GOVERNMENT SERVICES ESTIMATES COMMITTEE

May 9, 1991                          Department of Municipal & Provincial Affairs                            (Unedited)


 

The Committee met at 7:00 p.m. at Colonial Building.

[Beginning of Committee not recorded, due to technical problems]

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

MR. GULLAGE: I would be happy to answer any questions which members of the Committee may have. However, there may be occasions, in some technical areas, where I would wish to defer to some member of my staff to provide additional details or information. The Chairman has already explained that that is, of course, acceptable.

I would like to introduce, firstly, the members of the Executive Group from the Housing Corporation. Mr. Chairman, I would assume that the Chair would entertain two opening statements, because we have two separate ministries in the sense that the Housing Corporation is separate with a separate Chairman and so on.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes. I do not think that will be a problem.

MR. GULLAGE: So, I would like to introduce, to my right, Mr. Robert Noseworthy, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation; Mr. Peter Honeygold, the Senior Vice-President of operations; Mr. Ed Heath, the Senior Vice-President of Finance and Administration Services; and also, Mr. Don Osmond, the Executive Director of Development with the Corporation.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to take this opportunity to review the Estimates of the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation and provide an overview of the activity proposed for 1991-1992. However, before looking at these areas I would like to provide a brief overview of the mandate and activities of the Corporation.

NLHC is the housing arm of the Provincial Government which strives to ensure that suitable and affordable housing is available to all residents, with the priority to provide such housing to those most in need. In these activities NLHC works in co-operation with the Federal Government, municipalities and community organizations. To assist in the Province's economic development, NLHC plans and develops residential and industrial land assemblies in areas of actual and potential growth.

The Corporation's prime responsibility is the delivery of social housing programmes for low income families, senior citizens and special needs groups. These social housing programmes, which are cost-shared on a 75/25 federal/provincial basis with Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, are delivered and administered by NLHC. As well as social housing, NLHC administers market rental housing, develops residential land assemblies, and develops and administers provincially owned industrial parks. With regard to the scope of NLHC activities, the Corporation presently manages a portfolio of some 6,000 social housing units and 1,000 market rental units. As well, the Corporation administers a portfolio of some 8,000 mortgages and home repair loans totalling in excess of $130 million.

In the area of land development, the Corporation has developed close to 6,200 residential building lots of which 5,600 have been sold to date. Over 1,000 acres of industrial land has also been developed of which close to 600 acres have been sold.

Gross expenditures for the Corporation for the upcoming fiscal year are estimated at $216.9 million, representing current account expenditures of $112.6 million and capital account expenditures of $101.2 million. It is important to note that the provincial grant of $16.8 million, referred to in the estimates, represents only the provincial share or 8 per cent of the total expenditures. Of the total expenditures anticipated for 1991-1992, 47 per cent or $101 million will be revenues generated by the Corporation from its own sources, 37 per cent or $80 million will be provided by the Federal Government, and 8 per cent or $18 million will be financed independently by the Corporation through bank loans. The net current account request of $12.9 million contained in the budget, represents an increase of nearly $1.2 million over the 1991-1992 revised budget. Capital programmes for the Corporation require no capital funding from Government.

The highlights of the 1991 - 1992 budget include the provision of some 270 new social housing units throughout the Province to serve families, seniors, natives, non-elderly singles and the disabled. Some 230 of these units will be newly constructed at a cost of $24 million, while the remaining forty units represent new rent supplements which will assist needy clients living in private rental accommodation. All programmes will provide financial assistance based on the tenants' actual annual income and their ability to pay.

Members may recall, I made a Ministerial Statement in the House just recently announcing successful proposals for the current year under the Private Non-profit Housing Programme. This programme provides funding to private non-profit sponsors to construct, primarily, senior citizens housing projects; the provision of almost $21 million in federal - provincial home repair funding to some 2,000 eligible recipients - this funding provides grants and loans to low income home owners, including natives and the disabled, to upgrade their existing homes, rehabilitation represents the greatest housing need in the Province, and will continue to be a major focus of the Corporation - the provision of some $35 million to fund residential land development, that will see an additional 1,000 residential building lots developed; the provision of some $5.8 million for industrial land construction in areas such as Donovan's, Clarenville and Stephenville, that will upgrade existing facilities and add some eighty acres to the inventory of lands available for sale; and the continued sale to the general public of the Corporation's market rental units with some 250 units, located in Goose Bay and St. John's, being offered for sale. Upon sale of these projects, the Corporation's portfolio will be reduced to approximately 750 units.

In closing, I feel the 1991-1992 budget of the Corporation represents an excellent balance in recognizing the continuing need for social housing in the Province, while considering the fiscal realities facing Government. In total, the social housing needs of some 2,300 additional households in the Province will be addressed through this budget in the coming year. In looking at the year ahead, the residential construction industry remains a promising part of our economy. Housing starts in the Province are anticipated to increase over 8 per cent and a continuing strong performance is expected in the renovation sector. Lower interest rates will improve the affordability of new homes for both first-time home buyers and the trade up market as well.

As the Minister responsible for the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation, I am looking forward to another successful year for the home building industry in the Province.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Tobin, I believe, is going to speak for the Opposition.

Mr. Tobin.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

(Inaudible) There is a prime need for Newfoundland and Labrador Housing to do a lot more in the Province than increasing rents (inaudible).

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Tobin, I would like to interrupt for a moment. As long as we recognize that you are questioning the Minister, I would like for you to ask one question at a time and (inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: My question to the Minister is: Will the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation refer all rental increases to the Landlord and Tenancies Board?

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, our rent increases, of course, are substantially in the market area of our housing portfolio, and any rent increases in the social housing side of our mandate, rent per se, is geared to income as we know. So, they are still confined to 25 per cent of their income. So, we are talking about the market side. We have had increases in the market side, but they, from time to time, are necessitated because of the need to maintain a rent that is reasonable, because we are normally at the lower end of the market sale in housing, in any case, in the market sector, but we have to maintain the units. They have to be refurbished and renovated from time to time, and we have to, therefore, periodically increase the rents. We do, from time to time, have to justify these rent increases of course, and appear before the Tenancies Board.

If I take the question correctly, it is: Will we refer all rent increases to the Tenancies Board? I think I would like the Chairman, possibly, to speak to that.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Mr. Tobin, all the market rental units, within the Corporation, that we own in the Province, are subject to the Residential Tenancies Board. Any rent increases relating to those individual tenants have the right to appeal to the Residential Tenancies Board, and indeed in many cases it does happen, and we appear before the board.

In terms of our subsidized social housing units, as the Minister points out, all the rent increases there are simply based on the individual's income. There is no increase in rent unless income rises. Indeed, if income decreases we adjust the rent downwards.

MR. TOBIN: Is there going to be a substantial increase in some of your housing programmes based on people's present income? Have you decided recently to increase that?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: No. It is all based on income, and there is a formula which is in place. We have made some adjustments to the deductions which have affected a small number of individuals in the portfolio, in a minor way. There may be one or two individuals within the portfolio who might be affected in a substantial way. If you have a case there that I could respond to, I would certainly be prepared to do it. But we have made some adjustments, and looking at it across the board, there are no significant impacts in terms of our social rental units.

MR. TOBIN: (Inaudible) adjusted up to 10 per cent in some cases?

MR. GULLAGE: I think the question is directed, really, to the market housing units and not the social units, and there is quite a difference, as the Chairman has explained, in that the social units are geared to percentage of income and any increases in the rents would have to be absorbed by the Corporation.

On the market side, maybe the Chairman could define which areas were impacted in the current increases.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The 10 per cent increases that you are referring to, Mr. Tobin, are in St. John's. They would be, primarily Elizabeth Towers, where we have completed the renovations that have been ongoing for a period of time, and indeed the rents have been frozen there for some two years, while the renovations have been ongoing, and we have not increased rents. So, the 10 per cent increase really reflects the increase in market rent to adjust for the market at Elizabeth Towers.

MR. TOBIN: (Inaudible) significant increase (inaudible) at Elizabeth Towers?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: After, I think, it is two and a half years, which would reflect basically an increased adjustment for inflation over that period of time. Indeed, it is based on a survey of the market conditions and other comparable accommodation in St. John's that would be in the private sector, for example. We would set these rents equivalent to those.

MR. TOBIN: So, has Elizabeth Towers been subsidized up to now by the Corporation, or has it basically been paying its own way for those years?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: It has certainly been paying its own way up until these recent renovations, which were necessary at Elizabeth Towers because of some structural problems that were being experienced with the exterior of the building. Our financial projections, over the next two to three years, would be that there will be some losses associated with the Towers, and after that it should get into a healthy financial situation again.

MR. TOBIN: (Inaudible) Housing Corporation (inaudible) at the Towers? Is any of that (inaudible)?

MR. GULLAGE: I will speak to that, Mr. Chairman.

Our intent, of course, is to not be in the market area as far as construction of new units, or continuing to hold the units we presently have, is concerned. Most of the market stock throughout the Province has been taken by the Corporation as a result of amalgamation, for the want of a word, of previous corporations, and the stock was in place. Our prime mandate, clearly, is to deliver social housing, and we do not want to be in the market sector. When the time is right and a good market price is available for these units, we intend to divest ourselves of them. There may be the odd exception. If we see that a particular group of buildings, or a building, is fulfilling a particular social need, we may decide to hold onto it and use it in our social portfolio.

I could give some examples, but I hesitate to do so, because of identifying the people who are occupying the buildings. We do have some buildings that are predominantly, for example 80 per cent, occupied by seniors. So, we would hesitate to sell off those buildings, as long as they continue to be occupied that way.

To answer your question, basically, I think we do not want to be in the market sector. That is not the role of the Corporation, as far as our rental accommodations are concerned.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

The housing, which you just made reference to (inaudible) the allocation of funding (inaudible), do you know how you selected these (inaudible)?

MR. GULLAGE: I did not play any role in it, so the Chairman should probably speak to that.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: In the fall of each year, we go for a proposal call for submissions under the programme, some time toward the end of November. This year we had some fifty-seven proposals which were submitted to us. There is SEED funding which is generally provided so that a group can hire resource people to do a need and demand survey, to look for a piece of land, to hire an architect to put together a concept plan, and that sort of thing. The proposals are submitted to us, and they are reviewed, then, by an in-house committee within the Corporation which is broad based. The criteria essentially is the need and demand, which has been defined in a given area; the ability of a group to deliver - in other words, certainly, if they have an ability to deliver, if there is a portfolio in an area which they are delivering now, that, indeed, provides us with some background to know that they have the capability to deliver; the ability of a group to administer the project in the longer term, if indeed they have been a viable operating group for a while; and the economic viability of the project in terms of its cost effectiveness. If the group, indeed, are prepared to contribute land or to contribute some form of equity to the project, that will assist in their being given a priority. Those are reviewed in detail by the Corporation and, indeed, there is a selection process based on that criteria, and the groups are priorized on that basis.

As you can appreciate, the funding that is available in any given year enables us to do, perhaps this year, ten to eleven projects out of a total of fifty-seven proposals which we had before us.

MR. TOBIN: The ones that were approved (inaudible), in terms of those given priorization, the ones that were approved here, and the ones that we have asked the Minister (inaudible), they were considered top priority by the Housing Corporation in order of their ability?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: That is correct. The recommendations were made to the Minister. That is correct, Mr. Tobin.

MR. TOBIN: Have you got indications that all of these will be taken up this year, the people who applied have indications (inaudible)?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Certainly. The track record that we have had over the past two years in this area has indicated that generally there has been 100 per cent take up in the year they have been allocated. We have not had to bring forward backup units in any given year. However, the backup units do remain a priority for the subsequent year. So, there is no reason, I think it is fair to say, why we would expect that any of these will fall short. But there are, of course, no guarantees. If indeed a proposal comes in, once the tenders are called for a project and it is above the maximum unit price that is allowable under the programme, we may very well have to cancel that project for that given year and look to another project, but certainly that has not been the history.

MR. TOBIN: How many people are there (inaudible) in a situation like this? What is the deciding factor (inaudible)?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Well, as I indicated, there is a need and demand survey which is produced which would show the waiting list in any given area. There are census statistics which show factors in relation to seniors' populations and that sort of thing, by a particular planning region that the Province would use in terms of its planning and research. Those things are compiled in a technical fashion, quite frankly, with a view to the need and demand criteria. That is how they are selected.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: I say to the Chairman, if I could be more specific in that regard, Marystown (inaudible).

MR. CHAIRMAN: Gentlemen, I will have to ask you to speak up (inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: I will try, Mr. Chairman (inaudible).

My question is to the Chairman again. I talked about Marystown in my (inaudible). I understand, from that group, that they have identified a desperate need for housing. The population of seniors has been identified, as well, and we were led to believe by some people in the organization that funding would be forthcoming. I was wondering if you could tell me why they did not qualify?

MR. GULLAGE: Well, I have the list of projects here with the criteria on them. I could only tell you why in respect of the other proposals that were essentially approved.

MR. TOBIN: The question that I have been asked by people down there, by the private (inaudible) is as to why they were receiving this funding now, to say (inaudible)? You know, that is not going to satisfy them. I would like for you to be as specific as possible, and say, `Listen, this is why Marystown did not qualify.'

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

I apologize for interrupting, but I am going to have to recess so (inaudible) determine what the problem is, because we definitely want the proceedings to be recorded for Hansard. We are having some difficulty (inaudible).

Recess

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

I must apologize for the delay. We were having some problems with the recording equipment, and I would like to explain to you what we have done. We have found five microphones that are in working order, so we have put two of them in the witness stand, one on each of the MHA's tables and one here. Because of the manner in which they are dispersed around the room, I have suggested that the five of them be kept on at all times. That way, with the five of them on, we will be able to do a sensible level of recording. I would caution you that, with the five microphones on there should be no conversations going on around the table, thinking that your microphone is turned off. So, you can be recorded regardless what you say, of whom you say it, and regardless of how discreet you think your comments might have been otherwise.

We have had the opening statements from the Minister. Mr. Tobin has used up fourteen of his fifteen minutes. I believe when we recessed, he had just asked a question and had not yet gotten an answer. Am I correct?

MR. TOBIN: Yes, I believe so.

MR. CHAIRMAN: You were awaiting a reply?

MR. TOBIN: I was awaiting an answer, yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: What were you asking?

MR. TOBIN: If you want me to repeat the question here, sure.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would ask the officials, as well, to please read their name and title into the record for us before speaking.

MR. TOBIN: My question, I guess, to the Chairman, for the record, is specifically dealing with the request from Marystown, as to why they did not score high enough on the list that was recommended for approval, why they did not score high enough on whatever formula you use, to be considered for funding from this year's projects.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The primary reason, Mr. Tobin, that I can read from here - there may have been others, as well - basically, is the need and demand versus other areas and other projects that had submitted proposals within the Province. That is not to say -

MR. TOBIN: What is the need and demand?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The need, the waiting list, other factors, other statistical information, in relation to the need for seniors' housing in that area, that contribute to warrant a demand for social housing in that particular area.

MR. TOBIN: So what you are saying, then, is that the need and demand is not as great in Marystown as it was -

MR. NOSEWORTHY: In Marystown as in some other areas.

MR. TOBIN: Based on what?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Based on waiting lists and other statistics that are used, Census Canada Statistics and what have you.

MR. TOBIN: That is a waiting list for people -

MR. NOSEWORTHY: People going in.

MR. TOBIN: Would you have copies of waiting lists of all the applications?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: We would have information on the need and demand information on all these projects, yes.

MR. TOBIN: Would you be able to share that information with me if I dropped into your office some day?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Certainly. I could review not only the reasons in terms of need and demand, but other reasons as well, that I am not totally familiar with here in all these fifty-seven proposals, but certainly the technical people -

MR. TOBIN: I know there is information that you would not have off the top of your head, so I will probably drop into your office some day and then we can go through it.

My time has expired, and I will get back to it again, Mr. Chairman, in some other instance.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Is there anybody here who would have a question for the Minister on the estimates concerning Housing.

Mr. Short.

MR. SHORT: First of all, I guess I should thank the Minister for his announcement the other day. I am not necessarily very popular with my colleagues in Stephenville and Port au Basques because I got all twenty units for my district, for the Western Region.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Must be a Liberal district.

MR. SHORT: It is definitely a Liberal district.

The question I want to ask the Minister is: The senior citizens' complex in Stephenville Crossing has been working for some time, a number of years, I guess, on - I do not know if you would call it a pilot project - congregate housing. I believe there is now a move to, perhaps, implement a pilot project, the first one in the Province, in terms of congregate housing, Mr. Minister? Is that correct?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes. That project is in a backup position for next year, as it sits right now. That is being considered in that -

MR. SHORT: It is being considered?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes.

MR. SHORT: The only other question, Mr. Chairman, is: Has all the budgetary process, as it relates to housing, been completed now? Because I get an impression in talking about doing up units, for example in my district, that they do not have a budget in that area yet.

MR. GULLAGE: Where we are right now, we have announced - and as you know, I announced in the House of Assembly, I think it was last week - some of the units are being allocated this year on a cost-shared arrangement, obviously, with the Federal Government, CMHC. We still have 50 per cent of the budget with our partner, if you like, with CMHC, that has not been released by the Federal Government as yet, and we time our releases and approval, if you like, subject to the Federal Government approving their portion of the budget first. So, there is still 50 per cent of that CMHC budget that has not been finally approved, federally.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

Mr. Aylward.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Minister, I did not get what the Member for St. George's said about a backup project that is coming. Could you explain that? I did not understand it.

MR. GULLAGE: Well, every year when we approve the projects - and I stand to be corrected - in all the categories, in native housing, seniors, and all the social housing components, we also approve projects in a backup position, so that if, in fact, some of the approved projects do not proceed, for whatever reason, the backups are conditionally approved for the next fiscal year. So, we know that they are being approved, assuming the list of approvals for the current year do not proceed. Some of them could kick in and be done. But if, in fact, that does not happen, and all of the approved list gets completed, then they are simply backups for the next year and are automatically approved. Am I right in saying that?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes, and it also allows for early tendering and what have you for the following year.

MR. GULLAGE: That is right. That allows, of course, for early tendering for the following year. It gives advance warning to the project organizers and the applicants that they have a backup position for their units and can start planning and tendering.

MR. R. AYLWARD: They were all on your list last week, I believe, where they not?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, they were.

MR. R. AYLWARD: These senior units that are being built now with the federal/provincial money that was announced last week, are they a part of the Department of Health's plans to create more respite beds, or whatever you call them, these units or the beds that were to be created and will be subsidized by the Department or Health, however it is done now, as senior citizens' homes or whatever you call them?

MR. GULLAGE: These units are self-contained units strictly within the Housing Corporation's mandate. We are, as part of the revised mandate of the Corporation, looking at, and I think it is safe to say that we will be working with a joint outlook as far as the housing sector you are talking about is concerned. That is, delivering housing for seniors and the various levels of health care, working with Social Services and the Health Department. So, those three groups, if you like, Housing, Social Services and Health, working together to provide the various levels of care and housing for our seniors' population. So, we will be working more closely with them in the future, but, as it sits right now, these are self-contained units that are strictly within our mandate, as it presently is.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The Housing Department, announced some time ago a very important change - and I congratulate you on doing it - to the priorities list for acquiring a unit with Newfoundland Labrador Housing based on people who find themselves in a battered family situation. I know, you have tried to help me out on a couple of them already. There seems to be some confusion out there, especially in the case that I had, of who actually will qualify, as a person under this policy. What would be the criteria, I suppose, or a clear definition of the criteria for someone who is in a battered situation?

MR. GULLAGE: I think I would rather let that question go to the Chairman or some other official in the Corporation, because that is a day-to-day operational question, probably better answered by one of the officials.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Mr. Honeygold could probably elaborate, but basically all we require, in terms of a priority, is proof really, that the individual is in a battered situation, and we have referral from an appropriate social agency. That is basically all we require, and on that basis we will certainly treat that individual as a priority as long as units are available.

Usually we have a point scoring system, as you are aware, which is in place, but that essentially goes out the window in a situation where we have a victim of family violence. As long as there is a referral, as I say, from that agency we do not require any other criteria.

MR. R. AYLWARD: It's a good policy. I am glad you did it.

Are there any plans now - I know Mr. Tobin touched on this in his statement - to increase the privatization of your holdings now, say the Churchill Park area, maybe, or areas that could be privatized, or that could be getting market value rents, or maybe they are now. I am not sure what way it works here.

MR. GULLAGE: Those units are presently in the market sector right now. They do not serve a social housing need. I suppose you could say, in a sense, that they are at the lower end of the market and could fulfill a need for seniors in particular, a lot of these units, but they are in the market sector right now.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Are you planning on privatizing them? Is there a plan to sell off any of your properties?

MR. GULLAGE: That is really what I mentioned earlier, that as market conditions improve, and assuming that we do not want to retain them for social housing needs, we do not see ourselves being in the market sector as far as holding units like that are concerned.

AN HON. MEMBER: There is a project in Pleasantville this year.

MR. GULLAGE: Yes. Pleasantville, hopefully, is presently in the process of being sold this year.

AN HON. MEMBER: Certain portions of Pleasantville.

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, certain portions, not all of Pleasantville.

MR. R. AYLWARD: As blocks or as condominiums for the people living there who might get a shot at them? What type of plan do you have?

MR. GULLAGE: I think they are on the market right now as blocks. Am I right in saying that?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. R. AYLWARD: And the people living there will not necessarily get first shot at them, they will just continue to rent from the new owner?

MR. GULLAGE: That is the intent right now, yes.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Was there any consideration given to trying to get a condominium type operation, so that the people who are living there now might have a shot at it? I know it is difficult to try to do on an existing building.

MR. GULLAGE: The Chairman will answer that question.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The two projects we are currently looking at are two apartment complexes. Actually, there are sixteen units per building, I think, in Pleasantville, and these are commonly serviced and really are not appropriate for condominium sale.

I think it is fair to say, as the Minister pointed out, and looking at the privatization of the market rental portfolio, that certainly where the opportunity arises we will look at a condominium type approach. It may or may not be pursued. Obviously, in terms of a condominium approach, unless the condominiums are sold in block over some period of time, the Corporation is still involved in maintenance, and we are still involved in the particular project. If, for example, condominiums are not necessarily a popular form of housing, I think it is fair to say, even in the Urban Centre of St. John's in many instances, we would have to weigh the cost of us continuing to be involved, if, for example, only 25 per cent of the project were for sale versus the sale of 100 per cent of the units to some private developer for rental accommodations.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Have there been any discussions with the present tenants in these units to operate them on a co-op housing basis and sell them to them as a co-op housing unit? Has there been any discussion or request from the tenants, or any consideration given to that?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: We have not called for proposals for those projects at this point in time. Certainly, one of the options that the tenants would have would be to put together a co-op project, and indeed come forward with a proposal to the Corporation, which would then compete with any other proposal as well. But we have not advertised and called for proposals for those projects at this point.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Just one final question. We do not, and it is probably not unusual, have any salary details for the Housing Ministry of your Department. I do not think this is the first time, it has probably always been done, but is there any possibility of getting the comparison of employees this year as compared to last year, so we can get a look at who was laid off and who is going to be working, similar to what we would have with the salary details in all the rest of the departments?

MR. GULLAGE: That is no problem, is it?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: They are included with our administration. Basically, it is rolled in with our administration budget and the details you have.

MR. GULLAGE: It is in there?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: They are not isolated out, but certainly we could get you whatever information you wanted on that basis.

MR. GULLAGE: Would you not have that?

MR. R. AYLWARD: I cannot find anything in the 1991 -

MR. NOSEWORTHY: No, it is not specifically in the document, but we can provide that. That is no problem.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Thank you.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Barrett.

MR. BARRETT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I guess, first of all, I want to thank the people at the Housing Corporation for allocating the twelve units for senior citizens in Whitbourne based on need and priority. They have been fighting for them for many, many years, and they finally were successful this year, and I am sure that the people, the senior citizens, and particularly the Royal Canadian Legion, would want me to convey their gratitude in that respect.

The other thing, I guess - and it is not very often I get a chance to say it - as an MHA, I have a lot of contact with the people within the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation, particularly employees. I know, from time to time, we have to contact the executive branch, but a lot of times an MHA is dealing directly with the employees in the field, and I guess I would like to express my appreciate for their co-operation, particularly within the last two years. I found them to be very co-operative and always very willing to help. I know, sometimes they cannot accede to our requests as they have their limitations, but I have found the staff excellent to work with, and I would like to convey that, through the Chairman, to the rest of the staff.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Thank you, very much. I will pass that along.

MR. BARRETT: As you are probably well aware -

MR. R. AYLWARD: You are not getting anything for that. Don't think you are getting anything for that.

MR. BARRETT: I give credit where credit is due. If they were not doing a good job, I would be the first one to criticize them. People who know me, know full well that -

MR. TOBIN: Are we supposed to believe that?

MR. BARRETT: I would like to, I guess, zero in on the Bull Arm area, and some of the things that are happening in that particular area of the Province right now. We all know that the workers are going to be housed in accommodations on the immediate site, and there is going to be a very elaborate camp and all kinds of facilities. One of the immediate problems, starting already, seems to be the lack of social housing in that immediate area. A year ago, rent in Arnold's Cove, for example, for a two-bedroom apartment or even a house was $350 a month. It is my understanding now that there are some two-bedroom basement apartments in an apartment building there getting $1100 a month. I think we are probably going to be faced with pretty big choices if we do not start thinking about some kind of a programme for social housing, particularly for the people who are not working on site. People working on site are going to be making anywhere from fifteen to the upper limits in terms of wages, but we are still going to have a lot of people who are on minimum wages and people who are low income people, and that is going to create a big demand for social housing in that area. So, I would like to find out, I guess, if the Housing Corporation is working on any kind of a plan in that respect.

MR. GULLAGE: If I might just comment first, and then I will ask the Chairman to elaborate further. As you know, of course, Municipal and Provincial Affairs, along with the Housing Corporation, have been very, very involved with the whole Isthmus area, planning wise. When I say planning wise, I mean the Isthmus area, per se, in terms of planning with Municipal and Provincial Affairs. The Corporation, per se, has been very, very much involved with Arnold's Cove, for example.

I think the problems you are speaking about with housing and with those apartments, as it presently sits, are temporary. I believe the accommodations for the executive management crew will be constructed eventually and this is a temporary situation. We are aware of the possible impact - and that is exactly why we are in there early - upon the communities and the people who live in those communities for housing as demand increases, as we see more business come into the area, hopefully, other than offshore, directly related to construction and so on. We are going to see a lot of other business come into the area. I would think a lot of communities are going to grow significantly. So we are aware of that and, in the short term, we would hope we will not see too great a rise in rents, while we are catching up with the demand.

Maybe the Chairman could elaborate a little further on the social housing side of it.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: I think there are a couple of things here, certainly in terms of what we refer to as social housing, for those people who eventually would need assistance in order to pay rent in a given area. We would anticipate that most of the housing that would be needed in that particular area, hopefully, would not be in the social housing category, and may very well be housing which is provided, and the individuals who would require that housing in the area would be capable of paying the rents that are demanded there, based on the incomes and the jobs they would have associated with the particular project.

It is not our mandate, nor do we feel it should be, to get in and provide direct intervention in providing private market rental housing which could be provided by the private sector. We would certainly want to facilitate that in any way we can by way of providing land and labelling that land for a private developer to go in and provide rental accommodation. I believe Mr. Osmond can speak to the specifics of it, but there is one private developer who recently purchased some land from us and is looking at providing some mini homes, a substantial number of mini homes, in that particular area now, which will, hopefully, satisfy a good portion of the market there. We are looking at the area in terms of land development.

We will be monitoring the situation in terms of the need for social housing, of those which perhaps are without jobs in the area, undoubtedly coming into the Bull Arm area, Arnold's Cove, Sunnyside, and what have you, or even the St. John's area, transients, the transient population, which will, I think, gather there over time. They may not be skilled workers, they may not be able to find jobs, and consequently may be in a homeless situation. We certainly want to monitor that and provide social housing to meet those needs in accordance with the monies that are available throughout the Province, to provide and respond to social housing.

But we are hoping that the bulk of the need for rental and home ownership that will be sparked by that particular project will be met by the private sector and facilitated by the Housing Corporation in any way through land availability and whatever. Don, I do not know if you would like to comment further on that.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Would you identify yourself please first, sir, and step up to the microphone.

MR. OSMOND: My name is Don Osmond and I am Executive Director of Development with the Housing Corporation. I will just elaborate a little bit about what our chairman indicated with respect to some land development activity in Arnolds Cove. We did complete a physical plan of the area over the past year and a half and about two months ago we responded to a market demand that started to arise. In particular we were approached by some private entrepreneurs who wanted to build some mini-homes in the area and we responded to that by having a tender call for a fairly large parcel of land in the Arnolds Cove area which could accommodate up to about 100 mini-homes. These are modestly priced homes that - there are some, in fact, around here. The place that comes into mind first of all is Gander, or Happy Valley, Goose Bay. There is a fair sized congregation of them, but these are fairly modestly priced homes that hopefully can address the lower end in terms of housing, price, needs, and so forth. I understand that Mr. Hubert Hussey of (inaudible) Construction actually was the successful bidder, that he will be beginning work now very shortly, as soon as the summer breaks, and I understand he hopes to have some of the homes -

AN HON. MEMBER: He has started now already.

MR. OSMOND: - available there some time later this year.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Winsor.

MR. WINSOR: I just have a couple of questions. If I heard the Minister correctly he said that there will be some $21 million spent on repair of, I guess, the RAP programmes as it is generally known for some 2,000 homes which works out to -

MR. GULLAGE: $28 million actually.

MR. WINSOR: $28 million? It was $21 million you said.

MR. GULLAGE: $21 million was it. Maybe I am looking at the wrong numbers.

MR. WINSOR: $21 million for some 2000 homes, which works out to something in the range of a $10,000 per household. My involvement with the RAP programmes that I have seen of late, very few are coming in at that amount of $10,000 unless an individual chooses to do it himself. If it goes into the contractor field they will charge you $10,000 just to do an estimate.

MR. GULLAGE: Are you speaking of a rural area?

MR. WINSOR: A rural area, yes. $10,000 to do any substantial amount of work if you are talking about rewiring which is generally associated with an upgrading, water and sewer system, artesian wells in our area run in the range of $5,000 to complete them. I am wondering how you got the figure of $10, 000, it must be substantially less in other areas. Would that be the case?

MR. GULLAGE: The average is $10,000.

MR. WINSOR: Yes, so I am just saying -

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, it is substantially less.

MR. WINSOR: Is it?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes.

MR. WINSOR: I keep hearing figures for privatization throughout. Each time I look at something that Government intends to privatize I always see the debit side and the credit side, and just about everything that Government owns it owes more on it than it is actually worth. What is the total assets of the corporation in terms of things that you would sell, and what are the total liabilities?

MR. GULLAGE: Would you like to answer that Mr. Heath?

MR. HEATH: Yes, my recollection is that at the end of March we had about $404 million worth of assets. Our liabilities are $330 million, so we have an equity of about $70 million provided by the Government over the last twenty-odd years by capital contributions.

MR. WINSOR: So, that would be $404 million -

MR. HEATH: We are talking of things like Elizabeth Towers, the Churchill Square Apartments and that type of thing. That is $404 million.

AN HON. MEMBER: And land, of course.

MR. GULLAGE: And land. So $330 million. So, really there is not a lot in terms of what the Province has invested in them for the last twenty or twenty-five years, getting back $70 million. We have certainly spent a considerable amount. Would that not be the case, in maintenance?

MR. WINSOR: Would that be any real profit? I mean, I notice in difference you have $70 million, but in terms of -

MR. HEATH: The numbers I have given you are the net book values of the assets. They do not represent market value. A lot of those dollars are invested in areas such as social housing units, and we are not there to make a profit, we are there to provide a service.

MR. WINSOR: No, I am not talking about social, I am talking about the items that you would identify as saleable, the real estate that you could sell.

MR. HEATH: The market rental housing?

MR. WINSOR: Yes.

MR. HEATH: The market value is probably $40 million.

MR. WINSOR: What is owing on it?

MR. HEATH: I think it is in the order of about $25 million, is it? Let me just refer to -

MR. WINSOR: The reason I ask is I know at some time someone proposed the sale of Elizabeth Towers, and the market value of it certainly seemed to be much less than was owing on that. After $1.5 million being spent on it, I am told that the market value of the thing has not been substantially increased very much in the real estate world.

MR. GULLAGE: That is right. It is going to take a few years to get over the burden, if you like, of the debt we had to put in place to bring Elizabeth Towers up to an acceptable standard. That work is substantially complete now, and hopefully the market conditions will improve. We cannot forecast what time in the future, but that is a project that could possibly be sold.

MR. HEATH: We estimated, at the end of March, 1991, that the book value of the assets are $30 million, and the market value is $42 million. There are monies owing at the various banks of $23 million. If we sell all, we could come clean with a profit of about $18 million, if we sell at market values.

MR. WINSOR: So I would assume that would go to the tender system. Would you go through a real estate agent or would it have to be tendered because it is Government property?

MR. GULLAGE: We would call for proposals.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. GULLAGE: We would call for proposals for the sale of those projects.

MR. WINSOR: Yes. The area of RRAP is the area that Newfoundland and Labrador Housing has most of its involvement in in my district, and all too often I am finding that two things occur. Number one, that the work that was done twelve, thirteen or fifteen years ago is badly in need of repair again, that there was not an adequate job done or materials were used that were later found to be deficient, the wrong type of windows were put in, you know, glass against glass, and now the tenants or the owners have lots of difficulties with them. Each time they go to talk to the RRAP people, they are told that, as a rule of thumb, second RRAPs are not given, which means that these people have to live in, certainly, less than adequate housing for what appears to be a long period of time. I understand $20 million is about the same figure you had for RRAP last year, about $20 or $21 million.

In addition to that, I do not know if Newfoundland and Labrador Housing is aware of it, but the Department of Social Services last year used to engage in repairs on housing to a lesser degree. They gave word to all their clients that, effective that date, they would no longer be doing any major repairs, that now it was going to be done through Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, yet in conversation with officials at Newfoundland and Labrador Housing they indicate that no such thing is occurring. Is there a plan for Newfoundland and Labrador Housing to do the repairs that Social Services formerly did?

MR. GULLAGE: No, not at this time.

MR. WINSOR: Have there been discussions?

MR. GULLAGE: There have been some discussions held with Social Services on the matter, but there is no formal plan in place to assume responsibility for that at this point in time.

MR. TOBIN: That was supposed to be done.

MR. WINSOR: Yes, it was supposed to be. I know it is not your department, but last year Social Services stopped funding any type of housing other than to make it weather tight and water tight because as of April 1st of this year it was going to come under the auspices of Newfoundland and Labrador Housing.

MR. GULLAGE: Was the intent to access the RRAP programme?

MR. WINSOR: Basically to a degree, but there is a fundamental difference in what Newfoundland and Labrador Housing were doing and what -

AN HON. MEMBER: To get Social Services to help.

MR. WINSOR: But apparently some difficulty was encountered because the standards that Newfoundland and Labrador Housing have are much more rigid than what Social Services had. You know, you have a standard but Social Services approved it as long as it was livable.

MR. GULLAGE: We have to follow the code.

MR. WINSOR: And you follow the code whereas they did not. Now I am finding that they are not doing any of it and people cannot qualify for grants because they are too far down on the list and people are basically caught nowhere.

MR. TOBIN: If I could follow up on that for one moment, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Before you do that, Mr. Tobin, for the sake of Hansard the gentleman to the Minister's extreme right at the end of the table has not been properly identified when he was speaking, and Hansard is wondering if he would for his benefit repeat his name and title.

MR. HEATH: Yes, my name is Ed Heath, Vice-President of Finance.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you.

MR. TOBIN: Could I follow through on that for one minute, Mr. Chairman?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Just one supplementary. Mr. Winsor's time is up anyway.

MR. TOBIN: I just want to follow through on this for one minute. Officials from Newfoundland and Labrador Housing and officials from Social Services, when I was Minister of Social Services, got together and meetings were held and agreement was reached. Newfoundland and Labrador Housing resisted it somewhat, but the agreement was reached where the amount of money that Social Services spent every year came out of the Social Assistance vote, but the amount that was spent on housing would be transferred to Newfoundland and Labrador Housing because they would have the people. It was felt at Social Services at the time that the social workers in the field did not have any kind of expertise in determining what houses needed to be repaired or how much repair should be approved or anything else. So the decision was made to transfer the money to Newfoundland and Labrador Housing and your people would become the experts in the field to do it. I believe, sir, that you were one of the officials from Newfoundland and Labrador Housing who was involved in that meeting and agreed to it.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would like to remind Mr. Tobin and all other Members of the Committee that the questions can be asked only of the Minister. It is only if the Minister so directs it that the officials -

MR. GULLAGE: I might just attempt to answer that, Mr. Chairman. Let's go back to the start of your question. We have a terrific demand for the RAP programme. As a result of that demand and the waiting list in every region we were fortunate enough to get our allocation up above the per capita percentage, I think per capita is probably the highest need in the country. So the Member was talking about second time applicants and we have a problem with first time applicants quite frankly, so there is a great demand for the programme. As far as the social services clients are concerned, that situation you mentioned with the relationship that was supposed to take place some years ago had a demand in there from those social services clients for other than housing as well. They were looking at the furniture and other items that might be applicable. It was a very small amount of money. Peter, do you know the funding that might have been put in place but was not proceeded with?

MR. TOBIN: Well what we have done, Mr. Minister, we took the figures that were expended on housing over the past few years and taken out of the social assistance vote for that period of time. We allocated the money that was spent to Newfoundland and Labrador Housing and let them administer it because we felt that they had the expertise.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I think probably the Minister would like to speak to that or somebody on the executive group.

MR. HONEYGOLD: There is no doubt that the agreement in principal was reached with the officials of Social Services. The money has not been transferred from the department into the corporations hands, so that physical activity of inspection and repair under our direction as opposed to the Department of Social Services has not taken place.

One thing that the Department has done, that we are aware of, is they have reduced substantially their effort in carrying out, let us say, maintenance type repairs and normal type refurbishing of houses, and have referred clients with any of that refurbishing need to our regional offices for attention under the RRAP programme. Whereas, I think, in years prior to last in most of the offices we had a very substantial waiting list, I think you will find now that that waiting list is at a very manageable level, and a lot of those clients are being served. Social Services staff, themselves, are really only handling the, sort of, absolute emergencies for their clients now, where a chimney top blows off, something of storm type nature, a water line freezes or some such thing as that. Those are the sorts of things being done by Social Services, and they have, in fact, substantially reduced their level of expenditure in that area of repairs.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Crane.

MR. CRANE: First of all, I am not as fortunate as these two fellows, I did not get any units this year.

MR. TOBIN: You are the only Liberal left out.

MR. CRANE: I must be. I will have to come over with you, Tobin.

MR. WINSOR: You will have to come over to our side.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

MR. CRANE: Several times since I came here, Mr. Minister, you and I have chatted about the RRAP programme, and, as well, I had one meeting with the Chairman about a year and a half ago. In the Carbonear Office, people are still waiting about five to six years, from the time they apply. I have to smile, because people say to me, `How can I get a RRAP programme, my house is leaking?' I say, `If your house is leaking, it is no good to apply to the RRAP programme, because it will be gone anyway before you get it.' It is about six years, I think, they are behind right now.

When I talked to the Chairman about a year and a half ago, he said they were going to try and come up with more inspectors, but so far there have not been any. I wonder is there any possibility that there is going to be any improvement in the Carbonear Office, as far as the RRAP Programme is concerned.

MR. GULLAGE: Correct me if I am wrong, Mr. Chairman, but I think the greatest demand in the Province happens to be in that particular region of the Housing Corporation, and that is the reason for the long waiting list and the long delay in getting approvals, the terrific demand. As far as the figures are concerned, we are looking at $6 million?

AN HON. MEMBER: Six and a half.

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, $6.5 million of the allocation for RRAP is in what we call the Avalon area, and that is predominantly the area you are referring to.

MR. CRANE: What about, say, last year? What was spent there last year? Did you spend all the allocated amounts?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, all that was allocated. The amount? I am not sure about last year's.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: It was slightly less than $6.5 million, but it would be in that order.

MR. GULLAGE: In that order.

AN HON. MEMBER: You are talking about the Avalon, Whitbourne and the Carbonear area.

MR. GULLAGE: Yes. The largest portion and the greatest demand is actually in Carbonear, and the bulk of the RRAP funding is spent there.

MR. CRANE: I know, and people are still, I would say, waiting since 1985 and 1986, people who applied back five or six years ago. Do you see any hopes of that improving?

MR. GULLAGE: As I mentioned, at meetings with the Federal Minister, in debating the allocation of units and dollars to make a special case for the RRAP Programme, because of the terrific demand in Newfoundland, we were fortunate enough to get it up. I think the percentage, of the national budget, is in the 7 per cent range.

AN HON. MEMBER: Eight per cent.

MR. GULLAGE: Eight per cent. So we do very well per capita. But, you know, we have a terrific demand and every year we try to get as much as we can, as many dollars as we can, and I think we have done reasonably well. I would agree, the waiting lists are long and it is a difficult problem.

MR. CRANE: So, you do not see any improvement in the near future?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Could I just respond to that?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The outstanding RRAP enquiries we have throughout the Province, roughly now are about 4,000. The bulk, close to 1500, would be in the Avalon area. Certainly, if we can maintain that same level of 2,000 units over the next couple of years, I think we will be putting a substantial dent in the current number of enquiries that we have. As the Minister points out, we do spend every dollar that we get, no question about it. We hound the Federal Government, literally, for everything we can, not only from allocations, initially, but any money that is not spent elsewhere in the country. We do that. So, I think, if we can look forward to maintaining those levels over the next couple of years, I can see that the demand that we currently have will be substantially reduced.

MR. CRANE: Thank you.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Tobin.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have a few questions I would like to get cleared up. Again, on the rent increases that have taken place, I consider 10 per cent to be a significant rental increase. In this period of time it is going to be difficult for some people to make their payments, in my opinion.

I am just wondering who was responsible for these rent increases. Would it be the Vice-Chairman of Finance? Is he the person solely responsible for these recommendations to increase the rent?

MR. GULLAGE: I think the Chairman better answer that one.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: I would like to blame it on him, but no, he is not.

MR. GULLAGE: The Minister is ultimately responsible.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: The 10 per cent increase is really only in respect of a couple of projects. That is not in every project that we have. Basically, Elizabeth Towers, and there are some units in Churchill Square where we have not - in the case of Elizabeth Towers we have not increased the rents there since 1986. So, the 10 per cent increase really, on a four-year running average, is not a substantial increase and is in line with the current market. In the bulk of other projects, I mean, we are talking about 3 per cent, 4 per cent and 5 per cent increases depending on the project and depending on the location. The rental levels themselves are established by appraisers, our appraisal group with the Housing Corporation, professional and accredited appraisers who go out and do a comparative market analysis of rents in the market place, and really establish rentals in these units on that basis.

MR. TOBIN: Well, I am certainly not satisfied with your answer, Mr. Noseworthy. I think it is a real grab at the people who can least afford to pay. You have people who get no increase in their pensions, you have people there who have their salaries frozen for a year, who are renting from the Housing Corporation, and you, Sir, and your Corporation turned around and smacked a 10 per cent increase on these people. It is difficult to accept. In any case, there is not much I can do about that tonight.

I wonder if you could give me the status of the industrial park for Marystown.

MR. GULLAGE: Where?

MR. TOBIN: Marystown.

MR. GULLAGE: The status of the Industrial Park at Marystown.

MR. TOBIN: The funding to the Industrial Park at Marystown.

MR. GULLAGE: Don, would you like to respond to that.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

MR. OSMOND: I just wanted to make sure - I did not believe I needed any notes.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would remind the witnesses that we would still like them to state their name and their title each time.

MR. OSMOND: With respect to a proposed industrial park for Marystown, there has been a fair amount of analysis and so forth over the past couple of years in trying to put together a project that would work, both fiscally as well as from a marketing perspective. To date, we have not been successful in generating such a project. We have not given up on it, however, and we continue to include a general sum in our budget to allow us to take advantage of the opportunity if it does happen to come about.

The problem in the Marystown area is primarily a financial one. The cost of developing an industrial park far exceeds the market values that it would generate, and so therefore, the project requires a very substantial subsidy to actually be implemented. As the hon. gentlemen are aware, there is no subsidy programme available for industrial park development in the Province. So, therefore, we are still endeavouring to look at any new opportunities that might come up with a view to breaking even financially. Otherwise, we do not have the ability to develop any industrial land in the area.

I might add, however, that there is some industrial land that has been developed by the Town of Burin along the main highway through Salt Pond. We certainly have been watching that fairly closely and hopefully it will be successful, and it may provide a means or a model, perhaps, for the Town of Marystown.

MR. TOBIN: Are you promoting Burin?

MR. OSMOND: No, Burin is not one of our industrial parks, so we are not promoting it as such. Indeed, there are a number of other industrial parks in the Province that the Corporation does not have a financial interest in, and so, therefore, it does not promote them specifically either.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Chairman, I have one final question, and I do not know if I am asking it to the right Minister or the right department. I know the situation in Corbin has been addressed through Newfoundland and Labrador Housing. The question I would like to ask now is something that my friend from Bellevue would have as much knowledge on as I would, or more. Some years ago the people from Port Elizabeth were resettled from Port Elizabeth to Red Harbour, and they moved everything they had, their houses, I mean they just took them across and moved over there and basically started a new community. It was all done through the resettlement programme. That is not there any more. When all that came about and the government was involved in it, giving financial assistance and the whole thing when they moved over. The only problem was no one got the land which was supposed to be part of the package. The ownership of land, the outright grant and all of that was supposed to be part of the package. It was not supposed to be a financial burden on these people who came to Red Harbour, it was supposed to be done by the Government. Percy, are you familiar with that?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. CHAIRMAN: No, I am sorry. The questions must be asked of the Minister.

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. TOBIN: No, I have no -

AN HON. MEMBER: After the break I will tell you what is going on.

MR. TOBIN: Yes, I know what is going on. I know that -

MR. CHAIRMAN: I recognize that Mr. Tobin might be asking a question and he might very well want the answer but I am suggesting that if you want to ask questions you ask them of the Minister.

MR. TOBIN: Okay, I am asking the Minister. I do not know what the question is really to be honest with you. All I want to know is (inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. TOBIN: They want their land straightened out and Government has a responsibility to -

MR. GULLAGE: The right jurisdiction is Environment and Lands.

MR. TOBIN: Environment and Lands would have jurisdiction over it.

MR. GULLAGE: Yes.

MR. TOBIN: Would you have any difficulty supporting a request for that? There is no research. Where would the files be on the resettlement programme, in Environment and Lands?

MR. GULLAGE: Well I would suggest that would be a good place to start, and if they are not there I would suggest that they would -

MR. TOBIN: I raised this before. I remember back some time ago the department then was going to get the engineering students from university or Trades College, the surveying students, to go out and do that as part of their programme so the land could be identified. Mr. Chairman, this might not be important to some of my colleagues, but I can tell you that it is important to the people of Red Harbour who are down there and cannot get anything done. Newfoundland and Labrador Housing was just involved in another one.

MR. GULLAGE: That is quite true, but I think in the context that you are speaking of now after the fact where that has been done the right agency would be Environment and Lands.

MR. TOBIN: So we can be assured of your housing support in any way possible in order to help us get this matter resolved.

MR. GULLAGE: Well we can help you facilitate the problem and get an answer, yes.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you very much. That is my question, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Are we ready to go to the sub-heads?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Can I get one more question in first?

MR. CHAIRMAN: I will assume that you mean that literally. Mr. Aylward.

MR. R. AYLWARD: I remember in a life gone by seeing a very elaborate proposal come across some desks. A piece of land between Mount Pearl and Cochrane Pond was planned to be developed, I believe, into a very elaborate, exclusive housing project with two golf courses. I know it was cancelled at that time, but is there any thought of Newfoundland and Labrador Housing rejuvenating their project?

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, we have had that project on hold, I guess, for quite some time, quite some years I guess. The land is either crown land or has been purchased by the corporation. I forget the number of acres there.

AN HON. MEMBER: In the Watercrest Project -

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, he is speaking of Watercrest.

AN HON. MEMBER: - there are approximately 1,100 acres of land involved in that project.

MR. GULLAGE: Eleven hundred acres, and the corporation's position on it right now is that we would like to see that developed by the private sector predominantly with the corporation being a facilitator, carrying out the necessary planning to co-ordinate, assuming that it continues to be as it is right now, a project that would involve two golf courses and a housing development with large estate lots, predominantly, and other facilities that would tie into a project like that, in a stage where we would see the private sector being the main developer, and possibly, on a proposal call basis, see the private sector make proposals and ultimately be the developer or developers, if that happened to be the case. But our role would be one of planning and facilitating the project, per se.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Minister, would'nt you think that that, being the largest block of relatively cheap land that is left on the whole of the Avalon - St. John's - Mount Pearl area, that it would be more advisable for the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation to try to facilitate providing reasonable cost lots for people who might get to build homes, rather than golf courses and exclusive housing?

MR. GULLAGE: We presently are developing the Southlands, west of Mount Pearl, a combination of metro land and Mount Pearl land, as the boundaries are presently set. The number of lots would be what in the Southlands?

AN HON. MEMBER: Almost 5,000 units.

MR. GULLAGE: Almost 5,000 units. So, the land you are speaking of for residential development and keeping land costs reasonably low, which is, I guess, our role in this particular project, is being accommodated in the Southlands development. Watercrest was not seen in that context. It was seen as a project that could be developed whereby the sale of the estate lots would pay for the development of the golf courses. So, it was a different context entirely and really was not in the same area of planning for residential lots as Southlands had.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The sale of all your lots in the Southlands will pay for all the cost of Southlands also. That is not something new.

MR. GULLAGE: No, no! That is correct.

MR. R. AYLWARD: But still it would be a good project to land bank it, if necessary, for the future, to have reasonable priced housing, other than have some exclusive -

MR. GULLAGE: If our current position on it changed, that would be quite correct. I would think the demand, though, for lots that far out and away from Southlands, in addition to the numbers of lots we are developing in Southlands, which is a considerable number, we would be looking a long ways away. The thought with Watercrest again, unless we change our position on it, was that it would be a project similar, I guess, to Marble Mountain, in a sense that we would be promoting an obvious need. Surveys have been done showing that this region or this area could take as many as five golf courses. So, that need is there, and if we wanted to follow that thinking, from a tourism, recreation, sports standpoint, that it made sense to add golf courses to this region, then the way to do that, very cost-effectively, might be to develop it along with estate lots. But, there is no argument. We could change our position and bank that land, as we do land banking elsewhere throughout the Province. We could very well bank the land, that is quite true. It is banked right now, but it is banked for the reason I just stated. I am not suggesting that our position on it will never change.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Thank you.

MR. CHAIRMAN: You had a question, Mr. Winsor?

MR. WINSOR: Yes, within the subhead on page 257, if I read it right, 1.1.01, Provincial Revenue last year was budgeted at some $4,250,000. This year you are projecting that it is going to be down, if I am reading it right, by some $350,000-plus, despite the fact that you have had an increase of about 10 per cent in the number of units. What accounts for that change from last year to this year, considering you got a rate increase?

MR. GULLAGE: I think the Chairman could best answer that question.

MR. HEATH: I do not think a comparison of the two numbers is really relevant. The first number you referred to, I think, is $4.2 million. That represents accumulated surpluses over the previous three to five years, and primarily results from us not requiring the full grant voted to us by the House. In addition, there were extraordinary profits made from sales of some of our block lands on Elizabeth Avenue and the like. I think, for the past three years, as a result of those extraordinary profits and as a result of more volumes in sales activities in land, particularly in the St. John's area, this has generated those additional monies that we regularly fund to the Government. When we went through that budget exercise for last year and we identified that $4 million as being excess surplus, as we had acquired, and we were able to return that to the Government. Similarly, this year we have identified, over the past couple of years, an accumulated surplus of $3.5 million. As of right now, March 31, 1990, we have no surpluses remaining, providing when this year end is complete and when our books are all added up and balanced, that we have remained within budget. If we have remained within budget, that will clean out the surpluses completely, meaning next year that number could very well be zero.

MR. WINSOR: So, at this point in time, Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, then, makes a profit after it pays the mortgages on all its properties? It runs at a profit, does it?

MR. HEATH: No. The net loss of this Corporation, which I call a loss, is really a subsidy, a grant from the Government. It is primarily to run the subsidized housing operations, which, by its nature, has to lose money. We project that in the next fiscal year the Province's share of those programmes, those social housing programmes primarily, will cost the Province $16 million. The Federal Government, by comparison, would be contributing three times that, $50 million. The total cost of the social housing programmes would be in the order of $50 or $60 million.

That surplus is just monies - let me back up. When we finish, the next year end, and we find that because heating oil does not increase as much as we think, because we apparently may make more money as a result of rents, we may not need that $16 million. At the end of the year, when we complete the year and go through the final year end process, we may come in under budget. If we come in under budget, the difference by which we come in under budget at the time gets recorded and put into our surplus account to be refunded at a later time to Government, when and if they so require.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Tobin.

MR. TOBIN: Just a quick question. Is the same amount of funding in place this year for student employment as last year?

MR. GULLAGE: Pardon?

MR. TOBIN: Is the same amount of funding in place this year for student employment as last year?

MR. GULLAGE: I do not think it is quite the same. We are down significantly.

MR. NOSEWORTHY: We have, indeed, had to cut, as a result of our budgetary exercise this year, monies for student employment, co-op programmes, for example, that were formally sponsored by the Corporation. We are not quite certain by how much it will be down, but certainly our student employment is likely to be down significantly this year.

MR. TOBIN: So, will there be some activity then? For example, where the students go around doing maintenance, cutting grass and all that, will that be taking place basically the same as last year?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: Hopefully our maintenance programme will not be affected very seriously. We had, I think, last year, maybe twenty students or so at head office in accounting and some of the administrative areas. Certainly, that is the part of the programme that will be -

MR. TOBIN: So, are you saying there may be some cuts in maintenance for student employment?

MR. NOSEWORTHY: We are hoping to maintain a level of maintenance equivalent with last year, but there may be some reductions. Hopefully, we will be able to maintain a substantial programme. Where they will be mostly affected is at the head office, the twenty or so that we had there.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much. I would like to direct your attention to the subheads on page 257.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Chairman, just before you get to the subheads, I think that probably you have been more negligent in this than anybody. I am sure that you did not notify the Minister that he was responsible for the coffee and donuts.

MR. GULLAGE: I was not notified.

MR. TOBIN: So, probably if the Chairman -

MR. CHAIRMAN: It was as much a surprise to the Chair as to anybody else, that we did not have any coffee or tea, or as much as a kettle. So, when we take our coffee break we are going to have to take it without our coffee.

MR. GULLAGE: If you would like to order some in, Mr. Chairman, I would be glad to pay for it.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Would you be so kind as to do that for us? The Minister says order in some coffee and charge it up to his department.

MR. TOBIN: Coffee and donuts.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The meeting will be over by the time it gets here.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The subheads on page 257.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Chairman, I note, when we are doing our subheads now, we are going to vote on $12.9 million. I am sure the Housing Corporation operates on more than $12.9 million? Is there a reason why that cannot be broken down into subheads, like the rest of the department or the rest of all departments?

MR. GULLAGE: Why is it shown as a global figure?

MR. R. AYLWARD: (Inaudible) reporting $12 million in the Housing Corporation. Where is the administration? What do you spend it on? I mean, we are just voting on -

MR. GULLAGE: That is the amount that flows in from the Province, the initial subsidy or grant or whatever you want to call it. At the end of the year we are required by the Government to return a surplus. That is just a budget exercise, if you like, as the Vice-President of Finance explained. Hopefully, that surplus will exist by way of savings in economies and so on. I think all years it does, does it not? I do not think we have had a year when we have not returned some dollars to the Province.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes, I realize that, but I mean -

MR. GULLAGE: Because out of the past number years we have always returned some surplus.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes, I know that and (inaudible).

MR. GULLAGE: It is simply a global figure and it is broken out into sub-heads of the corporation.

MR. R. AYLWARD: And I know the corporation gives out an annual report every year that shows more expenditures, but what I am saying for the purposes of the Committee and for the Budget purposes couldn't we have a breakdown like everyone else?

MR. GULLAGE: A breakdown of the $12 million and where it goes throughout the corporation.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Write down everything the housing spends. I do not know why it is not done.

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, maybe Ed should speak.

MR. HEATH: I think first of all some of the detail that you might be looking for, to show, indicate or give you some reassurance that we are responsible and accountable is in our annual financial statements. We do present an annual financial report that is audited by the Auditor General, and that is available to everybody.

The reason primarily why those numbers are not broken out in any kind of detail within these estimates is simply that it is just not practical from an administrative point of view. As you have sub-heads you have to draw monies from the Government on those sub-heads specifically. Right now for us to operate reasonably efficiently we simply draw it on one amount. We request from the Government one amount every month, one twelfth of that Budget amount. They, in their books, simply issue one cheque and charge it to one account. If we had, for example, as many accounts as we had within our own books within the Government organizations we would have to draw money in that same manner, it would mean that we would have no flexibility to move monies from one sub-head to another, we would have to go through special warrants. It would mean that all revenues that come to this corporation would have to be deposited, as I understand it, directly in the Government's bank account. We would not have the power to receive and credit funds within our own account. It would be an administrative nightmare for us to have individual sub-heads. That is not to say that we cannot provide committees and individuals such as yourself (inaudible) the kind of detail, but not on that one.

MR. R. AYLWARD: It is not only housing; I would like to see it for Farm Products, I would like to see it for Newfoundland Hydro. If you can get a financial statement and someone can read it you are okay, but most of us trained monkeys are not up to that yet.

AN HON. MEMBER: I thought you were trained!

MR. R. AYLWARD: We are not trained well enough then.

I would certainly like to see it for all those Corporations.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. CHAIRMAN: Back to the sub-heads on page 257.

On motion, sub-head 1.1.01 carried.

On motion, total heads, carried.

MR. CHAIRMAN: We will now turn to the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs. I would ask the Minister to release his officials.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

We will have a break when the time comes.

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, can I get a minute to change hats?

MR. CHAIRMAN: We thank the Minister's officials for coming. We thank them for their indulgence and their co-operation, and we would now ask that they be replaced with the officials from the other department, and the Minister change hats.

We will begin now to review the estimates of the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

Recess

MR. CHAIRMAN: The meeting will now come to order.

We are about to review the Estimates of the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs. I will ask the Minister to introduce his officials, and once he has done that, he can begin his opening statement. Procedures are the same as before. The Minister will have fifteen minutes, and the Member from the Official Opposition will have fifteen minutes to reply, and that will be Mr. Tobin.

Mr. Minister.

MR. GULLAGE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, I would like to introduce the Deputy Minister, Mr. Clarence Randell, to my left; Mr. Art Colbourne, at the far end, the Assistant Deputy Minister of Municipal Support Services and Support and Fitness; Felix Croke, who is there next to Art, the Acting Director of Financial and General Operations; of course, Don Peckham who is the Assistant Deputy Minister - Finance, Planning and Administration; and Frank Manual, of course, the Chairman of the Canada Games Park Commission. Frank is also Chairman of the Residential Tenancies Board and the Pippy Park Commission, which are under separate Ministries.

I will read my opening statement first.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I apologize for interrupting, but before you do that, Mr. Minister, you all have a copy of the Minutes of the last meeting. Are there any errors or omissions.

MR. WINSOR: Yes, in Section 1 they list the people who were there. I seem to recall being there. Perhaps I was not, but I seem to recall being at the last meeting.

MR. CHAIRMAN: That omission is noted. Are there any further errors or omissions?

Would somebody move, then, that the Minutes be adopted as amended?

On motion, the Minutes as amended, adopted.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Minister, you may continue with your opening statement.

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, I will commence by highlighting the major items in the Estimates of the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs. The total estimates for the Department are $168,474,300, gross expenditure. There are revenues in both current and capital account totalling $22,323,100, leaving a net expenditure of $146,155,200. These figures include the Canada Games Park Commission expenditures. There are 557 permanent positions in the Department operating all divisions.

Mr. Chairman, the Department is comprised of three main branches, and it's delivery service embodies a number of regional offices to ensure the best delivery of services to the municipalities, recreation commissions, youth groups, cultural and historic resources organizations, etc., in the most efficient manner possible.

The Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs is responsible for matters relating to local government, municipal financing, real property assessment, urban and rural planning, development control, engineering for water and sewer, road construction and reconstruction, and co-ordination of emergency planning to municipalities. It is also responsible for the office of the Fire Commissioner, which is responsible for fire prevention, suppression, and regulation and training throughout the Province. It administers the operations of the St. John's Fire Department, which delivers fire services to the North East Avalon Region.

The Department is responsible for amateur sports, fitness and recreation activities, as well as youth services, historic resources, and culture. It is responsible for communication policy for the Province, as well as the operation of the Canada Games Park Commission.

The Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation, as I indicated, is a separate entity. That is really redundant now, as it was dealt with earlier.

The activities of the Department are broken down within activities into the following main categories: Executive and Support Services; Services to Municipalities; Assistance and

Infrastructure; Municipal Protection Services; Recreation Services and Facilities; Cultural and Historic Resources; Youth; and Communications.

Mr. Chairman, I will now elaborate in more detail the responsibilities of the Department following the order of activities which I have just outlined.

Executive and Support Services; this activity mainly provides the funding for the operation of the executive, administrative, accounting and other financial support services for the whole department.

Services to Municipalities: Funding in this area totalling $23,007,300 covers the provision of engineering services for water and sewer installation, street reconstruction, and paving programmes, the provision of town planning for municipalities, the provision of assessment services to municipalities with real property tax, the provision of development control services to areas on protected roads within municipalities, and the maintenance and operation of industrial water systems. Funding is also provided to support the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Municipalities, and the Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Municipal Administrators.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to provide some details on some of these services. Firstly my department has regional offices established for the following regions: Labrador, Western, Central and Eastern. The idea of these offices is to have the delivery of services provided in the areas more close to the communities and groups served by the department. It also provides for a better liaison between the department and the municipalities and will provide for a more timely and meaningful response to municipalities and organizations as departmental employees in the regions can get to know the municipal needs of towns, cities, local service districts, sports and recreation organizations and so on in the region more intimately than could be done directly through the head office alone. These regional offices have been given a considerable amount of authority and latitude to manage the responsibilities within their jurisdictions.

The Real Property Assessment Division operates under a separate Act and has responsibility for the assessment of real property in all municipalities with a real property tax except the City of St. John's. At present some 250 communities have adopted a Real Property Tax and the division has assessed approximately 175,000 properties throughout the Province. This division must continuously conduct reassessment in these municipalities on a rotational basis.

To assist the division in its ever growing task my department has purchased a computerized MASS appraisal system which when installed by the end of the current year will fully automate the assessment process. Using this new system my department will be able to catch up with the backlog of reassessments and new assessments required to be done and over time the reassessments which are now conducted every six to seven years will be able to be conducted more frequently, probably every three years. This will be a tremendous benefit to the municipalities as they will be able to be much more current in their assessed values and it will eliminate the need for major increases in the taxation value of properties which occur every six years due to the large amount of inflation which normally occurs during such a long interval. We also have the advantage of allowing the municipalities to earn more revenue through the adoption of an earlier reassessment cycle without having to necessarily increase the mil rate.

Within the services to other municipalities grouping is a Municipal Inspection Division. A small staff of eight inspectors are available on a continuous basis to all municipalities to undertake internal audits when there are financial problems within the municipalities and to offer them advice where they require it for financial planning or to advise them on general municipal procedures. This service is especially helpful to new councils when they are not used to the procedures and operations of councils.

There is the development control section within the Urban and Rural Planning Division which is responsible for the establishment and monitoring of policies for the control of the Province's main highways and other areas which are placed under this control. This ensures that proper planning is adhered to in areas which are not incorporated which may be near municipalities or in other areas where growth activity is taking place.

There is a Local Government Division with a staff of five people. This group provides general support to the municipal operations sector of the Department and provides advice to the regional managers on managers of departmental programmes and policy.

Mr. Chairman, there is also an Urban and Rural Planning Division. This division is staffed by professional town planners and supported by planning technicians and other administrative staff. The role of this division is to provide town planning advice, to provide municipal plans for municipalities and to advise them on various planning policies and regulations which may be used within the individual municipalities. The department also occasionally hires town planning firms to supplement the work of the Urban and Rural Planning Division and cost-shares the development of town plans with some municipalities through this process.

There is an Engineering Services Division of the Department. This Division is responsible for administering the municipal water and sewer, street reconstruction and paving programmes of the Department. Within this Division also is a Planning and Design section and an Industrial Water Services section.

The Planning and Design Group is responsible for reviewing the plans and specifications of water and sewer projects which are approved for municipalities throughout the year, and the Industrial Water Services Division is responsible for the operation and maintenance of the Government owned industrial water systems, which have been installed to service certain industrial enterprises throughout the Province in some municipalities.

Mr. Chairman, within the services to municipalities, my Department provides funding for the St. John's regional water facility at Bay Bulls. I would like to note, while this activity is called the St. John's regional water and sewer servicing activity, it is really the North East Avalon regional water system, as it provides services to St. John's, the Goulds, Mount Pearl, Paradise, Wedgewood Park, and Conception Bay South.

Grant funding is also provided for community water services. This is separate from the other capital water and sewer installations. It is designed to provide domestic water and sewer services to local service districts and is comprised of smaller type systems. Funding is also provided to assist municipalities with the development of solid waste management facilities. Mr. Chairman, this year some $12 million has been provided for the development of water and sewer facilities pursuant to a Federal/Provincial cost-shared agreement for communities in Northern and Coastal Labrador.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to announce that this year Government completely reformed the municipal grant system. For the first time, grants to municipalities are made available using a formula which introduces the concept of assessing economic needs and taking into account the community's ability to generate its own revenues, as factors in determining the amount to be made available to them. Previous structure embodied a straight line formula which saw money going to all municipalities regardless of the need. This new formula, in addition to changing that to a more equitable situation, also puts Government, for the first time, in control of this portion of the budget. Under the previous formula, municipalities received funding in accordance with the level of their taxation rates, and, therefore, if they increased their rates it meant additional funding was required from Government. Under the new formula Government sets the total amount to be paid to municipalities, and this amount is distributed according to the formula, and, therefore, puts Government in control of the total amount in any given year.

Assistance and Infrastructure Support: Mr. Chairman, this section provides funding for the water and sewer programmes. The amount provided in the estimates is the amount required to meet the repayment on the debt, which is financed through the Municipal Financing Corporation when the projects are completed. Some $55 million is available to cover the debt, both principle and interest payment, for road construction and paving programmes.

Provision is also made for special assistance to municipalities. This $1.5 million is provided to enable my Department to respond to requests of the municipalities for special assistance when they are in dire need. It covers such items as special assistance to meet administrative and operational overheads, when there are insufficient revenues generated within the town during the year. This fund is managed by a departmental finance committee which reviews all requests for this kind of assistance and recommends whether or not funding should be made available, and the amount.

Mr. Chairman, funding has been made available for regional co-operation initiatives. This funding, essentially, is designed to be used in conjunction with Government's amalgamation initiatives. The expenditure of this funding is allocated upon recommendation to Cabinet for items designed to support the amalgamation initiatives.

A considerable amount of funding is also provided for the statutory grants to municipalities. This year, some $47 million will be granted to municipalities under the Municipal Operating Grants and Adjustments Programme.

Municipal Protection Services: Mr. Chairman, funding in this section covers emergency measures planning and response funding to municipalities under the Joint Emergency Preparedness Programme which is cost-shared with the Government of Canada. It also provides funding for fire protection services and the operation of the Fire Commissioner's Office. Funding is also provided to assist municipalities with the acquisition of fire fighting vehicles and apparatus.

Recreation Services and Facilities: This programme provides for the encouragment and financial support of recreation, fitness and amateur sports for all ages throughout the Province. Support services are provided to municipalities and sport and recreation organizations, by the Department, and, as well, grant funding is made available directly to these organizations to support in the development of approved activities.

The major activities of this service sector include: Support to community groups in the amount of $3,080,900; and community sports facilities, $1,743,500. A considerable amount of money is spent on the operation of community sports facilities, such as the recreation centre at Torbay and St. John's, swimming pools at Corner Brook, Happy Valley - Goose Bay, and Gander, and the operation of the recreation centre in Happy Valley - Goose Bay.

Mr. Chairman, included in this area is the operation of the Canada Games Park Commission. The Province provides an expenditure of $900,000 for the operation of the facility.

Cultural, Historic Resources and Youth: This service includes the responsibility for maintaining and promoting public awareness of our heritage and cultural resources, through support for the development and operation of museums, archives, historic sites, arts and culture centres and the provision of a secondary touring circuit. Financial support is also provides for Youth Services, the Public Libraries Board, the Heritage Foundation, the Arts Council, and the Art Procurement Programme.

Mr. Chairman, my Department spends a considerable amount of money in the operation and maintenance of the arts and culture centres, which are located throughout the Province. In addition, funding is provided, by way of grants and subsidies, to support the development of arts and cultural activities throughout the Province.

Almost $6 million is provided to support the Newfoundland Public Libraries Board which has libraries scattered throughout the entire Province. Funding is also provided to the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council. Government has increased its traditional level of support for this area.

Funding is also provided for the operation and development of historic sites. Mr. Chairman, there have been very exciting developments in this area over the last several years, the most notable being the research into the vast whaling activities at Red Bay, Labrador. This activity is ongoing and the research should be concluded by the end of this year. My Department is also responsible for the operation of the provincial archives. It also provides grant funding to the Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Funding for Youth Services is also provided within this area. My Department has an active Youth Services Division which provides support services to many youth organizations throughout the Province. Funding is provided directly, by way of grants and subsidies, to various youth activities throughout the Province.

Mr. Chairman, this is the last section of the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs - you might say, thank heavens - and is the responsibility for the Communications Policy and Development for the entire Province. This Division is responsible to oversee the regulation and control of communications within the Province. It provides technical advice to Government in the formulation of its provincial policy from time to time.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my opening statement. I trust that the details will be of assistance to the Committee and will have answered some of the questions members may have. I would certainly be happy to answer any questions now.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome any questions.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

I will now turn it over to Mr. Tobin.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to start off by saying to the Minister, and I do not say it in a vindictive way or anything like that, but I think that the speech you just gave is probably the worse one that has ever been given in this building, and whoever wrote it should at least get a week off without pay.

Having said that, I do not intend to spend fifteen minutes responding to what the Minister said. I have some questions that are probably going to get into my fifteen minutes, Mr. Chairman. I am surprised that the Minister did not inform us tonight as to how much the capital funding will be for water and sewer projects this year. I do not know why the Government is sitting back and not making the announcement. I would suspect it is going to be similar to the way the provincial roads were done, and that is, pork-barrelled to the extent we have never seen before, and you are waiting for the House of Assembly to close in order to do it, so you will not get the flack that you so justifiably deserve on it. I think that that is the reason, or there is no money.

I have had the opportunity to speak to some contractors who are extremely concerned about the lateness of the projects being put in place. I say that sincerely, they were concerned about it. I really think that the time has come for you to make the announcement on the water and sewer applications to be approved.

When you talk about the grant structures, what system is going to be put in place this year in terms of water and sewer and roads, and do you have to spend all your money first before you get to the roads or can councils apply for the roads up front and get the funding without having to interfere with the water and sewer programme?

I have been hearing, by the way, that water and sewer will be the first priority, and by the time it gets done if all the money is not spent then that is going to be what is left for roads. I do not know if that is true or not. I will ask you to comment on that.

The grant structure: I don't think you should take any amount of significant pride in the grant structure. Every council in the Province is basically having a difficult time with it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: What was that?

AN HON. MEMBER: Lambast him.

MR. TOBIN: Lambasting the Minister, yes. I would also like the Minister to tell us how much it cost to have Ernst and Young do this tax grab on the people of the Province? How many millions in total? How much was paid to have Ernst and Young show you how to take something close to $10 million away from the tax payers in the municipalities of the Province? I would like to hear a response to that.

On the amalgamation issue, I want to get into that in great detail, Mr. Minister, and I think today we have done the bigger one in this area, but I am talking about the ones in the rural part of the Province, and I think particularly in my own District like Lewins Cove, Port au Bras, Fox Cove, Mortier and Spanish Room, what is going to happen to these and when they can expect it because they too are beginning to get frustrated as to what is going to happen and when they are going to move, and there is nothing really taking place there.

One other question I would like the Minister to answer for me is when will we see the announcement of the First Regional Services Boards in this Province? When can we expect to hear something about that, will it be sooner rather than later? That is a question I would like to have an answer on tonight, if we would hear something on the structure of the Regional Services Boards.

There are a couple of other issues that I would like to raise with the Minister. I have difficulty with the way the Government has approached certain aspects of it. One, Mr. Minister, is the reduction of the electrical subsidy programmes to councils. I met with the Marystown Town Council the other night and they told me that in a meeting with you and your officials on April 1st I think was the date, they had reference in it as Fool's Day so it had to be April 1st, and they were told by you that there would not be any reduction in the grant structure and that has taken place, and their budget has already been submitted for approval.

The other thing that I was told the other night by the Marystown Town Council is since they submitted their budget you have increased the cost of industrial water supply to the tune of I think it is between $45,000 and $50,000 extra for the Marystown Town Council. I think that is extremely callous for the department or whoever is responsible to do that in the middle of the year. I think if you are going to do something like that, Mr. Minister, it should be done when Councils are setting up and preparing their budget, not after they are approved. And the situation, if I understand the Municipalities Act, is that after the 31st of March or something you cannot increase the taxes or whatever the situation is. So the Town of Marystown finds itself in a difficult situation on that issue. Since the budget has been submitted to you for approval Government has taken away or cost them an additional $50,000 plus, and I think that is wrong. That should not be allowed to happen.

Crown corporations: I will read from, Mr. Minister, I am sure you are familiar with it, it is called the policy manual for the Liberal Party entitled 'A real change' and I have some ad stuff taken out during the election campaign that I would like to reference as the night goes by, by certain candidates. But one, Mr. Chairman, is the tax base received: crown corporations and agencies would be required to make financial contributions to the Municipalities equal to the tax paid by the private corporative sector. I am wondering if he could tell me if that has been implemented, because the Marystown Town Council, who received $35,000 grant in lieu of taxes from the Marystown Shipyard which is a crown corporation, had been notified just a few weeks ago that that is to be eliminated.

I am just wondering if you are familiar with this? I do know there were commitments made by certain candidates in the election, based upon the 'real change' Liberal policy, in that regard.

The other thing I would like for you to comment on is: the Government would undertake immediately - and you are elected two years now - to establish a provincial water and sewer corporation that would take over and continue to operate all existing water and sewer facilities, and, over a period of years, build and expand new ones to areas now not served, in much the same way that Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro expanded electrical services to all parts of the Province under the Rural Electrification Programme. In this way, many people in all parts of the Province would, as they do now for electrical power, pay basically the same rate for water and sewer services. The water and sewer corporation could, like Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro, borrow to build the systems to serve the presently unserved areas of our Province, and repay those monies from its overall cash flow.

So, I would like for the Minister to tell me how he has set up that committee, and, if he could, tell me who is on the Board of Directors of that committee that was supposed to be set up in the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs. I would also like for the Minister to give me the details of how he structured that.

Mr. Chairman, there are other areas that we will get into, I am sure, as the time progresses. Do you want to break?

MR. CHAIRMAN: We will have the coffee delivered to the gentlemen's tables.

MR. TOBIN: Sure. No problem.

There are other areas that we want to talk about. Particularly, if I may, are the grant structures that have affected - as a matter of fact, when I met with the Marystown Town Council on Monday night - I used that as an example - I was informed by the council that their reduction is to the tune of probably a little in excess of $200,000, and the Town of Marystown cannot absorb that kind of loss.

So, that is basically what I have got to say in my opening remarks. I am sure I will have time to ask some questions, if the Minister wishes to respond. If he does not, he will get no coffee. Probably you should give the Minister a break to have a coffee, Mr. Chairman. It would be only fair.

MR. CHAIRMAN: No, I prefer that the coffee be brought to the tables.

MR. TOBIN: I think the Minister (inaudible).

MR. CHAIRMAN: That is right. Mr. Minister.

MR. GULLAGE: Were those questions given to me, or a statement?

MR. CHAIRMAN: That was the time that was allocated for his opening statement.

MR. GULLAGE: Okay. So, the questions come now.

MR. CHAIRMAN: He choose to use it to ask questions. If the Minister would like to take the time to respond to them, you may, by all means.

MR. GULLAGE: I took it as a statement, but luckily I wrote most of it down, I guess, if that is the way you want to handle it. So, what will I do, start with the first one and go right through?

MR. CHAIRMAN: That would be entirely up to you, Sir, if you wish to respond to the questions, or if you want to just make a general comment and we will throw it open to more questions.

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, the first question was, how are we going to handle the capital works this year, and water and sewer allocations versus road allocations. Well, we are treating the capital works the same as we have in previous years, in that there are still two distinct areas. I will be proceeding to Government, if you like, with a recommendation that will see a sum of money in total for water and sewer and a sum of money for roads. So, we do not intend to focus on one to the detriment of the other, if that was the question.

I do not know what Government will decide in the final numbers, but our intent is to proceed to a recommendation that would include an allocation for both water and sewer and roads. So, there would be two separate components in the recommendation.

The member mentioned the grants and the fact that every council on the Island had a problem. I do not know how he arrived at that. I guess he maybe canvassed 500 communities and came up with that statistic, but I would like to say that I do not believe that is so. I will try to explain, if I can, some of the problems with the grants programme. The problems are not with the grants programmes, per se, the grant side of it. They are with the debt portion -

MR. WINSOR: The same thing.

MR. GULLAGE: - which are debt subsidies, if you like. A lot of communities that were being impacted on the positive side by the grants portion, per se, if I might say it that way, the four components that are there, positively, saw a net negative impact after adjustments were made for subsidies on debt.

MR. WINSOR: Substantial! Substantial!

MR. GULLAGE: For the first time a lot of these communities who previously were asked to pay little or nothing towards their debt, the fact that they were now asked to pay a portion of the existing debt in the corporation meant that even though they had a positive impact on the other side of the grants, if you like, ended up with a negative impact. So it has created some problems. I must say the grants programme that we analyzed over some fourteen or fifteen months, equalization component, incentive component, roads and population being the main factors, that which I refer to as the grants programme, I have to say, Mr. Chairman, has shown a redistribution of money that has proven to be very successful because what we have done - and I guess the proof of the success of it is the fact that substantially all the urban areas have been affected - we have caused a shift in dollars away from the urban areas, and I am mostly referring to communities that have populations in excess of 2,000. It is really not an urban area, but let's say 2,000 and above and there are about forty-six of them. Almost all of them were impacted to some degree. As you rise in population it is kind of evident that you grow to be a certain size because you had something going for you other than a residential tax base. It might be a fish plant or it might be a paper mill, or it may be that your service area for a given region, like St. John's is obviously, whatever the reason you grew to be a certain size. So that gave you an advantage because you have an industrial business tax base as well as a residential tax base.

The grants programme saw a shift in dollars away from those more affluent communities, if you like, towards the rural communities that needed to be assisted with their revenues because most of them had very little going for them except a very limited residential tax base. I believe, and I think I speak for my executive as well that we have implemented a very good grants programme. I am not saying it is perfect. As a matter of fact I have invited the Federation of Municipalities to have input throughout this year and, I guess, in future years; input in the sense that if they have suggestions to make where we may make improvements, if improvements are warranted we will certainly have a look at it. We do not pretend that like any Government programme -

MR. TOBIN: There is a Liberal on the Regional Services Board. Are you going to listen to him?

MR. GULLAGE: Nothing is perfect, Mr. Chairman, and we do intend to continue to monitor and see how it is affecting the municipalities. But the programme is in effect and like I say we will continue to monitor it. I think mainly it has been very successful. I will say though that the debt, which is only $2 million, the fact that we have asked municipalities to pay something towards the existing debt on the books and the capital corporation, has caused negative impact, perceived as negative impact because a lot of them for the first time are asked to pay something on the debt where previously the vast majority were paying little or nothing.

The Regional Services Board, the question was: when will we implement the first one. We put the legislation in place because we saw several situations in the Province that were sort of obvious, I guess, and I can give you some examples: Grand Falls-Windsor, Bishops Falls currently with a committee in place. They saw the possibility if they wished, if the need was there, particularly if we get into large expenditure of funds for a treatment plant or whatever it takes to bring the services up to an acceptable standard. If we end up with debt sharing arrangements, Federal-Provincial-Municipal, some sort of a legal entity, obviously more than a committee may be required to fund and arrange for such cost-sharing. That is an example and you can apply that example to any community. Obviously you all know the details of the Regional Services Legislation. We do not want to impose that legislation on a given area. Obviously it is available to be used. There may be situations, I cannot see any right now, there may be situations where the Government may want to say: in spite of the communities not wanting the legislation that it makes sense to put it there. I do not foresee any like that, but to give you another example we may have a service that has been used by three, four or five or more communities in a region and yet is being maintained and operated by only one community because the service happens to sit in that community or happens to be maintained and operated by that community. In fairness, if the other communities absolutely refused to pay any share, the Government may very well want to put a board in place and insist that on a per capita basis or some other reasonable basis for cost-sharing, that they all pay into a service that they use. I do not foresee anything like that in the immediate future, but it may come to be.

The main intent of the legislation is to provide a legal entity, if you like, a board that has legal status, can borrow money, and so on, that can be -

MR. TOBIN: Will they see one soon?

MR. GULLAGE: I do not know off the top of my head. I cannot predict any in the immediate future, but, no doubt, in the coming years we will see many of them put in place, in my view.

The other question I have was on the electrical subsidy programmes. Yes, because of cuts in the budget one of the areas identified, where we made a change, was electrical subsidy programmes, mainly for arenas, I think almost entirely for arenas. We caused that to be $10,000 subsidy across the board, where previously we had $15,000 in place for urban areas. So, again we caused some problems, I suppose, for some of the urban areas, in that we reduced their amount from $15,000 to $10,000.

MR. TOBIN: Some of the towns have not even been notified about that yet, Mr. Minister, by the way, have not gotten a letter.

MR. WINSOR: Most of them got one, then, because they have all called me.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

I would like to remind members of the Committee that Mr. Tobin has had his time. As soon as the Minister has finished answering the questions that were included in Mr. Tobin's statement, I would like to turn it over to Mr. Crane.

MR. TOBIN: The Minister is not finished, boy.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I was reminding you that I would prefer it if you did not interrupt.

MR. GULLAGE: We found that with our industrial water systems, because of budget cuts, we had to ask the communities to pay a little more in the water rates. It is unfortunate that the timing was late. We ran into timing problems on the grants, per se, anyway, because, as we all know, we decided at the very end of the year to implement the programme. We would have liked to, as I have said many times, have a decision on the grants back in September, say, but we made it at the end of the year. We felt it was important enough to implement, and we knew we had to bear the brunt of criticism and deal with the lateness of it with the municipalities. So, it did create some problems.

We have examined the question about the water and sewer corporation. We have examined it in some detail. I am not saying we will not find a way to do it. Again, I am repeating myself, because I have said it several times in the House, that we have examined the option of a water and sewer corporation. But, when you look at the figures I have seen, a $2.5 billion problem with replacement and another $2.5 billion for new water and sewer needs, it creates a terrific problem. If you put a water and sewer corporation in place and you have to purchase the existing infrastructure and then start adding new infrastruture, we are looking at a terrific cost per household. So, so far we have not found a way to put it in place. We are still looking at it.

I think that was it, unless there is another question that I missed.

MR. TOBIN: Yes, Mr. Chairman, there is one other one. I asked you if you could give me the figures on how much it would cost to get Ernst & Young to do this?

MR. GULLAGE: Oh, I am sorry. I do not know the answer.

We can get you a breakdown on that, we do not have it here tonight. Is there a ballpark figure?

MR. OSMOND: (Inaudible).

MR. GULLAGE: Well, we will get the figures for you.

MR. TOBIN: Sure.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Crane.

MR. CRANE: I only have one question for you, Mr. Minister. The Summer Games money, has that been approved yet?

MR. GULLAGE: Yes, the Summer Games monies for Harbour Grace - Carbonear have been approved. I think it is $700,000 in total, some of which is in the current budget and some of which will be in next year's budget.

MR. TOBIN: How much?

MR. GULLAGE: $700,000.

MR. TOBIN: $700,000.

MR. GULLAGE: That is for facilities construction.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Aylward. I am sorry! Were you finished your question, Mr. Crane?

MR. CRANE: Yes, thank you,(inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: What's that? I would like the Member to say that again, I missed that.

MR. WINSOR: You have been asking questions to the former (inaudible).

MR. CHAIRMAN: Were you finished with your other question, Mr. Crane?

MR. CRANE: Yes, that is it.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Aylward, if you could begin your questioning I am sure the Minister can still hear you.

MR. R. AYLWARD: First of all, Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask a question of the new chairman of the Canada Parks Games Commission, the man of many titles, I call him; he has many responsibilities now and I was just wondering, does he still go fishing and, does he still use the blue charm?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. CHAIRMAN: It is most effective on the Hamilton River; is it not?

MR. R. AYLWARD: I could not resist that although it is a kind of a private joke -

MR. GULLAGE: (Inaudible).

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. R. AYLWARD: He will explain it to his Minister if he has not already heard it, I am sure.

Mr. Chairman, I would just like to ask a couple of questions about the St. John's Fire Department, which certainly has many problems, as there is much discontent in the St. John's Fire Department, some of it brought on by the unwarranted changes in the pension plan, over which I know the Minister has no control because it is done by others, but when we look at the fire department and the Fire Commissioner's office, there are thirty-five less positions in those two areas this year over last year, and we see that there are at least twenty-seven fire fighters less; there are two less fire-fighter inspectors, which I would consider to be a very important area.

There were only five there in the first place, I think, and now we only have three left. There is a superintendent missing, two fire captains missing and fire protection technicians - I am not sure what it is but a fire protection technician seems to be a needed position, I suppose, if it has anything to do with fire safety. Then there is one position here called Fire Inspector and Protection Supervisor; I do not know if it is in the Fire Commissioner's office and I am not sure what that position would be, is it one of those which was cancelled, renamed? It could be.

But overall, there are at least thirty-five positions gone from the St. John's Fire Department and I am wondering what effect that is going to have on the level of fire protection that we have in the city, two cities I guess and the general metropolitan area, and how many of these were actual people laid off and how many of them were positions that were not filled or positions which were vacant and just cancelled?

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, we administer the St. John's Fire Department predominantly for communities in the north east Avalon; there is a small component, some 15 per cent of the budget is faced off against provincial buildings, the rest of it is cost shared by the municipalities, so we cost it out to them with various rationale.

There is an urban and a rural component if you like, but it is costed out to the municipalities, so we have a responsibility to operate the fire department as efficiently as we can on behalf of those municipalities and we found that in comparison to similar areas in Canada, we were relatively overstaffed.

We had complaints from the main players if you like in the region of St. John's, Mount Pearl in particular, saying that the costs were excessively high and they were, per fire fighter if you like. In an analysis of it we discovered that and the Woods Gordon Study pinpointed it as well and we found that we were able to accommodate savings by way of changes in the number of men per shift; adequately cover off the danger, the fire-fighting capability by making changes and down-sizing to some degree but certainly we are maintaining a force that is equal or better to other regions of Canada of similar size and we have effected some savings, but in the main we continue to operate a good fire department. I know I have probably missed some of the questions. Perhaps Don Peckham who is responsible for the fire department may want to add to what I have said.

MR. PECKHAM: I think, Mr. Minister, that I will just touch on one point here, that the whole forty-four fire fighter reduction has been achieved through attrition to date. I mean no layoffs up until now, and some of these people were able to be saved as a result of reducing the guards in buildings. One time there were guards staying back in the buildings when the equipment went out. These have been eliminated now, they lock the building when they leave and were deemed not essential in the buildings. The others mostly are reductions in the shift operations through reducing the number of personnel on equipment. The old equipment used to run more men, but there is a fairly modern fleet of fire equipment now and the number of men per piece of equipment is less than it used to be, but the number of pieces of equipment on the road is still the same.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The new fire hall that is in Mount Pearl now has not been manned since it was built, and I hear some of the councillors or some of the people involved in Mount Pearl suggesting that they are paying $300,000 a year on service costs or interest costs or something on the construction of that or just the maintenance or to keep it there unoccupied since it has been built. Has the Minister any plans of putting some firemen in the Mount Pearl new fire hall and to get some of their new pieces of equipment that they have in place in use?

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Chairman, the problem with the Mount Pearl fire department, of course, or fire station if you like, is that the City of Mount Pearl is presently a partner to an agreement with the Province to provide fire fighting services in the northeast avalon including Mount Pearl. So while a partner to an existing agreement and a signatory of a union agreement which goes with it they built a building in Mount Pearl for their own fire department. My position and the Government's position since we took Government is that you cannot be a part of two union agreements and two agreements to provide fire fighting services. I have offered on many, many occasions to man that department, and made comments like give me a half hour and I would have enough fire fighters in there to man that particular station and that is still the case. We are more than willing to man that fire department and operate it. The problem we have, of course, is that Mount Pearl maintains that they want to operate their own fire department, I guess walk away from an existing union agreement and put thirty or thirty-five men on the street. They would not even guarantee me as Minister that they would give some priority rights to these fire fighters for employment (inaudible). So I have been maintaining a pretty adamant position on it, I guess, because of the unfairness of the fact that they are signatory to a present agreement with the Province and with the union. So having said that, the other point that was raised was about the fact that they could run a department more economically and so on. They are basing their analysis on a temporary situation of putting a combination of full-time and volunteer people in place which we feel would only be temporary because unions would not tolerate that for too long, and very quickly that so called savings they are identifying would disappear because the union would insist that being a union hall or building it should be manned completely by their union people. And other figures used in their estimates in our view and our analysis of it showed that it would not effect any more savings by having a separate department or building operating in Mount Pearl. In fact economies of scale would tell anybody who did an analysis that the larger the department, the more firemen, the more staff equipment, the more economical it becomes to operate it and certainly the better the protection you can provide, because you are able to provide a better service, and one station, of course, backs up another, in a fire situation where we need extra equipment. So there is no question in our mind that we had the figures in the estimates given back to us, and the counter arguments will, at best, be only temporary, the savings that they identified. In fact, it would be very difficult to operate that Department any more efficiently that we are presently doing with the fire department on the north east Avalon.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mount Pearl's idea of a full-time and a volunteer-split fire hall, is that not the way 99 per cent of North America is going it right now, even larger cities like New York and Montreal?

MR. GULLAGE: I hesitate to answer that. Don, maybe you could answer that question.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The Carmichael Commission commented on that when they did their report, that most fire halls in North America, not in Newfoundland -

MR. PECKHAM: Don Peckham, Mr. Chairman.

There are a number of fire departments throughout North America that operate composite departments, some paid and some volunteer. They do not generally work well in the culture or the environment that we work in here in Newfoundland, with the union setup that we generally have. These fire departments, with the composite setups have entirely different kinds of arrangements than we have and they have different shift arrangements. So, it is difficult just to say that they be put in place and work.

Our view is, that in a setting such as Mount Pearl, that you would have difficulty in maintaining volunteers who could be available to staff the fire department, due to their work commitments. It is okay in areas where people work close to home and are available most of the time, but in areas where they would not be it is quite difficult to expect them to be on duty. We are finding that problem already here now in places like Conception Bay South, and they have now started to hire paid firemen to supplement the volunteers they had for a few years in the past.

MR. CHAIRMAN: It being two or three minutes before the hour of ten, I would like to remind the members of the Committee that this building closes down at ten o'clock. There is no security to arrange for it to remain open beyond that time. I have made arrangements for up to a thirty-minute extension on that closing time, but I will ask members of the Committee if they can assure me that we can clue it up with the subheads within that thirty minutes, then, I will allow it go on.

MR. TOBIN: Not a chance.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Well, in that case I will now call for a motion to adjourn. But, before I do that, I would like to thank the Minister and his officials.

MR. GULLAGE: I have just one question, Mr. Chairman, if you will allow me a question.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Very well.

MR. GULLAGE: We have one of the subheads, the Canada Games Parks Commission, and I am just wondering, rather than having Mr. Manual come back another time, is there any question that might be -

MR. WINSOR: Yes, I have some.

MR. TOBIN: We have a lot of question on that, yes.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would like to thank the Minister and his officials for coming here tonight, and for their co-operation. I would like to thank the Committee Members as well, particularly my Vice-Chairman, Mr. Aylward, for his assistance. I would like to thank Jeff Barter, from Hansard, for struggling through the problems he had with his recording equipment, and our Page, Tom Hodder, who struggled through the absence of a copy machine and a kettle. I would like to thank the Clerk of our Committee, Elizabeth Murphy, and the member of The Evening Telegram staff, Brian Cleary, for spending the evening with us.

I will now call for a motion to adjourn.

AN HON. MEMBER: So moved.

The meeting now stands adjourned.