Legislative Assembly Honourable George J. Ferguson : That's right. Walter R. Shaw : Now, the question I have to ask is this. Who decides when an emergency situation arises? Hon . George J. Ferguson : Well, Sir, if it is a sick call and they call the doctor, contractor or the government, and they say that they have a sick call person, they should immediately go and take care of it. Now I understand there has been cases where they have called the despatcher, and the despatcher has phoned the doctor who was supposed to be in charge before leaving. Walter R. Shaw : Thank you very much. I quite realize that the emergency exists there and always will. Now I wonder if the emergency situation doesn't go a little wider than that where it effects the economic interests of a farmer. If he has ten hogs to go to market and if he keeps them any more than a day or two they are overweight and he loses a premium. Now isn't that not an emergency situation too ? Hon . George J. Ferguson : I believe the opposite in that case. You see the policy in his case, the policy is that he must pay for opening his lane. Now if it is the case such as happened last week, and I have asked for the cost and I haven't gotten it as yet, but there was a farmer who has 250 hogs and he was out of feed for three days we will say. So he called me and I sent out a piece of equipment and it was necessary to send a bulldozer in order to open the road. Now just so I would have the information for myself I have asked for the cost. I imagine it is going to cost the Department $400.00 to open that man's lane. A lot of money. Walter R. Shaw : Well of course that is a lot of money for the farmer too, that's a killing amount. Now I think that really there should be very careful judgment on this matter of emergency. I think it should extend out beyond sick calls, these of course, have priority. One fellow said to me a few days ago, he said just talking this thing over. He said, "I am a young man and I had a date with my girl that I have to meet her on this night, and a snowstorm comes and the lanes are plugged, and if I don't get there she breaks off her engagement with me and I am out of luck." Isn't that an emergency? (Laughter) Hon . George J. Ferguson : Worse than that. (Laughter) Walter R. Shaw : I think you should be more sympathetic, Mr. Minister , on these matters. Hon . George J. Ferguson : I try to be. Walter R. Shaw : If a farmer has to open a lane that is costing him four or five hundred dollars, well he might as well let his hogs go. That's just one case that I am thinking of. Walter Dingwell : Mr. Minister , would you mind, would you permit another question? And where does the farmers lane start? Now we have no difficulty keeping our driveway open, but we do experience extreme difficulty from the end of our driveway to the open portion of the road. Hon . George J. Ferguson : Why, yes, Mr. Speaker , I realize that this is a problem, and this has existed for years. I can think back over the years of shovel¬ ling mine out and I have searched my soul over it, but I don't know how you can correct it. I realize that after the roads are widened and ready for another storm and you have your lane opened, they should get it away, or at least, they should come back and clear it out and this is what we try to tell them to do, but I'm not sure it's always practised. It's a very difficult thing to ... . J. Walter Dingwell : It's usually even after it is opened, the operator did open it up, the greatest portion of snow that we're asked to pay for, to get, on the Government property we're asked to pay for to remove. Hon . George J. Ferguson : That's true. Mr. Speaker , one of the problems of the Dept. of Highways is money, or rather the lack of money. On a busy road —114—