[ Progress of Bills . . . ]

Ten o'clock a.m.

Prayers by Ms. Whittred.

Mr. Farrell-Collins made a statement indicating he would not be proceeding with a matter of privilege regarding the Electoral Boundaries Commission Act, of which earlier notice had been given.

Mr. de Jong advised the Chair of his intention to raise a matter of privilege.

The House proceeded to "Orders of the Day."

The Hon. D. Streifel (Minister of Human Resources) tabled the Annual Reports of the Ministry of Social Services, 1994-95; 1995-96.

Pursuant to Order, the House resumed the adjourned debate on the Address in Reply to the Speech of His Honour the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the Session.

The debate continued.

On the motion of Hon. M. Farnworth, debate was adjourned to the next sitting of the House.

And then the House adjourned at 11.57 a.m.

Thursday, April 3, 1997

Two o'clock p.m.

The Hon. D. Miller (Minister of Employment and Investment) presented to the Speaker a Message from His Honour the Lieutenant Governor, which read as follows:

Garde B. Gardom
Lieutenant Governor

The Lieutenant Governor transmits herewith Bill (No. 6) intituled Job Protection Amendment Act, 1997 and recommends the same to the Legislative Assembly.

Government House,
March 25, 1997.

Bill introduced and read a first time.

Bill Ordered to be placed on the Orders of the Day for second reading at the next sitting after today.

On the motion of Mr. Weisgerber, Bill (No. M 202) intituled Senatorial Election Act was introduced, read a first time, and Ordered to be placed on the Orders of the Day for second reading at the next sitting after today.

The Hon. U. Dosanjh (Attorney General) tabled the following:
Legal Services Society Annual Report, 1995-1996;
British Columbia Council of Human Rights Annual Report, 1995-1996;
Ministry of Attorney General Annual Report, 95/96; and
British Columbia Police Commission Annual Report, 1995/96.

The Hon. S. Hammell (Minister of Women's Equality) made a statement with regard to the deaths of the Gakhal family.

Ms. Stephens made a statement.

Order called for "Oral Questions by Members."

Mr. Weisgerber presented a petition regarding the Senatorial Selection Act.

The House proceeded to "Orders of the Day."

Pursuant to Order, the House resumed the adjourned debate on the Address in Reply to the Speech of His Honour the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the Session.

The debate continued.

On the motion of Mr. Barisoff, debate was adjourned to the next sitting of the House.

The Speaker delivered his reserved decision as follows:

Honourable Members:

On March 25, 1997, the Member for Delta South sought to raise a matter of a breach of privilege, namely, that the Minister of Finance had misled the House when presenting the 1996-97 Budget in June of 1996. The complaint is essentially the same complaint he raised on the 9th day of July 1996 and which was dealt with by the Speaker's decision given the 15th day of July 1996, albeit with reference to an additional document.

The new complaint is founded on an analysis of a forecast on which the budget was based, viewed in light of the Public Accounts for 1995/1996 which were tabled in the House by the Minister of Finance on March 25, 1997. When a matter has been dealt with by a Speaker's decision it ought not to be raised at a later date unless material information which was not available at that time has been subsequently discovered. In the case at hand, the Public Accounts for 1995/1996 were not available until the Spring of 1997, so it seems to me that the matter can be raised.

Secondly the matter must be raised at the earliest opportunity. The Member gave notice at the time of prorogation of his intention to raise the matter and I am satisfied that this was the earliest opportunity, as the Public Accounts for 1995/1996 became available during the adjournment of the House after the Summer of 1996. I am also satisfied that the House can address the matter after prorogation in these circumstances.

The Member indicated at the time he made his application that he was prepared to move a motion, should the matter be accepted by the Speaker. It has been established that the more appropriate practice is to table the proposed motion at the time of making the application.

The role of the Speaker in matters of privilege is outlined in part by the following quote from the 6th edition of Beauchesne at page 29:

". . . 117. (2) It has often been laid down that the Speaker's function in ruling on a claim of breach of privilege is limited to deciding the formal question, whether the case conforms with the conditions which alone entitle it to take precedence over the notices of motions and Orders of the Day standing on the Order Paper, and does not extend to deciding the question of substance -- whether a breach of privilege has in fact been committed -- a question which can only be decided by the House itself. May, (19th ed.) pp. 346-347 . . ."

I have reviewed the ruling of July 15, 1996 in light of the new material submitted by the Member for Delta South. That ruling was based on a consideration of a wealth of material and resulted in the conclusion that the matter involved a disagreement between Members as to facts and the nature of forecasting. Has the new material changed the conclusion of July 1996? In my opinion it has not.

The Budget is based on forecasts and the record shows that the Minister of Finance indicated that the forecasts are based on not one, but a number of indices.

The material tendered does not indicate an intention to deliberately mislead, a key element in the complaint. I am of the view that the reasons adopted in my ruling of July 15, 1996, would also apply at this time.

Accordingly, I cannot find that a prima facie case of breach of privilege has been made out which would justify setting aside the ordinary business of the House.

Dale Lovick, Speaker

The Speaker delivered his reserved decision as follows:

Honourable Members:

On March 24, 1997, the Member for Matsqui rose in his place to indicate to the Chair that he wished to reserve his right to raise a matter of privilege. This satisfied the earliest opportunity rule as well as the courtesy requirement of giving prior notice to the Speaker pursuant to Practice Recommendation #7 of our Standing Orders.

On March 25, 1997, the Member for Matsqui raised the matter of privilege stating that the former Member for Oak Bay-Gordon Head and the Minister of Finance and Corporate Relations "deliberately and willfully misled this Assembly, by claiming in this House that the 1996-97 budget would have a surplus of $87 million when important ministry documents, obtained through freedom of information, were all projecting a deficit."

The Chair also heard representations on the matter from the Government House Leader.

On July 15, 1996, the Chair ruled on a question of privilege raised by the Member for Delta South, namely that in 1996 the Minister of Finance and Corporate Relations had deliberately misled the House in statements made in the House characterizing the budget of that year as being a "balanced budget."

It was ruled in that matter of privilege that there was a dispute as to allegations of facts between two Members with respect to their characterization of the matter of economic forecasting and its relationship to the budget. The ruling also determined that there was no evidence that the House had been deliberately misled by the Minister.

It appears to me that the case at hand is predicated on facts similar to those which gave rise to the matter of privilege last July 9, 1996.

In the course of his submission the Honourable Member tabled documents and papers on budget preparation containing economic forecasts and projections, including Treasury Board and Ministry of Finance correspondence with the former Minister of Finance and Corporate Relations. The Member also tabled Finance Ministry transition documents dated May 22, 1996.

The Chair has examined the tabled material, which spans the period from February 1995 to June 1996, and considers the key documents to be the transition documents dated May 22, 1996. I have as well reviewed the relevant statements of Hansard to which the Government House Leader referred in her intervention.

The question then is whether the key documents tendered introduce a new element into the matter. The Chair must determine whether a prima facie case has been made based upon the information provided by the Member.

The Minister made several interventions in the House with respect to budgetary forecasts, the principle of which is that, and I quote:

"one forecasts based on the best information and the forecasts are subject to change."
(British Columbia Debates, July 30, 1996, p. 1166)

In my opinion, the material tendered by the Member does not constitute new information in this case that would change the findings of last July 15, 1996 on the same issue. The evidence provided to the Chair does not indicate an intention to deliberately mislead the House. The Chair considers the matter to be one of disagreement between two Members as to allegations of facts. It has been ruled on numerous occasions that a dispute as to facts ought not to form the basis of a complaint of a breach of privilege.

I therefore cannot find that a prima facie case has been made based upon the information submitted by the Member.

The Chair wishes to make a further important point in order to assist Members in future applications. While the Member's statement met the test of brevity and he appropriately informed the House of the facts on which the matter of privilege was based, the Member did not, at the end of his statement, tender the required motion to be moved had the Chair found that a prima facie case was established.

This is clearly stated in our guidelines, at page 48, in Parliamentary Practice in British Columbia, 3rd ed., as one of the essential elements required in raising a matter of privilege:

"A copy of the motion the Member intends to move, should the Chair find a prima facie case has been established, must be tabled."

This requirement is also recorded in the British Columbia Journals (British Columbia Journals, Ap. 11, 1990, p. 20; British Columbia Journals, June 25, 1982, p. 174; British Columbia Journals, Ap. 13, 1982, p. 41).

For the above reasons, the application must fail.

Dale Lovick, Speaker

And then the House adjourned at 5.59 p.m.

DALE LOVICK, Speaker