MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. It may be a little soon, but I would like to call the House to order at this time. If there are guests who haven't arrived yet, they can come in later on.
We will commence the daily routine, unless there are introductions of guests.
The honourable member for Cole Harbour-Eastern Passage.
MR. DENNIS RICHARDS: Today, it gives me great pleasure to introduce two individuals to the House to you and through you, Mr. Speaker. As mentioned yesterday by the honourable Minister of Housing and Consumer Affairs, today is Take Our Daughters to Work Day. Although I couldn't bring my own daughter, I brought a daughter of a constituent of mine and she has been following me since early this morning and will continue to follow me throughout the day. She tells me it is her pleasure, by the way, and it is certainly mine. I would like to introduce to you the Grade 9 student from Eastern Passage Junior High School, Leslie Scott. Leslie, if you would stand and receive the welcome. (Applause)
Mr. Speaker, I will continue because seated next to Leslie is a very distinguished constituent of mine. This lady has just been awarded the Halifax County Volunteer of the Year Award and she has participated in a great number of community activities, the least of which happens to be as the President of my constituency. I would like to welcome Carolyn Scott to the House of Assembly. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: We will commence the daily routine.
PRESENTING AND READING PETITIONS
PRESENTING REPORTS OF COMMITTEES
TABLING REPORTS, REGULATIONS AND OTHER PAPERS
STATEMENTS BY MINISTERS
GOVERNMENT NOTICES OF MOTION
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Housing and Consumer Affairs.
HON. ELEANOR NORRIE: Mr. Speaker, in keeping with the earlier introduction and yesterday's ministerial statement, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas April 27th is Take Our Daughters to Work Day, when many parents, employers and schools are cooperating to encourage girls to spend the day at work with a parent or other interested adult; and
Whereas Take Our Daughters to Work Day represents a great opportunity to acquaint girls with the wide range of career options open to them, many of which were not open to women in the past; and
Whereas this day is also an opportunity for boys to come to a greater understanding of the obstacles faced by girls and women, and to understand the idea that gender roles in society can be confining for both men and women; and
Whereas Take Our Daughters to Work Day is an opportunity for boys, girls, parents, educators and the business community to envision a future where it will no longer be unusual to see women in trades and technical work, leading corporations, or in elected office;
Therefore be it resolved that this House recognize and support the efforts of schools, parents and employers in helping girls and boys to a more equal future in the work place and in the world.
I would seek waiver of notice.
MR. SPEAKER: Is it agreed that notice be waived?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
The honourable Minister of Health.
HON. RONALD STEWART: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas April 23rd to April 29th is National Physiotherapy Week in Nova Scotia; and
Whereas there are more than 400 licensed physiotherapists helping Nova Scotians in communities throughout our province; and
Whereas physiotherapists make an important contribution to health care delivery in Nova Scotia and have an important role to play in our renewed health care system;
Therefore be it resolved that this House of Assembly recognize National Physiotherapy Week, April 23rd to April 29th, and commend and thank them for their dedication and professionalism.
I would seek waiver of notice on this resolution.
MR. SPEAKER: Is it agreed that notice be waived?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
INTRODUCTION OF BILLS
NOTICES OF MOTION
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Leader of the Opposition.
MR. TERENCE DONAHOE: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas although faced with a very short deadline many of the province's school boards and home and school associations and teachers did pull together their resources to respond to the White Paper on Education; and
Whereas the minister, who said on April 5th that he would take 27 days to review any and all submissions received, has but six days left of his self-imposed timeline to review proposals before taking a decision to Cabinet; and
Whereas this very quick deliberation - similar to the unseemly haste with which the government reviewed casino regulations - has already been muddied by the introduction of legislation associated with changes in the White Paper;
Therefore be it resolved that in light of the comments of the Nova Scotia School Boards Association and others this week that, "they continue to have concerns regarding the course of education restructuring in Nova Scotia", this minister give the submissions proper and full attention before any further steps are taken with respect to our public education system.
MR. SPEAKER: The notice is tabled.
The honourable Leader of the New Democratic Party.
MR. JOHN HOLM: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas in December 1994 the Black Learners Advisory Committee released their report on minority hiring and improving the school system for black students; and
Whereas the recommendations contained in the BLAC Report will assist in dismantling the systemic discrimination that has and continues to maintain African Nova Scotians as a cultural and educational under class; and
Whereas the Government of Nova Scotia has not officially responded to the recommendations of the BLAC Report;
Therefore be it resolved that this House urges the Minister of Education not to delay any further, and in his response expected shortly to the BLAC Report, that the minister outline, with a clearly set timetable, the government's agenda to dismantle systemic discrimination in Nova Scotia.
MR. SPEAKER: The notice is tabled.
The honourable member for Lunenburg.
MRS. LILA O'CONNOR: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas Flavour '95 is a three day - from April 28th to April 30th - consumer exhibition combing a wealth of tourism information with the sampling of sumptuous food, wine and liquors; and
Whereas the tourism aspect of 'Flavour 95 shows Atlantic Canada guests the beautiful and historical sites we can see within our province; and
Whereas the exciting food displays, through the Quality Food Program and Taste of Nova Scotia offer the opportunity, together with smaller local exhibitors, to sample the unique Atlantic Provinces culinary delights;
Therefore be it resolved that the members of this House of Assembly extend congratulations to the organizers, sponsors and participants of Flavour '95 who put forward the best Atlantic Canada has to offer under one roof and give us all a feeling of pride and enjoyment.
I ask for waiver of notice.
MR. SPEAKER: The question is for waiver of notice.
Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
The honourable member for Kings North.
MR. GEORGE ARCHIBALD: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas the Mayor of Wolfville told town council on March 20th that the MLA for Kings South, the Minister for the Economic Renewal Agency, had assured her there would be no municipal amalgamation in Kings County without the prior consent of residents; and
Whereas last Friday, April 21st, in this Legislature, the Minister for the Economic Renewal Agency clearly denied making any such statement to the mayor; and
Whereas the Mayor of Wolfville once again on radio this morning in the Annapolis Valley was saying that there is no disagreement between herself and the Minister for the Economic Renewal Agency and that municipal amalgamation will not take place unless consent was given by the residents of Kings County;
Therefore be it resolved that the Minister of Municipal Affairs make an immediate and abundantly clear statement to the residents of Kings County as to the power she has given the Minister for the Economic Renewal Agency concerning municipal amalgamation plans.
MR. SPEAKER: The notice is tabled.
The honourable member for Halifax Atlantic.
MR. ROBERT CHISHOLM: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas April 28th of each year has been chosen by the Canadian Labour Congress as a Day of Mourning in recognition of workers killed, injured or disabled on the job; and
Whereas in Nova Scotia, more than 12,000 people have been killed or injured on the job during the last five years; and
Whereas promises to strengthen and improve the Occupational Health and Safety Act still have not been fulfilled;
Therefore be it resolved that this House should honour those workers who have been killed or injured on the job by ensuring there are no further delays in implementing long-overdue improvements to Nova Scotia's health and safety laws, including the right to refuse unsafe work.
Mr. Speaker, I would request waiver of notice.
MR. SPEAKER: The request is for waiver of notice.
Is it agreed?
I hear several Noes.
The notice is tabled.
The honourable member for Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley.
MR. BROOKE TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas this is the 73rd year of operation for the Truro Music Festival Society, yet the first year that some assistance will not be provided by the provincial government; and
Whereas the Truro Music Festival is the oldest such annual festival in Atlantic Canada and is operated totally by volunteers while receiving the majority of their funds from private donations; and
Whereas the annual participation rate in the Truro Music Festival averages between 5,000 people and 6,000 people, including both young adults, individuals and school class groups;
Therefore be it resolved that this Liberal Government and the member for Truro-Bible Hill revisit the request from the music organizers to see if funds can be found to assist with the 1995 festival.
Mr. Speaker, I seek waiver of notice.
MR. SPEAKER: The request is for waiver of notice.
Is it agreed?
I hear several Noes.
The notice is tabled.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Timberlea-Prospect.
MR. BRUCE HOLLAND: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas Nova Scotia has a long history of democracy; and
[12:15 p.m.]
Whereas due to the dedication of Nova Scotia women the right to vote was secured by women in Nova Scotia when the women's suffrage bill received Royal Assent in Nova Scotia on April 26, 1918;
Therefore be it resolved on this special day when young women are exposed to a variety of career options through the Take Our Daughters to Work Program, sponsored by the Nova Scotia Advisory Council on the Status of Women and the Nova Scotia Government, that we encourage young women throughout Nova Scotia to get involved in our political structure so that they may effect change like those women who secured the right to vote in Nova Scotia over 70 years ago.
Mr. Speaker, I ask for waiver and passage without debate.
MR. SPEAKER: The request is for waiver of notice.
Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
You have an introduction, too, that you wanted to make?
The honourable member for Timberlea-Prospect.
MR. BRUCE HOLLAND: It gives me great pleasure to introduce today Alison Baker, the daughter of Al and Brenda Baker, and Tabitha Smith, the daughter of Betty and Gary Smith, who are all constituents of mine. Alison and Tabitha are here with me today, their parents asked me if I would bring them, under the Take Our Daughters to Work Program. We spent some time in the constituency office this morning and over at the caucus office and they are here today to hear Question Period and some of the debate on bills. I would ask all members to give them a warm welcome. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Halifax Atlantic.
MR. ROBERT CHISHOLM: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas Rule 9(2) of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly states that it is the right of any member to appeal a Speaker's ruling by way of substantive motion; and
Whereas a member's right to make such a substantive motion is violated when Mr. Speaker engages in debate of the motion before notice has even been presented in its entirety; and
Whereas on two occasions this week, Mr. Speaker has pre-emptively ruled out of order NDP motions, making it virtually pointless to make a substantive motion to appeal a ruling of Mr. Speaker;
Therefore be it resolved that this House urges Mr. Speaker to apologize for his gross interference with a member's well-established freedom to place before the House a notice of motion.
MR. SPEAKER: I rule that motion to be out of order.
The honourable member for Sackville-Beaverbank.
MR. WILLIAM MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas this week is Volunteer Week throughout Nova Scotia in recognition of the valuable contributions made by volunteers;
Whereas each community in Nova Scotia has named a representative Volunteer of the Year;
Whereas Ms. Pauline Stanick has been nominated as Volunteer of the Year for the community of Sackville;
Therefore be it resolved that this House extend congratulations and best wishes to Ms. Stanick for her significant contribution to the betterment of life in her community.
Mr. Speaker, I request waiver of notice and passage without debate.
MR. SPEAKER: Is it agreed that notice be waived for that motion?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
The honourable member for Eastern Shore.
MR. KEITH COLWELL: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas on Sunday, April 23rd, The Lake Charlotte and Area Historical Society was officially formed with 16 charter members; and
Whereas the goal of The Lake Charlotte and Area Historical Society is to promote the region as a major tourist attraction, by focusing on the fascinating industrial boom the area experienced between the 1920's to 1960's; and
Whereas in the period between the two World Wars the Lake Charlotte area was a booming region which included very positive and productive sawmills, rich gold mines and a busy harbour;
Therefore be it resolved that this House applaud the members of The Lake Charlotte and Area Historical Society on their foundation and recognize their efforts to make the area a major tourist destination, while keeping alive the pioneering and innovative spirit which characterized the early settlements along the Eastern Shore.
I would ask for waiver of notice.
MR. SPEAKER: Is it agreed that notice be waived?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
The honourable Leader of the Opposition.
MR. TERENCE DONAHOE: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas the Minister responsible for the Advisory Council on the Status of Women rose yesterday with great fanfare to announce Take Our Daughter to Work Day as an opportunity for Nova Scotian girls to see firsthand a variety of career options to consider in their future; and
Whereas the Minister of Education last week suspended enrolment for the Medical Lab Technicians course at Nova Scotia Community College where 85 per cent of the students are young women, and;
Whereas medical lab technicians' unemployment rate is significantly below average and the average salary is $32,000 which is well above the average salary of women in Nova Scotia;
Therefore be it resolved that the Minister of Education reconsider his decision to eliminate the Medical Lab Technicians course and demonstrate a real commitment to the advancement of career opportunities for young Nova Scotian women.
MR. SPEAKER: The notice is tabled.
The honourable member for Annapolis.
MR. EARLE RAYFUSE: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas the Annapolis County Volunteer Awards ceremony and reception were held last evening; and
Whereas the Annapolis County Volunteer Awards ceremony celebrates 15 years of recognizing community volunteers; and
Whereas 43 residents of Annapolis County were recognized for their outstanding contributions to the lives of people in our communities;
Therefore be it resolved that the members of this House extend congratulations to the awards ceremony organizers and to the 43 residents of Annapolis County for their hard work and self-sacrifice.
Mr. Speaker, I request waiver of notice on this motion.
MR. SPEAKER: The request is for waiver of notice.
Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried.
The honourable member for Yarmouth.
MR. RICHARD HUBBARD: Mr. Speaker, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas in this, the 50th Anniversary marking the end of the Second World War, Canadian soldiers are still deployed to war zones in order to achieve a lasting peace: and
Whereas Nova Scotians are serving in peacekeeping missions in Croatia; and
Whereas Private Scott Leblanc of Yarmouth has been given commendation for his work in Croatia in 1993;
Therefore be it resolved that the members of this House commend Private Scott Leblanc for serving the world in a mission of peace and for making Nova Scotians proud of Canadian peacekeeping units throughout the world.
Mr. Speaker, I request waiver of notice on this motion.
MR. SPEAKER: Is it agreed that notice be waived?
It is agreed.
Would all those in favour of the motion please Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is carried. (Applause)
I wish to advise the House that the Clerk has conducted a draw for the Adjournment debate at 6:00 p.m. The winner this afternoon is the honourable member for Halifax Atlantic. He has submitted a resolution reading:
Therefore be it resolved that this Liberal Government do its homework on the real costs and benefits of public/private partnership before handing off all of our public assets at great cost to Nova Scotians.
So, we will hear debate on that topic at 6:00 p.m.
Before we begin the Question Period, are there additional introductions of guests that are here, I see several more in the gallery? If not we will advance to Orders of the Day. The Oral Question Period today will last for one hour, the time now being 12:23 p.m., the duration will be until 1:23 p.m.
ORDERS OF THE DAY
ORAL QUESTIONS PUT BY MEMBERS
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Queens.
MR. JOHN LEEFE: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Fisheries. As evidenced by correspondence I received today there continues to be confusion and bitterness with respect to RADAC and the matter of aquaculture in Annapolis Basin. I table three of the letters to which I will refer to in my first question. Basin fishers has demanded the resignation of the member for Digby alleging conflict of interest and also demanding the resignation of the member for Annapolis who is alleged to have offered, on April 23, 1993, to resign if aquaculture goes ahead in Annapolis Basin. My question to the minister is what immediate action is the minister taking to get RADAC back on track and functioning as the legitimate advisory body to the minister?
HON. JAMES BARKHOUSE: Mr. Speaker, I have not been privileged to see these letters, I have not heard of these letters. The fact that the accusation against the member for Digby would even be implied or mentioned in this Legislature I think is unfair because this member has in no way any affiliation. Perhaps his son is involved with one of the companies but that I believe is an arm's length situation. There is no way that that member has any implications with respect to the awarding or granting of one of those proposals.
With regard to RADAC, that is a community-based operation under the management of the Western Valley Development Authority and I do not have the authority to tell them what to do and when to do it. That is their mandate to operate independently of the arms of this government. (Applause)
MR. LEEFE: Mr. Speaker, ACOA has been very aggressive pursuing aquaculture development in Annapolis Basin as evidenced by a letter from Jeff Mullen, the Account Manager for ACOA in Nova Scotia to Paul Buxton, dated March 9, 1995, and I will table that letter and another letter that is associated with this question. Is it true that Mr. Aiden Mullen has been appointed to RADAC and that Mr. Aiden Mullen is Jeff Mullen's father and, if so, does this not give at least the appearance, if not the substance, of a conflict?
MR. BARKHOUSE: The two people that the member opposite has brought to the floor, Mr. Aiden Mullen is a member of the Ratting Beach Farm which last year had been chosen as one of the experimental farms to operate in the Annapolis Basin. I understood that was a very successful operation and, again, had requested enlargement of their operation this year.
Mr. Aiden Mullen could be the father of the other Mr. Mullen, who works for ACOA. I think that the people who are in charge of his department of ACOA should be responsible for considering any implications of involvement with the Mullen family. But I can say Mr. Aiden Mullen, whether he is a member of the RADAC, I cannot confirm. Members of RADAC have been appointed by the people within the community. There are three members of the aquaculture operations there, also three members from the Basin fishers, and together they chose the other ones besides the municipal appointments. Whether there is any conflict of interest, I think that has something to do with the ACOA operations over which I have no jurisdiction.
MR. LEEFE: My final question to the Minister of Fisheries is one that I take no pleasure in putting but I have no choice if I am to meet my public responsibility in so doing. This morning I checked with the Registry of Joint Stock Companies and I found that the member for Digby-Annapolis, name is listed as a Director of Casey Fisheries Limited and my question to the minister is this. Is the minister absolutely satisfied that there is no conflict of interest respecting the member for Digby and any application by Casey Fisheries Limited respecting aquaculture sites in Annapolis Basin?
MR. BARKHOUSE: The implication. That member has been here, I believe, about 25 years. He has been involved as a member of this government whether it was in Opposition or on this side of the House. Mr. Speaker, he has not been advocating, he has not inferred that that company, and I don't believe that that company, Casey Fisheries Limited, is actually directly involved. It is an operation of Mr. Earle Carpenter and Duncan Casey.
I believe the company that has been incorporated to function in the role, and it had made the application, is at arm's length from Mr. Joe Casey, the honourable member for Digby-Annapolis, who has been here I believe about 25 years and who certainly has not, in my opinion, and from any undertaking and any understanding, Mr. Casey is at arm's length from this operation. I certainly feel quite confident that there is no conflict of interest and I would stand by this commitment. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Leader of the New Democratic Party.
MR. JOHN HOLM: As the minister will have to leave, I am going to direct this question to the Minister of the Environment. The new regulations under the new Environment Act exempt pits and quarries from the minister's department's assessment and watchful eye if the aggregate is to be used for the purposes of fulfilling contracts for the Department of Transportation. My question to the minister is quite simply this. Why have you and your department decided to exempt the Department of Transportation and, in fact, to forego your responsibilities to ensure the proper environmental protections are in place?
HON. WAYNE ADAMS: The exemption the member refers to is an ongoing one but I will tell him at the end of that that there is no relinquishing of responsibilities for environmental protection and control with the Department of Transportation or any other department or with anybody else.
MR. HOLM: When you read the regulations it sounds very much like it is a fox that is guarding the hen house because it is the Department of Transportation itself that is supposed to be monitoring to ensure that the guidelines and so on are being followed, Mr. Speaker, not the minister's department.
[12:30 p.m.]
My second question is quite simply this. The minister will know that the permit for the Tidewater quarry in Waverley has been suspended. My question to the minister, if that company wins a contract, as it has, from the Department of Transportation, can that company use aggregate from that pit to fulfil its contract obligations to the Department of Transportation?
MR. ADAMS: Mr. Speaker, that sounds like a matter that is in the hands of the operators, as opposed to the controller, which is ourselves and government. If a company had a supply of surplus on hand and wanted to sell it, I don't think we could tell him he can't sell that material.
MR. HOLM: Mr. Speaker, the minister either accidentally or on purpose did not hear my question. That operation is supposedly shut down. That quarry is shut down in Waverley, the permit has been revoked, unless the minister has reinstated it, which will not be amusing to many people.
My question to the minister is quite simply this. Can that company skirt the regulations, skirt its permit by providing aggregate to the Department of Transportation from that quarry, when it has had its permit revoked for violating the terms that were adopted by the former Minister of the Environment back in 1985, as a result of an environmental assessment? Do they have that ability to use that rock?
MR. ADAMS: Of course not, Mr. Speaker, the answer is no.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Pictou Centre.
DR. JOHN HAMM: Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Community Services. The minister will remember when he introduced the new Social Workers Act in November of 1993 that many concerns were raised about individuals practising social work who did not have either a Bachelor or Masters of Social Work. At the time, the minister made reference to Clause 23 which would, in effect, provide a grandparenting clause so those individuals could be registered as qualified social workers. At that time, the minister described a process which seemed to indicate easy access by the grandparenting clause.
However, many people are having difficulty in being approved by the registration board. Can the minister indicate if the government is represented on this board, which is reviewing the applications?
HON. JAMES SMITH: Mr. Speaker, the Act does allow licensing by the profession and gives the profession of social work control and power and responsibilities within its own profession, much like the Provincial Medical Board.
There are appointments, and specifically answering the member's question, there are appointments to the board by government. I know that one is that of a judge. I am not sure of the others, I would have to check to inform the House, Mr. Speaker, but there are, as the honourable member would know, like the Provincial Medical Board, there are government appointments to the Board of Examiners of the Association of Social Workers.
DR. HAMM: Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for his answer. In view of the large number of calls that I think MLAs are receiving, and no doubt the minister, there is a lot of concern out there that a number of people who felt they would be admitted by the grandparenting clause are finding out that they are rejected.
My specific question to the minister, having established now that there is government representation on the registration board, is the minister absolutely satisfied that the registration board is applying Section 23, the grandparenting clause, in exactly the way it was described, both at his press conference and to the members of this House when he was speaking on the social worker bill?
DR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, this was legislation that had been available to government, the previous administration, for quite a period of time. Like a lot of other initiatives, for some reason or another they did not see their way clear to bring this forward. As Minister of Community Services, I feel very strongly that in this province we should do all we can to encourage the team players within our communities and in our institutions, whether they are physicians, lawyers, social workers, nurses or whatever. This was an attempt to do that, Mr. Speaker.
The problem with any profession that lacks the power of licensure is that they cannot determine who calls themselves a social worker and who does not. There is no question that many people have thought they were dealing with social workers when, in fact, they were dealing with a family benefits worker, municipal social service workers. These people, of course, in large part, do not practice social work.
The other concern is that of family counselling and marriage counselling, where practically with very little recourse and without even having to belong to the Nova Scotia Association of Social Workers, they could, in fact, advertise that they were doing work that was really best served by social workers.
I realize it is a long answer. I am satisfied that the process is in place. It is working. There are letters and calls and concerns because of people who are not, in fact, practising social work who would like to be grandparented in.
I would end by saying, Mr. Speaker, that those jobs will in no way be threatened, if they are working for the Department of Community Services, if they are municipal workers that we are taking in under our one-tiered system. There is no way that they are going to lose that job, it is just that they will not be able to call themselves social workers because, in fact, they are not doing social work.
DR. HAMM: By way of final supplementary, would the minister confirm that there are groups of employees within the Department of Community Services, within the Department of Health and within municipal departments of social services which are being automatically accepted or rejected, by the nature of the classification within those departments?
DR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, the Department of Community Services and the Department of Health have nothing to do with determining who is practising social work in this province. As the member has mentioned, the Act is clear on this and this is the determination of a professional body. It is an attempt to add professionalism to a group that is very important, both within the Department of Health and of the Department of Community Services and within our communities.
We, within the department, did try to determine some areas where we thought we would make information available as to the type of work being done by certain groups. I think family benefits workers pretty well generally across the board are not considered to be social workers. That has added a lot of confusion, and I think to the detriment of the profession of social work.
There have been some people in some areas of the province, Mr. Speaker, that I know have been grandparented in, in all fairness, under some difficulties and great discussions, who have a Grade 10 education, or maybe a high school education. They have done that because the nature of their work was considered to be evolved over the years to be that of social work.
I think this is an issue, Mr. Speaker, that if we want to keep looking around, this can be really broadened and we can see winners and losers. I think we are all winners because what we are doing is a very important part of the health care and social services of this province. There is professionalism added and they will make the decisions as to who shall call themselves a social worker. The other people will not be losing their jobs, certainly within our department and in the Department of Health. Any influence that I have, and I don't think they need that because I think the association is fair in making that determination. It is just that they won't be able to call themselves social workers if they are not practising social work.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Supply and Services on a brief introduction.
HON. GERALD O'MALLEY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I will not eat into the time of Question Period, I hope. I would want to honour this day, the Take Our Daughters to Work Day in government circles in Nova Scotia. Two well-known people in this House who have brought their daughters today, Mrs. Marilyn Gaudet and Mrs. Elizabeth-Ann Coady, whom I am sure everybody in the House is aware of. They have brought their daughters along and I don't know Mrs. Gaudet's daughter's first name, but Ms. Gaudet.
Then on the other side I want to introduce, a very warm spot in my heart, my granddaughter, Kimberley Coady, who has knocked on many doors in search of votes and will some day be running for Premiership of this province, Mr. Speaker. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley.
MR. BROOKE TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the honourable Minister of Natural Resources. The Minister of Natural Resources and this government was pretty ruthless last year as they attempted to help the Premier save his political rump. In the bid to hang on to the Premier's job in October, a bid that was eventually pushed back until July (Interruptions) Well, Mr. Speaker, when I mention ruthless I make mention of the fact that this minister fired a worker at Salsman Provincial Park and replaced her with the wife of the President of the Guysborough-Port Hawkesbury Liberal Association. Granted the minister gave the wife of the president an interview but Nova Scotians certainly understand the smoke and mirrors that are being put forth by this government.
The minister couldn't stop there, Mr. Speaker. Last week, a directive was given to fire the chief caretaker at Salsman Provincial Park in Guysborough. The minister even went one step further and the information I have . . .
MR. SPEAKER: Please, please, bring this to a question.
MR. TAYLOR: . . . he suggested that that individual could not reapply. The question is essentially this. Is the Minister of Natural Resources able to explain to Nova Scotians just how much more crass he intends to be in his bid to save his Leader's job because there were other provincial park workers called and told last week that their jobs would be expunged?
MR. SPEAKER: With deference, I feel that question has to be ruled out of order. It imputes motives; it makes all kinds of accusations; it is not a proper parliamentary question. The question should simply ask the minister if a fact is correct or something of that type, but not ascribe motives and impute all kinds of things.
MR. TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, may I simply rephrase and ask the minister . . .
MR. SPEAKER: Will you put the question cleanly?
MR. TAYLOR: One question cleanly, Mr. Speaker. Is the minister able to explain to Nova Scotians if he called other provincial park workers last week and told them that they were not needed?
HON. DONALD DOWNE: Mr. Speaker, I don't make a point of calling anybody in regard to staff activities within a region of this province. Staff would have been dealing with all those issues.
In regard to the issue of the hiring, the individual that the member opposite alluded to in regard to the female employee, it appears to me that those employees that were hired last year were hired under the fair-hiring policy of the Province of Nova Scotia and she obviously won the bid for the job. I am very happy to see qualified people have the job; the fact that it is a woman is even greater.
In regard to the other matter with me calling staff, I certainly don't make it a habit of calling staff in regard to who is in or what their jobs are, that is up to the department's staff to do.
MR. TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, with all respect, another classic example of smoke and mirrors. Will the minister at least guarantee me today that if the government intends to stick to the decision of firing a 16 year caretaker at the park, the minister will at least assure me that the new caretaker will not be plucked from the ranks of the Guysborough-Port Hawkesbury Liberal executive?
MR. DOWNE: Mr. Speaker, this is really getting so, so sick, to hear that kind of a comment made in this House. If you want to go back in the files (Interruption) and disclose in the Department of Natural Resources and the previous ministers and who hired who and who is related to who, I would be happy to table some of that information any minute you want it.
I take exception to the fact an individual that got laid off in our department, if they got laid off it was because of just reason, I have no reason to doubt why our staff decided to let an individual go because, obviously, if there was a just reason to let him go, they would have been let go.
In regard to the hiring of a new individual, they will be going through the hiring process as our policy states and may the best person win. A simple process that we have tried to do is being clouded because they are so used to working under their system that they can't see something trying to work that is beneficial to Nova Scotians, Mr. Speaker.
MR. TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, in hopes of obtaining a more suitable answer I would like to go to the Minister responsible for the administration of the Human Rights Act. Last spring, after being fired from her position at Salsman Provincial Park and replaced with the wife of the President of the Guysborough-Port Hawkesbury Liberal Association, Mrs. John Fenton took her complaint to the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission in Sydney. One year later she has not yet to even find out if an investigation is going to be launched. Can the minister define for me the backlog of work faced by the Human Rights Commission and just when Mrs. Fenton will be able to find out if an investigation is going to proceed?
[12:45 p.m.]
HON. WILLIAM GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, I don't know but I will certainly check. I think the honourable member would realize, like all government departments, we are trying to do more with less. There are more demands for service and there is less money for all departments, including Human Rights. I will check with the Human Rights Commission and find out the status of it and when the matter will be dealt with.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Kings North.
MR. GEORGE ARCHIBALD: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Cabinet Minister responsible for the G-7 for Nova Scotia. I would like to ask the minister how much money the Province of Nova Scotia is making as a contribution towards the total cost of the G-7?
HON. JAY ABBASS: Currently our budget is $4.6 million and it is expected that we would spend at least slightly less than that, Mr. Speaker.
MR. ARCHIBALD: We see a great deal of work being done throughout the downtown core of Halifax, Mr. Speaker. My question to the minister responsible for the G-7 expenditures would be, is the work that we are seeing done throughout the core of the city, is it being tendered?
MR. ABBASS: Actually most of the work that you are seeing done would be contracted through the City of Halifax.
MR. ARCHIBALD: We are spending $4.6 million and it is not being tendered and it is being let by the City of Halifax. Could you indicate to me who is in charge of the spending of the Nova Scotian taxpayers' money of $4.6 million? It is a lot of money to be not tendered at all, so could you tell us who is in charge and is the provincial government doing anything to see that the work is being awarded in any fair kind of a method?
MR. ABBASS: I can only assure the member opposite that any project that is ear-marked as a provincial project is being tendered totally in keeping with any guidelines which now exist in government. If the member opposite would like to specify a particular project over which he has a concern, I would certainly verify on the record that that is the case. I can tell you that any provincial dollars are being spent only through appropriate and are entirely within keeping of the policy guidelines method.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Halifax Atlantic.
MR. ROBERT CHISHOLM: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Fisheries. It was reported today that a review of the first six months of The Atlantic Groundfish Strategy known as TAGS has shown that there are some serious problems in terms of that program meeting its stated objectives. The suggested consequence of this review may be that the program will be significant and perhaps severely cut.
My question to the minister is, has he had any discussions with the feds, has he been approached by the federal government, with any prospects or proposals to change the program, proposals, Mr. Speaker, which would obviously leave many fishing communities in Nova Scotia high and dry?
HON. JAMES BARKHOUSE: Mr. Speaker, it is a very important matter that the member opposite has brought here today. The TAGS program initiated about a year ago was to help those people who have been very seriously hurt in many parts of Atlantic Canada, particularly Newfoundland. Again, in Nova Scotia, estimates were given that there were about 6,000 people who would take up the program. Unfortunately many other people were affected by the decline in the groundfish stocks and, as a result, there were many more people, I think, over 9,000 people who have taken up the program.
As a result of this undertaking, the federal government through Human Resources development and under the leadership of Lloyd Axworthy, have had an extremely difficult time in processing the extraordinary amount of people who have applied as a result of the uptake, the funding has been extended to provide services and support to these families in these difficult times. Some of the funding, I understand, that has been taken from the training program to help these families, just for their food and lodgings and the necessities of life. We have spoken in the past and we have staff that are currently negotiating on that FOWAP program, which is an older workers retirement program. We have not completed the negotiations on that.
There is also the HABS Program, which is an undertaking of about $300 million to help fishermen take early retirement for their vessels and sell their license to the federal government. At the present time, and in response to the actual activities that have just taken place in Ottawa, I believe it is the federal Fisheries Committee where this information has been delivered. We have not had any recent correspondence - I mean within this last week - to discuss this particular matter of what happened, whether the program will be four years now instead of five years. We have not had the opportunity to discuss this with our federal Member of Parliament, who has been tied up in the turbot wars and all these other negotiations that have been ongoing. I believe that as soon as it is possible, I will be working with my senior staff to find out what the federal agenda is with regard to the TAGS program.
MR. CHISHOLM: Mr. Speaker, I would just ask the minister if he would agree to respond to this House, to report back to this House at the earliest opportunity the results of his discussions and his department's discussions with the federal government on the question of changes to the TAGS program because, as he well knows, there are many communities in the Province of Nova Scotia that will be severely affected if the decision is made to reduce this program from five years to four. Will he endeavour to bring himself up to speed on this issue and report back to the House at the earliest opportunity?
MR. BARKHOUSE: Mr. Speaker, I do have a copy of a recent report, April 19th, which I would certainly table to the members of the Legislature so that they would be aware of what took place about a week ago and let the members opposite know how many thousands of people who have had the opportunity to take part in this program and the hard work that the federal civil servants have placed in enabling these people to take up the program. There are many people in many regions of Nova Scotia who have been seriously affected by the downturn in the groundfish fishery, many fishermen and plant workers. So, I would ask for staff to make a copy of this and I will table it so the member opposite will have the latest information, as of a week ago, and as new information comes, I would certainly make it available to all members of the Legislature.
MR. CHISHOLM: I thank the minister for his response. On clearly a related question, and my final supplementary, as the minister knows, there have been serious weaknesses in the TAGS program in terms of determining eligibility. One problem that continues to come up is the fact that boat owners who have a lifetime history in the groundfish fishery are being excluded from eligibility to TAGS because of the fact that they are incorporated and just drawing a salary. The consequence of that for these people is not the money that they would receive if eligible but is the fact that eligibility determines whether in fact their license will be reinstated or whether they have the authority to transfer that license. I would like to ask the minister if he is aware of this problem and, if not, would he apprise himself of the situation and ensure that some of his staff can get involved and to see that this problem is rectified? It has been brought to my attention and we are trying to work through the TAGS people, but it continues to come up and it is causing some considerable amount of consternation and hardship for people in communities that I represent.
MR. BARKHOUSE: The member opposite brings up a very important aspect of this whole TAGS program. Early estimates gave substantial numbers of people that they estimated estimated would apply. There was something like 6,000 people. Beyond that, there were many people who had an attachment to the fisheries so when a criteria had been established and there is a booklet that has been published and is in the hands of most people and it had a fairly tight criteria. To my understanding, no exceptions have been made to that even though there is an independent review panel established that would enable those people who feel they have been discriminated against, they have been given two or three levels of opportunity to appeal to ensure that fairness has been given to all of those that have had a direct attachment to the groundfish fishery.
This is an issue about the groundfish fishery which means round fish which are cod, haddock, pollock, halibut and flounder. People in different areas of this province have had different degrees of dependency upon the groundfish fishery. If you did not have a level of $3,000 income from those species of fish but also fished lobster, your income could be $15,000 to $20,000 a year but if you did not accrue $3,000 worth of sales of fish in a period from 1989 through to 1992, you were not dependent upon the groundfish fishery.
This dependency upon groundfish is one of the very basic criteria but there are many other issues like the member for Eastern Shore the other night who brought up the trawl baiters in the Eastern Shore who do not qualify. Yet, the trawl baiters that work for a plant could qualify but those that have worked independently and provided the service don't qualify.
There are many exemptions and the criteria is very tight . . . (Interruption)
MR. SPEAKER: All right, no fourth supplementary, this is getting too long.
MR. BARKHOUSE: Mr. Speaker, I will make this short, the criteria is something that the federal government has established. We have interceded on behalf of fishermen and their families when they have asked us to intercede and we will continue to work on their behalf. I will pledge to make an effort to try to find explicit answers for the member opposite.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Hants West.
MR. RONALD RUSSELL: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Justice. As the Minister of Justice is well aware, the court-house in Windsor will be losing the offices that were formally occupied by the Department of Justice and the Supreme Court will only be sitting there on an occasional basis in future. I was wondering if there was a study that the minister has with regard to that specific court-house to show what financial gains or losses are occasioned by the transfer of the functions presently carried out by the Department of Justice and moving them down to the Town of New Minas?
HON. WILLIAM GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, it is true with court reorganization that certain people who work for the Department of Justice in the court-house in Windsor will no longer work after six to nine months, after a certain period of time. It is also true that all the courts, except possibly the Supreme Court, will continue to meet there and even the Supreme Court, if the judges so choose to sit at Windsor, they certainly are free to do that and probably will given the lack of court space overall. So, I suspect over the next period of time, the Supreme Court will continue to sit there.
On the other matter, I think you have to look at it broadly and it is estimated that overall, when you follow our court reorganization on an annual basis, the province expects on a full year basis to save $1 million.
MR. RUSSELL: Mr. Speaker, I was wondering if the honourable minister would just repeat that last figure?
MR. GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, just so it is completely clear, I tried to indicate that it is on an overall basis for the whole province and Windsor is part of the reorganization. With the changes all across the province, including Windsor, the object, goal and expectation is that on an annual basis on the cost of courts, $1 million will be saved.
MR. RUSSELL: Mr. Speaker, that is what I expected. We are having a savings of $1 million right across the province. It is my understanding from independent appraisals of the situation, for instance in Windsor, that it is going to cost something in the order of about $100,000 a year negatively to the province. In other words, the province is going to have to provide an additional $100,000 per annum to move the present offices, et cetera, to the Town of New Minas, so that there is no savings in the removal of the justice system from the Town of Windsor. My first supplementary to the minister is, is the decision to close the Windsor office based entirely on financial reasons and is that decision irreversible?
[1:00 p.m.]
MR. GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, the decision in relation to Windsor and a number of areas of the province is based on work that goes back to the time of the former government when studies were carried out. I think I even have a copy here in my file of a report that was carried out at the time. It was the Department of the Attorney General, Courts & Registries Division, Court Reform-Phase II, Courts & Public Offices Review, Proposals and Recommendations, dated February 1993.
As a new minister coming in I picked up on that report and I can assure you, as is my wont, I didn't rush into anything. I very carefully considered the whole picture, given our resources, given that the Department of Justice like all other departments has to live with less, in fact, 12.5 per cent over four years. In a perfect world we would not change Windsor or any other part of the province but we had to make these difficult decisions that were before us and we made them. Yes, I have to say that that is a final decision that those changes are to be made. I am not sure to which independent study the honourable member refers but all I can tell him is that overall with all the pluses and minuses whatever they might be, we hope to save $1 million a year.
MR. RUSSELL: I would suggest to the Minister of Justice that if you are going to save money, you save money by closing those particular facilities which are costing additional funds. The Department of Justice is going to spend $60 million, by the minister's own admission, over the next 10 years, that is $6 million a year to save $1 million a year. What kind of financial advice is the minister getting?
MR. GILLIS: I think the honourable member is mixing up apples and oranges to an extent. I think you have to look at the realities all across the province. For example, part of the changes relate to probate. There is an average of eight wills probated a month and the recent figures, over 21 months, I think to the end of December 1994, just for comparison purposes and the amount that will be spent on courts, there is an amount that might be up to $60 million; we all know that some of the clerk facilities are very inadequate in the province. We have to spend money, whether that money will come directly from the public sector or we might be able to do private/public partnering, in order to do this. Mr. Speaker, part of the problem is this honourable member is in the mind-set of his friend John Buchanan who put us in debt $8 billion; we have to control this and unfortunately, we have to take action and sometimes it hurts a little but we share it all across the province. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Kings West.
MR. GEORGE MOODY: Thank you very much for the applause. My question is for the Minister of Health. On Tuesday the Minister of Health said in this House that any private programs that seniors had did not cover an unlimited amount of drugs. I talked to a senior this morning, that statement is not true, it is false. I would ask the minister, given the fact that there are plans that do provide an unlimited amount of drugs, total cost of drugs and covers other areas as well that those seniors could be exempt from this minister's program if that could be proven to be factual?
HON. RONALD STEWART: I undertook, as the honourable gentleman opposite knows, to examine programs to explain to seniors exactly the benefits of this new insurance program we introduced for Pharmacare. As I have said repeatedly here, the costs of private plans in this province are linked and predicated upon the costs of our own Pharmacare Program. If the senior opts out - if they could, which they can't - of these programs, or our program here, their premiums would change and they would be exposed. I would be happy with my staff to examine that and to explain to seniors exactly why the new program is beneficial to all.
MR. MOODY: The minister is doing a poor job of explaining it to many seniors that are calling me. I would ask the minister, one senior called today - I had six calls - who said that MSI, if they didn't pay the premium, they would not be covered under MSI.
Is the minister saying to these seniors, through MSI, if they don't pay the Pharmacare premium they will not be treated under MSI in this province?
DR. STEWART: Mr. Speaker, of course not, that is nonsense.
MR. MOODY: If that is the case, will that minister direct MSI, when calls come in by seniors who are told if they don't pay the $215 that they will not be covered under MSI, will the minister today direct MSI to tell seniors, I would want to know, if seniors do not pay the $215, what is going to happen to them? One senior told me today he would go to jail. I am asking the minister, what is he going to do to those seniors who refuse to pay the $215?
DR. STEWART: This is typical of this honourable gentleman, fear-mongering and scaring seniors across the province by his unfounded allegations, which only make political points in a very sensitive area. We are not here to score political points, we are trying to inform the public as best we can. I have repeatedly said, as has the Finance Minister, that the Senior's Pharmacare Trust Board of Directors will be very understanding and will develop the policies in concert with the seniors of this province. That is the difference, by the way, Mr. Speaker, from the former administration and their approach to Pharmacare and I would stand very solidly on that.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Pictou West.
MR. DONALD MCINNES: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Education. This week, I received in the mail at my home the 1995-96 Community College calendar and a special feature on the community college system. I want to thank the minister for providing this information to us.
My question is, I want to know - and this has happened before, in fact it happened two weeks ago - why they would mail such a heavy package? I know it is not a lot of money, maybe $100 or $200 or $300, and I am not picking on his department, but this is the one I got last week and I have been thinking about this for some time, why do departments send these heavy items to our homes when we are sitting here five days a week and they could deliver them for nothing?
HON. JOHN MACEACHERN: Mr. Speaker, I thank the honourable member for the question but it is a much wider mailing list than just the members of the House of Assembly, so when we send them out, we send them to a mailing list on which we have included the honourable member as well as other members of the House. But if the honourable member would like, we could make a special direction so that from now on they will be delivered directly to the House or to the caucus offices, if that would please him.
MR. MCINNES: Well, Mr. Speaker, I am not asking to be singled out, by any means, but I just think there are 52 members and if they were all mailed - if they were all, I didn't say they were because I don't know, but I know mine was and it has happened on more than one occasion - I just want to ask the minister, perhaps he could ask the staff if they would look at having that particular item, when the House is in session, to be sent here or to our caucus office, or whatever, and it would save a few hundred dollars, and a few hundred dollars is a few hundred dollars.
MR. MACEACHERN: Mr. Speaker, as I am sitting here and thinking of the cost of mailing it and the cost of delivering it to the offices, we will examine it and find out what is the cheapest way of getting it to the honourable members and we will do it the cheapest way possible. But as I sat and thought of it, the cost of a courier to even bring it to the caucus offices may actually be more than it would be to mail each of those copies out, but I assure the honourable member that I will take a look at that.
MR. MCINNES: Mr. Speaker, I think this is a serious matter and it is not a lot of money. My question, if I can go to the Minister of Supply and Services, perhaps if I could ask that minister if he would do a little memo out to all the departments and say that any mailings to be done, of any heavy material particularly, would be when the House in the session, either sent to our caucus office or to the Legislature?
HON. GERALD O'MALLEY: Mr. Speaker, I thank the honourable member for the question and the general trend of his pursuit. I think it is a very admirable one and if the mail can be delivered at no cost, that would be our objective. We will certainly, along with the Minister of Education and other ministers, look into the matter. If it is achievable in that manner, that is the manner we would pursue.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Minister of Municipal Affairs on a brief introduction.
HON. SANDRA JOLLY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I am pleased to have in our east gallery today a number of our very valuable staff from the Department of Municipal Affairs, as well as their daughters. As you can see, we have a large representation here. They are going to be doing some reviewing of mapping and registries this afternoon. They are going to have an opportunity to work the LIMS system and look at computerized mapping into aerial photos. So, I am very pleased to have them here today and I would ask them to rise and receive the warm welcome of the House. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: Now, I am going to add one minute onto Question Period because of time consumed with introductions and I trust that other introductions can wait until Question Period is over.
The honourable Leader of the New Democratic Party.
MR. JOHN HOLM: Mr. Speaker, I would like to return to the Minister of Justice, if I might. We see that, and of course, it doesn't come as a surprise, his colleague, the Minister of Finance, has put private construction of provincial jails on this government's fire sale list of services that they plan to put out to the private sector. Independent studies have shown that private prisons do not, there is no conclusive information or evidence that they save money and, in fact, the public safety is often reduced. My question to the minister is quite simply this, if there is not and he does not have conclusive evidence that private prisons are more cost-efficient and improved programs and public safety, why is your department even considering the privatization of such facilities?
HON. WILLIAM GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member is going on certain assumptions. We have to act on faith sometimes and to look at various options. We are not the flat earth society, we are prepared to look at options and our plans with regard to corrections where costs are going up, we are trying to live within our means and our plan would be later this year to call for expression of interest just to see, given very tight standards, what the private sector could provide. It may be that they can't provide it. It may be that the public sector can compete with it and do it better financially and otherwise.
I think we have a responsibility to look at various options, including just calling for expressions of interest just to see what type of response we might get from the private sector for either constructing and/or operating facilities. (Interruption)
MR. HOLM: Mr. Speaker, we have got another debate going on but the minister, I think, hit the nail on the head when he said it has to do with spending controls and cutting down, living within their means. My question to the minister is really quite simple. We have seen that the Minister of Transportation plans to enter into a sweetheart deal that is going to result in hundreds of millions of dollars of increased costs to Nova Scotians. I will lay them out later on for the Minister of Municipal Affairs, if she wishes. My question to the Minister of Justice is quite simply this, is it not the fact that the government's intentions of privatizing provincial jails has more to do with this government's fiscal spending controls legislation, in other words, hiding the true costs of delivering these services by having them appear on somebody else's books rather than the province's? Is that not the real purpose, so that Nova Scotians will end up paying more so you can hide the cost?
MR. SPEAKER: The question, is it not the real purpose, casts aspersions and imputes motives and should not be placed.
MR. GILLIS: Mr. Speaker, here is the way it is. All honourable members know that people in the province, citizens, have to live within their means. Governments should try to live within their means. I know the Party for which the honourable member is Leader may not think that that is important, but it is important because when we run up our debts and spend our first $1 billion to $1.2 billion on debt charges, it takes away from running proper prisons or proper nursing homes or proper schools.
We want to do this responsibly. As I said earlier, I just wanted to look and see what the options are to see if we can operate corrections properly, rehabilitate, have better facilities and do it that way. If we can't, we still have the public section option. (Applause)
[1:15 p.m.]
MR. HOLM: That is a strange view of good, fiscal management. Their view is to hide the true cost, try to, from Nova Scotians, (Interruptions) and to pass those . . .
MR. SPEAKER: Question, please.
MR. HOLM: . . . debts, Mr. Speaker, on to somebody else's books so that they can make a huge profit while seniors and others are having . . .
MR. SPEAKER: Question.
MR. HOLM: . . . their drug programs, et cetera, cut. My question to the minister is quite simply this. I want to know what price, how much is this government prepared to pay in terms of reduced public safety, reduced programs, in order to be able to hide your debt on somebody else's books rather than being up-front with what the true cost of delivering the services are for the people of the Province of Nova Scotia? (Interruptions)
MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Before the honourable minister answers the question, let there be some calm in the House, please.
When there is silence, the honourable minister will make his answer.
MR. GILLIS: The government plans to operate responsibly. We are not trying to hide behind anything. I think that the honourable member is scare-mongering talking about safety. The Department of Justice, as long as I am involved, will not go into any program or project, private sector or otherwise, if we don't have equal public safety or better facilities and better rehabilitation. Don't worry about that. What we have is scare-mongering.
What I find is that we have this honourable member concentrating on this, and I have said this in the House before, yet for many years in Nova Scotia, our frail, elderly, and those who can't look after themselves, are in private sector nursing homes with standards. Surely we can have standards for correctional centres just like nursing homes have and run them properly. (Applause)
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Leader of the Opposition.
MR. TERENCE DONAHOE: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister responsible for the Halifax Harbour Clean Up Incorporated. Since the March 31st deadline of the three-way agreement with the feds, the province and the municipal units has expired, a number of metro residents have been in contact with me and have asked just what is the state of the nation as of today with Halifax Harbour Clean Up. Recently, as the minister will know, the Mayor of Halifax among others indicated, in speaking for himself and for the City of Halifax, that he was not keen to let the issue of the clean-up just wither and die.
Would the minister please tell me and the House today what is the status of the provincial contribution to the project? Monies were allocated, reserved for that purpose. The agreement has come to an end. Where are those funds and what is the provincial government's position relative to pursuing any Halifax Harbour clean-up initiative?
HON. SANDRA JOLLY: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to respond to this question. As the honourable member knows, March 31st was an important date with regard to the funding that was available. I think it is important also to recognize that it was under the previous administration, both federally and provincially, that there was a commitment of $73 million made federally only, towards the Halifax Harbour clean-up. That commitment was based on a certain technology being used in the clean-up. As progress went on, trying to ensure that they could get that $73 million in funding, in actual fact the program kept developing. What was to be a $200 million project went to a $400 million project which no one could afford. Mr. Speaker, as you know, it has only been in the last, I think, seven months or eight months, that that project, the $400 million project has fallen off the table because no one could afford it.
At this particular point in time, I know the municipalities have been collecting their pollution control fund and they, themselves, have been doing quite a bit of work on how they can do clean-up within the harbour. The City of Halifax have spent some money on Duffus Street, which is doing some clean-up. There has been an allocation of $20 million to upgrade the Mill Cove plant, which has been done through the infrastructure project. I know that the City of Dartmouth is looking at consolidating some of the outfalls that are over there in Dartmouth Cove. So the clean-up is going on an ongoing basis.
Certainly we all feel, particularly the municipalities, that the important aspect is the at-source control and we have to look at that.
MR. DONAHOE: Well, that is an interesting review of certain activities being undertaken by everybody except the organization that I asked about. I asked about the provincial government. The minister, Mr. Speaker, as I am sure you observed, didn't come within light-years of indicating where the provincial government is in relation to its commitment to continuing to be a partner of one kind or another, and I am not trying to suggest a particular kind of partner or particular level of funding.
By way of supplementary, I want to ask this minister if she will please, in as straight and as direct a manner as she can manage, simply say to me and to this House, what is the state of the commitment of the provincial government of the Province of Nova Scotia today, to be a participant in any Halifax Harbour clean-up initiative? I remember asking the predecessor minister responsible, and he got off some lines about how they were going to go out and check - which seems to be the buzz-word these days - private/public partnership possibilities. I want to know from this minister if she is pursuing that course? What is the provincial government's commitment, both in policy terms and financial terms, to moving forward with a Halifax Harbour clean-up project?
MS. JOLLY: Mr. Speaker, as the honourable member knows, the Halifax Harbour clean-up is the responsibility of the municipalities. I mean that has been very clear from the very beginning; both waste and waste water management and garbage issues are all things that are the responsibility of the municipalities.
What we have done, as a province, is provide some leadership when there were initial discussions. At this particular point in time, as the honourable member knows, the Province of Nova Scotia does not have any money in any of its budget figures for harbour clean-up. That is very clear in the Minister of Finance's budget that came through. I think it has been stated by the Minister of Finance, the Premier and certainly myself, in the short time that I have been responsible for this. There is no budget item in our budget for harbour clean-up.
It is also important to know, Mr. Speaker, there is no project on the table. There hasn't been a decision on how the harbour will be cleaned up. There is no project on the table at this point in time. There has been a lot of discussion on at-source control and trying to control what is going into the harbour, first and foremost, before we make a decision or the municipalities, in actual fact, make a decision, on how you clean-up the harbour as it is.
MR. DONAHOE: Well, I understand all of what the minister has just said now and, notwithstanding the fact that in the election campaign of April and May 1993, she and her colleagues vilified the then current government, relative to solid waste management and Halifax Harbour clean-up and other things, alleging that we were failing to exercise the kind of leadership necessary, as should be exercised by the province, to address these issues.
She clearly is indicating here today that this provincial government has washed its hands and abdicated any responsibility or involvement or interest in exercising any leadership in regard to Halifax Harbour clean-up. No money and it is a municipal responsibility.
I ask this minister if she will indicate to me today, is she prepared, as minister responsible for Halifax Harbour clean-up, and presumably if she is responsible, it means she has some responsibilities and something to do; will she, in that capacity, undertake some leadership to bring together the municipal units now and pursue the possibility that there is, indeed, a private/public partnership, that might result in a more fulsome Halifax Harbour clean-up project, than simply letting it die the natural death, which it appears now to be dying?
MS. JOLLY: Mr. Speaker, I think we are showing a responsibility. We have not tied money to a certain project, which is what the previous administration did, that you only get $73 million, if you, in fact, do it our way. We are opening it up for an opportunity for public/private partnering. But, in actual fact, there is water utility, with the amalgamation that we are looking at, we are putting all the water utilities into a single water utility.
There has been a suggestion that a water and waste water private sector would be the approach to go. But at this point in time, Mr. Speaker, I would have to say the municipalities - we are dealing with the Dartmouth water system, we are dealing with the amalgamation and the four mayors, on an ongoing basis - I know we are having discussions. I have already said the Mill Cove treatment plant is being upgraded; Duffus Street is being upgraded; and Dartmouth Cove is being upgraded. The municipalities, in actual fact, are increasing and moving forward on clean-up in the harbour.
MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The time allotted for the Oral Question Period has expired. I know there are a number of introductions that some honourable members wanted to make. We could perhaps have those now, introductions of guests. Well, then, fine.
GOVERNMENT BUSINESS
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Government House Leader.
HON. RICHARD MANN: Mr. Speaker, would you please call the order of business, Government Motions.
GOVERNMENT MOTIONS
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Government House Leader.
HON RICHARD MANN: I move that the Speaker do now leave the Chair and the House resolve itself into a Committee of the Whole House on Supply unto her Majesty.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Hants West.
MR. RONALD RUSSELL: Mr. Speaker, I would like to take advantage of a few minutes going into Supply to continue to talk about uranium mining. Yesterday we had that subject on for Opposition Day, but unfortunately I was unable to complete my remarks. We had a number of people present in the gallery yesterday from various organizations around the province that have been very active in bringing forth their concerns with regard to uranium mining, bringing it forth to members of the Legislature, to their municipal councils and to anyone else that they can reach through the medium of public meetings.
Following my remarks yesterday, which were somewhat brief, the Minister of Natural Resources spoke and he defended the present government policy. As is well known, there was a moratorium placed on uranium mining back in 1985, for a period of five years. During that first period of five years, the exploration for and the mining of uranium was not permitted. On January 31, 1990, when that moratorium expired, then the government of the day, in response to the concerns expressed to them by various citizens and associations across this province, decided to reinstitute the moratorium for a further period of five years, which brought us up to January 31, 1995. That is this year and that is where we sit at the present time.
My argument, Mr. Speaker, and the argument put forward by residents in my area - because that is where, indeed, there are fairly substantial deposits of uranium - and people also around the province, the argument put forward is that nothing has occurred between 1985 and 1995 which alters the picture with regard to uranium mining. In other words, it is still the type of business that can create immense problems environmentally not only for the present- day population of this province or even for the next couple of generations, but for hundreds of generations to come that can be affected by the results and the residue of uranium mining.
In his response to the arguments that I put forward, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Natural Resources said that the moratorium was still in effect because nobody could mine radioactive minerals in this province unless they proceeded through the Department of Natural Resources to obtain a permit to go out and explore and to mine. That is perfectly true, but the thing is, without a moratorium, all that the minister has to do is to say, yes, I am going to give you a permit, and we could be in the business of mining radioactive materials.
Now, that would be fine and it may well be fine while we have the present minister in place. However, ministers come and go and perhaps a minister with an entirely different viewpoint from the present minister may occupy the position of Minister of Natural Resources. I am not even sure, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Natural Resources is of such a bent as to say, if somebody came forth with a proposal to open a uranium mine, no you can't. I don't think really that the minister is sufficiently sold on the idea that uranium mining cannot be done safely. I don't believe that because, yesterday, in response to my arguments that I put forward about tailing ponds that that could be in existence for hundreds of years from now and require maintenance, he said that there are ways that the industry have at the present time of taking care of that residue. He told me about what they were doing in Saskatchewan, whereby they were drilling down into the granite and tipping the residue from the milling and mining of uranium, tipping that surplus material into a mine shaft and that that would take care of it.
[1:30 p.m]
That is not a new technology. You can get rid of any kind of waste you like by putting it out of sight, but you don't necessarily solve the problem with that waste. At the present time, as far as I am concerned, as far as the majority of people in this province are concerned, we cannot at the present time accommodate radioactive waste. The radioactive waste that we get from our present nuclear plants in Canada, the radioactive waste that we presently get from our uranium mines in Canada, there is no way that has been found to adequately dispose of those wastes. As far as I am concerned, as I say, and as far as people in Nova Scotia is concerned, I do not believe what the minister had to say yesterday with regard to the fact that, yes indeed, today we can safely mine uranium.
The minister also had an another interesting argument. He went on to ask, who would come to Nova Scotia to mine uranium? Who would come to Nova Scotia and open a uranium mine? Obviously, a uranium miner might do it; however, the argument he put forward was that nobody would be interested because, number one, our deposits are not immense. They are reasonably large but they are not as big, for instance, as what they are in Saskatchewan or as big as they are in Russia. The interesting thing is that of recent date a French company has indicated that they will be opening a new mine in Saskatchewan. They will be opening it, I believe at Lac la Ronge, which is in the northern section of Saskatchewan and this mine itself is 350 kilometres further north. So, this mine that is being established is way in the outbacks, if you will, of the urban centres and even the rural centres of Saskatchewan.
This same French company is one of the companies that was in Nova Scotia exploring for uranium. At the present time there is no shortage of uranium. We have no need for it in Canada. The amount that is required to run the nuclear plants that we presently have is adequate and we are not in the business of manufacturing nuclear weapons so we have ample uranium being mined at the present time; in fact, we have surplus quantities being mined which are being sold abroad. Nevertheless, like all elements, eventually the present areas where mining is being carried out, those ore reserves will be exhausted and then the mining companies are going to look at places such as Nova Scotia.
The mining companies are interested in Nova Scotia from the point of view of coming in here and staking areas and doing exploration. No, they are not interested in mining because of the depressed price of uranium ore and because of the surplus, but they are interested in long-term reserves of any mineral including uranium, so it is quite conceivable that this company, for instance, this French company, who, as I say, has had an interest out in Hants heretofore, could come back now that the moratorium is lifted and go out there and do exploration and staking, with no intention whatsoever to put in place a mine, perhaps for 20 or 50 years. However, they would do the exploration and the staking.
The difficulty and the problem with radioactive minerals in the mining process is that even the exploration for the minerals themselves creates equal problems, as does the mining. You have to get down to the granite to extract samples, to determine exactly what area you want to stake and to determine what the reserves are in that particular area.
As soon as the overburden is removed, that rock face becomes open to the atmosphere and you are going to get dust from removing the overburden, which is going to be carried by air currents around to the surrounding countryside, which can do immense damage, incidentally, to plant life and also to animal life. Lastly and most importantly, Mr. Speaker, it is opening up that face to the impact of rain and snow, which then transmits the radioactive material down through the soil, through the surrounding area to the rocks and down into the water table.
In rural areas, as you well know, Mr. Speaker, coming from a relatively rural area yourself, people depend on dug wells, they depend on drilled wells to get their water. Once the water table becomes polluted with radioactive materials, that is the end of that water supply.
So, Mr. Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to finish off what I didn't have a chance to say yesterday and to assure all members of the House that this is a very important subject, it is a subject that may affect any member in this House because there are scattered pockets of uranium right across this province. As I say, in spite of what the minister says, he may have the best intentions in the world, it is quite possible for people to come in now and to take out an exploration permit to search for radioactive materials. When they do that, you have a problem. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable Leader of the New Democratic Party.
MR. JOHN HOLM: Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to stand as we are going into Supply to bring up a topic that has been addressed in the House before and to remind all members of an excellent report, and that is a very modest adjective to use when I say an excellent report, but not only that but a very important report that was released in December of 1994 and prepared by the Black Learners Advisory Committee under certainly the very capable hands of the members of that, particularly the Chairman, Castor Williams.
Now, Mr. Speaker, the report which is aimed at trying to come up with concrete ways of redressing the inequities and empowering black learners, I think is an excellent starting point. In that report they make very substantive, very concrete, very doable, to use a term that the Minister of Education likes to use quite often, recommendations. They also set out with the recommendations, they provided a timeframe in which they hoped that action could be started.
Now, Mr. Speaker, I note in looking at the timetable that was proposed, that we have not been able, or the government has not been able, to meet the timetable being suggested. (Interruption) Pardon me? Yes, I am being advised that somebody wants to do an introduction, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER: Yes, the honourable member for Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley is looking for that and possibly others.
MR. HOLM: Okay, I will stop for a moment then and allow the interruption and come back in just a moment.
MR. SPEAKER: You have used two minutes, you have 13 minutes remaining.
The honourable member for Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley.
MR. BROOKE TAYLOR: Mr. Speaker, I do want to thank the Leader of the NDP for affording me an opportunity to introduce two very fine gentlemen, and very distinguished, I might add, from the constituency of Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley. The member for Pictou West concurs that they are very fine gentlemen. I want to introduce Fred Kennedy.
Incidentally, Mr. Speaker, Fred was a candidate for the Liberal Party in the 1984 provincial election. Accompanying Fred is his friend and my good friend, farmer Doug Scott from Murchyville, and Fred, of course, is from Middle Stewiacke. (Applause)
MR. HOLM: Mr. Speaker, if I may, I almost will be in a sense starting over again. The report that was presented to the Minister of Education and then presented in this House, laid out an action plan. That action plan called for, as it was done, the presenting of the report to the minister and to the government in December 1994. At that time, the Minister of Education, it was hoped, would be able to be responding to that report by February 1995 and that representatives of BLAC and the Policy branch of the department would be meeting to draft legislation to prepare the process to be implementing many of the recommendations that would require that would have been taking place by that time.
Now, those timeframes have passed and I am not trying to be critical or harsh with the minister or with the government, for allowing those timeframes to have passed by such a modest amount of time without concrete actions having been taken, given the fact that the minister has and I can't remember the exact date, but the minister has indicated that he will be responding to the detailed recommendations of the report. I understand that those responses are to be made, if my memory serves me correctly, within the matter of the next, actually should almost now be the next few days, because when I heard it, it was going to be within a couple of weeks. Obviously, the responses are intended or are supposed to be quite prompt.
When one puts a week or two weeks maybe, in the context of the greater timeframe that the blacks and others in this province have suffered from discrimination, systemic discrimination and all forms of discrimination, may sound like a very short period of time. As the Governor General, in his remarks pointed out today, in this building in the Red Room, that blacks have been mistreated in a deplorable fashion since they first visited and came to our province.
We and this government, have to come up with a very concrete, a very committed, unequivocal commitment that they are going to act and to act immediately without all kinds of new studies, all kinds of lengthy delays, to once and for all, begin to address the shame that has faced this province as many other provinces and other parts of this world for far to long.
In the report released in December, there are a couple of sections that I want to refer to and one has to do with the context. It said, for example, that black Nova Scotians like other black Canadians, are victimized by a racist ideology and a racist social structure. Racism permeates the entire social, economic, political and cultural environment of Nova Scotia and Canada. The situation was clearly articulated by the Donald Marshall Report when it stated, blacks have had to bear almost unbearable burdens.
I think that those of us who have tried to better understand and to familiarize ourselves with the history and with the circumstances of the black population within Nova Scotia would agree wholeheartedly with that statement and that context.
[1:45 p.m.]
Mr. Speaker, those who have not done so, and especially those members on the government benches, who control purse-strings and who can also prod the minister and his government colleagues to take some actions, should bear in mind and have a look at, for example, the chart that appears which shows the linkage between the different factors and the consequences. Whether those deal with the negative perspectives that are affecting the black learners, the institutional and the systemic barriers, and the socio-economic factors, which are all interlinked, which all combine and which all act as very serious barriers towards moving forward to addressing the problem.
When one takes a look at the analysis that was done, it points out that it is possible to attribute low or average incomes, chronic high unemployment and the kind of work performed to the lower educational achievements of African Nova Scotians. A review of all available studies and data clearly shows wide disparities in education between blacks and white Nova Scotians. The question is, why is educational attainment in the black communities, so much lower than the Nova Scotia average, given the commitment of the black community to the importance of education?
We all know in this House and if we all listen to our own words, we all know that our future is crucially dependent upon the level and the quality of the education that we receive. That equates for all students, Mr. Speaker, and to members of this House, and unless we are able, unless we are committed - because we are able. Let us delete that section, because it is not a matter of if we can, it is a matter of if we will. I suggest we have to make it a firm commitment, we have to take the positive stand and we have to say, quite clearly and unequivocally, that we, as the representatives of the people of Nova Scotia, as the elected members in this House, we will do everything that is humanly possible, to make sure that those barriers to members of the black community, from receiving the highest and fullest of educations, so that they can move forward in our society and to assume their proper and equal role and position in society, both in the social and the economic and in all the different fields. When one takes a look at the report, there are some items, there are some recommendations that will, of course, take some time to develop and that will take some time and cooperation and even some money to develop. But some of them are quite concrete, very simple and straightforward, but it is extremely important that we should be working on them and should have been working on them before now.
I am not going to try and I do not have enough time to go into the whole report, obviously, at this point in time, but one of the points, looking at Recommendations 7(a) and 7(b), for example: communicate and enforce equality and anti-racist standards and require all components of the education system, including school boards, to develop and implement anti-racist policies. That should be something that we should have already stated, Mr. Speaker, that was to be done. That is something that we should have stated, that there are to be funds, if any funds are needed. Narrow timelines, timeframes should have been imposed to develop such a policy and standards and it should be made very clear immediately that those standards are going to be enforced and enforced right away.
There are things that we can do; there are many things that have to be done. We need more, not only for the benefit of the students who need better educational opportunities and to have the barriers, both social, economic and systemic, all the different types of barriers, removed. We also need to do extensive training for all of those who are involved currently in the education system. The teachers, those who work with boards, those who work with trustees and all others. It is my belief, and I think that I am being fair when I say this, that the Minister of Education genuinely does, also, not only from things that he has said relative to this report, but from some discussions in other meetings that we have had over the years and positions the minister has taken. I believe that the minister believes in true equality, that there should be true equality and educational opportunity and standards for people of all races in the Province of Nova Scotia.
Mr. Speaker, what I am saying and the reason why I am bringing this forward at this time, is that I hope - and maybe the minister even today, I don't know if he is going to speak on this topic today - I would sincerely hope that the Minister of Education on behalf of his government within an extremely short period of time, and I am saying within a week or two weeks, will lay out for Nova Scotians and, more particularly, for the black population who have been disadvantaged, who have been treated over the years in a deplorable manner and who have had to face many severe barriers in obtaining a higher quality of education, I hope the minister will not only respond in terms of saying which recommendations we are or are not prepared to adopt, but I hope that the minister will also lay out, very clearly, commitments in terms of time lines as to when those recommendations will come into effect, that the government is going to support, and what resources the government is prepared to commit to that.
All Nova Scotians and all Nova Scotia benefits when we have a strong, healthy society. All Nova Scotians are going to benefit when each and every member of that society is going to be provided with an opportunity to receive a high-quality, equal education because, when that happens, that will help to alleviate many of the social as well as the economic problems that exist in the province at the present time, from one end of the province to the other and in all segments of society. This is a crucial . . .
MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The time has expired.
MR. HOLM: Thank you, and I was just about to finish, Mr. Speaker. This is a crucial issue and it is one that deserves the highest priority in the way of attention from this minister and this government on an immediate basis.
MR. SPEAKER: The motion is carried.
Before I leave the Chair, I want to advise the House that the Deputy Speaker is attending official duties on my behalf with His Excellency the Governor General of Canada and the Premier, to which the Speaker was also to be a participant but, being unable to be in two places at once, I sent the Deputy Speaker, so the Deputy Speaker is not here with us. The honourable member for Hants East, who sometimes assists me by taking the Chair is likewise absent from the House today so I have asked the honourable member for Cumberland North to take the Chair and act as Chairman of the Committee of the Whole House on Supply. He will take the Chair now and the House is resolved into a Committee of the Whole House on Supply.
[1:54 p.m. The House resolved itself into a CWH on Supply with Acting Deputy Speaker Mr. Ross Bragg in the Chair.]
[5:55 p.m. CWH on Supply rose and the House reconvened with Deputy Speaker Mrs. Francene Cosman in the Chair.]
MADAM SPEAKER: The Chairman of the Committee of the Whole House on Supply reports:
THE CLERK: That the committee has met and made some progress in considering Supply and asks leave to sit again.
MADAM SPEAKER: Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
The honourable Government House Leader.
HON. RICHARD MANN: Madam Speaker, we are going to return to Public Bills for Second Reading. Perhaps before we do we could ask for unanimous consent of the House to dispense with the Adjournment motion at 6:00 o'clock or the moment of interruption and continue through with the business of the House until 7:30 p.m. and adjourn for the evening at that time since there will be no late debate this evening. I would ask for the consent of the House for that.
MADAM SPEAKER: Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
The motion is carried.
The honourable Government House Leader.
HON. RICHARD MANN: Madam Speaker, would you please call the order of business, Public Bills for Second Reading.
PUBLIC BILLS FOR SECOND READING
MADAM SPEAKER: The honourable Government House Leader.
HON. RICHARD MANN: Madam Speaker, would you please call Bill No. 5.
Bill No. 5 - School Boards Act.
MADAM SPEAKER: The honourable member for Pictou West.
MR. DONALD MCINNES: Madam Speaker, Bill No. 5 was adjourned by my colleague the member for Queens when we last were on the bill. Unfortunately he is out of the House this evening so I will try to make some remarks in regard to this bill, An Act to Amend Chapter 6 of the Acts of 1991, the School Boards Act.
I did have the opportunity to speak on the motion for the six months' hoist the other night and expressed my concern at that time that I thought the bill was wrong simply for the fact that it gave the minister an extreme amount of power to go down in the bunker and to reduce the number of 22 boards down to five or seven or maybe even to one. I think the bill is a one page bill, Clause 1, Section 8A(1)(a), ". . . amalgamate a school board with any other school board; (b) annex the whole or any part of a school district to another school district.". As I say, I just think it is wrong and I want to try over the next few minutes to point out why I feel it is wrong, and others in the province, including my own Pictou District School Board, the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, the Nova Scotia School Boards Association, the Association of Nova Scotia Education Administrators and also the Federation of Home and School Associations.
This is a bill that a number of years ago reduced the school boards by a significant number. There were six in Pictou County at that time and it was reduced down to 1; 22 boards across the province. In my own county the boards were reduced from six to one board. I honestly thought at that time that was too big a reduction. I did have the opportunity to sit on a school board and I am sure there are many members in the House that had that opportunity over the years, to have sat on a school board. It is a very rewarding and interesting experience. One has the opportunity to work with the teachers and with your superintendent of schools and you are able to visit the schools and be a little bit aware of what programs are going on and what have you.
As I say, I sat on a school board. At that time we had two high schools and quite a number of elementary schools all over the rural municipality of Pictou County. In fact, we built a number of schools during that period of time as well: MacLeod School, Frank H. MacDonald School, River John School, West Pictou Elementary.
AN HON. MEMBER: Did they build a Donnie McInnes school is what I want to know? If they didn't, they should have.
MR. MCINNES: Well, very kind of you, George. The member for Kings North is helping me.
I want to take a moment and make some quotes through you, Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Education on a report that was tabled and presented to (Interruptions) You fellows be quiet, I can't hear.
AN HON. MEMBER: You are not missing much.
MR. MCINNES: I know. The Pictou District School Board made a presentation to the Minister of Education. I know he will be back quickly to hear what I am saying about that. They did make a very good presentation to the minister on March 2, 1995, in regard to some of the things, in response to his White Paper on education reform.
[6:00 p.m.]
I am reading directly from the presentation made by the Pictou District School Board to the minister, "We believe that the key political decisions affecting our schools should remain as close to the people as possible and those affecting the whole district are best made by a local elected board. Pictou District should be recognized for the effectiveness and efficiency with which it provides quality programs, for its visionary initiatives, and be given the option to remain as a single school system.".
Now that is what I am saying, we have an excellent school board there, now all elected members, and I think that is proper. They have done a good job over the past number of years, since the joining together of those six boards and down to one board.
This document also goes on to say, ". . . if Pictou District is required to amalgamate with other Boards, . . .", which they say, ". . . is not our first choice, but it is our contention that . . .", they would prefer to work with a community like Antigonish. Pictou and Antigonish Counties are not that far apart and I think it would be much better than the proposal which I know you have all seen, the District No. 3, with 28,876 students for Pictou County, Colchester County, Cumberland County and East Hants. It is just too big a board.
There are schools out in Parrsboro, how would anybody from the Pictou area know anything about the school system and what was needed or what is required in the Parrsboro area? It is a very good area, by the way, and one that we would be very pleased with - Cumberland County, I will come to that a little later on but they are very concerned, too, that they want to represent their own area.
Now again, Mr. Speaker, I am going to quote from the school presentation of Pictou County to the minister, "A major restructuring of school Boards is incompatible with a simultaneous move to site-based management as proposed. The proposed Board restructuring options will require either a substantial strong Central Administration staff including sub-systems to support the transition to . . . or a significant transfer of governance power and authority to school councils and a corresponding reduction in the roles and responsibilities of Superintendents and School Boards - a process that will require a comprehensive developmental training program and a phase in period of several years. It would be impossible for a regional board with a downsized Administrative staff to fulfill the duties as currently proposed.".
Now they give an example and one of the examples is, "It would seem that in order to fulfill the expectation as outlined in the White Paper that the Board would have to meet with each School Council at least four to six times each year . . .", now get this, ". . . a budget meeting, a meeting to review and approve the school improvement plan, a meeting to review and accept the Councils Accountability Report, a meeting to set area rates, and policy related meetings. Assuming a minimum of 4 meetings with each school council the Chignecto . . .", I guess is what they call it, the Chignecto federal school board, ". . . with 91 schools would have to schedule the equivalent of 364 meetings just with the school councils one meeting a day, seven days a week, twelve months of the year covering an area from Amherst to the Guysborough County line!".
That is not what I said, that is what the Pictou Central District School Board said to the minister when they made their presentation to him. I don't know whether he listened to it or not, but I know that he has a copy of it and I will make it available to him if he so wishes.
Now, I am still with this Pictou County presentation, "School Board Regionalization be restricted to the minimum essential i.e. where there is municipal amalgamation, where small boards could not otherwise survive - probably not fewer than 14 Boards would remain.". Now they are saying if we have to do it, maybe we should go down to 14. As I say, this is the Pictou District School Board's presentation to the minister.
I think we want to offer every young Nova Scotian every opportunity for the highest quality education; I think that is our goal, isn't it? To offer our young people the best opportunity possible. Quite frankly, the Pictou District School Board is very much opposed to Bill No. 5, which gives the minister the opportunity to reduce the boards from 22 boards to 5 or 7 boards.
I have a quote here from the Cumberland District School Board, "It would be a mistake to make the Cumberland district school board into part of a larger unit say the county teachers. `The economies . . . that are the driving force behind board amalgamation have already been achieved by the (school) board in Cumberland County,' the county local of the Nova Scotias Teachers Union said this week. `We see very little, if any, fiscal or educational gains to be achieved by school board amalgamation.'". Then it goes on to say, "The province's white paper on education says the Cumberland board should be amalgamated" - as I said - "with the Colchester-East Hants and Pictou boards, to save money.".
There is a big distance from my area going up the Trail to Amherst, from Pictou to Amherst is about 90 miles. If you go around the other way, via Parrsborro, it would be probably 130 to 140 miles, so that would be even more. The Amherst Teachers Union also doubts amalgamation would improve students' educations. I quote, "`The best opportunity for our students, we believe, lies with the present school board.' The teachers say education should `be treated as the investment in the future which it is. Therefore we suggest that the regions of economic renewal . . . be used as the basis of amalgamation.'". It goes on to say - I want to be fair - "The Cumberland local supports the concept of advisory councils and site-based management, but wonders how they'd be implemented.".
In today's paper, the 27th, the Halifax District School Board said that school board amalgamation proposals, they are saying perhaps there should be 12 boards, 11 boards plus 1, the Acadian provincial board, and that is fine. The Halifax District School Board has asked the minister for an extension and they go on to say, "A board . . .", this is the Halifax District School Board, they go on to say, ". . . with 57,000 students spread unevenly over 5,376 square kilometres (is) not an option the parents of Halifax City (want) for their children," Mrs. MacFarlane said, in a letter to the minister. Mrs. MacFarlane went on to say, "We've tried five meetings and we've looked at a variety of options for the three metro boards, and we couldn't reach consensus.".
That is what they are saying, that perhaps we should have 12 zones for the school boards and perhaps we could live with that. I do not think it is right, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Education, as this bill states, that he, down in the bunker, may order Clause 1, Section 8A(1)(a), ". . . a school board . . . ", to be amalgamated ". . . with any other school board; (b) annex the whole or any part of a school district to another . . .". He has the authority, if this bill passes which it probably will.
Now I want to go to another submission that was presented to the minister. This submission was from the President of the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, John MacDonald; from the President of the Nova Scotia School Boards Association, Sandra Everett, the president of the Association of the Nova Scotia Educational Administrators; and also Anne White who we all know very well is the President of the Nova Scotia Federation of Home and School Associations. They made this presentation to the minister dated April 18th. I want to read again from that because these are the people who represent the teachers, students, school board associations and the parents.
I am going to quote again from this paper, "We would ask the Minister to provide research data to support the claim that was made for the educational change in the White Paper, and we also request the clear explanation on how the projected savings were calculated . . . We feel rather than viewing amalgamation as a cost-savings measure, which is highly questionable, what is urgently needed is an in-depth analysis of the funding formulas.".
In other words, Mr. Speaker, they are saying that they do not see how the amalgamation of all these school boards is going to save approximately $6 million per year. I do not understand it, and I would like to see the minister present the figures to us to show where the saving would be to save that $6 million. Here the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, school boards association, educational administrators and home and school associations are saying the same thing. That is what they say, and I think they do represent the interest groups that are used for teachers.
There were others, I am still with this same presentation. Some participants questioned the need for amalgamation and others reflected a great concern for the extent of the proposed changes. Some boards were viewed as too large now. They were concerned that amalgamation was perceived by the government as a cost-saving measure. They felt that amalgamation structures such as those proposed would negatively affect the education. The big thing is that there would be a loss of personal contact, maybe a loss of accountability, a loss of control by the local community council and a loss of existing specialized programs.
As I say, Mr. Speaker, that is not me saying that, this is being said by the various groups, the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, home and school associations, and so on. I don't think I want to quote any more from that and I am not going to have too much more.
[6:15 p.m.]
Then on Wednesday, April 26th in the Halifax Chronicle-Herald and the Mail-Star again we had an ad. In this document he talks about Education Horizons and "This document proposes unparalleled changes to education in Nova Scotia . . .". I won't read the whole thing: "1. School Board Amalgamation The reduction of 22 existing school boards in favour of five, or seven school boards, is a move that would centralize school board authority away from local interests and local communities. Fewer school boards would result in many rural areas feeling further removed from decision-makers. More so, there appears to be a distinct lack of validated evidence that school board restructuring with either save dollars or improve the quality of education services to students.". And that is what we are saying.
That is what we say and I sincerely believe that the fact that with the size of the boards we have now, and maybe we have special cases and I again want to say to the minister, he talked about the Guysborough School Board going bankrupt, perhaps that one can be tied-in with some other board, and I appreciate that, but I don't think we have to go the route to five or seven boards, or go the route to fact that the minister will have the opportunity to do it down in the bunker, without consultation, he will just be able to go down there and do it.
Now this ad, of course, was put in by the Nova Scotia Teachers Union. They are asking for responses and anyone wishing to respond to that ad.
Well, Mr. Speaker, I don't want to delay the bill but I wanted to make the point that I am not in favour of Bill No. 5, I don't think it is the right thing to do. Maybe we could reduce the number of boards, five or six, or whatever the magic number is. But, as I say, when you look at your White Paper, Education Horizons, there is a lot of good information in there which is very helpful, but you are going to make Cape Breton into two boards. I would like to hear those members get up and tell us if they think that is the right thing, for Cape Breton to have two boards in Cape Breton Island. I don't know. It seems to me - or option number one is that they would have only one board and they would have 36,839 students under that one board. Wow!
I should go through this for you, just so you will all be aware, just in case you didn't look at it. Region number two would be Pictou-Cumberland-Colchester-East Hants. They would have a student range of 28,876. That would be called Chignecto Central. Number three proposal was Metro Halifax County, which of course is Halifax County, Bedford, Halifax and Dartmouth. Could you believe that there are 57,000 students in that area?
Then we go to number four and man, I wouldn't want to sit on that school board; it goes from East Hants, down to Kings County, Annapolis County, Digby County, Yarmouth and down around to Argyle (Interruption) - no, Cape Breton is on the other end, I know that, Shelburne, Yarmouth, Lunenburg, Queens and Clare-Argyle, with 38,000 students. How would a person in Lunenburg have any idea what is going on with the schools down in Digby or whatever? It blows my mind away. It really does. It really blows my mind away.
Now the minister explained to me when I was talking on the hoist amendment the other day, about how he was going to have the French board, the Acadian provincial board work and that is under 5,000 students and I appreciated his answer and perhaps that one can work that way. Now, those schools are spread out across the province, but he is going to have it set up and that is fair. But I think it is wrong that the minister, with this bill, to amalgamate by order. Clause 1 Section 8A(1), "Notwithstanding Sections 7 and 8 of this Act and subsection 22(1) of the Utility and Review Board Act, the Governor in Council, on the recommendation of the Minister, may, by order, (a) amalgamate a school board with any other school board; (b) annex the whole or any part of a school district to another school district.".
Mr. Speaker, I feel very strongly about it. I know that the bill will probably pass and go to the Law Amendments Committee, but I shall not be voting for it to pass. I do sit on the Law Amendments Committee, but I think it is wrong and I am sure the member for Cumberland North thinks it is wrong too. I am sure he does not want the students from Cumberland County to be involved down in Pictou. It is just too big a board.
Mr. Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity to partake of the debate on An Act to Amend Chapter 6 of the Acts of 1991, the School Boards Act. I will not be supporting this bill.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Kings West.
MR. GEORGE MOODY: Mr. Speaker, Bill No. 5 is a very good example of this government's arrogance and this government's abandonment of communities in this province. What this government is doing with this bill, it says to communities in this province, we do not care about your uniqueness. We don't care about the things that happen in your small areas anymore. We are going to make you big and we are going to tell you how big you ought to be and we are going to tell you how it is all going to work.
We had the Minister of Education run around the province and, I have to tell you, anybody I talked to said that the Minister of Education came with plugs in his ears and his mouth going and that they were not happy, after the meetings were over, that they felt that the government was listening to what the possibilities really are. We are looking at going from 22 boards to 7, 9 or 5. Who knows?
We have a piece of legislation that says the minister can walk into Cabinet and that Minister of Education can decide how many. Probably not many people in this Legislature know that right now, with the reductions this government has made to education and with the reductions they are going to make, they spend the lowest per pupil of any province in Canada, except P.E.I. and, with the reductions that are coming, we will be below P.E.I. That tells me that we have a government that does not care about education, that is not concerned about young people and their education. If you were, you would be concerned about the system and what is happening to it and how much money should be given to education to invest in our young people and to invest in our future.
If you talk to anybody and you look at what has happened, what this government has done to special education funding, it is a crying shame. We had students with learning disabilities in this province and many of those students required special assistance through resource teachers and through EAs. In this province, in many areas, these students were getting an opportunity, to complete a formal education, an opportunity to go through school, otherwise they couldn't go through school without that aid, that additional help.
What I am told has happened today, yes, people are continuing to be evaluated, continuing to be tested and it has been discovered that yes, there are a lot of students that have a learning disability and a lot of students with special needs. What this government has now done by taking away the funding, they are ignoring those people. What is going to happen to those people if they can't receive a formal education? Who is going to care for them and at what cost to society because they weren't able to get a formal education because this government has not made the commitment to help those students that have special needs in the schools of our system.
I have talked to educators, I have talked to principals, I have talked to some people who work with these students and test these students. They come home each day and just throw up their hands and say, these students are crying for help, the parents are crying for help. What this government has done is turned the tap off and they are not giving these students any assistance and there is no future. The future is bleak, the future is black. I will tell you, this government does not show any compassion when it cut the funding to special education in this province.
We have a Minister of Education running around the province saying, we are going to put every cent into the classrooms. Every cent into what classrooms? Because they are still looking for it. Yes, they can spend more on administration and more on his staff and other staff but you look at what is happening in the schools and I will tell you, this government doesn't realize the parents are beginning to find out, and it took a little while for them to realize - that their young people and their children are not receiving the additional help and the kind of education and the opportunities that they were receiving, it is fast diminishing.
Classes are becoming larger and teachers are asked to cope with additional problems without support. What does that do? I thought we should be concerned about quality of education. I haven't heard the minister talk one bit about the quality of education. He talks about numbers and the great numbers, we are going to reduce the number of boards in this province and somehow some magic is going to happen that is going to increase the quality of education in this province. It is not going to happen.
When you think of a school board that runs from Hants County, to Kings, to Annapolis, to Digby, to Yarmouth, to Shelburne, to Queens, and Lunenburg and you say to yourself, if someone was an elected school board member from Kings County, how do they know the problems in Shelburne County? How does the person in Annapolis know the problems in Hants County?
We all argued for years, and I argued for it, to have elected school boards, to have people that could be reached by the parents and students and have people that they could go and see. Can you imagine trying to get hold of all the members of a board that large if you had a concern? Parents are losing their rights in this province, students are losing their rights, whether it is a transportation issue or whether it is an issue in the school. Now this government is taking it so far away from them and they say, we are going to improve the system by reducing and making a larger board but less boards.
The minister claims he is going to save a lot of money on administration. School boards will tell you and I think it was in their presentation, the one that was made, that they have reduced their administration. The boards have been cut year after year, they have reduced their administration. I know in Kings County alone the number of administrators that have been reduced. But can you imagine that we are going to have, yes, fewer administrators for one board whether it be one board in Cape Breton County and you have got a meeting on the other side of the Island, it is going to take you all day to get there. If you are in Hants County and you have to go down to Shelburne, it is going to take you most of the day to travel. And the cost of that, that is going to be more efficient and people are going to understand more about community needs and school needs and school busing problems and educational problems? I can't believe that.
Now, we have a minister who has put in a bill that won't even allow us, as elected people of this province, to have any say on exactly what size board he is going to put forth. He is going to do that in Cabinet. Never before in the history of this province has anyone made such dramatic changes to the school system and the number of boards without allowing the bill to come before the House that spells out exactly what he is going to do.
AN HON. MEMBER: Secret.
MR. MOODY: It's a secret. This went on in a communist country. I can't imagine it going on in a democracy where people get a piece of legislation like this and they say, trust me, I know what is best and I don't want any other 51 members of the Legislature confusing my mind that they might know something about education, don't confuse me. I was appointed Minister of Education so don't confuse me with the facts.
AN HON. MEMBER: They'll make their decisions down in the bunker.
MR. MOODY: Down in the bunker. (Interruptions)
[6:30 p.m.]
I will tell you there are a lot of people and you know, it took a long time for this government to get this to happen but it did happen and they upset a lot of people and this is why it happened. The Teachers Union, the school board and the federation of home and school associations and the president of the association of Nova Scotian education administrators all came together in a common cause and that was to try to get this government to listen. They came together as a group because they felt that if they could work together to agree on what should happen in this province, in response to the White Paper, that just maybe the Minister of Education might take out the ear-plug for five minutes and listen to what is being said by these four groups. Thus far, there has been no indication by this minister that he is willing to pay the least bit of attention to what these people are saying that is happening and should happen in education and that is a shame.
The minister has not produced any documentation, none that shows that he can save $6 million or $11 million, it depends on which one he is going to go with. We have no documentation, we can't find out how it has been calculated, we can't find out exactly how this is going to be better for the kids.
The one thing that is sort of missing in this whole thing is the students, you know, you say to yourself yes, the government is so intent on saving money but what about the students. How are they going to be affected? What is this going to do for them? There is some advantage to amalgamations, obviously, but there are some disadvantages when you get too large and you get too ridiculous. You can go from one extreme to the other and that is what this government is doing. The minister says, well, we had to introduce a bill because we gave that early retirement and so we have to do something for a small board like Guysborough. I don't have any difficulty with this government dealing with the problem they have in Guysborough but why are you going to affect the kids in Kings County and Annapolis County and Digby County and everywhere else because you have a problem in Guysborough County?
Now, that says to me that minister is saying that we are going to ask everybody else to be affected because I have a problem in Guysborough County. I find that very strange. If you have a problem in Guysborough County and maybe that area is small, maybe that board needs to be amalgamated, maybe there is an arrangement that could be made with a board next door and you can solve that problem. Guysborough wouldn't go broke and you then wouldn't upset every other board in the province.
Now Halifax has indicated that maybe it is not what the five or seven that government is suggesting. Maybe it is 12. If the government had done this right from the beginning and what the government did was put together a White Paper and said, here are your options. Never mind allowing the communities to develop their options or never mind allowing the communities to put forward a position that, lo and behold, might work better than the government saying, this is what is best for you.
So the minister has not allowed the kind of proper consultation to go on and is not addressing what is really happening in education or the problems we are having in education. He is not addressing those at all, but comes along with a bill that says that he, with his Cabinet colleagues, can annex the whole or any part of a school district. It does not even say he has to annex it all, but that he can take pieces of one and put it together with pieces of another. He can do this. This legislation will allow him to do this and he does not even have to tell us how many boards he is going to end up with. He has not told us.
Why the rush? Well, if the rush is for Guysborough, then why don't we deal with Guysborough and allow the rest of the province to put together a plan, one that, first of all, has at the top, students. It is not what it is all about. This, what the minister is talking about, has at the top, finances, and we are going to start with the premise that we are going to save money, but I have not seen any piece of paper when it talks about the quality of education and improving education for young people. That is what we should be all about. How are we going to allow our young people opportunities in education and to ensure that there is some accountability in the educational system and end up with the kind of quality education I think we all want?
Now the minister has not addressed the issue of accountability, not at all. This does nothing to do that. The Teachers Union says that they do not believe that five or seven boards is a move that would centralize school board authority away from local interest and local communities. They think by making it five or seven boards, and I agree with them, that you are taking it away from the community and you are taking it away from local interest groups.
I think when you go in rural areas, it is fine and this government does not seem to understand. Whether it is the amalgamation that is happening with the municipalities or this amalgamation, there is a difference between urban areas of this province and rural areas. For so long, we have had a lot of uniqueness in the rural areas and those that choose to live there choose to live there because of the quality of life, maybe it is the educational opportunity, maybe it is the quietness, whatever. Those who choose to live in the urban area choose it for whatever reason.
What this government has decided is that it does not matter whether you live in a rural area or an urban area, you are going to be lumped in with the same and we will see that here in metro when they end up with one school board, whether they are serving Musquodoboit Valley or the Eastern Shore or downtown Halifax.
So we are not convinced, in our caucus, and I don't think any of the four groups that I mentioned earlier, whether it be the home and school association and I don't believe this government has paid enough attention to the home and school associations in this province. They have worked very hard over the years and done a lot of good work in the schools, for education. I don't believe this government is listening or allowing them the kind of participation or giving them the kind of recognition they should give them because they automatically think that school councils, and they haven't said whether or not the home and school federation could be the starting point.
I happen to believe that the home and school associations could very well be the starting point. There is nothing wrong when the minister says that he wants more parent involvement and we have to find a way to get more parents involved in the education system. There is absolutely nothing wrong with getting more parents involved or more students involved in the education system. But what is going to be left of the system after this minister destroys it? That is what is happening, as he reduces the funding. Cuts are happening this year to school boards, there are going to be additional layoffs and there is not even enough money to handle a request for emergency funding that is around the province that is dealing with environmental issues, all kinds of emergency issues and this government is not even funding that to the level that it should be. So we are going to have more layoffs, we are going to end up with class sizes of 40, and with teachers with no support, no EAs to support them for those students that have special needs; and this government continues to make those cuts.
What is happening, does anyone talk, does the minister talk about what is happening in the classrooms, about what is happening with education and education opportunities in this province? I have not heard a word. Well, if he is talking to them, he is not talking to the same people that I am talking to because the people I am talking to are telling me that with the cuts that have been made and the way this government seems to pay very little attention to the special education component and not funding it properly, that we have so many kids - you know in Kings County, Mr. Speaker, this year, and I will bet it is true in every school board across the province, they have had more suspensions in this last year, it has tripled, and maybe even larger, but they had tripled the last time I checked. You have to ask yourself, why are we having all the suspensions? Well, I will tell you why we are having all the suspensions, because those students who have learning difficulties and used to get some additional help, when there was funding, are not getting that help anymore, so those students are getting into trouble.
So what does the school system do? They suspend them. But what does that do for that student in the long term? It does nothing for that student in the long term. Should we be proud in this province because of this Minister of Education's policies, that more students than ever before are being suspended? I would not be very proud of that and I know they are not proud of it in Kings County and I am sure they are not proud of it around the province. But you have to analyze why it is happening and very quickly they tell me why it is happening; there is no support for these young people. This government has to wake up and has to understand that these people who have special needs have to have that additional support. The EAs in that county were cut to about one-third of what was there in hours before. When they gave one-to-one assistance to many of the students in the classroom, many of those people required the one-on-one.
What happened now, with this government's policy? No more one-on-one. What is happening now is many of those students have been suspended. I have had parents call me and say, look, we don't know what to do, our kid has been diagnosed, tested and this is what is required but the school board and the schools say that there are no funds to help your child, no funds. These are hardworking Nova Scotians, men and women who go to work every day to support their families and they are helpless because what this government has done has taken away a tool that was used to allow these students to go through elementary, junior high and high school. They have taken away that tool and I don't believe this government knows how much they have affected the lives of many of the young people in this province. Because this government won't change and because this government continues to reduce funding this year they are going to affect again many of the lives of the young people of this province.
[6:45 p.m.]
I can't imagine any MLA supporting a budget and a government that has that kind of an effect on the young people of this province. What we have is a piece of legislation that the minister says will cut some costs. I haven't had anyone, whether it be from the four groups I described or whether it be from any parents or any school board or any community of this province, not one has come to me and said, that this is a good idea - not one.
Now, I have to say that if you have a piece of legislation and you cannot find one person who is in the system that thinks it is good, you must have to start questioning what in the world is happening. What is happening is a power grab by the Minister of Education. Now he may have the best of intentions, but this power does not give the Honourable John D.S. MacEachern, Minister of Education and Culture the authority. It gives every Minister of Education, present and future, the authority. What this legislation does, if the present minister says, okay, it is going to be seven boards in the province, we could have an election and we could have a new Minister of Education that says no, no, it is not going to be seven, it is going to be one. All he or she has to do is take it to Cabinet and Cabinet approve one and it is one.
I would think an issue like that should at least come before the Legislature. An issue like that affects the lives of a lot of young people in this province, as well as many families, I would expect any government to bring the legislation to the Legislature. This government is not doing that and this government is setting it up so that next year it is seven, the next year after that it could be five, it could be three, it could be two or it could be one. They never have to come back to this Legislature again to do that.
To me, that is not what democracy is all about. We are all elected in 52 ridings in this province to come to this Legislature and debate the changes that are happening. At least the government on the amalgamation of the municipalities, the Minister of Municipal Affairs did not take the approach that, I am bringing in one piece of legislation and I am going to be able to amalgamate whatever areas I want by just taking it to Cabinet. At least she recognized that the way democracy works is you bring each piece in and you allow it to be debated publicly and you allow people to have an opportunity to participate in that debate and you allow them the opportunity to go to the Law Amendments Committee. You allow the process and then at least people have their say.
Then you end up with a piece of legislation that we all have to live with. At least it is a democratic process. This kind of legislation takes away from that democratic process because if she came in, the Minister of Municipal Affairs, with the same kind of legislation, she could amalgamate any areas of the province without coming here to the Legislature. She could mix and match any way she wants and that is what this minister can do. He can mix and match any way he wants and none of us the opportunity to get up and say, look this mix is right or this mix is wrong or that would work better or it wouldn't work better. We won't have that opportunity and to me that is not fair. That is not even reasonable. I think anybody who would vote for this legislation the way that it is written cannot be in full support of the democratic process. I cannot imagine why you would even want to get elected unless you sit in Cabinet because you will not have any say on what happens around the province. You will not have any say at all.
You know, Mr. Speaker, I am sure there will be groups that will come before the Committee on Law Amendments on this bill. I am sure that they will ask for some changes. I think one of the changes that they will ask for, is to maybe see it delayed or see it so that they know exactly that there will be some, at least, accountability when the minister trots into Cabinet and deals with an issue in five minutes and then runs out and how it might affect many of the people around this province.
Can you imagine the busing problems? Mr. Speaker, Kings County is not all that big, but there are many five year olds who get on buses and parents have concerns about stops and they call the (Interruption) Are you okay, Mr. Speaker?
MR. SPEAKER: Carry on.
MR. MOODY: Okay, I thought you were falling out of your Chair, but it is okay.
MR. SPEAKER: No. I am just reading Erskine May, here.
MR. MOODY: Okay. That is good to know that you have now begun to read it. (Laughter)
MR. SPEAKER: I am at Page 141.
MR. MOODY: I am impressed. Getting back to Bill No. 5. I just lost my train of thought for a moment and I apologize for that. Getting back to Bill No. 5, there has to be a process so that the parent of the five year old in Kingston, Nova Scotia does not have to call the school board member in Shelburne who is chairman of the transportation committee to see if that stop can be changed because of a certain circumstance. Those circumstances happen all the time of where stops change and where it is a dangerous section or whatever.
So as we get so large and as we take away that personal touch that I think that is needed, I think this government is going to change the way that this whole province thinks. You know, we have had a nice province. We have a lot of nice communities in this province. People take pride and I know that people in Kings County take pride, as well as they do in Annapolis or as well as they do in Lunenburg, but how are you going to take pride in your county when you are a part of a great big region? I find that people do not take the same interest when it grows so large that no longer can you relate to your local area and that is what this government is doing. They do not want people to relate to their local area.
I honestly believe that this piece of legislation will have a negative effect on education in this province. People will not get a same level of service. They will not get the same personal level of service as they have had in the past. What can they do about it? They cannot do anything about it. I know that this minister has said, that everybody on the present boards are going to be there until the next election, at least nine months before the election, ". . . the Governor in Council may determine the minimum and maximum number of members on the school board after the next election of school board members.".
Here we have, if we have Hants, Kings, Annapolis, Digby, Yarmouth, Shelburne, Queens and Lunenburg in this one proposal were going to have a hundred and some people sitting around the school board meetings. Now that doesn't make a lot of sense and I don't know how that is going to work. You know how much opportunity you get to speak in here with 52, can you imagine sitting around with over 100 and how much opportunity you are going to get to speak or how much input you are going to have?
The minister says that we will only allow that to happen until the next election and then we will reduce the numbers. Now we don't know what the numbers are going to be so we don't know in Kings County whether we are going to have 1, 2, 3, 4 (Interruption) I am not. It took us a long time to get an elected representative to represent the small Town of Berwick because the people in Berwick felt, initially, when we had part-elected school boards and part-appointed, they didn't have a lone representative from the Town of Berwick, they felt because they are a unique little town, that the town should have at least one representative on the school board.
Under this system, that little Town of Berwick isn't going to have anybody to represent them on the school board. They are going to be lumped in with a whole larger group of people. We don't even know in Kings County whether we might get two people on the elected school board. We have two people from Kings County on the regional health board and neither of them from the western end, both of them from the eastern end. Now what kind of representation are we going to have on this new board? Will it be distributed so that people will be - will there be less than there will be MLAs? Now we all know, in Kings County, we have 3 MLAs, but you may not even have 3 school board members. Now, can you imagine how local that representation is going to be? If you have 1 board in Cape Breton County and you have 12 members, can you imagine what representation you are going to have? It just doesn't make sense.
I hope that at some point this government will understand that by forcing 5 or 7 boards on this province without at least looking at Halifax's proposal of 12, which they say makes it difficult but at least they think it might be workable, if this government is bound and determined to reduce the number of boards in this province, why wouldn't they at least allow others to make a presentation such as the Halifax District School Board did on 12? The 12 would allow you 3 boards in Cape Breton, not 1, which would, to me, be much more reasonable than 1. At least in the Valley, we wouldn't run all the way from Hants County around to Lunenburg County, we would end up with Hants West, Kings and Annapolis; difficult, but more reasonable, and one that I think people could live with.
They are saying in the southwest you would have Digby, Clare-Argyle, Yarmouth and Shelburne; not a bad combination. They are even allowing Queens and Lunenburg to have their own, or they could join. We would have Metro Halifax County, we would have Cumberland and Pictou and Colchester-East Hants, and it would remain the same. There are other options out there for the government, but they are not being considered and I think this government has to take that into consideration.
I think the one area, the Acadian francophone one, is probably one area that we would probably all agree on. That one board, even though there are distances, there may be some rationale for one such board in the province. Again, that covers a lot of area, but that might work, I haven't heard anyone say to me that that isn't a good idea.
[7:00 p.m.]
I know, in Kings County, we have francophone schools and I guess the Charter of Rights would allow French, if someone's first language is French and where numbers warrant it then you are going to end up with a French language school. I think that those have grown and I think that because we are a province that has a lot of DND, that we get a lot of parents, and in our area, it is Greenwood where a lot of francophones get stationed and their parents' first language is French and they speak French at home and so there is an opportunity for a school and there is a school but it is run by the Kings County District School Board. I think there is some merit in tying these boards together because of their common interest. I think, I don't know if again there would be all that much savings because of the distance between them but I do believe that because of the numbers that it may warrant having one board.
I am just about finished, Mr. Speaker, but I want to say that, obviously, I won't be supporting this bill. I am disappointed that the government continues to make the kind of educational cuts that it is making to the young people of this province. I think, as every member in here would say, the young people of our province are the future of our province. An investment in our young people is a good investment in the future. This government is not making that kind of a commitment, it is not making that kind of investment in education and what it is doing is actually taking away from the young people's opportunities.
I heard it said that even though this government has claimed that they can take the money out of the system and not hurt the system they cannot produce any facts or any documentation that says that with less money there are a better opportunities for young people, that is just not happening. Anybody who was a teacher knows that when you get 40 in a classroom and you get students with special needs and you have no support, that you can't provide better education. There is nobody more important in the whole system than the classroom teacher but when the class size gets beyond a certain size the teacher has difficulty in providing that quality of education that should be provided.
I will be opposing this piece of legislation basically because I think it infringes upon my rights as an MLA that the government is going to make the decision behind closed doors, down in Cabinet on how many school boards are going to be in this province and where. It gives the government the power to do that at any time without any input from any member of the Legislature and I am also going to oppose it on the basis that if we are going to have amalgamation it should be spelled out just exactly what is going to be amalgamated and where and what the cost-savings are and what the benefits are to the students. I have seen nothing of that in this piece of legislation, it has to be one of the worst pieces of legislation I have seen here for a long time and it is certainly one that I will be opposing.
MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Kings North.
MR. GEORGE ARCHIBALD: It is my opportunity to stand in my place and what a pleasure it is to have the opportunity to stand here and do my best to represent the views of the people for Kings North and discuss this bill, An Act to Amend Chapter 6 of the Acts of 1991, the School Boards Act. I guess the crux of the Act indicates that the minister has the power by order to, Clause 1, Section 8A(1)(a), "amalgamate the school board with any other board; (b) annex the whole or any part of a school district to another . . .". We are going to cross county lines, if we wish. We are going to put counties together, pretty much whatever whim the Minister of Education may take at any given time.
Clause 1, Section 8A(2) says, "The Governor in Council may determine the minimum and maximum number of members of the school board . . .". You see, it is all power to the elected Cabinet of this province. That flies in the face of everything that the Education Horizons paper talked about. Now, if I could review a couple of things in the Education Horizons, because it is very topical and it is very close to this bill. This Education Horizons is one of those things that it does not matter what your point of view is, I think your aims, dreams, ambitions can be filled in whole or in part by reading this book, because this book does not say anything about the individual teacher, student, parent, board, on-site management, off-site management, site-based management or anything else that is really objectionable. It is one of those warm and fuzzy kinds of papers that has come forward.
You can see many of the musings of the Minister of Education in this. It is all pleasant, nothing particularly objectionable but not a whole lot of down to earth practical substance that you can grab hold of and say, look, this is what it means, this is what it does not mean. Because with this, if I may read a little from it, says, "Students must take more responsibility for their learning, including regular attendance and demonstrating respect for the rights of others and a willingness to learn.".
Mr. Speaker, I ask you in all honesty and sincerity, who can argue with that? Further, "Students must be given a greater role in the education system through involvement in decision-making and participation on school councils.". Well, one of the things you notice if you go to a school in Nova Scotia today, as compared to 10 or 15 or 20 or 30 or 40 years ago when we were all students - and at some point in the last 40 years we were all in school, some even teaching, others of us trying to learn. The students have changed a great deal over the years. When I went to school in Halifax, I think one of the main requirements was a shirt, a necktie and a pair a pants with a press in them and shiny shoes. Over the years that has changed, so when you go to the schools today physically the youngsters look different. They can wear sneakers, Levis, a T-shirt and some even have a whisker or two. But there is more to the students than that. It is not just the physical thing that has changed in the school, Mr. Speaker, it is the knowledge and the experience and the expectation that the students have. So things have evolved, things have changed and students do want a greater role in the system and they should have more responsibility for their learning.
On the other hand and at the same time, some students, Mr. Speaker, have decided that discipline does not include them in the classroom. Now on Monday of this week, I met a person who has been teaching school for many years and at the present time he is a substitute teacher. He was called and notified. Would you come and teach for three days this week? We have an opening. He said, no, I don't feel up to it because the discipline in that class is beyond what I can do, I cannot cope with the attitude of some of the students. This is a very serious matter, discipline in our schools. I don't see exactly any recommendations to talk about correcting the discipline.
Now on the Human Resources Committee that is chaired by the honourable member for Lunenburg, last winter, Principal Gillis from Cape Breton came and talked to us about discipline in schools. What he has done is spearheaded an amalgamation, for discipline purposes, of three high schools in his area. They have segregated one classroom in his school and youngsters in school, students, are sent to that classroom for the day and there is one teacher responsible for these eight students. The students can be there for an offence from wearing a hat in school to throwing a rock through a school bus window and anything in between.
One of the things that Mr. Gillis pointed out was they rarely ever go back to that classroom again. They spend a week in the classroom and they have study carrels for each, with sidewalls so their desk is facing the wall, their books are beside them and any problem they have scholastically, the home room teacher is there to help in all subjects. If the problem is mathematics and he happens not to be strong on calculus or statistics, then he can call in the math teacher for that period of time, or history or English or French. Whatever the student needs, he is given that instruction in that room. The student eats his lunch in that room for that week. The student uses the separate washroom facilities available to that room.
In short, that student has no contact with any other students in the school during school hours. This is punishment for the student but it also, according to Mr. Gillis, teaches some of these students that they are not incapable of learning. Sometimes it is the first time the student has had individual attention from a teacher, or even an adult, in some long period of time. Just the interest shown by that teacher is sometimes enough for that student to say, by golly, I am not the numskull that people have been telling me, I am capable of learning. Some of the students who have been in that detention room have suddenly decided that they want to learn, to have an opportunity, to get ahead.
You know, more schools should be following the example of Mr. Gillis' experiment that they spearheaded. The Chairman of the Human Resources Committee sent a summary of that to all district school boards throughout Nova Scotia and I hope as many principals as possible have had the opportunity to at least be exposed to what they are trying in the Sydney area because discipline in the schools today is very hard to maintain. But it is a priority that cannot be overlooked because if you have one student who decides the rules are going to be made by themselves, it is very difficult for the teacher to maintain order in the classroom and it is difficult for the other students to learn.
Now this paper by the Minister of Education certainly indicates that discipline is a concern, but it is more than a concern, according to many people. It is becoming even more of a concern because the numbers of students in our classrooms are becoming more and more, year by year, particularly this year when the funding for schools across Nova Scotia has been drastically reduced and classrooms have become larger because the students have to be taught by fewer teachers.
Now the parents in this article by the Minister of Education, Education Horizons, the parents should provide support for their children in the education system. Look, is there anybody that does not agree with that statement because it is true, they should. First they should help the children prepare for learning by providing the needs of discipline and values and second, become partners in school decision-making. I have been involved in the home and school association at Aldershot Elementary School and at Cornwallis District High School and during that time, particularly at Aldershot, we, as parents, organized the development of a school playground. The teachers organized chicken barbecues, spring flings and spring fairs so that they could purchase computers for the students.
[7:15 p.m.]
The parents were involved, but I want you to know, Mr. Minister, very often it was the same parents I would see at the home and school meeting. It was the same parents I would see helping to organize the school lunch program. It was the same parents I would see in the school yard the two days that we set aside to put up the new swing sets and gymnastic equipment. It was the same parents I saw helping the teachers who were raising money to purchase computers for the students.
So, these words ring hollow. The Minister of Education says parents should provide support, well, sure they should, but what is he going to do if it continues the way it has in the past when a few parents carry the load for the rest? What is the minister doing that is practical? Does the minister live in a little dream world and say, this is the way things should be, so I am going to snap my fingers, this is the way they will be.
These things are great, but if they are not attainable then why on earth doesn't the minister deal with the reality that we are facing today. One of the realities is that all parents cannot provide the support for their children in the system. Many parents are single parents, many parents are looking after two or three jobs, some have just been laid off. There are pressures on the family today that were not there 50 years, 20 years and even 10 years ago.
There are other children at home and some of the other children are creating thoughts and stresses within the family. Parents have a difficult time today in many cases. Simply because the minister says they should provide the support doesn't mean they are going to. Parents sometimes have trouble disciplining their children themselves. Sometimes the values of the parents are a little bit different than what the school wants to see as values. Some of their values are different than what the minister indicates they ought to be. Just because the minister wants the parents to take part in the schools, does that mean that the parents are equipped and can.
There is a section on teachers. They need to be role models of lifelong learning by periodically updating their subject knowledge, teaching and technology skills. I know for a fact and you know for a fact that the teachers are doing that. They are always trying to upgrade their knowledge and they are always trying to bring up their technology skills, for the most part. Just as the MLAs and just as the passengers going down the road in the bus, we are all different, we are all individuals and we all have different goals, aspirations and desires.
Teachers must have every opportunity for continuous learning for professional development. Well, I think that is up to the Department of Education, it is up to the school boards and it is up to the teachers themselves. What is wrong with that? Thirdly, teachers are the closest to students in the school system. They should be part of the decision-making as participants on school councils. Finally, teachers should regularly communicate with students and their parents about expectations in progress. You know, one of my favourite days at school was always the parent-teacher day and you make your appointment and you go in and you sit down. It was great when your child was making 85 in Math and you went in to see the Math teacher. Well, that was probably one the nicest days you have all week. But, then if you happen to go down to English or French and your child isn't a master in English, French or some other subject, I mean that is not such a great day. I think at the present time, schools and teachers are sending the note home two or three times a year, sometimes more often, that they want to have a parent-teacher meeting. Sit down and discuss, even if your child is the brightest kid in the world and doing so well.
You know, it is nice to go and hear from the teacher first hand what a marvellous child you have and how great things must be at home. It also gives the opportunity for us when your child is not doing well in his subject to go ask the teacher what is the problem. It gives the opportunity for the teacher to say look, I am available at lunch hour, I am available after school, I am available before school to help your child with a little extra tutoring; there is a problem and I think we can overcome it.
So this is one of the areas that I cannot argue with. I just cannot argue with a lot of the things in this White Paper. What has this to do with the bill?
MR. SPEAKER: That is just what I have been asking myself during the last 10 minutes.
MR. ARCHIBALD: Because one of the things you have got to read when you read the bill, is bear in mind this White Paper or whatever you call it, White Paper on Restructuring the Education System.
This is the White Paper and somewhere over this one-page bill, that and the two of them you would sort of think they just fit together like your hand and your glove, but I am afraid, Mr. Speaker, they do not. They fit together like this. So all of the good and positive suggestions that we have heard do not bear fruit in this bill because this bill has absolutely nothing to do with helping our students get a better education. This bill has everything to do with giving the Minister of Education the unilateral power to decide how many school boards we have, where we are going to have them, how many school board members there are going to be, what size. You know, the minister has the ultimate authority.
The minister the other day, when I was a little critical, he jumped up and said, I want you to know that Kings County, Hants West and Annapolis have all said, we are going to work together. Well, you know, that is great. If the Kings, Hants, and Annapolis boards had suddenly one night, simultaneously, just jumped and woke up out of a deep sleep and the light bulb came on and they said, look, and three of them simultaneously called the Minister of Education on the phone and said, we want to get together. You see, that would be credible. But what it is, is when you get a gun to your head and you get a map drawn, well, I should not say that, when you get a map like this in front of you that says, school board number five will be the Valley with West Hants, Annapolis, Digby and Kings. That is quite a large board. Or you get the other proposal that woofed it all the way in to even a bigger area, I think it took in Yarmouth and number four, yeah, here you go.
When you get a call and you read this White Paper when the school boards in the Valley looked at the map, Mr. Speaker, as I know you looked at it and said the Valley Southwest School Board District No. 4 concerning Hants West, Annapolis, Kings, Digby, Shelburne, Yarmouth, Lunenburg, Queens, Clare-Argyle, the anglophone part of that. The entire half, even more than half of the mainland, it is a big area. You are going to be one school board. Well, don't you think that the ones in the Valley, West Hants, Kings and Annapolis would have said, jumpin' Christmas, what are we going to do, we had better get on the phone and make a proposal that is better than what he is making? Of course they did.
Kings District School Board did not say, we want to join with West Hants and Annapolis because of any burning desire to have a larger school board. They said, we better join with them or else the minister is going to put us in with Clare-Argyle, Queens, Lunenburg, Yarmouth, Shelburne, Digby, Annapolis and West Hants. That is so unmanageable, it would be so difficult to have a district like that, that it would be impossible for the school board to function. I know that. The school board knew that. Why couldn't the Minister of Education figure that out? It is a huge area. You would have to pack your lunch if you were going to try to drive around it and if you left in the afternoon you would have to take your sleeping bag. The distance is so great you can't make it between meals.
So the Kings District made a proposal and the minister might or might not accept it, I don't know. It is frustrating as a member of the Legislature to read a paper, Education Horizons, to have so much easy listening, sort of. You hear the radio stations playing easy listening. Well, this is easy reading, not a whole lot of controversy but there is not enough substance, everything is a little bit wishy-washy.
Little wonder parents, school boards, and teachers are scratching their heads and saying what is the real goal of the Minister of Education? First it was to save the $11 million and that has sort of become wishy-washy now because the numbers he was basing his $11 million on were not the budgeted numbers of this year, 1994-95, they were the budgeted numbers of 1993-94 and most of the school boards have already made substantial cuts in their school budgets so that the $11 million is only going to be attainable at tremendous cost-cutting. Already, we have heard from the school board in Colchester-East Hants. They cut $1 million last November from their school budget.
MR. SPEAKER: Excuse me, I think the House had agreed by unanimous consent to adjourn at 7:30 p.m.
MR. ARCHIBALD: Mr. Speaker, I would like to move to adjourn this debate today and report progress and start it at another time.
MR. SPEAKER: Well, I am sure that that opportunity will be afforded to you but the motion for now is that the honourable member moves that we adjourn this debate.
Is it agreed?
It is agreed.
The debate is then adjourned.
The honourable Acting Government House Leader.
HON. SANDRA JOLLY: Mr. Speaker, the hours for tomorrow will be from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. and following the daily routine we will go into Estimates in the Chamber. We will be doing Health and if we should finish Health tomorrow, I think we move on to Education. We will, as well, have the Law Amendments Committee meeting in the Red Room and I believe that starts at 9:00 a.m. After Estimates, we will move into bills and continue with the debate on Bill No. 5.
MR. SPEAKER: Is there a time proposed at which we would revert from Supply to bills?
MS. JOLLY: We will do the complete four hours on Estimates tomorrow.
Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.
MR. SPEAKER: The motion is that the House do now rise to meet again tomorrow morning at the hour of 8:00 a.m.
The motion is carried.
[The House rose at 7:30 p.m.]
QUESTION NO. 11
By: Mr. George Moody (Kings West)
To: Hon. Ronald Stewart (Minister of Health)
(1) I want to know, as does Mr. David Webster of Kentville, Nova Scotia, why the present Liberal Government did not include an opt-out clause under the new seniors' Pharmacare Program? I, along with Mr. Webster, want to know where the monies accumulated by the new seniors' Pharmacare Program will be depositied? Who will be deciding where these monies will be allocated?
QUESTION NO. 12
By: Mr. Terence Donahoe (Leader of the Opposition)
To: Hon. William Gillis (Minister of Justice)
(1) I want to know, as does Mr. Bob Ritchie of New Minas, Nova Scotia, will this government make forceful representations to the federal Government of Canada to ensure that restitution to the victims of crime be a compulsory part of a convicted criminal's sentence?
QUESTION NO. 13
By: Mr. George Moody (Kings West)
To: Hon. Ronald Stewart (Minister of Health)
(1) I want to know, as does Mr. Bob Ritchie of New Minas, Nova Scotia, if this government is planning to discontinue the funding of abortions under MSI?
