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Excerpt from MR. SPEAKER: The honourable member for Cape Breton Nova. MR. GORDON GOSSE: Mr. Speaker, it's a pleasure to rise tonight and speak on the Throne Speech. The first item I would like to address is my government's firm and full commitment. Firm commitment. Commitment to what? Almost seven years of government, what have they been committed to? Not too much. Health care - supporting families, threatening communities, building brighter futures, and I'll go with a text out of that page, and the quality of our air and water are just a few. Could you imagine the quality of air and water in the strip mine in Boularderie Island in Point Aconi? Could you imagine the water table when they're finished gutting that beautiful part of Cape Breton Island? Can you imagine that, Mr. Speaker? The devastation of strip mining, the scar it would leave. Portable water will be nowhere for the people who live over there. That's the full commitment. Strengthening our communities. [... excerpt: ...] Mr. Speaker, Nova Scotia resources, the next heading in the Throne Speech. "Nova Scotia's resource industries. . . adapting to change". "My government believes a prosperous future depends on careful management of our natural resources" - bring out the strip mining, Mr. Speaker, bring it out, 160 feet down. I mean, we're going to look after the management of our natural resources. We have a Donkin Mine there to go back to coal mining underground, the proper way to mine coal. Let's get it done, why tear up beautiful PointAconi in Boularderie Island? That is very good for tourism, I can just see an eco-tourist down a 160 foot hole in the middle of Cape Breton Island. Can you imagine? Would you take a canoe down to that water? I'll go on to the minerals, you imagine the wildlife around there. I remember touring that site one day with my Leader, Mr. Dexter, and the member for Dartmouth East, the member for Hants East, the member for Dartmouth North, and the member for Cape Breton Centre, and we saw two deer there, two beautiful deer down in Point Aconi. There were the deer over on one side and there was this pile of - I don't know if it was slag, I would call it slag because I'm a former steelworker - tailings or trailings of the mine, and this pool of water, I've never seen a colour like that before. I think I saw it a long time ago when I was a young fellow. I used to look in the telescope to look at the moon, and it kind of looked like that. It was really weird, a big hole like that, a moonscape. That's what the stripmining did to that part of the Island. This government believes a prosperous future also depends on careful management of our natural resources. Imagine. How many fish were in that water, Mr. Speaker? How many fish would be living in that water? What about the lobster fishermen? What about the agriculture? What about all those other things that are going to happen there? To create how many jobs? How many jobs and economic benefits is this project going to bring to Cape Breton Island? How many jobs? Mr. Speaker, again I talked about the opening of a satellite office. Let's see if this government will do the right thing and open an Office of African Nova Scotian Affairs satellite office in the community of Whitney Pier, where it belongs, where it should be, with easy access. Let's not go to the downtown area where people will have to walk or take a bus, too far away from the community. Let's do the proper thing here. Our environment, our energy, our people and our products - that's a lovely heading, Mr. Speaker. That is just beautiful. I'm looking at Towards a Sustainable Environment. Could you imagine the Government of Nova Scotia offering ecosystem tours of the beautiful Bouladerie Island and Bird Island? Could you imagine after what is going to happen over there an ecosystem tour? I cannot understand how this government can actually say that stripmining (Interruption) I guess in a sense you could call it environmental prejudice. In what other part of this province would you have coal dust, arsenic and lead in the soil, incineration of PCBs, asbestos, vermiculite asbestos in attics of public housing? Where else would that happen? Would that happen anywhere else? I'm glad that we have a new Cape Breton Premier, so he can tell the people of Cape Breton Island he's going to take that mobile incinerator and burn the PCBs and the PAHs in Inverness County where they belong. That will show leadership to the people of Cape Breton Island. That will show leadership, by doing those things. No burn. It would show leadership out there to do that. Mr. Speaker, there are some good things I guess I could say in the budget, but I can't find too many. In my first Speech from the Throne, when I was first elected, there was never a mention of Cape Breton Island, but now we have a Cape Breton Premier, he mentioned it once. So I guess, myself, as a Cape Bretoner, I should be very happy with that aspect, that he mentioned it once. Once, he did, once. It was once, I'm telling you, once. That's a big improvement from the last Premier. AN HON. MEMBER: What did he say? MR. GOSSE: He just said, once, that he was going to create an Office of African Nova Scotian Affairs in Cape Breton Island. That's it. That's what he's going to do for Cape Breton Island. AN HON. MEMBER: What about housing? MR. GOSSE: Housing - how many units of affordable housing did they build on Cape Breton Island? AN HON. MEMBER: None. MR. GOSSE: Not one. Not one. I'm glad to see affordable housing in this document, but how many times are the people of Nova Scotia and the people of Cape Breton Island going to get fooled by this? I'd like to see a minister stand up over there, in Community Services, and tell me how many people are living in the new affordable houses that they built in Cape Breton Island. He can show me here tomorrow, or in the next few days that we still have remaining here, how many tenants are living in new affordable housing units built in Cape Breton. How many? None. Not one, Mr. Speaker. It's a shame. Not one. Not one person. They spent $37.3 million, and we still don't have a unit in Cape Breton. We got $18.9 million left in the affordable housing budget, and now they're going to say that we're going to build affordable housing, $18.9 million. Not one. I'm sure he's a Cape Breton Premier. I'm pretty sure. AN HON. MEMBER: Does he sing Out on the Mira? [... ... ...] |