1976 Legislative Session: 1st Session, 31st Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

FRIDAY, MAY 21, 1976

Morning Sitting

[ Page

1951 ]

CONTENTS

Routine proceedings

Constitution Amendment Act, 1976 (Bill 15)

Introduction and first reading. Hon. Mrs. McCarthy — 1952

Committee of Supply: Department of Health estimates.

On vote 86.

Mr.Cocke — 1952

Mr. Macdonald — 1955

Hon. Mr. McClelland — 1957

Mr. Cocke — 1959

Mr. Wallace — 1964

Hon. Mr. McClelland — 1968

Mr. Wallace — 1970

Mr. King — 1971

Hon. Mr. McClelland — 1973

Auditor General Act (Bill 45)

Introduction and first reading. Hon. Mr. Wolfe — 1973

The House met at 10 a.m.

Prayers.

MR. L.B. KAHL (Esquimalt): Mr. Speaker, in the gallery today

is a group of students from Esquimalt Senior Secondary. They are

accompanied by Linda Petch, Christy Luke and Andrew Reeves, their

teachers. I would like the House to bid them welcome.

HON. T.M. WATERLAND (Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources):

Mr. Speaker, at 11 o'clock this morning we will be joined by a group of

grade 10 social studies students from Hope Secondary School, and they

will be accompanied by their teacher, Mrs. Koopman. I ask the House to

join me in welcoming them.

HON. G.M. McCARTHY (Provincial Secretary): Mr. Speaker, in

the House today are the students who are graduate students of the first

legislative intern programme in our province. They complete their term

of service this week and they are with us today on their graduation day

just prior to leaving for Ottawa where they will be one week in Ottawa

observing the legislative process in the House of Commons.

I would like to tell you about these interns. These are 10 young

university graduates who are interested in the political and

legislative process. They commenced their training in January.

Briefings by various government departments were arranged by my

department, and in that regard I would like to thank Mr. Semmens of our

department who has done such a tremendous job of co-ordinating this

programme.

The programme was arranged to provide the interns with the idea of

the responsibilities and method of operation of all of the departments.

Following the briefing and indoctrination period, the interns were

individually assigned to a number of departments to work in those

departments on projects which would give them a better and a clearer

understanding of government business.

When the assembly began sitting on March 17, the interns were

assigned to each of the caucuses of the political parties represented

in the assembly and, in addition, one intern was assigned to your

office, Mr. Speaker. While in the caucuses, the interns were employed

on constituency and legislative research. We have all been most

impressed with the interest and enthusiasm displayed by the interns

themselves and by the most positive comments received from all who had

dealings with them.

I would like to pay tribute, too, this morning to Dr. Walter Young whose responsibility,

leadership and expertise the interns have shared. They have benefited greatly

from his programme.

We are very fortunate indeed to have had 10 such bright young people

sharing with us and some of the members of the House their first

legislative experience. I'm sure that both for the MLAs who are here

for the first time and for these interns who have had this opportunity

for the first time, it has been an inspiration for them. I know it has

been a very great inspiration for us, Mr. Speaker, and I ask the House

to bid them a very fond farewell to this experience and hope that they

will return and benefit all the rest of their lives from the experience

they have shared with us.

MR. W.S. KING (Leader of the Opposition): I would

like to associate the official opposition with the remarks of the

Provincial Secretary with respect to the interns from the University of

Victoria. Three of those young people were assigned to work with the

New Democratic Party caucus and certainly we enjoyed having them with

us. We found them to be sensitive to the function of government and the

system of politics that we work under. They were most helpful, and I

certainly hope that they benefited from the experience with our caucus

as well.

I want to also express my appreciation to Dr. Walter Young for

taking the initiative in terms of developing this programme and to

congratulate the government on initiating the programme. I just want to

say, Mr. Speaker, that I hope the government considers very seriously

continuing this programme on an equal basis to this year, if not an

extended one, because I think that kind of practical experience in the

everyday affairs of our province and in the practical method in which

government operates is invaluable in terms of their education along the

lines of political science.

I certainly want to thank everyone involved.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, the

Provincial Secretary made a very gracious statement in which I join

along with that of the Leader of the Opposition as well. I would like

to extend my own personal and professional tribute to this group of

parliamentary interns. Like, I suppose, other party leaders I had an

opportunity for a joint meeting with all of them and was very impressed.

As a one-person caucus I perhaps have the right to mention one

person by name and that's a particular word about Mr. Eric Burkle who

was an intern with our group. He was extremely hard-working, bright and

helpful, as were they all, and I hope that a lot like this group come

back next year.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, I

[ Page 1952 ]

would have no hesitation in expressing my strong

support of this initiative which was taken by Dr. Walter Young. I also

would hope I'm not intruding on any privilege by naming Miss Leanne

Berry, who was attached to that powerful political force in the

province which is the Progressive Conservative caucus. Without being

too flippant I would say that Leanne took

part in meetings every day in

a very active way and contributed in a very mature and, to me,

inspiring way, because of the recollections of how little education we

at that age received in parts of the United Kingdom, for example.

I think the programme has worked very well. I was just a little

perturbed by the Provincial Secretary's use of the word

"indoctrination" in describing the discussions that were held. I'm sure

she didn't mean it in the least desirable way, as sometimes applies in

politics. But I do feel that this programme merits the support of all

of us and I congratulate the government, as the Leader of the

Opposition did, in supporting this programme in the way they've done. I

also hope that it will be continued in the years ahead. With the

greatest feeling of warmth I do wish the interns the very best of luck

in their visit to Ottawa and in their continuing careers, whether they

involve politics or not.

Introduction of bills.

CONSTITUTION AMENDMENT ACT, 1976

Hon. Mrs. McCarthy presents a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor:

a bill intituled Constitution Amendment Act, 1976.

Bill 15 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on

orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Orders of the day.

The House in Committee of Supply; Mr. Schroeder in the chair.

ESTIMATES: DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH

(continued)

On vote 86: minister's office, $101,052 - continued.

MR. D.G. COCKE (New Westminster): Mr. Chairman, we began this

vote last night — vote 86, discussing the Minister of Health's (Hon.

Mr. McClelland'

s) responsibilities. One of the things we talked about

last night was the far-ranging responsibilities of the Minister of

Health. It is a ministry that really takes care of some of the most

basic needs of the people in British Columbia, a ministry that other

jurisdictions look at with a good deal of envy, and a ministry that

those people across the border — certainly I've had contact with many

of them in the United States — particularly look at with envy.

We have, for instance, in the United States a federal ministry of

health, education and welfare. Of course, they're called a secretariat

down in the United States, but it just indicates how much more

attention we pay in this jurisdiction to the health and welfare of the

people in our province and, for that matter, in our country.

We're delighted that over the past our particular party has added a

great deal of depth to the health provision for the people in our

country. Many of you will recall that in the past there were great

fights over medicare. As a matter of fact as recently as in the mid

'60s there was a discussion that grew into an argument, and an argument

that was so great that ultimately it ended up in a doctors' strike in

the province of Saskatchewan. That strike will never occur again

because now their doctors recognize the importance of provision of

health care to all people on as equitable a basis as is possible.

Mr. Chairman, we have to look very carefully at the people and

particularly the person who is most responsible for health care

delivery in our province. I indicated last night that we had felt to

begin with that the Health department would not require too much

discussion in the early sessions of this new parliament. Given an

opportunity to produce, the Minister of Health could very well be

spared a lot of in-depth discussion.

Mr. Chairman, I did indicate some sorrow in that the minister did

decide to make some rather grave changes very early on in his ministry

that I think could very well hamper the delivery system, particularly

with respect to education.

Mr. Chairman, something else occurred — something that I think most

of us view with alarm. I'd like to take you back to a mid-April

question period. I believe it was April 15, on a Thursday. I may be

wrong on the dates, because I don't have the particular date or Hansard

before me, but I recall very well asking a question with respect to

moneys that were given to various hospitals, particularly lower

mainland and island hospitals, that seemed to be somewhat more than

should be indicated necessary at the end of the fiscal period. At that

time we were asked to wait for the answer to the question — which would

also indicate to me that it was prior to the 15th — until the minister

could more thoroughly check his facts.

Mr. Chairman, I don't particularly want to deal today in any great

depth with whether or not certain moneys were paid that should have

been paid — I think that was pretty well made clear. I could argue, I

think, on some of the basis for moneys being paid at

[ Page 1953 ]

the end of the year, and I know perfectly well that

when I was Minister of Health those kinds of payments were made to

hospitals in order to even up the budget so that moneys due in the last

fiscal period would not be charged in the next fiscal period.

We thought that an inordinate amount had been put into that area and

we were concerned about it. So, Mr. Chairman, I asked the question and

the minister checked. The minister checked carefully and, to my

profound regret and amazement, the answer was given and then

gratuitously, beyond giving the answer, the minister publicly

admonished a public servant.

Now, Mr. Chairman, I believe that was a savage blow to our system. I

believe that using a public servant to take that kind of heat has no

place in our system. The British parliamentary system is one that I

think gives us an opportunity each to take our responsibility where

that responsibility is made clear. How can we expect a public service

with loyalty? How can we expect a public service that can become in any

way at all avant garde, in any way at all become imaginative in their

interpretation of what they feel is necessary to perform their duty?

Mr. Chairman, it's my view that no minister of the Crown has the right

to drag a public official through the kind of political mire that a

publicly elected person has to, by the very nature of his work, expect.

Each of us who runs for political office knows full well that in doing

so we have to take the heat from time to time, and, as our

responsibilities grow....

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: That's right. And as our responsibilities grow,

Mr. Chairman, as we take further responsibilities, and particularly

ministerial responsibilities, then that kind of responsibility

indicates very clearly that we are the ones who should be taking the

criticism, the public criticism, that is our due, whether or not we are

directly involved. I suggest that we cannot have an effective public

service if public servants are looking over their shoulders at all

times, concerned about every move they make, everything they do, for

fear their reputation can be impaired, not just for now but for always.

Mr. Chairman, I think this is a most serious matter — a most serious

matter indeed. I don't think that any public official at any level —

and I am talking in terms of appointed public officials — I don't

believe that it's our right as parliamentarians, as ministers, to let

our officials take the heat. In accepting the appointment, we accept

everything that goes along with that responsibility and that

appointment, and that is to accept directly and gracefully our due in

that respect.

I believe that what occurred as a result of the answer to that

question was something that, had the minister even thought about it

carefully, he would have come to a far, far different decision. Nobody

has named this unnamed person. Nobody has named this public servant,

and I hope that never occurs, but Mr. Chairman, everybody knows that a

serious demotion took place as a result of this particular situation.

The reason they know is because it was made public. I suggest half a

minister would have corrected the mistake he made immediately, but such

is not the case.

I'm dealing with something that I think we should all deal with

seriously over the next few months. I think that B.C. has oftentimes

had a name for being just a little bit bush-league in its way of doing

business.

I want to suggest to you that from time to time during the last

parliament the then-opposition reflected a great deal upon certain

public servants. I felt at that time that that was untoward, and I feel

today, as government, that it is even more untoward to reflect upon

public servants in this jurisdiction.

Mr. Chairman, if this kind of activity keeps up — and I suggest that

I sure hope it doesn't — it reflects a government that regards people

as tools, not individuals with character, not individuals with rights,

and particularly the right to public respect. That, Mr. Chairman, is

most important.

The one most important aspect of this thing that everyone should

recognize clearly is that public servants cannot, will not, defend

themselves. They have not the vehicle to defend themselves; they have

not the way to defend themselves, and certainly their entire

job-training, their direction, has always taught them that one cannot

defend himself.

So I suggest that attacks on public servants, no matter what public

servant, should not occur in this way. I'm not suggesting for one

second that administrative decisions should not be made around

deportment, around ability, around just doing one's job. Some people

can't handle particular jobs. I'm certainly not reflecting on this

particular case; certainly nobody is asking that that be hampered, but

to wash it in public is just far too much.

Mr. Chairman, I suggest to you that what occurred showed a lack of

dignity; it showed a lack of courage. I admonish the minister to think

carefully upon what he did. I admonish his colleagues to think very

carefully about their responsibility to the people in this province who

elected them. I say that this is no way to conduct the business. Mr.

Chairman, if you can't take the heat, you'll quit. You thought I was

going to say that if you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes!

MR. COCKE: Poor old Truman has been quoted

[ Page 1954 ]

so many times on that I felt that this time I would let him go.

Mr. Chairman, seriously, we must be.... I suggest to you that any of

you in the back bench who are looking very optimistically toward those

front benches, take this matter seriously. Anybody who sits there and

laughs about a situation as serious as this doesn't expect the respect

that this side of the House can afford from time to time to those

members.

Mr. Chairman, I just hope that what has occurred won't be repeated.

I hope that we'll all take a lesson from what has occurred here in the

last while. As opposition, to some extent they got away with this kind

of activity, but in no way should we expect this kind of activity from

government members.

Now, Mr. Chairman, last night I discussed for a very brief moment or

two the medical-centre concept. I suggested that if you want orderly

development and delivery of health care, if you want orderly

development of health training, then the last thing you want is to see

a situation where groups are pitted against one another. So in order to

provide an opportunity for all of the groups in this province that were

interested or involved in those two processes, we put together an

organization called the B.C. Medical Centre.

I went over a few of the names of the people who spent thousands and

thousands upon thousands of voluntary hours. I talked about the

past-chairman of the medical centre, Jack Christensen, who,

incidentally — and probably the minister didn't know — is no

card-carrying member of the New Democratic Party. He is the president

of Tahsis Co., and he was past-chairman of VGH.

Jack Christensen spent many, many, many, many hours working toward

the goal that we had set, a goal, Mr. Chairman, that we were told by

the top brains in medical care in Canada was to provide an

opportunity to bring B.C. back into the fold in this country. B.C.,

unfortunately, had been a jurisdiction that was so far behind the rest

of Canada that we didn't even look good compared to Newfoundland.

Newfoundland had a better basis for their health training.

So, Mr. Chairman, there were people like Christensen; Dr. Bates, the dean of

medicine; Bruce Buchanan; Joe Corsby; George Donaldson, a CA; Gordon Draeseke,

chairman of the Council of Forest Industries at the time; Julia Levy, PhD, who

is a researcher for cancer at UBC; Walter Ross, a trade union person at one

time and now a business person; Sheila Thompson, PhD, at Douglas College;

J. Ronald Longstaffe, a prominent businessman and also a major shareholder in

one of the larger forest industries; Dr. Kenneth Hill, past president of the

B.C. Medical Association; Dr. Peter Ransford, the chairman of the emergency

health service; and Donovan Miller.

Mr. Chairman, these people gave of their time, much more than could

be expected by any citizen in this province and I was proud of the work

that they did. That work was to see to it that B.C. was put on the map

as far as putting its act together and co-ordinating the activities of

all the major hospitals and the UBC in Vancouver. The medical centre

wasn't just a bunch of people. It included the Vancouver General

Hospital, it included St. Paul's Hospital, it included the G.F. Strong

Rehabilitation Centre, it included the UBC and its hospitals, it

included cancer and children's and many other activities. But you know

what it afforded? It afforded them to work together instead of apart.

So what did this board do? They put together a group of top-notch

hospital planners. I predict that in this province you're going to have

real difficulty finding top-notch hospital planners to do a job such as

they did, because we are now looked upon with a very jaundiced eye by

those people who have any kind of information as to what occurred at

the stroke of a pen.

They also put together a group of senior administrators and they

also put together a group of first-class committees to research the

needs of the province, and then they put together first-class groups of

people to implement. The education committee was a good example, headed

up by the former dean of medicine at UBC. I think what we have to do is

think like that former dean of medicine, Dr. Jack McCreary — and he

always emphasized that health training was the top priority, not just

medical training.

We've heard the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) in here talk

in terms of medical training. That's all he can think about. But, you

know, when you train doctors you must train rehabilitation medicine

people. You must train nurses. You must train other paraprofessionals.

And you should train them all together. They should be all part of the

same concept, so it's not a case of UBC alone and it's not a case of

UBC making all the decisions with respect to health training. No, Mr.

Chairman, it is not. What it is is a way to produce the needed health

workers in our province, and we have been an absolute failure in this

regard in the province of British Columbia, a failure to the extent

that we've been left behind by every other jurisdiction, pretty well,

in this country.

So, Mr. Chairman, I suggest to you that in doing what that minister

did, there is no way that we can replace the people or the expertise

that have gone down at the stroke of a pen — or upon an election or

upon placing in charge Mr. Allan Kelly. I suggest that there's only one

of two reasons that I can see for this having occurred. One is the old

system. If you don't want anything to happen, you divide and conquer.

That old divide and conquer way produced what I

[ Page 1955 ]

would suggest to be the most antiquated teaching

and tertiary facilities that can be found, and we've suffered and we're

destined under this coalition government to remain there.

Just think of some of the details. What about the children's

pediatric centre that was announced sometime after the announcement

with respect to the medical centre being rent asunder? Well, I suggest

to you that what occurred was a result of that announcement, after it

was very clear that that hospital could have been underway now. But

what occurred as a result of the minister's decision was as follows:

we're back to the days of Charles Dickens. We're back to the days of

Charles Dickens, and let me tell you why.

I pick up The Vancouver Sun of April 27, and what do I find in the headlines? "Hospital Gifts Needed."

MR. J.J. KEMPF (Omineca): Humbug! Humbug!

MR. COCKE: Humbug? Yes, do you know where I got this, Mr. Chairman?

"'Large private donations will be required or the $30

million children's hospital will be a glorified tonsil department,' the

chairman of the hospital planning committee said Monday. 'The hospital

to be built on the Shaughnessey Hospital site will have unlimited

requirements for research and diagnostic equipment which will not be

paid for by the government,' Geoffrey Tullidge told the annual meeting

of the Health Centre for Children Society."

Who is Geoffrey Tullidge, Mr. Chairman? He is closely involved in this whole

question. Geoffrey Tullidge is the chairman of the children's hospital.

He is the president of the Children's Hospital on East 59th. He was also

appointed by the provincial government to head the committee drafting recommendations

for the new children's facility. So it is not, Mr. Chairman, as if Mr. Tullidge

doesn't know some of his facts. I suggest to you we are back in the days

of Charles Dickens.

If we have to depend in this jurisdiction, in order to get a

children's facility, on private donations, then, Mr. Chairman, the

whole thing has just gone right out the window. The whole delivery

system is back many, many years. I am sorry about it, Mr. Chairman. I

really am.

I suggest to you that the hospital should not be a pediatric

hospital on its own. The minister, when he was announcing it, said he

had been informed by people in medical service that there was no need

to have those two hospitals combined — that is, the maternal and a

child-care centre. Let me suggest to you that the course the minister

has chosen is by far the most expensive course that one could ever

imagine. The duplication of facilities, the duplication of equipment

that will be required under these circumstances, is absolutely

scandalous, Mr. Chairman — absolutely scandalous! Why would you want to

divide the pediatric and maternal, which incidentally could have been

underway now? High-risk maternity and pediatric care are absolutely

hand-in-hand requirements. Everybody who is informed, with few

exceptions, suggests that those two activities should certainly be

combined right within the same institution. I can give you

documentation after documentation.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Yes, we certainly can, Mr. Minister of Labour

(Hon. Mr. Williams). I suggest to you that were you in any other

position, a person with your intelligence certainly would not have

chosen the route that has been chosen here before us. The need in this

province has been so great for 25 years, but what has the minister

done? He has, by the very nature of his decision, said that there will

have to be pediatric facilities for high-risk newborns at the VGH —

that is, equipment and facilities at the VGH — also at the new

children's hospital and also at Grace if, in fact, that is what they

are going to do with Grace Hospital. Mr. Chairman, it can be combined

and it is much, much cheaper.

I'll certainly get into as many more of the aspects of this as I can

later in this debate. Mr. Chairman, I suggest that the present plan

calls for a duplication of equipment the like of which can only be

described as an insult to the intelligence of the people in this

province. I would hope that the minister will very quickly change his

course in this matter.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouer East): Mr. Chairman, I just want

to say a few words following what was said by the member for New

Westminster, because I recall very distinctly the Minister of Health's

answer in this House at the time when he said a terrible mistake had

been made and money was paid out — I think it was $7 million to

hospitals — before March 31. "I have had to be very severe with

somebody in my department. I have had to admonish that person. I have

had to," I understand, "cut the salary by one-third" — I think from

$30,000 to $20,000.

Interjection.

MR. MACDONALD: No, you didn't say that, but I understand that

has happened. Mr. Minister, through the Chair, I suggest you have

broken one of the first principles of cabinet government in that the

minister is responsible and should not duck and dodge behind a civil

servant for the mistakes in his department or the mistakes of

government.

[ Page 1956 ]

Now two things are possible. A mistake was made by a senior civil

servant in your department. Now if that were the case, that's option

No. 1. If that were the case, it's very clear that the minister is

responsible. This is a responsibility that he can share with nobody

else. This is from the Hansard Society: "Members of the cabinet are

collectively responsible for the omissions as well as the commissions

of their colleagues, no less than being individually responsible for

every action which is done by them or by any of their civil servants."

That's not the way.... The minister nods his head. Ivor Jennings and

cabinet government...you came into this House and made a sacrificial

goat of a senior civil servant, and gave yourself out as "Mr Virtuous."

MR. CHAIRMAN: Please address the Chair.

Interjection.

MR. MACDONALD: Well, I don't know whether it's a headline or

not; I'm not concerned with that. But I say that that's what you did,

Mr. Minister; you did accept that you are responsible for what happens

in your department.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Please address the Chair.

MR. MACDONALD: I'm speaking particularly to the Chair, but I hope the minister's listening to what I say to the Chair.

MR. KEMPF: Absolutely the Point Grey socialist.

MR. MACDONALD: Was that a car dealer, or what was that down there?

This is from Ivor Jennings: "...the minister being responsible for

everything done in his department." In Herbert Morrison's book on

government and parliament, at page 321:

"Even if he has no real personal responsibility whatever,

the minister is still held responsible. He will no doubt criticize whoever is

responsible in the department in mild terms if it is a small mistake, and in

strong terms if it is a bad one. But publicly he must accept responsibility

as if the act were his own."

That's what you've not done, Mr. Minister. You did not deal with it

when you came into this House.

I'm saying what I'm saying at this time on the basis that the senior

civil servant whose salary was cut, who was publicly admonished, and

whose identity has to be known to everybody throughout your department,

throughout the civil service, and to many people around Victoria,

whether we hide the name or not, this person has been publicly

admonished.

I'm being kind in what I've said in the first part of my remarks

because I've assumed that the senior civil servant made a mistake. Yet

everybody in this House and everybody in the civil service in a senior

position in British Columbia knew perfectly well that up to March

31,1976, this government was asking, through the civil service, that

money be shovelled out in this and that direction to pile up the debt

of 1975-76.

HON. R.H. McCLELLAND (Minister of Health): Nonsense!

MR. MACDONALD: I knew it; everybody here knew that that was

happening and that the direction was coming through the Department of

Finance. Your senior civil servant whose salary you have cut, whom you

have publicly admonished and made yourself "Mr. Virtue" in the process,

that man was carrying out the implicit wishes of the Social Credit

government of British Columbia.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order please. Order!

MR. MACDONALD: And yet you.... What's the point of order, Mr. Chairman?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Member, I ask you the second time: please

address the Chair. Just so that it's clear as to what that means, to

address the Chair means that you do not address your speech directly to

any person in the House, that you address it to the Chair. "You"

becomes "him," and "you" becomes "he." The member has been in this

House long enough to know that.

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Chairman, then I want to tell you about

the conduct of a certain Minister of Health. I want this conversation

to be between the two of us. I'm going to refer to what he's done. I

hope he listens in; I'm not afraid of eavesdroppers. (Laughter.)

What I'm just saying to sum it up is that there's no question here

that when the minister got up as "Mr. Virtue" and offered up this

senior civil servant as a sacrificial goat to be slaughtered to cleanse

his own position in this matter of funnelling out money to departments

of government, to agencies of the Crown, in any old way in which they

could spend it prior to March 31 in order to blame the NDP and make the

bottom-line guys happy, when he did that he broke one of the first

principles of government, which is that the department acts as a unit;

it acts as a team. The minister is responsible as if the act were his

own, and he has no right coming in here.... Even though a mistake was

made, the act is his own and he should apologize for it to the House.

He wouldn't do that.

In addition to that, I say that senior civil servant

[ Page 1957 ]

was simply carrying out the well-known policies

within the public service of this government up to March 31. He was

doing in the Health department exactly what happened in education when

the university presidents, to their astonishment, had the manna of $7.5

million drop down, and they said:

"Whooh, what government is this that gives us what we don't even ask for?"

The hospitals got the same thing. We all knew the buzz was through

the public service: "Any agency need any money? Now's the time to get

it. It's coming out of here like water. Ask now. After April 1 it's a

different matter."

So I say this minister should have been up front. He ducked and

dodged his own responsibility by admonishing one of his own civil

servants. I say that's bad for morale in the public service. I say it's

bad for the principle of ministerial accountability in Canada's

government.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Well, Mr. Chairman, the only member left

from Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald) is being as irresponsible as we

expected he would be, and if anyone is dragging a public servant's name

through the mire, it's that only member left for Vancouver-East and his

friend from New Westminster (Mr. Cocke.)

I accepted full responsibility for every action that was taken. I

still accept that responsibility and I have no apologies to make for

being part of an open government. I have no apologies to make, Mr.

Chairman, to those members for accepting the responsibility to the

public to ensure that our public service operates efficiently and

effectively at all times.

What you're doing today, and what that member, Mr. Chairman, is

doing today — I accept your admonishment in advance — what those

members are doing is dragging up an issue again which is going to, I

suppose, result in that public servant being named publicly because of

your actions.

MR. MACDONALD: Not your spanking, but our actions.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Because of your actions, that's correct.

Interjection.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I have no apologies to make and I would act in exactly the same way again.

AN HON. MEMBER: He should apologize.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Those members, Mr. Chairman, should apologize for the actions that they've taken in this House today.

Interjections.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: In accepting the appointment, we accept

the heat that the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) talked about,

and we have no apologies for accepting that heat, but neither have I

any apologies for taking a firm and responsible stand in the direction

of the department in which I've been placed in charge.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

AN HON. MEMBER: Duck the responsibility, that's what you're doing. What kind of a minister is that?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, we know the manner in

which the former government operated when they took no responsibility

for their offices but gave all of that responsibility to former

newspaper people, to former radio hotliners, to executive assistants

with no experience whatsoever. I wonder whatever happened to John Mika,

who ran the Insurance Corp. of British Columbia while the minister

ducked his responsibility, who ran the Transport and Communications

department while the minister ducked his responsibility. We don't

operate that way. We take the responsibility and we're in charge of our

departments.

MR. COCKE: Then why don't you do it? Why did you let somebody take a dive for you?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please! The Minister of Health has the floor.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I would like to deal with

a few of the issues — there weren't many — but there were a couple of

issues raised, certainly not by the only member left from

Vancouver-East (Mr. Macdonald), but by the member for New Westminster

(Mr. Cocke).

He talked about nothing happening. I'm sure we'll get into this in

more detail as the estimates go on, but there is a children's hospital

being built. If you'll recall, Mr. Chairman, the comments of the noted

pediatrician in the Vancouver area, probably the most noted

pediatrician in this area, Dr. Sidney Israels, when it was announced

that the children's hospital was going to be built after 40 years of

waiting, and certainly after waiting through the previous

administration's years when nothing happened, Mr.

[ Page 1958 ]

Chairman, his reaction was that he's delighted. I'm

happy about that and so are the medical profession in Vancouver and all

of British Columbia because we are going to have a children's hospital.

We're going to have a new Grace Hospital. We're going to have an

expanded cancer facility. Nothing happened. The member said the

children's hospital could have been started now under the plans being

formulated by the former government. Mr. Chairman, all that was

happening was that plans were being formulated, committees were being

held, meetings were being held, architects were meeting with architects.

We made total payments, Mr. Chairman, through the British Columbia

Medical Centre, to one architectural firm of $1.6 million and we were

paying that architect $50,000 a month and we never erected one brick in

a children's hospital anywhere. The children's hospital is going to be

started this year under this administration. You talk to Dr. Sidney

Israels if you don't think he's delighted and he's delighted, Mr.

Chairman.

Interjection.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Morsels! Mr. Chairman, I don't have any apologies to make about volunteers being involved in the children's hospital project.

Mr. Chairman, as a result of meetings that we had with the Variety

Club of British Columbia, following the recent very successful telethon

in which every part of British Columbia was involved in a most

heartening and meaningful way, it was decided that Variety Club wanted

to get involved in an ongoing way in providing services for children,

because that's what service clubs are all about.

I know that no one on that side of the House, Mr. Chairman,

understands either service or volunteerism. The people who are involved

in Children's Hospital understand volunteerism. Some of the members in

this House who served as MLAs for that community know better than I

about Children's Hospital. But for years Children's Hospital was the

recipient of many, many trusts and grants from wills and other kinds of

trust benefits that came to that hospital, and for some strange reason

approximately three and a half years ago those funds dried up. I wonder

why. It was simply because there was a change of government — a change

to a government whose attitude toward volunteerism was....

MR. COCKE: Nonsense!

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: That's right — nonsense. Its attitude was nonsense.

Those funds dried up. Well, I'll tell you, Mr. Chairman, those funds will

start flowing into Children's Hospital again and they will be put to good

use by the people involved in Children's Hospital. I have no apologies to

make for accepting volunteerism as a way of life and a desirable way of life

in this province in which we live.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I want to deal briefly

with the British Columbia Medical Centre. Yes, the decision was made

that we would not continue with the British Columbia Medical Centre. I

agree with the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke), Mr. Chairman,

that there were some very good people who served on the board of the

British Columbia Medical Centre, and particularly the chairman, Mr.

Jack Christensen, who found himself with a task that he was unable to

fulfil, in my opinion, because he was led down the garden path by the

previous government, which kept cutting out the rug from under those

people at BCMC.

In his own heart, I think the former Health minister also would

admit, if he was completely honest with us, that the BCMC wasn't

working. He knew it and he had to keep cutting back and had to keep

pulling things away from the board of the British Columbia Medical

Centre. That's too bad, because those people were dedicated. They had a

purpose but the purpose was taken away from them — not by this

government but by the previous government, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, all of those people were told well in advance that the British Columbia Medical Centre was going to be no longer.

Interjection.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: The member makes a good point, Mr. Chairman — no one has yet been fired on television by this government.

I would like to pay tribute to Mr. Christensen and that board of

directors, some of whom are still serving on the board and are serving

as the interim board for Shaughnessy Hospital.

Those hospitals which were member facilities of the British Columbia

Medical Centre, Mr. Chairman, didn't disappear in a puff of smoke —

they're still there and they still operate. When the concept of the

British Columbia Medical Centre was formulated, one of its principal

responsibilities was, as the member for New Westminster pointed out, to

co-ordinate the planning of hospital and education facilities for the

member institutions. It was thought, and I think that the people who

developed the concept probably thought they were doing the right thing

at that time, that the planning process for each of the hospitals could

be streamlined in a saving of both time and money. That was the

concept, but that wasn't the

[ Page 1959 ]

experience. The experience proved that this

arrangement was not successful. Instead of streamlining the situation,

the British Columbia Medical Centre did, if anything, make the planning

process more difficult by the introduction of a fourth body.

The centre, in its beginnings, may have given the impression that it

was to plan exemplary facilities. What it did, in effect, was to create

the demand for very expensive units — expenses which were far beyond

the capacity of this province to meet. That former minister, Mr.

Chairman, recognized that and that's the reason that the board of the

British Columbia Medical Centre was frustrated in its efforts to do the

job that it thought it had a mandate for but for which that mandate was

removed.

The role of the British Columbia Medical Centre came under question

by the Greater Vancouver Regional Hospital District, by the University

of B.C., by the Universities Council and by the very hospital societies

which the BCMC was supposed to bring together. It didn't bring them

together, Mr. Chairman. It drove them apart. The fundamental question

then that evolved when this government took office was: could these

functions of the British Columbia Medical Centre be performed by

existing agencies without the use of this special organization? It was

a decision that was made by myself and, again, I make no apologies for

accepting that responsibility. But it was decided that the planning and

construction of special facilities could be carried out much more

successfully in joint cooperation by the regional hospital district and

the province.

The senior staff of the British Columbia Medical Centre were also

prepared to agree that BCMC was not a satisfactory agency through which

to make and implement plans for health education.

MR. COCKE: You are absolutely out of your tree.

AN HON. MEMBER: Right on!

Interjections.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: The B.C. Medical Centre did make some

contributions but it was concluded that the return on the considerable

expenditure required to finance this organization did not justify its

continuance. Those contributions that it did make will be kept and will

be utilized in future health-care planning in this province.

After giving considerable thought, Mr. Chairman, to all of the

variables, the decision we reached was the only logical alternative.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, I know the minister was under duress

in making the decision that he made. I know that the minister feels

guilty about having wasted $5 million to $6 million of the taxpayers'

money.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: I didn't waste it. You wasted it.

MS. R. BROWN (Vancouver-Burrard): You wasted it.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: You wasted $5 million. It's down the drain, Mr. Chairman.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Just let me deal with one or two of the concepts,

Interjections.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please.

MR. COCKE: The Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) gets

nervous, Mr. Chairman, and I don't blame him, because it is scandalous.

Those are the same people in the coalition who went around waving flags

and screaming that the previous government wasted money.

MR. R.L. LOEWEN (Burnaby-Edmonds): A billion dollars.

MR. COCKE: When we see waste....

Oh, nonsense! Go back to Texas where you got your money.

Interjections.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. members, order, please! The member for New Westminster has the floor.

MR. COCKE: I'd just like to deal for a moment or two with the

child and maternal concept. I'd like to deal with a letter that

everybody who has anything to do with this certainly has received by

now. This is some information that I think everybody should read

carefully from nurses who were involved in this whole question of child

and maternal care. I'll direct your attention to something that they

said. This is for men and women alike:

"A great need has existed for 25 years to update the

maternity and children's hospital facilities in B.C., presently by far

the worst in Canada. However, no one could agree where, how or when

this should be done.

[ Page 1960 ]

"The B.C. Medical Centre was established and it made

the decision to build a maternal child-care hospital on the Shaughnessy

site of Oak Street, land purchased from the federal government for $1.

In spite of the opposition from the citizens around Shaughnessy area

and Mr. Kelly, a member of GVRD, a great plan evolved with the

cooperation of the leading pediatricians, obstetricians and other

specialists concerned with all aspects of maternity and child-care

research."

Mr. Chairman, what was discussed there was a concept....

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Yes, I'll agree. When I was Minister of Health we

said that the B.C. Medical Centre board presented a plan that was far

too rich and so we cut that plan back, but even in the cut-back plan

you had the co-ordination of effort of these two very important

services. You had two diamond-shaped buildings, one for maternity and

one for pediatrics, right there as part of the same facility.

Mr. Chairman, we would have been proud of having this facility, and

it would have been started by now. It would have been started by now,

Mr. Chairman, and there's no question in my mind, providing city hall

in Vancouver went along with it. That is, they just gave us the right

to start building.

This was going to be probably the best or the most modern concept in

North America, and the Minister of Health says: "Yes, I proudly did my

duty." His proudly "did his duty" was to waste millions of dollars. He

talked about $1.6 million of architectural plans, $1.6 million of

architectural plans that were wasted, put on the shelf.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Wasted! Put on the shelf, Mr. Chairman. Are you

going ahead with that courthouse or not? We're not going to build a

95-storey building like your predecessor wanted.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, let me go on. Let me describe a meeting that took place....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. members, may I suggest to the committee

that in committee there is no restriction on the number of times you

can speak, but you must speak while you are standing. I hear a number

of questions being asked, and I suggest that you await your turn. The

Chair will gladly recognize you and you can speak.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, I'd like to, with the help of this

information, describe a meeting that took place between the hon.

Minister of Health and a group of people interested in the child- and

maternal-care facility.

The background of the meeting was that the people I am describing

met on February 6 and 7,1976. They were a consumers' committee. They

held a seminar and, as a result of the seminar on the maternal health

workshop, these were the highlights:

(1) The need for an umbrella group of health-care oriented consumer

groups to represent them in the planning and operation of health care.

(2) That a mandate should be sought by this umbrella group for

these consumer groups to represent them before all bodies concerned with health

care.

The workshop supported the child and maternal unit at the B.C.

Medical Centre on the Shaughnessy site because it brings the standard

of health-care delivery for women and children in the province up to a

standard enjoyed by the rest of Canada. And there was concern that they

must now wait for some time to come. The integration of maternity and

pediatric facilities is absolutely essential for the optimum care of

both mother and child.

So, Mr. Chairman, this group then met with the hon. Minister of

Health, and what was the outcome of that meeting? There were six

people, including this writer's person; a brief was presented by Marie

Clark, and what did the brief outline? The pressing need seen for child

and maternal facilities, and it went on to outline why the need.

It showed support for the proposed child and maternal health-care

unit. It talked about time-cost factors in the support of the B.C.

Medical Centre concept. Mr. Chairman, after listening to this brief,

the minister began by saying.... I think this is important: after

listening to a very long and very well-laid-out brief, the minister

began by saying that he'd had it with people complaining about the

quality of care they received from medical professionals in this

province. That's not what they were even talking about! They were not

talking about the care that they were receiving from medical

professionals.

"What was distressing to us was that at no time had we made any criticism

of medical care, publicly or privately. We were concerned with the poor facilities

and lack of research space, and afraid that recent graduates of top researchers

would not come to B.C. We were also afraid that the good ones that we had would

leave." And why shouldn't they go where more would be made of their

skills?

The minister said that letters he had received from mothers so far

say that they don't want big maternity hospitals. Who's suggesting a

big maternity hospital in the first place? What they want is home

births. Mr. Chairman, home births! "We pointed out that the

[ Page 1961 ]

proposed child and maternal health unit was small,

not big, and wanted to know what back-up services these letters had

asked for." None, apparently. None.

Now, Mr. Chairman, I think it's a disgrace that this matter has been

just overlooked, brushed aside. The minister talked about Sid Israels.

I've talked to Sid Israels by the hour — Dr. Israels, a very

prestigious pediatrician in the province. I suggest to you that Sid

Israels is at a point in time where he'll accept anything, providing we

have at least something in this province in the way of a child-care

unit. But you don't need a child-care unit alone. Anybody with any

expertise at all will tell you that that's the most costly way to go.

It's going to present duplication.

What the minister is saying, in effect, is that we are going to have

to have the sophisticated maternal care at VGH, a large maternal

hospital at Grace and a pediatric centre likely on the Shaughnessy

site. Each of those centres is going to have to be provided with

facilities that, I suggest, will be duplication after duplication.

Mr. Chairman, I suggest to you the minister has wasted millions of

dollars of the taxpayers' money that has been spent on planning by the

very best people in this province, people that he now will be

scratching for, trying to hire, because that minister is working by the

seat of his pants. He doesn't know where this unit is going to go. He

suggests now that it might even go to Shaugnessy. But, Mr. Chairman, he

has chosen the wrong course.

The third question about the whole medical centre I'd like to talk

about, just for a second, is the UBC facility. Many are saying, Mr.

Chairman, that the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) should now

watch his other ear. The Minister of Health had no say — there's no

question about that. He had no say in the new facility that's to go

ahead at UBC. He wasn't even permitted to make the announcement. He

wasn't permitted to make the announcement of that hospital!

AN HON. MEMBER: Ho hum!

MR. COCKE: Ho hum! I'd say "ho hum" too, if I were a

backbencher looking for a job. Mr. Chairman, he's probably on the way

out, the back bench say; otherwise he would have been permitted to make

that announcement. But he didn't. He did not make the announcement; the

Minister of Education made the announcement.

He announced the hospital that is dubbed the family-practice unit.

That is the biggest bunk I've ever heard of! If that minister will now

turn around and talk to his officials, I predict that once you've taken

off the few beds that they have out at UBC, in the family-practice unit

they have there, you will have a net increase of 16 beds, family

practice, on the campus. If you are to adopt the plan you said you were

going to adopt — that's a plan calling for 2,500 square feet per bed —

it's going to be the most monstrous, expensive, ridiculous operation

one could ever imagine.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. COCKE: To build it, $60 million and another $30 million

to equip it — $90 million wasted at UBC. It's a wastrel government that

we have now — $90 million wasted. I'd like the Minister of Health (Hon.

Mr. McClelland) to argue with that one — 2,500 feet per bed; and you

add it up. That's $60 million right there, for anybody who knows

hospital construction costs, and to equip it another $30 million — $90

million just to satisfy the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer)

who's been going on this high flyer for some many years.

What will it cost to operate? I predict that it will cost the public

of British Columbia a monstrous sum to operate that new concept. You

know what I predict ? It'll cost $21.9 million per year to operate

these 240 beds that you're building out there that isn't accessible to

the people in Vancouver — only accessible to the students at UBC who

are not sick.

And what have you got when you get there? You have no hotels. So

therefore it'll be an in-bed kind of an operation. The people that come

down from all over this province for diagnostic workups, where will

they stay? I suggest that they can't stay on the campus. There's no

place for them to stay. So therefore they'll have to be accepted as

in-patients for sophisticated diagnostic workups. What good will this

do the students at UBC?

I suggest to you that the facilities that are in downtown Vancouver

right now, if improved, and the facilities that were being created at

the Shaughnessy site — I am talking in terms of all of them in

cooperation — would have given you everything that you need.

I suggest that when I received, along with every other MLA in this

House, a letter from the alumni association that was in favour of this

facility, I just said to myself: who has been giving them guidance?

That doesn't reflect a 70,000-person concept out there — the 70,000

graduates of UBC. That reflects the opinion of a few people in the

ivory tower. I think it's shocking, Mr. Chairman, and I would like to

say that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. King) sent the following

letter back — and I'll put it on the record.

"We are interested in the position you took in your

letter of April 9 regarding your support of the new proposed university

acute-care hospital, as well as support for the increase in health

sciences available at UBC. We see the two issues as quite separate.

Naturally the increase in basic science facilities at the

[ Page 1962 ]

university is entirely up to the allocations committee at UBC.

We agree that there is a good case for increasing those facilities and certainly

hope they will go ahead.

"On the other hand, the basis for building a new

hospital facility there is to us very difficult to understand. There is

no question that the other Vancouver facilities will suffer because of

this decision, and taking hospitals away from doctors and patients

doesn't seem to us to be very well-thought-out direction at all.

"We certainly can understand the enthusiasm of your

association for the hospital site. However, we believe that the choice

of the UBC is ill-advised and will not serve the overall needs of the

lower mainland citizens in the most desirable way."

Mr. Chairman, it's so obvious that they're on the wrong course. All

of the things that we're doing out there are only to satisfy promises

made, and those promises, in the long run, are promises that will

provide nothing but waste.

I want to take your attention back to a statement made by Rafe Mair,

the Minister of Consumer Services. Mair cited something about a $100

million overrun in the Human Resources department, which was explained

as a clerical error, and said that the Social Credit government will

probably not even make a $1,000 error in its financing. We've seen

many errors already, but, Mr. Chairman, this monstrous error, creating

a hospital at UBC that will not serve the people of this province, will

only serve the elitist kind of activities that we've seen. It's a waste

of operating costs that is monstrous, and I suggest to you, so the

officials know what I'm basing this on, I'm saying that $250 per bed

will be the operating cost of that facility by the time it's created.

It's easy to see that $21.9 million per year will be the operating

cost of that facility. The size of it, the structure — everything else

— is a waste, and it just brings me back to what that Minister of

Consumer Services said originally: "There will be no waste." This is

wanton waste, just to satisfy the needs of the member for Point Grey

(Hon. Mr. McGeer) who is now Minister of Education, minister in charge

of ICBC and all of those other activities.

Mr. Chairman, I want to bring to your attention a letter that I received from Stuart Keate, publisher of The Vancouver Sun . He asked that I appear on a panel on April 7 at 2 p.m. in the boardroom of The Vancouver Sun .

Along with me were invited the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr.

McGeer), the Minister of Health and others. This was to defend the

whole situation of the B.C. Medical Centre and the UBC campus hospital

and all. I agreed to go on that panel. At the last minute I was told

that the thing had been called off because neither of the government

officials would go on that panel. Shame, Mr. Chairman! They had all

sorts of time; they were notified, as I was, on March 24. They had all

sorts of time to make any kind of changes in plans necessary to provide

that they were there on April 7 at 2 p.m. They were afraid to face the

music. I am surprised that the minister is in the House today

discussing his estimates.

Mr. Chairman, that letter and the reply to that letter indicate to

me that there was no way that they were going to go and make any kind

of a defence to that situation.

Mr. Chairman, let me bring to your attention another letter that I

received. This is a letter to Dr. H. L. Murphy, who was director of

education planning. This was written by an Alice Baumgart, a graduate

fellow who is now finishing her PhD at the University of Toronto. Do

you know what she said to Dr. Murphy in The Vancouver Sun , March 3, 1976?

"I wish to convey my deep concern about the recent

action of your government in doing away with the B.C. Medical Centre. I

am particularly distressed by the demise of the education planning

division. This division was beginning to play a vital role in bringing

some order out of chaos which now characterizes education for health

manpower. Moreover, it was doing this in a manner which was one of the

most innovative in North America. The educational planning division

may, indeed, serve as a model for many other jurisdictions.

"Isn't it a shame that we're going to have to take our

innovative ideas elsewhere? As a former British Columbia resident who

is actively involved in inter-professional education in the health

sciences, I can only consider the government's stance as myopic and

simple-minded. It is my fervent hope that your government will at least

recognize appropriately the useful and novel work of the education

planning division of the B.C. Medical Centre and not let their

considerable efforts come to naught."

Mr. Chairman, I understand that someone wishes to be recognized. I will yield.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. Members, some distinguished guests will be

arriving in the chamber very shortly. Perhaps we could just retain our

seats and wait quietly till they approach the chamber.

HON. W.R. BENNETT (Premier): Mr. Chairman and Hon. Members, I

would like to welcome to this chamber a distinguished visitor from the

state of Israel. His Excellency Chaim Zadok moved to Israel from his

native Poland in 1935 and has been a fighter for freedom in the war of

independence, Deputy Attorney-General of Israel from 1949 to 1952, a

lecturer in commercial law at the Tel Aviv Law

[ Page 1963 ]

School from 1952 to 1961, Minister of Commerce and

Industry and Minister of Development from 1965 to 1966 and now Minister

of Justice since March, 1974. He arrived in Victoria earlier this

morning and leaves again this afternoon. At some future date I hope he

will be able to spend more time with us here in Victoria and British

Columbia.

Accompanying His Excellency is Simuel Ounot, Consul-General of

Israel. Also accompanying the minister is Mrs. Zadok. I wish the House

to welcome His Excellency, the Consul-General and Mrs. Zadok. I wish

them welcome and shalom.

MR. N. LEVI (Vancouver-Burrard): Nyem meod lekobel otchem Anachnu rozteen, me mephlagah shalanu NDP, lagid sholam aleichem ve toda rabar.

For the benefit of Hansard I'd like to welcome our guests again on

behalf of the New Democratic Party. We are mindful of the long social

democratic conditions of your country, and we're extremely pleased that

you're here.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Chairman, I

join all members of the House in our expression of the warmest welcome

to His Excellency, his lady and the consul, and extend highest regards

to you and your great country. While I cannot equal the second member

for Burrard (Mr. Levi), may I say: Shalom u braha.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Chairman, as a landed

immigrant Scot I also cannot emulate my friend from Vancouver, but I

would say that we in the Conservative Party extend a very warm welcome

to you.

We are well aware of your problems in a turbulent world and the fact

that you're surrounded by some neighbours who cause problems, but the

Scottish race also used to fight its neighbours with some fervour, and

they seem finally in large measure to have solved that problem, and I

wish you the same success in Israel.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Shall vote 86 pass? The member for New Westminster continues.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, thank you for permitting me to continue my remarks, and I will be very brief at this point.

Mr. Chairman, I believe that the Baumgart letter that I read

characterizes the opinions that many, many people have about the

Medical Centre — people who understood it. One of my biggest problems

has been that people haven't really understood what was going on. I

suggest that there certainly is no justification for wasting taxpayer

money in this way and at the same time cutting services.

We have available, Mr. Chairman, at the Vancouver General Hospital the nucleus

for the service that's necessary and it needs updating. St. Paul's Hospital

needs to be brought up to date and teaching provided at these facilities, teaching

provided at Shaughnessy — teaching provided at the existing extant facilities,

if you will.

Mr. Chairman, UBC has a hospital now — a psychiatric hospital. I

think that that probably also characterizes what happens when you build

out there. One of the people that I consulted, in the process of coming

up with the idea of whether or not to put a hospital on the campus or

not, was the Deputy Minister of Health for Canada. The former Deputy

Minister of Health for Canada was the person who put together the

Sherbrooke campus hospital. You know what he said? He said that that

hospital on the campus at Sherbrooke was the biggest mistake in his

life.

Then I talked to Claude Castonguay, at that time Minister of Health

for the Province of Quebec. I said to him: "What are you doing about

Laval?" He said: "Laval University's going to be different." He said:

"The teaching will go on at the university, but at the hospitals it

will go on in the present six hospitals in Quebec City."

We could have done the same thing, Mr. Chairman, but what is

occurring now is going to create a dichotomy of interest. I suggest

that that really won't take care of the needs for this province.

Mr. Chairman, we didn't have enough time to develop the facilities,

but we were certainly on time. The B.C. Medical Centre Act was only

brought into being late in 1973 — October, 1973, to be exact. That

shows that in the short time that they had available from late 1973 to

1975 they did a monstrous amount of work, and were right on time.

The present minister, Mr. Chairman, has taken the money that was invested in the future of B.C. and wasted it.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, I'd like to ask one question: what in the

world has brought about the decision to put a 300-bed extended-care

hospital on the Shaughnessy site? Has any study been done to show that

it's a good idea?

Mr. Chairman, I wonder at some of the decisions that are emanating

from the present minister and from those people who took the place of

the old B.C. Medical Centre.

Mr. Chairman, what about cancer? Is cancer to grow in its present

site? Is the direction of cancer in B.C. to be inhibited by not

becoming part and parcel of what was a co-ordinated activity, or is it

going to be on its own again? If it is, then it's not going to be an

aspect that will grow and flourish in our province.

We were fortunate; we were able to attract one of the best brains in

cancer in North American, Dr. Tom Hall, away from the United States —

the antithesis of the old brain-drain syndrome. We were able to attract

[ Page 1964 ]

him back up to here to lead the cancer control agency.

But, Mr. Chairman, we have to put priorities where priorities are

needed, and it should be part of an integrated process of teaching,

research, and part of the whole delivery system in this province. To

leave it where it is, I suggest to you, is to spend probably $25

million to $30 million on a very inaccessible area. I talked to the

city council at some length in Vancouver, and what did they tell me?

Get every service away from VGH that you possibly can. People now

taking children down to the cancer service, or people going down there

themselves, spend half their time driving around the block and

congesting what is already a terribly congested area still further. I

suggest the direction of the B.C. Medical Centre was to move the

nucleus of cancer up to the Shaughnessy site. That should still be very

much a part of where we're going.

Mr. Chairman, I only hope that if the minister is steadfast in his

determination to rip apart, to rend asunder all of the work that was

done, I would hope that he can put together some kind of an

organization that will at least attempt to co-ordinate the activities

of the health, teaching and health delivery in B.C. — not medical

training, Mr. Chairman, not as the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr.

McGeer) described it, but health training. Co-ordinated health training

is what B.C. sorely needs, and I would hope that that will be the

direction. Certainly if not now, it will come, because even that

minister cannot stand in the way of progress forever.

MR. WALLACE: The dimension of the health budget in many

hundreds of millions of dollars means that we should look at health in

a very wide sense, and this I am sure we will do in the days ahead, but

on this particular occasion I would like to speak specifically on one

issue of great importance to the greater Victoria area. Despite

participation in a political forum, I do intend to try and present a

very fair and objective review of this particular issue and try to

avoid either emotionalism or politicking. I simply want to try and

bring to the House some kind of valid and accurate appraisal not only

of an issue which will meet the need of people in this area but which

does involve a large sum of money at the same time.

Mr. Chairman, I am talking about the issue of the new general

hospital to replace, in large measure, the Victoria General Hospital. I

am the first one to agree with many of the residents of this area that

there has been a long delay in tackling and beginning to solve this

particular problem. I am sorry that the Minister of Municipal Affairs

(Hon. Mr. Curtis) is not in his place because the delay in providing

this third hospital....

Mr. Chairman, I don't think we have enough members for a quorum.

MR. CHAIRMAN: No quorum in the House? Then it is incumbent upon the Chair to have those members present transcribed in the Journals , and I would ask that the Clerk-Assistant would begin.

Hon. members, standing orders 6 and 7 read:

"The presence of at least 10 members of the House, including

Mr. Speaker, shall be necessary to constitute a meeting of the House for the

exercise of its power.

"Whenever Mr. Speaker adjourns the House for want of a

quorum, the time of the adjournment and the names of the members then

present shall be inserted in the Journal ."

Interjections.

MR. CHAIRMAN: So that means we do have a quorum. May we continue?

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Chairman, I knew that every member in the House was just bursting to hear my speech....

Interjections.

MR. WALLACE: Anyway, I notice my friend from Saanich and the

Islands (Hon. Mr. Curtis) is back in his place and I appreciate that.

I'm not in any way implying anything critical of that member. I just

wanted to comment that the first study of any significance to try and

solve our local problem, believe it or not, was published in May, 1968

— eight years ago.

At that time the chairman of the Capital Regional Hospital District

was one Hugh A. Curtis who, I remember, held a public meeting at the

Municipal Hall in Saanich. I was at that time much impressed by the

strong push which the present member for Saanich and the Islands gave

to this study. As the members can probably see, this was no mean

appraisal of the facts; it was an in-depth review of the hospital needs

of the greater Victoria area, looking as far ahead in the final part of

the report as 1986 from 1968. That report, Mr. Chairman, made some very

distinctive proposals, which in large measure have not changed in the

years that have gone by without action.

As I said at the outset of my remarks, I'm not here to lay blame or

to criticize delays, but I do feel that someone now must try to put the

facts in perspective in the hope that we can prevent making a very

regrettably wrong decision about this hospital, costing $40 million to

build and probably $1 million a year to operate — to ensure that it

will not be placed in the wrong site in this area simply to save,

admittedly, a sum of money in the short run.

This report I have referred to is well known as the Agnew Peckham report, and recommended in

[ Page 1965 ]

recommendation (4) that a new general hospital of

about 200-230 beds be built in the general area of Elk Lake. For those

of you in the House who are not as familiar with the area, Elk Lake is

on the Pat Bay Highway, on the way to the ferry terminal or the

airport. It was suggested that the site be at least 20 acres and

preferably 30 acres or more.

It's also important to mention recommendation (22). It made it

quite clear that it was not recommended that there should be a general

hospital in the Colwood-Sooke area, at least not until a hospital of

100 beds could be justified.

Recommendation (23) goes on to say that when a hospital is justified

in the Colwood-Sooke area, it should be a branch or division of one of

the larger general hospitals.

Mr. Chairman, these are facts and the recommendations by hospital

planners and people with expertise who are paid taxpayers' dollars to

come up with factual, relevant, accurate information.

Now in the delays that have occurred since 1968, one of the problems

appeared to be the inadequate powers of the advisory committee. In

November, 1974, the former Minister of Health (Mr. Cocke), who has just

taken his place....

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: Sorry, I correct that statement: the former

Minister of Health who has been here all morning and has spoken so much

that I've had to wait quite a while to get my piece in.

At any rate, in November, 1974, the then-Minister of Health amended

the bylaws of the regional hospital district which enabled the

directors to set up a hospital and health planning commission with

greater power and greater authority. The very real and obviously wise

reason was to try and build public confidence in the planning that

would be done, but, above all, to ensure that when these planners and

experts made their recommendations these very recommendations would

carry a great deal of weight — in the same way that within the medical

sphere, perhaps, the general practitioner gets a second opinion from a

consultant who is more highly trained, as a patient would attach more

significance to the consultant's report.

So this amendment to the bylaw in 1974 resulted in the setting up of

the health and hospital planning commission in the greater Victoria

area. That commission was subsequently composed of very dedicated and

highly respected individuals in our community in the greater Victoria

area. And I don't say that because the chairman happens to have the

same name as I have, but Robert Wallace has done a very first-class job

in chairing that health and planning commission.

Mr. Chairman, one of the first functions the commission assumed was

to review all the possible sites in the greater Victoria area which

might be suitable for this third hospital. They reviewed nine sites and

the site, the relationship to highways, the time distance to hospitals

and to the university, ancillary use, the effect on the neighbourhood,

fire protection, transit services, view and surroundings, subsoil, et

cetera. There were actually 21 criteria used and each criterion was

given so many points. The nine sites were reviewed within that very

complicated but necessarily thorough context, which again bears out the

professional enthusiasm with which this commission proceeded to do its

job.

Before I go further, Mr. Chairman, let me just say that when these

results were worked out, the Helmcken Road site, now being suggested

for a hospital, was No. 7 on the list of nine. It was the seventh most

desirable. When this commission had taken all this trouble, gone

through all these details of study and all these different criteria,

the Helmeken Road site was No. 7 in the list of suitability.

So while there are many other points to be covered, that point is

very significant in this discussion — namely that a very substantially

significant study by well-informed planners and regional directors,

some of them, surveyed nine sites in a very efficient and reasonable

way and came up with that conclusion.

One could also quote other aspects of the report, Mr. Chairman. But

I don't want to go into a great deal of detail on the report as such,

because the conclusion about the Helmcken Road site is quite obvious. I

should also say, to put the matter in context, that without any doubt

the overall conclusion was that the McKenzie-Douglas site was without a

doubt far superior in relation to all these different criteria than any

of the others.

I'll just quote paragraph (

a) from the report of July 16, 1975. It's entitled "General Location Considerations."

"The Helmcken site compares very poorly with the three

The effects of this will be felt by visitors to the hospital, doctors,

hospital staff and outpatients, to mention only a few instances. The

site does not have transit service at present, of particular importance

to female staff, and extending service to this site would require

developing a new route. Locating a hospital on this site" — and again

I'm referring to the Helmcken site — "would increase traffic congestion

both on the Trans-Canada Highway and on the old Island Highway, and the

congestion would be compounded by satellite uses associated with the

hospital."

[ Page 1966 ]

Now there can't be anything much clearer than that. Another part of

the report which I think is being overlooked in the public debate

that's going on states that the criteria utilized in the site selection

by the committee was fully in accordance with the goals and policies of

the regional plan. It states:

"The planning staff have examined the three sites

preferred by the site selection committee and have found that these

locations do not fundamentally oppose the principles of the regional

plan." In regard to the regional plan, the report went on to say:

"In this plan, hospitals of regional significance are

to be located taking account of the adequacy of regional roads, public

transport, water and sewer services for the proposed uses and

compatibility with adjacent uses." Surely these again are very

fundamental factors in planning any large hospital.

Mr. Chairman, I might interject that this report also referred to a

quote from the magazine entitled The Scientific American . I think

members would agree that that's a very reputable journal or magazine

which deals with a wide variety of human issues. The Scientific

American in March, 1971, had been studying the cost of U.S. government

buildings, and went on to say that the findings of that U.S. study were

quite relevant in looking at the Canadian buildings of the same type

and size. It pointed out, on the basis that most of these buildings,

such as a hospital building, were looking at a life of perhaps 40

years, that of the total cost, 2 per cent was in the building, 6 per

cent was in the operation and maintenance of the building, and 92 per

cent was in the cost of salaries. I understand that a rule-of-thumb

formula that's used these days is that when you are building any

substantial project, the site cost of the land can be reasonably

considered to be about 10 per cent of the total cost of the project.

I refer, Mr. Chairman, to the Agnew Peckham report of 1968. I just

want to say that because of the various delays and problems in

progress, the regional hospital board in 1975 asked for a review of the

original report by the same consultants. Dr. McQueen embarked on a

restudy of the original study. Unfortunately the regional politicians

chose to keep that second study secret and it was never published in

the manner that the original one was published under the direction of

the now Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Curtis). At any rate,

the press, with their usual nose for news and accuracy, reported in the

Daily Colonist of April 9, 1975, the heading: "Little New in Hospital

Study; Rehash of Old Ideas at a Cost of $34,500." The second study, I

gather, more or less confirmed the same basic recommendations as the

first study. Soon after that restudy the commission went to work and

came up with this proposal that without a doubt the McKenzie-Douglas

site was far superior, for all the reasons I've mentioned, to any other

site. I understand that the decision by the commission was almost

unanimous.

Again, with respect, I would have to question the judgment of some

persons in the field of the hospital district activity keeping in

camera the kind of voting that went on on an issue which had dragged on

for years and which was increasing in cost and complexity as the years

go by, and now will cost $40 million. I think that it would be only

fair to the taxpayers, if we are using highly competent planners and

consultants and elected members or appointed members to a planning

commission, that when they make a decision of this significance we

should at least know what the voting was, but I am told that it was

almost unanimous.

Since that decision there's been a provincial election and the

government has changed, and that caused some further delay, but finally

the regional hospital board asked the present Minister of Health to

make a decision. Again, to put all the facts on the table, Mr.

Chairman, the Helmcken site, as compared to the Douglas-McKenzie site,

is unquestionably something in the order of $1 million cheaper.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Two!

MR. WALLACE: Well, the minister says $2 million, but that

overlooks the fact that the Helmcken site will require a substantial

amount of servicing. It is in unorganized territory and has, I believe,

a large water pipeline that runs right through the middle of the site

that will have to be relocated. Sewer facilities will have to be

provided to the site. There is only access through one road, namely

Helmcken Road, and there are many reasons why the simple price that is

being quoted at the Helmcken site is by no means the final price for

making the site acceptable for hospital construction.

I agree with the minister that we probably cannot tell at this point

what that additional cost will be, but it is not at all accurate to

compare the land cost at Douglas-McKenzie simply with the land cost at

Helmcken Road, because the Helmcken Road site, apart from all the other

disadvantages, some of which I mean to mention in a moment, requires a

substantial expenditure of funds, if only in the form of providing

sewerage facilities and highway access.

The minister has clearly gone on record as stating that there is a

restraint on government spending, and that the whole thrust of the

government's policy these days is to minimize costs. That's a

reasonable goal, and that should be a goal of government, but it

shouldn't be a goal of government if you make a short-term decision

which is going to cause nothing but wasteful expenditure of money,

traffic jams,

[ Page 1967 ]

inefficient service and overhead costs over the next 40 years.

That will make this $1 million difference look like peanuts once we

get into the new hospital, if it is ultimately built on Helmcken Road.

The minister has made the decision, and I'm speaking at some length

today in the hope that I can demonstrate to him some very valid

reasons why it would make a lot of sense to reconsider his decision.

I might interject that I congratulate the minister and welcome his

reconsideration on the per diem charge for extended-care patients which

he announced last night. It does show that the minister is not rigid in

his approach to political decisions and is willing to acknowledge that

a decision might have been made without all the evidence being

considered, and it's exactly that principle I'm trying to stress today.

He may well have made his decision about the third hospital site

without being a party to all the information, and without looking down

the road 10 or 15 or 20 years and recognizing that we're not just

building a hospital to save $1 million in the short run, but probably

will end up putting a hospital in the wrong place. When it's there and

built, and it's going to cost $40 million to build and $15 million a

year to operate, do you want it in the wrong place? It's just that

simple.

In asking the minister to reconsider the decision he's made, I just

have to ask if the government has forgotten one of its own recent

decisions. I'm talking about the Department of Highways, and I'm sorry

that the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) isn't here to take

part

in our debate. Again, if I might refer to the Minister of Municipal

Affairs (Hon. Mr. Curtis), who has had a long awareness of the traffic

problems as they affect the Blanshard Street extension and the

Trans-Canada Highway, he and I and any of us who have been in the

municipal picture for any length of time know that the bottleneck on

the Trans-Canada Highway between the Town and Country shopping centre

and the Colwood cutoff is one of the most severe traffic problems in

the whole greater Victoria area. It is of increasing severity,

particularly from 7 till 9 in the morning and 4 to 6 in the evening,

most weekends, and certainly June, July and August when we have a high

flow of tourist traffic on that highway. The Helmcken Road intersects

the Trans-Canada Highway right in the middle of that biggest bottleneck

section. To top all that off, Mr. Chairman, we just had the

announcement by the government a few weeks ago — I can't remember the

exact date, but I think the end of April — by the Minister of Highways

that the plans to extend Blanshard Street and widen the Trans-Canada

Highway have been postponed indefinitely.

When you put all that together I would submit, Mr. Chairman, that

there are many powerful facts which would surely make the minister

reconsider.

I'm not entering into a debate as to whether the money is available

for widening the highway or not. That's a much more debatable issue.

What I'm trying to emphasize is the fact that the hospital on Helmcken

Road would be a very short distance from the point where Helmcken Road

intersects a

section of very busy highway which is becoming

increasingly clogged and congested, and that very

section of highway

which the former government had promised to widen will not now be

widened, and there's no date set as to when it will be widened.

In fact the Minister of Highways announced the policy of the

government to cancel widening of the highways. I have a clipping here

from The Vancouver Sun of April 30:

"The minister said no money has been allotted to the

two projects, and he did not know whether money would even be set aside

in the 1977-78 budget. Widening the Trans-Canada Highway between Town

and Country and Thetis Lake overpass was to be done this spring at an

estimated cost of $5 million."

Mr. Chairman, I know you're busy reading something else, but I really think you should get this.

"Work on the Blanshard Street extension was to begin this fall, after nearly 13 years of setbacks."

Thirteen years we've been talking about this particular highway! Later on in the same report it states:

"The widening of the Trans-Canada Highway between Thetis

Lake overpass and the shopping centre was considered a high priority because

traffic along the route is getting hopelessly tangled up during rush hours."

It surely goes without saying, Mr. Chairman, that if there's one

particular building in our society where it is rather important to have

hasty access, it would surely have to be a hospital. I can't really

think of any other type of building which must have that as a very

primary consideration in choosing a location.

Can you just imagine, Mr. Chairman, an ambulance trying to get along

that part of the Trans-Canada Highway at peak rush hour? No doubt its

sirens would blare and all the other traffic would come to a halt and

they would do the best they could, but I think the potential for the

ambulance with the victim itself to get into an accident under these

circumstances would be very considerable.

One of the reasons that ambulances have to be particularly careful

is that very fact that in their haste there are liable to be

misunderstandings at traffic lights, or whatever, and when the

ambulance itself becomes involved in the accident, then, of course, we

have double trouble. Not only the person in the ambulance may well

never make it to the hospital but someone else in the other vehicle

becomes involved or

[ Page 1968 ]

injured.

The statistics, incidentally, Mr. Chairman, from January of this

year show that at the Helmcken Road

section of the Trans-Canada Highway

there have been 12 accidents of one kind or another since January.

I really feel that the minister is correct only to this extent: that

by putting the hospital at Helmcken instead of Mackenzie, in the very

short run he would be saving something of the order of $1 million and

maybe more than that. I'm the last person to try and slough off that

figure in the terms of C.D. Howe, for example, by saying "What's a

million?" That isn't my opinion at all. We all know that $1 million is

a lot of money, but I have to repeat that the total project we're

talking about is so very, very much more.

The building itself will probably cost $40 million and the operating

costs around $12 million to $15 million a year. Do these sums of money

not justify putting out the extra million in choosing the site in order

to get the hospital in the right place?

Now I've been approached by various persons saying that, of course,

there is growth of population both in the Colwood-Langford area and in

the Saanich Peninsula area, and I acknowledge that argument. But again,

on three grounds I say that it doesn't really hold up in the long run.

First of all, the regional plan for the western part of the district

does not suggest a general hospital with all the associated facilities

that would be required in that Helmcken region.

Secondly, the population growth is still faster in the Saanich

Peninsula area than in the western area, and thirdly, the traffic

problems that I have referred to, to me seem a convincing argument that

almost on that basis alone it would seem very unwise, if not utterly

foolish, to proceed with the construction of a hospital with that kind

of capital and operating expenditures at a site where the very

efficiency of the hospital would be suspect and access would be a very

serious problem.

I would say in conclusion, Mr. Chairman, that two very basic

principles are involved beyond the dollar principle. First of all, we

all pay lip service at least to the concept of regional planning and

regional development of facilities. I know again that the Minister of

Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Curtis) has a much wider understanding and

experience in this field than I have, but he knows that in terms of

sane and long-sighted planning the regional concept has to be followed.

It makes no sense at all to draw up regional plans and to have

regional hospital boards and regional concepts until one day somebody

makes a unilateral decision based on the dollar sign which just throws

all the regional planning out the window. Now if that's what the

government wants to do, I would suggest that we should scrap

nine-tenths of all the people who are involved in regional affairs. I'm

not being facetious when I say that. It makes no sense at all to have

these many highly skilled, dedicated regional people, whether they're

planners or technicians or regional directors or what they are, if

they're committed to a concept and they spend their days and their

weeks and their months studying and coming up with recommendations

based on that concept and then they find that, for the simple fact of X

amount of dollars, all their expertise and the recommendations just go

out the window. That, I think, is almost more important than this

specific example of where that kind of principle is probably about to

be contravened.

Furthermore, Mr. Chairman, I'll just quickly finish by saying that I

know the public of greater Victoria are utterly frustrated about the

lack of action or the delays, and now that we appear close to deciding

on one site or the other they are much relieved, and I personally am

being accused of obstructionism by asking the minister one more time to

reconsider.

The last thing I am trying to do is obstruct. What I am trying to do

is say for goodness' sake, after eight years, please let us not put the

hospital in the wrong place.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Everybody wants to see the new hospital

built as quickly as possible. One of the points that the capital region

people made when they met first with me in my office was that I was the

fourth Health minister that they had dealt with on this problem. We

certainly don't want to see them deal with a fifth; we want to get on

with the hospital. That was the major portion of our consideration. We

also, Mr. Chairman, wish to make sure that regionalism is a concept

that works. I don't think the government should be arbitrarily stepping

into regional decisions on an ad hoc basis, but there is a time when

the minister of any department has to take some personal

responsibility. In all conscience, Mr. Chairman, there was no way in

which I could recommend the purchase of the particular site in

question, not only because of the cost but certainly primarily because

of the cost.

[Mr. Veitch in the chair.]

Our own department, Mr. Chairman, in evaluating the various sites

which were up for consideration for a new hospital, clearly indicated

that some of the western sites were, in fact, suitable for a new

hospital — in particular the Helmcken Road site, which had been

included in the commission's submissions.

We have a couple of objections, Mr. Chairman, to locating the

hospitals at this site. First of all is a question that you referred to

about the comparison of the two sites simply in terms of dollar values.

You're correct; it can't be done. You are also correct that there will

be a significant outlay of capital funds

[ Page 1969 ]

to maintain sewage facilities for the Helmcken Road

site if we go there. Now whether or not we have to go out and connect

on to sewage in the unorganized area or the municipality or we put a

sewage disposal site on-site, it doesn't really matter; it's a

technical detail. But the cost will be there. As well, the topography

of the McKenzie-Douglas site does not lend itself to the easy

construction of a hospital. It is going to cost a significant amount of

extra money to build a hospital on that site. I've got estimates

ranging anywhere up to an extra $1 million just to take care of the

topography problem that we have at the site. There will have to be

considerable structural changes made in the construction of the

hospital itself in order to make up for that.

I say the prime objection, Mr. Chairman, is the cost of that

property. It's $2.5 million — $100,000 an acre — for a piece of

property which cost a total, to the owners, of $417,000 to accumulate.

That is a significant profit, for a private developer, which this

government was not prepared to accept for a piece of property which is

still within the agricultural land reserve. The last time the

application was made to have that property taken out of the

agricultural land reserve, that application was refused.

Mr. Chairman, we were able to get the option on the site which is

now the basis of a proposal that we made to the regional district

people not even for the $20,000 an acre, which was the estimated cost

when the evaluation was done, but for $15,000 an acre. We have a firm

option on 34 acres of property at that location now, signed with the

owner. We have made the proposition to the regional district that here

is the opportunity for the regional district to get ahead with a

hospital. We've made the guarantee to them that we will enter into

services that are necessary. We have made the promise that if they will

accept that proposal, Mr. Chairman, we will give them immediate

approval to begin planning a new hospital for the greater Victoria

region.

I think it's a good proposal, and I think that many other members of

the region, as well as the planning commission, also agree that it is a

good proposal. In fact, one of the members was quoted in the press the

other day as saying that in closed meetings of the commission there was

objection, not recorded, to the McKenzie-Douglas site. So, Mr.

Chairman, I think all of us want to get on with the job. I would like

to see the region, and the commission, address itself to this new

proposal. I still can't accept the cost of that property as a cost on

government. That is a decision that has been made and, at this point, I

don't see us going back on it. I appreciate the member's concern in

this whole issue, and certainly we share it, but there we are.

If I could just reply quickly to a couple of the points that were made by the

member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) with regard to the child and maternal

health-care centre, we have a basic disagreement on the way to provide those

facilities. We think we are doing the right thing in providing those facilities,

with a new children's hospital to be built immediately and the rebuilding

of Grace Hospital which, interestingly enough, is one of the only hospitals

in British Columbia where the occupancy rate for maternity is going up, and

that's because Grace is held in such high esteem throughout this whole province.

We think that Grace Hospital can do the job. They've proven over the years

that they can do the job, and we've guaranteed to them that we will rebuild

that hospital on its present site to take care of the needs that we think the

people of British Columbia have. So we have a difference of opinion.

Mr. Chairman, as well with regard to the waste of money, I pointed

earlier to $1.6 million in architectural fees being spent on BCMC so

far to one architectural firm. If that money had all been spent on a

facility which was going to be built, I suppose it wouldn't be wasted,

but most of the money was spent on something that will never see the

light of day and would never have seen the light of day regardless of

which government was in power. Only $400,000 of those fees was spent on

the child and maternal health care centre; $1.2 million was spent on

the overall development plan for the Shaughnessy hospital site, a plan

which was scrapped by the previous government because they knew that

they could never afford it, and also because they knew that the city of

Vancouver would never allow the kind of development that they were

planning for that site. There was a massive upheaval in the city of

Vancouver because no one at that level had ever been consulted about

what was going to happen at the Shaughnessy site.

We've made sure, Mr. Chairman, that in relation to the children's

hospital we had representatives from the city of Vancouver on the task

force which met to decide where the children's hospital would be built

and what kind of a hospital it would be and how it would be financed.

We were assured by the city of Vancouver that we would have their

complete cooperation in this matter.

Briefly on the UBC hospital, there's no point in us going all the

way around the bush on this, because we have a basic disagreement. I'm

sure we'll never come to a meeting of the minds on this development. I

would remind the member for New Westminster, Mr. Chairman, that he has

no knowledge of what kind of a hospital is going to be built on the UBC

campus, because nobody does. That's the reason.

Interjection.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I'm saying now that there has been no decision made on

[ Page 1970 ]

what kind of a hospital will be built at UBC except

that it will be under the direction of the Department of Health and it

will be a complete family-practice hospital. That's the commitment that

we've made, and the $90 million figure is something that the member has

picked out of his own imagination, as usual, because there is no figure

except $50 million which has been committed and offered to the task

force which has also been set up in a very democratic way with the

representatives from the medical profession, from UBC, from the Greater

Vancouver Regional District, and others concerned, and the major

teaching hospitals as well, to decide what kind of a hospital will be

built to provide for doubling of the number of British Columbia

students who can be graduated from the medical school at UBC. Mr.

Chairman, that's the democratic way to go about things and that's the

way we intend to continue to go about things.

Let me caution again that the terms of reference of that task force

do not only include a school at UBC, a medical school at UBC. They also

include.... The task force is expected to report on the measures which

are necessary and the amount of funds out of that $50 million or $55

million which is necessary to make sure that the facilities in the

existing teaching hospitals are upgraded to be able to handle that

doubled output of British Columbia students coming from UBC. It's all

part of the package and it answers the criticism that is being made by

the British Columbia Medical Association that they have no objection,

as I understand it, to a teaching hospital at UBC providing we make

sure that those other facilities are offered. That's exactly what we're

doing, Mr. Chairman.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Chairman, I would just like to respond

briefly to the minister's comments. I can't possibly overemphasize the

concern of many people, of all people in this community, that for as

much as we don't want to have any further delay, it really doesn't make

any kind of sense, just for the sake of ending delay, to forge ahead

and build a $40 million hospital in the wrong place with all kinds of

problems. Transportation and access to a hospital surely has to be a

fundamental concept in the planning and the decision as to where it

will go.

I couldn't agree more that the minister must be sensitive to the

first outlay of dollars and that if you're comparing two sites and

one's $1 million cheaper than the other, it has....

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: Okay, let's say a million and a half, not two

million, and I said at the beginning of my remarks that I didn't want

to get into a hassle on arguing about figures which none of us know

with absolute precision. We do know that the Douglas-McKenzie site is

certainly a great deal more expensive than Helmcken; that is not a part

that I would argue.

But the minister did talk about the McKenzie-Douglas site being in

the Agricultural Land Reserve, Mr. Chairman. I just want it to be on

the record that the Helmcken site is also in the Agricultural Land

Reserve. So let's not suggest that that is any significant difference.

I can inform the minister, without revealing any secrets, that the

municipality of Saanich would be very happy not to have a hospital on

the McKenzie-Douglas site, because they are already in negotiations for

a large-scale commercial development on that site, which will provide

them with a tax base which every municipality has its tongue hanging

out to accept. I wouldn't want the impression to be left that somehow

or other we can't build a hospital at the McKenzie-Douglas site because

it's in the Agricultural Land Reserve. Technically at the moment it is,

but it's every intention of the municipality of Saanich to have a large

commercial development on that site.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: No, but the fact is that there are many reasons,

regardless of how the land is put to other uses. There are many cogent

reasons, I am led to understand, that the municipality wants it out of

the Agricultural Land Reserve, and they have good arguments which,

presumably, as a municipality...they'll be taken directly to

cabinet. So I just give the cabinet fair warning that they'll be

hearing from the municipality of Saanich, which is the legal right of

the municipality of Saanich, both to seek that course and to avail

itself of the provisions under the statute to seek to have that land

removed from the Agricultural Land Reserve. But even that isn't the

most important thing.

A clipping from the Victoria Times on November 8, 1974, quotes the

then-Minister of Highways (Mr. Lea) as saying that he agrees with his

planners that this combined Blanshard Street-Trans-Canada Highway

problem "poses probably the most unique and complex transportation

problem in North America." He went on to say that he had been told by

his department advisers — I am talking about Department of Highways

advisers — that the measures that were even being proposed were only

the minimum that would be required to try and solve that highway

problem in any kind of adequate way. Now even these minimum measures

have been postponed indefinitely.

Mr. Chairman, I keep coming back to the emphasis on comparing

perhaps $1.5 million in 1976 with nothing but access and highway

problems for many

[ Page 1971 ]

years ahead, not to mention the question as to

whether efficient standards of emergency care could be guaranteed to

patients in emergency trying to get down that highway and get to the

hospital in a hurry.

MR. L.B. KAHL (Esquimalt): What nonsense!

MR. WALLACE: The member for Esquimalt interjects.

I would just hope that he doesn't happen to end up as the first

patient trying to get to that hospital in a hurry. Somebody will be

that first patient; and it's rather similar to the arguments we have

heard during the strike that because somebody didn't die from lack of

care, perhaps the strike could continue. But every right-thinking

person knew that sooner or later somebody was going to suffer and

probably die because of the strike. It didn't happen as far as we know;

but give it another day or two or a week or two and it would have

happened.

All I am saying is that if you build that hospital on Helmcken Road,

because of the incredible evidence of traffic congestion already, which

is going to get worse in the absence of any Highways department plan to

improve it, sooner or later somebody isn't going to get to the hospital

because of the surrounding problems of traffic congestion and

inadequate highway access.

Now it's quite obvious I am talking to deaf ears on that side of the

House. I have tried to present this argument objectively, and all that

the member for Esquimalt can come up with is an interjection of the

word "nonsense." I think that is a very irresponsible comment from the

member for Esquimalt. Regardless of that attitude, I am trying to make

the point that this community desperately does need action and some

decisions made for that third hospital. But because we have almost got

to the point of decision, let's not be so overwhelmed by the legitimate

concern about spending dollars wisely that we save a million and a half

now and cause ourselves, and a lot of patients, endless amounts of

trouble, with perhaps less than effective patient care in relation to

emergencies and, indeed, costs which will be shown over the years far

to exceed the $1.5 million that you save in the short run.

MR. W.S. KING (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Chairman, I

would like to move to the subject of the dispute that has taken place

in the hospital industry between the Health Labour Relations

Association and the Hospital Employees Union. I appreciate that this

has been a matter of concern to the government over a period of time,

and statements have been made when the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr.

Williams) invoked

section 73 of the Labour Code to provide for a 21-day

cooling off period. I point out, however, that the action on the part

of the Minister of Labour does nothing to provide an end or a solution

to the dispute.

The dispute continues and must be resolved within the next 21 days.

I'm going to try to draw to the Minister of Health's attention an

approach which I think it's obligatory on him to take if there's any

prospect whatsoever of that dispute being solved in a voluntary way.

I'm not offering this in a critical sense, because I understand pretty

well the problems that do obtain in the health industry in terms of the

bargaining structure and so on. But the fact of the matter is that

under the directive which apparently has gone out from the Department

of Health to the hospitals, I submit to the House, Mr. Chairman, that

it's absolutely impossible for the hospital industry to consummate a

collective agreement with their employees at this time.

I refer, to begin with, to an

article which appeared in the Vancouver Province on today's date, an

article by John Braddock, a medical reporter:

"Hospital services are likely to be cut if a

provincial government directive limiting operating cost increases is

carried through, Vancouver area hospital administrators warned Thursday.

"They hear they will have to pick up the tab for this

year's collective bargaining agreements. And if the Hospital Employee's

Union settlement is greater than hospitals expect, the money will have

to come from other programmes. The same would apply to registered

nurses and other groups seeking new contracts.

"The directive from John Glenwright, associate deputy

minister of hospital programmes, says that because of the government's

policy of constraint the 1976 increase will be limited to 8.5 per cent

of the 1975 budget, subject to certain adjustments.

"The method will replace the previous practice of

'line by line review of hospitals' estimates' in which each service was

costed separately.

" 'Your attention is drawn to the fact that funds

provided to your hospital on the above (new) basis must cover any

increased costs that will be incurred by your hospital as a result of

1976 collective bargaining agreements, including any additional costs

that may result from the job evaluation study,' Glenwright said in his

circular.

"He asked the hospitals 'to cooperate by postponing

the introduction of any new programmes until after the 1976-77 fiscal

year. I wish to emphasize that because of the limited funds available,

hospital programmes will not be in a position to provide funds for new

programmes during the current fiscal year.'

[ Page 1972 ]

" 'It is regretted that no funds will be available for financing the hiring of summer students in the hospitals in 1976.'

"Lions Gate Hospital administrator, John Borthwick,

called the 8.5 per cent 'awfully tight. We'll just have to reassess the

cost of programmes, but it all depends on the settlements reached with

the unions.' "

That's the relevant

section of the article. It's not in its entirety.

I would further expand on this problem by reading from the Blair

report, the report of the industrial inquiry commissioner which was

directed to the Minister of Labour, and I presume to the Minister of

Health, on April 5 of this year. On this important matter of job

evaluation, which I'm sure the Minister of Health and his officials are

aware of...and there's some very pertinent sections in the Blair report

which clearly point out that unless the Minister of Health is prepared

to stand behind, to guarantee the funding to the hospitals in this

province, which will be incurred by the new collective bargaining round

this year, then the hospitals have no other place to obtain those funds

from, other than to cut services. That's what they're in business to

provide — services to people who are ill.

So I'm not sure whether the Minister of Health understands that the

directive that has been sent out, his failure to give a commitment so

far that he will stand behind whatever costs are imposed by the new

collective agreement, is, in effect, and very effectively ensuring that

no agreement in that industry can be consummated between the hospitals

and their employees. I'm sure that the government would wish to see a

voluntary solution to the problems that exist in that industry.

Certainly that's the preferable way of solving the problem of human

relations, and industrial relations is human relations.

I point out that the industrial inquiry commissioner, Mr. Blair,

starting on page 12 of his report, gave a very cogent background of

this problem of job evaluation, which is a high-cost factor of the

collective agreement this year. I'm not going to read it all because I

don't think I have time today. I'll deal with this more fully next week

perhaps, but there are a number of passages here that I would make the

House aware of. The commissioner concludes in discussing job

evaluation, which will set a rate for all of the functions covered by

the Hospital Employees Union members.... He says on page 14:

" In their current round of wage negotiations, the

parties negotiated their way together on job evaluations to the extent

set forth in the revised

article 12, job evaluation, of their proposed

collective agreement, which is attached hereto and forms part of this

part. However, the opposing views of the parties in respect of several

aspects of the matter have prevented full agreement between them on job

evaluation.

"As pointed out earlier, the Minister of Health has

not yet officially released to the parties the administrative

committee's report on job evaluation, and since there will be an

initial implementation cost to the job-evaluation programme proposed in

the administrative committee's report, Health Labour Relations" —

that's the bargaining arm for the employer — "takes the position that

it cannot agree to the implementation of the programme until such time

as the parties have received from the Minister of Health official

notice of his acceptance and release of the report in question."

And it wishes words to that effect embodied in the revised article, job evaluation, of the new collective agreement.

What, in effect, the Health Labour Relations Association is saying

is that while they are in favour of adopting in principle the

administrative committee's proposed job-evaluation programme, they must

have assurance that the funds to cover its initial implementation costs

will be made available to its member hospitals by the Minister of

Health.

Now without that assurance...they have an agreement, a tentative

agreement that they would like to execute — they would like to

consummate and execute — as a collective agreement, but they are

prevented from doing so because, in effect, the Minister of Health, by

directive apparently, has said: "Look, you're going to be restricted in

total budget increase to 8.5 per cent this year, and if your collective

agreement salary increases — in addition to the other increases,

presumably, in hospital budgets for that year — exceed this amount,

then the funds will not be made available."

Now I point out that I'm sympathetic to the Minister of Health and

his officials in terms of the dilemma that confronts them under the

usual circumstances and the historic circumstances in the past whereby

the collective bargaining process imposes a charge on the department

which they have no way of controlling, and they are simply asked to

respond to. That's a problem, a real dilemma, and a flaw, may I

suggest, Mr. Chairman, in the bargaining structure and which our

government was confronted with, in all frankness, and which the current

government is confronted with. It's going to have to be straightened

out; it's a difficult one to deal with. But I submit that there is an

important change this year — a very, very important and significant

change, which I appeal to the government, particularly to the Minister

of Health, to recognize and respond to. That change is the fact that we

have on the floor of this House a bill, Bill 16, which would have the

effect of referring all collective agreements in the public sector

[ Page 1973 ]

in British Columbia to review by the Anti-Inflation Board.

I'm sure the government's intent to establish that process in the

province, and then repudiate it, in the case of the hospital industry

collective agreement by saying: "we're not going to rely on the process

we're bringing in by legislative action; rather, we are going to

establish our own guidelines at 8.5 per cent, subject to the directive

" — I think that would be

an act of bad faith, and I don't believe for

one moment that it's intended. I think the government hasn't recognized

that Bill 16 and their stated intention, although it's not passed yet —

it certainly is retroactive as I understand it.... So long as that is

the government's direction, then they have a clear obligation to say:

"Fine, we'll honour whatever cost is imposed upon us through the

collective bargaining process because we're secure in the knowledge

that it's going to be subject to review by the Anti-Inflation Board,

and that's the process that we've set up by statute as being fair and

equitable and acceptable."

Anything less would be a complete repudiation of the government's

direction and their initiative in Bill 16. It would be a clear denial

of the whole collective bargaining system, and I'm confident that

that's not what is intended. I think the dilemma has not really been

perceived.

Under the circumstances, Mr. Chairman, I appeal to the Minister of

Health to publicly commit the government and the department this year

to say: "Fine, we will not leave the hospitals holding the bag. We will

fund whatever costs are imposed upon you through the collective

bargaining system, secure in the knowledge that through our own

legislative action that collective agreement and that cost is going to

be subject to review by the Anti-Inflation Board anyway."

I want to suggest that if this is done, there is absolutely no

roadblock standing in the way of a settlement of the dispute between

the hospitals of this province and the Hospital Employees Union. I

suggest there's no roadblock if that occurs. I believe that the

government is as anxious as most of us are, I believe, to see a

conclusion to the industrial relations dispute in the hospital industry

that is not imposed in any arbitrary way and hence, perhaps, leaves a

lingering hostility and ill-will which would affect and downgrade the

morale of that very important industry where morale is important.

I am sure that the government feels as I do, that they would like to

see a voluntary accord reached by those parties, and I strongly appeal

to the Minister of Health. If he'll give that kind of commitment, which

is not an uncontrolled commitment any more, if he'll do that, I

strongly suggest that a voluntary settlement of that dispute is within

reach. I think it would be a great assist to the Minister of Labour

(Hon. Mr. Williams). I wonder if the Minister of Health could give

that kind of response. It's a conditional one. It's not a carte blanche.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, there's no way that I

could give that commitment at this present time. Your remarks are very

interesting and I'll take them into consideration. That's the best I

can do.

I would like to refer to the letter, briefly, that went out to the

hospitals. I'm sure the member, the former Minister of Labour (Mr.

King), will recognize that it wasn't a flat 8.5 per cent which was

mentioned in the letter, but 8.5 per cent after specific adjustments

have been made to the 1975 approved budget for the following year.

I would just like to point out, Mr. Chairman, through you to the

member, that the 1976-77 budget for hospital programmes — this year's —

is over $530 million. The 1975-76 budget, including two special

warrants, came to $462 million, so the increase to be voted, and which

we're discussing today, is $68.4 million. There will be an additional

increase because of the co-insura