HALIFAX, TUESDAY, APRIL 9, 2019

COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE ON SUPPLY

3:00 P.M.

CHAIR

Ms. Suzanne Lohnes-Croft

THE CHAIR: Order. The honourable Government House Leader.

HON. GEOFF MACLELLAN: Madam Chair, would you please call for the continuation of the Estimates for the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development.

THE CHAIR: The honourable member for Cape Breton Centre, for seven minutes.

TAMMY MARTIN: I thank the member and staff for the opportunity to ask these few questions.

I’m curious about the lack of libraries in some schools in Cape Breton. I find this very strange considering we’re trying to teach kids and encourage them to read. Is this the norm going forward or can we have some commitment from the minister that libraries will be put back in schools, especially at the elementary level?

HON. ZACH CHURCHILL: Just to clarify for the member, libraries are still in place. We have places where there is literature and books, places to do studies in the new buildings being developed. They’re moving more from a library setting to a learning commons, which is really exciting from a design perspective.

I know the member is speaking specifically about the library technicians. There has been a move in a number of regions, not just in Cape Breton, to move away from the library tech positions and have the teachers be the lead in terms of library navigation, introduction, and use for our students. Sometimes our regions have to make difficult operational decisions in relation to enrolment around FTEs. Our desire as a government is to ensure that the majority of FTEs that we’re using right now, any new FTEs that are coming full-time equivalent positions, that’s a job, are focused in the areas of increasing achievement and well-being. That’s where the focus of our full-time course equivalents is. But there has been a move, not recently, it started a number of years ago, to rethink how we do approach libraries.

Also, to the member’s point, literacy is absolutely critical and important to our government. We’ve restored the Reading Recovery program that was cut under the previous government. I believe by next year we will have 100 per cent coverage again of Reading Recovery, after four years of not having that program in place. Also, the previous minister invested heavily in literacy supports, teaching specialists. We are starting to see some moderate improvements in the area of literacy for our students, so we’re starting to see the achievement levels, generally speaking, increase in the area of literacy, and our hope is that’s pointing to the effectiveness of the strategies that have been put in place in the department and in our system.

TAMMY MARTIN: To be clear, the specific site I’d like the minister to respond to is Greenfield Elementary in New Waterford, which does not have a library.

ZACH CHURCHILL: That would be news to us. If the member could clarify, was there a library there before that’s no longer there? That is something that we can look into on behalf of the member.

The regions are responsible for operational decisions and allocations. They do have to fall in line with our policy investment priorities, but that’s the first time I’ve heard that’s the situation in New Waterford. We can look into that for the member and get back to her.

THE CHAIR: Your reply was to the minister but not to the Chair, so it wasn’t recorded. Is that a yes or a no?

TAMMY MARTIN: Yes, I’m sorry. There is no library at Greenfield. As well, those positions for library techs are very important to encourage reading, especially at a young age. How many positions have been lost through this change taking away any library techs that are out of the education system across the province? Just as an FYI, the library is now the pre-Primary room.

ZACH CHURCHILL: In terms of the overall full-time positions in the system, those numbers have increased every year that we have been in office. The regional allocation of those positions has shifted in regard to library tech, and that has been in relation to a new approach to libraries. In some schools, we have libraries in the classroom. Other schools, particularly the new ones that are being developed, have learning commons. In some schools, we still have the old libraries, where the teachers are the lead in terms of engagement with the materials in those locations.

TAMMY MARTIN: I’ll wrap this last question up into two things. The Reserve Mines elementary school that is slated to be built at some point, we still don’t have an answer as to when and where. As well, why is there no pre-Primary program in Reserve Mines?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We are in the process of rolling out Phase 3 of pre-Primary. The criteria we have used for the sites have been very specific and consistent. First, we’re looking at need as identified by EDI. Then we’re looking at accessibility, going into areas where there is less or no regulated child-care spaces. The third criteria we’re using is space availability. We are heading into Phase 3 of this. The details of the rollout of Phase 3 will be announced very soon.

TAMMY MARTIN: To be clear, is there no site selected for the build expected for Reserve Mines to replace the old Tompkins Elementary?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We haven’t released the rollout plan yet for Phase 3. I would ask the member to be patient and allow me not to get ahead of our own announcement and announce that on the timeline that we have scheduled.

THE CHAIR: Order, please. Time has elapsed for the members of the NDP. We’ll turn it over to the PC caucus.

The honourable member for Cole Harbour-Eastern Passage for one hour.

BARBARA ADAMS: I only have a couple of questions for the minister. First, last year when Island View High School opened, there had been an application put in for skills trades. At the time, that application was denied. My recollection of the information I was given was that they said they weren’t going to do it at the beginning of this year, but they can always reapply at the end of the first school year once they see how courses and things work out. I’m wondering if the minister and his department have received an application for the skilled trades program. If so, what was their response?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The department is in the process now of evaluating applications. I don’t know if there’s one specifically from that school. The evaluation criteria are really built around proximity to other skilled trades centres’ enrolment, and I’m sure there are a couple of other factors in there as well. We are in the process of looking at skilled trade programming from a provincial perspective. I don’t know where we’re going to land next year in terms of sites at this point, but that information will be coming out in time so people can prepare for the next academic year.

BARBARA ADAMS: The second question relates to busing. This year, there were no Grade 12s at Island View High. They were still going to Cole Harbour High. They were getting bused. This upcoming school year in September will be the first time that all those students will be going to Island View High School, but there will still be those who are going to apply for an out-of-area transfer to go to Cole Harbour High because of programs that are offered there that aren’t offered at Island View High. Can the minister tell me so that I can share that with the community: Is there any courtesy busing option for anyone from the Eastern Passage side of the constituency to go over to Cole Harbour High School in the upcoming school year?

ZACH CHURCHILL: Each region has policies in place around courtesy busing and applications. They will be dealt with at the regional level. Those local operational decisions do not make it to the minister’s office.

I can tell the member that we are in the process of reviewing busing from one end of the province to the other. We have completed a public consultation where we had approximately 9,000 participants, which is a really great number for a public consult.

We’ve also engaged SACs in the busing conversation and PACE, as well. We are in the process of evaluating the feedback that has come in. Staff will be developing policy and operational options for me to consider. I hope to have some positive changes in place for next Fall to deal with some of the problems that we have experienced, particularly here in HRM. The issues have really been unique to the area. I’m sure there are a number of factors that contribute to that, but we hope to have more to say on that in the very near future.

BARBARA ADAMS: I’ll take this opportunity to remind everyone who is not familiar with my area that there is a significant portion of Eastern Passage/Cow Bay that does not have any busing. You can’t even get on a public bus to get to school if you don’t have a school bus. It might be good for us all to remember that there is no direct bus link from Eastern Passage to Cole Harbour yet, although I keep hoping that we will work together at both levels of government to bring that about. To get from Eastern Passage or Cow Bay down to Dartmouth and then back out to Cole Harbour is an hour and a half ride one way. If those kids do not get courtesy busing, it is at least a three-hour ride to get to and from school if they have to take public transit.

The last question I have for the minister is about the Cole Harbour area of schools. When I asked the minister before about what was happening to that area of schools, he indicated, if I recall correctly, that he was leaving Cole Harbour and Auburn High Schools as they are, but there are still all of the junior high and elementary schools that we don’t know the fate of.

I believe there is still a moratorium on school closures, and I don’t know how long that’s going to last, so I guess I’m wondering about the moratorium. As well, what does the minister think is the timeline for when he may be communicating with those schools, the parents, the teachers, and the students as to when they might expect some kind of movement forward to start a school advisory process again? What is the plan?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We actually have been meeting with the SAC chairs from Cole Harbour and Auburn. The member whose desk I’m temporarily using, the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Aquaculture, the member for Preston-Dartmouth, along with the member for Cole Harbour have been very active on this issue for the last two years. We have communicated our intentions to the SAC chairs. The feedback we have received thus far has been really supportive and encouraging.

As I think I have responded to the member previously in Question Period, the plan is to keep both facilities open with some enhancements at the Cole Harbour facility. Once we finalize plans for that, we will be able to announce that to the community. The community, through their representatives on the SACs, has been involved in this conversation over the course of the last two years, very directly.

Sorry, I did forget to mention, and I thank the deputy for reminding me, that Cole Harbour was also announced as a site for the Technology Advantage Program that we have in place. That’s a great partnership with IBM and other tech companies. We will be getting a cohort of 20 kids into this program. It will start in Grade 9 and it will be a tech-heavy component to their learning. They will receive tuition for the first two years at NSCC, and we will then link them to market opportunities in the private sector.

[3:15 p.m.]

This is a program that’s going to be really exciting for the community and the other communities that they’re in. We have a site announced for Yarmouth, Cole Harbour, and I know that Membertou is involved, and Spryfield. That program has had great success. It’s based on the IBM P-TECH program, which is based out of the U.S. That started in the Bronx or Brooklyn and has really helped create labour market attachment for graduates who are having a hard time achieving labour market attachment and has turned the situation around for a number of people.

We know that there is an ever-developing demand for tech people. That’s why we have changed our curriculum to include coding. That’s why we’re engaged in this great partnership with IBM to make sure that we’re not just giving our students the skills that they need in school - particularly in this developing, exciting area of technological advancement - but also making sure they have job opportunities when they leave. I know the member must be really excited about having that program in Cole Harbour as well.

BARBARA ADAMS: The minister is correct: I am extremely excited about that new program. I also want to make sure that the students in all of my constituency are able to actually get to that school because it isn’t offered at the one that’s in Eastern Passage.

The minister did reference the fact that he had talked to the SACs for Auburn and Cole Harbour High School. I’m wondering two things: Has he spoken to the principals of those two high schools, and has he spoken to the SACs of the elementary and junior high schools - for all of those feeder schools, not just the high schools? Those parents are also concerned about what’s happening with their schools.

ZACH CHURCHILL: I have personally met with the SAC chairs of Auburn and Cole Harbour, but I do know that our representatives in the regional office have met with the principals and the other SAC chairs.

BARBARA ADAMS: I’m looking for clarification. Have you spoken with the SACs and the principals from the elementary schools and junior high schools?

ZACH CHURCHILL: As I just mentioned, our staff have been in contact with them as well.

THE CHAIR: The honourable member for Dartmouth East.

TIM HALMAN: Good afternoon, minister and staff. I have a number of questions I would like to pose to you on a variety of topics impacting our education system.

I would like to start off discussing an issue that impacted Nova Scotia today. I got up this morning, got the kids up, got them going, and then by 6 a.m. we discovered that the opening of school has been delayed by two hours. As a parent and a teacher, I do recognize that regardless of the decision that is made, we all recognize there will be criticism. There’s no way to avoid that. Certainly, those who have to make that decision, I know, make that decision with the utmost sense of responsibility to the safety of our students.

I know, through my experience in the classroom and now as a teacher and certainly, minister, I know you’ll be down this road with your children going to school. How do we find that balance? That’s my fundamental question. Are there ongoing conversations within the department to try to find perhaps a more uniform approach, from Yarmouth to Sydney, with respect to school closures?

I know some jurisdictions, for many years, have kept their schools open during snow days. Staff is expected to report to school and it’s at the parents’ discretion whether or not to send their students to school on that day, yet the schools would stay open. Are there any discussions within the department to look at that as an option for keeping the schools open during a snow day for staff?

ZACH CHURCHILL: It’s difficult to have a uniform approach to snow days, considering that the weather is not uniform. All we can do is have our operational leads make decisions based on the best information they have at hand. TIR is consulted as they do have the expertise on road conditions, but we do have to leave that up to local hands to decide on matters of safety. We think they are in the best position to do that.

This is not an area of focus for our government right now. We are very much focused on some really key areas we believe are pillars for the education system, including classroom conditions, inclusive education, non-teaching supports, early learning, and ensuring that we do better in helping our kids achieve higher levels of success and achieve better levels of well-being.

Those are the missions we have right now in the department and that’s where our focus will remain.

TIM HALMAN: I certainly appreciate those initiatives. However, the nature of the question regarding snow days was more or less to try to understand the extent to whether there are any policies being developed to try to make schools more open and accessible during a snow day. As you probably know, there are other jurisdictions that have been creative in terms of facilitating school openings on a snow day to ensure staff are there. If the parents or guardians feel they want to send their child to school that day, then they have that option. I think at the end of the day, that’s what it’s about, and I’m sure you would agree it’s about giving options.

I want to thank you for your response to snow days. I felt it was sort of a timely question, given what was going on here in metro today anyway, with the CSAP schools delayed by two hours and the HRCE schools.

For many years, I heard a lot of concerns from my former colleagues in the classroom with respect to PowerSchool. For those who aren’t familiar with that program, PowerSchool is the system by which teachers enter their marks. I know there have been changes to the PowerSchool system. I’m wondering if you could outline what changes have been made. The teachers of the province, are they receiving up-to-date professional development to deal with the changes that have been made to PowerSchool?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The work for PowerSchool, TIENET, the data collection overall has been ongoing. The Council to Improve Classroom Conditions has been the lead in policy recommendations in that regard. We also had a really helpful process called Ask the User, where we went out into our schools, we asked teachers and administrators and staff to tell us what they liked, what they didn’t like, what data they thought was critical in their work and in the lives of their students, and which data was redundant or not as useful.

There have been some changes made around data collection and attendance marks to date. I know this is an evolving conversation with the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions. I might expect that they have some more policy suggestions in the future.

TIM HALMAN: With respect to marks, one of the sources of frustration is that marks were broadcast via PowerSchool in real time. You would enter marks and then your students could go and access it at any time. Often those marks wouldn’t have a context, they wouldn’t necessarily provide a holistic description, I guess, of how the student was doing. In many respects, it was just raw data. Often those marks need to be compiled and calculated and put into a context.

I’m wondering if you could provide an update as to whether or not marks are still live. Can students still go on and see what their marks are, or do the teachers decide whether or not those marks would be broadcast live via PowerSchool?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I would like to thank the member for the question because I know this has been an issue of frustration and concern with our folks on the front line. The Council to Improve Classroom Conditions has been really active on this. They have spent their annual budgets on FTEs for class caps every year from Grades 6 to 12, on attendance policy workers, and more support teachers for high school.

I know this isn’t to the member’s question, but I just wanted to highlight what that group has been doing. Those dollars are embedded in the system every year. That’s a $20 a year investment in perpetuity that the folks have made. Since they have spent the money, they have been focused on some key policy areas. Assessment is one of them. They are in the process of finalizing some assessment policy changes for consideration for the department.

I have not received those yet, but I do know - and the deputy tells me who co-chairs that group - that the issues the member has brought up are being considered with that group right now. The deputy also tells me that teachers now have control over what data can be seen. That’s a change that has already happened.

TIM HALMAN: I think we need to recognize that, and this is just an anecdotal observation, but I found that sometimes you would almost see the level of anxiety increase in our students because of those live or real-time marks. They would often look at the information and not have guidance to interpret what those marks are. When I started teaching, a student would come to you, you would open up your mark book, and you could talk them through it in terms of what this mark means and what the big picture is. I am pleased to hear that teachers will be able to have that professional judgment to say, maybe every two weeks, to students, your marks are available, they are live, they view them, and then come see me so we can chat, because context is very important.

Are any costs associated with updating PowerSchool? Also, with respect to professional development, if changes are going to be made to PowerSchool, will teachers be given professional development, and is there a cost associated with that?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I share the member’s belief that moving from a live system to giving teachers discretion on the release of marks is positive, and I agree with the reasoning the member has given, so I am happy that we have moved in that direction.

There are PowerSchool leads in each of our regions who are responsible for supporting staff in terms of understanding the program and the updates. We believe the changes so far have been minor and don’t require any major new instruction to our staff. There are no major in-service costs that are coming out of this. At this point, I believe any costs are negligible to the budget.

Again, we are going to have some more policy changes coming forward from the council. This is a group of teachers, a guidance counsellor, and I believe there is still a student on that group. The union co-chairs that with the department, as well. I know they have given us great advice so far. They feel really good about the work they have done, the investments they have made, and some of the policy suggestions they have put forward on attendance and assessment. I expect that that great work is going to continue and lead to more positive changes in working conditions for our teachers.

[3:30 p.m.]

TIM HALMAN: With respect to TIENET and with respect to our individual program plans, oftentimes my experience, especially with TIENET, was that it was very challenging to decipher the information that’s being communicated. Teachers care deeply about students who require extra supports. Not that long ago, I remember hearing a lot of concerns that TIENET wasn’t effective in communicating the outcomes that the teacher was expected to execute in the classroom for that individual program plan.

I ask this, because the two topics of PowerSchool and TIENET were components to the frustration that our front-line teachers had. I am pleased to hear that there are gains being made on PowerSchool.

With respect to TIENET and our IPPs, I’m wondering if you could outline how TIENET has improved. I know the layout of that was problematic for many teachers. I’m wondering if you could give us an update and outline the changes that have happened.

ZACH CHURCHILL: We engaged in an ask-the-user process for PowerSchool and TIENET. There have been some changes made already to TIENET.

One of the issues that the users indicated was a problem was the complexity of the screens and there not being a simple way of inputting the data, so we have simplified the screens, reduced some of the screens, and made that process more coherent. We have also reduced the administrative burden on what gets documented and when, giving some more flexibility to the teachers so that they can focus more on teaching instead of inputting the data. There’s a bit more flexibility there. Also, there were some recommendations on assessment and from the inclusion commission that will impact further changes to TIENET as well. We are in the process of working with the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions to achieve those further changes.

TIM HALMAN: The minister made a statement a few days ago in this House, which all Parties agreed to, with respect to renewing our commitment to the inclusion model. I’m pleased to hear that that form of communication with our teachers about individual program plans is occurring. I think that’s very important. It was a major source of frustration because I believe every teacher in the classroom wants to make sure, especially if students need a different environment or different outcomes, that they have that information communicated to them as effectively as possible so they can get on with teaching in the classroom based upon what those students require.

Minister, you have talked a lot about the extra and new supports that have been added to the system, greatly needed supports. As you know, minister and Madam Chair, in my time in the classroom, I often felt that inclusion was a system that was, as I said in the House a while back, almost like a drop in the bucket in terms of the investments we made. Now I can see that we’re starting to move forward with that. When those announcements were made, I was happy to recognize that this is a good approach with the government.

My concern, minister, and I’ve expressed this to you before, is the stories that I’m hearing throughout Nova Scotia of where we’re not having an impact, of where the gaps may exist, while there are stories of success where the new supports are assisting. I’m curious: What steps are we taking to address the gaps?

ZACH CHURCHILL: Generally speaking, the feedback from the front lines has been positive. People are appreciative of the new non-teaching supports that are available. We’re hearing that it’s relieving some of the pressure in relation to classroom complexities and classroom management. That’s not to say that everyone is experiencing that the same way either or that that feedback is universal. We are still hearing that more is needed, and that’s why I think it’s important to recognize that we are in year one of a five-year rollout that will involve additional supports and additional investments that will be there to enhance the work that has already happened.

We have had teachers and administrators tell us that they have never seen so many supports in the classroom before. Considering the tension that we have had with the sector, for all of this positive feedback coming in, that is really telling me something, that people are starting to feel some of the impacts here in a real way. We have to say there is feedback that certain elements of our new FTE cohorts aren’t having the desired impact, so we are evaluating that, working with our regions to evaluate the effectiveness of a few positions and, obviously, of the folks who are filling them, to make sure that we’re all achieving the objectives that we want.

I do have one story that I might share. I won’t use her name because I still want her to have friends when she goes to work. I played volleyball with a teacher, and I asked her for some feedback, wondering if she was feeling the inclusion supports and if she was experiencing any sort of difference at the school. She said no. I said okay, and I asked her, what class are you teaching? She said, I’m the resource teacher. Then it dawned on me, you’re the inclusion support.

Some folks aren’t necessarily connecting the supports with the budget infusions and the new positions. That’s important for us to recognize, so we can better communicate the purpose of these positions. That will help us give better feedback if people are aware that the new positions in their schools are actually linked to the inclusion supports.

Also, we’re partnering with Inclusive Education Canada to help us with the rollout and implementation. We’re still engaging Dr. Sarah Shea at a high level in terms of where we’re going. Gordon Porter is helping us through Inclusive Education Canada with oversight and rollout. We have completed an RFP for a third-party academic to come in and do an annual evaluation and independent public reporting on how we’re doing with the inclusion rollout. We have put some necessary measures in place to make sure we have objective third-party input to help us evaluate the outcomes we’re achieving and make sure we’re getting closer to the intended outcomes that we’re going after. I do think that’s important.

We’re also partnering with Autism Nova Scotia to help us with the additional autism supports and making sure we have a stronger partnership with them as we move forward.

THE CHAIR: I’d like to remind the member to address your questions to the Chair and not to the minister. You’ve been using “you” a lot in your conversation.

TIM HALMAN: My apologies. I’ll work hard to improve that. I appreciate the comments from the minister. We saw $15 million invested last year. We saw $15 million coming forward in this budget for inclusive education. This is great news, especially for someone who’s spent almost 15 years in the classroom and there’s certainly that desire to hear these investments and that’s great.

However, it reminds me a little bit though of when I first started teaching and one of my master teachers would ask how student X is doing. They’re doing just great. They’re performing up to the expected standards. They’re doing well on their tests and they’re showing up on time. I remember the master teacher asking how I knew that. How are you measuring their success?

Fundamentally, that’s the question I’m posing. How are we measuring the success of these investments? What mechanisms of accountability are there in the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development to make sure that the money that’s allocated to the front lines, how do we know they are having an impact besides a conversation from teachers and front-line workers?

ZACH CHURCHILL: That’s a very important question. The deputy was just telling me she’s met with our regional leads to go over the system improvement guidelines and accountabilities. We are getting every leader in the system on page that these are the goals we’re going after, and I’ll be specific about what they are.

We want to reduce the achievement gap that some of our students are experiencing. We want to increase achievement levels overall. We want to improve the well-being of our students, which is collected with certain data points, as well. We’ll know we’re achieving what we want to achieve when we start seeing improvements in those three areas.

We have a system improvement plan our administrators will be held accountable for and our staff will be held accountable for. We are also, specifically with inclusion as I just mentioned, engaging independent third parties to help with oversight and reporting to the public, which is necessary for the department to objectively ensure that the way we’re rolling these out is going to be effective.

Another measure that will prove to be really beneficial, as well, is on standards of teaching excellence. We know, based on evidence, that no matter what a student is faced with at home or whatever socio-economic condition they are faced with at birth, that we can teach through those things and we can help change the trajectory of lives. In order to achieve that, we have to have objective standards of teaching excellence that can help guide our profession and performance evaluations. That will help us keep everybody in the system accountable for what we’re trying to do, and that is to help our kids do better in school, help our kids feel better, be healthier, and help our kids achieve a greater level of success upon graduation and beyond.

Broadly speaking, those are the metrics we’re using. We do have a system in place to help track that and keep people accountable and we’re also engaging with independent third parties to help with advice on implementation and reporting to the public.

[3:45 p.m.]

TIM HALMAN: To your point, the teaching excellence absolutely. I think anyone who’s spent some time in the classroom knows that the teacher is often the decisive element in the classroom. Let me extend that by saying that often in the inclusive classroom the program assistant is often the decisive element in the classroom to set students up for success. At this juncture, we’ve certainly talked about IPPs and TIENET and certainly still under the topic of inclusion, I’d like to discuss with the minister a little bit about the role of program assistants, which I’ve always felt is a role in our education system that is going underutilized. They provide enormous supports to our diverse learners here in Nova Scotia. I’ve always found in many cases if I was confronted with a class of, let’s say, 35 students and quite possibly seven IPPs, 10 adaptations, having that program assistant in the class was absolutely fundamental in setting all your students up for the success they all deep-down want.

I’m curious as to the extent to which the department has plans to expand roles for program assistants in terms of further training, further professional development, because I think we’d all recognize the valuable role they play in the education system and, along with that, the potential that role has to set students up for success.

ZACH CHURCHILL: Some things have changed since the member left the classroom to join us here in the Legislature. Class caps have been one of them, so there should be no classes now - or at least 99 per cent of classes we know would not be at 35 but would be below that. The class cap for Grades 10-12 is 32, Grades 7-9 is 30, Grades 3-6 is 27, and P-2 is 22, so we have class caps 99 per cent of the time that are being implemented. There is some flexibility there, if the principal in the region would prefer not to have a split class as an example. If they want to avoid having a split class, there is some flexibility to have some larger classes, but 99 per cent of the time they’re not choosing to do that.

In relation to the importance of teaching assistants or education assistants or program assistants, depending on what region you’re in, they are called different things, we partner with the Department of Labour and Advanced Education to help our staff up-skill and pursue further training in their field, which can also lead to better wages for those staff. There is a partnership that we have with LAE on that. Also, we’re partnering with Autism Nova Scotia on specific training for our EAs on how to properly deal with students who are on the autism spectrum. There is a great partnership there. They are helping us to provide some additional training and learning. Also, for the first time in our system, we now have child and youth care practitioners, who are there not just to provide interventions with our students but are also there to provide training and support to our staff in our schools.

The best feedback we’re getting right now - the area from the inclusion investments where we seem to be having the greatest impact based on the feedback - is with the child and youth care practitioners. We are essentially, I think I might say, universally getting positive feedback in that regard. Those additional supports are there for the teachers and for the students, and I think that those positions are really having an impact and are appreciated by the folks on the front line.

TIM HALMAN: While I know that class caps can’t always be achieved, I know school administration does their utmost to achieve those standards and expectations. The reality is, for thousands of our teachers in Nova Scotia, they are often confronted with situations where there are more students in the class than they can sometimes handle. Let’s recognize that, but I also recognize those changes have been made and that is a positive.

I’m curious as to the department’s intentions: Will there be a concerted effort in maybe the next fiscal year to hire more program assistants? Because when I meet with parents or guardians, they often tell me that their child doesn’t qualify for a program assistant. Or if I’ve spoken to administrators, they’ve often indicated that they put in a request for 10 program assistants but only received four or five. That translates on the ground, as the minister knows, to some students who require those supports not getting them. I’m curious as to whether there are plans to hire more program assistants.

ZACH CHURCHILL: We did hire 60 new EAs from last year’s budget in relation to the inclusion component of it, so we did hire more last year. I know that everybody is anxious and excited to see what the inclusive education supports will look like in the coming year. We are in the process of finalizing those plans.

We are doing some final consultation with our regions and our stakeholders to make sure that we get this right. I would just ask the member to be patient until we get to that point where we are able to announce the specifics of how that additional $15 million for inclusive education will be spent.

I will remind the member that the budget in education overall has been increased by over $30 million this year; that equates to approximately $300 million over the course of our term in government. The budget has been increased by approximately 30 per cent. That’s significant considering that for the majority of our history where we’ve had an education department, funding has coincided with enrolment. Where we are experiencing a bit of enrolment decline, the fact we have seen such an infusion and increase in investments is a first for this province. I believe it’s helping us tackle the major issues that we know our teachers, administrators, students, and parents have been faced with.

TIM HALMAN: I’d like to remind the minister that while investments that we’re seeing in education is a positive, we also have to recognize that ensuring those investments going to the identified needs in a strategic, comprehensive way is fundamental, as the minister knows. I feel systems of accountability, built in to the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, is fundamental.

I say that because I found in the span of my career, teacher accountability increased enormously, which I certainly understand why. This actually leads to my next topic: student responsibility.

We’ve talked a bit about accountability in terms of the disbursement of these new expenditures for inclusion. I’ve seen a lot of increases in accountability for teachers. One topic we don’t often discuss is student responsibility. I’m curious as to whether or not the department is going to move away from credit insurance and credit recovery.

My experience in the classroom, while it did help some students, I always had the concern that it was indirectly teaching some of our students to take the path of least resistance. I’m curious if the minister could give us an update on credit insurance and credit recovery, and if the department has plans to expand that or to maybe decrease it.

ZACH CHURCHILL: I appreciate the sentiments expressed by the member. We know that credit recovery is a necessary tool in some cases to help our students achieve higher levels of success; however, assessment is an ongoing policy conversation at the level of the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions. There very well might be some recommendations made in this regard that do land on my desk.

TIM HALMAN: The minister has referenced the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions on a few occasions. I’m wondering if the minister could give us an update on how often they meet and the nature of the topics that are being discussed. It sounds like a lot of issues that are impacting the classroom are being discussed there. Could the minister give us an update on how often they meet?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The Council to Improve Classroom Conditions meets two full days monthly to engage in this work. Their agenda is co-constructed with the department and the union. It is focused on the 10 key priority areas that are listed in the legislation that created that council.

TIM HALMAN: So many questions. We have to be strategic; we only have nine minutes together. Last week, there were three new education or executive directors hired. What is the process to hire an executive director for an education centre?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I believe the member is speaking about our regional executive directors, not the executive directors that we have in the department. There is a standard hiring process for that where there is a call for applications. In the case of the regional executive directors, we call for applications nationally.

The deputy chaired a hiring committee with other deputies that were brought in; I believe there were even deputies from outside the province that were included in that. The deputies from P.E.I. and Newfoundland actually came in to help us assess the applicants, considering the importance of these positions.

The way I understand the interview, obviously there is a short-listing process that happens based on resumés, cover letters and references; short-listed candidates were then asked to, I believe, provide a presentation in areas of importance and then answer questions to the committee. That is a process that was driven by the deputy, and it proved to be a very good process because we’ve got three really good people with a lot of experience. I know all of them have high ambitions for our children and are really committed to the policy objectives that we have as a government to increase achievement, improve well-being for our students, and close the achieving gap.

[4:00 p.m.]

We are filling in a really powerful roster of public servants to help us achieve this goal. I can’t speak highly enough of the folks in the department from our Executive Director of Strategic Policy & Research, Sara Halliday, who’s here with us today; the deputy that we scored from Ontario really will benefit whichever governing party has the pleasure of sitting on this side of the House; and, of course, we have these great Finance folks as well who help me keep up with all the budget questions and have helped us achieve more efficiencies in terms of delivering funding to our agents.

In the case of three new regional executive directors, Dave Jones in the Valley, Paul Landry in the Strait, and Chris Boulter in the Tri-County, I’ve had the great privilege and pleasure of meeting these gentlemen, talking about their passions for education, our children; I’m really excited to see what these folks can help us achieve over the course of the next two years of our mandate.

TIM HALMAN: On to busing now. I think we’d all agree that the upheavals we saw in September of last year, there were some major disruptions to the transportation of our children from home to school and back. I certainly saw in my years in the classroom, interruptions and problems but nothing like we saw last year, and I think even the minister has indicated that as well. I know we’re all in agreement that there have to be solutions moving forward.

I know that $1.9 million was invested for 37 new buses for the Halifax Regional Centre for Education. I’m curious: Does the department anticipate this number going up as you continue to hear feedback?

ZACH CHURCHILL: As I mentioned earlier in today’s deliberations, over the course of the last couple of months, we’ve just completed a major public consultation, 9,000 participants. We’ve engaged our SACs on the conversation around busing and we have engaged the Provincial Advisory Council on Education, as well. Of course, we’ve reached out to the unions representing the staff who get our kids to and from school safely.

We are currently in the process of developing - I know staff in the department are currently in the process of developing options, operational and policy options, for myself and our other members of government to consider. We will announce those when we land on those decision points, to the member, but the intention is to improve the busing experience, the communication experience, the efficiency and effectiveness of our network of transportation, because every parent, every student should expect and demand that we get our kids to and from school safely.

TIM HALMAN: Certainly, in Dartmouth in the last 10 or 15 years we’ve seen a lot of growth. I think of Baker Drive, a lot of growth there in the last 10 years and in our community of Dartmouth East, we’re going to see the Port Wallace community go in. We’re expecting over the next five to seven years a lot more residents of Dartmouth East, so we know that these communities are growing.

I’ve found in my time as an MLA, often parents just trying to find out whether or not they qualify for a bus is very frustrating and challenging. I’m just wondering, is the government - the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development - looking at population patterns and school sizes and acting proactively to avoid the bus challenges that we had at the beginning of the school year?

I think if they did that, looking at the population patterns, that might be able, moving forward strategically, to mitigate a lot of these busing issues that we’ve been seeing get worse year after year and certainly last year, one of the most challenging years we’ve had on record.

ZACH CHURCHILL: That, of course, happens. Our regions take the lead in analyzing population data, which comes from Census, from regulated child-care numbers as well, that’s evaluated. We also deal directly with municipalities on their municipal planning strategies. Bringing all this data together helps us make an educated guess, based on the evidence as to what the population pressures are going to be.

That’s not to say that it’s accurate all the time. We do have a situation in Yarmouth where a school will be built for next Fall, and there are new questions about whether it can handle the population of Yarmouth. We’ve actually seen a little population boom as a result of our investments in the ferry and our support and the growth of the lobster industry as well.

For those folks who don’t know, we are the lobster capital of Canada down my way; 30 per cent of all lobsters that are sold in the country come out of southwest Nova Scotia. Sometimes you can’t predict when there are going to be little booms in population growth, particularly in small communities like Yarmouth.

It’s not a perfect science, but the process is one that gives us our best chance at making sure our buildings, our busing, and our infrastructure are prepared to handle the demographics of the day.

TIM HALMAN: One of the frustrations parents had was that communication was very, very problematic when trying to get information about their buses. Are there plans on the department’s part to have a more immediate person available for communication to parents, to let them know what’s happening with the buses?

ZACH CHURCHILL: That is one of the biggest issues that’s been brought forward by the public. We recognize particularly with Stock, this issue is not the same in other parts of the province, communication was listed as a priority concern. We have brought new people into the region to assist with that; there will be changes to make sure that whoever is delivering our bus service will do a better job in communicating with parents. That is where we have identified a significant challenge.

THE CHAIR: Order. Time has elapsed for the PC caucus. We will move to the NDP caucus for an hour.

The honourable member for Dartmouth North.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I’m just checking my email here and I seem to have the opposite problem that most people have about busing notifications. I think I got six texts or emails from noreply@HRCE telling me that our bus will be two hours late today. But anyway, I’m very happy about it. I know that many people in my constituency are not having the same good luck with buses that I am right now.

Good afternoon, I’m going to start by asking some questions about the School Advisory Councils. In August 2018, the government announced the increased funding for School Advisory Councils. Can the minister tell us how much in total was given out to SACs last year and how much they will receive for the 2019-20 budget year?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The overall figure of dollars that went out to SACs is $2 million. That equates to about $5,000 per school community plus $1 for every student that’s in that school. There’s a base of $5,000 plus an additional $1 for every head in the school and that equates to approximately $2 million.

SUSAN LEBLANC: That was for last year. Can you tell us the amount that was budgeted for this year?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The number will be the same. That’s the allocation that we’ve come up with, $2 million. That did come from savings of the governance changes that we made last year; that has allowed us to give funding directly to school communities that they can then invest in areas that they believe are important in the realm of student achievement and well-being. Of course, there are parameters around what folks can spend the money on, but this is new money to SACs. The feedback we are getting so far is an appreciation for giving them some financial capacity to invest in areas that are important to their school community, and not putting all the pressure on them to fundraise to do that.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I would like to ask the minister if he could table the guidelines or the parameters that are provided to SACs about how the money can be spent, and also if there are reports required from the SACs on how they have used the money.

ZACH CHURCHILL: We can definitely table those documents. I will inform the member that they are also public, as well. These documents were distributed to SACs, I believe, last October, late October or early November, perhaps, in some cases. These documents are available to the public, but we can definitely have staff send them in so we can table them for the member.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I want to move on to the new positions, the non-union positions that were posted and hired. When the department hired school psychologists and speech-language therapists last year, they chose to create these 12 positions as 12-month, non-NSTU employees.

I’m wondering, for these school-based employees, what is the department’s policy on reporting for work during Christmas, March break, summer, and storm days when the school buildings are closed?

ZACH CHURCHILL: This is following the recommendation from the Commission on Inclusive Education, to have supports available for students outside of school hours. We know their needs don’t stop when the school bell rings; that came directly from the commission’s recommendations. So, in order to do that we do have a new group of non-unionized, or I should say non-teaching, a new non-teaching cohort of speech pathologists and school psychologists.

The model we are using for delivery of those services is very much aligned with SchoolsPlus. We’ve already had a SchoolsPlus program that works in and outside of the school day and the school year. SchoolsPlus supports are available in the summer, over some holidays, and we have incorporated this cohort of staff with that model.

The really exciting news from this is with those six new positions alone, we have extended the supports to close to 700 new students and, of course, these supports are now available outside of the school day and the school year. I think there are 679 new students that we have been able to reach with these new supports and that really speaks to the value of these professionals, these non-teaching professionals in our education system, and the reach and the impact that they can have on the lives of people.

SUSAN LEBLANC: Yesterday I was sitting in the Law Amendments Committee and Alec Stratford, who is the Executive Director of the Nova Scotia College of Social Workers, presented on the Financial Measures Act, talking about the need in Nova Scotia for a child and youth advocate office. He talked about the importance of such an office to protect children from systemic problems across departments and how an advocate office could be a proactive voice in raising the concerns of children.

I know that the member for Yarmouth, when the minister was in Opposition, he supported the creation of a child and youth advocate office. I would like to ask the minister: Does he still support the call from the Nova Scotia College of Social Workers for a child and youth advocate office in Nova Scotia?

ZACH CHURCHILL: Philosophically, I do think it is a good idea, but as a government we do have to make decisions based on the dollars that we have. In Education, our budgetary focus is on getting more supports into the classroom.

[4:15 p.m.]

There have been calls for new bureaucratic offices, for sure. The Institute on Inclusive Education was a recommendation in the commission’s report. I know that there were some other ones; Avis Glaze called for a new Ombudsperson’s office as well. I know the folks that the member mentioned have asked for a youth advocate office, so there definitely have been requests that have come in and recommendations to establish new bureaucracies related to youth and students.

We have taken the opinion, based on the fiscal realities of our province, based on the finite resources that we have, to focus all of our new investments in education into the classroom, into teaching and non-teaching support. That is the philosophy right now, that is the practice that guides our actions, that is where we know the support is most needed.

When you talk to teachers, when you talk to students, when you talk to parents, those folks generally do not advocate for new bureaucratic offices here in Halifax. Those folks are advocating for more people on the ground, in our schools, to help relieve pressure from our teachers; help our teachers focus on instruction and teaching and learning; and help make sure that our students have the additional people around them to help them do their very best.

I can say philosophically I have no problem with that idea at all. I did table a Private Member’s Bill during my time in Opposition on this. I do think it’s a laudable goal, it’s an idea worth consideration for sure.

Is that going to be a priority for me right now, as Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development, when I know we have so much work to do on the ground; in our schools; and bringing in a brand-new, free, universal social program like pre-Primary? I can’t say that that remains a priority for me, as a minister, when we’re looking at the key investments that we’re making. That’s because we want to get these supports in place to help the kids. Everything we’re doing is to try to help them do better. I think the supports on the ground are needed first.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I want to move on to some questions about child care. In 2018, the provincial government signed onto an agreement with the federal government to provide funding for child care. The federal contribution to the province’s child care budget for 2019-20 is $11 million. If the federal government changes, will the province still receive the money for the third year of the agreement?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We don’t control what the federal government does, but we have a contract with the federal government right now. The expectation of the province is that federal governments of any stripe keep their contractual agreements to us, particularly in areas of such importance as child care.

We as a Liberal Government here in the province, along with our federal level counterparts, have made it a priority to improve child care, to invest in and expand child care, and ensure that we have higher quality, more inclusive spaces in child care. Would I be worried if a Conservative Government took over, for example? That’s a hypothetical. Of course, that might create some concern for me because we’ve seen that that Party hasn’t really had a focus in these important social areas as, to be fair, the NDP and the Liberals have. We would hope that they would keep their contractual obligation to us, for sure.

SUSAN LEBLANC: The 2016 review of regulated child care also concluded that the current model of funding child care was not effective or sustainable; that the current model of funding was not effective in ensuring fair wages and benefits for educators; and that the current model of funding does not respond to the accessibility and affordability needs of families, children, and communities.

Although we’ve seen increased investment through the federal money recently announced, we have not seen any real change in the funding model for child care. Given that the model itself hasn’t changed, do you think that the investments being made will address the concerns about the effectiveness and sustainability of the model?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We actually have changed the funding model. Funding from the federal government is tied into the change as well. So, we are moving from a funding model where there wasn’t much accountability, where there was no real ability to ensure high quality standards, to a funding model where the dollars are tied to meeting quality standards. We actually have legislative authority now in the department to go out and make sure that these things are happening in the field. Our staff now have legislative authority to go out and check on these centres, as well.

The funding model has changed. Funding has also increased for the regulated child care sector. We’ve moved from having around $35 million a year invested into regulated child care, to close to $70 million dollars. We’ve actually almost doubled the amount of money we are spending in regulated child care.

Those are for quality measures, to help ensure there are more inclusive spaces; to help open up new spaces for infant care and one- to three-year-olds; and to also expand that sector in areas where there have been child care deserts in the province. I’ll remind the member that we’re moving from a system where only one out of four of our preschool-aged kids were accessing child care and early learning.

We are moving into a system on an ambitious schedule - four years - where we have 100 per cent access to early learning through pre-Primary, and we’re hoping to have greater reach with our regulated child care sector. At the same time, we’ve brought in pre-Primary and ensured that 3,000 kids are now accessing and benefiting from that program. We have also expanded regulated child care by about 1,500 spaces.

At the same time, we’ve doubled the income criteria for subsidies. Before, if your household income was $35,000 or lower, you would qualify for subsidy. We now have a household income base of $70,000 where you are able to get subsidy. We know that child care can be expensive, but we know how critical it is, not just for our kids - it’s important for them as well - but for parents, particularly those who want to contribute and play their part in the labour market.

There’s been a lot that’s happened in regulated child care. We have expanded it; we have doubled the funding; we have brought in quality measures and accountability that weren’t there before; we have made it more affordable for families who are participating; and we’ve made it more accessible by getting into communities where it wasn’t before. This is going to have a very real impact on families and on the kids that are benefiting from these programs.

SUSAN LEBLANC: This all sounds fantastic, and it sounds like a place I want to live, but I also don’t see that it’s actually the reality on the ground for many people. I just want to make a couple of comments.

Number one, my child is currently in the pre-Primary program. Love it, but the only reason he can be there is because the particular place that he goes to school has a before and after school program that we pay for. It’s a fantastic program, but it’s only accessible to those who can afford it and who are part of the French system; they already have the program in place, so we can take advantage of that.

I know that there are many people in the province who can’t access the pre-Primary program yet because of the lack of before and after school care. I do applaud that program, absolutely, and I always will. I hope that it extends to infancy. But the fact that so many people are still prohibited, or it’s prohibitive for people, because they don’t have the care after school, is a shame. I know there are pilot programs, but they need to expand quickly.

The other thing I would say is that this summer, we’re currently looking for child care space for my four-year-old because he won’t be five by the beginning of the summer. We’re hoping we can get a place in our old daycare and that spot will be - we can’t wait to find out, if he gets a spot, how much it will be. It will be expensive.

I guess my question is, with all of the doubling of budgets and all of those changes in terms of the subsidy - that’s great that the subsidy is opened up - how does it boil down in actual numbers and for actual people? Is there a limit on subsidized spaces in child care centres? If so, what is the limit and what is the percentage of total spaces that can be subsidized? What is the percentage of total spaces in regulated child care that are dedicated, subsidized spaces?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We don’t have a wait-list for subsidy. If you qualify for the subsidy, you get it. There is no cap on the subsidy program. I do have a host of data points right here that I think relate to the member’s question.

Currently there are 4,441 applicant families receiving subsidy in the province, so close to 4,500; over 5,500 children are in the program. Seventy-six per cent of applicants earn up to $35,000 a year and are receiving maximum subsidy; 63 per cent of applicants are employed; 15 per cent are enrolled in an education program; 4 per cent are working in an education program; 8 per cent are seeking employment. Some of this doesn’t relate to the member’s question, but I think I’ve gone over the stats that the member has asked for.

I will ask staff to get us the breakdown of subsidy level per income bracket because I think the member also wants that as well. If we can get that document in hand that would be really appreciated, and I’ll table that for the member and speak to it once I get it in my hands.

I do want to refer back to two questions that I committed to answering: the first, a question from the member from New Waterford in relation to library; the second, a question that was previously asked from the member that’s currently asking the question.

I was informed by staff that the New Waterford library has been not closed but reorganized. Instead of having one space for a library, they’ve actually used the materials in the library to have in-class libraries in the classroom. It is a new model, but the materials are still there and still available to students, just not housed in one area. It’s now housed in various classrooms. That is what I’m being told by our staff.

I will table the School Advisory Council spending guidelines for the member. These are available publicly, as well, but I’ll make sure that she has a copy of these for today’s deliberations.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I thank the minister for tabling those documents and some of that information. I have two more quick questions about that. When I qualified for a child care subsidy several years ago, when I first applied - I wasn’t making very much money - I qualified for 79 cents off a day. That was fantastic, but we decided to leave that in the pot for somebody else. It would be really good to know that the subsidies are actually meaningful subsidies and make a difference, even for the people who are making $70,000 a year.

The other question I had is: For those who don’t qualify for the subsidy, what are people paying these days for a regulated child care space? How much is it per month for each of the age groups?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I have the information on the average parent fees by age group for the regulated child care sector. Per day for infants, $42 for a full day in 2017-18. The latest data I have is for 2017-18. For toddlers, it’s $36 for a full day, and a preschooler is $35. Those are the numbers, and we are still waiting for staff to bring in the subsidy numbers, as well.

[4:30 p.m.]

SUSAN LEBLANC: Thank you for those numbers. In January of this year, the Nova Scotia Office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives reported that unappreciated and underpaid points out - sorry, the report was called Unappreciated and underpaid. The report points out a need for more data on this sector.

The last available data from a comprehensive survey of centre-based early learning and child care in Canada was released in 2012 by the Child Care Human Resources Sector Council, which is now disbanded. The report includes the recommendation that the government fund the regular collection of data about the EC workforce, and that includes a comprehensive workforce survey.

I would like to ask the minister if he agrees with this recommendation, and is this work under way? I’ll give you the context for why I ask it. I ask it because without the data, how will we know if the recruitment and retention efforts in this sector are being effective?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I am familiar with that report, which was noted by the authors. The data from that report was two years old, so the wages that were listed in that report, the amount invested or recommended to be invested in that report, did not reflect today’s environment.

I’m going on memory here, but I think that report recommended that we have an average wage - I think it was $17 or $18 an hour in Nova Scotia. I think our average wage is now over $19, so we are actually above the current-day recommendation that was made in that report. Also - and again I’m going on memory here - another recommendation from that report, I believe, was to double investments into regulated child care, which we have done in the two years since the data was collected for that report.

I was curious as to why the report didn’t take into consideration the major investments and changes that have happened in Nova Scotia over the last two years. I don’t know for sure, but it might be because the author of that report was partisan, and she did, I think, indicate that she was running the very next day for a by-election. I don’t know if that’s the case or not.

THE CHAIR: Order. Can we lower our voices here in the Chamber? It is very challenging to hear what the minister is saying.

The honourable Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development has the floor.

ZACH CHURCHILL: I don’t want to extrapolate more from that than is potentially the case, but I did feel that report was inaccurate. It used data from two years, I think from 2016, and the landscape is entirely different.

What we are doing now is very much in line with two of the key recommendations of that report in terms of funding and wages.

SUSAN LEBLANC: I have to be honest; I didn’t quite follow the minister’s response on that. It went in a lot of different directions, but I guess my point is that the report recommended that regular data be collected by the government so that we have data to monitor the ECE workforce.

I would like to ask the minister if he agrees with the recommendation that the government should be collecting data so that we can monitor how the retention and recruitment efforts the government is putting forward are effective. I don’t think it has anything to do with the person writing the report running for the NDP. I might be wrong about that.

ZACH CHURCHILL: The member might be wrong about that because another thing that the report failed to recognize is that we do collect that data. Anyone receiving a grant from the department must provide a report on that data to the department, so that was another fallacy in that report. I’ve suggested what my theory on that is; I will leave it up to the wisdom of the House and the public to make a determination on that.

THE CHAIR: The honourable member for Dartmouth South.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: As lively as that discussion is, I suspect it won’t go too far, so I’m going to move on for a moment to school food.

The federal Liberal budget included an announcement of their intention to work with provinces and territories towards a creation of a national school food program, which many people in Nova Scotia have been advocating for. Most of us will have received postcards that were addressed both to federal members and to MLAs. People were happy about the federal announcement, but there was no funding attached. My question to the minister is: Does he support the creation of a school food program?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I think we now have 100 per cent coverage on a breakfast program for schools. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think every single school or family of schools in the province now has a breakfast program. We also are providing nourishing snacks for our pre-Primary program as well, and I believe a meal as well for that program. This issue is really important. We know students are going to do better when they’re fed, and we want to make sure that’s happening. I think we can speak to the success we’ve had with our breakfast program in that regard.

Sorry, we don’t have 100 per cent coverage yet. Let me correct myself; 93 per cent of our schools have access now to the breakfast program. We’re not quite at 100 per cent, but we’re going to keep working with our partners to get to 100 per cent.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I have had the great privilege of meeting and connecting with all the good folks at Nourish Nova Scotia who work with that breakfast program and many of the volunteers, but the reality is, that’s still a volunteer breakfast program. While it is excellent, and I’m not taking anything away from the support of the program, the reality is across the province, and in my own constituency, we regularly hear that there are many children coming to school without lunch and further that there is a direct correlation. There have been reports and studies about this, but it’s certainly directly observable from teachers and librarians that there’s a direct correlation with this in both behavioural problems as well as academic achievement.

As the department moves to sort of completely restructure our education system in ways that we’re not totally fond of but that the department seems determined to do, I would suggest that school food is a huge thing to consider. I guess I would ask the minister: Is this part of the puzzle; is this something that the department is thinking about as they look forward in the educational landscape?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I know the member is absolutely right. These factors do impact achievement and well-being without question. We do invest through Nourish Nova Scotia and the Health and Wellness Department as well. We provide through funding for them in the amount of $2 million and, while the programs aren’t universal yet, we’re providing breakfast in 93 per cent of our schools. We do have nutritious snacks with a focus on fruits and vegetables that are made available, and there are a number of schools that are also receiving lunch as a result of that program. We intend to continue to fund that and see if we can expand that, particularly in communities where we know this is a greater challenge.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Could the minister say more about the schools that are receiving lunch as part of that program?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We will endeavour to collect a list of the schools that are receiving lunch as part of this program. There is also a lot happening at the local level, particularly in the Annapolis Valley where there are partnerships with local producers. This isn’t because of the department coming from the top down and telling our principals and our staff to do that. They are taking it upon themselves.

We do have a process where our school communities will recognize a need. They work through Nourish Nova Scotia and the Department of Health and Wellness, and we help them address that need. But some schools have also been really innovative in finding these partnerships locally. Are we at a universal food program that includes both breakfast and lunch? Right now, we’re not, but I think we’ve made incredible progress in recent years in this regard, and we’re committed to seeing that progress continue.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Without in any way diminishing that progress, if I go back to my initial question - and I look forward to seeing the information if this is not the case - it is my understanding from Nourish Nova Scotia that those are breakfast programs. There may be some places where enterprising volunteers have stretched breakfast supplies towards lunch, but the category is breakfast. The other piece of that is that they’re all volunteer programs, so it’s not top-down, but as far as we can see, it’s not actively supported by the department in terms of staffing.

I know in my own constituency that Debby MacDonald at the Dartmouth South Academy is the librarian, but she basically has a second full-time volunteer job off the side of her desk, which is running a breakfast program, collecting food, and advocating for space. I’m wondering: Are there any paid staff of the department who have food as their portfolio, either front line in terms of this breakfast program, not a sort of cafeteria worker or in the administration?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We do have staff at the department that help with the coordination of this. We have a Director of Personal Development and Wellness that is the administrative lead within the department. We recognize we’re leaning on volunteers in our communities; thankfully, volunteers are stepping up to the plate and doing their part for our communities. As a result, 93 per cent of our schools are accessing these programs in a way that’s helping kids fill their bellies very single day. It is labelled a breakfast program, but that is not to say that it needs to be limited to breakfast. Some school communities are stretching their resources in a way that allows them to provide healthy snacks throughout the day. Some have stretched their resources to include lunch, as well, where they have identified that that’s an issue.

I think we’re seeing a grassroots response that is being supported from a coordination perspective, an administration perspective within the department, but one that is driving the use of these resources in a way that can have the greatest impact. In some communities, it’s going to be breakfast. In the majority of them, it is breakfast, but some communities recognize the need that they have is extending those services in snacks and in lunch as well. I want to applaud them for that, and I want to applaud all the volunteers for stepping up to the plate and making sure we’re getting more food in the bellies of students who might be hungry.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Just to continue on this for a bit, while we all appreciate the volunteers who step forward to do this, it’s certainly our position that we don’t have enough volunteers, particularly if we extend this to lunch. We live in the province with the highest child poverty in Canada that’s food insecure. We know we have schools with food banks in them.

[4:45 p.m.]

One of the things I was surprised about when I took on this critic portfolio, as I have talked to many schools and travelled around many schools, is that although some schools have cafeterias, many of them are privately leased so they are not actually accessible to the school for this type of purpose. Dartmouth South Academy would be one that although they have a very co-operative relationship with that cafeteria, it is not theirs to use.

The other thing is it was my understanding - and I hope the minister can confirm this - that currently there is no requirement as part of a new school build that it has to have a cafeteria; my understanding is that that’s a “nice to have,” not a “need to have.” Is that accurate?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I’m not aware of any regulation or policy mandating there to be a cafeteria or not. They tend to be standard in the higher grades; in high school, generally speaking, you’re going to see a cafeteria. That is not standardized in the lower grades. That’s consistent from my time in school as well.

On the new builds, there is a heavy focus on community engagement with the design, as well, so elements in this regard can very much be up to the community to decide where their capital focus is going to be. Generally speaking, for higher grades, you see cafeterias; for lower grades, you don’t.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: When the minister said it’s up to the community to decide, it’s up to the community to pay for it, is my understanding. The community can’t just say we need a cafeteria. It’s not part of the standard build envelope. My understanding - and I could be corrected if I’m wrong - is that bleachers in the gymnasium, or a standard-sized gym, are all things that can be built, but they need to be built with financial support from the community and not out of the budget of government. Now, if I’m misspeaking, please correct me.

ZACH CHURCHILL: I’m under a very different impression, but we’ll double- check with staff. We don’t ask communities to pay for these things. The bills are our expense or our capital process.

In the event of a non-education-related project or facility that a community is looking at doing - an example would be the new build in Wedgeport; the community is looking for a cultural centre - it’s not something we would pay for. We can accommodate that in the design of the school and make sure that’s part of the RFP and incorporated into the design of the school, but when you’re looking at a project like that, there are other funding opportunities. This one in particular would be the federal government.

There are times when there’s a specific, unique desire that a community has that they might try to put money up on the table to get it done. A baseball field could be an example of that, but in terms of the standard cafeteria or gym, these sorts of things are funded through our capital process in the department. Unless staff tell me differently, that’s my impression.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I look forward to clarification on that point. I’m also wondering if communities are given the choice as to whether or not those cafeterias are run as kind of non-profit community projects that actually feed the school, or if they get a say in whether they’re leased to a private third company that might use them for the school and for other purposes.

ZACH CHURCHILL: Under the previous governance structure, those have been local operational decisions. We have seen the boards over years make different decisions in that regard. You will see a mixed delivery model from school to school and region to region. I can’t speak to the reasons for that. That isn’t something that we have standardized under the new governance structure.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: To be clear, that’s the decision of what would now be the regional centre, not the community itself.

ZACH CHURCHILL: It is a local operational decision that is very much informed by community feedback. Community has always had, and will continue to have, an ability to provide feedback, particularly in the design phase of schools. I don’t agree that the community wouldn’t have a say in that; in fact, I think they probably have over the years. I can’t speak to all the mixed models.

We’re inheriting a lot of this, as well, in the department with the new governance changes, but the reality is school boards have chosen based on whatever the reasons were - financial, community input, operational capacity - to have different models that are in our schools, and that’s the reality.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: How does the community provide feedback of that kind?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I can’t speak specifically as to how the community was involved at the board level in the past, but I can say on the new builds we’re overseeing, the community will have a direct input into the design phase of this. We’ll do that through SACs, through public input gathered through our online capacity, and public meetings. We will also be dealing directly with the municipalities on the design elements and site selection.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: All of those things sound plausible, maybe with the exception of the SACs, because to my knowledge, I don’t know how - I haven’t spoken to one SAC that feels like they’re empowered to collect feedback throughout their school. They’re a small body that can advise. Is there a plan? Does the department have something we could see that’s a process for public input for new school builds?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We are hopefully in the final stages of getting the actual process approved, so we’ll make sure that the member receives that. That will articulate basically every step of the consult. We’ve developed it over the course of recent months, and we’re just going through our approval processes in government to finalize that. Once that’s done, it will be made public, and we’ll make sure that the member is able to get a copy of that.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Can the minister tell me what percentage of schools in the province do not have a kitchen or cafeteria?

ZACH CHURCHILL: That’s not something we have right now. I don’t know that the previous boards collected that information. I know we’ve never had that information in the department. If that information is available, it would have been in the boards, and I’m not sure how that has been compiled over the years under the previous system.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I want to move on to a question about the Technology Advantage Program. Last month, the government announced that they would be offering a pilot of this Technology Advantage Program with IBM, I believe. Those would be offered to the junior high schools that feed into Cole Harbour District High School, J.L. Ilsley High School, and Yarmouth Memorial Consolidated High School, is my understanding.

I’m wondering if the minister can tell me what criteria were used to select the schools that would be included in this pilot.

ZACH CHURCHILL: The criteria were defined by IBM. There are three main criteria: one is labour market attachment, we are trying to go to communities where we’ve had an issue with labour market attachment; and the second is proximity to an NSCC campus, because this program entails tuition support for the first two years of a post- secondary program - so labour market attachment, proximity to NSCC, and proximity to an IT company. Obviously, we have plenty here in Halifax, and in Yarmouth there is Web.com. Those are the three criteria, as defined by IBM, that we followed.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Off the top of my head, it occurs to me that there must be more schools than those three schools, that fall in Liberal ridings, that would have fit these criteria. How were these three selected?

ZACH CHURCHILL: There actually aren’t that many in the province. I will say that this is a pilot, and we would love to expand this program and make it available to more school communities.

What was implied about this being driven by these schools being in Liberal ridings, I do take umbrage to that. That was not a deciding factor in this at all. We used IBM’s criteria and we looked at communities that had the very obvious labour market attachment issues.

The member would be aware of the poverty numbers that came out of my riding in Yarmouth and would be aware of the numbers, that data, in the Cole Harbour-Preston area and Spryfield. Before they engaged the department, IBM is also doing a program in Membertou, and that was decided by them.

I feel confident in the criteria. Not every school community has proximity to an IT company that is willing to partner and take students in, or an NSCC campus that meets the labour market attachment criteria.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Certainly, other constituencies in Dartmouth do, just for the record.

To this program more specifically, my understanding is that this is an American program in it’s genesis, a P3 program. Where is the evidence that this program has been successful where it has been tried in the past?

ZACH CHURCHILL: Just to clarify a point that the member and I previously spoke about in terms of cafeteria, cafeterias are in the standard construction for new schools. Their sizes differ, depending on enrolment, but cafeterias are standardized in our schools. Every new build should have a cafeteria; I wanted to clarify that.

What we will do is get the documentation on the success of the P-TECH program whose genesis is in the United States. We will make sure that we get that literature for the member to look at, but at a high level, this program has been very successful.

They have gone into some challenging neighbourhoods in inner cities where graduation rates were low, where labour market attachment was low, and they have turned some of these numbers around. I know that there is more specific information that we can pull together for the member that we don’t have in front of us right now, but we’ll make sure we get that for her.

[5:00 p.m.]

CLAUDIA CHENDER: The B.C. Government recently instituted a requirement that all public schools in British Columbia provide free menstrual products for all students in school bathrooms. Many different people in this Chamber in the last couple of months have referenced the notion of period poverty. There’s standard-issue toilet paper that we find in our washrooms that doesn’t discriminate by gender, but half of the population also experiences menstruation, and we don’t have standard-issue products for that. When people are living in poverty, those are very expensive items.

We know that there are pharmacies in Dartmouth that are starting to stock and provide those, but I’m wondering, could the minister speak about what is happening in Nova Scotia to that end, and whether Nova Scotia’s considering an initiative like that in British Columbia?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We actually are having conversations on that as we speak. The member for Halifax Atlantic has been a particular champion in that regard.

We do have those products available, mostly through guidance offices, I think. We recognize that that might create some barriers in terms of people being comfortable asking for those products, so we are investigating ways we can ensure that they are more accessible and that students don’t have to ask for them. That is a conversation that’s ongoing right now within the department and our caucus.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Thank you for that response. I look forward to great news on that front.

I want to ask a couple of questions about school administration qualifications. Our understanding is that in the HRCE, there’s been a change in the qualifications required for people applying for administrator positions. In 2016, the job description included a master’s degree in education or equivalent or current enrolment in a master’s degree. The job description sent to teachers in the HRCE earlier did not include this degree requirement in the qualifications.

Can the minister speak to why a master’s degree has been removed from the list of qualifications for school administrators?

ZACH CHURCHILL: The deputy is telling me that if that’s the case, that’s an oversight. There’s been direction to change the criteria in that regard. I thank the member for bringing that up. The deputy will be following up with our regional executive director on that front.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: My follow-up was whether that change has been standard across, so I’ll just look forward to information from you that that was an error and that that requirement hasn’t changed.

ZACH CHURCHILL: Just one more thing I’d add to that. At this point, that seems to be an oversight that we will remedy. I also want to mention that we are working with PSAANS, who are developing a lot of important things from an administration perspective, including succession planning and standards of leadership excellence.

We recognize the importance of our educational leaders in our system. That’s why we’ve given them a rare level of independence and removed certain conflicts of interest from their work, and it’s working out really well. We’re finding that the administrators, generally speaking, are feeling very confident about where they can take that profession and really elevate the effectiveness of our instructional leaders in the province.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I wasn’t going to go there, but since the minister insists it’s working out so well with PSAANS and the removal of principals and administrators from their union, I want to ask whether the minister or the department have any statistics on the turnover - people leaving that principal/administrator role over the last five years. My understanding is that the trend is sharply up, but I wonder if that’s the case.

ZACH CHURCHILL: We just received a clarification from HRCE. They have not changed the criteria, and that was reflected in their posting. I think what has happened is there was an NSTU posting that had inaccurate information on it. That’s what we’re getting right now. Thanks for bringing that to our attention.

The turnover last year, once we made the changes, was about 97 per cent, so almost 100 per cent of our administrators joined us in the new system. I think there was only one who chose to leave permanently, because we did give some grace period if folks wanted to go back to the classroom and maybe come back as administrators. There was only one that left on a permanent basis, who was (Interruption) Sorry, I won’t say who that was. That’s pretty good.

The historical fluctuations in administration are on par with that, so we didn’t see a drastic change in the usual fluctuation with administration carryover each year.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: That’s quite different than what I’ve heard, but to put a finer point on it, I wonder if that trend is the same with retirements. Did you see a greater than normal number of retirements in the last year than you did previously?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We do have the data, so I want to get that for the House, and we will table it for the member. What we experienced, looking at both retirements and individuals choosing to go back into the classroom, was that we actually had fewer people do that than . . .

THE CHAIR: Order, please. The time for the NDP caucus has expired. I will now recognize the Progressive Conservative caucus.

The honourable member for Dartmouth East. (Interruption)

Certainly, minister. We shall take a break.

[5:08 p.m. The committee recessed.]

[5:11 p.m. The committee reconvened.]

THE CHAIR: The honourable member for Dartmouth East.

TIM HALMAN: That concludes questions from the PC caucus. I’ll hand it over to my colleagues in the NDP.

THE CHAIR: Thank you very much. Merci.

The honourable member for Dartmouth South.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: When the Halifax Regional School Board still existed, they took leadership on analyzing incidents of racism and discrimination in schools. I know that is still being done in some capacity in the department. At that time, the board asked the superintendent to provide a report of the number of incidents reported through the incident-tracking referrals in PowerSchool, and there were categories of discriminatory and racist behavior. That category corresponded with the provincial school code of conduct for 2015 and 2017.

I know that was one of the concerns when the school boards were dismantled, particularly with the African Nova Scotian school board rep and other members of the community and school board members. Now that those school boards are gone, does that tracking and reporting continue?

ZACH CHURCHILL: I can confirm for the member that the data is still being collected. That work is still ongoing. Also, recognizing and changing the governance structure and losing some of the voices that were on those independent boards, we have enhanced the voices of the African Nova Scotian community and Mi’kmaq community within the department and management positions and on the provincial advisory council as well.

We do recognize the concern from those communities on losing voices that they had fought for on those regional school boards, but we still heard recognition from those folks that the governance structure was not helping us achieve what we’re trying to go after, and that’s reducing the achievement gap between our students. Those voices are still prominent, and their advisory and management capacity within the department.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Can the minister table the number of incidents reported through those tracking referrals in the past year, particularly under the category of discriminatory and racist behaviour?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We don’t have those figures on us right now, but we can have staff send those in for the member. On the program and system improvement plans, we are also mandating every school to collect data and break it down by equity group, because we want to do a better job understanding the achievement gap and seeing if we are doing our job to reduce the gap. Every school will be mandated to do that now.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Part of it is the achievement gap, but also, part of it is just racist incidents that we want to eradicate from our educational system.

[5:15 p.m.]

Back to the achievement gap. Your friend Dr. Glaze, author of Raising the Bar, called the achievement gap for African Nova Scotian and Mi’kmaq students “a persistent and troubling problem that must be addressed.”

The minister just spoke of enhancing the capacity of the department to deal with that. Can you speak with more detail about exactly how the department is doing that, and in particular, programs or staffing allocations in this budget, aside from those executive director positions?

With respect, I’m not that interested in the PACE members. As the minister said, PACE exists to advise the minister, and that advice may or may not be followed. I acknowledge that there is some consultation there, but I’m more interested in departmental paid staff and programs.

ZACH CHURCHILL: In terms of the department and regional resources, we do have new executive director positions for African Nova Scotia and Mi’kmaq learning. They are connected directly to the coordinators in our region and the student support workers in our schools. That’s the case for both the African Nova Scotian student support workers and the Mi’kmaq support workers.

Also, instead of having the equity lens being isolated or siloed in one particular area, we are making sure that the equity lens is used when developing any sort of new policy. We also have the Council of African Canadian Education, CACE - they’re another advisory group. So where those folks and the folks in the department used to work on their own to develop recommendations in a siloed way, we are now ensuring that those voices are included whenever we’re bringing policies forward, to make sure that that equity lens is put on those. We’re trying to front-end that work and not have it in its own silo, if the member understands.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I would love further clarification. We’ve heard about an equity lens, a gender lens, but I don’t understand what that means in operation.

Just to clarify my initial question: Aside from those executive director positions, are there additional staffing and programming allocations in this budget year over last for this purpose? Also, that equity lens - what does that mean? How is that operationalized as policies come forward?

ZACH CHURCHILL: There’s no new staffing out in the field. The two new executive director positions are the new positions. However, they are now directly linked to all those folks, and they are now linked into the department, which is very different than what happened before.

What I am talking about when we look at an equity lens - and this comes out of the inclusive education report - is that we need to look at our mandate for inclusive education, which involves breaking down any barriers to achievement and well-being. We are making sure that we now have that lens used for every single policy change and investment coming through the department. I hope that answers the member’s question.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I know what the lens is, but I am curious about how it is applied.

For instance, just as an analog, when we were told that there was an equity lens used by all departments by the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board and we then FOIPOPed that to see what the application was, we got nothing. What I want to understand is how that is applied.

ZACH CHURCHILL: This will be operationalized in an inclusive education policy that will identify the directives to the system, what the expectation is, and what the philosophical beliefs are that are guiding this.

We are in the process of working with Dr. Gordon Porter to finalize that policy, but that is how it will be operationalized: in policy and through directives to the system.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I thank the minister for that answer. I hope it is operationalized in such a way that the public, and certainly those of us in the Chamber, can track how those lenses are being applied. As the minister knows, nobody likes a good equity lens like we do. We want to make sure that it’s applied in a rigorous manner. It’s one thing to talk about it and it’s another thing to do it, so we look forward to seeing that process.

Moving on for a moment to teacher recruitment and retention, for the past two years we’ve had a shortage of subs in the province. I believe my colleagues in the Official Opposition brought this up. We know that the rules have changed recently to allow retired teachers to work more days. I believe - and correct me if I’m wrong - that this budget also shows a decrease in the amount for teacher recruitment. I wonder if the minister could comment on what the plan is for teacher recruitment and retention in the province, given the compressed circumstances.

I know the minister will talk about how many teachers they’ve hired. That’s great, cool - talk about it, if the minister would like to talk about it. But I am interested in the plan going forward.

ZACH CHURCHILL: Before I move to the answer to the last question, one thing I do want to mention is that we brought in Dr. Sharroky Hollie. This is to the member’s question on operationalizing the equity lens. For the first time in this province, we had culturally responsive pedagogy taught to just about every single staff person in the system, and that includes teachers, administrators, and support staff.

The feedback from that was really profound. We were monitoring the Twitter feeds and social media responses, and we also had a lot of unsolicited feedback come into the department, where a lot of teachers in particular indicated that they had a new way of looking at these issues, a new way of evaluating their behaviour. We know that certain parts of that aren’t going to change overnight, but I just want to mention to the member that that’s another way we can see real, tangible operational application of what we’re trying to do.

In relation to recruitment, the member is right. If she had expanded a bit more, then I probably wouldn’t need to mention all the hires that have happened, but we did hire the sub pool. They are now working full time. That’s a good thing, but on the other side, you are creating a substitute pressure, and as our population continues to age and we have more retirees coming online, this makes our training and recruitment efforts all the more important.

There are a number of things that we’re doing in that regard. One is working with our B.Ed. providers in Nova Scotia to make sure we do a better job tailoring our B.Ed. programs to produce graduates to meet the needs of the system, produce graduates in the areas where we know there is a deficit. Math and French would be two key examples. We also have a program of supporting our support workers - EAs, TAs, PAs, whichever they’re called in whatever region - to help them achieve their B.Ed., if that’s something they’re interested in. That is particularly being used in the Tri-County area, and we’re hoping to expand that beyond there as well.

We’ve also had a focus on diversifying the teaching, administrative, and support staff population. I’m happy to note that from the Mount, if I’m not mistaken, we have the first cohort of all-African Nova Scotian guidance counsellors graduating this Spring. They will be introduced into the system. On top of those things, of course, we are in other Canadian jurisdictions (Interruption)

I love that sound. When they say you don’t know until you’re a parent, it’s true. That’s not a sound I ever loved before the last two years, but that’s a sound I love and cherish now: the sound of children.

Beyond the work on the B.Ed., tailoring our programs to produce graduates to meet the needs of the system, the focus on diversifying our workforce, having specified grants and programs for those folks, and helping our support staff upgrade, we are also in recruitment mode across the province. We’re in other jurisdictions selling our province, selling the investments that are happening here in Nova Scotia, selling all the non-teaching supports that are coming online. We are supporting our teachers and helping them with doing their work and helping them with their quality of life.

We’re particularly going after the Ontario market, as I’ve mentioned before, considering that it sounds like there might be some large-scale layoffs there in teaching, and also a cohort of B.Ed. grads in Ontario who just might be needing to look for work in other jurisdictions.

The member also mentioned allowing graduate holders in specific fields of study to sub without having a B.Ed. Those are a host of things that we’re doing right now, not just to try to deal with the substitute pressure we’re having but to make sure we have the people we require in place to keep delivering high-quality education.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Just one question I had buried in there: my understanding is that the line for teacher recruitment has gone down in the budget. Can you confirm that?

[5:30 p.m.]

ZACH CHURCHILL: If there’s a line the member has a question about, perhaps she can dig that up for me and let me know.

Teacher recruitment is primarily housed in the regional budgets. They’re the ones doing the recruitment. That’s where the budget is housed, and those dollars have not been reduced, so I’m not sure exactly what the member’s referring to.

The member might be pointing to where there’s a reduction in teacher education, that might be it? That is a result of a vacancy that we have right now. That’s not a reduction in teacher recruitment dollars, just to clarify.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I appreciate the list of things we’re doing to make a more robust teaching pool, but it does cause some concern particularly with it embedded in the different areas. We were in this Chamber not six months ago when it hit the news that we hadn’t gone to a regional Atlantic Canadian doctor recruitment fair, notwithstanding our need for doctors.

I would be somewhat assuaged to know there was a kind of departmental plan, notwithstanding the fact that this was embedded. When the minister says we’re going after Ontario teachers, what does that mean, and are there any more details about that?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We’re working with the regions. They’re helping us identify where their pressures are. The department is engaged in going out and actively doing recruitment, so I’ve listed a number of things we’re doing already. The member reminded me that we also go to career fairs. We reach out to faculty associations directly. That’s also coupled with paid advertising and social media advertising. We try to penetrate those markets to the best of our ability, get directly to our audience and tell our story, and hopefully it will result in a good year for recruitment to Nova Scotia.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: I guess it’s better that you’re telling the story and not me, but moving on.

A March 27^th media article reported that the latest early development instrument, EDI, results for the province showed nearly one-third of Primary students in Nova Scotia had signs of developmental challenges and missed milestones as they entered school. I know the minister has spoken on many occasions about this as one piece of pre-Primary that there is the opportunity to identify these missed milestones.

I know there’s also inclusion funding provided to licensed child care for inclusion for these students who need that extra help. I’m wondering how that inclusion funding calculated. Is it calculated based on population data from the EDI or on the specific needs of individuals enrolled in the child care?

ZACH CHURCHILL: That funding is distributed on an application basis, so the folks in the classroom will identify additional needs or financial resources that are needed, they send an application to our department, and we respond. That’s for pre-Primary. The same goes for regulated child care as well. We do have inclusion grants. Those are also distributed on an application basis.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: One last question on inclusion funding. I’ve heard from a number of resource teachers and schools in the last year that because the allocations for support are made at the beginning of the school year, moving into the school year - like the FTEs, the supports, the teachers, and all of that - that this presents a problem, particularly for many schools in the metro area. There has been such a large influx of students moving to this area just generally, but particularly students with developmental challenges and other divergent needs who find more resources in the city and move in.

I know that many schools have enrolment of upwards of four, five, or six students with identified special needs in the course of a school year, but are completely unable to access, my understanding is, any additional funding or staffing support.

I would like to ask the minister if that is accurate, and if it is, is the minister considering changing that policy at all?

ZACH CHURCHILL: There is flexibility there. This year, mid-year, we did meet with HRSC to identify the additional pressures they were dealing with, and we did provide them, within our budget, additional funding to help accommodate that. Because that issue is more specific to metro, we are working with them to come up with a better funding approach that is more flexible, so they can, from a school perspective, be more responsive to those issues as they occur.

The answer is, yes, we do have flexibility. We do check in mid-year. Also, we are moving to an improved funding approach overall in the education system where we are able to be more responsive to the various pressures from a provincial perspective.

I think that moving out of the Hogg-formula era and into an era where our inclusive education funding is not tied to enrolment data but is able to be utilized in a responsive way to help the regions deal with the learning pressures that they have is really exciting. We will have this in place for next year.

I do want to state when we’re talking about the education budget that we are at over $1.4 billion and 90 per cent of our budget is fixed; 90 per cent of our budget is fixed on primarily the collective agreement, capital, and class caps, capital including busing, as well. When you consider those three factors, that is 90 per cent of our budget that we cannot play with.

What we are doing with the 10 per cent left over, which is the inclusion funding, is we are trying to be more responsive with that funding, not tying it to enrolment data - although enrolment does impact it - but also giving us a better opportunity to understand the learning needs of students and do a better job responding to them.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Can the minister provide the amount of additional funding that was provided to the HRCE midway through the year?

ZACH CHURCHILL: We can get that to the member. We do not have that in our Estimates Book.

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Mr. Chair, that concludes our questions for the Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development this evening.

THE CHAIR: Are there any further questions?

I would invite the honourable minister to offer any closing remarks he has.

ZACH CHURCHILL: I just want to thank the members opposite for the very thoughtful questions that were presented. We did our best to answer them. I know we have some outstanding information that we will make sure we provide to the House, but I know this is an issue that elicits passion in all of us. We’re talking about our kids; we’re talking about our future. I know that in this case it drove some very productive conversation and questioning. Some members are very good at really digging into this and challenging us to look at how we’re approaching funding and where the dollars are going. That is helpful from my perspective, as well as a minister. It makes me better and allows me to have a broader and more diverse perspective on these issues when I’m considering decisions we make within the department. I do want to thank the members for that.

THE CHAIR: Shall Resolution E5 stand?

Resolution E5 stands.

We will take a short recess while we await our next team, which I believe is the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal.

[5:41 p.m. The committee recessed.]

[5:46 p.m. The committee reconvened.]

THE CHAIR: Order, I call the Committee of the Whole on Supply to order.

The honourable Government House Leader.

HON. GEOFF MACLELLAN: Madam Chair, would you please call the estimates for the Minister of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal.

Resolution E39 - Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $497,280,000 be granted to the Lieutenant Governor to defray expenses in respect of the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal, pursuant to the Estimate.

THE CHAIR: The honourable Minister of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal.

HON. LLOYD HINES: Good afternoon, folks. Thank you very much for the opportunity to talk about the work we do at the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal on behalf of all Nova Scotians.

Today, I have the following staff with me: Diane Saurette, Executive Director of Finance and Strategic Capital Planning, and Peter Hackett, Chief Engineer for the department.

Madam Chair, the mandate of the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal is to ensure we deliver quality roadway and building infrastructure to support Nova Scotians and to ensure a thriving province. We will continue to work on twinning the identified 100-Series Highways, as well as undertake safety measures to improve efficiency and safety of all our roads.

Our mandate is also to focus on the QEII New Generation redevelopment in order to provide Nova Scotians with access to health care they need in the location they need it. We will work to ensure the QEII redevelopment and all other infrastructure projects under our department are delivered in a timely and fiscally responsible manner.

Finally, our mandate is to ensure we are leveraging all that we can for Nova Scotians to ensure we are fully maximizing Nova Scotia’s infrastructure potential as it relates to federal infrastructure funding programs.

Last Spring, we signed a bilateral agreement with the federal government through the Investing in Canada infrastructure program, which brings $828 million into our province and leverages more than $2 billion over 10 years. At TIR, we want to deliver quality public infrastructure for Nova Scotians by providing a transportation network for the safe and efficient movement of people and goods and by continuing to serve the building needs of government departments and agencies.

We manage the greatest share of the government’s capital budget that helps to pay for a substantial road and bridge network relative to the size of our province, and we take that responsibility very seriously. We manage and maintain 23,000 kilometres of roads that span four regional districts from Yarmouth to Amherst to the northern shores of Cape Breton. Our network also includes 4,100 bridges and nine subsidized provincial ferries.

Like my fellow Nova Scotians, I know many of these roads well. Throughout my travels in our province, I have had the opportunity to see the fine service provided by TIR’s more than 2,000 employees. They are committed to the delivery of safe roads that help keep people connected and the economy moving.

Our department’s employees are also responsible for managing the delivery of provincial buildings such as schools, hospitals, correctional facilities, and to maintain public structures such as provincial museums and the Nova Scotia Legislature. Our employees deliver major infrastructure projects such as the QEII redevelopment project and the CBRM Health Care Redevelopment.

In addition to highways and public works, we are responsible for policy development related to road safety. Last October, we introduced and passed a new, modern Traffic Safety Act that will help make the province’s roads and highways safer. It replaces the outdated Motor Vehicle Act.

The Motor Vehicle Act had not been rewritten since the early 1920s and had been amended numerous times. As a result, it was cumbersome, unclear, and inconsistent. The new Traffic Safety Act will enable us to quickly address the more technical and day-to-day issues that arise and the administration of road safety, recognizing the significant technological changes that are affecting our highway system.

Significant initiatives in the new Act include: defining vulnerable road users and imposing stiffer fines for drivers who injure vulnerable road users on our highways; clarifying the term “distracted driving” to reflect changes in modern technology; managing the advancement of autonomous vehicles, which continues to move even as we speak further into the reality of today; and enabling municipalities to make by-laws regarding noise, including mufflers.

We do this with an overall operating budget of $497.3 million in 2019-20. The operating portion of our budget is used for the day-to-day operations of the department, such as snow and ice control, highway and bridge maintenance, field operations, fleet amortization, ferry operations, vehicle compliance, engineering and construction services, administration, professional services, employee benefits, rim work, and smaller highway and building projects.

Last December, we released the province’s five-year highway improvement plan for 2019-20. It’s the 10^th year the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal has unveiled our five-year plan for building, repairing, and maintaining Nova Scotia’s roads, highways, and bridges. Sharing this plan lets Nova Scotians know about the improvements being made in their communities and when they can expect the work to be done. It also helps give Nova Scotian companies a better opportunity to prepare for the more than 150 highway improvement projects planned in the coming year. This coming year will be a busy one.

Nova Scotia will invest $300 million in capital spending on highways, bridges, and roads in 2019-20. That is $15 million more than last year. Last year was $60 million more than the year before, which was $10 million more than the year before that. In the last four years, this government has committed $1.025 billion to capital improvements on our roads in this province, and we’re very proud of that.

Transportation is critical to ensure safe and connected communities. That’s why we are making the largest investment in Nova Scotia’s infrastructure in eight years, and one of the largest in our province’s history. That $300 million investment includes: $130 million for major construction, such as new highways and bridges; $1.5 million for asphalt work and resurfacing; and $29.1 million for bridge replacement and rehabilitation.

Major construction on new highways and bridges accounts for $15 million of the overall increase, with much of the additional funding focused on twinning portions of Highway Nos. 101, 103, 104, and 107, the Sackville-Bedford-Burnside connector. When these projects are completed, Nova Scotians will be safer, and many lives will be saved in this province. Roads are expensive. Each twinned kilometre costs $3 million to $5 million, depending on the complexity of the road, the number of structures, et cetera.

Among the new projects in the upcoming fiscal year will be the beginning of construction on the Lantz interchange as well as widening and road improvements on the Cabot Trail at Cape Smokey, a piece of the Cabot Trail that is dear to my heart.

The five-year plan also continues our commitment to $20 million in spending for the gravel road program to proactively rebuild existing gravel roads in rural Nova Scotia, improving safety, and reducing maintenance costs. This will be the third year of the capital that has been dedicated to the gravel road program in Nova Scotia, and it will bring the total commitment to gravel road improvement in Nova Scotia to $50 million. That’s for subgrade improvement, to permanently fix the gravel roads by improving the subgrade. That’s crossed culverts, ditching, and crowning. The gravel is icing on the cake, because we want to go into those roads and improve the subgrade so that they will last a long time.

We have a great partnership with the Government of Canada. The significant expense of twinning and constructing new infrastructure points to the importance of working with our federal partners on the new Building Canada Fund, the Investing in Canada infrastructure program, and the National Trade Corridors Fund. We are very pleased with the investments made to date with our federal partners.

With the Gravel Road Capital Program, we are, as I mentioned, putting $20 million into that program to repair and reconstruct gravel roads. Well-maintained, good-quality roads are essential for rural communities. We have 8,700 kilometres of gravel roads in our province, and we need to have the ability to repair more of these roads than we have in the past. This program is a proactive approach that will rebuild roads to improve the structure and drainage. This will result in a longer-lasting driving surface and make regular road maintenance easier and cheaper.

The funding breakdown, based on the number of kilometres of gravel roads in each district is $5.8 million for the western district, which is Kings, Annapolis, Digby, Yarmouth, Shelburne, Queens, and Lunenburg; $2 million for the central district, which includes Halifax Regional Municipality and Hants County; $5.4 million for the northern district, which is Cumberland, Colchester, and Pictou; and $6.8 million for the eastern district, which includes Guysborough, Antigonish, Richmond, Inverness, and Victoria Counties, and CBRM.

I want to speak for a minute about the QEII New Generation project. Government continues to work closely with the Nova Scotia Health Authority on the province’s largest health care project to date, the QEII New Generation project. The project is a once-in-a- generation opportunity to rethink and rebuild the way we deliver health care. This work will allow services to be moved out of the aging Centennial and Victoria buildings in Halifax, in particular, and prepare for their eventual closure. They have come to the end of their useful life.

A major expansion of the Halifax Infirmary site is the biggest component of this project. This includes a new QEII Cancer Centre, a new outpatient centre, a new innovation and learning centre, and an expanded in-patient care centre. Work is well under way, and Nova Scotians are already seeing the benefits.

At Dartmouth General Hospital, we completed the renovations on the third and fourth floors and a new main entrance. The larger expansion is expected to be completed this Fall. Recently, a tender was let for work in the parking lot at that facility. Last year, a new operating room at Hants County Community Hospital in Windsor opened along with the existing OR which was renovated. Work is happening now at the Halifax Infirmary to get the third and fifth floors renovated for a new hybrid OR and two interventional suites. Construction of Nova Scotia’s first hospice residence is almost complete and will be welcoming patients in late April. We continue to communicate the progress and all updates of the QEII New Generation project when we know them.

[6:00 p.m.]

We are also working closely with the Nova Scotia Health Authority and health care officials on the CBRM Health Care Redevelopment project. This is a large, exciting project that will transform the way health care is delivered in Cape Breton, improving access to care and creating more reliable, sustainable services. Recently, we announced a major expansion of the Cape Breton Regional Hospital with a new expanded emergency department, critical care department, and cancer centre.

All three services will be part of the new 190,000-square-foot building to be constructed at the back of the Cape Breton Regional Hospital, which will be connected to the existing building via a pedway. We issued a request for proposals for design services for this expansion. Once again, we will continue to communicate the progress and all updates of this project to the House. Madam Chair, 190,000 square feet is approximately four and a half acres under-roof. That is a major commitment to the future of infrastructure in health care in Cape Breton.

As you know, the province has indicated that we will be removing tolls from the Cobequid Pass for Nova Scotia motorists once the bonds are paid off. This is expected to be in 2020. A decision on commercial trucks and non-Nova Scotia residents will be made as we move closer to this date and have fully assessed the long-term maintenance and operating costs. We want to give Nova Scotia motorists a break. As we move closer to 2020, we will look at how we will maintain this crucial piece of infrastructure going forward.

Government remains committed to the timeline set out in the legislation to close the existing Boat Harbour Effluent Treatment Facility by January 2020. More importantly, we also remain committed to remediating Boat Harbour. To date, just under $217 million has been set aside for the Boat Harbour Remediation Project. We are partnering and consulting with Pictou Landing First Nation, other levels of government, industry regulators, and academic researchers to make sure human health and the environment will be protected at all stages of this project.

Planning for the Boat Harbour Remediation Project is well advanced. Pilot-scale testing is in progress to look at the methods to effectively remove and manage to contain contaminated materials during the full-scale cleanup. The time required for the environmental assessment process is expected to result in the cleanup beginning in the Spring of 2021.

A subject that is dear to my heart is the Nova Scotia-Maine ferry. As you know, 2019-20 is a year of transition for the Nova Scotia-Maine ferry service, as we leave Portland and return to Bar Harbor as the U.S. port for the service. The Nova Scotia-Maine ferry is a vital part of our transportation system, like the Trans-Canada Highway, and is important to our tourism industry, particularly in southwest Nova Scotia. Businesses large and small benefit from the money spent by visitors who choose to come to our province via the ferry.

Madam Chair, I’m going to speak about this a little bit more later, but traditionally American visitors have been vital to the Nova Scotia tourism industry. The Nova Scotia-Maine ferry service has been an important element of that success. In 2018, the Nova Scotia-Maine ferry service transported about 13 per cent of the American visitors who came to our province, a very significant percentage of the over 200,000 Americans who came to Nova Scotia in the last season.

We are confident that the move to Bar Harbor will provide greater stability for the service and provide cost-savings that will reduce the subsidy in the long term. We are anticipating a cost of about $8.5 million to pay for the renovation of the Bar Harbor ferry terminal. It will appear in our 2018-19 fiscal numbers. Work on the ferry terminals includes a fixed span and pier, deck and pile repairs, as well as moving the transfer bridge from the Portland terminal and reassembling it in Bar Harbor. It also includes demolition of some other buildings. Construction of the customs plaza facilities and reinstallation of security equipment moved from Portland is also part of the renovation. Renovations to the existing terminal provide retail space for Bay Ferries Limited, public space for customers, and updated custom facilities.

We are happy to have Bar Harbor as a partner. They are demonstrating their support for Nova Scotia-Maine ferry service through their significant investment, support, and long-term commitment, including Bar Harbor’s $4.7 million purchase from the State of Maine of the ferry terminal itself. This allows Nova Scotia to avoid all the costs of owning, operating, and managing a facility in a foreign country at an annual lease cost of about $260,000 in Bar Harbor, per year, compared to $370,000 in Portland, including a commitment to annual investments in facility upgrades and improvements and a long-term stable lease for five operating seasons with a one-year right of renewal. The work is currently under way with an anticipated launch of the new Bar Harbor-Yarmouth route at the end of June. The province is budgeting $13.8 million to operate the Nova Scotia-Maine service in 2019-20.

We’re confident that moving the service from Portland to Bar Harbor offers an opportunity to reset the service in a supportive American home port. The natural advantage of a closer proximity to Nova Scotia gives us the opportunity to reduce the cost of the province’s contribution to the ferry service in the long term.

I want to take a few minutes to review how important our waterways are and have been to our province from a social, political, economic, and food-provision point of view.

Firstly, I want to recognize the great contribution that the Mi’kmaq have made to our province. I often refer to them as the original road builders in Nova Scotia because, remember, they plied our great rivers along our coast for many, many years in pursuit of those same activities that I mentioned: trade, economy, food, and social activities that create community. Really, not much has changed, and they did that for thousands of years.

The rivers are now our highways if you think about, particularly the twinning programs that we’re doing; the spirit of co-operation that exists between our department and the Assembly of First Nations is really something that we can all be proud of. If you look at the intersections of great rivers in Nova Scotia, we still have those intersections. I point to the Paqtnkek Interchange recently opened in Paqtnkek in Antigonish County, where we were able to work with the federal government to reestablish a link to a significant portion of reserve lands that had been severed in the 1960s, when we weren’t quite as thoughtful about our commitment to our Aboriginal peoples as we are now.

There are lots of examples of Aboriginal economic initiatives that have been enabled by these interchanges that have been constructed in co-operation with the federal government and with our provincial budget. They’re very important to our economic development and restore the importance of the Aboriginal community that perhaps had been tarnished a bit over the years.

When I look back at this province that we have, and we’re so blessed to have this little spot in the North Atlantic, I reflect on how important ocean travel has been to us. In my own riding, we have a significant legend which is the Henry Sinclair legend. Henry Sinclair was an Orkney Earl who visited North America in the 13^th century. There’s evidence of his landing in Guysborough County. That legend is tied up with the legend of the Knights Templar and also goes to the pursuit of the Holy Grail, which some people say is at Oak Island, as a matter of fact. The ocean and transport on the ocean have always been vital to our province. Leif Erikson and the Vikings visited our area, and certainly in Newfoundland there is lots of evidence of them there.

As the world evolved, we have the wonderful Acadian heritage that Nova Scotia is so lucky to have and so proud of, that came with Champlain’s early visits to Nova Scotia, by boat on that ocean highway, in pursuit of the bounty of the fishing.

Later on in the evolving process, things got a little heated between the British and the French, and we were left with the legacy of Louisbourg: one of the greatest fortresses ever built in the history of the world.

I want to talk for a minute about the wonderful legacy and linkage that we have with our American neighbours which is based on ocean travel. Many of us sitting in this House would have cousins who are in the so-called Boston States who left here. People from there came here based on the fishing trade that existed over the great oceans through that period of time.

I want to point out to the House the great debt that our tourism industry owes to our American visitors in particular. But also, if you look at our great relationship with the Caribbean, which is a significant portion of our current trade situation, we know that our Emera utility is a heavy investor in the Caribbean, so there is still a great relationship there. Our fishing boats transported fish to the Caribbean and brought back that wonderful elixir, sometimes known as rum, at the time.

I want to focus on Cape Breton for just a second, and I want to remind the House of some significant American presence, investment, interest, and commitment to Cape Breton, which has made the tourism industry in that wonderful part of our province.

I want to think about Alexander Graham Bell for a minute. We all know who Alexander Graham Bell is, and his wife Mabel, and how his great interest in her deafness spurred him to work on his invention of the telephone. We know how his genius mind was driven to flight and the Silver Dart was the very first flight in the British Empire on Baddeck Bay. We know his interest in flying and anybody who has been to that wonderful museum in Baddeck, built in 1959 - so what’s that, 50 years?

THE CHAIR: Sixty.

LLOYD HINES: Sixty years ago, and Alexander Graham Bell was an American. Alexander Graham Bell believed in the beauty of Cape Breton, and many people say that he was the founder of the Cabot Trail which feeds the tourism industry in Nova Scotia to this day, based on American investment in our province.

I also wanted to remind the House and the member for Victoria-The Lakes about the beauty of Middle Head and the Keltic Lodge at the Highlands; it is a remarkable property. Here we are today with heavy investment in that property, taken over by a visionary investor who has re-established that wonderful Thompson-inspired golf course and renewed that facility.

That facility was the estate of the Corson family who, in the early part of the century, came from the U.S. - another American - and built that facility because his wife was suffering from a lung problem and the advice was to get on the ocean. If any of you have ever been to Keltic Lodge - if you haven’t, I recommend that you go there and take in the breathtaking views and realize that you can’t get any closer to the ocean than when you’re at Keltic. It’s an iconic facility.

[6:15 p.m.]

Fast-forward some years, and we’ll go to Inverness County. The beautiful County of Inverness has so much history, lots of Celtic history, which I’m very pleased to say is part of my own history. My maternal grandmother was a Ross from North East Margaree. What do you see today if you visit Inverness? You see two of the world’s most highly rated golf courses, Cabot Links and Cabot Cliffs, which are contributing immensely to the economy in the member for Inverness’s area. They are world recognized, and I’m hearing they are providing 700 or 800 jobs into the area - an outstanding activity.

The importance of our marine transportation system to the province is underlined by this, and the importance of continuing the links with the U.S. for our tourism business is also underlined by that. Madam Chair, 13 per cent of American visitors from last year took the Nova Scotia-Maine ferry to get here, but we have many ferries that service Nova Scotia. We have the ferry at Pictou. We have the ferry at Digby. We have the Marine Atlantic ferry that plies to Newfoundland. The Ȋles-de-la-Madeleine are serviced by a ferry. We have the Halifax-Dartmouth ferries. We have nine interprovincial ferries in this province.

I want to make the point that Nova Scotians are kind-hearted people. We have great bounty in this province, and I think that Nova Scotians want to share that bounty. We don’t want to separate and segregate, point at an area and keep the bounty just in Cape Breton, much of which came from our American history and visitation. We need to spread that around.

With that, I’m happy to take questions.

THE CHAIR: The honourable member for Pictou Centre.

HON. PAT DUNN: I want to thank the minister for his brief comments. I certainly enjoyed them, and I welcome his staff here tonight. I’m looking forward to asking a few questions in the next few minutes. For a small province, we certainly have a lot of roads and a lot of bridges, as the minister mentioned in his opening comments: 4,100 bridges and somewhere around 23,000 kilometres of roads.

The first question I have for the minister is about the rail track between Port Hawkesbury and Sydney. We’re all aware that Genesee & Wyoming purchased the assets on December 12, 2012. We also know that there’s a significant amount of work that will be required to have this line functional again to accommodate traffic. There are certainly significant challenges that face anyone interested in using this line as it presently stands. Besides that, there’s limited resources, lack of local capacity to perform the scope of work necessary, not to mention all the environmental permits that would be required throughout. Talking to some witnesses, they have reported that this line is in very poor condition, with a great deal of grass and small trees growing inside the track’s rails, fallen branches, trees, and overgrowth encroaching on the track, not to mention a layer of rust on the steel rails in most areas since it closed in 2014.

The general state of the crossing’s overpasses indicate that they have been effectively abandoned, according to the Hatch report. It has been stated more than once that it would take probably $105-plus million to upgrade this rail to a Class III. My understanding is over the past years the government continues to pay the owners $60,000 a month, which if you do the math, I think would probably be $720,000 a year. My first question is: Does this payment, per month, continue in this particular budget going forward in 2019-20?

THE CHAIR: I would ask the minister to introduce his staff before he replies to the question.

LLOYD HINES: I apologize, Madam Chair, I thought I did that. I’ll do it in reverse order this time. This is the chief engineer, Mr. Peter Hackett, for the department and this is the chief financial officer for the department, Ms. Diane Saurette.

I appreciate the member’s question and the piece of railway that he talks about is the piece known as the St. Peters Junction that runs from Glace Bay to the causeway, which doesn’t quite fit the description that he talked about and is active; the other piece has been abandoned in rail traffic for some period of time. The piece from Port Hawkesbury to Truro which is owned by Genesee & Wyoming Inc. is in service and is being used by Port Hawkesbury Paper and Nova Scotia Power particularly to ship coal to the member’s own riding in Stellarton. That piece is operable. They did lose a significant customer in the last year starting in January, when Sable Offshore Energy Project ceased production and the propane shipments that were coming out of the fractionation plant at Point Tupper ceased operations.

Indeed, the government has responded to the wishes of the business community in Cape Breton to continue that subsidy which is up to $60,000 per year. I don’t think they’ve drawn down the whole thing, and that does exist in this year’s budget.

PAT DUNN: Going forward, this amount of money is being passed out to this particular organization; however, and I may be wrong, but my information is that they’re not really doing very much as far as the upkeep of that stretch from Glace Bay into Port Hawkesbury. Therefore, just from a common-sense point of view, it seems like it’s a waste of taxpayers’ money to have them paying such a great deal of money and nothing being done to that stretch there to sort of keep it updated.

A couple of questions - my understanding is that the government has been paying this since 2014 and they plan to continue paying it going into the future, in particular, this budget year, knowing full well that there doesn’t appear to be a lot of work going on in that stretch of line.

LLOYD HINES: As I mentioned in my opening remarks, transportation links are of vital importance to our society and our economy. The history of rail in Nova Scotia has been a successful one over a period of time, which has risen and fallen with the fortunes of our mining and extraction industry. If you think back to the wonderful history that Cape Breton enjoyed and is now back again with Donkin in the coal industry, that rail line was vital to the extraction process, to the steel manufacturing in Cape Breton to get those products out and to market. Prior to 1955, that involved one of the Atlantic region’s only rail ferries that went from what is now Port Hawkesbury to Mulgrave and continued into central Canada.

We are not about ready to give up on the future possibilities of that service. It’s a very important right-of-way and once those rights-of-way are abandoned, which the company has not shown any evidence of doing at the present time, then they are gone virtually forever in terms of getting them back. We are in a holding pattern on that particular piece of infrastructure and intend to continue to make that contribution as we sort through how the fate of industrial Cape Breton might evolve.

I would point out that there is significant investment going into the Sydney waterfront, and one of those particular investments to which rail is vital is a world-class container terminal. Until that matter clarifies, we intend to maintain that infrastructure.

PAT DUNN: Just to maybe conclude this particular question, I was actually having a conversation on the phone with a few taxpayers. They felt that it was unnecessary, the amount of dollars being spent on an area that didn’t seem to be even looked after as far as upkeep or whatever else. Certainly, I’d like to see a nice railway through to Glace Bay being used. In fact, my uncle was an engineer on the passenger train coming from Sydney right through, many years ago, and I believe at that time they called that particular passenger train, or at least he did, the cat killer.

My next question before I leave this particular issue is maybe an update from the province as far as the intention in stopping the assessment in crossing fees to the people who are living on that particular line. The line I’m referring to is the one on the other side of the causeway.

LLOYD HINES: That’s a matter between the rail owner and the private landowners who are affected by that. Those crossing arrangements exist in many parts of the country. As a matter of fact, on the Windsor & Hantsport Railway line, that same situation exists and in parts of that line there isn’t even any rail in existence. One particular piece of it that I’m very aware of called the Halfway River aboiteau, there is no rail there, yet they continue to collect fees. That’s a matter between the rail company and they are entitled to do that under their ownership rights. We have not interfered in that process and we presently have no intent to do that.

[6:30 p.m.]

PAT DUNN: I’m going to switch gears here and go to another area. As the chief engineer had mentioned earlier, prior to starting that, my constituency is three towns: Trenton, New Glasgow, and Stellarton. So, I don’t have too many roads I have to worry about outside of maybe a little stretch of 25 seconds of Highway No. 104 passing through. But, minister, I want to bring your attention to something that you’ve been dealing with for quite some time now, and it’s the Trenton Connector which is the Abercrombie Road and the connecting road coming out of Trenton going towards the highway. Over the years, there have been five fatalities on that particular intersection and at least 59 accidents. Of course, there is a set of lights there now.

Recently, we had a meeting at the Abercrombie Volunteer Fire Department; there were a couple of representatives from your department that attended, and the area manager, Greg Chisholm, was there from our area and so on. There was quite a crowd in the facility that evening expressing displeasure that nothing was being done for that intersection. There was a lot of brainstorming going on that it would be $3 million for a roundabout maybe slowing down the speed; the speed limit is 80 coming to that particular intersection from all four sides.

I know you can only spread the dollar so far, but I guess my question is: Is there anything in your plans in the immediate future where something different may occur at that particular intersection to alleviate the problems that they seem to be having there?

LLOYD HINES: I appreciate the member bringing that particular intersection forward. The member has brought that forward in the past, and as he mentioned, our staff are meeting with the community on it. We have undertaken a review to determine what the best solution could be: is it an intersection redesign; is it changes in the light configuration; is it the establishment of the roundabout, which is roughly in the $3 million dollar range?

We’re expecting that we will have the results of that study, with recommendations, by late June of this year. I’ll be happy to share those with the members, whose concern I share on that particular piece of road because of its history.

PAT DUNN: We’re all accustomed to going through lots of sets of lights around the province. For some reason, when you’re coming from the highway, coming towards the Abercrombie Road to cross over to go into Trenton, there’s a big sign with flashing amber lights that kind of give you a warning, it’s a down grade. Throughout my lifetime going through that area it always felt that there was something . . .

THE CHAIR: Order. I’m having challenges hearing the speaker. I’d like people to quiet down in the Chamber.

PAT DUNN: Thank you, Madam Chair. Coming down that grade, coming to the set of lights, it always appeared to me that there was something wrong with the way the lights would come on and prepare the drivers to stop. A lot of trucks like Pioneer Coal, for example, are taking coal from Stellarton into the Nova Scotia Power plant. If they hit that sign or are just passing that sign when the amber lights start flashing, they would have time, I guess, if their speed is what it should be. Sometimes it’s touch and go to stop some big rigs in time to allow other traffic to pass through. It’s not a question, just a comment. I always found that there was something amiss as I would drive through there.

Another question is on that same road. You may never have had anyone send a letter in to your department about this. If you go through that intersection and you cross over the connector bridge, if you’re on the connector bridge, you look to your right, and you’ll see Nova Scotia Power and the former Greenbrier plant. When you come off that bridge going towards Trenton, there’s a curve in the road.

I’m not sure if it’s initially an example of poor workmanship or whatever, but it’s a very dangerous piece of asphalt. There have been a number of accidents. What I’m referring to is when it’s raining. A lot of cars hydroplane, for whatever reason, on that little twist, that little turn, after they come off the bridge before they straighten out. Once you come off of the bridge you’re right into a turn. I have a couple of friends who had some very close calls where a car coming off the bridge went into a 360 and missed them. There have been accidents there that I’m aware of. Talking to the police and living in the area, you hear about them.

Anyway, I’m not sure if there’s anything that can be done, but maybe I’ll leave it with you for a comment, if you ever heard of that particular little piece of road. It’s immediately after you come off the bridge heading into Trenton.

LLOYD HINES: As I mentioned, we are doing a review of the intersection. I would like to take the opportunity to invite the member and the member for Pictou West, if they would like, to come make an appointment with the chief engineer. We can take a look at that road exactly. We can put it up on the screen and work together on what we can do to improve safety at that particular location.

PAT DUNN: The budget for the northern region, is it the same as last year more or less?

LLOYD HINES: In answer to the member’s question, there’s an increase in that budget of approximately $500,000.

PAT DUNN: As I mentioned earlier, I do not get a lot of calls dealing with roads in my office, but there are three areas that I do. One is when you come off the highway at Exit 23, New Glasgow, which is not in your jurisdiction. It belongs to the county. The second, of course, we just finished talking about, the Abercrombie Road, the Trenton Connector.

The other one that I get a lot of calls on is an eight-kilometre stretch from New Glasgow to Little Harbour. I believe it might be Route 289. I’m not certain, but it’s a stretch of road that has a lot of traffic on it all year long. A lot of people live down in the Little Harbour, Kings Head, Melmerby, Chance Harbour, et cetera, area and travel back and forth on that particular road. Of course, in the summertime, the traffic really increases due to the beaches down in that area.

That particular road is due to be resurfaced in 2022-23. I feel right now that that road is not safe. There are a million-and-one potholes that are covered over. Many of them are not now because of winter and so on. It looks like a crossword puzzle, and some of the edges of the road are starting to decay. What has been happening the last number of weeks is cars taking the opportunity to dodge potholes, sometimes with cars coming. It’s reaching the point where it’s not safe. Some of these holes are on corners, so when a car comes around the corner - especially somebody who lives the area knows the pothole is there - they’re making the move out across the line before they get around the corner, and all of a sudden, there’s oncoming traffic.

I know we have lots of roads to look after, but with a road like that with so much traffic on it in the shape it’s in, is there a possibility that that road could be pushed up maybe a year or whatever to accommodate, simply from a safety point of view?

LLOYD HINES: As I mentioned in my opening remarks, we’re celebrating our 10^th year of the capital plan in the department. It is a very useful tool and guide to tell Nova Scotians what our general intents are. They can look at the plan and see with some certainty what their expectations might be for a particular road. I tell the staff, we have the loaves and fishes job on our hands in the province because the highways are so important to all those things I talked about: our economy, our social life, and our food delivery. We have a great deficit in the amount of capital that we need to spend, and of course, we’re limited by the fact that we’re a province of less than a million people and the revenue that we can generate for that.

We in the department invite all members from all the Parties to come and meet with us in the Fall to identify the priorities in their particular areas. We missed the member for Pictou Centre this year. I know he has been talking to the chief engineer since then. I would just underline how important that particular meeting is for people, and I encourage all the members to take full advantage of that. There is flexibility in the plan to react to situations that we’re hit with because of weather events, traffic-pattern changes, or deteriorating infrastructure that accelerates more than we had anticipated. It’s definitely possible that that particular stretch of road could be reviewed to be moved forward in the plan.

As I mentioned, we’re spending $300 million in capital. That’s a huge deployment of capital in a small province. Sometimes, there are factors that impede the deployment of that capital. When that happens, we are flexible about moving that capital around, because it’s our objective to get that out the door, as it were. In answer to the member’s question, it is possible that that could be moved forward in the plan, and I would encourage him to continue to meet with our senior staff to see if that could happen.

[6:45 p.m.]

PAT DUNN: You mentioned in your opening remarks another $20 million for gravel roads. I believe it was $20 million last year and $5.4 million for the northern zone. Two things: I assume this money is used for equipment, salaries, and materials; and did the department spend the $20 million last year?

LLOYD HINES: We’re particularly proud of our Gravel Road Capital Program. Last year, we were able to deploy $18.3 million of the $20 million budget. The difference, approximately $1.66 million, is carried over into this year’s budget. That’s because of the lateness in the season. We couldn’t get some of those projects out. That money stays in the program.

The gravel road program is a contracted service. In answer to the member’s questions about where that capital is spent, it is spent through the contractor who deploys it in the various areas that he mentioned in terms of material, equipment costs, and whatever their cost is to build the gravel roads. We’re very happy to tell the House that we’re getting some pretty good results from that program. We’re getting very competitive bids from our robust road builders network. It’s onward and upward when it comes to this particular program.

PAT DUNN: The next quick question is just dealing with the RIM budget, and you don’t have to break it down. You may have mentioned it in your comments too. My question would be: Has there been an increase in the RIM budget this year? I think I can recall seeing there was $2 million set aside for brush cutting. That certainly would be music to the ears of Junior Theriault of Digby-Annapolis from 2003 to 2013. The question again: Is there an increase in the RIM budget for this current year?

LLOYD HINES: I thank the member for the pertinent question on our Rural Impact Mitigation, RIM, fund. In this particular budget, the gross amount of $17 million remains the same for 2019-20, which reflects the $1 million increase that came into the budget last year.

The member brought up the brush cutting and clearing, and I want to point out that we made a special commitment of an additional $2 million to the brush cutting program last year, and we are maintaining that commitment into this year. We were a little slow getting it going last year, but it’s in full sweep for this year. I’m sure all the members will notice an improvement particularly in our 100-Series Highways to improving safety with the brush cutting. Though the RIM budget remains the same as last year, which reflected a $1 million increase, for the first time in a long time, the reality is that we’re continuing the additional $2 million, which is dedicated to brush clearing in the province.

I would like to table the RIM funding allocation for 2019-20.

PAT DUNN: I can recall back a few years ago, probably prior to the minister being in the Legislature, the member for Digby-Annapolis getting on his feet in Estimates and telling the Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal Minister from Cumberland South that the weeds and the alders were growing so much along the side of the highway down there that they were meeting each other on the centre line, so he’ll be happy to hear that there’s an investment in brush cutting.

Moving on, just a very brief summary about a vehicle hitting a pothole: There’s a call centre, I understand. They call in to get a number. They can download an application. A few weeks ago, I had someone in my office who hit a major pothole on the main highway passing Truro and busted their rim and busted their tire. It was on a Monday, and I just happened to hit that same one Saturday night going through and was a little luckier. I didn’t do any damage. What percentage of residents get reimbursed for damage incurred after hitting potholes?

LLOYD HINES: I’m unable to respond to that particular inquiry because that actually goes to the ISD group, on the insurance side. It doesn’t go through our department. I’ll be happy to pass that request on to the minister, who will endeavour to provide that information for the member.

PAT DUNN: The next question is dealing with Highway No. 104, the twinning and so on. Prior to that, a few years ago, there was an exit placed on Mount Thom, to my understanding. Where this exit was placed, there were maybe three houses in that area. Where I’m going now is to the new twinning of the highway from Sutherlands River to Barneys River and Exit 28, which you have had lots of correspondence about from many people, the CAO of the Municipality of Pictou County and so on. Actually, I have a friend, and you’re probably aware of this, who is willing to donate the land to put an exit in this year. He has the land, he owns it, and he’s willing just to go, you can have it, if you would put an exit in there.

There appears to be an unwillingness at the moment to put an interchange in that Broadway area, and maybe there are reasons. I read in the correspondence: low traffic demand, moderate time savings, estimate costs, and so on. The staff does not preclude that maybe going into the future, there could be an interchange placed there. I’m saying, if there is a slight possibility that one could be put there in the future, maybe the time is now when they’re twinning through. A gated emergency access has also been evaluated by the minister’s department. That didn’t really go over too well with the residents. It didn’t seem to address the concerns that they have.

The exit would serve the needs of residents in Telford, Broadway, Meiklefield, Blue Mountain, Moose River, Piedmont Valley, and French River. It certainly would allow quicker access for EMO, ambulances, firetrucks, police, snow removal, maintenance, and TIR vehicles. A new exit may help with combating depopulation in this particular area. One gentleman in the area, and I’m not sure if this gentleman contacted the minister or not, said looking into the future when many people will be using electric vehicles, Broadway would be an excellent location for electric charging stations, and a ramp would offer the potential for commercial development.

The distance between Sutherlands River and Barneys River is 21.5 kilometres. This distance is 72 per cent longer than the average distance between any other exits on Highway No. 104. Between Halifax and Barneys River, exits are anywhere from 4.2 kilometres apart to 9.5 kilometres apart, with the average at 6 kilometres. Broadway is in a unique physical location. It is approximately halfway between New Glasgow and Antigonish, and it is also halfway between Halifax and Sydney.

Former TIR Ministers - the member for Glace Bay and former minister for the NDP, Bill Estabrooks - have said before that exit ramps should be constructed every four to five kilometres on the Trans-Canada Highway because safety is important. Once again, the perfect time to build this might be now, especially with the land being donated. Some residents tell me that they have to travel an extra 16 kilometres.

LLOYD HINES: Let me just say how happy I am to have the privilege of serving as minister in this government. The 38-kilometre section of Highway No. 104, a particular portion of which has the deserved name of a deathtrap, will be bypassed, and we will restore a safe corridor for all the people of Nova Scotia who travel throughout the Maritimes and particularly down to Cape Breton and on to Newfoundland with the establishment of the twinned highway in that 38-kilometre section.

[7:00 p.m.]

It’s absolutely understandable that people in our communities, when they see the expenditures, and I would call this a massive expenditure, would be interested to see if there are economies of scale that would enable improvements in their particular areas. As we see throughout the province, everybody is very passionate about their own communities when it comes to roads. However, the reality is that the department bases its investments on scientific assessments of what the best deployment - and therefore, the best return - is for these types of expenditures. That involves traffic counts, where the major traffic is. A traffic study has been done for this route over a long period of time, and the design that is being used to go to tender does not include an overpass, which are running in the range of $30 million for this particular site.

That’s not to say that it might never happen. Currently, I believe we have six active locations that are considered relevant for divided-grade highways, and they are being assessed constantly. One that is in the budget for this year is the Lantz interchange, which has been studied for some considerable time and, of course, is on a very busy portion of our highway system. I appreciate the matter that was brought up by this member and the member who represents the riding, but at this particular time, I must say that it’s unlikely that we would change our design and include an overpass at that site.

PAT DUNN: The next question is dealing with the Big Island Road. That’s a road that, for intents and purposes, would be between Merigomish and Lismore, the shore road to Antigonish. The Big Island Road, which runs off that route going to Antigonish, the shore road to Antigonish, as we call it, has many reported incidents of erosion and road damage along the Northumberland Strait. It seems every year the residents of Big Island experience being cut off from entering or leaving due to nature’s storms. A storm surge will often wash out the paved road to the island. Following that, several huge dump trucks will eventually arrive with loads of gravel and massive rocks to support the new roadbed. It seems to be a yearly event due to the nature of our storms and so on.

Are there any plans in the next year or two for your department to go into that road that connects the Big Island residents to the main road and repair that road so the chances of it being destroyed is less?

LLOYD HINES: Thank you to the member for bringing this to our attention. Last Fall, we did go in and effect some significant repairs on that particular section. We are working on a made-in-the-department solution for that section. We’re aware that we would like to do something that would be more effective on a permanent basis that would stop us from spending money and then having it wash away.

I would share with the House the issue of climate change and the erosion of our coastal roads, and we have a lot of them in this province. As I have said before, many of our busy roads in the province run along our coast because in the days when those roads were built, people sought out the sea-level grades that are available along the coast. We end up with the irony of having some of our most valuable waterfront property as part of the public road system.

In that instance, our local people on the ground are working on a more permanent solution, which we would be happy to share with the member. It’s also in the context of what we see as a need for us to focus on the issue of climate change and how it’s affecting our public infrastructure and the vulnerabilities that we have with our coastal road system.

PAT DUNN: I’m going to avoid the preamble, going back to potholes just with one quick question. Has the department ever looked beyond the scope of normal practice to examine other possible ways or methods of repairing our roads in the Spring?

LLOYD HINES: That’s a very pertinent question. We in the province seem to have fallen into a place where we sort of accept the Spring conditions. It has almost become a tradition, an unfortunate one. However, we are putting a lens on what we can do better. We have engaged Dalhousie to help us with some research into the more modern methods of dealing with this to find out what the best technique is across the world. We’re not alone in this world. There are lots of places with a similar climate, and I’m excited to say that we’re involved in that research.

THE CHAIR: Order. The time allotted for consideration of Supply today has elapsed.

The honourable Government House Leader.

HON. GEOFF MACLELLAN: I move that the committee do now rise and report progress and beg leave to sit again.

THE CHAIR: The motion is carried.

The committee will now rise and report its business to the House.

[The committee adjourned at 7:08 p.m.]