May 6, 1998 HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS Vol. XLIII No. 20


The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

Statements by Ministers

 

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: Mr. Speaker, as my hon. colleagues are aware, Premier Tobin is presently at the Offshore Technology Conference in Houston, Texas leading a delegation of fifty-seven businesses from Newfoundland and Labrador, the largest contingent ever from this Province in our 20-year history of participation in this international conference.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: With over 1,800 booths, exhibitors from over eighty countries and an estimated 50,000 visitors expected to attend the exhibition, each of these companies will have the opportunity to showcase their strengths, network with possible joint venture partners and develop crucial business contacts.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to announce today that several of our companies have signed business deals and joint venture agreements at the conference.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: ConPro, a subsidiary of SEA Systems Limited, signed two contracts valued in excess of $10 million. The company will design, manufacture, assemble and install the Control and Safety Systems on the Topsides of the Terra Nova Project's Floating Production Storage and Off loading (FPSO) facility. SEA Systems will also provide the Vessel Control and Safety Systems for the FPSO hull.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: SEA Systems Limited signed a cooperation agreement with Houston-based CorrOcean Inc. Under the agreement, SEA Systems will represent CorrOcean Inc. in Atlantic Canada, supplying high technology products as well as providing engineering inspection and monitoring services. This agreement will result in the transfer of technology from the North Sea and create employment opportunities for technical staff in Newfoundland.

Moya Cahill, President of Pan Maritime Energy Services, signed a Memorandum Of Understanding with Guy Cagnolatti, President of Freide Goldman Newfoundland Ltd., for Pan Maritime Energy to provide and exchange project management and engineering services to Freide Goldman Newfoundland Ltd. and other Freide Goldman subsidiaries. This MOU will result in the transfer of technology and engineering services provided within the Province worldwide.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to say that while Premier Tobin was in Houston, he met with Mr. J. L. Holloway, Chairman and CEO of Freide Goldman International, owners of the shipyard in Marystown, to discuss the company's plans to maximize use of that facility.

Premier Tobin tells me he was informed during the meeting that HAM Marine Inc., a subsidiary of Freide Goldman International, received a contract to build its fifth semi-submersible drill rig for Noble Drilling. Freide Goldman Newfoundland will fabricate the major structural components including pontoons and columns for the semi-submersible rig, translating into 300,000 person hours of work for the Marystown Shipyard.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS FOOTE: Mr. Speaker, this work, consistent with the agreement by Friede Goldman to increase employment levels at the shipyard in Marystown, will sustain employment levels for a longer period of time.

As well, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Holloway told Premier Tobin that there will be new and substantial work carried out at Friede Goldman Newfoundland, which will be announced later this summer.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, the Premier also met with Mr. Dick Chaney, Chief Operating Officer of Halliburton Inc. to discuss an increased presence for his company in Newfoundland and Labrador. Mr. Chaney has committed to increase staffing levels for operations in the Province in the near future.

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland and Labrador is quickly developing a solid reputation among the key players in the oil and gas industry as an area with great potential and a very bright future. These announcements, combined with the growing activity and high level of participation in this international conference by our companies, is a strong indication that our companies are leading the way as we continue to reap the benefits associated with the development of our oil and gas sector.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

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

I have just gotten a copy of the minister's statement, and I am going to respond to it. My colleague just came into the House.

Mr. Speaker, everybody wants a little good news, like the song says, `a little good news today.' But, of course, Mr. Speaker, many of these people who have announced contracts and so on have done so, a lot of it, on their own initiative and have done some great planning on their own. I am sure, when the Premier gets back to the Province, the lights, camera and action will begin again, and we will hear some more over and over again.

I will say, Mr. Speaker, it is positive and we do need a lot of positive news, I say to the minister. One thing that I do agree on is Marystown, and I am glad to see what is happening for the people in that area. Like any part of this Province, it is good for the entire Province when we see things like that happening. All we have to do now is quadruple that and continue to grow on those things around the Province, because there are some tough times in the Province.

Yes, it is good to have good news, Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt about it, but there are a lot of concerns out there that have to be addressed and addressed quickly, especially in some parts of rural Newfoundland. Hopefully, Mr. Speaker, the day will come when we will have press conferences all around the Province to announce that there are jobs going to be created. That is what the people want to see, something tangible, something that is real. Signing contracts and MOUs sounds good, preliminary work is good and, yes, we need a lot of good news - this is a little news - but hopefully we will see something tangible in the near future. Mr. Speaker, we stand and say congratulations to what we have done to date.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Education has been recognized.

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, I was going to offer leave for the hon. Leader of the New Democratic Party to make a statement but

apparently he is not prepared at this time.

Mr. Speaker, Phase I of the air quality testing program involving 150 schools throughout the Province has been substantially completed and another twenty-three schools in Labrador will be completed within the next month.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, the Department is now awaiting formal reports from the consulting companies which performed the studies.

As the reports are received, they will be circulated to the appropriate school board and the appropriate school council. They will also be reviewed by a departmental committee which, in consultation with the school board and the Department of Works, Services and Transportation, will develop remedial strategies as required. It is anticipated that any condition which constitutes a potential health hazard will be addressed at the earliest opportunity. Most corrective measures are expected to be undertaken during the summer period.

Mr. Speaker, the Department of Education has also developed a Phase II of the testing program and expects to have completed air testing in up to another seventy of our schools by the middle of June.

Although it is virtually impossible to complete testing of all our school buildings in this school year, we are confident that we will have addressed the priority issues for the school boards.

Mr. Speaker, the department has also retained the services of Dr. Patel, a microbiologist at Memorial University who is also reviewing the reports and consulting on any potential health concerns.

We will take whatever steps are necessary to ensure that the health and safety of students, teachers, and other workers in our schools are in no way compromised.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I want to say to the minister again today, that once these reports are received there should be a full public disclosure. The people of Newfoundland and Labrador should know the results of the air quality testing.

The minister admitted in the March 22 edition of The Evening Telegram that this follows from ten years of neglect. Mr. Speaker, the minister has said, why we have the air quality problem is because the Liberal Governments of Clyde Wells and his government had ten years of neglecting the school maintenance system. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the minister in that article said: There is no question that forcing school boards to live within meagre and shrinking budgets contributes to the sick school syndrome.

So, it is time for this minister to do what he is saying today, look after the air quality, admit that the fault lies in the ten years of neglect that he talked about in the March 22 edition of The Evening Telegram, do what is right -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. H. HODDER: - and make sure the public of Newfoundland and Labrador have access to reports as they become available.

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

AN HON. MEMBER: No.

MR. SPEAKER: No leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member does not have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: No.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

 

Oral Questions

 

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

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

Mr. Speaker, behind the scenes in the country there is a significant issue that has been ongoing. Within a year, the federal government and the provinces will have to renegotiate the massive equalization program which shifts billions of dollars each year from the richer provinces to those poorer regions. It is no secret, Mr. Speaker, that in many of the richer provinces the attitude seems to be coalescing that the level of tolerance towards the present equalization system is reaching a level at which there is hostility towards it.

I would like to ask the Acting Minister of Finance: What concrete arguments have the Province been making, to whom, and in what manner, to ensure that the equalization formula today is no less generous than it should be; in other words, Mr. Speaker, that the equalization money that comes in to our Province is equally as generous in terms of assisting this Province to develop the types of programs and services that the people in this Province expect?

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, that is pretty well the same question that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition asked the Premier, I think it was last week, and the answer has not changed since last week. The answer is that there are no negotiations going on talking about changing the equalization component of this Province; no formal negotiations.

The hon. member is probably aware that for the past eight or ten years when the various Ministers of Finance have met, the idea of equalization has come up in the context of other things, but there are no formal negotiations going on whereby there is any intent of changing the equalization formula in this country. It is part of the national Constitution. It has been there for years and there is no intention on the part of the provinces or the federal government to do away with the equalization formula, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: My God, Mr. Speaker!

First of all, it is not the same question I asked the Premier last week. The question I asked the Premier last week was on TAGS.

Secondly, Mr. Speaker, five months ago his Premier, as part of the First Ministers, entered into an agreement to negotiate a framework on Canada's social union, which talked about the fiscal framework for provinces and Ottawa. Now, for the Minister of Justice to say that no negotiations are going on is absolutely an incredible statement. The reality is that they are, so let me ask him this question.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary. I ask him to get to his question.

MR. E. BYRNE: Let him ask him this question. Minister, not only the equalization program but also the various transfer payment programs are under renegotiation. In addition, Mr. Speaker, the country's First Ministers agreed in December to renegotiate the rules on Ottawa's rules on its fiscal, financial borrowing and spending within the Province.

The question is this: What steps is the government taking to present a strong case to the federal government and other provinces to ensure that transfers are not cut or reduced any more to poorer regions like ours? What are you saying to try to convince Ottawa and the other provinces to ensure that these transfers, which are so crucial to the services that we provide as a Province, do not erode even further?

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

MR. DECKER: Mr. Speaker, I don't know if my colleague has enough information. It seems to me the hon. member is confusing equalization with transfer payments. The concept of the transfer payments - we all know about, was it the CHST? There have been major changes in the transfer payments, the way the health and social services payments have been made. These programs have been altered; there have been agreements which have been in place for the last two years.

As for equalization, that is a component which is, I think, on the average of the five provinces we determine about transfers due to the provinces under equalization. There is no attempt, as the Premier pointed out, to do away with the equalization payments in this country. I don't know what kind of fearmongering the hon. member is trying to enter into.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Mr. Speaker, here is a news flash for the Minister of Justice: The war is over, take the bullets out of your pocket.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board, in view of the fact he is here, he understands about the negotiation that is ongoing on a framework agreement on Canada's social union with respect to the negotiation of Ottawa's spending in terms of all the provinces with respect to equalization and transfer.

We have been long fighting for changes to the equalization program to allow it to act; not just to transfer money from richer provinces to poorer ones, but to let the money be funnelled in such a way that creates sustainable economic growth. To that end, can the minister provide any information today that would indicate to the people of the Province that, I guess, the proposals we are making to the federal government in this arrangement are such that on major resource developments, and the economic growth that should come from that, equalization is not cut dollar for dollar on that issue, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. DICKS: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I can confirm that. The Province has consistently taken the position, especially with respect to resource revenues which should increase geometrically in the next several years, that there should not be the type of offset that is now current under the present equalization plan in which we can eventually lose about eighty-four cents on the dollar.

We are also concerned about population decreases in the Province. One of the things we have argued, to a point successfully with our fellow ministers at a provincial level, is that there should be a floor in provinces which have population drops that are unprecedented, as we have had in this Province. So those are several of the issues that we are dealing with on equalization.

With respect to equalization generally, Mr. Speaker, I believe the principles should be the same as they have in the federal Republic in Germany. That is: In Germany, every German is entitled to the same standard of living, regardless of where he or she works, and to pay the same taxes. Because one of the other disadvantages in this country is that if you live in a province which is rich, you would have lower tax rates than you would have in provinces which are poor.

So we have made manifold, many, strong and varied representations to the federal government and have some reason to believe that there is some willingness to listen at the federal level; and we will know when the finalization of the equalization talks occurs in 1999.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Finance a question which I asked before he got here. He is right about the situation that occurs in Germany. There is also a situation that occurs in Ireland that transfers that take place, when transferred, if there are new developments that bring in new money, that money is not clawed back dollar for dollar.

Five months ago in December, the First Ministers agreed on a negotiation for a framework of redefining Canada's social union. There is one month left and there has been little discussion publicly on this issue. Can the minister update the House on what discussions the Province has been involved in with respect to this; what proposals have been made; and what sort of framework are we looking at as we move into discussions that will radically transfer or radically, I guess, redesign the present system of fiscal transfers to the Provinces?

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

MR. DICKS: Well, let me answer for the Department of Finance, Mr. Speaker. We are actually involved at the financial level which directly involves the equalization program with the federal government, which by and large is designed by the federal government on representations by the provinces because it is not provincial money that is transferred; it is federal money which is transferred.

Secondly, the discussions have also been occurring at the First Ministers' level, in which they give direction to the various ministers to move forward with these programs.

Thirdly, Mr. Speaker, we have a special group within government that is specifically making representation to the federal government on resource offsets, for instance, from Voisey's Bay and Hibernia. That is headed up by Mr. Bill Rowat, who is the former federal deputy minister and someone, ironically enough, who was seconded here from the federal government to the Province. We are making every effort, at an administrative, at a ministerial, and at the level of the Premier, to have a fair equalization system for this Province.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: Let's accept the premise, Minister, which is obviously true, that the redesign of the transfer system to the provinces is about to take place, and the redesign will be radical.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. E. BYRNE: It is. All the reports out of Ottawa, I say to the minister, are that is exactly what is taking place.

I would like to ask the minister this: Can we be assured, and can you elaborate even further, that the types of proposals being made: number one, ensure that transfers on one hand will continue to some degree; our resource developments, on the other hand, that any new money coming as a result of them, will not be clawed back dollar for dollar; that would allow sustainability and economic growth? Secondly, what sort of reception has the Province been receiving within the federal circles to such proposals?

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

MR. DICKS: Mr. Speaker, I will answer the question. I think we have to first of all differentiate. I have answered the questions concerning equalization. My view on that is that at the provincial level, which is the only level at which there has been any formal acceptance, there is an acceptance of a floor for population declines, and we are trying to establish a floor. We have only had provincial meetings on this so far.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: That is one part of it, as I said to the hon. member. On the equalization claw-backs, as the member refers to them, we do not yet have any indication from Ottawa as to what they will do or not do. That is a matter of active discussion.

On the third matter, and that involves the transfer programs which are different than equalization - the CHST, which is a combination of many other programs and a substitution for it - those declines have been dramatic for all provinces. The major issue that exists there, where we are on better terms with Ottawa than the provinces, has to do with per capita. Most of the other provinces favour one of two systems, either a per capita allocation solely, which favours the larger provinces - Ontario, Quebec, and Alberta in particular, B.C. as well - and also transfer of tax points, which favours the provinces. Ottawa is on side to some extent with that. We seem to find ourselves alone when it comes to fighting the issue that CHST in particular should include recognition of cost factors on delivery of service, should consider geography, whereas the other provinces are arguing very much in their self-interest that transfers should be calculated on a per capita basis.

Depending on which issue, which transfer program, whether it is equalization or the other, you find yourself at even with some people and at odds with others.

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

MR. E. BYRNE: A final question, Mr. Speaker. The First Ministers agreed in December that they would work out a framework agreement on recasting the federal government's role in transferring money, and the rules of federal-provincial relations, and it happened. That framework is supposed to be announced approximately one month from now. Is the minister in a position to update the Province on the status of those talks? What sort of things can we expect in that framework agreement in terms of redefining federal-provincial relations? What proposals directly, and can the minister table those proposals that have been made, would solidly and forthrightly put forward this Province's stance with respect to those negotiations?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would make two points. First of all, the discussions are ongoing, and we put forward positions. What the final conclusion of those will be remains to be seen. The second thing is what the hon. member is referring to is a framework agreement. A framework agreement is an agreement to determine the things you will discuss and eventually agree on.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: Well, it is an agreement to define the topics on which you will agree. It took us twenty years to reach one in one of our Aboriginal claims, so I just don't want it to be a misunderstanding. When you say that we are going to work towards a framework agreement, we would say that we will examine these relationships and we might decide how we will transfer funds in these categories. Which is not to say that subsequent to actually having a framework agreement you might not very well have some very serious discussions and disagreements about how those should be arranged.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. DICKS: No, Mr. Speaker, we are not at that point yet. When we are, and when an agreement has been made, I think that will be the appropriate time to table it. We will certainly make the members and the public aware when that is about to occur, at an appropriate time.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are to the Minister of Health and Community Services.

In light of the fact that housebound patients who require blood tests once per month or less frequently are being forced to pay for this service, I ask the minister: Would she immediately reverse this policy so the sick and the housebound can have equal access to this necessary medical service?

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

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

As I said yesterday, and I will say it again, I thanked The Evening Telegram for providing me the name so we could begin the analysis and the assessment of the individual cases. Our department is doing it and I will reiterate what I said yesterday, Mr. Speaker, that in a publicly-funded system, those people who are able to access the system have every ability to do so in either a clinic or a hospital or whatever. If they are non-ambulatory or housebound, those services will be provided for them.

Mr. Speaker, I have informed the public, I have informed the media, I have informed my colleague across the way, that I would be looking into these, and our officials are doing that. I have asked him for the names. He did not give me any names, but I had one from the paper, and I have asked my own officials to go back and look into it. As I said yesterday, Mr. Speaker, with a $1.1 billion department and tens of thousands of people entering the system every day, I cannot speak to the individual cases and I cannot speak to the specifics of those. What I have agreed to do and I feel responsible to do, is to look into cases that are brought to my attention, and if, in fact, these people are housebound or non-ambulatory they are able to have those services provided to them, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say to the minister, I spoke with health care professionals in community health. In fact, I spoke with two patients themselves who said they called your department some time ago, one a constituent of yours, and they were turned away and told it is not a problem for the Department of Health, it is a matter for community health. In fact, your staff gave them a number in community health to call, I say to the minister. You got the calls before I did.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: They called me when you turned them away.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary. I ask him to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: I will provide these names, as the minister asked, to the minister and to the media. If they want them, they can call.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: I provided the names also -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SULLIVAN: I ask the minister: Would she now confirm that her department is aware of this - I would ask her to talk to her staff if she is in doubt - and will she now tell this House if the directive to start paying really came from her department?

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

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

First of all, I would say to the member across the House, Mr. Speaker, this is not about constituents, this is not about politics. This, Mr. Speaker, is about our health-care system. Mr. Speaker, I want to say it again: It is not about constituents, it is not about politics, it is about a health-care system and our publicly-funded health care system.

Mr. Speaker, I am not interested in getting drawn into the politics of a constituent here and a constituent there or his constituent. This is about our publicly-funded system. I have asked him for two days - I am glad he is going to pass over the names. I wrote him yesterday and asked him and he could not do it, but I am glad to have them today. And, yes, I will work with my staff, Mr. Speaker, to try to find the answer to the questions and I will stand by what I said: If those people are housebound and non-ambulatory, we will provide those services.

Now, Mr. Speaker, if there is anything more I should do other than take the responsibility, that it is my responsibility, look into it and keep politics out of the health care system, Mr. Speaker, I stand to be corrected.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say minister, it would not have come to my attention had you done you job and returned your calls. It would not have happened.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Some of these people, minister - and I do have their names for you and I told you I would call everyone personally and see if they would agree to give their names to you. I told that to the minister in writing and she knows that quite well.

People are being asked: Can they afford to pay? I ask the minister: Is access to our medical services now going to be based on whether the individual has the ability to pay or the universality of our system and equal access? What standards are the department now setting?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I will say it again: Every single day in our health care system, the people in the system, our staff, our doctors and our nurses, interact with tens of thousands of people, Mr. Speaker. Yes, I can honestly say, I do not return every phone call I get every day because there are hundreds of them, and I will tell you, they are on enquiries and all sorts of issues. We have hundreds of staff in our system, Mr. Speaker, who we have come to rely and depend on, we have boards in place and we have staff out in those boards who are hired to do that sort of work.

Mr. Speaker, we have a publicly funding system. We have been very clear and articulate in asking the federal government for more money to go in to our publicly funded system. As I said yesterday, with initiatives such as the ones that are going on in Alberta, I am quite concern about the life and future of our publicly funded system.

We all know, based on the Canada Health Act, Mr. Speaker, that the services that are provided inside the hospitals are what is provided under the Canada Health Act. The services that are provided in the community come under the auspices of the Province and we do what we can, to the best of our ability.

Would we like to put more money in? You can count on the fact we would. Are we lobbing? As hard as we can. Will we stop? No we won't, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The minister can try to skate around this issue all she likes. People within community health professions have told me that people in your department are aware of this problem, and I am sure the minister has been briefed. Will she simply stand up and tell us whether she was aware that her departmental officials, senior officials I might add, have been aware that people are been asked to pay, people who are housebound, who cannot get out of the house and who are confined to bed? Some cannot get out of the house at all, I say to the minister, and are being forced to pay now because the test they are receiving is once a month or less frequent.

I spoke to people today. I have their names if the minister wants them. As I told her I would do, I would call these people and ask permission to give their names out.

I ask the minister: Is she aware of that, has she received a briefing from her department on that, and would she now admit it?

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

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

I will repeat the same answer to the same question that I have heard three times, Mr. Speaker. I appreciated the names I got from The Evening Telegram and I have asked my staff to look into that. I have asked the member across the way and I am delighted to get those names. I will say it again, Mr. Speaker: In instances where people are housebound and are not able to get the blood work done, that work will be provided under our publicly funding system. That is the answer to the question, Mr. Speaker.

MR. TULK: That is a good answer.

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

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

My questions are for the Minister of Education. Yesterday, towards the end of Question Period, I asked the minister questions regarding the court case initiated by the parents of children attending the Avalon East School Board. The minister did not seem interested in beginning the negotiations to settle this matter.

I ask the minister again today, in the interest of the children and that should be the priority for all of us: Will he not, now today, assign teachers to the Avalon East School Board in special education categories in the same ratios they are assigned to all other districts? Why the discrimination?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate an opportunity to speak further today with respect to the general policy issue, because I think everyone understands we do not want to discuss the specific court case.

Mr. Speaker, again the hon. member suggests there is some discrimination with respect to students in and around St. John's, and the Avalon East Board. The exact opposite has normally been argued to be true in the Province.

Because of the fact, Mr. Speaker, that we have the largest number of students in and around the capital city area, because of the fact we have the largest gathering of schools of all particular descriptions, Grade configurations, in and around the capital city region, because of the fact that we have right now about one-third of all the teachers in the Province teaching in and around St. John's, because of the fact that there are more options available to students in and around St. John's than anywhere else in the Province, Mr. Speaker, I would invite him to maybe chat again with the parents whom he spoke about last week in the Legislature on the Northern Peninsula, who are complaining because they do not have any options for different levels of mathematics, they do not have any options for different courses in science, they do not have any options for different levels in English language and arts and they do not have any music programs, Mr. Speaker. They have the minimum program.

The fact of the matter in Newfoundland and Labrador, Mr. Speaker, is that the policies of the government have not discriminated against anybody in District 10 in Avalon East, but have always had them in a position, and (inaudible) to do so, where they have the best educational opportunity in Newfoundland and Labrador.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for Waterford Valley.

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

I ask the minister: Will not admit that more and more parents who live in other parts of the Province, and have children who have special needs, are moving into the greater St. John's region so that their children can access better medical facilities with more options? In fact, will he not admit that the Avalon Consolidated School Board, the predecessor to the current board in this region, have a lot of data which shows that there may indeed be more students per capita in this region who have special needs than there might be in some other parts of the Province, because there are expert services available (inaudible) children's rehabilitation, and medical and other services that these children need?

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you Mr. Speaker.

Maybe I could continue to look at the area of special needs and special education as well. Mr. Speaker, even though the formula has been slightly different in this particular area because of the fact that you can have more than one child with special needs put into a single school in the St. John's area, whereas in other rural parts of the Province - if a child with special needs shows up in a community like Croque, they do not have the option to put those into an environment with several other students with special needs, like they do in and around St. John's - a teacher, a special needs teacher, a special education teacher, some particular hours from student assistants, have to be assigned to that particular school in that particular community because there is a single student there.

The same resource in and around St. John's can probably provide an equally good opportunity and experience for three, four or five special needs students in St. John's without needing an additional special needs teacher, an additional special education teacher, additional hours for student assistants, and so on.

The range of services in St. John's and in this area, in Board 10, including the area of special needs and special education, with the current formulas, is still far more advanced in this area than anywhere else in the Province. There is no discrimination. I understand that a parent and the board have launched legal action based on one component of a formula that has something like sixteen or seventeen different components to it. The full package, Mr. Speaker, gives an advantage to special needs students in this part of the Province that does not exist for students elsewhere, and I have no intention at this point of suggesting that today we are going to change any of the formulas.

We would like, Mr. Speaker, over time, to change all of the formulas.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister now to conclude his answer.

MR. GRIMES: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Because we would like to move to a program-based teacher allocation for students. We are not there yet. We are getting there.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: We hope to succeed in the years to come.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Waterford Valley, a supplementary.

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

The minister knows that if the Province-wide formulas were used for the Avalon East system, they would get about an extra fifty special education teachers. I say to the minister: Are we acknowledging that they have been assigned an extra eighteen special needs teachers?

I also say to the minister: Of the seventy special needs teachers that were announced in the Throne Speech and in the Budget, only fifty of them have been assigned to the school board system. I ask him today: In view of the fact that twenty of those teachers have not yet been assigned to the school boards, will he today commit to the Avalon East School Board that they will have a priority on those extra twenty that have not been assigned to the other boards to date?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would ask again that maybe the hon. member go back and check his information, because he is absolutely incorrect in this respect.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, the seventy teachers that were referred to and were mentioned by my colleague, the Minister of Finance, in the Budget - what we have indicated is that there will be up to seventy teaching units available to implement recommendations of the Canning Report on Special Matters.

The hon. member, in asking the question or putting the question, suggested that fifty of them have been assigned to school boards. The fact is this: None of them are assigned to school boards. Because he should understand and know, as a former administrator in the system before he took his pension, came to the House, collected his salary... He would have had more money, Mr. Speaker, except they robbed Harvey to pay Loyola and Paul. (Inaudible) threw him out of that job.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, it is a serious point. He knows that these particular teaching units are not given out by virtue of any formula to school boards. There are individual assessments of special needs students that are done; and if all of them are required in St. John's, that is where they will go.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to conclude his answer quickly.

MR. GRIMES: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

If all of them are required in Corner Brook, they will all go to Corner Brook. None of them as of today are assigned, because the assessments and evaluations are proceeding. The teaching units are for students who need them, not for any particular board because of an issue raised by the member opposite.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board.

In the past several weeks, four of the country's banks have announced their intention to pursue mergers: namely, the Bank of Montreal and the Royal Bank, and later the Toronto Dominion Bank and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. In the wake of these announcements there has been much discussion about the impact of these mergers on consumers, on jobs, on the economy, and opportunities for investment.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

MR. OTTENHEIMER: In the wake of these announcements there has been much discussion about the impact of these mergers on consumers, on jobs, on the economy, and opportunities for investment. My question to the minister is: Does this provincial government have a position on these proposed mergers, and is it concerned about this shift away from variety and choice towards the creation of Canadian `superbanks'?

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

MR. DICKS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, we have concerns about the effect on the Province, and in fact we have reviewed the original merger between the Royal Bank and the Bank of Montreal. We have not had a chance to determine what may happen in the case of the second merger with the Bank of Commerce and the second. I point out that primarily the regulation of banking in the country, and in fact in totality, is under the federal government. Regardless of our concerns, that decision as to whether to permit it or not lies with the federal government and not with the provincial, because we have no jurisdiction over banking. (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: The time for Oral Questions has elapsed.

 

Orders of the Day

Private Members' Day

 

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. CANNING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am very pleased today to stand in this House and present this resolution regarding the natural resources, both renewable and non-renewable, in our Province. Those resources belong to our people, all of our people. I want to just read the resolution through for the record.

WHEREAS the natural resources of Newfoundland and Labrador, both non-renewable and renewable, rightly belong to the people of this Province; and

WHEREAS future resource development in our Province must in every case possible, and to the extent possible, ensure that our people are the major beneficiaries in terms of jobs, secondary processing where it is economically feasible to do so, and any other economic benefit that is properly achievable through effective public policy;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this hon. House affirm this resource development policy on behalf of our people.

As we stand today and look about at many of our great natural resources, it is easy to feel the heavy hand of history, and looking back at some of the resource giveaways that I believe have occurred in this Province since Confederation, and even before Confederation. The fact is that we have been blessed with great natural resources: our wood, our fish, our mining opportunities, all those things that we have that can make us a forward-looking rich Province with the capacity to do the many things and provide the kind of society to our people that they deserve and demand.

Today we have to look at past policies for guidance to future policies. We need to ensure always that we achieve the maximum benefit for our people through any of these developments.

Today, one of the issues that I face in my riding is with the iron ore industry and the Iron Ore Company of Canada. It is their desire to expand their pellet production. Well, Mr. Speaker, let me say this: A company is not successful just because they have a huge resource. They are not successful because they have this great infrastructure, this capacity to mine. They are not just successful because they happen to be in one of the greatest countries of the world. Mr. Speaker, they are successful because of people. It is the people of Western Labrador who by and large have made this company very, very successful. The reality is now that we believe, in Western Labrador, perhaps the company is trying to turn back the clocks and not recognize that we have been a large measure of their success.

When we talk about whether a project is feasible, the law is clear that we don't look at what is absolutely the most profitable. It must just meet the basic feasibility test in an economic environment.

Now, Mr. Speaker, IOC has proven for nearly forty years that it is feasible to pelletize in Western Labrador. That is no surprise to anybody. They have proven it time and time again. As a matter of fact, when they poured the cement, when they raised the steel on this old unit in Sept-Iles, they poured the cement and they raised the steel to expand by two extra indurating machines at IOC, at the Carrol project in Labrador City. That was around 1972-1973. Those machines at IOC, at the Carrol project in Labrador City, have been running ever since, earning profit for the companies, providing opportunity to people, and the people have rewarded the company by ensuring that they use their skills and their abilities to ensure that unit was always profitable.

What happened in Sept-Iles? Within eight years that unit shut down because it could not compete in that era. It could not compete effectively with even that which was constructed at the same time, at Carrol project.

Mr. Speaker, there is no question in my mind that it is feasible to expand their pellet plant capacity at the Carrol project. As a matter of fact, they are currently now expanding from 11 million tons to 12.5 million tons in the very same plant in Labrador City. We want them to add another 4.5 million tons.

Mr. Speaker, I have to tell you, I was tremendously impressed and I appreciate it very much, when we had the rally at Labrador City some weeks ago on a cold and blustery Sunday morning. The Minister of Environment and Labour and the Member for Torngat and I, led that whole march, that rally, to the gates of the Iron Ore Company of Canada. I want to say today how much I appreciate those two members showing up and standing up and speaking on behalf of the people that I serve.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution is more generic, more global, more all-encompassing than just IOC. This is a fundamental policy that we must try to achieve on behalf of our people. It includes all resources. It includes non-renewable and renewable, because we have not always had a great history of ensuring that which God gave us we have used to maximize benefits to our people. We all know that. It is no secret to anybody, and we have not always been able to achieve the best out of that which we have.

Well, Mr. Speaker, if we are going to be a forward-looking Province with the capacity to provide the means for social advancement in this Province, the kind of health care, the kind of education, the kind of infrastructure as a society that we need and deserve, that which many other Canadians take for granted, we are going to need to harness the capacity of our own natural resources on behalf of those we serve. Whether it is Churchill Falls, whether it is Voisey's Bay, whether it is shrimp off the Coast of Labrador, or turbot, or any other kind of fish or wood, we must always ensure that it is used to the betterment of our people and not to our own humiliation some ten, twenty, thirty, or forty years down the road.

Mr. Speaker, if I look back, I look at the Churchill Falls agreement that was signed some thirty years ago. The price of power was low, and because the price of power was low we signed an agreement that each of us look back on with deep regret and are humiliated by to this day. Mr. Speaker, just because incidently the price of nickel happens to be low today, that is no reason to turn back clocks to do again, to repeat again, another type of Churchill deal. We must always, irrespective of what the instant market says, look at the long-term picture. That is why I brought this resolution here today, and I ask all members in this hon. House to support this resolution, to -

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, would the member take a question?

MR. SPEAKER: Would the hon. member take a question?

MR. CANNING: Sure, I will take a question.

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

MR. HARRIS: I wonder, would the member, as part of his resolution, require that all oil that comes from Terra Nova be further processed in the Province of Newfoundland? Would that be part of his resolution?

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

MR. CANNING: Mr. Speaker, this resolution is premised on the fact that where it is economically feasible we do that which is achievable through sound, public policy.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution, the resolution that I have brought to this House, speaks to the very need for us to achieve what is possible; to achieve what we can given our circumstance, given sound, public policy objectives, given sound, public policy development.

Mr. Speaker, this is not an issue with which to play politics; this is a very serious issue. This is an issue that says: We need, to the extent possible, to always maximize benefits for our people. That is why I have brought this resolution and, Mr. Speaker, that is why I would ask this hon. House to approve it.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

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

I want to rise today to respond to this particular motion put forward by the Member for Labrador West. The first thing he said, and I will repeat: It is very generic.

For one thing, nobody in this House is going to disagree with a motion that talks about developing our resources because, very simply put, it is the biggest mistake over years by different parties and everybody in this Province, and one of the major faults we have in this Province; because, when you put it in perspective and simplify it, it is as simple as this: We have the Churchill Falls development, one of the biggest of its kind in the world; we had one of the best fishing resources; we have a forestry resource that is comparable to anywhere in the world; we had mineral resources of the past; plus, now we have the biggest in the world, Voisey's Bay. We can go on and list - Hibernia and Terra Nova. Those are just six of them - we could name more - and here we have a population of 500,000 people and the highest unemployment rate in the world, Mr. Speaker. Yes, this lies at the root of the problem for Newfoundland and Labrador over years and years and years, this very motion.

What we have to start doing is turning the corner on some of them, and we have on some of them. In forest resources, for example, profits, again - the member talked about economic feasibility, yes. If I am going to start a business, I want to make sure it is economically feasible as a person starting a business. That is the way they have to look at it, and how much profit you can make. I mean, that is why you get into business, to make the most profit. That is what it is all about, being profitable, but what a government of the day has to do with each and every resource is try to strike a balance between saying: Okay Inco, we want you to make some profit and we want to make sure it is economically feasible for you; or, do we go to an extension in saying: Make as much profit as you can with our resource; it does not matter to us.

Mr. Speaker, that is where you draw the line and that is where you start to balance out, because for too many years in this Province, especially since Confederation when our resources started to be developed, we have given them away. We have simply given them away.

I started to mention the forest resources on which we started to turn the corner. Yes, we are looking at integrated sawmills now. We are looking at modern saw mills where we, of course, look at birch and other ways. Instead of just cutting the tree down, smashing it into pulp and sending it out to be made into newsprint, now we are starting to look at some other things. That is positive. This is one example of, I guess, moving in the right direction; a long way to go in the forest industry, but we are moving in the right direction.

Our fishery: If there was one resource in this Province that could have sustained all of us if it were managed right, we would not need Hibernia, we would not need Voisey's Bay, we would not need Churchill Falls. If our fishery resource alone was managed right, and we did the secondary processing of the billions, and I could probably even say trillions, of tons of fish that have gone out of this Province, if we had managed that right and did the secondary processing in this Province, we would not need the forestry, we would not need mines, we would not need oil, we would not need any of that; but it was done wrong, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, this is very generic, but I want to make these comments to the member because as far as supporting this, this is the mainstay of this Province. Our resources have not been managed properly over the years. That is the reason why 500,000 people in this Province, and declining every day, with Churchill Falls, Voisey's Bay, Hibernia, the fishery, the forestry. Imagine, 500,000 people in this Province, with all those resources, and we are looking at an unemployment rate? We should be importing people, if it was done right. Not to put the blame on - silly stuff that gets on in here sometimes about the previous government. They are all previous, and they all made the same mistake.

The Trudeau era and the Smallwood era and the Moores era, all of it, all a mistake, right on up to today. Here is the only difference now. Today, May 6, 1998, we have a chance to start changing the attitude of ourselves; not just Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, but governments of the day. I just made a mention of one example in the right direction that finally we started to do, I will say to the Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods, in moving in the direction of integrated sawmills and modernizing so that we get more out of a resource, instead of cutting the bloody tree down and shipping it out in a load of pulp for newsprint. That has been our problem. That is just an example.

In the fishery, like I have said before, if we took every other resource I just mentioned and did away with it, say we didn't have it, and we just had the fishery and managed that properly over the past twenty years, of the trillions of tons of fish that have gone out of this Province over the years, we would have had every man and woman who wants to work in this Province working, with that resource alone. So yes, we made mistakes with resources, all of us have, in the past.

I am not going to go on long with this, because it is something we all wholeheartedly support as far as using our resources. We have no problem with that. I just said that the Minister of Forest Resources and Agrifoods moved in the right direction with that. The Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture moved in the right direction with the fishery of the future and multi-species and secondary processing. I agree with that. I will say that those are two good examples of where we started to move in the right direction. As the minister admitted himself, they are small steps in the right direction, but at least we stopped going in the other direction of shipping it all out, don't even think about secondary processing.

I want to say to the Member for Labrador West, this is something I have a great problem with, and it is contradictory to me in his resolution, and what your Department of Mines and Energy and this government are considering with the pellet plant in Labrador City. I want to make this categorically clear to the Member for Labrador West, who I heard make comments on this. As far as pelletizing and expansion in Labrador City at IOC, there is only one answer from the Department of Mines and Energy. It is to tell the company: Forget your review. We are not going to wait for your answer on your review, whether you are going to expand in Sept-Iles, Quebec, or Labrador City. I am asking today in your resolution that this government and this minister say to IOC and its new shareholders: Forget your review, we don't want to wait until the end of May.

AN HON. MEMBER: We don't need (inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: I say to the minister, it is a sensible solution, and if you listen to it carefully you would even -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Well, you are not saying it. The Member for Labrador West, I am asking you to ask your minister right here today, and I will say to the people of Labrador West, tell the new company that has been in Labrador West for years with profits, and one of the lowest royalty regime rates in North America, that if there is any expansion of one pellet, if there is one expansion of IOC, forget the review by the end of May or whatever you are talking about. You don't need a review, you don't need to waste your money, your time. If there is any expansion of pelletizing in Labrador West, it is either done there or it is not done at all. Tell Sept-Iles to not even consider taking their plant out of mothballs, because that is where it should stay.

I hope the member agrees with that. It should not be a `wait-and-see' approach to what the company is going to say, I say to the member.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SHELLEY: Maybe you need some good advice. The minister should simply say to them: Sorry, forget your review, forget your consideration. There is no consideration. Close the door on it now before they even consider it.

Economic feasibility and profitability are two different things. Economic feasibility means that it can operate with some kind of profit. Profitability to a company means I can take $100 million or I can take $500 million profit.

I am not really interested in their profitability, Mr. Speaker. Yes, they have to be feasible; yes, they have to be business smart and so on. I am asking the member in this resolution, and I will be asking the minister in writing, that they tell IOC now to forget their review, there will be no consideration. If there is any expansion at all to IOC it happens in Labrador West or close the books. Forget about Sept-Iles, if there is going to be an expansion. That company, and the company before them, have made a lot of money and profit off the resource in Labrador West. If there is any expansion and any future expansions in Labrador West, it happens there or no dice.

As a matter of fact, I will end off by saying this to the member: Use the same philosophy which I support, that the Premier did on Voisey's Bay. Either the profits - everything happens here in this Province or it stays in the ground. I say to the member, you should say the same thing to IOC, that either you expand in Labrador West or you do not expand at all.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. EFFORD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I listened to the hon. member opposite, and some of the points he made were reasonable and logical, but he certainly does not need to stand here in the House of Assembly this afternoon and forget that he is an Opposition member, and start telling us what we should do. We are elected by the people; we know what we should do. For the first time in the history of the Province we are managing the resource the way it should be managed. The resources today are being managed the way they should be managed.

Let me give you a few points and correct a couple of things you said. The hon. member said that if we manage the fishery properly there would be enough employment for everybody in rural Newfoundland and Labrador. Now, the hon member knows that is not a fact. That could never happen, no. To say that the fishing industry could have been the sole industry to employ all people in rural Newfoundland and Labrador is not right.

AN HON. MEMBER: It is right.

MR. EFFORD: It is not right. It cannot be right.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. EFFORD: What we should be doing is employing the maximum number of people possible with the longest season possible, with the most sustainable income possible, in the fishing industry. That is the policy we should start with. That was never done in the history of the Province until recently. This government has now turned around the industry in this Province with no government assistance either in the harvesting or in the processing. It is totally independent of social programs, and it is now earning money with its own capabilities.

Here are the policies that we brought in.

AN HON. MEMBER: John, he wants to ask you a question.

MR. EFFORD: After, when I am finished.

The number one policy: We started off two years ago with 245 fish plants in the Province. Now, for anybody in this Province to say that there will be enough resource to keep 245 fish plants going, to employ people for the longest season possible in Newfoundland and Labrador, is dreaming and is just as out of touch with reality as his Tory buddies were during the Peckford days and the Moores days; just as out of touch with reality.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) open seventy-five more.

MR. EFFORD: Yes, and in the last election, or one of the previous elections, one of the policies they had was that they were going to open seventy-five more fish plants.

AN HON. MEMBER: That was the last election.

MR. EFFORD: That was the last election? Seventy-five more fish plants?

Here is what we are doing now. Since the last election, since we brought in the new policy, in 1997 we had fifty-seven core plants operating in this Province. Out of the 245 so-called (inaudible) buildings distributed around this Province, fifty-seven on the Avalon Peninsula, lying to people, leaving a false expectation there was employment. We have reduced the operating capacity of the Province. Last year, fifty-seven core plants regionally based around the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador to employ people for the longest season possible - not three weeks in one plant, four weeks in another one, six weeks in another one, and then after that depend on make-work programs, 10/42, or some kind of a social program to top up so they could get their UI or EI. That is what was happening in this Province for decades.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. EFFORD: That did not happen last year. No fish plant workers in this Province, no fish harvesters in this Province, came to the government, any department in government, and said that we need a social program, that we need a make-work program to top up our EI. That did not happen. Why? Because the number of fish plants reduced in this Province caused the people who needed work in those plants to get the seasonal work that they required. Why did that happen? We brought in another policy. No more shipping unprocessed fish out of this Province to be further processed anywhere else unless the consumer demanded a fresh quality product. That is the only reason it went out of this Province unprocessed.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. EFFORD: This government did that. We did not talk about it and not do it; we did it. We did not do it for political reasons. We did it for the maximum benefits of the people in the Province.

Let us look at the sealing industry. The first time in the history of this Province - for over 200 years there has been a seal

harvest in this Province, and the first time there was a tannery in this Province was this year. Never before in the history of this Province was there a tannery. Now, Mr. Speaker, we have three tanneries, three tanneries today in this Province, three oil refining processing plants in this Province. The next thing we are doing is the capsulization of the seal oil and capsulization of the (inaudible) meat to be done here in this Province, not in some other part of the world where the Tories would have had it done.

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

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

On a point of order, the hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture is up here in the House trying to take credit for something that his predecessor, the former hon. Bud Hulan did. The minister should admit that his predecessor got the ball rolling.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

There is no point of order.

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. EFFORD: That is not even worth a reply, Mr. Speaker. Let the people of this Province be the judge and say who did it and who did not do it. This government, Mr. Speaker, not this minister, brought in the policy. That is the problem with members opposite; they do not know how our government operates.

MR. TULK: They were pushed to it by you though.

MR. EFFORD: A little bit of pushing, yes.

But we do, Mr. Speaker. It is the first time in the history of the Province that we have three seal processing plants right to the full extent of tanning, refining of the product, refining of the oil and the packaging of the meat being shipped all over the world and they are going to increase. A $100 million industry at least, five years down the road, if we properly continue to manage that particular industry.

AN HON. MEMBER: We are going to wipe out an industry?

MR. EFFORD: The other thing we did - what do you mean wipe out the industry? You know all about it too, another bright wave.

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

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

On a point of order, The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, I am just going to quote for the minister from Hansard on Monday where he is said, "...Mr. Speaker, I would like to see the 6 million seals, or whatever number is out there, killed and sold, or destroyed or burned. I do not care what happens to them..."

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. HARRIS: How can we have $100 million industry, Mr. Speaker, if he wants to kill all the seals?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to take his seat. There is no point of order.

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. EFFORD: And he calls himself a lawyer. Blessed Lord.

Mr. Speaker, let me tell you the other thing we did under the management of the so-called government for a decade. The caplin fishery harvested, on average, 40,000 tons of caplin. They took the female caplin, boxed it and sent it to Japan. They took the 20,000 tons of male caplin and dumped every single one of them on the beaches and on the bottom to rot away and just create an environmental problem.

What did we do as government? A letter has gone out, went out last year, no more dumping of male caplin in the ocean. Each and every caplin must be totally utilized, whether it is for zoo food, whether it for fertilizer for the ground, whether it is for industrial waste, or whether it is for human consumption, or food for aquaculture or whatever, total utilization of the whole of the male and female caplin. That is the policy that this government brought in. It is simply called this, Mr. Speaker: managing the resource to the maximum benefits of the people.

MR. TULK: John, tell them about the cod farms.

MR. EFFORD: Yes, let's talk about the cod farms. For decades and decades people involved in the fishery of this Province put the cod traps out and took the cod fish, hauled up the cod traps, separated the large fish from the small, and threw the small fish away. A total waste of a resource. What did we do last year? We brought in the cod farming, where a fisherman now will haul his cod trap, take the large fish out that they want to bring to the market, take the small fish alive, put them into a cage adjacent or close to that area, feed them with the male caplin that you would have normally destroyed and thrown away, grow the fish for two or three months, double the value, double the price, and sell them in the fall of the year where it demands a top quality product and demands a top market price. This government -

MR. TULK: I have given another (inaudible).

MR. EFFORD: There you go. This government brought in that policy, Mr. Speaker, and I am not going to go on and name all the other numerous policies that we brought in.

AN HON. MEMBER: They are all going to be in Liberal districts.

MR. EFFORD: Every single one of them is a Liberal district. In fact, most of it was in Port de Grave district.

MR. TULK: (Inaudible) Bonavista North?

MR. EFFORD: Oh, a lot of it in Bonavista North.

Seriously, Mr. Speaker, it comes down simply to looking at the value of the resource, appreciating the resource that we have, management, so that the people in this Province can get the benefits out of it instead of having to depend on governments, whether provincially or federally, for subsidies, for make-work programs or for grants to keep their industry going, whether it be the harvesting industry or the processing industry.

My hon. colleague from -

AN HON. MEMBER: Labrador West.

MR. EFFORD: - Labrador West - I was going to say Torngat. I am proud to be able to stand and support the resolution put forth because it is a timely -

MR. TULK: Well, Torngat is always on your mind.

MR. EFFORD: Is always on my mind.

It proves that all members of this government, all members of this side of the House, have to focus on maximizing the resources, whether it is the fishery, the forestry, mining, the oil industry or whatever the resource is; maximizing the resources to the ability that we can for the benefit of all people in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak on this resolution now before the house, concerning the natural resources of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, no one could disagree with this motion, because it is basically the policy of every Newfoundlander, every government, every opposition, every party that ever existed in the Province of Newfoundland, that we should try and get the maximum benefit from our resources. It is such a novel idea, even the Newfoundland and Labrador Party created itself for the sole purpose of promoting this policy.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where are they gone?

MR. HARRIS: I do not know where they are gone, but that is how basic a policy statement this is.

I look at this motion, Mr. Speaker, and I look at the member and the members district and the problem he has there and I ask: Is this a grandstand by the member, because it is an issue in his district right now, or is this a policy that can actually have some effect on what is going on in his distract right now, or what might not be going on in his district right now, which we all in this Province want to see happen, and that is a new pellet plant?

Mr. Speaker, what does this mean, as to whether or not it is economically feasible to do so? Why is there a study going on, whether or not it is more economical, not economical but more economical, for the company that now owns the IOC to undertake pelletizing in Sept-Iles, or building a new plant in Lab West?

It is almost a `no-brainer', Mr. Speaker, it is a `no-brainer'. That plant down in Sept-Iles has been taken over. Every month, ever since it has been there, they have the engines all oiled up and they are running the fans every month. They are maintaining the system, they have been doing it for thirty years.

If the choice is for IOC, is it cheaper for us to turn this one on or build a new one, the answer is going to be that it is cheaper to turn this one on. We know what the answer is going to be and I suggest, Mr. Speaker, this policy here is not going to stop that, because they are going to come back and say: Oh, it is not economically feasible to build a new plant, we already have one down the road, down the railroad.

I say, Mr. Speaker, that this issue of the pellet plant in Labrador West is going to be a test for this government. Never mind Voisey's Bay. Let's not wait for Voisey's Bay or what ever is going to happen down the road. This is a test for this government's policy, and if the pellet plant is built in Labrador West as a result of this decision - and I do not mean built ten years down the road or five years down the road under some arrangement. I mean whether this plant opens in Sept-Iles or there is a new plant built in Labrador West instead is a test for this government's policy.

If they can, in the face of a negative decision by IOC, force a pellet plant to be built in Labrador West and keep that one in Sept-Iles shut down, that will be the test. Can they do that under this policy? I do not think they can, Mr. Speaker. I would be happy if they could, I would praise them it they did, but under this policy, Mr. Speaker, how is economically feasible going to be interpreted? Because very clearly, Mr. Speaker, IOC can say: How can it be economically feasible for us to build a brand new plant when we have one? Maybe the member can address that when he rises to speak at the close of debate.

Mr. Speaker, we all support the maximum use of our resources to the extent possible. I'm not so sure about the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture. The Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture was talking about some of the projects that he supported, and some of them are excellent. He supported them, although I understand they were paid for by the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans. I know this grow-out of cod on a test basis was done to increase, double or triple, the value of cod caught in Placentia Bay last year. It was supported by the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans department to bring that grown-out cod to market down in Boston and increase and enhance the value of that cod. That is an excellent program, and we have to be very creative about the use of our resources to maximize them.

As a policy - and I support this policy - so far this has been a failure in this Province. You look at Bowater's, you look at Abitibi-Price in Grand Falls. We have had paper mills in this Province for seventy-five years or more, and what have they done? Have they diversified the economy of the Grand Falls, Stephenville and Corner Brook areas? No, Mr. Speaker. They have produced one product, newsprint; one product being produced.

I remember I was on an airplane with several of the members opposite going out to Gander a couple of weeks ago, and reading in a magazine of a paper mill in Quebec, Tembec I think it's called. This is a paper mill that was taken over by workers twenty-five years ago because the company didn't want to run it any more. They weren't making enough money. It was taken over by the employees, and they had support from the government, and they had a list of all the products they were producing. They were producing textiles, clothing, cellulose, furniture, they were producing about a dozen products from the one paper mill they had taken over that was doing one thing when they took it over, and that was make paper.

Why, Mr. Speaker? Well, because it was economically feasible for Abitibi-Price to make pulp and paper, ship it out and do nothing else. It suits their business plan. That is part of their operation. They want paper for their paper mill. They were quite happy to take big sawlogs, some of them two and three feet in diameter, and stick them into the hopper and turn them into paper, while the sawmill industry goes without. We have had that history for the last seventy-five years.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: Yes, the last three years. Why did we wait seventy-five years to have a policy like that? Why would we wait seventy-five years? You were here and he was here, I saw him. He used to be down in the back benches or halfway through the wall. He was in the back benches or halfway through the wall. He was here.

As a policy, Mr. Speaker, it's a good thing, but is this something that can actually control events? I ask the member to consider the effects - and we haven't had a proper debate about it in this House, and perhaps I should bring in my own resolution - on the consequences of the Multilateral Agreement on Investment. That is something we haven't considered here in this House. All these policies we are talking about, provincial preference for tendering, further processing in this Province, all these will be illegal under the MAI. There are those who say it was wiped out at the end of April, but that's not true. They are only going back for another round.

The Multilateral Agreement on Investment, let me explain -

MR. TULK: (Inaudible).

MR. HARRIS: I will get to that now in a minute.

The Multilateral Agreement on Investment is an agreement that will allow foreign and direct investment rules to be protected so that we can't force them to do anything other than what they want to do with product in this Province. If they have a foreign direct investment, if some foreign company invests in resources in this Province, they will have the right to take them out, and that is something that we have to challenge, and I will be bringing a resolution to this House and we can have a full debate on that.

I want to talk about the seal fishery, Mr. Speaker. My Party, federally and provincially, supports the seal fishery. I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that there will not be any seal fishery if this minister gets his way; what he said in the House on Monday, Mr. Speaker, that he wants to see every single seal killed, destroyed, burned. He does not care what happens to them. There will be no tanneries, Mr. Speaker, if there are no seals, I say to the minister. There will be no leather chairs like this, Mr. Speaker, if there are no seals. There will be no seal oil if there are no seals. There will be no $50 million-a-year industry, Mr. Speaker, if the minister's intemperate, off-the-wall, out to lunch statements, like he made in the House of Assembly, are put into practice, or even perhaps - I suspect, Mr. Speaker, we will likely see Hansard from Monday quoted in the next advertising campaign of the IFAW, Mr. Speaker, saying: This is what the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture of Newfoundland says: Kill, burn and destroy every single seal.

MR. TULK: And you are likely to be the fellow to send it to them.

MR. HARRIS: Don't you worry, I say to the Government House Leader, don't you worry, the IFAW probably has copies of Hansard. They probably get them. They probably monitor what is being said in this House about the seal industry, looking for intemperate statements like this, off-the-wall, that they can use.

Now, I have to say the minister is usually pretty good. Usually he says these things off mike. He usually says these things when the microphone is not recording his voice. But Monday he lost it, Mr. Speaker, and he said, on the public record, that he believes that every single seal, 6 million or however many are out there, should be killed, destroyed or burned. Now that is the kind of comment, Mr. Speaker, that we can do without in this House. That is the kind of comment that we can do without in this Province. Mr. Speaker, we believe - I believe, on this side of the House - that we should have a full-fledged seal fishery and a seal industry, and we probably should have half as many, a quarter as many seals. The balance of nature has gone askew, there is no doubt about that.

We should have an appropriately developed policy with the kind of support that we are going to need from biologists and other people, perhaps around the world; get the support from organizations who believe in the balance of nature, and will have recognized that the balance has been undone by the policies of the Government of Canada and by what has happened to the fishery, and impose a proper reduction in the count of seals. We are not going to have that, Mr. Speaker, if the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture is making the kind of statements in the House that he made on Monday; intemperate, off-the-wall. I thought he had lost it, Mr. Speaker, he had lost it. That is the kind of statement you might hear someone make in a bar when they have had too much to drink and are just passing the time, not the kind of statement you would expect from the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture of the Government of the Province of Newfoundland.

I think, Mr. Speaker, if he does not resign, he should immediately withdraw those remarks and apologize for treating a matter of this seriousness in the way that he did on Monday. I think, Mr. Speaker, it is disgusting.

I believe in the seal industry and we can do a lot with the seal industry. We are doing a lot with the seal industry but we are not going to be able to do it under these kinds of terms and conditions, with the kind of statements being made by the minister.

So I believe, Mr. Speaker, that this policy that is being proposed, the resolution, is a good one, but I do not believe, Mr. Speaker, by itself it can resolve the problem because it is basically a motherhood kind of statement. The proof of the pudding will be in the eating, Mr. Speaker, and we will see whether or not the government of this Province is prepared to insist against the wishes of IOC and without cost to this Province. It is all very well if we subsidize it and say: You do it and we will pay for it. That is one of the favourite ways; like Voisey's Bay, you build a smelter and we will pay for it by reduction of royalties. We will make your operation profitable by taking back what we are due by ways of economical grant. That is easy to do, Mr. Speaker.

What is hard to do is to insist that IOC build a plant in Western Labrador when they have one down the railroad in Sept-Iles ready to operate, I won't say on a moment's notice, but without too much fuss and bother. They can set that one in operation.

If they come back with their feasibility study and say, well it is obviously more feasible to operate the plant down in Sept-Iles, what is this government going to do? That is going to be the test, Mr. Speaker. Are they going to insist and make it happen, or are they going to subsidize it so that it will happen, or are they going to recognize that their policy has failed? That is what I would like to see the member address when he gets up at the end to do the clean-up on this particular debate.

MR. SPEAKER (Penney): Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ANDERSEN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise today to speak to the motion put forward by my colleague, the Member for Labrador West, from the big land.

Mr. Speaker, I realize the last time I spoke in the House that the clock stopped, so I will be very brief today.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to the motion put forward by my colleague from Labrador West, because when we look at the state of our Province today and the high unemployment rate we have, and we look at the resources that we have no control over, then it is very easy to see why the young people in this Province are moving elsewhere.

I heard the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi when he mentioned that the Member for Labrador West was faced with sort of a crisis in Labrador West regarding the pellet plant, and the member felt he was grandstanding. Well, Mr. Speaker, if we stand up in this Province, as a government, and fight for jobs for our children and our future, I believe that my colleague and the people on this side of the House are not grandstanding, we are standing together.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ANDERSEN: Mr. Speaker, being a member of the government, I caution my colleagues on this side of the House that this resolution put forward by my colleague requires a lot of attention. We, as a government, have to deal with it. If we stand in this House to support this resolution, then speaking is one thing, but until we implement the right procedure, then it is a failure.

Mr. Speaker, I again congratulate my colleague. Probably no other member in this House knows the frustration, when you see resources taken out, such as the failure of the cod fishery, when people in certain parts of this Provinces did not even qualify for a TAGS Program. So, Mr. Speaker, I applaud my colleague. I was proud to travel to Labrador West and to go before the people there and show them our support.

I call upon all Members in the House of Assembly to support the resolution, and again I thank the member for bringing forward such a strong resolution to this House.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

It is ironic, Mr. Speaker, that the Private Member's Resolution, the wording: " - future resource development in our Province must in every case possible, and to the extend possible, ensure that our people are the major beneficiaries in terms of jobs, secondary processing where it is economically feasible to do so, and any other economic benefit that is properly achieved through effective public policy.

Secondary processing, Mr. Speaker. It is ironic that five minutes after I asked questions of the industry minister yesterday, the Member for Labrador West put forward a resolution talking about getting the maximum benefits from our resources because they are our resources. Yet, in my questions yesterday to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology, I asked the minister to do that very same thing with our water resource to ensure that we get the maximum benefit possible. After all, it was only last month that we opened up in this Province a state of the art bottling manufacturing plant capable of manufacturing bottles to bottle whatever you want to bottle from shampoo to windshield wash, to juice, to water, to whatever you want to bottle, can be bottled using the bottles that come from this manufacturing plant.

It was a great initiative by business people in our Province to open this plant, great foresight, and I anticipate they should be very busy. Keeping that in mind, Mr. Speaker, it should be economically feasible to bottle water in this Province considering we now manufacture the bottles in this Province. Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, under NAFTA and under the World Trade Agreement, if we export water out of this Province and into the States, or out of this Province to anywhere else in the world, we open up that resource to anybody else who may want to export water in bulk. We open up that resource to anybody else in the world who many want to come in and suck it dry. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is not fearmongering. That is a part of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

I read a quote yesterday, Mr. Speaker, that: Once a precedent is set it could have a cumulative effect and then you would simply open the door to others to do the same. After a while you are going to have a substantial dilution of your resource without any way of managing it and without any way of assuring it does not take place.

That was a quote by the Foreign Affairs Minister, Mr. Lloyd Axworthy, taken out of yesterday's Globe and Mail. He is aware of what the Free Trade Agreement will do, Mr. Speaker. The Canadian Citizens' Council is aware. They say that if we export our water in bulk from Lake Superior - now of all places, Lake Superior, that is full of sewer and factory flush out and everything else, and yet they are thinking of sending that out as a raw resource. We have far more pristine water here in this Province, Mr. Speaker.

In Ontario they are looking at sending out 600 million litres a year over the next five years, out of Lake Superior. Out of this Province, out of Gisborne Lake, the proposal is on the table to ship out 15.6 billion litres a year - not 600 million but 15.6 billion litres of water a year. Now, Mr. Speaker, it is not so much that, that concerns me. If we start to export our water in bulk, what do we have in place to prevent somebody in the future from coming in and saying they want to export water in bulk? If we allow it to go to the States or to any other country, especially to the States under NAFTA, we have absolutely no grounds to stop somebody else from coming in and exporting in bulk. That is written into the NAFTA agreement.

So let's presume that it is not even going to go to the States, although I see absolutely no reason we cannot put in place legislation to ensure it does not, but let's assume it does not even go to the States. Let's assume that it goes to Quebec for bottling.

If Quebec can find a market for bottled water that is shipped from our Provinces, surely with a bottling manufacturing plant here in this Province, and with the raw resource here in this Province, and with this resolution that was put forward by the Member for Labrador West to develop the resources for the maximum benefit of the people of our Province, wherever it is economically viable to do so, surely it would be economically viable to bottle our own water resource with our own bottles manufactured in this Province.

Mr. Speaker, it is a very contradictory statement to have this come out five minutes after the answer that was put forward by the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology yesterday.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. T. OSBORNE: No, contrary to what you have been telling people, Sir, I am not. I am against exporting water as a raw resource. I feel that the citizens of Grand Le Pierre, as well as the citizens of this Province, should benefit in the maximum possible way from that resource. That means the jobs from the bottling plant, the jobs from the manufacturing of the bottles, the jobs from putting the water into the bottles, and from labelling them, and from shipping them out. Not putting it into a carrier as a bulk resource and shipping it somewhere else to have the secondary processing done.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. OSBORNE: Contrary to what you have been saying, Sir, I am looking out for the benefit of the people of this Province so that they get the maximum benefit from our resources.

Mr. Speaker, we have to start doing that in this Province; we have to start deriving the maximum benefit possible from our resources. That means the jobs from secondary processing, the transportation of the processed product right here in this Province. Have we not yet learned from the mistakes of the past, where we give away our resources as raw resources to be shipped off somewhere else, and then to come back here as a secondary product? Have we not learned from the mistakes of the past?

We have to start deriving the maximum benefit possible from our resources. It is fine for the minister to stand in her place and say: We are going to look at this case by case, proposal by proposal. Let me say this: As this private member's resolution states, if we put the legislation in place to ensure that the secondary processing was done here where economically feasible, we would make sure that we got the secondary processing jobs. We would make sure that there are more people in Grand Le Pierre hired than just a couple of people to load it into a carrier and ship it off. If the company that is going to set up at Gisborne Lake have the intention of putting a bottling plant in place, which they say they have, what is the problem with putting legislation in place? Instead of putting the cart before the horse, why don't we put legislation to say that our water resources should have the secondary processing done before we ship it out? Why not put that legislation in place?

If the company that is going to set up there has no problem with putting a bottling plant there, why don't we make sure that there is legislation, so that we don't end up doing the same thing we are doing with Inco, chasing around in circles trying to put a resource tax in place after the deal is signed, after they have bought it from Diamond Field Resources, after somebody else has made $4.3 billion, and we have not yet derived anything from that resource?

Mr. Speaker, it is time we start looking at our resources to get the maximum benefit, the maximum jobs, the maximum spin-off revenue from that resource possible, and that is what I am in favour of in Grand Le Pierre. The next time you are speaking, Sir, to the Mayor of Grand Le Pierre, you can tell him that I want his community to have the maximum number of jobs possible from that, because that is what I am standing for, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Placentia & St. Mary's.

MR. SPARROW: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPARROW: He can speak for himself, I am sure.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is a pleasure to speak here today, and it is an honour to speak to the resolution put forward by my colleague from Labrador West. I think it speaks quite well of -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SPARROW: I think it speaks quite well of my colleague that he would stand up for this Province -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SPARROW: - stand up for his district.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SPARROW: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is this government that has put forward the strategies to do value-added in this Province. I have gone around with the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture in my district when we opened the cod plant in Argentia, in Freshwater, which unfortunately had a few problems afterwards, but we opened up that plant. It is the largest cod hatchery in Canada. John Efford and his department put forward a lot of good ideas there trying to get it up and running. It was implemented with federal funds brought to the district, I might add, by the hon. Jean Payne, working pretty hard on behalf of the residents of my district, a very good person.

Also in forestry, my colleagues, and the hon. Beaton Tulk and the current minister, worked hard in the forestry adding value-added as was just mentioned earlier by the NDP member.

Churchill Falls; the Liberal government brought it in at a low point in time for energy prices, yes, but it was put there with a Liberal initiative and is still there today; and it will certainly turn out to be a good deal. Of all the governments since Confederation that have tried to do something, it has been this government that is going to get extra value out of the Upper Churchill contract; this government.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPARROW: Everybody else is saying: Somebody should do this, somebody should do that. I see the Member for St. John's South was all bottled up about water a few minutes ago. I cannot understand, when you look at - the big thing that Newfoundland and Labrador has to start doing is, we have to start being salesmen. There is no point gearing up in production, no point whatsoever. There is no point buying ten portable saws and sawing up lumber when you have no place to sell it. You have to be geared up for sales.

The Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology has gone out, worked hard, and promoted this Province all over Canada, all over the world. It is on Sunday, Mother's Day, she has instructed people from her department to bring people to my district. They are not coming to my district only; they are going all over the Province, four or five different locations. It is a never-ending story to sell this Province, and it is this government and these people on this side of this House who are not the wishy-washy people who are wondering what is going to happen. They are making things happen. They are doing it with the Lower Churchill.

I was up with Chuck Furey when he spoke about the pellet plant, the hon. Chuck Furey, and with the Member for Labrador West and all the members from Labrador, in Labrador West, talking about that pellet plant. That deal was signed in 1938, pre-Confederation, and it is this government who is insisting, this government who is going to say, that it is going to Labrador West and not Sept-Iles.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I want to talk about value-added as it relates to my own district. What I would like to say is: It is no surprise to me -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) smelter.

MR. SPARROW: There will be a smelter, there will be a refinery, and they will be in Argentia.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. SPARROW: I did not get into this business to get a job. I got into this business to bring jobs to my district.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPARROW: I did not need a job. The only job I have ever had is the one I have in this House, and I am proud the people sent me here.

AN HON. MEMBER: Never had a job before?

MR. SPARROW: Never had a job before, Sir, self-employed, but I will say this: It is no surprise to me that Inco chose Argentia when they reviewed all the sites in Newfoundland and Labrador. It is no surprise because there were two great leaders of the Western World who came up through the fog in Placentia Bay, down to Ship Harbour across from Argentia, and they were the great Winston Churchill and the great Franklin Delano Roosevelt. They chose it because it was going to save the free world from that big menace, Adolf Hitler, because it was right next to the shipping lanes that was so threatening to the industry of the United States and of Canada. So it is certainly no surprise to me, certainly no surprise at all, that the smelter will come to Argentia.

I would like to say that we have to work as a team. There is no point if we have a mine that is not using the value-added of the smelter refinery. We have to work as a team, and we can certainly do that. This government will not be just wishing and hoping; they will be acting and making the future happen here in Newfoundland and Labrador.

I am more than pleased to support the resolution of my colleague for Labrador West. Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cartwright - L'Anse au Clair.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to rise today and have a few words on the motion that has been put forward by the hon. Member for Labrador West. I hope that this is the continuing of continuous resource development, maximizing opportunity and benefit for this Province. I guess I want to talk a little bit from the perspective of the place where I come from and the people I represent in Labrador.

The issue of a resource development, who owns it, whose opportunity it should be, and who should maximize the benefits from it, has always been a contentious issue in Labrador. It is one that has caused great controversy in the past and I am sure will cause great controversy in the future. For too long people across Labrador have been standing and saying: We can no longer sustain the economy of the region where we live if we are going to continue to have resource extraction, exporting of resources, taking everything out from under our nose, and leaving nothing for the people there to be able to make a living and survive on.

It has come to, I guess, some very controversial points in Labrador over the years with talk of separation, with talk of the New Labrador Party, with the height and the moment of politics that people have played. It has always come down to resource development and the people who live there. I would have to say that in this motion there should be other things. I think that adjacency should account for something. Wherever you have resource development within this Province, whatever region you have it in, there should be an adjacency principle that is attached to it. I think people in Labrador have been asking and begging for this, and have been asking that the Province recognize the extreme importance and the need to have this done.

I would say now that today the people of the Province are recognizing it. In light of new developments that are happening in the Island of this Province and in Labrador, the entire population is understanding and seeing the need for adjacency, the need to be doing things at home and maximizing the benefits at home first, before anyone else has the privilege and the opportunity to do it.

I guess first of all I want to talk about the Voisey's Bay project and what it means. I know how the people of Argentia are feeling today with the uncertainty over the smelter and the refinery, because I know how my people felt a year or so ago when we were told we would get no smelter and no refinery in Labrador. It was a sad day, because we had our hopes built up. We were out there lobbying, we were active. We though this industry was going to be the first resource from which the people of Labrador would see maximum benefits and economic opportunity derived. I know how he feels today because I know how we felt. It was a sad day, it was a disheartening day for us, but we accepted it to the extent that the benefits would go to the Province, that there are other people in this Province who are having a hard time, and a difficult time, and need to survive as well as we do in Coastal Labrador.

We realized that whatever benefits from any development, whether it is in Argentia, Corner Brook, Goose Bay or L'Anse au Clair, are going to be distributed to all the people. We know it is the revenue from these resources that feed our schools and our health care system, all of which we benefit from, and we realize that, but it doesn't make it any easier to accept.

I am going to talk about the fishery. The fishery is a resource that has been in abundance along the Coast of Labrador, north and south. It is a resource that could sustain every person and every community along that whole region, and it is not doing it. Why is it not doing it? Because the people who live there don't have the privilege or the opportunity to benefit. Because they are not the decision makers. Mr. Speaker, they don't distribute the quotas, they don't set the regulations, they are merely players. They are just the players in all of this and someone else decides all of the logistics and the policies and the legislation that goes with it for them.

Mr. Speaker, we have lobbied, we have cried, we have begged to be able to control the fisheries resources off the Coast of Labrador within the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, and still today we are unsuccessful in our plight to do so, and still today we are suffering because of it. So, Mr. Speaker, the resource development, the export of resources and the fact that we don't benefit 100 per cent is nothing new to the people where I live. It is nothing new to the district that I represent. We have been experiencing it for years and years and years, and we are still experiencing it.

Mr. Speaker, there was a point when we thought that maybe whatever quotas were out there in the fishery, we will capitalize on it because we will lobby and get this regulation that says: Any resources from the sea that are landed in communities in Coastal Labrador have to be processed in Coastal Labrador. Do you know what happened then, Mr. Speaker? They did not even land there. They went somewhere else. When they did not go somewhere else, they sent boats up. They tied up side by side in harbours and transported the resource from one ship to another ship so they would not have to dock at that wharf, because if they did the people there would benefit and they did not want that. Things have not changed, Mr. Speaker. We are still experiencing those problems, those difficulties, trying to overcome those pains and challenges that we have to deal with to be able to make a living up there.

Well, I hope with this new policy, Mr. Speaker, that those things will change, that we will see the maximum benefits from that resource derived by the people there; we will see their plants open, their boats full and their tables bountiful, Mr. Speaker. I hope the benefits are going to be theirs.

I also want to talk about the energy resource because energy has been another resource that we have been exporting out of Labrador for years and years and years. Well, this year, Mr. Speaker, we got a break. The Premier went in and negotiated a deal on the Lower Churchill to re-route benefits to this Province from that development. Again, Mr. Speaker, I will have to say that adjacency has to be considered. There have to be benefits to the people who are adjacent to the resource as well as the people that are within the Province that houses the resource, Mr. Speaker. That hopefully will be accomplished as a result of a resolution that has been put forward here.

We hope that because Labrador's resources are contributing grossly to the economy of the Province that we also will benefit a certain amount from these resources, Mr. Speaker, and we will see cheaper power for communities and people who are adjacent, not just for people in the United States and in Quebec; but we will see cheaper power for the people that are within 50 kilometres of the resource, 100 kilometres of the resource.

I have to say that the resolution that has been put forward by the Member for Labrador West is certainly one that every member in this House, I am sure, will stand and support unanimously, simply because we are all here to ensure that the benefits of all resources accrue to the people in this Province, and that they are employed and that they receive maximum opportunity from each and every thing that we can do and capitalize upon.

So I would say, Mr. Speaker, that when the shrimp management plan comes down a few weeks from now, the increased allocations will not go to the fourteen or fifteen federal licenses that are held by the multinationals off the Coast of Labrador, but rather the allocations will come to the people of this Province, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS JONES: They will be distributed amongst the communities of Labrador. The people of Black Tickle will not have to worry where their quota is coming from for their plant, Mr. Speaker, because it will not be given to the multinationals. It will stay for the benefit of our people. That is what we want.

That kind of management has to be taken with all resources, and not where it is possible. I would say, Mr. Speaker, it is always possible. Nothing is impossible and we will just have to make the resources in this Province work for us, work for our people so that we all capitalize on it.

I say to the member for Labrador West, that I support your motion wholeheartedly.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Government Services and Lands.

MR. McLEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak for a few minutes on this particular resolution brought forward by my colleague for Labrador West.

It is very interesting now, Mr. Speaker, that we have to be debating a resolution like this at all because now that we have started to develop our natural resources to the degree that we have, it shows the fortitude of this particular government, Mr. Speaker, that we have taken the aggressive action to ensure that we get all of the benefits from the resources that we will be developing.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take you back for just a minute or so to the older days. In the area where I was born and raised, my father always trapped. He brought home loads of fur each year and all of that fur was sold for practically nothing. It went to Montreal or Toronto and it was made into fur coats and were sold for millions and millions of dollars. Mr. Speaker, up until two years ago we were still looking at that. Our resources are being shipped out of this Province.

Mr. Speaker, I bring you back to the Iron Ore Company of Canada. We can talk about a former Prime Minister of Canada who was President of IOC for a number of years, who shipped all of the product down to Sept-Iles, so that Quebec could reap all of the benefits of that particular product.

Mr. Speaker, what we have done in the last two years to ensure that the pellet plant will be built in Labrador West where it certainly should be -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible). Do you agree with what I said?

MR. McLEAN: I did not hear you?

AN HON. MEMBER: There should be no review. Tell the company, you either (inaudible) in Labrador West or forget it.

MR. McLEAN: Well, I tell the hon. member opposite, that we have taken a pretty tough stand on that and we will probably see that in the end, that the pellet plant will go in Labrador West. We certainly indicated to the company that we do not take seconds,

we will only take what is reasonable for this Province.

Mr. Speaker, I would say that not only for mining, but for the fishery, for the forestry, for oil and gas and whatever we have to develop as natural resources in this Province. We have to do it for the maximum benefit of the people of this Province, no matter where it is.

Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that a lot of the hype over the smelter issue came out of my district. Originally, back in February, the council up there indicated that they wanted us to build a mine and mill without a smelter. Then the MP for Happy Valley - Goose Bay indicated that he was in support of that.

I have to say to you, Mr. Speaker, that these two initiatives don't represent the people that I represent. A large number of the people in the Lake Melville District support the policy that this government has right now, and that is a very aggressive policy of making sure that we get the maximum benefits from the resources that we have.

I would also say, Mr. Speaker, that the majority of people in Labrador support the policy that this government promotes, in terms of the development of our natural resources. Because if we do not do it, in this particular time when the exhilaration of natural resources is coming on stream, then let me assure you that fifty years down the road we will still have nothing, as we had nothing when the Churchill Falls deal was signed in 1969.

We saw Quebec gain millions and millions of dollars, while we were sitting there with a hugh resource; likewise with the Iron Ore Company and likewise with the fishery off our coast, a lot of that resource secondary processing being done outside of this Province.

Mr. Speaker, in the woods operations in Labrador right now, if we get into secondary processing we will be able to bring our employment rate down in that part of the Province to zero because we will then be looking for people to come in to work.

I agree with the speakers who have spoken so far, that we have to be very cognizant of our natural resources today and we have to ensure, through resolutions like this and through the government being very aggressive, that we get the maximum benefits.

I support the Member in Labrador West in his resolution today.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. CANNING: As I stand to close the debate on this resolution, I want to reflect upon some of the things that were said here today.

With respect to the Iron Ore Company of Canada, we have not made one move without full dialogue and consultation with the Chamber of Commerce up there, the town up there, the United Steel Workers of America up there.

As a matter of fact, before I brought this resolution to this House of Assembly yesterday, this resolution was read to the President of the United Steel Workers of America for his approval.

I was shocked here today to listen to the new corporate lawyer, the new advisor to the Iron Ore Company of Canada, none other than the Leader of the New Democratic Party, advising IOC that you have two options really: one is to start that plant is Sept-Iles or look for a subsidy from the government.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I listened to other people talk about the Iron Ore Company of Canada; what aggressive stand we should take. We need no advise from those who are of the same party, that we had once a President of the Iron Ore Company of Canada who became Prime Minister of this country, the Hon. Brian Mulroney, who did not treat us as well as he should, I can tell you.

We have absolutely worked closely with communities on this issue but this has more to do with the whole of the Province as well.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) 6,000 jobs.

MR. CANNING: Yes.

The reality is, this resolution today is about all of our resources, the non-renewable resources as well as the renewable resources. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I absolutely and firmly believe that, and I believe every colleague I have on this side of the House believes in that resolution, and I hope that those who are on the other side of the House agree with it too.

I am pleased to hear some of the comments from the Member from Cartwright - L'Anse au Clair with respect to adjacently, a policy which I believe in too.

I can you, Mr. Speaker, when the Minister of Labour and I and the Member from Torngat Mountains led a rally of 1,500 people to the gates of the company, the Leader of the NDP was not there and, Mr. Speaker, old coppertop was not there either.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I wish to close the debate on the resolutions.

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

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi on a point of order.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, the Member for Labrador West is accusing me, number one, of being a corporate lawyer for IOC, and secondly, for not attending a demonstration in his district.

Mr. Speaker, I was there the week afterwards and fully supported the idea of the pellet plant being in Labrador West. It has to be there. My concern, Mr. Speaker, is that his policy and his resolution won't do that job. That is the point I was making.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

There is no point of order. The hon. member is just further engaging in the debate.

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

MR. CANNING: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would now like to close off debate.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Is the House ready for the question?

All in favour of the resolution.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: Opposed.

Carried.

AN HON. MEMBER: Division.

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

MR. TULK: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. gentleman, rather than put everyone through Division, wants to know whether it was unanimously accepted or not, I am sure the Opposition House Leader and myself would agree that this resolution was unanimously accepted and have it so recorded, so he can go home and sleep well tonight.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

Let the record show that the vote was unanimously in favour of the resolution.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. TULK: Before your hon. moves the adjournment, which today I understand he does, I would like to inform the House that the Resource Committee this evening will review the estimates of the Department of Forestry Resources and Agrifoods in the House of Assembly.

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