March 27, 1997            HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS             Vol. XLIII  No. 10


The House met at 9:00 a.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

 

Statements by Ministers

 

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the controversy in recent days surrounding the school designation process in District 5, Central Newfoundland, is cause for concern and needs some clarification.

The reforms to the education system which we are now in the process of implementing are based on the recommendations of a Royal Commission which submitted its final report in March of 1992. During its investigation into the delivery of educational services, the Royal Commission found that many people expressed the desire for greater control of education at the local level. Parents wanted a greater say in the education of their children and greater control over the organization and administration of schools.

Repeated submissions to the Royal Commission recommended that local school boards be given more autonomy in the organization and administration of schools in their area. The Commission also recommended that parents be given a meaningful role in the operation of schools, and that school councils be established in all schools to provide an avenue for parental participation.

Government has listened, Mr. Speaker. We have listened to the people who say decisions made at Confederation Building do not adequately reflect local needs. Government acted on these recommendations and gave local school boards jurisdiction over the way schools are organized within the boundaries of their districts. This includes the right to decide on the number of schools it will operate, the location of these schools and the grade levels to be taught in each school. The decisions with respect to the organization and designation of schools within the Grand Falls - Windsor area are therefore well within the jurisdiction of the school board for District No. 5.

Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to be critical of this board in District 5 or any other board. It is within their right to make the decisions that will accommodate the wishes of parents and that they can defend at the local level in each case. The registration process, Mr. Speaker, was not a vote. It was an opportunity for parents to express their preference. The board should first determine the number of buildings needed to accommodate the student population. The education plan for the district should be done in a manner to maximize the educational opportunity for all the students. The board is then expected to, whenever possible, accommodate the preference of parents as expressed in the recent registration process.

Mr. Speaker, neither the Department of Education nor myself as minister intend to interfere with this process. We do, however, expect the boards to act in a fair and responsible fashion in making decisions that maximize the educational opportunities for the children they serve. The Department of Education, as always, Mr. Speaker, stands ready and willing to assist, but is firmly committed to the local decision-making model arising from the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Education.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

What I just heard, Mr. Speaker, is nothing but a cop-out. It is a complete abdication of responsibility by this minister and his department in dealing with the crisis which exists in education in our Province. It is the responsibility and the mandate of this minister to exercise leadership and to provide guidance and direction to these boards.

This is the maiden year for these boards. They are doing their best. They are dealing with the outcry from parents, a justifiable outcry, I might add, and it is the responsibility of this minister and his department to exercise leadership and to provide the resources, the personnel, the guidance and the direction to assist at this very critical time.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi. Does the member have leave?

By leave, the hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have to agree that the statement of the minister represents an abdication of the responsibility of the Department of Education to supervise the implementation of the Royal Commission recommendations and the changes to Term 17. To suggest that to accommodate the preference of parents where possible as a third priority after two or three others totally misrepresents the notion in people's minds when they voted in favour of education reform, Mr. Speaker.

This is, in fact, the minister who appointed these boards, who supplies the money, who designates the amount of money for new schools saying, in effect, that he will wash his hands of decisions that are made that may be unpopular and not in conformity to the wishes of the people when they changed Term 17. It is, Mr. Speaker, an abdication of government's responsibility.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Government Services and Lands.

MR. McLEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of my colleague, the Honourable Paul Dicks, Minister of Finance and Treasury Board, I wish to make the following statement.

The introduction of the HST on April 1, 1997 will result in the elimination of the Retail Sales Tax exemption currently provided on building materials purchased for housing in Labrador. In order to reduce the impact of the exemption removal, it was announced in the 1997 Budget Speech, that the Province will be providing a rebate of the provincial portion of the HST, the 8 per cent, paid on building materials purchased for the construction, repair or improvement of residences in Labrador.

The Province will administer the rebate and make payments to taxpayers, for claims totally at least $25 of the provincial portion of the HST (8%) paid, upon application to the Department of Finance, supported by receipts.

For the purchase of building materials only, it will be a simple matter of the taxpayer filing a rebate claim, accompanied by receipts, with the Department of Finance.

For the purchase of a new home or for renovations, the rebate will be based on the building material content of the contract.

Building materials used to construct a residence will qualify for the rebate, but furniture and appliances will be excluded. The Department of Finance will be providing rebate information throughout Labrador early in April.

We are pleased to offer this rebate to the residents of Labrador and anticipate that approximately $1 million in benefits per annum will result from the rebate program.

This is another example, Mr. Speaker, of what the government is doing and not talking about.

Thank you very much.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

All we are saying is they are announcing something that has already been done. It is nothing new. They are announcing something that has already been done. So I do not see the new news, Mr. Speaker. They are already getting a rebate and a break on it right now so what is different? They are trying to make a good announcement out of something that has already taken place. We have seen four of them this week already, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Cartwright - L'Anse au-Clair. Does she have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS JONES: I want to commend the government for continuing to realize that Labrador is indeed different and unique from the rest of the Province and sees the necessity of having policy and legislation that reflect the environment of Labrador and the people who live there. I welcome the news this morning. Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: Mr. Speaker, I wish to clarify for the benefit of the House and the general public, government's intent with respect to the future operation of the five Telecentres in the Province. Some concern has been raised in the media as to the future of these Telecentres.

The federal and provincial governments have supported five Telecentres in the Province over the last seven years. These centres are located in Trepassey, Clarenville, Baie Verte, Stephenville, and Forteau, and provide a range of economic and business development services for the use of information technology.

Mr. Speaker, the federal and provincial governments recognize the value of such services to the people who live in rural Newfoundland, and small business and economic development support services throughout the Province. Therefore we are currently reviewing means by which those services delivered through the five Telecentres can be extended to all twenty economic zones in the Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: We will do this, Mr. Speaker, through partnerships with other federal, provincial and community based organizations. This may mean that the organizational structures that currently exist may have to change in order that those services deemed important to economic and small business development can be maintained and indeed be extended to serve all areas of the Province more effectively.

In times where financial resources are limited, it is incumbent upon all of us to consider more efficient means to provide public service. This review will be completed within ninety days. No changes in the operation of the five Telecentres will be made during this period.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SHELLEY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I would like to thank the minister for her statement just a couple of minutes before I came to the House. I suggest to the minister if she had used the telecentres I might have got it even earlier.

Of course, in my first bit of debate in this House in this session I talked about the telecentres. The minister wasn't here, but the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology was. Of course, we have talked about this many times. We all know the benefit of these telecentres to rural Newfoundland. It is a link through technology which helps us and encourages people to invest and get involved in business. These five centres have done a tremendous job in the last little while.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Speaker, it is a constructive concern, I say to the minister, that they not only be maintained but that they are enhanced throughout the entire Province to serve people in rural Newfoundland, because we need them now more than ever, I say to the minister. Thank you very much.

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave!

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I welcome the news that the government is considering the inclusion of all twenty economic zones in the Province to be involved in these telecentres. I hope that this is not just something that we won't see any action on. The five centres that are there have been shown to be useful. If all twenty centres can be involved in this process I think we can look forward to better communications and better involvement in all of rural Newfoundland in participation in information technology and news about business opportunities.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cartwright - L'Anse-au-Clair.

AN HON. MEMBER: No leave.

MR. SPEAKER: No leave? The hon. member doesn't have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: No leave.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS KELLY: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask my hon. colleagues to join me in offering best wishes to the organizers, judges and participants of the 1997 Newfoundland and Labrador Drama Festival, which runs from March 31 to April 4 at the Arts and Culture Centre here in St. John's.

In this, the Provincial Year of the Arts, we celebrate the many ways our culture and heritage have been enriched by the contributions of those involved with the festival, and we look forward to a week of outstanding theatre.

The 1997 Festival marks the achievement of another milestone. All five of the plays are written, performed and directed by Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, and all five productions are set in this Province and deal with topics that we can all relate to. This is a first for the festival, and it is certainly an accomplishment worth noting as we move into high gear with the Cabot 500 Anniversary celebrations.

This festival represents the culmination of a full year of hard work for the organizers and theatre groups. And what's more, the people involved are volunteers. They do this out of a love of the theatre and the satisfaction of knowing that they have helped to preserve and enhance our rich artistic heritage. Truly, the dramatic spirit is alive and well in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The best part is that we, as potential members of the audience, get to reap the benefits of all that hard work. I encourage all of my colleagues to attend the performances of the 1997 Newfoundland and Labrador Drama Festival. It is a very special event that is by us, for us, and about us.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is perfectly fitting to offer congratulations to everyone involved in the festival, even though the curtain has yet to rise. So, to the Avion Players of Gander, the Beothuck Street Players of St. John's, the Carol Players of Labrador City, the Northcliffe Drama Club of Grand Falls - Windsor, and the St. John's Players - who are not only hosting the event but also celebrating their 60th Anniversary - I wish you all the very best of luck indeed.

Thank you, and break a leg.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

On behalf of members on this side of the House I congratulate all participants and those involved in the 1997 Newfoundland and Labrador Drama Festival.

As we are all aware, we have indeed a very rich cultural history in our Province, and the performing arts is only one avenue in which this cultural history and tradition is expressed and exposed.

Mr. Speaker, we congratulate all participants, and in particular, the Avion Players of Gander, Beothuck Street Players of St. John's, Carol Players of Labrador City, Northcliffe Drama Club of Grand Falls - Windsor, and the St. John's Players, and we wish them well.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave!

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I, too, wish to congratulate all of the participants in the Drama Festival. I think it is quite exciting to see that all of the plays are local plays written by Newfoundlanders and are being produced here, demonstrating once more the terrific cultural community and talent that we have.

I hope the enthusiasm about this event convinces the minister and her government to reconsider their plans to divest themselves of Arts and Culture Centres. Because it is these organizations and these buildings and these facilities throughout the Province that have also provided a place for these operations to take place and for this talent to be exhibited. Government must ensure that these facilities continue to exist.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member's time has elapsed.

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave!

AN HON. MEMBER: No!

 

Oral Questions

 

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions today are for the Minister of Health.

Mr. Speaker, I say to the minister, there is a crisis in the health care system here in our Province today. Just in the last day, doctors at the Western Health Care Corporation are indicating it is in a state of collapse. We have just seen a budget in which $11 million was taken out of acute care and long-term care facilities in this Province. I ask the minister: Will he move immediately to ensure that this $11 million is put back in the system to save the system from collapse?

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

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The health care budget was frozen last year in the usual spirit of doing what is right on behalf of the people of the Province. After just one year of a three-year frozen budget, we chose to unfreeze that, if you like, by continuing to add this year, where it was appropriate, additional money to the health care sector. This year we have more money in health care than we did last year under a flat line three-year budget.

We have not taken $11 million out of health care. We are re-allocating resources from the institutional side to the community side, as is appropriate, and is as per the three-year plans that have been laid out by the health care boards last year when we sat down to work out our budgets for a three-year program. We will continue to re-allocate within the health care envelope the budgetary resources that we have to ensure that they are spent in the most appropriate fashion and get done the best job possible.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Unless this is a false document I received, the health facilities operations on page 208 of the Estimates, I say to the minister, show that there is $11 million taken out of health care facilities operations this year. I ask the minister: Will he stop that pretence he is dealing with and get on and deal with the crisis he has caused in the system in this Province?

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

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The hon. member obviously does not hear very well early in the morning. I indicated to him that yes, we have moved from the institutional side, the two-thirds part of our budget, about $11 million this year that we have re-allocated to other areas of priority within the health care system. We will continue to move around the money within the envelope as is appropriate to ensure that we get the best value for the money and that we get the need met in the most expeditious and efficient manner. That will continue over the next two or three years, however long we are dealing with a flat line budget with an envelope within which we can work.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Not only are patients in this Province being in distress, there are dozens of calls every single week, human elements, human cases, with whom I speak, people and their families every day. Now, doctors are coming out. Doctors are now stressed out, overworked, under-paid, in a system that they are saying is collapsing - and the minister does nothing about it?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: Now, I ask the minister: Will he just stand and admit that we have a crisis in our system today?

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

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I will admit readily that we have a crisis within our system, but it is not the health care system, it is within the Parliamentary system. Because when the Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition continues to perpetrate a trail of gloom and doom and fear and rumour-mongering and putting forth propositions that will scare the life out of anybody, even the strongest-hearted politician, then I believe we have a problem in the system; but the problem is within the system that he represents, not the health care system that this government runs.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is no fearmongering or concern when people waiting for surgery die while they are waiting, I say to the minister, and people are waiting for fifty and sixty days for life-saving surgery. They are real cases, Minister, cases which I have referred to the Health Care Corporation, in many instances.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Now, the boards are out there crying out for help and the minister is ignoring the cries of the human element, of the people out there today. Now, I ask the minister: Will he stop paying lip service to this, stop denying it and do something today to address the crisis in our health care system before we have a total collapse?

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

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am prepared to stand and defend the record of this government with respect to health care in this Province. I am prepared, Mr. Speaker, to defend the record of a government, who, on the basis of our fiscal capacity, our GDP, spend more money per capita in health care in this Province than any other province or territory in Canada. I am prepared to defend the record of a government who re-allocate within the budget where it is appropriate to do so to get more value for our money. I am prepared to defend the record of a government who have recently allocated, in addition to the flat line budget, another $15 million or $20 million for health care purposes this year. I am prepared to continue to work within the allocations that we have to insure that the job is done properly.

It was interesting, Mr. Speaker, the other morning when I was driving across town, I noticed the famed Open Line Show host speaking with the Leader of the Opposition. He was raising the proposition as to whether or not we are probably putting too much money in health care vis-a-vis all of the other services that we delivered, and he was talking about the very high percentage that is going into health care. I say to the people who are on Open Line shows and to all of the people of the Province -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the minister to complete his answer quickly, please.

MR. MATTHEWS: - that health care is our number one priority and we will continue to do what is right and proper in the name of good health care.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The minister is the one who is denying the problem in the system today.

We do not want a health care system delivered by this government, in Ontario. This minister, when he took over the portfolio, I believe in August of 1994, knew the problems in the system and failed to do anything about them, and now he is looking at directing patients to another province, to deliver our health care system. There was money for Trans City to build hospitals -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Mr. Speaker, we are building them on one hand and we are closing them on another, we are not getting the funds to operate; Can the minister rationalize the dollars in the system? Can he see that we are not taking dollars out of acute care facilities in this Province and ensure that people are not going to get poor service next year, like they had this year?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, it is a challenge for every single government in Canada of every single political stripe within Canada to maintain pace with the increasing cost of health care. That is a challenge for Newfoundland and Labrador as well. But, Mr. Speaker, I would think that the Leader of the Opposition would want to recognize the work and the representation of the Minister of Health in succeeding in dealing with - in this fiscal year, with additional monies to address it - the problem of rural physicians in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Mr. Speaker, we have seen an increase in the rural physician wage package upwards of 25 per cent to 30 per cent as a direct result of the articulate representation by the Minister of Health of this Province and that matter has been dealt with.

Mr. Speaker, we have seen a review of the health care service in Central Newfoundland and as a result of that review, we now have a decision made in the Budget, to proceed with a brand new hospital at Harbour Breton. We have seen a decision to proceed with the completion of the rebuild, the redesign and the reconstruction of a new facility at Gander. Mr. Speaker, we have seen the decision to proceed with renal dialysis in the town of Grand Falls - Windsor.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, we have seen the decision to proceed with a $30-million new facility to handle the increased needs of that great basket of economic opportunity - Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, we have seen money put aside to look at the requirements for new facilities, both in Bonne Bay and in Stephenville.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, over and above the $4.5 million - and I am coming to a conclusion, Mr. Speaker -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER TOBIN: We have spent now, for equipment, $2.5 million more this year.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions, for the Minister of Education, are with respect to an issue which was referred to in this House approximately two weeks ago and which has received some public notoriety within the last few days. The issue is with respect to the air quality of the classrooms in our schools.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the minister: Can he tell us today which schools in this Province are being analyzed and tested for poor air quality?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Over the last couple of years, the Department of Education and the school boards have taken a very pro-active approach with respect to the issue of air quality in the schools of Newfoundland and Labrador. There were a number of incidents reported, starting two or three years ago, whereby students and teachers were complaining with respect to possible nausea, headaches, increased allergies, flu symptoms, and many people suspected it might be related to the quality of the air and air circulation within the buildings. So rather than just test the two or three schools where that was brought to the attention of school boards, the government went forward of its own initiative and randomly sampled over fifty of the 427 schools in the Province.

I am glad now that the Opposition is catching up to a matter that we discussed fully and openly in the press a couple of days ago; as was indicated, when the fifty schools were tested at random, on some measure - because there are a series of measures used by the professionals in the health care side and Occupational Health and Safety, because both issues are a concern, that some measures might be found to be less than ideal, but in only very rare instances, one or two in the last couple of years, have the health care professionals suggested that the air quality in buildings was so serious that maybe the best approach was to take immediate corrective action or abandon the building. When that was the assessment of the professionals, the action was immediately taken.

There are a couple of schools in the Province right now where reports have been brought forward by the parents and the students. They are being assessed as we speak, and corrective action will be taken if necessary.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I ask the minister: Will he table today the results of all tests that were conducted in the schools in our Province?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I do not know what purpose would be served by tabling the information in the Legislature.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) hide it.

MR. GRIMES: I was hoping that comment would come forward - the Leader of the Opposition is saying because we want to hide the information. The reality is that we gave the results of the testing to the directors of the school boards a year ago when the testing was done. They have the information.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: The people who deal with the schools in the Province, the people who deal with the children in the classrooms, were given the full reports. They were also given the temporary corrective measures that were proposed and recommended, and they are implementing.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. GRIMES: So the question was: Would we table the information? I do not think there is anybody in here, particularly members opposite, who would do anything about the information. We have provided it to the people who are actually taking the action.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister to take his seat.

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Speaker, the hon. the minister gives the impression that the matter has been addressed and resolved. I say to him, within the past ten days we have had discussions with individuals in the community of Cox's Cove, which is in the district of the hon. the Premier, where there are today problems with respect to air quality. I, personally, have had discussions with parents in the west end of this city, whose children are attending schools in the West End, where there are problems with respect to air quality. So I am saying to the minister, it is not a problem of the past. That is why I am asking the minister to table today the present - not the past, the present - what is the reality with respect to air quality in our Newfoundland schools.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I recognize that the hon. the Opposition critic felt obligated to ask his third question, because otherwise they would probably run out of questions. The answers have already been given.

It is a serious matter, though, Mr. Speaker, and in fact, when incidents like those occurring this year are reported, the school board itself initiates a full and detailed study in the schools that parents and students requested. That is happening in a couple of schools this year and the information is passed along now to the new construction board. In fact, Mr. Speaker, in the Budget this year, as again was indicated a couple of years ago, $2.5 million of the $14.2 million that is available for school construction projects this year is earmarked and dedicated to taking corrective measures in the most serious incidents that are determined by the professionals and it is being actioned as we speak, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions are for the Minister of Social Services. Under the Child Welfare Act, any person who believes that the interest of a child has been compromised, in a matter contrary to the Act, is legally required to report such matters to the Director of Child Welfare. Will the minister confirm that an employee of a group home for teenagers in St. John's made a report in accordance with the law and in a subsequent reaction, when the management of the group home found out the source of complaint, the employer engaged in constructive and successful dismissal actions against the employee? In other words, the employee was, in effect, dismissed for doing what he was required to do under the Child Welfare Act.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Social Services.

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

I ask my hon. colleague to be more specific in which home he is referring to. We have a number of homes in the city and in the Province in which we provide those types of services. I ask that he be more specific in his question.

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

MR. H. HODDER: Mr. Speaker, I have given detailed information to the Director of Child Welfare. I know the minister has been totally briefed. She knows exactly the home I am talking about. Will the minister also confirm that the employee, who was acting in compliance with the law, obtained legal counsel and in an out-of-court settlement was paid more than $6,000 by the group home to maintain his silence on both the initial reason for the report to the Director of Child Welfare as well as for the maintenance of silence on the gag order itself?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Social Services.

MS J. M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleague, for the record, to put out the specifics of the case that you are referring to rather than to put across the impression again that all of our group homes are working under some sort of a shadow. If you have the information and you want it on the record, as you obviously want my answer on the record, Mr. Speaker, I ask that my colleague come forward and identify the case he is referring to and I will then answer the questions with respect to that particular case.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. H. HODDER: Madam minister, I know that you know specifically the group home I am talking about. Given the fact that the minister either knew or should have known that an employee of this particular group home lost his job for doing what the law required he do and given the fact that the group home is funded by the Department of Social Services, does the minister have any comment as to whether or not she has seen anything wrong with the action of the group home management in this particular case?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Social Services.

MS J. M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I have asked twice and I will ask again of my colleague, for the record, to state the name of the home that he is referring to without casting aspersions on all the other group homes. In any event, I know that my hon. colleague is refusing to identify the name for the record, and I ask that he do that so that I can refer to the home in the question.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader on a final supplementary.

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Would the minister confirm that an internal audit of the group home is now being conducted to ascertain whether or not departmental funds were used to pay for the gag order?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Social Services.

MS J. M. AYLWARD: For the fourth time, Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleague to put forward the name of the organization to which he refers so that I can respond in an appropriate manner to the questions he is asking.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader on a final supplementary.

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

After four questions, the minister still has not acknowledged that she has detailed knowledge of this particular circumstance. It is a corporation here in St. John's and the name of the home that I refer to operates two group homes. Shalom is the name of the home. The minister has intimate knowledge. My file is very full on this particular case. I ask, finally, for today's question: Would the minister confirm that this same employee's spouse was told a few days ago upon her return to work after maternity leave that her services were no longer required because, `she could not expect to work in the group home after what her husband did.' Her husband complied with the law, I say to the minister. What protection does the minister offer to group home employees who comply with the requirements of the Child Welfare Act, and does the minister continue to have confidence in the integrity of group home management such as Shalom Incorporated?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Social Services.

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

Now that I have been made aware of the home you have referred to, I can say to you, Mr. Speaker, as I have said to my colleague, that this matter is under full investigation. Whenever a complaint is brought forward specifically with issues, as I have been made aware of, that home is under full investigation. It is not completed. Our main concern is the safety of those children, which we are assured of at this time. There are other parts of any investigation, which require investigation of the finances of the employee/employer relations. That is ongoing, Mr. Speaker, we are very aware of it, very concerned about it, and we are conducting a full investigation.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SHELLEY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My question is for the Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods. I, along with many people in this Province, have been expressing concerns about the state of forestry in this Province for some time. For a prolonged period of time, I, along with those people, waited with bated breath for the report, the analysis, and the plan for forestry in this Province, Mr. Speaker. It seems like something that is put on the back burner too often in this Province. One of the things I do agree with that the minister said in the plan is that there is a crisis looming, and that people in this Province fear that the forests are headed the same way as the fishery unless we act immediately. My first question is to ask the minister if he is satisfied with the report and the analysis, and does he think it justifies the plan he is about to embark on in forestry?

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, let me just say to the hon. gentleman as a report to put out for consultation in this Province for people to react to, I am perfectly satisfied with the report.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte on a supplementary.

MR. SHELLEY: That was a very serious question and I am glad the minister responded in that way. Now, I would like to ask a second question concerning Labrador. Of course, there are intentions in the plan when talking about Labrador and the resource in Labrador. I agree there is a potential for forestry in Labrador if it is done right, I say to the Minister of Forest Resources and Lands. I ask him: Does he think the amount of information used for Labrador, the wood supply analysis for Labrador, which I thought was ludicrous, is adequate to come up with an appropriate plan for Labrador?

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, let me just say to the hon. gentleman, we realize that in order for wood to grow in Labrador, given the climate and the nature of the soil there, it will take somewhat longer than it does on the Island. As a matter of act, I think the years that we have used for rotation is 120 years that we see the forests can rotate.

Let me also say to the hon. gentleman that what we are doing in Labrador, even at the present time, is while we have put this forward we are also saying to the stakeholders in Labrador: Come forward. We are holding meetings, I believe - as a matter of fact, I have a report on my desk from a stakeholders meeting in Cartwright some little while ago which says: Come forward, take a look at this report, come forward and put forward your ideas on what you see as a management plan. All of the stakeholders in Labrador, come forward and put forward for each of the districts - I think they are districts 19, 20 and 21 - for all of those areas, put forward your ideas and we will incorporate it into this whole plan.

Mr. Speaker, we realize that Labrador is special, that it is special in terms of its vegetation, that it is special in terms of its soil, that it is special in terms of its climate, and that therefore we have to be very careful we do not destroy the forest before we give it a chance to grow back (inaudible). We are very conscious of that and we are asking the stakeholders to come forward.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Speaker, it is one thing to consult and it is one thing to have action, and that is what he is talking about stakeholders. The suggestion I put forth a little while ago was the stewardship board, where we just don't have a consultation meeting in some time and then it goes through bureaucrats and we lose the whole process again. That is the problem in this Province, where we consult and then there is no link between there.

Next question for the minister, silviculture. Silviculture makes the most sense and provides jobs, but at the same time it invests in the long-term future in our forestry. Can the minister justify somehow the decrease in silviculture? It is a decrease in silviculture overall by the government. How can the minister justify, if we are in a severe crisis situation, a decrease in silviculture when there should be more?

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, let me just say to the hon. gentleman in answering his question that in terms of bureaucrats and consultation, I just came back from Port Hope Simpson three weeks ago in which I spent a full weekend in Port Hope Simpson, and I'm a politician and not a bureaucrat. I have to say to the hon. gentleman that it was one of the best conferences I've ever attended in my twenty years in public life. I have to say to the hon. gentleman that the people in Port Hope Simpson and on the Coast of Labrador - the Member for Cartwright - L'Anse au Clair was there, the federal member was there, the people from Abitibi-Price were there, the people from the integrated sawmillers were there. The Opposition though was not there. Those are the people who don't show up. They come in here and ask those kind of silly questions.

I have to say to the hon. gentleman that the people of the Coast of Labrador are looking forward to developing their forestry in conjunction with this government, in conjunction with some of the bureaucrats in the department, and we had a great conference. It was great. We are looking forward, as I know the Member for Cartwright - L'Anse au Clair is, to developing that forest for the people of Labrador and for their benefit, and in conjunction with them.

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

MR. TULK: In regards to silviculture, Mr. Speaker, let me say to him that we have planted well over 100 million trees two years ago. Well over 100 million trees.

AN HON. MEMBER: Not enough.

MR. TULK: The hon. gentleman says "Not enough."

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

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

MR. TULK: He asks: Why don't you take care of the forests? Then he says: Give more to my people.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the Government House Leader to take his seat.

MR. TULK: The hon. gentleman can't have it both ways.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. FITZGERALD: Mr. Speaker, thank you. My question is to the Premier. Premier, two years ago in June 1995 then-Premier Wells and our new Premier, who was then the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, announced a $100 million Economic Renewal Agreement to be delivered over a five-year period for aquaculture, information technology, and tourism. The federal government will contribute $16 million a year and the Province would contribute $4 million. I would like to ask the Premier: How much of this money is earmarked for aquaculture?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, I'm glad the member has asked this question because it gives me an opportunity to stand in my place, because I know the member has a keen interest in aquaculture. I know that he will be delighted to know that yesterday we had an announcement of some $800,000 out of this fund to bring halibut aquaculture technology to the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, the total production worldwide of aquaculture products has grown from 10 million metric tons to 22 million metric tons in the last twenty years.

Mr. Speaker, the total value in Canada has gone from $7 million in 1984 to $1.2 billion today. The only question is whether Canada is going to be part of it.

I am pleased to say, with our aquaculture initiative, Newfoundland and Labrador is going to be a dynamic new player as we embark upon an investment program of $20 million to bring new jobs to the people of this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Bonavista South, a supplementary.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think the minister should announce the funding on the actor's awards. We would certainly nominate him for an Oscar.

Premier, over the past two years this agreement has been announced on numerous occasions, during the last year's election, in the 1996 Budget, and again in this year's budget. Will the Premier live up to his 1996 election promise and build a research and development centre for aquaculture culture in the Bay d'Espoir area? Will he commit, right here today, to build this research centre?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, not only are we going to invest $800,000 for new halibut development in aquaculture in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador; not only are we going to invest hundreds of thousands, perhaps in the range of a million, more for cod development in this Province; not only are we going to invest in the scientists and research institutions to make Newfoundland and Labrador a leader; we are going to utilize the full potential as explained to all of us on a regular basis on Wednesday mornings in our caucus by the member, Mr. Oliver Langdon, who has done a tremendous job of articulating a vision for the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, to finish, the reason we are building new hospitals and building new schools, and building new roads in Bay d'Espoir, is that we know the area is going to boom with economic activity.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The time for Oral Questions has elapsed.

 

Petitions

 

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

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

Before I present a petition, I would like to ask the Premier a question: I wonder is he taking acting lessons along with his french lessons?

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

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) send a copy across to the rest of the boys.

MR. J. BYRNE: Yes boy, send it over. Send it over, I say to the Premier.

Mr. Speaker, I stand in my place today to present a petition, as I said I would do, like previous petitions that I presented with respect to the privatization of parks in Newfoundland and Labrador. The petition reads - I read it before and I will read it again, Mr. Speaker: To the hon. House of Assembly of the Province of Newfoundland in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned residents of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador asks for the House of Assembly to accept the following prayer;

We, the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador, wish to petition the Provincial Government, the Minister of Tourism and the Premier to immediately reverse the decision to privatize the provincial parks, as they are the people's resource. We feel that this decision was made in haste without any consultation with the people who own the parks, the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, there are signatures here mostly from Torbay, actually. This must have been one of the petitions in the area of Torbay. Now, I have spoken a lot on the privatization of parks and I know that members on the opposite side of the House agree with a lot of the comments that have been made over here but they will not stand in their place and support the petitions, nor will they present any petitions.

One of the points that I would like to address is the fact that the minister made statements that the employees of the parks will possibly have the opportunity to take over some of these parks. Now, Mr. Speaker, I think the minister is aware of a few applications possibly from employees within the various parks. I believe, in the Marine Drive park, down in my district, an individual who works in the park is interested in submitting an application to take over the park. Now, the problem is, of course, Mr. Speaker, that many of these employees are seasonal employees. They really cannot come up with the money to put in whatever facilities and/or services they would like to offer the people of the Province. The intent of privatization of the parks, from what I have been told, is to save $1.8 million. Now, I believe the minister - and I stand to be corrected on this - has offered some assistance to these employees to help take over the parks. Now, if indeed there is financial assistance - other than just advice - how much money, I wonder, is the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation planning to put into the assistance program for the employees to take over the parks? If it is nothing, well then they may save $1.8 million, which will end up being a detriment in the long term to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, especially with respect to tourism, but if indeed they are going to give some financial assistance to the employees to help them in taking over the parks then, of course, that would cut down on the amount of money that the Provincial Government would save with respect to the $1.8 million.

Now, as I said before, we have had meetings across the Province with respect to this issue and there are many concerns that come up with respect to the privatization of parks. One, that seems to be the major one, is that people are very fearful out there that we will lose the public park system. Now, the minister has stated that there will be no fear of that and that we will not be losing the public park system, that these parks will probably be the last and there is a core number of parks left for the people in the Province; but then, those words can ring pretty hollow, because we have heard it before. Two years ago when they privatized twenty-eight or twenty-nine parks - I think there are ten operating now - we were told that it would be to enhance the public park system, but what has happened? Now, a year or two later, we have more parks being privatized with a few left. Who is to say, Mr. Speaker, that a year or two down the road there will not be another brain wave similar to this one from within -

MR. SULLIVAN: Lack of a brain wave.

MR. J. BYRNE: Well, so-called brain wave, I suppose. They acted without thinking, Mr. Speaker. Obviously, there has been no planning gone into this. Then all the parks would be privatized and we would have no public park system. Some people might believe in that. I am sure the people out there in private industry, who have their eye on these parks, there may be one, there may be thirteen people, there may be fifty people interested in these parks but the whole thing is, who is to say that a year or so down the road that we may not have a proposal from some buddy of some minister or member of the government, to put in an unsolicited proposal and take over all the parks and we will have no public parks system in this Province.

Now, there are a lot of issues that come into play here because, Mr. Speaker, a lot of these parks, all the parks, from my knowledge, have been put there at the cost of the taxpayers in this Province. And if the minister is going to privatize these parks, are we going to see, if there is a 100-acre park or a 1,000-acre or 5,000-acre or a hectare park -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. J. BYRNE: By leave, Mr. Speaker, just to conclude?

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

AN HON. MEMBER: No leave. (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: I would not (inaudible) do that, if I were you.

MR. SPEAKER: No leave. The hon. the Member for St. John's South.

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I stand to second the petition, Mr. Speaker. We have presented many, many petitions now in the House on this particular issue. We have gotten approximately 17,000 names on petitions and we will have many more to present in the coming days.

Mr. Speaker, it amazes me how the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation can expect, while she says on one side of her face that, the Province can no longer afford to subsidize these parks, they can no longer afford the $1.8 million that they are pumping into these parks, yet, on the other side, she is expecting private operators to take over these parks, and not only does she expect them to pay the bills that the Provincial Government say they can no longer afford to pay, but she expects them to pay a bank loan because she is offering a 50-year lease to the new owners to - or there is a 50-year lease available on the parks to the new owners in order for them to secure bank financing. Mr. Speaker, if the Provincial Government cannot afford to pay the $1.8 million required to keep these parks operating, how in the world can a private operator not only pay the loan on a 50-year lease but also pay the expenses that the Province cannot afford to pay?

Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, I have to question seriously on this 50-year lease. If indeed these private operators are unable to afford to pay not only the bank loan, but the bills, the utilities, salaries and so on, and if they default on their payments and the bank takes over the park because of the fact that the bank then holds the balance of the 50-year lease, if the bank take over this park, does the Province have any say, as to whom the bank will then sell the rights to the remainder of the 50-year lease? To whomever the bank decides to give the remainder of the 50-year lease, what power does the Province have to ensure that these operators are going to operate at the standard that they are passing out now to the private individuals who are expected to operate these parks?

Mr. Speaker, in the minister's own program review, it states that the standards of provincial parks tend to be higher than the private sector equivalent and that provincial parks provide a higher quality facility. Provincial parks provide high quality outdoor recreational opportunities in a safe and environmentally secure manner, and they serve as an environmentally sustainable means of enjoying the outdoors without putting undue pressure on the environment. If the bank is to pass over the remainder of the 50-year lease to whoever is willing to pay for it, whoever is willing to take over the remainder of the 50-year lease, Mr. Speaker, what guarantees do we have that they are going to be operated at the standards that even the Province expects of the new private operators that they have the ability to choose, to hand-pick?

Mr. Speaker, it goes on further to say that private parks operators may not have the financial resources or the desire to implement the standards that are commonplace in all provincial parks. Mr. Speaker, if that be the case, not only can we expect a degraded level of standards to the private operators who take over the parks through the divestiture now from the Provincial Government, but we can expect a further reduction in standards once those people who cannot afford to operate these parks lose them to the banks and the banks hand them out to whoever they should choose, whoever comes along with the money. What is going to happen to these provincial parks, I ask the minister, once the operators who take them over cannot afford to operate them and they end up in the hands of the banks?

Mr. Speaker, I sent off a letter to the minister almost a month ago asking for information on the cost of operating these parks and the total investment by the Province into these parks over the years. I still have not gotten a response. If the minister were so prepared to cut loose twenty-one parks, then she should have this information available at her fingertips, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise to present a petition from a number of constituents of mine who are petitioning the House of Assembly to direct government to establish a universal comprehensive school lunch program for every school in Newfoundland and Labrador to help end child hunger and to give our children a better chance.

The petitioners are concerned that the effects of poverty and child hunger are not only causing harm to the children on an ongoing daily basis, but are also preventing them from participating in the opportunities that school presents, to learn and be valuable, effective members of society, and to have a chance to get a decent job and support themselves and their families.

According to the minister this morning, there are 427 schools in the Province. There is a volunteer-based school lunch foundation and school lunch program that offers opportunities and encouragement for community groups to establish school lunch programs, but there are not very many. I am going to get the exact figures over the Easter break and come back with them to the House as to how many operating school lunch or school breakfast programs actually exist in the Province today. I would venture to say that not much more than 10 per cent of the 427 schools in the Province have either program.

That represents a very inadequate response to the desperate need that exists in this Province to ensure that schoolchildren are given an opportunity to have a decent meal, a nutritious meal, at least once every school day, to help alleviate the child hunger problem that is being faced, that has been recognized by government-sponsored studies, that has been recognized by the Canadian Association of School Trustees, that has been recognized by educators throughout the Province, that has been recognized by teachers for many years in the Province, and is an issue that has sort of come out of the closet.

It has been a hidden issue. It has hardly ever been made public until recently, teachers are now getting to the point where they are going to make it an issue. I heard one school board official on television the other night saying that the time has come for them to make it an important issue for schools in the Province, to address children's needs that may be needs existing outside of the classroom itself, but very much affect what goes on in the classroom and the ability of those particular students to participate in the educational experience.

I think we are going to hear more of this. I, for one, am not going to sit down and stop talking about this until we see something more in the way of concrete action than this government is prepared to acknowledge is necessary. This is an issue which is of very grave concern to this hon. member and to many people throughout the Province who recognize that now we have more than one-third of our children living in families on social assistance. We know that the social assistance rates are inadequate to provide nutritious food for families. We know more and more people are relying on food banks. We know we are in a crisis situation in the ability of families to adequately feed themselves and their children, and we know that this issue has to be addressed.

I am calling on government to address this issue as a matter of right, not as a matter of voluntarism or a matter of charity, but as a matter of right of citizens, of children in our society, to have a decent opportunity to learn from the school system on which we spend so much of our money.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise again today to speak in support of the petition put forward by my colleague, the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

Mr. Speaker, we have been reading the report called Special Matters, dated June, 1996, written by Dr. Patricia Canning. I was watching on cable television last night as Dr. Patricia Canning and others were talking about the issue of child poverty, and in particular, the issue that she has raised in her report.

Newfoundland and Labrador experiences the highest rates of both family poverty and adult illiteracy in all the Provinces of Canada. In the latest stats that were available for this report, in 1992 the poverty rate for Canadian families was 13.3 per cent. In Newfoundland in 1992, over 18 per cent of families, representing 38,000 children, live below the poverty line. The poverty rate for children who live in single-parent homes was estimated to be 73 per cent. Seventy-three per cent of the children who live in single-parent homes live in poverty.

Mr. Speaker, with the reports that have been put forward, we know that children who live in poverty may suffer the consequences long term. We have heard many researchers, we have heard many of the people who speak in the House, and the parents who are signing the various petitions, plead with the government not to rely on volunteerism - however that is important - not to rely on the corporate community, but to show some initiative, show some leadership.

Even back in the 1930s, the Commission of Government knew that they had to address the issue of poverty in Newfoundland families. If they could do something about it in the harsh days of the Great Depression, we, in 1997, must do more than they were able to do then.

Mr. Speaker, we know the long-term consequences on children. We know that many children who are not able to eat properly cannot and will not achieve properly in school. As the federal Minister of Finance said in his federal Budget a few weeks ago, `opportunities lost in childhood are opportunities lost in adulthood'. We should listen to that. It is one of the wisest statements that the federal minister, Paul Martin, said in his Budget Speech. It showed that he wanted to lead a direction that would try to address this national crisis.

Mr. Speaker, I say to my hon. colleague bringing forward the petitions, keep up the work. We are also getting petitions with the same kind of plea to the House, that we want to see something done. We want to see concrete action. Move it beyond the rhetoric. We hope there will come a day, and it will come real soon, when the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi and I will not have to rise in this House and speak on behalf of children and childhood poverty. We would welcome that day, and we hope that day will come in the not-too-distant future.

As we said in 1986, we hope that by the turn of this century, we can eliminate child poverty in Canada, and in particular we want to eliminate it in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you very much.

 

Orders of the Day

 

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

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

MR. SPEAKER: Order No. 2. Are you talking about Motion 2?

MR. TULK: No, no, Order No. 2, Mr. Speaker, Committee of Supply.

MR. SPEAKER: Okay. Order No. 2, the Committee of Supply.

On motion, that the House resolve itself into Committee of the Whole on Supply, Mr. Speaker left the Chair.

 

Committee of the Whole

 

CHAIR: Order, please!

Bill No. 2. The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

MR. J. BYRNE: Mr. Chairman, today I rise, once again, to say a few words on the Interim Supply Bill, a bill that government is asking to be passed in this House to allow them to spend some money, I suppose, until we get the Budget approved. I know that the Budget that has come before this House very recently for 1997-98, I believe to be in a number of places very deceptive. I believe the document to be a deceptive document in that the Minister of Finance has said in the past that last year's Budget basically was predicting a $40 million deficit and this year's Budget ended up with a $29 million deficit, so we have to wonder why. That begs a lot of questions to be asked with respect to the layoffs, the layoffs that are coming within the civil service.

If we are $11 million better than we had anticipated over last year's Budget then why are civil servants being asked to leave their jobs? Of course the effect that the civil service has on the private sector in this Province is phenomenal because when we see 1100 people going out the door we are naturally going to have layoffs in the private sector, and that in term will have ripple effects throughout the economy and would be detrimental to the RST, the PST, the HST, and whatever taxes are on the go, the income tax and what have you. In actual fact the Province can be hurting itself by letting civil servants go. People have said to me, if we are that well-off why are we going out the door, Mr. Speaker? The turmoil that has been created by this administration with this Budget is unreal.

Now, we all know, and I have spoken many times in this House of Assembly on the morale of the civil service. I believe about three years ago I spoke on the morale in the civil service and it has been getting worse ever since. Now, while workers in the civil service were hoping that cuts were over and done with, and that people were finished going out the door, they are being told that over the next three years there are going to be 1100 more go out the door. So, that is now creating three more years of turmoil within the civil service.

Of course, the tactics of this administration and the previous administration has been to pit one group against the other over the past few years. In the referendum last year we saw churches being pitted against churches, community against community, and we now see schools being pitted one against the other in various areas of the Province, and so on, Mr. Chairman. We saw the Minister of Municipal Affairs going around the Province trying to get this municipality up against the communities that are not paying taxes, so it is divide and conquer.

We saw the Minister of Justice, which was absolutely ridiculous, before Christmas, coming out and asking the RCMP and the RNC to put in applications I would say, Mr. Chairman, if you really want to boil it down, applications for their jobs. They asked them to look at jurisdictions and make proposals to government, to the Department of Justice, for jurisdiction to say, okay, we can do this area for X amount of dollars, we can do that area for X amount of dollars, and what happened, Mr. Chairman. We had the RCMP going all over this Province with petitions, having public meetings and what have you, until they were ordered not to, to try and save their jobs.

Then we had the RNC, who decided to take the other route, Mr. Chairman, and basically sit back and see what comes down the tube. We will not fight for our jobs, which I think spoke very well for the RNC, the way they handled it.

It was ridiculous for this Administration to pit one police force against another in this Province. Both police forces are well respected, both police forces do their jobs well in the jurisdictions that they cover. To try and to pit these groups against each other is just downright wrong. It is morally wrong, and that speaks then of the morals of this Administration.

To me this Budget, as I said earlier, is a deceptive Budget, and it goes to the heart I suppose of what is going on in this Province today. We have seen, since 1991, municipalities being... I won't say raped, that isn't the right word, I would say, but certainly down loaded upon in a very negative factor. We have this Budget saying that the government is going to give the municipalities approximately $10 million to help them out, the municipalities that are in hard shape.

But what is going on, the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs yesterday when I asked him the question was highly insulted, basically, that he was asked the question. He stood in his place and said he was waiting for questions. The Budget only came down last Thursday and we have only been sitting this week.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Anyway, Mr. Chairman, I will have lots of questions for the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs in the future. I have fifteen or sixteen questions here now. I will give him the choice to pick which one he wants. He can pick anywhere from one to sixteen now when the House sits back in late April.

What is going on with respect to that $10 million - and it is benefiting two groups, but it is benefiting the Province more so than the municipalities. The minister and the government are trying to get the municipalities to refinance and use the private sector or the chartered banks to refinance. If they are successful in doing that and the government can give them, well, depending on the financial situation, X amount of dollars to get them into the chartered banks, that would take the debt away from the Province. Therefore it would make the bottom line of the Province's Budget look better. In the long haul what will happen to the Newfoundland Municipal Financial Corporation if in fact what is planned goes through?

It could very well be that it could be a good thing in the short term for the municipalities and the towns in this Province. It could be a good thing in the short term if the interest rate stays down. We know they want the towns to refinance, of course, because of the high interest rates being charged by the NMFC, and the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs said yesterday there could be some penalties for that. If there are going to be penalties paid to the government, is it now going to be giving the municipalities money to get them to refinance and actually taking it back to pay the penalties through NMFC? Those are some of the questions that need to be answered, and some of the questions that will be asked I'm sure in the future in this House of Assembly.

With respect to the interim supply itself, the Administration or the government is looking for $1,019,465,700. That is roughly one-third of the Budget. The government is asking for one-third of the Budget on interim supply. To me that seems to be a rather large amount of money to be asking for in the interim before the whole Budget, the 1997-1998 Budget, is approved. A lot of money to be asking for. That will lead me to the next question which is: Are we going to sit again this spring? I imagine we will, but for how long? How long will we be sitting? We haven't been sitting very much since last fall, let me tell you. The reason for that, of course, is that the government doesn't want to have the questions asked to it that we are asking in this House of Assembly. Of course, we have a lot of questions to ask.

The Member for Waterford Valley was up this morning asking the Minister of Social Services questions and the Minister of Social Services got up and asked him to be more specific and to name the location of the home he is talking about and when he did, the minister, basically said: well, we cannot answer your questions now because an investigation is underway. She knew full-well, before she asked the Member for Waterford Valley to be specific, she had the information but she did not answer the question, Mr. Chairman.

We have the critic for health, the Leader of the Opposition, asking questions often to the Minister of Health and we get the same old answer: The health care of the Province is adequate and it is improving. `Adequate' is the key word, Mr. Chairman, and the definition of `adequate' by whose terms. So, Mr. Chairman, this Interim Supply bill - I can understand them wanting to have so much approved at one shot, and I expect later on this morning that it will go through. Obviously this is going to be the last day that we are going to be sitting before Easter and we, certainly on this side of the House, would not want to hold up pay cheques of the civil servants although as I said earlier, Mr. Chairman, a good many of them are pretty scared today.

Another point with respect to this Budget, Mr. Chairman, and the tactics of this administration, is the situation with respect to pensions and people being forced to go out the door. I know that there are people within - teachers, take teachers for example. I have a friend who was forced, basically, to retire a little over two weeks ago, and who has been teaching for thirty years, who wanted to finish this school year and had planned to finish this school year but because of the tactics of this administration was afraid to stay, because he did not know what was going to happen to him if he decided to stay.

We have other people, people with Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, people within the civil service, people working within this building, Mr. Chairman, who are now checking out the retirement scheme, it is not a plan, it is a retirement scheme of this administration to force people out the door, but what is happening, Mr. Chairman, is that people who have been working for twenty-eight years, thirty years, and are very close to the retirement age, the formula that is being used, are being forced to take their money, their severance, and pay it back to the government to buy a year or two years to qualify for their pensions and if they don't do that, they are afraid that after this Budget goes through, Mr. Chairman, that they will be forced out the door anyway and won't end up with the severance and other benefits that would normally accrue to them if they had their full time in. So, Mr. Chairman, what is being done here is not fair.

The Leader of the Opposition has been up and spoken for two to three hours I would imagine on the Budget and he pointed out a lot of faults, a lot of the concerns and some of the trickery that is going on within the Budget. I don't want to get into that because the Leader of the Opposition did a good job on that, no doubt about it but, the Budget that is coming down the tube this year is not as the Premier and the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board make it out to be. They talked about a three-year Budget. Now, Mr. Chairman, if you look at a Budget that normally comes down each year, you get the Budget of course and you get something like a document called the Estimates of 260 pages which show the revenues and the expenditures for each division within each department.

With respect to the Budget that came down, the so-called three-year Budget, Mr. Chairman, it is one page, printed on both sides for a three-year Budget. Now that is pretty slippery I would say to you, Mr. Chairman, that is pretty slippery to say that we have a three-year Budget. Now, one page with the figures on it for a year and another page with figures on it for another year and to say that, that is a Budget when of course we know that it is subject to changes, major changes of course. How can they say that this is a Budget when an actual budget requires 260 pages, so in actual fact, the Budget should be somewhere around now 520 pages, plus the 260 will give you 780 pages, but we have 260, Mr. Chairman, what we normally get with one year's Budget. So what they are trying to do is, to give the people out in the Province some kind of perception that they have long-term plans, Mr. Chairman.

Now let me tell you what their long-term plans are if, there are any. It is not as in the Budget to make everything look hunky-dory. Basically, Mr. Chairman, what has been going on here is that we have been hearing since '89, that it is going to be two years and we will have prosperity, and in '91 we have prosperity in '93; in 93 we will have prosperity in '95 and now, it is going to be another three years down the road. So basically, in the year 2000 we are going to have prosperity in this Province. I think personally, that the people of this Province are getting sick and tired of hearing this two-year thing down the road, two years, two years and two years. What they want is something to happen now.

MR. HARRIS: Jack, you should know they are waiting for a better tomorrow, not ready for a better tomorrow.

MR. J. BYRNE: That is a good point. The Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi said we should be calling it, `waiting for a better tomorrow', and there is no doubt about that. We have been waiting and waiting and waiting, certainly since 1949, so it is not happening.

I mentioned this in the House of Assembly on a number of occasions since I came here back in 1993 - and I was fortunate enough to be reelected in 1996, or whenever it was - that there are people in this Province, and it seems not to be able to sink into people on that side of the House, the decision-makers on that side of the House, because I am sure they are getting the same type of calls that we are getting on this side of the House, and every day they are increasing. They are going up exponentially, Mr. Chairman, the number of calls that we are getting; because, of course, we see the social services rolls double since 1989, from 40,000 up to 79,000 last count.

CHAIR: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. J. BYRNE: My time is up already?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: In conclusion, I will get up again, I am sure.

Thank you.

CHAIR: The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

MR. A. REID: Mr. Chairman, why is it, when I get up to speak, everybody just leaves me automatically?

Mr. Chairman, I want to make some comments about what has happened to my budget in regard to municipal operating grants, and I quote Randy Simms, a councillor who is the Deputy Mayor, I believe - I am not sure - of Mount Pearl, on a T.V. program on Tuesday or Wednesday night of last week. He came out and said, I quote: I agree with what the minister has done.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Yes.

MR. J. BYRNE: Did he say that? Be serious now.

MR. A. REID: Yes, he did.

MR. J. BYRNE: Did he say he agreed with (inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Yes, I can get you the tapes and let you listen to them.

I can quote the President of the Federation of Municipalities who stated categorically that he was disappointed that there would be cuts this year, but now is the time for government and the federation to come together to plan the future path.

It was me who went to Gander last Friday night and went into what I thought would be the lion's den, that turned out to be more like a -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Yes. It turned out to be more like a used stable, but it was me who suggested that there could be other things that the government could look at in the next twelve months to look at the possibility of making some changes to legislation, and doing other things that would help municipalities in regard to their -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: My hon. friend from Bonavista South knows full well that I have been looking after him on an individual basis for the past couple of years. I even recommended that the government take large sums of money out of money that was scheduled for other parts of the Province to refurbish the stadium down there, that even his own leader had problems digesting when he heard about it.

His friend sitting on his immediate left is looking for $3.5 million now for another stadium in his area.

MR. J. BYRNE: No, I am not. Be accurate, now, in what you are saying.

MR. A. REID: More than that.

MR. J. BYRNE: No, it is not. Be accurate.

MR. A. REID: The wonderful and grand City of Mount Pearl is looking for funding this year for some work, which I can pretty well assure the hon. Member for Waterford - Kenmount those good people will be looked after.

The City of St. John's - and I quote Mr. Jeff Brace. After continuously trying to agitate me for almost an hour and a half in Gander on Friday night, when I finally told him what we were actually doing for the City of St. John's his comment was: Art, if I had known you were going to do this I would have kept my mouth shut.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Mr. Chairman, I'm beginning to wonder what his colours are, you know, because I'm not sure.

Even though there is $9 million set aside in the Budget for - well, not set aside in the Budget. It is $9 million one-time funding. We had that money and it needs to be set aside before the last of the year. If you look at the Estimates that $9 million is not in the Estimates for my department for next year. It won't be found because it was new money, so that is set aside. I have the leeway or latitude to go out with that $9 million, plus on top of that another $1.5 million that has been given to me to assist not only municipalities that are in financial debt but other municipalities. There are municipalities around, I say this to my learned colleague who went through all this with me for years, there is money there besides -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Yes we did. There is money there set aside not only for communities which are in dire straits, financial problems, there is money there that I can use to help other communities that would possibly, because of cuts in MOGs and the increase in the debt servicing and so on, I can go in and help them, give them a few dollars.

I admit to the House that it has been a rough, I guess, four years for me as a one-time municipal leader to have to go in and make the changes in my department that, yes, adversely affect a number of communities around the Province. I admit that, I don't deny that. I don't think anyone on this side of the House, I don't think there is anyone who doesn't realize that it is a lot harder for me to digest as an ex-mayor and an ex-president of the Federation than it is for a number of people sitting on both sides of the House. It is, I know, I feel it.

But then I was faced with a problem of 150 communities out there. Literally, ladies and gentlemen, colleagues, we have communities out there - and I don't want to stand in the House and talk about individual communities because I've never done it, not on an individual basis, Maybe with one exception. The hon. member points to me down there, but he forced me into it, Mr. Chairman. He held me down on the floor with his hobnailed boots to my throat and said: You had better name the community.

I can honestly say that I was losing a sizeable amount of money in my budget, which we all did, and I had to find some way - it would have detrimental, I suppose, to a large number of municipalities if I didn't get something back. The argument and the negotiations went on for a long period of time and I managed to succeed in not actually getting my MOG money back, but I got $10.5 million. On top of that, there is some money this year set aside for fire-fighting, there is some money set aside for local service districts, there is some emergency money set aside.

You know what I'm talking about. Because when you sneak over to me, and especially my friend for Baie Verte and he says to me: Art, have you got $2,000 or $3,000 for a fire department or for a town?, In most cases I accommodate him. But I always say to him: Don't let anybody know about this. Because if my buddies behind me find out about it they are going to ask: Why aren't you giving it to me? Right? So I do accommodate it, I take care of it, because I respect, even though I'm on the opposite side of the fence from my hon. colleagues, I do respect you. Especially you rural. I will say rural. Not so much the St. John's members or the members from Mount Pearl or Corner Brook or the major centres. But I know what the member from Bonavista Bay has to put up with on a daily basis when it comes to looking after his constituents. I would say the Member for Bonavista South gets more calls in a day than the hon. Member for St. John's South gets in a month.

AN HON. MEMBER: A year!

MR. A. REID: In a year! Now, I don't want to mislead the House and say I have more affinity and I treat the rural baymen, as we call ourselves, better than we do our hon. friends from St. John's, Mount Pearl and Corner Brook. But if I can say it lowly and softly, I feel quite honestly, and I think most of my colleagues from outside the overpass feel the same way, that, very lowly, Mr. Chairman, that the St. John'ses and the Mount Pearls and the Corner Brooks and the larger centres in the Province have a lot better chance of looking after themselves than some of our communities can do.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about my district?

MR. A. REID: Yes, your district is in it too.

I want to just tell you a little story about something that happened to me. It might be - and I am going to name the community - I have to in this case and I don't think, if the hon. member was sitting here, he would mind me saying it. I went to Trepassey about a month ago and I met with the council -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Yes. I went to Trepassey - and I say it in all sincerity, Mr. Speaker - I went to Trepassey because I was being told by my staff that, minister, if you want an example of a town falling apart, through no fault of their own, Trepassey is the example. So I went down there and met with the mayor and I met with the council and the town clerk. I had a long session with the town clerk manager. We sat down and - I am going to be honest with you - it tore the heart out of me when I heard what was going on in the community. Here was the town manager and the mayor telling me; Mr. Minister, our mil rates are 9 mils - which is one of the highest in the Province, higher than Mount Pearl. We are collecting over $300 a year for water and sewage taxes. We don't owe any money to NMFC. We have not asked for any money in Capital Works because we cannot afford it and here are our books. Even though we are collecting almost 95 per cent of our taxes we are falling further and further and further every year. I said, what have you done? They have turned off street lights. They have laid off staff. They have contracted out as many services as they can possibly contract. Basically the mayor said, `Minister, I am sitting on a time bomb.' I said, `What do you mean by that?' `If anything should happen in this community, if I get a major water break, if the motor goes in my fire truck, if anything happens, this town will go under.'

I had my finance people with me, they sat down and we went through everything. The conclusion was Trepassey cannot survive as it is today. Ladies and gentlemen, the reason why it cannot survive is that there are over 700 people gone out of the community and not gone out of down in the cove. They are not all gone out of one section of the town. They are gone throughout the town. You drive around the town and here are these beautiful homes, Mr. Speaker, that if they were in St. John's they would be worth, in any man's money, $120,000 to $150,000. I am not exaggerating, beautiful homes. The town manager says, `Here minister, is a letter.' She passed me a letter and this was a letter from a young fellow out in the North West Territories who owns one of these beautiful homes. His tax bill was $800. The letter said, `Take my home. Take it, it is not worth anything, to pay the taxes.' These homes now on an average down in that particular community, from what I have been told and it is hearsay, it is only just something that I have been told, the average house value has gone down around $10,000 from the average of $40,000 and $50,000 that it was three or four years ago.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I say to you quite honestly that is an extreme example of what is happening in a lot of our communities. My friend from Bonavista South knows full well what is happening on the Bonavista Peninsula. I know what is happening. Go up on the North West Coast. I was in Labrador this last month or a month-and-a-half ago and we talked to every community member with the member and it is happening up there on the Coast of Labrador. So what do I do? Realistically, when you look at the options that I had, the question was, what do I do with these communities? The only answer to it is to try to go out with some encouragement and the encouragement will be what I will take out of my pocket, the government will take out of its pocket and try at least to put these communities back on an even keel so that they can survive and the word survive is a very important word here because survive is all that they expect right now from government.

That is all they want from government, and they would be happy if they were in a position where they could at least at the end of the year look at their Budgets, look at their statements, and say, boys we broke even. That is all, we broke even. I can assure this House and my hon. colleagues on both sides of the House that that $10.5 million will be scrutinized. We will deal with communities on an individual basis.

MR. TULK: How would you utilize that $10 million? What are you actually going to do with the money?

MR. A. REID: Well, a prime example is, you have a community in your district that has been after me, and you have been after me now for three or four years, that owes something like $500,000 to the finance corporation. I am going to be suggesting this time that out of that $10.5 million, not to take $500,000 and pay it off, but maybe the department will make the payments for that town for the next ten or fifteen years until it is paid off. Okay.

Take a hypothetical situation, any community in the Province, and let us say they owe $30,000 or $40,000 in arrears to NMFC, their ratio debt charge is 30, 40, or 50 per cent, I am not going to go in and write a cheque for that community and say, here that is all paid off, because if I do that next year at this time they are going to be back in debt again. You will find that the vast majority of communities out there that are in this financial situation, number one, they have really low tax rates, and a lot of them have admitted to me already that, yes, minister, if you would come in and help us get this straightened out I am sure the people in my community would not mind, over the next three years, gradually increasing the taxes by a small amount so that we can contribute something to the overall plan.

There are communities out there, for example, that owe millions of dollars to the Newfoundland Finance Corporation, and that money, as most of us municipal politicians understand, every year you are given capital works that is a contract you sign for that amount of money. It is not a contract that takes in the full amount that you owe to NMFC. It is all done on the basis of the contracts that are awarded. You have communities out there, for example, that owe large amounts of money and we feel, after talking to the banks, private lending institutions, and private sector investment people, as well as NMFC, that in a lot of these cases we can take that money that they owe, the way you and I would do if we were strapped, and go out and refinance a sizeable amount of that long-term debt over maybe a longer period of time, which would mean that their payments to NMFC and their debt charges each year would be lower. If you could refinance it at a lower interest rate you would lower that, and that would be a way then, that the town could then also contribute to the straightening out of their financial arrangement.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)

MR. A. REID: Yes. It could be two or it could be fifty.

AN HON. MEMBER: (inaudible

MR. A. REID: No, you are wrong. It will not be taken away from the Province. The Province has always had, regardless of what a municipality does - and I think the hon. member knows this if he would stop to think, regardless of what municipalities do, the Province is ultimately responsible for it, and even through the debt may be transferred from NMFC to the Bank of Nova Scotia, or the Bank of Montreal, we are still on the hook and the lending institutions, the bond markets that lend us money, lend the Minister of Finance money, he has to have a list of all the money that is owed by municipalities, so we are still on the hook for it. It is still considered a provincial debt, the same as the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing money is considered a provincial debt.

MR. TULK: Will there be any municipalities who will not need the Province's guarantee?

MR. A. REID: I think we have fourteen or fifteen communities done now without guarantees, but even though - listen to me carefully - even though Mount Pearl did not want a guarantee Mount Pearl's debt still has to show up as a debt of the Province at the end of the day to our bond market. And I tell you why, it is ultimately the responsibility of the government of this Province to protect municipalities. The government cannot have a municipality go bankrupt so ultimately you have the responsibility.

Someone made a comment yesterday in the House that this was a way that NMFC could unload their debt. That is totally incorrect. Mount Pearl, for example, renegotiated some $9 million; I do not know the exact figures, but I will use them just to illustrate. Mount Pearl, two or three months ago, negotiated with a private institution and refinanced $9 million. Well, that was $9 million that NMFC had held up to that point. The Bank of Nova Scotia, or whoever it was, wrote a cheque, and they came in and gave it to NMFC. But the problem with that was that it wasn't a question then - NMFC could not take the $9 million and go to New York and pay down on that debt, because when the bonding agencies loan the Province money they loan it in lump-sum payments and it is into fixed rates for fixed periods of time.

So what does the Newfoundland Municipal Financial Corporation do with the $9 million that is passed back to them? They have to invest it. They have to put it into a fund and gradually pay down a portion of it towards their bond retirement. So it is not a question of Newfoundland Municipal Financial Corporation having an advantage here, because they still owe the dollars.

The advantage that the Newfoundland Municipal Financial Corporation will ultimately have will be, I suppose, the fact that large amounts of money for these larger communities will not have to be financed through them in the future; therefore, the amount that has to be borrowed on the bond market will be lower, if you take the whole thing in context.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) best Minister of Municipal Affairs that this Province ever saw. Art, do you know something? I don't now what you are doing here. You could be out making half-a-million dollars a year as a consultant to municipalities, with your depth of knowledge, the amount of knowledge you have.

AN HON. MEMBER: He is sacrificing himself.

MR. TULK: You are sacrificing yourself here.

MR. A. REID: I guess I do have a few things going for me other than the fact that I have a big mouth.

MR. TULK: Besides that, never mind that.

MR. A. REID: Besides that, yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: It is getting close to Easter, and I guess I am a little humble.

MR. TULK: Getting humble in your old age.

MR. A. REID: I am getting humble in my old age.

CHAIR: Order, please!

MR. A. REID: The greatest pleasure that I get out of sitting in the House.

CHAIR: Order, please!

Does the member have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: I will finish up.

The greatest pleasure that I get in sitting in this place is that every year around this time it becomes the most comfortable place in the world for me to be, and I will tell the member from Labrador why.

Every year around this time there is money announced for capital works, and I am the minister responsible for capital works. So even though there may be times when the Opposition would like to get up and nail me, around this time of the year everybody is very nice to me.

AN HON. MEMBER: And it is not because (inaudible).

MR. A. REID: That is for sure, not because of my congeniality or my personality.

AN HON. MEMBER: Everybody?

MR. A. REID: Yes, just about everybody.

MR. H. HODDER: A point of order, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Waterford Valley on a point of order.

MR. H. HODDER: I am sorry, Mr. Chairman.

I just want to remind my good colleague - he mentioned getting nailed and everything else - that there are only five days between the Passover and the Crucifixion.

CHAIR: The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, by leave.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Here it is, look.

I want to finish up and just say to you, quite honestly, that I understand where the criticism is coming from. I think if I was there today in the municipal realm, the criticism would be even stronger. Coming from me, it would be even stronger.

I want everyone in the House to understand that there is a sizeable amount of money there. It is there to help protect and maintain rural Newfoundland - rural Newfoundland. Remember, I have always said it, even though there have been questions and debate and comments made around this Province that we do not have the sympathy for rural Newfoundland that we have for -

AN HON. MEMBER: Sure Mount Pearl is made up of rural Newfoundlanders.

MR. A. REID: - but I can honestly say to you, when you look at me, Art Reid, as the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, you are looking at a bayman. I believe quite honestly that it is not only the St. John's and the Corner Brooks of the world that make up Newfoundland it is the Labrador Coast that makes up Newfoundland. It is Carbonear Island, Baccalieu Island and the Cabot legacy in Bonavista. We all make up what we would like to believe in, what we dream about, what we know about and what most Newfoundlanders, that are not in Newfoundland, continually think about as this wonderful Province.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, I want to say that tomorrow is Good Friday, most of us I guess will be in church, if not tomorrow, on Sunday. I am reading in church on Sunday, by the way Harvey. I am doing a lesson on Sunday in church in Carbonear. I will be -

AN HON. MEMBER: And so you should (inaudible).

MR. A. REID: Harvey is a United churchman and I am a United churchman. I will say to you that I will be at the funeral tomorrow, at his mother's funeral and I will be representing all of you, on both sides of the House because I know a lot of you cannot get there. I will be representing all the House.

I want to say quite honestly, that I hope you have a good three weeks holiday. I am taking off some time, not next week but the week after. I am going to disappear from it all and I hope and pray my hon. critic over there is not too bad on me while I am gone. Thank you very much.

MR. J. BYRNE: I'm a quite reasonable fellow. I speak the truth.

CHAIR: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to take a few minutes this morning to talk on the Interim Supply motion now before the House and to say that the Budget was only brought down a week ago and I have to say that I am awfully surprised at how friendly the House is, only a week after the Budget.

MR. J. BYRNE: It's Holy Thursday, now you be careful what you are saying.

MR. HARRIS: Now it has been suggested that it is Holy Thursday and I look to my far left over here, to the Member for Cape St. Francis and he is wagging his finger at me and is sort of making threatening gestures over there. But I think it is awfully friendly though, only a week after a devastating Budget, it is awfully friendly in the House. So I don't want to add to that, Mr. Chairman, so I am going to point out some of the problems that I see that this government has inflicted on the people of this Province as the result of this Budget.

Now I told the Premier yesterday that I thought it was a clever Budget. It was a clever Budget because as a public relations effort the government to date has been reasonably successful.

MR. J. BYRNE: What? At what?

MR. HARRIS: As a public relations gesture. They even have Jim - what's his name? The Premier's favourite broadcaster, the morning show?

AN HON. MEMBER: Jim Browne.

MR. HARRIS: Jim Browne. He said this morning on the radio to me, `Yes terrible, 1,100 people being laid off.' I said, no, no, no, not 1,100 people. That is not even what the minister said. I mean the minister didn't even say that but they managed to pass it off. They passed it off. Doug Letto, Mr. inside information last night, notebook, he finally got it from inside sources that there may actually be more than 1,100. A week later. Now, Mr. Chairman, I want to tell you something, I knew this before the minister read the Budget Speech. Do you know why? Because I read the Budget Speech a couple of hours before. It says on page 12, "The additional measures announced in this Budget will eliminate up to 1,100 full time equivalent positions over the next three years. This represents a four percent reduction in public sector positions. This is in addition to other reductions already underway, such as those from health care restructuring, education reform and declining student enrolments." So what does that mean? When you add it all up, Mr. Chairman, 900 jobs from the Grace goes, 1,100 full time equivalent positions. What does that mean?

The Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation has announced the closure of parks, the privatization of parks. If you took one seasonal job for three months, how many of them does it take to make 1,100 positions? Forty-four hundred, Mr. Chairman. What does this mean? It means that a family that is dependent on that seasonal job and whatever else the employee is able to get over the rest of the year - you know, perhaps a bit of UI, or `EI, EI, O,' as they call it now. A bit of UI, perhaps another job in the winter, a bit of a hobble, that family can survive. Instead, that family is going to suffer.

Mr. Chairman, I am not here to criticize the media. What I am here to do is point out that this government is pulling the wool over the eyes of the population. I know that the Minister of Justice smiles and laughs and chuckles. `Dr. Death.' They move him around. Did you notice that, Mr. Chairman, that they move this man around to different portfolios? Whenever there is a job to be done, whenever there is some harsh work to be done, they move the minister into place and set him on it. They put the leash on only a little bit, holding him back just a little bit and set him on whoever needs to be set upon. The Minister of Justice, former Minister of Education, former Minister of Health.

When we look at the health care system, when we look at the education system, and now the justice system - and I do not even think he will be very happy with this, what I am going to tell him in a few minutes. He was not here this morning because he did not want to hear anything about the lock-up this morning so he avoided Question Period, I noticed - did not want to talk about the lock-up.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Maybe he will get up now and answer the questions about the lock-up. I will ask him a few questions.

Mr. Chairman, what I am saying to hon. members and to you, is that this government has managed to get away with a massive change in the public sector by pretending it is only 1,100 jobs and being somewhat successful to date, but only to date, in convincing people that is the case. To add to the deception, they tabled the Departmental Salary Details - one hundred and seventy-four pages with the details, how many positions, each department, department by department. We can move the Department of Forest Resources and Agrifoods, and what we have here is a list, a permanent staff complement from the minister's office on down. From the minister's office on down, the permanent staff complement is listed out going on for several pages. Four hundred and forty-three approved positions according to the Departmental Salary Details.

However, you have to look at it a little closer - you have to take out your magnifying glass and you have to search throughout the document high and low, look for little footnotes, look for little tiny numbers the size of a whisker. You will find out if you do that that they have not removed from the salary details all the positions that have been abolished. So what is this 175 pages of trash? Trash! What this government is doing is trashing positions in the public sector without even letting people know what is going on.

I have a copy of only one page of this. On one page - this is in the Minister of Justice's department, the Youth Corrections division, Whitbourne. One hundred and nineteen positions are listed on page 165, but within a couple of days of the Budget being passed down, they said: No, this document that was tabled by the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board does not mean that there are still 119 positions in Youth Corrections. There are at least twenty-seven of them that do not exist anymore.

Now, Mr. Chairman, I find it passing strange that nobody seems to be too worried about that. You know, the government publishes a 175-page book, very glossy cover, Departmental Salary Details, said to be, in its own words, a compilation in detail of all the positions broken down in accordance with the 1997-1998 Estimates and yet, it is actually a farce and a fraud, Mr. Chairman, on the people of this Province and on the public-sector workers.

So, what do we have going on out at Whitbourne? Maybe the minister can tell us; maybe the minister knows. I am not sure even he is happy with it, because I think he believes that youth corrections is an area which needs a lot of support, that the individuals who get themselves involved in the correctional system as young people, need a lot of support, need a lot of opportunities to overcome the bad start that they have in life and not be treated as criminals in all cases, I mean, there are obviously exceptions. There are obviously exceptions where young people have conducted themselves in such a way as to make themselves a danger to the public, a danger to society in a very serious way, but these are the exceptions, Mr. Chairman, very much the exception.

In fact, if you look at the documentation released by the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary, they indicate that many young offenders - in fact, according to the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary Child Abuse Fact Sheet, almost 97 per cent of young offenders have had a history of child abuse prior to their becoming involved in the justice system, the youth correction system. Some of them who are in close custody end up in Whitbourne where there has been a fairly elaborate program developed over the last number of years to provide supports for them, to give them educational opportunities, to provide alternate activities in conjunction with the post-secondary education system in the Province. These young people who are confined to close custody as a result of coming into contact with the criminal justice system under the Young Offenders Act, have an opportunity to come out of there with a little better sense of themselves, Mr. Chairman, with a few skills, an opportunity to work and be productive - to work on a farm, to be involved in projects that are of use to them in developing skills and self-esteem and overcoming through counselling programs some of their difficulties.

So what do we see happening out there, Mr. Chairman? I am afraid what we see happening out there - and the minister can correct me if I am wrong - is a total dismantling of any notion of a youth correctional facility that does anything other than incarcerate young people, and if that is what is going to happen at Whitbourne, Mr. Chairman, I think the Minister of Justice should be ashamed of himself.

AN HON. MEMBER: Well, that is quite clear when they talk about surveillance cameras (inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: I think the Minister of Justice should be ashamed of himself if that is what is going to happen out at Whitbourne. And I cannot believe - and I have to say this, knowing the minister and the minister's concerns for young people. He has been Minister of Education, had a career as a school teacher, I understand, involved with young people. You have been a school teacher?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

AN HON. MEMBER: He never taught anybody anything.

MR. HARRIS: Alright, I take it back, he does not have compassion for young people that I thought he would have through his experience as a schoolteacher. He must have gotten his compassion for young people somewhere else, I say, rather than teaching school. Anyway, he can tell us his own career, I am not going to praise the minister - only to say that I cannot believe that this Minister of Justice believes we should take all programming aspects out of the Whitbourne correctional institution.

MR. DECKER: They are not coming out, and you know it. You were told they are not coming out, and you are getting up (inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Chairman, what we are being told is that the programs are not going out, but only the people who deliver the programs are going to disappear. That is a sleight-of-hand. The information I have is that the people who deliver these programs are going to disappear. The programs are going to stay, we are told by the minister, but the people who deliver the programs will not be there to deliver them. I do not know how -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Well, I am going to give the minister - the minister is going to have an opportunity to get up now and tell us exactly what is going on out there, how many positions are going to be gone, and what is going to be left when it is all over, what kind of program we are going to have.

Maybe while he is at it, he can tell us what Dr. Inkpen recommended when she did her report a couple of years ago. Maybe he can give us a copy of the report. I do not know if it has been collecting dust. Maybe it is being looked at and ignored. Maybe he can table it in the House and we will all have a look and see exactly what is going on in the minister's department. But I cannot believe the minister wants to see that very valuable program - which I understand has won awards and recognition across the country for the development of a program of great use to young people and young offenders, that that is not going to be able to exist in this Province anymore.

Mr. Chairman, the issues that are raised out of this Budget are massive. We have, in many departments of government right now, mass confusion.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER (Wiseman): Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: People are being called together in meetings and told: Twenty-five of you are going to go but we do not know who yet. So all of you, presumably, can get busy writing your resumés. We do not know who you are yet, we have not figured that out -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I am having some problems hearing the hon. member. Can we try to keep the noise down, please?

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I appreciate your interest in hearing the remarks. What we have is, instead of what the Premier promised a month-and-a-half ago or a month ago, when he said: We are going to do something, we are going to have a three-year plan, people are going to know who is secure and who is not, here we are a week after the Budget, a week after the end of the so-called program review which has been going on for months, and we have public servants all over the Province wondering whether they should be doing anything other than writing their resumés. I do not know if there is anything else going on in the public service other than people busily writing their resumés and trying to get them together to see what -

MR. FITZGERALD: How much money have they put there for resumé writing?

MR. HARRIS: If they put the money there necessary for resumé writing they would have spent a lot of money on that. They would have spent a lot more money than they wasted preparing the Departmental Salary Details that are worth nothing but recycled paper at the moment, Mr. Chairman, because they are not of any use to anybody.

We have serious issues and serious problems. We have the government creating chaos in the public sector. If you go down to the Queen's Printer, they will tell you that they are all going to laid off, they are going to be gone. What is going on? Has this government lost its head? The government has everybody in the public sector now concerned that the documents that the Minister of Finance files in the House cannot be trusted, cannot be believed, are not worth the paper on which they are printed.

There is an awful lot of skulduggery going on, of which the public is not being made aware. The public has not been made aware of it because the government has not been coming clean. They have not been providing the answers; they have not been providing the details; they have not been informing their own employees of what the circumstances are, what the situation is, and there is chaos in the public sector.

We have the Minister of Education over there today washing his hands of the trouble he has caused. He goes out and creates havoc.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who?

MR. HARRIS: The Minister of Education. He goes out and creates havoc amongst the parents of Newfoundland and Labrador, and then he comes in here this morning and washes his hands of it, and says: Well, this is what the people wanted. They wanted havoc; they wanted chaos; they wanted no result from the whole four or five years of agony and agonizing debate over school reform to end up exactly like this. This is what the people wanted. They wanted chaos; they wanted havoc, and they wanted the minister to get up in the House and say: I have no responsibility for what goes on out there in the school boards that I have appointed and told what to do. He has no responsibility.

MR. J. BYRNE: How long have you been up now?

MR. HARRIS: Not long enough, I say to the Member for Cape St. Francis.

The Budget that we have been asked to consider for a few days only - four days - four days' consideration of the Budget... They are going to shut her down today now and let the damage sink into the public sector.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hoping that people will forget.

MR. HARRIS: Let them forget. The House will not be open. We will not have the Opposition hammering the government every day on the Budget, as they have been doing the last four days. We will not have that. We will have the public out there without any guidance, without any questions being answered, and we will have the Minister of Finance getting away with a slippery Budget, one that the Minister of Health thinks is so greasy that it has fingerprints all over it. Greasy fingerprints all over the Budget, a very slippery Budget.

MR. J. BYRNE: What do you think of Robin Hood? Do you know who Robin Hood is?

MR. HARRIS: Who is Robin Hood?

MR. J. BYRNE: The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs (inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Oh, the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny.

MR. J. BYRNE: Robin Hood.

MR. HARRIS: Robin Hood and the Easter Bunny all rolled into one. Robin Hood, the Easter Bunny, and Santa Claus all rolled into one.

He whispered here today - he just sort of said very lowly - that St. John's really cannot count on the provincial government to recognize its need. What he does not say is that his government has taken $7.8 million out of the City of St. John's budget. That is the cost. That is on a $100 million budget. That is a fair chunk of change. That is nearly 8 per cent of the City of St. John's budget, and the minister keeps piling responsibilities on the City of St. John's - and his predecessors - piling responsibilities. Look at the Goulds. It is your problem; you bring it up to standard. Make the taxpayers of St. John's pay. We can soak them even more.

MR. J. BYRNE: They are taking $6 million out of municipalities, (inaudible) from the city, and give them back ten (inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Yes, he is robbing Peter to pay Paul. I wouldn't call him Robin Hood, I say to the Member for Cape St. Francis. I wouldn't call him Robin Hood.

MR. J. BYRNE: In his mind.

MR. HARRIS: In his own mind he sees himself as a re-distributor of wealth from what he thinks is a wealthy city, St. John's, which it isn't. The city of St. John's is in just as serious financial straits as other municipalities who are trying to meet tremendous demands from its citizens with limited resources and are being forced to make very tough choices as the result of this government's moves.

The downloading that is going on, Mr. Chairman, and I have to say, it is not as severe as is happening in Ontario under that fellow Harris -

MR. J. BYRNE: Don't go making comparisons here.

MR. HARRIS: - under that fellow Harris. I don't know where he got his name but he certainly does not have the same point of view of this hon. member but -

MR. FITZGERALD: He doesn't have compassion.

MR. HARRIS: I thank the Member for Bonavista South for that compliment.

The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs has portrayed himself as the Easter Bunny, Robin Hood, Santa Claus, all rolled into one. He thinks he is very well liked this time of year because he is in a position to pass out capital grants but that is not the way that government should operate, based on a minister having the kind of discretionary power to pass out or not pass out capital grants. I know he has to consider the needs of each and every municipality, the needs of each and every project. There has to be an objective process to determine what needs ought to be met and it ought not be based on how friendly people are to the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs. I am sure if he were to stand again he would retract that and tell us he was only kidding. He was only trying to have a little conviviality in the House and talk about how his personality changes this time of year, that during the rest of the year he is his usual self but this time of year -

CHAIR: Order, please!

I would like to remind hon. members that it is unparliamentary to have the chairs turned around so that the member has his back to the Speaker.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) conviviality was an unparliamentary word (inaudible) used very often.

MR. HARRIS: Well it is a rare word to be used in this House, I will acknowledge but I would never accuse the Government House Leader of being convivialist. I would never accuse the Government House Leader of being a raging convivialist. I would never accuse him of that.

The minister I am sure would say that he was only trying to be jolly in the hope and expectation that the Opposition would close down this debate and let them all go home to their districts but that is not the intention here, Mr. Chairman. The intention is to make sure that the government takes responsibility for the kind of decision that it is making and that it is forcing on the people of this Province and not hide behind phoney documents, Mr. Chairman, that give a false picture of what is going on when the true picture is that it is creating massive hardship throughout this Province.

The project of getting rid of 3,000 or 4,000 people from the public sector payroll is going to have a massive influence on the population of this Province, on the unemployment rate in this Province because, Mr. Chairman, the government is so happy to use multiplier effects when they talk about new jobs being created. They use that all the time, well we created so many jobs but the multiplier effect was times three. So if it is fifty jobs it is really 150 but, Mr. Chairman, if the government is going to be fair and honest when they are doing the reverse -

CHAIR: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. HARRIS: If I may have a moment to finish my sentence, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: Finish your sentence.

CHAIR: By leave.

MR. HARRIS: When they are going - it is going to be a long sentence.

Mr. Chairman, when the government is using statistics to boast their projects and ideas that they support they multiply by three, the multiplier effect. Well I say, Mr. Chairman, if they are going to be fair and honest to the public of this Province and not trying to pull off a PR scam than they should use the multiplier effect the other way and admit that there are perhaps, 3,000 or 4,000 people who are going to lose their jobs as a result of this Budget and that if you use the multiplier effect properly that, that is going to translate into 9,000 or 10,000 fewer people employed in this Province as a result of the multiplier effect, and that that is going to have a devastating effect on the economy of this Province. Not just the civil servants are affected, Mr. Chairman, but the economy of the Province.

On that note, Mr. Chairman, I think my sentence is ended and I will sit down and let some other hon. member speak.

MR. TULK: Mr. Chairman, I don't know whatever the -

CHAIR: Order, please! Order, please!

The Chair has not yet recognized the hon. member.

MR. TULK: Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: Thank you.

There was a novel, I guess it was written by - was it Virginia Wolf or William Faulkner, that went on and on, the whole novel was one sentence?

The hon. gentleman should take time over Easter to read it and then-

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: No, it was not Emily Brontë, no. I think it was written by –

AN HON. MEMBER: The Sound of Fury (inaudible).

MR. TULK: The Sound of Fury by William Faulkner?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: Yes, by William Faulkner. The construction of the whole novel was one sentence from beginning to end, and the hon. gentleman over on the other side, might do well to read that over Easter and then he could realize that he could probably come back here and (inaudible) information to speak in a sentence, he could speak for at least four or five hours.

Now, Mr. Chairman, this morning, in Question Period, the hon. gentleman from Baie Verte - White Bay, is it Baie Verte - White Bay still?

AN HON. MEMBER: Green Bay.

MR. TULK: No, it is not Green Bay. Green Bay is well represented by the former Minister of Forest Resource and Agrifoods. But in any case, the hon. gentleman raised some questions about silviculture and what the government is doing to try and see that the forests of this Province are kept for generations to come. I did not get the chance, because there is only so much time in Question Period anyway and it is only so much time the Speaker will allow you which is the proper thing but, Mr. Chairman, let me just say to -

AN HON. MEMBER: What is your (inaudible)?

MR. TULK: Boy, you have to listen to the Speaker.

MR. J. BYRNE: The Premier tells him to sit down.

CHAIR: Order, please! Order, please!

MR. TULK: You have to listen to the Speaker. The Speaker rules here and he rules very, very well I might say.

Mr. Chairman, let me just outline for the hon. gentleman. I am going to take just two or three minutes and outline to him what has happened there up until the end of 1996.

Mr. Chairman, let me tell him that, up until 1996 in this Province, since about 1980, there has been the sum of $173 million spent on forest and silviculture.

MR. SHELLEY: Since when?

MR. TULK: I think it is 1982 I believe it is, it could have been a little earlier than that but I think it is 1982. But up until 1996, there has been some $173 million spent on silviculture. There have been some 79,000 hectares of pre-commercial thinning - the hon. gentleman should write all of this down - he does not need to, I will send this over to him.

MR. J. BYRNE: How many acres in a hectare?

MR. TULK: How many acres in a hectare, 2.55 isn't it?

AN HON. MEMBER: No (inaudible).

MR. TULK: Well, whatever. It is about two-and-a-half. An old surveyor should know; a man who has made millions, hundreds of thousands, out robbing people, just going up through, Mr. Chairman, and shooting the line, should know. He is over there, he is supposed to be the wealthiest individual on the government side of the House - there is a little matter that is taking place that we have told him about and shown him and I want to caution him: Don't let it go to his head what he knows we have told him and that is that he is - I have to say to the Member for Baie Verte that he is one - a poll just released showed him that he has again topped the polls, he is the best regarded by people in this Province as the best opposition member in the House, the hon. Member for Cape St. Francis, and I can guarantee him now that after Easter - I don't have it with me but after Easter I am going to give him a copy of that poll so that he -

AN HON. MEMBER: One that you make up.

MR. TULK: No, no. The hon. gentleman should know different from that, I am not going to make anything up, I am going to give him the exact figures as the poll shows.

AN HON. MEMBER: Okay, I appreciate that.

MR. TULK: Now, Mr. Chairman, there were also some 1,500 hectares of commercial thinning in the Province; 32,000 hectares of site preparation; 2,200 hectares, 40,000 hectares of plantation.

I would like, one of those days, to take the hon. gentleman, and I make this commitment to him: one of those days when we are over in the Corner Brook area, on the West Coast of the Province, basically over in his area, I will take him and - the Member for Humber East knows this anyway; he is very familiar with it because he is part of the architecture that did this - fly him west of Corner Brook and down to Bay St. George's and show him what has been done with silviculture in this Province.

Mr. Chairman, I can guarantee you that the hon. gentleman will come back to this House a converted man. He will realize that in a matter of ten to fifteen years, when this stuff come to fruition, we will be well away for wood. He does not have to worry about that fact at all (inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: A point of order, Mr. Chairman.

MR. TULK: Oh, my. You see, you tell them how good it is and that is it then.

CHAIR: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis on a point of order.

MR. J. BYRNE: Mr. Chairman, I would just like to know, is the Government House Leader speaking on Bill 2? I want to know what the relevancy is to Bill 2.

CHAIR: The Chair is of the impression that the hon. the Government House Leader is speaking to the appropriate motion.

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: I am talking about forestry. I tell the hon. gentleman, don't get carried away with the poll. For the first time, I say to him, somebody in this House - and it happens to be from this side - happens to be relevant to this bill. I am talking about Interim Supply for the Department of Forestry, and pointing out what we are using it for.

Mr. Chairman, listen to this statistic: 160,000 weeks of employment have been created in silviculture. There are approximately 300 trained silviculture workers in the Province. Those are stats that I will send over to the hon. gentleman, and I have to tell him that I think this year - I believe this year, if my memory serves me correctly - we are going to be - I have the figures here somewhere - creating another 5,000 person weeks of employment in silviculture, and I can promise him today that the district of Baie Verte - White Bay, unlike when there was a Tory government in this Province and the Premier of the day - one A. Brian Peckford - stood on this side of the House and said: If you do not vote P.C. - you remember that; I think the Member for the Straits will remember that - if you don't vote Tory, you will get nothing. I am sitting on the financial chest of this Province. He used to rant and roar. I think he used to sit over there somewhere then.

Mr. Chairman, let me say to the hon. gentleman from Baie Verte - White Bay - I have one more fact that I want to give him first, but let me just say to him - that on this side of the House this minister will see that the forestry in this Province is treated right, regardless of where it is. I have to say to him that in Baie Verte - White Bay this year I am going to make sure that he gets fair treatment, that the forestry in Baie Verte gets fair treatment when it comes to silviculture. I am not going to carry on with that political partisanship that he is so used to, that he is a child of, that is his tradition, his good P.C. tradition, that we are not going to do it. We are going to look after the hon. gentleman.

There is one more thing I want to tell him before I sit down. He keeps going on over that about how the pulp and paper companies are not doing their fair share in the Province. Well, I have to tell him, I have to inform him - he says the pulp and paper companies are not doing their fair share - that since 1989 when that infamous government left office, the whole process of who is doing what is completely reversed. In 1989 the government was paying for 65 per cent of silviculture work in this Province and the companies were paying 35 per cent. It is completely reversed. It is now 35/65.

I also have to tell him that we have just struck an agreement with the paper companies in which they are going to front-end load again this year their work on silviculture, and do more in this year than they had intended under this five-year agreement. I have been given a bit of positive news. Having been given this good positive news I want to wish my critic for forestry well. I think his trip to Italy was successful, and I believe along with the Minister of Fisheries he is going to get a nice little tannery down in his district, and I want to guarantee him in the spirit of Easter Sunday that he is going to get a fair share of silviculture.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

MR. SHELLEY: Mr. Chairman, I have just two quick minutes to clue up, but I certainly intended to have at least half an hour today, and I was going to use the entire time to talk about forestry. After reading the entire report, the analysis, and so on, and after talking to many, many people over the last two months, since February 7, I say to the Member for Humber East that I know all about his knowledge and all about his involvement over the past in forestry. I can only make a blanket statement in a minute and a half, Mr. Chairman, and simply put I have some very, very deep concerns about the forest industry. It is not a matter of spreading fear or anything else, but if you talk to anybody in the forest industry they have some very big concerns.

Very simply put, Mr. Chairman, we see in front of us now the golden opportunity by this minister at this time in our history to do something about a potential crisis in the Province. We have a golden opportunity at this time because we have all acknowledged that what we have seen in the fishery can very easily happen in the forest industry. So, with a little bit more than action, and action has to come not just through the consultation process, but by actually doing something.

The people on the Baie Verte Peninsula are people who have depended on the logging industry for many, many years and I am glad to hear the minister say they are going to get their share of silviculture. But I would also like to remind him, Mr. Chairman, here in this House today, at the last minute before we close here, while waiting for the Lieutenant-Governor to come in, that it is also very important in my district for those some 200 people involved in the sawmill industry, not with Kruger and Abitibi, but in the private sawmill industry, that they have been such a main part of the economy that they have to be treated with the same kind of decency by the minister and that their problems have to be solved.

They are very big problems and the minister has to make sure that it is handled, and he has, like I said, not just talk in consultation and in meetings, but in action. When he comes back in his department and talks to his officials, to make sure that those people are taken care of and they remain in the forest industry. As far as this plan goes, the plan is only as good as its execution. It is good to have a plan, Mr. Chairman, and I use the analogy of being a coach. I have made many great plays in basketball but if you cannot execute them they are useless, they are not worth the paper they are written on. You have to be able to execute the plan and make sure that in five years from now we will not have a minister stand in this House and announce a moratorium on the forestry. Mr. Chairman, action, not rhetoric, move on.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: The hon. the Member for Bonavista South.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I just want to take a minute before the Lieutenant-Governor comes in. On behalf of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition to wish the Minister of Mines and Energy farewell, a bon voyage. I do not think we will ever see him in Ottawa unless he pays his own way, but I do wish him all the best as he exists this House. He has been a burden to the taxpayers of this Province and it is about time he has moved on and relieved us of that responsibility and that expense.

Thank you.

 

Resolution

 

That it is expedient to introduce a measure to provide for the granting to Her Majesty for defraying certain expenses to the public service for the financial year ending March 31, 1998, the sum of $1,019,465,000,700.

On motion, resolution carried.

A bill, "An Act For Granting To Her Majesty Certain Sums Of Money For Defraying Certain Expenses Of The Public Service For The Financial Year Ending March 31, 1998 And For Other Purposes Relating To The Public Service."

MR. TULK: Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee rise, report substantial progress.

On motion, that the Committee rise, report progress, and ask leave to sit again, Mr. Speaker returned to the Chair.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Lewisporte.

MR. PENNEY: Mr. Speaker, the Committee of the Whole have considered the matters to them referred, have directed me to report that they have adopted a certain resolution and recommend that a bill, Bill No. 2, be introduced to give effect to the same.

On motion, report received and adopted.

On motion, a bill, "An Act For Granting To Her Majesty Certain Sums Of Money For Defraying Certain Expenses Of The Public Service For The Financial Year Ending March 31, 1998 And For Other Purposes Relating To The Public Service," read a third, second and third time, and shall stand as on the Order Paper.

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

MR. TULK: I understand that His Honour is out there and is ready now to give royal assent to the bill.

SERGEANT-AT-ARMS: Admit His Honour, the Lieutenant-Governor.

His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor takes the Chair.

MR. SPEAKER: Your Honour, it is my agreeable duty on behalf of Her Majesty's dutiful and loyal subjects, Her Faithful Commons in Newfoundland, to present to Your Honour a bill for the appropriation of supply granted in the present session.

CLERK: A bill, "An Act For Granting To Her Majesty Certain Sums Of Money For Defraying Certain Expenses Of The Public Service For The Financial Year Ending March 31, 1998 And For Other Purposes Relating To The Public Service". (Bill No. 2)

SERGEANT-AT-ARMS: Please be seated.

HIS HONOUR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR A. M. HOUSE: In Her Majesty's Name, I thank Her Loyal Subjects, I accept their benevolence, and I assent to this Bill.

Mr. Speaker, I would wish everybody a happy break from their duties. Have a Happy Easter and a good holiday.

His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor leaves the Chamber.

Mr. Speaker returns to the Chair.

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, before I move the motion to adjourn there are a couple of things that are pleasant for us to do, I guess, and there are some things that may be somewhat nostalgic for some people in this Legislature.

Let me say that there is a tinge of sadness. There is a person in this House and there is a strong rumour that he may be leaving us. I don't know whether it is true or not. I guess he will confirm it or deny it at some point in time. I have to say to the hon. gentleman that I first met him I think it was 1960 when we went to school together in Wesleyville. I have to tell you that he was the smallest -

AN HON. MEMBER: Did you teach him?

MR. TULK: No, I went to school with him. I have to say that he sat behind me and he was the smallest fellow in class, he was the youngest fellow in class, and he was the smartest fellow in class.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

AN HON. MEMBER: Who was the biggest?

MR. TULK: No, the biggest wasn't me at that point. I've become the biggest and he still stays the smartest. If he should -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: I wasn't the biggest, no. If he should make an announcement sometime within the near future before we get back that he is not going to be with us I'm sure that all of us would want to say to him that he has done exceptionally well as a public servant, as a political figure in this Province, and I'm sure that even the Member for Bonavista South would concur that that has been the case.

He has served, Mr. Speaker, in an exemplary fashion. He is a man, I can say to you, of principle, and a man who will not bend his principles for anybody. Even though you may not always agree with him, you have to admire him for what he has stood for. Having said that, if he should decide to do something we wish him well, and we know that he will serve this Province well no odds where he wants to go.

There are a number of other people who are, I understand, leaving the employ of this Legislature. One, Mrs. Anita Hall, who will be retiring at the end of this month, and has served the Hansard office as a transcriber since 1976. Over the years, Mrs. Hall has had to, of course, listen to a great variety of speakers, debates, arguments. I suspect not only has she had to transcribe, in many cases she has had to - and I'm no exception to that - translate for many of us what we have said, and I suspect that in many cases some of that translation may have been very difficult. Mr. Speaker, I would like, on behalf on this side of the House, and I'm sure if he will do the same for their parties, but I would like to wish her well.

Of course, there is Miss Norma Jean Richards, the legislative librarian, who joined this House of Assembly's library in April 1967. That is some thirty years ago. She has worked for many members of the House, and in particular every premier of this Province, from Mr. Smallwood, Mr. Moores, Mr. Peckford, Mr. Rideout, Mr. Wells, and of course the present Premier, Mr. Tobin. She has become somewhat of a legend in this institution, and she has helped so many people with requests for information and in matters of research that it would be hard to express our gratitude to her. But we do want to do that. She began her career in the public service by working with the General Hospital Corporation in 1957, 1958, as a medical records librarian. She was awarded the Canada 125 medal in 1993. After nearly thirty-nine years of service to the Province Miss Richards has decided that she wishes to retire and we wish her well in that retirement.

Of course there is our Sergeant-at-Arms.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear! Hear, hear!

MR. TULK: I'm going to say that he was born in Lamaline, and he was born on May 26 1916, which makes him eighty-one years young. He is the son of the late Rev. H. and Mrs. F. Kirby, and like so many others was educated in his own town in Lamaline, also Port Rexton and Harbour Grace. Mr. Speaker, our Sergeant-at-Arms was enlisted with the First Volunteer Contingency Royal Artillery and sailed for England on April 14 1940. Like many of his peers he served us well, and indeed helped preserve many of the freedoms that we enjoy in this democracy, in this country, and indeed in parliament. He served with the 166th Newfoundland Royal Artillery, and fought with the British in North Africa in the Italian campaign.

He is married to the former Thelma Marper of Sheffield, England, and they have three children, Pamela, Philip and Deborah. He has been involved in many community activities, including the past commanding officer of the R.C.S.C.C. Terra Nova, executive council member of Branch 56, R.C.L. He started to serve in his present position as the Sergeant-at-Arms as an understudy in the fall of 1979 and took over the full responsibility of the position in the fall of 1981, where he has been ever since and, Mr. Speaker, has served us well and we want, and I am sure everybody in this House will wish him the best of retirement and if he feels like it, to come back, if he has the nerve to come back to sit around and watch (inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, if I could, I would like to depart a little bit from perhaps protocol here and say that the Member for Torngat Mountains just came down and is probably one of the most congenial people in this House - that is twice today - and, Mr. Speaker, he asked me if he could present an Easter Basket to our Sergeant-At-Arms from a lady in Labrador, so I would accept him if he would accept this from the Member for Torngat Mountains.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, before I yield to my hon. friends across the way because I am sure they would want to pass some remarks, I want to take this opportunity on behalf of the government to wish all of the people, and I won't name any individual particularly but wish the Opposition, all of the opposition, wish all of the people who work with us, Your Honour, on behalf of the government side of the House, we would like to wish everybody in this Legislature a happy Easter holiday - I was going to say Merry Christmas - but a happy Easter holiday. I hope you enjoy it and I say we look forward to having the first woman Sergeant-At-Arms service when we come back.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I too would like to comment on the Minister of Mines and Energy very briefly and to let him know that we will co-operate in every way possible as I have done in the past. In fact, I vacated my teaching position to run in politics so his daughter can get a job and fill my position. I co-operated with the minister from day one and I can assure you I will do my utmost after June 9 or 10 to see that you can get a job in the private sector somewhere. I hope you will enjoy your retirement from public life I am sure, and we have a big party planned for you back in June.

On a more serious note, we have three people retiring from service here to the public, you know, people who have done commendable jobs in their own respective areas. Mrs. Hall, who has worked in Hansard and transcriptions. I know I have co-operated, I have it so articulate and brogue-free of course to make her job so pleasant as so many others here in this House have. It is not an easy task I can assure you. We did get an occasional call for an interpretation or a spelling of a word that we used, that happened occasionally. I say to hon. members, I have not heard some speak yet so you have not had a call but that will happen, that will come.

Also, to Ms Richards, I guess Norma Jean as everybody knows her, has served with the House of Assembly for thirty years and thirty-nine in the service of this government and that is a very long and distinguished career, a person with whom everybody can identify, and we certainly wish her well too in her retirement along with Mrs. Hall and we hope you will have a very enjoyable retirement and live a long healthy life under our health care system.

To Mr. Kirby, our Sergeant-At-Arms, as we all know, we have co-operated on almost and in every instance to make your life as pleasant as possible here in the House of Assembly and Mr. Kirby who has served our country in World War 11 and went to fight for freedom; he has witnessed that aspect, he has been involved in private business, in public life and has made his mark here and a very respected individual here in the House of Assembly. Mr. Kirby we hope you will have a very enjoyable retirement at a ripe old age of eighty-one or a ripe young age of eighty-one. I am sure with your health and your mobility, we are going to see you around for many, many more years to come, and I hope you will enjoy every single one of them.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We are talking about retirements today and I know, even though he has not announced his retirement from politics we probably will not hear that announcement until after June. If we come back here and we find the Minister of Mines and Energy here, I guess we will probably be as disappointed as it appears the Government House Leader will be. I understand the minister has some plans and that they may lead to his retirement from public life, certainly from provincial public life but very possibly from public life in general, and we wish him well in his endeavours, but not too much luck, as they say sometimes.

We also wish to honour Ms Anita Hall, who has served the House as a transcriber in Hansard. As others have said, it is not an easy job sometimes to do both tasks, both to listen at times to what must be tedious debate and, as the Member for Baie Verte says, even learning how to spell the word, `deb-aa-te' sometimes can be difficult with some of the accents and pronunciations that are part of our cultural heritage. So we thank her for her service and wish her well in her retirement.

Also, Ms Norma Jean Richards, I have come to know as a very dedicated member of the staff of the House of Assembly, who has taken great pride in her work and great pride in her involvement as Legislative Librarian. My first contact with her was before I came to this House. I called to ask a question and she took pains to inform me that her job was to service and provide library service to all members and former members, not only of this House but also of the House of Commons. I, being a former member of the House of Commons, was looking for information, and she was pleased to be able to provide the information that I was looking for. On every occasion since then I have had the necessity to use the services of the legislative library, she has been most helpful and encouraging in looking up information, providing little titbits that you probably would not find in a well-catalogued library, the kind of information that you sometimes need to know, especially if you are a new member of the House of Assembly. So I think her thirty years of service to this House is a great honour. We are very pleased to see that she is being recognized here today and we thank her for her service.

Mr. Kirby has been an old friend of mine since I have been here, and up until recently, has been my nearest seat mate in the House of Assembly. I have watched over the years, with great respect, I must say, the dignity and decorum that he has brought to the proceedings of the House. Mr. Kirby, as the Government House Leader has pointed out, has had a long and fruitful life of service, both to his community and to his country. He is very proud of his service, as are we, in the 166th Royal Artillery Regiment. He has had the experience of serving his country in a terrible conflict, but he has proudly borne witness to that service and the camaraderie of his fellow-veterans I have witnessed in person at the Canadian Legion Branch 56. His service to this House has been acknowledged, and rightly so, and I, for one, will miss his presence here in this House. I wish him very well in his retirement.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair would also at this time just like to take this opportunity on behalf of all the staff of the House to thank Mr. Kirby, Ms Richards, and Ms Hall for their loyal and dedicated service to the House, and I want to wish them well in their retirement.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

The hon. Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I move that when this House adjourns today it will stand adjourned until April 22, 1997 at 2:00 p.m., providing always that it appears to the satisfaction of the Speaker, or in the case of his absence from the Province the Chairperson of Committees after consultation with Her Majesty's government, that the House should meet at another date. The Speaker, or in his absence, the Chairperson of Committees, may give notice that he is so satisfied, and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated by such notice and shall transact its business as if the House had been duly adjourned to that time.

I move, Mr. Speaker, that this House do now adjourn.

On motion, the House at its rising adjourned until Tuesday, April 22, 1997 at 2:00 p.m., or earlier to the call of the Chair.