April 11, 2019
HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS
Vol. XLVIII No. 5
The
House met at 1:30 p.m.
MR. SPEAKER (Trimper):
Admit strangers, please.
Order,
please!
I would
like to welcome several guests that we have both within the Chamber and outside
the Chamber today. First of all, outside the Chamber and watching us from Bell
Island are Ms. Lahey's grade five class. They're at St. Augustine's Elementary
and they're watching in support of one of their classmates who is the subject of
a Member's statement today.
So a
great welcome to you out there in television land.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
I'd also like to acknowledge
several members of the arts community who are joining us today. We have with us:
Courtney Browne, Amy House, Pete Soucy, Kevin Major, Marilynn Bernard, Josh
Goudie, Bridger Canning, Lynn Panting and Calla Lachance.
Nice to
see you all. Welcome.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
Statements by
Members
MR. SPEAKER:
Today we'll hear from the
hon. Members for the Districts of Harbour Grace - Port de Grave, Fogo Island -
Cape Freels, Conception Bay East - Bell Island, Baie Verte - Green Bay and
Windsor Lake.
The hon.
the Member for Harbour Grace - Port de Grave.
MS. P. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It was
an exciting event last evening at the Volunteer Appreciation Reception at the
Visitors Pavilion in Bay Roberts. Volunteers are the heart of our community. The
dedication and commitment demonstrated throughout my District of Harbour Grace -
Port de Grave is both heartwarming and outstanding.
We have
secured the Newfoundland and Labrador 2020 Summer Games, which will require
immense dedication and hard work by the volunteer community of Conception Bay
North to successfully host the thousands who are anticipated to visit our area
next summer.
Last
night it was a pleasure to be joined by my colleagues, the Members for
Lewisporte - Twillingate and Terra Nova, to show support for the future of the
2020 Summer Games and to attend this special volunteer celebration during
National Volunteer Week. It was a great way to show support for people who
contribute their personal time and efforts to help others and to say thank you.
I ask
that all hon. Members join me in congratulating the Bay Roberts 2020 Summer
Games Committee and all volunteers.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Fogo Island - Cape Freels.
MR. BRAGG:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
privilege to rise in this hon. House to highlight milestones in my District of
Fogo Island - Cape Freels. This past weekend marked the 25th anniversary of the
Crystal Gliders Figure Skating Club. Skaters from the past 25 years filled the
Beothic Arena to celebrate the occasion.
To
highlight the evening, the club held a special fundraiser to bring in world
champion Kaetlyn Osmond. Her speed and grace wowed the crowd, bringing cheers
and applause. The club also showed their appreciation to two long-time members.
Claudia Drover has been coach since the club started, dedicating 25 years to
training young skaters. Daphne Hounsell has served in many positions on the
Crystal Gliders Skating Club. She has also dedicated 25 years of volunteering.
A few
years ago, I spent time as a volunteer with this club; therefore, it gives me
extra special honour to thank everyone who has served on this club. Each and
every one who volunteered for this club has ensured its success. For that, I
thank you all.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay East - Bell Island.
MR. BRAZIL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I stand
today to acknowledge a young man in my district who has shown true leadership,
community spirit, ingenuity, but particularly empathy and compassion. I speak of
10-year-old Evan Byrne who was honoured yesterday at his school, St. Augustine's
Elementary, by the Town of Wabana and the residents of Bell Island for his
commitment to support the Young Adult Cancer Canada program.
This
year, Evan shaved his head for the sixth consecutive year to raise money for
Young Adult Cancer Canada, and to bring awareness to the need to support cancer
patients. Evan has raised thousands of dollars locally by selling tickets,
hosting special fundraisers and by contributing his allowance to the effort at
the young age of 10
He, like
so many young people, have been affected by the loss of a family member to
cancer, and wanted to do his part to make the lives of those facing cancer a
little brighter. When asked as a five-year-old why he was doing this, he
replied: Cancer makes people sad, and I want to make them happy.
I ask
all Members of this House to join me in congratulating and thanking Evan for his
leadership and for making people happy.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Baie
Verte - Green Bay.
MR. WARR:
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to
congratulate Dr. Todd Young, this year's recipient of the Society of Rural
Physicians of Canada's Rural Service Award, and also announce his nomination for
the Digital Health Canada Clinical Innovator Award. Both these announcements are
a testament to his leadership, compassion and investment in technology.
Founder
and owner of Medicuro, the only virtual health clinic in the province, recently
launched an accompanying mobile app. Patients are able to request an appointment
via embedded website chat or web-form clinical sessions hosted via live video
chat.
Main
Street Medical Clinic in Springdale was a pilot site for web-based electronic
medical records and provides a web-based education platform for delivery
training to patients and care providers.
Providing addiction services from eight locations across the Island, Dr. Young
has demonstrated his leadership and care for addiction patients throughout
Newfoundland and Labrador. Even as a busy rural physician Dr. Young finds time
to continue his training and personal education in the following: Addiction
Medicine Diploma program, University of BC; medical review officer, the American
Association of Medical Reviewed Officers; Executive Master of Business
Administration, University of Fredericton.
I ask
all my hon. colleagues to join me in offering congratulations to Dr. Todd Young
on his many accomplishments.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Windsor Lake.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, we here in the
House of Assembly recently joined in with the Be Cool for Autism Day, taking to
our social media accounts. What some may have thought to be a Blues Brothers
tribute, was in fact support of the vital work of the Autism Society of
Newfoundland and Labrador.
I'm
proud to report that the students at Roncalli Elementary, MacDonald Drive
Elementary and MacDonald Drive Junior High also joined in support of this
compelling cause, and of their fellow students on the autism spectrum.
Persons
with autism are friends, colleagues or family members with so much to contribute
to the province and people. I commend and personally support the work of the
Autism Society Newfoundland and Labrador for their excellent work in challenging
the stigma surrounding autism and providing support to individuals and families.
I
encourage the Members of this House to continue their support for the Autism
Society and its families and programs.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Statements by Ministers.
Statements by
Ministers
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Service NL.
MS. GAMBIN-WALSH:
Mr. Speaker, in October our
government, in partnership with Bluedrop Performance Learning, launched
SkillsPass NL. These online programs are targeted to help owners, managers,
employees and job seekers gain employability skills, save time and money by
being prepared for inspections, and ensure personal and public safety by
complying with regulations.
Just six
months ago, SkillsPass NL launched with four programs. Today, there are 12
programs available to anyone interested, including training on food safety,
tobacco and vapour products retail, as well as training for public pool
operators and marriage licence issuers and commissioners.
Mr.
Speaker, we want people and businesses to be successful and this initiative
makes a positive contribution to compliance, and to employee and employer
success. The e-learning is available free of charge to anyone interested. Plus,
participants' training records will be available to them electronically.
In
keeping with the objectives outlined in
The Way Forward, we have entered into a four-year partnership with Bluedrop
to develop SkillsPass NL. Our government will continue to work with Bluedrop to
offer additional courses with other departments on a number of initiatives.
We are
certainly looking forward to our province's workforce using this innovative
training technology to improve their knowledge and skills.
Mr.
Speaker, I invite my hon. colleagues, and all residents of this province, to
explore these programs at ServiceNL.myskillspass.io.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I'd like
to thank the hon. minister for an advance copy of the statement. Mr. Speaker,
we, on this side of the House, join the minister in recognizing the value of
SkillsPass NL by bringing more government programs and services online. We also
know the value of a digital economy is unquestionable. I'm glad that after three
years of little action, government has engaged with Bluedrop to offer more help
for those unemployed and more user-friendly platforms for businesses and
organizations. Clearly, the early success of SkillsPass NL has only been
successful through the massive unprecedented expansion of Internet coverage
through our administration.
Mr.
Speaker, in closing, whatever we can do to serve the people of the province
better is a good thing. I encourage all residents of the province to take
advantage of SkillsPass NL.
Thank
you very much.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's East - Quidi Vidi.
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I, too,
thank the minister for the advance copy of her statement. It's good to see one
of our local technology firms continuing to develop this online training.
Hopefully, this training will help owners and managers comply more easily with
regulations. We are told it will also help employees and job seekers.
So, I
ask the minister will she be reporting on a follow-up review of how the impact
of this training is on people looking for work.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
statements by ministers?
The hon.
the Minister of Municipal Affairs and the Environment.
MR. LETTO:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr.
Speaker, I rise today to highlight our government's investments in municipal
infrastructure. By collaborating with the federal and municipal governments, we
have invested more than $259 million in provincial funding for over 630
municipal infrastructure projects in the past three years. We are providing
quality infrastructure, creating jobs and enhancing services for Newfoundlanders
and Labradorians.
The
provincial government prioritizes projects that communities tell us are
important to them. Earlier this week, the Premier announced budget 2019 will
commit $129 million for municipal infrastructure. This includes new cost-shared
projects to provide 29 communities with better quality water and waste water
systems, improved roads and community buildings, and regionalized services.
In line
with The Way Forward, we are using
some of that investment to leverage as much federal funding as possible. In
September, we signed an agreement for $555 million in federal funding under the
Investing in Canada Plan. We anticipate releasing this year's project list after
the federal government completes its review.
Mr.
Speaker, I would like to acknowledge the supportive relationship we have with
municipalities and our private sector partners. We look forward to continuing to
work together to build safe and sustainable communities.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I want
to thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. We, in the Official
Opposition, clearly support investments of improved infrastructure in
communities throughout the province. There are many municipalities that are in
need of upgrades on their water, waste water and community buildings, roads and
other services.
However,
projects announced by the Premier on Monday will only go ahead if the federal
government gives approval. Instead of waiting to have all three levels of
government, the Premier wanted to start his election campaign early.
I look
forward to the federal government giving these funding approvals and to the
improvement of services and infrastructure which our communities badly need.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's East - Quidi Vidi.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I, too,
thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. It's good to see that
much-needed money being spent on municipal infrastructure projects. It's sorely
needed and thank goodness there's a federal government there to back it up.
Government knows the huge deficit in the province's municipal infrastructure,
the need for cash for roads, for water systems and the like.
Under
the current cost-sharing formula set by the provincial government, however, most
municipalities struggle to come up with their share, so I encourage the minister
to revisit these formulas to relieve the financial burden faced by so many
municipalities.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
statements by ministers?
Oral
Questions.
Oral Questions
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, in last week's
Throne Speech government boasted that it has stabilized spending, yet so far
this week government has announced almost $350 million and counting.
How do
all these announcements impact the fiscal forecast?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
First of all, Mr. Speaker,
before we get into this week's announcements and the opportunity to give back to
people of the province, it really reiterates the plan that we put in place in
2016 is working. But I do want to clarify for those that are watching and would
have listened and just heard some misinformation that just went out there by one
of the PC Members. This is really about cost-shared arrangements about an
announcement that we made on Monday of this week.
The
cost-shared arrangements that we made on Monday of this week were not federally
and provincially funded, they were actually provincially and municipally funded,
cost shared. So the information – facts matter, Mr. Speaker, when you make
announcements like this, but I just really want to clarify about the
announcement that we made on Monday about the $129 million that we're giving
back to the people of this province.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
The question was how the
announcements impact the fiscal forecast, Mr. Speaker.
Monday's
municipal infrastructure announcement stated that some of the money would be
used to leverage federal money.
How sure
is the Premier that these projects will go ahead if the province is still
waiting on federal approval?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
If you
remember back a few months ago, we've entered into multi-year agreements with
the federal government. Much of the announcements around infrastructure that we
can actually joint share with the provincial government are based on multi-year
agreements, but I do want to reiterate the announcement on Monday around
municipal capital works with the 29 communities that we just mentioned, nearly
around $129 million, were really just cost shared with those municipalities,
which is currently in the three-year plan which we announced on Monday. That is
all forecasted, Mr. Speaker.
I will
tell the people of this province that our plan is working; we are on track. Our
fiscal framework that we put in place in 2016, we are still on track with the
forecast that we put in place in 2016.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, next Tuesday,
April 16 is budget day for the province. The school year ends June 27. There's
plenty of time to debate the budget, if the government wanted to do so.
Is the
Premier's intention to debate the budget or will he throw us into an election
with no budget debate?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Good question, Mr. Speaker.
Always proud to be able to stand and debate where we've taken this province
since we took government in 2015.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
PREMIER BALL:
What we faced in 2016, I
think the Leader of the Opposition made mention yesterday about owning up to the
mess that they'd left us. Well, first of all, we saw the acknowledgement that
you did leave us a mess. There's no question about that. I think everyone in
this province would have recognized that.
Mr.
Speaker, we have taken this province a long way in the last 3½ years. I look
forward to the debate, whether it's at the doorsteps or here in this House of
Assembly. But, I will tell you, Mr. Speaker –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
– one thing for sure is that
the people of this province, unlike 2015, will get an opportunity to get a clear
understanding of the financial picture of this province.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
So, will there be a budget
debate?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there's always a
budget debate. You can't get a budget without having a budget debate.
Very
clearly, the Leader of the Opposition, a few weeks ago, was here sending
messages to me saying bring it on, we're ready, Mr. Speaker. Well, I will
guarantee you this, the financial picture of our province that we will put to
the people in this province, when we're ready for the debate, will look better
than the financial picture that you've missed the opportunity for your own party
– you couldn't even get the financial picture of the PC Party right, Mr.
Speaker.
This is
a crowd that's not ready to govern. They are not ready to govern. They haven't
even got their own caucus in shape.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
That's quite a bombastic
answer to a very simple question: Will there be a budget debate?
Budget
debate is used to flesh out details and examine spending from previous years.
Without budget debate government will hide, not only their plans but their
actions from the past 12 months.
Will the
Premier be open and transparent, as he has promised, and ensure that budget
debate occurs so the people of the province can understand the financial
condition of their province?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, every single
government that has (inaudible) – every budget that's passed by previous
governments, and this one for sure, will require a number of hours to debate
that will occur on the floor of the House of Assembly.
Mr.
Speaker, the people of this province, including the Leader of the Opposition,
including the Leader of the Third Party have all been calling for an election.
They've been asking for an election. Are they now moving from that position, Mr.
Speaker? We've been getting ready. The Leader of the Opposition, he's been
getting his – the PC Party has been getting his party ready.
Mr.
Speaker, we have no date picked yet, but I can guarantee you, before we go to
the doorsteps –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
– unlike in 2015 when we were
left with the mess, people will get a very clear understanding of what this
government has done.
This
province is being turned around by the work of this government, and we're
prepared to have that debate with anybody, anywhere.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
How you spend your money says
what your values are.
Budget
debate gives the public the chance to see what's included and what's not
included in the budget. Now that the Premier is making spending announcements
with money that we don't have, we need the budget debate to determine what the
government has to cut.
Will the
Premier open the books and ensure the budget is debated?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, what the people
of this province are expecting is an open debate no matter where it is. That is
what we were missing.
I wonder
if the Leader of the Opposition, when he spoke about owning the inheritance,
does he truly remember what happened in 2012 when the project was sanctioned,
Muskrat Falls? Just imagine a province that we live in today, if they had access
to some $500 million that will be going to rate mitigation, if we could actually
direct that to priorities of people in this province, and the Leader of the PC
Party is yet to stand up and take ownership for that.
We do
not take ownership for the mess that we inherited, that has been caused by you.
What we take ownership for is how we turned this province around, putting people
to work, putting a fiscal forecast in place that is working.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
Our plan is working; people
are seeing the benefits.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, another
bombastic answer that stonewalls a very simple question, the question being:
Will there be a budget debate?
This
government increased the gas tax, brought in the levy, cut libraries, introduced
a book tax, all in 2016, because they needed money. Yet this week –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. CROSBIE:
– they've opened the taps on
spending.
Is the
Premier acting in the best interests of the province, or just in the interests
of getting re-elected?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Speaking of being transparent
and opening the books, Mr. Speaker, the levy – as we said in 2016, the Leader of
the PC Party knows this, if he just looks at the plan, look at the legislation
that was put in place – will be gone. As the Minister of Finance said yesterday,
he will be very pleased to see that gone.
I was
very disappointed when we had to make difficult decisions like that. We had to
make the decisions like that because the PC Party hid the financial information
from the people of this province –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
I will guarantee you that
this government will not do that.
The
fiscal situation in this province will be laid out there, and we will lay it out
there on Tuesday of next week.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
I remind all Members, I will
not tolerate heckling of any kind. I want to hear questions and answers and only
that.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, I think
psychologists call that kind of answer: perseverating. It means you repeat you
yourself.
On
Monday, the Premier said he wasn't thinking that far ahead regarding the budget
debate. The budget is Tuesday. Will the Premier admit that with all of these
announcements, he is only focused on the election?
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Well,
the Leader the Opposition, the Leader of the PC Party seems to be a little
nervous of getting in front of the people of this province. Mr. Speaker, if I
was the leader of the PC Party right now I would be a little nervous if I had to
go and try to defend a project that will double electricity rates in this
province. If I had to defend a CHEAP plan, which says the electricity rates in
our province will be 17 cents, I would not want to appear in front of the people
of this province.
We are
putting in a credible rate mitigation plan, Mr. Speaker. We are putting in a
plan that will build on the plan that we put in place in 2016, putting people to
work in this province, putting this province back on a sound fiscal track. That
is what we are doing and that is what we will take to the electorate.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
The Premier has been
travelling the province handing out goodies. Will he admit that he is using
public funds to campaign?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, when I was
leader of the Opposition I travelled this province and I enjoyed every minute
that I did it. When I'm Premier of this province, Mr. Speaker, I travel this
province and I enjoy every minute that I do it.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
PREMIER BALL:
Any time that I can get in
front of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians – regardless of where they are,
whatever my job is – I enjoy doing it. I can assure you right now, if I was in,
like St. Anthony yesterday or at the Labrador Games, is he suggesting that the
Premier of this province should not go into those communities where they really
want to speak to our politicians? I look forward to seeing the tour wagon show
up where we are, Mr. Speaker, on the campaign trail whenever the election is
called.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Another stonewalling answer.
All the
indications are we are only days away from an election being called and the
government is making many announcements. When will they announce their rate
mitigation plan? It should be easy to do. You can just look at ours and borrow
from that.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there are about
five or six reasons why we will not be copying the Crosbie rate mitigation plan.
Number one, we don't believe that people in this province can afford a 17 cent
per hour electricity rate. We don't believe that they can. We will put in place
a rate mitigation plan that reflects the affordability of people in this
province, mitigating Muskrat Falls, Mr. Speaker.
I ask
the Leader of the PC Party: Will he once and for all stand up and apologize? We
wouldn't even need to be doing rate mitigation if it wasn't for the decisions of
the PC Party.
Will he
at least once acknowledge that and take the responsibility for the role that the
PC Party played in getting this province in the mess that it is.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
It's refreshing to move from
pure stonewalling to personal attack there; that keeps me on my toes.
With
yesterday's announcement regarding the replacement of Her Majesty's Penitentiary
with an expanded facility, is the minister considering consolidating
correctional institutions in the province?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, I'm going to
stand here before the Minister of Justice and Public Safety gets up and talk
about personal attacks.
I have
sat in this House of Assembly when the Leader of the PC Party has come back at
me, Mr. Speaker, and said many words that have personally attacked me. I can
guarantee you right now, no matter what forum we're in, I will defend what we
have done as a government. I will not shy away of telling people in this
province who put this province in the difficult situation that we're in.
If the
Leader of the Opposition thinks it's a personal attack by me asking him to
apologize for his party putting in place this project that is costing hundreds
of millions of dollars, Mr. Speaker, if he is ashamed to apologize and take
responsibility for that, well, I would say right now, I would be silent for him
as well.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
There's a lot more heat than
light in that answer, Mr. Speaker.
Will
this consolidation of penitentiaries result in job losses in Stephenville, Happy
Valley-Goose Bay, Bishop's Falls or Clarenville? If so, what will be done to
help these displaced workers?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have
to go back to the Member's first question, because the second question is led on
a wrongful premise: (a) there will be no consolidation and (b) there will be no
job losses.
We are
very proud to be building a new facility in this province that will be open in
2024, but to go back to ensure there's no misinformation put out there, there
will be no consolidation and there will be no job losses.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, we have bills
amending both the Automobile Insurance Act
and the Insurance Companies Act, which
have received first reading.
Can the
responsible minister confirm that this legislation will be debated prior to the
election call?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As you
can see, there's a little bit of a tussle there – both myself and the Minister
of Service NL wanted to speak to this.
Yes, we
have two pieces of legislation that are currently resting at first reading, and
I can confirm that our intent is to move forward with the debate next week.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
To whichever minister wins
the tug of war, can we be informed as to what recommendations of the Public
Utilities Board will be included in the bill?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Obviously, we will be debating that bill in the House of Assembly, but as the
Member knows, any bill that we debate here there will be briefings provided to
all Members of the House of Assembly prior to any debate here in the House. At
that time, Members will have a full opportunity to review the legislation, to
ask questions and then we will move into the House and have second reading and
Committee. I'm sure it will be a very thorough debate.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr.
Speaker, there are over 1,000 automated external defibrillators known as AEDs in
our province but there's no link to the 911 system; 911 operators need to be
able to direct individuals to the nearby AED wherever possible.
Why
isn't your government setting up this very important life-saving initiative that
I've been advocating for, for the last two years?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
The AEDs
were funded through money from Municipal Affairs and were located on the advice
of the Heart and Stroke Foundation. They ware very valuable tools, as the Member
opposite alludes to. The information that's out there is currently the subject
of a Hacking Health enterprise through our young entrepreneurs with the aim of
providing that information for the 911 service.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Conception Bay South.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I want
to remind government opposite, there's been numerous letters written by the
Heart and Stroke, by myself, by other advocacy groups to all of them, including
several ministers, and still no one has had the decency to respond to any of
those people. I call upon government to provide answers, explain, to be more
clear because this is a life-saving initiative and it's one I'll continue to
advocate for.
What
work, Minister, has been done towards setting up this registry?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I
thought I answered the questions quite clearly the first time but maybe my
strange accent has befuddled people.
The
bottom line is the information is out there. We need to collate it and it is
currently the subject of a Hacking Health enterprise, among other initiatives.
We hope to be able to bring this to fruition in the same way the Hacking Health
chapter here has done with at least three other initiatives.
We have
the biggest and most active Hacking Health chapter east of Toronto, Mr. Speaker.
I look forward to their deliberations at the next hackathon coming up in the
spring.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Mr. Speaker, I want to be
clear, what the minister is saying there now has not been communicated to any of
the groups that I've been talking to. It's great to keep in their own back
pocket, but people in this province, including people who have had heart
transplants, are crying out for this registry and no one over there has the
decency to tell those people. That's just not acceptable, Mr. Speaker.
Minister, these AEDs need a regular inspection to ensure batteries and pads are
working. With this registry, we can ensure that all are inspected and ready to
save someone's life if needed.
Will you
commit to the life saving registry today? Talk in plain terms so people can
understand what you're talking about.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I'm
trying to take the temperature down on the hyperbole – that means exaggeration
for the Member opposite.
From my
point of view, the Member raises some very interesting issues. There are wide
variety of sources of AEDs, some are owned by the Heart and Stroke Foundations,
some are donations to organizations like curling clubs. Those in health
authorities, for example, do have regular inspections in the same way that, for
example, fire extinguishers and such equipment would.
We are
working with Service NL on those background pieces and they obviously would form
an important part of such a registry to make sure this equipment is up-to-date.
We have
not forgotten about it. We're in regular communication with the Heart and Stroke
Foundation, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
Can the
Premier confirm that he has met with representatives from the taxi industry
regarding insurance issues?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, yes, we had a
meeting, at their request, by the way – the members from the taxi industry. We
had a great meeting, all the appropriate time, which went on for quite some
time.
The
minister responsible for Service NL did attend that meeting, as did members of
the taxi industry. We talked about a number of issues that impact their
industry, especially around insurance, but not just insurance.
Mr.
Speaker, there were a number of things that were discussed. We had a very good
meeting. As I said, it was a meeting that was requested by them. It was a
meeting that I had made a commitment to attend as well as the minister, who's
had numerous meetings with the taxi industry.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Last
month, the Premier stated that he'd look forward to meeting with the group
because he was sure that there would be some solutions that would come from it.
Can the
Premier provide an update on the meeting and what progress was made on resolving
the serious issues in the taxi industry?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Well,
there is no doubt, we covered a lot of territory and a lot of information that
was provided. Some of this was already available to us in Service NL. We all
know that this issue has been around this province for nearly two decades. We
all know there are concerns around facilities, insurance and the association
that the taxi industry is now having really – have no other choice but buy
insurance through them, but it was more than that.
We
talked about things like registration. We talked about uninsured drivers and so
on, Mr. Speaker. There was a multitude of things, all on the agenda of the taxi
industry. It was a very good meeting, one that they requested, one that we were
happy to attend.
Mr.
Speaker, collectively and together, we agreed to look forward and look to
putting in solutions to this problem.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Yes, thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
Why were
there certain members of the taxi industry not allowed to attend this meeting?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there was no one
not allowed to attend the meeting.
AN HON. MEMBER:
Yes, there was.
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
Please
proceed, Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Once
again, I will say I did not, at no point, ever suggest – if that is what the
Member opposite is suggesting, I would ask him to tell me who it is I excluded
from the meeting.
AN HON. MEMBER:
(Inaudible.)
PREMIER BALL:
I did not.
They
asked for the meeting; I agreed to meet. At no point did I say someone should
not be there, if that's what the Member is alluding to, not at all. There were
people in that room that I met for the first time.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount
Pearl North.
MR. LESTER:
Mr. Speaker, prescription
drugs in Canada –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. LESTER:
– that are not over the
counter are not taxed. However, medical cannabis has both excise and sales tax
applied to all sales.
I ask
the minister: Will the government commit to removing the provincial portion of
taxes for medical cannabis users?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Finance and President of Treasury Board.
MR. OSBORNE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I had
indicated to the Member yesterday, medical cannabis is federally regulated, not
provincially regulated. We do regulate recreational cannabis products in this
province; that's done through the Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation.
The
question that the Member is asking is more appropriately asked to the federal
government.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount
Pearl North for a short question, please.
MR. LESTER:
It seems to me that we're
more concerned with propping up the tax revenues from cannabis.
This is
a provincial sales tax that's applied to medical cannabis that's prescribed for
people who are in compromised positions. New Brunswick, PEI and Ontario –
MR. SPEAKER:
Quick question, Sir.
MR. LESTER:
– all covered medical
cannabis under the workers' compensation program.
I ask
the minister: Are you in discussions with WorkplaceNL to cover medical cannabis
for injured workers if they require it?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Finance and President of Treasury Board for a quick response, please.
MR. OSBORNE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Again,
medical cannabis is not regulated by my department. The Newfoundland and
Labrador Liquor Corporation regulates the sale and distribution of recreational
cannabis.
I
haven't had any discussions with WorkplaceNL regarding medical cannabis, no.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, artists have
mounted a respectful and convincing letter-writing campaign calling for an
increase in funding for ArtsNL, the only arts program investing directly in
artists for the creation and development of art. The number of artists applying
for this funding has significantly increased, yet the ArtsNL budget has actually
decreased.
I ask
the Premier: Does he fully understand how crucial this ArtsNL funding is?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank
the Member opposite for her question. Government is firmly committed to the arts
community here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, that's why we put
forward the Status of the Artist legislation, and we certainly value the
important work that ArtsNL does for the promotion and the creation of arts.
I had a
very productive meeting with business and the arts and artists on dialogue on
this particular matter. I just reflect back on a sunrise ceremony that took
place with members of the business community, with business and the arts, where
we had Lynn Panting's dance class and it was a way to start off connecting how
business and the arts are synonymous. Creativity and innovation go hand in hand,
and it's important that we invest in the arts.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for St.
John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, Rick Mercer
wrote: It is thanks to early support from ArtsNL and groups supported by ArtsNL
that I owe my career. Petrina Bromley, Newfoundland actor in
Come From Away on Broadway wrote: I
would never have become a professional actor if I hadn't been hired to act. That
only happened because someone got a small investment from ArtsNL to do a
project.
I ask
the Premier: Have these articulate and passionate artists convinced him yet as
to why ArtsNL investment is crucial to the development of the careers of our
artists?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have
the greatest respect for all of these artists and what they're doing for
Newfoundland and Labrador in their production and creation and marketing and
promotion of our province in their artistic endeavours and those new comers who
are looking to become professional artists and the work that they're doing
through their involvement with ArtsNL and all the other entities of government.
They do incredible work.
Our
government has been working with and listening to them. I have to say that it's
important that we continue to have ongoing dialogue, and that's why, as
minister, I've been going to various events and activities and festivals and
also seeing the investment first-hand, talking to the artists directly.
Any
investment in ArtsNL will be reflected in budget 2019.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, award-winning
writer, actor, Mark Critch wrote: When I was starting out, some friends and I
received a small grant that helped us to put off a show of original comedy at
the hall. That investment led to all I've done since. Investing in ArtsNL will
pay off culturally and economically.
I ask
the Premier: Is there anything else he needs in order to be convinced how
crucial ArtsNL funding is to the well-being and the growth of our cultural
sector? Faint praise is not enough.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I
said in the beginning, we have been investing in the arts. We continue to do so.
We see the value in the arts. This is why we have such a strong cultural
community here. It is because of all the individuals that are involved. We work
in partnership, we work with ArtsNL, government as well.
Any
investment in ArtsNL will come in budget 2019 – that is reflected in the budget
that is coming on Tuesday. And that's when the Member would find out if there's
any particular investment in ArtsNL.
But what
I can say is that the Premier and I have been on site of
Hudson & Rex, we see where film can come from a playwright, can come
from literary works, it's all very interconnected, it all drives the economy,
it's $450 million, there are 5,000 jobs, and the arts and cultural community is
so important to this government.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre for a very quick question, please.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, I ask the
Premier, in the past few weeks his government –
MR. SPEAKER:
Quick question, please.
MS. ROGERS:
– made several funding
announcements totalling hundreds of millions of dollars. Will he now join with
our artists and commit to this modest request for one of the best investments
this province can make for our people?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation for a quick response, please.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Mr. Speaker, I said that any
reflection of investment in artistic and cultural endeavours would be in budget
2019, but what I can say is that we are firmly committed to the arts community
here in this province, and we continue to make investments. Actually, there's an
announcement being made right now to expand the Princess Sheila NaGeira Theatre
in Carbonear.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Humber - Bay of Islands.
MR. JOYCE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I would
ask the question to the Opposition, but they don't answer questions, so I'll ask
the question for any Member of the Management Commission on the government side.
On
October, 24, 2018, during a technical briefing with the Management Commission
concerning the bullying and harassment reports, I ask, did Bruce Chaulk make a
reference about an individual who refused to participate in the interview
process, in what context was the statement made –
MR. SPEAKER:
Sir, I'm sorry, I have to
rule that question out of order, since it's directed to the Management
Commission and not to the House of Assembly. So I need a question directed to
government.
MR. JOYCE:
I ask the Minister of Natural
Resources, whoever wants to answer: Did Bruce Chaulk make any reference about an
individual who refused to participate in the interview process, in what context
was the statement made, and did Mr. Chaulk –
MR. SPEAKER:
Again, Sir, I see this as
related to the activities of the Management Commission. I'd say it's separate
from the policy of the government. So I see it as not appropriate for this
floor.
MR. JOYCE:
(Inaudible.)
MR. SPEAKER:
You cannot challenge the
Speaker, by the way. The idea of a question is to challenge the policy and the
direction of the government.
MR. JOYCE:
It is.
MR. SPEAKER:
You're talking about the body
of the Management Commission, to which I am the Chair.
The time
for Oral Questions is over.
Thank
you.
Presenting Reports by Standing and Select Committees.
Tabling
of Documents.
Notices
of Motion.
Notices of Motion
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Speaker, I give notice
that I will ask leave to move the following resolution respecting the
reappointment of the members of the Independent Appointments Commission.
BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Assembly as
follows: WHEREAS section 6(3) of the
Independent Appointments Commission Act provides that members of the
Independent Appointments Commission are to be appointed by the
Lieutenant-Governor in Council on a resolution of the House of Assembly; and
WHEREAS section 7(1) of the act states that
a commissioner may be reappointed; and
WHEREAS the appointment of the following
commissioners expires on May 25, 2019: Clyde K. Wells, chairperson; Zita Cobb;
Shannie Duff; Philip R. Earle; Derek Young; and
WHEREAS it is proposed that the said
commissioners be reappointed as commissioners for a term of three years.
NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the
following persons be reappointed members of the Independent Appointments
Commission for a term of three years: Clyde K. Wells, chairperson; Zita Cobb;
Shannie Duff; Philip R. Earle; Derek Young.
Further, Mr. Speaker, under Notices of
Motion, I give notice under Standing Order 11(1), that this House not adjourn at
5 p.m. this coming Monday.
Thank you.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further notices of motion?
Answers to Questions for which Notice has
been Given.
Petitions.
Petitions
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount Pearl North.
MR. LESTER:
Mr. Speaker, the Adult Dental Program
coverage for clients of the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program
under Access and 65Plus plans were eliminated in Budget 2016.
We, the undersigned, call upon the House of
Assembly to urge the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to reinstate the
Adult Dental Program to cover seniors and low-income individuals and families
for better insurance of oral health, quality of health and dignity.
Mr. Speaker, this is probably the seventh
or eighth time I've presented this petition since I've had the privilege of
standing here in this hon. House. I've yet to hear a response from the minister
and I, along with the petitioners, would really appreciate it.
As I've said before, people's nest eggs,
the little bit of cash they had poked away for those emergencies and rainy-day
funds or whatever it may be, they're long since used, and now people are putting
their health issues off as long as they can. They're coming to critical levels.
They're ending up showing up at emergency departments with all sorts of problems
that are costing the government and province and people a lot more; whereas, a
simple reinstatement of this program would ensure that we do not get to those
stages.
It's basically, again, where we're
shouldering the inability for government to rein in spending on the backs of
people who are most vulnerable.
MR. SPEAKER:
Further petitions?
The hon. the Member for Mount Pearl -
Southlands.
MR. LANE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
There
have been numerous concerns raised by family members of seniors in long-term
care throughout Newfoundland and Labrador, particularly those suffering from
dementia, Alzheimer's disease and other cognitive debilitating conditions,
whereby loved ones have experienced injuries, have not been bath regularly, have
not received proper nutrition and/or have been left lying in their own waste for
extended periods of time. We believe this is directly related to government's
failure to ensure adequate staffing at those facilities.
THEREFORE we petition the hon. House of Assembly as follows: To urge the
Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to instate legislation, which includes
the mandatory establishment of an adequate ratio, one staff to three residents
in long-term care and all other applicable regional health facilities housing
persons with dementia, Alzheimer's diseases and other cognitive debilitating
conditions in order to ensure appropriate safety, protection from injuries,
proper hygiene care and all other required care. This law would include the
creation of specific job position in these facilities for monitoring and
intervention as required to ensure the safety of patients.
Mr.
Speaker, the petition today, signatories are from Labrador area, Lab City,
Wabush and so on. Again, this is a concern that has been raised by the Advocates
for Senior Citizens' Rights. They represent thousands of seniors all throughout
the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.
We
presented numerous petitions on their behalf, thousands of signatories and their
concern is about staffing levels in long-term care facilities housing seniors
with dementia, Alzheimer's disease and so on. Their concern is about patient's
safety and their concern is about ensuring that there are enough staff at all
times – that's the important part here – at all times, ensuring there are enough
staff to take care of these seniors that need that help.
They
would like to see actual legislation in place that would dictate a certain
standard, basically without flexibility, saying that there must be a standard of
a certain amount of staff ratio to patients for these people.
That's
what they're asking for. They're not satisfied with regulations that the
minister could change, any minister could change. They're not satisfied with
policy of the health care authorities. They want legislation so that it
guarantees appropriate staffing for these seniors to take care of their needs.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
petitions?
Seeing
no petitions, I call Orders of the Day.
Orders of the Day
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I call
from the Order Paper, second reading of Bill 2.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded
by the Minister of Natural Resources, that Bill 2, An Act To Amend The
Correctional Services Act, be now read a second time.
Motion,
second reading a bill, “An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.” (Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Happy to
stand here today and speak to Bill 2, which is An Act to Amend the Correctional
Services Act.
I would
preface, I guess, this debate by saying that this particular amendment itself is
fairly non-substantive in and of itself. It doesn't contain a significant number
of changes per se, but the history of this particular bill and of this
situation, I think, carries some interest to people in the general public. I'll
try my best to explain where we are in terms of this particular piece of
legislation and what we've done since that time.
I think
I'll lead off, Mr. Speaker, by talking about this particular amendment. In
simple terms, this amendment, which is fairly short in length, it's only a few
pages, but it does have a number of housekeeping provisions to it.
This
bill clarifies the reference to cannabis in the definition of illicit drug, and
that's obviously for reasons that come with the legalization of cannabis in the
last year. That's one of the things that obviously was a change from when this
bill was originally done.
It
includes an additional principle and amends two existing principles, as it
relates to, I guess, the concepts that the bill wishes to cover. It clarifies
the authority for adult probation officers to procure and report information for
the court in respect of a person charged with an offence. It clarifies the
requirement that the dates that an offender is eligible for release be disclosed
to the victim or victim services on request.
I would
point out, these are things that have been happening in practice, but whenever
you do some form of – and this, in many ways, was a statutory review that we did
here. This is about codifying and clarifying practice and amending the
legislation to make sure that it's actually defined.
It
provides that the director consult with a qualified health care professional or
other qualified person when encouraging and coordinating specific programing and
services to provide for the specific needs of offenders.
In this
particular clause here, again, this is not something that has changed, this is
something that's being done in practice, but it's about codifying practice. It's
about codifying what you have been doing. I will go backwards after I go through
these changes to explain why it is that we are here.
It
provides authority for the Lieutenant-Governor in Council to make regulations
respecting investigations conducted under the act. That was probably the biggest
change coming from the original act, and one of the reasons that I think that
this bill has been delayed by many years.
Finally,
it replaces the word Aboriginal with the word Indigenous, corrects the name of
the Department of Justice and Public Safety and corrects references to the title
adult probation officer. Those, in some cases, are housekeeping. Obviously,
since the bill was originally done in 2011, the department name has changed. I
think that might have been 2014-ish.
Adult
probation officer, that title is again a housekeeping change. I would suggest
that changing the term Aboriginal to Indigenous, it's housekeeping in terms of
legislation but obviously I think it shows the significance of the terminology
that we use, and I think it's the term that conveys our respect. When you think
about Indigenous, Indigenous itself, when we talk about the definition refers to
origination, the origins. And when we talk about our Indigenous people, they
were the forbears, they were the originators of occupation and inhabitation of
our land. And that's something that we see throughout government and throughout
our federal government.
Now, I
want to go back and provide some history to why we are here today. So we all
know that back in 2011 the government of the day brought in the
Correctional Services Act, and that was basically a response to a
2007 report, Decades of Darkness,
which was a very significant report into the state of corrections in this
province. We had been governed by two pieces of legislation. Back in spring of
2011, government brought in and debated the legislation for the
Correctional Services Act, which would
be the replacement, the combination of the previous two acts, with a number of
changes.
One of
the big pieces that that act covered off was the disciplinary process going on
within the institution. That was changed. Now, without getting into the entire
debate – and I certainly have no desire to re-debate something. If anybody
wants, they can go back to Hansard
back in spring of 2011 and they can read the entire debate. But what came out of
it? Again, I'd say the vast majority of Members in this House actually, with the
exception of a few on both sides, were actually not in the House.
So what
happened? The bill is debated, goes through second reading, Committee, gets
third reading, it gets Royal Assent, but it was not proclaimed. The reason that
it was not proclaimed is that there was still work that had to be done by the
department. When we talk about the regulations, in many cases the regulations
can form up the substance of a bill, in particular cases. They're obviously very
important. In many cases, I'm passing on hearsay. I'm passing on information
that was passed to me by staff in the department who were there during that
time.
Certainly, I can't say enough about the staff of the Department of Justice and
Public Safety. They would have moved at the pace of the direction that was
provided to them by the people in charge. The reality is that that act was never
proclaimed – never proclaimed.
Now,
does that mean that we were still operating right by the specific confines of
the previous two acts? No, in many cases, policy would be changed, procedure
would be changed and the fact is that there were significant changes that
happened. But when you think about the act, the act was never proclaimed and the
department did – I can't talk about it or attest to what work the department did
between 2011 and 2015.
What I
can attest to is that in January of 2016, I am the minister of this department
and what we've done since then is I think we've shone a real light on
corrections in this province. If anybody were to look at the direction coming
from our department, looking at the changes, the legislation, the policy, I
think we've shown a real interest in reforming corrections in this province.
We
certainly don't take all the credit for that. It's being led by community, it's
being led by staff, by advocacy groups, by inmates, by parents and it's
something that we have an interest in too. We really have a group of individuals
working together to change the legislation.
So, what
happens is we come in – the original bill in 2011 had a five-year statutory
review. So, the thought process would be: Why would we proclaim a Corrections
Services Act in 2016 that the previous administration had not done, when the
fact is that it would have been up for review now anyway? So, that's what we
have done over the last number of years.
Now,
parallel, operating at the same time as that, we've had a number of issues going
on in corrections at the same time, and I can talk about them. One, we have done
reviews on disciplinary segregation and administrative segregation. One of the
biggest challenges that we face when we talk about corrections, one of the first
things we faced was we had over capacity in one of our institutions,
particularly the institution in Clarenville that houses female offenders. That
has a capacity of 26 and we are getting daily calls talking about capacity being
at 32, being at 33, which is not acceptable. So, we had to deal with the
transfer of female inmates back to HMP, a practice that had been done in the
past but hadn't been done within the past 20 years. That required renovations,
required change, required a lot of work.
We look
at the things we were trying to change within our institutions, things we wanted
to do ourselves. So we've had a number of people, and there are groups out there
– they know who they are – many were at our announcement yesterday, they've been
working with us, as well as staff and management of the institution.
One of
the big things, obviously, in the last year, corrections had a very tough year
in the last year, and I say tough in the fact that we had losses of lives within
our institutions. I got to tell you that's something that wears on absolutely
everybody, primarily the families – it's hard to know and put yourself in the
position. You can have empathy, you can have compassion but I can't say that I
know the depths of the sorrow that they face, I can only try.
But you
know what? It's been hard on staff. This has been extremely hard on staff, as
well as fellow inmates. I've had an opportunity to speak to inmates in these
institutions and to listen to them and talk about the difficulties that they
face, and we've tried our best to respond to their needs. Out of that came
another report, the Jesso report, an independent report.
One of
the other issues that hasn't gotten as much attention, for many years, now, many
of our RCMP lock-ups in this province have been housing inmates for far too
long. They're not supposed to be there for any significant period of time, but
the reality is that in many cases, sadly, inmates were serving sentences in
these institutions, which is not acceptable, and we've had no choice but to deal
with that. I had questions yesterday as it relates to our announcement about why
increasing the capacity. Well, the reality is that for many years the system has
not been following the rules. Now, that's through no fault of the individuals;
it's just been the reality of increasing populations and having space issues.
And they've been doing the best with what they can.
That's
one of the reasons that we've had to look at increased capacity, because you
have to be prepared for it, while at the same time we've been taking many steps
on reducing that population. I think that we have a healthier society when we
can talk about prevention and talk about trying to prevent the entrance of
individuals into that system and falling into that cycle where they continue to
perpetuate the same behaviours that lead to incarceration which is tough, not
just on them, but on their families as well.
But I
digress. So, we're doing a review of the legislation. The fact is that our
review of the legislation showed some changes were necessary, which I have
outlined here today, but the fact is a lot of it was already encapsulated, was
already encompassed, it was already done. So what we're promising here today is,
(a), we will bring in the Corrections Act, we want to debate that, I'd like to
pass that, and what we are promising is not just Royal Assent but proclamation
within 2019.
There
are still regulations that have to be drafted, that have to be done, and one of
the issues, too, is with those regulations comes a financial outlay. There is
money that has to be spent. Just to deal with the disciplinary process, where we
bring in outside adjudicators, the proper budgeting had never been done. It's
almost like we brought in a bill to deal with issues but the practicalities were
never worked out.
Again,
let me ensure that I lay that completely on the leadership, previously. I'm not
trying to throw anybody under a bus here but I'm trying to ensure that people do
not ever blame the staff. The buck stops with the political leadership, and
that's why any failures within the department now, I would say, would rest on
me. I would never say these staff that are unseen, working in the department,
doing briefings, doing all the hard work, they've been doing a great job and
they presented that today.
I was
lucky to have people present today, at the press conference, where we spoke
about these changes, and do you know what? Mr. Speaker, we had perhaps one of
the most wide-ranging press conferences on corrections and just the different
things we want to do. It expanded beyond the bill, beyond what we're talking
about here and it was a really good conversation, I felt, of what we're trying
to achieve and what we're trying to do.
I think
I've provided some of the history of why we're here now, what our goals are. Our
goals are, again, within 2019, to ensure that proclamation happens and that the
changes happen.
One of
the questions that came out was, well, this is an election year. At some point
during this year there will be an election. My answer to that is that
corrections and making positive change knows no political stripe. The fact is,
it has to come from leadership and this is something that has to be done,
regardless of who sits in the chairs. We have to ensure that these changes
happen.
Again,
if I were not to be here, no different then when I spoke about the new
correctional institution yesterday, I may not be in the position when the
building is complete but I want to see the building complete regardless of who
is there because it's a necessity and it's something that needs to happen.
On that
note, I think what I will do is take my seat. I think I've spoken to this in
length. I look forward to the debate on both sides. I look forward to the
Committee stage. I'll certainly try my best to answer any questions that come
up, but I will say, and this was something that was brought up during Question
Period today, is that this bill, like any bill that we do, everybody is provided
a full briefing, a full opportunity to question the very knowledgeable staff
that helped to draft the bill, to do the research on the bill.
I want
to thank all the members of JPS that helped to do that. I can't name names
because I may leave somebody out and I don't want to offend anybody. They all
know who they are and thank you to the Justice league for doing that.
On that
note, I will turn it over to my colleagues across the way to continue debate on
this bill.
MR. SPEAKER (Warr):
The hon. the Leader of
the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
I thank the minister for his
elucidation of the policy behind this measure, behind the bill. I think it's
fairly apparent that the background to this is the report of RNC superintendent,
retired now, Marlene Jesso, who submitted her report on four deaths in the
system in provincial custody. Her first recommendation was: “It is recommended the provincial government take immediate steps to
proclaim the new Correctional Services Act and ensure all associated regulations
and policies are updated.” This, I suppose, is the impetus behind this bill.
Just to
go back on that again: “It is recommended
the provincial government take immediate steps to proclaim the new Correctional
Services Act and ensure all associated regulations and policies are updated.”
The minister has obliged us by explaining that while the government is taking
the laudable step of bringing forward the bill to this House, its proclamation
yet awaits, presumably, some months more of work, including work on the
necessary budget which will be required in order to properly implement the
changes which the bill has made to the underlying piece of legislation.
The
primary work being in terms of budgeting, and the minister might consider
enlightening us as to whether the budgetary work – presumably this is additional
budget – that's needed to achieve proclamation will be reflected in the
Estimates of the budget about to be brought down next Tuesday, at the
appropriate time.
Again,
I'm saying the minister might enlighten the House as to whether – it might be of
interest as well to the House if we could be informed that in respect of the
amendments that deal with inmate health, who might've been consulted on these
amendments.
Again,
the minister – and I thank him for that – gave us an explanation for the change
in terminology. The preferred terminology, it now seems, is not Aboriginal, but
Indigenous. He told us that other legislation, other usages, federal
legislation, the preferred terminology now appears to be Indigenous and not
Aboriginal. I would ask the further question, whether Aboriginal groups,
Indigenous groups, as the case maybe, were consulted and expressed a preference
as to what terminology they preferred in terms of their self-identification. Did
any consultation occur in that connection with Aboriginal groups in this
province?
The
minister has dealt with the question of proclamation sometime in the year. I'll
just briefly state the principles of this legislation because they underscore
the importance of it, the great importance of this legislation and, in fact,
underscore the need for expedition to bring it in.
In the
Principles, part one, section 4: “This Act and regulations made under it shall
be interpreted and administered in a manner consistent with the following
principles: (a) the protection of society shall be given paramount consideration
in making decisions or taking action under this Act; (b) the safety of the
community and the furtherance of a just and peaceful society will be enhanced …”
It goes on to refer to “maximizing individual opportunities for rehabilitation
and reintegration that recognize the needs and circumstances of offenders both
in correctional facilities and in the community.”
The
reason I read those out is that it underscores the great importance of this
piece of legislation, not only to inmates but to the community at large and
indeed to staff members of correctional institutions because it goes on to
describe the duties that the community owes to staff members in correctional
institutions as well.
We would
commend the government for acting on bringing this forward. We're disappointed
to hear that proclamation will be further delayed and the minister might care to
provide some extra information on the few points I've raised.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for St.
John's East - Quidi Vidi.
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I'm
happy to stand and speak to this bill today. The minister made reference to this
bill being changes to a bill that came to this House in prior time and some of
us were here. Well, yes, indeed I was on March 31, 2011, as I look at my
briefing notes for March 31, 2011, at which time we were told that Bill 9 it was
then, and it was an act respecting correctional services, which is what we're
dealing with today, and we were told at that time that that bill in 2011, eight
years ago, replaced outdated, decades-old legislation. The officials said in the
briefing that the new legislation was long overdue. The officials said there was
a need to replace outdated language and outdated terminology, and the list goes
on as to why this bill was so needed eight years ago and was never proclaimed
eight years ago.
Three
years ago, this government came into being and the Minister of Justice and
Public Safety was the minister all during that time, yet we've waited over three
years now for a bill that was helping the
Correctional Services Act become up to date, while we were waiting for that
bill to be proclaimed. So today here we are and the minister obviously realizes
the problem with the fact that this bill here has never been proclaimed, even
though he's been minister since 2015.
He found
it so important that he actually did put out a release this afternoon, earlier
on today, saying that definitely the bill we're talking about today, which is
Bill 2, also Correctional Services Act
amendment, that the bill we're talking about today definitely will be proclaimed
sometime this year.
Well, I
would think after waiting since March 31, 2011 for new language, I would think
that this bill should be proclaimed the minute that we vote on it and we get
Royal Assent. I'm rather surprised to hear sometime this year we're going to see
this bill brought into play.
There
are points to be made. Obviously, some of it is so-called housekeeping. It's not
so much housekeeping, what it is doing it is making up for the changes that have
happened in the last eight years from the bill that wasn't proclaimed eight
years ago. For example, we have moved forward with some language in our society,
hence the change of the word Aboriginal to Indigenous.
We have
many things in it which are bringing things up to date, so I suppose even if
this bill, which was Bill 9 back in 2011, even if that had been proclaimed,
there may be changes we'd be making today, but we would at least have been
making them to a bill that had been operative.
The
original bill had to do with changes that were being called for by the 2008
review of corrections in Newfoundland and Labrador, called
Decades of Darkness. So we're even that much more beyond where we
should be because the review was done in 2008, the bill came in in 2011 and here
we are in 2019 trying to bring things up to date from the recommendations of
Decades of Darkness.
The new
bill, 2011, was legislation drafted to include recommendations from the report,
Decades of Darkness, and from best
practices in other jurisdictions. And again, when you read the briefing notes
that I had in 2011, some of it based on what we'd been told by the officials of
the department at that time, they did talk about how they went to other
provinces and looked at the legislation in other provinces. They talked about
how the Yukon was felt to have the most modern legislation, but best practices
adopted from other legislations, they did all kinds of consultations. I wonder
where the Yukon is now? They were ahead of us then; they're probably even more
ahead of us now as we waited eight years for this new bill.
So, here
we are today with a bill, changing a bill, upgrading to a bill that has been
around for so long because of not being proclaimed that it's out of date, so
we're modernizing the bill. I suppose maybe it's symbolic that we're doing it in
the week where the government says they're going to put in a new facility
replacing Her Majesty's Penitentiary. I hope that we're not going to have to
wait as long for this proclamation as I am sure we're going to have to wait for
the new penitentiary.
Here we
are amending a bill which remains unproclaimed, not in force since 2011,
updating this legislation. I just hope that the piece of legislation is not
going to remain on the shelf the way the 2011 piece of legislation was left on
the shelf, and I do hope that it comes off, but I really have to question why we
have to wait for some time in this year for this to be proclaimed. This should
be proclaimed the minute we get Royal Assent.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Minister of Fisheries and Land Resources.
MR. BYRNE:
Well, thank you very much,
Mr. Speaker.
What a
pleasure to speak on a progressive piece of legislation such as this one. It
does a lot for not only our justice system, but for our communities, as I
consider just the preamble which captures the essence of the bill and what it
creates for each and every one of us, for a stronger, more just society, for a
more secure community in which we all live.
The
preamble and the principles behind the bill state very clearly that the
protection of society shall be given paramount consideration in making decisions
or taking actions under this act; and further, that the safety of the community
and the furtherance of a just and peaceful society will be enhanced, as far as
possible, through maximizing individual opportunities for rehabilitation and
reintegration that recognizes the needs and circumstances of offenders, both in
correctional facilities and in the community.
And that
staff members who are responsible or charged with the responsibility for
engaging in these services, that staff members will be given, wherever possible,
appropriate career development and training opportunities, and a workplace
environment that encourages integrity and personal accountability and that it is
consistent with the relevant code of professional conduct established under
section 11 of this act be given consideration.
And it
goes on further, Mr. Speaker, offenders shall obey community supervision
conditions and correctional facility rules and will be subject to the least
restrictive measures consistent and necessary for the protection of the public,
staff members and offenders.
It goes
even further, Mr. Speaker, inmates are entitled to fair treatment with access to
effective grievance and disciplinary procedure; that inmates are entitled to
equitable access to health services consistent with the goals of public health;
and that policies, programs and practices will respect age, gender, sexual
orientation, ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic differences and will be
responsive to the particular needs of women and Indigenous peoples, the needs of
offenders with particular mental health and addictions requirements, the needs
of offenders with respect to the social determinants of health, and the needs of
other groups of offenders with special requirements.
I cannot
help but think, Mr. Speaker, in the context and the backdrop of the recent
announcement by our Minister of Justice for a new provincial prison, and the
importance that we all place on this facility, recognizing that this is a
facility that houses some of the most dangerous, but at the same time, people
who do deserve human dignity and human respect, but most importantly an
opportunity to rehabilitate and to come out better people, more law-abiding
people, and create an environment of safety for each and every one of us.
You know
a very wise person once said to me, a former minister of Justice and Attorney
General of Canada once said to me that to simply be punitive, to simply impose
incarceration for incarceration sake, without being mindful of the further
necessity for natural justice, for good justice, the justice afforded through
rehabilitation, we do not succeed in our objective.
Now,
that was a federal minister of Justice and Attorney General who was seeing it
from the perspective of he himself had been attacked. He himself had been the
victim of what appeared to be a hate crime, someone who was very incensed and
angry, who himself appeared to have been homophobic and was very concerned about
the decisions and actions of the federal minister of Justice related to matters
of justice of equality for members of the LGBTQ community.
He was
attacked viciously, viciously assaulted and attacked, and this individual was
convicted. Upon sentencing, the federal minister of Justice asked: What is
required to occur here? And he said: Do you think I or my family or my community
will be better served if this individual's incarcerated without context, without
reference to rehabilitation, without counselling, without proper mental health
guidance and services? No, I will be less safe under those circumstances.
So a
federal minister of Justice, who himself had been a victim of a vicious assault,
took a very high road, a very reasoned road, and said that it is easy to be
punitive; it is very human and very fair to seek justice in a higher order. That
was Andy Scott. He was a great friend of mine. He's passed away now. He will be
missed dearly but he really, really talked the talk but walked the walk.
When I
think of the prison that was just announced, the necessity of that, I can only
say that this was a good measure. This bill today follows suit with the
initiatives that we see and recognizes a better future for each and every one of
us by responding to the true needs within our justice system, empowering our
justice officials, our probationary officers, those that are so important in
dealing directly with those who face criminal prosecution and conviction and
incarceration of some variety or other. So these are the methods that create a
real 21st-century legal system, a 21st-century justice system.
It is so
important that this prison be replaced to a modern facility. It's not for the
convenience or comforts, per se, of those who would be housed in it, but that is
an element to this. We are not safe as a society. Our safety is not increased by
just simply imposing a very brutish or unfair justice system which does not
respond to the realities and the opportunities of rehabilitation.
That's
why I certainly applaud my government, the Members on this side of the House but
led by our Justice Minister. He's not only bringing in this piece of legislation
which responds to the needs of a 21st-century justice system, but he's going to
take a facility and turn it into a 21st-century facility. That I think, Mr.
Speaker, is why I will be supporting this piece of legislation and all Members
of the House should do so as well.
Thank
you very, very much.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
If the hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety speaks now, he will close debate.
The hon.
the Minister of Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank
my colleagues for their contributions to the debate, especially the Minister of
Fisheries and Land Resources for giving us some insight from his many years
within political legislatures, so I appreciate that.
What I'm
going to do now is I know that the Members opposite have asked some questions.
I'm not going to address them now, for the sake of I don't want to answer one
and miss one. So what we will do is put the bill into Committee, the questions
will be asked and I'll certainly try my best to answer them to the best of my
ability. On that note, I will sit and take my seat and conclude second reading.
Thank
you.
MR. SPEAKER:
Is the House ready for the
question?
The
motion is that Bill 2 be now read a second time.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
CLERK (Barnes):
A bill, An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act. (Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
This bill has now been read a
second time.
When
shall the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Now.
MR. SPEAKER:
Now.
On
motion, a bill, “An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act,” read a second
time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House presently, by leave.
(Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I move,
seconded by the Minister of Natural Resources, that the House resolve itself
into a Committee of the Whole to consider Bill 2.
MR. SPEAKER:
It is moved and seconded that
I do now leave the Chair for the House to resolve itself into a Committee of the
Whole to consider the said bill.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, that the House resolve itself into a Committee of the Whole, the Speaker
left the Chair.
Committee of the
Whole
CHAIR (Warr):
Order, please!
We are
now considering Bill 2, An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.
A bill,
“An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.” (Bill 2)
CLERK:
Clause 1.
CHAIR:
Shall clause 1 carry?
The
Chair recognizes the hon. the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
My question for the minister
is in connection with the delay in proclamation to sometime during this calendar
year needing budgeting work, will this appear in the Estimates for the budget
coming next Tuesday?
CHAIR:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
What I
can say is that the delay in proclamation is more to do with finalizing the
adjudication's process, and that right now the actual financial piece is not –
you will not see it specifically allocated in the line by line for the budget,
but obviously it would have to be established within the corrections budget that
you'll see in the line by line when we do the Estimates.
CHAIR:
Shall the motion carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, clause 1 carried.
CLERK:
Clauses 2 through 9 inclusive.
CHAIR:
Shall clauses 2 through 9
inclusive carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, clauses 2 through 9 carried.
CLERK:
Be it enacted by the Lieutenant-Governor and House of Assembly in Legislative
Session convened, as follows.
CHAIR:
Shall the enacting clause
carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, enacting clause carried.
CLERK:
An Act To Amend The
Correctional Services Act.
CHAIR:
Shall the title carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, title carried.
CHAIR:
Shall I report the bill
without amendment?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
Motion,
the Committee report having passed the bill without amendment, carried.
CHAIR:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Chair, I move that the
Committee rise and report Bill 2.
CHAIR:
The motion is that the
Committee rise and report Bill 2.
Shall
the motion carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, that the Committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again, the
Speaker returned to the Chair.
MR. SPEAKER (Trimper):
The hon. the Member for
Baie Verte - Green Bay and Chair of the Committee of the Whole.
MR. WARR:
Mr. Speaker, the Committee of
the Whole have considered the matters to them referred and have directed me to
report Bill 2 without amendment.
MR. SPEAKER:
The Chair of the Committee of
the Whole reports that the Committee have considered the matters to them
referred and have directed him to report Bill 2 without amendment.
When
shall the report be received? Now?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Now.
MR. SPEAKER:
When shall the said bill be
read a third time?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Tomorrow.
On
motion, reported received and adopted. Bill ordered read a third time on
tomorrow.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Yes, Mr. Speaker, I call from
the Order Paper, Address in Reply.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Natural Resources.
MS. COADY:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
pleasure to rise today to speak to the Throne Speech. I think all of us in this
House had the opportunity to listen the other day, not too long ago, to what I
thought was a Throne Speech that laid out the future of our province. It told of
not only where we've come from in a lot of ways and the struggles that we've
experienced in this province especially the last number of years, Mr. Speaker,
but it also said with hope and aspirations where we are going.
It is on
that vain today I would like to speak about some of the things that are
happening in Natural Resources. I do rise in this House quite frequently to give
explanation as to what's happening in the growth and development of the oil and
gas industry, on growth and development of our mining industry, but it bears
repeating, Mr. Speaker, how often and how much growth that has occurred since
this Liberal government took office back in late 2015, early 2016. It has been
my pleasure to serve as the minister responsible for Natural Resources, the
minister responsible for oil and gas, for mining, as well as for electricity and
energy generation.
I've had
the experience over the last number of years of managing the Muskrat Falls
project, Mr. Speaker, and you will know, based on the outcomes of the inquiry,
how difficult that project that we inherited and the mess that it was in. I know
yesterday the Leader of the Opposition, of the PC Opposition, stated that we
should own the problems that we inherit, but I reject that premise. I say that
we'll manage them, we'll clean up the mess that we inherited, but I certainly do
not own them. I will do my best for the people of this province to make sure
that they are remedied.
I want
to speak on a positive note here today. I want to talk about some of the things
that are happening in the oil and gas industry, some of the things that are
happening in the mining industry, and the prosperity, I think, that they bring
to the province, and the hope and opportunities they bring, and the amount of
work that we've been able to do as a government, as a people of this province,
of ensuring that we are on the right track of growth and development.
I spoke
in this House about Advance 2030. It's
a plan that we developed, government developed, with stakeholders in the
industry. About 150 stakeholders came together from the oil and gas industry,
supply and service industry, from what I'm going to call the education industry
– I don't want to call it education industry, but I will do so for this purpose
– from labour and from all different aspects of the oil and gas industry. We
came together to have a conversation and set a path and a course, and it's
called Advance 2030. It really is
setting up the province as a preferred location for oil and gas development.
I could
tell you over the last year we have advanced that plan forward very, very well.
There are over 30 recommendations that we're actively working on. I think almost
100 per cent of the short-term aspects of that plan are being worked on as we
speak; some are completed, some are still being monitored and managed.
The
targets in 2030 are ambitious; they're ambitious but achievable. For example,
over the next decade, in between now and 2030, we believe we can drill 100 new
exploration wells. That's a significant number, Mr. Speaker, and it will give us
– imagine if some of the prospectively that we're seeing on seismic – and we've
had it independently verified – imagine when we discover that oil, when we
actually drill and there's a positive result, how beneficial it will be to this
province.
So, 100
new exploration wells. We have five companies today, five large oil and gas
companies today with applications before the Canadian environmental assessment
process to drill offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. I know that ExxonMobil, for
example, have an exploration program this year. I was out most recently to visit
the West Aquarius, which will be the drill rig that they will use, and they are
actively pursuing some of the targets that they have seen, both in new areas
like the Flemish Pass, as well as existing areas in the Jeanne d'Arc Basin.
For
those listening, I'd like to make sure people understand that the four projects
that we have active offshore Newfoundland and Labrador, four of them are in the
Jeanne d'Arc Basin.
Now, Mr.
Speaker, we have over 20 basins offshore Newfoundland and Labrador – 20 basins.
It's pretty exciting to think that while we only have four projects today in one
basin, we've just signed up, and I'm looking here, Mr. Speaker, the framework
agreement that we have on the Flemish Pass.
As you
know, this past year we made an agreement with Equinor, a Norwegian company,
they are now working through the sanction process to develop the Flemish Pass.
I have
to say that it's pretty exciting. It's the first remote, deepwater project in
our offshore. It's some-500 kilometres from shore and in approximately 1,200
metres of depth. So, it will be a deepwater project. It will be the first, as I
said. All of our projects today, the four that we have active today, are in the
shallower waters of Jeanne d'Arc. This is in the Flemish Pass in 1,200 metres of
water.
They
have nearly 300 million barrels of oil. The total project cost is $10.9 billion
– $10.9 billion. That's the life-of-field cost, but we're expecting really
outstanding benefits from that.
For the
Province of Newfoundland and Labrador we're expecting $3.5 billion in revenues,
and we're expecting 22.3 million person-hours for the life of the field, in
terms of employment. That really does strengthen our oil and gas industry and
strengthen our economy, and I'm looking forward to Equinor advancing on the
development of that find.
But, Mr.
Speaker, I was speaking about more discoveries. So we have Equinor, who's
currently active in sanction and I know that they're looking at their
exploration program. We have ExxonMobil, for the first time since 1991, doing
pure exploration offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. We also have a company
called Nexen, BHP, BP – all of them actively pursuing exploration offshore
Newfoundland and Labrador. So it's a very, I'm going to call, exciting time
offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. A great time to grow and enhance our
offshore oil and gas opportunity.
I will
also like to tell the people of the province, for those that are listening
today, that our oil offshore Newfoundland and Labrador has one of the lowest GHG
– greenhouse gas emissions – in the world. About 1/3 less than anywhere else in
the world. So I have a lovely chart – I don't have it with me today, but it
shows looking at many of the fields around the world and what the GHG emissions
are for those fields. And if you look at those, Newfoundland and Labrador's
Hibernia Project is on the lowest end of GHG emissions.
So as
the world continues to consume oil and gas, as we know, for the foreseeable
future, at least 40 to 50 years out, that the world will continue to consume oil
and gas. And it's not just in transportation and others, it's in things like –
and I'll hold up my phone, here, Mr. Speaker. Plastic is very much part of the
oil and gas industry. So this is downstream, I realize, but that's where plastic
comes from. It's from the upstream oil.
We have
to realize that while the world is still consuming oil, how beneficial it will
be to develop more oil offshore Newfoundland and Labrador because of many
reasons. But one of which, of course, is the lower GHGs – greenhouse gas
emissions – per barrel.
Secondly, are the requirements under the clean energy plan that my colleague,
the Minister of Environment, recently put before the people of the province.
Under that plan, emissions for oil and gas companies will continue to come down.
That's a requirement. Under a lot of the carbon emission requirements of oil and
gas, and I'll tell the people of the province, I think it's 100,000 tons will
have to be taken out of that industry this year alone and, by 2030, I think it's
2.5 million tons. That represents about 600,000 vehicles taken off the road.
So
there's a lot of effort going into taking the carbon out of the barrel on our
offshore, making sure we're very focused on environmental protection. But if
we're going to develop oil in this world, I'd rather have it developed offshore
Newfoundland and Labrador because, of course, we have lower GHG levels.
Mr.
Speaker, I'm kind of looking at some of the other opportunities. So I talked a
lot about exploration and the fact that we're looking at having 100 wells
offshore Newfoundland and Labrador between now and 2030. We're looking to grow
the industry to about 650,000 barrels of oil a day, that's significant growth,
and we're looking to employ in operations several thousand people, direct
operations.
Mr.
Speaker, it brings big benefits to the people of the province in terms of
employment, in terms of growth in our economy but it also brings a tremendous
amount of revenues to government. I can tell the people of the province that
over the last decade some $20 billion – I know under the decade from the former
administration, about $20 billion to $25 billion came into this province. This
government thinks that we have to be very prudent in those expenditures and, as
you will have heard in this House before, the Premier speaking about ensuring
that we save some of that money for our future projects.
Mr.
Speaker, currently underway in terms of projects, the West White Rose is under
construction in Argentia. We have a tremendous number of people working there. I
think it's 5,000 person-years of employment during construction, so a tremendous
number of people working on the West White Rose project. First oil is
anticipated in 2022; they're still on track for that. It has about $3 billion in
economic benefits to this province.
So, the
oil and gas industry contributes significantly, but I don't want to just stop
there, the mining industry as well. I can tell you in the last two years in the
Department of Natural Resources we have signed up about $18 billion in economic
activity through oil and gas and through mining. Isn't that tremendous?
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MS. COADY:
A lot of it in Labrador, some
of it in Baie Verte, a lot of it all around the province and we know that both
offshore oil and gas, as well as the mining industry, really do contribute to
our success as a province, and we want to continue to encourage – mining is
vitally important to us all.
I held
up my phone previously. You know, the mining industry, all of the technology in
this phone starts with the mining industry. I know, for example, cobalt and some
of the rare earth minerals are required both in the new green economy, and we're
seeing – pardon me?
MR. HUTCHINGS:
Batteries.
MS. COADY:
Batteries, good point from my
colleague opposite, who is a supporter of the mining industry. I have to say the
Member for Ferryland is a strong supporter of both oil and gas development, as
well as mining development. He's been encouraging that growth and development,
and we all have to come together to do that.
But in
the last year, we had about $48 million in exploration in the mining industry;
$48 million, that's a lot of money, all around the Province of Newfoundland and
Labrador, where junior miners, where prospectors are out looking for the next
Voisey's Bay. We know how many people Voisey's Bay does employ; some 16,000
person-years of employment, 1,700 jobs on a regular basis. So, they're out
looking for the next Voisey's Bay, the next opportunity, and, boy, do we have
opportunities.
I could
tell you that over the last number of years it's been very interesting in the
Department of Natural Resources when we see online prospectors coming in and
making stakes all around the province, and we've seen a bit of a gold rush in
this province, a bit of a gold rush where in one day I think we had one of the
largest rushes, I'll call it that, to stake claims in Central Newfoundland, and
a lot of that exploration is going on today in both Grand Falls-Windsor area, in
Gander area, in the Baie Verte area, a lot of exploration going on.
But, Mr.
Speaker, Mining the Future, again, another plan that we have working with
stakeholders in the industry, we came together with stakeholders all around the
province in the industry and said: How can we grow our mining industry? When we
looked at that, we said: What are some of our yardsticks? So, we're currently at
$48 million in exploration activities. We want to be a $100 million. We want to
be one of the places in Canada where people come to explore, and we're putting
significant investments in our geological survey, as I've talked about before.
We've even had conversations with our neighbouring Province of Quebec to say,
how do we ensure the development of the Labrador Trough? Great opportunities
await us in Labrador, more –
MR. LETTO:
Gem of the world.
MS. COADY:
Gem of the world, as my
colleague from Labrador West says.
Mr.
Speaker, we're looking actively. We had 12 active-field projects under the
geological survey last year. Those have contributed greatly to the knowledge. We
have core samples stored around this province where people come in from all over
the globe looking at the opportunities in the mining industry in Newfoundland
and Labrador, and we want to continue to grow that industry. Currently, there's
direct employment of some 4,800 people in the mining industry. We think we can
really grow that industry and we're looking forward to that. We have a plan,
mining the future, to do just that.
Let me
tell you some of the great things that have happened in the mining industry.
Wabush 3, this is the Moss Pit, recently opened, myself, the Premier and the
Member for Labrador West were all there. It contains some 744 million tons of
iron ore. They're about 1,700 employees in IOC, and they're increasing
production about 23 million tons annually. It's a great story.
We know
last year we made an agreement with Vale to go underground at Voisey's Bay –
16,000 person-years of employment during the construction phase, and once
operational, of course, 1,700 jobs at the underground mine and at the Long
Harbour processing plant. There's going to be about $1 billion spent in economic
activity. Can you imagine – $1 billion spent in economic activity. Just that
activity alone generates about $69 million in tax revenue. Think about that,
that kind of activity.
We also
had the reopening of the Scully Mine with Tacora. They're reactivating the
Scully Mine and mill for a minimum of 26 years – 280 direct positions. We've
seen the reopening of Canada Fluorspar – $250 million in project capital
costs, 3,000 person-years of employment and 255 full-time positions, Mr.
Speaker. That's on the great Burin Peninsula.
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the Beaver Brook mine. My
colleague from Gander recently joined me and the Premier when we talked about
reopening the Beaver Brook mine. Again, great contributions to our economy.
We're seeing some exciting things happening in both the oil
and gas and the mining industry that are really driving economic success and
employment. I say to the people of the province, we're working hard to ensure
that we continue to grow the economy, we continue to add jobs. As the Premier
said the other day in the House, Mr. Speaker, we're seeing nine months of
consecutive employment growth.
Now, if
you look back from what was projected under the former Progressive Conservative
government, that wasn't going to happen. It was because of this extra effort and
extra diligence, I say, Mr. Speaker, on the oil and gas and the mining industry
that we're seeing this.
I want
to thank the great people of St. John's West for the opportunity to represent
them and to work hard for them, Mr. Speaker. We've done a lot in the district.
Of course, the extension of the Team Gushue Highway has finally been completed
that runs the length of my district. We've brought some employment opportunities
for people in the district. We most recently announced some announcements in
child care in the district.
I know
that I attend a lot of the events at many of the community centres in the
district and I'm very, very happy to do so and to continue to drive both the
opportunities for the people of St. John's West in our economy but also to help
them with both housing and ensuring effective health care and ensuring effective
transportation, ensuring that we have the money to reinvest in our economy and
that's driven by a lot of what we do in the Department of Natural Resources.
I thank
you for the opportunity today to speak to the event.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Are there further speakers to
the Address in Reply?
The hon.
the Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development.
MR. HAWKINS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's
certainly my pleasure to stand in this House in response to the Throne Speech
and to make some comments. Of course, as we know, her Honour, the
Lieutenant-Governor, presented such an eloquent Speech from the Throne with the
plan of government going forward for the next year. Certainly, Mr. Speaker, I
count it a real privilege to be able to stand in this House and be in the
presence of the Lieutenant-Governor as she presented the Throne Speech.
Mr.
Speaker, it's also my real pleasure to represent the beautiful people in my
District of Grand Falls-Windsor - Buchans. I count it a real honour every time
that I stand in his hon. House because if it had not been for the wonderful
people of my district, I would not have had this opportunity. Everyday I reflect
upon that and say a huge thank you to all of them for making this possible.
I know,
Mr. Speaker, in the last 3½ years, I've worked hard on behalf of my constituents
to ensure that their voice has been heard and their concerns have been
addressed. We've been fairly successful in being able to address some of the
issues that have been prevalent in my district.
Mr.
Speaker, as you know, of course, I've taken a number of opportunities to talk
about the people in my district. I realize, and I've said this before, that my
district has been somewhat hard hit over the years. As you know, in 2009, March
31, 2009, a very dark day for the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor when Abitibi
closed its doors and over 700 people were impacted. We know the impact of that,
Mr. Speaker. Then just roll forward a few more years into 2015 when Duck Pond in
the Millertown-Buchans area, they closed and another additional 365 people were
unemployed.
Mr.
Speaker, where we are today in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, in Buchans and
in the Badger area, in the Central area, Millertown and Buchans Junction, talks
of the resilience of the people in the area. Many people could have looked at
the glass as half empty, but, thank goodness, most people look at the glass as
half full. As a result, we've been able to rebound. Our economy is growing and
it's been my real privilege over the last four years to look at some of the
significant investments that we've made in my district.
Of
course, most of it, Mr. Speaker, is in relation to the infrastructure, a lot of
the infrastructure having to do with roads. I refer to the Buchans Highway. Last
year, we were able to do nine kilometres of road on the Buchans Highway. Mr.
Speaker, we're not there yet; we haven't completed all the work when it comes to
the Buchans Highway. There are still some concerns in that area that I will be
addressing going forward, Mr. Speaker.
The
other areas – we've worked closely with the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor and in
Badger, we've made investments in water and sewer, and, of course, as well in
the Town of Millertown. A very small picturesque town that has a very vibrant
council, a very small council in that, Mr. Speaker, but yet very energetic. It
was my pleasure just a few weeks ago to be able to go to Millertown where we had
a meeting about the remains of the Beothuks and where it should be; a town hall
meeting that was very, very productive, that was organized by the council in
Millertown.
These
are just some areas, Mr. Speaker, that I think the members of my councils within
my district are making significant progress.
One of
the other areas that I think – it's not unique in Newfoundland and Labrador but
certainly I'm proud of in my district is that the towns work in partnership.
When I say that, there are a lot of opportunities happening there, particularly
in the history. It was also my real pleasure to work with the Heritage Society
in Grand Falls-Windsor. As you know, Mr. Speaker, over a hundred years of
history in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, going back to the pulp and paper
mill, and that history, the memorabilia, a lot of the information, even right
from every single Advertiser that was
printed in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, was sitting in a very, very small
area.
So I was
able to work with my government to be able to provide, for the Heritage Society,
a new home that they are so proudly working on now to make it to a situation
where they will have, for many years to come, a home whereby they can display
all of the memorabilia that belong to the Abitibi paper mill, and really, not
only the paper mill, but also the entire history of the town and the surrounding
areas.
There's
a lot of pride and there's a lot of interest in ensuring that we do diversify
our economy. I've worked closely with the EXCITE Corporation and with the Town
of Grand Falls-Windsor, and with the investment into research. Research in Grand
Falls-Windsor and the EXCITE Corp is actually on the cutting edge of research,
really in Canada, and the partnerships that have been built there, and I am so
proud of that. So, I will continue to lobby on behalf of my constituents, and
certainly look forward to serving my constituents again.
Mr.
Speaker, just a couple of more references. This of course, as you know, is
Volunteer Week, and without volunteers, really our communities would not
survive, they would not exist, and I just want to make reference of a couple. I
had the opportunity and the privilege of attending the Kiwanis Music Festival
last Friday night, the highlights, the stars of the festival, and that's a very
successful festival, but it is only possible because there are literally
hundreds of volunteers that make it possible. Last week we had participants
right across the Central Newfoundland area, from Springdale to Lewisporte and
down the Connaigre Peninsula.
Every
year our young people come to Grand Falls-Windsor and participate in the Kiwanis
Music Festival, and really that has been the beginning of many of our young
musicians going on to university to become music teachers and have a career in
the music. So, it's very, very important for all of us and for the Music
Festival.
Mr.
Speaker, I want to speak, as well, when we talk about volunteers, my pride and
my joy is the Grand Falls-Windsor Cataracts. I'm been a Cataracts fan all my
life and, as you know, they are now involved in the Herder finals against the
Southern Shore Breakers. And I had the opportunity a few weeks ago to travel to
Mobile for hockey game between the Clarenville Caribous and the Southern Shore
Breakers.
AN HON. MEMBER:
Hear, hear!
MR. HAWKINS:
Thank you, my hon. Member.
Last
weekend I had the opportunity to go to the Jack Byrne Arena in the beautiful
District of Cape St. Francis. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, my colleague was
there as well, two great hockey games and I'm looking forward to this weekend
returning back to Grand Falls-Windsor and looking forward to the Grand Falls
Cataracts and the Southern Shore Breakers. I know where my bias is at, but I
just want to say thank you to all of them because it's very important that
behind both of those teams and every team that's in the province are dedicated
volunteers who give of their time, that really get out there, raise money, they
sell tickets, there are 50/50 draws, they do all kinds of things that are
happening to make it possible.
While
I'm cheering and pulling for the Cataracts, I know that in order for the
Southern Shore Breakers to make this trip this weekend as well, Mr. Speaker,
that it could only be possible with the volunteers, from the coaches to
everybody else that is involved. I just want to say that because I think it's
important from time to time that we recognize all the work that our volunteers
give to our communities.
Mr.
Speaker, for me, this has been an interesting year in a number of portfolios
from Advanced Education, Skills and Labour to Education and Early Childhood
Development, and the transition between two of those portfolios has been an
education in itself. There are many challenges that we face from time to time
and I think it's important that we do that and we face it and we embrace it.
One of
the things that I really wanted to make reference to, of course, over the last
number of weeks, we're looking at changing the Schools Act. The Schools Act is
somewhat outdated. I think the last time it was changed was 1997. We've gone out
for consultations with the general public and we have heard back, and the
consultations from the general public have now concluded and we are meeting one
on one with the stakeholders. We will have those conversations looking for
feedback.
Mr.
Speaker, the early indications are that there are a number of areas that parents
are concerned about and areas that we look at, whether it's inclusive education,
we're looking at better opportunities for our children and addressing some of
these needs. So all of these things will be taken into consideration. Once we
complete our one-on-one consultations with our stakeholders, then obviously I'm
looking forward to a new Schools Act.
One of
the other things that we've been looking at, and consultations are still ongoing
with a tremendous response from the general public and response from different
stakeholders, is in the implementation of junior kindergarten. As you know, the
education task force was one of the recommendations that we would look at and we
would do consultations for implementation.
Mr.
Speaker, so far, initially, there are varying ideas of how implementation of the
junior kindergarten should happen, what the model should be, who should be
delivering it, how it should be delivered. So consultation is an absolute,
tremendous opportunity for whoever, the general public, special interest groups,
stakeholders to have an input in how you would go about implementing such a
program.
I'm
continually looking forward to seeing some more direct ideas on what we're
looking at in the junior kindergarten. Mr. Speaker, that leads me to a couple of
other points I just wanted to make and one of them is that I think it was
brilliant of the Premier when he wanted to put together a Premier's task force
on education. It was certainly something that I think was very important and it
has certainly led to a tremendous amount of work on behalf of the task force, an
independent task force, that really looked at the education from a somewhat a
different perspective. Did they come back with everything new? No, Mr. Speaker,
they didn't. There were some of the things that were taken from previous task
forces.
One of
the things that impressed me was the fact that last July when we looked at the
Education Action Plan, I was really so pleased that the Premier was adamant that
there are 82 recommendations in that Education Action Plan, and that he wanted
to see all 82 of those recommendations implemented. I think that says a lot –
and I'm not pointing any fingers at anybody – but over the years many times we
have a tendency to have a report done, to have put a plan in place, and a lot of
times it just sits there and collects dust and never really anything gets done
about it.
So I was
so pleased and so happy when the Premier gave me the direction and said that one
of the things that, as minister you have to ensure, that the Education Action
Plan, the recommendations are implemented. Mr. Speaker, in such a very, very
short time we have over half of the recommendations already implemented, and we
do have some short-, medium- and long-term plans. So we are on track for the
implementation of all of these recommendations.
Mr.
Speaker, there's a tremendous number of areas within this Education Action Plan
that really speaks to improving resources within the education system. And one
of them is – and I'm not going to go through the details of it, but realizing,
in three years, there will be over 350 additional resources added to the
education system. These are additional. They include specialists in reading and
math, and they include teacher learning assistants, they include librarians and
they include English as a second language. So, we are adding resources.
This is
very important. Last year we did 40 schools, phase one. The results and the
feedback that I'm given, and I've had the opportunity to visit many of these
phase one schools, has been overwhelming, and talking to the teachers and
administrators that are in these schools, very, very positive.
Mr.
Speaker, very shortly the school board will now announce the 40 schools in the
phase two. As you know from the Education Action Plan, beyond year two, in year
three, all of the remaining schools will be included. This is a very important
direction that we're taking in education to ensure that our students are given
every opportunity and making sure that resources are available.
One of
the other areas that we looked at, because mathematics is certainly a focus area
– literacy and numeracy is so very important in our education system. One of the
things that we looked at, mathematics, particularly in K-to-three, K-to-six area
and looking at providing resources.
I saw a
couple of comments – I don't have them with me today, but a couple of teachers
that responded, have done the bursaries that we make available. We make
available bursaries to teachers – not to students, to teachers – to improve and
to look at other methodologies within teaching math, and improving their
professionalism.
So
today, I had some very, very positive comments that came from teachers that have
already taken the course, that have already taken advantage of the bursaries,
and a very, very positive feedback. They're excited, and in their correspondence
to me they wanted me to share with other teachers to encourage as many teachers
as possible to take advantage of these bursaries. These are just a tip of the
iceberg on what we're doing in education. I know my time is just about gone, but
I could take an hour and talk about the improvements were making in the early
childhood educators and all of the measures we're putting in place to improve
that.
The
bottom line in all of this is that we want to ensure that when we implement
these recommendations, when we put in place new measures, when we put in place
new resources, we need to have performance measurements that would tell us that
what we're doing is making a difference. There are a number of areas or
resources that we have provided to our K-to-three schools and to the teachers
and to the students that we are beginning to see we're beginning to make a
difference, and we're beginning to see improvements within our school system,
and our students are benefiting, and will benefit from the measures that we've
taken as a province, and we will continue to invest in our young people.
These
are really our future, and we really want to make sure that our young people
have the best possible education, and that they have the resources that are
necessary for them, not only to be productive citizens in their community but
also be able to give back to their communities and be able to give back to the
province as a whole.
So, Mr.
Speaker, I just want to say thank you for giving me this opportunity today to
speak and to highlight just a small portion of what we have done as a
government, and we will continue to do. I'm really looking forward and I'm
really enthusiastic about where we're heading and the direction that we're
giving and the direction that we'll move forward to as we improve our education
system for our students.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Is the
Member for Harbour Grace - Port de Grave speaking on a point of order?
MS. P. PARSONS:
No, I was popping up to speak
next.
MR. SPEAKER:
You've already spoken to this
motion.
My
records show you –
MS. P. PARSONS:
I have, but I am willing –
MS. COADY:
(Inaudible) Address in Reply?
MS. P. PARSONS:
Was that Address in Reply?
MS. COADY:
If you have spoken, you
cannot speak again.
MS. P. PARSONS:
Oh, well, if my assistance is
needed, I'll gladly stand up and speak again.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
You're not able to speak
again, though.
The hon.
the Minister of Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
great opportunity to get to stand here and speak to Address in Reply from the
Speech from the Throne, because there are so many great things happening in the
economy and what our government has been doing to create jobs and stimulate the
economy here in Newfoundland and Labrador.
I had
the pleasure yesterday to be with the Premier in my District of St. Barbe -
L'Anse aux Meadows in St. Anthony and he had addressed the Chamber of Commerce,
and a number of business people there were asking a series of questions, things
around our immigration plan and how we can continue to look at gaining
specialists and the various supports that are needed from the service industry
and hospitality, all the way up to specialists in health care. We had numerous
dialogues.
But
there's great economic potential, Mr. Speaker, in St. Anthony, with the Great
Northern Port development in Crémaillère Harbour. And it excites me when people
have a long-term vision of being able to look at something that will develop
over quite a number of years that can lead to significant job growth. To be able
to have a supply base and service area for international and shipping through
the Northwest Passage, because St. Anthony and area on the Northern Peninsula,
we're very strategically located, and it presents tremendous opportunity to
capitalize.
We
already have the second-largest international containerized shipping port. So it
was really positive to hear our Premier and hear government affirm our support
for advancing projects such as the Great Northern Port because of the economic
development that it can bring. Obviously, it has to go through an appropriate
due diligence process, and that matter is certainly unfolding.
Mr.
Speaker, when we look at the economic potential and we see the growth that's
happening in areas such as the tourism sector, coming up the Great Northern
Peninsula through Gros Morne National Park, we're seeing an investment in the
Cow Head Gros Morne Theatre. That's upwards of close to a $10 million
investment, and that's bringing people further north at Cow Head. They'll
continue to go from one UNESCO to another UNESCO in L'Anse aux Meadows and then
across to Labrador on a brand new ferry that has greater capacity and that can
take more tour buses.
I've
talked to accommodators on both sides on the Great Northern Peninsula, and in
Labrador, and they're very excited about the bookings that they have and the
number of visitors that are coming this season to go to Red Bay to see places
like Battle Harbour, or to go to L'Anse aux Meadows and see what's happening at
St. Anthony and the various festivals. The icebergs and whales that we are
absolutely phenomenal.
We've
seen new businesses start. As the province's Minister of Tourism, we've seen
where there's been significant job growth in that sector, not just on the Great
Northern Peninsula and in Labrador but all across this province. In 2016, when
the Exit Survey was done, it had shown that the sector had grown from 18,000
jobs to 20,000 today. That is very exciting, and we have over 2,800 businesses
involved in that industry.
As we
navigate and we look at our opportunities, Mr. Speaker, I was very pleased to
see today in the news that because of the Comprehensive Economic Trade
Agreement, we've known as CETA, something that I've certainly championed since
I've been in this House since 2011, to see the benefits of what CETA can bring
with the removal of seafood tariffs and we're certainly seeing that now.
On the
Great Northern Peninsula, in my district where there are four shrimp plant
operations, today it was announced that more industrial shrimp product will be
landed at these processing facilities; places like Black Duck Cove will see more
product. Quinlan were out highlighting their investment. Ocean Choice
International are highlighting that they're going to be able to create more work
in Port au Choix and that is going to have a tremendous trickle-down impact on
workers locally here on the Great Northern Peninsula, so that's very positive.
The fact
that the crab quotas had not declined as predicted and that there was a 1 per
cent decrease in 3K, with the higher price, this is certainly positive to see
that there will be more landed value from this particular resource. The fishery
is the backbone of our economy. Newfoundland and Labrador has Canada's largest
ocean economy. We have 37,000 people employed in the sector, whether it's in oil
and gas, whether it's in aquaculture, in fishery, and in supply and shipping and
transportation. And we have been working together through our various sector
work plans as part of The Way Forward
with the Minister of Natural Resources, with the Minister of Fisheries and Land
Resources, and various other plans that have come forward. We're starting to see
significant opportunities take place.
Mr.
Speaker, health care is so important. Yesterday when I flew up to St. Anthony, I
was sitting next to an individual and he came with his spouse and three kids.
They are coming to St. Anthony for a period of three years, hopefully longer.
But this is a specialist, an eye specialist, an ophthalmologist. We haven't had
that service in St. Anthony for a very long time.
A very
good social enterprise, St. Anthony Basin Resources Inc., purchased specialised
equipment a couple of years ago. So when people with our aging population and
demographic on the Great Northern Peninsula and Southern Labrador – and I
anticipate that we will see this specialist either travel, or residents in
Labrador come to St. Anthony to utilize and avail of this service because of the
distance and because of the opportunity for wait-list and access to service that
as people have cataracts and need those specialized services, they will get them
because the health authority has hired this specialist.
They
recently hired an audiologist. They have a pediatrician coming, another
anaesthetist. There are a significant amount of surgeons and offerings at St.
Anthony hospital, which is really important. I want to acknowledge the work
that's being done by the employees at Labrador-Grenfell Health, all the staff,
from the front line all the way to the top. Because one thing that we've seen in
the Labrador-Grenfell Health authority is that it's seen a lot of change. You
had a CEO that was serving in a part-time capacity, and then you had an acting
CEO before the new incumbent CEO. The new incumbent CEO has taken a significant
approach to community engagement, to listening, to seeing what the needs are.
And we're seeing a return on that by listening to people – that is so important.
We had a
health forum and we talked about recruitment and retention, we talked about how
we can engage and make sure that once these specialists come that they feel
welcomed in the community, that they know about all the services and great
volunteer groups and all the offerings that are available so that they'll want
to stay longer. We've had significant success in St. Anthony and area where
doctors and specialists spent decades. And they're our biggest ambassadors. That
is phenomenal.
Yesterday, the Premier had announced eight additional long-term care beds at
Charles S. Curtis Memorial Hospital. That is really a great step in terms of
helping to address the long-term care needs of the region. But we still have a
lot more to do when we look at the housing needs. Our government, working with
the federal government, invested in 10 affordable housing units in St. Anthony,
but we had also been working with St. Anthony Basin Resources to look at other
housing mixes.
Then if
you look at the John M. Gray and the protective care unit that is there, there
have been recent upgrades in terms of artistic endeavours of murals to stimulate
and provide a more inviting experience, and that is important to the people, the
residents who are living in the protected care unit.
My
vision would be to see dementia or protective care bungalows, like they have in
other parts of the province, like in Bonavista and Clarenville so that these
people can have a higher quality of living and have a more supported
environment. We all know that the changes of residents and complexities change
for care needs. Because when the John M. Gray Centre was built, it was built 20
years ago and we certainly know that things are changing.
We have
a home first support program. We've just announced that there will be two PCA
positions to help with those complex care cases so that people can stay in their
homes longer. But we also look at opportunities to be more innovative when it
comes to health care. The Minister of Health and Community Services has embraced
Hacking Health and how we bring that level of innovation, how we get into more
telemedicine, how we unlock the potential of all of our health resources,
whether it's through primary health care teams, which was also announced in St.
Anthony.
We have
smaller centres, like the White Bay Central Health Centre, which is more than
150 kilometres away. There are opportunities to look at housing supports there
as well, as I've raised in this House previously.
We must
continue to be working on the opportunities where we can unlock potential, where
we can find collaboration and growth. The Town of Port Saunders, for example,
they've created a community centre in their town building. They shut down two of
their other operations, their buildings, and they're working on another, to
bring all their stakeholders under one roof. That is leading to them to have
other opportunities.
They not
only added a youth centre for the youth, this is a community that has vision
because they're investing in their youth. They also been able to attain the
SEDLER community support program that will have a satellite office there to help
people with disabilities provide employment supports and services. These are
important investments.
Investments in basic infrastructure are so critical, Mr. Speaker. I have over
650 kilometres of road in the district and if you look at the amount of roadwork
–
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. MITCHELMORE:
– that has been able to be
done through having a vision of a five-year Roads Plan, where you can plan and
do more work, bundle work and partner with municipalities.
We've
seen investment done in Port aux Choix, which had a really terrible roads. Now,
since they have done that road, we've seen where the tourism numbers, through
Canada 150 and the advertising at the National Historic Site, they've seen an
increase of 60 per cent and they maintain that. They were, I believe, the only
site in the country that maintained their momentum after Canada's 150th birthday
with a 60 per cent increase. That shows that there is momentum in terms of
numbers coming into this community. They've embraced it; they're partnering.
We're
seeing where investment is being made in brush-side road cutting in terms of
River of Ponds to the Eddies Cove area, the Plum Point area, and going to St.
Anthony; you have a much safer highway. We've seen significant investment, Mr.
Speaker, on Route 430 this year, and there will be a multi-year plan to see that
paved.
We also
saw investment where, for the first time in the history of this province in 50
years, this is certainly something I've advocated for for quite some time and
I'm proud to be part of a government that's delivering on paving Route 434, the
road to Conche. Last year, saw eight kilometres, there will be additional
roadwork this year and next year it'll see completion. We also paved the road
going to Englee and the Roddickton area to see significant upgrades, and the
road to L'Anse aux Meadows going to a UNESCO World Heritage site.
These
are critical and substantial investments. It frustrates me because the former
administration had significant amounts of money, but the Auditor General's
report was very clear that MHAs, at the time, put forward their priorities and
that sometimes wasn't in the best interest. There was politics at play and
didn't get the significant amount of roadwork done.
We are
seeing results through our approach and our plan where roads that should have
been done years ago are getting addressed and we'll continue with the momentum,
Mr. Speaker.
The
forest sector has great opportunity on the Great Northern Peninsula and we've
seen where permits – this has been a discussion in this House of Assembly – have
been issued; there are private contractors. We already have a small sawmill in
Main Brook, but we would love to see a sawmill operational in Roddickton that
would also do value-added product. There is that opportunity to do so. The same
way with how a proponent is looking to move through a process to get to
financial close and to lead to a significant investment in the area.
We
certainly have not given up on the forest sector, Mr. Speaker, whereas the
Members opposite have. They invested $13 million and short-changed the people of
Roddickton-Bide Arm and area, having them believe that this would be able to
come to fruition and create jobs in their economy. It certainly didn't do that.
They've seen where the mills have closed in Grand Falls-Windsor under their
watch, and in Stephenville. We actually have a forestry sector action plan,
we're focusing on the sectors.
For an
administration previously, the PC administration, they talked about it. Even the
Acting Opposition House Leader had talked about their overspending that had
happened, that maybe they were a little too fluid in terms of how they kept
spending and spending and spending.
We've
had to make sure that the decisions that we make are prudent, that they're
working in the best interests of the people of the province, and not just focus
on one resource in terms of the oil economy and a hundred-dollar-a-barrel oil.
We focused on our mining assets, that's why we have the vision mining 2030.
We've seen where new mines in Gander and in the Glenwood area, the Antimony
Mine, we've seen these investments happening where they're being reactivated.
There's prospectivity on the Great Northern Peninsula, and I'm so pleased by
that.
I'm
pleased by the multi-year and the significant historic infrastructure plan for
municipalities, for local service districts, for community, for water and sewer
projects that will improve a better quality of life.
For a
government that's not just focusing on one commodity, oil, but focusing on
aquaculture, on the fishery, focusing on technology, focusing on all sectors, on
tourism and cultural industries, these are significantly important. On
modernizing our College of the North Atlantics throughout this province because
we must focus on everybody, from beginning, at a youthful age, to make sure that
they are invested in. That's why the Premier started the Education task force,
and it has the recommendations. They're looking at junior kindergarten and
seeking feedback. We implemented all-day kindergarten. We're adding resources
for inclusive education.
We've
done significant work when it comes to mental health and addictions and
Health-in-All-Policies. There is so much, Mr. Speaker.
The time
that I have is quite small, but the vision that's been put forward by this
government is significant. We are making a difference in an urban economy, in
rural economies, in Labrador, and internationally. Our companies are going
global. We're seeing them scale up. We're seeing where we'll be able to compete
with the best of the best, because we're investing in our youth. We've done
investments in coding. And that was another aspect of the task force on
education. We want to challenge our youth. We want them to be tomorrow's
innovators and problem solvers. They may not all be software engineers, but they
will use this skill set to take them through whatever career field they want to
do with the rest of their lives.
That's
why we continue to invest in Memorial University, the Marine Institute. We made
a significant announcement in our ocean sector today of collectively, from the
provincial government through Natural Resources and TCII, $3.5 million, with the
federal government, $8.5 million, to see more than $20 million invested to see
the next phase of the Holyrood Marine Base. That's going to continue to solidify
us as an ocean leader, because we are the leader in the ocean economy.
Newfoundland and Labrador has Canada's largest ocean economy – 37,000 people
employed, and over 50 per cent of all of our exports it accounts for.
There
are great things happening in Newfoundland and Labrador, and I've never been
more pleased to be part of a team that is delivering and making sure that we
have a mental health facility here in our province to replace the Waterford. The
Minister of Justice and Public Safety has announced a plan and investment to
replace the prison, Her Majesty's Penitentiary. We all know that these are
important investments for the people of the province and for the future as we
move forward in Newfoundland and Labrador.
So, Mr.
Speaker, it's certainly been a pleasure to hear the Speech from the Throne, to
hear the vision of government, of our Premier and leader, and the approach that
is taken on consulting, listening, being out in community.
For me,
I've taken that time over the last eight years to be in every community in
Newfoundland and Labrador, with the exception of La Poile. And I keep saying to
the Minister of Justice and Public Safety it's a place I must get to, I must see
it, because everywhere in Newfoundland and Labrador there is opportunity, we
must all get out there, go there and see it and unlock that great potential,
because there's so much we can do, but we have to do it together.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER (Warr):
Thank you.
The hon.
the Government House Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I'm
going to adjourn debate on Address in Reply. At this time I would move, seconded
by the Minister of Natural Resources, that the House do now adjourn.
MR. SPEAKER:
It is moved and seconded that
this House do now adjourn.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
This
House stands adjourned until Monday, April 15, at 1:30 o'clock.
On
motion, the House at its rising adjourned until tomorrow, Monday, at 1:30
o'clock.
The
House met at 1:30 p.m.
MR. SPEAKER (Trimper):
Admit strangers, please.
Order,
please!
I would
like to welcome several guests that we have both within the Chamber and outside
the Chamber today. First of all, outside the Chamber and watching us from Bell
Island are Ms. Lahey's grade five class. They're at St. Augustine's Elementary
and they're watching in support of one of their classmates who is the subject of
a Member's statement today.
So a
great welcome to you out there in television land.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
I'd also like to acknowledge
several members of the arts community who are joining us today. We have with us:
Courtney Browne, Amy House, Pete Soucy, Kevin Major, Marilynn Bernard, Josh
Goudie, Bridger Canning, Lynn Panting and Calla Lachance.
Nice to
see you all. Welcome.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
Statements by
Members
MR. SPEAKER:
Today we'll hear from the
hon. Members for the Districts of Harbour Grace - Port de Grave, Fogo Island -
Cape Freels, Conception Bay East - Bell Island, Baie Verte - Green Bay and
Windsor Lake.
The hon.
the Member for Harbour Grace - Port de Grave.
MS. P. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It was
an exciting event last evening at the Volunteer Appreciation Reception at the
Visitors Pavilion in Bay Roberts. Volunteers are the heart of our community. The
dedication and commitment demonstrated throughout my District of Harbour Grace -
Port de Grave is both heartwarming and outstanding.
We have
secured the Newfoundland and Labrador 2020 Summer Games, which will require
immense dedication and hard work by the volunteer community of Conception Bay
North to successfully host the thousands who are anticipated to visit our area
next summer.
Last
night it was a pleasure to be joined by my colleagues, the Members for
Lewisporte - Twillingate and Terra Nova, to show support for the future of the
2020 Summer Games and to attend this special volunteer celebration during
National Volunteer Week. It was a great way to show support for people who
contribute their personal time and efforts to help others and to say thank you.
I ask
that all hon. Members join me in congratulating the Bay Roberts 2020 Summer
Games Committee and all volunteers.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Fogo Island - Cape Freels.
MR. BRAGG:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
privilege to rise in this hon. House to highlight milestones in my District of
Fogo Island - Cape Freels. This past weekend marked the 25th anniversary of the
Crystal Gliders Figure Skating Club. Skaters from the past 25 years filled the
Beothic Arena to celebrate the occasion.
To
highlight the evening, the club held a special fundraiser to bring in world
champion Kaetlyn Osmond. Her speed and grace wowed the crowd, bringing cheers
and applause. The club also showed their appreciation to two long-time members.
Claudia Drover has been coach since the club started, dedicating 25 years to
training young skaters. Daphne Hounsell has served in many positions on the
Crystal Gliders Skating Club. She has also dedicated 25 years of volunteering.
A few
years ago, I spent time as a volunteer with this club; therefore, it gives me
extra special honour to thank everyone who has served on this club. Each and
every one who volunteered for this club has ensured its success. For that, I
thank you all.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay East - Bell Island.
MR. BRAZIL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I stand
today to acknowledge a young man in my district who has shown true leadership,
community spirit, ingenuity, but particularly empathy and compassion. I speak of
10-year-old Evan Byrne who was honoured yesterday at his school, St. Augustine's
Elementary, by the Town of Wabana and the residents of Bell Island for his
commitment to support the Young Adult Cancer Canada program.
This
year, Evan shaved his head for the sixth consecutive year to raise money for
Young Adult Cancer Canada, and to bring awareness to the need to support cancer
patients. Evan has raised thousands of dollars locally by selling tickets,
hosting special fundraisers and by contributing his allowance to the effort at
the young age of 10
He, like
so many young people, have been affected by the loss of a family member to
cancer, and wanted to do his part to make the lives of those facing cancer a
little brighter. When asked as a five-year-old why he was doing this, he
replied: Cancer makes people sad, and I want to make them happy.
I ask
all Members of this House to join me in congratulating and thanking Evan for his
leadership and for making people happy.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Baie
Verte - Green Bay.
MR. WARR:
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to
congratulate Dr. Todd Young, this year's recipient of the Society of Rural
Physicians of Canada's Rural Service Award, and also announce his nomination for
the Digital Health Canada Clinical Innovator Award. Both these announcements are
a testament to his leadership, compassion and investment in technology.
Founder
and owner of Medicuro, the only virtual health clinic in the province, recently
launched an accompanying mobile app. Patients are able to request an appointment
via embedded website chat or web-form clinical sessions hosted via live video
chat.
Main
Street Medical Clinic in Springdale was a pilot site for web-based electronic
medical records and provides a web-based education platform for delivery
training to patients and care providers.
Providing addiction services from eight locations across the Island, Dr. Young
has demonstrated his leadership and care for addiction patients throughout
Newfoundland and Labrador. Even as a busy rural physician Dr. Young finds time
to continue his training and personal education in the following: Addiction
Medicine Diploma program, University of BC; medical review officer, the American
Association of Medical Reviewed Officers; Executive Master of Business
Administration, University of Fredericton.
I ask
all my hon. colleagues to join me in offering congratulations to Dr. Todd Young
on his many accomplishments.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Windsor Lake.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, we here in the
House of Assembly recently joined in with the Be Cool for Autism Day, taking to
our social media accounts. What some may have thought to be a Blues Brothers
tribute, was in fact support of the vital work of the Autism Society of
Newfoundland and Labrador.
I'm
proud to report that the students at Roncalli Elementary, MacDonald Drive
Elementary and MacDonald Drive Junior High also joined in support of this
compelling cause, and of their fellow students on the autism spectrum.
Persons
with autism are friends, colleagues or family members with so much to contribute
to the province and people. I commend and personally support the work of the
Autism Society Newfoundland and Labrador for their excellent work in challenging
the stigma surrounding autism and providing support to individuals and families.
I
encourage the Members of this House to continue their support for the Autism
Society and its families and programs.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Statements by Ministers.
Statements by
Ministers
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Service NL.
MS. GAMBIN-WALSH:
Mr. Speaker, in October our
government, in partnership with Bluedrop Performance Learning, launched
SkillsPass NL. These online programs are targeted to help owners, managers,
employees and job seekers gain employability skills, save time and money by
being prepared for inspections, and ensure personal and public safety by
complying with regulations.
Just six
months ago, SkillsPass NL launched with four programs. Today, there are 12
programs available to anyone interested, including training on food safety,
tobacco and vapour products retail, as well as training for public pool
operators and marriage licence issuers and commissioners.
Mr.
Speaker, we want people and businesses to be successful and this initiative
makes a positive contribution to compliance, and to employee and employer
success. The e-learning is available free of charge to anyone interested. Plus,
participants' training records will be available to them electronically.
In
keeping with the objectives outlined in
The Way Forward, we have entered into a four-year partnership with Bluedrop
to develop SkillsPass NL. Our government will continue to work with Bluedrop to
offer additional courses with other departments on a number of initiatives.
We are
certainly looking forward to our province's workforce using this innovative
training technology to improve their knowledge and skills.
Mr.
Speaker, I invite my hon. colleagues, and all residents of this province, to
explore these programs at ServiceNL.myskillspass.io.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I'd like
to thank the hon. minister for an advance copy of the statement. Mr. Speaker,
we, on this side of the House, join the minister in recognizing the value of
SkillsPass NL by bringing more government programs and services online. We also
know the value of a digital economy is unquestionable. I'm glad that after three
years of little action, government has engaged with Bluedrop to offer more help
for those unemployed and more user-friendly platforms for businesses and
organizations. Clearly, the early success of SkillsPass NL has only been
successful through the massive unprecedented expansion of Internet coverage
through our administration.
Mr.
Speaker, in closing, whatever we can do to serve the people of the province
better is a good thing. I encourage all residents of the province to take
advantage of SkillsPass NL.
Thank
you very much.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's East - Quidi Vidi.
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I, too,
thank the minister for the advance copy of her statement. It's good to see one
of our local technology firms continuing to develop this online training.
Hopefully, this training will help owners and managers comply more easily with
regulations. We are told it will also help employees and job seekers.
So, I
ask the minister will she be reporting on a follow-up review of how the impact
of this training is on people looking for work.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
statements by ministers?
The hon.
the Minister of Municipal Affairs and the Environment.
MR. LETTO:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr.
Speaker, I rise today to highlight our government's investments in municipal
infrastructure. By collaborating with the federal and municipal governments, we
have invested more than $259 million in provincial funding for over 630
municipal infrastructure projects in the past three years. We are providing
quality infrastructure, creating jobs and enhancing services for Newfoundlanders
and Labradorians.
The
provincial government prioritizes projects that communities tell us are
important to them. Earlier this week, the Premier announced budget 2019 will
commit $129 million for municipal infrastructure. This includes new cost-shared
projects to provide 29 communities with better quality water and waste water
systems, improved roads and community buildings, and regionalized services.
In line
with The Way Forward, we are using
some of that investment to leverage as much federal funding as possible. In
September, we signed an agreement for $555 million in federal funding under the
Investing in Canada Plan. We anticipate releasing this year's project list after
the federal government completes its review.
Mr.
Speaker, I would like to acknowledge the supportive relationship we have with
municipalities and our private sector partners. We look forward to continuing to
work together to build safe and sustainable communities.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I want
to thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. We, in the Official
Opposition, clearly support investments of improved infrastructure in
communities throughout the province. There are many municipalities that are in
need of upgrades on their water, waste water and community buildings, roads and
other services.
However,
projects announced by the Premier on Monday will only go ahead if the federal
government gives approval. Instead of waiting to have all three levels of
government, the Premier wanted to start his election campaign early.
I look
forward to the federal government giving these funding approvals and to the
improvement of services and infrastructure which our communities badly need.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's East - Quidi Vidi.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I, too,
thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. It's good to see that
much-needed money being spent on municipal infrastructure projects. It's sorely
needed and thank goodness there's a federal government there to back it up.
Government knows the huge deficit in the province's municipal infrastructure,
the need for cash for roads, for water systems and the like.
Under
the current cost-sharing formula set by the provincial government, however, most
municipalities struggle to come up with their share, so I encourage the minister
to revisit these formulas to relieve the financial burden faced by so many
municipalities.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
statements by ministers?
Oral
Questions.
Oral Questions
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, in last week's
Throne Speech government boasted that it has stabilized spending, yet so far
this week government has announced almost $350 million and counting.
How do
all these announcements impact the fiscal forecast?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
First of all, Mr. Speaker,
before we get into this week's announcements and the opportunity to give back to
people of the province, it really reiterates the plan that we put in place in
2016 is working. But I do want to clarify for those that are watching and would
have listened and just heard some misinformation that just went out there by one
of the PC Members. This is really about cost-shared arrangements about an
announcement that we made on Monday of this week.
The
cost-shared arrangements that we made on Monday of this week were not federally
and provincially funded, they were actually provincially and municipally funded,
cost shared. So the information – facts matter, Mr. Speaker, when you make
announcements like this, but I just really want to clarify about the
announcement that we made on Monday about the $129 million that we're giving
back to the people of this province.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
The question was how the
announcements impact the fiscal forecast, Mr. Speaker.
Monday's
municipal infrastructure announcement stated that some of the money would be
used to leverage federal money.
How sure
is the Premier that these projects will go ahead if the province is still
waiting on federal approval?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
If you
remember back a few months ago, we've entered into multi-year agreements with
the federal government. Much of the announcements around infrastructure that we
can actually joint share with the provincial government are based on multi-year
agreements, but I do want to reiterate the announcement on Monday around
municipal capital works with the 29 communities that we just mentioned, nearly
around $129 million, were really just cost shared with those municipalities,
which is currently in the three-year plan which we announced on Monday. That is
all forecasted, Mr. Speaker.
I will
tell the people of this province that our plan is working; we are on track. Our
fiscal framework that we put in place in 2016, we are still on track with the
forecast that we put in place in 2016.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, next Tuesday,
April 16 is budget day for the province. The school year ends June 27. There's
plenty of time to debate the budget, if the government wanted to do so.
Is the
Premier's intention to debate the budget or will he throw us into an election
with no budget debate?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Good question, Mr. Speaker.
Always proud to be able to stand and debate where we've taken this province
since we took government in 2015.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
PREMIER BALL:
What we faced in 2016, I
think the Leader of the Opposition made mention yesterday about owning up to the
mess that they'd left us. Well, first of all, we saw the acknowledgement that
you did leave us a mess. There's no question about that. I think everyone in
this province would have recognized that.
Mr.
Speaker, we have taken this province a long way in the last 3½ years. I look
forward to the debate, whether it's at the doorsteps or here in this House of
Assembly. But, I will tell you, Mr. Speaker –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
– one thing for sure is that
the people of this province, unlike 2015, will get an opportunity to get a clear
understanding of the financial picture of this province.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
So, will there be a budget
debate?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there's always a
budget debate. You can't get a budget without having a budget debate.
Very
clearly, the Leader of the Opposition, a few weeks ago, was here sending
messages to me saying bring it on, we're ready, Mr. Speaker. Well, I will
guarantee you this, the financial picture of our province that we will put to
the people in this province, when we're ready for the debate, will look better
than the financial picture that you've missed the opportunity for your own party
– you couldn't even get the financial picture of the PC Party right, Mr.
Speaker.
This is
a crowd that's not ready to govern. They are not ready to govern. They haven't
even got their own caucus in shape.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
That's quite a bombastic
answer to a very simple question: Will there be a budget debate?
Budget
debate is used to flesh out details and examine spending from previous years.
Without budget debate government will hide, not only their plans but their
actions from the past 12 months.
Will the
Premier be open and transparent, as he has promised, and ensure that budget
debate occurs so the people of the province can understand the financial
condition of their province?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, every single
government that has (inaudible) – every budget that's passed by previous
governments, and this one for sure, will require a number of hours to debate
that will occur on the floor of the House of Assembly.
Mr.
Speaker, the people of this province, including the Leader of the Opposition,
including the Leader of the Third Party have all been calling for an election.
They've been asking for an election. Are they now moving from that position, Mr.
Speaker? We've been getting ready. The Leader of the Opposition, he's been
getting his – the PC Party has been getting his party ready.
Mr.
Speaker, we have no date picked yet, but I can guarantee you, before we go to
the doorsteps –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
– unlike in 2015 when we were
left with the mess, people will get a very clear understanding of what this
government has done.
This
province is being turned around by the work of this government, and we're
prepared to have that debate with anybody, anywhere.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
How you spend your money says
what your values are.
Budget
debate gives the public the chance to see what's included and what's not
included in the budget. Now that the Premier is making spending announcements
with money that we don't have, we need the budget debate to determine what the
government has to cut.
Will the
Premier open the books and ensure the budget is debated?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, what the people
of this province are expecting is an open debate no matter where it is. That is
what we were missing.
I wonder
if the Leader of the Opposition, when he spoke about owning the inheritance,
does he truly remember what happened in 2012 when the project was sanctioned,
Muskrat Falls? Just imagine a province that we live in today, if they had access
to some $500 million that will be going to rate mitigation, if we could actually
direct that to priorities of people in this province, and the Leader of the PC
Party is yet to stand up and take ownership for that.
We do
not take ownership for the mess that we inherited, that has been caused by you.
What we take ownership for is how we turned this province around, putting people
to work, putting a fiscal forecast in place that is working.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
Our plan is working; people
are seeing the benefits.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, another
bombastic answer that stonewalls a very simple question, the question being:
Will there be a budget debate?
This
government increased the gas tax, brought in the levy, cut libraries, introduced
a book tax, all in 2016, because they needed money. Yet this week –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. CROSBIE:
– they've opened the taps on
spending.
Is the
Premier acting in the best interests of the province, or just in the interests
of getting re-elected?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Speaking of being transparent
and opening the books, Mr. Speaker, the levy – as we said in 2016, the Leader of
the PC Party knows this, if he just looks at the plan, look at the legislation
that was put in place – will be gone. As the Minister of Finance said yesterday,
he will be very pleased to see that gone.
I was
very disappointed when we had to make difficult decisions like that. We had to
make the decisions like that because the PC Party hid the financial information
from the people of this province –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
PREMIER BALL:
I will guarantee you that
this government will not do that.
The
fiscal situation in this province will be laid out there, and we will lay it out
there on Tuesday of next week.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
I remind all Members, I will
not tolerate heckling of any kind. I want to hear questions and answers and only
that.
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, I think
psychologists call that kind of answer: perseverating. It means you repeat you
yourself.
On
Monday, the Premier said he wasn't thinking that far ahead regarding the budget
debate. The budget is Tuesday. Will the Premier admit that with all of these
announcements, he is only focused on the election?
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Well,
the Leader the Opposition, the Leader of the PC Party seems to be a little
nervous of getting in front of the people of this province. Mr. Speaker, if I
was the leader of the PC Party right now I would be a little nervous if I had to
go and try to defend a project that will double electricity rates in this
province. If I had to defend a CHEAP plan, which says the electricity rates in
our province will be 17 cents, I would not want to appear in front of the people
of this province.
We are
putting in a credible rate mitigation plan, Mr. Speaker. We are putting in a
plan that will build on the plan that we put in place in 2016, putting people to
work in this province, putting this province back on a sound fiscal track. That
is what we are doing and that is what we will take to the electorate.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
The Premier has been
travelling the province handing out goodies. Will he admit that he is using
public funds to campaign?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, when I was
leader of the Opposition I travelled this province and I enjoyed every minute
that I did it. When I'm Premier of this province, Mr. Speaker, I travel this
province and I enjoy every minute that I do it.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
PREMIER BALL:
Any time that I can get in
front of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians – regardless of where they are,
whatever my job is – I enjoy doing it. I can assure you right now, if I was in,
like St. Anthony yesterday or at the Labrador Games, is he suggesting that the
Premier of this province should not go into those communities where they really
want to speak to our politicians? I look forward to seeing the tour wagon show
up where we are, Mr. Speaker, on the campaign trail whenever the election is
called.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Another stonewalling answer.
All the
indications are we are only days away from an election being called and the
government is making many announcements. When will they announce their rate
mitigation plan? It should be easy to do. You can just look at ours and borrow
from that.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
The hon.
the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there are about
five or six reasons why we will not be copying the Crosbie rate mitigation plan.
Number one, we don't believe that people in this province can afford a 17 cent
per hour electricity rate. We don't believe that they can. We will put in place
a rate mitigation plan that reflects the affordability of people in this
province, mitigating Muskrat Falls, Mr. Speaker.
I ask
the Leader of the PC Party: Will he once and for all stand up and apologize? We
wouldn't even need to be doing rate mitigation if it wasn't for the decisions of
the PC Party.
Will he
at least once acknowledge that and take the responsibility for the role that the
PC Party played in getting this province in the mess that it is.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
It's refreshing to move from
pure stonewalling to personal attack there; that keeps me on my toes.
With
yesterday's announcement regarding the replacement of Her Majesty's Penitentiary
with an expanded facility, is the minister considering consolidating
correctional institutions in the province?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, I'm going to
stand here before the Minister of Justice and Public Safety gets up and talk
about personal attacks.
I have
sat in this House of Assembly when the Leader of the PC Party has come back at
me, Mr. Speaker, and said many words that have personally attacked me. I can
guarantee you right now, no matter what forum we're in, I will defend what we
have done as a government. I will not shy away of telling people in this
province who put this province in the difficult situation that we're in.
If the
Leader of the Opposition thinks it's a personal attack by me asking him to
apologize for his party putting in place this project that is costing hundreds
of millions of dollars, Mr. Speaker, if he is ashamed to apologize and take
responsibility for that, well, I would say right now, I would be silent for him
as well.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
There's a lot more heat than
light in that answer, Mr. Speaker.
Will
this consolidation of penitentiaries result in job losses in Stephenville, Happy
Valley-Goose Bay, Bishop's Falls or Clarenville? If so, what will be done to
help these displaced workers?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have
to go back to the Member's first question, because the second question is led on
a wrongful premise: (a) there will be no consolidation and (b) there will be no
job losses.
We are
very proud to be building a new facility in this province that will be open in
2024, but to go back to ensure there's no misinformation put out there, there
will be no consolidation and there will be no job losses.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
Mr. Speaker, we have bills
amending both the Automobile Insurance Act
and the Insurance Companies Act, which
have received first reading.
Can the
responsible minister confirm that this legislation will be debated prior to the
election call?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As you
can see, there's a little bit of a tussle there – both myself and the Minister
of Service NL wanted to speak to this.
Yes, we
have two pieces of legislation that are currently resting at first reading, and
I can confirm that our intent is to move forward with the debate next week.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Leader of the
Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
To whichever minister wins
the tug of war, can we be informed as to what recommendations of the Public
Utilities Board will be included in the bill?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Obviously, we will be debating that bill in the House of Assembly, but as the
Member knows, any bill that we debate here there will be briefings provided to
all Members of the House of Assembly prior to any debate here in the House. At
that time, Members will have a full opportunity to review the legislation, to
ask questions and then we will move into the House and have second reading and
Committee. I'm sure it will be a very thorough debate.
Thank
you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr.
Speaker, there are over 1,000 automated external defibrillators known as AEDs in
our province but there's no link to the 911 system; 911 operators need to be
able to direct individuals to the nearby AED wherever possible.
Why
isn't your government setting up this very important life-saving initiative that
I've been advocating for, for the last two years?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
The AEDs
were funded through money from Municipal Affairs and were located on the advice
of the Heart and Stroke Foundation. They ware very valuable tools, as the Member
opposite alludes to. The information that's out there is currently the subject
of a Hacking Health enterprise through our young entrepreneurs with the aim of
providing that information for the 911 service.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Conception Bay South.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. PETTEN:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I want
to remind government opposite, there's been numerous letters written by the
Heart and Stroke, by myself, by other advocacy groups to all of them, including
several ministers, and still no one has had the decency to respond to any of
those people. I call upon government to provide answers, explain, to be more
clear because this is a life-saving initiative and it's one I'll continue to
advocate for.
What
work, Minister, has been done towards setting up this registry?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I
thought I answered the questions quite clearly the first time but maybe my
strange accent has befuddled people.
The
bottom line is the information is out there. We need to collate it and it is
currently the subject of a Hacking Health enterprise, among other initiatives.
We hope to be able to bring this to fruition in the same way the Hacking Health
chapter here has done with at least three other initiatives.
We have
the biggest and most active Hacking Health chapter east of Toronto, Mr. Speaker.
I look forward to their deliberations at the next hackathon coming up in the
spring.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for
Conception Bay South.
MR. PETTEN:
Mr. Speaker, I want to be
clear, what the minister is saying there now has not been communicated to any of
the groups that I've been talking to. It's great to keep in their own back
pocket, but people in this province, including people who have had heart
transplants, are crying out for this registry and no one over there has the
decency to tell those people. That's just not acceptable, Mr. Speaker.
Minister, these AEDs need a regular inspection to ensure batteries and pads are
working. With this registry, we can ensure that all are inspected and ready to
save someone's life if needed.
Will you
commit to the life saving registry today? Talk in plain terms so people can
understand what you're talking about.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Health and Community Services.
MR. HAGGIE:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I'm
trying to take the temperature down on the hyperbole – that means exaggeration
for the Member opposite.
From my
point of view, the Member raises some very interesting issues. There are wide
variety of sources of AEDs, some are owned by the Heart and Stroke Foundations,
some are donations to organizations like curling clubs. Those in health
authorities, for example, do have regular inspections in the same way that, for
example, fire extinguishers and such equipment would.
We are
working with Service NL on those background pieces and they obviously would form
an important part of such a registry to make sure this equipment is up-to-date.
We have
not forgotten about it. We're in regular communication with the Heart and Stroke
Foundation, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
Can the
Premier confirm that he has met with representatives from the taxi industry
regarding insurance issues?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, yes, we had a
meeting, at their request, by the way – the members from the taxi industry. We
had a great meeting, all the appropriate time, which went on for quite some
time.
The
minister responsible for Service NL did attend that meeting, as did members of
the taxi industry. We talked about a number of issues that impact their
industry, especially around insurance, but not just insurance.
Mr.
Speaker, there were a number of things that were discussed. We had a very good
meeting. As I said, it was a meeting that was requested by them. It was a
meeting that I had made a commitment to attend as well as the minister, who's
had numerous meetings with the taxi industry.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Last
month, the Premier stated that he'd look forward to meeting with the group
because he was sure that there would be some solutions that would come from it.
Can the
Premier provide an update on the meeting and what progress was made on resolving
the serious issues in the taxi industry?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Well,
there is no doubt, we covered a lot of territory and a lot of information that
was provided. Some of this was already available to us in Service NL. We all
know that this issue has been around this province for nearly two decades. We
all know there are concerns around facilities, insurance and the association
that the taxi industry is now having really – have no other choice but buy
insurance through them, but it was more than that.
We
talked about things like registration. We talked about uninsured drivers and so
on, Mr. Speaker. There was a multitude of things, all on the agenda of the taxi
industry. It was a very good meeting, one that they requested, one that we were
happy to attend.
Mr.
Speaker, collectively and together, we agreed to look forward and look to
putting in solutions to this problem.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Cape St. Francis.
MR. K. PARSONS:
Yes, thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
Why were
there certain members of the taxi industry not allowed to attend this meeting?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Mr. Speaker, there was no one
not allowed to attend the meeting.
AN HON. MEMBER:
Yes, there was.
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
Please
proceed, Premier.
PREMIER BALL:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Once
again, I will say I did not, at no point, ever suggest – if that is what the
Member opposite is suggesting, I would ask him to tell me who it is I excluded
from the meeting.
AN HON. MEMBER:
(Inaudible.)
PREMIER BALL:
I did not.
They
asked for the meeting; I agreed to meet. At no point did I say someone should
not be there, if that's what the Member is alluding to, not at all. There were
people in that room that I met for the first time.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount
Pearl North.
MR. LESTER:
Mr. Speaker, prescription
drugs in Canada –
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. LESTER:
– that are not over the
counter are not taxed. However, medical cannabis has both excise and sales tax
applied to all sales.
I ask
the minister: Will the government commit to removing the provincial portion of
taxes for medical cannabis users?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Finance and President of Treasury Board.
MR. OSBORNE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I had
indicated to the Member yesterday, medical cannabis is federally regulated, not
provincially regulated. We do regulate recreational cannabis products in this
province; that's done through the Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation.
The
question that the Member is asking is more appropriately asked to the federal
government.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount
Pearl North for a short question, please.
MR. LESTER:
It seems to me that we're
more concerned with propping up the tax revenues from cannabis.
This is
a provincial sales tax that's applied to medical cannabis that's prescribed for
people who are in compromised positions. New Brunswick, PEI and Ontario –
MR. SPEAKER:
Quick question, Sir.
MR. LESTER:
– all covered medical
cannabis under the workers' compensation program.
I ask
the minister: Are you in discussions with WorkplaceNL to cover medical cannabis
for injured workers if they require it?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Finance and President of Treasury Board for a quick response, please.
MR. OSBORNE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Again,
medical cannabis is not regulated by my department. The Newfoundland and
Labrador Liquor Corporation regulates the sale and distribution of recreational
cannabis.
I
haven't had any discussions with WorkplaceNL regarding medical cannabis, no.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, artists have
mounted a respectful and convincing letter-writing campaign calling for an
increase in funding for ArtsNL, the only arts program investing directly in
artists for the creation and development of art. The number of artists applying
for this funding has significantly increased, yet the ArtsNL budget has actually
decreased.
I ask
the Premier: Does he fully understand how crucial this ArtsNL funding is?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank
the Member opposite for her question. Government is firmly committed to the arts
community here in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, that's why we put
forward the Status of the Artist legislation, and we certainly value the
important work that ArtsNL does for the promotion and the creation of arts.
I had a
very productive meeting with business and the arts and artists on dialogue on
this particular matter. I just reflect back on a sunrise ceremony that took
place with members of the business community, with business and the arts, where
we had Lynn Panting's dance class and it was a way to start off connecting how
business and the arts are synonymous. Creativity and innovation go hand in hand,
and it's important that we invest in the arts.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for St.
John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, Rick Mercer
wrote: It is thanks to early support from ArtsNL and groups supported by ArtsNL
that I owe my career. Petrina Bromley, Newfoundland actor in
Come From Away on Broadway wrote: I
would never have become a professional actor if I hadn't been hired to act. That
only happened because someone got a small investment from ArtsNL to do a
project.
I ask
the Premier: Have these articulate and passionate artists convinced him yet as
to why ArtsNL investment is crucial to the development of the careers of our
artists?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have
the greatest respect for all of these artists and what they're doing for
Newfoundland and Labrador in their production and creation and marketing and
promotion of our province in their artistic endeavours and those new comers who
are looking to become professional artists and the work that they're doing
through their involvement with ArtsNL and all the other entities of government.
They do incredible work.
Our
government has been working with and listening to them. I have to say that it's
important that we continue to have ongoing dialogue, and that's why, as
minister, I've been going to various events and activities and festivals and
also seeing the investment first-hand, talking to the artists directly.
Any
investment in ArtsNL will be reflected in budget 2019.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, award-winning
writer, actor, Mark Critch wrote: When I was starting out, some friends and I
received a small grant that helped us to put off a show of original comedy at
the hall. That investment led to all I've done since. Investing in ArtsNL will
pay off culturally and economically.
I ask
the Premier: Is there anything else he needs in order to be convinced how
crucial ArtsNL funding is to the well-being and the growth of our cultural
sector? Faint praise is not enough.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I
said in the beginning, we have been investing in the arts. We continue to do so.
We see the value in the arts. This is why we have such a strong cultural
community here. It is because of all the individuals that are involved. We work
in partnership, we work with ArtsNL, government as well.
Any
investment in ArtsNL will come in budget 2019 – that is reflected in the budget
that is coming on Tuesday. And that's when the Member would find out if there's
any particular investment in ArtsNL.
But what
I can say is that the Premier and I have been on site of
Hudson & Rex, we see where film can come from a playwright, can come
from literary works, it's all very interconnected, it all drives the economy,
it's $450 million, there are 5,000 jobs, and the arts and cultural community is
so important to this government.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for St. John's Centre for a very quick question, please.
MS. ROGERS:
Mr. Speaker, I ask the
Premier, in the past few weeks his government –
MR. SPEAKER:
Quick question, please.
MS. ROGERS:
– made several funding
announcements totalling hundreds of millions of dollars. Will he now join with
our artists and commit to this modest request for one of the best investments
this province can make for our people?
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation for a quick response, please.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Mr. Speaker, I said that any
reflection of investment in artistic and cultural endeavours would be in budget
2019, but what I can say is that we are firmly committed to the arts community
here in this province, and we continue to make investments. Actually, there's an
announcement being made right now to expand the Princess Sheila NaGeira Theatre
in Carbonear.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Member for Humber - Bay of Islands.
MR. JOYCE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I would
ask the question to the Opposition, but they don't answer questions, so I'll ask
the question for any Member of the Management Commission on the government side.
On
October, 24, 2018, during a technical briefing with the Management Commission
concerning the bullying and harassment reports, I ask, did Bruce Chaulk make a
reference about an individual who refused to participate in the interview
process, in what context was the statement made –
MR. SPEAKER:
Sir, I'm sorry, I have to
rule that question out of order, since it's directed to the Management
Commission and not to the House of Assembly. So I need a question directed to
government.
MR. JOYCE:
I ask the Minister of Natural
Resources, whoever wants to answer: Did Bruce Chaulk make any reference about an
individual who refused to participate in the interview process, in what context
was the statement made, and did Mr. Chaulk –
MR. SPEAKER:
Again, Sir, I see this as
related to the activities of the Management Commission. I'd say it's separate
from the policy of the government. So I see it as not appropriate for this
floor.
MR. JOYCE:
(Inaudible.)
MR. SPEAKER:
You cannot challenge the
Speaker, by the way. The idea of a question is to challenge the policy and the
direction of the government.
MR. JOYCE:
It is.
MR. SPEAKER:
You're talking about the body
of the Management Commission, to which I am the Chair.
The time
for Oral Questions is over.
Thank
you.
Presenting Reports by Standing and Select Committees.
Tabling
of Documents.
Notices
of Motion.
Notices of Motion
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Speaker, I give notice
that I will ask leave to move the following resolution respecting the
reappointment of the members of the Independent Appointments Commission.
BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Assembly as
follows: WHEREAS section 6(3) of the
Independent Appointments Commission Act provides that members of the
Independent Appointments Commission are to be appointed by the
Lieutenant-Governor in Council on a resolution of the House of Assembly; and
WHEREAS section 7(1) of the act states that
a commissioner may be reappointed; and
WHEREAS the appointment of the following
commissioners expires on May 25, 2019: Clyde K. Wells, chairperson; Zita Cobb;
Shannie Duff; Philip R. Earle; Derek Young; and
WHEREAS it is proposed that the said
commissioners be reappointed as commissioners for a term of three years.
NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the
following persons be reappointed members of the Independent Appointments
Commission for a term of three years: Clyde K. Wells, chairperson; Zita Cobb;
Shannie Duff; Philip R. Earle; Derek Young.
Further, Mr. Speaker, under Notices of
Motion, I give notice under Standing Order 11(1), that this House not adjourn at
5 p.m. this coming Monday.
Thank you.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further notices of motion?
Answers to Questions for which Notice has
been Given.
Petitions.
Petitions
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for Mount Pearl North.
MR. LESTER:
Mr. Speaker, the Adult Dental Program
coverage for clients of the Newfoundland and Labrador Prescription Drug Program
under Access and 65Plus plans were eliminated in Budget 2016.
We, the undersigned, call upon the House of
Assembly to urge the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to reinstate the
Adult Dental Program to cover seniors and low-income individuals and families
for better insurance of oral health, quality of health and dignity.
Mr. Speaker, this is probably the seventh
or eighth time I've presented this petition since I've had the privilege of
standing here in this hon. House. I've yet to hear a response from the minister
and I, along with the petitioners, would really appreciate it.
As I've said before, people's nest eggs,
the little bit of cash they had poked away for those emergencies and rainy-day
funds or whatever it may be, they're long since used, and now people are putting
their health issues off as long as they can. They're coming to critical levels.
They're ending up showing up at emergency departments with all sorts of problems
that are costing the government and province and people a lot more; whereas, a
simple reinstatement of this program would ensure that we do not get to those
stages.
It's basically, again, where we're
shouldering the inability for government to rein in spending on the backs of
people who are most vulnerable.
MR. SPEAKER:
Further petitions?
The hon. the Member for Mount Pearl -
Southlands.
MR. LANE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
There
have been numerous concerns raised by family members of seniors in long-term
care throughout Newfoundland and Labrador, particularly those suffering from
dementia, Alzheimer's disease and other cognitive debilitating conditions,
whereby loved ones have experienced injuries, have not been bath regularly, have
not received proper nutrition and/or have been left lying in their own waste for
extended periods of time. We believe this is directly related to government's
failure to ensure adequate staffing at those facilities.
THEREFORE we petition the hon. House of Assembly as follows: To urge the
Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to instate legislation, which includes
the mandatory establishment of an adequate ratio, one staff to three residents
in long-term care and all other applicable regional health facilities housing
persons with dementia, Alzheimer's diseases and other cognitive debilitating
conditions in order to ensure appropriate safety, protection from injuries,
proper hygiene care and all other required care. This law would include the
creation of specific job position in these facilities for monitoring and
intervention as required to ensure the safety of patients.
Mr.
Speaker, the petition today, signatories are from Labrador area, Lab City,
Wabush and so on. Again, this is a concern that has been raised by the Advocates
for Senior Citizens' Rights. They represent thousands of seniors all throughout
the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.
We
presented numerous petitions on their behalf, thousands of signatories and their
concern is about staffing levels in long-term care facilities housing seniors
with dementia, Alzheimer's disease and so on. Their concern is about patient's
safety and their concern is about ensuring that there are enough staff at all
times – that's the important part here – at all times, ensuring there are enough
staff to take care of these seniors that need that help.
They
would like to see actual legislation in place that would dictate a certain
standard, basically without flexibility, saying that there must be a standard of
a certain amount of staff ratio to patients for these people.
That's
what they're asking for. They're not satisfied with regulations that the
minister could change, any minister could change. They're not satisfied with
policy of the health care authorities. They want legislation so that it
guarantees appropriate staffing for these seniors to take care of their needs.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Further
petitions?
Seeing
no petitions, I call Orders of the Day.
Orders of the Day
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I call
from the Order Paper, second reading of Bill 2.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded
by the Minister of Natural Resources, that Bill 2, An Act To Amend The
Correctional Services Act, be now read a second time.
Motion,
second reading a bill, “An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.” (Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Happy to
stand here today and speak to Bill 2, which is An Act to Amend the Correctional
Services Act.
I would
preface, I guess, this debate by saying that this particular amendment itself is
fairly non-substantive in and of itself. It doesn't contain a significant number
of changes per se, but the history of this particular bill and of this
situation, I think, carries some interest to people in the general public. I'll
try my best to explain where we are in terms of this particular piece of
legislation and what we've done since that time.
I think
I'll lead off, Mr. Speaker, by talking about this particular amendment. In
simple terms, this amendment, which is fairly short in length, it's only a few
pages, but it does have a number of housekeeping provisions to it.
This
bill clarifies the reference to cannabis in the definition of illicit drug, and
that's obviously for reasons that come with the legalization of cannabis in the
last year. That's one of the things that obviously was a change from when this
bill was originally done.
It
includes an additional principle and amends two existing principles, as it
relates to, I guess, the concepts that the bill wishes to cover. It clarifies
the authority for adult probation officers to procure and report information for
the court in respect of a person charged with an offence. It clarifies the
requirement that the dates that an offender is eligible for release be disclosed
to the victim or victim services on request.
I would
point out, these are things that have been happening in practice, but whenever
you do some form of – and this, in many ways, was a statutory review that we did
here. This is about codifying and clarifying practice and amending the
legislation to make sure that it's actually defined.
It
provides that the director consult with a qualified health care professional or
other qualified person when encouraging and coordinating specific programing and
services to provide for the specific needs of offenders.
In this
particular clause here, again, this is not something that has changed, this is
something that's being done in practice, but it's about codifying practice. It's
about codifying what you have been doing. I will go backwards after I go through
these changes to explain why it is that we are here.
It
provides authority for the Lieutenant-Governor in Council to make regulations
respecting investigations conducted under the act. That was probably the biggest
change coming from the original act, and one of the reasons that I think that
this bill has been delayed by many years.
Finally,
it replaces the word Aboriginal with the word Indigenous, corrects the name of
the Department of Justice and Public Safety and corrects references to the title
adult probation officer. Those, in some cases, are housekeeping. Obviously,
since the bill was originally done in 2011, the department name has changed. I
think that might have been 2014-ish.
Adult
probation officer, that title is again a housekeeping change. I would suggest
that changing the term Aboriginal to Indigenous, it's housekeeping in terms of
legislation but obviously I think it shows the significance of the terminology
that we use, and I think it's the term that conveys our respect. When you think
about Indigenous, Indigenous itself, when we talk about the definition refers to
origination, the origins. And when we talk about our Indigenous people, they
were the forbears, they were the originators of occupation and inhabitation of
our land. And that's something that we see throughout government and throughout
our federal government.
Now, I
want to go back and provide some history to why we are here today. So we all
know that back in 2011 the government of the day brought in the
Correctional Services Act, and that was basically a response to a
2007 report, Decades of Darkness,
which was a very significant report into the state of corrections in this
province. We had been governed by two pieces of legislation. Back in spring of
2011, government brought in and debated the legislation for the
Correctional Services Act, which would
be the replacement, the combination of the previous two acts, with a number of
changes.
One of
the big pieces that that act covered off was the disciplinary process going on
within the institution. That was changed. Now, without getting into the entire
debate – and I certainly have no desire to re-debate something. If anybody
wants, they can go back to Hansard
back in spring of 2011 and they can read the entire debate. But what came out of
it? Again, I'd say the vast majority of Members in this House actually, with the
exception of a few on both sides, were actually not in the House.
So what
happened? The bill is debated, goes through second reading, Committee, gets
third reading, it gets Royal Assent, but it was not proclaimed. The reason that
it was not proclaimed is that there was still work that had to be done by the
department. When we talk about the regulations, in many cases the regulations
can form up the substance of a bill, in particular cases. They're obviously very
important. In many cases, I'm passing on hearsay. I'm passing on information
that was passed to me by staff in the department who were there during that
time.
Certainly, I can't say enough about the staff of the Department of Justice and
Public Safety. They would have moved at the pace of the direction that was
provided to them by the people in charge. The reality is that that act was never
proclaimed – never proclaimed.
Now,
does that mean that we were still operating right by the specific confines of
the previous two acts? No, in many cases, policy would be changed, procedure
would be changed and the fact is that there were significant changes that
happened. But when you think about the act, the act was never proclaimed and the
department did – I can't talk about it or attest to what work the department did
between 2011 and 2015.
What I
can attest to is that in January of 2016, I am the minister of this department
and what we've done since then is I think we've shone a real light on
corrections in this province. If anybody were to look at the direction coming
from our department, looking at the changes, the legislation, the policy, I
think we've shown a real interest in reforming corrections in this province.
We
certainly don't take all the credit for that. It's being led by community, it's
being led by staff, by advocacy groups, by inmates, by parents and it's
something that we have an interest in too. We really have a group of individuals
working together to change the legislation.
So, what
happens is we come in – the original bill in 2011 had a five-year statutory
review. So, the thought process would be: Why would we proclaim a Corrections
Services Act in 2016 that the previous administration had not done, when the
fact is that it would have been up for review now anyway? So, that's what we
have done over the last number of years.
Now,
parallel, operating at the same time as that, we've had a number of issues going
on in corrections at the same time, and I can talk about them. One, we have done
reviews on disciplinary segregation and administrative segregation. One of the
biggest challenges that we face when we talk about corrections, one of the first
things we faced was we had over capacity in one of our institutions,
particularly the institution in Clarenville that houses female offenders. That
has a capacity of 26 and we are getting daily calls talking about capacity being
at 32, being at 33, which is not acceptable. So, we had to deal with the
transfer of female inmates back to HMP, a practice that had been done in the
past but hadn't been done within the past 20 years. That required renovations,
required change, required a lot of work.
We look
at the things we were trying to change within our institutions, things we wanted
to do ourselves. So we've had a number of people, and there are groups out there
– they know who they are – many were at our announcement yesterday, they've been
working with us, as well as staff and management of the institution.
One of
the big things, obviously, in the last year, corrections had a very tough year
in the last year, and I say tough in the fact that we had losses of lives within
our institutions. I got to tell you that's something that wears on absolutely
everybody, primarily the families – it's hard to know and put yourself in the
position. You can have empathy, you can have compassion but I can't say that I
know the depths of the sorrow that they face, I can only try.
But you
know what? It's been hard on staff. This has been extremely hard on staff, as
well as fellow inmates. I've had an opportunity to speak to inmates in these
institutions and to listen to them and talk about the difficulties that they
face, and we've tried our best to respond to their needs. Out of that came
another report, the Jesso report, an independent report.
One of
the other issues that hasn't gotten as much attention, for many years, now, many
of our RCMP lock-ups in this province have been housing inmates for far too
long. They're not supposed to be there for any significant period of time, but
the reality is that in many cases, sadly, inmates were serving sentences in
these institutions, which is not acceptable, and we've had no choice but to deal
with that. I had questions yesterday as it relates to our announcement about why
increasing the capacity. Well, the reality is that for many years the system has
not been following the rules. Now, that's through no fault of the individuals;
it's just been the reality of increasing populations and having space issues.
And they've been doing the best with what they can.
That's
one of the reasons that we've had to look at increased capacity, because you
have to be prepared for it, while at the same time we've been taking many steps
on reducing that population. I think that we have a healthier society when we
can talk about prevention and talk about trying to prevent the entrance of
individuals into that system and falling into that cycle where they continue to
perpetuate the same behaviours that lead to incarceration which is tough, not
just on them, but on their families as well.
But I
digress. So, we're doing a review of the legislation. The fact is that our
review of the legislation showed some changes were necessary, which I have
outlined here today, but the fact is a lot of it was already encapsulated, was
already encompassed, it was already done. So what we're promising here today is,
(a), we will bring in the Corrections Act, we want to debate that, I'd like to
pass that, and what we are promising is not just Royal Assent but proclamation
within 2019.
There
are still regulations that have to be drafted, that have to be done, and one of
the issues, too, is with those regulations comes a financial outlay. There is
money that has to be spent. Just to deal with the disciplinary process, where we
bring in outside adjudicators, the proper budgeting had never been done. It's
almost like we brought in a bill to deal with issues but the practicalities were
never worked out.
Again,
let me ensure that I lay that completely on the leadership, previously. I'm not
trying to throw anybody under a bus here but I'm trying to ensure that people do
not ever blame the staff. The buck stops with the political leadership, and
that's why any failures within the department now, I would say, would rest on
me. I would never say these staff that are unseen, working in the department,
doing briefings, doing all the hard work, they've been doing a great job and
they presented that today.
I was
lucky to have people present today, at the press conference, where we spoke
about these changes, and do you know what? Mr. Speaker, we had perhaps one of
the most wide-ranging press conferences on corrections and just the different
things we want to do. It expanded beyond the bill, beyond what we're talking
about here and it was a really good conversation, I felt, of what we're trying
to achieve and what we're trying to do.
I think
I've provided some of the history of why we're here now, what our goals are. Our
goals are, again, within 2019, to ensure that proclamation happens and that the
changes happen.
One of
the questions that came out was, well, this is an election year. At some point
during this year there will be an election. My answer to that is that
corrections and making positive change knows no political stripe. The fact is,
it has to come from leadership and this is something that has to be done,
regardless of who sits in the chairs. We have to ensure that these changes
happen.
Again,
if I were not to be here, no different then when I spoke about the new
correctional institution yesterday, I may not be in the position when the
building is complete but I want to see the building complete regardless of who
is there because it's a necessity and it's something that needs to happen.
On that
note, I think what I will do is take my seat. I think I've spoken to this in
length. I look forward to the debate on both sides. I look forward to the
Committee stage. I'll certainly try my best to answer any questions that come
up, but I will say, and this was something that was brought up during Question
Period today, is that this bill, like any bill that we do, everybody is provided
a full briefing, a full opportunity to question the very knowledgeable staff
that helped to draft the bill, to do the research on the bill.
I want
to thank all the members of JPS that helped to do that. I can't name names
because I may leave somebody out and I don't want to offend anybody. They all
know who they are and thank you to the Justice league for doing that.
On that
note, I will turn it over to my colleagues across the way to continue debate on
this bill.
MR. SPEAKER (Warr):
The hon. the Leader of
the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
I thank the minister for his
elucidation of the policy behind this measure, behind the bill. I think it's
fairly apparent that the background to this is the report of RNC superintendent,
retired now, Marlene Jesso, who submitted her report on four deaths in the
system in provincial custody. Her first recommendation was: “It is recommended the provincial government take immediate steps to
proclaim the new Correctional Services Act and ensure all associated regulations
and policies are updated.” This, I suppose, is the impetus behind this bill.
Just to
go back on that again: “It is recommended
the provincial government take immediate steps to proclaim the new Correctional
Services Act and ensure all associated regulations and policies are updated.”
The minister has obliged us by explaining that while the government is taking
the laudable step of bringing forward the bill to this House, its proclamation
yet awaits, presumably, some months more of work, including work on the
necessary budget which will be required in order to properly implement the
changes which the bill has made to the underlying piece of legislation.
The
primary work being in terms of budgeting, and the minister might consider
enlightening us as to whether the budgetary work – presumably this is additional
budget – that's needed to achieve proclamation will be reflected in the
Estimates of the budget about to be brought down next Tuesday, at the
appropriate time.
Again,
I'm saying the minister might enlighten the House as to whether – it might be of
interest as well to the House if we could be informed that in respect of the
amendments that deal with inmate health, who might've been consulted on these
amendments.
Again,
the minister – and I thank him for that – gave us an explanation for the change
in terminology. The preferred terminology, it now seems, is not Aboriginal, but
Indigenous. He told us that other legislation, other usages, federal
legislation, the preferred terminology now appears to be Indigenous and not
Aboriginal. I would ask the further question, whether Aboriginal groups,
Indigenous groups, as the case maybe, were consulted and expressed a preference
as to what terminology they preferred in terms of their self-identification. Did
any consultation occur in that connection with Aboriginal groups in this
province?
The
minister has dealt with the question of proclamation sometime in the year. I'll
just briefly state the principles of this legislation because they underscore
the importance of it, the great importance of this legislation and, in fact,
underscore the need for expedition to bring it in.
In the
Principles, part one, section 4: “This Act and regulations made under it shall
be interpreted and administered in a manner consistent with the following
principles: (a) the protection of society shall be given paramount consideration
in making decisions or taking action under this Act; (b) the safety of the
community and the furtherance of a just and peaceful society will be enhanced …”
It goes on to refer to “maximizing individual opportunities for rehabilitation
and reintegration that recognize the needs and circumstances of offenders both
in correctional facilities and in the community.”
The
reason I read those out is that it underscores the great importance of this
piece of legislation, not only to inmates but to the community at large and
indeed to staff members of correctional institutions because it goes on to
describe the duties that the community owes to staff members in correctional
institutions as well.
We would
commend the government for acting on bringing this forward. We're disappointed
to hear that proclamation will be further delayed and the minister might care to
provide some extra information on the few points I've raised.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Member for St.
John's East - Quidi Vidi.
MS. MICHAEL:
Thank you very much, Mr.
Speaker.
I'm
happy to stand and speak to this bill today. The minister made reference to this
bill being changes to a bill that came to this House in prior time and some of
us were here. Well, yes, indeed I was on March 31, 2011, as I look at my
briefing notes for March 31, 2011, at which time we were told that Bill 9 it was
then, and it was an act respecting correctional services, which is what we're
dealing with today, and we were told at that time that that bill in 2011, eight
years ago, replaced outdated, decades-old legislation. The officials said in the
briefing that the new legislation was long overdue. The officials said there was
a need to replace outdated language and outdated terminology, and the list goes
on as to why this bill was so needed eight years ago and was never proclaimed
eight years ago.
Three
years ago, this government came into being and the Minister of Justice and
Public Safety was the minister all during that time, yet we've waited over three
years now for a bill that was helping the
Correctional Services Act become up to date, while we were waiting for that
bill to be proclaimed. So today here we are and the minister obviously realizes
the problem with the fact that this bill here has never been proclaimed, even
though he's been minister since 2015.
He found
it so important that he actually did put out a release this afternoon, earlier
on today, saying that definitely the bill we're talking about today, which is
Bill 2, also Correctional Services Act
amendment, that the bill we're talking about today definitely will be proclaimed
sometime this year.
Well, I
would think after waiting since March 31, 2011 for new language, I would think
that this bill should be proclaimed the minute that we vote on it and we get
Royal Assent. I'm rather surprised to hear sometime this year we're going to see
this bill brought into play.
There
are points to be made. Obviously, some of it is so-called housekeeping. It's not
so much housekeeping, what it is doing it is making up for the changes that have
happened in the last eight years from the bill that wasn't proclaimed eight
years ago. For example, we have moved forward with some language in our society,
hence the change of the word Aboriginal to Indigenous.
We have
many things in it which are bringing things up to date, so I suppose even if
this bill, which was Bill 9 back in 2011, even if that had been proclaimed,
there may be changes we'd be making today, but we would at least have been
making them to a bill that had been operative.
The
original bill had to do with changes that were being called for by the 2008
review of corrections in Newfoundland and Labrador, called
Decades of Darkness. So we're even that much more beyond where we
should be because the review was done in 2008, the bill came in in 2011 and here
we are in 2019 trying to bring things up to date from the recommendations of
Decades of Darkness.
The new
bill, 2011, was legislation drafted to include recommendations from the report,
Decades of Darkness, and from best
practices in other jurisdictions. And again, when you read the briefing notes
that I had in 2011, some of it based on what we'd been told by the officials of
the department at that time, they did talk about how they went to other
provinces and looked at the legislation in other provinces. They talked about
how the Yukon was felt to have the most modern legislation, but best practices
adopted from other legislations, they did all kinds of consultations. I wonder
where the Yukon is now? They were ahead of us then; they're probably even more
ahead of us now as we waited eight years for this new bill.
So, here
we are today with a bill, changing a bill, upgrading to a bill that has been
around for so long because of not being proclaimed that it's out of date, so
we're modernizing the bill. I suppose maybe it's symbolic that we're doing it in
the week where the government says they're going to put in a new facility
replacing Her Majesty's Penitentiary. I hope that we're not going to have to
wait as long for this proclamation as I am sure we're going to have to wait for
the new penitentiary.
Here we
are amending a bill which remains unproclaimed, not in force since 2011,
updating this legislation. I just hope that the piece of legislation is not
going to remain on the shelf the way the 2011 piece of legislation was left on
the shelf, and I do hope that it comes off, but I really have to question why we
have to wait for some time in this year for this to be proclaimed. This should
be proclaimed the minute we get Royal Assent.
Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
The hon.
the Minister of Fisheries and Land Resources.
MR. BYRNE:
Well, thank you very much,
Mr. Speaker.
What a
pleasure to speak on a progressive piece of legislation such as this one. It
does a lot for not only our justice system, but for our communities, as I
consider just the preamble which captures the essence of the bill and what it
creates for each and every one of us, for a stronger, more just society, for a
more secure community in which we all live.
The
preamble and the principles behind the bill state very clearly that the
protection of society shall be given paramount consideration in making decisions
or taking actions under this act; and further, that the safety of the community
and the furtherance of a just and peaceful society will be enhanced, as far as
possible, through maximizing individual opportunities for rehabilitation and
reintegration that recognizes the needs and circumstances of offenders, both in
correctional facilities and in the community.
And that
staff members who are responsible or charged with the responsibility for
engaging in these services, that staff members will be given, wherever possible,
appropriate career development and training opportunities, and a workplace
environment that encourages integrity and personal accountability and that it is
consistent with the relevant code of professional conduct established under
section 11 of this act be given consideration.
And it
goes on further, Mr. Speaker, offenders shall obey community supervision
conditions and correctional facility rules and will be subject to the least
restrictive measures consistent and necessary for the protection of the public,
staff members and offenders.
It goes
even further, Mr. Speaker, inmates are entitled to fair treatment with access to
effective grievance and disciplinary procedure; that inmates are entitled to
equitable access to health services consistent with the goals of public health;
and that policies, programs and practices will respect age, gender, sexual
orientation, ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic differences and will be
responsive to the particular needs of women and Indigenous peoples, the needs of
offenders with particular mental health and addictions requirements, the needs
of offenders with respect to the social determinants of health, and the needs of
other groups of offenders with special requirements.
I cannot
help but think, Mr. Speaker, in the context and the backdrop of the recent
announcement by our Minister of Justice for a new provincial prison, and the
importance that we all place on this facility, recognizing that this is a
facility that houses some of the most dangerous, but at the same time, people
who do deserve human dignity and human respect, but most importantly an
opportunity to rehabilitate and to come out better people, more law-abiding
people, and create an environment of safety for each and every one of us.
You know
a very wise person once said to me, a former minister of Justice and Attorney
General of Canada once said to me that to simply be punitive, to simply impose
incarceration for incarceration sake, without being mindful of the further
necessity for natural justice, for good justice, the justice afforded through
rehabilitation, we do not succeed in our objective.
Now,
that was a federal minister of Justice and Attorney General who was seeing it
from the perspective of he himself had been attacked. He himself had been the
victim of what appeared to be a hate crime, someone who was very incensed and
angry, who himself appeared to have been homophobic and was very concerned about
the decisions and actions of the federal minister of Justice related to matters
of justice of equality for members of the LGBTQ community.
He was
attacked viciously, viciously assaulted and attacked, and this individual was
convicted. Upon sentencing, the federal minister of Justice asked: What is
required to occur here? And he said: Do you think I or my family or my community
will be better served if this individual's incarcerated without context, without
reference to rehabilitation, without counselling, without proper mental health
guidance and services? No, I will be less safe under those circumstances.
So a
federal minister of Justice, who himself had been a victim of a vicious assault,
took a very high road, a very reasoned road, and said that it is easy to be
punitive; it is very human and very fair to seek justice in a higher order. That
was Andy Scott. He was a great friend of mine. He's passed away now. He will be
missed dearly but he really, really talked the talk but walked the walk.
When I
think of the prison that was just announced, the necessity of that, I can only
say that this was a good measure. This bill today follows suit with the
initiatives that we see and recognizes a better future for each and every one of
us by responding to the true needs within our justice system, empowering our
justice officials, our probationary officers, those that are so important in
dealing directly with those who face criminal prosecution and conviction and
incarceration of some variety or other. So these are the methods that create a
real 21st-century legal system, a 21st-century justice system.
It is so
important that this prison be replaced to a modern facility. It's not for the
convenience or comforts, per se, of those who would be housed in it, but that is
an element to this. We are not safe as a society. Our safety is not increased by
just simply imposing a very brutish or unfair justice system which does not
respond to the realities and the opportunities of rehabilitation.
That's
why I certainly applaud my government, the Members on this side of the House but
led by our Justice Minister. He's not only bringing in this piece of legislation
which responds to the needs of a 21st-century justice system, but he's going to
take a facility and turn it into a 21st-century facility. That I think, Mr.
Speaker, is why I will be supporting this piece of legislation and all Members
of the House should do so as well.
Thank
you very, very much.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
If the hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety speaks now, he will close debate.
The hon.
the Minister of Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank
my colleagues for their contributions to the debate, especially the Minister of
Fisheries and Land Resources for giving us some insight from his many years
within political legislatures, so I appreciate that.
What I'm
going to do now is I know that the Members opposite have asked some questions.
I'm not going to address them now, for the sake of I don't want to answer one
and miss one. So what we will do is put the bill into Committee, the questions
will be asked and I'll certainly try my best to answer them to the best of my
ability. On that note, I will sit and take my seat and conclude second reading.
Thank
you.
MR. SPEAKER:
Is the House ready for the
question?
The
motion is that Bill 2 be now read a second time.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
CLERK (Barnes):
A bill, An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act. (Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
This bill has now been read a
second time.
When
shall the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Now.
MR. SPEAKER:
Now.
On
motion, a bill, “An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act,” read a second
time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House presently, by leave.
(Bill 2)
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I move,
seconded by the Minister of Natural Resources, that the House resolve itself
into a Committee of the Whole to consider Bill 2.
MR. SPEAKER:
It is moved and seconded that
I do now leave the Chair for the House to resolve itself into a Committee of the
Whole to consider the said bill.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, that the House resolve itself into a Committee of the Whole, the Speaker
left the Chair.
Committee of the
Whole
CHAIR (Warr):
Order, please!
We are
now considering Bill 2, An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.
A bill,
“An Act To Amend The Correctional Services Act.” (Bill 2)
CLERK:
Clause 1.
CHAIR:
Shall clause 1 carry?
The
Chair recognizes the hon. the Leader of the Official Opposition.
MR. CROSBIE:
My question for the minister
is in connection with the delay in proclamation to sometime during this calendar
year needing budgeting work, will this appear in the Estimates for the budget
coming next Tuesday?
CHAIR:
The hon. the Minister of
Justice and Public Safety.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
What I
can say is that the delay in proclamation is more to do with finalizing the
adjudication's process, and that right now the actual financial piece is not –
you will not see it specifically allocated in the line by line for the budget,
but obviously it would have to be established within the corrections budget that
you'll see in the line by line when we do the Estimates.
CHAIR:
Shall the motion carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, clause 1 carried.
CLERK:
Clauses 2 through 9 inclusive.
CHAIR:
Shall clauses 2 through 9
inclusive carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, clauses 2 through 9 carried.
CLERK:
Be it enacted by the Lieutenant-Governor and House of Assembly in Legislative
Session convened, as follows.
CHAIR:
Shall the enacting clause
carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, enacting clause carried.
CLERK:
An Act To Amend The
Correctional Services Act.
CHAIR:
Shall the title carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, title carried.
CHAIR:
Shall I report the bill
without amendment?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
Motion,
the Committee report having passed the bill without amendment, carried.
CHAIR:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Mr. Chair, I move that the
Committee rise and report Bill 2.
CHAIR:
The motion is that the
Committee rise and report Bill 2.
Shall
the motion carry?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
CHAIR:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, that the Committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again, the
Speaker returned to the Chair.
MR. SPEAKER (Trimper):
The hon. the Member for
Baie Verte - Green Bay and Chair of the Committee of the Whole.
MR. WARR:
Mr. Speaker, the Committee of
the Whole have considered the matters to them referred and have directed me to
report Bill 2 without amendment.
MR. SPEAKER:
The Chair of the Committee of
the Whole reports that the Committee have considered the matters to them
referred and have directed him to report Bill 2 without amendment.
When
shall the report be received? Now?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Now.
MR. SPEAKER:
When shall the said bill be
read a third time?
MR. A. PARSONS:
Tomorrow.
On
motion, reported received and adopted. Bill ordered read a third time on
tomorrow.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Government House
Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Yes, Mr. Speaker, I call from
the Order Paper, Address in Reply.
MR. SPEAKER:
The hon. the Minister of
Natural Resources.
MS. COADY:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
pleasure to rise today to speak to the Throne Speech. I think all of us in this
House had the opportunity to listen the other day, not too long ago, to what I
thought was a Throne Speech that laid out the future of our province. It told of
not only where we've come from in a lot of ways and the struggles that we've
experienced in this province especially the last number of years, Mr. Speaker,
but it also said with hope and aspirations where we are going.
It is on
that vain today I would like to speak about some of the things that are
happening in Natural Resources. I do rise in this House quite frequently to give
explanation as to what's happening in the growth and development of the oil and
gas industry, on growth and development of our mining industry, but it bears
repeating, Mr. Speaker, how often and how much growth that has occurred since
this Liberal government took office back in late 2015, early 2016. It has been
my pleasure to serve as the minister responsible for Natural Resources, the
minister responsible for oil and gas, for mining, as well as for electricity and
energy generation.
I've had
the experience over the last number of years of managing the Muskrat Falls
project, Mr. Speaker, and you will know, based on the outcomes of the inquiry,
how difficult that project that we inherited and the mess that it was in. I know
yesterday the Leader of the Opposition, of the PC Opposition, stated that we
should own the problems that we inherit, but I reject that premise. I say that
we'll manage them, we'll clean up the mess that we inherited, but I certainly do
not own them. I will do my best for the people of this province to make sure
that they are remedied.
I want
to speak on a positive note here today. I want to talk about some of the things
that are happening in the oil and gas industry, some of the things that are
happening in the mining industry, and the prosperity, I think, that they bring
to the province, and the hope and opportunities they bring, and the amount of
work that we've been able to do as a government, as a people of this province,
of ensuring that we are on the right track of growth and development.
I spoke
in this House about Advance 2030. It's
a plan that we developed, government developed, with stakeholders in the
industry. About 150 stakeholders came together from the oil and gas industry,
supply and service industry, from what I'm going to call the education industry
– I don't want to call it education industry, but I will do so for this purpose
– from labour and from all different aspects of the oil and gas industry. We
came together to have a conversation and set a path and a course, and it's
called Advance 2030. It really is
setting up the province as a preferred location for oil and gas development.
I could
tell you over the last year we have advanced that plan forward very, very well.
There are over 30 recommendations that we're actively working on. I think almost
100 per cent of the short-term aspects of that plan are being worked on as we
speak; some are completed, some are still being monitored and managed.
The
targets in 2030 are ambitious; they're ambitious but achievable. For example,
over the next decade, in between now and 2030, we believe we can drill 100 new
exploration wells. That's a significant number, Mr. Speaker, and it will give us
– imagine if some of the prospectively that we're seeing on seismic – and we've
had it independently verified – imagine when we discover that oil, when we
actually drill and there's a positive result, how beneficial it will be to this
province.
So, 100
new exploration wells. We have five companies today, five large oil and gas
companies today with applications before the Canadian environmental assessment
process to drill offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. I know that ExxonMobil, for
example, have an exploration program this year. I was out most recently to visit
the West Aquarius, which will be the drill rig that they will use, and they are
actively pursuing some of the targets that they have seen, both in new areas
like the Flemish Pass, as well as existing areas in the Jeanne d'Arc Basin.
For
those listening, I'd like to make sure people understand that the four projects
that we have active offshore Newfoundland and Labrador, four of them are in the
Jeanne d'Arc Basin.
Now, Mr.
Speaker, we have over 20 basins offshore Newfoundland and Labrador – 20 basins.
It's pretty exciting to think that while we only have four projects today in one
basin, we've just signed up, and I'm looking here, Mr. Speaker, the framework
agreement that we have on the Flemish Pass.
As you
know, this past year we made an agreement with Equinor, a Norwegian company,
they are now working through the sanction process to develop the Flemish Pass.
I have
to say that it's pretty exciting. It's the first remote, deepwater project in
our offshore. It's some-500 kilometres from shore and in approximately 1,200
metres of depth. So, it will be a deepwater project. It will be the first, as I
said. All of our projects today, the four that we have active today, are in the
shallower waters of Jeanne d'Arc. This is in the Flemish Pass in 1,200 metres of
water.
They
have nearly 300 million barrels of oil. The total project cost is $10.9 billion
– $10.9 billion. That's the life-of-field cost, but we're expecting really
outstanding benefits from that.
For the
Province of Newfoundland and Labrador we're expecting $3.5 billion in revenues,
and we're expecting 22.3 million person-hours for the life of the field, in
terms of employment. That really does strengthen our oil and gas industry and
strengthen our economy, and I'm looking forward to Equinor advancing on the
development of that find.
But, Mr.
Speaker, I was speaking about more discoveries. So we have Equinor, who's
currently active in sanction and I know that they're looking at their
exploration program. We have ExxonMobil, for the first time since 1991, doing
pure exploration offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. We also have a company
called Nexen, BHP, BP – all of them actively pursuing exploration offshore
Newfoundland and Labrador. So it's a very, I'm going to call, exciting time
offshore Newfoundland and Labrador. A great time to grow and enhance our
offshore oil and gas opportunity.
I will
also like to tell the people of the province, for those that are listening
today, that our oil offshore Newfoundland and Labrador has one of the lowest GHG
– greenhouse gas emissions – in the world. About 1/3 less than anywhere else in
the world. So I have a lovely chart – I don't have it with me today, but it
shows looking at many of the fields around the world and what the GHG emissions
are for those fields. And if you look at those, Newfoundland and Labrador's
Hibernia Project is on the lowest end of GHG emissions.
So as
the world continues to consume oil and gas, as we know, for the foreseeable
future, at least 40 to 50 years out, that the world will continue to consume oil
and gas. And it's not just in transportation and others, it's in things like –
and I'll hold up my phone, here, Mr. Speaker. Plastic is very much part of the
oil and gas industry. So this is downstream, I realize, but that's where plastic
comes from. It's from the upstream oil.
We have
to realize that while the world is still consuming oil, how beneficial it will
be to develop more oil offshore Newfoundland and Labrador because of many
reasons. But one of which, of course, is the lower GHGs – greenhouse gas
emissions – per barrel.
Secondly, are the requirements under the clean energy plan that my colleague,
the Minister of Environment, recently put before the people of the province.
Under that plan, emissions for oil and gas companies will continue to come down.
That's a requirement. Under a lot of the carbon emission requirements of oil and
gas, and I'll tell the people of the province, I think it's 100,000 tons will
have to be taken out of that industry this year alone and, by 2030, I think it's
2.5 million tons. That represents about 600,000 vehicles taken off the road.
So
there's a lot of effort going into taking the carbon out of the barrel on our
offshore, making sure we're very focused on environmental protection. But if
we're going to develop oil in this world, I'd rather have it developed offshore
Newfoundland and Labrador because, of course, we have lower GHG levels.
Mr.
Speaker, I'm kind of looking at some of the other opportunities. So I talked a
lot about exploration and the fact that we're looking at having 100 wells
offshore Newfoundland and Labrador between now and 2030. We're looking to grow
the industry to about 650,000 barrels of oil a day, that's significant growth,
and we're looking to employ in operations several thousand people, direct
operations.
Mr.
Speaker, it brings big benefits to the people of the province in terms of
employment, in terms of growth in our economy but it also brings a tremendous
amount of revenues to government. I can tell the people of the province that
over the last decade some $20 billion – I know under the decade from the former
administration, about $20 billion to $25 billion came into this province. This
government thinks that we have to be very prudent in those expenditures and, as
you will have heard in this House before, the Premier speaking about ensuring
that we save some of that money for our future projects.
Mr.
Speaker, currently underway in terms of projects, the West White Rose is under
construction in Argentia. We have a tremendous number of people working there. I
think it's 5,000 person-years of employment during construction, so a tremendous
number of people working on the West White Rose project. First oil is
anticipated in 2022; they're still on track for that. It has about $3 billion in
economic benefits to this province.
So, the
oil and gas industry contributes significantly, but I don't want to just stop
there, the mining industry as well. I can tell you in the last two years in the
Department of Natural Resources we have signed up about $18 billion in economic
activity through oil and gas and through mining. Isn't that tremendous?
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MS. COADY:
A lot of it in Labrador, some
of it in Baie Verte, a lot of it all around the province and we know that both
offshore oil and gas, as well as the mining industry, really do contribute to
our success as a province, and we want to continue to encourage – mining is
vitally important to us all.
I held
up my phone previously. You know, the mining industry, all of the technology in
this phone starts with the mining industry. I know, for example, cobalt and some
of the rare earth minerals are required both in the new green economy, and we're
seeing – pardon me?
MR. HUTCHINGS:
Batteries.
MS. COADY:
Batteries, good point from my
colleague opposite, who is a supporter of the mining industry. I have to say the
Member for Ferryland is a strong supporter of both oil and gas development, as
well as mining development. He's been encouraging that growth and development,
and we all have to come together to do that.
But in
the last year, we had about $48 million in exploration in the mining industry;
$48 million, that's a lot of money, all around the Province of Newfoundland and
Labrador, where junior miners, where prospectors are out looking for the next
Voisey's Bay. We know how many people Voisey's Bay does employ; some 16,000
person-years of employment, 1,700 jobs on a regular basis. So, they're out
looking for the next Voisey's Bay, the next opportunity, and, boy, do we have
opportunities.
I could
tell you that over the last number of years it's been very interesting in the
Department of Natural Resources when we see online prospectors coming in and
making stakes all around the province, and we've seen a bit of a gold rush in
this province, a bit of a gold rush where in one day I think we had one of the
largest rushes, I'll call it that, to stake claims in Central Newfoundland, and
a lot of that exploration is going on today in both Grand Falls-Windsor area, in
Gander area, in the Baie Verte area, a lot of exploration going on.
But, Mr.
Speaker, Mining the Future, again, another plan that we have working with
stakeholders in the industry, we came together with stakeholders all around the
province in the industry and said: How can we grow our mining industry? When we
looked at that, we said: What are some of our yardsticks? So, we're currently at
$48 million in exploration activities. We want to be a $100 million. We want to
be one of the places in Canada where people come to explore, and we're putting
significant investments in our geological survey, as I've talked about before.
We've even had conversations with our neighbouring Province of Quebec to say,
how do we ensure the development of the Labrador Trough? Great opportunities
await us in Labrador, more –
MR. LETTO:
Gem of the world.
MS. COADY:
Gem of the world, as my
colleague from Labrador West says.
Mr.
Speaker, we're looking actively. We had 12 active-field projects under the
geological survey last year. Those have contributed greatly to the knowledge. We
have core samples stored around this province where people come in from all over
the globe looking at the opportunities in the mining industry in Newfoundland
and Labrador, and we want to continue to grow that industry. Currently, there's
direct employment of some 4,800 people in the mining industry. We think we can
really grow that industry and we're looking forward to that. We have a plan,
mining the future, to do just that.
Let me
tell you some of the great things that have happened in the mining industry.
Wabush 3, this is the Moss Pit, recently opened, myself, the Premier and the
Member for Labrador West were all there. It contains some 744 million tons of
iron ore. They're about 1,700 employees in IOC, and they're increasing
production about 23 million tons annually. It's a great story.
We know
last year we made an agreement with Vale to go underground at Voisey's Bay –
16,000 person-years of employment during the construction phase, and once
operational, of course, 1,700 jobs at the underground mine and at the Long
Harbour processing plant. There's going to be about $1 billion spent in economic
activity. Can you imagine – $1 billion spent in economic activity. Just that
activity alone generates about $69 million in tax revenue. Think about that,
that kind of activity.
We also
had the reopening of the Scully Mine with Tacora. They're reactivating the
Scully Mine and mill for a minimum of 26 years – 280 direct positions. We've
seen the reopening of Canada Fluorspar – $250 million in project capital
costs, 3,000 person-years of employment and 255 full-time positions, Mr.
Speaker. That's on the great Burin Peninsula.
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the Beaver Brook mine. My
colleague from Gander recently joined me and the Premier when we talked about
reopening the Beaver Brook mine. Again, great contributions to our economy.
We're seeing some exciting things happening in both the oil
and gas and the mining industry that are really driving economic success and
employment. I say to the people of the province, we're working hard to ensure
that we continue to grow the economy, we continue to add jobs. As the Premier
said the other day in the House, Mr. Speaker, we're seeing nine months of
consecutive employment growth.
Now, if
you look back from what was projected under the former Progressive Conservative
government, that wasn't going to happen. It was because of this extra effort and
extra diligence, I say, Mr. Speaker, on the oil and gas and the mining industry
that we're seeing this.
I want
to thank the great people of St. John's West for the opportunity to represent
them and to work hard for them, Mr. Speaker. We've done a lot in the district.
Of course, the extension of the Team Gushue Highway has finally been completed
that runs the length of my district. We've brought some employment opportunities
for people in the district. We most recently announced some announcements in
child care in the district.
I know
that I attend a lot of the events at many of the community centres in the
district and I'm very, very happy to do so and to continue to drive both the
opportunities for the people of St. John's West in our economy but also to help
them with both housing and ensuring effective health care and ensuring effective
transportation, ensuring that we have the money to reinvest in our economy and
that's driven by a lot of what we do in the Department of Natural Resources.
I thank
you for the opportunity today to speak to the event.
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Are there further speakers to
the Address in Reply?
The hon.
the Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development.
MR. HAWKINS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's
certainly my pleasure to stand in this House in response to the Throne Speech
and to make some comments. Of course, as we know, her Honour, the
Lieutenant-Governor, presented such an eloquent Speech from the Throne with the
plan of government going forward for the next year. Certainly, Mr. Speaker, I
count it a real privilege to be able to stand in this House and be in the
presence of the Lieutenant-Governor as she presented the Throne Speech.
Mr.
Speaker, it's also my real pleasure to represent the beautiful people in my
District of Grand Falls-Windsor - Buchans. I count it a real honour every time
that I stand in his hon. House because if it had not been for the wonderful
people of my district, I would not have had this opportunity. Everyday I reflect
upon that and say a huge thank you to all of them for making this possible.
I know,
Mr. Speaker, in the last 3½ years, I've worked hard on behalf of my constituents
to ensure that their voice has been heard and their concerns have been
addressed. We've been fairly successful in being able to address some of the
issues that have been prevalent in my district.
Mr.
Speaker, as you know, of course, I've taken a number of opportunities to talk
about the people in my district. I realize, and I've said this before, that my
district has been somewhat hard hit over the years. As you know, in 2009, March
31, 2009, a very dark day for the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor when Abitibi
closed its doors and over 700 people were impacted. We know the impact of that,
Mr. Speaker. Then just roll forward a few more years into 2015 when Duck Pond in
the Millertown-Buchans area, they closed and another additional 365 people were
unemployed.
Mr.
Speaker, where we are today in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, in Buchans and
in the Badger area, in the Central area, Millertown and Buchans Junction, talks
of the resilience of the people in the area. Many people could have looked at
the glass as half empty, but, thank goodness, most people look at the glass as
half full. As a result, we've been able to rebound. Our economy is growing and
it's been my real privilege over the last four years to look at some of the
significant investments that we've made in my district.
Of
course, most of it, Mr. Speaker, is in relation to the infrastructure, a lot of
the infrastructure having to do with roads. I refer to the Buchans Highway. Last
year, we were able to do nine kilometres of road on the Buchans Highway. Mr.
Speaker, we're not there yet; we haven't completed all the work when it comes to
the Buchans Highway. There are still some concerns in that area that I will be
addressing going forward, Mr. Speaker.
The
other areas – we've worked closely with the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor and in
Badger, we've made investments in water and sewer, and, of course, as well in
the Town of Millertown. A very small picturesque town that has a very vibrant
council, a very small council in that, Mr. Speaker, but yet very energetic. It
was my pleasure just a few weeks ago to be able to go to Millertown where we had
a meeting about the remains of the Beothuks and where it should be; a town hall
meeting that was very, very productive, that was organized by the council in
Millertown.
These
are just some areas, Mr. Speaker, that I think the members of my councils within
my district are making significant progress.
One of
the other areas that I think – it's not unique in Newfoundland and Labrador but
certainly I'm proud of in my district is that the towns work in partnership.
When I say that, there are a lot of opportunities happening there, particularly
in the history. It was also my real pleasure to work with the Heritage Society
in Grand Falls-Windsor. As you know, Mr. Speaker, over a hundred years of
history in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, going back to the pulp and paper
mill, and that history, the memorabilia, a lot of the information, even right
from every single Advertiser that was
printed in the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor, was sitting in a very, very small
area.
So I was
able to work with my government to be able to provide, for the Heritage Society,
a new home that they are so proudly working on now to make it to a situation
where they will have, for many years to come, a home whereby they can display
all of the memorabilia that belong to the Abitibi paper mill, and really, not
only the paper mill, but also the entire history of the town and the surrounding
areas.
There's
a lot of pride and there's a lot of interest in ensuring that we do diversify
our economy. I've worked closely with the EXCITE Corporation and with the Town
of Grand Falls-Windsor, and with the investment into research. Research in Grand
Falls-Windsor and the EXCITE Corp is actually on the cutting edge of research,
really in Canada, and the partnerships that have been built there, and I am so
proud of that. So, I will continue to lobby on behalf of my constituents, and
certainly look forward to serving my constituents again.
Mr.
Speaker, just a couple of more references. This of course, as you know, is
Volunteer Week, and without volunteers, really our communities would not
survive, they would not exist, and I just want to make reference of a couple. I
had the opportunity and the privilege of attending the Kiwanis Music Festival
last Friday night, the highlights, the stars of the festival, and that's a very
successful festival, but it is only possible because there are literally
hundreds of volunteers that make it possible. Last week we had participants
right across the Central Newfoundland area, from Springdale to Lewisporte and
down the Connaigre Peninsula.
Every
year our young people come to Grand Falls-Windsor and participate in the Kiwanis
Music Festival, and really that has been the beginning of many of our young
musicians going on to university to become music teachers and have a career in
the music. So, it's very, very important for all of us and for the Music
Festival.
Mr.
Speaker, I want to speak, as well, when we talk about volunteers, my pride and
my joy is the Grand Falls-Windsor Cataracts. I'm been a Cataracts fan all my
life and, as you know, they are now involved in the Herder finals against the
Southern Shore Breakers. And I had the opportunity a few weeks ago to travel to
Mobile for hockey game between the Clarenville Caribous and the Southern Shore
Breakers.
AN HON. MEMBER:
Hear, hear!
MR. HAWKINS:
Thank you, my hon. Member.
Last
weekend I had the opportunity to go to the Jack Byrne Arena in the beautiful
District of Cape St. Francis. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, my colleague was
there as well, two great hockey games and I'm looking forward to this weekend
returning back to Grand Falls-Windsor and looking forward to the Grand Falls
Cataracts and the Southern Shore Breakers. I know where my bias is at, but I
just want to say thank you to all of them because it's very important that
behind both of those teams and every team that's in the province are dedicated
volunteers who give of their time, that really get out there, raise money, they
sell tickets, there are 50/50 draws, they do all kinds of things that are
happening to make it possible.
While
I'm cheering and pulling for the Cataracts, I know that in order for the
Southern Shore Breakers to make this trip this weekend as well, Mr. Speaker,
that it could only be possible with the volunteers, from the coaches to
everybody else that is involved. I just want to say that because I think it's
important from time to time that we recognize all the work that our volunteers
give to our communities.
Mr.
Speaker, for me, this has been an interesting year in a number of portfolios
from Advanced Education, Skills and Labour to Education and Early Childhood
Development, and the transition between two of those portfolios has been an
education in itself. There are many challenges that we face from time to time
and I think it's important that we do that and we face it and we embrace it.
One of
the things that I really wanted to make reference to, of course, over the last
number of weeks, we're looking at changing the Schools Act. The Schools Act is
somewhat outdated. I think the last time it was changed was 1997. We've gone out
for consultations with the general public and we have heard back, and the
consultations from the general public have now concluded and we are meeting one
on one with the stakeholders. We will have those conversations looking for
feedback.
Mr.
Speaker, the early indications are that there are a number of areas that parents
are concerned about and areas that we look at, whether it's inclusive education,
we're looking at better opportunities for our children and addressing some of
these needs. So all of these things will be taken into consideration. Once we
complete our one-on-one consultations with our stakeholders, then obviously I'm
looking forward to a new Schools Act.
One of
the other things that we've been looking at, and consultations are still ongoing
with a tremendous response from the general public and response from different
stakeholders, is in the implementation of junior kindergarten. As you know, the
education task force was one of the recommendations that we would look at and we
would do consultations for implementation.
Mr.
Speaker, so far, initially, there are varying ideas of how implementation of the
junior kindergarten should happen, what the model should be, who should be
delivering it, how it should be delivered. So consultation is an absolute,
tremendous opportunity for whoever, the general public, special interest groups,
stakeholders to have an input in how you would go about implementing such a
program.
I'm
continually looking forward to seeing some more direct ideas on what we're
looking at in the junior kindergarten. Mr. Speaker, that leads me to a couple of
other points I just wanted to make and one of them is that I think it was
brilliant of the Premier when he wanted to put together a Premier's task force
on education. It was certainly something that I think was very important and it
has certainly led to a tremendous amount of work on behalf of the task force, an
independent task force, that really looked at the education from a somewhat a
different perspective. Did they come back with everything new? No, Mr. Speaker,
they didn't. There were some of the things that were taken from previous task
forces.
One of
the things that impressed me was the fact that last July when we looked at the
Education Action Plan, I was really so pleased that the Premier was adamant that
there are 82 recommendations in that Education Action Plan, and that he wanted
to see all 82 of those recommendations implemented. I think that says a lot –
and I'm not pointing any fingers at anybody – but over the years many times we
have a tendency to have a report done, to have put a plan in place, and a lot of
times it just sits there and collects dust and never really anything gets done
about it.
So I was
so pleased and so happy when the Premier gave me the direction and said that one
of the things that, as minister you have to ensure, that the Education Action
Plan, the recommendations are implemented. Mr. Speaker, in such a very, very
short time we have over half of the recommendations already implemented, and we
do have some short-, medium- and long-term plans. So we are on track for the
implementation of all of these recommendations.
Mr.
Speaker, there's a tremendous number of areas within this Education Action Plan
that really speaks to improving resources within the education system. And one
of them is – and I'm not going to go through the details of it, but realizing,
in three years, there will be over 350 additional resources added to the
education system. These are additional. They include specialists in reading and
math, and they include teacher learning assistants, they include librarians and
they include English as a second language. So, we are adding resources.
This is
very important. Last year we did 40 schools, phase one. The results and the
feedback that I'm given, and I've had the opportunity to visit many of these
phase one schools, has been overwhelming, and talking to the teachers and
administrators that are in these schools, very, very positive.
Mr.
Speaker, very shortly the school board will now announce the 40 schools in the
phase two. As you know from the Education Action Plan, beyond year two, in year
three, all of the remaining schools will be included. This is a very important
direction that we're taking in education to ensure that our students are given
every opportunity and making sure that resources are available.
One of
the other areas that we looked at, because mathematics is certainly a focus area
– literacy and numeracy is so very important in our education system. One of the
things that we looked at, mathematics, particularly in K-to-three, K-to-six area
and looking at providing resources.
I saw a
couple of comments – I don't have them with me today, but a couple of teachers
that responded, have done the bursaries that we make available. We make
available bursaries to teachers – not to students, to teachers – to improve and
to look at other methodologies within teaching math, and improving their
professionalism.
So
today, I had some very, very positive comments that came from teachers that have
already taken the course, that have already taken advantage of the bursaries,
and a very, very positive feedback. They're excited, and in their correspondence
to me they wanted me to share with other teachers to encourage as many teachers
as possible to take advantage of these bursaries. These are just a tip of the
iceberg on what we're doing in education. I know my time is just about gone, but
I could take an hour and talk about the improvements were making in the early
childhood educators and all of the measures we're putting in place to improve
that.
The
bottom line in all of this is that we want to ensure that when we implement
these recommendations, when we put in place new measures, when we put in place
new resources, we need to have performance measurements that would tell us that
what we're doing is making a difference. There are a number of areas or
resources that we have provided to our K-to-three schools and to the teachers
and to the students that we are beginning to see we're beginning to make a
difference, and we're beginning to see improvements within our school system,
and our students are benefiting, and will benefit from the measures that we've
taken as a province, and we will continue to invest in our young people.
These
are really our future, and we really want to make sure that our young people
have the best possible education, and that they have the resources that are
necessary for them, not only to be productive citizens in their community but
also be able to give back to their communities and be able to give back to the
province as a whole.
So, Mr.
Speaker, I just want to say thank you for giving me this opportunity today to
speak and to highlight just a small portion of what we have done as a
government, and we will continue to do. I'm really looking forward and I'm
really enthusiastic about where we're heading and the direction that we're
giving and the direction that we'll move forward to as we improve our education
system for our students.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER:
Thank you.
Is the
Member for Harbour Grace - Port de Grave speaking on a point of order?
MS. P. PARSONS:
No, I was popping up to speak
next.
MR. SPEAKER:
You've already spoken to this
motion.
My
records show you –
MS. P. PARSONS:
I have, but I am willing –
MS. COADY:
(Inaudible) Address in Reply?
MS. P. PARSONS:
Was that Address in Reply?
MS. COADY:
If you have spoken, you
cannot speak again.
MS. P. PARSONS:
Oh, well, if my assistance is
needed, I'll gladly stand up and speak again.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
You're not able to speak
again, though.
The hon.
the Minister of Tourism, Culture, Industry and Innovation.
MR. MITCHELMORE:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It's a
great opportunity to get to stand here and speak to Address in Reply from the
Speech from the Throne, because there are so many great things happening in the
economy and what our government has been doing to create jobs and stimulate the
economy here in Newfoundland and Labrador.
I had
the pleasure yesterday to be with the Premier in my District of St. Barbe -
L'Anse aux Meadows in St. Anthony and he had addressed the Chamber of Commerce,
and a number of business people there were asking a series of questions, things
around our immigration plan and how we can continue to look at gaining
specialists and the various supports that are needed from the service industry
and hospitality, all the way up to specialists in health care. We had numerous
dialogues.
But
there's great economic potential, Mr. Speaker, in St. Anthony, with the Great
Northern Port development in Crémaillère Harbour. And it excites me when people
have a long-term vision of being able to look at something that will develop
over quite a number of years that can lead to significant job growth. To be able
to have a supply base and service area for international and shipping through
the Northwest Passage, because St. Anthony and area on the Northern Peninsula,
we're very strategically located, and it presents tremendous opportunity to
capitalize.
We
already have the second-largest international containerized shipping port. So it
was really positive to hear our Premier and hear government affirm our support
for advancing projects such as the Great Northern Port because of the economic
development that it can bring. Obviously, it has to go through an appropriate
due diligence process, and that matter is certainly unfolding.
Mr.
Speaker, when we look at the economic potential and we see the growth that's
happening in areas such as the tourism sector, coming up the Great Northern
Peninsula through Gros Morne National Park, we're seeing an investment in the
Cow Head Gros Morne Theatre. That's upwards of close to a $10 million
investment, and that's bringing people further north at Cow Head. They'll
continue to go from one UNESCO to another UNESCO in L'Anse aux Meadows and then
across to Labrador on a brand new ferry that has greater capacity and that can
take more tour buses.
I've
talked to accommodators on both sides on the Great Northern Peninsula, and in
Labrador, and they're very excited about the bookings that they have and the
number of visitors that are coming this season to go to Red Bay to see places
like Battle Harbour, or to go to L'Anse aux Meadows and see what's happening at
St. Anthony and the various festivals. The icebergs and whales that we are
absolutely phenomenal.
We've
seen new businesses start. As the province's Minister of Tourism, we've seen
where there's been significant job growth in that sector, not just on the Great
Northern Peninsula and in Labrador but all across this province. In 2016, when
the Exit Survey was done, it had shown that the sector had grown from 18,000
jobs to 20,000 today. That is very exciting, and we have over 2,800 businesses
involved in that industry.
As we
navigate and we look at our opportunities, Mr. Speaker, I was very pleased to
see today in the news that because of the Comprehensive Economic Trade
Agreement, we've known as CETA, something that I've certainly championed since
I've been in this House since 2011, to see the benefits of what CETA can bring
with the removal of seafood tariffs and we're certainly seeing that now.
On the
Great Northern Peninsula, in my district where there are four shrimp plant
operations, today it was announced that more industrial shrimp product will be
landed at these processing facilities; places like Black Duck Cove will see more
product. Quinlan were out highlighting their investment. Ocean Choice
International are highlighting that they're going to be able to create more work
in Port au Choix and that is going to have a tremendous trickle-down impact on
workers locally here on the Great Northern Peninsula, so that's very positive.
The fact
that the crab quotas had not declined as predicted and that there was a 1 per
cent decrease in 3K, with the higher price, this is certainly positive to see
that there will be more landed value from this particular resource. The fishery
is the backbone of our economy. Newfoundland and Labrador has Canada's largest
ocean economy. We have 37,000 people employed in the sector, whether it's in oil
and gas, whether it's in aquaculture, in fishery, and in supply and shipping and
transportation. And we have been working together through our various sector
work plans as part of The Way Forward
with the Minister of Natural Resources, with the Minister of Fisheries and Land
Resources, and various other plans that have come forward. We're starting to see
significant opportunities take place.
Mr.
Speaker, health care is so important. Yesterday when I flew up to St. Anthony, I
was sitting next to an individual and he came with his spouse and three kids.
They are coming to St. Anthony for a period of three years, hopefully longer.
But this is a specialist, an eye specialist, an ophthalmologist. We haven't had
that service in St. Anthony for a very long time.
A very
good social enterprise, St. Anthony Basin Resources Inc., purchased specialised
equipment a couple of years ago. So when people with our aging population and
demographic on the Great Northern Peninsula and Southern Labrador – and I
anticipate that we will see this specialist either travel, or residents in
Labrador come to St. Anthony to utilize and avail of this service because of the
distance and because of the opportunity for wait-list and access to service that
as people have cataracts and need those specialized services, they will get them
because the health authority has hired this specialist.
They
recently hired an audiologist. They have a pediatrician coming, another
anaesthetist. There are a significant amount of surgeons and offerings at St.
Anthony hospital, which is really important. I want to acknowledge the work
that's being done by the employees at Labrador-Grenfell Health, all the staff,
from the front line all the way to the top. Because one thing that we've seen in
the Labrador-Grenfell Health authority is that it's seen a lot of change. You
had a CEO that was serving in a part-time capacity, and then you had an acting
CEO before the new incumbent CEO. The new incumbent CEO has taken a significant
approach to community engagement, to listening, to seeing what the needs are.
And we're seeing a return on that by listening to people – that is so important.
We had a
health forum and we talked about recruitment and retention, we talked about how
we can engage and make sure that once these specialists come that they feel
welcomed in the community, that they know about all the services and great
volunteer groups and all the offerings that are available so that they'll want
to stay longer. We've had significant success in St. Anthony and area where
doctors and specialists spent decades. And they're our biggest ambassadors. That
is phenomenal.
Yesterday, the Premier had announced eight additional long-term care beds at
Charles S. Curtis Memorial Hospital. That is really a great step in terms of
helping to address the long-term care needs of the region. But we still have a
lot more to do when we look at the housing needs. Our government, working with
the federal government, invested in 10 affordable housing units in St. Anthony,
but we had also been working with St. Anthony Basin Resources to look at other
housing mixes.
Then if
you look at the John M. Gray and the protective care unit that is there, there
have been recent upgrades in terms of artistic endeavours of murals to stimulate
and provide a more inviting experience, and that is important to the people, the
residents who are living in the protected care unit.
My
vision would be to see dementia or protective care bungalows, like they have in
other parts of the province, like in Bonavista and Clarenville so that these
people can have a higher quality of living and have a more supported
environment. We all know that the changes of residents and complexities change
for care needs. Because when the John M. Gray Centre was built, it was built 20
years ago and we certainly know that things are changing.
We have
a home first support program. We've just announced that there will be two PCA
positions to help with those complex care cases so that people can stay in their
homes longer. But we also look at opportunities to be more innovative when it
comes to health care. The Minister of Health and Community Services has embraced
Hacking Health and how we bring that level of innovation, how we get into more
telemedicine, how we unlock the potential of all of our health resources,
whether it's through primary health care teams, which was also announced in St.
Anthony.
We have
smaller centres, like the White Bay Central Health Centre, which is more than
150 kilometres away. There are opportunities to look at housing supports there
as well, as I've raised in this House previously.
We must
continue to be working on the opportunities where we can unlock potential, where
we can find collaboration and growth. The Town of Port Saunders, for example,
they've created a community centre in their town building. They shut down two of
their other operations, their buildings, and they're working on another, to
bring all their stakeholders under one roof. That is leading to them to have
other opportunities.
They not
only added a youth centre for the youth, this is a community that has vision
because they're investing in their youth. They also been able to attain the
SEDLER community support program that will have a satellite office there to help
people with disabilities provide employment supports and services. These are
important investments.
Investments in basic infrastructure are so critical, Mr. Speaker. I have over
650 kilometres of road in the district and if you look at the amount of roadwork
–
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Oh, oh!
MR. SPEAKER:
Order, please!
MR. MITCHELMORE:
– that has been able to be
done through having a vision of a five-year Roads Plan, where you can plan and
do more work, bundle work and partner with municipalities.
We've
seen investment done in Port aux Choix, which had a really terrible roads. Now,
since they have done that road, we've seen where the tourism numbers, through
Canada 150 and the advertising at the National Historic Site, they've seen an
increase of 60 per cent and they maintain that. They were, I believe, the only
site in the country that maintained their momentum after Canada's 150th birthday
with a 60 per cent increase. That shows that there is momentum in terms of
numbers coming into this community. They've embraced it; they're partnering.
We're
seeing where investment is being made in brush-side road cutting in terms of
River of Ponds to the Eddies Cove area, the Plum Point area, and going to St.
Anthony; you have a much safer highway. We've seen significant investment, Mr.
Speaker, on Route 430 this year, and there will be a multi-year plan to see that
paved.
We also
saw investment where, for the first time in the history of this province in 50
years, this is certainly something I've advocated for for quite some time and
I'm proud to be part of a government that's delivering on paving Route 434, the
road to Conche. Last year, saw eight kilometres, there will be additional
roadwork this year and next year it'll see completion. We also paved the road
going to Englee and the Roddickton area to see significant upgrades, and the
road to L'Anse aux Meadows going to a UNESCO World Heritage site.
These
are critical and substantial investments. It frustrates me because the former
administration had significant amounts of money, but the Auditor General's
report was very clear that MHAs, at the time, put forward their priorities and
that sometimes wasn't in the best interest. There was politics at play and
didn't get the significant amount of roadwork done.
We are
seeing results through our approach and our plan where roads that should have
been done years ago are getting addressed and we'll continue with the momentum,
Mr. Speaker.
The
forest sector has great opportunity on the Great Northern Peninsula and we've
seen where permits – this has been a discussion in this House of Assembly – have
been issued; there are private contractors. We already have a small sawmill in
Main Brook, but we would love to see a sawmill operational in Roddickton that
would also do value-added product. There is that opportunity to do so. The same
way with how a proponent is looking to move through a process to get to
financial close and to lead to a significant investment in the area.
We
certainly have not given up on the forest sector, Mr. Speaker, whereas the
Members opposite have. They invested $13 million and short-changed the people of
Roddickton-Bide Arm and area, having them believe that this would be able to
come to fruition and create jobs in their economy. It certainly didn't do that.
They've seen where the mills have closed in Grand Falls-Windsor under their
watch, and in Stephenville. We actually have a forestry sector action plan,
we're focusing on the sectors.
For an
administration previously, the PC administration, they talked about it. Even the
Acting Opposition House Leader had talked about their overspending that had
happened, that maybe they were a little too fluid in terms of how they kept
spending and spending and spending.
We've
had to make sure that the decisions that we make are prudent, that they're
working in the best interests of the people of the province, and not just focus
on one resource in terms of the oil economy and a hundred-dollar-a-barrel oil.
We focused on our mining assets, that's why we have the vision mining 2030.
We've seen where new mines in Gander and in the Glenwood area, the Antimony
Mine, we've seen these investments happening where they're being reactivated.
There's prospectivity on the Great Northern Peninsula, and I'm so pleased by
that.
I'm
pleased by the multi-year and the significant historic infrastructure plan for
municipalities, for local service districts, for community, for water and sewer
projects that will improve a better quality of life.
For a
government that's not just focusing on one commodity, oil, but focusing on
aquaculture, on the fishery, focusing on technology, focusing on all sectors, on
tourism and cultural industries, these are significantly important. On
modernizing our College of the North Atlantics throughout this province because
we must focus on everybody, from beginning, at a youthful age, to make sure that
they are invested in. That's why the Premier started the Education task force,
and it has the recommendations. They're looking at junior kindergarten and
seeking feedback. We implemented all-day kindergarten. We're adding resources
for inclusive education.
We've
done significant work when it comes to mental health and addictions and
Health-in-All-Policies. There is so much, Mr. Speaker.
The time
that I have is quite small, but the vision that's been put forward by this
government is significant. We are making a difference in an urban economy, in
rural economies, in Labrador, and internationally. Our companies are going
global. We're seeing them scale up. We're seeing where we'll be able to compete
with the best of the best, because we're investing in our youth. We've done
investments in coding. And that was another aspect of the task force on
education. We want to challenge our youth. We want them to be tomorrow's
innovators and problem solvers. They may not all be software engineers, but they
will use this skill set to take them through whatever career field they want to
do with the rest of their lives.
That's
why we continue to invest in Memorial University, the Marine Institute. We made
a significant announcement in our ocean sector today of collectively, from the
provincial government through Natural Resources and TCII, $3.5 million, with the
federal government, $8.5 million, to see more than $20 million invested to see
the next phase of the Holyrood Marine Base. That's going to continue to solidify
us as an ocean leader, because we are the leader in the ocean economy.
Newfoundland and Labrador has Canada's largest ocean economy – 37,000 people
employed, and over 50 per cent of all of our exports it accounts for.
There
are great things happening in Newfoundland and Labrador, and I've never been
more pleased to be part of a team that is delivering and making sure that we
have a mental health facility here in our province to replace the Waterford. The
Minister of Justice and Public Safety has announced a plan and investment to
replace the prison, Her Majesty's Penitentiary. We all know that these are
important investments for the people of the province and for the future as we
move forward in Newfoundland and Labrador.
So, Mr.
Speaker, it's certainly been a pleasure to hear the Speech from the Throne, to
hear the vision of government, of our Premier and leader, and the approach that
is taken on consulting, listening, being out in community.
For me,
I've taken that time over the last eight years to be in every community in
Newfoundland and Labrador, with the exception of La Poile. And I keep saying to
the Minister of Justice and Public Safety it's a place I must get to, I must see
it, because everywhere in Newfoundland and Labrador there is opportunity, we
must all get out there, go there and see it and unlock that great potential,
because there's so much we can do, but we have to do it together.
Thank
you, Mr. Speaker.
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Hear, hear!
MR. SPEAKER (Warr):
Thank you.
The hon.
the Government House Leader.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I'm
going to adjourn debate on Address in Reply. At this time I would move, seconded
by the Minister of Natural Resources, that the House do now adjourn.
MR. SPEAKER:
It is moved and seconded that
this House do now adjourn.
Is it
the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
This
House stands adjourned until Monday, April 15, at 1:30 o'clock.
On
motion, the House at its rising adjourned until tomorrow, Monday, at 1:30
o'clock.