November 26, 1992            HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS          Vol. XLI  No. 72


The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Lush): Order, please!

Statements by Ministers.

Oral Questions.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, a point of privilege.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's East on a point of privilege.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, I was rising on the point of privilege which I raised yesterday and gave notice of yesterday. I am now in a position to -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair had called Oral Questions. I am just wondering whether the Member for St. John's East is aware of that. Points of privilege are not usually brought up during Question Period; however, if the member is prepared to use the Question Period time, I think he should be made aware of that.

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

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, when the Chair called for Ministerial Statements, I stood. I believe the Chair looked over there and saw no ministers standing and did not see me, but I was standing before the Chair called Oral Questions.

MR. SPEAKER: If hon. members are prepared to revert back to the period before Oral Questions was called -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Okay.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise on a point of privilege, and I gave notice of it yesterday. I understand the procedure to be that I would make my submission now and the Chair would rule as to whether or not there was a prima facie case of privilege before the House.

I have a motion, if the Chair rules in that favour. I was relying on Beauchesne, but I understand from the Clerk that the procedure of this House is that if the Chair does rule that it is a prima facie case of privilege, that the Government House Leader is the one to make the motion.

My point of privilege concerns the following, Mr. Speaker, and it regards a statement made in the House by the Minister of Social Services on November 5, 1992. It was made, and the two factors that I believe have to be established are: Number one, my giving notice was given at the first reasonable opportunity; and if there is a case of privilege.

I will read the statement made by the Minister of Social Services on November 5th. It was made at the point in the Standing Orders to do with Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given. The minister said that he was asked a question by the Member for St. John's East yesterday - that would be November 5th - concerning the emergency housing repair program, and I quote: He mentioned a case in Bellevue district where in fact he suggested work had not been completed. I am happy to report to the House that that case, in fact, has been looked after - I believe a couple of months ago.He goes on to say: these two disabled individuals who required heat and electricity added to their house, through the intervention and hard work of the Member for Bellevue and my staff, we were able to carry out that work some two months ago.

Now, Mr. Speaker, that statement was made on a day following a question by me, in which I made the statement in the House that the work had been ordered but that the contract had been cancelled. The minister did not have to rise in the House on November 5, he had ample opportunity to check with the individual's involved, with his officials and with others. Though he rose, not in answer to my question, Mr. Speaker, but presumably in answer to inquiries and action that he had taken. So, Mr. Speaker, we have a situation, there is not a minister misstating himself in the House, but a minister after reflection and opportunity to investigate the facts, comes forward and offers to the House information which in fact is not correct.

Mr. Speaker, the work of which I was speaking and of which the minister was speaking did not in fact commence until after the minister had made his statement in the House that it was done two months ago. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the building permit or permit that was granted to do the work is in fact dated November 16. I am told that the work in fact commenced a couple of days before that but certainly was not completed until after November 16 and in fact, Mr. Speaker, it appears that the questions asked in this House were what resulted in the work actually getting done. So, Mr. Speaker, we have a case here where the minister misled the House.

In looking at precedence I have discovered of course the general rule that a question of privilege must relate to the members capacity to serve the people who have chosen him as their representative and to act in the House. Mr. Speaker, it is impossible to represent people in this House if upon asking questions the minister comes in, and this was done I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, in an attempt to put down this hon. member and say that his facts were not right, that this work in fact was done two months ago through his staff and the Member for Bellevue. In fact, Mr. Speaker, he was misleading the House and as the Premier would say: it is more than I can say as to whether he was doing it deliberately or not or whether the Member for Bellevue was providing him with this information deliberately or not. I refer the Chair to the Erskine May eighteenth edition, where it has said that, this is page 137 of the eighteenth edition referring to Caters case: first of all it talks about the giving of false evidence, before the House, or before committee's of the House as punished as contempt but then it goes on to say, person's who present false, forged or fabricated documents to either House or to committee's are guilty of a breach of privilege.

Then it goes on to say: that conspiracy to deceive either House or any committee of either House, will also be treated as a breach of privilege.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is now debating - when an hon. member is making a point of privilege, it is just to state what is the point of privilege and to see if the Speaker grants the debate, otherwise the member just makes the point of privilege and takes his place.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am just providing a precedent to Your Honour, to allow you to determine whether or not in fact this comes within the bounds of a breach of privilege. Obviously, I am not arguing the case but just stating the precedent and I would say, Mr. Speaker, that I have not the knowledge as to whether there was an intention to deceive the House but I do say, Mr. Speaker, that given the fact that this statement made by the minister was not made in answer to my question of the moment, but in fact was given after an opportunity to examine the facts and look it up that, if it is not a purposeful deceit of the House, it is certainly such a serious degree of negligence with respect to the facts as to constitute a breach of privilege of members of this House, so I would ask Your Honour to rule that this is a breach of privilege.

I should say as well, that the true facts only came to my attention yesterday morning, Mr. Speaker, at approximately the noon hour, and I raised the matter in the House yesterday afternoon so the two conditions: number one, that there be a prima facie breach of privilege, if in fact the circumstances whereas I have set forth, and secondly that they were brought to the House at the first reasonable opportunity, and I suggest, Mr. Speaker, this is not a question of a dispute as to the facts, it is a question of the facts being what they are, the minister in fact, has misled the House.

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

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, the issue for the House as I understand it at this particular moment, is whether or not there is a prima facie case of a breach of privilege, and a prima facie case as the hon. gentleman for St. John's East -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. ROBERTS: I am sorry, it is difficult to speak, Mr. Speaker, when the hon. Member for Burin - Placentia West, is muttering in quite so loud a tone, if he could mutter a little less loudly, it would help.

The point I was making, Mr. Speaker, is the issue before the House is whether there is a prim facie breach of privilege. If there is, a certain procedure then begins to take place.

A prima facie case is one which, if not rebutted, if simply standing on its own, would constitute a case. All the hon. gentleman has said, if I heard him correctly - and I haven't seen the papers to which he has referred, nor have I seen the citations or the - you know, I was here in the House when the questions and answers of which he speaks were given; I haven't seen the case laid out. But all he said amounts to a dispute on facts. Now, the clearest thing in Beauchesne, in parliamentary practice, Mr. Speaker, is that a dispute between members, and this comes up all the time - seldom with quite the aura of pomposity with which the hon. gentleman has surrounded it - but it comes up all the time in the course of debate. It is simply a dispute between two members as to whether or not a certain set of facts existed, or whether it was another set of facts.

If Your Honour wants a citation, I would simply refer you to section 31 (1) in the current edition of Beauchesne, which is found on page 13.

Now, Mr. Speaker, if the hon. gentleman wants to table all the information or provide it to us, we could look at it or give it to Your Honour and you can make the ruling - it is for Your Honour, obviously, to make the ruling. But my submission is that he hasn't even made out a prima facie case of privilege, it is simply a matter of a dispute between him and my friend and colleague, the Minister of Social Services as to a given set of events, and that ain't privilege.

MR. SPEAKER: I think the Chair is ready to make a decision on that point of privilege now.

As the hon. member knows, 'a dispute between two members about questions of fact said in debate does not constitute a valid question of privilege, because it is a matter of debate' - I am quoting from Maingot. I think the hon. member mentioned, also, that the minister was misleading the House, and I quote Maingot: 'An allegation of misleading the House is not out of order or unparliamentary, nor does it amount to a question of privilege.' Of course, if the minister admitted that he misled the House, then that would be a different matter, but the minister didn't admit that he misled the House, so I would have to say that the member did not establish a prima facie case.

Just for hon. members, as well, I want hon. members to look at - I don't know the appropriateness of raising the point of privilege at the time that the hon. member did. Now, I know, a point of privilege can be raised at any point in time, but I was calling for Ministerial Statements, and the member said I looked to the left - because, obviously, that is where one looks for ministerial statements - I didn't bother to look to the right, because they don't come in this House from the right. Normally when I finish Ministerial Statements, when there are no Ministerial Statements, I call Oral Questions immediately. In the past, there were two occasions when members -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

- there were two occasions when members rose on points of order. One, right at the point when the Speaker called order. The Speaker says order, and I call nothing, but then a member stands in his place to make a point of privilege. But once I have called Ministerial Statements, I think then we are into Ministerial Statements. By the same token, once I have called Oral Questions we are into Oral Questions, unless it is a point of privilege related to oral questions. Other than that, if we are on a point of order, we should do it the minute the Chair says order, when we are opening the session. After that point, at the end of Oral Questions or, of course, before we go into the routine Orders of the Day.

Now, I think we reverted back from Oral Questions to Statements By Ministers. So it is Oral Questions.

Oral Questions

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SIMMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have some questions I would like to ask the Premier, coming out of some public comments he has made in the last day or two, particularly with respect to the mini-budget and the approach that the government may have to take, etc., etc., etc. We understood that Cabinet was going to make decisions today. I think that is what he said publicly. Can he tell us now if a date has been set, for example, when the mini-budget will be presented to the House and, while he is on his feet, could he tell us, or at least give us some idea of the procedure that will be used in presenting the mini-budget? Will it simply be a Ministerial Statement and response or will it be an opportunity for full-length debate like you have under a full budget presentation. What exactly are we going to do, or does the government know yet?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: I guess the simplest answer is that the government doesn't know yet. Cabinet met until just a few minutes ago. We didn't conclude our meeting. We will be reconvening - well, I have another meeting at five o'clock - probably about five-thirty. I don't know by what time we will have made some decisions. I can only say to you that one decision is clear now. I do not feel that we can possibly make a revised financial statement for the Province, until Mr. Mazankowski has made a statement on behalf of the federal government. Because what he has to say in that statement may well have substantial bearing on what the Province does or has open to it to do.

So it will take a few days after that to come to a conclusion. A good deal of work will be done before December 2, when Mr. Mazankowski proposes making a statement. So it shouldn't take us much longer, after December 2, before which we can make a statement in this House. We are not in a position, or at least the Cabinet has not decided yet, what will be the form of it. I don't know whether we will be able to do that this evening when we meet again or not, but as soon as I know I will undertake to let the Leader of the Opposition know.

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

MR. SIMMS: I thank the Premier, Mr. Speaker, for the answers.

Now, I also wouldn't expect the Premier to reveal budget details. I do not think that would be very wise of me to expect him to do that. But can I try in some other way to ask him what general direction he thinks this process might take. I mean, we are all familiar with the cut and tax approach of the government for the last three years. Is there any way in the world that the people of Newfoundland and Labrador should expect to see, in this particular budget, any kind of action or decisions that might help to stimulate the economy, as opposed to simply just looking after cutbacks?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: I could be equally evasive as the hon. member and say that the position we are going to take is the right one, the one that we believe will be the right one for the Province. The challenge, as the Opposition Leader knows - I guess that is really the point of his question - is to meet and cope with two competing forces at the same time. One of the competing forces is the financial problem that the Province has due to reduction in revenues below what was anticipated, and the high debt load that the Province bears relative to other provinces of Canada or many other provinces of Canada, at least. That makes it very difficult for us to borrow more money to stimulate the economy.

Now, equally, the Opposition Leader is quite correct, that in these kinds of recessionary times, the medicine that we would like to be able to apply is some economic stimulus, if we could, but that takes financial resources. So I am quite confident that the Leader of the Opposition is well aware of the dichotomy that the government finds itself in at this particular time.

I should say to the House, Mr. Speaker, that the government is considering all of those aspects. We have to look at our capital budget, what we can do with that, the extent to which that may or may not be restrained and the extent to which it might adversely affect our overall objective, to restrain it too severely. There are a whole lot of considerations that the government has to take into account, before it makes it final decision.

So I can only say, in answer to the specific question of the Leader of the Opposition, that I can't tell him exactly what the direction will be and to what extent it will be in that direction. I can only assure him that government is cognizant of all of the circumstances that we have to address.

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

MR. SIMMS: Mr. Speaker, on a supplementary.

I believe the Premier - and I don't want to misquote him, but I am sure if I do he will be the first one to correct me - but I believe somewhere along the way I read or heard that the Premier had asked or encouraged the Prime Minister to do exactly what I was suggesting about borrowing a bit more and stimulating the economy and so on. Now, that may be incorrect, but I am sure I read it or heard it somewhere, and he may want to take the opportunity to point out that he has been misquoted again.

I do want to ask him this, and this is something that I know he did say. The Premier himself told the media and, through the media, the public, that the measures that they will take as a government to reduce the deficit will be uniform across the board. I think that is pretty well a quote. Now, I want to ask him: What exactly did he mean by that? Was he simply referring to the public service sector unions or is he talking about the general public? In other words, does he have tax increases in mind, in order for it to apply uniformly across the board to all the population?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: The leader has raised two issues. I will tell the House precisely what the news media were trying to report about my comments at the time to the Prime Minister. After my meeting with the Prime Minister a couple of days ago, both of us met the media outside his office. He briefly addressed the media and, in his words, then left me to their tender mercies and walked back in to the shelter of his own office, so I responded on behalf of both of us to the questions that the media wanted to raise.

They were asking questions about the financial situation and I was expressing understanding, great understanding for the position for the federal government. They asked me if I was looking for money from the federal government and I was explaining to the media that no, because I knew the position that the federal government was in and what I was looking for was co-operative effort to solve jointly our financial and economic problems, and one of the media asked me: Well, in the present economic circumstances, do you feel that we should have some stimulus in the economy? and my response to him was that the government had very little option, the Federal Government had very little option in terms of stimulating the economy.

It had the same dichotomy facing it that I just addressed, so to the extent that it borrowed extra money to stimulate the economy, it exacerbated the deficit and debt problem, but I believe that it was appropriate to the maximum extent that the government could, within the limitations of its debt and deficit situation, that the government try to find some means to spend its money in a way that would provide an economic stimulus. I had not asked the Prime Minister to do it. I explained to the news media that that was my view of what ought to be done, but that we ought to recognize the limitations on the Federal Government in this regard.

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

MR. SIMMS: A supplementary.

Mr. Speaker -

PREMIER WELLS: I had forgotten, he had a second part (inaudible).

MR. SIMMS: I forget what it was, too.

PREMIER WELLS: Okay, now I know.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: That was the first part of it and the second part was, I am quoted, he said, and I think this is a direct quote, of having told the media that the matter was going to be uniform across the board. I don't recall using those words but here is what I did say to the media, to the best of my recollection: that the government recognized that it was not right to attempt to address these problems solely on the basis of restraining compensation in the public service and restraining public expenditure, that this was a problem that the Province had to address on a Province-wide basis and that the government was aware of this and it couldn't be addressed solely by placing restraints or constraints on one sector of the economy. This may, in fact necessitate some tax adjustment. There may be other means of doing that, that the government is looking at and we are considering other possible means now. But what I did say to the media was not that matters would be uniform across the board, I don't recall using those words, but I did indicate clearly that the government was not seeking to deal with it solely on the basis of restraining public expenditures on salaries and other programs.

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

MR. SIMMS: Mr. Speaker, on a supplementary.

For the last three, three-and-a-half years now, the Government of this Province have cut jobs and services in each of the last three budgets, in particular, but still, the overall spending has really increased over that period of time; the government has taxed like no other government in our history, in our recent history certainly, yet the revenues from provincial sources all seem to be falling consistently and steadily. Is it not a bit obvious now to the Premier that really, what has transpired in the past has caused us to be past the point of diminishing returns, and when is he going to wake up to that reality and really have a hard look at trying to do something to stimulate the economy and create some jobs? Doesn't he think that that really is where the answer lies, and if so, why has he not done it for the last three years?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Most of the underlying statements that the Opposition Leader made are not correct, so his conclusions in the question on which he bases it, of course, are not very sound: The government cut jobs and services in 'each of the last three budgets'. We cut jobs in one of the last three budgets, not each of the last three budgets, there was a significant reduction in one of the last three budgets. The second statement was that revenue from provincial sources have been going down and doesn't the government realize that the answer is to stimulate the economy? No, Mr. Speaker, he is wrong on that, too. Revenue from provincial sources has not been going down steadily over those last three years, and I will produce the detail.

AN HON. MEMBER: It has been going up.

PREMIER WELLS: It has been going up over the last three years. What has been going down is revenue from the Federal Government.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WELLS: Just listen. I ask hon. members to just listen to the figures. Just listen to the figures.

The last year they sat on this side of the House, the federal revenue, I believe, was more than 50 per cent of the total budget. The federal transfers was more than 50 per cent of the total provincial revenue. Now, Mr. Speaker, the federal revenue on this last year, this current fiscal year, I believe was projected at 44 per cent - down 6 percentage points.

With the drop that we have just recently been advised of - the drop of some $49 million in equalization - that may drop it another one, two, or maybe more percentage points. It may, in fact -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) EPF.

PREMIER WELLS: I am talking about the total - EPF and equalization.

I am talking about the total federal transfers. Mr. Speaker, They have gone down in the last three years, and with this recent reduction - even with a $16 million increase in EPF, but with a $49 million decrease in equalization, will cause a further reduction in the percentage of the total revenue of the Province that comes from federal sources. It will be down probably to 43 or 42 per cent.

Now, Mr. Speaker, how, therefore, can the question of the Leader of the Opposition be correct when he says that the provincial revenues have gone down each year? - they have not, Mr. Speaker, they have gone up, because that is what has supported the reduction in the federal revenue.

Now, in the meantime, we have needed this additional revenue to keep the Province going, in light of the federal reduction. Am I blaming the Federal Government? No, Mr. Speaker, I have stood in this House year after year after year and said that I understand what the Federal Government have to do because of their massive deficit and the incredible debt situation of the country. I cannot argue against what they are doing, and we must help, with the rest of the country. I have stood here and said that time and time and time again, lest anybody start saying, as they have been doing, that all we are doing is blaming the Federal Government. That is not so. We recognize the massive problem that exists in the nation. Because of the necessary decisions that the Federal Government must take, and I understand that, we are faced with reductions that we must deal with. That is exactly what we have been doing, Mr. Speaker, and I am surprised that the Leader of the Opposition doesn't really see the broader picture.

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

MR. SIMMS: I have just one final supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

It is too bad we didn't have a bit more time to discuss it here in Question Period. The point I was trying to make to the Premier, and he does so very well - he is so clever at twisting the things that we are trying to say - the point I was making to him is that they have taxed and taxed and taxed for the past number of years. Yet, in comparison to the number of provincial tax increases that you have imposed on businesses, personal income tax, and all the rest, without getting into a debate, the revenues from provincial sources have gone down.

In this recent statement that your own Minister of Finance made two weeks ago, the point is $32 million less from federal sources, but there is $63 million less from provincial sources. Your own provincial income tax is down by $47 million, which is a reflection on the policies of the government, and that is my point. My question is: Would the Premier take the advice that I have offered him from time to time in the past, the advice of the Board of Trade, the advice of several business groups around this Province, and the advice of his own former Minister of Justice, the Member for Humber West? Will he cut some taxes to stimulate investment and consumer spending in this Province so that we can begin to repair the damage that his government has inflicted on the economy of Newfoundland and Labrador?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

PREMIER WELLS: Here are the revenue figures from the provincial sources for the last five years: 1988-'89, $l,333,000,000; 1989-'90, $1,484,000,000; 1990-'91, $1,553,000,000; 1991-'92, $1,645,000,000; 1992-'93, projected at $1,721,000,000 - steady increases, Mr. Speaker. But the Leader of the Opposition makes a valid point when he says that part of that increase is due to increase in the rate of taxation. He is quite correct when he says that. Then, he asks, will we take the advice he has given us? That is part of what put us in this mess, Mr. Speaker. We can't borrow. We either generate revenue from economic activity and taxation combined, or we borrow.

I refer hon. members to an article by Giles Gherson, in the Financial Times or the Financial Post, one of them, of the last few days, talking about the bonds of Saskatchewan and Newfoundland, possibly reaching the junk stage. Now, here it is. Let me quote exactly what he said: 'Already, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

PREMIER WELLS: I ask hon. members to stop babbling and they might hear something that might enable them to make an intelligent judgement on this issue, Mr. Speaker. Here is what he says: 'Already, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland are a step away from having their debt downgraded to junk status in the U.S.' Now, Mr. Speaker, the advice from the Leader of the Opposition is go and borrow more - cut taxes and borrow more. Now, there is his advice, Mr. Speaker. Is that what he wants to do - bankrupt the Province? Mr. Speaker, we are going to be very responsible in the management of the financial affairs of the Province and we will seek to provide the maximum possible level of economic stimulus that we can provide within the limits of the ability of the government to borrow more money, and within the limits of the ability of the taxpayers of this Province to pay more taxes - and both are very limited, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. WINSOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have a question for the minister responsible for Employment and Labour Relations. The Minister of Finance has already announced that all departments of government have to implement a 3 per cent savings program. Let me ask the minister, Is it his intention to implement such a program in the already inadequate employment division of his department?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations.

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the question. The instructions are being followed in all departments of government and we are reporting back to Cabinet as to the options that exist in every division of every department, as to how to effect savings for the remainder of this year.

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

MR. WINSOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If I understand the minister correctly, he is saying that with four months left in this fiscal year, his department, his division of government, the one responsible for employment in this Province, is not going to take part in any employment programs for the remainder of 1992 - 1993? Is that what the minister is saying to the unemployed of Newfoundland - that his department, directly responsible for employment, is not going to partake in any job creation for the rest of this fiscal year?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations.

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, I really don't understand why he is asking this - it makes absolutely no sense to me. He asked the question, Is that division of the Department of Employment and Labour Relations looking at saving 1 per cent on salary cost and 3 per cent on operating cost for the rest of the year, like every other division of every other department? That has nothing to do with whether or not the programs that are in place are going to continue. It is just to say, Can these measures of savings be effected in the next four months, while continuing on with the programs. And how you can go from that first question to the second is completely beyond me, because it makes absolutely no sense.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Fogo, on a supplementary.

MR. WINSOR: Mr. Speaker, the minister is obviously not very alert today. I am saying to the minister that he has four months of this fiscal year left and we have an unemployment crisis in this Province. Is the minister saying that for the remainder of this year, his employment division will create no more jobs for the people of this Province, only maintaining what is already there? Is that what he is saying?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations.

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, I will try to make the hon. member opposite understand: On an ongoing basis throughout the twelve months of the fiscal year, the Department of Employment and Labour Relations, through its Employment Services branch, runs programs, graduate employment programs, student employment programs, the employment generation programs, that through every month for the whole of the year, there are applications being processed and approved. I signed a batch of them yesterday. In a couple of those programs for approval, as the requests come in, the money is still budgeted and flowing. They get approved accordingly as the research and review of each application is done based on its merit. There is nothing stopping the continuation of the employment programs in the division of Employment Services in the department. What we are looking at, is to ask, in terms of the operational costs related to running that program or any other, can we effect savings in the rest of this fiscal year? - and we are looking at that.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Fogo, on a supplementary.

MR. WINSOR: Mr. Speaker, the minister knows that there is nothing left in the department. There are a few dollars left for the ongoing programs. If there is money left in the department, why hasn't the minister spent it to create jobs in this Province? Mr. Speaker, what nonsense!

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the federal minister announced a $5 million program for job creation in areas affected by a poor fishery. The federal minister took his responsibility seriously because it was mainly a federal responsibility. Mr. Speaker, the provincial minister has a responsibility as a Minister of Employment for the unemployed labourers, the miners, the loggers in this Province. Mr. Speaker, my question is: What is he going to do to help all the unemployed? Is he going to suggest, as the former minister did, that these people go to Social Services for assistance? Is that what he is suggesting?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations.

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I believe I heard the hon. member's number quoted correctly. He said that Mr. Crosbie yesterday announced a $5 million program to help people in the fishing areas, with fishery response projects that will give them the necessary amount of work so that they can qualify for unemployment insurance. I don't know what province the hon. member has been in for the last while, but two months ago on the 18th of September, this government announced a $13.5 million program in which there are now 4,000 people currently working in the Province that would not have been without that initiative.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

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

MR. WINSOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The minister knows that was only replacing what he took from it last year. Mr. Speaker, since the minister has nothing to offer, let me ask the minister responsible for Social Services: Thousands of Newfoundlanders on UI following the employment program that was in place last fall and early last winter, are now about to have their benefits terminated. Since the minister has indicated there is going to be nothing in his department, will the Minister of Social Services have some money put into the Community Development Fund in his division so that these people can have an opportunity to work?

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

MR. GULLAGE: Mr. Speaker, we have to respond, of course, in my department on a needs basis, as people need our services, whether it be social assistance or other services. I think the government has responded this year with programs through Employment and Labour Relations, my department and Municipal and Provincial Affairs. Some $11 million was added to our current spending. We are in the last stages now of spending that money. I gave out some approvals, as a matter of fact, I have some with me, for some final projects that are being included in the $5 million dollars that was in my department. So, Mr. Speaker, I would say we have done a substantial amount of work this year. We have created a substantial amount of work throughout the three departments that have been involved already.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This week, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Municipal Affairs announced changes restricting the right of councils to tax some of the utility companies in this Province. I have been in contact with the Burin Town Council, which will lose approximately $87,000 dollars, and the Marystown Town Council who tell me they will lose approximately $95,000 dollars. What is the minister going to do, Mr. Speaker, to prevent this burden from being passed on to the taxpayers of these towns? I have been told by the Burin council, for example, it will mean a whopping 35 per cent increase on property taxes if they have to find that money.

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

MR. HOGAN: Since the imposition, or the projected imposition of this new tax on utilities, Mr. Speaker, there have been no submissions forthcoming from any municipalities to the department to point out any plight or any extra burden but it is realized by this government and by this department that, indeed, in fact, some councils, particularly the ones that have been mentioned by the hon. member, will have had an inordinate burden placed on them. They will have to try to cope with it, and we will assist them the best way we can.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West, on a supplementary.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, I say to the minister, he can expect correspondence.

I would like to ask the minister, Mr. Speaker: Is he aware that last year the Marystown town council took Newfoundland Telephone to court for the right to tax the equipment within the building - not just the property but the equipment within the building. Mr. Speaker, after several months of court work, through appeals, that eventually led to the Supreme Court ruling in favour of Marystown just a few months ago, does the minister realize that now, in this bill he is going to bring before the House, he is overruling the court decision that gave Marystown the right to tax the equipment of Newfoundland Telephone?

I would like to ask the minister, Mr. Speaker: Does he support the court's decision, and if he does not, why not? Mr. Speaker, why has he brought into this Legislature a bill that will overrule the rights of the Supreme Court of this Province?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

MR. HOGAN: Thank you for the protection of the Chair, Mr. Speaker.

I am not fully aware or fully cognizant nor am I fully briefed on the decision of the court in that regard, but I am aware of the fact that the legislation will withdraw the ability of the councils to tax equipment.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

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

I just remind members to my right that the Chair is having difficulty hearing the answers. After just about every statement there is some kind of noise or response and the Chair can't hear. The Chair would like to hear what is being said, because if the Chair can't hear what is being said then it can't make any judgement if members should ask any question related to it. So I would ask hon. members, please, to restrain themselves and to please realize the difficulty of hearing someone speaking when someone else is interjecting. I would ask the minister to continue with his answer. I don't know whether the minister was finished with is answer or not.

MR. HOGAN: Yes.

MR. SPEAKER: The minister is finished.

The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My final question to the minister, then, Mr. Speaker. What he has done here is put restrictions on the councils to tax public utility companies in this Province. But they are saying to the Burin town council, you can go out and charge Fishery Products 20 mils if you want to, but you are going to be restricted in charging our buddies in the utility companies.

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the enormous cost involved in that case that went to the Supreme Court, is the minister aware that his department paid the greater portion of that cost to have Newfoundland Telephone brought to the Supreme Court and have the lawyer's fight successful in having this ruling made in favour in favour of Marystown? Is he aware that his department paid to have that procedure put in place?

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

MR. HOGAN: No, Mr. Speaker, I was not aware my department is that generous. It was probably before my time, the generosity of my predecessor. I might not have been as generous to my hon. friend.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

AN HON. MEMBER: Name them, Mr. Speaker.

MR. HOGAN: If hon. members don't want to listen, Mr. Speaker, I don't want to give them an answer.

MR. SPEAKER: Question Period has expired.

Presenting Reports by

Standing and Special Committees

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

MR. GOVER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to table the Public Tender Act Exceptions for October, 1992.

MR. SPEAKER: If I could interrupt hon. members, I see some students leaving, and the Chair inadvertently forgot to welcome a group of students here today. Members will understand that they generally only stay for Question Period so, as they leave, we would like to welcome them, if they have not left. They are a group of thirty-three students from the Pentecostal High School in the district of Port de Grave -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

- accompanied by their teachers, Mr. Junior Taylor and Ms. Karen Janes.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

Petitions

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SIMMS: Mr. Speaker, I stand today in the Legislature to present a petition, a number of petitions, in fact - I am going to present them all together - that are gathered by a number of groups of concerned citizens in this Province. The number of petitioners total 6,198 names on these particular petitions that I will table, and I understand other members of the Legislature have similar petitions to present from different parts of the Province.

These names are collected by a number of different groups, including the well-known SNAG group from Placentia, the SNAG group from St. John's, the Coalition Against Incineration, Action Environment, and other individuals.

Mr. Speaker, I have been asked to make it clear to the House that this is not the end of the petition drive to be undertaken by these groups of concerned individuals. Really, it is only the beginning. They intend to continue to collect names for petitions and have them presented here in the Legislature, and we have offered to do whatever we can in that regard.

I might mention, before reading the prayer of the petition, if I might, that the group is holding a demonstration on Sunday - that is this coming Sunday - at 2:00 p.m. in front of the Confederation Building, this wing - What is this called, the east wing?

MR. MATTHEWS: The west wing.

MR. SIMMS: This is the -

MR. MATTHEWS: East Block.

MR. SIMMS: - the East Block, here in front of this building at 2:00 p.m., and I know that there will be representatives from all parties there to lend support to their request. Their request, in essence, is a request for the Government of this Province to take a position firmly and finally, opposing the incineration project that has been proposed for Long Harbour.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I should also point out that some of the names on this petition, by the way, or some of the petitions included in here, in fact, one of them, in particular, has come from a number of residents of New York - as far away as New York. Their prayer is a little bit different. They say that Newfoundland is fighting a proposal to build an incinerator to burn 3,500 tons of New York's waste each day, and they say, please support their efforts - that is, the efforts of the Newfoundlanders - by signing this petition and mailing it to them when you have finished it; make the United States solve our waste disposal problems, not export them elsewhere, which is a rather interesting little twist to the petition.

The actual prayer of the majority of these petitions, without doing every single one of them, reads as follows:

WHEREAS the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador has some of the most unspoiled natural beauty in Canada; and

WHEREAS we, the undersigned, wish to both preserve and conserve this natural heritage; we petition and urge the Government of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, through the House of Assembly, to immediately enact legislation which will prevent the importing and incinerating of garbage at the proposed site at Long Harbour, Placentia Bay, Newfoundland.

The other petitions' prayers are quite similar, Mr. Speaker, but I will just refer to this particular one from the Coalition Against Incineration, which states:

WHEREAS the importation of garbage is an indignity to the people of Newfoundland and should not be seen as a future growth industry for this Province; and

WHEREAS the incineration of garbage is destructive and hazardous to both human health and the environment of this Province; and

WHEREAS the incineration of garbage goes against the principles of sustainable development, your petitioners respectfully request that the hon. House take such action as may be necessary to immediately stop the proposed garbage incineration project for Long Harbour and ban through legislation, all future such projects and, two, develop a comprehensive waste management program for this Province that stresses the reduction, reusing and recycling of our garbage and which excludes incineration.

Now, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that there is a five-minute time limitation on our speaking time, I will serve notice that I will be presenting some other petitions tomorrow, perhaps on the same issue, and it will give me a chance to get into some of the specific details.

I want to make it absolutely and abundantly clear - I thank the Minister of Finance - I want to make it absolutely and abundantly clear that our party, from a public perspective, have made a decision, have taken a position on the issue and have done so six months ago, back in June, I think it was, sometime, when we wrote the federal minister responsible for ACOA, asking him to withdraw the funding that had been provided for this study. We also had raised questions in the Legislature, as Your Honour would know, to the Minister of Environment and Lands, from time to time, and for the life of us, we cannot understand why this government is not able to take a position, or at least, to tell us: Are they in favour of barges and barges of garbage coming over to this Province from places like New York and other parts of the United States?

Surely they should be able to know what their position is on that particular question. Thus far, we have been unable to get that kind of response from the government. Some of them over there say: Well, we think we should wait and see what the study says. Others over there say: I am opposed to it. The Member for St. John's South, I think, has publicly said it; the Member for Humber West has certainly said it. Some of the ministers over there, including the Premier, say: Well, I personally don't like it, but I think we should see what the study has to say. Somewhere along the line, Mr. Speaker, surely God, they must be able to take a position as to whether or not they, in principle, support the concept of garbage coming into this Province, other people's garbage, from places like New York, for the purpose of incineration, or whether they are not. Now, that should not take a lot of difficult thinking, I wouldn't think, on the part even of members on that side of the House. They should not have that much difficulty.

So, we support the prayer of the petition and, as I said, as a party, our position is quite clear: we oppose it and, in fact, we think that the government should bring in legislation to ban the importation of garbage for this purpose and then that will resolve and solve the whole question. It will no longer be a question. That is our policy as a party. I don't know what the government's party policy is. I believe our policy is similar to the NDP policy; I cannot speak for the NDP, but I think theirs is similar to ours, as my friend points out.

MR. HARRIS: Yours followed ours.

MR. SIMMS: No, our announcement on our position followed the day after, I think, and that was because you heard we were about to call a press conference the next day and you rushed out to make your statement. We know all about that.

In any event, Mr. Speaker, that is hardly the issue. It is not the matter of importance as to who or when or where. The issue that is of importance is that 6,198 names today, I do not know how many more, another 15,000 I think, over the next little while, they are looking for 20,000 or 25,000 names on petitions and if that is not a pretty strong indication to the Minister of Environment and Lands, who has publicly said, 'I understand' - I think she said it here in this House. In response to a question asked by the Health critic, the Member for Harbour Main, she said: 'I am not sure that the people of the Province are opposed to this, I really cannot judge that.' Well, I am not sure where she has been for the last several months, but if she doesn't believe that the majority of the people of this Province is opposed to that project, then she will never be convinced because there has been enough evidence to prove that.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the representatives from the groups, SNAGG, The Coalition Against Incineration, Accident Environment and others are also in the gallery today in the Legislature, for obvious reasons. I guess they want to see what the response of the government to the petitions might be. We will have to wait and see if there is indeed any response. They are not obligated to reply, but I am sure somebody over there will take a position on it for the benefit of the people in the gallery, at least, so they can report back to the 6,198 petitioners that we have here this afternoon. There will be more petitions coming, and I know there are some more here today.

Mr. Speaker, I firmly support the prayer of the petition and ask that the petition be placed on the Table of the House and referred to the department to which it is directed, and that the government take the necessary action to respond to the petitioners.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader and Minister of Justice.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. TOBIN: The recycled member.

MR. ROBERTS: I would rather have been recycled, Mr. Speaker, than be in the raw native state of the hon. gentleman from Burin - Placentia West.

Now, Mr. Speaker, if I may, I would like to address this in the same serious way as did the hon. Leader of the Opposition. I am quite prepared to engage in badinage with the hon. gentleman from Burin - Placentia West, but this is a serious matter. His leader treated it seriously and I would like to treat it seriously as well, if he would do me the courtesy of trying not to be rude for once in his career.

Mr. Speaker, I haven't seen the petition. I shall look forward with great interest to reading it, but I listened with great interest to hearing what my friend, the Leader of the Opposition, had to say. I understand some of my colleagues on this side, including my friend from Humber West, has a similar petition, and there may be others who will be presenting them as well. That is as it should be. We are one of the few legislatures, I guess in the Commonwealth, that continues a tradition of presenting petitions. I think it is a good one and I hope we will continue, as we have, to accept them.

I am glad too that there are people in the gallery today. We don't speak to the gallery. My hon. friend opposite wasn't speaking to the gallery, not much. But people should be here if they wish to be and hear what they wish. I am glad people are here because I would like to be able to say just where this government stands and why, within the three or four minutes left of my five-minute period.

We are not waiting for a study on the Long Harbour garbage proposal or whatever the official name of it is. The only government involved in a study is the Government of Canada, as my friend, the Leader of the Opposition, pointed out. The Government of Canada, in the personage of the hon. John Crosbie, has funded, I gather, a very large study, in the order of about $1 million. Now, there is not a nickel, or to quote what John Crosbie used to say in the long ago time when he was in the House, when the Leader of the Opposition was just a young pup instead of being the mature dog he is today, "Not a jot, not a tittle," of provincial money in that study. We have had nothing at all to do with it. ACOA, for reasons known only to ACOA or to John Crosbie or whatever process ACOA goes through, has taken $1 million of the federal money and funded that study. There is no provincial money in it. Now, that is fine. The Government of Canada and ACOA will answer for what they have or have not done.

We are not waiting for a study. We are not awaiting any study of any sort. What we are waiting for is an application. At this stage, all we know is that there is a group out there who have managed to get their hooks into $1 million of the Government of Canada's money, contributed, no doubt, in part by the taxpayers of Newfoundland and Labrador. This group is out there and they are having a fine time. Whatever the merits or demerits of their proposal, they are having a fine time. They are going ahead with a study. Now, what that will lead to, I do not know, and none of my colleagues know. My friend, the minister who is absent for unavoidable reasons or would otherwise be here in her place speaking to us, does not know. When we get an application, if we get an application, then it will be dealt with.

MR. SIMMS: Why wait?

MR. ROBERTS: Why wait? Mr. Speaker, we have always taken the naive view on this side that we should not execute the criminal until he is convicted; we should not come to a judgement on anything until we have the facts. That may be one of the reasons why we are here and the hon. gentleman and his colleagues are over there.

AN HON. MEMBER: Sprung (inaudible).

MR. ROBERTS: Just compare it to Sprung. They sprang with the money and then got the judgement later. We are not going to do that. When we get an application, if, i-f, underlined - a little word with a great big meaning - if we get an application, then we shall deal with it in accordance with the laws of this Province. The government position will be stated, as always, frankly and fully in this House if the House is meeting, and if not in a public forum, and when the House meets we shall come here and gladly answer for it. And when the time comes we shall gladly go to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador to explain what we have done and to ask for their support, which we believe we will get.

We are not in favour of garbage. It is the hon. gentlemen opposite who are concerned with garbage. What we are concerned with is a proper and due process set down by the laws of this Province. If an application comes in from this garbage group, then we will deal with it. Until that happens - and it may never happen - I do not know if it is going to happen. The hon. gentleman opposite may have some kind of clairvoyant powers to enable him to determine it, but if it happens we will deal with it. It is his friends, his political bedfellows - the ones with whom he is cheek to cheek, chin to chin, belly to belly, toe to toe, jowl to jowl - it is his friend, John Crosbie, who is funding this - not anybody over here.

So, Mr. Speaker, the answer is that Mr. Crosbie and ACOA have taken a million bucks and they are lashing it out in this study, or they have given it to these people to lash out on the study. I hope some of it stays here in the Province. That is the only good news.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. minister's time is up.

MR. ROBERTS: By leave?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member does not have leave.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Harbour Main.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member for Harbour Main is speaking on the petition.

The hon. the Member for Harbour Main.

MR. DOYLE: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to support this petition presented by my colleague, the Leader of the Opposition, who has enunciated our position on this particular issue quite well. It is documented that we are totally and completely against the importation of American garbage.

The Government House Leader can talk all he wants about John Crosbie and the fact that the federal government has given a million dollars to this project. If it was not the government's intention to proceed with this project; if it was not the government's intention to call a feasibility study on this project, why did they not get in touch with John Crosbie and the federal government and say: Save your million dollars and put it into job creation in this Province?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DOYLE: That is all they had to do.

- if it is the government's intention to proceed with feasibility studies on this project. We contacted Mr. Crosbie and we told him exactly that - to save the million dollars and to put it into something much more useful than this. So the government is dragging its' heels on this particular issue, and it should not be.

We have asked the Minister of Environment and Lands, and we have asked the Premier, to bring legislation to the House of Assembly - a one clause bill which would ban this particular project and bury it once and for all - and that is what the people of this Province want.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DOYLE: They want this particular project buried once and for all!

Contrary to what the Minister of Environment and Lands says, there is a large consensus across this Province - all across Newfoundland and Labrador - that this project should be buried once and for all.

Mr. Speaker, how dare the Minister of Environment and Lands stand in her place and say: Well, I do not know if I have received one negative phone call on this particular issue. She should be in the House today to see a petition of 6,100 names come in here, and she should be listening to the open line programs this morning when the position of all these people was put forth by Mr. Angel, who did a darn good job in enunciating the position of the people of this Province with respect to this issue.

I believe there is something like 70 or 75 per cent of the people against this project, and it is about time that this government showed a little bit of leadership.

I remember when I was sitting on that side of the House and a project came before the former government to store toxic waste in the abandoned mines on Bell Island. It was the Premier of the Province, who was then Leader of the Opposition, who stood in his place and said: The people on Bell Island are against this; the people in Newfoundland are against this; let's bury it. We do not need a feasibility study. Now, all of a sudden, his position has changed. All of a sudden he is willing to see this project come to Newfoundland.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DOYLE: That is shameful, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

It might be the appropriate place to remind hon. members that a petition is not a period for debate, although the Chair tolerates a little on each side. I thought it might be the right time to remind hon. members on both sides of the House just what our Standing Orders say in relation to this, and I quote very quickly Standing Order 92 which says: Every member offering a petition to the House shall confine himself to the statement of the parties from whom it comes, the number of signatures attached to it and the material allegations it contains. The Chair did not make the rules, the Chair is enforcing the rules. The hon. the Member for Harbour Main.

MR. DOYLE: But, Mr. Speaker, how strange it is, how strange it is indeed that the government can change its position so quickly. That it would be over on this side of the House calling on the government to bury a project like the storage of waste on Bell Island because the people were against it. Now all of a sudden, Mr. Speaker, we see this government prepared to sit idly by and not show one bit of leadership. We would support without reservation, on this side of the House, the Minister of Environment and the government, if they were to bring a Bill into this House, a one clause Bill, banning this project and burying this project as it should be, Mr. Speaker, we would support that and give it speedy passage but the government has chosen not to show any leadership on this issue. Mr. Speaker, as all people in this Province are aware this is a relatively new technology.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! The hon. member's time is up.

MR. DOYLE: By leave, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have the privilege of presenting a petition on behalf of residents of Ship Harbour. Mr. Speaker, this petition from the undersigned members of the coalition against incineration state that: the importation of garbage is an indignity to the people of Newfoundland and should not be seen as a future growth industry for the Province. Further, that the incineration of garbage is destructive and hazardous to both human health and the environment of the Province. Further, that the incineration of garbage goes against the principles of sustainable development and asks the Honourable House to take such action as may be necessary to immediately stop the proposed garbage incineration project for Long Harbour and ban through legislation all future such projects. Further, Mr. Speaker, the petitioners ask that the government develop a comprehensive waste management program for this Province that stresses a reduction, reusing and recycling of our garbage and which excludes incineration.

Now, Mr. Speaker, what is interesting about this petition, is it comes from the people of Ship Harbour, Placentia Bay and Mr. Speaker, there are 126 signatures of the 129 residents of Ship Harbour. Only three residents of Ship Harbour, Mr. Speaker, did not sign the petition. I do not know whether it was because they refused and they support the project or whether or not they were available in the community when the petition was being taken around. So, Mr. Speaker, this is of great significance and it should be of great significance to the Minister of Environment that 126 out of 129 people, residents of Ship Harbour signed this petition. Now, I do not know, Mr. Speaker, what more the Minister of Environment and this government needs to understand that the people of this Province are opposed to this petition.

The Minister of Environment stated that she only received one letter on it, she only thinks there is one person in the Province who is opposed to this project apparently. They go much further than just saying we should ban this project and I think that that is fundamental to the petition but they asked that the government develop a comprehensive waste management program for the Province and stressing the reduction, reusing and recycling of our garbage and excluding incineration.

Now, Mr. Speaker, that is a big task to ask of this government because the Minister of Environment has not even managed to get going a project to recycle the garbage and the fine papers in the Confederation building itself. For two years, Mr. Speaker, the estimate's committee has been asking the Minister of Environment and the predecessor, to put in place a comprehensive waste management program, just for the confederation building alone. For two years, Mr. Speaker, we have been getting nothing but verbiage, rhetoric and platitudes. Now, Mr. Speaker, if the petitioners of Ship Harbour are to be listened to, the government has to provide some leadership and decision making, leadership by example through its own actions and in the public service and the House of Assembly and the government buildings here and confederation building, east and west block. They have to provide leadership here and they have to tell the people of this Province that they are listening. That the people of Newfoundland do not want this project to go ahead.

I heard the Minister of Forestry and Agriculture inviting an application. He said we need an application. Well, Mr. Speaker, we do not need an application. An application is what this government seems to be inviting, they want this project to be put before them, so that they can dilly-dally around but they have already - it appears, Mr. Speaker, given this group, The North American Resource Recovery Group, some assurance that if they do put an application before them, that they could get it approved and that Mr. Speaker, is what the people of Newfoundland and Labrador do not want, Mr. Speaker.

The people of Ship Harbour, a fishing area in Placentia Bay, know what pollution can do, they have their views on what is good for Placentia Bay and what is good for Newfoundland, and 126 out of 129 of them have signed this petition. Mr. Speaker, what more does this government need in terms of finding out the views of the people of this Province, 'Say No To American Garbage', that is the motto of this group who is trying to get this government to take a very simple action and tell the proponents of this proposal that it will not be approved, that the people of this Province do not want to become the garbage dump of North America, say no, now, Mr. Speaker, that is what these petitioners want and the government should simply do it. I want to place this on the Table of the House and I ask that it be brought to the attention of the Minister of Environment and Lands, so she will know that she is very wrong if she thinks that the people of this Province are not opposed to the project. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. MURPHY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is a pleasure for me to rise this afternoon because it is exactly one week ago today that I rose and brought this issue to the floor of the House of Assembly. Now, Mr. Speaker, let me say this and let me say this emphatically: It is, and I say to the Chair, it is unparliamentary to tell a lie or to purposely deceive this House. I say now, that this hon. member was the first member to stand and speak against the importation of American garbage, the first, without a political whim.

I watch hon. members Opposite, I watch the member who just spoke, the Member for St. John's East, who sat around for a month or two, watched the political error, watched it develop, wanted to see which way it was going and coming, as well as the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, watched, looked, waited and took their time, they did not stand on their own, never said one word, Mr. Speaker, but now they have the petition in their hands, now they see the wind, now they hear what is going on, now they stand up with all this great courage. Well I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that both hon. leaders are standing with false courage. Now let me talk about the issue and why I do and have supported the non-importation of American Garbage.

No. 1. This Province would never be able to control the type of garbage we would receive. That is the first fearsome problem I have with it. Do we get toxic waste? Do we get nuclear waste? Who is going to tell the people of Newfoundland that the containers that are coming in here with garbage in them have just old newspapers or just household garbage? That is the first fear I have and that has already been identified when we heard a statement from the proponents of this project this morning, say they know how to separate metal and there are empty containers going back and now they are trying to solidify their position a little more. Well I have also a great fear of who controls garbage coming out of New York. I think I know the group who controls garbage coming out of New York. They walk around with slick hair, navy blue suits and machine guns. That is another fear I have. They own the issue, so I have a fear of that.

Another comment I would like to make is that, the hon. members Opposite, somebody convinced their colleague and/or their cousin, Mr. Crosbie, to give $1 million for a feasibility study to look into burning garbage in Long Harbour. What I would like to know is why they did not give my hon. friends in the gallery or give somebody else $1 million to fight the cause against it, why didn't they do that? Where was the credibility in that? Let me continue by saying that is the issue that, number one, it is not fair.

Now if all of the garbage plants that are existing are similar to the one that exists at Long Harbour, why does anybody need $1 million? Why don't they bring in the records of these other plants if they are so wonderful and lay the data sheets on the table, show us about the bottom ash and the fly ash, show us that the fly ash is scrubbed and properly contained, siloed and what have you.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. MURPHY: No, no. I tell the hon. Leader of the Opposition: You have made a political issue out of this, and you will pay the price for it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. MURPHY: You do not know what you are talking about. That is your problem.

MR. SIMMS: Why don't you ban it?

MR. MURPHY: I will ban it - when the time comes. I spoke out first against it, and I will continue to speak out against it. I will continue. I will not support any side, any political party, in the burning of garbage in Newfoundland. I will not! You can be sure of it!

Now if you burn toxic and/or nuclear garbage; if you scrub that material, all you have done is condensed it. You have only condensed it, if you contain it at the stackhead. You still have to take it; bring it back; it is condensed; you put it in a drum - what kind of a drum? A steel drum? What kind of a drum do you put it in? It will go away, and twenty-five, thirty, fifty, or a hundred years later we will have a love canal on our hands. That is what will happen in this Province.

My hon. friends opposite, when they smelled the political wind on this - but they were long after this hon. member, I suggest to you, long after, and he knows it.

AN HON. MEMBER: On the bandwagon.

MR. MURPHY: - but bandwagoning is what you are doing today. You are getting up with the petitions. This group never asked me to present a petition, because I will fight this issue alone. I do not need any help from anybody else. I do not need any help, but I support -

MS. VERGE: (Inaudible) your government.

MR. MURPHY: It does not matter. I will tell the hon. Member for Humber East that she had no help from her caucus on lots of issues either - lots of them - and she knows it, and I know it.

So just leave this hon. member to my sincere wish that we never see American garbage. We have enough problems in this Province to deal with our own garbage. We are trying now to recycle, and we should be encouraging that program here in our own beautiful Province.

Can you imagine somebody coming in from the United States, or from Europe, or from God knows where, on the east coast ferry, and asking one of the crew members: What is that smoke I see? - on his way into Argentia. Oh, that is the smoke coming from a plant that burns American garbage. Is that the kind of message we want to send out to the world? I am not against jobs. I am totally for jobs.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) buffoon.

MR. MURPHY: Well perhaps the hon. Member for Grand Bank has every right to call me a buffoon, but I have not made a political issue out of this, and I will not make a political issue out of it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Torngat Mountains.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I have recognized the hon. the Member for Torngat Mountains.

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

I rise in support of this petition, and I do not want to get into a debate about who was the first or who was the second or who was the third. I think credit needs to be given to the group who are leading this fight, and that is the group SNAG!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WARREN: Mr. Speaker, it is up to every member in this Legislature to stand up and be counted. That is what is needed - and here is the Member for St. John's South who wants to be given credit for being the first person. I say: Shame on you. Give credit to the people. Give credit to those who deserve credit, and those people who are in the gallery today. Give credit to them. They started this going, and they want their members to stand up and support them. Do that, I say to each member here. All we have here are two or three members on the government side getting up now and saying they are supporting this petition - two or three members.

Go back ten or twelve years ago when they were trying to open a uranium mine in Labrador. Was it then only two or three members on the government side who decided to stop it? It was every member, and the government came in and stopped the uranium mine. All this government had to do today was come in with a small, short, down-to-earth bill saying: We are going to stop the importation of garbage.

I am surprised, shocked, and disappointed in the Member for St. John's South who wants to get credit -

MR. MATTHEWS: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: A point of order.

The hon. the Opposition House leader on a point of order.

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, the Member for St. John's South already took part in debate on this petition. I think it would only be fair if he would listen now and let the Member for Torngat Mountains -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Speaker, I ask you to control the Member for St. John's South so that the Member for Torngat Mountains can have a say on the petition.

AN HON. MEMBER: Get on with it.

MR. MATTHEWS: Look - again.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

To that point of order, hon. members know it is unparliamentary to speak from your seat unless you have been recognized by the Speaker, so I would ask the hon. Member for St. John's South to restrain himself.

The hon. the Member for Torngat Mountains.

MR. WARREN: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I would hope he will listen to you, he doesn't listen very often.

Mr. Speaker, we must remember also that we took a very conciliatory approach. We met right at the beginning with a Mr. Smith and a Mr. Kirby. They came and met with me and my hon. colleague from Harbour Main. We decided then, Mr. Speaker -

MR. ROBERTS: (Inaudible).

MR. WARREN: I say to my hon. friend, the Minister of Justice, he might have been a bully when he was a Boy Scout, but he shouldn't be a bully in this House though.

I want to continue, Mr. Speaker, and say that we met with those two and, from there, we decided to go and hear the public's view. We went and heard the public's view. We had a public meeting in Placentia, in the Dunville area, we had a public meeting here in St. John's and we heard the views of many, many people. We came back and our caucus made a decision that we were in support of what action they have taken and, subsequently, today we will continue to support the endeavours of this group to make sure that American garbage is not brought into our Province to be burned. We have much more to offer in this Province than American garbage. I say to my hon. colleague from St. John's South, who is shaking his head -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) fifteen years while he was in there.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. WARREN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say, in my concluding remarks, that we are proud to stand up and support any group that wants to make Newfoundland and Labrador a better place to live.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Before I recognize the hon. member for Humber West, I would like to welcome to the House, on behalf of hon. members this afternoon, Mr. R.V. Wellbourne, First Secretary, Management and Consultant Affairs, the British High Commission in Ottawa.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am pleased to present to the House a petition similar to those presented by the Leader of the Opposition and the Member for St. John's East. I think anyone listening to the comments on the petition, notwithstanding the heated remarks sometimes passed, would certainly quickly come to the conclusion that there is a virtual unanimity of opinion in the House, and that is against any incineration of American garbage.

My colleague from St. John's South, I think, has spoken in the House today very persuasively and eloquently, as on other occasions, with respect to the individual reasons why this proposal should not go ahead. Those relate to the element of control of the substances that would be incinerated.

Having said that, however, there is a broader philosophical issue that this particular petition addresses and that is important to the future of the Province economically as much as any other matter, and philosophically as well. It is interesting that when I listened to the debate - it may be hard for those who are perhaps not familiar with proceedings in the House, but this is really a non-partisan issue. As the hon. House Leader pointed out, the government does not, and has not, approved any particular proposal for incineration. Nor has it even indicated that it will bring the matter forward to any extent whatsoever. What has happened, as he pointed out, is that the federal government has funded a study of a group that want to go ahead with this particular proposal.

Now, when it first came to the news media, contrary to any intervention of the provincial government or any participation in the manner in which it came about, as was pointed out, I received an incredible response from my district. Now, as people know, Humber West is in the City of Corner Brook and you would not think that there would be any immediate concern. But, with the exception of the current economic problems confronting this Province, I have received no greater response than on the particular proposal to incinerate American garbage here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. It was uniformly contrary to the proposal in any form whatsoever, and for the very reasons stated by this proposal.

Although it has been read, I would just like to repeat a portion of it, and that is: to immediately stop the proposed garbage incineration project for Long Harbour, on the basis that the incineration of garbage goes against the principles of sustainable development and that it is destructive, dangerous and hazardous to both human health and the environment of this Province. That very clearly is in accord with the wishes of my constituents and, for that reason, I oppose it. In addition to which I want to say that I am firmly committed against a project of this type.

While on the one hand one might for various reasons think that we would be advancing the economics of the Province by employing some handful of people to burn American garbage. What would we really be saying? Another speaker in this House has spoken to us about becoming perceived as the garbage dump of North America and I concur with that sentiment. What we are really telling people is we are opening the doors to a type of destructive development in this Province that is not destructive solely to the environment but also of a sense of personal dignity of every resident of this Province. We are telling people that we consider the environment in which we live to be nothing more than a place in which garbage could be incinerated. That we would take waste products of other parts of this world, and that is unacceptable to the people of this Province.

Let me say as well that to the extent there might me an economic justification for it, that that would be more than offset by the long term economic harm done to the prospects for development in the areas of tourism, and in wildlife management and other educational areas that are so important to us when we look at the prospects for development. Mr. Speaker, it is rather ironic, if I could just conclude on that thought, that a proposal which seems to have an economic basis, in fact, in its favour, is on the contrary very much to be refused for that very reason. That to the extent a handful of jobs would be created on the one hand, many more would be lost in the long run as the result of any attempt to approve this.

So, let me just say, Mr. Speaker, in concluding that this is not a proposal which has even come before the provincial government as of yet. The Premier has indicated that he is opposed to this on a personal basis, my friend and colleague the Minister of Environment and Lands, the hon. Patricia Cowan, has indicated to me her great concern about this and I know is monitoring it, in as much as it is being seen in the media, and is very aware of the problems with this particular proposal. I can say to this House that I have every confidence that if and when it comes before government that this project will not be approved, that this is an issue which crosses party lines, that it is more than the members of this House that oppose it, Liberals in the Province and the NDP and Conservative members, are deeply opposed in point of principle to the particular project and to the whole question of incineration of garbage from any other destination here in this Province. I should say as well, in concluding, that there are other aspects to this petition, one of which is to develop a comprehensive waste management plan for the Province. I fully endorse that as well and I know that the Department of Environment has individuals working on this, because of its comprehensive nature it is going to take some time. Coming from Corner Brook we are particularly aware of environmental issues and the fact that recycling will be a key to our future development, not only on a provincial basis but also with respect to any goods we hope to export. I am delighted to present this petition. I believe it is very well founded, the remedies sought and the suggestions made to government have great merit, Mr. Speaker, and on behalf of my constitutions and on behalf of those individuals who have spoken to me about it, I would certainly like to commend this petition to my colleagues and to the government for approval. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Mr. Speaker, what are the members opposite doing? They are not deceiving anyone. The Premier, the Minister of Environment and Lands, the Cabinet are staying silent, refusing to address this petition of over 6,000 residents of the Province. When asked, the Premier and the minister are playing ostrich, hiding their heads in the sand, saying: no application has come to us. They seem to be oblivious to the ongoing efforts to establish an incinerator at Long Harbour, to burn imported garbage from the United States. Mr. Speaker, everyone in the Province knows what is going on, virtually all citizens of the Province oppose the Long Harbour incinerator, yet the government is abdicating its responsibility. The government has an opportunity to say no up front - we do not need to wait for an application, we are not entertaining an application for an incinerator to burn imported garbage. Mr. Speaker, the most the members opposite can muster is two token backbench members to get up here today in front of the audience -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair wants to again quote our standing orders and ask hon. members what it means to them. The standing orders: every member offering a petition to the House shall confine himself to the statement of the parties from whom it comes. The number of signatures attached to it and the material allegations it contains. The Chair did not make the rules, the Chair is enforcing them and asking hon. members to abide by them.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Mr. Speaker -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair has heard some comments and the Chair will remind hon. members that if it hears the comments, the Chair will address them, and hon. members know what the comments were.

The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Mr. Speaker, other hon. members may know but I am afraid I am not sure of what Your Honour was referring to. I assume you were referring to comments made by some other member. Let me proceed. I will say that along with the Leader of my Party and all the other members of my caucus, I support the petition. Not only that, Mr. Speaker, I call for the introduction of legislation to ban the importation of garbage for the purpose of incineration.

For some time, I have been urging the minister and the government to introduce a comprehensive waste management program and for a start, show some leadership by having a recycling program within government offices. That still has not materialized. Mr. Speaker, when the party I support and belong to was in power, the government refused outright to allow uranium mining in Labrador. The government refused outright to allow the storage of toxic waste in the abandoned mine shafts on Bell Island. The party I belong to did not delay, did not equivocate. The Premier I supported was up front in opposing dangerous activities such as uranium mining and storage of toxic waste on Bell Island.

Mr. Speaker, it is time for the decision-makers opposite, the Premier and the minister to stand up and be counted, to let people know one way or the other where they stand on the proposed Long Harbour incinerator. It is no longer acceptable for the Premier and the minister to evade the questions, to avoid their responsibility. It is no longer acceptable for the Premier and the minister to pretend they do not know what is going on, to say they cannot comment until and unless they receive an application.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Port de Grave, on a point of order.

MR. EFFORD: Mr. Speaker, I think it is incumbent on myself, as an MHA sitting in the House of Assembly, as one hon. member listening to the points put forward on a petition, that when any hon. member stands to his or her feet to put a complaint against anything said in government, that they should state their facts clear and true, and the hon. member knows full well, it was myself, as an opposition member at the time, who uncovered what her government was going to do at the time, to the people of Bell Island.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

AN HON. MEMBER: That is right.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

No point of order.

The hon. Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Not only did the member not have a point of order, he was not uttering the truth -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MS. VERGE: - Mr. Speaker, let me conclude, let me conclude -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. ROBERTS: I hesitate to interrupt the hon. Member when she is in full flight because it is so seldom we see her with all her plumage displayed, but, Mr. Speaker, she knows full well she cannot stand in her place and accuse another member of not telling the truth, she knows that. She is just simply doing it to draw attention. Unfortunately, we either have to draw attention to her or the House will deteriorate into just a slanging match, so surely, Mr. Speaker, on my point of order, she should be asked to withdraw the remark.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East.

MS. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I certainly withdraw anything I have said that may be considered unparliamentary.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member that is fine. The hon. member's time is up.

The hon. the Member for Bellevue.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to rise today to support the petition presented by my hon. colleague and friend.

A few years back, the community of Long Harbour and the surrounding areas of Long Harbour were devastated with the closedown of the Long Harbour phosphorus plant. Some 135 or 140 people from my district worked at Long Harbour over a great number of year and, to date, there are still some people from my district working at that facility, in the cleanup.

This House is already on record, in a private member's resolution, as opposing a garbage incinerator for Long Harbour. As a matter of fact, it indicates, and was passed unanimously in this House last year, that unless it was proven to be environmentally, socially, psychologically, and economically feasible, that there would be no such thing as a garbage incinerator in Long Harbour. So I think this House is on record as being opposed, unless all of these conditions are met.

As I travel through my district, I get different opinions. As you know, the way that the prevailing winds blow, this particular facility will probably have more impact on the district of Bellevue than any other district in Newfoundland. The facility, itself, may be in Long Harbour, but we are very close to that facility and, as we know, most of the pollution will come over across the road into the district of Bellevue, in the communities of Chapel Arm, Norman's Cove, Chance Cove, Long Cove, and all of these communities here.

When this particular application is filed, I will do my best, and based on the information that I have today - I have attended quite a number of meetings where this company has done submissions. I was in the community of Fair Haven one night for two or three hours, listening to a presentation made by the company that proposed this facility, and at that meeting I asked a lot of questions of this particular company about what was happening and what was about to happen in Long Harbour. Based on the information that company gave to me that night, if there were a vote in this House of Assembly today, I would have to vote against this particular facility for Long Harbour.

I think the sad part of all this is that the people of Long Harbour and the people of Chapel Arm and those communities that were affected by the closedown of the Long Harbour facility are desperately looking for jobs; and why wasn't the $1 million that was allocated, not allocated to look at bringing some other industry into that area? The Federal Government and, to some extent, the Provincial Government, over the last number of years, have sort of sat on their hands. And this area is hit very, very hard. I think the $1 million could have been better utilized. There was a great resource there. The infrastructure is there to attract some other industry, and here we are - what always bothered me is that we can import garbage into Newfoundland, burn it, and make a profit, but we can't bring anything else into Newfoundland and ship it out and make a profit. We can pay for the shipping in, but we can't pay for the shipping out.

So I would like to have seen this million dollars used for a feasibility study to attract other industry into this particular area, rather than the importation of garbage.

I can assure you that this hon. member, when the time comes, will speak for the majority of the residents in my district.

MR. TOBIN: Well, why don't you ask the Premier, right now, to cancel - to bring in legislation (inaudible).

MR. BARRETT: This government is not a one-man show, so when the time comes, people will stand up.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

Orders of the Day

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

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker - finally. We will carry on with the adjourned debate on the -

MR. R. AYLWARD: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. ROBERTS: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. gentleman from Kilbride.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Member for Kilbride to restrain himself, please.

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Let us, if we may, carry on with the adjourned debate on Bill No. 38, which is Order 12.

I believe the hon. gentleman from St. Mary's - The Capes adjourned the debate, if memory serves me.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. Mary's - The Capes.

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

I realize I only have half-an-hour or so left - a little bit less probably - so I will just make a few points in summation because I know there are others who want to speak on it.

For those who have forgotten or who didn't have the privilege of being here when we were talking about the bill, the main concern raised was not that health care boards were being set up around the Province. We are in support of community health care boards. We have seen examples. Maybe I should draw to the attention of some members, who may not be familiar with it, the experimental board that is set up in the Ferryland area. Some years ago we had visits from the Nurses' Association, public health nurses, who wanted to try a pilot project in the Ferryland district, expanded actually into the district of St. Mary's - The Capes as far as St. Shotts, to try to beef up the services of the public health nurses in the area, and perhaps to have a better hands-on delivery of health care in that total area.

This project has been a tremendous success. There are many areas of the Province where we are depending on medical doctors who are asked to do a tremendous amount of work that nurses could do and that trained local personnel could do if they had some proper direction and supervision. Doctors, themselves, do not have the time to spread themselves around to all the small communities, to try to train people or encourage people to get involved. Consequently, when any kind of a health problem arises, doctors are called, quite often from their busy offices, to attend to minor needs throughout the area. Where you have an area adequately covered by either the public health nurses or nursing assistants or trained personnel under supervision, then a lot of this work can be taken off the doctors' shoulders, and we have much better overall coverage, especially for the aged and those who require some minor medical supervision and care on certain occasions.

Consequently, with a public health service such as this, supervised by boards, community health boards, then we can certainly improve the lot of the people throughout the Province. One of the concerns here is, we are only looking at a small number of boards that would be regionally centered in the larger areas that would undoubtedly have very little time or attention to pay to the smaller rural areas of the Province where the needs really are. Consequently, I feel that we should have in place smaller regional boards that could look after specific areas, boards that would have a complete knowledge of the needs within their own areas and can make whatever decisions that are necessary and pertinent for the people within these jurisdictions. So that is one of the concerns.

The other major concern we have is, these boards, these major boards that we are talking about here, will be appointed strictly by Cabinet. That can be extremely dangerous. We could have a number of hospital boards and community health care boards around the Province dancing to the tune and the whim of whatever government happens to be elected at the time, especially in times like this when governments have to cut back, where health care is such a sensitive area and, where, if boards are appointed, friends of the government sit on those boards and then they will tend to go along with government wishes and not object or stand up for the needs within their own areas.

So, Mr. Speaker, these are the major concerns we have: One, that the boards are much too large. In order to deliver education properly, in order to deliver health care properly, we need people attuned with the local situations, the local problems. Consequently, smaller boards more locally centered, people familiar with the needs within these areas, can deliver and observe and govern much better services than somebody who is far removed, who has no idea at all of the local implications, the local needs, and who look at, basically, a black and white, dollar/cents issue. Health care, education and social services are not dollar and cent issues, as such. They are people issues and, consequently, we should be very much aware of the people's needs and be attuned to them. You can't do that if you are very far removed, just being fed secondhand information. You need to be close to the scene to know exactly what is happening so you can make proper decisions.

Once again I see the Member for Port de Grave nodding assent. He is a very localized person, himself and realizes that in order to deliver proper services to local areas we need smaller governing bodies, not ones that are far removed.

So consequently, Mr. Speaker, the two things we are concerned with: The size of the boards that are being recommended by government and, mainly, the way these boards will be appointed, and not chosen or elected locally, and the implications these decisions might have will have a very negative effect on the delivery of health care in this Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

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

I want to have a few words on this Bill 38, as well. The Minister of Finance sort of encouraged me to get up and get involved in the debate.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) what?

MR. TOBIN: The Minister of Health. And I have always been one to try to meet the request and encouragement of my colleague, the Minister of Health, so I decided that I would have a few words to say in this debate, to this piece of legislation that he is going to bring in to appoint all his political buddies to hospital boards in this Province.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) hospital board.

AN HON. MEMBER: He doesn't know what he is reading - they are health boards.

MR. TOBIN: They are health - okay, well, what do you call it?

AN HON. MEMBER: He doesn't even know what he is reading again.

MR. TOBIN: I do know what I am reading again, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: He is reading and doesn't know what it is.

MR. TOBIN: To create regional health care boards in the Province.

DR. KITCHEN: What has that got to do with hospital boards?

MR. TOBIN: I will tell the minister what it has to do with it, Mr. Speaker. It is to go out and appoint political buddies like he did in Placentia, when the hospital committee in Placentia were prepared to take on this government when they announced they were going to close down the hospital, that is what they did. And what did he do? He fired the hospital board. The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs went to the then Minister of Health and fired the hospital board who were taking him on, and then he said he was going to appoint -

AN HON. MEMBER: Lies.

MR. TOBIN: It is not lies, Mr. Speaker, and I don't think it is parliamentary to use the word, I really don't think so.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

It is certainly not parliamentary to use. The Chair didn't hear it but the Chair has mentioned before to hon. members, that one of the most unacceptable terms in Parliament is 'lies'. I just want to bring that to hon. members' attention again, and if the Chair hears it, or if it is brought to the attention of the Chair that a specific member used it, then the Chair has to bring into force the full parliamentary law.

The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I am sure that my friend, the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs will not be using that word again after what you just had to say. In any case, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs replaced the board in Placentia.

AN HON. MEMBER: No, he didn't.

MR. TOBIN: He replaced the members of the board in Placentia then, let me say it that way, because he couldn't stand the heat that was coming from Mr. Power -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: Okay, is Kevin Power and those fellows, for example, still on the board? No, Mr. Speaker, they are not, because they took on this government and they did the right thing to take on this government when they decided to close down the hospital in Placentia, just as they did the right thing throughout this Province when they had to take on hospital boards -

AN HON. MEMBER: The Tories.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, so what? So what, Mr. Speaker, if they were Tories? I don't care what anyone's politics are if they can do a good job. I wouldn't care what their politics were if they could do a good job.

MR. R. AYLWARD: I do, I care. I care what political stripe we are.

MR. TOBIN: Well I don't, I can tell you that. But what is happening here now is that the minister -

MR. EFFORD: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: What is that?

MR. EFFORD: Were they (inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, I have no idea what their politics are, nor do I care, as long as they were good, competent men and women. Their politics, Mr. Speaker, are not important to me, I say to the Member for Port de Grave. I have never practised that type of politics in the eleven years that I have been in the House, nor do I intend to start practising it now.

Not only that now, but when they put in place these health care boards, to whom will they be responsible? that is the question. They will become responsible to the Cabinet through the Minister of Health, I say to the minister, and if we have the Minister of Health sharing his concerns with the board in the same way that he has shared the health concerns of the men and women and children in this Province, then God help the boards.

He was Minister of Finance when himself and the now Minister of Education shut down eight or nine hospitals in this Province. Port aux Basques, Mr. Speaker, Placentia, out in Trinity - Bay de Verte district there was another one closed down. They were closed down all throughout the Province. Yes, I say to the Minister of Health: yes. They are downgraded, Mr. Speaker, and turned into senior citizens homes and the primary care for the people in this Province since this government came into power has never been treated so shabbily before in the history of Newfoundland and Labrador, I say to the minister.

MR. R. AYLWARD: It is better if you can skip the lines, isn't it?

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker. Well if I caught my colleague from Kilbride - I could talk about skipping lines and all that but I want to really get into this Bill today and point out, Mr. Speaker, how this government continues, day in and day out, to operate in a political manner, how this Minister of Health cannot wait to phone his buddies in Placentia, his colleagues in Placentia or throughout. Mr. Speaker, I doubt very much if myself or my colleague from Grand Bank will be consulted in terms of having appointments made to the board but the prominent Liberals down on the Burin Peninsula will be contacted, I would say to the Minister of Health. Mr. Speaker, as long as this minister continues to operate and to put people in positions because of their political stripe, then the boards will not work. I think what the Minister of Finance said, Mr. Speaker, is true. I think that is what the Minister of Finance said when he passed along. What you are saying is true. I am not sure but I think that is what he said.

AN HON. MEMBER: No, he said that is true.

MR. TOBIN: That is true, okay, and it is true. The former Minister of Education, the member for St. John's North is nodding approval, Mr. Speaker, to what I am saying. Is nodding approval to what I am saying and I am not surprised because the member for St. John's North, Mr. Speaker, is a living example of what I have just said. When we were in government we did not make political appointments. We had that member, Mr. Speaker, the member for St. John's North, a well known Liberal who had been defeated I believe, Mr. Speaker, on a few occasions running for the Liberals, who had been defeated running for the Liberals, Mr. Speaker. When we wanted to appoint someone to an education board in this Province and we thought this man was the right person to serve in that capacity we did not balk. We did not balk, Mr. Speaker, we did not balk in the making of that appointment to that minister.

AN HON. MEMBER: Former minister.

MR. TOBIN: Former minister, well that is up to him. But he knows what I am talking about.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)

MR. TOBIN: No, Mr. Speaker he was not and it is too bad that he is not still a minister, I say to the Minister of Industry, Trades and Technology, it is to bad he is not still a minister and it is to bad that Clyde Wells decided that he could not carry the - what do they call the Education Bill?

MR. MATTHEWS: The Royal Commission.

MR. TOBIN: The Royal Commission. It is to bad the Premier lacked the confidence in him to carry the Williams Report. It is too bad, that the Premier of this Province thought that the member from St. John's North would be to decent and to honourable, to carry the load. So, Mr. Speaker, he needs someone who is neither decent or honourable and he got the member from the Strait of Bell Isle to carry the Royal Commission Report.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

AN HON. MEMBER: I can go along with that.

MR. TOBIN: And the member for St. John's North again nods approval, so what I am saying must be right.

MR. MATTHEWS: Old hatchet man. The chop, the Atlanta chop.

MR. TOBIN: Atlanta, yes. Mr. Speaker, the Atlanta chop, there were people in this Province when they were watching that World Series involving Atlanta, who so often made reference to the present government -

AN HON. MEMBER: Chop, chop, chop.

MR. TOBIN: - now I had the opportunity in the past couple of days, while I was in my district, Mr. Speaker, while I was in my district I had the opportunity to speak with people - teachers, educators, health care workers, throughout this Province, and the same message came through loud and clear everywhere - that the people of this Province are sick and tired of this government continuing to chop, chop, chop.

There is another thing, Mr. Speaker, when we are on this Bill on health care. This past Summer, I say to all my colleagues in this House, and I thank most of them by the way; this past Summer I was involved in the twenty-four hour relay on the Burin Peninsula, which I have been for the past couple of years.

AN HON. MEMBER: Twenty-four hour what?

MR. TOBIN: The twenty-four hour relay, and the money was for the health care facility on the Burin Peninsula.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) receipts?

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, I will tell you something. The minister certainly pledged support to me, as did all members, and their names have been submitted - not all of them - some of them; some of them would not.

I want to say that on the Burin Peninsula this summer we raised somewhere in the area of $90,000. I hope the Minister of Health is listening to this. Ninety thousand dollars was raised on the Burin Peninsula this year, through the twenty-four hour relay, for health care.

MR. EFFORD: In your district?

MR. TOBIN: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

MR. MATTHEWS: Well, on the whole Burin Peninsula.

MR. TOBIN: On the whole Burin Peninsula.

I also say to the Minister of Health - the Minister of Health disappeared, but I also say that I was proud - the Minister of Education, I am sure, would like this - to be on the team that raised the most money.

MR. EFFORD: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: I say to the Member for Port de Grave that every cent that I raised, without exception, was raised by support I received from my colleagues in this House on both sides. Now I was only on the team. There are a lot of other people.

AN HON. MEMBER: What did you do?

MR. TOBIN: We walked for twenty-four hours, Mr. Speaker.

MR. EFFORD: Walked for twenty-four hours?

MR. TOBIN: That is right - ran, and ate, and -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: No you did not. You gave me twenty dollars, and I am expecting $100 next year from the Government House Leader.

MR. ROBERTS: For a worthy cause, yes.

MR. TOBIN: Well that is very worthy.

I say to the Government House Leader -

MR. ROBERTS: (Inaudible) so you should be careful.

MR. TOBIN: I say to the Government House Leader that when it comes to supporting worthy causes such as that - $90,000 being raised for health care on the Burin Peninsula - I certainly will be supporting it. I say that to my friend.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I have to interrupt the hon. member. It is my duty to inform members at 4:00 p.m. - as a matter of fact I am remiss in my duty already - to remind hon. members of questions for the Late Show; so I apologize to the hon. member.

The first matter is related to the question asked by the Member for Fogo of the Minister of Education re: student aid.

The second matter of dissatisfaction was raised by the Member for Harbour Main, and it was related to questions asked the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs with respect to utility taxation in Conception Bay South.

The third one was raised by the Member for Burin - Placentia West, and related to his dissatisfaction to answers given by the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs regarding the taxing of utility companies.

The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

MR. TOBIN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As I was saying, this year we did raise, on the Burin Peninsula, $90,000 and that I want to publicly thank all of my colleagues in this House for their support.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TOBIN: There is one other thing I want to say, and that is that yesterday we all received in the mail, in our post office box, letters from the Janeway Hospital. I am sure my colleague from St. John's North, and the Minister of Education and the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology, received yesterday a letter from the Janeway Children's Hospital, trying to raise money.

There is a letter there about a little girl. She is very special to me.

AN HON. MEMBER: Jane.

MR. TOBIN: A little girl, Mr. Speaker, who is very special to me, and I sincerely hope that hon. members in this House will again, after reading that story, see fit to support the Janeway this Christmas in a big way. The whole story is there. She is my niece, as a matter of fact.

MR. MATTHEWS: I have that at home in my apartment.

MR. TOBIN: We all got them, yes.

I will ask all members of this Legislature, Mr. Speaker, this Christmas to think about the Janeway Hospital when they read that story and make a contribution.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to say to the Minister of Health -

MR. MATTHEWS: Look at John. You put him asleep. Look! You have him put to sleep over there.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, we certainly will grant leave to the minister if he wants to have a little nap. We will grant leave to him, Mr. Speaker. Actually, Mr. Speaker, I would like to see the minister awake, because I have never had that opportunity yet.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. R. AYLWARD: It would be a first in this House.

MR. TOBIN: It would be a first, yes, if we could see that minister awake.

In any case, I am about to clue up, Mr. Speaker. I say to the Minister of Health that when he appoints these regional health care boards to make sure that they are done in a fair and equitable way.

MS. VERGE: We should elect them.

MR. TOBIN: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Make sure that they are not all clones, make sure that they are not all grouped together, to justify a political need, to ensure that it is not done for political purposes with the main and sole aim being to satisfy the needs of Liberals in this Province, as scarce as they are getting.

Mr. Speaker, I want to say, in closing, to the Minister of Health, to put some teeth into these committees. Once you set up these boards, don't do what you did the other day, for example, on the Burin Peninsula, with the hospital which the Government House Leader fought against when he was Minister of Health in the Smallwood Government, don't pick up the phone some day and say I want you to cut $231,000 from your health care budget.

AN HON. MEMBER: What!

MR. TOBIN: $231,000. That is what the Burin Peninsula health care system was slashed by this year, slashed also last year, Mr. Speaker. And I say to the Minister of Health, that that is one place and one facility, one institution that I and my colleague from Grand Bank take a lot of pride in. Because when the Liberals were in power the present Government House Leader, who is coming in now with the Minister of Health, who said, an improved ambulance service to Clarenville is enough for the people of the Burin Peninsula. Well, Mr. Speaker, we did not accept -

MS. VERGE: Who said that?

MR. TOBIN: The Government House Leader when he was Minister of Health with Smallwood.

MR. R. AYLWARD: What did he say?

MR. TOBIN: He said, he was building no hospital on the Burin Peninsula, an improved ambulance service would be sufficient to satisfy the medical needs.

Mr. Speaker, I can tell the minister that he made the statement in St. Gabriels Hall.

MR. ROBERTS: I was there and the hon. gentleman was not.

MR. TOBIN: Oh, wasn't I?

MR. ROBERTS: There were no rocks there, the hon. gentleman couldn't have been there.

MR. TOBIN: Couldn't he? Well, Mr. Speaker, there was one there on two legs. There was a rock there on two legs when it came to dealing with the people of this Province. Not only a rock, Mr. Speaker, but he had a heart of rock, to go down there and tell the people of the Burin Peninsula the best they could expect was an improved ambulance service.

MR. MATTHEWS: A heart of stone.

MR. TOBIN: A heart of rock, Mr. Speaker.

MS. VERGE: They were going to resettle them all (inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: That is right, Mr. Speaker.

MR. ROBERTS: (Inaudible) Motel Mortier.

MR. TOBIN: It was in St. Gabriels Hall.

MR. ROBERTS: Motel Mortier.

MR. WOODFORD: You didn't even know where you were.

MR. NOEL: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: What is the old shoe shiner saying, Mr. Speaker, old secondhand shoes?

Now, Mr. Speaker, not only did that member, when he was Minister of Health, not want to put a health service on the Burin Peninsula, he wanted to resettle rural Newfoundland. That was his agenda, Mr. Speaker, the resettlement of rural Newfoundland, and let all the health care needs of this Province be served from metropolitan St. John's.

They did not want to go outside the overpass, that was the health care structure of this Province, very much so. What is the Minister of Health saying?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: No, Mr. Speaker, he is not.

AN HON. MEMBER: What is he talking about?

MR. TOBIN: I say to the Government House Leader that I have been around this House now for eleven years and you talk about these petitions that were being presented in the House today, and you talk about the environment and everything else, when, what better demonstration to support the environment in this Province than to recycle a politician, I say to the minister. What better demonstration, what better way to help the environment than to recycle a politician, I would say to the Government House Leader. But I want to say I understand my colleague for St. John's East; my friend and colleague for St. John's East wants to make a few comments in this debate and we do have the Late Show this evening, so in doing so -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: Mr.Speaker, when the minister gets up we will have the funny show. I would say to the Minister of Health, Mr. Speaker, to forget about appointing these boards, have them elected, be a first; be the first minister in this administration to elect health care boards in this Province, the same as they have elected health care boards in other provinces in this country, that is what the Minister of Health should do, forget his political appointments and his buddies, and bring in place an election for health care boards in this Province. That is my request to the Minister of Health and I hope he will take my advice.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Torngat Mountains.

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

There is something in this Bill I would like to, if I could have the minister;s attention, I understand there are going to be five particular boards and I gather from what was said in the estimates that of those five boards, there would be four on the Island - and I am sure the minister is listening - I understand there are going to be five particular boards, four on the Island and one in Labrador. I gather that this particular board and the hospital boards will go hand in hand -

Mr. Speaker, I say to my hon. colleague that this was the information that was given by the former Minister of Health in the committee meetings, there would be four particular boards on the Island and one for Labrador. I would like to ask the minister, when he is addressing this particular issue, I understand that this hospital board will co-ordinate and co-operate with the hospital boards as such in a particular area.

Now, at the present time we have the Grenfell Regional Health Services Hospital Board which takes in all the way from Roddickton, all the way up the Northern Peninsula and all of Labrador, and I will ask the minister, if you are going to have a board in Labrador, one of the five boards being in Labrador, how well will that work in co-ordinating with the Northern Peninsula which comes under the hospital board which takes in all of the Northern Peninsula and all of Labrador?

I believe there should be one board for Labrador. I believe that we should take from Roddickton to St. Anthony, also with the hospital board. The Grenfell Regional Hospital Services Board should be smaller and should only include Labrador. The Northern Peninsula should be taken out and put into another board, so I would like the minister to really, seriously look at that. When he establishes the health care board for Labrador, that he also look at redefining the Grenfell Regional Health Services Board as it pertains now - geography about 1,400 miles from Roddickton, all the way up the Labrador coast, all the way up to Nain, which is practically impossible for a hospital board to administer.

I would think that what should happen is that the main headquarters of the hospital board would be in Happy Valley - Goose Bay, which is the centre of Labrador, and that particular hospital board would take in probably from Black Tickle, north. I would suggest probably Black Tickle or Cartwright, but it would be up to the minister to define the geographic -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) Labrador West.

MR. WARREN: Yes, I would like to see all of that coming under one particular board.

Now I would like to ask the minister to seriously consider this, because if it is going to be the hospital board and the regional health board, then they have to go hand in hand, and if there is going to be one board for Labrador on health care, surely goodness he should make sure that both boards will at least come in the same geographical area.

That is my only concern, Mr. Speaker, on this particular thing as it pertains to Labrador.

Thank you very much.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to speak briefly to the legislation because I think there are a couple of important points that need to be made.

Firstly, I have no difficulty in supporting the concept of regional community health boards, but I do have a problem in giving the Cabinet carte blanche with respect to deciding when and where and how they are going to be administered, and how big they are going to be, and how many there are going to be.

We were told by the previous Minister of Health that he had a plan. When he was criticized last year for the closing down of hospital beds and the destruction of the health care system, that no, no, this was all part of a plan to improve the health care system of the Province; that he definitely had a plan, and all would be seen in the course of time as to what that plan was.

Well, Mr. Speaker, if there was indeed a plan, then where is the plan? Why are we not seeing the plan, instead of seeing the government giving more power to itself to decide from day to day, or from Cabinet meeting to Cabinet meeting, what the health care system of this Province would look like. If there is a plan that the minister is prepared to show the light of day to, and to allow to be studied by the people of this Province, to decide whether they accept or reject it, then let us see the plan, and let us see the legislation that puts that plan into place, and not just have this kind of essentially empowering legislation which allows the government, through Cabinet, to establish regional community health boards, and automatically they become corporations and they have the power to direct the delivery of health care services outside of hospitals in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is a good idea to have these health care service boards, the community health boards. It is a new, innovative type of approach to allow the people of a community, of a region, to have control over the delivery of their health care needs. I think an awful lot can be accomplished through the development of these health care service boards that will have a fundamentally different approach to public health and health care services in the Province.

It is time that the people took some ownership over health care, the same way as they are demanding to take ownership over the education system, they are demanding to have more community control over schools. We have had demands over the years progressively for elected school boards; for a decrease in the influence of appointees to school boards, and a greater emphasis and demand for totally elected school boards so that the people of this Province have some control over the education for their children.

The same process is at work in the health care system. The government has been very reluctant, and governments in general have been very reluctant, to give people some control over these services, and it is time that they were.

I would ask the government to look at it from a democratic point of view, and see this as an opportunity to provide a balanced community health care board. They are referring to them as regional community health boards. I am not sure that is a choice word here because there may well be circumstances where a community health board might not be an entire region comprising the whole or half of the Avalon Peninsula, or the Burin Peninsula.

It may be a more discrete sort of region or maybe a community health board, such as the Shea Heights Community Health Board, which could be administered as well and given the power to deliver health care services under the same legislation. So, I give that criticism, Mr. Speaker, that it is not comprehensive enough a program to be able to adequately address and criticize and it does not indicate how these boards are going to be filled and what principles are going to be used to select people for them or elect people for them.

I see no commitment, Mr. Speaker, from the government or from the minister to ensure that there is an adequacy of representation of both male and female persons, Mr. Speaker. Clearly, in the area of health care, just as in other areas, there is a need for gender equity, Mr. Speaker, on this type of board, because the delivery of health care services is of course of great importance to both men and women. In fact, Mr. Speaker, as the member for St. John's South well knows, women as consumers or users of the health care system far, far outnumber men in the use of hospital and health care services and ought to have perhaps far more say in the delivery of those services and the organization of those services, which would lead, Mr. Speaker, to greater community involvement and I would submit to greater quality of service and better health care services if the people who are the users of those services have a greater say in how they are put together. And I see the former Minister of Education agreeing with that because he knows how the education system improves when the parent's get involved and the communities get involved in ensuring that their children get better educational services. The same thing will happen, Mr. Speaker, if in the health care delivery area the people are more involved and have more control and more say on it. In fact, Mr. Speaker, there have been studies demonstrating this very fact, that the health, the actual health of the population of the region improves when the people are involved in the delivery of health care through community health centres. The cost goes down, the health goes up.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Health, who is not listening to what I am saying, the Minister of Health would do well to listen to the fact that when communities control their health care they are healthier and they can deliver health care services at a cheaper price and that is something that the Minister of Health ought to be very aware of. So, I say, Mr. Speaker, that this is an opportunity for the Minister of Health to learn something about democracy. I know he has had difficulty in the political parties that he has been in before. I know he was kicked out of one and he is just barely hanging onto the other one but it is an opportunity to learn something about democracy. I see, Mr. Speaker, that there is a few minutes left before the late show starts. I just wanted to make those points. I do not see yet the plan of the Minister of Health, even though we have been promised one for several years. I do not see any commitment ensuring that there is adequate representation of women on these health care boards that he is talking about. I do not see any way, any commitment to ensuring that they are representative of the community that they serve. I do not see that and I do not see any real understanding by the minister of what great improvements can be made to the health care services by having the communities themselves more involved in the health care delivery. Neither do I see any commitment of ensuring that there will be adequate funding in place and what kind of powers these health care boards will have. They are going to direct the delivery of health care services. It is very unclear Mr. Speaker, what is included in that and what plans the minister has. So, I would ask him to address those in his closing remarks on the Bill and I would want to hear what he has to say. Perhaps we will have to read it in Hansard, Mr. Speaker, because I have an engagement downtown. So I will look forward to reading in Hansard the minister's closing remarks on this debate and I thank hon. member's for their rapt attention to my remarks.

MR. SPEAKER: Before I recognize the hon. Minister of Health, I would like to welcome to the Speaker's gallery, on behalf of hon. members, a former Minister of the Crown, and the former Member for Pleasantville, Mr. Jerome Dinn.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. Minister of Health speaks now, he will close the debate.

The hon. the Minister of Health.

DR. KITCHEN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

After listening to all the comments that were made on this Bill by members opposite I am tempted to respond in detail to all these comments, but I am sure that in the several minutes that remain to me I will not be able to cover all the points, except to say that the main purpose of setting up regional community health boards is to be able to provide non-hospital type services to people. It has nothing to do with hospitals. It has to do with health services that take place outside hospitals.

One of the unfortunate things about the measurement of health care is that many people, including members opposite, equate health care with the number of beds that are around, called hospital beds. It is really not related to hospital beds anymore. At one time that might have been a good measure, but it is no longer a measure of - it is not the only measure; put it that way. It is an indication, perhaps, in some cases, but the changes that have taken place in health care means that just counting hospital beds does not tell you whether you have a good system or a bad system. You can reduce hospital beds and have a better health care system by spending your money in a different way.

You see, nowadays there are lots of people doing outpatient work - much more outpatients than there ever was. A person can go to a clinic or a hospital and get - not go to bed - but you can get surgery performed without actually staying overnight in the hospital. The other thing is that the same number of beds, or even fewer, can service many more patients than ever before because of the shortened length of time that people spend in hospital beds.

Sometimes a person needs now to stay just overnight, or a couple of days, where a few years ago they used to spend ten days and twenty days, and months. This is what is happening. Nowadays a bed, for a year, can serve many more patients than it could years ago. So this business of attacking a health care system as if all you can count is the number of beds, is the usage of those beds, and it is no longer an appropriate measure.

What we are trying to do with the health care boards -

Mr. Speaker, I adjourn debate on this point because I believe our time is up.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: As per our Standing Orders, it being Thursday, we will start the Adjournment Debate.

Debate on the Adjournment

[Late Show]

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition Party Whip and the Member for Harbour Main.

MR. DOYLE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yesterday I asked the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs a question about the effect that the 2.5 per cent utility taxation measure would have upon the Town of Conception Bay South.

Mr. Speaker, it is going to have a devastating effect, I would say to the minister. It will mean a $250,000 revenue shortfall to the Town of CBS because of that 2.5 per cent. What is the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs prepared to do to help the Town of Conception Bay South to make up that revenue shortfall? The minister and his department is not prepared to do anything, and, Mr. Speaker, that is in addition to the $200,000 that the town is going to lose in the third year of the new Municipal Operating Grants program, so that is a total of $450,000 that the Town of Conception Bay South is going to lose.

MR. TOBIN: How much?

MR. DOYLE: Four hundred and fifty thousand dollars, Mr. Speaker. And this government is not prepared to do anything to assist the town. The axe has fallen once again on the Town of Conception Bay South, and we see the minister, the Member for Conception Bay South, totally astounded by this revelation, wondering where we got these figures, the $250,000. You wouldn't know but that it was Operation Blue Book, or something, that nobody knows. And, as I said to the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs yesterday, we got that information from the Treasury division in the Town of Conception Bay South and we got it from the minister's own department.

Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which equates to a one-mil rise in property tax, and the additional $200,000 that they are going to lose because of the Municipal Operating Grants program that the government brought in recently, equates to another one mil that the town is going to lose. That is two mils, Mr. Speaker, they are going to have to raise taxes, because of that $450,000 revenue shortfall that this government is responsible for - two mils.

MR. TOBIN: Two mils, that is 20 per cent.

MR. DOYLE: Two mils, that is 20 per cent taxation, Mr. Speaker, a 20 per cent rise in taxes in the town. So, when the new year rolls around, the Town of Conception Bay South is in for a very, very big shock. And the minister apparently doesn't even have that information available to him. He didn't have it when I asked him yesterday - he didn't know where we were coming up with the figure of $250,000. So it stands to reason that if the town which is charging 5 per cent were bringing in ten dollars, if they charge 2.5 per cent they will bring in five dollars.

Now, I was never very good at math, Mr. Speaker, but the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs should have those figures readily available to him. But the fact remains that the town once again, this year has been hit by this government to the tune of $450,000 and, Mr. Speaker, they cannot make up that revenue shortfall without some help from this government. And the help they are going to get from this government is nothing. They have already been told that they are not going to get any help from the minister. Mr. Speaker, a small town like Conception Bay South cannot afford that kind of revenue shortfall in one year.

They cannot afford a revenue shortfall in one year of that amount, Mr. Speaker, so I am asking the minister today - and it is pointless to ask the minister, the Member for Conception Bay South to do anything about it, because she doesn't know what is going on, she is asleep half the time, asleep at the wheel. But at least, Mr. Speaker, the minister should have the common decency to go to the people of Conception Bay South and say that he is going to do something to make up that kind of revenue shortfall. It is too much for a town of that size to absorb in one year and it is going to mean a 2-mil raise in taxes, but he is not even aware of that. I am absolutely amazed that the minister who brought in the program is not aware of the devastating effect that that policy is going to have upon towns right across Newfoundland and Labrador. It is absolutely amazing. And the people of Conception Bay South cannot afford that.

So I would ask the minister now, to have a little bit of compassion for the town and go to the town and say: a $450,000 revenue shortfall is too much and we are going to do something about it. And it is not only the Town of Conception Bay South, there are towns right across the Province, towns all over my district that are going to be negatively affected by that, so what kind of a tax grab is that going to be? What is going to happen to the unincorporated communities who are going to be affected by it, as well?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

Before I recognize the hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, I would like to bring to members' attention a previous ruling of this House, that it is unparliamentary for hon. members to turn their backs to the Chair. I have noticed that it is going on a lot lately. When I was in school I didn't want to embarrass my kids and I don't want to embarrass people here. So I would ask people, in future, to refrain from doing that. The guilty people will know who I am talking about.

The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I have recognized the hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HOGAN: I want to apologize, Mr. Speaker, for whoever had their back turned. I wouldn't turn my back on you, and I never did. I always sit here in my chair and face you. I don't know who did it, but whoever it was should acknowledge it to me tomorrow. Mr. Speaker -

AN HON. MEMBER: Who is the hon. gentleman?

MR. ROBERTS: It is his colleague (inaudible).

MR. HOGAN: I need the Chair's protection, Mr. Speaker.

The hon. the Member for Harbour Main, as usual, is up hallucinating or misleading the House. I know he is a non-smoker, so I don't know what he is into. There is something that happens to him when he gets up and starts bandying around figures and, in particular, when he attacks my hon. friends, the Minister of Education or the Minister of Health. We watched his performance here, and then I listened to what he did out in Makinsons to the poor people out there. That was one of the most shameful acts that was ever carried out by any minister since Confederation, to turn his back on his own countrymen, the crowd from the head of the bay.

AN HON. MEMBER: He lost the poll out there, see.

MR. HOGAN: They are treacherous.

AN HON. MEMBER: He lost the poll.

MR. HOGAN: And he lost it. Yes, he lost everything, lost all credibility. He lost everything when he gave up on Makinsons.

AN HON. MEMBER: I have two questions here, so answer both of them now.

MR. HOGAN: No, I will answer this one.

MR. ROBERTS: You let the word go forth that the hon. gentleman for Harbour Main let Makinsons down.

MR. HOGAN: Anybody he ever looked at or anybody he ever touched, he let them down. He is a crying shame to his countrymen at the head of the bay, I tell you that.

I heard him earlier today attacking Long Harbour and the good, fine people of Long Harbour. He and his buddies will be the first ones up there looking for a job, when the thing starts up.

But anyway, getting to his point about $250,000 that is going to be lost to the community of Conception Bay South. Now, I don't know where he got the figures, but he is a bit of a welder and a bit of a millwright. So I guess he fabricated.

AN HON. MEMBER: He is an iron worker.

MR. HOGAN: He is an iron worker, is he? He welded it all together. Anyway, the truth of the matter is the best figures that are available to him are 1991 figures, which I have. With the taxation applied to both companies, Newfoundland Power and Newfoundland Telephone, the best figure that he can come up with is $136,000. Now, I stand to be corrected on that. When I get the proper figures, I will come over, Mr. Speaker, and table them in the House just for the member's edification and information.

MR. TOBIN: Are you saying you can get a proper figure?

MR. HOGAN: Yes, after I go to Nutri-system or wherever they go to - Henry Summers.

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the utilities tax being applied across the Province, it is something that members of this House and members of this government, the previous government and the government before that, right back to 1949, have struggled with. This government took the bull by the horns, brought the thing to a head and finally settled it. There are some municipalities that will lose drastically and there are some municipalities that will gain a lot. It is pretty well split.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. HOGAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

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

Mr. Speaker, my question, as well, is to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Fitness.

AN HON. MEMBER: Fitness?

MR. TOBIN: Yes, Mr. Speaker, fitness.

My question, Mr. Speaker, and I will repeat it again for the House, is for the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Fitness.

The minister announced in this House the other day -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: You have some room to talk. You have some room to talk, too, I say to the Minister of - you can't even button up your coat. At least I bought one big enough.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I have recognized the hon. the Member for Burin - Placentia West.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, the minister announced in this House yesterday, or on Tuesday, I guess it was, this piece of legislation, and it is going to have a devastating effect on my district, as the minister is very much aware.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: What is that?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, he is the only puncheon without a heart that I have ever met.

Let me say to the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs that -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: No, seriously. When the minister did have trouble with his heart, I was the first in the hospital to see him.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TOBIN: I was, then.

My district, Burin, will lose $87,000 and Marystown will lose $97,000 under this announcement that was made, where the government has decided - where the Premier has decided to look after his buddies where he served on the board as Chairman of Newfoundland Light and Power. He is now back paying the debt that he owed, and he put in place protection for Light and Power in this Province. That is what has happened. He put in place, in this Province, protection for his buddies who sat around the table making decisions in this Province, and brought in a program of 2.5 per cent, whereby councils such as Burin is going to lose $87,000 that they can ill-afford. They will have to increase their tax rate in Burin by 35 per cent to the residents of this Province because of the action of this government.

The Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, when he was President of the Federation, was one of the first people who put this in place, so no one should be surprised that he brought it in. When he was President of the Federation, he was in and lobbied with all the ministers in the past - all the ministers in the past, including some in this House - to have brought in this piece of legislation, to sock it to some of the councils, to nail some of the people in this Province, particularly the residents of Burin, Marystown, CBS, Grand Bank, Jerseyside - in his own district. He didn't even have the nerve to send them a copy of his press release. They had to phone me. Contact had to be made to my office for the people of his district to get the information as to what was taking place.

I ask the minister if he will take into consideration the debt load that is going to be applied to these people, and if he will try to convince his colleagues to put in place some sort of a system whereby the towns in this Province can be compensated for the money that they are going to lose.

It is not right to phone up the Burin Town Council or the Marystown Town Council and say that on the 31st of December you are going to lose $87,000 or $95,000; and they are figures, by the way, that I got from the councils, I say to the minister.

The other thing that is ironic about this is that this government supported financially the Marystown Town Council to take to court the Newfoundland Telephone Company so they could charge taxes on the equipment inside their buildings. They supported it and it went through the court challenges, and finally it got involved in appeals and ended up in Supreme Court, and the court ruled in favour of Marystown; and this government, to protect their buddies in the Telephone Company, will put in place legislation, and I will read it: 'Property assessment values for utilities and cable companies will be charged to exclude equipment and materials

directly related to the generation or distribution of services. That was put in place after the Supreme Court of this Province had ruled in favour of a town, Mr. Speaker. Why, I ask this government - why do you have to put in place that type of protection for companies that have licence to print money on the backs of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Does the hon. member have leave of the House?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Agreed.

MR. TOBIN: Mr. Speaker, why has this minister fallen before the whims and the wishes of this Cabinet and put in place a system whereby the taxpayers of this Province -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) pussycats.

MR. TOBIN: I ask the minister: Why did they support financially, the Marystown town council to take Newfoundland Telephone to court if, the next day, they were going to put in place a system to strip them of the money they were going to be awarded by the courts?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. MATTHEWS: Well, shortly thereafter.

MR. TOBIN: No, not the next day, Mr. Speaker, but within the regime of this government. Last year, Mr. Speaker, or this year, I don't know when it was.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who makes the laws?

MR. TOBIN: Who makes the laws? The Supreme Court, in this case, made the laws. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that the law dictated that Marystown had the right to tax the equipment, Mr. Speaker. And this government here, to look after their buddies who sit around the boardroom in this Province, decided to put in place this package, to strip them of the monies they were entitled to.

It is no wonder, Mr. Speaker, that the Member for St. John's North is agreeing with me, and it is no wonder the Member for St. John's South disagrees, because he has buddies in (inaudible) places.

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

The hon. member's leave has been withdrawn.

The hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

AN HON. MEMBER: Now, boy, what are you going to say about that?

MR. HOGAN: Mr. Speaker, that was an act of charity! When you sat the man down, it was an act of charity!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I am having difficulty hearing the hon. the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs.

AN HON. MEMBER: I hope you weren't having difficulty hearing the minister.

MR. HOGAN: You will have to watch my lips and read them, Mr. Speaker, with the noise and babble coming from the opposite side.

Mr. Speaker, the truth of the matter is, if we were protecting the corporate giants, as implied by the hon. member, with the introduction of this tax, we actually decreased the taxes in incorporated communities by $2.4 million.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HOGAN: So, how would we be protecting them? And the monies that would come from the non-incorporated communities will come into the general revenues, as I would indicate to the member from Ferryland. From the telephone company the rates or the revenue to incorporated municipalities would increase by $225,000 dollars but there is no protection because we are asking them to pay out more plus what they would have to pay out in the non-incorporated communities. But I agree, I do agree with my - what are you, my blubbery friend from the Burin Peninsula - that there are some municipalities who are indeed hit drastically hard and it is going to be tough on them. As usual the municipalities can come to my door, it is open, we will sit down, we will talk about it and I am sure there is some way in which, if there is an inordinate burden of taxes, that we can help them out, as we have always done in the past and we are prepared to negotiate and have them operate a smooth, budgetary, fiscal, responsible council.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. WINSOR: Mr. Speaker, after hearing my friend from Burin - Placentia West and his fine speech and the response from the minister, Mr. Speaker, I would have much preferred to have listened to the member for Burin - Placentia West. But I asked the Minister of Education some questions the other day with respect to student loans. The minister tries to -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. WINSOR: Yes, Mr. Speaker, mine is paid back. I have been out of university for more then ten years.

Mr. Speaker, the minister seemed to indicate that everything was all right with the student loans and I am not talking about the amount and I do not want the minister today to confuse that. We are not talking about the amount of student loans and we are not talking about what Ottawa gives and we are not talking about what the Province gives in grants. We are talking about the processing. Now, I want the minister to get that straight because he does not seem to understand and he did not understand the other day that we are talking about the processing of student loan applications and appeals.

Now the minister said yesterday: we are going to have it brought up to date, I think within a few days. I wish the minister would listen to the recording that is on today, the recording that you have to suffer through because there is no one there to answer the phones, indicates that loans have been processed, and that is as of twenty minutes ago, up until October 21st. Now, we were told yesterday it was November 2nd but that is from an official but the machine you have to talk to or listen to there, indicates that it is October 21st. That's as far as student loans are processed, October 21st. Mr. Speaker, it is virtually impossible for a student to get through on that system that is there, practically an impossibility and as any member opposite will know, that if you try any of these numbers, and I have been trying them, all four or five of them whatever I have since two o'clock today -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. WINSOR: The line is busy. The line is busy, you can never get through, Mr. Speaker, -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. WINSOR: No, Mr. Speaker, I was not tying up the line because it was only a busy signal and the reason is -

AN HON. MEMBER: ( Inaudible).

AN HON. MEMBER: He is giving you lines there.

MR. WINSOR: The Minister of Finance is getting carried away because he has been responsible for some of it because of the layoff that he inflicted down there in the past few days, that is part of the problem that is down there. There is insufficient staff there to handle the amount of processing that has to go through. Now, Mr. Speaker, the minister thinks it is funny. He thinks it is a great joke to blame all of this on Ottawa and everyone else and say the student loans have not changed since such and such a year and we recognize that is a problem, but that is not what we are talking about today. The students who are calling me are calling about their appeals being processed. They are not disputing the amount of money, they are disputing the slowness in getting the thing processed, so they can get money in their pockets, so they can buy books, so they can pay their bills, and, Mr. Speaker, it is no good for the minister to give the money December 15th when they are at home because they were unable to -

MR. BAKER: (Inaudible) money.

MR. WINSOR: Yes, they are appealing the amount of money they are to receive -

MR. BAKER: So they are concerned about it.

MR. WINSOR: No, Mr. Speaker - boy he is getting worse. Since they gave him the Minister of Finance with the President of Treasury Board he has been unable to handle the pressure, it is slipping away from him daily. These students know they are going to have a legitimate case. It is the process that is involved in assessing student loan applications which is the problem, it is a flawed process. I had a constituent who submitted all the documents only to find out yesterday, that they are requesting now a separation slip. He sent it in six weeks ago. Six weeks ago he sent in all the information needed for an appeal and they informed him yesterday that they cannot process his appeal, now they need a separation slip, and it has been sitting there for six weeks, Mr. Speaker, while the student has had no money, his parents have had none to give him and that individual has had to suffer because of the problems in the administration. That is what I want the minister to address today, the problems in the administration of student loans. We can talk about the amounts later, that is not the immediate concern, it is processing the applications that are in there now, why is it so slow and what is the minister going to do to make it possible for students to get money in the next day or two?

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, this is the place on the Order Paper for hon. members opposite to get up, when they are not satisfied with Answers to Questions that have been asked. Now, Mr. Speaker, I remember the question quite clearly. It was a good question, well thought out. There is no doubt about that. It was an excellent question. And I gave a very precise, concise answer, Mr. Speaker. I can't for the life of me understand why the hon. member is wasting the time of this House to say that he is not satisfied with an answer that I gave to a question when it was truly, Mr. Speaker, one of the best answers I have heard given in this House of Assembly in many, many years. So there is no reason for the hon. member to be -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's predecessor in this House, Beaton Tulk, could always understand the answer to a question. You didn't have to give it to him in baby talk. You didn't have to spell it out for him, Mr. Speaker. Maybe the hon. member should confer with his predecessor and learn how to listen to an answer, especially a good, precise answer which is right to the point.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member raised some questions about the student loans. I agree there is a problem with the whole student loans program in this country today. It is in a total mess, Mr. Speaker, as I told the hon. member when I answered the question clearly and precisely last week.

In 1984 his bosom pal in Ottawa, his good Tory buddy in Ottawa, Brian Mulroney, came down here and threatened to inflict prosperity on Newfoundland and Labrador. Now, we all know how important education is to this Province. The words were hardly cold when he went back to Ottawa, Mr. Speaker, took the student loans and froze the whole thing at 1984 levels. Now, the hon. member can try to cover that up all he likes and threaten me not to speak about the amounts of student loans, threaten me about that. But I am not going to be quiet because I owe too great a debt to the students of this great Province of ours, Mr. Speaker.

If the hon. member thinks that there is enough money in the student loans program, I got news for him. I don't think there is enough money in the student loans program, Mr. Speaker. There is not another Education Minister in this great country of ours, be he Tory, be he NDP or whatever his political affiliation is - all the Ministers of Education are absolutely perturbed with the student loans program which is provided by his cousins, his Tory cousins in Ottawa, Mr. Speaker.

So I will have him know that the students of this Province are not satisfied with the amounts. I am not satisfied with the amounts. There is not a minister in the country who is satisfied with the amounts.

I have only heard one person in this great nation say that he is satisfied with the amounts in the student loans, and that is the hon. Member for Fogo. He is satisfied with the amounts. Do you know why he is satisfied with the amounts? He is afraid that if he were to say that he is not satisfied, somehow it might be some reflection on his bosom pal in Ottawa who is in the process of inflicting prosperity on Newfoundland and Labrador. That is why he is getting up and saying it is enough. The fact is, there is not enough money.

You know, Mr. Speaker, when hon. members were over here - when their bosom pal in Ottawa froze the student loans, and applied a 3 per cent administration fee on it - a student who today goes up to get a loan -

MR. ROBERTS: That is where they got their million dollars for the garbage study in Long Harbour.

MR. DECKER: There we are. That is where it came from.

A student goes to get a $1,500 loan, or whatever it is. He has to go through the process. He has to try to get through on a telephone line which the hon. member has blocked up there, and MHA's have blocked so students cannot get through to them. He goes through all that, and finally he gets his loan. Right off the top, 3 per cent is knocked off - administration.

The hon. member is satisfied with all of that. That is not a rule made by this Province. That is a rule made by his bosom pal. Every minister in this country - every education minister - has been asking for the last year-and-a-half; and my colleague, the Member for St. John's North, knows the arguments that every minister has been having with his bosom pals in Ottawa to try to do something about that. Student loans have been frozen since 1984. There has been a 3 per cent administration fee put on it.

Now, when hon. members were sitting over here, to deal with that freeze and to deal with that 3 per cent administration fee, they come forward with a deferred bursary system - a deferred bursary program - which we are locked into, and it has become a curse. It has become a curse to the student loans program - a deferred bursary that they put in place.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. minister's time is up.

MR. DECKER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was just getting in full flight.

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

MR. ROBERTS: Mr. Speaker, I shall be asking my colleagues to vote in favour of the motion to adjourn. If not, we are back here this evening. I suspect even my friend, the Opposition House Leader, does not want us back here this evening.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. ROBERTS: Well, given their performance perhaps we should, but not tonight, Josephine - not tonight.

Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that when the House meets in the morning we shall carry on with the Minister of Health's bill. We will no doubt hear his concluding - how much time does he have? An hour?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. ROBERTS: God.

Anyway, we will hear the conclusion of Order 12, Bill No. 38. Then we will go on to Bill Nos. 46 and 40, and on and on from there on the list I gave my friend earlier today.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now - I do not need to move that the House adjourn. I ask my friends to vote in favour of the motion to adjourn. We will be back at 10:00 a.m., bright and early.

AN HON. MEMBER: Nine.

MR. ROBERTS: Nine in the morning, bright and early - even brighter and even earlier and no doubt ready to go.

I only hope that the hon. gentleman from Burin - Placentia West has a good night's rest and comes back here rested, because watching him attack my friend, the Minister of Municipal and Provincial Affairs, was just like watching a pussycat savage a big boxer dog.

On motion, the House at its rising adjourned until tomorrow, Friday, at 9:00 a.m.