LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF
Monday, March 1, 1993
The House met at 1:30 p.m.
PRAYERS
ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS
Mr. Speaker:
Pursuant to the authorities and practices of theHouse, I now report that
I have examined the petition and findthat the petitioners have not complied
with the set authoritiesand practices in the following respects.
According to our Rule 81.(8): "No petition shall be receivedif it
prays for expenditure, grant or charge on the publicrevenue, whether payable
out of the Consolidated Fund or out ofmoneys to be provided by the
Assembly."
Therefore, I regret to advise the
honourable member for SwanRiver (Ms. Wowchuk) that her petition is out of order
and cannotbe received.
TABLING OF REPORTS
Hon. Leonard Derkach (Minister of Rural
Development): Mr.Speaker, first of all I would like to
table the Annual Report1991‑1992 for the Canada‑Manitoba
Partnership Agreement onMunicipal Water Infrastructure for Rural Economic
Diversification(PAMWI).
I would like to table the Annual
Report 1991‑92 for the
Hon. Clayton Manness (Minister of Finance): Mr. Speaker, I wouldlike to table, firstly,
Volume 3, Public Accounts 1991‑92,Summary Financial Statements and,
secondly, the ManitobaHydro‑Electric Board Quarterly Report for the nine
months endedDecember 31, 1992, and the Report of the Provincial Auditor tothe
Legislative Assembly for the fiscal year ended March 31, 1992.
House Business
Hon. Clayton Manness (Government House Leader): Mr. Speaker, the government, at this time,
would like to waive the two‑day noticeof motion, with the permission of
the House, and introduce fourbills at this time.
Mr. Steve Ashton (Opposition House Leader): Mr. Speaker, Iunderstand the government House
leader is asking for leave. Ithink we
already have a significant amount of business.
We would like to know when the
second reading committeehearings will be held on the Sunday shopping bill. After thegovernment has decided when they are
going to do that, we mightget down to the rest of the business‑‑
Mr. Speaker:
Order, please. Is there leave to
allow thehonourable government House leader to introduce said bills?
Some Honourable Members: No.
Mr. Speaker:
No. Leave is denied.
Hon. James McCrae (Minister of Justice and
Attorney General):Mr.
Speaker, I would request leave of the House to introduce Bill14, The Personal
Property Security Act and ConsequentialAmendments, for first reading.
Mr. Speaker:
Does the honourable Attorney General have leave?
Some Honourable Members: No.
Mr. Speaker:
No. Leave is denied.
* (1335)
Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis (
Mr. Speaker:
Is there leave to revert to Introduction of Bills?Leave? [agreed]
INTRODUCTION OF BILLS
Bill –210The Plain
Language Act
Ms.
Judy Wasylycia-Leis (St. Johns): Mr.
Speaker, I move,seconded by the member for Concordia (Mr. Doer), that Bill
210,The Plain Language Act; Loi sur la langue courante, be introducedand that
the same be now received and read a first time.
Motion presented.
Ms. Wasylycia-Leis: Mr. Speaker, Bill 210, The Plain LanguageAct,
would see all consumer contracts and all governmentstatutes, regulations and
publications written in plainlanguage.
This legislation arises out of the growing concernthat many contracts,
laws and regulations are often unreadable,packed with legalese and written in
language that is hard tounderstand.
The absence of plain language, Mr.
Speaker, contributes to afear of the system and deters many from pursuing their
rights.This bill would make laws and legal documents understandable. Itwill help ensure people can comply with
their legal obligationsand obtain the benefits to which they are entitled. It will helpManitobans to clearly understand
the full intention of governmentactions without the help of a dozen lawyers,
and finally, it willhelp ensure fairness and equal access to the law for all of
ourcitizens.
Motion agreed to.
Introduction of Guests
Mr. Speaker: Prior to Oral Questions, may I direct the
attentionof honourable members to the gallery, where we have with us
thisafternoon forty Grade 9 students from the Chief Peguis JuniorHigh school. They are under the direction of Mr.
Barmeier. Thisschool is located in the
constituency of the honourable Ministerof Culture, Heritage and Citizenship
(Mrs. Mitchelson).
On behalf of all honourable members,
I would like to welcomeyou here this afternoon.
ORAL QUESTION PERIOD
Budget
Child Anti-Poverty
Programs
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, we haveraised the issue of child
poverty and its alarming rate ofincrease in the
Mr. Speaker, we have seen a series
of budget decisions fromthis Premier's (Mr. Filmon) government dealing with all
thosethree areas affecting the poor in
Further, Mr. Speaker, there was a
reduction in the socialwelfare benefits and health benefits last week of some
$3 millionout of a $20‑million fund that will affect again children
livingin poverty, particularly those with teeth that need care thatwill not get
it with the cutbacks of this provincial government.
I would like to know how these
budget decisions that havebeen announced by this Premier's government will
eradicatepoverty for children in our province.
Hon. Harold Gilleshammer (Minister of Family
Services): Mr.Speaker, over the last three years, we
have announced a number ofinitiatives that have enhanced the social allowance
system in
We did make an announcement last
week that we felt we had tomake some adjustments to the benefits for social
allowancerecipients. We still have left
these benefits in place that arecomparable to what other provinces have. The adjustments arenecessary because of the
tremendous increase in the SocialAllowances line, some 65 percent over the last
three years.
Program Reduction
Criteria
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I wouldlike to again ask the
Premier (Mr. Filmon), whose comments werethat we will do these three things,
education, health care andsocial programs, to help eradicate child poverty,
everything hehas done in the last two months in terms of the budget
decisionshave been kicking the poorest in the teeth, have been kicking
thepoorest children in the teeth and those are the Tory prioritiesin this
province.
I would like to ask the Premier how
he, in his tough budgetdecisions, can square the choices that his government is
making.On the one hand they are increasing their revenues by tens ofmillions of
dollars with the undebated expansion of video lotteryterminals in the city of
How does the Premier square the
value system that comes intoplay in terms of making those kinds of budget
decisions on thepeople of
* (1340)
Hon. Harold Gilleshammer (Minister of Family
Services): Mr.Speaker, the member referenced the fact
that governments have tomake choices.
Governments across this land are making choices.Every government in this
country is making those tough choices atthis time.
The member is making some reference
to Bill 70 which wasenabling legislation that was brought about through
therecommendations of the SARC committee.
This government consultedwith members from the City of
Mr. Doer: Mr.
Speaker, this is absolutely indefensible,indefensible to have the children in
poverty in this province interms of the
BudgetProgram Reduction
Criteria
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): I would like to askthe Premier, in terms of his
commitment in this Chamber a yearago in eradicating poverty, how he can defend
having millions ofdollars going in grants in lieu of taxes for training to
placeslike Keystone Ford, $10,000; Kingswood Golf and Country Club,$9,000;
Linnett Graphics, $7,000; Wardrop Engineering, $10,000;lots of grants, Mr.
Speaker, millions of dollars in grants goingto corporations. At the same time, they are cutting the
benefitsto children living in poverty.
How does he defend this in theHouse?
Hon. Gary Filmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, as the Minister ofFamily
Services (Mr. Gilleshammer) has indicated, there have notbeen cuts throughout
the years that we have been in government,and we have been in government for
almost five years. Duringthat period of
time, the Department of Family Services, andparticularly those lines that
pertain to Child and FamilyServices, daycare, to foster parents and so on, have
beenreceiving over that period on an annualized basis increases thathave
averaged in the range of 9 percent, over that period of timeof five years.
So we have not been reducing those
areas, that is No. 1.Number 2, Mr. Speaker, the grants that he talks about are
fortraining people for jobs. That is a
very key priority. That isabsolutely for
training. Not a nickel can flow without
thatmoney going to pay for training. So
when he talks about it, heis absolutely misleading the public. [interjection]
Yes,absolutely. This is, of course, the
problem that you have withNew Democrats, is that they are dishonest when they
talk aboutthese things. They will not
tell people the truth‑‑
Mr. Speaker:
Order, please.
Point of Order
Mr. Steve Ashton (Opposition House Leader): Mr. Speaker, this isour first day back after
he recess, and I would have thoughtthat perhaps the Premier of all people might
have taken the timewhen we were in recess to assess the way we behave in this
House,and in particular not talk about dishonesty. I mean, coming fromthis government, its
actions, it is horrid for members of theopposition to take comments like that,
and I would like to askyou to have him withdraw that comment unequivocally.
Mr. Speaker: The honourable member does not have a point
oforder. The honourable Premier did not
refer to any specificmember.
The honourable First Minister, to
finish his response.
* * *
Mr. Filmon: Mr. Speaker, it is that lack of honesty that,
ofcourse, has left the New Democrats in the position they are, withno
credibility. Every nickel of payroll tax
deduction is basedon the dollars that are spent on training of their employees
forjobs and that is exactly what we need in this province, is tohave well‑trained,
capable employees for the jobs that are therein our society.
The New Democrats speak out of both
sides of their mouths.On the one hand they say, spend more money on training;
they say,encourage the private sector to spend more money on training, andwhen
it happens they criticize it. Mr.
Speaker, they cannot haveit both ways and the public knows why they have a lack
ofcredibility in this province, and that is why they are where theyare.
* (1345)
Throne Speech
Education System
Mr. John Plohman (Dauphin): Mr. Speaker, the public knows thatthere is total
neglect of children in this province by thisgovernment. That is what they know, and nowhere has it
beenexemplified better than by the cuts by the Minister of Education(Mrs.
Vodrey) of 2 percent, not the 2 percent she announced, butthree, four, five,
six and higher cuts to divisions across thisprovince. All this, when in November in the throne
speech, thegovernment said, my government realizes that education andtraining
are the keys that unlock a world of opportunity and afuture of economic growth
and prosperity.
Mr. Speaker, I ask the Minister of
Education, what hashappened to this world of opportunity and economic growth
andprosperity, and will the minister now admit that her governmenthas failed
only two months later to live up even to the wordsthat she included in the
throne speech?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, I reject entirely what the member
has said. Let me tellyou that this
government maintains its commitment to educationand its commitment to students,
and we are making sure throughwhat we have put forward and have offered to
school divisions interms of options that students and their programs will
beprotected.
Mr. Plohman:
Mr. Speaker, how can this minister reconcile hercallous actions now with
her position of December 2, '92, whenshe said:
I am very pleased with what this government has putforward in relation to
education in this throne speech,especially when the Antler River School
Division states, in thearea‑‑
Mr. Speaker:
Does the honourable member have a question?
The honourable member for Dauphin,
kindly put your questionnow, please.
Mr. Plohman: I
say, the failure at the school levels‑‑we seeincreased violence and
I have to ask this Minister of Education,how can she stand in her place in this
House when there are cutsbeing made right across this province, the many
divisions in theprovince, how can she reconcile the position she took in
thethrone speech only two months ago?
Mrs. Vodrey:
Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would remind themember that there is a
fiscal issue relating to all Canadiansthat this province is not immune to the
fiscal position and thatthis province has had to make some very difficult
decisions.Those are only the decisions that we are now asking school boardsto
make, and we expect that they will make them in good faith.
I would also like to remind the
member what I heard theLeader of the Opposition (Mr. Doer) say in the Budget
Debate of1988, when he said if you are not willing to make the toughdecisions
today, you will not have the money to deliver theservices tomorrow.
Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh.
Mr.
Speaker: Order, please. Some things never change. Order,please.
The honourable member for Dauphin has the floor.
* (1350)
Mr. Plohman:
Mr. Speaker, she just admitted they are notdelivering the services.
I ask, how can this minister stand
in her place and defendthe economic mismanagement of this Minister of Finance
(Mr.Manness), total economic chaos which is the result of the cuts
ineducation? How can the minister
justify the position in light ofthis economic minister, this Minister of
Finance, who has failedtotally in regard to management of the economy in
Mrs. Vodrey:
Mr. Speaker, again, I will remind the member of thefiscal position of
this country and this province and to say thatthis government has made every
attempt to make very fairdecisions, very fair decisions across government. We recognizethe importance of education, and
in doing so, we have maderecommendations to school divisions so that the
integrity ofprograms and the programming for children will be protected.
School Divisions
Budget Reduction Alternatives
Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): Mr. Speaker, I have a question forthe
Minister of Education.
While performing major surgery to
our educational system,this government continues to pay lip service to the
importance ofeducation as we have seen in this House today. Not only have weseen the minister take a cut
at public school funding, but wehave seen her come up with unrealistic ideas
and suggestions toschool boards.
Can this minister enlighten the
House today as to whatoptions she has suggested to the school divisions that
have tocome to grips with these awful cuts?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, I did outline several options
which were put forward toschool divisions.
One was an option similar to the option thatwe in government have put
forward to our own employees. We
didsuggest that school divisions might look at work week reduction.In addition
to that, we have asked them to look at administrativecosts in the same way that
we in government have and to make surethat we protect the interests of children
in the classroom andcurrent programs.
Department of Education
and Training
Administration Budget
Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): Mr. Speaker, can the minister tellus if she
will in fact be cutting her own administrative budget20 percent as she has
asked the school divisions to cut?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, that nformation will come forward
with the budget.
Education System
ReformReport
Tabling Request
Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): Mr. Speaker, a final supplementaryfor the
Minister of Education.
Can the minister tell us and is the
minister prepared totable a framework to deal with educational reform? The MTS andschool trustees are waiting for
this. She indicated to us beforethat in
fact the process had been underway, but it was news tomost of the educational
officials and organizations.
Is she prepared to table that today,
or is her reform simplycut and slash?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Theprocess of educational reform has been
very important to us, andit is proceeding, Mr. Speaker, in a very organized
way. In thatorganized way we have had
focus groups, we have had discussionswith all of the representative groups in
education. We havespoken with the
teachers, the trustees, business, industry andthe MFL. We have made sure that in beginning to design
ourprocess of reform we have included all of the partners, includingthe public.
Pediatric Bed Closures
Mr. Dave Chomiak (Kildonan): My question is to the Minister ofHealth (Mr.
Orchard). On February 18, the head of
the minister'sown hand‑picked reform team, Bernard Blais stated, and I
quote:All bed closure decisions are made by the deputy minister and
theminister.
Now that this minister has
completely closed the children'sward at St. Boniface Hospital, which changed
from his originalannouncement that some beds would stay open and some day
surgerywould remain open, can the minister advise this House when andwhy he
made the decision to completely close the children's wardat St. Boniface
Hospital?
Hon. Donald Orchard (Minister of Health): I am very pleased towelcome my honourable
friend to the important position of criticin the ministry of Health, and I hope
that my honourable friendbrings to his responsibility on behalf of the New
DemocraticParty, some of the policy they might bring forward in terms ofhealth
reform. Possibly they might want to share
with us theprogressive initiatives in other provinces that they may or maynot
be familiar with.
I know that my honourable friend the
member for Kildonan (Mr.Chomiak) will approach his new responsibility with the
kind ofenthusiasm that he has shown in the past, and I hope, Sir, thathe does not
fall victim immediately to what I describe fondly asthe Leader's disease,
although he has fallen victim to thatalready, Mr. Speaker.
To qualify, so there is no
confusion, not my Leader'sdisease, the Leader of the Opposition's disease.
Point of Order
Mr. Steve Ashton (Opposition House Leader): Mr. Speaker,Beauchesne is very clear that
answers to questions should bebrief and relate directly to the matter raised.
If the minister wants to debate
health care policy in thisprovince we are more than willing anytime, anyplace,
but heshould not waste the time in Question Period and should answerthe
question raised by our new Health critic.
Mr. Speaker: I
would remind the honourable minister, thehonourable opposition House leader
does have a point of order,and I would ask the honourable minister to deal with
the matterthat is raised.
* * *
Mr. Orchard:
Indeed, and I certainly look forward to the NewDemocrats debating health
policy. It will be a refreshing changein
the five years I have been here.
Mr. Speaker, my honourable friend
asked the question when andwhy and what was the process around decision making
in terms ofconsolidation of all inpatient services for children in Winnipegto
the Children's Hospital. That decision
was made and wasannounced following recommendations from a number of
studygroups, including the Urban Hospital Council.
I want to indicate to my honourable
friend that the latestrecommendation which arrived on my desk approximately the
end ofNovember indicated that when government was consolidatingservices the
Urban Hospital Council recommended completeconsolidation of pediatric bed
services to the Children'sHospital.
* (1355)
Mr. Chomiak:
My supplementary to the same minister:
Will theminister at least consider keeping these beds open for a
periodof 18 months to two years to allow for a time period to find outwhether
the consolidation which would result in only onechildren's hospital being
available to 600,000 people?‑‑becauselast year on at least two
occasions, Health Sciences Centre wasovercrowded and St. Boniface was alerted
as a backup. We willhave no more backup,
Mr. Speaker.
Will the minister, at least in the
interim period, allow an18‑month to two‑year period to see if a
backup is in factnecessary?
Mr. Orchard:
Mr. Speaker, I know my honourable friend does notalways have all the
information before him, and certainly theopportunity to receive full and
complete information is notavailable, but I want to indicate to my honourable
friend thatone of the pieces of incorrect information that he may have
beenpredicating some of his observation on, the consolidation ofinpatient
services to Children's, is the fact that this was theplan as envisioned by
governments in planning the Children'sHospital since 1975. Now that is a long time to achieve a goalof
consolidation of pediatrics into one hospital, but it was theplan in 1975 and
will be expedited.
Mr. Speaker, I want to tell my
honourable friend that sincethe Children's Hospital opened to accept children
for inpatientservices in approximately 1982, a number of beds have never
beenopened at Children's Hospital. With
the complete confidence ofthe professionals, Dr. Aggie Bishop as head of pediatrics,
we areassured that we can provide the inpatient needs of children in
Mr. Chomiak:
Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to the minister,I just do not listen
to focus groups. We have been listening
tothe patients; we have been listening to the parents and thenurses.
Health Care System
Francophone Community
Services
Mr. Dave Chomiak (Kildonan): My final supplementary to theminister: Will the minister at least attend the public
forumbeing sponsored tonight by the Societe Franco‑Manitobaine andexplain
why his government is ignoring the community, is ignoringthe safety needs of
children and is ignoring the Francophonecommunity?
Hon. Donald Orchard (Minister of Health): Mr. Speaker, it isregretful with the first
series of questions my honourable friendhas put out that he has not told the
exact truth. Now that againis a problem
my honourable friend had‑‑[interjection] Well, Ihope he tells the
truth‑‑
Mr. Speaker:
Order, please.
Point of Order
Mr. Chomiak: Mr. Speaker, I believe that the Minister of
Healthindicated that I am not speaking the truth. I object to that,and I am rising on a matter
of privilege.
Mr. Speaker: For
clarification, the honourable member did say heis up on a matter of privilege?
Mr. Chomiak: Mr. Speaker, I am asking that the
ministerapologize for indicating that my comments were dishonest.
Mr. Speaker: The honourable member does not have a point
oforder, but I would caution the honourable Minister of Health topick and
choose your words very, very carefully.
* * *
Mr. Orchard:
Mr. Speaker, I accept your caution.
Sir, that isthe caution that I am giving to the member for Kildonan,
becausein his preamble to the last question, he did not have his
factsstraight. We have not ignored the
Francophone community. Wehave not
ignored the concerns of children and families in
CN Rail
Employee Layoffs
Mr. Daryl Reid (Transcona): Mr. Speaker, today we learned thatCN Rail has
announced that it will reduce its workforce by 10,000people over three years in
My question is for the Minister of
Highways andTransportation. Considering
the historical significance ofrailway jobs to the
Hon. Albert Driedger (Minister of Highways and
Transportation):Mr.
Speaker, last year CN announced the potential layoffs of10,000 positions. Presently, they have 32,000 employees in
I got in touch with the senior
people from CN this morning.Just to clarify, based on the news release they had‑‑I
was notsure exactly what the impact would be‑‑and regretfully have
toconfirm the fact that there will be 350 actual layoffs at CN,plus there will
be 184 positions affected by a four‑day workweek. There will be another 62 that will be
affected byattrition reduction and cutback on summer hiring. Mr. Speaker,also, they have indicated a
further 323 positions that are goingto be laid off in western
What bothers me most is the fact
that
It is my intention to later today
meet with the president ofCN as well as the CEO to discuss the fairness aspect
of it, thatin the future, if there are going to be further reductions
takingplace, that we get dealt with in a fair way.
* (1400)
Mr. Reid: Mr.
Speaker, I thank the minister for making my pointfor me.
CN Rail
Retraining Programs
Mr. Daryl Reid (Transcona): Will the Minister of Labour explain,since two
years ago I asked him and his department to intercedein this process of
retraining for these employees who are facinglayoff and for those who are now
finding themselves laid off,what his department, the Department of Labour, is
doing toprovide skills upgrading for the employees who are laid off andthose
who are now facing layoff and an uncertain future, Mr.Speaker? What actions is his department taking to
provide these‑‑
Mr. Speaker: Order, please.
The question has been put.
Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, first ofall, I indicate to the
member for Transcona that the railwaysfall within the jurisdiction of Labour
Canada.
Having said that, there was a
particular concern that themember brought with respect to the trade certificates
of thosepeople working at the railroad in that they were not transferableto
other areas. At that time we put him
together with ourdirector of the Apprenticeship & Training branch and I
believeseveral of the officials from the unions who were involved todevelop a
plan that could be used to upgrade those skills. Iunderstand there were some complications and
difficulties in thatparticular process.
I indicate very clearly to him,
within the budgets and theavailable resources that I have in our department, we
are alwaysprepared to work with those groups to overcome thosedifficulties, but
again one of the major problems of course wasit being in federal jurisdiction.
Mr. Reid: Mr. Speaker, these employees are still waiting
forthis minister to act.
CN Rail
Retraining Programs
Mr. Daryl Reid (Transcona): My final supplementary is to theMinister of
Education.
Since the Department of Education
has anticipated that
What adjustment strategy does this
Minister of Educationhave, Mr. Speaker, to deal with this serious situation?
Hon. Albert Driedger (Minister of Highways and
Transportation):Mr.
Speaker, I think the members in the House probably are wellaware that the
severance packages that the unions have negotiatedwith CN and CP are second to
none in this country. My biggestregret
is that these jobs are going to be lost because thepeople, by and large, who
will be laid off or terminated‑‑thereare tremendous severance
packages that they have worked out.
In fact, my understanding is that anybody
working eight yearsor longer will receive over 80 percent of their wages until
age65. They also have severance
packages. My understanding fromCN‑‑and
I am not defending CN's position. I am
just saying thatthe employees who are affected, by and large, are not the
oneswho are raising the biggest concern, because the unions havelooked after
their employees well in that regard.
CN has also assured us that they are
trying to look forplacement with these people.
A lot of the positions that arebeing lost are basically through
attrition. Mr. Speaker, I thinkCN itself
was looking to see whether they can place many of thesepeople aside from what
training they can get.
UniversitiesFunding
Reduction Impact
Mr. Reg Alcock (Osborne): Mr. Speaker, since this governmentcame to
office they have worked steadily to transfer the costs ofeducation off the
government and onto the debt loads of studentsattending our universities and
colleges, and the trendcontinues. They
clawed back $2 million from the universities, a2 percent cut in the support
coming this year. They haveincreased the
fees to international students by more than 75percent.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the
Minister of Education avery simple question.
What will be the impact of all of thesedecisions on students currently
in programs at our universities?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, let me start with the failure to
flow the anticipatedfunds, and let me assure the House that was covered by
theuniversities with their surplus. In
fact, the universities stillretain a surplus therefore there was no effect on
students inthat regard.
Universities were only required to
share what otherManitobans have also had to share when anticipated funds did
notcome into
In terms of visa students, Mr.
Speaker, I can tell you thataction was taken to bring
Student Financial
Assistance
Mr. Reg Alcock (Osborne): Perhaps this minister should do somefocus
group with students. Can the minister
assure this Housethat we will not be moving to a loans only program in student
aidthis year?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): I can certainly tell the member I spend a
great deal of time withstudents and making sure that I speak to them and that
theirinterests are represented in the planning of this government. Ibelieve that is evident when we acted on
behalf of students andwe capped tuition at 5 percent this year.
Mr. Alcock:
Mr. Speaker, the question is a serious one. Canstudents expect the same level of grant
support this year as theyhave received in the past?
Mrs. Vodrey: The issues of student support are serious
ones. Ihave spoken with the honourable
member several times in terms ofthe
Universities
Quality of Education
Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Students in every survey and inevery interview
indicate that they are very concerned about thequality of the education that
they are receiving in
I want to ask the Minister of
Education, who has assuredManitobans that the quality of education in our
universities willnot suffer under the cuts she has proposed, could she tell
theHouse whether she measures quality in class size, in libraryservice, in lab
times and assistance, in counselling and guidanceservices, in the number of
assignments and evaluations, or doesshe have some definition of quality that
includes none of these,perhaps a focus group definition of quality? Will she tell ushow she intends to monitor
the quality of education in
* (1410)
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training):Again,
the quality of education is the most important thing thatwe are dealing with in
terms of students on our K‑12 side,students on our post‑secondary
side, whether they are in ourcolleges or our universities or our training
programs.Therefore, when the announcement was made to the universities, wealso
made recommendations to the universities so that we couldpreserve programming
for students. We have asked universities,in
the same way we have asked ourselves in government, to look ata version of the
work‑week reduction so that any reductions willnot affect students and
student programming.
Budget Consultations
Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Mr. Speaker, the minister thinksthat reduction
in hours of the staff on services is not going toaffect students. I have no idea where she gets these
ideasfrom. I want to ask the minister in
fact where she does getthese ideas from.
Did she talk to students, faculty, parents,boards of governors or the
UGC? Who advised her that hermillion‑dollar
clawback and the reductions to universities nextyear will not affect the
quality of education, and will she tablethose opinions?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, let me
remind the member again. When the
decision wasmade to not flow the funds to universities, it was because therewas
an understanding that those universities did have surplusesand the shortfall
was covered by surpluses with surplusremaining.
In addition to that, in this announcement, as I havetold the member
already, we have asked the universities toexamine ways to not affect students
and to not affectprogramming. I would
wonder what the member is getting at.
Isshe asking us to continually increase on the backs of students sothat
others can continue to get increases while other Manitobanscontinue to take
reductions?
Capital Budgets
Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Mr. Speaker, will the ministerconfirm that, in
addition to the clawback, in addition to thecuts to next year's budget, she
intends to dramatically cut thecapital and renovations grants to the
universities as well?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Speaker, I informed the universities when I
met with them lastweek that the capital budget will be announced when the
budget isannounced in this House.
Social Assistance
Child Tax Benefit
Mr. Doug Martindale (Burrows): Mr. Speaker, last year thefederal minister of
health and welfare met with his provincialcounterparts in
Can the Minister of Family Services
tell the House if heagreed in
Hon. Harold Gilleshammer (Minister of Family Services):
Mr.Speaker, I can tell the member that there
was a recognitionamongst the social services ministers across this country that
wehave to look at all of the programs that we have in place acrossthis country. I indicated in a previous answer that we have
seena 65 percent increase in the Social Allowances line over the lastthree
budgets. Other provinces, including
I would say to you that over the
last numbers of budgets in
Mr. Martindale: Mr. Speaker, unfortunately the minister
misses avery simple point, and that is, when the federal governmentimproves a
program, is the provincial government going topenalize people and cut it back?
Will the minister assure working
parents with children in thedaycare system that the new $500 child benefit will
be excludedas income so that children, and not his government, actually
dobenefit from this initiative and will not once again be penalizedby this
government's actions.
Mr. Gilleshammer: Mr. Speaker, I can say that if the
memberwishes to discuss daycare, this is an area of our budget that hasdoubled
over the last five years, and there is a tremendousamount of provincial
resources that flows into the daycaresystem.
The daycare system has been well served by the changesthat have taken
place.
Mr. Martindale: Once again, Mr. Speaker, the minister will
notanswer the question.
Does he agree with the Premier (Mr.
Filmon), who said onDecember 13, 1991, that his government would work co‑operativelywith
the federal government on any program designed to eradicatepoverty with respect
to children? If so, will he promise not
topenalize children and allow working parents to keep the child taxbenefit and not
claw it back through decreased child caresubsidies?
Mr. Gilleshammer: Mr. Speaker, in fact we have workedco‑operatively
with the constituents who access this department.
I say to the member that if you want
to understand therealities that are out there, I would suggest that you
lookcarefully at what Premier Bob Rae is saying these days about thetreatment
of social allowance recipients and the structuralchanges that we are going to
have to make in this country becauseof the tremendous increases in volume. I also would have himreference new‑President
Bill Clinton and the statements that hehas made on this.
I could tell you that the mood
across the country, with theministers of the social allowances department,
recognizes thatthere have to be fundamental changes in the system.
Manitoba Public
Insurance Corp.
Chairman's Salary
Increase
Mr. Leonard Evans (Brandon East): Mr. Speaker, Manitobans are inthe process of
paying exorbitant increases in their Autopacpremiums even though they were
misled by the Conservative Partyback in 1987 and 1988 that a Conservative
government somehowmagically would roll back the rates or at least freeze
them.Manitobans have had a rude awakening and are now particularlyoffended by
this government's decision to increase the salary ofthe new chairman from
$20,000 to $35,000 a year, a 75 percentincrease.
Will this government reverse this
decision, thisunconscionable increase, today?
Hon. Glen Cummings (Minister charged with the
administration of The Manitoba Public Insurance Corporation Act): Mr. Speaker, we are expecting of the new
chairman a considerable increasedworkload, which he has committed to.
Under the NDP, of course, there was
a minister who was thechairman of the board, the very thing that caused the
downfall ofthe NDP management of Crown corporations, the continual
politicalinterference.
Mr. Speaker, if the member opposite
wants to reference costsof chairmen in similar positions, I suggest he should
look atICBC. It seems to me that the
chairman there receives somethingthree times the rate of what the
Mr. Leonard Evans: Mr. Speaker, how can this 75 percent
increasebe justified in light of the massive cutbacks to schools, tohospitals,
to people on welfare, to universities, plus all of thepeople who are being laid
off? How, in all fairness, can
thisincrease be justified?
Mr. Cummings:
Mr. Speaker, at the very time when we are lookingto put some very
serious changes in the MPIC program‑‑Autopac2000 is coming forward‑‑the
member should look at his colleaguesto the west, where they increased Mr.
DeVito from not $10,000, to$90,000.
Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh.
Mr. Speaker:
Order, please. The honourable
minister, to finishthe response.
Mr. Cummings:
Mr. Speaker, let not the member be toosanctimonious. We are looking for leadership and expertise
atthe corporation. The retiring chair
indicated that the workloadwas exceeding the amount of time commitment that had
beenexpected. We are expecting an
increasing time commitment fromthe new chair, and we believe we are getting good
value for thedollar.
* (1420)
Manitoba Public
Insurance Corp.
Chairman's Salary
Increase
Mr. Leonard Evans (Brandon East): Mr. Speaker, I want to ask thePremier, does
the Premier approve of this unconscionableincrease, because I noticed this
Order‑in‑Council is bothrecommended by the Minister of MPIC and
then he signs it twice?He approves of it.
Mr. Speaker, will this Premier now
repeal this unacceptableincrease that is occurring while others are being asked
to take acut?
Hon. Gary Filmon (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I will repeat so thatthe member
for Brandon East can understand that the new chair hasbeen asked to increase
the time spent in the position to betweenthree and four times what the former
chair was spending there.The new chair is a former corporate secretary of a
majorinsurance company so has extensive background, a corporate legalcounsel, a
corporate secretary.
Under other circumstances in
Mr. Speaker: The time for Oral Questions has expired.
Speaker's Ruling
Mr. Speaker: I
have a ruling for the House prior to recognizingthe honourable member for
Crescentwood (Ms. Gray).
During Question Period on December
16, 1992, the House leaderfor the official opposition party the honourable
member forThompson (Mr. Ashton) rose on a point of order regarding theuttering
by the honourable Minister of Culture, Heritage andCitizenship (Mrs.
Mitchelson) of the words "those are racistcomments." The words in question were used in reference
to thehonourable member for Radisson (Ms. Cerilli). I took the matterunder advisement.
On November 1, 1990, I ruled in a
similar matter that thephrase "potentially racist attitude" was
unparliamentary. Inoted in that ruling
that in our own House the phrases "smackingof racist" and "it is
almost a racist assumption" had beenvoluntarily withdrawn by the member
who spoke them. Further, ina very
similar situation in January 1987, Speaker Fraser of theHouse of Commons ruled
that a member withdraw the words "racistcomments."
I am, therefore, ruling that the
honourable member forThompson did have a point of order, and I am calling on
thehonourable Minister of Culture, Heritage and Citizenship to riseand withdraw
the unparliamentary language, without qualification.
Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister of Culture,
Heritage andCitizenship): Mr. Speaker, in the
spirit of co‑operation as westart a new year in this House and according
to your ruling, Iwill withdraw those statements.
Mr. Speaker: I
would like to thank the honourable Madam minister.
MATTER OF URGENT PUBLIC
IMPORTANCE
Ms. Avis Gray (Crescentwood): Mr. Speaker, I have a matter ofurgent public
importance.
I move, seconded by the member for
Mr. Speaker: Before determining whether the motion meets
therequirements of our Rule 27, the honourable member forCrescentwood will have
five minutes to state her case for theurgency of debating this matter
today. A spokesperson for thegovernment
and the other opposition party will also have fiveminutes to address the
position of their party.
Ms. Gray: Mr.
Speaker, I rise today on this matter of urgentpublic importance to indicate to
you that in fact this is thefirst opportunity that we have to raise the issue
on the crisisin education funding.
We heard announcements from the
minister last week and theweek preceding talking about the severe cuts that are
coming toeducation in this province for this year, and given that this isthe
first day that we are now resuming sitting in this House, itis very, very
important that all members of the Legislature havean opportunity to discuss the
issues here.
Mr. Speaker, there is no other
opportunity to discuss thismatter since we do not have a budget before us and
we do not knowwhen that budget will be here.
We have had no Estimatesscheduled.
There are no committees, or there are no otheroccasions to explore this
very serious matter of educationfunding.
I believe this is a very urgent
matter because school boards,as you are aware, require to submit their budgets
to the city byMarch 15, and to municipalities.
Therefore they are required tomake very significant decisions which will
affect their studentsand the parents in the divisions in which they work. Further,the minister has arbitrarily slashed
out a percentage of schooldivision budgets based on the bottom line. This is not truereform.
We definitely have a crisis here in
education funding. Ithink it is very
important to each of the members of theLegislature, particularly those in rural
Mr. John Plohman (Dauphin): Mr. Speaker, I rise in support ofthis motion
here this afternoon. I am sure that not
only mycaucus colleagues and the Liberal opposition who has moved thismotion,
but also children, parents, students, trustees,superintendents, everyone
involved with education across theprovince has been shocked by the move of the
government at thepresent time, this minister and this government as a whole
whohave taken the unprecedented step of cutting the funding forpublic education
in this province in an unprecedented way.
We do not have another opportunity
in the debate with thebills before us in this House to discuss this issue and
raise theurgency that is being felt by people across this province inrural
We see that the quality of
education, contrary to what theminister says, is being impacted on in a
dramatic way by the cutsthat she has announced.
She has entrenched the inequities thathave existed throughout the system
from division to division byher actions and the government's efforts to
introduce a billlater on in the session that will come before this
House,entrenched inequities in the system, across the system. She hasensured, contrary to what she said,
that there will be massivecutbacks in services to children.
I was attempting, Mr. Speaker,
during Question Period torelay the message from the Antler River School
Division, a smallschool division in rural
This is the kind of impact that we
are seeing in our schoolsas a result of the inability of the education system
to cope withthe problems being thrust upon the system. This government istaking no actions in the
area of reform, Mr. Speaker, to reducethose demands on the system. Instead, they are choosing to ignore them, to
increase the class size, to cut the number ofprograms and teachers and let them
go their own way, and if they survive, they survive, and if they do not, they
do not.
This is a callous attitude toward
the public educationsystem. It is an
issue of the utmost importance in thisprovince, one that concerns us deeply in
the opposition, and allManitobans. I
believe that they would want us to raise thisissue and speak to this issue and
debate this issue in the Houseon an urgent basis here today. I urge all members, thegovernment, to listen
to what the opposition has to say, tolisten to what people are telling us about
their draconian cuts,their deep cuts unprecedented in the public education
system, Mr.Speaker.
I ask you to rule in favour of this
urgent debate at thistime so that we can get on with bringing forward these
concernsto the government.
Hon. Clayton Manness (Government House Leader): Mr. Speaker, the members opposite have called
for the set‑aside of the ordinarybusiness of the House.
Mr. Speaker, certainly their
arguments around urgency, evenwith an attempt with all the bombast associated
with their calls,still have not been able to build a case for urgency.
Education funding is an important
issue; all of usacknowledge that. But,
Mr. Speaker, decisions have been made andrendered by the Minister of Education
(Mrs. Vodrey), schoolboards are budgeting, and will be expected to do so,
within therealm of those decisions.
There is not a crisis. This
isreality.
The member just opposite said that
it is unprecedented. Heshould know that
a year ago
However, Mr. Speaker, the schedule
today probably could allowfor some debate.
We say that because, although there are acertain number of bills before
us that we could debate, giventhat we are coming into a period of time when one
day couldpossibly be directed towards debate on important issues, I wouldsay
that the government is prepared to engage in debate.
I want it fully understood that this
is not to be precedentsetting, that certainly no interpretations of the rules
wouldallow for a debate on this issue, given the fact that theopposition has
failed to establish urgency, but given that thisis not to be taken as a
precedent case, the government isprepared to debate this important issue.
Mr.
Speaker: I would like to thank the
honourable members fortheir advice as to whether the motion proposed by the
honourablemember for Crescentwood (Ms. Gray) should be debated today. Thenotice required under our subrule 27.(1)
was received.
* (1430)
Pursuant to our Rule 27 and
Beauchesne's Citations 389 and390, there are two conditions required for a
matter of urgentimportance to proceed.
First, the subject matter must be sopressing that the ordinary
opportunities for debate will notallow it to be brought on early enough. Second, it must be shownthat the public
interest will suffer if the matter is not givenimmediate attention.
In reviewing the Order Paper, I do
not see any otheropportunities in the near future for debate on this
subjectmatter. However, while I am aware
that some members view thematter to be a pressing one, I am not persuaded that
the issue isso pressing that the public interest will suffer if it is
notconsidered today.
I understand that changes to the
education funding formulawill not be implemented before the start of the
upcoming fiscalyear, therefore, I am ruling against the motion.
However, despite the procedural
shortcomings, which I havepointed out to the House, I note that there appears
to be desireof members to debate this matter today. Beauchesne's Citation387 as well as past
rulings of Manitoba Speakers take this intoaccount. I will then put the question to the House.
Shall the debate proceed? [agreed]
Ms. Gray: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to be able to
speak onthis issue. It is actually a day
of sadness that we must standin this House and debate a crisis in education,
because in factif this government had been managing the Department of
Educationsince they came into power in 1988 we would not be in this
crisistoday.
The Minister of Education (Mrs.
Vodrey) spoke about the factthat tough decisions had to be made. Well, if the then Ministerof Education and
the government had in fact started making somereasonable decisions in 1988 and
1989, we would not be in thisdifficult situation we are today. This government has promisedus education
reform. We have yet to see any document,
any shredof information, any shred of evidence that would show us that infact
there is a reform process that is underway.
What should have happened in 1988
and '89 is that thisgovernment should have decided to go into partnership with
theeducation officials, with the school division trustees, with theManitoba
Teachers' Society, parents, parent councils,universities and decided on what is
the strategy of education inthis
Since Thursday, all of my colleagues
in the caucus have beenbombarded by phone calls from people from across
We have seen from this government no
idea of a framework foreducation reform.
The minister spoke in the fall about howreform was underway, yet when we
speak to the very officials whomshe supposedly met with, they in fact said it
was a nonmeeting,and they were embarrassed for senior bureaucrats because it
wasobvious that the senior bureaucrats knew nothing about what thiseducation
reform was supposed to be.
The minister today has spoken to us
about the many optionsthat she has given school boards. Well, Mr. Speaker, the twooptions that she
has talked about are, decrease youradministrative budgets by 20 percent. We have some schooldivisions where they are
so small that in fact we have very fewstaff.
There may be two or three staff in that school division.How does one cut
that administrative budget 20 percent?
We asked the minister today in the
House: Is she prepared tocut her own
administrative budget 20 percent? It was
veryobvious by the rote answers that she was giving us today that infact she
probably is not prepared to do that. How
does sheexpect school divisions to cut their administrative budgets 20percent?
I will look forward to the
minister's comments today on thisparticular issue. I would like the minister to be able to
tellthis House and to be able to tell all Manitobans what otheroptions she has
for the school divisions to deal with the salarycuts. Some of these cuts are not 2 percent. Some of the schooldivisions will be faced
with a 5.9 percent cut. [interjection]
Now, I hear the minister say,
salaries. Now, Mr. Speaker,one of the
things and one of the difficulties in the educationsystem today is when school
divisions are forced to make cuts onsalaries or are forced to lay off
teachers. What happens, andthe
principals will tell you this and the superintendents willtell you this, is
that seniority does count.
They will tell you, in a school
division, it is good to havea mixture of teachers, teachers with years of
experience and newteachers, teachers with new ideas, with fresh blood, new
ideasbrought into the division. What
happens when we are forced intolayoffs is in fact many of those new teachers
are laid off. Youare left with
experienced teachers only, and you do not get thesame quality of education that
you might have if you were allowedas a school division to make those best
decisions as to having amix of teachers.
Mr. Speaker, when we are talking
about the crisis ineducation funding, we cannot forget the funding to post‑secondaryeducation
at the university level. Now this
government and thisminister have an unusual way of dealing with issues
toorganizations and agencies, and they did the very same thing withChild and
Family Services. They have done the same
thing withhospitals.
What they have said is we are going
to cut your funding. Youmake all the
decisions. You have to deliver the
service, but youcannot do a, b, c and d.
So they have taken away their autonomyto make decisions. They have taken away the authority that
theyhave. This minister has said, you
cannot cut programs, youcannot lay off university professors, you cannot raise
yourtuition fees more than 5 percent, but you must grapple with thesefunding
shortfalls, and it is your responsibility to make surethat you have a quality
education delivered.
They have said the very same things
to school boards and thevery same things to school teachers. They have said, you do nothave the tools, you
do not have the resources. It is
liketelling a carpenter to build a house, and you have to make sureyou have the
essential features in the house, but we are notgoing to give you any hammer and
nails to do the job. It doesnot work
that way. It cannot work that way. This minister andthis government should have
been in partnership with theseuniversities, with the school divisions, with the
school trusteesyears ago to say, how are we going to deal with education here
in
Mr. Speaker, I would ask that the
government reconsider theirposition on education funding, that they sit down
again with theManitoba Association of School Trustees, the school
divisions,that they go out and talk to these trustees, that they talk
toparents, and that they find out what people want to see ineducation, because
unfortunately the real tragedy of these cutswill not be seen this year. They will not be seen next year orthe year
after, but the real tragedy of these cuts will actuallybe realized in five and
10 years when it is far too late.
We are talking about a generation of
children here who arenot going to see the type of education that we here on
this sideof the House feel that these children should get, so we are notgoing
to see the worst results this year or the next, but it isgoing to be down the
road.
I would also like to say, in
response to the education crisisthat we have here in
* (1440)
Twice this afternoon, Mr. Speaker, I
have heard the word"reality" used, and "reality based," and
the Minister of Finance(Mr. Manness) talks about, this is reality. The Minister ofFamily Services (Mr.
Gilleshammer) says they base reality on whathappens in
We are our own province, and we have
to make our owndecisions. I would ask
that the cabinet and the Minister ofEducation (Mrs. Vodrey) reconsider their
shortsightedness inregard to education funding, reconsider the draconian
cuts,reconsider the regressiveness of their policies in regard toeducation and
that they look towards other options.
If they feel that dollars are short
and that we have to bemore efficient, nobody is going to disagree with that,
but youhave to plan and decide over a period of time as to how you aregoing to
ensure that those reforms do occur.
So I would ask this government to
reconsider, Mr. Speaker,and I look forward to the comments of the members of
this House,particularly those who represent rural areas. Thank you.
(Mr. Marcel Laurendeau, Acting
Speaker, in the Chair)
Mr. Plohman:
This is an extremely grave situation with regard topublic education in
this province. We have seen, over the
lastnumber of years, a reduction in the commitment to the publiceducation
system, and we have seen instead an increasing prioritybeing placed on private,
elite schools in this province.
One of the reasons why this
government now is short of moneyfor the public education system is because they
have beenproviding increasing amounts to elite schools in this province atthe
same time that they are decreasing their commitment to thepublic education
system.
It has happened continuously over
the last number of yearswith the elite schools receiving sometimes as much as
10 timesthe increases of the public education system under the formermember for
Roblin‑Russell when he was Minister of Education andcarrying on to this
minister at the present time.
It is an insidious attack on the
public education system, andit has resulted in many inequities developing
throughout theprovince, particularly in many of the smaller rural
schooldivisions who are not able to offer the same quality of educationthat
they can in some of the larger divisions, because a greaterand greater burden
is being borne by local taxpayers. So if
aschool division is poor in terms of their ability to raise taxesfrom property,
they are not going to be offering the same qualityof education, the same
variety of courses available andexperiences for the students in their
area. That is theregrettable part of
this whole lack of commitment to the publiceducation system.
I guess we can say we should not be
surprised by thegovernment actions here this year, because they have shown
us,over the last number of years, that they do not place a highpriority on
education, regardless of what they said in the thronespeech, regardless of what
they said in speeches, regardless ofwhat this minister said in speeches and
this First Minister, thisPremier (Mr. Filmon), because in fact their actions
speak louderthan words. This year that
is extremely evident in everythingthat has been done so far, Mr. Acting Speaker‑‑smoke
and mirrorsannouncement designed to leave the impression that the cuts werenot
as deep as they were.
In fact, we have seen many divisions
having cuts in the 6percent range, not 2 percent, as the minister said. Many willsuffer even greater reductions
because of the fact that they havegone through a collective bargaining process
with their staff andhave agreed to reasonable settlements very close to
inflation,and they will have to pay those as well.
This government seems to have no regard
for negotiation orconsultation or collective bargaining process that has been
inplace historically in this province.
They want to rule bydecree. This
Minister of Finance (Mr. Manness) is known forthat. He has done it before with the civil
servants. It is justa matter of who he
has decided the scapegoats will be for hiseconomic mismanagement and his
failure in this province. Whowill the
next scapegoats be? It was the civil
servants, thenurses. Now it is the
teachers they determined who are the fatcats in society and shall be singled
out for huge discriminatorypersonal tax increases.
Who are they trying to kid, Mr.
Acting Speaker? They saythey do not
increase personal taxes. Of course, we
know theyhave offloaded the taxes onto the property owners, offloadedtheir
responsibilities and tried to save face on their electionpromise, but have they
kept their promise insofar as the personalincome taxes of individuals and
groups in society? No, they havenot.
Their scapegoat that they identify
is never big business.No, they will give tax decreases, tax breaks to big
business, butnever will it be to the average working person in this
province,and whether it be in the public sector or in the private sector,but
particularly in the public sector, where they have singledout what they call
fat cats for discriminatory tax increases,huge tax increases by this Minister
of Finance and supported inan apologetic way by this Minister of Education.
She is, I think, not carrying out
her responsibility asMinister of Education at all. It is the Minister of Financemaking the
decisions for her. I think that is
regrettable,because the public education system in this province needs
aminister to stand up and say we cannot do this to the children in
The demands are being increased year
by year by society onteachers and students in the classroom. Students are lining upto see their teachers
for special help that they require becausethere are too many of them in
classrooms. They cannot meet theneeds
physically of all the kids in their classrooms.
Thisminister stands back and allows the Minister of Finance to makethese
kinds of callous deep cuts that bite deep into the qualityof education for our
children. We have to put our
children'sfuture first.
I found it rather ironic that the
First Minister would talkabout that, and the government, in the throne speech
this pastyear when they talked about the need for priority to be placed
oneducation. In fact, there has been no
priority placed oneducation.
When they said in the throne speech,
my government realizesthat education and training are the keys that unlock a
world ofopportunity and future of economic growth and prosperity; whenthe
minister said she is pleased with what was in the thronespeech; when the
Premier on December 10, 1992, just a few shortmonths ago, said we have been
hailed for bringing forward notonly a fair and reasonable, but a sensible, way
of funding forthe public schools in
It was not sensible in the first
place. It wasinactionable. The school divisions have told us that, and
Irefer to the Antler River School Division.
The Deputy Premier(Mr. Downey) should know if he would meet with his
constituentsthere, Mr. Acting Speaker, exactly what this has done to a
smalldivision in southwestern
* (1450)
The minister says it is not
affecting the quality ofeducation. The
minister said the quality of education will notbe sacrificed. She said it again today in Question Period
inresponse to a question that quality of education will not besacrificed. We will protect programs. That is not true, Mr.Acting Speaker, because
they are not doing it, and we seeevidence of this right across the province
that the children inschools are suffering in terms of the education quality
andopportunities because of this government's cut.
Let them talk about
Sure, Roy Romanow inherited a
massive mismanagement similarto what this Minister of Finance is in the middle
of in Manitobaat the present time. There
is no difference with this look‑alikeDevine that we have here in
Let us deal with the situation in
Mr. Acting Speaker, this is an
urgent matter; this is of deepconcern.
The government must change its position on this fundingof education and
ensure funding of inflation which their Premier(Mr. Filmon) said they would do;
they promised.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): The honourable member'stime has expired.
Hon. Clayton Manness (Minister of Finance): Mr. Acting Speaker,it is a pleasure to rise
on this very important issue. Myfriend,
my colleague the member for Dauphin (Mr. Plohman), ofcourse, has just provided
us one of his typical speeches. Whatis
the old saying: heap big wind, but no
rain; or lots of smoke,no fire?
An Honourable Member: Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Mr. Manness:
Lots of fury, but there certainly was not muchprovided in substance to
that particular presentation.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I too was
disappointed with the memberfor Crescentwood (Ms. Gray) in her lead‑off
presentation on thisissue.
I listened very closely to both
presentations, and what isobvious is that nothing has really changed. Both carp on andon. They say that reform has been promised by
this government inthe whole area of education, and they try to paint the picturethat
nothing substantive is changing within that area.
Let me say what they do not
say. What they do not seem tosay or
acknowledge is that reform from their viewpoint cannothappen with a lesser
amount of money. That says to me that,
to aLiberal and to a New Democratic Party member, reform can onlyhappen if
there is more money to spend. That seems
to be thepresentation as I hear coming from the opposition benches.
Mr. Acting Speaker, if that is their
view, then obviouslythere is not going to be a common sharing of the view as to
howreform should occur. For 30 years
now, governments throughoutthe land and in the western world, reform always
meant moreresources being spent, but the reality is today we do not havemore
resources to spend in support of reform, or even insupporting some of those
good areas of public service in thepublic sense that require the same level of
support.
Why not? Well, reform today is happening in many
householdsand many businesses because the reality of the times is pushingreform
and that reform is going to have to occur within finitebudgets. I say to you that education is no
different. It cannotbe looked at in
isolation. Our Minister of Education
(Mrs.Vodrey) understands that. Every
member of this Treasury bench,every member of this caucus understands that, and
a growingnumber of Canadians and Manitobans today are understanding that,but
not the dinosaurs over across the hall here.
An Honourable Member: Old‑think.
Mr.
Manness: Old‑think. Old small "c" conservative‑think. Whatthat means is spend, spend and spend some
more. Keep pushingback the wall. Mr. Acting Speaker, I heard a new term, and I
amgoing to label‑‑every time I hear the members opposite speak, Iam
going to use it on them. We hear, and it
is tragic, and I amprobably going to be chastised for using it, but today there
istremendous sensitivity around the term "child abuse" and
thereshould be, but do you know what the members across the way
arepractising? It is fiscal child abuse;
in every one of theirrequests, it is that the government of the day spend
more,disregard what is happening with respect to these deficits andthis growing
accumulated debt. What they are saying
to thechildren of today is, tomorrow we are going to steal the fruitsof your
labour, and we are going to steal all of the energies youput into earning those
fruits.
I say to the members opposite shame,
because it is old‑think,it is out of step with the realities of today.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I hear the
dinosaur from Dauphin talkingand talking and yipping and yapping, and all of
the taunts arenot going to be able to change the reality of our bottom line
andare not going to be able to help one dollar in dealing with theinterest on
the $4 billion that the members across the wayaccumulated in such a period of
time.
Mr. Acting Speaker, what I find
interesting is, in ourbudgets between '90 and '93 we devoted on a yearly basis
anadditional 5.5‑6 percent every year, $22 million every year,
toEducation‑‑6 percent a year, more or less, in the last fourbudgets,
year over year over year over year. By
the way, theLiberals voted against every one of those budgets and so did
theNDP.
How did we do this? Well, this is how we did it. We hadsome decent success on the provincial
debt side. We changed someborrowing
around. We had some favourable interest
rates. Withthose savings, where did they
go? Did they go into theDepartment of
Natural Resources? No. Did they go intoHighways? No.
Did they go into the Department of NorthernAffairs? No.
Did they go into Urban Affairs?
No. Where didthey go? They went into Health. They went into Education. Theywent into Family Services, Mr. Acting
Speaker. That is wherethose savings went‑‑$100
million a year increase into Health, $20million a year increase into Education. The member says that iswrong. Well, I guess it must have been, because they
votedagainst it‑‑voted against it.
So the issue today is not that we
have not put enough moneyin, because we have put every dollar in that we
could. The issuetoday is sharing.
Who should escape? Now the member for Dauphin said thatteachers
should escape. He is saying to Peter
Olfert, no, youtake it on the chin, and the civil servants, you take it on thechin,
but the teachers should escape.
How real is the problem? Well, I look around in the businesscommunity
today and I know two things. I know that
the corporatetax when we inherited government was $200 million. Today, thebusiness community is contributing
in corporate tax around $100million. So
who is paying the tax? I know also that
there areindividuals working for private business today who arevoluntarily
rolling back their wages. Why? Because they want tomake a contribution to
the bottom line, not like the‑‑oh, Icannot say this term, Mr.
Acting Speaker‑‑not like my honourablefriend the member for
Dauphin.
Mr. Acting Speaker, had we wished to
attack school divisionsand had we wished to attack the teaching community, we
could havedone so in Bill 70, because the powers were there. The powerswere built right into the
legislation. We chose not to because,in
fairness, we said to the education community, particularly thepublic school
system, you have these powers, you are autonomouswith respect to your ability
to tax and so we chose not to. No,we
certainly did have the legislation built into Bill 70, I sayto the member for
Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak).
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Mr. Acting Speaker, we will attack
nobody but, in fairness toMr. Olfert and the Manitoba Government Employees'
Union, we willask everybody to share. As
far as we can push our model, we willpush it.
We will push it into the public school system to theextent that we can,
in fairness to everybody who is carrying sucha portion of the load.
Now, Mr. Acting Speaker‑‑and
I only have a minute left‑‑Iknow what is happening in Saskatchewan
and I give them credit. Iunderstand the
situation they inherited, and I throw no criticismat the Romanow government for
announcing a year ago that theywould be reducing support to public schools by 2
percent‑‑nocriticism meant.
My involvement in reaching the decision and theNDP portrayal that I am
the bad guy is OK with me. I have
thickskin, I can take it, but I think it is terribly unfair to theMinister of
Education, our minister, who in all respects has beenreaching out to the education
community, who is so sincere in herattempts to have everybody work towards the
common good.
So I welcome this debate, Mr. Acting
Speaker, and I hope Ihave an opportunity over the course of many other speeches
to layout for members opposite the reality of the situation today ineducation
and, indeed, in the fiscal standing of the province asa whole.
Thank you.
Mr.
Reg Alcock (Osborne): I would like
to start maybe bythanking the Minister of Finance for one thing, and that
isencouraging this debate, because I think it is a very importantdebate.
I think, Mr. Acting Speaker, I would
like to start by tryingto frame this one in a slightly different way. These are toughtimes. Nobody denies that. Nobody denies that a government hasto make
tough choices but, when you make those tough choices, youdo it by looking
carefully at your resources and preserving thosepriorities that are of
paramount concern to your government ifyou believe that.
Now, Mr. Acting Speaker, in throne speech
and budget speechover and over and over again, this government has talked
aboutthe priority of education. They
have used words about qualityand accessibility, equity, flexibility,
responsiveness. In thebudget speeches,
this same Minister of Finance has talked aboutthat it is one of the
government's primary priorities to preservehigh standards of education. Yet they have failed their own test.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I attended,
along with other members ofthe House, a workshop by the technology council, the
new flagshipof the economic program of this government. What was thediscussion there over and over
and over again? It was tostrengthen
education. It was to build a base so
that we could becompetitive internationally in knowledge‑based
industries. Thatis what this government
was proposing in those workshops as wellas in this House and that was the
position that this governmenthad chosen to place education in.
So what are their activities? Since they have come tooffice, they have
worked steadily to transfer the costs ofuniversities onto the debt loads of
students. They have allowedtuition fees
increases that have totalled more than 80 percentsince they came into
office. They have reduced the
supportavailable through grant programs to students so that students, ifthey
are going to be able to go, have no choice but to assume ahigher debt load.
They have held their support for
universities to the 2‑2.5percent range despite what the Minister of
Finance said in thisHouse. The facts are
very clear, Mr. Acting Speaker. As
aresult, students are picking up more and more and more of theburden, and we
all know what that does. It means that
fewerstudents go and only certain types of students can go. Onlystudents who have the financial
capability to withstand thosetremendous increases can go to university.
That is unfortunate, because we all
hurt. We all lose whenwe fail to look to
the future. The Minister of Finance made
lotsof brave statements about the future and our children's future.Our
children's future is predicated upon a strong and creativeeducational process
in this province, and that is the very thingthat they are attacking and have
been attacking in post‑secondaryeducation for five years. This is not a new thing. This ismore.
It is a little harder, it is a little deeper, but this hasbeen going on
since this government came into office.
Mr. Acting Speaker, they took back
at year‑end over $2million from the universities. Now how does a university makethat up in the
final quarter of its year? That means a
very hugecut in its ability to provide services, in its repair andrenovations
programs.
In the University of Manitoba there
are buildings fallingdown around the students' heads. There is a basement dropped outof the
architecture building there, and rats and mice are cominginto the library
steadily. This government knows about
it, butit has refused to provide the support to do the capital
repairsnecessary.
Also, this government this year‑‑it
will be very interestingto see what they do with capital because the belief is
that therewill be no capital this year, zero.
Where are the universitiesgoing to find that $3 million? Are they going to continue totake it out of
the mythical surpluses that this Minister ofFinance keeps identifying? Are they going to continue to find itby
reducing the fat? There is no fat in
these universitiesanymore. That fat left
a long, long time ago.
I would invite the minister or any
member of the governmentto go in, as I have done, and sit down with the
students thereand talk to them. Sit with
the students in the Tache residenceas I did the other night. In fact, a great many of thosestudents are
from rural Manitoba. They come from the
communitiesthat these ministers used to represent and now have chosen toignore. And what do they say about it? They talk about sittingin lecture halls that
they are so crowded into because of theneed to cut back on classes, because of
the cuts that have takenplace, that they are sitting two and three at a
desk. They aresitting in the aisleways,
they are sitting on the stairways.
They talk about an increase in
machine marking of papersbecause there are no longer the teaching assistants to
help out.They talk of complete absence of seminars or any kind ofdiscourse
among students because there simply are not theresources available to do it.
They talk about it taking an
increasingly long period of timeto get feedback from their professors, feedback
that is sodesperately needed if they are going to improve, because
theprofessors simply do not have the time to give individualizedfeedback. They do not have the teaching assistants to
do it, andit is all they can do to keep up with teaching a class when
classsizes are moving to the 200, 300, 400 level.
It is absolutely disgraceful that a
government that putsforward as a major plank in strengthening this province,
putsforward education, puts forward knowledge creation, and then notonly does
not do anything to support it, but in fact undercutsit, in fact plays cheap
political games over and over again.
This Minister of Education (Mrs.
Vodrey) is more interestedin the response to her focus group and public opinion
and herpolitical management than she is in the educational management inthis
province, than she is for the development and support forour universities.
I want to talk about something else
that I just found soincredibly appalling in the discussions or in the
announcementsin the last little while.
This government has played the game ofhiding behind the Universities Grants
Commission for some time,but it came out from behind that cloak when it said,
and you willraise the fees for international students 75 percent.
It cast aside any pretence that
there was an independentarbiter making these decisions and ordered the
universities to dosomething. Between the
5‑percent cap that it is allowing onstudent fee increases and the 75
percent it is ordering forinternational students, they will face an 80 percent
increase.
I would like you just to stop and
consider that for a minutefrom a couple of perspectives. Major universities in this worldwork hard to
get a mixed student body. They work
extremely hardbecause they know that part of the educational experience takesplace
in the classroom, and part of it takes place in thediscussion groups among
students outside of the classroom.
Thosediscussions and those experiences and that learning is enhancedif
you have a range of opinions and a mix of experiences, and ifyou can get an
international mix, so much the better.
Harvard University, one of the best
universities in theworld, works very hard to ensure that in all of its
programsthere are students from all over the world represented, becauseit
believes that is the way you give a very high‑class, a veryworld‑class
education.
What are we doing? We are attacking the very people who
dothat. We are launching an attack on
those students who not onlydo not take jobs away from Manitobans because they
cannot workwhen they come to this country as a condition of their visa,
whobring in large sums of money to pay for the fees and their livingexpenses
and everything else, they bring cash into this province,who provide us with
linkages back into their home countries andwe talk about it, at least we give
lip service to the fact thatwe want to be international exporters and we want
to developstrong links and play in the global economy. What are we doingnow? We are rejecting 1,400 people who have the
ability to dothat. This is the most
shortsighted, stupid decision I have seenthis government make since it came to
office, and they have madea lot of them.
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I am in a sense sort of at a loss as
to how to deal with it,because when you listen to the language that comes out
and thestatements that are made about how you produce strength withinyour
community‑‑and sometimes this government likes to deal withsome
more folksy analogies. I mean, if you
think back to how theWest was settled, one of the first things people did once
theygot their communities built was build a school to educate for thefuture,
because they knew that it was by giving people aneducation and giving them
skills to be competitive and givingthem skills to grow with that we built a
stronger community.
This government, instead of
prioritizing, instead of saying,look, we have to make some hard choices and
here is an area thatwe are going to protect because it is so important to our
future,has chosen to attack it. That has
to be an unacceptable decisionin this province.
We simply cannot allow a government to act inthat fashion if we are to
remain strong as a province and if weare to grow and become competitive
internationally in the waythat this government says it wants to be. They ought to readtheir own throne speeches,
their own budget and act in accordancewith them instead of spending all their
time in their focusgroups listening to the opinions of those people and only
thosepeople who they believe will vote for them. I do not believe anyManitoban will support
this decision.
Hon.
Glen Cummings (Minister of Environment): Mr. ActingSpeaker, I appreciate the
opportunity to rise to enter into thisdebate on education finance as the
opposition has chosen to raisethe issue.
Frankly, this is one of those issues
that grips governmentprobably more closely than any other. We all have children, weall recognize the
value of education and the importance ofmaintaining that quality education in
this province and acrossthe country. Mr.
Acting Speaker, to hear the kind of criticismand debate that we are getting
from across the way does nothingmore than indicate that they are totally bereft
of ideas. Theyhave been able to
criticize because they think there are dollarsthat should have been spent in a
different way in differentareas, but not once have they raised the issue of
where thosedollars would come from or why there may not be enough
dollarsavailable to expand in the way that we would probably want tospend.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I have spent a
number of years as atrustee in a school division, and if there is one thing
that isvery near and dear to various communities across this province,all the
communities across this province but particularly in therural areas where we
have seen a drop in population, where wehave been faced with difficult
decisions as have some divisionsin the city where they have actually had to
contract their numberof schools, they have invariably found that in
dealingforthrightly and fairly with the problem that faces them thatthey are
able to bring forward a plan that indeed probablystrengthens the educational
opportunities within their divisionsafter they have taken a look at their
priorities and reorganizedtheir affairs.
When one asks the question, what are the optionsthat are available to
the school divisions today, what are theopportunities that they can use to
strengthen and underpin thequality of education which we believe is an expected
standardacross this province, it really comes down to the recognition bythis
government that local authority and that close local inputof the trustees is
what makes the difference in terms of decisionmaking around educational
opportunities within the variousdivisions.
We cannot continue to turn a blind eye to theproblems that have been
associated with educational finance as wesee a shrinking revenue base and as we
see long‑term results ofpassing on educational costs to property.
Mr. Acting Speaker, the local
municipalities for years havetalked about the accountability of school
divisions. They raisedthat issue with me
a number of times when I was responsible formaking these decisions at the local
level. They said, how manytimes do you
as a trustee get a call about the education taxes?They asked, how often do you
really feel that you have been heldaccountable for the decisions that you have
made? You know, aslong as those
decisions were being made without regard to wherethe dollars were going to come
from and without regard to thereality of some of the costs that we are being
faced with, astrustees, we did not receive a great deal of criticism, but
assoon as we were faced with the reality of having to contract someof the
services because the students were no longer there, wewere faced with some very
severe questions and some difficultoptions.
We did not always have the support
of the government inproviding options in how we might deal with those situations,because
in the minds of the opposition and in the mindset overthe last 20 years, Mr.
Acting Speaker, the only problem withdecision making around educational finance
has been whether ornot each level of government has been putting forward enoughdollars
to cover what the expected costs are. We
have to makesure, as we deal with the educational program in this province,that
we remember that we are protecting the future of ourleaders, protecting the
futures of our thinkers, our workers, ourmanagers. The young people and the minds in this
province areour most important resource, but they have to have a future tolook
forward to.
When we look at the impacts of
continuing to pass on fundsbeyond our ability to bring in revenue, we know that
we cannotcontinue to add the equivalent of a half a billion dollars worthof
debt annually without recognizing what the real cost, just ofthe interest, will
be to those people who are presently in theschool system. We are robbing from our children, and we
cannotcontinue to do that.
When we look at the alternatives, we
know that we have somevery resourceful and very capable administrators out
there in theschool divisions. We have
already seen the reaction from anumber of them that they believe they can deal
with the fundingthat has been presented them, that they know within their
ownorganization that they have options.
They know that they havethe support of this minister and this government
when they goforward to decide what are the best and most viable optionswithin their
division.
When they look at the options that
are available, Mr. ActingSpeaker, it does not mean that this government has
given them atemplate. What it means is
that we have given them the choicethat they may choose which direction to place
their emphasis,which are the most important aspects in their school
divisionthat they are prepared to support and make adjustments.
While it varies from division to
division, there has been anumber of divisions that have indicated that they do
have somesurplus. I know personally of
one school division that has asurplus left from their transportation
budget. Mr. ActingSpeaker, that goes
back to decisions, albeit efficient decisionsthat they have made, but decisions
that they have made to suittheir community and properly serve the students of
that community.
I think that is the emphasis I want
to put on my comments.The relative ability of school divisions may vary
somewhat fromdivision to division to respond, but there have been
adjustmentsmade in the formula that recognize those nuances
betweendivisions. I have had a number of
school divisions that havesaid to me, it is about time that somebody recognized
thosedifferences and included them in the formula, because now, evengiven the
restrictions that we now are being faced with in thisprovince, we have a better
ability to react, and we are beingrecognized for some of the specific
situations that arise betweenschool divisions.
That indicates there is a willingness andthere is an understanding and
there is an ability out there onthe part of the school division leadership to
be able to workwith us in dealing with this public funding issue.
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Mr. Acting Speaker, it comes down to
the simple questionsthat the public ask from time to time as they look at the
schoolsystem. Each area has its nuances,
as I said, but when we lookat some of our rural divisions and we see that 30‑passenger
busesare empty, virtually empty until they arrive within a mile or twoof their
destination and they start to pick up some of the ruralsubdivision students,
when we look at situations where we haveclassroom sizes that have to be offset
by the realization thattremendous distances are involved in travel, school
divisionswill be wrestling with these demons the same today as they havedone
before.
Mr. Acting Speaker, the decisions
that have been made and thefunding proposals that have gone forward are made
with an eye tomaking sure that we have a supportable system in the
future,because we cannot look at our children and tell them that theywill have
to pick up the cost of our excess. We
have to makesure they have the underpinning that is required for
theireducational opportunities. We have
accomplished that.
I believe that when this year has
finished this governmentand this Minister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey) will be
givenconsiderable credit for the fact that they have been able to, invery tough
economic times, establish a funding regime and asupport mechanism that means
that our children will get the verybest education within our ability to raise
funds to deal with it.
Mr. Acting Speaker, let not the
opposition say that this is asituation where you have to fund more, because the
opportunitiesare now reduced, and the taxpayers, who are expected to pick
upmore, are no longer able to produce those dollars. Thank you.
House
Business
Mr.
Manness: Mr. Acting Speaker, I wonder if I might have
leavejust to make a House business announcement. It will take 20seconds.
The
Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau):
Does the honourableMinister of Finance have leave to make a House
announcement?[agreed]
Mr.
Manness: Mr. Acting Speaker, I would
like to formallyannounce that the Standing Committee on Public Utilities
andNatural Resources will meet on Tuesday, March 2, 1993, at 7:30p.m., to
consider the 1992 Annual Report of the Manitoba EnergyAuthority and the 1992
Annual Report of the ManitobaHydro‑Electric Board.
Also, the Standing Committee on
Public Accounts will meet onThursday, March 4, 1993, at 10 a.m., to consider
Volume 3 ofPublic Accounts '91, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 of Public Accounts '92and
the Report of the Provincial Auditor for the fiscal yearended March 31, 1992.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I would also
like to announce thatinformally I had indicated that the Standing Committee
onEconomic Development would meet on Thursday, March 4, at 10 a.m.,to consider
the '92 Annual Report of the Communities EconomicDevelopment Fund. Unfortunately, I have to postpone
thatmeeting, and I will try and arrange a date for next week forCEDF. Thank you.
Committee
Changes
Mr.
George Hickes (Point Douglas): May I
have leave to make acommittee change?
The
Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau):
Does the honourable member have leave for committee changes? [agreed]
Mr.
Hickes: I move, seconded by the
member for
I move, seconded by the member for
Wellington (Ms. Barrett),that the composition of the Standing Committee on
Public Accountsbe amended as follows:
Concordia (Mr. Doer) for Elmwood (Mr.Maloway) for Thursday, March 4,
1993, for 10 a.m.
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* *
Mr.
Jerry Storie (Flin Flon): Mr. Acting
Speaker, I stand insupport of this resolution, and I intend in my few minutes
that Iam allocated to explain why very clearly to this Assembly.
The government of course is wont to
use rhetoric in supportof whatever action it might take, but the government
needs to bereminded from time to time about the commitment it made on
manyoccasions to the people of Manitoba.
Earlier today in QuestionPeriod my Leader read back into the record the
comments of theFirst Minister (Mr. Filmon) when it came to the
government'scommitment to education, to health, to services that were goingto
protect the children of this province.
Mr. Acting Speaker, although we all
recognize that thegovernment is facing some uncertain financial times, there
aremany of us and many Manitobans who believe that thosecircumstances are in
the main of their own making, that they arenot hapless victims in this
circumstance, that they have to takesome responsibility‑‑I am not
saying all responsibility‑‑theyhave to take some responsibility for
the circumstances we face inthis province.
They have to take responsibility not only fortheir own fiscal
mismanagement of the affairs of the province ofManitoba, they have to take
responsibility for theirphilosophical approach to government, to economic
development andthe delivery of services.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we have heard
time and time again membersof the front bench and the First Minister talk about
standingaside, talking about letting the private sector be the engine
ofgrowth. We know that they have
supported philosophically andpractically on many occasions initiatives of the
federalConservative governments, governments who are philosophically thesame as
this government, whether it is deregulation‑‑I see theMinister of
Highways and Transportation (Mr. Driedger) smiling.Of course, the Minister of
Highways and Transportation knowsbetter than most in this Chamber how damaging,
how destructivefederal transportation policy has been for the province
ofManitoba and this country, whether it is deregulation of theairlines, deregulation
in the transportation sector, whether itis the abandonment of our national
transportation institutions.We have lost thousands and thousands and thousands
of jobs.
What is the connection? What is the connection between thedestruction
of the industrial base of our country and theproblems the Minister of Finance
(Mr. Manness) and his governmentand that group are having financing education
and health care andthe social services Manitobans have come to rely on? What is theconnection? The connection, Mr. Acting Speaker, is the
fact thatif Manitobans are not here working, if they are leaving thisprovince,
if they are fleeing this province, if our populationcontinues to decline, if
Manitobans are not working, if they arenot contributing through the tax system
to revenue to thegovernment of Manitoba, the province goes broke.
Mr. Acting Speaker, that is the
problem that the Minister ofFinance and his government have. That is the problem thatconservative, right‑wing
governments have had for the last decadeand more in the industrialized world,
the simplistic fixation onreducing spending as a means of solving the deficit
problem orcreating new economic activity.
I have just spent the last two,
three months meeting peoplein Chambers of Commerce, economic development
groups,small‑business people all over the province. I have been inBrandon and Russell and Dauphin
and Gimli and Steinbach andEmerson and Carman and other places‑‑[interjection]
Not inEmerson. I am sorry. I meant Carman, not Emerson. I willclarify that‑‑in Lac du
Bonnet as well. I was in Portage
laPrairie not more than a couple of weeks ago meeting withrepresentatives of
the R.M. and the town. The turnout in
Portagela Prairie was thin, Mr. Acting Speaker, but I want to say thatthe
turnout in Lac du Bonnet and the turnout in Carman wasexceptional.
What I want to say is that this
government is not a haplessvictim. It
has been for the last five budgets the master of itsown destiny. The problem is that no conservative government
inthe world has ever reduced the deficit by cutting spending as itssole means
if that is all it did. It did not work
for MaggieThatcher. It did not work for
Ronald Reagan. It did not workfor George
Bush. It did not work for Brian
Mulroney, and it hasnot worked for Gary Filmon.
Gary Filmon inherited a surplus andnow has the highest deficit. If the Minister of Finance wants toget up and
contend that the Provincial Auditor is lying ormisleading the House, this
government inherited a surplus. Thatis
what they inherited, a surplus. The
Provincial Auditor of theProvince of Manitoba will confirm that to any member
who doubtsthat‑‑any member.
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An
Honourable Member: We chopped $150
million out of yourspending, out of that budget.
Mr.
Storie: Mr. Acting Speaker, there is
the only thing theMinister of Finance fixates on: We cut another $150 million.
I have just told you, show me a
government where cuttingspending alone solved the deficit problem. There is no suchthing.
Brian Mulroney's Conservative
government in Ottawa came intogovernment promising to control the deficit. They controlled thedeficit by cutting
spending. I ask you the question, is
thedeficit in Canada lower today than it was in 1984? Just like inthe province of Manitoba, deficits
continue to escalate, debtcontinues to escalate.
I ask you to refer to the Minister
of Finance's Third QuarterReport. This
province is a billion dollars deeper in debt ongeneral government programs
today than it was nine months ago.March 31, 1992, the general debt of the
Province of Manitoba wasapproximately $5.2 billion. As of December 31, 1992, theprovincial direct
debt was approximately $6.1 billion.
Mr. Acting Speaker, this fixation is
not working. It is notworking in the
economy. The more difficult, the more
alarmingcircumstance around this is the impact it is having on oureducation
system, on our health care system, on our daycaresystem, on the unemployed, on
the people on welfare lines acrossthe province.
Those institutions and those groups are feelingthe impact of this
particular government's policies and itscomplicity when it comes to federal
government policies which areunfortunately in the same vein.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I want to relate
the education cuts to myown constituents.
When the previous Minister of Educationannounced the new formula and the
sort of transition grants, Igot calls from divisions all across northern
Manitoba. Thecommunity of Leaf Rapids is
perhaps the best example, but I referthe Minister of Northern Affairs to his
own constituency, theAntler River School Division, where they noted that they
werelosing some $800,000 out of a $4.5‑million budget as a result ofthis
government's new education finance program.
What galledthem more than anything was the fact that during the same
periodthis government has been in office, private school funding hasincreased
150 percent.
Mr. Acting Speaker, it is not
fair. It is not honest and itis not
honourable for anybody on that side to suggest that thereis not money available
to support the public school system.
AsBrian Mulroney said to Pierre Trudeau in the debate in 1984, you,sir,
had a choice. This Minister of Finance
(Mr. Manness), thisMinister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey), this government had
achoice, and they chose to support private schools as opposed tothe 195,000
students who attend public schools. Mr.
ActingSpeaker, what is going to be the damage?
The damage is to thechildren of Manitoba, and that is the problem.
Hon.
Jim Ernst (Minister of Urban Affairs):
I am pleased to beable to participate in this very important debate.
I listened to the member for Flin
Flon's (Mr. Storie) normaldiatribe, patterned very closely after the member for
Dauphin(Mr. Plohman), who spoke earlier in this debate. Mr. ActingSpeaker, neither one of them are in
the real world. Both of themhave had
their heads stuck in the sand, I think, for the pastfive years. They do not understand what is going on
around them,and they have not paid any attention to it. They still thinkthat simply throwing money at
something is the way to solve theproblem.
They think that simply putting more money against aneducation system is
going to solve the education problems of thisprovince, and it is not.
For the edification of both of those
members, I would like topoint out that things have been changing in the world
aroundthem. They may not have noticed,
Mr. Acting Speaker, but therehas been not just a recession but a global
restructuring ofeconomic activity in every country throughout the world. Theymay not have noticed, but there have been
major plant closingsand layoffs. They
may not have noticed that, but the fact of thematter is, major restructuring
has been going on in the worldwithin the private business sector of every
economy. Certainlywithin the free world
at least and even within the Eastern Bloccountries, major changes have been
occurring.
The fact of the matter is that we
have had employee groupscome forward and say to their employers, look, we
understand thatthere is global restructuring going on. They have recognized it,and they have said,
how can we get involved in this process so wecan preserve our jobs? Simply saying, no, we are going to liveup to
the letter of our collective agreement‑‑they have comeforward and
said, look, let us participate, let us help you; letus help the business
survive so that we can survive, so that wecan have those jobs that we want so
desperately.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we have seen
employee groups come forwardand do that.
It is happening today in the province of Alberta,where the employees of
Safeway recognize that Safeway is in amajor competitive war with the
Superstore, and they have comeforward and said, we want to preserve our jobs,
so let usparticipate in this process.
Mr. Acting Speaker, the private
household has also gone onthat same track.
The private household today has to look at howit can restructure itself
because of the taxation load that itfaces, reduced incomes that it faces. We had during the '70s14‑15 percent
growth rates in income. In the '80s that
droppedby half to about 7 percent. In
the '90s it is down around 2percent. We
have to recognize those days of simply spend, spend,spend, spend, spend are no
longer with us and that we have to tryand make due with either more innovative
ways of spending themoney that we have or trying to find other ways around the
factthat we are not going to have the kind of level of growth, thelevel of
incomes that we experienced in the '70s and the '80s.
Unfortunately, the public sector
cannot escape the fact thatrestructuring is required. Restructuring in the public sectorhas lagged
considerably behind what has been going on in theprivate sector both on a
personal basis and on a business basisover the past five years or so. The public sector has torecognize also that
restructuring is required if we are going tosurvive, if we are going to provide
the basic services that arerequired by the people of this province in some
reasonablemeasure.
Even the Leader of the national NDP
party has recognizedthat, Mr. Acting Speaker.
Interestingly enough, the membersopposite have not yet, but their
national Leader at least has nowcome to recognize that simply ignoring the
deficit, ignoring thehuge legacy of debt that is being loaded upon the rest of
thepeople in this country, has recognized now that cannot be simplyignored, has
recognized now that we have to deal with the deficitand you cannot spend your
way out of this particular problem andthat artificial stimuli in the economy
simply increase the debt.Even the national Leader of the NDP has recognized
that. So I amhoping that eventually the
members opposite here will also cometo their senses and understand what has
gone on.
Mr. Acting Speaker, as indicated by
the Minister of Finance(Mr. Manness), there has been more money spent on
education overthe past 10 years, year by year by year, than ever before. Yet,go out and talk to the public and see if
they say they have abetter standard of education today than they had five years
agoor 10 years ago or 15 years ago. Ask
them if their kids canspell better. Ask
them if they really think they have a betterquality of education today, and I
suspect that a great many ofthose people would say no. I certainly get lots of complaintsabout the
level and the quality of education that their childrenare receiving. That is in spite of all the money that has
beenthrown against it, in spite of the hundreds of millions ofdollars that have
been spent on education in this province.
If throwing hundreds of millions of
dollars at it has notsolved the problem, then maybe there is something else we
need tobe doing, not necessarily throwing money at the problem, which isthe
answer of the members opposite in this House.
The fact ofthe matter is, we have to look at different ways of doing
it,different, more innovative ways of dealing with it. Dealing withthose innovative ways within the
context of what we haveavailable leads us to the current problem we have today,
but wehave to deal in fairness. We
cannot simply say to one particularsector, you should bear all the brunt of the
fact that revenueshave declined, that the entire world is restructuring in
terms ofits economy and so on.
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We should not say simply if
Education is to go and receivemore money, do we cut the grants then to the City
of Winnipeg inhalf? Do we close up our
provincial parks system? Do we
abandonour highways infrastructure? Do
we go and say, lay off 500 or1,000 public servants? I do not think those are the answers. Ithink we need to deal with the question of
fairness, and thatquestion of fairness is, how do you deal overall
governmentexpenditures?
I have sat now through six budget
processes for theprovincial government since we came into office in 1980. I sitevery week in Treasury Board dealing
with the spending programsof the government.
I have not seen one program that has comeacross my desk at Treasury
Board that does not have redeemingvalue, that is not of some benefit to
somebody somewhere. Butthe fact of the
matter is we do not have the luxury of being ableto do that anymore. The fact of the matter is that we
havesignificantly reduced revenues.
We had just an announcement last
week from the federalgovernment that says, we have already paid you $139
million toomuch, and we want it back‑‑spread over a period of time,
Iunderstand, and thank goodness for that.
But the fact of thematter is that significant sums are also required to
be returnedto the federal government throughout the system, so that
simplycompounds the problem that we are facing here with our budgetaryprocess.
(Mr. Speaker in the Chair)
So if education is to receive more,
who is going to receiveless? Who is
going to lose their job because of that?
Who isgoing to be unemployed and be able to go home and tell theirfamily
that they no longer have a job because the government didnot deal with it in a
fair way?
Our government has said we want to
deal with it in a fairway, and we want to deal with it with provincial civil
servants,but, Mr. Speaker, those provincial civil servants represent asmall
portion of the people who are employed through theexpenditures of the
provincial government. Eighty‑five
percentof the Education dollar goes towards salaries. Throughout ourmedicare system, hundreds of
thousands of people are employed inthat system through municipalities that
receive benefits inpayments and grants from the provincial government.
There are all kinds of other
organizations that exist ongovernment grants of one form or another that
ultimately go topay wages and salaries.
So we said‑‑and I
commend the Minister of Finance for leadingthis initiative‑‑we want
to try and spread that problem, thatpain, if you will, amongst all of the
people benefiting fromprovincial government expenditures, not just one group,
buteveryone. So we try and carry that
forward on a fair andreasonable basis, and that is exactly what we are in the
processof doing.
The members opposite, Mr. Speaker,
get excited over the factthat Education has been reduced in terms of the
totalexpenditures related to its budget line.
It is a nominalreduction overall, and when that nominal reduction
overall iscarried throughout the system it spreads the impact reasonablyand
fairly. Thank you.
Mrs.
Sharon Carstairs (Leader of the Second Opposition): Mr.Speaker, I join in the debate because I
really do believe thateducation is in a crisis in the province of
Manitoba. I want toaddress very
specifically some comments that have been made bymembers of the government
today, and I want to begin with theMinister of Finance.
He talked about a phrase, and he
called it fiscal childabuse. I think
that is an inappropriate use of words, because Ido not think one uses child
abuse with respect to the fiscalconstraints upon any government, but if we are
talking aboutchildren and the problems that they will inherit, then
obviouslyone must consider that they will inherit a deficit and a debt forthe
province, but I would suggest to the Minister of Finance (Mr.Manness) that the
only way that they will be able to deal withthat as young people, because they
are going to inherit some ofit anyway, will be if they have the ability to find
employment.
Statistic after statistic, study
after study shows us veryclearly that the only ones that will be capable of
findingemployment in the 21st Century are those who have a qualityeducation,
and the higher their level of education, the greaterthe opportunity there will
be for them to find employment.School dropouts will find themselves almost
unable to findemployment and will live on social assistance for most of theirlife
unless we find a way to provide them with upgrading. Highschool graduates will also find it not
easy to find employment inthe 21st Century.
Those in post‑secondary educationinstitutions, including our
universities, will have a bettertime, but it will not be free for them either.
One only has to look at recent
statistics in Canada, to lookat professionals and find out for example that in
the lawprofession at the present time 8 percent of the lawyers in thiscountry
are unemployed‑‑8 percent.
So the educationqualifications in and of themselves will not be
sufficient, butif they do not have those educational qualifications then
theiropportunities will almost be nonexistent.
So we have to ensurethat we have a first‑class education system
that givesopportunities for young people to maximize their potential withinour
society.
The Minister of Housing (Mr. Ernst)
said, we cannot just keepthrowing money at it.
Well, I would suggest that there are waysin which we can in fact bring
about fiscal control of education.One way to do that would be to do what this
government promisedto do in 1990, which is to undertake a fundamental
restructuringof school division boundaries in the province of Manitoba, butthey
decided to back out of that last year.
The reality is thatwe have far too many school divisions in the province
ofManitoba. We have far too many school
trustees, all of whom getpaid money, and when we can eliminate those
unnecessary positionswe will indeed save money.
We will save money on trustees.
Wewill save money on school division superintendents.
You know, it is interesting that the
minister seems to wantto debate this issue on education from her perspective of
havingformerly been a school trustee. I
wonder what she thinks of thatposition now, looking at the cuts which are being
made to herformer school division, which are going to make it impossible forthe
level of education in that school division to be maintained.The reality is that
unfortunately the school divisions cannotspeak for themselves in this Chamber,
and it is up to those of uswho have been duly elected to speak for them as we
did in meetingwith Winnipeg School Division last week as they outlined forthose
of us who are representatives in their area the very greatdifficulties that
they are going to have in meeting theexpectations of children.
The Minister of Environment (Mr.
Cummings) and the Ministerof Housing (Mr. Ernst) also went on to talk about
some of thedifficulties that they saw within the school system as it
ispresently structured. I found it
fascinating that one of theissues that was addressed by the Minister of
Environment was theissue of transportation.
It may come as a shock to the Ministerof Environment that that is the
fastest growing line in anyschool division's budget. It outpaces Instructional Resources byabout
seven times. Transportation. It is the movement ofchildren from one
program to another program or from home toschool. It is an extremely costly venture, but I
would suggestto you, Mr. Speaker, that the Department of Education
mandatesthose very transportation costs.
It is the Department of Education
that will not allow for thereview of school divisions that will allow some of
thosetransportation difficulties to be alleviated. It is theDepartment of Education that says
when a child needs to betransported and when a child does not need to be
transported, sodo not blame the school divisions because their
transportationline in their budgets is going up. Look to your own Departmentof Education that
mandates that particular line of the budget forthe school divisions, and that
is the fiscal reality of thesituation.
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(1550)
We also know that what is happening
in terms of the schoolsis that they are being asked to deliver services which
really arenot directly related to education, and again, it is theDepartment of
Education that has mandated that. It is
theDepartment of Education that has talked about the integration ofall special
needs children into the school system.
It does notfund those children.
It looks to the local school division tofund those children because, in
terms of the cost of thosechildren, less than 50 percent and in some divisions
as low as 34percent.
It is interesting that the Minister
of Education (Mrs.Vodrey) says you are wrong, but those are the statistics that
shetabled in the Education Estimates last year, and EducationEstimates clearly
show that less than 50 percent of special needsfunding is picked up by the
province. The rest of the funding
ispicked up by local school divisions.
That is the reality.
In 1993, in the Winnipeg School
Division budget, because Igot those figures last week, 34 percent of the
special needsbudget will be picked up by the Department of Education, and
yetthey mandate the service. They say
the service must beconducted, so when the Department of Education then turns
aroundand says, not only will you get 2 percent funding less from theprovince,
but in addition we are going to restrict your abilityto collect new taxes, what
they are in fact saying is, either violate our mandate or squeeze the
educational opportunities available to youngsters in this province. That is what is goingto happen.
(Mr. Marcel Laurendeau, Acting Speaker, in the
Chair)
If we want to find a means by which
we can offer qualityeducation, we have to do a fundamental restructuring
ofeducation. That, unfortunately, the
minister is avoiding, andshe is avoiding it because to re‑evaluate school
divisionboundaries I would suggest, Mr. Acting Speaker, is a politicalhot
potato and they do not want to deal with it.
And they do notwant to deal with it at exactly that opportunity when the
reviewof school division boundaries and the next provincial electionwill find
that their timing is almost identical.
Yet I would sayto the Minister of Finance that the only way that you are
goingto bring about some reason to the education policy is to bring about that
fundamental restructuring of the way in which we offereducation in the province
of Manitoba.
We have to set some fundamental
goals as to what it is wewant our education system to be. Do we want it to be a bodywhich teaches
computation? Is it a body which
teachescommunication? Is it a body which
teaches calculation? Is it totake the
three Rs of the past and move into the 21st Century,which is much more realistically
the three Cs, and to ensure thatthose young people have those skills that they
are going torequire?
This does not mean necessarily the
lavish expenditure of newdollars or even new dollars at all. We have to find ways withinthe present
structure to reorganize. But you know‑‑
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please.
Thehonourable member's time has expired.
Mr. Jack Penner (Emerson): This is certainly not one of theissues that I
think any one of us relishes debating in this Housetoday. Fiscal reality and fiscal responsibility are
words thatwe use relatively loosely to describe where we are
todayfinancially. This province over the
last number of years, if yougo back to 1983, has experienced administrations
that I believein all sincerity have attempted to provide education to
thechildren of this province. I believe
the department has done avery significant job in trying to find ways and means
to ensurethat our young people will in fact be equipped to face therealities of
the 20th Century. That is really what we
aredebating here today, the realities of the 20th Century.
I remember, and I believe it was
back in 1983 or thereabouts,when the Pawley administration promised the people
of Manitobathat the province would fund 90 percent of the education
budget.School divisions and school trustees, yes, taxpayers all acrossthis
province were looking forward to a greater degree ofassistance to provide that
base education for our small children.
I know the member for Dauphin (Mr.
Plohman) does not want tohear some of this because it reflects on some of the
things thatthey promised during an election campaign and during a term ofoffice
that they held for some eight years whereby educationfunding decreased
substantially, I believe, from a point of about74 percent in 1983 to 66 percent
in 1986. Those were the fiscalrealities
of the day.
Not only were their incomes
increasing, but the Minister ofEducation at the time, Mr. Storie, said, we have
other prioritiesthat we must address and therefore the decrease in
educationfunding. Well, I say to the
honourable members opposite that notonly is this government having to face
fiscal reality inrecognizing that our revenues are down very dramatically over
thepast year, and we can stand here as a government and defend thecommitment
that we have made to education in the increasedfunding that we have provided
over the last four years. In 1988we
provided a 5 percent increase in educational funding, in 1989a 5.5 percent increase
in education funding, and in 1991 a 7.8percent increase in funding. I dare say that record standsrather well
comparatively when you want to compare that with therecord of the 1983 to the
1987 Pawley administration. But thatis
not the debate that I believe we should be into today. Thatis the rhetoric I hear on both sides here
today. I hear theopposition now
complaining about a decrease in funding.
What we should be discussing is how
do we better reform oureducational system, our process, to ensure that the
needs of ourchildren will be met in the future.
Have we reached the timethat we reorganize the whole administrative
process ineducation? Have we reached the
time when we said, yes, maybe wehave created too much of a Cadillac in some of
the areas, thatsome of the chrome, some of the frills that we have added
intoour educational system need to be rethought? Should we thinkabout the basics of education
and how we ensure that those littlechildren that we put into the system in fact
receive those basics?
You know, there are too many times
when I look around our owncommunity and many other parts of our province when I
meetgraduates or people that have just graduated that cannot read andthat
cannot write. We have to ask ourselves,
what have we doneover the past 15‑20 years to ensure that those basic
elements ofthe education system were not ignored?
* (1600)
So I want to stand here today and
congratulate the Ministerof Education (Mrs. Vodrey) for taking a very
difficult, verytough stand on education finance and how we reorganize some ofour
thinking into providing the basic elements of education tothe future. Should we say that one of the fundamentals
isensuring that our graduates out of the elementary classes can atleast read
and write and that they know the basics of ourmathematics system? Are those some of the things that we shouldbe
paying attention to? Can we then in fact
reorganize some ofthe thinking around our fiscal responsibility as the Leader
ofthe Liberal opposition indicated?
I believe that the model that the
Minister of Education isworking towards, and I believe that what some of the
schoolboards and school trustees are saying to us very clearly, arethings that
we should give a great deal of heed to.
Number one,the taxpayers of this province have said time and time again,
wecannot afford to pay any more taxes.
What do you set asidethen? Do you
set aside the social services to increase fundingin education? Do you set aside the health care system
toincrease funding in education? Do we
ignore our basicinfrastructure in this province, just ignore it, set it
aside,let it decay to increase education funding? Or do we challengethe decision makers to
change the way that they have approachededucation over the last couple of
decades into rethinking how weadminister and how we provide, and whether it is
economicallyfeasible to do some of the things that we have done andreorganize
this system?
I believe that all Manitobans, all
with the exception of afew who are the ones who want to challenge and ask for
more allthe time, but the basic members of society today are far moreinterested
in providing quality instead of quantity.
That isreally what this is all about, to ensure that you get value
foryour money.
I am sincerely convinced that under
the leadership anddirection of our Minister of Education and with the support
andco‑operation of our schools boards and of people across thisprovince
that we can sit down and dialogue and come to a resolveon how to provide in a
more economical way a better system ofeducation for our children.
Thank you, Mr. Acting Speaker.
Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Mr. Acting Speaker, I think, whenevery
generation of Manitobans has looked at education, they haveknown that what they
are looking at is the future of thisprovince.
How we deal with education and how we look at it andwhether it is the
Manitoba school question or whether it is thecreation of the University of
Manitoba or whether it is thereforms of the 1960s, every generation has looked
at education inManitoba and tried to leave in place an educational system
whichwould meet the needs of their children and of the next generation.
How we look at education is an
indication, a very clearindication, of the kind of future that we see for our
province.A number of speakers on the other side have emphasized thechanges that
we are facing around the globe, the economicchanges, the shifts in education,
the increasing needs for avariety of new types of information and new kinds of
educationand that is true. I was glad to
hear their references to that.
When communities and societies have
to face those dramaticchanges that we are facing around the globe, the very
fasttransfers in money, the new kind of global economy that many ofthese
Conservative administrations have created with so littledisregard for their own
communities, we are indeed facing newtimes and in those new times the role of
universities becomescrucial.
Universities are the creators of new knowledge. Theyare the leaders of education upon which
all other forms ofeducation in some way depend.
They are the flagships which giveus the teachers, which provide us the
nurses, which provide usthe health care professionals, with the lawyers, with
thebusiness people, with the scientists.
Wherever you look in our society,
the kind of people who aregoing to lead us, who are going help us adapt to this
new andbrutal world that the Conservatives have created, must find theirsource
of new ideas, new knowledge, ability to be flexible andability to adapt, in the
universities. So, particularly in
thesenew times, the universities are crucial.
I would say, thirdly, Mr. Acting
Speaker, that universitiesin every age, whether it is from classical times to
our own 20thand 2lst Centuries, have been the instruments, the focus, for
thecreation of public debate, and it is one of the institutions,only one of the
institutions which help to form the kind ofcitizens that we look for in
Manitoba and for the nature of thecontinuing debate over what is citizenship
and how we each haveto play our part in the creation of economic policy,
publicpolicy, and in the kind of future that we want to see for ourprovince.
In particular, universities are
responsible for the trainingof teachers, and if we look at the entire
educational system inManitoba, nothing could be more crucial than the
preparation andcreation of teachers who are able and well educated and who,
infact, are able to lead us in the kind of new training culturethat we hear so
much about from these new‑market Tories.
Thetraining of teachers, the kind of education that they get
atuniversity, the kind of attitudes that they imbibe there, thekind of
understanding of research, of education, of childhooddevelopment, of
citizenship, of the future of Manitoba, all ofthose things which are so crucial
to every Manitoban, must beimbibed by students at university primarily, not
only university,but certainly one of the major institutions in the shaping
ofteachers.
To reduce the support to education
faculties, to teachertraining, seems to me, Mr. Acting Speaker, to be very,
veryshortsighted, indicates a lack of understanding of the way inwhich the
educational system works, and then lack ofunderstanding of the way in which
public policy and publicchanges are to come to this province.
Teachers at the heart are the very
basis of our transmissionof our culture, of what we want to transmit to the
nextgeneration. To reduce their
opportunities for learning, forunderstanding, for practice in the schools, and
for continuousupgrading as they must do, seems to me, again, a
veryshortsighted, an unbelievably shortsighted form of approach toour new
economic situation.
* (1610)
Second of all,
We face, as I am sure many of the rural
members know, aparticular geographical disparity in our ability to have
accessto education, and it affects not just aboriginal students but, ofcourse,
rural students as well. Nobody who has
been to ruralManitoba in the past year will have missed hearing the voices
ofrural
I want to indicate one of the
contexts of the difficultiesthat we are facing.
Perhaps the Minister of Education (Mrs.Vodrey) will also be addressing
this. But it is important tonotice,
since we are discussing Tory policy in education, to lookat the threats that
have come from the federal government.
Thereduction of EPF payments has affected education in mostprovinces of
In its recent cultural cuts, Mr.
Acting Speaker, it has alsoreduced areas of support that it had offered to
libraries for theprice of books and for postage in many areas. A federalConservative government with its
high interest rates and itsdisregard of the educational future of this country,
I think, haschosen to put the burden of education onto provinces and
ontoCanadian and
Hon. Harry Enns (Minister of Natural Resources): Mr. ActingSpeaker, I am delighted to take
part in this debate because ofits importance, its seriousness and its
timeliness. Althoughthere is a little
premature element to the debate taking place atthis time, as I really do
believe had we all been listening,particularly members opposite, a little
harder to what in anunprecedented way our Minister of Finance (Mr. Manness),
indeedthe entire government, has been telling Manitobans and thatcertainly
includes all members of the opposition, there ought tosurely by now be an
understanding that all governmental fundinghas to be looked at in its total
context.
I do not know what honourable
members opposite are going tosay when the budget is brought down as to
governmental impacts offunding with respect to other services that I know are
of equalconcern to all members in this House as well as to allManitobans. How does it appear when you take out of
theeducational funding that we are talking about now compared in thecontext with
fundings provided for the other important socialservices, namely health and
family services?
Mr. Acting Speaker, one is tempted
to get into the debatewith respect to the level of educational funding not just
in thisprovince but in
Mr. Acting Speaker, and to
honourable members opposite, I dowish to bring a perspective to this debate
that sometimes I fearis lost, and it comes from the experience that the people
ofManitoba have privileged in providing me with. I want to referto the impact that the
priorities of funding, not just of thisgovernment but the governments of the
past that have spanned some20‑30 years of my experience, have placed,
which, by and large,have had the bipartisan support of all members. There is noargument about the importance of
health; there is no argumentabout the importance of education; there is no
argument about thefact that governments and we as a society have a
specialresponsibility for the complex society that we have to cope with,that my
colleague the Minister of Family Services (Mr.Gilleshammer) has to deal with: changing lifestyles, thefailures of our
system, the failures of our families in all toomany instances, in particular
problems that that poses for us asa society, how to deal with children who are
often neglected,children who are not being looked after, children who need
thesupervision, who need the care, who need the compassion of thisor any other
government. That is not at argument.
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Mr. Acting Speaker, I wish to speak
with some knowledge aboutthe impact that this prioritization has had on the totality
ofgovernment services. You see, the
Department of NaturalResources today in 1993 is still expected to look after
ourparks, is still expected to look after our forests, is stillexpected to
better police and better manage our wildlifepopulation, is still expected to
make sure our waters are left inan unpolluted state for children and future
generations to come.Members opposite will be the first ones to not only remind
thatif it was important yesterday, it is even more important today.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I want to impart
this little bit oftrivial knowledge for honourable members to indicate to you
thatwhen I first had the privilege of being the Minister of NaturalResources
for this province, this Legislature decided that to dothose very same things‑‑and
the mandate has not changed‑‑that theDepartment of Natural
Resources deserved 7 percent of the totalrevenues of this province. Seven percent. That was the budgetallocated in the division
of departmental responsibilities in theyears '68‑69.
Today, Mr. Acting Speaker, it is
less than 1 percent, and Ican show you poll after poll, not polls this party
took or anyother, but national polls that have indicated that the
publicconcern, the public awareness, the public demand for mydepartment to
address those issues that my department islegislatively mandated for is much
higher today than it was 25years ago when this department had the respect of 7
percent ofthe revenues.
Now, Mr. Acting Speaker, I
complain. I complain openly. Icomplain around the Treasury Board; I
complain around my cabinettable; I complain on the hustings and publicly when I
can, but Iaccept the prioritization of the government that I serve that sawthis
decline take place‑‑and it did not decline over the periodof this
government. That decline took place
since the years thatI have experience with in 1968‑69, over 15 years of
NDPadministration, over an equivalent number of years, or close toit, of
Conservative administrations.
It is a simple fact of life that we
have placed as a societythat higher priority on what we call broadly our
socialservices. Mr. Acting Speaker, I
challenge honourable membersopposite, surely all of this has to have some
overall fairnessand be kept in context.
I know that different times during thiscoming session honourable members
will be going after mycolleague the Minister of Environment (Mr. Cummings), why
is he not doing a better policing job, a better regulatory job? Why is his department not being staffed with
more and more expert peopleto ensure that the environmental orders that he is
charged withby legislation to put on various activities across this land, whyis
he not doing a better job of it? Why am
I not doing a betterjob ensuring that elk not be harvested out of season, that
lesspoaching is being done, that big Duke the bear is not being shotin Riding
National Park? That is what I am being
charged with.
Honourable members, even though they
switched portfolios inthe critic's role, will continue to come and remind me of
that.I am simply saying, Mr. Acting Speaker, you can say that aboutHighways,
you can say that about the Department of Environment.Are there not urgent
depressing housing needs in our housingprograms for seniors?
What I am saying to honourable
members opposite, before theyrush off on a tangent on one specific issue of the
day, thatdemands, in my judgment, to be lifted out of this context oftotal
government service and provided with unlimited funding,that in today's real
world we will be judged as a government asto how fairly, how compassionately we
have used those resourcesthat we have.
I am satisfied, Mr. Acting
Speaker. I am satisfied because Iknow
that the task facing the Minister of Education (Mrs.Vodrey), the tasks facing
the Minister of Health (Mr. Orchard),the tasks facing the Minister of Family
Services (Mr.Gilleshammer) are tremendous, but I say to you and I say to
mycolleagues opposite, as I say to the general public, that thisgovernment has
attempted and I believe succeeded in bringingabout a real recognition of total
government services for whichwe are responsible to the people of Manitoba, and
to providingthem and to challenging our own bureaucracy to maintain thequality
of service, indeed to enhance it where possible, and tolook for different ways
of using those resources that we have andthat you will be in due order
providing the legislative approvalfor in this very Chamber. Because, in the final analysis we arenot
hearing alternative methods, and alternative methods meansalternative methods
of raising revenue. That is what we have
tohear from honourable members in this debate, and we are nothearing it.
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Inkster): Mr. Acting Speaker, I find thatwhat the
government has done over the past three, four and a halfyears since it has been
in office has been somewhat of adisservice to education and to the young people
in the provinceof Manitoba. Personally,
I have always felt that we have to relyon education and the quality of
education that is being deliveredthrough our institutions, that we have to be
able to count onthat to carrying
What has this government done, Mr.
Acting Speaker, in thisupcoming budget?
A 2 percent cut in education. Now
they aretelling the school divisions that they cannot increase taxes.Well, they‑‑they
being the school division‑‑have been restricted,or this government
has restricted the ability of the schoolboards to seek the taxes that they feel
are necessary in order toprovide the quality or the educational services that
they believeare necessary. After all,
these school trustees, whether youagree or disagree with the individual
trustees, do have a mandatewhich they have to fulfill, and this government and
particularlythis minister is not allowing those school boards that were
dulyelected, as we were, to provide the services in education thatthey feel are
absolutely essential and living up to what theybelieve are the standards that
the communities that theyrepresent in fact want.
Mr. Acting Speaker, the Leader of
the Liberal Party madereference to, on the one hand, we are saying to the
schooldivisions that they cannot increase taxes, that it is beyond themat this
point, where she pointed out‑‑and I want because I toomet with
Winnipeg School Division No. 1, and they talked aboutthe increase to
transportation at 7.53 percent. I do not
thinkthat we can emphasize strong enough that this is a line in whichthe
Minister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey) has mandated the schoolboard to fulfill,
that they do not have any choice, and this is a7.53 percent increase in
Winnipeg School Division No. 1 initself.
In the same budget, proposed draft budget, regularinstruction is
actually receiving a decrease of .65 percent.
Well, Mr. Acting Speaker, if the
government was sincere inits efforts, in its thoughts, to be able to better
prepare ourchildren to succeed into the future, how can we allow somethingof
this nature to occur? This is in fact
the area in which theteachers and the students are best able to make positive
changesto whatever it might be: the curriculum,
number of hours,professional development, and so forth.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I am convinced,
like other MLAs no doubt,that the No. 1 concern that I hear about education is,
in fact,the quality of education. I have
a working group that deals witheducation within my own riding, and in that
group, in themeetings that we have had, the discussions I have had
withconstituents of mine, the quality of education in the form ofcurriculum,
dropouts, literacy, the number of school divisions,the whole question of family
values, student discipline, the roleof parent councils, what roles should the
schools be playing,those are the issues that we have been dealing with at a
verylocal level within my own riding.
In essence, what we end up talking
about at every meeting, invirtually every discussion I have, is the quality of
education.I had a survey that went out to my riding. I am going to readthe question, and I will be
sure to give the Premier a copy ofthe results because I know he has quoted from
my surveys in thepast.
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The question I asked was, are you
satisfied with what isbeing taught to our children at our schools? Twenty‑threepercent said yes, 55
percent said no, 22 percent had no opinion.Mr. Acting Speaker, the quality of
education, and you do not needto hear from a survey, you can ask the
constituents which yourepresent, I am sure will be treated in such a fashion
thatpeople will be disappointed. They do
not feel that thisgovernment has been addressing the whole issue of quality
ofeducation. The government did take
some stands. We have seenthat in terms
of destreaming of the Grade 10 English and socialstudies. They had indicated that they had received
research infavour of doing that destreaming.
Well, I have discussed withprincipals, with parents, teachers, had some
informationdiscussions with respect to other research documents. In fact, Iunderstand that the
Mr. Acting Speaker, I am not
convinced that is in fact theway to go.
I would ask the minister to demonstrate to thoseindividuals that are
interested in why she believes we need todestream. She makes reference to one, she may even
makereference to more than one, I could not tell you right offhand,but from
what I do understand, at least with the groups that Ihave met with, is that she
has not been straightforward with whyit is that she feels that destreaming is
the way to go.
This is something that is not coming
from one or two peoplelocated in one little area. This is coming from individualsoutside the
city of Winnipeg and within the city of Winnipeg,and, Mr. Acting Speaker, I am
disappointed in the sense that youhave a minister at the same time who wants to
cancel theprofessional in‑service days through this budget. She issuggesting‑‑[interjection]
Well, to the Deputy Premier (Mr.Downey), the Minister of Finance set up a model
and said 10working days. I would
suggest, what does the Minister ofEducation (Mrs. Vodrey) want? Where are those 10 days going tocome
from? Maybe she should stand up and
suggest where those 10days should be coming from.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I do have only
two minutes left to speak,and I wanted to very quickly make reference to what
has been thebiggest disappointment from my perspective of this
particularminister. On March 17, she announced
that the province will notproceed with the review of the school division
boundaries. Ifind that absolutely
irresponsible for a minister to ignore thatparticular issue while at the same
time telling the schooldivisions that they cannot do this, they cannot do that,
that weare cutting back at this end. The
students inside the classroomhave been suffering at the hands of this
particular minister, andit is actions such as the school division boundary
review andputting it onto the back burner.
The city of
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and
Training): Mr.Acting Speaker, I am pleased to have an
opportunity today tospeak about education in
One way that we have done it is by
promoting a province‑widetest or examination in each year so that we can
look atassessment and we can be sure that the curriculum is beingfollowed and
that students from one part of Manitoba arereceiving the same quality and the
same type of curriculumteaching from one place to another so that there is not
aquestion that students may be deprived if they come from anotherpart of
Manitoba.
I would refer to the member from
Flin Flon in 1986 when thediscussion of standardized provincial exams was
discussed, and hecalled them of questionable validity. In his mind, there wasreally not the same
need to ensure that students from across thisprovince receive the same quality
of education. Mr. ActingSpeaker, we
stand by that. We believe that it is
important.
We have also spoken today about the
restructuring that isrequired‑‑[interjection]
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please.
Thehonourable minister has the floor, and I would appreciate it if
Icould hear. If the honourable members want
to have a discussion,have it in the loge.
Mrs. Vodrey:
Thank you, Mr. Acting Speaker.
We have spoken this afternoon about
the worldwiderestructuring that is occurring and the need around the world
torestructure and to bring a new type of thinking, a new type ofproblem solving
to our realities. We have also spoken
about therestructuring need within
Through that restructuring, we want
to ensure that ourchildren and our students in Manitoba‑‑and they
are not all youngpeople who are students.
Some of them are adults who arereturning to education and to training
programs‑‑that Manitobansreceive the very best education possible.
On the K‑to‑12 side, we
have introduced a new fundingformula.
This is now going into its second year of application.Through that new
funding formula, we have attempted to directsome dollars to some very important
areas that have beenidentified, areas like library services, areas like
counsellingservices, and that new funding formula is a responsive formula.In
the most recent announcement, Mr. Acting Speaker, we did addsix priority areas
that were recommended by the educationadvisory committee on education funding
to make that formula muchmore responsive.
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We cannot measure, however, our
commitment to education bydollars alone.
We do need to examine what is the job ofeducation, what it is that
education should be doing. In theprocess
of asking those questions, I have had the opportunity tomeet with a number of
Manitobans, with representative groups ofManitobans from the Manitoba Association
of School Trustees, theManitoba Teachers' Society and the Manitoba Federation
of Labourto discuss with those Manitobans what is the job of education.
However, Mr. Acting Speaker, when we
do look at the dollarstargeted for education, we can tell you that 80 percent
of thosedollars on average go to salaries and to benefits. We cannotcontinue to support increases. We need to protect programs. Weneed to protect our students. We need to leave the futuregeneration with
the best quality education system and not with anoverwhelming debt.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we have made
some suggestions with thateducational announcement to ask divisions to examine
ways inwhich they can use their dollars in the most effective way
whileprotecting programs and while protecting students. We did notchoose the way that in 1986 the
member for Flin Flon chose whenhe urged that teachers' salaries be frozen. At that time, in1986, he said that the cost
of maintaining our education systemis accelerating more rapidly than our
ability to fund it. Hesaid at that time,
it is not heresy to ask teachers to look athaving no increase.
What we have done is to present some
possible options toschool divisions. We
have asked them to look at theiradministration first. We have asked them to look foradministrative reductions
in the first place. We have also
askedthem to look at our version of the work week reduction, but thisas a tool.
It is very important, Mr. Acting
Speaker, that we do not turnfirst to the taxes on people, those people who are
alreadyexperiencing some reductions, so that a very small group willcontinue to
get increases. So we have asked school
divisions tolook at all of their options.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I can tell you
as well that the NDP partyin 1986 made the election promise that they would
like to achievea 90 percent funding in education. However, they found that in1987 the member
for Flin Flon (Mr. Storie) again had to say, wewould like to achieve that 90
percent, but there are otherpriorities as well, he said. We also found that the then Premiersaid the
word that they used during the campaign was that they"hoped" to
achieve, that they did not use the word "commitment"to achieve.
So I think it is very important that
we look at what thisgovernment is doing in terms of its commitment to education
andwhat this government has spoken to school divisions to in apartnership way
look at protecting students and programs forManitobans.
We do have a goal for quality. We have a goal for a qualitycurriculum, and
we do have a goal to support students who are atrisk. Further to that goal, we did develop the
Student Supportbranch last year. That
branch does work with individual schoolsas well as school divisions to develop
programs for students atrisk and to develop the supports that are going to be
of thegreatest assistance in each area of
As I have said, we have also brought
forward the neweducational funding formula, and we are making every attempt
tomake sure that that formula is as responsive to the needs ofManitobans as
possible.
Mr. Acting Speaker, let me spend a
moment now on the issue ofeducational reform, because the issue of reform is
also veryimportant to this government. I
have met with Manitobans whorepresent the interests in education. I have named some of thosegroups: Association of School Trustees, Manitoba
Teachers'Society, parents home and schools, Manitoba Federation of Labour.
The purpose of these meetings was to
focus on the issue ofreform and what those groups would see so that they could
puttheir minds to the issues of how they saw educational reform andtheir role
in it. That was the job of those
meetings.
We have also visited schools and
made sure to speak at eachopportunity with parents, with teachers and with
trustees. Thesegroups spoke of issues
such as standards. They spoke ofaccountability. They spoke of partnership, and they spoke of
thelearning environment.
The member for Crescentwood (Ms.
Gray) just called a pressconference last Thursday to say that that party now
thought itmight be a good idea to start speaking to Manitobans, that theywould
start holding public hearings in areas such as
Finally, I would just like to speak
of our commitment touniversities and our commitment to colleges. We continue ourcommitment to those areas.
We have the Roblin commission on
university educationoperating. We look
for that commission to bring forward the roleand the mandate of universities
for the year 2000. We want tomake sure
that our universities are in the best position toprovide the best and most
competitive education, but in thatprocess, we have made sure that we have
protected students in ourfunding announcement.
We have capped student tuition at 5percent to make sure that again
students were not the first placethat universities went to in this particular
fiscal situation.
Yes, the universities were required,
as many others, to takea reduction.
These are difficult times, but I know that theuniversities will work
with some of the options available to themto ensure that students and programs
are not affected.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we continue to
be strongly committed toeducation and very strongly committed to working with
Manitobansto make sure we meet their vision of education in
Mr. Dave Chomiak (Kildonan): Mr. Acting Speaker, I listened witha good
deal of attention to the Minister of Education's commentswith respect to the
fiasco that is occurring in our educationsystem today. I listened to her read her speech in this
Chamber.
You know, I have in front of me a
speech that could almost beidentical word for word. If I had time I would repeat it. It isalmost word for word the same thing that
we heard from thisminister, but do you know what? This speech was deliveredJanuary 22, 1991, by
the then minister Mr. Len Derkach. Do
youknow what? He says the same thing,
but there is one otherthing. There is
one thing in this speech made by the formerminister that is not contained in
the present speech by theminister. In
the former minister's speech it says, and I quote:Through a co‑operative
effort all of us will be benefactors twoyears down the road.
(Mr. Bob Rose, Acting Speaker, in the Chair)
Well, two years has come. It is two years since the ministerLen Derkach
delivered his fiat to school boards and people in theeducation community, and
in fact the co‑operative effortexhibited has not occurred two years down
the road. I will senda copy of it. I am sure that the former minister has
it.Perhaps the present minister can use it again in reference,because it is
almost word for word everything she said to ustoday, the same dry rhetoric, the
same reliance on failedConservative fiscal policies.
Mr. Acting Speaker, what is wrong
with the education systemtoday is not something that can be cleared up by the
presentminister. It is far too late in
this government's mandate. Theyhave had
six budgets. They are going into their
sixth budget,and I can tell you it is too late.
The ship of state is far outin the ocean and listing about. It is too late for this ministereven if she
had the capacity in cabinet to change it.
I believeshe is sincere. I
believe that this minister would like tochange the education system for the
better, but I do not believeshe has the clout or the direction in cabinet, Mr.
ActingSpeaker, and that is unfortunate.
We know that the real clout and
direction in cabinet isdetermined by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Manness)
whodetermines all in cabinet. We know
the Minister of Finance cameinto cabinet and dictated what would happen in the
educationfunding formula. So even if
this minister had a plan, I do notthink it could be implemented. Mr. Acting Speaker, it is far toolate in this
government's mandate to implement any kind ofmeaningful reform in the education
system.
The minister and the government, the
members opposite, are sofond of tests and examinations. Let us look at some of theinitiatives
initiated by this government in the last few years interms of education. Let us talk about the High School
Reviewinitiated. It is still in
chaos. It is still
administrativelychaotic out there.
School divisions do not know, and even theperson brought in at the late
hour to try to implement has beenunable to do it, so the government gets an F
on that, Mr. ActingSpeaker.
Let us talk about legislation, Mr.
Acting Speaker. Thisgovernment has
promised a reform to The Public Schools Act sincethey came to office. Where is it?
The minister had her ownreport. I
memorized the dates. April 29, 1992, was
when thereport was to be given from her advisory committee to theminister. Where is that report? We are almost a year latersince the time the
minister had the report and still we seenothing, still we hear we are going to
have more publichearings. We are perhaps
going to have a white paper. We arestill
into the sixth year now of this government's regime andstill no legislation
reform. I dare say, I suspect that it
willbe a promise in the next provincial campaign that they are goingto somehow
reform the education act.
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The funding formula was a sore point
with members of thisside of the House for some time. We predicted when the ministerbrought it in‑‑and,
by the way, Mr. Acting Speaker, I might addthe minister still to this day has
not released the backgroundpapers and documentation and the report which
initially promptedthis funding formula.
It still has not been released publicly,and we predicted there would be
real difficulties with thefunding formula, and do you know what, the former
minister cameon and attacked us, et cetera, which is the usual response. Youknow what, they have revised it at least
three times.
They have committees all across the
province trying to comeup with rejigging the funding formula because it is a
disaster.On top of that disaster, on top of that creaky structure, theyhave now
brought in a clawback‑‑clawback is not the appropriateword‑‑they
have brought in a 2 percent cut on an alreadyinequitable and unfair formula.
What members never fail to mention
on that side, Mr. ActingSpeaker, and it is a concern of mine, is equity. They do nottalk about fairness. They do not talk about access to programs.They
do not talk about children having access no matter where youlive in this province
with some flexibility. They do not
talkabout that. They talk about fiscal
management, and there is noconcern given to the equitable and the nature in
which theallocations are redistributed around the province.
Mr. Acting Speaker, comments from
members opposite are sorife with errors that I could probably talk for the rest
of theday in this Chamber about errors that I have heard in theircomments, but
time does not permit.
I want to talk about something that
has been a sore pointwith members on this side of the House for some time, Mr.
ActingSpeaker. Members opposite, part of
their new rhetorical responseto anything we say now is, you offer
alternatives. For two yearsI have been
speaking in this Chamber about better co‑ordinationof services between
government departments and the approach theytake. For a year and a half, the Minister of
Education and theMinister of Health (Mr. Orchard) have had on their desks
reportsfrom MASBO, MAST, Manitoba Association of School Trustees, andManitoba
Teachers' Society, a report calling for the betterco‑ordination of
services in education to children. Has
thereeven been a letter of response from this government? Has therebeen an action plan? Has there been any response from
thisgovernment?
If there is one area that would
perhaps help, that wouldperhaps deal with some of the concerns and problems in
education,there would be a better co‑ordinated approach to it, but we
haveheard nary a word. There is not even
a plan for members on theopposite side of the House, and every time we raise
concerns onthis side of the House, we get rhetorical verbiage from
membersopposite, and then we get the constant claim that we never offerany
alternatives, which again is part of their rhetoricalresponse.
(Mr. Marcel Laurendeau, Acting Speaker, in the
Chair)
Mr. Acting Speaker, they have not
done it, and you know, wewould welcome some initiatives from this government,
but I daresay that it is too late in the mandate, it is too late in thegame for
that bunch. Although I would welcome a
paper, I wouldwelcome something from members opposite talking about aco‑ordinated
approach and an action plan to deal with, but youknow what, it is lacking.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we held a press
conference in the fall totalk about this, something the government hated to
talk about,and that was the GFT, the Gary Filmon tax, pardon me,
thegovernment's offload of taxes onto the municipalities. It isfunny to hear the minister talk about
governments promising to goto 80 percent.
I believe that one member for Tuxedo in 1988promised to take provincial
funding to 80 percent. I alsoremember
that very same member‑‑we have tabled itbefore‑‑promising
that education grants would be at inflation orbetter under his government,
inflation or better under hisgovernment, another promise broken, another broken
promise bymembers opposite, another broken promise, and it continues.
The Minister of Education (Mrs.
Vodrey) I think is treadingon very dangerous ground, Mr. Acting Speaker, when
she criticizesmembers, when she criticizes us in terms of their funding of
theeducation system. They have offloaded
from provincial revenues,and one of the reasons they have done it is because of
thecorporate tax breaks that they have given to their friends whichhave not
been recovered, which we have not seen in terms ofincreases to the revenue
base. As a result, we have lost
revenueand we are faced with the difficult fiscal situation that we arein. Thank you.
Hon. James Downey (Minister of Northern
Affairs): Thank you, Mr. Acting Speaker and members of
the Legislature.
I am pleased to rise to debate the
issue which the LiberalParty presented to the House today. The government would morethan welcome the
opportunity to lay before this House and thepeople of
I want to open my comments, Mr.
Acting Speaker, to say that Ibelieve very strongly this Minister of Education
has put beforethis government, has put before the people of Manitoba and
thisLegislature, a program of funding that does in fact maintain theintegrity
of the system and in fact maintains the futureopportunities for our children in
the education system; but Iwill try to deal with the issues that I feel the oppositionmembers
are trying to deal with and point it out as I see it.
One has to fully appreciate that
over some 15 years ago now,in fact it was 1981 when the Lyon government was
defeated, thatit was presented to the people of
Today, Mr. Acting Speaker, what are
we hearing that is comingfrom not only just this government, but we are hearing
it fromall political stripes throughout
They have one luxury that we do not
have. I should not callit a luxury. They have one capability that we do not
have. Theyhave the capability of putting
greater taxes on the people of theUnited States which we do not have in this
province or in thiscountry. We have
already taxed the people of this country,
I think the other media comment that
was a front pageheadline today, when you see in fact that what our policies
aredoing for the average worker in this province are working, so Ithink there
is generally an acceptance of the problem by ourgovernment and by the
responsible leaders throughout the entireworld.
For some reason there is a group in this Assembly, Mr.Acting Speaker,
that have not come to that realization.
It isold‑think for political opportunism. Quite frankly, it is notselling out there.
* (1700)
I will deal now with the specific
issue of education andeducation funding.
Mr. Acting Speaker, we saw the employees ofgovernment and everyone in
this House last year under Bill 70take less.
We have seen the private sector out there, because ofthe restructuring
that is going on, take less. I do not
say thiswith any malice. I do not say
this with any disrespect, butquite frankly, up until this point we have not
seen the educationsystem deal with the difficulties as other people have had
todeal with until we point out that 80 percent of the costs ofeducation fall
within the whole area of salaries and you have toput a mechanism in place for
the decision makers to deal withthat component.
If you do not, then you in fact continue to seethe snowballing effect.
We have put, not by force, not by
edict, but we have put inplace a guideline, a system of policies that we
believe areacceptable by the public. In
fact, the communications that I amgetting, that they are very acceptable and we
believe that theycan be carried out without causing a loss to the students of
thisprovince.
There seems to be a philosophy from
the members opposite ineducation, in health care, in family services, in any
problemthat arises, that the solution is you throw more money at it.That is not
correct, because as I said, 80 percent of theeducation funding goes to
salaries, so if you increase educationfunding to those people who are working
in the system, it doesnot necessarily give you a better education. That is somethingthat just does not happen
automatically.
I do not begrudge people more money,
Mr. Acting Speaker, butwhen everybody else is having to size down and hold the
line, Iwould expect it should happen in education as well as it shouldhappen in
all segments of our society. The issue
is one ofapplication of fairness. I,
last year, met with some of theschool boards and school divisions and you know
what wasupsetting to some of the people who were on those boards? Someof those people were civil servants and
they said we are notunhappy to take a freeze in our wages, but we think it is
unfairthat the educators in our society do not have to deal with thesame
subject matter. That is where the
question becomes a matterof fairness.
The issue is if you are going to deal with aproblem, you have to deal with
the size and the magnitude of theproblem where you spend the most money.
Mr. Acting Speaker, I do not want
to, as I said, try tobelittle or say anything that would cause anybody any
hardship,but again when you are in the kind of times that we are in, weall have
to share to try and resolve the problem jointly. I findthis interesting, the only criticism
that came from the LiberalParty, the proposed leadership candidate, is he only
has oneconcern with our education policies.
Here we have the LiberalParty today who sponsored this emergency debate
and here is thenext Liberal leader to be, or would like to be, saying
hisproblem is that we have not realigned the boundaries. Nothing todo with the quality of education, nothing
to do with the fundingfor the system, but his problem is, we have not realigned
theboundaries.
An Honourable Member: Two school divisions in
Mr. Downey:
Two school divisions in
Well, at least he is on the record
of coming clean, but I donot think, Mr. Acting Speaker, he has really got to
the bottom ofthe problem. I think he is
trying to skip over this and not makeany commitment to do anything in a
meaningful way that might gethim into problems with the greater Liberal caucus
that is outthere that may support him.
So I guess I am quite pleased that
in general then hesupports our minister, he supports our education policies,
butwhat he does not support‑‑it is on the record‑‑that
we have notmoved on the boundary issue in Winnipeg. Well, not bad. I thinkwe can withstand that criticism, and
we have justified why wehave not moved on it, so I thank him for coming open
and clean inhis support.
There has been mention of a school
division of which Irepresent. That is
Yes, the New Democratic Party had a
representative there.Again, they seem to show up when they think they can make
somepolitical hay, but I never saw them in the constituency all thetime he was
the Minister of Education, or I never saw himcommunicating directly. In fact, that was the forgottenhinterland as far
as the New Democrats were concerned when theywere in government, but all at
once there is a newfound need toget into some of these constituencies that they
do not hold. Iwonder why. Is it because they are really sincere about
theproblem, or are they still trying to harvest political support inareas that
they now do not have? Well, be it as it
is, he wasthere. One of the things‑‑gosh,
I have got a flashing light herealready, Mr. Acting Speaker, time goes by
quickly when you are having fun, does it not?
Let me just conclude by saying, at
that time I said to thelocal community that we would do what we could on
sparsepopulation, and there have been some improvements made for
thatconstituency and for that school division.
I said that therewould have to be some increase in the local funding
because infact the special levy was considerably lower than the
provincialpercentage. I said, the most
important thing is we have toconsider some of the reduced funding, or some look
at how we arespending the money, because there have to be ways in which we
cansave some of the taxpayers' money as it relates to thatconstituency.
I do not support anything that is
unfair to
I believe, in my conclusion, Mr.
Acting Speaker, that we havedone the responsible thing. We are reforming the system. We areprotecting the students, and we are, in
fact, dealing fairly withthose school divisions in
Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson): Mr. Acting Speaker, like somany people have
said, we have such a short time today to debateeducation and the crisis in
education, it is tough to know whereto start.
This government's attack on public
education in this provinceis inexcusable, and we should be very clear that that
crisis iscreated by this government's foolhardy and shortsighted
economicpolicy. It is very clear what is
happening, and the Minister forAgriculture (Mr. Findlay) will pay close
attention because he wasat the same meeting I was this morning, finally, over
at theTranscona‑Springfield School Division.
An Honourable Member: His colleague was not there, though.
Ms. Cerilli:
No, his colleague was not there, and I know thatshe was not at other
meetings that the board of
What they are doing to public
education in this province isinexcusable, and it is interesting to hear the
Minister forNorthern Affairs (Mr. Downey) go on about how we have to cut
fromeverywhere, we have to be fair.
There is this attitude thatsomehow they really think that the world is
fair and equal rightnow‑‑oh, the world is fair.
As the Minister of Agriculture (Mr.
Findlay) heard thismorning, you cannot have people who have no belt to
tightentighten their belt. What this
policy is doing is having thepoorest school divisions pay the most. I have the informationhere from Transcona
School Division, which is one of the mostefficient school divisions. They have the most costs fortransportation; they
have the least ability to raise funds fromthe local area from taxes, and they
are being taxed the mostunder this new system.
Then we will talk about the quality
of education. Qualityfor whom, I would
ask. Is this government going to
providequality of education for residents and people of Transcona, forthe
children of people in Transcona?
No. This program for taxreform
and education is on the backs of people in areas likenortheast
It is very clear to see what is
happening to qualityeducation. I would
ask the Minister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey)if she thinks that having 30 kids in
a classroom is qualityeducation and how many kids are in the classrooms where
herchildren are, in a private school.
She lives in Fort GarrySchool Division, where there was an administrator
wholives‑‑we'll say that in a classroom in Grade 6 in Fort
GarrySchool Division, you could go into a school and find that thereare 18
children in a class. You go into
Transcona‑Springfield,there will be 26 students in a class in Grade
6. In Grade 9there will be 30 or more
children in a class inTranscona‑Springfield, and if you go to
* (1710)
Now, to me, you do not have to be
very clever to realize thatis not fair or just no matter how you define
it. This governmentseems to think that the
world is fair and that the world is equaland that equality is simply doling out
money the same toeverybody. They have
changed the policy of equalizationpayments.
Equalization means that when a child who comes from apoor family in a
poor region of the city you should have asubsidy going to that area so that
they can have some equality ofaccess and opportunity. Access is the key when you are talkingabout
these kinds of issues in education.
Access to education issupposed to be in a democracy the great equalizer,
and that isnot happening in this province at all anymore.
I get a little excited about
this. Yes, my training is as
ateacher. I am supposed to be a health
educator. That is mybackground, and I cannot
believe‑‑[interjection].
That is mytraining. That is
supposed to be what I am trained to do, butyou know what? I listen to the rhetoric coming from the
otherside of the House, and they talk about this back‑to‑basics
stuff.
Point of Order
Mr. Penner: I
am wondering whether the honourable member wouldclarify a statement that she
was trained as a teacher.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): The honourable member does not have a point
of order.
* * *
Ms. Cerilli:
Yes, Mr. Acting Speaker, my education is from theUniversity of
If we want to talk about education,
let us talk abouteducation that trains young people to know how to stand up
fortheir rights, because what is happening to young people right nowis they are
working over 70 or 90 hours a week and they aregetting no overtime. They are being ripped off left, right
andcentre, because young people are the most vulnerable to exploitin the labour
market.
There are young people who are not
even getting near tominimum wage. They
are too afraid to report it or even tellanybody, because they know that they
are going to get firedbecause they are expendable. There are a lot of young people outthere
looking for work. So it is very easy to
exploit youngpeople who do not know their rights. They do not know where
The issue of taking the clawback at
universities to me isabsolutely reprehensible.
It is the same kind of tactic thatthey will try to take with the public
schools when they go afterthe professional development days of the teachers,
when they goafter teachers' salaries.
Teachers have signed collectiveagreements. They have signed on to be paid at a certain
increasein salary that has tried to keep up with the cost of living.
Why is it that they are willing to
claw back salaries fromprofessionals in the public school system when they give
a 37percent increase to the Deputy Minister of Education? Why do youhave to pay these guys so
much? Why do you have to pay thepeople
of the Department of Education who advise this minister somuch‑‑$100,000
that person is getting? You could pay a
lot ofteachers with that $100,000. Yes,
I get a little excited and Iget a little mad, but I think that this is what it
is going totake to get through to this government to make them realize
thepeople of Manitoba have had enough.
I would hope that the Minister of
Agriculture (Mr. Findlay)paid attention this morning at that meeting to
understand thatjustice is not giving the same to everybody when everyone
doesnot start off equally. That is a
very basic concept that youngpeople learn in about Grade 5. They can understand it in Grade 5.
The other thing that I think is
really important is to lookat the excuse of the deficit. This government cannot understandthat
investing in the future means investing in the education ofyoung people. The member for Wolseley (Ms. Friesen) has
said it,the member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak) has said it. A number ofpeople have said it on this side
of the House, the member forFlin Flon (Mr. Storie), the former Minister of
Education. Wecannot expect that we are
going to have any kind of an economy ifyoung people are not trained to think,
trained to understand howto get information, how to work together.
When I was interrupted by the member
for Emerson (Mr. Penner)I was going to make the point that there is all this
talk nowabout back to basics. I would
like for the members opposite todefine basics for us, because basics today in
this high‑tech,competitive, as they would say, world are very different
from thebasics when they were in school.
The basics are no longer justlearning to read and write and do
arithmetic. Basics are abouthow to use
computers. That is a basic now. Basics are aboutlearning how to interact and
get along with people in a verystressful environment so we can do something
about the kind ofviolence and the kind of abuse that goes on in our
society.Those are the kinds of issues when I was a teacher and wasworking in
the public school system that I was dealing with. Iwas dealing with poverty. I was dealing with child abuse. I wasdealing with a number of kids who were
taking drugs and alcohol.That is what is going on in schools. I would implore the membersopposite to open
your eyes, talk to some real people living reallives and not your appointed
Tory friends who come to your focusgroups.
The other thing is this Tory rhetoric
about finding jobs.Young people have to go to school so that they can find
jobs.Well, Mr. Acting Speaker, I do not know if you have tried lookingfor work
lately, but there are no jobs. We help
them makeresumes. We give them little
courses, but they go out there andthey have three degrees, two degrees, high
school education, andthere are no jobs.
So I think we have to start teaching youngpeople how to create
jobs. We have to teach them how to
worktogether, how to be entrepreneurs, how to‑‑[interjection]
Yes,entrepreneurship. I believe in it
very strongly. My familycomes from a
long line of entrepreneurs.
Just to sum up then, this education
policy is not onlyincredibly unfair, especially to areas like Springfield
andTranscona, which, as the member for Springfield (Mr. Findlay)should know, is
one‑third of a rural school division and it isnot getting recognized in
this policy as a rural schooldivision.
The Brandon School Division has more urban centreresidents in it, and it
is being recognized as a rural schooldivision and Transcona‑Springfield
is not. That is completelyunfair. It is completely unjust, and if this
government does notchange and make the necessary changes in this policy, they
are infor a big surprise. Thank you.
Hon. Leonard Derkach (Minister of Rural
Development): Mr. Acting Speaker, I guess I am somewhat
pleased to enter into this debatebecause of what I have heard from the opposite
side of theHouse. Some of the concerns that
have been raised abouteducation funding have, indeed, sort of repeated old
ground thatwe have heard time and time again from the members opposite. Itis not a new debate when you listen to the
rhetoric that comesfrom the other side.
Most discouraging were the comments
that we just heard fromthe member for Radisson, because obviously by her
comments it isvery clear that she perfectly misunderstands what is out there
inthe real world with regard to funding of education in thisprovince,
especially when she talks about the fact thatTranscona‑Springfield School
Division is the poorest schooldivision in the province. She needs to travel a bit. She needsto broaden her horizons, and then
she may have a betterunderstanding of where we are at‑‑
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please.
Point of Order
Ms. Cerilli: Mr. Acting Speaker, on a point of order. I willinform the members opposite that I was
in
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please.
Thehonourable member does not have a point of order.
* * *
Mr. Derkach:
Mr. Acting Speaker, I congratulate the member forRadisson for
discovering part of rural
We should take the debate this
afternoon quite seriously,because indeed it is an important debate and one
which focuses onprobably the most important facet of our society and that is
theeducation of our children. Mr. Acting
Speaker, many members inthis House have a deep concern about what is happening
ineducation, and this is the correct forum to be debating theseissues.
* (1720)
We have heard a call from the NDP
across the way to throwmore money into the education system. That is their onlysolution to the problem
that faces us. I heard some commentsfrom
the members from the Liberal Party this afternoon, and Ihave to say that some
of the comments that I heard from theLeader of the Liberal Party were indeed on
track, especially whenshe said that it is not just money that is required in
order toreform our education system; as a matter of fact, we have to
finddifferent ways of doing things to reform the education system inour
province.
Mr. Acting Speaker, that is so
true. That is the way toreform the
education system, that is, to look at what theproblems in the education system
are and then address thoseproblems. We
have heard the public cry out about the need toprovide some standards in our
education system, to provide someability for students to meet a standard so
that they can be moresuccessful when they leave our education system, whether
it is atthe elementary level, the intermediate level, the secondary levelor the
post-secondary level.
Something that the member for
Mr. Acting Speaker, that provided
the opportunity for ruralstudents to at least access the first year of
university in theirhome communities, where they did not have to expend dollars
forroom and board and for travel in a community that was a distanceto
them. It would have been ideal to be
able to provide that ineach and every one of our remote communities, but that
to thispoint in time has not been possible.
Indeed, there arecommunities in rural communities that have seen the
success ofthis project and have indeed requested that their communities
beincorporated into this method of delivery of education to ourstudents in this
province.
Mr. Acting Speaker, when we talk
about education reform, weneed to focus on what the challenges before the
education systemare today. I have to
congratulate the Minister of Education andTraining (Mrs. Vodrey) for her vision
in terms of addressing thereal problems that are before us in education and
talking aboutreform in terms of what our education system needs to be
reformedto and how we need to address the challenges that are out therebefore
us. It is not one person who can do
it. It is not justthis Chamber, this
group of ministers who can do it. It has
tobe with the participation and involvement of the entire educationcommunity,
the parents of the children of this province andindeed all of the people who
are inhabitants of this province whohave something to say about our education
system.
We have been criticized for
underfunding education in thisprovince, yet when you compare the record of this
government interms of the funding that has been allocated to education withthe
record of the former administration, we stand head andshoulders above the way they
supported education. Mr. ActingSpeaker,
we do not have to take any lessons from them, becauseindeed when the inflation
rate was running‑‑and I will give yousome examples. When the average CPI in
Mr. Acting Speaker, those are the
kinds of examples that wecan turn to when we hear the criticism from the NDP
about thefact that we underfund education.
Their only solution is that wethrow more money at the education system.
I listened on my way into
I have to say that at least we have
heard some ideas comingfrom the Liberal caucus.
One was to redo the boundaries.
Well,yes indeed that may be a part of the solution, but should we havetwo
divisions in this city? That is going
pretty far out on alimb as far as I am concerned at this point in time,
especiallywhen you really have not consulted with the people in this city.At
least he does have an idea and he has put it forward. I haveto congratulate him for at least that,
because we have not heardanything of that nature from the members opposite in
the NDPparty.
The member for Kildonan (Mr.
Chomiak), who was the formercritic for Education, talks a lot about the
problems he sees ineducation. Even after
he has spent several years as the criticof Education and now has moved to a
different critic portfolio,he does not have any vision of where this province
should begoing in education, does not offer it, does not provide
thealternative. The only alternative
they have is to dump moremoney into the education system.
Mr. Acting Speaker, there are some
fiscal realities beforeus, some that we cannot hide from and we have to face
them headon. Our intent is not to
jeopardize the quality of education inthis province. Rather, it is to seek different solutions to
thechallenges that are before us and to address them in such a waythat the
quality of education for the children in our schoolsystem, whether it is in the
elementary, the secondary or thepost‑secondary system, is going to be
maintained and enhanced.
Indeed, the Minister of Education
and Training (Mrs. Vodrey)for this province is working very diligently with her
staff toensure that the children of this province are going to have
anopportunity that is equal to or better than you can find anywhereelse in this
country. That is her goal. That is the goal ofthis government, and we
are proceeding on that agenda.
I am very pleased to have entered
into this discussion thisafternoon and to add my comments to the comments of
those whohave already stood in this debate.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Daryl Reid (Transcona): It is my pleasure to rise to takepart in this
debate here today on something that is very, veryimportant to all of us, and
that is education in the province ofManitoba.
I must admit though that my experiences dealing witheducation in other
parts of the
I listened with interest to the
comments that were made bythe honourable member for Arthur‑Virden (Mr.
Downey) when he wasadding his comments to the debate here today. I am familiar withthe problems that he has
encountered in his own school division,the Antler River School Division, where
the parents expressedtheir concern at a public meeting not long ago for which
theMinister of Northern Affairs (Mr. Downey) was a little bit takenaback by the
attitude and, I guess, the strong and forceful waythat the residents of his
constituency put forward their positionwith respect to education. Of course, he was at a loss to haveany
answers for his own constituents at that time.
I hope tothis point, Mr. Acting Speaker, that he has at least come
forwardwith some solutions to the problems for his constituents. Heindicated that the key principle that he
wants to see isfairness, fairness in the funding to all of the school
divisionswithin the province.
A lot of my comments here today will
revolve around the issueof fairness, because my colleague the MLA for Radisson
(Ms.Cerilli), the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Findlay), myself, andthe M.P.
for Winnipeg‑Transcona had the opportunity today to meetwith the school
division trustees for the Transcona‑SpringfieldSchool Division No.
12. In that meeting that we had earlier
thispast week, on Tuesday to be precise last week, we met with thetrustees at
that time as well, and one of the key features thatstood out at those meetings
was the issue of unfairness in thefunding formula that is currently being used
by this governmentwith respect to funding education in the province of
Manitoba.That was the key single feature, Mr. Acting Speaker, that stoodout in
the process.
* (1730)
While politics usually does not enter
the discussion on theschool trustee level, one would think that there would be
membersof all political stripe being represented on that school board,and yet
it seemed almost‑‑in fact, it was unanimous‑‑all of
thetrustees of the Transcona‑Springfield School Division No. 12
wereunanimous in their position and their statement that the fundingformula
currently used is unfair.
The Minister of Agriculture (Mr.
Findlay) can sit there inhis seat, and I hope that he has listened to those
trustees todayand he has taken back their comments and put them to the
Ministerof Education (Mrs. Vodrey) and explained the position because heis
supposed to represent the community of Springfield, which isrepresented in part
by those trustees.
The comments that were made by the
Minister of NorthernAffairs (Mr. Downey), the MLA for Arthur-Virden, indicated
thatthe Liberals wanted to go to one or two school divisions withinthe city of
The member for Arthur-Virden
indicated that he will notsupport anything that is unfair by way of funding
through theDepartment of Education to the school divisions in the provinceof
The Minister of Education (Mrs.
Vodrey) in her announcementon February 15 indicated that there was going to be
a 2 percentreduction in funding to education.
In my school division inTranscona they are at nearly a 3 percent
reduction in funding, soI do not know where the Minister of Education gets the
2 percentfigure from, but she is way off base.
My colleague the
For the Transcona‑Springfield
School Division, the nearly 3percent reduction will mean a loss of nearly a
million dollars ona $32 million budget in the coming school year, something
thatthey can ill afford to do. Last
budget they were forced to cutpositions and cut programs in the community
already. On top ofthat, the Minister of
Education has taken and capped theirabilities to adjust the local levy within
the community at a 2percent level.
Now what the trustees are saying,
and the Minister ofAgriculture (Mr. Findlay) heard it today, for the first time
in ahundred years, Mr. Acting Speaker, the school divisions areasked‑‑
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please.
Point of Order
Mr. Downey: Mr. Acting Speaker, on a point of order, I was
notsure if I heard correctly. I do not
want to impute motives oranything like that, but I think I heard the individual
fromBroadway, who is a university professor when he is not in theHouse, suggest
that the alternative was for higher taxes for thetaxpayer‑‑
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Order, please. Thehonourable minister does not have a point
of order.[interjection] Order, please.
The honourable member forTranscona has the floor. I would appreciate hearing his speech.
* * *
Mr. Reid: Mr. Acting Speaker, just to correct and refute
whatthe member for Arthur‑Virden (Mr. Downey) has said, it has neverbeen
a position of this party on this side of the House, theofficial opposition, to
call for increased taxes, as the memberhas indicated that he has allegedly
heard in this House heretoday.
We know that the people in the
To continue with my remarks, Mr.
Acting Speaker, revenue fromthe province to the Transcona‑Springfield
School Division hasdecreased by 3 percent, and it means a loss of nearly a
milliondollars in the next upcoming budget year. On top of that, theyhave between a million
and a million and a half dollars ofuncontrollable expenditures that they are
faced with in theupcoming budget year.
So they have a significant increase inproblems for them, because they
have received a million dollarsless plus they have problems with
uncontrollables out of theircontrol, utility bills, salary adjustments, other
things that arebeyond their control.
This government has failed to recognizethat. On top of that, this government has asked
them to makemore cuts to the programs.
They have already lost 17 teachers inlast year's budget. They have had to cut programs. Ourenrollment is increasing. For a while it was decreasing, but nowit is
increasing again in the school division.Transcona‑Springfield School
Division has the lowest expenditureper pupil and the lowest assessment per
pupil in the city ofWinnipeg, in metro
We have, as part of our school
division‑‑one‑third of it ismade up of a rural
component. Yet the Minister of
Education(Mrs. Vodrey) refuses to accept that explanation when the
schooldivision trustees go forward and request assistance. She evengoes so far in a letter dated June
15, 1992, to tell the trustees that‑‑thanking them for the letter
that was sent when the schooldivision asked her to have a consideration for the
urban‑ruralsplit that we have there and to give some consideration by way
offunding. Instead she totally ignored
the question that was putto her and went on to say, we are thankful that you
accepted thenew funding model that was put in place. That was not even partof the letter that was
sent to them, Mr. Acting Speaker, so theMinister of Education refused to
address the question that wasput to her legitimately by the trustees
representing the childrenand the families of the community of Transcona‑Springfield.
I hope that the Minister of
Agriculture (Mr. Findlay)‑‑and Isee my light is flashing‑‑puts
those concerns to the Minister ofEducation to restore some fairness into the
education fundingmodel in the province of Manitoba, because for theTranscona‑Springfield
School Division No. 12 now that fairnessdoes not exist. I hope that the Minister of Education
willlisten to those comments and call a meeting with the trustees ofthat
division so that they can present face to face theirconcerns to her and that
she will address those concerns in anearnest way.
Mr. Bob Rose (
I would suspect, Mr. Acting Speaker,
if we were able to goback to the first Legislature of this province, into the
firstsession, if anyone had dared to estimate that by this time in1993 we would
be spending in Manitoba approximately $1 billion oneducation, I would suspect
that those people in the firstLegislature in the first session would have been
totallyastonished and unbelieving at that kind of a figure. That is not$1 million we are talking about,
not $10 million we are talkingabout, not $100 million we are talking about, but
$1000 millionthat we are spending in
* (1740)
It seems a little strange to me that
we should be sospiritedly debating the accusation that this government,
thegovernment of the day, the members on this side of the House, arenot
supporting education in
All of us realize very simply that
the total loss of theprimary, secondary and post‑secondary education
system in oursociety, if that were totally lost, within one generation
thesociety as we know it would come to a halt.
We would be backalmost to the caveman days, because education, as has
beenpointed out many times this afternoon in the debates, is ofprimary
importance in our society. In fact, it
is thecornerstone of our society. In
fact, it is the cornerstone onwhich we build.
At the same time, the automatic
spending in education doesnot mean that the quality of that education will
increase. Arewe suggesting that if we
spend $2 billion in education, it wouldbe twice as good? Are we suggesting, if we spent $500 million
ineducation, it would be half as good?
Certainly, the actualnumber of dollars that is spent on education is not
in itself ayardstick of the quality of education that is available.
It is certainly obvious to anyone who
has done any kind ofstudy of government spending at any level of government
thatdecisions are primarily made on the money that is available. Itseems that almost all, if not all, levels
of government tend tospend, or the spending expands, to fill the amount of
money thatis available.
The problem that we are encountering
now has come aboutbecause senior levels of government at the federal and
provinciallevel have had a habit of spending beyond what money
isavailable. This trend has been going
on in our country and ourprovince for almost a quarter of a century now, almost
25 years.I guess the time of reckoning has come, because the people onthis side
of the House at least recognize that you cannot foreverspend more than you take
in, that sooner or later there has to bea day of reckoning. Now it has taken us 25 years to reach
thatpoint of recognition, I suppose, and as previous speakers havesuggested
from the government side of the House, there stillappear to be some that have
not reached that point of recognitionas yet, but most of society has.
It is interesting to look across the
country to the variousprovincial governments who are made up of various
politicalparties of various political philosophies, and once they are inpower
they all have to deal with reality. They
have to deal withthe reality of 25 years of spending beyond what we are
earning,what we are taking in. It has
reached a point where we mustrecognize that and move to address that particular
problem.
The Minister of Finance (Mr.
Manness) coined a phrase thisafternoon, or at least quoted a phrase, fiscal
child abuse, whichraised some eyebrows across the way and some immediate
response.I do not think it was the minister's intent to cheapen the veryreal
concerns we all have with physical and mental child abusethat everyone in
society regardless of political belief aretrying to deal with. The fact remains that fiscal child abuse isan
expression that can very well apply to the kind of financingthat we have been
doing in our country for the last quarter of acentury, because it is not me
that will pay back this money thatwe are borrowing beyond what we are bringing
in. It is notnecessarily my children who
will pay that. It is the children inthe
education system who when they grow up must enter into theeconomy and who must
earn enough money to pay back the principalthat we are now borrowing to finance
our standard of living. Payback with
interest, by the way.
So fiscal child abuse, as we say, is
not an attempt tocheapen the term but is, in my mind, a very real description
ofwhat we continue to do with deficit financing.
If I have one criticism of our side
of the House, of thegovernment side of the House, in this whole question of
educationfinance, the current question of education finance, it is thetiming of
the announcement. By that I mean the
very difficultproblems that the school boards have in budgeting, the fact
thatthey have to have their budgets completed by the middle of March,and the
fact that they do not know what the level of provincialsupport will be until a
very short period of time before theyhave to make those decisions.
I think the overall message that we
are trying to get acrosshere is an excellent message. I think it is very timely, and Ithink perhaps
it is the kind of message that needs to beemphasized that it is not necessarily
just a one‑year thing, itis not necessarily a one‑time thing, it is
not necessarily aone‑time adjustment.
It is an attempt by everyone to face thereality of the fact that we have
been spending beyond our means,and that the problems facing our society in the
future are goingto be much greater if we do not face that fact right now
andattempt to deal with it.
I think I have to make the point,
Mr. Acting Speaker, beforemy time is up, that, as I have mentioned before, it
has taken us25 years to get into this particular problem, and it may verywell
take us 25 years to get out of it. The
move to get out willbe just as slow and gradual as the gradual buildup of
thedeficits and the debt that faces all levels of governments inthis country.
I think the point we really need to
emphasize is that it isnot a question of political philosophy, that it is not a
questionof political party, that it is a question of all our citizenscoming to
grips with the fact that we must learn to live withinour means.
I cannot believe that our education
system will not stillcontinue to produce fine graduates, very capable graduates
andgraduates who understand the reality of economics when we arespending $1
billion a year on education. Thank you.
Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis (
Never before, in the history of this
province, has oureducation system taken such a hit. The two percent and more cuts to base budgets
of school boards, directed, dictated by thisgovernment is unprecedented,
unparalleled and unquestionablyunacceptable.
This action is so shortsighted and
will cost so dearly downthe road that it raises for many the question of the
veryrationality and sensibility of this government, and many areasking as a
result of this drastic cut to our public educationsystem, has this government
entirely lost its senses?
* (1750)
Why is it forsaking one of its
foremost obligations, theprovision of a quality education to each and every
Manitoban?Why can it not see what damage it is doing to our public schoolswhich
are central, which are pivotal, which are fundamental tothe goal of providing
quality education to each and every one ofour citizens.
This government needs to be reminded
just why Manitobans needquality public school education. That need is based on theprinciple that the
social well‑being of our province‑widecommunity requires that every
student be educated appropriatelyin order to attain a fulfilling and productive
lifestyle. Aswell, it is based on the
principle that the economic prosperityof our province depends on the population
becoming more highlyeducated, more competent, more creative and that the
futureviability of the Manitoba economy will be determined in largepart by the
educational attainment of all of its citizens.
Mr. Acting Speaker, this essential
importance of publiceducation to the future social and economic well‑being
ofManitoba demands that this government show leadership, showforesight and
skill. It must have coherent plans and
financialcommitment to ensure the provision of quality education to allstudents
throughout the province and it must be able to addressthe obstacles to equal
educational opportunity.
It is being said, Mr. Acting
Speaker, by many that the publiceducation system is the last remaining
institution for creatingequality of opportunity and equality of condition, for
creating alevel playing field, for reducing systemic inequalities, forbeing an
equalizer in our society. Now this, too,
is being takenaway.
This Conservative government's education
policy, like itseconomic policy, is really based on the old philosophy,
thesurvival of the fittest. This
government's drastic educationcutbacks will hit the poorest neighbourhoods in
our communities,the most vulnerable members of our society, the poorest
amongus. It will mean larger classrooms,
higher student‑to‑teacherratios, fewer aides, less personalized
approaches, less time andenergy to identify problems like child abuse, less
time andability to recognize signs of suicide, less time and energy tocurb and
detect violence and detect learning disabilities andproblems facing the
students of today.
Mr. Acting Speaker, if the members
opposite do not hear ourwords today then maybe they will hear the words of a
teacherworking in an inner city school as quoted in the January 1991edition of
the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg newsletter. Iquote from an article written by Suzanne
Adkins, a teacher atDavid
What do my students expect of their
day at school?Certainly, I hope most of them share my hopes, but for others
thetime spent at school is time spent away from serious homeproblems. School can be a break from the bleak
environment ofpoverty. Breakfast in the
nutrition room fills an empty stomachand the clothing depots cover cold hands,
but these are justphysical needs and problems.
As an elementary school teacher, I
am part of an equationwhere compensation, motivation and co‑operation
equal education.It is a challenge to make learning relevant when the child
hashad very limited experiences of the kind that children of moreaffluent
families enjoy. Through in‑services
and research intonew programs and methods, teachers endeavour to better assess
andaddress their students' needs. Co‑operative
teaching withspecialists like resource teachers and teacher librarians
affordsnew insights into meeting students' needs, but this requires timeto
consult and plan together. A successful
learning environmentis nonthreatening where students are motivated to take
chanceswith reading and writing and where positive experiences andfeedback
encourage a child to try again and try harder.Individualized early intervention
programs for at‑risk childrenare designed to prevent students from
falling between thecracks. The article
goes on, Mr. Acting Speaker.
Clearly, the point has been made
very well by this teacher onthe front line in an inner‑city
neighbourhood. Without adequatefunding,
early intervention programs that are so vital to futuregenerations will be
lost. Cuts to quality education at a time
ofhigh unemployment economic insecurity are absolutely a recipe
fordisaster. Schools can and ought to
help counter the harshrealities of unemployment and economic uncertainty. They can tryto make up for what is wrong and
missing in their students'lives: parents
who are overwhelmed and cannot find jobs, parentswho move around in search of
affordable housing, parents who arenot together or not around because of
alienation and isolationand dependency.
Mr. Acting Speaker, without a doubt,
the cuts of thisgovernment will be disproportionately felt by the neediest in
oursociety. Many kids will move from
crowded classrooms to crowdedhomes and now may not even be able to find quiet
study time incommunity libraries because of actions being contemplated by thecity.
In conclusion, let me just ask the
question, can we affordthis government's cutbacks to education? Absolutely not. In thename of decency, human dignity, and
just plain old goodeconomics, we ask this government to change its mind,
rescind itseducation cuts, and put the key of knowledge back into the doorof
opportunity. Thank you.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laurendeau): Is it the will of the Houseto call it six
o'clock? No? OK?
Six o'clock. The hour being
6p.m., in accordance with the rules, I am leaving the Chair andwill return at 8
p.m.
ERRATUM
On Wednesday, December
16, 1992, Hansard No. 15, thefollowing comments should have been included in
the Hansard onpage 615 under the heading of Nonpolitical Statements immediatelyfollowing
Ms. Judy Wasylycia‑Leis:
Mr. Speaker:
Does the honourable member for The Maples haveleave to make a
nonpolitical statement? [agreed]
Mr. Gulzar Cheema (The Maples): Mr. Speaker, we would also liketo join with
the Premier (Mr. Filmon) and the members of thisHouse in wishing all Manitobans
the best of the holiday season.
As the Premier has said, we have
many cultures, many ethnicbackgrounds in this province, but the basic thing is
that everyculture has the basic ingredient of good morals, good ethics andgood
family values, and I think we can all celebrate, and we canall contribute.
Most importantly, I think we should
remember those peoplearound the world who are not that fortunate, who are
having arough time, either politically or otherwise, so we should wishthem all
the best and we hope that 1993 will be a better year forall of us in this
world. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker:
Does the honourable member for Radisson have leaveto make a nonpolitical
statement? [agreed]
Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson): Mr. Speaker, I want to make anonpolitical
statement today regarding the significant eventhappening in
I have had the chance to attend some
of the hearings, and Ido believe that this is a significant event, partially
because ofthe charges that were laid regarding the violations of the
humanrights legislation.
I want to talk a little bit about
the importance of thisevent. I want to
talk a little bit about the importance of allmembers of the House, of the
media, of all members of thecommunity recognizing the significance of this
human rightstribunal, because I truly believe that, as we learn better
andbetter to stand up for our own human rights, we are learning totake
responsibility for ourselves; and, as we learn to do thatindividually, we can
learn to do that as a society. As we
takeresponsibility for standing up for the human rights of others, weare
becoming indeed a more responsible society.
I would just urge all of us to take
very seriously and to payclose attention to the efforts of the tribunal
happening inWinnipeg. Thank you.