Mr. Chairperson (Gerry McAlpine): Order, please. Will the Committee of Supply please come to order. This afternoon this section of the Committee of Supply will resume the consideration of the Estimates of the Department of Highways and Transportation.

When the committee last sat, it had been considering item 15.1.(b)(1) on page 76 of the Estimates. Shall this item pass?

Mr. Gerard Jennissen (Flin Flon): I think, Mr. Chair, when we left off last time the minister was going to get back to me on the St. Andrews Airport, a little bit of an update on that.

Hon. Glen Findlay (Minister of Highways and Transportation): Mr. Chairman, the information we have on St. Andrews, I know that the member is probably referring to the fact that initially the Winnipeg Airport Authority would be taking over Winnipeg plus St. Andrews. I guess along the way the St. Andrews aspect got put on the back burner and they are now conducting due diligence regarding the transfer of St. Andrews airport. Transport Canada anticipates that the Winnipeg Airport Authority will take over responsibility for the airport maybe as early as April '98, but it is in process of due diligence at this moment.

Mr. Jennissen: I would like to move on to a new section, if the minister would agree to that, and that is on licences and licensing. I know some of that is water under the bridge really because it is already an accomplished fact, but I would like to ask some questions on it nonetheless.

First of all, the rationale for the decision to go to new licence plates.

Mr. Findlay: The last licence plates were issued in 1983, I believe. The plates were getting older. Many of the plates out there on vehicles were quite worn, cracked, hard to read, plus the available new number sequences that could be used for new plates that are issued was starting to get kind of tight. I think the biggest reason simply was you looked at plates of tourists travelling through from other parts of North America. Our is probably the dowdiest-looking plate of any you would see on the road, and it is time to upgrade to a more modern style design, more attractive, more tourism oriented. I have heard nothing but positive comments from Manitobans on the design that has been announced, not only for the design but for the fact that we are going to look like the rest of the States and provinces, more modern, more colourful, more attractive plate on our cars from now on.

Mr. Jennissen: Some people that were less than enthusiastic, they thought it was maybe a bit of a tax grab. I do not want to comment one way or the other on that. Could the minister give us a feel as to the cost for the new plate design?

Mr. Findlay: If I remember the question right, it is how much the design cost. The design did not cost us anything. The design, as drawn out or prepared, has been done over the course of time, so we did not pay anybody to design it.

Mr. Jennissen: So this was one design selected out of a series of other designs?

Mr. Findlay: Over the course of time, a new design had been thought of within the department, probably going back a few years. Some different designs had come up. A focus group was used to review them. The one chosen is the one that has been announced.

Mr. Jennissen: Where are those licence plates actually being produced? Are they being produced in Manitoba?

Mr. Findlay: A tender was put out for the new plates, and the successful tenderer--we will have them produced in Amherst, Nova Scotia.

Mr. Jennissen: So the Manitoba plates are being made in Nova Scotia, because that was the lowest bid.

Mr. Findlay: That was the lowest bid, yes.

Mr. Jennissen: Could the minister give me an idea how much it costs per plate on average and on average how much we get back when that plate is actually on the vehicle? How much does the Department of Highways actually make per plate on a regular passenger vehicle?

Mr. Findlay: Before the tender went out, we had projected a cost of $7 for a pair, and $1 for the individuals, which is what we are charging the people who are purchasing plates. [interjection] Did I say $1? It is $4 for an individual plate.

Mr. Jennissen: So does the minister have any idea, if all the plates are renewed, how much profit--I guess, that is the word I could use--we would make on this?

Mr. Findlay: As I mentioned in the previous answer, we had projected it would cost $7 for a pair of plates. The tenders came in surprisingly lower, and what surplus will be there--and there is some uncertainty yet--but there is some surplus there that has gone directly to the construction program. So any extra that has come back because the tender came in better than anticipated has gone to the construction program for the department. So if there is any profit, so to speak, in it, it goes back to the road users through additional money for capital.

Mr. Jennissen: I heard the figure noised about perhaps $700,000 to $1 million. Is that in the ballpark that would be so-called profit?

Mr. Findlay: That is in the ballpark. That is what will show up as additional money for capital project activity.

Mr. Jennissen: The minister in an earlier statement said that the new plates should be on some of the vehicles by the middle of the summer. How many new plates will there be by the end of the year, roughly?

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Mr. Findlay: The renewals will start to be mailed out on June 17, so as soon as a person gets his renewal he can go purchase his plates, but they are required--the first one is required to be in place by August 1. Then by the end of the year, with cyclical renewal, I would assume every month we could do about a twelfth of them depending on when the renewals come due for every licence plate holder. I would assume one-twelfth every month for 12 months. It will take a full one-year cycle to get all the plates renewed.

Mr. Jennissen: So that a year from this summer, next summer, we can expect approximately 700,000 vehicles. Would that be correct?

Mr. Findlay: Yes.

Mr. Jennissen: Now, if I can ask the minister another question on dealers, I have a number of letters from dealers who are worried about the dual plates, and I know the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) had asked that question and I do apologize, I do not recall the answer, but I think the minister said that dealers are not required to use dual plates.

Mr. Findlay: That is right, Mr. Chairman. The reason for going with the dual plates was for vehicle identification, to make it easier to identify for anybody enforcing the law or seeing a vehicle perpetrating a crime.

We have had considerable discussion with dealers because there are some, a little over, 5,000 dealer plates out there, and ultimately after, as I say, considerable discussion involving myself, involving department people, we have come to the conclusion that dealers--and I will read directly from the letter and I can give the member a copy of this letter that went to every registered dealer. It indicates in the last paragraph: I am pleased to advise that dealer plates will be exempt from the requirement to be displayed in pairs. This effectively means no change for dealer and repairer plates. One rear-mounted plate per vehicle will be required.

Part of that discussion also was the Winnipeg Police and the RCMP, and they concurred with that recommendation after hearing both sides of the story. Also, in the process, the discussion evolved around and concluded that in the issuance of dealer licences in the future, there will be a little tighter process to be sure that whoever have dealers licences are authentic real dealers. Everybody agreed to that also so that we will effectively have less plates out there identified as dealers, but the dealers will have the continued exemption of two plates. That is effective the way it is in other provinces that have dual plates.

Mr. Jennissen: I thank the minister for that answer.

The minister indicated that the new plates are a vast improvement over the old plates in terms of colour and attractiveness, and I think there is not too much disagreement on that. However, not everyone is happy with the new plates, and I would like to represent that segment of the population as well who think that perhaps we should not have gone to new plates. In fact, I would like to read into the record a letter from a Mr. William D. McGaffin from Dauphin, Manitoba.

The headline reads, New plates are a tax grab, and he writes as follows: Glen Findlay, Minister of Highways and Transportation recently announced new licence plates for Manitoba. They are supposedly more user friendly and will convince tourists to come to our province. That will not happen. Tourists come because of excellent service, low prices, friendly people, beautiful country, not some fancy licence plate. The biggest disgrace, however, is Findlay saying that the $7 fee for two licence plates is simply to recover costs. That is a crock. The number of dual plates for Manitoba is in excess of 650,000. That would bring in in excess $5.1 million to the province. If the plates cost that much to make and distribute, then I want that job. If the fees are actually for the provincial coffers, why can he not just say so? People are not stupid. They can understand a tax grab when they see one. Why do we need new plates? The old ones are quite effective and also work quite well. There are many unanswered questions. Some honest answers would be appreciated. William D. McGaffin, Dauphin, Manitoba.

I am sure the minister would like to respond to that fairly negative comment.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, I have effectively answered every allegation in there in the previous questions that the member asked. It is not a tax grab. It is a cost-recovery item. The coffers of the government will not see any additional money. It will all go to the purchase and distribution of those licence plates or to road surface. There is no profit for the government.

The fact that he says they will not increase tourism--there are a lot of things that it takes to make tourists come here, and there are probably about 50 items that could be mentioned and listed, and this would be one of those items. You have to do a lot of things to make tourists happy and comfortable here. I think to put a positive appearance on your licence plate, a friendly appearance, is very, very important. I want the member to know that the word "friendly" is a very recognized statement on our plates. I think we have all seen evidence of what "friendly" means on our plates with the response of citizens to voluntarily help those in distress because of the flood we just had. I can tell the member I had people outside the province say, now, I know why you have "friendly" on your plate--because of the reaction of people when there is a time of need. It also reflects on people in terms of volunteerism in this province, whether it is volunteerism for bringing sports events here or volunteerism in a community. That is the way we function in many of our communities, the strength of volunteerism, and that is what "friendly" means. It has been there; it stays there. Now "friendly" is a much more stylized word as opposed to a block word.

I think the plates are much more attractive, and I respect that the member has a letter from somebody who is not happy, but I would be the first to admit, I will never satisfy everybody, no matter what I do. If you do not do anything, you will get letters for us not doing anything. If one letter means that the world should stop, I am afraid the member is wrong. The vast majority of people think the time was right to change our plates, and the way we did it and the design we have there is pretty attractive to most.

Mr. Jennissen: Still, despite that, there was a heavy debate in the province, at least for a short while, about what should be on the plate, what should not be on the plate and so on. I know that some Francophones were less than happy with the fact that "bienvenue" was not on the plate, but I guess, by extension, you could argue, you know, the German people make up a large proportion of this province and the Ukrainian people and the Dutch and so on. I suppose you could argue there should be aboriginal art on the plates and so on and so on. Somewhere it is going to stop, but the question still remains that many people have asked that why not simply the word "Manitoba." Do we have to advertise we are friendly?

Mr. Findlay: If the member wants to go out on the front steps and say we were going to take "friendly" off our plate, he would get inundated with negative comments. That is very strongly supported, as I tried to indicate earlier in terms of it reflects what we are as a province. It is a symbol that we are identified by within the province and from people outside the province. It means a lot of things to different people. It is a statement that we are warm and friendly and we are happy and we smile and we appreciate people for who they are and what they are. It means all those things, and most every plate I have seen has some little slogan statement related to their province, to their state. That is just part of making the plates more friendly, more user friendly.

Mr. Jennissen: I do not disagree with the minister's analysis, except I notice that in Europe they have very plain, direct, visible plates with numbers and letters on them and identifying country. There is no need to advertise, you know, that the Dutch are friendly or the Germans are unfriendly or the French are happy. I mean, I do not know, I do not want to make this a long, drawn-out argument. I know this is not necessary, but it is just that there is a segment of the population that thought we could have simplified it.

Before we just drop that entirely, I just want to read into the record one more letter from Mr. Berglund. Drop the so-called essences, he says in the letter, it was in the Free Press, November 15, 1996. Let us see golden wheat fields, trees, water, big blue prairie sky, bison, maple leaf, Friendly Manitoba, bienvenue and licence numbers. Are we certain nothing has been left out? Other provinces are secure enough with a single design element. Only Manitoba needs a list. Go back to the drawing board and drop a few of these essences of Manitoba, please. I am sure our identity will survive.

So that is the counter argument. But, you are right, you drop friendly, I am sure you will get 100 negative responses as well. Since the plates are coming, I am not really sure why we are getting into this.

So let us go on to the next phase then--licensing of drivers and safety. Fatalities caused by 16-year-old drivers have dropped by half in Ontario after the province adopted a graduated licencing system. Some of the elements of that novice driver's system means that those young drivers do not go on freeways or multi-lane highways; they do not drive between midnight and 5 a.m. They may not have any blood alcohol level whatsoever, otherwise the licence is invalid. Are we considering something similar, or is it time that we should be thinking in those terms as well?

Mr. Findlay: I think the member is probably referring to graduated licences, that kind of approach to ease young people into the activity of driving. It is certainly an issue that has been brought to my attention. We have looked at it, we have talked about it, we discussed it. I want to relate to the members some of the facts that may be behind the scenes. If we look at the driving statistic records, people involved in accidents, and it exists for every age group all the way from 16 up to 85, 90, 95, whoever the oldest driver is, it is categorized by every few years. The most accidents are caused in that age category from 16 to 24. The highest incidence of accidents happen there for males only, and from 24 on up, no matter what group you take or how you do it, there is a pretty similar rate of accidents per 1,000 drivers. If you go on the female side of the gender, it is right from 16 to 85, there is no real change age-wise with accidents caused.

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Now what the member is identifying would apply to 16-year-old males, but it does not apply to 16-year-old females, and wherever graduated licences have been used, it does not respect that gender difference. I, for one, do not want to penalize good, young, female drivers who do not cause any higher incidence of accidents than anybody else in the population, have them negatively impacted in terms of their driving privileges when their record is perfect--well, not perfect, but equal to anybody else percentage-wise. Fundamentally, that is the reason.

If you want to target where the problem is, it is that young, aggressive male driver, and our laws are in place. The member mentions alcohol. It is illegal to drive over 0.08. It is illegal to drive, and the responsibility is there for parents and for society to be sure that our drivers are well trained, no matter what age, that they obey the law, whether it is alcohol or speed, but enforcing some of the graduated licencing aspects are also a bit of a challenge. Do you stop everybody after midnight to see if they are over the age of 18? I think not. So you can put all the laws in place you want, but if people do not obey them, you do not achieve much.

Another little gripe that I always have, if you look at the statistics when the Winnipeg police have their ALERT check stops at Christmastime, you just notice how many people are picked off that do not have a licence at all, that are driving vehicles. That is an issue we should target, first and foremost, if you want to improve the safety on the roads. People with terrible driving records still get behind the wheel even without a licence. They are not easy to catch unless you have those check stops where you can actually ask for the licence and they cannot get away on you. That is the group we should try to target, not, in my mind, young people, other than the male, who is aggressive at times.

MPIC is doing some great ads in the last couple of years. They are kind of horrifying ads. They are hard to watch, but they send a tremendous message. It is always disappointing when a week later you hear of another pair of young people in an accident involving alcohol and speed. It is just rather depressing; but, if they are going to do it, they will do it whether they have a licence in their pocket or not--that is what I am getting at. It is attitudes of drivers that we have got to address, and I think MPI is making a good effort to help the public understand that those accidents do not always happen to somebody else. They happen to you, if you do the wrong things.

So I am not a believer that graduated licences will change things on the roads, and I will not negatively impact on the female of 16 to 24 who has a very good driving record, historically.

Mr. Jennissen: I thank the minister. I was not aware that the 16-year-old females were much safer drivers. I had not seen the statistics, but I guess we are saying--

Mr. Findlay: They are dramatically different.

Mr. Jennissen: So I guess we are saying testosterone and hot cars do not mix at that age level, but I was kind of surprised the minister was saying that, when we do have those road checks, especially at Christmastime, a number of people are caught that do not have a licence at all. Do we have any kind of statistics on that, like a percentage on, at any given time, how many people actually could be on the road who have not even bothered to get a driver's licence?

Mr. Findlay: In most cases, they are suspended drivers. They may have a piece of paper in their pocket, but they have been suspended on the electronic record. We will see if we can get exact numbers, but they have been published in the Free Press at Christmastime. They usually give the results of the ALERT program, and I cannot remember from the top of my head exact numbers, but fundamentally my perception is that it is about equal to the amount that are found impaired. If you look at year over year over year, the number of people that they pick off impaired there is going down, down, down. So the effect of the program is very positive in that respect, but the number picked up without a valid driver's licence is disturbingly always there.

I guess it is fair to say that, if you get picked up with a few offences and have a lot of demerits, the cost of your licence is pretty high, and some people obviously make the decision, well, I cannot afford it, so why bother with it. Their attitude in terms of driving probably has not changed, and they have demerits for very good reasons. It has been bad driving habits, causing accidents, whatever. It is very difficult to get them off the road unless their attitude changes.

Mr. Jennissen: In the Winnipeg Sun, Tuesday, November 12, in an article Lifesaver spurned, there is a section there, and they quote Marlene Zyluk, acting registrar of Motor Vehicles, as saying, and this is in regard to graduated licences: We are trying to balance safety of the public against fairness to all persons, said Zyluk. Instead, she said, her department is preparing a proposal to get tough on problem drivers and repeat offenders.

Could the minister clarify exactly what they mean by that, get tough on repeat offenders and problem drivers?

Mr. Findlay: Well, I think what you just quoted and what we said, safety and fairness, is what we are trying to do with the different age groups. Tougher, I have just identified an area where there is a problem. We will be introducing various measures over the course of time that will be seen to be tougher, as we have in the past. I mean, we have the toughest drinking-and-driving laws in the country here. I think that they are working. As I mentioned, the number of people picked up impaired at Christmastime does indicate that the public is more responsible in that regard, and if they are going to go out to a party, there is a designated driver. I think many of our bars have ways and means of getting people home. There is another system that they use.

An Honourable Member: Red Nose.

Mr. Findlay: Red Nose, that is right. The Red Nose--I think that is the Manta swim club if I remember right. They are on call to take people home and their vehicle. I know some of the people involved in it, and I think there are three people who go: one to drive, one to look after the rider and a third person to bring his vehicle home. All they have to do is call, and all they ask for is a donation towards the Manta swim club. It is a volunteer effort to improve safety on the road which, I believe, is working. Another reason probably why there are less impaired people picked off in the check stops at Christmastime, a combination of factors.

We will continue to get tough where we believe that additional laws will improve the safety on the roads for all Manitobans, including the person who is driving the vehicle in an a state that he should not be driving it in.

Mr. Jennissen: I certainly concur with the minister's earlier statement that some of those ads that MPIC has been putting on, the RoadWise ads, have been very effective, at least in my opinion. As a bit of a student at mass media, I think they have been extremely effective ads, and maybe that is a very important direction to go--education.

Which brings me to my next point. I have always felt that in northern Manitoba it is really difficult to train student drivers, especially in the more remote communities, such as, let us say, Split Lake or Moose Lake and so on. I was wondering, are there any--and the reason I am asking this is because one of my own friends is in the driver-training business--are there any innovative programs or grants or things of that nature available to assist northern people when someone wishes to go into the remote communities to teach these young people to drive, because those communities are disadvantaged enough? It is just one more nail in the coffin if those kids come south and they do not have a driver's licence.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, the driver ed program is operated by MPI. Now, we cannot answer to what degree they are in the North or whether they are there at special times or what all, but they do put a lot of young students through their program. If they take that kind of a course, we allow them to get the driver's licence at fifteen and a half. Provided there is an adult with them, they can have a driver's licence at fifteen and a half. They have a probationary licence at fifteen and a half if you take a course, if you go and pass one of these courses. So there is a bit of a carrot there on our part to get them to take these courses, whether it is the MPI course through school or a professional driving course.

Mr. Jennissen: The next question probably, maybe does not fall under the minister's jurisdiction either then, and that is the actual training manuals used for young drivers or for any driver. My concern is that some students that have English as a second language have difficulty with the language. I presume immigrants would as well. Again, it may not be under the minister's jurisdiction, but is he aware of any attempts to create more easy-to-read manuals or even translated manuals in other languages?

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Mr. Findlay: What we have here, Mr. Chairman, is a Driver's Handbook, which is put out by Manitoba Highways and Transportation, and it is put out in English and French. Those are the two official languages of the country, and this is how we do it. I appreciate there are many immigrants that come here, and one of the first things they want is a driver's licence, maybe before they have had adequate opportunity to go through English language courses. I appreciate it does present a bit of a problem, but it would be very costly to have one in every language. All I can suggest is that, if there is a particular community out there that wants to facilitate the immigrants from their country, they could get involved in a translation of the handbook, but we do not have any grants to facilitate that.

The deputy just reminds me that British Columbia, which, for obvious reasons, has a number of languages, has been active in trying to use different languages, but finds that people have to know English in order to drive to read signs and all that sort of thing. So the indication is that they have backed away a little bit from what the member is asking, to give handbooks or give instructions in different languages. If you are going to drive, you have to know English anyway because the signs are in English. I guess what he is implying is that the experience in B.C. is not just totally positive.

Mr. Jennissen: Just for information's sake, I know that in the school that I taught for a number of years, Frontier Collegiate Institute, we did translate the driver manual into a simpler form of English for students that have English as a second language. Most of them are aboriginal students and their reading level was considerably below par. We merely simplify the language a little bit. So some of those are available. In fact, the department could probably pick them up free of charge from Frontier Collegiate Institute.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, the example the member has given would indicate that those kind of simpler reading manuals are made available through the school that he identified. I am sure they would go beyond that school, so those who want it can find it, if they are prepared that way, and that is good. I am glad the people would see to do it that way.

Mr. Jennissen: I am not sure if they are actually that widely distributed. Basically, I think my wife was involved in translation, or it was not even translation, it was sort of gearing down of language for a very small, specific clientele. I do not think it ever went beyond Cranberry Portage as far as I know, but I know they are available. I just thought that maybe via the government there might be wider distribution in the North.

I would like to go back to the safety issue again. Two years ago, Road Check '95 discovered that one out of every three trucks in Canada was unsafe. The figure for Manitoba was around 36.6 percent. I know we discussed it last year in Estimates as well. That was the third highest level in Canada behind Ontario and New Brunswick. I am just wondering if the minister could give me an update whether anything has changed, and if he has some figures to indicate that.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, the member reads into the record some of the stats from Road Check '95. Clearly, Road Check '96 was done--I am just getting the numbers here--but I do not imagine they are terribly different. The numbers are reasonably similar right across North America. The term "out of service" is used. But the vast majority, it is over 80 percent of those trucks that are identified as out of service, can be put back into service by the driver on the roadside. It usually has something to do with lights, the bulb can be replaced; brakes, which can be adjusted in many cases; or tires, which he can change. Many of those trucks are back into service minutes later or within an hour or two by roadside service right there. It is not serious defects.

There are rigorous inspections on big trucks. They have to go through safety inspection to be certified every six months. Naturally, six hours or two hours after leaving a safety inspection station, a light bulb could burn out.

Now, we also have passed a regulation in the province requiring pre-trip inspections, so the driver is required to check particularly lights and brakes before he departs on any trip, pre-trip inspection to promote safety, because the person really, ultimately responsible for safety is the person behind the wheel, because he is driving that vehicle. His safety is at stake if he does not be sure that his vehicle meets all the criteria of safety.

The safety code that we all abide by is nationwide. We all try to make sure that all users of the road abide by it on a daily basis. They go through the inspections. Ultimately things happen between inspections. They travel a lot of miles. My feeling is that the trucking industry has become exceptionally conscious of safety over the last few years. The kind of statistics the member mentions that have built up over the years cause them to realize that they have to have a positive public image, otherwise there will be greater pressure to restrict their use of the road. So there is a greater emphasis on safety by trucking companies, by drivers. It is an educational process. I am very confident saying the vast majority abide by that.

The other thing I might mention is that our DDVL has been involved in training police officers, RCMP and city police officers to do inspections. You may have seen some evidence in the Free Press I think in the wintertime of picking off some trucks that they thought should be inspected. A quick cursory eyeball of them going by would indicate that they are ripe for inspection. That kind of inspection and the signal it sends helps to stimulate those who may not want to abide by the law to be more conscious of the law and know that there is a consequence if they do not abide by it.

The statistics are there, but I think the member, if one wants to read a negative into those statistics, he can. The reality is, there is a lot of positive in terms of safety of trucks and a lot of the so-called items that are used to identify them out of service. It is not that serious and can be quickly rectified at the roadside. The truth is, it should be rectified every trip when they start.

The safety record is, by and large, pretty good. I have seen statistics for every thousand or ten thousand cars versus every thousand or 10,000 trucks. Cars cause accidents at three times the rate of trucks on a per thousand or 10,000 basis. Truck drivers are professionals. You might just recently have seen an individual from one of the trucking companies in Steinbach who received a safety award for 42 years on the road without an accident. Now, just add up how many millions of miles that individual drove and the kind of conditions he would have encountered--prairies, mountains, weather, populated centres. That is a phenomenal driving record, and the fact that companies and the industry give out those kind of awards is a stimulus for those who are currently driving to try to achieve a similar record.

So I try to be generally very positive about the trucking industry because of its role in our economy, the jobs it creates and the attitude that the vast majority of companies and drivers have, which is consistent with what we are talking about here, maximized safety for everybody involved.

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Mr. Jennissen: But in my mind, I still see some of those pictures of tires flying off trucks in Ontario and causing major damage. Now, I know that is, you know, one incident out of many, but when it does happen it is kind of horrendous. That brings me to the point, Mr. Minister, and I do not have the '96 Road Check statistics, unfortunately. Why is it that 36.6 percent of our trucks were found unsafe, but in Quebec it was down to 18.3? I am going back to '95. In other words, Quebec's statistics are twice as good as ours. Are they doing something different? At least they were twice as good as ours two years ago.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, the member mentions Quebec at 18 percent. When these roadside checks are done--those stations, say, out at Headingley, for instance, in Manitoba--they will stop whatever truck is coming. It does not matter whether it is from Quebec or from California or from Manitoba or Alberta. It may have happened in Manitoba, but it does not mean that all the trucks are from Manitoba. We have no idea what percentage were from Manitoba, as in Quebec. You would have no idea what percentage were Quebec trucks versus trucks from particularly Ontario or the Maritimes or from the northeastern U.S.

Our safety code is the same across the country. We are basically on a level playing field in terms of our inspections, inspection requirements. The National Safety Code is the same right across the country. So there is no particular reason we could put our finger on. I just want to identify the randomness of where the trucks can come from at any given time no matter where the location of the inspection is held.

The member mentions the truck tire-off incidents. Over a two-year period in Canada, there were five incidents, all in Ontario--all in Ontario. I will not deny that wheels do come off in different locations of the country, just that they have not caused accidents. But there certainly is a major emphasis right now to be sure we do everything possible to minimize or eliminate that. I know the deputy has talked to me about the ways and means of trying to do it on a cross-country basis. There are certain kinds of nuts that are a little less likely to come off, but if the bearings go--but those are some of the things that an astute driver will pick off, just by the way a truck drives. I mean, I cannot imagine not knowing a bearing is out when he is driving a vehicle. There are conscious efforts to minimize those kinds of incidents from happening--conscious, conscious efforts. It is always unfortunate when the next incident happens, but there is considerable emphasis in the industry and in the provincial and federal governments across Canada to be on top of it and to minimize the possibilities of recurrences.

Mr. Jennissen: I understand the minister's argument about the randomness of the trucks, that where they are being checked, they could be from any province, but it still seems hard to believe that Quebec would be that low and Ontario would be that high. I am making the assumption, maybe it is a simplistic one, that most of the trucks checked in Quebec would be Quebec trucks and most of the Ontario trucks checked in Ontario would be Ontario trucks. So I still do not understand why there is such a huge variation. It makes no sense to me statistically.

Mr. Findlay: We can just say it is the randomness of chance that it is that way. Before you read anything into it, we should look at more years than just one to determine if there is any consistency.

I now have the figures here in terms of what I was referring to about five incidents in two years of wheels off causing injury or death, all of them in Ontario. At the same time, in that two- year period--this is across-Canada statistics--6,500 deaths on our roads in Canada--remember, five deaths because of wheels off, and 280,000 injuries. So, in perspective, in comparison, even though one is too many, it is exceptionally low percentage-wise to total deaths on the roads and total injuries on the roads in the same two-year period across Canada. I would have to say it is almost like a plane crash. Air traffic is very, very safe, but one incident, which we have not had in Canada for quite some time, draws a lot of drama, and every one should be prevented. One incident draws a lot more attention than percentage-wise it probably should.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, the reason I was bringing out the Quebec statistic was that I thought, perhaps, they had a more stringent inspection program or there was something noticeably different from anywhere else in Canada; but, if there is not, then there is no use pursuing that. As for wheels or tires coming off, it can happen anywhere. I remember being in a cab in Winnipeg and an actual wheel fell off the cab, so I mean it happens here too.

I would like to move on to something we have alluded to before, actually, and that is young drivers being unsafe. An article in the Winnipeg Free Press--the minister may get the impression that is the only paper I read, but I just happen to have these copies here--on March 19, 1997, an article entitled "Angry drivers are killing more people than ever." I will quote a little bit: Angry drivers are behind the wheel in record numbers and they are putting you and your family in danger. A survey conducted last fall for the AAA--that is, I presume, the American Automobile Association Foundation for Traffic Safety--found a 51 percent increase in violent highway incidents since 1990, Art Levine [phonetic] wrote in the current issue of Redbook. Those trends are similar here as well.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, I am not aware that we have comparable statistics in Canada about angry drivers or frustrated drivers. Naturally, people's driving performance is affected by their mental attitude, and if you get into concentrated areas--you know, you are talking about American cities particularly, where you might be sitting on a freeway for an hour and you are really frustrated and you get angry. Generally we do not have those. Outside of Toronto and Vancouver we probably should not have those things happen in Canada because you do not have that level of congestion and frustration created.

I am not aware that we keep any statistics in that regard, but, naturally, if a person's attitude is very negative, his driving habit will be affected. He can cause things to happen, particularly in tight and congested travelling conditions. I cannot answer in terms of statistics here that would be comparable.

Mr. Jennissen: But, if the trend is that way, I wonder if the minister would respond to one other little quote here: There is a high-tech way to help save even more lives, photo radar, in which a camera shoots speeding cars and their licence plates. Because of public concerns over invasion of privacy, it is relatively underemployed--unquote. I do know we have toyed with that in Ontario, I believe, and other jurisdictions elsewhere.

Is that perhaps a route we may have to consider going in the future?

Mr. Findlay: Well, clearly when somebody commits a crime or violates the rules of the road, you would like to prevent them from doing it in the future. We have had some major discussions with the Winnipeg Police and the RCMP and the Brandon Police about the use of what the member is referring to, and that is photo enforcement. One thing I want to tell the member is, the RCMP made the statement that their code of ethics says that, when they see somebody committing a crime, they are to stop that crime from continuing. And they said, there we are sitting there with a camera and they see somebody speeding to 30-40 kilometres over the speed limit, he is a serious threat on the road. We are not very comfortable if we take a picture of that person, and two minutes or two hours he is still driving at the same speed and he causes a serious accident. We have not done what we should have done by our code of ethics--stopped that person. So their code of ethics says, I am a nice person to catch them and send them a ticket, but it has not done what they should have done, stopped that person from continuing to perpetrate the incident that he was doing--speeding.

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Anything that is going to get people's attention, such as that sort of process, will, hopefully, reduce speed. We have considered it, but have not decided to act on it yet in the province of Manitoba in terms of the photo radar. There is a lot of public dislike for that vehicle, and there are also people that claim that, if you send the ticket to me as a registered owner, I was not driving the vehicle; it was my son, my wife, a friend. So you do not really get the person you want to get by sending a ticket to an innocent person.

We have had those discussions, and I relayed that comment from the RCMP as one of the defining reasons why they do not consider it the be-all and the end-all of reducing speed on the roads. Generally speaking, the public is pretty good on the roads. Anywhere I have driven I very seldom see people who will go over the speed limit plus eight or nine or 10 kilometres, which is driving according to conditions generally, and it seems to be the tolerance that the police allow--that is my observation. I do not think speeding is as much a problem on the roads today as it was 10 years ago. Actually, the speed limits have been raised a bit. It may be a bit of a problem in the cities, because in cities, you know, if the speed limit is 60 or 80 and you are driving 100, there are more intersections, more chance of trouble.

But we have been in continuous discussion with people that are looking at improving the safety on our roads, and we may well be doing some things in the future that will be in that direction. I can assure the member that at this point in time the use of photo radar is not something that is strongly endorsed by the people we are talking to.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, the minister is quite correct. I know it is not a very popular technology at any rate, and he is also quite correct in saying that it can only monitor something that is happening. It cannot actually stop the person or slow them down or anything. Always the best safety gadget out there seems to be a police car on the road. I notice the traffic slows right down whenever I see those lights flashing, or it is on the road.

I would like to change slightly to--it is again a safety issue--the farm lighting that we talked about last year, the minister introduced last year. I have here the Keystone Agricultural Producers, KAP News, it is called. It is Volume 3, No. 1, March 1997, and I would just like the minister to comment on what they say in there.

The death of three Manitoba teenagers who collided with a combine header more than two years ago has prompted new provincial legislation for lights and markings on agricultural field equipment. The Highway Traffic Act regulations are still in draft stage--at least when this was printed--KAP, K-A-P, has been involved from the start and has gained concessions that will save producers big money.

Now, my concern is--and I would like the minister to respond to that--concessions are okay, I guess. It may save somebody money, but what about the safety aspect of that? In other words, those concessions, do they have safety ramifications, negatively?

Mr. Findlay: After the incident that the member referred to around Rosenort we set up a committee that involved KAP, RCMP, my department, several organizations anyway had representation on the committee. They went through a period of several months of evolving to what ultimately we brought in as legislation.

I take a little exception to what KAP is saying there. They did not cause concessions. They were around the table where people debated the pros and cons of various aspects of what was ultimately put in place, and everybody agreed to it. They are overplaying their hand in their statement, and I am disappointed they would take that position, because when you reach a consensus around the table you should not go out boasting about how you got this or you got that. Effectively, we took the safety standards that currently exist for new farm equipment are the law, and that used farm equipment will not face anything particularly different in the future, provided it is operated in the daytime. At night, then it has to have the lights on it.

I presume what they were referring to is they do not have to have the lights on in the daytime on the road where the equipment is visible, or anytime in the day when it is visible, because if it is foggy, of course, it is not visible.

Given that the incident happened in rural Manitoba, and given that the impetus to do it was driven by the affected people in rural Manitoba, it is unfortunate that KAP boast about concessions when they were at the table and they agreed to everything that ultimately came from the table, and what we introduced as legislative change was exactly the recommendations that came out of that entire body, of which they were only one player. So I think they are trying to play a little politics with something that one should never play politics with, and that is called safety on the road.

There was unfortunately the incident with the three teenagers, the one incident that the member refers to, and the two other incidents that year of somebody running into a vehicle being towed, and in both of the other cases an individual lost his life, so it is not something to make light of or boast about for making political advantage. They were on a committee, and the results of that committee were implemented in our legislative changes. There was complete, unanimous agreement and consent involving KAP, the police, other safety related organizations.

Well, here, I have got the composition of the committee now: Keystone Agricultural Producers, Prairie Agricultural Machinery Institute, Canadian Standards, Technical Committee, and Prairie Implement Manufacturers Association, and the RCMP. So there was a broad representation there, but what ultimately came out of there was something that was considered reasonable from a safety point of view, and practical from a farmer's point of view and not overly costly to the farm community on used equipment.

Mr. Jennissen: I am happy the minister explained it that way, and as the minister recalls, we did support the legislation because we thought it was good legislation, but what annoyed me a little bit was that it seemed that KAP was presenting it in such a way it was an either/or situation that was not consensus building, but rather we won and you lost, that kind of a thing, and that could possibly have safety ramifications. That is what worried me, and that is why I raised the issue.

Mr. Findlay: I just want to re-emphasize, what they say there is out of context with what happened and what the legislation was and it is unfortunate, and the next time I am meeting with somebody from KAP I will be bringing that to their attention. It is not appropriate to take that position after you have been at the table and agreed to the consensus position, and they agreed because they believed it was, in balance, the right thing. Then to go out and say they won concessions, that is putting a very negative spin on what we all want to have as positive for safety reasons.

Mr. Jennissen: We all want safer highways and we want our roads to stand up the best they can, and I suppose that is one of the reasons that the government is moving to these automated self-weigh scales. I do have a few questions about that though, and one of them is, I am a little puzzled how this works. So you pull up to a scale. Let us say you are driving a huge truck and it is loaded. So what if you are, let us say, 5 percent overweight or 10 percent? You do not just turf the grain or you do not just throw the logs off there. So then it is just more like a self-monitoring, but it still does not save the road. You are still overweight, right, and they know that there will not be a penalty for that?

Mr. Findlay: I remember about three years ago receiving input from particularly the cattle industry saying, you know, we load our vehicles and we are never quite sure what they are and, yes, you could say we could drive to an elevator, but that is not always convenient, and sometimes the elevator people do not want us driving in there. These give them a chance to, if they are on the road, pull over and find out what their weight is. If they know they are overweight by what it reads, the obligation then is to do something to reduce the weight or equalize the weight on the axles or to offload what is necessary, because they know if they ever encounter a checkpoint down the road or a scale where we have an inspector they are subject to being fined.

Now, we can also use those scales, as the member is referring to, if an inspector is there to use it as an inspection point for vehicles that come along. So if the inspector is there, it is not a free weigh if you are overweight. It can be used for the spot inspection process. But it is basically there for people to educate themselves as to what they are carrying and allow them to load appropriately with that load and subsequent loads.

The truth of the matter is, not enough people pay attention to their, particularly axle weight distribution of load weights, beyond the commercial truckers, who would have to do it all the time, because they are constantly going over scales and are very, very conscious of how they load. They are professionals and they load every day, and they know what they are doing. The guy who loads something once a month or changes what he loads, it is a bit of a guess as to what he has, and these scales are available to them as they are driving down the road, and it is a check that they can use to be sure that they are legal just in case they do encounter a legal weigh station down the road where they will be subject to fines if they are overweight.

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Mr. Jennissen: Yes, the point I was making though, that if you drive 200 miles or kilometres or whatever overweight and then you check yourself and find out you are overweight you have still driven, you know, on that road and may have damaged the roadbed or whatever. So that was my concern. There is really no penalty attached to it, but it is certainly an information system. How many of those six weigh scales will actually be operational? Will they be operational by the end of the year?

Mr. Findlay: Seven are planned. Several are in the process of installation. One on 75 is operational at this moment in time, but others in stages of preparation for ultimate use. But there are seven locations that have been currently identified.

Mr. Jennissen: They do not actually involve any building or any structure. It is sort of just, you drive up on a special lane and there is a readout and some kind of monitor, is that how that works?

Mr. Findlay: I have been watching one get built over the course of the winter and, you know, they have to put the scale in the lane, the extra lane that has been built. So you build the extra lane and then you have got to put the weigh scale in and then you have to have the readout placed out there too. So it has to have power, and there is a bit of work to putting that in and a fair bit of cost also.

Mr. Jennissen: On that cost figure, what does the minister estimate it would cost per scale?

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, for a ballpark cost, they are about $50,000 for the grade, gravel, pavement, and then another $50,000 for the weigh scale and the readout. So you are looking at about $100,000 in total per site. That is very approximate. It varies by site, of course. But you have to build a fair lane to accommodate the trucks to pull off, stop, and then pull back on. The one I can think of seeing is certainly in the vicinity of a fifth of a mile of lane that was built.

Mr. Jennissen: One of the questions I have is: Do we have enough inspectors and enough weigh scales as, say, compared to Saskatchewan? I am under the impression that they have more inspectors or that their workload is a little less paperwork and more actual inspection time available for them. Are there any comparable statistics?

Mr. Findlay: In terms of inspections, total number of staff is 42. It is the same this year as last year. Inspections consist of two major activities; one is at the stationary sites--the member can think of places like Elie just west of Winnipeg, which is certainly a major location. They also have roving staff for spot inspections that travel around with portable scales and can set up anywhere in the province, any road at any time. The general statistic is that we are not finding any inordinate number of violations wherever and however the inspections are done. The figure is about 95 percent of trucks that are stopped are within legal weights, which is a pretty high compliance. Probably the one thing that keeps people very conscious is the roving aspect of spot inspections that can be done.

I know I have been talking with people in the trucking industry, and it is their desire to be sure that they do not overimpact the roads, because they know there is a cost to us as taxpayers. They are not out there to beat the roads up, because they need to use them today, tomorrow and a month from now. So everyone wants to find ways to be sure that the last 5 percent continually complies. Our inspectors are one way, but maybe there are some better ways we can further impress upon people why we should have that number of noncompliance or violation from 5 percent to 4, to 3, to 2, to even lower, if we can get it there. We have not had blips in terms of number of violations. It is fairly consistent, routinely low.

The number I have now, now that we have the paper, is even better. It is 99 percent compliance. Now, that is an awful lot of your commercial trucks at your stationary places which they run into one every 200 or 400 miles, so they always load properly. That makes up a reasonable percentage of the actual inspections done, but 99 is a pretty high level of compliance.

Mr. Jennissen: With regard to inspectors and spot checks, if that is to apply, let us say, to a far northern area such as 391 and ore trucks or lumber trucks, whatever, you would know that inspector is coming. Right? There is only one way in and everybody has a citizens' band radio. In fact, I hear truckers joking about Cowboy Charlie coming. I do not know how true this is, but just for the minister's information, if he is into rumour, you know, they know the fellow is coming. What are they supposed to carry? Mr. Chairman, 62,500 kilograms, but they tend to carry a lot more than that. But, if they know he is coming, then, of course, they lower the load a little bit. They get caught on occasion, I guess, because the gentleman apparently is extremely clever as well and does not always travel in the same car, I presume.

An Honourable Member: A cat-and-mouse game.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, it is a cat-and-mouse game, but there is something to that. You cannot come from four different directions. You can only come into town from Thompson, and everybody knows who you are. I mean, you could be complying that particular day, but not the other 20 days that this gentleman is not anywhere around. I do not know if there is a way around that. If you are determined to cheat, I guess you can.

Mr. Findlay: It is the cat-and-mouse game of the police, or the inspector and the citizen on the road. It is difficult to have the perfect system where nobody knows that he is coming and he catches everybody that is in violation. Somebody has got a radio, and he hears that the inspector is on the road. He has his 61 logs on the truck--what is he going to do? Is he going to quickly stop and throw some off the road? Well, if the inspector comes along, he has got him.

I just want to re-emphasize to the member that the commercial trucking industry is pretty responsive in protecting our roads. I would have to also give the member some credit for saying that in the more remote areas that the tendency might be to violate a little. We are constantly concerned about the timber hauling trucks, no doubt about it. They have come to us with different approaches. They do want to haul higher loads or heavier weights.

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In Saskatchewan the same thing is occurring, and they pay an ongoing penalty on the basis of overload weight just in order to carry it. They see it as an advantage to pay that towards the additional road impact that they are involved in. I bet you every province is involved in that discussion at one level or another. Our idea is to maximize the way we can protect our roads, but again at the end of the day you cannot have inspectors crawling over everything.

Mr. Jennissen: The minister is correct that it would not work for hauling lumber. I was referring mainly to the Lynn Lake-Leaf Rapids area, and I think possibly only concentrate to maybe some gravel, I am not sure. I do not think it is a major problem either, but it is probably happening. It still brings up the question I raised earlier and that is, do we have enough weigh scales? I am thinking myself when I drive home, drive north to Cranberry Portage or Flin Flon it is roughly 800 kilometres. If that weigh scale is closed just north of The Pas I do not see any other weigh scale. I am up on Highway No. 6, I go all the way through, hang a left on Easterville Road, that is No. 6, then up No. 10 and sometimes that weigh scale is closed. So I could technically be a trucker driving from Winnipeg right up to Flin Flon, that is 800 kilometres or more and not see a weigh scale station. That does not mean inspectors are not on the road, but highly unlikely, at least the hours I travel.

Mr. Findlay: The member is referring more particularly to permanent scale?

Mr. Jennissen: Yes.

Mr. Findlay: The way we try to be as effective as possible, as I mentioned earlier a roving inspector, one way. Secondly, the hours that scale may be functioning will vary from time to time. One week you may go through and find it open a certain hour; the next week you will not find it; the third week you come back and find it open at quite a different hour. There is not any total pattern to when we are open and closed. The idea is to maybe have an element of surprise to the industries going through just to make sure that they are a little conscious that we could be there at any time and that there is not a guarantee that at two in the morning it will not be open. But the compliance rate is pretty good.

Mr. Jennissen: Just for my information, how many roving inspectors are there, and what is the fine if let us say you are 500 kilograms over?

Mr. Findlay: We do not have it right available. We do have public fines for different degrees of overload, but any one of those 42 could be roving. It depends on how the work assignments are worked out. Naturally we do man our permanent sites reasonably regularly. If we felt there was a particular area that was having a particular problem with the incidence of people really abusing the maximum weights, they would move people in there to send a signal real quick to clean up your act.

Mr. Jennissen: And the fines are high enough to be a deterrent. I do not have any idea what the fines are, but I presume that they are high enough to make it not lucrative to disobey the law.

Mr. Chairperson: The honourable Minister of Finance--or Highways.

Mr. Findlay: It is late in the afternoon I know, Mr. Chairman, but I might like to be the Minister of Finance at certain points in time.

Mr. Jennissen: A lot more road, eh?

An Honourable Member: Talk about money.

Mr. Findlay: The fines are basically quite high, because we get a fair number of complaints from people that do get picked off, how terrible the fine is, because they really did not intend to do that. So we do not listen too long or too hard to those stories, but certainly they get upset when they get caught, particularly if they are significantly over. It is a very hefty fine; it is not one that they laugh off and just pay it and carry on abusing the law.

Mr. Jennissen: Is there a permanent scale planned on the junction of Highway No. 10 and Highway No. 60, that is the Easterville Road? Because it seems to me there is a place there that is being groomed for that, but that has been in the offering now for a long time.

Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, the answer is no, not planned.

Mr. Jennissen: I am going to switch topics slightly to ask you for an update on the private used vehicle-inspection program. On March 27, 1996, the government's own news release mentioned that three inspection stations had been charged and 19 had been suspended. What are the latest statistics? Do you have any update on whether we have more problems? I know we got off to a bit of a rocky start on that and some questions about that. Can the minister give us an update?

Mr. Findlay: In the first year of operation, there was 102,000 inspections. Out of that there were 200 valid complaints. In the second year of operation, there were 113,000 inspections and 99 valid complaints. Out of the 99 valid complaints, 16 stations were sent warning letters regarding the quality of inspection that was performed, and five received show-cause hearings--five stations.

The department is going to be increasing its degree on onsite audits of those stations that are identified as needing that sort of action. I think the statistics do show an improvement out there. Actions taken along the way have stimulated people. They realize they have got to follow the handbook, got to do the inspections according to the guidelines and be accurate. The degree of valid complaints percentage-wise is very, very small. Then they cut in half the second year versus first year.

Mr. Jennissen: I wonder if I could jump back to an earlier sequence here. I was going to ask another couple questions on roads and overweight vehicles on roads. That came out of a statement actually the minister made in his opening statement. If I could just read that and he could clarify that for me, it comes out of Hansard on page 2690. "The timber haul transportation initiative, which the department co-chairs with Repap, focuses on developing a user-pay overweight permit. This policy includes a self-regulatory component. It is expected that this initiative, once completed, will promote a model for other resourced-based industries."

I do not understand what a user-pay overweight permit is or what the self-regulating component is all about. Can the minister explain that to me? I am sorry that I jumped away from that sequence.

Mr. Findlay: What I was answering you earlier, that is effectively what I was referring to. I remember I mentioned Saskatchewan in terms of coming to agreement with particular industries, and they pay a particular charge for the degree of overweight that they carry. It reflects the degree of damage that the department would think that the overweight is causing to the roads. They see it to their economic advantage of carrying greater weights and still paying an ongoing charge for that overweight. So it is done in certain industries in Saskatchewan and in Manitoba, and that is what I was referring to a few minutes ago.

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The self-regulation, they accept certain responsibilities to live then within the new defined guidelines and pay the appropriate fee associated with being allowed to haul those kind of weights. I think, generally speaking, on what we might call remote roads, it is a policy-ender. Let us say, constant evolution between us and industries so we can accommodate them, and they can be paying something towards the kind of damage they are doing to the roads.

Mr. Jennissen: So it is industry-specific then, like a Repap truck could be loaded more heavily and have a permit than another truck.

Mr. Findlay: Effectively, they will pay an ongoing additional fee, and yes, okay, I have your weight. But they pay for the damage that that extra weight causes on the road, and it is predetermined by technical staff and agreed to by the department and the industry involved. It is a specific agreement that is signed and only with those industries that the agreements are signed is that allowed to happen.

Mr. Jennissen: So it is in a sense a user-pay then. How would that be determined? How do you set the rate? Is it you figure 10 percent of the road is damaged? X number of trucks go over this road. This is how much money we would have to recoup. Is that how that rate is set?

Mr. Findlay: As I referred to earlier, I keep mentioning Saskatchewan because they have basically been the lead on this. They are ahead of us. They have established more of these kinds of agreements and have established what the degree of damage is. It is not a perfect science, I am sure, in terms of what Saskatchewan has done and what we are trying to do to accommodate similar industries.

Naturally, if Saskatchewan does it, we have the same industry here saying they have an industry over there that has a competitive advantage, so you are forced to respond in similar and like fashion, but it is a learn-as-you-go process, and the agreements that are signed are generally short term--[interjection] They are long-term agreements, but it is trying to keep our industries competitive and our roads funded in terms of the impact that they cause on our roads. The member does talk about self-regulation and by agreement, that is what it ends up being.

Mr. Jennissen: If we could go back to where we left off just a little while ago on the private used Vehicle Inspection Program, one of the arguments I heard the minister make was that under that program there would be many more inspections than there would be under the mandatory government program.

Do we have figures at this point to say how many lives we have saved, or are the fatalities down, I guess, is the question, or is that too premature?

Mr. Findlay: We would not have any way of knowing other than the general statement you hear from the industry that because we instituted the PVIP program, a lot of clunkers came off the road. It would simply be too costly to get them to pass inspections. I believe the figure previously through the MPI program is about 25,000 inspections were done per year, and as I have indicated, the first year, 102,000, the second year 113,000 inspections, so the number of inspections has gone way up, and a lot of those clunkers that everybody knew would not pass are off the road, or else any time that they would have transferred ownership out of the family this would not be inspected, it would just be off the road.

So you have had two effects. One, the number of clunkers on the road are much fewer, and those that have transferred ownership have had safety inspections, and, naturally, many of them had work done to improve their safety so you have safer used vehicles on the road, not only for drivers but for the rest of the travelling public.

There are at least four times as many per year, the inspections that are done, and now we get inspections on all transfers. Previously, the 25,000 was only in the city of Winnipeg, so we are covering the whole province now requiring, by inspection process, safer vehicles, safer used vehicles on the road.

Mr. Jennissen: But the number of accidents have not gone down regardless of the inspections. Is that not correct?

Mr. Findlay: They have injuries and collisions per thousand drivers and only have statistics up to 1995 which is when the program started. Whether you would ever see anything in these statistics is hard to say. Again, it is not a pure science how they are collected. Secondly, weather conditions, driver attitude, alcohol, speed, number of vehicles on the road, all those things affect the number of accidents. To say that the inspection program by itself results in less accidents, I do not know if you could ever prove that.

I think that if you have better brakes in your car, the severity of the accident will be decreased, and I think there is just a general feeling in the public that if you have more safety inspections on vehicles, whether it is school buses or used cars or commercial trucks, you reduce the incidence of the potential of that vehicle being involved in an accident.

There are always more drivers, more vehicles, more miles driven, and our cars are generally safer, too, in terms of the kinds of brakes they have today on the newer ones. So you have a lot of factors at play all the time, and our accident rate is generally comparable to what exists in other jurisdictions in North America.

Mr. Jennissen: But the main selling point of the privatized program was safety, however, and it did take a number of clunkers off the road, including a couple of mine, I must admit, which caused me some financial embarrassment, but I am willing to live with that as critic of Highways.

That is the point I am getting at. Is it not true that statistics indicate that although you could catch mechanical defects in this way, mechanical defects account for a very small percentage of the accidents though? So then that still begs the question why the privatized program was needed.

Mr. Findlay: The member reflects on clunkers. I mean, clunker with poor brakes versus a clunker with new brakes? I would sooner put my life on the record in the vehicle with new brakes that was picked up in this kind of a program. I have never heard anybody argue that we have not improved safety on the roads. Whether we can prove it with statistics over the course of time, I question whether we can.

The member has already given me the evidence I need; certain vehicles are off the road. Had the program not been there those vehicles would still be on the road. It is just a variety of circumstances. I think it would be hard to argue that more safety inspections are not an asset to safety on the roads.

Just one other factor that would make the member aware is that a lot of the minor accidents that happen require self-declaration to even get them on the record. Not a lot of people come in and say, well, I had an accident because my brakes failed. So you do not get that kind of statistic and that is, fundamentally, in terms of safety inspections, what you do. You improve the brakes in a vehicle where the brakes are, in some cases, in a state of disrepair and considered below a standard that is acceptable for safety.

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Mr. Jennissen: Just for the record, I have never had an accident with my clunkers, but they are off the road. It is basically bad drivers and, I suppose, also bad roads and road conditions that lead to most of the accidents, not mechanical defects. So I guess the stress should be on driver education and safety. I am certainly not arguing against safety. I guess you can never be safe enough.

But still, I do want to remind the minister again that there is a significant sector of the population out there that thinks that the motivation for that whole program had a lot more to do with Bob Kozminski's political and financial fortunes than actually safety. We do not want to revisit that one, although I could quote Fred Cleverley, and maybe I will just for the record, who says, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that handing the private automobile industry the right to say which car should be banned from the highways is a bad idea. It was a worse idea to give the same industry the right to determine how much an ordinary Manitoban has to spend to get his car licensed. So that is for the record and I am sure that the minister would want to comment on Fred Cleverley's statement.

Mr. Findlay: I think what we had developing prior to the program was a lot of corner lot operators selling used cars without any requirement of any kind of customer consumer protection regarding safety. They could sell anything. It could almost have no brakes in it, they could sell it. If the customer did not catch it, he ended up driving two blocks down and having the brakes fail, and he has got the cost. It is a bit of a consumer protection process that did not exist for the corner lot operators. He could have bought it from somebody who--you come back and complain and he would just, you know, fold his tent and move on somewhere else.

But for a garage, they had to be more accountable because they were in business for the long term. It was levelling the playing field in terms of public safety and driving used vehicles. Although it was difficult to make everything work perfect, I think the intent has basically improved safety and levelled the playing field for wherever you buy a used car. Make the people that purchase cars, wherever they get ahold of them and come and sell them to the public--in the process of getting them registered we can give the public some sense of assurance. In order to get that safety certificate it had to go through an inspection process so that they could have some comfort in terms of reliability. Our mission is to pick off those who do not do that inspection process properly and, again, increase consumer protection from the standpoint of safety.

Mr. Jennissen: It is true, though, that if you have a used car and you are selling it and it is safetied, it is okay for two years. I am just wondering, like, in two years you could put on an enormous amount of mileage or kilometres on that brake system. So, I mean, we have not removed all the bugs from it. It is a step maybe in the direction of safety, but we will never close all the loopholes I am sure.

Mr. Findlay: The two years is not there forever. I mean, if there is reason to revisit the issue of two years, it will be revisited. There are different lengths in other jurisdictions. I think Ontario is 30 days or something, which is an extremely short period of time, certainly in my mind a bit of overkill, but two years was picked for this point in time because I believe on average it is appropriate. If experience shows it is too long, it will be revisited.

Mr. Jennissen: So the minister does not feel that the government-run program, if we had expanded that, for example, and used maybe the money from the photo licence proceeds to fund that program and have a random mandatory inspection system by the government, that would not be better in the sense that the people that are doing the inspecting are not the ones fixing the cars normally. Would that not be a more objective, open and neutral system? I mean, the chance to rip off the customer would not be there.

Mr. Findlay: The person who is having the vehicle inspected is not required by any regulation to have it repaired in the shop where he had it inspected. It could be in another shop, or he can go home and do it himself. So he is not locked into repairs being done in the station where the inspection is done. We made very sure to keep the two--to give the consumer the opportunity to keep the two activities separate, if he so chose.

Mr. Jennissen: That is true, but, as Ross Rutherford pointed out in that CBC program, you know, you could go to one garage and they could give you one price to fix for your car, and if you do not like it, you could go to another garage and find totally different figures and numbers. So it is true that the customer could go to several places to shop around, but they are not likely to do that because, what, you have to pay $40 every time you have them inspect your car. So I do not know. I think there are some weaknesses in the system.

Mr. Findlay: As I indicated earlier, Mr. Chairman, it is not a perfect science. We argue to err on the side of safety, and the Ross Rutherford angle is to argue that the consumer should not have to pay and he is not responsible for improving the safety of the vehicle. I do not accept that argument.

When you can do something to increase safety and reduce the number of clunkers on the road, I think it is a positive thing to do. Like any program, it has a few growing pains, and we will always adjust, as they continue to adjust, to reduce the number of incidents where there are valid complaints and increase the degree of audits of garages to be sure that they understand the program, how it functions, and how to do it correctly.

So it is a growing and educational process for everybody involved. We are not afraid to lift the licence of somebody who is found to be significantly in error in the process of doing those inspections.

I think I just forgot to respond when the member said, well, we should have government stations all over. Well, what could we afford? Five, six stations, seven, eight? You know, we might have two in Winnipeg, one in Brandon, one in Thompson, one in Dauphin.

An Honourable Member: Riverton.

Mr. Findlay: I do not think we would get to Riverton. The way we have got it set up, we do have stations in Riverton; we have inspection stations there. So this way we have got it spread over, I think, some 800-plus stations or something across the province. So it is easy access for people everywhere this way. As I say, if we had government stations where that was all they did for 24 hours a day, or eight hours a day, you would cause people to have to drive long distances to get the inspections done, and that would be a hassle. So that is the trade-off to increase the degree of accessibility and still--I think the member would also agree--improve the safety of the vehicles in general on our roads.

Mr. Jennissen: But, in this system, if I have a clunker, a used vehicle, and I do not sell it, there is no onus on me to have it safetied, whereas in the old system, under random mandatory inspection, you could be called up and that vehicle would be checked. That is not happening now, so I do not see how that will improve safety.

Mr. Findlay: You are subject to being stopped at any time and day by the police to inspect your vehicle. If you are found to have one with tires that are not up to spec or brakes that are not up to spec, you suffer the fine and are subject to having your vehicle pulled off the road. That has always been that way, and it continues to be that way. If they stop you and your turn signals are not working or your brake lights are not working, they will give you a ticket or a warning, and they give you so many days to get it inspected and come back and prove that it is fixed. It has always been that way, and that still continues.

Mr. Jennissen: But in the older system, though, you could build in something if your car was over 10 years old; you know, you would have to have it inspected. It was mandatory.

Mr. Findlay: Only in Winnipeg.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, I know. It never reached the North.

Well, I think this way a lot of so-called clunkers are not being sold, are not being inspected.

Mr. Findlay: Nothing is perfect.

Mr. Jennissen: The minister, in his opening statement, mentioned Manitoba's participation in a new stolen and wrecked vehicle monitoring program established by the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators. Considering that, until recently, one out of every five used vehicles sold in the province had been written off elsewhere, does the minister have any sense of what the situation is like now?

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Mr. Findlay: Mr. Chairman, we are certainly going to be introducing legislation to allow us, in the Province of Manitoba, to do what the member is talking about. Currently, there is a national program that every province is committed to enter by the end of this year. Three are currently in it now and the rest of us are coming in.

We have to do legislative changes to accommodate stolen and wrecked vehicle initiatives, and this is not the time or place to talk about all the elements. We can talk about it in the legislative process, but it is very, very important that we get involved in this program to protect the public and to prevent ourselves from being a dumping ground for stolen and wrecked vehicles. It is quite an industry, quite a legal industry, that has developed in that aspect, and it is a nation-wide problem. If all the rest of the problems come in simultaneously, we will reduce the chance of being a dumping ground for those kind of vehicles.

It is business of moving in numbers. It is a business of taking a wrecked vehicle and rebuilding it and getting it back on the road. Every province wants to be sure that from this angle, again, we do not allow unsafe vehicles to in any fashion get back on the road in the hands of an unsuspecting public.

Mr. Jennissen: So the minister has no sense of, or statistics for, the feeling that there must be fewer laundered autos in the province now than there were before. Like, if we are saying one out of every five used vehicles that was coming was a write-off elsewhere, do we have a feeling now it is one out of 10, one out of 20, like, you have no figures on that whatsoever?

Mr. Findlay: We do not have any statistics of that context. All we know is it is a problem and a problem nation-wide, and we are going to move to close the loopholes in our system that allow some of that to happen. I mean it is strongly supported by the police and by all the vehicle licencing operations across this country.

Mr. Jennissen: Statistics in Manitoba indicate that 15 percent of Manitobans do not use seat belts, and there was some talk a while ago of perhaps building in demerits beyond the $66 fine and also demerit points. Is that going to go on, or is that on hold?

Mr. Findlay: The member beside you is starting to make faces at you.

Mr. Jennissen: Well, he speeds a lot.

An Honourable Member: Name him.

An Honourable Member: That is on the record.

Mr. Jennissen: But he always wears a seat belt.

Mr. Chairperson: Order, please. I would remind the committee that their remarks should be made through the Chair.

Mr. Findlay: At this stage, our position is to stay with the fine for nonuse of a seat belt, and the member is right, the fine is $66. I do not know what it is for the second offence, but it is a little higher. The police regularly have programs of greater awareness of those, to create an awareness to wear seat belts by making spot checks on people not wearing seat belts. Yes, the statistics continually show, you know, 15, approximately, percent do not wear seat belts, but at $66 a crack, and higher the second time, we think would be a pretty strong signal.

I am always disappointed when you see a vehicle go by and you see kids playing and jumping around in the vehicle. You know that there is not a seat belt on. Giving the driver demerits, I do not think would change anything, but the fines hopefully will, and the public awareness created by the police inspections, after applying the fine, will continue to promote people of the need to wear seat belts. We have signs on the highways and on it goes. I guess you can be happy you have got as high as 85 percent, but it would be nicer to get it even higher.

I know that the young people today, and I have got grandchildren, you know, if for sometime you get in and you do not put the seat belt on right away, they remind you because they are trained, they are educated to that--seat belt, seat belt, seat belt. You have some older people that are just very ornery about they did not wear them 40 years ago, why should they wear them now. It is tough to get their attitude to change, but I think it is more effective if the grandchildren work on them than us to put demerits in place.

Mr. Jennissen: When you are talking safety, you are talking, I guess, several factors including the driver of the vehicle and road and weather conditions. I think to some limited degree we have talked about driver education and vehicle inspection and so on, but the road and the weather also, obviously, are very critical factors. I cannot even begin to name, I guess, the accidents that have occurred on some of those northern roads, specifically 391, and also the Sherridon road, which is very narrow, as you know, and a lot of people have been hurt on the road, in fact, have been killed. So those are always things that bother me a great deal, because I feel that more money and effort and energy should be put into those roads. But I am fully aware, and the minister points this out quite regularly, that there are a limited number of dollars.

I would like to get on to the spring road restrictions a little bit and winter roads, but before I do that I think some of my colleagues would like to ask a few questions. They have been very patiently waiting, so if the minister does not mind slightly switching topics, because I have no idea what their questions may be. We will give them a chance. The member for St. Boniface (Mr. Gaudry), I think, has been patiently waiting.

Mr. Findlay: I am going to ask, you know, that in the the next 15 minutes or so we have a break for five minutes.

An Honourable Member: Sure.

Mr. Findlay: If you are prepared, let us do it now then.

Mr. Neil Gaudry (St. Boniface): Well, we can have the break right now.

Mr. Findlay: Your choice.

Mr. Chairperson: For the record, the committee will now recess for 10 minutes and return here at 25 after four.

The committee recessed at 4:18 p.m.

The committee resumed at 4:26 p.m.

Mr. Chairperson: Order, please. Will the Committee of Supply please come to order. We will resume the Estimates of the Department of Highways.

Mr. Jennissen: Mr. Chair, I wonder if you would allow my honourable colleague for Wolseley to ask a few questions before the colleague from St. Boniface does so.

Mr. Chairperson: Sure. I guess just for the clarification of the committee members, if anybody wishes the Chair to recognize any person, then all they have to do is raise their hand and the Chair will recognize him.

Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): I wanted to ask some questions about River Road in St. Andrews. I understand that it is the intention of the government to pave that road this year. I wanted to confirm that. I have a long-standing interest in St. Andrew's from an historical perspective. Perhaps we should start with this, the intention of the government to pave River Road, that is the old Parish Road historically that turns off the highway and goes past St. Andrew's Church and past Kennedy House.

Mr. Findlay: There has been considerable pressure from that community to do exactly what the member is referring to, to pave the road, and there will be some improvements to the curves in the road to make them safer. Previously we have done some riverbank stabilization there--three-quarters of a million dollars, I believe, was done to stabilize the riverbank. It is scheduled to be tendered this year.

Ms. Friesen: Mr. Chairman, the provincial government was part in the 1980s of a federal-provincial agreement called ARC, the Agreement for Recreation and Conservation which included River Road. It included a number of sites, 18 sites, from north of Selkirk right through to St. Norbert on the Assiniboine--or, sorry, on the Red, the Red sites. Part of that agreement was to maintain River Road as essentially, in the historic sense of a Parish Road as different from the highway, as an unpaved road. In part, it was to slow down the tourist traffic, because it was at that point under the ARC agreement being developed as a tourist route, and I know the government has maintained an interest in that in its brochures on the whole Selkirk region and maintains the interest in St. Andrews as a tourist route.

So the intent in the ARC agreement was twofold. It was, one, to maintain a different kind of historical presence along River Road than you might find, for example, on the main highway to Selkirk, to maintain that sense of the old road where there had been the connections between the church, between the old Hudson's Bay Company school, between Captain Kennedy House and Scott House, the basic historic sites in that area. But, secondly, it was also from the perspective of the residents to reduce the speed of traffic along that road, and I am sure it has done that.

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So I am interested that the minister is saying that there has been continuous pressure from the community, and I do not dispute that, but I wondered how that had been dealt with. Did the community understand the ARC agreement? Was the community, the current community--and I know this is a lot different from the community that was there, say, 15 years ago--made aware in these discussions about the ARC agreement? How does Manitoba, in particular, and how does the minister deal with the issue that the maintenance of River Road in that manner was part of the ARC agreement, the federal-provincial agreement, and now that seems to be being deviated from? Is there a formal process for that kind of deviation?

Mr. Findlay: I want to tell the member, Mr. Chairman, there has been strong pressure to do that road from the citizens that currently live there. I think she has identified that, 15 years ago the people that lived there--there would be a quite a bit different clientele living there today than what there was. But it is one of those roads that, like, there has just been incredible pressure to do it, and even from the elected member for Selkirk (Mr. Dewar) who has indicated to me: I want to have that road done.

So we responded to that pressure and we will build it in, what is called, a parkway road, not a high-speed road. It will have less than highway speed limits on it. It is not positive, but we believe it is 80. If there is a desire to have the speed limit further lowered, there is a process of applying to the Highway Traffic Board and making representation to do that, but very seldom do we have people arguing not to upgrade a road. It is constantly the opposite, and we can never meet all of those requirements to upgrade roads. But this one, people living along there have aggressively lobbied that they want a paved surface for dust control, for their improved living environment.

Ms. Friesen: The difficulty is often in conveying the recent past to people. We understand what happened in the 1880s, and we even know what happened in the 1950s, but ideas do change and people are often very unaware of what happened 15 or 10 years ago. So my sense is that the government did not know this either, that this particular branch of government did not know about the ARC agreement, did not know about the very specific decisions to retain that road in a particular type of condition.

Whereas, I am not necessarily saying that has to be held forever, it seemed to me there might be some process whereby the residents of that community, the people who had signed the ARC agreement, the reasons for it might be reconsidered. If then the reconsideration is such, on the basis of all that information, yes, we want to go ahead and pave it, yes, we want the speed limit at 80, frankly, it seems a bit high to me. I am a very slow driver compared to most of my colleagues. I set out an hour earlier for Selkirk than anybody else. I would think also living on that road, obviously, people will come to some agreement about what kind of speed limit they want.

I wonder if the minister would undertake to look at the ARC agreement, and I would suggest to him that he might want to talk to Mr. Ian Dixon who is now, I think, the manager of the Assiniboine River Board. I think he is currently in the employment of the provincial government. It might be somebody to talk to. He was the executive director of the ARC project and might be able to direct you to the right documents for this.

Mr. Findlay: In the process of making decisions of what to do with roads, there is always an open-house process. We usually meet with the municipality, tell them what the plan is. We discuss the pros and cons of what they want, what we think they can do and then you end up with an open house.

Staff tell me that the open house, this ARC agreement never came up from anybody who was present. We will follow up on what the member is talking about, the ARC agreement, and see what was there because we are not aware of it, because, you are right, we just cannot be aware of everything. We will look back and see. It would be very difficult to revisit the road from the standpoint of what people have asked for and demanded and what they now believe they have coming because it has been programmed to be tendered this summer, hopefully built this summer, but no guarantee, depending on weather.

So we will follow up with that and if there is any--I mean, speed limit is one of those things--I mean, they want a parkway, they do not want a high speed road and a parkway, the maximum speed limits are usually 80 kilometres and it could be less. That might be one way to be more accommodating to what the agreement was if there is any desire, dealing with the municipality, dealing with the residents, to change what we are doing or change the speed limit.

Ms. Friesen: I appreciate that there have been open houses on this, but perhaps what I could point out is that the open house may have been operating on the basis of incomplete information. Perhaps there is a responsibility of government here, which is a signatory to a federal-provincial agreement of some magnitude, that perhaps there is some way of indicating in departmental records. I assume that is what happening, that there is not a flag coming up now on departmental records that says, okay, this road has been involved as part of. That may induce people to look a little further.

I say this, not just because of historical reasons or--well, I do say it because I had personal connections with that and with the River Road, and the ARC project certainly is a continuing concern, but also because the province does have a strategy for developing tourist routes. It does have a particular strategy for that area which encourages tourists to use that. There is a whole new group in tourism which--I forgot what they are called, is it Rivers West?-- is trying to develop the whole St. Andrews area and to link it with sites in Selkirk, so the transportation routes, the maintenance of those routes, the naming of them and the linking of them with the historical past and the historical sites that are maintained there in part by the province. I mean, Kennedy House has a provincial link, as does the fishing museum on the other side of the river at Lockport.

So there are a number of very valuable historical resources in that area which are very close to a major population centre of Winnipeg. That is where the basis of tourism is for Manitoba. This is not just a small issue. I am concerned about the tourism future as well. So I will leave it with the minister, if he would not mind talking to Mr. Dixon, perhaps reviewing the departmental ways of recording material so that such issues might come up in the future in a more appropriate manner so that open houses might have full information. They may well make the same decision. I can accept that, but I would like to have seen something dealt with at that stage.

Mr. Findlay: I have committed that we will follow up and look into it, but the business of tourism is something that is really promoted very strongly up there, all the way up through into Lockport and all the regions around there. They are all trying to do whatever they can to improve tourism, and one of the things they want is a dust-free road. They feel it is better for attracting people to come up and go through the area. But we will follow up, no question.

Mr. Neil Gaudry (St. Boniface): Yes, Mr. Chairperson. I was not going to discuss the "bienvenue" plate, but since my colleague from Flin Flon did mention, all I want is to make a statement as to the fact that I was very disappointed that it was not done. The fact that I think it would have not cost more at the time because the contract had not been given out, and due to the requests from the Francophone community and that there was support from the community at large, I felt very disappointed. I do not know whether it has gone to the courts now, and I am not going to discuss it at length, because, like I said, I think I have asked the question and I have written enough letters and got responses which I appreciated.

Hopefully, next time around it will be considered. But my question is: What are the consequences if someone uses a sticker using the word "bienvenue"? What will be the outcome of any charges or what could be done?

Mr. Findlay: You mean a sticker to put on the plate in addition to what is currently on the plate?

Mr. Gaudry: Right.

Mr. Findlay: The plate is a legal entity, and the law is that anything that is on there that is not authorized is defacing the plate in the eyes of the enforcement officers. I think the member is clearly aware that we gave a lot of consideration to it. We have met with SFM on at least two occasions and had a lot of discussion. We had a tremendous amount of phone calls on that issue to my office, and there were very few that were supportive. I was quite disappointed in the nature of some of the calls and what was said. It really drew out some thoughts and comments from people you would not think that people would make today, but unfortunately they do. There was a high level of sensitivity on both sides of the issue, but the vast majority, very vast majority, were opposed to the additional word.

We have had to make a decision, and we have made a decision. The member has asked a specific question, and I have given him the answer regarding the law.

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Mr. Gaudry: So what the minister is saying, Mr. Chairman, is the fact that if it is defaced, there could be charges laid against these people or these drivers that have a sticker saying "bienvenue" on the plate.

Mr. Findlay: Anything that is on there that is not authorized would be deemed to be defacing the plate. That is the way the law reads.

Mr. Gaudry: The minister says that he did get a lot of calls. So did I, and out of the hundred calls or the meetings that I have had with people, I think there was one person that was against it. If you read in the paper, I think there were a lot of comments made in the letters to the editor and there were very few against it; most were for the word "bienvenue." I think I would like to point that out because, like I say, I had several calls and met a lot of people and they still talk about it. They still talk about it very positively. Like I said, I do not want it to linger on, the fact that it is a done deal now, they have gone to the people that are producing the plates and the contract has been given out.

Can the minister advise us who got the contract and at what price and were they the lowest bidders.

Mr. Findlay: There were six tenders, as I recall. The lowest tender was accepted and it is a company from Nova Scotia that is producing the plates. The company's name is Waldale Manufacturing Ltd., Amherst, Nova Scotia.

Mr. Gaudry: I thank the minister for his answers in regard to the questions. I have a letter here, and I do not know whether the Flin Flon asked, but there was a letter sent to the minister on April 10 from the Cormorant community council by Mayor Verna Hunter in regard to Provincial Road No. 287 to Cormorant, Manitoba. Has the minister replied? What is the process in regard to looking after their concerns in regard to that road?

Mr. Findlay: What was the nature of the request in the letter?

Mr. Gaudry: The Cormorant community council met on April 8, 1997, to discuss the community's concerns with the condition of Highway 287 from Clearwater-Atikameg to Cormorant which is approximately 35 kms. of gravel road. We are asking the Department of Highways to seriously look at making improvement as quickly as possible. During the past two years, five vehicles have rolled with one fatality. Four of the accidents have occurred this winter with three happening within the last month. The condition of the road has been of greater concern to this council, especially within the last year. We have written to the Department of Highways in The Pas, Manitoba, but as yet have received no response. Please consider our request as urgent. We await your response.

Mr. Findlay: I do not suppose the member would be surprised if I said I get hundreds of these letters every year. The requests are there from communities in letters like this, the requests are there from municipalities, either in letters or in meetings. I have in excess of 80 meetings with municipalities alone every year. There is a tremendous lobby all the time for many roads, but looking at the map I can see it is a fairly complex road in terms of all of the problems that exist that need to be corrected in due course.

We have not responded yet. We are preparing the response, but we will be responding to them. For communities all across the province, this is an ongoing process of communicating with them. By raising it, they get it to our attention that there is somebody out there who wants something done, and as evaluations are done of the road by staff and as projects are moved forward for the decision-making process each year, they get themselves on the list.

I think the member is probably aware--and I have used these numbers many times just to give some perspective of the degree of request there is versus the ability to respond--there are 18,000 kilometres of road in our system, 2,800 bridges and structures. We have a hundred million dollars of capital to spend each year. When I came into the department, I asked the deputy what was the wish list. He eventually came up with a list of $600 million versus the hundred we have every year, and that wish list in the last three years has grown to over 1,100 million. That was about a year and a half ago we identified that, and I am sure, if you went back and looked at the wish list now, it would be much higher than that.

So it is a long wish list, and we have to respond. At the top of the list come roads with serious safety problems or bridges that are in the process of failing or cannot carry the traffic that needs to use it or the traffic volumes on a road. The roads with higher traffic volumes, obviously you should respond first to them versus lower traffic volumes. It is surprising how many roads are around 50 to 100 to 150 vehicles a day, but really low use. There are many roads around Winnipeg, and the member is aware of 59 south, 5,000, 6,000 vehicles a day, and it is going to cost us some $60 million to supply an adequate, safe road for 14 kilometres. We are in that process, so $60 million in one spot.

You know, we just completed the northeast Perimeter which cost $17 million, but it is really a $60-million project, because the portion we have done has cost $17 million and there are two more lanes to pave and three interchanges to ultimately build over the course of time. So we respond as best we can.

I appreciate the input the communities give like this. We will give a detailed response, and the negotiation or discussion I am sure will carry on until such time as the responsible thing to do is to move them into some element of program consideration.

Mr. Gaudry: I appreciate the minister's response.

On a letter like this, for example, where they have concerns, and I see the accidents that have happened over the--how do you rate them in priorities? I know there is one fatality, and I think that is one too many. When the minister also gets to respond to these people, would it be possible that both of us here get a copy of the letter so that we know it has been responded to and we will see what is going to happen in the future?

Mr. Findlay: We will commit to get both members a copy of the response, but do not forget, when they identify that there are fatalities, it may not be road condition related. It may be weather related, it may be driver error, it may be vehicle error. I mean, there are a lot of other factors other than the road condition that can lead to accidents.

Granted, bad weather and tough road conditions are a dynamite combination. As I identified earlier, the thousands of accidents that happen and the fatalities that happen, you would like to prevent every one, but so much of it is attitude and the driver not driving to conditions. You may say the conditions were never good enough, but it is not always just the road conditions.

Mr. Gaudry: When you get a letter like this where they indicate that they seem to be complaining about the road condition, is there a study that is done in regard to seeing why these accidents have happened? Like, there are five of them, three in the last month when she wrote that letter.

Mr. Findlay: The people that are closest to the action are maintenance people who are out on those roads on a continuous basis. They have some responsibility to report to us if there is something particularly bad that needs attention, whether it is a maintenance thing, or whether it is a curve that needs to be reconstructed. They have responsibility to raise it from that level, which can draw quicker attention to us, in addition to the communities input.

In terms of the actual accidents, if a report comes to our attention, yes, it is part of the information. I would not say that we are constantly getting all the information on the nature of accidents, what caused the accident. Only if there is a police report will you ever have a chance to get it.

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Mr. Gaudry: The minister indicated that I knew of Highway 59. Yes, I guess he is aware that there are groups that have come to see us all that are involved along the stretch of Highway 59, which part of it is in my constituency in St. Boniface also. So what is the long-term plan with Highway 59? I know that there are 16 kilometres past the floodway in the process of being constructed in the very near future, but the long term, they have said that it has been promised in '93, '94, '95 to the American border, and this seems to have upset them over the long term. Can the minister indicate what program to finish Highway 59, four lanes, to the American border?

An Honourable Member: Oh, to the American border.

Mr. Gaudry: It was promised here according to the--I can read the letter, four pages.

Mr. Findlay: Like any road, it will be done in stages. There is a plan for the first 14 kilometres to just south of 210. We have done the approaches to the bridge over the floodway, and the bridge is under construction. We have committed in the program to complete that and to some further grading of some 3.6 kilometres for $2 million. The idea of getting it open by the fall of '97, to the north junction of Highway 300, which is just south of the floodway, so you go over the floodway on the four-lane.

We are currently in the process of acquiring land for further building. It is on a new alignment, had to be a new alignment because the old alignment had houses on both sides and curves. A new alignment was picked, again, public open houses held, and the alignment was approved. The unfortunate thing is that alignment goes through what is called Ritchot Park, city property, so we are working with the city to get ability to purchase the property to build the road. Plus, buying the property from other private landowners is always a challenge. It is amazing how often people come and say, just tell us, we will tell the people, and we will sign right away. As soon as a land buyer shows up, the world just changes overnight.

Now we are into people want this, want that, whether it is price or something else. So acquiring land in order to do it, this example, even though broad acceptance of the road--tremendous demand that we get it done, we are often held up on trying to acquire land. I just recently signed a letter to promote the city to understand we had to do this, and we needed to get on with the ability to acquire the land through that park. You can appreciate there is a certain level of sensitivity with that. If we do not go through the park, I do not know where we go, because you just cannot afford to buy up all those residences, and people hate that you take out their residences to build a road. So design is accepted. Design has been approved over time.

The member talks about all the way to the U.S. border. It will be a long time in the future, because the traffic volumes in the southern portions just do not warrant that kind of a road, given all the other demands that are brought forward.

Just another little aside, when I have met with that committee, at least once a year, and they are pretty demanding. I think over the course of the meetings you can have a better understanding of the complexity of the situation. It is not easy. You cannot drop it from a helicopter overnight. It is going to take some time to do it. They did make one demand which--I think they have backed off now--is stop all projects everywhere else in the province and just build ours, it is the only one that counts. It is an unacceptable position. They do not gain any momentum by bringing that kind of position to a table. I think the last couple of meetings I have not heard that statement, but it is how people think. It is stop everything else, just me, and then you can do somebody else. We cannot do it that way.

We constantly do projects all over the province every year. We never do enough anywhere, but we do something everywhere on an ongoing basis. We do those roads that are deemed in highest need, roads or bridges. Just on the bridge side, I mentioned 2,800 bridges and structures, well, we are going to do three bridges this year out of 2,800. It is going to take a long time to replace them all, because the costs are so high.

Mr. Gaudry: You have to do Provencher Bridge, so I can come across the river first.

An Honourable Member: City of Winnipeg, my friend.

Mr. Gaudry: Now, flood waters, has there been any damage done to Highway 59 to any extent?

Mr. Findlay: Highway 59, no, we are not aware of any damage to it. It was basically out of the flood water. The damages on Highway 75 were extensive and Highways 205 and 305, 330, 201. So there are lots of roads. Some of them are just coming out of the water. The deputy has just taken some pictures in recent days, and I have seen some of it from the air. There is pretty extensive damage in places, very extensive.

Mr. Gaudry: Mentioning Highway 75, what is the status to date as far as damage, and when is it going to be reopened completely to the American border?

Mr. Findlay: I remember flying over 75 at the peak, and I would suggest that certainly half of it was under water and for a long way north and south of Morris. It is currently open to Ste. Agathe, from Winnipeg to Ste. Agathe, and then from--

An Honourable Member: Local traffic?

Mr. Findlay: Well, you cannot go right through it, put it that way. If you want to go to the U.S. you have got to go out through Carman, Highway 3, and then you can come on 14. From Winkler you can come east and get onto 75 south of St. Jean. So it is open at the north end down to Ste. Agathe and open at the south end as far as Highway 14, but you can really get up as far as St. Jean.

So the section in the middle, certainly the water is coming down at Morris. Probably it was over the--you could not see the bridge railing at Morris, so it was at least five feet over the highway, and I do not know how much above that. But you flew over, you could see this much of the stop-sign post and the stop sign, of course, is above that, but there was not much post left. So you can appreciate it was up pretty high.

The biggest damage on 75 is just south of Ste. Agathe, about two miles south of Ste. Agathe where it really just ripped the road right up. The cement is laying every which way. It will take some reconstruction, but the department will do what they have to do to get it operational and do the ultimate long-term construction. That is where--the power of water was just unbelievable. I have pictures. I will bring them next week, and you will see the pictures of the road.

Last year there was no damage there, but this year there is very considerable damage. Hopefully, as it comes out of the water around Morris, there are no additional locations like that.

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Mr. Gaudry: Going back to Highway 59, the minister in one of his responses mentioned that the statistics did not warrant the four lanes or whatever, but in their report in one of the meetings the group indicated they were talking about the rapid growth of their region where, they indicated, southeastern Manitoba is one of the fastest growing regions in the province with a rate of growth of nearly 25 percent in the last 15 years. They were relating to the safety of Highway 59, of course, with the last two bad accidents they had there in the last six, eight months and the schools where the children are being bused around the region to schools specializing in delivery of programs.

These school buses stop frequently along Highway 59 and traffic is backed up during rush hour, both in the morning and in the late afternoon, causing drivers to take risks and threatening the safety of the children and of oncoming traffic. I was wondering what criteria that is taken in respect to these concerns of the people in the regions of Highway 59.

Mr. Findlay: As you go around the city, there are a lot of roads that carry people in and out of the city and Highway 59, up close to the city, will run right by the perimeter 7,000 vehicles a day, which is high. You get a little south of there, 5,500, and if I just go around the city: Highway 1, 13,000; Highway 15, right by the Perimeter, 12,000; Highway 213 or Garvin Road, 5,600; Highway 9 going north at 17,000, and on it goes. I mean the numbers are over 10,000 in many locations around the city, and as you go further away from the city, your numbers drop off dramatically. For instance, you go on 59 all the way south to the U.S. border, you are down to 370 vehicles a day.

So you can see with those numbers, and it declines all the way down. You start at the north end with 7,000 and you end up with 360 vehicles a day at the south end, although the region is growing. Highway 52 by Steinbach is 5,700 vehicles a day, so there is a section of it that is four-laned. So you four-lane where the traffic volumes warrant it, where you can afford to, I guess, first.

That is constantly looked at in comparing roads. Yes, safety is an issue, but traffic volume draws your attention to address a road. For instance, Highway 15 running east, as I mentioned, it was at 12,000 close to the city. You get out to 206 at Dugald, it is down to 7,000, but we have not four-laned it, we have just paved the shoulders to improve driving safety, but it can handle that volume with the paved shoulders. We have done that on Highway 16. Instead of four laning it--cannot afford to four-lane it--but we put paved shoulders on it. So if you are driving at a fast speed, you can move out of the way or you have room for air without hitting your gravel shoulder and losing control.

What we might have wanted to do five years ago, in terms of long-term planning and long-term discussion with people, we really cannot afford to do today because the costs are so high. Another example, just to give you the dilemma, on Highway 201 across the Red River at Letellier, the bridge desperately needs replacing--$10 million--one bridge. At the northeast perimeter where the new part of the perimeter comes into Lagimodiere at the northeast corner of the city, Highway 59 north and the perimeter--$29 million to build that interchange. Currently we have, you know, lights controlling the intersections there. It is not the most convenient thing in the world, but for $29 million it is going to take many stages to get that ultimately built and take probably several years to ever do it.

So, you know, people will lobby hard for 59 as you are talking about it, but in the context of all the roads, we respond where the urgency is the highest. The bridge that we are building closest to the city is Headingley bridge, on 340 I believe it is, 334, just south of Headingley over the Assiniboine and it is a cost of $8 million.[interjection] Well, the 59 bridge that we are building, yeah, it is over the floodway.

I am just trying to give you some of the context of the numbers and the challenges and the--it is 18,000 kilometres of road, and you bring the Cormorant road in, you bring Highway 59, you are talking dramatically different locations and circumstances. It is tough to balance where the right decision is, but the more people lobby and bring their points forward, it helps us in our decision making.

(Mr. Mervin Tweed, Acting Chairperson, in the Chair)

For those you do not hear from, you assume everything is okay. You have to. [interjection] I know what you are going to talk about, and it is moving along.

An Honourable Member: 391.

Mr. Findlay: Same thing, it is moving along. I get some good letters from up there.

Mr. Gaudry: One last question so my good colleague from Swan River here can ask a few questions, but I will have some later on as we go through the Estimates. There was a letter that was written by a Mr. Gibbs in regard to the bicycle route on Henderson Highway, and the minister responded and he says, we are currently seeking input on this issue from the R.M.s of St. Clements and East St. Paul and the City of Winnipeg and Cycle Manitoba. That was on March 4. I was wondering what is the status of this situation?

Mr. Findlay: There is a long route running up Henderson to Lockport and then they come across and come back down the other side. I know there are a lot of cyclists use that, especially in the summertime, and I have seen, well, we will call them professional bicycle riders rip right along there at a pretty good speed. There is a lot of traffic on all those roads, a lot of traffic, and we have indicated that we want some input from the R.M.s involved and Cycle Manitoba as to what to do in the future.

Certainly the local people see that paved shoulder as a place to park, and a parked car is hard to bicycle through. We will receive the input, and we will respond as we can. To do any rebuilding on that long stretch with ditches on both sides, exceptionally expensive, heavily populated area. Basically, it varies between a 70- and 80-kilometre strip. Some parts, it is four lane, some parts, it is two lane; a lot of traffic there, a lot of turning action on and off the road with all the houses and developments that are built and currently being built.

So we are asking for input on it in response to that letter as to what position to ultimately take, but we just talked about the demands we have to supply roads for cars, and now if we are asked to build bicycle paths too, it is stretching us to the point we are going to break.

Ms. Rosann Wowchuk (Swan River): Mr. Chairman, there are many roads that we could ask questions about, but I will leave that for my colleague the member for Flin Flon (Mr. Jennissen) to address those. I have a specific issue that has been raised in my constituency. Many people are starting to take more driver training with big trucks in order that they can be involved in the industry, because there is a demand for truck drivers.

The concern that has been brought to my attention is that they have to wait so long for testing. There is only one tester, and it is a real backlog. So I guess the question I ask is: Is the minister aware of this issue, and are you taking any steps to resolve it so that those people who take training can be tested at a more convenient time than having to take their training and then wait for a long time?

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The other question is: What role, or does the Department of Highways play any role in determining who can give the driver training, or is it open to anybody? Are there any restrictions on who can give driver training, or are there certain qualifications that have to be met before you can offer the training program?

Mr. Findlay: You asked the question: Can anybody offer the training? Yes, but the department certifies those who can be trainers. In addition, the large trucking companies certainly train their drivers and have the authorization to test their drivers.

You are talking about smaller communities like Swan River where I know farmers are buying big trucks and need a Class 1 licence, and they take the training and then they want the test. We are not aware of any backlog problems. If the member has specifics, let us know,

There are nine mobile testing units serving a large number of communities, and there is some scheduling necessary in order to accommodate the tester being there when the person wants to or needs to take a test. So whether there is a scheduling problem or whether there are enough testers out there, we are not aware of a problem. If there is, make us more aware.

The number of farmers with Class 1 licences is just escalating very rapidly.

Ms. Wowchuk: It is understandable that they will have to move to Class 1 as we have less and less railways and have to have bigger trucks that farmers will move, but these move towards getting a Class 1 licence so they can transport their own product.

These are not farmers in particular that I am talking about. There have been people offering driver training in Swan River so that they can get involved in the logging industry, because there is a demand for logging truck drivers. I am told that they have had a real backlog, but I will get the minister more information on that, and perhaps we can look at a way to resolve it because it has been a problem.

Mr. Findlay: Would it be a seasonal problem? I would just ask that all of that information be brought forward so we can respond.

Ms. Wowchuk: It may be a short-term problem, because this is when the courses are being offered. But I will get the additional information, and then, if we can look to resolve it, it would be very helpful for those people.

The other issue that seems to be a problem is drivers take their training from the training program, but they really have no experience. What they are looking for is on-job training, and there have been dollars identified through the Department of Education that are supposed to be training dollars. So I ask the minister: Is he aware of this problem, and is there something that perhaps could be worked through the Department of Highways and the Department of Education to make some dollars available for people who are taking this driver's training?

Many of these people who are taking driver's training are unemployed people who are now looking at this as an opportunity to get off social assistance. So I think it would be very valid if we could find a way to put some dollars in so that they would be able to get training, because no truck owner who spent a couple of hundred thousand dollars on a truck is going to let an inexperienced person go in and drive that truck. We do not let that happen with our tractors on the farm, and I do not blame the truck drivers.

But we have a problem here in that there is training being offered, but they cannot get the on-job training or the experience. I ask the minister if this is something that his department can help to resolve or work with the Department of Education to get some of these training dollars that were designated in the last budget in a way that can help the people that I am concerned about, people who have long been wanting to work, and now there is an opportunity out there for them. They have taken the driver training, but they just cannot get the on-job training that is needed to help them break into the workforce.

Mr. Findlay: What the member identifies clearly is a problem. You can do the training, pass the test, but where do you get the experience before you are so-called, had enough experience that you are deemed to be a qualified driver?

Dealing with the larger truck companies, they do offer that because you can be the secondary driver with an experienced driver for a period of time. I know we are talking two or three years, so-called your apprentice time with the bigger trucking companies. When you get out to Swan River and you talk to the logging industry, the luxury of that opportunity probably does not exist. It is very difficult to go from I got my licence, now how do I get enough experience that somebody will hire me? Very difficult. We do not have the capacity to offer anything in that category now. There are apparently some federal dollars that may well be coming through Education and may be, may be targeted to help in that context. But I bet you that they are thinking more of the commercial city-oriented kind of truck driving industry as opposed to the industry that the member is referring to.

On-job apprentice training is desperately needed, I know, but I do not know where it is available. The training is done, the testing is done, that has been our mission up to this point. To give experience--is it possible that people in the industry would participate in that on-job apprenticeship period because that is where it needs to happen? You need the real experience, the real conditions where you learn from. It cannot be done in another classroom or driving up and down a paved road. You have got to get on those rough roads and have the experience with the experienced driver in dealing with the conditions that you encounter.

Ms. Wowchuk: That is exactly what is needed. My understanding is that the trucking industry, the small outfits that are in the area are interested in working on this, but they need some training dollars. They are not going to do it for nothing. Even if they were going to do it, these people who are trying to get into the workforce need some money as well. I realize I should probably take this to the Department of Education, but if the minister or staff might be able to give me direction of some people that can work on this, I think it is a very important issue, and we can address it a little further somewhere else.

Mr. Findlay: We will follow up, particularly with Education, in terms of the training aspect, whether this qualifies or needs to be considered in the future, but there is a definite void there, particularly outside the city, I know. I know the trucking industry, everybody wants somebody that is heavily experienced, but how do you get the experience? There is a shortage of drivers, because the demand keeps growing for drivers.

Probably the driving conditions and working in a logging industry are even tougher than long-haul driving on paved roads, so we will follow up with Education through our staff.

Mr. Jennissen: This spring the province introduced new spring road restrictions with fixed start and end dates. If I can just quote from Keystone Municipal News a little blurb from their spring 1997 edition on that. The Keystone Municipal News states the fixed start and end dates are intended to help the trucking industry and Manitoba communities eliminate guesswork from their planning process.

I am sure those are the minister's own words as well. I have no problem with that, and I think the motive is very noble. However, there is a bit of a concern in the sense that the emphasis appears to be again accommodating the industry as the Keystone Agricultural Producers newspaper was saying about accommodating the farmers with the lighting on their machinery. We are accommodating the users, all right, but is that always necessarily in the best interests of safety, or does that necessarily keep the integrity of the roads the way we want?

I guess the question really boils down for me, should the date not fluctuate according to the seasons? Because I just came from the North and they are at least two weeks behind a normal schedule. Is that flexibility built into the system?

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Mr. Findlay: In terms of the fixed starting and ending dates, there are different dates for the northern region versus southern region. This pamphlet identifies Zone 1 and Zone 2, Zone 2 being the North with different starting and ending dates than the south. What has been done here, certainly as a result of considerable consultation with the industry, I have not seen anything negative written about what we are doing, because it is greater efficiency for them, greater predictability.

We are not going so many pounds per inch of tire or kilograms per millimetre of tire. We are going by axle weights, either 95 percent, 90 percent, or 65 percent of normal axle weight loadings, a little easier to understand. I think that is an accommodation for the industry in terms of increased ease of them being able to understand it. I think that is responsible to do. It is an accommodation, yes, but it is as a result of considerable discussion which our officials in the department are comfortable with. Their job is to protect our roads, and they do it in this context that has the user happier with the method by which you protect a road. I see it as a win-win for both sides.

(Mr. Chairperson in the Chair)

So there are two zones, different starting dates. Those starting dates can be adjusted, reflecting the kind of weather we get--late spring, early spring--because the mission is to protect the roads.

Mr. Jennissen: That was my concern, that that flexibility be there to mirror a late spring, an early spring or whatever, and I am sure it is there, but I just was not clear on that. The new spring road restrictions allow essential commodities to be transported at Level 1 weights on roads subject to Level 2 restrictions. I am not quite clear on the rationale for that. Could the minister explain that?

An Honourable Member: Which commodity did you say?

Mr. Jennissen: They allow, it appears, heavier loads than normal if they are essential commodities. Does that not still create damage to the road?

Mr. Findlay: If we can shut down the commerce of rural Manitoba in springtime, we might be able to protect the roads really good, but the list of exempted commodities is dealing with essential things that must move in those communities. I mean, we are talking livestock feed, drinking water, bulk milk, seed, fuel, fertilizer. These things must move. There is accommodation for essential commodities, used to be permanent exemptions, but now they are exempted, period. But it has always been that way. You cannot just shut a community down. You cannot prevent it from getting fuel. You cannot prevent farmers from getting seed to the field sort of thing. You cannot prevent fuel being transported to where it is needed to be used.

I say the list is fairly long in essential commodities, but again in working with communities, it can get pretty owly if they cannot move product in and out. Cow's milk every day, twice a day, three times a day, and the milk must move. Those accommodations must have to happen. It is not out of the ordinary; it has always been done that way.

The other thing is there is a time restriction where we have them running at night when the road may well be frost and that sort of thing. I think in balance the combinations are respecting our protection, their use, communities' needs as best we can. There used to be a situation where trucks empty could not run on highly restricted roads. You have got to take that all into consideration, make sure that you can allow commerce to continue, but there is still a fair bit of restriction happening at the same time in terms of the nonessential commodities.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, I was advocating closure of commerce or restricting communities from receiving essential commodities, but thinking more in terms of, instead of having three perhaps overloaded vehicles, why not use five lighter-loaded vehicles and still maintain the integrity of the road a little better that way? I was thinking in those terms.

The question I have for the minister is: What was the closure date for the South Bay- South Indian Lake winter road this year? I just came out of South Indian Lake. There was considerable murmuring about having that closed much too soon. I know that always is the case in the North. They like to run it until the very bitter end. The argument that the gentleman made, it was a Mr. Dysart who said he was under the impression--and I stand to be corrected--that the same dates were used for Berens River as for South Indian Lake. He wanted me to tell you that Berens River is quite a way further south than South Indian Lake, and therefore the same dates should not be used.

Mr. Findlay: On the northern winter road network, the window of them being open was January 23 to March 19. Every day that the roads are kept open there is a cost, and the department announces the window and tries to live with the window. There was a specific request with regard to Shamattawa this winter about getting building products in for building houses, so a special effort in their case kept it open until March 28 to allow additional trucks to get in there.

We are always concerned with safety, ice conditions, temperature, thickness of the ice. I know neither of us are experts in this context and you have to trust the judgment of the people who have the experience and know the roads. We close them, but at the same time we know that citizens still use them. Yes, they might get away with it for a while, but we cannot afford the liability of a road failing. Most of them are over ice and you know what is underneath the ice if somebody goes through. We believe that this is most appropriate but when there are special conditions, efforts will be made to keep the roads open longer provided it is deemed safe for what is transported over the roads, and we are talking here the bulk traffic.

Mr. Jennissen: When I was in South Indian Lake on this Monday past, that is the 19--what is today, 22?--they were still actually on that lake. Now, I do not know if they were using quarter-ton trucks or not, but certainly lots of heavy skidoos and that were still on the lake, but again, you know, it is a questionable call. The people there certainly felt, Mr. Dysart especially, that we could have easily kept that road open another two or three weeks without any problem, but, again, you know, I am no expert on it either.

To change direction slightly, as the minister put in his own press release of February 13, 1997, the winter road system is a critical supply link for northern residents and creates economic activity. I do not think he will get any disagreement from me on that. I know the province does spend approximately $2 million a year on winter roads and some of that, I believe, is federal money.

Still, there are entire sections of our province in northwest Manitoba that do not get any support and that still use toll roads specifically to Lac Brochet and Tadoule Lake, and although I really admire the northern entrepreneurs that make a living on those roads or work on those roads and create a good number of jobs--I am happy for that--it does, however, raise the cost of living tremendously for northerners. Now I had figures on that last year. I cannot recall them, but I believe in Tadoule Lake it adds at least another 25, 30 cents to every litre of gasoline because of the tolls.

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I believe that some of those larger trucks are paying tolls up to say around $7,000 or more, and I know I have seen bills from enterprises up there, toll bills that they paid to whoever constructed those roads, and the one bill was over $100,000. So I do know that, you know, there are considerable sums of money expended bringing materials in, but the end result is that that cost ends up on the backs of people that are probably the poorest people in Manitoba.

I guess I am dreaming a little bit here, but I wish there was a way that we could still maintain northerners creating those roads and creating those jobs, because I do not want to take that away, but on the other hand that it would not be a toll road. I know we have discussed this before and I know that is one of the recommendations out of one of your studies as well, the final report of the winter road study in 1994--that is the only one I have; there may have been a later one but that is the one that I have--also recommends that.

I guess what I am saying is: Why do we not have a comprehensive system right across the province so that northwest Manitoba, like the rest of Manitoba, would fall under the same rubric? In other words, their winter roads would be funded jointly by Manitoba and by Ottawa. In that way, the cost of living could be brought down, and the people that, by all accounts are the poorest of this province, would get a bit of a break.

Mr. Findlay: I am going to deal with a little bit of history here. You mentioned the roads that we do, the $2 million we spend. There is some federal cost-sharing on a good portion of it. We have not made any progress with getting federal understanding that we have other roads that the same consideration needs to be given. I do not dispute what the member is saying, that those people who live on those kinds of roads pay a higher cost because they are paying for who builds the roads charging a toll, and if they are going to use the road, they have to pay it.

It is an issue that we have that is unresolved. We will do what we can, but we have to get some federal participation on this, because a lot of the properties up there and people are federal jurisdiction. It would be nice to be able to do what the member is asking, and maybe ultimately we will get there. He raises it, that it is a legitimate point. There is no defence for it the way it is in terms of fairness.

Mr. Jennissen: Right now what we have is a user-pay system. It is philosophically perhaps a direction this government likes to go in. It is not one that I would support, but it is in place now. I am just hoping we could get a system that has one tier, not a two-tier system. I guess I could maybe accept it or live with it if it was in the more affluent part of the province. Even then, perhaps it would not be fair, but that particular part of the province where unemployment rates are soaring around 90 percent, the poverty is just unbelievable and the housing is unbelievable. It just somehow does not make sense to me that the poorest of the poor have to pay another 25 cents or 50 cents for a litre of gas, or whatever the commodity is--or food, and that is a direct result of the tolls being charged. I am not blaming the people making the roads. They have to recoup their costs too, but there must be a better way of doing it, so that all Manitobans live under the same rules.

Certainly one of the recommendations I believe it was--well, it is not a recommendation. Actually it is on page 6 of the final report, Winter Road Study, 1994 by John M. D. MacDonald. [phonetic] I have quoted this before, I am sure, on other occasions, and I will quote now: Provincial government engineers generally do not have any control over standards and specifications, nor tolls charged on winter roads constructed by the private sector.

So that is sort of the legacy that we are stuck with.

One of the recommendations in the same report, and I will read it, page 12 of the report is: That the construction and maintenance of winter roads funded by Manitoba Government should be carried out under the public tender system in the Manitoba Department of Highways and Transportation, that all winter roads constructed by the province fall under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Highways and Transportation.

That makes a lot of good sense, I guess, from an accountant's point of view, but it may not necessarily make all that much sense from an aboriginal perspective, because their costs are much higher and they want to become involved in building roads.

I know that there are arrangements with Norwin and perhaps with other groups as well. It may appear like a bit of a contradiction, because you want to get the biggest bang for your buck, I understand that, but I also plead with you that we are not just one department. There is an entire government. We have to be very conscious of our aboriginal people who live in really difficult circumstances. We would likely give them a hand up, that is we would like to see the Department of Highways as much as possible employ aboriginal people in constructing winter roads. I understand that the costs are much higher. I just would like the minister to comment on that.

Mr. Findlay: Just for the member's information, Mr. Chairman, he mentioned the Norwin, which we negotiate with them to build I think it is 830 kilometres of road. At the same time, we negotiate with several other bands and development corporations like Pukatawagan Development Corporation, York Factory Band, Midnorth Development, Allan McLeod Construction, John Sinclair, Jr. , Gilbert North, Gods Lake First Nations. So there are a number of other negotiated contracts with First Nations people. The total network there involving those eight negotiated contracts that I mentioned is 446 kilometres, so there is a fair chunk of road there too that was negotiated. It is line with what the member is talking about, about trying to get the people that live there involved and an opportunity to do some work and earn a living.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, I believe that is a sound strategy and a direction we should be going. That maybe contradicts the Winter Road Study, page 34 recommendation that says: Job creation should not be the main factor in the department's system of awarding a contract.

That is one of their recommendations. From an accountant's point of view, that does make a lot of sense. I guess our party perhaps makes that point over and over again, that there are other considerations other than purely financial considerations that sometime we have to look at. But we cannot, obviously, ignore the limited amount of funds as well.

I know I have read some of these major recommendations from that study, but I would like to repeat them one more time for the minister. There are at least four that I think are important. The first one is--these come out of the J.M.D. MacDonald Enterprises Ltd. Winter Road Study from I believe it was 1994.

The first recommendation was: All winter roads in northern Manitoba funded by the Manitoba government should become public roads under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Highways and Transportation and be administered under The Highway Traffic Act and other pertinent acts in regard to transportation. The travelling public should have free access to all public roads in Manitoba.

Secondly, that Crown land use permit should be discontinued for community connector roads in northern Manitoba. Toll roads should not be used or considered for winter road use in Manitoba.

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Thirdly, that there should be an overview committee consisting of the deputy ministers of Highways and Transportation, Natural Resources and Northern and Native Affairs to review all winter road proposals either public or private.

Then just one more that I would like to mention, out of 13 recommendations, is that winter road locations should be chosen, wherever possible, with a view to future permanent all-weather roads and highways, specifically in the case of a community like Pukatawagan, but also in the case of Granville Lake, where I believe Hydro has a winter road from the Suwannee corner, I believe it is, to Granville Lake to haul in their equipment. I believe they are going to use that winter road again next year to haul out their equipment. The people from Granville Lake have asked me, through their councillors, whether we could consider that an ongoing arrangement. In other words, that that winter road be kept operational in the future as well.

Mr. Findlay: On the Granville Lake road, you are referring to operational each winter as a winter road. With regard to the first recommendation that the member read, Mr. Chairman, we have had some discussion on this in the past, and there was no consensus from the First Nations communities. If you call every road a public road and everybody should have access, then everybody who uses those roads has to have a licensed vehicle. Currently, as the member I am sure is aware, there are a lot of vehicles that operate on those roads, they are outside of our regulated road system operating without licence--do not have those costs. Many of them seem to prefer it that way, at least, at this point in time.

We have already talked about the issue of toll roads and it is a matter of dollars, it is a matter of federal participation. We will continue to pursue to see if there is an ability to change the way things are done in that regard.

With regard to permanent location, I presume a permanent location, you are talking in terms of over land, consistently over land and, in some cases, that is what is done. But some locations, the over land is a lot of rocks, a lot of up and down. It makes a very poor road. You have a much more level road if you run the road over ice, over muskeg. At least it is level as opposed to the up and down and difficult-to-build-on terrain of a permanent road. So there are pros and cons to each. I am sure it is fair to say that, the appropriate decisions are made in different circumstances as to which way to go, whether it is the ice route or whether it is a permanent road route.

I do not profess to be an expert on it, nor do I profess to have direct first-hand knowledge, but we have people that we employ to do that. I trust their judgment in the short term and the long term to make appropriate, correct decisions and in consultation, of course, with people involved who may see it differently.

Mr. Jennissen: Yes, I would like to ask a couple of questions while we are on roads at this stage, on two places where I think a road is either under construction or should be under construction. One of them is the Black Sturgeon Nation, I believe about 21 or 26 kilometres to the east of Lynn Lake. That land has been granted to the Black Sturgeon First Nation which is an offshoot from the Mathias Colomb First Nation in Pukatawagan. They have land there and a mining company built them a road, or at least a rough road, sort of the clay bed is there.

Now part of that is on the reserve about three or so kilometres, and three or four kilometres is not on the reserve, but it is from 391 to the reserve. The boundary would be, I presume, three to four kilometres. I tried to drive down it but at that time our vehicle sank out of sight so I did not actually get to see to much of that road.

The chief of Black Sturgeon and others have urged us to try and help them put gravel on that road, make that road hopefully passable, and the reason they gave is that the federal government has a perfect opportunity to delay the housing it has promised Black Sturgeon for that area because they can use the argument, well, you do not have a really good road. So they are kind of trapped in a Catch 22 situation. You know, you get your housing when you get the road, but you have not got the road; you cannot get the housing. I know it is something that probably was not built into your Estimates, something that was not built into the budget. I have no idea how much it costs, but I think a little bit of gravel would go a long way there. I am just pleading that maybe the minister take a look at that special case.

Mr. Findlay: I do not know if the member maybe knows more than I do about this, but it seems that the mining company put the trail in?

Mr. Jennissen: I believe it was a company called Granduc Mining company. I am not sure what the rationale was, whether it was just a gesture of good faith to the aboriginal people. I do not know; I suspect not. I think they must have been doing some mining investigation or exploration in the area, but at any rate--or maybe the band actually paid for it; I do not know. But they did build that road. I was under the impression it was built with minimal cost to the band.

Mr. Findlay: What so often happens in these kinds of cases is it is not built to what we call a full standard and it is a trail at best--pioneer road is another term we could use--which is what was often the case in many northern roads. They were put through at a point in time when there was an urgency to get a trail through, and once the trail is through, then everybody wants it to be a full-use, all-weather road, and it is difficult to put gravel or inappropriate to put gravel on something that is not built to carry gravel or is not of a sufficient construction standard that it would stand up even with gravel on it.

So a trail is not the same as a road. I think I have said this before. This was going back 30 years. So much of the road network in the North was built basically under Northern Affairs, and there were not the standards used that Highways would have used had they been responsible. Then it got turned over to Highways, and now everybody wants them to be highways and they never were built to that. It is very costly to upgrade them, whether it is 391 or 373 or this road--very costly to upgrade, and we do it step by step. Although there is a trail there, we will respond to the member by written letter to get some understanding of what the quality of the road is and what would be deemed to be the appropriate way to approach it from here on.

I know what happens. The trail is there, now we want it all weather, and it may not be as easy as just putting gravel on. We need to find that out.

Mr. Jennissen: Actually I had discussed this with the minister's special assistant, Jeff MacDonald, and in our discussion we thought maybe a compromise that could be achieved, again no promises, but it might be achieved if it was a cost-sharing with the federal government. We are talking for our portion of it three to four kilometres. We are not talking an enormously large chunk, but I am under no illusion, it will cost money. I do not want to give Ottawa any more excuses not to bring houses they have promised.

Mr. Findlay: We will follow up and get further information and detail on it. I gather that, although it is maybe not all weather in the summertime, at least in the wintertime they should be able to get their materials in for the housing for seven or eight months out of the year.

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Mr. Jennissen: That is correct, but at the last meeting I was at in Lynn Lake with the Honourable Elijah Harper the pressure was on for Ottawa to deliver those homes by the middle of this year. That was the problem with the summertime, like, the band was not willing to wait and Ottawa, being in a peculiarly generous mood prior to the election, was actually, I think, promising those houses, with a little prodding, but they, of course, had the good argument, well, there is no road to bring the stuff. You build the road; we will get the stuff there.

So I committed to put as much pressure, I guess is the word, or impose on the minister's generosity to see if he could get a few gravel stones on that road. So, you know, I hope the minister checks that out and gets back to me particularly on the cost-sharing with the federal government.

The other road that I know I have mentioned several times--it is a repetitive theme probably--is the one to the Mathias Colomb First Nation, Pukatawagan. As I fly that part of the country, frequently I see it from the air, and where the Repap roads, the logging roads end and where Mathias Colomb starts, to me, does not look more than 25 to 40 kilometres. It is hard to judge from the air, but it is not an enormous distance. I would say 25 kilometres, maybe 40 kilometres, maybe 50.

At any rate, what I am suggesting to the minister is that, although this would cost a lot of money to build, I would point out that last year out of Mathias Colomb alone there were 308 medivacs at between $3,000 to $10,000 per medivac. So I am saying that it is costing us between a million and a million and a half dollars to fly people out of there. If there was a road, we could do that considerably cheaper, and if you could save even a million dollars a year, put a million dollars into a road system. I know it is maybe from a different pocket, and it is your budget you have to be concerned about, but I am saying globally a government should have to look at things a little differently and make sure that they use their money wisely.

I mean, we can keep flying people out of there forever if we want, but I would suggest that spending those billions of dollars we are spending now on medivacs be spent on road building, and I do not think it takes many millions to build 25 kilometres of gravel road. We would be better ahead, the community would be better ahead, the cost of living would be easier for those people and it would bring tremendous business and tourism to the region. It would bring business to Flin Flon for sure because Pukatawagan has approximately 2,000 population.

I think, looking at it from all angles, it is a winning proposition, but it does take a few dollars and I know the dollars are scarce, but I would like the minister to consider that.

Mr. Findlay: The part that the member refers to, Mr. Chairman, that is currently built, is a private road. It is a pretty winding road. It is a logging road. It is not a road for citizens to travel with cars, I am sure. It is difficult to give him an answer specifically, because we do not know the state of the existing road. I have no idea what we are talking about in terms of terrain to get from the existing road to Pukatawagan. It is certainly worthy of consideration, and we will get a better idea and, again, respond to the member by letter. Just because there is a trail there does not mean that it is the kind of road that people would be satisfied with. It is almost like his previous question about Black Sturgeon. The trail is not satisfactory for cars so that we are challenged to deal with the cost of upgrading to a current acceptable standard.

Again, my comments on pioneer roads, trying to make them into an all-year-round usable route for civilians, is just not as easy as it sounds. We will follow up on it.

Mr. Jennissen: I realize that, but the Sherridon road, before it was built to the same standards, I presume, and that is now a civilian road. On the map, I should point out to the minister, I think it does not show the Repap cuts. Some of those Repap roads, from the air at least, look reasonably good, and there are certainly a lot of heavy trucks on them. People from Mathias Colomb, Pukatawagan, feel, you know, any trail is better than no trail at all, and they are suggesting they would have no difficulty with that.

I know, in reality, once you are travelling it you want to upgrade it and upgrade it and you want higher standards. I am sure the minister has tangled with the 391 committee before. You want things better and better and better. I think that is logical, but at this stage all we are asking for, I think, is a land connection to Pukatawagan. Again, I point out that it would save us an enormous amount of money on medical bills alone, and I think also it would bring in tourists and allow the people of Mathias Colomb to invest a little of their effort and energy into that industry because unemployment is very high on the Mathias Colomb reservation as well.

So I hope the minister looks into that and considers that.

Mr. Findlay: We will, as previously committed, yes.

Mr. Jennissen: Now with regard to the Sherridon road, I travelled it the other day, and it does have some of the sides are more brush now, but we are still having a lot of problems with some very tight turns and especially with--the dangerous aspect is not even so much the road, it is the traffic on the road, the enormous number of pulp trucks that seem to come whipping through there in the centre of the road. I do not know if there is any way to alleviate that, but I just want to alert the minister that it is creating a lot of problems. It has created a number of accidents and fatalities and people are very unhappy with the way things are.

Again it is an example of, you have no road, you complain; you have a bad road, you complain. I am not suggesting that people are chronic complainers out there, but is there any way that the truck traffic can be regulated on it, maybe hours or days or whatever? I have travelled it, and I have run into 15 or 20 of these heavy trucks and they almost push you right off into the ditch.

Mr. Findlay: I would just say the member has also talked about creating employment and getting people working, and that is what those trucks do. So you ask for one thing, you get it, and then you look it in another way and you do not like it. There has to be an accommodation between the public and the truck drivers that are making a living, and that is one of the reasons the road is there, is to make a living. The law of the road is the law of the road. You have to drive on your side and obey speed limits and so on and so forth.

I would not want to advocate that we can keep the trucks off the road at certain times. I think the member or somebody would be on our case about limiting the ability to make a living. You cannot be all things to all people, I guess. We do try to maximize safety, and there is the rules and the law of the road.

We have the RCMP in Flin Flon, and it is their responsibility to enforce that the people using the road abide by the rules of the road. If there is a specific significance of that sort of circumstance, we can contact them if the member would like, or he can contact them and ask for some response as to whether they deem that the users of the road are properly abiding by the rules of the road.

Mr. Jennissen: To get back to Pukatawagan again and Repap cutting in High Rock and other areas fairly close to Pukatawagan, does the minister have any maps showing the Repap road system? I do not have them personally, so I cannot really tell how close, how far or what shape those roads are in.

Mr. Findlay: The answer is no, I do not have any maps of their roads.

Mr. Jennissen: The minister knows, and it is, again, a pipe dream, but I am not going to give up on it, and that is a ring road in northern Manitoba which would connect Pukatawagan-Flin Flon, Pukatawagan-Sherridon to Lynn Lake someday. This may be many years in the future. I do not want to get into the expenditures of that or the possibility of that. I know it is far in the future, but, certainly, part of that would be the Fox Mine Road, I think it is called. I flew over that not too long ago.

What is the status of that road? Is it a provincial road? What shape is it in? Is it being maintained?

Mr. Findlay: You are talking about from Lynn Lake to Fox Point? Yes, it is a provincial road, and it is being maintained. Just a further bit of information, the road the member is talking about is a $300-million road. It is costly.

Mr. Jennissen: Those are not the figures we use. Those are pretty discouraging figures, but even in stages maybe in the future in terms of tourism and that, it could be done. I know that this is not the appropriate time politically or financially to be even contemplating that, but on the other hand, if we were to desert the Fox Mine Road, then that one link would be gone, that possible link in the future.

Why is that road maintained? The mine is not active anymore. I could not tell from the air whether it was being maintained, and I was not sure what the reason for it was.

Mr. Findlay: It is a road that is surfaced and is maintained simply to keep it from deteriorating. I believe there is some level of exploration in the area so there is some use of it, but if you just abandon it, it would deteriorate really quickly. I would not want that to happen necessarily.

Mr. Jennissen: Well, I appreciate the foresight in keeping that road open. I was worried that it was going to deteriorate and be just left. I know it may not get maximum usage now, but I am still optimistic that 50 years from now we will see a lot of things happening in that region because that is where tourism, the pulp, the minerals, where all the good stuff is going to be happening. There is only one place to go and that is further north, I guess.

Anyway, I would like to start a new topic, but I think the time has come that perhaps the minister would like to consider this six o'clock.

Mr. Chairperson: Is it the will of the committee to call it six o'clock? [agreed]

The hour now being six o'clock, committee rise.