legislative Assembly
pounds for each filleter, but also the yield in terms of pounds of fillets for pounds of landed fish. This information is extremely valuable in terms of an individual incentive system.” They go on further, “The general appearance of the processing room is good, the plant is particularly clean and, from visual inspection, the quality control a rs to be comparable with other plants. The employees are provided with smart u orms and those responsible for sanitation in this area are to be congratulated on their achievement in not only makin this a satisfactory working environment but also in the care that is taken to insure first the quality of the finished product is of the highest order.” This paragraph is most important because it is not more than a week since the Premier stood up in this House and read a letter from a disgruntled fired employee of Gulf Garden Foods, who had written to Premier Shaw at the time, expressing his reser- iniggs of the sanitation in the plant, etc. He did this out of spite because he had been I or . . .
Some Member: For writing the letter?
J. Cyril Sinnott: Not for writing letters; he was fired before he wrote the let- ter, and I will tell you privately why he was fired if you want to find out. This man’s name was Harris, and he wrote this letter to Mr. Shaw after he had been fired because he was angry at the company, angry at the government, and angry at everybody else. But it was all his own fault. You were naive enough to be taken in by that letter, bring it in to the Legislature here and not only read it but table it afterwards. Yet despite the fact that for the past four months you had this report in your office and that para- graph was right in referring to the excellent sanitation conditions in the plant.
Honourable Alexander B. Campbell: Are you going to read all the report?
J. Cyril Sinnott: I am not going to read it all, I am just reading the conclusions that’s all. There’s more.
There has been a good deal of criticism in the press by members of the Government, Deputy Ministers, Civil Servants, and sometimes members of the Government themselves about the so called fishmeal plant in Gulf Garden Foods, which was just being installed when the Government chose to close it down. It has never turned a wheel yet. This is what they had to say about the fishmeal plant. “The fishmeal plant equipment is now just being installed and has not yet commenced oper- ation. It will not be commented on except to say that the equipment is conventional, utilizing triple effect evaporation of the stink-water, and containing a deodorizer to minimize air pollution, both of which are considered to be highly desirable features."
Leo F. Rossiter: He said it was no good.
J. Cyril Sinnott: I know he said it was no good. He didn’t read this report, that's why he didn’t know.
Now in regard to the general efficiency of the plant the report has this to say.
“It would appear to us that the plant is operatin§ as efficiently from a manpower
int of view as any other plants of similar size.” et the Premier said it is not a via-
gl’e operation, and is being mismanaged. I resume that he would ask us to accept his
statement in this regard as another matter of faith. I am skipping over this report, Mr. Speaker, because I don’t want to have to read it all.
Now the part which the Premier wants me to read, which he or someone in the Department of ndustry has underlined, I will be glad to read it and comment on it. “Areas requiring further study. The foregoing brief report indicates that, in general, the plant operation is highly satisfactory. However, in order to reduce the production costs in a shorter period of time than indicated on the statement of projected refit and loss, we would recommend that further study be carried out in connection wit the following items. (a) The ice delivery system is somewhat inefficient at the resent time. The study in this area should indicate optimum of delivery positions and t e cost of improving the delivery rate. (b) There appears to be an unusually large labour force involved in getting the fish from the washing machine to the filletting line. An economic study on the mechanization of this procedure should be carried out. “They merely recommend that it be mechanized.” (c) The cost of plant clean-up in the after shift hours appears to be a little high. This should be investigated from two points. First, the efficiency of the system, and possible modifications of processing to facilitate the clean-up. (d) The labour availability in the Georgetown area. There is a high rate of turnover of employees, and a training program in the plant for employees should be
—338—