The House met at 1:30 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Admit strangers.

Today, the Chair would like to welcome a special group of individuals who have been attending some festivities here at the Confederation Building today. I am referring to the War Brides of Newfoundland and Labrador.

On behalf of the House of Assembly, I offer each one of you and your family a very warm welcome to your House.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Also, we are happy today to welcome a group of ten Grade 9 students from Level I, all the way from D.C. Young School, Port Hope Simpson, in the District of Cartwright-L’Anse au Clair.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The students are accompanied by their teacher, Mr. Thomas Flynn, and their chaperon, Ms Karen Sooley.

Welcome to the House of Assembly.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The following members’ statements will be heard today: the hon. the Member for the District of St. John’s South; the hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi; the hon. the Member for the District of Humber Valley; the hon. the Member for the District of Cartwright-L’Anse au Clair; and, the hon. the Member for the District of Placentia & St. Mary’s.

The hon. the Member for the District of St. John’s South.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

Mr. Speaker, today is a very special day as we have recognized the significant contributions made by War Brides through the signing of a proclamation this morning. I would like to thank the hon. Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs for signing the proclamation, and the Speaker for his welcome of our special guests today.

I would like to recognize the War Brides who have joined us today in the gallery, and their families, and to thank them for spending the day with us as we recognize them and the contribution that they made to our Province, our culture and our economy.

During both the First and Second World Wars, as well as the Korean Conflict, thousands of servicemen from Newfoundland served overseas and many of them returned with brides and dependants. Approximately 1,000 women married servicemen from Newfoundland during the Second World War alone, making their return home the single largest influx of immigrants in Newfoundland’s history. We can safety say they made a tremendous contribution to our population.

With the start of their new lives in their new home the War Brides and their husbands became the new workers, entrepreneurs and leaders of the burgeoning economy of Newfoundland and Labrador, providing a solid foundation for the next generation, thus adding a tremendous contribution to our economy.

Most of the War Brides came from the United Kingdom, and while this is also where most of our ancestors came from hundreds of years ago, they brought a fresh approach to our old cultures and they added new ones as well. I can still taste the Scottish dishes my mother-in-law used to make, and can say from my own experiences that the War Brides added new food and new ideas to our rich culture.

The War Brides who moved to Newfoundland and Labrador left their own homes, family and friends to join their husbands and new families and make a home in an unknown land. They have added to our families and to our communities in many ways. Some of their contributions were made far from the public eye and in ways that cannot be measured, but we are a richer people and a richer Province because of them.

I would like all members of the House to welcome our special guests today and recognize them and their valuable contributions.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, last night was the opening night for Surfaced, the art fashion show and exhibit for the twenty-first annual Textile Studies graduates of the College of the North Atlantic, which is a two-year diploma program offered in collaboration with the Anna Templeton Centre.

Surfaced is the culmination of the final semester of the Textile Studies program. The nine students who are graduating worked very hard to create their own line of products, one-of-a-kind or limited editions, for sale and display in the graduate exhibition at the Anna Templeton Centre.

The Anna Templeton Centre contributes to the cultural heritage of this Province. The quality of work has been instrumental in encouraging the development of the Province’s artistic community. The Centre also provides after school and lunchtime arts programs in the St. John’s area.

As I mentioned, the Centre is in its twenty-first year and continues to produce great works and inspire artists. The instructors, some of whom have been through the program themselves, have a lot to offer.

The graduates of this year’s Textile Studies program are: Aryn Ballett, Ricky Brophy, Kailey Cahill, Meagan Hounsell, Susan Jarvis, Ashlynn Kenny, Laura O’Leary, Rebecca Smith and Denise Walsh. I encourage my colleagues to take the time to go and see what wonderful art they have created.

I ask the House to congratulate the graduates of the twenty-first Textile Studies program and the staff of the Anna Templeton Centre for all their hard work.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Humber Valley.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KELLY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As the Member of the House of Assembly for the District of Humber Valley, it gives me great pleasure to rise in this hon. House today and formally recognize an outstanding young man.

Jeremy Curnew, a Level III student at Elwood High School in Deer Lake, made history for chess on the West Coast at the provincial chess tournament recently held in Gander. He won gold in the Grade 12 division, and he is the first chess player from the Deer Lake area to earn a seat at the final stage of the Canadian Chess Challenge.

The national chess tournament will take place on May 16-18 at the University of Toronto. Curnew earned his place at the national tournament by winning at both the regional and provincial levels. He will be travelling to Ontario with the team of provincial gold medal winners, most of them are from the Avalon Peninsula.

His previous chess advisor, Debbie Olsen, and his present chess advisor, Clarence White, are extremely proud of Jeremy’s achievements. The school and the community also share the great excitement in Jeremy’s success.

Mr. Speaker, the documented benefits of playing chess are immense. Controlled studies going back over several decades, beginning in Russia, and more recently in the United States, have indicated that chess develops improved concentration, analytical, reasoning ability, circumspection, prudence, and judgement. It is known to foster greater self-esteem, self-confidence and significantly improve academic performance.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of this hon. House to join me in extending best wishes to Jeremy and the rest of the provincial team at the nationals.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Cartwright-L’Anse au Clair.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise in the House today to congratulate the Eagle River Credit Union, who celebrated their twenty-fifth anniversary at their annual general meeting in L’Anse au Clair this past weekend.

Mr. Speaker, this organization is a major success story in this Province. A credit union that resulted from desperation when the only bank in the area, the Bank of Montreal, pulled out of L’Anse au Loup in 1984. It was a group of local volunteers who formed a steering committee and worked with the Credit Union Council to form what we know today as the Eagle River Credit Union.

Mr. Speaker, since its inception, the Eagle River Credit Union has steadily and gradually expanded to further meet the needs of other surrounding communities. Today, they are the second largest credit union in the Province, having reached over $70 million in assets, establishing six branches in the Northern Peninsula and throughout Labrador, and serving well over 6,400 customer-owners.

As part of their mandate, over the past twenty-five years, the Eagle River Credit Union has made a significant contribution to the community and its people as well with substantial corporate donations and fundraising efforts for all charitable organizations.

Mr. Speaker, the credit union has also been recognized for its impressive track record and has won various awards for economic development as well as being named Credit Union of the Year in 1999 and again in 2002.

I ask all members in the House to join with me in congratulating the Eagle River Credit Union on their silver anniversary and recognizing their management team and their board of directors and wishing them every success for the future.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Placentia & St. Mary’s.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, on Valentine’s Day this year, I had the occasion to attend a birthday party in Whitbourne for Mrs. Melina Gosse. This was a special birthday party, Mr. Speaker, because on February 14 Mrs. Gosse celebrated her 100 birthday.

Melina Gosse was born in Green’s Harbour in 1909, the third of five children of Albert and Jane March. She grew up and attended school in Green’s Harbour and in 1939, while working at the Newhook Clinic in Whitbourne, she met and married Harold Gosse, who worked with the Newfoundland Railway. Mr. Gosse died in 1988.

They had three daughters and three sons. One son is Mr. Lloyd Gosse, the current mayor of Whitbourne. Mrs. Gosse still resides in her own home in Whitbourne and is a very bright, articulate and independent woman who reads and follows the news of the day. She has a very keen memory and a repertoire of songs and poetry which she is willing to share readily. I have had the opportunity to visit this wonderful lady on a number of occasions, and it is always a pleasure to chat with her.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all hon. members of this House to join with me in congratulating Mrs. Melina Gosse and in wishing her continued good health and happiness.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Statements by Ministers.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Innovation, Trade and Rural Development.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are renowned for celebrating the Province’s culture and for remaining close to their roots. For some it is through song, for others it is storytelling, and for many more it is through making of craft.

In addition to playing an important role in celebrating the Province’s cultural identity, the craft industry is an important contributor to local economies. It employs more than 1,600 people and generates in excess of $32 million in sales annually.

To support the continued growth of the craft industry, the Department of Innovation, Trade and Rural Development implements a series of initiatives that enable locally-produced products to be sold at home or abroad. Departmental initiatives include financial investments, regional and national trade shows, training and workshops, and hosting events such as the Provincial Craft Wholesale Show.

It is also an industry led by business savvy entrepreneurs who recognize the need to be innovative and utilize modern applications to market and sell their products. Mr. Speaker, taking innovative approaches to expand the reach of business in the smallest or largest of communities significantly improves the possibilities of success.

With this in mind, the department and industry work collectively to initiate tools that increase awareness in sales of such locally made crafts as traditional knitwear, specialty food, jewellery, and one-of-a-kind pieces that capture the spirit and the distinct culture of our region.

Coinciding with this year’s Provincial Craft Wholesale Show, a virtual trade show was launched. The virtual trade show expanded awareness of craft producers and their products to a wide audience and provided retailers unable to travel to St. John’s with the opportunity to participate in this event.

I am pleased to report that the virtual show led directly to new sales for producers. As we proceed forward, we intend to expand the use of the virtual shows to benefit all those in the industry.

The department, in partnership with the Craft Council of Newfoundland and Labrador has also launched a series of Internet marketing workshops. The workshops are custom designed for individual craft producers to help improve their presence on-line. Producers acquire practical skills that can be immediately applied to Web site development and enhancements, along with attracting visitors to their Web site.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland and Labrador’s geography can present barriers for smaller businesses like those in the craft industry. As a government, we are committed to facilitating the adaptation of modern applications and innovation that leads to local producers breaking those barriers and targeting new opportunities.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank minister for an advanced copy of his statement.

The craft sector, of course, is one of the more underdeveloped sectors in our economy and it is great to see anything that can be done by government and by that department in particular, to enhance that sector of our economy. We, of course, have some of the most skilled and creative craftspeople in this country, and anything that can be done to advance their interest and their industry is certainly beneficial.

I particularly note the use of technology here. We have all seen, of course, that technology and the impact it can have upon economic ventures is overwhelming, and eBay is just one example. Of course, if we can take the craft industry and put it on a more positive footing because of the use of technology, all the best.

I particularly note, as well, the fact that we can use technology to bring people together who have a similar interest in that industry, because oftentimes, given our geography, it is a barrier, that you just can’t bring them together. Someone may have a great idea, but quite often they don’t have the resources to come to these craft shows, for example, to promote themselves and their business. It is great to see that we are making use of technology in that regard as well.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I, too, thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement.

I have met people who have participated in the professional development workshops the minister referred to. I know that the artisans really do find them to be helpful. Newfoundland and Labrador is full of talented artisans and craftspeople, but it is unfortunately difficult for them to make a living, as we all know, because the market in Newfoundland is so small. Anything that can be done to stretch out and reach a broader market is really important. Unless artisans hit on a specific market right away it is sometimes a long road, because in order to make an income you have to export right away to do that.

I encourage government to continue with these initiatives but also to provide more income support to artisans especially in the beginning of the development of their product when things are so hard for them, and I encourage the government to play a much larger role in helping them with distribution and marketing outside the Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further Statements by Ministers.

The hon. the Minister of Business.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ORAM: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, last Thursday, May 7, the meeting of the Pan-Atlantic Investment Coordination committee was held here in St. John’s. This is a group comprised of senior investment coordinators and officials from the Atlantic Provinces and the federal government. Its primary objectives are to facilitate investment partnerships and build awareness in the international markets to better establish the Atlantic region as a good place in which to invest.

This was the first time since 2007 that Newfoundland and Labrador has had the occasion to host a meeting of the Investment Coordination Committee. It provided a beneficial opportunity for officials of our government who are involved in investment attraction to get together and to interact face-to-face with counterparts from New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and the federal government, in order to communicate, coordinate and share information, report on progress, scope upcoming international events, conferences, and missions and lay out additional groundwork for increased investment activity in the Atlantic Provinces.

Although on one level our provinces naturally compete with one another for foreign and national business, we also hold common interests in promoting our jurisdictions and regions as a whole for investment, and our individual efforts, activities and successes can certainly have mutual benefits for all.

Mr. Speaker, the meeting also provided our Province, as host, with an opportunity to highlight to Atlantic and the federal agencies the strengths and assets that make Newfoundland and Labrador an increasingly attractive place to invest, including our wealth of resources, our current and future major projects, and our significant financial investments in areas like infrastructure and research and development.

Mr. Speaker, like other jurisdictions in Canada and around the world, we recognize that attracting business from abroad creates new employment and contributes to diversifying our economy. That is why our government established the Business Attraction Fund as a key incentive for investors, and why in Budget 2009 close to $30 million was provided under this fund for this fiscal year.

Mr. Speaker, our Province was very pleased to host last week’s meeting of the Pan-Atlantic Investment Coordination Committee, as we advance in our own objective to position Newfoundland and Labrador as a preferred destination for inward investment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for an advanced copy of his statement.

Any initiative, of course, or meeting which has as its purpose coordinating your investment efforts is a positive move. We certainly need all the co-operation that we can have when it comes to advancing our trading interests and our business interests in the economy in general, certainly in these tough economic times that we currently have.

I would point out, and I do not mean to be negative here, but the minister uses the words: a good place in which to invest. Unfortunately, sometimes people outside, when they see things happen here, they get a different opinion.

For example, the AbitibiBowater expropriation piece, everybody here positively supported, unanimously endorsed that move, and I support it because I believe it was the proper move as well. Sometimes people outside misinterpret what our purposes were and some people see those types of actions as being unfriendly. I just think we need to educate them better as to why we did it. I would certainly agree that we did the right thing but unfortunately, sometimes people outside misinterpret for their own purposes what the initiative was about.

I would say in particular, with regards to the Department of Business, it has existed now for a number of years, five, six years, and I have questioned the minister extensively in Estimates every year about it and the Premier used to head up the department himself, initially. As I said to the minister, again, we look forward to more positive and substantive announcements. We have had lots of announcements from the Red Tape Committee of which the minister chairs and so on but we have not seen a lot of substantive ventures. Hopefully, the $30 million that is there now we will see that come to fruition with some good investments in the future which will create good economic circumstances for the Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I, too, thank the minister for the advanced copy of his statement.

This initiative, the Investment Coordination Committee and these meetings are obviously important as we look to investment in the Province, but we have had a lot of announcements. I do not want to sound repetitive here but we have. We have had the MOUs with Ireland, Iceland and Rhode Island. We know that the department has been in place for six years now. We have had initiatives like the ACOA based Team Canada Atlantic International Business Development Program. We go on supporting this but also waiting to see more to come back. We are soon going to be wanting to see the fruits of that investment.

It is my understanding we have about five businesses that have come forward in the past six years because of the department. We would like to see that double pretty fast, Mr. Speaker, if we are going to continue putting money into this.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

Oral Questions.

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In April, May, June and July of 2008, Eastern Health accumulated over 62,000 hours of nursing time during that four-month period. It is equivalent to over 5,000 twelve-hour shifts of overtime.

I ask the Premier: If he can indicate to us today what other government employees have that level of overtime in our system, and I ask if they think this is an acceptable workload to expect from nurses?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Mr. Speaker, I do not know across government. My colleague, the President of Treasury Board, might have some stats across government, but I suspect, Mr. Speaker, I truly suspect that is probably the highest of any employee group in the public service.

There are a number of reasons for that. Last year alone, we have about 5,000 nurses, on average each of them used about twenty days of unscheduled leave, unplanned leave. Now if you combine that with the fact that in December, 2008 the Canadian Centre for Help Information came out with a stat that said that we have the highest proportion of nurses working in permanent positions than anywhere else in the entire country, because that is what the nurses asked us to do. The compromise here though, Mr. Speaker, is when you do that, you do not have as many nurses available for relief. So they have to fundamentally do their own relief, and that is where the overtime is driven in many cases.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

If you look at those statistics and you also look at the fact that during that four-month period there was also 23,000 hours of overtime accumulated at the Health Sciences Centre alone, it is a clear indication that there is a lack of nurses in hospitals in this Province.

I ask the government today: If this level of overtime is required to cover regular nursing shifts, why would government even threaten to remove the monetary benefits that they were designing to address the recruitment and retention problem that exists in this profession?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: What the member is highlighting here for us is something that I said yesterday in a couple of comments I made to the press. The actions and the decisions made by the nurses’ union to start a job action next Wednesday, and to remove all overtime, puts the health system in a much more compromising position than if they had gone forward with what has normally been referred to as standard strike, where they withdraw the service and, in fact, have a picket line and all the other things that we tend to associate with strikes.

Their decision that they announced this week puts patients in a much more compromising position than if they were to ever follow through with what is normally expected in a strike situation. Because, in that situation, in order for them to have a legal strike, they need to have essential employee agreements in place and that would cover off those critical areas and would respond to patient safety issues that are going to arise in the health system, I say, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Not only do we have concerns with the fact that overtime is being pulled back by nurses in the Province, but this morning I was notified in writing by one nurse who had submitted his resignation to Western Health because of this situation, and I hope it is not the beginning of more resignations.

I ask government today: Instead of allowing our system to free fall into a devastating situation, that we are unable to bring stability to the health care sector, will you not reconsider your decisions and go to binding arbitration on these two issues so that we can avoid any cutback in overtime, any legislating back to work, and nurses from resigning from the system?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The law imposes upon us a duty to bargain in good faith. We have demonstrated our good faith, Mr. Speaker, by offering significant increases in wages, by offering to look at other issues. We were more than generous in our offer to the nurses. On March 26 we first made the announcement of the steps we were willing to take.

Mr. Speaker, for six weeks now we have been begging people to take a 31 per cent raise. In these economic times it is unbelievable that it is being turned down. There comes a point in time, however, where you cannot have your cake and eat it too.

In this particular case, the Supreme Court of Canada has said there is a right to a process, not an outcome. We have bargained in good faith. It is the nurses’ union that has been intransigent and inflexible.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The government is insistent on bringing in the labour market adjustment clause for nurses in this Province, but back a few year ago there was an issue with regard to recruitment and retention of nurses in Coastal Labrador communities. At that time, there was a private negotiation or deal done between the government and the nurses’ union to pay out recruitment and retention bonuses to nurses who would work in Coastal Labrador communities. That was done in the absence of any labour market adjustment policy.

Why does it need to be done differently today? Isn’t the precedent already there to deal with these situations?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask members for their co-operation.

The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Mr. Speaker, from day one in these negotiations the nurses’ union have maintained that this is about recruitment and retention. We know that there have been market adjustments utilized, and are being utilized, by our health boards. There have been, for example, sign-on bonuses, there have been other types of recruitment incentives, and they have been working.

The market adjustment is something that, as a government, we need to allow flexibility to address situations in exceptional circumstances, in hard-to-fill positions. It allows us, as a government, to deal with the issue of recruitment and retention, and that is what the nurses have asked us to do. That is what we have been doing.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is true, though, Minister, that this clause will allow you, as a government, to arbitrarily negotiate with individuals within the health care system and therefore bypass the union altogether, and give government that responsibility, and not have to deal collectively with their union process?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: I reiterate, Mr. Speaker, that what this clause allows us to do is to address recruitment and retention, which we were told by the nurses’ union is their number one concern.

I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that 30,000 other public sector employees have agreed to these clauses, that we have all of the major unions which have agreed. So, in essence, we have a clause that is being made the focus of an intention by the nurses’ union to further a national agenda, because from day one the president of the union has said we are going to take the government to court.

Well, I suggest to the president of the union and her legal advisors that they might want to have a closer read of that B.C. health services case than they have done so far.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

What I hear is the minister admitting that negotiating with the union on specific cases, like happened with benefit agreements for recruitment and retention in Labrador, did work and there needs to be no additional clauses.

Mr. Speaker, what I do not understand is, in a time when there is a recognition by the government opposite that we have a serious deficiency in the nursing profession in this Province, why they would be threatening nurses to legislate them back to work if they were to take strike action under conditions and negotiated conditions other than what is on the table today. Why would you do that?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Mr. Speaker, I became the Minister of Finance when the world was turning upside down from a financial perspective. We have seen the jobs that have been lost across this country. We have seen the jobs that have been lost in Grand Falls-Windsor. We know what is going on in Labrador West.

To offer a starting nurse, to say to him or her, your salary will be $60,000 after this contract, or by the time it ends, it is a 31 per cent raise. To say to a senior nurse, 72 per cent of which are on step seven, that you will get a 27 per cent raise, we will make you the highest paid nurses in Eastern Canada - east of Ontario, excuse me - Mr. Speaker, I say is more than generous.

Sixty thousand dollars to start in a profession is not bad, especially in these economic times, and, for the life of me, I cannot see why we are stuck on this market adjustment clause, other than the union has another agenda and that is what is going on here.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yesterday government released an external report into the Province’s child protection system, which demonstrated very little has changed since the 2003 murder of Zachary Turner. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the report identified five systematic barriers to the achievement of a baseline standard of Child, Youth and Family Services.

I ask the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services - we know that your government has taken many necessary actions since receiving this report, including the acceptance of its ten recommendations. I ask you today if you can tell the public what the plan and timelines are for addressing these key findings in the report.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, we have received the report from Susan Abell, as I had released yesterday and mentioned here in the House of Assembly. As Ms Abell points out in the report, and something that this government has reiterated as well, in order to truly be able to address the issues that we have in Child, Youth and Family Services right now, a series of quick fixes is not going to do it, and Ms Abell says that in her report. She indicates that it is going to take years for us to be able to have the system that we absolutely need in this Province. We are committed to do that, Mr. Speaker.

One of the first actions that I will be taking is to appoint the leadership team. We are going to need people who have a very strong background in social work and social work theory, and case management and risk assessment, and who understand the child protection process. I am hoping within the next week or so to have that leadership team in place.

We are going to take each of the areas that have recommendations. We are going to work with the existing division, the executive, and through that leadership team we are going to have action plans, we are going to have time frames, so that we can monitor our progress and see how we are doing; but, Mr. Speaker, we are determined that we are going to address all of these recommendations and build the best system we possibly can build.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

One of the key systemic barriers to the improvement of Child, Youth and Family Services that was identified in the report was the lack of leadership, and I certainly thank the minister for acknowledging that and indicating what her intentions are.

After the release of the Turner Review in 2006, your government committed to engage with experts from the Centre of Excellence for Child Welfare to provide expert knowledge in the area of research and evaluation and best practices.

I am just wondering if that did occur. If so, were there any policies that were reported, or were there any changes that took place at that time?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, there have been a number of initiatives that have started following the Turner report. In fact this government, since 2006, has invested, on an annual basis, $24 million into Child, Youth and Family Services.

What is important to note here, Mr. Speaker - because this is very serious work that we need to undertake as a department - is that we cannot go at this in an ad hoc way. We cannot go at this now and invest in training and development, or invest in policies and procedures.

We need to take each one of these recommendations and we need to make sure that as we address one we fit it together with the next. We need to do a legislative review; that should drive the policies and procedures. The policies and procedures should, in turn, drive the staff development and training that needs to take place. That, in turn, should assist in quality control.

So what we need to be careful of, is no matter what has been done up to this point, we need to make sure that we look at every piece of the puzzle and everything fits together; because, unless it is done with an integrated approach, Mr. Speaker, we will not be able to build the best system that we need.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Government funded 129 new social worker positions since 2006, and I think the minister indicated that yesterday. Yet, the report notes that only 50 per cent of the children in care had the base monthly visit from a social worker, and only 12 per cent of the children in protective care had such visits.

I ask the minister today if this was a result of vacancies in these social work positions and if there was a problem with trying to fill them. If it was, has that now been resolved?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, there is no quick or simple answer to why the social workers did not see the children as required under the minimum requirements in their jobs, but I will talk about the workforce instability because that is something that has plagued this system.

What happens, Mr. Speaker, is people who come in to do child protection work do the most difficult form of social work and they are in the most highly accountable positions that they can be in. Within the whole system, whether it is Health and Community Services or Child, Youth and Family Services, a social worker always has the option to apply on an internal competition to another position, whether it is in mental health or addictions, continuing care, youth corrections, youth services, whatever.

What happens, Mr. Speaker, is most people will try to get out of these highly accountable positions because of the responsibility that these positions entail, and the pay is equal for each and every social work position, including the people doing child protection. So a lot of times we have had case turnover because we have the newest, most inexperienced workers coming into these positions who are seeking out other options within the health care field.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Clinical Services Review analyzed a random sample of 400 active cases in Child, Youth and Family Services, and deficiencies were identified in close to 20 per cent of those cases.

I ask the minister: Have the cases where a deficiency was identified been reviewed since you first received the report, and how will you deal with the more than 9,000 other files that have not been reviewed to date?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, in the review that was done by Susan Abell and her colleagues there were sixty-eight cases out of the 400 that were sent back to the regions for immediate follow-up, so they identified gaps that needed follow-up. In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, what we have instructed was, we want every case on the protective intervention caseload reviewed so that any gaps in services that are identified will need to be addressed. This has been an ongoing piece of work within the regional health authorities.

In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, based on this report, it also notes that there were a number of cases that were screened out from receiving services; however, they did have a previous file with Child, Youth and Family Services or were recently terminated from the services. I have also asked that the authorities go back, review the cases that were screened out, that had previous intervention with the division, and to ensure that there is an appropriate critical analysis done to either confirm that it should be screened out or to provide the appropriate service.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, the Child, Youth and Family Services Act itself highlighted the harmful effect of judicial delay for child protection services, and our office has also heard stories of a two-year wait to have a child protection case heard in court. We know that your department has taken a lead on bringing changes to our court system and to reduce delays for child protective intervention.

I am wondering if the Minister of Justice, I guess, could give us an update, and whether your department has implemented the alternative dispute resolution process that was announced back in 2008.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, we are committed to doing a legislative review of the act that guides the work of Child, Youth and Family Services. It also says in the report that the legislation we have now is not sufficiently child-focused, and there is balance that needs to happen. This is a debate that happens right across the country, probably across North America and the world, where we have child protection services. There is a pendulum that swings between the preservation of the family or the rights of the child, and be child-focused.

Mr. Speaker, it seems at this point in time we are probably more leaning towards family preservation, which is still a very important concept as we work through these issues, but in saying that we also need to make sure that our legislation is child-focused as well.

As we do this legislative review we will certainly try to strike the balance that is absolutely necessary with one thing in mind, and that is the protection of the children.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Also with regard to protective intervention programs, the authors of this particular report noted that when they were investigating complaints of child maltreatment, that social workers’ evidence - I guess there were collections of information and documentation and interviews and some other evidence - was not necessarily documented appropriately in case files.

I ask the minister today: What immediate measures is your department taking to ensure that this approach to these investigations into child maltreatment is being documented in a more appropriate manner?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, one of the recommendations from the Abell report also includes documentation, so there is going to need to be significant work done in that area; but, at a minimum, because the reports or the files probably have not been documented appropriately, we have asked - and I have said this before, and this should capture some of the issues with documentation - we have asked that all files under the protective intervention caseload be reviewed so that we can identify gaps and provide the appropriate intervention.

I have also asked that critical analysis be done on the cases that were screened out. Again, if the documentation was the problem, or it was not documented appropriately and they got screened out, they should be captured in this review so that the appropriate services can be applied.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The report also noted that 22 per cent of the children in care and 21 per cent of the youth in care had been in the child welfare system previously, and it also notes that fewer than 10 per cent of protective intervention cases contained the family centered action plan.

I ask the minister today: What will be done to give parents the skills and resources to provide their children with a healthy, safe, life home and to end this instability that have been existing in these caseloads?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, that is a very important question that was just asked because we are here saying now that we want the preservation of the family as opposed to taking the child out, and that is exactly what Susan Abell said was one of the criticisms of this legislation that we are working under right now, that it is not child focused. So we need to be able to look at the protection of the child and put that as our first priority as opposed to preserving the family.

Mr. Speaker, there is also a very sobering statistic that I would like to share with the people in the House of Assembly today. Even when the most intensive, in-house interventions are provided to parents in their homes, studies will reveal that still 40 per cent of children in those homes will suffer re-abuse.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Just to switch to the Minister of Natural Resources.

Eighty-seven silviculture workers in Central Newfoundland have run out of work in the woods and they are wondering when government is going to launch its program with regard to silviculture. There are 3 million seedlings and 1,100 hectares of land, I think, to be planted and many of these workers are unsure if they are going to be recalled to work.

I ask the minister today: What the plan is for these employees?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources and Deputy Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

There are several agencies that do silviculture in our timberlands in this Province. As a government, we have people, silviculturists who work for the government and do work on behalf of the government. Abitibi had silviculturists who worked for them and were under the CEP and worked under that organization. We have a non-profit organization that operates in the Province who does silviculture work in the Province.

In terms of our own government program, Mr. Speaker, that work is proceeding as it does on an annual basis. In terms of the silviculturists who were affected by the shutdown of Abitibi, we are working very closely with them, Mr. Speaker, to try and be innovative and find ways to get the work that Abitibi normally would have done, completed this season.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, I understood that there was a five-year silviculture agreement that existed between the Province and AbitibiBowater, and these eighty-seven employees have been telling me that there is something like 3 million seedlings that need to be planted. They thought they would start work a week ago but they have not been notified and had any response from government.

So I ask the minister today: Can she give a firm commitment that these people will indeed have a job and that these seedlings will be planted this spring?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources and Deputy Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, there is an agreement between the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador and Abitibi for silviculture work. Abitibi was responsible for having that work done. The silviculture people who did that work were part of the CEP, separate from government’s silviculture program and also separate from a silviculture program that is also delivered by a non-profit agency.

Our program is going ahead as per usual, Mr. Speaker. We are trying to work with Abitibi and with the silviculturalists and their union to find an innovative way to get Abitibi’s work done, because Abitibi has indicated that they are not going to do the work. We are finding a way, working with the union, to ensure that that work goes ahead and hopefully we will be able to make an announcement in the very near future.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

On March of this year, the last remaining pulp and paper mill in the Province, Corner Brook Pulp and Paper, announced an eight-week shutdown of the number four paper machine, resulting in a temporary layoff of thirty unionized workers. This shutdown was scheduled to be from March 22 to May 17. This week, the company announced that the machine will not be brought back into operation. It will remain idle, indefinitely, and those thirty workers will remain unemployed.

I ask the Minister of Natural Resources: What, if any, discussions have been ongoing between government and the company with respect to number four and to ensure that it will re-operate in the future?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister Responsible for the Forestry Sector.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, first of all I have to correct the Opposition House Leader. Thirty people were not laid off. Thirty people were affected. In fact, there has been no job loss. There has been hours of workers on the call-in list affected but there have been no layoffs permanent or temporary as a result of the shutdown of number four.

Now, Mr. Speaker, Corner Brook Pulp and Paper made it quite clear in their announcement yesterday that markets have not improved. In fact, one of their largest customers does not have the need and requires less paper.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS DUNDERDALE: So, because of those circumstances, number four will, from a month-to-month basis, continue to be shut down.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, we know that there is a great deal of anxiety felt by offshore workers and their families about the resumption of the helicopter flights to the offshore installations. We have heard from some of these workers that even after the company briefings they are still very concerned that flights could be starting as early as Monday of next week. Industry is adhering to the standards required to operate in the offshore but the anxiety among workers is that the standards are not good enough.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the Premier: Will this government bring to the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board a request that the board include in its review – the review that is carrying out regarding helicopter transport – the question of the adequacy of safety standards?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The transportation of workers offshore by helicopter is regulated by Transport Canada Aviation. The Leader of the NDP is correct in saying that the C-NLOPB does have a role in terms of its chief safety officer, in also ensuring that the mode of transportation is safe and secure, and that is their job. They have a primary concern with the safety of employees on helicopter travel back and forth to the rigs. We have every confidence, Mr. Speaker, that they will exercise that responsibility; do everything that they can to ensure that the safety of workers is protected.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Since the March 12 accident, safety in the offshore has become a very public matter.

Mr. Speaker, on March 23 we asked if government would support making public the safety audits for all areas conducted by the C-NLOPB and, Mr. Speaker, at the time the Minister of Natural Resources said she would take the request under advisement.

So, it has been almost two months now, Mr. Speaker, and could the minister update the House on her efforts in this regard?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources and Deputy Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this government is very concerned with safety in the offshore. Even though we do not have any direct responsibility for the safety of our offshore workers, it is something that we pay a great deal of attention to. Even more emphasis has been brought to it, given the tragic circumstances that we have had to deal with in the last several months.

We are very pleased with the processes that are in place. We have confidence in Transport Canada Aviation, and we are very pleased that the board is doing its own inspections, doing its own review of the safety methods.

In terms of releasing information, Mr. Speaker, we always encourage all of our boards and agencies where it is - there is no comprising to individuals, or to the work of the board or the agency that they make as much information available to the public as they can.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please!

The time allotted for questions and answers have expired.

Presenting Reports by Standing and Special Committees.

Tabling of Documents.

Notices of Motions.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Income Tax Act, 2000. (Bill 29)

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion?

The hon. the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Wildlife Act. (Bill 30)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion?

The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources and Deputy Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Repeal The Government Kruger Agreement Act. (Bill 31)

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion?

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, Monday being a holiday, by leave we would like to read the private member’s motion for next week, if that is possible.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please!

Does the hon. member have leave to read the private member’s motion into the Order Paper today?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

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

MR. VERGE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to move the following private member’s resolution:

WHEREAS Members of the European Parliament decided on May 5, 2009 - by a vote of 550 in favour, 49 against and 41 abstentions – to ban the commercial trade of seal products in European Union countries, with two derogations:

(a) the import of seal products shall also be allowed where it is of an occasional nature and consists exclusively of goods for the personal use of the travelers or their families. The nature and quantity of such goods may not be such as to indicate that they are being imported for commercial reasons;

(b) the placing on the market shall also be allowed for seal products that result from by-products of hunting that is regulated under national law and conducted for the sole purpose of sustainable management of marine resources. Such placing on the market shall only be allowed on a non-profit basis. The nature and quantity of such products shall not be such as to indicate that they are being placed on the market for commercial reasons.

AND WHEREAS the next step to bring this ban in effect is a decision of the Council, representing each of the twenty-seven EU national governments; and the Council is expected to consider the matter in June of 2009;

AND WHEREAS it is the height of hypocrisy for European Union countries to ban the commercial trade of products from the Canadian seal harvest - which is ecologically sustainable, economically sustainable, tightly regulated and humane - while permitting the harvest, culling and hunting of animals within their own jurisdictions and the commercial trade of products from such activities;

AND WHEREAS the Council of the Federation on May 11, 2009 discussed the proposed trade ban on seal products by the EU at the request of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Premier and Nunavut Premier, Eva Aariak, and expressed a strong objection to the EU’s proposed ban, which is not based on fact or on scientific information and could be inconsistent with World Trade Organization obligations and with the commitment made by leaders of the G-20 meeting on April 2, 2009, to refrain from imposing new trade barriers;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the House of Assembly, by way of letters from the Speaker on our behalf, calls on the government of each European Union country to direct their representatives on the Council to vote against the ban on the trade of seal products within the European union;

AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the House calls on the Government of Canada to challenge the ban immediately, vigorously and persistently before the World Trade Organization if such a ban is finally imposed.

This motion, Mr. Speaker, is seconded by the MHA for Bellevue District.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion.

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I give notice, under Standing Order 11, I shall move that the House not adjourn at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, May 19, 2009.

Further, I give notice, under Standing Order 11, I shall move that the House not adjourn at 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday, May 19, 2009.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask members – the Chair is having great difficulty hearing the direction that is coming from the Government House Leader.

Further notices of motion.

Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given.

Petitions.

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate an opportunity to present my eighth petition in this House on behalf of the residents of Southwestern Newfoundland, in the communities from LaPoile, Rose Blanch, Grand Bruit, Isle aux Morts, Burnt Islands, Fox Roost-Margaree, Port aux Basques, Cape Ray, and the Codroy Valley, with respect to the lack of dialysis facilities and services in that particular region.

As indicated earlier, we have been trying to get the attention of the Minister of Health for quite some time now. In fact, he did have a meeting with council in Corner Brook on this issue some months ago. He undertook, at that time, to get back to them. We assumed that would be in this century at least, but so far he has not even seen fit to deliver a letter to them, acknowledging that he had the meeting, or that he was having anyone look at the issue and so on. I guess you can say he paid lip service to the issue.

Hopefully government will, as a result of raising the issue here, and the other people who are protesting the current sad situation that exists, hopefully he will have somebody directed in Western Health to at least look at this issue.

Now, I understand there is a committee currently in place at the hospital there, consisting of the chief of staff, and he is also talking to the person – there is a doctor in Corner Brook who looks after the dialysis services and actually provides the service and the care for the residents from that area who have to travel to Corner Brook. Hopefully, once we get some issues resolved – there is an issue, for example, of what space in the building would be used, should such a service come about, and the actual design of the service. For example, do all eight or nine or ten of these people need the satellite-based system or are there some who, for example, can use home dialysis? Those types of things are currently being looked at, but we do know that not all of them will be suitable candidates for home dialysis so we are still going to have the issue at the end of the day, and it is an issue that has been there for quite some time and needs to be addressed.

We have seen government deal with it in certain areas of the Province. They have dealt with it in St. Anthony. They have dealt with it in the Burin Peninsula region and so on. Labrador West is also now on the radar as needing similar type services, and hopefully government will address it. Certainly, the people in my part of the Province that I represent are no less citizens and no less deserving of care than most other persons in the Province, and if you can see fit to do it in those then I suggest it is only fair that you see the service is extended to the people of Southwestern Newfoundland.

Mr. Speaker, the people out there have their heads turned to the issue. The people in Western Health, I understand, have their heads turned to the issue. If we could only get the head of the Minister of Health tuned in to the issue and he would get on to it with his staff we might see something happen, because at the end of the day the Department of Health has to sanction that this be done.

Hopefully, the minister will tune in to the issue and at least respond that he is even aware and cognizant of the issue and that he is prepared to have a look at it. That would give the people there at least some sense of hope and not be totally desperate as if this government and that minister in particular seem to just not even care that it exists.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions.

The hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave.

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

It is a pleasure to stand today and present another petition on behalf of the residents of not only Pilley’s Island and Long Island, but from Triton, Grand Falls-Windsor, and even relatives and friends here in St. John’s, Robert’s Arm, Triton and so on. I guess it just goes to show that this petition is receiving tremendous support, not only on the island where the people have the concern but their friends and relatives throughout the full area.

I have to say it is a pleasure to stand today and support the residents of that area, as well as the Long Island Causeway and Transportation Committee – and even the MHA in the area. I know I saw an article in the paper where he said that his hands were not tied and he was not muzzled, but I just want to stand and support him and the residents so that their petition is brought forward on a timely basis. They are continuing to come in, Mr. Speaker. I know I have enough now until the House closes, but I will double them up if I get too many more.

Mr. Speaker, it is a very serious issue. Those people were promised a causeway, even though they have had a good ferry system for some time. In their petition they even state if they received a good replacement ferry or a fixed link - that was their request - but their petition is solely for a fixed link between Long Island and Pilley’s Island.

Those residents, and I know I have said this time and time again, have many concerns, whether they are medical concerns, getting people back and forth to the hospital in a timely manner, and more so in the winter months when the ice gets in and they do not know if the ferry is even going to get there for them, and many times they have had to call upon search and rescue helicopters and so on. With a causeway all of those issues can be resolved.

Those people are calling upon government to reconsider their decision. Even though they made a promise back in 2003, they reneged on it, just temporary first, saying that it was a financial situation, but since then they have been advised that this fixed link is not an issue with them, they will not look at this possibility again.

On behalf of the residents, I stand today and present this petition. Hopefully, government will reconsider, seeing the petitions that are coming in from that particular area. People say that this causeway, when it comes to the financial aspect of it, they say in the long run this is the most feasible venture, a fixed link, rather than a new or some other form of ferry service.

Mr. Speaker, I just present this petition today on behalf of those residents with regards to the Long Island causeway.

Thank you very much.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate an opportunity to present an eighth petition on behalf of the residents of Ramea, Grey River and Francois with respect to the current medical services situation that exist in those communities.

All three, of course, are serviced from the medical clinic, which is stationed in Ramea. The persons who work there, obviously, they go down the coast and do coastal clinics on a periodic basis as well into Ramea and into Francois.

As indicated earlier to this House, the problem, of course, is that there is supposed to be two nurse practitioners servicing that particular area and there is only one. Again, they brought the matter to the attention of the authorities at the Calder Health care Centre in Burgeo, which looks after the services, as well as to the people at Western Health. The issue is we cannot attract the additional nurse practitioner that is needed.

We have suggested to government that maybe they should look at changing the existing retention and recruitment. We even had questions in Question Period today where we have talked about specially negotiated agreements with Coastal Labrador, for example, to get the needed personnel there. So we are wondering again, why doesn’t government look at such a solution as that as a possibility to attracting this additional person there? We have whole communities that are without medical service. One person cannot work seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day for 365 days a year. She needs to get rested. She needs to get a break like anybody else. She cannot be on twenty-four-hour call all year round.

Now, they have tried to fix the service by bringing in an LPN and an RN actually from Burgeo from time to time, but that is not sufficient. You are always left short when you only have one person of the quota that is there. You are always dependent on somebody else coming in, and you do not always get it. Any time you do not get it, the communities are at risk.

I am hoping, of course, that the Member for Fortune Bay-Cape la Hune will stand up and support me on that issue as well, or at least acknowledge that she is aware of the issue. She represents one of those communities. Of course, the more pressure we can bring to bear and highlight this issue and the concern for this issue the better. Albeit, we are on opposite sides of this House, it would certainly be helpful if that member would, in fact, endorse even in writing that she is aware of the concern, that she supports the concern because working together on an issue like this everybody gains. Nobody loses if this issue is brought to the attention of the minister as a joint co-operative package rather than be seen as somebody in Opposition bringing it forward.

It needs to be solved, and it is much easier solved if we have both parties involved. I would encourage the member for that particular district to get involved. It is her constituents that are in need of this service as well and I look forward to her standing and giving me support on this issue.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

Orders of the Day.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move Motion 8, pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not adjourn at 5:30 o’clock p.m. today, being Thursday, May 14, 2009.

Further, Mr. Speaker, I move Motion 9, pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not adjourn at 10:00 p.m. today, being Thursday, May 14, 2009.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please!

The motion is that this House do not adjourn today at 5:30.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

A further motion that this House do not adjourn at 10:00 o’clock today.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Nay.

MR. SPEAKER: The motion is carried.

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Government Services to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act. (Bill 23)

I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Government Services shall ask leave to introduce a bill, An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act, Bill 23, and that the said bill be now read a first time.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the minister shall have leave to introduce Bill 23, and that this bill be now read a first time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Government Services to introduce a bill, "An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act," carried. (Bill 23)

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Occupational Health And Safety Act. (Bill 23)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Government Services, to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting The Registration Of Births, Marriages, Deaths And Other Vital Events, Bill 24; and I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Government Services shall have leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting The Registration Of Births, Marriages, Deaths And Other Vital Events, Bill 24; and that Bill 24 be now read a first time.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Government Services to introduce a bill, "An Act Respecting The Registration Of Births, Marriages, Deaths And Other Vital Events," carried. (Bill 24)

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion that Bill 24 be now read a first time.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act Respecting The Registration Of Births, Marriages, Deaths And Other Vital Events, Bill 24.

MR. SPEAKER: Bills 23 and 24 have now been read a first time. When shall the said bills be read a second time?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, Bills 23 and 24 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. the Minister of Government Services, to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Provide For Change Of Name, Bill 26; and I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Government Services shall ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Provide For Change Of Name, Bill 26; and that this bill be now read a first time.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Government Services to introduce a bill, "An Act To Provide For Change Of Name," carried. (Bill 26)

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 26 be now read a first time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Provide For Change Of Name, Bill 26.

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 26 has now been read a first time. When shall the said bill be read a second time?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, Bill 26 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Government Services, to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting Marriage In The Province, Bill 25; and I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Government Services shall have leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting Marriage In The Province, Bill 25; and that Bill 25 be now read a first time.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Government Services to introduce a bill, "An Act Respecting Marriage In The Province," carried. (Bill 25)

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 25 be now read a first time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act Respecting Marriage In The Province, Bill 25.

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 25 has now been read a first time. When shall this bill be read a second time?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, Bill 25 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. the Minister of Justice and the Attorney General, to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting The Public Trustee, Bill 27; and I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Justice and the Attorney General shall have leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting The Public Trustee, Bill 27; and that Bill 27 be now read a first time.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Justice and the Attorney General to introduce a bill, "An Act Respecting The Public Trustee," carried. (Bill 27)

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 27 be now read a first time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General to introduce a bill, "An Act Respecting The Public Trustee," carried. (Bill 27)

CLERK: A bill, An Act Respecting The Public Trustee. (Bill 27)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 27 has now been read a first time.

When shall the said bill be read a second time?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, Bill 27 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Justice and Attorney General, to ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Provincial Court Act 1991, Bill 28, and I further move that the said bill be now read a first time.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that the hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General shall have leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Provincial Court Act 1991, Bill 28, and that this bill be now read a first time.

Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 28 be now read a first time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

Motion, the hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General to introduce a bill, "An Act To Amend The Provincial Court Act, 1991," carried. (Bill 28)

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Provincial Court Act, 1991. (Bill 28)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 28 has now been read a first time.

When shall Bill 28 be read a second time?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

On motion, Bill 28 read a first time, ordered read a second time on tomorrow.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, from the Order Paper, I call Order 5, second reading of a bill, An Act Respecting Chiropractors. (Bill 8)

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that Bill 8, An Act Respecting Chiropractors, be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act Respecting Chiropractors." (Bill 8)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this bill that the government is putting forward now should enhance the practice of chiropractors in the Province. This new legislation, the Chiropractors Act, 2009, serves to enhance the governance and disciplinary procedures for chiropractors in the Province. These changes improve the public protection by placing greater accountability on the part of the chiropractic profession and it highlights their responsibility to the people that they serve.

The new act sets out an open and transparent disciplinary process which is regulated by the Newfoundland and Labrador Chiropractic Board. This process grants the board the appropriate powers and authority to investigate allegations of wrongdoing by the chiropractic profession.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, this new act provides the capacity for chiropractors to form a professional corporation, which is a current practice with other professionals including physicians and dentists and optometrists, bills that had been introduced in this House earlier, Mr. Speaker.

Given that the ability to incorporate is common in many other Canadian jurisdictions, this additional professional act will assist to make Newfoundland and Labrador a more competitive Province in attracting and retaining chiropractors. The act reflects new governance arrangements and disciplinary procedures adopted by the provincial government and incorporated in other legislations governing other disciplines such as massage therapists, veterinary medicine, pharmacy, ophthalmology, medicine, physiotherapy, dentistry and others; all have been introduced in this House in the past.

You may recall the origin of these changes, and amendments to these, together with other and all self-regulating disciplines, will eventually be covered by these changes. It comes about as a result of a White Paper on self-regulating disciplines.

All of these measures all reflect our government’s commitment to make sure that we have quality patient care and have the necessary regulatory and legislative structure to ensure that we govern the people who provide those services.

The bill itself, the Explanatory Note is pretty straightforward, "This Bill would revise the law respecting the regulation of chiropractors." There are a couple of things that I think are important which speak to the thrust of the bill that I just want to highlight.

It talks about the board itself, and I just want to bring to members’ attention the board’s composition. There are six members elected from and by chiropractors, in accordance with their own bylaws, who sit on this board. There will be three members that will be appointed under section 5 of the legislation, who are not chiropractors. The board shall elect from among the elected members a chairperson and a secretary-treasurer. That it the composition of the board that we are talking about.

I will not read each section of the bill, but given the thrust of the legislation I do want to speak to a couple of pieces here. The board shall register as a chiropractor and issue a licence to practice chiropractic to a person who (a) pays his or her professional dues. The individual will hold a degree or a diploma in chiropractic from the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College, a university or college within Canada recognized by the Council of Chiropractic Education (Canada) or another program that the board considers to be of their equivalent, making sure that there is an appropriate credentialing process if you are to be registered to practice chiropractic in this Province.

The other thing that this intends to do, which is a big thrust of this, is there is a complaints and disciplinary panel. From within the board itself, the board shall appoint at least three of their members, at least one of whom is a member appointed under section 5, which is the public sector piece. Section 5 speaks to those individuals who are on the board who are not practising chiropractors. They will constitute a complaints authorization committee.

So individuals or the general public who have a complaint with respect to the conduct or behaviour or practice of a chiropractor has an ability to register a complaint with this board and the complaint will be heard. This provides for an element of protection, which is the whole reason for legislation such as this. It provides for an element of protection for the consumers of the Province. The residents of Newfoundland and Labrador who avail of those services have some element of protection.

Some of the other points that I want to raise with respect to the bill, Mr. Speaker, because they are consistent with the other legislations that we have introduced in this House to deal with self-regulating disciplines, it talks about the whole complaint procedure and how that process works. If individuals are not necessarily happy with the results of that, there is a process through the court to ensure that if you feel aggrieved in some fashion there is a mechanism through a complaint procedure together with a court to ensure that you had an opportunity to have a true and fair hearing of the complaints that you have made.

Mr. Speaker, this is a significant bill in that it deals with the practice of chiropractic in this Province, and chiropractors in this Province. It is a significant bill in that it provides an element of protection for the consumers of this service in Newfoundland and Labrador, and it is a bill that provides a consistency in how we actually regulate and govern self-governing professions in the Province. So this legislation now will mirror that which is provided to other disciplines. As a benefit to the chiropractors, obviously, this legislation now gives them the opportunity to become incorporated.

Mr. Speaker, inasmuch as it is a significant bill, it has a significant element of protection in here and it is intended to provide a greater degree of transparency and openness in a practice such as this, but it is to some degree consistent with everything else we have done in this House with these other disciplines.

I will not spend a great deal more time talking about the bill because it is, to some extent, somewhat straightforward. It grows out of a White Paper. This is one of many that we have done. There are still a few more to be done, and we will introduce legislation in this House in the future to make amendments to the further legislation.

Given the fact that we have done this many times in this House to many other disciplines, this legislation has become somewhat routine, I say, Mr. Speaker, so I will end my commentary but I would move, seconded by my colleague, the Minister of Justice, that we would pass this bill in the Legislature and I await any comments from the Opposition. When we get into Committee, I will be only too glad to answer some questions.

MR. SPEAKER (T. Osborne): The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I certainly wanted to speak to Bill 8 today, An Act Respecting Chiropractors and chiropractic in the Province. Mr. Speaker, most people in the Province are familiar with chiropractic, and what it is all about, but the bill today speaks to the occupational regulations of the profession. It comes as a result, as what the minister said, in 1996 there was a White Paper that was released, titled: Challenging Responses To Changing Times, and it was a new proposal for occupational regulation.

As a result of it, Mr. Speaker, it encouraged a critical look at self-governance in all different professions. In fact, in many of these professions right now, including psychology, psychiatry, physician services, the legal practice, in all of these different professional areas we have already had a very critical look at the self-governance process and have enacted in this House of Assembly legislation regarding a number of these professions already.

Mr. Speaker, the goal of the White Paper on occupational regulation was to encourage very comprehensive and consistent practices within the Province. That means that every single chiropractor, every single chiropractic business would have the same act. They would have the same regulations. They would have the same consistency within their scope and their practice that was permissible under law in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The other purpose, Mr. Speaker, was to improve public protection through the establishment of efficient and effective disciplinary mechanisms. Mr. Speaker, that is very critical, because the public, no matter what the service is that you use, they want to at least feel that they have a safeguard there, that they are protected. They are protected in the case of malpractice; they are protected in the case of some kind of damage or injury that could occur. More importantly, they are ensured that once they walk through the door to seek the services of a chiropractor in this Province, or of any other professional service, whether it be dentistry, whether it be physicians, whether it be psychology, whether it be psychiatry, that they are walking through the door of an office that is regulated, that is monitored, that there is protection for their health and welfare in place. That is very important to people today, to consumers of these services when they go out to look for those kinds of treatments.

The other thing that the White Paper on occupational regulation looked at, Mr. Speaker, was more public trust; more public trust in the process of self-governance. That is to me, Mr. Speaker, that nobody is above the law. Nobody is above the law. So that even if you are practicing chiropractic in the Province, that if there is some reason in which your licence needs to be reviewed, if there is a right reason why you need to be looked at independently by a tribunal or by an appeals commission, that those mechanisms are there because they need to be there in order for the public to have confidence in the service that they are seeking, in order for them to have trust in the services that they are using.

It is our job, Mr. Speaker, in the Legislature to ensure that these laws and these regulations are put in practice for the protection of the public. It is also to ensure that practitioners are dealt with fairly. Just like when we passed the self-governance bills to deal with doctors in the Province and with other professional groups within the medical field, dentistry being one, pharmacy being another, and there were many others. Just like when we passed those acts, there also needs to be insurance that these chiropractors will be treated fairly. Because allegations are allegations, and while those that make the allegations are entitled to have trust in the system, to know that there is a process by which they can be heard and their complaints will be given fair hearings, so do the chiropractors themselves. They need to be assured that they are going to be dealt with fairly. They need to ensure that there is a process as well for them so that when there are complaints made that they can go to an independent, non-biased tribunal process and they can be given a fair hearing. They can be given a fair hearing, and they need to have that protection in their scope of work as well, Mr. Speaker.

So these things are very important and we realize that a self-regulated organization, in this case being chiropractic, will protect the public and will protect the practitioner, even though it does not look at things like the economic interests of that particular practitioner but it does look at the licensing. It looks at ensuring that they are given fair and reasonable treatment.

Mr. Speaker, the public also demands that there be standards around services like this, that there be accreditation around services like this, and I think it is only appropriate. It is only appropriate today when you go out to seek any professional services in this Province that those services be governed by standards and that they be accredited. Meaning, Mr. Speaker, that there would be laws and regulations of practice outlined by government in legislation, which is what we are doing in Bill 8, and that those particular laws be a credited process of how a person gets to practice in the Province.

When you look at accreditation, accreditation is done in many forms. In fact, Mr. Speaker, part of an accreditation for a chiropractor will be in meeting the licence requirements, will be in the kind and scope of practice that they can conduct, will be in the educational requirement and skill requirement that they are expected to have. That is just a few examples, but there could be a whole host of things that are included within the accreditation of chiropractors in the Province. Mr. Speaker, that is a standard today. It does not matter if you are in Newfoundland and Labrador, if you are anywhere in the country, it is a standard today that there be an accreditation process for professional services, and we have done this with a lot of professional services in the last two, three years in the Province.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, since the White Paper in 1996 there have been a lot of work done in drafting what standards would apply, what regulations need to be implemented, how these particular bills and pieces of legislation could be updated and revamped. In fact, the Chiropractic Act itself, I think, was amended in 1997 after that report. It was amended again in 2001 and amended again in 2006. So there has been amendments made three times since this particular White Paper to amend the practice of chiropractic in the Province and this is just another - not a further amendment but this is a revised act; a revised act, which I will get into in a minute, in terms of what new additions have been added and what things have been changed in that act. There have been some new things added and there have been some changes but for the most part the scope of the practice have been maintained and those things stay the same.

So, Mr. Speaker, just a little bit about chiropractic I suppose, first of all. It is a practice that has been ongoing in Canada since the early 1900s. In fact, Alberta was the first province in the country to bring in chiropractic services and to regulate the profession under legislation, and that was done in their Parliament in 1923.

Mr. Speaker, there are other provinces across Canada that eventually followed, because that is normally the trend. When things happen in the country, there is always one province that will enact or enforce legislation around a certain practice and then others will follow. In the country, chiropractic was first regulated under law in Alberta in 1923. It was after that that other provinces, as well, started to follow suit.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland and Labrador was the final province to pass a chiropractic act. In fact, in looking at the old act that I have here, we did not pass the act around chiropractic until 1990 in Newfoundland and Labrador, which is not very long ago, actually. I am sure most of you, like me, take the chiropractic service now for granted, in terms of being one of the longer standing practices that we have seen.

You know, what is ironic about all of this is that although chiropractic services and the regulated service was not introduced in Newfoundland and Labrador until 1990, this is indeed one of the largest primary health professions in the whole country. In the whole country! In fact, Mr. Speaker, it is the third largest primary health care profession in Canada. It is only third to the practice of medicine and the practice of dentistry, and there are over 6,000 practitioners of chiropractic that are regulated throughout Canada today. That is a large number.

I did not realize it until I was looking at this bill, and I went to do some research around the chiropractic profession itself in the country, in terms of looking at the statistics and the number of people that use the service, and I was absolutely surprised, myself, to learn that it was one of the third largest primary healthcare professions in the entire country, and realized that it came third only to the practice of medicine and dentistry. I bet there are a lot of people who do not realize how big this practice is and how much work is being done by chiropractors.

Mr. Speaker, chiropractic is a profession today, a professional profession that is established in over seventy countries around the world.

In Canada each year, there are more than 4 million Canadians who seek the help of chiropractors for relief from muscle, joint and spinal pain conditions. Mr. Speaker, we have all heard of people who have had injuries such as whiplash, sports injuries, accidents in the workplace, and accidents at home. All of these people normally end up seeking the services of a chiropractor. It is one of the mainstays of getting treatment for a lot of these injuries, and especially to get relief from pain and from muscle discomfort.

Mr. Speaker, there is over $8 billion spent in Canada’s health care system each year that is related to back pain and other disorders, such as shoulder disorders, neck disorders, and things, like I have said, such as whiplash and other injuries. Can you imagine that? That is an astronomical amount of money, over $8 billion a year in Canada, Mr. Speaker, being spent on chiropractic services for people who have things like back injuries, shoulder injuries and other joint injuries. I never would have guessed that it would have cost that amount of money.

Mr. Speaker, it is a very important service and obviously the reason why people seek this service. It is important because it has helped so many people gain back a quality of life that they would normally have not had. I know that, Mr. Speaker. I have been, myself, in a couple of automobile accidents and I know, today, if it was not for the chiropractic services that I had gotten I would have more extensive injury today, especially in my back and in my shoulders. I think anyone who has ever had an accident, who has been seriously injured in one way or another, especially in terms of back pain, neck pain and so on, they have had to seek the services of a chiropractor and they know how beneficial it can be.

Mr. Speaker, on three different occasions in my life so far, where I have had accidents, I have had to go and seek the services of a chiropractor in this Province. I have to say, I am lucky, I have a great chiropractor who gives me excellent service. In fact, I would recommend him to anyone because he has been such a professional at what he does, and provides such excellent treatment to the people who have used him. I, myself, Mr. Speaker, have referred numbers of people to him over the years and he has performed miracles for them as well in their lives in terms of getting a quality of life back, in terms of being able to function on your feet everyday, and having to do so without that pain and that anguish that often comes with those kind of injuries.

Mr. Speaker, he is a good Labrador chiropractor as well, born and raised in Labrador, who now has a practice here in St. John’s, a guy by the name of Dr. Robert Burton, who owns the Burton Spine Centre. I say to all hon. members, if you are looking for a good chiropractor there is a good one just down the road, Mr. Speaker, here in the city.

No doubt, Mr. Speaker, there are fifty-three individuals in this Province, fifty-two other than Dr. Burton, who have license to practice chiropractic in Newfoundland and Labrador. Those fifty-three individuals who are spread out all over Newfoundland and Labrador provide first class service to the people of the Province, provide an exemplary service to people who suffer from injuries, especially from workplace injuries.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, it was back a few years ago that, through the lobby efforts of members in the House of Assembly and through organizations like those that are lead by Patricia Dodd of the Injured Workers Association, in which they lobbied government to have workers comp injured patients able to seek the services of a chiropractor and have it covered under Worker’s Compensation. I think it was only appropriate, Mr. Speaker, because a lot of these people who were suffering from workplace injuries needed the services of a chiropractor and they needed to have it covered, because they did not have the financial resources after being injured on the job, after not having an income, not being able to even provide for their family and could no longer work and were suffering and in pain. Mr. Speaker, they needed to go and seek the services of a chiropractor.

In fact, Worker’s Compensation does now cover that service if it is deemed to be necessary, and I think that that is appropriate. The concern that I do have, Mr. Speaker, is for all the people out there who need the services of a chiropractor and it is not covered. There are numbers of them and I have had calls from quite a few of them over the years.

I am one of the lucky people, because I had a job in which I had insurance. I had a job which allowed me to carry insurance, so when I became injured I was able to seek the service of a chiropractor and I did not have to pay the full cost of that service myself. Obviously, I had to pay a portion of the cost. Obviously there was a cap. When I went over a certain amount I had to pay the rest myself, but it did allow me to seek those services and be able to be covered under my insurance program.

Not everybody in the Province has an insurance program. Not everybody in the Province who suffers from injuries, like back injury, neck injury, and severe pain that needs the services of a chiropractor, not all of those people are going to be workers’ compensation cases and covered under that program. Not all of these individuals are going to have an insurance program whereby they will be covered under their own insurance program. Many of them, unfortunately, do not have the option to seek those services unless they can financially afford it themselves, and I find that unfortunate. I find it unfortunate because I think that our MCP program should allow for some of that coverage. In fact, Mr. Speaker, I do not think even our Drug Subsidy Program, in which we seek other services and claim back a percentage of income, even looks after chiropractic. I do not think people have any financial support whatsoever in the Province, who need to seek the services of a chiropractor, who are outside of workers’ compensation and their own insurance program.

I think that is unfortunate because oftentimes the services of a chiropractor will allow a person to get back on their feet earlier, will allow them to get back to work earlier, will allow them to be able to deal with their pain in a more effective manner, and will allow them, again, to gain back a quality of life that otherwise would take them a longer period of time.

I think, Mr. Speaker, that chiropractic should be looked at in terms of a service, a medical service, a medical therapy, that governments provide to the people of the Province. Of course, Mr. Speaker, like other government therapies and other government medicare services of this nature, they are often cost-shared, depending on the financial situation that people find themselves in, but today people without money or without insurance or without being injured and receiving the benefits of workers’ compensation do not have the option to avail of these services, so it is one of these situations that I think government should be looking at.

Mr. Speaker, I want to talk a little bit about the licensing and the regulation of chiropractors. As you know, I have just said there are fifty-three practising chiropractors in Newfoundland and Labrador. There are fifty-three of them, which is a fairly large number for chiropractic services; realizing, of course, that most of them are in the eastern Avalon Region, but there are chiropractic services provided in almost all areas of the Province. I, unfortunately, do not have a chiropractor in my district but I guess it is because of the small population and the fact that it is spread out over such a large geographic area, but I do know of many other areas in the Province that are able to readily avail of this service, and it is a good service.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland and Labrador, like all other provinces, have a minimum licence requirement and that includes a graduation from an accredited chiropractic college, and we would all expect that would be the case. It has a minimum of three years pre-professional university or college studies, and I think most people would expect that would be required. As well, they have to have passing scores on all national examinations administered by the Canadian Chiropractic Examining Board, and they have to have all passing scores on provincial licensing examinations.

That is only fair. There is nothing nicer than knowing that the chiropractor that your are walking in to see tomorrow morning has had to write an exam for national standards and provincial standards and pass those exams, and did so with passing scores, Mr. Speaker.

It is a degree of comfort, again. It is that degree of trust in knowing that you are getting a service from individuals who are well qualified to provide that service and well qualified to be able to practice in that capacity.

Mr. Speaker, we were talking about lower back pain. Research indicates that 50 per cent of the population suffer from low back pain each year. Subsequently, it is the most common reason that any person would have to visit a chiropractic practitioner.

Mr. Speaker, next to low back pain it was neck pain and headaches, which are the second most common reason for visiting a chiropractic practitioner, accounting for 20 per cent of all visits to a chiropractic office.

I think those statistics are not really surprising to anybody. I think we all know that the most common reason that anyone would have to visit a chiropractor would be because of lower back pain. The next reason would obviously be because of neck and shoulder pain.

Mr. Speaker, these things account for the bulk of most visits to a chiropractic practitioner’s office. Again, as I said, it is important that we have in this Province - although we were one of the last provinces in Canada to enact legislation and regulations around chiropractic - I think it is very important that we have self-governing bodies around this profession. I think it is important that we do this in a way in which the public can see that it is open, it is transparent, it is regulated, and they can have confidence in the services and in the system that they are accessing. It is also important that chiropractors themselves have a fair process in which they can operate and work in this Province and know that if there ever are allegations, if there ever are any kinds of complaints made untoward their practice, that they have the benefit of being able to seek fairness within the system to have those allegations heard and to have them disputed.

Mr. Speaker, chiropractic is a regulatory body. It is a self-governing profession. It has the authority to grant licences and to grant the scope of practice. Each province establishes a self-disciplining and regulatory process.

The bill that we are debating today changes the legislation for chiropractics to increase the level of transparency and accountability, as I have just said. In fact, the original bill, which I have here and had an opportunity to look at, was only eleven pages. It is clear that the new bill, which I have here, is over thirty pages in length. Indicating the content in itself and the length of the content indicates that this is a much more comprehensive piece of legislation, that it outlines a great deal more in terms of accountability, both to those who use the service as well as to those who provide the service.

Mr. Speaker, the new bill that is being presented here today by the Minister of Health and Community Services, Bill 8, will come into force in October of this year. It has much more detail, as I said, than the original legislation, and for all who wants to read, it very clearly outlines the expectations of chiropractors in this Province.

One of the notable changes from the original legislation is that under the old bill the board was composed of five people. Those five individuals were appointed by the minister. Three of them were chiropractors and two of them were non-chiropractors who were representing the public interests. In fact, what this bill has done, it has increased the size of the board from the five members to the nine members. It has also taken out the address in here in which the minister would appoint the five members of the board and then has left it for six of these chiropractors to be elected amongst their peers. Mr. Speaker, I think that is only appropriate.

There are fifty-three practising chiropractors in this Province and they should have the opportunity to elect the people that they want to represent them to sit on this board. So they are asking that there be six chiropractors elected to this nine-person board and the other three members will be non-chiropractors that are appointed by the minister. I do not have a problem with that, Mr. Speaker. I think it creates a balance and it shows some fairness on behalf of the chiropractors because it gives them an opportunity now to elect the people that they want to sit on this board to represent them and it also gives an opportunity to have members of the public on the board. Maybe they should have been elected as well but the act is asking that they be appointed by the minister, and I do not necessarily have any issue with that.

We have all kinds of boards in this Province in which the Lieutenant-Governor in Council reserves the right to make those appointments from the public. I guess it is one of the perks or one of the benefits that you have in being in government these days, is you actually get to appoint somebody to a board. So be it, Mr. Speaker.

I have some confidence that the individuals being appointed to this board will be citizens of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, for one; for two, that they will be people who have a level of knowledge about the service being provided in the public, so that when they sit there, as members of this board, representing the broader public of Newfoundland and Labrador, that they will be able to ask intelligent questions. They will be able to debate rules and regulations. They will be able to hear the information, the requests that are coming forward in a very non-partisan way although they are being appointed by the government. So I have confidence that that would be the case, that those conditions would be met, Mr. Speaker.

I know from personal experience that most people who are appointed from the public to boards in this Province, no matter what party is in power or what government appoints them, these people normally take their jobs very seriously. They feel that there is a level of accountability on their part to the public for having the opportunity and the privilege to be able to sit in a position like that. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, they take their role seriously enough and they perform it to the best of their ability.

Mr. Speaker, I do like the fact that the original legislation is being changed and that the board is being changed, because it is important that the very board that this bill will serve, that of chiropractic, would have the opportunity to have some say in who sits there and who represents their interests.

Mr. Speaker, Bill 8 is simply in keeping with all other self-governing organizations in the Province. It is in keeping with all of the other legislation that has been designed to date, and that governs other professional occupations in this Province, everything from dentistry to pharmacy to psychiatry to psychology. All of these things we have also done legislation on, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I have twenty minutes or so left so I am going to take a few minutes to get into some of the different sections in the bill and what has changed as part of this new legislation.

As I said earlier, under the old bill we were dealing with about eleven pages to a bill. This new bill has over thirty pages contained in it, which should tell, in itself, that it is more comprehensive and it deals with a lot more issues, especially with more accountability and transparency issues. These things are, in fact, very important and very important to the public.

The old bill, Mr. Speaker, was amended several times, because the White Paper that talked about self-governing of professions in the Province was done in 1996 and under that particular bill it made the recommendation that all professions should have a self-governing practice and regime. Of course, since 1996 the old chiropractors act was amended several times. It was amended in 1997, in 2001, and again in 2006.

Mr. Speaker, this is not an amendment in this case. It is basically a complete new act that has been revised. While most of the things in the act are the same, there are some things that are different. I just talked about one of those things being the structure of the board and that fact that in the past there was a five-member board and all the members were appointed by the minister. Three of them would be chiropractors; two of them would be members of the public. Of course, now that board will be changed. There will be nine members on the board. Six of them will be elected by the chiropractors in the Province; that means the fifty-three regulated chiropractors that are out there licensed to practice. They will elect six member and, in addition to that, the minister will have the opportunity to appoint three people from the general public to sit on the board.

In addition to that, there are some other new things that are contained in this bill; several new things, in fact. There are six of them that I would like to highlight and get into right now because I do have a limited amount of time.

Mr. Speaker, the annual report, first of all, on the activities of the board, as well as the audited financial statements, and a fine of $1,000 where the board fails to comply. These things are new within the legislation, and basically what they are saying to chiropractors in the Province today, they are saying that you will have to file an annual report. The board will have to file an annual report. The board we just talked about being set up, that board will have to file an annual report on all the activities that they have completed as a board. They will also have to do audited financial statements. If they refuse to do those audited financial statements, then they will be imposed a fine of $1,000. So, any time where the board does not comply with the legislation they are and will be fined up to $1,000.

Mr. Speaker, what they are simply asking this board to do is not unusual. In fact, it is normal for most boards in the Province today, and that is that most boards would normally report on their activities. Most boards would normally have to provide to whomever they are established under, under what particular regime. In this case it is an act of the Legislature so they report to the House of Assembly, I guess. I would have to double-check that, but they do have to provide an annual report as well as audited financial statements, and the annual report may be a requirement of the Corporations Act as well.

Professional corporation: it allows for one or more chiropractors to be incorporated as a corporation to provide chiropractic services. As well, it outlines the details of a corporate registry, a corporation of annual licence, and effect of incorporation, and the act still applies to the individual chiropractors as well.

Although there is a separate clause in the act now that deals with professional corporations, in which these corporations have to be incorporated, they have to provide corporate chiropractic services, and they also have to outline the details of their corporate registry, they have to provide a corporation of annual licence and the effects of incorporation, this is all part of their incorporation.

Mr. Speaker, the act will still apply to individual chiropractors what the liability of an individual chiropractor is under that corporation as well as any misconduct of a professional chiropractic corporation. Those things will still be contained in the bill as well.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, there will be a complaints and disciplinary panel. This panel will be consisted of five chiropractors who are not members of the board. Mr. Speaker, the six chiropractors that will be appointed to the board to oversee the self-governance process for the practice of chiropractic in the Province will not be allowed to sit on the disciplinary panel, the complaints and disciplinary panel.

I think that is only fair, because if they were to sit on the complaints and disciplinary panel then they would, in essence, be in a position to be hearing complaints about themselves, and that would be an unfair process. This would be a different board; it will be the complaints and disciplinary panel. It will be established with five chiropractors who are not members of the board. Mr. Speaker, it also gives the minister again the right to appoint two people who are non-chiropractors, who are people in the public, in the general public, who the government opposite or the minister opposite feels would make a contribution to this particular board and they would be able to be appointed. It will be these five chiropractors, and these two appointees, that would constitute the complaints and disciplinary panel in which people could go to have their allegations heard.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to talk about allegations, because that is outlined in this bill as well. This bill outlines the full method of allegations to be made against chiropractors: what the effects of filing allegations are; what the powers and protocols of a complaints authorization committee are. It outlines the adjudication tribunal, which I talked about earlier as being very important to this process. It also outlines in the bill what the process is for a hearing, what information can be used as evidence in one of these hearings or in one of these tribunals. It also talks about what happens in the case of a guilty plea, and also the powers of an adjudication tribunal.

It outlines how to file and how to publicize decisions. Very important, Mr. Speaker, because we have gone through a lengthy process with Eastern Health on how they file and publicize decisions within the Health Care Corporation, and we certainly want to ensure that legislation that we are passing like this would outline what that process is and how it could be dealt with.

Mr. Speaker, let us talk about some of these, because the powers and the protocols for complaints to the authorization committee is very important. It is very important, because oftentimes when people do have complaints or they do have issues of concern they often do not know what mechanism is available to them to report these things, to ensure that somebody gets to hear what their experience has been or what their concern has been.

I think it is important that there is a full process outline, that there is a full process outline that defines exactly what the protocols are, so that if people do have issues and have complaints they know where they have to bring them. They know to what level they have to bring them. Whether it is to a committee, whether it is to a tribunal, whether it is to a complaints panel, they at least know where they have to go.

They also, Mr. Speaker, know who they have to go to. They know who they have to go to. When they get there, they know what the process is. They know what the process is. If this is an issue that will have to go to a hearing whereby they can present their case and be heard, they will know what the process is for that hearing. They will know what information they can bring to this hearing, what is the information that I can bring to this particular process to enter as evidence in my case. All of these things are outlined in this particular bill and in this legislation, which is very important.

The other thing it talks about in here, Mr. Speaker, is de-registration and suspension. This outlines what happens when a chiropractor is allowed or directed to surrender his or her licence in the Province. This outlines to everyone, in law, what happens when a chiropractor fails to comply and what the process is for a re-hearing. That is very important, because chiropractors themselves need to know that there is a process for them as well. They need to know that they will get a fair hearing if there is ever an incident in which they are being told that they are failing to comply with legislation; if there ever is a time when there is an allegation made against them in which their licence could be called into question. There is a process outlined in this legislation that will deal with all of these things as well.

Mr. Speaker, there is also a method for appeals, which is very important. I was going to get into that a little bit here. I just need to find the section here in the act.

Overall, I think that this bill, within itself, provides for a great deal of openness and transparency in seeking the services of a chiropractor in the Province. It also outlines in great detail how the board process will be established, not only the actual board for the self-governance of chiropractors in the Province, but also it outlines the entire appeal process. It outlines the tribunal process. It outlines what can be used as information and as evidence to deal with any of these things.

For example, Mr. Speaker, one of the final acts of the bill, one of the final regulatory pieces deals with the appeals section. One of these things is the ability to appeal to the trial division of the courts. What it outlines is that the board or a respondent may, within thirty days after receiving notice of a decision or order of an adjudication tribunal under this act will appeal the decision or order to the trial division by filing a notice of appeal with the Registrar of the Supreme Court. An appeal under this section does not stay the decision or order being appealed unless the trial division orders otherwise.

Mr. Speaker, there is no stone left unturned when it comes to giving people the opportunity to be able to register their complaints, to be able to bring forward issues, to look at options and routes in a case when they feel that they have not gotten the treatment that they expected. Even when they have gone through all of these different appeals, even when all of these decisions have been made, when judgement has been passed, they still have the opportunity within thirty days, even after the adjudication of a tribunal, to apply to the trial division of the Supreme Court.

So, Mr. Speaker, I do not think there could be anything else that people could ask for further within this bill, but what I can say is this, that chiropractors in this Province perform a very important service. They perform a very important service and they perform a service that may be constituted as a high-risk service in certain cases, and that is open for dispute. In fact, I have had this discussion with chiropractors in the past and they have quoted to me statistics on the low number of cases affecting chiropractic in the country compared to other medical practices.

We know it is an important service, Mr. Speaker, because we know that it is the third largest primary health care service being provided in the country today. We know that it takes third place only next to medicine and to dentistry. We know that chiropractors under this legislation will not only have to meet the demands of a Canadian regulatory process but also of a provincial licensing process. We know that every chiropractor, no matter whose door we walk through, will be required to have a certain degree of education, a certain degree of training. We know that they will have to write exams to meet the Canadian standards and pass those exams. We know that they will have to write exams in Newfoundland and Labrador and be able to pass those exams in order to practice in our Province.

So, Mr. Speaker, these are all very important pieces of legislation because they affect the health and the welfare of every single person who needs to access those services in the Province today. So, we have no problem with supporting the legislation. I think it is important to highlight the importance of a lot of these bills as we bring them forward. I think if there is something further that government would want to do for chiropractic in the Province, it would be to look at how we can address the concern raised by people who cannot afford the service, by people who need the service.

Mr. Speaker, when you look at the statistics that tell you that there is $8 billion a year spent in this country accessing the services of chiropractors for back injury and for neck injury and for other injuries, it tells you that it is a form of medical treatment that is working for people. I know that because I have talked about my own experience. I have had firsthand experience with the system. If there was one thing that government could do, it would be to ensure that there is an affordability of this important service for other people in the Province as well because right now today, as I have outlined earlier in my address, there are a lot of people who cannot afford the service. There are many of us who are fortunate to have medical insurance programs that cover a portion of it. There are people, unfortunately, who are injured on the job but because of the work done by the Injured Workers Association and by others like ourselves who have pushed to have Workers’ Comp cover injured workers in the Province, they have been successful in getting chiropractic covered as a form of therapy and rehabilitation for those people to get back on their feet and get back into the workplace. So, there are things that could be done to allow for more access to the service and I think that these are things that government needs to look at and needs to consider.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I am sure there are others in the House who would love to speak on this bill today as well. I do have a little bit of time left but I have concluded most of my comments and I would say that this is certainly a bill that we will be supporting in the Legislature.

Thank you.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I am glad to have an opportunity to speak to Bill 8, An Act Respecting Chiropractors. I have a great respect for chiropractors. It has been a long time since I first went to a chiropractor. I think at the time that I first did visit a chiropractor here in St. John’s, that person was the first and only one here practising in St. John’s. So we have come a long ways in the twenty-five years or so that I can remember first going to a chiropractor in this Province.

We have come a long ways, both in terms of numbers of chiropractors and we have come a long ways in terms of chiropractic being recognized as a profession, being registered, legislation covering it, and that makes me feel very good, actually, that people in this profession have the recognition and the protection that they have.

Bill 8, which we are discussing here this afternoon, is part of the ongoing harmonization of legislation for all self-regulating occupations, in accordance with a White Paper that was put forward by this government in 1997. Many organizations, such as registered nurses, physicians, dentists, denturists and others, have similar bills, similar pieces of legislation, that regulate their associations. This is extremely important, because if we are going to have groups that are registered and groups that are serving people in the Province we need to have legislation covering them.

All the bits of legislation that have been modernized and improved since 1997 are focused on recognizing the associations of professionals as groups that are self-regulating and groups that have independence, while at the same time being accountable.

Some of the areas that the legislation covers, and that similar legislation covers, are the appointment and election of board members, with a responsibility being shared between the profession itself and the government.

Another area that is covered is licensing and registrar functions, disciplinary procedures, complaints, appeals, and standards for educational programs. I think the standards for educational programs is a very important area, because it is those standards that ensure that chiropractors who are working here in this Province are equal in education and skills to chiropractors in other parts of the country.

One of the things that is important, number one, is that people are being treated by the most highly skilled people they can be treated by, and the other issue is that chiropractors, like other professions, should be able to move around the country in doing their work.

I do know, I have been told by the Newfoundland and Labrador Chiropractic Association, that they were consulted by the government and they did have a representative of their association who worked closely with the government in drafting the new law. I have to say that I was really glad to hear that.

I do know that with the other pieces of legislation that are similar to this one for other self-regulating organizations, the same kind of consultation happened. I think that was extremely important for those bills, as well as for this one, so that we know that the people who are going to be governed by this legislation feel comfortable with it and know that they can work under this piece of legislation.

It is important that we deal with this piece of legislation today, because the new act is to be proclaimed in October. When we leave this House this spring we certainly will not be back before October, if past experience proves me right, so it is important that we pass this act so that it can be proclaimed in October as, I think, has been promised to the Chiropractic Association.

The act that this bill is replacing was passed in 1990 and proclaimed in 1992, so this bill is modernizing that act, making it more modern in terms of recognizing the right of the association to govern itself . The legislation gives guidelines for that self-governance and gives guidelines for accountability but recognizes that the association should be able to govern itself.

There are some things in this bill that are new from the act as it exists. Some of them are significant. I think they are all significant or they would not be changed. One, of course, is the number of board members. The number of board members has been increased, and the increase is allowing for the board to have a mix on it, a mix of people who are elected from chiropractors themselves - that number is six - and then three who are appointed by the minister.

The purpose for the appointment by the minister is to have the public represented on the board of the association. I think that is extremely important and I am really glad to see that the Chiropractic Association would agree with that, because they have to be accountable to the public, not just to government as a body but to the greater public which government represents. Having members on the board who are appointed by government from the public is completely important. Of course, because of the larger number of members on the board they also had to increase the number that makes a quorum for the board. That makes sense.

Something that is in the bill, I think, that is important and that is in the other professional bills that we have passed in this House over the past couple of years, is that there is a Code of Ethics in the bill. That is new. That is something that is not in the current act. I think, in today’s climate, a Code of Ethics is something that one expects when one is looking at a professional organization.

There is also a section in the bill – and this would be new as well – it is a section on corporations as members and individuals as part of corporations and liability. It looks at who is liable when anything goes wrong. I think it is a very important piece.

Another important piece is that all chiropractors have to have liability insurance. I think that is extremely important. Again, that recognizes their professional position. It recognizes that they are dealing with the public, and that just like any other practitioner in the medical field there is always the potential of needing insurance because of claims being brought against them.

The other thing that is new – and this is something, again, that is in all of the legislation covering professional associations – is that you have now, for the chiropractors, a complaints committee, a disciplinary panel, and an adjudication tribunal. Previously, there was only a discipline committee. With only a discipline committee anybody who may have to be called and disciplined had no rights. They just had to accept the decision of the discipline committee. Now, with the adjudication tribunal they can request that a decision by a discipline panel can be revisited. They can ask that the decision be looked at. I think that is really important. Previously, only the committee decided on wrongdoing and ordered restitution. Now, there is a layered process. What is also important is that the process includes others, not just board members.

You now have a process in this legislation that ensures that chiropractors are treated fairly and with justice, and if there is a complaint brought against a chiropractor that he or she is given an absolutely fair hearing, as fair as one can possibly have.

I would like to use the rest of my time to talk a bit about chiropractic care and also about what happens in other provinces in Canada. Provinces that cover chiropractic right now are Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. They have partial coverage, it is not total coverage, but at least, because they are being recognized under the medical plan, which is extremely important, it means that the profession now has a recognition that is, I think, beyond where it was before that happened. It is the next step after registering a group and after putting them under legislation. Recognizing that they are part of health care and introducing this service into health care coverage becomes the next step. As I said, there are four provinces in Canada that have partial coverage: Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.

I would like to look particularly at British Columbia because British Columbia is very interesting. They have something that the other three provinces do not have. They actually recognize a number of therapies that currently in most parts of Canada, certainly here in Newfoundland and Labrador, are only covered by third party, and that means by insurance companies. One is chiropractic, the others are massage therapy, naturopathy, physical therapy and non-surgical podiatry. In British Columbia, each of these areas is covered partially under their health care program. One can have an annual limit of ten visits in each calendar year either in one of these areas or in a combination of these areas. I know now, actually my notes show me, that since last April as well acupuncture services were included among this group that gets covered.

It is very interesting that this is premium assistance that one gets under the medical plan in British Columbia. Supplementary benefit services include: income assistance recipients; Convention refugees; inmates at BC correctional facilities; individuals enrolled with the BC medical plan through their at-home program; residents of long-term care facilities receiving the Guaranteed Income Supplement; and individuals enrolled with the BC health program as mental health clients. They have a particular group of people whom they totally cover under this plan.

I find it very interesting to see such attention given by a provincial health plan to the coverage of therapies that in some cases, by some people, are seen as fringe. I would like to point out that all of these areas, chiropractic, massage therapy, naturopathy, physical therapy and non-surgical podiatry, are all therapies that are in use everywhere in our country today. All of them are covered by insurance plans which is very interesting, because the coverage by insurance plans shows a recognition that these therapies really do help people who need medical help. We all know that insurance companies would not be covering something if it could not be shown that the therapy that is being covered definitely can help the person who is receiving the service.

It is very important, I think, for us to reflect on that, because sometimes you hear phrases like traditional medicine and non-traditional medicine or alternative medicine. You hear all kinds of different phrases categorizing therapies. I think it is important to recognize that by doing that we sort of push things off to the side and they do not get recognized. I think it is good for us to reflect on the fact that in British Columbia their health plan recognizes that these therapies are essential to health and therefore are covered under their health care plan, partially. It is not a total coverage, it is a partial coverage.

The Leader of the Official Opposition talked about how she used chiropractors. I, myself, use physical therapy on a regular basis, and I know there are others of us in this House who do the same thing. Wouldn’t I love it if physical therapy had some coverage under the health care plan, because all of these therapies are therapies that really do help people have better health.

What I would like to do is talk a bit, as well, about the rationale for public coverage of chiropractic services. People might say: Well, why even bother? We do know that chiropractic care plays an important role in relieving the stresses and strains on our health care system. There are many things that chiropractic deals with that, because chiropractic care is there, people are not depending on the health care system as much.

Numerous studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of chiropractic care for musculoskeletal disorders. It is often the most cost-effective treatment for many joint and muscle dysfunctions that keep Canadians off their feet. This is something that I think, if we were to do a review of our health care system in Newfoundland and Labrador, one of the things we could look at is what are the preventative ways in which we can help people be healthier so that they are not turning up in emergency rooms, for example, that they are not turning up on a weekly basis in their doctors’ offices.

Some of these therapies, especially chiropractic, but the others that I have mentioned that are covered in British Columbia, these therapies really do have a preventative nature to them. Some of it is curative but some of it is also preventative, and they keep people, in a lot of cases, off medications. The therapies actually keep them off pain medication. It has been proven, and studies have shown that.

Some of the ways in which chiropractic helps Canada, with regard to medical costs, and helps the health care system, have been documented in studies that have been done.

For example, costly back surgeries can often be avoided. Ineffective and costly treatments, even for diseases, are avoided. Emergency room crowding can be reduced. Studies are proving this. Medication costs are lowered. People feel better more quickly and they get on their feet more quickly. Recurrent injury is prevented or minimized, and that, of course, is what helps keep treatment costs down. Productivity of workers is improved. That is why, in some cases, workers compensation will cover chiropractic. Dysfunction is prevented. Chronic care costs are minimized. Workers are back on the job more quickly. This has been proven again by studies.

To get the best benefit for the health care system from chiropractic, we need to look at policies and practices that will help more people be able to use chiropractic. Of course, we also need to help them pay for it. Some of the things that we need, we need to remove barriers to inter-professional referrals. It would be really good, you see, if chiropractic was covered by health care. A general physician could recommend that their patient go to a chiropractor and get coverage. These are the kinds of things that we need to do. We need to bring chiropractic practice into the mainstream. So the bill that we are passing today helps with bringing chiropractic practice into the mainstream. It is another step towards recognizing the profession and it is another step towards, I hope, this Province joining other provinces in Canada who have recognized the benefit of chiropractic and have put chiropractic under their provincial health plans.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I am glad to have been able to make those points this afternoon.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave.

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

It is a pleasure to be able to stand today and have a few words with regard to Bill 8, An Act Respecting Chiropractors.

We know, as we have heard from other speakers on this bill, it is a very important piece of legislation for the chiropractors and it is a very detailed piece of legislation with some fifty sections covered under the analysis section. It deals with regards to the makeup of the board, reference to meetings and quorums and by-laws. It also talks about the annual report and if there should be a misconduct or what have you, with the professionals in that corporation.

Mr. Speaker, to add to that, this piece of legislation really is simply in keeping with all other self-governing organizations in the Province. We know that in our last session of the House there were various other groups that legislation was brought in to bring forward rules and regulations, updating, housecleaning issues, I guess, and really this is what this piece of legislation is all about. We know that those individuals, the chiropractors, and it goes back – while I was doing some research, going back to 2003, February 14, it was at that particular time under a former Administration, the Department of Health and Community Services, the Newfoundland and Labrador Chiropractors’ Association, and the Newfoundland Association of Radiologists, a piece of legislation was brought in where improved services would be made for the residents of this Province. The key benefit that was brought forward at that time, it would save time for patients. Because before that piece of legislation was brought in, the chiropractors would have to route their patients back to their general practitioner before they could be sent for X-rays or other medical information. So when this piece of legislation came in, I guess this set the track for those individuals that it was time saving, not only for them, but also for their patients.

I have to be honest with you, when it comes to chiropractors – and I know there are many other members in this hon. House who from time to time have to see a chiropractor. The Leader of the Official Opposition just mentioned here this afternoon, she suggested that if anyone wanted to see a chiropractor you could go visit her doctor here in St. John’s. Well, I have to say, I am going to stick with the one that is in Bay Roberts.

There is a lady in Bay Roberts, my personal chiropractor, who does a wonderful job. I have to be honest with you, back a few years ago if someone told me the work that a chiropractor could do versus other forms of medication, I have to say, I do not know if I would believe it not, but I had an experience and I was advised to go there, to try it out, and I have to say it is one of the best moves I have ever made. As some other speakers mentioned, one of the key components - some 50 per cent of the people in this Province suffer from low back pain. I have to tell you, since that first visit and the treatment that I received I can assure you I have recommended many other people. They have accepted that challenge and proven this to be very worthwhile.

Also, Mr. Speaker, we know that there are fifty-three practising chiropractors in this Province. So it is fairly wide-ranging. I do not think they are all here on the Avalon. Maybe quite a few of them are, but then again, it is a service that is available to many of our residents here in the Province. Like I said before, it is an experience that once you go there it is not something that you are tied to for the rest of your life from it. Some people have to attend more often than others, but once you get in the system with a chiropractor and they find out the medical condition that you have, they just do not do something for the sake of doing it. They check things out.

This bill - once this comes into force - the rules and regulations and the governance of the chiropractors, this will be coming into effect this coming October.

Like I said, Mr. Speaker, this is a piece of legislation in keeping with other various organizations here in the Province. When I saw this piece of legislation I did approach the individual that I visit from time to time when I do have a problem. As a matter of fact, they looked over the legislation and like they said, there is nothing there; it is a good piece of legislation. I can assure you that, at the end of the day when the vote comes, I will be supporting this piece of legislation.

Just another couple of comments I want to make. I do not want to take too much time on this particular bill, but when you look at this bill there are some key components to it when it comes to the complaints and the disciplinary panel that will be set up. All too often we hear, not only with chiropractors or doctors, but with other professionals there comes a time when something unfortunately goes wrong and you have to go before a panel or place your complaints, it is good to know that this particular panel will be in place. There will be five chiropractors who are not members of the board and there will be two other individuals who are appointed by the minister. So we know that is in place there. Then there is also a method in place if there are any allegations that have to be reported.

With regards to de-registration and suspensions, many times people wonder where to go and what to do. So there are rules and regulations here. There is a fee system, a penalty system, if the reporting is not done on time. The key to it, I think one of the most important pieces there, is the appeal, the method to appeal if something should go wrong.

So, Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to take those few minutes to say that I support this particular piece of legislation and say that it is a good piece of legislation, and hopefully, what is in this legislation is what the chiropractors wanted. We have not had any negative feedback from it.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I will take my place.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, we will leave the debate on Bill 8 at this time and we will call Order 6 from the Order Paper, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act. (Bill 9)

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that Bill 9 be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act." (Bill 9)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is certainly indeed a pleasure to rise today and to have a few comments about the amendments to the Student Financial Assistance Act.

As a government, we are certainly pleased to continue to provide our students with one of the most affordable and accessible post-secondary education systems in the country.

In 2007, our government provided significant enhancements to students by supporting an interest rate reduction of 2.5 per cent and introducing a progressive upfront grant program of up to $70 per week. These measures were applauded by students not only in our Province but across the country.

Government has also continued with a tuition freeze at our public educational institutions at a cost of $56 million to cover the freeze to the 2011-2012 year. Undergraduate tuition for MUN students has been frozen at $2,550 since September 2003. This is the lowest in the country next Quebec, for Quebec residents only. In fact, for university students, undergraduate tuition is 44 per cent lower than the national average, and college-based tuition is 43 per cent lower than the national average as well.

In addition, we have been providing other relief such as relief to parents who support their children’s education, increasing loan limits for students who need more support, including co-op students, in our Debt Reduction Grant Program, providing extra support for students who have difficulty in repaying their loans, and integrating our loan process with the federal government to ensure students can manage their loans better. These significant changes are having an impact on students, their families and their communities, and students have been repaying their loans at even higher rates.

Budget 2007 initiatives provided $14.4 million in up-front grants and interest rate reductions directly in the pockets of students. Mr. Speaker, in 2007 we engaged students in our Province to determine their views on the assistance provided. This is another example of how our government has engaged the citizens of our Province on the issues that matter to them. Again, in January 2009 my colleague, Minister Burke, held a student debt roundtable. At that time students clearly articulated support for the 2007 Budget initiatives. They indicated that indeed they are the envy of other students all across the country. Those discussions, Mr. Speaker, have had an impact and this government has listened.

Mr. Speaker, today I am very pleased to introduce legislation to amend the Student Financial Assistance Act to provide further assistance to our students. As indicated in Budget 2009, three new measures have been directed to reduce the debt owed by Newfoundland and Labrador students and build on the measures previously introduced by our government. These changes will provide another $5 million to students, reducing the debt they accumulate and helping those struggling to repay their debt, on top of what we have done previously.

The elimination of interest on student loans is an unprecedented change in the way financial assistance is provided to students. Students have told us, Mr. Speaker, that this will make a significant difference in their lives, allowing them to pay off their debt faster and move on with critical life decisions.

We are also increasing the non-repayable up-front grants available to students by an extra $10 per week. In 2007 we placed a cap on provincial student borrowing so that students who borrow the maximum student loans would borrow no more than $70 per week in provincial loans and would be eligible for $70 a week in grants.

These are grants that are not required to be repaid. This was the first time since 1994 that this system was in place. Today, we are announcing that provincial loans will now be capped at $60 per week and students will receive an additional $10 per week, for a total of $80 in up-front, non-repayable grants. Mr. Speaker, this change is strategic, further reducing the debt students will have when they leave school.

As a government, we are committed to an educated and productive society, and the investments that we are making today will certainly make paying for that education more affordable and should improve access to post-secondary education for the students of our Province.

Mr. Speaker, as we move on with the debate a little bit – I have had a few introductory comments - I do want to make a few more comments by way of information that I certainly think people in this House and people who are attending to the debate will be interested in.

The legislation that we are introducing today will be applicable to any student who applies for a student loan. Any student will qualify, and it is projected that about 49,000 students will be affected by the legislative changes we are introducing here today. The changes will be effective August 1, 2009. So, effective this coming August, the interest on the student loans will cease, and the changes to the up-front grants will become effective.

By way of information, Mr. Speaker, the changes are applicable only to the provincial portion of a student’s loan, so there is still a federal student loan – or a federal contribution, I should say – but the changes today are applicable only to the provincial portion of the student loan.

The other piece that I think is important is, the changes that we are making will come automatically, so there will be no need for students who are currently in repayment of a loan to seek us out to try and make sure they get what is owed to them. In fact, we will make the changes automatically to anybody who is currently in possession of a student loan and currently in the process of repaying. We will certainly make the necessary adjustments to the debt that they have, and the interest that they have, and make sure that gets eliminated for all students who are engaged with us with a student loan.

As well, Mr. Speaker, I just want to make a comment on the up-front grants. If a student is eligible for the provincial loan of more than $60 per week, they qualify for an additional $80 in an up-front grant. Mr. Speaker, that is certainly a tremendous investment and, as I said a few moments ago, students in the Province have certainly said to us clearly that they are supportive of that and they recognize that our government is taking some very, very strong measures in support of what they are trying to do.

I want to share a couple of facts, Mr. Speaker, with members of the House. We are talking a little bit about investment in post-secondary education. I just want to first of all share a couple of things with you. The first is a couple of figures on tuition rates in Canada. I just want to give you a couple there, for the information of those who may not be aware. In Newfoundland and Labrador right now our average undergraduate tuition is $2,632. By comparison, the Canadian average tuition rate is $4,724. Further, Mr. Speaker, let me pick some numbers to read out to you which represent tuition rates across Canada: $4,530; $5,900; $5,500; $5,600; $3,200; $5,300; and $5,040 compared to $2,600 here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KING: Those are undergraduate tuition rates. I will touch very quickly on graduate tuition rates. In our Province, the average right now is $3,686 compared to $5,777 as an average across the country, Mr. Speaker. Just to pick a couple: in Nova Scotia, for example, the tuition is $7,200, just about double that of Newfoundland; in B.C., $6,500; in Alberta, $6,300; in Ontario, $8,797 tuition rate, compared to $3,686 here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

I also want to provide an example of what this means for people here, Mr. Speaker. I am going to just give you an example. Two examples, actually, I am going to provide you. The first example is a student, a dependent student from a family of four, going to Memorial University. I will use MUN as the institution of choice in this particular instance, but a student from a family of four, whose parents have a combined income, gross income, of $70,000, from August 1, 2007 to today, with the current changes that we are implementing, that student will save more than $17,500 or 63 per cent of what they would have paid back prior to August 2007; so, it is a difference of 63 per cent in savings from the student loan prior to August 1 to what will happen once today’s legislation becomes effective.

Mr. Speaker, the second example I will provide is, similarly a student from a family of four but a higher income, a family making a gross income of about $110,000, the same student will have a savings of nearly 33 per cent from what they would have had to repay prior to August 1, 2007. Mr. Speaker, as you can see and I am sure everybody else can understand, those are significant savings for students of this Province and certainly a strong move on the part of our government and a move that we are very proud of, to work towards debt reduction.

Mr. Speaker, I remember working in the system prior to having been elected. I remember working through the 1990s and the early 2000s in education in this Province, and I remember how much focus there was on restraint and cutbacks from the government of the day. I remember vigorously pursuing, trying to get investments in roofing, repairs, windows, siding for schools, textbooks, and teacher allocations. I remember all kinds of challenges over the years when I used to work with the school board, a number of school boards in the Province actually, Mr. Speaker. We worked and lobbied government. We were in times of restraint and student loans and student debt was continuing to go through the roof and tuition rates were continuing to go through the roof. They were very challenging times, Mr. Speaker, challenging times for all of us.

We have rounded the corner, though, in education. I would like, probably, to call this a time of renewal in some respects. Over the last couple of years we have seen significant investments at the K to 12 Level in particular. For the first part we have eliminated school fees, we have provided free textbooks for K to 12 students through the entire system, and we have modified and re-jigged the teacher allocation formula to provide more support to schools, greater teaching resources and a greater focus on the needs of schools and the needs of students to ensure that we continue to offer the kinds of programs and the quality of programs that we need in all of our schools in the Province; the kinds of programs, Mr. Speaker, which will open any door that a student wishes to walk through to go to post-secondary studies, whether it is Memorial or College of the North Atlantic or some other career choice that they make. We have made those investments to make sure we prepare all of our students no matter where they come from.

We have invested heavily in reforming the special services piece of education at the K to 12 Level with the ISSP/Pathways review. It has resulted in a significant reduction, Mr. Speaker, in the ‘administrivia’, as some people would refer to it, or the reduction of paper work that teachers have to do. It has helped us move through the system faster in identifying children and getting the necessary work done and the necessary programs in place and allowing teachers to have more time to focus on the needs of those students and more time to focus no the kinds of programming requirements they have.

I say that, Mr. Speaker, because a big piece of what we try to do in education at the K to 12 Level is to make sure that by the time our students leave Grade 12 or Level III, that they are well prepared to move into the post-secondary institution of their choice, or should it not be a post-secondary institution at least to make sure that they are as well prepared as we can possible make them and assist them to become productive members of society.

As I said previously, at the post-secondary level we have made significant investments. First, in program offerings, we have extended and expanded program offerings at Memorial and at College of the North Atlantic throughout the Province. We have invested heavily in our infrastructure, a significant investment. We continue to do that today to make sure that the facilities that we have across our Province at the post-secondary level are indeed quality facilities and well designed with the appropriate technologies and the appropriate resources to ensure that when our students come out they are coming out with a quality education, second-to-none in the world, and well prepared to move on and start productive careers.

Mr. Speaker, having said that, I referenced just recently the release of a survey, I believe it was on May 13, conducted of graduates of College of North Atlantic, between February and May of 2008. The survey highlights that there is a 95.5 per cent employment rate of graduates in College of the North Atlantic who were surveyed during that period of time. The graduates also indicated under the survey that they are extremely satisfied with the kind of program that they received at the college, very satisfied with the quality of programming they received, and very satisfied with how prepared they were to take on a career out in society. The survey also showed us that 98 per cent of the graduates who came through College of the North Atlantic would certainly recommend to other students that they attend that college.

As I said, we are certainly very, very pleased with what is happening at the college and what is happening at Memorial and Grenfell. To that end, the legislation that we are introducing today just builds upon some of the things that we have been doing over the past number of years to help our students get more money in their pockets, more money upfront, and less student debt on the backend when they graduate from their programs.

Mr. Speaker, it was only about two weeks or so ago we met with representatives of the Canadian Federation of Students, whom we meet with on a regular basis on a whole host of issues. As my predecessor, Minister Burke, would have done before me, we take their advice and we take their guidance on many of these issues which affect students. We are not able to do all that they ask for, but they recognize that as well. We certainly do our best to work with them and try and move the agenda forward that supports our students.

Two things came out of the meeting, Mr. Speaker. One was that they reported to us that in a recent meeting with other student leaders and other student federations from across Canada that was held in Ottawa, I believe, within the last three or four weeks, they were informed - and I have said it here before - that we do have the best student aid package in all of Canada, Mr. Speaker. Not only have we made good improvements but we are now leading the country in the kinds of support that we are providing our students and in the kinds of mechanisms that we are introducing to try and reduce student debt so that when they come out they have a better chance of succeeding and a better chance of getting on with their life.

I want to give a real example, Mr. Speaker, of how these reforms are impacting students and graduates on a daily level. The Canadian Federation of Students told a story of a phone call they received – and they receive many, as they tell us, when reforms like this are introduced. They often get the first call from students who will say: Well, what does this mean to me? How does this change affect me? How is it going to put money in my pocket? They get calls, Mr. Speaker, from students who have other concerns and other issues and other challenges.

In this particular case Mr. Speaker, a call was received from a graduate who had incurred significant debt over the course of her career doing a nursing degree. This particular individual, Mr. Speaker, had decided to leave the Province and go to the Western part of the country for what she saw as a greater income and said very clearly, Mr. Speaker, that her objective was simply to go where she could get a higher salary and try to pay down her debt and her student loan faster and hopefully give herself a greater chance of getting ahead and being successful in life.

The purpose of the call, Mr. Speaker, was to seek clarification from the Canadian Federation of Students of what exactly the elimination of interest means for her and what exactly the debt reduction grant means and how it might affect her. When they worked through the process, the result was that this particular student received back from government an amount of somewhere around $12,000. When that was applied against the debt that she had incurred, the student came to the conclusion, I am pleased to say to this House, Mr. Speaker, that she did not need to be out West. In fact, I think as we speak today the student is now back in this Province, employed as a nurse in this Province, making a living that she is certainly happy with and comfortable with, with a significantly reduced debt load, Mr. Speaker, about to start a family and about to move on with her life, and attributes a big part of that, Mr. Speaker, to the reforms that we have brought forward as a government over the last number of years.

I am certainly pleased to relay that story to the House because I think it is a success story, Mr. Speaker, for this government and for the reforms we have introduced. It is but one example, Mr. Speaker. There are many of those examples across the Province that we will see coming forward over the coming weeks and months and years, certainly, as we see the actual implementation of the removal of interest on the provincial portion of student loans and as we see the up-front grants continue to increase now from $70 to $80 per week.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I am going to conclude my introductory remarks by saying that it is certainly a pleasure to be able to introduce today legislation that will reduce student debt in this Province and put more money into the hands of our students.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Port de Grave.

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

I have to say, it is a pleasure today to stand with regards to Bill 9, An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act. From the explanatory note on this legislation it says: "This Bill would amend the Student Financial Assistance Act to allow the making of regulations to eliminate interest effective August 1, 2009…"

Mr. Speaker, no doubt about it, that is a good piece of legislation. I know some of my hon. colleagues said, say, no more. Maybe that is the end of it. I have to say, Mr. Speaker, I have to take a little bit more time than that. It is a good piece of legislation and I am sure each and every one of us here in the hon. House have heard from students over a period of time, how they find themselves in difficult situations when it comes to their student loans and the interest that is being charged.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to take us back for a little while. I know when I start some hon. colleagues across the way will say: Yes, but the former Administration did this or did that. The hon. minister, he mentioned about the cutbacks in the 1990s and early 2000s and how the funding was not there for various projects that had to take place. Mr. Speaker, that may be so, because we have heard it many times that when this Administration took over in 2003 we were on the verge of bankruptcy.

Then again, I want to take us back, Mr. Speaker, to January 14, 1999. At the time, the Administration that was in power was under the leadership of Premier Brian Tobin who committed a total of $106 million to the operating budget of Memorial and $45.4 million to CONA. As a result, Memorial and CONA were able to freeze their tuition levels for two years. That is not bad for someone that now we say that there was never anything put into the Department of Education to help students or anyone else.

The student debt was a national concern, Mr. Speaker, but both Memorial and CONA, at that time, let me assure you they welcomed that announcement. The president at the time was Dr. Arthur May, and he thought that no tuition increases could be any better news to Memorial University students who were celebrating their fiftieth anniversary as a degree granting institution.

Then we go to March, 2000. The Premier at the time was Premier Tobin, and he renewed his commitment to provide affordable quality education to the Province’s post-secondary students. The two-year tuition freeze benefited students at Memorial and CONA and he stated that it will continue for an additional year. The government’s total investment for the tuition freeze was approximately $36 million over a three-year period. Those fees at the time, Mr. Speaker, the university during this time were the lowest in Atlantic Canada and the college fees were the second lowest. So we heard here today, we were talking about we have the lowest fees. That is true, that is good news, but it was also good news back in March of 2000.

On April 5, 2002, under the former Administration, the Premier at the time was Premier Grimes, announced that changes to the Student Aid Program will include enhanced interest relief for students; $3.5 million has been earmarked for MUN to make university education more affordable. Student leaders and administrators will be invited to participate in a round table discussion to provide advice on how best to invest this money by a further 10 per cent tuition reduction or other actions to reduce student debt. So that was back in 2002 when we found ourselves in a very difficult financial position and there was a reduction of 10 per cent in the student loan program.

Mr. Speaker, this particular piece of legislation – also, I might add, in August of 2002, under a former Administration, there were changes to the Student Aid Program. They would become effective August, 2002 and they included: new debt reduction grants, enhanced interest relief, increased loans for Memorial University medical students, grants for early childhood education students, and a new institutional designation.

So, Mr. Speaker, back in those days when we found ourselves in difficult positions there was still funding, maybe not to the degree what is happening today because as someone said earlier, we have turned the corner financially in this Province. I have to say it again, we know what caused that to happen. It is the projects that came on stream back some time ago, and from 2003 on, the funds began to flow from those particular projects.

Mr. Speaker, under the current legislation it states that the Lieutenant-Governor in Council may make regulations setting lower interest rates for students, loan agreements and setting the effective date for these lowered interest rates.

In 2009, under the amended legislation, paragraph 16(1) says, "setting lower interest rates or eliminating interest for student loan agreements and setting the effective dates for those lowered interest rates or eliminated interest…" rates.

Mr. Speaker, from time to time, and I know the hon. minister, with all due respect, mentioned about funding for repairs to the roofs and other infrastructure within the school system and so on, but that is why we bring up, from time to time in this hon. House, issues related to the schools in our Province. Whether it is air quality caused by mould or whether it is from asbestos, whatever the issue may be, we know that many of the structures of our Province, some of them are old, there are many new ones that were built previously, and new ones are being built today. That is all good, Mr. Speaker, but that is why we bring it up, because we know that the individuals who are attending those schools today are the people who will be moving on to Memorial University, moving on to CONA and other private institutions, and they are the ones who will benefit from this piece of legislation today, as well as students who are already there.

Mr. Speaker, there are many issues when it comes to education. There have been changes, and changes will have to continue. We bring up issues with regards to the infrastructure within the various communities in our Province. We bring up school bus safety, and so on. Mr. Speaker, that has to continue. It is not being negative towards government or towards anybody. It is an issue that is brought forward by various school councils, by the parents, and we bring those issues forward and we will continue to do that.

Then, under subsection (2) of paragraph 16 it says: setting lower interest rates for debts owed to the Crown or the corporation as a result of the Crown or the corporation fulfilling the obligations of a borrower under a student loan agreement. The new piece of legislation, under 16(1)(2) of the act, the old legislation will be repealed, and it says, "setting lower interest rates or eliminating interest for debts…"

We understand where this is coming from, because the new Bill 9 states very clearly that as of August 1, 2009, the interest rates on the provincial portion of the student loans will be eliminated.

Mr. Speaker, I guess when we talk about Memorial University we know there are many issues that come to the forefront, and from time to time we bring those issues so that they can be addressed. Back over the last year-and-a-half there were issues that came up with regard to what many people – the Opposition probably said it, but many others in the Senate, the Board of Regents, and other professors at the university, we all got involved with the issue with regard to the selection of a new president for MUN, and how it came about, the political interference in the selection of a president.

I know myself and the hon. Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi attended a seminar or a briefing session at the university one time and we heard it very clearly from the individuals there, the concern they had, how the autonomy of the university was being affected, how the reputation of the university was being affected.

We have gone beyond that, Mr. Speaker. We have gone beyond that, because other individuals have taken over and hopefully within the next year or so someone else will be coming on as the president of the university, even though we believe that we lost a good individual who has now gone to New Brunswick and so on.

Since that time we have heard from the Canadian Association of University Teachers and they had major concerns with what went on. We know now the Board of Regents came forward and presented to government four recommendations to be considered, and they were hoping that this would come before this House, whether in this session or in the fall, and the four recommendations would be brought forward.

They were, Mr. Speaker: Change the act so that government no longer would approve the presidential selection, that it would be done by the Board and the Senate; a representative from the academic community would sit on the Board of Regents; that there would be an independent election of the Chair by the members of the Board of Regents; and the removal of Board members by government before their term is expired, with no reason.

Those were the four recommendations that were brought forward, and we are looking forward to that legislation coming before this House before 2009 is completed. Mr. Speaker, they were major concerns. There is no two ways about it. We have heard from, as I said before, individuals throughout the Province, throughout the country, so that this would be taken care of and it would not be an issue any more with regard to the involvement of government with the selection of a president for Memorial University.

Under section 16(4) of the current legislation, again it just states, "An interest rate lowered in accordance with regulations made under paragraph (1)(e.1) and (e.2) applies to a student loan agreement or a debt owed to the Crown or the corporation…." That is being repealed and amended to include an interest rate lowered or interest eliminated.

Mr. Speaker, as the minister said, this is good news to many individuals in our Province. I am sure that many of us - I know I have had individuals who have called and found themselves in a very difficult position.

We also know there was another issue that we brought forward only this week and it involves individuals who we are referencing here today when it comes to the interest relief. Those are the individuals who are attending another great college in our Province. I never had a chance to say this the other day. Question Period was over, or our time, when I was asking questions with regard to Sir Wilfred Grenfell College. I think the minister at the time made some comment, here we go again, that we were against another institution outside of the overpass in rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, nothing could be further from the truth. I hope that proceeds. Government are ones who made the announcement on it. They are ones who said that this would proceed, and there is no legislation in place. I tell you, Mr. Speaker –

AN HON. MEMBER: Tell us where you stand.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. BUTLER: I say to the hon. minister, right now I am standing in the place where the people of Port de Grave elected me to stand.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. BUTLER: I will stand here and bring forward the issues that we have been asked to do. There is no legislation in place with regard to giving Sir Wilfred Grenfell College status at this point in time. I will go through the scenarios, the time frames that were set out by this government.

Government previously indicated that it intended to introduce such legislation in the fall of 2008. Here we are, the fall session for 2008 has gone by and we are getting very close to the spring session of 2009 closing. Notice was given here today that we are going to burn the midnight oil. So, you never know, any time at all after this evening this hon. House could close and we still will not see this piece of legislation. Hopefully it will come forward in the fall, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, back in December 2005 government announced the commission of a feasibility study to examine degrees of autonomy for Sir Wilfred Grenfell College. That was back in December, 2006. In June 2006 government announced a $1 million extension, money to be spent on infrastructure to expand office space for facilities and support staff. Mr. Speaker, that is all good and wonderful, to spend this money, to recommend this money, but then again the legislation has not come forward to do what has to be done.

Mr. Speaker, in March 2009, Mr. Paul Wilson, a professor at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College and a member of the Senate with Memorial University said, "… while this process is being delayed and while we are not given our own budget and ability to get out there and recruit actively for Grenfell university, our registrations are going down year by year by year…." That is his quote. That is his quote, Mr. Speaker. He said, "There comes a critical point, and we might be there relatively soon, where you no longer have enough students to maintain the upper levels of your degree programs."

I think the numbers that were used, the numbers at Grenfell university, were in the vicinity of 1,400. When he made this report he said the numbers were down to 1,000. I think what has been stated, that they were hoping that the numbers by the fall of 2008 would be in the vicinity of 2,000.

We asked questions to the minister on that issue. We asked the minister: Is this why the legislation has not come forward? He said they were prepared to move ahead with it and so on.

Mr. Speaker, those are some of the issues that come up from time to time when we reference the universities, the structure here in our Province, and we fail to get the answers, fail to understand why the legislation has not been brought forward.

Mr. Speaker, back in October 2006, in regard to the bill that we are talking about here, the government announced that it was prepared to look at student debt ideas. That was good, Mr. Speaker, back in 2006. Really, it all started, I guess, when a young chap from Grand Bank, Travis Parsons – and I am sure we all remember him – launched an on-line petition urging government to wave the interest on student loans. Even though this is 2009, we are very thankful that that happened, for young people such as this young gentleman to bring it forward. Then again, government had to listen and here we see Bill 9 bringing about the issue that this young gentleman had. The petition started the year before the 2007 election and was to be delivered to government within six months. Then in November of 2008 we had the Federation of Students launch a petition campaign. They consisted of people from MUN, the Marine Institute, CONA, and Grenfell as well. They had a news conference to call on government to bring awareness to the fact that students today are grappling with high loan payments.

Like I said, it is good to see this piece of legislation. I guess the challenge now - and as far as I know it is not in place - is for the federal government to do the same thing when it comes to the federal portion of the student loans that the students here in our Province are burdened with from time to time.

In January, 2009, Mr. Speaker, the MUN Student Union prepared to give the petition over to government. I remember the day they presented it to the then minister. They were hoping for 20,000 signatures but they figured they actually had about 7,000 which was still a very positive number; when we get 7,000 individuals who come forward with a petition to government. It was predicted that eliminating the interest on the student portion of student loans would cost about 0.5 per cent of the Province’s surplus for 2008. Like the minister said, 7,000 signatures made a tremendous impact, I am sure. It is good to know that government listened to their concerns because those individuals had a very trying time in dealing with the interest that was built upon their loans.

Mr. Speaker, now that the legislation is before us and it will become law, I think it is in August of 2009, we know that some of the individuals and constituents, individuals who are members of various institutions and those who have graduated, many of them have questions that they are asking. They are wondering who will qualify. The minister touched on some of this earlier today, the people who will qualify. Anyone who is currently repaying their student loan will no longer be required to pay interest effective August 1, 2009. That will affect, I think it is somewhere in the vicinity of 49,000 students. That is a great piece of business, Mr. Speaker.

Some of the other questions they are asking: What if I had a loan from years ago? Well, unfortunately we get good news, but then again there are people who are wondering: What about me, a prior time? It is not retroactive. It would be wonderful if it was but we cannot push it too far. We know that there is a tremendous benefit coming from what is being done there now.

When does it come into effect, they ask? Well, we know that answer now.

The other one: Is it really zero per cent interest. Yes, it is, and that has been announced by government and the students will have that.

They are wondering if a person’s salary or any other type of earnings factor into whether or not they qualify for elimination of interest. In my understanding, that does not factor into it at all.

Those individuals who have a student loan, those who are presently in the system, from here on in they will have zero interest on their loans, Mr. Speaker, and that is a tremendous piece of business for them.

Mr. Speaker, I do not have a great deal more to say on this particular piece of legislation, other than to say that once this piece of legislation is brought forward and implemented, it will be a tremendous benefit.

I have had individuals over a number of years who find themselves in a very difficult situation and anything can happen to them. Many of them, after getting out of college or university, find it difficult getting that first job. I had one individual at one time, and I guess it came to the point where they had to start paying on their student loans. They were threatened that they would lose their home or they would lose their car. I guess they let it go too long and did not go through the proper channels. At least now we know something is going to be here for them to help lessen that burden.

I am sure the minister has probably already done this, through consultation with their counterparts in Ottawa, have made those suggestions to the federal government, made suggestions that they would consider doing the same thing because it is the right thing to do. Those individuals, when they come out, have a tremendous burden on their shoulders. That is why, in the past, many of our young people were unable to find jobs here in the Province. We know that is beginning to change around, even though we have a long way to go. Many of them would leave here and go out West. Some of them would go to the United States.

I have constituents of my own who did that, because the jobs were not here to provide the funds that they needed to pay off their student loans. They would go away to other places to work, and make the big dollars. Once they got their student loans straightened away, let me assure you, they came back home if there was a job available for them.

Mr. Speaker, with that, I will just say that Bill 9, no doubt about it, is an excellent bill. I can assure you I will be voting for Bill 9. Anything that is here to help our students in this Province, to help them financially, is wonderful.

Once again, Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity.

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

MS MICHAEL: Oh, I did not realize you were there. Do you want to go first?

MS JONES: (Inaudible).

MS MICHAEL: Oh, you go ahead then.

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I wanted to certainly have a few words with regard to Bill 9, and I thank my colleague, the Member of the NDP, for allowing me the time to speak now, because I will not be here from seven to seven-thirty, which would be the next half hour of debate.

Mr. Speaker, a couple of things with regard to this bill. First of all, I think every single one of us in this House of Assembly, over the time of our career in politics, has been engaged or met with students who have certainly had difficulty in trying to meet their financial requirement to obtain an education in this province. I think we have probably all listened to the stories that they have had to tell. I know so many young people today, in this Province, who work jobs, some of them even two jobs, still trying to put themselves through university, still trying to put themselves through college, trying to meet the demands of a full course load and still being able to earn money to pay for those courses and to pay for that education.

I have a tremendous amount of respect, Mr. Speaker, for students, a tremendous amount of respect for any person who wants to be a student of learning, because I think it is very important. There is absolutely no doubt, today, that it is the young people, it is the youth of our Province, who will form the next opportunities, who will drive the new economies. It is the youth and the young and the educated who will determine what the real future is for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians on a go-forward basis.

Mr. Speaker, I, today, deal with a lot of youth in my own district in particular. It is somewhat sad because a lot of the young people tend to graduate and move on to post-secondary education, and many of them do not come back to live in the communities or in the regions where they had grown up. It is unfortunate, but in a highly technical world most young people today are choosing occupational fields where they can become financially independent, where they can work at jobs, where they can have a quality of life that they desire. Oftentimes that forces them to make decisions to live in different regions, not necessarily in their hometowns or where they would like to be, and I certainly understand all of that.

Mr. Speaker, I can tell you today that in dealing with the young people in this Province – and, as I said, I deal quite a bit with them in my own district but also all over the Province - there is one thing that I have seen. I have seen in young people today a degree of professionalism, a degree of work ethic in terms of professional occupational career-seeking young men and women that are certainly on top of what they are doing. They know their game and they know their material. They will be the people who will drive the engine of business in this Province. They will be the new investors. They will be the people who will make the brave and bold decisions to create business, to create industry, and to go out there and try and make something in areas and fields of industry and study where very few have been bold enough to walk before.

A lot of us in this House of Assembly grew up in an age when technology was not the driving force of the economy, but rather it was the public sector and the social industry sector that drove the economy. Many of the people in this House grew up in a time when it was the thing to do to become a teacher or to become a nurse or to become a social worker. I am not saying that is not the thing to do today, because there are still lots of job opportunities in those areas, but you had fewer people who were looking at things in the technology field. You had fewer people that were looking at things in the advanced engineering fields.

We live in a different time. We live today in a society and in a world where the entire economy is being driven by technology. We live in a time where it is going to be critical to every province to be able to advance industry based on the new knowledge economy. We realize it here in Newfoundland and Labrador, and that is why we have focused in this Province more on those types of programs and those types of industry opportunities for our young people; but, Mr. Speaker, in order for our young people, in order for our youth, to be prepared, to be able to take on those jobs and those responsibilities, in order for them to be in a position to launch in and to invest and to be able to create opportunity where we have seen none in areas which have not been plunged by them or anyone else, they need to be educated. They need to be educated. If they are going to be the business investors of tomorrow they need to have money. They cannot come out of university and out of college with educations and see themselves strapped for ten and fifteen and twenty years with loans, and high loans, stopping them from having the ability to own property, to invest in business, and to do a lot of these things that many of us have had the opportunity to enjoy and do in our lives.

People will say it all comes in time, we have all had student loans, we have all had to make those payments, and it comes in time and I agree. I agree, it is all a part of growing up, it is all a part of the process, it is all a part of maturing, it is all a part of learning responsibility, but at the same time you can learn it with a lot less money hanging over your head. You can learn it owing a whole lot less money, there is no doubt about that.

Mr. Speaker, we always think that any time you can make it more affordable, more accessible and more readily available for young people in particular to be able to obtain an education that is a responsible thing for governments to do, to clear the path for that to happen.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, I have long been a person who has admired the system of free education. In fact, there was one Premier ever in the history of this Province who provided free education in Newfoundland and Labrador and that was the hon. Joey Smallwood, when he was Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, I can tell you, not only was he the only Premier ever in our history to provide an opportunity for young people in this Province to get a free education but he was also the very Premier who built the education system in Newfoundland and Labrador. He was the individual who started the institutions of higher learning in this Province, the individual who created things like Memorial University, who put us on the path to education. In fact, he was the one who decided to build community colleges all over this Province at a time when most areas of the Province had very little infrastructure. He had a vision that it was an educated society of people that would have the opportunity to be able to advance the people in this Province, to be able to advance the economic circumstances of this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, you will have to forgive me for talking somewhat loud, but I can hardly hear myself speak.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the members for their co-operation. I cannot hear the member speaking.

Could I have the co-operation of members, please?

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, between the Minister of Finance and the Member for Lake Melville, I could hardly hear what I was saying in the House of Assembly, and it is unfortunate because I am sure that these two individuals have enough critical issues in this Province –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: - that they could deal with, that they do not need to be sitting in their seat heckling all afternoon while we are talking about a student loan bill, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: In fact, it might be somewhat enlightening if they read the bill themselves. Now, wouldn’t that be something?

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, as I was saying, there was one Premier in this Province who did provide free education to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. Actually, I know many of the people who have sat in this House of Assembly - in fact, I have sat with a number of colleagues in the past who availed of the free university system that was offered to them at that particular time and, in fact, told me that they had come from families and areas of the Province where they would never have had the –

[Fire alarm sounds]

MS JONES: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. I think the Minister of Finance has set off the fire alarm, Mr. Speaker! He will not silence me by setting off the fire alarms in this building. It is either that or Debbie Forward is in the building, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The House is now in recess until we can find out what is going on.

May 14, 2009             HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS            Vol. XLVI   No. 21A

The House resumed sitting at 7:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): Order, please!

The Chair is ready to hear continuation of debate on Bill 9, An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act.

The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Just a point of information, I guess, for the House.

The Government House Leader and myself spoke after the recess which was brought about as a result of the fire alarm. The Leader of the Opposition was in the process of speaking at that time to the student aid bill and we have agreed that, as a result of a commitment, she will continue her speaking time later in the session and the Leader of the NDP will start the session tonight.

MR. SPEAKER: By agreement?

MS BURKE: By agreement.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader, by agreement.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I am very pleased to stand tonight to speak to this bill, which is An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act. The reason why I am so pleased is because the amendment that is being recommended is something that was in the Budget this year: that the government would eliminate interest on the provincial portion of student loans, which is on 40 per cent of the loan.

I am very pleased to stand and say I will be voting for this amendment, especially because the removal of the provincial portion of the interest of the student loans was something that was part of the NDP platform for the 2007 election.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS MICHAEL: Well, it was; we were there first.

So I am very pleased to see it, because we got a lot of positive feedback from the Canadian Federation of Students who said to us: Wow! That is fantastic! We didn’t even think of asking for that.

Then they started to ask for it and they did their petition –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MS MICHAEL: Oh, yes, that is the way it happened, and I am really glad to see that the government listened to the students, to the petition of 12,000, and to something that originated with the NDP platform of 2007. I want the record to know that, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS MICHAEL: I want the record to know that.

This is wonderful. It is really good, because one of the worst things that students have to face the minute they graduate is that debt that is on their back. This move will affect approximately 49,000 people. That is really something.

The Canadian Federation of Students estimated the cost at $8 million per year. The Budget, I think, has earmarked $5 million to cover the cost of the elimination of interest, to increase the amount of needs-based grants and decrease the spousal contribution amount.

The interest rate on students loans, as many of us know - especially those who are paying it know - has been prime, which is about 4.5 per cent, plus 2.5 per cent. So, with the elimination of the 2.5 per cent, the people who have been paying student loans and will continue to do so are having quite a burden taken from their backs. Of course, they still will have to pay the federal interest on 60 per cent of the loan and that is still prime plus 2.5 per cent.

The thing that I think would be really good is if this Province, in communicating with the federal government, could get them to understand what the burden is for students and to get them to do exactly the same thing. If the federal government were to remove the interest payments at least on their potion of the loan, what that would mean for students everywhere in Canada but especially for our students would be stupendous. It would mean that all the interest would be gone, and that would be something that would help them get more on their feet.

We all do, I know - it’s not just me in my office - every MHA in this House must get phone calls from people who are students who are calling to see: can we help them deal with the payment agencies, the collection agencies that they are dealing with, and help them deal with the burdens that they have? On a regular basis my constituency assistant has to deal with helping people with regard to their student debts. It is an ongoing problem.

This is a wonderful thing that is happening for our students, and I am delighted that we have this bill in front of us and that we are going to pass this tonight. On August 1, to know that all of those people who have been carrying these debts are going to get this break beginning August 1, it just makes me feel good to know that is going to happen.

One of the things that I want to talk about is that there are not complications but there are things that had to be put in place once the Province made this decision. For example, in 2007 when the Province reduced the interest rate by 2.5 per cent they had to communicate with the federal level to make sure there would be no problems. They had to deal with the different federal and provincial interest rates that would now create an incongruous situation that did not exist between the feds and other provinces. They had to make sure that the students were not going to suffer from red tape as a result of what the Province did, but that got worked out, just as what is happening now is going to get worked out. As far as I can see, there will be nothing that those who are carrying student debts will have to suffer from in terms of red tape except for still having to pay their interest to the federal level.

There is nothing wrong with this amendment. I think everything in this amendment is as it should be and, as I said, I am really very pleased to support it, but there are some things that I think we still need to think about to help post-secondary students in this Province.

One of the things that has been brought to my attention, and I am not sure the degree to which this is a problem but it has been brought to my attention, is that the Canadian Federation of Students is finding that it is not quite as able to be able to advocate for students who do have to deal with collection agencies. They are being told that they cannot represent them. So there has been some talk and some communication with me saying that perhaps the time has come to create an ombudsperson office to deal with student debt repayment issues, so students are able to pay back without issue. As I said, the groups that represent students, such as the CFS, are finding that it is not as easy for them to advocate because of privacy issues.

This is something that has just been brought to me quite recently but it is something, I think, because it has been brought to me that it is worth investigating. I am sure that the Minister of Education will be interested in looking at that, and to see the degree to which this has become a problem for the Canadian Federation of Students, and may also be for the student union as well. This issue came to us from the Canadian Federation of Students. There was a time when somebody from the CFS could go and actually advocate for a person when it came to dealing with the organizations they had to deal with in terms of problems that arose because of their student debt.

If this is a problem, if this were indeed proven to be a serious problem, then something like an ombudsperson would certainly be something that could be put in place to help students. Because I do not want, and I am sure that my colleagues in the House do not want to have the type of calls that I get.

We had a call one day from a man – we got it about 9:30 in the morning – and he had a deadline that day with regard to repayment. The way in which he had been treated over a period of time by the agency he was dealing with was just completely unacceptable. My constituency assistant spent most of the day working with him and with this agency; so that by 3:30 that afternoon things got resolved. He was even having the agency say things to him like: Well, if you cannot pay go to your family; somebody out there must have money to lend you.

He assured them that was not the case. Well, then, why don’t you get another mortgage on your house? He was even told when he talked about his child and his responsibilities: Well, maybe you had a child too soon. Maybe it was irresponsible to have your child when you had your child.

That was actually said to this man. As I said, my constituency assistant worked with him all day. Imagine that kind of thing happening. It is difficult when somebody has been out of school for a number of years and they are dealing with the agencies and this is the kind of thing they are dealing with. I do not think that kind of a person – well, he wouldn’t; he wouldn’t feel like he could call the Canadian Federation of Students. Maybe this is the kind of case that the Canadian Federation of Students is talking about when they say that they think an ombudsperson would be the way to go to help students who are in that kind of situation. Maybe the person could be within the Department of Education, maybe it could be a separate office, but it is just a proposal that I am putting out there because of issues that I know are still out there. Yes, the elimination of the interest payments is going to be good, but it is still not going to remove the student debt problem. We know that is still a major problem for so many students.

Another issue is looking at who it is who has loans and who it is who has debts, and the realization that we do need to look more at needs-based grants and offer more needs-based grants. Right now, for example, in Newfoundland and Labrador, 52 per cent of full-time post-secondary students aged eighteen to twenty-four, whose parents earn less than $40,000 a year, received a loan from the Canada supports loan program. That was in the year 2000. That is the latest statistic that we have. So 52 per cent of full-time students, their parents made less than $40,000 a year. This statistic shows us that students of lower-income parents are the students who need the loans and then they are the ones, the students, who become saddled with the debt. So they are the students who came from a family that had to get a loan and who had very low income. They themselves probably had low-wage jobs while they were in university, because unfortunately so many students have to carry jobs when they are in university these days. Then they come out of university with a debt that they had to incur. However, when we look at students whose parents earn $80,000, or more, only 14 per cent of students whose parents earned more than $80,000 received a public loan.

There is a real disparity between those who are at the lower end and those who are at the upper end. It does turn out for those at the lower end it is the student who carries the loan when they come out of university.

Another disparity that exists, and which says that we should have more when it comes to needs-based grants, is between women and men. More women students received CSLP loans than did their male counterparts. Of women, 34 per cent of women received CSLP loans whereas 29 per cent of men received CSLP loans.

Another statistic which should really jar us, I think, here in this Province is the difference between students who live close to a post-secondary campus and students who have to commute. One of the statistics here in our Province is that only 3 per cent of students from low-income families living beyond commuting distance participated in university - only 3 per cent. This, to me, is really upsetting because we know our geography, we know where our campuses are – and this statistic does not have to do with post-secondary in general; it has to do with university. So, basically we are talking about the campus in Corner Brook and the campuses in St. John’s. Only 3 per cent of students from low-income families living beyond commuting distance participated in university.

What that means is that those who are living outside of the commuting range, who cannot afford to come in because they are from low-income families, are destined to continue to be in the low-income range, because they are not getting the opportunity to move beyond that range. I find that percentage very disconcerting.

We need to ensure in our Province that the students, the young people who are the most disadvantaged, can have a full education like everybody else, that they have to be able to access education like everybody else. Needs-based grants, a major increase in needs-based grants, would do that.

I remember when I went to university in 1960; we had bursaries then. If you went into education, for example, to get your education degree, you received a bursary. Everything was paid for. You did not have to pay for university. There are others in this House who remember when university was free. I did not have to pay for my degree, but that is not the case for our students now.

If we really are serious, and I hope that we all are, about really trying to increase the education level of our young people in this Province, if we really are serious about those young people becoming trained and educated to prepare for the new jobs that we think are going to be out there, if they are not already there, because of the new industries that are happening in the Province - whether those jobs are in trades and technology, or they are jobs in areas that relate to university, so whether it is university or college it does not matter - if we want them to be able to be trained and educated for those jobs then we have to make sure that they can go to post-secondary schools, that they can become trained, that they become educated, without, at the same time, ending up with a massive debt on their backs that would lead them to a point like that thirty-year-old man who called my office one day, begging for help to try to deal with the debt.

Now, with him that day it ended up positively, but it ended up positively not just because of my constituency assistant trying to help him – at least she was keeping communications open - but a friend finally came through at about 3:00 o’clock that afternoon with $12,000 - just over $12,000 - to lend to him without, of course, any strings attached, so that he could get the creditors off his back. I know we all know of people like that, maybe not personally but through our constituency offices.

So, yes, I am delighted that we are passing this bill. I am delighted that it is before us. I am delighted that we have taken another step towards helping our people who are going to post-secondary education, going to either the college or to the university, and it is another step.

What I hope is that this government will continue to listen to students, will continue to listen to the Canadian Federation of Students, will continue to listen to the NDP, and the next act might have to do with needs-based grants.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Isles of Notre Dame.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DALLEY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Once again, I guess I am disappointed to hear that the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi is upset and hurt again, but if you listen to her comments today I think it is quite evident that her concerns, the concerns of our government, that she is obviously echoing the support for our government and I certainly want to thank her for that.

Mr. Speaker, as well, to get this going this evening, I certainly want to pass a quick comment on my good friend from Port de Grave who made comments earlier. Again, I think if we look through what he was saying, obviously he, too, was offering great support for our government and again I certainly want to thank him for that.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DALLEY: Mr. Speaker, this is an evening sitting. We cut short earlier this evening due to an unfortunate fire alarm. It is my understanding it was just that, a false alarm, but I will say somewhat fortunate because the Leader of the Opposition was - I will not say a rant, but - giving us a history lesson again about the great vision of Joey Smallwood. It was not something I wanted to hear heading into my supper, I have to tell you the truth.

You were talking about the free tuition that occurred. I think it was somewhere around 1965 there was some free tuition, I think history has shown, under great pressure, thanks to a young Rex Murphy at the time, but it was short-lived; probably as short-lived as the great Industrial Revolution and the vision that was all a part of that period of our history when we took $40 million into Confederation and not long after we went into debt, and we are still in debt and still trying to find our way out. So, Mr. Speaker, perhaps a timely break for dinner.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I certainly want to pass some comment on the amendments that we are putting forth here today on the Financial Assistance Act for students. It is a great piece of legislation, but there is some irony in it because we are adding something that we are taking away. Primarily, what we are adding here in the legislation is one word, and that is: elimination. We are adding something so that we can eliminate the centrepiece of this piece of legislation; we are eliminating interest rates on student loans.

Mr. Speaker, that, in itself, speaks to where we are as a government as we continue to listen to students, continue to listen to the young people and see what their needs are and do what we can, as I will show in a moment, all of the things that our government has done with respect to tuition and post-secondary fees to support our youth.

One of the common phrases that we hear quite often is that our children are our future. Certainly for those of us who come from education and an education background, we strongly believe that a better educated child and a higher educated child will make for a much better and prosperous future. That is exactly what this government has been about and that is exactly what our Department of Education has been trying to accomplish since 2003.

Mr. Speaker, this year there are a number of new measures, measures that highlight again initiatives to make post-secondary education more affordable and more accessible for students. There is a front end and a back end to our programs.

I will start at the back end, Mr. Speaker. The elimination of interest on student loans will have an impact for some 49,000 former students in this Province who are currently repaying their student loans. Mr. Speaker, that is significant. With a cut in interest rates, what that means is there is more money in their pockets. It means, for some, when they finish their undergraduate degrees they may be in a position and be able to afford to continue their education, on to masters or Ph.D. programs.

With the confidence they have in our government, knowing that our government is supporting education, we are seeing more and more students interested in coming to the Province to be a part of our education system. On the back end, what the elimination of interest on student loans is actually doing is allowing students to pay off their debt much faster. We are seeing that the accumulated debt in this Province is in decline and students, in paying off their debt much faster, are able to make more contributions to our economy.

Mr. Speaker, another key point with this amendment and what we are trying to do to make education more affordable and accessible is the increase to non-repayable upfront grants, from $70 to $80. This is going to support some 8,400 students in this Province. It builds on the initiative that we started in 2007.

Mr. Speaker, earlier today the Member for Port de Grave was up and talking about, very quickly, to list the initiatives that previous governments to ours made to support education. What he did leave out was that in the Liberal government of 1994, when they cancelled the upfront grant system and went to a full loan system, he left out that that initiative, along with rising tuition fees, the student debt in this Province rose by 300 per cent in one year. I went through the 1990s paying my loans and I would certainly have appreciated some elimination of interest rates at the time.

However, building on this 2007 initiative, we are able to cap the borrowing at $60 per week and increase the non-repayable grants to $80. What this means, Mr. Speaker, students get the money upfront, and on the end they do not have as much money to pay back. In 2007, when we brought in the grant program, that essentially, for all new students, cut their loans in half because they were able to balance the money they were receiving in loan with the money they were receiving in grants.

Mr. Speaker, added to that, an initiative this year is that we are decreasing the amount spouses are to contribute to their partner’s education. Reducing the discretionary income considered as a resource, from 80 per cent to 70 per cent, allowing families to keep more of their income and allowing spouses who want to pursue education, who want to pursue higher learning and perhaps switch careers, we are giving them a better opportunity. Making it more affordable and accessible for them to go back and pursue post-secondary education.

Mr. Speaker, if I might quickly point out, since lists seem to be the order of the day. If I could quickly point out what changes we have seen and improvements that we have seen in the student loan program since 2003. I will do this quickly. We saw tuition freezes for MUN and the College of the North Atlantic in 2004. We saw an integrated provincial student loan program with the federal government, to make it almost a one-stop shopping where we have one student, one loan approach. We established the Student Loan Corporation to allow for direct lending and to support the integrated student loan program. We had a further tuition freeze in 2005. We increased student loan limits from $110 to $140 per week in 2005. We increased the debt reduction grants in 2005. We increased the income threshold by 5 per cent to allow more students to qualify for interest relief.

Mr. Speaker, we combined the parental contributions and made it less, so that parents would have to contribute less to a student’s education. We froze tuitions again in 2006. We extended the debt reduction program to include co-op students in 2006. We froze tuitions in 2007. We reduced parental contributions so that parents with a combined family income of less than $65,000 would no longer have to contribute to their child’s education, and the upper limits also changed so that families with a combined income of up to $140,000 would now qualify.

Mr. Speaker, we decreased interest charges on student loans from prime plus 2.5 per cent, to prime in 2007. We implemented a $70 per week upfront needs-based grant in 2007, cutting loans in half. We froze tuitions in 2008. We froze tuition in 2009. Now we see in 2009, elimination of interest on student loans, an increase in upfront needs grants, and a reduction in spousal contributions.

Mr. Speaker, that is a number of initiatives, but I think what it speaks to loud and clear, from the outset of 2003 when this government was elected and this Premier was elected, there was a strong commitment to education, a strong commitment to our youth, and it is not by a single initiative but it is one thing after another, and we continue to find ways. We continue to work with students and student unions to find ways to make education more affordable and more accessible for all youth in this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DALLEY: Mr. Speaker, it shows our commitment to education, to higher learning, and it shows our commitment that education is indeed one of the pillars for economic growth in this Province.

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of other initiatives that we have done to support our youth in post-secondary education. Just to list some that we have seen this year: $1 million to support the graduate school fellowships; $5.1 million to expand the MUN School of Medicine; $1.4 million to Marine Institute for multi-beam sonar mapping; $575,000 to the Marine Institute to develop and apply the ocean mapping program. We have increased professional seats in our schools of nursing, social work and pharmacy. We have seen a $56 million commitment to tuition freezes for four years at Memorial University and the College of the North Atlantic.

Mr. Speaker, the Member for Port de Grave referenced today that during their tenure of government they had low tuition fees, the lowest in Atlantic Canada. Well, Mr. Speaker, we have low tuition fees as well, only our tuition fees are the lowest in all of Canada.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DALLEY: In all of Canada, Mr. Speaker, outside of Quebec that has a special tuition fee for their own residents. Our tuition fees, particularly at MUN, are 44 per cent lower than the national average.

Mr. Speaker, we are investing in new residences, addressing housing concerns. We are investing in new academic buildings, the Sir Wilfred Grenfell College, and we continue to support the scholarship programs at Memorial University. A suite of initiatives that our government has taken upon to support students and demonstrate our steadfast commitment to support education, to support Memorial, to support the College of the North Atlantic and to, most of all, support students and families of this Province.

Mr. Speaker, when you look at the full package, when you look at our history from 2003 to now, it is quite obvious that our government has met the challenge to try and remove barriers to affordable and accessible education. Tuition freezes, up-front grants, eliminating interest rates, reducing parental and spousal contributions, are having a big impact in our Province.

Many youth were forced to choose to go outside of this Province to look for a paying job because they could not afford to go to post-secondary. With these changes, more students can go to post-secondary. We have seen a trend where many students are taking part-time jobs to try and pay for their education. Mr. Speaker, these kinds of initiatives mean fewer students will have to get part-time jobs, and the research will show those without jobs that can commit to and study and be more focused on their studies will have better results.

Mr. Speaker, by reducing debt, at the end of the day our government has supported the students and families who are more likely to stay in Newfoundland and Labrador, more likely to find work in Newfoundland and Labrador, and more likely to support our economy right here in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, the minister referenced today as well a meeting recently with the Canadian Federation of Students. I, too, sat in on that meeting and I could sense their enthusiasm, their support, and they did reference their national meeting in Ottawa. I could see the pride in their faces that they, along with the work of this government, were able to accomplish. They did indicate they were the envy of their colleagues, the envy of the country.

Mr. Speaker, when they told them about the elimination of interest rates their jaws dropped, and around the table they were just looking at each other; they were in shock. Not only were they in shock that we had the elimination of the interest rates, but they were in shock looking at these young students wondering how they did it. They could not believe that they could accomplish this.

Mr. Speaker, very proudly they indicated to us they accomplished it because of the excellent working relationship that they have with our government and the former minister and now the new Minister of Education.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DALLEY: Oh, we have to throw in the parliamentary secretary as well.

Mr. Speaker, all of these initiatives we have seen from a report released in June 2008, a report by the Maritime Provinces Higher Education Commission, indicating that there has been a significant drop in the number of Newfoundland and Labrador students studying in the Maritimes.

As we know, we have declining enrolments in our schools. Most significant from this report, this report indicated a significant increase in the number of Maritime students coming to Newfoundland and Labrador. The report indicated that we have seen a 1,100 per cent increase in students coming to Newfoundland and Labrador to do their studies.

The minister referenced today that the Canadian Federation of Students are getting calls almost every day. They are excited; they know that we have one of the best educational packages and programs that can be offered in this country, not only from a student aid and student loan perspective but also from quality education as well.

Mr. Speaker, these inquiries about tuition rates and interest-free loans, up-front grants, and the supportive environment that they are seeing that our government is providing to education in this Province are making people want to come to Newfoundland and Labrador.

In closing, being a rural MHA, I think it is important for me to be able to apply a rural lens to the kinds of initiatives that take place in government, and to ensure that the people that I represent in my district can and will benefit from the initiatives of this government.

Mr. Speaker, when we consider a rural student in post-secondary education, I read a stat where the cost of their post-secondary education is approximately 20 per cent higher. Being from rural Newfoundland and having gone through the post-secondary system, I would probably argue that is on the low side. When you consider rural students who have to travel to prepare and find housing, and plan and leave home and come in to try to find suitable accommodations, the expense of travelling home the odd weekend, the expense of parents having to make moves and travel back and forth, all of this, Mr. Speaker, is an added cost and an added burden to rural students.

When I looked at these new initiatives that would allow students on the front end to get money up front and a grant debt reduction program when students finish, and the elimination of interest rates, these initiatives are aimed directly at those who borrow most. Those who borrow most are those, in most cases, whose education costs the highest, and that is our rural students. So I see these initiatives having a significant impact, and initiatives that will directly help make education more affordable and accessible for the rural students of our Province.

Mr. Speaker, one other point I want to make before I sit down, having met with the Canadian Federation of Students, the initiatives that we have taken since 2003, I think it is important that all of us, when given the opportunity, call on the federal government to make some universal changes, make some universal changes to their portion of the student loan program to make education more affordable and accessible right across this country for all students, and most importantly for the students of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, I certainly call on them to follow the lead of this government, for this government to work with students, to listen to them, to find ways, and to continue to work with them to find ways, to make education what it is today.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate an opportunity to have a few words with respect to Bill 9.

I do not think I will need the full twenty minutes that is allotted. I just had a couple of questions I would like to put to the minister, actually, and make a few comments. First off, I hope I don’t disappoint the Member for Placentia & St. Mary’s because I am going to commend the government on something again. He says I never give credit where credit is due. I think I did a lot of it yesterday and I am going to give credit again, because anything by any government that helps relieve someone of a debt that they have, particularly when that debt was incurred in the pursuit of making themselves better, making themselves better educated and in a position to contribute to the Province, is a good thing, no matter who does it, so you have to give credit when these types of things are done.

Some would suggest that it should have been done a couple of years earlier when we were in a surplus situation. I do believe the price tag on this, it ranges. The government, I think, budgeted $5 million for it this year. The student federation says it is somewhere in the vicinity of $8 million. Regardless of whether it is five or eight, the bottom line is, it is not an extremely expensive proposition for the government to do this. Some said it should have been done earlier and so on because we had the money in the coffers to do it.

Of course, some of us here have had the burdens of student debt in the past. There are some who, in the 1960s, of course, were fortunate enough under the old system in the Smallwood years, I do believe, that there was free education; they did not have to pay any tuition. Of course, that did not continue for obvious reasons. The Province was not in a financial position to be able to continue to afford it. Not only did tuition start but tuition escalated to very high proportions in some cases.

I know, myself, I attended Memorial University in the early 1970s, from 1972 to 1976, and incurred student debts. I know what it is all about. Actually, when I first went to work, working in Corner Brook, after I graduated from law school, it is pretty disheartening after you spend six, seven or eight years trying to get yourself into a position to get into the workforce and you realize right away that the first cut that comes out of your paycheque is that you have to pay for that student debt. Of course, I was pleased by the fact that you at least had your education. Yes, you had to pay it back, and there were certainly no breaks on interest that was charged on it there. It took quite a while to do it, actually. It took about another seven or eight years to actually repay it. They set you up on a repayment program, so you were actually in the workforce for some seven or eight years before you found yourself in a position that you had your education paid for. I also don’t mind saying I was fortunate enough that I did not have a lot of student debt. I had great parental support so I did not have a debt like a lot of the kids coming out today.

I know in my own community there are people who have in the $40,000 range. Particularly I know of one young couple, after they graduated, I believe each of them married and they each had $35,000 or $40,000 in debt to pay back - and, of course, the interest on top of that.

That is a pretty tough start when you are in your mid-twenties and you are married and you are anxious to get into the workforce. You had spent six, seven or eight years or whatever educating yourself, and you find that kind of burden that you had to repay. So anything that can be done to alleviate that; because, God knows, these young people, when they start off, they have enough expenses. There are a lot of us here, I am sure, who have kids of our own who went through that process. They get out, and if they are married with a young family, trying to look after the family, trying to get a home for yourself, trying to get a vehicle for yourself, the last thing you need on top of all your usual debts when you are getting started is to have to pay a student loan. So, when you do, any break that comes on that debt obviously is much appreciated.

I know in my own case, I had three children involved and was fortunate enough, of course, that they did not have to get student aid, but between all three of them, they spent twenty-two years in university. So, I am sure they appreciated it and it gave them a leg up when they got out that they did not have to face that kind of student debt. So, it is costly, but it is also something that everybody in this Province appreciates that is good to have, which is an education.

Now, it seems the focus has changed over the years. I know back in the early 1970s – in the late 1960s and the early 1970s when I was in the education process, it seemed like the governments of the day and the teachers of the day were driving the university education piece. You have to go to university to get truly educated, to get truly skilled to be something; whether you wanted to be an accountant or a teacher, or whatever. That focus seems to have switched somewhat. The actual university education today does not seem to have the same need or impact or focus that it had back in that time. I know a lot of people these days, for example, go into the trades instead, go into the skills. A lot of people, for example, in the Marine Institute doing different degrees, nautical science degrees and so on. So they seem to be getting in these shorter programs in some cases.

Trade schools; I know in Port aux Basques, for example, we pump through, every year in the local CONA, what they call an NDT course, Non-Destructive Testing course. Actually, it is the only facility in the Province that trains people for non-destructive testing. In fact, not only has it become a training centre for the students, and we get them from all over Newfoundland and Labrador, they come there to get trained. I think it depends, in some cases a twelve month program, in others it is an eighteen month program, or sometimes even a twenty-four month program.

The bottom line is, it is a case where it is not of long duration, but these people who have graduated, most of them that I know ended up going to Alberta, and they commute back and forth a lot of them. Some of them went there and lived there and raised their families there, and have settled into Alberta and do not intend to come back. A lot of them still continue to reside in this Province, and they make great money. Every person who was trained with NDT in that facility, since - I believe it was 1989 that it started, they make anywhere, $100,000 plus, from a one-year course that they took at CONA. Now that is great wages, that is great income, and it did not take four or five, six years to get it. Those people seem to have shifted a lot today towards the college education and trades education as opposed to the more standard back in the 1960s, early 1970s, getting a teaching certificate or getting a teaching degree, an education degree. So it has switched and it has changed.

My questions in particular about this, and this is for explanation because we come here to vote for or vote against or make suggestions and comments about a piece of legislation. I like to give and take when I - if I have a question, when I get an answer back as well. That is the purpose of course in second reading, is to get that explanation and allows the minister an opportunity to speak with his staff or whatever and get any info that he might need to give the explanation, and usually that is given in the committee stage.

In particular, I notice here we are talking about, in section (1) - because what this is doing of course is amending the already existing Student Financial Assistance Act. We are getting rid of some clauses that are in it and we are putting in a few more new ones. My reading and understanding of this is, what we are saying is we are basically giving the government some regulatory ability to make some regulations that deal with the student interest issue, and it talks about lowering them and it talks about eliminating them.

Now, the last sentence, and I have my own understanding of what it means but I am not clear on it and I would appreciate it if the minister could educate me there. That is the very last piece that says, (e.1) "setting lower interest rates or eliminating interest for student loan agreements and setting the effective dates for those lowered interest rates or eliminated interest…"and this is the piece I was wondering about "…except where a judgement of the court has been made with respect to a student loan agreement."

If you look down into the second piece there (e.2) the same thing "…excepting debts that are owed to the Crown or the corporation as a result of a judgment of a court." I am just curious as to what that actually means. For example, I would assume it means that if I had a student debt and I, for whatever reason, could not pay it, I was taken to court and I was ordered by a court order to resume payments on my debt. I would assume that is what happened and the court put that in the form of a judgment or whatever for the arrears, but also my understanding is that part of that court order is that you resume the payments on your outstanding debt. I am just wondering how the regulations are intended to work. Like, for example, anybody who was taken to court and ordered to continue, will they get the benefit of this interest reduction here or elimination as well? I would just like to know the interplay between what the court action did or did not do vis-à-vis a student debt.

Also, when you get into subsection (4) there, and again, I just cannot understand what it means. It says, "An interest rate lowered or interest eliminated in accordance with regulations made under paragraphs (1)(e.1) and (e.2) applies to a student loan agreement or a debt owed to the Crown or the corporation as a result of the Crown or the corporation fulfilling the obligations of a borrower under a student loan agreement notwithstanding that that lowered interest rate or eliminated interest…" and this is the piece again "…is contrary to a term or condition of the applicable student loan agreement."

For the life of me I cannot figure out what that means. I am wondering if the minister can, by way of explanation, give some example of how that would work in real life. I am certain that a lot of other people who might read this or students who will wonder about what does this mean or not mean. I think if we are going to be voting in favour of it, and I support the principle of it, that is the purpose of second reading, but I would like to have an explanation and an understanding of what it is exactly that I am voting for as well. This, no doubt, would be appropriate time to get that explanation, and I am sure it will be forthcoming from the minister.

Not withstanding that, that is the only comments that I had on this bill. I will certainly be supporting the principle of Bill 9.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Mount Pearl North.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and good evening.

It gives me great pleasure to rise this evening to speak in support of Bill 9, which is An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act.

Effectively, as previous speakers have indicated, Mr. Speaker, this legislation gives us the ability to fulfil one of the commitments that we made in the recent provincial Budget, and that is to eliminate the interest on the provincial portion of student loans.

Mr. Speaker, here in Newfoundland and Labrador we are very fortunate. We have one of the most affordable post-secondary education systems in the country. We have one of the most accessible post-secondary education systems in the country, and we also have some incredibly high quality post-secondary educational institutions in the country right here in Newfoundland and Labrador. We, of course, have Memorial University, we have the College of the North Atlantic and we have some great private colleges in this Province as well.

I remember being in high school and guidance councillors at the time suggesting that maybe I should apply to some universities on the mainland, in Nova Scotia or in Ontario, or elsewhere. I really believe, Mr. Speaker, that one of the best decisions I made was making the decision to stay and pursue an undergraduate degree at Memorial University. Unfortunately, the Student Financial Assistance Program that I experienced was nowhere near as great as the program that is in place for today’s students. I did have student loans, as I expect numerous members of this House did, and at the time there were no up-front grants like the ones that students now enjoy today as a result of the actions of this government and this Administration.

As I said, Mr. Speaker, today’s amendment allows us to eliminate the interest on loans. This is unprecedented. Students have asked over the years for this to occur and this government has listened. As a result, legislation like this and announcements like the ones that were made related to post-secondary education in this recent Budget make a real difference in the lives of students in Newfoundland and Labrador.

We are increasing the non-repayable up-front grants available to students by $10 per week. These non-repayable up-front grants were reintroduced in 2007 and that was the first time since 1994 that students in this Province have been able to avail of those up-front, needs-based grants.

As the minister explained quite well this afternoon, the provincial loans, the provincial portion of the student loans, will now be capped at $60 per week and students can receive up to $80 per week in grants that they do not need to pay back. This is quite significant.

To put it in perspective, there are literally tens of thousands of students in Newfoundland and Labrador that will benefit from this good news. In fact, about 49,000 students will benefit from this move to eliminate the interest, and about 7,000 students got up-front grants in the 2008-2009 school year. Now as a result of this latest announcement, about 9,000 students will benefit from up-front, needs-based grants. This is quite significant as well.

These announcements represent a major commitment by this government to investing in post-secondary education in this Province. These changes will cost about $5 million in 2009-2010, about $6.4 million in 2010-2011, and about $6.7 million in 2011-2012.

Mr. Speaker, these were not the only commitments that this government announced that affect post-secondary education that was announced in this recent Budget. Just to quickly share with you a number of other announcements that were made that I think are relevant. We saw $8.3 million in increased funding for College of the North Atlantic, over $21 million of increased funding in this fiscal year for Memorial University. That includes things like salary increases, the continuation of the freeze on tuition rates, and other programming supports. We have seen other investments in other areas as well. We have seen $1 million this year to support graduate school fellowships, $2.5 million to assist Sir Wilfred Grenfell College with the transition to autonomy, which is another great commitment that this government has made.

In these tough economic times, we all recognize the need to invest in infrastructure. We have had some great announcements in this Province in recent days and there were several commitments related to post-secondary education in this recent Budget; a new campus for the College of the North Atlantic in Labrador West, some improvements, a new academic building for instance at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College in Corner Brook. So our commitment to increasing the quality of post-secondary education and to continually invest in post-secondary education in this Province, our commitment is very clear.

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from the District of The Isles of Notre Dame pointed out that aside from the Province of Quebec, which has a special program in place for residents of its province, Newfoundland and Labrador has the lowest undergraduate tuition rates in the entire country of Canada. Good things are happening in post-secondary education in Newfoundland and Labrador, Mr. Speaker. In fact, our recent research shows us that more students are entering the labour market upon graduation, which is great news for the economy of this Province.

The amount of average student debt is starting to fall in Newfoundland and Labrador. Those who are in the repayment phase, those who have finished their post-secondary education and are now paying back their loans, they are paying less than what they have paid in the past, which again is great news for families, it is great news for the communities in this Province. The policies of this government are definitely making a difference and these are just a few simple examples of how they are doing so.

Mr. Speaker, we have increased funding to Memorial University over the last five years by 56 per cent. We have increased funding to the College of the North Atlantic over the last five years by about 70 per cent. These kinds of investments have never been seen before in this Province and it is great news for students. It is great news for educators and it is going to do great things for the economy of this Province.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is also significant to note while we are talking about financial assistance to students, we have also made considerable investments in apprenticeships which I think reflects a need in our economy today in the skilled trades. We have committed in this budget year $3.6 million targeted at hiring apprentices, which is going to be great news for our business community and for the skilled trades. We have committed another $20,000 to support a conference for skills work for women. We have also had other projects related to facility and equipment improvements at the College of the North Atlantic, another $2 million investment in this fiscal year and we have also introduced a mentorship program for female apprentices at a cost of about a quarter of a million dollars.

We have also made changes to allow credit for job training in Alberta. So these are some of the things that have benefited apprenticeship programs that are definitely impacting the post-secondary education system in a positive way. There has also been a significant increase in the number of apprentices in Newfoundland and Labrador over the last five years. In fact, in 2007 alone, we had over 4,000, about 4,100 apprentices. The result is going to be very positive for the skilled trades in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, I want to get back to talking about student financial assistance and I would like to give a very quick history of student aid grants over the last couple of decades in this Province.

In the 1990s there was a loan remission grant program and there were only about 500 students in the entire Province that availed from the program. In 2002, there was a debt reduction grant program and about 1,200 students benefited from that program.

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the leadership of our Premier and thanks to the leadership of our Ministers of Education and this government, in 2007, up-front grants were introduced. About 7,000 students benefited from those grants, a commitment of about $9 million. Now in 2009, over 8,500 - I think it is around there somewhere. About 8,500 students will benefit from up-front grants, at a cost of about $13 million. As you can see, there has been a major impact and a major increase in the number of students who are availing of those kinds of supports.

Mr. Speaker, the Member for Port de Grave this afternoon identified that when it comes to student financial assistance, it is indeed a national concern, and I would agree, it is a national concern. I would like to challenge our federal government to start to show some leadership on this issue and to show the kind of commitment that this government has shown to reducing student debt. I would like to challenge our federal counterparts to introduce non-repayable needs-based grants. I would like to challenge the federal government to reduce interest rates and ultimately eliminate interest rates on their portion of student loans and then that will have even greater impact on students, not only in Newfoundland and Labrador but right across this country.

Mr. Speaker, the Member for Port de Grave talked about the previous Administration and talked about the history of petitions that have been presented and so on. I think we have demonstrated that this government is truly listening to students. In fact, my colleague from The Isles of Norte Dame outlined some of the things that have happened over the last decade or so, in terms of tuition freezes and other improvements such as interest rate reduction and now ultimately the elimination.

The Member for Port de Grave also could not resist the urge to comment on the autonomy of Memorial University. Mr. Speaker, for a number of years I have monitored the results of the Maclean’s magazine survey that looks at post-secondary institutions in Canada and does a fairly objective comparison, for the most part, of universities in this country. Since 2001, Memorial University has been ranked fifth overall in the comprehensive university category. Memorial University has an excellent reputation and I would argue, Mr. Speaker, that it is a strong, vibrant, independent institution and it is among the best in the country, and as Newfoundlanders and Labradorians we should be quite proud of that.

My colleagues across the House also noted that they have received calls from students with concerns around student loans and student grants. Of course, all MHAs in this House get those kinds of calls from constituents, I do as well, and often working with the folks within the Department of Education we are able to resolve some of those concerns that students have.

I am surprised, Mr. Speaker, that there are still many students out there who are not aware of some of the programs, such as debt reduction and other supports that are in place for students today. Part of the process that we go through as MHAs is being able to inform our constituents of some of those supports and programs that are available that are definitely making a difference. I do know that many students in Newfoundland and Labrador are very pleased with the kinds of improvements that have been made, particularly over the last five years.

In 2007, our Minister of Education at the time engaged students to determine their views on issues related to post-secondary education and on issues related to student debt.

In 2009, just recently, again under the leadership of the former Minister of Education, now the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services, a student debt round table was held. Students clearly expressed their support for the actions that this government undertook in 2007 and they talked about the positive impact that those changes have had on students over the last couple of years. Our students told us loud and clear that they are the envy of other students across the country. That is really great news for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, I am confident that this government is going to continue to listen to our constituents. We are going to listen to student organizations like the Canadian Federation of Students that was mentioned earlier this evening, and by listening and by partnering and working with those kinds of organizations we can come up with great policies that truly do impact people’s lives.

One of the most exciting things about being a Member of the House of Assembly is having the opportunity to help constituents solve problems, and it is gratifying when I can work with a student in my district and help them overcome challenges that they face in terms of student financial assistance.

Another thing that is really exciting about being a Member of the House is passing legislation that truly does impact people’s lives. Mr. Speaker, as simple a piece of legislation as Bill 9 is, we are simply adding a few words to allow us to eliminate interest. It is going to have a profound impact on students in this Province now and in the future as well.

Mr. Speaker, one of the things I get great feedback on in talking to my constituents is the ongoing tuition freeze at Memorial University and at College of the North Atlantic, our two public post-secondary institutions in this Province. To date, we have committed about $56 million to support the continuation of those tuition freezes, but we have not stopped there, Mr. Speaker.

Recently, we have provided relief to parents who support their children’s education. As well, we have increased loan limits for students who need more financial support. So we are reaching out to those who have the greatest need. We have in fact included co-op students in our Debt Reduction Grant Program which has been a big benefit for students in programs like business or engineering and some of the programs at College of the North Atlantic as well. We have also provided extra support for students who have difficultly repaying their loans, which I think has had a major impact on students as well.

Mr. Speaker, again, my colleague for The Isles of Norte Dame noted the challenges that students from rural Newfoundland and Labrador face, and it is true. Our stats show us that rural students accumulate more debt than students living in urban areas; about 20 per cent more debt on average than students in urban areas. The exciting thing about our debt reduction initiatives is that they are targeted at those who borrow more. Rural students, as a result, will benefit greatly from these recent announcements and they are benefiting greatly from the announcements that have been made over the last couple of years.

Mr. Speaker, we are on a great path. I think the decisions we have made are doing great things to support post-secondary education in Newfoundland and Labrador. There is recognition in this Province, and there is certainly recognition by this government, that continued investments in education are going to be key to ensuring a bright future here, socially and economically. If we have a better educated workforce then we are going to be well poised to meet any challenges that lie ahead.

Mr. Speaker, while the changes to the actual legislation today are minor in nature, the impact of eliminating interest on student loans is incredible. The impact of increasing non-repayable up-front grants in this Province for students is incredible. Education is a critical part of this government’s plan and I certainly applaud this most recent initiative that was announced in the recent Budget.

This government is committed to an educated society and a productive society. We have increased needs-based grants. We have eliminated the interest on student loans and these things are making post-secondary education in Newfoundland and Labrador more accessible. These moves are making post-secondary education in Newfoundland and Labrador more affordable.

Bill 9 is more great news for the students of this Province. They have spoken, we have listened, and I certainly commend the Minister of Education, as well as the former Minister of Education, and our Premier on following through with initiatives such as this one.

Mr. Speaker, it has been a pleasure to speak to Bill 9 and I certainly fully support the move on behalf of this government.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, in an effort to accommodate all the speakers who would like to speak on the various bills this evening, we may need to juggle between one bill and another.

So at this time I would like to call Order 11, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act. (Bill 15)

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that Bill 15 be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act." (Bill 15)

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Minister of Justice and Attorney General.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

It is indeed an honour and privilege for me to stand in my place today to carry out one of my duties as the Minister of Justice and to introduce this piece of legislation, which is An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act.

It is an amendment which is set out in the Explanatory Notes. It says "This Bill would amend the Legal Aid Act to repeal paragraphs 49(a) and (c) to improve the efficiency of processing legal aid applications." I should have added: legal aid applications in summary conviction matters.

I am pleased that after hearing about the passing - the debate and the unanimous approval of members in the House about the legislation to eliminate interest on student loans, at least the Newfoundland provincial portion of a student loan, and to increase the needs-based grants. I can follow that piece of legislation up with this piece of legislation, which will improve access to the judicial system for people in this Province that will reduce an impediment to obtaining funding for legal aid, and that will increase efficiency and reduce delay in the criminal justice system.

So, Mr. Speaker, legal aid, I want to make clear, is not about aid for lawyers. I know there may be some people out there who may think that, but that is certainly not the case.

Mr. Speaker, the government of this Province spends a lot of money to provide a justice system for the people of the Province, a justice system that they can have pride in. The justice system consists of many of the people that you see everyday in this Province. You may start off with the police, whose job is to enforce the law, whose job is to investigate criminal activity, and to lay charges. It is quite a powerful role the police play in our society. They are the institution in our society that determines who is going to be investigated. They are the institution that determines who is going to be charged with a criminal offence.

Then, after the charges are laid, the matter goes over to the Crown Attorney’s office, which is also provided by the Department of Justice. They prosecute cases in the criminal courts. The courts, of course, are provided by the Department of Justice as well. We provide judges in provincial court and we provide the officials who work in the courts. The federal government in Ottawa appoints the Supreme Court judges. Then there is a need for defence counsel. There is a need for anyone who is charged with an offence to be able to be defended by somebody who is learned in the law and can provide a fair and good defence to the person so charged.

Now, Mr. Speaker, legal aid in this Province is governed by a commission, the Legal Aid Commission. The Legal Aid Act of 1975 provide for the governance of legal aid in the Province by establishing this Legal Aid Commission. There is a commission consisting of five members and those five members are appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, which is the Cabinet. It also includes the Deputy Minister of Justice and the provincial executive director.

The Province is divided into ten areas and each of those areas has an area director. The Commissioners that presently serve this Province: Mr. Nick Avis, Q.C. is the Chair of the Commission. Mr. Avis, as many will remember, was one of the counsels in the Lamer Inquiry. I know Mr. Avis, many years ago, was a legal aid lawyer himself before going into private practice in Corner Brook and now here in St. John’s. Mr. William Collins, who is a noted prominent defence counsel, is on the Commission. Krista Gillam, another lawyer; Katie Rich from Natuashish, former chief of the Natuashish band council, Innu band council, and Mr. John Jenniex from Humber Village, a former regional director of the former Department of Social Services, is a very valued member of that Commission as well.

Now, to become eligible for legal aid, section 47 of the Legal Aid Act does provide that - it sets out the proceedings for which legal aid can be provided. These include in Supreme Court, in Family Court, in Provincial Court, where the applicant is charged with an indictable offence. An indictable offence, in a proceeding by way of indictment is more serious offences that exist under the Criminal Code as apposed to the less serious summary convictions, and the third group is the hybrid offences in which the Crown can proceed either by way of indictment or by summary proceedings.

Also, legal aid is available for sentences of preventative detention under part 24 of the Criminal Code. Now that is the dangerous offender or the long term offender provisions under the Extradition Act of Canada and under the Fugitive Offenders Act of Canada. So as you can see, legal aid is available for the serious offences, the indictable offences.

Section 48 also provides that legal aid coverage may be available - and I want to emphasis the word may - in the less serious summary conviction offences where upon conviction in those summary convictions offences where there is a likelihood of imprisonment or there is a possibility of loss of means of earning a livelihood.

Legal aid is available or may be available on summary conviction matters, but section 49 of the act also states that no coverage is available for a summary conviction offence unless the area director of the Legal Aid Commission is of the opinion – and there are four criteria that have to help him form his opinion. Under section 49(a), there must be a possible defence to the charge. Under 49(c), there must be in existence circumstances that will serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty that may be imposed.

Mr. Speaker, the Legal Aid Appeal Board which was established under section 55 of the legal aid regulations – we know that many of the appeals that are heard by that appeal board are in relation to summary conviction offences involving sections 49(a) and 49(c). These sections, as I previously indicated, dealt with whether or not there was the merit of a defence.

The Legal Aid Commission is of the view, and the Department of Justice certainly shares that view, that litigants should have proper legal representation in the courts in order to get a fair trial in a timely manner. However, much time is expended, much time, I believe, is wasted, when people who are charged with summary conviction offences have to go to the area director and to convince the area director that there is a valid defence, that there is a defence that exists. As I said, the commission is of the view, and the Department of Justice shares the view, that everyone who is charged with an offence in which there is a likelihood of imprisonment or there is a possibility of loss of livelihood, that that person is entitled to a defence, a legal aid lawyer, and a lawyer at the trial.

Mr. Speaker, when the Legal Aid Act was first passed the maximum jail sentence that was allowed for summary conviction offences was only six months. The Criminal Code has been amended a number of times since then, and with respect to summary conviction matters there is an increase in the maximum allowable sentence, and it is now twenty-four months. Obviously, there is now a major increase in the number of applications for legal aid coverage with respect to summary conviction matters.

Delays in assigning defence lawyers result in cases taking much longer than might otherwise be the case. You could have a year versus several weeks. These proposed amendments would remove the onus of area directors to demonstrate that there is a possibility of defence in summary conviction offences, so legal aid may be provided to the defendants. This would provide increased access to the court system for defendants, and it will also free up legal aid resources.

Now, the present Minister of Finance, who is the former Minister of Justice, called into being a Task Force on Criminal Justice Efficiencies. This task force is formed to examine the operations of the criminal justice system in the City of St. John’s, and to make recommendations to increase efficiency and to reduce delay in the court system without compromising fundamental principles of justice.

The task force reported in February, 2008 that unnecessary delays resulted in hardship for the accused who is in custody. Secondly, it rendered it more difficult to ensure that a trial is fair, that they are likely to be prejudicial to the prosecution’s case and could have a devastating effect upon both the victims and key witnesses. There would be increased costs that place additional pressure on scarce resources, and it would breed cynicism and lead, or tend to bring the administration of justice into disrepute.

The task force made a number of recommendations to improve legal aid, to improve the process, including a specific recommendation for early assignment and assessment of legal aid cases, and in the Crown’s office. The amendment that is before you today, under Bill 15, would be consistent with this recommendation and would allow for applications for legal aid to be processed more expeditiously, thereby reducing costs and inefficiencies in the court system.

Mr. Speaker, I am advised that there is no other system or jurisdiction in this country which limits legal aid coverage in summary conviction matters to situations where there is a possible defence to the charge. However, the provinces of Quebec and Manitoba, Saskatchewan and the Yukon do limit legal aid coverage to summary conviction matters where there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction, and two, because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the best interest of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel. These circumstances which exist in these provinces are similar to the proposed amendments that we are proposing to section 49 of the Province’s act.

Mr. Speaker, I am extremely pleased that we are introducing legislation here today to improve legal aid. I am very pleased that in our budget there was an additional, I believe it was $485,000 of additional new money that went into legal aid. I am pleased that over the years we have invested $4 million of additional funding to provide legal aid to the people of this Province. We are doing so at a time when in other jurisdictions, because of the financial difficulties or the fiscal difficulties, because of what has been referred to as an economic tsunami, because of this great recession, that other jurisdictions are having to do the opposite, that they are actually cutting funding from legal aid.

I noticed in New Brunswick that there is recently a Chief Judge of the Court of Queen’s Branch in the Province of New Brunswick. I criticized the New Brunswick government for reducing funding for legal aid in New Brunswick by $360,000. Again, the chief of the provincial court in New Brunswick echoed that particular criticism. So I am pleased that we are doing the opposite here, that we are making legal aid more accessible to more people. We are removing an impediment and we are increasing access to justice.

Mr. Speaker, this government, the government of Premier Williams has made significant investment in legal aid in our Province. We recognize the value of this service to the people of our Province who may not have the financial means of accessing the justice system. Since 2003, as I said earlier, over $4 million of new money has gone into the commission. We have increased the number of lawyers by twelve, the complement of lawyers in the Department of Justice; we have lawyers in the Crown Prosecutors Division; we have lawyers in the civil division. Now the number of lawyers in legal aid, for the first time this year, I think, is greater than the number of lawyers in the civil division or in the Crown Attorney’s Office.

We increased the staff by eight administrative assistants, six articling students, four paralegals and two in-take positions, as well as two social workers to support Child, Youth and Family Services teams. I know last year, Mr. Speaker, when money went into the system for more lawyers for Child, Youth and Family Services there was also money given to legal aid so they could make lawyers available as well to deal with that very important topic of child protection.

Mr. Speaker, we funded an in-take officer for the Legal Aid Commission for provincial court, as per the recommendations of the Task Force on Criminal Justice Efficiencies and also a client services officer to assist inmates at the prison, as per the recommendations of Chief Justice Lamer. These positions allow for quicker assessment of applications and for quicker assignment of lawyers for those who requested services of legal aid. Similar to the amendments we are debating today, the positions help increase efficiency within our court system.

Mr. Speaker, Labrador has been a major focus of our spending on legal aid. In November, 2005, I had the pleasure, as being Minister of Justice at the time, of attending the formal opening of the legal aid office in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. The expansion of this service was no doubt needed, greatly needed, and our government is very proud to deliver this for the people of Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, in 2007 government, the Member for St. John’s South was the Minister of Justice at the time, and he reappointed a provincial court judge in Wabush to service that area. To support this full-time presence, $200,000 was provided in Budget 2008 to establish a legal aid office in that area. That is one thing about the justice system, if you invest in one part of the justice system such as police, well if there are more police officers that means there are going to be more charges. If there are more charges that means you will need more legal aid lawyers. There are going to be more trials, so you need more judges and if there are more convictions you are going to need more room in the prisons and more probation officers and victim services officers.

The legal aid office in Labrador is supported by a lawyer and an administrative assistant. Of course, the Member for Labrador West who very nicely and very quietly but very effectively was the person who was instrumental in having a judge reappointed in Labrador West. Following that a –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. MARSHALL: - a Crown Prosecutor was appointed in Labrador West and following that, a legal aid lawyer was appointed in Labrador West, and then there is a need for jailers, male and female jailers for Labrador West. Then he came to me yesterday and he now wants additional sheriffs in Labrador West. He did it without petitions and he did it without ranting and raving but he did it very, very effectively.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. MARSHALL: Many people in the area, Mr. Speaker, particularly women’s groups, stressed the need for legal aid services in Labrador West. The Department of Justice was informed of the need to have affordable legal services, as in many cases individuals, particularly women, were facing the unfortunate circumstances of a terminating marriage or partnership and could not afford these services. So I think we are all very proud, and I know the Opposition shares the view that this very important service is now available to the residents of that part of our beautiful Province.

In Budget 2008, $400,000 was provided to the Legal Aid Commission to allow for counsel of choice for those who were facing charges of murder and manslaughter. This was another recommendation of the Task Force on Criminal Justice Efficiencies. It was intended to end the deliberate slowing of trials on procedural matters which often accompany such cases.

One hundred and twenty-six thousand dollars was also provided, Mr. Speaker, to support persons with mental illnesses who would be required to make court appearances under the Mental Health Act. This is about showing care and showing compassion for the vulnerable of our society. The idea of showing care and compassion has been an ongoing theme with respect to legal aid in our dealings with the Government of Canada. The challenge of convincing the federal government to support civil legal aid has been a significant one. It is a challenge which has united all justice ministers in all provinces and all territories of Canada.

Mr. Speaker, I spent three years previously as Minister of Justice and I attended these FPT meetings. We had the honour of hosting the federal-provincial territorial meeting of Justice Ministers, and it took place at Little Rapids in the Humber Valley Resort. What was interesting: Usually when you go to these meeting there is a very large rectangular table and the ministers and their officials and their delegations are around this very large table and you are pretty far from one another. In Humber Valley the rooms are not big enough and we were told by the federal government that we couldn’t have the meeting there. Even though Newfoundland was hosting, we couldn’t have the meeting there because they couldn’t get the big rectangular table into the room. We said, no, we are going to have it there and we will use a circular table, which is what we did. Everybody was kind of huddled together around the table. I remember having my arm over on the Minister of Justice from Saskatchewan. As a result of it all, we all got very, very friendly.

I know at one meeting I went to in Ottawa, Irwin Cutler, who is the Minister of Justice under the Liberal government, the Martin government, was very supportive of legal aid. He is a very well known and a very well respected human rights lawyer with an international reputation. He indicated to me that he was unsuccessful in convincing his colleague, Finance Minister Goodale, to put additional funds into legal aid.

Then there was a change in government, and when we had the meeting at Humber Valley on the West Coast, the hon. Vic Toews, who is now the Minister of Justice, and Stockwell Day who is the Minister of Public Safety, came down. There was a large delegation from here in St. John’s that went out and we broke bread with our federal counterparts and we worked on them to provide funding for legal aid. In fairness, Minister Toews, I don’t think he was with us but he agreed that he would bring our issue, that the federal government should put more money into legal aid, because it is about protecting vulnerable people, it is about access to justice for people who can’t afford it, it is about women, it is about Aboriginal groups, it is about the poor, it is about people with disabilities, and legal aid is very, very important. Unfortunately, we were unsuccessful once again.

When I became Minister of Finance and went to the first federal-provincial territorial meeting of Finance Ministers, the first thing I did at that meeting was raise with Finance Minister Flaherty the issue of legal aid. He looked down at me and he said: Why the heck are you raising that here? I raised it there because I understand that Minister Nicholson was of the view that the Department of Justice in Ottawa was not responsible for civil legal aid, and that it was a matter that had to be dealt with by the Department of Finance. I raised it, it was acknowledged, but now the federal government will still not provide the funds. We can only continue to appeal to them, that there is a significant group of people in society who need help, and the federal government should join with the provinces.

I am pleased that our Province has invested – you know, when legal aid started, the federal government provided 90 per cent of the cost and the provinces provided 10 per cent of the cost. That is now completely reversed. We are now in a situation where the federal government is providing about 20 per cent of the cost of legal aid and the provinces are providing the rest.

We will continue to do so, because we think it is important, but I would urge all members of the House to encourage their counterparts in Ottawa to get the federal government to change its position.

Mr. Speaker, the amendment here is a positive one. Both the public and stakeholders in the court process will benefit from this amendment. The purpose behind this legal principle is to improve the delivery of legal aid services and to facilitate access to justice. There is no point having one of the greatest justice systems in the world if an important segment of our population cannot gain access to that system. The government is doing the right thing by amending the Legal Aid Act here to ensure accessibility for the people of our Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to speak to this, and I would urge passage of second reading of this bill.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I take this opportunity to have a few words on Bill 15, An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act.

I listened intently to the commentary of the Minister of Justice. I must say, right off the top, I am still not certain if I will be voting in support of this, or against this bill.

The reason I say that is, again, I do not have a good enough understanding at this point. That is the purpose, of course, of debate, to get educated when you do not understand something, to ask some questions. I will pose those questions and make those comments to the minister because I do not know if I misinterpreted what the bill is suggesting or not, but he started off his commentary by saying this bill will improve the system, will cause an efficiency, will make access to justice easier.

Now, I do not know if that is exactly what this is about, and I will go on and hopefully explain why I think that. I believe that is the intention. The government was hoping to improve the inefficiency, shall we say, in the legal aid application process that is there right now.

If that is the case, of course, we applaud it and we will be supportive of it. Anything that improves the legal aid application system, of course, is beneficial to the citizens, and that is what any program that we have is hopefully all about.

A lot of people, of course, avail of the legal aid system. I believe last year’s figures show that 7,585 people made application for legal aid; and, of those numbers, about 3,900, almost 4,000, were processed. I am not sure if those are exactly the latest figures. I know it was mentioned, and I had the benefit of reading, the Newfoundland and Labrador Legal Aid Commission Annual Report, but that report is for 2007-2008, so some of the information, no doubt, now that we are in 2009, might need to be updated.

We have received hundreds of calls in our office. That is part of an Opposition office, of course, that whenever something goes wrong people call you, not only as an MHA but in your main office here in the Confederation Building, when they have a problem accessing the system, and we have gotten literally hundreds of calls from people who say they have been denied access to legal aid and they do not feel it was proper that they were denied, and they have their reasons and state their reasons why they were denied.

In a lot of cases in our system right now, if you are wealthy or better off you can do fairly well in the justice system because you have the money to pay for a lawyer, or if you are on the other end of the range and you are poorer you can avail of the legal aid situation, but there is a whole body of people in between that who have to pay the piper themselves. No doubt the rich people pay themselves, also, but a lot of people do not have the money that it takes to go through some complex cases sometimes. Certainly, when it comes to civil matters that can be litigated for months on end, it is a very costly procedure. In fact the phrase, I think, that is being used today is that clients are being bled out, because the system is so expensive that it is not affordable, and that they are bled out because they are financially, in a lot of cases, bankrupt and insolvent before they get to the end of the case.

Fortunately for some people they realize that going in so they just do not retain a lawyer in any case, but too often, of course, there is a financial barrier that results in people giving up the fight before the justice that they are entitled to can actually be served.

The purpose of legal aid, of course, is to hopefully help the situation whereby you can provide to some people, along with certain criteria, who meet certain criteria, legal aid counsel so that they can help them out.

The minister used the word when he was going through, and he said: I emphasis the word may. That is no doubt the operative word here because it is not a case of shall - for example, the government shall do this or the government should do that, or legal aid, in this case, shall do this. It is not a mandatory provision that you are automatically going to get it; it is a may. There is always a question mark around it: Do you meet the criteria or not?

Looking at the amendment that we have here, specifically the first amendment, the only substitution I see from the old law to what we are amending is the word only, in section 48.(1), because previously it read as follows, "The area director may grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it in a summary conviction proceeding under an Act of the Parliament of Canada or of the Legislature where upon conviction there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood."

Now it says in this Bill 15, "The area director may only grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it in a summary conviction proceeding under an Act of the Parliament of Canada or of the Legislature where he or she is of the opinion that (a) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction; or (b) because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel."

Then it goes on, "(2) For the purposes of paragraph 47(d), an offence that may be tried on indictment or on summary conviction shall be considered to be an offence triable on summary conviction until the time that the prosecution elects to proceed on indictment."

Basically, as I read this, the word "only" - that substitution - suggests that there was more room previously to the area directors to make consideration on individual cases under the old provisions. The area director had a fair amount of discretion. For example, in the old legislation, legal aid would not be granted unless - and there were four conditions back then - (a) there is a possible defence to the charge; (b) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction; (c) there are in existence circumstances that would serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty that may be imposed; and, (d) because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel.

Now we have gone from those four provisions that were there before, to now we only have two. I would suggest that, as opposed to making access easier to the justice system, what we have done here is removed from the area directors the discretion that he had before to give consideration to those other two issues that have now been taken out.

For example, before, if there was a possibility of a defence to the charge, the area director could have given a legal aid certificate if there was a possibility of a defence. So, when the person who was charged went into the legal aid office and made their application, somebody does the assessment on a financial basis – do you meet certain financial criteria – but there was also a consideration of: Does the person have a defence possibility here?

You might well listen to the circumstances, read the facts or whatever that are provided in the disclosure documents from the Crown, and you might decide, as an area director, yes, we believe, on assessment, that person has a great defence – a possibility of a defence. Yet, now, under the way this act is being amended, that discretion piece is being taken away from the area director.

So, are we compromising on the one hand, that we are thinking we are going to achieve efficiencies in the system by cutting it from four provisions down to two, but at the same time we are taking that discretionary piece away from the area directors? What is more important?

I say that because you hear the old phrase: Don’t throw out the baby with the bath water. I am all in favour, and I am sure everybody is in favour, of getting efficiencies in any system, but at the same time if you compromise the opportunity that a person might have to get access to justice, by taking that out, have you really gained? Or you have gained but you have compromised the access to justice piece? Because I may well have a good defence but, right now, according to my read of this, an area director is not even going to have any - anything about it. In fact, they use the word only. They do not say, well, we are taking it out but the discretion still exists there. It is made very clear to area directors on a go-forward basis that there are only two things you can consider.

Now, whether or not the person had a good defence is out the window. I do not think that is very beneficial for our system. If we trust these people who work in our legal aid offices and our area directors to make these decisions, what is wrong with leaving that consideration in there? I think it is a very good consideration. In fact, I have a feeling that as a result of this amendment we may well end up with people falling through cracks in the system by taking this discretionary piece away from the area directors.

Under the current system, for example, if I applied for legal aid and he said you did not qualify, there is an appeal process. A lot of times in the appeal process you could argue that: Look, I should be given legal aid because I have, not only a possible defence, I have a probable defence. I have a great defence. The area director might even agree with me, but on a go-forward basis his hands are tied. He cannot, under the best of circumstances, say that is a consideration.

The other one that is being removed here is currently called (c) that is being taken out. It says: There are in existence circumstances that would serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty that may be imposed. The purpose that this is all about, of course, is so we do not have someone in court who is defending themselves, we are trying to provide counsel if it is going to help the system. Why would we take that away from the director? A person, for example, might qualify financially, meet all the financial requirements and today, one of the facts might be that by having a lawyer go to court with that person and explain the statement of facts, give the explanations as to what happened, speak and represent the accused, that may well help that individual have a less severe penalty by having legal counsel, but the area directors, on a go-forward basis, will not have that discretionary authority. I do not know how we are causing an efficiency in the system if we are taking away things that are intended to give people access to justice. It is contradictory. We trust these people. Just because it does not exist in B.C. or it does not exist in Nunavut, why do we need to take it out here?

So I think, contrary to what the minister started off by saying we are causing efficiencies in the system, I think just the contrary. I think we are causing less people to have access to the system because we are now forcing the area directors to be restricted to two reasons as to why he will or will not give legal aid. They specifically do that. There is no misunderstanding here. They use the word only. In other words area director, no matter if you think that you can get that person, by having him have a lawyer he can get two months as opposed to two years. Forget about the fact that he has a perfectly valid defence. Out the window, you are not even going to get to look at it. Now I do not think that is very good for our justice system, and that is not what it was all about.

The minister talks about all of the good things that government has done over the years when it comes to the provision of legal services. There certainly have been things done, not only in the legal aid system, but police officers, for example, more members for the RNC, more training for the RNC officers, new court facilities, and more sheriffs’ offices and so on. These are all great things but if at the same time – and he talked about, in a lot of cases he said: legal aid is about disadvantaged people. Legal aid is about women. Legal aid is about Aboriginal people. Legal aid is about the poorer people. That is all true, but at the same time this amendment, I suggest, is going to compromise some of those same people by not having the area directors on a go-forward basis be able to exercise this discretion.

Now that is some of my main concerns about the actual bill, and I am sure the minister will ponder the situation and I would appreciate his commentary on it. Maybe I am just confused, maybe I am out to lunch on this, but that is my reading of it. You had four ways to consider something, you say now you only have two ways. I think by taking away those two we have compromised the access, and I do not think that is the intention here. I do not think that is the intention at all but that is the way, I would submit, that is the end result of it. Not intended, but that is the end result of it.

If you read what it says now, go back again, it says: "The area director may only grant legal aid…" So we are not talking about something that is done in a positive vein even. Even the language is restrictive, negative, thou shalt not do. "The area director may only grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it in a summary conviction proceeding…" and, by the way, summary conviction proceedings, for those who do not know, we basically have under our criminal code two systems, two types of offences. We have summary conviction, which are the less serious of charges versus indictable offences, which are the more serious.

For example, murder would be an indictable offence whereas you might have - summary conviction might be a break and enter for example. So when you go to court the charges are laid, the Crown prosecutor decides, in some cases it could be either. Sometimes it could be indictable but he has the prosecutorial digression to go by summary conviction rather than treat it as the more indictable offence. Here we are talking about: "The area director may only grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it in a summary conviction proceeding under an Act of the Parliament of Canada…" and that is no doubt talking about the criminal code or other federal offences "…or of the Legislature where he or she is of the opinion that (a) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction; or (b) because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel."

Now maybe we do not need, maybe it is going to be suggested: well, we are getting rid of the earlier clause (b) that I talked about, the possibility of a defence (a) we are getting rid of that because now we can fit that under (b). It could be suggested because of extraordinary circumstances it is in the interest of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel. The minister might try to convince me and convince the public: well, we do not need that (a) one that we had formerly because the possibility of a defence fits under this one right here. Well I submit it does not, because this offence, this section talks about extraordinary circumstances. Now the possibility of an offence or a defence is not an extraordinary circumstance, I would submit. So what you have done is you have definitely restricted the authority of the area directors and you have done nothing to speed up the process.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Pardon?

In the old legislation legal aid would not be granted unless (a) there is a possible defence to the charge (b) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction (c) there are in existence circumstances that would serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty that may be imposed, and (d) because of extraordinary circumstances it is in the interest of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel. That was under the old system and now we are only going to have the two. You are only going to consider two events not the four events, I say to the minister.

Anyway, I look forward to the minister’s explanation of it. I pose my concerns and he will get an opportunity in closing or in committee reading to give his explanation, but that is the concern and that is why I said when I started I cannot say I am going to support the bill because I am not clear again. Not that I do not support it, it is just that I am not clear on the old wording, the new wording, and if we are really getting ahead on accomplishing anything here.

Now the minister talked a little bit about our legal aid system of course, and this is where all of this fits. We are making amendments to an act but there is a process that we have to go through. I would like to spend a few moments, if I might, just talking about that process as well. We started legal aid in this Province back in 1968 and at that time legal aid was managed by a committee of the Law Society. We did not even have like it is today. There was just a committee of the Law Society, the lawyers themselves, and they managed the whole system back then. That was in 1968, but in 1976 that changed, and the Legal Aid Commission was then established. That was established under the Legal Aid Act and they assumed responsibility for the legal aid plan.

So they shifted it out of the Law Society where there were obviously some possible administrative issues, the fact that it was governed by lawyers and so on. Governments were putting monies into the plan and only the lawyers themselves were deciding the administration of it. They decided that was not a good system. So we are going to take it out of the hands of the Law Society committee and put it into its own statutorily constituted commission, and that is when it started. There are seven people on it, as the minister said. You try to have people on there who, number one, work in some way or experience in some way the people who use the system so that there is an appreciation, as a committee member, of not only the wording of the act and how it is applied, but you have some understanding of our justice system, you have some understanding of the different circumstances in which legal aid might be required.

The persons on it now, of course, Mr. Nick Avis, alluded to by the minister. I happened to be the minister at the time and appointed Mr. Nick Avis as chair of the commission. That was back, I do believe, in 2002; very well-known criminal law practitioner in this Province, Mr. Avis, a friend of mine. I first met him back in Corner Brook. He was working with legal aid at the time. He punched his time in the trenches. He certainly knows what it is like to represent – he did some of the more complex, serious criminal cases in this Province while he was a practitioner with legal aid on the West Coast. Then he went into private practice after a few years and he moved in –

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Mr. Avis. Then he moved in here to St. John’s and he has conducted a private practice in here since as a criminal lawyer again. I believe he is also very well-known in family law circles are well.

He is a very competent person, very well-organized person and certainly understands the system. I am pleased to see that not only did I think I made a good choice when I appointed him back in 2002, but he is still there with this government as well. In a lot of these appointments, if you are fortunate enough to have someone of that capability to do the job - and he is absolutely apolitical, he is the type of individual who is concerned about the process and concerned about getting it right, a very competent person. In fact, as mentioned by the minister, he was one of the legal counsel to the Lamer Inquiry. I am pleased to say as well that I was the minister who appointed the Lamer Inquiry. We had some serious issues in our justice system in this Province, wrongful conviction issues. They had percolated for years in the system. People said we had issues with our legal aid system. We had issues with our police system when it came to the RNC, possibly, and how they investigated an offence - was it done properly and so on - and suggestions that the prosecution arm of our system might be faulty in some ways, so all of that culminated.

I was personally of the view that, look, it is time to delve into these things and have a comprehensive review of our criminal justice system, because if the population does not have an appreciation and a respect for and confidence in our justice system we are on a short road; we are going downhill pretty fast. That is why I was personally pleased to be involved with the appointment of the Lamer Inquiry. That was the whole purpose, to do a comprehensive review of our justice system. Because each and every one of us, on a daily basis, needs to have that confidence in the system to make sure that it works for all of us, because it might be someone today but it may be yourself tomorrow, or a friend or a family member of yours, and we all need to have confidence that the system will work, regardless of who it is and who is involved.

The other person involved there, I noticed the vice-chair is a Krista Gillam. I was not aware of that until I saw the annual report, but I am pleased to say that Ms Gillam, actually, is a native of my home town, Port aux Basques. I did not have anything to do with her appointment. It was after my time but I am pleased to see that again government, in its wisdom – besides, of course, she is a big advocate for women’s rights and she is a very intelligent person. In fact, she is one of the few people, as I understand it, from the Province who was accepted for law school after only two years of university.

For most people the trend is, if you go to law school you generally need to have an undergrad degree before you are accepted. Ms Gillam was very intelligent and very bright, and after two years of Memorial University she was accepted into Dalhousie Law School, I believe it was, and she became a lawyer in five years, shall we say, as opposed to the normal seven or eight years that it takes for the normal route.

She is very experienced in the criminal justice system. She came here after her graduation. She worked with another gentleman who is mentioned there, Mr. William Collins. Mr. Collins, of course, is well known in criminal legal circles in this Province as being one of the best when it comes to the criminal law, and how it works, and as a defence counsel. Krista Gillam worked for William Collins for quite some years. I do believe now she has moved on; she is in one of the government agencies, the workers’ comp board or one of the other agencies. I do not believe she is actually practicing any more now in private practice with Mr. Collins, but Mr. Collins, of course, is still plying the trade, and very ably so.

One of the nicest things, I guess, you get to do when you are Minister of Justice is the process of QC appointments. Every now and then, every year - there is actually a Queen’s Counsel Act, and under that act you have the right, as a minister, to bring forward certain names and the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, based upon the recommendations and so on, makes the appointments and there is an official swearing-in service. It is a recognition to people who have been in the service long-standing, recognized for their skills, experience and so on, and they are awarded a QC thing. The Minister of Justice was a QC recipient back in the 1980s, I do believe. That is how the system works.

I did not know Mr. Collins but his reputation preceded him, and I had the pleasure of awarding a QC to him back some years ago. I have to say, the man was the most appreciative recipient of a QC that I have ever met in my life. In fact, I remember when they did the swearing-in ceremony; they had a little reception after. The Law Society usually hosts a little reception, and they hosted a reception at the Delta after the ceremony took place at Government House, and I met his mother. Mr. Collins himself, I guess, is in his sixties now, late sixties, and his mom was there, a senior, but she was as proud as a peacock. Here was an individual who had years - thirty-plus or forty years at that time - in the legal profession and he had not been recognized as one of the principal practitioners of the criminal justice system in this Province. Over all those years that he practiced - and he was well known; he is a constant fixture when it comes to TV and major cases in this Province - he had been overlooked. There was, I say, a great source of pride on my part that I could do it and give him the recognition that he so richly deserved.

That was my experience with Mr. Collins, and to see that we have a Legal Aid Commission which has someone of his calibre on the Legal Aid Commission, there is no wonder that the commission is working properly, and no question as to why this commission is advancing when it comes to trying to make the legal aid system in this Province a better place.

The other mixture: Mr. Jenniex, of course, a former member of Social Services, great background, great experience as a social worker and administrator in this Province, to bring those skills sets to the commission; Katie Rich, the Aboriginal perspective that the minister alluded to, several of the major projects that the Legal Aid Commission have administered, created, administered in the last number of years, involved Aboriginals. To have someone of her stature and experience and capability and understanding of the problems first-hand, and how you can best deal with them, to have her insight onto that committee again is certainly very pleasing to see; and, of course, you have your government officials there. I do believe the current Deputy Minister of Justice, Mr. Burrage, is there, a very knowledgeable person; and, of course, we have the gentleman who I believe has been around as long as legal aid has been around, Mr. Newman Petten. It seems like he came with the system, a great gentleman, very competent again, very concerned and dedicated to his job, and he has been there for a great number of years. So we are certainly in good hands in terms of who we have on deck and the senior officers when it comes to the Legal Aid Commission itself.

Some people think that legal aid is only associated with: someone has committed a crime so they go down and they fill out an application and they get a lawyer appointed to them who will look after them. They never had any money and they could not afford it, so they got a lawyer to look after them because they committed a crime. That is the general understanding of a lot of people of what legal aid is all about, but legal aid has a line of business that is a little bit more complex than that.

For example, legal aid provides duty counsel to accused persons appearing in provincial and youth courts across the Province - duty counsel. Now, that is not where they have been assigned a lawyer to fight their case for them, shall we say. Usually when the court day starts there is a plea day. There could be fifty or sixty things on the docket for that day. A lot of times people are in trouble with the system for the first time and they do not understand the system, and that is what duty counsel does. It does not matter who you are. It does not matter how much money you have. You can go to court on a plea day and the duty counsel will give you some guidance as to what to do. There is no financial restriction on the duty counsel, and that is great - you talk about making the system efficient – that is great, because a lot of times if someone does not understand the basics of the system, and how it works, you can spend a lot of time in a courtroom trying to get through that process.

I have had cases myself, for example, where you would be sitting in a courtroom, there are fifty or sixty things on a docket, and there was no duty counsel, but these people have legitimate questions. You would not believe how much court time gets consumed, because the judge has an obligation to explain the process to these people and he took the time. All the judges that I ever had took the time, when an individual had a problem, to explain the process to them so that these are your options. This is the charge that is against you, that is alleged against you. Now, what do you want to do? These are your options.

That used to take a lot of time whereas now the duty counsel, that is done outside before you ever walk in through the court door. You have had the process explained to you, and you know what your options are. Then, when you go into the courtroom, the judge does not have to take that time to explain it all to you. We did not always have that, so the system does indeed work more efficiently today because we have the duty counsel.

They also have a system, as I understand, what they call the Brydges duty counsel. That is a twenty-four-hour telephone service to people arrested or detained by the police. Now, contrary to most people’s beliefs again, you do not have to be poor to get legal aid. You certainly do not have any financial restrictions on you when it comes to, if you have been picked up the police. It applies to everybody, without restraint, and a lot of people do not know that. For example, if anyone in this House tonight left here to drive home and the police, for whatever reason, felt they had some grounds to arrest you, and they pulled you over in your car and you said: Well, what is this all about?, and they took you and arrested you, no matter what your level of income, you have a right to call the 1-800 number and get some advice from that lawyer. You do not have to go through any financial process. You do not have to pick up the phone and say: Oh, I have a problem. I am down in the lock-up and I need some advice. What do I do?

Nobody takes a financial statement from you. You just make the call and there will be somebody twenty-four-seven to answer your call. A lot of people do not know that, and that is a nice piece of information because, as I say, no matter if you are a man or a woman, or if you are rich or if you are poor, that right exists for everybody, and that is what justice is all about.

A lot of people do not know the intricacies of the law and, because we do not, that is why we need to have some advice. It might be something very simple that you need to know, but obviously if you are not legally trained you do not know it. You can pick up the phone and call that legal aid number. In fact, you do not even have to know the number. You hear these things about the one phone call, and all this stuff that you hear. A lot of that comes from American television, of course. We have had some incidents lately, of course, involving the young gentleman who had autism, who was picked up by the police, in terms of the phone call or how many phone calls he could make, or did he get to make a phone call and so on.

If you are detained or arrested - and there is a difference between being detained or arrested - you have a right to say to the police: I want to call a lawyer and I understand that you have a number here for a free lawyer, the legal aid lawyer, duty counsel. I want the number. They have to give it to you. In fact, it is posted up down in all the police stations, and everywhere you might go in this Province you can avail of that service.

Also, the legal aid system, residents of this Province who meet certain financial and case eligibility criteria can get representation not only in criminal law but in family cases. You can also get it in some instances for appeals. There may have been something happen and you are not pleased with the decision and you need to appeal that case. So you can get it in the appeals. It is not only for the provincial court circumstances, for the things you see going through provincial court. It can be a higher superior court, if you meet certain criteria. Representation before administrative tribunals, in such areas as: immigration and refugee claims, Canada Pension, Employment Insurance, and social assistance. Now in a lot of these cases people either do it themselves - like everybody in this House, for example, is certainly familiar with the Canada Pension appeal system and with the Employment Insurance system.

I know the Member for Port de Grave here is probably the most experienced, I would go so far as to say the most experienced member or MHA when it comes to Canada Pension Plan appeals and EI appeals, bar none, than anybody who has ever sat in this House. Not only that, he is very successful at it; a great track record. The F. Lee Bailey of Canada Pension and EI claims sits right here as the Member for Port de Grave, and any person you ever talked to who has sat as a commissioner on these tribunals will acknowledge that. Very well presented, does not have a legal background, always perfectly prepared, knows how to explain the case, always has his medical evidence and stuff that he needs and knows the fashion to put his arguments together, and the results have spoken to just how organized he is in that pursuit. Now, not all of us of course have the experience and the wisdom of the Member for Port de Grave and can do that.

So, you can get legal aid in some cases. A lot of people do not know that. A lot of people do not even know about the existence of that right, but under certain circumstances if you have a Canada Pension Plan issue you can get legal aid, as I understand it, to give you legal counsel under certain prescribed circumstances. As well as certain social assistance tribunals, if you need it, if you can justify it and you meet the criteria, you have that right to have that representation.

MR. T. MARSHALL: (Inaudible)

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Yes, and I say to the Minister of Justice, not only is he the expert, he does not charge. You cannot say that for the legal system. He does it all free of charge as part of his duties as an MHA. He is not required to, of course, but most MHAs do these things as a service to your constituents. Especially, a lot of times I find – I have had the experience that a lot of people do not understand the system. They feel intimated by the system. Some people lack the educational ability to even figure out the forms or deal with the paperwork involved, and MHAs of course step up to the plate and do these kinds of things because that is part of your chores to do them.

The legal aid system that we have goes far beyond criminal law, as I just indicated. The other piece that I found intriguing is it is not only for residents. You would think that in order to access the legal aid system of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador that you must be a resident of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. That would seem to be an obvious thing, but there are circumstances where non-residents can access it. Even though you live in Ontario, there are circumstances where you get into an issue here, a problem while you are here, you can go to our legal aid system and they have mechanisms whereby they might provide the defence here and there is a trade off then with the legal aid plan of your home province. So that kind of stuff happens. A lot of people were not aware of that.

Tourists, for example, how often – I know I personally had a situation where a lot of tourists, over the course of the twenty-odd years that I practised, came to me and they had a little issue. They ran into something in a park while they were here, or they got a traffic violation, or something happened of that nature and they did not know where to turn. They do not need to come in and pay a lawyer to get that information. Our legal aid duty counsel, the twenty-four hour service will tell you that. Whether you are a resident or a non-resident, you are allowed to avail of that service. That is, again, a circumstance that a lot of people were not aware of.

Talking about the expansions of the system as to where we have come, and we have come a long ways over the last thirty years when I first saw the practice in Corner Brook. We have offices now in - St. John’s, of course, houses the head office of legal aid. That office has a provincial director and there are four senior lawyers there and fifteen support staff. In St. John’s we have two other offices in addition to that. Marystown has an office; Clarenville has an office, Gander, Grand Falls, Corner Brook, Happy Valley, Stephenville, and Carbonear. There is also a family and child legal aid services office here in St. John’s. There is a family and child legal aid services in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. There is a mental health court. That was a project that has proven to be very successful, as I understand it, and that is here in St. Johns. We have family justice services in Central Newfoundland; that is accordingly to this report. I am aware, as well, that some other things have improved since that time.

The minister made reference to Wabush, for example, with a legal aid office there. In fact, I am pleased to say again that the young gentleman who staffs your Wabush office is a resident of Port aux Basques. Yes, we do produce a fair number of lawyers out of that little place, and he is running the legal aid office in Wabush. A very bright person; actually articled at the firm where I was working myself. So he got great training I would submit. He went into the system, and he is there and he loves it; loves Labrador. He is a native of Port aux Basques. He did not know when he first left and went to Labrador - he first went to Happy Valley-Goose Bay and he was not sure, being away from home for the first time, he is only a young guy, he did not know how he was going to make out. I was speaking to him shortly after - he was not up there I do not think six months and he happened to come home for a visit with his mom and dad again and I ran into him, and he loves the place. He has since taken up residence in Wabush. I fear that, other than a family visit from time to time, we are not going to see him back on the Southwest Coast of Newfoundland anytime soon.

I mentioned earlier about the number of people who apply for legal aid. About, right now, I think there is slightly less than 50 per cent who apply, who get accepted. About 7,600 people applied in that particular year and about 4,000 people got accepted. Now obviously, I guess, in an ideal utopian system everybody would have a lawyer, without issue, no matter if you have money or you did not have money. If you had a problem you would have a fully paid legal counsel to help you through our system and give you the justice. Unfortunately, we are not in that utopian situation where we can afford to do that.

I would like to mention as well a couple of the projects that the Legal Aid Commission has been involved in over the past number of years, and very, very good projects. That is why I say about the people who you have on the Legal Aid Commission and a lot of this stuff generates from them and the staff members and so on that they have working with them.

There was an Aboriginal project, for example, operating out of the Happy Valley-Goose Bay office. It was intended to facilitate working with Aboriginal communities to better improve the quality of legal services to Aboriginal people. I understand that it has worked very, very well.

We had the mental health project, which of course, that was in collaboration with the Health Care Corporation. The purpose of that was to develop a protocol to improve and more efficiently deliver legal services to people with mental health problems. I have already alluded to the fact that they have established here in the city a particular mental health court. It is good to see that you just do not run the system the same year in and year out. We have come to the realization that you need sometimes special courts to deal with special issues.

For example, you have the Aboriginal project, which is great. You have the mental health project. We have a French-speaking project. That was, of course, where they hired a lawyer to make sure that the lawyer was fluent in French and to provide legal advice by telephone. Lots of times we have people in this Province and visitors from outside who do not speak English and yet legal aid has the capability that you can contact a person and get representation, get advice. In fact, in some cases you can get trials.

My friend, the colleague from the District of Port au Port, for example, he has a lot of French-speaking people in his district and if that is their preference, that they qualify for legal aid and they want to have a French-speaking lawyer assigned to them, that capability is there within our legal aid system today. That, I do believe, is patterned off – the same issue existed in our courts. I do believe at one time we did not have in the provincial courts in our Province the capability to deal with people - I know we had cases when I was practising where if you have an individual who is travelling through the Province who runs into a problem and he ends up in court and the judge does not understand the language, how do you ever deal with and dispose of the case?

Now we were fortunate enough for awhile on the west coast. I do believe the first provincial court judge appointed specifically because he had French-speaking capability was Judge Michael Roche some years ago. He had been a Crown prosecutor on the west coast for many, many years and he became a judge. I believe that was one of the criteria that was in his favour big time, was that he was fluent in speaking French as well.

MR. T. MARSHALL: And his brilliance.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: And his brilliance as well, I say to the minister. He was in fact a very brilliant character. I had the pleasure or misfortune sometimes, I was on the wrong end of many judgements that he had rendered because once he got on the bench of course he had to do what was right and proper when it came to his judicial renderings. I did not always get the answers that I wanted but you got justice and that was the name – at the end of the day you had an opportunity to represent your client fairly to see that your client availed of all the rules that exist and then you of course had to live with the decision once it came down.

We also have family and child legal aid services. I understand there are two offices, one in St. John’s and one in Happy Valley–Goose Bay and according to that report there was intentions to do the same thing, I do believe, and it is now in the Corner Brook office as well, Family Justice Services. We have recently, of course, had the appointment - in this Province, when it came to family law, we had the Unified Family Court system, which has existed in St. John’s here for quite some time. These judges are appointed by the federal government, as are all of our Superior Court judges. There was a system in St. John’s that dealt exclusively with family law, but we did not have a similar system anywhere else.

For example, if you were getting a divorce in St. John’s, or had a family issue involving custody or access, you could go to this court that had exclusively trained, experienced judges who dealt with family law, and had years and years of it, whereas on the West Coast, the judge who sat there, he had to deal with all of it. He is more like the MD as opposed to the specialist. One day he might have a divorce, the next day he had a corporate case, and the next day he had some criminal law case. Now that has changed. They are going to be putting a system in Corner Brook which has the exclusive family law piece, like they do down here in the Unified Family Court. The person who is appointed to be the first judge, as I understand it, of the Unified Family Court in Corner Brook, is Judge David Peddle.

AN HON. MEMBER: He was born (inaudible).

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I cannot say he was born in Port aux Basques, but he is the godfather of my son so I did have the occasion of meeting him. He is a very intelligent, down-to-earth person. I wrote him, of course, to congratulate him upon his appointment as soon as I heard about it - a very level-headed, common sense person. I think, in order to be the most effective Family Court judge, besides just the judicial understanding and smarts, you need to have a huge dose of common sense. He certainly has that, and a good, sound humanity about him. They could not have made a better choice when it comes to that type of selection than Judge Peddle.

The Legal Aid Commission, too, as I understand it from the commission, are not a standstill type of organization. I am sure they keep the feet of the Minister of Justice to the fire, because they are the type of group that every year can come back to you with fifteen new recommendations as to how we can improve the system. Of course, most times these recommendations have a price tag attached to them and you want new offices, you want new staff, you want the things that go with it, you want these extra projects that you have, and, of course, the minister and the department is not always in a position where you can give everything that you would like to be able to give when it is asked for.

I know when I was there, for example, we did not have the benefit of the cash flow that has existed in the past few years. The need was no different back in 2001 and 2002, for example, when it came to the need for legal aid lawyers, the need for RNC officers, but the money just was not there to do what you wanted to do and what this government has been fortunate enough to do in the last few years. We have seen massive changes to the legal aid system.

I would like to comment as well, the minister made a comment about who does what. It is pretty obvious that the federal government has seriously, drastically, unforgivably, dropped the ball when it comes to their obligations on legal aid and the support for the legal aid system in this country - not only in this Province but in this country. Back originally the federal government used to put in 90 per cent of the cost of the system and the provinces had 10 per cent. Now, over the course of the last twenty years, as the minister said, that switched. In fact, the minister said he believes the federal government now only puts in about 20 per cent. Well, the figure is actually 16 per cent. They have gone from putting in 90 per cent of the cost of the legal aid system, down to 16 per cent.

Of course, fortunately, the Province over the years did not say that the amount of money in the pot declined, the feds are not putting it in, and we have to get by on what we have. Governments have tried to make up for the difference, because albeit the feds did not put the money in the pot, you still needed a pot because you still needed a system. Because the federal government failed in their obligations to put the money in that was required, the provincial government had to step up to the plate. Unfortunately, you did not always have the money to put in what you wanted to the same extent as they were not putting it in, and that, of course, impacted the system and that led to fewer lawyers then there ought to have been in the legal aid system. It is a simple process when you size it up.

The justice system moves slowly at the best of times, but if you have a system whereby people who want and need advice to walk through that system do not have it, you cramp the system even more. Of course, that is the role of having duty counsel, legal aid lawyers; that is the role of having legal counsel appointed.

I have had the benefit of - or, not benefit of - the circumstance of, shall we say, of being a prosecutor for eighteen years, and there is nothing tougher than being a prosecutor, and I would think being a judge, if you have someone who is charged who is not represented. I have gone through that where you feel, albeit you had to do your job as a prosecutor, you also feel, because you are an officer of the court, you want to make sure that the person understands exactly what is going on, and that if there is a defence that he or she needs to get out, that they get it out. That is not your role as prosecutor, just to get convictions. That is not what it is all about. You have to do it fairly and present the evidence that exists in a proper manner. It is very unfortunate, and that happened and that cramped our system here, simply because the federal government did not put their money in.

I actually looked at the Estimates; I did the Estimates Committee earlier this month with the Minister of Justice. That is a process, of course, where we get to ask him about where the money goes, where does it come from, how much money is in the system, what do you spend it on, or are you spending it wisely and so on. I do not think anybody in this Province would suggest that what goes into the legal aid system is not spent wisely. There is a recognition that it is needed. We all probably, if we truly understood the system, would appreciate that there is not enough money into it.

I mentioned those figures of the federal government only puts in 16 per cent and the Province puts in the rest, which is 84 per cent that the Province kicks in. Right now, this year, there is going to be a total of $14 million put into the legal aid system in this Province, as I understand it; $14 million a year that it takes to run the system. That is a lot of money, but it is not enough. It is still not enough.

It is interesting, and I never realized this before, when I looked at the Legal Aid Commission report, they have financial statements attached to the back of the report, and I notice that it is not only the federal government and the provincial government that put money in. The Law Foundation of Newfoundland also puts money into the legal aid system to the tune of – at least in this count here it was $1.1 million that went into the legal aid from the Law Foundation, so it comes from a variety of sources, their funding. The provincial government puts in the bulk of it, the federal government kicks in their, I shall say, measly 16 per cent, and the Law Foundation kicks in a few dollars as well to make sure that the system is working properly.

The other thing about the report is that they just did not give you the sugar-coated stuff, the sugar-coated version of what was good. They pointed out that they have some challenges. I like it that they do not consider them just challenges; they consider them to be opportunities as well. For example, one was the Wabush-Labrador City office that, at that time, they wanted to put there; and, sure enough, they have that done now. They wanted to put a family and child legal aid services office in Corner Brook. That has been done in the last year.

He points out - Mr. Avis does, in his report - very, very well that when you do these kinds of projects it is not simply a matter of throwing some money at something and it happens. There is a lot of planning that goes into this to see: What is the need? What are the options we have? What is the best way to go about trying to fix the problem?

For such a project to succeed, of course, there needs to be education, education of the public. The public needs to have an understanding of what it is you are trying to accomplish, and the staff need to have an understanding, because in a lot of cases the system will work better if you have people who are experienced, who are well trained, who understand what it is you are trying to do with the new project and so on - and, of course, the courts. So, there has to be a whole bunch of stakeholders who are educated as to what it is you are trying to accomplish.

That was like in the case of the mental health court, which we have had and it has been successful. In fact, I do believe that the mental health court was so effective that it became a template for another particular problem that we saw, and that is the issue of family violence. A lot of times these cases are complex and they are very, shall we say, emotion laden because you are dealing with families, you are dealing with violence issues, you have victims sometimes who are spouses - quite often, in fact, females, women, who were the victims in family violence issues - and you had children who were victims, so you needed to have a system that had its own experience and its own piece of common sense and humanity around it for dealing with the issues and you just could not strictly deal with it in the parameters of a normal courtroom type of setting. You needed to have judges who were properly equipped to deal with those types of issues, and the staff who knew how to deal with those types of issues.

I am very pleased to see recently, in fact, that the Family Court system project has been kicked off here, and hopefully it will have the same life as the mental court process and at the end of the day it will not be just a project any more; it will actually be a continuing part of our justice system.

The judge there, of course, is Judge Greg Brown who has been a member of the bench for quite some years and again, in my belief, an individual who certainly has all the qualifications and capabilities that it takes to be a fantastic Family Court judge. He has the predisposition to be involved in that type of courtroom. It is not that he never had it for the rest, because he certainly did. He is competent in many, many ways, but he has a particular bend to him when it comes to being able to deal with family type issues and family violence type issues, so it is great to see. I have no doubt whatsoever that with the proper resources and the staffing, with him as the skipper on that ship, there is no question, this will not be a project only. This will actually come to fruition and it will be done, and not only done but done well, because that is the type of individual that he is.

My time is getting pretty well up there, Mr. Speaker, so I would just like to conclude by saying that we do have a very valuable system when it comes to legal aid. It is a necessary system, and hopefully it will continue. I am sure that the minister will try his best to continue to fund the requests that they need, because it is certainly a very valuable piece of our justice system, but I do have these concerns about the bill. I have alluded to those in the first part of my speech, and I have those concerns.

I am all in favour of efficiencies, but I would appreciate an explanation as to how this is making it more efficient. The minister has not convinced me yet as to why this is being more efficient. Perhaps if he could give me some more information, or put a little bit more flesh on the bones, shall we say, as to how this is actually going to make it more efficient, without necessarily getting into a legal debate here - because at the end of the day the people need to understand as well. We toss around words in here sometimes but the bottom line is, it is about understanding and that is what I am looking for here. I do not have a good enough understanding right now, based upon what the minister has said, based upon what I have read in this bill, as to why this is going to improve the legal aid system. If it does, fine, and I am sure that was the intention, but I would certainly appreciate a little bit more information in that regard.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I will take my leave with respect to comments in second reading on the legal aid bill.

Thank you.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I am pleased to speak to this act, An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act. I listened very carefully and with interest to what the Opposition House Leader has been saying, because the Opposition House Leader has hit upon some confusion that I have had with regard to this act, and which we have been dealing with in my office.

At first read it looked like it was a simple amendment, but when we read it carefully a lot of questions came up for us. When we read the short explanatory note that comes with the bill, it says, "This Bill would amend the Legal Aid Act to repeal paragraphs 49(a) and (c) to improve the efficiency of processing legal aid applications. As a consequence, sections 48 and 49 would be repealed and substituted by one section."

When we read section 49, the whole section, and particularly 49(a) and (c), and read the amendment that is being proposed, it seemed that in actual fact the amendment was more restrictive because of the removal of (a) and (c). Even though the Opposition House Leader read this out when he was speaking, I am going to read it out again because 49 in the act as it stands says that, "An area director shall not authorize legal aid in respect of an offence punishable on summary conviction unless he or she is of the opinion that (a) there is a possible defence to the charge; (b) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction; (c) there are in existence circumstances that would serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty that may be imposed; and (d) because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel."

Now, the proposal in the bill is that that get changed to say, "The area director may only grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it in a summary conviction proceeding under an Act of the Parliament of Canada or of the Legislature where he or she is of the opinion that (a) there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction;…" - which is in the act now – "…or (b) because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel." That is in the act now.

In reading section 49 from the act, and section 48, the amendment, I realize that in reading it I was reading both the same way, and that did not come to me until I was listening to the debate from the Opposition House Leader.

We did take time to contact one of the ADMs in the Department of Justice, and the explanation that was given us did not make sense to me. On one level I suppose it made sense, but on another level it did not because what was being told to us was that with the current reading and the current act there was too much court time wasted by people asking for extensions to appeal the director’s decision to a legal aid appeal. So, apparently there were a lot of people being refused and there was too much court time wasted on appeals.

We were also told that the amendment expands access to justice and ensures more people get access to legal aid, thereby taking pressure off the system. I could not figure out how the amendment expanded the access to justice, but I think now I have an explanation that I will be asking the minister to think about in responding to both of us, I think.

If it is that the practice under the act as it is now means that all four conditions had to be met in order for the person to access legal aid then I see the difference. So, if in the act as it is now the presence of a possible defence, the likelihood of imprisonment, circumstances that would serve to mitigate the severity of the penalty, and because of extraordinary circumstances, there are extraordinary circumstances, if all four of those had to be present in order for somebody to get legal aid then I can see why it was definitely restrictive for somebody who was facing an offence punishable on summary conviction. I can see why it was very restrictive. I can see why there must have been a lot of appeals, because I can see why a lot of people may have been refused.

I guess my question to the minister is: Will he be able to tell us exactly how 49 in the current act was interpreted in practice? How was it being interpreted in practice? If in practice all four of those conditions have to be there, then, yes, it makes absolute sense to say that the amendment is now less restrictive, that the amendment is allowing more access, because in the amendment there are only two conditions and it is either-or: that the area director may only grant legal aid to a person otherwise entitled to it if - I am putting in the if, but that is the meaning - if there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood upon conviction; or, because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interests of justice that the applicant be represented by counsel.

If those are the only two conditions, and only one of them has to be met, then there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that there is an expansion of access to justice, but what I need to know is, if in 49, all four conditions have to be there. If it is that all four conditions - it is or, or, or, or - then I do not see why 49 is being changed, but if it is that all four conditions have to be there, then I can understand what the Department of Justice was dealing with.

I know the minister is probably dying to get on his feet, because he had to listen to the Opposition House Leader talk for quite a while and now I am putting the same thing forward. I think I am putting it forward with clarity for myself that I did not have before I came into the room, and that is what the debate should be about: we should be getting things explained.

As I said, we made an attempt to get things explained over the last week, and even that was not clear enough to help me fully understand what might be the thinking that happened in the Department of Justice to bring the amendment to the House.

I shall definitely be looking forward to hearing from the minister, because I am assuming that by the time he gets up to respond to us he will have a clear answer for us on that. If it is as I am interpreting it now, then I would obviously vote for this amendment. If it is not, if it is at 49 you have the four different options - all either-or, either-or - then I do not see the reason for changing, so I look forward to what the minister will bring to us in responding to that.

Having spoken very specifically to the amendment itself, and the technicalities of the amendment, I would like to take just a little time to speak generally to the whole notion of legal aid. Here, of course, in this particular amendment we are dealing with a very particular aspect of legal aid, and that is legal aid as it relates to somebody who is in danger of being convicted of a summary offence, and that is one way in which one can access legal aid, but there are many other reasons why one might need legal aid.

I would like to speak to the reason that I think was one of the things that caused a legal aid office to be opened again in Labrador West, and that is the need of people, like women living in abusive situations, facing situations where they need legal assistance in getting out of an abusive relationship, getting out of a home, having their rights and the rights of their children protected. Many, many women who are in that situation do not have access to the resources that one needs to go into a courtroom. They do not have resources to access a lawyer. They do not have resources to even know how to get to the point of accessing a lawyer. They stand alone many times. It was the ongoing petitioning by the Status of Women Council in Labrador West that I know went on for years that I think must have eventually gotten through to the government because I had been, over a number of years, in contact with the Status of Women Council in Labrador West and I know how much time the coordinator of the Women’s Centre in Labrador West spends in the courtroom. She was acting as a legal aid person and she still does in many ways. She spent so much time as a coordinator of the Women’s Centre in dealing with women who needed legal help, who could not pay for lawyers and who could not access legal aid because there was no office in Labrador West.

When we are looking at setting up legal aid services, we are setting up legal aid services not just for people who are, to put in a colloquial way, in trouble with the law - that is one aspect of needing legal services - but another aspect of legal services is of those who are victimized. Whether it is victimized by strangers or victimized by people in their own home, like a male partner, and they absolutely need the assistance of a lawyer. So, obviously, in Labrador West they are very, very pleased at the Women’s Centre. They were very pleased when last year the money was there for a legal aid office to be set up in Wabush. It was absolutely essential for the well-being and the health of women and children in Labrador West.

I would like to talk a bit about the Legal Aid Commission and its three-year plan because I think it feeds directly into what we are talking about here tonight in terms of legal aid itself. The Legal Aid Commission, as other bodies in government, is required to prepare a three-year plan based on strategic directions of the Minister of Justice. The commission provides a lawyer to help people arrested or detained by police or anyone facing provincial or youth court without representation. So, it is an important body.

Currently, the commission employs fifty-two lawyers and forty-seven support staff. Now two of the areas - and this is what I was getting at. Two of the areas under which people may access legal aid through the Legal Aid Commission, one is under criminal law. Under criminal law, of course, you are dealing with indictable offences or summary convictions, and the other way to qualify for legal aid is under civil and family law. The proviso is: provided where there is case merit. In other words, the situation has to be investigated and a decision has to be made that the case merits legal help. Ninety-eight percent of the cases that come that are taking on by legal aid are dealt with by the legal aid staff; about 2 per cent are covered by private practice.

Right now, the Legal Aid Commission is in year two of its three-year plan. One of our concerns is that, both in terms of the values that are laid out in the plan as well as the goals of the plan, there seems to be somewhat of a vagueness. For example, the goal that was set for the year 2011 was to enhance its administrative structure and services to the Province. Now that is a pretty vague goal, to enhance its administrative structure and services to the Province. What we are concerned about is that there are not enough tangible indicators. How is the commission going to evaluate how it has enhanced its administrative structure and services to the Province?

It would be good if the commission, at this point in time, half-way through its plan, were to set some hard number targets. It would be good if they could name some more tangible indicators; perhaps if they were to look at having an independent audit done at the end of year three of the targets and tangible indicators. As it stands now, it appears that the goals, the indicators and the final results will all be measured by the commission itself.

Another thing that the commission could do in evaluating its goals, meaning that it will set concrete targets and it will set some tangible indicators, another way to evaluate if they meet that goal is to do a survey with clients to see how the administrative structure worked for clients. Do a survey with clients to see how they felt they were able to access the services and how the services worked for them. Then ask the clients what impediments, what barriers may have been there for them in trying to access the services. They may have been able to access them, but did they access them fully? The services were there in some way for them but not totally. So do a survey with the clients.

I believe that the Legal Aid Commission has good will and I think it would be very good if the minister were to look at this notion of making their goal, asking them to make their goal for 2011 a more practical concretely-based goal that can be evaluated, because if they do not do that they will never know if they did what they wanted to do. They will never know if the administrative structure has become more serviceable to people in the Province. I would recommend then that the minister look at asking the commission to revise the plan to include more tangible ways of measuring goals. To revise the plan to set more real measurable targets, also to have the plan involve outside independent verification of their measurable targets.

These are some ideas I pass on to the minister to help make the work of the Legal Aid Commission to be more efficient and more effective and of better service to the people in the Province. A lot of changes have been made; a lot of improvements have been made. Certainly there is more access. There are more lawyers but there is more that can be done to help us evaluate so that as the commission moves on in doing its work we can be sure that every year there is improvement and more people are benefiting from the work of the legal aid office.

Having said that, Mr. Speaker, I will just reiterate - and I know the minister has heard and he is working on it - that I look forward to a clarification of what the meaning, and practice based on the meeting, of the old section 49 or the current section 49 of the act is and based on what he tells us about that, then I will be able to interpret better whether the amendment that is being proposed is an improvement or not. So I look forward to that information from the minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Is the House ready for the question?

The hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Is it my understanding if the minister speaks now he is closing debate?

MR. T. MARSHALL: That is my understanding, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General.

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

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. T. MARSHALL: I am told it is still Thursday, so I will speak now and close debate.

I really thank the Government House Leader and the Leader of the Third Party, the Leader of the NDP, for their comments tonight. The Government House Leader was certainly most interesting. I know the other day he talked about my forthrightness in answering questions, but he also said that I was long-winded. After tonight I have a different point of view.

Mr. Speaker, I will say, with respect to the concern raised by the Opposition House Leader, and it was a good concern because the whole purpose of this legislation – and, of course, the comments of the Leader of the NDP, whose interpretation of the legislation was the same as mine – the Opposition House Leader did leave me under the impression that we may have been doing something the exact opposite of what we were intending to do. What we are intending to do is to make it easier for someone who is charged with a summary conviction offence to get legal aid, not make it more difficult. When the Opposition House Leader got up and said we were making it more difficult, of course, it caused me some concern.

Section 48 of the act very clearly says that the Legal Aid Act will permit legal aid in summary conviction matters in certain circumstances where upon conviction there is a likelihood of imprisonment or loss of means of earning a livelihood. That is a general rule that is set out in section 48(1).

Then, in section 49 it says that there is a limit on the area director’s power to grant a legal aid certificate in a summary conviction matter. We are not talking about indictable offences here. It states that no coverage is available for a summary conviction offence unless the area director is of the opinion that, number one, number two, number three - and the word there is and - and number four. All four things have to be there in order for the area director to give the certificate.

The problem is with (a) where it said there must be a possible defence to the charge. We are of the belief, or the Legal Aid Commission is of the belief, and the Department of Justice supports the belief, that if someone is charged with an offence where that person could go to jail, or that person could lose his or her ability to earn a livelihood, that person is entitled to a lawyer to defend the charge, whether or not there is a possible defence.

What was happening was that the people were going to legal aid, and legal aid was bothered by number (a), and there was a lot of discussion over that. Then the appeal, it was not an appeal in the court; it was an appeal to the legal aid board, and that was what was taking up all the time. So the amendment that we are bringing forward is that we are going to eliminate the old 49(a), we are going to eliminate the old 49(c), and that means that if someone can show the area director that there is a likelihood of imprisonment or that, because of extraordinary circumstances, it is in the interest of justice the applicant be represented – and the word is or; it is either-or - if you can show either one, you get your certificate and you got a lawyer and that is the way it should be.

I guess I will close debate and urge passage of this bill, and I look forward to any further questions during Committee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that the said bill be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

Carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act. (Bill 15)

MR. SPEAKER: This bill has now been read a second time.

When shall the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole?

Now?

MS BURKE: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The Legal Aid Act," read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 15)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, from the Order Paper I would like to call Order 12, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act. (Bill 17)

Motion, second reading of bill, "An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act." (Bill 17)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would move, seconded by my colleague the Minister of Justice, that Bill 17, An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act, be passed in the Legislature here.

I want to make a few comments on it in second reading, as this is a piece of legislation that has some real significance for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. This bill deals with a number of things, and I will go through all of it in a second, but I wanted to indicate up front that the major thrust of this bill is to eliminate what is commonly referred to as power walls in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Power walls are these large displays that you see. If you walk into a convenience store, and particularly you see them in convenience stores and other areas that sell tobacco products, these are large displays and they vary in size. Some of them may take up eight or ten feet of a wall, and some of them may take up smaller spaces, but what it is, the terminology is because they are powerful. They stand out. When you walk into these stores you will see great displays of tobacco products. Each and every kind that store is selling is very visibly displayed in a very colourful way, in a fashion to attract attention and to promote the use of tobacco products. There is lots of signage around promoting the tobacco products. You might see it in the store itself; you might see it advertised outside of the store. Sometimes large billboards will display some of these tobacco products, and the thrust of this bill is to eliminate those power walls, and there are some other things that are associated with it as well that we will talk about in a second.

Mr. Speaker, the significance of this bill, studies have shown very clearly that these power walls convey a message and they do, in fact, influence people’s thinking, particularly children and young adults who see these images. They are very impressionable at those ages, and the tobacco companies prey on individuals like that because the exposure to that kind of advertising and these colourful images promote tobacco products as being something that is normal and something that they should be engaged in, and they try to trap young children into starting to smoke at a very young and early age.

This bill also deals with some of the in-store advertising. In addition to the large power walls and displays of the tobacco products themselves you will see colourful signage promoting tobacco products, whether it is produced by a particular company and their brand, and then another brand will be displayed as well, again with some colourful posters, to lure people into the store but also, when they are in, to encourage them to buy the products. This bill now will focus on making change to that. No longer do we want to see that kind of promotion trying to lure young people to start smoking at a very young age.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, statistics show that most people will start smoking before the age of nineteen. So these products and the display of those products, and the signage used to promote these products, are targeting a very specific group of people, because statistically they will start smoking before the age of nineteen, and if you are able to make an impression upon them at that age then obviously they are going to be, as a company, as tobacco companies, they believe they will be successful and they will always have a market for their products.

I think, Mr. Speaker, we will all agree, and I do not want to speak for members opposite but I am certain as we hear comments this evening that no one will challenge in any way the suggestion that smoking is harmless to our health. Smoking is the number one cause of preventative deaths in Canada, and is a major contributor to serious chronic illness. If we are able to get at the source of it, and be able to make sure we get to young people early so they do not start to use that product and become addicted to it, then I think we will be a much healthier society.

Our Province has taken a very aggressive approach. It has been measured in some ways, trying to attack the issue from a variety of perspectives, whether it is education, legislation, promotion programs, social marketing campaigns, all of which have had some impact. I am very pleased to be able to say here tonight that since the Province’s provincial tobacco control strategy has been implemented, the overall smoking rates have declined in this Province from 28 per cent to 21 per cent, and smoking rates among our youth age fifteen to nineteen has dropped from 30 per cent to 17 per cent.

I am saying that, Mr. Speaker, not because I am boasting the fact that we still have 21 per cent and 17 per cent respectively of smokers in this Province, but the progressions we have seen here, the progress we have made moving from 28 per cent to 21 per cent overall, and moving from the 30 per cent to 17 per cent for youth, I think, reflects the notion that if we have a concerted effort, we develop a comprehensive strategy and stay focused on that strategy, we will achieve the desired results. This legislation, this bill here, is one more step in our overall strategy as we try to have a bigger impact on reducing the number of smokers in the Province.

I want to acknowledge this evening as well the partnerships that we have formed throughout Newfoundland and Labrador. We have the regional health authorities working together with the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco, including organizations that are part of that alliance: the Canadian Cancer Society, the Lung Association, the provincial wellness coalitions, and all of the school districts that have been very actively engaged with the Department of Health and Community Services and our four authorities in targeting, working collaboratively, targeting initiatives that will help see the reduction of smoking in the Province.

The amendments that we are proposing this evening, Mr. Speaker, as we talk about the Tobacco Control Act, some of these include the banning altogether of all promotion and advertising products from both inside and outside those retail outlets, and the regulation of the storage of tobacco and tobacco products so they are not visible. When you walk into a store in the future, when this bill is enacted, you should not see any tobacco products at all, and other than those very specified signage that will be allowed, either issued by the department and/or produced by the store itself, you will see a very small display indicating that tobacco products are, in fact, sold there, but it will not be the glossy prints that you see now. It is a small eight-and-a-half by eleven white sheet of paper with black lettering on it rather than the glossy formats you see now. All the catchy colours and the images to try to, again, bring your attention to a product. So this will be very much different than what we are seeing now as we go into many of these stores.

The other piece of this legislation also deals with some changes in the legislation where we are going to further restrict where products can be sold. Many of these products, and I have made reference to convenience stores as an example and grocery store chains, you have self products, but we have some others which is kind of contradictory. We still, today, allow tobacco products to be sold in sporting venues, which is a real contradiction when you think about it. We are still having tobacco products sold in some educational institutions. Again, contradictory to what we should be doing in those institutions. We have various events, cultural events and special ceremonies, and fairs, activities like that where vendors are allowed to sell tobacco products. With the implementation of this particular piece of legislation, we will, in fact, be further restricting where tobacco products can be sold.

I want to, at this time, Mr. Speaker, as well, acknowledge and commend municipalities. In the recent past, we have heard a number of municipalities announce that they are no longer going to allow smoking on many of their premises, in their stadiums, and balls fields, and recreation complexes. Municipalities are now banning smoking in these places and banning the sale of tobacco products in advance of this legislation coming.

I want to commend those municipalities who have shown the leadership, had the vision and had the understanding of it, the challenges and problems that are being created with the use of tobacco products. They are very clearly providing strong leadership to their community and I commend them for that. Now, this legislation will aid them in ensuring that this will become part of a provincial ban. So those communities out there, who have done it, thank you for the leadership. Now with this legislation, other municipalities will have to follow suite.

The other thing we are trying to do, Mr. Speaker, the legislation deals with as well, is an implementation strategy. We obviously, in as much as the thrust of the bill is to eliminate the display of those power walls, we need to acknowledge that many individual stores have gone through great expense to create those display units. They have gone through, as they design their store or modify their store to be able to display those kinds of products. As we did the consultation, one of the things we heard was we need to look at how we implement this and over what period of time, and how reasonable we might be in dealing with these vendors. So the implementation of this will be effective January 1, 2010.

The intent here is to try to work with the industry so they can make the necessary preparations, if necessary, to modify their stores, to think about how they may want to use that current space that is now being used by these huge power walls to do something different, or to make an arrangement to store their tobacco products in a very different way. We did some consultations as we approached the development of this legislation. We did not just consult with those individuals who may sometimes have lobbied government or have a special interest in ensuring that tobacco products are removed from display, but we talked as well to the retail sector.

One of the things I am very pleased to say, Mr. Speaker, is that 63 per cent of all the retailers that we surveyed responded to the questionnaire, and 77 per cent of those retailers are in support of the changes to the legislation that we are making here. There is, contrary to what might be popular belief, those very retail outlets that are actually going to be impacted by this legislation in fact support the initiative of government, and I want to commend them. I thank them for their participation in the survey. I thank them for their participation in the consultation process, but I also commend them for the insights that they have and for taking their role as a part of the community and showing some very significant contributions they want to make in improving the health of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians by supporting what we are doing here, even though it may have some impact on their very business, but they are prepared to participate with us in the best interest and in the overall interest of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

If you look at the last four or five years, particularly since we have been in government in 2003, our government has made some significant progress in moving forward with initiatives to see us reduce the amount of smoking taking place in the Province, but also as a part of our effort to normalize smoking. Obviously, it is a legal product that can be sold. People will make choices about smoking or not smoking, but we want to make sure that the activities that we are engaged in as a government not only encourages people to stop smoking, we want to make sure that it is not viewed as a normal thing to do.

I think it is these power walls we are talking about and the promotion material used by the tobacco industry that talks about smoking as being a natural thing to do, something that you should do as you reach a certain age, it is a normal activity, I say, Mr. Speaker. That is the image. That is the kind of message that they are trying to give to, especially the young people of our Province. We want to do just the opposite of that. We want to make sure that people understand that smoking is not normal, smoking is not healthy. It is not normal, and the more we can de-normalize it the better it is going to be. These initiatives that we are undertaking through legislation like this are all a part of our Provincial Wellness Strategy, I say, Mr. Speaker.

Now there are a couple of - one of the things that we have – unfortunately, and I just want to share some facts with you because this is pretty startling insights as I start looking at the impact that smoking has on people’s lives; who in fact are smoking and when they are starting to smoke. It is frightening in some respects, Mr. Speaker. So anything that we can do as legislators, anything that we can do as a society to protect individuals, particularly young people, then I think we have the responsibility to do that.

I just want to share a couple of facts with you. Mr. Speaker, 21 per cent of youth in Grades 5 through to 9 have tried tobacco. So when we start talking about these power walls and what impression they are having on what population group. Just picture this, small kids between the ages of, I guess, in Grade 5 to Grade 9, you are still in your preteen years, in your early teen years, these kids are in and out of grocery stores. They are in and out of convenience stores. Each and every day they are walking into those places and seeing these large displays of tobacco products, seeing pictures of people, pictures that display normal daily activities where people are smoking, trying to entice these young people to take up the habit of smoking, use their products. When you start looking at the ages of these young kids, obviously, we would all acknowledge that they are at a very impressionable age and these displays are intended to target that particular group.

The other statistic, Mr. Speaker, is that 17 per cent of youth aged fifteen to nineteen in Newfoundland and Labrador smoke. I said earlier, that is a significant reduction from where we were five years ago but we still have a long ways to go. If we are to have a real impact on our young kids then we need initiatives such as this one and others that are involved with our anti-smoking campaigns, and the kind of money we have put into the Smokers’ Helpline, the money we have invested in the alliance we have for control of tobacco, those initiatives.

The other thing, Mr. Speaker, I just want to share with you as well, is that 85 per cent of smokers start before the age of sixteen. So just think about it, Mr. Speaker. These kids, before the age of sixteen they are in primary school, middle schools, they are in junior high and they are the people that the tobacco companies are targeting to bring into their fold as being smokers and hopefully they will be addicted then for a long period of time. That is how they make their money, preying on the innocence of our young children.

When we see these large displays and promotion material targeting our young kids, then I think, Mr. Speaker, the onus is on us as leaders in our communities to enact legislation such as this to ensure that we are protecting their long-term interests.

There are a couple of things that I just want to walk through, Mr. Speaker, in the bill itself because the explanation of the bill – any time you introduce legislation in the House, this one is entitled, Bill 17, An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act. Inside, one of the first things you will find in a piece of legislation is an explanatory note, what this is intended to do. Mr. Speaker, this is intended to amend the Tobacco Control Act. There is already a piece of legislation on the books and this bill here tonight is intended to amend that piece.

Some of the areas that we are amending, I say, Mr. Speaker, are very clearly expressing: What is the purpose of this bill? Why is it that the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador has a piece of legislation on the books at all known as the Tobacco Control Act? Just so there is no misunderstanding at all as to why we had this piece of legislation I just want to read the purpose, because I think it is an important point, Mr. Speaker, because it speaks to the comments I made a moment ago about what age people are starting to smoke, what the target population would be for the tobacco industry as they use these promotion walls.

"The purpose of this Act, in light of the conclusive evidence that tobacco use causes premature death and disease, is to protect the health of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and in particular young people by restricting access to tobacco and tobacco related products and to protect them from inducements to use tobacco."

Clearly, Mr. Speaker, that is the expressed purpose of this act. It is the expressed purpose of what this government is trying to do with control of the use of tobacco in this Province. So let be clear, this bill has one intended purpose, this piece of legislation has one intended purpose, to protect young people of Newfoundland and Labrador from being sucked into, pardon that pun, to be lured into the undertaking and starting to smoke and use tobacco products that we all understand and acknowledge is hazardous to their health.

The other piece, Mr. Speaker, that I think is important to highlight here is that the act also talks about banning where you can sell products. I just want to make sure that as this bill expands - as I said a moment ago, we now have recreation facilities that will be banning smoking. So there are certain places you cannot buy tobacco products. For example, Mr. Speaker, this bill, this act will band the sale of tobacco or tobacco products in a pharmacy. In pharmacies in this Province you cannot sell and will not be able to buy tobacco products. Any temporary facilities, for example, fair grounds, exhibitions of some kind, or the Regatta, for example, here in St. John’s, a popular event each and every year. Those kinds of temporary facilities will not be allowed to sell tobacco products. Obviously, you will not see them in any of the health facilities, whether it is long-term care homes or hospitals or the like.

Also, Mr. Speaker, the university, as defined in the Memorial University Act, the college, as defined in the College Act, private training institutions, recreation facilities where the primary activity is physical recreation, including such things as bowling alleys, fitness centres, gymnasiums, swimming pools, an arena or rink, all of those areas. You are not permitted to sell tobacco products in any of those facilities. Again, all with a view of ensuring that we are removing the products. We are restricting access to a limited number of places where people can buy these products.

Mr. Speaker, another significant piece of this bill deals with the issue of signage. I said earlier that these displays of tobacco products is one thing, but the other area that we want to talk a little bit about is the whole issue of signage. I said earlier, not only can we not display the products but we are going to eliminate - you might drive out to any street, any highway where you might see these large billboards, sometimes you will see them as a part of a temporary fixture where a service station or a convenience store may have tobacco products in big letters, eight or ten inches high, promoting a sale on tobacco products. All with a view of enticing people off the highway into their store to buy a tobacco product at some discounted price as a part of any promotion. Those sorts of signs will disappear. As you walk into those convenience stores and other areas where you can buy tobacco products, where you will see these large displays of signage clearly indicating that they have a sale on this week of a certain brand name at a discounted price, these signs tend to be produced by the tobacco manufacturers and they tend to be done in a very professional and glossy fashion so as to capture your attention.

What will happen in the future, Mr. Speaker, you will see a very small sign. As I said a moment ago, it will be a piece of white paper eight-and-a-half by eleven with very small print, black letters on it that says: Tobacco products are sold here. You will not see a list of all the brand names that you can buy. You will not see a list of prices. So if you walk into a store in the future and you do not see the display of any tobacco, you do not see the display of tobacco products, and signage that says: We sell cigarettes here, and here are the brands. You will not see the products themselves displayed. What you will see is a very small sign acknowledging that tobacco products are sold here.

If someone wants to find out what products they have to choose from, then they will be allowed to have a small catalogue that they are able to pass out to one of their customers, have them browse through the booklet to determine what products they have and what prices they have. That will not be a very large digital display, but they will have to make available to them a price list and a list of products to be sold. So that is a very limiting display of, not only the product but the signage used to promote it, Mr. Speaker.

One of the other things that I think is really important in this bill is to start to look at the whole piece of this bill in concert with the other things that we have done. If you reflect for a moment on the things that we have done as a government, you might recall several years ago we banned the use of tobacco products in bars and bingo halls. At that particular time there was a real concern by the industry that this was going to have a negative impact on their business; bars would be closing by the dozens. I say, Mr. Speaker, that did not happen. Some of the bars went through some change as a part of normal business cycles. Some of them may have been impacted in some fashion. At the same time, Mr. Speaker, if you walk into a bar today no one is smoking. The same bars that were filled ten years ago are still filled today. It has nothing to do with the ban on smoking, but that action did have an impact in reducing the number of people who smoke in the Province. Pieces of legislation like this will now ban the display of tobacco products, another initiative to ensure that we are going to be moving forward with an aggressive campaign to reduce the use of smoking.

Mr. Speaker, one of the things as we went about this particular process and talked to the – I want to speak to this point for a second because there was an expectation that the people who would be most opposed to this would be the vendors themselves, people who sell these products. One of the things I want to say, Mr. Speaker, is we had a very positive response, very active participation from the retail sector in participating in our consultation process. As I said a moment ago, we were quite pleased with the fact that we had a large response, but equally as important, not just a response but we were surprised, and pleasantly surprised, to know the large number of retailers who actually support this initiative. Because they too believe, Mr. Speaker, and here is the interesting point. Despite the fact that they make money from this product, and the sale of this product, they too believe and fully understand and accept their responsibility to help governments, to help society, to help individuals not only cease smoking but also to recognize the hazards of smoking so that they will not take the habit.

Mr. Speaker, there are a series of penalties. This is not intended to be a piece of legislation that is threatening people, that if you do not do this then here is what will happen, but I think with any piece of legislation where we are trying to impose a responsibility - on vendors in this particular case - there has to be some kind of understanding that if you do not obey the legislation there have to be some penalties associated with it.

I just want to highlight how serious government takes the impact that this legislation will have on people. The penalties, I think, reflect the significance of the breach of actions by any retailers, because for the first offence there is a fine of $500 and the individual store or outlet will be prohibited from selling tobacco products for a period of three months. For a second offence there will be a fine of $2,500 and the outlet will be prohibited from selling tobacco for a six-month period. If there is a third offence, there will be a fine of $5,000 and prohibited from selling tobacco products for nine months. Obviously that is subject to a conviction under the act, but clearly those kinds of penalties reflect how government takes this action seriously, takes the significance of this bill seriously, and that is why we are introducing it.

Mr. Speaker, this will be just one of a series of initiatives - or one more, rather - in a series of initiatives that this government has undertaken under this particular piece of legislation here, which is the Tobacco Control Act, but also the environmental legislation that deals with - the last time we did something on that one was to deal with the ban on smoking in bars and bingo halls.

Mr. Speaker, we as a government are very pleased to be proposing these amendments to this legislation and I look forward to the support of Members of the House of Assembly as we move forward, together with our partners, and our many partners, as we do a couple of things. One, we want to make sure that we reduce the incidence of smoking in this Province, and we very aggressively try to ensure that the message gets out to the youth of this Province that starting to smoke is not healthy for you, starting to smoke is not normal and it has a major impact on your health and the quality of life, and decisions you now make as a young adult are going to be with you and affect the rest of your life and the quality of health that you will experience as you age.

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to the debate here on this particular bill, and if members opposite have some questions that we may want to deal with in Committee, I would be only too glad to entertain the questions and provide a response.

I do encourage members of the House, as they consider their views on this particular bill, to recognize that this has widespread support throughout the community at large, widespread support from the partners that we have engaged in the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco, the Lung Association, the Cancer Society, the health authorities, and all school districts in the Province, together with a large portion of the vendors who are going to be impacted as we implement this particular piece of legislation.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I will sit down and look forward to the continued discussion around the thrust of this bill.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am certainly pleased to speak to Bill 17, An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act. I must say, in Newfoundland and Labrador, we have certainly come a long way when it comes to the restrictions around tobacco in the Province; not just the display of tobacco or the sale of tobacco, but also the consumption of tobacco in areas that have been restricted for use.

I think going back just a few years ago when the first rules and regulations started to change around tobacco usage in the Province, and the kind of opposition that was posed by the public and by people out there in the communities. I remember when we were bringing in the first pieces of legislation around the control of tobacco in restaurants, and banning smoking in restaurants in the Province.

I remember at that time there was such an aggressive lobby being launched by people who owned these establishments, that they were going to be out of business, and that it was going to affect their profits, just like retailers are saying today that it will be investment loss for them.

I remember, going back, that many of these restaurant owners would come in consistently at the time to meet with either the Minister of Tourism or the Premier of the day, or the Ministry of Health, whoever they could lobby within government, to see if they could stop this from actually happening, because they felt that it would be jeopardizing their businesses. They felt that people wanted and needed to have the freedom and the flexibility, when they went out to eat, to be able to sit back after a good meal and light up a cigarette and enjoy that cigarette in a restaurant. They honestly did, and they felt that it was going to affect their business.

You know, it is just a few short years since that happened. I do not even think it has been ten years since that regulation was imposed in the Province, and I do not think we have seen any restaurants go out of business because of it. I do not think we have seen any owners that have actually lost business because of it. In fact, I would think a lot of them have gained business. I would think that there have been more restaurants set up in the Province, more establishments open since that time to cater to people who want to dine out in public.

In fact, if you go into any restaurant right now - and I know members in the House do. If they are like me, they often meet with constituents, meet with interested parties, in restaurants, because oftentimes the only free time we have is when we get to eat. Therefore, we take that opportunity to meet with groups, organizations and individuals to discuss business, and it is such a comfort today to be able to go in and sit in a restaurant and be able to have a meal and not have smoke surrounding you, and not have people lighting up cigarettes at the table next to you or at the table with you. I think people have seen real benefits in that particular ban, but no doubt it was a ban that was a catalyst for other things to happen around the usage of tobacco in the Province.

I remember the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco, which is an organization that partners with municipalities, and partners with other groups such as the Cancer Society and the Lung Association and other organizations that represent coronary diseases. It also partners with government, it partners with young people, with schools, and what they do, Mr. Speaker, is they take a strong message, a strong message to the public on how tobacco is used, where it is used, how it is sold, how it is packaged, and they have been very successful. They have been very successful in Newfoundland and Labrador. In fact, I have met with the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco on a number of occasions in my own political career, and listened to them as they made presentations and lobbied for change within the industry. They are still very active in this Province. In fact, they are part of the tobacco strategy for the Province to look at how we continuously reduce the use and the consumption of tobacco, how we continuously spread a message that this is unhealthy and it makes for an unhealthy environment.

As I said, Mr. Speaker, the first regulation around the usage of tobacco in restaurants, that restriction became the catalyst for a lot of other restrictions that have evolved over that period of time. I think the first regulation was probably the toughest one, because people had to become more desensitized to the change in regulation, to the fact that things were going to be done differently, and oftentimes change is not received very well by people, unless it is something that they collectively instrument themselves. Sometimes it is received differently by different people.

Mr. Speaker, as a result of the success of the ban of the use of tobacco and smoking in restaurants, we have seen other bans. We have seen bans around the smoking in bars, which again was a very strong lobby launched by the Bar Association in the Province, by Hospitality Newfoundland and Labrador, as an industry representative group who again felt that this was going to affect the business that they operated.

I understand that; we all realize that. These are people who have invested a lot of money. They have invested a lot of money to build their businesses over the years, and all of a sudden we, as government officials or parliamentarians, decide that these are regulations that are healthy for the environment, they are in your best interests, so we are making those decisions. Not everyone sees it that way.

I remember when the ban was being imposed in bars in the Province, that there was a lot of protest by the bar owners. They would be here in Confederation Building. I remember seeing them sitting in the galleries and out in the lobby, looking for an opportunity to talk to ministers of the Crown, to talk to any politicians who would listen to what they had to say, and to make representation on their behalf.

Well, Mr. Speaker, I do not know of any bars that have really closed down in the Province as a result of that regulation. In fact, I have heard a number of them say it is one of the better things that has happened.

People still go to restaurants. They still go to bars. They still participate in that kind of public social environment and they still, if they want to smoke, I guess they still find a way to smoke, whether that would be out in the streets, or somewhere outside of the establishment, but they do. So, Mr. Speaker, it has not been a bad thing in terms of being something that would destroy or bankrupt businesses in the Province, as we would have been led to believe a few years ago when all of this started.

Today, Mr. Speaker, tobacco products are restricted in a lot of different places that they were not years ago; for example, just in public buildings alone. If you go back to the installation of this Legislature, you will find that at one time parliamentarians smoked in the House of Assembly. You would find out that Premiers smoked in their offices. In fact, I have seen pictures of past Premiers, both Liberal and Conservative, pose for photographs with cigars in their hands, in their offices, because it was the thing to do. I have seen pictures of Premiers and Cabinets that have sat and convened to do the business of the government, and the business of the people of the day, when all around the table you would have people who smoked. They would be sitting back in a Cabinet meeting having a cigarette. It was perfectly acceptable at that time, but things have changed a lot and it is not acceptable any more.

In fact, we work in a building that is completely smoke-free today, whereas a few years ago that was not the case. Today in this building, like other public buildings in the Province, there is no tolerance for smoking in these buildings. I have nothing against people who want to smoke, but these things are all done for a reason. They are done for a reason, and I will get into some of those statistics in a little while in terms of second-hand smoke and what it means to people who are in and around second-hand smoke.

Mr. Speaker, this act is basically saying that a person shall not sell or offer for sale tobacco in any of the places that I will read out for the record. For example: in a pharmacy; in a temporary facility; in a facility operated by a regional health authority or a personal care home in the Province. None of these facilities have the ability to be able to sell or offer for sale tobacco in this Province. A long-term care home; a nursing home; an assisted living facility; a child care service; a school; a university; a college; a private training institution; a building or a part of a building that is owned, leased or operated by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador; an agency of the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador; a Crown corporation or a municipality. Also, Mr. Speaker, the sale of tobacco restriction applies as well to recreational facilities where the primary activity is physical recreation. It applies to a bowling alley; a fitness centre; a gymnasium; a swimming pool; an arena or a rink; a theatre or cinema; a library; an art gallery; a museum; an amusement park; a video or games arcade; and a place prescribed by regulation.

Mr. Speaker, all of these places are restricted from the selling of tobacco products in this Province. Not only are they restricted from the sale but they are also restricted when it comes to the use of tobacco in or around the premises of these facilities. In fact, I was at a graduation ceremony last weekend when, at the graduation, the Mistress of Ceremonies stood up and made an announcement that anyone in the room who wanted to smoke would have to not only go outside of the facility but they would have to go outside of all the parameters of the school property, which meant they had to go actually out on the street or they had to go across another parking lot in order to be able to have a cigarette. Those were the strict rules that were being enforced in that particular school. So, Mr. Speaker, not only are you restricted in this Province from smoking in a public building but that restriction also applies, in most cases, to a large extent of the parameters that surround those buildings as well.

Mr. Speaker, there has been quite the change in regulation around the use of tobacco and the display of tobacco in the Province over the last number of years, and there have been a number of people, as I said, who have been opposed to this. In fact, when the minister announced that he was going to bring in a ban of signage on tobacco products in businesses, I think he used it as a power wall, that he was going to ban the power walls, which was an advertising gimmick that was often used by tobacco companies to promote their products. Mr. Speaker, we all know what that is. We have seen it ourselves, when you walk into a retail store or you walk into a gas bar and you look behind the counter and the entire wall is a huge display of tobacco products, displaying them in all shapes, colours, in all kinds of signage and promotion; and, you know, it is rather eye-catching when you walk in. It takes up a large amount of space, so therefore it is really hard to miss. I guess that is why they call it a power wall, because it dominates the advertising of mostly all the other products that are in the store, that you can see when you walk through the door.

When the government did announce back some time ago, after they had some consultation around the Province and also after a very aggressive lobby by the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco with government, there was some opposition to it. In fact, I remember one individual in the Province who made a comment, I think it was in the paper, when they said they had been smoking since they had been thirteen years of age. They did not like the fact that there was another restriction being placed on tobacco. They really felt like, these days, because they are a smoker, they are almost participating in something that is illegal.

I can certainly understand that perspective as well, because we also know that tobacco is a highly addictive substance. We all know that. We all know of people, or ourselves, who at one time were smokers and how hard it is to quit, how hard it is to reform yourself as a smoker because it is an addiction. It is a very addictive substance. I have talked to a lot of people about this who have tried to kick the habit, who have tried to be a non-smoker simply because they feel they are almost a minority these days, that they are segregated in society because of this addiction that they have. It is like every addiction, it is hard to just heave it down. It is hard to just give it up. For many people the desire might be great but the ability to do it is very, very difficult.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, I had a friend who quit smoking just about a year ago, and for about four months she used to say to me: I am just not the person I used to be, I have such a short tolerance, I find I do not have the patience that I used to have. I have been saying to my family: You had best stay away from me today until I can get through one more day. She has been successful, but it has been hard. It has been very hard to try and overcome an addition like this.

So, Mr. Speaker, when government announced that they were going to do this, and I read the comments by this gentleman who really felt like he was being treated as if he was doing something illegal because he was a smoker, simply because of all these regulations, I could understand where he was coming from. He also felt that every kid is going to try this, and you are not going to stop kids from trying this. He may be right when he says that just because you take all the power walls out in retail outlets when it comes to promoting cigarettes, just because you ban smoking in restaurants and bars and public buildings and playgrounds, it does not necessarily mean that you are going to stop kids from trying it.

Maybe he was right in his statement, but I think that as we become more educated, as we understand more what the implications of tobacco are, we do have a responsibility, and that responsibility is to place restrictions around the use of it. It is to regulate how it is being promoted and sold, and that is our responsibility. Maybe we will not stop kids from doing it, but we will at least hopefully reduce the number of children that actually do attempt to try it or entice to try it. We will hopefully reduce the number of children who actually see this as being something that is cool or glamorous or something that is being seen as acceptable.

When a person who is a smoker says they feel like what they are dong is illegal or that they are a minority or that they almost have to hide away to have a cigarette because there is a shame that is attached to it, well that already tells me that we have been successful in discouraging others from becoming addicted to this product as well. That tells me we have already had some success in ensuring that less people become addicted to tobacco.

So, Mr. Speaker, everyone has, I guess, a different opinion around these particular things, but we also have a responsibility to those who do not smoke, to ensure that they have a clean environment to work in, to be able to socialize in.

Mr. Speaker, it is well-known facts that second-hand smoke, which is known as environmental tobacco smoke - we also know that these cigarettes or this tobacco contains over 4,000 chemicals. These 4,000 chemicals, once it is inhaled and exhaled, it is also spread to other people who are in that vicinity. We know that second-hand smoke contains the same 4,000 chemicals that a smoker inhales through a cigarette. That has been proven, that is scientifically proven.

Mr. Speaker, according to the U.S. Surgeon General, there is no safe level of exposure to second-hand smoke, and second-hand smoke, we already know and has been proven, is extremely dangerous to infants and to young children. In fact, babies who breathe in second-hand smoke have a higher risk of dying from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or crib death. Babies and children who are exposed to second-hand smoke have more frequent lower respiratory tract problems, such as coughs, pneumonia, bronchitis and other things like that.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, we have all heard of the numbers of children who are on inhalers or puffers, as they call it. I know in my own district, I have noticed that there are a lot of children who actually use puffers or inhalers. Now, I am not saying it is because of exposure to second-hand smoke. It could be exposure to other environmental things as well. Whether it be mould or whether it be air quality, whether it be natural environmental pollens or whatever the case may be, but there is a higher level of children who do suffer from respiratory tract infections and coughs, and pneumonia and bronchitis, when they are in the presence of second-hand smoke.

Mr. Speaker, children who are exposed to second-hand smoke are more likely to develop asthma and they will suffer more from it than children of non-smokers who have asthma. I found that very interesting, very interesting indeed, because we also know that there is a high level of children who suffer from asthma. I do not know what the statistics are right now, but I remember about a year ago looking at – in one of the medical journals, I believe it was – some of the stats around asthma and the number of children who suffer from it. This will tell you that second-hand smoke, children who are exposed to it, are more likely to develop asthma than children of non-smokers and to have it more seriously than children of non-smokers.

Second-hand smoke also increases the number of ear infections in children. Now, most people would not have made that conclusion at all, but it certainly was indicated in the statistics that I looked at when I was doing the research for this particular bill and it noted quite clearly that second-hand smoke increases the number of ear infections in children. So I think it is important, when we bring in regulations like this, that it is not a form of punishment to anyone but it is a form of trying to foster a healthier society of people, and I think as we learn more about it we will want to do more to provide for that protection. As we learn more about how children can suffer, and what the consequences are of being in the presence of second-hand smoke, we will want to take more care to ensure that we have regulations that will protect them.

Mr. Speaker, some other things that are noteworthy as well: lung cancer is the leading cause of death due to cancer in Canada as well as right here in our own Province in Newfoundland and Labrador. Smoking tobacco is the single most important preventable cause of lung cancer and it accounts for 85 per cent of all of the new cases of lung cancer in Canada.

Mr. Speaker, we all know this, as a society. How many of us in our lives have known someone, had a relative, had a friend or someone in the community where we live, who has died or suffered from lung cancer. When you look at this and you know that most times it is preventable - the only preventable thing, I guess, or one of the most significant preventable indicators of lung cancer is smoking tobacco.

Also, Mr. Speaker, smoking tobacco can lead to respiratory and upper digestive tract cancers, and I think we have all known that as well, particularly mouth cancer, throat cancer, cancer of the voice box and the esophagus. Research also indicates that smoking tobacco is a contributing cause of leukemia and cancers of the bladder, the stomach, the kidney and the pancreas. It also indicates in the study that I looked at that female smokers are at a greater risk for developing cervical cancer.

Mr. Speaker, you might read all of these things and realize that, with statistics like that, why would people smoke? Again, it is substance that is addictive. It is not as easy as waking up tomorrow morning and saying: Oh, I have just learned all of this so now I am going to throw down the cigarettes and I am never going to smoke again.

It is not always that easy for most people, and I know that. It is very addictive and it is very difficult to overcome, and I certainly have a lot of pride for those people who do, and a lot of respect for them, because I know that it is very difficult to do things sometimes in life. When you look at addictions - addictions to anything, whether it is food, alcohol, drugs or tobacco - it is very difficult to kick addictions, to be able to change your lifestyle so that you can actually move away from those particular things. It is very difficult.

Mr. Speaker, in 2006 there were almost 5 million people, representing 19 per cent of the population of Canada, fifteen years of age and older, who continued to smoke. In Newfoundland and Labrador we were even at a higher rate than that. The Canadian rate of people over the age of fifteen who smoked was at 19 per cent. In Newfoundland and Labrador that statistic was at 21 per cent. Mr. Speaker, what was even more surprising is that 2.5 per cent of those people were between the ages of ten and fourteen.

Sometimes we think that kids do not always have the opportunity, do not have the resources, and do not have the accessibility to be able to get tobacco products. After all, we have increased the age limit for the purchase of tobacco. You have to show an ID now when you walk in to purchase a pack of cigarettes, if you are a youth, but they do have access and they find access to things like tobacco. Obviously, if they did not then we would not have 2.5 per cent of young people between the ages of ten and fourteen who were smoking.

Also, 27 per cent of males who smoke were between ages fifteen and twenty-four, and nearly 19 per cent of females. Again, the other thing that I was very surprised to learn, and very disappointed to learn, actually, was that pregnant women between the ages of twenty and forty-four, 10 per cent of them smoked regularly during most of their pregnancies. Isn’t that alarming? I would think that one of the first things, if you were having a child, would be to make as much of an effort as possible to be able to give up smoking. I know that it is not easy to do, as I said, but 10 per cent of those pregnant women between the ages of twenty and forty-four smoked regularly during most of their pregnancy. Those are some of the statistics that were researched and presented in a report that looked at these statistics in both 2006 and 2007.

One of the groups in this Province that has been very successful in promoting the effects of tobacco, the effects of tobacco on children, on adults, one of the groups that has been very effective in providing information as to what the health effects of tobacco are, is the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco, and not only the impact that it has on those who are smokers but also on those people who are in the area where they are subject to second-hand smoke.

Mr. Speaker, the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco has been dedicated and committed to reducing the negative health, economic and environmental effects of tobacco use in this Province. I would say that there is not a Member of the House of Assembly who, at one time or another, has not had a presentation from this group or has not been lobbied by this group or sent information from them giving us materials, educating us to what the impacts are.

They have also been involved with the Provincial Tobacco Reduction Strategy and they have been coordinating a plan around controlling tobacco and activities related to tobacco in the Province. That is the reason why we are here tonight looking at a bill that is going to ban how cigarettes are displayed and promoted in the Province, and it is only because of the effective work that they have done and the lobby efforts that they have made.

Mr. Speaker, the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco is really a group of partners who have worked tirelessly to implement not just the Tobacco Reduction Strategy throughout the Province but also to educate people. As I said before, their partners include groups like the Cancer Society, the Lung Association, health, education and labour organizations. It includes municipalities. In fact, the Federation of Municipalities have been very active in this campaign. Parks and Recreation have been involved, and so have Social Services, young people themselves, and government departments, school councils, Aboriginal groups, and there is probably a list that goes on and on. Mr. Speaker, they are making every attempt to communicate their messages to the public, to share their ideas for change that are relative to the control of tobacco and to try and get other people to come onside and to support their common goals.

Mr. Speaker, this particular bill, Bill 17, I guess the goal of this bill is to be able to ensure that there aren’t power displays of tobacco in retail outlets across the Province, that there isn’t that strong message when you walk into a door to influence young people or to influence people in general towards tobacco. That is the real purpose of the bill, but in doing that, in banning these displays and promotions of these products at retail outlets, there has to be regulations around it. There has to be controls built in and there has to be penalties for those who do not comply.

Mr. Speaker, they will be expanding the list, I guess, the list that I read from earlier when I talked about how pharmacies and schools and hospitals and municipalities are not able to offer up displays of tobacco and be able to promote tobacco products. Well they will be now adding another group to that list that they will stop them from using power displays to promote tobacco in the Province. They will be restricting signs indicting the availability of tobacco products and the price of tobacco products both inside and outside of the retail location.

So, Mr. Speaker, the time when you could walk up to a gas bar or retail store and see a big sign in the window that was promoting a tobacco product will be gone in this Province. You will not see those things any more. The day when you walk into a store and right behind the counter there is a full wall of tobacco products, that will not exist any more, that will be eliminated.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, all displays of the product will be eliminated and restricted. There will be certain rules for advertising and displaying tobacco in a store, and those rules will be specifically outlined as part of the legislation. There will be rules around how the tobacco products are advertised and the promotional materials that can be used where tobacco is sold.

For example, when tobacco companies now send out their product they also send out a whole bunch of promotional material to go with it that you can display around the business; that you can post, that you can use, I guess, as an advertising gimmick to get people to buy. Well, those advertising and promotional materials now will be prohibited for use in places where tobacco is sold.

Also, Mr. Speaker, there will be regulations around the kind of signs that may be used on any premises to be used in these displays, and there are going to be restrictions around that. There will be restrictions on where these signs will be permitted to be placed on a premise. For example, one time you could post it wherever you like. You could put it in the window of your store. You could stick it on the door. You could have it hanging over the counter where someone was going to purchase a product. Now, of course, there will be restrictions around where these signs will be allowed to be permitted in a business or on the premises of a business.

Mr. Speaker, there are going to be much tighter regulations around the sale of these products. In fact, the act itself says that, "A person shall not display or permit the display of tobacco in a place or premises in which tobacco is sold or offered for sale by a means or in a manner, including the use of a countertop or wall display, that permits a customer in the place or premises to view tobacco before purchasing it."

So, Mr. Speaker, I guess they are going to have to have a drawer or some kind of a cabinet under the counter someplace where they can lock up the product. Certainly, the act indicates that you will not be able to display tobacco for sale on any countertops or on any wall display in a place where a customer can view the product before they purchase it. So, really what they are doing is they are saying that tobacco products cannot be visible whatsoever; inside to the public, from the outside or the inside of an establishment.

Mr. Speaker, it is not an offence to view a product during the restocking of it or while a retailer is doing an inventory. That is always good to know, because you would not want to have to close down the business to restock the cabinet with tobacco products. So, at least they will be allowed to restock and they will be allowed to do an inventory.

Mr. Speaker, the act also says, under section 4.3 that, "A person shall not advertise or promote the sale or use of tobacco in a place or premises in which tobacco is sold or offered for sale on the exterior of the place or premises or anywhere within the boundaries of the place or premises." I think that is pretty self-explanatory. That is basically as to what I spoke to earlier, that you will not see the cardboard displays that you normally would have seen when you walk into these establishments.

Also, Mr. Speaker, with respect to signage, there is a section in the bill that speaks to that. It is actually under section 4.5. It says, "…a person may in a place or premises in which tobacco is sold or offered for sale (a) display or make available for viewing upon request, a sign that lists the types of tobacco for sale and their prices, if the sign complies with and is displayed in the manner, place, form and size prescribed by the regulations."

So what this actually means, Mr. Speaker, is that you will not be walking into a store and actually looking on a shelf, asking for a certain pack of cigarettes or a tub of tobacco or a pack of cigars. You will be able to go in and see a list of what they offer. You will be able to look at that particular list and you will be able to tell the person behind the counter what you want to purchase off that list. So you will no longer go in and say I want to pick up a pack of cigarettes in this brand but you will be given a list that you can look at, and that will be legal to be able to look at that list and to order.

They will have to display signs that are supplied by the minister, Mr. Speaker. I do not know what these signs are going to look like yet, I do not see that, but I guess it is part of the regulations that will accompany the bill. It also says that they will "…display a magazine or other publication that is offered for sale and that contains tobacco advertising if the magazine or publication is displayed in such a way that the tobacco advertisement is not visible to a customer unless he or she is reading the magazine or publication."

I think we have all gone into stores, Mr. Speaker, where we have seen magazine racks, where we have seen a whole bunch of magazines that are just lined up on racks on the wall. Well, in many cases tobacco companies advertise in those magazines. Mr. Speaker, if the store is selling the magazine and there is a tobacco company that has an ad on that magazine, on the back cover, that cannot be displayed in this store. In fact, they can still sell the magazine but they cannot display the ad for tobacco products. They would have to make sure that ad is not visible if they wanted to sell those magazines.

Mr. Speaker, there are very tight regulations but it also speaks to tobacco shops in particular, because we all know that there are particular businesses that only conduct the sale of tobacco, and this act very clearly speaks to different regulations, to a degree, for those particular businesses. Because when you see a tobacco shop, or a smoke shop I think it is called, in different places in the city, that is the only business they are into.

Mr. Speaker, the sections that I have quoted previously, sections 4.2 and 4.3, do not apply to those particular shops because they may display the name of their business outside the shop. For example, if they are the smoke shop they are allowed to have a sign, or if it says the local tobacco store they are allowed to have a sign that actually displays that, but advertisements, promotional material or products shall not be displayed or visible from the outside of the shop or the interior of the shop. The owner or person in charge of a tobacco shop shall not permit a person under the age of nineteen years to enter the premises unless accompanied by an adult. Mr. Speaker, there are some different regulations that affect those businesses that deal directly in tobacco products and tobacco products alone.

Mr. Speaker, once again we will have a transition in the Province when it comes to tobacco regulations, but it is not the first transition that we have gone through in Newfoundland and Labrador, and I am sure that there will be some opposition to these rules and regulations and the legislation that government is enforcing here as well, but the reality is that what we are doing is not really going to affect the bottom line of any business, and we all know that. I totally agree that as a government we should not be promoting addictive substances, and tobacco is an addictive substance. In fact, we go to great lengths to try and rehabilitate people, to try and help people who want to quit smoking, to help them reform their addiction to that product. So while we are doing that, I agree, we should not be out there promoting or encouraging.

I, too, agree that sometimes when we see those power walls of tobacco products, when we see the kind of promotion that goes on around those products, it can become quite appealing to young people. It can be appealing to young people who look at things that are being presented to them in a very upbeat fashion, in a very cool-looking fashion, in a way that makes it look appealing to be involved in it. So I think it is part of our responsibility to ensure that we try and curb that somewhat, and that we ensure that we make it as less appealing as possible, because I can bet you any money that any parent today who smokes and has an addiction to tobacco has probably tried to quit dozens of times in their lives and have been unable to, but I bet they do not want their children to become addicted to the product as well. I am sure that many of them would agree that, listen, if I need to get my pack of cigarettes, I can still run down to the store and pick them up, but my child does not have to walk in and see all of this promotion and all of this display, and thinking that it is something cool to be involved in.

Mr. Speaker, in concluding my comments, I just want to thank the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco for the work that they have done in this Province to promote the usage of tobacco, to promote the sale of tobacco, and the restrictions that need to placed around it, and to say that I think they are doing a good job as part of the Tobacco Reduction Strategy, and they have continued to be thinkers; they have continued to look at what controls need to be brought in place.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, this is not just Newfoundland and Labrador doing this. In fact, I think every province in the country now has brought in restrictions around the sale of tobacco, the signage, the promotion, the advertising of the product. I think almost every other province has banned the power wall image of tobacco products right across the country. In fact, I think we are probably one of the last provinces in the country to be bringing forward this kind of regulation.

Mr. Speaker, I will certainly conclude my comments on Bill 17, and I am sure there are other people in the House who would like to speak to this legislation as well.

MR. SPEAKER (Collins): The hon. the Member for the District of Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I am glad to have the opportunity to speak to this bill.

We have a lot of positive bills here tonight, and this is another one of them. I think this bill has been a long time coming, and we are pleased to see it. I am not going to go through a lot of things that have been said by both the minister and the Leader of the Official Opposition. I think we all know in the House, and anybody who might be up at 11:00 o’clock at night watching us knows by now, what the main purpose of this bill is with regard to controlling where tobacco is sold.

We have done a lot around legislation with regard to smoking itself, and where smoking might happen, but then there is another whole issue about how accessible tobacco might or might not be, and how where it is sold has an effect on who is smoking.

I am sure that all of us here have concerns about smoking among students, because smoking among young people is one of the places that have the highest percentage of smokers - it is with young people. This is something new, but it is something that has been happening over a period of time.

Once this bill is put in place, the fact that tobacco products will not be as visible in our society is going to be, I think, something that is going to really help with cutting back even more on the smoking that is going on. Because seeing things, having things suggested to you by advertising and by presence, that in itself creates a high incentive for people to start smoking, and basically for young people because it is young people who actually started. So, banning the sale of tobacco from the long list of places that we have here in this bill is extremely important. I am not going to go through the whole list again, I think it has been read out twice tonight and I do not think we need it read out again, but in general we are talking about any government buildings, health facilities, education facilities, athletic facility, museums, art galleries and other places. It is important to do this in order to dissuade people, especially young people, from smoking.

One of the things that have been pointed out is that in the definition of tobacconist - and the bill does allow a place that is devoted to the sale of tobacco, and we do have tobacconist shops here in St. John’s; I do not know where else in the Province, but I do know they do exist here in St. John’s - a tobacconist shop means a place or premises in which the only business conducted is the sale of tobacco. I understand that definition is one of the tightest across the country, so I am proud to see that.

Tobacco remains the third most commonly used substance among students in this Province. That is really interesting because we hear of other drugs that students are using, but tobacco remains the third most commonly used substance.

The Canadian Tobacco Use Monitoring Survey notes in the 2008 figures that the smoking rates for Newfoundland and Labrador is at 21 per cent. Now, we have come down in Newfoundland and Labrador. We seem to be hovering between 21 per cent and 22 per cent, but it means we have reached a plateau and we do not seem to be dropping below that, and we are still above the Canadian average which is 19 per cent.

I am hoping that this legislation, which I am definitely supporting, will help push the number of smokers downwards and that, as it is harder to find tobacco for sale, in terms of places where you may buy it, and it is not as obvious, so that we will get fewer new smokers coming in, that we will see our percentage drop even more. It would be good to push through the plateau that we seem to have been stuck in over the last few years.

There are some things that I would like to raise tonight with regard to how I wish the bill had gone just a little bit further, and in some cases I have some questions.

We are wondering whether or not the banning of the display of tobacco products extends to things that may be sponsored by tobacco companies. One of the things I have had said to me was, somebody mentioned that in the store in his neighbourhood, when he goes in, there is a clock on the wall. The clock is a du Maurier clock, and du Maurier is written on that clock. Now, it does not say the word tobacco, and it does not say the word cigarette or cigar, or anything else, but everybody knows that du Maurier is a tobacco company. The question is: Does this banning of the display of tobacco and tobacco products extend to things like that?

Obviously display signs advertising events, if tobacco is on them, I think that would be covered, but what about things like these clocks? These go back quite a bit in time, when clocks used to be sponsored by tobacco companies. It used to be sponsored by Coca-Cola and Pepsi, too, I think. That is one question.

Another question that I have is: Why is the department waiting until January 2010 to put this bill into force? I hope the minister might be able to give us an idea of why you are waiting until 2010 for that to happen. I am sure there is a logical explanation, so I would like to hear what that explanation is.

I am also curious with regard to vending machines, why vending machines were not banned altogether. There are not many places left where a vending machine could be put up, because when you look at the list of places where tobacco products may not be sold any more, some of these are places where vending machines would have gone. I guess I am wondering why the bill did not look at the whole issue of vending machines, and why vending machines could not have been removed.

Relating to the sale of tobacco products, of course, is the whole issue of smoking, and the minister did mention co-operation from municipalities. I think one of the municipalities that are really looking at smoking even more deeply now is here in St. John’s, where I think they are going to be banning smoking, for example, in outdoor areas, outdoor athletic fields - a big question about what will happen at the Regatta this year when smoking will not be permitted down in the Quidi Vidi area.

I think it is really good that the City of St. John’s is looking at banning smoking in those areas, because they are areas where families are around, all kinds of children are around. One might think you are out of doors and the smoke is dissipating, but when you are in tight crowds, like the crowd that happens down at the lake during the Regatta, smoking can really affect people around a smoker. I think it is really good that the City of St. John’s is doing what it is doing with regard to the outdoor smoking.

I have experienced, and I am sure others have, too, of being outdoors, even being on a sidewalk, passing somebody, and actually having smoke blown right into my face when I am outdoors. This is something, I think, that does happen, and happens regularly, so seeing a municipality take on this issue around smoking in the outdoor facilities is really good. I do not know, maybe there are other municipalities in the Province who have done that as well. I am not aware, but I am aware of what they are doing here in St. John’s.

I would also like to see the government sponsoring more smoking cessation products, therapies and programs, and doing more education around the therapies and programs that can help people stop smoking. We do have advertising going on but I think we need to beef that up and especially aim it at young people because they are the ones where the percentage of smoking is the highest.

One of the areas that is problematic is this thing of flavoured tobacco. It has been said, and I believe it, that flavoured tobacco is a tool to try to get young people to smoke, to use tobacco products. Is there any thought being given by the government to banning flavoured tobacco, because it is quite problematic? Now it will not be able to be advertised. I hope it will not be able to be advertised because of the new bill and the amendment to the act but if kids know it exists they are still going to look for it.

I do then ask the minister to explain to us why this bill is not coming into force until January, 2010? I do encourage the government, as I know it will do, to continue efforts to dissuade smoking which is a serious health issue in this Province.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

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

The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to thank the members of the Opposition who have contributed to the debate and the discussion this evening and I thank them very much for their comments.

The Leader of the NDP posed a couple of questions and I will attempt to, in my comments, respond to her. One of the questions was around vending machines. Vending machines are regulated federally and they are restricted as to where you can place them, in areas where you will not find minors. So if you look at the areas where we now sell tobacco products, vending machines will be located in bars and bars would not be included in that list of places where you cannot sell the product. Vending machines will only be in places where you have people of the age of majority would be attending. So therefore that is limited to bars. That was the logic behind that particular piece.

With respect to the other one, the implementation date, I had said in my comments earlier that we were trying to – and we understand that there are going to be some changes that retail outlets will need to make and we wanted to make sure that, in all fairness to them because many of them have invested significantly in some changes in their store and how they display their products and how they have laid out their counter space and so on. We wanted to be fair to them and ensure that they had ample time to make those kinds of changes, and some of these stores vary in sizes.

Now if you are part of a large national chain, you may have the resources to do some of these changes overnight. If you are a small corner store and your margins are very small then some of these changes may need to be made over a period, or allow you to adjust your business plan and to be able to arrange the financing, if necessary, to be able to do that. So in all fairness to them, we thought we would give them five or six months to do this. So that is why the implementation date.

There was a question, and it is an interesting question actually. I want to undertake, under committee, when we get into committee I will have a definitive answer for you on your example of the clock, because you are right. Sometimes these companies will have various promotions, like T-shirts or ball caps and a variety of things like that, that you might see hung up in a store. It is an interesting question. I will make sure when we get into committee, I will have had a chance to examine the legislation a little more closely and look at how that would be treated, and I will give you an answer at that time.

Mr. Speaker, I will conclude my comments, and I will undertake to have those questions answered for you in committee.

Thank you very much for the contribution you have made to the debate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that this bill be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

Carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act. (Bill 17)

MR. SPEAKER: This bill has now been read a second time.

When shall this bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House, now, tomorrow?

MS BURKE: Today – presently, I guess.

MR. SPEAKER: Now.

MS BURKE: Now.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The Tobacco Control Act," read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House presently, by leave.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I would like to call from the Order Paper, Order 9, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act. (Bill 12)

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that Bill 12, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act." (Bill 12)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This is a bill that will be of benefit to the pharmacists in the Province and a benefit to individuals, particularly those who travel into the Province and may want to have prescriptions filled and use the services of the pharmacists that exist in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. It is not a major amendment to the current piece of legislation, the Pharmacy Act, but it is one that enhances the services that are available to the people who travel in the Province, but also too, it makes it much easier for the pharmacists who practice in this Province to carry on their business.

This amendment also, Mr. Speaker, will allow pharmacists to fill prescriptions written by licensed prescribers in other provinces or territories. The bill, I might add, has been supported by the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Board. As we drafted this bill we wanted to make sure it was consistent with things that they wanted to do and was consistent with the things that would enhance their practice.

Currently, pharmacists who are in Newfoundland and Labrador are restricted from filling prescriptions that are written by other health professionals that might be in other parts of the country; covering prescriptions for people visiting here, tourists are here, people here for conventions and other reasons. There are lots of opportunities because of change of pharmacies, to be able to travel to Newfoundland and Labrador and have a pharmacist here fill a prescription that had been written by a doctor or some health provider in B.C. for example.

The sole purpose of these patients’ visits to physicians is often to just obtain signatures on a prescription. So why would we want to put someone through the rigor of visiting Newfoundland and Labrador, needing a prescription refilled, and only to see a physician here in this Province just to get a prescription filled? There is really no need for that kind of visit. So, it is much more of a convenience for the patients and for the people who are visiting the Province.

In recent years, Mr. Speaker, the volume of patients who have prescriptions written by authorized health professionals have been increasing steadily. Physicians are able to write prescriptions, veterinarians frequently write prescriptions, nurse practitioners write, and optometrists write prescriptions. There has been an increase in the number of individuals who are able to prescribe medications and therefore we are seeing obviously an increased demand upon our pharmacists.

By amending this act, Mr. Speaker, we will eliminate the need for such prescriptions to be co-signed by a physician within our own Province. It speaks to this whole issue of convenience of service for the people who are travelling. Obviously now too, Mr. Speaker, this brings us inline with the current practice around the country. Some of the things that we do sometimes in Newfoundland and Labrador, sometimes we are the first to be moving out on some of them and blazing new trails, but this particular piece of legislation here, this amendment, makes us now consistent with the rest of the country. That is one of the reasons the licensing board supports the initiative here and concurs with the language we have used in this particular legislation. In fact, the Pharmacy Board has requested that we would in fact introduce this legislation.

Also, too, Mr. Speaker, I want to point out that it is supported by the College of Physicians and Surgeons. We have consulted with them in this process and they too are in agreement with the amendments that we are making here and concur it is the right thing to do.

Mr. Speaker, also, now that we are talking about it, it is not the subject of the amendment necessarily but I want to highlight a couple of other initiatives that will positively impact pharmacists in this Province and the health care system as a whole. Later this spring the pharmacy network will be introduced to pharmacists throughout the Province. This will provide an opportunity for pharmacies to be connected with health providers. So we have a - electronically, we will have an ability to be able to track people, individual patients who are having prescriptions filled so that health providers are able to share the information in that data base and be able to provide enhanced quality patient care. This is a part of our electronic patient record system they are implementing. You may have heard me indicate in the House that we are one of the first provinces in the country to have PACS as an archiving system for our imaging system. I say, Mr. Speaker, this is one piece of all that - as we have the pharmacy network will also introduce at that particular time.

So, Mr. Speaker, this is somewhat of a routine amendment to an existing piece of legislation but it is also one, very clearly, that will enhance the services provided, enhance the services provided to the people who travel in Newfoundland and Labrador and provide an enhanced ability for pharmacists to enhance the service that they provide but also allow them to continue with their practice and to provide a better service to their customers.

With that in mind, Mr. Speaker, I will conclude my comments and I look forward to members opposite contributing to the debate and discussion. I am certain, as I have done with other bills, if there are some questions that are raised I will only be too glad to answer them when I stand and close debate and or when we get into committee, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am going to have a few words on Bill 12. This is an important bill because it has been having a tremendous impact on people in the Province and people who are travelling outside of the Province as well.

Mr. Speaker, what Bill 12 actually speaks to is allowing for pharmacists to be able to fill prescriptions that are prescribed by physicians that would normally not have a licence to practice in Newfoundland and Labrador, but would have a licence to practice in the country. In fact, I ran into difficulty with people who were faced with this particular regulation. I cannot even count how many times I have run into situations that were built around this legislation.

For example, Mr. Speaker, I happen to represent a district that most people will know borders on the Province of Quebec. In fact, a lot of people in my district go to the hospital in Quebec to see specialists, to see doctors, to have different therapies done that are not offered in my own district in Newfoundland and Labrador. Because they go to Quebec and they have a relationship with the physicians and the specialists that are in that hospital, oftentimes they are written prescriptions but when they bring their prescription to have it filled in their hometown, in their own district, they are unable to get the prescription filled and get a rebate, in particular on their drugs. We ran into this problem any number of times over the years, any number of times, but more importantly in the last year.

When the prescription drug program changed and there was a higher level of subsidy being afforded to people who were using the system and accessing medication, of course people wanted the opportunity to be able to get that discount on their drugs. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, they wanted to be able to fill that prescription at their own pharmacy and save that 30 per cent or 40 per cent in co-pay amount that they would get on their medication, but because their doctor was in the hospital in Quebec that had prescribed this particular medication, then they were not able to get the prescription filled there because that particular doctor did not have a licence to practice in Newfoundland and Labrador. They were licensed to practice in Quebec. So, therefore, Mr. Speaker, they could not get the prescription filled, therefore they could not get the co-pay amount reduced on their medication. Therefore, they would have to take their prescription back to the Province of Quebec, have it filled, but then they would not get their discount. They would have to do a mail-in to the Province and through MCP and the prescription drug program in order to get that money back. That is something that my constituents have been dealing with, in particular for the last year-and-a-half when the program changed.

What this regulation will now allow them to do is to be able to continue to go to the hospital in Quebec to see their same regular doctors, to see the same specialists, because they do have a lot of specialists there that we do not have, at the Forteau Health Centre, and that otherwise people would have to fly to St. Anthony to access. Of course, that would be a long trip, as you know, and it would be an expensive trip. So, Mr. Speaker, a lot of people do not want to take that option. Why would they? If you were living a fifteen- or twenty-minute drive from a health care facility, or even an hour drive from a health care facility, where you could go and see specialists and you could see surgeons and you could have tests done and there were doctors there, why would you want to drive past that facility, get on an airplane, fly to St. Anthony and see a doctor over there for the same thing?

Obviously, people use the health centre in the Province of Quebec because it is more convenient for them. It is just more convenient for them to be able to do that. Not only that, but it is more affordable for them; because if you are driving past a health centre that you can get the services in, and you are going to an airport and you are getting on a plane and you are going to another location to access those services, you are not doing it in one day. You have to overnight, so there is a cost associated with that. You have ground transportation when you get there; there is a cost associated with that. It just saves time and money for most people to use the health centre in Quebec, but the problem always was, when you went to that health centre and you had some problem that was diagnosed and treatment was prescribed, you would want to take your prescription and go to your own local pharmacy where you could hand in your drug card under the Prescription Drug Program and you could get your 30 per cent, 40 per cent, 50 per cent off, whatever you were eligible for, and you would save yourself some money up front.

What was happening was, because the doctors in Quebec were not licensed to practice in Newfoundland and Labrador, because of that, these prescriptions were not being accepted at the pharmacy in our Province and these people were being turned away. They did have the option to go to Quebec and have that prescription filled, which a lot of them would have to do, but then they would not be able to get the discount that they were eligible for under the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program. This will certainly help people in that area of the Province, but it will also help a lot of other people, Mr. Speaker.

First of all, in this Province we have a highly mobile workforce that commutes from one province to the other province on a regular basis. For example, we know that at any given time there are thousands of people from this Province who are engaged in a commuter workforce. Last year, a year ago, when there was a boon in Alberta, especially in the construction and trades industry, we had probably more Newfoundlanders and Labradorians commuting to work than ever before in our history, but they were commuting to the Province of Alberta, or they were commuting to Ontario.

Mr. Speaker, what was happening again, these people may have had prescriptions for medications, they were working for extended periods of time in other provinces and they were not able to get those prescriptions filled. This was indeed a problem for those people.

We have a lot of people in this Province who are sent out of the Province for specialist appointments, and when they come back, if they have been seen by a doctor in Ontario when they were there getting specialized treatment - because we all know that there are a lot of people who do have to go outside for treatment. For example, there were several times last year when there were different procedures that could not be provided for in the Province and people had to be sent out of the Province to have those procedures done. When they were sent out of the Province to have the procedures done, more than likely they were being prescribed medications by those doctors, whether that was at Mount Sinai Hospital, whether it was at another health care facility in the Province. Then, Mr. Speaker, when they came back home they were unable to get those prescriptions filled in Newfoundland and Labrador. They were unable to get those prescriptions filled.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I do not normally interject like this, but there is someone actually singing on the government side, to the point where it is disruptive. I realize it is late at night and whatever, but surely we can take the singing outside and not be as disruptive.

Thank you.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask members for their co-operation.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is very disruptive, with all the conversations. You add the musical notes to it, and it can throw you off when you are trying to discuss the Pharmacy Act at 11:39 p.m. in the government’s family-friendly House sittings that they promoted in the middle of a campaign. Let us not forget that was one of the commitments that they came in with, that they would have family-friendly sessions in the House of Assembly.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: Anyway, Mr. Speaker, notwithstanding that, it is only 11:39 in the night and we are here talking about the Pharmacy Act. I have to check the title at this hour to make sure I am still on the right bill.

As I was saying, this particular bill allows for prescriptions to be issued by doctors who are not licensed to practice in Newfoundland and Labrador but are allowed to practice elsewhere in Canada, and they are now able to be filled by pharmacists in this Province.

I think, Mr. Speaker, it is important for a number of reasons. One I have just outlined, because of the commuter workforce that we have in this Province, and because there are thousands of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians every day who are commuting to work in other provinces in the country. If they get sick while they are working in Alberta or Ontario or British Columbia and they have to seek the services of a physician while they are there, then when they come back home they cannot get those prescriptions filled. That was an issue, and an issue I am sure that many of us have been confronted with over the past couple of years.

The other issue was people who were being sent outside of the Province for specialist appointments and were being prescribed medications while they were seeking the medical services in other hospitals in the country. When they came back, they could not get the prescriptions that they had filled by pharmacists in this Province. That was a problem for them because then they would have to go and see another doctor, explain the situation, those physicians would have to be calling physicians at other hospitals in other provinces and getting the prescriptions reissued here in Newfoundland and Labrador so that these people could get the medication that they wanted.

Also, Mr. Speaker, there were stories of people who were travelling to our Province. In fact, there was a lengthy article in The Southern Gazette in September 2008 by a lady by the name of Florence Hynes. She had come home to Marystown, in fact, for a vacation, and when she came home she needed medication. She was residing in Fort McMurray at the time and she came home. She decided, because of personal circumstances and family circumstances, that she would stay in the Province for a longer period of time. Therefore she needed to be able to renew her prescription, but when she went to have her prescription renewed in Marystown she was told that in Newfoundland and Labrador we are not able to do that for you; we cannot do that for you.

Of course, she did not know that, as most people visiting the Province would not know that, because Newfoundland and Labrador is the only Province in Canada, outside of Quebec, where it is illegal to fill prescriptions that were written by a doctor who was not licensed to practice in this Province, because all other provinces had already changed their legislation to reflect this particular need. So people who were coming home on summer vacation, coming home because there was an illness in the family, coming home because of other circumstances, and decided to stay longer, or they would run out of medication while they were here, then they would have to make other arrangements because they could not just take their prescription into a local pharmacy anywhere in the Province and have that prescription filled.

That was an issue for them, and therefore it was an issue for people who were using the system. In fact, pharmacists have been expressing this as a concern for a while. In fact, Mr. Rowe, who was the President of the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Board, Don Rowe, he indicated at one point that he was getting calls from pharmacists on a regular basis with this concern. He had written a letter to the Registrar of the College of Physicians and also to Dr. Ritter at the time, who was the Executive Director of the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association. Everybody must remember him. He was the one that the Premier did not think too kindly of, in issues dealing with physicians in the Province. Anyway, Mr. Rowe, who is with the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Board, he did take it upon himself to write these individuals regarding the issue and indicate that there was a need to have it addressed, and that the act should be changed to reflect this concern that was being expressed by pharmacists throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Rowe and his group, through the Pharmacy Board, did lobby government to have the legislation changed, because it made sense to have it changed. It made perfectly good sense to have it changed, so therefore they made that representation. In fact, Mr. Speaker, every province in Canada now has changed its legislation. It was only in the last year or two that Ontario and Nova Scotia went ahead and made changes as well.

Mr. Speaker, there are other issues around pharmacists as well that need to be addressed by the government opposite. These are issues that I have raised in the House of Assembly, in fact, and I have a copy of Hansard here. I will probably go through it in a few minutes. Mr. Speaker, many of the pharmacists who are prescribing medications in other provinces are allowed to do so under what is called medication management. Now, in Newfoundland and Labrador, the Pharmacy Act does not speak to this. In fact, I questioned the minister in the House of Assembly on this only about a week or so ago, and about the legislative changes that pharmacists were asking for, so that they could manage medications without actually writing prescriptions or anything like that. I think the term they use medically is called continuous care, in which pharmacists, as I said, would not be permitted to write a prescription but they would have the ability to have some flexibility to do a couple of things. For example, if you are dealing with the same pharmacist - I know I deal with the same pharmacist on a regular basis. I know my pharmacist. I can go in and I can talk to him about the medications that I have. They know what I am taking. When I do go in, they will tell you if there is a new medication, if there are any side effects, if there are any problems in conflicting medications that you might already be taking, and you have a relationship with them that is one of trust and that you feel confident in the advice that they are going to give you, and you are very comfortable with it.

Mr. Speaker, we all have seen situations. We have all run into situations. In fact, I had a client last week in my office, an individual from St. John’s, whose medication had run out. In fact, Mr. Speaker, they were taking a medication for bipolar disorder and their medication had run out. They had no money to be able to get their medication. We all know that pharmacists stock extra meds and sometimes will be gracious enough to extend those meds to a patient they are familiar with, a client they have been serving, but they do not always have the ability to do that. In fact, they do not have the ability at all, I suppose.

Mr. Speaker, what about there was a situation? Say, for example, it is Christmas Eve and your mother or your parent is on some kind of a medication, and they have been prescribed this medication and their prescription runs out on Christmas Eve. You need to get enough medication to tie them over for those three days until the Christmas break is over and they can get an appointment to go see a doctor. Maybe they will just need three pills or four pills to tie them over until they can get in to get another prescription issued from their doctor.

All pharmacists want is the ability, in cases like that, to give them that extra day or two days of medication until they can get in to get a new prescription filled. That is all they are asking for, but really, they do not have the authority to do it. Under the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act they do not have the authority today to be able to do that. How many times in a year do you think a pharmacist is confronted with a question like that? They are constantly confronted with questions like that. That is the reality of the field of work they are in. The reality of human nature is that there are times when we will all forget things. There are times when we will all forget to get that prescription filled right before Easter break, or right before Christmas, or right before the long weekend we have coming up this weekend, or we are about to go out of town on an important trip and we cannot get in to get an appointment to get our prescription renewed. The first thing you do is go to your pharmacist. You go to your pharmacist to see if you can get that extra medication to tie you over for another day or two days or three days.

Mr. Speaker, it is not that they do not want to give that prescription, but they also know they are going to be subject to an audit at the end of the year. They do not want to be doing things that they are not legally allowed to do. So as much as they want to do it, they have to be very careful. They have to be very careful when they do so.

Mr. Speaker, they are confronted with this every single day. They are confronted every single day with a patient who walks in to get medication and finds out their prescription has expired, but yet, it is a Friday afternoon. They cannot get a doctor’s appointment until Monday morning and they need that medication. Believe me, the pharmacists want to give it to them but under the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act it does not allow for this type of medication management by a pharmacist, and this is what they have been indicating to government.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, when I raised it in the House of Assembly about a week or so ago, do you know what the minister said? He said: In fact, the Legislature will be making some further amendments to the legislation that will permit pharmacists to fill prescriptions written by physicians from out of the Province. Now how does that help a pharmacist who wants to have medication management under the act? I have no idea, but that was what the minister had to say. He went on to say a lot of other things that did not make a whole lot of sense either in that response, but he did respond.

Mr. Speaker, this is something that the pharmacists have been asking for. If the minister was going to bring in an amendment to the act tonight, why didn’t he bring in that amendment as well? The only implication to doing that is allowing the pharmacists in this Province to have the same kind of medication management that they have with other pharmacists across the country. So there was really no reason why it could not be done.

I will give you another example. If your doctor writes a prescription for a child, say my child was sick and I brought them in to a doctor and the doctor said: I am going to prescribe this to your child, this is the medication that they need. Well, when I get to the pharmacy to get that prescription filled, that prescription is in a capsule form or is in a tablet form. Because my child is young, the capsule might be big or the tablet might be big, and I ask the pharmacy: Does this medication come in a liquid form? He says: Yes, of course it comes in a liquid form but I cannot give it to you because your doctor has asked that I prescribe you this medication that is in a tablet form. Although it is the same medication, it is prescribed in the same dosage and in the same regulatory process that they have to take it, whether it is one, two or three times a day, or four times a week, but that pharmacist cannot say to that parent who wants a liquid form of medication for her child that I can switch it. Now, they can do it, but at the end of the year when they get audited they are going to realize the prescription that was given to that patient by the doctor is not the same as the prescription that they filled as a pharmacy.

So, Mr. Speaker, every other place in the country this is allowed. Other places in the country this is allowed. I do not understand that when the minister was looking at changes to the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act, why he did not institute those changes as well. Because I can guarantee you, Mr. Speaker, that a year from now, hopefully not at midnight, but a year from now we will be back here in the House of Assembly amending the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act again, only the next time to incorporate the practice of medication management for pharmacists in the Province, which could have been done tonight and this issue would have been resolved.

Mr. Speaker, these are the kinds of things that have been going on in the pharmacy industry forever. However technical it is to change a prescription like this, the Pharmacy Act does not allow them to do it in the Province. Although there is an expectation and although there are some pharmacists who do do it, but others do not, they stick to the letter of the law. They will not make a change whatsoever because they fear the potential of legal issues and that is the reality of it.

Mr. Speaker, recently the pharmacy acts in both the Province of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island was just amended making it legal for pharmacists to do medication management, such as the things and the examples that I just indicated. Even though pharmacists do not have the ability to write prescriptions, full prescriptions, they should not have the ability to do it, that is not their job, but they should have the ability to manage the medication that is being prescribed. There has been a recognition of this right across the country, that pharmacists should have the opportunity and the ability to be able to do this.

So I have no idea why, after aggressive lobby by pharmacists in the Province they have written - in fact, Mr. Rowe, who is the head of the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Association have raised these issues with government and with the minister. Pharmacists have raised these issues. They have made no bones about it, that while I am not allowed to do it, I have done it. Pharmacists have done it in the Province. They have done it because they know their client. They know the situation that this patient is in at any particular time and they just go ahead and allow for them to be able to access those medications, but legally they are allowed to do it because the act does not permit it.

Mr. Rowe, with the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Board, who speaks on behalf of all the pharmacists in the Province, says that the legislation needs to be changed. They need to be changed in order to define what the competencies of these pharmacists are and as to what they can do and to ensure that they are protected from a legislative perspective, because they feel today that they are not protected.

You have to realize as well that pharmacists do more than just dispense drugs. They have a value-added service in our system and a value-added service that is provided into the health care system in general. It goes far beyond the dispensing of drugs, Mr. Speaker. In fact, pharmacists do a lot of patient counselling, and I have witnessed it. I am sure you have as well when you go to a pharmacy to get a prescription filled and you see a patient at the counter and they are talking to the pharmacist and the pharmacist is explaining to them different aspects of the medication that they are about to take, what the side effects are when you take this medication combined with another type of medication that might be prescribed for that patient. I seen them comforting patients at the counter in talking about how they control the illness that they have, what they can do to try and alleviate pain, things they can do to make it easier on themselves. I have heard them stand there and talk to patients to make sure they understand how they are supposed to take this medication, how often they are supposed to take it to ensure that they do so in a safe manner.

Pharmacists also, Mr. Speaker, are involved in disease management, complex disease management; again, a part of their counselling but also a part of the other work that they have done. They also implement care plans for patients. We have all seen this, I have seen this. I have seen pharmacists take all kinds of time to sit down and review, especially with elderly people, a plan in which they should be taking all of their medications, how they should be taking them, and the things they need to do to take better care when they are being prescribed certain drugs and medications.

They review patients’ medical files, and I have been witness to that myself. They have done that to me, when I went down there to get a new prescription filled. They will look at my file and they will say: Well, you were taking this particular medication but you have not renewed that prescription in a year or six months or a year-and-a-half. They will pick that up on your file immediately because that is part of what their job is, to ensure they review your file every time that you go in to ensure that they know what is going on with you and the medications that you are taking. Mr. Speaker, I know that to be a fact, not only in my case. It not only happened once but it happened on many occasions. Pharmacists do more than just pass you out the medication after you pass them in a paper over the counter. In fact, their job goes further beyond that.

I want to talk a little bit more about the fact that they were asking for changes under the medication management program that did not materialize. One of the consequences of not having that in the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act is because all of these pharmacists are subject to an audit, and I talked about the audit a few minutes ago. How the audit works in a pharmacy is that an auditor will walk into a pharmacy and they will pick up probably about 400 different prescriptions as a sample of what pharmacists do, and believe me, pharmacists do a lot of prescriptions in the run of a year. We are not talking about a few hundred, but more like a few thousand. So an auditor will go into a pharmacy and they will take a sample to audit, and usually it is about 400 prescriptions that they will take. They will review every one of these prescriptions and they will discuss this with the pharmacist, and if there is any outstanding issues as to why a pharmacist may or may not have done something with any of those prescriptions - for example –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): Order, please!

I remind all members, even though it is late in the evening, that the House of Assembly is still in session and we are dealing with Orders of the Day. The member identified and recognized by the Chair has control of the floor, and I ask all members for their co-operation.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, it is not by choice that we are here. It was government’s decision to be here so maybe they should settle down and listen to the bills they have on the floor.

MR. SPEAKER: I ask the hon. member to continue with her delivery.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I was talking about the auditing process that pharmacists have to go through. One of the consequences of this auditing process is the fact that they do not have in legislation in this Province the ability to be able to manage medication. In fact, I asked the minister about this again a few weeks ago in the House of Assembly. In fact, he was very – not forthcoming, I should say, with a response as to when we could see a change in the act to incorporate this.

The reasons, Mr. Speaker, that pharmacists do not want to, whenever they are requested to be able to give out those extra medications for a couple of days or to change a medication from a tablet form to a liquid form, is because of the auditing process that they are subjected to. At the end of the year when an auditor walks into a pharmacy, they will take about 400 prescriptions. They will review every single one of these prescriptions and they will look at whether they were in complete compliance to what those prescriptions ordered. So if they pick up one of these prescriptions and they notice that doctor so and so prescribed to this person a medication that was in a capsule form but the actual sale of the medication that was presented by the pharmacist was in a liquid form, then they are considered to have done something wrong. They are considered to have done something wrong.

If there is a case where there is a prescription that they have found an error with, then there are three things that could happen, depending on what the audit shows at the end of the day. This is why pharmacists are so careful of what happens, because if there is an error in one of those prescriptions that are picked up, there are three things that can happen. They can report that pharmacist to a regulatory body, and we all know what that regulatory body is because we voted on it and set it up as an act of the Legislature back about a year or so ago. So, they can report it to that regulatory body.

Government also has the opportunity to ask the pharmacy to pay back the cost of whatever that prescription was and the dispensing fee. So if a pharmacist decided to do this for a patient or they were frequently coming to their pharmacy and they had gotten to know over the years, as a result of that audit and picking that up they could be asked to pay back the cost of what that medication was, plus the dispensing fee. The most serious thing that can happen to a pharmacist is they can be billed by the government for a clawback on the number of prescriptions they filled in a year, and that clawback is 5 per cent.

For example, if a pharmacist filled 1,000 prescriptions that year and they billed the government about $1 million for those prescriptions, then the government could clawback up to 5 per cent of the total cost that they were billed, which is a significant amount of money. One of the reasons why many pharmacists will not give you those two or three pills over the counter to tie you over until you go and get a new prescription from a doctor is because there is a penalty attached.

Now when I asked the minister about this in the House of Assembly, I asked him if he would put a process in place to ensure that they would not be subjected to this kind of auditing. This is what he said, Mr. Speaker. He wanted to correct me in my preamble, he said: Because there are no fines, and I want to point out that the audit process does not impose a fine. The audit process is around where - because pharmacists get paid automatically for the prescriptions that they fill. The auditing process is a review of what has taken place after the fact. Mr. Speaker, what he did not say, and he knew that I was right. It may not be constituted as a fine but it is constituted as a penalty. So while it may not be a fine that is issued, it is a penalty that could be imposed by the government.

In this auditing process against pharmacists, if there are errors found then the government has the ability to be able to clawback 5 per cent of all the billings that that pharmacy makes to the government in that year. If that billing to the government happens to be $1 million a year, then the government can clawback 5 per cent of that. The minister says: I want to correct the member in what she is saying in her preamble because there are no fines. Well, that is pretty loose with words. If it is a penalty, a fine, call it whatever you like, the ability is there for government to clawback this money.

Mr. Speaker, when I asked the minister about it in the House about a week or so ago, that was his response. Here it is written right in the auditing process as part of the legislative ability to be able to do, is to clawback this money from pharmacists. So words are very important, there is no doubt about that, very important in terms of how you portray something.

Mr. Speaker, a couple of other things with regard to the pharmacy piece and the prescription drugs because, as you know, pharmacists deal with all of the prescription drugs that are prescribed within the Province. One of the things that we have learned is that Newfoundland and Labrador is one of the provinces in the country that takes the longest time to consider cost additive drugs to be added to the formula. Yet, Mr. Speaker, they are one of the first provinces in the country to be able to add cost savings drugs to the formula. Now, isn’t that ironic?

What happens, Mr. Speaker, is that under the Canadian Common Drug Review program they make recommendations on new drug therapies that can be prescribed. For example, there might be even new information on existing drugs that now makes it more available to people, more predominant in using in different treatments and so on. Under the Canadian Common Drug Review they will make those recommendations but what happens in Newfoundland and Labrador, if one of those drugs that are being recommended cost more, there is no rush by the government to add it to the formula. In fact, they will only add cost additive drugs to the formula once a year, and that is in a new fiscal year which usually starts on April 1.

That is why every year when the Budget comes down you will hear the government saying we are going to add this new drug, or that new drug, but that new drug may have been available to other people in the country for the last eight months but never got added in Newfoundland and Labrador because there was an extra cost for that drug. Because the drug is cost additive, government takes up to a whole year in some cases before they add it to the formula, but if the Canadian Common Drug Review was recommending a drug that was less cost, cheaper for the Province, do you know what the timeline for the turnaround of adding that drug is in Newfoundland and Labrador? Sixty days. In sixty days they can put a cheaper drug on the formula in the Province and have it available to people in sixty days, but if it costs a little bit more than the one that was already there, it takes them a whole year to add it to that formula.

Mr. Speaker, in fact, we think that that is deliberate. We do not think that is by coincidence. We think it is a deliberate effort by government to save money on some of these drugs. I do not think it is realistic, and I think that if people knew the information around it they would not be happy with it. In fact, if you look at the billings for drugs, whether it be through pharmacists or through clinics or hospitals over the last couple of years, you will notice that the amount of money that we spend in drugs have decreased in this Province.

In fact, in 2008-2009 we were spending $148 million, over $148 million in fact, in drug costs in the Province. That number was revised. In fact, it was revised at a lot lower number. I think it was something like $14.6 million lower this year than it was in 2008-2009 for prescription drugs in the Province. So there is no reason that government had to wait a full year to add medication that many people in the Province needed as lifesaving medications and medicines.

Mr. Speaker, we have a record now in this country. In fact, it was just written in the provincial reimbursement advisory, it was just written in the international marketing services - that was on February 9, actually - that Newfoundland and Labrador is the second slowest provincial jurisdiction in Canada for adding many of these drugs to the formula. Now, isn’t that something? While our people out there needing lifesaving medication, needing these drugs for their illnesses and the diseases that they have, they have to wait sometimes up to twelve months longer to access these drugs than other people in Canada. They have to wait twelve months longer even though they are just as sick as the person in the next Province, they are just as sick as anyone else in the country who needs this medication, but in this Province they are waiting up to twelve months longer to get it. This is being done at a time when the government is saving nearly $15 million again this year in its provincial drug program. That is completely unnecessary, completely unnecessary.

Mr. Speaker, pharmacists know what new drugs and new medications are out there to be added to these formulas. Obviously, that is where we get our information. How would we know, Mr. Speaker, that there are new drugs out there today that should be available to patients in this Province that they will not get for a year? We only know that because we are being told by pharmacists and people who work in the pharmaceutical industry. They have actually told us what medications they are, that right now today are being provided to patients in other parts of the country but not in Newfoundland and Labrador and will not be provided here until probably April 1 next year. Yet, the minister and the government are going to save nearly $15 million this year over 2008-2009 drug costs in the Province. There is no reason why they could not be added and added to the formula immediately.

Again, Mr. Speaker, under special authorization we have seen a change this year as well. In fact, I can give you the list if you want the list. There are a number of lists. I do not have it in front of me but there is a list of medications that I was provided with through people in the pharmaceutical industry and I will give them to you. Apparently, I have been told they are under review in your department, by people in your department. They are under review.

MR. WISEMAN: (Inaudible).

MS JONES: Oh yes, I have all of that here too. You can speak to that when you close your remarks this evening.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, the minister is over there trying to take away from the bit of time that I have to speak on this important bill. He will get a full hour in a minute to speak on closing the bill.

Mr. Speaker, his question is the names of the drugs, and I already told him that I would get him the list of the drugs. I do not have it with me, but we do have it. We do have the list of the drugs but I just checked the back of my briefing note and it was not attached to the back of my note.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, I only have ten minutes or so left so I want to get to the conclusion of the rest of my comments.

Mr. Speaker, I want to speak for a minute to special authorization of the drugs as well; again, another integral part of what happens in the pharmacy business, in the prescribing of medication. Maybe the minister could provide a response for this when he stands.

In 2006-2007 in the Province there were 26,521 special authorizations for medications that were approved. Also, in 2007-2008 there were 23,115 special authorizations that were approved in the Province. In fact, these are numbers that the minister probably has in his own briefing book, I would say to him, because I think they came out of your briefing book, Minister. Before you condemn you briefing book, they came out of your briefing book. Anyway, Mr. Speaker, what I found interesting about this was not in the number of special authorizations that had been approved, although the approval level was lower in 2007-2008, but I also know that there were some changes made in some of the drugs that were normally offered through special authorization.

What I found interesting was the number of special authorizations that were denied. In fact, in 2006-2007 there were 671 applications for special authorization of drugs under the program that were denied, but in 2007-2008 there were 8,932 requests for special authorizations that were denied. I found that was a huge number - huge. When you compare the fact that the year before it was only 671, why would you have almost 9,000 people who were denied application for special authorization drugs?

MR. WISEMAN: (Inaudible) drugs came on the market that same year.

MS JONES: Maybe there were new drugs that came on the market that year, but maybe the minister could give me an explanation for that when he stands.

Now we know, Mr. Speaker, that there were a number of new drugs, and a number of these new drugs became open under the benefit program. I think that was this year that happened, not last year, so these statistics would have been from 2007-2008 as opposed to 2008-2009. Mr. Speaker, a number of the new drugs, I understood, that became open, where no longer people needed to apply for special authorization, happened between 2008 and 2009. Maybe if that was the case - or maybe that did happen in 2007, but it is a large number of people who would have been rejected authorization for medication under that program.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, to conclude my remarks, I just wanted to reiterate that this particular bill was really dealing with pharmacists and allowing them the opportunity to be able to fill prescriptions in the Province that were issued by physicians who would not necessarily have a licence to practice in Newfoundland and Labrador. That was necessary, of course, for a number of reasons, which have been outlined. I know for me, in my own district, it will make a tremendous difference to my constituents, because we went through a process last year when the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program had changed and more people became eligible for drug coverage because the threshold limits were increased. Of course, because they were eligible they wanted to get their discount on their drugs, but because they were getting the services of the hospital in Quebec they were being prescribed medications by doctors in Quebec and they were not permitted to be able to get those prescriptions filled in the district. Therefore, they could not get the reduction under the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program, and it was a real hassle.

In fact, we spent a lot of time on that issue, between the Department of Health and between the health boards, between the pharmacies, even in dealing with the health authority in the Province of Quebec which, by the way, still has that restriction. In fact, they have not lifted the prescription, so if it worked the other way around the people of Quebec still could not get their prescriptions filled.

As it is now, a person who lives in my district will be allowed to go and see a physician, or seek services there, as opposed to having to go to St. Anthony, which would be a plane trip away, to see a specialist for the same thing, which would cost them more money to be able to make the trip. They can actually go and still seek the services in Quebec, have their prescriptions filled now in Newfoundland and Labrador, when this bill comes into effect, which I think is this summer, in August, and then they will be able to also avail of the co-pay subsidy that they get under the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program.

I am sure, as well, that it will be a help for the commuter workforce in the Province. Many people in this Province commute to other parts of Canada to work. In the past, if they got ill when they were in Alberta or Ontario or somewhere else and they were prescribed medication, they could not come back home and have that prescription refilled. They would have to again go see a physician and do all the work that is required to be able to transfer and have new prescriptions issued in order to get it filled in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Of course, the story that really, I think, alerted a lot of people to this issue was the story back in September 2008 when a young lady from the Burin Peninsula, from Marystown, came home from Alberta for a vacation and, in fact, decided to stay for a longer period of time than she had intended and her medication ran out, and she needed to get a prescription filled. Of course, in Alberta you can walk in and get a prescription filled. It does not matter whether the prescribing physician is licensed in that province or not, but in Newfoundland and Labrador she could not get that prescription filled and she had to go through all of the hoops, I guess, of having a doctor on the Burin Peninsula call a physician in Alberta, where she was from, in Fort McMurray, to be able to have a new prescription issued to her in order for her to get medication when she was visiting and on vacation here in the Province.

So, Mr. Speaker, it is a bill that will certainly alleviate a lot of these obstacles and a lot of those factors that have been prohibiting people from readily accessing medication. In fact, outside of Newfoundland and Labrador and the Province of Quebec - we were the only provinces in Canada that still had that restriction. In fact, I think it was Nova Scotia who passed amendments to the legislation probably about a year or so ago, leaving ourselves and Quebec as the only two provinces that did not allow for the prescribing of medications by physicians who did not have a licence to practice in the Province, but all of these physicians do have a licence to practice in Canada and now they will have the ability to be able to use those prescription to have them filled at pharmacies in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Again, Mr. Speaker, I still do not understand why the minister did not go a bit further in his amendments to the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Act to include amendments to the legislation for the management of medication, because I do think that this is a very important one for pharmacists as well. It gives them a little bit more flexibility, but more so than anything it defines in legislation what they can or cannot do in the prescribing of medication themselves.

I know that this is something that is doable. I know that it has been an acceptable standard of practice in most other areas across the country, and why the bill tonight that we are debating is not also bringing forward these amendments for pharmacists I do not know, but I would guess that we will be back here in the House of Assembly probably a year from now making more amendments to this bill that will allow for pharmacists in the Province to be able to manage medication, and be able to do so knowing what their legislative powers are; because, as it is right now, because they are subjected to a vigorous auditing process, many pharmacists are afraid to give out those couple of pills or medications to a patient to tie them over for a couple of days until they can get a new prescription written, or they are certainly afraid to make any changes to a prescription like the change I talked about earlier in just taking a prescription that is for a capsule or a tablet and being able to prescribe it in a liquid form, if that is what the patient was requesting.

The reason they are afraid to do that - a lot of them - is because of the auditing process that is in place. So, government should either consider being more lenient with regard to the auditing process and allowing some flexibility there, or they need to make amendments to the act to allow for the management of medication by pharmacists in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, there are other components of the bill that we would have liked to have seen amended tonight, that were not brought in or introduced by the government, but I know that government is well aware of them, and I know that the minister is well aware of them, because when I asked him questions about them in the House of Assembly he certainly knew exactly what I was talking about. I am not sure that anyone else on the other side, however, knew what I was talking about, or what he was responding to, but he certainly did have a clear indication of what I was referring to and was very familiar with the issue. So, Mr. Speaker, I thought that when he indicated there were amendments coming forward to the Pharmacy Act to reflect what we are debating tonight, I thought at that time, although he was not saying that they were going to amend it to also include the management of medication for pharmacists, I thought they might at that time because it was an opportune time for them to be able to do that.

The other side to this, too, is that there has been a lobby by pharmacists looking for this. In fact, the head of the Newfoundland and Labrador Pharmacy Association has written the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association. Those letters were actually sent to the Department of Health, and they were also a part of a lobby to have this done.

I am sure the department will get to it at some point. It is unfortunate that we are not getting to it tonight, because it would have been a good opportunity to make those amendments and it certainly would have been better for the pharmacists

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that her time for speaking has expired.

MS JONES: By leave, Mr. Speaker?

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

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member, by leave.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I certainly appreciate the co-operation of the government, but I will have the opportunity in Committee later this evening to speak to this bill some more and I will take an opportunity at that time to conclude my remarks.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I do want to make just a few comments with regard to this bill, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act.

I will not go through a lot of the details that both the minister and the Leader of the Official Opposition have gone through. I think the bill itself is very straightforward and self-explanatory, although we have had explanation from both sides now with regard to the bill, so I think we all have a clear understanding of what the bill itself is about. It is obviously absolutely necessary, especially with the migratory workforce that we have in the Province that we certainly ease the ability of people to have prescriptions filled.

I would like to point out, with regard to pharmacists being able to fill prescriptions, it is not just the issue that this bill is dealing with; and this bill is dealing, of course, with the whole issue of pharmacists being able to deal with prescribers who are outside of our Province, and having prescriptions that have been written outside the Province recognized. That is pretty straightforward, and the bill is straightforward. Obviously, I have no questions about the bill, and no objections, but the bill itself does make us think about the reasons why people in the Province are having difficulties with their own prescriptions. It has to do with the issue that has been raised already by the Leader of the Official Opposition around medication management, but I do want to speak to some of the issues around medication management that I did not hear her say in particular - although she might have - because they are real to our people.

While the issue of being able to have prescriptions from outside of the Province filled because of the migratory workforce in particular, and that is one of the factors - there is more to it than that, but that is a major factor - the issue inside of the Province is an issue that the pharmacists are quite concerned about. In our discussions with the Pharmacists’ Association of Newfoundland and Labrador they have certainly raised it, and I would like to be a bit more specific about it because of the discussions that we have had with them.

It is the issue of prescriptions they get that are for more than one month, like three month prescriptions, which are quite common. Pharmacists are quite concerned about the patients whom they service who do not have the ability to pay for three months of prescriptions up front, and that has to do both for people who pay totally for their prescriptions, for all of their prescription and it also has to do for low-income people who are on the Access Plan or the Assurance Plan. The difficulty there is the co-pay; the co-pay, for example, for the Access Plan can be anywhere from 20 per cent to 70 per cent of the total prescription cost. When somebody has a prescription for three months having to pay, for example, if the co-pay were 70 per cent of the prescription cost, having to pay that becomes very prohibitive.

The pharmacists, if they try to deal with the situation of the patient that they are dealing with and if they make a decision to maybe only dispense one month at a time, then they could become penalized through the audits that they go through. This is not acceptable. I think I know - I think government does know that this is an issue for pharmacists. It is an issue that I think they are talking to government about and it is one that does have to be taken care of. The reason why I am bringing it up in relationship to the bill, we talked about the migratory workers, and that has to do with bringing in prescriptions from outside but inside, because of the nature of our health system – and it will always be this way because of the size of our population - many patients have to go to centres for their care.

For example, many people from different parts of the Province have to come into St. John’s or they may have to go to Corner Brook, or up in Labrador they go from the coast to Happy Valley-Goose Bay, for example. The issue is that they may be getting a prescription from somebody in St. John’s and going back home, to the Burin Peninsula or to the Bonavista Peninsula. Sometimes they are getting a prescription for three months because it is going to be three months before they see that doctor again, because they are coming back. So the issue of the multiple month prescription is a very serious one, both from the perspective of the patient as well as from the perspective of the pharmacist who really does want to help people; that the pharmacist in the community do know the people and they do know what they are going through.

So, it really is an issue and it is something that I would really hope government will get hammered out with pharmacists, but then it connects, of course, with the whole thing of our drug prescription program. I know it has been expanded over the years, I know that, but it is still inadequate. The co-pay is still too high. The cap runs, here in Newfoundland and Labrador, between 5 per cent and 10 per cent of a person’s income. Whereas, national studies that have been done say that it really should not be any more than 2 per cent of an income, and some provinces require even less than that. So there is still a way to go with our Prescription Drug Program.

I really would like to see the provinces and Ottawa continue talking with regard to a pharmacare program. I know provinces cannot do this on their own, it does have to be part of a federal-provincial program. I encourage this government to continue that discussion on the federal level with the federal minister and the provincial and territorial ministers, because we are going to continue to have this need escalate as our population gets older. We continue, as well, to have many drugs and treatments that are not covered.

Part of the issue is the whole issue of supplies that go with some of the diseases. Diabetic strips, for example, which are so important for monitoring diabetes, these are not covered by our health care program or a pharmacare program. The diabetic pump supplies for adults are not covered, and they can cost from $6,000 to $6,500 a year. So we have a long way to go in meeting the needs of our people, and pharmacists are in a very interesting position because they are the ones who see people in their real life at their counters. They know people’s incomes; they know everything about them in small communities in particular.

Even in larger communities, I know in my own life, I deal with one pharmacy all the time. I have been dealing with that pharmacy for years. My mother dealt with them. They knew our family. They know who you are, and that is the way it should be. They really are an essential part of the health care system. They are part of that whole continuum of people who deal with us in our health care and they should be as much a part of the discussions with government as any other group in that health care system.

I do encourage government, very seriously, to work more closely with – I do not know how closely they work with, so I am not making a judgement on that, but to listen more closely to what the pharmacists are saying about medication management. I do not care if we do have to come back next year to deal with it. I would like to see us come back. If it is not here this time, I think it is an issue that does have to be dealt with and I encourage the Minister of Health to seriously look at this. If he has something to tell us tonight about discussions that he is having and how often they have discussions with the Pharmacists’ Association, I will be very happy to hear it.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I actually did not intend, and do not intend to have much to say on the pharmacy piece. My colleague, the Leader of the Opposition is out right now. I just sort of wanted to prolong the situation, I guess, until it allows her an opportunity to take her seat. That is my purpose. Now, if the minister wants to move on to something else and allow her a chance to get back in, that is fine too. I do not intend just to delay the process for no reason whatsoever.

She will not be speaking on this bill anymore, of course, but it is on the next piece of legislation. My colleague for Port de Grave is arranging that.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, we concur.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services speaks now he will close the debate on Bill 12, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act.

MR. WISEMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to thank the members opposite for their comments. I gathered from the thrust of their comments there are a number of things that they would like the bill to include and be expanded beyond what we are proposing here. However, the thrust of the bill itself and what we have included in the bill and the amendments to the act, I gathered from the comments opposite that there is support for what we are doing here. Obviously, there are some commentaries about what we might do in the future and some enhancements that we might make; a lot of comments around the Prescription Drug Program itself, how it is administered and some of the ways in which we provide services to the clients who are covered.

Beyond that, Mr. Speaker, I thank them for their support for the bill. As we get into committee, if there are some very specific questions that they want to pose I will answer them for them at that time.

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 12, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, 'nay'.

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act. (Bill 12)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 12 has now been read a second time.

When shall Bill 12 be referred to a Committee of the Whole House?

MS BURKE: Today.

MR. SPEAKER: Today.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The Pharmacy Act," read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House presently, by leave. (Bill 12)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, earlier today in our session we had been debating some other bills and one was stopped because the fire alarm went. I cannot remember if it was bill –

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS BURKE: It was Bill 9, so we will continue. There was some time left on the clock, the Leader of the Opposition had been speaking on that and we will return to that bill at this time, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The continuation of second reading of Bill 9, An Act To Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act.

I recognize the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Unfortunately, I was just starting to get into the real debate of the bill actually, when the fire alarm did go off. I think at the time I indicated that the Minister of Finance would have gone out and pulled the alarm. I want to apologize for that, Mr. Speaker, because when I went out after, the first one I ran into in the hall was the Minister of Health. So, I am not sure, it might have been either one of them. Seriously, Mr. Speaker, there was nothing alarming to be worried about in the building and I do not think any member pulled the alarm.

Mr. Speaker, we were speaking on this particular bill, and Bill 9 is the Act to Amend The Student Financial Assistance Act. At the time I was talking about the importance of education in the Province and the importance of education to students in general. I guess we all know that it is an educated society that really prospers the greatest at the end of the day. That is why successive governments over the years have always tried to provide for the highest levels of academic learning and encourage the highest levels of academic learning that we could possible do in the Province.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, even going back to the early days when Newfoundland and Labrador first became a Province and became a part of Confederation with Canada, one of the first acts of this House of Assembly was to establish Memorial University. In fact, it was the first act of the House of Assembly, was to establish the Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, but we did not stop there in terms of establishing institutes of higher learning in the Province. In fact, Mr. Speaker, at the time, when that act was proclaimed in the Legislature, it was under the leadership of Premier Joey Smallwood. Others may have very varying views about Joey Smallwood, but he saw the benefit in having an educated people in this Province, and I am glad he did because many governments after have benefited from having a population of people that have been very educated, very determined and very able to launch new industries in a time of change.

Mr. Speaker, not only did he establish the act of the Legislature to set up the university, but he also established all of the community colleges right across the Province. In fact, in places where some do not exist any more today because they probably have been closed out, but back in those days he saw the benefit of bringing post-secondary education to all the different regions of the Province and set up the community college system or the trade school system, I think it was called back then, in which campuses were built all over the place. Some are still existing today and operating under different and new names, in places like Seal Cove, Grand Falls, Lewisporte, Stephenville, St. Anthony, and Goose Bay. In all of these places where there was a college of trades that was set up to ensure that people did not just have to move out of all the bays and inlets and coves and harbours around this Province and leave the precious life that they were so proud of and the precious places that they were so proud of, but they could educate their children and educate themselves exactly where they lived in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, right from the beginning as a Province, right from the beginning as legislatures in this Province, it was seen that education was one of the most important components that would form the foundation of success in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, it did not start there. In fact, Joey Smallwood, who at the time was the Premier when these institutions were set up, was also a common, ordinary folk in Newfoundland and Labrador, a man who walked the railway tracks, a man who organized unionized workers, labourers across the Province. He also understood from those journeys that there were many people in this Province who could not afford to send their children to university, he understood that. He understood, Mr. Speaker, at that time in Newfoundland and Labrador it was not unusual to see a family that would have sixteen or eighteen children in it, not unusual at all. There may even be colleagues here in the House of Assembly who came from large families. I know I have had colleagues before; I remember Roger Grimes once telling the story of seventeen of them in the family. Mr. Speaker, there were a lot of large families in Newfoundland and Labrador and it was not unusual.

In fact, in those days there was normally one income in a household - one income - and in a lot of cases that one income came from working as a logger or as a fisherperson or as a labourer. Most of them were construction workers who worked on the railways, worked on the highways, and they were one-income families, so it was often difficult to look at sending your child to university, and that was the reason that they brought in a system in the Province of free education, a free education for a period of time. It was under that free education that a lot of the bureaucracy that I have known in the years that I have been in this building had the opportunity to get an education, to get a university degree. In fact, if you go around departments of governments today, it is that generation of people that are looking at retiring now from the public service or have already retired, but it was that generation that got educated under the free university education system.

Mr. Speaker, that is something to be proud of, as a Province. It is something to be proud of, as a Province. I wish that today in Newfoundland and Labrador we were in a position to offer free education to our students. I wish that fiscally we were able to go out - I do not care what government it was - I wish that today we were in a financial position in Newfoundland and Labrador to once again say to the youth and the children of this Province that we want you to be educated and we will pay for that education, but I also know realistically that we cannot always do the things we want to do. I know that we have fiscal responsibilities that we have to live within. So, sometimes, even though the desire is there and the want is there and even the need may be out there, you are not always in a position where you can meet all of those demands.

Mr. Speaker, is there more that we can do? I think there is a realization by all of us that there is more that we can do, and I will get into talking about that in a few minutes, but I think it is something to be proud of, as a Province, that there was a time in our history when we sought out and placed education as one of the top priorities and main pillars for the foundation of building this Province, and I am very proud of it.

I never had that opportunity, but I am very proud for those who did. All of those I have met who have told me the story of how they accessed free education in this Province, they have all been good, enlightening stories. They have all been stories of people who probably would have never had the opportunity, and that is what I find good about it. I have watched some of those individuals who had the opportunity for that free education, who rose to the top of their professions, and they rose to be very successful in the fields that they were in. It would have been unfortunate if they would have never, ever, had that opportunity. That is why it is important to foster the potential that we have in our young population. It is important to do that. While today we may not be in a position to give them free education, we are in a position to do many other things.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, in 1999 we saw the first tuition freeze being implemented at Memorial University. I remember it well, actually, here in the Legislature, when the decision was made and the announcement was made to look at a tuition freeze in the Province. Again, it was at a time when many people felt that we were not in a fiscal position to be able to offer a tuition freeze at a university. It was at a time when many people thought that we were running deficits in the Province and therefore we should not be looking at extravagant expenditures like that, that we should not be looking at freezing tuitions.

I remember that there were critics at that time because they felt that government was not in a fiscal position in 1999 to be bringing in that kind of an action to freeze the tuition of students in the Province, and to offer Debt Reduction Grants, and to offer enhanced interest relief at that time for students and student loans, because that is what was offered at that time. Those programs served a lot of people in this Province. They served a lot of students in this Province. In fact, Mr. Speaker, at the time that this tuition freeze was first announced, Dr. Art May was the president of the university. I remember his quote and I will read it to you. He said, "No tuition increase is the best birthday present that government could ever give to Memorial University students on our 50^th anniversary as a degree-granting institution."

That was what the president of the university said at that time. Mr. Speaker, that was the beginning of a trend to freeze tuition rates for students in this Province, and I am proud to say that to this day tuition rates have been frozen in this Province.

AN HON. MEMBER: Because of us.

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, they had been frozen long before the government member over there indicates that they froze them. They were frozen in 1999, they were frozen in 2002, and they are continuing to be frozen in this Province, and so they should. So, Mr. Speaker, it was one of the first bolder moves, I guess, made in the interest of students in the Province for a long time.

The other move was in 2002, when Newfoundland and Labrador students were allowed to convert their student loan into a non-repayable grant. That was a good program, and is a good program. In fact, I can read at least two or three press releases from the government ministers opposite when they came into office. The first one was by the current Minister of Fisheries, when he was the Minister of Education, announcing that they would continue with the non-repayable grant, the new Debt Reduction Grant.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS JONES: That was in 2002, and I have the press release right here, Minister. I have yours there, too, that came in after.

Mr. Speaker, in 2002 it allowed Newfoundland and Labrador students to take their loans and convert them into non-repayable grants. Mr. Speaker, how it works is this: Debt Reduction Grants were earned on a semester-by-semester basis and students were notified. They did not have to apply, and there were provisions made to accommodate the students. They had to do so many courses in so many semesters. Each year it was reviewed. Obviously, they had to pass those courses in order to be considered for a Debt Reduction Grant. That was another program that came in.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, over the years since 2002 there have been millions of dollars spent, millions of dollars spent, to convert loans in this Province to students into grants - millions. In fact, when the government opposite came in they continued with the program. I have a press release here that was issued by the then Minister of Education, who today is the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture, when he first came out and announced that they would continue with the program, and that they would, this year, offer relief to so many students in this Province that totalled x number of millions of dollars.

Mr. Speaker, there have been a number of things and initiatives that have been done, but certainly was it enough? That is always the question. Was it enough or is it enough? I do not think it is ever enough. I do not think it is ever enough, when you look at the value that you are getting for the money that you are investing, because every time that you are investing in education, and investing in these students and investing in these young people, you are getting a return. You are getting a huge return as a Province.

Mr. Speaker, there are a couple of other things I want to mention. Even though there were initiatives with regard to interest relief, even though there was an initiative with regard to debt reduction, or taking loans and converting them into grants to reduce the amount of debt that students would incur, although those programs did exist, although there were freezes put on tuition, the reality is that student debt continued to climb. Although there was some relief, student debt continued to climb.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, in January of this year student loan debt in this country surpassed $13 billion. Can you imagine? The youngest, brightest minds that will lead and shape this country, in January of this year had loans that surpassed $13 billion in Canada. Just put your head around that. The total Canada Student Loan debt was increasing faster than $1.2 million every day, faster than $1.2 million every single day in this country.

When I read that, I had to stop and read it again, back in January, because I said this cannot be right. It cannot be right that the youngest, most brilliant minds in our countr