May 11, 2011                         HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY PROCEEDINGS                Vol. XLVI   No. 23


The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Fitzgerald): Order, please!

Statements by Members

MR. SPEAKER: Today the Chair welcomes the following members' statements: the hon. the Member for the District of Baie Verte-Springdale; the hon. the Member for the District of Port de Grave; the hon. the Member for the District of Conception Bay East & Bell Island; and the hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

The hon. the Member for the District of Baie Verte-Springdale.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. POLLARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise in this hon. House today to congratulate the Harry's Harbour/Jackson's Cove Salvation Army Corps for celebrating its 110 years of service and ministry to the people of the area.

To celebrate the remarkable achievement, on November 20 and 21 the Salvationists held a special weekend whereby people from all over the area, and special guests, were treated to a tasty dinner and special services.

During this time of fellowship, fun, and laughter everyone was reminded of God's goodness and faithfulness down through the years and was encouraged to keep the faith as they try to serve their fellowman.

Local organizers are to be commended for this special occasion and for highlighting the positive impact that the Salvationist had on the people of the area.

I ask all hon. colleagues to join me in applauding the Harry's Harbour/Jackson's Cove Salvation Army Corps for reaching such a significant milestone and wish them every success in their ministry.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MR. BUTLER: Mr. Speaker, musicians from the Trinity-Conception Bay region were among those honoured at the 2011 East Coast Music Awards in Charlottetown, PEI which was held April 13 to April 17.

The Once, a St. John's folk group featuring Coley's Point native Andrew Dale won Group Recording of the Year. Other members of the group were Geraldine Hollett and Philip Churchill, both from St. John's.

Duane and Curtis Andrews, though living in Carbonear, have strong family ties to Port de Grave. Duane added another trophy to his collection with a win in the Jazz Recording of the Year category and his brother Curtis and Paul Earle, known as The Idlers, won World Recording of the Year honours.

It is encouraging to see our local talent doing so well on the national scene.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all hon. members to join me in congratulating Andrew Dale, Duane and Curtis Andrews and the other members of their groups on being honoured at the ECMAs in 2011.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Conception East & Bell Island.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BRAZIL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I stand in this House today to acknowledge the establishment of the Portugal Cove-St. Philips Heritage Committee.

Mr. Speaker, in late February, I had the pleasure of attending a public meeting to discuss promoting the heritage of this unique corner of our Province.

While I assumed this would be poorly attended, as it may not be of interest to a large sector of the community, I was pleasantly surprised when over 150 residents attended with every intention of preserving and celebrating their heritage.

Under the Chair of Mr. Winston Fiander and a very talented, dedicated committee the evening proceeded with an overview of the significant geographic, educational, and historical, employment and social history of the community, along with an inspirational talk by former Lieutenant-Governor, the Hon. Ed Roberts regarding the importance of preserving our community's history.

Mr. Speaker, for three hours those in attendance shared stories of the historical events, noted citizens and geographic location which have all contributed to give Portugal Cove-St. Philips residents a sense of pride and respect for what this community has contributed to the history of this Province.

Mr. Speaker, the committee, with the support of the town council, is looking forward to preserving permanently their 500 years of history.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members to acknowledge the Portugal Cove-St. Philips Heritage Society for preserving and celebrating their history.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in this House today to congratulate the members of the Straits Rifters Peewee ‘E' division squad who won top honours at Bishop's Falls during the Minor Hockey Easter provincials. The Peewee squad's tilt at championship glory, took them the entire tournament without a loss. Their only glitch came in their second game of the event with a 4-all tie with Stephenville. They added a 3-1 victory against host Bishop's Falls, 11-2 victory against Corner Brook Regional, 3-1 victory against Southern Shore. They won the championship game against Stephenville 2-1.

I would like to take this time and congratulate each player for their hard work and relentless effort that led to their team's success: Mitchel White, Kyle Squires, Nicholas Mitchemore, Ben White, Jaret White, Megan White, Mack Coles, Bradley Way, Owen Way, Zack Applin, Ty Whalen, Allyson Moores, Blair Genge, Andrew Genge, Brandon Guinchard, Dillion Gibbons, and Luke Allingham.

I would also like to recognize those who dedicate their time and effort to the youth and to the game of hockey – the coaches: Dave White, Ian Dave White, Wayne Allingham, and Darryl Way.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all members of this House to join with me in congratulating this team and wish them well in their future competitions.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Statements by Ministers.

Statements by Ministers

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, thank you.

I am pleased to rise in this hon. House today to acknowledge the week of May 9 to 15 as National Nursing Week. The theme this year, Mr. Speaker, is Nursing – The Health of Our Nation.

Nurses across Newfoundland and Labrador play an essential role in the delivery of health care. This year, Newfoundland and Labrador made a particularly unique contribution to National Nursing Week. I am proud to say, Mr. Speaker, that Lori-Ann Sacrey, a registered nurse from Baie Verte, submitted the winning entry to a contest held by the Canadian Nurses Association to determine the theme of this year's National Nursing Week.

Mr. Speaker, our government recognizes the many different important roles nurses play in our health care system. Nurses work in a variety of areas such as patient care, education, administration, research, and policy. Whether they are interacting directly with patients or playing valuable roles in other areas of health care, nurses are making important contributions that enhance our health care system.

Mr. Speaker, there are currently 6,200 registered nurses and approximately 2,700 licensed practical nurses working across Newfoundland and Labrador. Our government has invested to effectively recruit and retain nurses by increasing the funding available to regional health authorities, to implement professional development activities and to address recruitment and retention needs. There are now thirteen registered nurse specific recruitment initiatives in place totalling more than $2.5 million annually. For example, Mr. Speaker, starting in January 2011, signing bonuses between $3,000 and $8,000 became available to registered nurses signing a one-year service agreement to work in a difficult-to-fill position in rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

I am pleased to report, Mr. Speaker, that last year approximately 86 per cent of our new Bachelor of Nursing graduates, and approximately 97 per cent of our licensed practical nursing graduates, chose to work in Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KENNEDY: Mr. Speaker, this represents 195 Bachelor of Nursing graduates, and 171 licensed practical nursing graduates who stayed in the Province to work. This increase in the number of nursing graduates staying in the Province along with the decrease in vacant nursing positions provides evidence that our recruitment and retention strategies are working.

On behalf of the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Mr. Speaker, I want to thank all nurses in this Province for the important contributions they make and extend best wishes to them for National Nursing Week.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. National Nursing Week is certainly very significant because it looks at the value of Canada's largest group of health care providers that we have. It provides an opportunity for all of us to celebrate those in the nursing profession, to celebrate the tremendous diversity that they bring to health care, and certainly understand the complexities of the jobs that many of them are tasked with doing every day. I want to congratulate Lori-Ann Sacrey of Baie Verte on defining this year's theme, Nursing - The Health of our Nation, and I think it was very appropriate.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to say that in Newfoundland and Labrador we are very blessed, because we have 9,000 people out there working in health care as registered nurses, LPNs, and nurse practitioners who provide first-class, first-rate health care to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians on a daily basis. This past year, I had the unfortunate experience of receiving some of that health care first-hand, and I can tell you that there is no greater group of caring, concerned people for the health of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians than those who we have working on the front lines in health care in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, we still have to be cognizant of the fact that our nurses are tasked with huge responsibilities, and oftentimes they are tasked with jobs that leave them overworked, working long hours, and in many cases, burnt-out. I remember just a while ago I heard the Nurses' Union president, Debbie Forward, say that although this was not a year of negotiation and contracts with government, it was certainly a year of having a lot of issues that they certainly had to deal with, in terms of workplace issues for the nurses in our Province.

So, Mr. Speaker, I realize my time is up, but if I could just, by one minute, clue up my statement.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member, by leave.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think it is important that we always be cognizant of the responsibility that we have tasked these people with. When you look at nursing as a profession within the Nation, we always have to cognizant of the fact that we have to be competitive and we have to encourage more use of our nurses within our health care system.

Mr. Speaker, what is unfortunate is that, today, we still have 325 vacancies of registered nurses in Newfoundland and Labrador. While there have been some efforts in recruitment, I suggest there needs to be quite a bit more.

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 thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. I am very happy to join with him, not just in recognizing National Nursing Week but also recognizing the achievement of Lori-Ann Sacrey in having the winning submission to the Canadian Nurses Association. It is important that we pay homage to the hard-working, competent, and dedicated nursing workforce in this Province. While I have not been in hospital myself, I listened to what the Leader of the Opposition said and I have had many people who have come to us about the health care system who point out how well they are treated when they are inside the health care system, they especially mention the nurses.

It is a dedicated workforce, and I am pleased that government has finally committed funds to build up and retain our nursing workforce. It is extremely important. I also hope that government will continue to address the shortfall of nurses and provide more resources for specialized training because we do require specialized training. I think it is one of the weaknesses that as new areas open up and nurses move in from other parts of the field, that they need training for the new specialized units.

They also face a very challenging work environment. We do not hear about it often, but nurses very often experience violence from patients and sometimes even abuse from families. It is a hidden piece of their workload that we do not see. It was only last weekend I met with somebody from the health care system who spoke to me about this issue. They have many things in their workload that go way beyond nursing duties.

I am glad to see that the government now has a government union committee working with these workplace issues. I encourage the minister to continue making sure that all of our support is there for the wonderful people who work in our health care system.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

The hon. the Minister of Government Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARDING: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I am standing today in this hon. House to announce the completion of this year's national Brake Check Day, as part of North America's Operation Airbrake, which took place on May 4.

This announcement is of significant importance as it comes today on May 11 which the UN has designated as the launch day for the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020.

Operation Air Brake is an annual initiative of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance. The alliance was created in 1982 with a mandate to oversee an international truck and bus brake safety campaign dedicated to improving commercial vehicle brake safety throughout North America. The objective of the initiative is to reduce the number of highway crashes caused by faulty braking systems on commercial vehicles, by conducting unannounced roadside inspections and educating drivers, mechanics and others on the importance of proper brake inspection, maintenance and operation.

Mr. Speaker, the Department of Government Services is responsible for inspections under the Highway Traffic Act. Our inspectors, who are certified by the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, conduct roadside inspections of commercial vehicles with an emphasis on braking systems and other mechanical safety systems. Inspection guidelines provide for the testing of mechanical components, brake adjustment and air pressure. Poorly adjusted air brakes and brake system defects constitute the main reasons for inspectors to determine that commercial vehicles should be placed out of service.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HARDING: The department mobilized twenty-five enforcement staff members across the entire Province at ten sites on the Island and in Labrador over a twelve-hour period on May 4. Out of 207 total inspections, 12 per cent of trucks were taken out of service specifically for brake systems and 21.2 per cent of trucks out of service for all conditions including brakes.

Mr. Speaker, over the past few years there has not been a significant change in the rate of vehicles taken out of service for poor air brake adjustment or other brake related defects. Traditional enforcement methods are having a reasonable impact in helping to remove dangerous vehicles from the road.

The Department of Government Services is continuing to participate in national initiatives such as Operation Air Brake which are important in ensuring that commercial vehicles are inspected and required corrective actions are taken, thereby making our roads safer for all motorists.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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 advance copy of his statement, and to say that we also recognize the importance of National Brake Check Day and applaud the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance on its initiative. It is good to know that people are going out and doing inspections.

However, Mr. Speaker, having said that, we believe the results of this one-day exercise is alarming. The minister's own percentages that he used, shows that forty-two of the 207 vehicles were found to be defective. Mr. Speaker, I think that is scary, not only to myself but to all those who are listening.

Mr. Speaker, not only commercial vehicles, in January 2011 the RCMP randomly pulled over ten vehicles in Central Newfoundland and two of those were unfit for the road. Mr. Speaker, it is a serious situation and hopefully, with National Brake Check Day and other initiatives like this, people will really take notice to what is going on in our Province.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to mention to the minister the inspections of our school buses. I have received many phone calls, and what is happening here is apparently the operators of the school buses receive a phone call before the inspectors actually go out and do the inspections. If someone has twenty or thirty buses, they pick out two or three that has nothing wrong with them, and that is very unfair. That is happening; it happened only recently, Mr. Speaker, in my area. So I challenge the minister to check out that and make sure that the inspections are done without any notification and hopefully our roads will be a safer place for each and every one of us.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. It is good to have a statement like this so that we can highlight an issue as important as road safety. We have enough accidents on our highways that we cannot control without having accidents happening because of faulty vehicles, especially commercial vehicles.

I am quite alarmed by the statistics that the minister has told us about. It certainly does not fill one with a sense of security, knowing that so many commercial vehicles could be on the road with defective brakes. Maybe the government needs to put more resources into this area to ensure that we can get as close to 100 per cent compliance as possible. Obviously, we need more of these sporadic checkups; we need more checks on these vehicles, to make sure that we get closer to not having anybody out there…

The minister says that traditional enforcement is having a reasonable impact. Well, that is not good enough, Mr. Speaker. Is it not reasonable for us to assume that all commercial operators are driving with safe equipment at all times? So I encourage the minister to look at beefing up these kinds of checkups and get all commercial vehicles off the road unless they are safe.

Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. FRENCH: Mr. Speaker, I rise in this hon. House today to recognize Sportfest. This event is organized by Sport Newfoundland and Labrador. The theme is: See it, Play it, Get Active! The event runs from May 12 to May 14.

Sportfest is designed to showcase a number of organized sports available to youth in this Province. This three-day festival is the first of its kind in Newfoundland and Labrador. It will allow participants to see demonstrations and actually experience over twenty different sports. More than 5,000 young people are expected to attend.

The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, through the Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation, has provided $25,000 to support this initiative which clearly fits the provincial government's recreation and sports strategy: Active, Healthy Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, three celebrated provincial athletes have been named as official ambassadors to Sportfest: Jamie Korab – Olympic gold-medal winning curler; Rod Snow – professional rugby player; and Michelle Healey – former MUN varsity basketball player and Chef de Mission at our last Canada Games. They have dedicated their lives to sport. They will be available during the Sportfest to share their love of sport with participants.

Sportfest is happening at the PowerPlex, 90 Crosbie Road in St. John's, and is open to the public on Friday night and Saturday. General admission is $2 and a family pass is $5. You can visit the Sportfest Web site for more information at www.sportfestnl.ca.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

I thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. It is indeed a great initiative. Anything that gets our families and our youth in this Province involved and makes them more active is certainly a positive move, not only for the persons who get involved but also for our system, even our health care system for example. To expose people to the opportunities that there are and the different types of sports that there, is a great thing.

I know in a lot of cases if you are not aware of something, how can you become interested in it? I think it is a great idea actually to have these well-known athletes in our Province involved, because a lot of times our youth in particular, they emulate what they see and the people who they see. If they are aware of the sport, they know that they have heroes who they can follow throughout the sport; it only bodes well for all of us in the end.

We would encourage everybody who is able to partake, to partake. I noticed that the cost, for example, is nominal, and that is a great thing as well because it is not something that you cannot access because it is not affordable. It is great to see that the cost here is certainly not prohibitive. Hopefully, hundreds of families and hundreds of youth will partake in this. We do firmly believe it is a good initiative and it is a step in the right direction.

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, too, thank the minister for the advance copy of his statement. I am pleased to see government supporting initiatives such as the one that is being described here today. It is so important to get children more involved in sports, organized or otherwise. This, obviously, is going to be a way to really get them excited. I understand - because I did hear this talked about on the radio - this is an interactive thing that will be going on. They just will not observe sports, they will get an opportunity to have their own hands-on, if you will, experience of the sports that are being presented at the Sportfest. It is a way to get children excited about a sport, learning a bit, getting over their hesitancy to jump in and try out for sports teams.

Organized sports do provide an unbeatable experience for children and youth. They learn teamwork, leadership, discipline, and even more important, they stay fit. It is important that we subsidize low-income children adequately to get involved in organized sports across the Province, because it is one of the drawbacks for low-income children. Many of the sports, they cannot take part in.

While events such as Sportfest are important for raising awareness on organized sports, the foundation of sport and fitness still lies in the schools. I encourage the minister to speak with the Minister of Education about how we can beef up our access to physical education for all our children in the school system.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Further statements by ministers?

The hon. the Minister of Government Services.

MR. HARDING: Mr. Speaker, I would like to rise on a point of order.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Government Services, on a point of order.

MR. HARDING: After I gave the statement today, the hon. Member for Port de Grave made a comment with respect to the bus safety and inspections in this Province. I am really concerned about the safety of our children riding on these buses, and I would like for the hon. member to table any information that he does have, documented information, with respect to the comments that he made.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

There is no point of order. I remind the hon. member as well that private members, by our own Standing Orders, are not permitted to table anything in the House of Assembly. That can only be done by ministers. If the hon. member wants to share information, that will be up to the hon. member.

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, in Nalcor's response to the Joint Review Panel, it says that it was directed by government to develop Muskrat Falls. Yet, in the House of Assembly, the Premier has insisted that developing Muskrat Falls as a stand-alone project was Nalcor's idea. It is an important distinction and it speaks to whether any alternatives to this project were actually considered.

I ask the Premier today: Can you specifically tell us what, if any, alternatives to Muskrat Falls were considered and will you table those reports in the House of Assembly this week?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, as I have said in this House and outside this House a number of times, there were a number of considerations for alternative sources of generation of electricity for the people of this Province outside of Muskrat Falls. Mr. Speaker, Muskrat Falls was determined to be the best option at the end of all of that analysis.

The second most attractive option is to refurbish Seal Cove, to develop small hydro on Round Pond and Island Pond, to add some wind to the system, and to develop new thermal; Mr. Speaker, all much more expensive than Muskrat Falls.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Premier may be aware, and if not she should be, that the Harris Centre has recently commissioned a study on alternatives to Muskrat Falls as a replacement for Holyrood. It commissioned three senior researchers at the Faculty of Engineering to study the economic viability of small hydro and wind power as an alternative to Holyrood.

The Harris Centre determined there is nearly twice as much small hydro potential on the Island of Newfoundland as Holyrood currently produces. It also determined that all the projects would be profitable charging a rate of less than nine cents per kilowatt hour. That is far cheaper than the 14.3 cents that Muskrat Falls power will cost.

I ask you, Premier: Why won't you direct Nalcor to consider those alternatives in light of the information brought forward by professionals in our Province?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the development of the Lower Churchill has been under consideration and under study, first of all, by Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro and by Nalcor for the last thirty-five to forty years in this Province. There has been analysis done within and without. In terms of the work that we have done through Nalcor since we formed the government of this great Province, we have engaged experts in terms of the development of this project here in this Province, across the country, and across the world.

Mr. Speaker, we are talking about, in terms of what we have done alone, eight years of analysis that we have had tested externally a number of times. Muskrat Falls is the best option for electricity generation in this Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Premier should know that when there is a failure to listen, there is always a failure of opportunities. When you fail opportunities in the Province, you fail the people of the Province.

Mr. Speaker, the Harris Centre has taken this very seriously, and they have looked at a number of alternatives. One of the things, as I have outlined, is they have looked at hydro development projects on the Island that could replace Holyrood at a much cheaper cost than what she is proposing under Muskrat Falls.

I ask you today, Premier: Have you read the documentation, have you looked at the submission that they have made, and are you open to even giving it consideration?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, we have, within Nalcor, the best expertise I would say to you that is available in the country, if not in North America, especially in terms of the development of hydro.

Mr. Speaker, not only have I laid out to her time and time again, as has Nalcor, in a number of briefings to the members of the Opposition, about the economics of this project and why it makes sense. It has been endorsed right across this country and, most recently, by a diplomat from the United States. It has been endorsed by the banks, it has been endorsed by our own Board of Trade.

This is a very good project. We look at everything. We have looked at small hydro as the second best alternative, which is Island Pond and Round Pond, but we still need to add wind and other thermal generation, which is more expensive again.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Pardon me, Premier, but Nalcor is the same people who expropriated the paper mill in Grand Falls, along with yourself, and did not realize that you had done it. So, I make no apologies for asking questions.

I can see why others in the country would be all on the bandwagon, because others in the country, Premier, will get Muskrat Falls power cheaper than Newfoundlanders and Labradorians will get Muskrat Falls power. That is the reason that they are all behind the project.

Mr. Speaker, the Harris Centre researchers also looked at wind power. Right now, Nalcor and the government is not even accepting proposals for wind power. There is a group in Argentia, I think, that have been trying to submit a proposal, and they have not been able to. They are saying that there is enough wind power on the Island of Newfoundland to produce 117 times more electricity than we currently need.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to pose her question.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I ask the Premier: Why have you prohibited Nalcor from considering wind farms as part of the solution to replacing Holyrood?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Back to basics, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, wind power is always more expensive than hydro. Hydro power is the cheapest way to provide electricity anywhere in the world. Mr. Speaker, we have the best wind regimes in North America. In Labrador, the amount of wind energy that is available for development is ridiculous in the numbers. So we cap it at 5,000 megawatts of wind in Labrador. We have equally as much on the Island, Mr. Speaker, but wind has to be backstopped. You have to have hydro, or you have to have nuclear, or you have to have something to backstop it, which makes it much more expensive, Mr. Speaker.

We have expertise within the Department of Natural Resources, within Nalcor, Mr. Speaker, who clearly understands this, as the Opposition clearly does not.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We understand very clearly, I say to the Premier, and so do many other people in the Province, especially the people at the Harris Centre who have been looking at this, and they clearly state that Holyrood could be replaced by a combination of new hydro and wind projects on the Island, but from what we can gather the last time that Nalcor looked at this was in 1986.

I ask the Premier today: Why are you not considering cheaper options for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador? Why do you insist on doing a project that is going to double the electricity rates of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and give rebates to everyone else in the country who are going to use that power?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the first thing we have to get straight is that Muskrat Falls is not going to double the electricity costs of the people of this Province. Mr. Speaker, what it is going to do in fact is stabilize electricity rates at where they might be in 2016 and ensure that the rate of increase is stabilized and predictable, Mr. Speaker. That is the first thing.

The second thing is we have looked at all options, Mr. Speaker. We have even looked at the option that the members of the Opposition put forward of identifying from a twenty-five-year-old report seventy ponds that we could develop all around the Province. God knows, what the transmission would cost. The amount would be so ridiculous.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: That is the only suggestion you have been able to come forward with since we have started this debate some months ago.

Mr. Speaker, all options have been considered. Muskrat Falls is the most reliable and cheapest answer to our energy questions here in the Province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Premier allows she does not have a crystal ball but yet she is trying to tell the people of the Province that it is the cheapest power that they can provide and she has not even looked at the options. Even the Harris Centre in this Province has looked at options, Mr. Speaker, that the Premier is not prepared to open her mind or open her eyes and allow to look at.

I ask her again: How can she feel that this is a good deal when she is prepared to double the rates of electricity for people in Newfoundland and Labrador, and yet give people in Maritime Canada and other corporations huge profits and breaks on their energy rates?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, you can repeat something that is incorrect 100 times, 1,000 times, 10,000 times and it will not make it right. Mr. Speaker, Muskrat Falls will not double energy costs here in this Province. We have proved it; we have laid out the information.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Mr. Speaker, the Opposition continues to look for any kind of support they can find anywhere no matter how outlandish or how far out in right field it is because they do not want this project to succeed, because their two attempts failed. That is the bottom line, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The real issue here is that we are standing up for the people of this Province, Premier, and you are standing up for Nalcor Energy –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JONES: - and Emera corporation, that is who you are standing up for. You are guaranteeing them a profit, not the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The Chair is having difficulty hearing the hon. member ask her question. I ask hon. members for their co-operation.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, according to the Turner report, government needs to implement third party oversight procedures in the oil industry. We have heard it on a similar recommendation from the Wells report. There are major environmental concerns surrounding the possibility of a well blowout.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the government: What action is being taken to implement the Turner recommendation for independent oversight? Our current procedures have been judged inadequate and inherently based and I ask the minister, what is being done to fix them?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Mr. Speaker, again, I want to assure the people of the Province that the measures we have in terms of the offshore are adequate and are very responsible measures that have been developed by the companies, been developed by the C-NLOPB which approves the safety plans. It has been approved by regulatory agencies besides the C-NLOPB, like Transport Canada, like the Canadian Coast Guard.

I do not want anyone left with the impression that we are not able to respond should something occur offshore. Should there be an incident of catastrophic proportions, as happened in the Gulf of Mexico, there is a tiered response. Captain Turner has said, given what has happened in the Gulf of Mexico he would like us to go back and review our response capabilities to make sure that we are aware of what happened there and we are able to provide an even greater level of response. We have indicated that we support that. We want to see the safety level increased, and we are going to continue to do that, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I ask the minister today: In doing that review, will he commit to implement the recommendation and will he ensure that there is a total system approach to a blowout control and will it mandate operators to regularly test that particular response?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Mr. Speaker, Captain Turner's report indicated a number of recommendations that crossed over a number of regulatory agencies. I have indicated before in this House that the C-NLOPB is an independent, arm's-length regulatory safety agency from government. They have a copy of the report. We forwarded it to them. They were consulted in the creation of the report by Captain Turner and I am sure they will do everything they can within their mandate to ensure that the recommendations are implemented. There are also recommendations there that would apply to federal agencies, to other regulatory bodies, to the provincial government, and we will work with all of those partners to provide whatever assistance we can to ensure that all of the recommendations are implemented as per Captain Turner's report.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, a catastrophic well blowout would affect our industries and environment for years, if not decades. Our fishing and tourism industries are particularly susceptible to the lack of liability borne by operators.

My question to the government is this. Since the report was received six months ago, what in negotiations have you engaged in with Ottawa to amend our operator liability? For example, right now ours is capped at $30 million. In the United States that liability is at $75 million, and they are looking at even increasing it to probably somewhere around a billion dollars.

I ask the minister: Has there been any discussions with Ottawa on what our cap is and what our liabilities are?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, as a point of clarification, there was a draft copy of the report received some months ago. We have only recently received the final copy of the report. It has not been six months. That is not a major point, but I just want to make that point.

Mr. Speaker, what we are doing, as I have indicated before, is there are a number of recommendations in Captain Turner's report that cross a number of government agencies, regulatory agencies. We are working with all of them to ensure that they move towards implementing all of those recommendations in terms of the mandate that each of those agencies would have.

Some that we have responsibility for, we will certainly look to do that ourselves. Some that other agencies have, we will work with them, encourage them, and advocate to them that they also do what they need to do to ensure the safest possible offshore environment that we can have here in Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, last evening I spent several hours grilling the minister in the Fisheries Budget Estimates and I raised a number of important issues; two that are of great urgency to the Northern Peninsula. One of these is the multi-species plant in New Ferolle that is still not up and running. The minister committed to finding out first thing in the morning if this plant is ready for production because we understand it is a shell of a building.

I ask the minister: Has he indeed made contact? If so, will he reassure the people of this area that the plant will operate this season, offering adequate employment?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. JACKMAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I did indeed follow-up. Our indications and our inquiries have pointed out that there are four or five people in the facility at present assembling equipment there. Mr. Speaker, we have the indication that there will be some production in that plant this year.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Mr. Speaker, this is a desperate situation. If it was not, I would not be bringing it to the House of Assembly floor. People are expecting this government and your minister to give leadership, to show that we do care, and that we are going to do something about this. It has been nearly three years since the current owner took over. There has been practically no operation at this plant.

So I again ask the minister: Are you going to allow this private company to control the people of New Ferolle? Will you take a stand to ensure that these people do get proper employment in this plant this year?

AN HON. MEMBER: When they do, send in a couple of (inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, legally Mr. Mullowney owns the plant and the licence that is attached to it. If anybody has followed the history of New Ferolle, myself and ministers past have done everything that we possibly could to get that moving. There has been court action. We have put facilitators in there to negotiate and attempt to move the process along whereby we could have that in operation.

Mr. Speaker, we cannot do any more as a government. The hope now is that people are in there assembling equipment. We would hope that the plant will be in production and will provide employment for the people of New Ferolle.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Mr. Speaker, this government gave that plant to this operator for $1. There is an agreement in place, and it is not good enough to just hope that something will take place, I would say to the minister.

Mr. Speaker, the lobster crisis is continuing to escalate, and we are midway through another week, and indeed, we are approaching the midway of the lobster season. There was little time to waste, and I would say today there is no time to waste. I have been hearing from lobster fishermen in my district, the Member from Burgeo & La Poile has been hearing from lobster fishermen in his district, I have been hearing from lobster fishermen in districts of some of the MHAs here in this House, and they are all worried, basically, of the same thing. They know they cannot survive without an income.

Given that the MOU report calls the lobster industry incidental to the larger processors, I ask the minister: How much longer will you take to allow this impasse to continue before intervening to ensure we have an immediate solution?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, we truly do sympathize with the situation that these harvesters find themselves in. There is no one in this House who does not care and want to get that issue resolved – we certainly do. I would, the members opposite would, and all of the members on this side would.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that I just found out a little while ago – I am surprised that the member has not found out, since the head of SPNL has gone forward for the Liberal Party. As we speak, Mr. Speaker, members of SPNL and FFAW are sitting down to attempt to find a resolution. That is the way it should be. We have the parties who have the business interests here, and the best way to find a solution is that they sit down and resolve and arrive at a price, and, Mr. Speaker, we certainly do hope that they will arrive at that resolution before the end of this day.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, again, we are hoping that a resolution comes forward, and the people of this Province are hoping that this government will give leadership.

I want to ask the minister again – I am aware, we are aware as an Opposition that the FFAW is meeting with SPNL, and I ask the minister: Has he been talking to those groups to have any input?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, let us be very clear, and let us go on the record. I hope someone asks for a response.

This morning, I forwarded a letter – because the issue of outside buying has arisen here – I have issued a letter to the FFAW, and to SPNL, and to the Association of Seafood Producers, around where they see it, if this is precedent setting, what is their stand on other species.

Mr. Speaker, not only did I issue the letter to those three parties, I issued the letter to both parties on the other side of the House. Let us see what their response is in terms of outside buying as it relates to lobster and other species in this Province. It is easy enough to sit on the fence, Mr. Speaker. Let them put their words where their mouth is.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Member for the District of The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. DEAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, with -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DEAN: - the crisis –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DEAN: Mr. Speaker, with the crisis we have in the lobster industry, quite frankly I find this shameful what is happening here today. I really do, and I am being sincere, I am not playing politics –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DEAN: We have people who have thousands and thousands –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. DEAN: We have fishermen who have thousands and thousands of pounds or dollars worth of lobster in crates; they do not know where to go with it. They have come to the Minister of Fisheries for a resolution and all he can do is throw it back across the House and say what would you do? Mr. Speaker, what I would do – what I would do is I would find a resolution to the situation before it got to where it is today.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, I did not hear a question there but I would certainly like a little bit of commentary on it because that is exactly what has happened. We deal with this issue on a crisis by crisis basis. So, Mr. Speaker, finding the solution here cannot just be the sole responsibility of government.

I cannot force nor can any of us force harvesters to harvest; we cannot force buyers to buy. We can attempt to facilitate a process, Mr. Speaker, and that is what the panel was about. If one side opted not to go there, Mr. Speaker, we cannot force them to do that. So, Mr. Speaker, we are looking for the longer-term fix and solution. Simply, my letter asked them for their input as to what would they see as some suggestions that I might take forward as a resolution to this on an ongoing basis, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Opposition House Leader.

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

Mr. Speaker, I spoke yesterday with at least two dozen lobster fishermen from the District of Burgeo & La Poile. These are men and women often who operate joint enterprises. They have thousands of lobsters in the water that they cannot sell, thousands of dollars worth that was going to keep them alive and existing for the next twelve months. It is also tied-in to being qualified for their EI. These people are hard-working, dedicated citizens of this Province.

I ask the Minister of Fisheries: When is he going to stop procrastinating, get off his duff, and give some leadership rather than passing the buck to others?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member to be sensitive to the language that he uses here in the House to ask his questions and pose his –

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: It is a sensitive issue, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

For the final time I am going to say to the Opposition House Leader that the Speaker is not going to tolerate the comments he makes to the Chair and the reaction he gets when the Chair rules on orders in this House. I ask him to take heed of that order here today.

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, I am not about to take any lectures from the Opposition House Leader, I can tell you that. There is nobody who wants to see this resolved in this House more than I do and more than any member on this side of the House. We know how people are impacted. I come from the Burin Peninsula where –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: (Inaudible).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. Opposition House Leader to apologize to the House for the interruptions that he continues to cause, and three times it has happened here today.

I ask the hon. member to apologize to the House, and to do it immediately.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I apologize, Mr. Speaker, for what I said.

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you, I say to the hon. –

Order, please!

There is no explanation of why you apologize. I ask the hon. member - I have heard the apology - please take your seat.

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: (Inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. JACKMAN: Mr. Speaker, nothing would be better to my ears today than to hear that the negotiations that are going on between SPANL and the FFAW will find a resolution to this.

Mr. Speaker, we are looking very seriously at the outside buying, but there are complications that come with that and there are precedents that are set. Therefore, I want to seek the input. The parties that I have sent the letters to have a vested interest here so I would expect a very quick turnaround, which then, Mr. Speaker, will allow us to make the next step and then hopefully make the decision around the outside buying.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

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

Mr. Speaker, in his report on this Province's offshore oil spill prevention and response practices Captain Mark Turner observed that current liability limits for offshore oil well related spills are far below what would be required for a significant blowout. He recommended government conduct a comprehensive review of the cost of liability with the goal of adjusting the amount to a value that better represents today's economic realities. Turner notes that in Norway the licensee is liable for pollution damage without a limit on costs, except for acts of nature of course. Mr. Speaker, in Norway the polluter pays.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the Minister of Natural Resources: Will government dispense with the idea of a costly review and recommend Norway's standards for our own offshore oil industry?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Natural Resources.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, we have indicated as a government in this House before that we are happy with the work that Captain Turner has done. We are very pleased with the quality of the work. He has come forward with some very important recommendations for government and for other federal agencies and regulatory agencies. We will take all of those under advisement. We are considering all of them now, as we speak, Mr. Speaker. We will follow through on the recommendations, and whether or not the liability limits increase and what they will be as a result of the work that we are doing. We will come back at some point in the future with some more definitive statement on that, but that work will be done, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I look forward to hearing more from the minister on this issue.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday in the House the Minister of Natural Resources quoted Captain Turner referring to a catastrophic event, such as a blowout, as an infrequent occurrence. I remind the minister, and all of us, the Ocean Ranger disaster was an infrequent occurrence. The Macondo blowout was an infrequent occurrence, and tragically, two years ago, Cougar 491 was also an extremely remote and infrequent occurrence. Mr. Speaker, we must always be prepared for the worst.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the minister: How could the government be satisfied to allow deepwater oil exploration without full plans in place to deal with a catastrophic event?

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SKINNER: Mr. Speaker, the reason why we engaged Captain Turner was to do a review of the response systems we have in place, to advise us whether or not he felt they were adequate, whether or not he felt they were suitable for the environment that we are operating in, for the level of activity that we have going on there, for the distances involved; all kinds of factors. Captain Turner has done his work and has come back with a report.

I have indicated here in this House before when I have been on my feet that he has given us recommendations that will incrementally improve upon the safety levels that we have. He has indicated we have a good regulatory and safety regime but he says that we can improve upon it, and we are going to work towards doing that, Mr. Speaker. Safety is not a static thing, it is something that is very fluid and incrementally we will continue every day that we are here in this government side to ensure that we do the best job we can for safety.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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 am really delighted to hear the minister speak so strongly about safety. It has to be our number one priority. I think that is why Judge Wells recommended that there be an independent authority set up to deal with safety and environmental issues.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the Premier: Where are the discussions with the federal government at this moment with regard to their support for Wells' recommendation?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER DUNDERDALE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this government has been very straightforward in terms of our position. Safety to our offshore workers, Mr. Speaker, and protection of the environment are our number one and two priorities.

Now, Mr. Speaker, once we received the Wells report, we immediately endorsed the recommendation of a standalone regulator. We indicated our support for that recommendation to the federal government. The federal government has not yet taken a position on it, Mr. Speaker. We reiterate our position every opportunity we have. As soon as the new government is settled in Ottawa, Mr. Speaker, and gets back to work, in short order I would hope, we will be there and we will be endorsing that recommendation again.

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.

Answers to Questions for which Notice has been Given.

Petitions.

Petitions

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

I remind the hon. Leader of the Opposition that the normal time period for presenting petitions is three minutes. This being Private Members' Day, I ask her if she would be cognizant of the clock and allow Private Members' Day, unless leave is granted, to take place at that time.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise today to present a petition on behalf of the people in Labrador with regard to the Trans-Labrador Highway.

WHEREAS the Trans-Labrador Highway is a vital transportation lifeline for the Labrador communities, providing access, generating economic activity, and allowing residents to obtain health care and other public services; and

WHEREAS Route 510 and connecting branch roads of the Trans-Labrador highway are unpaved, in deplorable condition and are no longer suitable and safe for the traffic volumes that travel this route; and

WHEREAS Labrador cannot afford to wait years or decades for upgrading and paving of their essential transportation route;

WHEREUPON the petitioners call on the House of Assembly to call upon the government to provide additional funding for much needed improvements to Route 510 and connecting branch roads of the Trans-Labrador Highway.

Mr. Speaker, the people in Labrador have never been more frustrated in their entire lives than they have been this year with the Trans-Labrador Highway. Mr. Speaker, people who are travelling over the highway are e-mailing me everyday. They are putting videos up on YouTube. They have opened a Facebook site where hundreds of people across Labrador who use the road right now have logged onto.

In the last couple of weeks, Mr. Speaker, I have had cases where patients could not be transported by ambulance because the roads are too bad. A patient came out of Corner Brook hospital after having a major back surgery. They could not even be taken down over the highway by ambulance because the road was so bad, Mr. Speaker. We had to make arrangements to have them flown back into their community.

This is the situation that people are left in. Truckers are calling me all the time. They are doing damages to their vehicles. It is costing them a fortune, Mr. Speaker. People who are having to travel for all kinds of reasons have never had to endure such deplorable road conditions in their entire lives, and they are asking the government to do something to respond to what their need is at this time.

Orders of the Day

Private Members' Day

MR. SPEAKER: This being Private Members' Day, and it now being 3:00 o'clock in the afternoon, I now call on the hon. Member for the District of Ferryland to present his private member's resolution.

The hon. the Member for the District of Ferryland.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. HUTCHINGS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is certainly a pleasure to stand here today on a private member's resolution, seconded by my colleague, the Member for Topsail.

To get the debate going today, Mr. Speaker, I think I will read it into the record:

WHEREAS in the 2011 Budget the government introduced a $3.2 million two-year pilot project focused on the development of child care spaces in family homes throughout Newfoundland and Labrador; and

WHEREAS this initiative increases from $2,500 to $5,000 the start-up grant to become a regulated family child care provider; provides start-up grants of $7,500 for homes that care exclusively for children up to the age of two; and provides for an ongoing stimulus grant to infant care homes of $200 a month per infant space, in recognition of the higher cost of operation in terms of staff ratios; and

WHEREAS this approach will help keep rates attainable for parents requiring infant care, the very type of care that, right now, is in the shortest supply; and

WHEREAS this approach is also of particular benefit for families in rural and under-serviced areas because it is feasible on a small scale; and

WHEREAS this pilot project has the capacity to support the creation of up to 400 child care spaces over two years; and

WHEREAS since coming to office in 2003, this government has increased the number of child care spaces by 50 per cent, adding 168 spaces in just the last couple of years, and in addition to the 400 targeted in the new pilot project, the government is planning to continue with the capacity initiative next year to provide for yet another 460 child care spaces; and

WHEREAS because of the $3 million the Province has invested this year under the Child Care Tax Credit to complement the federal child care tax credit, two parents in this Province earning minimum wage and raising two children will pay only $5 a day for child care, less than the $7 a day that this family would pay in Quebec;

BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED that this hon. House supports the government's decision to proceed with the two-year pilot project focused on the development of child care spaces in family homes throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, that is the resolution that was introduced. I would certainly like to speak to that to begin debate as we move forward through the afternoon.


Mr. Speaker, as a government we are committed to providing families and young children with the support they need to reach their full potential and live enriching lives in this great Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Our government no doubt recognizes the importance of supporting the healthy growth and development of children in Newfoundland and Labrador. We know much of the research and particularly over the past ten years –

MR. SPEAKER (Kelly): Order, please!

The Chair is having difficulty hearing the hon. member speak. I would ask all hon. members for their co-operation.

The hon. member

MR. HUTCHINGS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, as we know research over the past number of years, particularly the past ten years has underscored the importance of early years in terms of brain development and the lasting effects early experiences have on children's success in school and beyond from youth, very young, into their adult life. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, it is not only the quantity of early learning opportunities that is so important and child care spaces that must be addressed when developing a child care system, it is certainly the quality of the care and instruction in those homes or centres where child care is given.

That is why as a government we are moving forward to develop a comprehensive child care strategy for Newfoundland and Labrador. More families will have the opportunity to make balanced choices when it comes to their children. Children will also benefit from age appropriate programs and services before entering the K to 12 school system.

In this year's Budget, Mr. Speaker, government introduced measures to advance the implementation of its Early Childhood Learning Strategy entitled, Learning from the Start, to give children a firm footing in their emotional, social and cognitive development which is so important.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

This is the second time that the Chair has asked hon. members for their co-operation.

MR. HUTCHINGS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, quality early learning and child care is provided by well trained staff in environments including child care centres, family child care homes and family resource programs that promote early learning using well researched and best practices.

Our government has listened carefully to the concerns of parents and is committed to specifically targeting the shortage of child care spaces. Particularly in rural communities, Mr. Speaker, which is so important for children under the age of two and school-aged children as well.

Mr. Speaker, it is necessary to identify where we are in terms of demand and that is important in terms of the resolution and certainly in terms of the steps that our government is committed in Budget 2011-2012. Currently there are approximately 49,000 children aged zero to twelve with mothers in the paid workforce. As of February 2011, there were 6,574 child care spaces for this same group, but 13.4 per cent of children with parents employed have access to regulated child care.

Broken down by age group, Mr. Speaker, it looks something like this: zero to two years, there are 194 spaces, 104 centre-based and ninety family child care; from two to five years there are 5,418 spaces and some of these would include school-aged children as well; from the age six to twelve there are 962 spaces, this includes centres specifically licensed for school-aged children. Mr. Speaker, of that 6,574 in total we have 6,071 in child care centres and 503 in family child care homes.

Mr. Speaker, when you look at the number of centres in regulated family child care homes, again, as of February 2011, the number of child care centres was 181 and the number of family care homes eighty-six.

Mr. Speaker, that is where we are in terms of the initiatives that have been taken prior to this fiscal year. The initiative that was announced through Child, Youth and Family Services by the minister in the Budget is part of us going forward in terms of the two-year strategy, where we want to go in recognizing there is a shortfall and how we are going to meet that shortfall.

Mr. Speaker, as well, hon. members here in the House, certainly the Member for St. John's North and others here who have small children or myself – two children now who are thirteen and eleven – have gone through it and certainly recognize the challenge we have in terms of daycare and what is needed, in terms of starting out. It is so important in terms of early – and what is needed. That is very important, Mr. Speaker, that you have gone through it, you have experienced it, you understand this. Everybody here or most people here have been touched by it and understand the importance and access to it.

I may have said St. John's North, Mr. Speaker, Mt. Pearl North I reference in terms of –

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. HUTCHINGS: Everybody is okay.

Mr. Speaker, in addressing that shortfall, some of the things that we have identified in terms of moving forward, and I mentioned Budget 2011-2012, a further expansion of our capacity initiative, certainly looking at the development of family child care with a particular emphasis on infant child care. The goal of the two-year project is to increase family child care spaces by 200 each year for the next two years for a total of 400 spaces, and that is going to be over the next two years.

Certainly, this initiative is based on some of the research we have done. We are looking a shortage of regulated child care across the Province, particularly in rural areas, as I have mentioned, and for children under twenty-four months and school-aged children as well.

The new Family Child Care Initiative is intended to assist in addressing the problems and to provide more options for families in Newfoundland and Labrador. The two-year pilot project will serve to inform the ten-year child care services strategy. Certainly, initiatives starting now will move forward in the future to meet the needs of our families and of our children.

To achieve the goal of significant increases in the number of regulated child care spaces, particularly for children under twenty-four months, financial and other incentives will be put in place to encourage unregulated providers to become regulated, and for others to enter and remain in the regulated child care field. This public policy is not just a change in regulations; it is also a financial investment by the government in terms of stepping forward, building this program, and bringing financial incentives with it.

Under the initiative, family child care providers who are licensed and approved after April 1, 2011 will receive a $5,000 start-up grant. In addition, those licensed after April 1, 2011 to care for three children under twenty-four months will receive a $7,500 start-up grant. Those will be called infant homes. Providers in infant homes will receive $200 per month for each infant enrolled. Once again, Mr. Speaker, we are making this investment along with this initiative to increase the spaces up to 400 over the next two years.

Again, professional development is very important in terms of a program like this. That opportunity will be available on-line, so all providers can access it throughout the Province. It will provide them with the opportunity to connect with other providers. So, it is sort of a peer mentoring program. Those skills and experiences from others in industry, the dialogue can go on, and that information and research is certainly communicated, which is very important.

Information will be made available to regulated providers to assist them with the business aspect of their operations. That will include things like workshops with the business aspect through collaboration with the Department of Innovation, Trade and Rural Development.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, family and child care connectors have recruited more providers so the current staff can manage. They will provide as well funding for an additional home visitor. Again, we are looking at putting resources in place for these changes as we move toward meeting our goal of 400 new spaces.

In our Province, Mr. Speaker, no doubt, to have a future workforce comprised of well-educated, competent, and confident adults, attention to child development during the early years is essential. That is for the overall well-being of society that we recognize there are efforts needed to be made. We have certainly identified that and are certainly working towards it.

Mr. Speaker, from my own experience as MHA in the District of Ferryland, I know a number of years ago - I think it was 2007 - through an early initiative, a review carried out by the Department of Health and Community Services, there was identification that there was shortfall in my area in regard to early childhood spaces. Through that, a new initiative is coming on line this year. Through the new Lifestyle Centre in Bay Bulls, there will be a forty-eight space child centre, a proposed range up to seven years. Those are additional spaces; those are spaces that were never there before. Through the initiative of this government, the foresight of working with the community and working with the region, identifying it is needed, those are forty-eight, as I have said, child care spaces that were never there before are scheduled to open in approximately June of this year.

That is done in collaboration with the Kilbride to Ferryland Family Resource Centre. They are the sponsoring agency for this program. As I said, it is located in the new regional Lifestyle Centre in Bay Bulls which is a $4.2 million complex that as well, in total, is scheduled to open this year with the child care spaces hopefully available in June.

The satellite office of the family resource centre will be moved there as well from the Southern Shore arena where it is now and will move into the new Lifestyle Centre. This is part of the whole initiative, again through early learning childhood capacity and building on those spaces that we need. Once again, this is in rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, some of the investments for this project: $116,000 to date, and start up would be $156,000. Again, we are making that investment, we are identifying where it is needed, and we are meeting that need.

Mr. Speaker, as we move through this afternoon, I look forward to hearing from my colleagues in the House in terms of this private member's motion. As I said, there has been a commitment made by this government in prior years and again in Budget 2011-2012. In recognizing that we are moving ahead with a strategy, we are initiating this two-year pilot to increase those spaces, especially for infants. That is an initiative that as a government we believe in, we are moving forward on it, and I look forward to hearing comments and support from my colleagues here in the House.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am rising today to speak on the motion that has been put forward by my colleague. It is an unusual motion. In all of the time that I have been in the House of Assembly, I do not know if I have actually seen a motion where government has made a decision, announced a program, went forward with it and then all of a sudden they are back to the House of Assembly with a motion asking for support for the government. I have never quite seen that in my life. It shows that the government themselves are uncomfortable with their own decision. It shows that they did not make it with complete competency; therefore, they feel a need to have everybody come together and pat them on the back and say: Oh, that was a good decision, or that was a good job.

Mr. Speaker, most times when government makes decisions, and they go out and they announce decisions in the Province, they do it with conviction. They do it because they believe that they have already done what is right and proper. One would think that they did it with the support of their caucus. One would think that this motion would have been on the caucus table in the Tory caucus room three months ago, Mr. Speaker. Three months ago, informing the backbenchers in the government, informing the PC elected MHAs that we might be doing a pilot project in child care. Obviously, Mr. Speaker, it must have come as a big shock to them all when the Budget came down because, today, you have a backbencher bringing a motion into the House of Assembly asking them to support the pilot project of the government that the government has already committed to do, the government has already announced, the government has already budgeted for.

Now, you mean to tell me that with forty-three MHAs in the House of Assembly, representing the people of this Province, that there is no issue out there in none of their constituencies that is calling on the government to do something on behalf of the people they represent. Out of forty-three PC MHAs, there is not one issue in their district that anyone has a concern with, that they want to bring to the government to ask the government for support on, only something they have already agreed to do, something they have already announced, something they have already budgeted for in child care.

Now, one would have been shocked, because I was shocked. I was absolutely shocked when I saw it, Mr. Speaker. So, I was really, really shocked to see the motion come forward, based on what the government has already announced, already said it was going to do, already said it was going to carry forward, and that is the only issue they could find of importance out there in the whole Province of Newfoundland and Labrador today.

Now, Mr. Speaker, since we have the motion on the floor that is asking the people of the Province in voting to do absolutely nothing, that is asking no one in this House to call upon government to do anything, it is a motion that is calling for no action whatsoever, it is a dead motion. Because of the fact that it is talking about child care, I will take a few minutes to speak on child care in the Province.

Mr. Speaker, normally, in all of the time I have been here – and I cannot stress this enough – most private members' motions that you see call upon the people's House, that is all of us who are elected here on behalf of the people of the Province, to actually support something, or to bring forward something to implement change, or to call on government to take a certain action. It is very seldom ever done to seek approval after government has announced something.

You have to remember, the hallmark of the Administration, Mr. Speaker, the Dunderdale Administration, is child care. That was the centre plank in their Throne Speech, that was the centre plank in their Budget, and child care was the piece that they held up. This is what we want to be remembered for. This is what we want our legacy to be as a government. We want it to be around child care.

Well, obviously they are not feeling too comfortable with what they have done so far if they are bringing it to the House of Assembly looking for the four Opposition members, Mr. Speaker, to give them some praise on it. They must be feeling very uncomfortable, very unstable in the commitments they have made. They want some assurance that they are doing the right thing or they are going far enough.

Well, Mr. Speaker, they are not going to get a lot of assurance from me today, I can guarantee you that. What they will get is an assurance that there is nothing wrong with the pilot project that they are going to bring in. There is nothing wrong. We said that in the media over and over again. If they had read any transcripts or media clips on Budget Day, they would have heard that. Does it go far enough? Absolutely not, and the minister knows that. I sat in Estimates with her two days ago, two days ago, right before the motion came into the House of Assembly. In fact, Mr. Speaker, I walked out of the Estimates Committee with the minister and the member walked in with the motion. So there we go. I guess I gave them some suggestions or an inkling of where they should go on Private Members' Day.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, having said that, let's talk about child care for a minute. First of all, Mr. Speaker, what I will say is this, is that they did not go far enough. Right now, today in Newfoundland and Labrador, for any young family, for any family with children where the parents want to be able to go out and engage in the workforce, they need to have good child care for their children. That is the ultimate, Mr. Speaker. They need to have good, quality child care for their children. They need to have affordable child care for their children.

Mr. Speaker, those are the two fundamentals that we deal with in this Province around child care. It is around making sure we have the spaces. I tell you, they talk about all the spaces that they have created. I do not know where they have created those spaces. We have asked time and time again to get a list of where those spaces have been created, in what child care centres, where they are available to people. I do not know if the Leader of the NDP has ever received a list, but I do not ever recall seeing a list of where they have created all of these 168 spaces that they claim they have created in the Province. Mr. Speaker, maybe they could give us the full list.

Mr. Speaker, one of the fundamental issues around child care in this Province has been the lack of early childhood educators. This has been the one concern. I have met with daycare operators in all areas of this Province, Mr. Speaker. I have had discussions with PACAL's administration, which is the group that represents daycare operators in the Province. I have talked to individual workers who actually work in daycares and I can tell you that one of the fundamental problems have been around attracting early childhood educators. That was the one piece that the minister and the government buried their heads in the sand about and did not want to deal with.

We raised the issue last spring in the House of Assembly. We raised it here, several questions one day to the minister on early childhood educators, on the stipend that is being paid for education, how we can get more people into the system, how we can get more early childhood educators into the daycare centres. Guess what, Mr. Speaker? They not only ignored what we brought to the House of Assembly but they ignored all the people out there who work in the field. They ignored the daycare operators. They ignored the people who are in early childhood education who were asking for this, because they know they cannot handle the amount of work that is out there right now. They do not have the people to put into places.

Mr. Speaker, what you have today is you have daycares in this Province with spaces, I say to the Minister, daycare centres that have spaces. Guess what? They cannot take children into those spaces because they do not have early childhood educators. Because the regulations that you have laid out for them, they are unable to meet those regulations. I am not saying there is anything wrong with those regulations from a quality child care perspective, but if you are going to put them in place you have to allow a way forward for those centres to be able to attract the right people to do the job. This is where the government, Mr. Speaker, fell down in their daycare policy – one of the ways. I am going to point out a few of them now in a minute, but this is one of the ways.

Right now, today, we have daycare centres in this Province that have spaces, that are willing to open their doors to take children in, that are willing, Mr. Speaker, to provide the service, but they are not doing it because they cannot attract early childhood educators to the system. Mr. Speaker, we feel that this was one of the key areas that the government should have addressed. One of the key areas that government should have addressed, and they did not do it. They failed to do it. Because in addressing that key component, what they would have done is they would have automatically opened up extra spaces for child care in the Province, but they did not do that.

In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, let's talk about the cost, because I raised the issue in the House of Assembly and the minister got up too cute by half, I might say, in terms of what two people in a family would have to pay. Now, having said that, the rate is a lot lower than I thought it was but it is not as low as what the minister claims it to be.

For example, Mr. Speaker, in the House of Assembly a few weeks before Easter I asked a question of the minister with regard to two people who work for minimum wage in the Province, and they have two children and they want to put them into child care. She stands up and says: oh no, it is $5 a day; it is a $100 a month. This is what she says to me: $5 a day, $100 a month. Well, do you know what the first problem was, Mr. Speaker? The subsidy is $30 a day. I could not find a daycare that takes a child for $30 a day. That was the problem, I say to the minister. I could not find it. In fact, I have a whole list of them here. I have a whole list of them.

Mr. Speaker, we could not find a daycare. In fact, when we started making calls to all the daycare centres and looking for what their rates were on a daily basis to see if that two-income family, working for minimum wage, could put their two children in a daycare in this Province at what the minister says is $100 a month, we could not find it. Mr. Speaker, maybe she knows of one. Maybe she knows of one but I am going to tell you, we could not find one for this couple that I was dealing with, nowhere in their area.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, the rates came back like this. For infants, they said the cost of daycare charges per day is $60 a day in Newfoundland and Labrador, $60 a day. They said the government's subsidy rate is $44 a day. The other one was toddlers. Every centre that we talked to, and I say to the minister there might be a couple out there that we did not get a hold of where we did not get their rates, but I am sure she could find one if she tried. Anyway, their charge is $40 a day for toddlers. That is what they tell us they are charging today in Newfoundland and Labrador for their rates. The subsidy is $30 a day. Mr. Speaker, that translates into not only the additional $10 the family pays but the $5 towards the subsidy, which is $15 a day per family, which translates – and if I could do the math really quickly – I think it is something like $375. I know I had it here – $325 on a monthly basis. Now, that is a far cry from the $100 a month that the minister stood up in the House and said that people were going to have to pay for child care if you work for minimum wage in this Province.

We looked, Mr. Speaker, for child care for ages three to five. The daily cost for daycare for children aged three to five is anywhere from $35 to $40. There were some centres that actually offered it for $35 a day, and the subsidy was $30 a day. So, when we raise issue of child care, we are raising it for a couple of reasons. One is that we want to ensure that working mothers in this Province, women who want to work, women who are of child-bearing age, they want to have a family, and they want to be able to go to work, that they have the option to put their children into a child care centre. We also want to ensure that they can do it at an affordable rate, and that they do not have to take half of what they earn, or over half of what they earn from that job, to be able to put their children into a child care centre. Mr. Speaker, women in this Province have a lot to contribute to the workforce, and they cannot contribute adequately without the proper services being provided to them.

So, there is nothing wrong with having a pilot project. I think the minister said she is hoping this year to create forty-one or forty-two new spaces for infant care. Even that is a good start. We are not going to stand up here and condemn the fact that they are going to do a pilot project, but do we think it is enough, do we think they have addressed the major problems that needed to be addressed here? No, they did not take it far enough. They did not deal with the early childhood educators' piece, they did not deal with attracting quality workers into our child care centres that we have so we can make more spaces available, and they did not deal with the issues around affordability that a lot of families are still facing.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair recognizes the hon. Member for Terra Nova.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. S. COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Unlike the Leader of the Opposition, it is my absolute pleasure to rise here today to speak to this motion. As a new father with a young three-and-a-half month old daughter, I can certainly appreciate these things more than others, perhaps.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. S. COLLINS: Thank you.

I certainly applaud our government's steps to provide young families with the services, opportunities, and supports needed to ensure its success. Mr. Speaker, being a parent is such a huge responsibility, and certainly a gift. These measures introduced by government will certainly help parents to succeed.

In last year's Budget, we saw children and youth as our government's focus and this year we see further improvements and initiatives to build on that strong base. Bringing a child into this world, Mr. Speaker, is perhaps the biggest decision any couple will ever make. While my mother always said I was not a decision, she certainly did her best to raise me right.

One of the determining factors that goes into a decision when a couple looks into having kids certainly would be the finances surrounding them once the child is born. In particular, women may ask themselves: Can I return to the workforce, and what implications are there if I can? Certainly, that would depend largely upon issues surrounding child care. This is even more pertinent to low-income earners. That is where the child care subsidy comes in, Mr. Speaker.

The Department of Child, Youth and Family Services provides a subsidy to child care centres on behalf of eligible families to facilitate their access to quality and affordable child care. The Child Care Services Subsidy Program helps eligible parents or guardians pay for child care in a licensed care centre or a regulated family child care home. Some or all of the costs may be covered depending on family income. Transportation costs may also be covered.

As of January 2011, over 1,900 children in Newfoundland and Labrador are attending child care centres with support from the subsidy program. If you look across the Province, it is broken down as follows: Eastern Urban, 1,003; Eastern Rural, 143; Central, 470; Western, 299; and Labrador-Grenfell with twenty-three, and that brings the total subsides to 1,938.

Government is committed to making child care for low-income earners more affordable and more accessible allowing all people with the opportunity to reach their full potential. Research has shown that success and prosperity depends upon having a diverse educated and engaged population, which in turn depends upon having appropriate supports and services in place such as quality early learning and affordable child care.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, when children are provided with high-quality child care and early learning the social, emotional, and intellectual benefits are apparent as children enter school with a positive attitude towards themselves as competent learners with parents who feel supported in their parenting role.

Another piece of the puzzle is the child tax credit, and this, of course, focuses on families right across the board. Commencing with the 2011 taxation year, there will be a new non-refundable child credit tax based upon child care expenses currently deductible from income. The new child tax credit is one component of the larger ten-year strategy to support young families with their child care needs.

Budget 2011 commits $3 million annually for a non-refundable child care credit for deductible child care expenses that have been incurred. This credit allows for a maximum of $7,000 per year to be claimed for children up to seven years of age for a maximum credit of $539, and $4,000 per year for children aged seven to sixteen for a maximum credit of $308.

Mr. Speaker, the child care credit is a non-refundable tax credit that will be calculated at 7.7 per cent of the eligible child care deduction as reported on line 214 of an individual's income tax return. This will help make child care more affordable and is designed to provide relief from the rising cost for young families who must avail of child care in order to work.

When you combine the child tax credit with the subsidy program, minimum wage earners in our Province pay approximately $5 per day per child for child care in Newfoundland and Labrador. Mr. Speaker, our government recognizes that child care services are essential to supporting labour force participation both now and in the future.

Child care services provide a primary need for families, and that is to support workforce participation of young parents, allowing parents the opportunity for full- or part-time employment. By doing this, a strong child care system contributes to equality, especially for women, and a more equitable division of child rearing, facilitating employment opportunities for mothers.

Poverty related to unemployment or underemployment can be directly linked to a lack of early learning and child care, which obviously can have a huge negative impact later in life. Lone parents of low-income families are especially vulnerable when child care is unavailable, unaffordable, or of poor quality. Single mothers, in particular, are more likely to exit the labour force and consequently become reliant on income assistance as a direct result of not having access to appropriate child care.

High-quality early learning in child care is the first step to a child's success in school and in future workforce participation. Mr. Speaker, that obviously should be our focus. As a result, individuals who, before such initiatives, were left with little choice but to be dependent on Income Support now have a choice, a choice that will allow them to be self-sufficient and a contributor in our society. This is such an empowering tool and the benefits are immense to both parents and their children.

Mr. Speaker, more specific to children is the child development and early development as it relates to child care supports. The provincial government is committed to providing families and young children with the supports they need to reach their full potential and live enriching lives in Newfoundland and Labrador. Our government recognizes the importance of supporting the healthy growth and development of children in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, research over the past ten years has underscored the importance of the early years in terms of brain development and the lasting effects that early experiences have on children's success in school and beyond. Therefore, it is not only the quantity of early learning opportunities and child care spaces that must be addressed when developing a child care system, it is also the quality that is so important. This is why we are moving forward to develop a comprehensive child care strategy for Newfoundland and Labrador so more families will have opportunities to make balanced choices.

Children will also benefit from age appropriate programs and services before entering the K to 12 school system. In this year's Budget, government introduced measures to advance the implementation of its Early Childhood Learning Strategy entitled, Learning from the Start, to give children a firm footing in their emotional, social and cognitive development. Quality learning and child care is provided by well trained staff in environments including child care centres, family child care homes, and family resource programs that promote early learning using well researched best practices. Mr. Speaker, our government has listened carefully to the concerns of parents and is committed to specifically targeting the shortage of child care spaces, particularly in rural communities, such as where I live, and for children under the age of two and school-aged children.

Mr. Speaker, when I look at my own hometown of Glovertown, and I guess speaking in context of somebody coming from a city, it has a population of less than 3,000. In the Town of Glovertown alone there are over eighty children of pre-Kindergarten age. Like I said, if you take that in context - one of them is mine, and when you take that in context of the numbers, that is certainly huge.

I know when we were in the hospital, my wife gave birth in the Health Sciences Centre, and when we were in there - we actually spent ten days in, she had some complications. It was fantastic, the news you would hear from the nurses. We had fantastic care; I would certainly like to point that out as well. It was brought to my attention that we are now experiencing a relative baby boom here in the Province. They said the numbers over last year and the year previous to that has grown relatively in large amounts. So whatever we are doing is certainly working. I was thinking, well maybe that is just in St. John's. Maybe that is just in urban parts of the Province.

I recently visited my sister-in-law who gave birth in James Paton Memorial Hospital in Gander early last month and the exact same thing again was said by nurses, there is a baby boom happening. There are a lot of babies being born. Mr. Speaker, in a developed country, that happens for specific reasons. It just does not happen by chance. Certainly, I will speak to a few of those in a moment.

This government has made so many great strides. As I have said, unprecedented investments in health, education, amongst other things. This, combined with the latest announcements, has created a great environment to have and raise children. As I said, people do not go out and – even though I may have started off by saying I was a mistake myself, but when people are planning on having children they give thoughts to the different things. They give thoughts to the education system, the health system, recreational opportunities in your area, those types of things, and certainly child care plays a big part of that. I have not faced that yet, because of course my wife is on maternity leave, and we live in a country where we have a year's maternity leave, which is a fantastic thing.

I have a cousin in California now who just recently had a baby. No maternity leave whatsoever. She actually had to take three months sick leave from her job as a teacher. We are so fortunate that we have that first year which is so important in the development of a child, but then of course you have to look after that. The years following can be difficult if you do not have any steps in place and if you do not implement the correct things there to have care for your children outside the home if you wish to enter the workforce once again.

Mr. Speaker, I certainly and wholeheartedly will be supporting this motion, as you can probably tell. I would be very surprised if all of the members here in the House - after hearing the Leader of the Opposition. I would ask her to give this a second thought. I know a lot of times people – not a lot of times, all the time people play politics with things but if you look at this, how do you say this is not a good idea? I look down to - and it is not St. John's North, it is Mount Pearl North. I was actually surprised, I was going to wish Mr. Ridgley congratulations; but there are a number of young families there, as well as the minister herself. Ask us, how are we planning to deal with these things? That is the thing. Like I said, I am going to be looking into these services relatively soon. My wife hopes to return to the workforce, which I fully support, and she will be able to do that if there are proper services in place.

I would ask all members to support this motion, and just to finish off by saying there are so many great things happening in this Province. I am going to do my part to increase the population. I would certainly ask all the rest of the members in this hon. House – I do not know if that is unparliamentary to ask that of people. There are great things happening in the Province, it is a great place to raise a family. You ask anybody, you have people – I have friends of my own who have moved down from Alberta, Ontario. I have a friend from the Middle East; she brought her and her family back here because it is such a great place to raise children. Do not tell us; certainly ask us, because we are doing it right now. As I said, a number of members in this House are raising children and are doing it happily –

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. S. COLLINS: Yes, that is right.

Anyway, I will take my seat with that, and thank you for the opportunity to speak to this motion.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: It is the pleasure of the Chair to recognize the hon. the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

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

I am glad to have the opportunity this afternoon to address issues of early childhood education and care. The private member's motion that has been brought forward gives me the opportunity to do that. Obviously, the private member's motion is dealing with a program that government has announced. Well, a pilot project that government has announced in this year's Budget and it is something that government is moving ahead with.

I have many concerns about this pilot project, but I am not going to concentrate on those concerns per se. What I am going to do is what I hope government would be happy to have me to do, is to put forward thoughts and ideas with regard to early childhood care and education that I hope will help them as they continue putting together the ten year strategy for child care, as they continue looking at early childhood learning, and as they put this pilot project in place, which they are doing and which I assume they will be evaluating.

One of the things that strikes me as I look at all the efforts that are going into child care, is an African proverb that a lot of us have heard, I am sure. It is very simple, it says: It takes a village to raise a child. I think there is a lot for us to learn from that proverb, because it recognizes that the raising of children is not just the responsibility of an individual who actually gives birth to the child, it is not just the responsibility of the two people who created that child, it is not just the responsibility, even, of the family that those two people find themselves in, it is the responsibility of everybody in the community. It is a communal responsibility to help children with their development, whether that development is the physical development, whether that development is mental, no matter what their development is, that it is all of our responsibilities.

That is the reason, Mr. Speaker, that we have things in our society such as governmental agencies that protect children. That is why we have things in our society such as government responsibility for education. We know that it is everybody's responsibility to take care of children. It is everybody's responsibility to be involved with their development. It is everybody's responsibility to raise a child. We know that for education, we know that for child protection, and we know that for children's health. We had an unfortunate situation in this Province just yesterday where a mother was found guilty and has to go to jail because she did not provide for the child's safety. That is the community recognizing we all have a responsibility.

What that says to me is that when it comes to our early childhood education and child care everything about the child's learning, everything about the education of a child, everything about the care of the child is not just the responsibility of the parents or of the family in which that child finds him or herself, it is the responsibility of all of us. That is why, Mr. Speaker, what we need in this Province is a public system, a system that is publicly funded, that is publicly administered, that is totally, publicly developed. This is what we do not have at the moment, Mr. Speaker.

Families in Newfoundland and Labrador want a child care system that is high-quality, that is universal, that is affordable, and that is accessible and developmental. They want everybody to have access to good, high-quality child care.

We have a serious shortage of licensed child care and early childhood education in this Province. What we are dealing with here today in this private member's motion goes nowhere near taking care of that.

We have approximately 6,000 full-time equivalent child care spaces, but in 2010 there were 23,413 children under five in this Province. Even if some proportion of these families do not want or need child care there are still thousands of children under five whose parents work full-time and do not have access to licensed child care.

The way child care is funded and delivered in Newfoundland and Labrador creates a patchwork of services and does not provide high-quality early childhood education to every child. We have a fragmented system. Some of our child care spaces are public spaces, such as the child care centre attached to the House of Assembly and the one attached to the College of the North Atlantic. Some of our child care spaces are not-for-profit spaces like those that are at the resource centre that CUPE has here in St. John's, and there are many other community-based, not-for-profit child care seats. Some of the child care seats in this Province are private, for-profit seats.

We have a non-uniform system, a system that lacks adequate regulations and a system that does not take care of the needs of people in the Province, of children in this Province. The system that we have is non-affordable for many parents and we have subsidies and subsidies are fine but subsidies do not meet the needs of everybody in the Province, Mr. Speaker.

We have lack of standards because of the fragmented patchwork quilt of child care that we have; we have lack of standards, Mr. Speaker. Lack of standards always leads to lack of quality. That is one of the major problems when you have lack of standards, when you do not have a fully regulated system. A publicly delivered, publicly administered system would be fully regulated and that is something we are missing seriously in this Province.

A universal early childhood education and child care system gives every child an equal opportunity to get a head start in life and is that not what we want – that every child has the same opportunity to get a good head start in life?

Research clearly demonstrates that high quality, public, non-profit, early learning and child care delivers the best support to children and families. Families can feel secure and safe when they know that their children are going into such child care spaces that are high quality, that are not-for-profit, that are regulated and they are really taking care of the children.

Those kinds of centres and that kind of a system, Mr. Speaker, also assure that we have safeguards for child care workers. We have child care workers who are trained and we have child care workers who are paid according to their training because that is what we do not have right now, Mr. Speaker. We have a poorly paid workforce while at the same time we demand that they have training. It is not fair to the workers, Mr. Speaker, and we lose a lot of workers because of that. A high quality, public, non-profit early learning and child care system would mean that workers would be happy workers. They would be workers who are getting paid according to their ability and they are workers who will want to stay in the workforce. We will not have a high turnover and we will be assured that we have quality based care.

Another thing that a high quality public system will do, Mr. Speaker, is that it will make the best use of public dollars. Right now we have a system that subsidizes parents and some parents need to be – all parents need to be subsidized. When we are subsidizing parents with children who are going in to for-profit centres or who are even going into family-based care – because family-based care is for profit also – when we are subsidizing children going into such spaces, we are using public money to go into the private sector where those operating the spaces are trying to make money for themselves. It is a business.

This is certainly a poor and inadequate way in which to use our public dollars, Mr. Speaker. This is something that the new initiative the government is getting into with the pilot project they are talking about does not face. They are increasing spaces that are for profit and government is using public money to pay people who want to make money from running child care centres.

Lack of child care, Mr. Speaker, is a major barrier to the ability for both parents in a family where there are two parents to participate fully in the work force. Lack of a good, public, high-quality child care system does not meet either and is a barrier also for single parents, especially single women, who are trying to work. If they do not have good-quality child care, they very often cannot work and therefore are unable to give their children the quality of life economically they want to give them. Whether we are talking about families with two parents or families with one parent, having a good-quality public child care system enables parents to work fully and to be able to give their children what they need.

As I have said, mothers, especially single mothers, are the ones who experience the biggest barriers, Mr. Speaker. At least 13 per cent of women working part-time in Canada cite lack of child care as the reason why they do not work full-time, compared to only 2 per cent of men. That is a gross, inequitable situation, Mr. Speaker, and something we should be concerned about.

We know from the experience in other places, especially in Quebec, Mr. Speaker, that it is their wonderful child care program that has enabled so many more women to go into the work force. It has really benefitted the economy in Quebec, both because of more parents being able to work and also because of the good-quality jobs that child care workers have, Mr. Speaker. So, all of it benefits the economy. It is not an expense, it is a benefit; it is actually part of revenue. From an economic perspective it makes all the sense in the world. From the care of children, it also makes all the sense in the world.

It is mostly mothers who are losing out because of the shortage of child care spaces, as I have said. We often hear of young mothers - and I certainly hear about them in my office - who decides to stay home because they cannot find adequate child care.

A well-designed early childhood education and child care system will be good for the economy. It will help increase women's participation in the labour force, as I have said. It will create local child care jobs and local demand for goods and services. That is the basis of a good economy, Mr. Speaker, when what is happening is happening locally.

Mr. Speaker, what I would like to see - and this is what I encourage the government to look at - is a seamless early childhood education and child care program that is publicly funded, administered and delivered for children up to the age of six, and an after school program for school-aged children as well. It is the seamlessness that is really important, Mr. Speaker. An integrated program of early childhood education and child care needs to be administered by one department, not two as we have here in our Province, and preferably that department should be in Education.

What we need, Mr. Speaker, is an early learning and child care division that comes under the Department of Education. We do not need and we should not have one department dealing with early childhood learning and early childhood education, making decisions in one department, and then another department dealing with child care and making decisions and setting up programs in their department. That kind of system does not give us a policy that encourages integration of the system. We want seamlessness and that will come if we put the two issues together under one department.

Early childhood and child care centres I believe –

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER (T. Osborne): Order, please!

MS MICHAEL: - should be based in the schools, Mr. Speaker, especially in rural areas, not in families but attach them to the schools. That would support family daycare providers and offer ECE programs directly to children. It is a model that is used elsewhere and it is a model we could benefit from. We also need a full day Kindergarten for five-year-olds, and I do know that the Department of Education is looking at that and eventually for four-year-olds.

I would like to see government agree to a fully integrated approach with the goal of having only one department dealing with early childhood. The situation we have now of two departments dealing with early childhood education and child care will continue to support a fragmented approach.

Mr. Speaker, I would like the government to think about what I said right at the very beginning, that it does take a community to raise a child and that we make sure that our early childhood learning and child care policies and practices show the importance of the community raising that child. In our context, Mr. Speaker, that means a fully government-funded, government-delivered, and government-administered early learning and child care program.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

It gives me great pleasure to speak to our private member's resolution here today calling upon this House to support our two-year pilot project. It certainly focuses on the development of child care spaces in family homes, Mr. Speaker. It is a great motion.

I have to say right off the top, Mr. Speaker, I was really taken aback by the Leader of the Opposition's comment when she began by saying that this is the only thing of importance that we could find as a government. Mr. Speaker, what a statement to make: the only thing of importance that we could find as a government.

Well, Mr. Speaker, this is one of the most important things as a government that we will discuss in our entire time as a government and for many years beyond. Getting child care right is critically important, not only to the economy of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, not only to the workforce of Newfoundland and Labrador, not only to particularly women who will have an opportunity to either be in the workforce because of what we are doing around child care or to create family child care centres in their homes themselves where they can either stay with their own children or take in others' children, Mr. Speaker. Even beyond all of that, this is so critically important for the children of the Province. That is the most important thing. The children of the Province deserve that we absolutely do this right, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS JOHNSON: So, to make a statement that this is the only thing of importance that we could find is absolutely ridiculous, Mr. Speaker. This is an opportunity today for the Leader of the Opposition to get up and support what we are doing, endorse what we are doing, and support the motion put here today. Obviously, Mr. Speaker, with an attitude that this is the only thing of importance we can find, we are not going to get much support on that side of the House.

One of the other things that the member opposite did raise – and yes, we did have our Estimates Monday morning, and yes, she did ask where are these 168 spaces, Mr. Speaker. I have since gotten that information for her and I can certainly read it into the record here now. It is not something we are trying to hide. We are very proud of the fact that we have created 168 spaces in the last little while. Mr. Speaker, we see every day their research skills here in the House, but I do not mind helping them out a little bit and providing that information. Forty-one of those spaces were in St. John's; six were in Eastern Rural; seventy-six in Central; eight in Western; and thirty-seven in Labrador. So, you can see that this is all throughout the Province. As I said, we are very proud of the spaces that we have created.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JOHNSON: Mr. Speaker, the other thing that the Leader of the Opposition was talking about was the subsidy rate. We have one of the greatest subsidy programs in the entire country. We have increased the number of subsidies since we have come into government by 72 per cent with over 1,900 children being subsidized today. The subsidies are great. I did say in this House that two people working, making minimum wage, with two children would only pay about $100 a month per child. She is saying she cannot find anywhere where those rates are as low as what we said, she cannot figure out how we get to $100 a month.

Again, Mr. Speaker, we see their research skills every day, they cannot get it right with Muskrat Falls, they cannot get it right with all kinds of issues in the House. They get great dollars, from what I understand, in terms of research. Again, I do not mind giving her a place to start. She said she could not find one and maybe the minister could find one. I just came up with six or seven off the top of my head, so if they wanted to start some research there they can go ahead.

The Children's Centre is one; they do not charge more than the subsidized rate, the St. George's Y centre, the Way 2 Grow Child Care Center, several YMCAs, Building Blocks Quality Child Care Centre, and Lourdes Preschool. Mr. Speaker, that is just a few that I just came up with in a few minutes. They have had a couple of days to do the research; since Monday they knew this. The information is right there. It is very easy to find. As I said, they do not do great research. I do not mind helping them out, but it makes for much more informed debate when they do the research first.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JOHNSON: In any case, we will help them along.

The other thing she was being very cute about in saying that she should not find how we came up with the $100 a month. Mr. Speaker, I do not make things up or cloud them, or make them sound prettier than they are. I clearly said upfront in my comment when you take into consideration the provincial and the federal tax credit that are already currently in place, add that on to the child care benefit that we have put in the Budget this year, when you take all of that into account then does it become $100 a month, Mr. Speaker.

She is trying to be cute. I am not cute; that is not the way I operate. I do not put out numbers that are incorrect, Mr. Speaker. I speak facts, and the fact of the matter is when two parents, making minimum wage, with two children will only have to pay about $100 a month, Mr. Speaker. That is $5 a day, that is even less than what they charge in Quebec.

Mr. Speaker, one of the other questions that were raised was: Why focus on infant care? Just a few facts around that; we currently have 49,000 children in the Province with working parents. Of that 49,000, approximately 8,100 children are of the age of zero to two with working parents. Right now, we have 194 spaces available for infants, Mr. Speaker, that is about 2 per cent of the spaces that are available.

It is a critical issue. You can talk to anybody out there, you can talk to new parents, you can talk to parents who have gone through the system, you can talk to the grandparents who are helping out, you can talk to the family child care providers; it is absolutely an issue. When mothers are about to return to work after a year – or some people do not actually get the opportunity to have a year, some people cannot afford to take a year, but whatever it is, within that zero to two range, the space is definitely an issue.

Mr. Speaker, that is why we wanted to make that a priority in this year's Budget. No doubt we are going to continue with work on the ten-year strategy, but we did not want to wait until next year. I see this two-year pilot project as being an opportunity, particularly in underserviced areas, in rural areas where perhaps the need and the demand is not there and it takes quite a long time to put up the bricks and mortar, that this is an opportunity to find spaces. In that short order there are things that you have to go through in terms of occupational health and safety, and Government Services and getting the licence and so on, but we are very committed to moving that along as quickly as possible.

We see this as an opportunity to create spaces, particularly in rural Newfoundland. However, having said that we have had tremendous inquiries from even within the St. John's area since this Budget has been announced. We set a target of 400 spaces over two years; very cautious when we set that target because we do not like setting targets that we do not meet. With the enthusiasm that we are hearing since this Budget has been announced, Mr. Speaker, I have no doubt that we are well on our way in partnership with Family and Child Care Connections, with AECENL and all of our partners to meet that goal. As I said, only 2 per cent, and that is why the focus was there.

The other piece around it is there is a lot more opportunity in family child care settings to make a better income if you take the age category other than limiting it to infants, because you have the opportunity to take up to six children and no doubt the revenue is higher. That is why we also put in the $200 a month supplement for infant care only homes. We also did it on a $200 per month basis. We did not say that the child had to be in the home for one full year because we know in certain parts of the Province and in certain rural parts of the Province, particularly my own district, where fishing is a big industry, that not everybody needs child care for the entire year. You may just need it from April until October. So it is $200 per month that the child is in the home, Mr. Speaker.

In terms of the 168 spaces, where I just mentioned they were, this comes under our capacity initiative, Mr. Speaker. The capacity initiative is something that we started back in 2006 and we – not only the 400 spaces that we plan to create in the next two years with this budget, we also plan to continue on with the capacity initiative. That is about $1.6 million a year, in which we support not-for-profit centres to open up homes, such as the one that the member who introduced the motion mentioned, out in Bay Bulls. We supported that to the tune of $58,000 for developmental costs, and $266,000 for start up costs.

So, we currently have on the books right now another twenty-one centres that we are looking at supporting. We hope with these twenty-one centres we are going to create about 465 more spaces, Mr. Speaker. Now, they are not all infant spaces, but certainly, there is a need for age two to five, and after school is an area that needs improvement as well.

Since 2006, with the capacity initiative we have opened seven new centres, and we have expanded on six existing centres, and that is where the 168 spaces come from. So, since 2003, we have increased the number of child care spaces by 50 per cent, add on the 400 that we are hoping in the Budget, and add on the other 462; it is a great opportunity to create nearly 900 more spaces.

Now, Mr. Speaker, is that enough? Absolutely not. We know that there is greater need for this, but we cannot just snap our fingers today and create all these spaces tomorrow. That is why we are taking a very comprehensive, very thorough review to come up with our ten year strategy. It is so critically important, as I said in the beginning, that we get this right.

Mr. Speaker, there has been lots of consultation along the way.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS JOHNSON: Certainly, I am committed to much more consultation as we go forward. The plan is to have the ten year child care strategy announced by the end of next fiscal year, and it is very important that we talk to our stakeholders and the people who currently work in the field, operate in the field, the early childhood educators themselves.

I have had great meetings with the early childhood educators, the Provincial Association of Childcare Administrators, the Family and Child Care Connections group. We have had PACAL in; we have had the Early Childhood Educators Human Resources Council. I have had several consultants in, Kathleen Flanagan, from PEI, who designed the system in PEI. Between myself and the Minister of Education, we had Dr. Clyde Hertzman in talking about the importance of early childhood education and how it is so important for our economy; it is so important from a health perspective; it is important from an education perspective down the road. It is so critical, the first three years are very critical.

Mr. Speaker, we have done a lot of consultation along the way; we continue to consult. Over Easter break, I met with a lot of these organizations again and asked them to go back and come up with some ideas as to where they could see improvements. There are some things, Mr. Speaker, from what I heard from the groups that are very much common sense that we do not need to wait a year for in terms of the strategy to come out. Things like Level I or Level II wanting to become certified and they may currently be a nurse or a teacher but it can take them up to two years to get the early childhood education piece and therefore they are not certified Level I or Level II in their child care centre. These are things that I have directed the ADM and the staff to look at very carefully because if it makes sense it is something that we want to do. It is so critical that we do it right for our children.

I have also asked them to take a look at things like PEI where they have regulated rates that are charged and there is a whole debate around that. In fact, in Estimates the other day I asked the two leaders of the other parties where they were on that. Obviously the Leader of the NDP is supporting a public system. It often gets thrown to me because a public system, no doubt, would have to be subsidized. That is the only way it can be done. Then you get some people on the other side of the fence say: should we be subsidizing for everybody because there are people who can afford it?

It is not clear cut but I think that by meeting with all of these groups, by having them go back to think about it and then coming back again with me individually first but then in an entire group setting so that everybody can see all the different sides of the coin, I think that we will get to a ten year strategy that will work for the children of this Province, for the economy of this Province and just for the future outlook of the entire Province, Mr. Speaker. They are working on that now and we have committed to those meetings in June. Shortly after the House closes we will continue on with those meetings, Mr. Speaker.

With the minute that I have left I would certainly like to thank the member for bringing in this motion. It is one that is so critically important. There is no more precious gift to people on this planet then the gift of a child. Certainly being a mom myself I look at things a lot differently now with a child. We, as parents and as grandparents and as aunts and uncles and sisters and brothers, we just want nothing but the best for our children particularly when it comes to their care when we have to go to work and do our jobs and be able to help raise the family and give them all the opportunities they can have in life. Not only from that side of things, but from an educational perspective those early years are very critical.

This Budget piece speaks to family child care. As the Leader of the NDP said, we do have a mixed bag in this Province. We have family child care that certainly works in certain settings and is absolutely going to be part of the strategy as we go forward. As I said, bricks and mortars will not work everywhere. She also said we have not-for-profit and we also have private.

I looked at PEI, and PEI has excess spaces there. That is certainly not the case that we have here, but the other thing about PEI is they mostly have all not-for-profit. In this Province, we have about 70 per cent private and here in the city –

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that her time for speaking has expired.

MS JOHNSON: Could I have ten seconds to clue up?

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

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

MS JOHNSON: Just a final statement to clue up, Mr. Speaker.

It is so important that we get this right. Our Premier is so committed to this. When she asked me to do this job it was one of the things on her top priority; that we serve the children of this Province. Our government is committed to it.

I am sad to see that the Leader of the Opposition did say that this is the only thing of importance that we could find as a priority. It is unfortunate that we do not see the Liberal Party seeing child care as a priority, Mr. Speaker. We certainly do and we are going to make sure we get it right.

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 on this private member's motion. It is not an area that normally falls under my responsibility when it comes to being a critic. Usually it falls to the Leader of the Official Opposition who deals with this on a daily and weekly basis.

Of course, all of us who represent districts in this Province have children in our districts. It is pretty obvious, of course. Albeit it might not be your principal responsibility, you have an obligation to be aware of the issues that exist in your district and to promote and see what can be done for those people. Parents, for example, and particularly in this case parents with children, that the best programs and services that are possible can be made available for them.

Mr. Speaker, I am probably one of the most vocal, outspoken critics of government on many of their issues, many of their programs and policies, and that of course is a role you have to do when you know factually and truthfully that things are not being done properly. I have no problem in doing that. The Minister of Finance, as I said to him when I spoke at length recently about the Budget, confirmed: You call it like it is. Sometimes if there are good things, you have to acknowledge that it is good. It might not be the be-all and end-all that you hope for. At other times when it is not appropriate, if it is not proper, you have to stick to your principles, stand your ground and speak out against government. We are not here to be lackeys; we are not here to be cowering because you might need something from a minister from time to time. You have a job to do, and that is what it is all about. If you cannot do that, you are not doing your job effectively and properly.

I must comment, however, on the minister, she talked about research capabilities of the Official Opposition, Mr. Speaker. She talked about it in the area of the 168 spaces that were created by government. The minister is sort of poking fun in saying that the Official Opposition did not have the research capabilities to find out where those 168 spaces were.

I say to the minister first and foremost, notwithstanding the limitations of research capabilities imposed upon the Official Opposition by this government because they gutted the funding to the Official Opposition some years ago - all government members who voted for it, the Chair of the Management Committee and the PC government members and gutted the Official Opposition research budget. Notwithstanding that, which was an attempt to limit our ability to do our job, we have done quite an admirable job in terms of research, as we have seen here in this House of Assembly day in and day out when it comes to Question Period and keeping this government's feet to the fire.

With regard to the research capabilities of the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services, that is another case. For example, the Leader of the Official Opposition sat here in this House of Assembly at the Estimates Committee two days ago and asked the minister where the 168 spaces were. Could you believe the minister, who just stood on her feet before me, could not tell the Leader of the Official Opposition where the 168 spaces were, and to get up here today, poke fun and say we did not have the research capability to find it?

The very minister who just made that statement did not have the information herself, Mr. Speaker. She is the minister. She sat here in this House of Assembly talking about child care spaces today. She sat in the Estimates Committee two days ago with a group of people around her, deputy minister, assistant deputy ministers, researchers, and could not provide the Opposition with the information about where the 168 spaces were that they claimed to have created. Now, you talk about who is trying to fool whom. This is the minister getting on with this.

I say to the minister, before you start poking fun at anybody else do your homework. If you had had your homework done, we would not have to be asking these questions. You would have been able to give the information when you were asked in the proper place for the asking, which was in the Estimates. You, minister, were not able to provide the information. Now, you question who has the research abilities and who is doing his or her job. That is not lost on people. That is not lost on people at all, no more than it was lost on people today with the Minister of Fisheries telling the people around this Province, particularly in my district, I wrote a letter to see what you thought about solving the problem. Well, it is not about writing a letter, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: It is not relevant.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I agree, Mr. Speaker, I agree. It is not relevant, absolutely not relevant. I will come back to the topic. It is just so infuriating and frustrating, Mr. Speaker, when you see some of this stuff going on. Absolutely infuriating. You try to stand up for the people in your district and you get treated like that because you ask simple questions, appropriate questions that affect people's lives and pocketbooks.

We are here talking about child care. That impacts people's lives. It impacts the children, to make sure they have quality child care, and it impacts the parents who have to go to work and need somewhere to put them that is safe, in the hands of trained people so that they are properly cared for. It is a very sensitive issue, I say. That is very, very relevant. It is as relevant to members on the government side as it is to anyone in the Opposition.

Now, back to the motion at hand here. Although this might surprise the government members, this member for Burgeo La Poile is going to vote in favour of this resolution. Absolutely going to vote in favour of this resolution. Now, that is not to say that everything that government is doing is great. That is not to say that everything about child care that is being done in this Province is fantastic. We are talking here about a very specific pilot program that is going to take place over two years. It would be remiss and inappropriate of me not to encourage the government to follow through on it. It is not the be-all and end-all. If you listen to the leader of the NDP, there would not be enough money in the universe to satisfy what she wants, probably, when it comes to child care.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I have no problem saying that. I have no problem saying that. It is one thing to be realistic, it is something else to be unreasonable. Sometimes it is…

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: I say absolutely! If you are going to make requests you have to be reasonable in them. If it is reasonable, you should stick to your guns and fight for it. It is no good to come in here and wish for something that you know is absolutely impossible, but you cannot kick somebody when they try their best.

Now, I am not suggesting that a two-year pilot project is the best; far from it. It is not the best. Hopefully, we are going to find some results that come out of this program that is going to encourage this government to say it is absolutely necessary what we are doing when it comes to child care. Hopefully, then, we are going to find the money, as a government - maybe not this crowd; I suspect they will not be the government by the time that comes about, but whoever is government at that time it is going to be incumbent upon them to take that information - because we know there is a terrible shortage of child care spaces in this Province. We know we need to do something about it. If we can learn from this pilot project where we ought to go and where we need to go, then of course it becomes a funding issue. Hopefully, we can find the money to put into it because, personally, if I have a choice between allowing Nalcor to spend $30 million in sinking two holes up in Parsons Pond or I have a choice between putting $30 million into child care, it is a pretty easy decision for this person, if I were a member of government. You have to make priorities. I do not think there is any choice when it comes down to that type of decision. I think it is an easy decision to make.

If we talk about all the time in this House of Assembly, whether you are government or you are Opposition or anybody in this Province, we talk about where we want to take this Province. We talk about the youth we have in this Province, the children we have in this Province, and that we need to educate them. Before they ever get to that level where they are being educated they have to be properly cared for, and I do not mean properly cared for only when they are in the daycare. The daycare is an adjunct to what else is a part of their lives. They have parents who need to work. They have parents who need to put bread on the table. They have parents who cannot stay home. They must go to work in order to make ends meet. We need only look at some of the expenses we have in this Province, gas bills, power bills; power bills which, by the way, are going to double under this government when we get Muskrat Falls up and running. We have to prepare for that kind of stuff. That is why we need to care. It is not child care only, it is family care. It affects the care of everybody in the family.

I say to the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services do not get up and try to be too cute about slamming somebody's research capabilities. I am surprised she wasted ten seconds of her fifteen minute speaking time commenting on research capabilities of the Opposition rather than speaking to the motion which the Member for Ferryland has put forward. Her member put it forward and she got up and took most of her time talking about research capabilities and all the time she was highlighting what she herself had not researched, and her own inefficiencies and deficiencies in her department.

Mr. Speaker, there are all kinds of complications with this. There are monitoring issues. Nobody is saying the program is perfect. We do not know where it is going to be all done. We do not know how many people it is going to impact. We do not know the ramifications of it, but it is a worthy project. Nobody can take away from that. Anything you do to try to improve the lot of our working families and their children, it has to be a positive. The minute we stop focusing on those types of initiatives is when we have a real problem.

No doubt, this was, given the minor aspects of it, i.e. it is a pilot project as opposed to a commitment to a full-scale project. The funding is not a whole lot of money in terms of the $8 billion Budget the government has. I think it is something like $3.2 million. So, it is not a fill-your-coffers type of program.

No doubt, that is tied in somewhat to the election that is coming up in October. Because you feed everybody in the electorate a little bit of cheese or a little bit of the carrot and you hope you get their vote in October. No doubt, there is a piece of that there, too. That is politics; that is to be expected. There is no doubt the people in this Province are going to get fed a whole lot of carrots between now and October with the government members trying to entice their vote. That is going to happen - and the cheese as well. You will be seeing all kinds of things. There will be more fire trucks given out this year than you want to shake a stick at.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: In fact, I understand they have the fire trucks on order and they are all blue, Mr. Speaker. They tried to change the national colour to blue, the international colour. They tried to change them to blue instead of red.

Mr. Speaker, suffice it to say this member thinks at least it is a start. It is not the be-all and end-all. It is not everywhere we ought to go. It is not everywhere we need to go, but it is a start.

As I say, just because it is a motion put forward by a member of the government, the Member for Ferryland in this case, and just because I am in Opposition, you cannot oppose for the sake of opposing. There are some things you have to agree with if the principle of it is right. It might not have all the pieces solved, it might not have all the money it needs and whatever, but it is an acknowledgement. In a way, it is an acknowledgement by this government that they have failed to address the problem in the past. Because if you did not acknowledge that you had a failure in the past to address child care needs, you would not feel the need to have a pilot project to find out where you are going to go.

So, Mr. Speaker, if there is anything telling about this, it is very telling. If you want to look at the negativity of this, it is very telling that the government feel they have to have a pilot project about child care.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. KELVIN PARSONS: We know there were lots of problems in this department which is going to administer this, Mr. Speaker. We know that the former Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services for three years was trying to get off the rails what never, ever got on the rails. Now the new minister is supposed to be trying her best to get it on the rails.

Hopefully, this initiative will get done. Hopefully, it will lead to better and brighter things for the children and the working families of our Province. Because of that, Mr. Speaker, this Member for Burgeo & La Poile is not going to oppose – because I am not into opposing for the sake of opposing. I am into accomplishing things and getting things done, whether it be for my district, for individuals in my district, or the people of this Province. That is what public service is about.

Mr. Speaker, I believe this is a worthwhile initiative and therefore I will be supporting this resolution put forward by the Member for Ferryland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. DAVIS: Good afternoon, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much for the opportunity and recognizing me today to speak to this private member's resolution; a resolution that pertains to government's decision to proceed with the two-year pilot project focused on the development of child care spaces in family homes throughout Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, this afternoon I listened attentively to the debate here in the House. I have enjoyed listening to the debate. I listened to the Member for Ferryland as he introduced the motion this afternoon and brought his comments. I listened to the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi and her comments as well; as well as the address by the Minister of Child, Youth and Family Services who is very much in tune with the needs of children and families in Newfoundland and Labrador, and expressed that very well this afternoon in the House.

I would like to comment on the Member for Terra Nova briefly, if I may, as well, because I enjoyed what he had to say this afternoon. I know he talked a little about his own life and being a new parent. I congratulate him and his wife in reaching that stage of their lives. He also commented about his desire to continue to contribute to the growth of the population of Newfoundland and Labrador, and I wish him well with that as well. What was probably most interesting of all of his comments this afternoon, he made a comment about whatever we are doing it is working. I think he is referring to the efforts of government but I am not going to put him on the spot and ask him. I think he is referring to the efforts of government, and he is right. There are many efforts in government to help families and to help children in the best interests of children in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot go ahead with my comments this afternoon until I echo remarks by the minister in regard to what was brought forward by the Leader of the Opposition this afternoon. I was somewhat taken aback by her surprise to this motion, because this is a very important motion, Mr. Speaker. It affects many families throughout Newfoundland and Labrador and communities throughout Newfoundland and Labrador, young families and working families in this Province.

I also listened, Mr. Speaker, just now to the Opposition House Leader and looked forward to his comments; however, he spent a considerable amount of his time - by my estimation, the first six minutes or more - talking about other matters before he even got to the purpose of this debate and this motion today. He drifted back and forth on and off, but he did bring up some points towards the end of it.

Mr. Speaker, I have to say what I was waiting for this afternoon was to hear their vision and the vision of the Newfoundland and Labrador Liberal Party for children of Newfoundland and Labrador, but I have not heard it. It appears to me there probably is no vision for the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador when it comes to early childhood education and the children of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Mr. Speaker, this government does have a vision. This motion this afternoon is a very important one, as I said. It affects many families and children. It affects families throughout Newfoundland and Labrador. The part that I want to focus on this afternoon pertains to the provincial economy and the effects on the provincial economy that this motion and this effort will have. Newfoundland and Labrador experienced tremendous economic growth in 2010. We led the country in both GDP and employment growth, recording a 3.3 per cent increase in employment the last year alone, Mr. Speaker. For both parents, ability to participate in the labour market has a direct impact on that economy.

Mr. Speaker, having a stable, high-quality child care system allows for parents, in particular women, it allows for both parents with the opportunity to enter and remain in our labour markets, which is fundamental to our economic growth and our continued growth. A comprehensive system of child care helps to build the economy by building the population. It is also the foundation of a child's future education achievements. It is the foundation, and it is the beginnings, the very first entry into education for our youngest children. This government is taking a comprehensive approach and is continuing to make meaningful investments to support children and their families.

Mr. Speaker, we are determined to create the conditions that will enable families to grow and children to develop, conditions that will support people in fully participating in the workforce and contributing to the economic growth of our Province. In recent years, Mr. Speaker, there was a Canadian economic analysis conducted by Robert Fairholm, an economist who had carried out a study funded by the Child Care Human Resources Sector Council. Robert Fairholm said, in 2009, that it has been shown that for every dollar invested in the child care sector, they estimate there is a $2.54 benefit in real value to our economy. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is a tremendous value for $1 spent and a $2.54 realization.

That study said that by all measures, early childhood education and care sector provides one of the largest, if not the largest, boost to short-term economic activity of all the major sectors of the economy through direct, indirect, induced, and mothers' workforce participation. That is significant. This government is committed to make those efforts to ensure that early childhood education is available to both parents. In doing so, it makes that contribution to our economy.

Mr. Speaker, there is also a tremendous amount of effort and work being done by government to ensure that the continued development and education of our early childhood educators continues. Government provides a wage supplement to early childhood educators. Now, childhood educators, I have to explain, are broken out into levels depending on their education and their experience.

An entry level would be a person who has started a basic course in early childhood education, generally a forty to sixty-hour course in early childhood education. Level I would be a person who has one year of training or equivalent. Level II would be a two-year early childhood education diploma. Level III would be a person who has a diploma as well as post-secondary specialization, which would be extra courses conducted at a university level. Level IV would be a person who actually has a degree in early childhood education.

Mr. Speaker, these supplements for Level I are as high as $3,300 for a person who is a full-time working Level I early childhood educator and is seeking to improve their level of education, ability, and expertise. That is an example. Those types of supplements are very valuable.

Mr. Speaker, there are currently 850 certified early childhood educators working in regulated child care in Newfoundland and Labrador alone – 850 – but there are currently 1,655 early childhood educators who are certified as entry level or above. So, they are working at some level within the industry throughout Newfoundland and Labrador. That is a high number.

Now, we realize there are people who enter into early childhood education. They are registered with the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Newfoundland and Labrador, and that registration is effective for a three-year period. Now, we do realize there are people who enter into early childhood education, then leave shortly after and do not stay in the field. We understand that. For 1,655, they are a significant number. We need to try to move those into the opportunities to provide early childhood education to more children. That is why this program, this pilot project, will help provide those opportunities in homes.

Mr. Speaker, of the 850 certified early childhood educators who are working in regulated child care, I was quite pleased and impressed to learn the numbers of those workers who are working towards furthering their education. There are a number of those working towards furthering their education.

Overall, I should tell you, there are 313 early childhood educators at the entry level; thirty-three of them qualified for entry level supplements in 2010. Of all the entry level educators who we have, there were ninety students - this winter 2011 alone - who took part in 135 courses to further their educations. That is an impressive number. Of just over 300, in that entry level, ninety of them took part in courses to further their education. Furthering their education makes them better qualified and better able to provide good quality to care for children in early childhood education facilities and in homes. That will make them better able to do that.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, the development of a quality affordable and accessible system of early learning and child care can result in substantial short-term and long-term economic benefits in Newfoundland and Labrador. Young families, including immigrant families, families wanting to return to the Province, are more likely to view Newfoundland and Labrador as a province of choice if early learning and child care supports are in place. Success and prosperity of our Province depends on having a diverse, educated and engaged population which, in turn, depends upon having appropriate supports and services in place with the help of early childhood educators to provide quality early learning and child care.

Mr. Speaker, for that reason, I will be strongly supporting this motion this afternoon. I heard the member opposite who said he will be supporting it as well, and I encourage all hon. members to do the same.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for the District of Ferryland. If he speaks now, he will close debate.

The hon. the Member for the District of Ferryland.

MR. HUTCHINGS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I want to thank all of those who participated in the debate today in regard to this motion. It is certainly an important motion to this government. I, as a member, in terms of introducing it, I think child care, in terms of our Province and the initiatives that have been taken to date and what has been looked at in 2011-2012 to move forward with the two-year pilot project in increasing daycare spaces, is of the utmost importance.

The Leader of the Opposition was not too positive in regard to the discussion on it. We think it is very important and we are proud to stand by it - certainly as a member and my colleagues. It is extremely important. So, I was happy to bring this motion to the House.

I certainly encourage all members to vote for the motion. It was a good debate, good discussion. A realm of discussion around private-public, rural-urban, what is available and where we need to go, but I think it was agreed by most that, strategically, this is the right direction. We are looking forward, we are doing a pilot, we are investing, and at the end of the day the important thing is that it is better for our youth, it is better for our families, and it is certainly better for our society in general, and we are on the track to do what we need to do.

So with that, Mr. Speaker, I will conclude my remarks and wait to see and encourage all my colleagues to support this motion.

Thank you very much.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

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

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. SPEAKER: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

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

Carried.

Motion carried.

MR. SPEAKER: It being Private Members' Day, Wednesday, this House now stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock tomorrow.