The Committee met at 7:00 p.m. in Room 5083.

CHAIR (Mr. R. Mercer): Order, please!

I would like to welcome everyone here this evening to this Committee on the Estimates of the Department of Environment and Labour.

Before we start, we will introduce the officials at this end starting with Mary.

MS M. HODDER: Mary Hodder, MHA for Burin- Placentia West.

MR. G. REID: Gerry Reid, MHA for Twillingate and Fogo.

MR. H. HODDER: Harvey Hodder, MHA for Waterford Valley.

MR. WHELAN: Don Whelan, MHA for Harbour Main - Whitbourne.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: John Ottenheimer, MHA for St. John's East.

CHAIR: I am Bob Mercer, Chairman, and MHA for Humber East.

The procedure we will follow this evening is, we will have the minister make some introductory remarks, he will introduce his colleagues at the end of the table, following which we will ask the Clerk to read the first Head, and it will be under the first Head that all the discussions and debate will occur.

Following the minister's introductory remarks, the Vice-Chair will lead off the questioning. We will then proceed with questioning from each of the members, as I have said in the past, until all the questions have been exhausted, or you and we together have been exhausted. So, with that little preamble, Mr. Minister, you are on.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thank you, Chair.

It is a pleasure to be here to provide an overview of our department and its operations.

To my right is Leslie Grattan, Deputy Minister of Environment and Labour; Gerry Crocker, our Manager of Operations. To my left is Mr. Gary Norris, Assistant Deputy Minister of Environment; Mr. Peter Whittle, my Executive Assistant and Mr. Joe O'Neill, Assistant Deputy Minister for Labour and Occupational Health and Safety.

Our department's budget is not very big, but it is what I would call an impact department. The last twelve months since the last election and the last Budget, you have seen a combined department of the Department of Environment and Labour Relations. Included in that department is the Occupational Health and Safety Division, which is funded by Workers' Compensation. We have the Workers' Compensation Commission and its administration under the department. We have, as well, the Human Rights Commission within the wings of the department in the sense of its reporting, so it is a department which is fairly diversified, and in the last twelve months we have worked to try to put the department together in a cohesive manner. We have made some changes and I believe that at this point in time, it is operating very effectively.

There are a number of initiatives that I would just like to highlight in our opening remarks that you may want to comment on or ask questions about. The Offshore Labour Relations situation has been evaluated by our department and we hired a consultant, a Mr. Morgan Cooper to complete an analysis of the offshore situation. That report is now in and a decision will be made in the next few weeks as to the direction we will take regarding the labour relation situation for the offshore as we head into an oil industry. That has been an intensive exercise that has included consultations with the oil industry and the labour movement, and we look forward to seeing the recommendations coming out of that report.

We are also, this year, doing a Workers' Compensation statutory review, which is an every five-year review. The report for that is due in this month and we have a committee of four people who have travelled the Province, Dave Alcock is the Chair, and we expect the report to give some recommendations to government caucus and the Cabinet, for improvements in the Workers' Compensation system. It has been an intensive review and we look forward to receiving that report, then hopefully, moving forward with some changes.

Occupational Health and Safety, is also an important part of the portfolio. It is the protection of workers, the promotion of education of safety in the workplace; it is really becoming more important now - it has always been in the past but, with the significant economic development that is forecast, and a lot of new, industrial sites opening up, this division is going to be challenged in the next couple of years to ensure that safety in the workplace is dealt with appropriately. So we are doing a lot of work in that division; we are looking at our resources there and what we may need in the future, and we are looking at some new initiatives there in Occupational Health and Safety, some different codes of practice in the workplace. We have been working with an advisory committee of Occupational Health and Safety which has been put in place over the past number of years. That is coming along quite well, but it is a fair bit of effort and it is going to require a lot of effort in the future.

The Environment branch presents a challenging time for us in the environment sector. Our new multi-material stewardship board which was announced this year, and the deposit-return system, is probably the most significant environmental initiative in a number of years for the Province. We have approximately thirty-five, thirty-six depots now?

WITNESS: Right now, yes.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thirty-six depots in operation. As of January 15 we started the system. Right now the numbers are looking very good as to the return rates. The six and three half-back system seems to be gaining acceptance, not without some problems, but we are overcoming those. It has a high level of public acceptance, we think, and we are going to be seeing probably some more depots in the next while as we fill in around the Province.

The geography is challenging for the program, but it is working fairly well, and we are getting a lot of response, in particular from students around the Province. They are really getting involved heavily, and that is very helpful in the development of the system. That initiative will also see - through the stewardship board, we are probably going to see in the next few months further initiatives in waste tire recycling, which is one of the areas we want to look at. We also want to look at some other packaging materials, the Tim Horton's type of stuff that is out there that is not really - we have not really dealt with it yet for recycling, so we are looking at that. The stewardship board will help lead the charge. It is similar to what has been set up in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

Also, in the energy area, there is a lot of public discussion about energy development, and that then includes our department because of the environmental assessment. We are looking at a reform of the Environmental Assessment Act this year to make it more effective. Also, the department's branch of Environmental Assessment is challenged because of all the energy proposals that are put forward, but it is safe to say that the department is meeting the challenge.

There is debate out there as to what types of hydro development or energy development should go ahead, but the Environmental Assessment Act is there to help with those deliberations. I believe it is working well. It is an excellent piece of legislation. We are going to make it more effective, but we have to deal with the environmental implications of any development, and energy is no different. The department basically ends up having an impact on the type of energy development because of the Act.

So it makes for lively debate, but it makes for necessary debate in the public, when it comes to energy development, and we have seen a fair bit of that in the past number of months.

With the Voisey's Bay development we are also into an environmental assessment, EIS, with the mine site and also the smelter site. We expect those will be intensive public reviews of those two developments, and at the end of it we will see a proper environmental plan for future development put forward. Also, in the mining sector we have seen a number of small mines getting started in the past couple of years. With that we have seen companies come forward with their environmental registration documents to provide their plan in dealing with the environment as they move ahead with business activity.

Also, we have seen a fairly big expenditure by the pulp and paper industry which we should highlight. The Abitibi-Price mill in Grand Falls - Windsor, and also Kruger in Corner Brook, have spent in total approximately $75 million to $80 million in the last three to four years in environmental protection, upgrading of their systems. It has certainly helped in Corner Brook, with the new system they have in place, and the same in Grand Falls - Windsor. Those companies have moved ahead, spent the money, and those areas are certainly benefiting from better environmental protection.

Our environment branch has very much a lot on its plate. It also is responsible for water resources in the Province, ensuring that the water resources are protected. That is again a challenge as you go forward with any development activity. I think I will leave it at that.

The Human Rights Commission is also under our department. It is operating at arm's length and doing very well. It is taking cases on, and we have a report in now from an advisory group with Human Rights. We are looking at that, and some recommendations for potential legislative change in the near future, so our policy branch is looking at that report.

The Workers' Compensation report is due in. Workers' compensation is an issue on which many people have some views. There have been some improvements over the past few years, but when the review comes forward in the next month we are looking there, I think, at hopefully some new improvements, some further and more effective response to the clients served by Workers' Compensation. That is one issue that I hope we can deal with better in the future.

At this point I will stop. That is the overview. If there are any questions about the estimates or any of those issues, we shall be happy to answer them.

CHAIR: Before I turn it over to the Vice-Chair to start off the questioning, the Clerk has asked me to remind the officials to sign the paper which is before the minister. I think we need that for purposes of record-keeping. I would ask as well that any of the officials who are speaking to the mikes state their name for purposes of the gentleman at the back here who is trying to keep a record of this evening's proceedings.

John?

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have a few questions. The first is an area that you spoke of briefly, Mr. Minister, in your overview, dealing with the new return procedures here in the Province. This may be more for one of your officials. I am interested in - and obviously, I guess, your response would have to be based on preliminary figures - perhaps a very brief analysis of basically what this program has, firstly, cost the Province, and secondly, the benefit accruing to the Province. Could you, perhaps in some preliminary fashion, give us some indication as to really where we are from a fiscal point of view several months after the commencement of this program?

MR. K. AYLWARD: The deposit return system? Okay.

The implementation of the system is not requiring government funding. The six-cent deposit goes on the wholesale price of a product. I ask my officials to jump in if I make a mistake as I explain this. Anyway, a six-cent deposit goes on wholesale and it is collected through the stewardship board in trust, I believe, Mr. Norris?

MR. NORRIS: That is right, yes.

MR K. AYLWARD: It is collected in trust and then dispersed to the depot operators as they collect the return bottles and other items.

There is no government funding required for the operation of the system. There is $300,000 that will be allocated annually for the operation of the stewardship board. It is $300,000 for the stewardship board and its operations, and that will come out of the deposits that are collected. So the government does not fund the system at all; it is funded by the industry and by the consumer.

We have thirty-six depots now, basically, around thirty-six, where previous to the system we had about eleven or twelve that were operating on an ad hoc basis, basically, with minimal revenue, and we were getting about 11 per cent to 12 per cent of the total beverage containers in the Province through our old system, which was basically very much ad hoc, volunteer.

With the present new system, so far, in the first four months, we have surpassed all of last year's total on the collection and we are very close to our target of 50 per cent - we are aiming for 50 per cent this first year - of beverage containers. I think there are 170-odd million annually in the Province, so we are aiming for upwards of 85 million to 90 million this year.

To us right now it is a success because we have viable depots which are around rural parts of the Province and in urban centres where they were not before. We have people working in the business. We have jobs created in a system that is seeing people in the recycling business either being employed, or entrepreneurs or business people taking on the new opportunity. We also have non-profit associations involved. We have some of the hospitals. Health care institutions are involved with some of the clientele who have been participating.

I think right now we are probably into over 100 people, 115 people, who are involved in the actual operations in the system. We expect that as the depots expand they will probably - we may reach upwards of fifty, fifty-odd depots or more. Again, it is one or two persons per depot as you go, so it will create more employment and the return rates will go up gradually as people get into the system.

The costs to government really are - there is no cost in the sense of budgetary. It is done through the collection. The stewardship board has its own separate budget. We will look at the return rates on an annual basis, and if we have to adjust the deposit return rate, we will look at that if we think it can help with the return rate. So that is the cost to benefits, Sir. We think they are flowing quite well.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: You mentioned, I believe, $300,000 for the stewardship board. I wonder could you just be a bit more specific as to - perhaps even a breakdown of those costs.

MR. K. AYLWARD: I will just give you an initial one. Maybe, Gary, you can give a little more detail. Right now the stewardship board has just started operating. I think they are going to have two or three staff, probably an executive director, two or three inspectors - maybe two inspectors, to ensure that the system is operating in parts of the Province. I do not know if the staffing has been decided. The board will decide that, the staffing, but the board will be decided.

The budget on an annual basis has to be approved by the Minister of Environment and Labour, but the operations of the stewardship board are outlined in the legislation which went through the House of Assembly, basically details their mandate. I think that is where we are right now. Gary, do you want to add to that?

MR. NORRIS: There is a board struck, as the minister indicated, the Multi-Materials Stewardship Board. It consists of three government representatives, three senior officials. I am included. There are people from industry: Mr. John Patten from Browning Harvey, Mr. John Gardner, President of TRA, and we also have three other members-at-large: somebody from Labrador, Donna Paddon; Georgina Hines from the Burin Peninsula, and Mr. Mike Vickers from the West Coast. These people come together and our Chair - I'm Acting Chair right now. In short order, hopefully within a week, we will have a permanent chair announced, which will require Cabinet approval.

This board gets together once a month - we have had about three meetings to date since the program was implemented - and really is going to provide direction in terms of how to run this system. We have a relationship with NewBRI, which is really a group that formed from the Canadian Soft Drink Association, and they are actually operating the system. They are out there setting up the depots, coming into the board seeking final approval for the establishment of those depots.

This $300,000 the minister referred to, right now we have no permanent staff hired. We are about to do that. Staff within the Department of Environment and Labour are providing that assistance to the Multi-Materials Stewardship Board. We will be hiring a manager I expect within a month. We have some temporary inspectors who are going around the Province. The monies, this $300,000, will be used to support the salary costs of those individuals, as well as their operating costs, and to also fund bringing the members of the board into these meetings which will be - right now we have held them in St. John's, but we probably will hold them throughout the Province. It is not, in my mind at least, a large sum of money. In essence, that is an overview, I guess.

WITNESS: Thank you.

WITNESS: Do you have a question?

CHAIR: Mary, would you like to...?

MS M. HODDER: I just wondered, with the environmental assessment study in Argentia, how much work will be created as a result of it? Do you have any indication of that?

MR. K. AYLWARD: With the study itself, or the project?

MS M. HODDER: As a result of the study.

MR. K. AYLWARD: As a result. It is a heavy, intensive amount of work, the environmental assessment is, and there are a fair number of consulting companies involved in it. I would say - Leslie? Probably, it is in the numbers of - they have thirty or forty people.

MS GRATTAN: I would say at least forty people would be actually collecting field data and doing the analysis.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes. You are assessing a lot of detail. They have to do a lot of evaluation of potential impacts of smelter and so on, so it is all detailed in the registration document. There will be a lot of people working there so it will have to be done well.

MR. G. REID: When do you expect that to be completed?

MR. K. AYLWARD: A `turn-off' question. It is at the discretion of the company. They may have it done by the Fall.

MR. G. REID: Is there a federal one going on currently?

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is a joint assessment between the Federal Government and the Provincial Government, both Departments of Environment. There is a joint assessment process we have agreed on, about what is to be evaluated and both governments will have to sign off at the end of the process as to the acceptance of the environmental impact study. The Federal and Provincial Governments, each has outlined its requirements in the study, so, if it is air emissions or social impacts, the environmental impacts on land, and so on, there are different details that are required. So, it may be done by the Fall but it is up to the company. They have to do the studies, they know what the requirements are and when they have them completed, they will come in and they are then provided to the public for further scrutiny and commentary and then a decision will be rendered at the end of that process.

MR. G. REID: I am sorry, Mary; I did not mean to -

MS M. HODDER: That is okay.

MR. G. REID: Is it the same with Voisey's Bay?

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is the same with the mine. Again, we have a joint assessment - the Federal Government and also the Provincial Government assessment process is in place. We also have included representatives of the LIA and the Innu in the panel. It is a public panel appointed with a Chair, and they are now into hearings to complete the guidelines, I believe, of the assessment process. They will travel to certain sites within the Province, to Coastal Labrador and other parts of the Province where there is public concern. It is a detailed environmental assessment which will probably take a time line of about fourteen to sixteen months at the minimum and once they complete the document, they submit it to both levels of government, both ministers, for final consideration and the EIS, if it is accepted, at that point in time, goes to the Cabinet for final approval.

MR. G. REID: Do you contract out much of this work? Because, obviously, you have a number of these on the go in the Province right now, outside of Voisey's Bay - environmental assessments.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. G. REID: So most of these are contracted?

MR. K. AYLWARD: No - well, the companies will hire their consultants to do the work but in our division of environmental assessment, we have our own people who will oversee the process in our department. And we have the environmental assessment committees that are formed for each project, for example: Voisey's Bay mine, there would be an EIS committee that would be struck which would include federal and provincial officials of, say Wildlife, of DFO, of Tourism; so there are experts in each part of the government who sit on the EIS Committee. The company then goes out and hires its own experts, does the required study, completes the work and submits it for evaluation to our officials and then the officials have to prepare a recommendation to the minister.

MR. G. REID: That must be quite an industry in the Province now, is it not?

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is a big industry. Jacques Whitford is an agra-earth environmentalist, too, for example, but Jacques Whitford has up to somewhere around eighty employees right now, at least eighty employees. Three years ago there were probably five or ten people, so it is becoming a big business. A big requirement for companies.

MR. G. REID: Yes.

MS M. HODDER: That accounts for the large variance in 2.3.01, that is, Professional Services, from $5,000 to $350,000.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. NORRIS: With respect to the mine/mill assessment, as the minister indicated, the assessment is ongoing. A panel of five members was struck and they are actually in St. John's today. They were in town yesterday and are taking presentations today, actually. I think there are about ten parties within the Provincial Government making presentations to the committee. The cost, there is a Secretariat that provides support to the panel as they travel around and make all the arrangements; it is quite a costly venture. That cost, will not be borne by the Province, it will be borne by the proponent, Viosey's Bay Nickel.

MR. G. REID: Is that the case in all these environmental assessment studies?

MR. NORRIS: No, not at this point.

MR. K. AYLWARD: No. We are considering that.

MR. G. REID: I am thinking about the smaller ones, like some of these hydro ones on the rivers.

MS GRATTAN: Right now, this is just something really we have - I guess the first example was the Terra Nova offshore project, where the proponent picked up some if not all of the cost. It is only on the major projects - right now we are thinking that is perhaps something over $15 million - that we would actually ask the proponent to bear the cost. Something every project will have to do now, though, is when they register, they will have to pay a fee of $200, which is a new measure.

MR. G. REID: Okay.

CHAIR: Harvey.

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I have a few questions. If I could, I will wrap them all up in one go at it here. That will be good news to all you people here.

WITNESS: (Inaudible).

MR. H. HODDER: But I have not told you how long it is going to be yet.

MR. WHELAN: At least ten minutes.

MR. H. HODDER: A ten-minute time limit?

MR. WHELAN: Ten-minute time limits at one point.

MR. H. HODDER: Okay.

MR. WHELAN: If you use your ten minutes, somebody else could use their, and if you had another round up, then you have another ten minutes.

MR. H. HODDER: In that case, then, I will stay. I want to get on to a couple of different things. One is the environmental issue of waste disposal sites, particularly as it relates to municipalities. We have tended in this Province to take - you know, I think we have given municipalities a bit of a great understanding. I want to find out: What are we doing to try to further the program started in the mid-eighties to reduce the number of waste disposal sites? How are we coming along in terms of their going to bring them where we can say that the municipal waste disposal sites somewhat resemble what we would like to see, in terms of being environmentally safe and environmentally meeting the guidelines and the criteria that we should have established a long time ago?

MR. K. AYLWARD: That is an excellent question, Sir, and we appreciate it. I probably should have highlighted it in the overview.

There was an inventory completed over a year ago, of the Province. Jacques Whitford consultants were hired by the Department of Environment and Labour to do an evaluation of landfill sites in the Province. There are over 200 landfill sites in this Province that we know of, that are registered right now. There are some recommendations that are sitting on a report that we are going to be acting on shortly to move forward on to see if we can reduce the number of landfills in the Province and get into regional waste management.

The initiative that the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs has under way right now, which looks at the regionalization issue, that issue is highlighting the need for a regional landfill and regional waste management. Over the next few weeks and months we will be approaching Municipal and Provincial Affairs and developing a plan to look at some regional waste management initiatives in a number of the regions of the Province.

Some have started in the past year, a couple in particular, one in Central Newfoundland. Botwood, for example has shut down its landfill and put in a transfer station. They are to be commended for doing that. There are a number of others that have done the same. We have many more, especially in the smaller communities, which are a mile or two apart, where you have your own landfill. We have to find a way to clean that up. The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs has identified with our department forty right now that we could shut down and then clean up together with these regions. We are looking at moving on that this year.

It is a big issue because we are doing the deposit-return system now, so that is going to create some revenue for some of the municipalities, if they handle their landfills in the right way. We are going to be talking to them about that. The Federation of Municipalities has decided to make it an issue now in the last couple of years. In the last year, they sponsored a conference on waste management in Corner Brook. So there is a fair bit of momentum.

There was a fair bit of effort put into St. John's Harbour and to get that issue moved, and in the St. John's area, that has started to move quite readily in the last year. I think we are going to shift as much of our emphasis as we can now towards the regional waste management issue because it is the biggest issue out there, besides the other issues that we are dealing with. It is one that we can move on with some momentum. We have identified the problem, we have identified some solutions, and now we have to spend some time doing it. It is a big issue, and if we are going to promote tourism in the Province we are going to have to start cleaning it up.

MR. H. HODDER: On the issue of industrial and domestic waste again, trying to deal with the hazardous waste components. We know that we have various guidelines on that, and we have had various programs promoted in certain regions of the Province. Collection times and disposals and that kind of thing. How is that program going in other parts of the Province? I am somewhat familiar with the Avalon north area. By Avalon north I mean this part of the Avalon, not the Carbonear part. How is that being carried out in other parts of the Province, and what initiatives are we undertaking to ensure that hazardous wastes are being disposed of in a proper manner?

MR. K. AYLWARD: We are developing, and we have a final draft, of hazardous waste regulations ready, new regulations. We have looked at P.E.I., what they are doing, and other jurisdictions in Atlantic Canada. The regulations are just about finalized and ready to go. We also have been involved in some of the sponsorship of hazardous waste days which, in the St. John's area, has been very successful. Last year I think Corner Brook was tried? I think it was Corner Brook.

We are now working on a further initiative to look at other regions of the Province, working with the municipalities. One of our officials has been in direct contact with a number of municipalities that are interested. We are also, and have been approaching, the producers of hazardous waste, the companies that contribute to making hazardous waste, to get them to give a contribution, stewardship-wise, to help them clean it up. In other words, the stewardship initiative, when it comes to the Stewardship Board, it is the same type of philosophy. When we reform our new environment act, which is also in the process, we are looking at being able to give the department the authority, the minister, to really get involved with the stewardship initiative heavily, to promote it heavily, and to get the companies that develop the waste or make the waste, to ensure they get involved in cleaning up the waste.

That initiative is under way as we speak and there will be a report probably next week, from which I hope we will see five or six municipalities this year, major ones in the regions, get involved in hazardous waste collection days. That goes hand in hand, too, with proper regulation which we have to finalize, and also with regional landfills that can handle it. That is important.

MR. H. HODDER: Are you suggesting that, for example, every time we go to purchase a gallon of paint that we would have a surcharge put on and that would then be channelled back? Or are we suggesting it be at the consumer-retail level, or would it be at the manufacturing level, so that we would be collecting it right at the point of manufacturing, or at the consumer end?

MR. K. AYLWARD: We are looking at what other jurisdictions have done right now. I believe we should approach the industry first and say: Look, this is a problem, and we believe you should contribute to cleaning up the problem. If we cannot get industry to come on side, then we will have to look at the other options. That is the way we approached the deposit-return system. We asked the industry to develop their own effective system, and we ended up coming with our own regulation, but working out an arrangement that was really a partnership at the end of it.

If the stewardship principle is going to be put forward, then we believe that a lot of the companies that are producing the waste - and this is pretty well getting standard across Canada, in a number of jurisdictions - should be involved in contributing to the costs of the clean up. There is a number of ways of doing it. It might be a levy that you may end up - you could look at that idea. We are going to approach the industry first.

MR. H. HODDER: By the industry, you mean the manufacturer or the wholesaler?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Really the producers of it, the manufacturers of it, and the users of it. The users in particular. Some of the big industrial users of hazardous waste in the Province that produce it at the end of their processes - so the bigger companies.

MR. H. HODDER: What do you mean by that? For example, let us say, looking at manufacturers - I am just thinking about paint - we would be looking at, say, Standard Manufacturing and Matchless, and those, but we would not be touching at all the great massive volumes of paint products that are produced in Montreal, let us say, and brought in here and sold by firms like the Paint Shops.

MR. K. AYLWARD: We dealt with that one also through the deposit return system. We had importation of products that are not manufactured here or processed here but we were able to deal with it at the wholesale level, so everybody is dealing with it in the marketplace. Here you would look at approaching the companies. A lot of companies who produce, for example, paints and other products, also have environmental policies, so they are into trying to promote what they do, that what they do does not hurt the environment, or that they are involved, so we want to get them talked to about what we think they should be doing to help. We will see what comes out of it.

MR. H. HODDER: Of course, I do not want to - I just used paint as an example.

MR. K. AYLWARD: No, that is just one. There are a number of others.

MR. H. HODDER: There is a great, long list of other household products that are very common, that we did a lot of identifying in Mount Pearl when I was there. We had a very aggressive committee working on that, very commendable to several of the councillors who were spearheading the drive at the time.

On the issue of water, and the resource management policies, we know probably that Canada has one of the great reserves. In fact, I was listening to an interview the other night by the former Margaret Trudeau, who is an environmentalist. She was giving one of her rare interviews, on I think it was CBC, a couple of nights ago in the late evening, and she was espousing there - and I think she was right - that as years go by, Canadian resource, with its clean water, is probably going to be among the greatest resources that we will have. Some people have misgivings that we will either treat it too lightly in the sense that we think it is a God-given thing and we do not want to manage it, overdo it, you might say, in terms of controlling it. Other people feel that we might become too stringent. What are we doing in this Province to: (a) make sure that we keep our natural water supplies as pure as we can; and, (b) what regulations are we putting in place to ensure that all of the spin-off benefits that come from the exportation of water - and we know about Gisborne Lake and the Grand -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Grand Le Pierre.

MR. H. HODDER: Grand Le Pierre in Fortune Bay, and that kind of thing, and there is good support for that, but we want to make sure that the maximization of the benefit stays with the people of this Province or, for that matter, on a national level. You deal with a national level as well with your colleagues across the country. We have a good policy for Newfoundlanders and, of course, also a good policy for the country.

MR. K. AYLWARD: There are a number of initiatives under way. When it comes to water resources and protection, municipalities are involved there now with declared watersheds in their protection, and policies to protect when it comes to development activity.

There has also been, I would say in the last four or five years, if we look back at it, a great number of watershed areas that have been developed. Boundaries have been developed by the department working with regions for protection purposes to allow for limited development in areas, development that is appropriate for an area. There has been a lot of evaluation of the watersheds of the Province done by the water resources division.

There has been some really good work done through the Canada/Newfoundland water resources agreements that we have had over the last few years, a lot of detailed GIS work, geographic information system work, that has given us a lot of homework as to how watersheds operate, how they flow, and where development should go in a certain area.

So there has been a lot of homework done, which has been very helpful, and it will help us in the planning, and we have to do more. There is a lot more to do, but there has been a lot done, and I think it very much helps. That, with the Environmental Assessment Act, when it comes to activities that are being looked at for development, you put the two together; and, you know, development will not occur unless it meets a lot of stringent requirements.

When it comes to the water export policy, that has been developed over the last year. Gisborne Lake is the first proposal that is on deck. We are still looking at and talking to the proponent, the first one who has been put forward. There is a second one for the same lake area, but there has not been any further development recently because the first proponent has not been into too heavy a negotiation, at least recently. He has been doing some further environmental work, I believe, but we expect some negotiations will start.

Paramount in the policy is the protection of the resource, first off, for the Province, that the resource gets first call for the needs of the people of the Province, which is paramount. Secondly, we are promoting value-added for water export, in other words potential bottling or types of value-added activity. And if we were to consider a further industrial use for water, which would be bulk shipment, the royalty rates would be higher and would be reflected, and we would also again look at the creation of employment and so on as a major issue. Right now we are awaiting details of the proposal. We do not have the vivid detail yet - we are still waiting - and there is a second proponent.

There is also some interest off the South Coast of Labrador just recently, so we expect we might get a proposal from there in the next little while.

MR. H. HODDER: Excellent.

Two minor questions; one is, I always see these signs on the highway that you must not litter and if you litter you are going to be prosecuted, and all that kind of thing. How many have you prosecuted successfully in the last five years?

CHAIR: Perhaps after this question we might pass it to Mr. Whelan, who has a couple of questions he would like to ask.

MR. K. AYLWARD: I am not sure exactly of the numbers. We did get one out of Marystown last year, but there were a number of others. We can check with the RCMP, who have been doing a superb job.

MR. H. HODDER: So you do it through the -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes, through the RCMP highway enforcement.

The former Minister of Highways, Minister John Efford, was involved with the adopt-a-highway program, and that has been pretty successful, too. It is really starting to catch on. So that, together with the increase in fines... You put a separate fine on for littering.

MR. H. HODDER: That was an excellent program.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes. So that, plus the separate fine for littering, plus the deposit-return system, all three of those initiatives are getting at the highway system, at least trying to get it cleaned up. It gives some incentive to clean it up.

CHAIR: Mr. Whelan, if you want.

MR. WHELAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have a few points.

Getting back to the environmental impact study with regard to Argentia, the project itself has to wait until the review has been completed and the report is in, and all this type of thing?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: And you say that will take a period of fourteen to sixteen months. How long has that been under way, or has it started yet?

MR. K. AYLWARD: The mine site will be about fourteen to sixteen months, is that right?

WITNESS: That is right.

MR. K. AYLWARD: That is the mine site. The smelter site, their EIS, they may complete earlier than -

MR. WHELAN: Than what?

MR. K. AYLWARD: The mine site. The smelter site may be completed earlier.

MR. WHELAN: Yes.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Because on the smelter site the issues are a little less complex, so it might be completed earlier. Potentially it could even be late this Summer, but it could be the Fall, depending. So if the EIS gets accepted, it gets submitted in the Fall or the Summer, we would look at it and get a recommendation. If it is acceptable then it goes to Cabinet for a final decision. So they could potentially be out of the EIS stage earlier with the smelter than with the mine.

MR. WHELAN: I spent a bit of time up around Argentia and you cannot walk fifty feet up there, especially where the smelter is supposed to be going, without seeing a sign, `Danger, PCBs'. Does anybody have any idea as to what extent these are there? And if so, the initial ground work for that would have to be a fairly extensive project.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: Is that a sensitive issue, or should I -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Not at all - no, I hope not.

MR. WHELAN: I see everybody looking at each other.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

AN HON. MEMBER: You are on the Committee, do not worry about it.

MS GRATTAN: We just cannot decide which of us will leap to answer your question.

MR. K. AYLWARD: We will take a first crack at it, anyway. There are five years of study that have been completed. It took five years to study the site, intensively study it, all of the different potential landfills. There was ground monitoring done, wells were put in place. It was a detailed evaluation of what is there in the landfills, in the land area. There is a remediation plan outlined for the next number of years to clean it up. The approximate cost to clean it up is in the $70 million to $80 million range. That would be done to acceptable Canadian environmental standards, Canadian environmental law.

MR. WHELAN: This is where the - okay -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: Go ahead.

MR. K. AYLWARD: In other words, the plan is in place. Now, with the smelter announcement we are looking at probably speeding up the work plan. In other words, they would move in more quickly and do more work and so on, and also, evaluate potentially where the smelter is going. Some of the work that they may want to do at the site, they may be able to do more quickly and so on. So we are looking at the work plan with the Federal Government. The Federal Government is responsible for the clean-up - the Department of National Defence, I believe, is it, DND?

MS GRATTAN: No, Public Works.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Public Works, sorry. Public Works is responsible for it, and we are on a co-ordinating committee to ensure that everything goes well.

MR. WHELAN: There was an agreement reached between the American Government and the Canadian Government over, what, a five-year period, was it? There was supposed to be x number of millions of dollars allocated to the Canadian Government for the clean-up of the Argentia site.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Right, amongst other sites, yes.

MR. WHELAN: Okay.

MR. K. AYLWARD: The Federal Government negotiated with -

MR. WHELAN: So the $80 million wasn't specifically put aside for Argentia itself. It was for a number of sites, was it?

MR. K. AYLWARD: The Canadian Government committed the funding without knowing for sure how much they were going to get from the U.S. They were in negotiations with the U.S. But the estimated clean-up costs - Goose Bay, I think, was about $12 million to $15 million, and Argentia was in the area of $80 million. Those monies were committed by the Federal Government before - you know, they were in negotiations with the U.S. Government, and they gave the commitment to clean it up because they were going to go after the U.S. Government to get the costs. So that is their obligation.

MR. WHELAN: It was allocated over - what was it, five -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Five years, yes, five or six years to -

MR. WHELAN: Will they be forthcoming with the $80 million, instead of five years -

MR. K. AYLWARD: There is -

MR. WHELAN: Because they are in negotiations with regard to that.

MR. K. AYLWARD: The work plan this year is about $14 million or $15 million?

OFFICIAL: Seventeen million.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Seventeen million dollars for this year, for the work plan.

MR. WHELAN: It was my impression that the groundwork was supposed to start this year for the smelter, with the view that it may be finished in maybe two years, so that in 1999, we would say, the smelter would be up and running. I am just trying to get a handle on where it is all going. With regard to the clean-up, if you are going to spend $17 million this year, and it is going to cost $80 million to clean it up, and the smelter can't be started until the environmental impact study is finished and the groundwork is done because of this PCB problem, where do we stand? Again, I say I am just trying to get a handle on when this whole thing is going to be started.

MR. K. AYLWARD: The work plan is being looked at now by the Federal Government with respect to speeding up the clean-up of the site. For example, right now there is not a problem with parts of the site. The company, when it comes to its EIS stage, the land that they may be choosing to start building on and construction on, they will be able to start some of that, because part of the site will be already cleaned up, or there won't be a problem with it.

So, it depends on the work plan of the company, right? They have to look at what the work plan of the Federal Government is to clean it up, and you have to overlay the work they are going to do, plus the sites they are going to need. They aren't going to need all the land that is out there. It depends on where they are going to put the smelter and so on. All those logistics are now being evaluated by the company and by the Federal Government.

MR. WHELAN: Regardless of where they put it there on that side of the harbour, those signs are fairly extensive. I walked right on through and I couldn't find a place where I - down by the stadium you didn't see too many, but every place else, you know, it seems like there are all kinds of things buried up there.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Come over to Stephenville.

MR. WHELAN: I am wondering, if they have a smelter there, I'm sure they won't be putting it next to a sign that says: Danger, PCBs. I am thinking the entire area would have to be cleaned up.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Oh yes, the areas that have been identified are going to be cleaned up. They know exactly where everything is in the sense of the evaluation. It was the most intensive environmental evaluation of a site done probably in Canada in the last ten to fifteen years.

WITNESS: So it has been done?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes, it has been done in the sense of just studying what the problem is. It took five years to study what the problem was.

MR. G. REID: But most of the environmental study is done?

MR. K. AYLWARD: In a sense, yes, because you know what is there so now, you have to look at your clean-up plan and you have to look at where you are going to put your smelter site, and that may be in an area that is either affected or not affected.

MR. G. REID: So the environmental impact study that has been carried out and funded by the company is not as extensive as we were led to believe, I guess - or not led to believe, but we assumed?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Well, there is a fair bit of work done.

MR. G. REID: (Inaudible).

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. G. REID: We would not be in very good shape if we had to start from scratch today. We certainly would not have it done in two year's time.

MR. WHELAN: It was $80 million, was it, for the clean-up?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Clean-up and some monitoring of the site, monitoring after, and that is mostly minimal (inaudible).

MR. WHELAN: Okay. Another point that I wanted to get some -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Jeeze, you are tough, you are.

MR. WHELAN: Pardon?

MR. K. AYLWARD: You are tough.

MR. WHELAN: Oh yes.

MR. K. AYLWARD: I am only kidding.

MR. WHELAN: The labour agreement with regard to the turnover project at Bull Arm - you mentioned this in your overview and I wonder if you could expound on it somewhat, just to let us know what the status is right now, and if there has been an agreement with the unions, a tentative agreement between the unions and the company and government, I guess; and if you have any details on it, I would like to know that; because it is of particular interest in the area that I represent, as there is a large construction population there.

MR. K. AYLWARD: That is a good question, Sir.

The agreement that has been struck is a voluntary agreement between the construction trade unions and the employer of the Terra Nova Group. The Terra Nova Group has contracted with the Grand Bank Alliance, which is a number of companies, to build the platform for the Terra Nova oilfield. A number of the components are being evaluated for building or construction in the Province and the Bull Arm site is a major site for potential construction activity. So the construction trade unions formed a separate group and started discussions with the consortium that is going to build the Terra Nova platform.

MR. WHELAN: The unions themselves voluntarily decided to approach the builders to come to some sort of an agreement, as to the way things would be carried out with regard to workers and their rights and all that kind of thing, wages and whatever.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes. They developed a collective agreement that would govern work conditions, pay rates and so on, conditions of working at the site; also, the potential for cross-trading, you know, unions doing cross-trading and so on. It really was a break-through agreement, because it is the first time in Canada that the construction trades were involved to the extent they were, of having almost a single collective bargaining agent. Joe, is that the way to put it?

MR. O'NEILL: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: It is my understanding that there will be one union representing all workers up there, and it is a little bit perplexing for me to be able to fathom how all these unions would come together and agree that one union would represent all the trades, and I am wondering how that has been accepted. I know they had all agreed initially but, once it was determined which union was going to represent all the trades, I have the funny feeling that this union here will say: Well, this was not done right, we need to have another look at it, or -

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is a collection of unions but they have agreed on a bargaining agent, one would be the bargaining agent for the collection of unions.

MR. WHELAN: Would this be an elected individual or an appointed individual by executives of the various unions?

MR. K. AYLWARD: I am not sure of the details of the constitution. They have their own constitution of how they will operate. Joe O'Neill, maybe you could give further thought on it.

MR. O'NEILL: Yes. Basically, the new union that is struck to -

MR. WHELAN: So this is a new union we have?

MR. O'NEILL: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: That is all we needed.

MR. O'NEILL: It is called the Newfoundland and Labrador International Building and Construction Petroleum Development Association.

MR. WHELAN: Say that again. So, is it a union of unions?

MR. O'NEILL: Actually, it is a single union comprised of the sixteen building trades unions, and you are quite right in that no doubt, everybody has heard by now that there are, at least one union maybe two of the building trades who do not quite see it the same way as the other fourteen trades. That is an issue that is being dealt with internally within the building trades who are in the Petroleum Association now. But essentially, it is a one-union set-up, and they have a collective agreement with PCL Constructors to look at future development at the Bull Arm site. So it is a one-union concept.

MR. WHELAN: Okay.

MR. K. AYLWARD: And it is also to give it a competitive edge in dealing with the site itself, in dealing with trying to attract business, and that is one of the reasons (inaudible).

MR. WHELAN: We are not assuming you know but, by the way you are talking, I would assume that the Bull Arm site was the site where the construction for part of the topsides, or whatever, was going to be held, but that is not necessarily so?

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is not fully decided yet.

MR. O'NEILL: No. The minister referenced earlier to... this sort of arrangement is an arrangement that - I knew when I started to speak that the lights would go out. It is the sort of arrangement that will help to market Bull Arm as a first-class, world-class fabrication facility that can attract potential - and I guess, it is more fabrication than construction. It is fabrication of topsides, modules and all that sort of thing, and there is a lot of that work around the world that Bull Arm can logically compete for, providing it had a good, sound labour agreement. And this is exactly what this agreement does, it really puts Bull Arm in the running, I guess, for future projects.

MR. WHELAN: So, how detailed is this particular agreement? I mean, the wage structure and all this type of thing, overtime and holidays, all that type of thing, has all been -

WITNESS: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: Is that right?

MR. O'NEILL: Yes. It is a collective agreement in terms of having all of the markings of the collective agreement, you know, grievance and arbitration procedures, wages and benefits. One of the key elements of it is that, even though it is structured from fourteen building trades unions, there can be no jurisdiction disputes, which I am sure, as you know, that was quite a feat to pull off.

MR. WHELAN: (Inaudible), problem there (inaudible).

MR. O'NEILL: Well, once a contractor assigns work, say, on a particular job, if the operating engineers feel that the labourers are doing their work, they cannot claim jurisdiction to the labourer's work. The assignment of work is solely up to the operator. It is a major breakthrough.

MR. WHELAN: There may be some internal problems as a result.

MR. O'NEILL: Oh yes, they have some internal issues from that.

MR. WHELAN: So this deal, is it signed, sealed and delivered, agreed to by the unions and signed by the companies?

MR. O'NEILL: Yes, the agreement has been signed by both sides.

MR. K. AYLWARD: We have two union leaders and two unions which are challenging the agreement to a point because they feel that there are certain provisions, I think mostly within the constitution of the new agreement, in that -

MR. WHELAN: Yes, that is the operating engineer and -

MR. K. AYLWARD: Yes, and the labourers, and they have the right but, you know, the thing is, they have all agreed on that one collective agreement.

MR. WHELAN: Can they hold it up? I mean, does it have to be 100 per cent of the unions agreeing or, is there some sort of a -

MR. K. AYLWARD: We are evaluating that now, Sir, because we may have to amend the legislation, it depends. So we are looking at potential amendments and it depends on the interpretation of the legislation. And their concerns may be dealt with internally yet, or they may not be, so it depends again on what they do further. But we will evaluate the agreement and look at the application to the Labour Relations Act. It is a voluntary agreement, they come together and our legislation recognizes voluntary agreements, but we may have to amend the legislation somewhat.

MR. G. REID: Is this unique in North America or in the world to have one group like that representing a particular area?

MR. K. AYLWARD: It is not unique. In Scotland, the competition that they would be facing off with, to do fabrication, has a single union environment, the same type as here, so they know that. They have been over there and have seen it. They have met with the people over there, working with their union leaders and so on, so they are familiar with what the competition is, and I think it is safe to say, that was part of the influence of what they saw. You know, the union leadership, I think if you talked to them and asked them if that was part of (inaudible) -

MR. G. REID: It certainly makes it more attractive.

MR. WHELAN: Who is the business agent? Has there been one appointed to represent the members of -

MR. K. AYLWARD: No, I don't think so.

MR. O'NEILL: The agreement it provides calls for a site rep, so that when work does commence at the Bull Arm facility, there will be a site rep who will represent the unions and there will also be a site rep who will represent the contractor, but at this point in time, they have not been named. But you are quite right in terms of the competition, and the notion was put forward early in the process that unless there were some kind of arrangement made with respect to the Bull Arm labour relations situation and labour being for Bull Arm, that Bull Arm could not even make it on the bid sheet for world projects. So this agreement was an absolute must.

MR. WHELAN: - was significant. The status quo was as things were with the Hibernia project.

MR. O'NEILL: Yes. It would not make the bid sheet.

MR. G. REID: I cannot imagine a company wanting to come in and negotiate with twenty unions.

MR. O'NEILL: Absolutely. It is part of the problem, yes.

CHAIR: Very well. Perhaps, John, you would -

MR. OTTENHEIMER: There are just a couple of points I would like to touch on. I remember a topic that was raised last year, actually, at the Estimates committee meetings: the Workers' Compensation Review Division, and I remember during our discussions about a year ago, there was some concern expressed about - I don't know if `efficiency' is the right word, but certainly the fact that perhaps a majority of the appeals were being heard by a particular member as opposed to a cross-section of the members who were appointed to the Review Division.

I am just wondering: Has that situation improved? Is there now, I guess, a fair representation of appeals being heard by various review divisions, and I ask that question from the point of view of a claimant or appellant, who perhaps, would feel best served in terms of having his case heard, by having it heard with at least the possibility of a particular review member hearing it, as opposed to just one member? So I am just wondering, how has that situation changed, if at all, in the past twelve months?

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thank you very much for the question.

We looked at that in the past number of months and through Program Review, we looked at, of course, every part of the department and also the functioning of the Workers' Compensation Review. We have had various representations. Some have been very supportive of having as much as possible, a single adjudicator. It certainly has benefited in the sense of cost in the whole operation of the system; the costs have been lowered, the time lines have been lowered, the response has been, on the most part, very, very effective and quick, as quick as possible, but we are looking at the appointments of other Commissioners. We do have more than one right now and we will have probably three or four over the next few weeks.

We have, I think, three now. And we are still just judging how it is operating. We are getting the public review which is due in shortly with the Workers' Compensation Review and we expect that will have some recommendations as to the effectiveness of the Review Division, and any suggestions they may have.

There has been some suggestion that we look again at a tripartite committee that would do the hearings but, for the most part, we feel it is working pretty well overall, the cost certainly, but also the efficiency and effectiveness to the clientele who have been availing of the review. Their response time has been much better. There has been a scattered, I suppose, client, who has had some difficulty, but considering the volume, we think it is running pretty well. We are going to wait on the outcome of the recommendations of the committee and that will happen in the next thirty days when they submit the report.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: I notice there in the Estimates, Professional Services of $175,000. Is that representation for the Review Division when decisions are appealed? Is that what that refers to?

MR. K. AYLWARD: That is a good question. I am not sure. Any help, Gerry, what do you think?

MR. CROCKER: Yes, $175,000 would be for the single adjudication costs and would also include legal fees for the Workers' Compensation Review Division.

MR. K. AYLWARD: If they need that?

MR. CROCKER: Right, if that is required.

MR. K. AYLWARD: And the salaries, I think, are the staff?

MR. CROCKER: Yes, that's right.

MR. K. AYLWARD: And the Commission (inaudible) staff, three or four.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Okay. Just one final point that I have. There has been some representation, as you know, in the House of Assembly and by various groups in our society for amendments to the Human Rights Code. I'm just wondering if, in fact, it is the plan of government, through your ministry, to make these amendments within the near future.

MR. K. AYLWARD: We are in the final stage. We have some recommendations. Final recommendations are ready for the caucus and government, and I am hopeful. We are moving on it and we will have deliberation on that subject very shortly. It has required an extensive amount of work because we had to look at the other jurisdictions and the evolving law, because it has been changing even over the past year. We have had Justice involved heavily, and there are some final recommendations now for consideration. Very shortly we will be bringing forward our recommendations.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: I have no further questions, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: Gerry?

MR. G. REID: No.

CHAIR: Mary?

MS M. HODDER: (Inaudible).

CHAIR: Don?

MR. WHELAN: No.

CHAIR: There being no further questions, we thank you, Minister, and your delegation this evening, for your answers. Some of the questions perhaps were coming a little bit unexpectedly, but we thank you very much for your answers, and we all learned greatly from them.

Before we clue up, the Committee has a couple of items of business. We have the Minutes from the meeting of last evening dealing with the Department of Health. I would like to have those Minutes moved and seconded.

On motion, Minutes adopted as circulated.

CHAIR: The Minutes of the meeting this morning dealing with the Social Services Committee of the House on the Department of Human Resources and Employment.

On motion, Minutes adopted as circulated.

CHAIR: We now need a motion to approve the heads of the Department of Environment and Labour.

On motion, subheads 1.1.01 through 6.1.01, carried.

On motion, Department of Environment and Labour, total heads, carried.

CHAIR: Thank you very much, Committee. We next meet, I believe, on Tuesday May 6.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the kindness and the effective questioning by the Committee. The minister was grilled and looks forward to Question Period tomorrow.

The Committee adjourned.