HANSARD

Printed and Published by Nova Scotia Hansard Reporting Services

Ms. Maureen MacDonald (Chair)

Mr. Chuck Porter (Vice-Chairman)

Mr. Keith Colwell

In Attendance:

Ms. Rhonda Neatt

Legislative Committee Clerk

HALIFAX, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 21, 2007

SUBCOMMITTEE ON PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

8:30 A.M.

CHAIR

Ms. Maureen MacDonald

MADAM CHAIR: I'm going to call the subcommittee to order. Today we are dealing with additional items to our Public Accounts Committee agenda. I really am pleased that we were able to meet this morning because I wanted to talk about bringing forward the Commonwealth Games as a topic and, additionally, I think we should consider the Atlantic Lottery Corporation.

I have a letter from Diana Whalen, who chairs the Standing Committee on Economic Development, and they have been approached by one of the unions to have the Superintendent of Pensions come to the Public Accounts Committee and talk about the administration of the pension that is with the association of health organizations, the one where there was controversy around the use of the surplus. What I would say is I would recommend that we defer discussing Diana's request until you all have a copy of the correspondence both from Ms. Whalen and from Joan Jessome to that committee, but that is an additional item that we should consider whether we will schedule in or not. I would ask the clerk to make that correspondence available to Mr. Porter and Mr. Colwell, so they can have a chance to look at that and talk about it.

Are there any additional ideas that people want to bring forward as topics at this time? Those are the two things that I think are more pressing.

Mr. Colwell.

MR. KEITH COLWELL: I think that the two items you have are very timely and the order you have them in is maybe the Atlantic Lottery Corporation first. The only reason I say that is because I think we need to get more information from the Games people. I would like to have information prior to that meeting, as much information as we can get, because I have some pretty strong feelings about this that I have never said publicly, but I always thought this wasn't a very good idea for Halifax because we just can't afford it. I was really afraid that property taxpayers in HRM were going to be hit with horrendous tax increases on their property taxes to pay for this. I would just like to see where they have spent money and if it has been spent wisely, which we will see. I am doubtful it has been, but let's see that - and there are so many needs in the municipality that need to be done. I have recreation centres in my area that are owned by HRM that just can't operate, there is no money to operate them.

So we are going to spend millions and millions on a bid and millions and millions later, giving away to other cities. If we had $10,000 in each one of the community centres I have in my area - and that is probably repeated all over HRM - they could do fantastic things for the young people in the community. So I would like to get the information on the bid, everything we can get from them. I think we should do whatever we have to do initially. I don't think that's one thing we should fool around with, and then call the Lottery people in. I've been here before and they have been here - they are pretty smooth with their answers. I think we can bring them in first and then possibly, if the committee and the subcommittee agrees, the Games people after that.

MADAM CHAIR: The Atlantic Lottery Corporation may take a longer time to organize to bring in than the bid committee, so I would take a different approach in terms of the timing - I think that the Commonwealth bid people would be more available to us to bring in, more quickly, and we do have the 28^th of March open.

My thinking on this was that we would begin by inviting the bid committee - Mr.MacGillivray and Mr. Logan - to come on the 28^th and provide any documentation prior to that that they would be making reference to when they came on the 28^th and that we invite them to provide an overview of the bid and how it all unfolded. So that we just start with a kind of information session with the bid committee themselves, and then we proceed with a subsequent meeting, where we would have the documentation that they would provide, plus any additional documentation that would be identified as a result of speaking with them. Then we would bring in the decision makers who made the decisions around the ending of the bid, because ultimately that's where we want to go, but I think the bid committee themselves would have the background information and that's kind of what my thinking is on this. Mr. Porter.

MR. CHUCK PORTER: Certainly I'm not opposed to seeing the Commonwealth team come in to answer some questions. March 28^th may be an issue. I mean, they'd have to provide the information by tomorrow for us to have adequate time with the business. I know with something that significant - I agree with Mr. Colwell, I want to be able to read through

that material. I want to be able to have some very definite questions as to what's going on. I don't know that one week will give that to us. It's Wednesday now - it's one week from today, you're suggesting. They'd have to provide that today and we'd have to be pretty busy reading, I think, between now and the end of one week. Certainly, I would like to see them come forward because I agree we all have some questions as to what went on. The number of meetings, again, I don't think we should be getting into two, three, four meetings with this either. We don't do that with others and I only say that because - where's the agenda that we did previously?

You know, we set an agenda last Fall basically to bring in what we thought were priorities and that's all that concerns me. What are we bumping out to bring other in, and all I would suggest is, Madam Chair, just that we have maybe a look at that and prioritize to make sure that what was a priority is okay to be bumped, I guess, for lack of a better word. I don't want to take away anything from those other issues that were important to this committee. But, certainly I'm in favour of both, the Atlantic Lottery Corporation and the Commonwealth Games.

MADAM CHAIR: Okay, let me just identify where we are in terms of topics that have been scheduled. We have, of course, today, the community college. March 28^th, there's an opening, nothing has been scheduled. April 4^th, we have the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. April 11^th, the Department of Community Services - that's around their IT, financial controls. April 18^th, we have the Department of Finance on the fiscal imbalance; and April 25^th, we have the Department of Economic Development and Transportation and Public Works on the leasing of vehicles.

So, those have been scheduled. We have other topics on the wait list that have not been scheduled. So there are other topics that are there that have yet to be scheduled. So in other words, April is fully booked, as it stands now. Now, our options are to proceed with April as scheduled, or to postpone some of the sessions that we have scheduled for April; in the past, that has been done as well. We've had groups coming in, but an issue has come up and it's been of such public concern that we've decided to invite the Department of Finance - and I've never had any tears from any of those witnesses say, no, boo hoo, we really want to be there. So we say, we'll bring you at a later date and we schedule sometime later.

That's where it stands now. So if we decide to keep the schedule the way it is, we're looking at the Atlantic Lottery Corporation and the Commonwealth bid not until May, which is a considerable period of time away.

MR. PORTER: I know May is a considerable time away - maybe five or six weeks. The only other thing I'm wondering, as Mr. Colwell stated and yourself, is how much time is it going to take for a report on the Games to be complete where they can give us some definite answers?

Again, I want them here in front of us, but I don't want to waste time, missing witnesses and I certainly don't want to have them just come in and tell us the report's not done, we don't have that answer yet. That's just wasting our time here and it's not a good use of our time.

Although six weeks seems like a long way away, if, in fact we could get them at that point, but I'm open to either/or. I just want to make sure the information is available to us before we bring them before this committee. That's my only concern.

MADAM CHAIR: Well, my concern, frankly, is that we not have a sanitized version of what went on. The best way to make sure that we don't have a sanitized version of what went on is to start the proceedings of hearing from people as soon as possible. Otherwise, that's what we're going to get. We're going to get a sanitized version of what went on and it's going to be a very frustrating exercise.

I can't imagine what report has to be complete. The decision has been made. The information exists. None of it has been released to the public, none of the public officials involved have one scrap of information on this in terms of - the municipal councillors don't know what the heck went on and have no information. Members of the Opposition Parties in this Legislature have no idea what went on and members of the public have no idea what went on.

The longer we delay getting some questioning underway, the harder it's going to be to get that information because what will come out will be a completely sanitized version of what went on. I don't have to remind people here of the difficulty this committee has had in exercising warrants to get information. So, I understand why we want to have information before we have witnesses for questioning. We like to have documentation as much as possible.

But, in this case, what I'm saying is, we start with the bid committee people to give us a briefing on the bid itself - what it was they were proposing - and then we bring in the political decision makers, or the senior bureaucrats making decisions who ultimately killed the bid. But we'll have information from the bid committee in advance. I think that makes the most sense in terms of trying to make sure we don't get only a sanitized version of what went on at some future date. That's my concern.

Mr. Colwell and then Mr. Porter.

MR. COLWELL: I'm certainly not interested in a sanitized version of this. As I say, I've had personal strong feelings which I haven't said publicly about the bid process right from the beginning, for all kinds of reasons.

I want to see line-by-line where every cent was spent. Every penny. I want to see if they travelled, what the entertainment costs were, what the travel costs were, who went, why they went - the whole nine yards. I think it's going to be quite interesting when this is all brought forward.

I know we have had an awful hard time getting this information from government departments in the past - which we shouldn't have, we definitely should not. It should be very simple, it's taxpayers' money we're dealing with here.

I don't want to get a sanitized version but, indeed, I want to get the detailed version of it to see exactly where the money was spent. Maybe everything was above board - I'm sure it was - but let's see how it was spent. If these things are going to proceed again, we want some accountability this time on this issue and it may be something different next time that the province and the municipality go after. I want to see a detailed report of where every penny was spent. I'd like to have that in my possession before people come in here because then they can say, we did this and we did that - then we can say, how come this cost this and this cost this and this cost this? We can really get down to it. We will get down to this pretty darn fast if we have that information. How we get that information is going to be another issue and I don't want to see that delayed. I would rather see us get that information and bump someone else we have on the list in April and bring them in at that point but I really want to see the detailed information, however we get it.

[8:45 p.m.]

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Porter.

MR. PORTER: Madam Chair, just for the record, for Hansard, I in no way was insinuating that we go for a sanitized version of this whatsoever. I also agree with Mr. Colwell. I want to see a detailed list of what took place, where the spending was, because I know that our caucus is going to have questions as well. We are very concerned with taxpayers' dollars also. It's not a case of sanitizing anything. I also agree with Mr. Colwell that I want to be able to have time to read what comes forward. I believe there is going to be an awful lot of information provided to us. If this committee feels, however, that we want to bring someone in, maybe they can provide some of that information, I don't know, in an information session. I don't know what kind of questions that we will be able to really come back with.

Again, I want to make it clear. I am not opposed. I am in 100 per cent agreement that this should happen. I just don't know that we have enough time within one week but, again, that's fine.

MADAM CHAIR: Okay, let me throw another idea out then. I'm really hating to lose the time on March 28^th. I don't think it would be unreasonable for us to invite the Office of

Health Promotion and Protection in to talk about the parameters that were given, what instructions were given to the bid committee and parameters that were set out around securing the games, financial and otherwise. Those documents, surely, would be available. We could start at that stage, understanding first off, what instructions did the bid committee have in terms of putting together the bid? Were there parameters? What were those parameters? If there weren't parameters, why weren't there parameters?

I think everybody wants to understand how did we go from the $700-some-odd million to $1.7 billion. That, I think, is a fairly fundamental issue. The other issue, of course, is the amount of money the bid committee has already spent in trying to secure games that we have now withdrawn from trying to secure. Surely there would have been some parameters set around that as well. So we certainly can start at that level.

I see no reason why, if we decide today to invite the Office of Health Promotion and Protection to come on Wednesday, why we couldn't ask for those documents to be provided to us by noon on Monday and that gives us an opportunity to review a small - my worse nightmare would be to ask for all of the documents and have boxes of material show up. We want to, I think, take this in chunks. We need to break this down into manageable pieces for the committee because there will be, I think, an enormous amount of documents to go through and it is unrealistic given that we have not a lot of resources, as a committee, to do it all at once.

So that would be my proposal then. We bring OHP in and we focus specifically on that feature and then we move along but we, I think, need to approve bringing in the bid committee next and then perhaps back to OHP and we need to identify documents that we want each group to provide as we move through this process.

MR. COLWELL: Well, first of all, I don't care how many boxes of documents they send. I will personally go through myself. I am that frustrated about this whole thing right from the beginning. They would be very interesting to get because then we wouldn't have to worry about who we get in here - we would soon get our answers from those documents, as long as they are not all blanked out like they have been before, which in this case they definitely shouldn't be.

I somewhat agree with the Chair's approach on this. I would also like to see not only the Health Promotion and Protection but HRM was a big driver behind this, not just Health Promotion. They are the ones who really initiated this to start with. It would be interesting to have some of their staff come in here at the same time as the Office of Health Promotion and Protection and get their view on the whole thing. They're sort of a child of the province, and the municipality is, so they can't refuse this committee, as far as I'm concerned, to come in here at our request.

So I would like to see them come in at the same time, if my colleague for the PC caucus agrees with this. I'm a bit reluctant, I'd like to have the information first but I can understand the Chair's approach on this - and I don't want to let this slide either, that's not my intention here. I'd like to have them in here today actually, with all the documentation. If I would have gotten it last night, I would have been up all night looking at it. I'm that frustrated about it. Especially when I see what goes on in my community and the lack of funding that's so desperately needed to do things for people in the community, and you can see what happens when youth - and my area is an example - don't have the facilities to go to. We have to put a stop to that, so I feel our priorities have to change.

Again, I think we're going to do that. I want to see HRM in here as well because they're just as involved in this as the Office of Health Promotion and Protection, and if we can do that - and I don't see why we couldn't - then initially, with hesitation, I would say yes let's do that right away. I don't want to let this slide either, that's not the idea - I just want information, and solid information.

MADAM CHAIR: We have jurisdiction. We can invite anybody, really, but we can't certainly compel HRM to come. We can invite them; we can invite the feds to come as well, but we don't have - this is the Standing Committee of the Legislature to look at the provincial accounts, really. I have no difficulty consulting with Legislative Counsel on that and I will do that, but I think that it would be a surprise to me if we have that much jurisdiction.

The other thing I would say - and I would caution us in the way we approach this - it has never worked that successfully for the Public Accounts Committee to bring in multiple departments and groups at the same time. The two hours fly by so fast, between caucuses. My thinking is - and I have no disagreement with you, believe me, in terms of asking HRM to come and participate through this process - my thinking on that would be to have them at a separate time. You bring in Office of Health Promotion, you bring in HRM, fine, let's do it distinctly because in that way the two hours will be spent in a focused way. It gets very confusing with multiple departments at the same time, and not enough time, really, to delve into the issues.

Mr. Porter.

MR. PORTER: I don't know whether we're going to be able to get HRM. We may be able to get representation via Service Nova Scotia and Municipal Relations, I guess. We may be able to and, again, if we can that's fine. I certainly am not in disagreement with that. It would be nice to have their perspective on things too, perhaps. Yes, we can move things out. That's fine. As I said, I'm not opposed. I just, again, want to make sure that we have enough material to ask some relevant questions - I don't want to be here not being able to ask questions that matter.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Colwell.

MR. COLWELL: Again, we have to wait to see what legal counsel says, but HRM is a creation of this province and of this Legislature, so I think we have jurisdiction to bring them in, period. It's not like the federal government, because we're a creation of the federal government. So I think we have jurisdiction to bring them in and I'd be surprised if we don't.

I think the idea of bringing in the Office of Health Promotion and Protection and HRM at two separate times would be fine; I have no problem with that and I would agree with that. Perhaps in that case we should ask the Office of Health Promotion and Protection for all their information, ask HRM for all their information - and any other government department independently that would be involved in this, ask them for information as well, immediately. Schedule the Office of Health Promotion and Protection first, because it's provincial, and then HRM, and then hold a meeting or two after that, whatever we need to go through all the information, and after we get the information and go through that, then bring in whoever we feel it necessary on that. I would agree to that.

MADAM CHAIR: And the bid committee, as well.

MR. COLWELL: Oh, definitely, yes, but I think we should bring the Office of Health Promotion and Protection and HRM in first, before the bid committee. Get their feeling on it, so we understand where they're coming from.

MADAM CHAIR: Their parameters, yes.

Mr. Porter, we have five minutes.

MR. PORTER: Yes, I'm just looking at the time.

I agree with that, I'm fine with that - I think that's not a bad way to proceed. The other question - and I'm just curious - why don't we have anybody booked for March 28^th? Did we have? We obviously have an agenda with a number of names on it and departments, so I was just thinking about that.

MADAM CHAIR: I think we had something booked and it got moved. It was moved back and it may have been the . . .

MR. PORTER: Service Nova Scotia? (Interruption)

MADAM CHAIR: Right, that's right. It had been booked and it was postponed because of the report. We're going to bring them back when that report is done.

MR. PORTER: Just so I'm clear - we'll be inviting, I assume, Health Promotion and Protection for March 28^th then, that is our plan?

MADAM CHAIR: Yes, we'll start there and we'll ask for all of the documents, and we'll look at other groups and we'll ask for all of the documents.

The last thing I would ask you is in terms of the times we have booked in April, what are we going to recommend about bumping any of these other topics - or not?

The order is on April 11^th the Department of Community Services, the IT system and financial controls - that actually could be moved, couldn't it?

MR. PORTER: I was just going to say we had NSLC on April 4^th - why would we not just move everybody out a week? If this is prioritizing, why are we just not moving them?

MADAM CHAIR: Yes, I'm sorry. I didn't have my glasses.

MR. PORTER: The only reason I'm saying that is we booked these basically as priority then, so they should kind of remain in that priority . . .

MADAM CHAIR: Yes. Actually they're not scheduled in order of priority, they were scheduled in order of availability. Mora took one from each of the lists. I'm sorry I didn't notice the Liquor Corporation, so that could be moved as well. The Department of Finance and the fiscal imbalance on the 18^th of April, I frankly wouldn't want to see that bumped. I think that, given what has just occurred around the offshore agreement and equalization, it would be very important for us to hear from the Department of Finance and get all of their information, their number crunching and what have you.

MR. COLWELL: I would agree with that.

MADAM CHAIR: Would you agree with that? On April 25^th, we have the leasing of vehicles from Economic Development and the Department of Transportation and I'd like to keep that as well. We do have two additional dates there, as well as the 28^th - that would give us three opportunities to have a look at the Commonwealth Games. I would think that would do it and, if it doesn't, we can talk about what else we need to do.

Are we agreed that's how we'll proceed? We'll look for all of the information from each of those departments, and we'll schedule it as much as we can in that way. We still have the Lottery Corporation. I think, with your approval, we will write them and ask them to appear in front of us in early May - the first available date we have in May, would that be agreeable?

Okay. So, that's basically it. There is no other business.

MR. PORTER: Just one question. If we're going to bring in a department next week, again, I want to go back, I want us to contact them today so we can have the information this week. There will be a great deal of information to go over, and if we don't get that information this week, then I don't see us having enough time to ask relevant questions in this Chamber next week.

MADAM CHAIR: We will make that contact today.

MR. COLWELL: Yes, I agree with Mr. Porter. I also think we should make the request of HRM as well, and if indeed their information comes in and the department's doesn't come in, we can just shift, with the permission of the committee, who our witnesses will be, dependent upon the information that comes. I don't want to miss this opportunity either, so whatever the Chair can do and the staff can do to make sure this happens, it is greatly appreciated.

MADAM CHAIR: I'll speak with Mr. Hebb as well about that just prior to making the contact. I will make a verbal report to our full committee, and I'll ask Mr. Colwell to move that.

MR. COLWELL: I so move.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much.

We stand adjourned.

[ The committee adjourned at 9:00 a.m.]