December 7, 1999 HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS Vol. XLIV No. 47


The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

Before we begin our routine proceedings, the Chair would like to welcome to the Speaker's gallery today, on behalf of all members, the President and Executive of the Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Fire Chiefs and Firefighters.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

Statements by Ministers

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Each year at this time, it is traditional for the Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Fire Chiefs and Firefighters to present its annual brief to the Social Policy Committee of government. This is a comprehensive and professionally prepared document and it serves to outline the Association's views and suggestions in the important areas of fire education, prevention and protection.

The Association's brief was presented earlier today and, on this occasion, I would like to take the opportunity on behalf of all hon. members to acknowledge the tremendous contribution firefighters make in terms of protecting the lives and protecting the property of all of us as citizens throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.

In its letter accompanying the brief, the Association stated that it is most pleased with the support shown by the Chair and members of the Social Policy Committee of government. The Association's letter states, and I quot, “The support shown by this Committee to our concerns will go a long way in providing a visible symbol of your government's support to the many men and women who give so much of their time as members of our fire departments.”

Mr. Speaker, the Association works closely with the Fire Commissioner's Office and it plays an instrumental role in many fire-related activities including, amongst others, the Learn Not To Burn Program.

This is a life-safety skills program for children and it stresses the teaching of positive and practical fire prevention behaviours. As a direct result of the input of the Association, this program is now part of the curriculum in 56 per cent of our schools.

Mr. Speaker, it is simply not possible to place a dollar value on the contributions that our 6,503 paid and volunteer firefighters make to our Province. It is a contribution beyond price.

Today we have 306 fire departments in the Province. They are professional, first-class firefighting units that are comparable to any that can be found in this country.

Firefighters are indeed special people. They devote their time, energy, and skills at considerable sacrifice. This is especially true when you consider that most firefighters are engaged full-time in other occupations from which they have to earn a living and support their families. As well, they are often called upon to put their own safety on the line in times of life-threatening fires. The men and women who operate our fire departments are deserving of our utmost respect and admiration.

As a government, we commend the leadership role of the fire service throughout Newfoundland and Labrador. As minister responsible for fire protection, I want to assure the Association of our intention to do everything possible within our financial and administrative means to allow them to effectively fulfil their important mandate.

One important statistic shared over lunch with the Social Policy Committee of Cabinet was that, as a result of their substantial involvement as an organization in the Now You're Cooking Campaign a couple of years ago - about three years, going back, as a result of that campaign, substantially - prior to it, for twenty-one consecutive years there has been at least one and on many occasions multiple fire deaths in the Province, every year for twenty-one years, as a result of fat fires in the Province. For the last three years there has not been a single fat fire fatality in the Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. MATTHEWS: I thought it important to share that by way of information statistic with the House today, with the people of the Province, in recognition of the leadership, support and effort that the 6,503 - volunteer, mostly - firefighters in the Province contribute to us as a society.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

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

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

We on this side of the House, too, would like to acknowledge the presence of the representatives of the Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Fire Chiefs and Firefighters here in the House of Assembly today.

This side of the House would also like to acknowledge the tremendous contributions of firefighters in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. It would probably do government well to pay attention and heed the recommendations and views of these people in the Province. Really, it took too long - it was only this past, last year, I believe, that government decided to put a compensation package in place for the volunteer men and women of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, and an insurance also, if there was someone killed on the job.

Mr. Speaker, just to look at the situation that these firefighters put themselves in, it was only this past weekend we all saw the news on television where six firefighters died in the line of duty in the U.S. That can happen here at any time in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. I have family members and a lot of friends in the fire department, and I know what these people -

PREMIER TOBIN: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Pardon?

PREMIER TOBIN: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: There you go. The Premier says that his father was a fireman for thirty years, so he knows full well the situation that these people put themselves in at their own risk and what have you.

All I can say is that I certainly, for one, appreciate their efforts, and I think the people of the Province do appreciate their efforts.

In conclusion, the government says and the minister says they would: ... assure the Association of our intention to do everything possible within the financial and administrative means to allow them to effectively fulfil their important mandate.

Just as an example, the Town of Logy Bay/Middle Cove/Outer Cove just recently, in the past few years, started their own volunteer fire department - I live in the town and am the former mayor - $600,000 of their own money, in a little town of 2,000 people, and not one red cent from government. So, I will be looking to the minister for a few dollars.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Labrador West.

MR. COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We rise in recognition of the firefighters of the Province as well. If we look around our communities in this Province, we find volunteers are evident through all walks of our community life; but nowhere are volunteers required, as firefighters are from time to time, to put their own lives on the line to save others.

Firefighters are also involved in many other aspects of their communities. A lot of the firefighters I know in rural Newfoundland and Labrador are also members of the ambulance service and other areas providing community support.

I think the statement by the minister is quite correct, that we could never pay - not even below minimum wage - for the services that are provided by the people who volunteer their efforts in the firefighting units around this Province.

Most kids, when they are young and looking around, always want to be a fireman or a fire woman, and I think that says a lot for your organization in terms of the respect you have in the communities you operate in. I think it is important that we continue to support firefighters in this Province in any way that we can.

Just as an afterthought, the Premier said his father was a firefighter for thirty years. I wonder if he put out as many fires as the Premier is after having to put out.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to update members of the Legislature on the success of information sessions held throughout Newfoundland and Labrador in support of development of the Province's manufacturing industry.

These sessions, held in October and November, were organized by the Manufacturing Forum, an initiative of government and the Alliance of Manufacturers and Explorers.

The workshops provided an opportunity for stakeholders to be introduced to the best manufacturing practices detailed in the Strategy for Small Scale Manufacturing in Newfoundland and Labrador. This strategy, announced five months ago, is one that was developed in partnership with the Manufacturers Alliance. The workshops focused on introducing practices that best encourage manufacturing and identified the supports available from the Manufacturers Alliance, educational institutions, and government to help firms adopt these best practices.

Over the past two months, information workshops were held in Grand Falls-Windsor, Plum Point, Happy Valley-Goose Bay, St. John's, Clarenville, Marystown and Corner Brook.

I am pleased to report that these sessions attracted upwards of 270 participants, with excellent representation from the private sector, education and economic development agencies. Response to the workshops from the participants has also been excellent.

Government will continue as a champion for the further development of the manufacturing sector, and so we should. Permit me to share some statistics about the sector with you.

Since 1996, manufacturing shipments have increased 20 per cent to more than $1.8 billion in exports. Since 1996, full-time equivalent employment has increased to more than 17,500, a growth of almost 20 per cent. Since 1996 exports have increased 25 per cent. In 1999 alone, from January to August, the value of all manufacturing shipments increased 10.5 per cent over the record pace achieved in 1998. Employment for the same period increased by 5.3 per cent. In the area of small scale manufacturing - which includes everything outside traditional resource sectors such as the fishery - there are more than 7,000 people employed, an increase of 40 per cent since 1996. That is 7,000 people employed full-time in more than 400 companies in both rural and urban areas.

The information workshops were the first steps in helping firms implement global best practices in manufacturing. With government's continued initiatives to develop the industry, small scale manufacturers in Newfoundland and Labrador will be able to thrive in an environment that enhances their efforts individually and collectively.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SHELLEY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

There is no doubt that we all like to hear good news. Contrary to what the government thinks, we do like to hear it. We do talk to these people in small business and manufacturing in this Province on a constant basis, as we always do. It is always encouraging when you get these people together to share their ideas because they know it best. Many small business people in this Province continue to say the same thing: Roll out the red carpet and not the red tape. Many of them struggle with the red tape every day in trying to develop small businesses in this Province, which can be the backbone of this Province's economy.

When the minister talks about statistics and so on he also should remember that, although we talked about increases here, there are many people in this Province who are still needing that job, needing those few weeks even to this date that we talk about.

The reality is this. The minister did say back some time ago that the proof is in the pudding. The proof was not in the pudding with the hearings themselves; the proof is in the pudding afterwards to see if it develops into actual jobs in this Province. That is when people will look at the minister and say: Yes, the pudding is worth eating, I say to the minister.

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.

I'm tempted to suggest that we change the name from ministerial statements to selective statistics.

The minister talks about growth in the manufacturing sector, yet Statistics Canada tells us that manufacturing is down in the Province by 14 per cent this year. The minister does not talk about the 25 per cent of our young people who are still unemployed. Nevertheless, we have to recognize the efforts continuing to be made by the small manufacturers in the Province. Particularly I want to commend the Alliance of Manufacturers and Exporters for their activity -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. HARRIS: - and they continue to produce good products, like the coat that was delivered to my office yesterday, Mr. Speaker, made right here in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Oral Questions

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

My questions are for the Minister of Finance today. On May 26, 1998 I asked questions to the minister directly when he announced, just a month previous, about the construction of condominiums at the base of Marble Mountain, some $3 million of public money put into that expansion. I asked him directly at that point this question: “Given that it seems to be the public policy of government to discontinue to be involved in the private housing business or private housing matters, what are the public policy reasons for becoming involved...?” The minister said that for any number of reasons. I would like to ask him today, remembering his enthusiasm back in April and May 1998 about the selling of those condominiums, could he update us today on actually how many condominiums have been sold?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Unlike the Opposition we are very supportive of Marble Mountain and we are very enthused about its prospects. All we need in a given year is for the snow to cooperate.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) snow.

 

MR. DICKS: Exactly. The hon. members opposite seem to question the wisdom of it, and they seem to be the only people in the Province who do not see that there is a great tourism benefit to the Province in having this. Mr. Speaker, as of yet, we have not sold any condominiums but we are pursuing some opportunities at the present time.

Thank you.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Mr. Speaker, what is at stake here is this. There have been $3 million of public money put into construction. I believe it was on April 8, 1998 that the minister himself at a press conference in Steady Brook said: In addition, this development will enhance opportunities for the region's hospitality operators. More people visiting the area means a greater need for accommodations, restaurants, service stations and the list goes on.

The release that he had at the time also said that the firm they had put in place - I think it was the firm of Pratt Henley Blackwood Architects Inc., which were the prime consultants, and Thornes Royal LePage Realty - it said: I am delighted with the decision to proceed -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary. I ask him to get to his question.

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

Further, it said: Based upon the response we had two years ago, we will feel we have no difficulties in selling these properties. I would like to ask the minister again the question: How many of the thirty-one condominiums have actually been sold?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have already answered that question. Let met say to the hon. member that what I said at the time is borne out. There has been a tremendous increase in tourism. A lot of it has been due to government initiatives. First of all, we had the 1997 year. We had the Canada Winter Games. We have the 50 anniversary.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Finance.

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

So what I said at the time was accurate. There has been a 30 per cent increase in tourism over the last three years and it has been mainly due, and I say to the hon. members, and the public well knows, to government's efforts in these areas. It is due to direct government infusion of money into events, be they sporting or commemorative events, and it is also due to government initiatives such as the snowmobile trails and so on. So the difference between our government and the position of the Opposition is that they stand and criticize and we act and do.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Seeing that the Minister of Finance will not answer, I will answer it for him. There have been no condominiums sold, Mr. Speaker, none whatsoever.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. E. BYRNE: Unless, Mr. Speaker, he has purchased one himself in the last couple of hours. I would like to ask him if he could answer this question. I am in possession of a letter from Hospitality Newfoundland and Labrador which have written you outlining that they have heard and they are concerned with the position that government are now considering, renting the units on a daily basis.

The minister himself and government have retained the services for some time of Martek Morgan Finch Incorporated , which is a rental property management firm. I would like to ask him: In view of the concerns that we have raised, in view of the concerns that Hospitality Newfoundland and Labrador have raised, can he assure people today that the condominium complex, the Alpine Chalets built by this government at the base of Marble Mountain, in this Province that government is now not getting back into the hospitality or hotel industry? Can he assure people and confirm that government will not rent these properties on a daily basis?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say to the hon member he should listen. When he comes to the House with a prepared set of questions, when they get answered he should accept the answer and then ask a new question, instead of reading the question he already had prepared. I answered his question when he first asked, that no, there were none sold. Then he got up and asked the question again and said that I had not answered it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DICKS: If the hon. member is going to ask intelligent questions in the House - and it would be a novelty - he should at least listen to see when they get asked if they are answered.

Let me say to the hon. member that he should understand a little bit about the history of the Province. The Province, over the years, has always had to lead the private sectors in many cases in making investments. You can go back to look at the Holiday Inns. They were built in1966 when no one else, either in the Province or outside, was prepared to invest. The Province built them, and before that there were no credible accommodations around the Province. We recently privatized them in 1996 to some profit to government.

Mr. Speaker, the same thing was true in Marble Mountain. The previous group that had been in charge had devised a plan to build condominiums there. The private sector was not forthcoming in building those. The government took the lead and built them. We have every confidence that they will be sold.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. E. BYRNE: The hon. member understands the history of the Province quite well: how much money this government wasted on Trans City, how much money has been paid out for failed lawsuits, how much money this government has wasted in this complex. Mr. Speaker, the minister's enthusiasm in April 1998 that every one of these condominium units would be sold has flatlined. People in the industry are now very concerned. I spoke to the Chamber of Commerce in Corner Brook and Rotary four weeks ago. The big question that was asked of me was: Do you believe that government should be in the business of hotel operating in competition with our own tax dollars, using our tax dollars to compete against us?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary. I ask him to get to his question.

MR. E. BYRNE: The question to the minister is this again: Are you, or is government, considering at all renting these properties on a daily basis which would be in direct competition with the existing private sector?

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, the difference between this government and that group when they were in power is this. In 1997-1998, we spent $3 million to build condos at Marble Mountain. The condos are there. They will be occupied. They will be sold. The colleagues opposite, when they were in government, spent $23 million on a cucumber palace which now is a vacant lot in Mount Pearl.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

That was a body blow. I do not even know how I can get to my feet to respond to the minister.

In May 1998 I asked the Minister of Finance a question - because this is an example and should be looked at in a larger context - on the merit of pursuing building condominiums in competition with the private sector. He said: “Marble Mountain is the single largest tourist draw to the Province.” The question is this, minister. Maybe you are not the right person to ask. Somebody can stand up and answer it. Why is the single biggest draw in the tourism industry in Newfoundland and Labrador operating under the Department of Finance and not under the Department of Tourism?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, for the same reason that the Province of Newfoundland is governed by the Liberal Party and not by the Conservatives.

Just let me say that government has an obligation across a broad spectrum of matters in this Province. We can adopt the hon. members' attitude that the only money that should be spent should be spent in St. John's, or we can look around the Province and see opportunities to enhance economic prosperity in other regions. We happen to believe that the government has an obligation to all parts of the Province, and that for many areas the greater potential lies in the tourism area, the fishery and others. We are prepared to stand by our investments because we believe they are in the long range interest of the Province. When we make money we are prepared to take the long range view and we are not prepared to abandon them merely because you get some adverse comment every now and then.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: A question was asked and was not answered, as usual, which is becoming a hallmark of the government, not answering questions put forward by the Opposition at all.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. E. BYRNE: I will ask it again. Why is it that the single biggest plum in the tourism industry, according to the government ministers, is being operated by the Department of Finance and not by the Department of Tourism, which it has traditionally been? Could he answer that question?

 

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The decision as to who should run which government corporations is a reflection of the portfolios and also the members at the time. As it happens, I happen to represent the Corner Brook area. Marble Mountain is of vital interest to the Corner Brook area. I had a particular interest, and the Premier was kind enough to assign that responsibility to me. There are other examples around government where one could easily argue that another agency should report elsewhere. Maybe the Liquor Corporation should report to the Minister of Tourism. I do not know. The hon. member can make whatever arguments he likes. The issue is not to whom they report but how well they are managed.

I say frankly to the hon. member that in Finance, when we had the pleasure and to some extent the responsibility and burden of running Marble Mountain, we turned around about a $600,000 cash loss in one year on a $300,000 drop in revenues from $1.5 million to $1.3 million, or $1.2 million rather. All I can say about it is that the evidence speaks for itself. Marble Mountain is in good hands, it is well managed, and hopefully we will have snow this year.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure the Minister of Tourism would share the assessment of the Minister of Finance, let me tell you that right now. I will ask him this question. A year and a half ago the minister made a public commitment to private hospitality operators, hotel operators and cabin owners in the western region of the Province that government's undertaking to build condominiums would at no point interfere or compete with them directly. Will he stand today and make the same commitment to those same hotel operators, cabin owners and hospitality owners in the Corner Brook region?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, let me just say that I am glad that the members opposite have something to cheer about today.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition asked why the Minister of Finance -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

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

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition was given the courtesy of asking the question. I ask the hon. members to my right to extend the same courtesy to the Premier.

The hon. the Premier.

 

PREMIER TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank members opposite for their courtesy and their attention.

The member opposite asked why the Minister of Finance is the minister responsible for the operation of an important tourism asset, an important economic generator in Western Newfoundland. I think that is a good question and a serious question and it deserves a serious answer. The reason that responsibility has been assigned to the Minister of Finance is that this is the same Minister of Finance who has presided over a fiscal policy that has generated the fastest growing economy in Canada for the second year in a row!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, last year the great economic engine of Canada, Ontario, performed exceedingly well, coming in second to the performance of the Minister of Finance. Last year the country as a whole grew at 3.1 per cent, exactly half the blistering pace set by the Minister of Finance.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, last year this Minister of Finance presided over a three year plan that saw our deficit go from nearly $300 million to a $30 million surplus!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. E. BYRNE: I did not hear. I thought the Premier said that this is the same Minister of Finance who could not sell one condominium in eighteen months! Is that what the Premier said? I will ask the question again -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

AN HON. MEMBER: Not one!

MR. E. BYRNE: Not one!

Mr. Speaker, the question was asked and it was not answered. I will ask it again. The commitment that the Minister of Finance made to the private sector operators of hotels, hospitality homes, cabin owners, et cetera, was that the government's expansion into the condominiums and building them would not in any way, at any time, ever compete with their industry. Can he stand and make the same commitment today?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, it is true that government should not be competing in a gratuitous way at all with the private sector. We certainly share that concern and would share that view held by Hospitality Newfoundland and Labrador. There are extraordinary circumstances on occasion when the inn is full everywhere else where you have to make a room available. For example, like we did last February in the same condominium to the Leader of the Opposition when he came to the Canada Winter Games.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: By the way, Mr. Speaker, as we did for the Prime Minister of Canada - the Leader of the Opposition was in good company - and as we did indeed for the Premier of the Province. Beyond those kinds of circumstances, I would expect that it is the private sector which will always have first opportunity to rent these rooms, but if the Leader of the Opposition is asking us to stand and say that if every single room is full and we have rooms at Marble Mountain that are available, would government sit on them when they could produce revenue, I think we would have to take a very close look, if every room was full, before we would say we would not make those rooms available to the Leader of the Opposition, or for that matter to anybody else.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Speaker, government still claims that it does not have a proposal from Inco, and after months of talks at the officials level and several weekends of negotiations involving both the minister and the Premier we have not been able to negotiate even a proposal from Inco. We did find out yesterday one useful detail, and that is the Province has made its own proposal to Inco which will be considered by Inco's Board of Directors. Surely the people of the Province, this government's own board of directors or shareholders have a right to know what offer was made to the Inco board of directors, and I say to the Premier: What did you propose?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, first of all, the Province has not made a proposal to Inco and, of course, the member who just spoke knows that. What I did say yesterday - and I think the record will show very clearly - is that the Province is asking for and expects to receive certainty, clarity, with respect to the issue of processing in the Province.

What we have said, what I and the Minister of Mines and Energy have communicated to Inco, is that even if a proposal is put forward which on the surface meets our requirements, beyond meeting our requirements on the surface, we need to be assured and satisfied; we need to have made certain the notion that any mine and mine/mill to be developed will also have with it full processing of concentrate in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

I can report today that I have indeed heard back from Mr. Scott Hand, the President of Inco, about two hours ago, who called to indicate that the matter had been taken up by the Inco board yesterday and that I should expect a response from Mr. Sopko, the chairman of that board, some time over the next number of days that Inco is committed, as indicated, they recommit themselves to processing within the Province. I thanked them for that information. I have indicated to them that we appreciate their declaration, but we require something more substantive and that is something by way of an agreement, and a binding agreement, that processing will occur in the Province. We will have to wait and see how this develops over the days, weeks or months ahead.

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Speaker, the people of this Province are mesmerized with the terminology used on this ongoing debate. Sometimes talks are informal, or formal, or casual, or final, or preliminary, or secondary, or serious. Sometimes we have talks, conversations, proposals, discussions, negotiations. Is it a framework agreement? Is it a Memorandum of Understanding? The people of this Province are giddy in terms of where we are on this particular project. We are mesmerized.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: I say to the Premier: In view of your comments just made a few minutes ago, when can you realistically be in a position to indicate to the people of this Province where we are with respect to these talks and negotiations on this very important matter?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: Don't let him advise you.

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, when the member is finished being -

AN HON. MEMBER: Coached.

PREMIER TOBIN: - advised.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, the question that is being asked by the member who has just spoken is: When will the government be able to fully advise the people of the Province and indeed members of this House as to the details of these negotiations? When? When we have something that we believe is worth putting before the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Today we are engaged in a negotiation. The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador has said repeatedly -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

PREMIER TOBIN: Yes, I am very well aware of the word I just used.

We have said, we will not enter into a formal negotiation until such time as a framework is agreed which has permanence, which has certainty for the Province in the area of processing. We don't accomplish that in this House by being pressured by members of this House, or being pressured by Inco, or being pressured by anybody to make a quick deal. We only look after the interests of Newfoundland and Labrador when we make the right deal, and if that takes another week, another month, another year, another decade, so be it. The people of Newfoundland and Labrador are prepared to wait as long as it takes to get the right deal, and so is this government.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: A final supplementary, the hon. the Member of St. John's East.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Isn't it true - and this is an indication, when we look at what has been said in the past on this issue - that one concession Inco wants from you is to allow some of the concentrate to be shipped out of the Province for final processing? Have you made any concession on that issue, I say to the Premier? Have you given Inco any indication that you may allow some of the ore to be shipped out the Province for processing to a finished nickel metal product?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

PREMIER TOBIN: Are you finished?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

PREMIER TOBIN: Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, I repeat: The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador requires certainty on the issue of processing, and we are looking - we have said many times - to see all of the product from the Labrador deposit processed within the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Inco understands very well our position. We believe that the board, the senior players, the chairman, the president and other senior officers, are today attempting to satisfy the bottom line of Newfoundland and Labrador.

 

I can tell the member opposite - and, by the way, I take no joy at all in saying this - that in the absence of being able to satisfy the bottom line demands, not just of the government but of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, there is not going to be a deal. I hope that is not the case. I hope there is a deal. I think the people of Newfoundland and Labrador want to see a development that is fair to the Province and fair to the company.

This is not a game that we are playing here. This is a major resource development and we have to proceed carefully. If it takes a little more time to get it right, or a lot more time to get it right, we will take the time.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions today are to the minister of Health and Community Services. There is a severe nursing crisis in our Province, but none more severe than in Labrador. Over the past two years, Minister, there has been 105 per cent turnover in nurses in Coastal Labrador, an 83 per cent turnover in the Melville Hospital, and 114 per cent turnover in long-term care.

Health Labrador Corporation has paid put over 15,000 hours of overtime to nurses working in Coastal Labrador and in the Melville Hospital in a four-month period from April to August. These hours do not even reflect the overtime paid to management. Health Labrador Corporation spends between $1 million and $1.5 million in orientation and nursing turnover each year.

Minister, you received a strongly-worded letter on October 14 from the Chair of the Health Labrador Corporation - your own appointed board - asking government to coordinate three initiatives that are necessary to avoid the possibility of morale problems, of job action, and more resignations. I ask you, Minister: What have you done to address this crisis in Labrador?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

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

I am sure the member opposite knows that issues around Coastal Labrador have been ongoing for years. There have always been issues around recruitment, particularly in Coastal Labrador, and 100 per cent turnover is not an unusual turnover for Coastal Labrador. As I said, a few facts are always important before I get to the answer.

With respect to the proposal that was put forward - the member may or may not know, but government has been in the process of negotiating, through Treasury Board, a Labrador Benefits Agreement. That particular group went through and looked at a number of issues and initiatives around all of the groups in Labrador with respect to that specific component. The Labrador Benefits Agreement Committee acknowledged that a sub-committee would be established to look at the special issues around nursing particularly.

From my understanding, Treasury Board has asked in writing and I understand are waiting for an answer to hear back from the leadership of the nurses' union if they are going to, in fact, put someone there to begin that negotiating process.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

She must be fully processed by now, I would say. What we need now are results, not process.

 

On September 4, an ad hoc committee consisting of municipal, provincial and federal representatives submitted a recruitment and retention proposal to Treasury Board, accompanied by a request to meet with the Social Policy Committee of Cabinet. They were unsuccessful in getting that meeting. They were also unsuccessful, I might add, in requesting on December 1, to the President of Treasury Board, an urgent meeting. On December 3, a response indicated an unsatisfactory -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary; I ask him to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: I ask the minister: What are you doing, and why are you ignoring the plight of nurses and the health care needs of the people of Labrador?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, the official bargaining agent for the Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union is the Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union. It is not the ad hoc committee.

We recognize the issues put forward. In fact, that proposal would certainly form the basis for any negotiation; but, to the best of my knowledge, Treasury Board has written a letter to the executive to the nurses' union asking to submit the names of their negotiators so they can begin the process.

Mr. Speaker, they are waiting for a response to that letter, just as I am waiting for a response from them as well to allow us to hire every single graduate of the class of 2000 for this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The people of Labrador are so frustrated with government inaction that yesterday they wrote the Premier - yes, and I have a copy of that letter - urging him to put forth his voice and support in expediting a meeting with Treasury Board, Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union, Health Labrador Corporation, and the ad hoc committee, who have the full endorsement of the Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union in this process. They have said they have not been told the truth on whether it is a collective bargaining issue, Minister, and stated it in that letter.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary; I ask him to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: This letter states - the letter to the Premier - they are going from crisis to crisis and they want an answer in seventy-two hours. Why, Minister, do Labradorians have to resort to this last-ditch effort in order for you to give them access to the health care that they need?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I can only assume that the member opposite is telling us to arbitrarily deal with an issue without the official bargaining agent. I think that is important for the record.

If there are issues around the process of negotiation, my colleague, the President of Treasury Board, will tell you that the official bargaining agent needs to be at the table. You don't bargain with ad hoc committees about a specific union's issues. That union has to identify its negotiating committee, and I hope when they do that they will give us the permission to hire every graduating nurse in the class of 2000.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I ask the minister, is she aware - and they have led us to believe it was a collective bargaining issue. I ask the minister if she is aware that it has been confirmed by officials of the Newfoundland and Labrador nursing union, who have made it very clear to Treasury Board that they are very happy for Treasury Board to proceed and have discussed it with this committee and get the issue resolved in Labrador. Are you aware of that?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the President of Treasury Board.

MS THISTLE: Mr. Speaker, I would like to inform this hon. House that my colleague, the Minister of Health and Community Services, works very closely with the President of Treasury Board and is completely aware and involved in every issue that is happening throughout Treasury Board.

I would like to also say that we are very concerned about the situation as it exists in Labrador. As my colleague just mentioned, one of the items that came out of the Labrador Benefits Agreement was a commitment to form a committee to work specifically on the issue of nurses in Labrador. In fact, I have to say to this hon. House that when I was in Goose Bay on the Jobs and Growth consultations with the committee, we met with nurses in Goose Bay. We met with nurses in Goose Bay after the committee held its hearings.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister now to conclude her answer.

MS THISTLE: Mr. Speaker, we did meet with nurses at that time and we came back with a commitment to nurses that we would work on their issues. Since then we have, in fact, written a letter to the ad hoc committee dated December 1. I don't know if the member opposite has a copy of that letter, seeing he has a copy of everything else.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MS THISTLE: As of December 1, we did write the ad hoc committee and we are now awaiting a formal response so we can begin -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister to conclude quickly.

Question Period has ended.

Notices of Motion

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Finance.

2

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

 

I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce the following bills, entitled, “An Act To Amend The Family Law Act,” and “An Act To Amend The Judicature Act.”

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, “An Act To Amend The Medical Act.”

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

MR. McLEAN: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, “An Act To Amend The Highway Traffic Act.”

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Works, Services and Transportation.

MR. WOODFORD: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, “An Act To Amend The Works, Services and Transportation Act,” Bill 48.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Mines and Energy.

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, “An Act To Amend The Electrical Power Control Act, 1994 And The Public Utilities Act.”

Answers to Questions for Which Notice has been Given

 

 

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to give a partial answer to the Member for Cape St. Francis who asked a question yesterday concerning legal fees. It is going to take a little while to get all of the information. He asked in the House yesterday why the amount for legal fees had gone from $2 million last year to $7.8 million, and would we go over this year with the budget at $3 million.

I wanted to point out that I did not have the Estimates but he was referring to the wrong category. 2.1.01.09, Allowances and Assistance, is actually the amount that government pays out in any given year to people who sue government. That amount is a nominal amount because we have no way of knowing in advance what the liability would be. I refer him to the same section of the Estimates, 2.1.01.05, which is Professional Services. That would show that last year we budgeted $930,000 and we actually spent $1,490,000. This year we are budgeting about $1,675,000. I just wanted to point out to him that that is the relevant section.

I have asked the department to prepare the answers that he wanted. I believe it was for the last fiscal year. Notwithstanding that, I will provide him with the information as to which law firms were paid which amounts of money. It will just take me a little while to pick it up because it is done manually. It is not on computer as such. I should have that by early next week.

Orders of the Day

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I would like to call Motions 4 and 5, that is the first reading, so hon. members can have a chance to read them. They will be distributed later on.

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

 

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, you can certainly have leave. I also wanted to add this. Can we have leave for my colleague for St. John's West to read in a notice too? She missed it when we moved through it quickly.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, sure, when they are done.

MR. SPEAKER: It is agreed that we revert to Notices of Motion?

Notices of Motion.

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

MS S. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

WHEREAS some non-custodial parents in Newfoundland and Labrador neglect to honor their obligations to make child support payments and in so doing undermine the quality of life and opportunities for their children; and

WHEREAS in some instances the provincial treasury must provide financial assistance through its social assistance program to help children neglected by deadbeat parents, thereby transferring the burden of care from the parent to whom it belongs to the taxpayers of the Province; and

WHEREAS it is intolerable that deadbeat parents often can continue to enjoy their full privileges as members of society as if they have done nothing wrong despite their decision to snub their noses at the laws of the land and their social obligations as parents;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this hon. House urge the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to enact legislation to both revoke and deny renewal of the driver's licences of non-custodial parents who, without legitimate defense, neglect to meet their obligations to make child support payments.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: We will now deal with Motions 4 and 5.

Motion, the hon. Minister of Education to introduce a bill, “An Act To Amend The Schools Act, 1997,” carried. (Bill 43)

On motion, Bill 43 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

Motion, the hon. Minister of Health and Community Services to introduce a bill, “An Act Respecting Adoptions,” carried. (Bill 45)

On motion, Bill 45 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, second reading on a bill, “An Act To Amend The Financial Administration Act,” Bill 34. I think the Minister of Finance has stepped out there for awhile. Here he comes.

Motion, second reading of a bill, “An Act To Amend The Financial Administration Act”. (Bill 34)

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This is an amendment to the Financial Administration Act and it has to do with our sinking funds. As you know, the general provision with respect to bonds or securities that the government issues is that each year when we make payments we set up a part of that as a sinking fund, so that when the issue matures after twenty or thirty years there is sufficient monies there to pay the face value of the bond. What this does is this. Each year when we pay the interest payments a small portion of that, initially, is really payment toward capital, the same as you would with a mortgage. What happens with that little additional amount of money each year is it is invested, and of course over time this amount of money has a return. At the end of the bond term, be it thirty, twenty-five, twenty, fifteen years, whatever the term of the bond is, there is sufficient money in there to pay off the original amount.

What sometimes happens is that when the bond is set up we get better returns than anticipated, so that, for example - and it is not hard to imagine - at the time when interest rates were 10 per cent, the amount of money set aside reflects probably a return something in the vicinity of current interest rates, 5 per cent or 10 percent. When you go through a period like the early 1980s or you go through a period where you have higher yields on either bonds or securities, the amount in the sinking fund can be greater than required to retire the original face amount of the debenture or the debt. For example, in any year where you have monies maturing, you might find that your obligations on these bond issues where you have sinking funds set up, you might in fact have more money than is required to pay off the securities when they mature, which is a term we use for when the debt becomes due and owing.

What this does is allow the monies that are not required to redeem the debt to be paid in the Consolidated Revenue Fund. For example, it is like having a mortgage account. If you put a certain amount in there every month and you find that at the end of the year you have overpaid by $200 or $300, let's say, then you would put that money into your checking account, for example. What this does is it permits the government, where the sinking funds are in excess of the amount required to reduce the security, or to pay off security, to put it into the Consolidated Revenue Fund.

I suppose one could argue that you should do any number of things with this. I suppose you could say that it should go to retire additional debt or whatever, but we believe the proper and right use of the money, seeing that it came out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund initially - this is where all the tax monies comes in; it is where all the expenses of the Province are paid. If, for some reason, we have overpaid and set aside more money than necessary out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund, out of total government monies, to pay debt obligations which are generally far into the future, that the money be returned to the Consolidated Revenue Fund. That is the reason for that.

The second part would allow the Minister of Finance, by agreement, to issue replacement securities for the purpose of postponing the maturity of securities or their refinancing.

This is a consequential amendment because what happens each year, each time we go to market, we have to sign documentation and so on like that. In any given year we refinance a certain amount of it, of course, and not all of these issues have sinking funds. Some of these were set up at a time when no sinking funds were available. In some cases, as with the loans that we took out from the Canada Pension Plan - that we did yesterday - we decided to roll those over because we have that option. Instead of having to go to market we decided that, having the option to do it, we would then roll it over.

What this would do is give the Minister of Finance the opportunity to negotiate with the same people who have lent money to the Province, another agreement to repay it over a longer term.

In essence, what happens is that where the Province has built up a rather substantial debt as a consequence of running deficits really since our history, with the exception of the last four years or so, there are - quite a bit in the seventies, as the hon. member opposite suggests.

AN HON. MEMBER: In the sixties.

MR. DICKS: Oh, I thought you said the eighties.

In any event, there is an accumulated debt there that is impossible for the Province to pay off in any given year, so it is going to be our obligation as years go by, hopefully, to be able to retire this debt; but certainly in the near future what we will be doing is renewing this debt, and this just gives to the Minister of Finance of the day the right to do this and just to refinance and so on.

Where it is of some instance as well is with European issues - and we do have some Swiss and German issues, but Swiss issues in particular generally have a maturity date of - you cannot borrow on the Swiss market for more than ten or fifteen years. Recently it is even shorter than that. We have issues that come due that we take out for fifteen years, but there is a right or obligation of us - there is a right of the borrower to require the repayment of the money. So, for example, in year ten we will have to set up a new interest rate and people can choose whether to leave the money with us for the remaining five years or to have it redeemed at the accumulated coupon rate at the end of ten years.

This is really, for the most part, just a matter of housekeeping and really would allow us to facilitate our financing by dealing directly with our lenders rather than by going through our fiscal agents and so on, and should result in some cost savings to the Province I expect. It essentially will eliminate the placement fees on security issues that you either pay the banks or to the normal - if you deal with Wood Gundys and the RBSs and so on of the world.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER (Smith): The hon. the Member for Waterford Valley.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

I thank my colleagues from St. John's East and Cape St. Francis for that endorsement.

We, on this side of the House, recognize the nature of this particular piece of legislation. We recognize it as housekeeping. I was expecting the minister to indicate, however, approximately how much money we were talking about here. I notice in the Estimates for 1999 that we are looking here at about $35,964,000. That is the amount I assume we are talking about in that particular part for this fiscal year.

Really, what the minister has said is that this is the amount of money that they have that would be in excess of what is required to service the debt in this particular year and results from, shall we say, having extra money put into the sinking funds that are not required to pay off the debts that they pertain to.

What that means, of course, is that the Province in essence merely transfers back to the Consolidated Revenue Fund the $36 million approximately that has been put into the sinking fund and just transfer it back from whence it came. It came from the taxpayers and it was not required. You are merely putting it back into the general revenue, and government then has an opportunity to use it for whatever purposes it deems necessary to use. I understand that this amount of money was reflected in the budgetary amounts and that it is not extra money to the budget, that it has already been accounted for. All we are doing here is really ratifying the process which has already occurred. I don't know whether the minister wanted to verify that. We can exchange it back and forth or we can wait until at the end of the commentary that will be made by all of my colleagues here.

We on this side want to say to the government, we understand what is being done. It makes good common sense. We would, of course, have liked to be in a position where we could take that amount of money and just channel it directly into debt retirement. That would be the optimum choice; however, because of the fiscal position we are in - and the minister has indicated that there is an expected deficit of $30 million, thereabouts. He indicated that back last spring in the budget statements and he has restated that in the November update, that we still will be expecting to be a little bit, shall we say - our expenditures will be a little more than our revenues in total. However, I had expected him to have something to say in recent days about his meetings that he is going to tomorrow. I had anticipated a Ministerial Statement today indicating that he is up to see my good friend, Paul Martin. We know that the Minister of Finance is partial to Paul Martin's candidacy for the federal Liberal leadership, so we expected him to be telling us about what he is going to be talking to Paul Marin about in the next several days.

I notice this time he is only going as far as Ottawa, so he will only be gone for several days we assume. It is a long way to British Columbia, and it takes you a long time to get there, but we had expected a Ministerial Statement. Maybe we had anticipated that the minister would be standing in his place today and telling us that he was on his way to Ottawa - in particular because the Premier of Quebec has been in the public record making statements about what his expectations are from the Ministers of Finance as they meet on tomorrow, and I think it is on Thursday as well, and how he wanted to - the Minister of Finance in Quebec and the Premier of Quebec have been looking across the provinces and saying: Can we get support? Can we go to Ottawa with a united front? Can we see more money coming by way of equalization, by the health and social transfers? Can we get more money coming to the provinces from that federal budget that is in a huge surplus?

We had expected -

AN HON. MEMBER: Do you think the Member for Bell Island might be going with him? (Inaudible).

MR. H. HODDER: The Member for Conception Bay East & Bell Island, that member certainly will probably be off to Ottawa with the Minister of Finance because they are good buddies. They are separated in the House by some seven or eight seats, but we know that they are bosom buddies.

I say to the Minister of Finance, I had anticipated as well that he would be telling us something about the autumn updates on equalization. Now, does that mean that there are no monies coming to this Province? We know that there was $219 million. I say to the Minister of Finance, there is $219 million extra coming to the provinces.

I want to say to the Minister of Finance that when you had your last meeting, when you all gathered around this big table and you all said: The economy of Ontario is so good, it is so buoyant, it is such a great thing that is happening in Ontario, they are leading the country. Because of their tremendous growth, there is a huge amount of extra money coming into the provinces by way of equalization.

We expected the minister to come back from that meeting - because we had done the research on it - to tell us in Newfoundland and Labrador how much we were getting from that extra $219 million that would be shared among the seven have-not provinces. However, we have not had any updates. That can only mean one of two things. It can only mean the Minister of Finance did not get as much money by way of equalization as he thought he was going to get, or that the Minister of Finance is waiting to play the role of old Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus, or he is going to wait until after we have gone, so the House is closed, and then he can make the grand announcement to say that of that $219 million that was agreed upon a few weeks ago, Newfoundland gets X number of dollars.

We have not had an update from the Minister of Finance. We know that there was $219 million. We know, for example, in our research that New Brunswick got $69 million extra. Yet, the Minister of Finance in this Province does not share with the House how much extra money we got from the autumn adjustments that have occurred. Therefore, if the Minister of Finance in New Brunswick is able to tell his province that they got $69 million more, then I wonder why can't we do that in Newfoundland. I suspect that the Minister of Finance is waiting to play Santa Claus. He is waiting for the Member for Conception Bay East & Bell Island to tell him how much extra money we received from the autumn update on equalization.

I want to just clarify with the Minister of Finance that last year when all the provincial, territorial and federal ministers of finance and their officials met in Ottawa - I think it was Ottawa; it may have been in some other city - that it was at that meeting they confirmed they were going to change the method of calculation to a per capita basis for equalization and the CHST.

We remember when the federal budget came down last year. My colleague the Member for Ferryland remembers this quite well, because when the budget came down last year the Minister of Finance acted as if he were surprised. He said: The federal people have done us bad. In fact, I remember the Minister of Health and Community Services saying she was shocked by the federal government. She said: Paul Martin's budget would introduce a two-tier health care system in Canada. She was in the media that night on television and she was telling us all about this big threat to health care from Paul Martin's federal budget.

I had the comments of the Minister of Finance there - I looked it up just a few hours ago - so let me read you what our Minister of Finance said last year on, I think it was, February 17. He called the federal Minister of Finance's budget a laughable document. He said it was a silly document. The minister says: When it is all said and done, the province gets a net gain of just $9 million for health care. The minister says: It is an insensitive document. Health Minister Joan Marie Aylward says: The Province is going to take a very hard hit. She says the federal budget has created a two-tier health care system and that is not good enough.

I bring all this up because the minister is off tomorrow to meet all the other ministers of finance, and of course he is undoubtedly going to be accompanied by the good Member for Conception Bay East & Bell Island, who is there as his advisor, close friend and supporter. We have a team of two people off to Ottawa tomorrow and we want to make sure that Paul Martin this year gets the message. Last year, Paul Martin may not have been listening attentively. Last year, the Minister of Finance of this Province said that they changed it to a per capita calculation and that was not fully understood by the Minister of Finance. Of course, after that we had the Premier coming out and saying how shocked he was. Then certainly we know what happened after that.

After a while the Prime Minister had to come down to Newfoundland last February. In fact, he stayed free of charge at Marble Mountain. In fact, all of the big entourage were accommodated at Marble Mountain free of cost, with the hospitality of the government. That same Prime Minister took the Premier aside -

MR. FITZGERALD: Trudeau was supposed to buy the condo there, the big condominium. That was supposed to set the trend.

MR. H. HODDER: Yes, a big announcement that Pierre Elliot Trudeau was going to buy a condominium. I think that did not happen.

Mr. Speaker, I say to the Minister of Finance that we want to make sure that when he goes off to Ottawa this year that he delivers the right message, that he makes sure that Paul Martin understands Newfoundland's situation. Maybe when he comes back we will then not have to wait until after Christmas or sometime in January to have this big announcement that we have all this extra money. Because we know that last year, if it had not been for the federal government, we would have been in a terrible deficit situation, but because of the growth in Ontario's economy, last year we were able to bring in somewhere around $169 million to $175 million extra to this Province from federal equalization and transfer arrangements. That rescued the government and they were able to have a balanced budget.

We want to know how much extra money can be anticipate receiving by way of equalization from the federal government. We on this side of the House had expected the minister to be standing up and telling us because we know that announcements have been made in the other provinces, but no announcement has been made in Newfoundland and Labrador. We are wondering why that is. Is it that we are going to get nothing extra? Is that why the minister has not stood in his place? Is it that we are going to get zero? I do not think that is the case, because obviously the criteria that govern this would be met by Newfoundland and Labrador. We are still a have-not province in comparison to British Columbia, Ontario and Alberta. Therefore, if the people in New Brunswick know they are going to get an extra $69 million, then why are we today, I say to the minister, still waiting to get some idea as to how much extra money we are going to be receiving?

We on this side - if I could just return to the bill that we are discussing, the Financial Administration Act - do not find anything amiss with this particular piece of legislation. Again, it is a housekeeping matter. I suspect that if we were on that side and we had to face the same issue as contained in Bill 34, we would probably take the $35 million that we are talking about - $36 million just about - and we would allocate that money for current account expenditures rather than doing anything else with it, because it obviously was paid by the taxpayers and paid for the delivery of goods and services.

We support Bill 34 but we are hoping that the minister, in his concluding statement - in spite of the yawns of howls that are made by the Minister of Fisheries and his consistent interruptions in the debate - we are hoping that the Minister of Finance will address some of the issues I have raised on the equalization problems and what we can expect by way of autumn updates.

I understand that throughout the year there are probably as many as twelve or fifteen updates that occur. In fact, they are occurring on a continuous basis. We understand that. The federal government has made some statements, other provinces have made statements, and I think the Minister of Finance owes it to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, before he rushes off tomorrow to attend the federal meeting, to give an update -

AN HON. MEMBER: What? He is going again?

MR. H. HODDER: He is gone tomorrow. He is up there as Newfoundland's champion in Ottawa tomorrow, our fiscal champion. He is up there to do his best to look after -

AN HON. MEMBER: New Brunswick got sixty-nine. How much are we getting?

MR. H. HODDER: That is right, I say to the Minister of Finance, New Brunswick got sixty-nine. There is $219 million altogether, and we are hoping that the Minister of Finance will take advantage of this opportunity to be able to give us an update as to how much money we can expect.

Mr. Speaker, with these few comments, I am not sure whether or not my colleagues will be adding anything to the debate. If they are then I will yield to them, but I am looking forward to the minister's comments.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have a few brief comments. My definition of brief is different than some other people's definition of brief.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) say who.

MR. SULLIVAN: I won't point any fingers.

Yes, I agree with it. Why keep it in a sinking fund? Put it into consolidated revenue. That is where it should be. I was wondering why it wasn't there all along, why they were not following that procedure. We do not have a problem with that.

I was just wondering, though, and curious; we do have $450 million out there in Swiss francs and they are at 1.08, I think, this year, the exchange. When we purchased those, when we went to the market back in 1985, 1991 and 1997 respectively, I am just wondering if the minister knows offhand: What were the rates at the time? We don't do any hedging on our borrowing, I don't think, the government, or do we now? I don't think there is any hedging. I know, from my business background, when we dealt with US dollars and we dealt with the British pound, and particularly with the pound, we would certainly buy up so much in advance and really hedge against any fluctuations over a period of several months, sometimes it being volatile. I am just curious now. I know I can go back and research it, but the minister might know offhand, what it was, for instance, in 1985 or 1990. I am pretty familiar with the US dollar all along, and where we have been there, and a little more current with the pound, but have not dealt with any Swiss francs. We don't have that luxury. We don't have that kind of money - I know I don't; I don't know if the Minister of Finance does or doesn't - to start shopping around, an occasional Swiss bank account or two. I just wanted to ask that question, where we might be. I know the US is pretty well - we know where we are with that.

One of the biggest concerns, I suppose, in going to a foreign market is that there is a tendency for tremendous fluctuations in a market. We have seen - fairly wide - that it could cost us a helluva lot more than the low interest rates that we pick up on those markets. The borrowing has been lower on those markets as opposed to borrowing from a Canada Pension Plan or borrowing basically within Canada.

Those are just a few queries there. Maybe the minister might be able to put me at rest, that we do not have $450 million out there dangling with big currency fluctuations that might cost us a bundle and wipe out that $100 million or so that he is coming to come back with next week when we get those last equalization figures finalized.

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

If the hon. minister speaks now he will close the debate.

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I will respond to some of the comments opposite. It might be helpful.

First of all, I thank the members opposite for their support on the bill. I should say that it is a happy amended in some ways, because until recent years there was no such thing as a surplus in the sinking fund so no one foresaw the need to have this in the Financial Administration Act. We did find in 1995 that there was a surplus, and that was in part due to the increase in stock market and interest rates during that period of time. I know funds were taken out at that point and again this year. I don't think it will necessarily be a recurring item because you can do a more realistic evaluation from time to time but when surpluses accumulate you have to decide (inaudible), and I am glad hon. members support putting it back in the Consolidated Revenue Fund, for obvious reasons.

The hon. member said I was partial to Paul Martin. I thought he said pine marten so I was inclined to agree with him, but I will say that I have always been partial to Mr. Martin's name. Martin is a name which has always appealed to me. I would not dare contradict him on that but, having said that, I did take a trip to Vancouver to meet with the Ministers of Justice last week. If you have ever gone to Vancouver, you realize that trip certainly contradicts the saying that travel is about the journey and not the destination, because it is quite an arduous one. He said that I am off again tomorrow. I would say that probably going away would be the more accurate term, because I rarely get off on going to the mainland.

May I say that he raised a couple of things as to what we might have - as the Ministers of Finance this week. We did have a recent meeting in Toronto of the provincial Finance Ministers. I can say that there are two items really on the agenda that have a national consensus, a difficult one to forge at times.

The first is restoration of the CHST back to the $18 billion. The unfortunate part of that is because the federal government has changed the distribution formula from its former experience rate, if you will, 50/50 and now it has gone per capita. The older formulation really benefitted us because it reflected needs more so than the current formulation does. A concern that we share with a number of other provinces - PEI, Pat Mella articulated it very well; New Brunswick and some of the other provinces - that even if we are restored in terms of the amount to $18 billion, our Province will receive less because per capita we receive less under that distribution than we did in 1993. So being restored to full funding does not actually put that much more money in our pockets.

A little thing that happened last year in the federal budget that did not get a lot of attention was that the federal government capped the equalization at $10 billion. The problem with that for us is that equalization is distributed - right now it is $9.8 billion. So there is only $200 million room left for us to get to the ceiling.

Now in past years - last year when they changed the CHST per capital distribution we were aided because we got an increase in equalization, a substantial one. I forget the amount; it was over $200 million. The problem with capping equalization is that no matter how strong the federal economy gets, the Ontario economy in particular, and how weak ours get, we can only get an additional share; and our share of that is probably in the vicinity of $20 million of that $200 million worth of room, because we have about 11 per cent of the equalization pot across the country, or least of the incremental amount.

What we have forged as a consensus - and, believe me, it was a difficult one; Ontario was not entirely happy - but what we have decided to do as Finance Ministers, as a statement representing our joint position, and territorial ministers, is that we are asking Ottawa to do two things. One is to restore the CHST funding and also to lift the equalization ceiling.

From our point of view, we would probably benefit more from having the equalization ceiling lifted, but around those two issues we believe that part of the surplus should be dedicated to that.

I think those are most of the issues covered.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: I haven't followed what Quebec said, but I do know that they share some of our concerns. Last year they stood to lose up to $1 billion. It was $900-some million on the equalization issue, but they made quite a bit up on - I am sorry, on CHST. They made quite a bit up on equalization so the losses were not as severe.

As you know, CHST funding is certain; equalization is not. So, between the two, I would prefer to see the CHST funding being there because we would have greater certainty.

The hon. member asked about equalization estimates. We don't give them out, and there are fifteen revisions or more in the run of a year. The problem with it is that you might find personal income tax is up, equalization is down, corporate income tax is about the same; so, if you try to give a month to month report on these as you receive them - really there are only about two or three major revisions in the year - I think you give people the wrong message because it can vary substantially.

A lot of times, it has been the experience in the past, you could be up $30 million or $40 million at mid-year and you could be down $70 million at year end and vice versa. While you watch them, if the tendency is that they are up, you would hope that they will be up by year end, but it is not always the experience.

I think the most you can is that unless there is a drastic, alarming change in either direction, I do not believe that it is necessarily in the interest of the Province to report it; but, having said that, I will consider the hon. member's suggestion. Maybe there is something productive we can share with hon. members. I think what is happening in our personal and income tax base, for example, is of interest because that shows and reflects our own economic performance and the value of our own economy as opposed to some of the other transfers such as equalization which are less certain. (Inaudible) that information could be useful without distorting the financial picture at the present time.

All I can say to the hon. member, the fairest thing, I think, to say is that our economic performance is pretty much where we expect it to be. We could be up several tens of millions or in that vicinity but we are pretty much on budget.

The hon. Opposition House Leader asked about exchange rates. I do not know what they were in 1995. My recollection is that the Swiss franc was about 92 Canadian cents, or thereabout, somewhere in that vicinity, but it varies upward and downward. Interestingly enough, I have done an analysis as to whether or not it would be worthwhile for us to buy futures. The problem is that it is not. When you go into a foreign market, derivatives are very hard to calculate and you generally find that people who are making money on it are the banks that actually do the derivative calculations; and, looking out into the far future, they will give themselves a very generous bonus in order to carry that liability.

There is something that we have done, though. Three or four years ago we borrowed from the Bayerische Landesbank, which is a bank that is owned half by the Bavarian government. What we did was, we did not hedge the money but we did what we call a swap. So, rather than borrow in a foreign market -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: I am talking about money. Rather than borrowing in a foreign market and repaying in that currency, we had the foreign bank borrow for us because it had AAA rating. They exchanged the money for Canadian dollars, so our obligation to repay is in Canadian dollars; so that is fixed. What we followed as a deliberate policy is that where foreign issues have come due, unless it looked very, very attractive to keep it in that market, we have paid them off by borrowing in our domestic market.

MR. SULLIVAN: How much money was borrowed under that?

MR. DICKS: I think about 250, and what they did - they have a AAA rating, so what they could do is they could borrow and do a swap and they would make about four or five bases points on it, and it was still cheaper for us to borrow.

For example, I think it was around 6-and-some per cent so they themselves could borrow say at 6.04 per cent, they could re-lend to us at 6.10 per cent and we would have had to borrow in the market at around 6.14 per cent. A lot of times you can use other devices to get around this, and we have been looking carefully at our foreign borrowing.

I should say that Newfoundland generally, in the Province, has a fairly substantial exposure in foreign markets. We are still below Nova Scotia which is 40 per cent, I think, in American currency. You will notice, if you go back through our accumulated provincial debt, over time we have gradually -

MR. SULLIVAN: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: You are probably right. They borrow a lot more in the American market. You have to be careful because you can be damaged by currency fluctuations.

A few years ago we paid off a Swiss issue. I looked at it at the time, and even though the exchange rates had varied on that issue we saved ourselves about $62 million because the interest rate was so preferential that there was substantial amount of room to absorb currency exchange losses.

That is essentially it, Mr. Speaker. I know these are tangents but they are reasonable questions and I trust that I have answered them to the extent possible in a forum like this. That being said, I move second reading.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

On motion, a bill, “An Act To Amend The Financial Administration Act”, read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 34)

MR. SPEAKER (Oldford): The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, Order 19, “An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act”. (Bill 33)

I am going to pass over Order 18. If the Minister of Forestry is not here when we are ready to do it, then some of us will find the ways and means of getting it passed, but I want to do Order 19 first.

Motion, second reading of a bill, “An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act”. (Bill 33)

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Environment and Labour.

MR. LANGDON: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Obviously, one of the priorities of the Department of Environment and Labour is to make sure that the workforce in this particular Province, the workers and the employers, provide for maximum protection when it comes to employers at work in the workplace, employing occupational health and safety in the workplace.

We took the lead in the department in organizing the Occupational Health and Safety Branch of the department.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. LANGDON: I hope you guys (inaudible).

Mr. Speaker, I am looking for your protection from the people in front of me here.

We started the reorganization within the department itself. When I went there, one of the things I wanted to do was to reorganize the occupational health and safety. The person we put in charge of the occupational health and safety reorganization within the department was Joe O'Neill, who was the assistant deputy minister on the labour side, and we moved him over into occupational health and safety.

When we appointed the person to look after occupational health and safety, one of the first things that Mr. O'Neill and I did was to put all the people together in Grand Falls where we talked to them about what they saw we need to do within the department to really, in a sense, beef up and make more effective the occupational health and safety in the workplace in this Province.

As a result of that, we hired five new inspectors in the department, plus an hygienist. We have given these people a lot of training to make sure that when they do the inspections within the workplace, whatever that particular workplace might be, that they would feel very comfortable going in and working with the people in the workplace.

In this particular bill that is before the House, there are a number of changes that we want to put into the act to also improve the occupational health and safety regulations within the workplace of the Province; bearing in mind what I said a few moments ago, that we had to start with the department really in a sense to make sure that our house was in order, and that really was a priority with us, and we did that.

There are a number of changes. We can look at these when we go down clause-by-clause in Committee stage. I want to say to the House, one of the big things that we did was a deterrent to businesses that would violate the occupational health and safety of the worker in the workplace by increasing the fines. Our fines were among the lowest in the country. I think it was about $20,000 per offence. Now, $250,000 is the maximum offence. In addition to that offence - it might seem high for some businesses, who see that we are penalizing them with this amount, but - in addition to that we have also made it more stringent, and probably the most stringent in Atlantic Canada, and probably among the most stringent in the country, where we have given the courts the leeway as well not only to fine but to make improvements within that particular workplace to make sure that the same type of accidents do not reoccur. I think that is very important.

Another piece of information in this particular act, of course, now the act says that any workplace that has more than ten workers in the business may have a health and safety committee within that particular department.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. LANGDON: I am being so distracted here, Tom, I cannot hear myself speak.

This new legislation makes it mandatory that any workplace that has ten or more people in it must have this proviso in the legislation.

There is also a change in the definition as well, when we talk to the medical officer. These changes are required as a result to provide the department will greater flexibility in obtaining the services of a medical practitioner with expertise in occupational medicine. We have consulted with the stakeholders on this. I think it is a very progressive and forward moving piece of legislation. As I said, I look forward to when we do the clause-by-clause analysis of that to address it even more.

Again, I think it is progressive. We have talked to the stakeholders, and I think it enhances occupational health and safety within the workplace. I will say this, that for every worker and employer within the workplace, the onus in on the individual and the company to make sure that any worker that is on their premises operates within the safety regulations and confines of that particular workplace.

I remember only recently there was a person here in the Province that had a major accident in a oil refinery down in the States, and had first-degree burns in a number of instances. He made one particular statement which was: When you leave your family in the morning, you owe it to them to come back to them that particular night as well. Basically, in his sentence he is saying the onus is on the individual. We recognize that. When we work together as workers and as employers to enhance occupational health and safety within the workplace, then I think it is the right thing that we have to do, and to make sure to operate from the premise that every action is preventable.

I would stop there, Mr. Speaker, hopefully to do more later on.

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

MR. T. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr .Speaker.

I have read through the legislation and we will have some discussion during third reading on this particular bill. It is a legitimate piece of legislation, and whatever we can do to protect workers in the workplace is a progressive step. We need to do more to protect people in the workplace, but we need to go further than that.

One of the areas that I see is lacking in the legislation is that once a worker becomes injured a lot needs to be done to improve the system in that regard. As well, there is a lot that needs to be done to help the injured worker, the person who is off on compensation. We hear oftentimes of areas within the workers' compensation commission where workers who have been injured run into a great deal of resistence. We are going to certainly be looking for improvements in that regard as well. I have seen, in looking through the occupational health and safety legislation, it asking for a committee within the workplace of ten or more workers, and I think that is a progressive step; and heavier fines for employers who breach the legislation. There are ways and means within the legislation to add extra protection for the workers to prevent them from becoming injured.

Again, we are going to go more into detail on this in the clause-by-clause. We look forward to the clause-by-clause section of this legislation where we can present some of our ideas and (inaudible) -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. T. OSBORNE: Can you hear me, Mr. Speaker?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. T. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We look forward to the clause-by-clause on this legislation where we will present some ideas ourselves and some commentary on the legislation in areas where we feel it can be improved. We do not often see amendments or suggestions accepted by government, but I am sure we will have some to make on this. While it is a progressive piece of legislation and a very worthwhile piece of legislation, we will have further debate in third reading.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. HARRIS: (Inaudible) made the rule to exclude us yet.

MR. SULLIVAN: They haven't?

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Opposition House Leader says that we do not have enough people to be recognized as a party, but I would just say we haven't made the rule to exclude us yet.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SULLIVAN: Point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: On a point of order, the hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. SULLIVAN: Just a point of order. You were excluded until a rule is made for inclusion, I would add, basically, in that. That point, I would agree, is in the process.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

There is no point of order.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In the court of public opinion -

AN HON. MEMBER: You cannot really expect to be a recognized party when you have not even got enough people to call Division in the House.

MR. SULLIVAN: He is talking about public opinion now (inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: In the court of public opinion, Mr. Speaker, where it counts, we are certainly recognized as a party and recognized -

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: Recognized well for our interest and concern with the issues that affect people in this Province. One of those very important issues is before us for debate this afternoon in the form of an Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act.

Mr. Speaker, there are few things that this Legislature does in terms of passing legislation that are as important as what we do to ensure that the working men and women of this Province are protected from injury and death in their place of employment.

We have had a history of reasonably good legislation in this Province in the last number of years. Where we fall down in many respects is in enforcement of that legislation. We can have very good laws, but if they are not enforced or if in certain circumstances we do not have the capability of enforcing them then they are not very much good expect on paper.

One of the areas where we cannot enforce this law or other occupational health and safety rules is in the offshore of Newfoundland and Labrador, at the Hibernia platform, in offshore exploration, offshore drilling, offshore production, in Terra Nova or whatever other fields may be developed - White Rose, Hebron - and whatever will come to be in our offshore. We have no jurisdiction to enforce occupational health and safety. The reason we don't is because of something called the Atlantic Accord and the provisions in the Atlantic Accord which take away the jurisdictions of this Province to enforce occupational health and safety regulations. The same authority that has taken away the ability to enforce occupational health and safety regulations has not replaced them with any other enforceable regulations in the offshore.

 

I do not think anybody here would disagree that the offshore environment in Newfoundland and Labrador, whether it be undertaking for the prosecution of the fishery which has taken place here for five centuries, or whether for the prosecution of the exploration and production of oil and gas, is a very dangerous environment indeed. We do not need to remind ourselves of the great loss of life in the Ocean Ranger disaster, or the many other disasters that have befallen Newfoundland and Labrador workers at sea over the last number of centuries. How we protect ourselves, and how we protect our citizens from the potential of death and injury in all of our occupations, in all of our work, is very important.

What we see now is a government that falls back on the fact that in the end they have the right to withdraw a license to operate, close down a business, remove a license to operate for an operator in the offshore. As has been said by the Minister of Mines and Energy the other day, that at the end of the day they had the power to take away the right of an employer to operate in our offshore.

The practice, unfortunately, in terms of regulating industries, has been recognized by very competent authority to be problematic when the same group or individual is both regulating the operation of the industry, licensing and permitting an industry, and also regulating safety.

Mr. Justice Richard in the Westray Inquiry in Nova Scotia, for example, stated in his report on the death of twenty-six miners in Westray that there was a conflict of interest for the ministry of natural resources in Nova Scotia to both be responsible for licensing and permitting the industry and also responsible for safe mines.

That is the situation we have in our offshore today. The C-NOPB in this Province and the C-NSOPB in Nova Scotia both operate under the same system that operated in the pre-Westray era in Nova Scotia, where the regulation of the industry and safety responsibility rests with the same body.

In fact, it has not gone unnoticed that last week when I raised questions about the possibility of problems in our own offshore regulatory regime with respect to safety, it was not the minister responsible for occupational health and safety in the Province, the minister who just spoke, who responded; it was the Minister of Mines and Energy. The Minister of Mines and Energy talked about how safe our offshore is, not the minister responsible for occupational health and safety.

AN HON. MEMBER: He was acting.

MR. HARRIS: He was not acting. The Minister of Environment and Labour, responsible for occupational health and safety, was right here in this House of Assembly.

What we have done in this Province is duplicated the situation pre-Westray in Nova Scotia, where the department of government responsible for offshore promotion, offshore regulation, offshore development, is also responsible, through the C-NOPB, for liaising on issues of occupational health and safety. What has been the result of that, Mr. Speaker?

Well, one of the results of it is that we have a set of draft regulations. Now, if we had draft regulations that were about to be put into law, that would be one thing, but these draft regulations are ten years old. They are draft regulations which have not the force of law in the sense that anyone can be prosecuted for violating them.

When we look through this bill before the House today, we see a very important interest in enforcement. Clause 15 of the bill, the new section 67, repealed and substituted, “(1) A person who (a) contravenes this Act or the regulations; (b) fails to comply with an order...; or (c)... a code of practice adopted or established under....is guilty of an offence.” A minimum fine of $500 and a maximum fine of $250,000 or a term of imprisonment not to exceed twelve months, or both a fine and imprisonment.

That is for any industry in this Province but not for the offshore, not for offshore oil and gas industry, one of the most important and yet one of the most dangerous industries that we have in our Province.

What is sauce for the goose ought to be sauce for the gander. We cannot have an industry in this Province, or every industry in this Province except the offshore oil and gas industry, subject to regulations to fines, potential imprisonment for people violating occupational health and safety rules and regulations designed to protect life and safety in every industry, subject to conviction, fine, imprisonment, punishment for violating rules that put people's lives at risk. Yet, in our offshore oil and gas industry, we have none. We have no regulations, no penalties, no convictions for violations of the penalties, and no possibility of the kinds of fines and other penalties that go with that.

There is a very different approach that is taken by regulators who have a rule book that has to be enforced and a job of enforcing the rules and making sure that people who are supposed to abide by those rules also follow them and will suffer the consequences if they do not.

What we have instead is a regime where there is a cooperative model. We are goal setting and seeking to make improvements in regulations. Seeking to make improvements in practices is the way and the preferred method of operating, and not enforcement through occupational health and safety rules and regulations through a system that involves penalties if people violate the rules and regulations.

How does it work, and why is it - and no one has explained that so far - that there is only one industry operating in this Province that has no rules and regulations with the force - not only with the force of the Occupational Health and Safety Act; it does not have the force of the Canada Labour Code which provides for occupational health and safety as well.

Both the provincial and the federal governments, in this area, have let down the people working in our offshore. They have let them down. They have exposed them without their consent, without their involvement, and probably without their knowledge up until recently, to a regime that has only draft regulations in place.

The concerns were pointed out by Morgan Cooper in his report to this government as a consultant a few years ago when he talked about the oil and gas industry and the needs for a particular regime in the offshore. He talked about offshore health and safety, he talked about a labour relations regime, and he talked about other aspects of regulations that had to be modified in order to ensure that there was proper control and development of our offshore oil and gas industry.

We are in very early days in our industry. The time to set the standards and set the pace is now. Here, more than any place in Canada, there ought to be a particular sensitivity to the need for safety in the offshore.

As we saw in the Ocean Ranger disaster, sometimes it doesn't take very much, when added together with other malfunctions, with other conditions, with other realities, to cause the kind of disaster that led to the loss of eighty-three lives in this Province in 1983.

We do know that this loss of life was caused by a series of - by themselves, in and of themselves - very small and minor malfunctions and deficiencies but, when added together, the cumulative effect of these small problems led to a chain reaction which lead to the sinking of the Ocean Ranger. We do not want to see anything near like that repeated in this Province. We do not want to see a regime in our offshore that has any risk of failure to abide by the most stringent occupational health and safety rules and regulations to cause any injury or loss of life.

So far, we have not seen a proper response from the regulatory agencies as to why they are still operating with draft regulations that are eight and ten years old, as to why they see fit not to implement and actually pass regulations, give them the force of law under federal and provincial jurisdiction, and deal with the offshore industry just as we validly deal with all other industries operating withing the jurisdiction of the Government of Canada or the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador. We have seen excuses, but we have not seen any rationale or any reason or any result.

Questions were raised in the House of Commons on this issue last week. They have been raised in Nova Scotia over what happened to a young Newfoundlander who unfortunately was caught in a watertight door that was designed, in fact, as a safety measure. The watertight door which trapped Shawn Hatcher was a safety device that did not work properly.

Having investigated the matter, the Nova Scotia Department of Labour felt that there were grounds to prosecute those responsible for the operation of that vessel, those who were responsible for the training of staff people, training of seamen on board that vessel. They wanted to prosecute because they felt there were reasonable and probably grounds to do so.

Lo and behold, when the prosecution service of the Government of Nova Scotia delved into the matter, they found that they did not have the authority and they did not have the jurisdiction to conduct a prosecution for a violation of the laws of the Province of Nova Scotia because that jurisdiction had been taken away by the Canada/Nova Scotia elements of the Atlantic Accord.

Mr.Speaker, under the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board they could not prosecute either. In fact, they had a policy of not prosecuting. They had regulations that were in draft form only, and they felt that working with industry to improve safety standards was a better way to go. That is a philosophy that can lead to disaster.

Until and unless we have a situation where people in industry - and I recognize the minister as sincere when he talked about having the best legislation that we could possibly have, and offer the maximum amount of protection that we possibly can to workers in our industries. What can he tell us about young Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, and people from other parts of Canada and the world even, working in our offshore, in the offshore of Newfoundland and Labrador, expecting to have a regime with the same standards of safety and the same standards of enforcement as we have here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador? The standards that IOC must follow, the standards that the Come By Chance oil refinery must follow, and if they do not they can be subject to prosecution. We have seen recently a number of charges being laid against the operators of the Come By Chance oil refinery, arising out of the deaths of two Newfoundlanders in that enterprise. These prosecutions - and we cannot obviously prejudge whether they will successful or not; that remains to be seen. That is for a judge to determine on the facts put before the courts. The fact that the company operating the oil refinery at Come By Chance has to respond to charges that it failed to comply with occupational health and safety requirements has a salutary effect on their behavior in the future. It will make them re-double their efforts to ensure that all aspects of occupational health and safety are followed.

What record is there if some inspector from the ministry of labour writes a letter suggesting that someone improves their standards after an accident or after an injury, or after something drastic has happened? What is the effect of that? Where is the record of that? Where is the public response to avoidance and failure to comply with health and safety regulations designed to protect the people if there is no consequence to a company other than a letter from the minister or a letter from someone in a regulatory agency saying: You should improve your standards.

The fact is that under our legislation here in this Province, people are required to comply because if they fail to comply they are guilty of an offence. That is the way we control behavior. We have a criminal law system that seeks to control by example, by consequences, and by, I guess, a form of retribution and rehabilitation of offenders to reform the behavior of individuals and seek that they conform to the law of the land in a criminal nature.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible.)

MR. HARRIS: The Member for Humber East may find it boring to talk about topics of occupational health and safety in this Province. I say to him and other members opposite, this is very important legislation, and the fact that we are in a position and we are seeking to pass legislation today to provide for, on conviction, a fine of up to $250,000 or a term of imprisonment of up to twelve months for someone violating an offence, and for a corporation to have a fine of up to $250,000 with $25,000 per day for each day during which the offence continues, that provides some deterrent to the violation of occupational health and safety laws and regulations.

That is how important we think it is in this Province, in the Legislature, if we are going to pass this legislation in principle today, and in detail in the days to come. If we are going to pass this legislation, we have to ask ourselves the question: Why is this regime that is available to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador working in the fishery, working in the mines, working in the factories, working in the offices even, of this Province, but not available to people working in our offshore, suffering the dangers associated with the conduct of drilling, suffering the dangers associated with a production platform, with volatile gases subject to fire, subject to explosion, subject to any number of activities that could cause a serious injury and death to one person or indeed to many persons at one time?

We have already had a number of incidents on the Hibernia platform alone which required a concern about and evacuation of employees; potential explosions and fires which could have caused further explosions and caused serious injury and death.

We are in an environment where occupational health and safety is of the utmost importance. I know the operators of the Hibernia platform, HMDC, will say the same thing, that they too believe that safety in the offshore is a primary concern for them and their company.

That is not the point. The point is that the regime that operates onshore, with IOC in Labrador City, with North Atlantic Petroleum at Come By Chance, with businesses in St. John's, with Abitibi in Grand Falls and Stephenville, with heavy industry, light industry, construction and every other form of enterprise in this Province, makes these subject to the penalties for contravention of the act or regulations of occupational health and safety, subject to conviction and fine and imprisonment for violating them. Why does that same regime not obtain in the offshore of this Province? We had not heard the answer to that question. I'm going to continue to ask that question until we do have the same protection for our offshore oil and gas workers as we have for people in the Province working in every other industry. They come neither under the Canada Labour Code occupational health and safety rules nor under the Newfoundland and Labrador Occupational Health and Safety Act, and that is wrong. They are an industry like any other. They may have differences from other industries in some respects, but like any other industry they ought to be subject to the requirement of following occupational health and safety regulations and legislation, or be subject to the penalties of law as are set out in this act.

We must recognize that is why we have these inquires, such as the Westray inquiry. That is why we had the Ocean Ranger inquiry. We have these inquiries in order to determine what it is we are doing wrong that we could right, and what it is we are doing that we could improve to make possible occupation health and safety regimes that are going to better protect workers. When we read, specifically from Mr. Justice Richard in Nova Scotia at the Westray Inquiry, that there is a conflict of interest between the same entity regulating the industry and responsible for the safety of mines, in the case of Westray, and the ministry of natural resources in Nova Scotia -

MR. TULK: Jack, (inaudible) leadership (inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, that would be why we have inquiries. Why we have inquiries is so hopefully we will learn something from them. When Justice Richard in Nova Scotia in the Westray Inquiry says it is a conflict of interest, he said the concerns that were raised ought to be fixed, and that they played a contributing role in the Westray disaster that cost twenty-six lives, including the life of a young Newfoundlander.

The lack of rules and regulations in the Nova Scotia offshore, which contributed to the death of another young Newfoundlander, Shawn Hatcher of Burgeo, ought not to be in vain. If, as a result of the issues being raised surrounding these instances, that it can result in the change in our offshore oil safety regime to the extent that is required, then they will not have died in vain.

So I ask hon. members opposite, the minister in particular, and his government to take up this issue, to seek to change the offshore oil regime in this Province so that we do have enforceable occupational health and safety regime rules and regulations which can be enforced, just as we can enforce these rules and regulations onshore and offshore in other industries other than oil and gas.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Labrador West.

MR. COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to say a few words on Bill 33, An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act. We will have more debate as it goes through the next procedure, but I just want to say a few words now because occupational health and safety is one of most important pieces of legislation in this Province.

The right to refuse unsafe work in any workplace is really critical to the Occupational Health And Safety Act. It is one piece of legislation that I've certainly had some experience in during the last number of years. I can tell this House that the right to refuse unsafe or unhealthy work came directly out of a collective agreement, word for word pretty well, between the Iron Ore Company of Canada and the Steel Workers' Union following three fatalities in nine days, and following a two week wildcat strike in which we had members go to jail, we had members fired, all in the name of safety and having a right to a safe work environment.

There are some things in this bill that I find are going to require a lot of explaining. I would like for the minister to be able to explain to the House section 26.1 in particular, where an officer will need a warrant to enter a workplace upon a happening there that should not be occurring. I think it is also going to be interesting to see the way that the proposed mining regulations will form part of the occupational health and safety in administration and see how that is planned to take place.

I can say that the rights of workers in this Province up until the act was proclaimed - which I think was June1, 1979 - were very much compromised by having to work in unsafe and unhealthy workplaces, and it is only since then it has been different. You could have the best legislation for occupational health and safety in the world. It does not have any real teeth to it unless we have the enforcement part as well. The number of inspectors that are in this Province certainly needs to be increased to do justice to the number of work sites that are around this Province.

There was a time when workers being killed was a part of being employed. That is no longer satisfactory today, and that is why when pieces of legislation like the amendments to the Occupational Health And Safety Act come to this House, it is worth taking the time to read through it. Because everybody who is a member sitting in this House, while we are not exposed at most times to unhealthy or dangerous situations, we all have friends, relatives, children and parents who do work in workplaces around this Province. Having strong legislation, having strong enforcement, can make the difference of them living or dying.

We talk about accidents. The other thing that is important are industrial diseases that people have to be protected from and have the right to know about, and have the right to refuse to work around unless they are guarded properly.

I must say, in all fairness, that our Occupational Health And Safety Act, in comparison to other acts around this country, probably stands pretty close to affording the best protection to workers in any jurisdiction. Like I say, that did come at a price that workers paid many times with their lives. We do not have to take a back seat to most jurisdictions in the legislation that we have protecting workers in this Province. Again, it is the enforcement of the legislation that is critical to making sure that the laws we have passed are actually being enforced in the various work sites.

I think that I will conclude my remarks on that, but as it goes through Committee and the articles by articles being debated, then we certainly will have more to say. Because there are some - without getting into it now - disturbing amendments being proposed in this act that certainly will be worthy of debate.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. minister speaks now he will close the debate.

The hon. the Minister of Environment and Labour.

MR. LANGDON: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I wanted to commend the people who have spoken. I just want, for the record, in response to the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi, to say that my colleague the Minister of Mines and Energy this week in a news release reiterated again to the people of this Province that the C-NOPB does have the power, on behalf of the federal government, the Department of Environment and Labour and the Department of Mines and Energy, to enforce the provincial and the federal regulations in the offshore. I'm sure we will talk more about it in clause-by-clause analysis.

At this time I move second reading, Mr. Speaker.

On motion, a bill, “An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act,” read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 33)

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I think we should, first of all, correct the Order Paper. It reads: “An Act To Amend An Act To Amend,” in Order 20, Bill 44, the Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act.

I move second reading of the bill, Mr. Speaker.

Motion, second reading of a bill, “An Act To Amend The Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act”. (Bill 44)

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Environment and Labour

MR. LANGDON: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Two years ago there was a pilot project that was initiated in the bill here to the House that brought stability between the fishing industry and the harvesters in this Province. The Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture played an integral part in that particular piece of legislation as well. What we are asking for in this particular piece of legislation is to extend the deadline from December 31, 1999 and substitute it with June 30, 2000.

We have had consultation with the stakeholders. Mr. Noseworthy did a report on the two year pilot project for us. We have been talking with the people in the industry and in the unions and they concur with that. Hopefully between now and then we can work together with the stakeholders to put a permanent piece of legislation in place. It is very straightforward and I think that at the end of the day it will continue stability within the fishing industry in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. T. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. T. OSBORNE: Yes, we are only going to speak a moment. We understand that the industry is in favour of this and there is nobody opposed to extending it, from what I understand. Minister, I do not see any reason to belabor this bill. I see nothing wrong with it. If industry is in favour of it and there is nobody out there in the general public or within the industry opposed to it, we should not belabor debating the bill in the House of Assembly.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This is a very important piece of labour legislation. I do not intend to belabor the point, but I do wish to say a few words on this very important issue. It is an important issue because we are talking about a unique piece of legislation in the country, the Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act. There are a number of other provinces whose fishing communities - particularly the fishers and fish harvesters - would be delighted to have the kind of collective bargaining regime that we have here in the Province and have had elements of since 1971. It is due to the work of the Fishermen's Union and the leadership in our fishing communities around this Province who have stuck together through thick and thin over the last number of years.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

 

MR. HARRIS: I am just a little concerned that the Member for Bonavista South will be after the minister again on the very same issue. So I will stay away from that.

AN HON. MEMBER: Bonavista North.

MR. HARRIS: Bonavista North, sorry.

The importance of the Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act is that it does provide an opportunity for fish harvesters to engage in collective bargaining and to collectively refuse to sell a product through an orderly means of collective bargaining. This is not available in other provinces. Other fishing provinces such as British Columbia, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, do not have the benefits of this legislation. What we were doing here through the changes was in fact providing for a change in that legislation which restricted, in fact, the ability of fishers and fish harvesters generally to refuse to sell product on a collective basis and restricted it for the purpose of a pilot project. I think if we are talking about a permanent change of this nature we have to have a lot more consideration than we have had. We certainly have seen some success on this issue. It has provided some very beneficial effects, not only to the fish harvesters themselves and for the industry but also for the whole Province. We have had a lot less interference with markets, a lot more stability, and the ability of individuals to make plans. There is a lot more stability about opening and closing dates. We have seen benefit arising from the relief of uncertainty that came about from time to time as a result of strikes or lockouts in the industry.

We do support the extension, but we also support the fact that this is something that ought to be done only with the consent of both the union, whose rights we are talking about - the members of the union whose rights we are talking about - and with the companies themselves. Because it is a regime that has operated and has had its problems. I think it is encouraging to see that we have found something that may be a solution, that may satisfy the parties by forcing a final offer selection system on them, a regime which forces people not to be too bold when they take a bargaining position. It forces them to be reasonable. Because if at the end of the day you are left with an offer on the table that is out of whack with the industry, that is out of whack with the market, then the danger that you face is that the people sitting on the other side of the table, whose position is closest to being reasonably in connection with the market, is the one that is going to be accepted, and that may be something you will be forced to live with if you are not reasonable yourself.

It is a way that seems to have worked to date. We support the extension of the system for the time being and we await the further reports on its success and to give it a little bit more time, because we do not want to permanently change legislation which will have the effect of a significant amendment to the rights set forth in the Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act, which work in other industries. We see them, strike and lockout situations, which gets a lot of attention when it does not work. I know the Minister of Labour knows this because his officials are constantly involved in negotiations and conciliation, and in 99 per cent of the cases our collective bargaining system works to produce a collective agreement without resort to a strike or a lockout. What we hear about are the failures, not the successes.

We have a very successful collective bargaining regime in this Province, and the fact that we have had to look at special circumstances in the fishing industry. If they are acceptable to the parties involved in the long run, then they are certainly going to be supported by this party in the House.

I think we should take a longer period of time to see whether or not these things work. Sometimes it might take a cycle of the industry where prices go from being very good to being very bad and back again to see if in fact the system responds and responds well to fluctuations in price. That is the biggest factor. If we can get our fish harvesters in this Province getting very close to the market value of their product instead of being ripped off, if I can use a vernacular, by middlemen or merchants or by fluctuations in the market over which they have no control, if we can get closer to that, if this system will get us there, then I am all in favor. Because we would have then a better system that returns more dollars to the primary producers of this Province who are doing the catching and who have the big investment in boats and training and equipment to do the catching.

We do see that there are costs associated with this. There is significant cost in terms of being able to make proper presentations to arbitrators in terms of market research, in terms of making sure that both sides to these negotiations, to this process, have access to the kind of information they need. I think that is an important role that government can play and should continue to play in making sure that the present level of funding supports the cost of arbitrators and facilitators and market consultants in this field to make the process work.

It can only be fair if there a level playing ground of information, and a level playing ground of ability to present both sides of the case. I think government has done something positive here in helping to develop this system between the parties. I would like to see it succeed, and I support the efforts to see it continue until we can have a fuller assessment down the road as to whether it should be a permanent feature of our legislation.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER (Smith): If the minister speaks now he will close the debate.

The hon. the Minister of Environment and Labour.

MR. LANGDON: I just want to say that the Fisheries Association of Newfoundland and Labrador and the FFAW both support the extension that we are looking for here and looking for stabilities.

I would like to close the debate.

On motion, a bill, “An Act To Amend The Fishing Industry Collective Bargaining Act,” read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 44)

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that the Leader of the Opposition has a private member's resolution which he wants to introduce, and he has asked me if we would revert to Notices of Motion. We have agreed, as we always do, in the spirit of cooperation and loving each other up that we do so.

MR. SPEAKER: We will revert.

Notices of Motion.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. E. BYRNE: Let me say I appreciate the Government House Leader reverting because when the Chair -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) member.

MR. E. BYRNE: He is giving his member leave. Let it be known for the record that the Government House Leader has given his member leave to introduce this.

I was unavoidably out when the Chair called Notices of Motion, so I was not in a position to introduce it. I appreciate the Government House Leader giving me the opportunity to present it.

I will on tomorrow rise to move the following private member's resolution:

WHEREAS all parties represented in the House of Assembly have affirmed their commitment to the general principle that a Voisey's Bay development agreement will be acceptable only if it brings full and fair benefits to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador;

THEREFORE be it resolved that this hon. House affirm that a Voisey's Bay development agreement shall be acceptable only if it meets the following four conditions, in addition to generating revenues from a competitive regime of royalties and taxes, namely: that is shall involve a long-term mining operation of twenty-five or more years in duration; that it shall involve the concurrent blended extraction of ore from both the ovoid and the underground; that it shall involve complete processing in this Province of all nickel concentrate from Voisey's Bay to a finished nickel product, and; that the technology Inco uses in mining and processing the ore must meet appropriate environmental standards and must be applied in ways that fully comply with the first three of these four conditions; and

THEREFORE BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that any agreement that may be reached or might be reached with the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador and Inco, before it becomes final and binding on the people of the Province, be fully debated in the House of Assembly of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I think the Opposition House Leader has asked that we proceed to Order 18, “An Act To Amend The Forestry Act,” Bill 35.

In the absence of the forestry critic, let me just say very quickly that what this bill -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. TULK: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. You not called it yet.

Motion, second reading of a bill, “An Act To Amend The Forestry Act”. (Bill 35)

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

MR. TULK: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

What I wanted to say, Mr. Speaker, is that I would introduce this bill in the place of my colleague, the Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods.

What this bill does is provide a number of authorities, I guess, under the Forestry Act, to the forest management people, to first of all cancel a cutting permit where the conditions of the permit are not being met by the permit holder, and it also enables them to seize exhibits to assist in determining the cause of a fire, as well as to seize timber from the holder of a valid cutting permit who is in contravention of the act, regulations, or the conditions of the permit. It basically gives them the power of a peace officer for the purposes of enforcing the act and regulations.

Mr. Speaker, that is what the bill is about if the other side wishes to debate it.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Windsor-Springdale.

MR. HUNTER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to rise and speak on Bill 35, An Act To Amend The Forestry Act. Section 1 of this bill adds section 27(7) to the above referenced act. Simply put, this subsection allows the minister to cancel cutting permits if the permit holder does not comply with the conditions of the permit nor all municipal, provincial and federal laws respecting the cutting of timber.

Furthermore, clause 3 of the bill stipulates that a forestry officer can seize timber cut on Crown lands if forestry officials have reasonable grounds to believe that the permit holder has violated the conditions of a cutting permit or any provision of the Forestry Act or subsequent regulations.

Clause 2 of this bill empowers forestry officials in the course of a forest fire investigation to seize anything that is considered evidence or of assistance in the determination of the cause of that forest fire. In other words, the forest official does not require a warrant to seize property in the course of a forest fire investigation. The ability of forest officials to confiscate property without a warrant tips the balance of rights in favor of the state as citizens are offered little protection from unreasonable search and seizures.

Furthermore, clause 2 of Bill 35 may actually violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In fact, concern over this type of legislation violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms has been acknowledged in another bill currently before the House, and that is Bill 33. Bill 33(7) amends the Occupational Health and Safety Act to require a warrant to be obtained from the conduct of investigation where an officer of the department believes that a contravention of the act may have occurred. The reason given for this change to the Occupational Health And Safety Act was to ensure that the legislation conform to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Clause 4 of the bill gives forestry officials the power of a peace officer and authority to obtain a warrant for the purpose of enforcing the act or regulations where the matter or things are not subject to seizure of this act.

If I could, I could speak on some of the things dealing with the forest industry today. One is the sustainability, forest management, and that involves a lot of stakeholders in the forest industry and our environment and habitat. I think one of the prime stakeholders in our forestry industry and our forest resources today is the wildlife. Wildlife certainly has to play a key role in the habitat of our forest industry. We must protect and understand what wildlife need to sustain their existence in our forests. Not only the trees are affected by our sustainable forest management plans; it involves more than just animals on land. The fish in the waters around our country that are surrounded by the forest depend on a sustainable forest management plan that involves protecting the areas around our lakes and ponds, because of the habitat created for fish, beaver and other wildlife that live in and near the waters. They need to survive on food supplies and protection of habitat, particularly when it comes to the environment and the trees around these areas where food supplies are dominated because of the surrounding forests near the water edges.

There are a lot of stakeholders involved in the forestry. Some of them depend a lot on how we manage the forests and the utilization of our forest resources. Particularly, we look at the commercial aspect of our forest resource. We have papers and logging companies that depend on our forest resources. We must make sure that all these stakeholders are given a reasonable amount of protection so that they can avail of these resources; not only the biggest of the depending companies, but even the smallest of these companies, and these independent operators that depend on our forest resources. Some of these small operators have been around for twenty or thirty years, and a lot of these operators are falling through the cracks in the system because we are concentrating more on the bigger need and the bigger picture when sometimes we should be looking at the smaller picture. I know the annual allowable cuts are important, but at some time we will have to sit down and look at these annual cuts, because a lot of the smaller operators are being left out and they can only survive on these small amounts of allowable cuts that they are permitted to cut each year.

If we do not take these into consideration, then you are going to see in the near future a disappearing breed of loggers. Most of these loggers and small operators are getting up in age and they depend on these few weeks of work each year because of their small amounts of permits to cut small amounts of timber. That is being taken away from them because we are concentrating a lot more on the bigger picture, bigger companies, the paper companies and these integrated sawmills that are gobbling up all the allowable permits so that there is nothing left for the smaller stakeholders.

I think we have to look at the management of our forest resources -

MR. TULK: Point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Is the Government House Leader on a point of order?

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) hear the hon. gentleman say that the pulp and paper industry and the integrated sawmills were gobbling up all of the permits at the expense of everybody else?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

There is no point of order.

The hon. the Member for Windsor-Springdale.

MR. HUNTER: Mr. Speaker, it is important that we can recognize the problems of the forest industry today, particularly with the small operators. A lot have been forced out over the last few years. I think that in all our rural districts forestry is playing a very important part in creating jobs, particularly in some of the smaller communities that are surrounded by major forest areas.

It is important that we do recognize that problem, that small operators are being squeezed out and I can give the hon. minister lots of examples if he wants them. I will certainly come by and talk to you about some of the people in my district who are being squeezed out because this government is saying: There is not enough of the resource to go around, so too bad, little operator, we will see you around. There is no compensation, nothing there to respect these operators who have been there for so many years in the field.

I think the policies of this government, and particularly the Department of Forest Resources and Agrifoods, are not being sensitive to the needs of these small operators. If the minister wants to see some examples I will certainly be proud to come and give you examples and present you, hon. minister -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. HUNTER: Read Hansard tomorrow and you will see what I said.

Mr. Speaker, I know a lot more than what the hon. gentleman is saying that I know about sustainable forest management. I know it is important because of our dwindling resource in forestry. I have to say to the minister, what do you see when you are driving around the Province today? Do you see trees or do you see codfish hanging up there? I certainly do not see codfish hanging off the trees. I see trees. There are a lot of different kinds of trees. There are hardwoods and softwoods. We must recognize the need of utilizing our resources in a responsible way. Sometimes we can go in the country and we can say: This is a tree that could be used for the pulpwood industry. I know, because of the paper companies' holds on freeholds and leaseholds and everything on property in Newfoundland, that they have control over that.

There is a lot of timber in this Province today that we could be utilizing in a different way. I can certainly show the department a number of ways that we can utilize our resource a lot better. When I travel in the country today - I do a lot of traveling in our forest and wilderness areas - I see a lot of these hardwood resources not being utilized to the best of their potential. A lot of these trees are being left on the ground, being left behind. When there are so many people out of work in this Province today, we can utilize that resource to a lot better benefit to create a lot more jobs.

A lot of these small independent companies that I am talking about - logging companies, sawmill operators - do not want everything. They do not want the cream. They want to go in there. They came up with good ideas that if they could use this resource and utilize what is being left behind to create a lot of jobs in our Province.

If you travel around the Province today - when I talk to the department officials, they say: We cannot cut that wood because it is not there. I don't know if it is there or not. If I am looking at it and all I can see is trees, if the forestry officials say it is not there - I don't know if it is wood or codfish or what it is, but it has to be something. If it is not there, why are they so worried about people cutting it? If they go in to cut it and it is not there, what is the difference?

There are a lot of things in forestry today. I think we should be sitting back and looking at the resource in a more positive way, and look at full utilization of our resources today. When I see our resources today being left on the ground to rot, being overaged to a point that it is blowing down, useless and no good to anybody, I think our cutting practices have to be looked at. We have to look at better ways of utilizing our resources, and come up with better ways of cutting practices and using the tools that are to our advantage.

We looked at the harvesters coming in and cutting wood at a faster and greater pace. If we don't use technology and we don't use better cutting techniques and better utilization of our resource, then maybe we will not have anything there left to cut.

I looked at wood in Newfoundland and Labrador today when the government said that wood is not there because it is not old enough. It is thirty years old but it is not forty. We cannot cut it, so it is not there. In ten years' time there may not be enough people here in our workforce who would be left to cut it. I think that sometimes we have to go beyond the policy of looking at when it is the right time to cut, because sometimes we look at the human resource, too, where to cut it today might mean the difference of keeping some of our communities viable and a lot of people in our communities employed.

Some of these underutilized species are being just left there in the country, not even being planned for. I think that even to put it in a -

AN HON. MEMBER: Okay, Ray, you are right. (Inaudible), whatever you want.

MR. HUNTER: Whatever you want.

This is an important issue for me because I have a lot of small operators in my district. Maybe nobody wants to hear the truth, but the truth is that if we do not do something now to utilize our human resource with our natural resource then maybe it will be off balance in the near future and there will be no human resource in ten years' time to take advantage of utilizing this natural resource. Even at a natural regeneration process, this resource can bounce back pretty quickly with our climate and conditions here in Newfoundland and Labrador.

I think that if we do not go into the countryside and look at these underutilized species and these unaccessible wood supplies that the government says are not there, then we will see a diminishing number of our forestry workers in the years to come. Not only are they being diminished because they have to move away to work; a lot of these people are getting up in age. A lot of these people in the next couple of years will not be able to work in our forests. There are not many people coming behind to replace these workers, because they know the future is not there for them because of different techniques and mechanical tools to do the work that they were used to doing.

So, we must look at new ways of utilizing our resources in the forests today. It is important that we probably have more educational routes to go for younger people coming in, dealing with the different techniques and different programs and different tools to utilize that resource. I would like to see more emphasis put on retraining of forestry workers and small operators where they can take advantage of other trades and other things with respect to our forest resource.

It has been done for the fishery when there was no fish. Then, every effort was made to help out the fishing people in Newfoundland and Labrador where they could avail of educational avenues and other things; but with forestry workers, when they say there is no more resource, then people are sent home and they are not even given the courtesy of saying: We are sorry but we can help you in other ways. They are just sent home, and when their EI runs out they end up on welfare. I do not think that is acceptable and good enough in this day and age where we can take a resource like that, rape the resource, and tell workers there is no more need for them.

Mr. Speaker, a lot of these small operators deserve the attention from government, that government can do something for these operators. They do not have to just say: I am sorry, there are no more permits, no more trees.

There is a lot more I would like to say, Mr. Speaker, but I adjourn the debate for today.

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

MR. TULK: Are you finished?

MR. HUNTER: Yes.

MR. TULK: You are speaking, are you?

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

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the Member for Windsor-Springdale. He has managed to achieve, in one-half hour, what the Leader of the Opposition has failed to do ever since the House has opened and that is to rattle the Minister of Mines and Energy.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARRIS: He gave such an address that the Minister of Mines and Energy could not take it.

AN HON. MEMBER: He could not handle it.

MR. HARRIS: He could not handle it. He is after taking the berating that he has been getting from the Leader of the Opposition every day for ten, fifteen and twenty minutes a day, every single day since the House has opened -

 

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARRIS: - but no, he was unmoved. He managed to keep his straight face. He kept his bluff up, but today he lost it. The Minister of Mines and Energy lost it, and I want that to be on the record, and I want to congratulate the rookie Member of the House of Assembly for Windsor-Springdale for doing that.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARRIS: I think I am going to take a page out of the speaker's book. Perhaps if I were able to use the same kind of language, tone of voice, the same knowledge and experience that this member has and talk about this issue, then perhaps I, too, can achieve what seems to be almost impossible to achieve, and that is to rattle the Minister of Mines and Energy.

I am not sure, maybe there are reasons why he was easier to be rattled today; perhaps the fact that he could not advance his aspirations for leadership today because the Premier spoke for him. As he spoke for the Minister of Fisheries yesterday, the Premier spoke for the Minister of Mines and Energy today, so that might be part of it. It might not all be to the credit of the Member for Windsor-Springdale, but certainly he achieved a remarkable feat today in talking on An Act To Amend The Forestry Act.

Mr. Speaker, the bill itself is one that gives certain powers to forestry officials that they did not previously have spelled out in the act.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: The Member for Fogo & Twillingate wants to talk about the fourth mill on Fogo, is it?

AN HON. MEMBER: Twillingate & Fogo.

MR. HARRIS: Twillingate & Fog.

I say to the Member for Twillingate & Fogo, I didn't see his name anywhere on this at all.

MR. REID: I could be that, none of the above.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARRIS: I say that none of the above is all the other leadership aspirants over there put together, are the ones that add up to that none of the above.

The Forestry Act and the regulation of the forestry industry in this Province is a very important piece of work. I am afraid that our Province does not do a very good job in ensuring that we have a fully sustainable forest and a fully sustainable industry and, at the same time, protect our environment the way it should; and do a very good job of making sure that the forest companies in particular do a proper job of reforestation and replacing what they are cutting.

Not only that, we have the second important role and that is ensuring that every log that is cut is put to a maximum use. That should be a basic principle governing all of our forest resources, in the operation of our forest resources. We have for many, many years, decades I would say, seen saw logs being turned into pulpwood when there has been an absence of enough saw logs to run a proper sawmilling and lumbering industry in this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure that the level of debate at this hour of the day is probably going to be very elevated. Given the hour, perhaps it is a good time to adjourn debate.

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, I move second reading of the bill.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: I am sorry about that. I thought he had wisely finished, but certainly I should have known the difference.

Mr. Speaker, before I move the adjournment of debate, I suspect -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TULK: The Opposition House Leader hasn't told us, but I suspect we are debating the resolution by the Leader of the Opposition.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Government House Leader is entirely, absolutely, 100 per cent correct on this one.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. TULK: How did I guess?

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House adjourn until tomorrow at 2:00 p.m.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

On motion, the House at its rising adjourned until tomorrow, Wednesday, at 2:00 p.m.