ORAL QUESTIONS

GUY PAUL MORIN

Mrs Morin today delivered a letter to the Premier which concludes by stating, "Guy Paul was exonerated on January 23, 1995, but in the eyes of the people of Ontario and Canada, this doesn't right the wrongs done by incompetent public servants and government officials to Guy Paul and his family."

It is now clear that you are in a conflict of interest. Whatever excuses you may offer to explain away the delays of an inquiry cannot now have any credibility. As the government's top legal adviser you are on the one hand a defendant in a lawsuit for compensation and on the other you are mandated to establish a public inquiry on the same set of facts, which facts may serve to increase compensation. As the chief law officer for the province you are bound to act ethically. Minister, you are in a conflict of interest.

My question is this: In view of this conflict, will you now authorize Justice Gold to completely and independently establish the public inquiry which has been ordered?

Some 16 months later, on May 28, 1996, you told this House you are still working with Justice Gold and taking his advice. My question is this: Has Justice Gold changed his mind, after 16 months, about establishing a public inquiry as expeditiously as possible? If so, will you tell us why he has been supporting delays in establishing the inquiry?

1410

RENT REGULATION

I ask the minister today, is there one thing in this tenant "rejection" package which actually protects tenants in this province?

We're going to put before the public over the summer a consultation paper that provides a balance between tenants' rights and landlords' rights to get a reasonable return on their investment. At the present time there's absolutely no fairness in the system, and we intend to bring fairness to it.

The minister has decided to give away all the enforcement of standards to municipalities. Municipalities will charge user fees, municipalities will get no extra money from the government to enforce those standards and the access to the courts is going to be cut off.

Minister, agree at least very clearly that the promise you made in your riding to be elected and the promise the Premier made in the constituency of York South, that rents would be lowered, was broken in the consultation position paper you produced today.

Rather than deal with the housing shortage, none of the factors that are really causing the problems with rental stock have been addressed in this proposal today. Instead we will see as people move -- some 25% of apartments get vacated each year -- the end of rent controls. Minister, for the sake of the integrity of this House and for your own integrity, admit today that rent controls effectively have ended in this province. This is what you've said in the consultation paper and this is what we need to discuss over the summer.

We have put this consultation together after major discussions with landlords' groups and tenants' groups. We've consulted with tenants, we've consulted with landlords and we know we've got a system that is balanced, better than what is there now. As we continue to go on I know we'll improve it, and we intend to have the standing committee go out to the public this summer and we'll bring in legislation this fall.

My question is for the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. Your package means the end of rent control. You want landlords to be able to jack up the rent when a tenant moves out, you want landlords to get a bigger rent increase for sitting tenants as well and you've removed rent controls entirely for new buildings. Are you saying that rents aren't high enough? Is that your point?

We know that under the present formula the NDP brought in, right now the maximum rents in many cases are higher than the market rents, so if you wanted a system that put rents up higher than they should be, then you should keep your system.

Interjections.

The system we're bringing forward is a very balanced system that has been negotiated between landlords and tenants. We want to put it on the street to make sure we get further input, and we'll do that.

Tenants move a lot. In fact, your own study shows that more than two thirds of tenants move at least once every five years. This means that more than two thirds of tenants will face an unregulated rent increase within the next five years. You don't have to look very far down the road to see that means the end of rent control. Why don't you just come right out and say to people that you want rents to be higher, that that's your real goal here? Why don't you just come out and say it?

What guarantees have landlords given you that they will build affordable rental housing as a result of the end of rent control that you've announced today? What guarantee?

The member of the opposition is right that rent control alone is not going to entice the industry back. It's one of the issues. One of the other issues is the unfairness in the tax system, and why the city of Toronto, which buys the buttons on Save Rent Control, charges tenants four times the amount of tax that they do for a single-family home is a mystery to me. So if we address the tax issue, if we address a number of other issues, we're confident that the industry will come back and build apartment buildings once again.

1420

Minister, will you admit that the only incentive you've given to the private sector, the only incentive here, is the incentive to make big profits by getting rid of their tenants, and that the end of rent control won't guarantee a single unit of new affordable housing? We've got no guarantee.

We know that the industry is anxious to get out there and build when they can be assured they'll get a reasonable return on their investment, and if we make the changes we're planning to make, we know they're going to get out there and build, something they would never do under your legislation.

Minister, I'm going to send over to you three election leaflets put out by the member for High Park-Swansea, the member for Eglinton and your candidate in York South. They say things like, "Mike Harris will strengthen rent controls, not cancel them," "Rent controls will remain," and "Mike Harris will maintain controls for all tenants in rental units."

Minister, you are scrapping rent controls. The whole thrust of your policy is to increase rents, and you can't guarantee that a single unit of affordable housing will be built to compensate. Will you admit that you have broken the promise made by your colleagues to tenants? Will you admit that you've broken a promise?

I can tell you that in any area where there is a large vacancy rate, landlords are offering incentives for tenants to sign two-year leases. In Ottawa, for example, they're offering free televisions or free microwaves to sign a two-year lease. Why? Because there is supply and there is competition. Without supply and without competition, tenants are trapped. They were trapped under your system; they'll be let free under ours.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS

Minister, are you going to clarify the confusion regarding this poorly conceived idea? Answer the question of how you're going to ensure seniors are informed that they have to apply. How are you going to justify that fees will vary from community to community and pharmacy to pharmacy? How are you going to deal with the compliance problems that people in long-term-care facilities, sick seniors, are going to face and those people with mental disability who are trying to cope in our community? How are you going to tell all of those people that you've solved the problems, the challenges that you've identified, when you bring in the new user fees that you promised during the election you would not bring in?

Secondly, user fees are illegal in Canada under the Canada Health Act. If the copayments, for example, that are in every other province in Canada, including provinces run by four Liberal premiers, were illegal for some reason under the Canada Health Act, then I expect Mr Dingwall and Mr Chrétien would be clawing back those provinces for illegal user fees. That is not happening. These are not user fees and in fact they are the lowest copayments on any drug plan in Canada, the envy of all Canadians. We're sorting through the technical difficulties, keeping in mind that Ontario is not breaking new ground with this program; we're simply catching up to nine other provinces who have gone through all of these problems and solved them to the satisfaction of the people of their provinces.

I don't understand why you are hell-bent for putting in these new user fees. These user fees are going to affect sick seniors, sick children, disabled children, people who are suffering from mental disability. Will you confirm in this House today that you are planning to waive the user fees for recovering drug addicts on methadone? And if you are, how do you justify this action to people who are coping with mental illness in the community, who have compliance problems and need to take their drugs in order to survive day by day? What do you say to mothers with sick children who need antibiotics and are on social assistance and what do you say to those senior citizens living in long-term-care facilities? How do you tell people where they are supposed to fill in their application forms, and how do you justify waiving a copayment for recovering drug addicts but forcing others to pay the new user fees? Stand in this House today and answer those questions and forget your silly rhetoric.

I admit I've not raised this point very often, but my blood was boiling when Sheila Copps was running around this province saying Mike Harris and Jim Wilson cut health care. Nothing could be further from the truth. All of the facts in this House and in this government are contrary to what the honourable member and her party, at the federal level anyway, have been saying and she's been saying around this province too.

1430

With respect to the implementation concerns the honourable member has, I have had the opportunity to discuss this with other health ministers in Canada, and we've got a lot of good ideas from those nine other provinces that have gone through this. Our plan is still the most generous plan in Canada. We are able, by having everybody pay a little bit in the copayment, to expand the program to 140,000 working poor families in addition to those that are getting help with their drug costs today. It's a good-news item.

As seniors' minister I met recently with CARP, the Canadian Association of Retired Persons, and with the seniors' consumers association's Jane Leitch. They didn't even mention this issue, I say to the honourable member, because seniors in this province, in the spirit of generosity and in recognition of the federal government cuts and in wanting to fully preserve the Ontario drug benefit program, don't mind paying a few dollars to be generous to their fellow citizens, expand the program and save the program from your federal cousin's cuts. That's the generosity of spirit of the seniors in this province, and that's being expressed by their groups.

YOUNG OFFENDERS

Following these incidents, apparently these young people were isolated for varying periods of time. At least one of those young people who was put in solitary confinement says he was not allowed phone calls until he was due in court some days later. I have been told that this individual appeared in court with bruises to his face and cuts to the inside of his mouth which he claimed to his lawyer, his parent and the child advocate were caused by a beating at the hands of correctional staff at Middlesex.

Minister, these are additional incidents of young people allegedly being assaulted while in the care of your ministry. We know these are young people who have been charged with crimes; that's why they're incarcerated. But we're also talking about people who have basic human rights in Ontario in 1996. I would remind you that both the Young Offenders Act and the Ministry of Correctional Services Act forbid corporal punishment of young people.

It's absolutely outrageous that this situation continues. It's your responsibility as the minister to ensure that young people are safe and secure while in the care of your ministry, that they are not mistreated and abused by anyone, especially correctional staff. If you and your office had taken the allegations of abuse seriously when they were first raised by the mother who called your office, if you had read your briefing note of March 7 and taken account of the concerns about safety, it may well be that these other young persons would not have experienced the abuse that they claim occurred.

Minister, won't you finally admit that your inaction on behalf of young people in your care resulted in these additional problems at EMDC?

Are you aware that this young person, who alleges to have been assaulted by staff at Elgin-Middlesex, also felt intimidated by the presence of staff people who had witnessed the beating when he tried to contact the child advocate's office to complain about the incident? This amounts to interference and intimidation, exactly what the child advocate has alleged is endemic at EMDC in her report.

Isn't it true that these additional incidents are included in that child advocate's report? Isn't it true that this is not just one incident that took place on one evening after exceptional circumstances, it is numerous allegations of assault that took place over weeks and, for all we know, over months and possibly even years?

COURT DOCUMENTS

What has now changed is that the original police briefs will be held in the integrated case management unit at the courthouses. There's no longer going to be a need to make copies of those briefs. There will no longer be a need to transport those briefs back and forth. This then will free up crown attorney time and police time and will result in savings to the justice system so that we can focus on prosecuting serious crime and ensuring that officers are out on the road keeping our communities safe.

Improved efficiency, the elimination of duplication and resulting cost savings are key elements in the ministry's plan to modernize the justice system and make it more accessible, timely and affordable. Our goal is to streamline the justice system and make it less cumbersome, less unwieldy and more available to those who need access to justice.

1440

JUSTICE SYSTEM

You stated in this House in no uncertain terms that criminal prosecutions would not be reduced. In fact on May 13 you stated, "I have no plans to scale back the prosecution of crime in the province of Ontario.... We will not be scaling back prosecutions in this province one iota." Despite your denials and despite the Solicitor General's obvious differing stance on crime, a document by your ministry entitled Draft Screening Directives suggests that you're preparing to do just that. In fact your response just previously indicates that. That documents states: "Increased pressure on criminal courts and reduced resources are causing the ministry to change its prosecutorial screening standard."

Can you confirm that you are considering classifying such offences as death threats, fraud, break and enter as less significant and less deserving of resources, and are you disagreeing with the Solicitor General on the procedures on how to crack down on crime in this province?

I might tell the member about the spousal abuse project that's being set up in North York provincial court, a scheme to deal with spousal assault, to deal with wife assault, to provide counselling, to look at different ways to solve problems.

I might invite the member for Downsview, who thinks she's a very enlightened person -- I think she would become a little more enlightened if she visited the court in her own community, to understand how crime is being dealt with, to understand how communities are being kept safe and to understand how crown attorneys are dealing with the intake of cases so that we don't have a repeat of what her government did to the justice system in this province, when people were allowed to go free because they couldn't prosecute the cases that were before the courts.

YOUNG OFFENDERS

Young people are accusing the management at Elgin-Middlesex of assaulting them, and the management staff in turn say the youth suffered injuries because they assaulted each other. Correctional officers are accusing Elgin-Middlesex managers of ignoring the allegations of assault, and so are parents.

You deliberately refuse to answer any questions and continue to ask us to believe you remained unaware of these allegations for three months. You refuse to take responsibility for these very disturbing series of events that are hanging over your ministry. Minister, you are the one who must be held accountable for this mess. So I ask you very seriously and very directly, which one of the half-dozen investigations that you have set up will be investigating the role you and your political office played in this sad, disgraceful affair?

"...I had briefing sessions on a daily basis with the acting deputy minister.

"The ministry of corrections at the best of times is a challenging ministry in terms of the incident reports, but I feel comfortable with the reports I had on the basis of the efforts I made to try and keep on top of the wide range of issues."

In fact, you've demonstrated the complete opposite. You are not up to the challenge of your ministry. You've shown your incompetence by not knowing about these very disturbing allegations until three months after the fact. You have the gall to say you feel comfortable with the briefings you were receiving, when there was a very serious omission day after day by your most senior official, whom you say with no shame you met with on a daily basis and you're comfortable with those briefings.

Minister, you cannot be the judge and jury of whether you acted appropriately and whether your ministry officials acted appropriately since you've already concluded by making this statement, and frankly many others, that you're quite comfortable with their actions as well as your own. To resolve this issue, Minister, we must put this whole matter before a parliamentary committee. We need to hear from Michael Jordan, the acting deputy minister; we need to hear from your deputy minister, Elaine Todres, and from Neil McKerrell, assistant deputy minister of correctional services -- from your own political staff and, frankly, from you.

Minister, since you do not have the decency to step aside until these investigations are concluded, will you at the very least refer this scandal to a parliamentary committee?

1450

RURAL TELECOMMUNICATIONS

I'm amazed by the number of my constituents who are putting this new industry to work as a method of obtaining up-to-the-minute information on everything from the daily weather forecast to the latest trading prices. It would appear that these advances are rapidly becoming necessary for members of rural communities to stay competitive in the new world markets.

Access to telecommunications would seem to be of great importance to the future economic prospects of rural communities, and I would like to ask the minister what role the Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs is playing in regard to the important rural infrastructure issue.

Of course, technological advancement always has a cost, and this new telecommunications infrastructure will be no exception. Does the Minister of Agriculture intend to provide any funding assistance to increase access to telecommunications and improve the economic activity in rural areas such as Perth?

WATER QUALITY

What we're seeing today, I tell the member and the minister, is a dismantling of a special environmental team that is supposed to be monitoring all progress on the cleanup of the Niagara River, which has many toxic dumps adjacent to it. You are totally dismantling this team, totally undermining the effort of the province of Ontario to protect the drinking and recreational water for the people of Toronto and all of the other communities that get or use the water in Lake Ontario.

Minister, will you not reconsider this decision and re-establish the team that was in place to protect the environment and particularly the drinking and recreational water of all those residents who live on Lake Ontario?

I can say to my colleague across the way that Ontario is showing leadership in a number of issues: many, many issues. In many issues we are the leaders, bringing other provinces together with the federal government to try and solve problems that are beyond just one jurisdiction alone.

SERVICES FOR ABUSED WOMEN

The rape crisis line issued an announcement of their news conference last Friday, and lo and behold, on Monday they received a couple of calls, one from bureaucrats and one from your staff, saying that their funding would be forthcoming. This is after trying to get hold of people and get word on their funding for months. Nothing.

My question is, is this your new way of doing business? Do agencies providing vital services to abused and assaulted women have to call a news conference to get their funding?

Minister, you are gutting the Ontario women's directorate. Now I know why nobody has been answering the phones there. There's hardly anybody left to answer the phones. Your business plan has totally --

Interjections.

Minister, will you tell us today what exactly are your plans for the Ontario women's directorate?

In spite of what the opposition keeps saying to our communities, we continue to fund 97 shelters, 34 sexual assault centres, 27 hospital-based sexual assault treatment centres, 16 male batterer programs, 13 crown offices for victim-witness programs -- expanded to 26, as my colleague the Attorney General announced last week -- four programs in the Solicitor General's agenda expanded to 20 next year.

I don't understand why you continue to perpetuate the image that the Ontario government and the people of Ontario are not out there to support women, because they are. The only person that we ever hear from is you, from your riding in Riverdale, promoting this kind of propaganda and encouraging the people in Barrie and district to have to send out this kind of brochure when in fact they just got $75,000 from the Minister of Health, and quite frankly, like the Minister of Health, most of us are pretty fed up with the fearmongering that you are doing to women across the province of Ontario.

EDUCATION OF INSTITUTIONALIZED CHILDREN

This current year the amount of money involved in section 27 grants to school boards is $68.5 million, and there'll be some 6,505 children serviced under the section 27 grants. We are monitoring that to make sure those services are provided.

JUNIOR KINDERGARTEN

Minister, it appears that you have two sets of rules. On one hand your government is opposed to tax increases, but on the other hand you and your government are instructing certain communities to increase their property taxes even though they can continue the program without being required to do so.

Will you reconsider this decision and will you give the isolate school boards the options of finding the funding without having to increase their taxes?

The provisions under the GLG for isolate board funding are different from those for other boards and there is an attempt, whenever there is a change in funding by the ministry, to make sure that the same circumstances apply to the isolate boards as to the surrounding board areas so that they're on an equal footing and that the residents who are served in an isolate school board are on the same footing as the residents and taxpayers of the surrounding areas. In fact, that is what has been attempted by the ministry; that's the reason why we've had the changes to the funding model that we announced this year. I believe that the purpose of those grants is to make sure there's an equitable funding system and equitable community support by all those boards.

VISITOR

ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT AND CONSULTATION IMPROVEMENT ACT, 1996 / LOI DE 1996 AMÉLIORANT LE PROCESSUS D'ÉVALUATION ENVIRONNEMENTALE ET DE CONSULTATION PUBLIQUE

Deferred vote on the motion for second reading of Bill 76, An Act to improve environmental protection, increase accountability and enshrine public consultation in the Environmental Assessment Act / Projet de loi 76, Loi visant à améliorer la protection de l'environnement, à accroître l'obligation de rendre des comptes et à intégrer la consultation publique à la Loi sur les évaluations environnementales.

The division bells rang from 1505 to 1510.

Ayes

Baird, John R.	Harnick, Charles	Preston, Peter
Barrett, Toby	Hastings, John	Rollins, E.J. Douglas
Bassett, Isabel	Hodgson, Chris	Ross, Lillian
Boushy, Dave	Hudak, Tim	Runciman, Robert W.
Brown, Jim	Jackson, Cameron	Sampson, Rob
Carroll, Jack	Johns, Helen	Saunderson, William
Clement, Tony	Johnson, Bert	Sheehan, Frank
Cunningham, Dianne	Johnson, David	Skarica, Toni
Danford, Harry	Johnson, Ron	Smith, Bruce
DeFaria, Carl	Jordan, W. Leo	Snobelen, John
Doyle, Ed	Kells, Morley	Spina, Joseph
Ecker, Janet	Klees, Frank	Sterling, Norman W.
Elliott, Brenda	Leach, Al	Stewart, R. Gary
Eves, Ernie L.	Marland, Margaret	Tascona, Joseph N.
Fisher, Barbara	Martiniuk, Gerry	Tilson, David
Flaherty, Jim	Maves, Bart	Tsubouchi, David H.
Ford, Douglas B.	Munro, Julia	Turnbull, David
Fox, Gary	Mushinski, Marilyn	Vankoughnet, Bill
Froese, Tom	Newman, Dan	Villeneuve, Noble
Galt, Doug	O'Toole, John	Wettlaufer, Wayne
Gilchrist, Steve	Ouellette, Jerry J.	Wilson, Jim
Grimmett, Bill	Palladini, Al	Witmer, Elizabeth
Guzzo, Garry J.	Parker, John L.	Wood, Bob
Hardeman, Ernie	Pettit, Trevor	Young, Terence H.

The Speaker: All those opposed will please rise one at a time.

Nays

Bartolucci, Rick	Curling, Alvin	McGuinty, Dalton
Bisson, Gilles	Duncan, Dwight	Miclash, Frank
Boyd, Marion	Grandmaître, Bernard	Morin, Gilles E.
Bradley, James J.	Gravelle, Michael	Patten, Richard
Brown, Michael A.	Hampton, Howard	Phillips, Gerry
Caplan, Elinor	Hoy, Pat	Pouliot, Gilles
Castrilli, Annamarie	Kennedy, Gerard	Pupatello, Sandra
Christopherson, David	Kormos, Peter	Ramsay, David
Churley, Marilyn	Kwinter, Monte	Ruprecht, Tony
Cleary, John C.	Lalonde, Jean-Marc	Sergio, Mario
Colle, Mike	Lankin, Frances	Silipo, Tony
Conway, Sean G.	Laughren, Floyd	Wildman, Bud
Cooke, David S.	Marchese, Rosario	Wood, Len
Cordiano, Joseph	Martel, Shelley
Crozier, Bruce	Martin, Tony

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 72; the nays are 43.

The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Shall the bill be ordered for third reading?

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