December 9, 2008          HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS          Vol. XLVI   No. 47


The House met at 1: 30 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): Order, please!

Admit strangers.

Statements by Members

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Today we will hear the following members' statements: the hon. the Member for the District of Cartwright–L'Anse au Clair; the hon. the Member for the District of Topsail; the hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave; the hon. the Member for the District of Mount Pearl North; and, the hon. the Member for the District of Bellevue.

The hon. the Member for the District of Topsail.

MS E. MARSHALL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in this hon. House today to congratulate a resident of Topsail District.

Mr. Speaker, on October 25, 2008, the Mount Pearl Chamber of Commerce announced the recipient of the tenth annual Mount Pearl Best in Business Awards. In particular, the Mount Pearl Chamber of Commerce has created a Premier's Award to recognize outstanding achievements and contributions made by small business, and this year's recipient was Dallas Mercer Consulting.

Mr. Speaker, Dallas, who is a native of Harbour Grace, established their business in 2002 after recognizing that employers have an important role to play in the disability management process. Over the past six years, Dallas' business has grown to include her own office building, a staff of ten employees, and a fully equipped training centre where courses are offered on a regular basis.

Mr. Speaker, she provides clients in all provinces of Atlantic Canada and the Province of Alberta with a variety of services, including disability management, return to work support, appeals representation and training.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of the hon. House to join me in congratulating Ms Dallas Mercer, recognizing her achievements and the contribution she is making as a member of the business community of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Burgeo & LaPoile

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

I rise today to recognize local excellence in international student competitive debating.

Team Canada Debate is a group of nine high school students from across Canada selected for their exceptional abilities and skills in debating and speaking at international tournaments.

This year, we are proud to have two members from our Province on Team Canada: Jonathon Lomond and Sam Greene, both of St. John's. Just earning a spot on this team is a remarkable achievement and shows their level of dedication and skill.

Earlier this year, both of these students travelled to the Pan-American Championships in Peru, which saw Canada dominate. Sam Greene place first as an individual, and Canada won the event overall.

In September, Sam represented Canada at the World Championships. Canada was defeated in the quarter-finals, but Sam placed sixth overall as an individual.

In February, Sam will be travelling to Athens, Greece, to represent Canada at another World Championship.

Jonathon Lomond has just returned from an international debating competition in the central European republic of Slovenia. Not only did Canada win this event, but Jonathon Lomond placed first overall as an individual debater, the only undefeated competitor at the tournament.

This week, Sam Greene and another local and skilled debater, Samuel Fitz-Tate, represented Holy Heart of Mary High School and won the North American high school debate championships.

I would like to congratulate all these students and their coach, Simon Lono, who has acted as provincial debate coach and director of provincial debate operations for almost twenty years.

Thank you.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise in this hon. House today to congratulate the winners of the 2008 Mount Pearl Chamber of Commerce Best in Business Awards.

The tenth annual Best in Business Awards banquet was recently held at the Reid Community Centre in Mount Pearl, and recognized businesses and business owners alike for their dedication and commitment to the community at large.

Mr. Speaker, this year's nominees and winners are corporate leaders in the community, and I would like to take this time to congratulate them. In particular, congratulations to Dallas Mercer Consulting, who won the Premier's Award; Gladys Dunne Law Office, President's Award; H.J. Bartlett Electric, Community Commitment Member of the Year Award; Naturally Newfoundland, Youth Entrepreneur of the Year Award; A&W, Commonwealth Foods Limited, Employment Equity Merit Award; and, TD Canada Trust, Business Environmental Achievement Award.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of this House to join me in congratulating the winners of the 2008 Best in Business Awards, as well as the Mount Pearl Chamber of Commerce for hosting this wonderful event. Special thanks to the organizers and volunteers who make this annual event possible.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. BUTLER: Mr. Speaker, on Friday evening I was honoured to join hundreds of other residents in the official opening of the Bay Roberts eleventh annual Festival of Lights for 2008.

The evening began with an illumination parade to the Wilbur Sparkes Recreation Complex. Members of the special events committee and the councillors for the town served hot chocolate and treats to all those in attendance.

The highlight of the celebrations was the lighting of the Christmas tree and the award-winning illumination park. The Christmas illumination park was a first for this Province and won an award in the national competition last year.

Mr. Speaker, daily, from 4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. additional displays can be observed this Christmas season. For those visiting the site, all you have to do is just turn your radio to 88.5 FM and listen to twenty, minute songs of the season which are synchronized with the lights, a must for all to see.


Mr. Speaker, I join Mayor Littlejohn and the councillors in saying thank you to the special events committee and the sponsors for a tremendous job in presenting Festival of Lights 2008.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MR. PEACH: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise here in this great House today to tell you of six students from the Swift Current Academy who partnered with FFAW, DFO and DFA, and who conducted a field lab study collecting information which will assist in the controlling of the green crab population in Placentia Bay.

These six students are: Janell Maye, Victoria Smith, Neil Crocker, Codey Upshall, CJ Hickey and Cody Stacey.

These students were given the task to find the answers to the following questions: How many? Where are they? What are they doing? What are they eating? What is the effect on the environment? Are the numbers increasing? Are they spreading in other areas? How are they spreading?

Their research took place over the 2007 and 2008 fishing season, taking in thirteen fishing communities within Placentia Bay. These students were part of the presentation that the hon. Minister of Fisheries and myself attended on Wednesday, December 3, 2008 in Swift Current, along with members of DFO, FFAW, DFA, families and teachers.

It is the research of these students which will assist in the conservation of the shellfish fishery and improve the habitat and vegetation in the areas that green crab exist, in Placentia Bay.

I ask that this great House join me in congratulating the six students of Swift Current Academy in a job well done.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Statements by Ministers.

Statements by Ministers

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, advancing technology, especially to benefit rural areas of the Province, is a goal of the provincial government. The Internet and the World Wide Web open up a new learning dynamic as people can study anywhere on the planet.


I am pleased to inform this hon. House that due to an investment of $1.5 million in distance learning at Memorial University last year, enrolment has increased significantly. For the fall 2008 semester, collective distance education registrations have increased 13.1 per cent since 2007. Undergraduate registrations are up 12.8 per cent, while graduate registrations have grown by 15.6 per cent. The most significant growth was seen in the science faculty, with an increase in undergraduate registrations of 41.1 per cent.

Mr. Speaker, this funding has allowed the university to fast track course development. Full undergraduate degrees are now available in business, arts, police studies, nursing, technology and maritime studies. Graduate programs are now available in physical education, nursing and education. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the masters in physical education is the first on-line graduate program in physical education in Canada.

A fundamental belief of this government is accessible, equitable education. We believe that students deserve a quality education, regardless of where they live in Newfoundland and Labrador. At the K-12 level, we have increased funding to the Centre for Distance Learning and Innovation by $1.6 million this year. This funding is improving the distance education experience for students. Thirty-six distance education high school courses are now offered at 109 schools, which represent 80 per cent of all senior high schools in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, advances in distance learning technologies have opened a whole new world to the students of today compared to our generation – technologies that make distance education a truly interactive experience. This is evident in the performance of our CDLI students. I am pleased to report, Mr. Speaker, that these students are achieving scores in key subject areas such as math, language arts and the sciences, that are equal to or even higher than those in regular high school classes.

With these investments, Mr. Speaker, we are taking courses to the students. As the increase in enrolments clearly indicates, students throughout Newfoundland and Labrador have the desire to take advantage of every opportunity available, and this has spurred the growth of distance learning.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. BUTLER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I want to thank the minister for an advanced copy of her statement and to say that we are pleased to see that government is still investing money into the various school programs and at the university.

It is a known fact, Mr. Speaker, for the past thirty years Memorial University has demonstrated a record in leadership in distance education. The first courses using e-mail were introduced back in 1988 and on-line courses were introduced in 1994. So it is good to see that funding is still going forward to this great institution to continue on with distance education. As the minister in her statement has said, it is also being advanced throughout the Province now from K-12 and that is a great thing for all the students in our Province, and any money that can go into education to assist our students is welcome news.

The only thing, Mr. Speaker, I would like to add, is that I know there are still some communities in areas of rural Newfoundland that are having difficulty and some don't have high-speed Internet. So, hopefully down the road this will be corrected. I know there are more of them being hooked up to the Internet system, but, Mr. Speaker, overall we support this initiative.

Thank you very much.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

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

I, too, thank the minister for an advanced copy of her statement. Yes, I am very pleased to see the improvement in the access to distance learning. It is an extremely important program to have in place, especially as the numbers of children in rural Newfoundland are going down, and they cannot access high school where they are living without the distance learning.

I do think it is very important though that the government accelerate funding into distance learning so that students have equal access to distance learning through high-speed –

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair is having great difficulty hearing the hon. Member for the District of Signal Hill – Quidi Vidi. I ask members for their co-operation.

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

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

I was having difficulty hearing myself, so I appreciate your intervention.

As I was saying, I really encourage the government to put more money into the resources that are needed for distance learning so that rural students have equal access to high-speed Internet in order to be able to benefit from distance learning.

There is also a point, too, I want to make, Mr. Speaker. While distance learning is really important and in subjects like math and sciences and language arts students can learn well, there is also the issue of interaction in classrooms and, as the university does, students come together at different points in their distance learning to also spend time together in the masters programs and I do not think we can underestimate the benefit of students being together in a classroom.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

The hon. the Minister of Business.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ORAM: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, on November 14 and 15, the College of the North Atlantic held its third annual Business Case Competition in Grand Falls–Windsor.

Taking part this year were eight teams of business students and their coaches from campuses across the Province, including, for the first time, a "virtual campus" team that participated by distance through the use of technology.

The two-day competition provided the students with a unique and valuable opportunity to test their technical know-how developed in the classroom by analyzing a business issue and putting into practice their skills and knowledge of accounting, marketing, and HR management in a real-world problem-solving exercise.

Mr. Speaker, this year's case focused on a small business struggling to grow. The teams were handed the case that Friday afternoon and given a deadline of 8:30 the next morning to analyze it and provide a final report for a panel of judges. Each team also prepared a presentation and question and answer session on their findings and recommendations. They worked late into the night and well into the next day identifying the problems, researching, and developing possible solutions for the company.

I was pleased to be invited to speak at the awards banquet where the winners were announced. The team from the Bay St. George campus took bronze; the virtual campus, silver; and winning gold was the Grand Falls-Windsor team of Amy Ballard, Linda Davis, Sarah Kelly, Eun-Jae Yu, and coach Susanne Ivey, who earned the right to travel all the way to Qatar next March to compete in an intercontinental case competition being hosted by the College of the North Atlantic campus in that country. I am sure that it will be a thrill and an honour for them to compete in Qatar.

Mr. Speaker, the energy and effort that the students and coaches put into this competition went well beyond the intensive two-day period. They prepared for several weeks, team building and honing their analytical and presentation skills.

On behalf of hon. members, I want to recognize the College for providing such opportunities for students to apply their skills and gain valuable practical experience. I congratulate the winning team and applaud the professionalism, dedication, and commitment to excellence demonstrated by every student that participated. Mr. Speaker, I know that they will pursue the rest of their education and careers with the same vim and vigour they displayed in the competition, which certainly stands them and our Province in a very good stead.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I appreciate the minister providing us with an advanced copy of his statement. I certainly would condone the program and the competition. I know the students from Port aux Basques campus competed I believe now for a number of years and, in fact, placed last year in the events which were held in central as well. It is a great educational experience. It goes beyond the classroom. The persons that I have spoken to who took part in it, is that they loved the competitive spirit of it. It is done not only team versus team but also amongst themselves as to who can contribute most to the particular enterprise. It has been a great experience, besides the social positive aspects of it, of course, they get to see other campuses. They get to see the level of competition that they face here in this Province and what they are going to see when they get into the workplace. It is a really hands-on type of experience for them, so we would certainly congratulate them, first of all, and in particular the team that is going to be leaving to go to Qatar, and we wish all the best to the program in the future.

Thank you.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement.

I am happy to join with him in congratulating both the College of the North Atlantic as well as all the students who took part in this competition, and especially those who won medals. This is a wonderful experience for them, and it will be multiplied by going to Qatar and taking part in the Intercontinental Case competition.

The college has a good track record when it comes to competitions. Another big one every year, of course, is the Skills Canada competition, which involves students in trades and technology. Again, a competition in which the students of the College of the North Atlantic show how good the programs are that are going on inside our public college system.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers.

Oral Questions.

Oral Questions

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, with the ongoing economic turmoil that is taking place around the world and across the country, we were pleasantly surprised today to learn of the Province's surplus, and that it has increased from $554 million to $1.27 billion.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I only get thirty minutes in Question Period, so I ask they keep the applause short and the answers coming.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, it is indeed good news, especially what you have seen in our Province over the last few months, with the price of oil down and nickel falling. I think everybody in this Province would certainly be pleased to know that we are in the fiscal position that we are today, but what my question is about – earlier the Premier had made statements saying that we were on target in terms of our budgeting and where our surplus was. We certainly were not expecting to see the amount of surplus that is there today.

I am just wondering why the Department of Finance would have forecast that we were on target a few months ago, but yet be showing today that there was a surmountable increase. I am just wondering what occurred in that period of time that would have changed how they forecast their numbers.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, I have indicated certainly over the course of the last month that we expected to exceed our surplus, and that was certainly the case.

Our estimates at the beginning of the year are conservative estimates because we do not want to exceed expectations for the people in the Province. We are very pleasantly surprised and absolutely delighted that we have a surplus which is exemplary right across the country. I think we should stand, as Newfoundland and Labradorians today, and be extremely proud of what we have accomplished.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: We can monitor the price of oil, and we budgeted it at $87. We did have a ramp up; it went up to over $140. Now it is ramped down to $40 - $44 today, I think - however, production is a variable. The year before, production at Terra Nova, if I remember correctly, was down by two or three months, which has a significant impact on the bottom line.

Until you know where you are throughout your production - for example, if Terra Nova went down, or Hibernia went down, that would have a dramatic effect on our numbers. We are never really sure, until we actually get there, exactly what the numbers are going to be because probably the bigger variance is not only the price of oil but also the production of oil. That is why we had to be very careful in our comments. We did certainly indicate that we were going to exceed our surplus.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I ask because we need to have confidence in the numbers that are being released. If there was a shift in the position of what Finance was projecting a few months ago until now, obviously that would be a tremendous concern for us.

In the announcement, the minister also noted that the Province's pension funds are being negatively impacted because of this economic downturn and the slumping financial markets. I would ask today if you can provide me an update on the recent losses in our pension fund, and what impact that will have on a go-forward basis.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As the Leader of the Opposition is aware, in 2006 we paid $1.953 billion into the Teachers' Pension Plan, and a further $982 million into the Public Service Pension Plan 2007, trying to bring these pension plans up to the funding levels of 80 per cent to 85 per cent, which is suggested.

The recent downturn in the economy and what has happened, Mr. Speaker, has resulted in approximately, right now, a shortfall of $1.5 billion in terms of our pension funds. That is not unexpected in light of everything that has gone on, and some of the figures I think I gave last night in terms of losses by the banks.

One figure, though, that becomes important, Mr. Speaker, although we have decreased our debt servicing charges by approximately $200 million, there could be a result in the pension cost next year of an extra $180 million.

At this point there has certainly been a loss, but one that we feel is manageable and that we will keep under control.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The minister cited that infrastructure funding in his economic update is a key factor to helping the economy continue to create jobs and to create activity over the next little while.

In light of what has happened in Grand Falls-Windsor with AbitibiBowater shutting down, the layoffs in Wabush Mines, and the downscaling of other mining sectors in the Province that we are aware of already, I would like to ask the minister: Is government going to put more money into an infrastructure program this year over and above what was contained in the six-year plan of which we are into the third year now?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

 

We are acutely aware of what is taking place in Grand Falls-Windsor and in Wabush, but I think we have to keep in perspective - and I think there was a letter to the editor today from the union in Grand Falls - that AbitibiBowater, this is a process that they have been on to for a while in terms of they were putting no money into the mill, they were looking for a way out. As for the Wabush Mines situation, that is one we are monitoring closely.

It might interest the Leader of the Opposition to know that myself and the Premier met with a number of business people today and we talked about this infrastructure. Essentially what we were told - and these are leading businessmen in this city, or in the Province actually - is that there is nothing further we can put into infrastructure; we do not have the capacity. The $4 billion six-year plan is as much as we can handle right now along with the Vale Inco, Hebron, and then hopefully the Lower Churchill. So we are at capacity, there are not enough workers, and there is simply no way that we can do anything more with infrastructure right now.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I do not really buy that argument when you look at the thousands who are on the way home from Alberta, who are going to be looking for jobs in the next year as well, so you might want to enter that into your calculations.

Mr. Speaker, infrastructure spending is no doubt one of the things that has been cited that is necessary to drive the economy. Last year, the Province committed to $440 million in infrastructure in the last budget. I understand a lot of that money was not spent simply because tenders came in over budget and were not contracted.

Can the minister give me an update today on how much of the $440 million was not spent on the targeted infrastructure that it was allocated for in the last budget?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am looking at my notes, Mr. Speaker. My recollection of last year's budget is that we had budgeted $673 million for infrastructure spending, and in the update today we have indicated there is approximately $500 million that has been spent and we will spend another $1 billion over the next two years.

It is important, and whether or not the – I understand that the Leader of the Opposition does not understand. Nor would I necessarily expect her to. The reality is that this is not artificial spending here. We are not borrowing to spend on infrastructure. We are taking $1 billion and putting into infrastructure.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: What we are doing is we are trying to be cognizant of the cost. We are looking at the fact that sometimes there is only one bid, and we are looking at cost overruns. If contracts cannot proceed because of that, so be it, but we have to be prudent. We have to ensure that we are getting the best value for our dollar, and that is something that we are continually monitoring as a Cabinet, under the guidance of the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I say to the minister, I understand full well and I understand that there was infrastructure money committed in the Budget and announced that has not been spent.

I ask if he can provide an update on what amount of that money still has not been spent in infrastructure in the Province, and if there is any possibility that it will be spent in the next fiscal year?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Mr. Speaker, as I outlined today, if there is one thing that the Liberal Opposition should understand is that when we took office in 2003 the debt stood at $11.5 billion, it is now down to $9.2 billion.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: The deficit, the current deficit at the time was almost a billion dollars. Today we are into surplus for the fourth year in a row. So, it is not a matter of what you think or what you understand, what we are telling you - and you can take it from the economists, you can take it from the accountants - the money is being spent. And, for the information of the Opposition Leader, the year is not over. It does not end until March 31. We will continue to spend money on infrastructure as planned.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

You know, it is actually laughable when you listen to the minister and he talks about how they came into this with a deficit and now we have a surplus. I would like to remind him sometimes where that surplus comes from. Where the royalties come from and from what deals they come from, minister.

Mr. Speaker, in the announcement that was made today there was no stimulus package I guess in terms of support for the resource sectors or the manufacturing sectors in the Province. I understand that they did finally meet with some people in the business community, of which a few days ago they did not seem to think they needed to consult with anyone except the inner circles of government.

I ask the minister today: Is government looking at any specific programs that will help local producers or manufactures to weather the downturn that we are seeing in the economy?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, as the Opposition well knows, we have had a Business Advisory Board in place for I guess the last four years. Is that correct minister?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

PREMIER WILLIAMS: We have met with them on a regular basis and they have kept us informed. They have given us advice, we have listened to that advice, we have acted upon that advice, and we put in place our fiscal and monetary policy as a result of it.

Since then, everybody knows that what we put in place here in order to be in the position that we are in, which is an extremely good position – the Opposition should be up actually lauding the position we are in. We are basically putting lots of money into the infrastructure and creating jobs, reducing debt, lowering taxes, we have funded up our pension funds at a time when they needed to be funded up, what they never thought we could do.

Do you know what is most important? Do you know what I like the most? Barack Obama is listening to what we are doing here.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: That is a great compliment to this Province, because I have a lot of respect for that person. Obama outlines initiatives to create 2.5 million jobs; make public buildings more efficient; repair roads and bridges; modernize schools; increase broadband access –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: He will do it right because we did it right and he can have our (inaudible) any day of the week.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Well, at least we know that the Premier has opportunities for other employment. Maybe he will become the advisor to Mr. Obama or President Obama, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, also today, the minister again gave notice to the public sector unions in this Province that December 31 is a deadline for them to either accept government's wage offer or risk losing a portion of what is currently on the table.

I ask, minister: Why are you arbitrarily choosing a date for these unions to come to the table and to sign a contract, as opposed to going through the appropriate collective bargaining process and work through these issues jointly?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: There is no arbitrary date. December 31 is a very good date; it is the end of the calendar year.

Mr. Speaker, 20 per cent in any day and age is a more than generous wage offer.

PREMIER WILLIAMS: Absolutely.

MR. KENNEDY: Twenty percent compounded over four years is 21.5 per cent. We saw PSAC accept – or they would have been legislated – 6.85 per cent increase. We have seen increases in other provinces. The teachers in Ontario were told to take 12 per cent or the deal would be off the table.

What we have done is we are saying to the unions - and I wrote them a letter on Friday after informing most of them in person that this is the way it is. There is an economic reality to this world; that we will be going into deficit, potentially going into deficit next year. We need to get some economic certainty and labour peace. Now, you can quibble or argue, call it what you like –

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KENNEDY: - over the ands and the ors, but at the end of the day, this package is about money, and 20 per cent is something that we stand by and is more than generous.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to ask the minister why he is not using that same kind of a tactic to negotiate a settlement here, as opposed to arbitrarily pushing the backs of union leaders against the wall.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, after I came into this portfolio I met with all of the union leaders. I have met with a number of the union presidents on numerous occasions, and all but one meeting went well.

So, it is not a matter of arbitrarily imposing our will upon the unions. What we are saying to them is, CUPE accepted this deal back as far as March, I think it was – March or April of last year - that it is there and it is time to either do it or not do it, but it is time.

Now, the 20 per cent is there. I would say if I were in their position, 8 per cent before Christmas would be especially generous. If you want to stimulate the economy, you put 8 per cent into the hands of 38,000 people prior to Christmas and watch what will happen.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Just one final question with regard to the statement on the economy piece. The minister also indicated that they were working with the other Atlantic Premiers, they had identified three infrastructure projects that they felt the federal government should invest in: the Atlantic Gateway, the creation of green energy transmission, and affordable housing.

I ask the minister: Are there other infrastructure initiatives that your government has identified for Newfoundland and Labrador that you will be putting forward to the federal government, asking them to make those investments and to fast-track them at this time?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: If I may speak to that - because the Atlantic Premiers met yesterday in Prince Edward Island, and Minister Skinner represented me at those meetings - the position that we put forward with regard to the Atlantic Gateway is a very comprehensive position, a very well thought through strategy that has been worked through by the previous minister and the current minister, which deals with, first of all, an Oceans Agency for Newfoundland and Labrador.

We think that Newfoundland and Labrador should be the equivalent of the space agency in Canada – the Canadian Space Agency - Newfoundland and Labrador should be the Oceans Agency. A big venture, a big expenditure, it would create a lot of jobs here, put a lot of employment here, but we would be the Canadian leader in that particular area, and hopefully world leader, so we are nicely positioned.

The second piece of the Atlantic Gateway is we are trying to position ourselves as a North Atlantic Gateway, to open us up so that we can get up into the Northwest Passage, the arctic sovereignty issues, in order to service Greenland, Nunavut and Iqaluit, and also to position us from a Canadian perspective so that we are ideally positioned. That would include looking at upgrading the facilities in Happy Valley-Goose Bay and Argentia perhaps. St. Anthony would be another port that would be upgraded. That is part of it.

If I may just have fifteen or twenty seconds, Mr. Speaker, the second piece is the whole transmission. What we are saying is, because the Lower Churchill will not start tomorrow, if we are going to get a piece of this infrastructure money, we would like to get into the transmission side of it. That is a fairly significant capital expenditure. We are saying we should try and build the Atlantic transmission from Labrador to the Maritimes if, in fact, that Maritime route becomes open.

The third piece is affordable housing. We feel affordable housing is a really, really important piece in this Province, so we have launched that.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER WILLIAMS: The penitentiary would be there as well, but if you go in with too big a list you will end up with nothing, so we are trying to prioritize, establish our priorities, and hopefully the Canadian government – I have already spoken to Peter McKay. I spoke to him last Friday for an extensive period of time. Certainly, on the first two items he was very receptive and the other item is a joint exercise from all the Premiers.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

My questions are for the Minister of Justice.

The Department of Justice is responsible for the security of all government information and privacy information in this Province. Yesterday, the department released a report on corrections with redactions, or blacked-out information. The security features used to withhold this potentially sensitive information, including names, was amateurish at best.

I ask the minister - this is the fourth time this year, the fourth breach in this year of private information from government - what assurance do the people of the Province have with regard to the protection of their private information by government?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

We have a law in this Province that we are all bound by; it is called the Access to Information and the Protection of Privacy Act. Under that act it specifies that the people of this Province are entitled to information that government would have involving them, but the act also points out the fact that there are certain situations where we cannot disclose the information. It is mandatory that we do not disclose the information. One of those is when it has to do with the release of privacy information.

When the report, the corrections report, yesterday was put on the Web, unfortunately, through inadvertence, the report was put on in a way that I think one of the media in the city was able to take the report from the Web, cut and paste it, change it to a different format – I am certainly not an expert in this area – and the redacted information became available.

We were advised about that. The officials of the department acted appropriately and quickly to correct the matter. That has now been done. While it was unfortunate, the important thing is that we have the report that is going to lead this Province to bring corrections in this Province into the light after many years and many decades of darkness.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

Whether it is accidental or because somebody tampers, the bottom line is that private information is getting out about people that ought not to be out there. The question is: What are we going to do to ensure in future that it does not happen? It is fine to say we apologize and we are sorry and we took it down, but the fact is people were impacted.

Mr. Speaker, I personally brought this to the attention of the minister yesterday here in the House of Assembly about the potentially private information that was in the possession, not only of the media. The Opposition had a copy of it, the media had it, it is in the public domain, as a result of the Department of Justice's sloppiness, quite frankly. You advised me at that time minister that the information was not to be disclosed. In fact, you gave me a warning not to disclose it here in this House yesterday. Yet, the media had it all over the airwaves yesterday and the supper hour broadcast.

I ask the minister: Have you determined whether it was in fact unlawful for this information to be revealed, and do you intend to pursue any legal remedies for so doing?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker, as I previously said, the information that was put on inadvertently enabled the ‘redactation', if that is a correct word, to be removed. There is - when privacy information is released, if it is disclosed without authorization, there is a sanction contained in the legislation if it is wilfully released without permission. In this course, there was no intent to release the information. It wad done through inadvertence. It was unfortunate. The problem has now been corrected and we will now move forward with this wonderful report. The issue is not some minor computer glitch. The issue is the fact that after decades of darkness this Province is going to pay attention to correcting what is going on in the prisons of this Province, and it is about time.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you.

I guess we will see in the future, Mr. Minister, whether it is a simple case or not. We already know, for example, that government may be facing lawsuits from the fired superintendent and the deputy superintendent as regards to wrongful dismissal suits. Now you have opened yourself up, I would suggest, to a lawsuit from them and others for a breach of their privacy rights.

I ask the minister: What action have you taken since yesterday to ensure appropriate redress is made to these individuals as a result of this breach?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker, the Department of Justice contains a civil litigation division that provides legal advice to government. If any citizen feel that their rights have been somehow breached or impacted by any action of government, they certainly have the right to take whatever action against government they consider appropriate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you.

Minister, we understand having seen some of the information that was blacked out, that some of the blacked out information, in fact, dealt with security issues in some of the institutions around the Province. Obviously, it was blacked out for the reason that you did not want certain individuals, probably inmates, to become aware of it, but I suggest now they are indeed aware of it.

Based upon that, I ask: What has been done, or has any immediate actions been taken, particularly in the Labrador correctional facility and the West Coast correctional facility where two pieces of this blacked out information, I suggest very security sensitive, is now in the public domain? Has any action been taken to ensure that those security risks and life safety issues, in fact, have been removed in those two facilities?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

When my predecessor, the present Minister of Finance, who was the Minister of Justice, announced the fact that the commissioners had been retained, it was clearly announced at that time that all the information would be released, subject to privacy and security concerns. Obviously, the information, through inadvertence, was released through the media. I understand the Liberal Opposition also was able to do the same thing and get the information. The information should not be disclosed.

Anyone who introduces privacy information that should not be put out, while they are not governed by ATIPP, as we are, would be governed by federal privacy legislation and the appropriate remedies will be examined, and in due course, the necessary information would be obtained and government will take the corrective action.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Thank you.

Mr. Minister, I appreciate your answers in regards to how it got out there and so on, but the last question was dealing with the issue of just actually very sensitive, I would suggest, security information about these two facilities out there, and it could very well be in the hands of people who should not have it.

My question was: Have you done anything since yesterday to ensure that those two particular institutions where those security risks have been identified have now been corrected?

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

 

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. T. MARSHALL: Mr. Speaker, I have confidence in the new management and leadership in the prison correction system to take whatever actions is necessary as a result of the fact that a member of the media, one of the medias in this Province, releases information which should not have been released.

Thank you.

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

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I say to the Minister of Transportation, I do not know if they did have it figured out. They had it out there in the first place and it never should have been.

My last question for the minister. Minister, I heard a comment by yourself in the media today, the first time I think I have heard, with regards to the penitentiary, the possibility of the Province building a penitentiary for provincial prisoners, and I noticed the Premier alluded to it today in his answers to one of the questions as well on where it would fit on the priority scale as a possibility.

I am just wondering: How serious are we at this point in terms of the possibility of a go it alone approach with regards to the building of a penitentiary, and has any work, in fact, been done to date or is this just a we hope to sort of thing in the future?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

I thank the hon. member for his question.

The position of the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is quite simply that, we have a correctional system, a unique system, here in this Province where we house both provincial and federal prisoners in our correctional institutions. Obviously, the new institution that is to be built in this Province, it is in the interests of the federal government to join with us in building that new facility, and we continue to call upon them and we continue to engage them to do so.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

As we know, Mr. Speaker, each day there are new developments in the global economic crisis; however, in the financial update that we received today from the Minister of Finance there is nothing new announced to deal with this rapidly changing situation.

The Finance Minister's statement mentions that he will evaluate later on whether or not we have the ability to accelerate infrastructure spending in spite of knowing that the surplus will be over $700 million greater than that which was forecast.

I have to ask the minister, Mr. Speaker: Why is he not evaluating the situation now with the information that he has, and use some of the surplus to accelerate infrastructure spending now?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Mr. Speaker, we are evaluating as we go along.

Nothing new! A $1.27 billion surplus, reducing debt to $9.2 billion, funding pension plans, creating jobs, and mega projects: Nothing new! I don't know what the hon. member's definition of new is, but this all seems to be fairly new to me.

What I would suggest, Mr. Speaker – and perhaps the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi didn't hear my answer to the Leader of the Opposition. We met with a number of leading business people today and we discussed the issue of infrastructure. The indications that were given to myself and the Premier were that we do not have the capacity. They cannot take on any more work. There is no further construction that can be done. Between Vale Inco, the building of hospitals, schools, and highways, we are on bust and that is as far as we can go.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

The Minister of Finance has referred to increase in jobs. Well, right now our unemployment rate in this Province has not changed since 2007. We are stagnant. We have gone up .1 per cent. We need jobs here.

Why didn't the minister look at things like getting new training going, getting more women trained in trades and technology, putting more money into the jobs, into the training and jobs that will help us deal with the infrastructure issues?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for Signal Hill–Quidi Vidi.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I did ask a question. I am asking the minister why more money, new money, is not put into the area of training so that we can deal with the infrastructure needs, because the needs are there. The Premier talked about the schools. We need more money. I have a school in my district that has been waiting years for improvements and extensions, so speak to that, Minister, or the Premier.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, certainly this government has been very proactive in trying to ensure that we have more skilled trades people in Newfoundland and Labrador. One of the initiatives that we have brought in is the skilled trades program in our high schools and, Mr. Speaker, we have asked for schools to have 50 per cent of participation in those programs to be females.

We also have Centennial Scholarships from Alberta and two-thirds of those scholarships, Mr. Speaker, go to women who are training in the skilled trades. We have doubled the capacity of our skilled trades at the College of the North Atlantic and, Mr. Speaker, we had a task force on skilled trades, which we take very seriously, and we will continue to implement the recommendations of that Skills Task Force.

I gave a Ministerial Statement just last week, Mr. Speaker, that spoke of the increase in numbers of females in non-traditional trades being apprentices, and government's investment to make sure that we hire apprentices in our government departments, boards and agencies.

So, Mr. Speaker, we are very committed to ensuring (inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The time allotted for questions and answers has expired.

Presenting Reports by Standing and Select Committees.

Tabling of Documents.

Notices of Motion.

Notices of Motion

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

MR. O'BRIEN: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act Respecting Certified General Accountants. (Bill 72)

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion.

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

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will ask leave to introduce a bill entitled, An Act To Amend The Rooms Act, No. 2. (Bill 71)

MR. SPEAKER: Further notices of motion.

Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given.

Petitions.

Petitions

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. BUTLER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, to be honest with all hon. members in the House, I was not going to stand today with a petition on a long-term care facility, but when I heard the tremendous applause our leader got on her first question about the statement today, I said I cannot miss this opportunity.

My hon. colleague from the District of Carbonear–Harbour Grace, the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board, I was going to let him go today, where he had to come down with his financial statement on the economy and so on, but I want to take this opportunity again today to present a petition on behalf of the residents of the Conception Bay North and the Trinity South areas with regard to the long-term care facility for Conception Bay North.

My hon. colleagues in that particular area know the two facilities that I reference, and I am sure all hon. members, if they went there, would want to see something done with those facilities.

I understand that when this government took over in 2003, as they stated, they did not have the financial abilities that they have today, and the proposal that was put forward for a long-term care facility for Conception Bay North was placed on hold. No problem with that, Mr. Speaker, but the economy has changed, four new facilities have been built in this Province in various areas, and all I am doing is asking the government, on behalf of the residents on that area, if they would reconsider the recommendation that came forward in 2007, and hopefully that we would hear some good news in the budget this year with regard to a long-term care facility for the Conception Bay North area.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

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

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

I am pleased to stand and speak again to the issue that I raised last week, the petition with regard to improving medical transportation and the Medical Transportation Assistance Program here in this Province.

I have to say also that, with the good news that was released today by the Minister of Finance I would hope that the petition that is being presented by thousands of people with regard to the weaknesses in our program will probably get an easier ear.

Surely we can find the money to ensure that all patients, no matter where they live in this Province, can travel without burden to get the medical care that they need. It is a shame that people have to carry a burden for something that is not their responsibility.

They cannot help it if they have a disease, especially cancer, and cannot get treatment for the disease where they live. People in our Province should not be penalized because of where they live.

The out-of-pocket expenses for cancer patients in this Province are getting higher. A recent study done by the School of Medicine found that 34 per cent of rural cancer patients pay more than $200 out of pocket for travel and lodging for a single visit to an oncologist. That is one in three people. One in eleven cancer patients pay more than $1,000 for one trip, and some pay over $5,000. Only 6 per cent of patients can take advantage of the Province's Medical Transportation Assistance Program.

I really call upon the government, and call upon the Minister of Health and Community Services, and call upon the Minister of Finance, to recognize the injustice that sick people in this Province are suffering, and to right a wrong. We have the money to do it. If there is anything we should give some priority to, it is this call for covering the medical travel costs of people in this Province.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

Orders of the Day.

Orders of the Day

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Government Services, Motion 4, pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not adjourn at 5: 30 o'clock p.m. today being Tuesday, December 9, 2008.

Mr. Speaker, I also move, seconded by the hon. Minister of Government Services, Motion 5, pursuant to Standing Order 11 that the House not adjourn at 10:00 o'clock p.m. today being Tuesday, December 9, 2008.

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that this House do not adjourn at 5:30 o'clock today, Tuesday, December 9.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

The motion is carried.

Motion carried.

MR. SPEAKER: It is also properly moved and seconded that this House do not adjourn at 10:00 p.m. tonight, Tuesday, December 9.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

The motion is carried.

Motion carried.

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, before I call legislation from the Orders of the Day, I would like to just make comment as to the composition of the Public Accounts Committee because there have been some changes in that committee and just for a matter of public record, to ensure everyone understands who is on that committee.

The committee consists of the Member for Port de Grave, the Member for Placentia & St. Mary's, the Member for the Isles of Notre Dame, the Member for Cartwright–L'Anse au Clair, the Member for Grand Bank, the Member for Burgeo & LaPoile, and the Member for Fortune Bay-Cape la Hune.

Mr. Speaker, moving on to the Order Paper, I call Order 22, second reading of a bill, An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statute Law. (Bill 53)

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that Bill 53, An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In the Statute Law be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statute Law." (Bill 53)

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

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

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to rise in my seat here today in order to speak to second reading of Bill 53. Now the bill is entitled, An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statute Law and the short title of the bill is called the Attorney General Statutes Amendment Act.

The purpose of the bill is clearly set out in the explanatory notes. The purpose of the bill is to bring before the House, this particular House of Assembly, matters in the statute law in the legislation that has been passed in this House that requires legislative correction as a result of amendments or enactments that have been made in previous sessions. The amendments set out in the bill were brought to my attention, as Attorney General, through the Office of the Legislative Counsel, which is in the Department of Justice. The amendments are technical in nature and they are not matters of policy.

I understand, on an average, the Minister of Justice presents a bill similar to this every year or every eighteen months or so when in the judgement of the Office of the Legislative Counsel there have been a sufficient number of amendments compiled by then to warrant a bill.

I will just give some examples as to the type of amendments we have here. In clause 9 of the bill it refers to the Limitations Act. The Limitations Act is a law in this Province which says that if a person has a cause of action or a remedy against somebody else, that they have to pursue that cause of action or pursue that remedy in the courts of the Province within a certain period of time. There is a typographical error contained in the Limitations Act. It refers to economic loss arising from negligent representation, and the word should be: negligent misrepresentation. So that gives a rough idea of the type of clauses that we are dealing with here, and as I said, they are technical rather than matters of policy.

Clause 10 of the bill proposes an amendment to the Lobbyist Registration Act which provides that a consultant lobbyist within the meaning of the act who is engaged in lobbying in the City of St. John's or the city council has to file a return with the registrar within ten days.

Bill 14, An Act To Amend The Lobbyist Registration Act, was introduced in the spring session of the House of Assembly this year. The bill introduced amendments to extend the provisions of the Lobbyist Registration Act to the St. John's municipal council. The City of St. John's, in any entity, is controlled by the city. The requirement for persons already lobbying the city when the amendments came into force to file a return with the registrar of lobbyists was inadvertently not included in the amendments when it was extended to the city. So the act will correct that.

Clause 12 of the bill amends paragraph 81.4 of the Mental Health Care and Treatment Act, which act was introduced into this House in December of 2006. The section deals with the transfer of patients to and from the Province and contains an erroneous cross-reference in paragraph 81.4. The cross-reference should refer to subsection 3 as opposed to subsection 2.

Another example would be clause 15 of the bill. That clause proposes to amend subsection 22(2) of the Public Enquiries Act, 2006, by changing the wording with respect to defraying the cost of the inquiry.

Clause 20 of the bill, as an example, proposes to amend another typographical error that is found in paragraph 28(2)(e) of the Water Resources Act. The paragraph currently states, "where he or she is believes it to be advisable". The bill proposes obviously to remove the word "is".

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of different pieces of legislation that are going to be affected by this legislation. Various ministers will be here and if there are any questions about that legislation they can be directed to the appropriate minister and any information will be provided.

As hon. members are aware, from considering this type of legislation in the past, the amendments are technical in nature and don't involve matters of policy.

I would therefore urge passage of the bill and I look forward to any comments from the other members of the House.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

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

I appreciate an opportunity to have a few words with respect to this particular bill.

As indicated by the minister, this is truly a housekeeping bill. Over the course of time practitioners in the field, whether they be lawyers, dentist, massage therapists or whatever, in the course of their lifetimes they come across certain fact situations, and when they look at the legislation that governs their practices and what they are allowed to do and now allowed to do, they realize that the Act that was passed by the Legislature sometimes has errors in it.

Sometimes there is just a change of practice. It could be something as simple as a name. For example, I notice here there is one reference – they are changing from a board to a college, as I saw it there. On page 8 they talk about a board. Now, instead of a board they are going to call it a college. You are talking a lot of grammatical stuff. It could be an "and" or a "but". There might be a misrepresentation versus a representation, as the minister alluded. So, we had to do some housecleaning.

In fact, I guess it would be fair to call this full session in the fall of 2008 a housecleaning session. First, we had to drag the government here kicking and screaming to get the doors of the House open. Normally, we do have a parliamentary calendar which, to my knowledge, has been respected by the governments of the day going back years and years and years. The House normally opens within a week of the Remembrance Day holiday on November 11. Yet, in the fall of 2003 we didn't see any session because the government changed. Again, in the election of the fall of 2007 there was no fall session whatsoever again. In 2003 it might have been justifiable because you had a new government for the first time in fourteen or fifteen years. Certainly, in 2007 there did not seem to be any justification for not having a fall session.

Here we are this year, as we say, and we had to drag the government, kicking and screaming, to come in here again. It cannot have to do with the legislation. It must have to do with the Question Periods, because very day the House is open, of course, the Opposition gets to ask questions. As much as the ministers might like to say that they would love to get the questions, very rarely do we ever get an answer, number one.

There are two pieces that happen in this House. There are two parts to this House being open. Number one is the Question Period, which gives an opportunity for the Opposition. It is part of the democratic system to ask questions in the people's House of the government. That is a very important part of our democratic institution. Of course, the more condensed the session the less opportunities that an Opposition has to do that. That is favourable to governments. They do not want to get questions asked of them because, even if they do not, it is implicit that they should give some kind of answer. They do not want to be here, Mr. Speaker. That is the role of government.

We know what the Premier's position is, by the way, on the House of Assembly. We know what this Premier's stated position is. I believe you can go back and check one of the Maclean's magazine articles, and he stated quite clearly what he thought of the House of Assembly back a few years ago. Notwithstanding what he thinks about the system, it is a system that has existed for hundreds of years. In fact, I think we go back to 1832 here in this Province, ourselves, as having this hon. democratic system. As much as you might dislike it, you have an obligation as part of the system to be here, to keep the people's House open.

I believe there was even an incident back a few years ago when one leader was out captured in the newspaper of the day banging on these doors, or the doors down in the old Colonial Building where the House used to be, saying: Please, open up the people's House.

I believe that the Premier of the day, Premier Peckford, would have liked to keep the House adjourned for years if he could. I think they might have went something like twenty-one months one time and he never opened the House. They actually had to come and try to beat down the doors of the House.

I think, Mr. Speaker, it is fairly obvious that this government does not like to be here in this House. That is for the Question Period part. Then we will look, of course, at the agenda when they do get here. One thing about it, when you finally are shamed into having to open the House and finally come here, when you finally get here, then the question is: What bag of work do you bring with you? What is your workload that you have outlined to show what progress you have made in terms of a legislative agenda to the people of this Province?

You go down through our list - and I am looking at what we call the Order Paper that we use every day in this House, that gives the progress of bills and so on. If anybody goes through this, the first thing you will notice is that I think thirteen of the things that we dealt with in this House have to do with repeals. Now, folks, that is not new. For those of you who are not familiar with the word, it means there has been act that we no longer think is necessary and we are going to clean it off. Not a lot of rocket science as to how you are going to debate that. You do not need to have a super brain to get in here and debate that you are going to repeal something, I wouldn't think.

Now, mind you, I think there was a lack of brain power that went into some of the decision making as to how some of these bills got to be repealed. I will not go in today on my lengthy debate and comments that I made the last time about the Pickersgill bill. Anybody who would disgrace, in my view, or belittle the Pickersgill endowment by what you did in repealing that one ought to be ashamed - and I said so.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that second reading of a bill relates to the general spirit of the bill, and talks about the overall containment in the bill. I ask the hon. member if he would contain his remarks to the relevance of what is contained in the bill.

I just had an opportunity to look through the Explanatory Notes there, and some of the comments that the hon. member makes right now are certainly not within the spirit of the second reading of this particular bill.

I ask the hon. member for his co-operation.

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

You certainly will have my co-operation.

Mr. Speaker, that is why I think the very title of the bill, anomalies and errors, is pretty broad and general.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Now, if you want to talk about anomalies, I will give you a few anomalies that we deal with. If we want to get into the words anomalies and errors, I definitely think it was an error to try to repeal the Pickersgill endowment act. That was definitely an error, Mr. Speaker. There is no question, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to take second reading very seriously. There has been ample time put forward, and the hon. member has spoken many times on the act that he refers to. The act is still within third reading and if he wants to make further comments on that particular bill, that he would reserve his comments until that particular bill is called.

The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

I would just point out as well, Mr. Speaker, I agree with the issue of relevance, but normally the Government House Leader and the Opposition Leader, we appreciate that there is a book of business that needs to be done in any given day, and usually those things are done in the confines of good taste with the House, and there will be no difference today on any piece of legislation here, but we are talking about errors and anomalies. As the minister says, it is a housecleaning thing and it is a housekeeping thing. My comments talk about housekeeping and anomalies and errors in general. With all due respect, we are here on a housecleaning mission this session.

Of all the things that we are dealing with here, as I pointed out, we have on the Order Paper in this House, this session, fourteen repeal bills. We have ten amendments which deal in some cases with – like here, under this anomalies and errors bill, we have taken probably ten or eleven different statutes and made little corrections in them. Well, in these other ten amendment bills that we have brought in we have done the same thing. Some have one amendment and some have two or three amendments, but nothing of substance, no big overhauls in any of the legislation that we saw here. So, that was thirteen repeals, ten amendments, and we have this bill itself, an anomaly bill. If you put that together, that is about, in my count, twenty-four pieces of legislation which are fairly insignificant.

Mr. Speaker, I only see four actual new acts. As we have pointed out before, publicly, we did not see any book of business of substance from a legislative point of view, and that is disconcerting. For example, we hear about whistleblower legislation three years ago – or certainly committed in the Blue Book in 2007 – and here we are a year later, after commitments being made, and we do not see it.

We had the minister stand up yesterday and slam the Leader of the NDP because she dared mention that she is not going to support the repeal of the Midwifery Act. When she looks up, in all good taste and fairness, and says: Well, why would you repeal one if you do not have the other one prepared? – we do not get an answer. We still have to go consult with some people.

Well, there was no consultation on the repeal one. Yet, there was no preparation on bringing in a new one. That is what is amazing about this government. You talk about all the good we are doing, and the great managerial skills. Well, part of managing is managing the whole system, and part of the system is the House of Assembly.

If you look at the book of business that we have done here, or are expected to do here, this government did not bring anything, really, of substance. Now, I must say, there are two of substance: we have the emergency preparation piece that is going to come from the Municipal Affairs Department and is going to be debated later today, and we are going to have, as well, the fire department issues, and fire protection services in the Province, that is going to come from the minister, I do believe, some time later this week.

Those are two fairly substantial pieces of information and legislation that the people in this Province, the municipalities in particular, are concerned about, and that involved - for example, everybody has had briefings, and it is much appreciated that the minister's staff took the time out to go to the Opposition offices and brief them on these two very important pieces of legislation. That is part of the workload of this House. That is why that was good and that is why it was appreciated.

Other than these two bills, we have an overhaul on the chartered accountants bill, I do believe, and other than that we do not have very much in this session when it comes to the government showing that they actually brought in some kind of substantive workload, legislatively, to deal with.

That is the only comments I would make, is that it is very disconcerting that all these things that need to be done and yet we do not see it. We will come to the spring session, and everybody knows that the spring session is basically the budgetary session. The Minister of Finance will come in here for a few weeks, we will debate Supplementary Supply from mid-March onwards to April some time, then the Budget gets dropped, then we are into debating the Budget and we are into all kinds of Estimate Committees at night and in the morning and everything else. You do not stop. Then on top of it, the government, in the midst of all that last spring dropped in, I do believe, forty or forty-five pieces of legislation, amendments again and so on.

Somewhere the system has gotten screwed up. We do not have anymore, it appears, a budgetary session, and then in the fall we have a serious get down and do a legislative session. This government comes in in the spring and tries to jam it all in one time and then not open the House in the fall. That is not how it is intended to work. That is not what our accepted Standing Orders - not our Standing Orders, I should say, because it is not technically a Standing Order, but certainly an honoured practice in this House, a practice note is part of our Standing Orders, that we have a fixed calendar. The calendar is not being honoured by this government, and when they do open it they do not have a prepared legislative session. Not only do we talk about when you open it, but when you do open it you do not get the legislation in a timely fashion in most cases. If this work is being done in a proper order there is no big rocket science about some of this stuff. It just needs to be studied or briefings given. That can be done in a timely fashion, but it seems like it is only after you protest these things that you get it done.

The point we are just trying to make, Mr. Speaker, is that this bill in particular is pretty straightforward; Anomalies and Errors. Yes, you have to do this housekeeping stuff and yes, you do it about once a year, once every eighteen months or so. On some of the other issues we would suggest that it is time for the government to be more proactive when it comes to the fall legislative session. The schedule should be maintained. There should be a proper book of business that you are going to do so we can get something accomplished here. We were here for a week, for example, and never had anything hardly to do. Then we end up being in night sessions; night sessions in a session when there was virtually nothing to do to start with.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, that is all the comments I would like to make on Bill 53.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please!

If the hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General speaks now he will close debate at second reading of Bill 53.

The hon. the Minister of Justice and Attorney General.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

If there is no one else to speak, I will speak now and close debate.

Just to make a couple of comments on what the former minister had to say, the Opposition House Leader. It is certainly my impression from my knowledge of the members in this House that members are very happy to be here when the House of Assembly is sitting. We try very hard to get here. We knocked on a lot of doors. We talked to a lot of people to get here and I think we all feel it is an honour and a privilege to be here. Some of us who have duties outside of this House find it very difficult when the House is sitting to be able to do those ministerial duties and yet still be here in the House. I know that when I had my previous portfolio I had to spend a lot of time outside of the House, but with some portfolios it is a pleasure to be able to spend more time here in the House and listen to the tremendous debate and the very significant debate from all members of the House.

Speaking of Question Period, sometimes I think it should not be called Question Period. Well, it is called Question Period; it is certainly not called answer period. I do not think the Opposition is ever interested in our answers but it is important that we get our answers out so that the people of Newfoundland and Labrador can know what our policy is and know what this government under Premier Williams has been doing to bring good government to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, and that was certainly evident in the fiscal statement given by the hon. Minister of Finance today who brought down a - who indicated that the Budget for this year or the surplus projected for this year will be $1.27 billion. That shows we are in a very, very strong position for this year. Unfortunately, the prospects for next year with the lower oil prices are not as good.

I wonder, when you talk about Question Period, I know that the hon. member - I remember the former Member for Labrador West, when he was here he always used to give us notice of the questions he was going to ask. He was the only member of the House that would do that and I asked him why he did it. He said, because I really want an answer. He said I am not raising this to make you look bad or to be funny. I really want an answer. So here is the question, get me the answer and I will ask you next week. That is interesting. I understand over in England that is what they do. I could be wrong in that, but in England if a Member of the Opposition wants to ask a member a question, they have to give notice of the question. That is why we love to be here, because we do not know where the Opposition is coming from. We do not know what area they are going to ask us. So, we look forward to coming every day.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. Opposition House Leader for his comments and I close debate on second reading and move second reading.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 53, An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statue Law, be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statue Law. (Bill 53)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 53 has been now read a second time.

When shall the said bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House? Now? Tomorrow?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Remove Anomalies And Errors In The Statue Law," read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 53)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, Order 23, second reading of a bill, An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province. (Bill 59)

MR. SPEAKER: It is properly moved and seconded that Bill 59, An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province, be now read a second time.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province". (Bill 59)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS WHALEN: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to stand in this hon. House and bring in Bill 59, the Emergency Services Act.

Mr. Speaker, since 2003 our government have invested significant time and effort in ensuring that our Province is prepared for an emergency or a major disaster. The Emergency Services Act provides the strong legislative framework that our Province needs for emergency management and planning. There is no question that preparation and management go hand in hand.

The comprehensive legislative review, which led to this bill being tabled in the House of Assembly, was identified as a component of the strategy on improved emergency preparedness in Newfoundland and Labrador, approved by the provincial government in 2007.

When the Office of the Fire Commissioner and the Emergency Measures Organization merged in 2007, the new provincial agency known as Fire and Emergency Services - Newfoundland and Labrador undertook a line by line review of the Emergency Measures Act. Owing to the importance of public safety, it was vital to frame the legislation in a way that would reflect the current operation of our provincial emergency management agency, and more importantly, to enact policy that reflects a modern more effective emergency management system for the Province.

My colleagues and I feel the Emergency Services Act is a leading example of our government's commitment to protecting Newfoundlanders and Labradorians when an emergency or disaster becomes too much for individuals and municipalities to cope with on their own.

The citizens of Newfoundland and Labrador expect their provincial government to be ready to provide assistance when an emergency or disaster strikes. We will strive to assist individuals and communities to prepare for, respond to, and recover from such events.

In that respect, there are many functions this new bill proposes that relate directly to those priorities. To understand these functions, it is important that we outline the way that our emergency planning and emergency management currently transpires.

Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of my colleagues, and the general public, an emergency essentially means any real or anticipated event which requires the immediate action or prompt co-ordination of action as declared by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, the minister, a regional emergency management committee, or a council.

Emergency management is comprised of four interdependent and risk-based functions, commonly referred to as the four pillars.

The first pillar is prevention and mitigation, which aims to eliminate or reduce the impact of disasters to proactive measures taken before a disaster occurs, such as land management, public education, and protective infrastructure.

The second is preparedness, which relates to the readiness to respond to a disaster and manage its consequences through measures taken prior to the occurrence, including emergency planning, resource inventories, and training.

The third pillar relates to response. It incorporates action taken during or immediately after a disaster to manage its consequences, such as emergency public communications, search and rescue, evacuation, and emergency medical assistance.

The final pillar of emergency management is the recovery stage. Recovery includes actions taken after a disaster to repair or restore conditions to an acceptable level. It would include infrastructure and community reconstruction, financial assistance, and trauma counselling.

The way an emergency unfolds is unique in different regions of the Province, but usually begins with local first responders under the direction and the authority of their own municipality.

When a response becomes too onerous on a council or region, Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador will step in and co-ordinate a larger provincial response.

The occurrence of emergencies and disasters as a result of natural and human causes present a constant reminder of the need for all levels of government to be prepared to respond. In this decade, this has been evident more and more on account of events at the international, national and provincial levels. These events range from the 9-11 terrorist attacks in the United States with associated impacts on this Province, the 2003 outbreak of SARS in Central Canada, and the floods in the community of Badger 2003 and Stephenville 2005, which serve to clearly illustrate the need for the Province to be prepared.

Mr. Speaker, emergency planning is one of the most important efforts being carried out to date to lessen the burden on residents and municipalities when a disaster strikes. This past year, Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador hired three regional emergency management and planning officers. These individuals, located in Deer Lake, Grand Falls-Windsor, and St. John's, have been tasked with working with communities to develop an emergency plan. Currently, eighty-two municipalities and local service districts have emergency plans in place covering a population of 364,420 people. Even though this means that approximately 72 per cent of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are covered under a plan, there are still municipalities that have little or no work completed. Our government continues to meet with cities and towns to provide appropriate guidance and advice, and to promote regional planning initiatives where possible.

Another important point to consider is that the provincial government is also legislated to develop a business continuity plan or a provincial emergency plan. Strong emergency planning has obvious proven benefits; thus, serious consideration was given in this regard.

The purpose of emergency management is to save lives, preserve the environment, and protect property and the economy. The protection of life is of great importance. Keeping all of this in mind, the Emergency Measures Act was outdated and required a rewrite that would result in repeal with the introduction of new legislation. The new act establishes the Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador as an agency in legislation, and essentially provides the organizational and administrative framework for emergency services in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, the cornerstone of the Emergency Services Act is a mandatory requirement for emergency management plans by the Province and by municipalities within three years of proclamation. This requirement originates from the comprehensive planning theme within the approved strategy for improved emergency preparedness.

Strong partnerships, based on clearly defined roles and responsibilities, taking into account all of the prevention, mitigation, preparedness and response and recovery functions, is important to a fully functioning emergency management system. Further to this requirement, to assist in decreasing the burden for municipalities and local service districts, Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador will define in policy what constitutes an emergency management plan.

This policy will be flexible in this regard. In other words, communities of different sizes, complexities, and their nearness to potential risk will result in different plan development requirements, not unlike the planning requirements that are associated with business and activity plans within government.

Mr. Speaker, Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador will consult with Municipalities Newfoundland and Labrador during their policy development to ensure its views are fully considered and plan requirements are feasible. At the current time, Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador have a twelve-step approach to effective emergency planning. This guideline document is for use by municipalities. Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland and Labrador also offer emergency planning training and emergency management training to municipalities free of charge.

Municipalities need not worry. We will help you enhance the safety and the security of each and every resident of your town. Relevant and active emergency plans provide for an appropriate standard of care that emergency managers and other authorities are obliged to uphold, to ensure due diligence is exercised in their area of emergency management accountability to protect the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Under certain circumstances the demand of effective emergency response can and does exceed the ability of local authorities and requires the provision of assistance by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, the federal government, the non-governmental organizations and the private sector.

In the Emergency Services Act, the minister can declare an emergency in a town or region if the town or region fails to do so. This power was retained from the previous act and essentially allows for the minister to authorize appropriate actions.

By their very nature, disasters and emergencies can generate confusion in the roles and the responsibilities of governments and other agencies charged with the responsibility to respond. Proper emergency planning can and should minimize or eliminate this confusion by clearly laying out the roles and the responsibilities of all entities and establishing their clear protocols governing their interactions with each other.

Mr. Speaker, the Emergency Services bill focuses on a provincial emergency and requires the Province to have its own Business Continuity Plan and emergency management plan within three years of coming into force. While the Province has dealt effectively with recent emergencies, most of which have been relatively localized in their impact, response has occurred without the benefit of a comprehensive emergency plan.

Mr. Speaker, organizations have recognized that ensuring continuity of business requires that the functional operation of the full range of essential business resources and activities be incorporated into strong business continuity plans.

Prudent risk management practices dictate that in the event of a major business disruption there should be a step-by-step process in place to recover vital operations and to serve and protect employees and clients. While the probability of a major disruption may be low, the potential impacts of such an event on government operations are severe. The intent of business continuity planning is to lessen the impact that an organization sustains as a result of a natural event or other events in society. It will establish a process that will accelerate and improve the continuation of vital time-sensitive functions and restore full business operations to government.

While the provincial Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is leading the way in the development of a business continuity plan, the new Emergency Services Act will legislate that responsibility. The Business Continuity Plan is a critical component of a provincial emergency plan, a second legislative requirement. The provincial emergency plan will incorporate all municipal emergency plans, the Business Continuity Plan, and a crisis communication component. This will then be a comprehensive approach to addressing any major emergency or disaster in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, the final change I wish to point out today relates to a section of the old act where the provincial government has made a change. We have identified concerns with the expansive nature of the delegation of legislative powers contained in section 13 of the Emergency Measures Act.

Section 13 authorizes Cabinet to suspend or amend any provincial legislation during a declared emergency, including for example, the human rights code. There are no expressly stated qualifications on the purpose of such suspensions or amendments. It was important that the new legislation be aligned to provide strict accountability and transparency. We are very proud of this change.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, the people of Newfoundland and Labrador expect that their provincial government will provide assistance during times of crisis, and if this expectation is to be met, the Province must maintain a high level of preparedness to provide support when and where it is necessary to do so. Whether it be by empowering local first responders and municipalities with a plan to carry out response, or by properly delegating Fire and Emergency Services, Newfoundland and Labrador as the responding organization.

We feel this legislation provides a strong, comprehensive approach to ensuring our readiness in the event of a major emergency or disaster. Government will continue to move forward to better prepare and protect our Province from the dangers associated with emergencies, disasters, and fire.

I look forward to comments and constructive debate by the members of this hon. House.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER (T. Osborne): The hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave.

MR. BUTLER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate the opportunity to be able to stand with regards to Bill 59, An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province.

Let me begin by saying a sincere thank you to the minister and her staff who were so gracious – I think it was last Friday morning, came to our boardroom, met with us and with the Leader of the New Democratic Party. I must say, we had an excellent brief, not only on Bill 59 but also Bill 60.

Mr. Speaker, as the minister has stated, back in June 2007, a review took place of the Emergency Measures Act and the Fire Prevention Act. It was at that time, I think it was, they came to the realization that it would be too cumbersome to put it all in the one act. So that is why we are going to have Bill 59 and also Bill 60.

Mr. Speaker, what is happening here with a lot of it is the modernization of the language. The two acts in one, like I said, would be too cumbersome. Hopefully, Mr. Speaker, from what we have heard - what we have heard is that all of the stakeholders who are involved in the operation of this act, the legislation and the wording of it, they have been contacted and hopefully had a tremendous amount of impact in the legislation.

It is interesting to note, that in our Province today eighty-two municipalities have already approved an emergency plan. This accounts for 72 per cent of our population. So even though there are quite a few other municipalities and local service districts who are not involved at this point in time, I guess they are in more outlying areas because it seems that this has been brought forward on a good basis where, I guess, the populations are more gathered together, and I can reference as I go along with regard to the Conception Bay North area. As I go through the bill that is some of the things I want to speak about, what I have seen happen in our immediate area, in the Trinity-Conception Bay area.

Mr. Speaker, the main focus of the bill is with regard to municipal and regional emergencies but also it touches on a national emergency. From my understanding, I think the legislation states that by May 1, 2012, all must adapt to a plan. It is good to see that it is not only involving the main municipalities, it is also local services districts, and I understand the Inuit community as well. That is very important, because by all of them coming together, the small local service districts may not be able to put a plan in place on their own but they can work together with some of the larger centres as they come together with this particular bill.

The minister mentioned the five themes. I have to say, from what I have learned over the past several years, the main input, the main theme is the education and communication part of it. I know all of the rest are very important as well. What I have seen - and why I say that, I say it for a reason. It was just last year in August, 2007 when we had Chantal, the major storm that struck our Province. I know my area was devastated as well as the Member for Placentia & St. Mary's. Why I say we should have education and communication, all too often - this is no slight on the government today, there were other tragedies when our party was in power. All too often when an emergency takes place we see the Premiers, whomever they may be, the ministers coming to a different area, whether it be federal or provincial. They come with all good intentions. You will see various ministers coming because there are issues that are going to unfold because an emergency has taken place, but all too often, and I saw it happen in my area, that it was almost like a false impression was left because the people thought when those people came and comments were made that everything was going to be rosy, everything was going to be taken care of. We know when it comes to an emergency plan such as that, everything cannot be covered off on.

I know after it settled down I was swamped with phone calls from residents throughout the area saying: How come I have not heard this, I have not heard that? Now I have been told I am not going to receive this coverage or what have you. That is unfortunate. That is back when Chantal struck. That was when I called the Fire Commissioner's Office first. In the beginning they were a little bit hesitant about coming to the area. They did not think there was any need for it, but the problems grew. People did not understand what coverage they would have. So, finally they came out. There was a meeting arranged at the Bay Arena in Bay Roberts, and several hundred people came out. Once the Fire Commissioner and his staff explained: this is what coverage you have, this is the plan that is in place, they understood it fully.

My recommendation to the minister is when this plan comes in place, I think if an emergency happens, regardless how large or how small it is, that the authorities, the people in charge, the quicker they can get to the communities and explain things to the people, the better it is. Like I said, a false impression did set in in my area and I am sure it probably happened when there was a disaster in Badger and other areas throughout the Province. I have to say, that once the call went out, the individuals with the EMO at that time, there was nothing they did not do to try to accommodate the people. Even though there are people who were very upset because of what damages they lost, at the end of the day I think by coming and communicating with the people is the answer to it all.

As I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, this also references local service districts and Inuit communities. So once this falls in place in 2012, and hopefully everybody will come under the act, we should have a good plan in place in this Province regardless of what emergency should take place. Mr. Speaker, over the years - and I guess one that we can look at, and as I stated earlier a national emergency. We all know 9-11, and I guess really for the United States of America 9-11 was definitely a national emergency, but we also have to realize how our Province from coast to coast became involved when that incident happened, when the planes, travelling all over the world, landed here at St. John's and Gander and Stephenville, and how the people, the volunteers of our communities and our Province, came together and did what had to be done to assist those people. Sometimes this all takes place very quickly, but if we have a plan in place like this piece of legislation and we know the laws of the land, I believe it will be that much more convenient for everybody.

I also remember only recently, and I am sure the Member for Harbour Main will remember this, only several weeks ago there was a news story that went out that a plane had crashed in his particular district, in the Cupids area, but how it came together was unbelievable because here you have the fire departments, the Search and Rescue, the volunteers, and they knew what had to be done. I know the area that we represent, and the Member for Carbonear-Harbour Grace represents, and those people have a plan in place. They are a part of the eighty-two communities.

My hon. colleague across the way, they spent the whole night searching the woods and the ponds for this downed plane. Search and Rescue boats were out in the harbour, but what it was, it was a Chinese lantern or something that some individual had set up in the sky and someone thought they saw a plane crash.

It just goes to show - one thing about it - it was almost like an exercise in a school, a fire drill, to know how the students would get out of the school, about how they came together. I know there was probably a lot of time lost for the various individuals, the law enforcement and so on, but I will tell you one thing: it was a lesson that was learned.

I remember another time with an emergency where a plan came into place, and that was in the community of Upper Island Cove back a few years ago when a major rock slide took place and one particular huge rock came down and took the full side of an individual's house. I saw at that time what it is to have a plan in place. Even though it was only a small local incident, it had a tremendous impact on that community and how people had to be moved from their homes and placed in hotels and motels.

I also remember, like I said, I mentioned earlier about Chantal, the flood that happened last year. It is unbelievable what can happen in a short period of time with 100-and-some-odd millimetres of rain falling. I can remember seeing individuals who were standing by the brook that goes through the community where I live - they were about eighteen or twenty feet back from the edge of this small brook - and within a span of fifteen minutes, at about 10:20 in the morning –

AN HON. MEMBER: They were washed away.

MR. BUTLER: No, I say to the hon. colleague, they were not washed away but they were up to their knees in water when the flood came. It was almost like it just came up through the earth. I would venture to say, and the Minister of Municipal Affairs who was in office at that time in that department knows full well, it was almost like the water just came up through the earth, rather than flooding over it. I would venture to say, if anyone had some mechanism to look under the foundations, there is a lot eroding there.

Like I said, the departments all kicked in that time when they came together. There were the fire departments and all the local areas. We had the Avalon North Wolverine Search and Rescue. People came to the meeting from various departments: Transportation - I think the Member for Lake Melville was the minister at that time – and people from the Department of Human Resources, Labour and Employment. It is a major thing, coming together when you see an incident happen like this. I am sure the same thing happened when we talked about the incident that happened in Badger a few years ago.

As we look at the legislation we talk about, also, a provincial emergency. Just since this government came into power we hear much talk about a pandemic, if it should happen. Plans are in place and, from my understanding when we met with the officials the other day, still, various officials in various departments come together - not hoping that there is going to be a pandemic, but various departments do come together and have plans in place if something of this magnitude should unfold.

The bill also talks about a national emergency, God forbid, but we know the world today. We hear so many stories of what can happen from one country to the other, and who knows? At least we know that our provincial government is planning, not only here in our own Province but if something should happen on a national scale.

One of the clauses in the bill, and I think it is a good clause, outlines the no liability, the good faith clause, and it expands on the ‘clearity' of that particular section.

AN HON. MEMBER: Clarity.

MR. BUTLER: Clarity.

I thank my hon. colleague across the way. He is very helpful.

What happens here, Mr. Speaker, when we have volunteers, whether they are with the fire department or the Search and Rescue teams, all too often they go in to do good and at least they are not going to be held liable if something should go by the wayside.

Another issue in the clause that I think is very, very important, and we have seen this happen – I know I have - is the part when it comes to price gouging. When an emergency takes place, Mr. Speaker, I saw it a few years ago when, through a snow storm, the power was lost for two or three days – back, I do not know what year it was – we saw what happened in the stores. The price of everything went sky-high, anything that the people wanted, whether it was candles, kerosene, other heating fuels, even clothing if they did not have it. I saw it with Chantal, with regard to various pieces of equipment, generators, sump pumps, or different types of pumps. It just skyrocketed when all of the product in the area was bought up, and when they had to bring it in the prices were unbelievable. I am glad to see that is there. It also touches on someone's property; it will stay at the value of what it was before the emergency took place.

Mr. Speaker, just to conclude, I am not going to go on much longer because I believe this is a good piece of legislation, but to know that not only in the area that I represent - and we know, as I said earlier, that eight-two municipalities have plans in place. I know, for instance, one community in my district where the fire department, in conjunction with the town council, just a couple of years ago, had a student program. They went door to door in that community and they have a list in place of any medical concerns, whatever they may be, how minor or how large, and they have it all on file if something should happen and they get a call to go to that residence. It is not only just to go to the residence. They have a plan in place if anything should happen in their community, and that is the same community that had the rock slide a few years ago. I guess they learned from that and now they are prepared.

I have to say that all of those individuals are volunteers and they do a tremendous job. To know that this piece of legislation that is being brought forward here today by the minister - and we are looking forward to Bill 60 because, really, both of them go hand in hand to a certain extent.

I want to say, in closing, that we are very pleased with this piece of legislation and just confirm that we will be supporting Bill 59.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

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

I am very happy to have the opportunity to speak to Bill 59, An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province.

I join with my colleague from the Official Opposition in thanking the minister and her staff for providing us with an excellent briefing last Friday morning both on this bill and on Bill 60, which is a sister bill dealing with fire emergency services.

This is a very, very good bill, I have to say. I was quite pleased with the explanations that we were given by the staff from the division. It is comprehensive, and it is certainly up to date in dealing with the reality of today in terms of emergency possibilities. It seems to be very timely that we finally have this act coming out, an act which is much more up to date than the Act that it is replacing, both this one and the fire emergency act which is Act 60 which we are not discussing today but we shall be soon. Both of them are acts that are replacing two acts that used to be in place, the Emergency Measures Act and the Fire Prevention Act.

The Emergency Measures Act, in particular, in no way was related to - very peripherally - what we are dealing with today because it was focused more on a time when the emergency measure had to do with the fear of being attacked by another country, which was sort of what was at the bottom of it. I think the emergency that we are talking about in this act, the emergency services, is a much broader issue that we are looking at with regard to the emergencies.

With the kinds of wild weather we seem to be having in this part of the world, along with other parts of the world, for various reasons – there are all kinds of different theories on that. I am one who believes in climate change and I am sure that is what we are experiencing. The incidents of storms, the incidents of flooding, they certainly seem to be more frequent in the Province now than they have been. This act is certainly timely with regard to dealing with these kinds of incidents that have been going on now.

Before I talk sort of more generally, I just spoke to the minister and pointed out something. I read the act at least four times actually and then we had the briefing on Friday, but it was only this morning that I realized that under the definition of emergency we have – I am going to read it, "emergency means a real or anticipated event or an unforeseen combination of circumstances which necessitates the immediate action or prompt co-ordination of action as declared or renewed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council," et cetera. It only struck me this morning: Yes, but what makes it still an emergency? Like, what are these events about? It dawned on me the answer was in the very next section, section (h) where it says that the emergency management plan is intended to prepare for, et cetera, et cetera, the provision for the health, safety and well being of persons and the protection of property and the environment.

It dawned on me that in section (g) that is what the emergency is, that the events are actually a threat to the health, safety and well-being of persons and the protection of property and the environment. I wondered, and questioned with the minister why, perhaps, that phrase about the health, safety and well-being of persons and the protection of property and the environment should not also be in section (g) because it is what makes the emergency an emergency. The events are a threat to our well-being as persons and our environment and property.

It is not a major thing, but it just struck me today that the definition of emergency was not finished. I am not saying it is an amendment that has to happen. I have told the minister, she is talking to her staff and if it is thought – as we look further on at that – perhaps it should be amended, or not that it should but that amendment makes the word emergency clearer, then that could happen in Committee of the Whole. We could have that discussion and the amendment could be brought forward. As I said, I have been talking to the minister and I mention that now. It just makes it more clear what the emergency is about.

There were a few things that I want to note. I think some of them have been noted by my colleague from the Official Opposition, so I will not repeat a lot of what he has said. I may repeat some but there are a couple of things, I think, that he has not mentioned. One has to do with the fact that the emergency management plan includes also a business continuity plan. I thought for the sake of the public, who do watch us when we are having these debates and who are interested in reading our legislation, just to explain what a business continuity plan is.

What it means is that in an emergency there is business of government that has to continue, that people still have to be taken care of. In emergencies people still require the services of government. They require, for example, receiving cheques that come to them from government. There are a wide variety of services that still have to be provided by government. It is sort of like the show still goes on. In an emergency there are still aspects of life that have to be taken care of. What the business continuity plan is is that there is a plan in place that would facilitate that all essential services that are absolutely necessary for the well-being of the people, that those services can continue. I think it is an extremely important part of the plan, and looking at the minister I think I have interpreted correctly. It is a really important part of the plan because we cannot underestimate the complexity of ensuring that services go on. So whether the services are attached to an institution, like a hospital or a long-term care home or something of that nature where we have to make sure electricity continues and all of that, or whether it has to do with a cheque being sent out to people, all of these are things that have to continue.

It is a very, very complex thing to put together the full emergency management plan ,as well as the business continuity plan. I am delighted to see that government is committed to having this in place within three years. We know that a lot of things are in place now. When it comes to the emergency management plan, we do know that already about 72 per cent of the population is covered by plans that are in place, and that is excellent.

I remember once myself being part of an emergency. This was twenty years ago, and we had a pretty good system in place. I was actually in Labrador. There was a forest fire back in the 1980s and there had to be an evacuation of Sheshatshiu and North West River. I was in Sheshatshiu doing some work and there had to be an evacuation of Sheshatshiu, North West River to Happy Valley-Goose Bay. I remember how smoothly that went and how well we were taken care of in Happy Valley-Goose Bay because we were there overnight before we could go back after the forest fire.

We have a history in the Province of knowing how to deal with emergencies, but I think the government and the division that we now have in place have put a lot of care into looking at what has not been in place and how we can institutionalize the things that we have been doing very well but we have to deal with things in a modern way. We have to deal with things with today's technology and ensure that any gap that could be there has been taken care of.

I was also glad, and even though my colleague mentioned it I would like to mention it again as well. I was really glad to see the section, section 23 actually, which deals with price gouging because there is nothing as awful when people are in an emergency and sometimes you see it happen both in our own Province and in other places and you see it reported on the news, of people being in a terrible emergency needing food or clothing, needing equipment, things to keep their houses warm because of loss of electricity, anything, that the price goes up. It happens. I do see here that it is covered. There is a penalty for an offence. A person who commits an offence under section 23, a person who does put up a price, is liable to a fine of up to $5,000. It says that the section shall not apply to cost increases which in the opinion of the minister are reasonable and have been necessitated by the declaration of the emergency. I guess it is quite possible that you could have things having to come in by plane, for example, instead of by road or instead of by boat, and the extra cost of transporting what is needed could cause a price to go up. So there are times when it would be reasonable, and it is up to the minister to judge that.

The one thing that the section does not say is who is responsible for alerting authorities to the price gouging, but I guess there is probably an assumption that if prices go up overnight because of the emergency, the public would not be long letting it be known that it has happened. There is not anything here for alerting of authorities with regard to the price gouging. Maybe the minister could speak to that, how we think it is going to become known that price gouging is happening. That struck me this morning, actually. I got to do careful reading this morning of this document.

The other thing that – it is not so much an issue with regard to how the emergency measures happen, but it is an issue in terms of government always being able to have the resources to deal with emergencies, et cetera – is the issue of the cost sharing, because of course, it is not just the Province who is responsible for paying for emergency measures.

I think I have my figures correct, because I copied them down when we were being briefed on Friday morning. Actually, what I will do is I will not name the amounts because I could be wrong, but there is a first amount – I think it is about $570,000, where the provincial government pays 100 per cent of the cost related to the emergency. Then you go up so many – I think it is $1 million. You get into a first million then it is 75-25; the Province seventy-five, the federal government twenty-five, and so on. There is a change in the ratio of what is paid by federal and what is paid by provincial, and that is the main issue I want to make. I do not want to get into the figures because I could be making mistakes because I did this as we were being briefed. The point is the federal contribution.

It was shocking to hear the authorities tell us how long they are waiting for the federal government to give money for its responsibility. I think there is a lapse of years for some of the emergencies that we have had where the federal government still has not paid its contribution. I think that is awful, actually, and I know that the Province would be making noise about that and working on it, but I really encourage the government, encourage the minister, to continue fighting that issue with the federal government. It is totally unacceptable.

If the Province has identified an emergency, whether it is a regional emergency or Province-wide - and we hardly would ever have a Province-wide one; it can happen but we hardly would, they are usually regional emergencies, sometimes in very small areas, sometimes larger - if the Province has identified it, then the federal government should not be dragging its heels in paying its part.

Sometimes that has repercussions for individuals but I suppose most often it is more the Province that has repercussion because the Province puts out the money, but there are times when the Province is not responsible for putting out the money and the federal government is, and they drag their heels, and it is just not acceptable. I was surprised to hear how great the time lag is between the emergency, the expenditures, and then the federal government putting in the money that it owes.

I think, Mr. Speaker, that takes care of the main issues that I wanted to make reference to. As I said, my colleague from the Official Opposition has made several points that I had noted, but I do not think it serves any of us for me to repeat them.

The one thing that I do want to mention, because not everybody was at the briefing and I think it is good for them to know, when it comes to the fact that 72 per cent of the population right now is covered, as my colleague said, we can pretty well imagine that the 28 per cent who are not covered are living in areas where they are very small and where they do not have a lot of capacity for dealing with things of this nature, and putting together emergency preparedness plans, et cetera. So there is an issue of capacity in the smaller communities.

I was glad to hear from the staff who met with us that there are three staff in place in the Province who are there to co-ordinate and train these areas where they do not have the capacity. I would imagine that the department and the division will be monitoring the degree to which that training is being successful, and the degree to which the plans are being put in place, so that hopefully all areas, in three years' time, will have the emergency plans in place.

It was good to know that the resources are out there to make sure that even those very small areas that do not have the capacity are being helped to do so, because this is very serious. Now that we have an act - we will have an act, once we go through the process of passing this bill, et cetera - now that we have such an act in place, now that we have a sophisticated plan for dealing with emergencies, and I believe that we do, then it is also important that we put in whatever resources are needed to make sure that in three years' time, which is the goal time, 100 per cent of the population in the Province is covered by the plan that is in place.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the minister.

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

If she speaks now she will close debate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS WHALEN: Mr. Speaker, I just want to address a couple of points that my colleagues made.

The hon. member asked me about section (g) in the act, and really it relates to a broad definition of emergency, and in (h) it defines the emergency management plan.

Also, it was brought up about price gouging. Unfortunately, we have had to put that in the act, to make some provisions there, but now the people will become aware if such things happen; but I would hope, in the event of a disaster or an emergency, that the Good Samaritan would kick in, and our conscience. Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are known to really come to the plate when there is a disaster that takes place, so hopefully we will not see price gouging, but there is a provision in the act that people can make us aware and we will take our action.

On that note, I want to thank my colleagues today for their comments and the debate. This is a more modern act, up-to-date, more user-friendly, and I am very pleased to be the minister to bring this bill into the House.

With that, I would like to close debate on this bill.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that the said bill be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

Carried.

CLERK: A bill, "An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province." (Bill 59)

MR. SPEAKER: This bill has now been read a second time. When shall the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House? Now? Tomorrow?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Provide For The Organization And Administration Of Emergency Services In The Province", read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 59)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, Order 20, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Income Tax Act, 2000 And To Repeal The Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act, Bill 38.

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Amend The Income Tax Act, 2000 And To Repeal The Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act." (Bill 38)

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce an amendment to the Income Tax Act, 2000 and the Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act, which provides detail relating to the harmonization of our Province's capital tax and financial institutions with federal capital tax.

Mr. Speaker, our government committed in Budget 2007 to harmonize the provincial financial corporations capital tax with the federal capital tax base in order to lower compliance costs for taxpayers and to do our part to provide a consistent policy across the country. This amended legislation, Mr. Speaker, represents fulfillment of that commitment.

As background information, Newfoundland and Labrador imposes a capital tax on banks and loan and trust companies with permanent establishments in the Province. However, there is no general capital tax on other businesses. A rate of 4 per cent is applied on taxable paid up capital allocated to Newfoundland and Labrador and includes paid up capital stock, contributed surplus, retained earnings and reserves.

Under this harmonized tax, Mr. Speaker, the Canada Revenue Agency will now handle the administrative duties resulting in program savings for the Province and a resulting reduction in red tape to taxpayers who will now have to deal with only one government administrative agency.

Mr. Speaker, whenever you have to deal with multiple levels of government it becomes confusing for the average person, so that this streamlining of agencies will certainly make sense and hopefully make it easier for the public to deal with this issue.

The purpose of the bill, Mr. Speaker, is to harmonize that tax with the capital tax imposed under the Federal Income Tax Act by moving our capital tax to the Provincial Income Tax Act, 2000. This bill also includes a related amendment to the Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act that will provide for transitional issues in moving this tax out of that legislation to the Income Tax Act, 2000.

By harmonizing with federal capital tax, Mr. Speaker, we will be making some technical changes to our act, but the financial sector in our Province will not see any material change in their tax liability. While the new legislation introduced today will adopt many of the federal rules the real result will be a streamlining of capital tax rules for the financial sector in this Province.

There will be no change to our rate, no change in the exemption threshold, and no change in the taxpayer base.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: The real change, Mr. Speaker, will be cost savings and greater administrative efficiency as a result of the Canada Revenue Agency taking over the administration of our Harmonized Capital Tax as it already does for our Harmonized Sales Tax and our Provincial Income Tax.

Mr. Speaker, to very quickly review the act: It is bill 38, Mr. Speaker. Section 66.1(1) simply outlines some of the definitions that will be applied. Section 66.1(2) defines the capital of an authorized foreign bank. Section 66.1(3) adopts the Income Tax Act Canada rules for returns, assessments, payments, appeals and evaluation methods. Section 66.2(1), Mr. Speaker: capital tax is 4 per cent of taxable capital in the Province less the capital deduction. Section 66.2(2), capital deduction is $5 million if capital is $10 million or less. Section 66.2(3), capital deduction is nil if the capital exceeds $10 million.

It goes on like this, Mr. Speaker. There are some procedural issues but the key here is the harmonization of the two taxes.

Mr. Speaker, the harmonization, in this case, will hopefully result, as I have indicated, in streamlining. It is, as I have indicated, Mr. Speaker, some technical changes being made to the act, but the financial sector in our Province will not see any material change. No changing, as I have indicated, in rate, exemption or threshold, or change in taxpayer base.

Mr. Speaker, I am sure members will agree that this is another example of the progress being made by our government in reducing administration and government bureaucracy for business.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I appreciate an opportunity to have a few words with regards to Bill 38.

I must say, right off the top, if I have learned anything in this business since I got involved in politics in 1999, it is that you have to be, hopefully, as broad and as expansive as you can when it comes to understanding different issues, whether you are a lawyer or an accountant or a doctor or a psychologist or a social worker or a nurse or a fireman. Based upon the legislation that comes before this House, you wish sometimes you had all the skills, because it would make it so much easier to understand the different pieces of legislation. I would be the first to admit, I do not know what the minister's background is as an undergrad. I realize he has a law degree, but I do not know what his background is in terms of accounting. This individual is certainly not well versed when it comes to tax law, and I would admit my lack of information and knowledge about the subject, which is the reason, of course, that we think briefings are so important when it comes to this type of information. We appreciate the fact that the representatives in the Department of Finance did indeed provide the Opposition with information and explanation and background as to what this particular bill was all about.

It is pretty complex, of course, when you get into talking about taxable capital, subordinated indebtedness, and reserves. It is pretty highfalutin stuff if you do not have a background in accounting.

We would concur, that anything that lessons administrative rigmarole is certainly welcome. Anything, of course, that provides less compliance cost for anybody who has to deal with the tax department has certainly got to be a good thing. God knows taxes are complicated enough. God knows anybody, whether you are an individual or a business, particularly a bank, that you wish you never had to pay taxes. The last thing you need to compound that is, of course, not to understand the system, or for somebody to make the system particularly troublesome when it comes to compliance and to the cost of compliance.

We would concur here that this is a good move, to harmonize with the federal government. If our federal brethren are so kind as to take over the administration of it and the cost of administration, and remove that burden from the banks and financial institutions that deal in this Province, we would certainly be the first to concur with that.

Albeit it is a financial bill, and albeit, of course, that gives some leeway when it comes to actual comments and so on, we will not belabour the point; just to say, this is a complex piece of legislation, it is necessary, we appreciate the briefings that we had, and I am sure the banks that need to comply with it are appreciative as well of what is being undertaken here.

Thank you.

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

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

I do not have a lot to say to this bill. I think it is very clearly explained by the Minister of Finance why this bill is necessary. The harmonization process is one that is going on between all the provinces and the federal government. It makes absolute sense that this part of the taxation system should be harmonized with the federal government, with them doing the administrative work. Since income tax is dealt with that way and this tax makes sense, the capital tax act for financial corporations should also be dealt with in the same way.

I really do not have a lot of points to make. However, I am rather surprised at the Opposition House Leader in just doing what he did. I did not expect him to sit down so soon. I am going to take advantage of the fact that it is a financial bill dealing with money because there are some issues that I wanted to make last night, and in light of the economic statement that was made today by the Minister of Finance I do want to speak to some issues that are related to financial issues and related to the fact that we are in the good financial situation that was presented by the Minister of Finance today. I think, in light of that, we do have to look at where money can be spent in this Province for the good of the people and to make sure that the economy remains in the good, vibrant state that it is in.

The area that I want to speak to - it is fine to take care of the financial institutions and to take care of red tape cutting and to make sure that we have things moving well between the Province and the federal systems and that we are not duplicating efforts, et cetera. All of that is great, but we have a lot of issues in this Province that we do need to care about and we do need to pay attention to. It does not have anything to do with being positive or negative, it has to do with reality, it has to do with real issues that have to be dealt with.

The thing that I want to talk about today is the issue of housing and the lack of affordable housing in this Province. It is not just in the urban settings, although it is mainly in urban settings, it is also in rural Newfoundland. In the urban settings, however, it probably is exacerbated because we have more people coming into St. John's, coming into Corner Brook, coming into Labrador West as well, either because of educational possibilities and also the possibility of employment. What we are finding is that affordable housing is going down remarkably. In St. John's, all rentals are being affected. Our rental vacancy rate now in St. John's is around 2.5 per cent. That is extremely low. Only two years ago we were at 5 per cent and now we are down to 2.5 per cent. The vacancy rates in Corner Brook and Labrador City in particular are lower than 2.5 per cent. So, we have a real issue.

We have issues of people - younger people in particular but not just young people - doubling and tripling up in apartments, sleeping on couches, in some cases sleeping on floors. We know we had the story in the media not too long ago of a young student up in Labrador City actually sleeping outdoors while he was trying to be a student. Thank goodness that was heard by somebody in the community who had a space to rent, but we have a serious situation when it comes to housing.

Probably one of the biggest things that we need to look at is that here in St. John's in particular - I think it has happened in other places, but here in particular - there is an unprecedented increase in eviction notices. Now, this information was made available at a housing forum that took place here in St. John's a couple of weeks ago and it was government officials who talked about the high rise of eviction notices especially in the downtown core of the city, in what is called centre city. What is happening is that you have long-term tenants who are being evicted so that landlords can get higher rent, and there are a lot of examples of that happening here in St. John's

One of the things that we need, and this does not have to do with putting any money in at all, what we do not have in this Province and which we need desperately is rent control. We should not have landlords who are able to indiscriminately put up rent. When you have rent controls you do not have this kind of thing happening with eviction notices for this reason.

Now, rent controls have both a municipal and provincial dimension to them, but I really would encourage the Minister Responsible for Housing - now I am after forgetting where housing has been moved. Well, NLHC housing, anyway, has been moved to - it is not Business.

AN HON. MEMBER: Transportation.

MS MICHAEL: Transportation, which is another whole issue. This is a problem for me, the fact that NLHC is now with Transportation - I thank my colleagues for reminding me - because I see housing as a social issue, not as a nuts and bolts issue or a hammer and nail issue. I fear, with housing moving to Transportation, that can happen.

I am hoping that those inside of NLHC understand the social dimension of housing so well that they will make sure that they stay focused on the social dimension of the work that they are doing; however, it is also important that building new housing and building new units is also something that needs to happen, or restructuring; because here in St. John's, for example, a lot of the demand for housing, affordable housing, and housing that has rent that is subsidized, a lot of them are looking for smaller units than we used to require. Before, you had larger families and a lot of these NLHC units in Newfoundland and Labrador, especially in St. John's, were three bedroom units. Some are even four bedroom units. These are way too large for today's configuration. What you are seeing is a high demand for one and two bedrooms.

There has been a move inside of Newfoundland and Labrador Housing to convert larger apartments into smaller apartments. If you had two large apartments side by side it is easy to do that kind of thing because you can easily then make three apartments of out two, so there is work that needs to be done.

The non-profit housing in St. John's has a waiting list of 216. The officials from the government who spoke to this at the forum a couple of weeks ago pointed out that they believe the waiting list is actually higher than that, but people do not bother to apply because they know there is a waiting list. They just do not bother to apply. Two hundred and sixteen at the moment is the official number on the list, but if everybody who really needs the housing were to apply then the number would be higher.

With regard to NLHC housing, they have 900 request on a provincial waiting list, 438 in St. John's alone. On that list, 80 per cent of the waiting list is singles and seniors who want the smaller units, and there are not enough smaller units.

I am just noting here that I do have the statistic that, with the NLHC housing stock, 80 per cent of the family units are three or more bedrooms. That is a lot; 80 per cent of the family units are three or more bedrooms. It does not meet today's need.

We have a serious issue with regard to housing. Thirty per cent of Newfoundland and Labrador Housing tenants are low-income workers, and that is another issue because low-income workers really get caught. Low-income workers do not qualify for a lot of assistance that people who are on social assistance get, and low-income workers fall between the cracks. It is good that we have Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, because it really does assist the low-income workers.

I would suggest that we need more housing for low-income workers because the housing that is out there outside of Newfoundland and Labrador Housing is beyond their means, and also because of the point I made a few minutes ago that people are in housing where landlords want to make more money and they are just indiscriminately putting up the rates and causing people to have to leave. They either have to leave voluntarily or they actually get evicted because they stay, even though they cannot pay the higher rate and they just get evicted.

It is an awful situation. It is a situation that is not uncommon in a City like St. John's that is going through what we are going through right now, and we have been going through for a couple of years, and that is the large increase in income in the city, a large increase in demand by higher-paying people for the housing stock, especially the changing face of a downtown core when it comes to housing. That has happened in probably every big city around the world.

The thing is, you think we would have learned by now how to make sure that we maintain affordable housing for people who are not at the high end of earners in a city, or at the higher end of earners in a Province, and that those whose jobs are not bringing in any more money because of the work they are doing do not suffer because the housing market becomes more expensive because we have more people earning money at the top end.

That is not acceptable. As I said, it is something that does happen but it is something that can be mitigated against and we have not done it, so I am asking the government to take very, very seriously the housing needs.

We have housing needs in Corner Brook as well, especially with students, and I understand that the plans for the increase in residential units over in Corner Brook, at Grenfell, that plan is not going to meet the needs of students. We have to realize that students are part of the population. Students are not just studying; they are also earning money. Most students have to work, along with doing their studies, so they are contributing to society in every way: first of all, going through education so that they themselves can become educated and get better jobs. They are also contributing by having jobs right now as they study so that they can have enough money, one to study and to make ends meet for themselves. So, they are part of our society.

When we talk about housing, we have to realize we are talking about all housing. We do have a problem with the whole issue in Corner Brook with the housing that is going to be created, the new housing that is going to be created on campus already not being enough, I am being told. We have a similar problem up in Labrador City where we have to have real attention given to a residence for the students at the College of the North Atlantic. Not enough thought is going into that. I have had people from Labrador West speak to me their concerns with regard to the housing for students in Labrador City. I really encourage, as I have already said, I encourage this government to look seriously at the housing issue, and this is one place where we could be putting more money in.

If the Minister of Finance looks again at his figures and he evaluates where we can go with extra money into infrastructure, I would suggest to the minister that one of the places where it needs to go is into affordable housing. We would do two things by doing that. We would have people who are employed, and I would like to suggest that we are going to get more people coming back who have been in construction who will be ready to build houses. Also, we will have students who are in situations where they are not having to go deeper in debt because the housing that they are looking for is too expensive, because that is the issue, especially with students where they are living, a lot of them have student loans, then they will pay money that they cannot afford, adding to their debt, adding to their student loan in order to have a decent place to live.

The other thing that I would want the government to think about as it is right now enjoying, and we are all enjoying, the economic situation that we are in, but government has a responsibility to make responsible decisions about that. We also have to look at the energy consumption in this Province. In 2003, and it has not changed too much since then, Newfoundland had the highest energy poverty rate in Canada. What we mean by that is the poorest 20 per cent of income earners, that is the bottom fifth, spend more than 16 per cent of their annual income on energy. The average income household spends about 5 per cent of its income on energy. That is why the demand for the Home Heating Rebate is always so high every year.

I will acknowledge - I have not had an opportunity really to acknowledge the fact that yesterday the minister did announce the rebate. I am positive that the people in the Province, especially the bottom half of the earners are quite delighted with the fact that they are going to be able to get their rebate once more. I do also note the fact that the minister kept the same formula as last year. That means with the lower rate now for fuel, that people are actually going to get more for their money. So the $100, $200 or $500 is going to be worth more for them this year, and I acknowledge that, but it is something I think that we should take for granted, has to happen every year. I do not think people should be wondering if the rebate is going to happen every year. They should be maybe looking to see how much better it is going to be but they should not be wondering every year. I think government should announce yes, a home heating rebate will always be part of our plan as long as we are in the situation we are with the numbers of people living in poverty and with the cost of home heating, whether it is electricity or whether it is fuel. I would like to say that for people the rate is probably not going to go down as much this year because if they are not on fuel, if they actually use electricity, their rate is probably going to be the same as last year, if not a little bit higher.

The reason why people who are on the lower income have to pay a larger percentage of their annual income on energy has to do sometimes with the houses that they are living in. Sometimes the houses just are not well insulated, not well made and so they have to use more heat. Historically, we have had the high prices for heating oil; that this year is coming down. I am sure we have all seen it on our bills already. I am certainly seeing it.

We do not have a residential energy efficient retrofit program. If there is anything that the Minister of Finance could do, if there is anything that he could do to stimulate the economy it would be to put resources into an energy efficient retrofit program because that would include not just changing the source of ones heating from fuel to electricity, that is one way to retrofit, but retrofitting also means making the house energy efficient, because a lot of houses, as I said, are not insulated. The windows are not good; you get wind coming in through the windows. The doors do not fit well; you get wind coming in under doors. If you are getting wind coming in you are getting cold coming in, the circulation of cold air.

Retrofitting would, number one, help the individual because the individual family or individual person would be spending less money on heating, and if they are spending less money they have more money to spend on things they need. If we are talking about low-income people paying more than 16 per cent of their annual income on energy, they really do need more money because they are probably the people who are ending up at the food banks.

We had a report today of food banks here in St. John's with the numbers going up astronomically. One of the reasons people end up in food banks is that they have to pay for their heat. Therefore, because food banks are there - if they were not, they would go looking - they need food banks. That is one thing they can ask for and, to put it in a horrible way, they can beg for and get while they pay the price for their heat.

Doing retrofitting would benefit the individual. Doing retrofitting would benefit the overall economy, because retrofitting would involve workers working in retrofitting. We could, as a Province, start a Conservation Corps again, I would say to the Minister of Finance, and the Conservation Corps could get into training people to do retrofitting as Conservation Corps did. A Conservation Corps would get involved in training, it would then get involved in more employment, and it would help have energy efficient homes which would help people pay less money for their fuel.

I really ask the Minister of Finance to look at what could be done with a Conservation Corps program all over again, but one which is fully funded by government. We have the expertise, we have the people who were involved in Conservation Corps still here in the Province and still here in the City of St. John's. They could work with the Minister Responsible for Housing and work with the Minister of Finance in putting together a Conservation Corps program that could really be a stimulus for our economy.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I think I have covered all of the main points I wanted to cover and I have done it just about in my twenty minutes.

Thank you very much.

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


If he speaks now he will close debate.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the members opposite for their comments and I can assure them they will all be taken into account.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House that the said bill be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

Carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Income Tax Act, 2000 And To Repeal The Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act. (Bill 38)

MR. SPEAKER: This bill has now been read a second time.

When shall the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House?

Now? Tomorrow?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow.

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The Income Tax Act, 2000 And To Repeal The Financial Corporations Capital Tax Act," read a second time, referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow. (Bill 38)

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

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, Order 25, second reading of a bill, An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act. (Bill 63)

Motion, second reading of a bill, "An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act." (Bill 63)

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce amendments to the Management of Information Act. These amendments have three main purposes: to streamline the responsibility for the management of government information by moving the mandate for the Public Records Committee, which is to be renamed the Government Records Committee, from the Rooms Act to the Management of Information Act; two, to move the authority for the storage and management of semi-active records and the approval of standards and policies related to records and information management from The Rooms Corporation, and the Minister of Tourism, Culture & Recreation, to the Office of the Chief Information Officer and the minister responsible for the OCIO; and, three, to improve and modernize certain definitions and language within the act.

Mr. Speaker, government's information management policy advisory service are now vested in the OCIO, or the Office of the Chief Information Officer, which we discussed in this House last week in terms of the role of the OCIO, the number of people employed there, and the duties carried out by that office.

So this move results, Mr. Speaker, in management of the processes related to semi-active records to fall under one administrative authority. These changes, Mr. Speaker, are designed to improve and streamline the management of provincial government records and to update language contained in the Management of Information Act. This change, Mr. Speaker, enables public bodies bound by the Management of Information Act to deal with one entity rather than two.

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of terms used in this act, and a number of definitions. I will go through those very quickly in a second, Mr. Speaker, but basically what has happened is that the various departments involved – the OCIO and the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation - they have determined that the Management of Information Act and the Rooms Act need to be reviewed and amended to provide a more practical and client-friendly approach to records and information management.

The Rooms Act and the Management of Information Act, Mr. Speaker, were passed in 2005. They replaced the Archives Act as the legislative instrument to require management of information by public bodies. The creation of The Rooms Corporation governed by a separate piece of legislation, and the placement of the Provincial Archives into it, raised some issues for the information management mandate previously held by the Provincial Archives.

The most significant issue, Mr. Speaker, was that The Rooms Corporation is not considered to be the appropriate authority for development of information management policy for government. As a result, a decision was made to split the information management mandate in two, with the policy and advisory services mandate moving into the Management of Information Act administered by the Office of the Chief Information Officer and the Public Records Committee, and the operations of the provincial record centre, including a semi-active records management program, remaining with The Rooms Provincial Archives under The Rooms Act.

This split, Mr. Speaker, is somewhat impractical in that, instead of one agency working in a concerted manner towards a goal, it is necessary under the current arrangement for two agencies to be able to work together toward a common goal. This is complicated, Mr. Speaker, for public bodies which find themselves having to deal with two entities to get decisions made on records and information management and to seek advice and support in advancing their records and information management programs. There is often confusion relating to which of the two organizations has responsibility for which parts of the records and information management mandate.

The changes proposed, Mr. Speaker, would make a much less complicated environment for departments and agencies using the services of both the Office of the Chief Information Officer and The Rooms Provincial Archives.

So the main amendments to the Management of Information Act relate to, as I have indicated, moving the mandate from The Rooms Act to the Management of Information Act, and we will see that there are some additional changes to addressing the acceptability of electronic records as records to define government records, transitory records, abandoned records and Cabinet records.

The amendments, Mr. Speaker, can be described as a housekeeping measure primarily administrative in its purpose. The changes, like the last act that went through, Mr. Speaker, are meant to improve or streamline the process and to, in this case, improve and streamline the management of provincial government records and to update and improve language contained in both the Management of Information Act and The Rooms Act.

Given, Mr. Speaker, that government's information management policy and advisory services are now vested in the Office of the Chief Information Officer, it makes sense for all responsibility for management of all government records to fall under one administrative authority. The change enables one entity, rather than two, to effectively manage the proper storage, management and protection of government information in a consistent manner. So duplication of effort is removed. The essential change, Mr. Speaker, is that whereas the OCIO already had responsibility for the management of electronic records, they will now be responsible for the management of all, quote unquote, semi-active government records, paper and otherwise, regardless of their physical format.

The one definition that may cause some concern here – let me see if I have Bill 63. There is a definition of Cabinet record in here which, essentially, encompasses the process by which –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KENNEDY: He disappeared, Mr. Speaker. He is gone. Anyway, I followed the act. It is like the surplus, there it is, it could be gone.

The one definition that could cause some concern is that of Cabinet record. Essentially, the Cabinet record in the definition utilized here is one that encompasses the process from the time a memorandum is prepared, the purpose of which is to provide it to Cabinet, all the way to the Cabinet paper.

Now, as the Opposition House Leader would be aware - and especially in his time in Cabinet - Cabinet privilege is a very important concept of running a government. The Cabinet privilege ensures that decisions that are made by Cabinet are kept secret. It is the type of privilege that exists in law that ensures secrecy. There could be or there may be some concern that there could be a conflict between the ATIPP legislation and The Rooms and the Management Information act that we are putting forward in that – again, I do not have it in front of me and I am not going to move. If I remember correctly, the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act essentially defines a Cabinet record in a very broad term. I think it is under section 18, I am not sure of that, and it leaves open the ability of parties to seek information that could be, under this definition, be considered to be part of the Cabinet record.

Mr. Speaker, this is a somewhat contentious issue. In this particular case it is our position that this particular definition or the use of this definition in The Rooms Management Act has no relationship to the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act. This is a definition that we are using here today for the storage of information and that is the existing working definition of Cabinet records in use by government today. So, the fact that this definition is used here will not affect the ATIPP Act in terms of the definition used there. It is my understanding that the definition of Cabinet records in the ATIPP Act leaves some leeway in determining what is not part of the Cabinet record.

We are putting it in the Management of Information Act to have it placed in the legislation which addresses government's management of its records and information and to provide clarity on the definition. So, when it comes time for the storage of this information the OCIO has a clear guideline as to what paper, documents should come under the definition of Cabinet record. You see, Mr. Speaker, there are also some other definitions there. There is abandoned record, the archives, Cabinet record. I also saw a government record, a transitory record. So, what this is, it is to give guidance to the OCIO in running the Management of Information Act as to the types of information that should be stored.

Mr. Speaker, these definitions have been added to the Management of Information Act because it has been determined, with two different pieces of legislation over the last couple of years, that increased clarity is needed on the definitions. So, essentially, government records will replace public records. Public records were found to be a confusing term, as sometimes people thought it was records that were public rather than the records created by public bodies. I can see how that definition, when you are using terms like public in an ordinary dictionary meaning.

Government record, Mr. Speaker, is meant to be an all encompassing term for any records created by public bodies. A transitory record, Mr. Speaker, replaces copies of convenience, which was a leftover from a time when most records were in paper format. Transitory records, Mr. Speaker, will allow for regular disposal of electronic records that are merely reformats of final versions, and transitory e-mails that have no value as government records. An abandoned record, Mr. Speaker, is meant to address the issue where, from time to time, records are discovered for which an owner or a creator are not obvious, the records of defunct agencies or reorganized departments.

Under the legislation, as it exists today, Mr. Speaker, a permanent head or designate must sign off on the disposal of these records before they can be addressed to the public records committee. Records belonging to a defunct agency, or department, can sometimes have no logical permanent head to sign off on their disposal. In such cases, the proposed abandoned records provision would allow the Chief Information Officer to designate them as abandoned, and then they could move through the regular public records committee for assessment of their value by The Rooms Provincial Archives.

As I have indicated, Mr. Speaker, the cabinet record: the purpose this definition is to provide clarity as to what exactly constitutes a cabinet record, and to have it appear in the legislation which addresses government's management of its own records and information.

These are, Mr. Speaker, as I have indicated, essentially housekeeping measures. Again, it is meant to streamline, reduce overlap, and to provide clarity to the Chief Information Officer, or the Office of the Chief Information Officer, in the management of this type of information.

Those will be my comments.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I thank the minister for his comments.

I was looking forward to the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation actually standing up because the bill was titled under his name, but, of course, government can have whomever they wish to introduce a particular bill. I realize that the Minister of Finance certainly has some familiarity with dealing with Information Management, if not in Finance certainly in his position when he was in Justice. There were several issues involving privacy issues that he was, no doubt, intimately involved in in the Office of the Chief Information Officer.

I would appreciate an opportunity to have a few comments. Not only is the management of information to which government has control very important today - not only today but it is important on a go-forward basis - but it is very important as to how you manage it, where you manage it, who manages it, and what security provisions you have in relation to it.

We have had enough incidents in our Province, of course, that we have seen in the last couple of years even, with how information is managed. It has become an issue of public concern. I will speak to, first of all, the disclosure of it, sometimes when it ought not to be disclosed, sometimes when it ought to be disclosed and it is not, and how we deal with it in terms of what is the value of it.

What one might deem to be a non-valuable document, such as a government - and we hear words like semi-active and such being tossed around here - might to someone else be very important, might be very active, and certainly might be of a cultural or historical importance. We have had a couple of incidents in this Province where that has not been recognized, and we have seen court cases, in fact, which dealt with that very particular issue.

Of course, we have the interplay between other pieces of legislation. We are dealing here today with Bill 63. It is going to deal with the Management Of Information Act, but we are also going to be dealing with, pretty well simultaneously, the next bill, I guess, Bill 64, which is going to do with the Rooms Act. Then, of course, the minister alluded as well to the Access To Information And Protection Of Privacy Act, which interplays in a lot of respects with these two pieces of information. Certainly there is an interplay between ATIPPA, or the Access To Information And Protection Of Privacy Act, and the storage and management and disclosure of information as well. Trying to keep it all straight sometimes is a pretty complicated matter.

We have had a lot of headlines related to information in the Province, and the management of that particular information. Just this very week, we had the local newspaper, the Telegram, which did an exclusive story called Executive Decisions; a front page story talking about what the government did with certain information and how they would not disclose certain information when they were requested to do so. We had headlines, I believe the following day, saying: Williams wanted secret appeal speeded up in 2002; all related again to how government has been dealing with or managing information. We had headlines that screamed back in the early days of the Cameron Inquiry: Premier's office ordered information deleted.

You know, we are not talking here about an act that is of no importance or concern to the public. Those headlines that I just referred to, they have all occurred within the last twelve months. We had other headlines and photos we dealt with in this House. I directed a series of fifteen, twenty questions to the Minister of Tourism, Culture & Recreation at the time, dealing with the destruction of certain documents, or impending destruction of certain documents.

Somebody made a decision in the system that certain documents were to be shredded and those documents were shipped from one location to another by a company that was supposed to do the shredding. In the course of that, I guess someone saw a way to make a quick buck. Anyway, somebody ended up in possession of these documents and the issue became: Were they stolen? Was this transaction being done for money? Was that a criminal act that had been committed? Someone was actually charged with having committed a criminal act and the case unfolded down here on Duckworth Street.

Of course, my questions had nothing to do with the criminal piece, but my questions at the time were directed to the minister because of the whole process of how these documents got to the point of being shredded in the first place. Who made the decision to shred them? What are the criteria that one uses to decide what is no longer of any value? Should it be shredded? Who is to make that decision? Who was overseeing these things?

The minister of the day talked about it, and in his answers he said there was a three-step process. Even though he enunciated what the process was at the time, it did not work, folks, because those documents were going to be shredded, so somewhere along the line something did not happen.

I am assuming that these amendments here that we are dealing with in Bill 63 and Bill 64 today are partially in response to what happened back then, because it all dealt with management of information.

Now the minister, in his introductory remarks here in second reading, talks about the distinction between who was in control. Was it going to be the office of the information commissioner or was it going to be The Rooms people? Who should be controlling it? Did we have two different groups trying to fulfill the same mandate? Did that make things more complex? It was unnecessary? We are trying to supposedly streamline things here as we go forward. It is obviously very, very important.

Just to give you another example, which we have had within the last twenty-four hours, of how information is managed in the system – and we had four of these in the last year. That is, certain information is deemed to be governmental or bureaucratic, shall we say, i.e. the minister alluded to Cabinet confidences and Cabinet documents and what the parameters are surrounding that information. We have had information. There are other documents that are of an historical nature, a cultural nature, but government manages a lot of information that is of a private nature.

For example, ultimately somewhere in government or in its agencies – it could be health boards, for example. We have medical information, we have financial data on people contained within the Department of Health, and if that information is improperly secured there is a risk that it could be disclosed and people could be injured as a result of it, or suffer damages as a result of it.

I asked three questions today of the Minister of Justice pertaining to just one such example, and that concerns Her Majesty's Penitentiary and the report that was done on the correctional facilities in this Province this year, which was submitted back in September. The report was released yesterday. There were seventy-seven recommendations in it. In the course of doing it, the Department of Justice – good motivations, good intentions – posted it on the Web site, so that everybody in the Province or anywhere else in the world could read it.

Now, we had a bit of demanding to do to get that out of them. We asked questions here for the last two or three weeks about when they were going to release it because this government is not open very much to releasing documents in a timely fashion. There was, in fact, an actual undertaking in writing, a commitment in their Blue Book, going back as early as 2003, that any reports would be released within thirty days. I do not know if government has ever complied with that, a stated intention that they would release it within thirty days, acted upon within sixty days.

God forbid, if we are going to go back and see if they ever acted upon all their reports in sixty days. There might have been parts of them acted upon. I do not know if we have ever had government reports released in thirty days, as was undertaken by this government back in 2003 and confirmed again in 2007. We even had the Premier, for example, who said: Yeah, we realize we may have been a little bit tardy sometimes and we have not complied, so we are going to go back and do a complete list and housecleaning and see what ones we are not in compliance with and we will make sure we bring it all up to scratch for you.

That was last spring that the Premier was saying that. We bugged him so much here about what was not out there, that he had undertaken to put out there. I believe it was some time in August or September I was still getting, in my office, information that had been undertaken in a sitting in the spring that we were going to get. So sometimes we have to pry information out with a good pair of sharp pliers from this government in order to get it.

Anyway, back to the corrections report. The Minister of Justice, and as I mentioned to him today and I asked questions about that today – this information, inadvertent or not, found its way onto the Web and certain people, using very elementary procedures, there were blacked out portions of it in the report and they all became public. In fact, I was sitting here in this House and I had an envelope delivered to me. I started to read it and I said: that is not what I read this morning. Then I realized, all of a sudden, that I was reading the blacked out portions. That was delivered to me as I sat here in the House yesterday, in the House of Assembly. I sent it over to the minister because I did not understand what was going on. Did somebody inadvertently give me something that did not belong to me? I had the report here in front of me with the blacked out pieces. I said where did this come from? I gave it to the minister once I figured out what it was. I said were you aware that this information is out in the public domain? He confirmed that he had heard something about it and he understood that it was taken down from the Web once it became known to the people in Justice. No doubt, the people in Justice did not deliberately, wilfully put that out there. They blacked it out for certain legitimate reasons. They felt there was certain information that should not be released to the public. There were names mentioned in there. There were times and events mentioned in there and occurrences. There were security issues raised in there, locks that did not lock that should have locked. Cameras that did not work that should work. They did not want that kind of information being known to the world and certainly not I guess to the inmates, but, unfortunately, it was out there.

That is an example of where government managing information and an improper manner, wilfully or accidentally or inadvertently, can lead to some very serious consequences; particularly the one about the cameras. For example, it is known now in certain institutions that certain cameras that were surveillance cameras in an institution in this Province do not work. Guess what? The inmates in that institution now probably know that. Now nothing might ever happen. It might be a small matter of replacing the bulb or fixing the cameras or doing whatever but it was an issue, I would suggest, that should not have been known, but it was done. That is how important it is. It could in fact be, God forbid, but it might be a life safety issue that is involved. That is just one example that has happened in our Province in the last twenty-four hours.

We go back to the spring. There was somebody, for example, that government hired, an outside contractor I do believe, who came into one of the government departments - the Department of Health, I do believe, was doing some kind of work on a certain piece of work, a contract with the government as a contractor and all of a sudden we find out that somebody, because this person went on and used some piece of technology or went home and somebody hacked into that computer and had access to medical, personal information regarding somebody in this Province. Now that is very serious, folks. I do not think it is anybody's business of what my medical records are. I certainly do not think it is anybody's business of what my financial records are that I entrust – usually I do not entrust, I am forced to let the government have – and I do not think it is very proper if that information gets out into the public, nor does anybody here, nor does anybody in the public think that. We all know that – they say wherever there is a law, there is somebody who is going to try to bend it or potentially break it and that, of course, is no different. As long as you put security in place and security arrangements on your computers, there is always somebody going to try to hack into it. That is what causes the concern, because government can be as prudent as they want to be, as diligent as they want to be, and yet this type of information will get out.

Now, I agree, you cannot chastise anybody. You should not be condemning anybody because it gets out inadvertently. No. Everybody makes mistakes. That happens. The question then becomes, once it happens, how do we ensure that it does not get repeated? That is the issue, and what safeguards do we have in place that, once we know these breaches occur, that we immediately take remedial action to make sure that it does not reoccur? That is the significance. Nobody has a problem and understands that somebody has to manage the information, the most effective and efficient way that they manage it, fine. What happens if there is a screw up and it gets out? Where do we go then? Now, obviously, if there are damages to the individual one way or the other – it could be emotional damage, it could be financial damage, whatever. The government has to deal with the consequences of that. The courts will determine that. There is a place to do that.

Governments have to be cognizant of the real responsibility, the real seriousness of how we deal with the management of this information. It is not something frivolous, to say: Yes, we have this and sure, we will manage it and it is going to be in electronic form and so on, and we will store it at The Rooms or we will store it here or one person should be responsible for it or someone else should be. It goes a bit beyond that. It is a bit more serious than that, because beneath all of this information, it is not just about whether you can or cannot access a Cabinet document. It is not just about whether you can go back and get the press releases that were issued by the Department of Tourism and Culture for the last fifteen years. It is not that kind of what I would call – well, Cabinet confidence is one thing, but most of the stuff you can probably call it mundane after ten years. I am sure the release that the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation put out about the number of moose licences in this Province in 2001 probably does not rank very high today in terms of security needs.

There is a wide range of what is important and what is not important when it comes to information. I would like to think that, like the anomalies and errors bill that we saw today come back from the Minister of Justice, where we go back on a timely basis, once a year, or once every eighteen months, and clean up these pieces of legislation that need to be cleaned up, somewhere there ought to be, and maybe it does exist, I am not aware of it but maybe it does exist, somewhere there ought to be a review mechanism and a reporting mechanism so that – I do not think it is simply a case of, there is a breach and somebody, somewhere, is responsible for recording it.

I think you need that openness. How does the public ever know that something happened? You do not have to know the details of what happened, but you have to know that there was a failure in the system and that we took steps to fix it; because it is only if the public has the confidence level to know that it is being fixed as the breaches occur that you have faith and trust in the system.

So, instead of being, oh, don't tell anybody about this because it might cause turmoil, it might cause upset – I agree, you do not go out and cause stress. We just went through that, by the way, down in the Cameron inquiry. A lot of that was about, should we or should we not disclose? Because we had to balance the need to disclose versus the risk of causing emotional harm to some people. That is a very touchy, difficult decision to make, but I think ultimately, and I think we will see when the Cameron inquiry comes back, that the need to disclose will be paramount.

Governments tend to – and maybe it is a logical piece of governments – governments tend to be protective of information, shall we say, to be kind. Rather than err on the side of putting information out, governments tend to want to protect all information and keep it in, and that includes when something happens. Governments are not apt to say there was an error, there was a mistake.

I appreciate today, for example, the forthrightness of the Minister of Justice when he said: Yes, it was inadvertent but it happened; now let's fix it. Sorry, we will get on with it.

It is not a big thing, the world is not going to fall apart about it, but that approach to things, as to saying yes up front, yes it happened, yes we have to move on, but yes we hope it does not happen again and we will take steps to see that it does not happen, that, I believe, is the right approach to take to the management of information to start with, because there has to be trust.

If people come to the point of thinking that, every piece of information they put in to this government, they risk the possibility of seeing it tomorrow in The Telegram or in a CBC report, then that is not a very good comfort level. As time goes on, I am sure we will perfect the system more, or I should say it will be less imperfect as time moves on, and hopefully we will not have the four repeats that we have had.

We have had four or five, as I say, serious incidents this year, of breaches, and they are not always caused by governments. As I say, there are people who hack into this stuff. It happened inadvertently, I would think, in the case of the subcontractor, or the contractor who did that with his information.

Yes, it was reckless, I would think, to put it on his personal computer or whatever, that it got out that way, but it still happened. The thing is, the public need to have a confidence level that government is vigilant, not only in looking after and protecting your information but also making sure that the security provisions are in place so that it does not get accessed by someone else.

We will be voting in favour of the Management of Information Act, Bill 63 and its companion piece, Bill 64, when it gets called now in due course, because we think it is moving in the right direction. That is what the intent is - the stated intent is - of these pieces of legislation; but, of course, one can be the devil's advocate as well and say: If that is the spirit of the piece of legislation and that is the intent of the legislation, then that is what we are supporting.

We would not want to see, somewhere down the road, that these good intentions and the spirit of this gets twisted by some government, particularly, for example, when it comes to the Cabinet confidences piece, because that is a pretty broad definition that we have here in this bill about what is a Cabinet confidence. In fact, if you talk about being inclusive, I do not know if I have seen a more inclusive definition. I guess you could take it so far as to say the conversation that started down on the wharf between Jack and Joe, that ultimately led to a briefing note to go to a minister, that ended up with a policy decision in Cabinet, can be dragged in under this definition of Cabinet confidence because it somehow or other was a contributing factor or notion into that ultimate policy or decision of Cabinet. That is pretty broad what we have here, very, very broad, if you just look at the definition when they talk about Cabinet confidences.

By the way, I agree, this piece here deals with the management of that information. That is why I come back to the point where the tie-in between the management of that information, how it is secured, and sometimes how, under the Access to Information and Privacy piece, it has to be disclosed, so there is a link here.

Again, I guess all one can do and say at this point is, we know what the government's stated intention is as to the Cabinet documents. We just hope that – I cannot honestly say we have seen the spirit of openness for the last four or five years. Anything that we, as an Opposition, have tried to get from this government we have had to drag it out.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: Yes, drag it out, I say to the minister. In fact, if you go back – I think it is being compiled right now – in addition to what The Telegram did in their exclusive story this past weekend, if you go back and check the number of requests by the Official Opposition to the government, vis-à-vis ATIPP, and see how often they comply with the timelines that were in there, there were not very many compliances that were right on schedule. In fact, there was always every kind of excuse in the book offered. Instead of being the spirit of what should be disclosed, and that was the spirit of ATIPP - this is what you got, this is what you should disclose, this is how you should do it, and this is the process that you should use - the government took an opposite approach. It was almost like, instead of what we should disclose, let's go find a reason why we should not disclose. That is certainly not the intention.

I believe it was the PC Administration of Mr. Peckford back in 1980 that brought in the first ATIPP legislation, Access To Information, and it went for twenty years with all kinds of pros and cons and people complaining and saying you have to change this, you need to do something with it. Finally, in 2003 we took the culmination of twenty years of comments and suggestions, criticisms, a lot of which came from the Opposition members of the day, and put it all into a revised Access To Information, and struck a committee, in fact. Government did not even do it themselves. They said: Look, this is a very serious, complex issue; let's bring some independence to it. They went out and got an independent group consisting of lawyers, public citizens, people who were involved in a bureaucracy as respected bureaucrats in their own right, they drafted up a new proposal and came in, the government took it pretty well lock, stock and barrel and said, here is the new ATIPP and this is what we will operate under.

I will be the first to say that it was not perfect, by the way. I happen to be the minister who brought it in. I will say now, since 2002 to now, that the ATIPP legislation that we introduced in 2002 was by no means perfect. Big advances on what we had from 1980, took a lot of new factors into consideration - how people did business, how people stored, managed, disclosed information and so on - but it was not perfect and, newsflash, it was not expected to be perfect. It was, in fact, commented on when it was introduced in legislation to be just what it was. It was a recognition that more needed to be done with disclosing information that particularly was in government agencies. We needed to understand and appreciate that there were other bodies in this Province that were not covered by Freedom of Information that needed to be, such as health boards and school boards and municipalities. We had to have recognition that there was a different standard to be applied to information versus private information, and that was what the main focus was overall of the ATIPP legislation in 2002.

In fact, we could not even implement it. I believe it was the Minister of Justice of 2007, if I am correct, maybe 2006, but certainly at least five years after the original ATIPP was done in 2002, that we got the full proclamation of it, and that was the privacy piece. I am not sure which minister did it, but there were certainly pieces in terms of privacy that could not be done, were not done, until 2006. People understood why, because it was so comprehensive when it came to private information. Our health boards and our municipalities did not even have a process in place as to how to deal with access to information. They never had people trained who could deal with access to information. We did not, in government, have a proper process and format for information. I understand now each department has personnel designated to deal with ATIPP requests: how they are responded to and the timelines. Ultimately it comes back, I do understand, to the Department of Justice, to be the ultimate, shall we say, guide or decision maker as to what you should or should not do. That is where it comes back to now.

We had to start somewhere. They made the start in 1980. We had twenty years of trying to improve it. We made a major overhaul in 2002. We took four or five years, or this administration took some time, to implement the provisions of it concerning privacy, but we are still not there, folks.

The other biggest piece of ATIPP legislation that came in, in 2002, that was not there before, is that there was no recourse to appeal. That was the big, major glaring omission that was in the old legislation. You could come to government back in the old days and say, we would like to have such-and-such, and ultimately, if the government said, no thanks, you are not going to get it, sorry, you did not have any recourse when it came to appeal, to someone outside of government. If you did, of course, the issue of cost always came up. Who was going to pay for it? That was enough to discourage people from taking an appeal. Now you can actually appeal to the Supreme Court if you have to, if ultimately the decision is under ATIPP. In fact, you might not even have to pay for it, because if it is a legitimate request, the Privacy Commissioner himself will take the case on your behalf and take it forward to you at his cost. That is quite an improvement.

We do notice that the cost is still an issue and it still can prevent some people from getting information. I know we have one request outstanding now. We sent in the request and the department of the day came back and said, thank you very much for your request; we will compile the information and it will cost you $5,682 to get it. Whoa! Just a minute, now! God knows that the Opposition Party has enough problems when it comes to resources, particularly the Official Opposition. It cannot pay for research staff let alone paying $5,600 to get some information from a department. We went back, we said, we will refine the request. If it is going to cost that much, we will go back and we will refine the request. We went back and sure enough they narrowed it down to $628 to get the information. Folks, that is still a hefty price to pay for information, still a hefty price to pay, and it puts a price tag on that democratic piece of it. Obviously somebody has to pay for it, but unfortunately a lot of people who want the information cannot access it still because of the fee schedules that are in place. That is where governments, maybe unfortunately and unintentionally, get tainted with being protectors unnecessarily of certain information.

MR. WISEMAN: Be more prudent in your requests.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: A very interesting comment the minister just made, about being very prudent in your requests; from the Minister of Health and Community Services. That is the point. The requests are very prudent. There is so much going on, the information is so expansive, there is so much information that is within the government shelving that that is why it is so important that we be able to get access. It is not a case of being prudent. It is a case of being able to afford to get the information. Government can easily take what was intended to be the spirit of cooperation, but by putting these price tags on it, it becomes an impediment to the disclosure of the information.

If you have to run the gamut, which is happening folks, virtually every request that goes in you are either told you have to - obviously you have to meet the guidelines in terms of timelines and so on, but you come back with very few that meet the thirty day compliance rule and then you face this fee structure piece that you have to get at. That is not the spirit of a government that is open and accountable. That flies in the face of your claiming to be open and accountable.

We had a number of examples, even in this brief sitting of the House of Assembly, of openness and accountability. We are into our third week. The report on corrections came out in September 29. The minister of the day found out enough in it in twenty-four hours that he fired the superintendent and the deputy superintendent, but yet when the public says and when the Opposition says, can we have a copy of it, they say, no, sorry. We were here in this House clamouring for three days asking questions.

Just a minute! You have implemented forty-two of the seventy-seven recommendations. You fired the superintendent, you fired the deputy, but yet you do not think that it should be released to the public. Then when you did turn around and finally release it, you screwed it up, I say. You released it improperly in terms of the security provisions. That is just one case.

It is like the financial update. Great news in terms of where we stand with money in the bank, or going to have in the bank, the surpluses, but you have to scratch and claw so much to get the information. We are the last jurisdiction in Canada to get an update. Now, I do not know if that means the information was not available, or you are just tardy in getting it compiled, but why does it take so long? As I say, you have to pry information out with a pair of pliers to try to get, sometimes, information that is very essential to the public.

It is like the piece on the rebate for the oil. People were asking all kinds of questions. You have done it for four years, five years in a row. Anybody who lives in rural Newfoundland, certainly, and everywhere, who needs it, because it is a needs based program, were asking: When is this program going to be done? Now, it is not complicated to stand up and say, well, we are going to announce this the second week of December. We do it every year in December. Instead of that, you get the run around: Do not know, cannot tell you, we will do it whenever. No openness. The spirit is not there.

You talk about good management: well, good management skills include communication skills, and planning in terms of how you reveal information to people. That piece is missing, folks, missing, and part of it is being proactive instead of being reactive. With all due respect, a lot of the things seem to be reactive in nature, from the government, rather than being proactive.

Anyway, I have another twenty-seven minutes that I could legally or legitimately talk, but I do not intend to pursue it any further. I have made my points as to the seriousness of this management of information issue, particularly from a security point of view.

Once this session is concluded now, we will be back here, hopefully, in the spring in a new session. I am just curious now. Between now and the spring sitting of 2009, let us see how many security incidents we have regarding information within the government system. I am just curious, because from March of this year until now, December, we have had at least four situations where this government has not properly managed information. I am not even alluding to the issue of the court case where historical documents were being destroyed. You count that one, you can add that to the mix, because albeit, somebody said, ah, it is not worth anything. We apparently had two professors over at the university who gave sworn testimony, I do believe, saying that it was worth about $250,000. That is pretty good. I do not know who determines what value is but somebody felt it was going to the shredder and someone else, two professors felt that it could be bought and purchased, Memorial would pay $250,000 for it. That is a pretty wide gap and that is pretty serious issues. We will just pay attention.

Like I say, we are going to speak in favour of this now because you are on the right track if you are doing anything to improve security and to properly manage information that you have. We will be vigilant in watching, seeing what happens in terms of security from here on a go-forward basis. We are watching from the point of view that, again, it should be disclosed. It should be talked about. It should be acknowledged and recognized when you do it that something needs to be done to fix the problem, because there comes a time when if you keep getting five, six, seven incidents a year of breaches of privacy information, there are some holes in the system.

The question then becomes: Do we have a really leaky boat here, with all kinds of leaks, or is the system that we are using somehow flawed and the whole system needs to be done? Is it not a case of an individual thing but we have systemic flaws in the system? So far, 2008 has not been a good experience. Hopefully, 2009 will be much improved. If these two pieces of legislation that we have here are going to go any way towards improving it, so be it. We will be in favour of it, but I fear that we are going to see a situation that we are going to have further breaches in the future.

Meanwhile, and I said this to the former minister, I have no problem understanding and appreciating and sympathizing when these breaches occur beyond your control. I guess it is like I said about the law, you can make whatever law you want but the minute you make a law or you make a rule, somebody out there, if you have wrong intentions and you are deliberately going to break the law, you will probably find a way to do it. There is probably not much you can do about that, but when the mistake is because of somebody's inadvertence, because some policy was not in place that ought to have been, when protective measures were not there which should have been, that is when we have a problem.

Mr. Speaker, I will take my leave at this time. That is all that I have to say in second reading with respect to Bill 63. For the record, Bill 64 I do believe, as I say, is a companion piece with Bill 63. So I do not see any need to repeat myself when we come to Bill 64.

Thank you.

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

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

I am quite happy to have the opportunity to speak to Bill 63, An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act. I was a bit perplexed when I first looked at it and saw that this act was under the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation, but that got rectified today when it was the Minister of Finance who spoke to the act. It did, though, make me look at the history of archives and public records.

I did, in doing a little bit of research, note that originally, going back to 1984 and prior, that the Archives Act actually was under Culture, Recreation and Youth, which I think is quite curious that it ever was there. It is recorded twice, in 1984 and 1985, that the Archives Act was under Culture, Recreation and Youth, but then in 1991, or actually 1990, we see that the Archives Act, the same name, is under Municipal and Provincial Affairs. Then in 1993, the Archives Act was moved to Finance. So I guess with the appearance today of the Minister of Finance speaking to Bill 63, the Management Of Information Act, which does deal with the archives, I guess it means that the archives are still under the Department of Finance.

Is that correct, minister?

AN HON. MEMBER: Under The Rooms.

MS MICHAEL: Under The Rooms. No, this is a different act. The Information Act is not The Rooms Act.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS MICHAEL: Right. Okay. It is under the Minister of Finance at the moment.

So, at least that got cleared up for me. I was glad that the minister did speak to it a little bit but I needed to clarify it. I was also glad that he clarified the reason of changing the word public to government, and I certainly understand why that happened. At first I did wonder why that happened but when he explained it that made sense to me.

What I do want to talk to, though, is what my colleague from the Official Opposition spent a lot of time on, because I have spent a lot of time on it also. I have spent a lot of time looking at the definition of Cabinet record. The minister did indicate when he stood up that this probably was going to be something that was going to cause discussion, and he is quite right, because as soon as I saw the definition of Cabinet record and that it was being added to the act, I then went to the original act and saw that really there was nothing there at all. Then we have this extensive definition of Cabinet record. In actual fact, there are eight sections to the definition of Cabinet record. I actually had to spend a lot of time figuring this out in order to speak to it. I do have a couple of questions to ask of the minister. It did take up a lot of time in our office which, with all due respect to the Opposition House Leader, our office is way smaller than the Official Opposition's office. So it was even a greater stress on us to have to spend the amount of time that we did on trying to figure this one out.

I am still not comfortable with the brief explanation we received from the minister. I am going to have to read Hansard tomorrow to go over again what he said. I am not comfortable with the answer that I heard and questions are still abounding for me with regard to the definition of Cabinet record.

I went to the definition in the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act. I went there to get the definition of Cabinet confidences. The minister made reference to this, to section 18 of the act, but I want to read it into the record. I think anybody watching who does not have the document in front of them should hear what the definition is in the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act.

In section 18 of the ATIPP Act it says, "The head of a public body shall refuse to disclose to an applicant information that would reveal the substance of deliberations of Cabinet, including advice, recommendations, policy considerations or draft legislation or regulations submitted or prepared for submission to the Cabinet." That is it. That is the blanket statement.

Then there are some subsections, it says that definition, subsection (1) does not apply to information in a record that has been in existence for twenty years or more. So anything that is twenty years or older, it is available. It cannot be kept from anybody. That section does not apply to information in a record of a decision made by the Cabinet on an appeal under an act. So there seems to me, under the ATIPP Act, to be more restrictions with regard to the definition of the Cabinet record than we find in this new bill, the Management of Information amendment act.

I heard the minister's definition and I am rather curious because the minister, it seems to me, has acknowledged that the definition in the bill that we are dealing with today, Bill 63, is a much, much broader definition than the definition of Cabinet records in the ATIPP Act. He has acknowledged that. It covers everything from a memorandum, it covers an agenda, a minute, or a record of Cabinet recording deliberations or decisions of Cabinet. It talks about the various communications or discussions among ministers.

It is extremely broad, and what I find curious is that the minister said – and he is not here, but I know he has passed on the responsibility for listening to me to another minister, I think – the minister has said that there is no relationship between the definition in this bill that we are dealing with and in the ATIPP Act, and I am finding it really hard to understand how there can be no definition.

I know that the bill we are dealing with is the management of the information, but there is a point at which how the information is going to be managed would affect how ATIPP might be able to get at information if it needed to get at it. That, for me, is the disconnect between what the minister said and what appears to me to be the reality, that this very broad definition of Cabinet record is going to mean that the management of the information is going to include a much broader bag of tricks, as it were, than the definition under the ATIPP Act.

When I look to section 5.4 of the bill, where we see Exceptions to the rule of this bill, we see, "(1) Cabinet records shall be managed in the manner determined by Cabinet Secretariat." So the Cabinet Secretariat is going to decide how Cabinet records are managed. That is what is going to happen. Cabinet Secretariat is going to decide how Cabinet records are managed, so the Cabinet Secretariat will be using this definition that is in this bill to determine what is going to be managed and how it is going to be managed.

Then the question comes, well, if the Commissioner goes to Cabinet Secretariat and is looking for something that the Commissioner believes fits under the ATIPP definition and the Commissioner should have access to, the Cabinet Secretariat will be able to say, well, sorry, that is managed under the definition that is in the Management of Information Act.

I see a real problem between this, and my question to the minister is: Which definition rules? Which definition rules when it comes to access of information? Will we now have information that was accessible before now not being accessible because of this, because of the fact that Cabinet Secretariat will be using the definition in this act?

This is very problematic. We already have a problem with regard to access of information going on, where the commissioner is having a difficult time getting information from Cabinet, from government, and even when there are appeals to the commissioner by people who are trying to access information and the commissioner rules that the information should be released, government is not releasing the information.

What I think we have happening here is the potential for the privacy commissioner to have even less power to make sure that documents that the act governing the commissioner says should be available, or the act that the commissioner would use in determining whether or not it should be made available. We have a really serious problem and I think people are really going to be looking at this very closely and asking, what is going on here? Is this a move, using this act, the Management of Information Act, is this a move by government to make sure that every single piece of paper that they can possibly say should be secret will become secretive?

I am not speaking against the whole thing of the right of Cabinet to be in secret. I am not quarrelling with that; however, when you get to a point that, it seems to me, pieces of paper or conversations that could be five, six or seven layers away from a Cabinet decision could become defined as not being accessible, then we have a major problem, I believe.

I, too, along with others, will be questioning this government's commitment to transparency and openness and accountability, because I really see what is happening in this act with this broad, to put it mildly, definition of Cabinet record. I really see what is happening here as being really problematic and can really lead to even more secrecy on the part of governments - not just this government, all government that goes on here in this Province.

I would also like to know from the minister if the Chief Information Officer was involved in consultation with the drafting of this bill. Was the Chief Information Officer consulted? Did he have an opinion to give? Did the Chief Information Officer say yes, this works fine, or is there a discussion going on between the Department of Finance and the ATTIP office? Maybe the minister said there was a discussion that went on; I did not necessarily hear that. I heard him say that this is a potential area for a problem, so it seems to me somebody must have said something to the minister but at what point was it said? Why did the minister assume this could be problematic? Did he assume it because they knew, as they drafted it, it could be but they still believed it was all right, or did the minister say that because somebody went to him and spoke to him and said I really think this is problematic.

I think we need to know from the minister what this is all about, because this broadening of a definition really upsets me. Do we have now the Department of Finance, through this bill, giving a power to the Cabinet Secretariat that is not under ATTIP? I want a really clear answer from the minister with regard to who is defining Cabinet record here.

The other thing, then, the question I have for the minister, is: If this definition is going to become the operative definition used by Cabinet Secretariat, why wasn't the government up front and say they wanted to make a change to the ATTIP Act and do it there? Is it because there it would be too obvious that this was a move to protect more and more documents?

It is very, very disturbing, it is very problematic, and I will be looking forward to answers from the minister on the questions that I have been asking.

I mean, it is one thing to improve the management of government records. Obviously, we need that and government records should be protected at all times and should be managed carefully. We cannot afford having breaches in security of documentation, no matter what that breach is. It seems, based on what happened yesterday with regard to the report that came out from the Department of Justice, we may have to look at how technology works. Maybe technology is not working the way we thought. I do not think for one minute that the Department of Justice would have put the document up on the Web site if they thought that the redactions were going to be revealed. I do not think for a minute they would do that. So now we have another whole issue around electronic communication and we cannot take anything for granted. We definitely need to look at management of information.

We cannot blame others if there is a breach. If there is a breach of information, or a breach of security of information, if that happens, I really do not think that we can blame anybody who then reveals that information. It is not their fault that they got the information. The responsibility around the management of records, the responsibility is in the hands of government that there has to be every assurance, everything has to be put in place, to make sure that breaches do not happen.

Thank goodness it is a while since we have heard breaches of privacy issues being accessed through laptops that have been left in the wrong place by people either working for a government on contract or in full-time positions. We have not heard anything recently, and let's hope we never have to hear it again, especially also the possibility of a laptop being stolen and information being accessed through the laptop. There has not been anything recently and we have to hope that kind of thing is under control now and will not happen again.

Management of records and access to records - it is not just the management of records themselves, it is also the access to the records that has to be managed. That definitely has to be done. When it comes to that part of the amendment, I do not have a problem - I do not have a problem at all - but whether or not I can vote for this amendment is going to depend on what I hear about this whole definition of government record and what the minister has to say to us when the minister speaks again about the definition of government record. I have to get a clear answer about the relationship between this definition and the definition in ATIPP. I have to find out for sure that the commissioner, or the Chief Information Officer, is going to be able to access documents that, under the definition of the ATIPP Act, the commissioner thinks should be able to be accessed.

I think they are the main points that I wanted to make, Mr. Speaker. I have, as you can tell, a major concern with this bill in terms of that one piece in particular. It is crucial, it is an absolutely crucial piece, and we will just have to wait and see what else the minister has to say about the concerns that I have raised.

Thank you very much.

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): The hon. the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

If the hon. minister speaks now he will close the debate on Bill 63, An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act.

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

MR. JACKMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It gives me pleasure to stand and close this debate in second reading.

Some of the questions that have been posed by the Leader of the NDP and the Opposition House Leader are interesting ones. Very simply, the debate that I heard the Leader of the Opposition enter into, I kept thinking there is an individual that I know who watches this House of Assembly channel rather regularly and I am imagining that he is out there pulling his hair out when he is listening to some of the things that some of the folks across the way have mentioned, and I have to mention this one.

The Opposition House Leader, I may be mistaken but I do not think I have heard him mention, in this present sitting, Joe and Martha Chesterfield. I may be mistaken. I know that in past sittings here we have heard him over and over talking about Joe and Martha Chesterfield. As he was up speaking, I was wondering what Joe and Martha Chesterfield might be thinking, because I think Joe and Martha might have thought: Boy, this gives him an opportunity to get up and speak for some thirty-five minutes and try to get some answers to some questions that he posed in Question Period, that he felt that he did not get the right answers for.

He was given the answers, but I am assuming he is not satisfied with that - but he is not getting the answers. Then he is talking about this bill, and then he is talking about pressuring us as the government in getting information.

Mr. Speaker, I think I can speak to pretty well anybody on this side, that we will do things for the right reasons. We are not going to be pressured into doing them just because the folks across the way are standing up and saying that we have to give them answers. It has not worked that way before and I do not think it is going to work from here on in, Mr. Speaker.

He talked about the probate records that were in a - highlighted last year. I can simply say to him, and folks who are watching and the people of this House, this has nothing to do with that. If anything that was talked about across the way that made some – followed the direction in which we are leading, it is very simply this, that within government we have pieces of information here, there, all around the place. This is an effort to, I suppose I could use the word synchronize. That is what we are talking about doing. We have information that is paper documents. We have other types of information and we have one body now. It is the Office of the Chief Information Officer, who is starting to gather all that information under one body, and that being the Office of the Chief Information Officer, and that being under the direction of the Minister of Finance. That is very simply what it is.

I am standing here to close second reading of this bill and the one that follows it, 64, is an example of that, that in The Rooms Act we have information that needs to be put under the Office of the Chief Information Officer. It is as simple as that. The definitions that are being put in here, I will have to speak to the Minister of Finance to check on one thing for the Leader of the NDP, and I certainly will do that.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I will just simply close by saying that is it. This is a tightening up of the process, the procedures of handling information within government. With that, Mr. Speaker, I close the debate in second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Is it the pleasure of the House that Bill 63, An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act, be now read a second time?

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

The motion is carried.

CLERK: A bill, An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act. (Bill 63)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill 63 has now been read a second time.

When shall Bill 63 be referred to a Committee of the Whole House?

MS BURKE: Tomorrow.

MR. SPEAKER: Tomorrow?

On motion, a bill, "An Act To Amend The Management Of Information Act," read a second time, ordered referred to a Committee of the Whole House on tomorrow.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS BURKE: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Minister of Justice, that the House do now adjourn.

MR. SPEAKER: It is moved and seconded that this House do now adjourn.

All those in favour, 'aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

This House now stands adjourned until 2 o'clock tomorrow, being Private Members' Day.

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