LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Tuesday, 21 April, 1987. Time - 8:00 p.m. CONCURRENT COMMITTEES OF SUPPLY SUPPLY - HEALTH MR. CHAIRMAN, C. Baker: When we adjourned, we were discussing Commu nity Health Services. The Member for River Heights. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Wa it. MR. CHAIRMAN: Sorry, Mr. Minister. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Mr. Chairman, I think we had agreed that we would finish. We were getting all the � questions, then we were going to pass that all together. ' We agreed to go all over that

section and we'll finish that. Then we're going back to Community Health Services (Operations). MR. CHAIRMAN: Is that agreed, generally agreed? Okay. The Member for River Heights. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: We were having a discussion about community programs, Mr. Chairman, when we left. And my figure - I'm not sure it's absolutely accurate. You kind of try and separate num bers. But my figure is that, of the entire Mental Health budget, only about 3.5 percent of that is going for residential support, employment support, case managements, peer support, family support.

Is there any intention on the part of this department to increase that percentage by any great amount in the next year or two? HON. L. DESJARDINS: We ll, as I said before the dinner hour, that's what our plans are with this Cabinet paper � when that comes out, either as a White Paper or , whatever Cabinet decides to do with it. I think you'll see that, as I already said also, we approve in principle the Pascoe Report which is very clear in what direction it's going, and we're taking the first steps now to make that possible. That's exactly the main push. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: Does the Minister know how many of the individuals who are in the Guest Home Program which we saw and have been seeing over the last few days in the newspaper in rather graphic detail, how many of those, a percentage generally, would be defined as psychiatrically disabled? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Okay, the approved homes - those are four or less - there are 229, not homes but people. And licensed homes - those are the ones you were talking about, the guest homes where there are over four - it would be 355. And in suppor tive housing, there are 100.

Now there are some in Community Residences, 52, but you're not worried about those. Now you know, if we do that, we can also I would think - and that's very very difficult to assess - but I 1162 would think that you'd have a lot of people also in personal care homes, because senility is mental illness so you'd have at least 25 percent of those. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Mr. Chairman, my information sources tell me that an awful lot of our acute care psychiatric beds are presently being occupied by individuals who are in fact decompensating or slipping back. They're in these guest homes.

They can no longer cope and they go in and, for a period of time, have to occupy an acute bed psychiatric, and then come back into the commun ity. How many are we talking about in terms of these kinds of numb ers, and what future policies is the department looking at to alleviate some of these decompensating behaviour patterns? HON. L. DESJARDINS: That's the point that I was trying to make earlier, and for the other cases also. It's very difficult and it's wrong to go in the direction if you're not ready.

That's what I was saying that, in the days of Tulchinsky - I say Tulchinsky, because he was the Deputy Minister, and it was known that he was pushing that. I think he was probably ahead of his time, but his PR wasn't the best, and that's what was happen ing. A lot of people were out there with nowhere to go - and I think you heard me say that before - so they filled the acute care beds, the same as the ordinary hospitals. In General Hospital, there are a lot of people in acute care beds there who should be in personal care homes. It was the same principle.

Now the total caseload for our commun ity workers is 3,900, I'm told. In those residents that I gave you - that includes 52 who are Community Residences - there are 636, so that would leave you approximately 3,000 or so who would need that help. That's what I meant by people in the community and that's where day care and those kinds of - the same kind of service as Home Care and services for the elderly, not necessarily, but I mean the same principle. And if you haven't got that in, well these people are walking the street and it's worse in a way.

That's what's happening in many of the large cities in North America, I would imagine, and all over the world. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: A tough choice to make sometimes as to know whether they're better off in a facility like some of those guest homes where there are in fact no emotional programs, or whether they should be on the street where they may be emotionally better off, but they're starving. It's not a nice choice to have to make, programming. When an individual is deinstitutionalized under the We lcome Home Program, there has to be a . . . HON. L. DESJARDINS: That's not our program. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: No, I know. There has to be a program for that individual, a day program which could

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 be a workshop environment. It could be some type of day care centre, it could be a variety of things. When a person is deins titutionalized from a mental institution and goes either into the family care or into a guest home situation, what program is provided for that ind ividual to ensure that they have some guar anteed activity which is what is, I understand, essential to prevent this slipping back? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: That is pretty well practically the whole program that we're talking about, and that's what I meant by saying there's no point getting these people out of institutions if you're not ready to take care of them. · These would be the programs that we talked about before the dinn er hour, that we will discuss with the community and so on. Some of them would have to be in some form of an institution, except it's smaller so they call it a home, people who have to stay 6 or 20 or 30 to a facility.

Then also there's the program such as the same programs that we were talking about: the Day Care Program, the Proctor Program, and then certain therapy that these people would get. We have workers in the field trying to help these people, but they've had programs before that. At one time, they had these drop-in centres and so on that were a long time on Edmonton Street, that I think the Canadian Mental Health Association was running and some of those programs. It's to keep them busy and follow them, and help them out. Now in all fairness, I must say that - and this has nothing to do with the government.

I'm not defensive. But in all fairness, the media likes to be sensational, and I don't think it was all fair what they had. I've seen some guest homes that are pretty darned good, and I think we're lucky to have them. I think that they have workers, they have people who care in these areas. It's not generalizing the way they did it. I visited some of them. I was concerned, and I'm not saying it's perfect, but I think they' re better off than if they were alone, starving in an attic somewhere, in a room by thems elves and bored to death and lonesome. I think that they share things together.

It might not be the greatest with what they pay, but I don't think those articles were fair. That started years ago, that there was no licensing at all. It was just people who had boarding houses and they were just suppo sed to feed people, and that was it. Now this is much better. It depends on the operator. Some of them are very hard to get along with, but they still run fairly decent establishments. I think that was unfortunate. I don't think it's fair to generalize like that. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: Is there any requirement that guest homes that are licensed by the government are, in fact, required to operate a program of activities, an activity program, as opposed to the food and the care? HON. L. DESJARDINS: It is not an insured program. It is a program, as I said, that was started - it's licensed un der the Com muni ty Services, not un der our department. We're interested; we have some of our people who we would have to find places for. There's no doubt about that. Of course, the standards on that would not be the same as an insur ed service.

It's just an improvement, and government decided that qui te a few years ago, because of the general condition of these, what they call, boarding houses or rooming houses and so on that had no fire secur ity, nothing at all. Now, especially you approve those with four or less, and the others of course you have to license them. I think there's a certain amount of staff, but very little to - it's not sup posed to be a personal care home. It's just that they help these people with their medicine, the time to take their medicine, and make sure they eat well and that kind of stuff.

But it's an improvement over what it was. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Will the government be moving towards the insistence, as part of the licensing, the operation of some kind of program? And I'd compare it, for example, with the day care legislation. You can be a privately run day care. You may receive no funding from the Provincial Government at all but, in order to get a licence, you have to have a program of activity for the children who are in that particular day care centre. Is your department looking at any of that type of activity for the post-mentally ill? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: It's Community Services, and nobody can criticize or disagree with the, you know, direction that you're going, and I think it would be great. But then that also involves the government more and more, and then that's going to be costly because, if you start making rules and if you say they must have activities and so on, well they can't do that on air. They'll have to get paid; they'll charge more. And that's what they're complaining on now, that they're not taking some of those cases. They're taking people who - you know, you don't tell people where to live and so on.

It is a minimum of licencings that you do, and they take people who have the funds to pay for it. Some of them will not take people where either the welfare or another department pays, because we're not paying enough they say. So if we start saying, you must do this, you must do that, it's going to cost them even more money. We are working on that with the Community Services Department and making recom mendations about certain standards on that, but those are the concerns that we have.

You know, if we're not ready to pay more than we're paying or to increase that, we can on the other hand - because these people, they can't make money on that. They'll have trouble going to the bank to borrow money and they say, well what's your revenue. When they see it, they say forget it, you know, you'll never pay us back. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: There's no qu estion, Mr. Chairman, that programs like that will cost money.

I think that the ways in which they have to be evaluated is, what is the cost if that person is readmitted into an acute care bed for three weeks, six weeks, eight weeks, had that individual been provided with an activity program that might have prevented that slipping back into a depressive state or manic state or whatever would warrant readmission. HON. L. DESJARDINS: That's correct, but you can follow through the same principle, not only in those 1163

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 establishments. You'd have to go and see any person who lives by themselves who could be in the same position, in fact, worse, because I personally don't think there's anything worse than loneliness. These people who were very close to their spouse, let's say, who lost their spouse, are away from the work and they're living alone in an attic, to me, it's worse. So if you're going to do that, where are you going to stop? You know, and I don't disagree with that, but I mean we're talking about trying to keep what we have now. If we start all these programs, the cost would be phenomenal.

Sure, you're right. It's going to cost more if they go back in the institution and that's why we have it more and more. We have to have programs ourselves, not necessarily the guest homes and that. It might be that we will have to do that or some kind of program, call it home care for these people that we might have to provide a minimum of things. That's what we'll be looking at as we progress. We have a long way to go to do that. As you know, we've got to get people out of the institutions and so on. That's what we're going to do.

It's the same principle of getting people as much as possible out of institutions and working in the delivery of commu nit y health and decentralizing and working with the communities to provide those kinds of services. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: We have acute psychiatric beds I think in all hospitals in Winnipeg, with the exception of Concordia. HON. L. DESJARDINS: We ll, we'r e looking at Concordia now. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Do we have any acute beds in any other of our general hospitals, like the Thompson General or The Pas? HON. L. DESJARDINS: We have one bed in Thompson. But that would be what we'd be looking at.

I think we'll have to look also when we're looking at our institutions some kind of bed - you're talking about acute care now? MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Yes. HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, I was going to say in some of the personal care homes, because I see eventually that you might have most of the institutions emptied, but some of them you'll need more personal care homes for psychogeriatric beds. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: I have some . HON. L. DESJARDINS: Oh, excuse me. I said no, but I want to make sure.

We said that we were thinking, I said before the dinner hour, that we would want to put acute care beds in both Selkirk General Hospital and Brandon. We want to move in that to take them away. That would be emptying, taking 50 patients that we feel could maybe, with the help of those beds, go back in the commu nity. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: So am I correct in saying that the Minister is looking at beds in all Selkirk and Brandon General Hospitals? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: We 're doing that now and if we get our paper approved and all that, or whatever is decided, I would think that then we're looking at other areas, especially what we call the regional hospitals. That would be the first item. That's Steinbach, Portage, Dauphin, Thompson, Flin Flon, the Pas, those kinds of hospitals. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: If we could move on to some specifics now. In terms of the chief provi ncial psychiatrist, do we have a chief provincial psychiatrist at the present moment? HON. L. DESJARDINS: We have a fairly good arrangement. We had somebody who we're very pleased with.

Well let me say, first of all, that's been the history of every government that followed to try to recruit. It's been very, very difficult. We had Dr. Toews that we recruited a few years ago. He still has some connection with the un iversity and he doesn't want to lose that. We made arrangements and it's working fairly well. He's giving us approximately a day a week and he's back at the university. He's our acting, but we're still looking for a full time. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: One of the concerns, of course, is that if we are going to move to a more commu nity­ based service system, one would hope that there would be someone like the chief provincial psychiatrist who could kind of lead that battle. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Well, the chief psychiatrist would be there. The act requires one, and so on, and you need him to do special things, but he's not the one - I don't think anyway - that would lead that kind of service and the change.

That's one thing that we agreed that we didn't move as fast as we would have liked to, and we were chastised also for that, but we could blow our horn and talk about the directorate that we formed with Mr. Tom Walters, who is exactly the type of person to do exactly that and he's working under our ADM Don Mclean on that, who has the overall respons ibility. So that directorate has the responsibility for doing the planning and all that now and working with these people, and they are the ones that would be in charge of staff and the programs and all that, consulting with the psychiatrist. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: Is this directorate the same as the Central Advisory Committee? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Oh, no, no, no. The Central Advisory Committee are the names of people that I mentioned who are volunteers, people that are - no, this is - Mr. Wa lters is right here in front of you. It's new staff that we have. We didn't have that before. We set up the dir ectorate as one of the recommendations in the Pascoe Report, and he's in charge, with his ADM responsible, to plan and get these people and get exactly those programs started. They'll be responsible for our programming. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: The Central Advisory Committee was appoint ed by you in 1985, I understand, with the idea of giving public input into the mental health system. 1164

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 HON. L. DESJARDINS: As recommended by the Pascoe Report. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Is that continuing to meet, and how often do es it meet, and wha t kinds of recommendations has it specifically come up with? HON. L. DESJARDINS: They are very, very sincere people and very serious people. There is no way that those people will go through the motions. We had a new chairman that came in with a couple of members of his board to discuss the situation, and they wanted to make sure that they weren't going to lose their time. We had to iron this thing out.

I said, well, you know, if you're going to make recommendations and so on to us, but if it becomes a political thing, it's not going to work. We 're not going to help you to try to make life unpleasant for us, and they agreed. In turn, we agreed too, even before going to Cabinet, in presenting things for them so they can help us present the best possible recommendations to Cabinet. We 've done that on that five-year program that we're talking about that we'll get back shortly, and we did that with the act that we're talking about.

You see it would be very difficult to go to some organization, mail it to an organization, or if they don't agree, it could mak e it di fficult before we bring information. So these people, although some of the people, different organizations, are represented on this association, come from that - on this board, I should say - but they agreed that this is a confidential thing. They make a recommendation, and fine, it's up to us to do what we want with it, but of course, with those kinds of people, if we keep refusing everyt hing they send us, they're not going to stay very long.

They meet whenever they want when they've got something to do, at the call of the Chair. Not only are they limited to recommend or to work on things that we send to them, they can make recommendations. They are free to make recommendations to the Minister on their own, to initiate these recommendations, not to wait till we ask them to. Can you study this and make a recommendation? MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Have they prepared a recent list of recommendations or initiatives? HON. L. DESJARDINS: We ll, they've been very busy with the - most of them will be incorporated in the paper that I'm talking about.

That's going to be the main paper. They would like to see, as was discussed - earlier, us discuss with the public a White Paper or something like that. I asked if they were recommending -(Interjection)- yes, and I've asked them for - you know, we talked a while ago about what is the best, what kind of residence is the best. Some people are saying it shouldn't be more than six. That could be very costly. Other people say, no, you can have some of those, but you can have some in 30. For instance, Sister Ell in Sara Riel and so on, they have a proposal that they have in front of us now with 30 beds.

We always said that we want some of both. We have no problem in saying we want to deinstitutionalize, but not necessarily all six. That could be pretty darn costly also. So I've asked them to look at that also and make a recommendation to see if they're both acceptable or what, so they're looking at that. Also the legislation that we'll bring this year will be something that'll have to be redone next year, when we have legislation on the protection for the seniors.

By the way, this legislation - and we'll discuss that in the House - will go a long way, I guess, in talking about the minimum of care in service and so on, this legislation, because you certainly at least won't be able to abuse them or at least there'll be some protection. So that will probably come next year. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: For staff just so you'll know where I'm coming from, I'm going into now the Mental Health Directorate, and I'll be on 4.(c). I have a few questions in that area.

There's an 8.4 percent increase in Salaries; there's a 7.9 percent increase in Other Expenditures; and External Agencies - and we touched on this just before we broke at five o'clock - have in fact a decrease. Now we can argue that they have an increase over what was voted last year, but they have a decrease in what they got from what they're going to get this year. Now, we're talking about External Agencies under the Mental Health Directorate. HON. L. DESJARDINS: What page is it on? MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: 71 of the big book. There's an increase over '86-87 voted, but a decrease in over what was adjusted. HON. L.

DESJARDINS: If you look on the same page, if you look at the External Agencies, you will look also in the supplies and services. Some of that money is there, which you have over $1 million. Some of that $1.3 million, supply and services, some of that money was transferred there for project grow th. In other words, it went to the agencies. I don't want to mislead. Of course I can't, you'v e got it right in front of you. The total is not that much. I'm not saying it's a big increase, but you'd look at the 28 and the 27. It is not a decrease. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: As I see it, we have a numb er of agencies.

There are about 15 here, all of whom got grants last year. The grants totalled $1.224 million and this year they're going to total $1.219 million. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Under that, but there is also some money that was transferred that would go - Tom has gone to try to find out the exact amount. Yes, you had last year, there's $1.224 million, and this year $1.219 million. But we're saying that, out of this supply and services or professional fees and so on - then of course you have to see the way it moved up from last year. That's the same thing, that we're poor managers because we overspent.

But it was the actual that we voted in'85-86 was $931,000, and we actually put the $1.2 million. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: What movement occurred in this year in rural Manitoba with regard to the Proctor Program or the Day Program? HON. L. DESJARDINS: I'm sorry, I didn't get the first part. 1165

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: We spoke about the fact that there were additions in some of these areas. I specifically want to know, in rural Manitoba, what additions did we see to the Proctor Program or the Day Program between '86-87 and what is proposed for '87-88. HON. L.

DESJARDINS: If you want to add the total on this - this is for the Proctor Program - there was one person in Portage, the cost was $7, 100; Interlake Region, there was one person for $1,000; Parklands, there were five clients for a total of $3,679; Thom pson Region, there were five for a total of $4 ,210; the Westman Region, there was one person with two different Proctors - at a different time, I would imagine. It was $6,600.00. Then there are some here in the Interlake, five in the Interlake, seven in Parklands, one in Westman, three in Thompson and one in Eastman and that was about $49,000 or so in all. MRS.

S. CARSTAIRS: Were there any new da y programs developed in rural areas in the past year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Apart from this program, what we have for this year, the money that we're asking now should be enough money for 25 spaces in Parkland; those are new spaces, 20 spaces in Thompson; 10 in Winnipeg and Westman is under negotiation. Those programs serve to include work-related trai ning, recreation, social skill training and other rehabilitative types of programming for the mentally ill. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: In the Mental Health Directorate funding under Other Expenditures, the reference again to the aud io-visual link. Is that the one between the Health Sciences Centre and Brandon. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: How is that, in fact, providing services as the Pascoe Report would lead us . . . HON. L. DESJARDINS: We have a chronic shortage of qualified psychiatrists at the Brandon Mental Health Centre. That is why we . . . Then we've been trying again for years, not only that in Selkirk also.

In fact, all over Man itoba, except the psychiatrists normally who want to practise in private practice and so on. That's what led to that. That was developed with the Health Centre and the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Manitoba, with closed circuit television transmission in consultation and new admissions and consultation related to problem situations. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Is there any attempt on the part of the government to broaden that service, and thereby make that kind of psychiatric resource available to people in other communities? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: We're looking at that, and the link is capable of utilizing an existing link now between the Health Sciences Centre and the St. Boniface General Hospital, and used for transmitting ... also, we're looking at Selkirk to see how it works. It only officially opened on March 1, 1986. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: I'd like to move into the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services for just a minute. Again we see an incr ease in salaries, but it's not a high increase in salary but we see a decrease in Other Expendit ures for children and adolescents. The concern I have is that . . . Mr.

Chairman, I'm not critical of the increases in the staff year. HON. L. DESJARDINS: There's been some vacancies, and then you start at the ... You'll have people that'll reach a di fferent level also, after a certain apprenticeship. Then of course, this qualification pay that we talked about before, that's an increase of 10,000 also, that increased the total of 716. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: My real concern is the decrease under Other Expenditures, because this is the service delivery as I under stand it. This is where you have your supplies and services and your professional fees.

Are we going to be treating fewer adolescents this year under this program than we treated last year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: There's been a reduction in traveling, hotels, meals and other of $400.00. But I'm assured that there is no reduction in service at all. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Are we working towards, or have we achieved a day program for children and adolescents in Winnipeg? HON. L. DESJARDINS: It's actually a psychiatric medical service in Winnipeg, and it also supports community mental workers in the rural area, who work with children and adolescents. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: Are we still sending some of our adolescent clients outside the province for treatment? HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, we're not. Another thing I mentioned, we've had a difficult time recruiting psychiatrists. That's one thing that I think, unofficially - I've discussed that with some of the members of the board, of this advisory board. I'm going to ask them also to look at the possibility of employing more psychologists also because everybody's been trying to recruit and it's been very, very difficult, and so on.

It's been recommended to me on a number of occasions that we should at least explore the possibility to look at - I'm not saying to replace all psychiatrists, but to use the psychologists. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: How many children, adolescents are we treating for mental health disorders in Manitoba in a given year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: While we're looking for this information, I'd like to give you this. That concerns the long-term plans in child and adolescent mental health. In the past, criticism has been levied by many constituent groups over the lack of mental health services to children and adolescents.

To some degree this criticism is valid. Existing services in the area comprise children's community mental health workers; a total of 10 workers located in most but not all regions; children's forensic services, psychiatric services at the 1166

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 Child Guida nce Clinic, Manitoba Adolescent Treatment Centre, child adolescent units at Brandon and St. Bon iface Hospital, Adolescent Unit at Brandon Mental Health Centre. We 're aware of the limited mental health service available in the province to meet the needs of children and adolescents and, as such, my department has placed priority on the development of these resources. In fact, the building of the Mani toba Adol escent Treatment Centre has been one of the first major steps in many years to fill this gap.

That was something that was badly needed and we'd talked about that for years. That is probably why we're not sending so many people out of the province. In addition, there are 10 forensic beds for children planned as part of the redevelopment at the Health Sciences Centre. My department is also in the midst of conducting a review of the existing child and adolescent services. This review will form the basis for developing a long-range plan in the area.

As part of the planning process, there is a growing recognition for all departments who deal with children to plan cooperatively in order to ensure a successful future for young Manitobans. I'll give you the caseload, so that will give you the num ber that we have. It is the community health workers in the rural area and the psychiatrists in Winnipeg so far. I have the figures for 1985-86, but that can't be a good comparison; that's 15 months. In 1986-87, East man is 190; In terlake, 149; Thompson, 102; Norman, 128; Parklands, 115; Central, 169; the total rural was 854; and Winnipeg is 175, for a total of 1,029.

Then there's the Child Gui dance Clinic, open cases at the beginning of school year - and that's 1985-86, the last year I have though - 330; new clients, 334, for a total of 664. MRS. S. CARSTAIAS: In terms of the Brandon and the Selkirk centres, and just a couple of general qu estions, will the numb er of beds in both of those institutions be declining in this year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes. Currently, there are 725 patients. There are 325 in Selkirk and 400 in Brandon.

Then when this psychogeriatric building is ready in Brandon, the first one, 100 will be transferred from the Brandon Mental Hospital and the same thing in Selkirk. So that will transfer 200; that leaves 525. The acute care that I'm talking about in those two hospitals - I'm not talking about the rest of the area - roughly 50 in each, roughly another 100, and that will leave 425. Then it is felt that right now, with the program that we've done in studying the patients which is being refined, we should be able to transfer another 120 at least in each institution for another 240.

So that would be the one that we'll be discussing with the community and moving in the communit y. That would leave 185. At this time, we feel that we will have to keep those in the institution. That is the recommendation that will be considered by the Cabinet. That's part of the paper that I'm talking about. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: In the Brandon and the Selkirk psychogeriatric, the 100 each, do you expect to move those out during this fiscal year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Brandon, we do in the late fall; Selkirk, probably next year. MRS. S.

CARSTAIRS: So we can be assured that the figures, the bottom lines for Brandon will go down considerably for next budget year? HON. L. DESJARDINS: This is just the way they've been going down though. This is Brandon, and the first year that I'll give you is 1979, and then I'll give you every year until 1986. In 1979, we had 574 patients, that's Brandon; the next year, 555; the following year, 559; then 519; 492; 45 1; 427; and 407. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: I knew that the numb ers had been coming down. What I'm now talking about is the zero zero's coming down, in other words, the money.

I mean, we're going from $19 million to $20 million. Are we going to see it going the other way? HON. L. DESJARDINS: You'll get 100 in Brandon anyw ay, and then I don't know. We have no idea when we'll have a decision. I can tell you, at least the 100. Some of the others should start moving fairly fast, and I hope that the 100 next year in Selkirk, that'll be 200 and, by then, maybe another 100 with the 250, and in the communities which we hope to start pretty soon because we recognize that we want to keep people, you know, not centralize all in that area. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. MR.

CHAIRMAN: The Member for River East. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Mr. Chairman, just a few qu estions on the Mental Health Directorate. Can the Minister tell me - I believe he indicated before how many spaces there were in the Proctor Program. HON. L. DESJARDINS: 39. MRS. B. MIT CHELSON: There are 39 spaces throughout the province. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: I believe the Minister indicated that was an increase over last year. If I can recall back from last year's Estimates, the Minister indicated that there were 39 Proctor spaces at that time. HON. L.

DESJARDINS: No, there were 20 last year, and there are 19 more now. There are 39, it doubled. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Mr. Chairman, I beg to differ, but I'm going to quote from last year's Estimates. It says: "There were 20 in Winnipeg; 3 in We stman Region; 3 in Eastman; 1 in Central; 3 in Parklands; 3 in Interlake; 3 in Norman and 3 in Thompson." So, that's 39. HON. L. DESJARDINS: The best information I can get now, they assure me there were only 20 before and 19. What I either said or meant to say must have been that's the mo ney tha t we were planning. I don't 1167

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 remember that. I'm assured by staff that no, in effect, we had 20 and we have 39. So that's a mistake that should be corrected then - my mistake, if you're quoting me. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: So, if I'm unde rstanding correctly, there were 20. HON. L. DESJARDINS: 20, and there are 39. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Basis last year, and that's been increased by 19 . HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes, actual in last year's. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Actual to 39, and there are those spaces available. Are all those spaces full now? Those are programs that are in place? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes, 39 clients now. MRS. B.

MIT CHELSON: Thirty-nine clients now, and is there an anticipated increase over this year or is that number going to remain stable at 39? HON. L. DESJARDINS: While we're looking for that, the amount, all I can give you is the amount of money. But I can't tell you the number because you can spend 10,000 tor one and maybe 2,000 for another. It's not the same thing depending on the amount of care needed. And I think, what I read earlier in answer to the Leader of the Liberals, I think would ind icate that it varies quite a bit, the amounts. So I can't give you num bers.

I'll try to get the amount of money that we have for the Proctor. For the 39 it was approxima tely 261,000 tor the 39 last year. And that doesn't mean, you know that you can get the exactly the average but it gives you a fair ind ication if I can get the money that we have for this year. Wait now, I'm waiting for ... MR. CHAIRMAN: Oh, you're waiting for an answer. HON. L. DESJARDINS: We ll, if she has any other questions. MRS. B. MIT CHELSON: I'll wait for a minute for that answer. HON. L.

DESJARDINS: I'll try and get more, make sure we give you as much information and clear information that we can so I'll bring you back this for the next meeting. The next time we meet, I'll get, as close as we can, okay. And for the, we'll get for the Proctor Program and also for the day, for the day program also. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: And for the commu nit y residences also. Th ere are how many spaces, community residences? HON. L. DESJARDINS: There's 51 at the present. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Fifty-one, and are there any plans for increases? HON. L. DESJARDINS: We 'll give you what we have for those three programs.

MRS. B. MITCHELSON: I'd like to . MR. CHAIRMAN: Sorry, go ahead. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: I'm waiting so the Minister can hear my question. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Don't wait tor me, because I'll be coughing all night so go ahead. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Okay. I received a letter from a constituent of mine this month and I believe there was a copy sent to you also, a Proctor situation, where they had, I guess had a verbal agreement and they also received a letter of approval to be part of the Proctor Program and provide care tor a mentally handicapped person in their home, in the community.

And I believe ther e was some problem with the department and they in tact were not paid the amount of money ... - (Interjection)- HON. L. DESJARDINS: Mr. Chairman, I wonder if I can ask the member to privately give me the details, the name and so on and if I've got a copy it's probably being checked now and without naming the person we'll give you the information. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Wi thout naming ind ividuals or people because I was . . . HON. L.

DESJARDINS: We'll check into it if we can get, of course if you can give us the name or a copy of the letter, if we already have one that'll be easier tor us to find. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: I believe that the Minister has received a copy but we will discuss that then privately. HON. L. DESJARDINS: It's probably being investigated now. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: But I'm wondering then what the criteria is or how, how does the department decide how they're going to put people into this program then and -(Interjection)- HON. L. DESJARDINS: You mean, how we choose the, you're talking about the, not the client now .

You'r e talking about the -(Inte rjection)- MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Well, the clients are there. How are the people chosen and what is . . . HON. L. DESJARDINS: The client or the people that provide the service? MRS. B. MITCHELSON: Well, I guess maybe both, like I mean there are people out there that do need care in someone's home. HON. L. DESJARDINS: And we try to match people that ... 1168

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 MRS. B. MITCHELSON: You try to match them and how are ... HON. L. DESJARDINS: And that is, they're interviewed and checked by our field workers who decide, make the recommendation and decide. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: You don't then decide. You decide on an individual basis whether a Proctor situation would be the best for a certain client. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes, and discuss with the client of cours e and the Proctor and then an agreement is made. Depending cin the service required also. MRS. B.

MITCHELSON: Can the Min ister tell me, do you have people then in the commun ity that apply to look after people in a Proctor type; look after clients in a situation - are there people there that are readily available to do this type of work? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes, we advertise for that and then they're interviewed and I'm told that we've been fairly successfu l. We 're looking now at Proctors for groups also, not just one on one, to work, you know it might be certain hours to work with groups and. That doesn't exist now but we're looking at that now. MRS. B.

MITCHELSON: Wo uld that be then more likely a communi ty residence, having a community residence with a certain numb er of people or is the Proctor Program; it's not necessarily then a fulltime program. Can it be just a few hours a day or is it somebody who comes to live in your house on a full-time basis? HON. L. DESJARDINS: When we started the program we thought that we'd have maybe people one-on-one and that doesn't exist now. But that could happen, there's no reason why, you know, that we would turn that down in certain cases. That was felt that that was needed depending on the cost also.

It becomes more costly, it's the same thing as home care. But now it's mostly people that'll spend so many hours, let's say a day, take them out and phone them and that kind of service. Make sure that they're all right and if they need anything and so on. And I did mention that we're looking at them taking groups also not just the one-on-one. Like Big Brother or Big Sister. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: If I'm un dersta nding this properly then it's right now sort of a one-on-one situation but it's not necessarily a client that lives in with a family. HON. L. DESJARDINS: That's right.

I don't think we have any now, but I say there's nothing that would prevent it if that was needed and if we felt it would be feasible. But most of them don't need this 24 hours. MRS. B. MITCHELSON: So there might be somebody living on their own that needs some assistance or someone to come in to take them out, to call, to check up. HON. L. DESJARDINS: And it might be somebody that's ready to take somebody in their own home. So they would act as Proctor and then, of course, there would be board and room if that's the case. They might want this kind of arrangement. We would look at that also. MRS. B.

MITCHELSON: That's all for right now. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Pembina. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr. Chairman, before we broke over the dinner hour and before we broke for Private Memb ers' Hour , we were dis cussing the un derexpe nditure in Mental Health Directorate by the $460,000.00. Now, in discussing that earlier on, and I just want the Min ister to make sure that I didn't misun derstand his answer, some of his areas in which the underexpenditur e occurred was in the Proctor Program, Community Residence Program, and the Day Program. Is that correct? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: Those three were definitely areas where we und erspent. Are you asking me if there are other areas that we und erspent besides that? MR. D. ORCHARD: Presumab ly, Mr. Chairman, that would ... HON. L. DESJARDINS: I mentioned that before the dinner hour. Remember I was to give you figures for both salaries and opera tions, star ting with the Ma nagement Su pport with the chief provincial psychiatrist, the Mental Directorate and you asked me questions on that, the Forensic Service, that's salaries, and the Directorate, by the way was $460,500 less operating. Brandon, there are 282 in Selkirk, and so on.

MR. D. ORCHARD: I already have those figures. Mr. Chairman, the main question, and this is where I was trying to get a specific nailed down, when you deferred the mental health new initiatives in the Treasury Board submission, whereby you received approval for the overexpenditure in the home care line, was it an expansion in the Proctor Program which was deferred as part of the mental health new initiatives? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Well, a certain amount of money. It was a total of 460 that we hadn't spent. One of the points that I was making before that also, we hadn't been successfu l.

We had the money, one time we hadn't been successful in putting all this in place. At the time we might have been able before the end of the year, but when the decision was made, well, all right, you spend money on home care and hospitals and so on, because of the deficit, fine. You won't be allowed to spend that. We could have had, for instance, six bed units in a community residence for $140,000 and we could have spent $320,000 with an average maybe of $8 ,000 per client or day prog ram for $70,000.00. We could have a program for fifteen spaces.

That gives you an idea of some of the things that could have been done with that money. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr . Chairman, the area tha t received the most reduction in other expenditures, was, 1169

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 of course, the Mental Health Directorate where I did ind icate earlier on that that was the area of the mental health portion of the Department of Health which is developing and coordinating the community based mental health services. I just want to point out, although I don't have the numb ers in front of me for the actual expenditure under Mental Health Directorate for other expenditur es for'85-86, fiscal year two ago, but the Adjus ted Vote was $906,000 and your actual expenditure this year will be $765,000.00.

So, unless you under expended in the year before as well, your expenditur es were actually down last year over the previous year at a time when you, three years ago adopted the main tenets of the Pascoe Report and you ind icate that there is support for community based mental health for efforts to get away from our institutional system, it appears as if, when the crunch hits in the department, one of the first areas that can be hit hardest in curtailment of other expenditures is the Mental Health Directorate. HON. L. DESJARDINS: I explained that; I'm not going to argue that again.

I am saying that, yes, we were un derspent the year before also and I am saying that even in certain areas, even if we had $10 million right now, these programs have been further delayed by the time it takes to obtain community involvement and commi tment in some areas. You'r e talking about working with them and so on. I'm not saying then it might be. I don't know that. It might be that we would have spent that before the end of the year, at least start a program, and then we were told don't spend any more for a few months.

I have one bit of good news for those that are interested , I hope it's not a joke but the Jets are leading 1-0, Boschman from Neufeld at 1:20 of the first period. MR. D. ORCHARD: 1:20 of the first period? HON. L. DESJARDINS: I think that's what it says. I don't know who gave me this. I hope it's not a joke. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr. Chairman, in the Mental Health Directorate when we looked at SY's last year at Estimates time, there was five, on the Adjusted Vote you were up to eight. Are all of those positions filled and what were the additional hirings to accomplish?

They weren't discussed last year at Estimates time. HON. L. DESJARDINS: You'r e saying that these eight positions weren 't discus sed last year? MR. D. ORCHARD: Last year's Estimates indicate that Mental Health Directorate had five SY's. There was no request for additional SY's last year. And in the Adjus ted Vote we have the additional SY's. The question being, what for? They weren 't discussed last year. What are they accomplishing this year? What's the additional staff for? HON. L. DESJARDINS: You say we had five last year?

We had a gentleman from the Eastman region who was wor king as a mental health worker who is being transferred, there was Mr. Werbeniuk also, you know has been transferred from communi ty health, and the ADM gave a position for a secretary to Mr. Walker. Those are the three added positions. MR. D. ORCHARD: Okay. Mr. Chairman, last year, we approved just under $1.2 million in support to External Agencies. The actual expenditure was some $140,000 less. What agencies did not receive what was anticipated to be full funding? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: The money was $140,000 as was mentioned, and that was the cost of the community residence for a six-bed unit which we couldn't develop in time, and that was through this agency which looks after that for us. So it was that; we had the money to open another one. MR. D. ORCHARD: Which agency assists you? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Project Growth is the name of the agency which looks after these commun ities for us. MR. D. ORCHARD: Project Growth? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes. MR. D. ORCHARD: Okay. Is that particular community residence on target for this year, and part of this year's funding proposals? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: Project Growth started very late in the year and we'll have the amount for the full year. MR. D. ORCHARD: In this year's Estimates? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Yes. MR. D. ORCHARD: We ll, Mr. Chairman, we've discussed in general terms a number of areas in terms of mental health. There is certainly a lot of interest stimulated by the CBC's comparison of the Manitoba system versus the Saska tchewan system. I just want to close with a few comments that I think should be made on the record, and I noticed that the Premier was here earlier on. I think his coat's still here.

It's too bad he wasn't still here, because I think he's a fairly pivotal individual in terms of achieving any kind of com mu nity-based mental health programs and esta blishing regional services. As we discussed earlier on this afternoon, as we move to the community base, we're going to be winding down both Brandon and Selkirk, and I have before me a November 9, 1983, Winn ipeg Free Press article, and this was at about the time when the Pascoe Report, of course, had been discus sed by Cabinet and the basic tenets agreed to of the Pascoe Report.

It's been a while since I've read the Pascoe Report, but according to the

article - and I know the Minister will correct me if I'm wrong - it indicates that the Pascoe Report recommends phasing out of the Brandon and Selkirk Mental Health Centres by 1990 and replacing them with commun ity-based centres and services in eight regions throughout Manitoba. At that time, 1170

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 Winnip eg was just one region and, basically, the phasing out of Brandon and Selkirk by 1990. Now earlier on this afternoon, we discussed the political will of the Premi er, because one of those institutions is a fairly major em ployer in his own constituenc y, and I can't help but quote from this Winnipeg Free Press

article of November 9. I'll give you the whole paragraph. It says: "Desjardins said he disagreed with comments made earlier by his Cabinet colleague, Len Evens, who denounced the recommendation to phase out the Brandon Centre by 1990. Evans (Brand1m East) said such a system has been tried elsewhere but doesn't work because patients are left to 'flounde r for themselves' in the communit y." Now, Mr. Chairman, we talked about the Premier needing political will to make that move. We see that the other affected Minister of this admi nistration, Mr. Evans, initially was much opposed.

I don't know whether there's any statements of late from Mr. Evans which say, "Well, you know, I think the Min ister of Health is correct and the Pascoe Report was correct, and therefore I agree with it now." I kind of doubt that, whether there's been any such public pronouncement by Mr. Evans. I recognize that when you get behind closed do ors in Cabinet, there are a lot of various circumstances that fix into the meld of decision-making by Cabinet, not the least of which are the political considerations by those MLA's fortunate enough to be sitting around the Cabinet table. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Fortunate? MR. D.

ORCHARD: Well, in most cases, I've always conside red it fortunate and a privilege to be sitting there; maybe you should kn ow. HON. L. DESJARDINS: It's debatable. MR. D. ORCHARD: We ll, the company you keep, I can understand where you don't think it's so fortunate to be sitting around a Cabinet table with the Pawley administration - I agree - but I was always quite proud of my colleagues around the Cabinet table. But the point I'm trying to make is that we've got Pascoe's Report out. I think we've got a community at large that recognizes changes need to be made, that are willing to see those changes.

I note, in the 10 years that I' ve been here, the amount of opposition to group homes is incredibly diminished compared to what it was in 1978-79-80. It was a major, major issue. It doesn't appear to have that same kind of emotional portent because people are more willing to try the new system. I think that even though the Min ister disagrees with some of the numb ers, the CBC presentation did a service in educating Man itobans and helping this Min ister. He may not agree, but I believe it was good information that was put out by CBC in terms of the approach to delivery of mental health.

Whether the num bers were absolutely correct or not, I'm not arguing, but it made Manitobans aware that there is a different system. Now, Mr. Chairman, one of the major problems that we've got in this province, and I'll talk and I'll digr ess 1171 slightly right now and get into something which is economics. Maybe that's not an approach that one should necessarily take in terms of provision of mental health, but rural Manitoba right now is dying on the vine.

We have agriculture in the doldrums, and if we listen to the experts - which you should never do - it's going to remain that way for some considerable number of years, and we're going to have to substantially change our appr oach to rural Mani toba and economic development in rural Manitoba.

I find it an alarming contrast, and I know the Chairman will, too, when I leave my constituency and I drive to the City of Winnipeg, because once you get into the City of Winnipeg, the main impact of a half-million dollar deficit and a Limestone development and some of the other deficit-initiated projects are quite evident in the City of Winnipeg. We have two different economies in the Province of Manitoba, Winnip eg being where most people are very fortunate in their economic circumstances. Such is not the case in rural Manitoba. Rural Manitoba is hurting and hurting bad ly.

I should be in Agriculture debating with the Minister of Agriculture on it, but one of the things that we're tending to do, which exacerbates the problem in rural Manitoba, is we tend to concentrate all our sophisticated services in the City of Winnipeg. That's always been a problem with this province because Winnip eg is simply the large centre and naturally attracts all of these services. But in terms of delivery o1 mental health, I think that it is an ideal service in the Health Department that can be reg ionalized, decentralized, without dim inishing service, with in fact improving service.

I simply say again, the Saskatchewan model is the one that tells us it can be done, and it can be done at least as economically as what we're doing in here. The advantage to rural Manitoba is very obvious. If you have the Dauphins, the Mordens, the Winklers and some of the other major communities staffed with psychologists, psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses, mental health workers to provide services on a regional basis, that simply transfers wage packages from Selkirk, Brandon and Winnipeg communities to communi ties that need some suppor t right now and citizens that need support in those communities.

But I guess maybe there is more making up the decisions on how fast you move and how qui ckly you move on regionalized services in mental health than those kinds of considerations. Another thing that your Cabinet fails to have is adequate representation from rural Manitoba sitting around your Cabinet table. They're few and far betw een. Northern Manitoba is well represented. The problems in Northern Manitoba are distinctly different from those in rural southern Manitoba, and you don't have a rural southern Manitoba Cabinet Min ister.

The Member for Brandon East is not - with all due respect - in tune with the problems in rural Manitoba. He's not familiar With it. HON. L. DESJARDINS: It's an urban seat. MR. D. ORCHARD: So, Mr. Chairman, I can do nothing else than again, as I did last year, to urge the Minister

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 to proceed and, hopefully, he will find the political will to do it. I hope the comments of 1983 from his colleague, Mr. Evans, are not held as vehemently as they appear to be back then, because I believe you've got to get on with the job of providing a better system of delivery in the mental health area of your department.

I think, in the long run, you can provide better service, as efficient a service certain ly, and you can provide that additional advantage of having a new group of citizens in the commun ities of rural Manitoba, because every time that we have brought a new group of learning and expertise, you put a different focus on to a rural communit y. That's healthy, that's vibrant; that offers an exchange of information on a community basis that you can't get without those people being there.

I think also that we've had our concerns over the phasing out of the School of Nursing, which I realize is Community Services, at Portage la Prairie, the Developmental Centre. I don't know whether there is currently a program in Manitoba that adequately fits the needs for a community mental health worker as you decentralize the system. So, Mr. Chairman, with those few remarks, I simply want to urge the Minister to move on as quickly as possible.

I hope that when we discussed it earlier on this afternoon, and maybe the Minister can clarify this, but the group that was put together to study the mental health plan and tha t Cabi net will receive recommendations on, is that the sort of five-year plan that was referred to in last year's Estimates? That is what that group has done.

I never asked that question specifically before Private Members' Hour, but given that is the five-year plan, I think it is even more important that as quickly as possible, we and the members of the communit y, the Manitoba communi ty at large, have the ability to discuss that five-year plan. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Mr. Chairman, I'm not going to take too much time. I think we had a good discussion on that. I appreciate that the member is wanting to put something on record and I welcome that. It is his feeling and that of his party on this. But I don't know what else I can do to reassure him.

I haven't hedged at all on this. I said from Day One - in fact, last year I sent him a copy of a speech that I made, that I classified as the government's official position on the Pascoe Report. The speech that I made, I think mentioned 1983 or wh atever year it was, or'85,'8 4, to the psychiatric nu rses, and I told him this afternoon that I have no representation. Of course, members have a concern if they're going to lose jobs.

My honourable friend appealed today to transfer some of these positions in the rural areas because the rural areas are having problems and it's a different econo my, and that's all valid, but it's valid for everybo dy. I don't think that we chastised these people for trying to keep the jobs there, but as a Cabinet, I give you the policy of Cabinet on that. In fact, the member of his caucus from Brandon kno ws we need some changes. Everyday he's talking about cutting and so on to try and get as much mileage out of this situation in Brandon that we're cutting and so on. I know he knows it.

He knows that we have to make some changes. He knows they're not cut; he knows all that. There's good cooperation between the Commission and the hospital in that area, but I can reassure them, and I have no problem either. If it's just the Chamber of Commerce, if we're going to invent jobs just to give jobs to people, I don't believe in that. If we're going to, for instance, keep something, a costly thing like the School for Psychiatric Nur ses in Portage, I don't believe in that. If we can do it, we've got to cut down. On this question of decentralization, I believe in that.

I've said that not only in mental health; I've said that in the field of health in general. I said that we want to go back to, as much as possible, decentralize and have the community participate and that and give some option, not just make all the decisions from here on some of the priorities that are needed. I recognize the different priorities that could exist in different parts of the province. So I have no problem with that.

I told you what we were recommending and the First Minister as far as I'm concerned has always recognized that, that there will be some changes on there and, as far as I'm concerned, he agrees with that. I don't say he's jumping with joy. It's going to be a problem with him. It's going to be a political problem, but he's facing it and he's going to accept the responsibility, and so is the Member for Brandon. In the meantime, they're doing exactly what was done around this table today by bringing the concern of his constituency to us and making a statement in the news media.

That certainly is his right and that was his feeling. He was expressing something that I expressed. I said we have to be careful, but I didn't say that we would keep this thing going, that we would have all these big institutions forever and a day. So we are looking at it. We are commit ted to deinstitutionalize in that area also. We have a program now in front of Cabinet. I can't give him the answer today. We've talked about that this afternoon. It could be that we will have a White Paper or something that the communi ty can discuss, that we can look at the best possibility and the advice from the commun ity.

Then we will move. I think we've started in that direction, granted not as fast as the people would like to see it. But we have moved and I hope that we will improve that and move we certainly will as fast as we can, recognizing that we can't just drop everything else and just move in that direction. It's been a long time. It's been the poor orphan for a many years. It was something that wasn't considered by the feds or anybody else. It was something that wasn't done. That's why there are problems. We recogn ize that Saskatchewan is - we compare it to the best province. Saskatchewan is the best program of all.

That doesn't make it any better because there are other provinces that are at the same level as we are. But that's not something that we're proud of or happy with, but Saskatchewan is the best. Now CBC, I cooperated 100 percent with CBC. I gave them as much information as possible. I asked our people to talk to them. I gave them as much information as possible. The only thing I'm saying is that they took part of it and the other part, would they explain that it wasn't the full thing and when you'r e saying that it costs Man itoba $155 million and only $38 million in Saskatchewan, that is not the fact.

It's not just a little 1172

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 mistake. It's a little mistake if you say that $38 million is the same as $155 million. So, fine. As I say, with all the statements that were made and the direction that we go, I say there is no argument. I have no argument with the honourable member at all and, that, as far as I'm concerned, is the position of the government at this time. MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: A few minutes ago, the Minister told me that in 1979 there were 57 4 patients at the Brandon Mental Institution. Now we have that numb er in 1986 down to 407, I'm not disputing the figures.

In 1979, and I'm checking with the budget, it was costing us about $20,000 a patient. In 1986, it's costing us about $50,000 a patient. What that says to rile in no un certain terms is what the Minister has repeated, that he too is looking toward the commun ity-based mental health delivery system, because it's cost-effective and because it's probably better in the long term for the good health of the mental patient. But in his last remarks, the Minister used a number of words. He said we are looking, we are committed and we might issue a White Paper that would promote community involvement.

I would ask the Minister to remember that unfortunately has been the long-term history of the mental health movement in Manitoba. The government talks about reforms, not just this government, but government after government, talks about reforms. He ind icates they are committed to new reforms and then unfortunately get elected and a new study is commissioned. I only have to take you back to the Adamson Report of 1960 which says, psychiatric patients should be treated as close to their place of residence as possible, thereby avoiding major social di slocation.

Smaller hospitals, rendering comprehensive service and related to general hospitals will permit patients to accept treatment earlier. The provision of adequate ambulatory treatment ranging from consultation through day care programs and follow up will minimize the need for in­ patient treatment. That was 1960. In 1973, the Clarkson Report said, the mental health services must be regionalized and communi ty-oriented programs mus t be dev eloped. The care in the community as opposed to hospitalization must be emphasized.

We then go to the Pascoe Report in 1982, which again repeats the same data and tells us tha t we have to get on with it, that we have to, in fact, move to a communi ty-based system. Mental health services have been, as you yourself have said, Mr. Minister, the back end, if you will, in terms of getting the attention that they deserve. We know that we can spend millions more, but we also know that we're probably spending as much as we need to spend, we just need to spend it better. What we need to do is have the political will to change it.

I'm delighted that the document is being presented to Cabinet, but I hope for the . . . all of whom are in this room and all of whom will be affected by mentally­ ill people within their family unit will not have to wait for another election, for another set of commitments and for another study before mental health services in Manitoba become community based. HON. L. DESJARDINS: I accept that, providing also the honourable mem ber accepts that the Federal Liberals who were in government for a long time certainly failed us and failed the people of Canada for many years on that.

When these studies were made, they were brought up, and we asked to change this business of just acute care and Medicare. That wasn't done and we know that some of the Cabinet Ministers wanted that. So, I think we all failed. I agree. I don't know if it's failing and we didn't know as much as we did then. There were other priorities. It was new, but the best thing now is to act as fast as we can. In other words, this is the same thing that we'r e talking l:!bout in the field of health. We want to deinstitutionalize all over and go in more community care.

We feel that we will provide better service and better standards and at a lesser cost. As I said, that's why I'm saying that we should and I hope that we can, that I'm not too naive in thinking that we can all work togettier on that. But it's not only in mental health. It's the same thing. It's valid for other things too if you're going to go in the communit y. Thank you. MR. CHAIRMAN: I take it you're prepared to pass 3.(a)(1). MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: Not 3. MR. CHAIRMAN: 4.(a)(1) to 4.(g)(2) were each read and passed. Can we go back to

section 3 now? HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, you'v e got - you have to pass the ... MRS. S. CARSTAIRS: No you can't because it would combine 3 - we would have to finish 3 first. HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, it doesn't combine 3. MR. CHAIRMAN:

Be it resolved that there be granted to Her Majesty, a sum not exceeding $40,841,600 for Health, Mental Health Services for the fiscal year ending the 31st day of March, 1988- pass. We have 25 minutes, I guess we want to get started in

section 3. Community Health Services (Operations) - who's first? HON. L. DESJARDINS: I'd like to put on the record, if I may, Mr. Chairman, that the request that was made before the dinner hour, that information and more was provided to both the Official Opposition and the Liberal Party. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Minister. The Member for Pembina. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr. Chairman, I realize that the reorganization in Winn ipeg is new, but I have to tell you I had expected something other than hand -written flow charts for the different regions.

Is it so new that we don't have this formalized yet and isn't it part of the flow charts and information that's packed away in the department? HON. L. DESJARDINS: The reason for that is that is not finalized as yet. There could be some changes and 1173

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 that information was provided for the members of the committee at their request for today, and that's the best form in the short time that we had - that's the best form that we can get this info rmation . It could still change and that is why it hasn 't been finalized . MR. D. ORCHARD: Now, Mr.

Chairman, in taking a look at the way the Winnipeg regions - we got the executive director - and on your first flow char t, you move across the page to Centra l Services , Winnipeg Sou t!l, Winnipe g Nort h, Winnipeg West Central , and the accompanying map indicates the way the City of Winnipeg is broken into the three reg ions. I guess the question is, in the Central Servi ces, is it fair to assum e that they provide the coordinating serv ices for the entire complement of Winnipeg Regions , in other words the three Winnipe g regions , is that what Centn:I Services are to do? HON. L.

DESJARDINS : It serve s as the head of - you will see , you have another chart there that will tell you that service is head of administrative transition efforts wi th system analysts along with three regional administrative office rs. MR. D. ORCHARD: I'd just like to find tha t. HON. L. DESJARDINS: This one here , we should have numb ered them . It's in Health Community Ser vices, Winnipeg Central Services . MR. D. ORCHARD: Now, Mr.

Chairman, when we move to the regio nal staff of the region al areas and the reg iona l directors, now presumably these three regional directors are essentially replacing six area directors that were under the old Winnipeg single-region system. HON. L. DESJARDINS: They 're replacing one regional director and six area directors . We're saying the same thing , it was just that . MR. D. ORCHAR D: Now , the regional director was, if I recall correctly, Bill Werbeniuk, then ... ✓ HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, it was Ken Maskiw . MR. D. ORCHARD: Oh , yes, right, that's right .

Now I note that each one of the areas has basica lly - but not always - but basically the same areas of servic e delivery. Now one of the things that I want to ask the Minister, he might recall we had a fairly extensive discussion on this last year, and one of the concerns I had when we discussed this last year was how your regional coordination was going to work . Now , the most recent example being of - if I can put it so bluntly - a fiasco - is the example in Children 's Aid Society where you had the one Winnipeg region broken up into , I believe , six separate regions.

I notice that ther e's some smiles over there, but it's been docum ented that in some regions children have been left because there's no coordination of service between the regions - and have been left without services and I believe there's been some rather drastic results of that lack of coordination between the six regions under GAS. Mr. Chairman, I note that in the South Region, you have a majority - m aybe not a majority - but a fairly sizable portion of the dow ntown area where a n umber of your group home s are, for instance.

Now do we have a void in coordinating the services between the three regions , in other words , can West Central access the group homes which are located in the South Region , and can North Region access those grou p homes if their facilities aren't able to accommodate the needs of their patient load ? HON. L. DESJARDINS : Yes, they meet regularl y with the Executive Direct or, Mr. Robs on. For instance, you would have the - we were talking abo ut mental healt h - the supervisor of mental health , and so on, in the three regions meeting reg ularl y.

You will have also the regiona l coordinator , you see regional con tin uing care coordinators meeting regularly on that and they would have access to all the information in the whole city and the main respo nsib ility of the executive dir ecto r will be to coordinate the region there and make sure that the services are provid ed to all. MR. D. ORCHARD: Okay. So, Mr. Chairman, then to put it in layman 's terms , we don't have a jurisdiction al, if you will , dispute between the regions where you 're having one region overserviced in certain types of facilities .

You have a sharing of those facilities for all reg ions then, in other words? HON. L. DESJARDINS: I'm not sure that I understand . We're not suggesting that they have exactly the same number of spaces or group homes . You're talking about reasonable and fair, adequate services. Yes, we have this assurance and that's the responsibil ity of the executive director , to make sure that's the case and meeting as I say regularly, depending on what the concern is, but with the three people.

For instance , I gave you the example of the regional continuing care coordinator or the mental health supervisor , Community Services supervisor of public health and so on . They would discuss those things and work it out. MR. D. ORCHARD: Okay. I notice that the regional director of Winnipeg West Central has, under his jurisdiction, a supervisor of mental health, who has responsibility unique to West Central of supervisor for independe nt group living and day programs. HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, that's city-wide .

That might be wha t you're talking about, about the floating, that they have different responsibilities . They 're assigned to one region, but this is with the city-wide. He's the supervisor for that program , city-wide . There are a number of examples like that . MR. D. ORCHARD: Okay. The question in this case is: Why was the West Central Region chosen to locate this particular supervisor. Is there an expertise there in the supervisor of mental health or the regional director , Richard Voss, that lends his expertise , his background, his previous 1174

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 experience to coordina te that particular program for the city? HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, it's because that region had the greatest numb er of those individuals of that concern. They had the greatest num ber. It was left to the supervisor in that area. But that's discussed, as I say, with the three different regions. MR. D. ORCHARD: West Central Region of the city has more individuals, more people in independent group living and the day programs in terms of the mental health program? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Right. MR. D. ORCHARD: Well, that's new-fou nd knowledge.

I would have thought that Winnipeg South would have been the one with the most numb er of clients there, ok ay. Mr. Chairman, when we discus sed this last year - and we'll have to finish discussion on it probably Thur sday - one of the things that I asked the Minister last year was to how he expected the three regions to function. The example again I used was, of course, the Children's Aid Society, where the region was broken up. Six new ones were created. We had a duplication of staffing throughout the six new regions.

The figure that was available last year was 40 additional staff to accomplish the delivery of service under CAS. Mr. Chairman, I asked the Minister if we'd have the same expansion of personnel, and I was assured last year that wouldn't be the case. In fact, we would have the services under taken under basically the same staff complement but, yet, when we go through the regional services for Winnipeg, we've got an increase of 36 SY's, year over year. Now, can the Minister explain how you need 36 SY's if you streamlined the delivery of services here?

Are we not creating a duplication by having three regions versus one? HON. L. DESJARDINS: No, the change that we did did not create any new positions at all. In fact, it probably saved some positions, and there are no extra supervisors that we had. There is some staff, definitely. I hope as we go along that we want to give more service in the regions that we'll have the same staff that my honourable friend was talking about in the rural area also, to create that kind of staff in different areas.

As we work more with the public and more in public health and so on, and in mental health and so on, we probably will need more staff, but that has nothing to do with the reorganization at all. MR. D. ORCHARD: We ll, Mr. Chairman, I'm going to have to digest these flow charts between now and Thursday when we next resume the study of Estimates. But you're saying tha t now, under this new organizational system with 36 more SY's, those have nothing to do with the adminis tration? HON. L.

DESJARDINS: With the change, there are no extra supervisors or those kinds of positions that have anything to do with the reorganization. I'm saying that they're community workers in mental health, and it might be public health and so on, and more in the region as we want to increase the services, as we were advised to do today, at least in the mental health field. And I would think and I would hope that we will get more staff. We certainly will need more to do the things we've been asked to do in the in the mental health field. MR. D. ORCHARD: So just let me get clear in my mind what the Minister is saying.

Under the single Winnip eg Region, you had an executive director and you had six area directors, and presu mably . . . HON. L. DESJARDINS: One regional, We rbeniuk was a regional director. MR. D. ORCHARD: So that was for the whole province? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Remember, there was another one also with Community Services. Between the two of them, they had the whole province in the service of both departments. MR. D. ORCHARD: Now with the three regions - and I don't know how to frame this question so that it's clearly un derstood what I'm after.

You have a number of management and supervisory positions, as opposed to the payroll for home care providers, the payroll for mental health workers. In other words, you've got foot soldiers delivering the programs in mental health, in home care, etc. etc. All the programs that we went through under the Regional Services are being delivered here. You've got, as I call them, the foot soldiers who actually work with the client - that would be a home care recipient or mental health patient - and we've got supervisory staff.

Now you 're saying that there is, under the reorganization in the three regions, no increase in the numb er of supervisory staff positions? HON. L. DESJARDINS: That's the information that I have. There's no incr ease to the reorganization. The increase is what you call the foot soldiers, the people delivering the service and the larger increases have been mostly for home care. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr . Chairman, then prior to reorganization, you had your six area directors.

Those individuals, although some of them may have applied for the regional director positions and none were, as I under stand it, successful, are those individuals all working still within the Winnip eg region or in one of the regions? HON. L. DESJARDINS: The area directors are still all working there, except one who is the Director of the Manitoba Adolescent Treatment Centre. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr. Chairman, I note when we go into the Regional Services that there was an over expenditure on Salaries of $336,000 and an overexpenditure in terms of Other Expenditures of $386,000.00.

Now the $386,000 and over in Other Expenditures, the increase in Other Expenditur es is about - and I didn't take a percentage through on that, but you had $3 million. It's about an 11 percent, 12 1175

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 percent increase in Other Expenditur es in Regional Services for the whole province. No w we dis cu ssed this br iefly the other da y. Presumab ly, that Other Expenditure applies to all of the reg ions throughout the provi nce, not simp ly Winnipeg region. And what I'd like to do is: Can the Minister provide a breakout on what the Winn ipeg Region Other Expenditur es, what their overexpenditur e in that category was? HON. L. DESJARDINS: Okay, we'll try to get that for Thursda y. MR. D. ORCHARD: Mr. Chairman, I'll just check my notes, because I may have some qu es tions. Mr.

Chairman, I think we can probably continue this deba te. HON. L. DESJARDINS: Okay, and we'll try to get that information for the 1st. We probably won't meet in Estimates tomorrow and on the next da y. MR. CHAIRMAN: The hour now being ten o'clock, committee rise. SUPPLY - AGRICULTURE MR. CHAIRMAN, C. Santos: Committee, please come to order. We've been considering item No. 3, Mani toba Agricultural Credit Corporation. The Member for Roblin-Russell. MR. L. DERKACH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My question is to the Minister with regard to farmers who have lost their land or are in the process of losing their land or it being taken away by MACC. They may in fact apply for quitclaim and perhaps wish to lease the land back from MACC. In my area I know that is not happening. The land has been put out on tend er, and even after the previous owner applied to have the land leaseback again at a higher rate than was tendered, he was refused.

I'd like to know from the Min ister whether this is a policy of MACC or whether a farmer who in fact does get into financial trouble and cannot hold on to his farm will be given an opportunity to tease the farm back from MACC. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Ho nour able Mi nis ter of land and he may be even somewhat lower than maybe the highest bid, the corporation would consider, by going through the board process, looking at a previous owner and giving a previous owner and client, basically, the benefit of the doubt and some consideration for his being a former client in making a final decision on a possible land lease.

But not knowing the circumstances, the honourable member may want to provide it in writing and have us have a look at it. I guess I have to raise the question, is the circumstance that he is speaking of, is it currently in process or has the situation for him, as far as he's aware, been foreclosed already by a tease being issued to someone else? I don't know the circumstances, so I'm going to be raising many qu estions of the honourable member. MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Chairman, a few scenarios.

First of all, a young farmer who could not afford to make the payments anymore on MACC land who said to the MACC office, all right, you take my land and I'll lease it back from you because I still have access to equipment to work land with. I'd like to lease it back from you and I'll pay you $20 an acre. He was told that, no, if that in fact happened, he would have to pay somewhere in the neighbourhood of $30 per acre tease on the land. He couldn't afford that. Subs equently what happened to the land is, it was tendered for lease and was teased out at $12 an acre to another party altogether.

Now my question is, and my concern is, is there a policy with MACC whereby a previous owner has to pay a premium in order to lease land back from MACC, or is he given first preference? If he's got equipment available, is he given first preference to be able to lease that land back and continue farming, and that way he's not being chased off the farm? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, could the member indicate whether there was a farm site and buildings involved in that price? MR. L. DERKACH: There was? HON. B. URUSKI: There was a house and buildings on the farm site? MR. L. DERKACH: Yes, there was. Agriculture. HON.

B. URUSKI: Was that price that he just mentioned per acre, did that include all the buildings? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I guess, depending in terms of when those kinds of discussions on quitctaim took place, and I say that because our move into the leaseback has occurred generally and is being refined over the past year. Previous to that, we were basically moving land tha t we receiv ed, primarily through quitclaim on to short-term lease based on tend er.

I would say this, not knowing the circum stances the honourable member speaks of, and he may want to provide the circumstances to us to have another look, but in the event - I'm making the assumption that the applicant had his transaction a numb er of months ago when we were just working into the lease process - if he is a serious contender in the bid process for the 1176 MR. L. DERKACH: Well, it must have, because the land was leased. Mr. Chairman, if I might give some clarification on the matter. Yes, there was a farm site; it still is there.

The land was not leased to the previous owner, he had to move off the farm. The house and the farm buildings are standing vacant now and the farm was teased to another farmer for $12 per acre. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I think the honourable member should in fact provide me with the details because I'm only hearing one side of the story. There certainly is no policy within the corporation that will treat a former applicant differently than anyone else.

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 In fact, the reverse is the situation, that a former applicant, given reasonable farming practices and given a reasonable relationship with the corporation, in some of the dealings that we've had, we've in fact bent over; if anything, the benefit of the doubt goes to the former client in terms of future land leases. What the member is ind icating to me is the reverse of actually what had happened.

Perhaps the honourable member would want to give me a note and we'll have staff look at the situation and before we finish MACC, or within the next day or so, without revealing any of the names involved, give the background of the situation for my honourable friend. · MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Chairman, this didn't happen in only one isolated situation; it's happened in a couple. Let me ask another qu estion of the Minister. HON. B. URUSKI: Are you going to provide the details? MR. L. DERKACH: Oh, I can provide the details, that's no problem.

The second question to the Minister is, is there a policy whereby a relative, a father or a brother of the person who has gone und er, so to speak, where the father or brother does not get first crack at leasing the land, and has to go through the tender process, even though he offers the going rate for the land? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, family relations would not have a preference. The former landholder would have the preference. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Ste. Rose. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a question for the Min ister regard ing his policy on leaseback, as well.

It seems to me that he didn't delineate to the Member for Roblin-Russell very clearly what MACC's policy is. He said that they will go out of their way to lease back, but is there, in fact, a working policy for the people in the department? If so, I would like to hear what it is. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, we provided that information last year, but we will provide it again this year, the policy on leasebacks. Maybe I better ask my honourable friend, is he speaking about a leaseback directly to a client? Is that what he's . . . Because there is a difference. MR. G. CUMMINGS: That's correct. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, the policy, in terms of leaseback to a client, is that it would be a quitclaim leaseback. We will negotiate a five-year lease with an option to purchase on the following criteria: There is viability to that farming operation, based on the new terms; there are adequate resources to carry on the farming operation, even after our quitclaim; the general management ability of that farmer is in place; and lastly that no assets that were, in fact, under mortgage to the corporation have been converted for other reasons.

Those would be the four major criteria tha t the corporation use to determine a leaseback of an existing client on a quitclaim. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Roblin­ Russell. MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Chairman, to the Minister. That is exactly my question and my concern. When that parcel of land goes up for tender, are the same criteria applied? Because I can't see how you can apply those same criteria when you tender a piece of land. So, therefore, you'd ask the farmer who, or the client, whether there is viability to farm.

For example, how do you know that the person who is tendering for the land, that may get the tender because they're the lowest one, has any better ability to farm that land than the person who has undergone the quitclaim? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Cha irman, the honourable member will remember a year ago it would have been the policy of saying: "Look, we don't have a long-term lease, you can take your chances on the rental; we've got a quitclaim and we will look at you if you're very close to the bid, based on our experience with you, and still consider you for a lease if the tenders or the bids are fairly close. . . . until about June or July of 1986, until we firmed up, the longer-term leaseback provisions. Mr.

Chairman, the honourable member will remember a year ago during the Estimates process, maybe even yourself, as one ind ividual member raised this matter and in fact raised a concern why we were not taking the highest tender in the process of advertising the land that we had, in fact, taken in our possess ion. Now let's un derstand that once the land is quitclaimed, and there is no leaseback provision outright in the process of negotiation, that land automatically gets tendered.

We have used the basis of highest bid primarily because of some of the concerns that were raised last year of the allegations of favouritism, that favouring one over another. So we have in fact, on the basis of the discussions and the debate we had last year, we in fact moved to the issue of highest bid, where in fact a former client is not a lessee, negotiated right up front. Once that has been moved off the table then it's highest bidd er. Even then there is still consideration that can be given to a client if in fact the bids are so close that that issue would go to the board.

The Minister would not be involved in this, but this would be a management and board decision, in terms of arriving at it. I'm not aware whether any of those kinds of decisions, in fact, have been taken where the bids were so close that in fact they may have allowed a former lessee to take the land. There's about two a year, I'm advised by the general manager, that are so close that are looked at by the board. MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Chairman, I don't have any problem with accepting the highest bid when you have tendered the land for anybody else except the client.

But last year, if the Minister recalls, I brought a matter, a specific case to the floor here, where the individual who was living on the land, who could no longer afford the payments on the land, have asked the corporation 1177

/ Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 if they would leaseback the land to him. He would pay one-third of his crop towards the lease , and he would give up title to the land. He was told that they would not lease it back to him , and that he would have to move off and the land would be tendered for lease . Now after the estimate process here last year, Mr. Minister, in fact you intervened in that process or you had your staff intervene, and the land was leased back to the client in the end. My concern is that it seems like within MAGG there are two sets of rules.

One set of rules for the client, which is harsher than the set of rules when the land goes for tender. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, my honourable friend should recall that during the debate of my Estimates last year, we were exactly in the process of determining a longer term lease policy . The longer term lease policy for corporation clients and quitclaim clients of the corporation was not finalized till probably June or July of 1986 . I'm going from memory but we could check that. So we were in that transition period . I'm sure , Mr.

Cha irman, that matters prior to that and negotiations , say from January till June of '86 that would have been the policy of saying : Look we don't have a long-term lease, you can take your chances on the rental; we've got a quitclaim and we will look at you if you're very close to the bid , based on our experience with you, and still consider you for a lease if the tenders or the bids are fairly close . That was the policy until about June or July of 1986 , until we firmed up the longer term leaseback provisions . MR. G.

CUMMINGS: To the Minister regarding purchases of land from MAGG, after the land has fallen into arrears, and where a client would be prepared to purchase part of the land back, in order to start over again in some fashion, but to have cleared his debts off with the corporation , by allowing the majority of the land to go back . What is the policy regarding the evaluation of this property? How does the corporation decide at that point how it will establish the price for the sale of the land that the client may wish to keep? HON . B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, the corporation appraises the land at the time of the request , based on comparable sales of what's happening in the area , to try and determine what the market price of the day will be. That's basically market price on the date of appraisal. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Mr. Chairman , the Minister made a statement earlier today , I believe, whereby the corporation is prepared to accept some losses as long as the other creditors are also accepting losses of an equal proportion ; FCC, I presume , and the banks being the other -(lnterjection)- Okay, just let me finish the question, Mr. Minister.

Is it the policy of MAGG to accept write-off losses provided there have been some losses written off by the other creditors to the MAGG client? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman , it woul d depend on the situation. It would depend on the security of the corporation at the time , depending on its posi tion and depending on the circumstances of each case. Just to indicate to my honourable friend , I did not talk about losses in my earlier comments.

I talked about deferment of payments on the guaranteed operating line of credit where we said that we would continue with a client if other payments that had to be made would also be deferred generally in proportion to each lending institution's exposure in that case. That's what we were talking about earlier . But in the case that he mentions , one would have to look at every case on its merits dealing with the financial posi tion of financial security of the corporation in that instance. MR. G.

CUMMINGS: Does MAGG write off portions of its debt in order to allow farmers to start over again , perhaps, on a lesser scale? If it's a farm that has to be downsized in order to be profitable, does MAGG at any time write off a portion of the debt in order to let that farmer start over again? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, there is no doubt that the corporation does that in quitclaim instance s. There will be instances where the corporation will in fact write off debt. For example , you may have a

section farmer, and in the process of negotiation in terms of continuing that farm, we'd negotiate the home quarter , the buildings to the farm , and take the three-quarters in terms of the quitclaim. Then what we'd end up doing is we'd appraise the three-quarters at current market value . The difference between market value and what the mortgage was in the write-off would be a loss. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Did he just state that that is the corporation's policy or is this handled on a case-by­ case situation? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman , each case would be handled on its own merits and negotiated , but generally speaking, depending on the terms. And I guess we do have some concern in terms of - and I may as well put it on the record - on the leasebacks. We have had people, and I've said this earlier, do their number crunching and say hey, maybe it's to my advantage now to go into arrears and have you repossess my land , and then I'll go on to leaseback because financially it's much more financially attractive to me to do that.

So we say that every case is treated on its own mer its , depending on the financ ial circumstances and the exposure of the corporation at the time . There may be instances where we will be very, very hard in terms of our position, where we are well secu red and we're being attempted to be levered to pay off other people and we're caught. So, no doubt the corporation will say hold it. You want to be very hard in this instance; we're not giving an inch.

We're well protected , and so if there is a quid pro quo somewhere else then there may be considerations , but there have been occasions where the corporation , I would venture to say, depending on the negotiations ' circumstances, probably has taken some pretty tough positions . 1178 MR. G. CUMMINGS: Well, Mr. Chairman, I think the Minister now understands why some of the

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 sanctimonious positions that he has taken regarding the other lending institutions in this province are now a little hard to defend when the corporation that he represents in this House takes

part in some of the same activities. What is the corporation's policy regarding legal council for their clients when the y'r e me t with a foreclosure action by the MACC? Are they advised to have legal counsel with them when they meet with MACC representatives? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, on a qu itclaim situation, the advice of the corporation to a client is to have legal advice. I should tell my honourable friend that I have never attempted to defend the corporation, MACC, any dif ferently and to be treated any differently that we have treated other lending institutions. Mr.

Chairman, we've used the corporation to lead the way and try to show some of the leadership that is necessary in terms of attempting to embarrass some of their own colleagues, some of them. They don't like that, Mr. Chairman, but quite frankly, we have used the corporation, but I want to say very clearly, Mr. Chairman, that the corporation in terms of its dealing with farmers and in terms of whether it be peer advisory panels, the review panels, the mediation boards, we have not said that the corporation should have any prefer ential treatment to those bodies that we would not allow for any other institution.

So, Mr. Chairman, there is no inconsistency on my part. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Briefly, my qu estion again, Mr. Chairman, is does the corporation's representativ es advise the client to have legal counsel when they're faced with foreclosure from MACC? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, the honour able member should be aware that the federal legislation provides that there be a minimum of 15 days' notice.

Even if the farmer fails to act under the terms of the federal legislation, the corporation is bound to go thr ough provincial legislation, whic h req uir es automatically a mediation process, the review, and of course justification to the courts if there is no settlement reached and no agreement between the panel, the mediation board and the corporat ion. That being the case, the courts are involved and legal advice - certainly if the farmer requires it and wishes to have legal advice.

As I said earlier, on the qui tclaim cases, where they are voluntarily negotiated cases, the corporation ind icates to the farmer that he should have legal advice before finalizing his dealings with the corporation on qu itclaims. In terms of foreclosures, federal and provincial legislation makes it man datory that the corporation go through the review process. MR. G. CUMMINGS: The Min ister, of course. is talking about situations since Februar y.

My question would be then: Is it the policy of the corporation - when the Minis ter referred to earlier about the relationship between the client and the corporation has some bearing on whether or not a lease might be negotiated, and the Minister outlined one or two areas where it would be annoying to the corporation if the client were to be manoeuvring his payments in such a way that he would hopefully be able to rent rather than continue to purchase.

But what is the corporation's position regard ing situations where the farmer or the client has actually accepted legal advice which tells him that he is in fact better off to declare bankruptcy, rather than to continue to try and straighten up his affairs? What is the corporati on's direction to the employees under those circums tances? How are they to treat that farmer when it comes to terms of leaseback or buy back of portions of the property? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, I'm advised that, if the individual has not been cleared under federal bankr uptcy provisions in terms of the bankrup tcy application, then the corporation would not consider that individual for leaseback until a clearance was received under federal legislation. If the process has been completed, then an application to the corporation for leaseback could be made and the corporation would, in fact, entertain it on the merits of that application. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Mr. Chairman, I guess that is the area around which my concern centres.

I would like to point out to the Minister that it has come to my attention where a client of MACC, when he declared bankrup tcy and got legal counsel to represent him in his dealings with MACC, found himself very much at odds with the corporation and the representatives of the corporation. It's been the avowed statement of this government on many occasions that the farmers need an advocate, they need protection.

Why do they need protection from their own agen cy, and be thrown into a position where the agency accuses them of crooked operations by simply taking the legal advice that allows them to declare bankrup tcy? This same client is now suffering particular problems in attempting to downsize his farm and stay in business, because he is strictly at odds with the corporation. To the best of my knowledge, the client has not done anyth ing illeg al. They simply accepted the best legal advice that was available to them.

I wonder if the Minister would advise us if it is the policy of the corporation to be more difficult to deal with when the farmer employs legal counsel? I would hope the answer is not yes. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, one has to look at the advice that one is receiving, even if it be from legal counsel. If the stance taken by legal counsel on behalf of his client becomes an active adversarial role, obviously there's going to be some fairly tough stance and positions taken during that negotiating process.

We were just briefly discussing while my honourable friend was rising that there may be instances, for example, where an individual ma:r have a mortgage with the corporation, and still declare bankru ptcy. The trus tee may, in fact, allow that mortgage to remain in place, and the corporation would in fact continue to have that mortgage paid, even though that individual has declared bank ruptcy. There are those kinds of scenarios that can occur, but it would have to have the approval of the tru stee. So it's not a black-and-white situation. Obviously the member has heard one side of the story, and he's 1179

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 certainly capable of putting it forw ard. But I certainly don't accept that the corporation goes out with a sledgehammer and beats people about the head who take lawyers. I mean, I'm not a particular fan of lawyers. I think a lot of MLA's, if they're doing their homework, do a much better job than some of those lawyers who want to charge $50 to $60 an hour. They can basically read the same documents, and I think my honourable friend could probably give as good advice as some of the lawyers in his community possibly or anywhere around. But it really depends on what the intent (

a) of the farmer is in the negotiations and his advice from his lawyer as to how he should act in the dealings with the corpora tion. So, Mr. Chairman, it certainly isn't a clear black-and-white situation that the honourable member tries to point out. MR. G. CUMMINGS: Mr.

Chairman, I guess that leads me to one last comment, which is partly a comment and partly a question. � MACC, being a Crown corporation and being in a , situation of dealing with public funds, has a certain position in the community in dealing with its clients and dealing with the public that is perhaps somewhat different from other lending institutions, inasmuch as the criteria that are set down for loans should be the main reason for the acceptance or the refusal of the loan,

whereas a private institution, if the banker and the farmer do not get along, then Mr. Minister or myself have no basis upon which we can interfere.

But when MACC and an employee of MACC would take a particularly abus ive approach to a client, no matter how far that client may have been wrong in the eyes of the corporation, then I think the Minister has to agree with me, but I would hope that he would expect the corporation to take a position that is not allowing the corporation to be dragged down into name-calling and putting people in a position where they are literally forced to accept legal counsel in order to save thems elves from what the y felt was a very unc omfortable and high-pressured situation.

I hope the Min ister - he doesn't have to respond , but I hope that he will take that under consideration. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I want to state very clearly that I would not condone any employee getting into the kind of situation that the honourable member alludes to. I want to tell him as we ll that I have had correspondence from one individual. I believe, if he's not from his area, very close to his area, in dealings. I have written back to that individual saying, if you have specifics - don't give me generalities - give me specifics, and we will deal with it. But, Mr.

Chairman, until there are specifics in a situation, I expect that the corporation staff don't have to take abuse, and neither should they give it out. They should be polite enough to say, look, I don't have to take this in my employment as a public servant, and call me when you are in a better frame of mind - boom. That's what I would do. A MEMBER: But if they're not being given abuse . HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I want to ind icate that, if there are specifics, I tell my honourable friend, get them down in writing. Don't give me generalities, give me specifics. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Virden. MR. G.

FINDLAY: Now that we're into that area, I've got a couple of issues I'd like to bring up. One is to ask the Minister what was the disposition of the situation last year where MACC was in the process during Estimates of losing a qua rter

section to the tax sale in Archie R.M., and ask him what eventually happened with that quarter and how much liability the corporation ended up with there. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, the corporation, in terms of that one parcel of land, did in fact end up losing that quarter section. The land was tendered for tax sale. In the subsequent year, the corporation bid for the land was, in fact, I guess the highest bidder and the mu nicipality - I gather there were other bidders in the first year. They did not accept any tenders, sent everybody their money back and then sat on it for a year and then re-tendered it.

The municipality, this year, sold the land to the highest bidde r, which was not the corporati on. The corporation, in the process in terms of the mortgage outsta nding, would have lost $16, 000 approxima tely. MR. G. FINDLAY: That's the money lost with the mortgage. How much money was lost in terms of costs associated with the corporation's involvement after it was lost to tax sale? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, let it be very clear that I guess staff learned a lesson in terms of the advice that they received, because there were two lenders involved in the mortgage.

It was as a result of a mixed communication - and the two lenders happened to have been FCC and MACC. In terms of the discharge papers, the assumption given or taken by our staff was not the right assumption, based on the information that was given to them. Quite frankly, they ought not to have, basically, taken the word over a telephone of an employee in terms of how that transaction was carried on. It was clearly an error of the corporation accepting the verbal comments of another employee about the transfer of title. There were two parcels of land.

Title was transferred in one parcel and it was not transferred in another parcel, and the corporation assumed by tha t telephone conversation that both lenders were being treated similarly, and they were not. Unfortunately I have to say, we've made sure that our procedures are changed, and that does not occu r again, but it is clearly an expensive lesson on trust. MR. G.

FIND LAY: One further comment on tha t situation, when we were talking about it last year, I raised the situation that there was some abusive attitude on the part of the corporation in dealing with the council, and you had said at that time that a letter of apology would be written to the council. I would ask you: Was that letter written to the council apologizing for the behaviour of that individual? 1180

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, following our deb ate in that whole area, I asked staff to contact the council and discuss this. The secretary-treasur er, a councillor and I believe the reeve of that council were contacted and I'm advised by staff that there certainly was no allegation of abusive treatment by our staff. So we did make contact with, I'm advised, three individuals, an employee plus the two elected council members, to discuss this very situation. Mr. Chairman, I don't recall my undertaking but, if I made that undertaking, that would have been carried out. MR. G.

FINDLAY: It just so happens that, in that same R.M., a young fellow phoned me about a month ago. He admitted that he was behind in his MACC payments some two to three years, and had been working with the agent to try and come to some agreement. He wanted to stay on the land, and the agent's recommendation to him was to quitclaim and get a leaseback, but you should get a lawyer to make a proposal to MACC. He did that. He had a lawyer write a letter to MACC, making a proposal for him to stay on the land in some form. Going back to what the Member for Ste.

Rose said when you talk about involvement of lawyers, the communic ation back to the ind ividual was that they didn't care to deal with a lawyer. Because a lawyer has written a letter for you, we reject your proposal but, had you written the letter yourself, we'd be prepared to negotiate with you. That's the question: Why? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I can't explain the logic of that. Is there some commu nication written from staff tha t has in fact occurred? I mean, I don't understand why. Whether it's an individual or someone repres enting him writing the letter, what's the difference?

I don't see any difference. MR. G. FINDLAY: I don't either, Mr. Minister, and if that is going on, I would advise that it be corrected because people who get into this situation are pretty uptight, they're pretty scared. They go to a lawyer and he gives them a path to follow, and they believe that's the best path. They don't sit down and think it any further than that, and then they commun icate on their behalf with the corporation. I think the corporation should handle some of these people with kid gloves almost, because you can appreciate the condition that they're under , especially the young people.

They're work ing off the farm, trying to hold the farm together and meet their commitments, and they're in a desperate situation. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I am not one to defend anyone for abusive action . In fact, I would say that, in terms of dealings and my meetings with staff because I meet with staff right through the whole department on as regular basis as I can, at least several times a year. My whole role is that we are there to serve the public. Now that doesn't mean that we should not stand for what we believe in in principle and stand behind our policies and deal with them in a forthright manner.

I have some difficulty and, in fact, I appreciate the honourable member's comments about dealing with 1181 people with kid gloves. We could take the approach that we would accept and entertain options of proposals from individuals and we do if they don't wish to take legal advice.

But, as the honourable member well knows, you get yourself, and could get yourself, into a very dicey situation where you end up either being accused of coercion, the possibility of coercing somebody into agreeing about something that they may not wish to agree, may have taken different advice, or you could in fact be put in a position of being accused of playing favourites over someone else by dealing directly and not entertaining other proposals. So, depending on the circumstances, on the quitclaim leaseback, we've attempted to make sure that farmers look at (

a) their rights and their legal options in terms of what may be the best situation to suit their financial and their longer term needs in those circumstanc es. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Honourable Member for Roblin­ Russell. MR. L. DERKACH: With respect to a first-time client coming in for an MACC loan, when the projections and the num ber crunching is all done, is there a percentage of surplus funds that client must have - or potential client must have - over and above all his commitments in order for MACC to look at him or her favourably? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, I'm advised, in doing the calculations that the corporation would take into account and look at about 20 percent excess over his servicing capabilities as a requirement. In other words, if after all expenses, operating and living, let's say there would be a $10,000 residue, provided that his mortgage payments would not exceed $8,0 00 alone, would generally go. MR. L. DERKACH: You're talking about debt servicing costs and living allowances all lumped together.

So, in other words, as long as that person can meet his mortgage payment, his operating expenses and living expenses, there isn't any need for surplus funds over and above that. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I didn't say that. I said that operating expenses, ex cluding his debt servicing charges - operating and living expenses all paid for - the residue that is left should be 20 percent in excess of his debt servicing charges. MR. L. DERKACH: Okay, my question is: Is that a policy that is applied to each and every case when potential clients come in for a loan approval? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, on a first-time new loan, that is the procedure. There could be consideration as well given to the strength of the guarantor if there is one in the situation. In other words, I'm assuming that family members who are going to be guarantors, that guarantors strength would be considered in the total package, but given no gwarantor, that is the normal procedure. MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Minister, can you tell me what the essential difference is between the criteria that are

Tuesday, 21 April, 1987 set do wn by MACC and the criteria that is set down by the big horrible banks in dealing with the first-time potential client who comes in for a loan? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, let me ask the honourable member, if there is no difficulty of obtaining that loan from those big bad banks that he talks about, then why didn't the individual go there? MR. L. DERKACH: What is the Minister saying when he is asking that question? I'd like to have the Minister explain what he is trying to imply by his question. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr.

Chairman, I have never accused the banks of having their criteria for applications being somewhat different than ours, but let me just point out to my honourable friend that I would venture to say the criteria the banks use in terms of extending long­ term credit, they would never touch the clients that we are touching. MR. L. DERKACH: Mr. Chairman, just one last final point in question -(Interjection)- well, I have to accept your response, Mr. Minister, regardless of whether I agree with it or not. The response to the question is there and it's on record I suppose. But my next question to you then is, Mr.

Min ister, if the criteria are the same, they were not always the same because MACC used to be the lender of last resort or the lender that a young farmer would go to when he couldn't get monies from the banks or the credit unions who had more stringent guidelines or criteria set down for obtaining a loan. Now, obviously in the last year or so, MACC have changed. The policy has changed; the criteria have changed for lending money, for allowing loans.

They have come to use a different set of guid elines and therefore they have associated themselves more closely to the guidelines or the criteria tha t are set do wn by banks. I'm wondering, in this kind of economy, is that where MACC should be going in terms of assisting young farmers who are trying to get into the farming business? HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I don't think there is anything that I could say here tonight that would convince my honourable friends opposite any differently than they want to believe. Mr.

Chairman, quite frank ly, if we could meet - I mean we had this whole debate about the long line ups and the corporation not being able to respond. If our criteria, which hasn't changed, would have been so difficult, why would these hundreds of farmers have been beating down the doors, attempting to get loans from the corporation and from MACC? We haven't been able to meet all those takers. Seventy-five percent of our clients a year ago were FCC clients. Mr. Chairman, my honourable friend, the whole debate this afternoon, or part of the afternoon, centred on our inability to deal with all those applications. Mr.

Chairman, if our criteria was so difficult and we were so tough, why would we have these hundr eds and hundr eds of people beating down our doors coming to borrow money from us? Why would we have tripled our budge t within three years after coming into office to deal with that uptake and upsurge of clientele? Why 1182 would we have expanded the programming when we did if we are so bad in the eyes of my honourable friends opposite? But, Mr.

Chairman, they want to come here and argue individual cases, that we may have not treated them very well, and then tried to make that connection that somehow we are worse than the banks, but yet they want to make sure that we deal with the hundr eds of applications that we've got in a speadily manner. Mr. Chairman, I can't respond to my honourable friends and I don't know whether they know what they're talking about. MR. L.

DERKACH: It's unfortunate that the Minister goes off on sort of a loose tangent here because I wasn't accusing the MACC of being any big horrible corporation, I was simply asking for some criteria and how the criteria were different. The Minister said that they're getting hundreds of clients beating down their doors asking for loans. Of course, that's happening, and you ask the banks and the credit unions and they've got hundreds of clients lined up asking for money as well.

So let the Minister not feel that his almighty corporation is the only single financial institution that is having its doors pounded down by farmers. MR. CHAIRMAN: No. 3. The Minister of Agriculture. HON. B. URUSKI: Mr. Chairman, I want to tell my honourable friend - and let's just put it on the record - I want to tell him of one of the greatest inducements for the farmers to come. Here are two news releases: one on April the 7th from the Farm Credit Corporation; one from Ma nitoba MACC staff, April the 6th of this year '87.

It starts with "FCC five-year fixed interest term mortgages is now 10 percent; five-year fixed mortgages, MACC, 9 perc ent." Mr. Chairman, shared risk mortgage program dropped one and one to 9.5 percent. Ten-year fixed terms, Mr. Chairman, FCC, 10.75 percent; 10-year fixed mortgages, MACC, 9.25 percent. That's a 1.5 percent difference. Mr. Chairman, 15 loans with fixed terms of 15 or more years remained uncha nged