role="main" class="main-container container js-quickedit-main-content" id="main-content">

October 29, 1992

35th Parliament, 2nd Session

< Previous sitting day

Next sitting day >

Hansard Transcripts

The House met at 1002.

Prayers.

Mr Frank Miclash (Kenora): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: You must know that it's the government's commitment and it's obliged to have a quorum in the House at all times. I do not believe there's a quorum present this morning.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): I'll check with the table.

Acting Clerk Assistant and Clerk of Committees (Ms Deborah Deller): A quorum is not present.

The Speaker ordered the bells rung.

The Deputy Speaker: A quorum is present.

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

COURT SYSTEM

Mr Harnick moved resolution number 24:

That, in the opinion of this House,

(1) Recognizing that the Attorney General is a member of the executive council; and is also a member of a political party who, as such, is subject to partisan political influences; and recognizing that it is desirable to reduce the potential for conflicts of interest; and

(2) Recognizing that the Attorney General is responsible for the financing and administration of the courts; and recognizing the importance of the independence of the judiciary; and

(3) Recognizing that the Attorney General is responsible for the decision-making process of the prosecutorial system; and recognizing the importance of the independence of the prosecution service,

The government of Ontario should transfer the responsibility for financing and the administration of the courts to the judiciary and create by statute the position of an independent director of public prosecutions.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Mr Harnick moves private member's notice of motion number 24. Pursuant to standing order 94(c)(

i) the honourable member has 10 minutes for this presentation.

Mr Charles Harnick (Willowdale): This resolution is a resolution that I think is of some significance to the administration of justice in this province, and that is precisely why I have moved the resolution.

May I deal first with the idea of the creation of a director of public prosecutions by statute? The rule in Ontario at present is that the independence of the Attorney General in making prosecutorial decisions has been accepted by constitutional convention, but changes in society have made it increasingly difficult to demonstrate that independence.

Part of the problem is the problem of the Attorney General's accountability to this place. That accountability is what I describe as ex post facto accountability. The Attorney General is only accountable to the Legislature after a decision not to prosecute has been made or after a prosecution has been completed, because we all know the custom is that the Attorney General will not comment on a case when it's before the courts.

It's become increasingly difficult for the public to escape the conclusion that partisan political considerations aimed at furthering the interests of the government are not involved in decisions being made by the Attorney General. Let me be clear. I am not alleging this, but with every passing day it is becoming a possible conclusion, almost a probable conclusion, that can be reached by the public.

I point out the issue of the Brian Rapson prosecution, where the Attorney General was in the position of preferring an indictment. I point out the Wade Lawson decision, where there was a decision not to appeal an acquittal but where the jury system was immediately called into suspicion by the Attorney General, in conjunction with the Wade Lawson matter. It wasn't something that happened independently. It was a clash of the Attorney General's responsibility for legal policy versus his responsibility as a prosecutor.

I think there are too many conflicts right now in terms of the Attorney General's position vis-à-vis his prosecutorial duties. As minister of justice he's responsible for legal policy, but as the Attorney General he has to prosecute, and he has to prosecute in a neutral way to get at the truth of any particular matter. Those functions may well be in conflict: the function of dealing with legal policy versus prosecutorial neutrality.

The same minister, the Attorney General, is in charge of prosecuting. He's also in charge of delivering the legal aid system. There's a basic conflict in that. The Attorney General, as chief prosecutor, also has a say in choosing judges and deciding on their remuneration. The conflicts are obvious and the conflicts have to be eliminated.

The Ontario Law Reform Commission states that its primary concern is the independence of the prosecution service from potential pressure, and therefore it believes, and I agree with it, that a director of public prosecution, by statute, should be created.

The rationale for that is I think quite obvious. The rationale offered for the creation of an office of the director of public prosecutions is that a tenured professional with no political ties would be better able to disregard partisan political considerations when making decisions to prosecute. That is fundamental.

Such an office would increase the actual and perceived independence of the crown prosecution service. Moreover, it would remove the conflicts arising from the fact that the Attorney General and minister of justice -- they are one and the same -- acts both as legal adviser and prosecutor for the government.

I believe the Attorney General would continue to have the authority to give instructions to the director of public prosecutions in the form of general guidelines for the handling of cases, as well as specific directives for the handling of individual cases. Any guidelines or directives that would be issued by the Attorney General would be in writing, published and tabled in this Legislature.

The very concept I am outlining today is a concept that attempts to strike a balance in the need for prosecutorial independence but recognizing at the same time the involvement of the Attorney General as being the person most responsible and continuing to be that person. So I think the idea that this person, this director of public prosecutions, would usurp the function of the Attorney General is not part of what I'm saying.

Finally, dealing with this aspect, the Ontario Law Reform Commission recommended that the budget for the office of the director of public prosecutions be included within the budget of the Attorney General, but once the funds have been allocated by the Attorney General to the prosecution service, the director should have authority to allocate those funds within the prosecution service. Such an arrangement would again stress the independence of the director of public prosecutions.

The other aspect of my resolution is dealing with judicial independence and who in fact should be running the court system. I don't mean to imply that any judge, as an individual, is not independent in terms of the decisions he must make. However, we have a problem with the judiciary as a collective, because the Attorney General controls the purse strings; because of that, we have basic conflict.

Should your opponent, meaning the Attorney General, control the court system? Should your opponent decide the balance between civil case resources and criminal case resources? Should your opponent direct and hire and fire the staff of the courts in which you as a litigant might be fighting him? Should your cases be decided by judges who are forced increasingly into an economic and administrative dependence on your opponent? If the province's chief litigant controls the allocation of funds, how can it be said that the administration of justice is independent of the executive branch of government?

What I say is that the Attorney General should give the function of controlling how the courts work to the very people who should be operating the courts, and that's the judges. The people who work within the court system should be working under the direction of the judges. They shouldn't be working under the direction of the Attorney General, and then in a subordinate or tangential way, operate under the control of judges. It just doesn't work. I would ask this Legislature to reflect on that.

I further point out that sittings of the court, the assignment of judges to sittings, the assignment of cases to individual judges, sitting schedules, the makeup of trial lists and courtroom assignments should be controlled by the court process. They should not be controlled by the major litigant before the courts, and that's the Attorney General. I think the court system fails if we give the impression that the judicial system does not control its own process.

Again, we're looking for a balance. We're striking a balance. No one is saying that the courts get carte blanche to spend whatever money they want. They've got to be accountable to this Legislature, just as other functions of this Legislature are accountable to it: the Ombudsman, the privacy commissioner. They all have independence. They are all accountable to this Legislature for the money they spend. The court system would be no different.

Accordingly, I would be very interested to hear the remarks of my friends, particularly my friends opposite, on what I believe is an important question.

Mr David Winninger (London South): I'm pleased to join in this debate today. The member puts forward an interesting resolution with some history to it. I should indicate that back in 1975 this Ministry of the Attorney General released a discussion paper proposing that control over most staff in the court system's budget should be transferred to the judiciary, who would be accountable directly to the Legislature.

That paper was not implemented by the Conservative government of the day, in which Mr Roy McMurtry became the Attorney General. I think it would be fair to characterize the response to that paper at the time, in 1975, as somewhat lukewarm.

Five years later, in 1980, while the Conservative government was still in power, the Deschenes report, Maîtres chez eux: Masters in Their Own House, was proposed with largely the same approach. That report was written by a Quebec judge for the Canadian Judicial Council, which is made up of the federally appointed chief justices from across Canada.

The 1987 report, Report of the Ontario Courts Inquiry, conducted by Mr Justice Zuber, popularly known as the Zuber report, proposed a system of partnership in management of the courts, with judges, the government, lawyers and the public functioning as a sort of policy board for the court system, but leaving certain essential elements in the exclusive control of the judiciary and others in the hands of government.

In 1989 the previous government, the Liberal government, accepted this approach and created, by amendments to the Courts of Justice Act, regional courts management advisory committees and the Ontario courts management advisory committee, these committees being made up of equal numbers of representatives of the judiciary, the legal bar, the Ministry of the Attorney General and the public.

Recently, as the member has noted, in 1991 the Joint Committee on Court Reform, an umbrella group of lawyers' organizations formed to respond to the court reform initiatives of the previous government, struck a special subcommittee to prepare a report to the Attorney General on this very topic. It states, among other things, that a method of providing accountability for the expenditure of public funds in the courts would have to be devised if responsibility were transferred to the judiciary, but it does not develop the concept.

There are many questions on the issue of the transfer of management to the judiciary which remain, in effect, unanswered.

First of all, is there any actual conflict between the Attorney General's responsibility for court administration, as the member indicates, and the Attorney General's responsibility for the conduct of prosecution in government civil cases?

Secondly, does the public perceive any apparent conflict of interest between these roles as a problem?

Thirdly, is there another, perhaps more effective or less drastic, way of dealing with any actual or apparent conflict of interest?

And certainly, apart from conflict-of-interest concerns, are there measures that could be taken to enhance judicial involvement in the administration of the courts, short of an outright transfer of all responsibility?

What organizational structure is most likely to bring about efficient management of the court system and yet secure the essential elements of judicial independence?

What mechanism best secures accountability to the public for the expenditure of public funds on the court system, and what approach, moreover, will best ensure public confidence in the justice system?

Until these fundamental questions are answered, any change to the responsibility for the administration of the courts should be delayed. Further study needs to be done, I would submit, to determine the answers to the questions that I've just posed and to develop options for consideration by all parties.

Certainly, this government recognizes judicial independence as a fundamental and constitutional principle of the Ontario justice system. It cannot be infringed upon. The judiciary is assigned, as you may know, Mr Speaker, the right under

section 93 of the Courts of Justice Act to determine court sittings and assign judges at the present time.

As far as the proposal to create a director of public prosecutions is concerned, in 1989 the royal commission on the prosecution of Donald Marshall recommended the establishment of a director of public prosecutions in Nova Scotia. That proposal has now been implemented.

I admit to the member that there is a strong philosophical appeal in the administration of the criminal justice system by the judiciary or by a director of public prosecutions. However, such a proposal will require extensive policy work and fundamental legislative changes following a very wide consultation with all of our partners in the justice system.

Under the member's proposal, the role of the Attorney General would change fundamentally. While the director of public prosecutions would supervise prosecutions, there would also have to be a vehicle for accountability to the public through the Attorney General.

Despite these apparent and very actual difficulties, this government is committed to looking at the feasibility of such a system, and looking at the feasibility of such a system is certainly part of this government's overall review of how effectively our justice system operates. I'll have more to say about some of our initiatives in this regard as the debate unfolds.

Mr Robert Chiarelli (Ottawa West): First of all, I want to thank the member for Willowdale for introducing this particular resolution. In fact, I want to compliment him on being a superb member of the bar and a credit to the justice system in the province. I think we're fortunate to have him in this Legislature.

I do want to say, however, that the justice system is the glue and the fabric that holds our democratic system and our society together. I think it requires significant and substantive leadership. There are a number of pillars of leadership or certain groups that we look to for leadership in the justice system. We have the bar, if not the law society, which has been giving over the last couple of years superb leadership in terms of administration of justice. There are leaders from the bar who have been lobbying and advocating significant changes to improve the system in a very responsible manner, and I think they're having a significant effect.

Another pillar of the leadership required for the justice system is, of course, the judiciary. With one hand tied behind their backs, they are giving leadership in a way that they haven't in the past. I'm referring to people such as Justice Sopinka.

Another pillar of leadership in the justice system and for the administration of justice is the legal scholars and the various law reform commissions. They have done a superb job in terms of bringing issues to the fore and trying to bring significant change to the system, change which is long overdue.

Of course we have another pillar of our system of justice, which is the law enforcement officers and organizations across the country and the province. Once again, I think they are doing a superb job.

We come to the fifth pillar of leadership, and unfortunately in the province of Ontario it simply is not there, and that's the leadership of government, the leadership of the Ministry of the Attorney General and leadership of the justice bureaucracy here at Queen's Park and in the Ontario government.

If we do not have leadership from all those pillars, the system will fail. The system is now failing us because of the inertia and inaction of governments -- the Tory government before the Liberal government, the NDP government now -- and we must look at significant change from government, legislative change. That's why I compliment the member for Willowdale for bringing this resolution forward.

We have now an Attorney General who is a minister of reaction, reacting to Askov, reacting to legal aid funding crises, reacting to problems in his ministry, such as the Mary Hogan affair. There is inertia. There have been precious few initiatives brought forward by this Attorney General.

There are a number of initiatives which he has brought forward. They are ad hoc and they are very medium range in terms of reform of the system.

We need significant change in the legal system in Ontario. The people look to this government for leadership in many ways. The judiciary is looking for it, the legal profession is looking for it, and it's not forthcoming. I think I would like to put partisan comments aside; I would like to come up with a consensus for action, and that's why I'm complimenting the member for Willowdale on his resolutions, which I do want to address with some particularity.

I'm going to deal first with the question of director of public prosecutions. First of all, the role of the Attorney General is fraught with conflict. When you look at the various roles of the Attorney General -- the Attorney General's relationship to this Legislature, the Attorney General's relationship to cabinet, the Attorney General's relationship with the crown prosecutor, the Attorney General's relationship with the courts and the administration of the courts and the Attorney General's relationship with the police -- it is fraught with conflict.

We see it day in and we see it day out, and I think it puts the Attorney General from time to time in a very untenable position, whoever that Attorney General may be.

In light of the wide range of duties and responsibilities of the Attorney General, the potential for conflict of interest is significant. In particular, there has to be concern that when the head of the prosecution service is also involved in the political process, the prosecution system could be subjected to political pressure. We have seen that time and time again in this Legislature.

Some recent Canadian cases, such as the Donald Marshall inquiry in Nova Scotia, the Manitoba ticketgate affair and the Patricia Starr inquiry in Ontario, have highlighted the need for an independent prosecution service.

Another potential conflict arises from the fact that the prosecutorial and policy branches of the justice system are combined in one ministry.

When we look at the need for reform, we only have to go back to 1990. The Law Reform Commission of Canada released a working paper entitled Controlling Criminal Prosecutions: The Attorney General and the Crown Prosecutor.

It should be noted at this time that Nova Scotia is the only jurisdiction in Canada with a director of public prosecutions that is a statutory position. Other Canadian jurisdictions have officers with similar titles, but these positions are filled by order-in-council appointments. In Ontario, for example, there is a director of criminal prosecutions, but that is an order-in-council appointment. The role of the director is to conduct special prosecutions, handle direct indictments and advise the Attorney General on cases affecting the public interest.

The difference between a position that is created by statute, as suggested in this resolution, and the one that is filled by an order-in-council appointment is that the decisions of the order-in-council appointee will inevitably be subject to the view of cabinet; and that's a conflict. On the other hand, the decisions of a director of public prosecutions whose position is created by statute are also protected by that statute.

Let's look at some of the specific examples of potential conflict for an Attorney General. For example, the Supreme Court of Canada has held that the charter must be given a broad and liberal

interpretation. The minister of justice, therefore, in carrying out the duty of certifying that legislation complies with the charter, should ensure that the legislation favours the protection of individual rights and should not approve legislation that restricts such rights. However, the minister of justice, acting as Attorney General, is responsible for prosecutions and would likely favour legislation that enhances law enforcement capabilities.

There are a number of issues of potential conflict. I don't want to go into them all in detail, because time doesn't permit, but another example is the fact that the same minister is responsible for both prosecutions and the legal aid system. This situation means that the same law officer is, in effect, responsible for prosecutions and defence, since the Attorney General must allocate funds between the prosecution service and the legal aid plan, a large part of which is devoted to defending people charged with crimes.

Another example of conflict deals with the fact that the Attorney General appoints judges and negotiates their remuneration. There is at least a perception of conflict when the person who holds the position of chief prosecutor also hires the judges in the prosecutorial system.

Another potential conflict is that the agents of the Attorney General, the crown prosecutors, are sometimes called upon to investigate members of the justice department. This situation arose in the Manitoba ticket-fixing scandal. In that case, police and crown prosecutors, both under the jurisdiction of the provincial Attorney General, were required to investigate and prosecute persons, including two provincial court judges and one magistrate, who were part of the court system administered by the Attorney General's department.

The judge who conducted a review of the handling of the case commented that the case demonstrated "a point at which internal conflict arises and independence of the prosecutorial role breaks down."

There are number of other areas of conflict that I won't go into. However, with these types of examples in mind, the law reform commission recommended that a new office, the office of director of public prosecutions, should be created. This office would be in charge of the crown prosecution service and would report directly to the Attorney General. The director of public prosecutions would not be a civil servant but would be a lawyer appointed by the Lieutenant Governor in Council, chosen from a list of candidates recommended by an independent committee.

The rationale offered for the creation of an office of director of public prosecutions is that a tenured professional with no political ties would be better able to disregard partisan political considerations when making decisions to prosecute. We've seen the partisan nature of the Attorney General's office many times in this Legislature.

The recommendations of the law reform commission go on in some detail to deal with matters such as the term, the salary, removal and accountability. I therefore support the portion of the member's resolution dealing with this aspect of the administration of justice.

On the other issue, in terms of the administration of the courts, I want to deal with the recent report on Ontario court administration issued by the Joint Committee on Court Reform, which was formed in 1988 and represents the views of the Canadian Bar Association -- Ontario, the Advocates' Society, the County of York Law Association, the Criminal Lawyers Association and includes representatives from the Law Society of Upper Canada. I want to just refer to some selected statements from that report, because essentially I endorse the recommendations of that report and therefore support the resolution of the member for Willowdale on this particular point.

In referring to some of the comments, I want to point out that this group said it soon became apparent that there was recognition by all participants of the existence of serious problems and the common commitment and desire to address these problems in a constructive fashion.

I think the parliamentary assistant for the Ministry of the Attorney General is being overly partisan and too defensive when he looks at constructive suggestions that are coming from a respected member of the bar, the member for Willowdale, coming from the Joint Committee on Court Reform, coming from the Law Reform Commission of Canada, and they choose to put them on the shelf and continue the inertia that exists in the system in Ontario.

I do not have time, because we are limited here, to go into all the bases of the recommendations for the Joint Committee on Court Reform, but essentially, this particular report supports the member's resolution, which I endorse.

The committee refers to some US models which have proven to be very successful. In particular, the federal courts in the United States are administered by the Administrative Office of the US courts, which is referred to as AOC. The federal judicial branch budget is developed by the AOC under the direction of the budget committee of the judicial conference, which is an all-judge committee, approved by the judicial conference and incorporated without change in the president's budget submitted to the US Congress. In fact, some states have provisions for the court's budget to go directly to the State Legislature. In the United States, attorneys general play no role in court administration.

So the recommendations of the Joint Committee on Court Reform, with respect to independent funding of the administration of justice in Ontario, is a good recommendation. I endorse the recommendation in principle. There obviously have to be some refinements in terms of the recommendation of this committee. There obviously have to be some refinements in terms of the member's resolution, how exactly the funding will go into place, but we are at a point where the system of justice in Ontario is almost in disrepute.

In fact, when you see how the judges are speaking out -- I've received confidential calls in my office, as critic for the Ministry of the Attorney General, from judges complaining about the administration of justice. We are seeing them speaking out in speeches, issuing papers. We see the bar, the law society and groups such as the committee I have referred to saying that we need fundamental change. The society is moving in a geometric progression, and our ability to deal with the justice system here in this Legislature is still moving at an arithmetic progression level. We're not keeping up.

I think we should take the good advice of the bar, of the judiciary, of commissions, look at good examples which have been developed and adopt the principles that are embodied in this resolution.

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): I'm glad to enter into this debate, because as the former critic for the Attorney General, one of the first discussions I had with the member for Willowdale was on this particular topic. I have felt there was a problem with regard to the role of the Attorney General in the province of Ontario.

I think, however, that we must take the suggestions of the member for Willowdale and have some pragmatism about whether or not they can be put into place. I think that, as a Legislature, we should explore the avenues to achieve the principles in the most practical way we possibly can.

Historically, we derive our justice system from Britain, so the role of the Attorney General has evolved over a long period of history, some 800 or 900 years. Originally, the Attorney General was appointed by the king, the crown, to represent his interests in the courts. At a later time -- I think it was around 1400 or 1500 -- the king required that the Attorney General be a member of the House of Commons in Britain. As we progress through history and Canada started to be inhabited, the British governors appointed representatives whom they called attorneys general here in the province of Ontario.

I don't know whether many members are aware that there are certain cabinet ministers within Ontario who are mandatory under our Constitution. The Attorney General happens to be one of those members of the executive council required by

section 63 of our Constitution. It includes the Attorney General, the secretary and registrar of the province, the Treasurer of the province, the commissioner of crown lands and the commissioner of agriculture and public works.

So you have not only a problem in dealing with the changing role of the Attorney General in terms of what we can do in this Legislature, we might have a constitutional problem in making a dramatic change with regard to the Attorney General's role.

His role has been defined to some degree in federal law under the Criminal Code of Canada, but most of his powers -- and the most important part of his power has been his right to prosecute people in the province on behalf of the state -- have been evolved through common law, or through tradition or practice or whatever one might say.

The Attorney General in Ontario has four or five different kinds of functions he undertakes, and therein lies the problem or the potential for conflict between the various roles he undertakes. As I mentioned earlier, perhaps his most important traditional role is to represent the crown, the province of Ontario, in the courtroom in prosecuting people who have harmed the state, ie, the criminals or people who have been charged with a criminal offence.

The Attorney General also defends or sues people in the name of the crown. In other words, the government of Ontario is a very large institution and, as a result, that large institution has to be represented in the courtroom both in terms of criminal matters but also in property matters: civil suits indeed.

Therein lies one of the first problems with regard to conflict. If you're in the court on one side or the other, if you are prosecuting an individual in terms of a crime or you are representing a plaintiff suing somebody or representing a defendant, and if you're sitting in front of a person who's on your payroll, people might think the judge will favour the government as a result of the fact that it's paying the salary of the person sitting in judgement above. I don't think in practice that happens, but someone who has lost the case might think about that very fact.

Another very important function of the Attorney General now is the funding of the legal aid plan. The legal aid plan provides many people with funds who are unable to afford to defend themselves in our court against the Attorney General. But what happens in the situation where the Attorney General is put in a period of restraint, which most people are in the public service, and says to the legal aid plan, "It cost $70 million last year and we're going to have to cut that back to $65 million"?

One might argue that what he is doing, or what the potential conflict might be in the minds of the people, is that the Attorney General wants to win more cases in the court so he's cutting down the resources of the people who are trying to meet him in court or argue against his case in court. There's a problem there.

My colleagues have mentioned the problem with regard to the administration of the courts, and we of course deal with nitty-gritty things like how much judges are paid. I can remember two or three years ago when the former Liberal government faced this problem with provincial court judges, as they then were, who had not had a settlement with regard to pay increases and benefits or in being successful in talking with the Attorney General of this province for two or three years.

The Attorney General of this province, trying to establish some distance between his ministry and the independent judiciary, set up a committee called the Henderson committee under Gordon Henderson, a very, very knowledgeable and probably one of the most eminent counsels in Ontario and in Canada, and he comes from the Ottawa-Carleton area.

Mr Winninger: Is he a Conservative?

Mr Sterling: I'm not sure what Mr Henderson is, but he was appointed by a Liberal government.

Interjection.

Mr Sterling: I was asked about his politics.

At any rate, Mr Henderson worked with a group of people and came forward with recommendations. Those recommendations were ignored for three years, and it was only after pushing by myself and by some other members of the Legislature pushing the Attorney General that a solution was reached. Therefore there was the appearance between the Attorney General and the judges that he was in a fight with them, and here are the people whom they are meeting in court and there shouldn't really be conflict between the people who are deciding and the people who are being represented on one side of the court or the other.

Then there's a problem we have presently with the Attorney General, who, as I indicated, under our Constitution and under our legislation in Ontario, is a member of cabinet. Mr Speaker, you may know that I had the privilege of serving in cabinet for a period of four or five years, from 1981 to 1985.

During that period of time, I must admit, there were occasions when I, as a lawyer, felt uncomfortable about the discussion that was taking place around the cabinet table -- not that there was any intent or malintent about that discussion, but there were times when I wondered whether or not the discussion should be taking place at all, whether or not political and judicial interests were being intermingled and whether or not it was appropriate for the Attorney General of the province to be in the same room where that discussion was taking place.

I like the British system that has now been set up and I'd like to say, in Britain the Attorney General is an elected member. The Attorney General is appointed, I believe by the government of the day, and is normally a member of the same party. The Attorney General sits in the House of Commons in Britain every day and is responsible to the House of Commons, but he is not a member of the political cabinet. He can consult the cabinet and ask them questions, but he never takes political direction from the cabinet in Britain. Therefore you have an Attorney General who is in all regards, or very much more than our Attorney General, not a political character as such in terms of the cabinet.

I talked to the Attorney General from Britain, I think three or four years ago, and I was interested in the model which Britain has. I asked him how many staff he had, and his total staff was the grand sum of about 20 people. I would imagine that did not include, however, crown attorneys out in the counties around England and Scotland and Wales and Northern Ireland. But the fact of the matter was that they have set up a model whereby they have an Attorney General but he is separate and apart.

Under our system, we had back from 1971 to 1985 a character, or a cabinet minister, if you want to call him that, called the Provincial Secretary for Justice. Actually, I served in that role for about a year and a half, from 1981 to 1982 or 1983.

I proposed at that point in time that perhaps it would be more appropriate within the government structure to transfer from the Attorney General certain parts of those functions which I mentioned before. Legal aid perhaps should be over to a Provincial Secretary for Justice. You could transfer in fact just about all of the functions, save and except the prosecutorial role and maybe a legislative role as well, because I don't think a legislative role is as political or whatever.

You and our future governments might also consider the option of in fact following the British model and saying that the Attorney General shall not be a member of cabinet and that a secretary for justice shall take up all of those other roles, other than the prosecution or the defence of the crown in civil suits or whatever.

I agree with the thrust of my colleague's resolution and I will vote for the resolution. However, I am concerned about setting up another body which is not directly accountable to the government. I am very much concerned with the bodies which we have already which claim to be responsible to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. We have had difficulty in getting accountability back to the Legislative Assembly for those independent bodies.

I think it can be done through some kind of compromise, perhaps a more pragmatic and practical approach which I have possibly put forward in terms of splitting the role of the Attorney General between two ministries. Whether or not you want to remove the Attorney General from the cabinet is another consideration one might make, or in fact the Attorney General might want to remove himself from some but not all discussions of cabinet.

I want to leave the rest for my colleague to respond and add on to the end of his remarks.

I have enjoyed this. I have enjoyed a debate on an intellectual issue which I think should be carried forward more in this Legislative Assembly during private members' resolutions.

The Deputy Speaker: The member for London South.

Mr Winninger: I appreciated the remarks of the member for Carleton. I think it's quite interesting that not only did he serve as justice critic in the last government, but I also believe the one time that he served as parliamentary assistant to the Attorney General; he can correct me if I'm wrong.

The Deputy Speaker: I made a mistake. I suddenly realized that you've already addressed the House and this is not your bill. Normally, the one who introduces the bill has two minutes to -- unless I have unanimous consent to do so. Agreed? Agreed. The member for London South.

Mr Winninger: Thank you.

So as parliamentary assistant to the Attorney General of the day -- perhaps it was Roy McMurtry, I'm not sure -- as I said earlier, his government sat on a recommendation that was made way back in 1975, 17 years ago. Now he comes before us as a born-again acolyte of judicial administration of the courts and the establishment of a director of public prosecutions.

He also talks about legal aid. He suggests that because of a perceived or actual conflict, the Attorney General might diminish the resources available to legal aid. I put it to members: The facts speak for themselves. In the last two years, due to the rising demand for legal aid, the Ministry of the Attorney General has contributed 50% more than in 1990. If anything, the costs of the legal aid system are going up, not down.

The member for Ottawa West suggests that this Attorney General is reactionary rather than proactive. Ian Scott was pretty good in his day, but I suggest that this province now is blessed with the most progressive Attorney General it's ever had. Even Chief Justice Lamer of the Supreme Court of Canada paid the Attorney General a compliment on the way he was able to deal with the result of the Askov decision so effectively and in such a timely fashion.

At the time of the Askov decision there were approximately 205,000 criminal charges outstanding in this province. Of these charges, 151,000, or 74%, were in jeopardy of delay. After injecting a not insubstantial amount of money into the justice system, $39 million, including hiring and appointing additional judges, prosecutors and court officials to handle the delay and ensuring sufficient space was available, now, of the 188,000 charges pending in the province, only 17% are scheduled beyond the time guidelines set out in Askov. That's either due to the complexity of the case or, in some cases, the defence has waived its right to plead undue delay.

I promised that I would refer to some of the initiatives taken by this government in the interest of making our justice system work more effectively and in a more cost-effective manner for constituents. Some members of the opposition may say that there are ways to create accountability were financial administration of the courts to be transferred to the judiciary, but I would have to go back to my constituency and ask my constituents: "Who do you want to make basic decisions regarding where money is spent on the courts and whether too much money or too little money is being spent?

Do you want a democratically elected government to make those decisions or do you want an appointed judiciary to make those decisions?" This is part of the consultation that we have to enter into.

Earlier this year the Attorney General said to the people of Ontario that Ontario's justice system must be coordinated, it must be responsive, it must be accessible and fair, its practices must be efficient and its resources well managed. Its decisions must be enforced and respected and greater emphasis must be placed on prevention. The court system should be reserved for those matters to which it is best suited. Reforms aimed at achieving this vision will preserve and may enhance the integrity of the system.

Over the next 20 years we may require upwards of 100 new courtrooms, at an average cost of $2 million to $3 million each. So this government is exploring, with the judiciary and other parties interested in the functioning of the judicial system, measures that we can invoke to make better use of available space to avoid major capital costs.

In view of the financial constraints in this economy and that this government faces, with the soaring demand for access to the justice system and plummeting revenues, a number of initiatives have been undertaken.

We're exploring ways in which judges, lawyers, court staff, court users and other partners in the judicial system can make better use of court facilities, including holding tiered-court sittings.

We're developing a pilot project for an intake court for criminal matters, including screening of police charges by crown attorneys, disclosure to the defence and limited use of court duty counsel to defend

summary conviction and minor indictable charges.

We're exploring the possibility of a video remand system so that prisoners would not have to leave detention centres and so police confessions might be videotaped. We're exploring improvements to procedures and technology in court reporting services. We're improving the enforcement and collection of fines and exploring the alternative of civil remedies such as licence removal.

We have joined initiatives with the federal government on Criminal Code amendments that would expedite court proceedings, such as allowing senior police officers to attach bill conditions, and we're looking at the reclassification of offences.

We're exploring alternative dispute resolution techniques, such as arbitration for construction disputes. We're exploring satellite courts and evaluating them in the light of modern transportation routes and population trends, looking at their impact on access to the justice system -- not to mention the announcement of the pilot project for supervised access sites, amendments to the Arbitrations Act and the Class Proceedings Act, increases to the small claims jurisdictions and a variety of other initiatives that no previous government has had the courage to implement.

The Deputy Speaker: The member for Willowdale, you have two minutes to reply.

Mr Harnick: Mr Speaker, I understand that we have a minute left on the clock, or 53 seconds, that I would also like to use.

Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): It's our time.

Mr Harnick: Which is our time as well.

The Deputy Speaker: Is there unanimous consent? Yes, that's fine.

Mr Harnick: I regret the fact that we are having what I consider to be an intellectual debate. My friend the member for London South approached it in what I would describe as a pretty vitriolic way, and I regret that. But one of the things that causes me great concern over this issue -- and quite frankly, I'm not really interested in what a politician's opinion about this is -- but I'm caused some distress when the Chief Justice of Ontario states:

"The system has failed because the Ministry of the Attorney General has imposed a top-heavy bureaucracy on the administration of the courts, one which has little experience in the courts and courts administration. It has failed because the government has failed to recognize the need to safeguard the judicial independence which makes the courts different from government agencies.

"It has failed because it did not reflect

section 93 of the Courts of Justice act, which, in restating the principles laid down in the Supreme Court decision called Valente v The Queen, provides that the judiciary shall determine the sittings of the court, the assignments of judges to sittings, the assignment of cases to individual judges, sitting schedules and the makeup of trial lists and courtroom assignments.

"Most importantly," Chief Justice Callaghan says, "it has failed because it does not comport with the constitutional principle that the judiciary should be independent of other branches of government."

When the Chief Justice of this province says that, I think every person in this room has to be concerned, every member of the public has to be concerned and has to stand up and say that while the Attorney General did just fine looking after the Askov case, when he spent $27 million and left the justice system with nothing, tapped out, so that the rest of the civil side of the justice system is faltering, it is just absolutely burying your head in the sand.

When the Chief Justice of the province says that the system is failing, surely a debate on something like this is timely and important. I would hope that we would all consider it, not as politicians but recognizing that a member of the judiciary, who also, I might add, was the Deputy Attorney General for many years and knows this system probably better than any of us will, makes these kinds of comments.

May I just close by reading what former Chief Justice Dickson said about the independence of the judiciary:

"It is essential that the public have faith and trust in the judiciary as impartial adjudicators of all disputes of a legal nature. I fear that public faith and trust may be put at risk by the existing nexus between the judiciary and the Minister of Justice. Preparation of judicial budgets and distribution and allocation of resources should be under the control of the chief justices of the various courts."

The Deputy Speaker: The time allotted for the first ballot item has expired.

RURAL ONTARIO

Mr Johnson moved resolution number 29:

That, in the opinion of this House, recognizing that the rural regions of Ontario have concerns that are distinct from those of the urban regions and that it is important for government policies to take these differences into account; recognizing also that this government now must deal with the economic and social problems of rural Ontario, and in particular with the issues of planning, resource development and of the environment; and recognizing that it is important that rural regions be given representation at every level of the decision-making process, the government should do one of the following:

(1) Create a ministry or secretariat of rural affairs;

(2) Expand the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs;

(3) Create a rural development commission or agency.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Mr Johnson has moved ballot item number 28. Pursuant to standing order 96(c)(i), the member has 10 minutes for his presentation.

Mr Paul R. Johnson (Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings): It wasn't by luck or by chance that I designed this resolution. I must say that I come from a part of Ontario that, compared to other parts of Ontario, is about as rural as you can get. Except for two small towns, namely Picton in Prince Edward county and Napanee in Lennox and Addington county, the rest of my constituency is mostly rural. There are some other small villages and hamlets, but for the most

part I guess I could say that I truly represent a constituency of rural Ontario.

I was a municipal councillor some years ago. In Athol township, where I was a councillor, it became apparent to me at that time that the relationship the municipalities had, and indeed rural Ontario had, with the provincial government was such that there was a feeling that there was some misunderstanding in Toronto, as we always say in rural Ontario, or at Queen's Park, about the real and true needs of rural Ontario.

I've asked for a number of things within my resolution to give the government some options, because we know that if we're very demanding and very direct, sometimes what we ask for isn't what we get.

Certainly I think a ministry or a secretariat of rural affairs would be in the best interests of rural Ontario, but I want to say that it doesn't have to cost a lot of money to have better representation for rural Ontario. I'd like to think that a minister without portfolio responsible for rural affairs would be a good ministry, but then again maybe a secretariat that represented rural Ontario would be the best way to go.

As I said, I was a municipal councillor, but I've had the opportunity recently as a member of this Legislature to travel throughout my constituency and other parts of rural Ontario, and I've listened very closely to what the municipal politicians have had to say, to what the people have had to say, and, in my opinion, it's not a new problem. I want to make that perfectly clear. This is something that's been ongoing for a long period of time.

I think it's appropriate at this point in time to raise the issue of how, or how not, rural Ontario is treated by the governments of this province. I don't think it's been done with any direct disdain for rural Ontario. It's sort of the result of happenstance. I think rural Ontario wants better recognition at the cabinet tables of the governments of this province, and I don't think there's a member in this House who would disagree with that once he becomes aware of it, and I think that's what we want to do today. We want to have some dialogue within this venue, the Legislature of Ontario, where we can voice our concerns.

This chamber is full today with the members from rural Ontario, so that shows you they are very concerned indeed about rural Ontario and the role it plays in the government of this province.

Presently, we have a Ministry of Northern Affairs, and I recognize that it's a very important ministry and is a ministry that would deal with those issues that are particular to northern Ontario. I think that's very important, and I wouldn't want to suggest that we not have a Ministry of Northern Affairs.

But with regard to rural Ontario, I like to think it's unique enough and its differences from the rest of Ontario are substantive enough that the resolution I have brought before this Legislature today will be given some very serious thought by the government and by all the members of this Legislature.

Within my own constituency I have a chance quite regularly to talk with my municipal politicians, and they tell me they are concerned about how well they are heard or understood at Queen's Park. Certainly all of us, as members of this Legislature who represent rural constituencies, come before this Legislature and bring our concerns into this House, and still there is that concern that maybe the message that rural Ontario wants to give to the Legislature of Ontario, to the cabinet of Ontario, isn't strong enough. It isn't the kind of message that is being heard as well as the people in rural Ontario would like.

We must remind ourselves from time to time that taxpayers in this province pay taxes to the federal government, the provincial government and the municipal government and there's only a limited number of them. These taxpayers are quite concerned. They say that some of the programs, some of the decisions that are made at Queen's Park are made with an urban flavour, an urban characteristic that doesn't really represent the smaller, less densely populated areas that are rural Ontario.

When we look at how municipalities raise their taxes to pay for their programs and the services that all people in Ontario want, they believe there is an inadequacy with regard to how some of these programs are developed. They feel if there was a voice at the cabinet table, rural Ontario would be represented in such a way that some of these shortcomings and problems that become realized as a result of changes in legislation or regulations may not happen. I think that's a very important argument.

Certainly I can use the example of education, not to be opposed in any way to the changes the Minister of Education has advocated for the people of this province. However, I want to speak about my county of Prince Edward, which is within my constituency of Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings. It's the one school board that I, as a member of this Legislature, am entirely responsible for, inasmuch as a member of this Legislature can be responsible for school boards. I know they're having some difficulty with some of the programs the Ministry of Education would like to see implemented.

They are having problems because they don't have that density of population or that tax base to draw the dollars without a great hue and cry from the taxpayers within that area with regard to raising the funds for the programs.

Rural Ontario is not a rich area. I think if we examine rural Ontario more closely, some statistics from Statistics Canada very recently suggest to us that rural Canadians and those people in rural Ontario have a higher mortality rate, they have more serious health problems and they have lower literacy rates than their urban counterparts.

Towns and villages have difficulties in luring new businesses. Trying to get a business loan in a small town is not an easy thing, especially during these very difficult economic times. Also, according to some of the statistics, economic downturns affect rural areas first and hardest. Let me tell you, Mr Speaker, that's the message I'm hearing from my constituents.

Unemployment is about 25% higher in rural areas. That means that of unemployed people in the province, you would find it would be 25% higher in rural Ontario. As a result, we find that poverty becomes an issue in rural Ontario. It has a rural flavour, if you will. It's somewhat unique. It's not the same as in some of the urban areas.

I've offered three options to the government and I just want to reiterate them:

To create a ministry or secretariat of rural affairs: That would be my first and foremost option if I was to make a choice; that would be my first choice.

To expand the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs: If we can't have my first choice, then the second choice isn't too bad. It's going to send a message to rural Ontario that the government or the Legislature of Ontario is more concerned about rural Ontario.

To create a rural development commission or agency: That too has some merit, but it's not my first choice.

In winding up, I just want to say that I think this resolution is one that doesn't come from me; it comes from all those people in rural Ontario whom I've spoken to. In fact, some members of my caucus have raised this issue previously with me, and --

The Deputy Speaker: Your time's expired. Thank you.

Mr Johnson: -- on their behalf and on behalf of all rural members, I just want to suggest that they support this resolution.

Mr Ron Eddy (Brant-Haldimand): I'm very pleased to be allowed the opportunity to speak to this important resolution. At the outset, I want to say that because of my concern for the survival of rural Ontario, I will be supporting the resolution brought forward by the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings.

I do have some reservations, but before proceeding with outlining the reservations, I just want to acknowledge the increase on rural municipalities as the province downloads in various ways in services on local and municipal councils and on county governments, and increases, of course, the standards and imposes regulations as government proceeds. I well recognize the view in rural Ontario that Toronto solutions are in many cases imposed and they're not seen as being the answer or indeed as being helpful.

I want to point out the tremendous increase in local taxes being experienced in many rural areas of the province, and I specifically mention the Haldimand county section, the towns of Haldimand and Dunnville in my own riding, where there are tremendous, inordinately high taxes in comparison to my own area in Brant county.

I realize the face of Ontario is changing and it has changed, and I attribute that to the construction of the superhighways. The QEW, of course, goes back prior to the Second World War in 1939 and attracted development and industry, but since then we've seen the construction of the 400 series of superhighways, highways 400, 401, 402, 403, 404, and there are probably some others. They are attracting the industry, the development and the people, and as they attract the development, the cities are expanding.

We see London-Middlesex, of course, in a present bill and how much the city of London is growing at the expense of the rural municipalities.

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): Progressive liberal.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, order.

Mr Eddy: It seems the rural municipalities are not allowed to have commercial and industrial development, and I think that's a shame.

But the superhighways are attracting it and as that happens the rural areas in the hinterlands, if I can use that term, are indeed losing industry. Many areas are one-industry towns or villages. They lose that and there's nothing there to replace it. Jobs are lost and the population diminishes, and that certainly accentuates the problem so I'm very pleased to speak to that.

Mr Johnson's resolution states "that this government now must deal with the economic and social problems of rural Ontario," and I agree with that, although I find it quite ironic that the member's government actually decreased the Ministry of Agriculture and Food's budget by 6% this year. This indeed was the first cut in agriculture since --

Mr Noble Villeneuve (S-D-G & East Grenville): Ten per cent.

Mr Eddy: Ten per cent? Thank you, sir. I appreciate your help, honourable member. This is the first decrease, I'm told, since 1985.

It is with great pride that I remind members on both sides of the House that the Liberals increased the budget for the Ministry of Agriculture and Food by over 60% during its short stay in government. In its now famous Agenda for People, the NDP --

Mr Villeneuve: They changed the ministry.

Mr Eddy: Well, we would have done more probably if we had stayed.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, order.

Mr Eddy: The NDP promised in its Agenda for People that $100 million would be made available for low-interest loans for farmers. However, after taking office, the government initiated the Hayes task force, which presented a report on recommended farming initiatives during early spring.

There's no mention of $100 million in election promises in the options that are being discussed in the report. The long-term proposals in the report all involve government guarantees on private funds as opposed to direct government funding, as we feel was promised.

Does this now indicate that the government is considering following through with the promise? Is the government going to stop putting the burden of farm financing on the backs of struggling rural communities, because most of them indeed are farm assessment? That's what the backbone of the rural communities is. So that is a question I have.

As I stated earlier, I support the resolution, but I really don't believe we need to create a separate ministry or secretariat of rural affairs, not that that wouldn't be an advantage. It's because I don't believe this type of expenditure would be tolerated by the electorate, and of course Mr Johnson spoke to that, that it doesn't need to cost a great deal.

I do support the idea of expanding the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs. However, I don't believe the idea would be to hire more civil servants, but to refocus the kind of assistance the ministry offered. I also support the idea of creating a rural development commission or agency.

The Ontario Federation of Agriculture believes that the reason rural development strategies fail is because they are based on a top-down planning approach. However, the ministry is utilizing a bottom-up approach in its community planning pilot project in Huron county. The member for Huron is present, I'm pleased to see.

I believe there are at least two other pilot projects in the province. There is a municipality in my own riding that has an application pending and I hope that can proceed. It's a large rural township that needs the advantages the project offers and I hope could be accomplished.

The federation is hopeful of success in this project. A group of community leaders identify local problems and then plan and implement integrated solutions to the problems. The ministry's role in this project is to provide resource people to the group while the county provides a professional facilitator. The OFA hopes this approach will be utilized in other counties.

For this reason, I believe that a rural development commission or agency would be most beneficial to the rural communities. If it could be designed so that the communities are consulted at the beginning of the process in order to identify the problems instead of at the end of the process in order to listen to solutions, certainly success would be better attained.

The decline in the farming industry in the last 10 years has put tremendous economic pressure on Ontario's rural communities. Rural development initiatives are required to enhance the natural economic opportunities available in rural communities for new on-farm and off-farm business ventures. Rural members know that family farms are depending more and more on off-farm income in order to support their farming operations, indeed in order to survive these days, and that is a fact.

Our rural communities need the same support in planning their economic viability as the Ontario government is giving to the GTA. Perhaps with the establishment of a new rural commission or agency we would be able to help our rural communities, which they greatly need.

Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): I welcome the opportunity to comment briefly on this important resolution brought forward by the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings. In fact, it's so important that I would like to read it into the record one more time:

"In the opinion of this House, recognizing that the rural regions of Ontario have concerns that are distinct from those of the urban regions and that it is important for government policies to take these differences into account; recognizing also that this government now must deal with the economic and social problems of rural Ontario, and in particular with the issues of planning, resource development and of the environment; and recognizing that it is important that rural regions be given representation at every level of the decision-making process; the government of Ontario should do one of the following:

"1. Create a ministry or secretariat of rural affairs;

"2. Expand the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs;"

"3. Give added support and priority to the activities of the Rural Advisory Committee;

"4 Create a rural development commission or agency."

I consider the resolution to be important, because many of those who live and work in rural Ontario live in poverty, and the NDP government fails to realize that poverty is just as rural as it is urban. Our farmers may not be unemployed, but no matter how hard or how long they work, they just cannot make ends meet. They fall into debt and they lose hope.

Our farmers are not included in the government's long-term vision of the future. Our cheap food policy is neither kind nor just to our farmers. They are part of an economic system that does not treat them fairly or equitably. They earn less than the minimum wage even though they produce what we cannot live without: the food on our tables. Farmers could make a decent living if only they were paid fair prices for what they produce, enough to at least recover their costs. Others in the food chain prosper while farmers suffer. That is a sorry state of affairs.

In rural Ontario we are particularly fortunate in having some of the best agricultural land in the world. Our harvest is bountiful, but most of the time farmers are taken for granted. In 1991, the NDP government announced the appointment of a Commission on Planning and Development Reform in Ontario, the so-called Sewell commission. They were to travel around the province and develop a new system of planning and land use development for Ontario.

You can bet that a commission made up of city folk will come up with some recommendations that are not going to sit well with rural communities, including our farmers. What do a bunch of people from the city know about septic tanks and sewage systems and water allocation questions that the people in rural Ontario don't know? I can tell you, I don't think John Sewell knows.

The time has come for this government to finally realize that it becomes the responsibility of any society to collaborate with its agricultural and rural community to ensure productivity and fair distribution. Rural Ontario is the backbone of our province, and this implies that we all do our part to ensure that the inheritors of the good earth can stay on it, work it profitably and preserve it for the future generations.

Any modern province like Ontario that fails to protect and promote its rural community is headed for big trouble. A province that is not reasonably self-sufficient and secure in its production of food and the preservation of the rural way of life risks losing a precious measure of independence, security and prosperity.

As I noted earlier, the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings is trying to make this matter as easy as possible for his own NDP government and for his colleagues by providing them with a resolution with multiple-choice answers. The government is asked to "create a ministry or secretariat of rural affairs" -- that is the member's first priority -- "Expand the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs," or "Give added support and priority to the activities of the Rural Advisory Committee" or "Create a rural development commission or agency." I've said that before.

It is my hope that this government will select choice number 2, "Expand the mandate of an existing ministry to include rural affairs," perhaps within the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. Civil servants already employed by the ministry could deal exclusively with rural affairs, and use money for that purpose that is already part of that ministry's budget.

I don't want to see more taxation to pay for more civil servants working in a new bureaucracy, especially when we have the budget already cut by 10% now in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. This government has got to get its spending priorities in order and spend money that is already there more wisely, more efficiently and more effectively. This government must realize that the current bleak economic climate simply cannot support the creation of another new and expanded bureaucracy.

There are two PAs attached to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. The Ministry of Agriculture and Food's budget has been reduced. What have these two parliamentary assistants been doing? Have their salaries been reduced? I think not. Perhaps they should consider that in the near future. The member is not paying attention, but I think I finally got to him.

I thank you for the opportunity to say a few words and I hope that in the future this government will realize the ineffective way it's been dealing with the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

Mr Dennis Drainville (Victoria-Haliburton): It is an unusual privilege indeed to speak today on behalf of rural residents of Ontario. I have lots and lots of material and I only have five minutes, so I'm going to have to summarize a number of issues, but let me be very clear.

We hear a great deal of, I think, unfortunate rhetoric around the issue of the difficulties of rural people in Ontario making their needs and aspirations known to the government and to the bureaucracy. I want to cut through the rhetoric and just say this is a problem that's been with us for a long time, and it has more to do with demographics and structural problems than it has to do with political will.

In fact, in terms of the change in demographics over the last 50 years, we've seen a real shift in Ontario in the power base. The power base is now with urban areas, and consequently those municipal infrastructures have been built up in those urban areas. More people live there. More money goes there. More services are offered to those people.

In fact, we have a situation in which those who make decisions -- on a day-to-day basis, not the political decisions; the decisions on how various programs are developed and how they are administered -- those people who make those kinds of decisions are out of touch with the reality of rural Ontario. So it's an opportunity today to speak to that reality.

I'd like to say first of all that, as for my own area of Victoria-Haliburton, there are a number of issues that are very particular and make Victoria-Haliburton, like other rural areas in Ontario, very particular.

Access to government: In our area we do not have many government offices, and therefore in my own constituency office we end up working as brokers, trying to connect people to the various levels of government, trying to help them to access programs, trying to help them to cope with the bureaucracy in Ontario, but not having the means to do it, because there are few enough members of the bureaucracy there in our area to support the different questions and different people who are coming forward.

Also, I'd like to say that in terms of the rural population, there are some interesting figures. In Haliburton county, for instance, the population of seniors is 20.36% of the total of that county. The same in Victoria county; it's 17% of the overall population. What we're seeing is an increase in the number of seniors in our area.

What does that mean? In terms of infrastructure, it means we need heightened health care. We need more supports that are just not there for seniors in those areas. But does that mean we get more money coming into our ridings? In fact, no, that's not the case. We have great difficulties in trying to access proper programs and proper projects for seniors in our area.

I'd like to speak a bit about one of the most difficult problems, and that is that because Victoria-Haliburton is situated where it is, we have very limited membership on boards and agencies that surround us. For instance, many of our boards are located in Durham, or they're located in Peterborough, or they're located in Toronto, but they're not located in our area.

Usually, when we want a decision, whether it be in terms of health care or whether it be in terms of a children's aid society or whether it be in terms of even the Ministry of Transportation, we have to go outside our area to represent our views and put forward the needs of the people of Victoria-Haliburton. Very often, we have one seat on a board of directors or one seat on a particular agency that's been set up by the government. In other words, we are always at a disadvantage. We are always in a situation where we have to fight for everything we get.

This is not just the case with Victoria-Haliburton; it's the case right across the province of Ontario in issues surrounding the disabled, in issues surrounding women, in issues surrounding children. In all of those areas we are very, very underfunded in terms of programs. So it is that people in the rural areas begin to wonder indeed whether we're going to be able to get the kind of supports we need.

I would say that the resolution that's put forth by Mr Johnson is a resolution that needs support. It needs support because the voice of rural Ontario needs to be heard loud and clear in this Legislature but also throughout the bureaucracy. I will be standing up and voting in favour of this resolution and I would ask every member of this House to do it for rural Ontario.

Mrs Joan M. Fawcett (Northumberland): I welcome the opportunity to join in the debate on the resolution put forward by the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings, which demands that his government make rural Ontario a priority or, at the very least, that it be recognized by the Bob Rae government.

We from rural eastern Ontario have surely seen the disregard afforded our part of the province by this NDP government. Your government has dismantled the eastern Ontario cabinet committee, the eastern Ontario community economic development program and the Eastern Ontario Development Corp. Is it any wonder that the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings cries for help from his caucus colleagues? But let me tell him, he's knocking on the cabinet door, but nobody's home.

Surely the cabinet ministers from eastern Ontario, like the Honourable Fred Wilson from his adjoining riding or the Housing minister from Ottawa, should have made their voices heard by now. But, as he well knows, they haven't.

Perhaps the best example of how Bob Rae's government disregards not only eastern Ontario but all of rural Ontario is the way in which it has humbled the Minister of Agriculture and Food, the member for Hastings-Peterborough. This year's budget decrease of 6%, or $37 million, is the first time the Ministry of Agriculture and Food has seen a decrease in funding since before 1985, when the Tories were in government. The member's cry for help is like a wolf howling at the moon. Surely it's plain for the eye to see that his government has totally disregarded the families and communities of rural Ontario.

It's really difficult not to be negative when talking about the NDP government's record in rural Ontario. Almost every policy or program they put forward negatively affects rural Ontario. I ask, who was speaking for rural Ontario at the cabinet table or in caucus when the Minister of Health made cutbacks to our ambulance services, services that provide access to emergency medical treatment in places where there is none to be found, the services that link many rural Ontarians to hospitals and medical centres?

Did the NDP government forget rural Ontario when it was drafting its plan for long-term care? Did they not realize that we don't need another costly level of bureaucracy that district health units are more than capable of providing? They do provide this and coordinate many of the services that make it possible for seniors to live independently as long as possible. Those dollars could be spent expanding services that seniors and the disabled need, but instead, they continue to remain on long waiting lists.

For the first time in years, municipalities, and certainly municipalities in my riding, have had to turn down supplementary funding offered by the Ministry of Transportation simply because they couldn't afford to match it. You see, municipal governments are far more fiscally responsible than this NDP government. They are not willing to run up record deficits or tax their constituents to overspend in these economically tough times.

Perhaps the biggest problem facing municipal and county councils is that of waste management. I am sure the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings is aware that the landfill capacity in his riding is non-existent and that it could take five to 10 years to get an approval for another site. I ask him, as I am sure many people in his riding and the people throughout rural Ontario do, what are people supposed to do with their garbage? Can't you get your Minister of the Environment's head out of Toronto's garbage to at least look at the situation in all rural Ontario?

As the member points out in his resolution, there is, and I would say more now than ever before, a need for government to recognize not only the unique needs of rural Ontario but the significant contribution rural Ontario can have in rebuilding our economy.

We in our party have always believed that people in rural Ontario have had a strong entrepreneurial spirit. Governments need to promote programs to help rural men and women put good, new ideas to work. The spirit of entrepreneurship in our rural communities deserves this solid backing from the Ontario government.

For instance, why did the government take so long to make the decision to support the ethanol project? It took numerous days of the member for Cornwall as well as the member for S-D-G & East Grenville pleading, demanding, almost shaming the minister into action on this project, which was in danger of being lost to the province of Quebec. Why did something that made such sense environmentally and was energy efficient and cost-effective, to say nothing of the shot in the arm for corn farmers, not get top priority and approval?

The government must make its commitment to help rural communities manage change before change manages them. In doing so, community involvement must be an integral component of the planning process. There must be funding to provide for studies on rural development and to encourage rural entrepreneurs. No longer do we want to hear farm and community leaders say that rural Ontario's greatest export is its youth. No longer can the NDP government stand by and watch the GTA tail wag the Ontario dog. We must recognize rural Ontario for all that it has to offer and make a commitment to help develop and diversify the potential that exists in rural Ontario.

I commend the member opposite for bringing attention to the plight of rural Ontario. I only hope his government is listening carefully. Of the three options he suggested, certainly expanding the mandate of the existing ministry to include rural affairs -- but one of the key things there, I think, is to stop the cutbacks to the present OMAF. There can be no more cutbacks; we need increases in that budget. In creating a rural development commission or agency, I would definitely want to make sure that it was made up of farmers and rural-thinking people.

Mr Villeneuve: I too am pleased to rise in my place for a few minutes and address the private member's motion from the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings. First of all, I guess I want to admire him a little bit for not quite putting the facts the way they are. Indeed, the Ministry of Agriculture and Food had its budget cut 6% in the budget document and a further 3%-plus announced in August by the Minister of Agriculture and Food, so indeed we have a 10% reduction. I would like the member to maybe address that in his closing remarks. I know he's concerned by that.

It is certainly concerning all of us, because Agriculture and Food does have the vehicles in place to look after the rural parts of Ontario. They are set up in all parts of Ontario. If indeed the member's motion is going to meet with approval from the powers that be within this government, I think it has to go to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

It was interesting to notice the Liberal member mentioned that when the Liberal government was in power it increased the budget of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food by 60%. The interesting part about that is they took the farm tax rebate out of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and put it into the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. It was about $150 million, so it didn't mean one penny more from the government to rural Ontario, but it looked good when you added it to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

I remember back in the days when the NDP was in opposition. They promised us a ministry of eastern Ontario, believe it or not. But that sure went up in smoke very shortly after they formed the government, and of course the cabinet did not include anyone as a minister of eastern Ontario. That I guess we can accept.

However, we find out now that the Ministry of Natural Resources is going out into rural Ontario and designating areas as wetlands in spite of the fact that the farmers had no input. It's a great thing to designate so-called wetlands; however, remember people own that land and pay taxes on it. Just like the London annexation -- 64,000 acres -- farmers are very unhappy.

I suggest to those farmers who are in the area that's being annexed that indeed they should have the priority of selling at market value to the annexing body or to the government of Ontario with a leaseback. If they cannot farm without the hassle of that area, then at least they have their money at market value. But right now their rights are being totally disregarded in the London annexation.

More bureaucracy is something we don't need. I attempted to establish how many bureaucrats we have working for the government of Ontario right now. Would you believe that we don't have any more bureaucrats? They're FTEs, full-time equivalents. Now, that's interesting. We have more than 90,000 FTEs, full-time equivalents, working within the bureaucracy of the government of Ontario, up some 10,000 from about seven years ago. If indeed this new ministry is going to bring more FTEs into the system, I'm not sure I'm going to support it.

The Ministry of the Environment is one that gets very much involved in what happens in rural Ontario. I have met recently with a number of people within the Ministry of the Environment because of a certain project that's happening, not only in my riding but in my home community. Yes, the Ministry of the Environment did invest some money for architectural and engineering, but all of a sudden, we've come to where we are going to start putting bricks and mortar in place. There will be a lagoon dug, at least supposedly, and the sewage and water project was about ready to go, but they have no money for new projects.

I understand they will continue with the existing projects, but there is no money for new projects. Yet this particular project would bring in some 160 new homes to a small rural community. It would also look after major problems with sewage and water.

But there's no money for new projects. Money has been spent, the engineering is done. Basically the municipality has gone out on a limb and spent some of its own money to go into final design, but there is no money for new projects from the Ministry of the Environment. Yet the same ministry came through and put all sorts of requirements and absolute musts for this municipality to meet, procrastinated, put the things off, and now there is no money.

There are a few letters, one signed by Frank Anthony, the president of the Ontario Corn Producers association, and its heading is "Farming is not a Queen's Park Priority." I appreciate the member this morning realizing that, but he's bringing it with a rather soft touch. I think we have to tell the people of Ontario that Agriculture and Food got a 10% cut in the last year. It's now less expensive for the government of Ontario to provide support for Agriculture and Food than it is to run the provincial jails, for example. Not many people know that.

Jails cost more to maintain in Ontario than the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. Another interesting statistic is that the Ministry of Labour got a 16% increase in its budget. What did Agriculture and Food get? A 10% reduction.

I compliment the member for recognizing that, but call a spade a spade. That's what been happening. The Minister of Agriculture and Food, the Honourable Elmer Buchanan, I think is doing a great job, but he's a lone voice in the wilderness at that cabinet table, and I'm not sure that creating a new bureaucracy outside of his ministry is going to assist him.

There are two of my friends who are parliamentary assistants. I get to chat with them regularly and we discuss the problems they have in their particular ridings. Give these gentlemen more responsibility within the ministry of agriculture, the only ministry that has two parliamentary assistants. Let's use them. They're already being paid; let's use them.

In the Kingston Whig-Standard, a paper I'm sure the honourable member reads on a regular basis, the September 30, 1992, heading is "Mind-Boggling" regarding the additional costs that are being anticipated for the Ministry of Agriculture and Food: meat inspection and water testing, licensing fees for tractors, the purchase of annual permits by people engaged in food handling and the charging of provincial sales tax on resale of homes. These are costs it is being speculated will be added to the rural Ontario residents as taxpayers.

Another letter here -- and it's too bad the time is so short: "The gambling casinos that will be apparently occurring will destroy the horse racing industry of Ontario, which is anchored within the rural parts of Ontario. It's a multibillion-dollar business, the raising, the training, the production of feed etc, and it will be decimated by the coming of the one-armed bandit, that doesn't eat much hay, but it's sure hard on your wallet."

"A key difference between the Saskatchewan and Ontario situations is that we have not had the support of the Ontario Premier and the Ontario government seeking redress in the hardship year created last year." This is a letter from the Ontario corn producers, the soybean producers, the wheat producers and the OFA.

We have a major problem, and I have just touched the tip of the iceberg. I appreciate the honourable member bringing it to the attention of his government, but put the facts on the table.

Mr Paul Klopp (Huron): I stand here today to recognize my colleague who brought forth this ballot item number 28. It's amazing: It makes it sound like nothing has been done to this point in time, and I want to try to get the record a little more clear.

My political life started back in the late 1970s. One of the things I didn't hear when I went to meetings was that the government didn't care. As I worked my way along, all of a sudden this word kept coming into meetings, "It's the Toronto solution to rural Ontario." I kept a very open mind, but as time passed, we continued to hear that message. In fact, I think the message was not heard by the Tory government, and it was put out. The Liberals got in. I thought they would catch on that they should talk about rural issues, and not just talk about it but do something about it.

I don't have to scratch very deep: We did not hear at the meetings about the situation changing. It still kept going: red tape, Toronto issues forced on local governments in rural Ontario.

I think that was one of the reasons a lot of us in government were elected in rural Ontario, because they were not listened to. More importantly, they were not acted on. In getting here, one of the very first things was the graded lumber issue, which was put in by the Liberals; it came into effect when we got in. I got phone calls in my office: "What are you guys doing putting this graded lumber thing in? Don't you know anything about rural Ontario?" I instantly said, "I'd like to know who did this, we're going to find out about it and we'll fix it."

The first thing I found out was that the Liberals put it in. If they didn't consult rural sawmills, that's their problem. That's just one example. More importantly, we fixed that issue. It wasn't in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, it was in the Ministry of Housing, but the Ministry of Housing doesn't consult with rural Ontario and that's probably one of the reasons that happened, although there may be others.

So what did we do? We had to spend time fixing that problem. To me, it was one prime example of why we need to have the government of Ontario put the loop in of rural Ontario, not just the Ministry of Agriculture and Food but the Ministry of Housing, the Ministry of the Environment, MTO and every ministry. Basically, you take steps at a time, you build, and that's what this is about today.

I don't recall over the last 10 years in this House this kind of debate about rural Ontario. I find it bizarre when I hear questions, especially from the official opposition, which clearly had the mandate to get back on track. I can understand the Progressive Conservative Party losing it, because after 42 years maybe one gets a little complacent and that can happen, but for the Liberals to sit there and do that, I find it bizarre.

More importantly, what have we done? We've started to turn this ship around. One of the first things this government did was set up the Rural Advisory Committee, of which I was honoured to be the chair and have many colleagues on. That was one of the issues, the lumber grading issue. We talked in RAC and said, "Let's get on this," and we helped move it along.

The situation about the whole rural fabric isn't just agriculture; it's the towns. The opposition talked a little bit earlier about everybody leaving rural Ontario. Basically, the policies of government caused that. It's a question of which came first, the chicken or the egg. We listen about big multinationals and the free trade issues, but not the fact that you need small businesses and you need rural economic development. We are working on that.

Mr Robert Chiarelli (Ottawa West): Why do they leave it to a backbencher to bring it forward if it's so important?

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr Klopp: Obviously, I've hit a chord. The member knows I'm right. Thank you very much over there for your problems.

We started the pilot projects that were mentioned earlier by colleagues across the floor. You know, the best compliment is when your opposition tells you you're doing a good job, and I thank you.

Of course, it takes time. We've had 10 years with this horse in rural Ontario that's been fed poor hay. You can't fix it instantly. You've got to start rebuilding. People in my riding have told me you don't go for quick solutions, because that is not the right way. It is very painful, but we're working very hard on those things.

I look at the Ministry of the Environment; everybody talks about the situations there. We are working on that to streamline the process. It takes time, but we're working at it.

I look at little things which tell me we're doing things. The community centre in Belgrave, a little hamlet: Very clearly, if we hadn't had an NDP government promoting the idea that the lottery funds go all over Ontario, not just -- we all take our little chance and buy those tickets, and rural Ontario should have just as much chance to get those grants as a large municipality. I'd like to think, and I know, it was our initiative that said: "Belgrave should be on that list. It's just as important as a city of 40,000 or 50,000."

We say: "Let's spend more money. Let's spend more money." The reality is that we can't spend more money; we've got to spend it smarter. In the town of Bayfield the local seniors said, "We need to have something in this little town for our people." You know what happened? Because of the direction from our leaders, the Ministry of Health said, "Go and try to get it resolved, but there is no money." A local solution was arrived at. I went to that seniors' opening that day. Bayfield people do pay taxes, but it didn't cost the taxpayers anything and they got a service they wanted.

Indeed, I think we are doing great things. We are moving as fast as we possibly can, and today is one of these examples to show that we do care about this province and rural Ontario.

Mr Pat Hayes (Essex-Kent): I am very pleased to be up here speaking in favour of the private member's resolution of the member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings. I don't have a whole lot of time, so I'll just touch on some of the issues that were raised.

The Liberals, for example, talked about the budget and cutting back on the budget. Needless to say, the public knows, and all the farmers and all the rural communities know, that the Liberals left us with great debt and pretended they had excess money.

The other issue they talked about is that it took us so long on the ethanol situation. Why are you only interested in it after this government got into power? You weren't interested when you were in.

The member from the Conservative Party was talking about two parliamentary assistants. There are two parliamentary assistants in there who do work very hard. The difference is that the parliamentary assistants to the previous governments never had any input and weren't invited into many of the meetings with the Minister of Agriculture and Food.

The difference is that this government, even though there are certainly cuts in the budgets -- and not just that budget. We do not like to see cuts in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food budget at all; none of us does. But let me tell you one thing. This government, especially the Minister of Agriculture and Food, is doing a better job and spending our money more wisely, with less money. The farmers told us, "If you can put together a good program with less money, it's better than what the previous governments did." They spent lots of money on poor programs, ad hoc programs.

We had a program, the farm income assistance program, because of the financial review committee, where the farmers came to me and said, "This is the first program that I, as a farmer, was eligible for because you have set this program up for the people most in need." I think that's very important.

With regard to some of the problems we do have, the issue was raised on the annexation in the London area. I think with this type of resolution, and if this is followed through, there would be more and better input from the rural community to deal with some of these issues, because the things that we have in legislation that's passed or bylaws, or whatever the case, that are done in Toronto, traditionally for too many years these things have not necessarily met the needs of the people in rural communities.

The other thing is that with all the programs like FIAP, like the commodity-based loan program, the private mortgage program, the rural loan pool, the apprenticeship programs, these things that we're dealing with right now, let me tell you, this is the first time that we've had every farmers' association and all the commodity groups and the farm women's network and all these people on committees dealing with every one of these so the farmers have a voice right from the ground floor up on these.

The Deputy Speaker: The time provided for private members' business has expired.

Interjection.

The Deputy Speaker: Oh, I apologize. The member for Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings.

Mr Johnson: First of all, I want to apologize to all the members from the north. It was brought to my attention by the member for Cochrane North that there is not a Ministry of Northern Affairs. Indeed, there is a Ministry of Northern Development and Mines. However, that ministry does represent the north.

I listened very carefully to all the comments that all my colleagues in this Legislature made today. I agreed with many of them, and some of them were not so agreeable. However, let me tell you that with regard to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, I think the member for Essex-Kent is right: People from rural Ontario have been telling us for a long time, "You've got to spend your money more wisely." That's the message this government's taking now. It's the message that we've been given. Let's be fair and let's be frank: We're in very difficult economic times right now. At no time have we had to spend our money more wisely.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Food is doing a good job, in my opinion. I don't think the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, representing farmers and the farming communities in this province, should have to deal with all the other issues that I spoke of earlier. They shouldn't have to deal with the issues that are raised by the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Community and Social Services, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of the Environment.

I think there needs to be some kind of representative body, and as I've already indicated, I think it should be a ministry or a secretariat. There should be that representative body that is available for the people in rural Ontario to lodge their concerns with that comes before the cabinet so that there is true and real representation of rural Ontario at the cabinet. In my opinion, that has never happened in previous governments. It's not happening now. It doesn't have to cost any extra money. We can redistribute moneys within other ministries.

The Deputy Speaker: The time provided for private members' business has expired.

COURT SYSTEM

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will deal first with ballot item number 27, standing in the name of Mr Harnick. If any members are opposed to a vote on this ballot item, will they please rise?

Mr Harnick has moved private member's resolution number 24. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the nays have it.

Pursuant to standing order 96(f), the recorded vote on this ballot item is deferred.

RURAL ONTARIO

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will now deal with ballot item number 28, standing in the name of Mr Johnson. If any members are opposed to a vote on this ballot item, will they please rise?

Mr Johnson has moved private member's resolution number 29. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1206 to 1210.

COURT SYSTEM

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Will the members please take their seats. We will now vote on ballot item 27, standing in the name of Mr Harnick. All those in favour of the motion will please rise and remain standing until your name is called.

Ayes

Arnott, Bradley, Brown, Callahan, Caplan, Chiarelli, Cunningham, Drainville, Eddy, Elston, Eves, Fawcett, Harnick, Jordan, Kormos, Lessard, McLean, Miclash, Murdock (Sudbury), O'Connor, Owens, Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt), Poole, Sterling, Turnbull, Villeneuve, Wilson (Simcoe West).

Nays

Abel, Akande, Bisson, Carter, Cooper, Coppen, Dadamo, Duignan, Farnan, Frankford, Haeck, Hansen, Harrington, Hayes, Jamison, Johnson, Klopp, MacKinnon, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Mathyssen, Mills, Morrow, Perruzza, Rizzo, Sutherland, Wessenger, Winninger, Wood.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 27, the nays 30.

The Deputy Speaker: The ayes are 27; the nays are 30. I declare the motion lost.

RURAL ONTARIO

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): We will now deal with private member's notice of motion 29, standing in the name of Mr Johnson. All those in favour of the motion will please rise and remain standing until your name is called.

Ayes

Abel, Akande, Arnott, Bisson, Bradley, Brown, Callahan, Caplan, Carter, Chiarelli, Cooper, Coppen, Dadamo, Drainville, Duignan, Eddy, Elston, Eves, Farnan, Fawcett, Frankford, Haeck, Hansen, Harrington, Hayes, Jamison, Johnson, Jordan, Klopp, Kormos, Lessard, MacKinnon, Malkowski, Mammoliti, Marchese, Mathyssen, McLean, Miclash, Mills, Morrow, Murdock (Sudbury), O'Connor, Owens, Perruzza, Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt), Poole, Rizzo, Sutherland, Wessenger, Wilson (Simcoe West), Winninger, Wood.

Nays

Cunningham, Harnick, Sterling, Turnbull, Villeneuve.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 52, the nays 5.

The Deputy Speaker: The ayes are 52; the nays are 5. I declare the motion carried.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. All matters related to private members' public business having been completed, I do now leave the chair. The House will resume at 1:30 this afternoon.

The House recessed at 1217.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1330.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

ATTENDANCE OF PREMIER

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): A review of Hansard, the transcript of all proceedings in the Legislative Assembly, can be rather revealing. Consider the following statements:

"What are we supposed to do if they do not come here day after day and choose when to be here and when not to be here?" or

"The Premier has chosen to be away every single day since he announced his retirement in this House, with the exception of the one day we forced him to turn up. If he chooses to be an absent duck as well as a lame duck, that is his privilege, but we are certainly entitled to ask questions."

The author of those legitimate complaints is none other than Bob Rae, the Phantom of the Assembly, the absentee Premier who appears rarely in the House these days, and when he does favour elected members with his presence, chooses to depart early with opposition questions left in abeyance.

To the thousands of men and women in the Ontario auto industry whose jobs may be in severe jeopardy as a result of past and impending announcements of plant closings, the departure of Premier Rae for the Far East must be as dismaying and infuriating as it is to their elected provincial representatives, who wish to hold the Premier accountable and to seek solutions.

The Premier of Ontario should stay home to protect the jobs of General Motors workers in this time of decision by the new corporate regime, rather than abandoning the province to embark upon yet another foreign tour. It is time for the Premier to go to bat for the potential victims of the GM axe now, before the axe falls.

RYAN RIVINGTON

Mr Leo Jordan (Lanark-Renfrew): I would like to take a moment to tell you about a remarkable child by the name of Ryan Rivington, son of Mr and Mrs Rivington of Almonte, Ontario. He's a 13-year-old boy who was born with an extremely rare chromosome disorder called Wilf Hershorne syndrome. Ryan is one of only 40 people in North America who have this condition, and of these 40 cases, none of these children have walked and talked to the extent that Ryan has.

According to Ryan's language teacher, Brenda-Leah Dizzell-Jordan, Ryan has personally raised the limits of his syndrome through individual courage, the determination of his family and the support of the students and teachers of Caldwell school in Carleton Place.

Of 608 students nominated throughout North America, Ryan was the recipient of the Yes I Can award for 1992, for which he was honoured in Atlanta, Georgia. This award recognizes the tremendous progress that Ryan has made despite his handicap. Ryan is able to speak in five- or six-word sentences now. He is developing grammatical skills every day, and he's able to communicate through the use of a computer. The story of Ryan Rivington can serve as an inspiration for all families and children who face the challenges of being physically disabled.

FACILITIES IN WINDSOR

Mr George Dadamo (Windsor-Sandwich): I'm pleased to rise in this House today to announce the opening of two unique facilities in the city of Windsor.

I was proud to be part of the opening of Century Secondary School just last week in my riding of Windsor-Sandwich. Century Secondary is the amalgamation of both Shawnee and Cal-Tec schools, which have come together to form a creative new endeavour. Along the way, $2.5 million was spent renovating the 28-year-old building.

It is with due respect that I congratulate Mr Don Henry, principal of Century Secondary, as well as the staff, students and the parents on behalf of my Windsor colleagues.

I'm also pleased to inform members of the Legislature about the opening of the Accessible Housing Services office in Windsor at University and Campbell Avenue. I've had the opportunity to meet with Ms Barb Murdoch, the executive director of the office, and her staff, who will be assisting people in Windsor in need of shelter. They will be working closely with the offices of all the Windsor MPPs and together will find solutions for suitable housing.

Shelter is central to everything in our lives: our families, our work, our peace of mind. Housing is critical to our wellbeing. The service the office will provide to the people of Windsor and Essex county will make a real difference between a place to sleep or sleeping on the streets, and I'm pleased to be part of that solution.

Again I offer congratulations to everyone at the new Century Secondary high school at 1375 California Avenue, and also to Accessible Housing Services on University at Campbell Avenue in Windsor.

POLICE JOB ACTION

Mr Steven W. Mahoney (Mississauga West): Yesterday truly was a sad day when 5,000 to 6,000 police officers in this province found it necessary to come to the front lawn of Queen's Park to protest.

In the questioning in this Legislature, the Premier found it convenient to simply quote out of context from a release by Chief Robert Lunney, the chief of police in the region of Peel. I want to make it clear that the chief in the region of Peel is not in support of the job action, but clearly is in support of the men and women of the Peel Regional Police force. He understands the frustration, and in fact has said in an

article from the Toronto Star: "Their concerns" -- referring to the men and women of the police force -- "are the same concerns that the chief has, the same frustrations that I've experiencedI'm pleased to tell you that I support them because I feel the same way."

I've asked the Premier to stay home and deal with the police. We understand that on November 5, as has been pointed out by my colleague, the Premier will be leaving. He refuses to stay in this Legislature to answer the questions of the opposition. He refuses to meet with the police officers. He refuses to accept the fact that the chief of police in Peel region is in support of the men and women of that force and wants a meeting to take place. I call on the Premier to stay home and solve this problem.

FAMILY FISHING WEEKEND

Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): My statement is for the Minister of Natural Resources. It concerns a unique suggestion from the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters that would promote family activity and foster participation in conservation.

The Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters has written to your deputy minister to suggest that your ministry implement the concept of a licence-free family fishing weekend. Apparently, the province of Manitoba is already promoting a similar event, which has become quite successful.

It is my hope that you will give the federation's suggestion serious consideration. Perhaps a family fishing weekend could take place each year on the civic holiday weekend in early August, because I believe this event would go a long way towards fostering participation in conservation and greater caring for our natural resources in Ontario.

Minister, I think there is another very important reason for holding a family fishing weekend each year in Ontario, and it directly relates to a concern I have with your government's Sunday shopping legislation. Bill 38,

An Act to amend the Retail Business Holidays Act, will all but do away with a common pause day in the province of Ontario. I've always believed we should retain Sunday as a traditional day of rest, a common pause day, when we can worship in the church of our choice, rest up for the coming week or spend some quality time with our families. The NDP government's Bill 38 will put an end to this tradition.

Therefore, I urge the minister to seriously consider the federation's suggestion of a family fishing weekend to preserve the family structure as well as fostering participation in conservation and greater caring for our natural resources.

LONDON INVESTMENT IN EDUCATION COUNCIL

Mr David Winninger (London South): I'm pleased to rise in the House today to highlight a small but very positive step towards making Canada more globally competitive.

In my riding of London South, business and education are cooperating to teach grade 8 students what it takes to get and keep skilled jobs. This is being accomplished through an innovative first project of the London Investment in Education Council. Fifty London businesses and organizations will open their doors to 47,000 grade 8 students for three half-days of hands-on job experience. Such organizations as 3M, VanWesten and Rutherford Consulting Engineers, London hospitals and the University of Western Ontario will, on the work site, involve students in exploring a variety of different kinds of jobs.

The ultimate aim of this program is to demonstrate to students that they must be trainable and remain trainable to compete in a changing world, to show them there are not simply jobs to get but skills to learn. This understanding may abide with them throughout their lives.

I support the work of the London Investment in Education Council. I trust that its success will help our children succeed in the future and will help Canada succeed in an increasingly competitive world.

PREMIER'S CONDUCT

Mr Gerry Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt): I want to express my profound disappointment with Premier Rae. Two events this week have revealed a side of the Premier that is most concerning and in my opinion have done much to damage his personal credibility.

The first was when he decided to send a letter to the chair of the Ontario Municipal Board urging the chair to take action in support of the government. This is wrong, wrong, wrong. This is a quasi-judicial body. It's like a court. The Premier can't be sending letters instructing them what to do. It's wrong and it has done much to damage the personal credibility of the Premier.

Every single member of your caucus knows it's wrong, every cabinet minister knows it's wrong, but what did he do? He chose to defend the indefensible. He should have said he was wrong, admitted it and apologized to the people of Ontario.

The second thing that damaged his credibility was that, right when we're in the midst of an economic crisis, he has chosen to flee the country for two weeks. Right when we see youth unemployment in this province 20% higher -- Ontario's unemployment rate among young people is 20% higher than it is in the rest of the country -- what does the Premier choose to do at this time? He's gone. He has gone to Japan while we in the Legislature want him here to defend his actions. The Premier can run but he won't be able to hide from these issues.

TRANSFER PAYMENTS

Mrs Dianne Cunningham (London North): My statement is to the Premier. Mr Premier, since the rejection of the Charlottetown accord on Monday you have been quoted as saying the economy, jobs and training will be your government's priority.

On January 21, 1992, your Treasurer announced historically low transfer payments of 1%, 2% and 2%. School boards, universities and community colleges recognize these economically difficult times and have made responsible financial decisions based on your government's announcement. School boards and universities are now hearing they may not receive the promised 2% transfer payments for 1993.

This was a contractual obligation your Treasurer announced as part of a multi-year promise. Transfer payment agencies have already budgeted with a 2% increase for the following two years. Salaries have been negotiated and services have been rationalized due to the low transfer payments.

Mr Premier, if this is true, if this is truly a fact, this is totally irresponsible. You cannot effectively run a province while reneging on your financial commitments. No one would run a business this way. How can you possibly run the province in this way?

If you are truly committed to improving the economic situation in this province, you will ensure that school boards, universities and colleges receive their 2% increase for the next two years so that they can continue to educate our youth, so that they can meet the challenges of tomorrow.

Mr Premier, you should know that universities receive approximately $1.9 billion from the government, which means that for every $1 the government invests in higher education, our universities generate some $3.

TORONTO WATERFRONT

Mr Rosario Marchese (Fort York): I'm pleased to rise to share with all of you a success story in my riding of Fort York.

There was little vision on the part of the Harbourfront Corp and the local municipality when the west Harbourfront community, made up of co-ops and Cityhome buildings, first came into being approximately 10 or 12 years ago. At that time, no plans were made for schools, health and recreational facilities, transportation services or a shopping area for this new community. The residents of this neighbourhood have fought long and hard to bring some of these essential services to the area, and earlier this year I was pleased to attend the opening of the Harbourfront Community Centre.

The elected municipal representatives and I strongly support this project and are working closely with the community to find a permanent location for the co-op with better facilities so that a wider range of food products can be offered.

The West Harbourfront Food Co-op is an innovative community initiative which deserves our recognition and praise. It provides residents with nutritious food and invaluable work experience, but most of all it shows what a determined community can accomplish together.

NOTICE OF DISSATISFACTION

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Pursuant to standing order 34(a), the member for Mississauga West has given notice of his dissatisfaction with the answer to his question yesterday given by the Premier concerning police job action. This matter will be debated today at 6 pm.

Point of order, the member for Welland-Thorold.

VISITOR

Mr Peter Kormos (Welland-Thorold): I rise with great seriousness and indeed recognizing full well how important points of order are. Mr Speaker, you might recall that some three months ago I announced the birth of George Dadamo's son, Anthony. Well, here he is live at Queen's Park, Anthony Dadamo from Windsor-Sandwich. We all welcome him, with his mother, Maria.

Mrs Elinor Caplan (Oriole): On that point of order, Mr Speaker: I noticed that young Anthony was listening with real rapt attention when his father was making his statement in the House today, but I was discussing this with Anthony at lunch and I know how disappointed he is that Premier Rae is not here for his appearance in the House.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): I don't know if the member for Welland-Thorold can find anything in the standing orders that allows him to make this point, but how could I rule a baby out of order?

PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE

Mr Murray J. Elston (Bruce): I have a point of order with respect to some of the events of the last few days in this place. I have spent some time, if not my entire waking hours, looking at the rules and the standing orders and other things as we try to find a way in which we can conduct the business of this House. I've read in various places.

This happens to be Erskine May, but I've been looking in other places as well, and I look at page 200, for instance, where it talks about the role of the official opposition and the fact that this forum is our only place to do business, our only place to hold accountable the work of the executive of the government of Ontario, the only place to hold accountable the Premier and other people.

While we aren't asking you to sort of go and drag the Premier in here day after day because he won't attend on his own merit, because we understand that's not your role, Mr Speaker, we understand that generally speaking, the standing orders do provide the members of this place with guidance as to how we can do our work.

Our work is to analyse the public policy that is brought here to this House by the government. We have now been forced to deal with Bill 40 on the basis of three days of second reading debate and a few days in a committee over the summer, a committee which excluded almost 75% of the public deputations that wanted to be heard. We have gone through clause-by-clause, which excluded the reading on to the record and the debate of both the government amendments to the bill as it was filed for second reading. We have gone through two days of committee of the whole which also excluded the actual reading of most of the amendments upon which votes were held yesterday.

We have tried several ways of being able to do our business as members of Her Majesty's official opposition. As members of the opposition of this House, we are duty-bound to question, to query and to develop arguments against bad policy decisions. While I understand we cannot always come to an agreement that our case is right, we understand that we must be allowed, as official opposition, to put our case, sir. The standing orders tell us how to do it.

On numerous occasions, there have been questions about whether or not the time allocation motion which has been levied by the member for Windsor-Riverside in his capacity as government House leader actually covers off all the angles, and we have attempted to raise on several occasions means by which we could do our business.

Just reading these, I have found it somewhat problematic to feel comfortable that I can find anyplace where all the rulings and other things are available for me to consult, because when I raise something that is not specifically dealt with in these items there is, without hesitation, I might add -- and that causes me some degree of pause -- a ruling that the exact translation of the words on the page is to be dealt with. In other cases, I have found that you have liberally interpreted what has been written on the page in order to process the business of the day.

My point of order is this, Mr Speaker: If I cannot rely upon the words written in the standing orders of this House for guidance as to what can and cannot be done, then I would ask that you, Mr Speaker, with the work of your Clerk, right away compile for us a guide for the use of the standing orders, an annotated standing orders issue, line by line which helps us understand where in the dickens you're getting all of your rulings, and how it is that the rulings which you have done so far comply with not on