Madam Speaker: On the proposed motion of the honourable member for St. Norbert (Mr. Laurendeau), Bill 300, The Salvation Army Catherine Booth Bible College Incorporation Amendment Act (Loi modifiant la Loi constituant en corporation le Collège biblique Catherine Booth de l'Armée du Salut), standing in the name of the honourable member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton).

Is there leave to permit the bill to remain standing? [agreed]

Madam Speaker: On the proposed motion of the honourable member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux), Bill 200, The Health Services Insurance Amendment Act (Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'assurance-maladie), standing in the name of the honourable Minister of Northern and Native Affairs (Mr. Praznik).

Is there leave to permit the bill to remain standing? [agreed]

Is there leave to permit the bill to remain standing? [agreed]

Madam Speaker: Bill 202, The Home Care Protection and Consequential Amendments Act (Loi concernant la protection des soins à domicile et apportant des modifications corrélatives).

Mr. George Hickes (Point Douglas): Madam Speaker, I move, seconded by the member for Broadway (Mr. Santos), that the composition of the Standing Committee on Industrial Relations be amended as follows: Elmwood (Mr. Maloway) for Dauphin (Mr. Struthers) for Tuesday, November 5, for 4:30 p.m.

I move, seconded by the member for Broadway, that we rescind the composition of the Standing Committee on Industrial Relations, to be amended as follows: Burrows (Mr. Martindale) for Dauphin (Mr. Struthers) for Tuesday, November 5, for 6:30 p.m.

I move, seconded by the member for Broadway (Mr. Santos, that the composition of the Standing Committee on Industrial Relations be amended as follows: Burrows (Mr. Martindale for Elmwood (Mr. Maloway) for Tuesday, November 5, 6:30 p.m.

I move, seconded by the member for Broadway (Mr. Santos), that the composition of the Standing Committee on Public Utilities and Natural Resources be amended as follows: The Pas (Mr. Lathlin) for Selkirk (Mr. Dewar) for Tuesday, November 5 for 6:30 p.m. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Motions agreed to.

WHEREAS Manitoba is one of only two provinces without an AIDS Strategy; and

WHEREAS Health and Welfare Canada estimated that one in a 1,000 people are HIV positive, and further estimates that by the year 2000, one in four people living in the North will be infected; and

WHEREAS in 1990, two women in Manitoba were diagnosed HIV positive, but by June 1995, that number had increased to 37 which is a percentage increase of well over 1,800 percent over five years; and

WHEREAS despite the rising number of AIDS cases in Manitoba, the number of Manitoba Health staff assigned to deal with AIDS has been reduced from the equivalent of five full-time positions in 1985 to a situation now where two physicians work on the issue part time; and

WHEREAS senior health officials have said that Manitoba's health system has been reduced to the point where "the Ministry of Health lacks the ability to deal with epidemics"; and

WHEREAS there are still widespread misconceptions about AIDS; and

WHEREAS these misconceptions about AIDS are damaging to affected groups and individuals, and hamper education and prevention initiatives by community groups that are currently underway; and

WHEREAS the financial costs associated with treatment for a person infected with HIV/AIDS from diagnosis to death have been estimated in excess of $150,000, but some research estimates that the cost could be as high as $1 million for each person who dies as a result of contracting AIDS when the economic and social costs are factored in; and

WHEREAS there are a number of issues which the Minister's Advisory Committee on AIDS has asked the Minister to deal with including street outreach to vulnerable populations; the impact of AIDS in aboriginal communities, where numbers of infected individuals have been forecasted to reach epidemic proportions; and AIDS within the prison population; and

WHEREAS these issues cannot be adequately addressed without enhanced funding and staff resources; and

WHEREAS there is a strong public interest in developing and implementing an AIDS Strategy for Manitoba immediately which deals with: a) education and prevention, b) care and treatment, and c) research.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba urge the provincial government to consider developing an active partnership with the community to discuss and implement a three-pronged AIDS Strategy immediately dealing with: a) education and prevention, b) care and treatment, and c) research; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that this Assembly urge the provincial government to consider providing adequate funding and staff resources to fight this terrible disease in Manitoba.

Motion presented.

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Ms. McGifford: Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this resolution today. It has been with us for quite some time, and I believe it was in December 1995 that I first submitted the resolution, and because of this I want to begin by noting some small statistical, or large statistical changes to the original resolution. First of all, in Clause 3, I would like to point out that by June 1996, that number had increased to 51 which is a percentage increase of well over 2,500 percent, and further on down in the WHEREAS No. 8 the new cost as estimated is $180,000 as opposed to $150,000.

I would also like to point out that the minister has now produced a document entitled Manitoba's Provincial AIDS Strategy, and I will return to that document towards the end of my presentation.

I want to now add to the facts and concepts presented in the resolution as fuel for the need of a strategy, and I add the following points:

1. One in 10,000 Canadians is living with AIDS; one in 1,000 Canadians is HIV positive.

I want to note here that there is some controversy over when HIV becomes AIDS. There is a table of indicators, and there is a controversy surrounding how many indicators are necessary before an individual is said to have AIDS. This presents some difficulties for women because some of the indicators for women are different from men, and they are not always in the table, but really the point here is that there are 10 times as many individuals in Canada, and presumably in Manitoba there are 10 times as many individuals who are diagnosed HIV positive as have been diagnosed with AIDS, but these individuals will go on to get AIDS and will go on to die from AIDS.

Second fact. Some experts estimate that in Manitoba 1,500 people are HIV positive and do not know it. That is to say, there are 1,500 cases of HIV, but the persons who have it do not know it; health authorities do not know it. These people are living in our province and in many cases may be spreading the disease.

Fact three. AIDS is a women's issue. Women can and do get AIDS and pass it on to their children. Women desperately need education when it comes to AIDS. I was speaking to a public health nurse earlier today who told me that she has heard from many young women who believe that by taking a birth control bill they are also protecting themselves from AIDS, and this is truly shocking and certainly absolutely terrifying. AIDS is increasing three times more quickly among Canadian women than it is among Canadian men, and the point that I want to make here is that AIDS is ceasing to be a disease of gay and bisexual men and is certainly now a disease of women. AIDS takes the lives of more Canadian men than diabetes, kidney disease and chronic lung disease. AIDS is completely preventable, as it is passed only through sharing I.V. drug equipment, receiving tainted blood. It can be passed from a woman to her child while the child is in utero or also through breast milk; and, last, AIDS is passed through unprotected sex. I do not think we need to go into that in a lot of detail right now.

The latest statistics from Manitoba Health on HIV-AIDS, and these are the statistics as of June 30, 1996. The stats come out twice a year, at the end of June and at the end of December. Anyway, the latest statistics show that from June 1, 1985, to June 30, 1996, a total of 530 persons were diagnosed in Manitoba as HIV positive. They show that from January 1, 1996, to June 30, 1996, eight men and seven woman were diagnosed as HIV positive, which is really an incredible increase in the number of HIV-positive women. Again, I want to remind members of the House, and especially the minister, that HIV-positive women are likely to have HIV-positive children and the health consequences are enormous. Not to mention the emotional trauma, the physical suffering, the devastating effects on families, what happens if you are HIV positive is eventually you die and I think dying children have a particular poignancy. It upsets the balance of nature. It is not what we are used to. It certainly is not what we want.

The facts alone I think cry for a major AIDS strategy which includes, as we have said in the resolution, education and prevention, care and treatment and, of course, research, but we need to consider several other aspects of HIV-AIDS which necessitate a really multidimensional and multidirectional approach with regards to an HIV-AIDS strategy. For example, I think most of us recognize the stigma which continues to affect those living with HIV-AIDS, whether this stigma is externally generated or whether it is internally generated, and I know it is both external and internal.

People living with AIDS, or people who are HIV positive, are frequently spoken of as the lepers of the 20th Century. They are often deserted by their families or their real illness is covered up either by themselves or by their families and, therefore, supports from communities and supports from organizations, from groups outside the family, are absolutely essential since the care is not always there within the family. For example, I can remember when I worked in the AIDS community a young woman who was living in Winnipeg with three children, she was HIV positive. She was getting sicker. She refused to tell her family of her real illness, because she was afraid her family would turn their backs on her and desert her. She was forced, therefore, to depend on community AIDS service organizations for emotional support, for child care, for help with housework, for help with buying the groceries, other shopping, cooking and cleaning really for her entire life and for the lives of her children or the care of her children, I suppose, to be more accurate.

I remember a young man who died in a rooming house. His only furniture was a mattress on the floor. He had a couple of boxes for his clothes. He had no telephone. He had little sense of how to access services. He had no help from his family, who lived on a very distant reservation, and as far as I know, the family may not even have known of his illness because this young man, like many others living with HIV-AIDS, was quite ashamed to discuss the state of his health.

I think it is important when we talk about an AIDS strategy for us to remember that HIV-AIDS is a roller-coaster illness, that some days an individual can be extremely healthy and this can be followed by periods of terrible illness and even hospitalization. This makes regular employment for somebody living with HIV-AIDS extremely difficult. It often leads individuals in need of community support regarding advocacy for housing, for social assistance and sometimes with health care providers.

To ask a question--and this is happening with people living with AIDS, AIDS is more and more becoming a chronic disease rather than an illness which kills somebody quickly. So as AIDS more and more becomes a chronic illness, as persons living with HIV-AIDS live longer and as services become harder to access, consider for example the possible effects of Bill 36 on people living with HIV-AIDS.

In circumstances like this, the question of who decides when a person living with HIV or AIDS is no longer employable is extremely important. It is extremely important who decides whether that person still has to apply for 15 jobs every social assistance cycle. Who decides? Especially when an individual may appear very well one day and two days later the individual may be extremely ill and even hospitalized. So it is a very, very important decision who makes these kinds of decisions.

I want to move on from here to the kinds of care that are currently available. I first want to indicate that most AIDS service organizations include either staff or volunteers who are living with HIV-AIDS. Sometimes both staff and volunteers are living with HIV-AIDS. These people give thousands and thousands of volunteer work to public education, to providing care and support, to offering a range of administrative, managerial, policy-making services and also to fund-raising for their community and for the services that they need. Truly in the HIV community, the consumers are often the providers, and it is extremely important to remember not only the model they give to us all or serve for us all, but also the level of expertise existing among the consumers.

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People living with HIV-AIDS really know what they need, really know what they want and absolutely must be consulted at every stage of an AIDS strategy. As to the care that is available, I do not want to speak a lot about the medical care. There is care available from physicians, private physicians and from the Village Clinic. We have excellent HIV-AIDS nurses in Winnipeg, Jocelyn Preston at St. Boniface, Margaret Ormond at the Village Clinic, Anne Russell at the Health Sciences Centre.

There are several centres which offer pre- and post-test counselling. The medical care is available, though my contacts in the community tell me that because the Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae), who is going through the motions of showing interest in AIDS, because he has virtually turned his back on the community, that in Manitoba, and I quote, we are so very, very far behind in equipment, services, drugs, programs, treatments and facilities.

At this point I think it is important for us to salute the dedicated health care professionals and make the point that they cannot get blood out of a stone.

I mentioned the life-saving drug program, which of course has now been cancelled and which was always extraordinarily difficult to access in any case, but I think it is important to make the point that people living in the AIDS community are now quite naturally living in fear of future delistings of very necessary medications and pharmaceuticals.

Currently there are several AIDS service organizations available working in Winnipeg and around the province. There is the AIDS Shelter Coalition of Manitoba which is essentially responsible for creating the Artemis Housing Co-op, providing advocacy work, shelter, income security and, laterally, I understand providing food and clothing.

Pardon me, Madam Speaker. Are you indicating that I have two minutes? Well, I have much more to say than I possibly can in two minutes.

Perhaps in that case what I will do is, I want to briefly turn to Manitoba's provincial AIDS strategy. I want to point out that this AIDS strategy really began when the Krever inquiry was in Winnipeg and made clear that this government's record with regard to HIV-AIDS from 1985 to 1988 had been almost nonexistent. I am shamed by this public revelation the government has had about developing the AIDS strategy.

Now, to comment on the strategy itself, it is like certain hamburgers so thin that it has holes in it. I believe it to be a grand hoax, a public exercise and absolute, pure hypocrisy. When I read the introduction attributed to the minister, the cant and coyness, the utter hypocrisy of this introduction made me feel like J.A. Macdonald was reputed to feel after drinking too much gin.

To illustrate my point, this publication consists of 11.25 pages of text. There is not one full page. There are lots of graphs taking up spaces. Six pages are a prelude to the actual document, and I would say they are a very swaggering prelude. The whole thing is of course couched in politically correct language with proper nods from time to time to those living with HIV-AIDS and to their caregivers.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member's time has expired.

Ms. McGifford: May I ask for leave?

Madam Speaker: Does the honourable member have leave to continue? [agreed]

Ms. McGifford: I thank members of the House for giving me leave to continue.

I was talking about the whole document being couched in politically correct language. The strategy recognizes, as of course it should, that HIV-AIDS can be related to poverty and racism, that AIDS is a social disease insofar as persons living with HIV-AIDS are stigmatized, sometimes viewed as the modern equivalent of lepers, as we have already said.

The strategy apart from its sparsity makes sense. Why would it not? It reflects the views of the persons living with AIDS, their families, their caregivers. It is the condensation of 150 recommendations produced by a round table. It has feedback from 300 key persons and organizations in Manitoba and of course members of the minister's advisory council on AIDS. This strategy reflects the ideas, the recommendations and the experience of persons involved in providing care for those living with AIDS.

I was present at the round table that first met in November 1994 and at some of the subsequent meetings, and I know the research and the work that went into the discussion papers. I remember the minister's staff very carefully researching from provincial jurisdictions across Canada and producing the AIDS strategies in all the other provinces which had already developed their strategies, progressive jurisdictions like B.C. and Saskatchewan and like Ontario used to be, but I know too from being at that round table the skepticism that many persons felt. Many persons at the round table had little faith that anything serious would happen and, personally, I still do, for a paper is just a paper, and who is certain what will become of this paper?

It sounds to me like Manitoba Health is saying, here is the strategy, here is the information, here are the ideas, here are the visions, here is how to do it, indeed, here is how it must be done. The paper speaks of organizations, agencies, regional health authorities and jurisdictions being responsible for planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating their programs without touching on the very simple fact that these very AIDS service agencies in Manitoba will not be running after March 31, 1998, because they are running on federal money. They have never had a cent from this province and there will not be any federal money left after March 31, 1998.

So the big question, Madam Speaker, is, who is going to pay? Where is the money coming from?

Now, the House has already indulged me, and I do not really want to press my luck, but I do want to tell the minister that I look forward to one day eating my words, publicly apologizing, but today, as far as I can see, this AIDS strategy is another broken promise, even worse, I think, because it is setting up the sick and dying, pretending that there really is a plan to provide them with care when indeed, if there is not any money, the care simply is not possible. As far as I am concerned then, this strategy may be politics at its worst, and, quite frankly, I find it disgusting.

With those words, I will take my seat and leave it to the minister.

Madam Speaker: The honourable member for Gimli, with committee changes.

Mr. Edward Helwer (Gimli): Madam Speaker, I move, seconded by the member for La Verendrye (Mr. Sveinson), that the composition of the Standing Committee on Public Utilities and Natural Resources for Wednesday, November 6, at 9 a.m., be amended as follows: the member for Lac du Bonnet (Mr. Praznik) for the member for Portage (Mr. Pallister); the member for Gladstone (Mr. Rocan) for the member for Ste. Rose (Mr. Cummings).

Motion agreed to.

Hon. James McCrae (Minister of Health): Madam Speaker, the honourable member for Osborne (Ms. McGifford) has some significant experience in dealing with issues related to HIV-AIDS, dealing with people involved with this particular terrible disease, and that is acknowledged. Her continuing contribution by way of advocacy is also acknowledged. The resolution put before this House by the honourable member exemplifies that continuing commitment on her part, which is appreciated.

The honourable member quite rightly updated the resolution she has placed before the House, and with respect to the economic impact of HIV-AIDS from diagnosis to death referred to by the honourable member, indeed, the total economic impact may range as high as a million dollars for each person who contracts AIDS when all costs are factored in, that is not to mention the human factor, Madam Speaker.

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The resolution calls for the development of an active partnership with the community to discuss and implement an AIDS strategy, and that process did indeed go forward as set out, to some extent, by the honourable member, culminating in the release of the provincial AIDS strategy on July 4 of this year. That, too, was acknowledged by the honourable member. So certainly the initial comments of the honourable member are appreciated and helpful. The later comments, including those made after the honourable member was given leave by this House to exceed the time allotted to her, were somewhat, in my view, less helpful, nonetheless uttered with all of the right intentions, and so I will attempt not to take any personal offence by the comments made by the honourable member. I say that perhaps also on behalf of all of those people who have been involved in the development of the Manitoba AIDS strategy. The comments made by the honourable member, which were critical near the end of her presentation, could as easily be applied to myself as to all of the other people who were involved in the development of the Provincial AIDS strategy. So on their behalf, if not on my own, I will express regret that the honourable member chose to wind up her comments in the way that she did.

It might be of help to the House if I were to refer to the partnership-building references in the Provincial AIDS Strategy document as follows: When HIV-AIDS first appeared in the mid- 1980s, it became clear that many issues and concerns needed to be addressed. As time passed and the virus and disease became better understood, it was evident that to cope with HIV-AIDS we should need more than just sound scientific or medical knowledge. Manitoba Health responded to the first appearance of HIV-AIDS by introducing the surveillance and monitoring system to determine how HIV was being spread in Manitoba. The department developed initiatives to alert both the general public and target communities. Education programs were also developed for physicians and nurses who would be providing care and support to persons infected and affected by HIV.

These departmental activities were conducted by Manitoba Health staff already devoted to the control of sexually transmitted diseases, since HIV was and is primarily a sexually transmitted disease. Activists in the gay community responded to the threat of HIV by developing innovative education and prevention programs.

In the early 1980s, long before Horace Krever, Manitoba Health funded the Winnipeg Gay/Lesbian clinic which later became the Village Clinic. Recognizing the uniqueness of HIV disease, Manitoba Health established an advisory committee in 1985, again, long before Horace Krever, to address the prevention of HIV infection and other concerns. The committee included representatives from the gay community, the medical community and the department.

Although education and prevention activities were occurring in the gay community, most Manitobans had limited access to information on this new disease. In 1988 and again in 1994, Manitoba Health launched multimedia public awareness campaigns. By 1994, I suggest, Horace Krever was at work, but certainly all of the things that I have referred to so far, Madam Speaker, happened long before Horace Krever. In fact, days after my appointment as Minister of Health in 1993, I was part of the group of ministers in Canada who mandated Horace Krever to do the work that he has been doing. The references to only because of Horace Krever's urgings have certain steps been taken are quite incorrect, and the honourable member knows better than to say that, but she said it anyway. That is the kind of thing that is not helpful in a logical or rational discussion about such a serious issue.

In order to better understand the needs of persons at risk of infection and those already infected, two formal community consultations were conducted in 1989-90. The ad hoc committees on prevention and care and treatment made recommendations, several of which have been implemented.

Prevention and education projects of the past five years have included theatre for youth, peer programs for post-secondary students, outreach to street youth and sex trade workers, and the telephone information line which is still in operation. These projects have been aimed at both the general public and those at greater risk.

To facilitate a more co-ordinated approach to caring for clients in hospital and the community, three nurse co-ordinator positions were established, one each at the Village Clinic, Health Sciences Centre and St. Boniface Hospital, to which again the honourable member for Osborne (Ms. McGifford) referred.

Together, we have accomplished much, Madam Speaker, and to listen to the honourable member, you certainly would not think so. But it is on this success that we must now continue to build. The honourable member suggests nothing has been done and nothing will be done, and I just simply cannot accept that. There are too many people who have been involved in the process thus far for any risk of the honourable member's suggestions--any risk that the honourable member's forecast might somehow come true. There is a shift in the incidence of the disease and the honourable member is aware of that shift. There is a shift in the needs of people at risk and those infected, and the work of the Minister's Advisory Committee on AIDS has been much appreciated by myself and by the department.

Unfortunately for us all, the honourable member's very unkind comments today take no account of the work that has been done and take no account of those other people in our community who are committed to the issues that the honourable member says she is committed to. And I say I do not doubt her commitment, I just have a strong sense that an unkind attitude really does not help in helping us move forward with these things, and that is exactly the kind of attitude that especially people already infected with HIV-AIDS do not need. It is at times like that in their lives when a kinder attitude is something that I believe would be far more helpful and is more likely to get things done, get the kinds of services that they need to them when they need it most. You do not always achieve a co-operative and successful outcome simply by being unkind every time you get an opportunity to discuss an issue.

This is the kind of issue that ought to transcend the kind of cheap partisanship that sometimes characterizes the way we behave ourselves in this Chamber, Madam Speaker, and on behalf of all those who suffer from HIV-AIDS or those in the future who might be in that very unhappy position, I express my regret, and if I may on behalf of this whole House express regret for the positions that are sometimes taken in this place.

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The honourable member in her resolution calls for an AIDS strategy that deals with education and prevention, care and treatment and research. Those are all items that are the framework, the main focus of the AIDS strategy. So I think that makes it clear that there have been people who have been listening to the types of points of view put forward by the honourable member for Osborne (Ms. McGifford).

The goals of the strategy are to reduce the spread of HIV infection, an obvious goal, an obvious thing to attempt to do. Another goal is to provide a continuum of compassionate prevention, care, treatment and support programs for persons at risk of and infected or affected by HIV-AIDS.

Here again the honourable member put forward herself the services that are in place and available today, so that the strategy is indeed something that is an ongoing thing. It is not something that just popped up because the honourable member put down a resolution in this Legislature, Madam Speaker. In fact, the resolution is basically dated, of little use because it has already been accomplished and, instead of being the subject of such unkindness on the part of the honourable member for Osborne (Ms. McGifford), ought to have been withdrawn by the honourable member for Osborne with the expression of the hope that the work goes forward, which is exactly what I am here to do today, to express that hope and to offer the leadership of the government of Manitoba to make sure that the goals set out in the AIDS strategy for Manitoba are indeed carried forward by this government in the conduct of the Department of Health and the other departments that have also been part of the development of the strategy. Thirdly, there ought to be a facilitation of the planning, delivery and evaluation of all programs and efforts to ensure that they are guided by a Healthy Public Policy philosophy. The strategy deals with the very issues referred to by the honourable member, and if we could strip away the unkindness on the part of the honourable member, I think we would be in a better position to move forward.

Mr. Tim Sale (Crescentwood): Madam Speaker, it is with no pleasure at all that I put some comments on the record in this regard, in regard to my honourable colleague's appropriate resolution. The patronizing paternalism of the Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae) in regard to being nice is not something that would go down well in any centre in which people living with HIV or AIDS would dwell.

I have been to too many funerals. I have been to too many funerals of friends who have died of AIDS. I have been to too many meetings of voluntary associations who have tried to get this government to respond with even modest small grants to enable them to meet at least some small portion of the costs of the services they provide. I spent at least five meetings with officials of this minister's department in the early 1990s, when I was the Chair of the Manitoba AIDS Shelter Coalition. I met with his official, Ms. Lampe, now retired, I met with his official, Ms. Matusko, who is still there, I met with the medical officer of health, and we were told there is money aside for you. Madam Speaker, not a nickel, not a single nickel flowed to the organizations who were trying to make compassionate shelter available for people living with HIV-AIDS.

While we met and talked and talked and met and met and talked and talked some more, some of the people who were involved with that project died. So, when this patronizing minister stands up and tells my honourable friend to be kind, I would suggest that he go to the AIDS Shelter Coalition, to Kali Shiva, to Village Clinic, and meet with their clients and say, be kind to us, we are getting on with it, we are getting a strategy. But they are dying. They do not have to be kind to anybody who has made their last years less tolerable, less just, less compassionate than they might otherwise have been. So, if there is any offence to be taken, it is not here in this House among members who know all too well that, yes, in this House, posturing takes place. If there is offence, the offence is on behalf of those who have lived and died with AIDS, who have worked on their behalf in the community, who have met and spent countless hours trying to find just, compassionate and healing services that could find some funding from this Minister of Health and his predecessor, Mr. Orchard.

Madam Speaker, to term this document a strategy is to give whole new meaning to the English language. First of all, the document itself is eight pages of history with which we would take little exception. Most of it is true; some of it needs a bit updating, but most of it is true.

Finally, on page 11, we get the strategy. This strategy, so-called, was the subject of numerous federal conferences, international conferences, provincial working groups, private groups meeting, studies, and all of this was written by 1989. When I became chair of the AIDS Shelter Coalition of Manitoba, documents with these words in it were all readily available. The interlinking of income support, health maintenance, shelter, prevention, education, nonstigmatizing treatment, the role of research, all those things were known. All of them had been written about. The literature was already full of such wind and words. The difference is, Madam Speaker, some jurisdictions took them seriously and put into practice things that might implement some of these lofty goals.

Madam Speaker, a strategy is not words on paper. A strategy is not a promise to do something that for eight years we have known needed to be done. A strategy is action. A strategy is sitting down with those community groups that are at the very bottom of this lovely chart on page 17, underneath everything else, but in fact they are the only things that make life bearable for people living with AIDS. A strategy supports those organizations.

The minister talked about the Village Clinic. It was funded under an NDP government. It has had to fight for its life against this minister's attempts to put it out of business, to roll it into some other organization, to cut back its funding.

Madam Speaker, the first guidelines for dealing with employees of this government who are HIV positive were developed under the NDP government and were implemented during the last stages of life and the death of an employee of this government who was an employee of the Department of Education during the time in which I was the Assistant Deputy Minister of Education. Much educational work was done not by me and not through me but through my colleague who was the person responsible for community relations and education work, who is now the Education officer of the Manitoba Association of School Trustees.

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Madam Speaker, this is not a strategy. This is simply a defensive record of history with no resources attached to it, no meaningful commitment on the part of the department to actually allow community organizations to survive, no significant understanding of the degree of risk to aboriginal people. In fact, this government desperately wishes this whole issue would go away because they do not like dealing with it. Meeting after meeting after meeting, promises have been made, promises have been broken. Community organizations sustained by volunteers who themselves very often are volunteers at risk because they themselves are sick. In spite of their illness, they give incredible strength, incredible services. They give of themselves. They educate. They go to churches, they go to community clubs, they go to fraternal organizations, they go to unions, and they share their knowledge of how this disease can be prevented, and they share their commitment not to be dying but to be living with this disease.

Those of us on this side of the House, Madam Speaker, have been to too many funerals. We have been part of too many memorial services. Now, I am sure that members opposite have also had friends, maybe even family members who have contracted AIDS, and so they know, at least some of them know, of what this disease does to a person and to a family and to relationships. I would implore them, if they do in fact have any personal experience that they might draw upon, that they would go to this Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae) and say to him, for God's sake be just in what you are doing with the organizations in this community that are seeking your help to survive, because as my colleague has pointed out, by 1998 there will be no federal money left. It is only federal money that is sustaining those community organizations that are now in place, the few organizations, federal money and the incredible generosity, often of the very families of victims of this disease who in their legacies and in their tireless commitment to dealing with the challenge of AIDS have raised money through bequests or through donations or through other means.

I want to close my remarks with a little story. When my friends in the community and I were seeking to build the first shelter that was purpose built, in fact, for people living with AIDS and in fact the only co-op in Canada so designed, we knew we had to raise about $120,000 to make this thing go, and quite frankly, that seemed to us to be a daunting task. So we sought for opportunities, and finally one day a member of the south Winnipeg Rotary Club called us up and said why don't you come down and talk to us. We looked at each other and we said, gosh, south Winnipeg Kiwanis Club--I beg your pardon, Madam Speaker, not Rotary, Kiwanis. We said, gosh, you know, men's service club, I do not know whether they are going to be very open to this, but we will go. So we did, and we took our brochure and we took our story, and very quickly after I spoke, actually very briefly they said, we do not need to hear a whole lot more from you, we know what you are trying to do. We want to help. We think we could raise $35,000. Do you want to work on it? Well, you could have knocked me over. So I said later that evening to the gentleman who had made this, to me, astonishing intervention, I said, why, why your club? You are a suburban club of middle, older-aged men. I just would not have expected this from you, homophobia being what it is. He said, I had a very good friend die of AIDS.

It is that simple, Madam Speaker. When the disease touches you, all of the prejudices, all of the reluctance to deal with it slip away. So if there are members opposite indeed who know of or have family members or friends with this disease, I wish they would speak to their cabinet colleagues and would say to them that if you truly believe in a compassionate society you will not continue to abuse the trust and the commitment of those trying to work on this disease. You will not invite them to apply for funds and then yet one more time turn them down.

Madam Speaker, I call on the House to embrace this resolution to recognize that indeed we do not have a strategy. We have a set of windy goals, we have very little in place that constitutes anything that could possibly be called a strategy on AIDS.

Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Energy and Mines): Madam Speaker, I certainly would like the opportunity to join in this discussion on what is an extremely important subject to the people of the province, in fact, I would suggest to all people of the province. The member for Crescentwood (Mr. Sale) and the member for Osborne (Ms. McGifford) constituency spoke very much about the effects of a terrible, terrible illness on many people that they have known. I think the member for Crescentwood spoke about the number of funerals that he has attended and certainly by members on his side of the House.

I want both members to be aware that they or members of their party are not the only ones who have experienced funerals of individuals that they have known, friends who have died and suffered from this most terrible of diseases. One of them, I have a friend from my schooldays, who passed away from AIDS two years ago and I attended his funeral. It is when you see the young die so prematurely in their life, cut down by a terrible illness, that one feels the terrible waste of such a disease.

Madam Speaker, members of the opposition through this resolution have challenged us as a government on our strategy, the way we are attempting to deal with this particular issue. They challenged the Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae) and members on this side, and I think it is important though to put some of these into context. I know my time is short. I expect I will have other opportunity to speak to this matter if time perhaps runs out today, the remaining time available to me, but I think it is important to put it into context.

I know in my tenure as an assistant to the Minister of National Health and Welfare many years ago when this disease was just beginning to come into public recognition, discussing some of these issues and recognizing what a growing great pressure we would have on the health care system from a very practical point of view of planning how one deals with resources. At that time, the sense of how overwhelming the AIDS epidemic, because truly it is an epidemic and not limited to a small geographical locale but truly an international epidemic, trying at that time to sense how the ballooning demand for resources or share of resources will be dealt with. I remember in the Department of National Health and Welfare that sense of frustration in trying to get a handle and appreciating, just appreciating, the huge amount of resources that would be needed as this disease, illness spread throughout our population. It was very difficult in those days, as it is today, because the demand for resources is just so huge and so great.

I say to members opposite that one of the difficulties here is when one puts this illness which--and I do not think any member of this House can truly in words express the horror of such an illness as AIDS because it really involves the human contact in a way that makes it just such a terrible, terrible illness. But we put it into the context of so many illnesses, diseases today in terms of cancer, that we have seen expansion in breast cancer, for example, the growth and increase in cancer rates, and I say this for any Minister of Health, the demand for dollars for research is certainly growing, the demand for support programs for people who suffer are growing. Any Minister of Health having to deal with these issues and deal with them in a manner of the larger picture of all of the demands on the budget, keeping in mind that despite comments about cutbacks in Health that we are still--

Madam Speaker: Order, please. When this matter is again before the House, the honourable minister (Mr. Praznik) will have 11 minutes remaining.

The hour being 5:30 p.m., this House is adjourned and stands adjourned until 1:30 p.m. tomorrow (Wednesday).