March 11,

HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS

Vol. XLI No. 5

The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Lush): Order, please!

Oral Questions

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SIMMS: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct my

question to the Premier. A couple of days ago the Minister of Employment and

Labour Relations said publicly that government was no longer planning to cut

wages or benefits for public employees, or indeed ask them to take leave without

pay. He said somehow, suddenly, that government had found another way. Can I ask

the Premier if that other way was presented to the unions yesterday and did that

other way involve the government not contributing to the public service pension

funds for a period of six months while at the same time employees would be

expected to contribute during that same six months? Was that part of the

proposal?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, I am confident that the

Minister of Employment and Labour Relations said no such thing as the government

is no longer asking the public sector to take a reduction in wages because we

never were in the first place, so no longer wouldn't be accurate. He would have

clearly said, government never have asked them to take a reduction in their wage

rates or their salaries. I have been a lawyer too long to be misled by those

tricky little words.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to answer the

questions but I am not prepared to tear my throat up shouting against the

ceaseless babbling that comes from the other side. I am quite prepared to answer

them but not in the face of this continual babbling.

Mr. Speaker, the government is in the process of conducting

negotiations with the public sector unions and yesterday morning I know that the

President of Treasury Board met with the leaders of all the unions and had a

discussion with them about a particular matter. Until the matter is released by

agreement or the President of Treasury Board is prepared to make a statement on

it I do not think it is appropriate for me to attempt to conduct collective

bargaining with the Leader of the Opposition in the House.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SIMMS: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

It is rather surprising and ironic that the Premier would

accuse me of using tricky little words, it is kind of interesting. Let me ask

the Premier this: did part of the proposal that was presented to the unions

yesterday also include the part that employees would be required to work and

contribute to the pension plan for an extra six months beyond their retirement,

in order to make up for the shortfall in governments contribution to the pension

fund? Is that also part of the governments new found solution?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, my answer to that question is

precisely the same as the answer I just gave to the first question, it is all

part of the same issue and I think I should leave it to the president of

Treasury Board or the president of Treasury Board together with the leadership

of the unions with which he is negotiating to make any public statement on the

issue.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition,

supplementary.

MR. SIMMS: Mr. Speaker, could I ask the Premier this

question then: assuming that the government has looked at these kinds of issues,

and I am sure they have because it has been mentioned publicly, I think, by one

of the unions in weeks gone by, can the Premier indicate to the House if such a

proposal or such a manoeuvre was implemented, how much would that save the

government? I am sure that the government would have done it's homework on that

particular issue. Would it be somewhere in the range of $50 - $75 million if

such an idea was proposed?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: If, if, if, if a whole lot of things might

produce a lot of different results depending on the circumstances. Is it one

month, two months, six months, twelve months and there are a whole host of

possible answers and if you want to break it down by days, there are 365

potential answers. So it is not realistic to ask that kind of a question and

expect an answer in these circumstances. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition

would recognize the seriousness of the present financial situation and the

importance of finding an acceptable resolution of a difficult problem, and I

would ask them not to exacerbate an already difficult situation by these kinds

of questions. I have answered the question I think in a fair way. These are

collective bargaining endeavors that are under way at the moment, let the

president of Treasury Board and the leadership of the unions deal with the issue

appropriately.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SIMMS: I appreciate the lecture from the Premier but

of course he would know that I have a responsibility to ask questions dealing

with issues that have come to our attention, this is one that has, we are asking

the government if it is an accurate story or not. The reason we are asking, Mr.

Speaker, is because the Premier himself for example has said publicly that the

government would never roll back wage rates because of the impact it might have

on employee pensions down the road, he has said that publicly. The Minister of

Finance, pooh-poohed this very idea just a couple of weeks ago when it was

proposed by one of the unions, I think. He did that and dismissed that issue and

that idea publicly for the same kind of a reason, now it appears that they are

doing a flip-flop and that is the reason I am asking the question. So I want to

ask the Premier, once again, why is it, and it is factual and it is accurate,

why is it that the government now is prepared to tamper with pension funds at

this moment in time? That is what I am asking him.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

Order, please!

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, to the best of my knowledge

it was never proposed publicly or privately, on the basis of the assurance of

the President of Treasury Board, it was never proposed to him publicly or

privately and he never commented on it, pooh-poohed it, endorsed it or

otherwise, I accept his word, so the comments of the Leader of the Opposition

are therefore without substance.

Mr. Speaker, the President of Treasury Board is, on behalf of

government, looking at a variety of possibilities to deal with the problem and I

would say again to the Leader of the Opposition, it is important that on behalf

of all of the taxpayers of this Province we deal with this major financial

problem in the most effective way we can with the least possible adverse impact

on public employees.

Now please give the process a chance to work without trying

to derail it for political purposes. Do not try to derail this now, let the

process work and hopefully, result in a solution. It is important to all the

people of the Province that it does.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SIMMS: Yes. One final supplementary.

Mr. Speaker, I do not appreciate the lecture of the Premier

telling me how we should do our jobs over on this side of the House. We are

here, we have a responsibility to ask questions of the government. Now I do not

expect the government to pat us on the back or anything like that which he has

not been doing, but I do expect him to give us straight answers to good

questions, and these are good, legitimate questions because they are factual.

Now if he is not prepared to answer, let me ask my final supplementary to the

President of Treasury Board.

Can the President of Treasury Board confirm in fact, that

there is some potential tampering with pension funds going on as a result of a

proposal put to the unions yesterday by the government?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, the answer is still the same,

and if I appeared to be lecturing, it was because the circumstances justified

and, indeed, necessitated the lecture.

Now, I realize the role of the Opposition is to ask

questions, to hold the government responsible, but the Opposition should not

subvert the public interest in order to promote its own political interest. They

should not do that! They should put the public interest first and they should be

concerned about trying to find an acceptable and fair resolution to this

difficult problem, not trying to exacerbate the problem.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader and

Member for Grand Bank.

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am sorry, I

couldn't hear you there with the other noise.

I don't know if this is on the Premier's list of public

urgency or public business, Mr. Speaker, but in the Auditor General's report,

page 12, in a letter to this very House of Assembly just tabled a few days ago,

the Auditor General said that the government's statements of revenues,

expenditures, assets and liabilities, do not present fairly the financial

position of the Province -

MR. SIMMS: Do not?

MR. MATTHEWS: - do not present fairly the financial

position of the Province as of March 31 1992.

MR. SIMMS: First time ever.

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, I think this is only the

second time that an Auditor General, in the history of our Province since

Confederation, has made such a strong statement.

MR. SIMMS: The second time in our history.

MR. MATTHEWS: I think it is the second time - once during

the Smallwood era, and perhaps the Premier can remember that. I don't know if he

was a member of the Smallwood Government at the time. The Auditor General, Mr.

Speaker, is in effect telling you, the government, she is unable to certify the

accuracy of government's statement of revenues and expenditures or to determine

what government's true financial position is.

So I want to ask the Premier: How can you prepare a budget

based on financial statements which the Auditor General says are seriously

flawed?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: It is very simple, Mr. Speaker. The

accounts are presented on exactly the same basis as they have been for the forty

years that we have been a province - exactly the same basis, no change.

Now, three or four years ago - maybe longer, five or six or

seven years ago - the then Auditor General said: The new thinking of the

Committee of Public Auditors of the CICA, the Canadian Institute of Chartered

Accountants - that is, a committee called the PSAAC, the Public Sector

Accounting and Auditing Committee - feels that you should have an accrual system

instead of a cash system of reporting. They told the present Leader of the

Opposition when he had responsibility for Treasury Board. They told the former

government numerous times: not value for money, but the accrual system of

accounting.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the new Auditor General comes on board and

they say: We agree that it should be the accrual system, so she writes this in

her statement.

AN HON. MEMBER: Do you agree with it?

PREMIER WELLS: No, I don't agree with it. I do not agree

with it. As a matter of fact, I am having it assessed now. The best information

I can get is that the Auditor General's position will cause us to spend hundreds

of thousands of dollars more in accountants' fees and expenses in order to

create a set of statements that will be unusable by the financial community,

because they will then have to redo it back to the form in which it is, in order

for it to make sense to them. Now, that is what the Auditor General is

proposing, to the best of my knowledge, at this moment. I am having it assessed

and, Mr. Speaker, if anything is different I will report fully to the House.

I have asked the financial community to consider the Auditor

General's position and tell me whether or not she is right - whether or not that

additional expenditure of public funds to provide for the government's accounts

on a accrual basis is justified in all of the circumstances. Because I am

advised that the investors who buy our bonds - and those are the people who rely

on the financial statements of the government - those are the people for whom it

is vitally important. And if we have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars

more to do what the Auditor General says, and then hundreds of thousands of

dollars more to undo it, what is the Auditor General doing? She is causing

expenses.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER WELLS: Now, Mr. Speaker, the member read a

selective statement. Let me read the whole paragraph. Here is what the Auditor

General said: "I report that these financial statements present, in all material

respects, information relating to the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Province

as at 31 March 1992, in accordance with the accounting policies as disclosed in

Note 1 to the financial statements" - in all material respects.

"Also, I report that such accounting policies have been

applied after giving retroactive effect to the change in recording receivables

from significant taxes as disclosed in Note 1(c), on a basis consistent with

that of the preceding year" - everything done on a consistent basis. "However,

these financial statements do not follow certain accounting policies recommended

by the Public Sector Accounting and Auditing Committee of the Canadian Institute

of Chartered Accountants as being appropriate for government financial

statements."

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER WELLS: "These financial statements do not fully

reflect revenues and expenditures on an accrual basis".

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Premier has been rather lengthy. I know it has been an

involved question, but it has been rather lengthy. I think it is only fair to go

back to the Opposition. I am sure they have another question.

The hon. the Member for Grand Bank and Opposition House

Leader.

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, this is a very serious

situation. Members opposite might not appreciate it, but when the Auditor

General says that the revenues, expenditures, assets and liabilities of this

Province do not present fairly the financial position of the Province then

there's something radically wrong, I say to the Premier.

Mr. Speaker, I can understand the Premier not knowing. He's

been away from the shop so long that he doesn't know what's happening around the

cash register! He doesn't know what's happening around the cash register, that's

the problem with the Premier. Like anybody who leaves the shop and goes away for

months.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the member to get on with the question.

PREMIER WELLS: Is this a question?

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair is waiting for it.

MR. MATTHEWS: No, it's the equivalent of you reading the

book.

MR. SIMMS: Hear, hear! Right on!

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, the Premier and the Minister

of Finance have taken some very tough positions with public employees, based on

the government's own assessment of the Province's financial position. Isn't the

Auditor General telling the Premier, the Minister of Finance and the government,

that you really don't know what the financial position is? The situation may be

as you say, it may be better, it may be worse, but you really don't know. Isn't

that what the Auditor General's telling the government?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: No, Mr. Speaker. You see, you can deceive

more effectively with the truth than you can with a lie, if you only tell half

the truth. Now what the member has done is only half the truth.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WELLS: Now, Mr. Speaker, here's the truth. The

Member took one part of the Auditor General's sentence and didn't take the

qualifier. Here's the full statement of the Auditor General: while prepared in

accordance with the disclosed accounting policies, in my opinion because these

financial statements do not follow certain accounting policies recommended by

PSAAC, as summarized above and which I consider appropriate, they do not present

fairly the financial position of the Province and the results of its operating.

My reservations are explained in more detail in the following paragraph.

Now to select those half-dozen or so words, true though they

are, and present them the way the hon. member did, is the greatest deception of

all. It's using truth to deceive. Reprehensible, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Final supplementary, the hon. the Opposition

House Leader.

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, a former member of this House

once referred to the Premier as 'the master of deception.' How right he was, I

say to the Premier.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. MATTHEWS: You can squirm all you like, but I'm as

familiar with that report as you are. I think more -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to get on with the question.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. MATTHEWS: More, more, more!

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)!

MR. MATTHEWS: I'll reveal more over the next few days, I

say to the Premier. Squirm all you like. Squirm all you like.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. MATTHEWS: You don't know what's going on in the cash

register, that's the problem.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask members on both sides to please cooperate. I'm sure at

this stage they know what question period is all about. Brief questions followed

by brief answers.

The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. It takes

a little longer when you're continuously being shouted down by members opposite.

Because the truth is cutting them to the bone.

The Premier and the Minister of the Finance have been

constantly concerned with the opinions of credit rating agencies. They've

expressed that ever since they've been in office, and for good reason, because

they've mismanaged the economy. I want to ask the Premier: how will the credit

rating agencies look at a serious reservation like that expressed by the Auditor

General? How can they ignore her comment on the financial statement you present

to them when it really doesn't accurately reflect the financial position of the

Province? How are the credit rating agencies going to look upon this very strong

langauge of an Auditor General?

Only for the second time in the Province's history that we've

seen such strong langauge. The time before, I remind the Premier, it caused such

an uproar that the Auditor General was brought before the Bar of the House. What

are the credit rating agencies going to say about this statement by your own

Auditor General?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: I don't know precisely what the credit

rating agencies are going to say. I have, since this came to my attention... two

weeks ago the Auditor General wrote me a letter about it. I spoke with the

financial community and said: here's the Province's dilemma. We are given to

understand that the financial community want the accounts, as they've been for

all past years, as the former government did them, done exactly the same way,

reported on exactly the same basis, and we understand the financial community

want them reported that way. Now here's what the Auditor General says, and

here's what it will mean: a great deal more accounting expenditures in order to

provide it, and it will provide the statements on an accrual basis, with

information on an accrual basis. Is that what the financial community wants?

The one advisor that I was speaking to said: no, but I will

take it upon myself to do an assessment generally and get back to you on it.

That was about two weeks ago, I think, I was speaking to the person, and he told

me he would get back to me. The best information that I have at the moment is

the financial community, and I believe the credit rating agencies, have total

and complete confidence in the accounts of the Province as done by the

government, and that they do not endorse what the Auditor General recommends -

the additional expenditure that she recommends to produce the accounting in that

way - because it would be unsuitable for their purposes.

Now that does not make sense to me to expend that extra money

to achieve that merely because the Auditors General in the country, meeting

together as the public sector's accounts and auditing committee, decided this is

the way they should have it. I disagree. We cannot let them run the country's

accounts in that way if it is not the appropriate thing to do.

MR. SPEAKER: the hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have questions for the Premier. Yesterday the Leader of the

Opposition took the Premier to task for his government's breaches of the public

tendering and conflict of interest laws, and for his government's crass

patronage in appointing people to high paying government jobs.

In his reply the Premier said, and I quote: "Mr. Speaker, it

is inevitable that a number of people who are appointed will have a Liberal

background."

I ask the Premier today: Is that inevitable because you have

Liberal bag man Grant Chalker in charge of the Public Service Commission, at a

salary of $80,000 a year?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: No, Mr. Speaker.

I say again, the government will not be goaded by the

Opposition into refusing to appoint competent and qualified people in this

Province merely because they have been supportive of, or even significantly

involved in, the Liberal party in the past, any more than we would refuse to

appoint somebody because they have been supportive of, or significantly involved

in, the Conservative party. We are running a fair and balanced government for

the first time in this Province's recent history, and the members opposite do

not like it.

Now if they want me to, I will provide a complete list of all

of the appointments that they made, and what the political affiliation was. I

will dig that out and provide it - and they did it week after week after week

after week.

She mentioned the Public Service Commission. I remember the

vice-chairman being one Mr. Vince Rossiter. Does anybody remember the name Vince

Rossiter and the connection? Does anybody remember that?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East on a

supplementary.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Does the Premier not realize that I am not asking about

appointments in the sixties or the seventies or the eighties? I am asking about

his actions. I am questioning him - the leader of the party that got elected on

a platform of fairness and balance and real change.

Let me ask the Premier: Did he appoint Grant Chalker

vice-chair of the Public Service Commission as a reward for the money he raised

for the eighty-nine provincial Liberal election campaign; or was it a payback

for what Grant Chalker contributed to his $50,000 a year salary supplement when

he, as Leader of the Opposition, could not get by on the regular salary of

$75,000 a year, but had to have it boosted to $125,000 a year?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, I say again: We will not

refuse to appoint people because they have a Liberal background. Surely fairness

and balance means being fair and balanced to everybody.

Here is what the opposition want. Put them in government,

they appoint nothing but Tories. Put them out of government and the Liberals can

only appoint Tories - fairness and balance, opposition style.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: There are other members who want to ask

questions, I remind the hon. member, but I have not recognized them.

The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Why has the Premier had Grant Chalker in charge of the Public

Service Commission for a full year since Gilbert Pike retired? Why has the

Premier had in charge of the government's agency responsible for enforcing the

merit principle in hiring, an individual with no expertise in personnel, with no

previous public service background? Why has he had in charge of the Public

Service Commission a man whose chief claim to fame was raising money for the

Liberal party?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Mr. Speaker, the person who is presently

'in charge' as the member says, is the vice-chairman. He is there because he is

vice-chairman. We have not yet filled the vacancy of the Chairman of the Public

Service Commission. Now there is a good reason for that. We are contemplating

possible changes in the function of the Public Service Commission to add to the

responsibility of the Commission, and the chairman in particular, additional

responsibilities. There is one in particular that will be added and that is

responsibility for the implementation of the quality service management program

that is going to be put in place. But we have been seriously looking at one

other major responsibility that I am not prepared to discuss publicly now, of

turning that responsibility over to the Public Service Commission instead of

where it rests presently in government. This is one possibility that we are

looking at. Before filling the appointment we want to make definite decisions as

to what will be the job function. It is an eminently sensible approach and in

circumstances where the government is doing very limited hiring we do not have

to worry about making sure that we have a full complement at all times.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A supplementary to the

Premier.

Why is it that the Premier exempted from the Public Service

Commission the government agency that has done a lot of hiring and appointing,

namely Enterprise Newfoundland and Labrador? Was it to ensure that ENL stands

for employment for noted Liberals?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Fogo.

MR. WINSOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have a question for the Minister of Works, Services and

Transportation. Earlier this week, perhaps on Tuesday or Wednesday, the minister

made public the result of a feasibility study into a causeway between Fogo

Island and Change Islands. Let me ask the minister why he made this study public

without at least first informing the transportation committee on Fogo Island and

the council in Change Islands who had initiated it in the beginning? Why did he

not inform them first?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Works, Services and

Transportation.

MR. GOVER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Various groups have come to me since I have been Minister of

Works, Services and Transportation questioning the feasibility of a causeway

linking Fogo and Change Islands. There has been an ongoing dispute between the

departments and the people of Fogo Island over the cost estimates that the

department has worked up for the causeway. As a result of that, to put that

issue to rest, government commissioned a study, paid for a study, to determine

the social benefits and economic cost of a causeway versus a ferry, a causeway

linking Fogo and Change Islands. As a result of trying to address the concerns

of the people of Fogo Island and Change Islands the government commissioned a

study. During the course of that study various groups, individuals and

organizations on the two islands were consulted. As in all studies, before the

study is completed all interested parties are invited to make submissions and

are consulted, and this was done in this particular case. Government received

the report and as opposed to keeping the report secret, confidential, government

decided to release the report and to make it public for further discussion. The

report has been released. The report will be sent to the interested groups and

individuals and further discussions will take place on the report. That is the

standard operating procedure of government, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Fogo on a

supplementary.

MR. WINSOR: Mr. Speaker, let me assure the minister that

the people on Fogo Island do not think so this morning. Since Cabinet has

rejected the fixed-link idea what plans does the minister have to improve the

transportation link to and from Fogo Island?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Works, Services and

Transportation.

MR. GOVER: Mr. Speaker, obviously the member was not

listening to the answer to the question I just gave. Cabinet did not pass its

views on the viability or the benefits of a fixed-link versus a ferry. What

Cabinet authorized was the commissioning of a study, the receipt of a study, and

the release of that study. I anticipate meeting with the various groups who are

interested in this and receiving their comments on the study before Cabinet

makes a final decision on the viability of a causeway over other options.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Fogo on a

supplementary.

MR. WINSOR: Mr. Speaker, I do not know if the minister is

being misquoted but the minister is being reported in Central Newfoundland today

as having rejected the causeway, the fixed-link, and he has also rejected the

idea of building a ferry with icebreaking capabilities. That is the report out

of Central Newfoundland this morning. Since these have been rejected let me ask

the minister if it is now the plan of this administration to reconsider the

building of an icebreaker ferry that has had plans drawn up for it since 1989?

Is that now the plan?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Works, Services and

Transportation.

MR. GOVER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have not heard the media reports from central Newfoundland

but I do recall the questions that were asked me and the answers I gave when I

was interviewed in Grand Falls - Windsor about this particular report. The press

asked me what was the conclusion that the report came to and I told them the

conclusion that the report came to was that a ferry was more feasible than a

causeway linking the two islands. That was the conclusion of the report. That is

all I communicated to them. I did not say government had rejected one option

over the other because government has authorized the release of the report and

as I said I expected to see representation from interested groups and

individuals on the report itself. The report is not the be-all and end-all. I

was also asked the question: would a ferry be constructed in the upcoming

construction season?... I said to the press in response to that, Mr. Speaker,

that any decision on capital funding, be it a causeway or be it a ferry would

have to await the budgetary process.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Question Period has expired.

Petitions

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Terra Nova.

MR. GREENING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I rise today to

present this hon. House a petition on behalf of 302 residents of the Town of

Musgravetown. The prayer of the petition reads; to the hon. House of Assembly -

in the interest of tradition and preserving our forest and wildlife for our

continued use and enjoyment, we the undersigned are opposed to clear cutting

within a five mile, eight kilometre radius of our Town of Musgravetown. Mr.

Speaker, a couple of days ago I presented a similar petition to this House and I

am not sure the minister understands what the people are asking for. They are

not asking to stop clear cutting, they are asking for a mutual radius around the

communities between Port Blandford and Winter Brook and in particular

Musgravetown, today.

From listening to the radio, I understand that the minister

sort of misled the people by saying that they want to stop clear cutting and how

many jobs would be lost due to stopping clear-cutting. That is not the issue,

the issue is we want a mutual radius around the communities and I ask the

minister today if he would agree again and say when and where he will meet with

the residents to listen to their concerns about the domestic cutting and the

clear-cutting and stop putting the commercial operators against the domestic

cutters. So, once again I will ask the minister if he will agree to meet with

the residents in a public forum and discuss this situation. Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Green Bay.

MR. HEWLETT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I am in support of

that petition. What is basically being asked of the government, in this

particular case, is to be somewhat democratic and consultative with regard to

cutting in and around communities. A petition which was given out the other day

and this one expresses a concern that clear cutting is being carried out very,

very close to communities which destroys wildlife habitat and is generally not

very sightly, I should say, for tourist potential in the local area. So, Mr.

Speaker, it is up to the minister to meet with the peoples concerned, their

organizations, their public interest groups and come up with a situation that is

acceptable to all concerned. A situation which allows for the cutting of wood

for domestic and commercial purposes but also one that allows some safety to be

given to the natural environment and to the look of the countryside in so far as

people having to live there and people having to entice tourists to come visit.

I support the petition, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Forestry and

Agriculture.

MR. FLIGHT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I will take a moment

to address myself to the issues raised by the hon. member, both hon. members, in

presenting the petition or presenting and supporting the petition. Mr. Speaker,

the answer to the hon. Member for Terra Nova, is categorically, yes, I will meet

with any group or any representatives of any group from the Bonavista Peninsula,

anytime. All I would ask the member to remember is that I would have to do it at

my convenience based on obligations in the House of Assembly or in Cabinet or

whatever. So, Mr. Speaker, the answer is clearly yes and as a matter of fact I

will ask my staff to start identifying a time when these meetings can take

place. I will also make another commitment to the member, to the extend that we

can accommodate the concerns of the people on the Bonavista Peninsula, we will

accommodate their concerns to the extent we can accommodate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. FLIGHT: Now, Mr. Speaker, let me deal with the word

misleading because I say to the hon. Member for Terra Nova it is he who is

misleading the people of this House and misleading the people of Bonavista

North. The fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, and he well knows it, that if I

were to grant an eight kilometre buffer zone around every town on the Bonavista

Peninsula it would mean the shutting down of the commercial harvesting of timber

on the Bonavista Peninsula. It would mean 400 hundred jobs gone, Mr. Speaker, on

the Bonavista Peninsula. Now, Mr. Speaker, I am aware that the twenty-eight

commercial operators on the Bonavista Peninsula, most of whom, or a lot of whom

are in his district, have been contacting me, their employee's have been

contacting me, they are scared to death, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member is

going to get his way by making the case that he is making, and that I will

concede an eight kilometre buffer zone around those communities. This would have

the effect of shutting down the logging and sawmilling industry on the Bonavista

Peninsula.

Now, Mr. Speaker, there may be an accommodation, and I tell

you again that I will take the considerations and the concerns of the Save Our

Forest Committee from the Bonavista Peninsula or representatives from any town

on the Bonavista Peninsula, but everybody should understand, Mr. Speaker, that

if I have to impose an eight-kilometre buffer zone around every community on the

Bonavista Peninsula, it will effectively shut down the sawlogging and sawmilling

industry on the Bonavista Peninsula and jeopardize anywhere from 300 to 500

jobs. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is the fact.

The other thing I would say to the hon. member is, that if I

were to concede that on the Bonavista Peninsula, then by what right would I not

have to concede it to the rest of Newfoundland, and that would almost have the

effect of shutting down the pulp and paper industry in the Province, so, Mr.

Speaker, there has to be an accommodation. I respect and I understand the

concerns of the Save Our Forest Committee, of the representative who has written

me with regard to clear-cutting on the Bonavista Peninsula, but there has to be

an accommodation and we will work towards that accommodation, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Green Bay.

MR. HEWLETT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise to present a petition from 733 residents of the

Springdale area. A petition to the House of Assembly in which they are asking

the government to reconsider the elimination or the possible elimination of the

2 per cent clause with regard to teacher allocations. The prayer of the petition

indicates that Green Bay is a rural district, and has made concessions in the

past with regard to their education program, and the elimination of the 2 per

cent rule will lead to the possible loss of thirty-six teaching positions for

the Green Bay Integrated School Board.

Mr. Speaker, there are any number of scenarios that have been

coming out of the government with regard to how they are going to meet their

budgetary requirements, one of which of course, has been wage roll backs or time

off without pay, but the other, in the education system, is the elimination of

the 2 per cent rule, a rule which basically says that no one school board can

lose more than 2 per cent of its teachers in any given year, regardless of its

enrollment. This particular rule protects the teaching work force of various

boards in varying degrees.

In the matter of the Green Bay board, it will be one of the

worst hit if this particular 2 per cent rule is eliminated, they will lose

thirty-six positions. This would mean that in a school like Grant Collegiate in

Springdale, the school from which I graduated, could lose a half-dozen teachers

and would have nothing but a bare bones education program to offer as a result

of such a loss. That would be rather sad, Mr. Speaker. Back in the days when

school was listed by Maclean's magazine as one of the best sixty-five schools in

all of Canada, and here we are today, wondering, if indeed the 2 per cent rule

is eliminated, whether or not that particular school will be just sent down to

doing a bare bones reading, writing and arithmetic type of program. So, Mr.

Speaker, these 733 people from the Springdale area are very concerned. I

attended a public meeting that they had and they subsequently sent this petition

around the town and got 733 names. I think their plea should be heard, I ask

that the petition be tabled and referred to the Department of Education.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Ferryland.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise to support my colleague and the petitioners from Green

Bay district, with specific reference to the 2 per cent savings clause. I think

it is very important, and the government must realize that in order to create an

equality of educational opportunity, sometimes there must be an inequality of

educational funding, certain rural areas are hard hit by a 2 per cent savings

clause if it is eliminated. It is important to be able to maintain certain basic

courses and course offerings to people in rural areas so they would have the

same opportunities as in more populated urban areas that do not get the same

economies of numbers in these areas to be able to offer a program that is equal

throughout the entire Province. Eliminating the 2 per cent savings clause or a

weakening of the 2 per cent savings clause, will result in less course

offerings, less opportunity for people in these areas to be able to avail of a

decent education, and today, especially some of the courses that would be

eliminated would usually be a smaller selection of science courses, fewer

opportunities to take advanced math courses and so on. They will be going with a

general stream of courses, and these are the basic courses today that are

important to building a foundation.

In view of the courses that are needed today in the job

openings in technology fields, it is very important to have schools able to

provide equality of programs so there is no discrimination occurring among

people in different parts of this Province.

Recently - I know this government, over this past while in

the mini-Budget, took $17.5 million out of current account expenditures in

education. When money is removed from education, it hurts. Teacher positions are

reduced.

The 2 per cent savings clause - we shouldn't be looking at

elimination of the 2 per cent savings clause without any specific plan to be

able to utilize those positions and those funds in areas where we can maintain

programs.

It is not the elimination of the 2 per cent savings clause in

a strict sense that creates a problem, it is withdrawing these from a system

without doing an analysis of the effect it would have, so there could be a

better reallocation of those 200-300 units in strategic areas around the

Province so we can maintain a semblance of course offerings that is going to

give equality of educational opportunity.

I think that is very important, and with the upcoming Budget,

too, I think it is very important to consider that education is the underlying

basis upon which our entire economies operate, and we have seen an assault on

education over the past while. I think it has to stop and we have to look at the

matter realistically. If we hope down the road that we are going to have a fair

opportunity to obtain employment, a fair opportunity for young entrepreneurs to

go out, be industrious, and have the training that they need to be able to

create jobs and be productive members of the work force, that has to come

through education.

I think it is very important that we consider the petition

here, that government take heed, and the Minister of Education accordingly.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Education.

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for

giving me the opportunity to speak to this issue because there seems to be a

considerable amount of confusion throughout the Province because of some

statements about this particular problem.

Mr. Speaker, what is the 2 per cent rule? The 2 per cent rule

refers to a covering letter which was attached to the last teachers' contract,

and the one before that, and probably the one before that, as well, which said

that no matter what happens to school enrolment, school boards can only lay off

2 per cent of the teachers. Now, push that to its logical conclusion, and if

every man, woman and child moved off the Northern Peninsula, say, for some

reason, then we would have to keep about 500 teachers employed doing nothing.

Now, that is the effect of the 2 per cent rule which is covered by letter.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the result of this 2 per cent rule is that,

come September, next year, there are 301 teachers in the system, at a cost of

$17 million, who are not distributed with any rhyme or reason throughout the

Province. They are, by sheer accident, attached to specific school boards.

Some boards have as many as thirty-five or thirty-six

teachers on holdback. Other boards - for example the Pentecostal - don't have

any teachers on holdback. So the 2 per cent rule is a clause in a contract which

was put there with all the best reasons in the world, namely job security for

the membership of the teachers' union, and I have no problem with that.

Now, there is some confusion on the part of the people of the

Province with the needs of small schools. For example, Great Harbour Deep with

thirty-five students from K to VIII. Now, government recognizes that there must

be in place a formula to deal with the problems in Great Harbour Deep, or

Conche, or Croque, or Red Bay, or Mose Ambrose. The list goes on and on, Mr.

Speaker. There must be a formula in place which gives government the flexibility

to address the problem where it is happening.

The problem with the present clause in the teachers' contract

is that it interferes with the flexibility of government to deal with the

specific cases.

If, per chance, a school board has some teachers on holdback,

then they can address their problem. If per chance a school board has a small

school with a problem, and does not have some teachers on holdback, then that

board does not have the wherewithal to deal with the specific problem - and that

is happening in the Province, Mr. Speaker.

Now, all government has been saying is that we want to take

that $17 million and redirect it Province-wide, so that the people who live in

Mose Ambrose have the same crack at getting extra teachers, if they are

required, according to a formula which will be agreed upon by school boards and

by all the stakeholders in education.

Mr. Speaker, I can assure the hon. member who brought this

petition in on behalf of his constituents today, I can tell him he can go back

to his constituents - he can take the excerpt out of Hansard and mail it to

them. He can rest assured that we are talking about replacing a clause which, in

effect, has hamstrung the Minister of Education, has hamstrung the ability of

the Department of Education, to deal with specific problems that are out there

in the system. So he can rest assured that we are concerned with dealing with

the specific problems.

This I cannot do, because I am hamstrung by a particular

clause in a contract, which is therefore, a perfectly valid reason to protect

the jobs of people. There is nothing wrong with that. But government must have

the flexibility to deal with the specific problems and, Mr. Speaker, we will do

that.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Orders of the Day

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, Order No. 2, please.

MR. SPEAKER: Order No. 2.

On motion, that the House resolve itself into Committee of

the Whole, Mr. Speaker left the Chair.

Committee of the Whole

MR. CHAIRMAN (Barrett): Order, please!

A bill, "An Act To Amend The House Of Assembly Act (Bill No.

1).

MR. CHAIRMAN: Shall clause 1 carry?

AN HON. MEMBER: There is only one clause to the bill.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes, there is actually only one clause to

the bill.

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Chairman, let me say a word.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. ROBERTS: As Your Honour has noticed, there is, in

fact, only one clause in the bill. Because the bill simply adds a substantial

number of clauses. Let me say, we could do one of two things as members, and may

prefer, subject to Your Honour's direction - we could ask Your Honour to call

each clause; I mean, there are thirty-some clauses in the one

section that we

are adding. Perhaps that might be the way to do it; or we could take them by

'chunk', to use a very imprecise word.

What I do want to say to the Committee is, obviously, there

is no desire to restrict debate. If anybody wants to get into any part of it, we

should deal with it. There are no amendments, as far as I am aware.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The Chair is open to direction from hon.

members.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ordinarily, the

procedure has been, in Committee, to have a general discussion on Clause 1, and

if there are specific amendments, we will deal with them as they come.

MR. ROBERTS: That would be fine.

MR. HARRIS: I think that might be appropriate, rather

than try to make individual speeches and grab the floor at the appropriate time.

Because there are a couple of things that I would like to say, for example, and

it may result in an amendment, depending on the will of the House. Perhaps if we

could do it that way, have a general discussion on Clause 1, and if there are

amendments to deal with, then we can deal with them, as well, if members want to

speak on the first clause, and perhaps that might be the best way to do it. That

would be my suggestion.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Any hon. member who wishes may make a

comment, but we will take - if it is the wish of the House that we continue on

with the discussion on it, or if we just take it as one clause, that is entirely

up to the members.

MR. ROBERTS: Let's hear what the Member for St. John's

East has to say, Mr. Chairman. We are all in good form and good humour. Let's

get on with it. We will gladly hear what he has to say. The main thing is that

nobody will be restricted in his or her right to say whatever one wishes,

subject, as always, to the rules.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I do want to make a

few remarks today on the passage of this bill through the Committee stage and

the purpose of my remarks today - I mean, I have reviewed the legislation and,

as I said the other day, participated in a number of the amendments that were

proceeding through the Committee and I want to make some comments on the end

result of that.

I did have occasion, Mr. Chairman of Committee, to discuss

the legislation with someone in the Province of Saskatchewan who had similar

legislation going through their House and I was curious as to what criticisms

might have been made to the legislation in the Province of Saskatchewan. The

legislation was just introduced recently by the NDP Government in Saskatchewan,

as Bill No. 1, in their House.

I was informed, Mr. Chairman, that there had been a Tory

Government in office in Saskatchewan for some ten years which managed to do a

number of very, very negative things to the financial situation in Saskatchewan.

They managed to do a lot of negative things to the budgetary situation of

Saskatchewan. They did promise for all of those ten years to bring in conflict

of interest legislation but, of course, they didn't, and it was left to the NDP

Government, which was just elected last year, to bring in a conflict of interest

situation. As the Member for St. John's South says, yes, I do have some sympathy

for what the current government went through in their first year but they are

beyond that now. In their first year they probably had to go through a lot of

things to deal with what the previous government left them in this Province,

just as the Saskatchewan Government was left there.

To get to the point here, there was introduced by the

Saskatchewan Government, a conflict of interest legislation, a separate act

called, The Members Conflict of Interest Act. In that province there were some

criticisms made of the Act, very similar to our own, but I wanted to pass on to

hon. members some of the criticisms that were made by the Liberal Opposition in

Saskatchewan to their act.

In Saskatchewan, of course, we have the reverse situation of

here. There is only one Liberal member of the House of Assembly in Saskatchewan,

and that is the leader of the Liberal Party, and there is an NDP Government in

Saskatchewan. Here, we have only one New Democrat, the leader of the New

Democratic Party, and a Liberal Government, but I should say, while I am at it,

that the New Democratic Party Government in Saskatchewan looks after the Liberal

leader a lot better than this government looks after the leader of the NDP, in

terms of providing research assistants to allow that person to carry on their

work. It is a subject that I can take up in another forum. But some of the

criticisms that were made can apply here. Some of the criticisms of Linda

Haverstock in Saskatchewan to the Saskatchewan legislation, is that it doesn't

require disclosure of senior bureaucrats. I think some of our problems here are

covered by the existing conflict of interest legislation but it doesn't require

the same kind of disclosure that this legislation requires for members.

One of the other criticisms is that legislation in

Saskatchewan does not provide that members of the House after they are defeated

or retire, are not eligible for government appointments for a six-month period.

Now, Mr. Chairman, the Liberal Opposition in Saskatchewan has criticized their

legislation for not providing that; apparently, the Alberta legislation provides

for it, the Ontario legislation and British Columbia legislation provide for it,

that members aren't able to be appointed to government jobs, positions and

appointments within a period of six months after ceasing to be a member.

I suppose, Mr. Chairman, if we were to propose such an

amendment here, it would be called the Beaton Tulk amendment, so that if a

Liberal member on that side of the House were defeated in the upcoming election,

for example, if the Member for Eagle River were required to vacate his seat as a

result of losing the election, that the government would not be able to give him

a consolation prize of a position within the government, or the appointment to a

particular board; that, Mr. Chairman, might be an amendment that we would like

to see in this bill.

I only heard about this within the last the hour or so, so I

have not yet had time to draft such an amendment, but if other members want to

speak on this legislation, I will busily work out a draft for such an amendment

to be included in the bill - and we could call it the Beaton Tulk amendment -

that it would prevent a government from appointing their defeated members to the

government after the election and I think that that would be an appropriate

amendment to have here because we all know the folly that the government got

into in 1989 after the election when Beaton Tulk was unable to maintain his

seat, he was looked after by the government in a position, a very controversial

position, as it turned out, within the Department of Social Services, a position

to which he was appointed, as a political consolation prize for being a defeated

Liberal candidate and Liberal MHA. So, while we are at it, while we are putting

in force conflict of interest legislation, perhaps we should make sure that hon.

members, particularly, Mr. Chairman -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: The Member for Port de Grave would not be

entitled to a government position within six months after he is defeated in any

event. I don't know the details of the severance package available to hon.

members once they are defeated, I haven't bothered to look, because I don't

think it would apply to me, but for hon. members who expect to be defeated or

leave office, they may be very interested in the severance packages. I believe

that after a certain number of years there is some sort of a severance package

you can get for up to four or five or six months of severance pay if you are

defeated as an hon. member.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) in Ottawa.

MR. HARRIS: That is what it is in Ottawa. I know what it

is in Ottawa, I have only experienced it in Ottawa and I don't intend to

experience it here.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) amendment.

MR. HARRIS: The Beaton Tulk amendment. This amendment

would provide that Members of the House of Assembly, after they cease to be hon.

members, are not entitled, are not eligible, to be appointed by the government

in the public service or in a government appointment for a period of six months.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: For a period of six months. You can amend the

amendment if the -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: That is the situation under the Alberta

legislation, and I am told, B.C., as well. This is a criticism, and I think, you

know, we are being non-partisan here and we are talking about legislation that

would affect whatever government is in office. We worked very co-operatively, as

a Committee, to come up with a piece of legislation that was as good as we could

make it, but this issue wasn't brought forward by anyone, it didn't come to

anybody's attention.

It was brought to my attention today as a result of

statements made by the Liberal Opposition in Saskatchewan that that would be an

amendment that ought to be made to their legislation, which is very, very

similar to ours, sets up a commissioner that is separately appointed, I believe,

similarly to ours, appointed by the House of Assembly, the commissioner in both

places being an officer of the House of Assembly. I don't have the amendment

ready yet, in any event, so when someone else will be speaking, I will be

drafting the amendment while that happens, but I think it is one that might be

appropriate.

One of the other criticisms of the Saskatchewan legislation

is that it does not, as does Alberta legislation, prohibit a Cabinet minister

from buying land except for personal or for farm use. Now, Mr. Chairman, in the

Province of Alberta, their conflict of interest legislation provides that a

member of the Cabinet shall not purchase land while he or she is a member of the

Cabinet for purposes other than personal or farm use. That is what the Alberta

legislation says, and this is obviously to avoid Cabinet ministers speculating

on land or engaging in land development schemes while being a member of the

Cabinet, because even though you may not be able to nail down or pin down what

might happen, Cabinet ministers in there, in the course of their business, can

have certain knowledge about what might or might not take place, or might have

an advantage conferred upon them.

So that is a criticism brought forward in Saskatchewan by the

Liberal Opposition there. I suppose that may well be covered by

Section 23, with

reference to insider information, but the legislation in Alberta goes further

and prevents any possibility of there being a problem by ensuring that Cabinet

ministers won't be tempted to engage in that. Mr. Chairman, I would suggest that

members should consider whether that will be an appropriate change in the

legislation here.

Another criticism of the legislation in Saskatchewan, brought

forward by the Liberal Opposition there was that there ought to be a specific

prohibition of Cabinet ministers holding publicly-traded shares in

publicly-traded corporations without having them placed in blind trust or

outside of their control. Under our legislation, of course, these are declared.

There is a declaration made that an asset, liability, or financial interest must

be disclosed as a private interest. Under Paragraph 20 (

e) which describes a

private interest. It includes publicly-traded shares, so they have to be

disclosed. The question is, Mr. Chairman, whether or not a Cabinet minister

ought to be permitted to be able to continue to trade in those shares during the

course of being in Cabinet.

In Alberta and other provinces there is a prohibition of the

Cabinet minister holding such shares except through a blind trust. I think that

serious consideration ought to be given to preventing Cabinet ministers from

engaging in that kind of public trading in shares. Once again, it is something

that is potentially covered by the insider trading block in paragraph 23 of the

bill, that the prohibition against using insider information is certainly

available. But I think, once again, to be certain that a Cabinet minister is not

engaging in a business, which they have spelled out here - it is very clear in

section 27, that a minister shall not engage in employment or in the practice of

a profession and a minister is prohibited from carrying on business. I would

submit, Mr. Chairman, that it would be very easy to amend the legislation,

paragraph 27, to prohibit a minister from trading in shares of a publicly-traded

corporation except through a blind trust. That would mean that the minister

didn't have control over the trading of those shares, because that would involve

a form of carrying on a business, outside of the duties of a Cabinet minister.

I would submit, in the absence of a good argument from

members opposite, that that would be not an unreasonable prohibition on a member

of Cabinet, to prohibit a member of Cabinet from engaging in the trading of

shares of publicly-traded corporations. Because that is very analogous to the

carrying on of a business or a trade. At an appropriate moment, Mr. Chairman, I

will be making an amendment to that section, in keeping with the suggestions

that were made in Saskatchewan by the Liberals.

I say, by the Liberals, because I gather, in Saskatchewan the

Tories aren't saying very much about conflict of interest. I understand there

are a number of investigations going on right now and the Tories in Saskatchewan

aren't saying very much at all about conflict of interest in the Province of

Saskatchewan. I guess it is not surprising.

Mr. Chairman, those are my remarks. Today, at third reading,

I will be seeking to make an amendment to

section 27, with respect to what can

be carried on by ministers, and also, to the

section dealing with what shall

happen to members after they leave office, a prohibition on members being

appointed by the government for a period of six months to ensure that whatever

arrangements are made by a political party with defeated members are really

party business and nothing to do with government.

Given those remarks, Mr. Chairman, I will end here. As I said

in my remarks the other day at second reading, I think this is good legislation.

It is long overdue in this Province. It serves the interest of protecting - two

interests here: number one, the public interest in knowing that this type of

legislation exists to protect the public from unscrupulous individuals who might

seek to use their office contrary to the public interest, and number two, to

protect members, themselves.

I have to say that I had a certain amount of sympathy for the

Government House Leader, last fall, when he was being criticized for conflict of

interest, because there was no way, really, for that conflict of interest to be

adjudicated upon. We had the Premier standing and saying there was no conflict

of interest, and it really shouldn't be left up to the Premier to say that. But

under the old guidelines, under the old rules, the Premier had the right to

decide whether there was a conflict of interest or not. In this case, he decided

there was no conflict of interest but he was wrong on that, despite the fact

that he spoke with such great righteousness about the issue. He was wrong,

because there was a conflict of interest, and a perceived conflict of interest,

when a member of the Cabinet was receiving an income on a regular basis from a

business whose financial health was dependent upon, in part, work with this

government. I think that the public generally agreed with that, that this was a

real conflict of interest.

The Premier was wrong. The Premier tried to defend it, but

unsuccessfully. Eventually, I understand, the Government House Leader managed to

get himself out of the conflict of interest by making sure that all the money he

was owed was paid to him. I think it was a fortuitous outcome for the Government

House Leader. I think he was probably very glad that the conflict of interest

matter had been raised because it made him better off than he would have been

before.

Under this legislation, Mr. Chairman, when an allegation of

conflict of interest is being made, a member has recourse to an independent

commissioner who can adjudicate on the matter and make an impartial - not a

partisan adjudication such as the Premier made last fall, not a partisan

evaluation of a potential conflict which the Premier made last fall in declaring

there was no conflict of interest for the Minister of Justice. That was a

partisan evaluation. We would expect that the commissioner, under this

legislation, would make an impartial assessment of a situation and advise

members how they should avoid conflicts, because it is important that members

have a way of doing that.

So I support the legislation for two reasons, because it

provides protection for the public, and it also provides protection for hon.

members who are, in fact, honourable and who wish to have any allegations of

conflict adjudicated by an impartial body so that scurrilous allegations cannot

be made.

Those being my remarks, I welcome the comments of other hon.

members on my two suggestions for improvement of the bill: number one, with

respect to members taking government appointments, government positions, within

a period of six months after leaving office as members of this House; and number

two, a prohibition on Cabinet ministers engaging in the trading of

publicly-traded stocks during the period of their being in Cabinet, unless such

stocks are, in fact, being handled by a blind trust.

So I would welcome any comments any members opposite might

have on those, but I intend to propose those two amendments in this Committee

stage at an appropriate time.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Member for LaPoile.

MR. RAMSAY: Mr. Chairman, I would like to have a few

words about this bill, following the hon. member's comments about a blind trust.

It is something where, I would suppose, any member participating in business,

and if that business could, in fact, do business with the government in any way,

that would be a way in which financial aspects of it could be handled.

The other aspect of it that one might consider though, is

that a blind trust does not necessarily mean arm's length. It may, to a point,

but there is an aspect of -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. RAMSAY: Exactly, but the idea of a blind trust being

at arm's length can, in effect, still allow the individual to have discussions

and operations but, of course, then it gets into the broad

interpretation of

what 'at arm's length' would mean within the context of the law - I am not

studied in the law, but from information that I have available to me in the

study of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, the bill, itself, makes for clearing up a

situation which has been a problem, I suppose, although with the lack of direct

public input into the process, the lack of interest in the conflict of interest,

I suppose we could say, one has to wonder if this is probably more a symptom of

the problem of the way politicians are held in society today.

It could very well be that the lack of this kind of act which

addresses the problems of conflict of interest in a very forthright manner is a

possible responsibility for the low esteem with which politicians are held.

It is assumed by many in the public that a politician, just

by virtue of holding the title, is, in fact, a person who has some kind of shade

to their character - and that is wrong. It is the kind of thing, I suppose, for

which politicians have no one to blame but themselves, for the lack of

legislation and regulation that would prevent them from being held in low

esteem.

If the rules are strict and the test is applied by not only

the panels or whatever that are established in various things having to do with

politicians, then that test, as well as the test of the general public, not only

through the electorate, but the general public in general public opinion, is one

which would certainly make for providing a general sense of satisfaction that

politicians are in fact acting outside of a conflict of interest.

The specific parts of this Bill,

Part II where it discusses

the excluded private interest. Anything less than $10,000 in value is certainly

a reasonable assumption to make that anything less than that could not really

affect an interest in a manner that would affect a member's performance in his

or her duties. Go down through real property for residents. Even though we

currently place real property on our conflict of interest forms, we have to

wonder as to whether that is in fact the case.

Mr. Chairman, I won't comment any more. I'll allow other

members to have a chance.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Chairman, I'm drafting an amendment to

subclause - perhaps I could put the amendments on the floor. I'm drafting an

amendment to subclause II 27(1), to add after the provision - and if hon.

members want to follow it's on page 8 of the legislation. It would amend Clause

27(1) to add a new clause (

b) which would say that a minister shall not: hold

shares in publicly traded corporations except through a blind trust arrangement

approved by the commissioner.

I have that in writing. I'll pass it up. So the amendment

would be to amend Clause 27(1) to add a new clause (b), and renumber (

b) and (

c) as (

c) and (d). The new clause (

b) would read that a minister shall not: (

b) hold shares in publicly traded corporations except through a blind trust

arrangement approved by the commissioner.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Yes. It was hold or trade, I think. I've got

it written down: Hold or trade shares in publicly traded corporations except

through a blind trust arrangement approved by the commissioner. That would, Mr.

Chairman, answer the problems that the Member for LaPoile brought up in dealing

with that. Then the renumbering or relettering.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Relettering (

b) and (

c) accordingly. If that

amendment could be brought to the Table, Mr. Chairman. I don't see a....

If I may speak briefly to that amendment, that amendment

provides that - and it's consistent with the other items in Clause 27(1). A

Cabinet minister is not permitted to: "(

a) engage in employment or in the

practice of a profession; (

b) carry on a business; or (

c) hold an office or

directorship other than in a social club, service club, religious organization

or political party...." It's analogous to that in that it would prevent a

Cabinet minister from basically trading in publicly traded corporations, which

is for some people a profession - speculation and stock-trading. For some people

it's merely a source of income or a way of increasing the capital value of their

investment portfolio. That would be appropriate for an individual to engage in

that in private. To do that while being a member of the Cabinet would be

analogous to the engagement in a profession or carrying on a business.

I think the provision of having a blind trust, such as the

Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology apparently has established for his

winnings in the lottery. He advised the public that his million dollar lottery

winnings, after looking after some personal matters and very kindly offering to

send his mother on a trip anywhere she wants to go, he said publicly that he

would take the rest of the money, put it in a blind trust, until he no longer is

in public office. That, Mr. Chairman, is what we are suggesting here. If Cabinet

ministers want to engage in, or have investments in stock markets, that is

something they could continue to have and maintain, and have someone as a

trustee to look after those investments while they are in public office, and as

long as the arrangement is approved by the commissioner, and that would seem to

be satisfactory to the commissioner, then it would certainly be satisfactory to

this hon. member that that continue.

So I would propose that amendment to hon. members for their

consideration. I would have been happy to do so at our legislative committee

stage but it was not proposed by anybody and it had not come to my attention

until I heard today that the Liberal opposition in Saskatchewan felt that this

was a valid criticism of the Saskatchewan bill. I agree also that it is a valid

criticism of our bill because it has not had it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Some of them enjoy trading and hon. members,

such as the Member for LaPoile, could continue in his stock speculations. I do

not know what ones he speculates in. I am sure, not being in Cabinet, he has

lots of time for that - to engage in these things. Perhaps one day when he is a

member of the Cabinet he will not have time to do that, but this is for Cabinet

ministers only and it is in keeping with the provisions of

Section 27.

When hon. members have a copy of it - I believe a copy is now

being made for the opposition and for the Government House Leader -perhaps we

can deal with it then.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. ROBERTS: The hon. gentleman has posed a problem. This

Bill has been looked at for a fairly long time, as he would acknowledge, and it

was dealt with by a select committee on which both he and I served, and has been

here in the House for some considerable period of time. It is essentially the

same as the bill that was introduced before Christmas, with some fairly minor

changes reflecting the recommendations of the committee.

I gather what has happened is that he heard from some people

in Saskatchewan earlier today. The fact they are Liberals, I admire his taste,

but it not his taste, it is his timing that is causing the trouble because here

we are now, at committee stage, and he is sort of drafting on the run and we are

getting hand written amendments.

I must say to him, with all respect, that is not the way that

we should be doing legislation. In fact, in a day or two or three we will get to

the utilities taxation bill where the reason it is coming back in the House is

that we fell into exactly the sort of trap that the hon. gentleman is saying.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. ROBERTS: No, I say to my friend from Humber East, we

did not create the trap, but amendments that had not been properly thought

through were put through. It is not the policy. The policy of the bill, in fact,

looks better and better all the time.

I say to my hon. friend, I am not prepared to ask my

colleagues and friends on this side to support the amendment. Let me go on,

though, to say two things.

I have some difficulty with the thought that a minister of

the Crown, and

Section 27 refers only to ministers of the Crown - I just turn it

up here in my copy of the bill - it refers to ministers and that, by the way,

includes Parliamentary secretaries. We only have one and are likely only to have

one, but should there be more than one it would include more than one, that a

minister of the Crown buying and selling shares is engaging in a business or the

practice of a profession.

I do not know what kind of portfolios ministers have or may

have had or may have in the future, but you have to have a pretty big portfolio

and be at it a lot - you would be doing a lot of trading before it becomes

carrying on the practice of a profession, or engaged in employment.

The danger with ministers holding shares is a different one

and recognized, I suggest, by other parts of the Bill, and that is where a

minister, or for that matter a member, has an interest in something and it is

not properly disclosed or it is an improper interest.

I could say to my hon. friend that the Premier - he said this

many times in the House and outside, and I know he intends to carry on the

policy - as a condition of belonging to his Cabinet. Those of us who are in the

Cabinet, the fourteen of us, are there only because the Premier has invited us

to join his Cabinet, and we will be there only as long as he asks us to stay in

his Cabinet, or until we leave of our own volition, or until the electorate

takes us out. The point is that one is in the Cabinet because the Premier asks

one to join the ministry and one accepts it. The Premier, as a condition has

said, and we are moving to put into place the necessary paper work that there

will be blind trusts, real blind trusts. I will not go into blind trusts in

detail. In fact the blind trusts that can be put in place under the federal

rules are not blind. They are not even trusts in most cases but they are not

blind. There are all sorts of other problems that blind trusts do not engage. I

have an interest in a business that I bought from my father many years ago, my

brothers and I have it. A blind trust does not solve that. How do you deal with

a private company for which there are no shares? If I owned 1000 shares in the

Bank of Montreal that is easy to sell or easy to trade. Ring up your broker and

they are gone tomorrow. You pay a bit of a commission, get your money in, and on

you go, but if you own 1000 shares in the Widget Manufacturing Limited of

LaPoile or the Cormack Strawberry Farm Limited of Cormack that is not as easy an

interest to dispose of.

I say to my hon. friend that I do not think his amendment is

necessary because the policy point he seeks to achieve will be addressed in

another way, and in just as effective a way. I also say with respect that we are

not prepared to have amendments dealt with in this way, handwritten amendments

being brought into the House. When I say 'without thought,' I am not accusing

the hon. member of anything devious or careless but as he himself acknowledged

he had a phone conversation of some sort a little while ago and now it is

leading to amendments here in the House. I have the Saskatchewan bill. I sent

him a note he will recall on Monday of this week to say that I have it and if he

would like a copy of it I would have been happy to send it to him. My officials

have had it since August 17 and I can tell my hon. friend that this is one of

the bills that my officials, Mr. Curran and Mr. Lake took into account when they

drafted the Bill before us now. Mr. Curran met with the committee and

participated in the discussions. He is a lawyer on whom I have relied and he has

done a splendid job on this piece of work. Mr. Lake is the legislative counsel

and does equally splendid work. It is our view that the Bill now before the

committee is substantially better in policy, and if I may say in drafting, than

the Saskatchewan one. Now my friend Bob Mitchell, the Attorney General in

Saskatchewan, may not concur but I stand by it, that the present Bill is an

improvement on the Saskatchewan legislation.

I must say to my learned that with respect, and with regret,

I shall be asking my colleagues not to accept his amendment.

MR. CHAIRMAN: On motion Sub-clause 27 (1), carried.

Shall the amendment carry?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Those against.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Nay.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I declare the amendment defeated.

MR. HARRIS: I am quite prepared to accept that the

amendment is going to be defeated but I would like to have a vote.

MR. ROBERTS: Your Honour called -

MR. HARRIS: Your Honour asked whether it carried and

someone said, yes, and someone said, no, and then you asked who was opposed to

it. There has to be a proper vote, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: All those in favour of the amendment say

'Aye.'

AN HON. MEMBER: Aye.

MR. CHAIRMAN: All those against say 'Nay.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Nay.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I declare the amendment defeated.

On motion Sections 28 through to 58, carried.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Shall the enacting clause carry?

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Chairman, before we carry that. I did

not speak in the second reading debate because I could not have added anything

to the speech made by my friend for Gander, the Minister of Finance and the

President of Treasury Board, but let me make a couple of points to deal with

points which my friend for Kilbride made which in my view were made seriously,

not all his points are but these were and I certainly want to deal with them. I

agree completely with him that the committee stage was a very useful exercise

and let me say here now that we shall be moving to see what we can do to revive

the review committees, they got off track before Christmas, I accept my share of

the blame for that and we will see if we can get them back on track.

The act is subject to proclamation, it is our intention, I

say to the House, Mr. Chairman, to proclaim the act as quickly as we can, there

may be a need to get some forms, we will have to get a commissioner in place but

as soon as we can get it in place, we will. I agree completely the commissioner

is the key and these are points I think which a number of hon. members made, the

person who is to be the commissioner will be the key to this act. The

commissioner as Your Honour will recall, is appointed by the House, and we wrote

in a very unusual provision in this, that the commissioner shall be appointed by

the House of Assembly on the motion of the Premier, following consultation with

the leader of the Official Opposition and representatives of other registered

political parties, which of course is the phrase from the Elections Act, other

registered political parties having representation in the House of Assembly, and

I think that is an earnest of how we intend to approach this.

I will make one other comment. Spousal interest, a number of

members have spoken, I think my friend from Kilbride did. This act attempts to

strike a balance between competing interests. We believe it is a good balance,

time will tell whether it is or not, but it is an attempt to strike a balance

between the right of a spouse to carry on his or her profession and on the other

hand, the right of the public to be assured that the professional spouse is not

improperly benefitting from the fact that the spouse of the professional spouse

is a member of this House or a Minister of the Crown. With that said, Mr.

Chairman, thank you very much.

A bill, "An Act To Amend The House Of Assembly Act." (Bill

No. 1)

Motion, that the Committee report having passed the bill

without amendment, carried.

On motion, that the Committee rise, report progress and ask

leave to sit again, Mr. Speaker returned to the Chair.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Bellevue.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, the Committee of the Whole has

considered the matter to it referred, has passed the bill, Bill No. 1, without

amendment, and ask leave to sit again.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The House Of Assembly

Act", read a third time, ordered passed and its title be as on the Order Paper.

(Bill No. 1).

MR. ROBERTS: Order No. 10, Mr. Speaker, which is Bill

No.2, in the name of my friend The Minister of Environment and Lands.

Motion, second read of a bill, "An Act Respecting The

Reduction Of The Impact Of Packaging On The Environment". (Bill No. 2).

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Environment and

Lands.

MS. COWAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am pleased to be able to bring this legislation before the

House today. It is enabling legislation and I will give a bit of the background

why this legislation is here and what we hope to accomplished by having it

passed by this House.

The Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment brought

together a national packaging protocol, to which we as a government are party.

This protocol establishes targets for getting rid of waste, waste packaging - I

just find it a little difficult, Mr. Speaker, to talk when there are so many

other conversations around me. Anyway this Canadian packaging protocol

establishes targets for packaging waste and it is hoped by the year 2000 that

there will be a reduction of 50 per cent of the waste that goes into the waste

fill sites and the litter and so on, in Canada. An industry has been involved in

this and has volunteered actually to meet these requirements without

legislation. However, at the same time they have encouraged us to put in

legislation because of the fact that this establishes a level playing field

across Canada. You will notice I think if you buy things that packaging is

changing, a certain milk producing company here in St. John's is now putting

their milk products into a plastic bag and their idea in that is that it will

reduce what goes into the waste fill sites by 95 per cent, which is quite

startling when you think there is that difference between a wax milk carton and

the plastic bag that they are now using.

A variety in fact are, national, international companies

complying with the federal target of reaching this 50 per cent reduction in

waste by the year 2000. Each of the provinces is bringing in legislation such as

I have today, not exactly the same but similar legislation, as I said to

establish what we can see as an industrial level playing field acrose the

nation. So this act will enable the minister to collect data on packaging by a

company, institution or government department, or agency. It would enable the

minister to undertake various research projects on packaging and it also

provides for substantial fines up to $250,000 for contravention of the act or

regulations thereunder.

As well, it will provide the minister with the ability to

make regulations prescribing standards and codes in packaging, the minister will

then be able to regulate content and composition of packaging, provide for

reduction, reuse and recylying infrastructure for specific packaging types,

require the development of packaging waste reduction and prevention plans,

requiring periodiac packaging waste audits and requiring payment of a deposit on

packaging. So this is why the legislation is coming, it enables the minister to

set up regulations having to do with packaging in the Province. Beverage

containers, for example, one of the issues we are working on now, this

legislation will be of use when we put in place some regulations to in fact

control the beverage container problem.

So, I am pleased, Mr. Speaker, today to be able to bring this

Bill to the House for second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Harbour Main.

MR. DOYLE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate your

recognizing me. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have a few words to say on this

particular piece of legislation, environmental issues are certainly at the

forefront in the world today, all around the world environmental issues are

getting a little bit more attention than they previously did and environmental

groups in society generally are encouraging governments to be a little bit more

environmentally friendly also, Mr. Speaker, because I am sure all of us from

time to time have the opportunity to go into the country and to walk in the

woodlands and you see the litter everywhere. The pop cans all over the place and

the beer cartons and the empty beer bottles and you have to ask yourself, does

anyone really, really care about the environment today. We talk about the

environment and we say how very important it is to have a nice clean society and

a nice clean environment, but still when you go into the country and you see

what's happening all around us.... It's hardly believable when you see the

amount of pop cans, litter and beer cartons and what have you all over the

place.

I don't know where we stand in comparison to other provinces

but it really strikes me that we here in this Province are not as

environmentally friendly as we should be. We certainly have one of the most

beautiful provinces in Canada -

AN HON. MEMBER: Enemies of the environment.

MR. DOYLE: - but we are, yes, we're enemies of the

environment when you get right down to it. I don't know if there's a - I

shouldn't say it but I will - if there's a sloppier or a dirtier bunch of people

when it comes to walking in the country and throwing pop cans, beer cartons and

bottles all over the place. Mr. Speaker, I think we all have to be concerned in

that regard.

Now we've heard the minister on occasion talk about

recycling. I've heard and seen the minister myself talking on radio and t.v.

about the importance of the legislation that she was intending to bring in. I

looked through this Bill today and I have some concerns about it, actually.

Specifically I have concerns about Clause 5 in the Bill. It says that: "The

minister may (

a) undertake or support and encourage programs or research

into...," and it goes on that she may do that with respect to "(

i) environmental

profiles of packaging materials..." and the minister may - again, may -

undertake or support and encourage programs into "(ii) market development...."

It keeps going on - may, may, may, may, may.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DOYLE: May. I'm talking about what the minister may

do but not what she shall do or what she should do or what she will do. It keeps

saying "may."

Then you get down to Clause 6 in the Bill, the regulations.

"The Lieutenant-Governor in Council may make regulations...." Now the

Lieutenant-Governor in Council of course is Cabinet. So Cabinet may make

regulations prescribing a whole bunch of things. We get down - one, two, three,

four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. "The Lieutenant-Governor in Council

may make regulations (

a) prescribing standards and codes in packaging..., (

b) governing the content and composition of the packaging...." Again, Cabinet may

provide for the reduction and recycling system. It's all "may," Mr. Speaker, and

I have some real concerns about that.

Why didn't the minister come in with a bill saying: the

minister will, or the minister shall, do it. Not the minister may. So of what

purpose is the Act, I would ask the Minister of Environment and Lands, if it

doesn't require anyone to do anything? Now that's what it amounts to. This Act

doesn't require the minister, or it doesn't require the government, to do

anything. I would like to see that changed, if we can change it or amend it in

Committee, that the minister shall make regulations, the minister will make

regulations. Not the minister may make regulations, or the Lieutenant-Governor

in Council - Cabinet - may make regulations.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DOYLE: Yes, Mr. Speaker. So I would like to see that

changed in Committee. After all, if you look at the Highway Traffic Act it

doesn't say that you may be required to travel ninety kilometres an hour. It

says you will. I would ask the minister to give some serious consideration to

these comments. Granted it is a good public relations document but it doesn't

address the real concerns.

I would say to the minister, if she's not prepared to bring

in a bill that has some teeth in it, and actually requires someone to do

something, then there is really not much use in doing it. Because we've all seen

the minister as I said on t.v. and heard her on radio talking about legislation

and talking about environmental issues, and controlling the use of pop bottles

and the importance of recycling. I think we were, in fairness to the minister,

led to expect that the legislation would deal with these problems - that we

would actually have an action plan; but when I see this Bill I am inclined to

say that what we are getting is a couple of operational clauses there that say

that government may or may not do something.

Mr. Speaker, I do not know what kind of a signal that sends

to people out there who have been waiting for this type of legislation, and the

various environmental groups who have been expecting the minister to bring in a

bill that has some real teeth in it.

Then you get over to - and I do not know the significance of

this one, Clause VIII. Maybe somebody with a legal background can tell me. Where

a person has been convicted of an offence under this act, the courts 'may' - the

whole Bill is all 'may', 'may', 'may'. The minister 'may' make regulations, and

the Lieutenant-Governor in Council 'may' do this or do that.

I am just wondering if there are any concerns that I flagged

for the minister, and if she can tell me why the act is worded in that

particular way and why it would not give the act a little bit more teeth and

give it more authority by actually putting in 'shall', or the government 'will'

do it.

Mr. Speaker, these are all the comments I have to make.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's South.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. MURPHY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker - just a few words.

I have to agree with the Member for Harbour Main that I think

this particular piece of legislation -

AN HON. MEMBER: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. Member for St. John's East on a point of order.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

After the minister had spoken, I rose and was recognized by

the Chair and then deferred to the Member for Harbour Main. After having been

recognized by the Chair I would have expected that after the Member for Harbour

Main spoke I would be given the floor. Now the Chair has recognized the Member

for St. John's South and I think as a point of order I should be recognized

next.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. Minister of Finance on a point of order.

MR. BAKER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

To that point of order raised by the Member for St. John's

East, it is practice in this House, Your Honour, for the Speaker to recognize

individuals, members that the Speaker sees standing. The Speaker recognized the

Member for St. John's East and then recognized that he had made perhaps an error

and recognized the Member for Harbour Main.

The Member for St. John's East indicated that he would be

willing to give up his turn because I believe he recognized that the Member for

Harbour Main was standing first, so he sat down.

It is also another custom of the House, Your Honour, that

where possible the debate goes back and forth. In fact, the Member for St.

John's South stood up and Your Honour was following a time-honoured tradition in

the House of going back and forth one side and then somebody on the other. If

there is nobody from one side who stands up, then you get two speakers or more

from the other side of the House.

Also, Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out that you are not

depriving the Member for St. John's East of his chance to speak because he can

speak as soon as the Member for St. John's South sits down.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. MATTHEWS: To that point of order, Mr. Speaker, I

think the members have pretty well explained what happened. The Speaker

recognized the Member for St. John's East in error because he should have

recognized the critic, the Member for Harbour Main. With that, the Member for

St. John's East gave way - gave leave to the member.

AN HON. MEMBER: Graciously.

MR. MATTHEWS: Yes, courteously, graciously. Even though

it is right what the Minister of Finance says, that usually we go, if the Member

for St. John's South would be as courteous now as to give way for the Member for

St. John's East, then the problem would be resolved. We would not get into a

wrangle. I am sure the Member for St. John's South is going to do that.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's South to

the point of order.

MR. MURPHY: I have no problem relinquishing to the member

for St. John's East, as long as the Member for St. John's East understands that

the clock started when he stood up on his point of order.

AN HON. MEMBER: What, give him time?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member was not recognized, so his time did not

start. Is the hon. member giving leave to the hon. Member for St. John's East?

The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the hon.

Member for St. John's South for his courtesy.

I do want to speak to this Bill and I am very sorry that the

minister is not in her chair, although she is back in the Chamber now. I want to

make some remarks on this legislation because I think what we have here is very

unfortunate. It is very unfortunate, Mr. Speaker, that what we have now before

us is the product of four years of this government dilly-dallying with the issue

of beverage containers, containerization and packaging, four years of

dilly-dallying, four years of promises that they were consulting, that they were

thinking about the issue, that they were consulting with groups and it was a

very complex issue. Everybody who criticised them for not having a piece of

legislation were told to be patient because we are working on this, we are

consulting with everybody, we are going to do this right and when we come forth

we will have our policies, we will know what we are going to do and we will have

our decision made.

Well, Mr. Speaker, what do we have? We have a public

relations exercise, Mr. Speaker, the mountain laboured and brought forth a mouse

because there is nothing in this legislation whatsoever indicating what the

governments policy is with respect to containers. Nothing whatsoever indicating

what policy the government will pursue with respect to the overwhelming dumping

of containers in this Province and in particular beverage containers. Every day

there are tons and tons and tons of beverage containers imported into this

Province which contain fruit juices, apple juices or these speciality juices

that are coming out, all being brought into this Province, Mr. Speaker, not one

of them returnable, not one of them refillable, not one of them available for

any real re-cycling and this government and this minister have stood by for

three or four years telling us to be patient, be patient because we have a plan,

we will have this figured out and we will present this to the House of Assembly,

well, where is it, Mr. Speaker? All we have here is a Cabinet. The Cabinet may

make regulations that is all.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: No, the minister is not allowed to make

regulations. No, no, no the minister cannot make regulations. The minister may

undertake a program to encourage research.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Well, thank you very much. This, Mr. Speaker,

after four years of government, the minister now may undertake and encourage

programs on research into environmental profiles of packaging materials. Well,

isn't that progress? The minister may require a corporation to collect data on

packaging, well that is progress. What a substantial and humongous progress

being made by this government. I am not attacking the Minister of Environment

personally, I believe she is probably sincere. I know she was out in Salmonier

Line two years ago when hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of bags of garbage

were hauled out of the wilderness area.

MR. TOBIN: Who was on the Salmonier Line?

MR. HARRIS: The Minister of Environment and Lands was out

in the wilderness area two summers ago, when helicoptors were required to take

bags and bags and bags of garbage in the wilderness area of this Province. So

she knows and she is sincere. I believe she is sincere and lots of people were

volunteering to help to remove this garbage from the wilderness, this packaging

material, these bottles, these containers, that have been dumped there by

Newfoundlanders unscrupulous Newfoundlanders going into the wilderness area and

leaving behind their junk, containers and their garbage. So, I know the minister

believes. I suppose it is like persons going to church, Mr. Speaker, on Sunday

morning when a person goes to church, they get down on their knees and they say

they believe and in some places they have to stand up and say they believe. So,

what we have is the minister constantly, for the past four years, testifying as

to her belief in the environment.

Well, Mr. Speaker, that is what we have had from this

government, we have had a lot of testifying about their beliefs but we have not

seen any substantial action from this minister with respect to what the policy

of the government is on beverage containers.

We know that the Conservative government in Ottawa through

ACOA gave $800,000 in 1988 to build a bottling plant to make these two-litre

plastic bottles to be spread all over the environment. We know that. We know

what the Conservative government in Ottawa did. It gave them $800,000. Let's

manufacture hundreds of thousand of plastic containers and spew them all over

the environment. Fill up our landfills, fill up our environment. We know that,

we know what they did. What we want to know is what this minister is going to

do. We haven't heard that. There's not one ounce of policy in this bill, not one

ounce. But there are a lot of things to worry about. There's not very much here

but what we have gives us a certain cause to be concerned.

MR. TOBIN: What about the NDP (Inaudible) Hibernia?

MR. HARRIS: Let's look at the definition of "recovery."

MR. TOBIN: What about the NDP (Inaudible) provincially

and federally?

MR. HARRIS: Let's look at the definition of recovery, Mr.

Speaker. If the Member for Burin - Placentia West would listen instead of

speaking he might learn something. The word "recovery" is defined in this Act as

follows, in 2(d): "'recovery' means the process of obtaining and reutilizing

material or energy from solid waste."

Now I ask you, what do we mean by finding energy from solid

waste? Let's ask Long Harbour. What do they call themselves? North American

Resource Recovery. They're going to change from solid waste to energy. The

minister in her legislation recognises this as an environmental, apparently, as

one of the environmental actions that she is going to be looking into and

researching, collecting data on and promoting. The "reutilizing material or

energy from solid waste." So the burning of garbage in Long Harbour appears to

be one of the things that the minister in the new Act wants to deal with under

the disguise of an environmental bill.

So what we have is after four years of inaction, of

dilly-dallying, of making excuses, we don't have a policy. We have nothing. We

have something that they can take to the electorate, Mr. Speaker -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: - something they can take to the electorate,

I say to the Member for St. John's North. I know that the Minister of

Environment, the Premier and the other people who are running - the Member for

St. John's North has wisely decided to give it up - they'll be going out and

saying: we have a bill. We passed legislation on containers. We've passed

legislation to promote the environment, we've passed legislation to protect

recycling, we've passed legislation to do something about beverage containers.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: But they won't have, Mr. Speaker. All they

will have passed is Bill No. 2. So that they can say that they've passed

legislation but there will be no policy to eliminate useless packaging. No

policy. Only a bill to allow the minister to collect data. Now we don't have a

time limit on this. I don't know how many years the government is going to give

the minister to collect data. Perhaps another four or five. Why don't we have a

policy statement from the minister as to what the government intends to do in

terms of protecting the environment from packaging? Why don't we have something

which says that we're going to have a policy that requires the refilling of

certain kinds of containers?

When you have a certain number of bottles - I'm not saying

that every single item that comes into this Province has to be refillable. But

let's look at these juices. In the last three years there's a new juice industry

in this Province, last three years. That have never been there before. We have

these tall bottles of juice, they look like the old former Coke bottles. They're

about eight inches high and you can open them with your hand. They don't even

require an opener. Those did not exist in this Province before three years ago,

but they exist now in the hundreds of thousands. They're all over the

environment. You can see them in every corner store, every convenience store,

and in every supermarket in this Province. Some of them are even bottled in this

Province but not one of them is refillable, Mr. Speaker.

Maybe your memories are better than mine, or maybe they are

worse than mine, but I suspect that everybody in this House knows that you could

not buy a soft drink in this Province some time ago except in a bottle that went

back to the bottling plant, was refilled and came back to the store again, but

now you cannot buy a single soft drink in a refillable container, not one, and I

challenge any member of this House or any member of the government sitting over

there to bring in and put on the floor of this House one single soft drink

product that is in a refillable container that is refilled in this Province.

MR. TOBIN: But that is life.

MR. HARRIS: You can do it with beer but you cannot do it

with soft drinks. What has been happening in this Province is that the

government - not only this government - I am looking at both sides of the House

here, Mr. Speaker. It is not just this government but this government and the

previous government. I am not saying this is a personal failing of the Minister

of Environment and Lands so she does not have to get too worried, and the rest

of you over there do not have to try and protect her. It is not a personal

failing of the Minister of the Environment. It is a failure of policy by this

government and the previous government. Not one single soft drink, Mr. Speaker,

is available in this Province without it being in a bottle that is used once and

then thrown away. Now some of them say they are recyclable. Some of the

packaging material says, recyclable where available. Now, I do not know what

that means. What I think it means is it is not recyclable. I think it means

there are no facilities here to recycle those products and they put on it

recyclable where available or where facilities permit. I suspect, Mr. Speaker,

that every time a package says recyclable where facilities exist they do not

exist here in this Province. I would suspect that where a package says where

facilities exist they do not exist.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. HARRIS: Now, I know the Member for St. John's North

is going to tell me they are studying it. We are studying it. We are going to

have a Royal Commission. We are going to have consultation. We are going to have

continued consultation. We might produce a three or four volume report. We have

seen those before but what I want to hear is what the government is going to do.

Where is the policy that says we are going to have refillable containers for

soft drinks? Where is the policy that says we are not going to allow people to

produce this kind of packaging without having refillable containers?

I went to law school in the province of Alberta and I know

the Member for St. John's North is very familiar with the province of Alberta. I

think he probably has a PhD or four or five degrees from there, I would not be

surprised. He may have ten. He went to the same university as I did in the

province of Alberta. When I was there in 1976, that is when I went to law school

in the province of Alberta, they had in that province at that time a recycling

policy for any container, not just the refillable ones, although most of them

were. Mr. Speaker, wine bottles, and the product is not even produced in the

province of Alberta except perhaps some blueberry wine or some kind of prairie

berry. What would they be called? I do not know. Some Saskatchewan berry wine,

Saskatoon berries, I think. They used to make wine out of Saskatoon berries.

There were not very many wine bottles from Saskatoon berries, Mr. Speaker, but

there were lots of wine bottles from French wine, Portuguese wine, Italian wine,

and California wines out in Alberta and they were all returned because the

government of Alberta had a policy.

I think it was a conservative government as a matter or fact

who had a policy and a program so that you could bring all those bottles back to

bottle depots. You did not get a lot of money for them but when I was a student

the five or ten cents you would get back for a wine bottle, if you put them all

together with beer bottles and various other things, you could go off to the

bottle depot every Saturday, every three or four Saturday mornings and get

yourself a few dollars back and you would be doing something for the

environment. I do not know if these bottles were actually worth five or ten

cents. They probably were not, Mr. Speaker, but there was a policy in place to

ensure that there was something to provide that these bottles would be brought

back. There was an incentive to bring them back.

The Member for Burin - Placentia West, the next time he goes

into the pond in the country - what is the name of it?

MR. TOBIN: Garnish Pond.

MR. HARRIS: Garnish Pond. The next time he goes into

Garnish Pond on his skidoo he will know that in Garnish Pond he could probably

find lots and lots of bottles - lots of beer bottles, lots of beverage

containers - if there was an incentive to bring them out.

AN HON. MEMBER: Beer bottles.

MR. HARRIS: Beer bottles. If there was an incentive to

bring them out - there is already an incentive for beer bottles to get out - but

if there was an incentive to bring the wine bottles and the containers and the

other cans out, and bring them back, then he and his family and his friends

would be loading up their skidoos and bringing them back out to Marystown and

collecting the money for it, or giving them to the Boy Scouts or the Girl

Guides, or the Boys and Girls Club, or somebody in their community would be

doing that.

If we had refillable containers for soft drinks, the same way

we do for beer bottles, we would have two things. We would have a better

environment because we would be using less materials and those containers would

be refilled again, and we would also have more jobs in this Province, because I

will tell you, Mr. Speaker, if the beer companies had to bring the beer bottles

back to Nova Scotia or back to Toronto to refill them and send them back here

again - if they had to do that - they would not be moving their production to

Toronto.

AN HON. MEMBER: They do it in PEI.

MR. HARRIS: PEI, Mr. Speaker, a little, tiny Province

one-sixth the size of this Province, does not allow containers that are not

refillable for soft drinks.

Our Province has participated in - has been cajoled and been

convinced by the soft drink companies over the years, to allow them - and I

think we have the worst record in this country - I think that would bear up

under research, Mr. Speaker - the worst record in this country, for allowing the

soft drink companies to move to non-refillable, non-returnable, non-refundable

soft drinks - the worst record in this country.

Successive governments on the Conservative side and on the

Liberal side have permitted these agencies to move away from returnable,

refillable, containers and to move to the plastics and to the aluminum, and to

the cans that have been spewing about and going into our environment.

I am not saying, Mr. Speaker, that every single container has

to be refillable. I am not saying that every single container has to be of the

type that is refillable. There are adequate methods to recycle certain kinds of

containers. Aluminum can be recycled, I understand, very favourably if treated

in a certain way, and there may well be appropriate ways of doing that.

I am not saying that you get rid of all of that, but there

can be rules and regulations. Now this provides that there can be. This provides

that we can have rules and regulations.

The Cabinet, not in public debate in this House but secretly

behind the Cabinet boardroom, behind the Cabinet secrecy there will be a debate

about what they will do. Will we have this legislation or will we not have this

legislation? Will we hurt Browning Harvey or will we not? Will we hurt the

breweries or will we not? Will we go along with their policies or will we not?

Will we listen to talk about level playing fields, which I just heard the

minister refer to? Are we going to be talking about level playing fields with

the beer companies and the other companies? Are we going to be dealing with the

business interests or are we going to be dealing with the environmental

interests?

All that discussion is planned to go on in the Cabinet room,

Mr. Speaker, not here on the floor of this House - in the Cabinet room. Then we

will see - maybe we will see - some time down the road some regulations on some

aspects of it. They will not be brought before this House for debate. They will

not be brought before this House with the alternatives as set out to the members

of this House. What we will have is some regulation appearing at some time,

published in the Newfoundland Gazette, and no policy debates in this House

because there will be no time for it. It will be done in the secrecy of the

Cabinet room. We will have no policy that is going to be scrutinized by the

public in debate in this House. We will have something done, a few regulations

in the Cabinet room, and nothing for the public other than having to hear what

the minister has to say in her public relations statements which she has been

very good at - very good at. When she approaches this matter, when she speaks

publicly about this, when she goes out to Salmonier, the wilderness park and -

MR. TOBIN: How do you know she was on the Salmonier Line?

MR. HARRIS: She was out to the Salmonier Line, I do not

think she was fishing, I think she was there one Saturday or one Sunday

afternoon and there were a lot of people volunteering, and I do not know why,

why would you have to volunteer to clean up a wilderness area? If it is a

wilderness area you would think the people of this Province would have some

respect for the wilderness areas and not bring garbage and containers in there

and leave them in there, Mr. Speaker, you would think they would, but

unfortunately, that is not the case, and when we have the Minister of Forestry

and Agriculture permitting the forests to be ripped up, the way he does, whether

it be close to communities or not - the minister laughs, well I will ask him to

table in this House, tell us how many acres of land have been clear cut in this

Province in the last ten years and not replanted, table that in the House -

AN HON. MEMBER: The last thirty years.

MR. HARRIS: Go back thirty years, go back four years, how

many acres of land have been clear cut in this Province in the last four years

and not replanted? You can go back ten, go back twenty, go back thirty, yes, but

when we see the destruction that has been permitted to our forests, I suppose

one might be tempted to say it is no wonder the people of this Province leave

their junk and garbage in the woods because it appears that the government does

not seem to have enough respect for the land to make sure that it is kept in the

proper way. There is enough blame to go around, there is enough blame to go

around. I think the minister is just trying to spread the blame around. I am

sure there is enough blame to go around, the former government can take some,

each of us as individuals I am sure can probably examine our own consciences and

remember some time that we might not have been totally perfect in our behaviour.

But, Mr. Speaker, we have to look to the future with respect

to a policy on beverage containers, not a piece of legislation that is a shell,

a shell, no policy, no determination, no commitment, no substance to this Bill

whatsoever, it is what is called empowering legislation, that is all it is. It

is known as empowering legislation, no substance, no policy, no commitment other

than the platitudes of the hon. Minister of Environment and Lands.

That is all they are left with and I suspect that the only

reason we have this Bill, is because the minister is afraid, is frightened to

death to go into an election having had to admit that she has failed to produce

a single piece of legislation on beverage containers when she promised them for

so long and that, Mr. Speaker, is a travesty. Any friend, any true friend of the

environment would have to agree that this piece of legislation is a travesty of

environmental protection, a travesty in its lack of environmental protection.

That is why I felt it important to speak on this legislation

because I think what we have here is a con job. A con job, Mr. Speaker, a total

and unadulterated con job, and I say this with respect for the personal

sincerity of the Member for Conception Bay South. She has been required by her

government to perpetrate a con job on the people of this Province, a con job in

this House, there is not one ounce of progressive policy in this legislation, it

is window dressing. We all know what window dressing is, Mr. Speaker, somebody

who is dressed up to make it look like there is something going on behind the

windows, and they hope against hope that the voters of this Province are only

going to go window shopping, that is all they hope. They hope and they think

that their public relations effort will work, they think that having a little

bit of window dressing will convince the voters of this Province to satisfy

themselves with window shopping.

Well let us just go and look at the record of this government

and see what they have in their windows. Have they a piece of legislation on the

go? Oh yes, we have car wreck legislation. We've changed the legislation on

littering. We're going to fine people a half a million dollars for littering.

Isn't that wonderful. I'm sure that the people who litter, who may not have a

cent to their name, are very worried about the fact that they might be fined

half a million dollars for littering the public highways.

That's the window dressing, Mr. Speaker. Changes to the Waste

Disposal Act, we'll fine people a half million dollars for littering. We've got

a car wreck act. Not one that's going to really encourage people to bring back

cars and bring them out of the woods, but one that's going to punish them if

they don't. That's all.

MR. DOYLE: There are more car wrecks now (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: The critic for the official Opposition, Mr.

Speaker, says there are more car wrecks since. I tend to believe him. Because I

know the Member for Harbour Main has been very concerned personally about this

issue even though his government was not successful in solving the problem

either. If there are more car wrecks since - and if the member says that, I

suspect that it's probably true.

What we have is window dressing. Another piece of window

dressing. They hope that the voters of this Province are only going to go window

shopping and see what they have. The minister will say with all the sincerity

she can muster, she will say: we have a piece of legislation. She'll probably

say: we're working on the regulations. For the last four years she's been saying

she's been working on the Bill. She said that with great sincerity.

MS. COWAN: I haven't been there for four years.

MR. HARRIS: For all the time she's been there she's been

saying: we're working on the Bill. Mr. Speaker, she worked on the Bill and this

is what we got. A piece of window dressing for the election and we'll be hearing

that they are working on the regulations. We won't hear any real substance.

Because I don't think that this government is prepared to take on this issue. I

don't think this government is prepared to take on this issue in a serious way

and try and seriously do something about