 2628

April 1, 1975 Tape 882 (afternoon) Ill-1 "An Act Further To Amend The Judicature Act," read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow. On motion that the Fouse do now resolve itself into Committee of Supply. Mr. Speaker left the Chair. MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please'. 1401-01, fisheries. The Minister of Fisheries. MR. CROSBIE: Mr. Chairman, I spoke for about an hour on our last day makin~ some general points in connection with the department. I have of course a lot of information to give the committee as we go down through various subheads.

I think I touched all the general areas last week and I do not want to repeat it all now. I think just before I sit down that T might mention 1 of course, that there is a great deal of interest in the Province in improvements to the unemployment insurance formula for fishermen or in the development of an income support programme to replace the concept of unemployment insurance as it now pertains to fishermen. This was a commitment that has been made by the present Government of Canada, particularly during an electi.on campai.gn in 1Q74, and of course even before that when Mr.

Davis 1who was then the minister,made certain suggestions for changes that were given to the government and to the trade and for the fishermen to have a look at and to comment on. Now, since becoming Minister of Fisheries,on every occasion when I have heen in Ottawa in connection with fishery matters, I have asked the federal minister what the position is on any new income support programme. All I can tell the House, of course, is what I am told myself, that this is being worked on by Mr. Leblanc and his officials and I guess others.

They are looking at a variety of alternative approaches to income support for fishermen. There are all kinds of complications) of course, involved in this, and it is not something that is going to happen overnight. They are looking at various alternatives, perhaps guarantee~ annual income or revising the present unemployment insurance system and considering cash failure insurance, and looking at the 2629

April 1, 1975 Tape 882 (afternoon) suggestions that were made in the Davis proposal. These are all being studied. I believe it is likely that some changes are going to be tJl-2 made this year. I do not think that they are immediately imminent. Whether these will be the final changes or not cannot be told as yet. Whether there will be any major change in the application of unemployment insurance to fishermen this year is still not clear. Of course, only the Government of Canada can clarify that, but they are working on it.

It is a difficult and complicated task, but it is being worked on and we are l<eeping in touch with them and stressing the urgency of this matter to federal officials. Of course, they are well aware of it. Now, Mr. Chairman, there is no question that in Newfoundland today the terms and conditions and the quirks of the umemployment insurance system have an absolutely fantastic impact on what can be accomplished because everything else seems to center around it, particularly in relation to the fishery.

There is no question that the present unemployment insurance plan must be changed with reference to fi.shermen as it is distorting how the industry works. It is unfair in some of its aspects and it is a pressing matter that we hope the federal government will be able to come with the changes that have been promised this year or certainly before the end of the year, Another point that I might make, Mr.

Chairman, is that our impetus on the new drive that we are giving the development of the herring fishery on the Norther Peninsula and Labrador is being continued and we are not abating our efforts, Several weeks ago I had a meeting in Plum Point with the fishermen for the Northern Peninsula, St. Barbe ~orth,concerning our plans for the herring fishery on that coast during the coming season and our invitation to the Canadian Salt Fish Corporation to participate in the arrangments we have made with them.

Tomorrow I will be going to Forteau 1weather permitting, in Labrador South to meet with the fishermen of Labrador South or 2630

April 1, 1Q75 Tape 882 (afternoon) at least the area from Red Bay to L'Anse-au-Clair, to Blanc Sablon, to discuss with them their particular problems, a lot of which,of course,involve the herring fishery and some in other fisheries in the area. As I will make clear when we get to the detail on my estimates, there is a major effort being put by the Department of Fisheries this year into improving facilities on the Coast of Labrador South.

I believe there are funds provided in the estimates for the improvement and upgrading of five community stages along that coast and other work that will be done in that area partly as a result of the Royal Commission Report on Labrador services. In order to further that and to meet with the fishermen first hand and to have their views, we did meet with four or five of them who attended the meeting at Plum Point, myself and officials IB-3 of the department will be spending tomorrow in Labrador South weather permitting to hear from them. They have put in a brief to us.

The hrief is prepared by a member of the Extension Department of 'Memorial University who has put into written form their concerns and what they feel needs to be done in that area of the Province. It should he a very interesting day. So, I think that I discussed a lot of the general points last time. On April 8 there will be another meeting with the federal minister to discuss the various options that are there now for the rehabilitation of the East Coast ground fishery.

It is going to he a very important meeting because time is passing and shortly after that meeting presumably he will be making recommendations to his colleagues as to what is to be done by the Government of Canada at the end of April for the F.ast Coast fishery because,of course,unless major government assistance is available there will be no such fishery this year. One other point that might be made, Mr.

Chairman - I think I made it last time hut just to make it clear again - the Select Committee of this House which has been appointed by this House to consider the inshore fishery or to give various people who are interested in the inshore fishery in the Province a chance to make their views 2631

April 1, 1975 Tape 882 (afternoon) rn-<1 known publicly, has been asked hy the House to report by April 30. They have been toJd, and I think it has been said in this House, that if they find that deadline js too short, that the deadline will be extended although any interim report they want to make by April 3n would be welcome. Now, when that Connnittee was set up, Mr. Chairman, we made it quite clear we are not expecting miracles from this Select Committee or the members of the House on the inshore fishery.

The first purpose of it was to give everyone involved in the inshore fishery a chance to make their views known puhlicly as to what the problems are and any solutions they have to offer. The second purpose of the commjttee is to give eight or nine members of this House a chance first hand to hear these representations and to give us their views as to what they feel needs to he done and what the result is of their experience in these hearings. No one is pretending that it is a royal commission or that it is go1ng to be a report comparable to a roya] commission.

It will be a report from some of our members as to what impression they have gathered as to the problems of this moment and possible solutions, what suggestions do they have as the inshore fishery is starting up now and certainly by the end of April. That is why the time limit is there. But, the main purpose of this committee is to focus more attention on the problems of our inshore fishery at this stage because the trawler strike in particular has taken a lot of attention away from them. So, we are not expecting that it is going to he a royal commission or give us any kind of a royal commission report.

As to whether there will be a royal commission on the fisheries, only events will tell, but it is quite certain from all the studies that have now been carried out hy the federal government and ourselves that all the hasic information that affects the East Coast fishery of Canada is now be:1.ng assembled. What has to be done is not to examine the prohlems any longer, but is to decide on what are the proper 2632

i\oriJ. l, l 975 Tape R82 (afternoon) rn-s i<teps to take to en..,;ure that the industry is assisted through the next three to five years when hopefully the market and the resource will be back under control and in proper shape so that the industey can stand on its O'Wll feet once again. That is -what has to be devised by the end of April in part and certainly during the rest of this year because a lot of the struct ural changes that are, I think., needed in the long nm in the fishery will not be decided upon by April. )n . It will take the rest of the year to work those out. So, those are my 2633

April 1, 1975 Tape 883 (Afternoon) PK - 1 general remarks, Mr. Chairr.ian. I will try and answer any questions as they are asked or posed or as we go down through the various items. And I am prepared to spend however much time the House wants to spend,naturally,on discussing these estimates. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Leader of the Opposition. MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Chairman, let me first of all say that with response to the minister's closing remarks I would think that any time we spent discussing the Fisheries estimates would be \Jell spent.

I think the minister comes to this Committe in a way that none of his predecessors have done, at least none of his immediate predecessors, and I suspect some of his not so immediate predecessors which share this unenviable distinction. I think the minister comes armed with knowledge. Further- more, I think, the minister has made some serious study into the problems of the fisheries, and has done some hard thinking about some of the hard problems and even harder questions which we in Newfoundland are going to have to deal with. We are going to have to confront them. We are going to have to find some answers.

I think. the time will be well spent just for the simple fact that the fisheries are so very, very important to Newfoundland. We do not need to go through it again in any detail, Your Honour. I assume we are all intiuutely fRmiliar with the figures. These may not be the most up to date ones available but they are the most recent I have. The number of fishermen - and this is a matter more of art than of science because we have no definition of fishermen. We all know what a fisherman is. I mean that is no problem.

But, I do not think any government department - and perhaps the minister could confer - there is really no list of who are the fishermen. I mean the minister made a policy statement recently which, I think, centered about that fact, and quite wisely maintained the traditional position of governments in Newfoundland these past couple of hundred years.that really anvbodv who wants to go fishing can go fishing, and therefore is a fisherman.

The figures which I have show that there are approximately 15,300 fishermen in Newfoundland, fishermen or fishin~ related industries, and by far the greatest number of those, 2634

April 1, 1975 Tape 883 (Afternoon) PK - 2 of course, Your Honour, are in the inshore fishery. Indeed, I think, it is probably correct to say that approximately twelve per cent of our labour force at present, not the number employed, but the labour force,approximately twelve per cent, about one out of eight, would be employed directly or indirectly in the fishery.

And that in itself makes the matter important, but then when you add on to that, Your Honour, the fact that in most parts of Newfoundland the fishery is really, if not the only reason for existence, it is the basic reason for the existence of communities, and of homes, and of, you know, society in every sense of the word.

Really, Your Honour, if you go around this Province, if you take aside a very few areas, Labrador West, the fisheries have no impact at all there except a few of the constituents who go out and possibly on the 24th. of May catch some trout or catch - indeed I do not know if they can go ' fishing. AN HON. MEMBER: Inaudible. MR. ROBERTS: The minister who represents that constitutency says a lot more than the few - their only interest in fishing as such is the sports fishing end of it. And I suspect there are a few other constituencies where that is true.

Stephenville, the Town of Steohenville, one of the new seats of Stephenville is not terribly affected by the fishery. The district of Port au Port would be. There are a very few districts in Newfoundland, particularly, Your Honour, when we come to the Northeast Coast,that great stretch of coast that begins, I suppose,really be gins about Bay<de Verde,which is the first large fishing community. St. John's is one of the largest fishing communities in this Province, and it always has been. But, you know, if the fishery were to disappear from St. John's we would not have lost the economic base of tllis city.

The city exists by taking in,essentially,to use a metaphor, the washing of the rest of Newfoundland and then laundering it and sending it out hopefully washed. Indeed a gentleman who once sat in this !louse, and no doubt, will again, Mr. Wells, Mr. Clyde Well s used to refer to St. John's as being a parasite. AN HON . MEl''BER: Inaudible. 2635

April 1, 197 5 Tape 883 (Afternoon) PK - 3 MR. ROBERTS: A colourful phrase, one which St. John's probably found offensive, but one which is not necessarily inaccurate in the sense of describing the economic role. But, Your Honour, the point I am making is quite simply that this is the first time in this House we have had an opportunity really to discuss the fisheries in the way it should be discussed.

I hope that, there is not exactly a full Chamber, indeed we have an understanding that there will be no quorum calls during the sittings of the Select Committee, but I think it is indicative of the fact that there are so few members here. I regret the fact that the Select Committee is not here, Sir. I know they are having sittings, and I know they have the right to have sittings, and I know that they are under a deadline.

Still I regret very much the fact that the Chairman of that Committee when he realized that the fisheries estimates were to come on - and he must have realized it, because on Thursday when we rose the Minister of Fisheries finished his introductory remarks on this heading of his salary- I regret that the Chairman did not immediately get on the phone to his colleagues on that Colllllittee, the eight or nine other members who service on the Select Committee and say, look, boys on Tuesday they are going to be d6ing estimates for the Fisheries Department. We are all interested in the fisheries, let us be there.

Let us be there to see what is said, and see what we can learn. Let us also be there so that we can add to the debate. And I resent that. I think it is unnecessary. The Committee could have just as easily - I know they have a full

schedule - the Committee could have just as easily have sat tomorrow, as sit today in Carbonear and Placentia. One can get to Carbonear, and one can get to Placentia reasonably easy at any time. In view of the fact as the gentleman, the Minister of Fisheries has already pointed out the Committee have sort of been told that their 30th. of April deadline is a little flexible, that they could have easily taken the day and spent it here · in the House. Now, Sir, I listened wi.th great interest to what the minister had to say. I think I have followed everything he said. And I must say he is the first Minister of Fisheries, and I am trying very carefully

April 1, 1975 Tape 883 (Afternoon) PK - 4 to avoid getting into the sterile debate of the twenty or thirty men who held that portfolio over the years, but certainly he is the first Minister of Fisheries,in recent years,who has taken hold of that department. His iDDDediate predecessor was an unfortunate experience for the fishermen of Newfoundland. IDDDediately before that the Premier was Acting Minister of Fisheries, and that was a charade. But the minister has taken h6ld of the department, and, I think, that is a very good thing.

The minister - he bas already gone after me, he may again - when he was appointed I said that I thought it was a demotion for him. I think it is. He may challenge that. He moved from being in a portfolio that is traditionally number two in the government to one that while it should be number two or number one is not. While it was a demotion for the minister, I have no hesitation in saying that I think it may well have been the best thing to have happened to the fisheries certainly since this administration took office.

And I would be prepared to say on judgment yet to be rendered that it may well have been the best thing in many, many years. For all of his reasons I listened with great interest to what the minister ltacl to say. Ile cannot claim to be a fishermen by birth or even by descent. I suspect his ancestors abandoned the fishery fifty or one hundred years ago, ahont the same time as did mine. Indeed his grandfather and my grandfather were engaged in a - I was going to say - no I will not say it - but at least mutual business dealings which each of them intended to be to the other's disadvantage. MR.

DOODY: No wonder they both got out. ~!:l.. IWilEllTS: Well I am not sure whether they both did get out, Mr. Chairman. But the honourable gentleman cannot claim to have been decended from a long l:i.ne of fishermen but he can claim, and in fact has brought to the fisheries a lively appreciation of the problems. \·.'ell,r iwpc so. I thinlc it is necessary because the ·Newfoundland fishery today is beset on every hand by problems and by difficulties. The word crisis is overworked, it is a word that particularly those r,entlemen who write radio news headlines dearly love, but I think it is 2637

April 1, 1975 Tape 883 (Afternoon) PK - 5 probably not inaccurate 1 Our fisheries today are approaching a crisis. They may be in the midst of a crisis. It may be about to burst upon us. But if it not already here or about to burst upon us, it is not very far away. And I listened with great interest to what the minister had to say because I believe that he appreciates this fact. What he said was good as far as it went, but 2638

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 884 NM - 1 did not go far enough. I would hope when the minister speaks either again in this debate on the minister's salary 1and it is our hope on this side, Mr. Chairman, that in this department as with most others will have the extensive debate on the (01-01) heading, the minister's salary and then we will take whatever time the committee sees fit for this and "then we will go down through the items, relatively quickly. If there is some question that we wish to ask we shall or if there is some connent the minister or one of his colleagues wish to make, well then of course they will.

The thing that struck me about the minister's speech was the fact that he offered no solutions. Now I am not saying that he should have offered a panacea, I am not sure that there is anv all embracing solution to the problems of our fisheries. I am quite convinced there is no perfect solution. Fisheries have been studied and studied and studied and then studied some more. Over the years we have had royal commissions, task forces, high priced officials, smart politicians, we have had every kind of study that could possibly be imagined.

But I think what is remarkable, what underlies all of the reports that have been submitted and all of the speeches that have been made is that nobody has come up as yet with the perfect solution. Most people who have approached the fisheries have not come up with any solutions. I would hope the minister, when he speaks again, whether he speaks on this particular item or some other throughout the Fisheries Estimates, will outline to us the range of his thinking, the range of solutions which conceivably could be brought to bear.

Some people advocate for example that we should nationalize the fisheries, by which I understand them to mean that we, the people, through the government, should buy out all of the private industries in the fisheries and they should all be held in the name of the Province or in the name of the Crown or some Crown Corporation or some publicly owned body, 2639

April 1, 1975 TApe No. 884 NM - 2 be it provincial or be it federal-provincial or be it,for that matter , entirely federal. I am unable to understand how that is an answer to the question. It may be a desirable move to make. I have nothing against the philosophy that there are some types of activity that the public should own and that only the public should own. It may well be that the fishery is such a line of activity. Nor do I have any argument with the philosophy that there are many types of activity that the government can e_ffectively carry out.

I do not think that anybody would for a moment suggest that we should, in Newfoundland or in Canada, allow private companies to build roads and then rent them out for toll roads. That could be done. There are countries in the world that need - we nearly got to that point at one stage in Newfoundland. There was a suggestion back in the late twenties that Mr. Henry Ford of the Ford Company, the original Mr. Ford was going to bail out Newfoundland,as I recall it.

We were in financial difficulties then, as a Dominion as a country, and in return for that all he wanted was the simple concession of a - he was going to build a road across the island too, We would have had the Trans-Canada forty years earlier than we did, All he wanted in return was a very simple concession, the right to charge tolls on the Trans-Canada. Well,I do not know how serious that proposal was and I do not reeall the year in which it was made.

Itmay have been when the Monroe Administration was in office or it may have been when the Squires Administration was in, but whatever administration was in, spurned it and scorned it. I do not Chink anybody would say anything about that. But the nationalization of the fisheries, Mr. Chairman, is not in itself an answer. There is a lot of public money in the fishery now and I think that gives ·us at the very least the right to control the fisheries, to control the activity of the fishing companies, but I am not sure that owning all the fishing companies and, 2640

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 884 NM - 3 for that matter,owning all the fishing boats would take us any further forward, But it is one option. There are a number of others which I could outline, The point which I am trying to make is that I would like the i&inister to give us some outline of his thinking, of the administration's thinking. The m•nister resisted the trap which many felt he might fall into, the t~ap which many of his colleagues have fallen into over the years of attacking Ottawa, of trying somehow to pretend that the answer to all Newfotjndland's ills are in Ottawa.

I think the answer to a great number of our problems lies in Ottawa. Ottawa has jurisdictional control of the fisheries that we do not and Ottawa much more importantly has access to sums of money that well beyond our means as a province. But what sort of future does the minister see? What kind of fishery are we going to have? Are we in Newfoundland today on the verge of seeing happen in the fishery what has happened to our logging industry? Ten or fifteen years ago there were in Newfoundland 20,000 men who made part of their living from the logging industry.

All along the Northeast Coast, all through Central Newfoundland, all down through Western Newfoundland, men would go into the woods camps or into the woods and log for a month or two or three, make a certain amount of money and then they would go the rest of the year and they would fish or they would work on the roads or they would farm. ·Most of them would fish 1of course. We had what the economists tell me was sort of a plural economy. Over the years, and a very few years indeed, Mr. Chairman, we have seen a fundamental change in the Jogging industry.

I suppose today~Your Honour,there might be 3,000 men making a liv.ing out of the logging industry. They are making a very good living. Some of them, the men who work with the Bowaters Company,have just signed a contract for a very substantial rise in their wages. Almost without exception, Mr. Chairman, they are full-time loggers. They are men who have no other regular activity, They may be laid off for a month or two in 2641

April 1, 1975 Tape No. 884 NM - 4 the Spring or in the Fall, most of them are off now because of the roads, the fact that the ice and frost is coming out of the ground and it is not possible to operate on woods roads, indeed it is not possible,as the Minister of Transportation told us earlier, it is not possible at times to operate even on the regular roads in parts of this Province riRht now. But are we going to see that in the fishery? Maybe we will. Then if we are going to,should we?

Or should we try to prevent it~ It is all very well to say that, you know,it . is inevitable,that it is going to happen that we are going to have a full - time fishing industry~and certainly on the South Coast, the trawler fishery, the fishery which begins at Catalina, that is the most northerly port, to have trawlers fish into it now, it goes right around, I suppose Port aux Basques is the most westerly community with a fish plant now, there is nothing north of Port aux Basques by way of fish plants in which trawlers are based. That is essentially a full - time fishery now. That is very important.

It is all-important to those areas, but it is not the numerically important fishery and it is not the fishery that is important to the other fishery, the fishery which is important to the Northeast Coast of the province. I am concerned about that fishery. I think the problems of the trawler fishery are very real. I will say a few words on it a little later when I talk briefly about marketing and talk briefly about fish stocks. These are problems which affect the fishery, the trawler fishery. They also affect the inshore fishery)but what is the future for the inshore fishery? What ranges of choice do we have?

Can we develop in N~foundland a fishery that is part and .parcel of the rural economy? I do not think it could be maintained,Your Honour 1 that we can develop along what I call for purposes of convenience, the Northeast Coast,but really is the ice bound coast because that is the distinction, Sir, the ports from Bonavista North, the outharbours from Bonavista North and around into the Straits of Bella Isle and then the Labrador Coast, particularly that southern coast from Lance aux Clair up to Red Bay and to Mary's Harbour, ~5•? - "t ,._

Apdl 1 , 1975 Tape No. 884 ~ - 5 I suppose all the way to Cartwright or the communities out of which the men fish because they do not fish out of Cartwright,as Your Honour knows,but they move to Cartwright in the Winter. In the Spring they move out onto the Coast to Tub Harbour and Packs Harbour and Spotted Islands and these coimnunites and fish there. That fishery is dE"termined by the ice, by the Arctic ice and by the inshore ice. So it cannot be a year r-ound fishery. It cannot be a year round fishery for the fishermen. Well then,what is going t~ be the future?

We ~an extend,I believe,the role of the fish plants by trucking fish, Indeed,! understand that a certain 8!1\0unt of this has been clone. FisheryProducts have done a certain amount of this. They extended last year the season at Twillingate. The Fishery Products Plant at Twillingate worked longer thati it previously had because fish was trucked into it. Haw far can we extend this? Can we do it at Sonavista? There is a fish plant thei-e. Can we 2643

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 885 Page 1 - mw do it at Twillingate? And we ~o up as far as LaScie, the next large fish plant going North. What about Englee and St. Anthony, the other two large plants along the Northeast Coast? What about Port au Choix, which has a longer fishery now. Port au Choix must be eight or nine months of a fishery now, but it is still closed for a period over the winter. MR.P'. ROWE : They are lucky to get nine months. MR. ROBERTS: My friend and colleague from St. Barbe North says that they are lueky to get nine months.

They are, but they get a longer season by several months than do people fishing just on the other side of the Northern Peninsula, who really do not fish very much beyond mid-November at the latest, and cannot get fishing in a normal year until well on into May. Last year it was July 12, and they were still losing nets through ice action. Well maybe we will be able to extend the plants, the working season of the plants by trucking or for that matter by freezing fish round.

Perhaps trawlers could operate into those plants and could - it would mean extra freezing capacity, holding capacity, Your Honour but large quantities of fish could be put ashore, frozen round, held there, and then processed over the months when now the plants are closed. I would like to hear the minister talk about this, whether he thinks this is a feasible idea, whether it is something that is going to be done. But what about the fishermen themselves? Can anything be done to extend their season? I think some steps can be taken, better boats, better equipment. We cannot do anything about the ice.

You know that is beyond any man's control. But I am worried about the fishermen along the Northeast Coast. I have seen, even in the few years that I have been in public life, Your Honour, and I have come to know a little about the fishing along the Northeast Coast, about the life of the people 2644

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 885 Page 2 - 111W who depend on the fishery, I have seen what amounts to a quantum change in the fishery. I suspect we have seen more change in the traditional inshore fishery of Newfoundland in the last ten or fiteen year than were seen in the two or three hundred years before that.

Up until a very few years ago, the fishery was an inshore fishery and most of it carried out by men who fished within sight of land and who came home, who came to their home community, their home port every night, Whether they salted their fish or whether they sold it fresh and then it was processed by a fish plant, in either case, they proceesed it quickly and their fishing income was a portion of their total income. It may have been a large part. It may have been a smaller

part in some cases, but it provided an essential part of their income. And by turning to the fishery and by the other jobs that from time to timebe­ came available to them, working on roads or on construction or on logging or what have you, these men managed to make a living. Well, I am coming to believe now that I do not think that that is possible any more. I think that has been the experience of my constituents, Of really anybody who has looked at the Northeast Coast would have to come to the same conclusion. The Storey Committee, the committee headed by Professor George Storey and Mr.

Alexander and a number of other learned gentlemen from the university, really did not come to grips with that question. I had hoped they would. In that sense the committee's report was a disappointment. They assumed that the traditional plural economy could continue. I do not know whether it can, MR. BARRY: MR. ROBERTS: Did not the commission say they agreed to the - The Minister of Mines and Energy, I am not sure. I have it here, but they may well have assumed. They certainly assumed that it should continue. MR. BARRY: I think a Director of the Bargaining Committee said that they thought it would continue. MR.

ROBERTS: You know, they may well have come to the conclusion that it could continue, but they gave little attention to it. As my 2645

April 1, 1974 Tape no. 885 Page 3 ~mw colleague and friend from Bell Island says, they tended to direct their attention, first of all to the licencing question which they were asked to look into . - well that is fair enough - and also into the marketing end of it, But we still do not know.

I do not think ·anybody could put forward the Storey Committee Report as being at all a useful doc1.DD.ent on that point, the point of the future of the traditional inshore fishery or, I think, they use the tenu;, plural economy ~r something of that sort of thing that sociologists come up with, but the guy who makes part of his living fishing and the rest of it wherever he can. MR. BARRY: You do not have the hard cold facts on the n1.DD.ber of dollars they can make - MR.

ROBERTS: Well, we are lacking in data, Indeed, it is staggering, The minister, having been in government now for a year or two, would, I know, agree with us. It is staggering how m11ch information there is and how little of it is really useful. Governments in Newfoundland,and I suppose in Canada~have vast whacks of information at their disposal but remarkably little of it is useful or is in form that is particularly helpful to policy makers. For example, as I mentioned, we do not know how many fishermen there are. We have no definition that I am aware of, even statistically, of what is a fisherman?

MR BARRY: (Inaudible). MR. ROBERTS: Well, it would help to know whether we are talking about five per cent of the people of Newfoundland or fifty per cent. MR. BARRY: Well, it depends, Maybe a definition of a fisherman for different purposes, for the purpose of income stabilization 1that is one thing, 1and for the purposes of gear replacement maybe is another. thing. MR. ROBERTS : Well, as the minister says, the Minister of Energy, we can have different

definitions for different purposes. And indeed the fishermen's fishing industry Collective Bargaining Act has a definition of fisherman in it that is about as embracing and all- 2646

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 885 Page 4 - mw inclusive as it could be, which is a definition for that purpose, for the purpose of the Collecti~e Bargaining mechanism. The fact remains, on the inshore fishery, we just do not know exactly what is involved. We all have our ideas based to some extent on personal knowledge, based on our reading of history, based on what we know about the Province and what we have learned from our endeavours over the years. But the fact remains that we do not know what is going to happen along the Northeast Coast, and the people there, Mr.

Chairman, are beginning to sense, and I detect a very real feeling of malaise. I think Dr. Llewellyn Parsons who worked at the university on a recent study on Career Aspirations and Career Expectations of Students and of their Parents in Newfoundland was one of the most revealing doc\Dllents that I have seen or read of in some considerable time. I do not propose to paraphrase what Dr.

Parsons and his group came up with, but I think I am being accurate when I say that they finding was, with respect to the inshore fishery areas, the ice fishery areas, that very few parents wanted their children and very few of their children wanted themselves to enter the inshore fishery as a career. That was the aspiration side. When it came to the expectations side, a very large percentage of the parents and students, involved felt that they would end up in the fisheries.

And the moral there, of course, is that the fisheries, in the eyes of this study or these people, and I think it is an accurate feeling, the fishery is not a desirable way to make a living, the inshore fishery. And that, Mr. Chairman,presents a very real challenge for the minister and for the policy makers and for all the people in this Province. Because if there is no inshore fishery, if the traditional inshore fishery along the Northeast Coast does not continue, then the Northeast Coast, as we know it, will not continue. And we will see, Mr.

Chairman, I venture to predict, changes in population and in the way people live 2647

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 885 Page 5 - mw and in the places they live that are far greater than any we have ever seen in Newfoundland. Because in community after comlD.unity along that coast, Mr, Chairman, the only reason that people settled was to prosecute the inshore fishery. And now if they cannot prosecute the inshore fishery, the question then comes1what are they to do? What are they to do? Ear1ier today in the House we talked briefly about Buchana.

The people of Buchana, economically, are living under a death sentence, The feeling is that mine, the Buchans mine, that supperted those people for all those years, will close, will close within the very near future of three to five years, Well,what is going to happen to the inshore fishery? Is it under a similar death sentence? I do not think it is. I hope it is not.

But I would like to hear the minister's views and his comments and his opinions,because I beiiev~ this is one of the essential questions facing us today, We can talk about income security programmes, and I will say a few words about those because I think they are an important part of the answer, We can talk about new gear and technology, But what we need is a commitment by the people of Newfoundland and by the Government of Newfoundland, and I do not in that sense use the word governmedt to speak about a Tory Government of a tiberal Government, I am talking about a government as a collecttYe expression of the will of the people, the wish of society.

We need a commitment 2648

April 1, 1975. Tape 886 RH - 1 to preserve our fishery and to develop it and to make it a viable industry in 1975 terms. It is not now. I do not know if the minister has any data. I have none. I have not been able to get any. I am told none is available on the age group distribution of the nine or ten or eleven thousand men who now prosecute the fishery - he is shaking his head to indicate he does not have it. My own observation of my own constitutency and other places I go is that most fishermen in this Province are very much on the older portion of the work force. There are very few young men going fishing.

I speak here of the inshore fishery. There are s0111e. I could name a dozen men in my district who are young men, who have made a commitment·. The Port au Choix area, Anchor Point, Port Saunders, many young men have taken on large commitments in the form of longliners, small trawlers and that like and are committed to the fishery, but by and large, if there are 10,000 men working in the inshore fishery, I would venture that as many as 8,000 of them are within five to ten years of a normal retirement from the work force. Now, what does that mean for Newfoundland? I think the figures are accurate.

I can only put them forth as a suggestion as an estimate or as a guesstimate. Statistics Canada cannot give us any information. The various fisheries departments cannot. The minister, I gather, has been unable to locate any. It might be a very useful study and perhaps when we come to registration, not in the sense of licensing but registration in the sense of getting some information, a very useful piece of data would be exactly what is the age group structure of our fishermen because, Your Honour, if my assumption is correct, it shows that the fishery is dying.

If that is not acceptable,and it is not to me, then what steps should we take to try to get younger men to come into the fisheries? As part and parcel of that, we have got to answer the question, 2649

April 1, 1975. Tape 866 RH - 2 can we get younger men to go into the traditional inshore fishery as we have known it and as it is still practiced in large parts of this Province? The rough figure we are always given is 10,000 fishermen, Sir, in the inshore fishery. There may be - how many longliners are there - 500? MR. CROSBIE: In that area, yes. MR. ROBERTS: Of the order of 500 longliners. Given five men to a longliner crew, that is 2,500 men.

That leaves us by these calculations approximately 7,500 inshore fishermen, men who prosecute the fishery from trap-skiffs, from small boats using gill nets, very few traps left, some hand lining, most of them a combination of whatever they can tum their hand to. I have come up the figure 7,500 inshore men, but I am not putting these forth as laws of the Medes and the Persians. I am going from about 10,000 in the inshore fishery. If there are 500 longliners let us take five as being a medium crew, medium sized crew, that is 2,500. That leaves us roughly 7,500 who prosecute the fishery by traditional means.

This are the same men who fished for lobsters by and large, or who fished for salmon. They are not the men who fish for crab, but then again the number of men prosecuting the crab fishery is relatively small, possibly a couple of hundred in all and it is confined to relatively small - I am sorry? MR. CROSBIE: MR. ROBERTS: MR. CROSBIE: MR. ROBERTS: There is about just over 600 longliner type vessels. Well, I thank the minister. So if there are 600 - And about 8,000 motor boats. Yes. ~ell, then my rough figuring was not too far off, the information he has that - MR.

CROSBI-E: They say here about 10,400 inshore ground fish fishermen plus 8,000 motor boats and the rest in the longliners. MR. ROBERTS: Well, in other words, my figures were not that far off, but I thank the minister. So, we are talking maybe 8,000 men. The longlinermen are in a little sub-category for these purposes. They are not as outdated technologic•lly as are the inshare boats. 2650

April l, 1975. Tape 866 RH - 3 The age of those 8,000 men, I would suggest, on an average or on a meduim, Mr. Chairman, is very, very high. Their sons are not following them into the fishery and that holds a real message for us economically because many of the very large nmnber of people unemployed in Newfoundland today~ many of them are younger people and if they cannot look to the fisheries and they are not able to find alternate er•ployment, then our problem as policy makers and as a House of Assembly is far greater. It also presents a social problem and I cannot underline this too heavily, Mr.

Chairman, because I think it is crucial. The Northeast Coast of the Province just cannot exist in its present form if there is no work Pvailable for the men and the women who live in these smaller communities. Over the years, I have heard talk about well, we will develop nodal cODD11unities. That was a great phrase that the officials and the experts had at one stage and we are going to have little roads linking co111111Unities. Well, the centralized schools are a good example of a nodal type of concept. There it is applied to education, but it also could be applied to the fisheries.

There may be something in that particularly if the length of the fish plant operating season can be extended by the means I have suggested, either trucking in fish from areas where fishing can continue longer than it can in ice areas,or by freezing fish round and then processing it a little later on. That is sometimes done now, for example, in Fortune where you get a glut offish corning over from the Burin Peninsul•, from the Point May - Lawn-Lamaline area.

During the trap fishery they freeze the fish round in Fortune and then they process it a little later on when there is a lull or a lag in the trawler landings. What is going to be done? I hope the minister will speak to that point. I think it is absolutely crucial. Indeed, I would not want to say that any one problem is the single most important problem in the fisheries in Newfoundland today, but I think it is 2651

April 1, 1975. Tape 866 RH - 4 fair to say there is no problem more important than that question of the future of the Northeast Coast,the future of the traditional inshore fishery. I think even under redistribution there are twenty-five or thirty seats in the area affected. That shows the number of people who live in these areas. You could really start, Your Honour, I suppose you could start at Port de Grave District and you could work all the way around the Coast, certainly into the St. Barbe District and the new Port au Port District, the Bay of Islands District to a lesser extent.

The people there tend to work in Corner Brook or in that area. But in all that area the insho~e fishery is paramount and I would hope the minister, I would ask him if he would speak to that. At this stage I am not quarrelling. I may or may not quarrel with him. That depends on what he says, but I think it is a major problem. I think it is one which only now is emerging and I suspect we have not got very long to try to solve it.

If something is not taken, action is not taken, I do not think I am being an alarmist, but I am saying that:in five or ten years I can see the fishery, instead of having 8,000 men in inshore boats, maybe there will only be 1,000 or a couple of hundred. If they are getting, as I suspect, if we getting to the point where the labour force is getting on up in years, they will begin dropping out of the labour force and no replacements coming in. That may be inevitable. I hope not. If it is inevitable, alternate sources of employment have got to be produced.

The Rural Development Department has been a cataclysmic failure in this sense. It may or may not have been set up to try to deal with this problem, but if it was, it has not. I am not even sure they understand the problem in that department, but it certainly has not come to grips with the problems of people in our small fishing communities to provide viable employment. If there is no future, if that is the conclusion that we come to, we as a House or the people of the Province, then in fairness the 2652

April 1, 1975. Tape 866 RR - 5 people of the Northeast Coast should be told that, so tliey can plan their lives accordingly and so they can build their coimn\inities accord.ingly, if that is to be the future, But we are seeing a steady drain in population now, Mr. Chairman, and I am not talking about resettlement. We can talk atout that if we wish, but in 2653

April 1, 1975 Tape 887 (Afternoon) in outhabour after outharbour along the Northeast Coast, and along the West Coast we are seeing a steady drain· away of people, the younger people. Part of it is inevitable. There has always been a movement from rural areas to urban areas. I suppose the first big example of it was when Dick Whittington came up to London, I think it was in 1315 to become the Lord Mcyor. There has always PK - 1 been this drain.

Many members of this House, the honourable gentleman for Placentia West grown up in the community of Brigus, a rural community which at one stage was the third or the fourth largest co1lllllunity in all of Newfoundland. MR. BARRY: I was born in Red Island. MR. ROBERTS: He was born in Red Island, but he can take no claim for that. He left Red Island at an early age, and therefore it may have been the cultural centre of Placentia Bay. But he grew up, his formative years were spent,as I understand it, in Brigus. The honourable gentleman came to St.

John's to make his home and to carry out his life's work as have thousands of Newfoundlanders.But that pace is accelerating, Your Honour, the pace of change is accelerating, and as I have said when I began this we may be witnessing what I can only call a quanttm1 jump, a jump completely unlike any that has gone before in the inshore fishery in this Province. That is one point that I would hope - I have developed it at some length - but I would hope the minister would speak to it. I make no apologies for dealing with it at some length.

I think it is important enough, I think it is important enough, in fact, Sir, that we were to debate nothing else in this session of this House of Assembly except the fate of the inshore fishery and what future there is, and what can be done to make the future what we believe it should be and what people want it to be,then we would have earned our keep. I think it is one of the great issues.

It may or may not be a political issue but it is one of the great concerns, one of the great issues that must be dealt with by anybody who is interested in the public problems of Newfoundland today, and who is interested in trying to make this Province a better place to live in. The minister is going to Ottawa,as he told us,today week 2654

April 1, 1975 Tape 887 (Afternoon) PK - 2 to 11,ttend a meeting called by Mr. Leblanc, I believe the other four ministers in Eastern Canada, the Atlantic Provinces and Quebec will be there. They are going to have a look at some studies that have been prepared. It may be premature but I hope the minister would give us some indication of exactly what range of options are being considered. A one-day meeting in Ottawa is not going to solve any problems. The most that could happen at a one-day meeting is that five men and the minister at Ottawa, !·!r.

Leblanc, six men,come together with their officials and they agree upon a series of decisions. But the studies I am sure are going ahead, they have been underway,we are told,for months now, and the deadline of April 30 was set some months ago, It is not going to be met 1 apparently. We are not going to have any :J.ong range settlement by the end of April. Indeed I do not think it was ever realistic to expect one. When the minister talks of middle range programmes - just what is, what sort of time range are we talking of? The next few month? The next year, two, or three?

And when can he see, and when can he see a long range plan being worked out? And what can he see in j t? All these meetings are very useful, and I am sure there is much information passed back and forth. But we have been studing the fisheries now - this administration came into office a little more than three years ago, I think the fishermen of Newfoundland 1who believed rightly or wrongly that the Liberal Administration had let them down.

We can debate that if we wish, but they believed it, whether they were right or wrong - I think three years ago they believed that the Tory Administration would somehow come to grips with the problems of the fisheries, and would make some major changes. Certainly they were encouraged, the people of Newfoundland, the fishermen of Newfoundland were encouraged to believe that by the Premier and by statements made by other members of that v,overnment. Well,here we are three years later• We still not have seen the answers.

We have not even been told what types of answers, what ranr,e of possible answers are being considered. I am not blaming the minister for the sins of his predecessors. They have a heavy enough burden to carry on their own, but I think the minister might indicate to us the sort of ranges we are looking at. Just what is being considered? 2655

April 1, 1975 Tape 887 (Afternoon) PK - 3 And perhaps then if he takes the people of Newfoundland and the fishermen of Newfoundland into his confidence, we might get a better policy. I believe we would. The Select Committee exercise , Your Honour, will not serve that purpose.

The Select Committee will provide a forum, and i t is providing it whereby people can come forward and, I think it is fair to say without detracting from those who appear before the Committee or those who are on the Co1111ittee th.at we will in almost every case merely hear the repetition of points of view that have been made before and suggestions th.at have been advanced in earlier days. What is needed n= 2656 - ----·----- -- --

April 1, 1975. Tape 888 RH - 1 is not further studies. I would infinitely prefer a Select Committee to be set up to have a dozen ranges open to it, a dozen possible policy options and then go to the fishennen of Newfoundland and the people of Newfoundland and say,now here are the types of things we could see being done. There are argU111ents in favour of each and against each. You give us your view. That is the sort of leader­ ship that I would expect from the Minister of Fisheries.

He has not been in the job quite long enough yet to expect him to do it, but I would hope very shortly we will be in that pesition for the inshore fishery, for the deep sea fishery, the trawler fishery, the ice-free fishery, whatever Y~ur Honour wishes to call it. I am very disappointed at the - I think the Select Committee is being sent off to do their work with both hands tied behind their back. All they are doing really is going around the Province, maybe valuable but it is not enough, going around the Province to hear briefs.

People are not being asked to respond to initiatives or to respand to policy suggestions. They are being asked merely once again to go through the well known litany of what is wrong with our fishery and what should be done about it. I do not think for a moment the government are looking to the Select Committee for policy ideas. The mere fact that the Conmittee was only set up as a last minute decision two or three weeks ago, and I say it was a last minute decision because it was not even referred to in the Throne Speech. The idea of select committees was not foreign to the government.

There was a Select Connnittee referred to in the Throne S~eech, but it was not the Fisheries Connnittee. It was a last minute idea, obviously, for political purposes. If we are going to have an election this year I suspect the government would want to be able to say well, we did set up a Fisheries Connnittee and we heard the peoples' views. But I cb not think the government are looking to it for advice or for suggestions. The minister's statement that there is going to be a meeting on the 2657

April 1, 1975. Tape 888 RB - 2 eighth of April which is going to look at further suggestions put forward by the officials is a much more meaningful statement for the fishermen of Newfoundland than the hearings of the Select Committee. I think the Committee could have done even better work than it will do. Mr. Chairman and his members will try very hard, but I do not think they are being given the ammunition to enable them to do the job properly. Mr.

Chairman, if I could turn briefly to some of the specific problems which I see confront our fisheries now, I would like to make some reference to three specific areas, the marketing area, the technology area, call it the offshore stocks area, whatever one waats to call it, but let me call it that for the purposes of these few remarks. Let . ·me speak first about offshore stocks, This is the glamorous part of the problems of the fishing industry. It is a problem that:is very well known, It has been extensively publicized.

The SOFA Organization, the Save Our Fisheries Association, which seems to have become defunct, I do not know if - Is the minister - MR. CROSBIE: MR. ROBERTS: No, it is defunct as far as I know. It is defunct. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Inaudible. MR. ROBERTS: Well, that may very well have been, but, I mean, it seems to\have disappeared, but it has served a very valuable purpose for two or three years. It is sort of, not a distant early warning device, but as an early warning device. I think the problem is well known.

I think most people in Newfoundland feel that they are aware of the problem in declining stocks and the problems of over-fishing. I think the solutions are equally well known. We debated it at some length in this House on a resolution which I brought in and which was amended by an agreement between myself and the gentleman from Placentia West. But it is essential that we get control of our fisheries out to the edge of the Continental Shelf, the Margin. It is essential for two reasons. One is a negative one, 2658

April 1 , 1975. Tape 888 RH - 3 passive one. That!is to preserve what fish~ we now have, to preserve what we now have. The trawlers, I think one of the reasons underlined the very long and very bitter di·spute, the trati:ermen strike which happily hal!I now ended was the fact that boats, trawlers, were getting constantly sm,aller catches. A few years ago one of the modem stern trawlers, if it did not bring in a half million pounds of fish for seven days at sea, thl! captain would be looking for e111ployment elsewhere.

Now, if the one of the stern trawlers in ten days at sea can bring in 150,000 pounds of fish, that is c.onsll.clered a pretty good voyage. Well, that bas obviously knocked the ecQn(7111ics of trawler fishing right into a cocked hat. So, we have got to preserve our stocks. We have got to make sure that they are managed properly. It is obvious that no international agency can do it. ICNAF bas failed completely. We have tried the ICNAF route. It will not work. That is why I feel that it is the duty of the coastal state, I think that is a widely accepted view, 2659

April 1, 1975 Tape 889 (Afternoon) PK - 1 that is why I feel that if Canada does not succeed in getting an agreement interna:~ionally at this Conference in Geneva now1 the LOS III then we should go ahead and act unilaterally. We have __ , all sorts of precedents for it in Canada. We have our own domestic precedents, the Arctic Territorial Waters Pollution Bill, pollution Act is probably the most recent, the most in point.

We have all sorts of precedents internationally going way back to the anchovies swimming off the West Coast of South America, and the unilateral proclamation of 200 mile -limits in the early '50's. Or the Americans in 1946 in the Truman Doctrine unilaterally proclaiming their jurisdiction of the minerals of the Shelf. We do not have to be ashamed of unilateral action if it is the only way to achieve what is an essential end. It does not make us bad boys internationally.

And in any event I have long ago come to the conclusion that we should stop worrying about rocking the international boat, we should start being concerned about the man in the fishing boat. But, Mr. Chairman, there is a very positive reason why we should take control of the fisheries out to the Margin of the Shelf, and that is, we could then increase our total fish catch · by three or four hundred per cent.

Because whatever fish were caught then, Sir, would either be caught by Canadian ships or - and I would very much regret this - by foreign ships acting under Canadian licence. 1 think Canada should catch the fish, and then if other countries need,it as they do, we should sell it to them. We can catch it and process it as cheaply as can any other people. We do not have to go across thousands of miles of the Atlantic Ocean to catch the fish. We do not have to create great huge factory ships, We have our factory ships.~ They are on shore, fish plants.

We should not deny these countries access to the food they need, If they are prepared to pay a fair price for it, we should be willing to sell it to them. So to me the convincing argument, the glorious future that we could get out of the Continental Shelf control, control of our fishery resources,is a vast increase in the fishing industry in 2660

April 1, 1975 Tape 889 (Afternoon) PK - 2 Newfoundland. Not just the inshore fishery but in the deep sea fishery where we now have four connnunities on the Burin Peninsula thriving, prosperous because of the four fish plants there, In Trepassev, Harbour Breton, and Gaultois, Ramea, Burgeo, all of which can have a great future if the stocks are perserved. Port-Aux-Basques, Bonavista, which should become a trawler port, Catalina, Harbour Grace should become a - here in St. John's where we now have five or ten communities thriving on the trawler fishery, we could have twenty or forty.

And I think that should become a cardinal point of the policy of the Government of Newfoundland. The Continental Shelf is securing the control of that fishing resource, Sir, is absolutely vital to the future of this Province. Let me turn then to the question of technology. Within the past two years, and I speak particularly here of the inshore fishery) we have gone through a revolution in gear and technology.

A few years ago, Your Honour, almost any man could get into the fishery, All he had to have was a trap skiff or a punt or some sort of a boat, a couple of hundred dollars worth of nets and he was a fisherman. Today, Sir, the fishery,eve~ its simplest form,its economically most primitive form, that fishery is becoming a very capital intensive industry. It is nothing now for a fisherman to have $20,000 or $30,000 worth of boats and gear. Even a trap fisherman is talking of that sort of money.

Longliner fishermen,who used to be contemplating an investment of $30,000 or $40,000, longliners are now coming to $100,000, $150,000, $200,000. They are now beyond the means of an ordinary fisherman. Even with the programmes which may have been adequate in the past, the programmes under which most of those 600 longliner type boats were built, of a ninety per cent loan, and a fairly generous repayment terms and low interest 1 there is no way, Your Honour, that our men could move into modern fishing boats with those programmes.

We have always been a few years behind in technology in Newfoundland, or in Canada for that matter. It has been said that generals are always concerned with fighting the last war. Well, Mr. Chairman, we have being equipping ourselves constantly for an ever 2661

April 1, 1975 Tape 889 (Afternoon) PK - 3 outdated fishery. And I would ask the minister what he can see, what he is going to do, what he proposes to help. The costs are going up, 2662

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 890 Page 1 - mw boats are being repossessed,and the minister might speak on that. I understand that the Fisheries Loan Board has embarked on a policy of becoming much more strict. They are cracking down, my colleague says on the people who have loans and who have not been able to rep~y them. Well that may be a very good business move, but it may be very bad policy. It may well be,and indeed I know of a number in my own constituency, men who have fished very hard, who have just not been able to make enough money to service the debt.

They cannot deny the fact that they have not serviced the debt. They have not met their legal obligations. AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible), MR. ROBERTS: Well,that might be a good thing. But I am concerned and I would like to hear the minister - there has been no statement of policy on it. It has just been a tightening of the screws, a more Scrooge-like attitude. I am not sure that it will benefit our fishermen.

If a fisherman is not able to meet his commitments, then I do not see how it solves the problem or it helps the Newfoundland Commonweal in anyway to take his boat away from him, and what investment he may have in it goes. I always understood the Fisheries Loan Board had adopted a de facto policy, it may not have been a written one or a published one, but a de factor policy, if a fisherman had not been able to make his payments because he had not been able to get the fish and he bad tried very hard to get the fish, they would not take his boat away from him, They would sort of add it on, AN HON.

MEMBER: (Inaudible). MR. CROSBIE: That is still true, MR. ROBERTS: The Fisheries Loan would be a very never- never loan indeed. Because it really was not intended as a loan, Sir. MR. CROSBIE: Well,now that is not true. MR. ROBERTS: Maybe we should move, Mr. Chairman, to a concept of providing fishermen with boats. And, I think whatever we do on 2663

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 890 Page 2 - mw on the Northeast Coas~ the inshore fishery, it is going to involve getting our fishermen into bigger boats. If the inshore fishery does not suffice, and I do not think it will in its present form, I do not think it can continue in its present form with small trapboats, we are going to move to near deep water or to mid-water technology that is going to involve very large sums of money. Maybe the time has come when the government should adopt a concept of the government owning the boats and renting them to fishermen.

We will take a certain portion of what the fisherman catches in a year. We do it with text books. If we could do it with school text books, why cannot we do it with fishing boats? It might cost a fair amount of money. I suppose, Your Honour, you could invest 1we11, $100,000, each, you could invest $50 million and only have 500 boats. That might be enough, but in a Province that is now talking of borrowing $1.6 billions and that is a floor, it will go up from there to develop hydro electric power, surely we can contemplate $50 million or $100 millions going into the fishing industry.

I think along those lines, we may have to look at gear banks. While I am on gear banks, what happened to the - AN HON.MEMBER: (Inaudible). MR.. ROBERTS: Well it has been in about seven throne speeches. Whatever happened to the committee set up about nine months ago, in the middle of an election? It is amazing, Your Honour, how this government's initiatives in the fisheries come in the middle of elections. On June 17, 1974 the Premier, obviously reacting to, I venture to say, some panic calls from Mr.

John Lundrigan and other Tory candidates who were about to pay the price at the polls for the Premier's neglect of the fisheries, ~he Premier issued the following statement. I assume he issued it. He came out from our Information Service. It read: Within the next week a conmittee will be set up to investigate the concept of a fishermen's equipment and gear banks in an effort to help offset the rising costs 2664

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 890 Page 3 - DIW of fishennen of the Province. The government's subsidy programme which ranges from forty to six per cent is not resulting in lower costs for fishermen's gear and equipment. The fishennen are not receiving the full benefits of the subsidy programme, when they are faced with almost daily price increases. AN HON. MEMBER: 'the Premier said it? MR. ROBERTS: Oh, yes. Well I do not know whether the Pr-ier said it, as my colleague asks, it was over the Premier's name.

It says, I believe - so it must have been the Premier -~ it says, I believe part of the problem lies with the suppliers of fishmen's gear. It seems that the suppliers were inflating their prices as soon as increased subsidies are announced. I am not satisfied with this situation. This is why I have asked the Minister of Fisheries to set up a colllllittee to determine the full facts of the mat~er. The make-ap of the committee will be announced by, it names the Minister of Fisheries, who was then the member for Gander, in the near future. And I would hope that their investigation will bring positive results.

Well, Mr. Chairman, nine months is a pretty good gestation period. It is as 2665

April 1, 1975. Tape 891 RH - 1 long as any of us enjoyed. I do not know whether the,a011D11ittee was set up or not. It may well have been that the most- the Premier's next positive in fisheries was to remove the Member from Gander as Minister of Fisheries, but I would like to know what came out of it. I would like to know the results of the investigation. The Premier states his belief. He does not lay a charge as such but he states his belief that the suppliers are inflating their prices. Now, Mr.

Chairman, the heavens alone know that I am not going to stand here and defend such charitable institutions as John Leckie Limited and others. They are obviously in it for the buck. They are going to get all they can out of it and one of the regrettable things is that we are coming to a stage where we have a near monopoly in fishery supplies. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: They are about the only one - MR. ROBERTS: Well, Leckie's are certainly the largest firm in the fishing supply business now, nets, ropes, and what have you.

I do not know what proportion of the market they have, but it is a very large proportion and it is getting larger. Are they inflating their prices? The government have the power to find out. If this government can take a judge of the Supreme Court a year-and-a-half to inquire into allegations which were unfounded and made against my colleague from Bell Island, surely they can find out, surely they can find out about inflated fishing gear. The Premier has stated his belief. Now, I assume his belief was well founded. One can only assume it was. I will give the man the benefit of the doubt. He is not here today.

I do not begrudge him his holiday. I hope Bermuda is a pleasant place to be and I have no doubt Bermuda has its fishery problems too,and doubtless is being investigated. Mr. Chairman, I would like the minister to tell us exactly what has been done. Has that committee being appointed? If so, have they reported? If so, what did their report state? What action has been taken? Furthermore, I would like to know whether the 2666

April 1, 1975. Tape 891 RH - 2 Premier's belief has been borne out and if so, what are the government going to do about it? Maybe we should have a crown gear corporation. It has been suggested by a number of people, my friend from Bell Island, the gentleman from Bonavista South who is so helpful to the Minister of Fisheries. Indeed, I do not see why they do not make him at least associate Minister of Fisheries. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Minister of State - MR. ROBERTS: Minister of State for the Fisheries. No, I would not put him that high. MR. NEARY: - only allowed to attack Ottawa. MR. ROBERTS: Mr.

Chairman, a number of honourable gentlemen have suggested this and maybe it should be done. I do not know if it would lower prices, but at least it would guarantee that there was no inflated profits in it. A crown corporation could sell gear for exactly the same price as it bought it, together with whatever the justifiable overhead charges are. Then, if we are going to have a subsidy, let us build in the subsidy. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Inaudible. MR.

ROBERTS: Well, the minister may say the fishermen abuse it, but the fact that there may have been abuses in gear prograDDDes is a telling commentaryon the minister as much as it is on the fishermen, the minister or his predeccesor. I realize the minister inherited many of these things and cannot be held to account for them, but it is a pretty damning indictment of the administrative set-up set up by the gentleman from Gander. He presided over the birth of this monstrosity that has allegedly cost us millions of dollars. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Inaudible. MR.

ROBERTS: Now,now, now, the gentleman from Gander now plays his usual game of asking if I am against it. Well, Your Honour, I do not like bad eggs, but that does not mean I am against hensjand that is the answer to the honourable gentleman. That is an answer in full measure and one which is intellectually every bit as honest as his 2667

April 1, 1975. Tape 891 RH - 3 approach. If the minister has nothing to contribute, he should be as silent now as he was during his tenure of the office as the Minister of Fisheries. We are talking about serious problems. The Minister of Fisheries has approached them seriously . If the honourable gentleman from Gander, if the honourable gentleman from Gander, he had his couple of years in the fisheries and he was a complete and unmitigated disaster. Indeed, the best thing the honourable gentle­ man ever did for the fisheries of Newfoundland, Sir, was leave the portfolio.

The best thing he did, it was the most positive thing he did. If the honourable gentleman wants me to debate his tenure of office, I would be delighted to do it, but I do not feel par­ ticularly it would help the community to get ahead and I think it is quite relevant to the minister's salary, Sir. But I do not think it would be particularly - it would be great fun, be amusement,but it is like taking candy from a child. It is Poor sport. The minister would be well advised to keep quiet and let his colleague,who knows something about the fisheries and has an appreciation of the problems deal with it.

If we lost, if we, the people of Newfoundland, lost a million or two millions through that Gear Replacement Programme, then the administration is more to blame than anybody else. They are the people who paid it out. They are the people who set up the system, 2668

April 1, 1975 Tape 892 (Afternoon) PK - 1 but I am concerned now about this gear bank, and this great announcement, this great announcement that the Premier made less than a month before the election. And I am sure I am not being uncharitable nor inaccurate when I say the fact that it was annnounced during an election was the major reason the Premier made that announcement. MR. NEARY: It is too bad he is not here to answer it. MR. ROBERTS: Well the Premier, if we had to wait for the Premier to be here the House would be sitting in mid-August. MR. BRETT: Inaudible. MR.

ROBERTS: We would still only be on the Fisheries estimates. He has left his assistant here, which is a clear case. MR. BRETT: You spend a lot of time - MR . ROBERTS: The honourable gentleman for Trinity North is one of the few men who can enter a room and add nothing to what is in the room. .\fil. BRETT: Ver/ funny! HR. ROBERTS: Now, Mr. Chairman, - indeed the honourable gentleman adds considerably to the presence of a crowd in the room by leaving that room. /1R. BRf.I'l' : Very funny! MR. ROBERTS: Now, t!r. Chairman, the gear bank problem is a very real one.

The government last year moved to increase subsidies, Quite a substantial extra amount of money was made available. And I do not blame the government, I do not hold them to account for the fact that prices of gear are rising. I blame them for what they control but they cannot control that. But, Sir, our fishermen are running into rapidly increasing costs, and they are increasing far more rapidly than their ability to meet them. So, Nr. Chairman, I appreciate if the minister would speak to tliis point.

I am sure he is familiar with the Premier's press release ·1rnt if not I should be happy to send him a copy of it. I read it in its entirety . As far as I know there has been nothing done since, but I confess that I may not know everything on this point and a number of others that the minister could tell us. AN llON. 1IBMBER: Inaudible. 2669

April 1, 1975 Tape 892 (Afternoon) PK - 2 MR. ROBERTS: I would like him also to tell us of what he thinks of this idea of a gear bank) whether we should have a crown corporation that purchases gear. So maybe Mr. Leckie goes out of business, Well, that is tough. My heart breaks for John Leckie Limited. My heart breaks even more for the fishermen of Newfoundland. If we can get gear into the hands of fishermen cheaper then let us act, let us set up a gear bank. Maybe be we should lend fishermen gear, just as we, I think, should lend them boats.

If we are going to have fishermen, Sir, they have to have equipment, and if they cannot afford to get the equipment on their own then they are going to have to get it from public funds. That is as obvious as the night following the day. We use large sums of public money to invest in economic dev~lopment. Let us use some money here. While I am on the questions I would like the minister to deal with, and I realize this one is a legacy from his colleague, his predecessor,- I do not know.

The Minister of Health obviously has a crucial question, Your Honour, but I am trying to ask the Minister of Fisheries whose estimates are now on, and perhaps my cousinly colleague could do me the courtesy to let me make mine, unless it is absolutely crucial, in which case let us adjourn for five minutes~ But I am talking about fisheries, and the Minister of Fisheries may be minjster of a number of other things. And I could tell the minister he is going to get his strike because of his maladro•it handling and no other reason.

But the thing I want to bring up to the minister now is, exactly what happened to the trawler fleet? His predecessor announced that tenders had been awarded for trawlers, the famous trawlers. The Premier, Sir, had them sailing, I thought I saw my colleague for St. Barbe North earlier looking at the P.C. Times - the P.C. Times that was the one from Hermitage was it? Where they tried a con job. Oh, yes, yes, the P.C. times, Your Honour, Tory Times, Volume I No. 30 It ceased publication after the third issue. It ceased publication on Polling Day. Your P.C. action government, It may be Your Honour's, it is not mine.

But I read now - it has been put under a number of 2670

April 1, 1975 Tape 892 (Afternoon) PK - 3 tables, and indeed it is in with those people in Hermitage district who are unfortunate enough not to have indoor facilities have also put it to good use . A.'< HON. HE!-IBER: }tr... ROBERTS: Inaudible . Now Tory times are hard t imes, no matter what it says on the booze glasses the y used at Tory Conven t ions . Anyway, ''New Trawler Programme Will Expand Fishery" is the headline in this document .

Your P.C. action government is proceeding with one of the r,reatest most imaginative fish development progralllllle ever undertaken in North America . (Paragraph) the paragraph is important, Your Honour, i t indica tes a new thought. The government has decided to esta blish a trawler prog.ramme at a cost of $60 m.illion over the next three years to greatly expand the Island 's fishing industry, provide many hundreds of jobs on the fishing trawlers themselves, and many hundreds of new permanent jobs in fish ?)rocessing plants around the Island . 2671

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 893 Page l - mw It names the Premier. Oh, I could read it. It is not improper. Premier Frank Moores and Fisheries Minister Harold Collins say - in unison they say this - that when in operation the government owned trawler fleet will provide existing fish plants with a continual large source of supply so that they will be able to operate at a continually high level of employment. So far so good, Your Honour. I mean, Your Honour, I know, is with me and we all devoutely wish that that was true. The people in the Hermitage district were deceived by the Minister of Fisheries on this point.

It goes on. The government will order twenty ships immediately with the first seven to be delivered at the end of 1974, the next seven at the end of 197§ and the remainder at the end of 1976. Already naval architects have completed plans for the ships and shipyards in many parts of the world have been contacted to give quotations on building the new vessels. AN HON. MEMBER: It is true. MR. ROBERTS: Oh, I have no doubt. Maybe a letter went out saying, this is a contact, give us a quotation. Now what I want to do, Your Honour, and it is really unfatr to hold the present Minister of Fisheries responsible for this.

I have no doubt he will give us one of his spirited defences. Maybe he will go on the offence, which is his usual practice when he cannot defend. But, Your Honour, in November 1973, and all of this was not published under the Lieutenant-Governor's imprint, I think it is fair to regard it as being a statement of administration thinking on a number of points. I doubt if it was in with the law. The law required every newspaper to be deposited in the Department of Provincial Affairs. But it was 2672

APril 1, 1975 Tape no. 893 Page 2 - mw widely circulated in a portion of the Province during a time of some public discussion of the issues therein. I want to know exactly where the seven ships are that were going to be delivered at the end of 1974. Perhaps the minister could give us their names, thett cost and where they are now being used?

I do not have a reference here, but I am sure I could find one, Because I remember the Minister of - what is he? - the Minister of Forestry and Agriculture he now is, briefly until he gets turfed out of this portfolio, as he has been out of two others, announcing in the House that tenders had been awarded, Either saner heads prevailed or the ministry backed off from what would have been a very unwise proceeding. But I venture to say that the Minister of Fisheries will be unable to give me the names of those seven ships, because no contracts have been let.

Indeed, Sir, the only activity we have seen is we have seen a vast amount of money lashed out on Harmon I and 11 to convert them. They are still at Marystown being converted. Are they out of Marystown now? AN HON. MEMBER: 0ne is down in St. Uohn's Harbour. MR. ROBERTS: Well then the honourable gentleman is much closer to St. John's Harbour than I am. I certainly hope the honourable gentleman is. Harmon! and 11 then have been converted, and there are the three experimental boats, which as of about ten days ago _were still decorating the Marystown Shipyard, very strange looking vessels. AN HON. MEMBER: ~culpin. MR.

ROBERTS : The sculpin is an ugly fish, and it may be that the sculpin, as such, would not be an unfair name for them. But they are still there. They have been there for two or three years. I do not know whether they were built aa a make-work project for the yard in an effort to keep the yard going 2673

April 1, 1975 Tape no. 893 Page 3 -mw or whether they were built as a serious innovation in the fisheries. Where are they going to go fishing? I think the strike that was caused last week was caused by, as I understand it, British workmen coming in to work on those ships. AN HON. MEMBER: No, the Atlantic boats. MR. ROBERTS: The Atlantic boats, the new trawlers for Atlantic Fish. But in any event, they are there. Vast amounts of public money have gone into them. They have not as yet caught even a sculpin. As far as I know, they have not even been in the water. They are still sitting there, the three - MR.

DOODY: One of them is in the water now and the other two - MR. ROBERTS: One in water? MR. DOODY: The Minister of Fisheries knows. MR. ROBERTS: Well he knows everything. Well we will let him speak about it. MR. DOODY: (Inaudible). MR. ROBERTS: He says one is in the water and two others, three years later 1are still a lovely baby blue colour, Your Honour, just the nicest baby blue, Your Honour could want, and there they sit decorating the foreyard of the Marystown Shipyard. Well I would like to know what happened to the trawler programme.

It obviously has been consigned to the junk heap, and I think ~hat is probably a good thing. There may be a time in a year or two when we will need such a programme. We do not need it now. So the government might let us in on their thinking. believe, I have not looked it up, but in the estimates a year or so ago, there was a large amount of money - it must have been the Industrial Development Department - to enable some ships to be constructed. MR. DOODY: There is some money in there now, a subsidy for ships. 2674

April 1, 1975. Tape 894 RH - 1 AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Inaudible. MR. ROBERTS: No, but that is Atlantic Fish. I am talking about the great new plant, the ones the Premier used to boast about before. I give the Minister of Industrial Development full marks. He is even cannier than I had though and I had always thought he was a fairly canny fellow, but if he was so canny that he resisted the suggestion that these should go into his estimates, more power to him. I could look through the estimates. There was some money, I think in last year's estimates or the year before.

The Minister of Fisheries,as he then was, was very much on his feet defending the great progrsmme and either he knew it was a charade, in which case he was misleading the House, I do not think he was doing that, or he was distributing his ignorance of the matter. AN HONOURABLE MEMBER: Conditions changed. MR. ROBERTS: Yes, conditions changed. They changed overnight and a great long-range planning progrsmme suddenly came to nothing. Out of those twenty ships, Sir, not one keel has been laid, not one rivet has been riveted and not one fish has been fished.

The only thing that has happened to that programme is the Minister of Fisheries was replaced. That may be in itself enough to justify it. Now, Mr. Chairman, we must save that. That should go int the archives as an historice document along with a lot of other broken promises by the Tory Government. Now, let me talk about shore facilities, Sir. The minister spoke at some length on shore facilities and there is a fair amount of money in his estimates this year for shore facilities, most of it coming from Ottawa -