Manitoba Hansard — 13 March 1980 (Sitting 16A, 31st Legislature, 4th Session)

31-4-16a

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

Time: 2 :30 p .m . LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MANITOB A Thursday , 13 March , 1 98 0 OP ENING PRAYER by Mr. Speaker . MR. SPEAKER , Hon . Harry E. Graham (Birtle-Russe ll): Befo re we proc eed , I should like to draw the honourable members ' atte ntion to the gallery , where we have 12 students of Grade 11 Standing from the Power view High School . These students are under the direction of Mrs . Larson , this school is in the cons tituency of the Honourable Member for Rupert sland. We also have 43 students of Grade ll Standing from the Diocesan High School , under the direction of Mr. Insull.

This school is in the constituency of the Honourable Member for st. Boni face . On behalf of all the honourable members, we welcome you here this after noon . Prese nt ing Petitions • • • Reading and Receiving Petit ions • • Pres enting Reports by Standing and Special Committees Ministerial Statements and Tabling of Reports ••• Notices of M'.>tion ••• Introducti on of Bills. MATTER OF URGENCY MR. HOWARD PAWLEY (Selk irk ): Mr. Speaker , I wish to move a matter before Oral Questions dealing with the matter of urgency . Mr •. Speaker , moved by myse lf , se conded by the Honourable Member for St .

Johns ; That pursuan t to Rule 27 (1), I move to set aside the ordinary business of the House to consider a matter of urgent public importance to wit ; that the government has mislead this Hous e and the peopl e of Manitoba by failing to make adequate budgetary provisions as outlined in the Throne Speech for subs tantial increases in the aDDunts provided for the operation of post secondary instit utions in the public school system. Therefore , the government has not prevented dramatic increas es in the mill rates within Manitoba school divisions, and has allowed reduc tions in the educa tional programs . MR.

SPEAKER: The honourable member will have five minutes in order to put forward the urgency for this debate . The Honourable Leader of the Opposition . MR. PAWLEY : Mr. Speaker , in presenting this matter for debate , the urgency of the matter , I first would like to point out a contradi ction which has occurred between the announcement by the Winnipeg School Division No . 1 that it will be meeting with the Minister of Educa tion on March 2lst, in order to present to the Ministe r of Education a request for an additional $8 million.

And the statement yesterday by the Minister of Education in this Hous e, which reads as follows : "I t has never been the practice of government to depart from the funding sc hedule applicable to all sch ool 1 divisions of the province . I can 't see in this particular instance that we will be departing from that particular practic e" . Mr . Speaker , we are faced with a deadline by th e School Di vision No . 1 and for other sc hool divisions within Manitoba to present to the City of Winnipeg and to other municipalities their Est imates for school spending by March 15th. We know, Mr.

Speaker , that already it 's clear , in view of the increase by the Minister of Education in the foundation levy which will af fe ct all Manitoba rate payer s, commerci al, farm , residential; we know that due to the increases that are tak ing place this year insof ar as spending , that there will be considerable mill rate increases , sharp mill rate increases , and that 's very very clear from what is oc curring now in the City of Winnipeg; we know as well, Mr.

Speaker , that there will be cuts in educ ational programs this year as a resul t of what is taking place under the leadership of the Minister of Educa tion . Now, Mr. Speake r, for us to delay this motion to a date beyond March 15 th , will mean that it will be too late. It will be too late if we await the Estimates of the Minister of Education . It will be too late if we await the meeting of March 2lst , in which the Minister of Educa tion is meeting with school trustees from - 815 -

Thursday, 13 March, 1980 Winnipeg School Division No . 1. The deadline is M3.rch 15th, in which the Estimates are to be provided to the var ious municipalities . Mr. Speaker, that meeting of M3.rch 2lst will be little better but a farce . Little can come out of su ch a meet ing . It will be already too late on March 2lst in order to make the type of changes that are ne cessary to ensure that there wi ll not be a sharp incr ease in the mill rate, any cut in the educational programs wi thin the Province of M3.nitoba. Mr.

Speaker, we say that we must act today, we mus t have debate today, we must have supp lementary estimates today, so that we can deal with the neglect and the delay that is being fo istered by this government upcn the Pr ovince of M3.nitoba and the grave aff ect which it is having upon the rate payers and educationalists of this province . MR. SPEAKER : I will now allow a member of a recognized pclitical party to re ply and give their argument on this matter. The Honourable Government House Lea der . HON. GER ALD W.J. MERCIER (Osborn e ): Mr.

Speaker, on behalf of the only other recognized political party in the Legislature, if I may res pond to the motion by the Leader of the Opposition and indicate that his motion and his comments are based on some assumptions which are no t accur ate. Basically he ref erred to cuts in the Estimates of th e Department of Educa tion . Those Estimates have been tabled before this Legislature and in fact have indicated substantial increas es in that partic ular department. With respe ct to the urgency of this matter which is a subjec t before the House, Mr.

Speaker, and the only subje ct which is before this House, the Minister of Educa tion has indica.ted that he and other members of this government wi ll be meeting wi th represent atives of the Winnipeg School Board next week . The fud get of th e government has not yet been presented to this Legislature. The Minister of Education has not yet presented it and dealt with his Estimates in the Legislature.

He indicated yesterday in response to a number of qu estions that there were many matters which he would like an opportunity to discuss with the Committee of Suppl y and members of th e other side during his Estimates where they are most appropriately dealt wi th, Mr. Speaker . So, Mr. Speaker, I urge member s of this Legislature to de feat the motion as it is not a matter of urgent public impor tance . There are many matters yet to be dealt with in the Legislature with respect to this matter . MR.

SPEAKE R: I have listened carefully to the argument put forward by the Honourable Leader of the Opp os ition and I must say he made an excellent ef fort to urge the urgency of debate on this particular matter . I have listened to the remarks of th e Honourable Government House Leader and I re fer members to our Rul e 27, and under Rule 27( 1) , the Leader of the Oppos ition did provide me with sufficient no tice, as req uired . I have given him the oppo rtunity, under 27( 2) to make his submiss ion.

The purpose of subse ctio n 5, and I read this out to the members: "T he right to move to set aside the ordinary business of the House for the purpose mentioned in subrule 1 is subject to the following instructions ". And I re fer to Sub (d): "T he motion shall not anticipate a matter that has previously been appcinted for consideration by the House; or with re ference to which a notice of motion has previously been given and not withdrawn". That 's from the Rules of our own House here . We have ref erred on numerous occasions to Beauches ne's Par liamentary Rules and Forms in Beauchesne 's Fifth Edition.

The House of Commons has a somewhat di ff erent system in that they use Standing Order 26 for M3.tter s of Urgent Public Importance . fut while they use a dif ferent procedure, the subject matter and the ruling on the subjec t matter is very similar to ours and I would ref er members to Gita tion 28 7 : "Urgency within this rule does not apply to the matter itself, but means urgency of debate. When the ordinary opportu nities provided by the Rules of the Hous e, do not permit the subjec t to be brought on early enough and public interest demands that discu ss ion take place immediately". - 816 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 The argument put forward by th e Honourable Leader of the Opp osit ion would , in my op inion , probably meet that ci tation . However , we go on to Citation 29 1, and I read from the motion that he has put forward that the government has mi slead this House and the people of Manitoba by failing to make adequ ate budgetary provisions. Citation 291 reads : "A general ques tion of the maladministration of a depart ment cannot be considered a gen uine emergency".

Having listened to the arguments and having read numerous sp eakers ' rulings over the last ten years, I have to rule the subjec t matter out of order . The Honourable Member for Kildonan. MR. PETER FOX: Mr. Speaker , much as I appreciate your ruling, and though you have gone into some de pth , there is a matter of interp retation in respect to the rules and I respectfully challenge your ruling. MR. SPEAKE R: Shall the ruling of the Chair be sustained? Aye. All those oppose d , please say nay? In my opinion , the ayes have it. MR. FOX : Ayes and nays , Mr. Speaker. MR . SPEAKER : Call in the members.

The question before the House is , shall the ruling of the Chair be sustained? A STANDING VOTE was taken , the result being as follows : ANDERSON BANMAN BLAKE COSENS DOM INO DOWNEY DRIEDGER ADAM BARRO W BOSTROM BO YCE CHERN IA CK CORRIN ENNS FERGUSON FILMON GALB RAITH OOU RLAY HYDE JO HNSTON COWAN DES JARDINS DOERN EVANS FOX GREEN YEAS JOR GENSON KOVNATS LYON MacMASTER McGILL McGRE OOR McKEN ZIE NAYS HANUSCHAK JENK INS McBRYDE MALINOW SKI MILLER PAWLEY MR. CLERK : Yeas 27 . Nays 2 3. MR. SPEAKER : The ruling of the Chair is sus tained .

ORAL QUESTIONS MERCIE R MIN AKER ORCHARD PRICE RANSOM SHERMAN SCHROE DE R URUSKI USKIW WALDING WESTBURY MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable Leader of the Oppos ition• MR. PAWLEY: Mr. Speaker , my question is to the Minister of Education . Will the Minister of Education detail for the Chamber by what power or authority he enjoy s so that he may deal ef fectively with the proposals that will be presented to him by the Winnipeg School Division on March 2lst ? MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Edu cation . HON. KE ITH A. COSENS ( Gimli): Mr.

Speaker, as I believe everyone in this Hous e is well aware , we 'll be meeting with the Winnipeg School Division on March - 817 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 2lst. At that time, we will hear their concerns and give those same concerns our due cons iderations . MR. PAWLEY: Mr. Speaker , my qu estion is to the Minister . In hearing their conce rns , can the Minister advise the people of Manitoba how that will aff ect their mill rates? MR. COSENS : Mr. Speaker , that 's a little diffi cult to prophesy at this point be fore we hear what those particular concerns may be . MR . SPEAKER : The Honourable Leader of the Opp os ition . MR. PAWLEY : Mr.

Speaker , a further to the Ministe r , can he advise what can be done now that the School Board has already sent in its budget; what can be done afte r- March 15th , pertaining to meeting the request that the sc hool division had indicated they will make to the Minister? MR. COS ENS : Mr. Speaker , I haven 't se en thos e partic ular reque st s. Until I've had an op portunity to see them and to consider them , I would no t hazard a parti cular answer as to what can be in regard to that matter . MR. SPEAKER: Mr.

Speaker , further to the Min ister of Education , since March 15th is the deadline, can the Minister advise the House how he can deal with this matter af ter the termination of the deadline March 15th for the presentation of the budge t to the City of Winnipeg? MR. COSENS : Certainly , Mr. Speaker , th e budget has a deadline and our meeting is on March 2lst . Any decis ions that we would make at that time, I sup pos e, would apply to the sch ool division 's budget but , as the Leader of the Oppo sit ion sa ys , would have no particular impact on the mill rate for this year . MR.

SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for In kster . MR. SIDNEY GREEN : Mr. Speaker , I'd like to direct a quest ion to the Honourable Minister for Urban Affai rs. In view of th e fact that the Chairman of the School Board has been wrongly blaming her diff iculties on the equalization system in greater Winnipeg, in view of the fact that the Conse r vative government has maintained this system for three sess ions of the Legislature , would the Minister now consider making greater Winnipeg one sch ool division , for taxation purposes in any event , so that there will be no further argument as to who is subsidiz ing who?

MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Urban Affair s. MR. MERCIER: Mr. Speaker , I don 't accept the assumpt ion conta ined in the Member for Inkst er 's comment with resp ect to the Greater Winnipeg equalization levy . I believe that matter is under consideration and review by the Minister of Education . Mr. Speaker , if there is to be any action along the lines suggested by th e Member for Inks ter , Mr.

Speak er , I am satisfied that it would be done in close consul tation with the various sch ool boards , in order to satisf actorily determine their views and no t in the method used by the previous government in their impos ition of Unicity concep t upon the citizens of this city . It is not an example that we would follow, Mr. Speaker . MR . SPEAKER : The Honourable member for Inkst er . MR. GREEN : Mr.

Speaker , I would like the Honourable Minister to clarify what is wrong with my ass umption that the Conservative administration has through three sess ions of the Legislature indicated no change in that system . And I want to know whether the Minister has done any studies as to whether or not making Greater Winnipeg one taxa tion unit for sc hool division purposes would result in eq uity to the citizens of Winnipeg. - 818 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. MERCIER : Mr. Speaker , as I indicated , the Greater Winnipeg equalization levy is a matter under consideration under the jurisdic tion of the Minister of Education , and I wouldn 't pres ume to enter into a subject matter which he is involved in and over which he has au thority· MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for Inkster with a final suppl ementary. MR. GREEN : Yes, Mr. Speaker.

In view of the Min ister 's suggestion that the Pr ovince of Mrnitoba would not take any unilateral steps , such as the im posi tion of a metropolitan form of government which was done by the Roblin adminis tra tion and the unif ication of Greater Winnipeg which was done by the New Democratic Party administration , is the Minister saying that , regardless of whether or not the present system of taxation is inequitable, his government will not do anything if the munici palities say don't do it? MR. MERCIER : No , Mr. Speaker . MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable Member for Elmwood • MR. RUSSELL DOERN: Mr.

Speaker , I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Edu cation in regard to the possible introduction of user fees in the Winn ipeg School Division caused or forced upon them by a shortf all of provincial funding . Would the Minister opp ose the introduc tion of suc h fees or would he approve or sanction them? MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Educ ation . MR. COSENS: Mr. Speaker , I can't accept the honourable member's premise either and of course the funding in something that is certainly within the juris di ction of the school board .

They will make the decisions as to how dif ferent courses are funded within their division . MR. DOERN: Does the Minister feel an equal responsibility toward the public school system and pr ivate and parochial schools ? MR. C:OSENS : Quite obviously not , Mr. Speaker , or we would be funding them at equal levels . As I pointed out yest erday , we fund the public school syst em at approximate level between $1,000 and $1,100 per pup il. The private schoo ls , that do meet the requ irements to rece ive funding , rece ive some thing in the neighbour hood of $380 or $39 0 per studen t. MR.

OOERN: I would ask the Minister , Mr. Speaker , whether he has any con cern that the present course of ac tion being pursued by the Winnipeg School Board will resul t in a transfer of a number of students from the public sch ools into the pr ivate and parochial sc hools , which could result in further declining enrolments , a farther deter ioration of quality , in a vicious circl e.

And I would ask the Minister whether he would be prepared to mo nito r the number of student s , in the public sch ool system and in the private and parochial sch ool system, to see whether there is any shifts caused by a de te riora tion in the public sc hool sy stem . MR. C:OSENS: Mr. Speaker , I appreciate that qu estion from the Member for Elmwood because it gives me an opp ortunity to perhaps relay to him some figures that have to do with quality in Winnipeg No . 1. In 1976 , Mr.

Speaker, there were 36 ,833 students in the public sc hools in Winnipeg No . 1 and some 2, 276 teachers, for a pupil-teac her ratio of 16 .3 . ; 16.3, Mr. Speak er . In 1979 , the average pupil enrolment in Winnipeg No . 1 was some 32 ,601 students , a drop of 4,2 32 pupils from 1976. The number of teachers emp loyed in 1979 in Winnipeg No . 1 was 2, 269. I remind the Member for Elmwood that in 1976 the number of teachers employed was 2, 276. The teacher-pu pil ratio in 1979 was 14. 4.

Now I say to the Member for Elmwood , in answering his qu estion and his concern for qu ality , in 197 6 , when the teacher-pupil ratio was 16. 3 and his party was in - 819 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 power in this province , was the quality of educa tion poorer than it was in 1979, under our administration , when the teacher-pupil ratio was 14. 4? MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Fitness and Amateur Sport. HON. ROB ERT (BOB ) BANMAN (La Veren drye ): Mr. Speaker , yest erday I took a question as notice from the Mem ber for Fort Rouge , when I was asked whether or not there was any signifi cant change in the number of agent s that would be involved in the selling of lottery ticket s .

I had the Manitoba Lottery Commission ch eck with the Weste rn Lottery Mani toba Distributor , which is the distributor in the Province of Manitoba. They informed me that the staf fing levels have been the same for about a year now and that they don 't antici pate any changes . MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for Fort Rouge . MRS. JUNE WESTBURY : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . My ques tion is addressed to the Honourable Minister of Urban Affa irs. Does the Minister agree that govern ments have res pons ibility for rehabilitation and revitalization of core areas of inner cities? MR.

SPEAKER : The Honourable Attorney-Gene ral . MR. MERCIE R : Yes, Mr. Speaker. MRS . WESTBU RY: Since projec tions reveal that between 21,000 and 50 ,OOO peo ple , including 3, 500 elementary sc hool children , have lef t or will leave the inner city of Winnipeg, . adversely af fecting School Division No . 1, does the Minister intend to introduce any proposal to make downtown core area of Winnipeg more attractive econ omically and phys ically for families to live in ? MR. ME RCIER: Mr.

Speake r, there are a number of Ministers on this side of the government who are involved in projects in the inner core area of the city in order to att empt to revitalize it and to improve the core area of this city . MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Mem ber for Fort Rouge with a final supple mentary . MRS. WESTBURY : To the Minister of Education , Mr. Speaker .

Speci fically what steps will the Honourable Minister be taking to alleviate the disproportion ate arrount of sch ool property tax paid by School Division No . 1 taxpayers, because of, (1), the fact that more than one-t hird of the founda tion levy is raised in Winnip eg; ( 2) , Winnipeg No. 1 taxpayers subsidize sch ool division by $5 .9 million , the 1978 figure through redis tribute of eff ect s of Grea ter Winnipeg ed ucation levy ; and (3), becaus e the Winnip eg No . 1 receives the lowes t level of net provincial suppo rt through the Foundation Gran ts Program? MR. SPEAKER : Order pl ease.

May I suggest to in posing a ques tion , it should no t be argumentative . ific inf ormation , it's quite all right. Did the honourable member com plete her questio n?. The Honourable Mem ber for Rossmere . the honourable member that , If you 're asking for spec- MR. VIC SCHROEDER : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . I have a ques tion for the Minister of Educat ion. I app reciate his histo ry lesson .

I'm just wondering whether he als o has , for the Hous e today, the ratio in 1969 between pupils and teachers in Winnipeg No . 1, and could. he also tell us whether there is any previous year , in the last 15 years, where the pupil to teacher ratio increased from one year to the next ? MR. SPEAKER : Order pleas e. I sugges t to the honourable member he file an Order for Return , asking for detailed information of that na ture . The Honourable Member for Rossmere. - 82 0 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. SCHROEDER : Well, Mr. Speaker , the Minister of F.clucation gpve some speci fic figures wi th respect to pupil to teacher ra tios for the years 1976 and 1979; they were unsol icited. I am now asking for an additional figure for 1969. MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable Minister of Education . MR. COS ENS : Mr. Speaker , I cert ainly felt that the figures were essential to answer the Member for Elmwood 's ques tion , which certainly seemed to equ ate quality with student- teacher ratios , and that is why I supplied them .

As far as supp lying them for other years, I can go back, I sup pose , to the origin of the public school system in this province and supply those figures for the Member for Rossmere . I will take the quest ion as no tice and get him those particular figures . MR. SCHROEDE R : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . To the Minister of F.clucation, I would then also ask for his undertaking to provide informat ion as to whether , in the previous 15 years, th e pupil to teacher ratio has increased in any other year from one year to another , as it app ears to be in 1980 -81 from 197 9-80 . MR. COS ENS : Mr.

Speaker , in supplying th e member with the information that he has asked for , that will certainly be obvious and I'll take that aspect of the question as notice also. MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for St . Vital . MR. D. JAMES WALDING : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . My quest ion is to the Honourable Minister of Education . The Minist er has said , in answer to question s in this House before , that the Winnipeg School Division has given ass urances there will be no reduction in the quality of education .

I'd like to ask the Minister wheth er he can give an assurance to this House that there will be no reductio n in the quality of educa tion in School Division No . 1? MR. COSENS: Well, Mr. Speaker , I have some problem wi th that ques tion . Firs t of all, I would like to know what the Member for St . Vital is sugges ting as the measurement of qu ality of education. Is he suggesting that it comes from measuring the success of the graduates of that particular system? Does he suggest that it can be measured by the teacher-pupil ratio?

If he does, I've already sug gested to him that in 1976 obviously the quality was much lower than it was in •79. So if he would like to suggest the measurement that we should use in decid ing what the le vel of quality is , I'd certainly be prepared to use that measure ment at this time? MR. WALDING: Mr. Speaker , a supplementary qu estion for the same Minister .

Since the Min ister doesn 't seem to have any policy or any idea of what quality of educa tion means , and since the Minister has said to this House yesterday that he assumes no res ponsibility for the level of education that is for the school board , will the Minister tell this House jus t what he is responsible for? MR. SPEAK ER: Order please , order please . It app ears to me as though we may be getting into a debate that previously today was ruled out of order . How ever, I hope that the questio ns should no t be face tious , nor should they be argu menta tive.

I would hope the Mem ber would probably want to rephrase his questio n . Would the Honourable Member for St . Vital care to re phrase his question ? MR. WALDING: No , Mr. Speaker , I would li ke to ask another question . I would like to ask the Min ister of Education whether he is prepared to re commend to his colleague for St . � tthews that he, th e Mem ber for St . � tthews who is a teacher and a re present ative from Winnipeg No . 1, be prepared to withdraw his pro posed resolution on the Greater Winnipeg education levy in that that member has just voted agpinst the oppo rtunity to debate suc h a thing? MR.

COSENS : My answer , Mr. Speaker , is no. MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable Member for Rupertsl and . - 821 -

Thurs day , 13 March , 1980 MR. HAR VEY BOST RCM : Thank you , Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Premier. Will the Premier con firm that , by his government 's prac tising rest raint in the provincial fun ding of school divisions, he's merely forcing the sch ool divisions to incr ease the taxes imposed on homeowners , which is universally re cognized as one of the most re gress ive forms of taxation . MR. SP EAKE R: Order , order please. �in , may I suggest that the hon ourable member 's qu estions not be argumentative.

Again , he's asking for a dis cuss ion and we 're going to , I'm af raid , get into a debate during the question period. The qu estion period is available to all members. If you want to us e it for debating time, that is your privilege. The Honourab le Firs t Minister. HON. STERL ING R. LYON (Charleswood ): Mr. Speaker , I'm happy to attempt to enlighten my honourable friend from Rupertsland as to the education financing system, It may take me some time , however , to drive home a few point s.

No. one , we 're well aware of the res pons ibility of the Province of Mani toba with respe ct to foundation and other fun ding programs for the public education sy stem in Manitoba and have been ful filling thos e res pons ibilities wi thin the financial means of th e people of Mrnitoba for the last two-an d-a-hal f years, very su cce ssf ully I would say , Mr. Speak er. No. two , Mr.

Speaker , my honourable friends qu ite conven iently overlook the fact that in the Estimates which are before them at the present time there is an increase in the Tax Rebate Pr ogram and in the other program on income tax , the Pro perty Tax Rebate Pro gram, and the other allied program, of approximately $11 million to $12 million which will be going directly to the ratepayers in M3.nitoba as an ameliora ting fact against , no t only increasing sc hool costs , but the sales tax imposition as well , Mr. Speaker. No. three , as the Minister of Education has indicated to the House • • • Mr.

Speaker , I know my honourable friends don 't want to hear the fact s. They didn 't want to hear them when the Minist er of Education told them about the pupil-teac her ra tio in Win nipeg , but they 're going to hear those and they 're going to hear a lot more before this debate 's over. Mr.

Speaker , my honourable fr iends know that there is an increase in the Estimates for public educ ation grants this year from the Province of Manitoba , and those education Estimates are appointed for debate and my honour able fr iends will be able to se e how those grants apply , when the education Estimates are before the House. So I say to my honourable fr iends , that they can have all the fun they want at questi on period wi th their elephant tears , with their moc k - if I may say so , Mr.

Speaker - with their mock , mock concer n about the ratepayers in the Cit y of Winnipeg , about whom they didn •t care very much when they were in off ice , when they imposed the highest provincial taxation in this province 's history. So if my honourable friend wants me to continue reading him a lesson • • MR. SPEAKER : Order pl e ase . Order please. I hope that we're no t getting into a real debate at this particular time. The Honourable Member for Rupertsland with a suppl ementary qu estion. MR. BO STROM: Well, Mr.

Speaker , I will attempt to make my questi on short and to the point , which is unlike the speec h we just got from the Firs t Minister.

I would ask the First Minister if his answer to us today is just another example of his attempting to mislead the people of M3.nitoba by his practic e of inadequately funding the educat ion sys tem in Mani toba, whereby his government is transferring taxation from the provincial revenues of this province , wh ich are more progressively collected than the property tax sy stem , whereby the people of M3.nitoba now have to pay higher property tax, higher education tax on their pro perty , a much more re gress ive form of taxation. MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable First Minister. MR. LYON : Mr.

Speaker , to continue what I was say ing. There are a number of areas -- (Interjec tion )- - I'll answer his qu estion with a great deal of joy. - 822 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1 980 There are a number of areas , Mr. Speaker , --( Interjec tion )- - My honourable friends obviously, Mr. Speaker, want to continue the ir rudeness . MR. SPEAKER : Order . Order please. The Honourable First Minister . MR. LYON: Mr. Speaker , now that we have a modicum of order restored again, could I continue what I was saying?

This government , as we indicated and as the Minister of Education has indicated on a numb er of occ asions and is ap parent to anyone who can read figures - and I make that ass umption that that can be done across the way - has indicated that the school grants are up this year and the debate has been appo inted for that matter in the Estimates , as it is done every year , and my honourable fr iends will be in formed then . I had mentioned the $12 million increase in the Rebate Pr ogram for the tax payers of Manitoba.

My honourable fr iends conveniently overlooked that 75 percent of the senior citizens in Manitoba living in the ir own homes no longer pay in the education tax in the Province of Mrnitoba, thanks to this administration . So if my honourable friend , the Member for Ruperts land , wants to st and up in th is Hous e or on any other platform in �nitoba, Mr. Speaker , and try to make out that this government does not understand or it does not relate to its res ponsibilities in the field of education , then I'd say he's on a winning and a very sticky wicket . MR. SPEAKER : plementary .

The Honourble Member for Rupertsland with a final sup- MR. BOSTROM: Well, Mr. Speaker , as a final suppl ementary I'd like to ask the First Minister if he can conf irm, and in a very brief wa y rather than giving us a full speec h , that the Pr operty Tax Credit plan has not been increased since his government has come into power? In the same sp an of time , Mr. Speaker , the taxes that have been imposed on property owner s and home owner s are a result of his government's inadequate funding of the education system in Manitoba . MR. LYON: Mr.

Speaker , obviously my honourab le friend overlooked what I was just saying. Does he want me to repeat it ? With respect to the dif ferent groups of cit izens in this province who are now benef itting by virtue of policies that this government has brought in to relieve senior citizens of Manitoba , 75 percent of th em , of the cost of taxation? If my honourable fr iend is opposed to that , Mr. Speak er , let him stand in his place and say so . But I me rely want to say that we are carrying out our mandate to the people of Manitoba with respec t to educat ion costs .

Unlike my honourable friends opp osite , we are prepared , and qu ite reasonably prepared , to meet with the members of the School Division No . 1 to hear their case , to hear the kinds of arguments that they wish to put forward with resp ect to their budgeting proces s. And we will not impose , as my honourable friends did , a kind of encumb ered form of system of city administr ation on the people of Winnipeg, which accounts in large measure for the increased rate payer cost s that city taxpayers are paying today , more so than educ ation . And, Mr. Speaker , the Member for St .

Joh ns was one of the principle arch i tects and perpe tra ters of that sy stem. MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for Rupertsland on a point of order . MR. BO STRO M: Surely , Mr. Speaker , you 're going to call the Speaker to order when he 's not even ref erring to the qu estion which I asked . MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable Member for St. Boni face . MR. LAURENT L. DESJ ARDINS: Mr. Speaker , I have a qu estion to the Minister of Health . To keep up with the inflation , th e doctors and the medical profess ion were given fees for the last two years .

Why then are the ch iropractors , who have been rec ognize d by the Conse rvative government who brought them in Medicare , why has - 82 3 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 their fees been fr ozen the last ••• well , ever since my honourable friend took of fice ? Don't they have to fi ght inflation also? MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Health . OON. L. R. (fud) SHERMAN (Fort Garry ): They do indeed have to fight in fl ation also, Mr. Speaker , but we have undertaken a study of chiropractic and are measuring and evaluating it in terms of the increase in the budgetary ap propriation for chirop racti c services in the budget of th e Health Services Com miss ion over the past two years , which has been significant .

And the subcommittee studying the practice was delayed in getting its work underway by the inability of the Chiropractic Association to supply the necessary documenta tion . MR. DES JAR DINS: Mr. Speaker , my honourable fr iend the Minister says , yes , that they have to fight inflation but the ir increase has been frozen . Isn't it a fact that this study started more than a year ago? And why isn't it fin ished now? And why is it , if you 're studying a profe ssion , why aren't they called in to have a chance to present something , which they haven't been up to now? MR. SHERMAN : It's true , Mr.

Speaker , the study was launched by us a year ago. It was approximately February of 1979 , but inf ormation that was requested by the commit tee of the Chiro practic Associat ion was not made available to the com mittee until December of 1979. I cast no criticism or off er no reasons for that . It simply is a fact . So that delayed the committee in getting to the nub of the matter . Secondly , in looking at fees , one always has to look at comparative and com petitive situations vis-a-vis the rest of society and vis-a-vis the rates and the levels of re muneration for their counterparts in other provinces .

And I think the honourable member would concede , Mr. Speaker , that the pra ctice of chiro practi c is a well remunerated practice in Manitoba today. MR. DESJA RDIN S: The Minister is saying then that the medical profession were not getting proper fees but the chiropractors are too well paid and this is why there hasn't been any increase . MR. SHERMAN : Well , Mr. Speaker , what I'm saying is there are many factors to be taken into conside ration . One is the competition for medical practitione rs , the competition for doctor s, th e attractions of other jur isdiction s.

And there is no qu estion and I never denied that Manitoba doctor s had fallen in the scale of comparative earning op portunitie s, ne t incomes in Canada , in the past several years , and needed to be resp ons ibly addressed in that area. This is not true of chirop ractor s in Manitoba. MR. DESJAR DINS : Mr. Speaker , would the Minister study the medical pro fession befo re the. MR. SPEAKER : Order , order please. The Honourab le Member for St . Boniface have a ques tion ? The Honourab le Member for St . George . MR. BILLIE URUSKI : Thank you , Mr. Speaker .

I direc t this qu estion to the Minister of Education , and ask him , in view of the escalating costs in providing transp ortation for school pupils in Manitoba , and generally that the provincial trans portation grants only cover about half of the costs of providing trans portation , can the Minister indicate what assist ance rural sc hool divisions might rece ive from this government in meeting the ir trans portation costs in the upcoming year? MR. SPEAKER: The Honourab le Minister of Educ ation . MR. COSENS: Mr. Speaker , to the Member for St .

George , obviously he missed th e announcement that I made somewhat earlier in the year to the school boards announcing the largest increase towards transportation grants that we've seen in - 824 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 this province for many years. This will , in large part , go towards taking care of those increased costs that they are ex periencing in the trans portation of students in this province . MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Member for St . George . MR. URUSKI : Th ank you , Mr. Speak er .

In view of the escalating trans portation costs , irrespective of the anno uncement that the Minister has made the sc hool divisions are still finding it diff icult to meet the escalating costs , can the Minister indicate whether there wi ll be any additional ass istance to sch ool divisions in the trans portation area? MR. OOSENS : Mr. Speaker , ha ving provided, as I have just mentioned to the Member for St .

Ge orge, the largest increase I believe that has ever been provided in this province towards transportation of students this year , we feel that we have gone a long way towards solving that particular problem. It has enabled a larger number of sch ool divisions to have a greater percent age of their costs covered by provincial money than ever be fore . If he is saying , what are we going to do in the futur e, certainly we will rec ogni ze escalating cost s in the future as well. I would expec t that it will be nece ss ary to take that into consi deration ne xt year in the grants that we provide.

We will have to look caref ully at what hap pens to gasoline cost s and other costs when we look at our budget next year , as we did this year . MR. SPEAKER : plementary . The Honourable Member for St . George with a final sup- MR. URUSK I: Thank you , Mr. Speaker . My qu estion is to the First Minister and he indicated that assistance was provided to the pens ioners of this province in the $100 tax credit program.

Is it not a fact that the ass istance that the Cons ervative government provided to the pensioners of Manitoba covers only the most weal thy pens ioners in this province who own homes , whose ass essment is in excess of 56 ,OOO , and those are the only ones who have bene fite d by that pens ioner ass istance program for sch ool taxes ? MR. SPEAKE R: The Honourable First Minister . MR. LYON: Mr.

Speaker , I suppose it would be obvious to everyone excep t the honourable member , who just asked that rather convuluted questio n , that you have to be paying taxes in order to get some rebate , in order to get some relief from it . And so, Mr.

Speak er , I am happy to say that 75 percent of the senior cit izens in Mrnitoba li ving in their own accommodation are paying no education tax today on ac count of the programs that have been going on in this province for many year s, one of which we added in the last two years when , according to my hon ourable friends opp osite , nothing has been done for the ratepayers· May I say , Mr.

Speaker , as well, that I find it passing strange for a group of NDP members in this Legislature to be complaining to this government about the lack of funding for education or , for that matter , anything else in this province , when they perpe trated the waste of hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers dollars on hydro , which could have been used for education , hospit als , and many other thin gs . MR. SPEAKER : Order , order please. The Honourable Member for Po int Douglas. MR. OON ALD MALINOWSKI : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . Mr. Speaker , I have a questio n to the Honourable Member of Labour .

In view of the fact that the food prices are ris ing almost weekly and , for instance , in the last month of February the prices rose eight perc ent , will the Minister increase the minimum wage during this session? MR. SPEAKER : The Honourable Minister of Labour . - 82 5 -

Thurs day , 13 March , 1980 HON. KEN MacMASTER : I have no intention of propos ing that at this time , Mr. Speak er . MR. MALINOWSKI : Mr. Speaker , to the same Minister . In view of the latest statistics showing Manitoba wi t h the fastest increase in the employment rate of many provinces in Canada and in view of the rapidl y increasing cost of living , will the Minister instruct his friends in the private secto r to create more jobs or does he pref er that more people go on welfare? MR. MacMASTER: Well, Mr.

Speaker, it may not be any cons olation to the member but we do have the third highest minimum wage in Canada . The member s the other day were talking about statist ic s , unemployed and employed , and that's a game some of them like to play. Seeing as the members talk about employed people, he should talk about exactly three years ago February of 1977 when there was 421 ,000 employed peo pl e in Manitoba , and as of this month , wh ich is a pretty good com parison - three years ago this month there we re 421 ,000 people employed in Manitoba; this month there are 453, 000 , an increas e of 32 ,000. MR.

SPEAKE R: The Honourable Member for Po int Douglas wi th a final sup plementary . MR. MALINOWSKI : Thank you , Mr. Speaker . To the same Minister , I would like to thank him kindly for his lecture about the histo ry . I am not asking you what happened ten or four years ago. You are responsib le now. I'm looking about the future and the present time . Mr. Speaker , if and when the Minister should decide to increase the minimum wage - it is warran teed - will the Minister con firm to the Legislature and the wor kers that he will increase the minimum wage by 60 percent , Mr.

Speaker , as he and his Cabinet colleagues ••• MR. SPEAKER : Order , order pl ease. The qu estion is hypot he tical . Would the Honourable Member for Point Douglas care to re phrase his quest ion? MR. MALINOWSKI : Mr. Speaker , I appreciate your ruling but I believe that the certain sit uation right now on the market is more hy pothetical than the ques tion . Well , simply, I would like to ask the Minister if they are contemp lating a raise for 60 percent I think that my people from Po int Douglas, who are just working for minimum wage are also entitled to have a 60 percent raise as a minimum wage .

ORDERS OF THE DAY MR. SPEAKE R: The time for questio n period having expired , we will proceed with Orders of the Day . The Honourable Government House Leader . MR. MERCIER : Mr. Speaker , I move , se conded by the Minister of Economic Development , that Mr. Speaker do now leave the Cha ir, and the House resolve itsel f into a Committee to consider of the Supply to be Granted to Her Majesty.

MOTION presented and carried and the House resolved itself into a Committee of Supply with the Honourable Member for Radisson in the Chair for the Department of Labour and Manp ower ; and the Member for Virden in the Chair for the Department of the Attor ney-G eneral . CON CURRENT COMMITTEES OF SUPPLY SUPPLY - ATTORNEY- GEN ERAL MR. CHAIRMAN, Morris McGregor (Virden) : Call the committee to order . We're on Resolut ion 19 .5(d )(l). The Member for Wolse ley. - 82 6 -

Thurs day , 13 March , 1980 MR. WILSON : Previously I had wanted to know under this

section , what are the present requ irements for the cost of trans cripts of trials? I had talked about with modern technology - several years ago, they used to charge 25 cents a copy , and now I believe that Xerox , 3M and other copying people have got the cost down to somewhere under 4 cents a copy and I wondered , has the cost of transcr ipts decreased along with the savings of te chnology? I wonder if the Minister can give me some indication as to the transcr ipt cost for the original and then for copies . MR. MERCIER: Mr.

Chairman, I will undertake to obtain that information for th e mem ber and provide it to him just as soon as we have it. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Wellington . MR. CORRIN : On this item , Mr. Chairman , I'd want to know whether or not there have been any new staff persons retained to type or take trans cri pts in the department . MR. MER CIER : Court re porter s? MR. CORRIN : Yes . MR. MERCIER : Mr. Chairman , th e Estimates

summary sheet that I ha nded out indicates an increase of six new court reporters . MR. CORRI N : I'm wonder ing, on both sides though, the big problem as I'm sure the Minister is aware, is app arently a lack of people to ty pe the tapes . Apparentl y there are seemingly a goodly number of reporter s; th e problem is that the se cretar ial st aff which sup ports them has been suggested to be inadequate . And I'm wondering whether ther e are going to be any more sec re tarial ass istants re tained to the department . MR. MER CIER : Mr.

Chairman , my under standing is that the court reporters hire their own ty pists . MR. CORRIN : Here perhaps I need some clarification . I had heard a rumour that there was a move af oot to stop the court reporters from do ing private work , that they were no longer going to be able to do private work outs ide the system and that it was going to be a full service su b- department or agency , with all the se cretarial st af f within the department . I understand this has been the practice , Mr. Chairman, for several years , perhaps going back well beyond this government .

Court reporter s are allowed , in their off hours - al though I don't know how many off hours they could have if we 're supp lementing the staff by six - to take private matter s. An example would be preliminary procedures prior to a trial , su ch an Examination for Discovery in a lawyer's of fice . I unders tand they are allowed to bill for that procedure on a private basis , and what they do is they let that work out to pr ivate se cretar ial staff and pay those peo ple , presumably out of the moneys they rec eive from the lawyers involved in their proceedings .

What I'm wonder ing , with all these shortages and the need for more staff , and apparently the anti cipation of some that there's going to be a full service staff I know that there are a few pr ivate court re porters that have dis cussed th is with me, peopl e who are in private bus iness of court reporting - and there are several firms in Winnipeg - who thought this might be the case ; they felt that the government poss ibly was moving in accord with its general policy to support the private se ctor and thereby would be limiting the right of the public se ctor reporter s to compe te with th em.

And that's the que stion . I'm wondering whether or not • • • I guess there may be two or three questio ns. Are we going to be denying the public sector report ers access to private se ctor business? Secondly, if that's the case , are we going to be providing a full service department with se cretarial staf f in hous e? MR. MER CIER : Mr. Chairman , with resp ect to the first qu estion from the Member for Wellington , the answer is , first ly , that priority must be given to the - 827 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 work of the department , to the trials that take place , and the taking of an Exam ination for Discovery privately cannot not interfere with that . I'm sure he will be aware that a new chief court reporter was appointed this past fall to replace Mr . Phillips . Mr s. MacGregor assumed that position in the fall. --( Interjection )-- Mrs. MacGregor became the chief court reporter in the fall.

I'm antici pating receiving a review of that whole area , since we do have a new chief court repor ter , with resp ect to a number of concerns that have been raised with me during the past year or so. MR . CORRIN : Mr . Chairman , I'm just wondering in that regard whether any members of the private court reportin g firms have approached the Minister and asked him to look into this matter . He said that there had been concerns ex pressed about it ; I'm wondering if that were from the private sec to r. MR; MERCIER : Well, Mr .

Chairman , there have been concerns expressed within and from outside of the department . MR . CO RRIN : On the same general item , Mr . Chairman , I'm wondering whether or not any ste ps are going to be taken to redress the situation that was mentioned in the Juvenile Justic e Committee 's Report , lack of reporting staff in many of the Juven ile Courts of the province.

There was speci fic mention by the Justice Committee that they felt that there should be recorders in all courts of record in order to insure the same rights to ju veniles as to adults , and perhaps that 's why the six new reporters, but I'm wondering , could he deal with that? MR . MERCIER : Mr . Chairman , two of the six will be for the new building on Broadway Avenue and the extra courtrooms there , one in the Winnipeg Law Courts Building , two in Family and Juven ile Court , and one in Thompson . MR . CHA IRMAN: 5. (d) (l)- -pass ; 5. (d) (2)--pa ss ; 5. (e) (l)- -pass - the Member for Wolseley . MR .

WILSON : Yes under th is

section I recall last year having fought for a reclassi fication of what appeared to be • • At least a couple of years ago the ir salary structure seemed rather low and I am pleased to see that the classif ication seems to have brought these fellows who are guarding prisoners , etc. , up to higher salary level.

I did want to sincere ly hope today that , in discuss ing a thought of mine which I hope to put on the record , that the Tribune will be more objective and report what I am obj ecting to rather than just the vague term Crown lawyers because I would like to suggest that under the Sheriff s and Bailiff s there may have been a large increase in staff but I wondered , if trained people such as the Winnipeg Police and if trained people suc h as the RCMP do not feel inclined in crimes of nonviolence to handcuff people, why it is incumbent upon the province of Manitoba to spend all that money and all that time having these people , who are basically not experienced in police work - there may be the odd case where you get somebody that's an expoliceman - to go around and handcuff individuals to be paraded around for the benefit of the general public .

It would seem to me that if there is a cost and priority

section - it certainly doesn 't aff ect me because it 's already past history , but I'm thinking of people from this day forward - that any particular person , whether it be male or female, who is put to that indignity to be handcuffed and thrown into a paddywagon , where up until that time the system saw fit that the individual could sit in the back of the police car , the individual could sit in the back of an unmarked passenger vehicle operat ed by the RCMP , yet as soon as they arrive , a hoard of these parti cular sherr if f's men - and there always seems to be seven or eight of them sitting around ; maybe they 're hoping for a busy day . I would hope that under the Sherif f 's

section that these men would be given a more public relations job. They seem to take a great deal of pride in their authority and in some cases they have alluded to the fact that there has not been any exceptions to the policy . There has been cases where member s of the legal profession have not been handcu ff ed , but I would think really that the handcuffing policy of the government should be • really , when you get into people accused being brought down to be detained and - 82 8 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 arrest ed , and a bail hearing, it would seem to me that the handcuffing policy of the government leaves something to be des ired. And I would think that the ••• well, the Deput y Sherif f told me that it was a government policy that all person s, regardless of the charge, were to be hand cuff ed . Now , that was from the Deputy Sherif f.

I'm simply saying, there 's a cost factor to all this staging and presentatio n, and if the Minister can give me some justi fied reason why people that have been trusted by the city police and by the RCMP, and by members of the legal profession who walk with them , and walk in and out of court with them , that these people should all of a sudden become dangerous to the public as soon as they are put into the hands of the sheriff 's men .

I would think that after bail is set and there 's an indication that it 's just a matter of time before that is accomp lished , I think the accused should be allowed to go with their lawyer a nd make the necessary arrangements and phone call. The salting of this person , male or female , into a tank, is to me another que stionable aspec t , but I think possibly the main one that I would like to deal with is the hope that our government would review the handcuf fing policy .

It seems also, af ter a bail hearing, that until the dots are dotted and the t's are crossed , that as people come out of the witness docket , they are again pounced on by several individuals from the sheriff 's of fice and handcuffed in front of all the witnes se s, all the people who may be there for dif ferent reasons. I would think there has to be a categorization here so that this policy is looked at and possibly some changes take place . MR . MERCIER : Mr .

Chairman, the policy to which the Member for Wolseley refers was that all prisoners were to be handcu ff ed , and to be handcuffed behind their backs except for certain excepti ons . We have reviewed that policy and have revised that policy now.

Handcuffing is not to be mandatory , but discretion is to be given to the escort off icer not to handcuff under certain circumstance s, where , for examp le , by reason of age , inf irmity, or information supp lied to the escorting of ficer , suff icient to enable him to satisf y himself that the person in custody is unlikely to attempt to escape or to act in a disorderly or violent manner with respec t to himself, the escorting of ficer , to members of the public . We are in the process of preparing a training manual for sheriff 's of ficers involved in escorting prisoner s.

The policy is subj ect to the provision of the necessary information to the sheriff 's of ficer . Mr . Chairman , we have reviewed the previous policy and have revised it in accordance with what I have indicated . MR . WILSON : I think that 's wonderful news for future generations. I cer tainly applaud the Minister for looking into it . I think another aspect , it 's probably very frivolous , but they have another policy where there 's absolutely no coffee for any , if I can use the word , prisoners or accused people , and I wondered if that aspect of it could be discretionary as well. MR .

CHAIRMAN : 5, (e) (l)- -pa ss ; 5. (e) (2)--p ass ; 5, (f )(l) - the Member for Wellington . MR. CORRIN : Mr . Chairman , in this regard I only have one very short quest ion , that is whether or not the problem that was reported in the news papers about the court reporters in Portage la Prairie has been resolved.

This is with resp ect , for those members who perhaps ar en 't familiar with it , this is with re spec t to the retention of, I think , two court reporter s, I'm not sure of the numbers, whose hiring was thought to be inappro priate by some people associated with the court becaus e they couldn 't speak certain native tongues , which are apparently widely used in that particular judicial cat chment area. Mr . Chairman , we would ask whether or not these people have been transferred and others transferred in , or what manner of resolution this has now come to? MR . MERC IER : Mr .

Chairman, I met with representatives of the Dakota Oj ibway Tribal Council earlier this week , at which they exp ressed some concern with respec t to this matter . I have passed on that concern to Chief Judge Gyles , and I believe to Mr . Chartrand , to review the conce rn that has been ex pressed . MR . CHAIRMAN : 5. (f) ( l)- -pa ss ; 5. (f) (2)- -pa ss ; 5.( g)(l)- -pass - the Member for Burrows . - 829 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. BEN HANUSCHAK : You will note , Mr. Chairman , that there is quite a sig nif icant increase in salaries , an increase of over $50 ,000 , from $33 ,600 to $84 ,500 ; coul d the Minister offer some explanation of that increase? MR . MERCIE R : Mr . Chairman , the increase in salaries is an estimate of what will be required to replace the former Chie f Medical Examiner , Dr . Parker , who passed away last fall. The province I think was very fortunate in not only having such a skilled person and hard working person occupy that position but were also fortunate in that Dr .

Parker worked out of the Deer Lodge Hospital and I believe the province was able to obtain his services as Chie f Medical Examiner for some thing in the neighbourhood of $20 ,000 per year . We have formed a committee of doctor s, some of whom are pathologists , to consult with in finding a replacement for Dr . Parker . Dr . Henry Dirks is presently the Acting Chief Medical Examiner . It is somewhat involved in that there has been a fair amount of consultation with the Health Services Commission and the medical institution s. To date we have not yet filled the position but it has been actively pursued .

We don 't know what we are going to have to pay a new Chief Medical Examiner . It all depends on the kinds of arrangements we can make with perhaps the Medical School , perhaps a hospita l. MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Wellington. MR. CORRIN : Yes, Mr . Chairman , I wanted to talk about matters that arose during the course of the contraversy surrounding the death of a young man by the name of Lyle Dean Enns. You recollect , Mr. Chairman , late last summer this unfor tunate young man met a tragic death .

He was the victim of a shooting and as a result of that there was a good deal of contraversy surrounding whether or not an inquest pursuant to the Fatality Inquiries Act should be held in anticip ation of the trial· proceedings in which his brother and I think poss ibly his father were involved . It was repres ented at the time by his fam ily 's solicitor that the facts upon which the case for the de fense rested could not be adequately secured unless recourse was had to a prior inquest proceeding .

I think that the point that the solicitor made was that there would be a denial of a certain fundamental right if the accused per sons , since the accused family members charged with cr iminal off enses arising out of that event , or peripheral to that event I suppo se , were forced to take the stand in order to disclose what transpired relative to the death of their son and brother at the hands of the RCM Police . It seemed to me , Mr.

Chairman , without perhaps dealing with the merits of the case , that on fundamental princip al they had made a good point ; that it was a dicey bus iness for the accused persons to , on the one hand , def end themselves without the information; on the other hand , it was a dicey business for them to be able to both waive their rights and give testimony and , at the same time , def end themselves .

I am wondering whether the Attor ney-General is considering any revision of the legislation , namely the Fatality Inquiries Act , in order to ass ure that there would be some sort of mandatory inquest examinations of all police related fatal ities . It seems apparent to me that this , presumably , would never happen very frequent ly , it may happen very occ asionally , and in order to avoid a similar repetition of circumstances such as this I was wondering whether the Attorney -General would consider an amendment to the act that would first of all make such inquiries mandatory .

Right now I under stand they are simply discretiona ry , and really it's a bit of a con flict of interest because it seems to me that eff ectively the same agent makes a decision as to whether to have the inquest as has to make the decis ion whether or not to file the prosecutio n; at least that person is resp onsible to the same authority , namely the Attorney-G eneral.

I've consulted with the former Leader of the Opposition and he tells me that , al though he didn 't have final authority in the inquest , with resp ect to inquests he was invariably consulted on the subject by the , I believe it 's the Chief Medi cal Examiner . So because of this apparent confl ict of interest or seeming conf lict of interest , I am wondering whether there is going to be an y revision of the law. - 830 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR . MERCI ER : Well, Mr . Chairman , just on a small point on the last matter raised by the Member for Wellington. Under the Act the Attorn ey-General , whoever he is , has the authority to order an inquest at any time .

I think I have in dicated to the Member for Wellington in the past , certainly to othe rs, that we are reviewing the provisions of the Fatality Inquiries Act as it is in Manitoba and comparing the provisions of our legislation with legislation and practices and procedures in other provinces and I anticipate that , as a result of that review, there will be amendments to this Act of th is Session of the Legislature . MR . CHA IRMAN: (g) (1)--pa ss ; (g) (2)--p ass. Resolved that there be granted to Her Majesty a sum not exceeding $10, 244 , 700 for Attorney-G eneral, Law Courts--p ass.

Resolution No . 20 , 6.( a)- -pass ; 6.( b)- -pa ss . Resolved that there be granted to Her Majesty a sum not exceeding $214 ,400 for Attor ney-Gene ral , Legislative Counsel--p ass . Resolution No . 21 , 7. Law Enforcemen t. The Member for Wolseley. MR. WILSON : I wonder with interest I have a couple of areas here .

One is the summer resort areas are policed in a - for years they have been attempting to resolve a particular problem and they can 't seem to get any senior police personnel to want to work the summer resorts and , as a result , there 's been a great deal of dissatisf action amongst not only co ttage owner s from Manitoba but possibly one of the gravest conce rns is our tourism image, and the amount of rec reational vehicles that leave Manitoba and go south and when recreational vehicles, during the summer months the flow comes north , these people have less than a quiet enjoy ment , and I wondered if this is a provincial respons ibility or if it's divided.

Because it seems to me that it 's under the RCMP contract and some other forms and I wondered if the Minister might enlig hten me : Do we foot the bill for this entirely and what are the plans for the 80 's for protecting the people fro m, just literally , rebels without a cause, as the Member for St . Boni face says , bullies and people that seem to take a great deal of pleasure in taking pegs out of tents and doing all sorts of things within the camp grounds ?

I think it 's something that we get a lot of fresh new dollars from tourists that come up here and I would like to see Manitoba have a friendly Manitoba image rather than one of rowdyisms in the recreational vehicle parks. I wondered if the Minister could comment . MR. MERCIER : Well, Mr. Chairman , just brief ly, the province polices the provincial parks. Under the provincial policing agreement with the RC MP, the province assumes all of the cost. It 's a difficult concern to deal with without some speci fic incidents .

There was reference in the Chief Inspecto r 's Report fil ed under The Liquor Control Act to a program that was initiated , I think , in Grand Beach with respect to turning over liquor . That appears to have met with some success in that area . MR. WILSON : Then maybe I'll have to be a little more frank . What the com plaint seems to be is that some of the people that are the special consta bles , touring these recreational vehicle parks and other s, some of them are barely old enough to shave and what I'm suggesting is that the people seem to want to demand a more senior per sonnel .

If there 's a fact that we are trying to save money , that is one thing , but if they 're all getting the same salary it would seem to me that if it 's that important to the province that maybe some of the constables • • I appreciate that they don 't want to be away from their families and I guess that has to be taken into considerat ion , but it seems there 's a lot m ore respect for a more senior police consta ble.

What basically they ' re saying is , the people that the government is hiring do not appear physically capable to be able to stop any rowdyism and break up gangs of bullies who may be beat ing up on one or two people. MR . CHAIRMAN: The Member for St . Bonif ace . MR . LAURENT L. DESJA RDIN S : Mr . Chairman , I think the member is somewhat mixed up. I don 't think that he 's re fer ring to the RCMP , but in all the prov incial parks, you have a limited number of RCMP who are patrolling their dist rict , - 831 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 and the parks are in there , and you also have the rangers, or special police that are hired by the province in the parks. I don 't think it's a question . • • there might be the odd one that are fairly young , it might be students during the summer because it 's not a full-time job , and I don 't think that it would change very much if you had somebody a little older when you are dealing with a gang, and so on . I think it has been a problem and it always will be a problem of the department .

I know there was a problem when I was the Minister of Tourism responsible for the parks , and I can only see one thing , and I think there is probably less than there has been . Every year of course we read something - I remember this last summer somebody was terrorizing and they were demanding money , they slit the tents and so on , and it 's qu ite difficult when you 're in a place and it 's pretty dark and iso lated and you have people like that , it's no t very much fun . But I would suggest, I don 't think it 's the personnel at all.

One or two can 't do anything if they ' re going to have to face a group , they call the RCMP in that case, ·but I think that maybe the Minister responsible for the provincial parks should look to see if the penalty could be more severe , if they could be kicked out of parks for a couple of years.

And that ef fect , when that happ ens , if we throw the book at them , because the member ce rtainly has a point , that there 's nothing worse than that when you can 't leave your family , you have your young kids and so on , and they all come out there for a wild party and they 'll go in the parking area , maybe in a trailer , or in a truck , this does happen , there is no doubt about it . But I don 't think that we could faul t the person nel . If any thing , maybe they should hire more in special areas .

But I think that maybe the Minister , it would be the Attorney-G eneral, would look to see if we could be a little tougher on them and throw the book at them to stop them once and for all. MR . CHAIRMAN: The Member for Gladstone. MR . JAMES R. FERGUSON : Thank you , Mr. Chairman . I would like to ask the Minister what formulas or agreements are existi ng now between the , say , villages and towns , what cost-sharing formula is involved , as say , 450 population or 500 , whatever? What share is the province picking up? MR. MERCIER : Mr .

Chairman , under 500 , we ass ume full policing costs ; the province assumes full policing costs . I would indicate to the member that we are reviewing that 500 population req uirement and considering raising that to 75 0. MR . FERG USON : Yes, one other thing, on this report we rece ived the other day from the Chief Inspector of the Liquor Contr ol , I find again this year that rural related convictions are 8, 865 , for total fines imposed of $400 ,059 .55, as against 307 convictions and $16, 012 for the city of Winnipeg.

I would wonder what the disc repancy is here , or the harrassm ent , or is it the people in rural Manitoba are not as good livers. MR. MERCIER : That was the Chief Inspector 's report? MR . FERG USON : This is prosecuti ons under The Liquor Control Act . MR . MERCIER : Mr. Chairman , st atist ics speak for themselves . I can 't MR . FERGUSON : As MLAs we 're picking up a considerable amount of com plaints , feeling that there is some harrassment and when you compare the two , it's obvious that when 56 percent of the population lives in Winnipeg that there 's some thing ou t of balance here. MR.

MERCIER : One thing the report did indicate this year was that the RCMP report indicated virtually a 13 percent decrease in the number of impaired driving charges and ref usal to take breathalizer • MR . FERGUSON : Well, I st ill don 't think this answers my question , because people are st arting to think that there 's a bit of harrassment going on , that they 're being over-po liced . Whether or not they are , I don 't know , but the fig ures seem to indicate that they are . - 832 -

Thursday , 13 Ma rch , 1980 MR. DESJAR DINS: Take the police out of there and put them in the parks . MR . MERCIE R : Mr. Chairman , one has to agree there 's an obvious disc rep ancy . The Member for Gladstone raises a concern which we could certainly attempt to review with both police authorities . MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Wolseley MR. WILSON : Mr .

Chairman , I'm always concerned about the revenue aspect to government as well as the expenditu res , and I wondered if th e Minist er might en lighten me , maybe there 's been some change , but is there any way that law enforce ment bodies , whether they be st udents or RCMP or mun icipal police forc es , is there any way that we could warehouse and sell , either at public auction or give to charity or something , the confiscated liquor , because it seems to bring a tear to the eye of many a taxpayer to see all of this liquor allegedly des troyed .

One who appreciates the odd drink of Napoleon Brandy or Grand Marnier , or something , and even the working man 's champagne , Labatt ' s Blue, I would be very very interested in the Minist er 's comments if there is st ill a policy of destruction of con fiscated spirits , or is there some move af oot to put this to either medicinal or charity , or probably resale? MR. MERCIER : Mr . Chairman , the report of the Chief Inspector under The Liquor Control Act on Page 6 indicates that seized liquor is , in some cases , donated to various hospitals and homes for the aged.

No guarantee or warranty is given that the liquor is potable , and the individual authorities decide in what manner and for what purpose the liquor may be used . So I assume it's used for either medic inal or recreation purpos es . MR . WILSON : On another subject , I was sort of interested in a particular case that happened some months ago.

At that time it was alleged that Manitoba was sort of headquarters for export of munitions , and in one particular case there was 5 ,OOO M-16 rifles , 50 ,OOO hand grenades , 10 million rounds of ammunition , 1, 000 anti-ta nk missiles and 2,0 00 plastic explosives , and I wondered if the Manitoba law had been modernized to make the province of Manitoba sort of a place where , I call them merchants of death , but people that sell explosives to different countries and di fferent political fact ions in those countri es , a nd us ing Manitoba as a base of operat ions.

There seemed to be, having read the case, something as to whether Manitoba laws could deal with this particular problem. I'm jus t wondering , is it still against the law to export mun itions from Manitoba? MR. MERCIER: Mr. Chairman , I'm advised that that would come under federal laws , federal jurisdic tion , the export of arms . If the member has a concern that those laws are not suff icient , we could per haps review that matter in the particular case he ref ers to and answer the member's conce rn s. MR. WILSO N: I'm not particularly concerned about any case that is past histo ry .

I am concerned that if the province of Manitoba had a reputation for being able to have this type of activity going on within its boundaries , what safeguards do the citize ns of Manitoba have that , say , well, in other words , maybe there 's a concer n. I know in St . Pierre they were concerned about cyanide , I woul d be concerned if it was basically illegal and no t being enforced , that throughout the city of Winnipeg there were certain warehouses that contained mun itions that were for sale to dif ferent political fact ions and dif ferent countries around the wor ld.

That 's my concer n, is this a federal concer n, that the citizens of Manitoba alert the federal au thorities , is this the way the route goes , or is it a concern of all police enforcement bodies? MR. MERCIER: Mr. Chairman , I would think that all police au thorities would be concerned about that , al though the law involved is one involving the federal government . - 833 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR . CHAIRMAN : 7. --pas s. The Member for The Pas . MR . McBRY DE: Mr . Chairper son , in the area of law enforcem ent , there's not that much time left , but I wonder if the Min ister could give us some indication in terms of what new initiatives or what is happening with previous initiatives in terms of policing of remote areas and native communities , Indian Metis com mun ities. There were some special programs under way and I know the Minister is aware of those , and if he could give us an update on what 's happening and if there 's anything new in that field. MR. MERC IER : Mr.

Chairman , which program was the member ref erring to? MR. McBRYDE : Mr. Chairpers on , I'm refe rring to training of community con st ables , training of band constables and training of special constables who are na tive people and incorpo rating those into the RCMP. Mr . Chairper son , there was also a proposal at one time from the Dakota Oj ibway Tribal Council in terms of band policing, and I wonder if the Minister could give us an update on that law enforcement in remote commun ities? MR . MERCIER: Mr. Chairman , we do provide, and I appreciate the member probably doesn 't have the

summary we passe d out. We indicate in there that we are providing for 20 staff man years for the 3B Consta ble Pro gram . We 're providing for $80 ,OOO again for the Dakota Oj ibway Tribal Council Program. The Community Cons table Program, I believe is funded through Northern Aff airs . MR. McBRY DE : Mr. Chairper son , I wonder if there has been an evaluation done so far on these programs , and if he could give us an update on that . MR. MERCIER : Mr . Chairman , with respect to Dakota Oj ibway Tribal Council Program , that was st arted in , I believe 1977 .

In 1977 -78 there was an agreement to fund the program for three years at a cos t of $80 ,OOO per year . Because of unders tandable delays in recruiting cons tables and in training consta bles , the program at the present time has only been under way in actual operation for about a year and a half. We have met twice in the pas t month with the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council about the continuation of that program. There is under way a re view of the success of that program which is antici pated to be completed by mid -1 980 .

We 're hopef ul that that will give us so me understanding of its success and prospects for its cont inuation . Mr. Chairman, with respect to the 3B program , there has been an evaluation re port completed on that program, which is now in the hands of the department . With respect to the Community Const able Program , I th ink the questions of the member would have to be addressed to the Min ister of Northern Af fairs , where that program is funded , as to its success in its objec tives . Unfor tunately , Mr.

Chairman , we may have time to cont inue this later on , we jus t rec eived this morning some comments from the RCMP related to RCMP perso nnel serving in detachment areas which include Indian res ervations which we didn't have an opportunity to review earlier this morning. Perhaps by 8 :00 o'clock I will have had an oppo rtunity to review this material and perhaps can comment fur ther. MR. CHA IRMAN: The hour of 4: 30 has arrived . I am now leaving the Chair for Private Members ' Hour and will return at 8: 00 p. m. Committee rise. SUPPLY - LABOUR AND MANPOWER MR.

CHAIRMAN, Abe Kovnats (Radisson ): This committee will come to order . I would direct the honourable members' at tention to Page 69 of the Main Estimates , Department of Labour and Manpower. Resolution No . 91 , Item 3, Manpower Division, (

a) Research ,

(1) Salaries--pass - the Honourable Member for The Pas . MR. RONALD McBRYDE : Yes, Mr. Chairperson , in last year 's Estimates Book - and I'm sorry I couldn 't find mine jus t bef ore I came in - I believe in last - 834 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 year 's Es timates Book under this

section or under Employment Services

Section , Item ( 4) , there was an item called Grant Assistance and I wonder if the Minister coul d tell us where that item would appear in this year 's Es timates and whether it 's within his department st ill or in a dif ferent de partment . MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . Mr. MacMASTER : That 's in the Department of Education , Mr. Chairman . MR . CHAIRMAN : (1)- -pass - The Honourable Member for Ruper tsland. MR.

BOSTROM: Mr� Chairman, I believe that the Honourable Mem ber for The Pas , by way of a sp eech on the last af tern oon we considered these estimates , raised a number of issues which have st ill no t been res ponded to by the Honourable Minister . I wonder if he would have any resp onse to the comments and questions raised by the Honourable Mem ber for The Pas . MR. MacMASTER : I didn't notice too many reasons to answer . It 's similar statements that we debated last year , there is no reason at this time to answer those partic ular allegations . MR. BOSTROM: Well, Mr.

Chairman, that obviously provides us with some in dication of the Minister 's att itude towards the issues which my colleague from The Pas raised and those issues related to the kind of things which are happening in nort hern Manitoba or ra ther, I should say , the kinds of things that are not happening in northern Manitoba, and I believe that his department , which he now heads and which has a research capacity , is not address ing itself to that problem and the many problems that are faced by the peopl e living in northern Manitoba, Mr.

Chairman • And he is doing no better a job at that in this new capacity as Minister of Labour as he was in his capacity as Minister of Northern Affairs and I believe , Mr . Chairman , that he has the resp onsibility , as a Minister of the Cr own , as a Minister in the provincial government of Manitoba , to address himself to the un employment problem in northern Manitoba. Mr. Chairman, it's a very serious problem. It 's one which is scandalous . If one looks at the numbers of people that are unemployed , young people 18 to 25, 30, who are in northern Manitoba that have no oppo rtunity to work and, Mr.

Chairman, this Ministe r , while he was Minister of Northern Affai rs, cut back on programs that were assi st ing those people to find work in the community and outside the community . We have heard no thing yet from this Minister in terms of these Es timates , in terms of manpower researc h , as to what his government intends to do about this problem. In fact , Mr. Chairman, they seem to want to ignore it compl etely. In our capacity as oppo si tion , Mr.

Chairman , we 've been looking at some of the people that are unemployed in northe rn Man itoba and if I could just ref er to a single community where there are about 450 resident s , about 75 percent of those res idents are unemployed , Mr. Chairman, and mos t of them , as a result of two years of conservat ive government , are not even able to collect unemployment insurance becaus e they have absolutely had no opportunity to work even on the short-term work proj ects , which we used to provide as a government , through winter works and th e PEP program and the spec ial northern employment program and so on .

I can give you , wi thout giving the names of individuals , some indication of the amount of welfare that 's paid out in these communities because these people are now forced onto the wel fare roles , which al l Manitobans and all Canadians must pay for . Mr. Chairman , it's a scandalous situation and it's one in which the people in these communiti es do not want to be in this posit ion. They would much rather have gainful employment .

There is no one from his department who is looking at this problem to • • • at least no people have been indicated or no ap proach or po licy has been indi cated within the Es timates process whereby there are people in his department address ing themself to this problem. Mr. Chairman , jus t going through a short exampl e here where we have people ranging in age from 18 years old to 55 , 60 years old, that are employable peo ple , that have dependents and who are forced onto the welfare roles , if you jus t look at some of the rates of wel fare that are paid. Mr. Chairman , an individual in - 835 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 this community who 's health is good, who is interested in working , is collecting .$758 a month in wel fare , who has seven dependent s . Mr . Chairman , why doesn 't th e government take that kind of funding and make it available for some kind of re training program so that a person like that would have the opportunity to be gainfully employed either in that communit y or outside that commun ity ? We had a program, Mr.

Chairman , of educating peopl e to be teacher s, to be nurses , to be personnel who could operate services that are presently servicing the communities in no rth er n Manitoba; services , Mr. Chairman, which peopl e now from outside most of these communities are providing. People are imported in all the way from the Maritimes to work in some of the northern commun ities to be teachers .

Why isn •t this government using the funds which they are already paying ou t, $758 a month to one family in welfare, why aren 't they using those funds to help a family like that at least train one of its members to be a use ful pro ducti ve member of that community?

And one of the ways they could do that is to increase the amount of funding that 's available for programs like teacher train ing, like nursing training , like the programs we had in North er n Affai r s and other departments to train peo ple to take jobs that are now being provide d by government personne l , government personnel who are recruited from outs ide the commun ity. Mr. Chairman , why isn 't the government us ing funds like this , which would be no further expense to the ta xpayer - if any , marginally more expensive to the tax payer - and in the long run , Mr.

Speaker , the problem would at least be on its way to solution . Bec ause the implications of continuing along th e direction that this government is following , and that is abandoning peo ple to the wel fare rolls , Mr · Speaker , is creating a monst er , because in the long run , it creates more peopl e on wel fare. The children who are growing up in wel fare homes are learning a par ticular style of li fe and when they go out , Mr. Chairman, to be members of soc iety , they have learned a particular way of living , and it 's a life of wel fare . So that rather than having one family on welfare , Mr.

Chairman, in the next generation , in this case for example , you may have eight families on wel fare ; the existing family that is now on welfare , and the seven dependants who will have families of the ir own • So this problem, Mr. Speaker , has horrendous implications. And it's a problem that mus t be addressed now. It mus t be se riously addressed now .

His department should be doing rese arch into this problem, should be determin ing the people available for training, the people available for project s that would be use ful to the commun ities , peopl e available for recruit ment and selection for jo bs that are outside the communities , those who are willing to relocate . fut , Mr. Chairman, to date we have seen nothing , very little and , at best, inadequate resp onse and pro grams on behalf of this government to address itself to this problem. I'd li ke the Minister to respond to these issues , Mr.

Chairman , rather than say that we discu ssed this last year and we debated it last year , therefore we don 't have to debate it this year . Well , Mr. Chairman, they did no thing the fir st year they were in government ; they did no thing the seco nd year they were in government , and they're doing no thing now. In fact , Mr. Chairman , if you look at the trends , this government is reducing , over time , its ef forts in this area. If the fact s were known , Mr.

Chairman, the month ly welfare rolls are getting bigger and bigger as time goes on , as people fall further and further behind , and get more and more des perate and unable to find any form of empl oyment. There was a time when peopl e used to move fr om the remote communities into the city of Winnipeg looking for work. Well, Mr. Chairman, by the ac tions of this government we can see that that is something which they are no longer doing either , because there are no op portunities in Winnipeg ei ther for them .

I'd like to know what activities this Minister plans to follow to prepare people who are moving into the city of Winnipeg , or any other urban cen tre , to be able to ass is t them to gain useful employment and to assist them to relocate into a new situ ation , a new style of lif e; what if anything , his de partment is doing by way of studying the situation of migration from remote commun ities into centres in Mani toba , whether it 's Winnipeg, Brandon , The Pas , or Thompson , or wlierever; what his department is doing by way of researching the movement of peopl es , po tential manpower, poten tial worker s; and what he is doing by way of instruc ting his re search staff to come up with proposed policies and programs to deal with the situ ation. - 836 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. MacMASTER: I've said befo re , Mr. Chairman, and I'll say it once more , as the Manpower Division Estimates unravel it will be pretty obvious that there 's been a variety of different things attemp ted, some successf ully , and other s that we propose to attempt . It 's interes ting that the member talks about people coming out of communities ; he full well kn ows that there are a large number of people coming out of the communities and getting succes sf ully employed in a variety of programs that the government has.

Several departments are very actively involved in training peo pl e out of com muni ties and he knows that , but he also likes to throw around sup posed facts and figures without having th e facts , which is sort of typic al. Maybe he should check the wel fare rolls of the province of Manitoba when he very ad amantly st ates that there are more people on welfare , there are more people on wel fare .

It 's easy to say that , and he may get some press for it . fut the facts of the matter are , there is approx imately 4 ,OOO less people on welfare in the province of Manitoba today than there was in the fall of 1977 . Now , I don 't say that 's good. We 'd all like to say that it's 14 ,000 less , but as the Manpower Division unravels and as Northern Aff airs unravels and as Education unravels , he'll see that there are things being done. The teacher pro grams he 's talking about , the nursing programs , those things are in ef fect , and I th ink he really kn ows it .

His argument may be that they're no t enough , and that 's valid, that 's valid from the opp osition that you 're not doing enough ; that 's part of th e exercise we 're going through. But he full well does know that there's a large variety of programs in place , and if he '11 wait as we go through the Man power Division , he will find some new initiatives this year , some brand new initiatives that we 're taking , and he 'll get some of the numbers of the people that are involved in some programs that we 're already into . MR. CHAIRMAN : (1)-- pass - the Honourable Mem ber for Ruper tsland . MR .

BOSTROM: Thank you , Mr. Chairman. The one community that I'm talking about has 130 heads of families on welfare , and Mr. Cha irman, the mon thly wel fare bill for thes e people range from approximately $350 to a high of $894 , and these are provincial welfare rates , Mr. Chairman . These are 130 heads of hous eholds in a community of about 450 peop le, where approximately two-thirds of the res idents are children under the normal working age. --( Interjectio n)- - I don 't wish to reveal the names of th e peo ple and/or the community in this case because, Mr. Chairman , we have a confidential situation here .

MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister on a point of order . MR. MacMASTER : I'd like to pos e a ques tion which I think the member will find accep table and I hope he accepts it as a reasonable one . I'd like hi m then , privately , to give me that commun ity and I will privately tell him what we have sp ecifically tried to do , and if nothing su fficient is being done I will endeavour to try and find out what is going on in that particular community . I'm prepare d to deal with him on that one-to-one basis . We have done this before with that particular member. MR.

CHAIRMAN : That 's acceptable to the Honourable Member for Rupert s land? The Honourable Member for Rupertsland . MR. BOSTR OM: Mr. Chairman, that 's acceptable to me if it's acceptable to the community . I would have to consul t with them on this case . The matter is however , Mr. Chairman, that we ha ve a situation where a good number of the people of working age in the community are unem ployed and have very little op portunity during the year to find employment . Mr.

Chairman , all I'm saying is that the pro grams and policies of this government have proven inadequate and continue to be inadequate ana if I look through the estimates here, the Minister says he is going to tell us that there are major new programs and major new initiatives . Well, Mr. Chairman, looking at these es timates and comparing them to other year s, I know that there are no major new initiatives by this department or any other de partment to deal with this problem. This is only one comm unit y and there are probably 100 - 8 37 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 others like it in northern Manitoba both non-t reaty and treaty commun ities which are every bit as much a res pons ibility of this government as they are of any government , Mr. Chairman. All of the peo pl e in Manitoba are the responsib ility of the government of Manitoba whether treaty or non-t reaty . The Minister may say that he 's no t re sponsible for those who are on welfare in Indian reserves . But I would say , Mr. Chairman , that he should be looking at Indian res erves in the same light as he is looking at non-treaty commun ities in northern Manitoba or wherever they are .

So that the policies of his government would address itsel f to problems of people in Manitoba and the problems of people in Manitoba in this case is severe un employment with a lack of oppo rt unity for them to find any kind of meaningful employment and/or to see any hope for the future in terms of obtaining any usef ul oc cu pation or income from employment . They subs ist on minimal op portunities that have been there for th e last centu ry , a littl e bit of fish ing, a little bit of trapping , a little bit of odd jobs here and there but no permanent op portuni ties for employment.

Many of thes e commun ities , Mr. Chairman , live in areas where there are re sources and because of the lack of ac tion on the part of this government there has been virtually no attempt to relate those people to that resource and to give them the opportu nity to develop that resource through providing them with the technical and financial assistance to develop the resource . And beyond that , Mr. Chairman , we have to reco gnize that these communities can 't ex ist entirely on that res ource base. That 's only one way that we co uld address ourse lves to the problem.

The other parts of the problem mus t be solved in other ways . There mus t be ways of finding alternative employment op portun ities for peopl e outside of the communities where they ex ist and the government should be address ing itsel f to that problem becaus e there is an entire population within the city of Winnipeg that are on the welfare roles and that are on unemployment insurance and in the case of treaty Indian people, Mr. Chairman , when they move into the city of Winnipeg they be come the charge of the munici pal or provincial au thorities .

They become someth ing which the government then has a direct financial involvement in . And in the case of the non-t reaty communi ties in nort hern Mani toba , they are a charge on the provincial government directly and even the treaty communities , I believe , that the Minister and his government have a res pons ibility to in terms of assist ing them to find opportunities to obtain useful employment for their peopl e. MR. CHAIRMAN : (1)-- pass: The Honourable Member for Churc hill. MR. COWAN : Yes , thank you , Mr. Chairper son .

Firs tly if I might, when we were discussing - if I could go back a few days - when we were disc ussing the Women 's Bureau on the past Friday , we had a bit of a procedural wrangle over the ex tent of the debate on one of the items at which point I st ood up and had sug gested that we would not be threatened by people who would attempt to rest ric t the debate and I know having had conversations with you , Mr. Chairperson , that there was some qu estion as to whether or not I was directing my remarks about people at tempting to res trict debate to yo urself or not .

I have had the opportunity to go over the Hansard and in it there was not in tent but as it was not as spec i fic as it could have been at the time and people might from reading that assume that I was directing my remarks at the Chairperson for at tempting to res trict the debate , I thought I would take this op portunity and put it on the record , if I can , th at I have no obje ctions with the performance of the Chairperson and when I was refe rring to members threatening to res trict debate during th e procedures , I was not and had not intended to ref er spe cifically to the Chairperson .

I feel that you have done a capable job and am quit e pleased wi th your per formance as Chairper son , so I wanted to get that on the record just to make certain that there was no misunderstanding as to your abilities as a chair per son . I th ink your record stands you in good st ead throughout the procedings that I have been a part of . Last year during this discuss ion on these Es timates , we talked about a number of programs which were being reviewed and researc h was being done on , Mr. Chair pers on . One of them was the evaluation of the New Careers Pr ogram.

The Member from The Pas had asked if there was an evaluation on the New Career s Program being completed by the res earch department and the Minist er at that time indicated that - 83 8 -

Thursday , 13 Marc h , 1980 there was , that it had been started and it was an ongoing evaluation. Perhaps we can ask the Min ister now, if that evaluation has been completed and if so , is he willing to share it with membe rs on this side of the House who have a particular interes t in that speci fic program? MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . MR. MacMASTER : It is , as I said , an ongoing evaluation .

We hope to at some parti cular point cut it of f and I'll be prepared at that time - which certainly isn 't today or tomorrow or the next week or two - I can ass ure the member that we are going to evaluate the present sys tem of the New Career s Pr o gram , the way it 's being admin istered and I'd like to further advise him that when we get under New Career s, I'll be talking to him about some slightly diff erent direc tion that we propose to go with New Caree rs .

So once we ha ve, he can understand from that , if we are proposing some new direc tions then somewhere in the near future we 'll be reaching some very positive conclus ions on the ef forts of the past New Career s programming which hasn 't be en all that unsu cces sf ul but we think we can improve it somewhat.

So in the very near fu ture I can assure him that I' 11 give the Mem ber fr om Churchill an evaluation of the New Careers Program and when we get into it in our Es timates here , we are prepared to talk to him and others about some slightly dif ferent dire ction we want to take with that program keeping in mind we intend to continue it . MR. CHAIRMAN : (1 )- -pa ss. The Honourab le Member for Churc hill. MR. COWAN : Thank you , Mr. Chairperson .

We are aware of shift in direct ion that is taking place now from our conversations with our consti tuents and of course that is why I bring it up and look forward to disc ussing it in some detail dur ing that item of the Es timates . Also last year the Minister indicated that a review of the Apprenticeship Pro gram would take place in the next few mon ths and I would ask the Minister if that review has been completed and if he would be kind enough to share it with the members on this side if it has . MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . MR.

MacMASTER : The only total review that we have com pleted is the one that I forwarded to the member . The others I hope to have in the very near fu ture along the same format wi th the general sorts of information that I gave him - the one I should say we upped, our evaluation program qu icker to get it in place - so I could in fact give the members of the opp osit ion a sample of the kinds of things that we plan on doing. Again when we get into Appr enticeship I am qu ite prepared to talk about some of the difficulties that we have had and how we think we 've corrected them at that time . MR.

CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Church ill. MR. COWAN : So then I would be correct in assuming from what we rece ived both the Member for The Pas and mys elf yes terday , I believe, that these are the four or five st udies that the Minister did give us are in fact the total number of studies that are ready for publication that have arisen out of the department in the past since the Minister has been res pons ible for this particular aspect of his department? MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . MR. MacMASTER : That 's the ones that are prepared in that particular form at this time, Mr. Chairman.

As I said we are prepared to forward copies as they come on . We exp ect in the next couple of months to have a large number, six , eight , ten , of various program reviews completed . We 've had a change in st aff during the course of the year and some new direc tion and conse qu ently some of the booklets and the forms that you see coming - 83 9 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 out now are really a fir st of their partic ular type and we think it's vindicative of the op enness that I certainly want to be wi th the members op posite , in laying out jus t how we see things are working and it certainly gives them a good position which is maybe a first to totally , absolutely , at their leis ure , review them , come back through the form of a letter or a phone call, or a coff ee , whatever they want , in the House , whatever is their wish , and discuss what they think is missing in there , what could better improve the evaluation , how we could better serve the consti tuents in all of Manitoba.

I think the ones that he does have he will have to agree are pretty complete . MR. CHAIRMAN: The Member for Churc hill. MR. COWAN : Thank you , Mr. Chairper son . I'll continue on jus t for a few momen ts more . The Minister yesterday passed over a book called , Major Provisions in Negotiated Working Conditions and Manitoba Collective Agreements In Eff ect De cember 31 , 1978. Can the Minister inform me as to how this book is being distributed throughout the province ? What the procedures are to ens ure that it is getting into the hands of peo pl e who might be able to make the best use of it ?

Because it is a very comple te book . It 's an example of rese arch that 's been done by other provinces and I know in ot her provinces that they make these books freely available to unions , freely available to employer groups and people who are interested in the negotiating pro cess, and that 's important because it tends to give you an overview of what 's happening and allows you to develop your own proposals in light of what seems to be oc curring in your spec i fie indus try and in your province as a whole . MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minis ter. MR.

MacMASTER : We 've sent ou t 40 or 50 as a st arting point to see if interes t would be generated and we now under stand that req uests are coming in for others. So it 's ano ther example of the medium point we 're at where (

a) were pro ducing the material, (

b) we st ill haven 't got what we consider , an ideal system of getting it out , and the Member for Churchill and I talked abou t that type of th ing; that we are establishing sys tems of getting all the literature out that we can possibly get out to people so that they can make good use of it . MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Member for Churc hill. MR.

COWAN : I wonder if the Minister would be kind enough - and he doesn 't have to do it during the proceedings today but at some point in the near fu ture be fore his Est imates are over - forward me a list of who this particular book has gone to - there'd be 40 names or so, I would imagine - so we can discuss that per haps under the Ministe r 's Salary, if there is any need to discuss that and I'm not certain , no t knowing who it has gone out to .

Also , the Minister during the ques tion period today provided us with some figures that I assume were provided to him by his research department on employ ment levels . I'm a bit con fus ed . I wasn 't able to cat ch the figures as he was giving them to us during the qu estion period. I wonder if the Minister would have those figures available and be able to repeat them to me at this time. MR. CHAIRMAN : The Honourable Minister . MR. MacMASTER : They were February over February 1977 -8 0 , unemployed in both

part icular months of each respective year was 28,0 00. El:nployed in February 1977 was 421 ,000. El:nployed in 1980 was 45 3 ,OOO . Now the example that the member and I were hassling about yes terday - and I guess you can call it a hass le, you can throw st atistics back and forth and I consider at times to be a total waste of time - but it 's an exampl e of what can happen if you pi ck a mon th over a month , or a year by year . I don 't susp ect that there's actually 32, 000 more people working . I don 't really acc ep t that because if you took March over March , next mon th over 1977 you may find that figure is down to 31,0 00. If you went May over May a year or two - 84 0 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 back you may find it's back up to 41,0 00. Really what you do and what I was attempt ing to ex plain to the Member for Churchill is at the end of the year you average out your month over month or year or year and then you establish the real true employment growth wi thin your work force during the course of the year . He was talking, just to enlarge on how things get out of perspe ctive in relationship to month over month or year over year , he mentioned in February over February , it looked like a 1,000 increase last year to this year .

Hell, January over January looked like a 5 ,OOO increase. So you see the figures might have been exceptiona lly low in January of 1979, excep tionally high in January 1980. Thos e things fluctuate up and down , and that 's what the indication that I gave him was . MR. COWAN : Thos e of course were , for the rec ord , seasonally adjus ted levels , and when using a mon th over mon th from year to year , one can jus t as accurately and probably ef fectively use the unadjusted levels .

I thank the Minister for making my point , in no t only my re ply to the Throne Speec h , but also my comments yesterday that you have take a global pictur e, that you have to look at trends and you have to look at what happ ens over a certain period of time and use the averages and use the adjus tments .

But I th ink that point has been belaboured enough during the course of these debates and the course of th e Throne debate and will be, of cour se , belaboured more during th e fud get debate . --( Inter jectio n)- - Next month , the Minister says , of course next mont h, one of us will be throwing statistic s back and forth ; and he's right , to jus t throw statist ics back and forth is a waste of time. fut to try to use stat istics to define circumsta nces , to define situations, to discover trends and be able to deal wi th those trends is not a waste of time , and that 's why we have this very important department bef ore us today for discu ssion and debate , because that 's one of the jobs of this department .

So I jus t wanted to make certain that I had heard the Minister correctly during the Ques tion Period ; that 's the reason for asking that ques tion , not wishing to get caught up in another battle as to whose statis tics are better than whose other statist i cs . The Minister last ye ar , during the time of this particular discuss ion on this researc h de partment , indicated that a review of the private secto r youth employ ment program was ongoing and "will be completed shortly", was his words .

I would ask the Minister now if he has that re view of the Private Sector Youth Employment Program, and in that case we were talking about the year previous , I would also wish to know if he has a review for this last year , in other words the year be fore , which he had indicated was being completed shortly during last year 's Estimates and also , the review of the last year immediat ely preceding these Es timates? MR. MacMASTER : I ex pect to be able to forward that review to the Member for Churc hill be fore the end of March . MR.

COWAN : Just a point of clarif ication , th at would be for both years, the reviews for both year : The private secto r youth employment program in its fir st year , and the private sector youth employment program in its second year? MR. MacMASTER : The only one I've been working on is the '79, Mr. Chairman. MR. COWAN : Now because we use di fferent years in a way that I'm no t qu ite accus tomed to yet , even having been here for three years , by '79 does he mean this last year?

Well then , I would ask the Minister what happened to the review that he had said was ongoing and would be com pleted in a short period of time for that program in the year previous ? He had indicated during the Estimates that it was an ongoing review that his department was looking at . It was a very important issue at the time. I remember we stayed here late in the night on that particular ni ght , probably largely because of that discu ss ion. I'm certain that you , Mr. Chairper son , may well remember that night also.

And at that time we were assured that it was going to be com pleted shortly , and I have been looking foward to it ever since , Mr. Chairper son , and would wonder now if it would be possible to at long last have an oppo rt unity to see if our al legations at the time , which were qu ite strong, were as correc t as we believed them to be. - 84 1 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. MacMAS TER : I don 't know whether we use d ongoing or complete , or for wa rded , or what . It 's a year ago ; I'm su re Hansard will dictate what I said. I can undertake now a review of the 1978 , along the same format as the one that I hope to have available , as I said , before the end of March of 1979. MR.

COWAN : Hansard is quite explicit and detailed as to the Minister 's answers , and the answers were that it was an ongoing researc h pro gram, that it would be, his e xact words , excuse me , "will be completed shortly", and that 's a quote from the Hansard ; I can find the proper nota tion and date and the time. It was Thursday, May 17th , I can find the page number of Hansard if the Minist er would care , although I don 't think it 's necess ary. I'm certain that he knows there was some sort of a commitment to have it completed . There was never a commitment to give it to us . That commitment was ne ver made.

As a matter of fact , ·we had urged the Minister to make that commitment at the tim e and never did rece ive that commitment . So I'm no t saying that he said he would give us su ch a review; I'm jus t saying he said that it was ongoing and would be completed in a short period of time . As to whether or no t it has been , I would hope that the Minister can provide us with it as soon as it is. I'm making that req ues t again this year , as well as the one on the previous year .

The Minister indicated also last year that they would be reviewing the Appren ticeship Program? -- (Interje ction )-- Well I would like to continue on wi th that jus t a bit, if I can , and at the same time , the Minister indicated that they would be st arting an out-m igration study ; in other words , a stud y to determine where the interprovincial flow of population was going .

I assumed at the time the Minister was going to try to determine why and try to determine what could be done to either change it , if it was necessa ry , or to support those forces which tended to keep trained personnel here , and that 's why I mention the Apprenti ceship area. I would ask the Minister if he has had that study compl eted . I know he hired personnel spec ifically for doing it , and if the Minister would make that stud y available to us also, upon completion , if it has not been completed . MR.

MacMASTER : The demographic review of what 's happening wi thin the prov ince , and those going out and those coming in, both em igration and immigration , is an ongoing thing, and I don't , at this particul ar time , see any particular study being handed down. The member is correc t th at we did hire a personnel as a de mographer . Sub sequent to that we lost the person who was heading up the Immigration Department , so there has been a change of per sonnel within that partaicular departmen t. There is a great deal of work going on in this parti cular area.

We do know that the numbers of people leaving Manitoba are qu ite similar, in fact less than , if you averaged - and here we get into stat isti cs again , but if you average it out - to be kind to some of the cr iticism fr om op pos ite , and I probably shouldn 't be with some of the nonsense they 've raised wi th those particular figures , bu t the fact of the matter is , if you went back ten years, you'd find it averaged out that there is very little change , except for the last couple of years , it has been somewha t less . And that parti cular figure is established .

We do know that people crossing our coun try are not stopping as qui ckly in Mani toba as they might have a few years ago becaus e the boom , of cour se , is in Alberta and I th ink everybody shares with me the fact that a lot of good tradesmen are getting out there , and what is taking place as far as the oil recovery indus try , what 's happening there is very ac cept able to all Canadians .

The immigration of the federal government has dropped of f, and those types of figures are available , if the member woul d like that . fut those three kind of th ings certainly have been looked at, but a total demographic study of what 's happ ening wi thin Manitoba is an ongo ing thing and that type of thing might no t be available for a year or two. There's a tremendous amount of work to do in that field . You don 't do those ki nd of things with a person or two or three. You do a lot of things that relate to it in the course of a year .

So there's no particular document that 's going to be tabled in this House at this time , or in the foresee able filture , as relates to that . - 842 -

Thursday , 13 March , 1980 MR. COWAN : Mr. Chairman , I would like to ask the Minister very sp ec i fic ally whether this sect ion , this Research

Section , has done any res earch into the stru ctural unemployment problem that my colleague for Rupert s land and I have been talk ing about and which we really haven 't got a res ponse from the Min ister on . Is this

section spe cifically doing some research into that structural unemployment problem in no rthe rn Mani toba and in native communi ties and in Metis communities in Manitoba? Is there any spec ific research or studies being done in order to assist the Minister and this government to develop any programs or policies to over come that serious problem? MR. MacMASTER : They don 't sp ec i fically go out and do those things , Mr.

Chairman, but we are a gs thering source at this particular time , and when we get into the Manpower Needs committee area and on into the Estimates you will find that some of the findings that have been pulled toge ther from a v ariety of depart ments indicate a desire by my own ministry to do a variety of different things , which again we 'll get in to . And I'm no t trying to mince words wi th the Member for The Pas . We don 't speci fically go out and study the situation ; it 's a gathering source at this particular point . MR. COWAN : Yes , Mr.

Chairper son , what we probably need as well as a Man power Needs committee , which does form an important fun ction , is sort of a need of peopl e for employment committee , because that 's the kind of structural problem we 're dealing with in northern Manitoba and in the remote communities , and indeed in some pockets of unemployment in southe rn and rural Manitoba, even within the city of Winnipeg, Mr. Chairman . The Minister , I assume fr om somewhere, got the statis tics for provincial wel fare rolls , but Mr.

Chairman , what I was talking about when I made my comments was the situation of unemployed employables in northern Manitoba. The number of un em ployed employables in receipt of welfare has gone up ; and if you take that figure and look at the remote commun ities , it has gone up qu ite considerab ly; and if you take that figure and apply it to Indian res erves , then it 's gone up even further . So I don 't know if the Minister is pretending in this Chamber , Mr. Chairman , that we don 't have a se rious unemployment problem wi thin the remote communities in Manitoba.

I would hope that the Minister would not try - he 's tried to pretend , he and his government , many things , but I'm assuming that even he wouldn 't try and pretend that there's not a serious unemployment problem within the remote com muni ties . Mr. Chairper son , the Minister indicated to my colleague, who had some spec ific figures in terms of communities , that he woul d be wi lling to say what has been done in certain communities and what the pres ent situation is in terms of govern ment programs , in terms of his department what ef forts have been made. So maybe , Mr.

Chairman, the Minister would like to provide that information to us , and it would probably be very use ful , Mr. Chairpers on , if he could take a com munity and say , in 1977 at this same time in the year , the following things were happen ing. In 1981 , the following things are hap pening in that community . Excuse me , 198 0 , what is happening in thos e communities .

And if he could do it for all the remote communi ties , if he coul d spec if ically tell us what is hap pening in Cormorant these days ; if he could spec ifically tell us what is happening in Easterville these days ; if he coul d spec if ically tell us what is hap pening in Moos e Lake, or Wanless , or Sheridan , or Broche t, or Lac Brochet , and go through the whole list of communi ties , if he has that in formation available . Mr.

Chairper son , all that you have to do is to go into some of these com muni ties , to have been going into them for a number of years , to see that the si tuation is in fact , deter iorating. Things are getting wors e. Peopl e are unable to get wo rk. People are unable to sup port their families . And Mr. Chairperson , I don 't want to repeat my sp eech that I made the last time we met on this subjec t , because , Mr. Chairman -- (Interje ction )-- and the Minister says , "Go od ", and it 's well he should. It 's well he should, becaus e that has been his biggest failing as Minister.

That par ticular Minister campaigned in 1977 on employment . He went to remo te communities and said , "When a Conservative government is in offi ce there will be more jobs available, " and Mr. Chairpers on , there are now less jobs avail able. Tt>e promise was not ke pt in any way , sh ape or form , Mr. Chairman . - 84 3 -

Thursday , 13 March , 198 0 So well the Ministe r should say , good, that I don 't keep reminding him of this serious failure , of the drastic failure of him and his government in reg ard to employment creation because , Mr . Chairman , the Minister just has to go into some of the remote communities and talk to the people there , to see what 's happening . It is depressing to talk to them and see that in fact the people that worked be fore don 't have work now, that a community that had things going for it doesn 't have things going for it now. Mr .

Chairman , I suppose I have a problem of getting angry when I see that situ ation , when I see people suf fering in the remote communities in no rthern Manitoba , when I see people suffering in rural areas , some of which fall in my constituency , and , Mr. Chairman , I can relate that suf fering directly to programs that have been cut out by this government , to things that should have been done by this govern ment that weren 't done, Mr . Chairman. So I am not going to apologize for getting angry with the Minister or getting annoyed with the Minister , because, Mr.

Chair man , there are people in my consti tuency , there are people of northern Manitoba that are worse off, that are suffering , that are in bad straits because of the acti on and the inaction of this Minister and this government , and I won 't apologize for keeping reminding the Minister of that deplorable situation . MR . CHAIRMAN : (1)--pas s. The Honourable Member for Churchil l. MR . COWAN : Yes, thank you , Mr. Chairper son . As the Member for The Pas has sta ted this is the area , as we talked yest erday , of the greatest failing or one of the greatest failings of the government.

There are areas of greater failings in ot her areas and I can only hope wi thout going on in some detail , because we had discussed this item in great detail jus t the other day when we went through the statisit ics , when all of us on this side , especially those of us from no rthern Manitoba , because that is where the situation is at its worst , that is where the contradictions are so apparent .

The Minister came forward promising jobs , the Minister came forward when he was elected promising a better economic community in the north, a more viable economic community , and in every instance , in every single sp eci f ic instance there are fewer jobs than before . In the mining industry , and I am not going to talk about specif ic towns because some towns have more jobs than they did bef ore , some towns have less jobs than they did be fore , but in the

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Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	31-4-16a
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	31st 4th hansardpdf 16a.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
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