November

21, 1997

HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS

Vol. XLIII No. 35

The House met at 9:00 a.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

Statements by Ministers

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

Rural Renewal.

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I would like to provide members of

this House with a description of the Collective Enterprise Development Program,

a new business assistance program that my department launched this October in

partnership with the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Co-operatives.

The Collective Enterprise Development Program is a

micro-lending program that offers small business loans. Its unique feature is

that the program encourages the creation of small groups of people interested in

exploring and establishing new business ventures. The groups then act as a

sounding board for the business plans prepared by individual members, and are

ultimately responsible for approving each member's loans.

The Collective Enterprise Development Program loans are

provided by commercial lenders, typically banks or credit unions. They are not

government grants or gifts. If any member of the group falls behind with their

payments, the borrowing privileges of the entire group are suspended. This is

why this kind of program is also known as peer lending or circle lending. Where

this approach has been used in other countries, loan repayments have been close

to 100 per cent. Once a person is judged ready by the group to start a business,

they can, under this program, secure their first loan of $500 from a local bank

or credit union. Upon its repayment, successive loans are available up to a

maximum of $5,000.

The Department of Development and Rural Renewal and the

Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Co-operatives have each contributed

$500,000 to the cost of setting up this program. This funding acts principally

to provide loan guarantees to the commercial funding institutions and to provide

expert business advice to the lending circles through local co-ordinators that

will be guided by the Federation of Co-operatives.

I believe this program is ideal for rural Newfoundland and

Labrador. First, it is a program in which people help each other, and we have a

long history of mutual help. Secondly, this program builds on the strengths and

skills of a community by sharing skills among group members. Few entrepreneurs

have all the skills necessary to start a business. This program ensures that we

tap into community strengths. Thirdly, the Collective Enterprise Development

Program builds on people's interests, on the things people are good at, and

because the businesses operate in a co-operative rather than a competitive

manner, it encourages the growth of complimentary businesses which, in turn,

helps build strong community and regional economies. Does the hon. gentleman

understand that?

AN HON. MEMBER: No, read it again.

MR. TULK: The Collective Enterprise Development Program

is a useful addition to our small business support programs. Many existing

business assistance programs assume some familiarity with business concepts.

This program is particularly helpful for people with limited business knowledge.

I am also pleased, Mr. Speaker, that my department has been able to partner with

the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Co-operatives on this program. This

program is a co-operative process that relies on effective partnering between

community-based organizations and government, something in which the Federation

are experts. The Federation has a long history of co-operative effort and I

think it is only fitting that they should be the delivery agents for this

program.

Mr. Speaker, as Minister of Development and Rural Renewal, I

am confident that this program will be an effective economic development tool

for rural Newfoundland and Labrador. This program will help to foster

entrepreneurship and new business start-ups throughout the Province. It will

result in new jobs being created in communities through all areas of the

Province. The program in its pilot form has already attracted over sixty people

and is expected to have 100 participants by next January, creating 100 new

businesses. It is an innovative and flexible approach to the need for business

development in rural areas and it will help my department meet its prime

objective, Mr. Speaker, which is the development and renewal of rural

Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

MR. SHELLEY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, The minister is having a lot of trouble with his

press statement. A couple of days ago he had to read the Member for Bonavista

South's press statement, today he had trouble reading his own.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Speaker, I will say this very quickly,

that small business, I believe, is going to be the key to this Province's

recovery, especially small businesses in rural Newfoundland in particular at

this stage. Because this is a step in the right direction, I will say that. I

will say it is a step in the right direction but only a small step. The truth

is, a lot of these people in this Province as they watched the programs over the

last few nights, the brain drain they call it or whatever, the good

entrepreneurs with good ideas that come in everyday with business plans and

ideas to go forward and like they have said to me on many occasions: Why don't

you roll out the red carpet for a change instead of the red tape? That is what

happens in this Province, the good ideas go out of this Province to other

provinces, as we saw in Alberta the other night.

So, Mr. Speaker, the advice to the minister and the

government is step this up tenfold so we can get on with reviving rural

Newfoundland through small business and through small business initiatives.

Oral Questions

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions today are for the Minister of Health.

A greater emphasis today is placed on prevention by all those

involved in the health care field. Now, I know the minister has mentioned that

on numerous occasions.

I ask the minister is she aware of any increase in infection

rate in hospitals in our city?

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We have infection control nurses and departments in all of

our hospitals. I do not carry the data of the day to day infection rate, but I

could certainly provide information, as could my colleague obtain from the

community health boards and through the institutional boards on the rates of

infection in the Province.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Leader of the

Opposition.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would consider it a responsibility of the Minister of

Health to know if there are changes in infection rates and what is happening in

that very important area.

I spoke with a person last week who underwent surgery earlier

this month and was sent home and who is back in hospital now for over two weeks

and eight people out, discharged around the same time, seven are back in now

again because of infections that have developed. There is a revolving door

policy in place at hospitals today.

I ask the minister, does the minister realize that sending

people home too early is counterproductive and actually costs tax payers

millions of dollars annually in health care costs?

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As I will say again in response to my colleagues

preamble,

infection rates change on a day to day basis and I am sure as my colleague

knows, hospitals certainly have a higher rate of infection than anyone's home

would, so it makes perfect sense to move people out of hospital and into their

home or into their community health, as soon as possible for a number of

reasons. Most people would prefer to recuperate in their own home.

As my colleague also knows, we have improved with our drug

programs and also with the other services available. We provide extensive

coverage for antibiotic treatment. Physicians prescribe those as needed, and we

have follow-up in our communities.

There will always be infections, and certainly it is a

concern we all have with the over-use sometimes of prescribing of antibiotics.

We will always have infections, but I have to say that I think our physicians

and our nurses are doing a fine job. I compliment the work they are doing in

early diagnosis, prevention, and early intervention, and I stand by the fine

work that is being done by our health care providers.

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

supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The minister is not telling us anything new. I think they are

doing a tremendous job under the stresses put on them by this minister and this

government.

Newfoundland and Labrador is recognized as having the highest

readmission rate of any province in the country. While many people are being

released from hospital shortly after their surgery, many of them needing several

dressing changes per day, we have not seen sufficient community health nurses

put in place to ensure there is an appropriate follow-up to prevent this

infection, I say to the minister.

When is the minister going to stop paying lip service and

provide real assistance to the resources in the field of community health?

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

All across this country we have been focusing on a program of

early intervention and prevention - part of that whole program across the

country - and, as my colleague knows, services within our health care system are

covered mostly in the institutional sector as outlined under the Canada Health

Act.

We have said in this House many times about our commitment to

community development and resources, and that is why over the last number of

years we have injected separate money into our community health budgets to try

to bring them up to speed. For example, in the western region alone last year we

injected almost a million dollars to increase the amount of home support

available for people in that particular region.

In addition we have provided, over the last four years

specifically, separate injections of money into the community to help develop;

and I would say when you have a health care system, a publicly-funded system,

that is based on institutional care, it is taking every province in this country

awhile to build up their community resources, and to build them up to a point

where we are able to deliver the type of services we want in the community.

It is a transitional period. We have been working to do that,

and we are certainly no further behind and, in fact, ahead of some of our

Atlantic Canadian Provinces in this area.

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

supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is good to have people move out of hospitals early, but it

is important out in the community that we have the people to care for them. I

fully support that if we have the resources out there; but, Minister, you are

moving them out and you are not putting the resources in place to do it.

In cost-effectiveness within the system, I ask the minister:

Why are there vacant nursing positions now in hospitals, when casuals are out

working full-time, when nurses are being called back to work double-time on

weekends and extra shifts, being paid double, because there is no one available

to work those shifts? It is going on every single week. Does the minister

consider this to be efficient use of health care dollars?

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all I

would like to say, as all of our administrators and many of our nurses would

admit, that there will always be a use of casual nurses and casual workers in

our system. It is a function, as I try to answer the question, of how we deliver

health services in our Province.

In addition to that, we always have traditionally, as long as

I've been involved in the system and long before, areas where we have shortages

of expertise. Since casual positions have been made permanent in terms of

seniority, ability to compete for jobs, there is certainly more interest in

applying for permanent jobs. The budgets that are in the system are delivered by

both delivering casual services and by delivering full-time services. We have

given a commitment through the Health Forum with the nurses and with the other

groups to look in collective agreements that are upcoming on how we are going to

deal with the issue of casual nurses.

I'm sure my colleague would have heard me speak about that

many times, both in the House and in the media, and I'm sure he can attest to

that, if he asked the many participants of the Health Forum, that the use of

casual workers was one that was raised and that we agreed that we would look at

when we got into the collective bargaining process, not into the House of

Assembly.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No, not a speech, Mr. Speaker, a

response to a

preamble prior to the question.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

A supplementary, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. She missed the

point of my question. It wasn't about casual nurses, I say to the minister,

after a lengthy answer. I wasn't invited into the Forum, and people who

complained weren't invited. Some managed to get invited later. It was a closed -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: - door conference. (Inaudible)

hand-selected people by the minister.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please!

The hon. member is on the supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: I ask the minister again, I said: In view

of the fact that casuals are working full-time hours, in view of the fact that

full-time people are being called back on weekends to work double-time, get paid

double-time, in addition to their full shifts, why are there unfilled positions?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: It is a question, Mr. Speaker.

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, more time wasted. Mr. Speaker,

this is not a time for debate. It is a time to put supplementary questions and

have them over with.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I had the question

asked just about when they interrupted me. I will start again. Why are there

unfilled full time positions in hospitals today when casuals are working full

hours, when full time nurses are called back to be paid double overtime on

weekends? Does the minister consider this to be efficient use of health care

dollars?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would first like to comment on the

preamble that my

colleague referred to prior to his question about the participants of the forum.

In fact, it wasn't a hand-picked forum, Mr. Speaker, it was a forum

representative - every single health provider is represented in this Province in

addition to consumers, in addition to people who have access to the system and

require access. So, Mr. Speaker, the participants were all there, including

government officials, including the people who make the decisions around the

Cabinet Table.

In response to the question, Mr. Speaker, as long as I can

remember and anyone in the health care system can remember, in many of our

speciality areas there has always been the need to provide call- back services.

I know that particularly in the health care corporation, with the transition of

all the organizations under one corporation, Mr. Speaker, there is an effort to

try to minimize the number of casuals. The chief executive officer of that

particular institution, Mr. Speaker, has said -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to conclude her answer.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: The chief executive officer, Mr.

Speaker, of that particular organization has said they have a goal in mind to

reduce the number of casuals. Once they are able to identify the full number of

permanent positions so that no worker is disadvantaged in their ability to

apply.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

A supplementary, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is like extracting teeth. I asked the minister a simple

question, is it efficient to have positions not filled? I know the situation

with casuals. It has been talked about before. Is it efficient use of taxpayer

dollars to have full time people back at double time with casuals working full

time when there are unfilled positions there? Yes, I know I asked the minister,

is it efficient use of dollars?

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

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, when the need arises for

extra staff or staff to be called back in speciality areas I have full

confidence in the management and in the delegation of the appropriate people to

work in those positions, Mr. Speaker. I do not keep a

schedule of every shift

that is covered by nurses and support workers in the Province. I have to count

on the boards and on the people who are managing the hospital to deliver

services. Again, I say, Mr. Speaker, the role of the government is not to do the

direct work of the health care system but to oversee it through the use of the

boards.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for

the Minister of Finance.

On Monday, November 17, I asked the Minister of Finance a

question regarding the Retail Sales Tax legislation on used vehicles. The

minister said it would have to be monitored and fair. I agree with that, but the

problem is that this proposed system is going to be grossly unfair and unjust.

Shouldn't the minister and the government be proactive in dealing with the

offenders of the present system? And, basically, does the minister agree that

punishing the innocent for the guilty is morally wrong? Deal with the problem.

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In response to the hon. member's question, everybody feels

that any form of taxation is less morally preferable to some other form of

dispensation, but the issue concerning the taxation, the sale between private

individuals, has not been finalized by government. It was raised by someone in

the media. It was raised in this House. We, as government, have not announced

the details of our policy. What I have said in general terms is that government

is examining whether it should, in the case of individual sales between private

individuals, weigh that against the red book value.

We are looking at different things. The red book proposes two

values. For example, it proposes a wholesale value and a retail value. There is

a considerable difference between 16 per cent, in some cases, to 35 per cent,

and I can cite examples for the hon. member.

What we are also looking at is a form of additional appeal or

assessment, depending on if the individual disputes the amount of the red book

value being an appropriate and fair value for the sale of those vehicles, and

that is one level of appeal one might have to a group of appraisers, for

example, around the Province.

These are issues with which we are still dealing. In due

course, when government comes to a final determination of policy, we will make

it known to the House and to hon. members, as well as the public.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis, a

supplementary.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would say the

minister would make a great used car salesman.

Mr. Speaker, the other day the minister talked about an

appeal system. Will the minister confirm that if a seller or a buyer disagrees

with the book value then a special appraisal will be required, and that

appraisal will have to come form either a licensed appraiser or a new car

dealership? Therefore there would be two extra costs if a person wants to sell a

car, the unjust tax, of course, and the appraisal fee. And will the red book

value tax be required to be paid up front under the appeal system - or black

book, or blue book, or pink book, whatever?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to thank the hon. member for his compliment, first of

all. I suggest it is probably easier to sell used cars in the Province than it

is to sell Tory principles.

Having listened to his question, however -

AN HON. MEMBER: What?

MR. DICKS: I am sorry. I said, it's easier to sell used

cars than Tory principles, the critical difference being that at least a used

car exists.

Acknowledging the difficult task my friend across the House

has, yes, government is concerned. There are legitimate sales. We are not

questioning that in all cases the red book value would apply, but I would say

many people are coming to conclusions about even seeing what government will

implement.

First of all, the red book value - and we are looking at

imposing the wholesale as opposed to the retail value, and there is considerable

difference. I suggest to my friend that he wait until we make the details known.

We are still examining it. There are parts of the policy which still concern me.

I want to ensure that if it is implemented it will be seen as fair to all

taxpayers of the Province, as does the hon. member himself.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis, a

supplementary.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say to the minister, at least we have principles to sell,

not like the crowd over there.

Mr. Speaker, under the present system, a tax administrator

often questions the purchase price compared to the book value; the sworn

affidavit system was dropped a number of years ago. Will the minister reconsider

this new, unjust, unfair, morally wrong rip-off tax system, and look at an

affidavit system and, will he table in the House, the study -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: I am asking a question, lighten up, take

your time, watch your blood pressure.

Will the minister table in the House the study he referred to

the other day, with regard to the fraudulent sales?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

First of all, with respect to the member's comments, he said,

at least they have principles to sell. We, on the other hand, do not sell any

principles; we stand by ours, Mr. Speaker.

In answer to his question, Mr. Speaker, we stand by ours,

they are not for sale. In any event, Mr. Speaker, yes I will, I will table the

study that we did. I do not have it with me this morning. I will table it for

you on Monday or maybe later this morning.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please!

The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions this morning are for the Minister of Education

on the important issue of air quality in our schools.

The minister has studied schools in the Province, Mr.

Speaker, at random, and has had an opportunity to analyze the reports of air

quality of certain other schools.

I ask the minister: Which schools were studied, what were the

results of the air-quality studies, Mr. Speaker, and like the previous minister,

who indicated that he would table, will this minister table the comprehensive

list of schools which were studied and the results of those tests?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am glad that the Opposition has finally discovered that

over two years ago we commissioned a study of some schools in Newfoundland and

Labrador and, Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to explain a little bit of

the background and development of the issue because, in the early 1990s, in I

think it was 1992 or 1993, there was a circumstance where, there was a fungus in

a school in the Gander Bay area where, in fact, every corrective measure failed

to the point that the school had to be closed and a new school built because the

air quality was so bad, it actually put at risk the health of the students, the

teachers, the other workers in the school system.

Because of that, Mr. Speaker, and the fact that in other

isolated instances in the Province, we occasionally heard complaints that

children in particular, the students most notably, and sometimes the teachers

and other workers in the system as well, would have headaches or their allergies

or asthma would be aggravated in some circumstances, the Department of Education

requested that a random study be done, and this was requested in 1995.

Some fifty-five schools were tested in all regions of

Newfoundland and Labrador. I do not know the details of the individual schools

but the important part, Mr. Speaker, and I am glad that the Opposition has

finally realized it - and this was done two years ago; the fact of the matter

is, when we received the report, we immediately forwarded the information to

each of the school boards that had had a facility tested so that they would be

aware of the results -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the minister to conclude his answer quickly.

MR. GRIMES: - and they could start taking action with

respect to the matter if they thought it was serious or if there was any

possibility of a health risk to the people who were in the school, primarily the

students, the teachers and the other workers.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. GRIMES: So it is a matter, Mr. Speaker, that is

largely in progress.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! Order, please!

The hon. the Member for St. John's East, a supplementary.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Speaker, I do not need a history

lesson on the topic. I will ask my question again.

Will the hon. minister table the list of those schools in

this Province which have been tested with respect to the issue of air quality

and will he also table the results of those tests?

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

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, again, to continue where I left

off the last time, the information was sent to all of the school boards that had

had a school tested and the important

part is this: that the people who are

genuinely concerned about the air quality in the buildings have the information

and are dealing with it.

I know, Mr. Speaker, that the member opposite sometimes is

genuinely concerned and sometimes pretends to be concerned about other issues,

but in this instance, rather than go into a process of tabling information in

the House and so on, the information has been given directly, a year-and-a-half

ago, to the people who are already doing further testing. They have done some

corrections in some schools. They are taking interim measures. There has been

$2.5 million put in the budget this year for major mechanical interventions in

schools and renovations and repairs, and all of the action that is necessary -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - with respect to this item is being done

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to take his seat.

MR. GRIMES: - through the school boards. It will not be -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - expedited in any way -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - Mr. Speaker, by putting information -

MR. SPEAKER: I ask the hon. member to take his seat.

MR. GRIMES: - on the Table in this Legislature.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I just want to remind hon. members that answers to questions

should be as brief as possible, should deal with the matter raised and, of

course, should not provoke debate. Questions should not repeat questions already

asked, although this does not mean that other questions cannot be raised on the

same point of order.

The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Speaker, it is unbelievable that on

such a fundamental issue of the health and well-being of our students and

teachers who work in our schools on a daily basis that the minister refuses to

let the public of this Province know the situation today as it exists in this

Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: It is unbelievable that the minister can

be so cavalier in an answer that he will not let the people of this Province

know. I will ask him a much more direct question, Mr. Speaker. Were any schools

found to be in urgent need of repair, and if so, if he refuses to table the

information, will he answer the question: Which schools were in urgent need of

repair, and could he tell us this morning?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

With respect to the information and a suggestion by the -

again, the pretence of one of the leadership candidates opposite suggesting

again that he is so concerned about this issue, and trying to suggest that I am

cavalier by indicating that I do not see any purpose to be served by putting a

report on the Table of the Legislature a year-and-a-half after it has been in

the hands of the school board officials who are already acting on the report.

Because the member opposite, the Opposition education critic,

has finally discovered, a year-and-a-half too late, that there is an issue that

the government and the school boards have been very concerned about, are working

with and are dealing with on a daily basis with respect to air quality. The sham

and the scam and the sorry state to get up and suggest that there might be

something wrong here, because a year-and-a-half later he finds out that there

was a study. He wants a report put on the - the people who need to deal with

this and are genuinely concerned about the students and the teachers and the

workers in the schools have the report. They have had it for over a year. They

are dealing with it.

With respect to the issue of the urgent schools - and here is

again the innuendo to suggest that there might be some circumstances out there

where the health of the students and the teachers and the workers are at risk.

The reality is this. The report showed, and the report is a completely public

document

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - that has been in the hands -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - of people for over a year, the report

showed that -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - none of the schools -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: - were in urgent - where there was any real

risk to the students and the teachers.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for St.

John's East.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The only concern I have on the issue of leadership is the

leadership of the Ministry of Education of this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: In the identification of concerns and

problems, Mr. Speaker, as they relate to the schools in this Province, has the

minister done the honourable thing and has he informed the people who are

directly affected of the risks they are taking? Have they been directly informed

of the risk? I speak of the teachers, the students, and their parents. Have they

been informed of the risk directly?

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

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, again, with respect to the

matter raised, if I were the Leader of the Opposition I would not be - I am sure

while he tapped on his desk as the candidate behind him asked the question, I do

not think he will be applauding him in March. There is not much doubt about

that.

The other issues. Again, the difficulty with the line of

questioning that I was dealing with in my last answer. The hon. member is trying

to suggest that there are people at risk in the schools. That is the whole

difficulty with the nature and approach to this particular study. The study was

done, it was a serious issue, it remains a serious issue. All of the people who

need to know who are charged with the responsibility for running and managing

the system, to make sure that everybody in the schools of Newfoundland and

Labrador are safe and are not at risk, have been aware of the circumstance for

over a year, there is no risk and nobody should be suggesting that students,

teachers or other workers in the school system are at risk in any of our

buildings because it does not exist. When there is a suggestion that there might

be a health risk, further testing is done and immediate measures are taken in

the schools. There are no students, teachers or workers in the school system -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister to complete his answer.

MR. GRIMES: - at risk in Newfoundland and Labrador.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for St. John's West.

MS S. OSBORNE: My questions are for the Minister of Human

Resources and Employment.

Will the minister confirm if it is her department's policy to

claw back the shelter component of their student loans from social assistance

recipients who are in post-secondary schools and will she tell us when this

policy came into effect and why the department was so late notifying students? I

have copies here of people who received the letter with the postmark after they

had gotten their cheque. Is she aware that some students, especially students

beyond their first year of post-secondary, unaware of the change in policy and

after receiving incorrect advice from the schools, went ahead and spent some of

the student loan money on essentials like food and are now being asked to repay

that money to her department?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Human Resources and

Employment.

MS BETTNEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the

member opposite for asking a question which will provide me with an opportunity

to provide some background on this particular policy on student aid.

The department's policy with respect to the Student Aid

Program is that where student parents who are clients, receive student aid, they

have to consider the food and shelter component which is included as

non-allowable income. What that means is when students draw down student aid,

any student in the Province, they are receiving with their student aid, a

portion of expenses for food and shelter. Where students who are receiving

social assistance wish to continue to receive social assistance, which in effect

is food and shelter, we have asked those students to return to the department, a

portion of the food and shelter component that was returned in their student

load. As a matter of fact, for the majority of single parents, what this means

is that they are able to continue then, on their social assistance, which in

fact provides approximately three times the benefits that would be included in

their student aid. So, there is a major advantage to single parents.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister to conclude her answer quickly,

please.

MS BETTNEY: I was only able to answer one of the hon.

member's questions. I believe that there were about four, so I will (inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I just want to remind hon. members and hon. ministers in

particular, that during Question Period, if in addressing a question it requires

a lengthy answer, he or she may require it to be placed on the order paper, if a

question requires a lengthy answer, I ask the ministers to do that.

The hon. the Member for St. John's West, a supplementary.

MS S. OSBORNE: I appreciate this concept of this student

loan and the shelter component, however because there were some errors or some

miscalculations in the timing of getting the letters out to these recipients,

their shelter component is now spent and what I am asking, rather then clawing

it back all at once, giving these single parents and otherwise parents with

small children, fifty dollars a month for food because of the departments policy

to claw it back all at once, what I am asking the minister now is to instrument

this in the form of an overpayment. These students are not trying to get out of

paying back this money that they owe. Rather then putting -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to get to her question.

MS S. OSBORNE: Would you please put this claw back in the

form of an overpayment to ease the hardship on the recipients?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Human Resources and

Employment.

MS BETTNEY: Mr. Speaker, the situation with clients who

are coming forward who in particular, for some reason, did not return the

subsidy and still wish to receive social assistance, we are dealing with each

one of those cases on an individual basis.

In the majority of cases we are able to make accommodation

where the students are able to return the amount over a longer period of time

than simply an immediate repayment at the time. That depends, of course, on the

amount of time that is remaining in the term to start with because for students

who are then returning to their course of study in the next semester, they would

still have an additional problem if that return amount, the refund amount, were

spread over the continuing term but the actions of the department in this case,

Mr. Speaker, are to try and work on an individual basis to meet the requirements

of the students in this regard.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Question Period has ended.

Presenting Reports by

Standing and Special Committees

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, I have Special Warrants to table

- six copies of five Special Warrants. The first, relating to the Legislature,

Mr. Speaker, is in the amount $1,800,000 to provide funds for the referendum on

educational reform; the next is for the Executive Council, a Special Warrant in

the amount of $300,000 to provide funds for the operating costs of the Voisey's

Bay office; Works, Services and Transportation, a Special Warrant of $35,334,000

to provide funds for the Labrador ferry services which was $15,334,000 and the

construction of the Trans-Labrador Highway at $20 million; Municipal and

Provincial Affairs, a Special Warrant of $6,500,000 to provide funds for an

extension to the existing Canada-Newfoundland Infrastructure Agreement; the

Department of Forest Resources and Agrifoods, a Special Warrant in the amount of

$7,800,000 to provide funds to facilitate divesture of the Newfoundland Farm

Products Corporation.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Petitions

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, today I rise in my place to present a petition

on behalf of a number of individuals who are very strongly opposed to the

proposed new tax that is going to be unjustly implemented by the Minister of

Finance in the near future with respect to the retail sales tax on used

vehicles. The wording of the petition is as follows - I would like to read it

out for the Minister of Education's purposes because he is always questioning

the wording of the petitions. It goes like this - a petition to the House of

Assembly:

To the hon. House of Assembly of Newfoundland and Labrador in

legislative session convened, the petition of the undersigned residents of

Newfoundland and Labrador;

WHEREAS the Provincial Government has stated it will

introduce legislation to tax the sale of used vehicles based on their book value

and not on the sale price; and

WHEREAS Newfoundlanders should not pay taxes on an amount of

money they did not pay; and

WHEREAS we believe taxes should be paid only once, when the

vehicle is purchased new;

WHEREFORE your petitioners urge the Government of

Newfoundland and Labrador not to proceed with legislation that would tax the

sale of used vehicles based on the book value, and as in duty bound, your

petitioners will ever pray.

Actually, Mr. Speaker, this all came to light last week when

there was an

article in The Evening Telegram referring to this new

proposed tax. Now, I had known of this proposed tax increase, and I was prepared

to bring it up in the House of Assembly but The Evening Telegram got the

jump on me this time around. Actually, I asked questions in the House of

Assembly on Monday of the Minister of Finance. The Minister of Finance confirmed

that they are looking at changing the retail sales tax legislation to require

people to pay taxes on the book value of used vehicles. Now, Mr. Speaker, the

minister tries to rationalize or justify this by saying that there is a number

of sales in the Province, as much as two-thirds I believe, that the price for

vehicles being sold or the bill of sale comes in for two-thirds less than the

actual book value. Mr. Speaker, that may very well be the case, that some

individuals do sell their vehicles and give a bill of sale for less than the

amount of money that the purchaser paid, that may be the case but my problem

with it and the people's problem out there is that now this Administration is

going to try to punish the innocent for the guilty, to ask people to pay taxes

on money they did not spend. There is nothing, by any stretch of the imagination

that the minister can rationalize or justify for innocent people to pay money to

the government for money they did not spend.

This Province, from what I understand, Mr. Speaker, has the

highest tax rate of any other Province. The people in this Province are paying

more money in taxes - the consumer is the most highly taxed consumer, in other

words, Mr. Speaker, than any other consumer in the country. It is absolutely

ridiculous for this Administration to even consider putting tax legislation in

place to have people pay a tax on money they did not spend.

Mr. Speaker, I have received a number of calls on this issue.

There have been other issues in the past that upset people. The deal where they

were going to try to privatize Newfoundland Hydro. I got a number of calls on

that. On education reform I got a few calls, not a lot. This issue seems to

really have people fed up with this Administration. I can tell you right here

and now that this Administration is becoming too arrogant. It thinks it can do

whatever it wants to do and get away with it.

The minister, in answering questions today, got up and talked

about this crowd over here, or the Tories, having to sell our principles. At

least we have principles out there to sell. That Administration, the longer they

are in power, almost daily now, they are getting worse and worse. They are not

listening to the people of this Province. It is a fatal mistake for any

administration, not to listen to the concerns and the will of the people of the

Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

There was an

article the other day in the paper about the

ministers not being accessible. I cannot say that, personally speaking, because

if I call the minister, I will give credit where credit is due, they do get back

to me personally. The

article was referring to the public trying to get in

contact with the Premier and the various ministers on that side of the House.

There seems to be some problem in that regard. Again, I say, I personally do not

have that problem. I usually get a response, and the ministers normally do get

back to me, thankfully. I appreciate that.

The government of the day has to listen to the people of this

Province. In 1995-1996 the Budget came down and it said it had no tax increases.

What it did have were three full pages of licence fees and permit increases.

Some went up doubled and tripled and what have you. In 1996-1997 I think there

were six full pages of licence fees and permit increases, but it did not have

any tax increases. The people -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. J. BYRNE: They are being nickelled and dimed to

death.

By leave, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

MR. TULK: No leave.

MR. SPEAKER: No leave.

MR. J. BYRNE: The Government House Leader refuses leave,

Mr. Speaker. Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Bonavista South.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise today to support the petition so capably put forward

by my friend and colleague here.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. FITZGERALD: Once again, we see this government

bringing about an uncaring tax to once again levy a hardship on the poorest

people of this Province. It is not a point, Mr. Speaker, of people going out and

ripping off government. I don't believe Newfoundlanders do that. I think

Newfoundlanders are the most honest people in this country. It is a point where

people go out and they buy second-hand cars because they cannot afford a new

one.

If the government wants to raise taxes on the sale of

vehicles, then let them charge 20 per cent on automobiles like the Minister of

Works, Services and Transportation buys. Let them charge 30 per cent on a car

like the Minister of Justice or the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board buys,

not a second-hand car where somebody goes out and pays $700 or $800 for a car.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) a second-hand car.

MR. FITZGERALD: You do not, or you do?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: You probably do, I say to the member, and

I drive them as well. The reason I drive them is because I cannot afford to buy

a new car. That is the shame of it. When the whole tax regime is implemented we

should look at taxing those who can afford to pay, not those who can least

afford to pay. That is what has happened here with this particular tax.

If I am going out to buy a second-hand car, as I usually do,

and if I can reach an agreement between myself and the seller of that vehicle,

then what is government, or who is the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board,

to say: You have to pay more taxes because I deem that that purchase was worth

more than you paid for it? Who gives the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board

that authority? Who gives the Cabinet that authority? There should be some trust

here between the government of the day and the people they represent.

Somebody writes out a bill of sale, in most cases it is like

an affidavit, it is witnessed by somebody - and it should be witnessed. If there

is any doubt there that Newfoundlanders are practising fraud or they are telling

lies, I say to people opposite, go out and have them sign an affidavit. Have

them take an oath and bring it in, and let the Minister of Finance accept that,

but it is wrong and it is shameful for this government to go out and levy a tax

on a product for more than that individual paid for it.

If they want to raise money, like I said, tax the

higher-priced items. If the Government House Leader wants to buy a fur coat,

slap a 30 per cent tax on it if it is over $500. If I am to buy a suit of

clothes and it is over $300, slap a 30 per cent tax on it, but do not put a tax

on something that is $100 - a $100 suit or $110 suit - and then go back to the

minister, because this is what it could lead to, or the minister come back at

you then and say we are going to tax you for $300 because that is the cost of

suits. That is probably taking it a little bit far, but that is what we are

giving this minister the authority to do.

Minister, I call upon you to look at what you are pursuing to

do here. Look at the hurt that you are going to bring about on Newfoundlanders,

those who can least afford it. Try to have a heart, and immediately lower the

tax on second-hand vehicles, as is done in most other provinces, rather than

have them pay taxes on dollars that they do not even spend.

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, I would like to say a few words

to this petition.

The hon. the Member for Bonavista South intrigues me with his

concept of the way he would apply taxes. I think it is an idea that we should

pursue and just push it to its logical conclusion. For example, if a Minister of

the Crown is buying a car, he is suggesting he would pay 30 per cent. I would

like to pursue that and see whether the hon. member would base that on the fact

that a minister is a Minister of Justice, or a Minister of Human Resources and

Employment, or would you base it on income?

Then the hon. member talks about if the wife of the

Government House Leader were to buy a fur coat, then there should be 30 per cent

taxes on it. Now, would the tax be on the fact that an individual is buying a

fur coat? What about if the wife of the member were buying a cloth coat that

cost more than a fur coat?

The idea that the hon. member is putting forward is somewhat

intriguing, but I believe it would be somewhat difficult to enforce. Would I

have to carry a card proving that my income is $100,000 and therefore my taxes

on a car would be 30 per cent? Or if my income was a mere $10,000 my taxes would

be 3 per cent?

It is an intriguing idea, but I do not believe it is really

doing justice to the petition that has been presented, to talk about this

somewhat unique way of administering the tax system.

No doubt the Minister of Finance and government will

certainly take it under consideration, but I believe the answer is going to be

that we are not going to follow his advice on that because it is going to be

somewhat difficult to administer.

Orders of the Day

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, Order No. 2.

On motion, that the House resolve itself into Committee of

the Whole on Supply, Mr. Speaker left the Chair.

Committee of the Whole

CHAIR (Mr. M. Penney): Order, please!

Order No. 2, Committee of Supply, Resolution and Bill No. 28

Respecting the Granting of Supplementary Supply to Her Majesty.

The hon. the Member for Bonavista South.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I rise this morning to add a few words of wisdom to Bill 28.

Before I get into that, I would say to the hon. the Minister

of Justice, referring back to a response to a petition, that first of all there

is one thing I would like to correct. I did not say: The House Leader's wife, I

said: The Government House Leader, when I talked about purchasing a coat at the

value of a certain price and you would put taxes on it. I am a firm believer -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: Well, I do not want people putting words

in my mouth - and the other thing, Mr. Chairman, it has nothing to do with

people's income.

MR. TULK: Remember when you (inaudible) `Roger'?

MR. FITZGERALD: Remember when you (inaudible) and she was

not very happy with you, and I had to come to your defence, if I recall. So, Mr.

Chairman, if somebody wants to go out and buy a high-valued item, then forget

what his income is, he will decide whether he can afford it or not. But I think

those people -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) buy her one.

MR. FITZGERALD: You probably bought her one afterwards, I

would say, in order to get back into her good books again, if not you would be

sleeping in another bed, I say to the member opposite. You probably did that

night.

Those people, Mr. Chairman, if we are looking for ways to

generate revenue and if we are looking at ways of raising taxes then we should

look at raising it and getting it from the pockets of those who can most afford

it. I have always been a firm believer of that, whether it is my Party's policy

or not, that if somebody can afford to pay $500 for a suit of clothes, or $200

for a pair of shoes or $45,000 or $50,000 for a new car, let them pay the taxes

on it, let them pay an extra tax on it. If they can afford that luxury they can

afford to pay taxes but do not go back -

MR. TULK: `Roger' (inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: Pardon?

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: You agree? Sure you agree.

- but do not go back and hit the poor little fellow who is

out there trying to keep twenty dollars a week aside from his unemployment

insurance cheque or his TAGS cheque and say, we are going to charge you now for

more than you paid, for any item, whether it is a car, a shirt or a pair of

shoes. That is wrong, Mr. Chairman, and we are hitting, once again, the people

who are the poorest of the poor of this Province. If we continue to go in that

direction to solve the problems of this Province and this country on the backs

of the working poor, and on the backs of the unemployed, then I fear, Mr.

Chairman, that our lot in life will become much, much worse that it already is

today.

Mr. Chairman, when I look at the head of expenditures on Bill

28 and I see Development and Rural Renewal, $10 million, I have to ask: How many

jobs are being created through the expenditure of $10 million? What has been

done, Mr. Chairman, as we watch Here and Now these past number of nights and we

see people leaving this Province, we see mothers and fathers, sisters and

brothers and grandparents crying publicly, because their families have to leave

this Province to find a job. And then the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture,

gets up here in this House, just yesterday, saying: I do not see what the big

deal is with people having to leave this Province. We are only a small Province,

so what, if somebody has to go to Alberta to find a job? So what, if somebody

has to go to Ontario to find a job?

Mr. Chairman, that is all very well when you come from the

lofty perch of government ministers opposite. It is all very well for them to

say that because they do not have to leave. When you see people out in rural

Newfoundland today, having to bar up their homes - some people have put their

whole life savings into it - bar up their homes, turn off the heat, drain the

pipes, disconnect the electricity and pack up and take their personal, worldly

belongings and put it into a U-Haul and head up to Alberta or head up to Ontario

then, to me, Mr. Chairman, that is not a wonderful thing and it is not hard to

see why people find it so difficult to leave this Province.

I have had to do that myself and that is probably why I know

where I come from this morning; that is why I cannot support the Minister of

Fisheries and Aquaculture when he makes statements like that, because the

statements are wrong. There is nothing more difficult than having to close up

your house, than having to leave your family and to go yourself to another

region of this country in order to get a job.

Some of the people leaving this Province are going with no

work experience. For many of them, it is their first job and they are going to

be disillusioned very quickly when they find out that the riches of Alberta and

the riches of British Columbia are not going to provide them with the

twenty-five and the thirty-dollar-an-hour jobs that some people lead them to

believe might be waiting for them. They become very disillusioned and most times

a lot of them return back in worse financial situations than when they left, I

say to members opposite.

One time growing up here in this Province, it was almost part

of our upbringing that we had to leave, we all had to go to Toronto. I suppose

there is nobody in this House that did not spend some time in Toronto - I doubt

if there is. I spent eight years there myself. I went to Toronto back in - let

me see, I went to Labrador first and then I left Labrador and went to Toronto -

back in 1966, but I went there because I wanted to go, I did not have to go. I

quit a job to go. There were some jobs around in those days. You could almost

pick up your suitcase, get into your car and go and find a job. You could almost

do that right here in this Province, but not anymore. The people who are leaving

this Province today, for the most part, are not coming back. They are leaving

because they have no other choice. Families are leaving, they are taking their

loved ones with them and they are going and they are making new lives in other

provinces of this country.

Mr. Chairman, there is one place that it really hits home - I

have said this here before and I am going to repeat it - one place it really

hits home, and that is when you go to weddings and you hear the messages being

sent back to the bride and groom. There is a time in every wedding ceremony when

they read out the messages, the messages of congratulations, and members

opposite nod their head because they know exactly what I am talking about. One

time when those messages were read you would hear the message coming from

Buchans, Labrador City, Grand Falls - Windsor, St. John's, Baie Verte, the work

centres of Newfoundland. This is where you would hear the messages from. You go

now - and every member sitting in this House today will remember it when they

hear it, the first thing that will come back to them is: I remember hearing the

Member for Bonavista South say that and he is right. Listen now when you go to a

wedding. The messages come back now from Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Australia.

This is where people have to go to find a job. And it really strikes home to

you. Those are young people, it is not their grandmothers and grandfathers who

always lived there, who are sending them the messages, it is people their own

age sending them a message from where they have had to go to find work. They

cannot afford to come home and visit them. That is what is happening.

When I see that $10 million, I have to question the minister.

How many of those people have been allowed to stay here in this Province today

by the expense of that $10 million? How many jobs are being created? I am not

saying the answers are easy and I am not saying that members over there do not

care about it or have no feelings, none of that. It is a problem that we are

experiencing and I think we are experiencing it here in this Province moreso

than any other province in Canada today. Something has to be done about it. We

do not have the magic fixes, we do not have the magical solutions, but there is

still a lot of money being spent. There is still a lot of money being wasted

that I think could do a lot to help improve the conditions in rural Newfoundland

and Labrador. A lot of money is being wasted. And people are not asked anymore,

that is the sad part about it. People are not asked anymore, and I suppose, a

prime example of that is that big concrete medium that always comes to my mind,

going through Grand Falls. Whoever decided to put that there should hang his

head in shame. He should hang his head in shame. Nobody in Grand Falls -

Windsor, or very few people, wanted it there, very few people. Even the member -

I think the member, if she spoke, would probably not say much different from

what I am going to say.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: Maybe it was, but it was shameful. You

watch and see what is going to happen. I do not know if the member has any

statistics of how it has affected business but I know that the businesses were

quite concerned in that particular area. I mean, it is almost like you are

driving through Mississauga, Ontario, somewhere, this great big concrete medium

where we divide one side of businesses from the other side, and the amount of

traffic certainly does not warrant it. How many people heard people complaining

in this Province because they had to stop at a light in Grand Falls on their way

to Corner Brook? I have not heard one. I do not know what the project cost but

it was certainly a very expensive project.

MR. RAMSAY: Thirteen million.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thirteen million dollars - that is

ridiculous! Can you imagine what you could have done with $1 million of that $13

million, I say to the Member for Burgeo and LaPoile? Can you imagine what you

could have done for the people over there if you had $1 million of that $13

million that was wasted in Grand Falls? Now, a few people got a job there for a

couple of months and that is the smallness and the pettiness of the whole thing,

Mr. Chairman. The few jobs that were put there is small in comparison to the

dollars that it cost. There was nothing long-term and it was certainly a waste

of money.

The Outer Ring Road right here in this city, $100 million is

being spent on an Outer Ring Road here to move people from the Trans-Canada

Highway over to the eastern side of the city, $100 million. Now, I can imagine

what I could do in my district and every member here, if they had $1 million of

that $100 million - and we each could have had $2 million of it. Just imagine

what we could have done. The Member for Bellevue, the road going down through

Sunnyside, can you imagine how happy they would have been if they could have

spent some of that money to do something with that road going down through their

town? The road through Lethbridge in my district and the list goes on because we

have lots of communities and lots of towns out there that could have spent that

money.

AN HON. MEMBER: We could not take the money anyway

because Peckford signed a deal for the Outer Ring Road.

MR. FITZGERALD: I do not care who signed a deal, it was

wrong. We have to stop placing blame on those individuals and look at what we

are doing ourselves and what we have control of, Mr. Speaker. It is ridiculous!

Now the double-lane highway going out to Whitbourne, I have

no problem with that. It is a good highway, Mr. Chairman, and hopefully it will

be continued. But here again, there had to be an uprising of people. Communities

had to speak out, businesses had to speak out to stop them from putting a

divided highway there and killing another four or five businesses and laying off

hundreds of people right there in the Whitbourne area. It should not happen.

This particular highway -

AN HON. MEMBER: It is not going to happen.

MR. FITZGERALD: I hope it does not, I say to the member,

and use whatever influence you can in order to convince them not to let it

happen.

AN HON. MEMBER: It has been delayed for eight years.

MR. FITZGERALD: Well, I am glad that it has. Somebody

said to me the other day: I have not seen any activity on the double-lane

highway this year. Normally, over the past number of years, we have seen a few

kilometres, ten, twelve. I said: No and I hope you never see anything else there

if they are going to put the divided highway past Whitbourne and do something to

destroy those businesses and cause lay-offs of the people who are working there.

But something has to be done, Mr. Chairman.

AN HON. MEMBER: Well, I have to get the policy

(inaudible) changed.

MR. FITZGERALD: Well somebody's policy has to be changed

and it is not only his policy that this government is continuing to carry on

with, I say to the member. But there is nothing wrong with the divided highway.

It is a wonderful highway. It needed to be done. It needs to continue if we can.

What we have to do is pay more attention to what is happening in the rural areas

today - that is what we have to do.

I go back to the Outer Ring Road here. You can blame that on

a cousin of ours up in Ottawa, if you want to, and sobeit. It was still a wrong

decision. I get up in the morning and come to work, I am usually here about 7:45

a.m. I usually get in somewhere between 7:30 a.m. and 7:45 a.m. That is usually

the time I get in here. I do not have any problem with traffic. I get into my

car and if there are no red lights I would not even have to stop. And if you

stop at a light, for the most part there is not a lot of traffic moving. Ten or

twelve minutes after that you are probably into some traffic, then there is

another break, and then, just before 9:00 a.m., you are into more heavy traffic.

Boys, instead of spending our $100 million to put this giant

roadway through the City, why can we not get up a few minutes earlier in the

morning? The Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture is an early riser. His car

used to be usually here on the lot when I come in. Ask him. The Leader of the

Official Opposition, I can tell you, is not one of the last people in this

building in the mornings and he is certainly not one of the first to leave here.

AN HON. MEMBER: He leaves his car here all night.

MR. FITZGERALD: No, he does not leave his car all night.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes he does. I was in here 12:00 last

night and (inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: Many times he drives from down in his

home town, down in Ferryland and he does not have any problem. I do not think

you have any problem with traffic congestion coming in here in the morning.

MR. SULLIVAN: I can get 80 per cent of the distance in

half the time. From the Goulds to here it is a massive problem. From the Goulds

out it takes forty-five minutes

MR. FITZGERALD: What time?

MR. SULLIVAN: Any time after 7:45 in the morning. I have

to leave home at 6:30 a.m.

MR. FITZGERALD: Yes, because you are coming - here again,

it is from 7:45 a.m. to about 8:15 a.m. There is a time there when people are

trying to get there at 8:00 a.m. If you adjust it could be ten or fifteen

minutes one way or the other. You would not have a big problem. It certainly

does not warrant spending $100 million. When I see the $10 million being spent,

Mr. Chairman, those are some of the things that I have to ask when I wonder

where it is being spent.

Then we see $32,800,000 being spent on Education. I think the

Minister of Finance and Treasury Board talked about implementing new programs

and talked about - I suppose what did not happen with education reform was where

some of this money is probably being spent. Because you had to rehire new

teachers or other teachers, you had to give them a recall, you had to open

schools and this sort of thing.

Here again, it is money that the Minister of Education -

because of the way they carried out their referendum, and because of the way

they phrased the question on the referendum, we are costing the taxpayers of

this Province another $32,800,000. I can guarantee you that if I had $200,000 of

that to spend on the school in Lethbridge or the high school in Musgravetown,

where the Member for Terra Nova knows full well what I am talking about, that it

would make some vast improvements in the structures of those two particular

buildings. The school in Lethbridge is disgraceful. You talk to the school board

there in Clarenville and they will tell you it is probably one of the worst

schools in Newfoundland and Labrador.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) mentioned that before?

MR. FITZGERALD: I have mentioned it before. I have

mentioned it even before the community and the school was in my district,

because I know the school very well, Mr. Speaker. The school was built back in

the early 1960s. There has not been a lot done to it. There is a few portables

added, and the portables were - I do not know if they were ever upgraded. Like I

said the other day, it was a situation where the workers had to crawl up

underneath the school in order to alleviate a problem, and nobody would even go

up underneath the portable classrooms for fear that they would tumble down on

them.

That is where we are educating our children. Then we go out

and we say our children cannot compete with other children. We go out and we

talk about underachievement. I do not know how children can achieve and compete

and go out into the workforce and compete with other people in other places,

other students in post-secondary education, and what have you, when we do not

provide the proper places to give them an education.

Mr. Chairman, some of this $32 million is being spent on a

school in Lethbridge, and other schools around this Province, in order to

improve the conditions in which those students find themselves every day. There

is nothing wrong with spending that money, and I would encourage the minister to

be strong and vibrant and give as much money as he can in order to improve the

schools around this Province.

Mr. Chairman, we look at Health, $3,500,000. I have to ask

the Minister of Health: How much of this money is being spent on going out and

recruiting doctors for rural Newfoundland and Labrador? There was a solution

brought forward - I believe it was a solution - I think the minister brought

forward a viable solution in which he talked about allowing some foreign

doctors, some doctors from other countries, to come here and practice without

fully implementing the requirements for the LMCCs which are required now in

order to practice here in the Province of Newfoundland. She is going to relax

some of the criteria. There is nothing wrong with that, I say to the minister.

In fact, I have a hospital in my district, in Bonavista, a ten-bed acute -

MR. EFFORD: You do not have a hospital. The hospital is

in the district, you do not own it.

MR. FITZGERALD: No, I do not own it, I say to the

minister.

MR. EFFORD: Then why did you say: I have a hospital in my

district?

MR. FITZGERALD: I do not own my district either, but it

is something that I cherish. That is why I assume ownership. I assume ownership

for everything that I think is good and that is needed.

Mr. Chairman, I have a hospital in my district with ten beds

and no doctor - no doctor, I say to the members opposite.

I understand the Member for Baie Verte wants to say a few

words to this particular bill before he leaves, so I will sit down to rise

again, I say to members opposite.

CHAIR: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, I would like to say we have a

hospital. We have a Regional Health Centre in Bay Verte that is serving the

people of my district, I say to the minister.

Mr. Chairman, I am glad to rise today to have a few minutes

on this particular bill. When we talk about money in this Province, I guess

everybody is interested in where it is being spent, if it is being spent in the

proper places.

I guess my colleague, the Member for Bonavista South, hit the

nail on the head. What most of the people around this Province are saying is,

yes, we are spending money. People say we do not have enough money. Government

uses that line continuously - we do not have the money - but then you look at

the priorities and that is when people start to wonder what the Administration

is doing.

The best example my colleague used today was the Ring Road,

and what is happening here when it comes to transportation initiatives in this

Province. It is so funny, because there is no way that you will explain to

somebody in a rural district especially - I have talked to people in Grand Falls

- and I have used this example before, they are putting double-lane highways

through Grand Falls, but here is the hypocrisy of the whole situation. People in

Grand Falls and Windsor were actually calling me to say they did not want it.

Grand Falls - Windsor is not a metropolitan St. John's or Toronto or anywhere.

It is small-town Newfoundland really, some 15,000 people in the area. We have

businesses along that highway that did not want the pavement. So here is the

hypocrisy and the irony, I guess, of the whole situation. Two hours away, in my

district, we have 112 kilometres of unpaved road. In 1997, when we are sending

people to the moon, we have that much unpaved road in one small area, and just

two hours up the road in Grand Falls - I have people from Grand Falls - Windsor

calling me, saying, we do not want the double-lane highway and pavement. It is

going to ruin my business. We do not have any massive traffic flows going

through Grand Falls. We have not had any traffic jams on the highway coming

through Grand Falls - Windsor.

That is what people were saying to me, and business people in

that area - I would name some of the businesses if I had talked to them to get

their permission earlier today, but I did not - called me to say, `We do not

want it.' Then, an hour on the other side of us, on the Baie Verte Peninsula, we

have Pasadena; getting ready for a major two-lane highway going through

Pasadena. I do not know the population of Pasadena, maybe I can be corrected

from the member for Humber East, but I know it is a small town, 4,000, 5,000,

6,000 people. They did not want the pavement.

Then, Mr. Chairman, if you want to go a bit further, go to

Corner Brook. You survey Corner Brook and ask the people of Corner Brook how

many people wanted that confusing highway that goes by Corner Brook now. I drive

by Corner Brook hundreds of time, I live in Baie Verte, but Corner Brook is like

a second home to me, I have been there hundreds, maybe even thousands of times.

I never had a big problem driving into Corner Brook with massive traffic jams

going through Corner Brook, but still Mr. Chairman -, no, you have to have a

double lane highway, you are a big metro area and then I suppose the hypocrisy

of all the ultimate examples that people in this Province use is $116 million

for a ring road in St. John's.

Mr. Chairman, while the House is in session I am in St.

John's, otherwise I live in my district. That ring road to me, what I figured

out was that, if I leave in the rush hour time as the member for Bonavista South

said, the practical logical reason to this is that from now on I can leave

during rush hour and I can be into the Confederation Building fifteen minutes

early, maybe twenty minutes earlier.

Whoop-de-doo, Mr. Chairman, $116 million, you know what the

rural members in this House of Assembly could do with $116 million. Here is what

they can do, Mr. Chairman, they could answer the biggest problem facing

Newfoundlanders and Labradorians today, that is rural Newfoundland communities

are saying, we want the dignity and the satisfaction of having the necessities.

The necessities being a paved road and water and sewer.

How can someone on Macks Island, where the Minister of

Justice has a home out there and I was out there the summer and we talked to a

man there, while the minister was there, a man that said: I counted last winter,

327 white buckets of water I had to carry during the winter months because my

line freezes up and we cannot get a new line into my home. That is what it is

Mr. Chairman, on Little Bay Islands, a small

section of Little Bay Islands that

community, a small part of it called Macks Island and that man looked at me this

summer and that is what he said: it just makes me sick, he said to see $116

million there and something else under renovations in the Confederation Building

or the offices of the MHAs, while he said, I am carrying around white buckets of

water.

Now, Mr. Chairman, that is the fundamental question that has

to be answered in Newfoundland and Labrador today. Where are the priorities of

government and where are they spending those monies because we have to go back,

and if you want solutions you have to be criticized, the solution I have said

and I have even spoken to the Premier himself on it and to other minsters, the

solution to Newfoundland and Labrador is let rural Newfoundland and Labrador

know that you are committed to where they live. Let them know that you are

committed to where they live. That people are saying to you out there what we

saw on television last night and the night before, was people living in small

communities of this Province that were happy, that were content.

They did not want a boom, they did not want a mall, they did

not want four lane highways, they just wanted to own their own homes, they

wanted their children to at least grow up with them. If they left when they

finished school that was fine. People of rural Newfoundland have said to me, I

do not mind if my child has to leave when he is eighteen or nineteen and go to

university and so on. They do not even want that anymore, they know that that is

not realistic anymore. What they are saying to me and I know they say it to all

rural members here, all we want is to live in our communities, our homes where

we grew up, the home that I own, the community that has very little crime, the

community that has people coming together, it might be 100 people, it might be

200 people in that community, but the parents are saying, all I want is for a

decent drop of water, I want a decent road even, if it is gravel, to be graded

properly and I want my children to be able to go through school, through high

school. That is all they are asking.

The truth is, people say that there is a very complicated

answer to Newfoundland's problem and it is not, it is a simple solution. The

simple solution is to show to rural Newfoundlanders that it is okay to live in

Petites, Ming's Bight, Flowers Cove, it is okay to live there. All they are

asking for is, listen what they are asking for, water and sewer or at least

water, they are not even saying sewer anymore. They are saying that they will

put in their own septic tank, I have to back track there, Mr. Chairman, it is

not even water and sewer, it is a water line. In Macks Island they are saying

give me a water line so we can have running water throughout the winter. Give me

$5,000. I went to the municipal affairs minister the other day and said, all

they is need a bit of insulation so their water line will not freeze. They do

not want a double lane, they do not want a mall, they want their water line

insulated so that they can have a bit of running water during the winter months.

In Macks Island on Little Bay Islands, the Minister of

Justice was there with me this summer.

MR. TULK: Who?

MR. SHELLEY: The Minister of Justice was there with me

this summer, he has a place in Little Bay Island, a beautiful, beautiful little

community and the minister has been there, in Little Bay Islands, a beautiful

place but my point is, not to be critical but I am just saying what rural

Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are saying in those smaller places: Just give

us a bit of decency, a bit of dignity and have an insulated water line with

running water and you have to send a grader because you cannot afford to pave

it, that is enough for us and so our kids can go up to school, up the road

instead of being shipped away like they are in Harbour Deep in Grade IX. Can you

imagine your child here today, any members who have children in school in Grade

IX saying: goodbye we will see you - you are not talking about an

eighteen-nineteen-years-old, you are talking about a kid, thirteen, fourteen

years old, saying goodbye I will see you at Christmas, going away to go to

school.

Mr. Chairman, that is why they are upset and I will go back

to the same solution as before and as a matter of fact, in the Statement that

the minister started today - and I will say it again because we went a little

off track during the Statement - but the truth is, that is the right approach.

MR. TULK: What?

MR. SHELLEY: The rural small businesses in small

communities. That is the right approach and I also agree on this and I will be

very sincere with the minister on this - that the concept is what I have always

believed in, that the solution for Newfoundland and Labrador is within the

people of the Province. It is not outside; it is not Voisey's Bay and Hibernia.

My God, we all jump up and down and go out when the big guns come into town for

the Hibernia announcement or oil is flowing and now there is Voisey's Bay. Yes,

I am going to be there too with everybody else lined up, waving our arms in the

air, Voisey's Bay is flowing. You know what I am more excited about?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: That is right. What I really believe and

what my heart and soul are into, I am just as excited to go out in Ming's Bight

tomorrow and a fellow say to me: Boy I had my ACOA grant, I have a little

business started and I am going to hire two people next week. I am just as

excited about that, Mr. Chairman, because I am telling you that it was the

previous administration and administrations before that - they had election upon

election on Hibernia, then it was Voisey's Bay, God knows what is next but for

God's sake, when are we going to wake up and say: Small ideas for a small

Province involving a lot of people is where the solution is, not in the big,

mega projects any more, Mr. Chairman.

So I say talking about rural Newfoundland that it is as

simple as this: I love rural Newfoundland, I live there, I have grown up there,

I am still living there and it is what makes me tick as a Newfoundlander because

that is where I have seen people - and I love going down to Fleur de Lys,

Coachman's Cove and standing around talking to these people who live there and

get their stories from them and for a while, Mr. Chairman, as a young person

growing up, I could not understand that.

When I left my home town when I was seventeen years old to go

to work in Labrador City, I could not understand that, I said: I have to get out

of that little place, I do not understand why people are living here and I went

to Labrador City; I went out West, I came to St. John's -

MR. TULK: When did you leave?

MR. SHELLEY: I left when I was seventeen years old. When

I was seventeen, Mr. Chairman - I will say to the minister why I left. I looked

around and I saw - although at that time in Baie Verte it was good, mines were

opening, there was hiring and firing going on but the job prospects still were

not good and I just thought there was something better -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Well for one thing, there was not a job for

me.

MR. TULK: There wasn't?

MR. SHELLEY: No, there was not a job for me but secondly,

Mr. Chairman, like -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Well I do not want to get in too much with

the minister but -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: No, no, I will tell the minister, I will

tell you outside the House but it is more of a personal thing I guess, coming

from a huge family, which I did. I come from a very big family and times were

tough and if you wanted to make it you had to get out on your own. So when I was

seventeen I got a one-way ticket to Labrador City and I went to work in

construction. That is what I did, then I finally ended up back in St. John's

going to university and that is just my story but that is one I suppose of

thousands of stories in Newfoundland like they say in the naked city.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Yes, sure. We were all told that.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: The difference today, and I say to the

minister, the difference now when I was fairly young - but at that time, I

stayed within the Province, I went to Labrador City to get a job. I could have

gone to Corner Brook that year and had a job but that was a different era and we

are in another era now, is what we are talking about and the whole theme that

the minister missed while he was outside the House -

MR. H. HODDER: Out-migration occurs primarily when the

Liberals are in power like Sir Richard Squires in the 1920s and -

MR. SHELLEY: Well anyway, we are not going to get into

that now. What we are going to stick on now is the same debate, Mr. Chairman,

and I will leave this part of the debate and go on to one more subject for the

day, that I believe the rural Newfoundland factor and how rural Newfoundlanders

and Labradorians feel, that they have to be included in the process and that

program is a small step I say to the minister in the right direction because

what it does is, it involves solutions within Newfoundlanders to do something

for themselves out there. That is what it does. That is the essence of that

program, which is good. I applaud it.

Let's quadruple it, let's ten times it. That is a program

that the minister and his department really should look at. Give Newfoundlanders

small amounts to go and prove what they have done. Like I said yesterday in the

House, Mr. Chairman, in Ireland, where they actually of course contract for

buildings and give them every opportunity possible, if they have some decent

chance at succeeding in a business. Because a lot of us know, through business

people and so on, that the smallest of ideas and so on are the ones that work.

Don't ever forget that Alexander Graham Bell invented the light-bulb while he

was in the dark. That is what it was all about, when thinking one time in the

dark. That is the whole idea.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Thomas Edison, yes. He did it in the dark,

that's right. The Member for Grand Falls - Buchans. He did it with no noise, I

guess.

Mr. Chairman, the point is, let's give Newfoundlanders and

Labradorians the tools and get out of their way, and take away the red tape. So

that when a guy or lady comes into my office or into any of us as members and

they have a decent idea, and they are enthusiastic, let's not dampen that

enthusiasm by sending them to ten more offices before they finally get an

answer: Yes boy, go ahead, start up your little business. That is the key to

development in this Province.

There is one other subject I want to touch on today, and this

is also a sensitive one to me. I brought it up yesterday with the Minister of

Education in the House. I want to say to members in the House on the floor of

this House of Assembly today, as a representative of my area, but not only for

my area, for any part of the Province, education in the Province, and in

particular the students and how they feel now about extra-curricular activities,

and how they have always felt. It is dear to me. I'm going to give you the basis

why it is dear to me.

Because as a student - and I said this while Premier Wells

was in the House - I was not too excited about - and this is no shock to anybody

- about science and math and geography and everything else. My excitement in

school was knowing that you could go on a trip with the basketball team, or that

the drama club was going somewhere, or that... whatever, a science fair was

going on. Anybody else that thinks that your student or your child - I have

three children now - is running off to school at 9:00 in the morning because he

is excited about his math class is living in a dream world. The essence and the

heart and soul of an education is a well-rounded education, and that involves

children involved in extra-curricular activities. Be it basketball, hockey,

science fairs, drama clubs, a youth conference like there was the other day in

Corner Brook.

If any of us believe anything else - I don't think we do. I

think we all realize that students are what it is all about. I said that to the

Premier here in the House. Some people thought I was a bit radical to say it,

but I don't think it is. I believe that if I didn't have extra-curricular

activities in school, myself, personally, that I would not have finished high

school. I would have been a drop-out, I would not be here today. That is my true

honest guess, and my own personal views on education.

I love the sports. I went there, and my coaches who, by the

way, were teachers and people outside the teaching profession, were some of the

main people who moulded, for whatever reason, you can say good or bad, while I

was in school. I bet if I asked any Member of the House of Assembly here today,

remember a team you were on or a drama you were in, and even the Pages here

today, your extra-curricular activities in school. You can talk about a teacher

or a coach or somebody who helped you through the system. My coach, as a matter

of fact -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) school (inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, I don't want to quote what the

Member for Bellevue just said, because I tell you what, he would get an awful

backlash from people in this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Quote him!

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, the Member for Bellevue just

said that there is too much of that in school and the students are not

concentrating on their work. Maybe the member is too old. Because if you go back

in school and remember it - I'm not saying everything, but even extra-curricular

is anything at lunch time. Intramurals. You didn't like intramurals at lunch

time? You didn't like the fact that it was a club organized in school?

AN HON. MEMBER: We did all that (inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Those things, Mr. Chairman, keep you

interested in school. If you don't believe in that then you are too old, you are

after forgetting, boy. I say to the member, I don't forget. I was excited coming

to school and when the coach would say: Make sure you are in school now on

Friday because we have a trip coming up, and you have to have your marks up.

Your marks have to be up. It was a good thing to use.

I speak for not just the students of Elwood today, who I

spoke to last night, by the way. I spoke to a young lady by the name of Vanessa

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: I spoke to a lady last night by the name of

Vanessa Percell, who is the vice-president of Elwood Collegiate. By the way, I

know Elwood very well. I played a lot of basketball there in my days.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Pardon? She goes to Elwood. I spent a lot of

time in Elwood over the years playing basketball and coaching teams and so on. I

know it very well. Last night I spoke to her and her parents.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, now the Member for Bellevue is

saying - he is going to get in more trouble here today, because he is making - I

can't believe - usually he is very smart on things, but today... He said: Now

you play volleyball and you can't spell. I coached volleyball teams, and my

volleyball and basketball players were the best spellers and the best

mathematicians and so on. Because at grade VI and VII when I was coaching them I

said: Now yes, guys, you can play basketball and volleyball, but your marks have

to stay up, you have to show leadership in the school. You talk about spelling

and mathematics. You know what the sports do? It develops the real character.

You ask the students who are out there. It shows how much leadership qualities

they have. It shows that you can share with people. It shows that you can get

involved as a team in a team effort.

I'm really disappointed in the Member for Bellevue today,

thinking that spelling is more important to them. Leadership qualities, getting

out in life and dealing with people, and showing qualities like that, are much

more important. I would put it ahead of spelling any day of the week. As a

matter of fact, if you want to get on to spelling, you want to see some of the

spelling of the Members in this House of Assembly when you see things come

across your desk. That is where you would be surprised. If the Member for

Bellevue thinks spelling is more important. The most important thing is that

there is a well-rounded student and that he or she enjoys his or her education.

That is what they are there for, to enjoy it. The best way to help them enjoy it

is to make sure there are extra-curricular activities available.

Ms Vanessa Percell, I talked to her last night, three times

as a matter of fact, sent me a letter that the Premier last weekend in Herdman

Collegiate at a youth conference stood in front of hundreds of students and said

first thing: I have two (inaudible). One, more funding for these youth

leadership conferences. I say, Premier, good for you, good job, wonderful job.

Secondly, I quote from Vanessa Percell in her letter from Elwood High as she

stood there with all these kids. She said - and the Premier also got up and

said: You are the leaders, you are our future leaders. You have more energy than

Lower Churchill. That is what he said, and he said it again last night, and he

is right. He said: You have more energy than the Lower Churchill. He said: You

know what? We are going to make sure that you have extra-curricular this year,

because we are going to make sure you have the extra substituting days. That is

what the Premier said last week in a youth leadership meeting. Go talk to those

500 students who were screaming last night on t.v. cheering the Premier, because

that is what he said to them.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: That is good, I say to the minister. All I

say, Mr. Chairman, today, and my message is two things. First of all, remember,

don't ever lose the thought that the students who are in our schools today love

their extra-curricular and it is what makes them a full person. It develops them

in sports and drama, in music and so on. They have to have that or otherwise -

I'm sending out a warning today - you are going to see an increased drop-out in

the schools in our Province if that ever happens, if the extra-curricular is

ever taken out of school. That is my prediction.

I want to end off by saying this. The teaching profession

again. I salute the teaching profession, especially those who take the time to

coach after school, to go away on the weekends and so on. The Member for

Twillingate & Fogo did it, and the Minister of Development and Rural Renewal did

it. I did it. I don't know if I had a free weekend in my years that I didn't go

somewhere with a group of people or - and wore out the cars, and you had your

car full, kids going everywhere. I did that, the minister did it.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) way to Corner Brook.

MR. SHELLEY: Is that right? I broke down with a few

students a few times too, Mr. Chairman, and I would do it again. Do you know

what? There is nothing more. You don't get extra pay. You don't get anything

extra. I asked my wife who still coaches now - as a matter of fact, this year I

volunteered to, when I can, coach again with the high school team. I said I will

do what I can, but there is -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) rewarded for that. They voted

for you because of that (inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: That is right. Believe it or not, a lot of

that continues over. Mr. Chairman, the only thing we have - and the people who

did it will understand what I'm about to say -, the biggest reward - there is no

money involved. As a matter of fact you lose. You lose on your car, you lose on

gas, you lose on everything. The biggest reward is to look at those kids when

you have them in a dressing room somewhere when they are heading into a

championship game, and they are looking at you, and when the game is over, win

or lose - I've had winning situations, I've had losing - and they look at you

and say; Sir, thanks a lot, I will never forget it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, I will tell you now

(inaudible) - yes, we won lots, and we lost lots. I've had kids cry. Four years

ago, my last year before I entered politics, I took a bunch of kids from St.

Pius X school in Baie Verte, which is my old school, and I started to coach

them. These kids, for their own reasons, half of them at least were of social

assistance recipients and so on. Hard times, like a lot of people around. Never

travelled. Half of them weren't to Corner Brook, as far as Corner Brook, up to

that point.

I arranged a trip that year because I had a friend of mine

living in Oshawa, another teacher of mine. We fund-raised, and we took those

kids to Toronto and Oshawa. As long as I live, the days of my teaching, I will

never forget that experience of watching those kids get on a plane that they

never thought they would get on and land in Toronto and see all that. We went to

the SkyDome, we did all that. That teaching moment will never be forgotten by

those children. They still talk about it today. They are nineteen, twenty,

twenty-one years old now. I see them now, and they keep saying: Sir, I will

always remember the trip we did to Toronto. Went to a hockey game, we did it

all.

In essence, we have to salute especially the teachers who

take the time for extra-curricular activities. We have to remember that students

have to have that extra-curricular activity to make them a well-rounded,

first-class citizen of this Province. So that they will take that, and as they

go into whatever profession they will take those leadership skills and those

social skills and bring them over into whatever profession they go on to.

I salute those students. I don't like to see them out of

school. I suggest they go back to school, as a matter of fact. I don't want to

see them out of school, but you have to get your point across. The students of

Elwood have done it very well. The other children have done it in their own

different ways, the other different students, and I applaud them for what they

are talking about. Because I still remember what it was like to teach and to be

a student in that particular situation. I salute the Elwood students. You got

your point across well.

Good luck to them all, to all the students in this Province,

and I hope we don't have to face this crisis. I hope it is handled by the

Minister of Education and the government so that the students don't even have to

think about it, so they can go back to their studies and enjoy school like they

should, because they are the best days of their lives.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: Mr. Chairman, let me first of all congratulate

the member.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: Pardon me?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: Were you up?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: Let me first of all congratulate the member on

what is probably one of the better speeches, one of the better debates, that I

have heard in this Legislature in a long, long time. If I were being political

this morning, I would say

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: No, no, I know you weren't.

I said, if I were being political this morning I would

recommend him for a certain job in the Province, but I am not being political. I

think we have to be a bit serious about the issue about which he is talking.

Let me say to him that one of the things that I have always

believed myself, as a person who was part of the establishment of the rural

development movement in the Province, as a high school teacher and a high school

principal, and a principal of the system - we used to call them `co-ordinating

principals' when I was around; it is a long time ago - is that one of the

problems that we have always had in rural Newfoundland is the delivery of

services, getting people past, as he says, the red tape. It has always been a

problem. It is there now. You have so many organizations at government level

that are funding organization, that try to fund good ideas, but it is a problem

that is there.

I think the micro-lending program that we announced this

morning - that we announced in October, actually, the $1 million that we put

into it is money that will be well spent. I want to say to him that one of the

other programs that we also done in the last week-and-a-half is a program with

the Newfoundland and Labrador Organization for Women Entrepreneurs, in which we

have put, between the federal and provincial governments, I think it was $1

million that we put into that as well, to enable women entrepreneurs to get

involved in the micro-lending program and indeed to partner across the Province.

I don't think there is anybody in this Legislature who would

disagree that there is a large out-migration of people from this Province, that

there is a large out-migration of our younger people, that there is a large

out-migration of our better educated young people.

The truth is, that has occurred in Newfoundland for some

time. It is not a new phenomenon. It is not something that has happened

recently. There has always been a large number of people leaving the outports to

move to some of our far larger urban centres, and to move to other parts of the

country, and indeed to other parts of North America. The problem today is the

numbers that are leaving.

Mr. Chairman, nobody can deny that has happened since 1992.

As a matter of fact, I believe you could say that July 2, 1992, was a turning

point in the history of Newfoundland. I am not saying this to criticize John

Crosbie. The truth of the matter is that we found out, we quickly realized -

whatever part he had to play in seeing that happen - we started to realize on

July 2, 1992, when the NCARP program was put in place, we realized suddenly that

our fish stocks were gone, or we started to realize it. I think some of us are

now coming to a more definite conclusion in our minds on that.

Of course, when the groundfish fishery in this Province

collapsed, the whole economic base and many of our smaller communities went up

the spout as well. As a matter of fact, we found that we had some 30,000 people,

approximately, who had to have income replacement. Mr. Chairman, that has

exasperated the problem in rural Newfoundland like you cannot believe. There has

been no economic base in rural Newfoundland since that date. I would say to you

that this phenomenon is a turning point in our history.

Now, Mr. Chairman, this government, I have to say to hon.

members opposite, we are working. We are trying to find new ways of getting

around that red tape. We are trying to find new ways of saying to people - and I

would recommend the program that we announced this morning to every member. I

tell you what, you should call up the department, get the brochures and

distribute them to your constituents, make them aware of it. I suggest to you

that if there is a need to put more money into funding that type of organization

with the Newfoundland and Labrador Cooperatives, I think we will work extremely

hard to find new money to put into that program, if it is all used and it

remains the success that it is.

Again I want, as I said, to congratulate the Member for Baie

Verte on a speech that I think was very well put together on rural Newfoundland.

I want to congratulate him on putting forward a problem that we all know exists.

Mr. Chairman, if he has some new ways of delivering financing very quickly - to

get around the red tape - to see that rural Newfoundland is revitalized, I want

to invite him to put them forward. We are open for suggestions. We have no other

desire - other than the Member for Baie Verte has - and that is to increase and

build a strong foundation of strong economic base in rural Newfoundland. We are

looking at every means of doing that.

For example, one of the constituents of my friend from

Windsor - Springdale, as a result of our meeting with them last week - and I

must say to the Member for Windsor - Springdale, we had a great meeting down in

his district with the Regional Economic Development Board. As a result of that

meeting, he came up with an idea which we have to take a look at. It had to do

with cutting back or lowering the income tax rate for some of our younger

entrepreneurs to get them to stay here, as an enticement for them to stay here.

I say to you that we are going to take a look at that. He has written me this

morning, I have the letter - I thought I had it here with me but it must be over

in my office. He has written me to say I want you to pursue this idea. I want

you to research it to see if it makes any sense because if it does than why not

put it forward? I am going to do that research because it is a new way of maybe

enticing our young people.

Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that if we can get through and

slow down that rate of out-migration out of this Province in the next two or

three years, if we can slow it down until we steer ourselves into that new

economic direction that we are trying to take, then I believe that within the

next two or three years we will turn the corner in this Province. I really

believe that, that in the next two or three years we will turn the corner and

our young people will be here.

Now let me also say that there are young people outside this

Province - I have two daughters myself, my son is not yet old enough - but I

have two daughters who live outside this Province. They both live in Ottawa. One

is a clinical pharmacist and the other one is a software engineer, electrical

engineer. Now they are living in Ottawa and are doing very well. I would like to

see them home. I would like to be able to go home this afternoon and sit down

and have a conversation with them but I can't. I will tell you something, I

would sooner for those two girls to be in Ottawa employed - and they are making

close to $100,000 a year, doing well. I would much sooner see those two girls in

Ottawa making a living than for me to be able to go home this evening and sit

down and talk to them because I will tell you they are enjoying life and that's

what's important.

I hope too though, Mr. Chairman, that if can create the right

climate in this Province, if we can build industries that have the level of

skills that require those types of people to come back home to Newfoundland and

Labrador, if we can build those types of industries that require those skills, I

would hope that many of those people - and it happens, it happens everyday - but

I would hope that we can build the type of industries whereby those people can

come back and contribute their experience to Newfoundland and Labrador, and to

rural Newfoundland and Labrador in particular. Now let's say, as I have just

indicated, that it happens.

We now have a person in Bishop's Falls, for example, building

those wide recreation vehicles. That person came, I believe, back from B.C. It

is going to be on Here & Now about people coming back and contributing to

this economy. It is the same thing with the glove factory in Point Leamington.

You can go around the Province and find numerous examples where people left this

Province, but when the opportunity was presented to them - and that has to be

part of our program - they decided: Boy, I am going home and will take my

experience, my learning, what I have done. I am going home to Newfoundland and

Labrador.

The truth of the matter is, there are very few people - I do

not know... it is hard to figure out what makes us tick - but there are very few

people who leave Newfoundland, who, if given the opportunity, they will not come

back. I tell you, they are very few. There is something in us that says once you

are born on this rock - and it is not a rock, I have to stop using that, too.

Once you are born in this Province you want to stay here. The strange thing is,

I say to the Member for Waterford Valley, that home for somebody who lives, let

us say, in Wisconsin is anywhere in the United States almost, but home for a

Newfoundlander is in Newfoundland and Labrador - that is where home is.

Mr. Chairman, I believe quite sincerely that if we can move

past this stage we are in, and somehow - and I think it is important that we

somehow entice as much as we can young Newfoundlanders and Labradorians to stay

here. But I think it is equally important that we try to create the types of

industries, using the types of technologies - and we are going through that

phase in our history where the skills of our young people are changing. They

have changed at a faster rate than have the types of skills that are required in

many of our businesses and many of our industries. They are changing their

skills at a faster rate than they are becoming available in our economy.

I think if we can get the kinds of technologies that are

connected, for example, with offshore oil, if we can build that base here, if we

can build the type of base that is needed in the service industry - for example,

I will just mention, my daughter is a clinical pharmacist in Ottawa. The truth

of the matter is, there is no occupation in Newfoundland called clinical

pharmacist, and it requires a few special skills that she picked up. She decided

to go that route. We have not reached that degree of, shall I say,

sophistication in the Province whereby she could practise that profession

anyway.

She could practise pharmacy, but being a clinical pharmacist,

I think that the job she does - I tell her she is a pill-pusher, but

nevertheless - I think the kind of job she does is what you want. I think you go

through the wards with a doctor in a hospital, he diagnoses what is wrong with

the patient, and you look at him with your specialized skills and you say: Here

is what you should prescribe for that person. I think that is basically the type

of job skill, and that is the reason I call her a pill-pusher. In any case, we

have not reached that kind of sophistication in many of our industries and many

of our businesses.

There are other people here who want to speak. Let me just

say to the Member for Baie Verte again that I think this is one of the better

speeches that has come from the Opposition. I think it is one of the better

speeches that we are going to hear during this session. I think he was sincere

in what he said. I think he was. Having said that, let me just say to him that

we invite any suggestions he might have. We can stand here and debate politics

and fight like the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens over the

Stanley Cup, that is part of politics, but in the final analysis, I believe that

all of us would want to contribute to the survival of rural Newfoundland and

Labrador as we know it.

I believe if we do we can build a quality of life in this

Province that we have never had. It is a tremendous task. I want to say that I

was in Trois-Rivires, Quebec this summer enjoying an agricultural conference

when I had a call from the Premier. He said: `You have to be home by tomorrow.'

I asked: `What for?' I figured I was gone, for some reason or another. He said:

`I want you to take on the Department of Development and Rural Renewal, and I

want you to take on this TAGS program because they are interconnected.'

He asked: `How do you feel about that?' I have to be frank

with you about what I said to him. I said: `I am frightened to death. I want to

take the challenge, always wanted to take the challenge, but I am frightened to

death.' He asked: `Why are you frightened?' I said: `Premier, I think this is

the single most undefined job that you could give anyone to do. Because we are

going through that change, that if you do not handle it right, we would have, I

believe, missed an opportunity. It is a tremendous challenge, as well. It is a

tremendous problem because of our geography, because of the way that we are

stretched out, and because of a movement - there is a general movement in North

America away from rural society to urban society. Our challenge is to try, I

believe, to arrest that, turn it around and build a better Newfoundland and

Labrador and a better tomorrow.

Thank you, very much.

CHAIRMAN (Penney): The hon. the Member for Cape St.

Francis.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I rise in my place today to say a few words on this bill,

once again. Before I get into the bill, though, the Government House Leader was

just up and he kind of took the wind out of my sails somewhat because I was

going to say a few words concerning the previous two speakers, but now I will

have to say a few words with respect to the previous three speakers. Obviously,

the speakers are the Member for Bonavista South, the Member for Baie Verte and

the Government House Leader who spoke from the heart this morning with respect

to what is happening in Newfoundland and Labrador, and rightly so.

Newfoundland and Labrador and the people living in

Newfoundland and Labrador today, are in hard times, and it does not only refer

to the financial hard times that the people find themselves in, it is for many

reasons that all seems to be coming together at this point in our history. I

have been watching the same shows, I suppose, that the members spoke about, this

past week or so on television, and my heart has gone out to a lot of the people

that have to leave this Province because they see no future here in Newfoundland

and Labrador; that is a sad state of affairs, Mr. Chairman.

The Government House Leader said that this happened in the

past, it seems to happen in the form of a cycle, I suppose, that we have people

leaving this Province at different times in our history, but the big problem

today, of course, is the fact that we have so many people leaving this Province.

The concern I have is not that it is just the brain drain that was referred to

in the show on CBC the other night - and, by the way, one of the people

highlighted in that show was from Logy Bay, a young guy, Dion Kavanagh, who

worked for the Town of Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove on summer jobs. I know

him well. It is sad to see young men like him having to leave this Province and

go away to obtain work. And the big problem here is, it is not likely that they

are going to return. They all talk about wanting to return, but that is not

likely to happen.

I have to say with all sincerity, that I sincerely hope what

the Government House Leader said a few minutes ago, will happen, in that, in the

next two to three years, we can turn things around in this Province and stem the

tide of the out-migration. I know, to be realistic about it, it is not going to

happen overnight, but we need to take action to stem the tide.

MR. EFFORD: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Mr. Chairman, the Minister of Fisheries and

Aquaculture is over there mouthing off again. It is too bad he cannot slither

back to his chair and say a few words. I say to the Minister of Fisheries and

Aquaculture, I will leave the Province immediately after him, probably. So, that

is the chance you have of seeing me leave this Province. I will do my best to

stick it out here, I can guarantee you that, even if the minister decides he

wants to leave Newfoundland and Labrador once he is kicked out of his job over

there as minister. Maybe we will do the Province a favour and we will get some

people in that chair there that can do the job that he is being paid to do. I

would say to the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture, if he is going to speak,

try to get his facts straight first before he opens his mouth.

Mr. Chairman, I am trying to be serious here on this issue

but, of course, the minister over there is sloughing it off as usual, not taking

the situation seriously.

With respect to that, the fishery in this Province. I do not

profess to be an expert in the fisheries field in this Province. I know I grew

up in Torbay where, when I went onto the - what we call - the big beach in

Torbay or over in Tappers Cove and wanted to get a fish, the fish were there for

me, I can guarantee you that, and big fish. But maybe what this government

should be looking at and the Federal Government of the day, maybe we should be

looking at an inshore fishery. The people of this Province survived for 500

years basically on the inshore fishery, Mr. Chairman, and maybe that is

something we should be looking at now.

The people in this Province, prior to the past number of

years, were pretty well self-sufficient and took care of themselves, especially

in rural Newfoundland. In the communities, Mr. Chairman, where one family

basically depended upon another, they shared services and shared what wealth

they had. The situation we have today, what we have to deal with, of course, is

to try to stem the tide of people leaving this Province, because it has a major

impact, not only on the families themselves and the turmoil that they feel, but

basically the fibre of Newfoundland is leaving.

MR. EFFORD: Have you any idea of the Newfoundland who

lived in Ontario in the 1970s? Some 100,000 Newfoundlanders were living in

Ontario in the 1970s. Do you have any idea?

MR. J. BYRNE: Mr. Chairman, the Minister of Fisheries is

over there sitting in a chair - he is not supposed to be speaking from someone

else's chair, for a start, but if he wants to get up after I speak let him get

up and say a few words on this issue, this very serious issue that the minister

seems to be -

MR. E. BYRNE: The difference is they were going and

coming back later.

MR. J. BYRNE: It is very insignificant, Mr. Chairman, his

attitude toward this. But as the Member for Kilbride just mentioned, the

difference today is that back in the 1970s the people left this Province to go

get a job for six months or a year and returned to Newfoundland. They were not

taking their families with a complete feeling of dismay that they would not be

returning.

MR. EFFORD: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: That is the problem today. If the minister

would be quiet there now and let me finish my few words on this topic.

I was agreeing with the Government House Leader, his

Government House Leader, by the way. I was agreeing with what he had said. I was

agreeing with what the previous speaker, the Member for Baie Verte had said and

the Government House Leader had agreed with him, that what we have to do is look

at this in varied situations to try to come up with ways to stem the tide of the

out-migration in this Province. It not only affects the families, Mr. Chairman,

it also affects the transfer payments. It affects the tax base that we have in

this Province, Mr. Chairman. It will affect the seniors in this Province in a

number of years. If we cannot stem the tide or get those people to return, there

will not be a tax base. It will affect the working population, how many people

we have here to do the job. That will hopefully occur if we turn things around

in this Province in the next two to three years, as the Government House Leader

hopes will happen, that we all hope will happen, that I am sure every member in

this House of Assembly hopes will happen, that we can stem the tide of

out-migration in this Province, that we can create some jobs here to keep people

here and create even more jobs to draw back the number of people who have left.

What I have been speaking about, Mr. Chairman, is the fact

that people are up there now wanting to come back and are hoping to come back.

This Administration, basically, have been giving out hope over the past few

years. The Premier said we will have a better tomorrow. People are still waiting

for it and hopefully we will have a better tomorrow. I am certainly going to

work towards that. I have no problem with working towards a better tomorrow, but

I will remind the Minister of Fisheries of what the previous Premier said, that

he will bring home every mother's son. He said that but he did not produce it,

did he? He did not produce that, I say to the Minister of Fisheries. It is all

well and good to get up here and talk -

MR. E. BYRNE: `John', he indicated about a rally in your

(inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Yes, Sir, he certainly indicated it. It is

all well and good to get up and talk and mouth off, as some of the ministers

have a tendency to do over there, Mr. Chairman, but let us see the actual

concrete product. Let us see what happens, Mr. Chairman.

MR. EFFORD: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Now, the Minister of Fisheries is again

trying to distract me with a foolish little booklet he has over there that he

keeps waving around. You would not know but it was the be all, end all of his

arguments - and it is, come to th