LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF
Thursday, May 27, 1993
The House met at 1:30 p.m.
PRAYERS
ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS
PRESENTING PETITIONS
Mr. George Hickes (Point Douglas):
Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Christine H. Massan,
Isabelle Thompson, Gwen Pompana and others requesting the Premier (Mr. Filmon)
to consider making, as a major priority, the establishment of a solvent abuse
treatment facility in northern
Mr. Steve Ashton (Thompson):
Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Stephen Walker, Victor
Walker, Eric Mason and others requesting the Premier (Mr. Filmon) to consider
making, as a major priority, the establishment of a solvent abuse treatment
facility in northern
Mr. Doug Martindale (Burrows):
Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Joseph Monias, Gabby
Flett, Annie Monias and others requesting the Premier (Mr. Filmon) to consider
making, as a major priority, the establishment of a solvent abuse treatment
facility in northern
* * *
Mrs. Sharon Carstairs (Leader of the Second Opposition):
Mr. Speaker, I beg to present the petition of Sheila Mullen, Dan Neal,
Garth Mihalick and others urging the government of
* * *
Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis (
TABLING OF REPORTS
Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister of Culture, Heritage and
Citizenship): Mr. Speaker, I would like to table the
Auditor's Report and Statement of Operations for the year ended March 31, 1992,
for the Office of the Queen's Printer.
INTRODUCTION OF BILLS
and Summary Convictions Amendment
Act
Hon. Jim Ernst (Minister of Urban Affairs):
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Minister of Government Services
(Mr. Ducharme), that Bill 38, The City of
Motion agreed to.
Bill 39‑The
Hon. Clayton Manness (Minister of Finance):
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Minister of Environment (Mr.
Cummings), that Bill 39, The Provincial Court Amendment Act (Loi modifiant la
Loi sur la Cour provinciale), be introduced and that the same be now received
and read a first time.
His Honour the Lieutenant‑Governor, having been
advised of the contents of this bill, recommends it to the House. I would like to table this message.
Mr. Speaker: It has been moved by
the honourable Minister of Finance, seconded by the honourable Minister of
Environment, that Bill 39, The Provincial Court Amendment Act; Loi modifiant la
Loi sur la Cour provinciale, be introduced and that the same be now received and
read a first time.
His Honour the Lieutenant‑Governor, having been
advised of the contents of this bill, recommends it to the House.
Agreed? Agreed and
so ordered.
The honourable minister did this on behalf of the
honourable Attorney General (Mr. McCrae).
* (1335)
Bill 40‑The Legal Aid Services
Society of
And Crown Attorneys Amendment Act
Hon. Clayton Manness (Minister of Finance):
Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Attorney General (Mr. McCrae), I move,
seconded by the Minister of Government Services (Mr. Ducharme), that Bill 40,
The Legal Aid Services Society of
His Honour the Lieutenant‑Governor, having been
advised of the contents of this bill, recommends it to the House. I would like to table the message.
Motion agreed to.
Bill 41‑The
Hon. Harry Enns (Minister of Natural Resources):
Mr. Speaker, I am instructed to do the following: Please read script and follow the next three
steps.
I move that Bill 41, The Provincial Parks and
Consequential Amendments Act (Loi concernant les parcs provinciaux et apportant
des modifications correlatives a d'autres lois), be introduced and that the
same be now received and read a first time, seconded by the honourable Minister
of Labour (Mr. Praznik).
I am instructed to remember to table the message by
saying, I would like to table the message.
So I table the message from His Honour.
He has been instructed about the bill.
Motion agreed to.
Introduction of Guests
Mr. Speaker: Prior to Oral
Questions, may I direct the attention of honourable members to the loge to my
right, where we have with us this afternoon Mr. Arnie Brown, the former member
for
On behalf of all honourable members, I would like to
welcome you here this afternoon.
Also with us this afternoon, we have from the
Also, from the
On behalf of all honourable members, I would like to
welcome you here this afternoon.
* (1340)
ORAL QUESTION PERIOD
Grain Shipments
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): My question is to the Premier.
Mr. Speaker, we have been raising the issue of the
During the Premier's Estimates, subsequent to the
announcement that was made in February of 1992 and after the
Today, we have learned that ships will be leaving for
There was a lot of optimism from the government ministers
opposite, optimism which we shared in February of this year.
Can the Premier tell us what is the status with the
shipment of wheat to
Hon. Gary Filmon (Premier):
Mr. Speaker, I would just prefer the member not take liberties with what
I said in Estimates. I did not say that
I had confidence that it would improve the situation for the
With respect to the
That is regrettable, Mr. Speaker. We certainly would have preferred that this
not be the case. I know we will be
trying to follow that up with the Wheat Board to see whether or not there is
any alternative to that schedule.
Grain Shipments
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): There are two parties to the negotiations and
different parts of the negotiations that are being concluded with the Soviet
Union‑‑or Russia, rather‑‑particulary in light of the
fact that, allegedly, they were over their, quote, credit line, to begin with.
We do not have any confidence on this side, watching what
has happened with Brian Mulroney and Baie‑Comeau getting priority
shipping year after shipping year. It
looks like Charlie Mayer has continued to acquiesce to the Prime Minister, in
our opinion, and has not stood up on behalf of the people of
I would like to know from the First Minister (Mr.
Filmon): What is the status of other potential shipments from the Canadian
Wheat Board through the
How many ships are going to go through the
Hon. Albert Driedger (Minister of Highways and
Transportation):
Mr. Speaker, we are facing the same problem that we have faced for the last
five years in terms of getting advance commitment from the Wheat Board. We have lobbied as extensively as we know
how. The Premier (Mr. Filmon) himself
has written to the federal minister imploring him to make use of the
We are still hopeful that we can come to some
understanding or agreement that grain is going to move through Churchill again
this year. I am still optimistic that
under the
At the present time, there is no commitment. We continue to push and lobby for grain to
move through the
* (1345)
Northern Studies Centre
Funding
Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a further
question to the Premier (Mr. Filmon) about Churchill.
Churchill has been working to try to get long‑term
shipping agreements from the Canadian Wheat Board, and, again, the mayor said
today that he feels very negative if this federal Conservative government is re‑elected
in terms of the future of the port.
We have asked questions about the
Lastly, Mr. Speaker, we have asked questions for a number
of years about the situation with the Northern Studies Centre or the Arctic
centre in Churchill. That centre has
been funded at about approximately $200,000.
It was reduced and then increased again, then it was reduced and then
increased again. Now we understand there
is no security of funds for that centre.
We understand, because of the tentative nature of the provincial
Conservative government's commitment to this
Can the Premier tell us‑‑this community just
cannot keep getting body blows from Conservative governments in
Hon. James Downey (Minister of Northern Affairs): Mr. Speaker, I think that we are quite
prepared at any time to put the record of this government up against the
inaction of the previous administration in the
We all appreciate the fact that it is the Canadian Wheat
Board, it has been stated many times, that offers grain for sale out of this
country, and it is the purchaser who determines where they will pick the
product up.
We, through the Minister of Highways and Transportation
(Mr. Driedger) and through the different departments, have continually
expressed interest in having purchasers take grain out of the
As it relates to the Northern Studies Centre, I believe
those questions would be appropriately asked in the Estimates of the Department
of Education where the traditional funding has been.
We have committed to the
PFRA Study Release
Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson):
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Environment.
Due to an amendment in The Environment Act, the minister
could request that other jurisdictions provide their studies and information
relevant to an environmental assessment in
Given that the PFRA is not registered to make a
presentation at the upcoming Clean Environment Commission hearings, will the
minister ensure that all of their studies are made public by the dates of the
hearings in
Hon. Glen Cummings (Minister of Environment):
Mr. Speaker, the Clean Environment Commission will certainly look at
what information is available as they go through their hearings, and if they
believe there is information that would be useful, that would be vital to any
decision‑making process, that they would want to have made available to
them, then we will see that request.
I am sure that any information that is needed, Mr.
Speaker, can be made available. It is
not a matter of the commission sorting through material and deciding whether or
not they want to hear it. They want to
hear all of the information.
Ms. Cerilli: Given that this
government has said these Clean Environment Commission hearings will be as
thorough as possible and the new amendment gives this minister the power to
request this information, I ask that the minister will make a commitment to
request that the PFRA studies will be made public, so we can have a complete
review, and all the information will be made available for the
Mr. Cummings: Mr. Speaker, the
answer I gave a moment ago is the correct answer.
If the commission sees that there are gaps or further
information they need to make a decision that is fully informed, then they will
request that information.
Mr. Speaker, I give you my commitment and I give the
commitment to the province that any information that is needed for a proper
decision will be made available.
* (1350)
City of
Concerns
Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson):
Given that the City of
Hon. Glen Cummings (Minister of Environment):
Well, Mr. Speaker, I am disappointed that there is a view that the
commission will not take a broad enough approach to this licensing process.
We have said consistently that the commission will not be
fettered in the concerns that can be brought before it and the information it
will be able to request.
When I look at the fact that it is considered that a
public campaign is being put in place, I have to ask the question, Mr. Speaker,
that the commission should be looking at the facts of the matter, and what we
need is to make sure that all of the facts are brought forward. They can then deal with the matter appropriately.
Grain Shipments
Mrs. Sharon Carstairs (Leader of the Second Opposition):
Mr. Speaker, on February 17 of this year, we learned with great fanfare
of a great sale of wheat to the Soviet Union, now
The Wheat Board denied it. The Wheat Board said there is no deal. Well, there is clearly a deal. A deal has been signed, and the Premier said
today he knew nothing more about the deal other than what the media knew.
Will the Minister of Transportation tell us if he has had
any information which would indicate that such a deal has been made, other than
media reports, and if he does not, why does he not have that information?
Hon. Albert Driedger (Minister of Highways and
Transportation):
Mr. Speaker, we go through this course again in terms of what is happening at
Churchill or not happening at Churchill.
It was our understanding at the time we met with the delegation from
It was not this government that made the announcement
that they would be prepared to take so and so much grain through the
We further felt this was a commitment on their
behalf. We are pursuing it right now to
find out what has happened, but my understanding is‑‑and one of the
frustrations between the Canadian Wheat Board and Export Klieb, which is the
counterpart from Russia‑‑we were under the impression that any
further grain, that a good portion of that would move through the
We are in the process of finding out exactly what went
wrong or what is going wrong because my understanding was that the Export Klieb
people by and large had given an indication that they were prepared to take the
grain through the
We are pursuing that.
I will make that information available as soon as we have further
information on this thing.
Mrs. Carstairs: But, quite frankly,
we cannot deal with just impressions.
Can the Minister of Highways table today correspondence
that he has had with the Minister responsible for the Wheat Board and the Wheat
Board itself indicating the arrangements that he believed were made in good
faith by the Russian delegation meeting with our government?
Mr. Driedger: Mr. Speaker, I do
not have that information here. I will get what information I have and bring it
forward to the member at a later time.
Grain Shipments
Mrs. Sharon Carstairs (Leader of the Second Opposition):
Can the Premier (Mr. Filmon) tell the House today if there was any
funding that was provided to the Russian delegation by the
Hon. James Downey (Minister of Northern Affairs): Yes, there is joint funding between the
* (1355)
Substance Abuse Treatment Centre
Mr. George Hickes (Point Douglas):
An important information meeting was held this morning with Chief Sydney
Garrioch of the Cross
Mr. Speaker, I will table a copy of the brief presented
at the meeting for the benefit of those members of the House who were not able
to attend.
Given the serious problem of solvent abuse in our
province, will the Minister of Health today make a firm commitment on record to
provide provincial funding out of the health reform initiatives fund for a
solvent abuse treatment facility in northern
Hon. Donald Orchard (Minister of Health):
As my honourable friend may well know from that presentation, MKO put
forward a proposal to the federal government through the Medical Services
Branch for a treatment centre to be located at
Mr. Speaker, I think it is most appropriate that MKO
continue their efforts to seek financial assistance from the federal government
to provide that treatment centre at
Mr. Hickes: Then can the Premier
(Mr. Filmon) tell us if he has raised this matter with the federal government,
and has he obtained a guarantee of funding this year for a solvent treatment
centre in northern
Mr. Orchard: Maybe my honourable
friend has this information and, should he not, I would be glad to provide him
with it.
Apparently after receiving the proposal from MKO for a $7‑million,
30‑bed treatment centre at
The Medical Services Branch is conducting a survey across
Mr. Hickes: Mr. Speaker, it was
made very clear this morning that there are enough studies and papers brought
forward, that it is time for action.
So I would like to ask the Premier (Mr. Filmon): Since his own 1992 Health Action Plan stated
that
Mr. Orchard: Mr. Speaker, my
honourable friend, in his preamble, is correct in that we are undertaking
initiatives in terms of substance abuse, but my honourable friend is not
correct in saying that this initiative has not been commenced, and I look
forward to the opportunity of explaining a number of initiatives through my
ministry and through government in terms of substance abuse, not the least of
which is the tabling of legislation we believe will work in terms of the issue
of sniff.
Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat troubled with my honourable
friend's direction of questioning in terms of automatically making the
assumption that the province ought to provide the entire funding package for a
treatment centre which is clearly a federal government responsibility.
Mr. Speaker, my honourable friends, when they were in government
and had the opportunity to act on this, did not, preferring to rely on federal
government leadership. Now from
opposition, they seem to be proposing a somewhat changed approach.
School Division Boundary Review
Terms of Reference
Mr. John Plohman (Dauphin):
Mr. Speaker, reports now indicate that the public school boundary review
is on once again after being shelved a year ago by the Premier (Mr. Filmon)
when he said in the House on March 18, and I quote: " . . . now is not the time to further
impose yet another potential major change on them."‑‑them
being school boards.
As with most actions of this minister, mass confusion
reigns in
So I ask the Minister of Education today: Will she clarify if she is truly proceeding
with a boundary review this time? Is it
tied to the establishment of the Francophone division, and will she table in
this House the objectives, information on who will be involved, what the
projected savings will be and the timetable for such a review?
* (1400)
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): Mr. Speaker, in answer to a question
yesterday, I did say in this House that I expected to make an announcement
regarding the issue of school boundary review shortly.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Speaker, I asked for the terms of
reference. Obviously, the minister does not know what she is doing again. She
cannot even confirm if it is on again, off again‑‑
Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Question, please.
Mr. Plohman: In regard to this
potential review, Mr. Speaker, can the minister assure the House here today
that the public will be involved from the very beginning, even before the terms
of reference are established, that it will be consulted and that there will be
no decisions imposed on the public by this minister, as the Premier seems to
indicate is the way‑‑
Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member has put his question.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, as I said
to the member earlier today, as I said yesterday, the issue of boundary review
was deferred in an announcement last year.
There were a number of issues which the school divisions and the public
were working very hard on at that time.
I said yesterday in the House and earlier today that I
planned to make an announcement about school boundary reviews shortly.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Speaker, I want
to ask the minister if she can tell us today‑‑not shortly, today‑‑whether
in fact she will be following the recommendations of her own reform report,
which she released after six months of sitting on it, which asks that
governance and greater equality of educational services be a major objective of
that report, especially in rural
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker, again, any information regarding
this government's plans and details, of course, would come forward at the time
of an announcement.
I would like to remind the member we did say last year
when we deferred the issue of school boundary review that there were a number
of issues which were ongoing, and those issues have now been brought to a
stage, I think, that has provided the public of
Last year, when the school boundary review was deferred,
we were in the first year of a new educational funding formula. We are now into the second year.
Last year, we had just completed the final hearings of
the review of legislative reform of The Public Schools Act. We did not have that report yet. That report we now have and that has been
released to Manitobans for comment.
Last year, at the time the boundary review was deferred,
we had not released any information on our plans for Francophone
governance. This year, we now do have
that legislation before the House.
Fourthly, Mr. Speaker, last year, we had only announced
the formation of the Task Force on Distance Education. That final report has now been released
before the public. We have four
initiatives which have now been completed and are before the public.
Special Operating Agencies
Fleet Vehicles Branch
Mr. Reg Alcock (Osborne): Mr. Speaker,
I have a question for the Minister responsible for Government Services.
Last year, the government began setting up under its
legislation for special operating agencies a series of quasi‑private
sector organizations that were delivering government services, one of them
being Fleet Vehicles. I, frankly, was
rather supportive of this move at the time they began.
I note, however, when one looks at the Orders‑in‑Council
that were passed at the time the agency was set up, Orders‑in‑Council
that have been amended just a couple of weeks ago, that the value of the assets
transferred had been reduced by some $2.284 million.
I would like to ask the Minister of Government Services
where that $2.2 million has gone.
Hon. Gerald Ducharme (Minister of Government Services):
Mr. Speaker, first of all, I will get into more of that when we go into
Estimates, but briefly what it is, is underestimating. The value of the vehicles that were going
into the new company were underestimated by that amount of money.
As you can probably appreciate, we had about 2,600 or
2,700 automobiles that went in, and it was overestimated, the ones going into that
company at the time it was started.
Mr. Alcock: Mr. Speaker,
however, at the same time that the organization was set up, it declared in the
publicity that was put out that it would be required to produce annual
operating plans. I also notice that they
have removed that requirement in this new O/C.
I am wondering if the minister can explain why they are
changing the way in which these organizations operate.
Mr. Ducharme: In no way are we
changing the operating of the SOA that was established.
The year‑end was just at the first of April, Mr.
Speaker. I will go through the plan with
the individual when we do get to Estimates.
As I explained earlier, there was a difference that was going in, as we
were establishing a new company at the time.
Mr. Alcock: Mr. Speaker, I have
been through the plan quite clearly, and the minister has taken a number of
steps this year to change the way in which this organization functions.
I an wondering if he will assure us it is not because the
organization is having trouble competing in the way he said it would.
Mr. Ducharme: Mr. Speaker, in no
way are we having any difficulty in the establishment of the plan. The employees who are involved have done an
excellent job. The only question he does
have‑‑and it is a logical question‑‑is the
overestimation of the vehicles going in.
At that particular time, they were estimated going into
the SOA at the time, and as a result of the 2,800 automobiles that were
involved, that can easily happen. It was
just a book type of entry that established that value at the time of the
establishment of the company.
Private Money Lenders
Regulations
Hon. Linda McIntosh (Minister of Consumer and Corporate
Affairs): Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Premier (Mr.
Filmon) took as notice for me a series of questions from the member for Elmwood
(Mr. Maloway) regarding loan brokers. I
am pleased to provide the answers to those questions today.
The member indicated yesterday, in fact stated
categorically, that the government had done nothing on this issue and asked
when we are going to do something and what it is going to be.
I think it is important to put on the record, Mr.
Speaker, that my department did begin to investigate this as soon as the
initial complaint came to us toward the end of April and that we have been
working with the City of
The investigation is still ongoing. I am able to provide certain pieces of
information today, however, that I was not able to report before. Unlike the member opposite, of course, my
department has to operate on the basis of evidence, proven evidence, and due
process must be abided by.
I can inform the member that under The Business Practices
Act which this government was pleased to bring in, my department, after
consulting with Crown counsel, obtained from the court and carried out an order
to freeze the firm's bank account.
They also obtained and carried out a search warrant. They also received an order granting an
injunction which prohibited any representation being made to the effect that a
loan had been obtained and from accepting any fee pursuant to that without
prior written confirmation of such approval being first received by the lender
involved. That was the first point that
was raised by the member.
Secondly, he asked a number of questions again on loan
brokers. I wish to emphasize first of
all, Mr. Speaker, that it is important for the member opposite to understand
that orders such as these can only be obtained after one is able to detail
their sufficient cause and sufficient evidence for a judge to grant that these
orders be allowed.
The second question the member asked, which I will
provide the answer for‑‑he asked three questions, Mr. Speaker. That was the first one.
The member opposite asked why we had not acted on a
supposed 160 complaints received by the Better Business Bureau. I should first indicate that the Better
Business Bureau is not a branch of my department. It is a private, nongovernmental agency of
business people, members of the business community. They do not report to government.
Secondly, I should indicate‑‑and this is very
important because the member based the premise for the rest of his question on
the first statement, which was inaccurate‑‑the Better Business
Bureau did not receive 160 complaints.
They received 160 inquiries over a period of time about loan
brokers. The member may wish to consult
a dictionary‑‑
Mr. Speaker: Order, please.
* (1410)
Education System
Violence Reduction Strategy
Mr. Dave Chomiak (Kildonan):
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Education.
The government cannot duck its responsibility for the problems
in education, including those of violence in the classroom and providing safe
environments.
As MTS stated in its report today, quote: Adequate resources have to be provided and
that is the responsibility of the government.
The government does not get it, Mr. Speaker, despite
numerous reports. Will the government
now deal with the issue as raised in the MTS report today by specifically doing
three things: co‑ordinating services, providing resources to decrease
classroom size, and thirdly, providing proper clinician support?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): The issue of violence in the schools is one
that has been of great concern and has been discussed frequently and has also,
in support of reducing violence in the school, been supported by this
government in terms of financial support.
That financial support has been offered through our Student Support
Branch which has delivered a number of programs which will assist schools in managing
violence in the schools.
We have also spoken during the process of Estimates and
in this House before about the co‑ordination of services which is now
being considered by ministers within this government, and we have taken that
process very seriously, and I believe that we also have a record to stand by.
Mr. Chomiak: Mr. Speaker, how can
this minister say that they are taking it seriously when they fired 66 people
from the very division that created the document, Working with Violent and
Aggressive Students?
How can she make that claim and claim that there are
adequate resources at the school division level?
Mrs. Vodrey: That member seems to
continually misunderstand‑‑I give him the benefit of the doubt of
misunderstanding‑‑when he now knows that clinicians will be hired
by school divisions as their direct employers and that the funding for
clinicians is provided through the schools funding formula model and that the
support for clinicians was increased by this government under the new funding
formula model.
Mr. Chomiak: My final supplementary
is to the same minister. Will the government stop procrastinating, bring
together all the departments to deal with the issue and perhaps in her
education reform package that she talked about earlier, they can put something
in there about violence and providing a safe environment for children and
teachers?
Mrs. Vodrey: The issue of
violence in the schools and the issue of violent behaviour is one that has been
looked at. I did explain in the
Estimates process that there has been a committee which was directed to be set
up. Deputy ministers chaired it. It also
had a working group. The working group
has reported to the deputy ministers.
The ministers will now look at the information which has
been provided, and in terms of what will appear within legislation, there have
been recommendations which appear in that report regarding rights and
responsibilities of parents, students and teachers, and we will certainly have
a look seriously at the recommendations.
Children's Dental Health Program
Funding Reinstatement
Ms. Rosann Wowchuk (
People understand the value of this program. It is based on wellness, preventativeness,
and it is very cost efficient.
I want to ask the Minister of Health if he will now admit
that he has made a mistake by slashing this program. We would applaud the minister if he would now
admit this and reinstate the funding to a program that is very valuable to
rural and northern Manitobans.
Hon. Donald Orchard (Minister of Health):
Mr. Speaker, as tempted as I am to garner applause from the negative
democratic party, I cannot take up that offer, with all due regret.
However, I will indicate to my honourable friend that
since the meeting I had the opportunity to attend in Minnedosa some two to
three weeks ago, a number of initiatives have commenced with significant
leadership from some of the individuals involved in the delivery of the program
in the school system.
I am hoping that maybe these initiatives coming from the
individuals involved in the program might lead to a reasonable opportunity in
the community funded by the community.
Ms. Wowchuk: Mr. Speaker, will
the minister then consider other recommendations, and will he consider the
recommendation that came out of last night's meeting asking that the program be
maintained for this fiscal year and that a dental health assistant be hired to
review the program, and allow people to have input? Those people who deliver the program have not
had any input. There has been no
consultation.
Will he reinstate the funding‑‑
Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member has put her question.
Mr. Orchard: Mr. Speaker, I know
my honourable friend was unable to attend the meeting in Minnedosa, but when I was
at that meeting, I made it very clear to all those who were in attendance that
the financial decision of government in terms of being able to maintain the
treatment side of the program was not up for reconsideration, that I did not
have that kind of flexibility, as my honourable friend requests.
Subsequent to that, Sir, the suggestion was made by one
of the superintendents of a neighbouring school division as to whether
government might entertain options in which parents might be able to work
within the school division to maintain the program. It is those types of options that we are
willing to entertain further investigation of fact and possibility.
Fee for Service
Ms. Rosann Wowchuk (
Will the minister assure us that this program he is
considering now does not involve a fee for service and that it will be open to
all people?
Hon. Donald Orchard (Minister of Health):
Mr. Speaker, as I indicated to my honourable friend from Swan River, who
was not at the Minnedosa meeting‑‑but she might consult with the
member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak) who was, because one of the superintendents
made a suggestion exactly au contraire to what my honourable friend is
suggesting now, wherein a superintendent who I believe had a substantial
knowledge of how the program has worked made the exact opposite suggestion and
asked whether government would consider having school divisions, with cost
recovery from parents of children enrolled in the program, be able to explore
the option of continuing the program with cost recovery from parents with
children enrolled.
Mr. Speaker, that suggestion was not government's. That came from a superintendent who was part
of the meeting in Minnedosa.
School Division Boundary Review
Government Commitment
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (
Mr. Speaker, I would argue that it is a question of
political will. In fact, when we saw the
will of the government to change and restructure City Hall, they were quick to
be able to take action.
My question to the Minister of Education: Can she tell this House why that very same
political will is not there to restructure the number of school divisions in
the city of
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): Mr. Speaker, it is obvious the member has not
been very close to the issues of education and has not had the opportunity to
know very closely what the issues are that have been occupying a great deal of
time in terms of education, so let me review them for him again.
Last year at the time that we deferred the boundary
review, there was in its very first year of operation, a new ed funding
formula, and school divisions were in the first year of application. Secondly, the hearings had just been
completed for the legislative reform of The Public Schools Act. There had been no analysis of the
recommendations and there had been no report issued. Thirdly, we had not released our plan for
Francophone governance and, fourthly, the Task Force on Distance Education had
only just been set up and had not even begun its work yet.
Mr. Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, what is
clear is this government has no intention of fulfilling an election promise they
made to the
Mr. Speaker, I have been following the issue of education
very closely, and the quality of education has been deteriorating under this
minister.
Mr. Speaker, my question to the minister is: What is this minister doing specifically to
ensure that the quality of education is improving in this province, not
continuously going downhill and deteriorating under this particular minister's
administration?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Speaker,
obviously, I reject, as I am sure many Manitobans will, the comments of that
member, but I will say to him‑‑and he might be interested in
listening further in the Estimates of the Department of Education‑‑that
there are a number of initiatives which are underway. There have been a number of reforms which
have begun and have been completed within the past three years to look at
education and education reform. There
are a number which are also currently in progress.
I have said that I will make an announcement regarding
the boundary issue shortly.
Mr. Speaker: The time for Oral
Questions has expired.
NONPOLITICAL STATEMENT
Mr. Speaker: Does the honourable
member for the Interlake have leave to make a nonpolitical statement? [agreed]
Mr. Clif Evans (Interlake): Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure that I wish
to inform members of the House, in recognizing a student by the name of Donald
Hallett from the Peguis First Nations Reserve who is graduating from Grade 12
from the
Mr. Speaker, the school and his peers are honouring him
on June 3 with a special awards night, and I know that members of this House
join me in congratulating Donald on this very, very great accomplishment in
continuing his education.
Thank you.
* (1420)
ORDERS OF THE DAY
House Business
Hon. Clayton Manness (Government House Leader):
Mr. Speaker, I would like to announce, firstly, a Standing Committee on
Public Utilities and Natural Resources will meet on Tuesday, June 8, 1993, at
7:30 p.m. and Wednesday, June 9, 1993, at 7:30 p.m., if necessary, to consider
the 1991 and '92 Annual Reports of the Manitoba Telephone System.
Mr. Speaker: I would like to
thank the honourable government House leader for that information.
Mr. Manness: Mr. Speaker, I would
ask the members of the Legislature whether or not there is a willingness to
waive private members' hour.
Mr. Speaker: Is it the will of
the House to waive private members' hour?
No? Leave is denied.
Mr. Manness: Mr. Speaker, I move,
seconded by the Minister of Environment (Mr. Cummings), that Mr. Speaker do now
leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a committee to consider of
the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty.
Motion agreed to, and the House resolved itself into a committee to consider
of the Supply to be granted to Her Majesty with the honourable member for St.
Norbert (Mr. Laurendeau) in the Chair for the Department of Education and
Training; and the honourable member for
* (1430)
COMMITTEE OF SUPPLY
(Concurrent Sections)
EDUCATION AND TRAINING
Mr. Deputy Chairperson (Marcel Laurendeau):
Good afternoon. Will the Committee of Supply please come to order.
This afternoon, this section of the Committee of Supply,
meeting in Room 255, will resume consideration of the Estimates of Education
and Training. When the committee last
sat it had been considering item 1.(e)(1) on page 34 of the Estimates book.
Chairperson's Ruling
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Before we
move on, I was just going to bring down my ruling from last week.
During the evening sitting of Committee of Supply, meeting
in Room 255 on Tuesday, May 25, 1993, the honourable member for Dauphin (Mr.
Plohman) used the words "misleading to the public." I had ruled that
the words were unparliamentary and had asked him to withdraw.
The honourable member for Dauphin explained that he had
not used the words to indicate that the Minister of Education and Training
(Mrs. Vodrey) was deliberately misleading but that the global figures presented
were misleading to the public.
I subsequently took the matter under advisement. I reviewed Hansard from that evening and past
Speakers' Rulings to provide some guidance on the use of the word
"mislead." There have been
many instances where the word "mislead" in many different contexts
have been ruled both in and out of order.
On October 30, 1990, the Speaker ruled: "It is very plain that any words that
indicate that a Member knowingly or deliberately misled the House are
unparliamentary."
In my opinion, the phrase used by the honourable member for
Dauphin (Mr. Plohman), that is, "misleading to the public," was not a
direct charge that the minister had intentionally or knowingly set out to
mislead the public, and is not unparliamentary in the context in which it was
used on Tuesday evening.
I should have not asked the honourable member for Dauphin
to withdraw the phrase, and I apologize.
Having said that, I would like to remind the members of this committee
that, although some words may be unparliamentary one day and not the next,
dependent on the context and other factors, the word "mislead" and
other words meaning the same thing have caused intervention on the part of the
Chair, and I would caution all members to choose their words carefully.
* * *
Mr. John Plohman (Dauphin):
Does the minister have any items to table prior to our beginning today,
especially those dealing with the reserves, surpluses?
Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Training): Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I do have some items
for tabling this afternoon. The first one
was requested and is a list of the Department of Education and Training
Secondments for the 1992‑93 Fiscal Year.
Secondly, I have a Manitoba Education and Training
Classification Activity during the fiscal year '92‑93, where we were
requested to provide information regarding the number of classification
requests processed, upward classifications and so on. I would like to table that now.
Then, Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I would like to table
information regarding Declared Aboriginal Employees in the Department of
Education and Training as of the date May 28, 1993, and that information is
broken down by division and is also broken down by classification.
Then, I would like to table the information from Manitoba
Education and Training regarding the directors in the department. This information covers all the areas of
Manitoba Education and Training with a numerical summary of male, female,
disabled individuals, native individuals, visible minority individuals.
Finally, I would table for the member, as I said that I
would, the percentage of 1992‑93 Net Operating Expenditures by Division
in Descending Order of the percentage.
Mr. Plohman: I thank the minister
for that information. I wondered if she
was also going to provide the FRAME reports, or is that not ready at this time?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, it was our understanding that the FRAME reports and that
information was to be tabled and available under the line 16.5.
* (1440)
Mr. Plohman: If the minister can make
it available before that, it might assist the process somewhat. So if there is no reason why it should not be
tabled prior to that, then I would ask the minister to consider that. I am not going to push that point at this
time any further‑‑just to have it considered in terms of
facilitating the process.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I want to ask the minister before
we get into this section, it is kind of a preliminary question asked in the
House about the Northern Studies Centre.
Could the minister indicate what line of her department this would be
covered or if indeed, there is provision made for this Northern Studies Centre
in this department?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I can tell the member that the funding for this particular area is
found in the Department of Education and Training, as was spoken about in the
House today. The amount of money is
$100,000, and the budget line would be found in the post‑secondary part
of my department under the Advanced Education and Skills Training division.
Mr. Plohman: I thank the minister
for that clarification. That will be
helpful.
This particular area deals with the office of the
assistant deputy minister, and as I said earlier, the effect of schools funding
is an important objective, an expected result of the activities of this
particular office.
There was some discussion recently regarding, first of
all, the Francophone division that will be set up. I am wondering if the minister can indicate
for the record what the grant per student, per pupil, is across the province,
in other words, if money is being transferred‑‑and I asked the
minister questions under the policy area about the establishment of a
Francophone division. We had some
discussion earlier this week on that, but we did not clarify the figure of
dollars that would be associated with any transference. I would assume that this office would be
involved in determining what that would be in terms of the transference to the
Francophone division from existing divisions, along with the students when they
would move to that division.
Could the minister give us the precise figure on that?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, during our last discussion, I did explain to the member that the
Monnin Committee is now in the process of doing its work with the communities,
and, through that, there will be a registration process where parents then
determine the registration of their children.
We will need to have the results of the Monnin Committee,
which will then assist the new school board, when elected, in looking at the
registration, looking at the ages of young people registering within the
Francophone division. They will be able
to look at the issues relating to transportation within the Francophone division. Then, as a result of that, we would then be
able to come with the number for the average per student cost within that
division.
As I have said to the member before, there is still some
work that is being done. It is in
progress at the moment. When all of that
work is done, then we will be able to provide the information to the member.
Mr. Plohman: Maybe it is possible
that the minister did not understand my question. I think we could have some information that
is available now as opposed to waiting till the Monnin Committee has finished
its work.
We are not asking at this particular time for the total
dollars, even the total number of students that would be registering with the
new school division. I assume that the minister
is saying that there will be some indication of that from the Monnin Committee
when they make their report, some indication of intention by students or by
parents, but that is not what we were asking right at this particular moment.
What I wanted to know is the average cost or average
grant per student rather than if it varies per division, which I assume it
might‑‑the average amount of the grant, of the per‑pupil
grant for students in
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the information that the member asks would best be discussed under
16.5 at that particular appropriation, but we could perhaps, given a little bit
of time, provide the member with an estimated number this afternoon.
Mr. Plohman: Yes, we had
calculated a figure dividing the total amount of dollars provided to the public
school system by the number of students and came up with a figure. I believe that to be an accurate figure. However, we would not want to use inaccurate
information, so if the minister can indicate what a good ballpark figure would
be, without anyone attempting to hold the minister to within $100 or $200 or
$300 per student.
Mrs. Vodrey: I can provide the
member with a figure of approximately $4,000, but I would do so with the
caution that that information is not being verified by calculation and that is
only an estimated number. I would not
expect that the member would want to use that very specifically in further
discussions.
Mr. Plohman: Well, that is the
figure that I have been using, Mr. Deputy Chairperson, as a result of the
simple calculation that we did. However,
I wanted to determine whether the minister's figures were in that same
ballpark, or whether there was a great variation. For example, would that average be, if it
was, say, a ballpark average figure‑‑would it be reflective of the
majority of the students who would be transferred over to the Francophone
division, knowing that the majority of those students are located in the school
divisions of St. Vital and St. Boniface and perhaps Seine River?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I will tell the member, as I have said from the beginning, I am
not able to tell him that number at the moment.
I am not able to see into the future, and I am not able to provide him
with that information.
I have explained what is already in progress in terms of
the setting up of the Francophone division, and when that work has been done by
the Monnin Committee and then the details looked at by the school board, which
we expect to be elected this fall coming up, fall of '93, then we will have
more information for him.
* (1450)
Mr. Plohman: I appreciate the
minister not having all of the definitive information, but she is certainly in
a position to determine whether that figure is an average figure, is reflective
of where the majority of students would come from, because she and her
department would know this.
I note that the assistant deputy minister's office is
concerned about real and perceived equities, and so, therefore, would be fully
aware of grants coming from the province by division. You cannot deal with the issue of equity and
inequities if you do not have that knowledge and that information.
So the minister is in a position, through this particular
office, to supply this committee with information as to per pupil grants that
would be provided to, say, the St. Boniface School Division, if I use that as
an example. If the $4,000 figure is
reflective, then I will accept that. If
it is not and if it is, say, $5,000, then I think that is significant.
So I am asking the minister if in fact the divisions
where most of the students are projected to be transferred from would be
reflected by the $4,000 figure, or is it more likely that figure should be
higher than that?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
again I can say to the member, as I have said, that I will not speculate. I cannot speculate. We do deal with grants, but those grants are
established again when we have a set of pupils, when we have more details on
transportation.
However, he has asked for information regarding the per
pupil cost for some school divisions by way of example, and I can tell him it
is $3,700 for St. Boniface and $4,300 for White Horse Plain. Those differences are a reflection of a
number of issues including the tax base.
Mr. Plohman: Would the minister
know the variance in the per‑pupil dollars raised by local taxation for
those divisions, or for all divisions in the province? Would it vary from as low as $1,000 to as
high as $2,000 additionally per pupil?
Because I note in the Francophone policy paper that the minister has
issued, there has been an indication that these dollars would also be
transferred, that dollars raised locally for each of these students would be
transferred.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
the member is getting into some details which we would cover in 16.5 when we
have the appropriate staff here, with the appropriate information available at
that time. At this point, it would
really just be speculation. It would
simply be an effort to deal with figures which may not be accurate. So I would ask the member that we look at
this in 16.5 when we have the appropriate information to discuss it.
Mr. Plohman: I do not want to push
the minister on this and her staff. It
seemed this would be a figure that would be readily available. I am talking about averages. That is why I asked it. In terms of the money raised locally, that
variance would be something that would be within the routine knowledge of the
minister. However, it seems it is not,
so I will move on to another area.
If the minister does get the information, an average
figure and a variance, I would like to get that as soon as possible. We certainly will be asking that when we come
to 16.5 as well.
The issue of amalgamation of school divisions or boundary
review, has there been an initiation of any of the components of policy in this
area by this office that we are dealing with now? I say that with the thought
that, since the assistant deputy minister is dealing with the whole area of
effective school funding and real and perceived equities, satisfaction of
school divisions and so on, indeed that would be something this office would
play a major role in.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair, as
I have said, I have not yet made an announcement on the issue of boundary
review. I have also said that I would be
looking to make an announcement on the issue of boundary review shortly, within
the next while. I am not able to discuss
any potential details relating to that because an announcement has not been
made, and there is, at this point, nothing for the member and me to look at
continue discussing around such an announcement.
Mr. Plohman: Is this office
involved in putting together the minister's terms of reference and facts
involving costs associated with any review, potential savings, that kind of
thing? It would seem that savings from
the public school system would be an area where this office would play a major
role.
I remind the minister that the Minister of Finance (Mr.
Manness) is quoted recently as well saying that there are savings to be
made. I can get her the quote from the
MAST newsletter that just came out, as well.
The Minister of Finance, on an open‑line show, on, I believe, April
27, indicated that there were major savings to be had, and this review was, by
no means, off. It was something the
minister felt was very important to move ahead with as quickly as possible
because there were savings to be had. I
am paraphrasing his statement but it is very close to what was said, as I
recall it in that newsletter.
So I understand that the minister has been working on
this, and probably does have some information to give to the committee. The announcement does not mean that she
cannot talk about it, just because the announcement has not been made yet. We
are talking about the principles and concepts involved. I am asking, under this line, dealing with
this office as it applies to a boundary review, because we are talking about, I
would think, costs, here.
Since the minister's office, the assistant deputy
minister in this case, is involved in that whole area of equity between school
divisions and costs, it is important that we understand the role that his
office would be playing in this review and the status of that preparation.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, the issue of boundary review, as I said in the House, was
an issue which was deferred by this government.
It was deferred because there were a number of initiatives which were in
the process, in some cases, of being developed; some had not even been
announced, the details of which had not been announced.
Now, as I have said earlier today, there were four, in
specific, that I have referred to. I
will go over them again.
One was the issue of the new ed finance formula. The new ed finance formula was in its first
year of application. School divisions
were dealing with the new formula, the degree of certainty that we believe it
provides for school divisions. We recognize
that it would require some ongoing reshaping; that is why we kept the committee
available to do the work of that ed finance model. That committee did its work, by the way, and
some of its recommendations were reflected in the ed funding formula and the
announcement this year.
Then, I also spoke about the issue of Distance Education
Task Force, and that had only just been struck.
Obviously, there had been no report and no work done yet on behalf of that
committee. That committee has now provided its report to government; that
committee's report is now out and is being reviewed.
Then, I also spoke about the legislative reform issue,
and the last hearing was only held towards the end of January. As a result of that, we did not have any
analysis of that information or any information which was out for the public to
examine. Then the fourth issue, as well,
was Francophone governance. Our plan had
not even been announced. So with that,
we did defer the decision.
* (1500)
What I have said to this point is that it was only
deferred, and I expect to make an announcement on it shortly. When I do make that announcement, I will be
able to provide the member with a great deal of information that he might wish
to ask for at that time, but at this time, I have not made an announcement
regarding it.
Mr. Plohman: I am certainly aware
that the minister has not made a formal announcement. I thank her for that clarification again, a
very interesting dissertation and reiteration of what she said in the House
today about why times are better for a review now than they might have been a
year ago. I am not questioning the
minister on the issue of why it is more appropriate now to proceed with this
review.
Simply, I would assume that the minister would do some
preparation prior to making such an announcement and would have some ideas of
the concepts she is dealing with and the parameters she wants to have on any
review, some contemplation of who would be involved and the format to be
involved, something about the timetable and that kind of thing.
All these things would have to be considered, I would
think, by the minister and would be some of the things that she would be
dealing with in consultation with her staff to come up with a review process
that would be acceptable to the general public and to the school divisions
throughout the province.
We know it is not going to come out of thin air. At least we hope it is not when the minister
finally makes the announcement, that she is not just going to kind of dream it
up the day before. So we do have a
situation here where we are in a preannouncement stage, and there is a lot of
work that has to be done. I am asking
about that angle or that aspect of it.
Perhaps the minister can just tell us whether she sees a
per‑pupil saving, in terms of funding, of any review, and has she
projected an amount with regard to that?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, as the member said, this is a time before any announcement has
been made, and in the time before any announcement, I would not in any way
consider making suggestions, speculations and providing a discussion.
When an announcement is made, then there will be
information which I think will answer some questions which the member might
wish to put forward at that time, but an announcement has not been made
yet. When I do make the announcement and
whatever that announcement may be, then I will be able to answer questions the
member has at that time.
Mr. Plohman: Does the minister
have any projections on per‑pupil savings of amalgamation?
Mrs. Vodrey: It seems the member,
whatever the announcement may be, seems to want to prejudge exactly what an
outcome might be and want to have some details before there has been any input
which the member might wish to be a part of.
So I will say again, I have not made an announcement
regarding this. I expect to make an
announcement regarding it shortly. At
the time of the announcement, the member will have an opportunity to ask a
number of questions, and I expect I will be able to provide some information
for him at that time.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the reason I ask that, of course, is the Minister of Finance (Mr.
Manness) did state that there are savings to be made and it is a quote from his
statement.
There seems to be a preoccupation with savings. I would assume that this is one of the major
considerations of the government in terms of boundary review. So I ask her whether she has a projection
since the Minister of Finance has stated that there are savings to be made,
whether she knows whether they have been quantified in any studies. If the minister does not want to say she is
including that consideration in her announcement that is to come, fine, do not
say it, but the point is I want to know whether this office has been involved
in any projections with regard to savings that could be achieved as a result of
amalgamation.
It is a simple question, and I think the minister should
be able to answer that.
(Mr. Jack Reimer, Acting Deputy Chairperson, in the Chair)
Mrs. Vodrey: The member is
questioning me on comments made by my colleague at a time when I was not
present, and I am afraid I do not know exactly what my colleague said. I was not there. If he has those questions, he might like to
ask that colleague in that colleague's Estimates any further details or
background as to why those comments were made.
What I have said today is that I expect to make an
announcement shortly, and when I make that announcement, I will make sure there
is information which the member would like, and we will be able to discuss it
further at that time.
Mr. Plohman: Well, does the
minister then‑‑if she does not want to comment on her colleague's
comments, would she be able to give a direct answer on her opinion? Rather than basing it on somebody else's
opinion, this is the minister's opinion I am asking for as a result of any
research and studies she may have had done by her department.
Does she have any projections on potential additional
costs or savings as a result of any boundary review or amalgamation of school
divisions?
Mrs. Vodrey: Again, the member
wishes to jump ahead of any information which might be provided in an
announcement, and I have said to him, and I think that I can only say it again,
I expect to make an announcement shortly.
When I do make that announcement, then we will be able to
look at exactly what is included in that announcement, and I will be able to
answer questions regarding that announcement.
Mr. Plohman: Well, Mr. Acting
Deputy Chairperson, does the minister not want to consult with anyone regarding
this announcement prior to doing it?
Mrs. Vodrey: Again‑‑well,
let us go over it again. As I have
explained to the member, I will be making an announcement shortly, and when we
have a chance to look at that announcement and what is included in that
announcement, then the member may wish to ask some questions at that time.
Mr. Plohman: Prior to making the
announcement, who is the minister consulting with?
Mrs. Vodrey: Again, the answer
remains the same. When I provide the
information at the time of the announcement, then we will be able to discuss
the information contained in the announcement, and until an announcement is
made, I am not able to provide any further information to the member.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chairperson, I am a very patient person, and I can just keep, you know, probing
the minister with these questions and she will find it, I think, to her
advantage to deal with them.
They are, as the member for Osborne (Mr. Alcock) has
stated, legitimate questions. I am not
asking the minister what will be in the announcement. She may say that she is shelving it until
after the next election. She may say
that she is going to proceed before the election. She may say she is proceeding
immediately. She did not want to give me
those details of timetable and so on. So
what I am asking her now, whom is she consulting with prior to making the
announcement? The minister always talks
about partnership.
* (1510)
An Honourable Member: Focus groups.
Mr. Plohman: Well, she has talked
about focus groups, and that may be all the consultation that is taking place,
but if it is focus groups, then say so.
Is she consulting with the trustees on this? Is she consulting with the Teachers'
Society? These are the partners that the
minister has mentioned previously in the Estimates process. She talked about the partnership. Is she talking with superintendents prior to
this? Whom is she consulting with?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chair, as I have said to the member, I do have good discussions on a regular
basis with partners in education. I have
the opportunity to speak on a regular basis with the Manitoba Teachers'
Society, school trustees, school superintendents, home and school parent‑teachers
associations, and visits when I go into schools, when I go into the colleges
and universities, and when I am in the community. So there is a great deal of
opportunity for people to raise a number of issues with me.
However, the details of any announcement that will be
made in the near future will have to wait until the time of the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: We certainly
understand that the minister now is very reluctant to give any details of
whether she will be making an announcement that says there is a review coming
or there is no review coming. However,
the reports in the Free Press today, from the quotes from the minister,
indicate that the review is still on.
The Finance minister has stated it is certainly something the minister
is pressing ahead with at the appropriate time.
We have legitimate concerns in the opposition,
representing the public interest, ensuring that the minister is doing her job
in the interests of the public. That is
our job to ensure that the minister is doing that, at least to our best
ability. So it is important we know that
the minister is not too far along on any announcement she makes and perhaps
gets down the road with imposing certain things as opposed to a true consultative
review involving all the partners of education.
I am concerned the minister may, in fact, announce some
decisions as opposed to consulting on a review.
That is why we want to ask these questions now before an announcement is
made, not ask after an announcement is made or to give advice. It is too late then. We need to have an understanding of what
process the minister is going through to get to the announcement.
I ask her to provide that information at the present
time, as to, for example, the assistant deputy minister's office at the present
time. How is this office involved in the
preparation for that announcement? Are
financial matters a major consideration in that preparation?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chair, let me start with the last question first. The content of any announcement would be
revealed at the time of the announcement.
The member asks what kinds of things might be considered if there is
such an announcement to provide the review.
Obviously, I would provide that information at the time of any such
announcement, so that information is information which is yet to come.
The member is speculating out loud about perhaps
outcomes, and that is purely speculation, and I think it is important to look
at it as speculation and not fact. He is
speculating out loud. He is wondering
out loud about possible outcomes, about what may happen, about how any such
announcement might be developed.
I have provided
the information that I am able to, and that is to say, that a year ago, slightly
over a year ago, boundary review was deferred.
As he heard from me in the House yesterday, and obviously from some
conversation that he may have had with another minister, this government did
make a promise in 1990 that we were interested in looking at boundary
review. We have said, as of yesterday,
that I expect to make an announcement on boundary review in the very near
future.
That is the information that is available at this
time. It relates to our government's
position, and it relates to a position a year ago of deferral. I have explained that in the deferral there
were a number of reasons for deferral at that time. Now I have said that an announcement is to be
expected shortly. When I make that
announcement, the contents will be available to the member. We will be able to have a more full
discussion at that time around whatever the content of that announcement is.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chairperson, I hope we will because the minister is certainly not being very
forthcoming with this committee at the present time. The questions I am asking are very legitimate
on this important issue. I guess I would
just like to ask the minister whether she is consulting, at this time, on the
issue of boundary review with school boards in the province prior to making any
announcement.
Mrs. Vodrey: I would remind the
member that I do have a very strong record of consultation, and that I do have
regular meetings. If there is any
question around that legislative reform, the reform of The Public Schools Act,
never before has there been a public consultation on that reform. The reforms of the past have been done
without any public consultation; therefore, with the issue of legislative
reform now, there has been public consultation.
As I have said, there have been the opinions of over 6,000 Manitobans
who have come forward and who have given their ideas of what they believe the
reform of The Public Schools Act should look like. That was important information.
That is important information, because it has allowed
Manitobans to say what they believe is important before legislation is written,
and then before it requires a great deal of discussion during committee hearing
process. This allowed Manitobans to say
from the beginning where they believed what the reform of The Public Schools
Act might look like and what it should look like.
So I would say that there has certainly been consultation
on a number of issues. In the matter of
the school boundary issue, any further information will come forward at the
time of the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: Can the minister
indicate whether the reform that she talked about which resulted in the report
on the panel on education legislation reform, whether the recommendation on
school boundaries is a consideration in the process that the minister is going
through right at the present time, prior to her announcement?
(Mr. Deputy Chairperson in the Chair)
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the recommendation that comes forward from the panel on education
legislation reform was again a comment.
It was outside of the specific scope that that committee was looking at
in terms of where Manitobans believe they would like to see amendments to The
Public Schools Act. They have made a comment on information which Manitobans have
provided for them.
How this relates to the announcement that I might make in
the next short while, we will have to wait until we see the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: The minister does not
even want to tell this committee whether she believes that her philosophy with
regard to her review is consistent with what is being recommended here or what
is being noted as a comment by the panel.
I point out to her that they are suggesting that the
public wants a special commission. In
the newspaper today, the minister said she is looking at a special
commission. She is quoted by Don
Campbell that she is looking at a special commission.
That is more information than the minister has been
prepared‑‑I would have to characterize her comments in the Free Press
as being quite forthcoming compared to what the committee is getting here.
The minister seems to have clammed right up on this issue
as she perhaps, in a moment of disregard for the consequences, decided to make
some comments on the review. She talked
about the idea of a commission. I want
to ask the‑‑
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Order,
please.
* (1520)
Point of Order
Mrs. Vodrey: On a point of order,
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I do not believe it is appropriate for members to
speculate on a frame of mind or on motivation in terms of answering. I believe the member is doing that right now.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: The
honourable minister did not have a point of order. It is a dispute over the facts.
* * *
Mr. Plohman: Can the minister
indicate then‑‑I think the minister's actions are something that
anyone can draw conclusions about with regard to this, the contrast between
what was said in the paper and what is being said in this Chamber‑‑nothing
in the committee and some speculation in the media. There is the difference.
I just wanted to ask the minister, is that one of the
considerations then, a special commission, or has that been ruled out by the
minister?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, in the committee this afternoon, I have given information
to the member regarding reasons for deferral, what has been accomplished by the
Department of Education since the time of the deferral. I have outlined four specific areas, some
were not even announced at the time of the deferral, which have now been
announced and are very close to being accomplished, so that information has
been covered this afternoon.
I have also this afternoon explained to the member that I
will be making an announcement shortly in response to a question that was posed
yesterday by a reporter in the Free Press.
The question specifically has not been posed this afternoon, but the
information was, if there was to be an announcement on a boundary review, would
it be possible that among the options which might be considered for such a
review if it was announced, would it be perhaps a commission?
At the time, I said a commission would be a possibility
if in fact that was the announcement.
However, I have said an announcement has not been made. Until the announcement is made, any details
about the content of that announcement, what it would be, will have to wait
until the announcement is made.
Mr. Plohman: The minister has made
an announcement through her statements that this is just a deferral and
therefore a review and a campaign promise by the government in the election
campaign of '91 is still on. In other
words, it is just a deferral. That is
clearly an announcement that a review is pending. The exact details of that announcement are
what is at issue here in terms of whether it will include a commission or not,
whether there will be consultation or not and all of those kinds of things.
So the minister cannot backtrack to the point of saying
now that she cannot even tell this committee whether she is going to have a review
or not. That clearly has already been
stated so hiding from that fact is fruitless.
I want to ask the minister now as she contemplates this
announcement whether in fact the governance issues and education services as
outlined as a concern and identified as a concern, especially in rural areas,
by the panel in their comment in their report on legislative reform will be
taken into consideration in drawing up the terms of reference that will be
included in the announcement.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chairperson,
again, I do not want to make this difficult for the member; sincerely, I do not
want to make this difficult for the member; but I will say that until the
announcement is made, it is very difficult for us to discuss these issues.
If he is asking, is government concerned about service in
rural areas, has government been looking at issues in relation to service in
rural areas, I will tell him, yes, we have.
That is why last year we struck the Task Force on Distance Education and
I have explained to the member that the third and final report of the Task
Force on Distance Education has been released and we are expecting that it will
be examined by school divisions.
We understand that as we have spoken about before during
this Estimates process that the issue of Distance Education is very important
to particularly rural and northern
We have spoken about, as recently as Monday, the Distance
Education issues being integrated within our PDSS section of the division of
the Department of Education and Training because it would be important that the
curriculum development and Distance Education be both in consideration at the
same time.
So if he is looking specifically at concerns and action
being taken to support rural schools and northern schools in
If he wishes to ask further how that may relate to an
upcoming announcement, we will have to wait until the announcement is made.
Mr. Plohman: Under the objective
of this particular section of the department:
implementation and evaluation of policies for the Administration and
Finance and Support to Schools divisions, what role is this section of the
department playing in preparation for a position on boundary review?
Mrs. Vodrey: I just wonder if I
could ask the member to refer to that section again, please?
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, on page 29 of the Supplementary Estimates booklet, Financial and
Administrative Services, Office of the Assistant Deputy Minister, Objectives,
second line, implementation and evaluation of policies‑‑leaving
out, processes, operations and services.
I did not quote that. I just said, implementation and evaluation of
policies for the Administration and Finance and Support to Schools divisions.
I asked the minister, referring to that objective from page
29 for this section of the department, what role this section of the department
is playing in preparation for a position on boundary review?
Mrs. Vodrey: This particular set
of objectives refers to our school funding model, and that is where the work is
particularly tied in to this objective.
Mr. Plohman: Funding models are an
integral part of the function of any school division, and development of
policies with regard to boundary reviews or configurations are tied very
closely to that. That is why I asked the
minister the question, whether this section is playing any role in developing a
position on that.
If the minister is saying no, there is no role being
played, then, fine, I will ask these questions dealing with the role under
another section.
Mrs. Vodrey: The answer is
no. Again, further information regarding
the announcement will have to be discussed at the time of the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: Does the minister
have any analysis from this section on per‑pupil costs or savings of the
boundary question?
* (1530)
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, I have answered this question several times this afternoon
about any of this information, and I have explained that when, in fact, there
is an announcement which I have said to the member will be shortly, then we
will be able to discuss anything further, relating to the content of that
announcement.
Mr. Plohman: The minister tabled a
list of accumulated surpluses of divisions, without identifying them, as the
percentage of their net operating expenditures.
Has the minister discussed with her staff the fate of operating
surpluses under a revised boundary configuration?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the answer is no.
Mr. Plohman: Can the minister tell
us what her position is on surpluses under a revised boundary configuration for
Mrs. Vodrey: Again, as I have
said when we discussed the issue of surpluses into the future in the past,
no. It is very difficult to speculate in
general. I did make that point when we
discussed this the last time we were sitting.
The information regarding surpluses in any proposed
announcement I will be making shortly I am not going to comment on at the
moment, because we do not have that announcement before us.
Mr. Plohman: In preparation for
the announcement, is the minister, in a formal way, consulting with anyone
outside of her department?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, this is a question which has been asked this afternoon and
which I have answered this afternoon. I
am prepared to answer again, if that would be helpful.
The answer is I have had, since I have been minister, a
great deal of contact with all of the educational organizations and also
parents and parent‑teacher home and school associations, also with
individual parents, parent councils and Manitobans.
Since I have been minister, I have spent a great deal of
time making sure I have that kind of contact with Manitobans. So I can tell him that this contact is
ongoing.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Deputy Chairperson,
we know the minister has talked with people in education, and from time to
time, yes, as circumstances develop, it can be done very informally. I am asking about formal consultation with
anyone, any groups, outside her department in preparing the announcement on
boundary review.
Mrs. Vodrey: The answer remains
the same. The answer is that there is
consultation going on, on a regular basis, of issues of interest to the
partners in education, to parents, to individual schools, to individual Manitobans. There is information brought forward
frequently regarding issues that people feel are important. I can tell him again that the consultation
and the discussion, which I think is very important‑‑it was spoken
about a great deal today‑‑is important and is ongoing and then any
further information regarding a proposed announcement would come at the time of
the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the minister is saying that the announcement is being developed
and the position by her staff in the department?
Mrs. Vodrey: What I said was that
as Minister of Education I have contact with many Manitobans and with the
educational partners, as we all do as MLAs and as elected individuals, and
certainly as Minister of Education, I have contact as well.
Mr. Plohman: Has the minister put
out any proposals at all for feedback yet on this issue prior to making the
announcement?
Mrs. Vodrey: The member would
like to get the information that would be contained in an announcement through
some other method. I have explained to him that I will be making the
announcement shortly and that when I make the announcement there will be
information. The member might like to
ask questions at that time.
I know he has been speculating out loud about what that
announcement might be. He has even been
hypothesizing about portions of the announcement. I have been again attempting to provide him
with the answers that are available before the time the announcement is made,
but now the information that I believe he would be seeking would be contained
within the announcement.
Mr. Plohman: I am certainly
disappointed in the minister's unwillingness to be forthcoming in any way,
shape or form in this. I think this is
illustrative of the general mode of operation by this minister's secretive
approach to things, dropping them on the public without any outside
consultation.
As much as the minister says that there is consultation,
we have not seen any evidence of that from the minister's answers, any evidence
whatsoever from any groups outside her own staff within her department who have
been consulted in coming up with her final announcement. It would seem to me that the minister has
either not consulted or is choosing to hide relevant information from the
Legislature and the committee.
The minister should realize that is not her role and that
is not proper protocol and ethics by a minister of the Crown when coming before
the committee.
Point of Order
Mrs. Vodrey: On a point of order,
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, first of all, I say nonsense to everything the member
has said so far. I would also like a clarification of the member's accusation
of unethical behaviour.
Mr. Plohman: If the minister does
not have it clear already, I think‑‑
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Order,
please. The honourable minister did not
have a point of order, but I would ask all members to choose their words very
carefully so that we do not provoke any animosities here.
* * *
Mr. Plohman: I certainly would not
want to do that, Mr. Deputy Chair. As I
have indicated, the minister has not been forthcoming and is not doing her
position any favours in terms of its position in the Legislature. Certainly, we are not pleased with that, and
I do not think the public will be either.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I want to‑‑
* (1540)
Point of Order
Mrs. Vodrey: On a point of order,
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, before we move on the issue of forthcoming, the member
simply wants to have the announcement before the announcement is made.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: The
honourable minister did not have a point of order.
* * *
Mr. Plohman: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the minister continues to abuse the rules of the House by
interjecting with non‑points of order, and she knows that very well after
being here now a couple of years. She
certainly should know what a point of order is.
The minister knows as well that I have not asked her for
the announcement. What we have asked is
what preparation, what consultation she has done, whether she has considered
certain pieces of information. She has
refused to answer every one of those questions, and we could go around this
thing for hours. I am prepared to do
that.
I think, and I am sure my colleagues agree, that this
minister has to have more respect for the Legislature. I say that seriously. More respect, it is not a game. It is a time to supply information, and that
is what is lacking in the minister's attitude towards what is happening at this
committee, a lack of respect for the process and for the Legislature of
Manitoba and the parliamentary process.
That is what I am raising with the minister. I could not say that more seriously.
It is clear that those aspects that I have asked about
are important aspects for the public to consider prior to any announcement, and
that is what the minister has a responsibility to live up to in terms of her
position as minister. I am going to
indicate to the minister that this will not serve her well, this secretive
approach to these major concerns.
As much as I would like to continue this and would be
quite willing to and patient to do this, Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I am going to
move on and, at the same time, note the complete reluctance of the minister to
provide forthcoming answers to this committee.
Point of Order
Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister of Culture, Heritage and
Citizenship): On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Chairperson,
I would like to indicate that certainly a member of the Legislature who has
been a member of government and a cabinet minister indeed should understand the
process of the Legislature. He knows
full well that when any government or any minister of any government is making
an announcement, indeed that announcement is made and then members of the
opposition do have the opportunity to ask questions. So the minister is within her right.
I guess I might just like to point out‑‑
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Order,
please. The honourable minister did not
have a point of order. It is a dispute
over the facts.
* * *
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: The
honourable member for Osborne, on a point of order.
Mr. Reg Alcock (Osborne): No, I am just
going to ask a question.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Just one
minute then. The honourable minister, on
another point of order.
Mrs. Mitchelson: No, not on a point
of order. I have my hand up to speak.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson, not then on a point of order, but
just on a comment. We have a member of
the official opposition who is the critic who is condemning a minister of the
government for many different aspects that fall under her responsibility.
I might just like to comment and say that when the critic
for Education was the Minister of Highways, I might ask him to make some
comment on how much consultation he did prior to building the bridge north of
Selkirk to nowhere, which cost the taxpayers of Manitoba some $27 million to
$30 million?
We have a member of a government that was turfed out that
was extremely irresponsible in making that decision. I have not checked back through Hansard and
the records and the kind of information that the then‑Minister of
Highways did put on the record as to who he consulted and how many Manitobans
actually supported that decision and how many people indeed today travel over
that bridge that was built that went absolutely nowhere. So we have a‑‑
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Order,
please. Could I ask the honourable
members to deal with the line that we are on.
That is Financial and Administrative Services. I think the bridge issue falls under the
Department of Highways.
Mr. Alcock: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I actually would like to make a serious intervention here, if I
might.
We are in this committee room. We have been in this committee room for some
20‑odd hours on this particular department. We have a bunch of staff from the department
who are being forced to sit through this.
I agree with what the Minister of Culture, Heritage and
Citizenship said and what the minister has said to date that a minister should
not be forced to reveal in advance policy decisions that may simply be in
formulation. That is not what the member
is asking for. I think this is just
generating into a farce. I think it is a
waste of everybody's time.
The member is asking clearly, what process did you go
through; who did you talk to; how are you arriving at that? I think those are legitimate questions. I think if all we are going to do is sit here
and play word games, we should shut the process down and go home.
Surely, there is a role in the Estimates process for
people to ask legitimate questions and receive honest answers. Otherwise, I
mean this whole business that we are engaged in right now is discredited.
To the extent the member asks questions that he knows he
should not be asking, I would grant the minister some leeway, but I would like
to hear a few answers to some legitimate questions.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: 1.(e)
Financial and Administrative Services (1) Salaries $903,800.
Mr. Plohman: Is this the Internal
Audit section? Have we passed that
line? Internal Audit is also covered
under this as well, is it not?
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Yes, it is.
Mr. Plohman: Yes, I want to ask
the minister, with the hope of course that we will get more forthcoming answers
from this minister, whether she could give us a review of the audits that were completed
under this section this past year and some indication of some of the
findings. We will be asking more
detailed questions on that.
So if the minister is able to provide some of that to us
at this time‑‑I understand that for the next year, for the year
coming up, Workforce 2000‑‑as printed in the Supplementary
Estimates‑‑Stevenson Aviation Centre, Professional Certification,
Administration, Pupil Transportation and New Careers will be audited. Could the minister give us a report on this
past year's activities in this area?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I would like to start by introducing Jane Holatko who is the
Director of Internal Audit and who has joined us at the table.
In terms of the audits for the Department of Education
and Training for the year 1992‑93, they include the Manitoba School for
the Deaf, Distance Education and Technology Branch, Assiniboine Community
College, Red River Community College, Keewatin Community College, Program
Analysis, Coordination and Support branch of the PACE Training division and the
Post‑Secondary Career Development and Adult Continuing Education
branch. The last two are in process.
In addition, there were general audit certifications done
in this past year, as well.
Mr. Plohman: Can the minister give
us a review of the Distance Education audit?
Obviously, that section was eliminated in this year's budget. Was that as a result of anything that came
out of the audit?
Mrs. Vodrey: No, the
restructuring of that particular branch was not as a result of the audit, and
the restructuring of that particular area was, again, as I have spoken about,
an effort to bring the work of the Distance Education and Technology Branch in
as a part of our Program Development and Support Services division.
* (1550)
Mr. Plohman: Was there any
contemplation of eliminating this division when this internal audit was begun
because, obviously, the work was done for nothing if the division is gone?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the audits that are done are done to improve management
practice. They look at information such
as management processes, legislative and administrative requirements, financial
reporting and controls. That was the work of these audits.
However, the audits do not include decisions of government
policy in terms of the restructuring which has been done with the Distance
Education and Technology Branch which does integrate it much more fully with
our Program Development and Support Services work.
Mr. Plohman: I did say that the
division was eliminated, and, of course, that is not true. There are several‑‑a large number
of staff; I take it 37 staff remaining versus 49 the previous year. Obviously,
the work is still ongoing.
However, the audit was as of the operation of the branch
at that particular time as opposed to what it might exist at the present
time. I asked the minister whether there
was any contemplation of those changes prior to deciding on which sections
would be audited this year. Was that a
consideration in determining whether this section would be audited?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, the auditing that was done on the Distance Education and
Technology Branch was part of a regular audit cycle, and, obviously, the
auditing can only be done on what exists currently and it cannot be done on
what may exist in the future.
Mr. Plohman: The minister just
said earlier, and as I know, the internal audit to work as it was set up when
we were in government‑‑the internal audit function was set up in a
number of departments throughout the '80s.
I do not know whether Education was one of them, but certainly most
departments were established with an internal audit function.
It was to improve management and the internal workings of
the branches that were selected for audit.
This was done on a rotationary basis, I would think, throughout the
whole department over a number of years with a few branches every year, but
that contrasts somewhat with what the minister just said that, obviously, the
audit could only be done on what existed at the present time‑‑at
that time‑‑not what was going to exist in the future, but there are
recommendations made about what will exist in the future, what changes should
be made.
I would ask, then, whether the changes that were made
were consistent with what the audit had identified for improvements.
Mrs. Vodrey: The audit, then, as
the member knows, really deals with the issues of management practice, not
necessarily the issue of configuration or staffing.
I am informed that, as a result of internal audit now,
they are in the process of reviewing and doing a follow‑up of the audit
recommendations. Though Distance
Education has been integrated, there is still, as I would remind the member,
the Winkler area.
So the results of the audit process are being followed
up, but I would remind him that they focus on issues relating to management
practice and not policy decision.
Mr. Plohman: Yes, Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, as I understand it, they also deal with adherence to legislative
requirements, on the part of the branches that are being audited in the
adequacy of financial reporting.
Can the minister indicate, for each of these branches,
the major recommendations, or would she be prepared to table those on the
workings of the branches that were audited this past year?
Mrs. Vodrey: I believe the member
was asking for the recommendations of the internal audit as they looked at the
Distance Education and Technology Branch.
What some of the recommendations were: An improved program prioritization supported
by cost‑benefit analysis, a formal plan of long‑ and short‑term
resource needs, review of Distance Education, review of funding
mechanisms. The recommendation also was
improved linkage of operational and financial planning. We were also recommended to look at
consistency and provincial perspective of the plans and policy for Distance
Education and Technology course development, delivery, funding and other
support, also, the establishment of departmental reporting mechanisms based on
the role of Distance Education and Technology, and formal evaluations and
business case reviews of major new initiatives.
We also were to look at improved internal controls,
financial monitoring and accountability of contracts and partnership
agreements, use of gross accounting procedures for the Manitoba satellite
network, expenditures supported by appropriate contracts and sufficient invoice
detail, review and realignment of the ISP Winkler staff workload, and also
improved program budgets, proper invoice coding to program areas and monitoring
at the program unit level, and decisions on the ISP inventory and student
record systems.
Mr. Plohman: I asked the minister
if she could table those for each of the audits. Can she do that?
Mrs. Vodrey: I am prepared to
table those results, and I will table them at the next sitting.
* (1600)
Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley):
Mr. Deputy Chair, I believe last year, this section conducted an audit
of the Labour Market Policy unit. I
wonder if we could hear a discussion of the results of that.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I am informed that it was not a specific audit of the labour
market area, but rather it was a review and an audit of what was the former
PACS area, policy analysis and co‑ordination area. I am informed right now that the work
relating to that area is in a draft report stage.
Ms. Friesen: I believe last
year's Estimates suggested that there was a separate audit to be done of the
Labour Market Policy unit. I am just
trying to look for it in the book. Was
that a mistake or were plans changed in the middle?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I am informed there has not been any change, that the audit was
for the policy analysis and co‑ordination unit, the former PACS and the
labour market area is a portion of that unit as it was structured at the last
Estimate's process, and, therefore, it would have been part of a review of that
total area.
Ms. Friesen: When does the
minister expect that to be completed?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, there is a process when the draft report is done. We expect, because it is in part of that
process, to have the final information in about a month's time.
Ms. Friesen: Would the minister
be tabling that when it is available?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I am informed that those reports are internal to government. However, I am tabling this year some summary
information of the completed areas and would be prepared to table, whether it
be Estimates next year, the similar kinds of summary information relating to
that area.
Ms. Friesen: I am interested in
the section that would deal with the Labour Market Policy unit. I wonder if the minister could tell me, since
she has the staff here, the kinds of questions that were being asked in that
unit. How many people were you
evaluating? What level of evaluation is
it? Is it an audit which looks at
results?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
the audit which is done by the internal auditor is not an evaluation of the
effectiveness of a program. The auditor
informs me, again, as I believe it has been stated before, the auditor does not
evaluate people or programs. The auditor does examine management process and
also financial controls.
Ms. Friesen: Then in the evaluation
of the management process in that particular unit, would there be any
evaluation of what appears to be the absence of any labour policy, strategy,
document, anything available to the public?
Where is the management process in that unit that is not leading to the
presentation of any labour market strategy?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
again, the auditor in Internal Audit does not evaluate program outcomes, and so
would not be looking at that specific issue but instead looks at the management
practices and the controls. They look at
issues such as the setting of objectives:
are objectives defined and understood?
They look at issues of planning:
does a planning process take place, and is it effective? They look at program review and evaluation: are programs reviewed on a periodic basis and
any required adjustments made? They look
at program efficiency and effectiveness to say:
are criteria set and monitored in order to assess a program's efficiency
and effectiveness?
They also look at areas such as financial reporting and
controls, and they look at the reporting and monitoring, financial planning,
internal controls and checks. They look
at protection of assets, central government financial control procedures and
policies.
Ms. Friesen: I am sure since the
minister has already a draft version of this report she could tell us what the
evaluation is of the planning process in the Labour Market Policy unit.
Mrs. Vodrey: No, I do not have a
copy of the draft report. The report in
the process is sent to the assistant deputy minister of that area, and the
assistant deputy minister of that area is reviewing it, and then it is passed
on to the deputy minister. So we are not at the stage where I have a draft
report.
Ms. Friesen: Do we have the staff
here who conducted that evaluation?
* (1610)
Mrs. Vodrey: I did introduce Jane
Holatko who is the director of the area.
She is of course in charge of the audit.
The staff member who conducted the audit is not here. Again, I just would say that it is important
in the matter of an audit that there is some separateness in terms of the
practice and that we have to be careful in terms of what we are asking the
auditor to comment on in terms of the line of questioning the member is
pursuing.
Ms. Friesen: So we do in fact
have the supervisor here who presumably laid out the questions and supervised
the production of that particular report.
As the minister knows, I have made many attempts in
Question Period and at other times in fact to find any kind of strategy from
the Labour Market Policy unit, to find any kind of reports. So this is not a
new question on my part of having asked about the effectiveness and the
planning and the goals and where this unit is going.
So now that we do have somebody here who has met with
that unit, who has posed some questions, it seems to me it might be helpful if
we could have a sense of where the planning and the goals and the efficiency of
that unit are.
(Mr. Bob Rose, Acting Deputy Chairperson, in the Chair)
Mrs. Vodrey: The issue of the
labour market policy which flows or governs that plan is best looked at under
16.4. The auditor, as I have explained,
does work relating to the management practice.
The auditor would not be able to comment on the issue that the member is
asking and that is the issue of what exactly the work has been within that
area. We can discuss that work when we
do get to 16.4.
Ms. Friesen: But since we do have
the staff here in audit, and what I am trying to get at, and I will certainly
do that when we get to this unit later, is to try and understand why there has
been no labour market strategy from this government at a time of recession, at
a time of educational change, at a time when most Manitobans are really fearing
for their educational and labour future.
So it is a major issue, I think, for Manitobans. Perhaps here we can eliminate one reason for
the absence of that strategy. Is it a
management problem? Is there a
difficulty there? You have done an
audit. Does it show any difficulty? If it does not, then we can eliminate the
management aspect. And when we come to
the other section which looks at the unit itself, then we can look for other
causes.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chairperson, first of all, I completely reject the member's statement of no
policy. I completely reject that.
We have been speaking about the work that has been done
by that unit over some time. I simply
point to the reorganization of the post‑secondary side of the
department. I point to the signing of
the Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force Development Agreement. I point to The Colleges Act and the colleges
moving to governance. There certainly
has been a lot of work done in that area, and we can certainly examine the work
that has been done in that area when we get to the budget line.
In terms of the Internal Audit, as I have explained, the
director of that area is here. She has
explained. She has provided the
information to me and I to the member of exactly where in the process the
internal audit report is and that she would not be commenting on the issues
that the member is asking.
Ms. Friesen: Mr. Acting Deputy
Chairperson, it is the minister I am asking to comment. I am asking her to comment on the management
and the efficiency of her Labour Market Policy unit, which she has done an
audit of and whose audit staff she now has with her in the room.
The minister, for example, mentioned the signing of the
Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force Development Agreement some years after other
provinces have signed and certainly two years in delay from the documents that
we have had in this process. In 1991, it
appeared that some distance had been gone towards the signing of that
agreement. Two years later and with only
a year left to run in the program, six months of which is going to go into
planning, we have just begun to look, in this province, at a labour market
development plan.
Here is an audit which looks at efficiency. Is this efficient? The minister wants to parade it as an element
of inefficiency. Well, I would like to
see the audit and hear from her perspective whether this was an efficient way
to proceed with the development of the Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force
Agreement.
(Mrs. Shirley Render, Acting Deputy Chairperson, in the
Chair)
Mrs. Vodrey: Madam Acting Deputy
Chairperson, it seems that the member would like to speak about the process
that we went through in terms of the signing of the agreement and what in fact
we did in terms of the signing of the agreement. I am more than happy to talk about that and
the decisions that were made and the negotiations that occurred within the
negotiation for the Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force Development Agreement.
As I have said before, in the process of signing, many
provinces did not sign at exactly the time that the agreement came into
effect. It did not affect the funds
flowing. We can look at any effect that
the member might be concerned about in terms of the signing of that agreement. However, the agreement is now signed. We can talk when we get to that budget line
around the issues that were negotiated by
I spoke about wanting the recognition of our colleges
within our Manitoba Labour Force Development Agreement. I have spoken about a number of issues which
are contained in that agreement. It was important to
Again, in terms of the overall labour market strategy,
there has been information coming forward.
I have also explained when we have discussed it in the past that the
labour market strategy, though it is developed from within the Department of
Education and Training, there is also an opportunity to talk with other
government departments that would be important in terms of developing the labour
market strategy.
Also from that area, in co‑operation with the
federal government, we produced Manitoba Prospects, which provided information
to Manitobans who are looking at labour market forecasts for professions and
for the kind of work that they might like to do.
So there has been information which has come from that
particular department. I am more than
prepared to talk about it in greater detail.
When that detail is discussed and the member has full information, we can
then perhaps continue on with her concerns about‑‑or any concerns
which she might express.
Ms. Friesen: Madam Acting Deputy
Chairperson, the issue we are looking at here is an internal audit of a unit
which, to me and to other Manitobans, seems to have been very
unproductive. I am trying to eliminate
some of the reasons for that lack of productivity.
* (1620)
You have done an audit which has looked at management,
which has looked at planning, at goals, at efficiency and effectiveness. You had a Labour Force Development Agreement,
which was ready to be signed in 1991, not the earliest but by no means the
latest at that point. Then between 1991
and '93 it seemed from the outside that nothing happened in that unit. Nothing
happened with the signing of that Labour Force Development Agreement except,
yes, the minister says that money flowed.
Yes, money did flow.
One of the purposes of that Labour Force Development
Agreement, in fact, is to co‑ordinate the purchasing of policies, to co‑ordinate
the attitudes and the relationships with community colleges and with post‑secondary
education. What happened in those two
years was, in fact, the reduction of our community colleges, the withdrawal
from courses and programs by the federal government without any co‑ordination. That is the problem, and we are suffering
with that now, so where is the efficiency in the management in this particular
unit?
Mrs. Vodrey: Madam Acting Deputy
Chair, again I absolutely reject the term used by the member, "lack of
productivity." She is absolutely
wrong in that area. She is asking for
information, and I have been providing her with information which speaks to the
productivity of that unit, which speaks to the work of that unit, so I
completely reject the premise that she is putting forward her questions on.
I have explained to her what the work of the internal
auditor has been. Her questions focus
much more on what she is looking at as an area of outcome, and in terms of the
area of outcome and the productivity, I differ.
I tell her that there certainly has been productivity and there has been
work.
When we look at the Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force
Development Agreement, there was a process of negotiation with the federal
government. Yes, we look for this Labour
Force Development Agreement to lead to a much greater sharing of information,
but the federal government has made certain decisions, which I have spoken
about in the House before, regarding how they wish to fund, what they wish to
fund. I have explained to her, as well,
the federal government has indicated that they will be funding students
differently. In the past, they had
funded a number of their students, not only as fee payers, but also they had
provided funding which also helped to underwrite the costs of the course. The federal government has made these
changes. These changes are made. She is somehow trying to tie those decisions
of the federal government very specifically to our signing of the Canada‑Manitoba
Labour Force Development Agreement.
When we get to that area, we will be more than happy to
talk about where things are now and exactly what has occurred in the time of
the negotiation. We do look forward to
now a much greater collaboration; however, there are other areas which also
flow from this. I know that the member
may want to talk at a later time about the Canada‑Manitoba Labour Force
Development boards, which also we will be looking to move ahead with now we
have the agreement signed.
In terms of the influence on the colleges, it was very important
for
We also had to look out for the interests of Manitobans
in terms of making sure that where the federal government was funding, if they
made any changes, the interests of Manitobans as providers could be looked
at. There were a number of issues. The
member may want to discuss then the details of the negotiation that led up to
the signing of that agreement, but if we are looking specifically in terms of
the development around the labour force area and if we look at the work of that
area, I would say that area has worked hard.
We will be able to discuss what that area has produced, but I have given
her some examples this afternoon.
If the member wishes to look at the area of internal
audits specifically, I have explained that the internal audit did not look at
that particular area alone; it looked at a whole segment of the post‑secondary
side. I have explained to her, as well,
the process that occurs with an internal audit and that the information in a
draft form is given to the assistant deputy minister. The assistant deputy minister is currently
looking at that information, and then the information will be passed on to the
deputy minister. I also explained that
it does not comment on outcome. It does
not comment on personnel. The member
seems to want to have some comment drawn about the issues of personnel and
productivity, and that is not what the internal audit does.
Ms. Friesen: We should just
correct the record, because I did make no mention of personnel. My concerns indeed are outcome, and they
relate in the context of this particular line to efficiency, to management, to
review and to this particular unit. The
minister may want to spend, I think it was, 10 minutes simply repeating
herself. I mean, she may find that is
very interesting, but it really does not move the process very far.
It makes no sense to say that this unit is part of a
larger one and the larger one was reviewed.
The issue is that, yes, this unit was reviewed. Here we are a year later, I am quite prepared
to understand that there is not a report ready but that you have a draft
report. It does seem to me that here is
the Minister of Education who has conducted an internal review of a unit, I
should use the word audit of a unit, which, I think, has some significance to
Manitobans right now and which there have been concerns about in the delays in
certain areas and in the absence of a visible document.
If we had a labour market strategy in front of us, I
think we might not be asking these kinds of questions. We would be asking different kinds of
questions. But I do not understand why a
minister who has her staff here, who has conducted in the last year a review
which includes this unit, is not prepared to ask any questions or answer any
questions on that particular unit.
Did, for example, this audit include the question of the
planning of a labour market strategy in Manitoba, and did it ask any questions
as to the review and the internal efficiency of that unit which has led to the
absence of such a report?
Mrs. Vodrey: If I can help the
member distinguish in terms of her questions what information might come from
this, first of all, the internal audit asks the question: does an operational plan exist? It does not ask, specifically, the kinds of
questions which the member has been asking.
I think it is important to note as well that, as
minister, I have to be careful to not have interfered within an internal
audit. The information of the draft
report, if I ask for that information now, it may be seen, I am informed, as
interfering. I want to be careful not to have done that.
Ms. Friesen: So we have an
interim report that is going to the deputy minister, and then it will be
referred to the minister? Will that full report be tabled or is it simply an
abstract of that?
* (1630)
Mrs. Vodrey: I can go through the
process again for the member if it is helpful, that there has been a draft
report which has been submitted by the internal auditor, by the person who did
the audit to the assistant deputy minister of the particular area. The
assistant deputy minister does have a chance to look at the draft report.
The comments are not whether the ADM likes what is seen
in the report but rather does the audit process appear to have been fair. Then the draft report of the audit is
returned to the auditor who does produce a final report, which is then given to
the deputy minister. At the moment, the
draft report is with the ADM and the ADM would be reviewing it.
As I have also explained, the audits are not tabled, but
what I have agreed to table today in these Estimates is the information that I
have of a summary nature of the areas which have received an audit and in which
the report is complete.
Ms. Friesen: In the case of this
particular section, when does the minister expect to table that?
Mrs. Vodrey: As I have said,
these reports are not tabled.
Ms. Friesen: The minister is
going to make this report available then in some way.
Mrs. Vodrey: As I have said this afternoon,
first of all, the audits are not tabled.
The audits have never been tabled.
The audits were not tabled under the previous administration. What would be available for the member at the
Estimates next year would be, as I will be making available for this year where
there has been a completed report, it is not the audit report itself, is a
summary outline of the findings. That is
in fact the most that has ever been made available under any administration.
Ms. Friesen: So the minister is
going to make available a summary, an abstract of this report that will include
the Labour Force Development unit.
Mrs. Vodrey: What we had
discussed earlier today was those areas in which there has been a final audit
report. We do not have at the moment a final
report for the area, which included, among others, the labour force area.
What I have said is, next year at Estimates, when that
final report is available, at that time it might be considered if requested to
simply provide the summary of some recommended actions. That has been requested of the final reports
which have been received. I have said
that under those areas in which we have a final report, I will, for the first time,
table summary information of recommended actions.
Again, I would remind the member, this has not been done
before, and it was not done under the previous administration.
Ms. Friesen: So the minister is
going to make available a summary of the post‑secondary career
development of Distance Education, of the PACE, which includes labour market
development policy and of the community colleges, the ones that were done last
year‑‑sorry, except the Labour Market Policy unit.
Now, I do not understand why the minister is saying, this
report will be ready soon. I mean, after
all, the money presumably was passed last year for this to be done within one
year. It is not included on the things
that the minister expects to do this year, so would it not be appropriate if
the minister is going to make available any kind of summary that it be done as
close as possible to the year in which the money was paid out and for which the
minister had planned the completion?
I mean, we assume, obviously there are problems, and you
do not necessarily always manage to do things on time, I think that happens to
everybody, but why would we be having to wait 11 to 10 months more for
something which was presumably paid for, voted on last year?
(Mr. Deputy Chairperson in the Chair)
Mrs. Vodrey: Again, I would
remind the member that the operations are ongoing and that funds available in
one year does not necessarily mean that the project is completed within that
year.
As I said, when I stated the work of the Internal Audit,
two were actually in process. They were
not completed. The two in process are
the Program Analysis, Co‑ordination and Support, the PACS branch, which
includes the labour market area that the member has been looking at. Therefore, that one is not ready and,
certainly, we would be able to discuss it at Estimates next year.
What I am able to table for the member for the first
time, because it was not done when her party was in power, is information which
relates to items requiring action which could be seen as a summary of some of
the information within the internal audit and that only for the areas in which
there has been a final report.
Ms. Friesen: That still does not
address the problem of why the minister expects there to be to be another 10‑
or 11‑month gap before the availability of this. I mean, if it is going to be available next month
or the month after, which would be reasonable if it was voted upon a year ago‑‑yes,
things are continuing, but you are asking us to vote here on a whole other
range of things. I mean, if you are not
going to make available any of the information until a year from now, one must
only assume that the work is going to continue for another year, and that
surely affects the kind of list that has been provided here for this coming
year, for the next fiscal year. So it is
very difficult to judge this list if earlier lists have not been completed and
in fact are going to extend for another year.
Would the minister, for example, undertake to make that
summary available on completion?
Mrs. Vodrey: Again, this
information is internal. It is often
useful in Estimates when available at the Estimates time, and what I have said
this year is that I am prepared to make available for the first time
information of the completed areas. This is not a completed area. Therefore, it will not be available.
Ms. Friesen: Then my question
was: Will it be available on completion?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
again, we are discussing the functions of the internal auditor, and in order to
demonstrate the functions of the internal auditor, we have agreed to table some
information. That information has not
been tabled in the past, was not tabled by the past government and has not been
tabled by this government. The
information is, by and large, confidential information, information for use
internally.
* (1640)
Again, the member seems to be having some difficulty
dealing with the fact that the internal auditor must remain impartial and
objective, and somehow the member is tying that work to specific outcomes, and
she is in fact making it very difficult for the work of the auditor and for the
auditor to remain impartial. The
auditor's work, again, that activity must be measured against certain
standards, certain standards, for instance, by the chartered accountants in
Manitoba, and therefore, when we look at the work of the internal auditor‑‑I
have described the kind of work that branch does, that part of the department
does, but I have also been very careful through all of our discussion to ask
the member to remember the work of the internal auditor must be seen as
impartial and objective. We will not be
dealing with anything which in any way jeopardizes that particular objectivity
and impartiality.
Ms. Friesen: I do not think it
will need anybody to read the record to recognize that I have never questioned
the impartiality, that I have not made it difficult for the auditor. It is the
minister I am speaking to. It is the
minister's policy, the minister's audit and the minister's questions. In fact, I have used the same language that
the minister used of management planning goals, efficiency effectiveness
criteria and review. Those were the
items I was asking about.
The minister has offered, and I thank her for that, to
table certain aspects, certain summaries of some reviews. Now it seems to me that she is saying she
will not table others. That is what I am
finding difficult. It has nothing to do
with the auditor or her impartiality. I
really resent the minister putting those kinds of words into my mouth or
attempting to.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, I said to the member that because this work is often done
and available during the Estimates process, that the information when completed
would be available at the Estimates time next year as we have provided the
information for this Estimates time. If
she checks the record, she will see that has been said today several times.
Ms. Friesen: As the minister well
knows, the issue is that that audit was voted upon. It will be two years by the time the minister
is tabling any kind of summary, and that is my question. Why is there such a long time delay when it
could be tabled‑‑whatever the minister is choosing to table, and I
recognize that a summary in a summary is very much interpretive, so I am not
under any illusions as to what the minister is going to table out of that‑‑but
it at least will be a summary of some of the questions that have been looked at
in this particular area. The minister
seems not to be interested in making that available on completion and that is
the part I do not understand. Some can
be tabled on completion. Some
cannot. Why is that?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, again, the discussion this afternoon has focused around not
protecting the minister, but protecting the auditor's impartiality. That has been the issue and the pivotal point
that we have been looking at. The member
has every right to question government policies and actions and government
record, and I have already begun to discuss those actions and our record on an
area and about a budget line which has not yet even come up during the
Estimates process. I am more than
prepared to talk about those particular areas.
Now the member wants to add to that and wants to talk
about internal audit findings, but she has occasionally used another word. She has used the word "review". I think that she has confused the terms of
the internal audit with the term of review.
What she seems to be interested in is a discussion which would best take
place around that budget line around information regarding that particular
area, that labour market area, and she may wish to talk about what kinds of
reviews or information is available.
However, in the area relating to the internal audit and
to the internal auditor, we have to look at protecting that auditor's
impartiality, and I have explained why.
I have also explained that what I have been prepared to table in order
to look at the work of the internal auditor is information that is far beyond
information which was ever given by her party when her party was in government.
Ms. Friesen: I do not know how
many times I have to repeat this, but the issue of the auditor's impartiality
has not been brought into question by anybody.
It is the minister who has raised that and continues to raise it.
The issue is, why is the minister prepared to table some
summaries on completion, and not this one?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair, I
have said as well several times this afternoon that this information is
internal, but that through the Estimates process, for the Estimates process,
some of this information may be useful.
I am prepared to do that during the Estimates process, but I have also
said that the other information that the member wants is not available yet.
Therefore, it could be made available for the Estimates process next year.
Ms. Friesen: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I guess that will simply have to stand on the record. The minister will have to leave us with two
years of absence of information where she has a completed one and she is not
prepared to table at that time. I guess
that will be part of the government's record.
In that context I want to look then at the relationship
of this auditor to the Provincial Auditor.
Could the minister tell us, after the deputy ministers receive those
reports, what the link is with the Provincial Auditor?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
the Provincial Auditor has access to our audit reports; the Provincial Auditor
may rely on our reports. However, our
auditor does not report to the Provincial Auditor.
The Provincial Auditor may audit areas of our department
and may, in fact, rely on the audits which have been done by our departmental
auditor. But it is not a reporting
relationship, and our departmental auditor reports to the deputy minister.
Ms. Friesen: Are there ever
meetings between the two auditors, or does it occur between the Provincial
Auditor and the deputy minister?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
both occur.
Ms. Friesen: I want to ask about
the Workforce 2000 audit. Perhaps the minister could begin by giving us an
outline of what the questions are to be asked there, the range of the review
and the timing on that.
* (1650)
Mrs. Vodrey: The area of
Workforce 2000 will be audited partly by the Provincial Auditor and partly by
the internal auditor.
We were interested in the auditing of that area, and when
the Provincial Auditor was looking at what areas may be audited, as well, we
had also expressed an interest and saw an area which we believed would be
useful. Therefore the Provincial Auditor
said, I am informed, that they would certainly do part of that audit, and then
a part that they would not be doing, we will be doing ourselves in the internal
audit.
Ms. Friesen: And this is arranged
between the deputy minister and the Provincial Auditor.
Mrs. Vodrey: I am informed that
the Provincial Auditor does have an opportunity to speak with the deputy
minister and also with our internal auditor.
They, however, do make the choice of the audit area. There were several areas in which we would be
interested in having the audit done, and they chose to do Workforce 2000, but
they have not yet defined the scope of their audit.
Ms. Friesen: I am just interested
in running over again the independence of the auditor within the
department. The minister made a number
of comments earlier about the reporting line to the deputy minister but not to
the Provincial Auditor, so I do have some questions about how these discussions
take place and where the actual choice is and where the reporting lines remain.
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, the internal auditor reports to the deputy minister in terms of
the findings of the report. The internal
auditor does not report to the deputy minister how she will go about doing her
work. The deputy minister does not
consult about the kinds of questions that will be asked, and how that work will
be performed. That is where the
impartiality lies for the work of the internal auditor.
In terms of the Provincial Auditor, the Provincial
Auditor has the ability to make decisions about where audits will lie. However,
the Provincial Auditor does have some contact and discussion in terms of areas
which we might like to have audited, but they did choose themselves to do
Workforce 2000.
Ms. Friesen: The minister said
that the scope of this audit has not yet been determined. Could she give us some idea of the timing of
this? We may not know the scope. What are we looking for on a completion date,
or when will we know the scope of the audit?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy
Chairperson, I am informed that the Provincial Auditor has begun work, but we
have not received a report or information on the scope of that work yet.
Again, they do not report to the department. The Provincial Auditor does not report to the
department. So we look for the
information to come regarding the scope of their work, and then we will be
looking at areas which are not covered by the Provincial Auditor.
Ms. Friesen: Given the fact that
we have had some discussion over the continuing audit, the absence of
conclusions yet in the Labour Market Policy unit, I am concerned that by next
year we do have some basis for discussion of Workforce 2000, and so the timing
does become an issue. I understand the
minister has not received from the Provincial Auditor what I guess will be requests
for information from the auditor of this department. When do you expect to
receive it? What kind of timing do you
have? Do you have an expectation or a
commitment to conclude that before the next Estimates?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair, I
am informed that really the closest we can give as a date is before the end of
the fiscal year. We do not have an
indication from them of exactly what the date may be.
Ms. Friesen: Just to clarify
that, that is, the request from the Provincial Auditor may not come until the
end of the fiscal year, so in fact we may not be looking next year in the next
Estimates at any completion of the Workforce 2000 audit?
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair, I
am informed that really this depends very much on the scope of the report and
in terms of when the Provincial Auditor brings that report forward.
Ms. Friesen: As I understand it,
the Provincial Auditor is going to be requiring or requesting information and
assistance from this department and, presumably, from the Auditor's section in
Workforce 2000. As I understood it, the
minister was saying the Provincial Auditor chose the work and will require some
section of it, or some portion of it, to be the work of the department.
* (1700)
Mrs. Vodrey: Mr. Deputy Chair,
the Provincial Auditor will define the scope of the work. The Provincial Auditor will table the
report. Then we will look at areas which
were not covered by the Provincial Auditor, and our own Internal Audit will
then look at auditing those areas which were not done by the Provincial
Auditor.
We have talked about this as a joint area. We identified this as an area we would like
to have audited. The Provincial Auditor
has also agreed to audit in this area, but we cannot give any further detail
now on exactly what our particular part of the audit will be until we have the
information from the Provincial Auditor.
Mr. Deputy Chairperson: The time
being 5 p.m. and time for private members' hour, committee rise.
ENVIRONMENT
Madam Chairperson (Louise Dacquay):
Order, please. Will the Committee
of Supply please come to order.
This section of the Committee of Supply is dealing with
the Estimates for the Department of Environment. Does the honourable minister responsible wish
to make an opening statement?
Hon. Glen Cummings (Minister of Environment):
It has been my practice to keep my opening remarks very short. I will put a little bit more on the record
this year perhaps than I have other years, with intention mostly to make sure
that we are getting a full range of information upon which there may well be
some questions asked.
The department's strategic plan has been I think fairly
well spelled out in the mission statement, that is, to ensure a high quality of
environment for present and future generations of Manitobans. There are a number of trends that are evident
with respect to environmental management and I would like to outline those.
There is an increasing public concern and expectation on
environmental issues even though we have tough economic times.
Madam Chairperson: Order, please. I wonder if I might request the co‑operation
of all members in having their private meetings either in the loge or outside
the Chamber in order that the critics may hear the minister's opening
statement.
Mr. Cummings: There is also
increased concern about the health and environment link which is something that
I do not think has been debated enough in this House from time to time. There is a development and evolution of the
sustainable development concept, one which I believe is becoming increasingly
well accepted and practised across the country.
There is an internationalization of environmental issues
as well. It is becoming increasingly
apparent that jurisdictions, countries, provinces cannot deal in isolation with
environmental issues. We have far more
interest in approaching environmental issues in new manners using new
technology, using new approaches of doing what are some of our old
responsibilities. There has been an
emergence of a number of new players in the environmental responsibility of this
jurisdiction and others and an increasing complexity of environmental issues.
The department, I believe, has a high degree of technical
competence, despite some of the questions and criticisms that are raised in
this House from time to time. The department
has a sound reputation across the country.
Our laboratory is considered one of the best in terms of its standards
and its quality. The water quality
objectives that were produced in this province are used as an example in many
jurisdictions.
Harmonization of environmental regulation has been
something that the department and myself at the minister's level have been
working on for the last number of years and have in fact been leading in the
nation in terms of bringing together the various jurisdictions for responsible
harmonization of environmental standards.
The Ozone Depleting Substances Act has also been well
criticized from time to time. There is
absolutely no dispute that
We have an effective Emergency Response Program, and a
successful reorganization of the department has been undertaken. I believe
there is a high sense of morale and purpose among the staff and I want to put
on the record that that is appreciated and I think serves the public of
Manitoba very well.
A number of issues I will address just as quickly as I
can, Madam Chairperson. First of all, in
water, our responsibility is to ensure that domestic water is safe, wise use of
existing and assimilative capacity in our waterways, minimization of the
introduction of toxins into Manitoba's waters, minimize risks and impacts
related to exotic species, protection of sustainable use of ground water and
surface water, protection of water quality at our borders and within the
province and ensure no net loss of aquatic habitat.
A number of areas that could be classified under waste:
insure the environmentally acceptable management of solid waste, hazardous
waste, biomedical waste, pesticide containers and residues and liquid wastes
and sludges. Let me address one part of
that particularly, Madam Chairperson, the handling of the pesticide container
problem in this province, despite the number of times the issue has been raised,
is by far recognized as one of the more practical approaches and is doing a
good job in terms of the percentage of containers that are being returned and
are being properly managed. The fact is
that
That is not to be critical of
Madam Chair, we are on track, I believe, to meet our 50
percent reduction of solid waste by the year 2000, and that we will be able to
ensure the proper management of dangerous goods through a number of initiatives
in the department, through the establishment of the Hazardous Waste
Corporation, and that we will be competent in our ability to respond to the
challenge of pollution prevention.
Under air, we must maintain a scientific knowledge base
to track air issues such as global warming, ozone layer depletion, and toxics
in air.
Just on that point, I would like to indicate that we have
what is now known as the boreal study.
We have a responsibility to co‑ordinate our
contribution to maintaining and improving transboundary global air quality,
identify, monitor and control point sources of air emissions and track ambient
and urban air precipitation quality.
Under land use, the Department of Environment is involved
in: ensuring sustainability of
terrestrial resources; protect our soil quality; establish standards for acceptable
soil quality; ensure the diversity, productivity and quality in vegetation and
wildlife habitat; develop and implement a management plan for contaminated
sites; co‑ordinate the interface between land use and environmental
issues as a preventative strategy.
* (1430)
I want to indicate that while all of these cut across
various responsibilities within government, it indicates, I think, very vividly
the good reasoning and the positive effect of having sustainable development
committees of cabinet working to make sure that the various projects, that the
various initiatives are co‑ordinated between departments.
We are pursuing a number of specific strategies through
the harmonization of effort at the national level through ministers in
council. We are working with local
governments and departments in focusing on regional solutions to a number of
the environmental issues in the province.
We have a responsibility to develop innovative approaches and
enforcement, and develop alternative approaches to command and control which,
with the greatest of respect, was the topic that we were debating yesterday in
Question Period, about whether or not command and control is the only way of
achieving goals within environmental regulation or whether there are other practices
that are equally as effective. We need
to place greater reliance on targets, objectives and standards rather than
prescribing specific technologies or approaches, and we need to extend
resources through involvement of others using delegation and empowerment.
The Department of Environment is a small department, and
it works closely out of necessity and out of practicality, but in fact one of
the most effective ways of accomplishing the goals of the Department of
Environment is working with the other departments in this government, the
Department of Agriculture specifically, Department of Natural Resources,
Department of Labour, Department of Highways.
We work with all of those departments very closely on various topics.
The department continues to work towards our remediation
of contaminated sites. In 1993, the
installation of alternate water systems for
I want to refer again specifically to the Transcona Domtar
site because we have now completed the tests of the system that may well be
brought to this province in order to treat the Transcona soils. There has been a community meeting completed
whereby the members of the community have indicated that they are willing to
consider the establishment of that site for the treatment of the soils, and
that ongoing process will be in their backyard for a couple of years while the
work is done.
We are also continuing to work on the Manfor site at an
enormous amount of money. We have
already put about $9 million into the cleanup of the Manfor site. Manitoba Hazardous Waste Management
corporation has embarked on developing a soil treatment facility for petroleum
contaminated soils. That will be up and
running this summer. We are also
pursuing cost sharing with the Government of Canada under its Contaminated
Sites Program with respect to the cleanup of some of the sites I have mentioned
above. So this is a very important area,
and there has been a lot of activity going on there, Madam Chairperson.
Environmental liability, I think, is probably, in the
minds of many people, one of the most important aspects of environmental
responsibility these days, one of the most controversial as we try to assign
proper liability and assign that responsibility so that dollars can flow for
the cost of cleanup. We have worked with
the stakeholders of
I would like to say that we just returned from the
ministers' meeting 10 days ago where the work that was led by
The department is involved in an interdepartmental basis
and at the national level in a position that requires or allows us, as a
province, to put forward a strong negotiating position regarding NAFTA and
regarding the side agreements. The basic
premise that we want to assure is that we will see an upward harmonization of
environmental standards from the level of enforcement of environmental laws
across the board that will be acceptable.
Public health inspections remain a high priority. To better address the department‑wide
issues, many of the current public health inspectors have been reclassified to
environment officers, and their responsibilities have increased in conjunction
with our increased presence in the communities of rural
The department continues to work closely with the
Department of Health with respect to delivery of public health services.
Madam Chairperson, the department emergency response is
very active. They have been running a 24‑hour
emergency response program. The service
across the province mainly regarding environmental accidents or emergencies
that may arise. It seems to me that a
lot of people forget that this small department responds to about 400 calls,
ranging from minor incidents to the 20‑day evacuation of
The department anticipates increased training and
regionalization for our emergency response workers. Pollution prevention is part of the
reorganization of the department. The
Planning and Innovation division was responsible for introducing a number of
new initiatives which would eliminate pollution at its source. As a cost‑containment measure, this
branch was eliminated this year, but has been replaced with a line
responsibility where an awful lot of the initiatives that they put into place
are now being operationalized within the department. This branch launched a number of new programs
such as the CFC and The Ozone Depleting Substances Act. The regulatory framework for The Waste
Reduction and Prevention Act has brought national attention to our ability to
lead into an orderly and progressive reduction of waste in this province.
This has been done with a tremendous amount of personal
effort on the part of the people in that section and using some fairly limited
resource, and using some imagination in bringing in the resources and the help
from various other sections which have overlapped in responsibility in
government. I believe that it has worked
very well.
The first province to enact CFC legislation‑‑we
now have 5,000 trained service technicians in this province, and that will also
indicate that we are in a fairly successful working relationship with a number
of industrial and environmental groups.
All of this was initiated through the former working group that brought
the industry, brought environmental groups and the department together to make
recommendations to government. They made policy recommendation; they made
suggestions for regulatory amendments.
They helped develop a compliance guide, a citizens' guide, a building
owners'/managers' guide, and vetted a number of industrial concerns, and
provided a communication linkage that was previously not available.
We have extended the secondment of the co‑ordinator
in that area until the end of September of this year, and I believe that we
have taken a rather bold step because we now have mandatory certification of
technicians in this province which puts us well ahead in terms of the
containment of CFCs, even though we are a small portion of the potential
numbers of CFCs that can be released.
* (1440)
Under waste reduction I will try and summarize some of
the things that have occurred there. But
the fact is that beverage container and packaging regulation came into effect
in 1992. To ensure that container
recovery meets or exceeds levels achieved in other provinces, these
requirements were put in place, that there would be a filing of a reduction
program by the beverage industry, licensing the distribution, target recovery
rates, a monitoring program.
Financial assessments are being made against the industry
and retailers are being required to either install recycling bins or inform
customers of the closest recycling depot.
I can indicate that by the first of August, as I have said previously, a
decision will be made on a go or a no‑go proposal to regulate the
beverage container industry into a deposit program or into another program that
would hopefully have an equal success rate.
In the past year, we have done a number of things in
terms of newspaper recycling. To say it
quickly, we have put a quarter of a million dollars from the old newspapers
into the fund in regional processing centres and in enhancement of recycling
across the province.
We have a request for proposal process that we have been
following on tires. An announcement has
been made, as you will have recalled, but we expect to have a used‑tire
management program in operation by this fall.
As of the first of June, it affects anyone who has successfully recycled
a tire and will be eligible for a $2.50 rebate to help offset that cost. That will continue to be funded through the
use of a $3.00 levy on tires. Out of that, we will also be offering 50 cents to
any municipal site that runs a recycled tire or a tire collection depot in
order to help offset some of their costs as well.
The decision to establish the used‑tire proposal
followed 14 different responses that we had from our request for proposal
process and we received everything from tires to energy to tires to alternate
products. In the end, the decision was
made that a number of the proposals wanted monopoly positions in the province
and none of their proposals seemed to be able to answer the concerns that we
raised in that respect and we indicated that we would go with an open system of
refund for a proper processed tire. We
have since had an informal response that would indicate that almost half of our
tires may well be taken up by existing recyclers as they expand their operations.
A number of recycling networks have now been
developed. We now have eight recycling
networks and over 60 municipalities that are serving a population of 160,000
outside of the city of
The department has also been active in the establishment
of a mid‑continent recycling association involving six states and two
provinces in an initiative that was followed from a meeting of our Premier with
leaders in these other jurisdictions that I believe will have some very
positive long‑term spin‑offs to this province and to the region as
a whole in terms of waste reduction.
A number of regional waste management proposals are
underway. We have put out $200,000 out
of the Environmental Innovations Fund to help 10 regional waste management
initiatives. Over 75 municipalities have
taken advantage of the matching grant program available to investigate their
regional management problems. We work
closely with those people and the Department of Rural Development to establish
a strategy to reduce ultimately some of the waste disposal grounds out there
but most certainly to make available a more environmentally sound waste
management system.
I will spend a couple of minutes talking about the
Environmental Innovations Fund, which has now been renamed the Sustainable
Development Innovation Fund. It provides
funding for development and implementation and promotion of environmental
projects. The source of revenue is the
environmental protection tax, which applies to alcohol beverage containers and
disposable diapers and some portion of the tire fund as well.
Applications for funding and support are received from
community groups and associations, student and parent‑teacher
associations, business and citizens organizations. As of March, the funding support totalled
$876,000, had been earmarked for recycling, composting, education and
awareness, regional waste management, regional recycling networks and market
development. In addition, major program initiatives improved solid waste
management facilities‑‑and to manage used tires are being
contemplated for the balance of this fiscal year.
Environmental Youth Corps was an opportunity to prepare
for environmental challenges of tomorrow by helping young people gain valuable
education and experience. The program
encourages youth to volunteer throughout the province for projects to improve
and protect
The purpose of the Youth Corps is to promote and maximize
the involvement of the youth in environmentally related projects. I have to indicate that it has been highly
successful in involving young people. We
have 6,500 youth between the age of six and 24 who participated last year on 65
projects throughout the province. In '92‑93,
the program had 8,000 participants. The
projects eligible for funding include water quality, waste minimization, fish
habitat, restoration, protection of flora and fauna, wildlife habitat and
rehabilitation of natural environment in local parks.
There has been much discussion here and in other parts of
the province about joint review panels.
This year we should see the completion of the first joint review panel
in this province. The North Central Transmission
Line panel includes Mr. George Campbell, Mr. Harry Wood and Mr. Tom
Henley. I think, undoubtedly, they will
become the first panel to complete their work on a joint basis and report,
given that the Conawapa panel is no longer active.
We have spent an enormous amount of time and energy on
Our sensitive area regulation, you will recall, was
discussed in this Chamber. It has been
in a position to be implemented on very short notice. It presently is in limbo as a result of a direct
request by the First Nations in that area asking that it not be implemented
while negotiations are going on, on the basin‑wide management plan. Then as a demonstration of good faith we have
agreed not to implement it at this point, but it is available to be implemented
on very short notice if we feel that those negotiations are not proceeding in
the best interests of the water quality.
We have spent some considerable amount of time with KPM
mining. Our attempt to have them present
information in the city of Winnipeg has not yet been complied with, but we
believe that is the only way that they will be able to show us and show the
people who are the consumers that they will be able to adequately protect the
water quality as they proceed with their exploration, and it appears that they
will be working on that exploration.
We have declared Sections 8 and 10 under The Dangerous
Goods Handling and Transportation Act.
It provides for licensing of handlers and transporters in accordance
with these sections of the act and will require that materials be disposed of
at a licensed facility. Adequate
controls, we believe, are in place to control future disposal facilities, and
now that these sections are proclaimed, implementation and enforcement are
proceeding.
* (1450)
The fact that we now have a successful siting for the
Hazardous Waste Corp., that it is now proceeding with its contaminated soil
management, will lead us to have a controlled environment and a practical point
of allowance for disposal of material.
That is the second part of enforcement, frankly. People need to be able
to feel when they are being regulated that they have an option as to where they
want to take their soils or other contaminated products. The development and construction of a facility
of this nature will enhance our ability to enforce as well, because there will
be a much more willing compliance on the part of producers of some of this
material, because while they are coming under compliance today, they are
somewhat limited in how they may expand some of their operations because they
may feel some constrictions of where they will be able to find additional
disposal for that which should be classified as hazardous material.
We have recently introduced a regulation to control stubble
burning, and those regulations will be in place this fall subsequent to the
passing of an amendment in the Legislature which will allow us to have RCMP
officers to be declared as environment officers as well. I believe it is a practical solution which we
have been able to work out in co‑operation with a number of other
departments, particularly the Department of Agriculture and the Department of
Natural Resources, and I think it has been a successful conclusion to what was
a very tough situation that occurred in and around the city of Winnipeg last
fall.
We have successfully finished publishing and releasing
the second State of the Environment Report, and I would only take a moment to
again compliment members of the department who put the work together using
editors and using contributors from other parts of government, other parts of
our regulating departments, because, again, with a fairly minimal budget, they
have come forward with a report that I think is based on a lot of well‑founded
data.
It now has started on the first trend line. This is the second report. So we can start to compare the information
one to the other, and I think we have the foundation for a very readable report
which I think is quite useful to all of our educational systems, and I think it
is useful to everyone else in the province who has enough interest to sit down
and look through the trends and the concerns and the positive things that are
included in a State of the Environment Report.
Zebra mussels are still with us. They are not in this province yet, to our
knowledge. By working with the
Department of Natural Resources using educational programs, using some
brochures, using some promotional material and doing a lot of promotional work
in areas where we believe campers, boaters and others who would have a
potential to have zebra mussels attached to their equipment, we have managed to
at least delay if not stop the advent of zebra mussels in this province.
I have mentioned the Manitoba Hazardous Waste Corporation
and what I think that its successes have been and where it will ultimately end
up. I close my remarks by stating the
obvious, which is that we are well on our way to having the second voluntarily
sited and constructed hazardous waste management facility in
I will close at that point, Madam Chairperson, and invite
questions.
Madam Chairperson: Does the critic for
the official opposition, the honourable member for Radisson, wish to make an
opening statement?
Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson):
Just very briefly, I want to put some concerns on the record. First of all, let us start off with a general
comment about this government's approach during this budget, which the theme
seems to have been, we are making tough decisions. When we look at what is happening in the
province and across the country in terms of environment, we can see that the
tough decisions are not anywhere near being made. The tough decisions that we
as a community have to start making are in becoming more sustainable and to
start to balance the economy and the environment, we are nowhere near doing
that.
It is interesting when we look at the statements made by
the government now that they have completely dropped all reference, when the
Premier (Mr. Filmon) is speaking, we do not hear references to sustainable
development anymore. All we hear now is,
there are tough decisions, and they have again bowed down to the old style of
economics, which ignores environmental concerns. So I think that we can see that with a lot of
the issues that are raised in the province, this government is not making the
tough decisions in terms of environment.
It is difficult as the critic in the opposition, given
our limited resources, to think that we can come anywhere near to following all
of the environmental problems in the province. Whenever we do come up with
industries that are not in compliance with their licence, that are not being
inspected properly, and we see the kind of blockade that we are dealing with in
situations like with Palliser, with the Abitibi‑Price licensing of their
effluent, with the horrible long‑term effects like the Stony Mountain
situation with the hazardous waste there.
Even though it sounds, from the minister's statements,
that there is a lot of activity in this area, it is clear that we do not have
an efficient system. We know that there
are a lot of industries that are in violation.
I hear all the time that mines are in violation of their licences for
effluent. We hear, and we know, because
it is documented to some extent now, that the water quality in
One of the concerns that I have raised before is that the
department continues to hide behind its procedural operations and is not forthcoming
with information. The government has not
been supporting citizen actions. We get
information that, when there are citizens concerned about the quality of their
water or reports of airborne emissions, they are met, in the department, with a
lack of information; with not being given a clear indication about what their
rights are; people are not encouraged to participate in environmental
assessments; they are not given the information that they need.
We just have to be concerned, I think. Even though there is a lot of talk about
moving in a positive direction, I do not think that we can be confident that
happens, that that is what is happening.
I have listed a number of other areas here. We just continue to have delays in the area
of hazardous waste. There is not a week
that goes by where I do not get some complaints about the sewage lagoons not
operating properly in this province; there being leaks and that is not being
dealt with; the poor performance in this province on waste reduction and recycling;
the way that we are not actually having the polluter pay; that there is no
input, financially, from industry in a meaningful way.
So, with that, I will end off and just try and get right
into some of the questions.
Madam Chairperson: Does the honourable
member for
Mrs. Sharon Carstairs (Leader of the Second Opposition):
Madam Chairperson, yes, I do. For
the purposes of these Estimates I will probably be the critic for the duration,
since the critic is off busy doing other things.
Madam Chair, I was concerned with this particular
department from budgetary day on, because while it appears that there has been
an overall increase for the Department of Environment of some 4.5 percent, when
one examines line by line what has happened to this budget, one sees a very
strange ordering of events.
We see, for example, that the government is still touting
its Institute for Sustainable Development, and I think we would all like to
think that
* (1500)
The government, obviously, has some long‑term hopes
and dreams for this particular institute and is prepared to spend some $1.375
million on it. I would like to know what
the federal contribution is because recently we have seen that declining in its
actual value. The reality is that
Manitobans, on a day‑to‑day basis, are much more affected by the
line of the minister's department which is entitled Waste Reduction Prevention
and Planning.
When we look at that particular line in the budget, it
has seen its staff cut in half and its budget reduced by some 56 percent which
does not bode well for waste reduction plans on a day‑to‑day
basis. In reality, I think one should
remember the old adage which if one takes care of the pennies, the dollars will
look after themselves.
Well, in this
particular department, we seem to look after the dollars, but we ignore the
pennies, and I think quite frankly to the disadvantage, ultimately, of our
children and our grandchildren who want to live in a community where waste
reduction is considered one of the true measurements of whether we are
ecologically concerned.
One only has to look at the amount of waste that gathers
around this building to realize that we are still very slow in changing
attitudes and in changing the directions that people have with respect to their
own individual as well as governmental business production of waste and the
means by which we can prevent that.
I am also concerned about the increase in environmental
operations because almost all of that increased money has gone into one specific
piece of legislation and that is The Dangerous Goods Handling and
Transportation Act and that there has been no other change in environmental
operations in the province of Manitoba.
We also know, of course, that the joint environmental assessment review
which was well funded has, in essence, been curtailed dramatically, because
Conawapa has been cancelled.
One wonders what will happen next time the next
government‑‑this one or any other government‑‑decides
to revitalize this particular project. Perhaps,
the government should be considering doing an environmental assessment of such
a project, such a far‑reaching project, when they are not under the gun
to approve such a project. That is
always the weakness of much of what goes on in any environmental review not
just by this government, but by any government and no matter what their
political stripe, that a government makes a decision or a business makes a
decision, although most often it is government, to spend large sums of money.
Those large sums of money are tied to a whole wish list
that the government wants to do, encouraging business, encouraging and
stimulating job creation, all of which are positive goals. Unfortunately, the
environment so often takes a second role and a secondary role to those other
ambitions and in particular times of recession, the environment appears to be
coming lower and lower and lower in any evaluation that is done. A year ago I think in the Angus Reid poll,
the environment was the No. 1 issue for all Canadians. In the most recent poll, the environment is
No. 6. That makes sense.
When people cannot feed their families, when they do not
have jobs, they do not have the ability to pay their rent, they are not going
to consider the environment as being quite so critical in their day‑to‑day
life as that putting of the food on the table.
All the more reason, I would suggest, that environmental reviews are
perhaps done in a logical and reasonable fashion and not when other, quite
frankly, mandates are competing for the interests of the population at any one
given time.
I also want to get into some debate with the minister
about the Clean Environment Commission and philosophical debate about the Clean
Environment Commission. We have I think,
as a political party and I refer now to the Liberal Party, tried to be
extremely supportive to the Clean Environment Commission. We were not particularly happy with the
decision it made about Oak Hammock, but we did say before they were brought in
to do the review that if they made their review and in their best judgment
having heard witnesses that we certainly were not able to hear, that there
would be no environmental long‑term damage, we said we would abide by
such a decision.
The decision was made on Oak Hammock Marsh, the project
went forward, but then, while we are still dealing with the construction of
that particular project, the Clean Environment Commission made another
report. This time it was with respect to
logging in provincial parks. They made
strong recommendations, recommendations which were, quite frankly, not accepted
by the government, and so the Clean Environment Commission's report was swept
aside.
That does not give us great comfort in knowing that it is
this very Clean Environment Commission that is yet once again looking at the
I would like to know exactly where the minister stands
and where his government stands on whether they are going to support
recommendations that are made by the Clean Environment Commission or whether
they are going to quite frankly swing with the tide. When the tide is out and
it is in government's favour, then they will say, wonderful, we appreciate, we
support, we encourage the Clean Environment Commission. When the CEC comes up with a report that does
not, and the tide is in, well, then they will say, sorry but we are going to
push the tide back out again.
So those are the issues that I will be dealing with in
the Estimates process, and I look forward to some interesting debate.
Madam Chairperson: I would remind the
committee that we will defer dealing with item 1.(a) until the completion of
the other line‑by‑line items.
At this time, I would invite the minister's staff to
enter the Chamber.
Mr. Cummings: First of all, I
introduce my deputy Norm Brandson; ADM Serge Scrafield; Wolf Boehm, who is
responsible for administration; and Kent Hawkins, who is a man of many talents,
but is responsible for public health inspections.
We will attempt to answer questions as quickly as we can,
Madam Chair. I would only like to make a
couple of comments, however. However my
critics wish to handle the process is fine with me. There were only a couple of things that I
would like to respond to in terms of the opening comments.
I am particularly sensitive to the question of whether or
not I or this government in general, of how we would deal with the Clean
Environment recommendations. I want to
make it very clear, particulary in the response to whether or not there should
be logging in
In fact, we have since gone to a very extensive process
to respond to the recommendations of the commission. In fact, every recommendation of the
commission has been responded to, including the one regarding the amount of
logging that should occur in parks. The
result of the review that has been done, as a result of the practicality of how
operations are being allowed to proceed, the recommendations in that particular
area will actually come very close to being accomplished, even in the area that
was outside of the Clean Environment Commission's jurisdiction of recommendation.
* (1510)
At least we are in a much better position to respond to
the question of logging in parks. As
much as we have reviewed it in detail, we reviewed it in principle, reviewed it
in terms of what are needed lands to be set aside in this province and what the
definition of "parks" had been.
We have simply not responded by taking logging out of one park and
putting it in another, as has occurred under previous administrations.
The fact is that a number of the parks in this province
were established and called parks even though the parameters under which they
were established allowed for multiple use.
Frankly, what has occurred over the last few years is that the public
has chosen to‑‑and there are certainly a good number of reasons,
but the public has chosen not to accept the multiple‑use aspect.
The Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Enns) has
responded, I believe, fully and completely in that respect. I would like to indicate that the respect of
this minister and this government for a Clean Environment Commission on their
recommendations is not at all besmirched by the decision that was made in that
respect or the decisions around Oak Hammock, because as more and more people go
to Oak Hammock today, what they have found is that this project is meeting the
requirements that were placed upon it under the environmental review. That is the type of result that one should be
able to expect from the review of the panel, the implementation of their
recommendations.
I think the time would be more usefully spent if we get
on with the questions that the opposition considers a priority, and I will step
down.
Madam Chairperson: 1.(b) Executive
Support (1) Salaries.
Ms. Cerilli: This is the section
that deals with overall departments, priorities and directions. I want to start off by asking: How would the minister summarize the policy
priorities for his department, and how is that decided upon? [interjection] How are you deciding what
the priorities are and what your priorities are for the department?
Mr. Cummings: Both this critic and
the Leader of the Second Opposition (Mrs. Carstairs) have referenced the
question of priorities. I said, I
believe, during this process last year that when we were moving toward the
declaration of Sections 8 and 10, under Dangerous Goods, that would be our
priority in getting on with any initiatives we were going to be putting
forward, that would be one of the most important aspects because it is a section
that needs to be dealt with and an area that was of concern to us.
That was tied to a larger strategy of course of getting
the ability of the Crown corporation, the Manitoba Hazardous Waste Corp., in a
better position to respond to demands that might be placed on it as a result of
that, and at the same time there is a great deal of work that goes on within
the department in terms of a strategic planning process. Frankly there are choices of the department,
and I as minister and we as government have to move on.
I know that our critics have said that the Planning and
Innovation Branch that the changing of their responsibilities could be
considered as throwing out of the initiatives that they have taken over, and
that is certainly not the case. What has
happened is that they have been producing initiatives probably as fast or
faster than could be followed up on.
The fact is that all of those initiatives are being
internalized within various sections of the department. So in establishing priorities one simply has
to say, what is the most important thing that you can do to protect the
environment, protect our future resources?
When I look at what we can accomplish in hazardous waste‑‑this
is with or without the Hazardous Waste Corporation itself being able to treat
the materials‑‑that is one of the areas where we know that
technologically and with the addition of some staff in that area that we can
make progress.
We also know that waste management, the waste disposal
ground regulation and the changes that have occurred there, while those were
not big changes in terms of pages of regulatory work, they have had a traumatic
effect across rural
I have had, frankly, a fair bit of backlash from rural
municipalities who were not too keen on this.
I have to say that things have changed over the last year, that I now
see a lot of municipalities that are taking the alternate approach, that they
want to be ahead of regulation, they want to be ahead of some of the concerns
that people are raising.
The difference is that the public has said to their local
governments that we want you to deal with this problem, and the same thing is
occurring simply in the way people approach the service that is available
through their local waste disposal ground.
Voluntary separation of waste a la rural municipal waste
grounds was unheard of. It is happening
with a high degree of success in some areas.
The City of
The
The other setting of priorities, of course is‑‑well,
very often occurs through the type of debate that we are engaged in here. We have public reaction in terms of‑‑and
we need to be able to recognize whether it is in this type of debate or in
public forums that I am involved in, as to what concerns may be in the public
forum.
That is very much reflected in the licensing
process. The technical aspects of a
licence are very often the easy part. I
think we probably have a number of examples in front of us for the coming
summer‑‑the Fisher Branch issue, the Pembina Valley water pipeline‑‑where
the biggest challenge to the commission and to regulators will not be the
technical answers that are required, but making sure that adequate public input
is available and that adequate information is available as to any impacts on
how those are quantified and dealt with.
Establishing in the priorities of the department, we
obviously did a lot of discussion with the department through my own office and
we set the priorities as I outlined, particularly regarding the hazardous
waste.
Ms. Cerilli: Madam Chairperson,
so am I to understand when I ask the question how you set priorities, the first
thing that you said was that we look at what we can do and that would be a
concern.
The next thing you talked about was waste reduction and
recycling and then you mentioned leadership that this province is taking with
respect to national issues like viability for contaminated sites and then you
also mentioned public concern as expressed at hearings and then you also said
that lowly critics also have an influence on priorities, and I guess that is by
the issues we raise.
* (1520)
Well, that is a concern to me because nowhere there is
there any mention about what are the most serious concerns with respect to the
environment in
So I do not know if you want to clarify for me, if that
indeed is how you are setting the priorities, because the questions I was going
to ask following this are to have you put on the record what you see as the
most environmentally damaging activities in the province‑‑what are
the most damaging things that are happening in the province and what are the
most serious threats to the variety of natural resources that we have in
different areas in the environment?
Mr. Cummings: Let me be very
clear. One can either give two‑word
answers here or we can get into longer discussions. We talk about a process of establishing
priorities. I indicated that we chose an
area that was obviously one that would have the most beneficial effect for the
environment in the province.
We are not backing off on our existing mandate unless
there are parts of that mandate that no longer apply. We have our basic responsibilities that I
indicated in my opening remarks.
I indicated that hazardous waste, through implication of
what happens as a result of declaring Sections 8 and 10, were our
priority. It was not a question of whether
or not we could or could not do something.
It was a question of what we could do that would create the most
effective benefits to the environment.
In terms of all of the other aspects of what follows from
that, it was clearly identified two years ago in the State of the Environment
Report that water quality is one of the areas that needs to create the most
concern.
Frankly, the process that we have put in place, where we
are increasing our knowledge in the area of water quality and monitoring, is giving
us the ability to strike licensing requirements, to evaluate projects that end
up going forward to make sure that mitigating or offsetting actions are in
place. Those are the kinds of things that begin to protect and ultimately
enhance the water quality.
We have spent millions of dollars, albeit not
megamillions, but there have been millions of dollars spent in this province
over the last few years on increased water retention and water quality
enhancement. We know if we do not
protect the water quality that we have taken the first step towards the
degradation of the environment.
This has been primarily an agricultural‑‑and
we talk about broad applications across the countryside, if you will. It varies from agriculture to logging to
mining to urban sprawl. All of those things have an impact on water
quality. Coupled with that is the fact
that industrial activity can have a dramatic effect on air, water and
soil. Therefore, the priority ties very
nicely with the one area that we have identified a couple of years ago that we
need to continue moving on, and that is the protection of the water quality
enhancement.
Ms. Cerilli: Let us start off
talking about water quality first then in answer to the rest of my question.
What are the most damaging activities in the province and
in what areas is the water quality and water resources in the province most
threatened?
Mr. Cummings: Madam Chairperson, I
guess the question is so broad and sweeping that one could either answer it now
in a few short words or take the rest of the day talking about the broad
impacts of living on this planet. Almost
every activity that occurs as a result of mankind in this province will have an
impact on the environment.
As a farmer, I was somewhat offended when a number of environmental
groups pointed out to me when I first came into office that agriculture could
be seen as offensive to the environment.
I do not think there is anyone here who would say, however, that we
should eliminate agricultural activity.
What we need to recognize is that the protection of the water, the soil
and the air from environmental impacts that we are all concerned about leads us
to a number of actions, whether it is in agriculture or mining or the other
activities that come back to certain basic principles to ensure that the
domestic water is kept available to us in a purer possible way, to make sure
that we, in licensing discharges, recognize any impacts that may come from
that, the minimization of release of materials that could be classified as toxic. Obviously, you have to be the most concerned
about anything that could be classified as a persistent toxic in the
environment.
Minimizing all of those risks, it is difficult to
indicate whether there is one activity known to this province that would be the
most environmentally damaging.
Certainly, you could sit at the end of
However, you have to look at what are the real impacts
and what are the accumulative effects of any of the activities that occur. You could go to a tailings pile in northern
I think we have to look at it from a broader sense as to
what activities are impacting on some of the more important areas of our
responsibility and deal with them. We
deal with the whole cross section.
Some of the emissions that used to be allowed by industry
into Winnipeg's riverways through the sewer system, treated or otherwise, are
probably now somewhere out there in the Churchill estuary. You know, you could take this question as
broad and as wide as you want to, and you could ask: Is that why we have PCBs in the blubber of
the whales in
I think it would be much more accurate to talk about how
we manage potential and real impacts on the environment and how we mitigate against
them. Rather than attempt to pinpoint a
particular activity, I take the other approach that we should point to what is
our most important responsibility, if we have to in fact prioritize one ahead
of the other. I point to water quality
as being one that we identified a couple of years ago.
Ms. Cerilli: The minister seems
to be insinuating that this is not a legitimate question. We are talking about priorities here, and I
remind him that I am asking him these questions as he is in his role as the
Environment minister, not as he is in his role as a farmer.
I am wanting to find out if we are setting
priorities. We have limited
resources. What is the priority then of
all of these things that the minister has mentioned? What does he think are the activities that
are causing the greatest damage to water quality in
* (1530)
Mr. Cummings: One of the greatest
concerns that I have is that you will end up with toxics in the water, that you
will end up with erosion that helps to get those toxics in there, that you can
end up with improper discharges, that you can end up reducing the aquatic life
and the fish and the biota through overloading of certain riverways as a result
of human activity.
I take the discussion one step further, and that is,
well, we are the regulatory body. We can
look at the
We live in the Prairies, and it makes the job of
regulation that this department does even more problematic. We do not have spring fed rivers running off
the slopes of the mountains. We have to
deal with the reality of prairie rivers, prairie wells and prairie lakes which
very often become neutrified simply because of lack of rainfall and increased
concentration that goes with that in the waterways.
So it becomes a matter for the department to make sure
that they are adequately regulating and controlling any impacts on the
water. Very often that, outside of some
of the regulated waterways such as I point to the
I can point to a dozen communities outside of the city of
My point is that the department works from the regulatory
aspect, but we work very closely with the other departments to make sure that
the water quality is enhanced in the long run.
Ms. Cerilli: In the beginning of
his answer, the minister made a comment that he does not want to see toxins and
discharges go into the water. Well, I
would just ask, toxins from what and discharges from what? What are the concerns that the minister would
have of potentially harmful impacts on our water resources?
Mr. Cummings: Madam Chairperson,
frankly, what that reflects is that my earlier comments were not seemingly
accepted as being a responsible answer to the question. That is, if you are talking about toxins
getting into the water, you are talking about hazardous waste. When we talk about hazardous waste, the way
we regulate that, the way we get it out of the environment will be through
Sections 8 and 10, will be part of the process that will help us with that.
So this is not a scatter‑gun approach, it is a
reasoned approach. The point I want to
make, and this is not a reflection on anybody's question, is that this is an
integrated approach. Just dealing with Sections 8 and 10 in and of itself, you
might say that if that is all we did all year, we would not be much of a
department. But, essentially, you asked
what our priorities were. We said that
we have moved up the level of activity in this area, made it a priority to get
better regulatory capacity in this area, and it reflects very much back onto
water quality which is what we believe is‑‑if we must choose
between the three elements that the environment has to deal with, soil, air and
water, then obviously the water is our greater concern at this point.
The Department of Agriculture has put forward a lot of
effort and works with this department in terms of soil erosion. Frankly, you
talk about toxics getting into water, erosion of soil does carry toxics into
the water in a degree that can be unacceptable.
That is why there is such an emphasis that has been put in that area.
The same thing, however, is true about human
effluent. Rural residential development
can be a wonderful lifestyle, but unless thereto we put into place proper
sewage systems and regulation, we can end up with a contamination of ground
water in a manner that is most unacceptable and becomes very difficult for
communities.
I can point again to a number of communities who say they
need water supplies because their wells are contaminated. Why are their wells contaminated? Because they have had improper sewage
disposal from their private residences.
Why have they not dealt with it? From the historic manner of disposal of human
effluent, they have not put in complete systems or they have not put in proper
septic tank systems. This is the area
that is increasingly being regulated as well, as people begin to realize the
problems that are associated with this.
The contamination from gas stations is certainly evident,
but it is more evident inasmuch as you can smell or taste gas pretty quickly,
but you might not recognize at the critical moment when you have also a
contaminated well from other sources.
There can be health problems associated with that very quickly.
The Minister of Rural Development (Mr. Derkach) gets all
kinds of requests to enhance water and sewage, but smaller communities out
there very often want the water first.
That may very well be as a result of the scenario that I just talked
about.
When we talk about the larger centres in this province,
we have to worry about what industrial wastes are getting into the sewage
streams and make sure that we do not expose ourselves to undue risks in that
area as well.
Ms. Cerilli: I guess what I am
trying to do with these questions is just sort of establish some kind of sense
of where the greatest threats are in Manitoba and what are the sources‑‑the
most threatening hazardous waste to water then in Manitoba.
Mr. Cummings: The member is asking
me to pinpoint a single source that has polluted a significant amount of ground
water or surface water. I suppose that
in itself might be difficult because what is important to one person might not
be as important to someone else, or what is important environmentally, why
should one aquifer be less important than another environmentally.
So the point is that there is a number of historically
contaminated sites. We have Manfor, the
major contamination of an aquifer there.
We only hope that the water of the contaminated ground water does not
get over to the rural residential wells that are about a mile away from the
plant site or get into the river.
We can look to the
* (1540)
I point to
The same thing applies to oil fuel, waste from
industry. You can go through a whole
gamut of these types of situations that can have long‑lasting impacts on
water quality. Again, if you contaminate
an aquifer, you have probably got a problem that will last for a century. So many people have historically not looked
to the problems associated with dumping on ground, if you will, not realizing
the long‑term effects and problems associated with that getting into
aquifers.
We do not have a long history of a highly industrialized
society. A lot of the heavy industry has
been located near the mining communities, in the city of
Something as long‑term as changing and upgrading
the sewage treatment in the city of
We are all collectively dealing with a number of
situations that relate to these activities.
We spent‑‑I do take some umbrage about this one, not with
this member particularly, but with the critic from her area‑‑enormous
resources looking at the air quality around Palliser Furniture. A number of people have said that that is a
terrible polluting process. But when our
officers went out there and looked at the sawdust that was presumably blowing
onto people's sites from the Palliser plant, where was it coming from? It was coming from houses that were being
constructed right beside them in the housing development.
I guess I am saying that we have to get into perspective
what are some of the real polluting problems out there. When I talk about what might be getting
dumped, or might have been dumped historically into lagoon systems that were
not recognized as being polluting, are probably now the cause of long‑term
concerns that we have about water quality.
You only need to look down our streams, particularly near our larger
centres, to see the concerns that can be around that.
We are only today, in the last decade‑‑Manitoba
is now seen to be the one jurisdiction where the treatment of‑‑we
have a higher percentage of urban effluent treated in this province than any
other province in
Ms. Cerilli: What we are talking
about here is setting priorities, and I would say that it is perfectly
reasonable for the Minister of Environment to point, to use his word, to
certain areas and say, this is a contaminating practice, this has to be a
priority. He mentioned twice that there
was a problem with the sewage in
Since we are discussing, you know, setting priorities, I
think it is reasonable to ask sort of these broader questions, and that will
relate to something that the minister mentioned, which is trying to make the
connection between health and the environment.
I would ask the minister in the same vein what the
department considers the greatest risks in Manitoba to people's health from
environmental contamination, environmental problems.
Mr. Cummings: I think the answer
is that it would be any potential release of toxics into our drinking water or
into our air.
Ms. Cerilli: I thank the minister
for that straightforward answer. I will
pass over to the Liberal Leader.
Mrs. Carstairs: Madam Chairperson, I
have a number of questions in this particular area.
I would like to begin with the fact that if this is the
executive support branch of the minister's department and there are seven
staff, can he outline for me the number of co‑ordinating committees with
other departments which exist between members of this support staff and members
of, for example, the support staff of the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr.
Enns), the Department of Agriculture (Mr. Findlay), the Department of Rural
Development (Mr. Derkach), or any other departments that might exist?
Mr. Cummings: First of all, at the
senior level there is the Interdepartmental Planning Board, which is all the
deputy ministers from this area. I guess
I am going to have to take a minute to contemplate all of the various levels at
which we work. The Department of
Environment works daily with the Water Resources branch, for example, of the
Department of Natural Resources getting information and co‑operating on
response to licensing and other matters.
Water quality and water quantity have a number of overlapping areas.
The Provincial Land Use Committee, which I chair, all
departments co‑operate to provide information to that area. When I indicate that that is the Cabinet
level, but there is all of the various work that goes on without ever getting
to Cabinet in terms of the work that the interrelationship of those departments
on provincial land use, the Crown lands, sales, appeals of Crown lands uses,
those sorts of things.
There is the Sustainable Development Committee of Cabinet
where we have again the same process where only additionally the various
departments assess their areas, assess the projects and processes in their own
area and then we have to come together in agreement between all of those areas
as a result of the analysis that is done cross‑jurisdictionally.
* (1550)
The Department of Environment enforces ministers in rural
There are a number of other areas that we work. The Department of Environment is almost
always represented on a number of ad hoc committees that may be stuck on
certain issues because environment is invariably part of the process from the
point of view of industrial development.
Wherever there is licensing required, there are technical advisory
committees on each of those processes for all the other departments that could
have input are asked to be represented as part of that technical advisory
committee.
I think if you would like a list of those or if you wish
a more generic answer which I just gave that you would have to agree that the
Department of Environment is involved with almost all of the decisions that are
made on the resource side of government‑‑resource and, to a large
extent, health.
For example, there is a committee working on biomedical
waste which the Department of Environment and the Department of Health are
equal participants. Those sorts of
things mean that we are in contact with other responsible, regulatory bodies in
the government almost daily.
Mrs. Carstairs: What I would really
like to know is at what process is the Department of Environment involved
because it is a strange department in many respects? Strange in the sense that it deals with all
of these areas, but decisions frequently seem to get made by other departments.
I want to know at what stage the Department of
Environment gets involved? Only when it
becomes clear to the Department of Agriculture, oh, gee, imagine, the
Department of Environment maybe should be involved in this, or are you involved
from the beginning?
Mr. Cummings: Very much from the
beginning. There are certainly incidents
where we could all point to the fact that perhaps either this department or
other departments might have been involved sooner.
But I would have to say, now that I have been in this area
for four years, I guess, in excess of four years, I find that that was one of
the challenges when we came into government, came into this area, and the co‑operation
between the departments has increased dramatically, probably as a result of two
things. Number 1, as ministers and as deputy ministers, we have all been
challenged to work cross sectorally as part of our approach to sustainable
development and the decision‑making process that surrounds that, and also
by the increased responsibility that we have in relationship to all of these
areas.
Let me provide an example. A very vivid example was the regulation of
stubble burning that has just recently occurred. It has been a process that
could be controlled under a number of different areas, depending on the
location, depending on the nature of the problem. Natural Resources, Agriculture, Environment
were all involved. Natural Resources
used to become involved where natural resources were being threatened by a fire
or by domestically lit but perhaps escaping fires. Bog fires would be a perfect example, peat
moss fires.
The Department of Environment was responsible for air
quality, so we immediately had a responsibility from the start. The Department
of Agriculture‑‑in the early planning stages of how we would face
the problem of stubble burning, the Department of Agriculture was expected to
take the lead because they had an educational responsibility.
The Department of Environment was involved in the obvious
aspects of air quality. We are also involved
from the point of view that The Environment Act has the capacity to be expanded
to regulate these types of functions. As
the member would recall, in the early discussion of control of burning,
particularly in the Winnipeg region, the Department of Agriculture took the
lead, but the Department of Environment was very much part of all of that
activity.
The network was out there through the Department of
Agriculture to do the educational function.
When it became necessary to deal with an emergency situation, of course,
then emergency response was able to be implemented, but when it came down to
finally implementing the regulations, they were implemented under The
Environment Act. However, we have right
from the start made sure that all departments were involved in that.
That is a very small example, but that is pretty typical
of how these types of issues are handled.
I would indicate that right from the start the interdepartmental
planning board is meant to be the co‑ordination.
Mrs. Carstairs: I am presuming that
the managerial position under subappropriation 1.(b) is the deputy
minister. Is that correct?
Mr. Cummings: That is correct.
Mrs. Carstairs: Can the minister
explain why his deputy minister seems to be one of the lowest paid deputy ministers?
Mr. Cummings: Actually he has
asked me that a couple of times, too. It
is not a reflection on the present incumbent, but it is the entry level at
which the present deputy minister entered at, and under terms of restraint, we
have not been increasing anyone's salary beyond what would be normal
incremental increases. Therefore a
number of people are in that situation.
I think the member has frankly raised a question that all
of us need to think about in a broader sense.
If I were to have brought in an increase in this department at the DM
level for an existing personnel at the same time as we were asking everyone
else to take a 3.8 percent hit on their salary, I do not think it would take
much imagination to describe what would have occurred to me and what would have
occurred in this House. Therefore, we
are in the situation that we are.
Mrs. Carstairs: Well, the minister
may not realize it, but there is a little bit of method in my madness
here. I think the minister is quite
aware, whether he admits it or not in this Chamber, there is a certain pecking
order in deputy ministers. Some are considered a little bit more senior than
other deputy ministers are considered senior.
Perhaps, I can make these assertions because I am leaving public office
and I do not have to worry about ever having a deputy minister.
The reality is that on the pecking order of deputy
ministers, this deputy minister is not very high. What impact does that have on his influence
when he meets with other deputy ministers?
Mr. Cummings: I am enjoying this
discussion because when I meet with other Environment ministers across the
country, I am the lowest paid of them as well, and I like to think my influence
is quite substantial. I would say the
same thing is true in terms of the civil service. We are a small but, I would blush to say, an
important department.
The influence of the Department of Environment in fact
goes far beyond just the size and/or the level of reimbursement that we
receive.
* (1600)
Mrs. Carstairs: I notice that the
Communications budget for this particular subappropriation is 22.4, which is
not high in and of itself, but I decided that I would do a little
tracking. It turns out that the
Communications budget for this department, if one just takes the appropriations,
is some $434,600, which seems like an inordinate amount of money for a
department that only has a budget of $16 million.
Would the minister like to tell me just what they are
spending $434,600 on in terms of communication?
Mr. Cummings: That is mainly
telephone bills, Madam Chairperson.
Mrs. Carstairs: Well, I am glad it
is mainly telephone bills, but very high telephone bills. Would the minister like to explain why this
particular branch has, in overall percentage terms, considerably higher
telephone bills than other government departments?
Mr. Cummings: Well, take $126,000
away from that, and that is the amount that would be left for telephone
communication. Part of it may be
reflected on the decentralization model.
We have a very small department, but we have just recently decentralized
into other sections of the province.
That would obviously increase our operating costs. In fact that has been one of the questions
this department and others have to wrestle with in terms of making sure
providing that service and keeping within our mandate is not simply replacing
travel costs with other costs.
I stand to be corrected.
I am sorry. There was $126,000
spent on publications, so then the information I am receiving is that the
$400,000 is primarily telephone. The
second aspect of that is, if I can speak to the $126,000, that we have
published things such as the ozone pamphlet.
Those are the kinds of things that we have put out. The fact is that this department does an
awful lot less public communicating than we did a few years ago. The fact is
that has been one area that we have been very conscious of the fact that while
the department has a responsibility, it does not have a propaganda
responsibility, and we have been very conscious about making sure that the
costs in that area have been contained.
There are a number of things that go with that. I have just received the information that out
of the $126,000 that would have gone into publications, $80,000 of that was for
advertising under The Environment Act where we have a statutory requirement to
publicize applications for licence. That
would be a large part of that.
In terms of why the volume of telephone communications, I
am not sure that I have made the comparison with other departments. I am not
sure on what basis the member would say that this is inordinately high compared
to other departments. We, frankly, do an
awful lot of business on the phone. I
personally have probably contributed a fair bit to that cost myself. Part of that would be national
responsibilities. Part of it would be
the fact that we have found in a number of situations that when you have a
rural minister, you probably have increased travel and telephone costs, because
communications that I might make out of my office would necessarily add to the
department's costs as well.
We also have‑‑and we do not have a breakdown‑‑but
my deputy is indicting to me that as part of our emergency response
responsibilities that we sometimes get some extremely expensive phone
bills. There is a very expensive type of
communication that we have been involved in and that may in fact be the answer
to part of the question as to why this, in relationship to the size of the
department, would appear to be an expense that is different than the normal
pattern.
Mrs. Carstairs: I will get into it a
little later, but it struck me particularly for example in Waste Reduction and
Prevention Planning, which had an overall reduction of 56 percent, actually saw
an increase of 47 percent in communications.
That is what alerted me to going through the rest of it, quite frankly,
and trying to figure out what had happened with respect to the minister's
communication budget, but 2.6 percent of his budget is very high.
Just for purpose of clarification and then I will get off
the topic, because I got confused with his presentation at one point. Of the $434,000, is that $126,000 to be
subtracted or am I to find that $126,000 someplace else?
Mr. Cummings: You will find it
someplace else. It is additional to and
will be found in another place in the Estimates. I would just indicate, the waste reduction
area was not reduced. It was the
planning area that was reduced.
Frankly, that area, when you talk about communication
costs, I can indicate in a very practical sense that since we introduced the
new waste disposal ground regulations and the CFC regulations and the newsprint
and used tire regulations that we have introduced, all of that has involved not
only a lot of communication in the province, a lot of that has involved
communication on a broader scale across the country, particularly tires. It just struck me that almost all of the
phone calls surrounding tires, for example, would have been made out of that
area. We followed
I would have to indicate even as well that all of the
information for the waste disposal grounds, or almost all of it, would have
probably come through that area which would involve work outside of the city
and would have been disadvantaged of a centralized program.
The other thing that I think needs to be touched on is
that I have asked specifically that we not travel as much out of this
department. Departments of Environment
everywhere do more travelling than other departments and many responsibilities
the last couple of years. We have said
that conference calls might be much preferable to airline tickets in order to
get certain jobs accomplished. That
might have reflected in this area as well as a result of that directive.
Mrs. Carstairs: Two years ago the
communications function of this department, as well as all other departments,
were reorganized and they were put over in the Department of Culture, Heritage
and Citizenship.
What is the relationship between that and your
department? Presumably you no longer write the ads. That is written by the communications
department, as I understood was supposed to happen. Are you then charged for those ads as part of
your communications budget?
Mr. Cummings: That is
correct. I would think in the case of
the ads that we referred to in terms of licensing, these are pretty generic and
probably specific. So the layout might
be handled differently, but I am sure they are pretty generic and we probably
do most of the work internally.
Madam Chairperson: Item 1.(b)(1)
Salaries $292,500.
Ms. Cerilli: I just want to go
back here before we pass this section.
This is the section dealing with policy.
I know that the Sustainable Development Round Table has developed
a policy on overall government changes to become more sustainable. Is this the area that would oversee that, or
what responsibility would the department have in implementing that kind of a
policy for government?
Mr. Cummings: First of all, the work
that the member refers to would primarily be the responsibility of the
Sustainable Development Secretariat, which is made up of employees who are
working there on a full‑time basis representing various disciplines from
different departments.
Each department then becomes involved in subcommittees
that would provide advice to the secretariat on the type of work that they are
doing. The secretariat does the major
portion of the writing. They do the
major portion of the policy thinking that would go into a lot of those
documents that you are talking about. So
we would not be directly involved.
* (1610)
I, as minister, would be involved because I am part of
the round table which the secretariat reports to the Premier (Mr. Filmon) and
his staff to the round table.
Madam Chairperson: 1.(b) Executive
Support (1) Salaries $292,500‑‑pass; (2) Other Expenditures $79,900‑‑pass.
1.(c) Waste Reduction and Prevention Planning (1)
Salaries $167,000.
Ms. Cerilli: This is the division
that has been eliminated, as I understand it, and I guess, first of all, I want
to see where the staff that were in this area have been allocated.
Mr. Cummings: First of all, what
you see here is what was the old Planning and Innovation division. I think all of those personnel are still with
us. The secretary of Planning and
Innovation is‑‑they are all still located in
I think the answer that provides maybe the most
illumination for the member would be put in this context. When the SYs were eliminated, when the staff
years were eliminated, two of them were vacant, so that did not mean that there
was any warm body that was looking for a job.
The balance was reassigned into other vacancies in the department. Out of that group, one was able to pick up a
fairly significant responsibilityy with the Department of I, T and T, so that
meant that there was not a staff year in the Department of Environment that was
needed for that person.
Therefore, many of the same functions are still being
performed but under different direction, but we no longer have a director at
that level. They are reporting to other
people existing within the department.
Ms. Cerilli: That is what I am
trying to understand, where are these people reporting? You only had three staff that were working on
all the issues and all the programs under waste reduction and now we have those
people hidden, it seems, so I appreciate that you probably saved some money from
not having a manager for that small number of staff, but where are these people
working then? Do they still have the
same job responsibilities, or where are the positions operating under, I guess
is a better way to phrase the question?
Mr. Cummings: Laurie Streich is
with Environmental Management; Michele Guay is with Operations; Jerry Spiegel
is director of the newly established Pollution Prevention Branch; Lorna
Hendrickson has gone to I, T and T.
Gerry McCormick‑‑the other position there was vacant. The people associated with the WRAP group are
all under the new Pollution Prevention Branch, which means that their
responsibilities still encompass a good deal of what they did before, but they
have to do some forward thinking in terms of the processes that we implement in
the department or initiatives that we take to prevent the‑‑as the
branch says, pollution prevention.
Ms. Cerilli: Why was this change
made with the staff being moved in this way?
What was the reason?
Mr. Cummings: I think it could be
best described as a way of saving some administrative dollars, saving some
dollars cost to the department. At the
same time, we took a lot of their functions and put them into the regions in
terms of the planning, put more responsibility on some of our other structure,
but provided us with a reorganization that saved some money. At the same time, we felt that we could
redirect their responsibilities on a more decentralized approach.
For example, while it may seem insignificant to urban
members‑‑and it is not a reflection on my critics but the reality
of how we have to administer our responsibilities‑‑the Department
of Environment did not have much of a presence outside of the city of
We are now more decentralized, and as a result, we are
more involved with the regulation of a lot of responsibilities that people used
to have to come to
Ms. Cerilli: My concern in this area
is that the WRAP strategy was just undertaken.
Am I correct in seeing that there is no longer any division that is
being referred to by that name?
Mr. Cummings: That is correct.
Ms. Cerilli: Not only do I think
that this is going to confuse people, especially when we have so many people
trying to participate through all the various task force committees that are
dealing with waste reduction, but I am also concerned, with an area that is so
active with so many committees and programs, why there are only three people
working in this area. Now it is not even
clear how many other responsibilities people have that are supposed to be
dealing with the Waste Reduction and Prevention program. If this an area of focus, why are there so
few staff?
Mr. Cummings: Essentially, it is
the same number as we had performing this function before in relationship to
the WRAP responsibilities.
I think the member would have to appreciate that we
cannot simply continue to expand or to accept the status quo. One should not simply change for the sake of
change, but I think we have to push along in the evolution of matters such as
the WRAP. The regulations are well established.
The administration of those regulations can be assisted in a number of
ways by other sections of the department.
The fact is that if I am faced with a choice between an
environment officer who will help administer The Dangerous Goods Act or adding‑‑and
I emphasize the word "adding"‑‑to the WRAP branch of the
administration, then obviously I think the choice is such as we described when
we were talking about priorities earlier.
We want to get the dangerous goods handling and
transportation process in place. We have
said from the start that we would put any additional resources or redirect
resources if they were available to us.
* (1620)
The numbers are small to begin with, and we have not
reduced the number of people who are available there. For example, recycling programs, we could
have half a dozen recycling co‑ordinators in the department if we chose
to.
We are in fact getting a lot of regional people
involved. We are getting a lot of
involvement from the municipal people.
The City of
I think that this was a reasonable approach. I am a little surprised that people are
taking this as a sudden backing off from the need to get on with waste
reduction when at the same time we have now got our tire levy in place. We are, I think, the third jurisdiction in
western
The fact is that in beverage containers, we now have the
beverage container industry regulated.
While that is not evident tomorrow by whether or not there is going to
be a deposit, the decision has been made that by the 1st of August that will be
concluded.
We have also made the direct approach as part of how I
believe we can accomplish things more efficiently in government, but there is
nothing wrong with having to bring in a contractor for six months or maybe less
if that is what it takes, or eight months if that is what is required, to deal
with a specific matter and then allow it to move on.
With the greatest respect to the gentleman sitting in
front of me and other civil servants, one of the biggest problems that
government has in containing its costs is to fill long‑term SYs because
then you do end up with a situation where you have, if you have to cut back,
people with real problems, families sitting there uncertain of their future.
To be able to bring in contractors to deal with short‑term
issues is an efficient way of managing dollars, and the example is the beverage
container industry. We were able to,
rather than put a full‑time staffperson in place to manage this, get a
contract with Arthur Andersen, a nationally, internationally known accounting
firm for $15,000.
For over two years, we were able to acquire a highly
skilled professional group to manage the beverage container regulation for us
and the administration of it. The fact
is that even gave some comfort to the industry, because Arthur Andersen was
able to give them the competitive confidentiality that they required. Pepsi did
not want Coke to know how many cans they were selling in
It is a different way of approaching things, and it is a
small item. It is not a broadly based activity
in our department. It is a very
acceptable way of managing a specific problem, if you will, for a specific
period of time without having to produce the SYs or establish the SYs that
would then give me the credibility of saying, well, we have increased the
number of SYs in this department by 10 percent; therefore, we are doing a good
job of looking after the environment. We
can do a pretty good job, and the method of judging it is not necessarily by
the number of SYs or even the number of dollars, but by the efficacy of what we
are doing in the end.
Ms. Cerilli: Well, that would
lead me down a whole different line of questioning. How many positions or contracts are being
contracted out into this department?
That money does not seem to be shown in this division, so where would it
be shown?
Mr. Cummings: That particular
contract was funded out of the Sustainable Development Fund.
Ms. Cerilli: Was it department
money or is this another project that was done with money under the Innovations
Fund?
Mr. Cummings: It was a
project. It has a beginning and an end
and allows on the 1st of August for decisions to be made.
Excuse me, Madam Chairperson, there is an additional
piece of information. I do not want to
leave the member with the wrong impression because second to this is the fact
that we are establishing, through this mechanism, a licensing process in the
province. The costs that are being borne
by the industry, the dollars that flow into government, will offset those
costs. The industry pays a licensing fee
to government. Those dollars are
available to offset the kind of costs that we are talking about, so it really
becomes a bookkeeping matter. In order
to keep it clear and, if you will, transparent, the money is attributed out of
that fund. The fact is the government
does recover, although we do not recover directly into departmental coffers.
Ms. Cerilli: The issue seems to
be that you are using Innovations Fund money to contract out work that would
have been done to implement the WRAP program by staff from the department. Am I
understanding this correctly? Is that
what you are doing?
Mr. Cummings: I think the member
is choosing to reflect on this in a way other than what the reality is. The department did not have to hire or use
existing staff to run this program. That
is correct, but it is not the kind of job that would likely have led to a long‑term
job within the department because ultimately if we‑‑and as an
example‑‑went to deposits, the program might well be run outside of
government. The fact is that this was
not replacing staff. This was frankly a
very innovative way in my opinion of dealing with a short‑term issue that
we had to get control on so that we can implement the recycling system in this
province. It did not replace staff. You could argue that staff could have been
hired but it did not replace staff.
Ms. Cerilli: The minister was
saying at the beginning that they are saving money and creating short‑term
contracts. I was concerned in finding
out what the SYs in this division have done, but we are finding out that work
that could have been done in this department is being done using Innovations
Fund money to contract out.
I mean there are all sorts of other related issues that
we could get into with this and I think generally the whole area of waste
handling has been understaffed. I mean,
we continue to have programs that rely on paying people less than minimum wage
because they are working under the ARC‑type programs. We have the responsibility for landfill
changes put onto municipalities that do not have the money to put staff in
those landfills to make sure that regulations are implemented. This whole area, I mean, we are not dealing
with it in a way that is going to make sure that we are having secure
employment for people.
Other than that, I want to move on and ask the minister,
the staff who are working under the waste reduction programs, what is their
technical expertise and what exactly are they doing, the two staff or three
staff who are still responsible for the waste reduction area, the WRAP program?
Mr. Cummings: I would like to
answer the postamble from the last question before I answer the specifics of
this question. I hope the member is not
advocating that we should not use every means available to us to try and be
efficient in how we do our work. I do
not apologize for the fact that we probably have asked a lot from these
people. I have never been shy about
acknowledging the hard work that they have put in. That is not a question in my mind. They have worked hard. They have been recognized publicly by me and
I appreciate the efforts that they have put in.
* (1630)
Contrary to the view that a lot of people have of civil
servants in many cases, we have a lot of hard‑working civil servants in
the area and we need to encourage them to use innovative ways of dealing with
problems that we have been unable to fund them to the level that perhaps they
might have wanted.
Every time we are challenged like that we come up with
some better ways of doing things. I
point to the beverage container aspect, I point to the waste disposal ground
regulation as areas where people whom we have worked with outside of the
department and people within the department have responded; the environment
officers, the public health inspectors across the province have responded. They have taken on the extra responsibility,
and they have got the job done.
So I hope the member is not saying, because we appeared
to be short staffed, because we were scratching for dollars here and there,
that we somehow were not getting the job done.
Not only were we getting the job done, we were finding ways of doing it
more efficiently and probably much more cheaply than any other jurisdiction in
this country.
Let me give another example of why we should not think
that the old‑think is the only way to administer a department. When I point to The Ozone Depleting
Substances Act, we established a partnership with the industry. Industry provided the training program at
cost to its technicians. We now have
5,000 trained technicians in air conditioning in this province who are licensed
under the CFC Ozone Depleting Substances Act, which we can point to as being
the only jurisdiction in the country that has any kind of standards such as
that that have been imposed, and the industry has worked with us to the point
where we have got almost all of it done for free.
Now, if I am going to be criticized for that, I would
like to hear the member's response on the record so I can take it out with me
when I go campaigning, because that is what the public is expecting from us in
terms of how we administer our departments.
Furthermore, when asked about the quality of the people
who are administrating in there, Marjorie Simpson came to us from the Vital
Statistics branch. I would think she
came there as a result of the offer that this government made that we would use
people to the best of their capabilities in other parts of government when
sections of their branch may have been getting decentralized. I suspect that was how Marjorie came to us.
Marjorie has worked as secretary to the Conawapa panel as well.
Jim Ferguson and Rod McCormick came from the Biomass
Institute and the Recycling Council of Manitoba, and that is where they got
their grounding in recycling and waste handling.
Ms. Cerilli: The minister
neglected to answer my question, which was the qualifications and expertise of
the technical and professional staff who are working in this program.
(Mr. Gerry McAlpine, Acting Chairperson, in the Chair)
Mr. Cummings: I just provided it‑‑Marjorie
Simpson, Jim Ferguson, Rod McCormick, and the background that they brought to
the area. Jerry Spiegel is still heading
up the pollution prevention branch. His
qualifications, well, he has headed the waste reduction area and Policy and
Planning and evolved into handling some of the waste reduction areas as part of
his responsibility in Policy and Planning.
It seems to me only logical that Policy and Planning
should not continue to handle these things in the long term, that they should
become operationalized within the department.
It makes eminent good sense for someone who might wish to spend more
time evolving and working on planning and policy matters to not be saddled with
the day‑to‑day responsibilities that go with some of these other
functions.
Ms. Cerilli: Well, my concern is
that with so few staff, the area that needs to be addressed is creating,
working on some kind of end use for the collected recyclables, working to
identify markets locally or as close locally as possible, using some kind of
economic tools to encourage, using market forces‑‑that is often the
term‑‑to encourage waste reduction.
I am wondering what kind of expertise there is in the area or with the
staff to do that.
Mr. Cummings: All of them, to
varying degrees, have had a lot of interrelationships with the industry as a
result of their past experiences and their experiences within the department.
Now the member has gone from what I think is being
critical of the fact that they are not getting enough support to being critical
in the sense that maybe she now is saying that they do not have the
qualifications to do what they are doing.
You cannot have it both ways.
Either they are valuable to us or they are not.
Now it seems to me that the energy and the synergy, if
you will, of this area is as a result of their various experiences, and the
wide experiences they have had related in this area originally did flow from
the fact that they were part of the policy and planning area.
I do not necessarily think that government can be the
main source of knowledge in terms of markets, market development, particularly
in the area of recycling. Government can
assist. Government can co‑ordinate.
Government, in some cases, can make arrangements to subsidize, but
government cannot in itself be omnipotent to everything that goes on in the
province.
When you think of things such as recycling, there are
some very well‑organized, well‑run and profitable companies out
there that have been in recycling for the last 30 years. They got into it because they saw that they
could provide an end market. They
developed that, and they have developed a lot of profit around it, if I look around
and judge correctly some of the things that they are doing.
So I believe that programs should be developed that
enhance the opportunity to use the private market to develop end‑use
markets for the products. An example
would be that newsprint has bounced around to the $35 to $45 value, but as the
economies of scale have developed, as the demand for old newsprint continues to
grow, it is very likely that we will see some increase in the value of
newsprint, which will help drive the reclamation of this newsprint because it
will now return more money from the market.
It also applies in the terms of tires. We have just announced a $2.50 rebate for
companies that recycle, find an acceptable end use for a tire. I have already run into one person who believes
that given a little bit of time, he would be happy to take most, a big percentage,
of the tires in this province without the levy.
That is a result of market forces at play. If he can find the equipment that he needs at
a price that he anticipates and not be faced with‑‑or have
sufficient technology in that equipment that would meet the emissions
standards, then that simply proves that government would be foolish to involve
itself any further in the market.
* (1640)
So, again, you should not judge our success or lack or
success by how many people we are able to employ in government. They may be
getting employed in other sectors of our economy as a result of policy and
decisions that government makes, as a result of intervention that government
may make in the market. But we do not
have to be the source of all information in terms of finding the market for
some of the recyclables.
(Madam Chairperson in the Chair)
I would suggest‑‑and this is not a reflection
on the people employed in the department‑‑but I would suggest that
government might be the least likely to find the right market for some of the
recyclables. It is a reality of where
you market the material out there.
The example of the tires, the example of the fact that we
now have the grocery products association coming to Manitoba to see whether or
not this might not be the best jurisdiction in Canada to run a multimaterial
recycling program, because they do not have it splintered into a number of
government areas that are already regulated, that government supplies the end
market, the government intervenes in who should be employed in terms of the
handling of the material.
It can be market driven, and the Wrap Act can be used to
enhance or change the direction of the product by doing the same thing that we
are doing under the tires, by providing an incentive that comes from the
product in the first place.
Ms. Cerilli: Okay, we will deal
with tires. The minister is being known,
at least by this member, for his convoluted answers. It is a good strategy. But we will deal with tires.
Right now, I would say that the process is not
working. The minister, in his opening
remarks, talked about proposals to locally reuse and create some kind of an
industry to reuse the waste tires. I
understand that there has been about 14 proposals. I would like to find out what some of those
were, but I understand that none of those have been accepted.
I am concerned that what right now we have is that there
is a government collecting the $3 on tires, that that money is just going to
the government coffers. I do not know
what is happening with the tires. I do
not know what garages or different establishments are doing with the tires. So I would like some clarification of that.
The minister talks about there being a system, but there
does not seem to be a system. There
seems to be a situation where, maybe, we will not have the tires going to
landfills, but it does not seem like we are going to have any kind of reuse
happening locally.
So one of the things that I would ask is if there are
staff in the department who are promoting this with industries locally‑‑for
example, with asphalt industries‑‑or if there is some other program
or local industry where there have been some accepted proposals for what to do
with the tires.
Mr. Cummings: The member is
correct to say that a "system" is not in place at this juncture. What we have is a fund which we committed to
the recycling of tires, and that commitment remains. The monies do not flow into general revenues
to disappear forever. They will be
reallocated through the Sustainable Development Fund to a fund that would
probably reflect the same type of organization that we have under the
The $2.50 is effective next Tuesday for any recycler who
can demonstrate a proper end use for a tire.
During the period between now and the first of August, we will be
working with people who have experience in the area to give us advice on how a
system should be exactly structured, and how to attempt to put in place systems
that will properly monitor and control the dollars that will be available for
the tire fund.
The systems in other jurisdictions have been contracted
out and managed somewhat similar to the model that I am talking about. We intend to use their experience plus our
own to develop a program where we can show a direct response from the tire
removal to the dollars that are collected.
That is a hard commitment, one which we have no desire to waver from,
because I saw what happened to Jim Bradley in
We may well not get all of the Manitoba's tires that are sold
in 1993; they may all not be recycled in 1993, but we have already an existing
industry that believes that he will expand, he will double, he may even
quadruple his output given the ability to access the tire fund for the products
that he is putting out. There are, of
the 14 requests for the proposals that we had, still some of them who are still
modifying their proposals so they were prepared to come back to the province
with modified proposals.
A number of them, however, wanted a monopoly on the tires
that were available in the province and chose to protect existing industries so
that they were not put out of business.
That would not have precluded a lot of them coming into
business, but some of the leading proponents wanted five‑year guarantees
on all tires. What that would have done
was it would have tied up the levy for that period of time. Technology is moving so fast in this area
that, as I said earlier, it may well be that we will not need the amount that
we already have in place. That levy
might well be adjusted after three years.
That is the kind of thinking that is in place.
We intend to make sure that we guard ourselves against
inappropriate collection of the levy, against people getting the levy and not
using the tires in the manner that they prescribe. We intend to do what we can,
and I think we can successfully guard against tires being imported from
We look to
Ms. Cerilli: This should be
industry's problem. This should be the
retailers' and tire manufacturers' problem, for making sure that we do not have
piles of tires set up.
How can the minister explain that the system is or the
levy as it exists now and the proposal that this government has made is not
going to simply have us have different piles of tires elsewhere and is going to
ensure that the manufacturers and the retailers for the tires are the ones that
are going to be dealing with disposing or collecting them and making sure that
they would travel to the appropriate industry to be reused?
Mr. Cummings: The member's
approach may well be a useful suggestion, but there is not a jurisdiction that
I am aware of that has chosen, as I think she just said, to regulate anybody
who sells a tire to have to make sure that tire is properly disposed of in the
end.
* (1650)
What generally happens is that a levy is imposed on the
tire at the point of sale that then, through what is simply a subsidy, allows
for someone, some industry to make use of that product. You will find, if you
look through the industry today, that the Goodyear stores, the Canadian Tire
stores have already found ways of moving the tires that end up at their
door. They are not all going into
landfills. In fact, the private
enterprise is finding a market for a lot of tires out there today, which
government does not need to be involved in.
The request for proposals brought forward show there are
14 different ways of dealing with these tires, but the incentive payment, we
concluded, would be a better way of getting an industry going in this
province. It may well be that we will
end up with three or four smaller recyclers doing various things.
I would suggest if you are talking about recovery of
energy to replace hydro, that becomes very much a matter of having to keep the
levy high enough in order to be able to afford the system that would support
that. That might be the only choice in
the end, but I do not think we have explored all of the options. The people who
came forward with their various proposals, there has to be a recognition, you
can only make so many doormats.
In B.C., there is a wide variety of products that are
being made, and B.C. has found that they are exporting less and less tires all
the time, that they are finding other industries springing up. I have looked to every jurisdiction where
government has got involved with helping to finance or guaranteeing supply or
income to companies that want to process the tires, and I have not found a
successful example yet. What has generally
ended up being the case is that it is the industry proponents who bring a big
chunk of their own money to the table, apply their innovation and their
efficient operations to it, who are the ones who have survived.
It is not that long ago that a pyrolysis plant in B.C.
was seen to be the answer to all problems of tire recycling. I now find that the parts for that plant are
for sale. The incineration aspect, the
consultants that we hired to look at what are the possibilities across the
country for recycling and what are examples that we could pick up on told us
that an incineration plant for the production of alternative energy sitting
next to the biggest tire pile in
The availability of tires drove them to put the plant
there. They had no transportation costs, and they still could not make enough
money out of the production of energy.
Now that might reflect on the type of incinerator they used, but it
certainly shows that government has every opportunity to get burned if it gets
too far into this process. Then, not
only is the levy at risk, you probably end up with taxpayers' dollars at risk,
and I refuse to go down that route.
Ms. Cerilli: Until we are going
to have some kind of use that meets the criteria of the government, starting on
Tuesday, where are the tires going to go in the meantime?
Mr. Cummings: To begin with, part
of our announcement also included that there would be a 50‑cent tire
allocation to municipal waste disposal grounds that they could receive upon
having‑‑through the potential recycler, if he chose to come to a
particular site, he could pay 50 cents‑‑the municipal site could
expect to receive 50 cents apiece for the tires. A recycler will not be paid until he has
recycled the tire. In other words, we
are not going to pay $2.50 a tire to have somebody pile them and possibly have
them walk away from the piles somewhere down the road. That is not what we envisage at all.
But where will the tires go on June 2? They will continue to flow in the same
general patterns that they are right now.
I believe that the demand will increase in a gradual manner, that we
will see an incremental growth starting immediately from Winkler. Winkler, in fact, is the plant there‑‑the
name is not important. The plant located
at Winkler has in a preliminary way said that they may take half the tires in
the province. I will withhold judgment
on how quickly that will occur, but that is an example of how we will start to
see a change in the direction that the tires flow.
There are also other companies around, large waste
companies, that may well be willing to put in place operations. There are at least two private investors here
in
I think that is a better approach than to allow for
inappropriate disposal of the tires, which leads to accumulation of tires in an
uncontrolled manner. We will not allow
that, because we already have regulations that regulate the size of tire piles
or the conditions under which they may be stored. We believe we have the bases covered in terms
of protection of the environment.
Ms. Cerilli: Still it seems like
you are going to be relying on when there is a user in place. I do not know if the Continental Tire company
at Winkler is going to be able to make sure that they start getting the tires
with the imposed levy starting on June 2.
Starting on that day there are going to be people that are paying the
levy, but there is not a guarantee that those tires are not going to be going
to the landfill.
Mr. Cummings: There is a
responsibility and a guarantee that the monies collected on the levy will go
for the removal of the tires from the waste system. If they are not removed in '94 that money
will remove them in '95. The dollars
will not be scalped.
We may be able to use some dollars to enhance some of the
municipal collection areas, that type of thing, but the tire monies will remain
focused in the waste and tire area. When
the system is running fully operationally it will take the full amount of the
levy. If technology advances the way
some people suggest it may, in three years or four we may well be able to
reduce the levy or eliminate it.
Ms. Cerilli: Right now I am not
talking about the money. I am talking
about the tires. I am concerned that
industry does not have its mechanism in place.
I am talking not again about the retailers, just about the
manufacturers, to ensure that these tires are going to be collected in a safe
way. What is going to be in place?
Mr. Cummings: I believe they are
being collected in a safe manner today.
The disposal of them is not one that is necessarily appropriate. Tires in landfills are benign, but it is a
loss of potential energy and a resource.
That resource need not be buried.
It should be put into an alternate use today. I think our regulations are adequate to
protect the environment today.
Madam Chairperson: The hour being 5
p.m., committee rise.
Call in the Speaker.
IN SESSION
Committee Report
Mrs. Louise Dacquay (Chairperson of Committees):
The Committee of Supply has considered certain resolutions, directs me
to report progress and asks leave to sit again.
I move, seconded by the honourable member for La
Verendrye (Mr. Sveinson), that the report of the committee be received.
Motion agreed to.
* (1700)
PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS
Mr. Speaker: The hour being 5
p.m., time for Private Members' Business.
DEBATE ON SECOND READINGS‑‑PUBLIC
BILLS
Bill 200‑The Child and Family
Services Amendment Act
Mr. Speaker: On the proposed
motion of the honourable member for
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remain
standing? [agreed]
Also standing in the name of the honourable member for
Interlake (Mr. Clif Evans), who has one minute remaining.
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remain
standing? [agreed]
Bill 202‑The Residential
Tenancies Amendment Act
Mr. Speaker: On the proposed
motion of the honourable member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale), Bill 202 (The
Residential Tenancies Amendment Act; Loi modifiant la Loi sur la location a
usage d'habitation), standing in the name of the honourable member for
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remaining
standing? [agreed]
['
ill 203‑The Health Care
Records Act
Mr. Speaker: On the proposed
motion of the honourable member for St. Johns (Ms. Wasylycia‑Leis), Bill 203
(The Health Care Records Act; Loi sur les dossiers medicaux), standing in the
name of the honourable member for Emerson (Mr. Penner).
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remain
standing? [agreed]
An Honourable Member: Call it six o'clock.
Mr. Speaker: Okay. Is it the will of the House to call it six
o'clock? No? That has been denied.
Bill 205‑The Ombudsman
Amendment Act
Mr. Speaker: On the proposed
motion of the honourable member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak), Bill 205 (The
Ombudsman Amendment Act; Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'ombudsman), standing in the
name of the honourable member for Niakwa (Mr. Reimer).
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remain
standing? [agreed]
Bill 208‑The Workers
Compensation Amendment Act
Mr. Speaker: On the proposed
motion of the honourable member for Transcona (Mr. Reid), Bill 208 (The Workers
Compensation Amendment Act; Loi modifiant la Loi sur les accidents du travail),
standing in the name of the honourable member for Niakwa (Mr. Reimer).
An Honourable Member: Stand.
Mr. Speaker: Stand? Is there leave that this matter remain
standing? [agreed]
SECOND READINGS‑PUBLIC BILLS
Mr. Speaker: Are we proceeding
with Bill 209? No. Bill 211? No.
Bill 212? No. Are we proceeding with Bill 214? No.
Are we proceeding with Bill 216?
No.
PROPOSED RESOLUTIONS
Res. 28‑Active Living
Mr. Gerry McAlpine (Sturgeon Creek):
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable member for La Verendrye
(Mr. Sveinson):
WHEREAS physical fitness is essential in keeping people
of all ages physically and mentally healthy; and
WHEREAS the government of Manitoba has developed the
Active Living Program, over a six‑year consultation period, with input
from the Manitoba Fitness Directorate in co‑operation with the
departments of Education and Training, Culture, Heritage and Citizenship, as
well as the Manitoba Sport Directorate; and
WHEREAS the Active Living Program, through the use of
games and other promotional materials, encourages a lifestyle that will promote
lifetime physical activity; and
WHEREAS good physical health helps prevent many ailments
that afflict our society; and
WHEREAS Active Living will be introduced in
WHEREAS the Active Living Program will also be introduced
to the public through local workshops where communities can explore ways of
creating a supportive environment for the program.
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Legislative Assembly of
Manitoba encourage the people of
Motion presented.
Mr. McAlpine: Mr. Speaker, it is a
real pleasure for me to stand at this time and speak on active living. Active living, through the use of games and
other promotional material, encourages lifestyle changes that promote lifetime
physical activity. This approach
promotes all forms of exercise from moderate activities to world‑class
competitive sports. Active living is
designed to fit all ages, abilities and lifestyles. The best form of good health is expressed in
a person who practices physical activity on a regular basis. Conditioning of all walks of life through
active living along with good nutrition, a major force in promoting longevity
and improved quality of health.
If we as legislators could encourage and stimulate the
masses into true active living to the extent of challenging all of our body
systems, would we not make major progress in reducing the health budget of $1.8
billion per year? As well, what about
the Family Services of just $1 billion and a rising budget. I believe we all know as we look around the
Chamber the importance of active living, creating a healthy mind and body or
the lack thereof. People who are
physically fit feel better about themselves and thus are more successful people.
Therefore, I am encouraged by this resolution and the
fact that active living as a lifestyle was introduced into
I am not necessarily saying that I am a shining example,
Mr. Speaker, but I can remember when I was a boy going to school, although I
was very active in sports and track and field, I never had the appreciation for
fitness as I do today. For me to even
think of running a mile in those days would have been bordering on
insanity. Today, either my level of
insanity has increased or my appreciation for running five to 10 miles is like
a walk in the park. It has given me an
understanding of the importance of being physically fit. I feel a lot better about my appreciation for
active living today as opposed to 30 years ago.
Maybe it was because back then we took health for granted. Today, because of active living and a keen
interest in nutrition, I have not had a sick day that I can remember in 10
years.
I feel this can also be achieved by the majority. The question is: Are the majority willing to take the
responsibility? I believe it is appropriate
that Manitoba Fitness Directorate continues to play a lead role in promoting
active living for all Manitobans in concert with Education and Training,
Health, and Culture, Heritage and Citizenship, with municipalities and with
many nongovernment organizations. I am
pleased the province and our government remains committed to the further
development of active living in
Saying this, I am optimistic that my colleagues will come
through on June 22nd in supporting me in the Celebrity Challenge Half Marathon
as part of our caucus team. I believe,
and I am sure many of my colleagues agree, that we, being referred to as the
leaders, should always lead by example rather than follow. I always welcome the opportunity to
participate in active living and good health as a way of life. I believe it is our duty as individuals to
care for our physical attributes, whatever levels we have inherited, and to
strengthen them through practising good health.
Active living will help us achieve our goals.
This was something I feel was evident when I addressed
several hundred physical education teachers from across North America about a
year ago at the
They too feel that the active mind of the physically fit
are in a category of the more teachable than those that are not. There is no
question in the minds of these individuals that the importance of active living
must be encouraged amongst our young people.
They are our future and it is their attitudes and habits that are going
to carry us well into the 21st century.
* (1710)
It is interesting to observe that people who practise
active living have better understanding of their conditions than those who take
them for granted. Look at our athletes
as an example. Nobody knows their bodies and conditioning better. They treat their physical fitness and
activity like a fine‑tuned machine.
This practice is available and should be considered as a
means of dealing with our own well‑being.
Too often, great numbers of our population turn this responsibility over
to medical practitioners who are treating the many with crisis care. This is compounding the problem and is
contradicting the philosophy of active living, nutrition, as well as good
health.
I appreciate crisis care has its place, but not in every
instance in attempting to stabilize one's health where minor ailments are the
test. I support making our body systems
work for us and to keep them working rather than trying to replace them through
substitution of body chemistry.
This is achievable through this resolution, but we must
maintain our focus individually and collectively including all groups promoting
active living.
I commend the Manitoba Parks department and the
recreation association for establishing an active living committee which is
exploring the many ways in which parks and recreation practitioners can
integrate the active living concept into their strategy planning.
This will help to enhance their ability to meet the needs
of their groups. What better way to
utilize our parks than to create nature trails for walking, jogging and cross‑country
skiing? What better way to appreciate
the beauty of nature and to get the physical benefits of activity in
There is something about the energy one gets while
enjoying the freedoms of nature. It
creates a useful and vibrant energy that is near impossible to explain, but we
all know the feeling is real. It does
exist. We, as participants, must capture
every emotion that emanates from this experience.
People feel energized, stronger and more youthful
experiencing the fruits of nature in which active living is expressed. I believe that nature was created by our
maker, is an expression of perfection.
If we believe this, as it is perfectly true, then why would we not want
greater exposure to nature? Why would we
not want nature flowing through us?
Is it not reasonable to expect that if nature is
perfection, if we had nature flowing through us to create health, that we would
be more fit and healthier through nutrition to enjoy more active living?
I believe this is fundamentally elementary. Then why are we not more open to this
principle of creating health? The
I believe that we are capable of accomplishing anything
that we want to without limitations provided we are committed and focused on
our goals. Anyone who participates in
active living knows that the reason we do not do more is because we program our
brains with negative thoughts, and I would challenge any and all in this Chamber
to take up the task. You will be amazed
and proud of the results. I believe it
is just a matter of making up your minds and doing it.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I would like to make
reference to a few theories and quotes.
The first is the theory of the last inch as it applies to what I am
saying. Rule No. 1 is the last inch is
the hardest of all. Rule No. 2, what we
want most always lies beyond the last inch.
Rule No. 3, the last inch always looks impossible. Rule No. 4, most people would rather quit
than face the last inch. Rule No. 5, the
great secret for making it across the last inch is to stop thinking about it
and begin. Rule No. 6, we must walk the last inch alone. Rule No. 7, once we have walked across the
last inch, we feel exhilarated and triumphant.
No. 8, once we have walked the last inch we can reach back and help
others through it.
The nervous system and our brains play a major role in
whether or not we tune into the active living concept, and to say that we are
too old is only an excuse, or to say I am too fat is only an excuse as well, or
to say that I have a handicap is only an excuse, and there are others as I look
around the Chamber. They are only excuses.
There is a book called As a Man Thinketh. There is a quote in there that reflects my
feelings and I will quote this: Man is
made or unmade by himself. In the
armoury of thought, he creates the weapons that destroy himself. He also
fashions the tools with which he builds for himself heavenly mansions of joy,
strength and peace.
By the right choice and the true application of thought,
man ascends to divine perfection. By the
abuse of wrong application of thought, he descends below the level of the
beast. Between these two are the grades
of character, and man is neither maker and master of all the beautiful truths
pertaining to the soul. None is more gladdening or fruitful of the divine
promise and confidence than this. But
man is the master of thought, the molder of character and the maker and shaper
of conditions, environment and destiny.
Another thought in theory to help you in this quest for
health, physical fitness for active living to promote longevity can be summed
up in this quote: Sow a thought, reap an
action.
An Honourable Member: Sow in thought, reap
in action.
Mr. McAlpine: Sow a thought, reap
an action. Sow an action, reap a
habit. Sow a set of habits, and reap a
character. Sow a character, and you reap
your own destiny.
We are in control of our own destinies. We merely have to take responsibility and
make the decisions, what our destinies are going to be, active living or not,
and remember, the past does not equal the future.
Also, do not focus on your failures. Get up there and take another cut at the
ball. The time to start is now. Go for it. Active living is your key Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for this time.
* (1720)
Mr. Jerry Storie (Flin Flon):
Mr. Speaker, my remarks are going to be fairly brief to this resolution.
I have had a chance to speak with the member for Sturgeon
Creek (Mr. McAlpine) on a number of occasions about issues relating not just to
recreation but to health. I have some
respect for his approach to a holistic view of health and health‑related
matters, but I have to say to the member‑‑[interjection]
The green ones that the member for Charleswood (Mr.
Ernst) is referring to is probably pond scum.
That side knows a great deal about that matter. Pond scum is an ingredient in many herbal
remedies. I am not sure whether the
member for Sturgeon Creek can recommend pond scum, but I know some of his
colleagues can. [interjection] Pond
scum, that is right. It is algae, used
in a more, perhaps, understandable phrase.
Mr. Speaker, what I am concerned about is that this
resolution is very much in the same vein as the amendments that come from the
government side. It reflects a disdain,
if you will, for fact. This resolution
is as inconsistent with what the government is doing as any of the programs and
the answers that we get from the government ministers on a daily basis.
The fact of the matter is that while I respect the
member's intention, and I respect his commitment to a holistic form of health
maintenance which includes a balance of many things in life, including
recreation and diet and many other things, this government has done so many
things, Mr. Speaker, that would undermine the ability, the will of people from
all walks of life to maintain that healthy lifestyle.
This government has cut funding to the people in our
society who need it most. This
government has cut funding to education, to our young people. It has cut funding to groups who support
recreation programming and seniors, Mr. Speaker. It has cut money across the board to groups
who would otherwise be out there promoting the kind of lifestyle that this
member talked about and referred to in his resolution.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the member
for the Interlake (Mr. Clif Evans),
THAT this resolution be amended by removing all the words
after the first "WHEREAS" and substitute the following:
WHEREAS this government has ignored the relationship
between physical, mental, and emotional health and one's economic
circumstances; and
WHEREAS the
WHEREAS this government has cut funding to many groups
who support health, recreation and education programming.
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this Legislature condemn
the government for its inability to co‑ordinate its rhetoric with its
action.
Motion presented.
Mr. Speaker: The honourable
member's amendment is in order.
Mr. McAlpine: I have not had an
opportunity to review the amendment, but in terms of what the honourable member
for Flin Flon is speaking, I think he has missed the point of the resolution
that was given here in the interests of everybody in
I understand, in listening to the opposition through
Question Period, that they are coming from a different perspective. They do not understand. They expect that government should be doing
everything for the people. All this
resolution has offered is that we are asking people to take responsibility for
their own selves. The member for Flin
Flon, he does not believe that is an important aspect, taking responsibility
for creating health and also for physical fitness.
If people take the attitude that the honourable member
for Flin Flon and the opposition are promoting, we are going nowhere. We are going to have a Health budget not at
$1.8 billion, but probably $3 billion and $4 billion. Is that what they are looking for, because
that is what he is implying with this amendment? He is talking about us doing away with all
the funding for all the Education and what, and all the other departments,
Family Services. What kind of a message
is he giving to the people in
* (1730)
I have seen, in my short term in this Chamber, that there
does not appear to be a whole lot of common sense across the way. They talk one thing, but they do
another. When they look at this
resolution, the amendment "WHEREAS the province of Manitoba has 55,000
unemployed and . . . " what does this member expect this government to do,
to go out there and take people and give them jobs? That is what you are asking. That is what the member‑‑[interjection] That is the problem
today, Mr. Speaker, because of the fact that the people find it easier to stay
at home and live on the welfare rolls that the NDP have built up over the
years.
It is better for these people to sit on the welfare rolls
than go out and get a job or sit on unemployment. That is the member for Flin Flon (Mr.
Storie), as he sits there and he chuckles from his seat. All we want to do with this resolution is to
ask people to take responsibility. The
member for Flin Flon sees fit to make his amendment and to try to score some
points with these welfare, unemployed people.
This is political posturing that this honourable member
is offering. He goes on to say that
"WHEREAS this government has cut funding to many groups who support
health, recreation and education programming".
Mr. Speaker, I had a constituent, and this is a couple of
years ago or soon after I was elected, in the fact that they were relying on
government to provide the grants and to do the work that volunteers have grown
accustomed and built this country.
This leader said that before the grants were readily
available to them‑‑this is a gymnastics organization in my constituency‑‑she
said that years ago, before they were getting grants, they used to have 60 and
70 volunteers doing what had to be done to run that organization. With the grants they ended up with three
people doing the same work as those 60.
When the grants were cut back to this organization, she said, thank God,
we are finally going to be able to get somebody in the community doing
something for themselves, and we will get the volunteer spirit back.
That is the kind of message that we are getting. In the '70s, when the NDP, the opposition
that we face today, and many of those members are still sitting in their seats,
I served with a service club. It was a
service club that was looking to serve the community's greatest needs. As time went on and as the NDP lived
throughout their life, through the 70s and the early 80s, it was almost
impossible to find a project that we could tie into to serve the communities
greatest needs. There was nothing,
because the NDP and their government philosophy were doing everything for
whatever for the people, and that is the wrong approach. To me, this is bordering on communism or
whatever you want to call it. That is
what it is. It is socialistic. It is full of socialism right through to the
end. That is what this opposition is
looking for. This is what they talk
about. Nobody is taking the
responsibility over there.
Now this Kinsmen organization which I belong to, we used
to have 40 members within that club.
Mr. Storie: How many do you have
now?
Mr. McAlpine: Well, the honourable
member for Flin Flon asked me, how many members are there now? Well, there were 40 members in this one
club. There are less than 15 members
with five clubs combined.
Do you know the reason for it is because they are still
looking for the communities' greatest need because governments have provided
the things that people can do for themselves as volunteers. So I am appalled at what this member for Flin
Flon with his resolution is saying, that this government has fallen on bad
tidings as far as this government and the people of
What they are talking about is providing less for people
in terms of encouraging people to take responsibility, and what they are doing
is they are creating an environment of dependency on governments. To me that is the wrong approach. It is the same thing as our own body
systems. The more you substitute for a body
system, the weaker it gets, but I do not know whether the member for Flin Flon
understands that.
Just like our children, the more we do for our children,
the more they expect from us, but what he is saying and criticizing this
government for, in cutting back‑‑what I am saying is people have to
take responsibility. They have to stand
up and do for themselves what they are capable of doing. They have to get out there and set goals
rather than waiting for the welfare cheque or the unemployment cheque, get out
there and create their own destinies.
Now maybe the member for Flin Flon (Mr. Storie) has
difficulty creating his own destiny because he is of a mind set that enables
him only to see what other people can do for him, not what he can do for other
people.
John F. Kennedy said, do not ask what the country can do
for you, but what you can do for your country.
The honourable member for Flin Flon does not understand that, but that
is something that he should take at heart when he considers writing amendments
to resolutions‑‑resolutions that he is asking government to do the
things for people.
People take responsibilities if they are encouraged to do
that. That is what we should be doing in
promoting active living. We should be
helping people to take that responsibility and show them how they can. Give them the confidence to do what they are
capable of doing for themselves.
* (1740)
So I would hope that my fellow members and colleagues
will defeat this amendment with this resolution and take the responsibility as
true Manitobans should and as true leaders and legislators in this Chamber
should take the responsibility for themselves and all Manitobans. I suggest to the member for Flin Flon (Mr.
Storie) to maybe take a little walk in the park one day and really find out
what life is all about. Thank you, Mr.
Speaker.
Mr. Ben Sveinson (La Verendrye): Mr. Speaker, I have a few words to say on this
topic. Listening to the opposition
across the way, it is obvious they were not ready to discuss or to speak on
this subject, but there are a few things I have to say about this resolution
put forward by the honourable member for Sturgeon Creek (Mr. McAlpine) and
indeed the amendment. So I will just put
this on record, and then we will vote on it very shortly. I will just say a few words.
Let us take a look and see exactly what has happened to
society over the years. You look back
many years ago and a canoe has become a motor boat, a bicycle which you pedal,
or indeed just walking to a store, has become a motorcycle or a car. We have done this thing of trying to provide
everything for our children and for our people that we never had or we thought
we had missed somewhere, but the fact is that all this has affected us in a
physical way.
I am no exception.
I do not stand here preaching at people in the sense that indeed I am a
physical specimen that should be put up on some kind of a pedestal. However, I would just like to point out a few
things that indeed over my years of growing up as a child, my childhood and
into later years, some of the things that I have done.
I have played a lot of baseball. I thought I was a fairly good baseball
player, and I was. However, in later
years, after I got married and raising our children, we had a family team which
we played baseball all over the southeastern area. When we quit, or our family team finally
stopped playing baseball a few years ago, my oldest brother, who happens to be
56, 57 years of age, was playing baseball at that time.
It was a mixed baseball team so in fact our sister‑in‑law,
who was pitching for us, happened to be 53 years of age and she still plays
baseball to this day, so she must be in neighbourhood of 57, 58 years of age
right now.
It is a thing of getting together. It was part of our family thing. It was a creative effort to be with our
family and having fun, but the fact remains that this is active living.
There are many things we have done over the years‑‑hunting,
fishing. Many of these things are an
awful lot of fun and I think many of the people‑‑when I say that I
have had one of the finest childhoods anybody could ever have, I really mean
that because I had endless amounts of fun and was very, very active in doing
them, and in fact I was very physically fit.
My children also are very physically fit. However, yes, Mr. Speaker, they are big
fellows. I have two sons and a daughter.
Both have been active in many different kinds of sports. [interjection] Well, the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Enns)
mentions how strong my sons are.
Believe me, I used to play with this idea of arm
twisting. Well, just to let you know how strong they are, I quit twisting
wrists with my two sons about 10 years ago.
That would put them in the neighbourhood of 14 to 15 years of age. They are big fellows and very strong. So I have had a lot of fun with them. There
are many times that I have taken my sons out fishing and had a good time with
that.
But let us take a look at our working areas, industry,
manufacturing and so on. What has
happened in our workplaces?
We have gone from a labour‑intensive, physical type
of work to mainly machines, pushing buttons, things that in fact do not take
creative thinking at all, in others words, in ways of making that particular
physical job easier, because anybody can push a button, it does not take
creative thinking.
Many of these things have been lost, and so in fact, what
do we do today? We have to teach our
young people not just computers, not just higher education but, indeed, we have
to teach our young people that that is not all there is to this world.
There are many, many things that we have to encourage our
young people to do. We have to encourage
them to test their skills and their stamina in many things like basketball,
baseball, judo, karate, many different types of sports, but I think we have to
go further than that.
We have to teach them from young within our homes, within
our schools, as the Minister of Education (Mrs. Vodrey) has put forward a
number of these initiatives within our schools, and I am very happy of that,
but we have to encourage them to work that into their everyday life.
In doing this, in fact, it becomes part of you. Indeed, we get back to that where the
connection comes between physical and indeed creative thinking. That is a thing that we can think up many
different things to do.
I will just take a little jaunt back to when I was a
young person, things like for example, trapping and fishing. Would you believe, Mr. Speaker, that I was a
very, very accurate shot with a slingshot?
An Honourable Member: No.
Mr. Sveinson: Oh, indeed, indeed.
An Honourable Member: I do not believe it.
Mr. Sveinson: I loved playing with
bows and arrows, slingshots.
An Honourable Member: And yet, he turned
out to be a straight arrow.
Mr. Sveinson: Indeed, I quit
playing with that slingshot when we were having some fun at quite a distance
when my brother stuck his head out from behind one of the buildings and, very
accurate as I was, I snapped off a fast shot and I happened to take half of one
of his front teeth out. After that, I
decided to stay away from that kind of thing and be very careful with the
different things that I did.
I could go on endlessly with what active living can do
for us, but indeed I would recommend to everybody in this Assembly, and indeed
all the people of
Mr. Speaker: Is the House ready
for the question? The question before the
House is the amendment as moved by the honourable member for Flin Flon (Mr.
Storie) on the resolution of the honourable member for Sturgeon Creek (Mr.
McAlpine), Active Living. Is it the
pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All those in favour of the amendment, please say yea.
Some Honourable Members: Yea.
Mr. Speaker: All those opposed,
please say nay.
Some Honourable Members: Nay.
Mr. Speaker: In my opinion, the
Nays have it.
An Honourable Member: On division.
Mr. Speaker: On division.
The question before the House is the resolution of the
honourable member for Sturgeon Creek (Mr. McAlpine), Resolution 28, Active
Living. Is it the pleasure of the House
to adopt the motion? Is that
agreed? No?
All those in favour of the motion, please say yea.
Some Honourable Members: Yea.
Mr. Speaker: All those opposed,
please say nay.
Some Honourable Members: Nay.
Mr. Speaker: In my opinion, the
Yeas have it.
Mr. Storie: Mr. Speaker, yeas and
nays.
Mr. Speaker: Yeas and nays. Call in the members.
* (1750)
(Mr. Marcel Laurendeau, Acting Speaker, in the Chair)
A STANDING VOTE was taken, the result being as
follows (Yeas 24, Nays 0):
Yeas
Barrett, Cerilli, Cummings, Dacquay, Derkach, Doer, Downey, Driedger,
Enns, Ernst, Gilleshammer, Helwer, Lamoureux, McAlpine, McIntosh, Mitchelson,
Orchard, Penner, Praznik, Reimer, Rose, Santos, Sveinson, Vodrey.
(Mr. Speaker in the Chair)
Mr. Speaker: The motion is
accordingly carried.
The hour being after 6 p.m., this House is now adjourned
and stands adjourned until 10 a.m. tomorrow (Friday).