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ORAL QUESTION PERIOD

Children/Youth Programs

Government Initiatives

Mr. Gary Doer (Leader of the Opposition): Madam Speaker, my question is to the First Minister (Mr. Filmon). This government has systematically cut the bridges of opportunity for our young people across this province and also across our urban settings. The United Way agencies have provided a report about their first-hand experience to deal with the cutbacks and decisions that have been made by this government in terms of its impact on people and its impact on our youth. The agencies have said to all of us loud and clear that we better start paying attention and this Premier and this government better start paying attention, that they were concerned about the level of anger and despair in six- and seven-year-old children and that they felt that this hopelessness was translating itself many times over in our society and was leading to the involvement of our young people in gangs, petty crime and prostitution.

I would like to ask this Premier: When is he going to wake up and take leadership on these issues that are facing our communities and take leadership to restore faith for our young people rather than despair, which is what we see in many communities across this province?

Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister of Family Services): Madam Speaker, I thank the honourable Leader of the official opposition for that question because it does provide me with the opportunity to talk about the United Way's process and the report which, in many instances, is a very positive report. I know the Leader of the Opposition is trying to pull out every negative comment in that report, but the fact of the matter is that all of the funders, whether they be the United Way, the Winnipeg Foundation, the City of Winnipeg, the federal government or the Province of Manitoba, recognize and realize that we need to be working together. We need to be seeking input from the community on how to resolve the issues that face our youth and our children on a day-to-day basis.

We all know that there are problems and there are issues that need to be dealt with, and we will work co-operatively seeking community input and advice to try to find the answers to the problems that exist.

Mr. Doer: Madam Speaker, this is a Premier who has cut money to friendship centres; this is a Premier who has cut money to access programs; this is a Premier who has cut money to our New Careers Program; this is a Premier who has cut money to public education; this is a Premier who continues to cut money for the children and youth who are so important to our future, and this Premier just sits on his hands and does not even take a leadership role in this Legislature about what we are going to do about it.

The United Way report goes on to say that the provincial government in its funding, in its legislation and in its policies has shifted the focus from prevention to a treatment model. Of course, we have other reports--the Postl report. We have the Youth Secretariat report that was buried by this government.

When is this government going to restore prevention and long-term thinking by restoring hope and opportunity to our young people, rather than cutbacks and a treatment focus after the fact? When is the Premier going to take that leadership?

Mrs. Mitchelson: Madam Speaker, I totally reject the preamble from the Leader of the Opposition. We have done a lot within government to try to show leadership, co-ordination and co-operation. We all know there are vulnerable children out there in our communities who need our support and our co-operative efforts in order to solve the problems.

I reject again the issue of the reports from the Children and Youth Secretariat, working documents that were provided by five different steering committees that have been compiled into reports that I will table today here in this Legislature. It talks about what our government policy will be, what the strategy considerations will be and where the recommendations from those steering committees are at, which ones we have already implemented, which ones we are working on and which ones will require some longer-term solutions.

I would also like to table for my honourable friends in the opposition a document called Families First, which was done by the Department of Family Services, that looks at a co-operative approach to working with families and with community to find the solutions.

Mr. Doer: Madam Speaker, we will see how much the government censors out from the real report that the government never released, the Youth Secretariat street gang subcommittee report that talked about the acute challenges we all face and the lack of co-ordination and leadership from this government and this Premier.

Page 9 of the United Way report dealing with agencies that are on the front lines of our challenges and our children and our youth goes on to say--and it is not dissimilar to what the Postl report has stated and their own buried Youth Secretariat report has stated--that agencies are feeling powerless to deal with victims of gang recruitment. Many young people need skills to deal with victimization and gang involvement and many children feel marginalized and need hope. When will this Premier take a leadership role and restore hope and opportunity to our young people in our communities rather than the despair they get from the members opposite in the Tory party?

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Mrs. Mitchelson: Madam Speaker, again, we have to look towards the co-ordination, through the Children and Youth Secretariat, of many departments within government that are trying to find the right answers, trying to work with the community to find the right answers. I would like to table for my honourable friends across the way, in case they have not seen the news report from the Family Centre of Winnipeg whom we have partnered with as a result of the work that the Children and Youth Secretariat has done in a program called the FAST program, where not only the Family Centre of Winnipeg but the Children and Youth Secretariat, the Child Guidance Clinic, Winnipeg School Division No. 1 have all joined forces and provided funding. The Winnipeg Foundation was also involved to deal with children and families.

We all know that the support has to go to parents to learn how to accept responsibility and to learn how to parent. If we can work with parents and children together through programs like the FAST program that was just announced, these things are going to make a big difference in the way children receive support in our communities. I hope my honourable friends will read the information and support the kinds of initiatives we are undertaking.

Education System

Funding

Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Madam Speaker, the United Way study makes the point that the future is not what it used to be, and those are their words. Nowhere is that more true than in parts of my constituency where many families face hunger, constant poverty and increasing fears for their children from the growth of gangs in the community. But we also have institutions which are in daily contact with young people who offer food, who offer nurture, literacy, safety and a ladder to the future of opportunity, and those are the public schools.

I want to ask the Minister of Education to explain why, given the situation that Winnipeg is facing today, her government has chosen for five years to cut provincial support to public schools.

Hon. Linda McIntosh (Minister of Education and Training): Madam Speaker, I have indicated to the member before, but I will repeat it again, that we have increased funding by $115 million to public schools since we took office in 1988. That is a substantial increase. I grant that there has been a fluctuation, but that period of two years, you can take a look at what the federal transfer payments have done to Manitoba in terms of cuts for health, education and family services. You can see that we have not passed that cut on to the public schools.

So to indicate, Madam Speaker, that the funding to public school education has increased since we took office by $115 million, and you can see that reflected in the taxes, the levies that school divisions have had to impose which are far, far less than they ever had to impose when the NDP was flowing money to public schools.

Ms. Friesen: Could the Minister of Education, who has in fact since 1988 reduced the percentage of the provincial budgets spent on public schools when those are the very institutions which offer young people hope, which offer skills in mediation and anger management and enable people to deal with the anger and despair that the United Way--

Madam Speaker: Order, please. Does the honourable member please have a question?

Ms. Friesen: Madam Speaker, yes, I do. Why is the government cutting the assistance to public schools at a time when those children, those teachers and those trustees need all the help they can get, and we are in a crisis situation?

Mrs. McIntosh: We are not cutting funding to public schools. This year funding was maintained--in fact a slight increase. We have already been able to give an indication that next year there will be no cut. We do not know what the amount will be, but it will be certainly as much as this year.

We also have done a number of other things that the member is aware of through the Child and Youth Secretariat, which they are critical of, where we have just flowed $450,000 from Health into Education to hire registered nurses for medically fragile children in schools, where we have $250,000 being used from Health, again to train paraprofessionals for the classroom to deal with children with nonmedical needs but simply bodily function needs, a number of initiatives like that that are underway that have helped pour money in over and above what we provided this year, which was a slight increase, not a decrease.

Ms. Friesen: Could the Minister of Education tell us what plans she has in the immediate future, not another announcement of sports camps, not another set of discussion papers, but what assistance is there going to be to the schools of the inner city, to the teachers and the trustees who are facing that anger and despair every day?

An Honourable Member: . . . stand up and do not have an answer.

Mrs. McIntosh: If they do not want an answer, I do not have to give it, if that is what the member for Wellington (Ms. Barrett) is telling me.

I would indicate that I too visit schools, and I have seen wonderful things happening in the schools in Winnipeg School Division No. 1. I see hope; I see optimism; I see excellence; I see that in schools that the member would say are filled with despair and disadvantages. I went to visit a teacher who has done extremely well with literacy, where his children are doing incredible work with literacy in his class. I have been in schools where I have seen a partnership involvement of business, with families, with school staff, wonderful things happening in the schools in the inner city of Winnipeg.

She may be looking for and seeing despair. I realize she thinks that is her mandate. I recognize that there are problems which we are moving to address, but I also see the hope, the optimism and the excellence that is there.

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Point of Order

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Wolseley, on a point of order.

Ms. Friesen: Madam Speaker, on a point of order, my mandate is to represent my constituents, and that is what I am doing when I speak of the anger and despair that I see.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Wolseley does not have a point of order. It is clearly a dispute over the facts.

Children/Youth Programs

Government Initiatives

Mr. Doug Martindale (Burrows): Madam Speaker, the Postl report, the Children and Youth Secretariat and their reports and the United Way all recognize the very strong link between poverty, hopelessness and despair. Yet when the Minister of Native and Northern Affairs had the opportunity to speak at a forum, a public forum in the inner city in Winnipeg, he said that the province cannot afford to invest more money in children.

I would like to ask the Minister of Family Services (Mrs. Mitchelson): What is she going to do and what is her government going to do to start investing money in children, especially poor children in the province of Manitoba, and stop the cuts that this government continues to inflict on the poorest of the poor in this city and this province?

Hon. David Newman (Minister of Native Affairs): Madam Speaker, I read that newspaper description of what I was alleged to have said, and it simply is not an accurate reporting of what I said. The particular occasion he was talking about was the event at what used to be the Marlborough Hotel--I have forgotten its name now--and this dealt with the Perry Preschool Program. At that time we, the Children and Youth Secretariat, my department and I believe one other department of this government supported an event to share that very research with the business community and charitable community and funding community in this city, all with a view of encouraging more collaboration and positive support for the programs which had been researched and had been recommended by the Children and Youth Secretariat. It is just absolutely inconsistent with what was said, that particular quotation.

Mr. Martindale: Madam Speaker, I would like to repeat my question for the Minister of Family Services. There seems to be a contradiction between what the Minister of Native and Northern Affairs is prepared to do and what the Minister of Family Services and her government is doing, which is to continue the cuts to the poorest of the poor in the province of Manitoba. When is she going to start reversing the cuts and investing in children?

Hon. Bonnie Mitchelson (Minister of Family Services): Madam Speaker, I thank my honourable friend for the question, although I think his question is on the basis of an article that is inaccurate, because we have already seen the actions of the Minister of Northern Affairs where he has just made announcements around programs for children, for aboriginal children through his department.

We know that in the budget there is more money for the Children and Youth Secretariat. There is half a million dollars there that was not there before to lever resources in order to provide new programming. We have support through the Family Support Innovations Fund. We have money in the Winnipeg Development Agreement. We have all kinds of initiatives that are underway or will be underway to try to co-ordinate services and provide better supports to children that are vulnerable and need our support.

Madam Speaker: The honourable member for Burrows, with a final supplementary question.

Mr. Martindale: Will the Minister of Family Services acknowledge that it was her government's policy of standardizing welfare rates in 1993 that is causing the City of Winnipeg to continue cutting welfare rates, including for children from zero to 18, by up to 15 percent effective on May 15 of this year? What is her government doing to stop the cuts that continue because of their policies? When are you and your government going to start investing in children in the province of Manitoba?

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Mrs. Mitchelson: We obviously are investing in the children of Manitoba and the families in Manitoba, as evidenced by our welfare reform initiatives and the initiatives that are in place to try to help single parents that are living in poverty on welfare and their children move off of the welfare system and into the workforce. We have had significant success through the Taking Charge! program, through Opportunities for Employment. We will continue those programs to try to ensure that the best form of social security, which is a job, will be available for more and more women and children living in poverty.

Shelter Allowances for Family Renters

Funding Reduction

Ms. Marianne Cerilli (Radisson): Madam Speaker, in the throne speech and the budget speech, this government claims to want to deal with poverty and those families left out of the economy. Many of these families, we know, spend more than 40 percent of their income on housing, and this is why it is completely inconceivable that the budget in Housing shows a 20 percent cut to the Shelter Allowances for Family Renters program, a $250,000-cut in support of these families with children.

I want to ask the Minister of Housing if he can explain why they are cutting this program while claiming to want to support families with children.

Hon. Jack Reimer (Minister of Housing): Madam Speaker, the member has used the figure of 40 percent for housing. It is totally out of sync with our formula. Our formula is 27 percent of gross income. So I am not too sure what area or what way the member is talking about where members are paying 40 percent.

Under our public housing formula, it is only 27 percent for families. If it is a single person or bachelor, it is only 25 percent, unlike the federal government which has been advocating that we go to a 30 percent formula. We certainly are not at a 40 percent percentage.

Madam Speaker: The honourable member for Radisson, with a supplementary question.

Ms. Cerilli: Madam Speaker, I will clarify for the minister. I am talking about the shelter allowances program for family renters. The threshold is more than 30 percent of their income going to pay for rent. Can the minister explain why they have cut this program and why the budget for '95-96 for the program was underspent by more than $300,000 and if the same thing is occurring this year in this program?

Mr. Reimer: Madam Speaker, one of the things that the Department of Housing does quite judiciously is look at cost and availability of funding and where the best allocation of funding should be going. Because a department has become more efficient in its allocation of funding and the resources that are available for it through internal measures or through cost accounting or through better efficiencies that the department goes to, naturally there is going to be a saving. Because there is a saving does not mean that there has necessarily been an underfunding of this particular department.

Ms. Cerilli: Can the minister explain how this is a saving for the families that will no longer be able to access this program? I mean this is a cut, not a saving. Can the minister explain how they can rationalize this cut when they claim to want to support the very families that are involved in this program?

Mr. Reimer: Madam Speaker, I should point out that within public housing it is based on applications. It is based on a demand of applications that are processed. If the applications go down, naturally there is going to be less money spent.

Madam Speaker, it is just a matter of rational thinking. If there are less people that are going into the system, naturally there is going to be less utilization of the monies. There is going to be less funding of monies that are going to be utilized.

Point of Order

Ms. Cerilli: On a point of order, Madam Speaker, I would ask that you get the minister to answer the question, which was about the SAFFR program. It is not about public housing, and if he would understand that this program is affecting renters in the private sector, and would he answer the question with respect to the--

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Madam Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Radisson does not have a point of order.

Labour Market Training

French Language Services

Mr. Neil Gaudry (St. Boniface): Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Education (Mrs. McIntosh). Last week the Premier indicated that your government was getting close to an agreement on the devolution of manpower training resources and again last night indicated that. I accept the logic that Manitobans are better qualified to make decisions affecting labour market training than a bureaucrat in Ottawa, but I still have reservations about specific guarantees concerning French language services.

Will the minister guarantee that French language services now available under the federal government will still be available under provincial administration?

Hon. Gary Filmon (Premier): Madam Speaker, that is absolutely the intent of the negotiations, and it is a condition that the federal government would require of us. I am given to understand that, in the course of the discussions, the federal bureaucrats who have been involved with the negotiations are confident that Manitoba can and will provide the services equivalent to what is currently provided under the federal system.

Mr. Gaudry: Will the Premier or the Minister of Education (Mrs. McIntosh) guarantee that there will be no loss of French language services where they now exist in Manitoba, and if she cannot, what sort of message are we sending to Anglophones in Quebec in their struggle to protect English language services?

Mr. Filmon: Yes, Madam Speaker, that is the assurance that we must provide in order for the federal government to transfer this responsibility to the provincial government, and we are confident that we can do so and that we will do so.

Mr. Gaudry: Can the minister tell this House, when the agreement is signed, will the Premier include a guarantee in his agreement that French language services will continue and be improved?

Mr. Filmon: Madam Speaker, I do not think the federal government can require us to improve upon the services that they already provide that meet the test of the official languages that they are under. The issue is whether or not we can give assurances that we will provide those services in the minority language at least as well as they are being provided today under the federal system. We are giving those assurances, and I am told that the federal government is confident that we will be able to fulfill those assurances.

Youth Gangs

Reduction Strategy

Mr. Gord Mackintosh (St. Johns): Madam Speaker, yesterday, when we asked the Justice minister why the government has not responded to the NDP's Gang Action Plan, he appeared to excuse this government's inaction by saying that Saskatchewan, of all things, had not looked at this kind of a strategy, a pathetic groping for excuses.

My question to the Premier is: Would the Premier now acknowledge that the only response to the gang challenge is not simply police and prosecutions, and will he order his government ministers to act in a comprehensive way across departments, or is this just not still enough of an issue in Tuxedo for this government to give a tinker's damn?

Madam Speaker: Order, please. I would remind the honourable member for St. Johns to exercise caution in the use of words in the Chamber.

Hon. Gary Filmon (Premier): Madam Speaker, the latter part of the member's question, of course, indicates just exactly his viewpoint on this, which I think is rather obnoxious to most Manitobans, that he regards this as simply a partisan issue on which he can make cheap political points. We do not, and that is why the Minister of Justice (Mr. Toews) has been participating in a wide variety of different initiatives that do involve partnerships with the federal government, partnerships with the City of Winnipeg, partnerships with the community, and that is why, with respect to the Winnipeg Development Agreement, there are initiatives contained within that with respect to community-based initiatives, the urban sports camps, other issues that there are specific initiatives on. We do not regard ourselves as having magic answers.

Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh.

Madam Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Filmon: Madam Speaker, I know that members opposite do not want to hear the answers.

Madam Speaker, that is why we believe that we have to continue to work with as many different groups and organizations and as many different people as may have solutions that can be applied, that may have answers that may help us in the initiative.

This is not an issue to which there are magic solutions. The member in his pompous attitude from on high suggests that he has all of the solutions. We will continue to work with all groups and organizations and all individuals who want to help solve the problem.

Mr. Mackintosh: Madam Speaker, a supplementary to the Premier, who should recognize that what is obnoxious is the government's inaction in dealing comprehensively with gangs: Would the Premier stop the denial and recognize that the challenge of gangs in Manitoba and Winnipeg in particular is very real and serious? It does demand a comprehensive response. Is he prepared to do as his own commissioned report by Ted Hughes recommended as its essential recommendation and that is, there must be a reprioritizing of resources?

I quote, Madam Speaker, if you will allow me a brief quote: An investment into economic and social programs that would allow poverty-stricken people with no marketable skills, no jobs and no job prospects to participate as law-abiding citizens.

When will he act on this report?

Mr. Filmon: Madam Speaker, I think it is absurd for the member opposite to speak of denial when there are a number of initiatives that are named in the throne speech that we have talked about with respect to a partnership with the employment community for providing job opportunities for aboriginals with training, for specific training initiatives for things such as community-based initiatives, for recreation activity and healthier choices to be made, a variety of different issues that have been brought forward and will be brought forward under the Winnipeg Development Agreement.

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We have indicated, Madam Speaker, that this is a serious issue, one that must be addressed and one that we as a government are prepared to work in partnership with all levels of government and all interested community-based organizations and individuals to try and seek better solutions, because clearly we do not have all of the answers. I do not believe anybody does, and anybody who stands up and suggests that they do, quite frankly, is just out of touch.

Mr. Mackintosh: If the Premier says that the government is not in denial, why was the issue of gangs not so much as raised as an issue in the throne speech, in the budget speech, and why is the government cutting back on programs like Night Hoops? Why is it burying reports for gang awareness for parents? Why is it burying the Youth Secretariat report on gangs? Why is it not acting? Why did he not even respond to the NDP's Gang Action Plan when it was sent to him by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Doer) back in September?

Madam Speaker: Order, please. I would remind all honourable members that when posing questions, it should consist of a single question, not multiple-part questions.

Hon. Vic Toews (Minister of Justice and Attorney General): I think, Madam Speaker, the First Minister has in fact indicated many of the initiatives in a general way, and it is often difficult to give a complete and full answer in the context of Question Period. I can point out one example and I know then the member will say: Well, why are you not emphasizing crime prevention instead of community, or if we do it the other way around, he will take the other side of the issue.

I can give one example. For example, Community and Youth Corrections is participating in a program named Choices in conjunction with the Winnipeg Police Services and the Winnipeg School Division. We think this is a very good program. We think that this is one way of identifying children who are at risk and trying to divert them into more constructive activities. We realize that that program by itself is not the answer. There is a multifaceted approach.

I, for one, and I believe every member of this government is prepared to sit down and listen to constructive solutions that the member for St. Johns brings forward. I have stood up day after day and asked him to bring one constructive solution and he never has.

Health Care System--Rural Manitoba

Emergency Services

Ms. Rosann Wowchuk (Swan River): Madam Speaker, shortages of doctors, closures of emergency rooms are problems facing rural and northern Manitobans, but this government continues to move ahead with regionalization without addressing the problem. Right in the Minister of Health's own constituency, the Beausejour Hospital has had to use donation money to keep its emergency doctors working because this government ignores the issue.

Why has this government and this Minister of Health allowed this problem to accelerate to the point where the health care of rural and northern Manitobans is being put at risk?

Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Health): Madam Speaker, first of all, this side of the House and certainly I, as the MLA for that area, are very concerned about medical services. The situation that she outlines in Beausejour is one where last winter the practitioners who provide service at that Beausejour Hospital threatened the local board to withdraw unless they received a special remuneration to provide that service.

The member may know that we do have an agreement with the Manitoba Medical Association that provides for fees for services. The correct place to have negotiated that would have been through the agreement which expires next year. In the interim, we have put together a plan over the next 90 days to develop a new model for rural physician funding which should deal with this issue, and surely to goodness she would not expect that that new model could be developed overnight. It does take some time, and we seem to have the co-operation of the various parties involved.

Ms. Wowchuk: Does the minister not realize that providing emergency care service in rural and northern Manitoba is much different than providing emergency care in urban centres? If he does not address this situation immediately, we will see fewer doctors in rural Manitoba, and we will see the health of rural and northerners put further at risk because of lack of action of this government.

Mr. Praznik: Madam Speaker, the member for Swan River says that the question--and we have two communities now where services were withdrawn, I believe Winkler being one and Beausejour being the other. She said we should deal with it immediately. What that really means is we should make an ad hoc payment to doctors who threaten to withdraw services. Now does that solve the problem? Absolutely not.

I would like to table here today, for the benefit of the member for Swan River, a letter from Dr. M. Kuschke of the Blue Water medical clinic in Pine Falls. In this letter he indicates clearly if the North Eastman Regional Health Authority pays the Beausejour doctors while the doctors in Pine Falls are doing the service that they believe they are ethically required to do, that they will withdraw services. So surely to goodness we need a comprehensive strategy that is transparent for the whole province, and that takes some time to develop.

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Ms. Wowchuk: Of course we need a comprehensive study, but we have not seen it from this government.

Will the minister admit that his government is avoiding a problem and is instead moving ahead with regionalization and shifting the problem onto the regional health board? Will the minister get control of this situation and ensure that we have doctors and proper health care in rural and northern Manitoba?

Mr. Praznik: First of all, I totally reject the accusations of the member for Swan River. If anything, as minister in this government I am working very, very closely with the regional boards. I have attended meetings with the North Eastman regional board, with their doctors.

The problem we have today is because the previous Beausejour Hospital board--I attended the meeting with them where we indicated Manitoba Health was not going to continue to fund ad hoc solutions to problems that needed long-term answers. They made a deliberate decision to use donation money to solve a short-term problem. The result of ad hocking these solutions, which the members are demanding I do today, is that we will continue to have problems.

I recognize that we have a problem with the way we remunerate physicians, not with regional boards, but we have a problem with the way we remunerate physicians in rural Manitoba, and to address that we need to have a transparent model that will work. We have asked the MMA to be part of a 90-day process to resolve it. Surely the doctors of Beausejour can live up to the responsibility to their community for 90 days.

Grandview District Hospital

Closure

Mr. Stan Struthers (Dauphin): I have received 122 letters of support to the Grandview hospital from families who live in the town of Grandview. The minister also has received copies of these letters. These people feel that the hospital has been threatened, and they are worried that the hospital will close down, and they will be looking to this minister for protection of their health care services. The doctor situation is becoming more stable and it is a new facility. What will this minister do to ensure that the Grandview hospital remains open to serve not only the citizens from Grandview but other Parklanders as well?

Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Health): Madam Speaker, the member for Dauphin has flagged the biggest issue facing rural health care facilities in Manitoba today. The fact of the matter is across rooms in our total rural and northern health care facilities the occupancy rate is some 58 percent, of which two-thirds of those acute care beds are not used for acute care purposes. So we are talking about one in five acute care beds being used for acute care purposes. If that trend continues, Grandview hospital and many others will be threatened, and part of the drive for regionalization is to be able to deliver services on a regional basis, appropriate services, effectively and efficiently. We are not in the business of closing facilities. We want to make them relevant to their communities so they will be used, and that is what this process is about.

Mr. Struthers: Madam Speaker, through all that rhetoric the minister said he wants the board to close the hospital in Grandview.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Dauphin was recognized for a supplementary question.

Closure--Meeting Request

Mr. Stan Struthers (Dauphin): Madam Speaker, will the minister, after saying what he just said in this House, come through on his word that he gave to folks in Grandview in January and come out and meet with the group that is worried about the hospital being closed? Will you meet with those people and tell them what you said here in the House?

Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Health): Madam Speaker, in fact, I am going to be in Dauphin tonight. I will not be meeting with people in Grandview, but I indicated I would be delighted to meet with them. It is a matter of scheduling and I intend to do that.

The member for Dauphin talks about rhetoric. All he has to do is look at the facts. We have one particular hospital in Manitoba today that is a 10-bed hospital, has a 40 percent occupancy rate, as low as 20 percent in the summer. How do you have a hospital with two beds in it, with two patients in it? If we do not look at bringing in appropriate services in those facilities, their future is threatened, and that is what this process is about, for the Grandviews, Winnipegosis, working with the Dauphin hospital to ensure that we are delivering services in an appropriate manner, making use of our facilities and not wasting them, and that is what is happening now.

Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. Time for Oral Questions has expired.