Madam Speaker: Order, please. The time being 5 p.m., time for Private Members' Business.

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Madam Speaker: On the proposed motion of the honourable member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton), Bill 200 (The Legislative Assembly Amendment Act; Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'Assemblée législative), standing in the name of the honourable member for St. James (Ms. Mihychuk), who has 13 minutes remaining. Stand?

An Honourable Member: Stand.

Madam Speaker: Leave has been granted to leave it standing. Also standing in the name of the honourable Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Radcliffe), who has 14 minutes remaining.

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

Madam Speaker: On the proposed motion of the honourable member for St. Boniface (Mr. Gaudry), Bill 202, The Child and Family Services Amendment Act (Loi modifiant la Loi sur les services à l'enfant et à la famille), standing in the name of the honourable member for Gimli (Mr. Helwer). Stand. Leave has been granted to permit the bill to remain standing in the name of the honourable member for Gimli.

Mr. Jim Maloway (Elmwood): I move, seconded by the member for Wolseley (Ms. Friesen), that

"WHEREAS in the six months prior to the 1995 provincial general election the Provincial Government spent hundreds of thousands of tax dollars on partisan advertising of Provincial Government programs in Manitoba in newspapers and on radio and television stations around the Province; and

"WHEREAS in 1993 the then Provincial Auditor called some of the Provincial Government's ads 'questionable' and stated that the Government should implement guidelines for government advertising; and

"WHEREAS on June 3, 1994 the Minister of Finance indicated that, 'I have staff working on this issue, and we will come forward with a position on the whole issue of appropriate guidelines and so on. So we are undertaking it. We take it very seriously.'; and

"WHEREAS despite repeated promises before, during and after the election the Minister of Finance has still not brought forward any standards or guidelines and refuses to act on his previous commitments; and

"WHEREAS thousands of dollars continue to be spent on questionable advertising contracts many of which have been awarded to former staff of the Premiers' office; and

"WHEREAS the Provincial Government wasted over $400,000 on advertising promoting the privatization of the Manitoba Telephone System prior to the sale of MTS and this advertising was clearly partisan.

"THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba request that the Premier consider following the advice of the Provincial Auditor in this matter and 'consider developing more explicit guidelines in this area, specifically defining the extent to which the political element is acceptable in ads paid with tax dollars'; and

"BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that this Assembly request that the Premier order the cancellation of all non-essential advertising campaigns until such guidelines are publicly released."

Motion presented.

Mr. Maloway: There is nothing new about our concern about this area of political advertising that this government involves itself in between elections. We have been on the record as expressing our concerns in the past about this issue and will continue to do so into the future, certainly until we get some sort of specific guidelines that have been previously promised by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Stefanson) in this area and not been delivered upon.

For example, Madam Speaker, I think that we should look at appointing a committee of the member for Transcona (Mr. Reid) and the member for Wolseley (Ms. Friesen) to take a look at various aspects of this whole issue. I think the members for these two constituencies would be interested in several criteria in trying to determine the extent of this political advertising.

Part of the criteria that I think they would be wanting to look at is the timing of the amounts of money that are spent on political advertising. I think what you would find is that as the government gets closer to an election window, an election period, that the tempo and the amount of political advertising increases. For example, I would suggest, and I think this committee will probably find this out over time, that they would find that after the 1995 election there is a big dip in the government advertising spending department and that as the government's political fortunes fall and the proximity to the next election increases, what you will find is that the political advertising will increase as a result.

Madam Speaker, back in 1994, it was unmistakable. You could not open a newspaper in this province, you could not turn on a radio, you could not watch a TV show without this constant barrage on the part of the government advertising its wares. At the time, what we were finding was that (a) an election was fast approaching, and (b) we were finding that the Conservative Party, the governing party, was in trouble with the electorate, and its polls were bearing that out. It was, at best, in a minority government situation if it were to go into an election, and what they had determined was that in an effort to bring themselves back out of the depths of despair that they were in at that time that they had to shovel tons of government money into this political advertising. Now, once the election was over in 1995, we saw a distinct drop in the amount of money they were spending at that time.

Another element that the member for Wolseley (Ms. Friesen) mentioned is that the sections of the populace that this advertising is aimed at--and that would be another criteria, I think, that we would want to give this committee to examine, because I think it would be interesting to try to determine, based on what sort of polling results the government gets and which of its target groups it is in trouble with at any particular time, that, in fact, if we were to sit back and be able to look at this thing, we might be able to determine that, in fact, the advertising program of the government is somehow designed to correct some of the problems that it--[interjection] I know the Minister of Housing (Mr. Reimer) is deeply interested in this matter, and well he should be because there was his seat and many others that were the target of some of this advertising, because at that time, in 1994, this government was very concerned about its chances in St. Vital and in the Minister of Housing's riding and other ridings.

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So I submit, and I think our committee will conclusively determine and prove without any shadow of a doubt, that there was a conspiracy, that the Tory party and the government advertising were basically tied in together to work in tandem to produce the results that we later saw.

What were those results that we later saw? I mean, we saw an improvement. We saw the numbers go up in the government's popularity ratings just at the right time, just when they needed it, and, Madam Speaker, that is why they will not accede, they will not agree to guidelines as promised.

You know, I believe it was three years ago, June 3, 1994, when the Minister of Finance (Mr. Stefanson) promised he would follow up on the Provincial Auditor's suggestion. The suggestion that curbs be put on this political advertising was made by the Provincial Auditor of the day, and the Provincial Auditor suggested that guidelines be developed and that they regulate the content of the government advertising. That was three years ago.

The Minister of Finance at the time promised that he was going to follow up on that, and absolutely nothing has changed during that time. In fact, rather than proceed with a follow-up to the recommendation and a follow-up to the questions, what the government did is that it continued--it just continued on its merry way, oblivious to these requests, because I believe it is almost like drug. This government is addicted to the government advertising program. It cannot get away from it, and, as the need arises, the money starts to be freed up. For example, Madam Speaker, there was $200,000 spent on a Health newspaper distributed last fall; minister's photos were on it. The Premier's (Mr. Filmon) campaign manager Barb Biggar was involved in it.

Hon. James McCrae (Minister of Environment): It really gave you a positive feeling when you read that paper.

Mr. Maloway: The former Minister of Health, of course, was quite satisfied with that program, although I guess in the short run it did not help him out in terms of his ability to hang on to his portfolio.

For example, in the telephone system, in the privatization efforts of the government last fall for Manitoba Telephone System, what did we find in that situation? The government spent $400,000 in an advertising campaign to help push through the sale of MTS. This, Madam Speaker, was at a time when a poll was done. I had the results earlier today that indicated that an overwhelming number of people, both in the country, in the rural areas, and in the city of Winnipeg, were opposed to the government's privatization, but at that time they realized they were in a serious political problem. They pulled out the ready, tailor-made answer that this government has come to depend on, and that is a huge advertising contract was let and they sent out brochures and so on promoting their desire to sell the telephone company, and so it goes. This is what they have been getting away with all this time, so why should we expect that they should come up with guidelines? I mean, if they can manage to get away with this time and time again, over and over again, they have no incentive.

So perhaps my recently appointed committee here of the member for Transcona (Mr. Reid) and Wolseley (Ms. Friesen), when they come up and do this study and come up with these guidelines, will be able to pass them on to the interested media outlets and maybe mail them out to interested people. Maybe the member for Crescentwood (Mr. Sale) would like to join this new committee. See this committee has now got three members, and it is increasing. You know, good ideas always start with the first couple of people. They increase over time, and once the ball gets rolling, Madam Speaker, there is no stopping it, and the government may find that after a number of years of, in their view, successfully attempting to buy the people support with their own money, that may, in fact, not work.

Another area of basically political advertising and quasi-political advertising is the advertising on Lotteries, and I know the former Liberal Leader, who is now in the Senate, I always thought that it was one of--

An Honourable Member: Mr. Molgat.

Mr. Maloway: No, not Mr. Molgat; no, I am talking about the more recent Liberal Leader, Mrs. Carstairs. As much as I disagreed with a lot of her program, I must admit that there was one thing that stood out that she advocated that I particularly liked, and that was a ban on the promotion of lottery advertising.

I mean, I could understand the government's need and desire to be involved in the lottery and gaming business. I was part of a government that certainly had a role to play, developed a very major role in that area, certainly not to the extent that has been developed by this particular government in its nine years, nowhere near that. But even during our tenure, I would have been happier had we laid off on the advertising and promotion of the Lotteries program.

I think we could live with a certain amount of gambling and lotteries in the province, because there was a demand for it, and we could live with that. But to spend money on advertising, basically lifestyle-type advertising, promoting a regressive form of taxation, I always thought was not the right way to go and something that I would rather do without.

Well, Madam Speaker, this government has become so absolutely addicted to lottery revenues, it cannot live without the lottery revenues and, as a result, it promotes and advertises gambling in unprecedented levels. I would think that is one area that the Conservatives should probably take a look, take a second look at what the newly-minted senator had to recommend when she was in this House--

An Honourable Member: Senator Carstairs.

Mr. Maloway: Senator Carstairs, one of her good ideas, that the government should look at that and try to tone down, if not eliminate completely, the advertising for gambling and casinos and so on in this province.

So, Madam Speaker, there are a number of things that this government should be doing rather than simply running holus-bolus into the future spending money that need not be spent on advertising programs that do nothing more than promote lifestyle advertising and keep friends of the government in business. What we have here is the government's friends, the former Premier's staff member, Barb Biggar, being given contracts one after another to promote the government's programs.

We talked about the criteria for political advertising. What sort of criteria are we going to apply to political advertising? It is very simple. You look at the advertising that the government runs. There should be a sign on the bottom of it: paid for by the PC Party of Manitoba. In fact, the bill should be sent to the PC Party of Manitoba [interjection]

I would ask you to submit--look, I will make you a deal. I would invite the government--the government does not have to submit its advertising to our independent committee that we have just appointed here. We are not asking you to turn it over. We will add the member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale) to our committee now, too, so now we are up to four. We are not suggesting that you give it to our committee of four to vet, to decide whether it is political advertising or not.

We are saying turn the ads over to an independent body and have them come up with a decision as to whether or not your advertising is political or not. [interjection]

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Yes, not to an equivalent of the Public Utilities Board that is loaded with Tory hats. I am talking about give it to an independent body, and that is why the Provincial Auditor was asked to take a look at this situation. That is why the Provincial Auditor came through with recommendations that the government do something about it. Now, how more independent can we get than requesting the Provincial Auditor to take a look at it? Surely, the member for Brandon West (Mr. McCrae) could agree with that suggestion, that it be turned over to an independent body.[interjection]

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

Mr. McCrae: Madam Speaker, let us tell it like it is today. The honourable member for Elmwood (Mr. Maloway) and I were, I believe, elected on precisely the same day. We have been around this place on one side of the House or the other for some 11 years. I am going to say to the honourable member, if you do not try to fool me, I will not try to fool you. Today the honourable member has stood, as they say, on his hind legs and roared about the practices of the government of the day, never mind the previous one or governments in general across this country, and railed--I think the honourable member for River Heights (Mr. Radcliffe) would say the honourable member for Elmwood is a railer--in his comments today.

I read with interest the resolution that he has placed on the order paper and listened with interest to his comments and could not help but smile pretty well all the way through as it was all coming back, Madam Speaker. All of the practices they condemn today were practices in which they engaged pretty well every day they had an opportunity when they were in government. Everybody knows that what I am saying is true, so I think that this is probably an hour of entertainment for honourable members and anyone else who happens to be tuned in to our discussion this afternoon.

It is true that the philosophical position taken by honourable members opposite and that taken by honourable members on this side from time to time can be seen to be quite different. In the light of the kinds of things the honourable member was talking about today, I was interested in an article that I have uncovered in Harper's magazine for April of this year. It talks about the kinds of regulation the honourable member is talking about. All of a sudden, now that he and his colleagues are not in office, now is a good time to have some kind of guidelines and regulations for governments when they spend money.

He forgets altogether about the government of British Columbia, the new Democratic government of British Columbia, just weeks before a provincial election campaign called there, taking out full page ads criticizing the federal government and doing everything they can to get the people to get interested in an issue of importance to everybody, but certainly to New Democrats in B.C., who can read polls as well as anybody else, and see that if they have a strong card at all, which it turns out they did, it would be in the area of health spending and education spending. So, well, let us take out full page ads, get the taxpayers to pay for those ads railing at the federal government for their vicious cutbacks.

Now, I would be the first to agree with the British Columbia government or honourable members opposite or anyone else who would like to suggest that the cutbacks in social programs at the hands of the federal government in recent years have indeed been vicious. They have been very painful for provincial governments across this country, but that gets away a little bit from the point that I am making. The honourable member uses the word "partisan" when discussing government advertising or government communications. And that is what this is all about. Is it partisan or is it not partisan? If it is not partisan and if it is relevant, it is probably okay. If it is partisan then it should not be paid for by the taxpayer. I can agree with that.

The honourable member made specific reference to Health News, something that came out under my watch as Health minister, and the honourable member made some suggestion that that may or may not have had something to do with the shortening of my term as Health minister and how disappointed I would have been at having lost the Health portfolio. Well, my goodness, let me remind the honourable member that I am still well and I am still smiling and I am still here, and more to the point.

But let me go back to Harper's magazine, because the honourable member seems to be advocating some sort of censorship or guidelines or whatnot for government advertising. Well, sure, it is appropriate that governments use appropriate judgment and do not cross over that line of partisanship. Everybody can agree with that, but I also made reference to the differences in ideologies. I think it could be said that New Democratic ideology more closely resembles that of Communist China than the ideology of honourable members on this side of the House.

In Harper's magazine, there is reference to regulations for journalists issued in China last October by China's central propaganda department. Now, we do not have a propaganda department, but the New Democrats certainly did, in everything but name, when they were in office, but here are the regulations set out by the central propaganda department in China, and these rules appeared in the December, 1996, issue of China Focus, a newsletter published in Princeton, New Jersey.

I want all honourable members to listen carefully to this because this is the kind of thing the honourable member is proposing here with his resolution today, and I quote: In order to guarantee unity of thinking and to avoid a negative impact on political stability, all sensitive issues such as the campaign to protect the Dayu Islands--these were islands claimed by Japan--or the overseas democracy movement are not to be covered.

The regulation goes on: There have been over 10,000 cases of demonstrations and protests in urban and rural areas within the past year. All of these are not to be covered. All cases that have a significant impact or involve government officials should not be reported, such as the case of the former secretary of the Bejiing Municipal Party Committee, Chen Xitong--and this person was ousted in 1995 for corruption, and it goes on--or the case of Zhou Beifang of the Capital Iron and Steelworks. Now, this person, about whom there was not to be any reporting, is a close ally of Deng Xiaoping, and this person was sentenced to life imprisonment for bribery.

An Honourable Member: This is very relevant.

Mr. McCrae: Oh, this is extremely relevant. This goes to the very pith and substance and to the very heart of what the honourable member for Elmwood (Mr. Maloway) is bringing forward here today.

The regulation in China goes on: When reporting on issues concerning Hong Kong, the media must act in accordance with the policy formulated by the party's Central Committee. When reporting on foreign affairs, the media must not reveal state secrets. Articles written by dissidents are not to be published. Propaganda departments must strengthen censorship of the media. Those that violate the regulations must be dealt with severely.

This is the tone taken on by the honourable member for Elmwood, but, you know, as the honourable member spoke, I could not help but think back fondly on the days of Judy Wasylycia-Leis here in this House. I join with my colleagues, especially those colleagues opposite, I am sure, but I am sure all honourable members would congratulate Ms. Wasylycia-Leis on the success of earlier this week, and I know, even though I will not agree with the things that she is going to say in Ottawa, that she will take her message there on behalf of her constituents who voted for her with conviction, with sincerity and with a lot of energy, and that is good for Judy.

I am very happy for her in that regard, because Judy and I go back to our days in Ottawa when she first ran for public office and I was a constituent and got to vote in an election in that particular constituency. Next thing, you know, what do I find? Judy Wasylycia-Leis, she is here in Manitoba, and I lived in the neighbourhood which she now represents as a member of Parliament before she even moved there.

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So I feel entitled to comment about Judy. But what Judy did--[interjection] Well, I am sure Ms. Wasylycia-Leis will not hesitate to say whatever she thinks about me as well, but the things I say about Judy I say with sincerity.

On the other hand, in her days here, in her days as Minister of Culture, Heritage and Recreation, as it was then known, she brought forward--after a lot of pushing and prodding, that government brought forward freedom of information legislation, passed it in this House.

The people of Manitoba, represented by the members here, passed legislation, and then what happened? Judy and her colleagues, of which one was the honourable member for Concordia (Mr. Doer), and I know the honourable member for Elmwood was around for part of that time, too, sat on that legislation for three and a half years. I am sure there was a lot of work going on, making sure what it was they were not going to make available to the people of Manitoba should they happen to request it.

So it is in that light and in the light of what I said about what is going on in China and that sort of thing, that I look at this resolution brought forward by the honourable member for Elmwood today and ask myself, well, ought we not to look at the source of all of the wisdom contained in this resolution before we make up our minds about what we should do with this?

Now Charlie Farquharson would have had a thought about this sort of thing. He would say, I read it and immediately put it behind me. That is what Charlie would say. As for me, I think that some of my colleagues will probably want to join with me and discuss some of the items here, but the honourable member did make specific reference to Health News. I wanted to say a word about that, because as Minister of Health I was bombarded daily by allegations and misinformation and factually, totally off-the-wall information brought forward by people who had partisan interests at heart.

An Honourable Member: And malice at heart.

Mr. McCrae: And suggested it even goes as far as malice. But I know there was a wish on the part of some people around here to sort of mix up the facts a little bit and leave an impression out there that the state of affairs was somewhat worse than it was. In fact, Health News was designed to inform members of the public. The honourable member for Elmwood singled out that publication as a partisan publication, which is simply not so. There are all kinds of health administrators and people in the health system in Manitoba who ask me for months--nay, years, to get out more information about what is going on in our health system, so that the public can be informed and can be supportive or not supportive, but at least informed about what is going on. So that when criticism is levelled, when advice is given, it is informed. That was the reason for that. There is not a partisan word in any of that. If the honourable member can find it, I defy him to bring it forward and make an allegation.

It is not good enough. When you have two sides and when you have one party like you do in China, I guess you can say whatever you want, but here in our democratic system we have two sides. When the honourable member says things that need to be challenged, well, there are honourable members on this side of the House who are going to challenge it. So I cannot help but smile as I listen to the honourable member today because it all came back, it all came back.

I remember the honourable member for Brandon East (Mr. Leonard Evans). The story is out that in the good old days of the Jobs Fund, one of the things about the Jobs Fund was that about 10 percent of all the expenditures were supposed to be used to inform the public about all of these wonderful jobs that were being created for Manitobans.

Now the story goes around about the honourable member for Brandon East who had under that program some grant to make or some such thing, which amounted to not more than about $130, but there had to be a press release for that. There had to be a personal appearance. There had to be a sign. [interjection] We are going to check that one. So I am always willing to learn a lesson from anybody who has a lesson to share with me. It is a very good thing to do especially in public life because it is not my government, it is not my Legislature. I am here for a brief period of time and somebody else will come along and carry on, and that is the nature of our democracy.

I do find it passing strange that the honourable member for Elmwood, of all people, so supportive of the NDP ideology, so supportive of the previous NDP government headed by Mr. Doer--sorry, by the Leader of the Opposition then, Mr. Pawley, and so supportive of double-digit increases in Autopac rates, so supportive of scandals and $27-million faux pax in the sands of the Saudi Arabian desert, and so supportive of all that. Surprisingly enough that the honourable member for Elmwood is still here, but maybe not surprising that he should bring in such a resolution as the one he brought in today. With no regret, whatsoever, I will not be supporting this resolution.

Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Inkster): Madam Speaker, it is a resolution, and when we read through it, there is a lot of merit to this resolution. When I see resolutions like this, there are a number of things that come to mind. What I would like to be able to do is to talk about some of those things because in a campaign there is a lot of advertising that is done and the advertising that is done is paid for by political parties. I do not have any problem whatsoever with that sort of advertising. In fact, I think that it is important. The Elections Act allows us to be able to do that. After all, we get tax receipts and all sorts of wonderful things that allow us in order to be able to participate and try to get people re-elected and, in some cases, get some newly elected. I hope to see lots of newly elected as opposed to re-elected, and advertising plays a critical role in the elections.

The concern, of course, is the advertising that occurs prior to the election, the lead-up to the election. I have seen some things from this government that really make you wonder in terms of whether or not it should have been the Conservative Party paying for something, as opposed to the government paying. The first piece that comes to mind for me is the former Minister of Health, the Minister of Environment (Mr. McCrae). When they were not doing too well with respect to the promotion of their own cause or their own actions within the Department of Health, what they did is they came out with this wonderful glossy, I think it was something like eight pages, and it had this glowing picture of the former Minister of Health. It talked about how wonderful the government is and all these good things that it is doing within the Department of Health. Now that particular piece of propaganda is an excellent example, I believe, in terms of the Conservative Party should have paid for that, not the taxpayers of Manitoba or the government department.

I have seen other things in areas such as tourism and other programs where you actually see more pictures of ministers. I can vaguely recall the Minister of Rural Development where there was one piece where he had about six to eight pictures of himself in one piece going out promoting in rural Manitoba. [interjection] No, no exaggeration whatsoever. Madam Speaker, it is absolutely amazing.

Who can forget about the gambling? The amount of advertising this government has done in gambling to promote Manitobans to go out and gamble so that the government can get more revenues. [interjection] Well, whenever I bring up this whole gambling issue--maybe what I should do is go back to the '93 leadership box that I might have somewhere and get a copy of that particular statement that I made. Everything that I have said since then has been very consistent with it. The idea, of course, is that you have to have a gaming policy based on tourism.

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What this government does is it has a gaming policy based on revenue generation, and there have been a lot of negative social impacts as a direct result of that. Instead of talking about those negative impacts, what it does is it uses taxpayers' dollars to advertise on how wonderful and what this government is doing to enhance Manitoba by wisely spending those lottery dollars that have been generated, huge billboards saying: here is where we are spending the money on health care, here is where we are spending the money on a deficit reduction and all these wonderful things in order to try to rebuff the negative criticism that has been levelled at this government because of its gaming policy.

That is something in which, again, I would suggest to you, Madam Speaker, that the government, the taxpayers, should not have had to pay through the Crown corporation of Lotteries. We should not be promoting Manitobans to go gambling, and then with some of those proceeds put on this huge campaign to try to minimize and marginalize, if you like, the damage, the political fallout of a policy that has not been thought out.

So it is a form of damage control, and that is what this government does a lot of advertising on. In areas in which they detect that the public is reacting very negatively to some of the actions that it is taking, it takes a great deal of money, and it promotes a side that has been twisted only to fit their own political agenda.

That is not to say that there is not a need for advertising. There is, in fact, a need for government advertising. There are all sorts of wonderful programs that the government provides. I can recall, you know, a couple of years ago when I was really advocating strongly that the government actually advertise the SAFER program, the Shelter Allowances for Families. The budget was decreasing, and I said, you know, the reason why that is the case is because if people do not necessarily know about it, or you rely strictly on word of mouth, the demand for that particular program will decrease.

So that might be a good way to do some advertising, as opposed to trying to tell Manitobans that this is what we are doing in health, but not to worry, it is a good thing; the government has everything on track.

Madam Speaker, there is a big difference. There are things that the government does in which the public needs and has a right to know, and the government has a responsibility through press conferences and other means, such as advertising, to use that as a tool in order to better inform the public on all sorts of things that could be happening.

But when I see the resolution, and we talk about, Madam Speaker, primarily with respect to how the province has been doing its advertising, it does beg the question on whether or not the government is behaving in a responsible manner. That is the reason why, as I say, in principle, when we look at the resolution, that form of advertising, such as some of the things that I have cited, is not acceptable, and the government needs to re-evaluate how some of these dollars are, in fact, being spent.

With those few words, Madam Speaker, I was more than happy to put my own personal thoughts on this particular issue.

Hon. David Newman (Minister of Energy and Mines): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in opposition to this resolution.

First, speaking to the preamble of the resolution, it focuses on health reform and focuses on lotteries, and the case is made based essentially on those kinds of subject matters which are addressed by this resolution. Similarly, Manitoba's telephone system and the sale of the Manitoba telephone system has been singled out in the debate and in the resolution.

I would assert, Madam Speaker, that in both cases the case is not made; the position is not founded. There is a legitimate purpose behind what was done in each of those three instances.

The health reform information and the way it was done was done responsibly and in a way that was demanded, not only by the opposition but by the community of Manitoba, the citizens of Manitoba. They wanted to understand more in ways that they could read with some interest, understand more what was going to be happening to their greatly valued health care system, something that affects everybody in this province.

Are the honourable members opposite really suggesting that the humanity should be taken out of it, the simplistic kind of communication should be made into some sort of treatise, some sort of black and white, uncreative sort of approach that is dull and no one would read? That is not the kind of communication the people of Manitoba want, I would assert.

With respect to the Lotteries, a case for public involvement has to be made with respect to Lotteries. There are all kinds of other points of view. This government happens to believe that under government control, government regulation, Lotteries do generate revenues in an appropriate way with free choice of people involved, and there is a need to disclose information in relation to the purpose of the monies raised and how the money is spent and an understanding of the overall process, the morality of involvement in public Lotteries.

With respect to the Manitoba Telephone System, again, the case that had been made most loudly was for more transparency and more communication and more time and, again, whatever communication was done was necessary and demanded by the public.

So the resolution does not have a case in support of it that is proven and, as a result, I could end the discussion right there. However, I want to take it a step further and put this in the context of other situations where we have to draw the line. The boundaries have to be set as to how far one can go in communications, spending taxpayers' money for the purposes of communication. How do you ensure that you are not crossing the line and exhibiting unacceptable partisanship, that is, the advancement of your own political party, at the expense of the public and getting an unfair advantage over opposition parties?

Well, we have many, many checks and balances that assist the decision makers in putting together communications in an appropriate, balanced way. The line is going to be drawn in accordance of what is perceived to be the opinion of the ultimate jury, the most important jury, that is, the jury of public opinion.

So it has been asserted that the government should consider explicit guidelines as to where you draw the line. Well, coming from a legal background, Madam Speaker, I have difficulty applying strict legal guidelines, strict, explicit legal guidelines for this kind of situation, because those can interfere with effective free speech and necessary free speech and the kind of free speech which is going to be listened to by the jury out there who are evaluating whether their money is being spent wisely. We recognize as a political party and as a government and I as an MLA and a caucus the sacredness, the importance of our trusteeship for spending taxpayers' dollars prudently and conscientiously and with the best interests of the public in mind.

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So in assessing what you are going to put in a communication, one must consider the consequences if you violate that trust. Who were the watchdogs besides the well-informed and conscientious public that we have in Manitoba, who have exposure to all kinds of information sources, whether it be the written media or it be the radio media? It can be the television media, it can be the Internet, all the different means of accessing the views of the critics of the government of the day.

The other critics besides the media are, of course, the official opposition, who have their chance in the legislative debates and especially during Question Period to single out what they believe to be inappropriate release or communication out of the government, and they do so. They do so with a great deal of zeal, and every time that they do it, that is another lesson for government and the advisors to government that they must be cautious, careful and respectful of public opinion.

We have the unofficial opposition, as well, that speaks often and loudly and with great vigour in this Legislature. They, too, are watch dogs looking for an opportunity to label the government of the day with an accusation of partisanship to make that sort of case, and it is done again and again and again.

Then in the media we, of course, are exposed again and again to the challenging interviews when you leave the House, the exposure to telephone interviews and personal interviews by the print media and the other media sources. Once again, they are always looking for a story and the moment there is a smacking, an indication, a hint, a smell, a possible partisanship in something, they will jump all over it.

Then on top of that, of course, we have the public Auditor who looks at this kind of a situation and indicates that it might be helpful for a government to have, in effect, a checklist of its own to protect itself. I would argue, frankly, that is not necessary in my view, because it is something which is the product of common sense. It is not a science, and it is the same sorts of standards that govern a trustee.

It reminds me when I was on the Law Reform Commission, we were analyzing The Trustee Act. We used to have a listing of the kinds of things that a trustee could and could not do, investments a trustee could and could not make; a listing of those kinds of things. The listing which was intended to be a guideline turned out to be a constraint. It turned out to be a straight jacket. The Law Reform Commission of the day recommended that substituted for the listing of guidelines was a prudent-man, prudent-person test, the prudent-investor test. That has withstood, as a matter of fact, more than one government in this province, and the legislation under a Trustee Act is intact, and the standard is that of a prudent person.

Well, I assert that that is the kind of test that should be applied here, and we are as accountable, more accountable, than a trustee administering large amounts of money. To put this, again, in context we talk about government communications. What about communications from foundations? Whether it be the Winnipeg Foundation or the Sill Foundation, the Jewish Foundation, they have their annual reports. What about the United Way? They have their annual reports. All of them also have public communications, and they certainly want to let the public know, using charitable money, money that has been entrusted to them to spend in the public interest.

They want to share with the public in human ways that the public will understand, what is being done by those trustees on behalf. Frankly, my own experience would be in government that the government is even more careful than trustees of those kinds of institutions, because they have to be politically sensitive in ways that can cause even appearances to get in the way of substance. So this government has been, I believe, very, very careful in this respect and very prudent and very responsible to the taxpayers of Manitoba.

The humanization of the communications is very important. One of the problems, I would submit, Madam Speaker, with government communications historically and even continuing to this day is that there is not enough personal touch to it. It is in the absolute commitment to be nonpartisan that things come out sometimes very dry, and it does not share the sort of heart that is behind the communication. To have constraints imposed and, in fact, monitored standards would cause the critics to, in effect, look at adherence to the guidelines almost like judges trying to evaluate whether or not they breached a guideline or they did not apply a particular guideline in a particular case, rather than looking at the total communication and looking at it in a way as to whether or not it was respectful of the public trust.

I also want to indicate how this drawing the line can be a very difficult thing to do in the professions. I know that in the legal profession and in the medical profession there was always a question as to when you were, in effect, engaged in advertising as distinguished from sharing with the public the facts about you as a professional, because advertising in the old days was frowned upon until there was an intervention, first of all, in the United States asserting the right to freedom of speech and therefore opening up the doors.

Another example of where you have to draw the line, and I would assert always on the side of free speech, is MLAs themselves. We honourable members in this Legislature, as you know, do not even have partisan or party colours on our signs in front of our buildings, and we cannot display any partisanship within our offices. We cannot conduct ourselves in that way, and that is good, but on the other hand, you have to be a human face within your own constituency, and you have to be able to share with some enthusiasm the information about government programs. You are wearing your hat as a service provider within that constituency.

So, I, in conclusion, would suggest, Madam Speaker, that the resolution should be defeated, and I heartedly endorse freedom of speech over constraints by--

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The hour being 6 p.m., this House is adjourned and stands adjourned--just for clarification, was the honourable member for Riel finished his remarks, because technically and legally he has one minute remaining.

The hour being 6 p.m., this House is adjourned and stands adjourned until 1:30 p.m. Monday.