May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1613 Legislative Assembly of Alberta Title: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 8:00 p.m. Date: 06/05/16 head: Government Bills and Orders Committee of the Whole [Mr. Marz in the chair] The Chair: I’d like to call the Committee of the Whole to order. Bill 20 Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2006 The Chair: The committee has been discussing Bill 20, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2006. The hon. Member for Cardston-Taber-Warner still has 17 minutes. Mr. Hinman: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Blues aren’t back, so I don’t know where I finished. Maybe I’ll be a little bit repetitive here, and I apologize for being redundant. We were talking, though, about a castle and about building the walls higher, the walls thicker, the moat deeper, and more water. I think the problem that they’re looking at, Mr. Chairman, is that they don’t realize that this castle that they’re building doesn’t include all Albertans though I believe they truly think that it is protecting all Albertans. So as they build their castle, there are more and more that feel outside, and they can’t get through.

They’re being pushed away and are wondering: “What kind of government is this? They don’t even let me inside the castle, and the walls are too high to see over.” They definitely feel pushed to the outside. The Chair: Hon. members, I know that the committee is a less formal part of the process, but we still need to keep our side conversations down so that we can hear what the speaker is saying. Right now the Member for Cardston-Taber-Warner has the floor. Mr. Hinman: As I started out, what I was looking at, Mr. Chairman, was the fact that the House leader explained about democracy and the importance of it.

I guess I have to wonder: if we can’t filibuster in here and we don’t have recall, how could the people ever possibly stop a government from doing something that they don’t go along with? They seem to have a divine right to rule for four or five years and then can never be stopped. This isn’t in the interest of the people.

But what I find really interesting and curious about this: though this government says that recall is wrong, I definitely remember that in November 2004 the people gave a mandate to the Premier, who was very much up front and open in saying: I’ll be here for three- plus years before I step down. Yet he’s been recalled by his own elite members of his party and turfed and told to leave. If you don’t believe in recall, why do they allow their own leader to be attacked?

So there are some questions that need to be answered there for the people of Alberta because they voted him in with a three-year mandate, yet he’s not going to be able to complete what he promised to the people of Alberta because of his own members. You have to ask the questions, you know, on private corporation versus a public corporation, and what openness should be there. We understand very well the difference in what’s allowed. The House leader, I believe, was the one who spoke and said that we didn’t understand and that they’ve got to be repetitive and go over and over it.

I guess I just want to point out to the House leader – and I don’t know whether the hon. member was lazy or whether the reporter was lazy – that we have almost the identical, the same words talking about: The subtler problem is that the legislation could give the govern- ment the power to append other important documents to the formal briefing notes – and by doing so, put them off limits, too.

In other words, a ministerial assistant could potentially take an embarrassing internal memo or departmental report, put it into the same binder with the briefing notes as an appendix and suddenly make it a classified document. So I think that not only do you need to say to the members of this opposition that we don’t understand. I think it’s more important that you get out and tell Albertans because I think a lot more Albertans read the Edmonton Journal than they do Hansard. It’s not a secret that’s inside this House and what’s going on there.

That’s what’s being reported in the papers, and they would do well to follow that. Paula Simons comes forward with some more interesting points that I’d like to read into Hansard. Internal financial problems the government doesn’t want us to know about? They’ll be top secret until it’s far too late to raise the alarm or fix the problem. So why should you care? After all, you’re probably not an investigative journalist . . . An Hon. Member: Is this on the amendment? Mr. Hinman: We’re long past the amendment. You should keep up on things. . . . just an ordinary citizen.

The May sun is shining, the Oilers are leading the Sharks three games to two. Perhaps you’d prefer the government get on with doing its job efficiently, without nosy reporters poking into private matters that don’t concern them. Except that everything our government does is a public matter – and your direct personal concern. We don’t work for Ralph Klein and his crew. They work for us. Every cabinet minister is your . . . I apologize. I’m sorry. I was reading the news clipping. I’ll retract that. We don’t work for [the Premier] and his crew. They work for us. Every cabinet minister is your employee.

So is every civil servant. We hire them with our votes . . . The Chair: Hon. member. The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: I don’t mind him making a sp eech per se, but Beauchesne is very clear in cautioning members from quoting extensively from public documents. So perhaps we could just be reminded of that and ask the member to stop and carry on with the rest of his comments. The Chair: The hon. Government House Leader is absolutely right, and I was on the verge of bringing that to your attention. So if you would please carry on. Mr. Hinman: I thank the hon.

Government House Leader and the chair for reminding me of that. I didn’t think it was long. I thought it was short. So I apologize. I wasn’t trying to just use up time. I would highly encourage the government members to read the article. It puts out some very good points. The secrecy that goes on isn’t good. I talked earlier about a past Prime Minister who was saying that the electorate wasn’t smart enough to understand. This is very much the same problem. We’ve tried to reform health care, and I think everybody in this House

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061614 agrees on that, that we need to reform it, but secrecy hasn’t worked, and it’s been brought forward three times. What are the briefing notes that go in there? I would put forth to this government that they might be amazed if those briefing notes and those opinions were there and we were to educate the electorate rather than smothering them with smoke and trying to flash them with fancy mirrors so that they can’t see it. That’s what good government is: it’s leading the people.

I don’t believe at all that it’s an incompetent government that, after it puts out its ideas and listens to the people, retracts them and says: gee, we’ve got to rethink which pathway we’re going down here. The Premier has been very good, when he’s floated ideas in the past and then found them unpopular, at retracting them and going back on it. We’re very much in a position where it seems like we’re in a small town and there’s only one restaurant, and that restaurant says, “Everybody has got to come and eat what I’m going to feed them.” They’re not even allowed to know what’s on the menu.

They say, “Oh, we wouldn’t feed you anything that isn’t for your good health,” not realizing that there might be allergies and things, and saying, “No, what we have is good.” The people will reject this. It is a bad thing if Bill 20 passes. They’re not going to be pleased with it. As they push forward, it will be to their detriment after the detriment of Albertans, unfortu- nately. [interjection] Are you whining or someone else? I’m not sure. Mr. Chairman, there are many aspects of Bill 20 that have been brought up that Albertans are upset with, that opposition members are upset with.

I even had one person from this House talk to me that isn’t in opposition, and he said: “Maybe what we need to do is amend the name. It should be perhaps the respect the dead and protect the skeletons bill. That would maybe be more appropriate.” Graham Thomson in his

article recently said that the best thing to happen would be for the House to recess tonight. [interjections] I’m not reading anything. You guys, pay attention. It’s unbelievable. Moaning and moaning. You’d think you were a Canadian Tire advertisement as soon as someone says something they don’t agree with. The Chair: Hon. member, could you please direct your comments through the chair? Mr. Hinman: I’d appreciate that, Mr. Chair. I can’t even hear myself think. There’s so much moaning and nah, nah, nah that I thought it was a Canadian Tire advertisement. They’re still continuing.

Anyway, Graham Thomson, who says that he’s always com- plained how short the House has sat, is now saying that the best thing that could happen would be to shoot the old nag before she reaches the finish line on Thursday. I’d have to agree. It would be to the benefit of Albertans. An Hon. Member: Is this on the amendment? Mr. Hinman: Where has everybody been, Mr. Chairman? Maybe you need to tell them that we’re on Bill 20 and that they’ve invoked time allotment. [interjections] Chair’s Ruling Decorum The Chair: Hon. members, the hon. Member for Cardston-Taber- Warner has the floor, and we are speaking on Bill 20.

The amend- ment was dealt with before recessing at 5:27, so we are now on the bill, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amend- ment Act, 2006. If the member would please continue and if the rest of the Assembly would please allow him to do so, we may make some progress. Hon. member, please proceed. 8:10 Debate Continued Mr. Hinman: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We only need to look at the voter turnout to see how it went down the last time. It’s been brought up many times that actually the 21 opposition members have more votes than the government members, but we realize it’s 21 to 62.

We only have to look at the latest report that ranks different professions and how they’re trusted, and we realize that being a politician is ranked at the bottom of some 20, 29 things. There’s a reason for that, Mr. Chairman. It’s because of past behaviour, but we could change that with future behaviour and raise the standards. One has to wonder if that’s going to change. It doesn’t make one exactly excited to say that you’re an elected representative when one reads and thinks of such thoughts when you talk about government.

The Chair: Hon member, we’re speaking about Bill 20, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2006, not electoral reform. Mr. Hinman: I realize that, Mr. Chairman, and I thought that the two were directly related. When the secrecy is there so much, it’s a problem. But I will try and get back more on track then. The bill brings up many points that are good, and it does protect the privacy of individuals. No one in this House has been arguing or debating that.

The debate has gone on and continues to go on about the things that can be buried for five or 15 years, and they seem to miss that point. That’s what we’ve been trying to bring up. There were some excellent points brought up by the Member for Calgary-Bow and other members, and that’s the type of debate that we need to be able to push through and to understand this thing. But to bring in the time allotment has not been helpful to this House, and it’s certainly not helpful to the democratic process. Basically, to wrap it up, Mr.

Chairman, the public perception, the opposition perception is very much that this is about secrecy. This is not a bill that’s in the interest of people. The people have no way of stopping this bill. The oppos ition now is left with no way of stopping this bill because of the time allocation that’s been given to that. It’s wrong. But I will comment on the $59 million that the hon. minister says has been spent on this and the $550,000 collected. Yes, money is very much a major factor in this, but I don’t know that it’s a bad factor.

We don’t want to have to spend $120 million, but on the other side, when something is reasonable – I spoke with one reporter who said that it cost him over $3,000 to access the information, to get to it. It’s very difficult to get to those things, but I don’t know that that’s totally bad. Mr. Herard: What did he get for his 3,000 bucks? Mr. Hinman: Mr. Chairman, the hon. Minister of Advanced Education wants to know what he got for the $3,000. I’ll refer to him later, maybe this evening, if he wants to talk on that subject. But, yeah, he got some interes ting things, and there’s lots more there.

As was mentioned earlier, maybe we need to amend it to respect

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1615 the dead and protect the skeletons. That might be more applicable. As the Premier leaves, there are many titles: Klein set to slam the door on public rights; Tories’ privacy amendments blasted; doors of government swing closed; and many other comments like that. Mr. Chairman, if someone was listening, I think that it would perhaps make them think twice on this and say: I don’t know that this is so good. Perhaps what we need to think about is that maybe we haven’t explained it good enough to the public, and we should step back and explain it and look at it a little bit better.

The third way came through, and there was great resistance. People are always afraid of secrecy, and it’s not a good thing. An open and honest debate where people can see what the ministers are being told would be important. A good example in the future is that we’re going to have more and more debate over nuclear power. Is that going to be secret? Just for the minister, just for cabinet to decide what’s good or bad for Albertans? I think that would be great to be open and say: “These are the pros; these are the cons.

What do Albertans want?” and not let an elite group or an elitist group of 24 or 25 say: “We know best. We’ll hide all of our briefings. Anything that we’re told will be ours for five years, and that will be the best for Albertans.” There’s nothing more disappointing than to have a nanny government that says that it knows everything that’s best and hides everything from the people so they don’t know. I would urge this government to reconsider as we vote on this. We could perhaps put it off for a while, come back in the fall, debate it some more.

It’s not in the best interest to push this through, and I would hope that the old nag gets shot before the night’s over. With that, Mr. Chairman, I’ll take my seat. Thank you. The Chair: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Calder. Mr. Eggen: Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know that there are just a few brief minutes left to speak on Bill 20, and I’m glad to have the opportunity. What we’ve seen in these past weeks in regard to Bill 20 has sort of hung over this Legislature, this Assembly, a bit like a vulture.

Each time I knew that in the dead of night it was going to pop back if there was an opportunity to pass it, and now at this late time it seems as though closure has been invoked. You know, I find that gravely offensive because, in fact, debate and clear debate on something like this is absolutely essential. We’re only now starting to get the public educated as to what the full parameters of Bill 20 are, and I would urge . . .

The Chair: I hesitate to interrupt the hon. member, but pursuant to Government Motion 19 agreed to May 16, 2006, which states that after two hours of debate all questions must be decided to conclude debate on Bill 20, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2006, in Committee of the Whole, I must now put the following questions to conclude debate. [The clauses of Bill 20 agreed to] [Title and

preamble agreed to] The Chair: Shall the bill be reported? Are you agreed? Hon. Members: Agreed. The Chair: Opposed? That’s carried. The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would move that the Committee of the Whole now rise and report Bill 20. [Motion carried] [The Deputy Speaker in the chair] The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Drayton Valley- Calmar. Rev. Abbott: Well, thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Committee of the Whole has had under consideration a certain bill. The committee reports the following bill: Bill 20.

I wish to table copies of all amendments considered by the Committee of the Whole on this date for the official records of the Assembly. The Deputy Speaker: Does the Assembly concur in the report? Hon. Members: Concur. The Deputy Speaker: Opposed? So ordered. Might we revert briefly to Introduction of Guests? [Unanimous consent granted] head: 8:20 Introduction of Guests The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Calder. Mr. Eggen: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I just want to take a brief time out from all the action here to introduce my family to you and through you to all members of this Assembly: my wife, Somboon, and my daughter, Ava, and a very special person in our family today, Genevieve, who just turned 14 about an hour ago. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Glenora. Dr. B. Miller: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am very pleased to introduce to you and through you 13 people from the House Next Door Society, which has a number of homes in my riding. It was my privilege to have a picture taken with them.

They’ve been touring the Legislature, and I’d like them to stand and please receive the warm welcome of this House. The Deputy Speaker: If I may, the guests that just left, just to get it in the record, were the wife and two sons of our legal counsel Mr. Rob Reynolds. His wife, Ritu, and his sons, Samir and Nikhil, were here to see their father work tonight. head: Government Bills and Orders Second Reading Bill 43 Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It’s my pleasure to move Bill 43, the Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act, 2006, on behalf of the hon. Minister of Justice and Attorney General. [Motion carried; Bill 43 read a second time]

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061616 head: Government Bills and Orders Third Reading Bill 38 Livestock Identification and Commerce Act The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development. Mr. Horner: Well, thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my pleasure to move third reading of Bill 38, the Livestock Identification and Commerce Act. It’s an important bill to the livestock industry, Mr. Speaker. It does consolidate and revise three existing acts. I’d just like to clarify a few things before we move forward. There seems to be some confusion regarding the regulation of livestock products.

I’d like to clarify that the regulations addressing eggs, honey, and poultry that exist today under the Livestock and Livestock Products Act will continue under that act. Returning to the subject of B ill 38, it will better address the regulatory requirements relating to commercial transactions of the livestock industry. This is an industry that has changed substantially over the past few decades, and we do need to ensure that the legislation reflects our modern realities.

The bill clarifies that the purpose of a livestock inspection is to confirm that the person possessing the livestock is the owner or the owner’s agent and that the sale proceeds are flowing to the correct party. Bill 38 sets out a mandatory requirement that sellers disclose security interests in the livestock they are selling. This provision supports the statutory bar to conversion actions that protect buyers who follow the requirements of the act, pay in accordance with the manifest, and otherwise engage in bona fide transactions.

In the end what we’ve designed is legislation that will facilitate fair commerce, protect personal property, and promote the integrity of marketing within the livestock industry. These are important policy goals that Bill 38 certainly achieves. No single group, be it lenders or producers, has achieved their utopia under this, but Bill 38 is a compromise that respects the goals of a diverse industry. It’s a balanced bill which I believe w ill be beneficial to everyone in the livestock industry. Mr.

Speaker, I know that many have stood in this House and spoken about their concerns on this bill but have also expressed their support to see it pass. I appreciate the support that has been received from many members in this House and anticipate their support at third reading. So I’m very pleased to move this bill at third reading. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie. Mr. Agnihotri: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my great pleasure to speak on Bill 38, the Livestock Identification and Commerce Act. The Canadian Bankers Association has expressed an objection to

section 18, statutory bar to conversion, and

section 18(3), to extend protection to agents of the seller, of Bill 38. The new

section 18, statutory bar to conversion, protects cattle buyers by limiting the ability of creditors to collect from the current owner; that is, pay twice for the cattle. In a typical sale cattle are trucked to a large packer who purchases 40 truckloads of cattle a day. Payment is due within two days, so the buyer is typically unable to check for liens. A good analogy is buying and selling used cars. Following the car analogy, the buyer checks for liens before purchase. This cannot be done with cattle as there is no mechanism to search cattle by serial number, that is VIN.

The ca ttle industry relies extensively on lending and borrowing. The Canadian Bankers Association concerns are this. The lending institutions currently have the ability to collect monies owed by the seller from the future owner of the cattle. Lending institutions will lose this ability in Bill 38. This change may allow auction marts to not take the task of evaluating the risk as seriously. The agent for a seller or buyer, such as an auction mart, is well positioned to evaluate title or security interests in cattle. Mr.

Speaker, for example, they can get to know their regular clients and only search or assess security risks from unknown clients. The banks have not used their ability to sue future owners of the cattle for lost funds; however, they argue that the ability to sue provides a safety valve which keeps buyers and agents conducting due diligence in checking for security interests. These changes will have two effects, Mr. Speaker. First, these changes could effectively stop farmers from getting credit for livestock as banks will not be able to collect on their collateral.

Two, this will increase the cost of borrowing for farmers as it increases the risk associated with lending money to farmers or ranchers. The bankers propose two solutions. First, the bankers propose repealing

section 18(3) and substituting a

section that would require auction marts to perform due diligence in checking for security interests. Two, when an auction mart is the financier of cattle, the auction mart and seller should be considered associated or not at arm’s length. See

section 1,

definitions. As such, the statutory bar to conversion would not apply. The statutory bar to conversion provides protection to buyers who purchase large numbers of cattle, mainly the big three meat-packing plants. They argue that they need this protection because it is not feasible to check every animal. My questions are to the minister. How does the minister plan to resolve the legitimate concerns of the Canadian Bankers Associa- tion? Does he have any intention to amend the bill to include these concerns? Why were these concerns not addressed prior to bringing Bill 38 to the Assembly? Thank you very much.

The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Vermilion- Lloydminster. Mr. Snelgrove: Mr. Speaker, might I ask consideration of the hon. members for unanimous consent to doff our jackets for the long line of third readings that we have tonight due to the wonderful Alberta day that’s sharing its warmth in here with us? The Deputy Speaker: There has been a ruling on this on the past. I will accept the motion. Are there any opposed? That’s apparently carried. So we will allow the jackets to be removed on this very hot evening. Hon. members, does anyone else wish to participate in the debate? The hon.

Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development to close debate. 8:30 Mr. Horner: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Very quickly because the hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie basically repeated the same concerns and pretty much the same speech as the Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar brought forward. In fact, Mr. Speaker, this act will continue the major security that banks have under the Canadian Bank Act. Indeed, I’m a little surprised that the Liberals are supporting the interests of the bankers here and not the industry, which is who we’re supporting. I am surprised that they’ve taken the side of the big banks.

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1617 To the hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie, we do not do amendments in third reading. Amendments are done in Committee of the Whole, as I’m sure the hon. Speaker could probably let you know about. It’s certainly something that by now we should all know in this House. So, no, I will not be introducing any amend- ments in third reading. I believe, Mr. Speaker, that the industry, after three years of consultation, has been looking at compromises with not only the banking industry. As an ex-banker I understand the banking industry.

I understand the security that they take in agriculture. I believe that this bill is a very good compromise and will serve our industry very well. I ask all hon. members to support it. [Motion carried; Bill 38 read a third time] Bill 34 Alberta Corporate Tax Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Leduc-Beaumont- Devon. Mr. Rogers: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased today to move third reading of Bill 34, the Alberta Corporate Tax Amendment Act, 2006. Mr. Speaker, I would like to address a few specific concerns raised during the Committee of the Whole debate. The hon.

Member for Edmonton-Rutherford asked for an elaboration on the reimburse- ment of the Crown charges and to provide an example of when this would apply. The Deputy Speaker: Hon. member, a private member cannot move a money bill on behalf of a minister. It has to be moved by a minister. Mr. Horner: Mr. Speaker, it’s my pleasure on behalf of the hon. Minister of Finance to move third reading of Bill 34, the Alberta Corporate Tax Amendment Act, 2006. The Deputy Speaker: Okay. Does the hon. Member for Leduc-Beaumont-Devon wish to speak on the motion? Mr. Rogers: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My apologies for my lapse of memory. Mr. Speaker, again referring to the questions from the hon. Member for Edmonton-Rutherford,

section 12.1 provides that where one party reimburses another under the terms of a contract for Crown royalties paid, the reimbursi ng party is trusted as having incurred the royalties directly for income tax purposes. These arrangements are common in the oil and gas sector. This member also questioned wh y Alberta is not paralleling the federal transition period for resource tax changes. The federal government, Mr. Speaker, is phasing out the resource allowance and returning to royalty deductibility over a four-year period from 2003 to 2006.

Alberta reviewed its royalty tax policy in 2003 and decided not to parallel the federal phase-out to ensure that no Alberta taxpayers were adversely affected during the transition. As the federal government revises its Income Tax Act to implement the phase-out, Alberta has to ensure that the Alberta Corporate Tax Act does not parallel that transition. Effective January 1, 2007, the resource allowance is eliminated for both federal and Alberta purposes, and royalties are then fully deductible. This member also queried the treatment of income versus mutual fund trusts in

section 7. Mr. Speaker, this provision parallels federal rules that describe how corporations must calculate their income when they receive a distribution from a mutual fund trust. The member also asked if the minister or ministry has ever used the power to waive penalties or interest owing allowed under

section 10, and if so, the member asked for a list to be made public. Since the time that the provision came into force, Mr. Speaker – and that was 1992 – interest and/or penalties have been waived for corpora- tions which cannot comply with the Alberta Corporate Tax Act due to extraordinary circumstances. Tax and revenue administration, Alberta Corporate Tax Act, information circular CT-5R3 provides information on what are considered as extraordinary circumstances and how corporations apply for the waiver.

The information circular has been made available to the public since 1992, when this provision came into force. In terms of providing a list, as the information requested is tax information specific to particular corporations, in accordance with

section 77 of the Alberta Corporate Tax Act we must keep this information confidential. Finally, the member questioned why

section 106 is being substi- tuted. This

section provides the definition of the Alberta crown royalties paid by an individual that qualifies for the Alberta royalty credit, the parallel program to the Alberta royalty tax credit for corporations. In fact, you will notice that the same amendment is being made in

section 26 of the act, which provides rules for the Alberta royalty tax credit program. These are technical amendments to the act itself, Mr. Speaker, to clarify its

interpretation rather than a policy change. Mr. Speaker, I hope that these responses clarify the concerns raised by the hon. member. To review, Bill 34 will reduce the corporate income tax rate to 10 per cent from 11.5 per cent. This reduction will save Alberta businesses $265 million in 2006-07. This reduction is necessary, Mr. Speaker, to maintain Alberta’s competitive advantage as Alberta is not just competing within Canada with other provinces but in a much larger global marketplace.

Enhancing the Alberta tax advantage for business helps attract investment and encourages entrepreneurship, meaning that Albertans will have more jobs and stronger communities and a better quality of life. Mr. Speaker, I urge all members of this Legislature to give their support to Bill 34. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Beverly- Clareview. Mr. Martin: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Bill 34, the Alberta Corpo- rate Tax Amendment Act, 2006, should be better titled the Alberta corporate gift.

We’ve said this before, and we’ll say it again: in an overheated economy, when we already have the lowest corporate tax rate in the country . . . Mr. Mason: In the universe. Mr. Martin: In the universe maybe. Yes. I forgot about that. . . . and you move it down to 10 per cent, and you’re talking about 8 per cent down the way, what is the economic sense of that, Mr. Speaker? The money will be going. It’s $370 million lost revenue. The point is: how is that going to help the Alberta economy? These global corporations can take this money and say thank you very much and invest it anywhere they want in the world.

Who’s to say that it will even trickle down, the old trickle-down theory? Not many people have felt trickled down upon recently. It doesn’t even make sense here because it can trickle down somewhere else. That’s the point. Why would you do this, especially at this time? There

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061618 might be some logic to it if we had an economy that was staggering and we needed some investment. If we didn’t have an overheated economy, I might be able to understand that, but I see this economy, when we theoretically can’t get labour, we have jobs going wanting, we have the corporate sector with the lowest tax rate, and we’re going to lower it more. One can only believe that this is an absolute gift to the people that support this Conservative government. 8:40 Mr. Eggen: It’s a payback. Mr. Martin: It’s a payback. Exactly.

It’s a $370 million gift to the wealthiest people at a time when we’re going to be facing some difficulties in schools. We’ve talked about rising health care costs. We’ve talked about the problems. We don’t have enough money to index AISH people. We don’t have money for this, that, and everything else. But for the very wealthiest people in society here it is, $370 million: “We don’t care. You can have it. Do what you want with it.” It’s going again, most of it, to an energy industry that’s already making more money than they’ve ever made before, Mr. Speaker, in an overheated economy.

We add that on in this budget. Even this government admits that we’re losing $400 million in income trusts, probably to the same group of people, Mr. Speaker. So there it is, a loss of some $700 million. Eventually the problem with this is that when the Premier handed out the dividend funds, he said that it would be one time because we don’t want to get obligated into a taxation rate for people, like taking medicare premiums off, which would have been $800 million for ever ybody. We don’t want to do that. We just want to do one-time things.

Well, now we’re taking the corporate tax rate, and we’re going to live with that for how long? And you’re talking about lowering it even more down the way. This makes absolutely no economic sense at all other than what I said, that it’s a gift to their friends who pay the piper for this particular govern- ment. They’re clinking champagne glasses in downtown Calgary, I’m sure, at the generosity of this government. Meanwhile, what are we going to do down the way if the economy changes, Mr. Speaker? Now we’ve promised them 8 per cent, 6 per cent.

Maybe eventually we’ll have to just hand out the money to them without any taxation rate at all. It seems to me, when this government pleads poverty over so many other things and calls people irresponsible because they want money for certain programs, that this is the most irresponsible act that I’ve seen. As I say, I could understand it – maybe not agree with it but understand it – if the economy was in recession to some degree and you wanted to stimulate investment. What does this stimulate? It stimulates money going outside the country. That’s all it does, Mr. Speaker.

As I say, it’s not just a one-time gift like the dividend funds were to ordinary Albertans. This is a gift that keeps on giving year after year after year. Just to show you how generous we are, we’re even talking about lowering it to 8 per cent. I find this particular bill the most offensive thing that they’ve done this time, and there have been a lot of offensive things that we talked about in Bill 20. This is costing the taxpayers a lot of money. Eventually it is going to have an impact on the programs and the things that we can offer Albertans down the way, and we will regret this particular Bill 34. Now, Mr.

Speaker, I don’t think there’s any doubt about how I feel about this particular bill, but we always try to help this govern- ment out because Lord knows that they need the help. Mr. Knight: Thanks, Ray. Mr. Martin: You’re welcome. You’re very welcome. I want to move an amendment here, Mr. Speaker. I’ll send it up. The Deputy Speaker: Hon. member, an amendment is not in order. An Hon. Member: A reasoned amendment, is it? Mr. Martin: Yes. An Hon. Member: Well reasoned? Mr. Martin: Well reasoned. The Deputy Speaker: Apparently it is in order because it’s a reasoned amendment, so I will accept it. Mr. Martin: Mr.

Speaker, do you want me to go ahead or wait? The Deputy Speaker: Just wait a moment until it’s circulated to all the members. It’s now fairly well distributed. You may proceed, hon. member. Mr. Martin: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The motion reads that Bill 34, the Alberta Corporate Tax Amendment Act, 2006, be amended by striking out the words after “that” and substituting the following: Bill 34, Alberta Corporate Tax Amendment Act, 2006, be not now read a third time because the redu ction in the corporate tax rate contained therein shifts the tax burden onto individual taxpayers and narrows the provincial tax base, thereby posing a threat to stable and predictable funding for core programs. Mr. Speaker, it seems to us, as I said, folly to be moving ahead in this direction, especially when we don’t know what the future holds.

As I said, the Premier said that the reason he was doing the prosper- ity bonus is that he wanted this to be one-time funding. Now, here we go to the corporate sector, the wealthiest people, and say that we’re going to permanently lower their taxes and even more so down the way in the future. We think it’s time to put a stop to it, and this amendment would do that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Grande Prairie-Smoky. Mr. Knight: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With respect to this amend- ment, just a couple of comments, if I might.

The reason given for the amendment before us is that the reduction in corporate tax rate contained shifts the tax burden to individual taxpayers. Nothing could be further from correct. Individual taxpayers in the province of Alberta are also seeing a reduction in their tax rates. Again, it does not narrow the provincial tax base because, in fact, increased activity in our economic realm, that we have done very well with in the province of Alberta, will actually increase the tax base, not decrease it.

So I would suggest that we’re not posing any threat whatsoever to the stable and predictable funding for core programs in the province of Alberta, all of which have increased dramatically in the last number of years. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie. 8:50 Mr. Agnihotri: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my great pleasure to rise and support this amendment to Bill 34. This bill is nothing but to cut the corporate tax from 11.5 per cent to 10 per cent.

Alberta Liberals always stand for the health care premiums being cut before any corporate tax, but this bill is totally helping the rich people. “The reduction in the corporation tax rate contained therein shifts the tax burden onto individual taxpayers.” I absolutely agree with the

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1619 hon. member who proposed this amendment. Nobody is against the reduction in tax, but our first priority is to eliminate the health care premium tax. Alberta Liberals would prefer to cut the health care tax and some other user fees before we cut any corporate tax. That’s all I have to say. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Highlands- Norwood. Mr. Mason: Thanks very much, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased to rise to speak to this reasoned amendment.

I would point out to the House that this reasoned amendment would have the effect of defeating a government money bill and therefore is a motion of confidence. It’s our intention that the government should in fact be held accountable for its stand on corporate taxes. This corporate tax cut is unnecessary. Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, it’s part of a program of the government to cut corporate income tax in this province from 15 per cent to 8 per cent, a promise that was made by Steve West a number of years ago, about six years ago, when he was the Provincial Treasurer.

As far as I can tell, that comprises the entire and complete rationale for these corporate tax cuts. As my hon. colleague has said, this shifts the balance towards the personal income tax, and the proportion of funding of government operations that is borne by individual taxpayers is increased in proportion to that of corporations. At this time Alberta corporations, like corporations across North America, are earning record profits. They are earning higher profits than they ever have before.

So to cut their taxes at this time is completely unnecessary, yet it cuts into the ability of the province to finance on an ongoing basis its programs. I will quote from the government’s own documents. The govern- ment’s own budget documents state that with no general sales tax, payroll taxes or capital taxes, Alberta’s tax base is relatively narrow compared to other jurisdictions. Rev. Abbott: Right on. Mr. Mason: We’re getting applause over there for having a narrow tax base. I think the hon. member needs to talk to his Treasurer because she addressed this the other day during her estimates.

It goes on to say that while this is a benefit to Albertans, it also comes with some risks. A broader range of taxes means more stable revenues. With relatively fewer revenue sources, predictable funding for key public services is at more risk in the event of an economic slow-down. Consequently, it is inadvisable to eliminate or dedicate more taxes. That comes from Alberta Tax Advantage, page 134. That is exactly what the government is doing. They are narrowing the tax base, reducing their source of revenues which come from renewable sources as opposed to nonrenewable sources.

The amount lost in this year alone is over $265 million. Cuts to corporate income taxes started in 2001, and will save Alberta corporations about $435 million in taxes this year. These savings are on top of the savings from cuts to other corporate taxes, such as the elimination of the financial institutions capital tax and the drop in the railway fuel tax. That was Budget 2004. In two years alone, then, the cuts from 12.5 per cent to 10 per cent will have taken by a conservative estimate more than $700 million out of government revenue.

The $700 million could have paid three times the amount urged to increase and improve on seniors in long- term care throughout the province. That $700 million alone – remember, that’s just what was saved in two years, not all five that have seen cuts in rates – would pay more than twice the amount of new schools being sought by the Calgary board of education.

How can the government constantly applaud itself as having one of the best education systems in the world and announce that its strategic plan is to prepare students for the workforce and citizenship when it denies both the building of new schools and the repairing of old ones? How can this government face its citizens with such pride when it is denying children their future in order to pay for tax cuts that aren’t needed and are so damaging in other ways? Mr. Speaker, it’s not just a matter of shifting the balance toward personal income tax. It’s not just revenue loss. It’s economically ill advised.

At this time small business and the public sector are having a hard time competing for labour, in particular, and materials as well. So in this kind of situation it will become even more difficult. With a large tax cut for big corporations, small business will have a more difficult time competing for scarce resources in this economy. So in a word this tax cut is inflationary. The Auditor General has repeatedly asked the government to provide rationale for its tax cuts and particularly for its corporate tax cuts.

In other words, it’s seen as an expenditure item, a policy question that requires some sort of rationale in order to be justified. The government has not provided any justification other than an old promise made by Steve West. Mr. Speaker, this is clearly nothing but a gift to corporations. I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie speak in favour of this because the hon. Member for Edmonton- Rutherford, the Finance critic, has spoken in favour of this tax cut and on a number of occasions.

So I don’t know where the Liberals stand on this, but I do know what the government is benefiting by this. I have in front of me, Mr. Speaker, the 2005 corporate donations to the Conservative Party of Alberta. The Conservative Party in 2005 from the oil and gas sector received $223,460.27. From financial management and insurance they received $150,385.

From the construction, development, and real estate sector they received $232,408.94; from the engineering, consulting, and professional management firms, $148,000; from utilities, $65,000; from the health care sector, $62,000; from the mining, forestry, and agribusi- ness sector, $125,900; from professional corporations, $29,000; and from all other corporations, $333,828.19 for a grand total of $1,370,433.12 last year from the corporate sector in donations to the Alberta PC Party. We see why they support this government.

We see the symbiotic relationship between corporate donations to the Conservative Party and cuts to taxes for corporations. That really is the only economic explanation that I can see for this corporate tax cut. Needless to say, we urge all hon. members to vote in favour of this motion of confidence in the government on this budget. This corporate tax cut is irresponsible, unn ecessary, unjustified, and frankly completely unsupportable, Mr. Speaker. Thank you very much. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Cardston-Taber- Warner. Mr. Hinman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to rise and speak to this amendment on Bill 34. I’m opposed to this amend- ment, and I just want to go over a few points that the hon. Member for Grande Prairie-Smoky shared with us. There’s this notion that there’s a direct relationship between lower taxes and lower revenue, and quite the opposite has been shown time and time again. When you actually lower taxes, you often increase the government’s revenue. We’re grateful here in Alberta for the number of corpora- tions that have relocated here, and as I’ve spoken before, I’ve urged this government to follow up on their commitment to go to 8 per

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061620 cent. They said that. Corporations have moved here, and we should be good to our word in Alberta. 9:00 The hon. third-party leader has talked many times a bout pharmaceuticals. Wouldn’t it be a great blessing to Alberta if our corporate tax was a drawing card and we would actually get a pharmaceutical corporation to come into the province and want to produce those pharmaceuticals here in the province? We want to attract business. We want to be progressive and moving forward, be very diversified. We’ve gone to a flat tax of 10 per cent.

That’s helped professionals to come back to Alberta, doctors and research- ers, because they know that they’re not going to be penalized and treated unequally. So I am very much opposed to Bill 34 and hope that we’ll continue to lower taxes here and increase the revenue for the benefit of all Albertans. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: Others? Hon. Members: Question. [The voice vote indicated that the motion on the amendment lost] [Several members rose calling for a division.

The division bell was rung at 9:01 p.m.] [Ten minutes having elapsed, the Assembly divided] [The Deputy Speaker in the chair] For the motion: Eggen Mason Pannu Martin Against the motion: Abbott Herard Mitzel Backs Hinman Oberle Coutts Horner Prins Danyluk Knight Rodney DeLong Liepert Rogers Doerksen Lindsay Snelgrove Evans Lukaszuk Taylor Forsyth Lund VanderBurg Fritz Magnus Webber Hancock Miller, B. Zwozdesky Totals: For – 4 Against – 30 [Motion on amendment to third reading of Bill 34 lost] The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would seek the unanimous consent of the Assembly to shorten any future division bells for the remainder of the evening from 10 minutes down to two, and I wonder if the rest of the members would consent to that unanimously. [Unanimous consent granted] The Deputy Speaker: Now, on Bill 34 does anyone else wish to participate in the debate? Mr. Backs: I’m very pleased to rise to speak and say a few words in favour of this bill, Mr. Speaker. You know, there are some very positive things here.

The initiative to share tax info with the Chief Electoral Officer I think brings about some certain degree of accountability on that financial information. It ensures that all insurance companies are paying tax. I think that’s good. I’m disappointed that it doesn’t have removal of health care premiums in it. I think that there would be a greater efficiency for government in general in removing that bureaucracy and removing that payment. I don’t think that that particular bureaucracy has any real value to Alberta and that it should be just rolled right into the tax.

I think there is a need to reduce taxes not only in this area but in a number of areas. We will be having to prepare for what happens after the high oil price boom. If we can begin to attract and hold businesses in Alberta at least because of the taxes, if not because there are some problems in some other areas, it would do great good for the future of Alberta and Albertans. I’m sometimes very disappointed in what the New Democrats seem to have in their view of taxes.

They always seem to think that money grows on trees, that all business is bad, that any sort of profit- making mechanism, any small business is somehow a difficult thing for our economy. I don’t know what would make the economy grow or go at all if the New Democrats had their way. Many people are saying that they’ve given up on labour in the last three or four years. They hate business. They hate profit. I don’t know where they seem to be coming from or seem to be wanting their support. You know, they seem to love their ivory tower sort of ideas and all the rest of it.

I don’t know if they have any idea of where we would actually make an economy work with the ideas of the New Democrats. With that I thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: There seems to be an awful lot of chatter. Please, if we could keep it down, the Speaker would be able to hear the hon. member that has the floor. Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 34 read a third time] Bill 10 Engineering, Geological and Geophysical Professions Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Lac La Biche-St. Paul. Mr. Danyluk: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I rise to move third reading of Bill 10, the Engineering, Geological and Geophysi- cal Professions Amendment Act, 2006. Mr. Speaker, I appreciated hearing the many thoughtful comments and discussion on this bill. Bill 10 will clarify and strengthen the engineering profession by allowing registered professional technolo- gists to sit on the council of the Association of Professional Engi- neers, Geologists and Geophysicists of Alberta, known as APEGGA, and vote on the association’s new and amended regulations and bylaws. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie.

Mr. Agnihotri: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my great pleasure again to rise and speak to third reading in support of B ill 10, Engineering, Geological and Geophysical Professions Amendment

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1621 Act, 2006. This bill allows registered professional technologists in engineering to vote and be elected to the engineering council of the Association of Professional Engineers, Geologists and Geophysicists of Alberta. It’s called APEGGA. RPT engineers w ill have an increased opportunity to participate in the governance of APEGGA. ASET supports this change as registered professional technolo- gists, RPT engineers, have been part of APEGGA since 2001. They feel voting privileges should have been in place since then.

This bill allows them to have the right to vote in the governance of their professional association. Mr. Speaker, in the year 2001 the act was amended to include registered professional technologists in engineering as Association of Professional Engineers, Geologists and Geophysicists of Alberta, APEGGA, members. They were not, however, granted voting or council membership rights in the association at that time.

There are currently about 150 RPT engineers in Alberta, but the number is growing from 135 in 2003. 9:20 Some members of APEGGA are not in favour of the change as they would prefer to keep the governance of APEGGA in the control of traditionally qualified professionals. The practice of engineering, geology, and geophysics in Alberta is governed by the Engineering, Geological and Geophysical Prof essions Act. APEGGA is man- dated to administer the act as a self-governing body on behalf of the Alberta government, all in the interest of public safety and well- being. It has about 43,000 members.

APEGGA is governed by an elected council of 19 members, including three public representa- tives appointed by the government, and directs the association’s affairs. APEGGA’s regular activ ities include registering and licensing qualified members, establishing practice standards, administering a complaint and discipline process, encouraging professional develop- ment, reviewing member and corporate practice, stopping those not qualified from practising and using the title. Mr.

Speaker, within a clearly defined scope of practice registered professional technologists are permitted to independently practise engineering, geology, or geophysics in Alberta within a narrowly defined scope of practice and to take responsibility for that work. This category recognizes that certain qualified individuals can be permitted to independently carry out certain specific functions, normally within the definition of professional engineering, profes- sional geology, or professional geophysics, without the supervision of a professional engineer, professional geologist, or professional geophysicist.

An RPT engineer is licensed to independently practise engineering in Alberta within a clearly defined scope of practice. A registered professional technologist must be registered as an RET with ASET and be nominated for registering as an RPT engineer by ASET, have at least six years of experience in work of an engineering nature that is acceptable to the APE GGA board of examiners, be of good character and reputation, demonstrate knowledge of law, ethics, and professionalism by passing the national professional practice examination, and meet the English language competency requirements as well.

I support this bill. This is a good bill. That’s all I have to say, Mr. Speaker. Thank you. Mr. Backs: Just a very brief couple of comments to speak in support of Bill 10, Engineering, Geolog ical and Geophy sical Professions Amendment Act, and reluctantly in support because I don’t think it really accomplishes a whole bunch. The nature of giving a vote to a group of registered professional technicians, which will amount maybe to 150 in a membership of 40,000, is not giving a likelihood of a whole bunch of folks getting elected from that group.

In many ways I think what we’ve done with this is really struck something that the two groups have agreed on, and because of that I support it. But I don’t really think that it accomplishes much of anything, and we’ll be back in this Legislature down the road dealing with the nature of the conflict or the nature of the necessity of coming up with something that will better deal with the demarca- tion lines, the ways that the professional technicians and technolo- gists deal with the actual engineers, geologists, and geophysicists. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question?

The hon. Member for Lac La Biche-St. Paul to close debate. Mr. Danyluk: Mr. Speaker, I rise just to ask everyone to support this bill. [Motion carried; Bill 10 read a third time] Bill 14 Health Professions Statutes Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Cypress-Medicine Hat. Mr. Mitzel: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the opportunity to speak to third reading. Bill 14, the Health Professions Statutes Amend- ment Act, 2006, makes amendments to the Health Professions Act that respond directly to issues raised by professions being brought under the act.

The Health Professions Act is nearing full comple- tion. There will be 28 regulatory colleges established under the act and governed by regulation when it is fully implemented. Currently there are 16 colleges regulated under the act. The regulations for six more colleges are being finalized this spring. The amendments proposed in Bill 14 will strengthen the Health Professions Act and respond to issues raised by individual colleges and by the federation of regulated health professions. Mr.

Speaker, the key amendments to Bill 14 include clarification respecting receipt of complaints, the application of continuing competence programs, adding flexibility to the process for consider- ing applications from professions to be governed under the act, enabling councils to regulate the title of specialist with respect to their profession, the addition of several protected titles, an amend- ment by the practice statement for opticians to allow the regulatory body to regulate its members who are performing refractions and conducting assessments.

During debate on the bill issues were raised with respect to two of the proposed amendments. One issue is related to opticians performing refractions and eye health assessments. The issue respecting eye health assessments was addressed through a House amendment agreed to by the regulatory bodies for optometrists and opticians to remove the reference eye health. The reference is now to conduct assessments.

I want to assure you that the amendment respecting the perfor- mance of refractions, which is not a restricted activity, only ensures that what opticians are currently doing as part of the practice of opticiantry will be subject to the regulatory control of the opticians college. It doesn’t change the scope of practice for opticians, nor does it permit them to perform the restricted activity of prescribing corrective lenses. The second amendment that generated much discussion during debate on the bill relates to applications by professions who want to be regulated under the Health Professions Act.

Instead of having to establish that there is support from the majority of practitioners, the minister will now be able to refer the application for investigation as

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061622 long as it is in the public interest . It’s important to emphasize that the minister is not being given the authority to choose who is regulated or recognized. That decision rests ultimately with the Legislature. It requires an amendment to the Health Professions Act. Professional self-governance is not a right but a privilege which is delegated to professions only when the public interest is served by doing so and when the advantages clearly outweigh the disadvan- tages.

In conducting an investigation, the Health Professions Advisory Board would be expected to ascertain such factors as what consti- tutes the practice of a profession, whether the profession is distinct and identifiable, what risks there are to the public of incompetent or unethical practice, and the qualifications and minimum standards of competence that are required for a person applying to the practice or profession. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This bill is an important part of the journey in having the Health Professions Act fully implemented, and I ask the hon. members for their support of third reading of Bill 14. The Deputy Speaker: Are there others? Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. The Deputy Speaker: Does the hon. Member for Cypress-Medicine Hat wish to close? Mr. Mitzel: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 14 read a third time] Bill 25 Securities Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Grande Prairie-Smoky. Mr. Knight: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It’s a pleasure to rise to move third reading of Bill 25, Securities Amendment Act, 2006. We had excellent discussion on Bill 25 during Committee of the Whole two weeks ago, and I’d like to take an opportunity to respond to a couple of questions that were raised in committee. The hon. Member for Edmonton-Gold Bar asked how the revenue from fees collected by Alberta Securities Commission is used. The Minister of Finance was correct when she responded that the revenue goes toward the commission’s general operation. 9:30 In addition, Mr.

Speaker, the Securities Act requires that revenue from administrative penalties be used for investor education and to enhance the knowledge of the securities market operation in Alberta. The hon. Member for Edmonton-Manning also asked a number of questions, and in response to his queries a bout the pr oposed new sections 33.1 and 76 of the Securities Act, these provisions reflect the streamlining initiatives with other jurisdictions for interim orders and registration process by the executive director.

Section 33.1 amendment streamlines the process to make a permanent cease-trade order against issuers failing to file required disclosure. This is based on a similar provision in British Columbia. The

section 76 amend- ment, Mr. Speaker, streamlines the conditions of registration. The hon. member also asked about sections 184 and 192, which deal with the appointment of independent review committees for investment funds. Answering this question will require some context. Canadian Securities Administrators have developed a proposed rule, or a national instrument, as it’s called, that sets out the structure and functions of the committee.

The proposed national instrument 81-107 requires that all publicly offered mutual funds have an independent review committee charged with reviewing any conflicts of interest that may arise out of the management of the fund. The committee would also provide recommendations to the manager to fairly resolve these conflicts. Mr. Speaker, the proposed rule would also establish firm guidelines to determine who could be appointed to an independent review committee. I should note that the rule is still only proposed and following two public consultations has yet to be adopted. Previously the hon.

Member for Edmonton-Rutherford had asked whether we could provide an indication to the Assembly on how the passport system is working. Th e instrument that facilitates the passport system is a multilateral instrument, 11-101, principle regulator system. The instrument provides issuers with exemptions in nonprincipal jurisdictions from continuous disclosure and most prospective disclosure requirements and exemptions for registrants. In Alberta 12 per cent of applications from issuers regarding the continuous disclosure filings have been made under the passport system.

I grant you that it is not a large number; however, keep in mind that the system has been in place less than one year. These early indications are promising since it takes time for market participants to become acquainted with the passport mechanism. Finally, I note that some of the opposition members again repeated the argument for a single securities regulator. I’ve given the same response in the past, and even if provinces and territories were to change direction and pursue a common regulator, we would need to harmonize and simplify our securities laws.

The changes to securities legislation set out in this bill are required regardless. It’s important we ensure that our securities legislation remains modern, streamlined, and harmonized with other jurisdictions. This is essential not just for Alberta but for Canada to compete in the global marketplace. In closing, I hope my comments have helped clarify any outstand- ing questions, and I urge members to support Bill 25. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question? Hon.

Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 25 read a third time] Bill 28 Local Authorities Election Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Calgary-West. Mr. Liepert: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased tonight to move third reading of Bill 28, the Local Authorities Election Amendment Act, 2006. The Local Authorities Election Act describes the process for the election of municipal councils and school board trustees. It is an important piece of legislation that sets out how our leaders are elected at the local levels.

Bill 28 will promote integrity and confidence in the election process by setting election standards that result in more secure and transparent election procedures. The amendments will endeavour to acknowledge and encourage the public’s role and participation in the election process. Bill 28 will also ensure that small and large jurisdictions can respond to their specific needs by permitting some discretionary procedural options within the legislation’s framework.

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1623 As previously noted, these amendments were developed through consultations with municipalities, school boards, and the public. They deserve the support and approval of all members of this Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Any others? Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 28 read a third time] Bill 29 Environmental Protection and Enhancement Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Cypress-Medicine Hat. Mr. Mitzel: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It’s my pleasure to rise today to move third reading of Bill 29, the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, 2006. The six amendments in this act provide clarity to industry for emissions reduction, remediation of contaminated sites, and reclamation of coal and oil sands mines while upholding the principle of polluter pays. The bill also allows for expansion of the network of Alberta Environment’s partners, supports the use of tools such as codes of practice, and makes access to environmental information easier for Albertans. I urge support of this bill, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: The hon.

Member for Edmonton-Glenora. Dr. B. Miller: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This bill has had extensive debate in second reading and in Committee of the Whole, led by our Member for Calgary-Mountain View, and we are against this bill. It’s not going to have the effect that it intends, and I’m not going to go through all the points of debate again. Just to register our opposition. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Are there others? The hon. Member for Edmonton-Manning. Mr. Backs: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

You know, there are some things to be said for some of the companies that do do so well in reclaiming some of our oil sands areas and some of the ways that this bill will move towards helping them. I think that we have to have some justifiable pride in some of the companies that have been able to develop some of the practices that have brought forward some great strides, I think, in ensuring that the land is reclaimed.

If anybody goes near some of the areas in the oil sands and sees some of the little parks that are being developed, some of the buffalo paddocks, some of the other areas, I think that they will agree that there are some great efforts being made in some of the ways that some of the mining reclamation companies have come forward in the way they deal with soils, in the way they stockpile their muskeg, in the way that they handle some of these things. I think they’re laudable, and I hope that this legislation will help to provide for ensuring that their work goes forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Calder. Mr. Eggen: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I just wanted to be very brief in voicing finally. We’ve gone through a lot of debate in regard to Bill 29. As often is the case, I’m finding that when a bill tries to bite off more than, perhaps, it can chew, you end up with some parts that are quite laudable, in fact, but others that require amendments. We were unfortunate in not being successful with those amendments. So I just wanted to stand in opposition to this bill this evening. Thanks. The Deputy Speaker: Are there others? Are you ready for the question? Hon.

Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 29 read a third time] Bill 31 Health Information Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Calgary-West of behalf of the hon. Member for Calgary-Nose Hill. Mr. Liepert: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On behalf of my colleague the Member for Calgary-Nose Hill I’m pleased to move third reading today of Bill 31, the Health Information Amendment Act, 2006.

Amendments proposed in this bill will better address provincial electronic health record requirements, co-ordinate the retention periods for health records held by professional bodies, and clarify disclosure rules. The amendments are a culmination of stakeholder feedback, input from the all-party Select Special Health Information Act Review Committee, and analysis by Alberta Health and Wellness.

Amendments promote patient safety, enable better tracking of drug trends, facilitate greater accountability in how funds are spent, allow for more accurate patient drug histories, and guard against health system fraud. 9:40 Regarding the additional disclosu re provisions that generated much discussion during the bill’s debate, the goal is to balance the privacy of individual’s information with access to protect the public and manage the health system. So with that, Mr. Speaker, I move third reading of Bill 31 and ask for support from members. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Glenora. Dr. B.

Miller: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think this is an important bill because it deals with an important ethical issue; namely, the right of individuals to privacy and confidentiality about the informa- tion about their health. Of course, because of the public interest and the public need for safety and against fraud and so on, we’ve had a thorough debate about that, and I think that this bill really does manage to strike a balance with the protection of an individual’s privacy and confidentiality on one hand and acc ess to health information by various public bodies on the other.

It’s kind of an interesting Canadian compromise because, as a matter of fact, we don’t prize individualism as much as we do the needs of the community as a whole, and I think this bill is directed to those needs of public security and public safety. So I think that the stipulations in this bill, the protections that are in this bill are adequate, and I think we will vote in favour of this on third reading. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question?

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061624 Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 31 read a third time] The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Calgary-West. Bill 32 Human Tissue and Organ Donation Act Mr. Liepert: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my pleasure to move third reading of Bill 32. This act updates the tissue and organ legislation. It will become more inclusive and explicit about the process of donations. Clarity will assist the public and the medical professionals who deal with organ and tissue donation on a regular basis.

This legislation and associated regulations will require tissues and organs being trans- planted in Alberta to be from safe sources, thereby protecting the health of Albertans receiving transplants. This legislation also includes mandatory consideration and the subsequent required reporting of potential donors. This will further increase donation and benefit the people of Alberta and Canada who are in need of life-saving and life-altering transplants. Mr. Speaker, we still need Albertans to sign the universal donor card on the back of their health care card and talk to their family about their wishes to donate.

While this legislation will work to reduce the wait-list for transplantation, our next task will be to reduce the number of Albertans who need to transplant. Factors such as high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, burns, alcohol abuse, and tobacco use can all contribute to the need for transplants, so we need to do whatever we can to be healthy and prevent injuries. Being physically active, eating healthy foods, and living a healthy lifestyle can all make a difference.

Combining this new legislation with people making their wishes known and good prevention will eventually lead to a reduced need for organ and tissue transplants. With those few words, Mr. Speaker , I move third reading of the Human Tissue and Organ Donation Act and ask for the support of all members. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Glenora. Dr. B. Miller: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think it’s just tremendous – I’m giving out bouquets here – to see the progress beyond the private member’s bill to this very solid bill, Bill 32.

All the questions that I was really concerned about in discussing the private member’s bill have been pretty well answered. This is a very important bill in terms of providing the organs for people who need them, and I support this bill wholeheartedly. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 32 read a third time] Bill 33 Alberta Personal Income Tax Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Government House Leader on behalf of the hon. Minister of Finance. Mr. Zwozdesky: Yes. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

It’s indeed my pleasure to rise tonight and move third reading of Bill 33, the Alberta Personal Income Tax Amendment Act, 2006, on behalf of the hon. Minister of Finance. I think everyone is well acquainted with this bill and the advan- tages that it will provide on the taxation front for Albertans. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Leduc-Beaumont- Devon. Mr. Rogers: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the hon. members opposite for their support of this legislation throughout the process. I’d like to also address a few concerns raised during Committee of the Whole debate.

The Member for Edmonton- Rutherford questioned why the legislation used $12,900 as the basic spousal and eligible dependent amount instead of $14,523, that is used in the 2006-07 fiscal plan. The member suggested that this was due to the indexing that has come into effect since the last time this bill was amended. In fact, he is correct. The amount of $12,900 was the basic spousal and eligible dependent amount for 2001, the year we switched to the single rate tax system. Due to inflation-proofing this amount had grown to $14,523 by 2005.

There was no need to update the legislation each year to account for these inflation-related increases. However, since we are adjusting the amount by an additional $100 this year, we need to update the legislation. The easiest way to update the original $12,900 to $14,899 is to start the inflation-proofing process again from scratch. The hon. member also wanted to know the effect of the starting date of July 1 on the fiscal plan. When indexation occurs partway through the fiscal year, as it does in this case, the part-year effect is in fact built into the fiscal plan.

I hope that these responses clarify the member’s concerns. To quickly review, Bill 33 will increase the basic spousal and eligible dependent tax credit amounts by $100 on top of inflation- proofing for a total increase of $376. With this change, Mr. Speaker, more low-income earners will be added to those shielded from provincial income taxes. Our basic personal and spousal amounts will be $14,899 in 2006, over $6,000 higher than the province with the next highest amount. This means that you can earn more in this province than anywhere in Canada before paying any provincial income tax.

This means that more than 1 million of Alberta’s 2.36 million tax filers pay no provincial income tax. Mr. Speaker, this strengthens the government’s focus on building Alberta’s tax advantage as Albertans continue to pay the lowest overall taxes in Canada. I urge all members of this House to support Bill 33. Thank you. Mr. Backs: Mr. Speaker, I rise to support this bill again, albeit reluctantly. It’s much ado about nothing really. I think the average for an individual taxpayer that will come out of that cut there will be about 35 bucks. It’s important; a tax cut is a tax cut.

What I think is more important is what it doesn’t deal with. It doesn’t deal with things like my private member’s bill both last year and this year that call for a recreation tax credit to help with some of the things that were talked about in the previous bill, looking for greater physical fitness, greater ability for children to access all sorts of recreation. We’ve seen some advances in some special programs in northeast Edmonton and other areas.

We’ve seen some volunteer programs that have been doing it in many, many areas for a long time, but that could be improved. 9:50 The income tax cuts certainly could be much greater if the health care premium wasn’t there. I mean , it’s just totally inefficient in terms of any essence of looking at economics or anything. It’s

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1625 surely a political tax in its worst form, and if that was not there, it could actually give a much more substantial income tax cut if we had that in place. There’s no relief in the personal income tax area on things like credits for working in the oil sands, a travel area, things that could be put in place to attract people to Fort McMurray and other oil sands or northern remote areas to ensure that we’re actually pulling workers from Alberta and from Canada. I speak in favour of this bill, but I’m again reluctant because it is much ado about not too much. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Deputy Speaker: Does the mover wish to close? Mr. Zwozdesky: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 33 read a third time] Bill 35 Fuel Tax Act The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased to move third reading of Bill 35, the Fuel Tax Act, on behalf of the hon. Minister of Finance, with kudos to the hon. Member for Calgary-Nose Hill. Mr. Speaker, Bill 35 will replace the existing Fuel Tax Act, which is outdated and no longer reflects how the tax is charged and collected.

This bill is largely mechanical and technical in nature and does not change the fuels that are taxed nor the tax rates. There were some questions brought up during Committee of the Whole, so I’d like to take a few moments to provide responses to those questions. The hon. Member for Edmonton-Rutherford wanted some information about the international fuel tax agreement. This is essentially an agreement among 48 American states and 10 Canadian provinces that enables uniform collection and distribution of fuel taxes paid by motor carriers transporting among jurisdictions.

The agreement not only saves the trucking industry from having to file a fuel tax return in each jurisdiction travelled through but also significantly reduces the paperwork and compliance burden for fuel tax reporting. The hon. member also inquired about

section 13 of the bill, and asked how many of the accounts referred to in that

section actually exist. In fact, no special accounts have been required to date.

Section 13 is fundamentally similar to

section 6 of the current Fuel Tax Act and provides that such accounts might be required where the financial stability of a remitter may be in question. There was also concern about the prohibited sale provisions in the bill.

Section 18(5) prohibits farmers from selling marked fuel for farming operations in Alberta at the reduced price to anyone other than another farmer for use in farming operations. Mr. Speaker, this

section is very similar to

section 14(5) of the current act. It essen- tially allows two farmers who are both authorized to purchase fuel at the reduced price to sell fuel to each other. The act does not govern the sale price. The hon. member’s final questions were regarding the duty of vendor

section and whether anyone had contravened

section 13(1), which is the similar

section in the existing act. We are not aware of anyone being charged for an offence for contravening that

section in 2004-05. Regarding questions from the hon. Member for Edmonton- Beverly-Clareview. He asked about marked fuel and what happens if a vendor is not passing savings on to the consumer. Mr. Speaker,

section 10 provides that if the vendor does not pass on the benefit of the tax exempted on the marked fuel, the vendor is liable to pay to the Crown an amount equal to the benefit that has not been passed on. This is a penalty on the vendor. Whether the benefit under

section 10 has been passed on will have to be determined based on a review of the facts of each case. Since marked fuel does not include tax and the consumer who purchases the marked fuel has not paid tax, there is nothing the consumer can recover from Alberta Finance. As previously discussed,

section 13 of the existing act requires the tax and farm fuel benefit to be passed on to farmers.

Section 10 expands that requirement to all tax exemptions. I’ll just reiterate, finally, that the principal goal of this bill is to provide the overall framework on how the fuel tax is applied and collected, and the bill provides for a multistage direct tax, meaning that the person who is highest in the supply and distribution chain will pay the tax to the Crown. Every person in the chain would pay the tax but would later recover the tax from the next person in the chain. In the end it is the end-user, or consumer, of the fuel that ultimately pays the tax. Mr.

Speaker, finally, I would just like to simply say that Bill 35, the Fuel Tax Act, will make the administration and collection of fuel taxes easier for everyone involved. On that basis, I would urge everyone to vote in support of it at third reading. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 35 read a third time] Bill 36 Securities Transfer Act The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Grande Prairie-Smoky. Mr. Knight: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and move third reading of Bill 36. Again, Mr.

Speaker, we’ve heard some excellent discussion on this bill both during second reading and in Committee of the Whole. I commend the hon. Member for Edmonton-Rutherford. He took the opportunity to learn about the legislation from government staff and clearly did a lot of research on his own. The concerns and questions he raised demonstrate his understanding of the Securities Transfer Act’s significance, and I thank him for speaking in its support last week. Mr. Speaker, stakeholders have urged prompt uniform implemen- tation of securities transfer legislation in Canada.

The Securities Transfer Act represents an important example of interprovincial co- operation in responding to the needs of Canada’s capital markets. It will provide a single, uniform source of rules for transferring and holding securities and interests in investment properties traded in Canada and elsewhere. Ontario has recently made amendments to its Securities Transfer Act, making its bill virtually identical to Bill 36 in Alberta. Other provinces plan to introduce a securities transfer act in 2006. Once implemented, Mr.

Speaker, Canada’s securities transfer laws will become more closely aligned with the Uniform Commercial Code in the United States, and this is essential to ensure that Canada remains competitive not only with the United States but also in the global marketplace. I urge all members to support this important legislation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061626 The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 36 read a third time] Bill 37 Miscellaneous (Provincial Treasurer) Statutes Amendment Act, 2006 The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On behalf of the hon. Minister of Finance it’s my pleasure to rise and move third reading of Bill 37, the Miscellaneous (Provincial Treasurer) Statutes Amendment Act, 2006.

As previously noted, Bill 37 is basically a housekeeping act that fundamentally allows changes in legislation with references to “Provincial Treasurer” to be replaced with the phrase “Minister of Finance” or the minister responsible. It’s simply updating legisla- tion that aligns other legislation with the current title and responsi- bilities of the Minister of Finance and other program ministers. I would urge everyone’s support in that regard. Thank you. The Deputy Speaker: Are you ready for the question? Hon.

Members: Question. [Motion carried; Bill 37 read a third time] head: 10:00 Government Bills and Orders Committee of the Whole (continued) [Mr. Marz in the chair] The Chair: I’d like to call the committee to order. Bill 43 Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act, 2006 The Chair: Are there any comments, questions, or amendments to be offered with respect to this bill? Are you ready for the question? Hon. Members: Question. [The clauses of Bill 43 agreed to] [Title and

preamble agreed to] The Chair: Shall the bill be reported? Are you agreed? Hon. Members: Agreed. The Chair: Opposed? Carried. Bill 42 Appropriation Act, 2006 The Chair: Are there any comments or questions or amendments pursuant to this bill? The hon. Member for Edmonton-Manning. Mr. Backs: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’m very pleased to rise and speak to Bill 42, Appropriation Act, 2006, and to speak to the expense and equipment/inventory purchases that may apply to some of the $26,748,531,000. A lot of coin, a lot of money, a lot of budget there.

Yet, you know, we get to see time and time again that there really isn’t much of a budget in place when we vote for a budget and for the monies that run the government in this province. It seems that time and time again we will be seeing supplementary spending in the billions, and I’m sure that it will be coming forward. It doesn’t seem to matter when it comes forward. The budget doesn’t matter, and we will be looking out.

Nonetheless, there are a number of areas where obviously very quickly after this budget has come forward there may need to be something: in education, of course, where we’re seeing layoffs and problems with class sizes. The amount that was put forward and originally budgeted is not looking to handle what is necessary as schools and boards look to the necessary monies that they have to run this so, so important area of our economy and of our culture and of our system.

You know, if we could be looking toward some different ways of dealing with some of the monies that are spent there, if we could be looking at ways to ensure that families, children are not spending all their time raising extra money over and above what they have budgeted for the schools for things like textbooks and trips and just all sorts of small things, school lunches and things like that, we would have a much more efficient system and actually provide education and experience for our young people.

If we look at Advanced Education, you know, there are many areas of Advanced Education that seem to be very problematic right now.

In the last report I had seen, there were 5,000 spots left wanting for apprentices to get into this year in northern Alberta, 5,000 apprentices in southern Alberta, people who are dying to work in the trades, who want to learn, to move ahead in their trade, to get into their trade, to try to find out how to make their way in a new career, yet they are not able to because those resources, those spots are not available. [Reverend Abbott in the chair] We look at, you know, Economic Development. My gosh, in Economic Development we don’t seem to be doing much of anything. We seem to be going back in many sectors.

In terms of real agricultural development in new areas, in nutraceuticals and things like that, we haven’t seen a whole bunch. We haven’t seen a lot of development in many, many sectors as the nature of our economy seems to be driven more and more by oil and gas and not expecting more and more in other areas. I was actually pleased to see the bill passed earlier this evening to ensure something of a tax cut because I think that may help some- what for economic development, but we’re not, you know, looking to training. I mentioned earlier under Advanced Education that the spots aren’t full.

We’re looking to bring in temporary foreign workers, temporary foreign contractors who will not train appren- tices that will be needed in the ec onomy as we approach the demographic time bomb of the retirement of the baby boomers, and that’s just coming up in a few years. These things aren’t at all addressed. We look at, you know, the many areas in Finance where we haven’t really looked at, I think, tax cuts that would help to ensure that our economy is working more efficiently, that we are training more people, that we are developing our oil sands in a meaningful way and not just in a pell-mell, confused way.

You know, I look at some of the ways in Gaming that our lottery fund payments are disbursed, and I really wonder how that makes a whole bunch of sense. I look at some of the things in Health and Wellness, and I very much am distressed at what has been happening with our seniors and

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1627 the difficulty for them to have a decent retirement with just the few resources that so many of our seniors have to deal with. I look at the nature of Infrastructure and Transportation, and I didn’t really see, you know, some things that may help with aboriginal development and the provision to the aboriginal work- force of training for them and things like the east-west connector, things like some provision for the Peavine-McLennan road, more monies to ensure that highway 63 could go even faster. Some of it is very good, and I appreciate some of the spending that is there.

I think that was necessary and should have been looked at over the long term. In transportation we look at, in spending on road building and other similar types of infrastructure spending, a difficulty in the long term. I think it was not too many years back that the budget was cut very severely, and half of the people who work in that industry were lost. You know, it’s very difficult to bring them back, very difficult to reinstitute their training very quickly, and now the industry is having a huge problem bringing people up to speed.

Their effi- ciency is not as good as it was, and I think that somehow that that has to be looked at as being an area where we have certain of these programs which are assured certain spending on a regular basis, that there be some type of a fund in pl ace that ensures that this capital investment would continue in good times and bad, and that we would have that carry forward and not lose the contractors, not lose the people who work in that industry, not lose the ab ility and the capability to work on that and just throw money at it in a much, much bigger way in good times. That’s what we’re seeing.

We’re spending a whole bunch more b ecause we didn’t deal with it correctly in the past. 10:10 I look at the Solicitor General and the problems that we have in Edmonton in not taking care of the Remand Centre and ensuring that spending was put in place a long time ago to ensure that the proper facility is in place.

I hear candidly and privately, to be truthful – they don’t want to be public – from some of our police officers in north Edmonton that people are not being charged, that JPs, or justices of the peace, are not putting people in because they cannot honestly put some of the guys who should be put in the Remand Centre there because there is actually no space. Under Seniors and Community Supports, the PDD. Gosh, I hope there’s something that happens in that in the next few weeks.

The people in Edmonton that I’ve talked to, the hundreds and hundreds of people that were at some of these meetings and demonstrations that looked to the real effect of what have in reality become cuts in a number of areas – the layoffs that have already happened in some areas are affecting people that are some of the least able to defend themselves in our society and are looking to so very little.

Yet there was a cut in the Edmonton area of 3.5 per cent, I think, in some of these areas, in a system that does not make a lot of sense, quite often, in the number of providers and the way that some of these providers are controlled and administered, in some of the standards that are set for them. It’s very, very questionable. [Mr. Marz in the chair] Sustainable Resource Development.

When we look at the nature of ensuring that our forestry resources, our sustainable resources are coming forward in a much better way, I’m fearful of what may happen if we see the pine beetle coming through into Alberta in the same way I’ve seen in travelling through B.C. what has happened there. I’m not actually very, very encouraged by what I’ve seen. The whole nature of the budget, though, I think leaves some room open for some other spending. I hope that in some ways there could be some cuts in some areas, but that won’t happen. With that, I end my remarks. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Chair: The hon.

Member for Edmonton-Ellerslie. Mr. Agnihotri: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It’s my great pleasure to rise again and speak to Bill 42, Appropriation Act, 2006. The government has spent a huge amount of money, no doubt, but the money, I think, was not spent wisely. I start with the Department of Community Development. The overall ministry expense for Community Development for the year 2006-07 is $242 million, a 14 per cent decrease from the 2005-06 forecast. The 2006-07 expense and equipment/inventory purchases estimate is about $229.7 million, a 5 per cent increase. I just want to make some comments.

After spending a huge amount of money, why is this department so far behind compared to the other provinces in Canada? I was surprised when I was listening to question period. Somebody asked a question of the Deputy Premier, and she was quite happy with the way the government is handling community development. Still, I think of major concerns like the sports plan. I think the government was talking about the sports plan for a long, long time. I still have a copy of that, and they have not implemented the sports plan so far. A cultural policy is not there yet.

A former Minister of Community Development promised to implement a cultural policy during this session, but I haven’t seen any policy yet. The minister of health talked about active lifestyles and giving some incentives to recreational facilities or maybe a tax rebate. She was going to implement that. Some good ideas which every body appreciated, but it’s not happening so far. After spending so much money, so much discussion, it’s not in progress yet. The human rights commission. Still I’m receiving lots of complaints from my constituents. Some people are waiting a long time, and the cases are still pending.

I don’t know where we’re wrong, but if after spending a huge amount of money and the problems are still there, what’s the use of injecting money into certain departments? Libraries, yes. The government gave a $20 million lump sum of money, but if you compare the per capita funds to the ’80s, still we are behind co mpared to any other province in North America. We don’t have any plan to prepare athletes for the Olympics.

I talked to somebody who manages and looks after top athletes not only for Alberta but for the country, and according to him Alberta has some really good athletes that can shine in the next Olympic Games. This job is part of the federal government as well, but still the Alberta government is not doing anything to help the Olympic department to produce some more athletes for the next coming Olympic Games.

The Alberta sector, as I’ve said many times during question period and during the budget debates, creates about 3,500 jobs, and the revenues are coming approximately the same as – the government gives them grants. It’s not fair w ith this sector. I know that today the Minister of Finance didn’t agr ee with this, but I still think this sector needs some more funding. I mean, the money was spent like horse racing or some other departments’ money. I’m not saying that the money was not spent. Even this government has broken all the records.

This Tory party is, I think, the most spending party ever in the history of Alberta. They should take a lesson. I mean, they should spend money very wisely. Another thing. I hear lots of complaints about the WCB. The people on low income, contentious files, long-term – they are struggling. Some people believe that the government is like a

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061628 private department. The government is totally trying to, you know, back off from this department, and they are not listening to individu- als. 10:20 I’m glad that the government is giving some money to AISH after a long time, but still the people are complaining that every year there should be an evaluation, at least after one year, so that they can get a raise according to the inflation rate. The PDD were protesting just a couple of weeks ago outside this Legislature, and they were given a 2 per cent raise. If you work it out, it’s less than the inflation rate. They are people.

Somebody said, you know, that the necessity of life is three things, Mr. Chairman: food, clothes, and shelter. I mean, a car, holidays, gambling, or if you do something else is a luxury. Those people with the low incomes are vulnerable people. They don’t begrudge the big corporations if they are making profits in billions, but they do begrudge if they don’t even get the basic n ecessities to live a reasonable life. Every time we ask a question to the minister, they say that we are number one or number two. Nobody ever said that the art sector is number 10. I mean, how can we believe that?

I suppose the health care system is number one. How can we believe it’s number one when every time the minister compares it with Europe or somewhere else, with the other states. We will believe this health care system is number one or number two when we don’t get any complaints. The people are suffering. There are long queues in the emergencies. I know that the department is working hard. Fifteen years ago we had a rally of about 15,000 people in Mill Woods, and at that time the waiting time was only four hours. Now it’s nine hours’ waiting time. We are not going forwards. We are going backwards.

I’m not talking about only health care. Every time you ask the Minister of Education, they spent that much money, in the classroom there’s no problem, the classroom size problem is fixed, but when you talk to the students, the problem is still there. I just want to know where we went wrong, and what we can do. I think the main reason is because we just throw money when we see a problem. When we see a problem, throw the money, and that problem is solved for a while. Then after some time the problem starts again. Another thing, the long-term care centres.

I know that in spite of the Auditor General’s report – and they found out that in one-third of the facilities their standard of living is low, and every time we ask a question, the government is not listening. The government always answers very tactfully, but I don’t call them answers. Yes, we ask them questions. We ask questions about the long-term care centres, but we don’t get the proper answers that we actually asked for. But they always answer tactfully. Drug abuse, crystal meth. In my riding crime is the major issue. Here’s the report. We spent an 11.8 per cent increase on policing programs.

If we spend that much money, why? Every time I read the newspaper, there is a stabbing, killing, kidnapping. In my riding recently two or three girls were just kidnapped, or nobody knows where they are. The bus incidents happen during the nighttime, and people are so afraid that they don’t walk after 9 o’clock. I mean, I respect the people working in the police department. I know that they are working hard. They always take risks to save our lives. I’m not criticizing them, but my question is: where are we wrong? We can spend money – and the government is spending money – but the money is not well spent.

It’s not spent wisely. My suggestions and my comments are that before we put some money in, we should have a proper policy. We should have proper discussions. Maybe we should have all-party discussions, case by case if they want. I think the NDP, Liberal, Alliance, or any independent person would love to sit with them because we are here to serve the people, to serve Albertans. Okay? I mean, I’m sorry to say it, but if everybody thinks this way, I don’t think we will have a problem. The problem is that, first of all, we don’t admit that there’s a problem.

We can’t solve problems just by throwing money, giving grants to the different communities. We gave $20,000 to Applewood community in Calgary, and the Auditor General’s report found that the money was misused. We still can’t find out why the government is not giving us the document through FOIP, which is 719 pages. That document contains the secrecy of that Applewood community, and we can’t get it. Mr. Lukaszuk: How do you know what’s in it? Mr. Agnihotri: Well, we want to find out. This is our job. Mr. Lukaszuk: But you know what’s in it. Mr. Agnihotri: I’m saying that I want to know. Why is there secrecy?

This is the point. You guys don’t admit that. Through the chair. Sorry about that. Deregulation. When it was regulated, the people were happy. They were paying less than $5 a gigajoule, right? Now they are paying three times more. If we come back to regulation, anybody here can guess how much we lost, why we lost because of a lack of long-term sustainable policies. At this point everybody, all the scholars agree that we are receiving royalties in billions and billions of dollars. Where’s the policy? Nothing. And nobody wants to hear.

Anyway, if we can give a 40 per cent, 60 per cent increase in grants to horse racing, what’s wrong with the arts sector? What’s wrong with them? I was in Fort McMurray two weeks ago, and there is only one theatre. I talked to the manager, and she said: if we had three theatres like this, they would be full for seven days, and it cost them $1.8 million. Do you know how much the Alberta government paid them? Only $50,000. One million dollars comes from next door, a college, and the college gets the money from three big companies, Suncor, Syncrude, and some other – I don’t exactly know the name of the third company.

It’s a shame. I mean, we are not spending money where the money should go. That’s my comment on that. 10:30 I met a group of people from the university, Mr. Chairman, and I’m sorry to say that they said that sometimes they don’t even see the teachers. There are over 550 students sitting in the classroom during lectures. Can’t we do something? Can’t we make their lives a little bit better? Of course we can if we admit that there’s a problem or if we spend money wisely, but we don’t. Everybody sitting here knows that we have a lack of doctors, we have a lack of nurses, nursing staff. Just talk. They all talk.

But, I mean, there are 4,000 foreign doctors doing ordinary jobs. If they get a little bit of training, we can send them to rural areas, and we can solve the problem easily. But, no. If they cross the border, go to America, those doctors get a licence. They can work there, but they can’t work in Canada. This is a problem. Training centre. I mean, if we know we have shortages, there’s a problem. I’m dealing with one person. I’m meeting tomorrow morning with the minister of human resources. I told that party, I said: why don’t you talk to the minister directly? I appreciate that the minister agreed.

He said: okay, you bring them here. He will listen to them.

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1629 There’s one of the big companies here. Their workforce is 300 people, full-time workers, and they need 25 workers right away. He said: “I don’t care where you guys, you know, import those. Bring them from any country.” Thank you. The Chair: The hon. Member for Edmonton-Glenora. Dr. B. Miller: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to say a few words about, first of all, the process in terms of the budget process. I hope that all hon. members will read the Parkland Ins titute’s publication Fiscal Surplus, Democratic Deficit: Budgeting and Government Finance in Alberta.

It’s an excellent document. It raises issues about how the whole budgetary process takes pl ace, especially in respect to the involvement of opposition members, that there are no open, public, prebudget consultation hearings across Alberta. For example, the House of Commons has a budget committee that travels across the country and listens to public input. I think that that kind of process should happen provincially as well. I remember when the committee came to Edmonton from Ottawa.

I had a chance to address the committee on behalf of Poverty in Action, which was a group trying to deal with poverty here in Edmonton. It was a very important moment for this group to be able to speak to and to be heard by politicians coming from Ottawa. I think that kind of involvement is certainly important in terms of the public having a sense that they have input into budgetary discussions. I mean, actually, school budgets seem to have a better process in terms of involving the public than this government. I spent some time in a school recently.

They are in the process of looking at budgets now, and they invite parents to come and be involved and to look at the whole budget and to provide input before it goes to the school board. I think that that’s important to have that kind of input. Well, Mr. Chairman, just looking at this whole budget, I only have one issue.

I mean, like my colleague from Edmonton-Ellerslie I could raise lots of issues about different parts of this Appropriation Act, but in looking at the whole document and all the different increases that there are in all the departments, the one area that I’m really concerned about is Human Resources and Employment and the continuing low rates for people unable to work or expected to work and so on. The basic welfare rates haven’t changed very much in about 12 years.

Twelve years ago I helped to actually form a group called the Quality of Life Commission in order to deal with the cuts to social services that affected poor people in this province. It was our privilege, in forming that commission, to actually invite high-profile people to be on the commission such as the Hon. Lois Hole and the Hon. Doug Roche. They went into the inner city and listened to people living in poverty. After hearing the stories, they were convinced that people living on SFI then – it was called SFI – didn’t have enough money that could amount to a living wage.

That’s why we have so many people going to food banks. That’s why we have churches opening their doors to provide meals for people in this city and throughout this province. The money that people get on welfare is just not adequate to live. It is just deplorable that in this rich province here, 12 years later, the rates are the same. So in this budget under People Expected to Work – Income Support it shows a decrease of $10 million from last year. Under People Expected to Work – Health Benefits, there’s a decrease of almost $3 million.

Under People Not Expected to Work – Income Support there’s a decrease of over $5 million. Under the People Working – Earnings Supplement there is a decrease of over $3 million, or 19 per cent, from last year, and health benefits has also decreased by almost $1 million. So I think that in a rich province when we have so many billions of dollars and a huge budget like this, it’s deplorable that those rates still are so low. Now, I’m not of the school that thinks that income is the only issue because I think that also there need to be social s upports.

There needs to be a social support system for people who are living in poverty. I deplore the approach that’s so prevalent that treats people just as individuals, and then the individuals come with their needs, but they’re not even told what they’re entitled to get in terms of social services. What we need is to revamp, completely change the whole welfare system so that it appreciates people holistically and provides the adequate social support system in the community. But income does mean a lot. People cannot get out of poverty, they cannot live day by day without having adequate income.

So if these rates continue this way, we’re just going to have a situation in this province where the rich get richer, because there’s so much opportunity for people in this province to improve themselves, and the poor get poorer, so the gap between the rich and the poor increases more and more. That will lead to social decay, lack of social cohesion in the society, a lot of fragmentation, a lot of despair on the part of those who have very little. I don’t think that’s the kind of Alberta that we want in the future.

So I would hope that as we move into the future, we would be wiser and put our money into providing for the people who have the least. I think it’s a measure of the morality of a government how we treat those who are the poorest in society. I think every budget is a moral document. It tells us what kind of priorities a government has. Budgets, even for families, are an indication of what priorities a family has. In this case because there’s so little money s upporting people who need it the most, at the very bottom of society, I don’t find this a moral budget.

I think it’s deplorable that we can’t have more compassion for those who are desperate and those who are in need. With that, I’ll take my seat. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 10:40 The Chair: Are you ready for the question? Some Hon. Members: Question. [The clauses of Bill 42 agreed to] [Title and

preamble agreed to] The Chair: Shall the bill be reported? Are you agreed? Hon. Members: Agreed. The Chair: Opposed? Carried. The hon. Government House Leader. Mr. Zwozdesky: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would move that we as a committee now rise and report Bill 43, the Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act, 2006, and Bill 42, the Appropriation Act, 2006, and beg leave to sit again. [Motion carried] [The Deputy Speaker in the chair] The Deputy Speaker: The hon. Member for Drayton Valley- Calmar.

Alberta Hansard May 16, 20061630 Rev. Abbott: Well, thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Committee of the Whole has had under consideration certain bills. The committee reports the following bills: Bill 43, Bill 42. The Deputy Speaker: Does the Assembly concur in the report? Hon. Members: Agreed. The Deputy Speaker: Opposed? So ordered. head: Government Bills and Orders Committee of the Whole (continued) [Mr. Marz in the chair] The Chair: I’d call the Committee of the Whole to order. Bill 40 Post-secondary Learning Amendment Act, 2006 The Chair: Are there any comments, questions, or amendments with respect to this bill?

The hon. Member for Edmonton-Calder. Mr. Eggen: Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I have some very brief comments in regard to Bill 40. Quite frankly, if I had my druthers, I wouldn’t be less inclined to look for ways to somehow improve this bill through amendment, but my very honourable and thoughtful colleague has done so. My feeling, just before I do bring forward the amendment that I have here for my hon. colleague for Edmonton-Strathcona, is to mention that I find it deplorable that we are moving these sorts of decisions from this Legislature to regula- tion. I think that it goes against every sort of better judgment.

I know that we’ve been studying this for the last two and a half years, and then to make this move I find a bit difficult to swallow. Nonetheless, I do have an amendment for Bill 40, and I’d like to distribute that now. Thank you. The Chair: We will call this amendment A1. We’ll just wait another moment to have them distribute it. Okay. Hon. Member for Edmonton-Calder, you may proceed. Mr. Eggen: Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

As I had previously stated, I’m finding it difficult to try to amend this bill, but if there is one place where it can be done, I would suggest that my hon. colleague from Edmonton-Strathcona has hit on it. Basically what he’s trying to do here is to place some reasonable control on how these regulations might be unfolding in the coming months and years. The biggest concern that I think postsecondary students have is to be able to budget reasonably for tuition. I’m suggesting through this amendment that the tuition must not be increasing more than the Alberta consumer price index for the previous calendar year.

That way people can make budgeting decisions that are reasonable, and in fact we can maintain a reasonable structure for public funding for postsecondary institutions as opposed to, let’s say, allowing one or more or many or all of our postsecondary institution tuitions to run out of control and, thus, compromise the ability for all Albertans to access postsecondary education here in the province. Thank you. The Chair: The hon. Minister of Advanced Education. Mr. Herard: Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. It’s an interesting amendment. It’s too bad they didn’t bring it to me before now.

One of the things that I’ve been able to do in the last few days was have a nice, long talk with students in the organization called CAUS. As you know, they’re currently changing their leadership with new presidents and vice-presidents and so on taking over the helm of the organizations. One of the things that I did commit to them is that if they give the regulation-making process an honest shake, in other words an honest try, and if for some reason it doesn’t work for them, then they can come to SPC and tell us what didn’t work and how we should fix it or make the suggestion that it go back into legislation.

They’ve asked me, you know, would I make that statement publicly, which I did last night and again tonight. I’ve also offered my two critics across the way to participate in that same process. With respect to this amendment, as you can probably appreciate, there are three steps that we take in order to approve policy, and that’s SPC, cabinet, and caucus. It would have been interesting had the Member for Edmonton-Strathcona approached us with that, and we might have had a discussion. As it is, I can’t on behalf of government accept this amendment because it would be a policy that has not gone through the process.

Thank you. 10:50 The Chair: The hon. Member for Calgary-Currie. Mr. Taylor: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I rise to speak in support of my colleague from Edmonton-Calder’s amendment to Bill 40 and to perhaps poke one or two holes in my hon. colleague the minister’s argument against it. Hole 1 would be this, if I’m quoting accurately, and Hansard will determine when the Blues are printed whether I got the quote exact or not: it’s an interesting amendment; too bad it didn’t come forward until now. Mr. Chairman, the minister was I believe first elected to this House in 1993.

That’s a long, long time ago, certainly long enough ago to read the Standing Orders, learn the rules about how this process works. If you have respect for what is supposed to go on on the floor of this House, where duly elected representatives of the population of this entire province meet to debate legislation and policy, you’d realize that this is the way that it works, that bills are introduced, and at various stages, as appropriate, amendments are moved.

Now, if the minister wants to say that he can’t support this amendment and members of his caucus can take their direction from that comment or not as they see fit or as the whip allows them to do, that’s fine, but to suggest that things would have been different if those of us on this side of the House had jumped through this minister’s hoops is disingenuous at best. You know, I too met with the outgoing and incoming leaders of CAUS this morning, so they were able to report to me on the meeting that they had with the minister yesterday.

In fact, the offer was made, although they weren’t 100 per cent clear on whether the offer was made as a sincere and binding commitment or whether it was more along the lines of: well, if you guys have some problems with this, come on back to my office and see if you can convince me to do it differently. Yes, I assume that my counterpart in the third party, the Advanced Education critic, has probably received the same letter from the minister that I received today, and the minister will be getting a written answer, I would assume tomorrow, to his offer.

I will say publicly right now that it is my intention to take the minister up on his offer, and if I have any influence whatsoever over the Member for Edmonton-Strathcona, I’ll try to persuade him to do the same thing.

May 16, 2006 Alberta Hansard 1631 I will do this on my terms, and my terms are simply this. Number one, understand that in my role as the Official Opposition Advanced Education critic I will continue to exercise that role, and I will not be co-opted by being brought into the consultative process. [interjections] Laugh if you will, jackals, but if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen, and I’m giving the minister the opportu- nity to withdraw the offer now if he’s not up to the challenge. Secondly, my agreeing to take

part in that consultative process, as specious as it is – because, of course, consulting with stakeholders is something that happens at the very beginning of the process, and there’s absolutely no guarantee that having been consulted with, the stakeholders’ opinions will actually be taken under consideration and acted upon if they happen to contradict what the government has already made up its mind that it wants to do.

So understand as well that my agreeing to participate and take the minister up on his offer in no way construes any kind of approval for Bill 40 and its undemocratic attempt to take tuition policy out of legislation and put it under regulation, where cabinet can mess with it any time it so feels and stick the students of this province with any old tuition policy that it would like, and there’s not a darn thing that they could do about it. Bill 40 is called the Post-secondary Learning Amend- ment Act, 2006. It perhaps should have been more accurately titled the denial of democracy amendment act, 2006.

I’m going to support my colleague’s amendment b ecause it is, I suppose, in a way an attempt to take something, which is so fundamentally flawed as to leave us on this side of the House shaking our collective heads, and try to fix it. In fact, Mr. Chairman, I doubt that a bill of 60 or so words that seeks to do only one thing, which is to undemocratize the process further, can be fixed. Perhaps this bill should have just been drowned at birth, but I will vote in favour of the amendment. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Chair: The hon. Minister of Advanced Education. Mr. Herard: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I think there are a couple of points that have to be made with respect to what we just heard. Number one, I think that the hon. member across the way probably doesn’t realize that if you want to get an amendment approved at this stage, you have to have the approval of the process: standing policy, cabinet, and caucus. To stand there and say that you can have approvals of amendments made in this House without going through process, sir, is just an admission that you don’t know how it works yet. Maybe you’ll need to learn that. To suggest, sir, that I did not make the offer that I said I did is absolutely wrong.

One thing I do not do, sir, is come here and cast false witness. I made the offer, and the offer will stand. Mr. Taylor: Mr. Chairman, I only report w