The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

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

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

I would like to inform members of this House that a Labour Market Development Agreement between the Government of Canada and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador was signed about an hour ago in Ottawa by Prime Minister Chrétien and Premier Tobin. This agreement will provide $308 million over the next three years for active employment benefits and measures and partnership initiatives with community-based organizations.

The new federal-provincial partnership is the first co-management agreement in the country and will help unemployed workers in this Province find jobs or acquire the skills necessary for employment. This initiative complements the philosophy of our new Department of Human Resources and Employment which was established in last week's Budget. We cannot go wrong in helping people maximize their full potential, Mr. Speaker.

This agreement will mean national employment programs will be redesigned and tailored to meet the needs, circumstances and priorities of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. As a full partner with the Federal Government, we will have an equal role to play in the design of, and the decision-making and management of federal employment programs resulting from Employment Insurance reform. This way, we can identify our priorities so that they will also complement our provincial programs.

We are embarking, Mr. Speaker, on a new philosophy that loudly sends the message that Newfoundland is open for business. This is no longer about training for the sake of training but about training to find meaningful work. This is about telling big business and all employers, we must manage these programs in a way which will support regional economic development in all of the economic zones in our Province.

Mr. Speaker, we are making the choices necessary to manage change. Our greatest resource is our people. People need jobs but they also need the skills required by employers in today's economy. We must provide support to people in a more active way to make sure they have the skills they need to meet the challenges of today's labour market. Government will act as a bridge between the people of our Province and the business and the workforce sectors.

Through the establishment of our new Department of Human Resources and Employment and through the partnership we have joined today with the signing of this Labour Market Development Agreement, it will be easier for unemployed workers to access labour market services tailored to meet their specific needs and objectives with an action plan to return to employment. Newfoundland and Labrador is a small Province. This puts us in an even better position to be adaptable and swift in turning our workforce around to meet the identified needs of employers.

Mr. Speaker, we are saying to Industry and Business that if you make the investment in Newfoundland and Labrador, we will train the workforce to do the job.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: If we do not have the existing trained workforce, then we will train people to meet your needs. This, Mr. Speaker, is about matching skills with identified needs.

This agreement will mean reduced overlap and duplication of employment services delivered by the Federal and Provincial Governments. The result will be a more effective and efficient delivery and operation of labour market programs and services for people throughout the Province.

Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador are working together in a way which will better serve the people of this Province. With a bright future ahead in this Province, we have to adapt and prepare for the future by offering people the opportunities they need to prepare themselves.

Our co-operative approach will allow people to develop the skills that they want to direct their own lives and their own futures. It will help Newfoundlanders and Labradorians find jobs and become active participants in the economy of our Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Today, the minister is announcing a $308-million program, a program of December 1, 1995 when the Premier was our federal minister - and I have the documents here and the back-up papers and I will tell the minister exactly what is in each of the three years. Before I start, I will tell the minister, year one of that program $85,837,000; year two, $106,319,000; third year, $115,799,000. No wonder the Premier has gone to Ottawa when he dumped the program on us that saw EI benefits reduced from $1 billion to $500 million and they are going to re-invest $308 million over three years, $100 million a year? This very program, I say to the minister, was announced a year-and-a-half ago, and out of the transitional job-training program, was $300 million and this Province has dragged its feet on the skills, loans and grants and students have not been able to continue in school because this government did not move to do something about it.

Now, the Premier, to do damage control - the minister who delivered this program - is trying to put a public relations spin on something that was announced a year-and-a-half ago and on which I gave the minister the very figures that are going to be used in this program.

This very booklet said here on December 1 1995: The EI program will respect provincial responsibility for labour market training and education and will reduce overlap and duplication within provinces. And she has the audacity to say it is the first province in Canada in a co-management agreement. There are provinces that are managing it themselves. Quebec runs its labour market program it has been looking for, and the minister - an announcement that was made a year-and-a-half ago, it is like the economic renewal agreement in this year's Budget, last year's and 1995 was announced again. How much more mileage is the Premier trying to get out of something in which he inflicted a loss of $500 million to this Province?

We were told we were going to get $120 million a year out of that $800 million that is going to be reinvested. Now we are only getting a little over $100 million a year -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. SULLIVAN: - a province that has lost half-a-billion dollars. It is shameful. It is a year-and-a-half late - we knew it a year-and-a-half ago - and they get up and try to pretend it is something new. There is not one new step, Mr. Speaker, in this. It is the same basic program.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi. Does he have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I suspect the minister must have been in Corner Brook last week because this looks like a part of `Snow Job 1997'. We have before us what appears to be a small fraction of the money that was lost to this Province when unemployment insurance was changed. The money taken out of income support is now going into training. Is this, I ask, the price that this government paid and that Newfoundlanders are paying for failing to take on the feds when they gutted the UI program, and the `silent seven' from this Province voted for it?

There are an awful lot of questions about this program. When they start co-ordinating this with this minister's idea of social policy, will we be seeing it like TAGS, income support on social assistance being only available to those who take on a training program offered by this government's department? This is the kind of question that this raises here. The monies involved is a fraction of what is being lost, and is a part of this government's attempt to convince the people of this Province that less is, in fact, more.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions today are for the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board. The minister has suggested to the people of this Province that we have a three year budget. The minister stated we have a three year budget and a three year plan. Now I read the documentation tabled by the minister and found one double-sided page in this entire budget. I ask the minister, is that your three year budget plan?

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, what is contained in the Budget document are several things, one is there are gross expenditures for government with the revenues and we have net spending figures. We are indicating a reducing deficit position over the next two years leading to a balance in the third year. As well, we have a table in the Budget document that sets forth the anticipated expenditures on a departmental basis over the next three years as well. My eye sight is not as good as the hon. member's, assisted by glasses, but I assume that that is the table he is referring to. I can't see the figures from this side of the House. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It shows in Appendix I, two pages, one double-sided sheet. I ask the minister, now where are the justifications for the numbers that are included on those two pages?

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, numbers don't have justifications. What we have done in the Budget -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, numbers are numbers. The numbers are set forth on a departmental basis the same as in the estimates of every budget that the government presents. I challenge the member to look at any budget that sets forth the numbers for each department and find a written justification for those. The numbers speak in and of themselves, Mr. Speaker. The truth is in the numbers. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, what an admission, I say, what an admission. There is no justification for his numbers and that is exactly what we advocate.

Now, minister, in your Budget documentation on page 23 of the economy, you showed a diagram relating to anticipated economic growth or economic decline. Now the Scotia Bank - that's on page 23 - the TD Bank, the Bank of Montreal, the Conference Board of Canada and the Royal Bank along with noted economists are predicting growth. I ask the minister, the government and its banker, the CIBC are alone predicting decline. I ask the minister, why are you cooking the books?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We can do a more detailed forecast, Mr. Speaker, than any of the banks. The Bank of Commerce by-and-large, being the Province's banker has fairly in-depth knowledge of our provincial economy. What the hon. member will find is that the projection of the national banks, the Conference Board of Canada and the others, is more tied to national trends than provincial realities. That is why one sees a difference between the different estimates, or among the different estimates of the chartered banks in the country.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition, a supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Those people last year predicted different growth, and they were right. This government was wrong in its predicted growth last year, I say. Maybe we should start listening to other people.

In the minister's little diagram here on page 23 it says the economy will contract because of ongoing government restraint. Is the minister willing to admit to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians that the economic problems forecast causing such grief, department cutbacks and lay-offs, are a fabrication of this government?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Of course not! What the member will find from year to year is that our forecasts as to the economy are much more accurate than any other predictors in the country. What happens is that from year to year there are changes because different things happen.

As the hon. member knows, the Hibernia construction over the past several years has been the main contributor to the Province's economy. This year, because of faults with the work completed in Korea, there was an additional eight months' work that charged back into the economy about $50 million a month, if my memory serves me correctly. Actually, that may be an overstatement; it may be closer to twenty-four.

We had about 4,000 or 5,000 people working at an average of $70,000 per job, so the difference from year to year - given the fact that we monitor it much more closely than many other economic groups in the country - can be accounted for very easily, and actually we have done that in the past year.

This year we hope we are wrong, but I would be surprised if we were so. We could certainly go on operating the Province as the hon. member's colleagues did for many years, and add $200 million a year to the deficit, continually increase taxes, but we have decided that the way to manage this Province is to do it prudently, to follow our own advice, our own analyses and our own heads. The hon. member may have a different approach.

One can certainly not charge ahead spending money when every economic indicator is that your economy will be in decline and you will have less money to spend. We prefer to take the prudent course. We would rather, at the end of the year, have improved on our budget position rather than having to always revise it, as has been the practice over the memorable past.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition, a supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

For a government that has missed their projections seven of the last eight years, I would start to be worried, and try to start to believe who really is telling us the truth.

Isn't it true that the real Premier of the Province, Premier Malcolm, wants an economic crisis here in the Province? Mr. artificial privatization, wants an excuse to sell this Province off for a buck.

Now in order to accomplish this, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians must feel poor, so lay people off, cut departments, scream recession, everybody is afraid, nobody wants to spend and then what? I ask the minister: Isn't this all a part of Premier Malcolm's planning and the real Premier to make Atlantica the one union?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DICKS: The hon. member's problem obviously is that he can't stand success.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DICKS: This government, Mr. Speaker, has met and exceeded budgetary targets in each of the last few years. The year before last I became minister in August, and at that time, in the fall, we faced revenue shortfalls of $70 million. In six months we turned that around and showed closer to a $10-million surplus. Not only did we meet the shortfall we exceeded the original budget by almost $10 million. This year again, Mr. Speaker, there was a $44.08 million deficit forecast, we exceeded that by almost $15 million while at the same time making very substantial and strategic investments in education and health care which I am sure the hon. member would appreciate although he may say otherwise from time to time.

Having said that, Mr. Speaker, last year we exceeded our budgetary targets by $130 million and chose a substantial amount of that money to re-invest in the economy, to assist our municipalities through a variety of measures, paying down debt and to assist our school boards. If the hon. member thinks that is a wrong way to proceed, I would like his alternative put to the people of the Province at some point in the near future.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition, a supplementary.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Actually, what the minister said, is not true at all. In fact, he borrowed $15 million out of the $30 million contingency reserve fund. We would have borrowed $15 million without it and we ended up borrowing almost thirty so we dug into the contingency reserve fund $15 million, in which this minister and the Premier said, they would bring those expenditures to the House to have them approved but that was not done.

Now the minister is concerned that every two years - the Liberals say we would be rich in two years time. Now it started back in 1949 I believe, and it continued again in 1989 every two years. Now I suggest to the minister, if he were being truthful and wanted all of us to be rich -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: I ask the minister, where all of us want to be rich, where we can all buy a park of two, I ask the minister now: what is he doing to ensure that we get royalties from Voisey's Bay? It is not there.

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, I find the hon. member's approach at least is consistent even if his issues change from time to time. Last year, during the provincial election we heard much ado by his party about the fact that deals had been cut, and there would be no smelter and refinery in the Province, that there would be no transshipment centre. Mr. Speaker, all that has come to fruition and has transpired.

The people of the Province can be assured that this government will insist upon and receive from Voisey's Bay, from the offshore exploration, from the whole resource sector, a full, fair and substantial return from all of these assets of the Province. We believe that there is room in this Province for a business growth, and there is also room for growth in provincial government revenues to redistribute the wealth, and that will be done.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You have heard our concerns on cooking the books. Now I want to ask the question to the Minister of Health. I held out hope for the integrity of government, but the Minister of Health shattered that, my feelings of good faith, on Thursday after the Budget Speech. After reading the Budget, and as the minister was leaving outside this House here, side by side with the real premier, `Premier Malcolm,' he said: A crafty piece of work, my son, your fingerprints are all over it. I ask the minister: What did he mean by that statement?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)!

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

The hon. the Minister of Health.

MR. MATTHEWS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would say to the hon. member he shouldn't believe anything he hears and only about half he sees.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This government talks about the largest and most advanced smelter and refinery in the world. It talks about a state-of-the-art transshipment facility. My question today is for the Minister of Education. Why does this minister continue to boast about a low pupil-teacher ratio when many classrooms, particularly in the more urban parts of our Province, have some thirty to thirty-five students in those classrooms? With the resources which we have in this Province there is no excuse for any single classroom in this day and age to have that many students in those classrooms. When is this minister going to provide the best and most advanced system of education for our children, who are truly the owners and beneficiaries of Voisey's Bay?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm glad to see the hon. member is truly interested in the education system because it is extremely important to all of us.

It still remains a fact, regardless of what the hon. member asks by way of a question here in the Legislature or what anybody else would purport to say, the reality of the circumstance right now in Newfoundland and Labrador is that we provide a professionally trained educator for every 14.8 students in the Province. There is just one jurisdiction that provides on a better ratio than that, which is in Quebec. The national average is one trained professional educator for every 15.4 students in the Province.

With respect to Alberta, that we hope to emulate at some point in the not too distant future with respect to monies to spend on our programs like health care and education, it provides a professionally trained educator for every 17.9 students in the Province. In fact, if we were in Alberta and it had the same student population as we have in Newfoundland and Labrador, 106,000 students, it would have 1,243 less teachers teaching them than we do in Newfoundland and Labrador.

So there is quite an effort being made here. There are reasons for it, Mr. Speaker -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the minister to conclude his answer, please.

MR. GRIMES: Yes, Mr. Speaker. There are reasons why we have a low pupil-teacher ratio, and there is a good reason why it is still the second-lowest in the country, and we will commit to trying to maintain those kinds of levels in the future, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Despite the spin and despite the minister's interpretation of those statistics, the fact remains in many classrooms in the urban parts of this Province today there are thirty to thirty-five students in those classrooms. So I say to the minister, how is it possible that these stats - that he in fact maintains - is the situation in this Province today? How do these stats reveal what in fact is the situation today? It just doesn't work. Mr. Speaker, education should not be based on economic means and on the means of a family's wealth. To carry on with this atrocity, Mr. Speaker, the government now wants to stamp the foreheads of our children. It would like to separate the poor children and have them tutored by those, the minister says, are in their own economic level. Why in this rich Province, Mr. Speaker, are the children only having tutoring provided for by the taxpayers if the children are poor? Why, Mr. Speaker, are the only ones tutoring under this program the poor students? Where is the minister's sensitivity and how can he permit such a program to be implemented in this Province?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think I might, sort of this time around, copy a page from the tactics of the Opposition because I do believe I will get copies of that question and send it to the households of Newfoundland and Labrador because they won't believe they heard it for starters. They will not believe that they just heard that presented as a serious question. We understand, Mr. Speaker -

MR. E. BYRNE: Stand up and say it (inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: We understand and the people of the Province understand - we understand, Mr. Speaker, and we do know that the people of the Province understand, from the public consultation that we undertook, that parents know that there is no direct relationship between a pupil/teacher ratio and class size. They knew that at the meetings. They understood perfectly well while the statistics on pupil/teacher ratio were presented. Nobody is purporting that it means the class size, Mr. Speaker. The member opposite knows the difference and it is not the matter of most of the classes are like that. Yes, there are some classes with thirty and thirty-five students in them and yes, Mr. Speaker, there are some classes with five and six and eight in them as well. Mr. Speaker, you can have the argument both ways.

With respect to the question on tutoring - which is the one I think I will get a copy of and send to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador - tutoring, Mr. Speaker, has never been a paid for activity and a paid for service in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Individuals who have needed tutoring have either paid for it themselves, Mr. Speaker, in this Province or the teachers themselves have volunteered to provide tutoring service after hours. What we are doing, Mr. Speaker - and I can't believe that the member of the Opposition, the critic, is suggesting there is something wrong with it. He is suggesting that because we are going to fund, for the first time, some money to provide for tutoring for students of low income families who may need the help and whose parents can't possibly afford to pay for it, like I might for my daughter or son and child because we are going to offer a hand for the first time ever in the Province for some children who need the service but can't afford it, he is suggesting, Mr. Speaker, there is something wrong with that. I would like for the people of the Province to pass judgement on that question, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say to the hon. minister, he is completely out of touch with reality. Mr. Speaker, he is clearly unaware of the vulnerability and the sensitivities of young children in our schools today who, in order to be tutored, have to undergo and have their families undergo a means test. That is a humiliating experience for the children of this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: I ask the minister, this Province is planning to build new schools, who will staff them? He is laying off some 468 teachers. We have buildings that require improvements. We have overcrowded classrooms. Does this minister, I ask in terms of the department that he is supposed to be running, does he know what he is doing? When will the schools and the children in this Province get their entitlement from our resources?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate the comment as well with respect to being out of touch because it is clear that the hon. Opposition critic does not understand how we deal with people from low income families and people on social assistance in the school system where we deal with several programs already in a very non-stigmatizing manner, so that they get textbooks with no charge and nobody in the school knows it. We manage to do that, and the members opposite maybe do not know that, but we have every capability in the system and the system is very sensitive to low income families and social assistance clients, and the children of them, because they know what can happen if the stigma gets attached.

In the education system, to the credit of the professionally trained educators who are there, to the credit of the social workers, to the credit of the parents, and to the credit of the children themselves, they manage to deal with these issues in a completely non-stigmatizing manner, and the member opposite would suggest that now we are going to add another program that will be of value to these people who need it most in the Province, and that all of a sudden we are not going to be able to do it except by stigmatizing and branding the children as saying: You are from social assistance families, and that you need this and you are going to have to be marched out in front of your peers.

Mr. Speaker, it does not happen today; it will not happen with this program, and I am more convinced than ever that I will have to get the questions and send them out to the people, the public, to see (inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Minister of Environment and Labour.

In the 1997 Budget, Appendix II, page 3, there is a new fee for certificate of approval for water and wastewater systems. The charge for service increased from zero dollars to between $200 and $1,000. Is this new fee for the people building new homes with a well and septic system and/or a new charge for existing home-owners who want their well-water tested?

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for the question.

Yes, it was a practice in the past that there was no charge for a lot of work done by the officials. We have decided that there will be a charge for it. I will undertake to get the details of what it will cover, and bring it back to the member. I will get the details, because I do not have all the details with me; but I will get the details.

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

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My next question obviously will not be answered by the minister because he put the new fees in place and he doesn't know anything about them.

How much revenue is anticipated from this new fee? And how much total revenue is expected from the eight new fees in your department?

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I will undertake to get the details of exactly what the fees will cover. They will cover some of the work that we have done in the past for permits and applications. It talks about going to $200 to $1,000. We are talking about municipalities here, we are talking about major businesses and so on, so I will undertake to get the details and bring them back.

We also have the Budget Estimates coming up, and I guarantee you that I will have all that detail for you very shortly.

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

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

Mr. Minister -

AN HON. MEMBER: Kevin, were you at are the Cabinet table when those fees were (inaudible)?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair has recognized the hon. Member for Cape St. Francis.

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

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: He was. I know he...

AN HON. MEMBER: I don't think he was.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. J. BYRNE: The environmental management and controls area of the Budget was decreased by $523,300. With new revenues to your department, yet a decrease in its budget and the increased demand for EPRs and environmental assessments for Voisey's Bay, the smelter, thirty or forty rivers are going to be dammed, how will your department do justice environmentally to these projects at a critical time in Newfoundland and Labrador's development? Will there be a free-for-all for government's buddies, especially with respect to the rivers?

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: First off, Mr. Speaker, on environmental assessment, our existing staff will be maintained and basically we will be able to deal with, we believe, the environmental assessments for projects as they come forward.

Right now we have twenty-three projects for power brought forward to the Environmental Assessment Division. That is a lot of work, and we will evaluate if we need more staff in the future; but because of the economic development that is starting to occur in the Province because of the efforts of this government and so on, yes, our department is going to be under pressure; there is no doubt about that. We know we will face pressures for environmental assessment and so on. We believe, and we are pretty sure, that we can deal with these issues as we go, but we will be evaluating, as we go, the workload on the department and we will take it under consideration, but we are going to deal with the issues as they arise.

We are dealing now with the environmental assessments on a timely basis. Companies are getting their responses as they should. We are getting the public involved in environment assessments, so we are carrying on work as we should, and we are dealing with the companies as we should, and the Budget we have brought forward will ensure that we deal with it in the future.

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

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

My questions are for the Minister of Human Resources and Employment, AKA the Department of Social Services. In the Budget statement, government has noted that young adults between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one who are living with relatives will have the incomes of these relatives assessed if they are to receive assistance from the Department of Social Services. In effect, you have raised the definition of minors or childhood by as many as three years. I ask the minister: How will she assess the income levels of these other relatives, what type of means test will be used, and whose income will be included in determining eligibility?

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

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

Yes, in this last Budget we did implement a rule whereby eighteen- to twenty-one-year-olds who are living with their parents whose incomes are above the social assistance rates that would include the $89, plus the cost of the drug card into their incomes, if their incomes are actually higher than what would be allocated on social assistance, then they will no longer be eligible.

Right now, Mr. Speaker, it is important to note, that any single eighteen- to twenty-one-year-old child of even anyone sitting in this House could go to the Department of Social Services and collect social assistance. We believe, more importantly than even the amount of money, that this measure is very important to prevent a cycle of dependency to assist people to move on to other sorts of training like our SWASP programs, other initiatives that we are working on, and we see it as a very positive step to address these issues before they become chronic problems, which we believe can be prevented through prevention programs.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader, a supplementary.

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

I ask the minister: What happens to the parents of these young people who do not agree to share the confidential information about their income levels and the various sources? Has the minister referred this initiative of her department to the Department of Justice for an opinion as to whether or not people's rights under the Constitution have been compromised, or may be compromised?

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

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

Our view is that when people come in to apply for social assistance they sign a contract to disclose certain pieces of information. If we know for a fact that their parents are lawyers or doctors, teachers or nurses, or whatever, who are making more than social assistance rates, then those rates would be considered as an offset to what this particular applicant would receive.

Mr. Speaker, with as little money as we have, even though we spend $250 million a year on income assistance, we believe that we need to spend the money in the most efficient way. We need to prevent a cycle of dependency and we believe it is a positive step in moving forward to addressing some of the problems we face today.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Opposition House Leader, a supplementary.

MR. H. HODDER: In other words, you have not referred it for an opinion as to the constitutionality of the proposal. Repeated studies have indicated need for the department to include young people between the ages of sixteen and eighteen under the protection of the Child Welfare Act. On the one hand, I see the department saying to parents and other relatives, you must accept responsibility for eighteen- to twenty-one-year-olds. I ask the minister: When will she be introducing legislation which will say that her department accepts responsibility and will provide assistance to sixteen- and eighteen-year-olds who are falling through the cracks in the system? And will that be included in the spring's legislation?

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

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

As I have referred to previously, we are currently reviewing our child welfare legislation. We are hoping to have that ready for the Fall sitting of the House, and we will be putting forward a number of major changes and recommendations to address a number of issues that have been outlined in the Social Policy Advisory Committee, the Select Committee on Children's Interests, the Provincial Strategy on Violence, any number of consultations. We will be looking to address a number of those issues when that legislation comes forward. It is being developed now with the assistance of our front-line staff at all levels. At the appropriate time it will be brought forward to this House where it will be adequately debated.

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

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. OSBORNE: It is good water, I say, Mr. Speaker. As I look through the glass I can see clearly that this water is pure and clean. Pure clean water is a resource that is becoming very valuable in the world today. As we can see clearly through this glass, I say we can see clearly through the government, a government which is delaying the establishment of a water royalty regime.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OSBORNE: A government that is negligent in setting regulations for water export. Mr. Speaker, I ask the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board, the minister responsible for the implementation of taxes in our Province, when is he going to establish a royalty regime on the water exports from our Province?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, we are working on the regime for water export. The Departments of Finance, Industry, Trade and Technology, and Environment and Labour are working together to bring forward the regime for taxation for water export opportunity. This government is the one that is recognizing it as an opportunity. We are taking the time to go about looking at the opportunity and trying to put a policy in place that will reflect what is publicly accepted as an opportunity and then to go forward.

We have an application in that has not moved very far because the proponent has not moved very far. We are dealing with the policy and whenever any proponent is ready for water export, we will have it ready. It is not a problem of delay or anything else.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. K. AYLWARD: We have been dealing with it and have been looking at -

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Question Period has ended.

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, I table the Report of the tribunal on Salaries and Benefits of Provincial Court Judges.

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

MR. K. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I would like to table the Annual Report 1996 of the Labour Relations Board of Newfoundland and Labrador. Thank you.

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to move the following resolution:

WHEREAS section 28 of the Provincial Court Act, 1991, requires the Lieutenant-Governor in Council to appoint a tribunal to recommend the salaries and benefits of the Judges and the Chief Judge of the Provincial Court of Newfoundland; and

WHEREAS the tribunal submitted its report to the Minister of Justice on February 21, 1997; and

WHEREAS the report has been laid before the House of Assembly today, as required by the Act; and

WHEREAS the Act requires the House to approve or vary the report within thirty days of its being laid before the House; and

WHEREAS government has decided to ask the House to vary the recommendation of the report;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this House vary the report on the salaries and benefits of Provincial Court Judges as follows:

No.1: By deleting Recommendation No.1 and substituting the following: The salaries of Provincial Court Judges be maintained at their current level pending further consideration by the Minister of Justice and the Chief Judge and the Judges of the Provincial Court; and

No. 2: By deleting Recommendation No. 2 and substituting the following: The differential between the salary of the Chief Judge and the other Judges of the Provincial Court be $5,000 so that the salary of the Chief Judge will be at all times $5,000 higher than the salaries of the other Judges of the Court.

MR. SPEAKER: Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given.

The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: I wonder if, by leave of the House, we might - it is our turn on Wednesday and I want to give members as much notice of motion as I can on our private member's resolution, so I wonder if we might revert to Notices of Motion so that the Member for Labrador West can move a private member's resolution?

MR. SPEAKER: Agreed?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Is it agreed that we revert to Notices of Motion?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Agreed.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Burgeo and La Poile.

MR. RAMSAY: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will on tomorrow ask leave to introduce the following resolution:

WHEREAS workers in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador living near the Quebec/Labrador boundary have sought equal employment opportunities for many years; and

WHEREAS there are restrictions which in the Province of Quebec apply to the hiring of construction tradespeople from other provinces; and

WHEREAS Quebec and Ontario have recently come to an agreement on labour mobility between their residents;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador initiate discussions with Quebec to achieve a similar labour mobility agreement.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, today I rise in my place to present yet another petition with respect to the privatization of parks in our Province and I will read the petition for the information of the Minister of Education, because he normally questions the wording. Yes, I say to the Minister of Human Resources and Employment, what is your problem? Do you have a question?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: No question? Okay, here it is:

MR. GRIMES: (Inaudible).

MR. J. BYRNE: Pardon?

MR. GRIMES: How many did you have (inaudible)?

MR. J. BYRNE: Enough - one is enough for us, not like you guys, I say to the Minister of Education.

To the hon. House of Assembly of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador in Parliament assembled, the petition of the undersigned residents of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador asks for the House of Assembly to accept the following prayer:

We, the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador, wish to petition the Provincial Government, the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation and the Premier, to immediately reverse the decision to privatize the provincial parks, as they are the people's resource. We feel that this decision was made in haste, as has been proven, without any consultation with the people who own the parks, the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Now, Mr. Speaker, there are signatures on this paper from St. John's, Torbay, Pouch Cove, Portugal Cove, Whiteway and other areas, Seal Cove - from all over, Mr. Speaker.

There have been a number of these petitions presented in locations all over the Province to this point in time, and we expect many more to be submitted to us to be presented in the House of Assembly to speak on behalf of the people of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Of course, the members on that side of the House who were elected to speak on behalf of the people of the Province are refusing to do so. They are following, like a horse with blinkers on, the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation, who is following advice from some civil servant within the Administration to bring in some revenues for the Province this year to help balance the Budget.

This situation with respect to parks is a similar situation as what happened last year when the Minister of Government Services and Lands brought in new regulations and forced the people of the Province who had cabins, the people who had residential leases and commercial leases, to make application by the end of October last year, to get a money grab. The same thing is happening now but it is harder to get a handle on this with respect to how much money they are going to take in.

But with respect to Crown lands last year when I stood up in the House of Assembly and said it was going to be a potential for $21 million, not the $6 million that was put forward by the Minister of Government Services and Lands, $21 million was taken in. That is what helped make the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board's Budget this year look so rosy. But, in actual fact, we even question the Budget itself and the figures in the Budget. We are questioning if it is the true picture, if a deficit was really there.

The minister stood in his place today and referred to the fact that there was a proposed deficit of over $40 million and they were down to $29 million. That begs the question that is being asked by at least 1,100 people in the civil service who are going out the door in the next three years: Why do we have to lay off another 1,100 people within the civil service, directly? They are talking about another 1,000 teachers, over and above the 450-odd they are planning on laying off this year who are going out the door, and some other 1,000 individuals who are going to be retiring. So, in actual fact, we are looking at approximately 3,000 people.

Why is it necessary, when the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board himself says that the figures in the Budget are not quite accurate, that we are better off than he had anticipated or the projected deficit for last year?

With respect to the parks themselves, there are some concerns out there, and this was brought up at a meeting I attended in Torbay at the end of February sometime, a few weeks ago, in the middle of a snowstorm. Between fifty and sixty people who attended the meeting. What their concern was, of course, is that these parks are going to quite possibly be sold off to the buddies of people in government, government members. The minister has made statements that there will be a first offer made to the workers in the parks.

I sincerely hope, if the minister does not back off - which she should, by the way, because 97 per cent of the people we have talked to are certainly saying that the parks should not be privatized, that there should be a public park system. We really do not know if there will be a public park system a year or two down the road. It all started out two years ago. They were going to privatize X number of parks to enhance the public park system. Now, this year, a year or two later, we have twenty-one more parks being privatized.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. J. BYRNE: Just to clue up, Mr. Speaker. I just wish to say that I support the people signing this petition. I am prepared to go on continually, day after day, presenting petitions in this House on this issue as long as the people are prepared to present them to me to be presented in this House.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am proud to stand and support my colleague's petition against the privatization of provincial parks. In the Budget document titled The Economy it says: "The Province... experienced significant growth in... areas, including increased traffic on charter airlines, visits to the world-renowned Cape St. Mary's Seabird Sanctuary...", campgrounds and so on, which are part of the provincial park system.

We are told that the provincial parks are being privatized because of a lack of visitorship in the parks. Yet, the Provincial Government's own budget documents say that they have experienced significant growth in the visitorship to campgrounds that are a part of our provincial park system. Mr. Speaker, this is rather confusing because the minister herself has stated that they have to privatize these parks because of the lack of visitorship.

I have stood in my place in the House, Mr. Speaker, many times speaking to petitions against the privatization of provincial parks, citing my reasons, which include the fact that in the Provincial Government, the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation's own program review, they state that the standards of provincial parks are much higher than that of the average private sector equivalent - that our parks are affordable. Mr. Speaker, our parks are affordable because of the tourism-generated dollars as a direct or indirect result of our provincial park system and, most importantly of all, this year would be a bad year to experiment with the privatization of provincial parks, being the Cabot 500 year.

Mr. Speaker, in 1995, when the Provincial Government cut twenty-eight parks from our provincial park system, they promised to put $1 million a year over a five-year period into enhancing our existing provincial parks. Mr. Speaker, that has not happened. In 1995, they put $1 million in. In 1996, they put $500,000 in, and in 1997 they are cutting out another twenty-one parks. Let alone the fact they are not investing any extra money into our parks, they are cutting out an additional twenty-one parks. Mr. Speaker, this is absurd. Truly and clearly, Mr. Speaker, this decision is a bad decision on behalf of the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation and on behalf of the government.

Mr. Speaker, our provincial parks are the pride of our tourism sector. Our tourism sector is supposed to be one of the most important industries to our Province for the future growth of the economy of our Province, and yet, in the 1997 Budget they are telling us that over the next three years, the Budget for the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation is going to be cut from $28 million down to $16 million. Mr. Speaker, as far as I am concerned, that shows very little faith in our tourism sector. It shows very, very little initiative on behalf of government to market our tourism to the rest of the world. If tourism is supposed to be one of the most important industries to our provincial economy in the future, Mr. Speaker, you would think that, not only would they not decrease the provincial budget, they would increase it.

Mr. Speaker, there is no way we can rely on the groundfish sector of our economy nearly as much as we did in the past. We have to branch out and look for new ways to enhance our economy, to get our people back to work and to create jobs and employment in our Province. And cutting the tourism budget in half over the next three years is not only a bad move, Mr. Speaker, quite frankly, it is insulting to the tourism industry in our Province.

AN HON. MEMBER: It is stupid.

MR. OSBORNE: Yes, stupid. It is a bad move, Mr. Speaker. We have seen our tourism sector, the tourism industry in our Province, decimated over the past number of weeks by cutting loose from our provincial park system twenty-one parks and seven scenic sites and by projecting that over the next three years they are going to cut the tourism budget almost in half. Mr. Speaker, I am happy and proud to speak in support of the people who have presented the petitions to the House of Assembly.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise today to present a petition on behalf of a number of Newfoundlanders resident in the areas of St. John's, the Goulds, Mount Pearl, Torbay, who are petitioning the House of Assembly to direct the government to establish a universal comprehensive school lunch program for every school in Newfoundland and Labrador to help end child hunger and to give our children a better chance.

Mr. Speaker, this is one of a number of petitions that I have been asked to present in the House of Assembly by people who are concerned that our school system is not adequately able to help large numbers of children, in that those children are not able to learn because they are going to school hungry. Whether it be a breakfast program or a lunch program, it is fairly evident in this Province that there needs to be some assistance provided through this type of program to allow children to learn.

The flagship, if you will, of this program was started in Bishop Field school in my district some years ago, and it was developed as a recognition of the serious problem that existed here in the city of St. John's, and exists elsewhere in the Province of Newfoundland as well, of children who are unable for one reason or another to come to school with a full belly. In addition to alleviating the pain of hunger, and the embarrassment that goes with that, the school lunch program also provides some nutrition which helps the child's health and obviously also increases that child's chance to be able to learn in school and participate fully in the school programs that are being offered.

Mr. Speaker, that program also developed another feature that I guess the Minister of Education was referring to in his response to questions from the Member for St. John's East today. They have also developed a stigma-free way of delivering that program so that no one knows who is providing money to pay for school lunches, and who is obtaining the benefit of the program, because each and every student is required to bring in an envelope from home with either a cheque in it or a piece of paper, and no one knows who brings in what. And the doctor's child sits down in school next to the child of someone on social assistance, or someone whose family has lost a job, or a child of a single parent, and they sit down together and enjoy a meal together. In fact, it has become an accepted part of daily school life at Bishop Field school to have this program and to have this going on.

In other places they have had breakfast clubs, and all children come and enjoy breakfast or enjoy lunch at their school. This is a stigma-free way of delivering this program, and I have no real problem if everybody does not always pay, even those who can. We do not have to start dividing people up in this Province by category. What we have to do is ensure that those who need this kind of assistance can get it. The only way to do that, in my view and in the view of the petitioners here, is to have a universal, comprehensive program so that every school can take advantage of this program, not just those who may have the infrastructure of a Kinsmen Club or a Lions Club, or someone who is prepared to take on that project as their pet cause for the year or for the duration.

Mr. Speaker, it is not good enough to rely on charity, or on a charity-based model, for something as important and as basic as hungry children needing to have food to be able to learn properly in school. This is a project, a program, which I am supporting with all the fervour and interest and passion that I can arouse for this. It is a desperately needed program. It is a shame to see - and teachers all over this Province will tell you that it is a reality of life for school children today, that many school children do not have proper meals, do not have lunch to bring to school. In fact, a couple of years ago it was discovered that one school board -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will refer to that a little later.

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to stand today in support of the petition by my colleague to my right, with respect to the importance and, in fact, perhaps necessity of a school lunch program in each and every school within our Province.

The wording of the petition, Mr. Speaker, makes it clear that poverty and its effects are problems for many in our Province. It stipulates as well that the situation is getting worse, and when we hear the statistics, and look at the statistics found in the report entitled: Special Matters, a report prepared by Dr. Patricia Canning, it was found that some 38,000 almost 40,000 children in this Province could well fit within the definition of a child in poverty in our schools. This is an alarming statistic, Mr. Speaker, and a statistic of which we ought to be ashamed. It is sufficient reason why the suggestion that is being made and, of course, the prayer of the petition, ought to be taken seriously by each and every member of this Legislature.

The petition states as well that child poverty and child hunger are a sad reality which hurts children today and their chances for the future in education and in life, and hungry children cannot learn. It is a known fact, Mr. Speaker, that the ability of a child to learn and to concentrate is directly impacted by what that child eats on a regular basis, on a daily basis, so it is in the best interest of this Legislature and it is indeed in the best interest of society generally, to insure that our young children are properly nourished and have a good, reliable diet on a daily basis. This can only be done or at least partially be done, Mr. Speaker, by making sure that the kind of program which is being advocated by this petition, is introduced into our school system.

The third point I wish to make, and I believe it is a very important point, Mr. Speaker, is that, this program ensures that it is stigma-free. In other words, children are not labelled, children are not identified as children in need or in want, and that enhances this program. It is a very significant factor in support of this program. Children are not being singled out by their peers as being children who require and must rely on a program such as this being offered in their schools. So, I strongly support the wording of this petition, Mr. Speaker; I feel it is a program that has significant merit, and a program and a policy which ought to be taken into account very seriously and given the attention and the concentration that it needs in its formulation, to ensure that the young people of our Province are adequately protected.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Waterford Valley.

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

I wish today to rise and present a petition: `To the hon. House of Assembly in Parliament assembled, the petition of the undersigned residents of Newfoundland and Labrador, humbly showeth' it says, and this petition is commonly known now as the petition that asks the government to institute a universal, comprehensive school lunch program for every school in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, this petition, again is presented on behalf of a great number of residents and I wanted to let hon. members know how widespread the support is for this petition. The petition I have here today has people from Burnt Islands, from Bonavista, Hickman's Harbour, Bryants Cove, from Chamberlains, Corner Brook, St. Brendan's, from the Goulds, Kelligrews. Mr. Speaker, there is such widespread support for this petition that people from all parts of the Province are signing the petition.

I have names of people who signed here from places like Port au Choix, from Cartwright, Labrador, from Springdale, from Bishop's Falls, from Red Harbour on the Burin Peninsula, from Musgrave Harbour, from Mary's Harbour in Labrador and from Corner Brook to Lawn.

Mr. Speaker, people across this Province want to see something done about the school lunch program; they want to see something done about hungry children. Therefore, the people who are signing this petition, which is now being circulated Province-wide, are saying to the government: We want more than lip service done when they are talking about child hunger and child poverty.

Mr. Speaker, hungry children are found in every community in this Province. There are no communities where we can say that this is not a problem. We want the government to listen to the people of this Province, listen to the children. As my colleagues have said on many occasions since this House opened, we have to start to not only pay lip service to it, we have to do something very concrete. I was pleased some time ago to be present at one of the ceremonies down at St. Joseph's School when one of the groups of the corporate citizens in this community came forward and offered support.

The business community knows that they have to invest in children. Part of the investment includes investing in school lunch programs. I am pleased to say that I am totally in support of this not being just a government initiative but a community-based initiative. While we say to the government: You must show the leadership, we are not saying to the government that it cannot be funded jointly by other community groups and other community agencies.

We have seen all the statistics. We know about the 40,000 children who are hungry. We have heard it over and over again. Therefore, we are saying to the government, it is time for the government to start to listen to the pleas of the parents, and to the pleas of the children, in particular. We know what a dramatic and negative effect child hunger has on school performance by these children. We know that the stats that have been out there for a long time show a one-to-one correspondence between the fact of a child being hungry and that child's ability to reach his or her full potential.

While I was pleased to hear the Minister of Social Services say that she is committed to having the Department of Human Resources and Employment, I meant to say that today I was pleased that the minister finally recognized it, because today when the minister gave her Ministerial Statement, on the front of the page it still says Department of Social Services. Maybe she will catch up after a while.

I also want to say to the House that I am pleased the minister is committed to helping people reach their potential. Well, let us start early. Let us start with children. Yes, we agree that we should be doing something about the young employable people, but let us start right early. Let us make sure that Kindergarten children have a good lunch, have something to eat before they come to school. Because in spite of the fact that we have a great deal of evidence about hungry children at lunch time, the research will show -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

MR. H. HODDER: - that the school breakfast program is even more important.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is my pleasure to support the petition presented by the Opposition House Leader. It is a similar petition to one that I, myself, presented earlier. I am pleased that the member has presented it. These petitions are starting to come from all over. I understand, Mr. Speaker, there is someone collecting hundreds of names in your own district and it is intended to bring them in for presentation sometime in the next number of days for presentation to the House.

People are realizing it is something that should be done, should be dealt with by government, and should be dealt with now. People cannot wait for the uncertainty of donors, of corporate entities stepping forward. Let us face it, when Petro-Canada comes up with $200,000 for the school lunch program it is not exactly cutting into its bottom line by doing so. It is done as a corporate gesture, as part of a public relations campaign of a mega corporation that is doing business in this Province and making and intending to make many millions of dollars or hundreds of millions of dollars off the Terra Nova Project over the next number of years. What we really need, Mr. Speaker, is a government-established program that is going to ensure that every school in this Province has a school lunch program so that all can benefit from it.

Now, I have a bit of a concern about the attitude of this government, so, in a way, this is kind of a challenge to the government. It is a challenge to the government to recognize the need for a universal program. What we have happening at this stage, Mr. Speaker, in government is a distinction of people. There are certain people who are deserving of government help and there are certain people who are not. In fact, Mr. Speaker, on Friday, the Minister of Social Services, now called Human Resources and Employment, issued a press release in which she said she has new initiatives to ensure that funding only goes to eligible income support clients. She said they will initiate several new measures to ensure that income support will only be provided to people who are deserving of and entitled to benefits. Now we are talking about the deserving poor, Mr. Speaker. This is a great early Victorian concept. Charles Dickens used to have great fun with it back in the early 19th Century, there is the deserving poor and there is the undeserving poor.

We are hearing about it again today, Mr. Speaker, when eighteen- nineteen- and twenty-year-olds are being kicked off the social assistance roll because somehow they are not deserving because their parents made some money. Now, Mr. Speaker, this is the same department that tells an individual who is on social assistance, a single parent who is on social assistance, that when their child turns eighteen, she is no longer a family. She is now a single person. She is not even a family anymore. The child is eighteen years old and the mother, who still has that child living in the same house, gets cut off social assistance because she is no longer a family. She is treated as a single person by this same department.

So, Mr. Speaker, while we have to have compassion, we have to have understanding and compassion for people who are in dire need of social programs in order for them to be able to participate fully in society. We have to recognize that there is a political issue at stake here.

We have had in this Province - and I started this statement at the end of my comments in the petition I presented earlier - we have had in this Province an example, several years ago, of a school which sent a school bus around lunch time bringing children from the school to their homes and back again at a cost of some $10,000 on an annual basis. The reason and the rationale given by that principal for having the school bus was because the parents did not want their children in school at lunchtime because they had no lunch. So the school board paid the cost of bringing in a school bus, to bring children home, to no lunch, pick them back up again and bring them back in.

It would be cheaper, Mr. Speaker, it would be more humane, it would be more compassionate, more sensible to have a school lunch program to ensure that all the children of this Province have at least one good healthy, nutritious meal during the school day so that they can have a full belly, Mr. Speaker, and that they can learn properly. That is the important point of this, Mr. Speaker, that it ought to be universal. It ought to be ensured that the schoolchild has the advantage of this program.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time has elapsed.

The hon. the Minister of Education.

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I just want to make a few comments with respect to the petition. I understand, Mr. Speaker, the intentions of the petition and the need basically for school lunch programs to be more broadly based than they currently are. The government actually debated this issue rather extensively in the last year or so on a couple of occasions, one, when we decided through the Department of Education and the Department of Social Services - which will now become, of course, the Department of Human Resources and Employment - to make a contribution of $125,000 to the existing provincial school lunch programs. Also, Mr. Speaker, later we had a major corporate sponsor, Petro-Canada, come on board with $200,000 to contribute to a similar program.

MR. SULLIVAN: (Inaudible).

MR. GRIMES: The Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Speaker, obviously shows he does not know what is going on. The provincial contribution was made months before the corporate sponsor came onside. Mr. Speaker, I guess that the research again is showing its top quality in terms of comments being made.

Mr. Speaker, the conscious decision was made for us not to put in place a universal comprehensive School Lunch Program for the Province run by the government for a couple of very good reasons. Currently, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. The current programs are extremely good programs being run by a board with community support, corporate sponsor support, great volunteers, and a very loyal and dedicated staff.

The programs are in place and they are spreading, slowly but surely, to areas of the Province where there is need, and they are spreading with great success because they have tremendous local support, and largely because they are not being seen as government programs. Mr. Speaker, they are being delivered in a manner, as I mentioned earlier in a comment today in Question Period that is non-stigmatizing. They have had great success with the programs in making them work and making them work very well through the benefit of students who need to participate.

The failures, and there have been a few in the past - and I know the members opposite who are serious about the petition are listening intently, because there have been some failures and the failures have been attributed to the fact that there has been no local ownership. In some cases they thought it was more a government hand-out program and they treated it as a government program. They did not get involved in it, they did not volunteer, and they did not participate. It was given to them by the government and they did not, at the end of the day, make it work.

There were no partners locally, there was no ownership, and it was seen to be run by the government in a couple of areas, and it failed, unfortunately. There had been School Lunch Programs in three or four locations in the Province that had been started up differently than the ones that succeeded and they have had to be folded up after a short period of time because the people locally did not buy into them. They were stigmatizing, they did not operate properly, and they just did not work.

So, we do expect, Mr. Speaker, that there is to be growth and expansion with respect to the School Lunch Programs in the Province. We have contributed to the existing group who do this extremely well. They get extremely positive local buy in, both by the volunteers, the parents, the students themselves, and the corporate sector. We expect continued local support to show itself and manifest itself throughout other regions of the Province where need is identified.

Mr. Speaker, we are fully prepared to participate in even more of a financial manner than we are today, when they can demonstrate to us that they have local areas identified whereby the program should naturally expand. We are willing to participate along with the corporate sponsors, but the history and the lessons of the proposal in this petition, as outlined here, have been the ones that have led to failure in the past. The ones that are being done today with the combination of local volunteer support, local community based support, good staff, corporate sponsorship, a well planned program delivered in a non stigmatizing way, has been a receipt for success and we will continue to build on that with the partners, Mr. Speaker, and we will not try to jump in as government, and reinvent the wheel and put a government program in place of one that is working extremely well because of the efforts of others who have planned it even better than we could probably even imagine it and dream up ourselves.

I hope those few comments are useful, Mr. Speaker, because the government certainly is on record as supporting the intent of expanded School Lunch Program opportunities. We hope we have learned from the mistakes of the past, that having a government program put in place of people, instead of just supporting the one that is there now working very well, is the wrong way to go.

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

MR. OSBORNE: I rise today to present a petition to protect the privatization of our provincial parks. The prayer of the petition is as follows; we the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador wish to petition the hon. House of Assembly to voice our concerns over government's decision to privatize our provincial parks. We are asking the government to immediately reverse its decision to privatize the parks because we feel the decision was made in haste without consultation from the people who own the parks, the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, many of the people on this side of the House have stood and spoken out against the privatization of the provincial parks, people from our caucus, and the NDP member. It is quite obvious that the people on this side of the House are opposed to the privatization of our provincial parks. There are very few people, I would suspect, in this Province who are in favour of the privatization of provincial parks, and most of those people are sitting on the opposite side of the House here.

Mr. Speaker, The Program Review not only suggests that we do not privatize provincial parks this year, but it goes on to say that our provincial parks are better run, better equipped, and better managed, for the most part, with the exception, of course - I am sure that there are private parks out there that have very good standards, but for the most part most of the private parks in our Province do not have the standards that our provincial parks have.

Mr. Speaker, there are a couple of reasons for that. The main reason is the fact that the private park operators simply do not have the financial ability to operate those parks at the same standard at which the provincial parks are operated. Furthermore, The Program Review goes on to say that the private park operators may not have the desire to operate the parks at the same standard at which the provincial parks are operated. Furthermore, The Program Review goes on to say that many of the private park operators in our Province today are experiencing some difficulties financially. They are unable to put in place the health and safety measures that are commonplace in our provincial parks.

Mr. Speaker, it is truly unfortunate that this provincial government is unable to see that our provincial parks are operated at a standard that is not only expected but is a fundamental right of the people of our Province. As taxpayers, the people of our Province have a fundamental right to utilize and enjoy and use our provincial parks. Parks are not meant to be a surplus generator of revenue. The municipalities, and St. John's is one example, spend $3.5 million a year - St. John's spends $3.5 million a year - operating the municipal parks. If the municipal government were to take the same attitude that the provincial government has taken towards the parks then we would fear losing Bowring Park, or Bannerman, or Victoria Park. Provincial parks are there because the taxpayers put them there. They are owned by the taxpayers; they are owned by the people of our Province, and the owners of these parks were not consulted prior to government's decision to privatize these parks.

Mr. Speaker, the owners of these parks were not given the opportunity to voice their concerns and their opinions on the privatization of these parks. The owners of these parks, through my understanding in travelling across the Province and holding meetings to consult with the people - something that the provincial government has refused to do in this particular case - the owners of these parks, the people of our Province, are insulted. They are afraid, as a matter of fact, of what is going to happen with these provincial parks knowing the record of the government in the past.

In 1995, twenty-eight parks were cut from the provincial park system and only ten of those have survived to date. Mr. Speaker, that record does not show well.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

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

I want to rise to support the petition put forward by my colleague, the Member for St. John's South, and to acknowledge that the members on this side of the House have been out doing consultations. I can tell the members that we have consulted with the people of this Province in a number of places. We have had meetings in St. John's, and we have had them, I do believe, down in Torbay. We have had them in the Harbour Grace, Bay Roberts area. We had them in Corner Brook over the weekend, and in Grand Falls.

Mr. Speaker, I say to hon. members of the government opposite that when they got elected they prided themselves on consultation. They said: We are going to go out and consult with the people. And they say to themselves we did a great job. I look at the election documents I see nothing about privatisation of parks. I hear a lot about: We are going to listen to the people we are only going to act after we consulted the people. Then when I look at the privatisation plan for the provincial parks I don't see any of that, so I ask myself: What has happened here?

In the last couple of weeks we have held a number of meetings in various parts of the Province and the attendance has been quite good. We are out there listening to what the people are saying. These petitions that we are presenting here are basically saying to the government: Why don't you take some time and consult with us in various parts of the Province before you act?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible)!

MR. H. HODDER: Mr. Speaker, I would just say to the Government House Leader that when the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board went around this Province with his dog-and-pony show there before it brought down the Budget, that it prided itself on consultation, but on the issue of the parks there has been no consultation, none whatsoever.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)!

MR. H. HODDER: I say to the Government House Leader he should be up today, he should be protesting, he should be saying: We apologize to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. We tried to privatise the parks without consultation. If the Government House Leader was really interested in listening to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador he would say: We are only going to look at the privatisation issues in the provincial parks after we have had a proper consultation.

The truth is that this government only consults when it predetermines what the answer is. It says: What answer do we want, do we like the answer? If we like the answer we will do some consultation. We know what the Minister of Justice tried to do with the RNC and the RCMP. He didn't say: Let's consult. He threw out kind of a flag out there and said: Let's see what happens. So when this issue came up, clearly the issue of privatisation of the parks is not meeting with very favourable response from the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. Clearly the government should be listening to what people are saying. Clearly the minister responsible should be saying today: Thank you to the Opposition, thank you to the people over here who have organized those public meetings, and should be saying: I'm so glad that the Opposition had the courage to organize a public meeting.

On the basis of the public meetings we have had, we are going to be bringing forward more and more petitions. We believe that the voice of the people should be heard in this House and we are going to try to facilitate that. With these comments, Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to speak. I assure the Government House Leader that if he wants to get up and have a little chat about the lack of consultation in the formulation of this policy and to tell the people of Newfoundland and Labrador how sincere and how apologetic he is, we will give him leave to speak beyond the normal five minutes that has been assigned for petitions. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. TULK: Motion No. 1, Mr. Speaker, the Budget Speech.

MR. SPEAKER: Yes, the Budget debate that was started on Thursday, the adjourned debate, Motion No. 1.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On this Budget I'm not sure where the best place to start is.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I don't think I will. Maybe I will comment on this brochure passed around by the minister of human resources and employment, the one that has a brighter tomorrow. It has Canada in red and it has Newfoundland and Labrador in blue. That is their better tomorrow, I say!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: They are finally starting to see the colour. I must compliment the minister. She got something right. She isn't colour blind, I can say to the minister.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: You better have a talk to Jean and Brian. Even in the Budget book, I might add, there is even blue on the horizon in the Budget book. They have confidence in our future, I must say to the minister. But it has a lot of red ink inside.

AN HON. MEMBER: This is what I like, Loyola. Loyola? This is what I like, The Record to Date.

MR. SULLIVAN: Mr. Speaker, their record to date. That is another story. I'm not sure if I will get to that before the next two weeks to speak on this Budget are out, but I'm sure I will in due course, I say to the minister.

First of all, when you look at the Budget, less than a year ago they projected the economy of our Province would be in serious decline. Not what economists said it would be, but they cooked the books to have over 4.4 per cent negative growth last year, when people around said we would have 2 per cent negative growth. Then all of a sudden they find tens of millions in newfound wealth in personal income tax and corporate tax so they can do a few of the things they need to do.

The same story again. The Toronto Dominion Bank, the Bank of Montreal, the Royal Bank, the major banks, are telling us that we are going to have some positive growth, and here this government, the (inaudible) and their banker, telling us that the growth is going to be negative this year. Negative again, so they can have those tens of millions of dollars again so they will be able to cook up some other deals.

Back to last year. I asked, after the Budget last year, the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board I think - I had hoped would be around on the Budget - the Minister of Finance -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Good. I asked the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board - and in fact I asked the Premier, and the Premier didn't answer first. I asked him a second time. He indicated that before we borrow beyond the $14.9 million we would come back to the House and inform the House if they needed to do extra borrowing out of the contingency fund. They used that $30 million slush fund to put $15 million of borrowing from that fund without coming back to the House of Assembly; which the Premier on record, and the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board, had indicated they would do.

As you read through this and listened to the Budget Speech, all forty or forty-five minutes, you would think we are living in a province that is richer than Alberta. You would think we are living in the richest province in the world. We could be, potentially.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I think the Minister of Health summed it up best when he walked outside and said: It is a crafty piece of work my son, you got your fingerprints all over it. He said it to Malcolm. That sums up the carefully scripted words in this Budget. The gloss of this Budget doesn't show the true impacts of this Budget.

I'm going to just go through the Budget, make comments on many of the particular specific areas here. I ask the minister if he wants to bring in a tape so we can let everybody in the House hear those great words he spoke last Thursday after the Budget. His response today said it all. He couldn't respond. He wouldn't get up to deny it because he knows we have the proof. He just had to sit there and take it, I would say to the minister. Maybe we will have permission to have a tape recording tomorrow. That might be practical here in the House.

The minister talks about going around the Province on Budget consultation. While they are travelling around the Province, before we get to the Budget, they announce we are going to privatise our parks. Where in the pre-Budget consultation document did anyone see reference to parks and people's public opinion on whether they want their parks privatized? Where was the consultation? There was no consultation. They said: People told us not to raise taxes. Last year they told them. They went out and raised $40 million in licences and fees, an exorbitant increase I might add. Then they try to put pressure and threats on the Newfoundland Teachers' Association in the Budget, actual threats: You had better do something about your unfunded liability or we will spend the money somewhere else, or we will ignore you.

Those types of threats have been used before.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, the Minister of Health. I am sure he read the `Cheers and Jeers' today in the newspaper. He has been there very prominently displayed, I say to the minister.

When you talk about a three-year plan, can you imagine a three-year budget on two single little pages, one page, both sides, double-sided -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: That is our three-year budget plan. That is it, the first time you ever got a three-year plan on two pages with nothing in it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I say to the Minister of Education, maybe if they did - I do not agree with that either, I say to the minister. Minister, I do not agree with that. But I can tell you it will not happen with us over here, I say to the minister.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. At the way the minister is slashing the health care, I had better calm down because I would not want to be in the minister's hands. I would fear for my life then, I can assure the Minister of Health.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: You probably would. I would not doubt that. You would engage a slot down in the morgue probably, I say to the minister.

The government talks about letting - the Premier said that 1,100 people... What we want to do, he said, is remove that uncertainty out there. We want to let people know three years in advance what their future is going to be. We want to tell a person who is working in the public service today that your job will not be there next year or the year after.

Where do we see in this plan who the 1,100 people are going to be, how they can plan for their future? It is not here. Then, to come out before the Budget and announce a $10 million plan to get people to take early retirement when not a single person has availed of that plan.

AN HON. MEMBER: That is not true. (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I ask the minister: Is she going under a particular buy-back provision? That is what is in this new plan. Buying back your reduction is the only difference in this plan and the workforce reduction. You can already retire under other plans that are currently in place, announced last October and extended to September, and the word now is that it is going to be extended. I have been informed by officials that it is not going to terminate in September; it is going to be allowed to continue. The only difference is that you buy the reduction. And who, at the age of fifty, is going to buy a 30 per cent reduction at a cost of about seventy or eighty.

I spoke to one individual under this new plan for early retirement. Is the minister familiar with it?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, this new $10 million package.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: The only difference in that, I say to the minister, and the workforce reduction one, is that this plan allows you to buy your reduction. Under the old plan if you were fifty-three and had thirty years you could go out and retire, get your 60 per cent pension. Under this plan if you are fifty-three you can buy your reduction for age fifty-four and fifty-five, and for anybody who is in the middle of the pack in terms of income in the public service, it would cost $50,000 to $60,000. I know an individual who it would cost $78,000 to buy two years. People are just not doing it. It is not an incentive for people to take early retirement, so what is going to happen?

The Premier then tries to shift focus and tell the people that we are going to blame the people that have been around for thirty years - blame them for keeping young people out of a job. That is what he is indicating. That's the slant. The Minister of Education, probably he was the one that probably came up with the plan. He is so good at sending those types of plans and smoke screens out there and deceptions there. Maybe he is the expert. Maybe he is the expert in doing that, in whitewashing people. Maybe he is the guy who devised that plan.

MR. J. BYRNE: Look at the mess in Education.

MR. SULLIVAN: You saw what he did with Cabot 500 when he was in Tourism. Now they have him in Education and it is nothing but problem after problem after problem. I hope, for the benefit of the people of this Province, that there are no new departments created for that minister to get his hands on. I just hope there is none because if we have to tolerate another department that that minister gets his hands on, we are in deep trouble. Thank God, he hasn't gotten Health yet. The current minister we have is doing good enough a job as it is, good enough a job at slashing without getting the Minister of Education, who told us in government documents and told us in Ottawa and told the people of the Province, we need this amendment to Term 17 because we want to reinvest dollars back in the education of the Province. What do they do? They get their chance to reinvest it and they sucked another $30 million or $40 million out of education. The last two years they sucked $50 million out of there. They sucked $50 million in the last two years and again this year but almost $100 million out of education in the last three years.

Then we talk about this labour force adjustment fund. Now what a farce, a voluntary departure program and try to come in with a program to pretend we are putting some new money into doing retirement.

We talk about harmonization and the effects on this Budget. I found out actually, the Minister of Finance - I found out finally what the Minister of Finance has done. The Minister of Finance has taken the HST and instituted a new insurance tax that is going to bring in $35 million. So when people here today - the announcement about insurance could be going down - how many people realize, on April 1, insurance premiums are going up to 15 per cent? They are going up to 15 per cent, insurance; car insurance, house insurance, property insurance -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Exactly, but I am saying they are going down and HST is putting it up to 15 - not HST, there would have been no insurance tax. I say to the Member for Fogo & Twillingate that because insurance was not subject to GST, it was only subject to 12 per cent RST when harmonization came in we used the GST base which meant there would be no RST tax any more. That is redundant. So rather than let that lie the Province brought in a new tax called an insurance tax in which you are going to pay 15 per cent premiums on your insurance. So here the insurance companies will lower their rate and the government increases their taxes to get the money in that they are saving on one hand and you are losing on the other. That is $35 million and the Minister of Finance can confirm that. I say to the Member for Fogo & Twillingate, $35 million.

What they also did, because if I sold a vehicle to you in a private deal, after April 1, there will be no tax on that because there is no RST. So what did this government do? They brought in a new tax on the private sale of vehicles that is going to bring in another $50 million. So that is another $50 million that is being brought in because the new taxes that have been implemented - because of the HST.

MR. TULK: Loyola, do you want me to (inaudible)?

MR. SULLIVAN: No, actually we have four - not here today due to illness - out trying to bring some business back to the Province in Italy. We have a member gone to Italy to bring people back. We have a member accompanying the minister down in Bonavista for a big announcement on Cabot 500th, trying to straighten out the minister and get the minister on track.

I would like the Minister of Finance to listen to me and answer a few questions here and have a few comments in due course. We are talking about under HST, we are told what families at all income levels would save. We asked the Minister of Finance on many occasions over the last while, to admit that low-income families, seniors on fixed incomes and young families would be hit hard by harmonization. The minister never admitted it until Budget Day. He never admitted that low-income people are going to be affected, any amounts - yes, and I say to the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi, he announced that people who have less than $15,000 will get three dollars a month, forty dollars a year. If you look at two pensioners together, they will not qualify; two pensioners' incomes on old age pension supplement will not qualify for this three-dollars-a-month supplement they are going to give back.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: You can send them out.

MR. TULK: There would be nobody left (inaudible) -

MR. SULLIVAN: I just say to the Government House Leader, if he keeps fourteen in here that is all I say to you, they do not have fourteen in here -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) what?

MR. SULLIVAN: We won't have a quorum.

MR. TULK: You can call a quorum, will you?

MR. SULLIVAN: If we only have less than -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) to that? We are up (inaudible) look over there.

MR. SULLIVAN: I will ask protection from this `bull in the china shop', Mr. Speaker.

Can you imagine? The minister stood up and he said: because the poor are going to be so affected, the seniors and the fixed-income people, we will give them three dollars a month.

Mr. Speaker, on one hand the government is announcing new hospitals and on the other hand they are closing them down. They built three hospitals - talk about hospitals: They built three hospitals here in this Province under the Trans City deal at a cost of almost $30 million capital cost and another $70 million to pay them off, almost $100 million; they have one that is not even partially operational in Burgeo, they are cutting back. They closed the one up in Port Saunders; they just had to shut that down last week and the one in St. Lawrence the ruins are not operational, so we spent $100 million, including financing on three Trans City hospitals and we do not even have them operational today, only certain portions of them.

I mean, they are in the middle of a decision out there. They don't know - out in Gander -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I was, I think, the second or third Newfoundland-born Canadian.

MR. TULK: About April 1st?

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. In fact -

No, close, I was not born April Fool's Day but very, very close. That is all I would say.

MR. TULK: April 2nd or what?

MR. SULLIVAN: Close, my wife's cousin was the first. She was the first Newfoundlander born.

AN HON. MEMBER: Is that right?

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, and I missed it by two days actually.

AN HON. MEMBER: Did you, April 2nd (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, around there. No, April yes. If it were the 29, I say to the minister, I would have been born a Newfoundlander, not a Newfoundland Canadian. Does the minister know when we joined Confederation? Does the minister know it couldn't be two days before? Oh my, oh my.

No wonder the agriculture and the forestry we see in this Province is in a mess, I say to the Speaker, no wonder it is in a mess. He wants permission now to read my horoscope.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: Since I have the floor, I say to the minister it is so good, just pass it over and I will read it. I will read it into the record, Mr. Speaker.

MR. TULK: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

A point of order, the hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. TULK: The hon. gentleman, I would like to warn him of impending disaster because his horoscope says: Before making any decisions about a certain work matter, you need to think further. Your communicative skills are off kilter so keep ideas to yourself. Avoid controversial issues in the evening.

MR. SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was never a believer in stars. I was never a believer in horoscopes. I am a believer in creating the future, not trying to follow the steps laid out by somebody else I say to the Speaker, and he is certainly a horror in his House I can tell you. His policies and views are lacking the scope that we need to put this Province on a road to recovery, I say, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, he is a `horrorscope,' that is what he is. A horror (inaudible). I say to the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board, we spent $100 million on three Trans City hospitals. We closed the one in Port Saunders, opened it again, partially used; one in Burgeo, partially used. One in St. Lawrence, they never even opened up all the long-term care beds. We put one out in Gander. They can't make up their mind, politically, will we do a little bit to keep them happy for another year or will we not? What do we do? We will decide we will cover them this year, but we need $30 million more to do the rest. What are we going to do with that? When? Where is your long-term plan? How much are you going to put in next year? I don't see your plan over the next three years in your three-year plan. It isn't here, because it is a farce, this particular Budget. It doesn't have the specifics that are needed to set out an economic plan for our Province.

Then we look through - and here is a very interesting one - the Minister of Health probably should certainly pay heed to this one. There are eighty-four unfilled rural physician positions out there now, and $2.6 million in the Budget. If you fill the ones that are vacant out there with the money they put into the Budget, you would be able to pay each doctor $30,000. In other words -

AN HON. MEMBER: That's extra.

MR. SULLIVAN: No.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)!

MR. SULLIVAN: No. The Government House Leader, it isn't extra. In fact, Dr. Peter Roberts, who did a report on salaried physicians, the chair of the salaried physicians committee, the Minister of Health can tell you this, indicated that there was not sufficient money in the current Budget that ends this fiscal year to allow even to meet the ongoing commitments, not talk about pay anything for the eighty-four that are unfilled. That is in reports.

AN HON. MEMBER: You don't understand (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, he doesn't understand it, I will agree. I say to the minister, if the Minister of Health is so informed how is $2.6 million going to fill eighty-four positions? Eighty-four positions at $30,000 each uses up the money. The salary scale right now starts at around sixty -

MR. MATTHEWS: Point of order.

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

The hon. the Minister of Health is standing for something.

MR. MATTHEWS: Point of order, Mr. Speaker. The hon. member who is entering the Budget debate is already very quickly off track, substantially misinformed, and has his facts altogether wrong.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. MATTHEWS: The facts of the matter are these, Mr. Speaker. There is enough money in the Budget now to fund all of the eighty positions or sixty that are vacant.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

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

MR. MATTHEWS: We are using that money now on locums and things of that nature.

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

MR. MATTHEWS: So get your facts straight and we will hear you.

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

I'm sorry, the Minister of Health is just using an opportunity to engage in the debate.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) wrong, Loyola.

MR. SULLIVAN: When I look ahead at their Budget for this year -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) straighten you (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I can tell the Minister of Health, I don't need to be straightened out on it. Because I've read the correspondence from the chair of the salaried physicians' negotiations, I've read Dr. Roberts' report, I followed the information on it, I say to the Minister, and that is incorrect. If the minister has a plan, the minister should be able to tell us today, because it is in the Budget, the salary scale that starts at $67,000, what each step of that scale, all I believe eleven or fifteen steps on that scale, can he tell us the new figures on every step on that scale, first of all? Then I will know where the $2.6 million goes. Then the eighty-four doctors are left out there, unfilled positions around there, there is no money.

The minister has not budgeted an increase in health. The budget has pretty well been frozen from last year. Last year we saw the pain that people went through in this Province. When you freeze a budget it is equivalent to a several percent decline, especially in medical services. The increasing costs of medical institutions, increased costs of drugs and medical equipment are escalating with inflation. Freezing a budget is taking dollars out of the budget for people who need immediate service in emergency departments.

We are seeing people piled up on stretchers in emergency departments, I say to the minister. There are documented cases I have of people who are up to two days on a stretcher waiting for surgery for a hip, waiting to get into a room. Very sick people are not getting through the system. Longer waiting lists for cardiac surgery, more stretchers in emergency because the budget in health is frozen when people want that as their priority. There is not enough money in the Budget. It is not allowed in this Budget here. It is not increased there, not even to pay those eighty-four unfilled positions because this government is not serious about filling the positions when the very people involved on it, the doctors - in fact they quit the committee, one doctor, because this government has dragged its heels for two years and indicated that Medicare, MCP, didn't even have enough money to pay the ones that are there not (inaudible) eighty-four new ones and to put $2.6 million in - and it was stated that it was going to be put in - to increase the salary levels for doctors.

A starting doctor in this Province now gets $67,000 under salary. If they are going to increase that scale for all the doctors that are in the Province, you can only increase it by just a few thousand dollars, roughly $3,000 I think would be the figure. I don't have all the numbers of doctors in front of me but roughly $3,000. That would only drive up the scale by $3,000 not counting the other eighty-four positions out there unfilled. If you paid them the lowest amount of $70,000 times the eighty-four unfilled, we would need almost $6 million more dollars to address the problem. In fact, we need in excess of $10 million to address the shortage of doctors here in our Province.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I will get to education. I know the minister is there very eagerly waiting - to see that this government, who sold Term 17, they went out and promoted Term 17 and said, we need this legislation to reduce duplication in our system, to do the things we need to do to reduce school boards so we can put dollars back and reinvest in education. What did he do? What did he and the Premier do? They took the money and whipped the $30-some million, $40 million out of education and siphoned it out. Last year $25 million siphoned out, twenty-five more the year before. Can you imagine? They took $100 million out of our children's future in a matter of three years, $100 million.

Then we talk about today, the farce today for the Minister of Human Resources and Employment to stand up in the House today and include in this document figures that I put on the record in the House already before she circulated the brochure, telling about the $308 million today is a program that was announced on December 1, 1995, when Premier Tobin was then Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. A program where they took $500 million in the last three years, took out of employment, out of the income in this Province and now they are going to put back $100 million a year when they took out $500 million a year. A program that we were told was going to give us $120 million and the same Premier who sold us out on this program is up in Ottawa now trying to announce a program that is a year-and-a-half old, trying to draw the mileage when he inflicted the pain when he was our minister. I mean it is nonsense, utter nonsense to have to put up with this crap in the House of Assembly today. Crap that is what it is, to put up with that today in the House of Assembly on a program that the Premier gave us on December 1, 1995.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: If it is not parliamentary, I withdraw it. I will find another word. That is all that's to it. I'm sure I will come up with a word that is parliamentary. I'm sure I will find one. Yes, we will find one I am sure. We have a lot of colleagues around here who have expertise in the English language. It might not be my strong point, I say to the minister, but I am sure I can come up with a substitute.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I won't call it that. No, that would be elevating it to too high a level, I say to the minister. I wouldn't want to do that. That would be doing an injustice to it, that is what I say to the minister, and I wouldn't want to do that. I would want to give it the full lack of respect that it deserves, that report.

Now I am going to use the Minister of Agrifoods instead, that is who I'll use. We don't have to put up with the Minister of Agrifoods. Mr. Speaker, we are told to reinvest in our future, to reinvest in our kids. Pass Term 17 because we need it here. I went to Ottawa when they passed out the nice little brochure up there. I had to keep them in line on occasion there, but generally they told the truth, generally speaking. A few times they stepped out of line and I had to remind the Premier: no, Premier, that is not what the church leader said. That is not what he said. The Minister of Education was there. You can ask him because he was there. He knows.

MR. TULK: There is nothing that he does not know.

MR. SULLIVAN: He thinks he knows everything.

MR. TULK: Did you hear him on Open Line the other morning? Bill Rowe said to him: do you want to just answer questions about education? He said, oh, no, I can answer anything.

MR. SULLIVAN: He said the last thing I want to do is try to answer a question on education. He usually answers a question on education by talking about something else. Whatever you call it, a new Department of Human Resources and Employment. You can put any name you want on a department, any particular name. It does not make a big difference what you call it. The programs and services that are delivered by that department is what is important. You can call it by any name whatsoever and it does not change the fact.

When we look here at numerous areas, when you look at education and the tutoring, as my colleague from St. John's East mentioned, do you not think there is something wrong when you have to be a poor child in school to be able to be a tutor, and a poor child to get tutoring, so a poor child would have to tutor a poor child, but to do that they have to do a financial assessment of the parents, maybe bring a parent's income tax form to determine if that kid can be a tutor for this particular kid, or that kid can receive tutoring. That is a stigmatization in the school system that we do not need.

Even with the books issue you try to do it as discreetly as possible. I spent over twenty years in the classroom and have a little knowledge about dealing with those things. It is a concern when you have to stigmatize because people know. People say that person is a peer counsellor, a tutor there, that one is getting paid and this one is not. This one cannot be tutored and paid, that one can't. How do you deal with it on a practical basis?

MR. TULK: If you spent thirty years in school, how many years in kindergarten?

MR. SULLIVAN: I skipped the first eight years.

AN HON. MEMBER: You can't talk; you got kicked out of kindergarten for not shaving.

MR. SULLIVAN: It is difficult in a school situation. Just look at the practicality of it. How do you determine which kid gets paid for tutoring because they are poor, and which kid gets to be tutored because they are poor? It is a tough situation. It is difficult as it is.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you saying do not tutor them?

MR. SULLIVAN: No.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes, you are.

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I am not. Now, I would like the legal opinion on that, I say to the member, but overall maybe he is offering the legal opinion. I did not coin the phrase, but it is difficult in the school situation to try to determine because kids in schools know these things.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you against that?

MR. SULLIVAN: I am against school? No, I am very much in favour of them, I say to the member.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you against tutoring?

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I am all in favour of it. In fact, my daughters' do it free and I hope will continue to do it free, peer counselling or tutoring, in the school system. In many of the schools in my district people do that, as I am sure they do in other parts of the Province. In fact, I very much encourage it.

MR. TULK: You opposed it.

MR. SULLIVAN: I never opposed it.

MR. TULK: Yes, you did.

MR. SULLIVAN: I opposed stigmatization, putting a stigma on kids. You have to deal with the problem. Mr. Speaker, if we look here at the Student Summer Employment Program. When you read it out in the Budget it looks so good. Today we are announcing a $2.5 million provision for student summer employment, Cabot 500. What did it turn out to be? I think I heard a spokesperson for the Canadian Federation of Students of Newfoundland and Labrador indicate that it represents $2.25 an hour. I heard that statement, $2.25 an hour. It is a voucher thing. It is not what they were led to believe. It was not their input when they were consulted. It is not what they were told: Do not give us that type of program. They did not give us those details on Budget Day. They are the things that filter out as time goes on.

It said that 3,000 students were going to qualify, and increasing assessing student loan programs is another particular area that -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I thought there were thirty-six people applauded. I thought the Telegram ad said there were only thirty-six people applauded the Budget, wasn't it?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, not at all.

People who are in the cycle of dependency on social assistance need to get out of that, and need assistance to do so, and this avenue is not an avenue to be able to achieve that.

Under municipalities, while the minister indicated that $9 million is going to be available to communities to help re-finance debt with the Municipal Finance Corporation, a cutback of 60 per cent in MOGs is going to be devastating on rural Newfoundland. Rural Newfoundland will be devastated because of the cutbacks. Can you imagine communities around this Province that have experienced an out-migration of people unprecedented in our history being told that they are going to have a 60 per cent reduction in the revenues from this government? Really what it is amounting to is driving those small communities into bankruptcy, or driving them into a forced regionalization process.

What we need is a plan that is going to be able to revitalize, to help sustain rural Newfoundland. We have not seen anything from this government to help sustain rural Newfoundland. We have seen devastation; we have seen cutbacks in municipal operating grants; we have seen it in road structure. The roads in this Province are falling down around our ears.

This government, in the long term, if you look at capital expenditures... They are going to look at balancing their budget. If you look at capital account under net expenditures, or gross expenditures, they are looking at taking $48 million out of capital construction in this Province over the next three or four years. In a Province that has been decimated by a lack of capital structure and investment, that is how they are going to do it, and they are going to do it under a Budget that is false. It is a scam. It is a cooked Budget just like last year's, and we saw the effects of it this year when all of the major banks out there are telling us - except the government's bank, and government - that we are going to be experiencing much less growth than you are saying. That is cooking the books to suit the situation to be able to free up some of your revenues down the road. There must be an election coming up in the year 2000. By trying to cook the books and give people the impression there are going to be rougher times, and to lay off people in the public service and not give them reality today that is the master plan. It is a scheme. It is very easy to see through it, I say to the minister.

Rural communities out there today, and even in larger communities - it does not have to be just rural; larger towns are experiencing a lot of problems - we are going to have a 50 per cent increase in the household contribution to capital works, water and sewer. We are going to see the debt servicing costs going up by 50 per cent over three years.

We are going to see a withdrawing of a contribution... When this Province should be fighting Ottawa on tearing up the social safety net in the country, we are losing $70 million on health and post-secondary education this year alone under the Canada Health and Social Transfer. That is a devastating amount on top of $87 million last year.

We received $427 million last year under established program financing and CAP, which rolled into Canada Health and Social Transfer; $87 million last year, another $70 million out of that this year. No wonder the Premier runs up to Ottawa, up there now, to try to put a positive spin on this announcement that was announced when he was minister on December 1 1995. I mean, that is utter nonsense, the worst form of hypocrisy.

Then, trying to sell it as a big news story? Three hundred and eight million in Newfoundland and Labrador, when over three years we are losing $1.5 billion. What a farce this particular announcement is. Then the gall to stand up and try to tell us and the people of the Province it is a new program, $308 million. Utter nonsense. I'm sure the people of the Province will see through it because it is false and it is only a scam.

We are talking about the Economic Renewal Agreement. Under Economic Renewal, they announced Economic Renewal in this Budget, they announced it in last year's Budget, and this Economic Renewal Agreement involves only $20 million out of the public purse of this Province over five years, $4 million a year. This was announced in June 1995 at Hotel Newfoundland at a news conference I attended. Four million dollars a year for five years out of this Province? They announced it in 1995, they announced it in the election campaign, they announced it in last year's Budget, they announced it in this year's Budget, and we will be seeing it in the next two budgets. How much mileage can you get out of $4 million a year? What a (inaudible) farce.

Then, to try to convince people that here we are, all this new money? Where is the better tomorrow that people were promised? They haven't seen it. It is always two years away. It was two years away in 1949 - one year away then. It was two years away in 1989: Oh, tough for two years, then we will see things better. We were told last year - coming into the Province we only had a $40 million deficit. It grew to $270 million by the time the election campaign started - trying to hoodwink the people of the Province. That shouldn't be allowed, and I'm sure people will see through that in due course.

Newfoundland Farm Products, another issue. I don't see a problem with the privatisation of Newfoundland Farm Products. No, the government shouldn't be into selling chicken. Just because it is chicken it shouldn't be in the process of selling it. No, on a serious note, it shouldn't, there is no need. That is an area, why not? I've said it before; why not privatize Newfoundland Farm Products? There are lots of areas that can be privatised in government, and we have said it on many occasions. But there are areas that shouldn't be, and shouldn't be undermined, and Newfoundland Hydro is one of these, and this government is doing everything it can to undermine the integrity of Newfoundland Hydro.

A lot of people don't realize Hydro put into this Province this year, in this year's Budget here, $65.6 million is going into the treasury of this Province out of Hydro this year. Last year they budgeted $53.2 million. A company we wanted to sell, $100 million in two years; a cash cow for this Province. When all other businesses operating in this Province last year were budgeted to put in $50.5 million on corporate tax, but it was up, so it went over $63 million or so, corporate tax went in on all other companies, and Hydro this year is putting in $66 million. And we want to undermine it by all those private sites, giving sites out to friends all over the place? To undermine the integrity of Hydro and to drive up the price of electricity in the process. Newfoundland and Labrador taxpayers will pay the price for that if that ever happens.

I agree with privatisation of many functions, ones that do not serve a public interest, ones that private business can do better, because government has done a miserable job of running its own affairs. I wouldn't want my affairs to be run by government. I'm sure many members in this House wouldn't want their affairs to be run by it, because it hasn't had a very impressive record. I don't care what government stripe in the past, whether it was the PC government in the 1970s and 1980s or the Liberal government. It is a shame that the taxpayers' dollars should be squandered on useless, worthless hand-outs, political nature or otherwise, or non-political, it doesn't matter. The people should be accountable for the proper expenditure of public funds.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I'm talking about anything, any use.

I just made a statement saying that Newfoundland Farm Products should be privatised, I make that statement.

MR. TULK: What happens if it can't be privatized?

MR. SULLIVAN: If you can't privatize it you can't privatize it, then we have to look at the options there. I think you can privatize any particular operation. The point is: Do we as a government, and should we as a government, subsidize non-profitable operations? Should we do social housing as a different matter? Private housing, we saw some houses - Churchill Square for instance, Elizabeth Towers and so on.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) say Loyola, boy, and he made enough money (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: I would like to have the colleague who just went out of the House, I am sure he could advance the cash for me on reasonable terms to do that.

MR. TULK: Oh no, he would not at reasonable terms.

MR. SULLIVAN: Reasonable terms to him. It depends who is reasonable too, I say to the minister.

Look, there is a point that comes when governments have to let business do business and the best thing governments could do for business is to stay out of the hair of business and let business operate but they are not doing a very good job of doing that I say to the minister, not a very good job at all.

MR. J. BYRNE: Which one of your buddies (inaudible)?

MR. TULK: What?

MR. SULLIVAN: He has not decided yet.

Transportation, can you imagine, in a Province with billions of dollars worth of roads and bridges in this Province, $12.2 million I think last year - No, last year it was about $50 million spent in provincial money last year I think on Works, Services and Transportation. Can you imagine, billions of dollars worth of investments in highways and bridges and only $50 million spent to try to maintain them. Has anyone driven around the roads of this Province lately? Well, I have. I would say the big majority of communities in this Province I have visited. I have seen the atrocious state of many of the highways in this Province. I can tell you I have driven, not in the winter where the upheaval in the springtime that is usually worse but, the roads in this Province are in a declining state and is going to pay a price to us overall on industry, on tourism and others but we have to allocate a certain amount of our resources to maintaining infrastructure. I mean, that is important. We cannot go all one way or out another way there has to be a balance done in each particular year and thank God, I would say, there was a fellow called John Crosbie who gave us all this money that we are doing the roads in the Province now or there would not have been any. We would be in desperate shape.

Even the Member for Harbour Main - Whitbourne applauds there, he agrees with that, he understands the importance of getting investment in infrastructure I am sure; and in talking about the Member for Harbour Main - Whitbourne, there should not be a divided highway through Whitbourne. Why do you spend millions of dollars on big, grandiose, overpasses and underpasses, millions of dollars and business on the side of a highway by putting them out of business? Why do you spend tens of millions, the most expensive infrastructure for overpass and underpass that take up a big chunk of the highway money when you could be cutting a good highway across the Province at a better price? It is a shame, it is irresponsible and it should not be done. There should not be one in Grand Falls - Windsor; there should not be one in Whitbourne -

MR. TULK: Who started that?

MR. SULLIVAN: I don't care who started it, it is wrong. I don't care who started it.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Who started it?

MR. TULK: John Crosbie.

MR. SULLIVAN: No, he didn't start it. This Province makes the decisions on that. He provided the money to do - this Province can spend it now -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Who do you want to?

MR. TULK: Another Tory, Peckford.

MR. SULLIVAN: Well, it would not have happened if I were there, that is all I can say to the minister, because I don't agree with it whoever did it and I am not going to debate what Premier Wells, when he was here or what is happening now with Premier Tobin or Premier Peckford, we should not be spending tens of millions of dollars when a paved highway could send you miles and miles farther along the highway. Now, what is wrong when you come to Whitbourne or Grand Falls - Windsor with slowing down, reducing your speed a little and keep the community undivided, what is wrong with it?

When you come into Whitbourne, it encourages people to stop, maybe to spend a few dollars they would not have spent. People go on the highway now, they do not stop in these areas. It should not happen, it should not be allowed and the people should rise up in arms and say no divided highway through Whitbourne. We are not going to permit it. We are going to take it in our own hands, and we are not going to do that.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Maybe that is what they did, an overpass for Cochrane Pond Park so they can privatize it. Yes, maybe there is a method to their madness.

We have seen transportation investment in this Province going downhill rapidly, and it is important that we are seeing a large amount of our dollars - and I want to see a decent Trans-Canada Highway, because every dollar you spend out there - we are not going to get the opportunity again.

We see an example now and there is some reference made in The Throne Speech... We were told in this House in December by the Minister of Works, Services and Transportation that she hoped to announce in December an agreement to take over the ferry service on the Southwest Coast and into Labrador - well, the Southwest Coast has been taken over - the Labrador ferry service, and have an announcement in December. Now, three months later, we do not have an announcement because the Government of Canada is not prepared to put in the $700 million to $800 million needed to eliminate the ferry service to Labrador and to build a Trans-Labrador Highway. A top-grade, gravel road cannot be done for less than three-quarters of a billion dollars. The Government of Canada - we were told in this House in December we would have it by the end of the month. In January we were told; we still do not have it.

What the Premier should be up in Ottawa doing is not trying to strike an agreement on a December 1, 1995 announcement, a deal on an announcement of two years ago. He should be up now trying to announce an infusion of capital into building infrastructure in this Province and opening up Labrador with a Trans-Labrador Highway that will link it closer to the Island portion of this Province. That is what the Premier should be doing in Ottawa now, not on an excursion up there for no particular purpose.

When you look at a multi-year financial plan, and you look at planning up to year, can you imagine... This is their multi-year financial planning. It is comical. It is comical to have a single page in a Budget, and this is their four-year plan.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: That is part of it. You will find out what ours is in due course, I will say to the minister.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: That is part of it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, that is a long ways from being out of it, I can tell you. I can tell you, a year ago with the Budget Speech - a year ago in May - I said: this government needs a long-term plan. And it was carried in the media a year ago, last May. I said: We need a five-year plan to look at our future projections. And do you know what they came back with? For the last two months they talked about a three-year plan.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Look, look.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I hate to tear it out. No, we have to buy them.

Here is what is in a three-year plan. All it has is a gross revenue for the Province. In fact, it is telling us that our Province is going to take in $2.9 billion in revenues in the year 2000. That is going to be $100 million less than we are taking in now.

Here are a few good points. My colleague from Cape St. Francis... Can you imagine today in the House, the question was asked of the Minister of Environment and Labour - it is in his own department - brought in a new fee, six pages of fees and permit increases when we were told, no new taxes. Last year we were told no new taxes and this government raised $40 million in new fees and licences; and we were told no new taxes.

The Minister of Environment and Labour was asked today: Can you tell us, Minister, this fee here that states, under environment - I will find it here - to inspect water and wastewater systems... In other words to get a certificate of approval for your septic tank in your private residence now could cost, it says here, from $200 to $1,000.

Can you imagine $1,000 to have someone drive out in rural Newfoundland, look down in the hole and say: that's okay and $1,000? Call that cost recovery. The minister today didn't know the fees in his own department. Where has he been during the development of the estimates, during the fees discussions? He can't tell us what it is. Maybe he can tell us what it is but maybe he didn't want to because he didn't want people to hear him but we will do what we can to flush out the answer to that question. To flush out the answer for what it cost to have a person walk by - maybe line up five or six at a time - walk by each one, look down and $1,000, $5,000 or $6,000 a day. I don't know if there are any people here in his department being paid $1,000 or even $5,000 a day. I don't think the wages are that high in here I can tell you.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No, in fact for the record, I had callers today who indicated that they called the meeting at Holiday Inn and they informed them that they were not aware of any meeting there. That is correct. No, that is what they informed a lot of people. There was a mistake but we still add up thirty-seven people. We still had over thirty people. Yes, thirty people.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, there was a Liberal spreading information. In fact, the member for that area showed up. He told everybody there was no meeting and then he showed up himself.

I read in the newspaper today that volunteer organizations in the Province - there is a lot of concern out there, Mr. Speaker, that today with many kids being abused physically, sexual and otherwise, it is important today that proper screening occurs. It is important that -

MR. GRIMES: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Mr. Speaker, with many kids in society today being sexually and physically abused it is very important that proper screening occurs for people dealing with our youth. We have seen in this Province over the last several years, many incidents of young kids - young boys and young girls - being abused, both physical and sexual abuse. It is important that a proper screening process be in place to hire people, even on a volunteer basis, that are dealing with these youth.

So, Mr. Speaker, there are organizations out there who sometimes screen up to thirty and forty people for volunteers, having to pay a $25 fee now to get a letter of conduct from the RCMP. If the Boy Scouts want to have someone assist them, Big Brothers, Big Sisters or any organization, they have to go to the police and pay $25 now to get a certificate. Believe it, these are organizations out there that are serving an important public function. It doesn't make any difference, if the young kids out there, the potential for abusing kids and we have seen it, we have seen the abuse from Mount Cashel. We have seen it in other incidents ongoing in Newfoundland. We saw it in hockey and minor hockey. It is important, I say to the minister and it is no laughing matter. It is important that our kids today have people supervising them who we can trust.

Organizations are complaining that they have to pay twenty-five dollars to screen out forty people who want to work with young boys or young girls, pay twenty-five dollars each, $1,000 for forty people just to get a letter of conduct. That is not acceptable. This government has to reverse that just like you reversed the seven natural attractions -

AN HON. MEMBER: Loyola, (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, that is the four-year plan I say to the minister. It is the four-year plan.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. Some people need a lot of practice to get a point across I say to the minister, they need a lot of practice but I am sure the Minister of Education has practice from both sides of the fence. When he wept on the steps of Confederation Building on behalf of teachers, we saw one side. When he is here as minister we see the other side I say to the minister, and here is what we have. That's it, I have the page open here now. It does not take any practice. I mean, how long did it take him to do a three-year plan? You could have done that in three minutes.

MR. GRIMES: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: It is a crafty piece of work my son. Your fingerprints are all over it. That probably sums it up as the Minister of Health said. I think we will play that on the news tomorrow morning.

To write examinations, to register and people out there today even trying to obtain a job are paying a substantial increase. There are even impediments to getting married. Can you imagine? Just to produce a licence it is fifty dollars.

MR. TULK: Why do you think I got married on (inaudible)?

MR. SULLIVAN: To get a certificate, I don't know; tell us. Transfer of ownership, snowmobile registration is increased. A person who wants to register a vehicle $140 from $120, we have seen and -

MR. J. BYRNE: What was it in 1989 forty, sixty dollars?

MR. SULLIVAN: Sixty dollars. We have seen a tremendous increase, a dealer plate, a taxi. Taxi drivers and taxis have enough problems struggling in our economy but to put a 50 per cent increase on a taxi registration, 50 per cent increase -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: So what implications - so you are saying a taxi driver cannot buy beer now because they put up the fee? Is that the implication he is making?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Well, that is what he is implying. I will ask the minister, veterinary fees, it says various. Next year what are the rates? Are they under discussion?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. SULLIVAN: When are they going to be decided?

AN HON. MEMBER: Soon.

MR. SULLIVAN: Who is going to decide them?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: That won't be soon. That won't be soon I say to the minister. We waited six years for the five-year report on forestry so, how long are we going to wait now?

AN HON. MEMBER: Well, I can't help it (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, you can. You certainly could do something about them. He even liked Danny; he liked Danny a little more and look what happened to Danny. I am glad he did not like you. If he had liked you we would have had a lot of trouble. There are probably other people he did not like also but we won't get into any specifics. The man is not here to defend himself so we won't be too critical.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. Right now, to photocopy just a sheet now, one dollar.

MR. GRIMES: What do you think it should be?

MR. SULLIVAN: What?

MR. GRIMES: It should be free?

MR. SULLIVAN: I mean, it was fifty cents and I think that is reasonable, but one dollar to photocopy if you want fifty pages copied down in the courts, you pay fifty dollars. That is a little exorbitant and I don't think that is cost recovery.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Roger, that is not cost recovery.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Well why, if it is not significant, why increase it? I mean -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No. I don't agree. If someone wants a photocopy of something there they should pay for it, but I don't think a dollar to copy a sheet or to have fifty sheets copied, fifty dollars is a reasonable return. I don't think it is that costly for each sheet that goes through those copiers.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: No. Cost recovery on those things I think is appropriate but if you try to convince me that to walk up and inspect a septic tank and you pay $1,000 is cost recovery, then there is something wrong. There is something radically wrong if that is the case.

MR. GRIMES: There used to be about ten inspectors before but now there is only one.

MR. SULLIVAN: So, you are going to charge $1000 now for one.

MR. GRIMES: Dozens of inspectors have fallen down the hole in one afternoon.

MR. SULLIVAN: I say to the Minister of Education that the fee before this Budget to inspect a septic tank was zero, and the fees now are from $200 to $1,000, and that to me, I can assure you, is not cost recovery. When you call someone to visit an area they wait until they have another call, or try to line up a few an area and then they go out. To drive up to Harbour Main, I use that area as an example, Harbour Main - Whitbourne, to inspect four or five septic systems that day and charge $1,000 each, $5,000. That is gouging. That is not cost recovery, it's called gouging.

AN HON. MEMBER: (inaudible)

MR. SULLIVAN: No, I said $200 to $1,000. Last year it was $40 million, I understood. Maybe the minister can confirm? The number quoted, I say to the Minister of Finance, was $40 million collected in fees last year, permits. I am sure the minister is able to confirm that.

MR. J. BYRNE: He does not know.

MR. SULLIVAN: An accident letter. Does that mean it was a letter written by accident, or is it a letter based on when somebody has an accident, that the letter cost $50? It is $50 now to just get an accident letter under the RCMP or the RNC. Maybe the Minister of Justice could tell us if it is $50 to just get a letter on an accident, and that is cost recovery? How many hours does it take to prepare a letter?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)

MR. SULLIVAN: So that is $23.75 an hour, $20-some an hour.

AN HON. MEMBER: (inaudible)

MR. SULLIVAN: Electricity, too, so that is what it costs for a letter and the Premier told us it cost $2,000 - what is that he sent out? The Record to Date cost $2,000. Look how many pages are in that and apply $20-some odd a page and look at the circulation of it.

MR. TULK: That stuff is so good it just goes on the page automatically.

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes, I can imagine. Now, because we do have a few successful tourism sites we are going to charge people through the nose for them. Cape St. Mary's Interpretation Centre, and there are a few others to be announced. God, help us, to be announced, I say on some others, and I just wonder, too, what government is doing in terms of its debt? Our Province is one of the highest in debt in foreign currency, on foreign debt.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible)

MR. SULLIVAN: Roughly, 50 per cent of our debt is in foreign currency, and we have been fortunate this past year because the Canadian dollar has performed fairly well, as the Minister of Finance very well knows, in terms of other currencies, and we have been a beneficiary of debt on foreign exchange. That has happened, but that will not always happen because dollars are going to fluctuate in terms of where we are invested in the Japanese yen. We have the Swiss frank, and we have the U.S. dollar, and we have done fairly well in that regard.

Understand now, too, I say to the Minister of Finance that the Canada Pension Plan of which we have been getting monies under the Canada Pension Plan, I understand in order to put that on a more solid footing you may not get the rates we have been getting. I guess that is basically correct. I say to the minister that it could have some effect on our borrowing under the Canada Pension Plan because why should people who contribute to a Canada Pension Plan allow their money to be invested at a lower rate because the provincial government wants it? It makes sense. Would you not want your pension plan, your investments, to yield the maximum return?

That has not happened, and there are more pressures now especially when you are going to see your contribution to the Canada Pension Plan going up almost ten cents a dollar. There will be 9.99 cents on the dollar over the next several years. That is what is going to be paid to the Canada Pension Plan to make it viable, and that has not happened in the past and we are going to see changes.

Our Province is heavily indebted on the foreign market subject to currency fluctuations there. I do not think we have hedged in the past. I do not think we have been buying ahead, to my knowledge. We gamble, we flip a coin and we take our chances. The coin has come right side up this last little while and I am delighted that it has strengthened against the U.S. dollar, but with that it always brings other negatives, too. When it strengthens against the U.S. dollar, being an export Province, we pay the price because when we export into the U.S. we do not get the return than on our sales. We do not get our profit. We do not get the same price that is paid for those goods to the people who supply them here in the Province, and that is the negative aspect of having a stronger dollar, reflecting on a stronger international community.

I would certainly hope that the Minister of Finance is making efforts to - not because you can go out and borrow the Swiss francs at 5.25 per cent that we are not going to go out and do that in the fluctuating market. If we can maximize borrowing on the Canadian market at close to that percentage we are still going to be money in, in the long-term. Because a lot of this financing here, the long-term financing - and when I look through this Budget and look at where we have invested and the dollars that are invested in each area, it shows that we have a significant amount of leverage out there on the foreign market. Hopefully, that is going to be reduced in the near future - in fact, this year we are not required to borrow very much. While the Budget shows about a $20 million deficit, if you take away the contingency reserve, we really have a $10 million surplus this year - if you do not consider the contingency.

While this is happening, we are seeing around the Province significant lay-offs in the public service. We do need a streamlined public service, no doubt about it. We need an efficient public service.

We need more front-line empowerment. The same word used in this Budget was in that piece of paper they waved around there. Front-line empowerment was used and the Budget even gave that two weeks later. The Budget used the same words. We need more front-line empowerment in our public service, more responsibility on the front lines instead of having to go through layers of bureaucracy to get an answer. Because there is nothing more frustrating than passing a piece of paper to about five or six different hands, it is utter nonsense. It is a waste of taxpayers' dollars. It is inefficient and let us get on and get the job done and let us make it efficient. We do not disagree with an efficient approach there. Who does? Every time we have inefficiencies, people pay for them. People pay for inefficiencies in our system.

What we need, and what this Budget has not addressed, is the concerns in our health care system. This Budget froze health care over a year ago. Ask anybody, everybody in this House has had relatives, family around this Province who have encountered problems with the health care system; every single one. There is not a day goes by that people do not experience some type of problems in our health care system. To freeze the budget is a decrease. It is going to be increased by only $2 million between now, last year's budget and this year's, and that is with rural doctors, $2.6 million. So if you took out the $2.6 million for old doctors, there is a decrease in actual dollars in the health care budget this year.

Hospitals out there are telling us that they cannot operate on the money they have, and here, this government is going to move forward and make other cuts within the system. I mean, people just cannot take it anymore in that regard. We have been misled, Mr. Speaker. We were led to believe here that we are going to get a better education system; we are going to have an education system that is going to eliminate duplication; we are going to have it efficiently run, and we are going to take the dollars, we were told - the education critic has mentioned that on numerous occasions - that the dollars we were going to save were going to be reinvested into education to have more productive, better-educated students coming out of our school system today, and that has not happened. There has been a breach by this government in what they told the people of this Province.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: That is right, a breach of faith in this government, that was given by the people when they were told that we would have a better system, and we would have dollars reinvested in the system.

It is great to see new schools in the Province. There is nothing like moving into a new school. It gives a new sense of environment. The environment is an important part of learning.

The Member for Torngat Mountains, I know some of the schools in his district - there are three, I have seen in the media on a few occasions that are in desperate shape. The one in Hopedale, I believe, I saw in the media last year, and it is important -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: The building is an important part of the learning environment and if we are going to replace schools in the Province - it needs to be done.

The Minister of Education tells us that the dollar - the pupil/teacher ratio... You cannot judge the pupil/teacher ratio in Newfoundland and Labrador against Alberta. You have small communities. They are in my district; they are in other districts all over the Province. For the member I referenced from Torngat Mountains, they are small. You cannot have the same pupil/teacher ratio in small, isolated communities that you have in big communities. You cannot get the economies and numbers. Newfoundland and Labrador is a rural-based type of Province. Alberta has several hundred thousand people, around 600,000 or so in Edmonton and the same number in Calgary. Other provinces have their populations clustered in one specific area. We have small, rural communities. You cannot judge pupil/teacher ratio.

The Minister of Education does not tell us that we invest the smallest amount into education, I believe, per capita in dollars, of any Province of Canada.

AN HON. MEMBER: He will not tell you.

MR. SULLIVAN: No, he will not tell us that. He knows that we invest fewer dollars per person in education than any other province in this country, and that is a shame.

We have seen an education budget here now that has been devastated. Can you imagine, in this day and age, siphoning dollars out of education? The net amount in education today in the Budget is $662 million, when it was $735 shown last year, but some of that was just paid up in the last fiscal year. But there was about $40 million of that and $50 million the two previous years. Can you imagine taking $100 million out of education? Where does it come from?

If it is fewer buildings that is fine, that is extra money to go into students in the classroom - but it is not; that is extra money taken out of the classrooms in the Province. Several months before I became a member of this House of Assembly there was a Royal Commission report, the Williams report that was tabled. Still, today, in the classrooms we are experiencing more disruptive behaviour, more difficulties in dealing with special needs students in our system, than ever before. We have commissioned reports that are gathering dust. We have Special Matters, a review of special education here, by Dr. Canning. Oh, this is just a report; we are going to look at this now. It is only an opinion. Her opinion is not right, I think the minister said, not necessarily right at all. There are other opinions that differ from hers. So we are going to throw that in the garbage?

We have the social strategy, social plan, a consultative document. It was going to be released last fall, then it was going to be released in the winter. Now, they are saying it is not. We are going to take that, we are going to rework it, rewrite it, reword it, and we are going to give you what we want to give.

We have seen too much of this. We have seen the Burin Peninsula, Bonavista and Clarenville health boards report by the minister - his own senior departmental official sat and wrote the report, sat on a part of the committee that put that report on the hospital boards. Arm's length, he tells us, when his own senior official at the ADM level is on the committee doing the report. Then he is pretending the hospital board is autonomous, and then he is up to his armpits involved with it.

There are some things out there today that are not realities at all, not the realities that people see. People do not see the true picture. This Budget, as time goes on, is going to be seen for what it is truly worth. We have seen a crafty piece of work - that is what we have seen, and I will admit it is a crafty piece of work. In the words of the Minister of Health who said to Malcolm: who said to Malcolm: A crafty piece of work, my son, it has your fingerprints all over it. That tells you what is in this Budget.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who said that?

MR. SULLIVAN: The Minister of Health said to the `premier.'

AN HON. MEMBER: What premier?

MR. SULLIVAN: `Premier Malcolm.' He said: It is a crafty piece of work my son, your fingerprints are all over it.

AN HON. MEMBER: Bring in the tape tomorrow, Loyola, bring in the tape.

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. I had my Budget dusted and the fingerprints of the one and only Malcolm were found on it. They were found on page 1 and page 2 and page 3, I will say - I know I'm starting to sound like a former premier of the Province, I better stop -, and on page 4 and page 5 and on and on.

Can you imagine now, the Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods, released, well, a five year report comes out, the plan that shows a twenty-year outlook on the forestry. The Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods released that, telling us that our forests were over-harvested last year, when we cut over 3 million cubic metres last year, when -

AN HON. MEMBER: No, no, no, (inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. One point nine million cubic metres was supposed to. The major companies cut 1.88 million cubic metres. The logging operation domestic cutting, here is what it said in your report, in case you don't know: 1.88 million cubic metres were harvested by the pulp and paper companies, which represents 62.6 per cent of what was harvested. That comes to over 3 million cubic metres.

In this Budget the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board made the announcement that in that department over the next three years we are going to be cutting up to $1.7 million from our silviculture program. One point seven million dollars is going to be taken out of silviculture. We are going to take up to $1.7 million less spent on silviculture in this Province this year and over the next two years than we have been spending. Is that what you do for a forest industry that is in difficulty?

What did we do for the fishing industry when it was in difficulty? What do you do? I would like to add, when you look at what this government has done since 1989, government increased its commitment to silviculture and companies decreased it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: Yes. I would look back at the figures, I say to the minister. We have seen a decrease by companies in silviculture. We are going to address our shortage of trees in our forests by cutting back on silviculture. We tried to do it with our fishery when it was being devastated, when the fishers out there, the fishermen, fisherwomen, said: the fish is getting scarcer. We have to tow for longer periods of time. The fish is smaller. It is getting scarcer. The government said: No, we have to balance the social impact with the health of the stocks. And what do we do? We imbalance. We looked at the social impact, and since 1992 we have seen the devastation that has been inflicted on the people of this Province when we tried to balance social against environmental. It never, never works when you try to balance social against environmental. If you do not take care of our forests, I say to the minister, and you do not deal with the problem today, it will be a bigger problem tomorrow, and it will be a bigger problem well into the future.

We have to stop dealing with short-term solutions to long-term problems. We have to start putting positive solutions forward. Sometimes you have to bite the bit a bit in order to be able to sustain that particular resource in the future. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices.

We are doing now to our forests what we did to our fishery, and this minister is the one who is selected to be responsible - yes, the chief protector over our forests as the Minister of Forest Resources, and that is serious. I am quite serious about it. It is very important.

There are many people in this Province depending on pulp and paper for a livelihood, and our critic who held a news conference indicated that we cannot have that token consultation they talk about. All the partners who are depending on that forest resource, the sawmills and operators, and the pulp and paper -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: It took you six years to produce a five-year report.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SULLIVAN: What he did was pathetic when he was there. It was pathetic, and it is pathetic now. Nothing is getting done on it, and I look forward to seeing some positive solutions put forward.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I adjourn debate.

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

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

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, for hon. members here, I understand the Leader of the Opposition needs a bit more time to clue up tomorrow. We will be back on the Budget Speech.

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